your friends. That will bring the watch and the surgeon-perhaps the gensd'armes, the lawyers, the jailor, and the judge. Mind you attend to all I order.' To give a true idea of this nocturnal scene, the painter should possess the crayon of Charlet and Calota, and use the pencils of Teniers and Rembrandt. Painting only can express it.

"I have now had some pleasure for my money," said the count, pointing to the amazed and stupified rag-gatherer. "As for Caroline Crochard," resumed he, "let her perish by the horrors of hunger and thirst, amid the despairing cries of her famishing children, after recognising the utter baseness of him for whom she abandoned me! I would not give a sou to save her from the extremity of misery; and I will never see you again, because you have assisted her!"

So saying, the count left the motionless physician, and disappeared on his way to his solitary and cheerless mansion in the Rue St. Lazare.

BEST MOTIVES.

"The course of true love never did run smooth."

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WHEN people are mystified by the deeds of others, there is generally a great talk about motives. "What could be his motive for cutting us?" "Oh certainly! I can't say I should like such conduct in my daughters; but then, you know, my dear Miss Backbite, perhaps we don't understand your motives." "Pray, sir," said Sir Richard Birnie, "if you were not guilty, why did you effect your escape from the officer the other night?" Vy, your vorship, I can explain that ere," said the gentleman at the bar, "and you'll think better on me ven you knows my motives. You see, your vorship, that it was a Toosday night, and I vas brought up a Hindependant Vesleyan, and vas always particular about chapel: Ivanted to go to a prayermeeting, and as I know'd the hofficer vould'nt go along o'me, cos he varn't no vays religiouslike given, vy I vent alone sooner nor miss; and them was my motives, your vorship." But to my tale.

The sun had sunk below the level of the lowest chimney-pot in St. James's

street, and the morning of that meridian was pretty far advanced, when the Honourable Berkeley Fitzruby, the handsomest fellow on town, half marched, half sauntered, into the Countess of Lackland's drawing-room, and was graciously received by the Lady Augusta, the youngest and sole unmarried of a blooming family of daughters. The beautiful blonde sat on a huge ottoman, at a marquetan table, busily engaged with a lithograph of Taglioni, a pile of shaved deals, and a bottle of transfer varnish. "How very apropos you are come, Berkeley," she said; "you are such a clever creature-do tell me how to use this transfer composition."

"Upon my honour, Lady Augusta," answered Fitzruby, "if you do me the honour to consult me, I fear I shall be selfish in my instructions."

"Selfish," said Lady Augusta, "how is that possible? it will be a work of charity,"

"If," rejoined Berkeley, "you will apply my tuition, you may indeed enact a work of charity."

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Why now, Berkeley, I dare say you are getting up a Fancy Fair, and you are going to ask me to supply you with work-boxes and cigar-cases, and to take a stall. But now do tell me how to use this varnish properly."

"Why really, Lady Augusta, unless it is applicable to animate as well as inanimate objects, I almost doubt my capabilities of instruction in its use: but if it can be applied to the living, I would, in all humility, entreat it might be used to transfer the image of a certain silent adorer to the gentle bosom of nature's fairest creation."

"Ah! ah!" said the lady, affecting to misunderstand him, " I see now it is a play, and not a fair, you are getting up; but what can I do in it?" "Everything."

"Oh, indeed!-would my part be a long one?"

I

"I hope so."

"But I have such a horrid memory; could never recollect a dozen lines." "In this case," said Berkeley, word by heart will only be required."

one

"Oh, then," said Lady Augusta, "I think I can achieve it; but do you mean me to go through the whole of this long part, with the exception of one word, in dumb show?"

"That were rather too hard," answered Fitzruby, 66 one word only is

6

Unable longer to conceal his pain,' unfolding with passionate ardour, yet with trembling respect, the tale of his enduring love; then you must receive his declarations with some encouraging show of sympathy, and when he thus takes your hand and swears, as I now do, by all my hopes of heaven, thy smile is dearer to me than the breath of life,' and adds, 'O speak! say, dare I believe I am beloved, or hope I may be?' your ladyship must whisper-'Yes.'The lady blushed, and looked down, and said nothing, and smeared the table over with varnish, and affected a lack of comprehension. "And now, Augusta," said Berkeley, resuming his proper character, "may I believe, or may I hope? -speak-tell me."

Not now,' ," answered the lady, turning away her head; "not now, Berkeley-another day-to-morrow.

"To-morrow, be it then," he said, "I obey ;" and having gracefully kissed the fair hand he still held, he withdrew.

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Lady Augusta had not recovered from the perturbation which Fitzruby's declaration, although long expected, had created, when the earl her father entered, and introduced to her notice Barnaby Grampus, Esq., of Tokenhouse Yard, in the city of London, bill broker. Augusta, my dear, my particular friend, Mr. Grampus," said the earl, as he handed forth the desiccated Scot, "pray sit down, Mr. Grampus. Mr. Grampus, Augusta my dear, is just returned from Scotland"-the lady bowed her head "has been building a seat there," continued the earl," on a very superb scale -delightful views, Mr. Grampus, I dare say. Croignaskallan Castle, near Loch Ness, I think. Augusta, you are very fond of Scott's novels, and of his Lady of the Lake, and the descriptions they contain of the mountain scenery of Scotland-how should you like to visit the spots his genius has made sacred?"

