After spending the chief of her mornings in reading novels, which filled her head with romantic absurdities, and parading Bond Street in the expectancy that some of the marvellous exploits of which she had been reading would be realized in her own person, Philomena would return home after a turn or two, disappointed and angry, to contrive some new plan; which was no sooner formed than put into practice. Thus her evenings were usually spent with the same degree of censurable, if not criminal irrationality, as her mornings. As one error too generally leads to another; in order to carry her schemes into execution she was obliged to practise deceit with her father; who, unconscious of his daughter's imprudence, firmly believed her when she told him she was engaged with her friends. This dissimulation with a parent reflected a greater disgrace on her, than all the little indiscretions of which she was guilty. Deliberate falsehoods, and premeditated deviations from honor, are by far more culpable than the inconsiderate folly that leads to them.

"You are certainly embellishing," exclaim the lovers of romance, "for the purpose of amusing us, and bringing your moral to bear. The result, however, of this young lady's eccentricities? It is to be hoped that her ideas were elevated somewhat above a partnership with a vender of cabbages!"

The ideas of a female who can condescend to

lose sight of her own consequence by falling into all the extravagant follies of the town, and indulging propensities that must for ever blast her reputation, cannot abound with moral propriety, at all events, however exalted they may be in other respects. Philomena was lofty in the extreme, in many instances; but her pride was not of a nature to reflect much credit on her high notions of birth and rank in society, as her frequent attendance at a certain fashionable resort in the neighbourhood of Hanover Square too plainly evinced. In spite of the precaution she took to disguise her figure, and to conceal the unprotected state in which she joined the gay circle to partake of the amusements of the evening, she could not long escape the eye of observation. One act of imprudence was followed closely by another;— the busy tongue of slander was soon put in motion; and intimations of the flagrant impropriety of her conduct at length reached the ears of her fond father; who, alarmed, though doubting the truth of what he heard, watched for a while the proceedings of his daughter; and alas! was too soon convinced of her folly and extravagancies. After reproving and expostulating to no purpose,-for in vain did he endeavour to bring her to reason, and apprehensive that ruin and disgrace awaited her, he resolved upon the expedient of sending her to some of his relations in India, hoping thereby to turn her from the destructive course she was pursuing. Accordingly he lost no time

in writing to the friends to whose protection he recommended her; and having secured her a passage in the first fleet that was to sail, he trusted from his knowledge of two or three respectable families that were going out in the same ship, that she would be out of harm's way during the voyage; and that on her arrival, as is usual with our fair country-women, she would enter into a matrimonial compact, and become a virtuous member of society, without exposing herself to further reproach, or bringing actual disgrace on her family. If report speak true, however, e're she reached the Cape, a gallant son of Mars became enamoured of her charms; she listened to the soft things he whispered in her ear; and to the great mortification of her fond father, he heard that she became a mother before she was a wife: commanding as little respect among strangers in a distant clime, as among her more intimate connexions at home.

"And were these improprieties of conduct to be attributed solely to the reading of novels?" inquire again some of the young votaries of fiction.

Perhaps not wholly so: but it no doubt led in a great measure to her ruin. Philomena was naturally fond of romantic adventure; and by constantly roving among the flowery productions of wild and romantic scenery in search of something new and wonderful, she proceeded without fear or caution, and met her destruction in these delusive fields of enchantment.

Though not criminal, a still more glaring instance of romantic folly may be traced in the conduct of fair Ellen, of Peckham, who fell desperately in love with a young Knight of the Brush, merely from the encomiums lavished upon him by her friend; and actually declared that no other man should ever lead her to the hymeneal altar'; though she had never seen him, nor was she aware that his affections were even at his own disposal. Chance or stratagem did, however, some time after, bring about the desired meeting. The youth was smitten-the delighted Ellen readily encouraged his advances-yielded to the eloquent voice of love-and, to her sorrow, became the wife of a man who repays her affection with neglect, severity, and hard unkindness.

What can be the result of such determinations, but vexation, disappointment, and sorrow? Even Kings and Emperors are not exempt from the penalty they inflict; as the following anecdote evinces:

"Holbein, who for his extraordinary talents attracted the notice of Henry VIII. during his residence with Sir Thomas More, to whom he was recommended by the great Erasmus, was taken into the King's service, who settled on him a provision for life; although he once hazarded the severe displeasure of his royal and turbulent patron. For being despatched by Cromwell to paint the Lady Ann of Cleves, Holbein so flattered her with his pencil, that Henry, who was a

Z

great admirer of beauty in the fair sex, fell in love with the portrait, and was induced to marry her. But when he discovered how plain she really was, his anger" says the historian, "was turned from the painter to the minister; and poor Cromwell lost his head, because the unhappy Ann was denounced by her royal husband for a Flanders Mare," and not the Venus depicted by Holbein !