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whidder as minister of Dalmailing is admirably described :

Poor

compilation, and Bogle Corbet, another novel, the object of which, he said, was to give a view of society generally, as The Provost' was of burgh incidents It was a great affair; for I was put in by the patron, simply, and of the sort of genteel persons who are and the people knew nothing whatsoever of me, and sometimes found among the emigrants to the United their hearts were stirred into strife on the occasion, States. Disease now invaded the robust frame of and they did all that lay within the compass of their the novelist; but he wrote on, and in a short time power to keep me out, insomuch that there was obfour other works of fiction issued from his pen-liged to be a guard of soldiers to protect the presbyStanley Buxton, The Member, The Radical, and Eben tery; and it was a thing that made my heart grieve Erskine. In 1832 an affection of the spine, and an when I heard the drum beating and the fife playing attack resembling paralysis, greatly reduced Mr as we were going to the kirk. The people were really Galt, and subjected him to acute pain. Next year, mad and vicious, and flung dirt upon us as we passed, however, he was again at the press. His work was and reviled us all, and held out the finger of scorn at a tale entitled The Lost Child. He also composed a me; but I endured it with a resigned spirit, commemoir of his own life, in two volumes-a curious passionating their wilfulness and blindness. ill-digested melange, but worthy of perusal. In 1834 old Mr Kilfuddy of the Braehill got such a clash of he published Literary Miscellanies, in three volumes, glaur on the side of his face, that his eye was almost dedicated to King William IV., who generously sent extinguished. a sum of £200 to the author. He returned to his native country a perfect wreck, the victim of repeated attacks of paralysis; yet he wrote several pieces for periodical works, and edited the productions of others. After severe and protracted sufferings, borne with great firmness and patience, Mr Galt died at Greenock on the 11th of April 1839. Of a long list of our author's works, several are already forgotten. Not a few of his novels, however, bid fair to be permanent, and the Annals of the Parish' will probably be read as long as Waverley or Guy Mannering. This inimitable little tale is the simple record of a country minister during the fifty years of his incumbency. Besides many amusing and touching incidents, the work presents us with a picture of the rise and progress of a Scottish rural village, and its transition to a manufacturing town, as witnessed by the minister, a man as simple as Abraham Adams, imbued with all old-fashioned national feelings and prejudices, but thoroughly sincere, kind-hearted, and pious. This Presbyterian worthy, the Rev. Micah Balwhidder, is a fine representative of the primitive Scottish pastor; diligent, blameless, loyal, and exemplary in his life, but without the fiery zeal and kirk-filling eloquence' of the supporters of the Covenant.

Micah is easy,

garrulous, fond of a quiet joke, and perfectly ignorant of the world. Little things are great to him in his retirement and his simplicity; and thus we find him chronicling, among his memorable events, the arrival of a dancing-master, the planting of a pear-tree, the getting a new bell for the kirk, the first appearance of Punch's Opera in the country-side, and other incidents of a like nature, which he mixes up indiscriminately with the breaking out of the American war, the establishment of manufactures, or the spread of French revolutionary principles. Amidst the quaint humour and shrewd observation of honest Micah are some striking and pathetic incidents. Mrs Malcolm, the widow of a Clyde shipmaster, comes to settle in his village; and being a genty body, calm and methodical,' she brought up her children in a superior manner, and they all get on in the world. One of them becomes a sailor; and there are few more touching narratives in the language than the account of this cheerful gallant-hearted lad, from his first setting off to sea to his death as a midshipman, in an engagement with the French. Taken altogether, this work of Mr Galt's is invaluable for its truth and nature, its quiet unforced humour and pathos, its genuine nationality as a faithful record of Scottish feeling and manners, and its rich felicity of homely antique Scottish phrase and expression, which to his countrymen is perhaps the crowning excellence of the author.

