Our second specimen is also of a rural character. It probably the girl's brother, is looking on with the greatest is that of a girl feeding the fowls, while a boy, most eagerness.

and Julia will be nineteen to-morrow. Something must be done," continued she, after a long pause, during which it appeared she had failed of the answer to which she considered herself entitled. "Something must be done, Mr. A.” "And why ?" answered the quiet man.

Why ?-Why because the little ones will be big ones soon; they are treading fast on their sisters' heels; and because my constitution is too weak to answer the claims of more than three daughters out at the same time. You never help me. Do, dear Mr. A.; think of something that may get the girls off."

"Let them alone, my love,” replied Mr. Allington, "let them alone, and you'll see they'll go off of themselves." Yes," rejoined the lady somewhat pettishly, "I suppose they will, but not by themselves. You'll have them go off with the tutor, Mr. Docet; or the curate, Mr. Proseit; or the bailiff's son young Whistler; or-"

"I don't know a better man any where than our curate," said the unrelenting husband; "and as for the-" "Pray, hold your tongue, Mr. A., unless you wish me to go into a fit."

There was a pause on both sides, and no fit was gone into. And then the pause was broken (as is so seldom the case) by the lady. But her voice had a coaxing tone, as she resumed the subject.

"My dear, dear John, they are your own childrenthink of that. Surely you must feel a little anxiety to see them happy?"

"I do see them happy!" replied the contented gentleman, and drew the window-blind quite up." And you shall see them happy too. Look at them, my dear: three, four, five, six, well-grown, healthy girls, romping in the field there with their three little brothers. It's a fine sight, and I can't say I'm in a hurry to lose it. If they were not happy they would not laugh so heartily, and run and jump so.'

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"Swallows

"The Fates forbid!" said Mr. Allington. them up, indeed!-Why, he drinks and he plays;-a drunkard and a sharper-"

"Some ill-natured people do hint that he does sometimes drink a little more than is good for his health, and does play a leetle bit more than necessary, but I don't believe a word of it:-I won't believe-"

"And a glutton," continued Mr. A., as if in a humour to proceed in the statement of a sum in which the unit's place was still far distant, “and a—”

“A glutton, Mr. A.!—What can you possibly mean? Don't you know that there never was a time when it was so absolutely essential a quality of a gentleman to understand cookery thoroughly? But now, dear Mr. A., I wish you would be serious. If we could get him, indeed it would be something like a match. But the world has given him away already, and I fear there is nothing very likely to break it off. Well, what a lucky woman Mrs. Carleton is, to get such a marriage for her ugly daughter!" "Ugly daughter!" said Mr. Allington.

"Decidedly ugly," replied his wife: as long and as pale as-"

"Pale!" said Mr. Allington.

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Pray don't repeat my words, sir-it is not well-bred. I said pale, and I say so again. She is as pale as a sheet, except when she speaks or sings, and then she is altogether as much too red. I hate your changeable complexions and your bashful girls: just as if they had never been any where, and knew nobody but their own papas; I can't abide it. We were speaking of Mr. Burton: he's too poor. But we mustn't offend him neither; for you know the title and property are on the cards still, Mr. A. Tell him Adey is much too young. Say it would be the death of me to part with her, and that you must have time to break the offer to me. Leave it so; and then, in a year, suppose, if nothing better should turn up-"

"No, Mrs. Allington!" said honest John, rising: "no

were allowed to please myself, and, as I verily believe, Adey too, I should accept his offer directly. But, as for playing with the feelings of an honourable and frankhearted young man, and gambling with his happiness as well as with our daughter's, it is what I will not do; so I will go and tell him the truth, and—”

"Just like the rest of your obsolete notions," answered the prolific and provident mother. Happy, indeed!--I will refuse him, if you really desire it. If, indeed, I Get them rich husbands, Mr. A., and then you might see them happy, and have something to be proud of.-Adelaide! Maria! Julia!" she screamed, putting her head so far out of the lower window that I thought it prudent to make a corresponding movement of mine, in the inverse ratio of the upper; come in directly!--You'll be ruined in the sun there without your bonnets! My dear Mr. A." lowering her voice, and resuming the dialogue, we must think of something for them: we must get some of them married."

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Nothing is easier," replied the husband in a dry, business-like tone, lowered, whether by design or not, to a whimsical unison with that in which her last words were

spoken; "nothing is easier, my dear Mrs. A. Surely, surely you were not asleep last night-no, I am sure you were not-when I told you that I had had a good offer for Adey. Our neighbour, Tom Burton, proposed to me for her yesterday. If she were to marry him, she would only go a couple of miles from us. We might see her every day-lovely, and happy, and dear to us, even as in this happy hour, with sunshine and home all around her, only with one more affection to sweeten the long life which, please God, is before her; and that need not make us jealous, my dear Mrs. A. She has known him from infancy, and I am sure she likes him."

