have used. The only advantage of the country is in providing one with good tenants who pay high rents, with good sport in hunting and shooting during the season, with good crops upon one's land to defray town expenses, with some good specimens of womankind on one's farms to smile upon one's rural enjoyments, and with a few other good things equally necessary to the comfort and respectability of a person of fashion. I am a man of the world, and have learnt how to enjoy life. Buttercups and daisies are flimsy things, but there is a solid excellence in bricks and mortar."

"Ay!" said the admiral, with something like an appearance of sarcasm, "the country air is certainly pleasant at times after having been a d―d long cruise in every infernal climate under the sun; but what person of real taste would ever think of comparing it with the substantial delights of a London atmosphere? Pooh! It's a jolly boat to a man of war.' And the laugh of Sir Antler burst out like a ship's broadside.

"True, very true, admiral," replied his lordship, joining in the laugh. "Your facetiousness is irresistible, upon my

honour."

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Ay, , ay, my lord, I know something of these matters," continued the Knight of the Bath. "I was born and bred in London; and before I went to sea, knew every knook and corner in the place as well as I now know a cable from a marlin spike. London's the place after all. Talk of flowery lanes and sweet retreats! It would take a devilish clever poet to describe the beauties of Field Lane; and some of the finest pisantry in the world can tell you that there are no retreats half so sweet as those in the neighbourhood of the Seven Dials. Ha ha ha!" His laugh again resounded through the room. "Plantations have their value," he continued. "D-e, without them we should be compelled to build our 'wooden walls' of stone; but what are those country sticks compared to our London Clubs ?" Here broke forth another peal of obstreperous merriment.

"Ah! admiral, you'll be the death of me!" exclaimed Lord Sponge, attempting to restrain a mirth which was affected. "Yes! the country is of little service. It may boast of its annual fairs, but not one of them could exhibit so much attraction as our May Fair.'"

,'" said Augustus St.

"Not to mention our fancy fairs,'

John with a languid smile.

"Or our fashionable fair," added Captain Fitz-Grey, with

a yawn.

"Gentlemen, you are too amusing," observed his lordship, apparently attempting to look grave. "Really you should have some consideration for my humourous susceptibilities. We hear a great deal about the lowing herds' and the fleecy flocks;' but such tame animals could never be brought in juxtaposition with the beasts in the Zoological Gardens."

“No, I'm d―d if they could, without being devoured !" shouted Sir Antler, as he gave the table a thump which set the glasses ringing, and immediately favoured the company with a peal of laughter louder than any that had preceded it.

"Pour l'amour de Dieu! gentlemen, have some pity upon me!" exclaimed the exquisite, looking particularly horrified. "I am not deaf unluckily, nor would I be made so par choix. However, as you have determined to hunt down the subject, I suppose I must attempt my jeu de mot before it is put hors de combat." Here he fixed his eyes significantly on Lord Sponge. "To keep up the comparison, I will say that you may go any night to a certain house in St. James's, where, even in winter, you may observe men reaping a harvest,' though they perform the operation in a manner somewhat different to the method usually practised in cornfields.”

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"In other districts in town," remarked the young legislator, trying to speak with becoming gravity, "some prudent folks may always be discovered making hay while the sun shines.'"

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"And to such an extent are we agriculturists," said the admiral, slily winking at Sir Dumpling, "that there is scarcely a person with a decent head of hair who does not fully understand the value of crops."

"There is not a milliner in Bond Street," observed his lordship, with an emphasis which could not be misinterpreted, "who cannot discourse of lawns, as familiarly as the most enthusiastic Damon in existence."

"And many a frequenter of Tattersall's," continued the M. P., with a more visible smile, "however ignorant of ditching he may be, is fully competent to explain the mystery of hedging."

"The rural dance and the rural song, which poets talk of," remarked the guardsman, "may give pleasure to provincials; but I should like to see a village danseuse perform a pirouette with the elegance of Taglioni, or hear a rustic cantatrice execute a cadenza with the brilliancy of Malibran." "Even in the scenic advantages the town may vie with the country," said the admiral, looking as if he was going to

say something particularly brilliant; "for what can be more arcade-ian than the neighbourhoods of Piccadilly, the King's Theatre, and the West Strand?"

Of course this sally was liberally laughed at, but by none more than by the utterer.

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Having by the relation of these facts proved the superiority of town in natural advantages," observed Mr. Augustus St. John, with the air and tone of a premeditated speech, "let us proceed to investigate the different characters of the inhabitants of cities and villages. In the first place—"

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“A thousand pardons !" exclaimed Lord Sponge, interrupting the oration he saw preparing. "When a landed proprietor visits his estate, his labourers immediately consider the propriety of giving him a warm welcome, and on the first night of his country residence he is waked out of his sleep by the cheerful sight of his hayricks in a blaze; or, going to shoot a few of his own pheasants on his own lands, some of his sporting neighbours of the humblest origin, imagining that he is interfering with their privileges, waylay the gentleman in his preserves; and after bestowing upon their landlord many impressive proofs of their attachment, they leave him minus half a dozen teeth, his purse and watch, and his double-barrelled, a hundred guinea Joe Manton. If by the merest accident in the world he should happen to become acquainted with some chaste Diana' on his estate, in a few months afterwards a singular three-cornered-cocked-hatted individual in blue, turned up with red, will wait upon him with the compliments of the overseers. He discovers that the politeness of the parish officers arises from the immediate probability that the fair goddess will increase the number of his Majesty's subjects; and after being comfortably bullied by three of the damsel's indignant brothers, and one virtuous father, he pays a considerable sum to accommodate matters, and in a few days the young Astyniax' makes his appearance, the exact image of one his ploughmen."