In the following passage the placing of Mr Bal

When we got to the kirk door, it was found to be nailed up, so as by no possibility to be opened. The sergeant of the soldiers wanted to break it, but I was afraid that the heritors would grudge and complain of the expense of a new door, and I supplicated him to let it be as it was; we were therefore obligated to go in by a window, and the crowd followed us in the most unreverent manner, making the Lord's house like an inn on a fair day with their grievous yelly-hooing. During the time of the psalm and the sermon they behaved themselves better, but when the induction came on, their clamour was dreadful; and Thomas Thorl, the weaver, a pious zealot in that time, got up and protested and said, 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.' And I thought I would have a hard and sore time of it with such an outstrapolous people. Mr Given, that was then the minister of Lugton, was a jocose man, and would have his joke even at a solemnity. When the laying of the hands upon me his, but he stretched out his staff and touched my was a-doing, he could not get near enough to put on head, and said, to the great diversion of the rest, This will do well enough-timber to timber;' but it was an unfriendly saying of Mr Given, considering

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the time and the place, and the temper of my people. and it was a heavy day to me; but we went to the After the ceremony we then got out at the window, Mrs Watts of the new inn of Irville prepared at my manse, and there we had an excellent dinner, which request, and sent her chaise-driver to serve, for he was likewise her waiter, she having then but one chaise, and that not often called for.

But although my people received me in this unruly manner, I was resolved to cultivate civility among them; and therefore the very next morning I began a round of visitations; but oh! it was a steep brae that I had to climb, and it needed a stout heart, for I found the doors in some places barred against me; in others, the bairns, when they saw me coming, ran crying to their mothers, 'Here's the feckless Mess-John;' and then, when I went in into the houses, their parents would not ask me to sit down, but with a scornful way said, Honest man, what's your pleasure here?' Nevertheless, I walked about from door to door, like a dejected beggar, till I got the almous deed of a civil reception, and, who would have thought it, from no less a person than the same Thomas Thorl that was so bitter against me in the kirk on the foregoing day.

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Thomas was standing at the door with his green duffle apron and his red Kilmarnock nightcap-I mind him as well as if it was but yesterday and he had seen me going from house to house, and in what manner I was rejected, and his bowels were moved, and he said to me in a kind manner, Come in, sir, and ease yoursel; this will never do; the clergy are

God's gorbies, and for their master's sake it behoves us to respect them. There was no ane in the whole parish mair against you than mysel, but this early visitation is a symptom of grace that I couldna have expectit from a bird out of the nest of patronage.' I thanked Thomas, and went in with him, and we had some solid conversation together, and I told him that it was not so much the pastor's duty to feed the flock, as to herd them well; and that although there might be some abler with the head than me, there wasna a he within the bounds of Scotland more willing to watch the fold by night and by day. And Thomas said he had not heard a mair sound observe for some time, and that if I held to that doctrine in the poopit, it wouldna be lang till I would work a change. I was mindit,' quoth he, 'never to set my foot within the kirk door while you were there; but to testify, and no to condemn without a trial, I'll be there next Lord's day, and egg my neighbours to be likewise, so ye'll no have to preach just to the bare walls and the laird's family.'

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nothing can be better than the account of the early struggles of this humble hero-the American sketches of character with which the work abounds-the view it gives of life in the backwoods-or the peculiar freshness and vigour that seem to accompany every scene and every movement of the story. In perception of character and motive, within a certain sphere, Mr Galt stands unrivalled; and he has energy as well as quickness. His taste, however, was very defective; and this, combined with the hurry and uncertainty of his latter days, led him to waste his original powers on subjects unfitted for his pen, and injurious to his reputation. The story of his life is a melancholy one; but his genius was an honour to his country, and merited a better reward.

THOMAS HOPE.

THOMAS HOPE, the author of Anastasius, was one of the merchant princes of England whom commerce had led to opulence, and who repaid the compliment by ennobling his origin and pursuits with taste, munificence, and genius. He was one of three brothers, wealthy merchants in Amsterdam. When a young man, he spent some years in foreign travel, visiting the principal places in Europe, Asia, and Africa. On his return he settled in London, purchased a large house, and a country mansion (Deepdene, near Dorking), and embellished both with drawings, picture galleries, sculpture, amphitheatres for antiques, and all other rare and costly appliances. His appearances as an author arose out of these favourite occupations and studies. In 1805 he published a folio volume of drawings and descriptions, entitled Household Furniture and Decorations. The ambitious style of this work, and the author's devotion to the forms of chairs, sofas, couches, and tables, provoked a witty piece of ridicule in the Edinburgh Review; but the man of taste and virtu triumphed. A more classical and appropriate style of furniture and domestic utensils gained ground; and with Mr Hope rests the honour of having achieved the improve