"O it would be delightful, papa," said Lady Augusta.

"I anticipated your answer, my dear. Mr. Grampus, however, was fearful you might view the prospect of a journey, or a residence among the rugged hills of Inverness-shire, with dread."

“ Mr. Grampus, papa ! Mr. Grampus is very good, but

"Ah, yes-I see, my dear," continued her father, "you don't understand me. Well, I'll leave Mr. Grampus, for a few minutes, to explain himself;" and he left the room. This was explanation sufficient; the lady's comprehensive faculties were fully awakened, and she sighed as she mentally compared Fitzruby and Grampus, and with the mind's eye glanced alternately at Croignaskallan Castle, Inverness-shire, and Curzon street, May Fair.

Grampus was an elderly gentlemanabout sixty, say-standing about five feet four inches, of a thin shrivelled frame, with a considerable bend of the back, confessing to a pair of lank legs, enveloped in a wrinkling pair of drab kerseymere breeches, the vile production of some Gaelic Schneider, and a pair of boots with long brown leather tops, that would have given Hoby the nightmare ; the upper part of his person was wrapped in a black coat and waistcoat, of a cut that a professor of geometry would have been puzzled to define, and of dimensions that made it doubtful whether the honourable gentleman, for he he was a member, had not, by some mistake, encased him in a garment of the great rint receiver of the seven millions; add to this, a thick fat nose, a pair of small light grey eyes, overhung by red bushy penthouse brows, and a thin sallow hatchet face, crowned with a scanty powdered crop of weak, straight hair: and the outward man of Grampus is before you.

"Your leddyship," said the swain, when the earl had quitted the room," is no doot surprisit at your noble father's words, which I can weel see your intelligence has richtly interpretit intill a declaration of my most respicful wushes for a nearer alliance with the earl through your ladyship."

"I have certainly," said Lady Augusta, "so understood my father, and I feel sensibly the honour you do me, sir, but -" and here she faltered.

"Ah! weel! weel!" resumed Grampus, interrupting her, "I'll not hurry your leddyship in a matter of sich importance, but I may be allowed to men

tion that I shall not object to add another thousand to the three thousand a-year, and the castle that the earl and myself had agreed on, as the settlement." Four thousand a-year and the castle!! Lady Augusta's brain was in a ferment; "but then he's such a horrid creature-poor Berkeley-oh no, it's impossible-grace, elegance, taste, and Fitzruby, forbid it." "To-morrow, perhaps, your leddyship will be prepared to give me an answer," said Grampus. The lady courtesied an affirmative, and the bill-broker went forth to do some discounts in a neighbouring square.

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"But, my dear mamma," said Lady Augusta, "I do love Berkeley, and he promises to give over play; and besides, the old lord, his uncle, who died last week, has left him a provision.”

"A mere thousand a-year, my love," said the countess; "not sufficient to find him in cologne and cambric; and his debts are enormous."

"How very unfortunate, mamma; for he's very handsome, now isn't he? and very accomplished!"

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"But think, my dear child," said her mamma, of the settlement Mr. Grampus proposes."

"O don't name him, mamma; he looks as if he would take me into the city to live; he's a detestable creature! How can you expect me to think of him while Berkeley exists?"

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'But, my dear Augusta, consult your prudence and good sense in this case; consider, my dear, your father's unfortunate losses will be known next week, We must then go on the Continent to economise, and all chances of marriage will be lost to you; and, what is worse, we cannot for some years support such an establishment as an unmarried daughter requires."

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'Well, then, mamma, if I must be married, you must, indeed, let Berkeley have me; for I cannot, indeed, be that monster's," said Lady Augusta, bursting into tears.

"Well, well, my dear," answered the countess, "don't weep-go to your room and dress; and as I shall not have another opportunity of speaking to you to-night, let me beg of you, once for all, to sacrifice some of your wishes to your prosperity."

The Lady Augusta retired to her room accordingly, and wept till her maid, Jemima Jenkins, assured her she

was looking almost unbecomingly pale, when she ceased to abandon herself to her grief, and gave herself up to her tire-woman instead. The earl and countess had a dinner-party on that day, and among the guests were Fitzruby and Grampus; the former had been invited because he had ruined himself in so fashionable a manner, that nothing in the world of ton could be deemed complete unless he was in some manner mixed up with it; the latter gentleman had won his invitation three weeks before, by cashing a bill for the earl, which the humane member of the humane society would have shrunk from if the acceptor had been even starving. Lady Augusta was placed, greatly to her mortification, next to Old Mortality, and consequently had no opportunity of insinuating a syllable concerning her forlorn condition to her beloved Berkeley, or of exchanging a word or look of confidence with him; as soon, therefore, as her withdrawal could be tolerated, she pleaded a violent head-ache, and retired for the evening to ponder on her hard fate; and when at last she slept, to dream that a vampire in old Grampus' powder and top-boots was keeping his wedding festival in the midst of a snowstorm, on a cairn three thousand feet above the level of the sea, and quaffing her blood out of a Highland quaick-but I grow prolix.

