suaded the Academy that glaciers owe their origin to the cooling produced at the immersion of this globe, by the evaporation of the waters which then covered it; and he demonstrated, by conclusive experiments, that this cooling is especially intense when the water which is evaporated, instead of being a unique liquid surface, is mixed with certain foreign substances, such as earth or sand, which are held in suspension. Do not omit to notice that M. Alvaro Reynoso has demonstrated to the satisfaction of this learned society, that the hydrogene of water acts as a real metal and forms a base of greater energy than soda potash-all the mineral bases when exposed to an extreme degree of temperature. He thinks the day is not distant when he can manufacture granite, porphyry and marble, in his laboratory!!

Where shall we go after dinner?

Shall we go to see poor Bayard's last piece? You know Bayard is dead after writing 224 dramatic pieces, all of which were successful, and sixty commanded great success. He died in the prime of life, falling dead in his own ballroom shortly after the dispersal of his guests. He was, next to M. Scribe (his uncle by marriage), the best vaudevillist we had; his last vaudeville none but he could have composed; it is Boccaccio's Tales dramatized! Do not let us waste the evening by seeing Mme. de Girardin's Lady Tartuffe; although Rachel and Samson appear in it, their admirable talents cannot give intellect to that balderdash.

What say you to the Italian Opera, where Mlle. de Lagrange has won great success as an unrivalled cantatrice, overcoming difficulties the violin could not surmount; and Mlle. Cruvelli walks the tragedy queen of song, and M. Napoleone Rossi inherits Lablache's mantle and paunch. This theatre is the most fashionable theatre in Paris, and, for the first time since the Liberty, Equality, Fraternity of 1848, frightened the surprised box-proprietors of the Salle Ventadour, the fashionable world of Paris now display there again their luxury, beauty, and grace.

If you like gay, light, sparkling music, seek the Opera Comique, the company is excellent, the theatre handsome, and very well lighted. They are now playing La Tonnelli, a new opera by M. Ambroise Thomas, the popular author of Le Caid and Le Songe d'une Nuit d'Eté. Madame Ugalde, Mlle. Lefebvre, Mlle. Duprez, appear there alternately. I do not know a place of amusement where an evening may be passed so pleasantly.

The Gymnase certainly cannot be recommended now, as they are playing there a rather dull comedy by M. Emile Angier, which turns on points somewhat similar to the Hunchback. If you cannot see Mme. Rose Cheri in any other piece, go by all means, and enjoy the pleasure her admirable talents invariably give. M. Ponsard, another of the hopes of France, gives a comedy-Honor and Wealth, at the Odeon, which is said to be successful, and has won him the rosette of officer of the Legion of Honor. I must confess I have never felt interest in any of M. Ponsard's writings: he is too cold.

The press has given us several charming books recently. I have read none with more pleasure than the Politique de la Restauration en 1822 et 1823, by Count de Marcellus. Allow me to quote a new and characteristic anecdote about George IV. and Mr. Canning: "There was a ball at the Palace; I was obliged to dance there the more gayly as my friends and brothers were fighting valliantly in Spain; that is the diplomatic rule. Politicians who have had a conference in the morning, have always some rectification or new argument to make to each other at night. I was led off by the Minister (Canning), far from the ballroom (very much to my regret, I must acknowledge), and carried into the bay of a window, where George IV. saw us, and coming up, said:-Ah! my dear Marcellus, things have changed very much since we met. You triumph in Spain. and I am glad of it. But it is said King Ferdinand has recalled as ministers at Cadiz, the men who deposed him. That's a weakness I should never imitate. They wanted to give out that I was insaneyou, better than any one else, know when and why. But as I told Lord Liverpool just now, if my ministers should declare me mad, I might regain my good sense, but I would never take back my ministers. Mr. Canning was listening, and very much embarrassed, when the King turning towards him said "What are you telling the young representative of France, Canning?" "Sire, I was vaunting the excellence of representative government to him, and was, at the same time, explaining the travaux forces of the House of Commons which are its sequences. As M. de Marcellus cannot yet be an orator at home, he is an auditor here." "I know," interrupted the King, "my dear Marcellus, that you have been this year an auditor under very painful circumstanI pity you sincerely for all you have been obliged to hear and undergo. I am certain that if your mouth had not been

ces.

closed, and if Parliament would have heard you, you would have had an easy task to confute all you heard." "Sire," said I, "the sailor forgets the storm when the calm returns." "True; but take care, and don't allow yourself to be dazzled by our system of government, said to be so perfect. If it has advantages, it also has great inconveniencies. I have never forgotten what a King, a homme d'esprit, said to me about it:-'Your English government is good only to protect adventurerst and to intimidate honest folks?' What do you think of it, Canning?" As Mr. Canning, evidently embarrassed, stammered and hesitated, the King continued-"Therefore, for the good of the world, we should never wish any people to have our own institutions.

