one hand, and applied the two fore-fingers of my other to the artery

-Would to heaven! my dear Eugenius, thou hadst passed by, and beheld me sitting in my black coat, and in my lack-a-day-sical manner, counting the throbs of it, one by one, with as much true devotion as if I had been watching the critical ebb or flow of her fever -How wouldst thou have laugh'd and moralized upon my new profession !- -and thou shouldst have laugh'd and moralized on-Trust me, my dear Eugenius, I should have said, "there are worse occupations in this world than feeling a woman's pulse." -But a Grisset's! thou wouldst have said—and in an open shop! Yorick

-So much the better: for when my views are direct, Eugenius, I care not if all the world saw me feel it.

I

THE HUSBAND.

PARIS.

'Twas

HAD counted twenty pulsations, and was going on fast towards the fortieth, when her husband coming unexpected from a back parlour into the shop, put me a little out of my reckoning.nobody but her husband, she said—so I began a fresh score-Monsieur is so good, quoth she, as he pass'd by us, as to give himself the trouble of feeling my pulseThe husband took off his hat, and making me a bow, said, I did him too much honour-and having said that, he put on his hat and walk'd out.

Good God! said I to myself, as he went out-and can this man be the husband of this woman!

Let it not torment the few who know what must have been the grounds of this exclamation, if I explain it to those who do not.

In London a shopkeeper and a shopkeeper's wife seem to be one bone and one flesh: in the several endowments of mind and body, sometimes the one, sometimes the other has it, so as in general to be upon a par, and to tally with each other as nearly as a man and wife need to do.

In Paris, there are scarce two orders of beings more different: for the legislative and executive powers of the shop not resting in the husband, he seldom comes there- -in some dark and dismal room behind, he sits commerceless in his thrum night-cap, the same rough son of Nature that Nature left him.

The genius of a people where nothing but the monarchy is salique, having ceded this department, with sundry others, totally to the women-by a continual higgling with customers of all ranks and sizes from morning to night, like so many rough pebbles shook long together in a bag, by amicable collisions, they have worn down their asperities and sharp angles, and not only become round and smooth, but will receive, some of them, a polish like a brilliant-Monsieur le Mari is little better than the stone under your foot

-Surely-surely, man! it is not good for thee to sit alone-thou wast made for social intercourse and gentle greetings, and this improvement of our natures from it, I appeal to, as my evidence.

-And how does it beat, Monsieur? said she.-With all the benignity, said I, looking quietly in her eyes, that I expected-She was going to say something civil in return- -but the lad came into the shop with the gloves-A propos, said I, I want a couple of pair myself.

THE GLOVES.

PARIS.

HE beautiful Grisset rose up when I said this,

TH

and going behind the counter, reach'd down a parcel and untied it: I advanced to the side over-against her: they were all too large. The beautiful Grisset measured them one by one across my hand-It would not alter the dimensions-She begg'd I would try a single pair, which seemed to be the least-She held it open-my hand slipped into it at once- -It will not do, said I, shaking my head a little -No, said she, doing the same thing.

There are certain combined looks of simple subtlety —where whim, and sense, and seriousness, and nonsense, are so blended, that all the languages of Babel set loose together could not express them- -they are communicated and caught so instantaneously, that you can scarce say which party is the infector. I leave it to your men of words to swell pages about it-it is enough in the present to say again, the gloves would not do; so folding our hands within our arms, we both loll'd upon the counter-it was narrow, and there was just room for the parcel to lay between us.

The beautiful Grisset look'd sometimes at the gloves, then side-ways to the window, then at the glovesand then at me. I was not disposed to break silence -I follow'd her example: so I look'd at the gloves, then to the window, then at the gloves, and then at her—and so on alternately.

-she

I found I lost considerably in every attackhad a quick black eye, and shot through two such long and silken eye-lashes with such penetration, that she look'd into my very heart and reins-It may seem strange, but I could actually feel she did

It is no matter, said I, taking up a couple of the pairs next me, and putting them into my pocket.

I was sensible the beautiful Grisset had not ask'd above a single livre above the price-I wish'd she had ask'd a livre more, and was puzzling my brains how to bring the matter about-Do you think, my dear Sir, said she, mistaking my embarrassment, that I could ask a sous too much of a stranger- -and of a stranger whose politeness, more than his want of gloves, has done me the honour to lay himself at my mercy?-M'en croyez capable ?-Faith! not I, said I; and if you were, you are welcome - So counting the money into her hand, and with a lower bow than one generally makes to a shop-keeper's wife, I went out, and her lad with his parcel followed me.

ΤΗ

THE TRANSLATION.

PARIS.

HERE was nobody in the box I was let into but a kindly old French officer. I love the character, not only because I honour the man whose manners are softened by a profession which makes bad men worse; but that I once knew onefor he is no more-and why should I not rescue one page from violation by writing his name in it, and telling the world it was Captain Tobias Shandy, the dearest of my flock and friends, whose philanthropy I never think of at this long distance from his deathbut my eyes gush out with tears. For his sake, I have a predilection for the whole corps of veterans ;