|of their death. But Robin has store of tender | the zest of a repartee, that most evanescent anecdotes; and any one who has a mind to and least transfusible of all things; and when cry over the sorrows of a widowed turtle-dove, she uttered her pretty petition, "Mirth, admit and to hear described to the life her vermilion- me of thy crew!" brought as ready a comeye, black gorget, soft plumage, and plaintive | prehension, as true a spirit of gaiety, and as note, cannot do better than pay a visit to the garret in the Soak, and listen for half an hour to my friend the bird-catcher. MY GODMOTHERS. Or one of my godmothers I recollect but little. She lived at a distance, and seldom came in my way. The little, however, that I do remember of her, is very pleasing. She was the wife of a dignified clergyman, and resided chiefly in a great cathedral town, to which I once or twice accompanied my father, whose near relation she had married. She was a middle-aged woman, with sons and daughters already settled in life, and must in her youth have been exceedingly lovely; indeed, in spite of an increase of size which had greatly injured her figure, she might still be deemed a model of matronly beauty. Her face was in the highest degree soft, feminine, and delicate, with an extreme purity and fairness of complexion; dove-like eyes, a gentle | smile, and a general complacency and benevolence of aspect, such as I have rarely seen equalled. That sweet face was all sunshine. There was something in her look which realized the fine expression of the poet, when he speaks of -"those eyes affectionate and glad, That seem'd to love whate'er they looked upon." Her voice and manner were equally delightful, equally captivating, although quite removed from any of the usual arts of captivation. Their great charm was their perfect artlessness and graciousness, the natural result of a most artless and gracious nature. She kept little company, being so deaf as almost to unfit her for society. But this infirmity, which to most people is so great a disadvantage, seemed in her case only an added charm. She sat on her sofa in sober cheerfulness, placid and smiling, as if removed from the cares and the din of the work-a-day world; or, if any thing particularly interesting was going forward in the apartment, she would look up with such a pretty air of appeal, such silent questioning, as made every body eager to translate for her, -some by loud distinct speech, some by writing, and some by that delicate and mysterious sign-manual, that unwritten shorthand, called talking on the fingers, whatever happened to be passing; and she was so attentive and so quick, that one sentence, half a sentence, a word, half a word, would often be enough. She could catch even much innocent enjoyment into a young and laughing circle, as she found there. Her reliance on the kindness and affection of all around her was unbounded; she judged of others by herself, and was quite free from mistrust and jealousy, the commonest and least endurable infirmity of the deaf. She went out little, but at home her hospitality and benevolence won all hearts. She was a most sweet person. I saw too little of her, and lost her too soon; but I loved her dearly, and still cherish her memory. Her husband was a very kind and genial person also, although in a different way. The Dean, for such was his professional rank, was a great scholar, an eminent Grecian, a laborious editor, a profound and judicious critic, an acute and sagacious commentator-who passed days and nights in his library, covered with learned dust, and deep in the metres. Out of his study he was, as your celebrated scholar is apt to be, exceedingly like a boy just let loose from school, wild with animal spirits, and ripe for a frolic. He was also (another not uncommon characteristic of an eminent Grecian) the most simple-hearted and easy-tempered creature that lived, and a most capital playfellow. I thought no more of stealing the wig from his head than a sparrow does of robbing a cherry-tree; and he, merriest and most undignified of dignitaries, enjoyed the fun as much as I did, would toss the magnificent caxon (a full-bottomed periwig of most capacious dimensions,) as high in the air as its own gravity would permit it to ascend, to the unspeakable waste of powder, and then would snatch me up in his arms, (a puny child of eight years old, who was as a doll in his sinewy hands,) and threaten to fling me after his flying peruke. He would have done just the same if he had been Archbishop of Canterbury-and so should I-the arch-episcopal wig would have shared the same fate; so completely did the joyous temperament of the man break down the artificial restraints of his situation. He was a most loveable person was Mr. Dean; but the charm and glory of the Deanery, was my dear godmamma. My other godmother was a very different sort of person, and will take many more words to describe. Mrs. Patience Wither (for so was she called) was the survivor of three maiden sisters, who, on the death of their father, a rich and welldescended country gentleman, had agreed to live together, and their united portions having centred in her, she was in possession of a handsome fortune. In point of fact, she was not my godmother, having only stood as proxy for her younger sister, Mrs. Mary, my mother's any thing; and every fresh present from Mrs. Patience seemed to me a fresh grievance. I was obliged to make a call and a curtsy, and to stammer out something which passed for a speech; or, which was still worse, to write a letter of thanks-a