in fact, take us a long dance among roots, and
fruits, and vegetables. It must be enough,
therefore, that we have here briefly expressed
a general sense of obligation to our vegetable
friends, and hinted at a fact which, in our
high philosophy, we now and then forget, that
the outer world may be a shadow, or a reflex
of our own minds, or anything you please to
call it ; but that we, poor fellows, should be
rather at a loss for dinner, if the earth did
not send up for us, out of a kitchen that
we did not build, our corn, and wine and
oil.

ANGEL EYES.

THE cold night-wind blew bitterly;
The rain fell thick and fast;
The withered trees sighed mournfully,
As a Woman hurried past.
What does she here, on a night so drear,
Alone amid the blast!

Her face, though fair and youthful,
Is worn with want and pain;
And her hair, that was once a mother's care,
Is tangled with wind and rain;
And nights of sin and days of woe
Have wrought their work on her brain.

There is no tear upon her cheek;
But a wild light in her eye,
As she turns her sin-seared countenance
Up to the frowning sky,
And prays the quivering lightning flash
To strike — that she may die!

The wild sky gazed unpitying
On the wilder face below;
The lightning mocked her desperate prayer
As it darted to and fro;
And the rain ceased and the stars came forth,
And the wind was hushed and low.

"Oh, stars! have ye come forth to gaze
Upon me in my shame!
I left the city's wicked streets,
For I could not bear the blame
That was heaped upon me as I went,
And that cruel, cruel name!

"I passed the house of the false, false one,
Who tempted me to sin;
I stopped and gazed through the window-pane,
And saw the bright fire within;
And he sat there with wine and cheer,
While I stood wet to the skin.

"Behind me, on the wintry sky,
There gleams the city's light;
Before me, shine the clear cold stars,
Like the eyes of angels bright;
I cannot hide from men's eyes by day,
Nor from angels' eyes by night.

"I know a pool that's still and deep,
Where, 'neath the willow's shade,
When a happy child, the water-weeds
And rushes I would braid;
But I little thought within that pool
My grave would e'er be made."

She sought the place with hasty steps,
And a wild and rigid stare;
But she saw the mild, bright eyes of the stars
Had got before her there;
And to Him who sent them to soften her heart,
She fell on her knees in prayer.

PHASES OF "PUBLIC" LIFE.

IN THREE CHAPTERS. — CHAPTER THE FIRST.

WHEN the race of this huge London World-City
shall be run — when the millstone shall
have been cast into its waters, and the word
has gone forth that another Babylon has
fallen — when the spider shall weave his web
amidst the broken columns of the Bank;
the owl shriek through the deserted arcades
of the Exchange, and the jackal prowl through
labyrinths of ruins and rubbish, decayed
oyster-shells and bleached skeletons of the
dogs of other days, where once was Regent
Street — I should very much like to know
what the " Central Australian Society for the
Advancement of Science," or the " Polynesian
Archæological Association," or the " Imperial
New Zealand Society of Antiquaries," would be
likely to make of a great oblong board which
glares at me through the window at which I am
writing this present paper — a board some
five-and-twenty feet in length perchance, painted
a bright resplendent blue, and on which are
emblazoned in glittering gold the magic words,
"Barclay, Perkins, and Co.'s Entire."

One of these boards will, perchance, be
disinterred by some persevering savant from
a heap of the disjecta membra of old London
antiquities; wheel-less, shaft-less, rotting
Hansom's Cabs, rusted chimney-cowls,
turn-pike-gates of ancient fashion and design,
gone-by gas-lamps and street-posts. And the
savant will doubtless wonder he will find in
the mysterious board — the once glittering
characters — some sign, some key, to the secret
free-masonry, some shibboleth of the old
London world. Learned pamphlets will be
written, doubtless, to prove a connection
between Barclay and Perkins and Captain
Barclay the pedestrian, and Perkins's steam-gun,
who and which, joined together by some
Siamese bond of union, became thenceforth
and for ever one entire " Co." Other sages,
haply, will have glimmering notions that
Barclay and Perkins have something to do
with a certain X.X.X.; others stoutly maintain
that the words formed but Christian and
surnames, common among the inhabitants of
old London, even as were the well-known
"Smiths," and the established " Jones." " We
know," they will say, " that the great architect
of the most famous buildings in old
London was called ' Voluntary Contributions; '
we know that a majority of the citizens of
that bygone city were addicted to the creed of
Zoroaster, or sun-worship; for we find on the
ruins of their houses votive plates of brass, of
circular form, bearing an effigy of the sun,
with a reference to fire insurance — these