The Ayrshire Legatees' is a story of the same cast as the Annals, and describes (chiefly by means of correspondence) the adventures of another country minister and his family on a journey to London to obtain a rich legacy left him by a cousin in India. "The Provost' is another portraiture of Scottish life, illustrative of the jealousies, contentions, local improvements, and jobbery of a small burgh in the olden time. Some of the descriptions in this work are very powerfully written. 'Sir Andrew Wylie' and The Entail' are more regular and ambitious performances, treble the length of the others, but not so carefully finished. The pawkie Ayrshire baronet is humorous, but not very natural. The character of Leddy Grippy in The Entail' was a prodigious favourite with Byron. Both Scott and Byron, it is said, read this novel three times overno slight testimony to its merits. We should be disposed, however, to give the preference to another of Mr Galt's three-volume fictions, Lawrie Todd, or the Settlers,' a work which seems to have no parallel, since Defoe, for apparent reality, knowledgement. Two other splendid publications proceeded of human nature, and fertility of invention. The history of a real individual, a man named Grant Thorburn, supplied the author with part of his incidents, as the story of Alexander Selkirk did Defoe; but the mind and the experience of Galt are stamped on almost every page. In his former productions our author wrought with his recollections of the Scotland of his youth; the mingled worth, simplicity, pawkiness, and enthusiasm which he had seen or heard of as he loitered about Irvine or Greenock, or conversed with the country sires and matrons; but in 'Lawrie Todd' we have the fruit of his observations in the New World, presenting an entirely different and original phase of the Scottish character. Lawrie is by trade a nailmaker, who emigrates with his brother to America, and their stock of worldly goods and riches, on arriving at New York, consisted of about five shillings in money, and an old chest containing some articles of dress and other necessaries. Lawrie works hard at the nailmaking, marries a pious and industrious maiden (who soon dies), and in time becomes master of a grocer's shop, which he exchanges for the business of a seedsman. The latter is a bad affair, and Lawrie is compelled to sell all off, and begin the world again. He removes with his family to the backwoods, and once more is prosperous. He clears, builds, purchases land, and speculates to great advantage, till he is at length enabled to return to Scotland in some style, and visit the place of his nativity. This Scottish jaunt is a blemish in the work, for the incidents and descriptions are ridiculously exaggerated; but

from Mr Hope, The Costume of the Ancients (1809), and Designs of Modern Costumes (1812), both works evincing extensive knowledge and curious research. In 1819 Mr Hope burst forth as a novelist of the first order. He had studied human nature as well as architecture and costume, and his early travels had exhibited to him men of various creeds and countries. The result was Anastasius, or Memoirs of a Modern Greek, written at the Close of the Eighteenth Century, in three volumes. The author's name was not prefixed to the work-as it was given forth as a veritable history - but the secret soon became known, and Mr Hope, from being reputed as something like a learned upholsterer, or clever draughtsman, was at once elevated into a rivalry with Byron as a glowing painter of foreign scenery and manners, and with Le Sage and the other masters of the novel, in the art of conducting a fable and delineating character. The author turned from fiction to metaphysics, and composed a work On the Origin and Prospects of Man, which he did not live to see through the press, but which was published after his decease. His cosmogony is strange and unorthodox; but amidst his paradoxes, conceits, and abstruse speculations, are many ingenious views and eloquent disquisitions. Mr Hope died on the 3d of February 1831, and probate was granted for £180,000 personal property. Mr Beckford and 'Vathek' are the only parallels to Mr Hope and 'Anastasius' in oriental wealth and imagination.

'Anastasius' is one of the most original and dazzling of modern romances. The hero is, like Zeluco,

ing, still so fresh, so erect on its stalk, at mid-day hung its heavy head, discoloured, wan, and fading; but so frequently had the billows, during the fury of the storm, drenched my boy's little crib, that I could not wonder he should have felt their effects in a severe cold. I put him to bed, and tried to hush him to sleep. Soon, however, his face grew flushed, and his pulse became feverish. I failed alike in my endeavours to procure him repose and to afford him amusement: but, though playthings were repulsed, and tales no longer attended to, still he could not bear me an instant out of his sight; nor would he take anything except at my hands. Even when--as too soon it did-his reason began to wander, his filial affection retained its pristine hold of his heart. It had grown into an adoration of his equally doting father; and the mere consciousness of my presence seemed to relieve his uneasiness.

