selle, if the Doctor had taken you at your word?" She replied, "I should have done as I said; but that could not have happened, for my offer was of a nature not to be accepted by a man of the Doctor's character."—"Why not? If I had been in the place of the Doctor I should have married you, and trusted to time for the rest.” "Yes," she replied, "but had you been in the place of the Doctor, Mademoiselle Gellimert would not have made you the same proposition."

About this time Mademoiselle Gellimert seemed to have attained a state of apparent resignation, which led us to hope that before long she would recover altogether her health and spirits. Through the interest of Doctor C. L. she obtained a situation in a great cotton-manufactory, near the charming valley of Montmorency. The proprietor, a wealthy man and fond of his leisure, finding that the zeal and assiduity of Mademoiselle Gellimert rendered his presence less constantly necessary, confided the management of the concern in a great measure to her care, and allowed her such a salary as would, with her frugal habits, have enabled her to lay up a handsome provision for her future years. About this time the Duke de Richelieu went out of office; and Moranbert, as he had surmised, lost his situation. In the conversations we had upon this event, Mademoiselle Gellimert spoke with respect of his talents, but with contempt of his selfishness. This was a further reason for our believing that she was thoroughly cured of her passion. Moranbert on being dismissed, returned to his native province, where there are several extensive iron-works. The proprietor of one of the principal establishments of this kind, who was a distant relation of Moranbert, took him into his employment, and in a short time, from his activity, business-like habits, and useful knowledge (for he was a good chemist) he secured his entire confidence and good will, and was sent over to England to inspect the iron-works in that country, with a view to the adoption of any improvements they might suggest to him. On passing through Paris on his way to Calais, he made not the slightest inquiry relative to Mademoiselle Gellimert, though he met both the Doctor and me more than once. This circumstance seemed deeply to affect this unfortunate girl; for it appears that notwithstanding her apparent indifference and expressed contempt for his character, she had always looked forward with anxiety to the fall of the Duke de Richelieu's ministry,―hoping that, on a check being put to the ambitious projects of Moranbert, his heart might have reverted to her, and brought him a penitent to her feet. But when she learned that he was actively employed in his native province, and that his ambition, though it had changed its object, did not the less absorb all his thoughts, she appeared completely heart-struck, and sunk into a state of melancholy stupor that lasted several days. From this state, however, she aroused herself, but evidently by a great effort, and gradually assumed, at least outwardly, a philosophic resignation, which in an ordinary character might have passed for good-humour. The last time I saw her was at her lodgings in the Rue Montblanc, on a fourth story, which she made use of on her occasional visits to Paris. Doctor C. L. and two other friends were with her. She was speaking of her present fate and past happiness with apparent gaiety, when all of a sudden she exclaimed as if speaking to herself, "This has lasted too long ;" and before we could be aware of her intention, she sprang

to a window at the other extremity of the room, got on the balustrade, pronounced the words," Adieu, docteur !" and precipitated herself upon the pavement. Wild with horror we rushed down stairs, but on reaching the street found her lifeless. A crowd surrounded the body, from more than one of whom were heard the expressions, " Mon Dieu! Qu'elle est belle ! C'est un désespoir d'amour."

In a will which was found in her desk, she left her furniture, books, and a few thousand francs, the all she possessed, to M. Moranbert, director of the iron-works at ———. I have heard, but I hope for the honour of manhood that it is not true, that M. Moranbert showed not the slightest sign of emotion on learning the death of this devoted and interesting girl," who loved not wisely but too well."

LONDON LYRICS.

The Gunpowder Plot.

As, on the fifth day of November,
I walk'd down Bartholomew-lane,
I heard a poor Stock-market member
Thus vent to the pavement his pain.
The boys had Guy Faux by the girdle,
Intending to roast him red hot;
The broker look'd blank at the hurdle,
And thus sang the Gunpowder Plot.

"Away with yon' Gunpowder Percy,'
Commit the old rogue to the flames,
Grill, barbecue, show him no mercy,
For plotting to blow up King James.
That two of a trade wrangle ever,

I often have heard-who has not?
How vain his fantastic endeavour

To cope with our Gunpowder Plot!
"By us the Welsh Railway's impeded,
Mine Searchers are baulk'd in their dip,
The call to cash up' is unheeded
By holders of Mexican Scrip.
Montezuma we've cut a head shorter,
The New patent Paper we blot,
London Brick's uncemented by mortar,
And all through our Gunpowder Plot.

