sieur Jobus, already in the flesh, and and the large political papers, as already already permanent in his department, must observed, had not assailed the Cochin have been watching the proceedings from China Minister on the clerk question from behind a curtain, and chuckling to himself, not knowing accurately, as yet, to which that it was a merciful, though mysterious party he belonged. They were waiting. dispensation of Providence, that the peo- If he turned out a Monarchist, the Repubple in performing revolutions should always licans would lead the assault by taking light upon the wrong culprits. Then he the part of the poor ill-paid clerks, whom pictured M. Jobus, reading of the execu- it had been sought to turn out of house tion of Louis XVI. in the Moniteur Univer- and home without indemnity, while bloated sel, looking on from his window at the over-paid officials (ie., himself,) revelled flight of Charles X., figuring as spectator in anti-democratic splendour, &c., &c. If, at the downfall of Louis Philippe, raising on the other hand, he proved a Republican, his hat to the Empress Eugénie on her than the Monarchists would open their way to the railway station on the 4th Sep- batteries upon him by lamentations over tember, 1870, and repeating to himself M. Jobus, who was an institution of the after each of these catastrophes: "It is past, and had been persecuted solely on certainly a great comfort that I should be that account. permanent and irresponsible."

The Count resolved to embody his views He imagined that the sentry who sal- in the form of a programme or constituuted him, eyed him askant, as if reflect- tion, which he should submit to his friends ing: "You're a poor creature." A black in the Cabinet, and then advocate publicly dog perhaps M. Jobus's dog sitting whenever he had a chance, in order that on his hind quarters in the yard, be- no doubt whatever might remain as to side a grey dog, set up at what his sentiments were, a bark his approach and appeared to be saying, This project of constitution began to "that is the man who thought to uproot absorb all his leisure. He read treatises M. Jobus," at which the grey dog was of political philosophy - Plato, Stuart Mill, seized with a prolonged fit of hilarity. and essays in the Revue des Deux Mondes. He wrote a lengthy and dejected letter to He took in English periodicals, he sought Mdme. de Claire, confessing all his trou-out Englishmen and Americans in society, bles, his deceptions, his depondency. He explained that he had done violence to his nature to seem other than he was, to be puritanical and unbending, and that it had all broken down. He thought of the talisman Pritchard," which he used to wear on his locket, and felt that it would be wise to have a new locket emblazoned with that same motto. What, indeed, did discussion or worry on political matters lead to? Government and policy were always the same, for Government and policy were M. Jobus.

She answered, "Persevere; but there is no need for puritanism. Be yourself Results are not attained in a day, and, as for M. Jobus, I suppose he will yield to time like other crumbling monuments."

V.

and sounded them as to the charters of their respective liberties. Mr. Washburne gave him a copy of the United States Constitution; Lord Lyons presented him with Hallam and a facsimile of Magna Charta. The clerks in his office began to breathe. The terrific spell of work that had fallen upon them when that direful Tabular List was being drawn up, loomed backwards in the distance like a forgotten nightmare. They found time to read the news of their country, play pitch and toss, and crack walnuts during office hours as in the good old days; and save that they continued to be civil to the public, nothing was changed from what it had been of yore. The young gentleman in the blue-striped shirtcollar and with the double eye-glass was even reinstated in his cane-bottomed chair and his emoluments, on expressing contrition for the past, and promising not to put his tongue in his cheek for the future. The Count had never been brasque with his subordinates even when the reforming fever was most strongly on him. He was always courteous and unassuming; but he now fell perceptibly into his old manner of letting things drift as they listed, and judging them all with a smile. He bought

officio members, and a Legislative body of 300 members, elected by universal suffrage, for a term of three years.

