The Peasant Countess.

come Mr . Andrew ' s articles , which are written with considerable ability ancl good taste . We have pleasure in re-producing the opening chapter for the benefit of our readers : — - "The history of our great families is rich in materials for the romance writer and the poet . ' One of the most attractive stories is that of the Peasant Countess of 1 BurgMey House "by Stamford Town , '

a lady immortalized by Alfred Tennyson , the Poet Laureate , who was , as our readers are doubtless aware , born at the Parsonage of Somersby , near Spilsbj , Lincolnshire , hi the early part of the present century . The poet tells us in his charming "ballad , entitled The Lord of Burleigh , how Henry Cecil , under the guise of a poor landscape painter , sought and won the heart and hand of a village maiden , and how he conducted her on a tour , seeing ' Parks with oak and chestnut shady ,

Parks and ordered gardens great ; Ancient homes of lord and lady , Built for pleasure or for state ;' until , they reached a majestic mansion , where we are told that the domestics bowed before the young lover , whose wife then , for the first time , discovered his rank . ' All at once the colour flushes

. Her sweet face from brow to chin , As it were with shame she blushes , And her spirit changed within . Then her countenance all over Pale again as death did prove , But he clasped her like a lover .

And ho cheered her soul with love . So she strove against her weakness , Though at times her spirit sank ; Shaped her heart with woman ' s meekness , To all the duties of her rank . And a gentle consort made he , And her gentle mind was such , That she a noble lad

grew y , And the people loved her much . But a trouble weighed upon her , And perplexed her night and morn , With the burden of an honour , Unto which she was not born . Faint she grew , and oven fainter , . As she murmured" Oh ! that he

, , AVas once more the landscape painter , Which did win my heart from me !" So she drooped and drooped before him , Fading slowly from his side ; Three fair children first she bore him , Then before her time she died . '

The real facts of this remarkable story are not so highly poetical as Mr . Tennyson s lines would lead us to believe ; they , however , present a curious example of aristocratic eccentricity . Henry Cecil was born in the year 1754 , and was the only child of the Hon . Thomas Chambers Cecil , by his marriage with Miss Charlotte Gardner . When he had reached the age of nineteen he was an orphan and presumptive heir to the titles and estates of an uncle , for whom he had not any affectionate regard . So long as the old Earl lived he did not trouble Burleih with his presence . Young Cecil spent his

g time in travelling through England , and enjoyed a life of quiet ancl homely adventure . AVhile yet his uncle held the family estates ancl titles he married into a good country family of the West of England , selecting for his bride the pretty Miss Yernon , only daughter of the Squire of Hanbury Hall , in the county of Worcester . The union was far from a happy one , and after fifteen years of married life , in June 1791 , just when he was seven-and-thirty , he petitioned for and obtained a divorce . We find , before procuring