"Now then, ladies-now then!" cried Mrs. Grit, hurriedly, as she disappeared from the window. "But please make haste."

"What can this mean?" thought Mrs. Cruddle and Miss Peers. "That's the way to the sand," said Alfy: "and I know there's periwinkles, and starfish, and little crabs, like there was at Margate."

The door was here opened a little way as Mrs. Grit looked out. Then she allowed the party to enter, as soon as she was satisfied that they had not changed places with anybody else; and, finally, she slammed the door to again, with nervous haste, and shot the bolt. "The beggars are abominable," said Mrs. Grit, when the feeling of security was re-established: "so unpleasant too, for you, ladies, to be kept waiting. But it is not my fault."

From the imperfect view obtained of the man who had departed as they came up, Mrs. Cruddle did not think that he looked very like a beggar. He was florid and hearty, well clad, and carried a walking-stick.

"I cannot understand this at all," she said to Miss Peers, as they entered their sitting-room.

"I think there must be smuggling going on; if so, the French brandy is remarkably good for cherries," replied the other lady, in whose mind romance and domestic economy were ever mingled. "A smuggler-dear me !-I wish I had taken more notice of him." "Once I went on the sands directly after breakfast," hinted Alfy: "and was so good all day afterwards."

But the suggestion was unattended to, in the curiosity of the minute.

Anon new matter for wonder arose. The butcher's boy arrived with some meat that had been ordered, and instead of delivering it in at the door, in the ordinary method, was told by Mrs. Grit to wait until she got a long piece of string, by which the shoulder of lamb was pulled up to the bed-room window. And then, as little Alfy still kept indulging in allusions to the sea-coast, it was thought proper to indulge him. But just as they were about to start Mrs. Grit put herself before the door, in the attitude of a stage-heroine, who declares that if any body attempts to pass it shall be over her dead body, and implored them to wait a minute.

"He is here!" she exclaimed, but almost in a whisper. “It is not safe just now-pray wait a minute, ladies."

Mrs. Cruddle grew still more astonished. As for Miss Peers, she at once put down the object of alarm as a sea-chartist, or something equally terrible. Every attempt to procure a tranquil explanation from Mrs. Grit was a failure. She only replied that she was a wretched woman, but that they should one day know all: and then, beckoning them to the back of the house, opened the kitchen door, after a cautious survey through the window, almost pushed them out, and banged it to, as before, after them. Under these mysterious circumstances the walk was not agreeable; and although little Alfy was in high spirits, and heaped up shingles, dug holes, collected marine trash, and got his feet wet after the most approved fashion, and in a way that would, at another time, have called forth the highest encomiums, Mrs. Cruddle and Miss Peers had a cloud hanging over them which prevented them from fully entering into the spirit of his diversions. Their return was attended with still greater unplea

santry. They were not admitted for half an hour, and then in a hurried manner by a French window, just as the mysterious stranger appeared round the corner of the house. All this was so bad, that Mrs. Cruddle determined to leave the place the next morning. Even the few hours of it, she said, were beginning to undermine her health.

The afternoon passed very uncomfortably, and at last they went to bed, sleeping less readily than on the preceding evening, but towards morning falling into a deep slumber. From this, Miss Peers was awakened by a noise in her room, and, opening her eyes, she observed, to her horror, that the dreaded man had opened her window, which she had neglected to fasten, and stepped into her chamber. He now stood at the foot of the bed.

"Who are you? Go away! What do you want, man?" cried Miss Peers, with a ringing scream.

"Don't be afraid, ma'am, it's an execution," replied the intruder. "A what!" shrieked Miss Peers; and by this time her cries had brought Mrs. Cruddle into the room, who nearly fainted. She had caught the man's word, and expected nothing else but that everybody was to be put out of the way immediately.

"I'm sorry to intrude," continued the man; "but don't distress yerselves, now. Only I'm in possession, that's all."

"Oh!" gasped the ladies. Mrs. Cruddle having wrapped her form in the bed-curtain, and Miss Peers pulled the counterpane up to her very eyes.

The truth dawned upon them. They saw that the miserable state of the house was owing to everything available having been sold, and that their difficulty of egress and entry was accounted for by the presence of the man.

"Leave the room," cried Mrs. Cruddle. "Leave the room, and let us pack up our things at once, and go. Well-I'm sure!"

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Beg your pardon, ladies," said the man; "but you can't move a thing. I'm in possession."

"But everything you see is ours,these boxes, and clothes, and linen even."

