against the voracious propensities "of the great leviathan." But this is not the worst of it; for after áll, the gift bestowed, (or said to be given) as a special mark of good, on the flying-fish, was only a mauvaise plaisanterie: for he no sooner pops his head above water, than he encounters a new enemy, in certain sea-birds, equally Catholic in their fisheating devotion; which force the wretched victim back to his native element, leaving it only the choice between becoming a constituent portion of a shark or an albatross. This is a distressing image, and the new-light doctrine is a relief to the fancy, which teaches that the flying-fish launches into the air in pursuit of pleasure, and is led only by an exuberance of temperament to sport in the sunshine, and sparkle in the waters, in all the happy wantonness of a joyous existence,

Who has not felt this buoyancy of spirit, this disposition to fly, when under the strong excitement of health and spirits? "Portez-vous bien," says that true philosopher, St. Evremont, "voilà à quoi tout doit aboutir. "Be well: that is the end to which all things should be directed:" but to this end how many of the elements of life must mingle. It is curious to observe the rapid changes which take place in our existence quite independently of ex ternal circumstance,-the light boundings of the spirit, the high beatings of the heart, unassignable to any foreign cause; and then the depressing laboured respiration, and sinking of the soul, though uncon scious of a real sorrow. Even our dreams are under the influence of these inexplicable conditions The aged and the hypochondriac never dream of flying; and even the young and the happy awaken sometimes under the influence of impressions, more painful to feel than easy to account for.

The temperament of genius is peculiarly suscep tible to these alterations of organic elasticity and depression. It is a true flying-fish of moral life, sporting in the sunshine, and shrinking under the cloud. Even philosophy itself takes its colour from the constitution. Optimism is the mere creation of a "pleased alacrity and cheer of mind;" and the Epicurean is but another word for a man who digests well; while the Cynic is only to be argued with by calomel. This may appear all very fanciful; but it has a practical corollary of undoubted certainty; and that is, when you feel misanthropy and disgust creeping on you, instead of penning a diatribe against the nature of things, take a long walk. Air and exercise-a flying-fish excursion into the sunshine, are worth a whole army of syllogisms for harmonizing the pulses of thought. Nature is the poet's true book of reference. It was Shakspeare's. The nature of the French poets, even in their Augustine age, was Versailles, and the coteries, literary and gallant, de la cour et la ville,

TOLERATION.

DU CLOS has some admirable things in his excellent memoir of Louis XIV. Here is one :"Nulle persécution, beaucoup d'indifférence, et d'oubli, c'est la mort de toutes les sectes."*

Madame D'Epinay, in her Show up Book of the

*"No persecution, and plenty of indifference or forgetfulness, would be the death of all sects."

Church and State society of France, before the Revolution, draws a picture of this author, peint en charge. Still he was an admirable writer, and appears to have been an honest man.

OLD-FASHIONED FRIENDS.

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WHAT a horrible thing it is to be ashamed of one's old friends, merely because they are old-fashioned. The other day some " English epicures," topsawyers of London ton, dined with us, when a dropper-in, from Connaught, took a piace (left vacant by a late apology). I had dined with my provincial guest many years back, and thought it the greatest possible honour to be asked to his Castle Rackrent. He then appeared to me a very fine person, and his table a very fine table. But, horror of horrors! what were my feelings when, uncovering the entrée next him, before the soup was removed, he asked one of the most noted Amphitryons of the day, if he should help him to some of the savories; and when, after calling bouilli, bully-beef! petits-pâtés, mutton-pies! soup, broth! crême-au-pistache, "raspberry crame!" and fondue, "podden!" he ended by sending back his glass of ale, not because he "never touched malt," but, because, as he told the servant, "he preferred his porther out of a pewther pot, after the ould fashion." French cookery has made but slow progress among the "mere Irish," in the remote provinces; and "the jug-day" at Bogmore (far below the original from which it was copied) is still to be found in nearly all its details among the

hospitable festivities of the genuine and unmixed descendants of Milesius.

The science of cookery is the science of civilization; and considering the effect which the material, raw or cooked, has upon the digestion, and the digestion on the brain, it is a science of quite as much importance, as any other in the great scale of utility and consideration. When Lord Byron took to vegetable diet, he used to say to one, from whom I had the anecdote, "When you eat beefsteaks, a'n't you afraid of committing murder?"

IRISH BEGGARS.

“Souhaiter les bonnes fêtes" was thought provincial and old fashioned, even in the time of Louis the Fourteenth in Ireland the custom is as fresh as ever. "Many happy Christmas's, Easters, and Patrick's days," is the wish of the lower orders, and particularly of the mendicity of Dublin. The Irish beggars are perpetual calendars of days appointed by the church to be kept holy. The resources of their eloquence are indeed infinite, and their keen sense of the influence of pathos and humour on the feelings, (beyond the power of words or even facts to express,) is among the many proofs of the shrewdness and innate perceptions of the people, even in the very lowest state of human degradation: for what, on the scale of human wretchedness and prostration, is so low as the Irish beggar!

A book might be written on the mendicity of Dublin; which, like the history of the country, would

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be at once tragical and farcical. The prevalence of a religion which makes charity (uncalculated charity, the most mistaken and frequently the most selfish virtue,) a leading dogma, combines with the poverty of the people, to render beggary an order, almost as much tolerated and respected in Ireland as in India. Every quarter, and every street of the capital, had, some twenty years back, its established and privileged female beggar; who, known to the great, and maintained by their servants (for services given). was permitted to exercise the immunity of the court fools of old, and to address their superiors on the occasions of their ingress and egress, with a sort of sevile familiarity, often seasoned by humour or tinctured by sarcasm. Generally half mad, and always more than half drunk, their folly or their inebriety was deemed an excuse for their impertinence. Lady M-n-rs, descending the steps of her house to get into her carriage, was addressed by a well known beggar of her neighbourhood in the usual tone of supplication.

"Go away," said her ladyship, "I will give you nothing.

"Och! then long life to your ladyship; and it's often you gave us that, God bless you!" was the reply, in the same tone of imploring misery, as the charity was asked.

The beggar, who frequents Kildare-street, loitering about the portico of its club house, at two or three in the morning, observed the Rev. Mr. reel forth, and, before she could lend him her assistance, find his level in the kennel. In that state herself, in which "ladies wish to be who love their" glass, and unable to extricate the reverend gentleman, who