vive the grotesque and wild images derived from the ferocities of savage life, or the conflicts of the first settlers with nature and the wild man. Theodore Parker, the transcendentalist, had a habit of collecting every fact to the disadvantage of the public men he did not like, with the design some day to attack and expose them. These damaging charges were called by his friends his scalps. It was complacently said of him, "He keeps all his scalps in the desk of the Music Hall. While you are listening to him, he suddenly draws one forth, shakes it at the audience, and puts it up again. It was the scalp of a clergyman. You recollect the sin for which he was slain, and grimly recognize and approve." It was a boast that this leader of thought was healthily built. "There was no room in Parker's head for vermin-not a single rat-hole in the whole house." In their scorn for the past these zealots invent a transatlantic Billingsgate of foul similies. The Catechism, for example, is a bundle of old rags. With this is mingled a curious jargon of scientific analogies. Venerable creeds are fossilizations; to rest on one belief or opinion is crystalization. In Francisco and the gold-digging districts, cards seem to supply the language of metaphor. We must understand the games of Euchre and Poker to follow their meaning. To become euchred, we are told, is to lose two points, and the right bower is the knave of trumps. So in the dialogues commemorated by Bret Harte: "What have you got there?" asks the pursued highwayman of King Lynch; who replies, "Two bowers and an ace," showing two revolvers and a bowie-knife. "That takes me," returned Tennessee, and submitted to his fate. There are some objects in nature and art whose one use and purpose in life seems to be as illustrations. We acknowledge to finding no other utility in the thorn that is inseparable from the rose; nor in Prince Rupert's drop; nor in apples of Sodom, if there are such things; nor in house-spiders; nor in the stray atoms that float on the stream or lie in our path, to be swept into space after they have met the all-embracing eye of poet or moralist. We can do very well without them; but Dryden wanted a comparison for the labours of petty critics who find faults and cannot see beauties, and nothing else would have done as well. "Errors like straws upon the surface flow, He who would search for pearls must dive below." So did Swift illustrate the hypochondriacal fancies of discontent. "Small causes are sufficient to make a man uneasy when great ones are not in the way: For want of a block he will stumble at a straw." Our aim has been to show and touch upon illustration in its many forms as the enlarger of the human mind. The memory of every reader will supply a rush of further, and it may be thought, more appropriate and better-chosen examples. Those who treat it mainly as an ornament, altogether miss its functions and purposes. Metaphor is the educator of the imagination; perpetually building what is new upon the old, and compelling men into a wider apprehension:-to see through the mind as well as through the eye. What would our ordinary talk have been but for the wits and the poets of all time, who have hung round every common sight, and sound, and need of homely nature with analogies: so forcing upon us the recognition, it may be the contemplation, of higher things? AT Sarrebourg, I had to wait two hours before I could see Monsieur le Sous-Préfet, who was breakfasting with messieurs the councillors of the arrondissement, in honour of the Plébiscite. Five or six mayors of the neighbourhood were waiting like myself; we saw filing down the passage great dishes of fish and game, notwithstanding that the fishing and shooting seasons were over; and then baskets of wine; and we could hear our councillors laughing, "Ha! ha! ha!" They were enjoying themselves mightily. At last Monsieur le Sous-Préfet came out; he had had an excellent breakfast. "Ha! is that you, gentlemen? said he; come in, come into the office." 66 ask for the person called George Weber, | light cart and a good horse. Thence I authorization to open a public-house at drive to Thiancourt, where I lay in a stock Rothalp. Well, it's out of the question. of red wine. After that, I rove right and That George Weber is a Republican; he has already offered opposition to the Plébiscite you ought to have notified this to me. You have screened him because he is your cousin. Authorizations to keep public-houses are granted to steady men, devoted to his Majesty the Emperor, and who keep a watch over their customers; but they are never granted to men who require watching themselves. You should be aware of that." Then I perceived that my rascally deputy, that miserable Placiard, had denounced us. That old dry-bones did nothing but draw up perpetual petitions, to beg for places, pensions, tobacco excise offices, decorations for himself and his honourable family, speaking incessantly of his services, his devotion to the dynasty, and his claims. His claims were the denunciations, the informations which he laid before the Sous-Préfecture; and, to tell the truth, in those days these were the most valid claims. I was indignant, but I said nothing; and I simply added a few words in favour of cousin George, assuring Monsieur le Sous-Préfet that lies had been told about him, that one should not believe everything, &c. He half concealed a weary yawn; and as the councillors of the arrondissement were laughing in the