handsomest, the most accomplished, and the wittiest man in Paris!

One day, while this social furore was at its height, a celebrated physician received a professional visit from an unknown, whose pale cheeks and sunken eyes bore testimony to the suffering to which he described himself as being a prey. The man of science prepared a prescription, but assured his patient that what would most speedily effect his restoration was change of scene and agreeable society.

"Seek in congenial companionship relief from the mental anxiety by which you are evidently oppressed," said the modern Esculapius-"fly from study and self-contemplation;-above all, court the society of the Marquis de Plusesprit !"

"Alas! doctor," returned the stranger, "I am Plusesprit !"

Speaking of Repartee, reminds me of a pretty scene of which I was a witness, not long since, while ruralizing for a week with an old friend and his charming daughters, at their beautiful and hospitable home, on the banks of the Hudson. By the way, I have before introduced you to their acquaintance-the pleasant family of letter-writing memory!—

An elderly foreign gentleman, of large information and agreeable manners, but not one of fortune's favorites, had been dining with us, by special invitation, and the lovely daughters of my host had vied

with each other in doing honor to one in whom sensitiveness may have been rendered a little morbid by the effect of the tyrant Circumstance. Every hour succeeding his arrival had served more effectually to melt away a certain constraint of manner, by which he seemed at first oppressed, and his expressive face grew bland and genial under the sunny influences of courteous respect and appreciation, until when he rose to go away at sunset, he seemed almost metamorphosed out of the man of the morning.

The sisters, three, accompanied their agreeable visitor to the vine-draped veranda, where I was already seated, attracted by the beauty of the evening, and of my local surroundings. I had been particularly admiring a fine large orange-tree, at the entrance of the porch, which was laden with flowers and fruit, and, with pearls glittering from a shower just bestowed upon it by the gardener.

"Will you not come again, before Colonel Lunettes leaves, us, Mr. ?" asked my sweet young friend Fanny, in her most cordial tones, linking her arm in that of one sister, and clasping the waist of the other, as she spoke, "we will invoke the Loves and Graces to attend you".

"The Graces!" exclaimed the guest, quickly,extending his hands towards the group, and bowing profoundly" then you will come yourselves!-the Graces are before me!" And then he added, with a courtly air-"Really, Miss Fanny, you too highly honor a rusty old man

"An old man,” interrupted Fanny, with the utmost

vivacity, dissolving the "linked sweetness" that had intwined her with her sisters, and extending her beautiful arm towards the superb orange-tree before her, "an old man!-here is a fitting emblem of our friend Mr. -;-all the attractiveness of youth still mingled with the matured fruit of experience !"

Charming Fanny! God bless her!-she is one of those earth-angels whose manifold gifts seem used only to give happiness to others!

I called one evening, not long since, to pay my respects to the daughter of a recently-deceased and much-valued friend. She had been persuaded into a journey to a distant city, in search of the health and spirits that had been exceedingly impaired by watching beside the death-bed of her departed mother. Her appearance could scarcely fail, as it seemed to me, to interest the most insensible stranger to her history;―for myself, I was inexpressibly touched by the language of the colorless face and languid eyes to which a simple black robe lent additional meaning.

Just as I began to indulge a hope that the faint smile my endeavors at cheerful conversation had caused to flicker about her lips-as a rose-tint illumines for a moment the white summit of an Alpine height-there entered the drawing-room of our hostess a bevy of noisy women, young and old, who gathered about the sofa, where my friend and I were

seated near our hostess, and rattled away like so many pieces of small (very small!) artillery.

I saw plainly that the mere noise was almost too much for the nerves of the silent occupant of the sofa corner; but what was my surprise at hearing them go into the most minute particulars respecting the recent death of a gentleman of our acquaintance! His dying words, his very death-struggles were carefully reported, and the grief of the survivors graphically described!

Unfortunately, having relinquished my seat beside the mourner to one of these women, I was powerless in my intense wish to attract her attention from the subject of their discourse; but my eyes. were riveted upon her, with the keenest sympathy for the torture she must be undergoing. Her pale face had gradually grown white as a moonbeam, until, at length, as though strengthened by desperation, she sprang from her seat, and essayed to leave the room. One step forward, a half-stifled sob, and the slender form lay extended on the floor in hapless insensibility.

"While Mr. Smith is tuning his guitar, let us beg Mrs. Williams to redeem her promise of reciting Campbell's 'Last Man' for us," said a graceful hostess, mindful of the truth that some of her guests preferred eloquence and poetry to sweet sounds, and desirous, too, of drawing out the accomplishments of all her guests.

Mrs. Williams, gifted with

"The vision and the faculty divine,"

glanced a little uneasily at the ever-twanging guitar as she politely assented to the requests that eagerly seconded that of her hostess. Mr. Smith still continued to hum broken snatches of an air, twisting the screws of his instrument with complete self-engrossment, the while.

"I will not interrupt Mr. Smith," said the lady, in more expressive tones than were ever elicited from catgut by the efforts of that gentleman, moving with a step graceful as that of a gazelle to the other end of the room.

Our little circle gathered about her, and enjoyed, in an exquisite degree,

"The feast of reason, and the flow of soul,"

that so far surpasses the merely sensuous pleasure afforded by music, when not associated with exalted sentiment.

As the company broke into little groups, after thanking Mrs. Williams for the high gratification for which we were her debtors, I overheard Mr. Smith say, with a discontented air, to a youth with a "lovely moustache," who had "accompanied" him in his previous musical endeavors, "I'll never bring my instrument here again!"

At this critical moment, our hostess approached with a water-ice, as a propitiatory offering, and expressed the hope that the guitar was now renewed