Hearts!" Her nose turned up. It was a heart, and her mouth led a trump. Her face gave a heart, --and her cap followed suit. Her sleeves puckered and plumped themselves into a heart-shape, and so did her body. Her pin-cushion was a heart, the very back of her chair was a heart, — her bosom was a heart. She was "all heart" indeed!

A MARRIAGE PROCESSION.

BRIDE AND BRIDESMAID.

IT has never been my lot to marry,

- whatever I may have written of one Honoria to the contrary. My affair with that lady never reached beyond a very embarrassing declaration, in return for which she breathed into my dull, deaf ear an inaudible answer. It was beyond my slender assurance, in those days, to ask for a repetition, whether of acceptance or denial. One chance for explanation still remained. I wrote to her mother, to bespeak her sanction to our union, and received, by return of post, a scrawl, that, for aught I knew, might be

3*

in Sanscrit. I question whether, even at this time, my intolerable bashfulness would suffer me to press such a matter any further.

My thoughts of matrimony are now confined to occasional day-dreams, originating in some stray glimpse in the PrayerBook, or the receipt of bride-cake. It was on some such occurrence that I fell once, Bunyan-like, into an allegory of a wedding.

My fancies took the order of a procession. With flaunting banners it wound its Alexandrine way in the manner of some of Martin's painted pageants to a taper spire in the

JOINERS.

distance. And first, like a band of livery, came the honorable company of Match-makers, all mature spinsters and matrons, and as like aunts and mothers as may be. The Glovers trod closely on their heels. Anon came, in blue and gold, the parish beadle, Scarabæus Parochialis, with the ringers of the hand-bells. Then came the Banns, it was during the reign of Lord Eldon's Act, three sturdy pioneers, with

their three axes, and likely to hew down sterner impediments than lie commonly in the path of marriage. On coming nearer, the countenance of the first was right foolish and perplexed; of the second, simpering; and the last, methought, looked sedate, as if dashed with a little fear. After the Banns- like the judges following the halberds came the Joiners: no rough mechanics, but a portly, full-blown vicar, with his clerk both rubicund a peony paged by a pink. It made me smile to observe the droll clerical turn of the clerk's beaver, scrubbed into that fashion by his coat at the nape. The marriageknot borne by a ticket-porter came after the divine, and raised associations enough to sadden one, but for a pretty Cupid that came on laughing and trundling a hoop-ring.

near.

- not a

The next group was a numerous one, Firemen of the Hand-in-Hand, with the Union flag- the chief actors were With a mixture of anxiety and curiosity, I looked out for the impending couple, when, how shall I tell it? I beheld, not a brace of young lovers, a Romeo and Juliet, "he-moon here, and a she-sun there," not bride and bridegroom, but the happy pear, a solitary Bergamy, carried on a velvet cushion by a little foot-page. I could have foresworn my fancy for ever for so wretched a conceit, till I remembered that it was intended, perhaps, to typify, under that figure, the mysterious resolution of two into one, a pair nominally, but in substance single, which belongs to marriage. To make amends, the high contracting parties approached in proper person, a duplication sanctioned by the practice of the oldest masters in their historical pictures. It took a brace of Cupids, with a halter, to overcome the "sweet reluctant delay" of the Bride, and make her keep pace with the procession. She was absorbed, like a nun, in her veil; tears, too, she dropped, large as sixpences, in her path; but her attendant bridesmaid put on such a coquettish look, and tripped along so airily, that it cured all suspicion of heart-ache in such maiden showers. The Bridegroom, dressed for the Honeymoon, was ushered by Hymen, a little link-boy; and the imp used the same importunity for his dues. The next was a motley crew. For nuptial ode or Carmen, there walked two carters, or draymen, with their whips; a leash of footmen in livery indicated Domestic Habits; and Domestic Comfort was personated by an ambulating advertiser of "Hot Dinners every Day.”

I forget whether the Bride's character preceded or followed her, — but it was a lottery placard, and blazoned her as One of Ten Thousand. The parents of both families had a quiet smile on their faces, hinting that their enjoyment was of a retrospective cast; and as for the six sisters of the bride, they would have wept with her, but that six young gallants came after them. The friends of the family were Quakers, and seemed to partake of the happiness of the occasion in a very quiet and quaker-like way. I ought to mention that a band of harmonious sweet music preceded the Happy Pair. There was none came after, , the veteran, Townsend, with his constables, to keep order, making up the rear of the Procession.

THE MAN IN THE HONEYMOON.

A MAD DOG

Is none of my bugbears. Of the bite of dogs, large ones especially, I have a reasonable dread; but as to any participation in the canine frenzy, I am somewhat sceptical. The notion savors of the same fanciful superstition that invested the subjects of Dr. Jenner with a pair of horns. Such was affirmed to be the effect of the vaccine matter, and I shall believe what I have heard of the canine virus, when I see a rabid gentleman, or gentlewoman, with flap-ears, dew-claws, and a brush-tail !

I lend no credit to the imputed effects of a mad dog's saliva. We hear of none such amongst the West Indian Negroes, and yet their condition is always slavery.

I put no faith in the vulgar stories of human beings betaking themselves, through a dog-bite, to dog-habits; and consider the smotherings and drownings that have originated in that fancy as cruel as the murders for witchcraft. Are we, for a few yelpings, to stifle all the disciples of LoyolaJesuit's Bark —or plunge unto death all the convalescents who may take to bark and wine?

As for the Hydrophobia, or loathing of water, I have it mildly myself. My head turns invariably at thin, washy potations. With a dog, indeed, the case is different: he is a water-drinker; and when he takes to grape-juice, or the stronger cordials, may be dangerous. But I have never seen one with a bottle except at his tail.

There are other dogs who are born to haunt the liquid element, to dive and swim; and for such to shun the lake or the pond would look suspicious. A Newfoundlander, standing up from a shower at a door-way, or a Spaniel with a parapluie, might be innocently destroyed. But when does such a cur occur?

There are persons, however, who lecture on Hydrophobia very dogmatically. It is one of their maggots, that if a puppy be not wormed, he is apt to go rabid. As if, forsooth, it made so much difference, his merely speaking or not with what Lord Duberly calls his "vermicular tongue." Verily, as