THE SONG OF THE LAST LEAF. Oh! why was I thus left companionless, dreary, To pine on in solitude hopeless, and weary, And sigh o'er bright scenes that for ever have flown. nations, the opprobrium of civilization, and the disgrace of Christianity. All power founded upon the sword must be maintained by the sword. As lie is built up upon lie, so is conquest upon conquest, till detection in the one case and defeat in the other, brings the whole deformed edifice crushing in ruin upon its creators. Egypt, Syria, Persia, Oh! how sweet was the Spring-time, when sunbeams were dancing, Greece, Rome, once all-powerful, where are they now? Oh how gay was the Summer, when flowers were springing, Uplifting their heads all bespangled with dew, While from bosoms of softness their perfumes were flinging, And the breeze as it swept through their bells, meekly bending, But the Spring and the Summer passed laughing before us, I gazed on them falling, with sorrowful anguish, Oh! how hard 'tis to live, when we live but to languish Farewell to the Winter,-too long have I tarried In the grave of my kindred-soon-soon I shall be ! It ceased, on an eddying gust it was carried, And thus died with song "The last leaf of the tree." RICHARD ROWLEY. Notices of New Works. National Evils and Practical Remedies. (Concluded from page 174.) The fourth great evil mentioned, is Commercial Monopolies instead of Free Trade. Politics do not lie within our sphere of action. We are apart from, and clear of the turmoil and contests of parties. Free trade has its thousands of earnest advocates, while protection is yet the creed of thousands more. With that we have nothing to do, and will content ourselves with quoting Mr. Buckingham's argument, to shew that nature meant different nations to exchange with each other. They, in their decay, all testify to the fact, that power founded upon force is never permanent, and that the curses and ruin of war ever recoil upon the war makers. But, (says Mr. Buckingham) if these do not speak in language sufficiently intelligible to be understood, of the emptiness of glory snd the waste of war, let the three living nations of England, France, and America-all now or recently engaged in scenes of conquest and subjugation-answer. England, if she speak the truth, will say, that her eight hundred millions of public debt, the interest of which crushes her labouring population to the earth by the taxes necessary to discharge it, is the price which she has paid for conquests that never enriched her, and for battles in which she has never yet gained a continent, or an island, a plantation, or territory, that has not cost more than it was worth, and the maintenance of which, when won, has not been an incumbrance on her natural resources. And France, if she would speak truly, might point to Algeria as an example of how much blood and treasure may be wasted in vain; while the conquest of Mexico by America, was calculated to extend her weakness, increase her debt, and risk disunion, rather than add to her prosperity or increase her strength. And yet we go on, in the face of all these facts, which history teaches us, as if they had never happened, to speak of war as a noble occupation-to give to warriors more honour than to any other class of citizens-to dress and decorate the slayers and destroyers of their fellow-men in the costliest robes and adornments, and to idolize them while living, and when dead, as if they were the saviours and benefactors of mankind. Then there is the waste of preparations for war in time of peace, and the only remedy for this is, as Mr. Buckingham tells us, a "truly Holy Alliance"-a Congress, where each nation should have its representative, and whose decision in all national disputes should be binding. The "good time" when this philanthropic dream shall be a happy reality is assuredly "coming," but as yet we are afraid that neither rulers nor people are, with all our boasted civilization, sufficiently enlightened to permit the realization of the idea. Before that can happen, the strong must consent to give up their pernicious vantage ground of power, and stand with the weak upon the common platform of equal right and justice. The sixth great evil to which Mr. Buckingham alludes, is Competition, or Rivalry and Opposition, instead of Union and Co-operation. This is to us the great and monster evil which is at the bottom of almost all societarian evils. The advocates of our present system assume the whole matter in dispute by telling us that " 'Competition is a law of human nature." But we think that they talk of laws, while they do not take sufficient care to analyze and discriminate between laws and tendencies. Under varying conditions, the same law produces not only different but very dissimilar tenden It is a remarkable fact, that the very conformation of the surface cies. Thus an object placed exactly on its centre of graof our globe seems specially formed for this