minors of syllogisms whose majors were non-apparent to Adam Crotch. It was in vain that he tried to explain to her the nature of the petitio principii.

In the course of time, Adam had sons and daughters. His philosophy now encountered fresh trials. Disquiet and doctors' bills he was prepared for; but he was not prepared for the requisitions of monthly nurses. He had not counted on supernumerary napkins, bibs, caps, pinafores, ribbons, feathers, frocks, and trouOccasional disturbance whilst at his studies he had expected, but he never thought he should be called from his books to rock a cradle. An expedient which he adopted to lighten this especial burden should be recorded. It consisted in the adaptation of a smoke-jack to produce the required motion; but this arrangement was continually interfered with by the cook.

sers.

Grievously, too, was his rationalism outraged, during the period antecedent to the nativity of each little Crotch. What but whim and caprice could beget a craving for gingerbread, shrimps, pickled cabbage, syllabub, and artichokes? Once he was inflexible,-he could not afford compliance, and to his eternal disgrace among the neighbouring gossips, and the never-ending reproaches of Mrs. Crotch, the brand of Burgundy in purple indelible, was imprinted on his offspring's brow!

His calculations thus confounded, his system thus upset, his scheme of domestic happiness thus baffled, what was the philosopher to do? He had no alternative but to cut down his own expenses to the lowest possible mark. He renounced wine, he forswore grog, he relinquished even the solace of his pipe-he drank his tea without milk or sugar-he lived on the smallest amount of food that would support nature. He bought no new books; his studies were arrested that he might avoid arrest. A small patrimony was all he had to subsist on. This he had thought to do by close shaving on philosophical principles, but found himself obliged to effect it by an economy opposed to his philosophy.

Our latest account of Adam Crotch represents him as meditating some scheme for the enlargement of his means. He intends to devote those faculties, heretofore employed on speculation, to business. Would that he could discover that Stone, whose acquisition has so long been the philosopher's object! In the meantime, let philosophers in general, and those of the Crotch school in particular, about to marry, study attentively, that chapter in the book of human nature whose special subject is woman.

P. L.

CROMWELL IN THE SHADES.

A TERRIBLE region-lighted by neither sun nor star. One can hardly breathe for the throngs that press upon us on all sides,—that glide, and flit, and wheel to and fro,—the spiritual wrecks that, from the first day of creation, the surging sea of life has bee never casting up upon these awful shores. Hosts of faces-pale, as from the contemplation of some new and most unutterable horror, bear down upon you every instant; they will overwhelm you in their wild career-their ghastly eyes almost touch your own, yet they are gone; they have passed over-around-through you; unsubstantial as the business on which they are engaged.

It is the very mockery of worldly existence. See the Miser there; how he guards the heap he has raised, to remind him of his beloved gold! How he glares upon all who approach! Would any one touch it, he is at his throat. Miserable shade! what avails it? Suddenly the intended murderer and his victim, as by the influence of the same thought, burst out into yells of laughter, that sound like so many blows upon the dull earth-they scatter the pile to the winds-part, and presently begin again, each to build, or to contend as before.

Shades woo, and other shades listen; the seducer will triumph. But-shudderingly-he flies; just when she ceases to do so.

Here, in the centre of an eager and struggling throng, sits the crowned and robed monarch, dispensing honours among those who press forward exultingly to receive them-kneel and worship him for his bounty-and then, as though some subtle poison ran through their veins as the ribbon touched their breast, or as though the coronet burnt into the very brain, as it was placed upon the head, suddenly tear them off, and dash them down, and spit upon them, in contempt and hatred, before the giver's own eyes. Yet, behold, they are again struggling for the front of the circle.

Statesmen sit in solemn council. A sedate form rises, utters words of sympathy for the sorrows of a poverty-stricken people, and deplores in earnest language their ignorance; but his words are responded to by curses from the myriads around; the neighbouring gibbet catches his eye-he leaps up in frenzy, re-echoing

every curse upon his own head; his only prayer is for instant annihilation.

Warriors pursue, and the stricken fall; yet in the very moment of conquest the victor's arm, like a dreamer's, becomes unnerved. Some strange consciousness overpowers him; he turns away; the pursued now becomes the pursuer, and with the same result. Yet Miser, Seducer, King, Statesman, Warrior, must go on thus eternally. They are the mimes of their own former state. The allabsorbing passion of life remains here in all its intensity; their punishment is to see it in its true character.

And how they still hover upon the very edge of these gloomy shores, yearning ever to recross the fatal stream, and live again— oh, how differently-the years allotted to them of human existence. And that thought will sometimes allay the intolerable fever that preys upon them. Here too they watch the movements of the unresting ferryman, who will draw an occasional smile from the most forlorn, by his utter indifference to the quality, or quarrels, or appeals, of his spiritual freight. See, for instance, when a duke is complaining, in language almost inarticulate with emotion, that he has been seated by the side of one of his own labourers— what can be more full of content than worthy Charon's face?

