12. There corks are drawn, and the red vintage flows,
To fill the swelling veins for thee, and now
The ruddy check, and now the ruddier nose
Shall tempt thee, as thou flittest round the brow;
And when the hour of sleep its quiet brings,
No angry hand shall rise to brush thy wings.

1.

W. C. BRYANT.'

144. A TAILOR'S EVENING SOLILOQUY.

D' His burning bosom button'd it with stars.

AY hath put on his jacket, and around

Here will I lay me on the velvet grass,
That is like padding to earth's meager ribs,
And hold communion with the things about me.
Ah me! how lovely is the golden braid
That binds the skirt of night's descending robe!
The thin leaves, quivering on their silken threads
Do make a music like to rustling satin,
As the light breezes smooth their downy nap.
2. Ha! what is this that rises to my touch,
So like a cushion? Can it be a cabbage?
It is, it is that deer' injured flower,

Which boys do flout us with;-but yet I love thes
Thou giant rose, wrapp'd in a green surtout.
Doubtless in Eden thou didst blush as bright
As these, thy puny brethren; and thy breath
Sweeten'd the fragrance of her spicy air;
But now thou seemèst like a bankrupt beau,
Stripp'd of his gaudy hues and essences,
And growing portly in his scber garments.
3. Is that a swan that rides upon the water?
Oh no, it is that other gentle bird,
Which is the patron of our noble calling.
I well remember, in my early years,

When these young hands first closed upon a goose;

'See Biographical Sketch, p. 118.- Cabbage, a term applied tc "cloth purloined or stolen by one employed to cut out a garment."

I have a scar upon my thimble finger,
Which chronicles the hour of young ambition.
My father was a tailor, and his father,

And my sire's grandsire, all of them were tailors;
They had an ancient goose,-it was an heir-loom
From some remoter tailor of our race.

It happen'd I did see it on a time

When none was near, and I did deal with it,
And it did burn me,-oh, most fearfully!
4. It is a joy to straighten out one's limbs,
And leap elastic from the level counter,
Leaving the petty grievances of earth,

The breaking thread, the din of clashing shears,
And all the needles that do wound the spirit,
For such a pensive hour of soothing silence.
Kind Nature, shuffling in her loose undress,
Lays bare her shady bosom: I can feel
With all around me; I can hail the flowers
That sprig earth's mantle; and yon quiet bird,
That rides the stream, is to me as a brother.
The vulgar know not all the hidden pockets,
Where Nature stows her loveliness.
But this unnatural posture of my legs
Cramps my extended calves, and I must go
Where I can coil them in their wonted fashion.

O. W. HOLMES.'

you

145. SPEECH OF SERGEANT BUZFUZ.

OU heard from my learned friend, Gentlemen of the Jury, that this is an action for a breach of promise of marriage, in which the damages are laid at fifteen hundred pounds. The plaintiff, Gentlemen, is a widow; yes, Gentlemen, a widow. The late Mr. Bardell, some time before his death, became the father, Gentlemen, of a little boy. With this little boy, the only pledge of her departed exciseman, Mrs. Bardell shrunk from the world, and courted the retirement and tranquillity of Goswell-street;

'See Biographical Sketch, p. 217.

and here she placed in her front parlor-window a written pla card', bearing this inscription,-" APARTMENTS FURNISHED FOR A SINGLE GENTLEMAN. INQUIRE WITHIN."

2. Mrs. Bardell's opinions of the opposite sex, Gentlemen, were derived from a long contemplation of the ines'timable qualities of her lost husband. She had no fear, she had no distrust, all was confidence and reliance. "Mr. Bardell," said the widōw, “was a man of honor,—Mr. Bardell was a man of his word,-Mr. Bardell was no deceiver,--Mr. Bardell was once a single gentleman himself: to single gentlemen I look for protection, for assistance, for comfort, and consolation; in single gentlemen I shall perpetually see something to remind me of what Mr. Bardell was, when he first won my young and untried affections; to a single gentleman, then, shall my lodgings be .et."

3. Actuated by this beautiful and touching impulse (among the best impulses of our imperfect nature, Gentlemen), the lonely and desolate widow dried her tears, furnished her first floor, caught her innocent boy to her maternal bosom, and put the bill up in her parlor-window. Did it remain there long? No. The serpent was on the watch, the train was laid, the mine was preparing, the sapper and miner was at work! Before the bill had been in the parlor-window three days,-three days, Gentlemen, a being, erect upon two legs, and bearing all the outward semblance of a man, and not of a monster, knocked at the door of Mrs. Bardell's house! He inquired within; he took the lodgings; and on the very next day he entered into possession of them. This man was Pickwick,-Pickwick, the defendant!

