Faust or the Freyschutz to do with your scampering up stairs?

"

Every thing. After learning German, my first use of the acquisition was to go through all their Romances, and consequently a regular course of Diablerie-from the Arch Demon who inhabited Pandemonium, to the Imp that lived in a bottle-from the scholar who bartered his soul, to the fellow who sold his own shadow. The consequence I might have foreseen. My head became stuffed with men in black, and black dogs-with unholy compacts, and games of chance. I dreamt of Walpurgis Revels and the Wolf's Glen-Zamiel glared on me with his fiery eyes by night; and the smooth voice of Mephistophiles kept whispering in my ear by day.

Wherever my thoughts wandered, there was the foul Fiend straddling across their path, like Bunyan's Apollyon,-ready to play with me for my immortal soul at cards or dice--to strike infernal bargains, and to execute unholy contracts to be signed with blood and sealed with sulphur. In a word, I was completely be-Devilled. "

But the stairs-the running up stairs? »

The result of my too intimate acquaintance with so much folly and profanity-a kind of bet. S'death! I'm ashamed to mention it!--a sort of wager that came into my head one daya diabolical suggestion of course-that the Fiend might have me body and soul, in default of my reaching the top of the stairs before counting a certain number!»

"What! a wager with the Devil!»

Yes the infernal suggestion-for it was an infernal suggestion--was whispered to me at the stair-foot; and as if my salvation had really depended on the issue, I was up the whole flight in an instant. The next moment sufficed to convince me of the absurdity, not to say sinfulness, of the act; but what defence is our deliberate reason against such sudden impulses? Before reflection could come into play, the thing was done and over. Nor was that the end. You remember my irresistible prompting to kiss the red, rugged hand of poor Sally?.

"

Well, there was the same mental process. You know how

much our ideas are the slaves of association-and especially they are so in a tenacious mind like mine, in which the most trivial fancies obtain a permanent record. To find myself near any stairs was enough therefore to revive the diabolical hint the mere sight of a banister set me off, in fact before the month was out I had raced again, again, and again, not only up my own flight, but up those of half my friends and acquaintances.

It was impossible to help laughing at this description. The picture of a gentleman scampering up people's stairs, with the agility of a lamplighter, was, as I said in my apology, so very comical.

Humph! Not if you knock down your own servant with the tray, or frighten an old rich aunt into hysterics-both of which I have performed within the last week. »

"But you might perhaps break yourself—»

« Never! it's impossible! As I said before, the mere sight of the banisters is enough. Besides, from practice, the thing has become a habit, and the mental prompting is backed by a bodily impulse. No; and he shook his head very gravely, I shall never leave it off-except by death. And with my state of health, to run full speed up a long flight, there are six-and-twenty stairs, and two sharp turns-under penalty of eternal perdition, before one could count a score— »

Why, surely you do not believe in the validity of such a wager?»

"Heaven alone knows, seplied Horace, very solemnly, who, if he had not been made positively superstitious by his German reading, and his familiarity with the supernatural, had at least learned to regard the abstract evil principle as a real and active personage. "I have tried over and over again to argue myself into your opinion. But all my reasoning and casuistry are of no avail against a sort of vague misgiving; and, as the forfeit is too awful to be risked on a doubt, I always take care, as far as in me lies, to secure the stake by winning the wager-that is to say, by getting to the top before I can count twenty. »

You might secure it by slow counting."

VOL. II.

70

"

As if that would retard his! No, my dear fellow, there is no cheating him! To tell the truth I shudder at times to think what may happen to me-a fall-a sprain-the encounter of other people on the stairs-a loose rod-the cat or dog-which by the by, shall be sent away

I looked again, full in Horace's face; but he was as grave as a Judge, and evidently in sad, sober earnest as indeed appeared the next minute, when he went off into one of his fits of abstraction, but continued to himself. From what he muttered it was plain that he was in the predicament of the people described by Coleridge as "possessed by their own ideas. Some of his expressions even impressed me with a doubt of his perfect sanity-whether he was not under the influence of a kind of monomania. However, I tried to laugh and reason him out of his «wager," but the attempt was futile, and I took my leave.

"God bless you, my dear fellow? and the tears filled his eyes as he energetically squeezed my hand, it is the last time you will see me; mark my words. However, it may affect me hereafter, that Diabolical Suggestion has done for me hereand will hurry me to my grave!»