Then the trial of the new-comers before Rhadamanthus-most unerring and righteous of judges. Have they sought the good of their fellow-men ?-a thousand errors are overlooked; on the wings of joy and love the glad spirits are dismissed to their Elysium. There they, too, live over again their former lives. There they, too, have a more than mortal knowledge of what those lives should have been; and the partial becomes a complete harmony. Have they pursued chiefly their own gratifications? no excuses now save them; they join the band that extends around-far, far away, numberless as the sands of the shore. Have they outraged all the most sacred laws of nature, and made their lives a universal burden ?the iron gates of Tartarus yawn wide for them beneath their feet; they sink amid a thousand shrieks and sounds of horror.

But chiefly they haunt these shores in order to learn what is passing in the world above; and whether it be that some dark inklings have reached them, that the reign of the inexorable Pluto will pass away whenever the world shall cease to send fresh subjects for punishment, or whether it be that the further they fly from self, and all things pertaining thereto, the less furious become their pangs, many listen with an interest that is inex

pressibly touching to aught that speaks of improvement; and turn away in drearier hopelessness than ever, as they learn how strongly runs the current in the opposite direction. Yet, obedient to their destiny, touch but the master passion, and the wandering spirit seeks again its old gratification,-begins once more to heave the stone up the hill.

"Ha! the boat has just grounded," exclaims the shade of a stock-jobber, as he rushes forward and questions the ferryman.

"Charon, Charon! you remember me; I died last night. Tell me, there's a good fellow, what was the decision on the York line to-day? Tell me. I hold-I mean I did hold-ten thousand pounds worth of shares. Tell me correctly; and you shall have some shares yourself, in the very next allotments I have to do with."

What a

"Is he dead yet, Charon ?-the incumbent, I mean. world it was! That I should live for thirty years, daily looking for his death, and then die myself before him! Is he dead, Charon? you know, the vicarage was promised to me."

"Well, Charon, what news? Is the world any better or worse since we left it ?"

"No, gentlemen-no; there's no news worth mentioning. The world was always wicked; now it's getting dull into the bargain. Well, I shall be all the merrier for it.-Oh, by the bye, some among you may think it news to hear that they 're talking of putting Cromwell among the kings. I mean his statue."

"Father!"

"Charles!"

For a moment there was a deep pause. The two spirits who had thus spoken gazed in each other's eyes, seeking to read a confirmation of the truth of what they had heard. They shook with emotion, and, as if to relieve the pressure on their throbbing temples, took off the golden circles that pressed them. It was the accidental gesture of a moment; but, with a sudden consciousness, they hurriedly replaced the symbols of their earthly state. The elder then started forwards.

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Charon, you must be mad, or there is rebellion again in England-another Cromwell arisen. You forget, Charon, my son was restored; that monarchy regained its own."

"Mad! I did not forget to bring you here at the right time, King Charles the First of England. Mad! What, then, were you, to come, as you did?"

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Well, but Charon," said the younger spirit, "consider now, seriously, whether you are not mad. Cromwell among the kings! Ha ha

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ha!"

Harkye, King Charles the Second; if I find there is another Cromwell, I'll take you back to him."

man pushed off.

And therewith the boat

"Ha! ha ha! the malicious scoundrel. Take me back? Jove forbid until, at least, the way 's quite clear. But, father, can it be true? Cromwell among the kings!"

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Yes, England must be in rebellion. Our thrones, Charles, are again in danger. Oh that I could live over again my time! The canting traitor should not out-plot me then. My right hand should not know what my left hand did. I would give him, as I before said I would, the halter for his neck, that he thought was to be the garter for his leg, in reward for his traitorous presumption in daring to treat with me, an anointed king, for the quiet possession of my own throne. Yes; but I would also take care he should not discover my purposes, as he did by the discovery of that fatal letter, which I had written to my queen there, Henrietta, while the treaty was in progress. Alas! it was that that overthrew me. Yet, can it be? Cromwell among the kings!"

"And why not?" interposed the voice of one of the new comers. And the question was caught up and repeated by some of the shades around-" Why not?"

It

"3

'Suppose, gentlemen," said another, "we try the cause. is a great and solemn one, and upon which a just decisionHere the speaker, gliding to the side of Charles I., with outstretched hand, whispered, "I am quite at your service; what's your case?" Receiving, however, no other answer than a look and a gesture of most significant contempt, the barrister shade quietly remarked, "Oh, very well; perhaps the other side will require me. Come, let us try the cause.

Find me a fitting jury," observed the monarch: "then, indeed, I might consent to state it."

"Of whom could a fitting jury be formed?"

"Of my equals.'

"An excellent idea!" exclaimed a jester. "Here; seek all the kings up to or beyond the Conquest; they are most of them hovering about. But, let me see, there's Bluff Hal and two or three more down in Tartarus. We must have him up, at all events, for the occasion. Rhadamanthus likes justice.-Quick