had baptized under the name of Etienne, lived there. This Etienne had a daughter, pretty, pious, and charitable, with whom the buyers and sellers of fish, etc., placed the alms which the early Christians were wont to devote to the relief of poor pilgrims and travellers.

with this precious burden, fled away towards the place | Gery had brought over to the true faith, and whom he where she had left her young. She knew that by so doing she would be able to draw thither the hermit who had protected her. The spot was a charming and picturesque one, afterwards called Ursidong, or the Bear's Grove, situated in the forest, on the border of the river Haine, which has given its name to Hainault. As the bear had calculated, Ghislain followed her; but, impelled by the desire to join her little ones, she went so fast that the saint in a very short time lost sight of her. He found himself bewildered in the midst of the vast forest, where the foot of man had never yet traced a path, when an eagle appeared before him, fluttering to attract his attention. Ghislain, seeing something extraordinary in all this, suffered himself to be guided by the eagle, and presently arrived at the Grove of the Bear.

This spot he found to be so attractive and convenient that he transported thither his dwelling. His new friends, the eagle and the bear, never quitted him. Numerous anchorites, drawn by the reports of these marvels, came and placed themselves under the discipline of the saint. They built a grand monastery, around which, in process of time, grew a town, which was called Saint Ghislain. It is two leagues from Mons and four from Condé. The Abbots of Saint Ghislain were lords spiritual and temporal.

Up to the end of the last century, when the monastery was suppressed, an eagle and a she bear were constantly kept there in memory of the saint, who died in 670.

But before dying, he desired to visit Saint Armand, who was preaching the true faith at Antwerp, and on his way thither, Saint Ghislain stopped for a time near Brussels, in a part of the forest of Soignes, which now forms part of the city. He there effected many conversions, and built, to the honor of Saint Peter, a small chapel; the road which conducted to it, and which now leads from the Rue des Tanneurs into the Rue Haute, is still called the Rue Saint Ghislain.

The city of Brussels was then in its infancy, being almost entirely enclosed within the Grande Ile of Saint Gery. By the side of a bridge, defended by a wooden gate, which led into the city, stood, just where the Marché-aux-Œufs now stands, a small house, built at the edge of the Senne. An old man, whom Saint

One day a renowned brigand, named Stock, having seen the young maiden, was so smitten with her that he resolved, during the night, to force an entrance into her father's house, to carry off the treasure which he knew was kept there for the help of the poor, and to possess himself of the beautiful girl-with violence even, should she resist; a common exploit with the ferocious villain, who was the terror of the country, and whom no one had ever been able to vanquish.

By chance the good Saint Ghislain, on his return from Antwerp, had come at nightfall to demand shelter of old Etienne. At one o'clock, when all the world was sleeping, except the saint, who was reciting his matins, the atrocious Stock noiselessly entered the house. Before thinking of looking for the money which he proposed to carry off, he turned an eager gaze upon the beautiful form of the sleeping virgin. Unhesitating in his diabolical purpose, he moved towards her, but as he did so he felt himself seized from behind; two powerful hands held him as in a vice; his prodi. gious strength, which nothing had ever before overcome, was exerted now in vain. In the efforts which he made to turn and face his antagonist, he distinguished the head of an enormous bear. He uttered a horrible cry.

The maiden awoke, terrified, and scarcely conscious of what was passing before her. The bear of Saint Ghislain, carrying the stifled brigand, opened a window at the back of the house, which overhung the Senne, and threw him into the river, which bore his body helplessly away towards the sea.

The fair girl, after falling on her knees, and rendering thanks to heaven, went and aroused her father; and at break of day the saint, blessed by all, departed with his faithful companion the bear.

Above old Etienne's door was sculptured the figure of the animal which had at once saved his daughter and delivered the country of the horrible Stock. At the present time, the same house, many times rebuilt, is an estaminet, the sign of which is a bear.

ure dry up; whose capacity for enjoyment declines; who does not preserve intact and pure his sense of the beautiful, and with that sense, for they are twin and inseparate, his love for the lofty and the noble. And in behalf of the beautiful, in behalf of all graceful and true things, in behalf of humanity in all its loftiest aims, Fiction has its mission-a mission which the dull people cannot always impede, and which eventually shall claim and secure a recognition broad, just, and liberal.

