unconsidered impulse. But whatsoever were the causes, the result was happy, the mediation eminently successful.

"His loving words her seem'd due recompence
Of all her passed paines: one loving houre
For many yeares of sorrow can dispence,
A dram of sweete is worth a pound of soure.
She has forgott how many a woeful stoure
For him she late endur'd: she speakes no more
Of past: true is, that true love hath no powre
To looken back: his eies be fixt before."

Joyously rung out the bells upon the sunny ninth of May, the day of Lizzy's bridal, that ceremonial which was solemnly to seal the reconciliation between her lover and herself. The church-tower heaved and swayed as though it were instinct with life; yet with an even, steady pulsing, as a strong man's chest might heave at every respiration of his lusty lungs. The sound went floating up the valley far and wide; it wandered into hollow lanes, and found a separate echo from each surrounding eminence-it filled the air with blithe, exhilarating music, and made the very sunshine seem more glad, the overarching heavens more blue, the earth more green, and kindled in the eyes of all who

thronged the porch, lined the church-yard path, and clustered round the gates, to greet the egress of the wealthy farmer and his pretty bride--a cheerful sparkle that said, as plainly and distinctly as a glistening eye could say, "God bless them both!"

Then we believe Frank Harper to have been, as at this moment we believe him still to be, as happy and as proud a husband as ever knelt beside a young and blushing bride, poor in the ordinary acceptation of the word, but rich in the wealth of an unsullied mind and virgin heart. The narrow education which outward circumstances had so materially restricted in early life, has been since repaired by the acquisition of accomplishments befitting the sphere in which her marriage has entitled her to move. But still the unassuming gentleness of manner-the innate nobleness-all that previously conferred upon her character its dignity, attractiveness and strength-remain the same, unchanged and undiminished. Indeed, no one who, since the wedding of its master, has shared the shelter of its roof, can regret that this old rambling pile has ceased to be "Bachelors' Hall." J. S.

ACH quarter of the gay and fascinating city of Paris has its distinctive and peculiar social characteristics. The "quartier St. Denis" has been appropriated by the busiest and the dirtiest of the trading population; the Chaussé d'Antin, with its gay pavé and good houses, by bankers and merchants; and St. Germain, with its large hotels and aristocratic air, by the ancient nobility, so admirably described in the novels of Mons. Balzac ; but that which is the most peculiar, which has no rival, in fact, in any other city in the world, is the "quartier Latin," the natural retreat of students and grisettes.

Grisettes! how many are the associations which this word calls up!. !-how many mingled recollections does it excite, from the time of Laurence Sterne to that of Eugene Sue! and yet, when the question is asked, how difficult it really is to define satisfactorily the true character of that creature of life and animation, a Parisian grisette! The French academy cannot do it, for the dictionary description of "a woman of mediocre

condition" is an avoidance, not a solution of the difficulty,-for the grisette stands alone, defying definition. If you walk in the gardens of the Luxembourg, however, or stroll down the Rue Vivienne, or the Rue Richlieu, you recognize at once one of the class so essentially peculiar; and you say, "Ah! there is a grisette." You know her at once, perhaps by her pretty dress of bright-coloured cotton, by her tasteful and coquettish cap, with its gay knots of pink ribbon, and by her neat, well-fitting boot; or if you fail in her costume, you know her by her bright eye, her rosy cheek, her ready smile, and her elastic step.

If one could take cognizance of her thoughts, they would be of Paul de Kock's last novel, of the coming ball, of the Sunday's fète, or of the handsome student, who has twice during the morning strolled past the window of her employers, and whom she once danced with at St. Cloud; yet that little grisette has been working very hard, and for perhaps two nights since has not closed her eyes; but what is that?-she has earned thirty sous a day, she has means to enjoy the next fête, to buy a new cap, perhaps to minister to the wants of the suffering student, whom she thinks, poor fool, most surely loves her. And 'tis well that she has a bright fancy, a lively spirit, and a trusting heart, for her interest in the world's goods are otherwise slender enough.

Escaped from childhood and apprenticeship, the grisette takes a little garret, just large enough to contain a bed and table; she has no chair, for the bed renders that a superfluity, and the purse of the young milliner who earns but thirty sous per day, admits of none. There is, however, a little mirror, a portrait of

the Duke of Orleans, and a water jug filled with violets, which she must take out before washing, but the water is the more welcome for its perfume; and outside her window is a box full of stocks, the favourite flower of grisettes.