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'Very sorry, ma'am," said the man; "but you morn't touch 'em. They all belong to me."

Mrs. Cruddle uttered a cry of despair, and threw herself upon the reclining form of Miss Peers. Little Alfy heard the noise, and came in, joining his screams to the confusion, as he clung to his mother. The tableau of horror-helpless, crushing horror, was complete.

The straits to which the unfortunate ladies were reduced,-how they could not even get a pocket-handkerchief; how they did not dare to write to Mr. Cruddle; and how he arrived on Saturday in the middle of it, will be detailed to anybody who passes the house at Ventnor, and may care to call. But Mrs. Cruddle is supposed to be cured. As violent remedies at times put a stop to long-standing diseases, this terrible adventure is supposed to have annihilated her marine propensities. At all events, she confidently told Miss Peers on the evening of their return to the court in London, that "there was nothing like home after all."

THE RISE AND FALL OF THE JESUITS.

With one or two exceptions the mass of publications devoted to the Jesuits may be comprised under the head of controversial, panegyrical, or condemnatorial, pamphleteering. Indiscriminate praise on the one hand; indiscriminate censure on the other; these are the leading characteristics of the laudatores et censores of that remarkable order. The one party can discern no good in the actions of the Jesuits; the other, no evil. They are either angels or devils-black or white-according to the point from whence we direct our view.

The first appearance of the Jesuits on the active scene of the world was as the humble, devoted, and ardent, purifiers of religion and morality as the renovators of the holy Catholic Church; and with this noble object in view they swore fealty to the sacred vows of obedience, chastity, and poverty. But they did not long abide by those vows. From the humble servant, they soon became the haughty master of the church; and, in lieu of purifying the mind of the faithful from its grossness and superstition, they were accused of entangling it in the fine-spun web of logical sophistry, and fanatic controversy, which caused them to labour under the imputation of being its debasing despots, instead of its enlightened directors. A short sketch of the character and career of the order may not be unpalatable at the present moment, when so much is written and talked about them; not only by the grave historian, but also by the gay romancer-not only by your popular preacher, but also by your prosy politician.

Ignatius Loyola, the founder of the order, was a licentious libertine of the military class, in which that chivalrous age abounded. It was an accident that made him an ascetic agitator in re-moralizing the minds of his fellow-men. He was wounded in the foot at the siege of Pampeluna, which cut short his military career by disabling, and ultimately deforming, his person.

Towards the middle of the 16th century, the Church of Rome was ripe for renovation; that is, it was as corrupt as it well could be. The religious spirit-the pure, old, orthodox, spirit—had dwindled down to a mere shadowy existence, and had been replaced by a hollow, selfish, and thoroughly worldly feeling. In lieu of simple piety, pure rectitude, and honest benevolence, in high places, and among the more dignified of the Romish hierarchy, there were gross and ungodly desires, voluptuous aspirations, and sinful indulgences. The purple and the fine linen had completely superseded its beggarly antithesis; and the occupants of the papal throne had surrounded themselves with the "pomp and circumstance" of a highly intellectual and refined luxuriance. They had long forgotten the precepts, and only pretended to follow the footsteps of their pastor and master, the

"The History of the Jesuits," by Andrew Steinmetz, and the "Chute des Jesuites," by M. St. Priest, for instance. The work of Mr. Steinmetz is an elaborate compilation of historical matter relating to the Jesuits, highly creditable to his industry and research. The work of M. St. Priest comprises the period of the decline and fall of the Jesuits, and throws a new and interesting light on the suppression of the order.

humble Nazarene. The image of their great prototypes, the apostles, who laboured so hard, and fared so meanly, was completely effaced from the memory of the Popes; and Paul, on Mars' hill, preaching to the Greeks the divine truths of the gospel, presents a very different picture to the mind's eye, to his namesake at Rome receiving the humble Jesuits in the full blaze and glory of the "scarlet abomination."

