beautifully with the fitful and lurid gleams and gushes of black
vapor that flashed and eddied from the volumes of Lord Byron. As
for Tom Moore, some of his songs diffused an odor like a burning
pastil.

I felt particular interest in watching the combustion of American
authors, and scrupulously noted by my watch the precise number of
moments that changed most of them from shabbily printed books to
indistinguishable ashes. It would be invidious, however, if not
perilous, to betray these awful secrets; so that I shall content
myself with observing that it was not invariably the writer most
frequent in the public mouth that made the most splendid appearance
in the bonfire. I especially remember that a great deal of
excellent inflammability was exhibited in a thin volume of poems by
Ellery Channing; although, to speak the truth, there were certain
portions that hissed and spluttered in a very disagreeable fashion.
A curious phenomenon occurred in reference to several writers,
native as well as foreign. Their books, though of highly
respectable figure, instead of bursting into a blaze or even
smouldering out their substance in smoke, suddenly melted away in a
manner that proved them to be ice.

If it be no lack of modesty to mention my own works, it must here be
confessed that I looked for them with fatherly interest, but in
vain. Too probably they were changed to vapor by the first action
of the heat; at best, I can only hope that, in their quiet way, they
contributed a glimmering spark or two to the splendor of the
evening.

"Alas! and woe is me!" thus bemoaned himself a heavy-looking