TERMS OF PUBLICATION. The lltPoßTEjjis published every Thursday Mor i.ios, by E. 0. GOODRICH, at $2 per annum, in ad vance. \ DVEIITISEMENTS exceeding fifteen lines are h erted at TEN CENTS per line for first insertion, :D FIVE CENTS per line for subsequent insertions Special notices inserted before Marriages and If aths, will be charged FIFTEEN CENT, per line for • .u-li insertion All resolutions of Associations ; communications of limited or individual interest, and notices of Marriages and Deaths exceeding five lines, are charged TEN CENTS par line. 1 Year. 6 mo. 3 mo. One Column, $75 s, 1565. I>ATRICK & FECK, ATTORNEYS AT LAW, Offices In Union Block, Towanda, Pa., formerly occupied by Hon. Wm. Elwell, and iu Patrick's block, Athens, Pa. They may be consulted at either place. 11. W. PATRICK, aplld W. A. PECK. nli. McKEAN, ATTORNEYS COUN • SELL OR AT LAW, Towanda, Pa. Par ticular attention paid to business iu the Orphans' Court. July 20, 1866. UENRY FEET, Attorney at Laic, Towan la, Pa. juu'JA. 66. \\ T 11. CA ENOCH AN, ATTORNEY • • • AT LA IT, Troy, Pa. Special attention given !• • .ißccting claims against the Government lor Bounty, I . K Pay and Pensions. Office with E. B. Parsons. Esq. J me 12,1866. LMIWAKD OVERTON Jr., Attorney at L.ai t .TP, Towanda, Pa. Office in Montanyes Block, over Frost's Store July 13th, 1865 | OIL N N. C A LIFE, ATTORNEY AT VI LAIT, Towanda, Pa. Also, Government Agent or tbe collection ol Pensions, Back Pay and Bounty. A-R No charge unless successful. Office over the Poo. Oil BTLLES, M. I)., Physician and Sur- J • gton, would announce to the people ol Rom- Bo- J rough and vicini y, that he has permanently locate I at | I tbe place formerly occupied by Dr. G W. Stone, for the I practice of his p ofession. Particular attention given to the treatuieut of women and children, as also to the ; pi. OLIVE of operative aud minor surgery. Oct. 2 ,'66. i tit. PRATT has removed to State street AJ (first above B. S. Russell & Co'S Bank). Persons HUM a distance desirous A con.-ultiug him, will be most I likely to find him on Saturday OI each week. Especial attention will be given to surgical cases, and the extrae ti nof teeth. Gas or Ether administered when desired. | July is, is.;,;. D. 8. PRATT, M. D. s |\OCTOR CHAS. F. PAlNE.—Oiliee in x/ GUKK'S Drug Store, Towanda, Pa, Calls proaipt | ly attended to at all bona. Nov 28, "66. 1) W A Rl> MEEK S—AUCTIO NEER.— JL-J All letters addressed to him at Sugar Run, Brad- I ford Co., Pa., WFFL receive prompt attention, May"'6otf, TEHRAN CIS E. I'OST, Painter, Towanda, I A I'U, with 10 years experience, is confident he can give the best satisfaction iu Painting, Graining, Stain itjg, Glazing. Papering, Ac. AS* Particular attention | paid to Jobbing in tbe country. April 9, '66. I J. NEWE LL , I * COUNTY SURVEYOR, 1 Ii irwell, Bradford Co. , Pa„ will promptly attend to all business in his line. Particular attention given to run ning and establishing old or disputed lines. Also to surveying ot ailunpittented lands as soon as warrant are obtained. May 17, 1*66. Dentistrp. RPWENTY-FIVE YEARS EXPERIENCE X IN DENTISTRY J. S. SMITH, M. D„ would re oecltully inlorm the inhabitants of Bradford County that be is permanantly located in Waverly, N.Y., where I H has been in the practice of his profession for the past lour years. He would say that from his long and suc- CT -tul practice of 25 years duration, he is familiar with I vii the different styles of work done in any and all Deu : i establishments iu city or country, and is better pre pared than any other Dental operator iu the vicinity to do work the best adapted to the many aud different •.sue that present themselves oltentimes to the Dentist., •< he understands the art of making his own artificial !• th, and has tacilities tor doing the same. To those quiring undersets of teeth he would call attention to - new kind ol work which consists oi porcelain for both plate and teeth, and torining a continuous gum. It is more durable, more natural in appearance , and much o tter adapted to the gum than any other kind of work. | 1 bose iu need of the same are invited to call and exam- I.IE specimens. Teeth tilled to last for years and otten t mes for life. Chloroform, ether, and "Afttrous oxide" ■ administered with perfect safety, as over tour hundred I. ent.s within the last four years can testify. 1 will be in Towanda from the 15th to 30th of every Imonih, at the office of W.K. TAYLOR, (formerly oc e ;iiil by Dr. O. H. Woodruff. ) Having made arrange • its with Mr. Taylor, 1 am prepared to do all work in T ie very best style, at his office. N0v.27,1865. yl. [Yll 11. WESTON, DENTIST. Office AJ IN Pattou's Block, over Barstow A Gore's Drug and Cheal< al Eiors. Ijano6 A 21 ERI CA N HOTEL, T O WANDA, PA., Having purchased this well known Hotel oa Bridge Street, I have refurnished and refitted it with every . faience for the accommodation ot all who may pat r r.lze me. No pains will lie spared to make all pleas IT aud agreeable. J. s. PATTERSON, Prop. May 3, '66. — tf. YLTARD HOUSE, TOWANDA, PENN'A On Main Street, near the Court House. C. T. SMITH, Proprietor. Oct. 8, 1866. DER HOUSE, ;i four story brick ed- KJ- ifice near the depot, with large airy rooms, elegant I: lor- . newly furnished. has a recess in new a ddition lor Ladies use, aud is the most convenient and only iclass hotel at Waverly, N. Y. It is the princi pal e tor stages south aud express. Also for sale ot -tern Tickets, and in Canada, on Grand Trunk Rail way, tare to Detroit from Buffalo, $4, is cheaper than _• oilier route. A pply for tickets as above to C. WAREORD. tf stabling and care of Horses at reasonable rates. Waverly N. Y., Oct . 