"I flatter myself a daughter of mine can like any man when I tell her he is a proper match for her," said the justly proud mother. "But Mr. Burton won't do, Mr. A. and you know it, and it is provoking of you. He is too poor: his rich cousin is the partie; it is he that swallows up the wealth and real respectability of the family. If we could manage Sir James Burton now!"

"Tell him what?" shrieked Mrs. Allington, in a voice of the utmost consternation, and then, bringing her husband back to within confidential distance of my ear"Tell him nothing, Mr. A.-dear Mr. A., if you love me, tell him nothing! Since you are not to be guided by my prudent tenderness for our child's best interests, do at least only refuse him; but tell him nothing. Oh, my dear Mr. A., how your indiscretion alarms me! But now that I have got your attention for a moment, do just sit down again, and let us consult a little farther as to what's to be done for our other poor dear girls. There's Maria and Julia, as well as Adey, plenty old enough and to spare. We must look about us."

Here there was so large a blank in the dialogue, that I began to fear I should learn no more of the secrets of the family. At length Mr. Allington for once broke silence, and in a more animated key than was usual with him.

"My dear," said he, I have been thinking over all the young men who visit here, and I do believe I have my eye on one who would be a good husband for Marią. Guess!- He's not far off. Of all the birds in the air, what do you say of young H-?"

Now, ladies and gentlemen, I have a particular reason, which I may explain hereafter, for not mentioning more than the initial of this very respectable name.

"I say he is a poor, pitiful fool," sharply replied the

odious matron," and that he shall have no daughter of mine. He spends on himself all he has, and only thinks how to maintain his idle profusion, instead of how to get on in the world by means of his excellent connexions. He is over head in debt already, and his income is not so good by one-half as he is unprincipled enough to represent it to those who, like us, Mr. A., have an interest in knowing. But still the creature has his use. He brings others, and will do no harm to the girls, for he philanders only with married women. He does not want a wife-that is to say, not a wife of his own; and, moreover, I know it, Mr. A., if he does like one of our girls better than another, it is Adey, and not Maria. Take my word for that."

the fair and full apology (and how seldom is the apology required!) for that mystic, undisputed power, which, never claimed by the feebler sex as a right, is sure to be yielded by the other, as much from impulse as from courtesy. At that age the features repeat, with ready truth, the blameless story of the eager mind. How modestly are the outpourings of a buoyant spirit tempered by the deepening tinge of that bashful yet dimpled cheek, and how eloquently are they pleaded for in the stealthy glance of that half-penitent, half-laughing eye! There is nothing under the sky like the clear deep beauty of the eye which I am thinking of, unless it be the ocean when it lies calm and open to the sunshine, and reflects only the brightness and the colours of heaven, on which it looks.

Do you understand me, ladies and gentlemen? If you do not, I pity you, all and equally.

It was from a long, stedfast gaze upon this picture that I was one day roused by the gentle voice of the original herself, then but a few years older, who had been sent by her father to desire my company during his ride. She had approached quite close to me before I perceived her; and probably she had already spoken unheeded. A playful but diffident look claimed identity with that recorded on the canvass, and as her eye followed mine to what had been the cause of my abstraction, the glow on her cheek became as deep as in childhood. We were silent. I felt like a detected thief-yet why? It was no offence; and if it were, surely I was before a judge who had no great reason to be severe. At length, with a sigh, she said,

I said I had a particular reason for not mentioning more than the initial of this last described gentleman's name. Out upon the malicious old witch!-I, ladies and gentlemen, I-the blushing author-am young H- -. There is an English proverb touching the nature of the personal topics which listeners are oftenest fated to hear. There is also a French one which says, that "only truth can wound." Every word this detestable woman said is true. I do spend more than I shall ever be able to pay. I am given to talk mysterious nonsense to married persons of the other sex. For I find I cannot hold my tongue; and I have in my time discovered that, if one talks much to a young unmarried lady (and I have not much fancy for talking to old ones), one's discourse is apt to be noted down with a degree of precision quite disagreeable by a certain married lady of great authority in these matters-"Do you know I was very happy when that was painted? her mother. But if ever I could think of sacrificing myself to matrimony-if ever I could think of "altars and homes," in any but the widely patriotic sense-if I could reconcile myself to give up all the thousand indulgences of celibacy-if, as Alcides did when he married, I could surrender my club-if I could compromise my love of Ascension turtle, and mock turtle, and of every other turtle for that of one faithful turtle, of one little happy nestoh how I should jump at that respectable way of life, shared with the pretty, and amiable, and good, and dear Adelaide Allington.