Alas! who can track the zig-zag steps of a woman's will through the mazes of a woman's heart. A short ten days had but elapsed, when a bevy of carriages beset the earl's door-the servants all befavoured, while ladies, befurbelowed and beflounced, and men in white gloves and waistcoats, "discoursed sweet music," of a marriage; and as the clock struck two, Barnaby Grampus, Esq., and Lady Augusta Grampus, stepped into the travelling chariot and four, and were whirled along the New North-road, on their way to Croignaskallan castle, while the Honourable Berkeley Fitzruby, in wayward mood, took wing for Paris, that seat of consolation to disappointed lovers. "Poor thing!" said the ladies to each other, when they met again at the duchess of -'s déjeuné, "what a sacrifice! but no doubt she was actuated by the best motives."-"O certainly," undoubtedly," "-"her father's immense losses,"" the only means to save the family," -"best possible motives," "kindest motives,".

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"most

affectionate motives,"-" most disinterested motives :"-in short, all lamented the match, but agreed that the lady acted from the most exemplary motives.

THE SWELLING OF POETRY.

WHERE hast thou spread thy couch of dreams, O fawn-eyed offspring of the many-daughtered Fancy? Where, with thy white footsteps, dost thou make glad the earth, O jewel-cinctured playmate of the soul of man?

The cloud-belted hills are thy thrones, O Poetry and 'tis for thee that the brooks chant their orisons in the mistroofed valleys! Thou walkest with the lonely Ariadne by the shores of the sounding sea, and art not terrified by the ringing cymbals of a northern host. Thy home is the universe! The golden clouds, which are the Almighty's breath, are to thee a dwelling! Thou floatest now in the western sky, wrapped in the mantle of yon silver mist.

Like the character of a good man on earth, the lofty mountain rises till the chaste snow reposes for ever on its summit, and it seems to belong more to heaven than to earth: silent it rises but for thy whisperings, lonely but for thy companionship. Where the broken columns of old Rome lie grand against the moon, there, on the mossy cushion which time hath woven for thee, thy footsteps are !

O'er the past thy alchymic spell is flung ! As century after century, fulfilling its circle, has been rolled away in order between us and God, thou hast gilded their edge with the abiding brilliance of thy glance; a brilliance, like that of the jasper column of the waters, whereon the moon's image walketh to us in the night, brighter as more distant. Where the torch of history has been extinguished in the damp cavern of the distant path, thy lamp has still kept its purple flame. Thou canst change also as thou canst reveal. On the page that chronicles the days of the lance and the shield, truth had affixed a dark stain of vice, but thy rose-tipped fingers passed over the leaf, and transformed it for ever into a star of glory.

Why doth the transparent leaf of the sweet rose glow so passionately? Because it hath lain against thy cheek.

All night thou dancest with the sum

mer waves as beneath the crystal-glancing moon, eye of the star-vestured night, they leap and laugh in their timid sport; and when they blush to be surprised by the morn at their dalliance, there thy presence deepens.

Where the lurid sun looks through the desolate and bare-armed forests of the north, like the eye of a demon glaring through the grates of hell, thou art a spectator: thou ridest, too, upon the messenger moonbeams that come down into the dark groves of the south, like the voice of the muezzin in a crowded city, to keep alive therein the thought of heaven.

The hours are companioned by thee. 'Tis morn. Diana like, the coy dawn comes, with timid quickness darting opal shafts from out day's quiver; thine eye is upon them as they shoot along the sky. 'Tis noon. The imperial sun hath reached the key-stone of day's arch, and pauses to survey the world he rules; a symphony of triumph is rung out by attending harps, but mortal ear can hear but thine. 'Tis night. The king of light descends to rest, and the seven daughters of the king of light have met in all their pomp to spread their sire's couch; they spread the couch, and thou the canopy.

Thine, too, the seasons in their varying course. The spring wind, like a dancing psaltress passes o'er the earth, who, like a maiden dreaming of her lover, faintly smiles unconscious of the act, and, smiling, wakes. Upon the breezes of the spring thou floatest! The velvetvested Summer, like a queen so heralded, comes winning her soft and stately course, and waving her languid and imperial arm to scatter crowns among her lovers. Thou art with her in her rosy bowers, and in the secret grottoes of her delight thou art her attendant! Following his queen who has gone before to gather earth's tribute of pleasure, comes the monarch of the harvest, majestic Autumn, to reap the profit of the year. The forest hangs out its crimson banner to the sky, and the bearded wheat puts on its golden robe, and meekly bends its bowing head. To him whose livery of service all earth adopts, thy homage is not wanting. Like the aged and lonely lingerer by the way-side when the triumph has past by, stands sad and desolate Winter. The moaning wind raves disconsolate through the creviced ice, like a frantic mother looking for her lost