iligant thing to put two balls into the pistle instid o' one, and give the masther a chance over the 'torney ?"

"Oh, you murdherous villain !"

"Arrah, why shouldn't the masther have a chance over him? sure he has childre, and "Torney Murphy has none."

"At that rate, Andy, I suppose you'd give the master a ball additional for every child he has, and that would make eight. So, you might as well give him a blunderbuss and slugs at once."

Dick locked the pistol-case, having made all right; and desired Andy to mount a horse, carry it by a back road out of the domain, and wait at a certain gate he named until he should be joined there by himself and the squire, who proceeded at the appointed time to the ground.

Andy was all ready, and followed his master and Dick with great pride, bearing the pistol-case after them to the ground, where Murphy and Tom Durfy were ready to receive them, and a great number of spectators were assembled, for the noise of the business had gone abroad, and the ground was in consequence crowded.

Tom Durfy had warned Murtough Murphy, who had no experience as a pistol-man, that the squire was a capital shot, and that his only chance was to fire as quickly as he could." Slap at him, Morty, my boy, the minute you get the word; and, if you don't hit him itself, it will prevent his dwelling on his aim."

Tom Durfy and Dick the Devil soon settled the preliminaries of the ground and mode of firing; and twelve paces having been marked, both the seconds opened their pistol-cases, and prepared to load. Andy was close to Dick all the time, kneeling beside the pistol-case, which lay on the sod; and, as Dick turned round to settle some other point on which Tom Durfy questioned him, Andy thought he might snatch the opportunity of giving his master "the chance" he suggested to his second." Sure, if Misther Dick wouldn't like to do it, that's no raison I wouldn't," said Andy to himself; "and, by the powers! I'll pop in a ball onknownst to him." And, sure enough, Andy contrived, while the seconds were engaged with each other, to put a ball into each pistol before the barrel was loaded with powder, so that, when Dick took up his pistols to load, a bullet lay between the powder and the touch-hole. Now this must have been discovered by Dick, had he been cool; but he and Tom Durfy had wrangled very much about the point they had been discussing, and Dick, at no time the quietest person in the world, was in such a rage, that the pistols were loaded by him without noticing Andy's ingenious interference, and he handed a harmless weapon to his brother-in-law when he placed him on his ground.

The word was given. Murtough, following his friend's advice, fired instantly bang he went, while the squire returned but a flash in the pan. He turned a look of reproach upon Dick, who took the pistol silently from him, and handed him the other, having carefully looked to the priming, after the accident which happened to the first.

Durfy handed his man another pistol also; and, before he left his side, said in a whisper, "Don't forget; have the first fire."

Again the word was given: Murphy blazed away a rapid and harmless shot; for his hurry was the squire's safety, while Andy's murderous intentions were his salvation.

"D-n the pistol!" said the squire, throwing it down in a rage. Dick took it up with manifest indignation, and d-d the powder. "Your powder's damp, Ned."

"No, it's not," said the squire; "it's you who have bungled the loading."

"Me!" said Dick, with a look of mingled rage and astonishment: "I bungle the loading of pistols !-I, that have stepped more ground and arranged more affairs than any man in the county!-Arrah, be aisy, Ned !"

Tom Durfy now interfered, and said, for the present it was no matter, as, on the part of his friend, he begged to express himself satisfied.

"But it's very hard we're not to have a shot," said Dick, poking the touch-hole of the pistol with a pricker which he had just taken from the case which Andy was holding before him.

"Why, my dear Dick," said Durfy, "as Murphy has had two shots, and the squire has not had the return of either, he declares he will not fire at him again; and, under these circumstances, I must take my man off the ground."

"Very well," said Dick, still poking the touch-hole, and examining the point of the pricker as he withdrew it.

"And now Murphy wants to know, since the affair is all over and his honour satisfied, what was your brother-in-law's motive in assaulting him this morning, for he himself cannot conceive a cause for it."

"Oh, be aisy, Tom."

