at Brittles; the constable put his hand behind his ear to catch the reply; the two women and the tinker leant forward to listen; and the doctor glanced keenly round, when a ring was heard at the gate and at the same moment the sound of wheels.

"It's the runners !" cried Brittles, to all appearance much relieved. "The what!" exclaimed the doctor, aghast in his turn.

"The Bow-street officers, sir," replied Brittles, taking up a candle, "me and Mr. Giles sent for 'em this morning."

"What!" cried the doctor.

"Yes," replied Brittles, "I sent a message up by the coachman, and I only wonder they weren't here before, sir."

"You did, did you. Then confound and damn your- -slow coaches down here; that's all," said the doctor, walking away.

ON WITNESSING MR. MACREADY'S PERFORMANCE OF CLAUDE MELNOTTE IN" THE LADY OF LYONS."

HUSH the thick breath, and still the throbbing heart!
Stir not to break the deep, yet thrilling trance;

And call not this the actor's hireling part,
Vision of poesy and young romance!

The bright creations of the poet's thought,

In truth and life, with thee Macready dwell;
By rich and kindred genius, only taught

To cast o'er us the soul-enthralling spell.

I cannot speak-the over-gushing heart

Bursts into numbers;-dull perchance and cold.
Would I could boast the subtle polished art

And glowing words to paint perfection's mould.
Actor and bard-your mingled triumph take-
Stern manhood, even, wipes the tear away-
For yours the chords of sympathy to wake,
And old and young, the enchanter's will obey!

March 13th, 1838.

C. T.

VOL. I.

A MODERN ECLOGUE.

Non tu in triviis, indocte, solebas
Stridenti miserum stipulâ disperdere carmen?
VIRG. Ecl. 3.

On a stout bench, that faced "The Pig and Friar,"
Sat Jemmy Doubletouch and Pat Maguire:
Long tubes of clay, with dark Virginian weed,
Crown'd the rude board to serve their present need;
While, placed by Tapps, the host, between each man
Best double-stout o'erflow'd the polish'd can.
And who were Pat and Jemmy? some will cry:
"Arcades ambo," is our sage reply,-
"Cantare pares," and if not too weary,

Or else too drunk, “parati respondere."

In fact, they both were chaunters-up and down-
Highways and byways-country and in town-
Traversed the land while loud their ditties rung,
And oft composed the sonnets which they sung;
And now by chance had met beneath the shade
That Thomas Tapps' wide-spreading beech-tree made.
What glees were troll'd, how many clouds were blown,
What cans were fill'd and emptied, is not known,

(Save by the host,) until, as time flew past,

Though friends at first, they had a tiff at last,

And on this point in anger took their stand

Who in his craft was deemed the better hand.

"I'll bet," quoth Doubletouch, "four quarts of stout
To one of punch, (but stiff,) I'll serve you out.

But, hark! my daisy, nothing old won't do ;

So mind your stops, and strike up summat new."

Agreed!" says Paddy: "Done" cries Jem, "that's flat! But for a judge ?-here's Tapps-now go it, Pat!"

Pat.

Och! whisky's the life and the sowl of a man,
So I'll sing its praise first, and as long as I can:
If the says were made of it-good luck to the sight!
It's myself 'ud be swimmin' from mornin' till night.

Jemmy.

Oh! ale is the stuff that will make a dog jolly,
Wot cures them is sick and is got melancholy:

It runs through our gammut than quicksilver quicker,-
I'm bless'd if it ain't the most primest of licker!

Pat.

St. Patrick's the boy that could turn topsy-turvy
Great Britain and Scotland-so says Father Murphy;
He bothers the world with his devil-may-care, O!

St. Patrick for iver, the comical haro!

Jemmy.

And where is the chap for St. George that won't cheer

Nor swig in his honor a gallon of beer?

St. Georgy's the one as a body may brag on;
Hurrah for the feller as wallop'd the dragon!

