sister were warned against the course they had taken. In the present crisis, Jack proposed a long-cherished project of his, to which Bessy at once agreed. It was, that they should store up their old house furniture with a kind neighbour, who had offered to spare room for it, and both work and save till they were able to take a small house in some quiet decent street, where they should keep a little shop together, and, as Jack said, maybe get rich some day.' a widower. In less than three years, Mr Jones was too busy to either miss her or marry again; but the pair had an only son, and the design of his life was to make that son a gentleman, as he understood the term. Accordingly, the boy was sent to some of the best schools in England, and in due time to college at Cambridge, equipped, trained, and tutored, expressly for the estate which his father was to purchase for him out of the gains of his hard-working life. People said that Harry Jones The furniture was accordingly intrusted to their old was worthy of all the old man's hopes and pains. He neighbour, and the house given up to the landlord. Jack grew up handsome, lively, and clever. There was still in found the cheapest possible lodgings for himself, and Bessy, his father's library a long shelf full of prize books which quite unconscious of Mrs Jenkinson's boasted benevolence, he had brought home from schools and colleges: he had accepted, at that lady's request, the situation in which our a world of friends, and good reports of his character and story found her. Patiently and cheerfully had she per- conduct came from every quarter; but, in the midst of formed its many duties; Jack, too, had worked hard and his college course, the young man lost place, prospects, earned well in a button manufactory, and a year of the and his father's good graces, as it seemed for ever, for he probationary time had just closed with some prospect of married the kitchen-maid of an inn. The old man at success. The brother and sister met by accident, for once disowned him. He could have forgiven anything Bessy had no holidays, but the family spent that evening but a low match, and his son was too proud, or knew him at the house of Miss Timmins, a maiden aunt of the late too well, to seek his forgiveness. From that time Harry Mr Jenkinson, who resided in an out-of-the-way corner disappeared, as far as his former friends and associates of the town, and invited them regularly once a quarter to knew. Perhaps their search after him was not earnest. tea, and a very early turn out. Miss Timmins was past Some said he and his wife had sailed in a ship of free emisixty, and had some money in the bank at her own dis-grants for Australia; some that they had taken to very posal. The Jenkinsons could not, therefore, think of dis- humble ways of living in England; and Mr Jones never obliging her, and she was pleased to insist on Bessy's al- mentioned his son. The disappointment of his longways accompanying them, because the girl was a relation, cherished design had no power to slack his endeavours though her generosity never extended farther than that after riches. The manufactory took the place of wife and acknowledgment. son to him. He lived alone in a great brick house, and was daily served, flattered, and fawned upon by many a hopeful expectant of his decease, whom the old man long outlived. Jack worked in his factory, and though the idea of acknowledging a mere mechanic's relationship to his sister's family would have more than disgusted Mr Jones, the great man had taken particular notice of his industry and prudence, and Jack feared that the story might make himself and sister appear foolish in the eyes of Mr Jones. With many resolutions never again to mind people at the doors of gin-shops, he walked silently, and one might say sullenly, on beside Bessy, bidding her good-night at Mrs Jenkinson's door, which happened to be in the next street. When returning from this entertainment as usual by the most private way (for, though Miss Timmins was a little rich, the Jenkinsons considered her by no means genteel), Bessy met her brother, and, being allowed to walk with her, notwithstanding his artisan dress, as far as the great people's door, they had discussed their humble hopes and prospects, till interrupted by the occurrence we have just related. Mrs Jenkinson's rebuke to his sister had fallen heavily on Jack's mind. At first he was angry at the hard and cold manner in which Bessy's mistress had spoken regarding so small and so well-meant an action, but when Mr Jones appeared, his wrath changed to vexation at the whole business, and his own share in it, for Jack felt assured that all would be communicated to him. The Jenkinsons, young and old, whatever might be their individual differences, agreed on two articles of pride, to which even their unacknowledged cousin the young mechanic adhered. The first was that the deceased Mr Jenkinson had kept a shop in the preserve and pickle line, with seven men and boys employed about it; and the second, that Mr Jones, the great manufacturer of the Royal Coburg button, was mamma's eldest brother. Mr Jones was one of the many men