26, 1866 -3M. C. W. GROCERIES AND PROVISIONS, WHOLLSAI.E AND KETAIL, J0 H N MERID ET H, •lain st. , first door south of Rail Road House, Towanda, is just received a large addition to his stock of GROCERIES AND PROVISIONS •'• oich will be sold at wholesale and retail, at the very west rates. U mer s Produce of all kinds, bought and sold, IJE public attention is respectlully invited to my A which will he found to be Kresh. bought at low i as and will be sold at correspondingly low rate.s fo wand >, July 17,1866. AND TOILET SOAPS, FOR sale cheap at the NEWS ROOM. E. O. GOODRICH, Publisher. VOLUME XXVII. (From Dickens' Christmas Story.) THE ENGINEER. His name, sir, was Matthew Price ; mine is Benjamin Hardy. We were born with in a few days of each other ; bred up in the same village ; taught at the same school. I cannot remember the time when we were not close friends. Even as boys, we never knew what it was to quarrel. We had not a thought, we had not a pos session, that was not in common. We would have stood by each other, fearlessly to the death. It was such a friendship as one reads about sometimes in books : fast aud firm as the great Tors upon our native moorlands, true as the sun in the heavens. j The name of our village was Chadleigh. Lifted high above the pasture fiats which stretched away at our feet like a measure less green lake aud melted into mist on the farthest horizon, it nestled, a tiny stone built hamlet, in a sheltered hollow about midway between the plain and the plateau. Above us, rising ridge beyoud ridge, slope beyond slope, spread the mountainous moor country, bare and bleak for the most part, with here and there a patch of cultivated field or hardy plantation, and crowned highest of all with masses of huge gray crag, abrupt, isolated, hoary, and older, than the deluge. These were the Tors, — Druids' Tor, King's Tor, Castle Tor, and the like ; sacred places, as I have heard, in the ancient time, where crownings, burn ings, human sacrifices, and all kinds cf bloody heathen rites were performed. Bones, too, had been found there, and arrow-heads, aud ornaments of gold and glass. I had a vague awe of the Tors, in those boyish days, and would not have gone near them alt. r dark for the heaviest bribe. I have said that we were born in the same village. He was the son of a small farmer, named William Price, and the eld est of a family of seven ; I was the only child of Ephraim Hardy, the Chadleigh blacksmith—a well-known man in those parts, whose memory is not forgotten to this day. Just so far as a farmer is sup posed to be a bigger man than a black smith, Mat's father might be said to have a better standing than mine ; but William Price, with his small holding aud his seven boys, was, in fact, as poor as many a day laborer ; whiist the blacksmith, well-to-do, bustling, popular, and open handed, was a person of some importance in the place.— All this, however, had nothing to do with Mat and myself It never occurred to eith er of us that his jacket was out at elbows, or that our mutual funds came altogether from my pocket. It was enough for us that we sat or the same school-bench, con ned our tasks from toe same primer, fought each other's battles, screened each other's faults, fished, nutted, played truant, robbed orchards and birds' nests together, and spent every half-honr, authorized or stolen, in each other's society. It was a happy time; but it could not go on forever. My father, being prosperous,resolvdd to put me forward in the world. I must know more, and do better, than himself. The forge was not good enough, the little world of Chad leigh not wide enough, for me. Thus it happened that I was still swinging the satchel when Mat was whistling at the plough, and that at last, when my future course was shaped out, we were separated, as it then seemed to us, for life. For, blacksmith's son as I was, furnace and forge, iu some form or other, pleased me best, and I chose to be a working engineer. So my father by and by apprenticed me to a Birmingham iron-master ; and, having bidden .farewell to Mat aud Chadleigh, and the gray old Tors in the shadow of which I had spent all the days of my life, I turn ed my lace northward, and went over into " the Black country." I am not going to dwell on this part of my story. How I worked out the term of my apprenticeship ; how, when I had serv ed my full time aud become a skilled work man, I took Mat from the plough aud brought him over to the Black Country, shilling with him lodging, wages, experi ence, —all, in short, that I had to give ; how he, naturally quick to learn and brim ful of quiet energy, worked his way up a step at a time, and came by and by to be a " first hand" in his own department ; how, during all thes ; years of change, and trial, and effort, the old boyish afiection never wavered or weakened, but went on, grow ing with our growth and strengthening with our strength—are facts which I need do no more than outline in this place. About this time—it will remembered that I speak ot the days when Mat and I were on the bright side of thirty—it happened that our firm contracted to supply six first class locomotives to run on the new line, then in process of construction, between Turin and Genoa. It was the first Italian order we had takeu. We had had dealings with France, Holland, Belgium, Germany ; but never with Italy. The connection, therefore, was new and valuable, —all the more valuable because our Transalpine neighbors had but lately begun to lay down the iron roads, and would be safe to need more of our good English work as they went on. So the Birmingham firm set them selves to the contract with a will, length ened our working hours, increased our wa ges, took on fresh hands, and determined, if energy and promptitude could do it, to place themselves at the head oi the Italian labor-market and stay there. They deserv ed and achieved success. The six locomo tives were not only turned out to time, but were shipped, despatched, and delivered with a promptitude that fairly amazed our Piedmontese consignee. I was not a iittle proud, you may be sure, when I found my self appointed to superintend the transport of the engines. Being allowed a couple of assistants, I contrived that Mat should be one ol them ; and thus we enjoyed togeth er the first great holiday of our lives. It was a wonderful change for two Bir mingham operatives fresh from the Black Country. The fairy city, with its crescent background of Alps ; the port crowded with strange shipping ; the marvellous blue sky and bluer sea ; the painted houses on the (juays ; the quaint cathedral, faced with black and white marble ; th street of jew ellers, like an Arabian Nights' bazaar ; the street of palaces, with its Moorish court yards, its fountains and orange-trees ; the women veiled like brides ; the galley-slaves chained two and two ; the processions ol priests and friars ; the everlasting clangor TOWANDA, BRADFORD COUNTY, PA., DECEMBER 20,1866. ol bells ; the babel of a strange tongue ; the singular lightness and brightness of the climate, —made, altogether, such a com bination of wonders that we wander about the lirst day, in a kind of bewildered dream, like children at a fair. Before that week was ended, being tempted by the beauty of the place and the liberality of the pay, we had agreed to take service with the Turin and Genoa Railway Company, and to turn our backs upon Birmingham forever. Then began a new life, —a life so active and healthy, so steeped in fresh air and sunshine, that we sometimes marvelled how we could have endured the gloom of the Black Country. We were constantly up an ! down the line : now at Genoa, now at Turin, taking trial trips with the locomo tives, and placing our old experiences at the service of our new employers. Iu the mean while we made Genoa our head-quarters, and hired a couple of rooms over a small shop in a by street sloping down to the quays. Such a busy little street, —so steep and winding that no ve hicles could pass through it, and so narrow that the sky looked like a mere strip of deep-blue riobon overhead ! Every house iu it, however, was a shop, where the goods encroached on the footway, or were piled about the door, or hung like tapestry from the balconies ; and all day long, from dawn to dusk, an incessant stream of passers-by poured up and down between the port and the upper quarter of the city. Our landlady was the widow of a silver worker, and lived by the sale of filigree or naments, cheap jewelry, combs, fans, and toys iu ivory and jet. She bad an only daughter named Gianetta, who served in the shop, and was simply the most beauti ful woman I ever beheld. Looking back across this weary chasm of years, and bringing her image before me (as I can do) with all the vividness of life, I am unable, even now, to detect a Haw in her beauty.— Ido not attempt to describe her. Ido not believe there is a poet living who could find the words to do it ; but I once saw a pic ture that was somewhat like her (not half so lovely, but still like her), and, for aught 1 know, that picture is still hanging where I last looked at it, —upon the walls of the Louvre. It represented a woman with brown eyes and golden hair, looking over her shoulder into a circular mirror held by a bearded man in the background. In this man, as I then understood, the artist had painted his own portrait; in her, the por trait of the woman he loved. No picture that 1 ever saw was half so beautiful, and yet it was not worthy to be named in the same breath with Gianetta Coneglia. You may be certain tbe widow's shop did not want for customers. All Genoa knew how fair a face was to be seen behind that dingy little counter ; and Giannetta, flirt as she was, had more lovers than she cared to remember, even by name. Gentle and sim ple, rich and poor, from the red-capped sail or buying his earrings or his amulet, to the nobleman carelessly purchasing half the filigrees in the window, she treated them all alike, —encouraged them, laughed at them, led them on and turned them off at her pleasure. She had no more heart than a marble statue, as Mat and I discovered by and by, to our bitter cost. I cannot tell to this day bow it came about, or what first led me to suspect how things were going with us both ; but long before the waning of that autumn a cold ness had sprung up between my friend and myself. It was nothing that could have beei' put into words. It was nothing that either of us could have explained or justi fied, to save his life. We lodged together, ate together, worked together, exactly as before ; we even took our loug evening's walk together, when the day's labor was ended ; and except, perhaps, that we were more silent than of old, no mere looker-on could have detected a shadow of change. Yet there it was, silent aud subtle, widen ing the gulf between us every day. it was not his fault. He was too true aud gentle-hearted to have willingly bro't about such a state of things betweeu us.