of a Rembrandt; or the elegant allusion bestow the holy calm of a Claude upon the piece. Here one part of the subject must be subdued and in shade; there another thrown into broad relief; truth of perspective, foreground, and distance, all must be there. That title-page is worse than useless, which possesses not the power to charm the eyes and warm the imagination of the beholder."

My nephew ended; and though he did not, like the angel in Milton, leave his voice so charming in my ear as to make me think him "still speaking," yet family kindness induced me to promise him to record his speech among my lucubrations, and thus give him that immortality which the commentators on Shakspeare enjoy.

"The things we know are neither rich nor rare,
But wonder how the devil they got there."

THE DAY OF BADAJOS.

"Now speak, old soldier,

The height of honour ?”

"Rather to suffer than to do a wrong,

To make the heart no stranger to the tongue;
Provoked, not to betray an enemy,

Nor eat his meat, I choke with flattery;
Blushless to tell wherefore I wear my scars,
Or for my conscience, or for my country's wars;
To aim at just things; if we have wildly run
Into offences, wish them all undone ;

'Tis poor, in grief for a wrong done to die;

Honour, to dare to live and satisfy.”

MASSINGER

THE DAY OF BADAJOS.

"TO-MORROW, Sir," said my faithful valet, Havresack, placing the boot-jack and slippers before the arm-chair in which I was dozing over the pages of my favorite Folard, "tomorrow will be the day of Badajos; this night, nine years ago, I was lying by your honour's side on picquet before the walls of the old castle."

“True, Havresack," said I, as I drew off my boot, and exchanged it for the luxury of an easy shoe;" and, as times go, we are not a whit less comfortably quartered at present than we were on that same picquet."

F

"For that matter," rejoined my factotum, "I suppose it's all for the best, as Mr. Scruples tells us; and it certainly is time for us old soldiers (it's a name your honour's not ashamed of), to have done with marches and out-lying picquets: but for my part, if I had ten years service off my back, and the same master to follow, I should not mind to be again on that covering party with our lads.-It was a cold night, and the ground none of the driest, for we had a rainy siege of it; but it was a fine thing, as we lay there, to hear the drums of the garrison beating their tattoo with the music sounding quite close to our ears, and to think how soon we should be among the rascals. You'll remember, sir, how hushed and quiet every thing was after the Frenchmen's tattoo had done sounding; except now and then a volley from our batteries on t'other side the town."

"I do, indeed, remember it all, Jonathan," said I," and can never forget it; for poor Desmond was wrapped in the same boat-cloak