"IT is a private opinion of mine," says a writer in ens. He is not true nor strong, whose functions for pleas "Household Words," that the dull people in this country are the people who govern the nation." Of course by "this country" the writer means England, but we discover so much application in his remarks to "this country" (meaning America), that we shall proceed to quote him. "By dull people," he continues, "I mean people of all degrees of rank and education, who never want to be amused. I don't know how long it is since these dreary members of the population first hit on the cunning ideathe only idea they ever had, or will have-of calling themselves Respectable; but I do know that ever since that time, this great nation has been afraid of them-afraid in religious, in political and social matters. *

The dull people decided years and years ago, as every one knows, that novel-writing was the lowest species of literary exertion, and that novel-reading was a dangerous luxury, and an utter waste of time. They gave, and still give, reasons for this opinion, which are still very satisfactory to persons born without Fancy or Imagination, and which are utterly inconclusive to every one else. But, with reason or without it, the dull people have succeeded in affixing to our novels the stigma of being a species of contraband goods. Voyages and travels are the delight of the dull people. How they hug them to their bosoms! How they turn their intolerant backs on novels! Every man (or woman) who has voyaged and travelled to no purpose, who has made no striking observations of any kind, who has nothing whatever to say, and who says it at great length in large type and on thick paper, with accompaniment of frowsy lithographic illustrations, is introduced to their hearths and homes as a most valuable guest, philosopher and friend!" So proceeds our author at length. We take up the lance, and tilt at the dull people by his side. It is time their formidable ranks were broken; it is time the world was rid of their cant, dullness and false teachings. "Facts, sir! facts, sir!" is the incessant cry of these Gradgrinds. They seem to think, in their intense devotion to one-sided, narrow-minded utilitarianism, that granite is the only wear; that a hard, unvarying, stern, unpromising aspect is the only religious, philosophical and natural one, which nature and human nature are designed to present; they practically ignore the ten thousand appeals to fancy and imagination, which nature, in its colors of sky and earth, and its myriad forms of grace and beauty, so clearly and forcibly inducts as the philosophy and the wisdom of Providence. To this practical lesson, reflected whichever way we look, upon sky, earth and sea, they are persistingly blind. They see nothing but granite-feel nothing but granite. So feeling and thinking, they would make the world as dull and blind as themselves; feed it only on chips and thistles "facts, sir! facts!"-and vigorously crush out and trample down every fair or tender growth, every flower of fancy, that would fain spring up and flourish in the human heart.

-ONE of our contemporaries is in a sad way. It is very much troubled by the acting at some of our theatres of the play called "Camille." Once a week (it is a weekly), it has a fling at this unhappy production. If it has anything to say about the stage, it begins and ends with a philippic against "Camille." If it has occasion to moralize, it moralizes about "Camille." It seems to think that "Camille ” is just as much in everybody else's mind, as it is in its own. It declares that all the old English stock-pieces have been driven off the stage by this "Camille," and plays of its kind. It asserted this at the very moment when a revival of the old comedies was drawing splendid houses at one theatre in our city, and Shakspeare's "Winter Tale" was upon the stage of another; of such inconvenient facts, it could take no notice. It can only see "Camille" whichever way it looks. It seems to believe that the whole art of acting has been given up to the representation of this unfortunate and much-abused play.

The Dame aux Camélias is, undoubtedly, a very bad play. It ought never to have been put on an American stage. But there is a great deal of nonsense uttered about it; and a great deal of unnecessary solicitude about a supposed growth of licentiousness in our literature. Immoral plays are by no means new things under the sun; nor can any period be found when a censorship upon literature has not been wise and necessary. But within a few months the public and the press have become unaccountably moral. Papers not very pure in their antecedents, have suddenly turned zealots and moralists of the severest kind. The public has been virulently seized with a sort of moral epidemic. To hear many talk, one would think that improper literature had never been heard of before-that, we are sinning to a degree in this particular so much beyond anything in the past experience of the world, that we should be held up as a humiliating spectacle of depraved taste and fallen nature. If this sudden sensitiveness arise from a growing purity in the popular mind, why we applaud it with all our might. But we do not believe it. It is only one of those explosions of virtue to which, as Byron said, the English public are periodically addicted. We have too much hope in the future, too much faith in the inevitable progress of all things human to higher and purer destinies, to sympathize with this incessant upbraiding of the new and passing age; We give all honor to learning; we exalt the sciences; we this senseless clamor about an imaginary vitiation of our delight in the spread and growth of true knowledge. But tastes. We suggest to all those who indulge in this clamor, we have no right to sacrifice to these our instincts for the who are lamenting over the good old English undefiled, to beautiful. The human mind is only healthy and vigorous go back to the gods they worship, and see what clay they when all its functions and capacities for happiness are deve- are made of. We suggest, for instance, to that ubiquitous loped. The Ideal has its claims no less imperative than the individual who is incessantly talking about his wife and Real. If the imagination withers, the whole system weak-daughters in the newspapers-all men have wives and daugh

ters, for whose morals they are loudly solicitous-to take home to the bosom of his family the good old works of Tom Jones, Roderick Random, Tristram Shandy-the works of Fielding, Smollett, Sterne, Steele, and Swift; and, as a wholesome contrast to the French drama, we recommend the comedies of Congreve, Farquhar, and Colley Cibber. The refining and ennobling influence of these authors upon his wife and daughters," will enable them to encounter the moral shortcomings of modern literature with impunity and success.