— Neither do I believe—fiery as my nature is - that it was ming. It was all hers—hers from first to last—the sin, and the shame, and the sorrow. If she had shown a fair and open prefer ence for either of us, no real harm could have come of it. 1 would have put any con straint upon myse f, and, Heaven knows ! have borne any suffering, to see Mat really happy. I know that he would have done the same, and more if he could, for me. But Gianetta cared uot one sou for either. She never meant to choose between us. It gratified her vanity to divide us; it amused her to play with us. It would pass my pow er to tell how, by a thousand imperceptible shades of coquetry, —by the lingering of a glauce, the substitution of a word, the Hit ting of a smile, —she contrived to turn our heads, and torture our hearts, aud lead us on to love her. She deceived us both. She buoyed us both up with hope ; she madden ed us with jealousy; she crushed us with despair. For my part, when I seemed to wake to a sudden seuse of the ruin that was about our path, and I saw how the truest friendship that ever bound two lives together was drifting on to wreck and ruin, I asked myself whether any woman in the world was worth what Mat had been to me and I to. him. But this was not often. I was readier to shut my eyes upon the truth thau to face it ; and so lived on, wilfully, in a dream. * Thus the autumn passed away, and win ter came, —the strange, treacherous Geno ese winter, green with olive and ilex, bril liant with sunshine, and bitter with storm. Still, rivals at heart and friends on the sur face, Mat and I lingered on in our lodging in the Vicolo Balba. Still Gianetta held us with her fatal wiles and her still more fatal beauty. At length there came a day when I felt I could bear the horrible misery and suspense of it no longer. The sun, I vow ed, should not go down before I knew my sentence. She must choose between us.— She must either take me or let me go. I was reckless. I was desperate. I was de termined to know the worst, or the best. If the worst, I would at once turn my back upon Genoa, upon her, upon all the pur suits and purposes of my past life, and be gin the world anew. This I told her, pas sionately and sternly, standing before her II the little parlor at the back of the shop, one bleak December morning. "If it's Mat whom you care for most," I said, " tell me so in one word, and I will never trouble you again. He is better worth your love. lam jealous and exact- REGARDLESS OF DENUNCIATION FROM ANY QUARTER. [ ing ; b* is as trusting and unselfish as a woman. Speak, Gianetta ; am Ito bid you good by for ever and ever, or am I to write home to my mother iu Eugland, bidding her pray to God to bless the woman who has promised to be my wife ?" " You plead your friend's cause well," she replied haughtily. "Matteo ought to be grateful. This is more than he ever did for you." " Give me my answer, for pity's sake," I exclaimed, "aud let me go !" " You are free to go or stay, Signor In glese," she replied. "I am not your jail or." " Do you bid me leave you ?" " Beata Madre ! not I." " Will ) ou marry me if I stay ?" She laughed aloud, —such a merry, mock ing, musical laugh, like a chime of silver bells! " Y'ou ask too much," she said. " Only what you have led me to hope these five or six mouths past !" "That is just Matteo says. How tire some you both are I" "0 Gianetta?' I said, passionately, "be serious for one moment ! I am a rough fellow, it is true, —not half good enough or clever enough for you ; but I love you with my whole heart, and an Emperor could do uo more." " I am glad of it," she replied ; " I do uot want you to love me less." " Then you cannot wish to make me wretched ! Will you promise me ?" " I promise nothing," said she, with an other burst of laughter, "except that I will not marry Matteo !" Except that she would not marry Matteo! Only that. Not a word of hope for my self. Nothing hut my friend's condemna tion. I might get comfort, and selfish tri umph, and sotne sort of base assurance out of that, it I could. And so, to my shame, 1 did. I grasped at the vain encourage ment, and, fool that I was ! let her put me off again unanswered. From that day, I gave up all effort at self-control, aud let myself drift bliudly on—to destruction. At length tilings became so bad between Mat and myself that it seemed as if an open rupture must be at hand. We avoid ed each otiier, scarcely exchanged a dozen sentences in a day, and fell away from our old familiar habits. At this time—l shad der to remember it!