What will pass here would prove a curse elsewhere; the earth has neither the same fruit on its surface, nor the same minerals in its interior. So it is with nations, and their customs and their character. Recollect what I say, my dear Marcellus, it is my unalterable conviction." Without waiting for a reply George IV. turned his back on us, giving me a knowing glance and smile. Mr. Canning, completely disconcerted, found some difficulty in regaining his sang-froid. He pressed me earnestly by the arm, and said, bitterly-"Representative government is good for something His Majesty forgot to mention. Its ministers must bear without reply the epigrammes of a King who endeavors thus to avenge his want of power."

AM a cripple. Not one of you who gaze with indifference, or mere idle curiosity, on the chance deformities of your fellow-men, can conceive of half the painful consciousness those few words carry with them. There may be no physical suffering, no great lack of agility or strength, no inconvenience; but the perpetually recurring sense of a marked difference from the rest of mankind, a sense which every gesture of derision, every curious glance, or-worse than all-every look of pity, serves to keep alive, requires an elevated philosophy, a serene stoicism, more difficult to assume than the steadfast endurance of acute bodily pain.

When I was quite young, through the carelessness of a servant, I received a severe fall. For a while my life was despaired of. I was then an only child; and all that parental care, aided by medical skill, could effect, was done to save me. How often have I wished-Heaven forgive me! that their efforts had been in vain. My first return to health, the dawning consciousness that succeeded a long delirium, the kind, anxious faces bent over me, float across my memory like a dim vision. The low, sweet music of my mother's voice, seemed continually cautioning me to be still-and for days I lay quiet, anticipating the pleasures of my first day out of doors; or counting seconds with the tall clock that stood opposite the foot of my bed, until I would fall asleep and dream it all over again. I cannot now distinguish

which were my waking thoughts and which dreams.

The

One day, when I felt that I had got quite well, and they had left me alone, the idea occurred to me to get up and give them a pleasant surprise. When I attempted to rise, for the first time, I felt pain; and I noticed a strange protuberance about my shoulders. In an instant the whole truth flashed upon me. tears of my parents, the commiseration expressed in the faces of friends-the anxiety they had all vainly endeavored to hide from my childish apprehension— were now interpreted. I was a hunchback. Not by half so crooked as the man I had seen in the show-no, no; not so awfully deformed as he-but nevertheless a hunchback. It was long before I recovered from the mental depression which succeeded the first consciousness of my condition. At first my feelings found vent in strange, incoherent blasphemy. I, who had always been mild and gentle, repelled even my mother's caresses with cursing, until I expected every moment the earth would open up and swallow me. And, then, through fear and exhaustion, I fell into a stupor of indifference to every thing around me.

After my recovery, it was a great while before I ventured outside the house. I dreaded the jeers of my former playfellows; for I could only imagine myself a subject of sport to them. When the beautiful summer days passed, one by one,

and I felt the soft air, and beheld the green trees and bushes from the window of my room, I would resolve that on the morrow I would go out and enjoy it to the full; but, with the morning would return my old fears; the distant shout and laughter of the school children brought to me only an aching sense of loneliness and despair. My parents, I believe, understood my sensitiveness, and judiciously forbore to urge me against my inclination. I cannot recollect that in all my life they ever once alluded to my misfor

tune.

It was a tempting, delicious June day, that I resolutely picked up my satchel of books, and marched off to school. A good while I lingered at the door of the schoolroom, half-inclined to return home. At last I mustered up courage to go in, and quietly slipped to my accustomed place, unobserved by any one but the teacher. He came to me and spoke a few words of welcome, made some kind inquiries, and then resumed his seat. I began to feel more at ease, and studied so hard that I entirely forgot myself till the little bell tinkled "play-time." Then my dread returned as my schoolfellows crowded around me. But I was disappointed. They were kind-too kind. I received their boisterous welcome with such a shrinking timidity that they were all glad to leave me and run out to their play-except one, a lively, blue-eyed girl, whom I dreaded most of all, who had always been delighted to teaze and annoy me-she remembers it well. She lingered behind the rest; and was so frank and gentle, so unobtrusive in her good-natured attentions, that I was completely charmed out of my reserve, and gayly chatting with her when the rest came in.

From that time I devoted myself to study with a zeal and perseverance that soon won me a fair standing in the estimation of my teacher and schoolmates. I took a pleasure in history and biography -especially in reading of geeat men who were afflicted with some bodily malformation. It gave me great delight to know that one of the Kings of England was humpbacked-though I did not wish to be like him; he was too wicked-and then there were club-footed poets, and lame orators and crippled generals without number. I dreamed of the time when I should become great and astonish the world, and carry a high head on my crooked shoulders. Somehow or other, little Fanny was

always a good deal mixed up with these dreams.