in England of whom it might be said that they made their own fortunes. Early neighbours in Bradford recollected him keeping a small hardware shop, and could trace his progress from one upward step of business to another, till he established the above-mentioned manufactory in Birmingham, some five years before. There were many greater capitalists, but no prouder man, in the town than Mr Jones. The thought that his hand had gotten him this,' with which he surveyed his warehouse, his machinery, and the scores depending on him for bread and work, had a self-magnifying effect on a mind naturally narrow, and capable only of money-making. He kept his workmen at an awful distance, admitted the existence of no opinion but his own among his neighbours, and expected to be served like a sultan by his less wealthy relations. On that point at least Mr Jones was gratified: all his relations, including the Jenkinsons, had speculations on his will-not that the rich manufacturer was indeed heirless, but, while his pride grew and his wealth increased, vexation and disappointment had found their way into his dwelling. In the rising days of his fortune, Mr Jones had married a notably industrious woman. Her days were careful, and troubled about many things of the housekeeping kind, Lut she left him According to Jack's fears, the tale was related in Mrs Jenkinson's sagest manner, just to show what such people could take upon them,' that evening in the drawing-room, when Bessy had been sent off with Mary and Anna to the usual routine of lessons and bed. Mr Jones wondered that Jack hadn't more sense. Mrs Jenkinson considerately blamed his sister, who, she averred, had got notions about doing good not at all becoming her station. George Frederick remarked that the shop-door sermon must have been a capital joke; but the young lawyer's wonted laugh at his own wit seemed for that time insincere. Neither his mamma nor Miss Elizabeth, and still less the great button-maker, had remarked how attentive he was to Bessy's comings and goings, and what, in his own opinion, attractive airs Master George Frederick gave himself in her presence. The genius and the gentleman of the Jenkinson family could, however, condescend to the poor relation and governess only in by and stealthy ways. deed, in common with all would-be great young men, George Frederick's opinion of women, unless blessed with rank and fortune, was rather low, and the prediction of a titled heiress for his bride would not have astonished him in the least. Bessy was as keen as most girls to perceive, but neither vain nor silly enough to be caught by, such covered and master-like advances. She went quietly, and to all appearance unconsciously, about her work and walks, and the young solicitor had been hitherto obliged to live and act without notice. In Often had his pride been piqued, and his wrath roused, by repeated failures in his scheme of conquering Bessy's heart; often had he tried to think her a dull, commonplace creature, on whom it was not worth while to make an impression, but, in spite of all, his respect was won by her wise and gentle ways, and the vain, indolent young man at times caught himself in many a waking dream proudly sharing with Bessy the fortune he should have inherited, and the fame he would have won. Still she did not admire him, nor appreciate his genius—at least George Frederick thought so, though he had contrived that she should hear sundry little poems of his, which were read in the family circle, to the great glory of all the Jenkinsons; and also, that, if he could only bring his mind down to it, he would certainly make a fortune by the law. George Frederick did not know how often Bessy had told Jack in confidence of his exceeding cleverness, and how she excused his airs and vanities, which her brother could not forgive, on the ground that Providence had given him such extraordinary talents, but not a mother like what theirs had been. Master George Frederick pursued his legal studies in the manner of a man who knew them to be far beneath him; occasionally stooped to conquer Bessy, with wonted success; and wrote small verses on great subjects between. Mrs and Miss Jenkinson laboured hard at gentility and Berlin wool. Mr Jones and the Royal Coburg Button Manufactory went on as they had done before the commencement of our story. Jack toiled at his trade. Bessy washed, mended, and heard lessons till another evening, which found her and her brother in the same quiet street. The Jenkinsons were not with them then. Jack had reached the summit of his early ambition, for Bessy and he, each carrying a bundle of their last and lightest moveables, were on their way to a small house, which, thanks to repair and change, now opened where the gin-shop had been. Its landlord had offered them the place at a reduced rent, partly because he had known their father, and partly because few families likely to pay could be acommodated there. The house consisted of a shop, a back parlour, two closets which the landlord called bed-rooms, and another, with a fireplace in it, which he designated a kitchen. Well-to-do people would scarcely have thought the