Juba to be illuminated; and he determined to spare no cost in illuminating him. His head, therefore, he painted celestial blue; legs in cinnamon colour, with scarlet feet; pea-green tail; body a sort of Mosaic of saffron and rose colour; and, by way of finish to the whole, the ears and tip of the nose he thought proper to gild. Having finished this great work of art, Mr. Ferdinand turned him out for public exhibition. As a point of duty to his master, Juba naturally presented himself first of all in Mr. Mule's library. That gentleman had just been reading, in the Curiosities' of Happalius, the part which treats of basilisks; and, as Juba came suddenly bounding in, he fled from him in consternation, under the notion that he was attacked by some hybrid production of a basilisk and a dragon, such as no heraldry has yet attempted to emblazon. Not until the creature barked did he recognise his outraged Juba; and, at the same moment that his eye took in the whole enormity of the guilt, his sagacious wrath detected the hand of the artist.

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Such were the steps by which Mr. Ferdinand Lawler, as yet not nine years old, had ascended to the acme of guilt,—and obtained for himself in one house, at least, the title of young malefactor. Being already debited in Mr. Mule's books with all sible crimes, it may be readily supposed that all actual crimes against Mr. Mule-his peace or dignity, were regularly set down to Mr. Ferdinand's black account. Never was seen such an awful arrear of guilt, so interminable a bill of offences, as Mr. Mule had in his own study filed against the young malefactor. Centuries of virtue would seem insufficient to expiate it. Not a window could be broken in the town, but "of course" it was broken by Mr. Ferdinand; not a snow-ball could be flung at Mr. Mule from behind a wall, but it bore the impress of Mr. Ferdinand's hands. If Mr. Mule slipped in frosty weather, he felt assured that Mr. Ferdinand had been cultivating and nursing the infant lubricity of that particular path with a view to that particular result. And if Mr. Mule happened in the dark to be tripped up by a string stretched across the street, he affirmed peremptorily that the bare idea of such a diabolic device-the mere elementary conception of so infernal a stratagem-could not possibly have entered into the brain of any European young gentleman, except that of Mr. Ferdinand, since the Christian era, or that of Catiline before it. And he always concluded by saying, " And, sir, you will see that I shall live to see him hanged."

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In this point, however, Mr. Mule appeared to be taking a view too flattering to his own preconceptions; at least his anticipations seemed as yet, in newspaper phrase, to be "premature. twice seven years had passed since he had first bespoke young Mr. Ferdinand for the gallows, and as yet, Mr. Ferdinand was

neither hanged, nor apparently making any preparations to be hanged. In his tenth year he had been sent to a great public school at Mannheim; and very singular it was to observe the different impressions which that event had produced in two adjoining houses. In the one house was heard the mother of Mr. Ferdinand, weeping day after day for the loss of "her brave-her beautiful!" whose gaiety and radiant spirit of youthful frolic had filled her house with laughter and with involuntary gladness like that of birds in spring. In the other was heard Mr. Mule, chuckling for at least three weeks that the "young malefactor" was sent to a distance; and sent to a place moreover where he might chance to learn, experimentally, what it was to have a snowball lodged under the ear; where his own feet, as well as other persons', might chance to be tripped up on a lubricated path; and where his own shins, as well as those of elderly gentlemen, might happen to be broken over a string in the dusk. Under what different angles was Mr. Ferdinand's character contemplated from these two contiguous stations; seen from his mother's drawing room, it wore the very happiest aspect of hope and vernal promise; seen from Mr. Mule's library, it seemed a character that belonged to the mere scape-goat of Europe. Truth compels us to add that the mother's view was the more correct. Mr. Ferdinand had gone through the school with applause; and, spite of his unconquerable spirit of frolic and mischief, had borne the character of the most good-natured boy in Mannheim. From Mannheim he was transformed to the university of Jena, where he had supported his character as a scholar; and had since served two campaigns in the Prussian cavalry with distinguished reputation, and latterly with some special marks of royal favour. In consequence he was spoken of in his native town with universal respect; the gallows, if it must come, seemed at least to be postponed to an indefinite distance; and even Mr. Mule began to doubt-if not whether Mr. Ferdinand would be hanged-yet whether he himself should live to see Mr. Ferdinand hanged. In general, at least; but there was one case in which he did not doubt. Whenever he looked into Happilius, whenever he reflected upon basilisks, whenever he meditated upon illuminations, he was sure to cry out in conclusion " And, sir, I shall live to see him hanged."

