he instantly committed to print; there is not a scene of his hundred novels which is not a picture from life. And what pictures! Once he pursued a lady in a black satin cloak, with green slippers, up into one of the gamblinghouses of the Quays. He never saw her face; and when he tried to make some inquiries at the gambling-house, he was told that his life depended on his silence. Years afterward, while descending the Rhine, he saw a lovely young girl in the company of two ladies, and overhearing their conversation, found that the child was the lifelong disappointment of a prince of the house of Courtenay, who had sent his wife, the daughter of the Duc de Richelieu, in search of an heir, fourteen years before! There were circumstances in the tale which poured a sudden light upon Restif's memory of the green slippers. And yet, we hear people declaim against Rousseau for leaving his children at the Foundling Hospital, as if he were the one unnatural being of his age!"

"Restif called himself a reformer. He published his romances as fast as we now print in the newspapers. In six years he wrote eighty-five volumes! They all had one object to persuade men that property was the root of all mischief."

:

"He anticipated St. Simon, then, and Proudhon?" I said.

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sixty-six lamps; while lovely servingmaids, in Roman robes, presented their long tresses to the guests, for napkins! Weary and worn out, at last, Restif, about the year 1794, went back to Courgis, where he had first learned Latin and love. The republicans had laid waste the church; but the poplars of La Fontaine Froide were still standing. Where was Jeannette Rousseau?

"If you choose to put together, as people always do, men who are as much alike as Voltaire and Rousseau," Paul replied, with a smile. "He was a Socialist, certainly, in a vague, fiery fashion. But the revolution disturbed and distressed him. He mourned, terribly, over the death of Mirabeau, of whom he has left us the most vivid sketches, and Cubirères draws a melancholy picture of Restif as he saw him, towards the end of his life, silent and moody, and not answering when he was spoken to. He was no longer the Restif of those fine festivals which Grimod de la Reynière used to give, where no one was admitted who would not promise to drink eleven cups of coffee, and where, after a series of electrical experiments, dinner was announced by a herald in his tabaret, and served in silver, on a round table lighted with three hundred and

"Restif walked up to the old house. An old woman sits spinning in the doorway. It is Jeannette; the same bright eye lights up the withered roses of her cheeks; the old grace lingers about the lines of her bowed and trembling form!

mademoi

"Do you recognize me, selle?' said Restif.

"I have seen you, I think, sir,' she replied; but I am an old woman now, and it was long since.'

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"I am Nicholas Restif, the choir-boy of the cure of Courgis!'

"The poor old couple fell into each other's arms, weeping.

"Jeannette had read, from time to time, the books of Restif. She had seen that, in everybody whom he painted, he had pleased himself with tracing some trait of Jeannette. She had not forgotten those old meetings-those octo-syllabic verses!

"I have never married,' said she. We are too old now for happiness; but we can, at least, die together.'

"And a curé was found, who ventured to unite, in secret, this melancholy pair.

"Was it strange I should have thought of Restif. yesterday, in the Cathedral ?"

"No!" I answered, "nor was it strange that the Prefect should have repudiated the reminiscence !"

•

Then, you don't think Restif very engaging, with all his romance,'" said Paul. But, in his old age, the French nation voted him two thousand francs, 'for his services to morality!' and the Academy would have received him, but for his want of taste!"

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"And here!" he cried, as a furious ringing of bells broke in upon his talk, "here we are, at the Embarcadere, and this is Paris. Restif is at rest now. Is the spell of Circe broken?"

WE E have gotten a new barber in the village. It is a good thing to have a barber in the country. You hear all the news, all the weddings, the engagements, the lawsuits, and other festivo matters in his aromatic shop. Our former Master Nicholas has left us suddenly-"Maestro Nicolas quando barbero del mismo pueblo." We miss him very much. I used to admire his long and learned essay upon the uman air. The uman air, for want of capillary attraction, could not maintain its place upon the uman ead, without the united juices of one hundred and fifty-five vegetables. So long as he devoted himself to procuring the necessary vegetables, and hung his argument upon a hair, he did very well. It was pleasant to doze under his glib fingers and his vegetal philosophy. But, unfortunately, he got into politics. Barbers usually have excitable temperaments. The barber of our village became the softest of the softs. He was ready to argue with anybody and everybody, in his "garden of spices."