Unfortunately, however, this botanical taste of the grisette is much against her. There are many morose and selfish people who cannot understand the love of flowers, or indeed of any other unstimulating and simple pleasures; and the elderly citizen, whose room is immediately beneath that of the grisette, has this order of mind. He is apt to lean forth early and late with bald head and dressing-gown, to enjoy the air that agitates the cowls of the neighbouring chimney pots; and the care the grisette bestows upon her botanical nurselings, by watering them twice a day, the effect of which sometimes extends itself to the head and collar of her neighbour, is not calculated to increase any feelings of amity between the surly citizen and the lively grisette.

The grisette seems the only creature in the world over whom change and circumstance have no control. She never sighs, but laughs and sings; and if she has not one sous in the world, with which to purchase her roll and coffee, she only laughs the merrier. The grisette is the most laughter-loving being that can be found in this existence of care and calculation; but she never calculates, she leaves all that to dull people and diplomatists. Tell her she may fall ill; she laughs, and asks, "if there is not the Hotel Dieu ?" Tell her she may be unable to work, and may starve for want of means; she laughs, and asks, "who ever died of want in Paris?"-for she has not read "Les Mysteres," and never believes in evil. Tell her old age may come, when lovers, health, and spirits will all forsake her; she laughs again, and tells you that "thousands of grisettes have lived before her, and she is content to do as they did."

But, it is not only in avoiding all care for the future, and in taking no heed, not only for to-morrow, but even for the evening of the same day, that the extraordinary conquest of a perpetual sunshine of feeling over the ills of life developes itself in the grisette, but it is precisely the same with the contrarieties of the present. If until four o'clock in the day, the grisette has not tasted a morsel of food, and seeks the six sous necessary to purchase a cutlet, when she knows she can find no credit; and if, after all her search, only a two sous piece appears; she laughs, shakes her head, and trips gaily forth, hoping to discover a friend who will lend her a dinner; and should she find that the fleuriste at the corner is as badly off as herself, they laugh together at the absurdity of the thing. If in the coldest night in winter, she breaks the pane of her little window, and has no means of replacing it, she laughs; and as the wind whistles round the room, sings to it a joyful refrain. Still, the grisette is not exempt from the pains and penalties of life. Paris is not a paradise to her; and though many moments are eminently happy, many hours there are, which, to another, would be heavy and grievous. The grisette toils at her vocation every day but Sunday, and even then generally until mid-day; for she is a victim to others; and as a fleuriste, an embroiderer, a milliner, a sempstress, as the case may be, has little timé that she can claim. Some classes of grisettes work at home, others are attached to the shops they serve. If the grisette works in her little garret, no

VOL. II.

thing can be more solitary and monotonous than the day she passes in the work-shop it is otherwise; and although the mistress of the establishment, once, herself, a grisette, but now of an age "respectable," imposes silence by her presence, this constraint removed, masqued balls, and approaching fêtes, afford abundant conversations to the grisette there employed on the bonnets and dresses of the great ladies, to whom a grisette is a creature worthy only of every description of contempt. Still, the solitary day passed in her own apartment, among the chimney pots of the Quartier Latin, does not make the grisette sad or unhappy. She exercises her fingers it is true, perhaps laboriously, always with an agility, neatness, and taste, worthy the highest admiration; but her thoughts are free, and employ themselves actively on all the subjects most interesting to her. The grisette affects nothing-neither religion, nor morality, nor learning, nor sensibility; but she sings over the airs of Musard's quadrilles, laughs again at the recollection of Paul de Kock's novel, that she remained awake all night to read, and of the handsome student, who twice offered her the shelter of his umbrella, when overtaken by a shower of rain upon the Boulevards.

Like the great dames who despise her, the grisette has her tastes, but they are simple and inexpensive, and bear no resemblance to either Sèvres china, or cashmere shawls. The grisette loves flowers, neat boots, roasted chestnuts, galettes, negus, and refreshments generally. In galettes and chestnuts she is a connoisseur; and the good man who presides in his stall at the Porte St. Denis, would no more think of offering an ill-made galette to a grisette, than would a chestnut roaster of the Rue du Bac expect to impose upon her an inferior fruit, instead of the true and celebrated produce of Lyons, which foggy town is as famous for its chestnuts as its silks: art engaging itself to charm duchesses, and kind nature providing for the grisettes.

