bent almost to the earth, ragged and wretched, led by a little dog and a string. The haggardness of incurable misery was imprinted upon his cadaverous face; his tottering limbs wavered tremulously, as if on the point of surrendering the careworn body to the dust from whence it came; and the staff on which he leaned rocked to and fro, like a reed trembling in the breeze. As he turned his face from time to time towards the heavens, the deep tenantless sockets proclaimed that his sight was as dark as his fate.-He was stone blind. Led by his dog, the aged beggar passed on from door to door, bending his body still lower than it was bent by poverty and years. He seemed to be asking charity; but his petitions were met with ridicule, scorn, abuse, and sometimes violence. At length, he was rudely thrust from the door of a house Benhadar recognised as having belonged to an old friend, and fell headlong into the street, from whence a stranger more goodnatured raised him up, and sent him on his wretched pilgrimage again. "Poor wretch!" exclaimed Benhadar feeling in his pocket, and pulling out a piaster. "Poor wretch! his course is almost run." "He has yet another scene to play," replied the genius; "Behold!" Benhadar looked, and saw the same miserable old man in a paroxysm of raving madness. He was tearing his tattered garments, and scattering his few white hairs to the wind, in howling fantastic exultation. He rolled himself upon the ground, alternately laughing and shrieking: he scattered the sands on his bare head, and filled his mouth with the dust, as he buried his furrowed face in the earth, Then, as if inspired with new vigour, he started on his feet, and striking furiously about with his staff, at length dealt a blow which laid his dog dead at his feet, and essayed to pass forward on the way. In a few moments he missed his accustomed guide, and, passing his hand along the string till it reached the dog at the other end, he ascertained that he was dead. The conviction appeared to bring him back to himself a little while. He raised the poor animal in his arms, caressed, kissed, and mourned over it as over a lost child. The momentary energy of madness subsided into helpless imbecility, and death closed the scene. The old maniac and his dog lay by the side of each other. "Miserable man!" exclaimed Benhadar, lost in the scene; "miserable man! but Allah be praised, his sufferings are at an end!" 46 His sufferings are not at an end, they are just beginning," cried the genius. "Knowest thou that wretched old man?" "Alas! no," replied the merchant; "how should I know him?" "'Tis the same wretch thou sawest stab the sleeping stranger in the rocky dell; 'tis the same wretch thou didst behold revelling among robbers and lascivious women; and that wretch is Benhadar, of Balsora." Benhadar stood for a while stiffened with horror, unable to withdraw his eyes from the wretched old beggar, whom he saw taken up rudely, thrown into a cart, and buried in the Potters'field among outcasts. At length a thought seemed to strike him, and he exclaimed, exultingly, "Allah be praised! I know all this beforehand, and will take measures in time to avoid these calamities. Blessed are those who are wise in the future !" 66 "dost thou Presumptuous fool!" answered the genius: believe that to escape from evil it is only necessary to foresee it? dost thou think fate is a spaniel, to obey thy will, and crouch at thy bidding? Know, O wretched merchant! that thou hast gained by thy knowledge nothing but the misery of anticipating what thou canst not avoid. Allah has vouchsafed, as the descendant of his prophet, to let thee see to what thou art doomed; but not even for the prophet himself will he alter that doom." As the genius uttered these terrible words, he disappeared, leaving the merchant in despair. He joined his family, and received their caresses in silent agony; for he remembered the old woman of the desert, the adventure of the sacred standard, the scene of the pirates, and, last of all, the murderer-beggar-maniac. He wandered whole days in the solitudes of the tombs, without the city gates, whence he returned only to weep over his children. His wife tenderly inquired what was the matter with him, his children sought by a thousand caresses and tender assiduities to make him smile, and his friends condoled with him in his misfortunes. All availed nothing; he could not endure the present for his anticipations of the future, and gradually sunk into the abyss of despair-enjoying nothing-hoping nothing. One day, he sat in the same spot from which he had beheld the horrible scenes of his future fate, recalling them, one by one, in sad succession to his shrinking memory, "O Allah!" at length he exclaimed, in the bitterness of his soul," why cannot I die? It is better to perish, than thus to live!" "Who calls?" cried the same terrible voice he had heard in the same spot, at the same hour, exactly a year before. He looked, and saw the same majestic figure gradually evolving itself from the dark mist. "Who calls?" The most miserable of men," answered the merchant, "What wantest thou, Benhadar ?" "To die." "Art thou then tired of the present existence?" “No-but of the future. Take me, O Allah! from this miserable life!" "Thy wish is granted," cried the genius: "behold!" Benhadar looked, and saw the angel of death approaching towards him, clothed in all his terrors. He shook his terrible dart, and held an empty hour-glass to show that his sand was run out. Lightning was in his bright sunken eye, that shone like a lamp in some dark recess, and his lip was curled in scorn of weak mortality. In his train followed the terrible ministers of his wrath-disease, writhing in agony,-remorse, devouring his own heart,-despair, turning his dagger upon himself,-fever, counting his quickening pulses, and old age lagging in the rear, looking wistfully behind, as if meditating to skulk away, and suffer yet a little longer the lingering nothingness of a burthensome existence. The merchant covered his face to shut out these appalling spectres. "Art thou ready?" cried the genius. "Not yet not yet," replied Benhadar; "I wish to settle my affairs, to take leave of my wife and children, and to beseech the prophet to bless them.” It is too late now-death cannot wait thy time: at this moment millions of breathing mortals have their hours numbered-fate cannot stop for thee-prepare!" The angel of death advanced towards the shrinking mer chant, who essayed to fly, but was rivetted to the spot; each step he approached, the heart of the merchant beat weaker and weaker, and the intervals of breathing became lengthened ;his knees trembled the cold clammy dews condensed upon his forehead in big round drops-his eyes grew dim-his breath was as if it came from some icy cavern--and, as the angel touched him with his dart, he sunk to the earth without sense or motion. In this state he was carried into his house, and laid upon a couch, where he remained for some hours. At length he awoke to a perception of his present situation; but of the past, so far as it related to the genius, the pageantry of the vast mirror, and the visit of the angel of death, he remembered nothing-all had faded from his memory as if it had never been. Benhadar rose from his couch, and whatever misfortunes afterwards befel him, they were not embittered by the horrors of anticipation. "The moral of thy story is just," said the Bashaw of Smyrna; "and yet I wish I knew what the commander of the faithful wants of me at Constantinople." So saying, he mounted his camel, and proceeded on his journey at the head of his attendants. J. K. P. IMPROMPTU, On hearing that there are three families now residing near Grosvenor-place, Pimlico, within the space of about twenty yards, whose respective names are "Black," White," and " Grey." 'Tis a fact irrefutable,-singular, too, And what, perhaps, many will scarce believe true; As also to many in Pimlico town; Whose several names form a trio of might, Mister GREY, Mister BLACK, and their friend, Mister |