your correspondents, shall amply fulfil all my engage

ments.

I am,

Your guide, guardian and friend,

AZRAEL.

DEAR MIC,

I am one of that class, who are invidiously termed Old Bachelors. By the by however, I have for sometime been just on the point of proposing myself to a fair lady. There is but one thing that prevents Florella from being precisely what I wish, and this is that she is in the habit of rising late in the morning. I beg of you not to call me an odd fellow for this singular notion, before you give me a short hearing. It is, I know, in the polite world deemed a very unfashionable thing for a young lady to be up betimes, that she may assist in putting the house in order and in preparing the morning repast. But for myself I have arrived at such an age, that I have become divested of some of the lofty romantic views of youth, and therefore am on the lookout for moderate substantial comfort, rather than for imaginary ecstacy. The last cannot be attained here below under any circumstances; while the former is enjoyed by many in every walk of life. To this end scarcely any thing is more conducive than punctuality and systematic regularity in conducting our matters. But these can never exist in a family, where the female who presides over its concerns, is to be found asleep, when she should be up and be actively engaged in arranging her household affairs, that the business of the day may be both commenced and concluded in good season. The harrassing perplexity, arising from such-shall I venture to call it-laziness, is easier felt than described, as all husbands jaded in this way very well know. Like what is said of poverty; it, in the end, usually causes love to jump out of the window, that it may make its escape from their dwelling. Thus you have the reasons for my delay; and are they not substantial? What say you?

Your well wisher,

SIMON LOOKOUT.

We must say Simon's remarks teem with plain good sense. Though he may not be deeply read in the sentimental works of the day, nor be much acquainted with the more fashionable circles; he is certainly no ignoramus in the every day concerns of domestic life. We do not see but Simon and Florella must continue to be two, if she does not, in the desirable particular, mend her ways. He is certainly reasonable in his request, and we hope this hint will be readily attended to, that the matter may speedily be brought to a happy issue. For ourselves we cannot forbear adding that we think the quality upon which he insists, though insignificant in itself, is still in its consequences of prime importance-many times more valuable than all your accomplishments and elegancies--your skill in drawing, your proficiency in music, your smattering of the French, and a thousand such like trifles.

We might go on to remark on the peculiar importance of regularly rising early, where family-worship is wished to be maintained. We might also dwell on the value of this kind of regimen, in preserving and confirming the health. But we leave these considerations to some future occasion, and conclude for the present by expressing a hope, that such of our fair readers as have no objections to making themselves acceptable to the active and promising among the other sex, will remember Florella's example.

To the Editors of the Microscope.

GENTLEMEN,

Permit me to take an early opportunity to tender you my sincere thanks for the pleasure and satisfaction I have received from perusing your three first numbers. I have been particularly gratified by your independence in daring so far to burst the shackles of precedence, as to introduce English mottos. You have indeed used one Latin phrase in your titlepage, but this is perfectly excusable, being, as a learned friend Informs me, pat to your purpose. Nothing strikes the mind. with more pleasure than an appropriate and intelligible motto:

it serves, like a bright gem, to set off and give lustre to all that follows. On the other hand, nothing is more vexatious and provoking to a plain English reader, like myself, than to be obliged to start with three or four lines she does not understand, and then, every few sentences, to be compelled to fall pellmell upon a Latin or Greek quotation.

This practice was very pardonable in the writers of the two or three last centuries. The works of the great masters of ancient learning, having been for ages locked up within the walls of the cloister, had at the beginning of this era just burst forth upon an astonished and admiring world. Every author then very naturally wished to enrich his own pages by something drawn from these treasures. Few English writers of standard merit had as yet appeared, and those that wrote at that day, if they alluded at all to the sentiments of others, were necessitated to quote the ancients.

At the present time, however, our own literature has arrived at such a state of cultivation, and so many well-written volumes upon almost every subject have issued from the press, that there is scarcely, I am told, an important sentiment in any ancient author, that is not to be found expressed with equal elegance in some English classic. But notwithstanding this, each new writer seems determined to tread exactly in the footsteps of those who have gone before him. And such is the servility and classical pedantry of some that they seem absolutely to lug in the language of antiquity on all occasions, and for every purpose, and that too even when they well know that it is entirely unintelligible to most of their readers. How strikingly is one, in such cases, reminded of those words of the inimitable delinea tor of the human character: "He has been at a great feast of languages, and stolen all the scraps." Your friend and well wisher,

RUTH HOMESPUN.

TO CORRESPONDENTS.-Lucy and Honoria shall have a place: We feel obliged to Leuwenhoek, jr. for the results of his acute vision: It would give us much pleasure to hear from him again. The request of S. cannot, we fear, be complied with.

to lay it before our readers :

To the Editors of the Microscope.

GENTLEMEN, I have the honour to belong to the class of community, usually styled Dandies. This was originally a name of reproach; but no matter for that: we are not particular about what we are called, if folks will only keep their hands off our clothes, and let us peaceably follow our own noses, wherever they may chance to lead us. It gave us great satisfaction to find in your first number, so much of the milk of human kindness; hence you learn the motive to this epistle. We cannot doubt that you will be interested with a slight sketch of the great principles of our conduct and the leading traits of our character.

You must understand then that humility, or a modest estimate of our own merits, lies at the foundation of all our actions. It is indeed the clue to the whole mystery, as you will soon perceive. That every man should in some way be busily employed, in order to prevent Satan from using his cranium as a workshop, and that every one should endeavour to turn his measure of talents, however small, to some good purpose, we hold to be self-evident propositions. We say " however small" his talents are, for certainly a wide difference exists

among men in this respect. There is no one characteristic in every thing around us more marked than that of gradation from lower to higher, until you arrive at the last link in the chain of created existence. If you begin at the most shapeless mineral and pass to the most imperfectly organized vegetable body, and then if, after inspecting in succession the different species of this kingdom, you make a transition to the animal world and rise step by step up to man-that tailless paragon of animals, as my Lord Monboddo will have it ;how regular and how evident is the ascent? So also, if you look around you, and compare your fellow-men with each other; how marked is often times the difference, and how much do some surpass others in intellect? To borrow the poet's language:

"Order is Heaven's first law; and this confest,

Some are, and must be, greater than the rest,

More rich, more wise."

Now it is our desire to get into precisely the nich we are, in this world of gradation, designed to fill. Most of us have, in our bosoms as well as in our past lives, mournful evidence that we are not qualified by our abilities for any useful employment, either mercantile, mechanical or agricultural. Nor have we, as we have pretty good reason to know, such talents as would enable us to excel, or even to keep our heads above water, in any of the professions. Since, therefore, we have not the power to instruct, nor benefit mankind; it is our more humble aim to please the fashionable world, intending by all means to include in this phrase ourselves and most of the ladies. To please the last is a particular object, and this is the key to most of our movements.

Inasmuch as it has been said that women are disposed to regard external appearance more than any other qualities, and as they are usually best pleased with what looks most like their dear selves; it is our desire to excel in beauty of person and to resemble the female world, as much as we can, in dress and form. Unyielding nature seeming to detest this metamorphosis, as much as philosophers say she abhors a vacuum ; we have been obliged to call in art to our assistance, and thus