their rear marches a battalion of schoolboys, ranged in crooked and
irregular platoons, shouldering sticks, thumping a harsh and unripe
clatter from an instrument of tin, and ridiculously aping the intricate
manoeuvres of the foremost band. Nevertheless, as slight differences are
scarcely perceptible from a churchspire, one might be tempted to ask,
"Which are the boys?" or, rather, "Which the men?" But, leaving these,
let us turn to the third procession, which, though sadder in outward
show, may excite identical reflections in the thoughtful mind. It is a
funeral. A hearse, drawn by a black and bony steed, and covered by a
dusty pall; two or three coaches rumbling over the stones, their drivers
half asleep; a dozen couple of careless mourners in their every-day
attire; such was not the fashion of our fathers, when they carried a
friend to his grave. There is now no doleful clang of the bell to
proclaim sorrow to the town. Was the King of Terrors more awful in those
days than in our own, that wisdom and philosophy have been able to
produce this change? Not so. Here is a proof that he retains his proper
majesty. The military men, and the military boys, are wheeling round the
corner, and meet the funeral full in the face. Immediately the drum is
silent, all but the tap that regulates each simultaneous footfall. The
soldiers yield the path to the dusty hearse and unpretending train, and
the children quit their ranks, and cluster on the sidewalks, with
timorous and instinctive curiosity. The mourners enter the churchyard at
the base of the steeple, and pause by an open grave among the burial-
stones; the lightning glimmers on them as they lower down the coffin, and
the thunder rattles heavily while they throw the earth upon its lid.
Verily, the shower is near, and I tremble for the young man and the
girls, who have now disappeared from the long and shady street.

How various are the situations of the people covered by the roofs beneath
me, and how diversified are the events at this moment befalling them; The