"British Silk we have put out of favour,

Our wives scorn to wear it in cloaks,
British Salt we have spoil'd of its savour,
Our Real del Monte's a hoax :
Shareholders, grown wiser, the risk count,
Determined to know what is what.
Colombian Scrip's at a discount,

When singed by our Gunpowder Plot.

"Gwennappe, with its tin and its copper,
Has now in its shaft sprung a leak,
The shareholders don't think it proper
Directors should play hide and seek.
Greek Bonds are cast into the gutter,
Cheam Soap to a discount has got:
Metropolitan Alderney butter

Runs off in our Gunpowder Plot.

"Pearl-divers lie strangled below sea,
Red rubies won't come at a wish,
Gold sticks like a leech to Potosi,
And Myers gives up 'London fish.'
Huge logs lie unshipp'd at Honduras,
The Company leaves them to rot;
The schemes are lay'd sprawling as sure as
A gun by our Gunpowder Plot.

"Then haste, boys, your faggots burn brighter;
And if, in the midst of your sport,

Some fragment of charcoal and nitre
Shall blow into air Capel-court;
The shareholders, cruel as Nero,
Will laugh at our merited lot,

And cry, Mr. Guy, your 're a hero!
Long life to your Gunpowder Plot!'"

MERRY ENGLAND.

"St. George for Merry England!"

THIS Old-fashioned epithet might be supposed to have been bestowed ironically, or on the old principle-Ut lucus a non lucendo. Yet there is something in the sound that hits the fancy, and a sort of truth beyond appearances. To be sure, it is from a dull, homely ground that the gleams of mirth and jollity break out; but the streaks of light that tinge the evening sky are not the less striking on that account. The beams of the morning-sun shining on the lonely glades, or through the idle branches of the tangled forest, the leisure, the freedom," the pleasure of going and coming without knowing where," the troops of wild deer, the sports of the chase, and other rustic gambols, were sufficient to justify the well-known appellation of "Merry Sherwood," and in like manner we may apply the phrase to Merry England. The smile is not the less sincere because it does not always play upon the cheek ; and the jest is not the less welcome, nor the laugh less hearty, because they happen to be a relief from care or leaden-eyed melancholy. The instances are the more precious as they are rare; and we look forward to them with the greater good will, or back upon them with the greater gratitude, as we drain the last drop in the cup with particular relish. If not always gay or in good spirits, we are glad when any occasion draws us out of our natural gloom, and disposed to make the most of it. We may say with Silence in the play, "I have been merry ere now," and this once was to serve him all his life; for he was a person of wonderful silence and gravity, though "he chirped over his cups," and announced his characteristic glee that "there were pippins and cheese to come." Silence was in this sense a merry man, that is, he would be merry if he could, and a very great economy of wit, like very slender fare, was a banquet to him, from the simplicity of his taste and habits. "Continents," says Hobbes, "have most of what they contain"—and in this view it may be contended that the English are the merriest people in the world, since they only show it on high-days and holidays. They are then like a school-boy let loose from school, or like a dog that has slipped his collar. They are not gay like the French, who are one eternal smile of self-complacency, tortured into

affectation, or spun out into languid indifference, nor are they voluptuous and immersed in sensual indolence like the Italians; but they have that sort of intermittent, fitful, irregular gaiety, which is neither worn out by habit, nor deadened by passion, but is sought with avidity as it takes the mind by surprise, is startled by a sense of oddity and incongruity, indulges its wayward humours or lively impulses, with perfect freedom and lightness of heart, and seizes occasion by the forelock, that it may return to serious business with more cheerfulness, and have something to beguile the hours of thought or sadness. I do not see how there can be high spirits without low ones; and every thing has its price, according to circumstances. Perhaps, we have to pay a heavier tax on pleasure, than some others: what skills it, so long as our good spirits and good hearts enable us to bear it?