—there were moments when I felt that I hated him. Thus, with the trouble deepening and widening betweeu us day by day, another month or five weeks went by ; aud Febru ary came ; and, with February, the Carni val. They said in Genoa that it was a par ticularly dull carnival : and so it must have been ; for, save a flag or two hung out in some of the principal streets, and a sort of festa look about the women, there were no special indications of the season. It was, I think, the second day, when, having been on the line all the morning, I returned to Genoa at dusk, and, to my surprise, found Mat I'rice on the platform. He came up to me, and laid his hand ou my arm. " You are ill late," he said. " I have beeu waiting for you three quarters of an hour. Shall we dine together to-day ?" Impulsive as I am, this evidence of re turning good-will at uuce called up my bet ter feelings. " With all my heart, Mat," I replied ; " shall we go to Gozzoli's ?" " No, no," he said, hurriedly. " Some quieter place,—some place where we can talk. I have something to say to you " I noticed now that he looked pale and agitated, and an uneasy sense of appre hension stole upon me. We decided on the " Fescatore," a little out-of-the way trat toria, down near the Molo Vecchio. There, in a dingy salon, frequented chiefly by sea men, and redolent of tobacco, we ordered our simple dinner. Mat scarcely swallow ed a morsel, but, calling presently for a bottle of Sicilian wine, drank eagerly. " Well, Mat," I said, as the last dish was placed on the table, " what news have you?' '• Bad." " I guessed that from your face." " Bad for you,—bad for me. Gianetta." " What of Gianetta ?" He passed his hand nervously across his lips. " Gianetta is false, —worse than false," he said, iu a hoarse voice. " She values an honest man's heart just as she values a flower for her hair, —wears it for a day, then throws it aside forever. Hhe has cruelly wronged us both." "In what way? Good Heavens, speak out !" "In the worst way that a woman can wrong those who love her. She has sold herself to the Marchese Loredano." The blood rushed to my head and face in a burning torrent. I could scarcely see, aud dared not trust myself to speak. " I saw her going towards the cathe dral," he went ou, hurriedly. "It was about three hours ago. I thought she might be going to confession, so I hung back and followed her at a distance. When she got inside, however, she went straight to the back of the pulpit, where this man was waiting for her. You remember him, —an. old man who used ty haunt the shop a month or two back. Well, seeing how deep iu conversation they were, and how they stood close under the pulpit with their backs towards the church, 1 fell into a pas sion ot anger and went straight up the aisle, intending to say or do something, I scarcely knew what, but, at all events, to draw ber arm througli mine, and take her home. When I came within a few feet, however, and found only a big pillar be tween myself and them, I paused. They could not see me, nor I them ;• but I could hear their voices distinctly, and—and I listened." " Well, and you heard—" " The terms of a shameful bargain— beauty on the one side, gold on the other ; so many thousand francs a year ; a villa near Xaplcs—Pah! it makes me sick to repeat it." And, with a shudder, he poured out an other glass of wine and drank it at a draught. " After that," he said, presently, " I made no effort to bring her away. The whole thing was so cold-blooded, so deliberate, so shameful, that I felt I had only to wipe her out of my memory, and leave her to her fate. I stole out of the cathedral, and walked about here by the sea for ever so long, trying to get my thoughts straight. Then I remembered you, Ben ; and the re collection of how this wanton had come between us and broken up our lives drove ine wild. So I went up to the station and waited for you. I felt you ought to know it all ; aud—and I thought, perhaps, that we might go back to Eugland together." " The Marchese Loredano !" It was all that I could say ; all that I could think. As Mat had just said of him self, I felt "like one stunned." " There is one thing I may as well tell you," he added, reluctantly, " if only to show you how false a woman can be. We —we were to have been married next month." "We ? Who ? What do you mean ?" " I mean that we were to have been mar ried, —Gianetta and I." A sudden storm of rage, of scorn, of in credulity, swept over me at this, and seem ed to carry my senses away. " You /" I cried. " Gianetta marry you 1 I dou't believe it." " I wish I had uot believed it," he re plied, looking up as if puzzled by my ve hemence. " But she promised me ; and I thought, when she promised it, she meant it." " She told me, weeks ago, that she would never be your wife 1" His color rose, his brow darkened ; but when his answer came, it was as calm as the last. " Indeed 1" he said. " Then it is only one baseness more. She told me that she had refused you •; and that was why we kept our engagement secret." " Tell the truth, Mat Price," I said, well nigh beside myself with suspicion. " Con fess that every word of this is false ! Con fess that Gianetta will not listen to you, and that you are afraid I may succeed where you have failed. As perhaps I shall —as perhaps I shall, after all 1" " Are you mad ?" he exclaimed. " What do you mean ?" " That I believe it's just a trick to get me away to England,—that I dou't credit a syllable of your story. You're a liar, and I hate you !" He rose, aud, laying one hand on the back of his chair, looked me sternly in the face. " If you were not Benjamin Hardy," he said, deliberately, " I would thrash you within an inch of your life." The words had no sooner passed his lips than I sprang at him. I have uever been able distinctly to remember what followed. A curse, —a blow, —a struggle,—a momeut of blind fury,—a cry,—a confusion of ton gues,—a circle of strange faces. Then I see Mat lyiug back in the arms of a by stander ; myself trembling and bewilder ed, —the knife dropped from my grasp ; blood upon the floor ; blood upon my hands; blood upon his shirt. And then I hear those dreadful words, — " 0 Beu, you have murdered me !" He did not die, —at least, not there and then. He was carried to the nearest hos pital, aud lay for some weeks between