a villain spoiled by early indulgence; he becomes a renegade to his faith, a mercenary, a robber, and an assassin; but the elements of a better nature are sown in his composition, and break forth at times. He is a native of Chios, the son of Greek parents. To avoid the consequences of an amour with Helena, the consul's daughter, he runs off to sea in a Venetian vessel, which is boarded by pirates and captured. The pirates are in turn taken by a Turkish frigate, and carried before Hassan Pasha. Anastasius is released, fights with the Turks in the war against the Araonoots, and accompanies the Greek drogueman to Constantinople. Disgrace and beggary reduce him to various shifts and adventures. He follows a Jew quack doctor selling nostrums-is thrown into the Bagnio, or state prison-afterwards embraces the Turkish faith-revisits Greece-proceeds to Egypt-and subsequently ranges over Arabia, and visits Malta, Sicily, and Italy. His inHad not my feelings, a few moments only before, trigues, adventures, sufferings, &c. are innumerable. been those of such exceeding happiness, I should not Every aspect of Greek and Turkish society is deso soon perhaps have conceived great alarm; but I picted-sarcasm, piquant allusion, pathos and pashad throughout life found every extraordinary burst sion, and descriptions of scenery, are strangely inter- of joy followed by some unforeseen calamity; and my mingled in the narrative. Wit, epigram, and the exultation had just risen to so unusual a pitch, that a glitter of rhetorical amplification, occupy too much deep dismay now at once struck me to the heart. I space; but the scene is constantly shifting, and the felt convinced that I had only been carried to so high work possesses the truth and accuracy of a book of a pinnacle of joy, in order to be hurled with greater travels joined to those of a romance. ruin into an abyss of wo. Such became my anxiety The traveller, too, is a thorough man of the world, has a keen in to reach Trieste, and to obtain the best medical assistsight into human weaknesses and foibles, and de-ance, that even while the ship continued to cleave scribes his adventures and impressions without hypocrisy or reserve. The most powerful passages are those in which pathos is predominant-such as the scenes with Euphrosyne, whom Anastasius has basely violated-his sensations on revisiting Greece and the tomb of Helena-his reflections on witness

ing the dead Araonoot soldier whom he had slain the horrors of the plague and famine-and, above all, the account of the death of Alexis, the child of Anastasius, and in whom were centred the only remains of his human affection, his love and hope. The gradual decay of this youth, and the intense anxiety and watchfulness of his father, constitute a scene of genuine grief and tenderness. We forget the craft and villany of Anastasius, thus humbled and prostrate. His wild gaiety and heartless jests, his degeneracy and sensualism, have passed away. They had palled upon himself, but one spring of pure affection remained to redeem his nature; and it is not without the strongest pity and kindred commiseration that we see the desperate adventurer reduced to loneliness and heartbroken despair. The scene is introduced by an account of his recovering his lost son in Egypt, and carrying him off to Eu

rope :

My cousin's letter had promised me a brilliant lot, and-what was better-my own pockets insured me a decent competence. The refinements of a European education should add every external elegance to my boy's innate excellence, and, having myself moderately enjoyed the good things of this world, while striving to deserve the better promised in the next, I should, ere my friends became tired of my dotage, resign my last breath in the arms of my child.

The blue sky seemed to smile upon my cheerful thoughts, and the green wave to murmur approbation of my plan. Almighty God! what was there in it so heinous to deserve that an inexorable fate should cast it to the winds?

In the midst of my dream of happiness, my eye fell upon the darling object in which centred all its sweets. Insensibly my child's prattle had diminished, and had at last subsided in an unusual silence. I thought he looked pale; his eyes seemed heavy, and his lips felt parched. The rose, that every morn

upon the main. How, then, did my pangs increase the waves like an arrow, I fancied it lay like a log when, as if in resentment of my unjust complaints, the breeze, dying away, really left our keel motionless on the waters! My anguish baffled all expression.

In truth I do not know how I preserved my senses, except from the need I stood in of their aid: for, while we lay cursed with absolute immobility, and the sun ever found us, on rising, in the same place where it had left us on setting, my child-my darling child-was every instant growing worse, and sinking apace under the pressure of illness. To the deep and flushing glow of a complexion far exceeding in its transient brilliancy even the brightest hues of health, had succeeded a settled, unchanging, deadly paleness. His eye, whose round full orb was wont to beam upon me with mild but fervent radiance, now dim and wandering, for the most part remained half closed; and when, roused by my address, the idol of my heart strove to raise his languid look, and to meet the fearful inquiries of mine, he only showed all the former fire of his countenance extinct. In the more violent bursts, indeed, of his unceasing delirium, his wasting features sometimes acquired a fresh but sad expression. He would then start up, and with his feeble hands clasped together, and big tears rolling down his faded cheeks, beg in the most moving terms to be restored to his home: but mostly he seemed absorbed in inward musings, and, no longer taking note of the passing hour, he frequently during the course of the day moved his pallid lips, as if repeating to himself the little prayer which he had been wont to say at bed-time and at rising, and the blessings I had taught him to add, addressed to his mother on behalf of his father. If-wretched to see him thus, and doubly agonized to think that I alone had been the cause-I burst out into tears which I strove to hide, his perception of outward objects seemed all at once for a moment to return. He asked me whether I was hurt, and would lament that, young and feeble as he was, he could not yet nurse me as he wished; but promised me better care when he should grow stronger.

