of Shakspeare and Scott that they are fond of introducing familiar occurrences like these amid their most wild and romantic scenes, while feebler writers are afraid to do so for fear of destroying the effect, or rendering what is already tame or outrageous, ludicrous.

Of late there is a kind of puppyism sprung up in discoursing of eating, first generated by some of the petit-maitre correspondents of the New Monthly Magazine. They discourse about the pleasures of the table in a style of superlative affectation, treat all solid joints as relics of ancient barbarism, and all who partake of them as vulgar and John Bullish, learn the names of a dozen or two French dishes, and make a parade of their love of, and familiarity with, soups, slops, stews, and kickshaws, as weak, insipid, and unsubstantial as themselves. Puppyism in writing and dressing is bad enough, but puppyism on so solemn and serious a subject as eating, is carrying the jest a little too far.

ALBUMS.

Ye who in albums are required to write,
Be wise, before you undertake the same;
Remember that whatever you indite,

Remaineth, to your credit or your shame ;
That you had better leave the paper white,

Than rack your hapless brains with idle aim;

But, above all things, if the book you take,

Don't wait a year before you bring it back.-Sands.

ALBUMS are one of the greatest nuisances of modern times. They waylay you, or rather are laid in your way, in every house in the city, in which a young lady turned thirteen, happens to reside. They are as numerous and tormenting as flies at midsummer, and, like flies at midsummer, the irritating evil cannot be grappled with; for, in both cases, it is apparently so trivial, that all serious opposition and resistance become mighty ridiculous. Yet human happiness is, for the most part, made up of trifles; and it is to be feared that the deduction from the sum total, during the ensuing summer

months, on the score of flies and albums, will far exceed that created by anxiety for the temporary welfare of our friends, or our own spiritual concerns. Petty evils and insect troubles frequently vex a person more than substantial grievances. The insignificance of an annoyance gives it a ludicrous character that is very provoking, and frets one to think that he can be so easily fretted. Many a man's nerves are so strung that the tickling of a straw will set him almost crazy; while a heavy contusion brings him to his senses, and he smiles at the pain it occasions. Suppose, for example, a corpulent, choleric old merchant, preparing to take his after-dinner nap in an easy chair, on a sultry day in August-suppose sleep gently descending on his eyelids, and gradually and deliciously overclouding his faculties suppose, at this critical moment, a rascally blue-bottle fly effecting his entrance into the room, and commencing to amuse itself by tickling the old gentleman. He hears its ceaseless buzzing in his ears, and anon feels it promenading across his forehead, leaving an intolerable itching wherever it treads. Half asleep and half awake, he impatiently jerks his head, and for a moment puts the enemy to flight; but it is only for a moment, for scarcely has he composed himself to sleep, when he again feels his friend taking a walk down his

cheek and across his chin; he instinctively attempts to crush his tormentor, and slaps his own face, while all the time his nerves are acquiring a preternatural irritability. At last, a final attack upon the sensitive organ of smell puts sleep and patience to flight, and he starts from his chair in a highly sublimated degree of rage, chasing the disturber of his peace around the room in a perfect phrenzy. Suppose at this instant the door to open, and the servant to present a letter, informing him of the loss of a richly-laden vessel. He becomes immediately calm and collected. This is a misfortune worth struggling against. He braces himself up for the encounter, and determines to "bear it like a man." Thousands meet death with perfect calmness, but we have high authority that

-"there was never yet philosopher
That could endure the tooth-ache patiently;
However, they have writ the style of gods,
And made a pish at chance and sufferance."

It is the smallness of the evil, which seems so easily to be got rid of or avoided, but which cannot be got rid of or avoided, that destroys our equanimity; and, it is upon this ground that albums are afflictions of the first magnitude. The person who first invented them has much to answer for. They and steam-boats are the greatest curses and bles

sings of the present age; the one has been productive of as much trouble and inquietude as the other has of comfort and convenience.

A certain gentleman, who takes ten glasses of brandy per diem, justifies himself by saying, that it is not the use but the abuse of stimulants that is hurtful; and every young lady who keeps an album, at the same time complains that they "are so common." She seems to think that all her sex, excepting herself, are taking liberties to which they are not entitled. A respectable widow in this city has eleven daughters, each of whom maintains an album; and any unfortunate visitor who is caught fairly within her doors, may think himself lucky if he escape with the loss of five effusions. The senior portion of these misguided young ladies are fast verging towards a state of hopeless single blessedness, I am half inclined to believe merely on account of the cultivation of this pernicious habit. They have frightened away their oldest friends, and no male creature ever ventures within their reach. Indeed, what person in his senses would visit a house where a yard of poetry was required to be paid down as a tribute? Though not exactly carried on to the same extent, there are few dwellings in New-York into which a person not gifted (or cursed) with a knack of rhyming can safely venture. It