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Sweet Roger,

I thought I should have deck'd thy bridal bed
And not have strewed thy tomb.

After some controversy, perhaps too obstinately persevered in on my part, the Cornet converted me to cigars. I have said already, that I do not wish to unsettle any man's opinions, and therefore will let those who prefer the pipe, prefer it. I smoked pretty strenuously with him, and after he had been ordered away to Flanders, continued the practice. I moistened always, as is the custom of my country-where scarcely any other spirit is ever used-with whisky. Of that spirit let no one imagine for a moment that I am about to say any thing but what is laudatory. If I did so, I were as ungrateful as unwise-but it is not the spirit to smoke with. I say this emphatically, because I know it to be the case. I am little inclined to dogmatize, but when once I have formed an opinion after careful examination, I uphold it with that firmness which a just regard for one's own character and the interest of truth and honour demand.

Shortly after Silverthorne's departure, business took me to Dublin. Fatal, though delicious visit! On what trifles our fate hangs! I had finished my business, and taken my seat on the outside of the coach to return home, when, as we waited outside the post-office in Sackville-street, I heard a sweet voice say-I hear it yet tingling in my ears, though fifteen

years have elapsed-I heard a sweet voiceI cannot go on. I must lay down the pen

*

*

Excuse this gust of passion-it shall be the last. I heard a sweet though rather loud voice say, "Put the little portmanteau into the boot, and take care to tie the two bandboxes tight on the top, covering them from the rain. You can put the big trunk where you like, and I'll take the cloth bag and two brown paper parcels into the coach. Good bye, Judy. I'll write from Ballinafad as soon as I see the old Buck." I looked down, and my doom was sealed-I was in love

Dead shepherd, now I found thy saw of might
He never loved, who loved not at first sight!

That insiduous passion had entered my bosom for the first time. Is there any one who has not experienced it. If there be, I may envy his freedom from disturbance, but I pity the callousness of heart, and the distortion of feeling, for which he is indebted to it.

Cecilia shall I say, my Cecilia-was hasty in her movements, and rejecting the proffered aid of the guard, she stepped unassisted toward the coach. Her foot slipped in the attempt, and she fell on the flagging. I was smoking on the top when I saw this cruel accident, and without a moment's thought flung from my jaw as fine a Havannah as ever saw the Moro, leaped on the ground and raised her. She was not hurt, but considerably agi

tated. She thanked me with hasty accents, and looked on me with a glance, which even still is-but I have promised to repress my feelings.

The coach was full inside, and besides I had lived pretty close to my last tenpenny in Dublin, so that even if there had been a place vacant, I could not have taken it. She parted from us about day-break, but I was unfortunate in not being able to see her. In fact, the agitation of my spirits was such, that I had been obliged to drink fourteen glasses of whisky-and-water during the night, which had in some measure got in my head: for, as will happen when friends are parting, I had indulged a little after dinner with some few acquaintances with whom I chopped in Exchequer-street, and the guard seeing me inclined to be top-heavy, had laid me down in the well behind the coachman, where I was unluckily snoring when Cecilia left the coach. She asked for me to thank me for my assistance, but on seeing how the land lay, they told me that she said in her own kind manner, "Poor devil-he is flustered with drinklet him snooze it off." Sweet girl.

I was

When I awoke and found her gone, frantic. I had lost every clue to her. We were twenty miles away from the place she parted the coach before I roused, and the coachman informed me that a gentleman with a led horse was waiting for her, with whom

she immediately galloped away--he forgot, insensible brute that he was, in what direction. A new agony seized my mind-the gentleman! WAS SHE MARRIED? My brain was wild. I had no way of satisfying myself, for the accursed mail-coach-clerk had entered her name in the way-bill in such a hand as to puzzle Beelzebub himself, were he the prince of decipherers, and the only letter I could make out was the first, which I proved him to be as abominable in his ideas of spelling as in his writing, for her name, as I afterwards knew, was Crimeen, and the ruffian, regardless of all possible principles of orthography, had commenced it with a Q.

When I got home, I concealed my unfortunate passion as well as I could, but what can escape the eye of a parent? About nine days had elapsed before my father noticed my loss of appetite and my silence, but at last he could not bear to pass it by. "Boy," said he, taking me affectionately by the hand, "something is ailing you."

"Nothing sir," said I, "indeed."

"Ah!" said my father, "do not think to deceive me that way. There's your fifth tumbler lying before you this half hour, and you're scarce a quarter through it yet. I've noticed the same this last week, and except on the day Lord Bullaboo dined with us, when it behoved you to make an exertion, you have not finished any one blessed day seven tumb

lers. Dont think, my boy, that your father is not minding your happiness. You aren't in love, are you?"

The goodness of the old gentleman was not to be withstood, and I confessed the fact, and told him all about it.

"Never mind it," said he, "it looks the devil to you just now; but when you come to my time of life, you won't think much about such little accidents as meeting a girl at a coach door. So, go travel in God's name, and drive this nonsense out of your skull; travelling, besides, opens the mind and polishes the manners. So, go to my cousin Gusty, in Bristol; he lives out towards Lamplighter's Hall, and let me tell you, few soap-boilers from this to himself, and that's no small step, can beat him?"

Good, venerable man, with what pleasure I record your honoured words! He gave me letters of change and introduction, adding his blessing and a gallon of whisky, which, as he well observed, could not be got for love or money in England. I had no objection to the change of scene, and soon established my quarters at my cousin Gusty's. Gusty was a good fellow, hoggish in his manners like the Bristolians, but a strenuous supporter of Church and State. We dined punctually at one, and except on melting days, which he was obliged to mind, smoked through the evening. So passed a fortnight, but at the end of that

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