his chapel, "with no questions asked, for a
guinea, any time after midnight till four in
the afternoon."

GERALDINE.

THERE thou goest, there thou goest,
    ln thy virgin robes arrayed;
Pale and drooping, for thou knowest
    What true heart thou hast betrayed;
Hark! thy bridal bells are ringing!
    Do they waken happy tears?
Their exulting peal is flinging
    Discord, torture in my ears;
Are they tuneful unto thine,
Fair and faithless Geraldine?

Now thou standest at the altar,
    Where truth only should be heard;
Dost not inly feel, and falter
    To pronounce one fatal word?
No; I hear thy lips of beauty
    Utter the degrading "Yes,"
And the pastor, as in duty,
    Stretches forth his hands to bless;
Can thy compact be divine,
Fair and faithless Geraldine?

Of the tender vows we plighted,
    Thine are flung in empty air,
And my spirit is benighted
    In the darkness of despair;
Gold has bought thee; will it bless thee?
    Wilt thou find it aught but dross?
Will the hands that now caress thee,
    Pay thee for a true heart's loss?
Time, perchance, will show the sign,
Fair and fickle Geraldine.

Frenzied words! I will not blame thee,
    I, whose soul thy beauty won;
Filial duty overcame thee,
    Made thee do what thou hast done;
Thou hast left a grief within me,
    Grief I may not soon suppress,
But let sweet forgiveness win me
    To desire thy happiness;
Whatsoe'er of pain be mine,
Peace be with thee, Geraldine.

COFFEE PLANTING IN CEYLON.

IN TWO CHAPTERS.—CHAPTER THE FIRST.

IN the month of September, 1840, I started
from Kandy, the ancient capital of Ceylon, to
visit a friend who was in charge of one of the
many new coffee clearings then in progress.
I was accompanied by a young planter well
acquainted with the country and the natives,
and who had offered to act as my guide. The
clearing was distant about twenty-five miles.
The route we took has since become famous.
Rebellion and martial law have stalked
over it; and concerning it, the largest blue
books of last session have been concocted.

We mounted our horses a good hour before
day-break, so as to ensure getting over the
most exposed part of our journey before the
sun should have risen very high, an important
matter for man and beast in tropical countries.
Towards noon, we pulled up at a little bazaar,
or native shop, and called for "Hoppers and
Coffee." I felt that I could have eaten almost
anything, and, truly, one needs such an
appetite to get down the dreadful
black-draught which the Cingalese remorselessly
administer to travellers, under the name of coffee.

The sun was high in the horizon when we
found ourselves suddenly, at a turn of the
road, in the midst of a "clearing." This was
quite a novelty to me; so unlike anything
one meets with in the low country, or about the
vicinity of Kandy. The present clearing lay at
an elevation of fully three thousand feet above
the sea-level, whilst the altitude of Kandy is
not more than sixteen hundred feet. I had
never been on a Hill Estate, and the only
notions formed by me respecting a plantation
of coffee, were of continuous, undulating fields,
and gentle slopes. Here it was not difficult
to imagine myself amongst the recesses of the
Black Forest. Pile on pile of heavy, dark
jungle, rose before my astonished sight,
looking like grim fortresses defending some
hidden city of giants. The spot we had
opened upon was at the entrance of a long
valley of great width, on one side of which
lay the young estate we were bound to.
Before us were, as near as I could judge, fifty
acres of felled jungle in thickest disorder;
just as the monsters of the forest had fallen,
so they lay, heap on heap, crushed and
splintered into ten thousand fragments. Fine
brawny old fellows some of them; trees that
had stood many a storm and thunder-peal;
trees that had sheltered the wild elephant,
the deer, and the buffalo lay there prostrated
by a few inches of sharp steel. The "fall"
had taken place a good week before, and the
trees would be left in this state until the end
of October, by which time they would be
sufficiently dry for a good "burn." Struggling
from trunk to trunk, and leading our horses
slowly over the huge rocks that lay thickly
around, we at last got through the "fall,"
and came to a part of the forest where the
heavy, quick click of many axes told us there
was a working-party busily employed. Before
us, a short distance in the jungle, were the
swarthy, compact figures of some score or two
of low country Cingalese, plying their small
axes with a rapidity and precision that was
truly marvellous. It made my eyes wink
again, to see how quickly their sharp tools
flew about, and how near some of them went
to their neighbours' heads.

In the midst of these busy people I found
my planting friend, superintending operations,
in full jungle costume. A sort of wicker
helmet was on his head, covered with a long
padded white cloth, which hung far down his
back, like a baby's quilt. A shooting-jacket
and trousers of checked country cloth;
immense leech-gaiters fitting close inside the
roomy canvas boots; and a Chinese-paper
umbrella, made up his curious outfit.

To me it was a pretty, as well as a novel
sight, to watch the felling work in progress.