we may be pardoned the expression. It is the
compound householder, of whom all parties in the
State want to get rid. This should be opposed
with a firm hand; and I should say Worth
is the man to carry a strong, lasting, and
satisfactory bill. He affects an Abernethy bluntness
and decision. A short, dumpy lady faintly
wishes for a deep-green dress. "You would
wish to look like an ivy-bush, wouldn't you?"
he says, sarcastically. "With all my heart."

An agitated assistant comes in with a message.
The countess knows she cannot see him; but
would he design something?

"What is she like?"

"Sallow, monsieur, tall, and thin."

The artist shades his eyes, thinks a moment,
and presently sends out a complete sketch,
dress, trimming, everything, which is accepted
with gratitude. Even of a famous marquise,
perhaps his best customer, he will speak
slightingly. "She is nothing," he says.
"There is no foundation; I have to reconstruct
her altogether. It is endless trouble,
pulling down and building up." This is
perfectly true. Such attenuated votaries the priest
loads with finery—then piles up the fashionable
agony until something substantial has been
reared. A petticoat of rich thick white satin,
then a skirt of amber satin, groaning under
heavy trimmings and festoons, over that a layer
of tulle, stiff and glistening with golden flowers
and arabesques. Madame's maid is, of course,
understood to have done her part in "setting" a
good concrete foundation. The result is, this
lucky artist is making an enormous fortune.
The ladies of the Empire are deep in his book.
We may suppose the unhappy husbands shut
their eyes, and think that shooting the fashionable
Niagara is some time off yet.

HISTORY OF A SACK OF CORN.

THIRD CHAPTER.

OUR Irish major, during the dinner given
yesterday by the lady of his love, to welcome
his auspicious arrival, was told a very singular
circumstance. To his immense amazement, he
learnt that his fair enslaver, although
certainly the lawful widow of one husband, has
nevertheless three others all living, in perfect
health and spirits. Firstly, she married a French
tutor, who became a Moldavian subject to
facilitate his espousals; and has since set up a
cookshop. Secondly, she married an ex-cabinet
minister, who afterwards desired to unite
himself with the political party opposed to her
connexions; and arranged an amicable divorce for
that purpose. Thirdly, she married a young
medical man, who opportunely offered himself
for the vacancy, and who had been since
ascertained to have two other wives who could
establish a prior claim to him. Fourthly and lastly,
she married a cousin, to cancel the preceding
nuptials; who, subsequently, having been made
a colonel in the Turkish contingent, had, in
that capacity, unluckily shot himself, in
consequence of being unacquainted with the method
of loading his pistols.

The strangest thing is, that the three living
husbands are all then and there present, and
that the major, the fifth Consort Elect, sat
down with them and his betrothed to play a
game at lansquenet, and very merrily they
played it.

While the sharp struggle, however, is going
on in the gentleman's mind between his most
settled national convictions and his new love,
he looks somewhat grave and disconcerted. In
this mood he has mounted a stiff Turkish
cob and taken a gallop over the moors to
escape from his own thoughts. He has not
ridden far, when he notices a black-looking
object of considerable size floundering about in
the principal bog of a disused turf road leading
through the widow's estate to her residence.
Unconsciously resolving that he will make these
roads better when the land comes under his
control, he approaches near enough to see that
the thing which has attracted his attention is a
large travelling britzka, hopelessly stuck in the
thick black mud of the quagmire. The
disorderly mob of ponies once attached to it, having
broken their ropes and got loose, are now standing
with drooping heads and reeking flanks
close by on firm ground. A person in a nightcap
and an enormous black bearskin cloak is
gesticulating furiously from one of the smashed
windows. As the major comes nearer, he
perceives, with some difficulty, that the occupant
of the britzka is scolding in a kind of French
gibberish and Russian curses, which he
remembers to have heard in the Crimea. On
trying, therefore, to establish an understanding
in the French language, he meets with the most
gushing response which can be dictated by joy,
gratitude, and fright; and he speedily learns
that the alarmed occupant of the bearskin is
the cook of a Russian nobleman, who is no
other than our fascinating friend Aide-de-camp
General his Highness the Prince Dooyoumalsky.

The major is not so overwhelmed with this
intelligence as he would have been a few months
ago, having observed that nearly all his recent
acquaintances are princes, and anticipating that
he may be himself exalted to a kind of brevet-
rank in that direction by his approaching marriage.
Nevertheless, it has its effect; and a
Russian prince appears still a man of
consequence. The cook has been sent on before, to
consult with the chef of Madame the Princess
Ooleapeano Zika—in short, his, the major's,
own noble and matrimonial widow. Of course,
this alters the case entirely; and the major
devotes himself at once to the cook's rescue
with an energy and success which acquire for
him the eternal friendship and gratitude of
that great artist. They walk towards the
widow's chateau as fast as circumstances
and the bear-skin will permit. They have
not progressed very far upon their way, when
the usual shrill yelling that announces the
coming of a carriage drawn by post-horses in
Moldo-Wallachia is heard piercing the air