best apartment sufficiently large for a pantry, but it was a house of their own, the chattels their neighbour had kept for them were more than sufficient to furnish it, and all their savings, together with some credit, went to stock the shop with a miscellany of small wares likely to draw custom in the poor suburb of a great town. How Jack gloried in that shop, and rejoiced in the back parlour, when he and Bessy sat down there with their own kettle on the hearth, and their own tea-cups before them, need not be told; but his sister remembered that the little carpet had been darned by their poor mother, and the Bible in which she used to read stood first on their book-shelf. There were great evenings of planning and consultation between Jack and Bessy over their new estate. At first, it was arranged that the brother should continue at his trade, while Bessy looked after the shop and housekeeping, and it was wonderful how things prospered under her zealous and careful management. She dressed dolls and made necklaces to attract juvenile pence, worked babies' caps and stitched dickies for more advanced customers; and Jack was always in a hurry home when his work was done, to do what he called balancing the books, and talk with Bessy in the back parlour. Trade came and in creased steadily; the shop assumed an appearance of flourishing, though humble business; all the neighbours came there; servants from greater streets began to find their way to Bessy's counter; and the Jenkinsons at length took a friendly interest in the establishment. They had filled Bessy's place with a gaily-dressed, high-spoken lady, to whom a larger salary and better accommodations were awarded, because she had been in France with a baronet's family, and could teach the twins bon ton. Master George Frederick had got quite disgusted at some difficulties in his profession, and given it up, saying he would devote his life to literature, which devotion he prosecuted in the meantime by preparing a volume of poems, and carrying on a brisk though covered flirtation with the new governess. George Frederick nevertheless persuaded his mother to patrouise Bessy, and Mrs Jenkinson came with all the authority of a rich relative. She and her son were decided that Jack ought to make buttons no longer, but increase his stock of fancy things, and take entirely to shopkeeping, as it was far more genteel. They talked so much of what themselves and their friends would buy, that Jack tried to believe the plan must make his and his sister's fortune; but the main argument in its favour was the gentility. Against that, Bessy's fears of increased liabilities and uncertain sales had no weight; all the credit and capital which Jack could muster were put in immediate requisition for the fancy things, and he retired from buttonmaking, with the leave of Mr Jones and the approbation of all the Jenkinsons. Into the varieties of his new goods we will not enter. Most readers know what a comprehensive term 'the fancy line' is; but Miss Elizabeth and her mamma agreed that Jack had got darling things, and the homely trifles of Bessy's administration were huddled away into corners. Jack was rather ashamed of them now. His promotion to shopkeeping had been so sudden, that he felt awkwardly vain of the business. His idle and dictation-loving relations now thought him worth notice, and their daily visits and advices served to augment the young man's pride, if not his profits. His confidence in Bessy was shaken by these greater advisers. They rarely approved of her cautious measures, and Jack thought his rich cousins must know best. The opportunity of direction, so dear to the hearts of mankind in proportion as they are unfitted for it, was not thrown away on the Jenkinsons. Under their instruction, the shop was remodelled, till its grandeur became the amazement of the street, and, as the natural consequence of Jack's deference to their opinions and increased respectability, he was a general favourite with the family. Mrs Jenkinson occasionally invited him to tea; Miss Elizabeth found innumerable errands to the shop, so did an old officer of her acquaintance, but Jack did not observe that; and Master George Frederick made him a member of a literary society, consisting of his own humble companions and imitators, who met every Saturday evening to read original papers in his mamma's drawing-room. The gale of prosperity was faint, but sufficient to upset that untried character. Jack grew to a gentleman merchant in his own imagination; old clothes and acquaintances were alike disdained; he bought flash finery, assumed new airs, and paid special court to Miss Elizabeth. Bessy was left far behind in the march of his gentility. As her brother's expenses multiplied, hers were necessarily abridged, small as they had ever been, and, as the world's folly and falsehood grew upon him, Jack came to consider his sister a sort of inferior or servant to his grandeur. Nobody invited or patronised her, and Bessy did not care for that, but their old and loving companionship was broken; there were no more strolls together in the summer evenings, no more talks by the fire when the