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III. HERMES TRISMEGISTUS.

Time, however, and change, at length brought Mr. Mule to milder sentiments; all about him began to be proud of their young townsman. Mrs. Lawler was still next-door-neighbour, and had it in her power to do many neighbourly offices; patriotism and gratitude, therefore, alike appealed to him for some modifica

tion of his harsh sentence against Mr. Ferdinand; and finally, the illuminated Juba, the original materia litis and perpetual memento to his wrath, departed this life. And thus it came about, that, even upon those days when he read Happelius upon Basilisks, Mr. Mule was now accustomed to commute his original anathema for the gentler doom of" Sir, I shall live to see him banished."

This sentence, in one sense, Mr. Mule lived in fact to accomplish. After the battle of Leipsic, Mr. Ferdinand, having been severely wounded, had received leave of absence, and had returned to his native place. No sooner was he tolerably convalescent than parties innumerable were formed to welcome him home; at which parties he sometimes met Miss Fanny, who inflicted deeper wounds than those which he had received at Leipsic. It was evident from all writers on the subject that there was but one cause; and this he laboured to obtain through a series of tender epistles to the young lady. One of these, a booby of a servant lad delivered by mistake to Mr. Mule himself, who read it; and, in the first moment of his anger, recurred to the old sentence of hanging; and, as to banishment from Miss Fanny's society through any possible channel, personal or by letter, that he decreed extempore; to enforce which sentence, the old aunt was summoned to his assistance. Now, as this interdict was little short of Mr. Mule's worst and original malediction to Mr. Ferdinand, he resolved to countermine the old lady-or, to speak freely, the two old ladies; and, for this purpose, he addressed himself to Hermes Trismegistus.

"Hermes Trismegistus," as he was called by the literati of the town," Slippery Dick," as he was called by every body else,-demands a few words of special notice, both because he was a great man, and because we rely upon him as our Deus ex machina for the catastrophe of our tale. In gratitude for this assistance, we dedicate this paragraph to his biography. Slippery Dick was, at this time, a sort of runner to the "German Mercury," a newspaper published twice a week; he held the office also of "wonder-maker" to that journal, and personally distributIed it within the limits of the town. Hence it was that he had gained the honour of his classical designation. He had, however, other titles to that honour: for he was a forensic person, and had been much connected with courts of justice in his early days; he was an eloquent person; and, finally, he was a thief. At least, he had been a thief; that was the calling in which he commenced the business of life; and, being then resident in a great city, a very lucrative calling it was. Still, he found that many inconveniences arose from being a rogue; and in great cities it is astonishing with what ease a man of talents may emerge into a VOL. III. PART II.

