observe." My eyes were naturally attracted to a handsome couple, who danced extremely well. I expected to find all the optics in the same di

of a bow. The room was nearly the room. Can twenty years have full, but the dancing had not com-made this revolution in my inclinamenced. As all eyes were naturally tions? I began, therefore, at the tipturned towards the door to criticize top of beauty and fashion, and deand pull to pieces the comers-in, I scended in a regular ratio till I reachcould not of course escape the no- ed that term of the series when I tice of the company. Of those who thought I ought to stop. But all knew me, some recognised me with were engaged, and for the whole a slight inclination of the head, others night. Time was when I did not turned their eyes another way, and find the ladies so deeply engaged. some tittered and exchanged looks. Can twenty years have made such a Those who knew me not I could difference? This reflection was folperceive made interrogatories, in the lowed by a sudden rising in my throat, answers to which I could distinguish but I gulped it down with a sigh. the word "only," which magical" N'importe! I will not dance, I will sound effectually prevented a second look from those eyes which, I could observe, often rested on persons whose sole attractions were a title or a fortune. There is something won-rection as my own; but, ho! they, derfully bewitching in rank and riches; for, with all my philosophy, I confess I never heard that a man had ten thousand a year or a title without taking a second look at him. I leave those with more reflection than myself to account for this feeling. The striking up of a quadrille announced the preparation for the dance. As I used to be esteemed a good dancer, and had once figured in the native country of the quadrille, I thought myself privileged to stand up. There was a time when I generally selected the plainest partner in the room. Whether this proceed-gy, nobodies. The others were good ed from vanity in shewing the con- solid somebodies, whóm every one trast between their deformity and knew, pretended to know, or wished my handsome person, or whether it to know, and possessing "local habiarose from a feeling of pity springing tations" of no mean value or extent, from a naturally kind disposition, or and names of high sound and import. whether a mixture of both these" But that very fat lady," said I, causes might have influenced me, I" who dances with such agility, and leave others to guess. Now, how- attracts so much notice, surely she ever, I found the case altered. I felt is somebody of consequence?" "You a desire to dance with the prettiest are mistaken," said my friend; "she and most distinguished partner in is the least body in the room. They

were pointed towards a pair who were excessively plain, and danced most abominably. Surely, thought I, they are looking at these people, and wondering how they can make such fools of themselves; for what else can make them turn from beauty and grace to deformity and awkwardness? A whisper from a brother demiesolde told me the cause. The couple I admired were poor" airy nothings,' with scarce "a local habitation or a name," for they had neither possessions nor rank. They were in fact, according to the modern phraseolo

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are only quizzing her. Indeed, noted a daughter through the mazes of withstanding her apparent great size, the dance, I could no where see hapso diminutive a body is she, that piness or satisfaction. I thought I yonder dandy cannot see her without recollected that a ball-room was the using his magnifying glass." Have very focus of pleasure; at least, my twenty years, thought I, raised up youthful anticipations had often told this distinction between somebody me so, and I stopped not to consider and nobody? whether they had been realized. Is then the world so changed within twenty years? thought I. Here I must do my own sex the justice to say, that a better feeling seemed to animate them. There was among them, to be sure, abundance of vanity and affectation, but few of those angry feelings which I observed to ruffle the bosoms of the softer sex. A little reflection told me the cause of this difference. Man's scene of action lies not in a ball-room. In general, he attends it merely as a pastime; but woman has more serious business there. It is the arena wherein she tries her strength, and where her fate in life is but too often decided. If outdone in public, where shall she shine? Even that solace from the scoffs of the world, a home of her own, is often from this very cause denied her: for how few, unless favoured by Fortune, can hope, without passing with some degree of éclât through the ordeal of public opinion, to obtain the object of their ambition, a husband!

The regiment which gave the ball had been at Waterloo. Medals in abundance depended from the button-holes of the officers. A stripling, who had never seen a shot fired till that day, and of course none since, wore one dangling at his breast. I had served through the whole Peninsular war; I had been thrice wounded; I had my constitution shattered, and was still only a half-pay captain, without any badge of distinction or merit. Without wishing to detract from the glory of the gallant army which achieved the downfall of the tyrant, I confess I felt mortified and dissatisfied, I might almost say disgusted. Here again I felt a rising in my throat, but I gulped it down as well as I could.

