hung thee up, out of harm's way, above the mantel-shelf, or behind the kitchen door, whereas, thy parent was no savage, and so, having her hands full of other matters, she laid thee down, helpless, upon the parlor chair!

In the mean time, the "Herald" came. Next to an easy seat, my Aunt dearly loved a police newspaper;

- when she had once plunged into its columns, the most vital question obtained from her only a random answer; the world and the roasting-jack stood equally still. So, without a second thought, she dropped herself on the nursing chair. One little smothered cry, my cousin's last breath, found its way into the upper air, but the still small voice of the reporter engrossed the maternal ear.

My aunt never skimmed a newspaper, according to some people's practice. She was as solid a reader as a sitter, and did not get up, therefore, till she had gone through the "Herald" from end to end. When she did rise, which was suddenly, the earth quaked -- the windows rattled — the ewers plashed over the crockery fell from the shelf— and the cat and rats ran out together, as they are said to do from a falling house.

"Heyday!" said my uncle, above stairs, as he staggered from the concussion and, with the usual curiosity, he referred to his pocket-book for the Royal Birthday. But the almanac not accounting for the explosion, he ran down the stairs, at the heels of the housemaid, and there lay my Aunt, stretched on the parlor-floor, in a fit. At the very first glimpse, he explained the matter to his own satisfaction, in three words, "Ah! the apoplexy!"

Now the housemaid had done her part to secure him against this error, by holding up the dead child; but as she turned the body edge-ways, he did not perceive it. When he did see it - but I must draw a curtain over the parental agony

About an hour after the catastrophe, an inquisitive sheneighbor called in, and asked if we should not have the coroner to sit on the body: but my uncle replied, "There was no need." "But in cases, Mr. Shakerly, where the death is not natural." "My dear madam," interrupted my uncle, "it was a natural death enough."

FANCIES ON A TEA-CUP.

I LOVE to pore upon old china, and to speculate, from the images, on Cathay. I can fancy that the Chinese manners betray themselves, like the drunkard's, in their cups.

- ex

How quaintly pranked and patterned is their vessel! quisitely outlandish, yet not barbarian. How daintily transparent! It should be no vulgar earth that produces that superlative ware, nor does it so seem in the enamelled landscape.

There are beautiful birds; there, rich flowers and gorgeous butterflies, and a delicate clime, if we may credit the porcelain. There be also horrible monsters, dragons, with us obsolete, and reckoned fabulous; the main breed, doubtless, having followed Fohi (our Noah) in his wanderings thither from the Mount Ararat. But how does that impeach the loveliness of Cathay? There are such creatures even in Fairy-land.

I long often to loiter in those romantic paradises, studded with pretty temples, holiday pleasure-grounds, the true Tea-Gardens. I like those meandering waters, and the

abounding little islands.

And here is a Chinese nurse-maid, Ho-Fi, chiding a fretful little Pekin child. The urchin hath just such another toy, at the end of a string, as might be purchased at our own Mr. Dunnett's. It argues an advanced state of civilization, where the children have many playthings; and the Chinese infants witness their flying-fishes and whirligigs, sold by the stray natives about our streets are far gone in such juve

nile luxuries.

But here is a better token. The Chinese are a polite people; for they do not make household, much less husbandry, drudges of their wives. You may read the women's fortune in their tea-cups. In nine cases out of ten, the female is busy only in the lady-like toils of the toilette. Lo! here, how sedulously the blooming Hy-son is pencilling the mortal arches, and curving the cross-bows of her eyebrows. A musical instrument, her secondary engagement, is at her almost invisible feet. Are such little extremities likely to be

tasked with laborious offices? Marry, in kicking, they must be ludicrously impotent, but then she hath a formidable growth of nails.

By her side, the obsequious Hum is pouring his soft flatteries into her ear. When she walketh abroad, (here it is on another sample,) he shadeth her at two miles off with his umbrella. It is like an allegory of Love triumphing over space. The lady is walking upon one of those frequent petty islets, on a plain, as if of porcelain, without any herbage, only a solitary flower springs up, seemingly by enchantment, at her fairy-like foot. The watery space between the lovers is aptly left as a blank, excepting her adorable shadow, which is tending towards her slave.