shop was shut on winter nights. At times, Bessy thought she ought to be thankful because her brother had learned no dissipated habits, and his associates were so respectable; but the hours were dreary which she worked away in the house alone, and the girl could not help regretting the little twins and their lessons. Perhaps she thought of George Frederick, too; how his airs were now put on for the new governess, doubtless not in vain, as he had told Jack in confidence that there was one woman who could understand him, and the governess was known to distribute scraps of poetry, signed by F. J., among her friends. Bessy was thinking sadly of these changes, as she sat one summer Saturday evening, darning her own worn shawl by the waning light for the next day's church, when Jack, who had gone as usual to the literary society, returned in high excitement. Their meeting had been broken up by the intelligence that Mr Jones was seized with apoplexy while looking over his accounts, after a late dinner, and the doctor did not believe he could survive till the morning. That night Jack could talk of nothing but the wealth the Jenkinsons would inherit by the old man's will, and how Miss Elizabeth had advised him to lay in a stock of jet ornaments immediately. 'Indeed, brother,' said Bessy, on whose mind a fear of worldly risk had been growing, we have more goods than custom already, and I think Miss Elizabeth neither knows nor cares much about our business.' been. Now, he must go into the Gazette-perhaps, to prison. It was all by taking that house. What would the whole street say, and the Jenkinsons think, of them?' He was talking in this strain as they looked over their books one evening in the empty shop. His words cut Bessy to the heart, for the implied blame that was in them; but she knew her brother's mind was sore pressed. but we did all for the best. What signifies what the street says? If you must go into the Gazette, so did many an honest man; and as for the Jenkinsons, I fear, brother, they care little for us.' How do you know what they cared for?' cried Jack, in a burst of grief and anger: I shouldn't care myself if it were not for Elizabeth; I know it will break her heart.' 'She may have more interest in it than you think,' said Jack, with a look which told of great expectations and greater vanity. 'Mr Jones's will may be a good thing for us all; but I'm dreadfully tired, and must go to bed.''Jack, dear,' said the girl, 'perhaps we were both wrong, Bessy lit her low gas, and darned on, wondering if the match would turn out well for her brother, and where she would find refuge from the grandeur of her intended sister-in-law; but the same night Mr Jones passed from money-making, factory, and flatterers, to look over life's accounts, and the following week brought a succession of shocks till then unparalleled in the Jenkinson circle. First, Mr Jones's long disowned son arrived, with his wife and three children, not from Australia, but a small secluded village in the primitive county of Norfolk, in time to take possession of his father's great house, superintend the funeral, and prove himself heir-at-law; for, to the general amazement of his relatives, the rich and rigid old man had made no will. Next, it came out that, in prospect of the unbequeathed legacy, Master George Frederick had, only the day before, clandestinely married the new governess, whom people then discovered to have been a lady's-maid of doubtful repute. Bessy was about to reply, but she was interrupted by the entrance of young Bryce, an attorney's clerk, who had formed one of the Saturday's meeting at Mrs Jenkinson's. I should doubtless congratulate you in the matter of your cousin, Miss Elizabeth,' said the young man, who was noted as a news-gatherer, and known to be spiteful. 'What about her?' cried Jack, eagerly. 'Why,' said Mr Bryce, she has at last caught-I mean the old lieutenant has prevailed upon her to become Mrs Williams, and the wedding is fixed for this day week.' Jack crushed the ledger between his hands, and retired having looked at a purse, which he promised to think of, went his way to communicate the news, with some additious, to his next acquaintance. Jack had little time for reflection or composure. Scarce was Mr Bryce gone, when a commercial traveller, from whom the said purse, with many of its congeners, had been ordered under the Jenkinson sway, stepped in to request the settlement of his little account, sharply reminding Bessy that this was the third application, and, to all her apologies, the man of trade answered only that he would call to-morrow, when, if they did not pay, his firm would. take legal proceedings. As he went out with that threat, the clerk of Mr Stephens, their principal creditor in town, entered with a bill, which he said would be protested next day, if his employer did not get the cash; and while Bessy was pleading with him for some delay, there arrived a note from their landlord's man of business, informing them that the last quarter's rent was long due, and, if not paid immediately, he must distrain their goods. A report of failure and poverty had gone abroad regarding