be hereafter in respect to the theatre, she answered with all the firmness of a philosopher, but with all the gentleness of her sex, and peculiarly sweet character, "No cousin, I hope you will

excuse me."

"No! why not?" and both the ladies fixed their eyes in astonishment upon her.

"I hope my aunt, and you, cousin, will permit me to remain at home this evening, and not even ask why?" Again she felt unequal to her task, and wished to avoid explanation.

"You may do as you please, certainly. But why not see the play? The Wheel of Fortune is an unceptionable comedy." "I have read it, and many by the same author. Mr. Čumberland has been characterized by Goldsmith as the Terence of England, the mender of hearts;' but I do not think his plays unexceptionable. There are many objectionable passages; and in all his works he is an advocate for the absurd and unchristian practice of duelling."

"O my Emma, you are a little prude," said Mrs. Spiffard; and rising, she took a seat nearer Emma, accompanying her words with a playful tap on the cheek.

"I hope not, Cousin," said the blushing girl.

"I can't see what objection you can have to seeing your cousin's scenes," snuffled Mrs. Epsom.

"Will not my dear aunt permit me to remain at home?"

"You grow more and more opposed to the theatre, I think,” was the reply; "and with your voice and figure, it is exactly the line of life you ought to choose, and I have told you so again and again."

"But you have also told me, dear aunt, that you would have me consult my own happiness. My needle, and my habits of industry place me above the dread of want; and I have no ambition to display my voice or figure."

"And then," continued the aunt, "what an advantage to have the instruction of your cousin and myself."

"But Emma," added Mrs. Spiffard, "would feel herself degraded by treading the stage." This was said with some asperity-perhaps from consciousness.

“Oh,” exclaimed Emma, her beautiful cheeks glowing with additional colour, "Oh, how I have dreaded and wished to avoid this subject! But I find that in this as in every thing else, an honest, plain avowal of the truth, is the best mode of overcoming difficulties."

"I beg your pardon, my dear," said Mrs. Spiffard, earnestly and tenderly. "I did not mean to hurt your feelings, or

reproach you for differing from us in opinion. My education has been very unlike yours;" and she sighed. "But you had better go with us-perhaps you will be very lonely here. Take your book, as you have before done, and sit in our room, if you will not go in front and see the play."

"Unless for some very particular reason, cousin," said Em- ́ ma, firmly, "I will never again enter the walls of that theatre." Heyday! what have we now !" exclaimed the aunt.

Emma, then, with simplicity, related the insult she had received, and the fright she had experienced. She narrated the occurrence, not as we have described it (we, to whom all things are known,) but as it appeared to her. She apologized for letting so many hours pass without mentioning the circumstance. She expressed her deep feeling of the insult offered to her from some one evidently acquainted with the house, and, as she could not but suppose, feeling at home in it. She expressed strongly her gratitude to her protector, and added, “It is not the fear of personal injury that has made me come to this resolution, but a sense of what is due to you and to myself; to you, my aunt and cousin, as protectors of my orphan state; to myself, as one depending for future prosperity and usefulness on present conduct. I ought, as the subject is now unavoidably brought into discussion, to add that it is not alone the event I have recounted to you that has caused my determination, but the improper words I have, at various times, been obliged to hear in passing and repassing to your apartment in the theatre, and the improper conduct I have been forced to witness. With you-in your company, I am protected from insult, and see, at least, the appearance of decency among the people called supernumeraries, and others, who, when unrestrained by the presence of their superiors or employers, are not governed by laws or feelings which render them proper persons for a young and unprotected female to be placed so near, as to be within hearing of their jests and ribaldry. You cannot be always with me-your duty calls you before the public-and my appearance does not command respect from the ignorant, or shield my conduct from the suspicions or the censures of the libertine. My pleasure is in retirement. The gay frequenters of the boxes-or the glittering decorations of the proscenium of the theatre, give me, of late, no delight; I am isolated among the auditors; and the scenes which appear to please them, too often disgust me. If such is my situation in front of the curtain, behind it I feel that I am exposed to insult except in your immediate presence. The gentlemen and ladies of the theatre are engaged in their

respective duties; and are, for the most part, unknown to me. That I may be subjected to calumny is but too apparent, while placed so nearly in contact with vulgar indelicacy-not to say indecency. I hope my good aunt and cousin will yield to me in this, and not attribute my refusal to visit the theatre (except on occasions when duty to them requires) to false delicacy or any improper motive.”

Her "good aunt" sat petrified during this address. She had never heard any thing like it from female mouth before, and thought the girl "possessed.” Mrs. Spiffard's countenance had varied as Emma spoke. As she looked at her animated face, her own dark eyes sparkled as she listened to the accents of truth, purity, and feeling, she thought of the innocence of childhood, and the train of events which had since occurred and changed her to that which she knew herself now to be.

When Emma ceased to speak, her cousin dismissed these remembrances of former days and subsequent events-she felt as if she would willingly be in union with the holiness of the beautiful object before her, and at the same time be its prop. All her better self filled her bosom and glowed in her countenance, as she exlaimed, "I will never ascribe any of my Emma's actions to an improper motive!" and she kissed the girl with enthusiasm, while tears of affection dimmed the lustre of her eyes-but the jewel, which nature has bestowed on all her children, shone with its native radiance through those healing tears.

