among us. The present generation seem unwilling to "realise" by slow and sure degrees; but choose rather to set their whole hopes upon a single cast, which either makes or mars them for ever! Gentle reader, do you remember Monsieur Poopoo? He used to keep a small toystore in Chatham-street, near the corner of Pearl-street. You must recollect him, of course. He lived there for many years, and was one of the most polite and accommodating of shopkeepers. When a juvenile, you have bought tops and marbles of him a thousand times. To be sure, you have; and seen his vinegarvisage lighted up with a smile as you paid him the coppers; and you have laughed at his little straight queue and his dimity breeches, and all the other oddities that made up the every-day apparel of my little Frenchman. Ah, I perceive you recollect him, now. Well, then, there lived Monsieur Poopoo ever since he came from "dear, delightful Paris," as he used to call the city of his nativity-there he took in the pennies for his kickshaws-there he laid aside five thousand dollars against a rainy day-there he was as happy as a lark-and there, in all human probability, he would have been to this very day, a respected and substantial citizen, had he been willing to "let well alone." But Monsieur Poopoo had heard strange stories about the prodigious rise in real estate, and having understood that most of his neighbours had become suddenly rich by speculating in lots, he instantly became dissatisfied with his own lot, forthwith determined to shut up shop, turn every thing into cash, and set about making money in earnest. No sooner said than done; and our quondam storekeeper a few days afterwards attended a most extensive sale of real estate, at the Merchants' Exchange. There was the auctioneer, with his beautiful and inviting lithographic maps -all the lots as smooth and square and enticingly laid out as possible-and there were the speculators-and there, in the midst of them, stood Monsieur Poopoo. "Here they are, gentlemen," said he of the hammer, "the most valuable lots ever offered for sale. Give me a bid for them ?” A noble purchase. H. they are yours. You'll sell those same lots in less than a fortnight for fifty thousand dollars profit!" Monsieur Poopoo pricked up his ears at this, and was lost in astonishment. This was a much easier way of accumulating riches than selling toys in Chatham-street; and he determined to buy, and mend his fortune without delay. The auctioneer proceeded in his sale. Other parcels were offered and disposed of, and all the purchasers were promised immense advantages for their enterprise. At last came a more valuable parcel than all the rest. The company pressed around the stand, and Monsieur Poopoo did the same. "I now offer you, gentlemen, these magnificent lots, delightfully situated on Long Island, with valuable water privileges. Property in fee-title unexceptionable-terms of sale, cash-deeds ready for delivery immediately after the sale. How much for them? Give them a start at something. How much?" The auctioneer looked around; there were no bidders. At last he caught the eye of Monsieur Poopoo. "Did you say one hundred, sir? Beautiful lotsvaluable water privileges-shall I say one hundred for you?" "Oui, monsieur; I will give you von hundred dollar a piece, for de lot vid de valuarble vatare privalege; c'est ça." "Only one hundred a piece for these sixty valuable lots-only one hundredgoing-going-going-gone!" Monsieur Poopoo was the fortunate possessor. The auctioneer congratulated him-the sale closed-and the company dispersed. "Pardonnez moi, monsieur," said Poopoo, as the auctioneer descended his pedestal, " you shall excusez moi, if I shall go to votre bureau, your countinghouse, ver quick to make every ting sure wid respec to de lot vid de valuarble vatare privalege. Von leetle bird in de hand he vorth two in de tree, c'est vrai eh?" 66 Certainly, sir." "Vell den, allons." And the gentlemen repaired to the counting-house, where the six thousand dollars were paid, and the deeds of the "One hundred each," said a by- property delivered. Monsieur Poopoo stander. "One hundred !" said the auctioneer, "scarcely enough to pay for the maps. One hundred-going-fifty-gone! Mr. put these carefully in his pocket, and'as he was about taking his leave, the auctioneer made him a present of the lithographic outline of the lots, which was a very liberal thing on his part, considering the map was a beautiful specimen of that glorious art. Poopoo could not admire it sufficiently. There were his sixty lots, as uniform as possible, and his little gray eyes sparkled like diamonds as they wandered from one end of the spacious sheet to the other. a Poopoo's heart was as light as feather, and he snapped his fingers in the very wantonness of joy as he repaired to Delmonico's, and ordered the first good French dinner that had gladdened his senses since his arrival in America. After having discussed his repast, and washed it down with a bottle of choice old claret, he resolved upon a visit to Long Island to view his purchase. He consequently immediately hired a horse and gig, crossed the Brooklyn ferry, and drove along the margin of the