—LAST month we had occasion to mention the appearance of Elephants in Drama at a theatre in this city. In London, we observe, they have outdone us in the way of quadrupedal acting. At Astley's Amphitheatre they have produced Shakspeare's Henry IV., "with all the aids and appliances" of-horses! Stable scenes, street scenes, and battle scenes, were all illustrated with horses. Think of it! Shakspeare in the ring Shakspeare down amid the sawdust-Shakspeare in the hands of the circus-riders! Do they intend to enlarge upon the idea? Are we to have Hamlet and Othello on horseback? Shall Ophelia sing, and Constance mourn, and Desdemona weep-all equestrianly?

But, it is said that Henry IV. was well done-imposingly, with all pomp and splendor. Certainly but few plays are so well adapted for equestrian effect. Conceive of that splendid description of Prince Harry on horseback, being even to a slight degree realized:

"I saw young Harry with his beaver on,
His cuisses on his thighs, gallantly armed,
Rise from the ground like feathered Mercury,
And vaulted with such ease into his seat,
As if an angel dropp'd down from the clouds,
To turn and wind a fiery Pegasus,

And witch the world with noble horsemanship."

-NOTHING is too quaint, too absurd, or too whimsical for a Frenchman. At Paris there has just been organized a club pledged to the encouragement, support, and countenance of the blonde style of beauty! This movement was projected under the apprehension that blue eyes and golden hair were disappearing-that the brunettes were absorbing and exterminating this more delicate and spirituelle cast of female loveliness. The members of this club are pledged to marry only blondes; and to sincerely devote themselves to the interests of the fair-haired creation. The emigration of blondes is to be encouraged, and means taken to promote their introduction. What a rush into Paris there will be of Saxon beauties! How even the red-haired will take hope! What a passion for going abroad will seize We advise fathers upon one moiety of our young women! and guardians to look with suspicion upon sudden rhapsodies for Old World sights-to resist with all their might the importunities of blue-eyed demoiselles, "dying " for beautiful France and classical Italy. But guardians and fathers will probably be deluded; and we shall not be surprised to see it duly chronicled how ship-load after ship-load of brown-haired, auburn-haired, red-haired, Saxon-haired, and golden-haired beauties, have left our shores; how they have rolled and poured into Paris wave upon wave; how the darksprung eyed have taken the alarm; and how a grand war has up, to be known forever in history as the War of the Blondes and Brunettes!

-THE coming of the comet is still the event most talked "How to do," of. It is sandwiched between the necessary

and "Lovely day," of every chance encounter. It success-
weather," as a means of entertaining and
fully rivals the "
instructive discussion at all social gatherings, and even
sometimes ousts that time-honored subject of conversational
dissection from its venerable stool; and it fortunately
affords brain-exhausted editors a new text whereupon to
hang wise platitudes and mild generalities. The astrono-
mers, of course, disagree as to the fact; just as wise gentle-
men of other professions are apt to do whenever it is neces-
One cannot,
sary for them to be positive and certain.
therefore, depend upon them, and all that can be done is to
hope for a slight mistake in the calculations of those who
promise the spectacle. If it does occur, we shall be pre-
vented from making our July bow to our friends, and if
any of our distant readers should miss our coming at the
proper time, they may depend upon the collision as a fact.
But there appears to be some discrepancy as to the day. The
13th of June say all the European astronomers-the 16th of
How is this? Is
June say writers this side of the ocean.
it that the world in truth falls due on the 13th, but
that our trans-Atlantic friends, not so business-like and
practical as ourselves, forgot to allow the legal three days
grace, customary in all matters payable? If so, why of
course the event cannot legally come off before the 16th-
for which respite we hope we are duly thankful.

