Number Two suggested a spy. Number Three spoke of revenge, as the object. Number Five, elopement with some young lady. Number Six, madness. But Prior Wype argued murder, in the first degree. All were harmonious in suspecting something, and that something was feared to be highly criminal. The postponement of the meeting was ably discussed, and means resorted to whereby the victim should not escape them. Two were placed beneath the windows of Mr. Pim's room; these were armed with clubs. Two in the upper hall, and two at the entrance; while Prior Wype was by turns visiting all, and supplying them with the fortiter in re, by carrying hot toddies, and assuring them of his hearty coöperation in the event of a struggle. The clock clanged again; it was ten. Mr. Pim was napping it, in view of a night's ride. The sentinels were still on guard; but one outside was found dozing upon his post-supposed to be from hot poculents. Mr. Pim sprang up, rubbed his eyes, and looked at his watch, as the musical peal of the clock chimed the hour. Snuffing his candles, and poking the fire, he rang his bell, and was busy stowing away papers, as the valiant Falstaffian committee entered. There was no lack of courtesy on the part of Mr. Pim, but his visitors were very mute, and even Prior Wype showed unmistakable evidences of a mutiny, made courageous by his numerous police. And now, Mr. Pim having seated the committee, stepped aside and opened the meeting. Gentlemen, I dare say I address those who are invested with public power. You are called upon by your friend Mr. Wype, to stand godfather to the secret which is about having its birth. Circumstances render it imperious that I should be brief in my explanations, as I must leave in the mid-night coach, and have arranged accordingly. Gentlemen instigated by humane impulses, and for the mitigation of Mr. Wype's feelings—and, farther, for your own benefit-I have inconvenienced myself much, in allowing myself to be thus publicly discussed. Gentlemen! it would be, and, in fact, is, quite unnecessary for me to appellate myself a modest person - but I am. I have never sought notoriety. I have never accepted office, from the fact, I never had it offered; but presuming it might be, I'll assure you, gentlemen, I should not even then accept, unless it paid well. I premise thus far, to convince you my intentions are generous, without egotism or vanity. I am the son of a poor clergyman, and was educated very strictly.' (Evident sensation, Prior Wype hitching his chair nearer to his righthand man, and whispering.) At the age of eighteen, I left home: on my departure, my father called me into his study, to give me his last benediction and counsel. I well remember his serious aspect, gentlemen, as also his sage advice. To tell you all, would scarcely be proper; but in finishing, he gave me a letter, to be read once a month; and as I seated myself in the coach, he waved his hand to the driver, - and approaching the window, said, low but distinctly: Paul, remember the initials you will find in your letter-M.O.M.O.B.,' and bowing, he withdrew, and I rolled on. I need not say - but will time has gathered that venerable man to his fathers, and he is at rest. But with him was not buried his advice. However far I have strayed from his righteous ways, I have conscientiously clung to the memorable initials, and which now stand upon the book below. It has always created some surprise- and more talk; but this I pass over, knowing human nature is extremely meddlesome highly illustrated in the present case. I have seen it has made Mr. Wype unhappy, who evidently has vaccinated you all with the true virus; and I fear the disease is prevailing much in your village. I am the cause, no doubt, gentlemen; I regret, exceedingly, to be aware of this fact; but it cannot be avoided. Yet there is always a physician at hand, and as I have been the cause, so I can be the cure.' At this interesting juncture, the sound of distant wheels came upon Mr. Pim's ears. He stepped to the door. Sam! is my luggage all ready?' 'Yes, Sah.' 'Gentlemen! I will no longer detain you: M.O.M.O.B., when filled out properly, reads, and emphatically means: Master of my own Business! Gentlemen, good-evening!' There was but one sound heard distinctly, and that emanated from the immense cavern of Sam's jaws. It was, Yah wah! Yah chee! Yah hoo! The horn sounded without, and Mr. Pim, attended to the coach by faithful Sam, closed it against him, Prior Wype, his wise police, and the quiet villager, forever. LINE 8: ON A PICTURE OF LEDA. BY JOHN B. KEAS BEY, M.D. AH! LEDA! frail one, thou art fair : Well might the great immortal Jove, GUY LIVINGSTONE: OR THOROUGH.' Ich habe gelebt und geliebt. In one Volume pp. 487. New-York: HARPER AND BROTHERS, Franklin-Square. YEARS ago we remember having been dreadfully bored with the constantly-recurring question: "Have you read Mr. S -'s Travels?' It was a very pleasant work: and yet it was a sort of conversational aperient, much resorted to by young ladies with a taste for modern light literature. We always answered 'No;' and were thereupon assured that there was a rich treat in store for us.' With great