life and death. His case, they said, was diffi cult and dangerous. The knife had gone iu just below the collar bone, and pierced down into the lungs. He was not allowed to speak or turn, —scarcely to breathe with freedom. He might not even lift his head to drink. I sat by him day and night all through that sorrowful time. I gave up my situation ou the railway ; I quitted my lodging in the Vicolo Balba ; I tried to for get that such a wouiau as Gianetta Coneg lia had ever drawn breath. I lived only for Mat ; and he tried to live more, I be lieve, for my sake than his own. Thus, in the bitter silent hours of pain and peni tence, when no hand but mine approached his lips or smoothed his pillow, the old friendship carne back with even more than its old trust and laithfuluess. He forgave me, fully aud freely ; and I would thank fully have giveu uiv life for him. At length there came one bright spring morning, when, dismissed as convalescent, he tottered out through the hospital gates, leaning on my arm, aud feeble as an infant. He was not cured ; neither, as I then learn ed to my horror aud anguish, was it possi ble that he ever could be cured. He might live, with care, for some years ; but the luugs were injured beyond hope of remedy, and a strong or healthy man he could uever be again. These,spoken aside to me, were the parting words of the chief physician, who advised me to take him farther south without delay. I took bim to a little coast-town called Rocco, some thirty miles beyond Genoa,— a sheltered lonely place along the Riviera, where the sea was even bluer than the sky, and the cliffs were green with strange trop ical plants,—cacti, and aloes, and Egyptian palms. Here we lodged in the house of a small tradesman ; and Mat, to use his own wordV'set to work at getting well in good earnest." But, alas ! it was a work which no earnestness could forward. Day after day he went do wn to the beach, and sat for hours drinking the sea-air and watching the sails that came and went in the offing. By and by he could go no farther than the gar den of the house in which we lived. A lit tle later, and he spent his days on a couch beside tire open window, waiting patiently for the end. Ay, for the end ! It had come to that. He was fading last, waning with the waning summer,conscious that the Rea per was at hand. His whole aim now was to solten the agony of my remorse,and pre pare me for w hat must shortly come. "I would not live longer, if I could," he said, lying on his couch one summer even ing, and looking up to the stars. "If 1 had my choice at this moment, I would ask to go. I should like Gianetta to know that I forgave her." "She shall know it," I said, trembling suddenly from head to foot. He pressed my hand. "And you'll write to father ?" "1 will." I had draws a little back, that he might not see the tears raining down my cheeks ; but lie raised himself on his elbow,and look ed round. "Don't fret, Ben," he whispered, laid his head bick wearily upon the pillow,—and so died. And this was the end of it. This was the end of all that made life to me. I buried him there,in hearing of the wash of a strange sea on a strange shore. I stayed by the grave till the priest and the bystanders were gone. I saw the earth filled in to the last sod,and the gravedigger stamp it down with his feet. Then, and not till then, I felt that I had lost him forever, —the friend I loved, and hated, and slain. Then, and not till then, I knew that all rest, and joy, and #3 per Annum, in Advance. ' hope were over for me. From that moment j my heart hardened within me, and my life j was filled with loathing. Day and night, i land and sea, labor and rest,food and sleep, were alike hateful to me. It was the curse j of Cain, and that my brother had pardoned jme made it lie none the lighter. Peaee on | earth was for me no more, aud good-will J towards men was dead in my heart forever. Remorse softens some natures ; but it pois oned mine. I hated all mankind ; but above all mankind I hated the woman who had come between us two, and ruined both our lives. He had bidden rue seek her out, and be the messenger of his forgiveness. I had sooner have gone down to the port of Genoa and taken upon me the serge cap and shot ted chain of any galley-slave at his toil in the public works ; but, for all that, I did my best to obey him. I went back, alone and on foot. I went back, intending to say to her, "Gianetta Coneglia.he forgave yoir;j but God never will." But she was gone.— The little shop was let to a fresh occupant; and the neighbors only knew that mother and daughter had left the place quite sud denly, and that Gianetta was supposed to be under the "protection" of the Marchese Loreffano. How I made inquiries here and there, —how I heard that they had gone to Naples,—and how, being restless and reck less of my time, I worked my passage in a French steamer, and followed her, —bow, having found the sumptuous villa that was now hers, I learned that she had left there some ten days aud gone to Paris, where the Marchese was ambassador for the Two Sic ilies, —how,working my passage back again to Marseilles, and tlience, in part by the river aud in part by the rail, I made my way to Paris,—how, day after day I paced the streets and the parks, watched at the ambassador's gates, followed his carriage, and, at last, after weeks of waiting, discov ered her address, —how, having written to request au interview, her servants spurned me from her door and flung my letter in my