them, and every claimant had taken the alarm. Mrs Jenkinson turned out her new daughter-in-law, with the declaration that her family's prospects were ruined and their name for ever disgraced, on which the poet, hop-into the parlour at that intelligence; and Mr Bryce, ing to achieve fame and fortune by his talents, retired to the most expensive lodging accessible in town, from whence a series of wrathful epistles passed between him and his family, and his wife advertised to teach deportment and the piano. There was great gossip and much laughter over these occurrences. The Jenkinsons fell at least fifty per cent. in the estimation of their genteel friends; rumours of living above their income also began to arise, and the new Mr Jones did not notice them. Report spoke of him as a reserved, domestic man, whom old acquaintances averred they would never have known to be the dashing student. He kept his family quiet, and looked after the business as strictly as ever his father had done, but, his workmen said, with more kindly and considerate ways. Jack's neighbours remarked that he had a disappointed look, and that Bessy never spoke of the Jenkinsons, if she could help it. Her brother went to their house sometimes, intent on acting the comforter, but latterly Miss Elizabeth was nowhere to be seen, and the servant began to say that Mrs Jenkinson was not at home. Jack was puzzled, but nearer difficulties were now pressing on him and his sister. Fancy things were but little wanted in that neighbourhood, and Jack's zeal for selling them was not according to knowledge. The old goods had been put so completely out of sight, that customers ceased to inquire for them, and went elsewhere. In consequence, he had done no business that season, while his expenses had been unusually great, in spite of all Bessy's care and industry. Their savings and earnings, too, had long since dwindled away; and the creditors, to whom the greater part of their stock was still owing, became importunate. Jack had been too deeply engaged to observe the coming evil, though it cost Bessy many a troubled hour, till the girl feared that worldly-mindedness was growing upon her, as the nights became sleepless with thoughts of debt and danger. But her earnest warnings had been generally answered with a maxim, caught from George Frederick, that women were always afraid of something,' and, when a quiet hour for examining their books or taking counsel came, Jack was sure to be in a hurry after the Jenkinsons. Now that creditors were pressing, and sales scarcely supplied their daily expenditure (by this time, on the most meagre scale), Jack's courage fell at once, but not his pride. Like most weak people, he could not be brought to look misfortune fairly in the face, or think what was best to be done, but spent his time in useless regrets over the past. If he had continued at his trade-if he had not opened shop at all-how well he would have 6 Don't be cast down about it, Jack, dear,' said Bessy, laying her hand on her brother's shoulder as he pulled out the empty till, when all were gone, and gazed into it with a look of stupified misery; maybe we weren't as wise in worldly things as we should have been, but we will do better yet.' 'On what?' said Jack, looking fiercely up. We have lost everything-our very character! Won't they call us swindlers, and what not? And that girl-how she has used me!' No, Jack,' said Bessy, we have not lost everything: we have still good consciences and our trust in God. Friends may be false and fortune fickle, brother, but He never fails.' Bessy's speech was broken by a sore cough, which was growing upon her as the winter came. Care and anxiety had made the girl more than usually thin and white that season, and, as if struck by some still darker thought, Jack banged in the till, and rushed into the parlour. Bessy could speak to him again, but she knew not what to say: and, scarcely knowing what she did, the girl stepped to the shop-door. It was another clear, frosty night in October. The moon was shining on the quiet street, and Bessy's thoughts went back to one at the same season in which Jack and she had walked arm-in-arin behind the Jenkinsons, rejoicing over the prospect of the house and shop, then such a darling scheme with him. It had been courses for comfort. As pride and spirit both declined in that downward way, he had come to Birmingham, and temporarily established himself there in a wretched lodg. realised; but what days of trouble and estrangemant came with it. Now disappointment, debt, and poverty, were on them; and Bessy could have borne that, but they were no longer what they had been to each other. Jack sating, in hopes of seeing and extracting something from his alone in his sorrow, and she stood at the open door. The girl's heart grew sore and sick as she thought how they had hoped, and planned, and striven with the hard things of life together, and all to come to this. It was a bitter warning against laying up treasures in any shape on earth; health and hope were failing her fast, but she looked up to the clear sky, and tried to think of her mother's faith in the better country. There was