The whole religion, apparently, of the heads of the Church at that period, consisted in devising expedients to keep up their temporal power, and extend their political influence. They trafficked with the most precious part of man-and of consequence the most profitable-his immortal soul. His salvation, bereafter, was reduced to a matter of pounds, shillings, and pence; and not dependent upon good deeds, and virtuous thoughts. The house of God-the temple of the Most High-was turned into a common mart for the sale of that which ought to be esteemed above all price; and the Romanists in the 16th century-those soul-merchants-were worse than the money-changers of old, who were kicked out of the temple as common polluters of its holiness and sanctity. It was through the instrumentality of indulgences, dispensations, and absolutions, that that trading-abomination was enacted which filled the Christian world with disgust, and first lit up the flames of the Reformation. The evil and corrupt spirit pervaded every rank and condition of the hierarchy. The monks and friars, "black, white, and gray," imitating the superior orders, were equally eager in grasping at the good things of this world, and were not over-nice as to the conditions on which they received them. These mendicant-mummers by turns caressed. cajoled, and alarmed the people out of their property; and the bare contemplation of these saintly swarms cannot fail to conjure up deathbed scenes, masses, wax-lights, the confessional, relics, and a whole host of impostures, their stock-in-trade, which rendered them, at last, the objects of scorn and contempt, even to the ignorant and destitute. They were, as Cardinal Bembo racily remarked, tutte le umane secleratezze, coperte di diabolica ipocrizia, "all human rascality, covered with diabolical hypocrisy." The times, therefore, were ripe for a change; and, "when things are at the worst they sometimes mend."

Loyola and his nine followers appeared before Paul III., with the proposal to regenerate the Christian world, in the year 1537. After deliberating with his cardinals, he embraced the scheme, decided upon the name of the order, and issued a bull, which gave them full authority to act. Loyola took a great weight off the shoulders of Paul, which they were unable to bear with ease and comfort, as it interfered with his personal aims, and his secret desires. Paul was ambitious, but the mettle of his mind was not of that texture to second his ambition; and the ordinary difficulties of his position were sufficient for him to grapple with, even had he not created others which were of a purely selfish and personal nature. He, therefore, fell in readily with the plan of Loyola, which proposed to sap and undermine the many dangers which surrounded the papal throne; and he did this the more willingly, as it spared him the necessity, so repugnant to his nature, of confronting them openly. Paul was particular to distinguish the Society of Jesus from the Monks and Friars, who had become

the objects of contumely and reproach, and ordered them to be clothed in black, like the secular priests. This circumstance caused them, in after years, to be called the Janizaries of the Pope; or, the Black-band of the Church-militant.

The institution of the Order distinguished it from every other of the ecclesiastical profession. Loyola had based it upon the principles of military subordination, carrying the latter through every gradation, from the simple novitiate, to the general-superior of the body. The general had absolute control-he was a spiritual autocrat-and from his decision there was no appeal. He was subject to the Pope only. This was establishing the most complete imperium in imperio that the records of history furnish us with. The Monastic Orders had a dash of democracy in their institutions; they assembled in chapters, and elected their local superiors, and decided upon other questions concerning the community, by a majority of votes; and their respective heads residing at Rome, had but a limited authority over the convents of the distant provinces. Their chapters occurred frequently, and their generals and provincials were mostly changed every three years, which gave them something of a popular character. Loyola's, on the contrary, was strictly monarchical; and as the body developed its powers, and extended its ramifications over the world, it became like a vast web, from the centre of which all power must emanate and return; and no single point of that complicated structure could be touched without the whole instantly vibrating with the effect. The Jesuit-body were admirably adapted to the exigences of the times, and they most effectively aided the Papal authority, which just then urgently required aid; for Luther and the Reformation were thundering at the doors of the Vatican, and the reverberation of the blows echoed in the minds of men throughout the Catholic world, which fearfully foreboded the coming change. And what were the weapons which the dexterous Loyola proposed to wield against the bold and blatant German? We shall see. The soldier-saint took a sagacious view of the task he had imposed upon himself, and evinced a thorough knowledge of his fellow-workers, and the secret instincts of their minds. He did not enjoin upon them the necessity of first attending to old sinners-he left the latter to their course; as they were too stiff and unbendable in their thoughts and actions to effect any great change upon. Besides, they must soon die off; and the world is always young-generations are perpetually springing up-and the nascent frame is infinitely more supple than the wire-worn jointsand thews of advanced age; therefore he turned his attention particularly to youth, apparently with the conviction that

"Whatsoever way the twig's inclined, the tree will grow."

Accordingly, we find the first and imperious rule in Loyola's scheme is-" the education of youth;" and the second is devoted to the treatment of "elderly people and adults," who are to be reasoned with gently, comforted in their afflictions, and advised in all temporal matThe third denounces heretics, and their conversion is especially enforced for the good of the church; and to the heathen is devoted a similar injunction, the latter embracing a world-wide extent.

ters.

The plan of the society did not fully expand itself until Loyola was dead. He left behind him the frame-work, which he firmly filled in