interchange. If the whole crust of the earth had beeu land, the difficulties and expense of transit between distant countries, as France and China, for instance, would have been immense. But seven-tenths of the surface of the globe are covered with water, that fluid highway of nations, which affords the easiest, speediest, safest, and least costly mode of transit for all commodities of trade, from one region to another, and which highway all may now freely use. There was a time, indeed, when England arrogated to herself the supreme dominion of the sea, as France, in a similar spirit of delusion, once aimed at universal empire by land. But both these dreams of ambition have been dissipated by increased knowledge and a clearer sense of justice among mankind. It is happily not within the power of any nation to monopolize the ocean, and it never will be. The track of every ship, along her fluid path, is closed up again as soon as she has ploughed the furrow with her keel. No fortifications can be erected there, as around Paris or Portsmouth, nor barriers established, nor outposts occupied by any nation to the exclusion of any other. The raging tempest would scatter them in its fury, and the silent calm would smile on them with pity and disdain. The fifth great evil is War-war the homicide-war the widow-maker-war the orphan producer-war the tax breeder-war the hero creator-war the incubus of vity, has a tendency under the law of gravitation to remain steady, divert it a fraction of an inch on either side, and the same law produces a tendency to fall. A natural law is a principle unchangeable and immutable-a tendency is the mere expression of a law under certain conditions, and varies as the circumstances under which it is produced vary. So that when it is broadly asserted that competition is a law of human nature, we should require to be shown that it is not a mere tendency. Again, we are every day told that "Competition is the bond which holds society together." This too we think a bare assertion, and would rather believe that society has held together, not in consequence of, but in spite of competi tion. All analogy impels us to this conclusion, for competition implies separation, while co-operation implies union, and which of the two is more likely to bind society together, is so apparent, as not to need the pointing out. It is to the principle of combination that we Owe our railroads our docks and canals-our steam fleets and all the really great things (too great for competitive As a proof of the safety and profit of such investments, two individual effort) which render the first half of the nine-instances may be given. One is the manufacturing establishmenta of Lowell, in the United States of America, the best conducted, teenth century glorious. Competition is the chaos of and occupied by the happiest labouring population in the world, labour-combination its order, and it is to order and not as superior in their condition to the working classes of Manchester to chaos, that mankind must look for the elements of and Lyons, as the best paid English mechanics are to the worst paid Irish peasants, and yielding an average profit of fifteen per power. We have left but short space for the extracts cent. to the capitalists who formed these establishments. The from Mr. Buckingham's excellent and instructive other is the Irish Waste Land Improvement Association, by which about 20,000 acres of wholly unproductive land have been chapter. made fertile by labour, giving full employment and comfortable subsistence to more than 2,000 persons, most of whom entered on their labours without money, and all of whom have now some of their surplus earnings laid by; while the capitalists who assisted them in their first outlay, have realized seven or eight per cent. of profit. It must strike the most unobservant, on reflection, that there are now engaged in every trade and profession a much larger number of persons than can obtain, by their labour, a fair remunerative reward; the consequence of which is, that each underbids the other in his claims to support or employment, by which means wages and profits are reduced to their lowest possible minimum; and even at this minimun many remain still unemployed, while thousands are driven to labour for the smallest pittance on which human life can be sustained, with no surplus whatever for sickness or old age-with none for instruction, comfort, recreation, or enjoyment. It is the common sense and feeling of the injustice of this state of things, which has led, in England, France, and America, to the formation of Trades' Unions, to the establishment of Co-operative Societies, to the preaching the doctrines of Communism and Association, in various forms; to the outbreaks of the Luddites and Chartists in England; to the insurrections of the workmen in Belgium and France; to the resistance to the pay ment of rent and taxes in America :-the labouring classes, in