Pat.

I'll sing next of pratees, the boast of ould Erin

What dainty, compared wid 'em, 's worth a red herrin'?

23

You may walk from Coleraine to that place they call Hayti, Bad luck to the thing you will find like a praty.

Jemmy.

Let the Mounseer go boast of his soup made of herbs,-
Of his garlic the Don, vich some stomachs disturbs ;
I knows vot is vot, and I 'm wastly mistaken

If they 're equal to cabbage, when biled with good bacon.

Pat.

Was there iver a boy on the 'arth or the air

Who's not danced a jig at great Donnybrook Fair?
The blissed remimbrance e'en now makes me frisky,-
Such crackin' of heads, and such lashin's of whisky!

Jemmy.

Vot a sight as is Bartle'my !-not any part in

Of England collected sich vonders for sartin'.
Here's the man as will swallow a sword, if he's let :
Vot a hungry old cove, and uncommon sharp-set!

Pat.

In love I'm all over wid Katty O'Flannaghan,

For a glance of whose eye often back have I ran again!
Aisy death to me then, but she bates human natur,
The swate little, nate little, iligant cratur!

Jemmy.

Oh dear Molly Muggins, vot love is between us!
You're a regular, no-mistake, out-and-out Wenus!
Sich beauty to pieces would lather the world,
When your hair 's out of paper and dapperly curled.

Pat.

Och, musha! then sure it's myself that must pity

The spalpeen that never saw dear Dublin city.

They may talk of their Consthantinople-shoot aisy !— Whooo! we could bate them with Ballinacrasy.

Jemmy.

Faix! Lunnon 's a town vot is desperate fine,

And from all other cities will take out the shine.

There's the great Leaden Hall, and an Acre vot 's long, And the Parliament House where they chaffs it so strong.

Pat.

By this and by that, but a wager I'd howld,

No plant's like the Shamrogue, so purty and bowld,
Which stuck in our hats on our Saint's day is seen,-
But we stape it, your sowl! all the night in potteen.

Jemmy.

Your Sawney may chatter and boast of his Thistle,
Taffy talk of his Leek-but I care not a whistle.—
Odd rat it! what feller in country or town

As would not give a cheer for the Rose-and the Crown?

"Hold, hold, my masters!" Tapps exclaim'd," have done!

I thinks as how both bets are fairly won;

For both have chaunted prime and come it strong.
Jemmy, the punch is your'n for that 'ere song;
To you I judges, Pat, four quarts of stout,
And, if you please, will help to drink it out;
So now to work :-but ere you goes away,
Gemmen, I hopes you won't forget to pay."

TRISTAM MERRYTHOUGHT.

A LOVE STORY IN THREE CHAPTERS.

CHAPTER I.

-Whence springs this deep despair?

From such a cause which fills mine eyes with tears,
And stops my tongue, while heart is drown'd in cares.
Henry the Sixth. Third Part, Act iii. Sc. 3.

I HAD not seen Russell for many years-nearly a dozen. We were contemporaries in college, but many events kept us asunder. I spent a considerable time on the Continent; and when I returned, it so chanced that my visits to London were short and far between. I heard of him occasionally, but with no minute particulars as to his career. It was merely known to me that he had been called to the bar, and that the expected succession to a tolerably handsome inheritance, by the death of an uncle some few years earlier than it had been calculated upon, made him at first indifferent to his profession, and shortly estranged him from it altogether in every thing but name. In fact, I knew scarcely anything about him, and for some four or five years had hardly heard his name mentioned.

Business with which it is needless to trouble any one but those immediately concerned, rendered it necessary that I should pass through London, last month, on my way to America. I had only four or five days to remain in town, and these were busily occupied. On the day before my departure, however, it so happened that all I had to do was got over at an early hour, and I lounged somewhat easily through the streets, diverting myself with their various wonders, when I was saluted by a friendly slap on the shoulder. Turning round, I recognised my old friend Russell. He was not much altered during the twelve years I had not seen hin, much less, in fact, than men usually alter,—and his manner and style of address were as good-humored and good-natured as ever.

