and again and again did Job Caudle hear the monitions of bygone years. At times, so loud, so lively, so real were the sounds, that Job, with a cold chill, doubted if he were really widowed. And then, with the movement of an arm, a foot, he would assure himself that he was alone in his holland. Nevertheless the talk continued. It was terrible to be thus haunted by a voice; to have advice, commands, remonstrance, all sorts of saws and adages still poured upon him, and no visible wife. Now did the voice speak from the curtains; now from the tester; and now did it whisper to Job from the very pillow that he pressed. "It is a dreadful thing that her tongue should walk in this manner," said Job; and then he thought confusedly of exorcism, or at least of counsel from the parish priest.

Whether Job followed his own brain, or the wise direction of another, we know not. But he resolved every night to commit to paper one curtain lecture of his late wife. The employment would possibly lay the ghost that haunted him. It was her dear tongue that cried for justice, and when thus satisfied it might possibly rest in quiet. And so it happened. Job faithfully chronicled all his late wife's lectures; the ghost of her tongue was thenceforth silent, and Job slept all his after-nights in peace.

When Job died, a small packet of papers was found inscribed as follows:

"Curtain Lectures delivered in the course of Thirty Years by Mrs. Margaret Caudle, and suffered by Fob her Husband."

That Mr. Caudle had his eye upon the future printer is made pretty. probable by the fact that in most places he had affixed the text-such text for the most part arising out of his own daily conduct-to the lecture of the night. He had also, with an instinctive knowledge of the dignity of literature, left a bank note of very fair amount with the manuscript. Following our duty as editor, we trust we have done justice to both documents.

CAUDLE, whilst walking with his wife, has been bowed to by a younger and even prettier woman than Mrs. Caudle.

"If I'm not to leave the house without being insulted, Mr. Caudle, I had better stay indoors all my life.

"What! don't tell me to let you have one night's rest! I wonder at your impudence! It's mighty fine, I never can go out with you, and— goodness knows!- it's seldom enough, without having my feelings torn to pieces by people of all sorts. A set of bold minxes. What am I raving about? Oh, you know very well-very well indeed, Mr. Caudle. A pretty person she must be to nod to a man walking with his own wife? Don't tell me that it's Miss Prettyman-what's Miss Prettyman to me! Oh! you've met her once or twice at her brother's house? Yes, I dare say you have-no doubt of it. I always thought there was something very tempting about that house, and now I know it all. Now it's no use, Mr. Caudle, your beginning to talk loud, and twist and toss your arms about as if you were as innocent as a born babe; I'm not to be deceived by such tricks now. No; there was a time when I was a fool and believed anything, but-thank my stars!-I've got over that.

"A bold minx! You suppose I didn't see her laugh, too, when she nodded to you! Oh yes, I knew what she thought me ; a poor, miserable creature, of course. I could see that. No-don't say so, Caudle. I don't always see more than anybody else but I can't and won't be blind, however agreeable it might be to you; I must have the use of my senses. I'm sure, if a woman wants attention and respect from a man, she'd better be anything than his wife. I've always thought so; and to-day's decided it.

A good

"No, I'm not ashamed of myself to talk so―certainly not. amiable young creature indeed! Yes, I dare say; very amiable, no doubt. Of course you think her so. You suppose I didn't see what sort of a bonnet she had on? Oh, a very good creature! And you think I didn't see the smudges of court plaster about her face? 'em? Very likely; but I did. Very amiable, to be sure! say? I made her blush at my ill manners? I should like to have seen

You didn't see

What do you

her blush. 'Twould have been rather difficult, Mr. Caudle, for a blush to come through all that paint. No, I'm not a censorious woman, Mr. Caudle; quite the reverse. No; and you may threaten to get up, if you like. I will speak. I know what colour is, and I say it was paint. I believe, Mr. Caudle, I once had a complexion; though, of course, you've quite forgotten that; I think I once had a colour, before your conduct destroyed it. Before I knew you, people used to call me the Lily and Rose; but what are you laughing at? I see nothing to laugh at. But as I say, anybody before your own wife.

And I can't walk out with you but you're bowed to by every woman you meet! What do I mean by every woman, when its only Miss Prettyman? That's nothing at all to do with it. How do I know who bows to you when I'm not by? Everybody, of course. And if they don't look at you, why, you look at them. Oh! I'm sure you do. You do it even when I'm out with you, and of course you do it when I'm away. Now don't tell me, Caudle-don't deny it. The fact is, it's become such a dreadful habit with you, that you don't know when you do it, and when you don't. But I do.

“Miss Prettyman indeed! What do you say? You won't lie still and hear me scandalize that excellent young woman? Oh, of course, you'll take her part! Though, to be sure, she may not be so much to blame after all. For how is she to know you're married? You're never seen out of doors with your own wife-never. Wherever you go, you go alone. Of course, people think you're a bachelor. What do you say? You well know you're not? That's nothing to do with it-I only ask what must people think, when I'm never seen with you? Other women go out with their husbands: but, as I've often said, I'm not like any other woman. What are you sneering at, Mr. Caudle? How do I know you're sneering? Don't tell me I know well enough, by the movement of the pillow. "No; you never take me out—and you know it. No; and it's not my own fault. How can you lie there and say that? Oh, all a poor excuse! That's what you always say. You're tired of asking me indeed, because I always start some objection? Of course I can't go out a figure. And when you ask me to go, you know very well that my bonnet isn't as it should be—or that my gown hasn't come home-or that I can't leave the children—or that something keeps me indoors. enough before you ask me. And that's your art. with you, I'm sure to suffer for it. Yes, you needn't repeat my words, Suffer for it. But you suppose I have no feelings: oh no, nobody has feelings but yourself. Yes, I'd forgot: Miss Prettyman, perhaps yes she may have feelings, of course.