river to the Wallabout, the location in question. Our friend, however, was not a little perplexed to find his property. Everything on the map was as fair and even as possible, while all the grounds about him were as undulated as they could well be imagined, and there was an arm of the East River running quite into the land, which seemed to have no business there. This puzzled the Frenchman exceeding ly; and, being a stranger in those parts, he called to a farmer in an adjacent field. At first the Frenchman was incredulous. He could not believe his senses. As the facts, however, gradually broke upon him, he looked at the sky-the river-the farmer-and then he turned away and gazed at them all over again! There was his ground, sure enough; but then it could not be perceived, for there was a river flowing over it! He drew a box from his waistcoat pocket, opened it, with an emphatic knock upon the lid, took a pinch of snuff, and restored it to his waistcoat pocket as before. Poopoo was evidently in trouble, having "thoughts which often lie too deep for tears;" and, as his grief was also too big for words, he untied his horse, jumped into the gig, and returned to the auctioneer in all possible haste. It was near night when he arrived at the auction-room-his horse in a foam, and himself in a fury. The auctioneer was leaning back in his chair, with his legs stuck out of a low window, quietly smoking a cigar after the labours of the day, and humming the music from the last new opera. "Monsieur, I have much plaisir to fin you, chez vous, at home." "Ah, Poopoo! glad to see you. Take a seat, old boy." "But I shall not take de seat, sare.". "No-why, what's the matter?" Oh, beaucoup de matter. I have "Mon ami, are you acquaint vid been to see de gran lot vot you sell me dis part of de country-eh ?" to-day." "Yes, I was born here, and know every inch of it." Ah, c'est bien, dat vill do," and the Frenchman got out of the gig, tied the horse, and produced his lithographic map. "Den maybe you vill have the kindness to show me de sixty lot vich I have bought, vid de valuarble vatare privalege?" The farmer glanced his eye over the paper. "Yes, sir, with pleasure; if you will be good enough to get into my boat I will row you out to them!" "Vat you say, sare?" "My friend," said the farmer, "this section of Long Island has recently been bought up by the speculators of New York, and laid out for a great city; but the principal street is only visible at low tide. When this part of the East River is filled up, it will be just there. Your lots, as you will perceive, are beyond it; and are now all under water." "Well, sir, I hope you like your purchase ?" "No, monsieur, but I do not like it at all." "I'm sorry for it; but there is no ground for your complaint." "No, sare; dare is no ground at all— de ground is all vatare." You joke.' "I do not joke. I nevare joke; je n'entends pas raillerie. Sare, voulez vous have de kindness to give me back de money vot I pay?" 66 Certainly not." "Den vill you be so good as to take de East River off de top of my lot?" "That's your business, sir, not mine." "Den I make von mauvaise affairevon gran mistake!" "I hope not. I don't think you have thrown away your money in the land." "No, sare; but I have trow it away in de rivare!" "That's not my fault." "Yes, sare, but it is your fault. You're von ver gran rascal to swindle me out of de l'argent." "Hollo, old Poopoo, you grow personal; and if you can't keep a civil tongue in your head, you must go out of my office." "Vare shall I go to, eh?" "To the devil, for aught I care, you foolish old Frenchman!" said the auctioneer, waxing warm. "But, sare, I vill not go to de devil to oblige you!" replied the Frenchman, waxing warmer. "You cheat me out of all de dollar vot I make in Chathamstreet; but I vill not go to de devil for all dat. I vish you may go to de devil yourself, you dem yankee-doodell, and I vill go and drown myself, tout de suite, right avay." of Rome, the most splendid, the most graceful, the most eloquent of its nobles? It could not be. His voice had indeed been touchingly soft whenever he addressed her. There had been a fascinating tenderness even in the vivacity of his look and conversation. But such were always the manners of Cæsar toward women. He had wreathed a sprig of myrtle in her hair as she was singing. She took it from her dark ringlets and kissed it, and wept over it, and thought of the sweet legends of her own dear Greece-of youths and girls, who, pining away in hopeless love, had been transformed into flowers by the compassion of the gods; and she wished to become a flower, which Cæsar might sometimes touch, though he should touch it only to weave a crown for some prouder and "You couldn't make a better use of happier mistress. your water privileges, old boy! "Ah, miséricorde! Ah, mon Dieu! je suis abîmé. I am ruin! I am done up! I am break all into ten sousan leetle pieces! I am von lame duck, and I shall vaddle across de gran ocean for Paris, vish is de only valuarble vatare privilege dat is left me à present!" Poor Poopoo was as good as his word. He sailed in the next packet, and arrived in Paris almost as pennyless as the day