garden, he rose and said politely, "Monsieur le Maire, you are answered. Besides, you have already two public-houses in your village; three would be too many." It was useless to stay after that, so I made a bow, at which he seemed pleased, and returned quietly to Rothalp. The same evening I went to repeat to George, word for word, the answer of the SousPréfet. Instead of getting angry, as I expected, my cousin listened calmly. His wife only cried out against that bad lot she spoke of all the sous-préfets in the most disrespectful manner. But my cousin, smoking his pipe after supper, took it all very easily. left all over the country, and I sell my wine by the cask or the quarter-cask, according to the solvency of my customers: instead of having one public-house, I will have twenty. I must keep moving. With an inn, Marie Anne would still have been obliged to cook; she has quite enough to do without." "Oh! yes," she said; "for thirty years I have been cooking dishes of sauerkraut and sausage at Krantheimer's at Montmartre, and at Auber's in the cloister St. Benoit." 66 Exactly so," said George; "and now you shall cook no longer, and you shall look after the crops, the slacking of the hay, the storage of fruits and potatoes. We shall get in our dividends, and I will trot round the country with my little pony from village to village. Monsieur le SousPréfet shall know that George Weber can live without him." Hearing this, I learnt that they had money in the funds, besides all the rest; and I reflected that my cousin was quite right to laugh at all the sous-préfets in the world. He came with me to the door, shaking hands with me; and I said to myself that it was an abomination to have refused a publican's licence to respectable persons, when they gave it to such men as Nicolas Reiter and Jean Kreps, whom their own wives called their best customers, because they dropped under the table every evening and had to be carried to bed. On the other hand, I saw that it was better for me; for if my cousin had been found infringing the law, I should have had to take depositions, and there would have been a quarrel with cousin. So that all was for the best, the wholesale business being only the exciseman's affair. What George had said, he did next day. At six o'clock he was already at the station, and in five or six days he had returned from Nancy upon his own char-à-banc, drawn by a strong horse, five or six years old, in its prime. The char-à-banc was a new one; a tilt could be put up in wet weather, which could be raised or lowered to deliver the wine or receive back the empty casks, when necessary. "Just listen to me, Christian," said he. "In the first place, I am much obliged to you for the trouble you have taken. All that you tell me, I knew beforehand; but I am not sorry to know it certainly. Yet I could wish that the Sous-Préfet had had my letter. As it is, since I am refused licence to sell a few glasses of wine retail, I will sell wine wholesale. I have already a stock of white wine, and no later than As for telling you how many casks he to-morrow I am off to Nancy. I buy a had then in the house, that would be diffi The wine from Thiancourt followed. George stored it immediately, after having paid the blil and settled with the carter. I was standing by. STORY OF THE PLEBISCITE. cult without examining his books; but not a wine-merchant in the neighbourhood, not even in town, could boast of such a winevault as he had for excellence of quality, for variety in price, of red and white, of Alsace and Lorraine. About that time, he sent for me and Jacob to make a list of safe customers. He wrote on, asking us "How much may I give to so-and-so?" ་་ So much." "How much to that man?" So much." wager, Christian, that your young man 66 " How does this happen?" said George. - "I understand," he said, "that we are making a great mistake. Even in Paris, In the course of a single afternoon we this crowd of Germans, crossing-sweepers, had passed in review all the innkeepers shop and ware-house men, carters, bookand publicans from Droulingen to Quatre keepers, professors of every kind, astonVents, from Quatre Vents to the Dags-ished me; and since Sadowa, there are berg. Jacob and I knew what they were worth to the last penny; for the man who pays readily for his flour, pays well for his wine; and those who want pulling up by the miller, are in no hurry to open their purses to the others. That was the way cousin George conducted his business. He took a lad from our place, the son of the cooper Gros, to drive; and he himself was salesman. From that day he was only seen passing through Rothalp at a quick trot, and his lad loading and unloading. twice as many. The more country they annex, the further they extend their view. Where is the advantage of our being Frenchmen-paying every year heavier for the conscription, and paying for their taxes; sending our children to be drawn State, all the insults of the préfets, the exemption; bearing all the expenses of the sous-préfets, and the police-inspectors, informers, if those fellows, who have nothand the annoyances of common spies and ing at all to bear, enjoy the same advanones; since our own people are sent off tages with ourselves, and even greater My cousin, also, had a notion of distil- to make room for these, and by their ling in the winter. He bought up a great numbers they lower the price of quantity of old second-hand barrels to hold hand-labour? This benefits the manufac-If