Like all French women, the grisette affects pockets, both in her apron and in her dress; and strange enough is, sometimes, their store. Should she, in seeking for aught, find the necessity of taking out their contents, it is remarkable if one does not find chestnuts more or less roasted, half a galette, a few French plums, a thimble, a needle-case, and the claw of a small lobster; for the pocket of a grisette is at once her work-bag, and her general dependance against hunger; and when is a grisette not hungry? Poor creature, her hard work, her fine climate, her contented spirit, her general animation, her anticipations of the bright and pleasurable, all give her an appetite; but it is seldom that the gratifications produced by the good fare of a Parisian cuisine fall in her way; a cutlet at the most, or more commonly a cream cheese and tough galette, are her most choice dainties,-unless indeed, at the fêtes des loges at St. Germain's, where, in gypsy style, fowls are alike roasted and eaten in the open air, and the great diversion of the day seems to be in the labour of the cooks, then indeed the grisette and the student, if they have three francs between them, set aside one for the ball, and spend those that remain in good cheer, a bottle of thin wine, a fricandeau, and a gâteau; and nothing that can be produced by Verrey, with all his pines and iced champagne, can be found half so delicious; for with the feasters of St. Germain's is the pure spirit of enjoyment, the spirit excited by rare indulgence, and not sated and worn by perpetual stimu

lants. The Parisian lion (dandy) is ready to offer all his fortune, for the invention of new pleasures; the grisette wonders at the immensity that exist, and she asks in her simplicity for nothing better than their perpetual repetition.

To the world of Paris generally, Sunday is a day that in the city is marked by dulness, at least after mid-day; for instead of shops lined with lithographs, millinery, the literature of the day, or articles of vertù, nothing is to be seen but lines of green shutters, occasionally diversified by paintings of the calling pursued within; or, here and there, but very rarely, with an apposite remark on the sacred character of the day; but to the grisette, this Sunday is a fète-day, a day of joy, a day worth living for,-a day whose enjoyments are to be toiled for by days of labour, and nights of watchfulness,--a festival devoted to dancing, mirth, and pleasure. The fountains play at Versailles, or there is a fair at St. Cloud, or there are concerts at St. Germain's, and the grisette has earned three francs-enough to pay her fare by the railroad, and to buy a galette when there; and though she knows full well that on Monday morning she will not have a sous to pay for the milk that forms her early meal, she cares not then; nor does the coming day bring with it reflection. There is nothing in the whole world that the grisette loves so well as dancing; and she dances with a lightness and grace peculiarly her own. This taste is not remarkable, if we consider her character, and that for six days the poor grisette has been cribbed into her garret or her workshop,-her every energy bent towards procuring this eminent delight. In summer, grisettes may be seen by dozens, strolling along the gardens of the Luxembourg, charmingly dressed in the most simple, yet coquettish costume; each leaning on the arm of a student, and all pressing forward to the Thursday's ball, held on the bright green sward. Again, the carnival is the elysium of the grisette; she believes that the world holds nothing half so captivating, and she plays her part to the full. But though the Sunday fête and the annual carnival are delightful, the grisette sometimes indulges herself by giving a ball in her own apartment among the tiles; and although half her friends remain on the stairs, and the rest stand all night, although she sleeps herself the remaining hours on the floor, and knows that the next morning the proprietor will expel her from his house,-although the whole party are dying with thirst, and though they have no music but the singing of the merry shoemaker from the next street,-yet the ball of the grisette in her attic, is as much enjoyed as the best ball at the Tuileries or Versailles.

The grisette is neither literary nor learned; she can read, perhaps, with tolerable ease a novel of Paul de Kock's, and she can write a little in good text hand; but orthography puzzles her sadly, and she uniformly mends her pen with her scissors. Fortunately, however, as the grisette has sometimes an extensive correspondence, there are public letter writers in Paris, as in the East,-men full of zeal, worthy of confidence, and in their charges reasonable enough for the pocket of a grisette, unless, indeed, when they write in verse an epistle, which costs at least sixpence.

The grisette is peculiar in her reading tastes. Victor Hugo and Lamartine she thinks little of; neither is Alexander Dumas, or even Balzac, of much weight in the eyes of the grisette. Paul de Kock, an author whom no Parisian lady would read, is considered by

her as the greatest romance writer of modern days, for she loves the merry and the amusing, and will forgive much under such a garb; she feels no sympathy for a strain of highly subtilized morality-she says it is unnatural, and passes it over accordingly. Neither cares she for politics, and knows little of the difference between the Sultan, the Pacha, Louis Philippe, or the Duc de Bourdeaux.