stiff, formal, precise letter! I would rather have gone without cakes or needle-cases, books or battledores, to my dying day. Such was my ingratitude from five to fifteen. intimate friend, then falling into the lingering of her youth! But bribery is generally thrown decline, of which she afterwards died. Mrs. away upon children, especially on spoilt ones; Mary must have been, to judge of her from the godmother whom I loved never gave me universal report, and from a portrait which still remains, a most interesting woman, drooping, pale, and mild; and beautiful also, very beautiful, from elegance and expression. She was undoubtedly my real godmamma; but on her death, Mrs. Patience, partly from regard for her sister, partly out of compliment to my family, and partly, perhaps, to solace herself by the exercise of an office of some slight importance and authority, was pleased to lay claim to me in right of inheritance, and succeeded to the title of my godmother pretty much in the same way that she succeeded to the possession of Flora, her poor sister's favourite spaniel. I am afraid that Flora proved the more grateful subject of the two. As time wore on, however, I amended. I began to see the value of constant interest and attention-even although the forms they assumed might not be the most pleasant—to be thankful for her kindness and attentive to her advice; and by the time I arrived at years of discretion, had got to like her very much, especially in her absence, and to endure her presence (when it was quite impossible to run It is only Mrs. Patience was of the sort of women that young people particularly dislike, and characterize by the ominous epithet, cross. She was worse than cross; stern, stiff, domineer-away) with sufficient fortitude. ing, and authoritative, her person was very since she has been fairly dead and buried, that masculine, tall, square, and large-boned, and I have learnt to estimate her properly. Now, remarkably upright. Her features were suf- I recollect how very worthy of esteem and ficiently regular, and would not have been un-respect she really was, how pious, how hospleasing, but for the keen angry look of her light-blue eye, (your blue eye, which has such a name for softness amongst those great mistakers, lovers and poets, is often wild, and almost fierce in its expression) and her fiery wiry red hair, to which age did no good,—it would not turn grey. In short she was, being always expensively drest, and a good deal in the rear of fashion, not unlike my childish notion of that famous but disagreeable personage, Queen Elizabeth; which comparison being repeated to Mrs. Patience, who luckily took it for a compliment, added considerably to the interest she was so good as to take in my health, welfare, and improvement. pitable, how charitable, how generous! Nothing but the comfort of knowing that she never found it out, could lull my remorse for having disliked her so much in her life-time; the more especially, as upon recollection, I don't think she was so absolutely unbearable. She was only a little prejudiced, as one who had lived constantly in one limited sphere; rather ignorant and narrow-minded, a full century behind the spirit of the age, as one who had read dull books and kept dull company; fearfully irritable, fretful, and cross, as one who has had all her life the great misfortune (seldom enough pitied or considered) of having her own way; and superlatively stiff, and starched, and prim, in her quality of old maid. There is a great improvement now-a-days in the matter of single ladies; they may be, and many of them actually are, pleasant with impunity to man or woman, and are so like the rest of the world in way and word, that a stranger is forced to examine the third finger of the left hand, to ascertain whether or no they be married; but Mrs. Patience was an old maid of the old school-there was no mistaking her condition-you might as well question that of the frost-bitten gentlewoman pacing to church through the snow in Hogarth's In addition to these iniquities, she was as- inimitable and unforgetable "Morning." With siduous in presents to me at home and at these drawbacks she was, as I have said beschool; sent me cakes with cautions against fore, an estimable person; stanch in her friendover-eating, and needle-cases with admonitions ships, liberal in her house-keeping, much adto use them; she made over to me her own dicted to all sorts of subscriptions, and a most juvenile library, consisting of a large collec-active lecturer and benefactress of the poor, tion of unreadable books, which I, in my turn, whom she scolded and relieved with indefatihave given away; nay, she even rummaged gable good-will. out for me a pair of old battledores, curiously constructed of netted pack-thread-the toys I never saw her but she took possession of me for the purpose of lecturing and documenting on some subject or other, holding up my head, shutting the door, working a sampler, making a shirt, learning the pence-table, or taking physic. She used to hear me read French out of a well-thumbed copy of Telemaque, and to puzzle me with questions from the English chronology-which may perhaps be the reason, that I, at this day, to my great shame be it spoken, dislike that famous prose epic, and do not know in what century Queen Anne came to the throne. She lived in a large, tall, upright, stately house, in the largest street of a large town. The only things in the house which she did not scold were two favourite dogs-Flora, a fat, lazy, old spaniel, soft and round as a cushion, and almost as