hundred francs each, provisionally registered
on May 10, 1850. Chief Office, No. 17, Rue
Vivienne."

The promoters of this precious CERCLE
DE SAN FRANCISCO declare that certainty will
be the issue of this notable scheme, the
essence of which is hazard. "There never
was," they say, "an enterprise more sure of
gain. Three years, with twelve dividends,
paid once a quarter, will produce enormous
results. These have been accurately tested
by the most conscientious (?) calculations,
based on the produce of the German gaming-
houses, and we have ascertained that each
share of five hundred francs will yield an
annual dividend of three thousand francs over
and above interest at six per cent!"

The future House itself is thus painted in
bright perspective:—"A fine house of wood,
of two stories, with a magnificent coffee-room
on the ground-floor; a vast saloon on the
first-floor for two roulette-tables; on the
second, apartments for the manager, the
servants, and the officers; the whole
completely furnished, with all necessary
appurtenances for warming and lighting. Tables,
implements, counters, iron coffers for the
specie, &c., are to be immediately exported
by a sailing vessel. M. Mauduit, the manager,
will accompany these immense munitions,
together with subordinates of known probity.
M. Charles, chief-of-the-play at Aix, in Savoy,
is to follow, as director of the expedition, at
the end of October, by steamer. It is
expected that preparations will be complete, so
as to open the Cercle in San Francisco on the
31st December of this year."

Of all the bare-faced schemes that was ever
presented to a French public, this is surely
the most extravagant. There is nothing in
Jerome Patûrot that equals it in impudence.

YOUTH AND SUMMER

IT is Summer. Day is now at its longest,
the season at its brightest; and the heat
comes down through the glowing heavens—
broiling the sons of labour, but whitening the
fields for the harvest. Like hapless Semele,
consumed by the splendours of her divine
lover, Earth seems about to perish beneath
the ardent glances of the God of Day. The
sun comes bowling from the Tropics to visit
the Hyperboreans. The strange phenomenon
of the Polar day—when for six months he
keeps careering through the sky, without a
single rising or setting, rolling like a fiery ball
along the edge of the horizon, glittering like a
thousand diamonds on the fields of ice—is
now melting the snows that hide the lichens,
the rein-deer's food; and, quivering down
through the azure shallows of the Greenland
coast, infuses the fire of love and the lust for
roaming into the "scaly myriads" of the
herring tribe.

On ourselves, the Summer sun is shining,
glowing—robing in gold the declining days of
July, and taking her starry jewels from the
crown of Night—nay, lifting the diadem from
her sable brow, and invading the skies of
midnight with his lingering beams. Oh, what a
glory in those evening skies! The sun, just set,
brings out the summits of the far-off hills
sharp and black against his amber light:
Nature is dreaming; yonder sea is calm as if
it had never known a storm. It is the hour
of Reverie: old memories, half-forgotten
poetry, come floating like dreams into the soul.
We wander in thought to the lonely Greek
Isle, where Juan and Haidee are roaming
with encircling arms upon the silvery sands,
or gaze in love's reverie from the deserted
banquet-room upon the slumbering waters of
the Ægean. We see the mariner resting on
his oars within the shadow of Ætna, and
hear the "Ave Sanctissima" rising in solemn
cadence from the waveless sea. We stand
beneath the lovely skies of Italy—we rest on
the woody slopes of the Apennines, where the
bell of some distant convent is proclaiming
sundown, and the vesper hymn floats on the
rosy stillness, a vocal prayer.

  "Ave Maria! blessed be the hour,
  The time, the clime, the spot where I so oft
Have felt that moment in its fullest power
  Sink o'er the earth so beautiful and soft;
While swung the deep bell in the distant tower,
   And the faint dying day-hymn stole aloft;
While not a breath stole through the rosy air,
And yet the forest leaves seem'd stirr'd with prayer."

Study is impossible in the Summer evenings
—those long, clear, mellow nights, when the
Evening Star hangs like a diamond lamp in
the amber skies of the West, and the hushed
air seems waiting for serenades. The very
charm of our Study is then our ruin. Whenever
we lift our eyes from the page, we
look clear away, as from a lofty turret, upon
the ever-shifting glories of sunset, where far-
off mountains form the magic horizon, and a
wide arm of the sea sleeps calmly between,
reflecting the skyey splendours. Our heart is
not in our task. There is a vague yearning
within us, for happiness more ethereal than
any we have yet beheld, a happiness which
the eye cannot figure, which only the soul can
feel—it is the Spirit dreaming of its immortal
home. Now and then we pause—the beauty
without, half-unconsciously fixes upon itself
our dreamy gaze.

"Oh, Summer night!
So soft and bright!"

That air, that lovely serenade of Donizetti's,
seems floating in the room. A sweet voice is
singing it in my ear, in my heart. Ah, those
old times! I think of the hour when first I
heard that strain, and of the fair creature
singing it—with the twilight shadows around
us, and her lip, that might have tempted an
Angel, curling, half-proudly, half-kindly, as
"upon entreaty" she resumed the strain.
I fall into deeper reverie as I recollect it