face,--how, looking up at her windows, I then, instead of forgiving, solemnly cursed her with the bitterest curses my tongue could devise, —and how, this done, 1 shook the dust of Paris from my feet, and became a wanderer upon the face of the earth, are facts which I have now no space to tell. The next six or eight years of my life were shifting aud unsettled enough. A morose aud restless mau, I took employ ment here and there,as opportunity offered, turning my hand to many things,and caring little what I earned, so long as the work was hard and the change incessant. First of all, I engaged myself as chief engineer in one of the French steamers plying be tween Marseilles and Constantinople. At Constantinople I changed to one of the Aus trian Lloyd's boats, and worked for some time to and from Alexandria,Jaffa,and those parts. After that, I fell in with a party of Mr. Layard's men at Cairo, aud so went up the Nile and took a turn at the excavations of the mound of Nimrod. Then I became a working engineer on the new desert line between Alexandria and Suez ; and by and by I worked my passage out to Bombay,aud took service as an engine-fitter on one of the great Indian railways. I stayed along time in India ; that is to say,l stayed near ly two years, which was a long time for me ; and I might not even have left so soon, but for the war that was declared just then with Russia. That tempted me. For I loved danger and hardship as other men love safe ty and ease ; and as for my life,l had soon er have parted from it than kept it,any day. So I came straight back to England ; be took myself to Portsmouth, where my testi monials at once procured me the sort of berth I wanted. I went out to the Crimea in the engine-room of one of her Majesty's war steamers. I served with the fleet, of course, while the war lasted, and when it was over, went wandering off again, rejoicing in my liber ty. This time I went to Canada, and, after working on a railway then in progress near the American frontier, I presently passed over into the States ; journeyed from north to south ; crossed the Rocky Mountains ; tried a month or two of life in the gold coun try ; and then, being seized with a sudden, aching, anaccountable longing to re-visit that solitary grave so far away on the Ital ian coast, I turned my face once more to wards Europe. Poor little grave 1 I found it rank with weeds, the cross half shattered, the inscrip tion half effaced. It was as if no oue had loved him or remembered him. I went back to the house in which we had lodged together. The same people were still liv ing there, and made me kindly welcome. 1 stayed with them for some weeks. I weeded, and planted, and trimmed the grave willi my own hands, and set up a fresh cross in pure white marble. It was the first season of rest that I had known since I laid him there ; and when at last T shouldered my knapsack and set forth again to battle with the world, I promised myself that, God willing, I would creep back to Rocca, when my days drew near to ending, and be buried by his side. From hence, being perhaps, a little less inclined than formerly for very distant parts, aud willing to keep within reach of that grave, I went no farther than Mantau, where I engaged myself as an engine-driv er on the line, then uot long completed, be tween that city and Venice. Somehow,al though I had been trained to the working engineering, I preferred in these days to earn my bread by driving. I liked the ex citement of it the sense of power, the rush of the air, the roar of the fire, the flitting of the landscape. Above all, I enjoyed to drive a night express. The worse the weather, the better it suited with my sul len temper. For I was as hard, and hard er than ever. The years had done nothing to soften me. They had only confirmed all that was blackest and bitterest in my heart. I continued pretty faithful to the Mantua line, aud had beeen working on it steadily! for more than seven months, when that j which I am about to relate took place. It was in the month of March. The weather had been unsettled for some days past, and the nights stormy ; and at one point along the line, near Ponte di Breuta, the waters had risen ard swept away some seventy yards of embankme it. Since this accident, the trains had all been obliged to stop at a certain spot between Padua and Ponte di Brenta, and the passengers, with their luggage, had thence to be transported in all kinds of vehicles, by a circuitous j country road, to the nearest station on the other side of the gap, where another train and engine awaited them. This, of course, caused great confusion and annoyance, put ai! our time-tables wrong, and subjected the public to a large amount of inconvenience, in the mean while an army of navvies was drafted to the Bpot, aud worked day and night to re pair the damage. At this time I was driv ing two through trains each day ; namely, one from Mantua to Venice in the early morning, and a return train from Venice to Mantua in the afternoon, —a tolerably full day's work, covering about one hundred and ninety miles of ground, aud occupying between ten and eleven hours. I was therefore not best pleased, when, on the third or fourth day after the accident,l was informed, that, in addition to my regular allowance of work, I should that evening be required to drive a special train to Ven ice. This special train, consisting of hn engine, a single carriage, and a break-van, was to leave the Mantua platform at elev en ; at Padua the passengers