inert; and Daphne, a particularly ugly, noisy pug, that barked at every body that came into the house, and bit at most. Daphne was the pet par excellence. She overcrowed even her mistress, as old Spenser hath it, and Mrs. Patience respected her accordingly. Really, comparing the size of the animal with the astonishing loudness and continuance of her din, she performed prodigies of barking. Her society was a great resource to me, when I was taken to pay my respects to my godmamma. She (I mean Daphne) had, after her surly and snipsnap manner, a kindness for me; condescended to let me pat her head without much growling, and would even take a piece of cake out of my hand without biting my fingers. We were great friends. Daphne's company and conversation lightened the time amazingly. She was certainly the most entertaining person, the most alive of any one I met there. It was a grave-looking mansion, defended | encountered them. But then, as the fishfrom the pavement by iron palisades, a flight monger said of the eels that he was skinning, of steps before the sober brown door, and "They were used to it." every window curtained and blinded by chintz and silk and muslin, crossing and jostling each other; none of the rooms could be seen from the street, nor the street from any of the rooms-so complete was the obscurity. She seemed to consider this window-veiling as a point of propriety; notwithstanding which, she contrived to know so well all the goingson of all her neighbours, and who went up or who went down Chapel Street, that I could not help suspecting she had in some one of her many muffling draperies a sort of peep-hole, such as you sometimes see a face staring through in the green curtain at the play-house. I am sure she must have had a contrivance of the kind, though I cannot absolutely say that I ever made out the actual slit; but then I was cautious in my pryings, and afraid of being caught. I am sure that a peep-hole there was. She lived in a good position for an observatory too, her house being situate in a great thoroughfare, one end abutting on a popular chapel, the other on a celebrated dancingacademy, so that every day in the week brought affluence of carriages to the one side or to the other;-an influx of amusement of which she did not fail to make the most, en-spectable than amusing. It consisted of about joying it first, and complaining of it afterwards, after the fashion of those unfortunate persons who have a love of grumbling, and very little to grumble at. I don't know what she would have done without the resource afforded by her noisy neighbours, especially those on the saltatory side, whose fiddles, door-knockings, and floor-shakings, were the subject of perpetual objurgation; for the usual complaining ground of the prosperous, health and nerves, was completely shut against her. She never was ill in her life, and was too much in the habit of abusing nerves in other people, to venture to make use of them on her own account. It was a most comfortable grievance, and completed the many conveniences of her commodious mansion. Her establishment was handsome and regular, and would have gone on like clock-work, if she had not thought a due portion of managing, that is to say, of vituperation, absolutely necessary for the well-being of herself and servants. It did go on like clock-work, for the well-seasoned domestics no more minded those diurnal scolding fits, than they did the great Japan time-piece in the hall when it struck the hour; a ring of the bell, or a knock at the door, were events much more startling to this staid and sober household, who, chosen, the men for their age, and the women for their ugliness, always seemed to have a peculiar hatred to quick motion. They would not even run to get out of the way of their mistress, although pretty sure of a lecture, right or wrong, whenever she Mrs. Patience's coterie was, to say the truth, rather select than numerous, rather re half a dozen elderly ladies of unexceptionable quality, and one unfortunate gentleman, who met to play a rubber at each other's houses, about six evenings in the week, all the year round, and called on one another nearly every morning. The chief member of this chosen society was, next to Mrs. Patience, who would everywhere be first, Lady Jane, a widow, and Miss Pym, her maiden sister, who resided with her. Lady Jane was a round, quiet, sleepy woman, not unlikewith reverence be it spoken-to the fat spaniel Flora; you never knew when she was present or when she was not; Miss Pym, sharper and brisker, thinner and shorter, bore more resemblance to my friend Daphne, the vixenish pug-you were pretty sure to hear her.There was also a grave and sedate Mrs. Long, a slow, safe, circumspect person, who talked of the weather; a Mrs. Harden, speechifying and civil, and a Miss Harden, her daughter, civiller still. These were the ladies. The beau of the party, Mr. Knight, had been originally admitted in right of a deceased wife, and was retained on his own merits. In my life I never beheld a man so hideously ugly, tall, shambling, and disjointed, with features rough, huge, and wooden, grey hair, stiff and bristly, long shaggy eyebrows, a skin like a hide, and a voice and address quite in keeping with this amiable exterior, as uncouth as Caliban. For these gifts and accomplishments he was undoubtedly preferred to the honour of being the only gentleman tolerated in this worship She sneered at the bride, abused the bridegroom, found fault with the bride-cake, and finally withdrew herself entirely from her former associates, a