Now and then, bitter thoughts would come crowding on my mind, in spite of all I could do to be cheerful. I was never so lively as before the accident befell mebut sometimes my quiet, patient mood would give place to a gloomy melancholy; and I would sit for hours brooding over the past and looking despondingly toward the future. If interrupted, I would give way to violent outbursts of anger; and these were generally followed by extreme debility or positive illness. There was but one else besides, my mother who could exert any influence over me when in a refractory mood. To them I owe nearly all that has made life tolerable.

At length the time came when I was to leave home; to break up old ties and old associations; to plunge into a new life; with all the delicate sensibility of childhood, to struggle with the world as a man. No one whose heart has grown callouswith the chafing of active life, can feel what it is, for the first time, to see new scenes and new faces only, and meet with no look of sympathy wherever he may turn. If I shed a few burning tears when I caught the last glimpse of my mother's form, as she stood in the door waving me a final farewell, may I never be ashamed to own them. If I shed tears now, when I reflect that that glimpse was the last I ever saw of her, or shall see on earth, they are tears that fall like dew upon the thirsty

soul.

In my first intercourse with the world, my former timidity was changed into an asperity of manner and feeling that prevented me from making many friends. But I was honest, capable and industrious. I gave satisfaction. With increasing prosperity my temper grew more genial. I have succeeded well in life, and am contented. I have secured to myself that best of all stations in society, a respectable mediocrity. With an affectionate wife and dutiful children, with friends whose steadfastness has been tried through good and bad fortune, my share of happiness is as large as usually falls to the lot of any mortal. Albeit, occasional adversity or sad remembrances may sometimes cast a temporary gloom over my spirits, my complainings are turned to thankfulness, when I compare my own condition with that of others. There are thousands of straight-built, square-shouldered men, whom I have no reason to envy.

CHAPTER L

HOW I CAME TO GO TO WENSLEY,

BELIEVE I have a natural affinity

odd people. At any rate, allowing for my limited opportunities, it has been my hap to fall in with my share of them, during the time past of my pilgrimage. And I began betimes, too. I dare say not many of my readers ever heard of the Reverend Adrian Bulkley, of Wensley in Massachusetts; and yet I will make bold to assure them that they have not had many acquaintances better worth knowing than he. Or, if they have, their luck has been more than mine. It is a thousand pities that he had not fallen in the way of Charles Lamb or De Quincey. They, or Hawthorne, would have delighted in making him immortal. But, for the lack of a sacred bard, he must needs be forgotten, like the heroes that lived before Agamemnon, and be as if he had never been. Possibly his name may yet be one of the household words of the little inland town over which he predominated for so many years; and, perhaps, the genial eccentricities of his life and speech, may still make the staple of a winter's tale round a farmer's fireside there. But beyond these narrow bounds and the not much wider sphere of his clerical exchanges, he was but little known while he lived; and, even within them, his memory must, by the natural laws of decay, be gradually mouldering away, along with his dust in the Minister's Tomb, out of men's minds. So that it will not be many years before his name will survive only in the homely annals of the Parish Records, on the tablet lately erected by the Wensley Sewing Circle to the deceased ministers of the town, and in the Triennial Catalogue of Harvard College.

I well remember my first sight of him, and well I may; for it was connected with a little incident in my life, such as usually makes a deep impression on any ingenuous youth whom it befalls. Not to mince the matter, the government of the College, charged with my education, were misled by a train of untoward circumstances to the conclusion that a residence of some months in a rural district, remote from the temptations incident to academic life, would be at once beneficial to me, and of good example, by way of warning, to the rest of the University. I need hardly say to any one who knew me at that time, or who enjoys that advantage now, that they were entirely mistaken, VOL. II.-6

and rested their conclusions upon very erroneous premises. The facts were these. There was at that time a sodality, or voluntary association of youth for mutual improvement, the object of which was to combine abstract with practical science. Their purpose was to imitate, at a humble distance, the example of the divine Socrates, and to call philosophy down from heaven to minister to the necessi

ties of man. They delighted in nicely observing the effects of fire, for instance, on certain animal and vegetable substances. They curiously watched the chemical changes resulting from the mixture of divers liquids, one with another. And they speculated profoundly on the laws of pneumatics, whereby, through the agency of fire at the one end, and of a gentle suction at the other, a desiccated vegetable convolution could be returned to its original elements of air and earth in the form of smoke and ashes,-" pulvis et umbra," as Horace would have said, had he not died before the sight.

