"What have you done there, rogue?" exclaimed the czar, in a rage.

"I, sire," replies the urchin, "I have taken a pinch of snuff. For the last eight hours I have been in attendance; I have felt sleep overpowering me; I thought that it would rouse me up, and I prefer rather to fail in etiquette than in my duty."

Paul burst out laughing, and contented himself with answering:

Be it so, my boy; only, as the snuff-box is too small for us both, you will keep it for yourself."

CXXXIX.

DR. YOUNG.

This great writer was remarkable for his politeness, and for the cheerfulness of his disposition.

He was going one day in a boat, along with some ladies, to Vauxhall, and seeking to amuse them by playing an air on the flute. There were behind them several officers, who were going to the same place. The doctor ceased playing as soon as he saw them approaching. One of them asked him for what reason he put his flute in his pocket. "For the same reason

that I took it out, because I pleased," replied the doctor.

The son of Mars replied to him in an imperious tone, that "if he did not immediately take his flute up again, he would at once throw him into the Thames." The doctor, fearing to frighten the ladies, pocketed this insult in the best manner he could, took his flute and continued playing all the time that they were on the water.

In the evening he perceived the officer who had acted so rudely towards him, walking apart by himself; he went straight to him, and said to him with great coolness: "It was, sir, to avoid troubling my society and yours that I acquiesced in your insolent order; but in order that you may be convinced that one may have as much courage under a black coat as under a uniform, I hope that you will repair to-morrow to such a place, without a second, the quarrel being entirely between ourselves." The doctor stipulated besides that this affair should be settled with the sword. The officer implicitly consented to all the conditions.

The duellists met next day at the appointed hour and place; but at the moment when the officer was putting himself on guard, the doctor presented a horse-pistol at him. "What!" said the officer, "do you intend to assassinate me?”

"No," said the doctor, "but you must instantly dance a minuet, or you are a dead man."

A short dispute followed; but the doctor appeared so determined that the officer was compelled to submit. "Well," said the doctor, "yesterday you forced me to play in spite of myself, and to-day I have forced you to dance in spite of yourself: We are quits, and I am ready to grant all the satisfaction you may demand."

The officer stretched out his hand to the doctor, begged his pardon, and from that day they were excellent friends.

CXL.

THE GOLD SNUFF-BOX.

Dr. B...... was taking a walk one day in a public garden. A very well dressed man accosts him, and takes him by the hand. "Doctor, you do not remember me?" "No." "I am a merchant at Lille, where I had the honour of meeting you seven years ago." "It is true that I visited that place seven years ago, but I do not remember in the least having seen you there."

"That is astonishing. May I offer you some?" (offering him his snuff-box). "I do not take

snuff." "Oh! oh! it seems to me that you took some then." "I do no longer take any." "You do not remember, then, the time when we were together at Harcourt College?" "I remember the time very well when I was at Harcourt College, but I do not remember having seen you there." "I leave you in the hope that you will soon remember one of your old friends. I wish you good morning."

A quarter of an hour after, the stranger returns. A new offer of snuff; a new refusal, expressed with a kind of impatience and disdain. "I have already told you that I do not take any." "I beg your pardon; I had forgotten it. But you are a strange man! and your want of memory affects me singularly. Nevertheless, I wish to give you this evening a friendly supper." "I never take supper." The doctor turns his back on him and goes away.

While returning from his walk he meets some ladies of his acquaintance, to whom he relates his adventure; he praises himself much for having refused snuff offered by the suspicious hand of a stranger, an adventurer, and, who knows? perhaps worse than that.

"But," continued he, "from my hand, ladies, one can take some. I have some, and of the best, in a snuff-box worth fifty louis, which I bought lately." "Fifty louis! it must be very beautiful." "You shall judge for yourselves."

The doctor searches his pocket. "Oh, oh! no box, and a note!" He opens it, and reads: "Doctor, when one does not take snuff, one has no need of a snuff-box."

CXLI.

NEW METHOD OF LEARNING A MODERN LANGUAGE

Two English officers enter a café and seat themselves at a table, not far from a tall and lean fellow with a grave and crabbed air, who smokes a cigar, looking the while attentively around him.

Scarcely are our two Englishmen seated, when the conversation turns on a friend of theirs. "He ought to arrive immediately," says one of them.

At these words the grave stranger opens his mouth and says in bad English, with the greatest coolness:

"I arrive, thou arrivest, he arives, we arrive, you arrive, they arrive."

The Englishman, astonished, approaches the stranger quickly, saying: "Are you speaking to me, sir?"

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"I speak, thou speakest, he speaks, we speak, you speak, they speak.”

"Leave that man alone," says the other Englishman to his friend; "he is mad."