tion of the fair sex attributed her confinement to the true cause, and whispered that Miss Mac Gawly was "as ladies wished to be who love their lords."

Here was a solution to the mystery! It was now pretty easy to comprehend why Biddy was swathed like a mummy, and Roger so ready with his cash. No wonder the demoiselle was anxious to abridge delay, and the old crimp so obliging in procuring a priest and preparing all requisite matters for immediate hymeneals. What was to be done? What, but denounce the frail fair one, and annihilate that villain her father. Without a word of explanation I caught up my hat, and left the house in a hurry, and Mrs. O'Finn in a state of nervousness that threatened to become hysterical.

When I reached the quartermaster's habitation, I hastened to my own apartment, and got my traps together in double-quick. I intended to have abdicated quietly, and favoured the intended Mrs. O'Shaughnessy with an epistle communicating the reasons that induced me to decline the honour of her hand; but on the landing my worthy father-in-law cut off my retreat, and a parting tête-à-tête became unavoidable. He appeared in great spirits at the success of his interview with the parson.

"Well, Terence, I have done the business. The old chap made a parcel of objections; but he's poor as Lazarus - slily slipped him ten pounds, and that quieted his scruples. He's ready at a moment's warning."—"He's a useful person," I replied drily; " and all you want is a son-in-law."

"A what?" exclaimed the father of Miss Biddy. “A son-inlaw!"

"Why, what the devil do you mean?"-" Not a jot more or less than what I say. You have procured the priest, but I suspect the bridegroom will not be forthcoming."

Zounds, sir! do you mean to treat my daughter with disrespect?"—"Upon consideration, it would be hardly fair to deprive my old friend Hastings of his pupil. Why, with another week's private tuition Biddy might offer her services to Astley."

"Sir, if you mean to be impertinent," and Roger began to bluster, while the noise brought the footman to the hall, and Miss Biddy to the banisters shawled to the nose.' I began to lose temper. "Why, you infernal old crimp!". "You audacious young scoun

drel !"

--

"Oh, Jasus! gentlemen! Pace, for the sake of the blessed Mother!" cried the butler from below.

"Father, jewel! Terence, my only love!" screamed Miss Biddy, over the staircase. "What is the matter ?"-" He wants to be off!” roared the quartermaster.

66

Stop, Terence, or you'll have my life to answer for."—"Lord, Biddy, how fat you are grown!"

"You shall fulfil your promise," cried Roger, "or I'll write to the Horse Guards, and memorial the commander-in-chief."—" You may memorial your best friend, the devil, you old crimp!" and I forced my way to the hall.

"Come back, you deceiver!" exclaimed Miss Mac Gawly. "Arrah, Biddy, go tighten yourself," said I.

"Oh, I'm fainting!" screamed Roger's heiress.

"Don't let him out!" roared her sire.

The gentleman with the beefsteak collar made a demonstration to interrupt my retreat, and in return received a box on the ear that sent him half-way down the kitchen stairs.

There," I said, "give that to the old rogue, your master, with my best compliments," and bounding from the hall-door, Biddy Mac Gawly, like Lord Ullin's daughter, "was left lamenting!"

Well, there is no describing the rookawn* a blow-up like this, occasioned in a country town. I was unmercifully quizzed; but the quartermaster and his heiress found it advisable to abdicate. Roger removed his household gods to the metropolis-Miss Biddy favoured him in due time with a grandson; and when I returned from South America, I learned that "this lost love of mine" had accompanied a Welsh lieutenant to the hymeneal altar, who, not being "over-particular" about trifles, had obtained on the same morning a wife, an heir, and an estate-with Roger's blessing into the bargain.

REDDY O'DRYSCULL,

SCHOOLMASTER AT WATER-GRASS-HILL,

TO MR. BENTLEY, PUBLISHER.

SIR, I write to you concerning the late P.P. of this parishhis soul to glory! for, as Virgil says, and devil a doubt of it,Candidus insuetum miratur limen Olympi,

:

Sub pedibusque videt nubes et sidera pastor.

His RELIQUES, sir, in two volumes, have been sent down here from Dublin, for the use of my boys, by order of the National Education Board, with directions to cram the spalpeens all at once with such a power of knowledge that they may forget the hunger which plan, between you and me, (though I say it that oughtn't) is all sheer bladderum-skate: for, as Juvenal maintains, jejunus stomachus, &c. &c.—an empty bag won't stand; you must first fill it with praties. Give us a poor-law, sir, and, trust me, you will hear no more about Rock and repeal; no, nor of the rint, against which latter humbug the man of God set his face outright during his honest and honourable lifetime; for, sir, though he differed with Mr. Moore about Irish round towers, and a few French roundelays, in this they fully agreed.

As I understand, sir, that you are Publisher in ordinary to his Majesty, I intend from time to time conveying through you to the ear of royalty some desiderata curiosa Hybernia from the pen of the deceased; matters which remain penès me, in scriniis, to use the style of your great namesake. For the present, I merely send you a few classic scraps collected by Dr. Prout in some convent abroad; and, wishing every success to your Miscellany, am your humble servant, R. O'D.

THERE flourishes, I hear, in London, a Mr. HUDSON, whose reputation as a comic lyrist, it would seem, has firmly taken root in the great metropolis. Many are the laughter-compelling productions of his merry genius; but "Barney Brallaghan's Courtship" may be termed his opus magnum. It has been my lot to pick a few dry leaves from the laurel-wreath of Mr. Moore, who could well afford the loss: I know not whether I can meddle rightly after a similar fashion with Hudson's bay. Yet is there a strange coincidence of thought and expression, and even metre, between the following remnant of antiquity, and his never-sufficiently-to-be-encored song.

The original may be seen at Bobbio in the Apennines,—a Benedictine settlement, well known as the earliest asylum opened to learning after the fall of the Roman Empire. The Irish monk Colombanus had the merit of founding it, and it long remained tenanted by natives of Ireland. Among them it has been ascertained that DANTE lived for some time, and composed Latin verses; but I cannot recognise any trace of his stern phraseology in the ballad. It appears rather the production of some rustic of the Augustan age; perhaps one of Horace's ploughmen. It is addressed to a certain Julia Callapygé, (Kahn,) a name which (for shortness I suppose) the rural poet contracts into Julia "CALLAGE." I have diligently compared it with the vulgate version, as sung by Fitzwilliam at the Freemasons' Tavern; and little doubt can remain of its identity and authenticity. P. P.

THE SABINE FARMER'S SERENADE;

BEING A NEWLY RECOVERED FRAGMENT OF A LATIN OPERA.

**Our Water-grass-hill correspondent will find scattered throughout our pages the other fragments of the defunct Padre which he has placed at our disposal. Every chip from so brilliant an old block may be said to possess a lustre peculiarly its own; hence we have not feared to disperse them up and down our miscellany. They are gems of the purest whiskey."-Edit.