were to alight and find post-chaises waiting to convey them to Ponte di Brenta ; at Ponte di Bren ta another engine, carriage, and break-van were to be in readiness I was charged to accompany them throughout. " Corpo di Bacco," said the clerk who gave me my orders, "you need not look so black, man. You are certain of a baud some gratuity. Do you know who goes with you ?" NUMBER 30. "Not I." " Not you, indeed 1 Why, it's the Duca Loredano, the Neapolitan ambassador." " Loredano 1" I stammered, " What Loredano ? There was a Marchese—" "Certo. He was the Marchese Loredano j some years ago ; but he has come into his dukedom since then." "He must be a very old man by this time." " Yea, he is old ; but what of that ? He is as hale, and bright, and stately as ever. You have seen him before ?" "Yes," I said, turning away; "I have seen him, —years ago." " You have heard of his marriage ?" I shook my head. The clerk chuckled, rubbed his hands, and shrugged his shoulders. "An extraordinary atluiiy' he said.— "Made a tremenduous esclaudre at the time. He married his mistress—quite a common, vulgar girl—a Genoese—very handsome ; but uot received, of course, j Nobody vi its her." " Married her !" I exclaimed. "Impos sible." " True, I assure you." I put my hand to my head. I felt as if I had had a fall or a blow. " Does she—does she go to-night ?" I faltered. " O dear, yes—goes everywhere with him—never lets him out of her sight. You'll see her—la bella Duchcssa !" With this my informant laughed, and rubbed his hands again, and went back to his office. The day went by, I scarcely know how, except that my whole sole was in a tumult of rage and bitterness. I returned from my afternoon's work about 7.25, and at 10.30 I was once again at the station. I had examined the engine ; given instruc tions to the Fochista, or stoker, about the fire ; seen to the supply of oil : and got all in readiness, when, just as I was about to compare my watch with the clock in the ticket-office, a hand was laid upon my arm, and a voice in my ear said, — " Are you the engine-driver who is gu . ing on with this special train ?" 1 had never seen the speaker before. He was a small, dark man, muffled up about the throat, with blue glasses, a large black beard, and his hat drawn low upon hiseyes. " You are a poor man, I suppose," he said, in a quick, eager whisper, "and, like other poor men, would not object to be better off. Would you like to earn a couple of thousand florins ?" "In what way ?" " Hush! You are to stop at Padua, arc 3 r ou not, aud to go on again at Ponte di Brenta ?" 1 nodded. " Suppose you did nothing of the kind. Suppose, instead of turning off the steam, you jump off the engine, aud let the train run on ?" " Impossible. There are seventy yards of embankment gone, and—" " Basta ! I know that. Save yourseli, and let the train run on. It would he noth ing but au accideut." I turned hot and cold ;~I trembled ; my heart beat fast, and my breath failed. " Why do you tempt me ?" I faltered. " For Italy's sake," lie whispered ; " for liberty's sake. I know you are no Italian; but, for all that, you may be a friend. This Loredano is one of his country's bitterest enemies. Stay, here are the two thousand florins." * I thrust his hand back fiercely. " No, —no !" I said. "No blood-money. If I do it, I do it neither rt>r Italy nor for money ; but for vengeance." " For vengeance !" he repeated. At this moment the signal was given for backing up to the platform. I sprang to my place upon the engine without another word. When I again looked towards the spot where he had been standing, the stran ger was gone. I saw them take their places,—duke :t'; I duchess, secretary and priest, valet aud maid. I saw the station-master bow them into the carriage, and stand, bareheade . beside the door. I could not distinguisu their faces ; the platform was too dusk, and the glare from the engine-fire f> strong ; but I recognized her stately figure and the pose of her head. Had I not b en told who she was, I should have known her by those traits alone. Then the guard's whistle shrilled out, and the station-master made his last bow ; I turned the steam on; aud we started. My blood was on fire. Ino longer trem bled or hesitated. I felt as if every nerve was iron, and every pulse "instinct with deadly purpose. She was in my power, and 1 would bo revenged. She should die. —she, for whom I had stained my soul v. i.ii my friend's blood ! She should die, in the plenitude of her wealth and her beauty, and no power upon earth should save her ! The statious flew past. 1 put on more steam ; I bade the fireman heap iu the coke and stir the blazing mass. I would have outstripped the wind, had it been possible Faster and faster—hedges and trees, bridg es and stations, flashing past—villages no sooner seen than gone—telegraph wires twisting, and dipping, and twining them selves in one, with the awful swiftness of our pace ! Faster aud faster, till the tire man at my side looks white and scared, and refuses to add more fuel to the furnace. Faster and faster, till the wind rushes iu our faces and drives the breath back upon our lips. I would have scorned to save myself. 1 meant to die with the rest. Mad us 1 was, —aud I believe from my very soul that 1 was utterly mad for the time,—l felt a pas sing pang of pity for the old man and his suite. 1 would have spared the poor fellow at my side, too, if I could ; but the pace at which we were going made escape imposi ble. Viceusa was passed—a mere contused