pioneer to retain. If I thought that the red ink would forgive me the comparison, I should say that the beverage bore a striking likeness to that countinghouse commodity.

"Aie, donc, Rosbif-chuck!" and the five minutes' cracking of the whip having again set us en route, I began to calculate somewhat anxiously my arrival in Paris, where I was engaged to dine at six o'clock. Unluckily for this arrangement, we had scarcely travelled a quarter of a mile, when we encountered another Cabaret, at the door of which a cuckoo was waiting, with the name of "Etienne" written in large letters upon its pannels. "O le coquin! ah, le scélérat!" exclaimed my driver, "le paresseux n'est pas encore à Paris; excusez, monsieur, j'allons descendre pour un petit moment." To my threats of getting out if he did not speedily return, he only replied “Soyez tranquille, soyez tranquille, ne vous inquiétez pas ! je suis à vous tantôt, allez !" and in two minutes afterwards I saw him, through the window, seated very quietly with Etienne over a bottle of beer! How I wished to be perfect in the language, for only five minutes, that I might scold and swear à la mode Anglaise, though I had been long enough in the country to know that nothing is to be got by wrath and violence, while much may be accomplished by good humour and politeness. An old Frenchwoman, however, the solitary tenant of the other cuckoo, appeared not to have gathered this wisdom, for she stormed and railed in good set terms, which only extracted an occasional nod through the window from

Etienne, as much as to say, "Presently, good woman, presently." Summoning all my philosophy to my aid, I counted the glasses as they poured them out, and had at last the satisfaction of seeing an empty bottle: Monsieur Tellier rose; I got the reins and whip all ready for him, when lo! he reappeared in his old place with a pack of cards in his hand, which he very deliberately began dealing to his adversary! Provoking as it was, there was at the same time something so ridiculous in his perfect sang-froid, that I leant back in the cabriolet and burst into an immoderate fit of laughter; on my recovering from which, I was resolving to get out that I might prosecute the rest of my journey on foot, when Monsieur Etienne, dancing out of the house, and singing the popular burlesque song of "C'est la Portière, qui fait tout, qui voit tout," came up to Rosbif's side and exclaimed-" Monsieur, il faut descendre."—" Must get out," said I, "why so?"-" Because, Sir, we have been playing at cards for you, and I have won." Such was literally the fact; they had been casting lots for the possession of my body corporate; and Monsieur Tellier now arriving, appealed to my good sense whether it was rational that two cuckoos should proceed to Paris with two people, when one could answer the purpose. By way of consolation, however, he assured me that he sincerely regretted the loss of my society, and should be "charmé de me mener une autre fois." Accordingly, resigning my place to Morsieur Tellier, who turned his horse's head about, I heard for the last time his-" Aie, donc, Rosbif

chuck!"-mounted my new vehicle, and without further accident arrived at the Place Louis Quinze, at a quarter past seven, consoling myself for the loss of my dinner-party, with a thousand stern resolutions never again to take a ride in a cuckoo.

THE POET'S SUPPER.

Gardez-vous d'imiter ce rimeur furieux,
Qui de ses vains écrits lecteur harmonieux,
Aborde en recitant quiconque le salue,

Et poursuit de ses vers les passans dans la rue:
Il n'est Temple si saint, des Anges respecté,

Qui soit contre sa Muse un lieu de sureté. BOILEAU.*

MR. BENJAMIN BRIGGS, the junior partner of a thriving Manchester warehouse in the City, had an unfortunate propensity for tagging rhimes when he ought to have been examining piece-goods, knew much more of metaphors than muslins, arranged a distich with more interest than a diaper, and debased his faculties to tropes and similes, instead of giving up the whole force of his imagination to calicos and cottons. Upon the disease first manifesting itself, his seniors gave him the best advice, warned him of the dismal consequences that would inevitably ensue, if he suffered it to get a-head, formally declared that the credit of

* Boileau here alludes to the French poet Du Perrier, who, finding him one day at Church, insisted upon reciting to him an ode during the elevation of the Host.

their house would not allow them to retain any person convicted of so uncivic and anti-commercial an offence, and announced their intention of dissolving the partnership if he abandoned himself any longer to such idle courses. Prudence dictated a seeming submission, but nothing was farther from his thoughts than a final renunciation of the Muse. He stole at intervals from the counting-house to Castalia, mounted Pegasus instead of his pulpit-desk, and absconded from the worship of Mammon to pay his secret adorations at the shrine of Apollo. The constraint to which he was subjected at home only made him the more communicative abroad. -He laboured under a perfect incontinence of poetry; pouring his stanzas into every ear of which he could get possession, with such an unremitting copiousness, that his friends took alarm at his approach, and if they could not escape him altogether, generally forged some excuse for cutting him short in the midst of the most inimitable ode, or the very first scene of the most touching tragedy. Some he would slily draw aside upon 'Change under pretext of business, and make the blushing statue of Sir Thomas Gresham, or old Guy, privy to his inappropriate rhimes: others he would inveigle into an untenanted upper box at the play; and, just as the ghost of Hamlet was describing how his murderer "poured juice of cursed hemlock in his ear," he would distil his own not less unwelcome strophes into his victim's auricle: while some, again, he would lure away on a Sunday from the Parkpromenade into the most lonely recesses of Kensington-Gardens; when, to their great horror and amaze

ment, he would suddenly draw a tragedy from his pocket and discharge the whole of its contents at their head.

All these expedients being exhausted, and a regular audience becoming utterly hopeless, he at last hit upon the happy suggestion of inviting a few acquaintance of approved literary taste to sup with him at his lodgings in Wych-street, when he might, as a fair set-off for his lobsters, oysters, punch, and port wine, demand their opinions upon a poem which he meant to offer to the Royal Literary Society, in hopes of obtaining the Fifty-guinea prize. "As to attempting to write any thing," said Benjamin to his assembled guests," upon such a subject as Dartmoor, which was the first they held out to public competition, I could not have bowed my genius to such a drudgery; you all know, gentlemen, what a blundering business was made of the second proposition, the Fall of Constantinople and Death of Constantine; but I have now submitted to their adoption a noble theme-the Capture of Rome by Alaric the Destroyer; and, in the anticipation that they might select it, I have already composed a few hundred lines, upon which I wished you to do me the kindness of offering your remarks with all the freedom and judgment which I may reasonably expect from such approved friends and competent critics." Here he drew a large roll of paper from his coat-pocket, and a blank dismay instantly took possession of every face around him. Each saw the trap into which he had fallen, and each exerted himself to avert the threatened calamity. "My dear Sir," exclaimed Mr.