It has been said, that a grisette loves a dance beyond all other earthly things; and that if fêtes champêtres pass away with summer, and if there are no longer "Bals de Paris," and "Bals de Willis," at St. Cloud, St. Germain's, or Versailles, there are in winter a hundred orchestras devoted to this salutary and healthful enjoyment of the grisettes within the walls. The balls of each season are equally joyous, yet each has its peculiar aspect-an aspect indefinable like the grisette herself, but they would require too much space to describe, and I must leave them to the imagination of the reader, merely remarking, that they are all under the surveillance of the police, and that nothing can be more lively, more graceful, than the young dancers, nor, generally speaking, anything more correct than the arrangement itself. With us, it is often the dress, the society, the dissipation, the refreshments of a ball-room, that please; but to the grisette it is simply the exercise, the dance itself-her costume remains the same; there is still the pretty cotton dress freshly ironed, the little. apron with its useful pockets, the smart cap trimmed with rose-coloured ribbons, made up by herself, but setting the fashion to the milliners of the Rue Vivienne; the little black boots well fitting and tightly laced. As she is elsewhere, so is she at the ball; and for refreshment, it is seldom that she enjoys more than a glass of weak Bourdeaux at threepence the bottle.

After the ball, there is nothing half so delightful to the grisette as the "Spectacle ;" and the result, of course, is that the numerous theatres of Paris, those of the Boulevards particularly, realize large receipts on Sundays or fête-days, when the shops of the modistes, are closed. The Porte St. Martin or the Ambigu costs but little, less than sixpence purchases an entrance, and the grisette will labour hard but she will earn this pleasure. The love of a "Spectacle" is innate, I believe, in a grisette, --for whether at the booths in a country fête, or in admiration of the talents of Dejazet herself, the grisette is an amateur of the histrionic art; and in her own little garret, with an old tartan shawl draped over her gingham dress, dreams that even she is an actress. Were it not for this general taste for "Spectacles," it would be difficult to account for the. manner in which all the minor theatres of the French capital are nightly filled to overflowing; but when one looks round the house, and notes the students in the pit, and the grisettes-with their smiling faces and pretty caps-in the balcon and second gallery, the matter is solved at once, and one recognizes the universal taste which, in France, cherishes and supports the dráma.

In summer the grisette is a fervent admirer of the beauties of nature, in the shape of the Bois de Bologne, and the little park of Monceaux, and she likes them the better if combined with donkey-riding and strawberries and cream. This mixture of tastes is also observable at the theatre, for a grisette is never to be seen at the modern "Bobineau," or ancient theatre of the Luxembourg without oranges, or, if it is not their season, apples. As in all other matters, however, the

loss of a good, held for the time to be such, never affects the grisette; summer with its fêtes champêtres, its donkey excursions to Montmorency, its strawberry eatings, and its sunshiny days, may be past-she does not sigh that it is so, but hails November with added joy, because all the yellow bills pasted over the walls of Paris, announce the commencement of the grand masqued balls. And then we must grieve for the grisette. Habit and education have broken down the barrier which separates mirth and levity, high spirits, and utter abandonment to the intoxications of pleasure; and when the grisette abdicates her costume and her sex, we follow her no farther.

In the Tuileries gardens, the grisette is sometimes to be seen, but rarely; she may have a little dog attached by a string, or may be found among a group of laughing children with hoops and skipping-ropes by the sunny bank that the Parisians call the "little Provence ;" and it is pleasant so to see her-for she seems in her right place, where all is bright and happy. It is dif ficult to say at what age the grisette ceases to be considered such, or butterfly-like changes into a dull and uninteresting thing. Some French writers give thirty as her prime; but generally speaking I should think at twenty-six she became serious, and at two and thirty ceased to be a grisette. At this age she is transformed, changed; the laughing, careless, dancing girl begins to calculate, grows fat, is orderly, economical, has perhaps a husband, perhaps children, and inculcates lessons of virtue and morality as if they had been the sole guides of her own life. Sometimes an ancient grisette takes a shop and commences trade as a wineseller or grocer, married or unmarried; but if married, she is generally a good wife and a good mother, she is stern to her servants, and to her dressmaker and milliner gives herself the airs of a princess,-such are the strange changes that knowledge of the world, age, and circumstances, create in the Parisian grisette. however, is by no means the only city in France that produces grisettes; for Metz, Strasburg, Bordeaux, and Toulouse, are all equally celebrated for the grace and beauty of grisettes, whether dark or fair; but Paris offers a combination of the characteristics of all the grisettes of France, whether of the north, south, or mid-land, and therefore more correctly gives a specimen of the class.