How reverentially is yon urchin presenting his flowers to the Graybeard! So honorably is age considered in China! There would be some sense, there, in birthday celebrations.

Here, in another compartment, is a solitary scholar, apparently studying the elaborate didactics of Con-Fuse-Ye.

The Chinese have, verily, the advantage of us upon earthenware! They trace themselves as lovers, contemplatists, philosophers whereas, to judge from our jugs and mugs, we are nothing but sheepish piping shepherds and fox-hunters.

PERE LA CHAISE.

WALTON REDIVIVUS.

A NEW-RIVER ECLOGUE.

My old New River hath presented no extraordinary novelties lately. But there Hope sits, day after day, speculating on traditionary gudgeons. I think she hath taken the Fisheries. I now know the reasons why our forefathers were denominated East and West Angles. Yet is there no lack of spawn, for I wash my hands in fishets that come through the pump, every morning, thick as motelings, - little things that perish untimely, and never taste the brook." - From a Letter of C. Lamb.

PISCATOR is fishing, near the Sir Hugh Middleton's Head, without either basket or can. VIATOR Cometh up to him, with an angling-rod and a

bottle.

Via. Good morrow, Master Piscator. Is there any sport afloat?

Pis. I have not been here time enough to answer for it. It is barely two hours agone since I put in.

Via. The fishes are shyer in this stream than in any water that I know.

Pis. I have fished here a whole Whitsuntide through without a nibble. But then the weather was not so excellent as to-day. This nice shower will set the gudgeons all agape. Via. I am impatient to begin.

Pis. Do you fish with gut?

Via. No, I bait with gentles.

Pis. It is a good taking bait: though my question referred to the nature of your line. Let me see your tackle. Why this is no line, but a ship's cable. It is a six-twist. There is nothing in this water but you may pull out with a single hair. Via. What, are there no dace, nor perch?

Pis. I doubt not but there have been such fish here, in former ages. But now-a-days there is nothing of that size. They are gone extinct, like the mammoths.

Via. There was always such a fishing at 'em. Where there was one angler in former times, there is now a hundred.

Pis. A murrain on 'em!— A New-River fish, now-a-days,

cannot take his common swimming exercise without hitching on a hook.

Via. It is the natural course of things, for man's populousness to terminate other breeds. As the proverb says, "The more Scotchmen, the fewer herrings." It is curious to consider the family of whales growing thinner according to the propagation of parish lamps.

Pis. Ay, and withal, how the race of man, who is a terrestrial animal, should have been in the greatest jeopardy of extinction by the element of water; whereas the whales, living in the ocean, are most liable to be burnt out.

Via. It is a pleasant speculation. But how is this? I thought to have brought my gentles comfortably in an old snuff-box, and they are all stark dead!

Pis. The odor hath killed them. There is nothing more mortal than tobacco, to all kinds of vermin. Wherefore, a new box will be indispensable, though, for my own practice, I prefer my waistcoat pockets for their carriage. Pray mark this-and in the mean time I will lend you some worms.

Via. I am much beholden: and when you come to Long Acre, I will faithfully repay you. But, look you, my tackle is still amiss. My float will not swim.

Pis. It is no miracle; for here is at least a good ounce of swan-shots upon your line. It is over-charged with lead.

Via. I confess, I am only used to killing sparrows, and such small fowls, out of the back-casement. But my ignorance shall make me the more thankful for your help and instruction.

Pis. There. The fault is amended. And now, observe, you must watch your cork very narrowly, without even an eye-wink another way; for, otherwise, you may overlook the only nibble throughout the day.

Via. I have a bite already! my float is going up and down like a ship at sea.

Pis. No. It is only that house-maid dipping in her bucket, which causes the agitation you perceive. 'T is a shame so to interrupt the honest angler's diversion. It would be but a judgment of God, now, if the jade should fall in!

Via. But I would have her only drowned for some brief twenty minutes or so, and then restored again by the surgeons. And yet I have doubts of the lawfulness of that