one daughter whom he tenderly loved. They lived together in total seclusion, yet undisturbed in their solitude, since it was well known that they had no riches. But one night, it might be about this hour, a low knock was heard at the cottage-door-" "Holy Virgin! What noise was that? The Saints protect us! A footstep on the stairs!" " Fear nothing," said the princess, who felt that the entrance of Giacomo's ghost could hardly fail to better their situation. "We are like the old man and his daughter, too poor to rob." But the old woman sunk back in her chair, devoutly crossing herself, a thousand stories of Italian banditti and midnight murderers rushing upon her imagination. There was a knock at the door; another. "Come in," said the clear youthful voice of the princess. 'By the soul of Peter the Great!" cried Kathinka, "the child is distracted! Holy St. Nicholas, protect us! Sweet St. Sergius be our aid!"

But at the inviting sound the door turned on its hinges, and a young military man, with a dark, Italian countenance, though wearing the Russian uniform, entered the room. He looked round him with an appearance of surprise and sadness; then advancing with an air of profound respect, knelt at the feet of the princess. "Let me," said he, "be the first to do homage to the rightful empress of all the Russias!" The young girl drew up her slight form to its fullest height, while a crimson blush overspread her cheek, and fixed her clear, calm eye upon the intruder. "Illustrious and unfortunate scion of a noble house! last branch of a royal race! Is it thus I find thee?" "Pardon this intrusion, madam, and at this late hour. My purpose, the necessity for secresy and for dispatch, all must plead my apology."

With these words, and before the princess had time to express ber doubts or her astonishment, the young officer put a paper into her hands, signed by almost all the grandees of Russia. At the head of the list was the name of Count Alexis Orloff. The princess hastily read the contents, then stood bewildered and uncertain. The undersigned declared that, disgusted with the tyranny and ingratitude of the reigning empress, they bound themselves by a solemn vow to place upon the throne the legitimate successor of the Empress Elizabeth, the grand-daughter of Peter the Great; and swore henceforth to acknowledge and obey her as their only

lawful sovereign. The old nurse fell upon her knees, and kissing the hand of the orphan, ejaculated a prayer of thankfulness to heaven. Two hours were spent in deliberation with the emissary of Orloff, afterwards known as the Chevalier de Ribas, and the next day joy and hope illumined that sombre dwelling.

The chevalier, with every appearance of delicacy, persuaded the future empress to accept a small sum for present necessities: the first was a good breakfast, the next an addition to her wardrobe. A commodious house in the environs was next procured; and two days after, while the whole yet seemed as a shadow and surprising dream, Alexis Orloff arrived in Rome, and presented himself to the princess. He was welcomed by her as a friend and benefactor; by Kathinka, as a guardian angel; and he soon found that he had little to fear from the penetration of either.

(To be concluded.)

BURKE'S IDEA OF A WIFE.

The great statesman, Burke, was often heard to declare that every care vanished the moment he entered under his own roof. In this declaration how great an eulogium is passed on the wife, whose amiability and propriety of conduct called forth such an expression. On one of the anniversary mornings of their marriage, the politician, laying aside the cares of state, presented Mrs. B. with the following beautifully written paper, describing his idea of a perfect wife. He delicately headed it as below, leaving Mrs. B, to fill up the blank :

THE CHARACTER OF

"I intend to give my idea of a woman; if it at all answers any original, I shall be pleased; for if such a person as I would describe really exists, she must be far superior to my description, and such as I must love too well to be able to paint as I ought. She is handsome: but it is a beauty not arising from features, from complexion, or from shape; she has all three in an high degree, but it is not by these she touches the heart; it is all that sweetness of temper, benevolence, innocence, and sensibility, which a face can express,

