band to devote himself more entirely to the service, said in the blandest tones, his eyes twinkling up in the face of Buff-" I'll hold your coat, sir." The offer seemed to decide Adam, for he placed his hand to his top button-and when the crowd hoped to see a fine anatomy, Buff pulled still higher the collar of his coat, cast a look of scorn on the grinning drayman, and loudly proclaimed him to be unworthy of his notice. Saying which, he tried to step from the mob, who closed about him, and with derisive yells and hootings hung upon his heels. However, the reward of Buff was near; for Butler made up to him, and squeezing his hand, exclaimed, "I honour you, Mr. Buff-I reverence you; you have shown a philosophy worthy of old Greece,"(it was lucky for Adam, he could not show a shirt)—

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you have shown yourself superior to the low and ignorant assaults of-ten thousand devils!" shouted Mr. Butler, in a higher key, and leapt like a kangaroo. And with all his philosophy, well he might; for the individual who had offered to hold Adam's coat, having been repulsed in his kindness, had seized the hose of one of the fire-engines, and with unerring aim had deluged not only Buff, but his patron. A roar of laughter from the crowd, applauded the skill of the marksman. Mr. Butler stood dripping and melancholy as a penguin. Three times he called at the top of his voice "a constable!"

and "constable" was kindly echoed by the mob. However, no constable appearing, Mr. Butler called the next best thing-he called a coach. The coachman obeyed, and descending from his box, opened the door: for a moment, however, he paused at the reeking freight before him--however, humanity and his fare prevailed, and he admitted the half-drowned men, and touching his hat, and striking-to the door, he asked if he should drive " to the Humane Society?"

"To Street," said Mr. Butler, being too wet to understand the attempted joke. Away rattled the coach, the wags among the crowd shouting" do you want umbrellas, gentlemen ?" "I say, coachman-why didn't you wring 'em before you put 'em in ?" Mr. Butler sat as silent as the image of a water-god; and Buff uttered no word, but shook like a poodle new from the tub. The coach arrived at Mr. Butler's house. "Well, sir, what is your fare?" asked Mr. Butler, freezingly.

"Why, sir-let me see-six shillings," said the coachman very confidently.

"Six shillings!” cried Buff-" why, your fare is— "I know what my fare is for passengers-but we charge what we like for luggage."

"Luggage!" exclaimed Buff, and he looked round for the impedimenta.

"Luggage. The fare itself is half-a-crown; very

well-the three-and-sixpence is for two buckets of water." Mr. Butler, not being himself, paid the money, without even alluding to the philosophy of the extortion.

“Walk in-walk in-excuse me-but a minute," said Mr. Butler, in broken syllables, shaking with cold, and preceding Buff into a most comfortable parlour, wherein a fire glowed a grateful welcome :the host hurriedly stirred up the coals, and instantly quitted the apartment. Buff, being left alone, silently "unpacked his heart" against the ruffian who had drenched him-then eyed the fire-and every man believing that he can poke a fire better than his neighbour, again vehemently stirred it, and expanded his broad back to the benign influence of the caloric. As it crept up his anatomy, his heart dilated with hopes of good fortune; and his ire against his enemy began to escape with the steam. "It was well for him I had no shirt," thought Adam. (Simple Buff! it was better for thyself. Thou mightest, it is true, have been declared the conqueror of a drayman—when thy very destitution palmed thee off a victor of thine own passion. The juggling of fortune! when what seems to the unthinking world pure magnanimity, may only be a want of shirt.)

Adam stood, with all the fire at his back, and all his philosophy in his eyes. He surveyed the apartment, furnished with a most religious regard to

comfort, and thought of his own home in Seven Dials. Struck by the contrast, in the humility of his soul he felt for a moment a creature of a different species to that inhabiting the nook he stood in. "Thus it is," thought Adam, bending his melancholy eyes upon the glowing carpet-" thus it is, one man walks all his life in a silver slipper upon flowers, whilst another-yes another better than he,” Adam could not suppress the comparison, "treads upon sanded deal from the cradle to the grave. One man is doomed to feed his eyes with luscious pictures"-(Mr. Butler had on his walls some charming fruit-pieces)—" whilst another, turns pale at a milk-score." These truisms were unworthy of a philosopher-but then, Adam had had no breakfast: they were certainly beneath a man despising all creature-comforts, but then Buff was soaked to the

skin. This latter accident was but too evident, for he stood to the fire, enveloped in steam: Solomon's genii released from their brazen vessels, never rose in clouds of denser vapour: an utilitarian would have wept that is, had there been any use in tears to have witnessed such a waste of motive power.

"Bless me! what a smother!" suddenly exclaimed a feminine voice, and Buff, at the sound, cast his coat-tails off his arms, and coughing, loomed a little out of the surrounding fog. The speaker, seeing it

was not the chimney, but a gentleman who smoked, was about to let fall a curtsey, when Mr. Butler, entering in a hurry, prevented the ceremony. "Mrs. Black, my sister," said the host, "Mr. Buff;" and the introduction over, Mr. Butler, with a warm cloth morning-gown upon his arm, made up to his guest." Now, my dear sir, you had better put off your coat; you see, I—I have changed," and Mr. Butler complacently glanced at his rich ruby-coloured dressing-gown, lined with fur, to his toes"Come, or you'll catch your death of cold," and the benignant host pressed the garment upon Adam.

"Cold, sir?" said Buff, with an inexpressible smile of contempt at the suggestion—" I hope, sir, I have learned to subdue any such weakness.”

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Nay, now, I insist-you are wet through—you must take off your coat," said the hospitable Mr. Butler.

Buff put on a still more serious look, assuring his patron, that even if he felt the wet inconvenientand which he further begged to assure him, he did not-still he would keep on the reeking garment as a matter of principle. "Consider, sir," said Buff, securing the top button of his coat, and bending his brow-" consider, sir, what a miserable thing is man, if a pint, nay, a quart of water is to distress him. To despise the influence of the elements has ever been my notion of true philosophy. When we think