In this way hour after hour and day after day rolled on, without any progress in our voyage, while all I had left to do was to sit doubled over my child's

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couch, watching all his wants, and studying all his looks, trying, but in vain, to discover some amendment. Oh for those days!' I now thought, when a calm at sea appeared an intolerable evil, only because it stopped some tide of folly or delayed some scheme of vice!'

At last one afternoon, when, totally exhausted with want of sleep, I sat down by my child in all the composure of torpid despair, the sailors rushed in one and all-for even they had felt my agony, and doted on my boy. They came to cheer me with better tidings. A breeze had just sprung up! The waves had again begun to ripple, and the lazy keel to stir. As minute pressed on minute, the motion of the ship became swifter; and presently, as if nothing had been wanting but a first impulse, we again dashed through the waves with all our former speed.

Every hour now brought us visibly nearer the inmost recess of the deep Adriatic and the end of our journey. Pola seemed to glide by like a vision: presently we passed Fiume: we saw Capo d'Istria but a few minutes: at last we descried Trieste itself! Another half hour, and every separate house became visible, and not long after we ran full sail into the harbour. The sails were taken in, the anchor was dropped, and a boat instantly came alongside.

All the necessary preparations had been made for immediately conveying my patient on shore. Wrapped up in a shawl, he was lifted out of his crib, laid on a pillow, and lowered into the boat, where I held him in my lap, protected to the best of my power from the roughness of the blast and the dashing of the spray until we reached the quay.

In my distress I had totally forgotten the taint contracted at Melada, and had purposed, the instant we stepped on shore, to carry my child straight to a physician. New anguish pierced my soul when two bayonets crossed upon my breast forced me, in spite of my alternate supplication and rage, to remain on the jettee, there to wait his coming, and his previous scrutiny of all our healthy crew. All I could obtain as a special favour was a messenger to hurry his approach, while, panting for his arrival, I sat down with my Alexis in my arms under a low shed which kept off a pelting shower. I scarce know how long this situation lasted. My mind was so wrapped up in the danger of my boy as to remain wholly unconscious of the bustle around, except when the removal of some cask or barrel forced me to shift my station. Yet, while wholly deaf to the unceasing din of the place, I could discern the faintest rumour that seemed to announce the approaching physician. O, how I cursed his unfeeling delay! how I would have paved his way with gold to have hastened his coming! and yet a something whispered continually in my ear that the utmost speed of man no longer could avail.

Ah! that at least, confirmed in this sad persuasion, I might have tasted the heart-rending pleasure of bestowing upon my departing child the last earthly endearments! but, tranquil, composed, and softly slumbering as he looked, I feared to disturb a repose on which I founded my only remaining hopes. All at once, in the midst of my despair, I saw a sort of smile light up my darling's features, and hard as I strove to guard against all vain illusions, I could not at this sight stop a ray of gladness from gliding unichecked into my trembling heart. Short, however, was the joy soon vanished the deceitful symptom! On a closer view it only appeared to have been a slight convulsion which had hurried over my child's now tranquil countenance, as will sometimes dart over the smooth mirror of a dormant lake the image of a bird in the air. It looked like the response of a departing angel, to those already on high, that hailed his speedy coming. The soul of my Alexis was fast preparing for its flight.

Lest he might feel ill at ease in my lap, I laid him down upon my cloak, and kneeled by his side to watch the growing change in his features. The present now was all to me: the future I knew I no longer should reck. Feeling my breath close to his cheek, he half opened his eyes, looked as if after a long absence again suddenly recognising his father, and— putting out his little mouth-seemed to crave one last token of love. The temptation was too powerful: I gently pressed my lip upon that of my babe, and gathered from it the proffered kiss. Life's last faint spark was just going forth, and I caught it on the threshold. Scarce had I drawn back my face, when all respiration ceased. His eye-strings broke, his features fell, and his limbs stiffened for ever. All was over: Alexis was no more.