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f

You know all this well
And when I do go out

And as I've said, I dare say a pretty dupe people think me, to be sure; a poor forlorn creature I must look in everybody's eyes. But I knew you couldn't be at Mr. Prettyman's house night after night till eleven o'clock-and a great deal you thought of me sitting up for you. I knew you couldn't be there without some cause. And now I've found it out! Oh, I don't mind your swearing, Mr. Caudle! It's I, if I wasn't a woman, who

ought to swear. But it's like you men,-lords of the creation, as you call yourselves! Lords indeed! And pretty slaves you make of the poor creatures who're tied to you. But I'll be separated, Caudle; i will; and then I'll take care and let ail the world know how you've used me. What do you say? I may say my worst? Ha! don't you tempt any woman in that way-don't, Caudle; for I wouldn't answer for what I said.

"Miss Prettyman indeed, and-oh yes! now I see! Now the whole light breaks in upon me! Now I know why you wished me to ask her with Mr. and Mrs. Prettyman to tea! And I, like a poor blind fool, was nearly doing it. But now, as I say, my eyes are open! And you'd have brought her under my own roof-now it's no use your bouncing about in that fashion; you'd have brought her into the very house, where—” "Here," says Caudle, "I could endure it no longer. So I jumped out of bed, and went and slept somehow with the children."

A FUNERAL.

THE STORY OF A FEATHER.

"We give Thee hearty thanks for that it hath pleased Thee to deliver this our sister out of the miseries of this sinful world——”

Thus, in measured, metallic note, spoke the curate of St. Martin's-in-theFields, whilst the daughter Patty could have screamed in anguish at the thanksgiving. A few more words, another and another look, yet another -now the piling earth has hidden all, and the forlorn creature stands alone in the world. The last few moments have struck apart the last link that still held her to a beloved object, and now indeed she feels it is in eternity. Two or three women press about her, turn her from the grave, and, garrulously kind, preach to her deaf ears that “all is for the best," and that "to mourn is a folly."

All this I gathered from the gossips who brought back Patty to her dreary, empty home. There, after brief and common consolation, they quitted her; and there, for a time, the reader must leave the stricken, meek-hearted feather-dresser.

Early the next morning I found myself in the hands of Mr. Flamingo. The slight disorder-in truth more avowed than real--I had suffered in the roundhouse had, in the eyes of the tradesman, been amply remedied by Patty; and my owner turned me reverently between his thumb and finger, and gazed and gazed at me as though, for his especial profit only, I had dropt from the wing of an angel.

Great was the stir throughout the household of Flamingo, and great the

cause thereof. He had received an order from the palace of St. James's: his very soul was plumed, for he should get off his feathers!

This I heard and saw, and, I confess it, with the trepidation of expectant vanity, beheld the feather merchant make selection from his stock. At length, with melting looks and a short, self-complacent sigh, he placed me--I was sure of it—as the crowning glory, the feather of feathers, among my kind. I was to wave my snowy purity in St.

James's!

And for this, thought I, was I drest-prepared by the lean fingers of want in an unwholesome garret? Alas! I have since felt-ay, a thousand times—that if dim-eyed Vanity would use the spectacles of truth, she would at times see blood on her satins, blood on her brocades, blood on her lace, on every rich and glistening thread that hangs about her— blood. She would see herself a grim idol, worshipped by the world's unjust necessities, and so beholding, would feel a quicker throb of heart, a larger compassion for her forced idolaters.

"To the palace,” cried Flamingo to the hackney coachman, summoned to bear myself and companions on our glorious mission. "To the palace," cried the feather merchant, with new lustre in his eyes, harmony in his voice, and a delicious tingling of every nerve that filled his whole anatomy with music. "To the palace" were really the words uttered by Flamingo, yet in very truth he believed he said "To paradise.”

Not that St. James's was terra incognita to Mr. Flamingo--a Marco Polo's domain filled with golden dreams. Certainly not. Mr. Flamingo knew exactly the number of steps composing that private way to heaven, the back staircase. He had smiled and trembled, and bowed and wriggled, and smirked and cringed his way to the patronage of Queen Charlotte (of odorous memory). This exalting truth Mr. Flamingo had several times tested, and that in a manner peculiarly flattering to himself. For instance, a very fine cockatoo had been thrown in to the tradesman among a lot of foreign feathers: this cockatoo Mr. Flamingo submitted to the inspection of her Majesty, who was graciously pleased to say to it, 'Pretty Poll." On another occasion Flamingo took a Java sparrow to the palace, which bird was graciously permitted by the Queen to perch upon her little finger, her Majesty still further condescending to cry "Swee-e-e-t!" These circumstances were at the time totally overlooked by the Court historian, but they are recorded, written in very fine roundhand, in the "Flamingo Papers."

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I had scarcely been an hour in the palace ere my memory began to fail me. Yes, all the previous scenes of my existence, that an hour before lived most vividly in my recollection, began to fade and grow dim, and take the mingled extravagance and obscurity of a dream. Was it possible that I had ever been a thing of barter between a savage and a sailor for pigtail? Could I have ever known a Jack Lipscomb? Had I crossed the seas in the dungeon of a ship? Was it possible that I could detect the odour of bilge-water? Was there such a haunt for human kind as the Minories? And that old Jew-surely he was a spectre, a part of night