the fruits which he hoped to secure at a turers, the contractors, the bourgeois class, cheap rate in autumn; he laid up a great but it is misery for the mass of the people. store of firewood. All our country people I cannot understand it at all. Our rulers, had nothing to do but to look at him to up there, must be losing their senses. learn something; but the people down that goes on, the working-men will cease our way all think themselves so amazingly to care for their country, since it cares are favoured, and who hate us, will quiclever, and that does not help to make so little for them; and the Germans who folks richer. Thus spoke my cousin, and I knew not etly put us out at our own doors." what answer to make. Well, it is plain to you that our cousin's prospects were looking very bright. Every day, returning from his journey to Saverne or to Phalsbourg, he would stop his cart before my door, and come to see me in the mill, crying out: "Hallo! good afternoon, Christian. How are you today?" Then we used to step into the back parlour, on account of the noise and the dust, and there we talked about the price of corn, cattle, provender, and indeed everything that is interesting to people in our condition. What astonished him most of all was the number of Germans to be met with in the mountains and in the plains. But about this time I had a great trouble, and although this affair is my private business alone, I must tell you about it. Since the arrival of George, my daughter Grédel, instead of looking after our business as she used to do, washing clothes, milking cows, and so on, was all the blessed day at Marie Anne's. Jacob comdown there? By and by I shall have to plained, and said: "What is she about prepare the clothes for the wash, and hang butter. Could not Grédel do her own them upon the hedges to dry, and churn work? Does she think we are her ser "I see nobody else," said he; "wood- LIVING AGE. VOL. XXIV. He was right. But Grédel never trou bled herself; she never has thought of 1 of the quarry, asked for Grédel in marany one besides herself. Down there she riage. was along with George's wife, who talked to her from morning till night about Paris, the grand squares, the markets, the price of eggs and of meat, what was charged at the barrières; of this, that, and the other; cooking, and what not. Marie Anne wanted company. But this did not suit me at all; and the less because Grédel had had a lover in the village for some time, and that, when this is the case, the best thing to be done is always to keep your daughter at home, and to watch her closely. It was only a common clerk at a stonequarry in Wilsberg, a late artillery sergeant, Jean Baptiste Werner, who had taken the liberty to cast his eyes upon our daughter. We had nothing to say against this young man. He was a fine, tall man, thin, with a bold expression and brown moustaches, and who did his duty very well at the quarry by Father Heitz; but he could earn no more than his three francs a day and any one may see that the daughter of Christian Weber was not to be thrown away upon a man who earns three francs a day. No, that would never do. For a long while, Monsieur Mathias Heitz, junior, had come every Suuday from Wilsberg to the Cruchon d'Or, to amuse himself with Jacob, as young men do when they have intentions with regard to a family. He was a fine young man, fat, with red cheeks and ears, and always well dressed, with a flowered-velvet waistcoat and seals to his watch-chain; in a word, just such a young man as a girl with any good sense would be glad to have for a husband. He had property too; he was the eldest of five children. I reckoned that his own share might be fifteen to twenty-thousand francs after the death of his parents. Well, this young man demanded Grédel in marriage, and in a moment Jacob, my wife and myself were agreed to accept him. Only my wife thought that we ought to consult cousin George and Marie Anne. Grédel was just there when I went in with Catherine; but behold! on the first mention of the thing she began to melt into tears, and to say she would rather die than marry Mathias Heitz. You may imagine Nevertheless, I had often seen this Jean how angry we were. My wife was going Baptiste Werner going in the morning to to slap her face or box her ears, but my his work with his foot-rule under his arm, cousin became angry now, and told us that stopping at the mill-dam, as if to watch we ought never to oblige a girl to marry the geese and the ducks paddling about against her will, because this was the way the sluice, or the hens circling around the to make miserable households. Then he cock on the dunghill; and at the same took us out into the passage, telling us that moment Grédel would be slowly combing he took the responsibility of this affair; her hair at her window before the little looking-glass, leaning her head outside. I had also noticed that they said goodmorning to each other a good way off, and that that clerk always looked excited and flurried at the sight of my daughter; and I had even been obliged to give Grédel notice to go and comb her hair somewhere else when that man passed, or to shut her window. This is my case, simply told. That young man worried me. My wife, too, was on her guard. You may now understand why I should have preferred to have seen our daughter at home; but it was not so easy to forbid her to go to my cousin's. George and his wife might have been angry! and that troubled us. Fortunately, about