"Pon my soul, it's true."

"Why, he sent him a blister,-a regular apothecary's blister,instead of some law-process, by way of a joke, and Ned wouldn't

stand it."

Durfy held a moment's conversation with Murphy, who now advanced to the squire, and begged to assure him there must be some mistake in the business, for that he had never committed the impertinence of which he was accused.

"All I know is," said the squire, "that I got a blister, which my messenger said you gave him."

"By virtue of my oath, squire, I never did it! I gave Andy an enclosure of the law-process."

"Then it's some mistake that vagabond has made," said the squire. "Come here, you sir !" he shouted to Andy, who was trembling under the angry eye of Dick the Devil, who, having detected a bit of lead on the point of the pricker, guessed in a moment Andy had been at work; and the unfortunate rascal had a misgiving that he had made some blunder, from the furious look of Dick.

"Why don't you come here when I call you?" said the squire. -Andy laid down the pistol-case, and sneaked up to the squire.— "What did you do with the letter Mr. Murphy gave you for me yesterday ?"

"I brought it to your honour."

"No, you didn't," said Murphy. "You've made some mistake." "Divil a mistake I made," answered Andy very stoutly; "I wint home the minit you gev it to me."

"Did you go home direct from my house to the squire's ?"

"Yis, sir, I did: I wint direct home, and called at Mr. M'Garry's by the way for some physic for the childre."

"That's it!" said Murtough; "he changed my enclosure for a blister there; and if M'Garry has only had the luck to send the bit o' parchment to O'Grady, it will be the best joke I've heard this month of Sundays."

"He did! he did!" shouted Tom Durfy; " for don't you remember how O'Grady was after M'Garry this morning."

"Sure enough," said Murtough, enjoying the double mistake. "By dad! Andy, you've made a mistake this time that I'll forgive you.”

"By the powers o' war!" roared Dick the Devil, "I won't forgive him what he did now, though! What do you think?” said he, holding out the pistols, and growing crimson with rage: "may I never fire another shot if he hasn't crammed a brace of bullets down the pistols before I loaded them: so, no wonder you burned prime, Ned." There was a universal laugh at Dick's expense, whose pride in being considered the most accomplished regulator of the duello was well known.

"Oh, Dick, Dick! you're a pretty second!" was shouted by all. Dick, stung by the laughter, and feeling keenly the ridiculous position in which he was placed, made a rush at Andy, who, seeing the storm brewing, gradually sneaked away from the group, and, when he perceived the sudden movement of Dick the Devil, took to his heels, with Dick after him.

"Hurra!" cried Murphy; a race a race! I'll bet on Andyfive pounds on Andy."

"Done!" said the squire; "I'll back Dick the Divil.”

"Tare an' ouns!" roared Murphy; "how Andy runs! Fear's a fine spur."

"So is rage," said the squire.

you double the bet?"

"Done!" said Murphy.

"Dick's hot-foot after him. Will

The infection of betting caught the bystanders, and various gages were thrown down and taken up upon the speed of the runners, who were getting rapidly into the distance, flying over hedge and ditch with surprising velocity, and, from the level nature of the ground, an extensive view could not be obtained; therefore Tom Durfy, the steeple-chaser, cried "Mount, mount! or we'll lose the fun into our saddles, and after them!"

Those who had steeds took the hint, and a numerous field of horsemen joined in the chase of Handy Andy and Dick the Devil, who still maintained great speed. The horsemen made for a neighbouring hill, whence they could command a wider view; and the betting went on briskly, varying according to the vicissitudes of the race. "Two to one on Dick-he's closing."

"Done!-Andy will wind him yet.'

"Well done!—there's a leap! Hurra!-Dick's down! Well done, Dick-up again, and going."

