and politics, he no longer clung to either, and
thought the best name after all would be the MARTYR.

CHAPTER XXIX.

THE MAY FESTIVAL.

If not as splendid as the great ball at the Raleigh, the festival at
Shadynook was declared by all to be far more pleasant.

At an early hour in the forenoon bevies of lovely girls and graceful
cavaliers began to arrive, and the various parties scattered
themselves over the lawn, the garden, through the grove and the
forest, with true sylvan freedom and unrestraint.

Shadynook, thanks to the active exertions of Belle-bouche and
Philippa, was one bower of roses and other flowers. All the windows
were festooned with them--the tables were great pyramids of wreaths;
and out upon the lawn the blossoms from the trees showered down upon
the animated throng, and made the children laugh--for many little
girls were there--and snowing on the cavaliers, made them like heralds
of the spring; and lying on the earth, a rosy velvet carpet, almost
made the old poetic fiction true, and gave the damsels of the laughing
crowd an opportunity to walk "ankle-deep in flowers."

The harpsichord was constantly in use; and those old Scottish songs,
which echo now like some lost memory to our grandfathers and
grandmothers--we are writing of those personages--glided on the air
from coral lips, and made the spring more bright; and many gallant
hearts were there enslaved, and sighed whenever they heard sung again
those joyous or sad ditties of the Scottish muse.

Books lay about with lovely poems in them--written by the fine old
Sucklings and Tom Stanleys--breathing high chivalric homage to the
fair; and volumes of engravings, full of castles or bright pictures of
Arcadian scenes--brought thither by the melancholy Jacques as
true-love offerings--or sunset views where evening died away a purple
margin on the blue Italian skies.

And here and there, on mantelpieces and side-tables, were grotesque
ornaments in china; and odd figures cut in glass of far Bohemia; and
painted screens and embroidery. And through the crowd ran yelping more
than one small lap-dog, trodden on by children, who cried out with
merriment thereat.

Belle-bouche had rightly judged that many children should be invited;
for if bouquets are bright and pleasant, so are merry childish faces;
and so dozens of young maidens, scarcely in their teens, and full of
wild delight, ran here and there, playing with each other, and seeking
Belle