all these countries, feeling that they have not their due share in the enjoyments even of the wealth which their own labour produces; and that it is monstrous injustice, which no laws, either human or divine, could authorize or sanction, that while the labour of their hands and the sweat of their brow produces enormous wealth for others, they should themselves be kept down in the lowest stage of indigence and want. Again, as to the benefits our labouring classes receive from competition We are thus, in England, exporting to the extent of many millions annually, for the supply of other nations, every species and kind of article that the labour and ingenuity of our artisans produce, and have all our warehouses and shops overcharged with immense stocks of each; while, at the same time, thousands of our own countrymen are but half-fed, wretchedly clothed, miserably lodged, wholly uninstructed, and not enjoying so much actual happiness as the Hottentots of Africa, the Indians of America, or the savages of New Zealand; for all these have abundance of food, and sufliciency of raiment and shelter for the climates they dwell in, with an entire freedom from that incessant toil, confined atmosphere, and never-ending care and apprehension for the future, which, more than even present toil, breaks down the forms and spirits of our labouring population, and causes them to degenerate, by want and care combined, physically, mentally, and morally, and to give birth to offspring, for whom there seems no better or brighter hopes than for themselves. "All this," says Mr. Buckingham, "demands a remedy," and he demands not co-operation by the poor,"forthat without some wealth to begin with is impossible," but for them, and for this purpose he would invoke the aid of the legislature. He asks for shortened hours of toil, and a larger share of their produce for the poor,-Parliament has, by the Factory Act, shortened and defined hours of labour, and probably that principle will be further extended in action;-how more fairly to distribute produce is another question. Mr. Buckingham's device is, in principle, the same as that long ago propounded by Fourier; viz., to limit, by legislative enactment, the profits of Joint-stock, or associated bodies to 8 or 10 per cent. upon the capital, and in addition to the wages of labour, to divide the residue of profits among the labourers, so as to give all a tangible interest in the common prosperity. All this is just in principle and most desirable in practice, but in a commercial and competitive community, Government has neither the will nor the power to effect such changes. We would rather rest upon the power of the people to work out their own salvation, and with habits of prudence, forethought, and above all, temperance, they can do so. We would trust rather to feeling than to law, and would more implicitly rely upon a principle, graven by sound education upon the hearts of the masses, than to all the laws ever placed upon the statute book. By a fair union of capital and labour, the waste lands of England and Ireland might be made to yield not only employment, but competence to all who are now compulsorily idle. Mr. Buckingham is fully sensible of this when he says The seventh great evil is the helpless and hopeless condition of the unfortunate. How hopeless and how helpless, no man who moves about the world with his eyes open, need be told. On this point Mr. Buckingham writes thus eloquently- It is a matter of wonder and astonishment that the existing state of things has endured so long. In countries abounding and superabounding with wealth of every kind, thousands are suffering from hunger, nakedness, and want; in countries blessed with the highest degree of intelligence, and the means of communicating it to all, thousands are suffering for crimes resulting from their ignorance. In countries proverbial for the honour of their men and the chastity of their women, thieves and prostitutes abound in every town. In countries vaunting of their benevolence and piety, thousands are left unheeded in the depths of misery and immorality In countries complaining of the difficulty of employing their capital, thousands of able-bodied men are seeking employment, and unable to find it, reduced by that "necessity which knows no law," to borrow, beg, steal, or lie down and starve in the midst of wealth and abundance! The true remedy for this, as also for that other great evil-the conflict which every man finds going on between his sense of justice and charity, and his desire for individual gain-in short, between his duty and his interest, is a system of co-operation, which would impose on each his fair share of work, and deny to none the fair share of that abundance, which general industry could not fail to create. The second part of the work treats of a "Model Town and Associated Community," and, as a preliminary inquiry, Mr. Buckingham inquires as to the possibility