"Mind the next quickset hedge-that's a rasper; it's a wide gripe, and the hedge is as thick as a wall-Andy 'll stick in it.-Mind him!-Well leap'd, by the powers!-Ha! he's sticking in the hedge -Dick'll catch him now.-No, by jingo! he has pushed his way through-there he 's going again at the other side.-Ha! ha ha!

ha! look at him-he's in tatthers!-he has left half of his breeches

in the hedge."

"Dick is over now.-Hurra!-he has lost the skirt of his coatAndy is gaining on him.-Two to one on Andy!"

"Down he goes!" was shouted, as Andy's foot slipped in making a dash at another ditch, into which he went head over heels, and Dick followed fast, and disappeared after him.

"Ride! ride!" shouted Tom Durfy, and the horsemen put their spurs in the flanks of their steeds, and were soon up to the scene of action. There was Andy roaring murder, rolling over and over in the muddy bottom of a deep ditch, with Dick fastened on him, pummelling away most unmercifully, but not able to kill him altogether for want of breath.

The horsemen, in a universal screech of laughter, dismounted, and disengaged the unfortunate Andy from the fangs of Dick the Devil, who was dragged from out of the ditch much more like a scavenger than a gentleman.

The moment Andy got loose, away he ran again, and never cried stop till he earthed himself under his mother's bed in the parent cabin.

The squire and Murtough Murphy shook hands, and parted friends in half an hour after they had met as foes; and even Dick contrived to forget his annoyance in an extra stoup of claret that day after dinner, filling more than one bumper in drinking confusion to Handy Andy, which seemed a rather unnecessary malediction.

INTRODUCTION TO THE BIOGRAPHY OF MY AUNT JEMIMA, THE POLITICAL ECONOMIST.

BY FRIDOLIN.

PRELIMINARY DISQUISITION ON HUMAN GREATNESS, TOUCHING UPON THE TRUE PHILOSOPHY OF THE MATTER.

"SOME men are born great, some acquire greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them."

Thus read my aunt Jemima, and thus subsequently read I, in the days of our respective and respectable minorities; but with this difference- uncertain whether GREATNESS had not already clandestinely made its avatar into me at my birth, or whether it was destined hereafter to yield coyly to my wooing, or would force me in future years to cry in vain humility, "Nolo magnificari." I always felt confident of eminence; whereas my aunt Jemima often feelingly reverted to the misery of her young maidenly thoughts, when brooding over the certainty that she could never, under any circumstances, become a 66 great man."

"Great women" were unknown in her early days. There were no such things; save and except such as might be seen at St. Bartholomew's fair at inexpensive cost,-giantesses, who lowered themselves to gain a living by their height. But my aunt Jemima valued not such feminine greatness as theirs. Her aspiring spirit looked not “to measures, but to men." Our notions change!

It is very melancholy, and rather inconvenient, to drag through the last and heaviest stage of life a martyr to a marvel.

Horace, who forbids all wise men to wonder, himself exhibited a thriftless want of economy in the expenditure of his own wonder when he marvelled, in excellent metre, that any man should eat garlic who had not murdered his father; and also, that any mortal should have dared to venture on the sea before the discovery of Kyan's antidry-rot patent.

Nor can I much sympathise in the great marvel of that renowned French statesman, of esculent memory, who professed himself unable to discover any principle in nature, or in philosophy, that could explain how a certain Duke of Thuringia, passing through Strasburg on a diplomatic mission, should not have stopped to dine, en hate, de foie gras. As for the "three, yea four," curious problems of olden time, which consumed the wise king with their inexplicability, they are as clear to modern apprehensions as plate-glass: nay, as my aunt Jemima used to observe, in the days when glory and greatness had come upon her," Thanks be praised!" (My aunt was a religious woman, and guarded herself from profane expressions.)—“Thanks be praised! owing to the enlightenment of the age in which we live, even in those seven wonders of the world there is nothing so very wonderful now." There can be no objection on my part to allow that eclipses were pretty marvellous transactions as long as they occurred in consequence of a bilious dragon needing a pill, and bolting the sun to correct digestion; but ever since dragons have adopted a differ