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Book, a series of short tales and essays, sentimental and humorous, which were originally printed in an American periodical, but illustrative of English manners and scenery. Mr Irving had previously published in his native country a humorous History of New York, by Knickerbocker, being an imaginary account of the original Dutch inhabitants of that state; and he had also issued a satirical periodical entitled Salmagundi. "The Sketch-Book' was received with great favour in Britain; its carefully elaborated style and beauties of diction were highly praised, and its portraitures of English rural life and customs, though too antiquated to be strictly accurate, were pleasing and interesting. It was obvious that the author had formed his taste upon that of Addison and Goldsmith; but his own great country, its early state of society, the red Indians, and native traditions, had also supplied him with a fund of natural and original description. His stories of Rip Van Winkle and the Sleepy Hollow are perhaps the finest pieces of original fictitious writing that this century has produced, next to the works of Scott. In 1822 Mr Irving continued the same style of fanciful English delineation in his Bracebridge Hall, in which we are introduced to the interior of a squire's mansion, and to a number of original

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Washington Irving's Cottage.

issued from his fertile pen-Astoria, a narrative of American adventure; A Tour in the Prairies; Abbotsford and Newstead, &c. The principal works of Mr Irving are his Sketch-Book' and Bracebridge Hall; these are the corner-stones of his fame, and likely to be durable. In all his writings, however, there are passages evincing fine taste, gentle affections, and graceful description. His sentiments are manly and generous, and his pathetic and humorous sketches are in general prevented from degenerating into extravagance by practical good sense and a correct judgment. Modern authors have too much neglected the mere matter of style; but the success of Mr Irving should convince the careless that the graces of composition, when employed even on paintings of domestic life and the quiet scenes of nature, can still charm as in the days of Addison, Goldsmith, and Mackenzie.

[Manners in New York in the Dutch Times.] The houses of the higher class were generally constructed of wood, excepting the gable end, which was of small black and yellow Dutch bricks, and always faced on the street; as our ancestors, like their descendants, were very much given to outward show, and were noted for putting the best leg foremost. The house was always furnished with abundance of large doors and small windows on every floor; the date of its erection was curiously designated by iron figures on the front; and on the top of the roof was perched a fierce little weathercock, to let the family into the important secret which way the wind blew. These, like the weathercocks on the tops of our steeples, pointed so many different ways, that every man could have a wind to his mind; and you would have thought old Eolus had set all his bags of wind adrift, pellmell, to gambol about this windy metropolis; the most stanch and loyal citizens, however, always went according to the weathercock on the top of the governor's house, which was certainly the most correct, as he had a trusty servant employed every morning to climb up and point it whichever way the wind blew.

In those good days of simplicity and sunshine, a

passion for cleanliness was the leading principle in domestic economy, and the universal test of an able housewife; a character which formed the utmost ambition of our unenlightened grandmothers. The front door was never opened except on marriages, funerals, New-Year's days, the festival of St Nicholas, or some such great occasion. It was ornamented with a gorgeous brass knocker curiously wrought, sometimes into the device of a dog, and sometimes of a lion's head; and was daily burnished with such religious zeal, that it was ofttimes worn out by the very precautions taken for its preservation. The whole house was constantly in a state of inundation, under the discipline of mops, and brooms, and scrubbing-brushes; and the good housewives of those days were a kind of amphibious animal, delighting exceedingly to be dabbling in water, insomuch that a historian of the day gravely tells us, that many of his townswomen grew to have webbed fingers like unto a duck; and some of them, he had little doubt, could the matter be examined into, would be found to have the tails of mermaids; but this I look upon to be a mere sport of fancy, or, what is worse, a wilful misrepresentation.

The grand parlour was the sanctum sanctorum, where the passion for cleaning was indulged without control. In this sacred apartment no one was permitted to enter excepting the mistress and her confidential maid, who visited it once a-week for the purpose of giving it a thorough cleaning, and putting. things to rights, always taking the precaution of leaving their shoes at the door, and entering devoutly on their stocking feet. After scrubbing the floor, sprinkling it with fine white sand, which was curiously stroked into angles, and curves, and rhomboids, with a broom, after washing the windows, rubbing and polishing the furniture, and putting a new bunch of evergreens in the fireplace, the window-shutters were again closed to keep out the flies, and the room carefully locked up until the revolution of time brought round the weekly cleaning day.

As to the family, they always entered in at the gate, and most generally lived in the kitchen. To have seen a numerous household assembled around the fire, one would have imagined that he was tran

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