self-denial, we are still reserving this pleasure for some future day. Is it a spirit of perversity that makes us all dislike beforehand a book which every one is praising? or is it not, rather, the conviction that in literature, at least, the judgment of the people is not an infallible criterion of what will suit us? There are books which, having read and highly enjoyed, we have ventured to commend to a friend, only to have the satisfaction of seeing him yawn over this, and swear at that. We once asked an acquaintance to read 'EMERSON's English Traits;' since that he does n't consider our most elaborate and well-considered critical opinion of a book 'worth a bottle of Congress-water.' After many such failures and rebuffs, we prefer to give our readers such an idea of a new book, by quotations from it, as will enable him to judge of it for himself, while we are as well satisfied as ever of the correctness of our critical acumen. The author of 'Guy Livingstone,' who calls himself FRANK CAREw, we take to be an old acquaintance under a new name. The book opens with his entrance into a large English school. GUY LIVINGSTONE is the hero of the school: 'He was about fifteen,' says our author, 'but looked fully a year older, not only from his height, but from a disproportionate length of limb and development of muscle; which ripened, later, into the rarest union of activity and strength I have ever known. When FRANK enters the schoolgrounds Guy notices him, and says to the boys gathering around him: 'Don't bully him more than you can help, fellows.'' This interference in his behalf coming from the 'Count,' as Guy was called, has the effect intended, and FRANK is left unmolested. FRANK and GUY are soon sworn . friends. At the ripe age of seventeen Guy's estimate of the weaker sex, says his biographer, was nearly identical with that formed by the learned lady; who to the question, 'Did she think the virtue of any single one of her sisterhood impregnable?' replied C'est selon.' This opinion, among others of questionable morality, he had 'imbibed sitting at the feet of his evil GAMALIEL,' Sir HENRY FALLOWFIELD. GUY LIVINGSTONE goes up to Oxford at the age of seventeen, and thither, six months afterward, the author follows him. 'Guy's favorite pursuit was 'hunting;' but he threw off the superfluity of his animal energies in all sorts of athletics; in sparring especially, he attained rare excellence; so well known was it, indeed, that he passed his first year without striking a blow in anger, through default of an antagonist, except a chance one or two ex changed in the melée, which is imperative on the fifth of November.' We have the following glimpses of some of CAREW's college-acquaintances; of 'WARRENORE, too good for the men he lived with, a DAVID in our camp of Kedar; a LAUNCELOT in his devotion to womankind; a GALAHAD in purity of thought and purpose. I have never known a man of the world so single-hearted, or a saint with so much savoir vivre.' ' LOVELL, with his frank look and cheery laugh, the model of a stalwart English squirehood; and PETRE, equal to either fortune in reverse or success; calm and impassible as ATHOS, the mousquetaire; regarding money simply as a circulating medium,' ruining himself like a prince. He edified us greatly on one occasion by meeting his justly-offended father with a stern politeness, declining to hold any communication with him by word or letter till he (the sire) could express himself in a more Christian spirit.' 'And true Toм LYNTON, not clever, not even high-bred, but loved by every one for the honestest and kindest heart that ever was the kernel of a rough rind.' At a supper where the fathers of England were being discussed, ' and every one had a stone to throw at his ruling officer, Tom, who, though his own sire was an austere man, could not bear to hear the absent run down, broke in with, 'Well, gentlemen, remember they 're our fellow-creatures, at all events.'' At Oxford GUY LIVINGSTONE rescues his friend CAREW from the hands of the police; an awkward 'fix,' in which accident, not guilt, has placed him. CAREW'hears something pass his cheek like the wind of a ball, and the policeman's grasp on his neck is relaxed all at once;' and he is at liberty. As the heroines of the RADCLIFFE school of romances say: 'I turned to thank my preserver but he was gone.' 'In spite of Peace-Societies, and homilies against the brutal sports of the ring, there is something in a fair stand-up fight, with only the weapons provided by Nature for our self-defence, that enlists the sympathies of every manly Saxon heart;' but for lac of room, we shall refrain from quoting the description of the desperate er counter in which this gallant rescue involved our hero: his antagonist being 'the third best man in England,' and out of which he came victorious — of course. CHARLIE FORRESTER, whose golden rule was the Arabic maxim, Agitel lil Shaitan, 'Hurry is the devil's,' is a prominent character in the book. We allude to him only to show how he made himself famous: 'It was at a pic-nic at Cliefden, CHARLIE was hardly nineteen, and had just joined theth Lancers of Hounslow; he wandered away and got lost |