secession by which, it may be presumed, her own comfort was more affected than theirs. She now began to complain of solitude, and to talk of taking a niece to reside with her, a commodity of which there was no lack in the family. Her elder brother had several daughters, and desired nothing better than to see one of them adopted by Mrs. Patience. Three of these young ladies came successively on trial ful society, from which Dr. Black, the smart | rather faded, but still pleasing, and sufficiently young physician, and Mr. White, the keen, dependent on her mother's life-income, to find sharp, clever lawyer, and Mr. Brown, the in Mr. Knight's large fortune, to say nothing spruce curate of the parish, and even Mr. of his excellent qualities, an adequate comGreen, the portly vicar, were excluded. I pensation for his want of beauty. It was aldid not so much wonder at their admiring Mr. together a most suitable match, and so proKnight for his ugliness, which was so gro- nounced by the world at large, with the solitesque and remarkable, as to be really prepos- tary exception of Mrs. Patience, who, though sessing-it was worth one's while to see any thus effectually secured from the attentions of thing so complete in its way; but I did a her imputed admirer, by no means relished the little marvel at his constancy to this bevy of means by which this desirable end had been belles, for, strange and uncouth as the man accomplished. was, there was an occasional touch of slyness and humour about him, and a perpetual flow of rough kindness, which, joined with his large property, would easily have gained him the entré into more amusing circles. Perhaps he liked to be the sole object of attention to six ladies, albeit somewhat past their prime; perhaps he found amusement in quizzing them -he was wicked enough sometimes to warrant the supposition; perhaps for mixed motives are commonly the truest in that strangely compounded biped man-a little of both might influence him; or perhaps a third, and still more powerful inducement, might lurk behind as yet unsuspected.-Certain it is, that every evening he was found in that fair circle, cordially welcomed by all its members except my godmamma. She, to be sure, minced and primmed, and tossed her head, and thought they should have been better without him; and although she admitted him to the privilege of visiting at her house, to the coffee, the green tea, the chit-chat, the rubber, the cake and the liqueur, she carefully refrained from honouring with her presence, the annual party at his country farm, where all the other ladies resorted to drink syllabub, and eat strawberries and cream; pertinaciously refused to let him drive her out airing in his handsome open carriage, and even went so far as to order her footman not to let him in when she was alone. Besides her aversion to mankind in general, an aversion as fierce and active as it was groundless, she had unluckily, from having been assailed by two or three offers, obviously mercenary, imbibed a most unfounded suspicion of the whole sex; and now seldom looked at a man without fancying that she detected in him an incipient lover; sharing, in this respect, though from a reverse motive, the common delusion of the pretty and the young. She certainly suspected Mr. Knight of matrimonial intentions towards her fair self, and as certainly suspected him wrongfully. Mr. Knight had no such design; and contrived most effectually to prove his innocence, one fair morning, by espousing Miss Harden, on whom, as she sat dutifully netting by the side of her mamma, at one corner of the cardtable, I had myself observed him to cast very frequent and significant glances. Miss Harden was a genteel woman of six-and-thirty, pretty lively girls, so alike, that I scarcely remember them apart, can hardly assign to them a separate individuality, except that, perhaps, Miss Jane might be the tallest, and Miss Gertrude might sing the best. In one particular, the resemblance was most striking, their sincere wish to get turned out of favour and sent home again. No wonder! A dismal life it must have seemed to them, used to the liberty and gaiety of a large country house, full of brothers, and sisters, and friends, a quiet indulgent mother, a hearty hospitable father, riding, and singing, and parties and balls; a doleful contrast it must have seemed to them, poor things, to sit all day in that nicely furnished parlour, where the very chairs seemed to know their places, reading aloud some grave, dull book, or working their fingers to the bone, (Mrs. Patience could not bear to see young people idle,) walking just one mile out and one mile in, on the London road; dining tête-a-tête in all the state of two courses and removes; playing all the evening at backgammon, most unlucky if they won, and going to bed just as the clock struck ten! No wonder that they exerted all their ingenuity to make themselves disagreeable; and as that is an attempt in which people who set about it with a thorough good-will, are pretty certain to succeed, they were discarded, according to their wishes, with all convenient dispatch. Miss Jemima was cashiered for reading novels, contrary to the statutes made and provided-Belinda, the delightful Belinda, sealed her fate. Miss Gertrude was dismissed for catching cold, and flirting with the apothecary, a young and handsome son of Galen, who was also turned off for the same offence. Miss Jane's particular act of delict has slipt my memory,-but she went too. There was some talk of sending little Miss Augusta, the young est of the family, but