he left it. Should any one feel disposed to doubt the veritable circumstances here recorded, let him cross the East River to the Wallabout, and farmer J***** will row him out to the very place where the poor Frenchman's lots still remain under Ir was almost midnight. The party had separated. Catiline and Cethegus were still conferring in the supper-room, which was, as usual, the highest apartment of the house. It formed a cupola, from which windows opened on the flat roof that surrounded it. To this terrace Zoe had retired. With eyes dimmed by fond and melancholy tears, she leaned over the balustrade, to catch the last glimpse of the departing form of Cæsar, as it grew more and more indistinct in the moonlight. Had he any thought of her? any love for her? he, the favourite of the high-born beauties She was roused from her musings by the loud step and voice of Cethegus, who was pacing furiously up and down, the supper-room. "May all the gods confound me, if Cæsar be not the deepest traitor, or the most miserable idiot, that ever intermeddled with a plot!" Zoe shuddered. She drew nearer to the window. She stood concealed from observation by the curtain of fine network which hung over the aperture, to exclude the annoying insects of the climate. "And you, too!" continued Cethegus, turning fiercely on his accomplice: you take his part against me!-you, who proposed the scheme yourself!" 66 "My dear Caius Cethegus, you will not understand me. I proposed the scheme, and I will join in executing it. But policy is as necessary to our plans as boldness. I did not wish to startle Cæsar-to lose his co-operation-perhaps to send him off with an information against us to Cicero and Catulus. He was so indignant at your suggestion, that all my dissimulation was scarcely sufficient to prevent a total rupture ! " "Indignant! The gods confound him! He prated about humanity, and generosity, and moderation. By Hercules, I have not heard such a lecture since I was with Xenochares at Rhodes.” "Cæsar is made up of inconsistencies. He has boundless ambition, unquestioned courage, admirable sagacity. Yet, I have frequently observed in him a womanish weakness at the sight of pain. I remember that once one of his slaves was taken ill while carrying his litter. He alighted, put the fellow in his place, and walked home in a fall of snow. I wonder that you could be so ill-advised as to talk to him of massacre, and pillage, and conflagration. You might have foreseen that such propositions would disgust a man of his temper." "I do not know. I have not yet your self-command, Lucius. I hate such conspirators. What is the use of them? We must have blood-bloodhacking and tearing work bloody work!", "Do not grind your teeth, my dear Caius; and lay down the carving-knife. By Hercules, you have cut up all the stuffing of the couch." "No matter; we shall have couches enough soon-and down to stuff them with-and purple to cover them-and pretty women to loll on them-unless this fool, and such as he, spoil our plans. I had something else to say. The essenced fop wishes to seduce Zoe from me. 66 Impossible! You misconstrue the ordinary gallantries which he is in the habit of paying to every handsome face." "Curse on his ordinary gallantries, and his verses, and his compliments, and his sprigs of myrtle! If Cæsar should dare by Hercules, I will tear him to pieces in the middle of the forum!" "Trust his destruction to me. We must use his talents and influencethrust him upon every danger-make him our instrument while we are contending our peace-offering to the senate if we fail-our first victim if we succeed." "Hark! what noise was that?" "Somebody in the terrace! Lend me your dagger." Zoe Catiline rushed to the window. was standing in the shade. He stepped out. She darted into the room-passed like a flash of lightning by the startled Cethegus-flew down the stairs-through the court through the vestibule through the street. Steps, voices, lights, came fast and confusedly behind her; but with the speed of love and terror she gained upon her pursuers. She fled through the wilderness of unknown and dusky streets, till she found herself, breathless and exhausted, in the midst of a crowd of gallants, who, with chaplets on their heads, and torches in their hands, were reeling from the portico of a stately mansion. The foremost of the throng was a youth, whose slender figure and beautiful countenance seemed hardly consistent with his sex. But the feminine delicacy of his features rendered more frightful the mingled sensuality and ferocity of their expression. The libertine audacity of his stare, and the grotesque foppery of his apparel, seemed to indicate at least a partial insanity. Flinging one arm round Zoe, and tearing away her veil with the other, he disclosed to the gaze of his thronging companions, the regular features and large dark eyes which characterise Athenian beauty. "Clodius has all the luck to-night," cried Ligarius. "Not so, by Hercules," said Marcus Coelius; "the girl is fairly our common prize; we will fling dice for her." "Let me go-let me go, for heaven's sake!" cried Zoe, struggling with Clodius. "What a charming Greek accent she has! Come into the house, my little Athenian nightingale." "Oh! what will become of me? If you have mothers-if you have sisters "Clodius has a sister," muttered Ligarius," or he is much belied." "By heaven, she is weeping!" said Clodius. "If she were not evidently a Greek," said Coelius, "I should take her for a vestal virgin." "And if she were a vestal virgin," cried Clodius fiercely, "it should not deter me. This way no struggling— no screaming." 