From such unpleasant reflections, I sought relief in the eyes of the fair. But, alas! those eyes shone not for me! I never encountered them, but they turned away, as if they scorned to waste their beams on such an object as a poor half-pay officer. I began to feel that I too was nobody. I Next to the quadrille came the then turned to examine the counte- English country-dance, in modern nances of the fair, which I could the language ycleped kitchen-dance, still better do, as the sentinels, the eyes, kept up in country-towns for the acwere off their post. I could there commodation of those who cannot perceive exultation, pride, hope, and dance quadrilles. A bride led down. occasionally a glimpse of joy, but it She was in all the bloom of youth was the joy of triumph. I could see and beauty. It was evident that a abundance of envy, mortification, and deeper tint than usual suffused her disappointment, mostly skinned over cheek, and this was rendered still by a smile. But, except in the beam- more apparent by the contrast of her ing eyes of a mother as they follow-dress. Yet no eyes but mine follow

that Mammon always was, and always will be, worshipped to the end of the chapter; that when I first entered the world, being young, handsome, and with good expectations, I experienced no neglect in my own person; that being then gay, thought

some other admired object, I took but little notice of what happened to others; that being now comparatively old, and, of course, no longer handsome, with prospects blasted, and, of course, poor, I am become an object of indifference, if not of scorn, to the world; and that, under the in

ed her as she sought her way modestly but gracefully down the scarce open ranks. On the contrary, I observed envious tosses of the head, aversion of the eyes, &c. among the females, and even some unpoliteness on the part of the males in blocking up the way. I endeavoured to as-less, and occupied with myself or certain the cause of this. She was the apothecary's daughter, or, in other words, she was nobody. The couple that followed were not so treated; they were somebodies. Said I to myself, Was it so twenty years ago? I felt a sudden glow of indignation, followed by a shivering of disgust. I retired hastily to my humble dwell-fluence of disappointment and dising (where, come what will, I am somebody); and with a glass of grog and a cegar, sat down to meditate on the scene I had just quitted. The result of my cogitations was, that what I conceived to be an alteration in the world within twenty years, was in fact caused by viewing the same objects through a different medium;

gust, I may perhaps view the prac tice and customs of society with a jaundiced eye. I retired to bed, dreamt of the vanities of human life, of Solomon, Socrates, Seneca, &c. &c. and rose in the morning, though only ten hours older, full ten years wiser than I was the night before.

B.

GAELIC RELICS.

No. X.

of heath where reposed his sworn friend, a Macgregor, with the pa tronymic Mackildonich. Breaking the temporary rest of the living, the dead bewails the estrangement of his mortal remains from the dust of his clan.

¦ THE STRANGER grave, OR MACKILDONICH AND THE SON OF ALPIN. THE following fragment represents the vivid and unalterable sentiment of predilection for clinging to their own people in life and in death, which so firmly united the individual attachments of the Gael with the prosperity of their clan. A Macgregor, mortally wounded, escaped from the battle of Methven; and being pursued by a host of foes, retreated towards Glenorchy. He expired in a miserable hovel, and his body being found, was inhumed far from the graves of his fathers. His ghost is supposed to appear beside the bed

Mackildonich removes the bones to the cemetery of his forefa thers, and the troubled spirit retires to "his airy cave of peace." The ghost is supposed to say:

"Sweetly slumbers Mackildonich; while low, among the dust of strangers, lies Macgregor of the race of kings. No friend, no kinsman bends

over his unheeded grave. His dwel- their own woody hills, or they die ling is dark and lonely. The dry and are mingled with the dust of whistling grass and shaggy heath their own tribe; but he that is scatare the sole companions of moulder- tered to the earth of strangers, is ing limbs that hewed down ranks of || rootless as a withered leaf tossed by the valiant in battle, and hung up to angry gales." feed the eagles a host of the foes of Clan Alpin. Pale glimmers the silent moon over the unheaped cairn, where no son of Alpin ever made his narrow house; but he, that restless spirit, still hovers in the clouds of his own land. The blast of the forest drives fiercely; and as drops from the stern rock the living stream, the tears of a gloomy shade pour down for his own people, when he sails through the mist of a land of strangers. His people live among

Faintly over the wild vanished the mighty beam of renown. Mackildonich bore the warrior to the graves of his fathers of old, and in peace he lies in their earth. The nettle gray waves near, and the yew of battle is green at his head. The brave, the sons of the brave, stand around; they have piled his cairn to the skies. The cairn rises moon by moon, and heroes stand around, recalling the voice of his fame.

