great man immediately resumed the process of
composition.

Monsieur Werdet, naturally and properly
indignant, immediately left the room. He was
overtaken, after he had proceeded a little
distance in the street, by his friend Barbier, who
had remained behind to remonstrate.

"You have every reason to be offended," said
Barbier. "His conduct is inexcusable. But
pray don't suppose that your negotiation is
broken off. I know him better than you do;
and I tell you that you have nailed Balzac. He
wants money, and before three days are over
your head he will return your visit?"

"If he does," replied Werdet, "I'll pitch
him out of the window."

"No, you won't," said Barbier. "In the
first place, it is an extremely uncivil proceeding
to pitch a man out of the window; and, as a
naturally polite gentleman, you are incapable of
committing a breach of good manners. In the
second place, rude as he has been to you, Balzac
is not the less a man of genius; and, as such,
he is just the man of whom you, as a publisher,
stand in need. Wait patiently; and in a day
or two you will see him, or hear from him
again."

Barbier was right. Three days afterwards,
the following satisfactory communication was
received by Monsieur Werdet:

"My brain, sir, was so prodigiously preoccupied
by work uncongenial to my fancy, when you
visited me the other day, that I was incapable of
comprehending otherwise than imperfectly what
it was that you wanted of me.

''To-day, my brain is not preoccupied. Do
me the favour to come and see me at four
o'clock.
       "A thousand civilities.
                                               "DE BALZAC."

Monsieur Werdet viewed this singular note in
the light of a fresh impertinence. On consideration,
however, he acknowledged it, and curtly
added that important business would prevent his
accepting the appointment proposed to him.

In two days more, friend Barbier came with a
second invitation from the great man. But
Monsieur Werdet steadily refused it. "Balzac
has already been playing his game with me," he
said. "Now it is my turn to play my game with
Balzac. I mean to keep him waiting four days
longer."

At the end of that time, Monsieur Werdet
once more entered the sanctum sanctorum. On
this second occasion, Balzac's graceful politeness
was indescribable. He deplored the rarity of
intelligent publishers. He declared his deep
sense of the importance of an intelligent
publisher's appearance in the literary horizon. He
expressed himself as quite enchanted to be
enabled to remark the said appearance, to
welcome it, and even to deal with it. Polite as he
was by nature. Monsieur Werdet had no chance
this time against Monsieur de Balzac. In the
race of civility the publisher was now nowhere,
and the author made all the running.

The interview, thus happily begun, terminated
in a most agreeable transaction on both sides.
Balzac cheerfully locked up the six bank notes
in his strong-box. Werdet, as cheerfully, retired
with a written agreement in his empty pocket-
book, authorising him to publish the second
edition of Le Médecin de Campagne—by no
means, it may be remarked in parenthesis, one
of the best to select of the novels of Balzac.

Here, leaving him at the consummation of his
hopes, started in business with an edition to sell
of his favourite author, we must part with
Monsieur Werdet, who has now arrived, in the course
of his portrait-painting, at the end of the First
Sitting. How he and the great man subsequently
got on together, and what extraordinary revelations
of Balzac's character, mode of life, and
habits of literary composition were
subsequently vouchsafed to his long suffering
publisher shall be recorded next week, as ingredients
in those remaining portions of the Portrait
which are left to be completed at the Second
Sitting.

  TRADE SONGS. THE SAILOR'S WIFE.

       HUSH, my boy! hush, my blessing!
           Winds and waters, are they wild?
        Let them scream their noisy song;
        Let them rave and rush along.
         Thou'rt a sailor's child!

       Father?—he is on the seas,
           Far away, far away;
       Mother?—thou art on her knees.
           And she prays above thee,
       Prays that God will love thee,
            Night and day!

        Are we poor? What wantest thou
            With a ton of gold?
        All the milk I have is thine;
        Thou shalt have the days that shine;
            I will bear the cold.

                 THE OLD SERVITOR.

        WHO travels on the road to-night?
            It is the ancient Servitor.
        He stumbles on from left to right;
        He winks beneath the starry light;
            The poor old Servitor!

         An alms-man, he is poor and old;
            No silver hath he now in store:
        His face is thin, and pinched with cold,
        His mantle grey is round him rolled;
            The worn-out Servitor.

        A staff is tottering in his hand:
            He takes his journey o'er and o'er,
        Without an object, gained or planned;
        He withers on the fertile land,
            The fallen Servitor.

         He once had fortune—youth, and height,
            And strength, and merry words in store;
         He served a lord in his morning bright;
         But now he wanes into the night,
            The fading Servitor.

         He hath his little alms-house room
            (His name and number on the door):
         But dark. Perhaps, amid the gloom,
         He sees the Phantom of a tomb,
            The poor, sad Servitor.