-THE address of the Rev. Dr. Bellows in behalf of the
stage, naturally enough has been a prolific subject of discus-
sion with town-people. The stage has been defended and
upheld by worthy people many times, but we believe this to
be the first instance of a divine publicly appearing, sur-
rounded by actors and actresses, and addressing the sober
and religious element of the community in defence of amuse-
ment as a principle, and the stage as a necessity. Our
readers know that, unlike some of our contemporaries, we
have never, in these pages, ignored the theatre. We have
even run some risk of offending that portion of our readers
who adhere to the ancient prejudices against the theatre;
but we acted after deliberation, and with a belief that it was
not our privilege to shut our eyes to the existence of a fact
so palpable as that of the theatre-of an institution so
important and prominent in our social organization. We
realized, too, those truths so eloquently set forth by
Dr. Bellows, that the recognition, support, and censorship
of the stage by the discriminating and respectable classes of
society, alone could lift it to that elevation and purity so
long the ideal of all true admirers of the drama. We,
indeed, a few months ago, pointed out some of the benefi-
cial results that had followed a growing popular taste in our
midst for the theatre, and showed how absolutely the pub-
lic controlled it in all its moral and ethical aspects. The
stage has been in existence for over two thousand years.
It will exist for two thousand years more, unless it end
sooner with all other mundane things. It cannot be extermi-
nated nor ostracised. It will live, in spite of fulminations or
philipics—wisely, truly, ethically, if with the countenance of
the intelligent and moral public; licentiously, badly, vilely,
if its predominant support come from the vulgar and the
low. Which shall it be? The American public is to answer
for America. Our own convictions upon the matter are
firm and unwavering. We believe it to be our public duty,
in so far as our influence extends, to act our little part, as
censors and critics, to do what we can towards the eleva-
tion of the drama into that pure and lofty atmosphere
wherein all art and all poetry should alone exist

THE new comedy of Alexandre Dumas, fils, called "The Money Question," has some sharp hits, of which the following is a good specimen :

Jean. Why, you see, this is a tough bit of business for him. If he be sharp enough, he will make his fortune.

Réné. Of his sharpness I know nothing; but he is a man of probity.

Jean. Well, in business give me sharpness-the one thing needful.

Réné. What do you call business, M. Giraud?

completed, and discover in the poet a resemblance to Dante. He is of a large build, they say, and his predominant expression is "an august sadness." August sadness is good—but it is probably nothing more than dyspepsia.

The positive and comparative degree of wrongheadedness:

The Spanish caricaturists, to give an idea of the obstinacy of the Biscayans, represent a man knocking a nail into

Jean. What do I call business? The simplest thing in life a wall by butting at it with his forehead; but when they

-other people's money.

June, the fair and beautiful, is most exquisitely limned in these lines, whose we know not, but called,

"A Quiet Hour:"

It was an hour of stillness,

In the leafy month of June,
Midway between the cool eve
And the sultry ray of noon,
Thin clouds were idly floating,
And with his changing rays

The playful sun bedabbled

The green and ferny braes.
The birds were chirping faintly,
It scarcely was a song;

But the breath of green creation
And fragrant life was strong.
The lazy trees were nodding,
The flowers were half awake,
And toilsome men were basking
Like the serpent in the brake.
The Borean winds were sleeping,
Asleep was ocean's roar,
And ripple was chasing ripple
On the silver-sounding shore.
The countless ocean daughters

Were weaving from the waves
Bright webs of scattered sunlight,
To deck their sparry caves;
And in her sapphire chamber
Of lucent beauty rare,

The sea-queen Amphitrite

Was plaiting her sea-green hair.

Punch has a hit at the infant prodigies of some of our novelists, who are usually "translated" (that's the term, we believe) to another sphere upon pathetic death-beds, in the very midst of their transcendent goodness. "Don't you be a good boy, Johnny," says one lad to another. "Why not, Rob?" "'Cause in books the good boys all die, you know!"

Gallant to the last :

Fontenelle was ninety-eight years of age, when a young lady asked him at what period of life men lose all taste for gallantry? "Indeed," replied the old gentleman, you must ask that question of some one older than myself."

A grand, old fellow Fontenelle must have been, certainly; and we commend his reply to blasé Young America, who, at the age of twenty-two, affect to have got beyond such boyish inclinations.

want to express the extent to which perverseness is carried by the Arragonese, they sketch a person in the same atti

tude, but with the head of the nail against the wall, and the point turned to the performer's forehead.

A few curious Chinese aphorisms, culled from a book called "The Book of the Way and the Truth," by Laotoen, a philosopher who lived six hundred years before Christ:

Men of superior virtue are ignorant of their virtue. Men of inferior virtue do not forget their virtue. Men of superior virtue practise it without thinking of it. Men of inferior virtue practise it with intention. Great passions necessarily expose their possessor to great sacrifices.

He who knows how to suffice to himself is safe from dishonor. He who knows when to stop, never stumbles or falls.