"I don't know what is the matter with me this morning," said Mrs. Epsom. "I have not felt well since breakfast," and she went to a closet, and mixing something in a tumbler applied to it as a medicine.

Before the good lady had taken the emptied glass from her mouth, Spiffard entered-in that frame of mind which the reader may imagine to have been the result of the conversation and inuendos heard in the park, the ramble with Cooke, and the soliloquy which followed; all of which we have made the world duly acquainted with.

The first thing that caught his sight was the tumbler at the mouth of Mrs. Epsom. His eye was fixed upon it, and upon the old lady, with an expression, the description of which, words cannot convey. All the terrific images which he had been combatting rushed again triumphantly upon his imagination. His lips were compressed-he was fixed to the spotand the eyes of his wife and her mother were fixed upon him.

The latter turned away, put by the tumbler, and resumed her seat with great and dignified composure.

Spiffard turned his eye to his wife with a look of inquiry. "What's the matter, Mr. Spiffard?" she asked.

"The matter? nothing-I-I have had a long walk with Mr. Cooke-I-I am a little fatigued." And he sat down. His feelings approached to that sickness which occasions total prostration of bodily power-some times called heart-sickness. "I hope," said Mrs. Spiffard, "that the old gentleman was gay and agreeable. He was not very clear at rehearsal, and cut it rather short, leaving the prompter to supply his place. I am afraid he has been busier with his bottle than his book." This was spoken in a forced manner, and to hide the feelings occasioned by the previous scene.

"What a pity it is," said Emma, who had now resumed her secluded seat by the window, "that a man of such talents should be a slave to such a debasing vice."

"It is a great pity," said the old lady, with a most hypocritical sigh, as she took a huge pinch of Irish blackguard.

“It is damnable," cried Spiffard, with a tone and look which was as new to his auditory as it was unaccountable from any thing that had occurred since his appearance among them.

It is thus that we bring into new scenes and companies the feelings acquired elsewhere-and which are discordant, and sometimes irritating, to those of the persons we approach; and thus we, by our ill temper, mar the social harmony of our friends. How is this to be avoided? By repressing our selfish sensations, and adapting ourselves to those we mingle with.

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Perfectly damnable," he continued. "How can rational creatures be reconciled to the infamy which must attend so loathsome a habit, even if they do not dread the misery that precedes the death they purchase by their folly? We do not sufficiently show our detestation of the practice in men, but even the most thoughtless are shocked when they see it in a woman:" and he looked at Mrs. Epsom, not unobserved by his wife.

"Indeed, Mr. Spiffard, you take the matter up too seriously, and speak too severely," she said. "A little stimulus is necessary, absolutely necessary after, and sometimes during the exertions our profession demands."

"I deny the necessity, madam. If it exists, the profession ought to be abandoned. This stimulating, when often repeated, becomes a habit. The practitioner from a little goes to more, until the stomach becomes vitiated, and the appetite depraved. Then the time inevitably comes, when to refrain appears worse

than death; worse than the worst of deaths; a death of madness and remorse! unless some friendly hand, or blessed circumstance, snatches the victim from destruction."

"I believe there is much truth in what you say," said his wife ; "but I do not see what has occasioned your great warmth on the subject at this moment. Before you came in, we were engaged in a very interesting discussion-one in which you will take part; and I must make an appeal to you. What do you (think? our little Emma has determined never to enter within the walls of the theatre; and I can assure you that she has delivered her determination with an emphasis and manner-not to say discretion-which has convinced me that she would be the ornament of any stage in the world. But she abjures playhouses in toto-at least all behind the curtain, if not both boxes and stage."

"She is right!" said Spiffard, emphatically; "the stage! no! she is right!"

"Right?" exclaimed the two actresses.

"Yes, right. She is innocent she is pure-she is unsophisticated and uncontaminated: and to remain so let her hold to her determination."

"Thank you, sir," said his wife, and her eyes flashed their lightnings, and then were overclouded by the dark black desIcending brow; while her previously flushed cheek blanched. My mother and myself are indebted to you!"

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“The husband was silent. His silence was not that of one who has said that which was wrong or untrue. He looked firmly in the eyes of his wife, as if to read his destiny there.

Emma felt as if she was the cause of this threatening silence -the stillness which precedes the thunder's crash--and she wished to conduct, harmless, the lightnings of the gathering storm. She lifted her sunny eyes as she spoke, and fixed them upon Mrs. Spiffard.

“Nay, cousin, Mr. Spiffard knows, as we all do, that many, very many ladies, exemplary for virtues, as well as conspicuous for talents and acquirements, have not only frequented the theatre, but trod the stage. Ladies, who have adorned real life by their good conduct, their prudence, and their charity, as splendidly as they did the stage by their accomplishments and genius. I need not go to a foreign land for examples, when I can name so many at home--and when I know and feel the purity and virtues of my kind and good cousin."

This was spoken by the charming girl with the full confidence of truth, for such was her conviction. But the words