that forms her beauty. She has a face that just raises your attention at first sight; it grows on you every moment, and you wonder it did not more than raise your attention at first. Her eyes have a mild light, but they awe you when she pleases; they command, like a good man out of office, not by authority, but by virtue. Her features are not perfectly regular; that sort of exactness is more to be praised than to be loved; for it is never animated. Her stature is not tall: she is made to be the admiration of every body, but the happiness of one. She has all she firmness that does not exclude delicacy: she has all the softness that does not imply weakness. There is often more of the coquette shown in an affected plainness than in a tawdry finery; she is always clean, without preciseness or affectation. Her gravity is a gentle thoughtfulness that softens the features without discomposing them; she is usually grave. Her smiles are inexpressible. Her voice is a low, soft music; not formed to rule in public assemblies, but to charm those who can distinguish a company from a crowd; it has this advantage, you must come close to her to hear it. To describe her body describes her mind; one is the transcript of the other. Her understanding is not shown in the variety of matters it exerts itself on, but in the goodness of the choice she makes. She does not display it so much in saying or doing striking things, as in avoiding such as she ought not to say or do. She discovers the right and wrong of things not by reasoning, but by sagacity; most women, and many good ones, have a closeness and something selfish in their dispositions: she has a true generosity of temper; the most extravagant cannot be more unbounded in their liberality, the most covetous not more cautious in the distribution. No person of so few years can know the world better; no person was ever less corrupted by that knowledge. Her politeness seems rather to flow from a natural disposition to oblige, than from any rules on that subject; and therefore never fails to strike those who understand good breeding and those who do not. does not run with a girlish eagerness into new friendships, which, as they have no foundation in reason, serve only to multiply and embitter disputes; it is long before she chooses, but then it is fixed for ever; and the first hours of romantic friendships are not warmer than her's after the lapse of

She

years. As she never disgraces her good nature by severe reflections on any body, so she never degrades her judgment by immoderate or ill-placed praises; for every thing violent is contrary to her gentleness of disposition, and the evenness of her virtue. She has a steady and firm mind, which takes no more from the female character, than the solidity of marble does from its polish and lustre. She has such virtues as make us value the truly great of our own sex; she has all the winning graces that make us love even the faults we see in the weak and beautiful of her's."

TRE FAIRY OF THE FLOWERS.

I am the spirit that dwells in the flower,
Mine is the exquisite music that flies,

When silence and moonlight and reign over each bower,
That blooms in the glory of tropical skies!

I woo the bird with his melody glowing

To leap in the sunshine, and warble its strain,
And mine is the odour, in turn, that bestowing:
The songster is paid for his music again.

There dwells no sorrow where I am biding;
Care is a stranger, and troubles us not:

And the winds, as they pass, when too hastily riding,
I woo, aud they tenderly glide o'er the spot.
They pause, and we glow in their rugged embraces,
They drink our warm breath, rich with odour and song,
Then hurry away to their desolate places,

And look for us hourly, and think of us long.
Who of the dull earth that's moving around us,
Would ever imagine, that, nursed in a rose,
At the opening of spring, our destiny found us,
A prisoner until the first bud should unclose;
Then, as the dawn of light breaks upon us,

Our winglets of silk we unfold to the air, And leap off in joy to the music that won us,

And made us the tenants of climates so fair!*

*For this poem we are indebted to the Gallery of Fine Arts, as well as for the plate illustrating it, which is copied from the large print in that beautiful work.

BY J. S. BUCKINGHAM, LATE M.P.

From my first entry into Bagdad, I was surprised to find the Turkish language much more generally spoken and understood than the Arabic, notwithstanding that this city is more surrounded by Arabs on all sides, than either Damascus, Aleppo, or Mousul, in each of which Arabic is the prevailing tongue. The Turkish spoken here is said, however, to be so corrupt, both in idiom and pronunciation, that a native of Constantinople is always shocked at its utterance, and on his first arrival finds it almost unintel igible. I had sufficient evidence myself of the Arabic being very bad, taking that of Cairo, of Mecca, and of the Yemen, as standards of purity in pronunciation; for scarcely any thing more harsh in sound, or more barbarous in construction and the use of foreign words, can be conceived, than the dialect of Bagdad. Turkish, Persian, Koord, and even Indian expressions, disfigure their sentences; and such Arabic words as are used, are scarcely to be recognized on a first hearing, from the corrupted manner in which they are spoken.

L. 38, 1.

B