This harmless, not to say praiseworthy fraternity, appropriately denominated themselves "The Deipnosophoi," or supper-philosophers, a term which very aptly described the practical nature of their scientific pursuits. It did sometimes happen to them, as it hath to the ardent followers of science in all times, that they pursued their investigations a little too far, and that, occasionally, the supper was rather too much for the philosophy. It was the gloss of the rulers of the University, that the night which was the immediate cause of my introduction to Mr. Bulkley was one of these exceptional occasions. I neither admit nor deny the imputation. It was affirmed on behalf of the prosecution, that songs of a lively character, interspersed with laughter of a vociferous nature, and an occasional shout of triumph, disturbed the stillness of the night. It did also happen that the windows of an unpopular tutor (since a very eminent literary and public man) were broken in a most emphatic and unqualified manner, that particular night. But I defy the world to the proof that any of our party had any thing to do with that. But suppose both these charges could have been substantiated, I appeal to every impartial mind whether any inference could be drawn from them to the disadvantage of young votaries of science, who could not refrain from seizing a favorable moment for testing the principles of acoustics, or were unable to resist an eminently tempting opportunity to reduce to practice the

laws of governing projectiles. These liberal views, unfortunately, did not inspire the proctors when they gave hot chase to our party, who, resorting to the laws regulating muscular locomotion with great energy, all made their escape, with the exception of my unlucky self. But I, after practically experiencing the law of the resistance of matter by striking my foot against a stone, exemplified that of gravitation by measuring my length on my mother earth.

Of course, there was no use of resistance or disguise, when the enemy had me at such a deadly advantage. Wellington, Napoleon, General Taylor himself, would have surrendered under such circumstances. I was seized and identified, and then ordered to go to my rooms. This was quite superfluous, as I had no intention of going any where else. So I went thither, cursing my ill luck, and having a particularly ill opinion of supper-eating, combined with philosophy. Nor did this unfortunate conjunction rise in my estimation, when I was summoned before the college government in full conclave the next morning, to answer for the deeds done the night before. Honest old souls! Not one of them left! I hated some of them then, but I think tenderly and reverently of them all now. Of course, I admitted what could not be denied, but resolutely refused to give any information that should implicate any one else. So I was thought to have got off very easily, when the President sent for me soon after, and read to me my credentials (then popularly known as my walking-ticket), stating that the government, in consideration of Osborne's having assisted at a festal entertainment on such a night, sentenced him to be suspended for nine months, to pass the same under the charge of the Rev. Adrian Bulkley, of Wensley. After a little advice, given in the kindly and friendly tone which has given him a place in the hearts of all his academic sons, the President dismissed me with "a merry twinkle in his eye," as if he did not regard me as a sinner above all others, enjoining it upon me to leave town within an hour. Having expected this, and having escaped much better than I had feared, a chum of mine drove me to Boston as fast as Read's best horse could carry us. Here I reported my misfortune to my guardian (having been an orphan since infancy), and, after receiving, like Don Juan, "a lecture and some money," I took my place on the top of the stage-coach which passed through Wensley, on its way to Haverford, and found myself, about five o'clock on a fine afternoon in June, whirling up to the door of Grimes's tavern, well-re

nowned in all the region round about for flip, the loggerhead whereof never grew cold.

Old Grimes (I beg his pardon, I mean Major Grimes) squinted a welcome to me out of his one eye, while his copper-nose glowed with anticipated hospitality, as he assisted me to descend from my elevation. But his hopes of immediate advantage from my advent were dampened, by my inquiring, as soon as I had complied with the custom of the time, and done my best to qualify the coachman for breaking the necks of the travellers I left behind me, by a stiff glass of toddy,-by my inquiring, I say, for the house of the Rev. Mr. Bulkley.

"Mr. Bulkley!" repeated the Major, wiping his toddy-stick as he spoke, and laying it reverently aside for the next occasion, sure soon to recur. "You are a relation of his, perhaps, sir?

"None whatever, that I know of," was my curt response.

"Ah, only an acquaintance, then?" persisted the gallant toddy-mixer.

"Never saw him in my life," said I. "Only know him by reputation?" suggested the Major.

Never heard of his existence till this morning," I returned, rather snappishly; "but for all that, I wish to see him, and shall be obliged to you if you will tell me where he lives."

"Oh, I understand," drawled out mine host, cocking his eye afresh at me with an indescribably knowing leer, which was also indescribably provoking, "now I understand it all. When did you leave Cambridge, sir?"

Cambridge be d-d!" said I, in my haste (I do not justify this summary disposition of that ancient seat of learning, but historical accuracy compels me to record that this was the precise formula I made use of). "Is it any business of yours, I should like to know, where I came from? What I want of you is to know where I'm to go."

"Not the least business of mine in the world," responded my interrogator, with the most quiet equanimity, still regarding me out of the corner of his eye, with an expression in which fun and toddy seemed to be mixed, half and half, “but I have directed several young gentlemen to priest Bulkley's in my time-though it is a good while since the last one. I know how they look, sir; there's no mistaking 'em," and he chuckled till I felt inclined to close up the one organ he had left, for making such observations on the rising generation under difficulties. But, restraining my wrath, I contented myself with saying