B. G.

we are Catholics; these unhappy men differ from us in religious tenets, but they are our fellow-beings. It is for us to consider what they suffer, not what they believe." The nobles, thus called upon by all-persuasive beauty, never thought of deliberating.

NOBLE EXERCISE OF THE POWER OF BEAUTY. MADAME DESENETAIRE, the widow, liverance of those victims. "Tis true of the heroic Guy d'Exupiris, retired to her castle of Miramont, determined to pass in retirement the first year of her widowhood; but, superior to prudery, and sanctioned by the company of an aged lady, her aunt, she did not decline visits from the families of suitable rank in its vicinity. | After some months, several young gentlemen paid her avowed homage. She was one day in the balcony of her castle with a crowd of admirers, when she saw Mentail, the king's lieutenant, dragging to prison a number of Hugonots. Her eyes were filled with tears; but soon recollecting that briny torrents of compassion could be of no avail to the sufferers, and turning to the preux chevaliers of her circle, she said, "You have often complained that I give you no 'opportunity to prove your desire to serve me. If you are sincere, you will permit me to lead you to the de

They were soon accoutred, and the widow, equipped as an Amazon, was the first to mount her milk-white charger. Her golden-hilted brand gleamed in the sun, waving her followers to spur their steeds against Mentail. His troops were dispersed, and the captives set free. Enraged that a band led by a woman should compel him to resign his prey, Mentail collected a force of two thousand men to besiege the castle of Miramont. He was again defeated. Henry III. violently incensed by the disgrace of his officer, sent a chosen detachment of troops, with orders to

raze the castle of Miramont to the her defence, coolly reflected upon the

ground. When this news spread through the province, the nobility, gentry, and peasantry confederated to assist Madame de Senetaire, who was universally beloved. Henry, being apprized of the associations for

hazard of embroiling his subjects for an unmanly vengeance against a woman, whose offence originated in humanity, the loveliest charm of her sex. He withdrew his squadrons, and the lady remained unmolested.

TIMBER-RAFTS ON THE RHINE.

THE most important branch of trade carried on at Dordrecht is that in timber, which is floated down the Rhine. The arrival of such a float affords an extraordinary and interesting sight to the stranger. Let the reader figure to himself, in the middle of a wide river, a raft composed of thousands of trunks of trees, large and small, and among them oaks which have attained the age of two hundred years, fastened together, and covered with a floor so as to present one level surface. Let him imagine this floating island inhabited, not by a handful of men who work it down the river by means of wind and tide, but by upwards of a thousand persons, having each their respective occupation. This enormous naval caravan is supplied with all sorts of provisions requisite for a passage of some weeks, and the duration of which is always uncertain. The captain and his family have a habitation commodiously arranged, and suitable to his rank and functions; while several other apartments, formed of deal planks, contain a greater or less number of the other persons. These

apartments are contrived with reference to their employments, in which the fair sex bears its part; and every possible provision is made for the general safety, especially in case of storms. As soon as this floating caravan has reached the place of its destination, the raft is taken to pieces and the timber sold. Some of these rafts sell for not less than 30,000. sterling. The captain, who is generally commissioned to dispose of the timber, is of course detained some time, but his people immediately set out on their return on foot, in high spirits, and buoyed with the hopes of soon obtaining another job.

The consumption of provisions on board one of these rafts during the voyage from Cologne to Dordrecht is from fifteen to twenty thousand pounds of fresh meat, forty to fifty thousand of bread, ten to fifteen thousand of cheese, twelve to fifteen hundred of butter, eight hundred or a thousand of smoked meat, and five or six hundred casks of strong beer. The wages of each man is about thirty shillings, besides his keep.

ANECDOTES, &c.

HISTORICAL, LITERARY, AND PERSONAL.

FONTENELLE..

FONTENELLE was an admirable instance of literary longevity. In the

year 1751, after he had attained the age of ninety-two, he conspicuously sparkled among the beaux-esprits of