of systematic association. He shows how the health and serenity of mind of all classes are destroyed, their means are limited, and labour, to an injurious extent, is imposed upon all who work by our present system, the sole object of which is to gain wealth, and which blindly defeats its own end. Ask the noble what has mortgaged his estates and made him only the nominal owner of his princely domains? If he answers truly, he will say, competition in pomp, ostentation, luxury, and extravagance. Ask the prince-merchant what it is that every now and then tasks all his energies to avoid bankruptcy? He must say, competition with rivals either foreign or domestic. Ask the manufacturer how it is that he grumbles at a ten hours' bill, and stints his work people to the lowest farthing? He will reply by pointing to competition, which cuts down prices. Ask the tradesman what it is that placards our streets with "extensive failures," and "ruinous sacrifices," and you will hear that it is competition to sell even at a loss. Ask the labourer what cuts down the reward of his toil, and still the answer is, competition of man striving for employment with man. For a people to be good, happy, contented, and healthy, amid such a stormy battle for very existence, is as utterly impossible, as that we should have grapes from fig-trees, and real progressive improvement under such conditions is but the vision of a dream, the shadow of a shade. There is the root of that covetousness, which makes strife and enmity the mental atmosphere in which we live. And from this too proceeds that inconsistency between the theory of Christianity which we profess, and the course of life which we practice; and which, with all our lip-service and knee-worship, makes us contrast but poorly with the very infidels whom we affect to despise. Association, if practicable, would afford an anti dote. But then comes the question, is it possible? The general opinion no doubt is, that it is impossible; and the Government or the legislature would, to a certainty, scout the notion as a dream of a socialist or communist visionary. But Mr. Buckingham truly says Yet the Government find no difficulty in organizing a fleet and an army, with such ease and in such perfection, that every move ment of each is regulated at the Admiralty and the Horse Guards; and if you desire to obtain any information about any one individual in either of these vast bodies, you have only to apply to the Admiralty or the War Office, and they will give you his name, age, height, complexion, the colour of his eyes, the peculiarities of his countenance, and tell you in what ship or regiment he is, where stationed, in what company, what amount of pay is due to him, and every other particular. The Government can organize a large army of Custom-House and Excise Officers, coast-guard, tax-gatherers, and police, with a discipline so perfect, that they will find out every man, and ascertain his income, and even his political opinions, if desired. They can organize labour to build useless ships of war, and extravagant royal yachts, to kill oxen and hogs, prepare salt-beef and pork, and even bake biscuits in their own ovens, for the fleets at Plymouth and Portsmouth, besides making ropes, sails, and blocks by machinery, and every other thing needed for their naval arsenals. They can cast cannon and carnon-balls, bombs, and shells, make gunpowder, and Congreve rockets, and store up at the Tower 100,000 stand of arms, muskets, bayonets, pistols, spears, and tomahawks, to shed the blood and take the lives of our enemies when needed. They can swear in nearly the whole male population of London as special constables, to resist an apprehended insurrection, and marshal every division in its most appropriate place, enrolling old men of seventy, and young boys of fifteen for this purpose. healthily constructed. And amid all these, those who In It would be of great importance if, in every large establishment, the mode of payment could be so arranged, that every person employed should derive advantage from the success of the whole; and that the profits of each individual should advance, as the factory itself produced profit, without the necessity of making any change in the wages. Mr. John Stuart Mill remarks The objection ordinarily made to a system of community of property and equal distribution of produce-" that each person would be incessantly occupied in evading his share of the work "-is, I think, in general, considerably over-stated. There is a kind of work-that of fighting-which is never conducted under any other than the co-operative system: and neither in a rude nor in a civilized society, has the supposed difficulty been experienced. Education and the current of opinion having adapted themselves to the exigency, the sense of honour, and the fear of shame, have, as yet, been found to operate with sufficient strength: and common sentiment has sanctioned the