“Velum Serenissimae Mariae, Scotiae et Galliae Reginae Martyris, quo induebatur dum ab Heretica ad mortem iniustissimam condemnata fuit.  Anno Sal.  MDLXXXVI. a nobilissima matrona Anglicana diu conservatum et tandem, donationis ergo Deo, et Societati Jesu consecratum.”

On the plate there is an inscription, with a double certificate of its authenticity, which states, that this veil, a family treasure of the expelled house of Stuart, was finally in possession of the last branch of that family, the cardinal of York, who preserved it for many years in his private chapel, among the most precious relics, and at his death bequeathed it to Sir J. Hippisley, together with a valuable Plutarch, and a Codex with painted (illuminated) letters, and a gold coin struck in Scotland in the reign of queen Mary; and it was specially consecrated by Pope Pius VII. in his palace on the Quirinal, April 29, 1818.  Sir John Hippisley, during a former residence at Rome, had been very intimate with the cardinal of York, and was instrumental in obtaining for him, when he with the other cardinals emigrated to Venice in 1798, a pension of L4,000. a-year from the Prince of Wales, now King George IV.; but for which, the fugitive cardinal, all whose revenues were seized by the French, would have been exposed to the greatest distress.  The cardinal desired to requite this service by the bequest of what he considered so valuable.  According to a note on the plate, the veil is eighty-nine English inches long, and forty-three broad, so that it seems to have been rather a kind of shawl or scarf than a veil.  If we remember rightly, Melville in his Memoirs, which Schiller had read, speaks of a handkerchief belonging to the queen, which she gave away before her death, and Schiller founds upon this anecdote the well-known words of the farewell scene, addressed to Hannah Kennedy.

    “Accept this handkerchief! with my own hand
    For thee I’ve work’d it in my hours of sadness
    And interwoven with my scalding tears: 
    With this thou’lt bind my eyes.”

DREAMS.

  Oh! there is a dream of early youth,
    And it never comes again;
  ’Tis a vision of light, of life, and truth,
    That flits across the brain: 
  And love is the theme of that early dream. 
    So wild, so warm, so new,
  That in all our after years I deem,
    That early dream we rue.

  Oh! there is a dream of maturer years,
    More turbulent by far;
  ’Tis a vision of blood, and of woman’s tears,
    For the theme of that dream is war: 
  And we toil in the field of danger and death,
    And shout in the battle array,
  Till we find that fame is a bodyless breath,
    That vanisheth away.