cause of it is said to be the pretensions of both to the beautiful
Duchesse de P--, who, if report be true, cares for neither of the
gallants, but lavishes her favours upon a certain attache to the English
embassy."

"Such," thought I, "are the materials for all human histories. Every one
who reads, will eagerly swallow this account as true: if an author were
writing the memoirs of the court, he would compile his facts and scandal
from this very collection of records; and yet, though so near the truth,
how totally false it is! Thank Heaven, however, that, at least, I am not
suspected of the degradation of the duchesse's love:--to fight for her
may make me seem a fool--to be loved by her would constitute me a
villain."

The next passage in that collection of scandal which struck me was--"We
understand that E. W. Howard de Howard, Esq., Secretary, is shortly to
lead to the hymeneal altar the daughter of Timothy Tomkins, Esq., late
Consul of--." I quite started out of my bath with delight. I scarcely
suffered myself to be dried and perfumed, before I sat down to write the
following congratulatory epistle to the thin man:--

"My dear Mr. Howard de Howard,

"Permit me, before I leave Paris, to compliment you upon that happiness
which I have just learnt is in store for you. Marriage to a man like you,
who has survived the vanities of the world--who has attained that prudent
age when the passions are calmed into reason, and the purer refinements
of friendship succeed to the turbulent delirium of the senses--marriage,
my dear Mr. Howard, to a man like you, must, indeed, be a most delicious
Utopia. After all the mortifications you may meet elsewhere, whether from