An yet he is not known here efen by name. It would please me mooch, my senator, to haire you make one quotatione. Know you Watt? Tell me some words of his which I may remen baire."

"I have a shocking bad memory."

"Bad memora! Oh, but you remember somethin, zis most beautiful charm nait-you hafa nobile soul—you must be affecta by beauty-by ze ideal. Make for me one quotatione."

And she rested her little hand on the senator's arm, and looked up imploringly in his face.

The senator looked foolish. He felt even more so. Here was a beautiful woman, by act and look showing a tender interest in him. Perplexing-but very flattering after all. So he replied:

"You will not let me refuse you any thing."

“Aha! you are vera willin to refuse. It is difficulty for me to excitare youar regards. You are fill with the grands ideas. But come-will you spik for me som from your favorit Watt ?"

"Well, if you wish it so much," said the senator, kindly, and he hesitated.

"Ah! I do wish it so much!"

"Ehem!"

66

Begin," said the countess. "Behold me. hear everysin, and will remember it forava."

I listen. I

The only thing that the senator could think of was the verse which had been running in his head for the last few days, its measured rhythm keeping time with every occupa

tion:

"My willing soul would stay-"

"Stop one moment," said the countess.

"I weesh to learn it from you;" and she looked fondly and tenderly up, but instantly dropped her eyes.

"Ma willina sol wooda sta-""

"In such a frame as this," prompted the senator.

"Een socha framas zees.' Wait-'Ma willina sol wooda sta in socha framas zees.' Ah! appropriat; but could I hope zat you were true to zose lines, my senator? Well?"

"And sit and sing herself away,'" said the senator, in a faltering voice, and breaking out into a cold perspiration for fear of committing himself by such uncommonly strong language.

"Ansit ansin hassaf awai," repeated the countess, her face lighting up with a sweetly conscious expression. The senator paused.

"I-ehem! I forget."

"Forget? Impossible!" "I do really."

"Ah now! Forget? I see by your face-you desave. Say on."

The countess again gently touched his arm with both her little hands, and held it as though she would clasp it. “Have you fear? Ah! cruel."

The senator turned pale, but finding refusal impossible, boldly finished:

"To everlasting bliss'-there!"

"To affarlastin blees thar.' Stop. I repeat it all: 'Ma willina sol wooda sta een socha framas zees, ansit ansin hassaf awai to affarlastin blees thar.' Am I right ?"

"Yes," said the senator, meekly.

"I knew you were a poetic sola," said the countess, confidingly. "You air honesto-true-you can not desave. When you spik I can beliv you. Ah! my senator; an you can spik zis poetry!-at soch a toime! I nefare knew befoare zat you so impassione !-an you air so artaful! You breeng ze confersazione to beauty-to poatry-to ze poet Watt-so you may spik verses mos impassione! Ah! what do you mean? Santissima madre! how I wish you spik Italiano."

The countess drew nearer to him, but her approach only deepened his perplexity.

"How that poor thing does love me!" sighed the senator. "Law bless it! she can't help it—can't help it nohow. She is a goner; and what can I do? I'll have to leave Florence." The countess was standing close beside him in a tender mood waiting for him to break the silence. How could he? He had been uttering words which sounded to her like

love; and she-a widow! a widow! wretched man that I

am!"

There was a pause. The longer it lasted the more awkward the senator felt. What upon earth was he to do or say? What business had he to go and quote poetry to widows? What an old fool he must be But the countess was very far from feeling awkward. Assuming an elegant attitude, she looked up, her face expressing the tenderest solicitude.

"What ails my senator?"

"Why, the fact is, marm-I feel sad—at leaving Florence. I must go shortly. My wife has written summoning me home. The children are down with the measles."

Oh, base fabrication! Oh, false senator! There wasn't a word of truth in that last remark. You spoke so because you wished La Cica to know that you had a wife and family. Yet it was very badly done.

La Cica changed neither her attitude nor her expression. Evidently the existence of his wife, and the melancholy situation of his unfortunate children, awakened no sympathy. "But my senator-did you not say you wooda seeng yousellef away to affarlastin blees ?"

