sun, and yet glowing with
the warmth of a good action, the Haunted Man, haunted no longer, save
by those shapes which make the dreams of children beautiful, reseated
himself in his chair, and finished Our Mutual Friend.

MISS MIX.

BY CH--L--TTE BR--NTE.

CHAPTER I.

My earliest impressions are of a huge, misshapen rock, against which
the hoarse waves beat unceasingly. On this rock three pelicans are
standing in a defiant attitude. A dark sky lowers in the background,
while two sea-gulls and a gigantic cormorant eye with extreme disfavor
the floating corpse of a drowned woman in the foreground. A few
bracelets, coral necklaces, and other articles of jewelry, scattered
around loosely, complete this remarkable picture.

It is one which, in some vague, unconscious way, symbolizes, to my
fancy, the character of a man. I have never been able to explain
exactly why. I think I must have seen the picture in some illustrated
volume, when a baby, or my mother may have dreamed it before I was born.

As a child I was not handsome. When I consulted the triangular bit of
looking-glass which I always carried with me, it showed a pale, sandy,
and freckled face, shaded by locks like the color of seaweed when the
sun strikes it in deep water. My eyes were said to be indistinctive;
they were a faint, ashen gray; but above them rose--my only beauty--a
high, massive, domelike forehead, with polished temples, like
door-knobs of the purest porcelain.

Our family was a family of governesses. My mother had been one, and my
sisters had the same occupation. Consequently, when, at the age of
thirteen, my eldest sister handed me the advertisement of Mr.
Rawjester, clipped from that day's "Times," I accepted it as my
destiny. Nevertheless, a mysterious presentiment of an indefinite
future haunted me in my dreams that night, as I lay upon my little
snow-white bed. The next morning, with two bandboxes tied up in silk
handkerchiefs, and a hair trunk, I turned my back upon Minerva Cottage
forever.

CHAPTER II.

Blunderbore Hall, the seat of James Rawjester, Esq., was encompassed by
dark pines and funereal hemlocks on all sides. The wind sang weirdly
in the turrets and moaned through the long-drawn avenues of the park.
As I approached the house I saw several mysterious figures flit before
the windows, and a yell of demoniac laughter answered my summons at the
bell. While I strove to repress my gloomy forebodings, th