One day, while I was under his tuition, at the end of a prolonged debate with one of his sitters, by way of clinching his point, he did me the honor of tapping me twice upon the cranium, with the back of his hair-brush. "Sir," said he (tap), "I tell you that is so" (heavy tap). In consequence, I predicted his speedy downfall. Sure enough, he laid a wager that his candidate would have a majority in our village over all the rest of the candidates, and the next election only gave his candidate two votes. Next day our barber was missing. Public vandalism had crushed him.

paws. She is as white as new plucked cotton, or February clouds. All our other dogs, Jack, Zack, and Flora, are black; Juno, by contrast, looks strikingly white. One day, I found four black dogs under the porch. Of the four, I should say Juno was the blackest. She had been to the barber's on a visit, and he had given her a coat of his confounded Praxiteles balsam. Now she is growing out of it; but her present appearance is so repulsive, that the other dogs will not associate with her. Some day, I mean to give that barber a talking to about the matter.

Who that loves nature can forsake the country in October? Before the leaves fall, before "the flying gold of the woodlands drive through the air," we must visit our old friends oppositethe Palisades; we must bring forth our boat once more, and "white-ash it" over the blue river to the " chimneys." "What do you think of it, Mrs. Sparrowgrass?" Mrs. S. replied she was willing. So then, on Saturday, if the weather be fair, we will make our final call upon them. The weather was fine, the air warm, the sky clear, the river smooth, the boat in order, and over we went. I had invited a German gentleman, Mr. Sumach, to accompany us, on account of his flute. He is a very good performer upon that instrument, and music always sounds to great advantage upon the water. When we approached the great cliffs, Mr. Sumach opened his case, and took therefrom the joints of an extraordinary large flute. Then he moistened the joints and put it together. Then he held it up and arranged the embouchure to his satisfaction, and then he wiped it off with his handkerchief. Then he held it up again at right angles, and an impudent boy, in another boat, fishing, told him he'd better take in his boom, if he didn't want to jibe. Then Mr. Sumach ran rapidly through a double octave, executed a staccato passage. with wonderful precision, and wound. up with a prolonged bray of great brilliancy and power. Then the boy, by way of jibing himself, imitated the bleating of a sheep. Then I bent the

white-ash oars to get out of the reach of the boy, and the blisters on my hands became painfully bloated. Then Mr. Sumach, who had been trilling enough to make anybody nervous, proposed that we should sing something. Then Mrs. Sparrowgrass suggested "Home, sweet Home." Then we commenced (flute obligato).

HOME SWEET HOME!

WITH VARIATIONS.

"Mid (Taw-tawtle) pala (Tawtle) Though-oh! (Tawtle-taw!) Be it (Taw-tawtle) hum-(Tawtle) Taw, Tawtle-taw! (rapid and difficult passage, ending with an inimitable shake). A cha- (Tawtle) skies! (Tawtle) halo (Taw, Taw),

Which (Taw-tawtle) world (Taw) not (Taw-tawle), where Home! (trill B flat) Hoem! (rapid and diffi cult passage).

Sweet! (Toodle) sweet! (Toodle) home! (Toodle),

Be it (Tawtle-de-doodle-diddle-doodletaw) 'ble,

There's no-oh! (Toodle) home!"

By this time we had reached the base of the Palisades.

Now then, here we are-a segment of sand you might cover with a blanket, and all the rest of the beach a vast wreck of basaltic splinters! Rocks, rocks, rocks! From bits not larger than a water-melon, up to fragments the size of the family tea-table. All these have fallen off those upper cliffs you see rising from the gold, brown, and crimson of autumnal leaves. Look up! no wonder it makes you dizzy to look up. What is that bird? Mrs. Sparrowgrass, that is an eagle.

It was a pleasant thing, after we had secured the boat by an iron grapnel, to pick our way over the sharp rocksnow holding by a lithe cedar, now swinging around a jutting crag by a pendulous wild grape-vine, anon stepping from block to block, with a fine river view in front and below; and then coming suddenly upon the little nook where lay the flat stone we were in quest of, and then come the great cloth-spreading, and opening of the basket. And we took from the basket: first, a box of matches and a bundle of choice cigars of delicate flavor; next, two side bottles of claret; then we lifted out carefully a white napkin, containing only one fowl, and that not fat; then two pies, much the worse for the voyage; then two

"Mr. Sumach," said I, after the pippins and cheese, "if you will cast your eyes up beyond the trees, above those upper trees, and follow the face of the precipice in a direct line for some four hundred feet perpendicularly, you will see a slight jutting out of rock, perhaps twenty feet below the top of the crags." Mr. Sumach replied the sun was shining so brilliantly, just then, upon that identical spot, that he could see nothing at all. As, upon careful inspection, I could not see the spot myself, I was obliged to console myself with another sip of claret. Yet there it was, just above us.

