architecture, and the splendour of its circular painted windows. These windows have excited considerable interest, from a legend connected with their erection. One of them was, it appears, executed by a master mason, and the rest by his apprentice. When, however, the elder artificer discovered the preference exhibited by competent judges for the works of his assistant, his jealousy and thirst for revenge increased to so frantic a degree that he is said to have poniarded him on the spot. He was, of course, tried, condemned, and executed. Associated as they are with such a tragedy, there are few persons who visit the Abbey of St. Ouen without a careful inspection of its circular windows.

The extreme length, from the farther end of the Chapel of the Virgin, to its opposite western extremity, is about 450 English feet, whilst the height from the pavement to the roof of the nave is 108. The central tower rises 100 feet above the roof of the church, and is supported by four fluted pillars upwards of 30 feet in circumference. Its area below can hardly be less than 36 feet square. This is precisely the part of the edifice which Bonington has selected for the scene of his drawing; adding to the portrait those accessories which are so frequently to be met with in Catholic places of worship. Such is the beauty of this painting, that although its present possessor is said to have given only some two or three hundred francs for it, there are several collectors in Paris who would not hesitate to purchase it at a price of four or five thousand. Indeed, the fureur for the works of Bonington is even greater in Paris than it is in our own country. We ourselves remember to have been present at a sale of drawings in the French capital, at which a skilfully executed copy of the Charette, a small landscape, with a waggon in the foreground, by Bonington, was knocked down to a French amateur for three thousand

francs; and we have been told, we know not how truly, that there exists in this country at the present moment no less than three copies of his Lecture de la Bible, from the celebrated original in the gallery of a distinguished Parisian collector; all of which have been purchased at the highest prices demanded for his genuine productions: yet for his noblest picture-the Ducal Palace - and several small paintings of exquisite beauty, which he disposed of along with it to a bookseller of Bond Street, he obtained, so he himself informed us a short time before his death, less than 2007.; although his fortunate patron did not hesitate, whilst the canvass was yet wet, to exhibit one of them for sale at the British Institution at the more remunerating price of four hundred guineas. One of these very pictures is now valued at fifteen hundred guineas; yet certain noble collectors, who purchased Bonington's pencil tracings of costume prints after his death, at higher prices than he was accustomed to receive for his finished drawings whilst living, allowed it to remain unsold an entire season in the gallery of the British Institution, on the ground that the price was an exorbitant one for so young an artist to demand.

THE HOUR OF THE GLOAMING.

BY MISS E. L. MONTAGU.

I.

'Tis the hour o' the gloaming, and saft fa's the dew,

But I see na the green bank where the bonnie broom grew ;

I see na the dear cot by the auld birken tree,

Where thy voice sang sae sweetly, my Mary, to me!

II.

We met ance by the burn-side, an' ance in the grove,
An' the neist time we trysted I tauld thee my love;
I tauld how this puir heart was sair, sair for thee ·
But thy lip had nae answer, my Mary, for me!

III.

As I pressed the saft hand that was faulded in mine,
There was hope in the glad een that looked into thine;
But the word that I langed for, it wasna for me
And I gied up a warld's wealth, my Mary, in thee!

IV.

A' mute was our parting, we breathed nae farewell;
Wae swelled in my proud heart, but nae drap there fell;

But now at thy memory saut tears fill my e'e,

And my soul pours a blessing, my Mary, to thee!