CERTAINTY AND REPOSE. 4-09 



though then overclouded aspect, and a youth of about seven- 

 teen, and they repaired presently from the aisle to the chancel, 

 where they stood together, hand-in-hand, before a simple 

 tablet let into the wall. The names of three individuals had 

 been graven successively upon the marble, that of a mother, 

 who had died young a father (late vicar of the parish) and a 

 child, their only child Lucy, who had followed them at the 

 age of fourteen."* 



The foregoing episode of our early days, fraught with 

 sadness and closed by a record of the tomb, may appear 

 a theme unfitting for this cheerful season; but to ourself 

 there has long been much of peace and even pleasure in 

 its retrospect. It is true, that for many a year after the 

 above occurrences, the chirp of a cricket the sight of a 

 cockroach the survey of our cabinet treasures even the 

 cheery hum and busy flight of insect multitudes, gave us 

 more of pain than pleasure, for all seemed then as the 

 veritable spirits of our childhood's hearth and home, powerful 

 to bring before us memories steeped in sorrow. But now, 

 ye winged remembrancers ! ye are welcome all, and chief, 

 Acheta, good genius of our faithful Dolly, in whom, for 

 love of her as well as thee, we have joyed to acknowledge our 

 prototype and symbol. Not for this, though, should we have 



* The author read, some few years since, in a collection of French tales, a 

 story, of which he forgets both name and writer, bearing some incidental 

 resemblance with the above relation. 