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more reputable character. The realms of honesty and dishonesty, like those of great wits and madness, have thin partitions. As a thief, he was the best man in the world to catch a thief. So he became chief spy or informer to the police, and thus obtained a footing on the twilight frontiers or neutral ground of good and bad repute. Some indeed said that this was worse than being a thief; but others said "No: an informer was a prop to the laws, and an indispensable limb of the police-office." This last word suggested to him another change; he obtained the situation of a regular police-officer, and was now decidedly within the pale of reputable life. Some hankering, however, he still retained for his first calling: he was glad to detect a roguery; he was glad to assist in one of the two, he perhaps gave the preference to the latter; but merely, as he protested, because he found that it required greater talents. Tempting opportunities offered; suspicions arose; and, at length, Slippery Dick was requested to make himself scarce at the police-office, which he did; and, after many ups-and-downs, many flittings, backwards and forwards on both sides of the neutral frontier above-mentioned, he settled at last on the reputable side, in character of agent and correspondent to the German Mercury, professing himself a true penitent, and a decided convert to the primitive faith, that honesty is the best policy. Every Saturday, as he was taking his tenth glass of punch, he wept much for his past life. But still, as all flesh is frail, he manifested on Monday morning a constant propensity to engage any tricks, plots, or knaveries which kept on the right side of the law. To feel that he was abetting something not quite justifiable, was necessary as a seasoning or pleasant condiment to Dick's exertions; but being old, as he observed, and having no son to succeed him, he begged to decline all business of a dangerous character. He would invariably ask a high price for his services; but, if a man positively would not give it, then, Mr. Dick positively would insist in giving his services for nothing, rather than miss any luxurious piece of mischief. In short, he settled down into the regular Scapin of the place; and in that ancient part he become a "fourbe fourbissime."

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To him then, to Slippery Dick, with an entrance-fee of five guineas, (which, by the way, was wholly unnecessary) Mr. Ferdinand addressed himself. Dick liked the service immensely; for, at first sight, it seemed sufficiently wrong to be stimulating. Yet, again he doubted, on further consideration, whether it were not an act of virtue to deceive so obstinate an old gentleman as Mr. Mule; and Dick began to have scruples of conscience. These, however, Mr. Ferdinand found means to overrule. then again Dick murmured at the easiness of the service; simply to cheat two old women-it was really below a man of

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genius!" And on this notion he laboured to embroil and perplex the plain course of his duties, until he sometimes brought himself and his client into much unnecessary peril of discovery. However, as yet no discovery had been made. The ease of a man of genius is delightful. As the distributor of the "Mercury,' Slippery Dick had the privilege of the entré to Mr. Mule's breakfast-room; but as the disburser of infinite private news, which never found its way into the Mercury, Slippery Dick was indispensable. Philosophically speaking, he was one of the "conditions of the possibility" of breakfast; not the urn, or the coffee-pot, more so. With what ineffable impudence did he deliver his ineffable budget of lies! How, like Cæsar, or an Indian juggler, did he play with three balls at once; weaving a political lie for Mr. Mule, and interweaving it at the same time with the cross threads of two scandalous lies for the use of the old aunt!How, like the knave that he was, how, like Slippery Dick in his best days, did he carry on a collateral stream of pantomime communication with Miss Fanny, terminating (as a matter of course) in the dexterous insinuation into her hand of some fresh pleading on the part of his client!-In this way had a long "suit" been conducted between the lovers; but, in all processes, whether in courts of law or of love, it is well known that many questions will arise which cannot be discussed in writing; oral depositions must be had; oaths must be administered; the book must be kissed. For some such purposes, and as the result of the correspondence, Miss Fanny at length granted to Mr. Ferdinand a series of nocturnal interviews at the window; of which the tenth was granted this very evening. Genius of youthful love protect it from detection! And now, having unfolded three-fourths of our little drama by stretching the characters and situation of the chief persons on the stage, let the rest unfold itself as rapidly as possible; and, if possible, in three pages, and in time for this Number of the Quarterly Magazine.

IV.- -GHOSTS.

Fanny, the loveliest of roses, was standing (as we have said) at the window; and the cornet was outside on the lawn. Now it happened naturally enough, whether it were for the purpose of whispering, or of impressing something or other with particular emphasis upon the cornet's attention, or for any other purpose which it does not become a gentleman to look into too narrowly, that Miss Fanny bent her head downwards in answer to some supplicating tones of Mr. Ferdinand. But, good heavens! to see the absurdity and limited views of master-builders! Solely intent upon the very subordinate consideration of preventing robbers from stepping into the windows, the poor ignorant man, who