But, albeit this is true, too true, how could that plaguy woman, her mother, have known it? For I have never breathed it to mortal. I do not talk, that I know of, in my sleep. And if I did, how should that have enlightened Mrs. Allington? Adelaide herself never, but once, caught me off my guard; and I have no knowledge of Adelaide's character, if her mother could have obtained from her any sanction to her surmises.

Ladies and gentlemen, I must digress. Digress, if you please, with me. If you don't like my goings on, shut me, leave me, and there's no harm done.

In honest John's own den in Allington House there is a picture of his dear-my dear, dear Adelaide, when she was but a child. "How I do love," says the Ettrick Shepherd (and how I do agree with him), "how I do love a well-educated little girl of twelve!" It is an age worth so much more than all other ages; -when the young heart is so entirely occupied with the warm visitings of its own innocent gladness, (and at that age the tenderest heart is always the most joyous, for it has never known a stain or a sorrow). It is a merry, because a pure and honest age, and because its affections seem to it to be immortal;-death has never severed, nor unkindness blighted, one bud of their sweet stock. Alas! that such an age should ever lose its charm,-for lose that charm it will and must. There is the presence, and the consciousness, and the love, of all good-and the absence and the ignorance of all ill. There is the fair and full promise of all that hope can paint (and hope paints well); there is

A dear friend, a very dear friend, the companion of my infancy, was drawn at the same time. They were romps, I believe, rather than sittings, and we were sorry when they ended."

"And who was your very dear friend, Adelaide ?" quoth I, with an awkward prophetic anxiety.

"Our neighbour, Mr. Burton," she half whispered. It was enough. The tone and look told me the secret of her ingenuous heart, and the hopelessness of what mine had begun to cherish; and fie on the heart which from that hour could beat for her with any but a brother's love.

She put her arm within mine, and led me to her father. And now, ladies and gentlemen, suffer me to lead you back to Mrs. Allington and the window. I was in the act of leaving my ambuscade, from very anger at the discovery which that perspicacious lady had thus made of my best secret, and her pitiless disclosure of it to her husband, when honest John again riveted me to my chair by asking, with his wonted simplicity, the very question I longed to put.

"And how do you know all this?" said he.

"I know it," replied his obliging partner, "I know it all beyond a doubt. For Mademoiselle questioned Mr. H.'s confidential Swiss, by my direction, about his master's habits and fortune. Broullion affected to be diplomatic with her, but La Crepe was too much for him, and out it all came. Every one with eyes can see how it is, and I myself spent half a morning joining together some torn bits of paper which I watched him throw under the great library table, and they turned out to be some very bad verses, entitled 'The Irresolute, addressed to A. A.' Now don't fly off, Mr. A.," continued she, in a tone of soothing remonstrance, "for now I think of it, I must have a little quarrel with you. When we were discussing my projected little pic-nic last night, I fancied you inclined to throw a little cold water upon my little scheme. Now wasn't that a leetle unkind ?"

INSANITY CURABLE IN ITS EARLIER
STAGES.

BY MR. FORBES WINSLOW.

AMERICAN VARIETIES.-No. III.

down to settle at .
A WATCHMAKER'S RUSE.-A poor watchmaker came
-. The village was populous. This
person was utterly unknown; but he had ingeniously hit
church-door was opened daily, to send up his son, a lad of
on a project to procure employ. He contrived, when the
address, to the church-tower unseen, and to alter the clock.
his father's business. This measure, of course, made all
This the boy was enabled to do by a slight knowledge of
the watches in the neighbourhood wrong so repeatedly (and
every one swears by his church-clock) that the owners sent
them to the new comer to be cleaned and repaired. This