enforcement, by adequate penalties, upon those certainly not deficient in rigidity. The same sanctions would not fail to attach themselves to the operations of industry, and to secure, as, indeed, they are found to do in the Moravian and standard of duty. similar establishments, a tolerable adherence to the prescribed And we perfectly agree with Mr. Charles Bray, of Coventry, that, pipe-clay him into a good soldier, so, that at the word of command, If Government can take the raw recruit, and thump, drill, and he will march against an enemy, even to the cannon's mouth, surely it might drill and march an army against the greatest of all enemies,—want. They can do all these things in the way of "organization and association of labour; but, alas, they cannot (as they say,) or they will not (which is perhaps nearer the truth), undertake any organization and association of labour, to employ the unemployed portion of the population, and place in their own hands the means of not merely earning their own livelihood, but adding largely to the health, wealth, morality, and happiness of the whole nation. The old proverb says truly, "Where there's a will, there's a way;" and the absence of the will, seems, in this instance, the only solution of the problem, why the way has never yet been found, and why it is deemed, by the Government at least, to be beyond the power of discovery. To take a first step in the right direction, Mr. Buck-not sufficiently influenced by other motives, of rules of discipline ingham proposes the formation of a Company, the shares to range from a minimum of £20 upwards. The first step to be the purchase of 10,000 acres of land (that is a mile square). On this is to be built a town, called Victoria, of which a handsome print and a ground plan accompany the work. This town is to be inhabited by shareholders only, and by them all kinds of manufacturing operations are to be carried on. The hours of labour are to be fixed -labour itself is by its division and variety to be made attractive. Spirits and weapons of war are to be excluded. The profits of capital and the reward of toil are to be equitably adjusted; universal education is to be provided for ; and the means of instruction and amusement to be free and abundant for all. In short it is to be an associated community, supplying all its wants and accumulating wealth by the fair union of capital and labour. The cost of such a town, Mr. Buckingham estimates at four millions, not half what has been expended on many railways; and in a commercial point of view, such a speculation promises to be far more profitable than those undertakings, which have engulphed so many in utter ruin. Mr. Buckingham thinks, and it appears to us correctly, that after all expenses, a revenue of 25 per cent. would be secured-10 per cent. to be appropriated to capital, 10 per cent. to labour, and 5 per cent. for a reserve fundbeside the vast indirect saving, resulting from the decrease of crime and the increase of health, under proper social and sanatory arrangements. For a description of the proposed town, we do not find any passage sufficiently brief The remainder of the work is occupied by able and to quote, and we must therefore refer those who are in- interesting essays on "Financial Reform" advocating terested (and who should not be) to the work itself; but direct taxation on the progressive or graduated systemthis we may say, that, if realized, it will exceed in beauty," Emigration," shewing how labour and capital may be convenience, and healthfulness, all that ancient or modern advantageously and profitably employed in our vast colovisions have pictured. There are to be wide open streets, nial possessions-"Ireland," and "The necessity for a new squares, fountains, lawns, covered arcades, dining-halls, Reform Bill," pointing out those political reforms, to the lecture-rooms, places of worship, libraries, museums, attainment of which the popular mind is directing itself. music-halls, workshops, storehouses, and dwellings of all All moot questions of vast importance, which we must grades systematically arranged, conveniently situated, and leave to the arbitration of professedly political journalists. But better than all these opinions, Mr. Buckingham quotes the actual facts of the Lowell factories in America, where may be seen a happy, contented, manufacturing population, thriving by regulated industry; and the examples of the Rappites, Shakers, and Mormons, and the German Community at Zoar, whose members by associated labour, without wearying toil, have, according to high authorities, after providing abundantly for the wants of all, amassed wealth more than sufficient for their needs, and almost beyond their desires and power of disposal. If this can be done by a few comparatively ignorant men, surely it is within the reach of England, with all her resources, wealth, science, skill, industry, and manufacturing ingenuity. It is not only