Meantime I bless thee. By these thoughts of mine I bless thee from all such! I bless thy lamp to oil, thy cup to wine, I love thee not; I love thee not!-away! OVER THE DOWNS! BY ELIZA COOK, [ORIGINAL.] OVER the Downs we'll blithely tread, Over the Downs, when the wind is up, Distill'd from the purple heath. Over the Downs! and our cheeks shall bear Over the Downs! Over the Downs, when the twilight frowns, When the daisy sleeps and the glowworm creeps, With her star-lamp to beacon her love. Over the Downs! and our bosoms shall sigh As we see the woods and the waters lie In a misty veil over earth and sky: And dreams shall come, though we know not why, Over the Downs! Over the Downs! when the fair moon sits On her broad and fleecy throne: When the whirring wing of the dark bat flits, With wild and sudden tone. Over the Downs! and a prayer shall steal To cur lips with the holy joy we feel, And God shall list to our Souls' appeal That is poured in truth, while our warm hearts kneel, Over the Downs! Ecarte. BY JAMES SKIPP BORLASE. "JE marque le Roi, which, with the vole and two tricks forfeit for refusal, make me game. That is the third on my side, Monsieur Duprey, and I will trouble you to hand over a thousand francs." So spoke, with an air of sarcastic mirth, an ecarté player, at a Paris gaming saloon, to his opponent; who, to judge by the piles of gold and banknotes which during the last half-hour had from time to time been swept from the board into his adversary's pockets, had evidently been playing the losing game. In reply, the unlucky player pushed the remainder of his stakes across the table, and then, with a deep sigh, sank back in his chair. I had been attracted to these two players upon first entering the apartment, and had ever since carefully watched their game. The one was a tall, dark, middle-aged man, of grave and thoughtful countenance, who rarely raised his eyes from his hand, except now and then to watch the working of his opponent's countenance. He led his cards with extreme caution, seldom throwing out, and skilfully managing his high trumps. The other appeared his junior by some years; he seemed scarcely thirty years of age, and was evidently an inexperienced player, from the reckless way in which his continued ill-fortune made him handle his cards, and the fearful manner in which he allowed his inner emotions to exhibit themselves in every feature of his handsome and expressive countenance. I rapidly began to feel an absorbing interest in his game, for I saw that he was evidently losing far more than he could afford, and now I perceived that he was regularly cleared out. "Well, do you want your revenge, Monsieur, shall we continue?" "Monsieur Leville, I have no more ready money," was the calm reply. "But if you lose, I dare say you can draw a cheque on your banker, and if you win, why it will be well and good." "I have already overdrawn my account at the bank, but here is a watch, I will stake that more if you will." "I am not in want of jewelry, if I win," answered Leville, with an almost imperceptible sneer, "but to oblige you I consent." "All right; thanks; coupez ;" and as he spoke, the young Frenchman drew a magnificent gold repeater from his pocket, and laid it on the table. He then took up the cards and began to deal. "Trois et deux, not deux et trois," remarked the elder gambler, seeing that Duprey was dealing contrary to the manner they had adopted during the preceding part of the evening. "There now, my dear fellow, you have turned up the king, J' écarte." "I mark the king. How many?" "Three." Again the game commenced; I watched it with renewed and painful interest. Duprey won. His hope now returned, but in the next game it was again crushed, for Leville, owing to a lucky finesse, cleared the fifth trick first, and in the decisive one of the rubber, success again fell to the hand of the elder player. With a smile he pocketed Duprey's watch, and in return, with a polite bow, proffered him a regalia. His adversary accepted the cigar, lit it, and then, to conceal his emotion, pressed his hat over his brow and walked hurriedly from the room, while Leville, calmly whistling the last operatic air, looked after him for a moment, then shrugged his shoulders, and walking towards the rouge-et-noir table, in reply to the croupier's husky cry of "Make your game, ladies and gentlemen, red wins if black loses, make your game," laid a thousand francs on "colour. ,, I did not stay to see the result. Disgusted and sad at heart, I quitted the saloon, and the next minute found myself in the street. The great clock of Notre Dame struck midnight as I thoughtfully paced down the wide pavement of the Champs Elysées, and turned into a street beyond. The moonlight shed its silvery radiance upon the high houses on either side, upon the lofty trees skirting the street, and on the various lounging groups of civilians and soldiery who even at that late hour were traversing it—almost with its mild effulgence obscuring the gleam of the gas lamps that glimmered like stars between the foliage. Thinking of the pale, haggard, and excited countenance of Duprey, and the incidents of the gaming table, I unconsciously wandered on, until, upon looking around, I vainly endeavoured to recollect into what part of the city I had got. Turning up a street to my right, I at last discovered that it was flanked by the river, a little way up which I discovered the heavy corbels and arches of the Pont Neuf. Lighting a cigar, I walked towards it, pondering as I went, and gazing abstractedly at its dark outline mirrored in the moon-lit river beneath. Ön one of the parapets I beheld the form of a man, standing still and motionless, apparently looking down into the stream; but when I neared him, and he perceived me close by, he threw his arms above his head, and leapt into the river. I rushed forward; I looked over the side of the bridge, and saw a head struggling amid the waters. I glanced around; no human being was in sight to render assistance, and yet not a moment was to be lost, for the man was evidently sinking. So, taking off my coat, I clambered over the parapet, and being a good climber, easily descended the rough outer stonework, and dropped gently into the water. For a moment I glanced round to discover the object of my immersion, but it was so dark under the shadow of the wide arches that for awhile I could see nothing distinctly. Presently my eye caught sight of a head and two hands above