This young, guileless-looking and lovely girl was perhaps one of the most artful, heartless, selfish beings that ever existed. Her passion for admiration was unquenchable, and, although her ultimate object was a splendid marriage, she was resolved to be in no haste, and to enjoy the unbounded power of her charms for a time, unrestrainedly.

Herbert Sedley met Louisa everywhere; his mornings were passed in her aunt's small drawing-room, and his mother's box at the Opera was almost constantly graced by her

presence.

Sedley was entranced, bewitched, and he mistook his evanescent feelings for true, enduring affection. At times, he felt hurt and alarmed by her evident encouragement of a host of idle flutterers, but one of her sweet smiles would re-assure him. Louisa's heart (if she had one) decidedly inclined in favour of the handsome young Baronet.

At length Herbert Sedley resolved to end his suspense-if suspense it could be called, for his

trusting heart told him that the soft agitation and beautiful blushes of his beloved whenever he approached her, together with the eloquent language of her eyes, were sure indications that his feelings were fully reciprocated. He told the short history of his sincere, manly love to the artful, scheming Louisa, who had long been prepared for his declaration, and he was accepted.

They were married, and the unhappy Jessy Gardiner two days afterwards took up a newspaper and stood for many minutes motionless, with her eyes fixed on the brief announcement of what contained for her, volumes of sorrow.

It is an awful consideration, what may be the thousand different sensations produced by the newspaper we every morning so carelessly glance over, by the numerous advertisements-births, deaths, marriages, etc.

How many fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, husbands, wives, lovers, friends, are suddenly crushed in spirit, as their eyes rest on the unexpected record of some death. How many

breaking hearts, haggard countenances, and convulsed lips, feel, glare over, murmur out, those bankruptcies which pass almost unobserved by us.

How many long-cherished hopes of happiness, how many prayers, aspirings, and toilings are rendered null and void by those few words"Married on the inst." How many beings are lured to destruction and ruin by the plausible accounts of speculations contained in those columns. How many read in those records of theft and profligacy, the names of those dear unto them as their life-blood; the sons of their entrails, sunk into the lowest paths of vice; the once lovely, blooming daughters of their affection, changed into haggard, pallid, starving prostitutes! And close the gloomy picturehow many read in those heartless descriptions of the last hours and moments of felons launched into eternity by the executioner, amidst the abhorring groans of thousands; the fate of those dear ones who once were happy and innocent—

once could weep over a tale of woe, and shudder at the bare mention of crime!

"Alas! alas! for human nature!"

Jessy Gardiner was aroused from her sad reverie by Lady Sedley, who asked her to accompany her in a walk to pay an early visit.

Jessy felt a dispirited, broken-hearted thing, and not a word passed between her and her benefactress as they walked through the streets, with a keen, biting wind blowing in their faces.

Lady Sedley was thinking of her absent son, and praying for his happiness; but poor Jessy was in a species of stupor, and at sight of the utter dejection expressed in her countenance, many people turned to look at her a second time, with a sort of compassion.

Oh! how doubly desolate the unhappy feel passing through the crowded London streets, where no human being cares for them; no eye contemplates them with sympathy, no kind tone falls like balm on their wounded hearts, and they are jostled and hurried along, whilst the

different shrill cries, the stunning noise of carts and carriages, and the busy hum of trade, sound confusedly in their ears.

But when Jessy became a wife, her ill-regulated mind suffered more torture than before. In a moment of despair she had bound herself irrevocably, and had forged additional barriers between herself and the object of her adoration. What a fearful chaos of conflicting pangs is an undisciplined human heart.

Herbert and his bride returned from their tour, and the affectionate mother saw at a glance that her son was unhappy. An indescribable change had come over his whole manner and appearance.

His ideas of domestic happiness were high and refined, and he was peculiarly fitted to embellish and enjoy private life. He was a passionate admirer of grace and beauty, and came across the path of a being eminently endowed with both, and who was the cynosure of her own circle, and that circle the most brilliant in Europe. He was dazzled-blinded.

He