possible, but the only possible peaceful solution of the deadly competitive struggle between the wealth and the want, the abounding capital and the superabundant labour of modern civilization. We have devoted some space to this work, because it appears to us to be one of much importance. There is little in it that is absolutely new, but the best points of ultra writers have been carefully culled and lucidly combined. There is little to offend the feelings of society, and much with which all the good must sympathize. As a composition, it shows that much thought has been expended upon its preparation, but that it has been rapidly and hurriedly executed. We might wish it to have been more concisely and tersely written in a smaller space, for the public at large will not read large books; but, on the whole, we must put upon it the stamp of our approval, as a work written with an earnest purpose, for a useful end. We hope that it will be extensively studied, and that Mr. Buckingham may have an opportunity of fairly launching his project, as a hopeful means of solving those great questions, with which the heart of humanity is throbbing, and upon a settlement of which really depends the prosperity, happiness, and progressive improvement of all nations. THE ROSE, THE THISTLE, AND THE SHAMROCK-"Give me, thy fragrance lovely Rose, ROSE "On me, this fragrance heaven bestows, ADVICE TO THE LADIES. your time, in defiance of a saying-current only among "Think'st thou existence doth depend on time? Bear in mind that, as Dr. Johnson well observes: "many of our hours are lost in a rotation of petty cares, in a constant recurrence of the same employments." That you are, by nature, "noble in reason and infinite in faculties;" that—but I will introduce you to Mrs. Le Grand, late Miss Pinchbeck, an excellent specimen of frivolity. Mrs. Le Grand, late Miss Pinchbeck, then, is a great correspondent, that is, every afternoon she unlocks her ladies' rose-wood writing-desk, and papeterie, which latter contains her envelopes and fancy note-paper, and dashes off some half-dozen vapid notes, containing less practical utility, perhaps, than Solomon's (in the "Stranger")" foreign correspondence," and every morning the business-like knock of the postman announces the arrival of some responsive echoes wafted to her, crossed in the writing, and sealed with motto wafers. She calls her husband variously "hubby," "dear old crosspatch," and "old man;" says “bless you," unfailingly,-if she sneezes; carries a Letts' diary, in which she makes ostentatious memoranda, probably having in it for subject-matter, followers, and unfair joints; calls any hurry she may happen to be in a "scuffle" loses her housewifely keys, and then is "in tribulation about them ;" and knows only two words of French, which she consequently wears to death: "distingué," and "distrait." She is no reader, indeed, she wonders how any lady can go and see "Othello;" she parades a superstitious dread of ill-luck on a Friday; she will apostrophize a singed moth for five minutes together, in your presence; will speak of "styles of meat," of a cheesemonger's "shining" in bacon, of the weather as "muggy," and when disposed to be jocular, aims at it by using such exaggerating phrases as "exchequer," or "finances," to express a purse or money; "breaking a charter," for making an exception, and the like. In fine, she will go on with the same monotonous note, as the travelling clockman announces his passing by sounding-day after day; like, as after they have "cast on," "knitted," and "purled" ten or twelve rows, the votaries of crotchet and embroidery will commence again, so, ten or twelve hours of one day of her life and employment of it, typifies the whole. May I not write a brief moral under this picture. I have no high-flown views about woman's mission to impart. I was passed the other evening by two women, one covered about the bonnet and cloak with small dust-fall, followed at a little distance by two men, one of whom had At all events, I shall try the experiment through the doubtless been amusing himself by pitching handsful of medium of passionless foolscap and ink, of making you gravel after them. I should not have noticed this, but acquainted with some of my convictions on what I may that, just as they passed me, one of the women said, in call lady-vices, illustrated by no highly-finished por-reply to an observation, I had not heard made by one of traitures, but mere outlines of the most prominent characteristics of those of my female friends, who may serve to show my meaning. And, if you please, I shall dispense with the rules of art altogether in my gossip to you, meeting promiscuously (as I am in the habit of doing with Margaret, of whom, more anon-though there is often some art about that) meeting promiscuously, I say, with the topics as they rise. And, first, my fair-no anything? Is it fitting that you should while away readers, I would lay