Poor Horace! His prediction was too true. On calling upon him a month afterwards, I found that he had let and removed from his old residence: but one of his servants had remained with the new tenants, and was able to give me some particulars of her ex-master. His health had suddenly broken-his complaint declaring itself to be a decided organic affection of the heart, and he had suffered from violent palpitations and spasms in the chest. The doctors had ordered change of air and scene-and about a fortnight before, he had gone into the country, somewhere in Sussex, where he was living in a cottage, that as she significantly added, was all on one floor. But alas! she was incorrect in her statement. He was living nowhere; for that very morning he had gone to call on the clergyman of the parish, and after a flight which made the footman believe that he had admitted a madman, dropped dead on the last top step of the drawing-room stairs!

MONTHLY MAGAZINE.)

THE AMERICAN WILD CAT.

In the southern portions of the United States, but especially in Louisiana, the wild cat is found in abundance. The dense swamps that border on the Mississippi, protect this vicious species of game from extermination, and foster their increase; and, although every year vast numbers are killed, they remain seemingly as plentiful as they ever were in the memory of the oldest inhabitant. » The wild cat seeks the most solitary retreats, in which to rear its young, where in some natural hole in the ground, or some hollow tree, it finds protection for itself and its kittens, from the destructive hand of man. At night, or at early morn, it comes abroad, stealing over the dried leaves, in search of prey, as quietly as a zephyr, or ascending the forest tree with almost the ease of a bird. The nest on the tree, and the burrow in the ground, are alike invaded; while the poultry-yard of the farmer, and his sheep fold, are drawn liberally upon to supply the cat with food. It hunts down the rabbit, 'coon, and possum,' springing from some elevated bough, upon the bird perched beneath, catching in its mouth its victim, and doing this, while descending like an arrow in speed, and with the softness of a feather to the ground. Nothing can exceed its beauty of motion when in pursuit of game, or sporting in play. No leap seems too formidable, no attitude is ungraceful. It runs, flies, leaps, skips, and is at ease in an instant of time; every hair of its body seems redolent with life. Its disposition is untameable, it seems insensible to kindness, a mere mass of ill nature, having no sympathies with any, not even of its own kind. It is for this reason no doubt, that it is so recklessly pursued, its paw being, like the Ishmaelites, against every man and it most indubitably follows, that every man's dogs, sticks, and guns, are against it. The hounds themselves, that

hunt equally well the cat and fox, pursue the former with a clamourous joy, and kill it with a zest, that they do not display when finishing off a fine run after Reynard. In fact, as an animal of sport, the cat in many respects is preferable to the fox, its trail is always warmer, and it shows more sagacity in eluding its enemies.

In Louisiana, the sportsman starts out in the morning professedly for a fox-chase, and it turns cat, and often both cat and fox are killed, after a short but hard morning's work. The chase is varied, and is often full of amusing incident, for the cat, as might be expected, takes often to the tree to avoid pursuit, and this habit of the animal allows the sportsman to meet it on quite familiar terms; if the tree is a tall one, the excitable creature manages to have its face obscured by the distance, but if it takes to a dead limbless trunk, where the height will permit its head to be fairly seen, as it looks down upon the pack that are yelling at its feet, with such open mouths, that they

«Fetch shrill echoes from the hollow earth,»

you will see a rare exhibition of rage and fury, eyes that seem living balls of fire, poisonous claws that clutch the insensible wood with deep indentations,-the foam trembles on its jaws, hair standing up like porcupine quills, ears pressed down to the head, forming as perfect a picture of vicious, ungovernable destructiveness as can be imagined. A charge of mustard-seed shot, or a poke with a stick when at bay, will cause it to desert its airy abode, when it no sooner touches the ground, than it breaks off at a killing pace, the pack like mad fiends on its trail.

Beside treeing, the cat will take advantage of some hole in the ground, and disappear when it meets with these hidingplaces, as suddenly as ghosts at cock-crowing. The hounds come up to the hiding-place, and a fight ensues. The first head intruded into the cat's hole is sure to meet with a warm reception, claws and teeth do their work, still the staunch hound heeds it not, and either he gets a hold himself, or acts as a bait to draw the cat from his burrow; thus fastened, the