his bishop's costume, having by his side a tub
full of children, one of which was always
trying to get out; tradition says that he found
some infants starved with cold one hard
winter, at a period beyond the memory of
man, and resuscitated them by his prayers;
the lively one in the tub is intended to
represent their sudden return to life. If his
pictures and statues have been swept away
in the course of progress, his influence is as
great as ever, and the worship paid him as
sincere.

On the eve of the Saint, I went with
Madame Obé to see the illumination in
honour of the new Emperor of France, who
was proclaimed in the market-place in the
morning, to a remarkably silent audience.
Sabine, on my return home, as she placed
my tea on the table, with the philosophical
and familiar remark, that "no sooner was
one meal ended than another begun," paused
as if expecting that I should ask some question;
but finding I did not, she volunteered to
tell me of a surprise that she had prepared
for her little sister Florentine, the assistant
at the baker's opposite. "I would not buy
her bons-bons," said she, with dignity, "there
was no use in that; but I have bought her a
little jacket, one of those pretty knitted ones
which are so warm and useful; not maroon,
because of the flour, but a grey blue. I have
just run over the way to give it to her mistress,
who promises to put it under her pillow
when she is asleep: she will find it in the
morning, and be so astonished at who could
have put it there!"

"But she will think it was Saint Nicolas,
no doubt," I remarked.

"Ah, bah!" said she, contemptuously;
"it is only the ignorant who believe such
nonsense."

She had given five francs for this little
present; and, as it was within my knowledge
that her gains for the month only amounted
to ten, I was able to appreciate the liberality
of Sabine's offering, particularly as I
suspected the chief part of the remainder was
destined to her mother's use when she arrived
in the "cousin's cart," as was probable, next
market-day.

THE ROVING ENGLISHMAN.

CARES OF STATE.

I WAS living in the capital of a petty
German kingdom, I won't say where, because
it has nothing to do with my story; but,
perhaps it was in the dominions of the
All-Highest His Royal Majesty the King of the
Towering Taxes; perhaps it was in those of
His Effulgency the Margrave of Schwarz-
Wurst-Schinkens-Hausen. Let the discerning
reader choose between them.

I cannot say I enjoyed my stay there very
much, although I was living with Herr Doctor
Schnapsgeldt, a little man of great reputation
in those parts. But I am a plain Englishman,
fond of plain things and plain people, and I
must confess the little Doctor knew too much
about Semiramis for me; and I was so utterly
plagued and worried by this unfortunate
hobby of his, that I very often wished myself
back in London, and Semiramis—without
disrespect—at Halifax. Then the folk were all
a vast deal too grand, and I hardly know to
this moment whether I was ashamed of them
or of myself, when among them. They were
so proud and so pompous—so hung in chains,
and so festooned in ribbons. People whom I
am quite sure my cousin, Farmer Mangold,
(utterly ruined by Free Trade), could buy with
the stroke of a pen ten times over, looked
down upon the Doctor and me with such
contempt, and treated each other with such
ridiculous formality; using titles so long and so
incomprehensible, that I could scarcely make
up my mind whether to laugh at or be angry
with them.

Your subjects of his All-Highest make fine
caricatures. They are so naively and pleasantly
absurd, and so utterly unconscious of it, that
if you can only set at defiance all temptation
to get out of humour, you may have fine sport
among them. Poor, ostentatious, learned, silly,
heavy, huffy, smoking, soaking race, I can
never remember you without a laugh.

There is something good, too, in your
wondrous kootooing to dignities, oh ye long-enduring
poets and philosophers of Towering Taxes,
and I, for one, love you none the worse for it. If
I cannot look upon a goose with sixteen
quarterings having the same awe of him as you
have, if a king and a cobbler are one and the
same man to me—and I'd as lief dine with the
one as the other—don't let us quarrel about it.

I think, too, you are decidedly wrong about
Sauer-kraut; and, if I had been a Chinese, I
might believe that I was sent to eat it for my sins.
It is my opinion that a man ought to wash
himself once or twice between the beginning
of October and the middle of June. I do not
approve of eating black puddings for supper,
and smoking cigars bad or good until you smell
like a snuff-box; I should like you to ride
better, and dress better, than you do; I would
rather, even, you did not sleep between two
feather beds, with an unequal hay mattrass
beneath. Your beds might be longer and
broader without positive disadvantage; your
pillows less uneasy and less fluffy; your wash-
hand basins larger than pie-dishes, with a
glass of water in the centre. Let us—stay
while I put on my glove—let us shake hands.
Your hair is touzled, my friend; I know it
always was, and you might comb it, but you
won't. Your eyes are red; your beard is
rusty. But if I should ever want to know
whether Nimrod was left-handed, and
Cleopatra, spite of her reputation (for beauty),
had a cast in the eye—I do not know anybody
I would sooner come to than a touzled-headed
philosopher of Towering Taxes.

They were wondrous grand folk who lived
in the Hauptstadt. It took away the breath