that time the eldest son of Father Heitz,* the owner It is usual there for fathers of families to be distinguished as Father So-and-so. that he wished to obtain information, and tell the young man that he required a month for reflection. Grédel We could not refuse him that. would no longer come home; my cousin's wife begged us not to plague her; we had to give way to them; but it was one of the greatest troubles of my life. And I thought: "Now you cannot give your daughter to whoever you like; is not this really abominable?" I felt angry with myself for having lis ened to my cousin: but, nevertheless, Grédel stayed with them a whole week, in consequence of which we were obliged to hire a charwoman, and Jacob exclaimed that Grédel could not have offered him a worse insult than to refuse his best comrade, a rich fellow who boldly paid down his money for ten, fifteen, and twenty bottles at the club without so much as winking. However, he never mentioned it to cousin George, for whom he felt the greatest respect on account of his expect-added a sou to his property, and the son ations from him, and whose strong lan- has not a grain of good sense." guage dismayed him. At last my wife found that Grédel was staying too long away from home; the people of the village would have gone on to talking about it: so one evening I went to see George to ask him what he had learnt about Heitz's son. It was after supper. Grédel, seeing me come in, slipped out into the kitchen, and my cousin said to me frankly "Listen, Christian, here is the matter in two words Grédel loves another." "Whom?" "Jean Baptiste Werner." "Father Heitz's clerk! the son of the woodward Werner, who has never had anything but potatoes to eat? Is she in love with him? Let the wretch come let him come and ask her! I'll kick him down the stairs! And does Grédel grieve me so? Oh! I should never have believed it of her!" Come, Christian," said my cousin, "you must be reasonable." Reasonable! she deserves to have her neck wrung!' "But the other fellow- why he has nothing at all." The other, Jean Baptiste Werner, is a good man, who has done his duty by Father Heitz; it is he who knows everything, who manages everything, who takes in orders, makes all the arrangements for the carriage of stone by carts or by railway. Heitz puts the money into his pocket, and Werner has all the work, for want of a little capital to set himself up in business. He has seen foreign service. I have seen his certificates of character in Africa, in Mexico. They are excellent. If I were in your place, I would give Grédel to him." "Never!" cried I, thumping the table; "I had rather drown her." Half the wine-glasses were shattered on the floor; but my cousin was not angry. "Well, Christian," said he, "you are wrong. Think of it. Grédel will remain here. I will answer for her. You must not take her away at present. You would be quite capable of ill-treating her, and then you would repent of it." Let her stay as long as you like!" said I, taking my hat; "let her never darken my doors again." And I rushed out. Never in my life had I been so angry and so grieved. At home I did not even dare to say what I had learnt; but Jacob suspected it, and one day, as Werner was stopping in front of the mill, he shook his pitchfork at him, shouting: "Come on!" But he pretended not to hear him, and went on his way. I was in a fury; I wanted to lay hold of her. Happily, she had gone into the garden, and George held me back. He obliged me to sit down again, and said: What is Mathias Heitz? a fat fool who knows nothing but how to play at cards and drink. He was put to college at Phalsbourg, at M. Verrot's, like all the other respectable young men in the district; but he now drives about in a charà-banc in a flowered waistcoat and jingling seals; he could not possibly earn a I was at last, however, obliged to tell couple of pence- and the old man would my wife the whole matter. At first she like to get rid of him by marrying him. I was near fainting; but she soon recovered, have obtained information about him. He and said to me: “Well, if Grédel won't may come in for from fifteen to twenty have young Mathias, we shall keep our thousand francs some day; but what are hundred louis, and we shall have no need fifteen thousand francs for an ass? He to hire a new servant. I should prefer will eat them, he will drink them-per- that, for one cannot trust strange serhaps he has already swallowed half-and vants in a house." if there is a family, what are fifteen or even twenty thousand francs between five or six children? Formerly, when girls used to have an outfit for a marriage portion, and the eldest son succeeded his father, things went on pretty well. It did not want much talent to carry on a wellestablished business, or to follow up a trade from father to son. But at the present day, mother-wit and good sense stand in the foremost ranks. Grandfather Heitz was an industrious man; he made money but Father Mathias has never "Yes; but how can we declare to Mathias Heitz that Grédel refuses his son?" 'Oh, don't trouble yourself, Christian," said she; "leave me alone, and don't let us quarrel with cousin George, that's the principal thing. I will say that Grédel is too young to be married; that is the proper thing to say, and nobody can answer that." Catherine quieted me in this way; but this business was still racking my brain, when extraordinary things came to pass, which we were far from expecting, and |