copper Iamp suspended from a hooked nail,
formed the subject and accessaries of this
tableau d'intérieur. Half within and half
without the protecting mantle-piece were
two large and deep arm-chairs—not those
known as á la Voltaire, for they had been
produced and sent into the world long before
the author of Zaire.

The entire apartment being thus described,
and the inventory drawn up at full length,
the living occupants of the scene next demand
our attention. The house had no porter
belonging to it, and every lodger had a key
of the street-door. Whenever M, Prisetout
entered, he lighted his rat in the room of his
excellent neighbours. Two knocks on the
door, given in a particular way, announced
his arrival. The signal had been agreed upon,
to avoid disturbing this new Philemon and
Baucis, who every evening, sentimentally
reposing in their arm-chairs, awaited there
the supper-hour. This supper was not
extravagant. Three hundred and sixty-five
times in the year it consisted of a couple of
herrings, which were always cooked at the
same minute on a gridiron placed in the
centre of the hearth. After having opened
the door himself by the aid of the key, which
they did not remove even on going to bed,
and without even saying "How do you do?"
for fear of interrupting so charming a tête-à-
tête, M. Prisetout glided through the three
chambers, separating the wicks of his slender
bougie the least in the world; and once
arrived close to the fire-place, he stretched
his arm between the two venerable figure-
heads, got a light at their lamp, drew his
hand back cautiously, gave a double nod with
his head, regained the door with wolf-like
step, and then shut it after him.

The same thing happened regularly every
evening. The fire shone upon the hearth;
the lamp, suspended under the mantle-
piece, illumined with its tempered light
the silver heads of the aged couple. The
two arm-chairs softly cradled their limbs,
and a couple of herrings lay upon the
gridiron.

When we say that nothing ever changed
from clay to day, we do not mean to be
understood in the strictest sense of the
words. Every year, when M. Prisetout was
obliged to return to "the galleys," he used to
send a charwoman in the morning to prepare
his cabin: and at night, he always expected
to find, as during the preceding year, the
perfect reproduction of the domestic scene
which we have lately been describing.

The first sitting of the session of 1829 had
just taken place. The cannon had announced
the return of Charles X. to the Tuileries.
The introductory scene of that new comedy
had just been analysed with all possible care
by M. Prisetout, who thought of his good
neighbours as he reached his lodging. He
mounted the staircase, knocked, and opened
the door; every material object was in its
usual place—the bed, the buffet, the lamp,
the two arm-chairs, even the very gridiron
itself. But, alas!—this time, one of the
chairs was empty!—and on the gridiron, on
the wife's side, there lay only a single herring.

Poor old lady! The invalide's seat was
there, before her very eyes, as if for the
purpose of recalling to her memory him with
whom she had lived so long! The place of
the second herring was also empty; for she
would have considered it a sacrilege on her
part to encroach upon the territory of the
absent fish. These simple reflections compelled
M. Prisetout to halt upon the threshold
of the door. He dared not advance a step
further. An extraordinary degree of emotion
seized him. His knees trembled, his heart
was full, his eyes grew dim, and his tears
flowed as if bursting from an unexhausted
fountain.

Let those who can explain all the mysteries
of the heart, and the inconsistencies of
human sensibility. The unimpassionable man,
who had beheld with unmoved heart and dry
eyes the most terrible spectacles and the
most bloody dramas, felt his tears flow at the
sight of an empty armchair and a half-filled
gridiron.

But, patience! You have not yet heard
the whole of the story.

M. Prisetout was roused from his reflections
by a noise on the staircase. He turned round,
and saw behind him the old invalide, who
held between his finger and thumb his usual
supper suspended by the tail.

The first herring had unfortunately fallen
into the ashes, and the invalide had gone
downstairs to replace it with another, while
M. Prisetout entered the room to light his
rat at the lamp in the mantle-piece.

Far from being delighted with this
unexpected dénoûment, M. Prisetout was very
much annoyed at it, as if some unlucky
accident had happened. He had made a
wasteful expenditure of sensibility; he had
thrown away at least a couple of tears; he
had been regularly robbed, and he promised
for the future to keep a sharper look out
over his emotions. Whenever he saw a raw
stenographer pitying any misfortune, or
grieving over any tragic event, he said, by
way of consolation, "Dry up your tears, my
worthy fellow; the herring will come to life

FISHING FOR TUNNY.

I WENT up one Sunday, during service, to
the romantic little church of Bordighera,
on the Ligurian coast of Italy. The whole
congregation was assembled; the women
inside, the men at the door. Suddenly
there arose a screaming in the distance, and
all the little urchins who had been left at
home in the huts were soon to be seen
scampering at full speed to the church door,
shouting "Matanza! Matanza!" When