of the multitude of the poor suffering under privation, without the support and solace of great ideas. It is sad enough to think of them on a winter's night, aching with cold in every limb, and sunk as low as we in nerve and spirits, from their want of sufficient food. But this thought is supportable in cases where we may fairly hope that the greatest ideas are cheering them as we are cheered; that there is a mere set-off of their cold and hunger against our disease; and that we are alike inspired by spiritual vigor in the belief that our Father is with us-that we are only encountering the probations of our pilgrimage-that we have a divine work given us to carry out, now in pain and now in joy. There is comfort in the midst of the sadness and shame when we are thinking of the poor who can reflect and pray-of the old woman who was once a punctual and eager attendant at church-of the wasting child who was formerly a Sunday-scholar of the reduced gentleman or destitute student who retain the privilege of their humanity-of 'looking before and after.' But there is no mitigation of the horror when we think of the savage poor, who form so large a proportion of the hungerers-when we conceive of them suffering the privation of all good things at once-suffering under the aching cold, the sinking hunger, the shivering nakedness-without the respite or solace afforded by one inspiring or beguiling idea.

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I will not dwell on the reflection. A glimpse into this hell ought to suffice (though we to whom imagery comes unbidden, and cannot be banrshed at will, have to bear much more than occasional glimpses); a glimpse ought to suffice to set all to work to procure for every one of these sufferers, bread and warmth, if possible, and as soon as possible; but above everything, and without the loss of an hour, an entrance upon their spiritual birthright. Every man, and every woman, however wise and tender, appearing and designing to be, who for an hour helps to keep closed the entrance to the region of ideas-who stands between sufferers and great thoughts (which are the angels of consolation sent by God to all to whom he has given souls), are, in so far, ministers of hell, not themselves inflicting torment, but intercepting the influences which would assuage or overpower it. Let the plea be heard of us sufferers who know well the power of ideas-our plea for the poor-that, while we are contriving for all to be fed and cherished by food and fire, we may meanwhile kindle the immortal vitality within them, and give them that ethereal solace and sustenance which was meant to be shared by all, without money and without price.” ”

Never, then, tell a man, permanently sick, that he will again be a perfect picture of health when he has not the frame for it— nor hint to a sick woman, incurably smitten, that the seeds of her disease will flourish and flower into lilies and roses. Why deter them from providing suitable pleasures and enjoyments to replace those delights of health and strength of which they

must take leave for ever? (Why not rather forewarn them of the Lapland Winter to which they are destined, and to trim their lamps spiritual, for the darkness of a long seclusion? Tell them their doom; and let them prepare themselves for it, according to the Essays before us, so healthy in tone, though from a confirmed invalid-so wholesome and salutary, though furnished from a Sick Room.

AN AUTOGRAPH.

To D. A. A., Esq., Edinburgh.

I AM much flattered by your request, and quite willing to accede to it; but, unluckily, you have omitted to inform me of the sort of thing you want.

Some persons chalk them on

Autographs are of many kinds. walls others inscribe what may be called auto-lithographs, in sundry colors, on the flag stones. Gentlemen in love delight in

carving their autographs on the bark of trees; as other idle fellows are apt to hack and hew them on tavern-benches and rustic seats. Amongst various modes, I have seen a shop-boy dribble his autograph from a tin of water on a dry pavement.

The autographs of the Charity Boys are written on large sheets of paper, illuminated with engravings, and are technically called "pieces." The celebrated Miss Biffin used to distribute autographs amongst her visitors, which she wrote with a pen grasped between her teeth. Another, a German Phenomenon, held the implement with his toes.

The Man in the Iron Mask scratched an autograph with his fork on a silver plate, and threw it out of the window. Baron Trenck smudged one with a charred stick and Silvio Pellico, with his fore-finger dipped in a mixture of soot-and-water.

Lord Chesterfield wrote autographs on windows with a diamond pencil. So did Sir Walter Raleigh and Queen Elizabeth. Draco, when Themis requested a few sentences for her album, dipped his stylus in human blood. Faust used the same fluid in the autograph he bartered with Mephistophiles.

The Hebrews write their Shpargotua backwards; and some of the Orientals used to clothe them in hieroglyphics. An ancient Egyptian, if asked for his autograph, would probably have sent to the collector a picture of what Mrs. Malaprop calls “An Allegory on the Banks of the Nile."

Aster, the Archer, volunteered an autograph and sent it bang into Phillip's right eye.

Some individuals are so chary of their hand-writing as to bestow, when requested, only a mark or cross:-others more liberally adorn a specimen of their penmanship with such extraneous flourishes as a corkscrew, a serpent, or a circumbendibus, not to mention such caligraphic fancies as eagles, ships, and swans.

Then again, there are what may be called Mosaic Autographs -i. e. inlaid with cockle-shells, blue and white pebbles, and the like, in a little gravel walk. Our grandmothers worked their autographs in canvass samplers; and I have seen one wrought out with pins' heads on a huge white pincushion—as thus:

WELCOME SWEET BABBY.

MARY JONES.

When the sweetheart of Mr. John Junk requested his autograph, and explained what it was, namely, "a couple of lines or so, with his name to it," he replied, that he would leave it to her in his Will, seeing as how it was "done with gunpowder on his left arm."

There have even been autographs written by proxy. For example, Dr. Dodd penned one for Lord Chesterfield; but to oblige a stranger in this way is very dangerous, considering how easily a few lines may be twisted into a rope.

According to Lord Byron, the Greek girls compound autographs as apothecaries make up prescriptions,-with such materials as flowers, herbs, ashes, pebbles, and bits of coal. Lord Byron himself, if asked for a specimen of his hand, would probably have sent a plaster cast of it.

King George the Fourth and the Duke of York, when their autographs were requested for a Keepsake,―royally favored the applicant with some of their old Latin-English exercises.

With regard to my own particular practice, I have often traced an autograph with my walking-stick on the sea-sand. I also seem to remember writing one with my fore-finger on a dusty table, and am pretty sure I could do it with the smoke of a candle on the ceiling. I have seen something like a very badly scribbled autograph made by children with a thread of treacle on a slice of suet dumpling. Then it may be done with vegetables. My little girl grew her autograph the other day in mustard and cress.

Domestic servants, I have observed, are fond of scrawling autographs on a teaboard with the slopped milk. Also of scratching them on a soft deal dresser, the lead of the sink, and, above all, the quicksilver side of a looking-glass-a surface, by the bye, quite irresistible to any one who can write, and does not bite his nails.

A friend of mine possesses an autograph—“REMEMBER JIM HOSKINS"-done with a red-hot poker on the back-kitchen door. This, however, is awkward to bind up.

Another but a young lady-possesses a book of autographs, filled just like a tailor's pattern-book-with samples of stuff and fustian.

The foregoing, sir, are but a few of the varieties; and the questions that have occurred to me in consequence of your only naming the genus, and not the species, have been innumerable. Would the gentleman like it short or long? for Doppeldickius, the learned Dutchman, wrote an autograph for a friend, which the latter published in a quarto volume. Would he prefer it in red ink, or black,-or suppose he had it in Sympathetic, so that he could draw me out when he pleased? Would he choose it on white paper, or tinted, or embossed, or on common brown paper, like Maroncelli's? Would he like it without my name to it as somebody favored me lately with his autograph in an anonymous letter? Would he rather it were like Guy Faux's to Lord Mounteagle (not Spring Rice), in a feigned hand? Would he relish it in the aristocratical style, i. e., partially or totally illegible? Would he like it-in case he shouldn't like it-on a slate?

With such a maze to wander in, if I should not take the exact