66 "Struggling! screaming!" exclaimed a gay and commanding voice: 'You are making very ungentle love, Clodius." The whole party started. Cæsar had mingled with them unperceived. The sound of his voice thrilled through the very heart of Zoe. With a convulsive effort, she burst from the grasp of her insolent admirer, flung herself at the feet of Cæsar, and clasped his knees. The moon shone full on her agitated and imploring face; her lips moved, but she uttered no sound. He gazed at her for an instant, raised her, clasped her to his bosom. "Fear nothing, my sweet Zoe." Then, with folded arms, and a smile of placid defiance, he placed himself between her and Clodius. Clodius staggered forward, flushed with wine and rage, and uttering alternately a curse and a hiccup. "By Pollux, this passes a jest! Cæsar! how dare you insult me thus ?" "In jest! I am as serious as a Jew on the Sabbath. Insult you! for such a pair of eyes I would insult the whole consular bench, or I should be as insensible as King Psammis' mummy." "Good gods, Cæsar!" said Marcus Coelius, interposing; "you cannot think it worth while to get into a brawl for a little Greek girl?" "Why not? the Greek girls have used me as well as those of Rome. Besides, the whole reputation of my gallantry is at stake. Give up such a lovely woman to that drunken boy! My character would be gone for ever. No more perfumed tablets, full of vows and raptures! No more toying with fingers at the CirNo more evening walks along the Tiber. No more hiding in chests, or jumping from windows. I, the favoured suitor of half the white stoles in Rome, could never again aspire above a freedwoman. You a man of gallantry, and think of such a thing! For shame, my dear Coelius! Do not let Clodia hear of it." cus. While Cæsar spoke, he had been engaged in keeping Clodius at arm's length. The rage of the frantic libertine increased as the struggle continued. "Stand back as you value your life," he cried; "I will pass." "Not this way, sweet Clodius. I have too much regard for you to suffer you to make love at such a disadvantage. You smell too much of Falernian at present. Would you stifle your mistress? By Hercules, you are fit to kiss nobody now, except old Piso, when he is tumbling home in the morning from the vintner's." Clodius plunged his hand into his bosom, and drew a little dagger, the faithful companion of many desperate adventures. "Oh, gods! he will be murdered!" cried Zoe. The whole throng of revellers was in agitation. The street fluctuated with torches and lifted hands. It was but for a moment. Cæsar watched, with a steady eye, the descending hand of Clodius, arrested the blow, seized his antagonist by the throat, and flung him against one of the pillars of the portico with such violence, that he rolled, stunned and senseless, on the ground. "He is killed," cried several voices. "Fair self-defence, by Hercules !" said Marcus Coelius. "Bear witness, you all saw him draw his dagger." "He is not dead-he breathes," said Ligarius. "Carry him into the house; he is dreadfully bruised." The rest of the party retired with Clodius. Coelius turned to Cæsar. "By all the gods, Caius! you have won your lady fairly. A splendid victory! You deserve a triumph." "What a madman has Clodius become !" "Intolerable! But come, and sup with me on the Nones. You have no objection to meet the consul?" "Cicero ? None at all. We need not talk politics. Our old dispute about Plato and Epicurus will furnish us with plenty of conversation. So reckon upon me, my dear Marcus, and farewell." Cæsar and Zoe turned away. As soon as they were beyond hearing, she began, in great agitation: "Cæsar, you are in danger. I know all. I overheard Catiline and Cethegus. You are engaged in a project which must lead to certain destruction." "My beautiful Zoe, I live only for glory and pleasure. For these I have never hesitated to hazard an existence which they alone render valuable to me. In the present case, I can assure you that our scheme presents the fairest hopes of success." "So much the worse. You do not know-you do not understand me. I speak not of open peril, but of secret treachery. Catiline hates you; Cethegus hates you; your destruction is resolved. If you survive the contest, you perish in the first hour of victory. They detest you for your moderation; they are eager for blood and for plunder. I have risked my life to bring you this warning; but that is of little moment. Farewell be happy!" "Do you fly Cæsar stopped her. from my thanks, dear Zoe?" "I wish not for your thanks, but for your safety; I desire not to defraud Valeria or Servilia of one caress, extorted from gratitude or pity. Be my feelings what they may, I have learned, in a fearful school, to endure and to |