are so often found running into excesses of folly, that people well employed scarce dream of. Listlessness and idleness must be eschewed by the person predisposed to insanity, in like manner as the wine-cup must be shunned INSANITY may be cured, as the cholera was, most easily by the man who is threatened with fever. Any employand most surely, in its precursory stage, when its existence ment is better than the doing nothing; but if the circumis not suspected by the most watchful friend, but is to be stances of the patient will admit of the expense, travelling perceived at a glance by the intelligent physician. We have is among the most agreeable and rational sources of amuseno doubt that most diseases are thus preceded by certain ment and occupation he can have; but if this remedy is precursory signs, which, like the first droppings from a impracticable, let him enter into society, and cultivate a cloud, give indications of a coming tempest. We rememtaste for social pleasures. Then, though like the astrober how gentle, how insidious, were the approaches of the nomer in Rasselas, when alone he finds his mind chained cholera; a slight disorder of the alimentary canal, hardly down by an uncontrollable violence to one or two absorbing worth attention, was, however, the sure forerunner of the thoughts, by mingling with other men, and taking a part dreadful collapse. And so we believe that most diseases in the duty of pleasing, these thoughts will be dissipated, have their warning voices; and if we would hearken to and the fell spirit exorcised. "I cannot conceive," obthem in time, much evil would be prevented. It is curious serves Dr. Uwins, "a more delightful spectacle than that that this important branch of medical inquiry has not yet of an individual whose constitutional cast is melancholy, been attended to: but though doctors may not like the warring against his temperament, and determining to old saying, let every one bear in mind that " enter with hilarity into the scenes and circumstances of an ounce of social life." prevention is better than a pound of cure." Obsta principiis let him try to avoid a calamity, rather than have to extricate himself; and he will have, as far as human foresight warrants us in saying, a long and happy existence. Mr. Winslow's remarks upon this point are worthy of attention. "In a great majority of cases," he observes, "the premonitory indications are well marked and unequivocal. The experienced physician and accurate observer will be able to detect, before the mental alienation becomes apparent to others, the early dawnings of derangement. He knows that it is frequently manifested by some change in the person's usual healthy habits of thinking and acting; by the exhibition of odd fancies and whims. Although surrounded by every thing calculated to contribute to his happiness, he is the most miserable of human beings; trifles annoy and irritate him; he sees in his dearest friends his deadliest enemies; talks of conspiracies, of plots, and stratagems; becomes suspicious of every thing and every body; his former objects of pleasure afford him no delight; he avoids society, and is occasionally heard muttering strange things to himself. In the majority of cases these are the early dawnings of cerebral disease leading to unequivocal insanity, and yet we are so tied down to definitions, arbitrary standards, and poetical tests, that we will not admit derangement of mind to be present until the symptoms are so self-evident and glaring, that the condition of the mind becomes apparent to the most superficial observer. When this view of insanity is recognised as orthodox, and moral treatment is adopted at the early stages of the disease, much good may be expected to result." The success attending the treatment of insanity mainly depends upon an early recourse to such means as will divert the mind from its one absorbing thought; hence, observes our author, "occupation is an infallible specific for many of the imaginary ills of life." In cases where the mind is sinking under the influence of its own weight, and the fancy is allowed to dwell uninterruptedly upon the ideas of its own creation, until the individual believes himself to stand apart from all the world, the very personification of human misery and wretchedness, the physician can recommend no better remedy than constant and steady occupation for the mind and body. Burton concludes his able work on "melancholy," with this valuable advice, "Be not solitary-be not idle." Dr. Reid recommended a patient, labouring under great mental depression, to engage in the composition of a novel, which, during the time he was occupied with the task, effected much good. The mind is an active, restless thing within, and must have food from without, or it will feed upon itself; hence, men of leisure, as they are called,

ruse established the artisan.

APPROBATIVENESS.

-"We've come off with flying colours," as the ensign said when he ran away from the enemy.

INQUISITIVENESS.-Looking over an editor's shoulder while he is writing.

"I go the whole hog for internal improvements," said the bear as he devoured the boar-pig.

FORTITUDE.—A hungry man standing unmoved amidst the ringing of dinner bells, the clashing of dishes, and the smell of roast turkey.

There is an old maid up in Sullivan street, who can look so all-fired sour, that she goes out by the day to make pickles. It saves a heap of vinegar.

"Less of your jaw and more of your legs," as the negro said when the alligator seized him.

MY FELLOW-CLERK.

BY ALEXANDER ANDREWS.

THE chief clerk of Messrs. Cash and Squeezum's establishment was a little, stout, square-built German, the happy possessor of an annual income of £40 sterling, a pair of bright, piercing, mouse-like eyes, and the euphonious appellation of Peter Smug.

The celebrated commercial firm of Cash and Squeezum was engaged during the French war in the Riga bristle trade, "and a roaring business," said the mercantile world, impressed by the dignified state in which Mr. Cash, senior, and Mr. Cash, junior, rolled daily into the city, screened from the vulgar gaze by the pink blinds of their carriageand-four, a roaring business are they doing." For once the mercantile world was mistaken, as the London Gazette soon testified, but this is no business of mine.

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