to be put out of shape or out of place; change disturbs it and makes it angry. Then it looks back to better days, when none of the villainous innovations were known, which are now so prevalent in every thing. I am glad that I am neither gas nor steam, for it would break my heart to be abused as they have been.

But of all the regrets of the better days that are gone by, none are more pathetic than the lamentations for the loss of all our great men. What marvellously great men did live in the days that are past! This, of course, says the triumphant croaker, must be admitted. There is no denying that Shakspeare, Milton, Pope, Scott, Byron, Pitt, Fox, Canning, Sheridan, are all gone, and have not left their likenesses behind. It is no easy matter to conceive any human being more proud and happy than a triumphant croaker. If you stop a man in the midst of his lamentation and prove to him, as clear as light, that he has no good ground for complaint, you seem to inflict an injury upon him; but if he can repel your arguments, and establish his own growling position beyond all question, he is far happier than if he had never had any cause of complaint. Is there, says he, a man now living who can write as Shakspeare wrote? Very likely there is not; but if there were, he would be quite a superfluity; we have as much Shakspeare as we want and so of all the rest.

The cause of his style of reproaching the present

by referring to the past, is to be found in the loud lamentations, which mark the departure of great men from the sublunary scene. When a distinguished man dies, the public feels a loss. Funeral, elegy, monument, epitaph, biography, all make the loss more talked about. But when a great genius is born into the world, there is no talk about it. We notice the great trees that are cut down, but we regard not the saplings that are springing up in their place. Thus we think that we live in sad, degenerate days, and thus we get into the habit of looking upon great men as good for nothing till they are dead. In the book of the Proverbs of Solomon, it is said, that a living dog is better than a dead lion. Pephaps it may be ; but we do not in general seem to hold this doctrine; indeed, we regard the living as dogs, and the dead as lions.

I think another cause of our looking back on the past as on better days, may be found in the fact that we are all growing older. The world is not half so pretty and wonderful to us now as it was when we were young. To a boy, a schoolmaster is often an awful and a great personage; he is regarded with admiration, as a miracle of majesty, and a paragon of knowledge. Old Busby knew that, when he kept his hat on in the presence of royalty in his own school But what a different idea of schoolmasters we acquire when we are grown up to man's estate! We measure all things by the standard of our own feelings;

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we have no other rule to go by; and if we feel ourselves growing old and wearing out, we think that the world is growing old and wearing out; and if our eyes grow dim, we think that the sun shines more feebly than he was wont to do; and if our feelings grow obtuse, we fancy there is nothing in the world worth caring for; and if we go to the scenes of our boyish holidays, and if our boyish feelings do not return to us we fancy that the place is sadly altered. I remember hearing one of the greatest puppies that ever lived complain of the conceit and affectation of young men of the present generation, and say, "It was not so when I was young."

LEAVING HOME.

ETONIAN.

SWEET spot! I leave thee with an aching heart,
As down the stream my boat glides smoothly on;
With thee, as if I were a swain, I part,

And thou the maiden that I doated on.

I ne'er shall view yon woody glen again;
That lowly church, calm promiser of rest;
Yon white cots, free from riches and from pain,
Fantastic gems upon the mountain's breast.

Fast, fast, thou 'rt fading from my longing sight; The next bold turn, and thou art gone for aye,A dream's bright remnant on a summer night The faint remembrance of a love gone by.

Farewell! and if Fate's distant unknown page
Doom me to wreck on Passion's angry sea,

I'll leave Philosophy to reasoning age,

And charm the tempest with a thought on thee.

ATTENDING AUCTIONS.

BY M. M. NOAH.

THIS is the season of the year, preparatory to the first of May, when families sell their household furniture, either to purchase a new stock, or remove to the country, and these furniture auctions are attended by crowds of ladies. It is astonishing to witness the avidity with which the papers are examined for the purpose of discovering auction notices, and the bustle of early dress and preparation to visit the house from which the red flag is displayed. A continual current sets towards the mansion, particularly if the furniture is elegant and the owner fashionable; and in this squeze we shall find persons of all characters and purothers to sell some to replenish their stock again and most for their curiosity. A celebrated bachelor, who lately sold out, was honored with an immense party of young ladies, who came to pry into the comforts and mysteries of "single blessedness," in such crowds, that the staircases, antechambers, and all the rooms were jammed as close as a bag of cotton.

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