"Oh, marm, it was a quotation-only a quotation."

But at this critical juncture the conversation was broken up by the arrival of a number of ladies and gentlemen. But could the senator have known!

Could he have known how and where those words would confront him again!

SAM WELLER'S VALENTINE.

CHARLES DICKENS.

Mr. Weller having obtained leave of absence from Mr. Pickwick, who, in his then state of excitement and worry, was by no means displeased at being left alone, set forth long before the appointed hour; and, having plenty of time at his disposal, sauntered down as far as the Mansion House, where he paused and contemplated, with a face of great calmness and philosophy, the numerous cads and drivers of short stages who assemble near that famous place of resort,

to the great terror and confusion of the old-lady population of these realms. Having loitered here for half an hour or so, Mr. Weller turned, and began wending his way towards Leadenhall Market, through a variety of by-streets and

courts.

As he was sauntering away his spare time, and stopped to look at almost every object that met his gaze, it is by no means surprising that Mr. Weller should have paused before a small stationer's and print-seller's window; but, without further explanation, it does appear surprising that his eyes should have no sooner rested on certain pictures which were exposed for sale therein, than he gave a sudden start, smote his right leg with great vehemence, and exclaimed with energy, "If it hadn't been for this, I should ha' forgot all about it till it was too late!"

The particular picture on which Sam Weller's eyes were fixed, as he said this, was a highly-colored representation of a pair of human hearts skewered together with an arrow, cooking before a cheerful fire, while a male and a female cannibal in modern attire-the gentleman being clad in a blue coat and white trowsers, and the lady in a deep red pelisse with a parasol of the same-were approaching the meal with hungry eyes, up a serpentine gravel path leading thereunto.

A decidedly indelicate young gentleman, in a pair of wings and nothing else, was depicted as superintending the cooking; a representation of the spire of the church in Langhorn Place appeared in the distance; and the whole formed a "valentine," of which, as a written inscription in the window testified, there was a large assortment within, which the shopkeeper pledged himself to dispose of to his countrymen generally at the reduced rate of one and sixpence each.

"I should ha' forgot it-I should certainly have forgot it!" said Sam; and, so saying, he at once stepped into the stationer's shop, and requested to be served with a sheet of the best gilt-edged letter-paper, and a hard-nibbed pen which could be warranted not to splutter. These articles having been promptly supplied, he walked on direct towards Leadenhall Market at a good round pace, very different from his

recent lingering one. Looking round him, he there beheld a sign-board on which the painter's art had delineated something remotely resembling a cerulean elephant with an aquiline nose in lieu of a trunk. Rightly conjecturing that this was the Blue Boar himself, he stepped into the house, and inquired concerning his parent.

"He won't be here this three quarters of an hour or more," said the young lady who superintended the domestic arrangements of the Blue Boar.

"Wery good, my dear," replied Sam. "Let me have nine penn'orth o' brandy and water luke, and the inkstand, will you, miss ?"

The brandy and water luke and the inkstand having been carried into the little parlor, and the young lady having carefully flattened down the coals to prevent their blazing, and carried away the poker to preclude the possibility of the fire being stirred without the full privity and concurrence of the Blue Boar being first had and obtained, Sam Weller sat himself down in a box near the stove, and pulled out the sheet of gilt-edged letter-paper, and the hard-nibbed pen. Then, looking carefully at the pen to see that there were no hairs in it, and dusting down the table so that there might be no crumbs of bread under the paper, Sam tucked up the cuffs of his coat, squared his elbows, and composed himself to write.

To ladies and gentlemen who are not in the habit of devoting themselves practically to the science of penmanship, writing a letter is no very easy task, it being always considered necessary in such cases for the writer to incline his head on his left arm, so as to place his eyes as nearly as possible on a level with the paper, and, while glancing sideways at the letters he is constructing, to form with his tongue imaginary characters to correspond. These motions, although unquestionably of the greatest assistance to original composition, retard in some degree the progress of the writer, and Sam had unconsciously been a full hour and a half writing words in small text, smearing out wrong letters with his little finger, and putting in new ones which required going over very often to render them visible through the