Paris,

Curious and interesting as the character of the grisette is, it is scarcely remarkable that such a class exists in France, when the country and its social condition is considered. The fathers and mothers of families are compelled to find some provision for their children, and among the various vocations of men, little remains for the girls of mediocre condition but to become dressmakers and milliners; the necessities of life constrain them to work indefatigably, while the climate and habits of society in France induce to carelessness and enjoyment. Without family restraint, without moral or religious education, while the opinion of the world around is in her favour, it is scarcely remarkable, that the light-hearted lively Parisian grisette recompenses herself for days and nights of toil, by reckless levity, too often, it must be allowed, carried beyond the bounds of order, or morality. We grieve that it is so; but yet it must be acknowledged, that she has often dispositions fitted for better things-with a tenderness of nature, and truthfulness of thought, that do honour to her sex.

The faults of the grisette are the faults of her train

ing, and the social character of her country. She does not commit evil, or lead an immoral life, knowing it to be such; for if she did, remorse would soon place a cancer amongst her happiness: but others, besides the grisette, hold opinions, which could not be tolerated for a moment if tried by a rigid code; and they are perhaps less deserving charity, because their inducements are less. The leyities of the grisette do not harden her heart, or vitiate her character; they do not make her deceitful, interested, or full of hatred to those who may be better. The great lady in her handsome bonnet may sneer at the pretty girl in her gay cap, and perhaps even feel a little jealous of her gentility and grace; but the grisette never recriminates, even in thought. All her friends love her, all her acquaintances laugh and sing with her,-all, like her, go to carnival balls, attended by their lovers; and in all this the grisette knows no harm, for it is the habit of her class, and is as much part of her natural existence, as is her daily labour in her vocation.

If her friend or lover needs it, the grisette dines on a galette to provide them comforts. If both forsake her, she sheds no tear, she heaves no sigh, she indulges in no gloomy condemnations of "an ungrateful world;" she continues to trust and to confide, to work, to sing, to laugh, and to be happy.

Sometimes the poor grisette, sorely sinned against, may be thrown into bad hands, and bribed to evil that she owns as such; in this case she becomes uneasy and regretful, and escaping from her gilded cage, flies back to poverty, laughter, and the Quartier Latin.

Lately, one part of their vocation has been taken from the grisettes, and as carriers of bandboxes and parcels, they have been superseded by men with goldbanded hats, and other insignia of their duties; the result being, as in all other civilized countries, that women are denied a fair arena, and are afterwards condemned for the evil so produced. For the streets of Paris, for the Boulevards, for all eyes that rest complacently on happy smiling faces, the exchange of hardfeatured men for the light-stepping grisette is a decided loss, and we love not to see any inroad upon the privileges and means of occupation of a class who have so few.

The contrast of the grisette to the London milliner's girl, with her wan cheek, her lustreless eye, her attenuated frame, her narrow chest, her consumptive cough, is remarkable indeed,-the one is care-worn and sad, the other thoughtless and merry. Both work hardboth have sleepless nights, scanty meals, and often an empty purse; but the poor London girl, while the grisette is dancing in the open air, or laughing heartily at a farce on the Boulevards, is penned in a cold cheerless garret, with aching head and heart, pining over that misery of the parents or the sisters, which her utmost toil cannot avert.

The London girl may be more moral, more religious, more orderly than the grisette, -it is the result of the opinions and the climate of her country. But so are the levity and insouciance of the grisette; and though she is faulty, her transgressions have some apology,-while her goodness of heart, her kindness of demeanour, her thorough disinterestedness, her forgiveness of injuries, her frequent abnegation of self, and her indifference to the ills she has, render few characteristics of France more curious, more remarkable, or more interesting, than that of the Parisian grisettes.

It was in one of the earliest years of the reign of Henry the Eighth, and on a glorious summer's day, that two men sat in earnest conversation together in the oak-panelled parlour of a small house abutting upon St. Paul's Churchyard. The one was a soldier,

the other a priest. The former was habited as an officer of the yeomen of the guard-his morion surmounted by a plume of feathers lay before him on the table, and his rich scarlet and gold uniform shone gay and glistening in the sunshine. He was a young man, but vice and unbridled passion were stamped, like Cain's mark, upon his face. His eyes were bloodshot; his mouth coarse and sensual, and his whole bearing fierce and swaggering. His priestly companion had thrown back his cowl, probably for coolness, and disclosed features, the expression of which, like that of the captain of the guards, was evil, but which, unlike his, was partly redeemed by an appearance of lofty