a sound of footsteps on the pavement, and, turning, Bessy saw a man, who had approached unobserved, and now stood as if to take notes of her and the shop. The threats and demands of that evening rushed at once upon her memory. Instinctively she stepped in, but, to the increase of her terror, the stranger followed. There was evidently some confusion in his mind also. He looked about him for an instant, and then, like one catching at an apology, requested to see some pocket-books that were in the window. Much relieved, Bessy laid a number of them before him on the counter. He took up one after another, asking its price, but looked all the while at her, and the girl could not help observing him. He had the manner and appearance of a gentleman, but the serious, handsome face had traces of bygone strife and trial, though no whitening was yet on the dark hair. 'Perhaps you don't like the pocket-books, sir,' said Bessy at length. 'Oh, yes,' said the stranger; I will have a couple; but might I ask if you have lived long here?' 'Not long, sir,' said Bessy. My brother has not taken the place above two years.' Your brother?' said the stranger, speaking low. Was there a gin-shop here formerly, and did you ever speak to a man who hesitated at its door?' 'Oh, yes,' said Bessy. But that is long ago, when I was a governess with the Jenkinsons. Perhaps it was bold, 'I'm the man to whom you spoke,' interrupted the stranger, and I have come to thank you for saving me, body and soul, that night; for your words made me think as I had never thought before, and things have went well with me since then." 'It was not I but God, that did it, sir; and maybe He would do something for us too,' cried Bessy, in her simplicity. Why, what evil has happened to you? Can I do anything? My name is Jones,' said the stranger. 'Oh, sir,' said Bessy, as the tears filled her eyes, 'we can sell nothing, and everybody is dunning us.' 'Here's my check-book. What's the amount of the debt?' was the stranger's rapid answer. The last words, though spoken but a little louder than the rest, smote on Jack's ear like a trumpet summons, and he rushed out in time for Bessy, who had flown with the news, to seize him in her arms, exclaiming, Brother, you wont have to close, or be called a swindler, for here's a gentleman who says he will lend us something to pay them all.' There was long talking in the back parlour before Jack could be brought to comprehend that their visiter was indeed Mr Jones, the son and heir of his former employer, and the haggard, shabby man to whom Bessy had spoken at the door of the gin-shop, when Mrs Jenkinson's remarks were such a terror to him. The contrast between that individual and the great manufacturer was almost beyond Jack's philosophy. Bessy understood him better, when he briefly explained, that, having made an unequal match- a foolish one no doubt, as the world goes,' said Mr Jones, but there are worse women than my poor Sally'-the consequent loss of friends and fortune in his young and unstable years, the domestic disquiet naturally resulting from a difference of habits and education in his helpmate, with which the undisciplined mind of youth was ill-suited to cope, had driven him to wild and intemperate father, when the brother and sister, in the midst of their own communings, saw him hesitate for a moment at the door of the gin-shop. The thorns had grown up, but not entirely checked the growth of his better days, and Bessy's simple speech fell upon that like dew. It taught me what neither school nor college had done,' said he to make the best of things as they were, and look above my own wisdom. I have had some strivings and much to regret in life; but tell me the amount of your debt, for mine can never be paid with money.' Before noon next day Jack was a joyful man, for all his creditors were paid in good bank paper, and the shop perfectly cleared of the fancy things, which the owner of a travelling bazaar bought at a reduction that, under other circumstances, would have made him groan; but Mr Jones had assured him that his talents were quite mechanical, and offered to make him foreman of his own department in fabricating the royal Coburg button. At the same time, the grateful capitalist secured the house to Bessy by a lease, which he purchased for her own and her brother's life, and requested her to fill the shop in her own fashion and at his expense, by way of present occupation and provision for future days. There is not a better attended shop within the streets of the neighbourhood than that kept by Bessy, nor a prettier back-parlour than that to which Jack comes home at night. People call them the Jenkinsons now, for of the greater family the twin girls went out last year as nursery governesses, and their mother has gone to live with Lieutenant Williams, whose half-pay hardly keeps him out of despair at the increase of his family. George Frederick, after sundry removals on the descending scale, migrated to London, in a state of uncommon seediness; he said, to astonish the booksellers, but later reports mention him as prompter to a minor theatre. The factory of the royal Coburg button still smokes