"They" (the English) says Froissart, "amused themselves sadly after the fashion of their country"—ils se rejouissoient tristement selon la coutume de leur pays. They have indeed a way of their own. Their mirth is a relaxation from gravity, a challenge to dull care to begone; and one is not always clear at first, whether the appeal is successful. The cloud may still hang on the brow; the ice may not thaw at once. To help them out in their new character, is an act of charity. Any thing short of hanging or drowning is something to begin with. They do not enter into their amusements the less doggedly, because they may plague others. They like a thing the better for hitting them a rap on the knuckles, for making their blood tingle. They do not dance or sing, but they make good cheer-" eat, drink, and are merry." No people are fonder of field-sports, Christmas gambols, or practical jests. Blindman's-buff, hunt-the-slipper, hot-cockles, and snap-dragon, are all approved English games, full of laughable surprises and "hair-breath 'scapes," and serve to amuse the winter fire-side after the roast-beef and plum-pudding, the spiced ale and roasted crab, thrown (hissing-hot) into the foaming tankard. Punch (not the liquor, but the puppet) is not, I fear, of English origin; but there is no place, I take it, where he finds himself more at home or meets a more joyous welcome, where he collects greater crowds at the corners of streets, where he opens the eyes or distends the cheeks wider, or where the bangs and blows, the uncouth gestures, ridiculous anger and screaming voice of the chief performer excite more boundless merriment or louder bursts of laughter among all ranks and sorts of people. An English theatre is the very throne of pantomine; nor do I believe that the gallery and boxes of Drury-lane or Covent-garden filled on the proper occasions with holiday folks (big or little) yield the palm for undisguised, tumultuous, inextinguishable laughter to any spot in Europe. I do not speak of the refinement of the mirth (this is no fastidious speculation) but of its cordiality, on the return of these long-looked for and licensed periods; and I may add here, by way of illustration, that the English common people are a sort of grown children, spoiled and sulky perhaps, but full of glee and merriment, when their attention is drawn off by some sudden and striking object. The May-pole is almost gone out of fashion among us: but May-day, besides its flowering hawthorns and its pearly dews, has still its beasted exhibition of painted chimney-sweepers and their Jack o' th' Green, whose tawdry finery, bedizened faces, unwonted gestures, and short-lived pleasures

call forth good-humoured smiles and looks of sympathy in the spectators. There is no place where trap-ball, fives, prison-base, foot-ball, quoits, bowls are better understood or more successfully practised; and the very names of a cricket bat and ball make English fingers tingle. What happy days must "Long Robinson" have passed in getting ready his wickets and mending his bats, who when two of the fingers of his right-hand were struck off by the violence of a ball, had a screw fastened to it to hold the bat, and with the other hand still sent the ball thundering against the boards that bounded Old Lord's cricket-ground! What delightful hours must have been his in looking forward to the matches that were to come, in recounting the feats he had performed in those that were past! I have myself whiled away whole mornings in seeing him strike the ball (like a countryman_mow-` ing with a scythe) to the farthest extremity of the smooth, level, sunburnt ground, and with long awkward strides count the notches that made victory sure! Then again, cudgel-playing, quarter-staff, bull and badger-baiting, cock-fighting are almost the peculiar diversions of this island, and often objected to us as barbarous and cruel, horse-racing is the delight and the ruin of numbers; and the noble science of boxing is all our own. Foreigners can scarcely understand how we can squeeze pleasure out of this pastime; the luxury of hard blows given or received; the joy of the ring; nor the perseverance of the combatants.* The English also excel, or are not excelled in wiring a hare, in stalking a dear, in shooting, fishing or hunting. England to this day boasts her Robin Hood and his merry men, that stout archer and outlaw, and patron-saint of the sporting-calendar. What a cheerful sound is that of the hunters, issuing from the autumnal wood and sweeping over hill and dale!

-"A cry more tuneable

Was never halloo'd to by hound or horn."

"The gentle and free Passage of arms at Ashby" was, we are told, so called by the Chroniclers of the time, on account of the feats of horsemanship and the quantity of knightly blood that was shed. This last circumstance was perhaps necessary to qualify it with the epithet of "gentle," in the opinion of some of these historians. I think the reason why the English are the bravest nation on earth is, that the thought of blood or a delight in cruelty is not the chief excitement with them Where it is, there is necessarily a reaction; for though it may add to our eagerness and savage ferocity in inflicting wounds, it does not enable us to endure them with greater patience. The English are led to the attack or sustain it equally well, because they fight as they box, not out of malice, but to show pluck and manhood. Fair play and Old England for ever! This is the only bravery that will stand the test. There is the same determination and spirit shown in resistance as in attack; but not the same pleasure in getting a cut with a sabre as in giving one. There is, therefore, always a certain degree of effeminacy mixed up with any approach to cruelty, since both have their source in the same principle, viz. an over-valuing of pain. This was the reason the French (having the best cause and the best general in the world) ran away at Waterloo, because they were inflamed, furious, drunk with the blood of their enemies, but when it came to their turn, wanting the saine stimulus, they were panic-struck, and their hearts and their senses failed them all at once.

+ Vanity is the same half-witted principle, compared with pride. It leaves men in the lurch when it is most needed; is mortified at being reduced to stand on the defensive, and relinquishes the field to its more surly antagonist.