There is no greater calamity than the desire of acquiring. The sage relishes what is without savor. He avenges the injuries he receives by benefits. He begins by easy things when he meditates difficult things; by small things when he meditates great.

A tree of large circumference sprang from a root as delicate as a hair; a tower of nine stories arose out of a handful of earth; a journey of a thousand lis began by a step.

Be attentive to the end as well as to the beginning, and then you will not fall.

To know, and to think that we know not, is the highest pitch of merit. Not to know, and to think that we know, is the common malady of men. If you are afflicted at this malady you will not be infected with it.

Beware of thinking your dwelling too small for you; beware of becoming disgusted with your lot.

The net of heaven is immense; its meshes are wide, and yet nobody escapes.

The sage fears glory as much as ignominy. Glory is something low. When a man has it he is filled with fear; when he has lost it, he is filled with fear.

You may intrust the government of the empire to the man who fears to undertake to govern the empire.

The most excellent arms are instruments of misfortune; they are not the instruments of the sage. He uses them only when he cannot dispense with them, and places above all things calm and repose.

We all like to read Sheridan's jokes, even when they get to be old friends:

The English papers speak of a bust of Tennyson, just Sheridan never gave Lewis any of the profits of the Castle

Spectre. One day, Lewis, being in company with him, satisfied, he would cease his importunities. He had

contrived, with the assistance of the painter, to thrust his own face through a canvas hung where the picture had before been placed; but she, on perceiving it, persisted in asserting that it was no more like than before. Upon this the marshal could not keep his countenance, but, by laughing aloud, discovered at once his stratagem

and her obstinacy.

'You forget," said the Spaniard, with a scornful smile them: “you forget that I am a Castilian!"

A new litany:

Well

It is said, that onions certainly increase the fragrance of flowers, and that if a large onion is planted near a rose-bush, so as to touch its roots, the odor of the flowers will be won

derfully increased, and the water distilled from those roses far superior to any other.

The following joke, current in Paris circles, is certainly entitled to a good laugh:

At a ball, a group, among which was the secretary of Feruk Khan, were discussing the merits of the Euphrates

From tailors' bills, doctors' pills, western chills, and other Valley Railroad. "Your country," said a lady to the secretary, ills-deliver us.

"will then be very near to us." "Yes, if the project should

From want of gold, wives that scold, maidens old, and by be accomplished." "Do you doubt its accomplishment ?" sharpers "sold"-deliver us.

From stinging flies, coal black eyes, bakers' pies, and babies' cries-deliver us.

From seedy coats, protested notes, sinking boats, and illegal votes-deliver us.

"The difficulties of execution are very great and numerous."
"Certainly, but the English engineers will surmount them."
Oh," replied the young Persian with an air of cunning,
all these
"there is one against which their science must fall;
"Well ?" "Well,
deserts are peopled with ostriches."

up!"

From modest girls, with waving curls, and teeth of pearls those birds, you know, digest iron; they will eat the road General exclamation, in which the Persian was -never mind. declared a spirituel farceur !

The master of a certain grammar school declared that "he never taught a boy in his life: he whipped, and they learned!"

Those who have read Charles Reade's "Peg Woffington," will not have forgotten one of its most striking situations-the scene of poor Triplet's triumph, where the despised portraits of Peg Woffington, after having been satisfactorily demonstrated to be a mere daub, and not the least likeness in the world, is proved to be the very reality—the lady herself stepping in propriâ personâ from behind the canvas, through a hole in which she had exhibited her face. The author appears to have derived this very striking and novel situation from a French source; for it is recorded of the Marshal Luxembourg, that he took his mistress to the house of a celebrated Parisian artist, in order that she might see the likeness of the marshal, and sit for her own. When, however, she saw the portrait, she declared that she had never seen any person like it. The marshal knew that this was mere prejudice, and persuaded her to go once again to the painter's house, after the last sitting, assuring her that if she should not then be perfectly

Have you
read Barry Cornwall's last volume? Fail
not, if you confess to No, and let us stimulate your
desire by this exquisitely fine extract:

Tread softly by this long, close-curtained room!
Within, reposing on her stateliest bed,

Lies one embowered in the velvet gloom!

A creature-dead! .

Lately how lovely, how beloved, how young!

Around her beauteous mouth, sweet eyes, and golden hair
(Making the fair thrice fair),

A poet's first and tenderest verse was flung.
Now she lies ghastly pale, stone cold, quite hid

From balmy April and the fragrant air,

Upon the dark, green, silken coverlid;

Her limbs laid out to suit the coffin's shape;

Her palms upon her breast