advertisement and pretended that the shoe
was theirs; but, every one of them was unable
to get her foot into it. The proud fine sisters
answered it, and tried their feet with no
greater success. Then, Cinderella, who had
answered it too, came forward amidst their
scornful jeers, and the shoe slipped on in a
moment. It is a remarkable tribute to the
improved and sensible fashion of the dress
her grandmother had given her, that if she
had not worn it the Prince would probably
never have seen her feet.

The marriage was solemnized with great
rejoicing. When the honeymoon was over,
the King retired from public life, and was succeeded
by the Prince. Cinderella, being now
a queen, applied herself to the government of
the country on enlightened, liberal, and free
principles. All the people who ate anything
she did not eat, or who drank anything she
did not drink, were imprisoned for life. All
the newspaper offices from which any doctrine
proceeded that was not her doctrine,
were burnt down. All the public speakers
proved to demonstration that if there were
any individual on the face of the earth who differed
from them in anything, that individual
was a designing ruffian and an abandoned
monster. She also threw open the right of
voting, and of being elected to public offices,
and of making the laws, to the whole of her
sex; who thus came to be always gloriously
occupied with public life and whom nobody
dared to love. And they all lived happily
ever afterwards.

Frauds on the Fairies once permitted, we
see little reason why they may not come to
this, and great reason why they may. The
Vicar of Wakefield was wisest when he was
tired of being always wise. The world is too
much with us, early and late. Leave this
precious old escape from it, alone.

TRIBUNALS OF COMMERCE.

In France, Germany, Spain, Portugal and
Sweden, men of commerce have obtained,
since generations past, tribunals other than
of law, by which their differences are amicably
and speedily adjusted. No sooner has a
dispute arisen than the disputants present
themselves to one of these friendly councils;
which does all that a court of law could do,
except delay, and a great deal which no legal
tribunal could accomplish. These councils are
at once special juries and judges. In Paris
they are composed of a president, ten judges,
and sixteen assistant judges, selected from
the commercial inhabitants of the district,
who sit in sections so arranged that each
member performs duty twice within fifteen
days. Their labours are discharged gratuitously;
they take cognizance not only of all
commercial disputes but of bankruptcies.

The leading feature in the proceedings of
these councils is despatch. So simple are the
forms of procedure that a decision is, in most
cases, obtained immediately. The utmost
time allowed for defendant to appear in court
is twenty-four hours, whilst in certain cases
requiring urgent decision the president can
command the appearance of those concerned
within an hour, if his messengers can find
them. The cases are conducted and defended
by the disputants themselves, the interference
of attorneys being disallowed; only a few
"licenciates," well acquainted with the
commercial law of the country, are permitted
to assist in expediting cases through the
courts. That business in these places is
wonderfully facilitated will be evident when
I mention that no longer ago than eighteen
hundred and forty-eight several hundred suits
were disposed of in one day before the council
of the Seine. Of course this could only be
done by weeding out all extraneous matters,
by rigorously conforming to the known
usages of commerce, and by having several
judges sitting at the same time.

The bankruptcy section of this commercial
tribunal had been not less actively engaged.
It is on record that, between the
years eighteen hundred and thirty-six and
eighteen hundred and fifty — that is to say
during fifteen years— not fewer than six hundred
and sixty-four thousand five hundred
and sixteen decisions had been given: which
is an average of forty-four thousand three
hundred and one judgments in each year.

I would, however, remark that it is not
only in expediting proceedings that the tribunals
of commerce of the Continent are so
valuable: they sift matters of a technical
character with a degree of accuracy which
no amount of legal acumen could pretend to;
simply because the men composing them are
intimately acquainted with the details and
usages of every day commercial life. The
reader may possibly have some very faint
idea of the singular technicalities which occasionally
beset and bewilder both counsel and
judges; but there are few readers who have
any distinct conception of the difficulties, the
blunders, the absurdities, the mischief entailed
by lawyers undertaking to conduct and
judges to decide upon matters pertaining
strictly to trade, manufactures or science.

The rapid strides made by art-manufacture,
by chemistry applied to industry, by science
in relation to our most ordinary requirements,
have materially increased the conflict of
interests amongst the commercial part of the
community, and the range of knowledge necessary
to unravel the intricacies of commercial
and manufacturing disputes. Each
year the learned in mere law are bewildered,
judges are perplexed, and suitors are disgusted
with the necessity which compels
men of law to wade through statements and
arguments on topics which are as intelligible
to them as one of Southey's poems would be
to a red Indian.