4. Of this man I will say little. The subject presents but few attractions; and I, Gentlemen, am not the man, nor are you, Gentlemen, the men, to delight in the contemplation of revolting heartlessness, and of systematic villainy. I say systematic villainy, Gentlemen; and when I say systematic villainy, let me tell the defendant, Pickwick, if he be in court, as I am inforined he is, that it would have been more decent in him, more becoming, if he had stopped away. Let me tell him, further, that a counsel, in his discharge of his duty, is neither to be intimilated, nor bullied, nor put down; and that any attempt to do either the one or the other will recoil on the head of the at

tempter, be he plaintiff or be he defendant, be his name Pick wick, or Noakes, or Stoakes, or Stiles, or Brown, or Thompson.

5. I shall show you, Gentlemen, that for two years Pickwick continued to reside constantly, and without interruption or in termission, at Mrs. Bardell's house. I shall show you that Mrs. Bardell, during the whole of that time, waited on him, attended to his comforts, cooked his meals, looked out his linen for the washerwoman when it went abroad, darned, aired, and prepared it for wear when it came home, and, in short, enjoyed his fullest trust and confidence. I shall show you that, on many occasions, he gave half-pence, and on some occasions even sixpence, to her little boy. I shall prove to you, that on one occasion, when he returned from the country, he distinctly and in terms offered her marriage,—previously, however, taking special care that there should be no witnesses to their solemn contract; and I am in a situation to prove to you, on the testimony of three of his own friends, most unwilling witnesses, Gentlemen-most unwilling witnesses, that on that morning he was discovered by them holding the plaintiff in his arms, and soothing her agitation by his caresses and endearments.

6. And now, Gentlemen, but one word more. Two letters have passed between these parties,-letters that must be viewed with a cautious and suspicious eye,-letters that were evidently intended, at the time, by Pickwick, to mislead and delude any third parties into whose hands they might fall. Let me read the first:-"Garraway's, twelve o'clock.-Dear Mrs. B.-Chops and Tomato sauce. Yours, Pickwick." Gentlemen, what does this mean? Chops and Tomato sauce! Yours, Pickwick! Chops! Gracious heavens! And Tomato sauce! Gentlemen, is the happiness of a sensitive and confiding female to be trifled away by such shallow artifices as these?

7. The next has no date whatever, which is in itself suspicious:-"Dear Mrs. B., I shall not be at home to-morrow. Slow coach." And then follows this very remarkable expression,"Don't trouble yourself about the warming-pan." The warming-pan! Why, Gentlemen, who does trouble himself about a warming-pan? Why is Mrs. Bardell so earnestly entreated not to agitate herself about this warming-pan, unless (as is no doubt the case) it is a mere cover for hidden fire- a mere substitute

for some endearing word or promise, agreeably to a preconcerted system of correspondence, artfully contrived by Pickwick with a view to his contemplated desertion? And what does this allusion to the slow coach mean? For aught I know, it may be a reference to Pickwick himself, who has most unquestionably been a criminally slow coach during the whole of this transaction, but whose speed will now be very unexpectedly accelerated, and whose wheels, Gentlemen, as he will find to his cost, will very soon be greased by you!

8. But enough of this, Gentlemen. It is difficult to smile with an aching heart. My client's hopes and prospects are ruined, and it is no figure of speech to say that her occupation is gone. indeed. The bill is down; but there is no tenant! Eligible single gentlemen pass and repass; but there is no invitation for them to inquire within, or without! All is gloom and silence in the house: even the voice of the child is hushed; his infant sports are disregarded, when his mother weeps.

9. But Pickwick, Gentlemen, Pickwick, the ruthless destroyer of this domestic ō'asis in the desert of Goswell-street,—Pickwick, who has choked up the well, and thrown ashes on the sward,Pickwick, who comes before you to-day with his heartless tomato-sauce and warming-pans,-Pickwick still rears his head with unblushing effrontery, and gazes without a sigh on the ruin he has made! Damages, Gentlemen, heavy damages, is the only punishment with which you can visit him,-the only recompense you can award to my client! And for those damages she now appeals to an enlightened, a high-minded, a right-feeling, a conscientious, a dispassionate, sympathizing, a contemplative Jury of her civilized countrymen!

CHARLES DICKENS.

CHARLES DICKENS, the famous English novelist, was born at Portsmouth, in February, 1812. At an early period he became reporter for the newspaper press of London, and thus escaped the cramping necessity of depending for subsistence upon his first purely literary labors. His earliest works, "Sketches by Boz,“ first written for periodicals, were collected and published in two volumes, bear ing respectively the dates of 1836 and 1837. His works immediately succeeding, "Pickwick," "Oliver Twist," and "Nicholas Nickleby," fully established his reputation. The career of DICKENS has been one of uniform success. His inore recent publications, Dombey," "Bleak House," and "Little Dorrit." prove conclusively that, far from having "written himself out," the resources of his mind are well-nigh inexhaustible. His genius, which has peopled our literature with such a crowd of living and moving characters, gives promise of as many now creations, equally varied and true to nature.