since) to the commission of a matrimony which I had only conjured up for your diversion. William Weath

erall has married Mrs. Cotterel's maid. But to take it in its truest sense, you will see, my dear F, that News from me must become History to you; which I neither profess to write, nor, indeed, care much for reading. No person, unless a diviner, can with any prospect of veracity conduct a correspondence at such an arm's length.

Then as to Sentiment. It fares little better with that. This kind of dish, above all, requires to be served. up hot, or sent off in water-plates, that your friend may have it almost as warm as yourself. If it have time to cool, it is the most tasteless of all cold meats. I have often smiled at a conceit of the late Lord C. It seems that travelling somewhere about Geneva, he came to some pretty green spot or nook, where a willow or something hung so fantastically and invitingly over a stream-was it? or a rock ?-no matter: but the stillness or the repose, after a weary journey, 'tis likely in a languid moment in his Lordship's not restless life, so took his fancy that he could imagine no place so proper, in the event of his death, to lay his bones in. This was all very natural and excusable as a sentiment, and shows his character in a very pleasing light. But when from a passing sentiment it came to be an act; and when by a positive testamentary disposal his remains were actually carried all that way from England, who was there some desperate sentimentalists excepted that did not ask the question, Why could not his Lordship have found a spot as solitary, a nook as romantic, a tree as green and pendent, in Surrey, in Dorset, or in Devon? Conceive the sentiment boarded up, freighted, entered at the Custom House (startling the tide-waiters with the novelty), hoisted into a ship. Conceive it passed about and handled between the rude jests of tarpaulin ruffians-a thing of its delicate texture-the salt bilge wetting it till it became as vapid as a damaged lustring. Trace it then to its lucky landing at Lyons, shall we say-I have not the map before me -jostled upon four men's shoulders-baiting at this town-stopping to refresh at t'other village--waiting a

passport here, a license there-the sanction of the magistracy in this district-the concurrence of the ecclesiastics in that canton; till at length it arrives at its destination, tired out and jaded, from a brisk Sentiment into a feature of silly Pride or tawdry, senseless Affectation. How few Sentiments, my dear F, I am afraid we can set down, in the sailors' phrase, as quite seaworthy.

Lastly, as to the agreeable levities which, though contemptible in bulk, are the twinkling corpuscula which should irradiate a right friendly epistle-your Puns and small Jests are, I apprehend, extremely circumscribed in their sphere of action. They are so far from a capacity of being packed up and sent beyond sea, that they will scarce endure to be transported by hand from this room to the next. Their vigor is at the instant of their birth. Their nutriment for their brief existence is the intellectual atmosphere of the by-standers. A Pun hath a hearty kind of present ear-kissing smack with it; you can no more transmit it in its pristine flavor than you can send a kiss. Have you not tried in some instances to palm off a yesterday's pun upon a gentleman, and has it answered? Not but it was new to his hearing, but it did not seem to come new from you. It did not seem to hitch in. It was like picking up at a village alehouse a two-days'-old newspaper. You have not seen it before, but you resent the stale thing as an affront. This sort of merchandise, above all, requires a quick return. A pun and its recognitory laugh must be co-instantaneous. The one is the brisk lightning, the other the fierce thunder. A moment's interval, and the link is snapped. A pun is reflected from a friend's face as from a mirror. Who would consult his sweet visnomy were it two or three minutes (not to speak of twelve months) in giving back its copy?

I am insensibly chatting to you as familiarly as when. we used to exchange good-morrow out of our old contiguous windows in pump-famed Hare-Court in the Temple. My heart is as dry as that spring sometimes. turns in a thirsty August, when I revert to the space that is between us; a length of passage enough to render obsolete the phrases of our English letters before

they can reach you. But while I talk, I think you hear me-thoughts dallying with vain surmise

"Aye me! while thee the seas and sounding shores hold far away."

Come back before I am grown into a very old man, so as you shall hardly know me. Come before Bridget walks on crutches. Girls whom you left as children have become sage matrons while you are tarrying there. The blooming Miss W-r (you remember Sally Wr) called upon us yesterday, an aged crone. Folks whom you knew die off every year. If you do not make haste to return, there will be little left to greet you of me or mine.-Elia.

HESTER.

When maidens such as Hester die,
Their place ye may not well supply,
Though ye among a thousand try,
With vain endeavor.

A month or more hath she been dead;
Yet cannot I by force be led
To think upon the wormy bed
And her, together.

A springing motion in her gait
A rising step, did indicate

Of pride and joy no common rate,
That flushed her spirit.

I know not by what name beside
I shall it call:-if 'twas not pride,
It was a joy to that allied,
She did inherit.

Her parents held the Quaker rule,
Which doth the human feeling cool;
But she was trained in nature's school-
Nature had blest her.

A waking eye, a prying mind,
A heart that stirs, is hard to bind ;
A hawk's keen sight ye cannot blind—
Ye could not Hester.

My sprightly neighbor, gone before
To that unknown and silent shore !
Shall we not meet, as heretofore,
Some summer morning,

When from thy cheerful eyes a ray
Hath struck a bliss upon the day-
A bliss that would not go away-
A sweet forewarning?

-CHARLES LAMB.

LINES WRITTEN IN MY OWN ALBUM.

Fresh clad from heaven in robes of white
A young probationer of light

Thou wert, my soul, an album bright,

A spotless leaf; but thought and care,
And friend and foe, in foul and fair,
Have written "strange defeatures" there.

And Time, with heaviest hand of ...
Like that fierce writing on the wi
Hath stamped sad dates he can't 1904

And error, gilding wore desige -
Like speckled snake that viaja ad inima,
Betrays his path by crooked me S

Disjointed numbers; sense unknit;
Huge reams of folly; shreds of wit;
Compose the mingled mass of it.

My scalding eyes no longer brook
Upon this ink-blurred thing to look :-
Go shut the leaves, and clasp the book.

-CHARLES LAMB.

CHOOSING A NAME.

I have got a new-born sister;
I was nigh the first that kissed her.
When the nursing-woman brought her
To papa, his infant daughter,

How papa's dear eyes did glisten!
She will shortly be to christen;

And papa has made the offer

I shall have the naming of her.

Now I wonder what would please her-
Charlotte, Julia, or Louisa?

Ann and Mary-they're too common ;
Joan's too formal for a woman;
Jane's a prettier name beside;
But we had a Jane that died.
They would say if 'twas Rebecca,
That she was a little Quaker.
Edith's pretty, but that looks
Better in old English books;
Ellen's left off long ago;
Blanche is out of fashion now.
None that I have named as yet
Are as good as Margaret.
Emily is neat and fine;
What do you think of Caroline?

How I'm puzzled and perplexed,
What to choose or think of next!
I am in a little fever

Lest the name that I should give her
Should disgrace her or defame her :-
I will leave papa to name her.

-MARY LAMB.