and thunders among Birmingham's thousand chimneys, and Jack, though in the receipt of good wages, has never again grown too great for his sister, or run after superior young ladies. Their neighbours say, that neither he nor Bessy will ever marry, they are so happy together. Better times have taken away her cough and sickly look, but she is still the same cheerful and kindly spirit. Few have ever heard the substance of our tale from her. Bessy says it was God's work, and should be spoken of with reverence; but Jack's factory friends often laugh at his anxiety to advise all ill-doing characters, especially at the doors of gin-shops, and many of them have been puzzled to find the meaning of his uniform reply- Ha, let me alone; I learned by Bessy's example what good might be done by a word in season.' THE JUVENILE MISCELLANY. DESPISE no man, for the lowest of mortals may have it in his power to do you a service or an injury, and therefore the lowest should have a hold on your hopes and fears. This maxim I would place on a more generous principle. Cultivate the benevolent sympathies, and, while you regard mankind as brothers, your demeanour will be marked with civility and justice to all, and your beneficence will be exercised with the discretion of one who delights in doing good to human-kind. A young man, in the morning of existence, begins his journey under happy auspices, and continues to its close in the same virtuous course; but not unfrequently, on his looking through the perspective of opening life, he is blinded by the dazzling glare of the passions, deceived by the hazy forms of fancy, and, allured from the right path, he is ruined before he is aware of danger. When time brings him towards the close of his pilgrimage, his passions are cooled, his fancy can no longer delude, and, under the mild light of the evening sky, he descries to his joy or sorrow the track he has passed. Young man, by reflection and forethought, anticipate what you cannot learn by your own experience, the wisdom of age, and, without losing the innocent gaiety of youth, put yourself under its guidance. At a fashionable assembly, the gaiety of people may be either real or feigned. The open-hearted and benevolent go for relaxation and amusement: they desire to be pleased, they are pleased, and every acquaintance they meet, they greet with a smile. Unhappy in themselves, the envious and selfish cannot share in the happiness of others, yet they also smile, but their smile is the mask that conceals the discontent of the heart. The smile of the openhearted is spontaneous and genuine; the smile of the envious is a painful effort to hide the internal sorrow that would mortify them by exposure. Two individuals, alike endowed with clear and comprehensive intellect, engage respectively in two different enterprises. Their characters as their pursuits are dissimilar: the one is selfish, and his selfishness scruples not to descend to fraudulent policy; the other is benevolent, pure in motive, and honourable in conduct. In keen pursuit-merely in action-their enjoyment is pretty equal, for the mind is engrossed and amused with the execution of its plans. But every series of thought has its under-current, and every series of action its cessation. When the mind relaxes in its eager attention, and glances for a moment on the under-current, it feels self-approval or self-reproach, according to the nature of the pursuit, and when the enterprise is finished, and the mind is called to reflection, it feels the joyous or grievous conviction that nothing but what begins with virtue can end in pleasure. The panorama of life-beautiful but deceptive to the romantic youth-is similar to a peculiar style of painting which has been discovered in the excavated ruins of Pompeii. Immediately on your entrance into a chamber, you behold a picture delineated on the wall, distinct in its outlines, admirable in its composition, and harmonious in its colouring; but, when you advance nearer, on a closer inspection, you see nothing but a confused mass of lines and blots. Remoteness gives it beauty, approximation dissolves its charms. I wish to buy some articles which I think are conducive to my comfort, but I find that my stock of money is unequal to the purchase. I will not borrow nor ask credit. What then am I to do in such a I must bring my desires by self-denial to a level with my stock; or I must increase my stock by frugality and industry to meet my desires; or I must be unhappy, and pine for what I cannot obtain. To check unreasonable desires, is prudence and virtue; to gratify reasonable desires, is industry and usefulness. It is laudable to aspire to the comforts and elegances of life, when the acquisition of them is as honourable as the enjoyment of them is virtuous and beneficent, but it is uuwise and vexatious to covet what is beyond our means of attainment. case? THE CHEMISTRY OF THE KITCHEN. A SERIES OF PAPERS BY A COUNTRY DOCTOR'S WIFE.