great stress on your not being frivolous; and this, I would beg of you, not to be, in defiance of those conventional rules that indicate the manufacture of book marks, fly-traps with yellow paper, canary birds insida, porte monnaies, anti-macassars, Joseph's-coat-like patch-work table-covers, and jugshaped Berlin wool pence-pouches, as the fit disposal of FROM causes I need not now stop to trace, those persons on whom the ladies liberally shower the epithets of killjoy, square-toes, or old quiz, have hitherto, for the most part, had it all their own way in the reading of "lectures" and delivering of "preachments" to our fair countrywomen. May not I-seeing from a point of view quite different to theirs-jot down some notions of mine on so important a subject? I have never heard that the alphabet was less easily learnt from ginger-bread letters; that draughts of medicine were rendered less efficacious by being flavoured with peppermint, garnished with pink paper, and dispensed by an assistant possessed of good teeth, and valanced with those "dear whiskers;" nor can I believe that my observations, and fault-finding I may add, will be the less note-worthy for their writer's being a young bachelor, with not the faintest intention of ever being an old one; but keeping at the bottom of his Pandora's box of daily vexations, the hope of matrimony. the men, "We were not made to throw stones at, however." Very well, I adopt your sentiment, madam, that woman's vocation is not to have stones thrown at it, nor is it either to be put in a glass-case and looked at like a wax flower-like Mrs. Le Grand. Should you have "great taste in dress," but nothing besides, no genuine sympathies-no degree of information-no average intelligence your time in conversation, well termed small-talk, that leads to no result-elicits no new fact, and could possibly have no Q. E. D. written at the end of it? I at all events, will launch Burchell's (in the Vicar of Wakefield) expressive criticism, "Fudge," at you for it. I, at all events, will assert that the cares of house-keeping, whether shared by a family of daughters, or discharged single-handed, are not so engrossing; but that you, who are engaged in no regular occupation, have the amplest leisure for laying in a stock of that learning, which is justly pronounced better than houses and lands. Mrs. Bell Wether too is a lady who I hope will not include you among her disciples. She is a great stickler for conventionalities ("I should like to do what is proper, of course," in her own words), tells you, that no fashionable person would be seen in town after August 12th; that the Queen has taken her physician with her on her tour; or that a new ladies' ear-trumpet has been invented, shaped like a flower. The peerage and baronetage supplies her idea of the sublime and beautiful (a Burke wrote a book on each); indeed, she has an implicit respect for the great, in the abstract, and will prose half an hour together on what relationship my Lord Tom Noddy bears to my Lady Noodlehead, and whose title he will succeed to: she would lose anything rather than caste; and over her tea, which she makes from a tea-urn, she will affect a very finical horror of low neighbourhoods and humble people. Poor quivering shirt-hand in White's rents, ragged hawker in Brown's Lane, she knows you not! And yet, tell her of a shipwreck in the other hemisphere, read to her of a conflagration leagues away, and she will show such "a dejected 'haviour of the visage, together with all forms, modes, shows of grief," as makes me recall a phrase in the cheap outfitters' advertisements, "mourning to any extent at five minutes notice." But let me now, however, turn to a more congenial subject; let me leave the Le Grands and Bell Wethers (polished grates may I call them, compared with stoves glowing with a ruddy, crackling fire), let me leave these, and all who in their anxiety to be lady-like forget to be womanly, and turn to that Joan of whom I confess myself to be the Darby, that certain party who has not the least idea of high life-Margaret. Mind, I by no means desire to affirm that Margaret is the N. of -, to whom I am irrevocably willed to be the M. of No, if it were in that certain state, I should hardly last week have been exacting the customary tribute, which had cost me a three minutes' chase and all my breath, from a very pretty girl in pink, at kiss in the ring, or reassuring her engaging terror, while what was billed as "a sanguine display of fireworks was going on, hard by: or at a still later period have, Petrarch-like, dogged a very Laura of charmers in a slate-coloured bonnet, and a black silk visite, a full two miles out of my way, until, indeed, her abruptly stopping to exchange salutations with a rival in a shooting-coat and garden-hat at the corner of a street, obliged my simultaneous disappearance down an opposite one. Oh no, we are not engaged, though when, as she sews a button