by again sinking into repose.

"That dog's a philosopher," I said; "He never says a word more than is
necessary:--then, again, not only blest in love and friendship, and my dog;
but what luck it was to sell, and in these times too, that old, lumbering
house of my father's, with its bleak, bare, hilly acres of chalk and
stone, fat eighty thousand pounds, and to have the money paid down, on the
very day the bargain was concluded. By the by, though, I had forgot:--I
may as well write to Messrs. Drax and Drayton about that money, and order
them to pay it immediately to Coutts's,--mighty honest people and all that:
but faith, no solicitors should be trusted or tempted too far. It's a
foolish way, at any time, to leave money in other people's hands--in
anybody's hands--and I'll write about it at once."

As I said, so I did. I wrote my commands Messrs. Drax and Drayton, to pay
my eighty thousand pounds into Coutts's; and after desiring that my note
might be forwarded to them, the first thing in the morning, I took my
candle, and accompanied by Neptune, who always keeps watch by night at my
chamber door, proceeded to bed, as the watchman was calling "past twelve
o'clock," beneath my window.

_Blackwood's Magazine_.

* * * * *


TO THE LADY BIRD.


"Lady Bird! Lady Bird! fly away home"--