"Mr. Sumach," said I, "I wish you could see it, for it is one of the curiosities of our country. You know we have five wonders of the world in Ameri ca-the Falls of Niagara, the Natural Bridge in Virginia, the Mammoth Cave of Kentucky, Trenton Falls, and the Palisades. Now sir, just above us, almost at the brink of that dizzy height, there is singular testimony of the freaks of nature. That tough old rock, sir, has had a piece taken out of it, squarely out, by lightning, probably; and the remnants of the vast mass now lie around us, covered with lichens, nut shells, dead leaves, table cloth, and some claret bottles. If you will go with me some two miles north, there is a path up the mountains, and we can then walk along the top of the vast precipice, to the spot directly over us." Mr. Sumach declined, on the ground of not being accustomed to such rough walking. "Then, sir, let me describe it to you. From that jutting buttress of rock in front, to the opening there, just back of you, there is a flat platform above us, wide enough for a man to lie down, with his head close to the inner wall, and his feet a few inches over the precipice. That plat

form is probably one hundred and fifty feet long; the wall behind it is some twenty feet high; there is a little ravine, indicated by the gap up there, by which you can reach the platform. Once on it, you will see the wall back of you is very flat and even, as well as the stone floor you tread upon." Mr. Sumach answered "very well?" in a tone of inquiry. "Now," said I, "here, in this paper, is the Legend of the Palisades, and, as we are upon legendary ground, I will read it to you." Mr. Sumach, with a despairing look at his giant flute-case, said he would like much to hear it; so, after another sip of claret, I unrolled the manuscript, and read:

A LEGEND OF THE PALISADES.

Long before the white sails of Europe cast their baleful shadows over the sunny waters of the western continent, a vast portion of this territory, bounded by perpetual snows and perpetual summer, was occupied by two mighty nations of red men. The Iroquois, by far the most warlike nation, dominated, with its united tribes, the inland from Canada to North Carolina, and east and west, from central Pennsylvania to Michigan; while the great Algonquin race peopled the sea-board, from Labrador almost to the Floridas, and extending itself westward, even to the borders of Oregon, again stretched along, beyond the waters of the Mississippi, unto the hunting-grounds of the swarthy Appalachians. This bright river, in those days, flowed downward to the sea, under some dark, Indian name; and, where yonder village glitters with its score of spires and myriad windows, the smoke of numerous camp-fires curled up amidst pointed wigwams, of poles, and skins, and birch-bark, wrought with barbaric cha

racters.

Of the Algonquin tribes that formerly inhabited the banks of this mighty stream, tradition has scarcely preserved a name. A handful of colored earthen beads, a few flint arrow-heads, are the sole memorials of a once great populace. But tradition, with wonderful tenacity, clings to its legends. Even from the dross of nameless nations, some golden deed shines forth, with a lustre antiquity cannot tarnish. So among the supernatural songs of the Iroquois we find a living parable.

Long before the coming of the pale faces, there was a great warrior of the

Onondaga-Iroquois, by name the Big Papoose. He had a round, small, smooth face, like that of a child; but his arms were long, and his shoulders broad and powerful as the branches of an oak. At the council fires he spoke not; at hunting parties he was indolent; and of the young squaws, none could say: "he loves me." But if he spoke not at the council fires, the people knew the scalps in his wigwam were numerous as the cones upon the pine tree; and if he cared not for hunting, yet he wore a triple collar, made of the claws of grizzly bears, and the old braves loved to sing of the great elk he had pursued and killed with a blow of his stone axe, when his feet were as the wings of a swallow. True it was, the love that is so common to man, the love of woman, was not in his breast; but the brightest and boldest maiden eyes dropped in his presence, and many a time the bosoms of the young squaws would heave just a little. Yet the Big Papoose was the friend of children. Who bound the tiny flint arrow-heads to the feathered shafts, and strung the lithe bow with the sinews of deer, and practiced the boy warriors of the tribe in mimic warfare, and taught them to step with the foot of the sparrow, and to trap the fox, the rabbit, and the beaver, and to shout the death whoop, the sa-sa-kuan? Who was it but the Big Papoose, lying yonder, face downward, on the frozen crust of the lake, his head covered with skins, and around him a score of boy warriors, lying face downward, too, watching the fish below, through the holes in the ice, that they might strike them with the pointed javelin, the aishkun? Yes, he was the friend of children, the Big Papoose! There was then a very old brave of the Onondaga tribe; his hair was like the foam of the waterfall, and his eyes were deep and dark as the pool beneath it. He was so old that he could lay his hand upon the head of a hundred years and say "boy!" He it was who had found, far in the north, under the uttermost stars, the sacred pieces of copper; he it was who had seen the great fish, so large that a single one could drink up the lake at a mouthful; and the great Thunder Water he had seenNiagara; and the cavern, big enough

to contain all the Indian tribes, the Iroquois and the Algonquins, and the stone arch that held up the skies, the