daughter and her mother. Sextons and undertakers are the cheerfullest
people in the world at home, as comedians and circus-clowns are the
most melancholy in their domestic circle.

As our old boarding-house is still in existence, I do not feel at
liberty to give too minute a statement of the present condition of each
and all of its inmates. I am happy to say, however, that they are all
alive and well, up to this time. That kind old gentleman who sat
opposite to me is growing older, as old men will, but still smiles
benignantly on all the boarders, and has come to be a kind of father to
all of them,--so that on his birthday there is always something like a
family festival. The Poor Relation, even, has warmed into a filial
feeling towards him, and on his last birthday made him a beautiful
present, namely, a very handsomely bound copy of Blair's celebrated
poem, "The Grave."

The young man John is still, as he says, "in fust-rate fettle." I saw
him spar, not long since, at a private exhibition, and do himself great
credit in a set-to with Henry Finnegass, Esq., a professional gentleman
of celebrity. I am pleased to say that he has been promoted to an upper
clerkship, and, in consequence of his rise in office, has taken an
apartment somewhat lower down than number "forty-'leven," as he
facetiously called his attic. Whether there is any truth, or not, in
the story of his attachment to, and favorable reception by, the
daughter of the head of an extensive wholesale grocer's establishment,
I will not venture an opinion; I may say, however, that I have met him
repeatedly in company with a very well-nourished and high-colored young
lady, who, I understand, is the daughter of the house in question.

Some of the boarders were of opinion that Iris did not return the