on for me, she asks what we men would do without her sex I cannot help beginning to think. I shall never be able to do without her: though, when I am sufficiently happy to be holding skeins for her to reel, and she calls all my fingers thumbs in such a bewitching way, that I do sometimes catch myself glancing at the unringed fourth finger of her left hand; and though, often, when roused by some remark of hers from a rapt contemplation of her, I begin to wonder whether this may not be the private interview preparatory to a final settlement, mentioned in matrimonial advertise ments. I will attempt a faint outline of her appearance :-Ivory shoulders, pearly teeth, ruby lips, ebon hair, these are some of the gifts, which fused into one person, make her "a real fortune to a husband," but could I daguerreotype the "feminine assault" of her smile when she corrects a trifling misstatement with, no-I tell a story -or tells your and her humble servant of wet nights, that he will "go home by water, then,"-you-why you too, perhaps, would be wanting to launch into the honourable estate of matrimony with so winsome a steersmate. And as I consider Margaret as coming near enough to womanly perfection for my purpose, I shall just finish this paper with her description. She works for her living with her hands, which may excuse her fondness for light reading in leisure hours; she can sympathize with that dashing h ayman, Claude Duval, with that preux chevalier Valancourt, and in a word, generally with that numerous class of travel-stained pedestrians, who towards the close of a wet day in the spring of the year and at the opening of many a dry novel I call to | mind, are continually arriving at romantic road-side inns. (I know that by many this same novel reading is regarded as only an intellectual dram-drinking. But is not this preferable to the intellectual total abstinence so rigidly observed by Mrs. Le Grand, and many?) In ber own humble phrase, she is not dull. I say she has a decided talent at inaking lemon cheesecakes, whips, &c.: she is what is called a good market-woman; she is very fond of her needle, and mending (her head, I promise you, does not go Berlin-wool gathering); she is the only woman I believe in, for sewing on buttons strong; and lastly, she has that excellent quality of being a good listener, seldom speaking but when she has something to say. My dear girls, I have led you with a strangely vagrant step, it is true, over a page of my crotchets on that important topic, the ladies and matrimony. I have drawn on life, not fancy, for my sketches and observations, may I conclude by hoping that such A. B. C. hints, as it was in my power to give, may not be useless to you, and by adding that I may, perhaps, at no very distant period, write to you in a different capacity than that of a young bachelor. LOQUACITY AND RESERVE. The ideas of a great talker differ very much from those of the reserved man-the former being superficial and comparatively valueless, while the latter (generally vented in proverbs) are truthful, impressive, and profound. The language of the former skips along as easily and gracefully as the greyhound, while, on the contrary, that of the latter proceeds slowly, clumsily, and heavily onwards, like the ponderous and unwieldy elephant. He finds it difficult to give utterance to his thoughts, which rush forward to the portal of his month in such crowds, that they in fact block it up. Whenever you meet with a man of this kind, give him time, and do not mistake his tedious tardiness for ignorance or imbecility of mind. In nine cases out of ten he has lived in solitude, and because he has not been habituated to conversation, his tongue grows so rusty that, when he does venture into society, no one will wait till he is drawn out, and therefore his reserve continues to increase. Do not contemptuously turn your back upon him, but listen, and he will, in all likelihood, repay your civility with interest. The eagle is a solitary bird, and his voice may be harsh, but still he is an eagle nevertheless. Do not imagine that he is dead or asleep, but be more attentive to nature. The gun is silent until its note is one of triumph; the tiger's fatal spring and terrific roar are simultaneous; the volcano is silent before an eruption; and all nature seems dead before the tornado and the earthquake. Nature employs silence to concentrate her energies, that the effect may be more appalling and sublime. As iron, by long exposure to the action of fresh water, has a rusty exterior, but is inwardly improved in quality, so the rust of the reserved man is only superficial, while his ideas, over which the stream of time has passed, are susceptible of a higher polish, and sink more forcibly into the mind of his hearer. The diamond is a rough, dull stone, when first brought from its rocky bed, yet it receives from the lapidary a brilliancy, almost capable of dispelling the gloom of night. |