to the Pole, and is to be met with in every possible variety, from
the Napoleon blue silk of the London exquisite, to the coarse red or
green cotton of the Turkish rayah. Throughout the Continent it forms
the peaceful armament of the peasant, and no more curious sight can
be imagined than the wide, uncovered market-place of some quaint old
German town during a heavy shower, when every industrial covers
himself or herself with the aegis of a portable tent, and a bright
array of brass ferrules and canopies of all conceivable hues which
cotton can be made to assume, without losing its one quality of "fast
colour," flash on the spectator's vision.

The advantages of the Umbrella being thus recognised, it must be
confessed that it has hitherto been treated in a most ungrateful and
step-motherly fashion. We fly to the Umbrella when the sky is
overcast--it affords us shelter in the hour of need--and the service
is forgotten as soon as the necessity is relieved. We make abominable
jokes upon the Umbrella; we borrow it without compunction from any
confiding friend, though with the full intention of never returning
it--in fact, it has often been a matter of surprise to us that any
one ever does buy an Umbrella, for where can the old Umbrellas go to?
Although that question has often been asked concerning the fate of
pins, the fact as regards the former, looking at their size, is more
curious--and yet, for all that, we treat it with shameful neglect, as
if ashamed of a crime we have committed and anxious to conceal the
evidences of our guilt.

Let us then strive to afford such reparation as in our power lies,
by giving a slight description of THE UMBRELLA AND ITS HISTORY,
making up for any deficiencies of our pen by the assistance of the
artist's pencil.