48 Whitsun-Ew. [J ULY, 



Tom Coper, Bon showing much verbal respect and outward deference for 

 liis umpire's judgment and experience, but managing to get the ball done 

 liis own way after all ; whilst outside the shop, the rest of the eleven, the 

 less-trusted commons, are shouting and bawling round Joel Brent, who 

 is twisting the waxed twine round the handles of bats the poor bats, 

 which please nobody, which the taller youths are despising as too little 

 and too light, and the smaller are abusing as too heavy and too large, 

 Happy critics ! winning their match can hardly be a greater delight even 

 if to win it they be doomed ! Farther down the street is the pretty black- 

 eyed girl, Sally Wheeler, come home for a day's holiday from B., escorted 

 by a tall footman in a dashing livery, whom she is trying to curtesy off 

 before her deaf grandmother sees him. I wonder whether she will succeed ! 

 Ascending the hill are two couples of a different description, Daniel 

 Tubb and Sally North, walking boldly along like licensed lovers ; they 

 have been asked twice in church, and are to be married on Tuesday ; 

 and closely following that happy pair, near each other, but not together, 

 come Jem Tanner and Susan Green, the poor culprits of the wheat-hoe- 

 ing. Ah ! the little clerk hath not relented ! The course of true love doth 

 not yet run smooth in that quarter. Jem dodges along, whistling " cherry- 

 ripe," pretending to walk by himself, and to be thinking of nobody ; but 

 every now and then he pauses in his negligent saunter, and turns round 

 outright to steal a glance at Susan, who, on her part, is making believe to 

 walk with poor Olive Hathaway, the lame mantua-maker, and even affect- 

 ing to talk and to listen to that gentle humble creature as she points to the 

 wild flowers on the common, and the lambs and children dis porting 

 amongst the gorse, but whose thoughts and eyes are evidently fixed on 

 Jem Tanner, as she meets his backward glance with a blushing smile, and 

 half springs forward to meet him; whilst Olive has broken off the con- 

 versation as soon as she perceived the pre-occupation of her companion, 

 and began humming, perhaps unconsciously, two or three lines of Burns, 

 Whose " Whistle and I'll come to thee, my love,'* and " Gi'e me a 

 glance of thy bonnie black ee," were never better exemplified tVian in the 

 couple before her. Really it is curious to watch them, and to see how 

 gradually the attraction of this tantalizing vicinity becomes irresistible, 

 and the rustic lover rushes to his pretty mistress like the needle to the 

 magnet. On they go, trusting to the deepening twilight, to the little clerk's 

 absence, to the good humour of the happy lads and lasses, who are 

 passing and re-passing on all sides or rather, perhaps, in a happy oblivion 

 of the cross uncle, the kind villagers, the squinting lover, and the whole 

 world. On they trip, linked arm-in-arm, he trying to catch a glimpse of 

 her glowing face under her bonnet, and she hanging down her head and 

 avoiding his gaze with a mixture of modesty and coquetry, which well 

 becomes the rural beauty. On they go, with a reality and intensity of 

 affection, which must overcome all obstacles ; and poor Olive follows with 

 an evident sympathy in their happiness, which makes her almost as envi- 

 able as they ; and we pursue our walk amidst the moonshine and the 

 nightingales, with Jacob Frost's cart looming in the distance, and the 

 merry sounds of Whitsuntide, the shout, the laugh, and the song echoing 

 all around us, like " noises of the air." 



M. 