-NO. XII. As it is only the substance of the body itself, and the food by which that substance is sustained, that we kitchen-folk have to do with, a very few words must suffice for those kinds of matter which are thrown out of the body as excrement. The reader understands that the body never remains the same. It never stands still a moment. Matter flows through it continuously, assuming its form as it enters by assimilation into the confines of life, and resuming the ex-organic character as it leaves them. A living animal is like a river; it is the same river to-day and tomorrow, but it is not the same water. Now the material stuff of the body is being always changed during life, not into the proximates which death converts them into (namely, the proteines and gelatines), nor yet into the products of putrefaction, but into a set of compounds intermediate between these two. We have already seen that carbonic acid gas is being perpetually thrown off at the lungs; and certain nameless and unexamined, but sensible enough, emanations are set free from the lungs, the mouth and the skin. The more obvious ways of escape for the waste matter of the frame, however, are the sensible perspiration, the saliva, the lubricating fluid of the mucous membrane, the gastric juice, the pancreatic juice, the bile,, and the urine; and so admirable a manager is nature, that every one of these excrementitious juices is made use of as it passes. Saliva contains no more than about 1 per cent. of solid matter, much of that small quantity being saline. It has long been said to contain sulpho-cyanide of potassium, but I don't believe it, and that for strong reasons not to be mentioned here. But it seems to have a peculiar kind of animal matter, salivary matter, of which little more can be said. One result of its animal and salty composition is its great capability of being worked into a froth or lather like soapy water. Churned by the motion of the mouth, and respiration, it bells with facility; so that, when swallowed, it carries so much air into the stomach. Liebig is of opinion that the principal use of saliva is neither more nor less than the mixing of the masticated food with air, in fact, with a view to its oxidation; and it is a very feasible supposition. The thorough chewing of one's food is very important, as everybody knows. It divides it, and the more it is broken up the better; it softens and makes a sort of well-mixed soup of it; and it also charges it with atmospheric air by this property of the saliva. Bolting of meat and bread cannot be condemned too lustily by a zealous cook; but it is one of that personage's prime duties to make the process both easy and agreeable, if not absolutely delightful. Dr Kitchener, who was a truly great man, was of opinion that each bit of roast beef (for example) should receive some thirty mortal gnashes. Hence the good of dining in company, slowly, cheerfully, talkatively, and with a series of waitings; and hence the horrors of a bachelor's mutton chop, rapid, sullen, silent, and at once! That man is a foul feeder, and therefore 'no better than one of the wicked,' who permits anything a passport to that antetypal and glorified kitchen, the human stomach, before its conversion into a soft pulp in its every particle by the threefold process of salivation. As for the gastric or stomachic juice, much has been written about it to little or no purpose. Under the supposition that the transformation of flesh and bread and vegetables, to say nothing of fish and fowl, into slimy chyme in the first instance, then into white chyle, and lastly into ruddy blood, must be an enormously difficult task, physicians and chemists looked for something extraordinary in the digestive liquor; and when you look for a thing, you are sure to find it-in your own opinion. The chasm seemed so great, that they were for throwing a great bridge across it. To change the figure once more (and the third time is fair), they wanted what would meet their foregone conclusion and appease their curiosity, and so they came upon more than one mare's nest and away. But it turns out that there is nothing remarkable in or about this gastric juice, after all; a thing not to be wondered at, now that the chemists of the Continent have shown how identical animal food is with the blood to be made from it, and how closely vegetable food resembles it too: in fact, even vegetarian food is identical with blood in its more important part, as we have seen above. Before food is sent down into it, it is a neutral mucous fluid; but, as digestion proceeds, it grows acid, owing to the setting free of muriatic acid, the alkalis wherewith that muriatic acid was previously combined getting otherwise engaged. The main task of digestion is to change coagulated into soluble albumen and fibrine; or, let us say, coagulated into soluble proteine. Not that all the coagulated proteine of food has to be rendered soluble; for we have seen that twice as much of the albuminoid matter of the blood is solid as is properly dissolved, and that in the form of the blood-globules. Digestion, then, may be said to consist in the re-solution of one-third of the solidified proteine of the food, and the working of the other two-thirds into globuline and hæmatosine; the latter being perhaps the more difficult problem. To change the white of a boiled or |