the turbid waves, and I immediately struck out towards them. Before I could get alongside, the drowning man gave a loud shriek, and disappeared. I was about to dive after him when the body rose again to the surface-the head thrown back and deadly pale-the long black hair floating on the waterthe eyes open, ghastly and bloodshot. I now swam cautiously around him, and, seizing him by the hair, dragged him towards the shore, reaching it just at the same time as a party of gendarmerie, who, aroused by the despairing cry of the drowning man when first sinking, had reached the bank. These helped me to pull him on shore, and then, as the full light of the moon fell upon his face, I recognized with a thrill of horror the countenance of the young gambler, Duprey. I instantly drew a spirit flask from my pocket, and succeeded in pouring a small portion of its contents down his throat. We were then about to raise him on our shoulders, in order to convey him to the nearest hospital, when he slowly opened his mouth, and while consciousness appeared again for a moment to dweil in his upturned eyes, he murmured, "Don't remove me-I am dying. Oh, Father in heaven, forgive me! Lucille, dearest Lucille, farewell!" and then his eyes glazed, his jaw fell, and he was a corpse. For three days the body of the gambler was exposed to view in the dark cages of the Morgue, in order to be identified, but without avail. No one came to claim it, and then he was buried beneath the dark sod, with the mystery of his life unravelled and unknown. Literary Notices. Neddy and Sally, or the Statute Day; a Lincolnshire Tale of Real Life: By JOHN BROWN. Horncastle: Robert Farbon. A taste has latterly sprung up for simple poems written in our racy and idiomatic county dialects, Lancashire, Yorkshire, and Somersetshire especially. In the first-mentioned Mr. Edwin Waugh holds the highest rank, but he has no unworthy rival in the Yorkshire author of "Nattering Nan," so far as humour is concerned. A brother Odd-fellow, in Lincolnshire, Mr. John Brown, has published several similar works in the Lincolnshire dialect. We have read the one at the head of this notice with much pleasure. It is full of genuine humour, and has evidently been written con amore, and with true Lincolnshire relish. His "Lay of the Clock," is a more thoughtful poem with a high purpose, and shows much feeling and poetic expression. The Village Feast and other Poems. By JOHN WALKER LEE. London: Hamilton and Adams, Paternoster-row. The principal poem contains some picturesque and truthful descriptions of rustic life and rustic enjoyment, intermixed with moral and philosophical reflections, expressed in easy flowing rhyme, with occasional passages of much poetic beauty. The following extract is a fair specimen of the general quality of the poem : "How transient are the joys of earth! In pleasure's courts, and crowded ways, As merrily as birds in spring.' Yet Mr. Ord's view of life is by no means a gloomy one, as many passages in his poem indicate. The concluding lines attest the geniality of his muse :"In social circles let me dwell! I envy not the hermit's cell, His crystal drink, and guiltless food, Andrew Rourke, Prov. C.S. MR. ANDREW ROURKE was born on the 29th March, 1819, at Grinfield Cottage, Edge Hill, at that time a delightfully situated suburb of Liverpool. In early life he was employed for some years in a merchant's office in that town. He was afterwards apprenticed to a watchmaker, which trade, however, he subsequently abandoned for the more congenial occupation of an accountant. Mr. Rourke has been an active member of the Order for upwards of twenty-three years. He was initiated in the Amicable Lodge, Liverpool district, on the 11th of June, 1839. In the following October he was elected secretary, and subsequently V.G. and N.G. The latter office he has served twice in his own lodge, and three times in new lodges opened by the district. In June, 1842, he was first elected to the office he at present holds-the Corresponding Secretaryship of the Liverpool district. In the whole, he has fulfilled its duties for a period of sixteen years. In 1843 he was elected one of the deputies to represent the Liverpool district at the Bradford Annual Moveable Committee, to which meeting he acted as one of the assistant secretaries. He subsequently represented his district at the A.M.C.s held at Newcastle-on-Tyne, Glasgow, Bristol, and Oxford, at each of which meetings, as well as at Bradford, he was elected one of the sub-committee appointed to report upon the proceedings of the G.M. and board of directors. He acted as secretary to all of these committees, with the exception of the one held at Bristol. He has since represented Liverpool at the Annual Committees held at Preston, Leicester, Shrewsbury, Bolton, and Brighton. At two of these meetings he acted as secretary to the Estimates Committee, and at another as secretary to the New Districts Committee. At the Glasgow A.M.C. he was appointed one of the trustees empowered to invest the sum of £1,000 belonging to the General Fund of the Order. The resolution, however, was not carried into effect. At the Oxford A.M.C. he was a member of the committee appointed to consider the state of the then ODD FELLOWS' MAGAZINE, and to report thereon, with a view to its improvement. Mr. Rourke was amongst the earliest advocates of legislative protection to the funds of the Order. He took an earnest part in the discussion of this question at the Bradford meeting in 1843, and again at Oxford, when the debate was specially reported and published. In 1846 he had a lengthy correspondence with Mr. Tidd Pratt on this subject, a bill being at the time under the consideration of Parliament, when he was instrumental, in conjunction with others, in procuring the insertion of a clause exempting friendly societies from the operation of 39 Geo. 3, c. 79, and 57 Geo. 3, c. 19, commonly known as the "Corresponding Societies Acts." Mr. Rourke was likewise amongst the earliest of our financial reformers. He voted at Glasgow, in 1845, in favour of the celebrated resolutions for placing the finance of the Order upon a sounder basis. He was, at this period, an officer of the Liverpool district, and consequently, in conjunction with his able colleague, the then Prov. G.M., now Past Grand Master Luff, had to encounter serious difficulties and responsibilities in the troubled times which followed. When the question of financial reform was revived |