she, poor child! never made her appearance. She was her father's favourite, and probably begged off; and they had by this time discovered at the Hall, that their young lasses had been used to too much freedom to find the air of Chapel Street agree with them. The only one we ever saw again was Miss Jemima, who, having refused a rich baronet, a good deal older than herself, for no better reason than not liking him, was sent to her aunt's on a visit of penitence; a sort of house of correction - an honourable banishment. I believe in my heart that the fair culprit would have preferred the Tread-Mill or Botany Bay, had she her choice; but there was no appeal from the lettre de cachet which had consigned her to Mrs. Patience's care and admonitions, so she took refuge in a dumb resentment. I never saw any one so inveterately sullen in my life. One whole week she remained in this condition, abiding, as best she might, her aunt's never-ending lectures, and the intolerable ennui of the house, during a foggy November. The next, the rejected lover arrived at the door, and was admitted; and before she had been three weeks in Chapel Street, Sir Thomas escorted her home as his intended bride. They were right in their calculations; rather than have passed the winter with Mrs. Patience, the fair Jemima would have married her grandfather. unsuccessful enough-a lamp being a sort of machine that never will submit to female direction; a woman might as well attempt to manage a steam engine. The luminary in question was particularly refractory. It had four burners, which never, for the three nights which she continued in office, were all in action together. Some sent forth long tongues of flame, like those which issue from the crater of a volcano, giving token of the crash that was to follow; some popped outright, without warning; and some again languished, and died away, leaving behind them a most unsavoury odour. At last the restive lamp was abandoned to the butler, and light restored to the drawing-room; and had Miss Patience taken a lesson from this misadventure, all might have gone well. But Miss Patience was not of a temperament to profit by her own errors. She went on from bad to worse; disobliged Flora by plunging her in the wash-tub, to the great improvement of her complexion; made an eternal enemy of Daphne, by a fruitless attempt to silence her most noisy tongue; and, finally, lectured Mrs. Patience herself for scolding about nothing. In short, she was a reformer, honest, zealous, uncompromising, and indiscreet, as ever wore petticoats. She had in her head the beau ideal of a perfect domestic government, and would be satisfied with nothing Another niece now made her appearance, less. She could not let well alone. So that who, from circumstances and situation, seemed she had not been a month in that well-ordered peculiarly fitted for the permanent companion and orderly house, before her exertions had and heiress-the orphan daughter of a younger thrown every thing into complete disorder; brother, lately deceased, who had left this only the servants were in rebellion, the furniture child but slenderly provided for. Miss Pa- topsy-turvy; and the lady, who found herself tience (for she was her aunt's namesake) was likely to be in a situation of that dynasty of a young woman of two-and-twenty, brought French kings who reigned under a maire du up in a remote parsonage, without the advan-palais, in a very justifiable passion. This tage of any female to direct her education, and considerably more unformed and unpolished than one is accustomed to see a young lady in this accomplished age. She was a good deal like her aunt in person-far more than comported with beauty-large-boned and red-haired, and looking at least ten years older than she really was. Ten years older, too, she was in disposition; staid, sober, thoughtful, discreet; would no more have read a novel or flirted with an apothecary, than Mrs. Patience herself. Aunt and niece seemed made for each other. But somehow they did not do together. One does not quite know why-perhaps because they were too much alike. They were both great managers; but Miss Patience had been used to a lower range of household cares, and tormented mistress and servants by unnecessary savings and superfluous honesty. Then she was too useful; would make the tea, would snuff the candles, would keep the keys; affronted the housekeeper by offering to make the pastry, and the butler by taking under her care the argand lamp; which last exploit was rightful anger, was, however, more moderately expressed than had usually happened with Mrs. Patience's causeless indignation. The aunt remonstrated, indeed, and threatened; but the niece would not stay. She was as unbending as an oak-tree; rejected all compromise; spurned at all concession; abjured all rich relations; and returned to board at a farm-house in her old neighbourhood. After this contumacy, her name was never heard in Chapel Street; and for some time the post of companion remained vacant. At length Mrs. Patience began to break, visibly and rapidly, as the very healthy often do, affording so affecting a contrast with their former strength. In her the decline was merely bodily; neither the mind nor the temper had undergone any change; but her increasing feebleness induced her medical attendants to recommend that some one should be provided to sit with her constantly; and as she protested vehemently against any farther trial of nieces, the object was sought through the medium of an advertisement, and appeared to be completely attained when it |