After the usual wonderments, and mutual applauses of our marvellous good looks, we fell into such conversation as might be expected between old acquaintances meeting after a long period of absence. Jack This was dead, Tom T'other was married; Will Smith had got on in the world, Joe Brown had been unlucky. Bright-eyed Miss A. was now sober-eyed Mrs. B. with half a dozen daughters, one to come out this season; brighter-eyed lady C. the reigning belle of our early circle, was still unmarried. Then there was that shocking story of Mrs. D. and the sad fate of poor Sir Richard E. and so on until we got through the alphabet of our old friends chatting in this manner, as we sauntered along, not caring where. The evening began to set in, and Russell asked me if I was engaged to dine. I answered in the negative, and he therefore made it a point that I should dine with

him.

"Must I dress?" said I; "for, as I start for Liverpool in the morning, my luggage is all packed up; so if there be the least ceremony, I must decline."

"Not the least-you may come precisely as you stand, and we are not very far distant from our destination."

I accompanied him, and a few minutes brought us to his house. It

is situated in one of the good streets near Cavendish Square, and among the most spacious of its neighborhood. We arrived there about six o'clock. He apologised for leaving me for a moment, and I found myself alone in an elegantly-furnished drawing-room. It is hard to say what it is that reveals the presence of a lady in a house, and yet you cannot enter one in which she dwells without being at once convinced of female superintendence. It is not merely order and care, for in the well-arranged house of a wealthy bachelor these may be attained with as much scrupulous rigor as in any ménage superintended by a lady. Nor is it necessary that the inexplicable array of those matters in which female taste, or what they are pleased to call industry, should be met with on the tiny tables they so much love, for these we do not always meet with; but the ensemble of a room inhabited by a lady has an air strikingly different from that which is the result of the carelessness of a master or the anxiety of a servant. Such was the air impressed on me by my first glance round Russell's drawing

room.

Is he married? I thought. Perhaps.-I never heard so. But then we have been so much asunder. Would he not have said something about it? But then he might have taken for granted that I knew of his marriage, but nothing of his lady.

My doubts were soon resolved. Russell returned with some slight alteration of dress.

"You are a man of the world," he said, "George, and, in short, have you any objection to meet to-day at dinner a lady to whom I give my name, but who-who, in fact-never consulted the church about our union? I could not, of course, introduce her to Lady Herbert ; but to you-"

"Never mind me," said I, "it is a matter of no consequence-I have seen too many strange things in my travels to start at so ordinary a trifle. Mrs. Russell shall be accepted by me as you introduce her."

His eye gleamed with satisfaction, and murmuring, "Poor Jane!" he diverted the conversation to some common-place topics. In a few minutes dinner was announced; and on proceeding to the diningroom, I found that the lady was there before us.

She was tall and dark, with hair as black as the skies at midnight, and eyes as flashing as the brightest meteors that ever flitted across them. Her features were handsome and lofty, but, I thought, marked by a varying expression of melancholy and sternness. This might be no more than mere fancy, occasioned by my knowledge of the unhappiness of her position: She was dressed in black velvet, which admirably set off her majestic and symmetrical figure. Her gestures and manner were of the highest order of grace and dignity, and the few words of greeting with which she addressed me were marked by a sweetness of tone, and an elegance of style, which acts like a masonic sign to introduce on the instant to each other persons who belong to what Burke calls the Corinthian capital of society. She is indeed a splendid woman. Her age may be about thirty, or, rather, a year or

two less.

During dinner, our conversation was of the ordinary kind; her share in it was sufficient, however, to prove that she had mingled in good society, had read much, and had thought more. Russell's conduct towards her appeared to me to be studiously tender-nay,