A general laugh ensued.

"Captain Fitz-Grey, the claret!" cried the admiral.

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Sponge!" exclaimed Sir Dumpling, "ring the bell and order coffee." The man of the world obeyed.

"If he is a member of parliament," continued his lordship, looking rather pointedly towards Mr. Augustus St. John, "and his politics do not happen to meet the views of the ale-house legislators, greater dangers threaten him. If he join the neighbouring hunt, in attempting to leap one of his own hedges it is ten to one he finds himself impaled by a

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pitchfork, held by some friendly tenant on the opposite side; and should he return home late at night, he has sometimes the pleasure of hearing a bullet from an air-gun pass within an inch of his head. If he has the good fortune to be the man of the people,' he must undergo perils of a different kind. He must give balls to the wives and daughters of his constituents, and every night must be danced to death through reels and country-dances with partners more gracious than graceful, who generally possess the attractions of prize beef, fed upon oil-cake and mangel-wurzel. He must attend political dinners, wretchedly cooked and more miserably provided, where he must talk as much nonsense as his audieuce can digest, on such subjects as Universal Suffrage, Ballot, aud Popular Rights, and be poisoned with as much bad wine as may be placed within his reach, in roasting the government and toasting the mob; and, to add to his enjoyments, he will discover that his friends are not only attached to himself, but have an equal affection for every thing belonging to him: they drive their pigs into his turnipfields; make free with the produce of his orchards; snare his game; carry off a sheep occasionally, when they cannot resist the calls of nature for his mutton; and pay a visit to his poultry when they are desirous of enjoying the luxury of poached eggs."

"Bravo!" exclaimed the admiral, his eyes sparkling with childish delight; "your lordship's the drollest fish I've met with, since I saw off the coast of Cuba a d- -d ugly nondescript monster that wanted to swim off with the ship's anchor tucked under his starboard fin."

“Thank ye, Sir Antler," replied his lordship, evidently not exactly pleased with the compliment; "you do me too much honour."

"No cream," said Mr. Augustus St. John to the servant who handed him coffee.

"You're right, my dear sir," said the officious toad-eater; 66 never take cream after wine-it curdles on the stomach." "Ay," said the Admiral, with his usual laugh; "makes syllabubs against your will."

"I have been describing to you some of the delights of a country life," observed his lordship; "but how insipid they appear when brought in comparison with the enjoyments of town-dear, delightful town!"

"You may well say dear!" exclaimed Sir Antler emphatically.

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"It would be useless," continued Lord Sponge, to

mention all the advantages fashion confers on the metropolis which are not bestowed by her upon the provinces. Every man of taste must prefer the beauties which may often be observed in Willis's Rooms to the picturesque charms of nature. The opera and the ballet, although somewhat foreign to the purpose, speak for themselves. The extent to which the moral virtues are exhibited in cities would quite surprise your village philosophers. I am a man of the world, and nothing surprises me. The London tradesmen frequently announce that they are selling goods much under prime cost, pro bono publico.' They do not barter so cheaply they cannot make use of Latin-and they boast not of such philanthropy in the country: ergo, the countryman must be less honest, less learned, and less generous than the citizen. The metropolitans occasionally declare themselves' ruined,' that their customers might meet with an opportunity of finding 'great bargains,' a sacrifice never heard of in rural neighbourhoods; and other honest citizens have more than once on the eve of retiring from business offered their goods 'for any price they would fetch,'-instances of wholesale benevolence scarcely to be paralleled among rustic chapmen. Other evidence, which proves the moral superiority of the men of streets over the men of fields, consists in the immense number of safe and effectual remedies' the humanity and skill enclosed in bricks and mortar have discovered for the purpose of counteracting all the ills which flesh is heir to.' For every malady that afflicts the human race there may be found at least fifty certain cures ;' yet such is the perversity of human nature that hundreds of people die every day."

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"Dd fools!" ejaculated the admiral, as he gulped down his coffee.

"Having sufficiently established the moral superiority of the town," remarked Mr. Augustus St. John, once more attempting to perpetrate a speech, "it becomes necessary to say a word or two on the superior taste and refinement of the citizens. My right honourable friend has said

"Exactly so!" exclaimed Lord Sponge, interrupting the orator, to his great annoyance; "and I was going to say, that the countryman lives in his cottage, a simple unadorned edifice, with which he and his forefathers were satisfied. He never thinks of any more extensive alteration than a new thatch, or a fresh pig-sty. He knows nothing of architecture, never having heard the name mentioned. But the inhabitants of London seem anxious to adorn their residences with all the splendour of architectural embellishment. It