Now if Tom had been put on his oath, he could no more have answered correctly, in regard to the appearance of the weather, than the man in the moon, and not half so much, for it is fair to suppose that if there be a man in the moon, he is not addicted to the practice of drinking, and therefore keeps a bright look out on things below.

He replied guardedly-"'Pon my word I don't know, but I'll look," and feeling his way to the window, he threw aside the curtains, and a bar of pale starlight threw itself immediately on his wife's face. "Clear as crystal, you perceive, dear”—and down went the curtain again.

Clara was very thoughtful and affectionate, and suggested that if the curtain was kept up, he could see his way better about the room.

No, no, dear," replied Tom, very slowly as before, "I've heard that starlight produces lunacy after"-midnight he was about to say, but caught himself dexterously, considering his situation" and that's dreadful, you know."

Tom made several stumbles after this, and presently his wife caught a whiff of the cloves.

"Good gracious, Tom, how long you are, and how dreadfully you smell of cloves."

"Eh ?" said Tom, starting-" C-l-o-v-e-s ?"

"Yes, cloves!-any one would think you'd been embalmed like a mummy."

This made him twitch and go wool-gathering.

"Phew! you're regularly scented with them. Where on earth have you been to-night ?"

Tom was thrown entirely off his guard; his brain rambled, and without the remotest idea of what he was saying, replied"W-h-why-hic-Clara dear, the fact is I just been on a little trip to the East Indies, and while I was there I fell over a spice-box."

This told a tale. Clara immediately sat up in bed and shed

tears. The cat was out of the bag, and we should not be surprised but that a Caudle lecture as long as a charity sermon was the consequence of poor Tom's unfortunate slip of the tongue. He has never touched cloves from that day to this, and it is probable ere long he will avoid the "bottle" entirely, his wife insisting that every one that drinks must sooner or later keep company with a subterraneous person, distinguished from the rest of mankind by a remarkable species of tail and a "cloven' foot; this latter adornment would keep Tom out of his road, if nothing else succeeded.

Most decidedly.

AN OHIO WEDDING.

WITHOUT the slightest desire to be intentionally alliterativea euphonism of language at which the savans affect to turn up their ugly noses (for who ever did see a critic with a handsome "handle" to his physiognomy)-we are about to remark that extraordinarily odd things often occur in Ohio. Of course we do not mean in that portion of the State nearest to the magnificent river that flows murmuringly as a boundery; nor in the large cities, such as Cincinnati, the "Pride of the West," or 'Porkopolis," as the eastern editors call it, in sheer envy of the billions of burly swine that are annually knocked in the head in the neighbourhood. But it is in the little towns far back near the borders, in what are termed the Lake Counties, where ridiculously primitive "goings-on" are enacted, and of which we purpose to tell the reader.

Connubiality up that way is not made a theme of protracted consideration, "long drawn out." Wooing is not carried on to indefinite periods, and then timidly turned into a mere conjugal job. There is an absence of all that fuss and shopping, bridesmaid manœuvring, and honeymoon-ing. There is no occasion for a wedding-breakfast; cut-glass smelling-bottles at the altar; silks and furbelows; orange-blossoms in the hair; announcements in the papers; and the nine hundred and ninety-nine items of nonsense which are all deemed established steppingstones to the temple of bliss.

There is no occasion for the bridegroom to glitter in smooth kids and a satin waistcoat. There need be no purple suspenders

and gilt-edged dickeys; diamond rings are not demanded; nor need there be a white "choker;" or, for the matter of that, any throat-covering at all. There seems to be no wish for carriages with superb trappings, to stand in magnificent waiting at the chapel-doors; no picturesque footmen with polished staffs and powdered locks, to gossip outside while the ceremony is being conducted within. The parson may officiate without flowing robes and solemn stateliness. "Pomp and circumstance" are Courting is thus carried on:

wholly set aside as dead letters.

when the couple meet that "have a liking for each other," the conversation runs

"Sally, I love you," says Simon.

"Do go 'long!" replies Sally.

"I swow to man I do," insists Simon.

"Now leave off a-talking sich stuff, you Simon," retorts Sally.

Perhaps Simon then plucks up courage and kisses his Dulcinea-perhaps not, according to the amount of courage he happens to own. Then he runs off to the rick, and she to the kitchen. The matter is not much thought of again till after tea; perhaps the "old folks" have gone to bed; and then, while the couple are sitting at least five yards from each other, Simon, after a long silence, with his eyes riveted on the toe of Sally's massive bull-hide shoe, again remarks

"I do love you, Sally."

"How you keep talkin', Simon !”

" I'd like dreadful well to git married."

"Ain't you well ashamed of yourself, Simon ?"

His eyes are still on the shoe.

"Why there's no harm in that."

"I never heard of sich a thing."

"Why you don't mean to say you're a-goin' to be an old maid ?"

"Not a-purpose," says Sally.

"Well, you must be if you don't accept a proposal?” "Yes, I know, but-"

"But you don't like me ?"

"Eh?" says Sally, with a start.

"No, you like somebody else better?"

"It's no sich thing."

"I b'leve you've got a hankerin' after Peter Colson? I seed you look after him the t'other day out of the spring-house

winder ?"

"Why, Simon, may I be planted if you ain't a-gittin' jelus!" "Pshaw! you needn't count on me gittin' jelus about—” And before Simon sees proper to finish the sentence, he grows desperately red in the face, and all at once goes off to bed in the dark, leaving his gawky love "alone in her glory" with a confused regret of having offended the " poor feller ;" amid which is shadowed the knowledge that she ought to conclude darning the heel of a stocking that has been in an imperfect state in her work-box for some weeks.

The following day Simon sulks whenever he sees Sally, and Sally grins, to the exposure of her box of ivories, whenever she meets Simon. The next day, although he had fully made up his mind that he would not speak to her for a week, he has to ask her "where the soap is ?" and then she relents suddenly, and says:

"You ain't mad, are you, Simon ?"

"Don't speak to me!" replies Simon, with an attempt at dignity, which is so thoroughly rustic and unsuited to his nature that it would not be recognized if the words did not afford some clue to the expression.

"You're crammed full of conceit.'

"Why, Simon! now thur, Simon, don't be a fool, Simon !" This is said with the purest meaning, but the swain takes exception in his ardour to the word fool.