rubies, to be more conspicuous; the use of it was to keep his temper within bounds whenever he held interviews with M. Jobus. That gentleman continued to rule 2. The Senate to be renewable by thirds every and be useful, as in his palmiest days. To two years so that the term of office of each Senbe sure, when there was an appointment bers of the Senate to be the President of the ator shall be of six years. The ex-officio memto be filled up, the Count endeavoured to select the best man that he knew; but he Republic on leaving office; ex-Cabinet Ministers had sent his hobby, Puritan, to its stable, Cour de Cassation, Cour des Comptes, and Triof five years' standing, the Chief Judges of the and was determined not to risk quarrels bunal de Commerce; the Procureurs Generaux with lady or other friends for the empty of the Cour de Cassation and Cour des Comptes; satisfaction of being treated by everybody a Member elected out of each of the five classes as a Jack in office. Thus, his school com- of the Institut de France; the Doyen and subrade, M. de Pleumeauvent, obtained the Doyen of the Faculty of Medicine; the Archgovernorship he wanted, Mdme. de Rose-bishop of Paris and four prelates elected by the croix was promised a post for her brother, Episcopacy, and the three senior Generals and and when a minor vacancy arose for which Admirals on active service. he knew of no eligible person, he abandoned the nomination to M. Jobus, who always knew of somebody. Needless to 4. Complete separation of Church and State. add, that water-melons began to travel 5. Liberty of the Press and of public meeting. once again through the streets under the 6. Trial by jury in civil cases where desired custody of dragoons, and that cork-soles, by either of the suitors; and abolition in crimiheaps of newspapers, and novels were de-nal cases of "l'instruction secrète." spatched about the country with the Gov- 7. Municipal independence; each Municipal ernment frank, as if nothing had ever hap- Council to elect its own Mayor. pened to check the practice.

3. A President of the Republic elected by the two Chambers for a term of seven years, and not re-eligible.*

9. Compulsory military service for all ablebodied citizens.

10. Compulsory education.

8. Appointment of Prefects for a term of five In this way time flew by until the open-years subject to good behaviour, and abolition ing of the session, a day or two after which of all sub-prefectorates. M. de Ris completed his plan of a constitution, and had it neatly copied out on foolscap by his Secretary, skilled in précis writing. It was a bright December morning when, with his document in his official portfolio, the Cochin China Minister went to attend the Cabinet Council where he intended producing it.

There was to be a question put to the Cochin China Minister that afternoon by an honourable member of the Right, who wished to know whether it were true that a post of dignity in Cochin China had been bestowed upon a convict who had escaped from the hulks (i.e. to a Republican who had been transported to Cayenne for his opinions under the Second Empire, and had fled thence). As the Count would have to vindicate his appointment, he had conceived that no opportunity could be more fitting for a public profession of his new faith, and he explained this to his astonished colleagues, who, not having come prepared to hear a new Constitutional programme read to them, sat in blauk dismay round the council board, when the Count drew out his manuscript, and perused it aloud with evident satisfaction.

PROJECT OF REPUBLICAN

FRANCE.

11. Payment of such Senators and Deputies only as shall make an affidavit that their income

is below 25,000 francs.

12. Establishment of Divorce, and simplification of the Marriage Laws; men to be considered of age at twenty-one instead of twentyfive, and free to marry at that age without sanction from parents.

There were some three score more arti

cles that followed the above, which were only the more prominent items of a programme that embraced reform and reconstitution in all its branches - the re-casting of the judicial System alone absorbing a couple of dozen paragraphs. Never had the members of the Cabinet twirled their pens so disconsolately over their blottingbooks. Why was this new Cochin China Minister always breaking out in fresh places after this fashion? Most rueful of all to behold too were the Republican Ministers. If this programme were pushed

* M. de Ris's idea in fixing seven years was prob ably this. That during a term of four years a Pres ident has scarcely the time to give full play to his abilities; besides which, Presidential elections in exCONSTITUTION FOR citable countries should not be too frequent Seven years is a term neither dangerously long nor inconveniently short. A French President, however, should never be re-eligible, for re-election in France would be the certain prelude to monarchy.

1. Two Chambers, viz., a Senate elected by the Councils General and comprising certain ex

had got to loggerheads with his colleagues, came and shook his hand very cordially. But the Count was not thinking of Chisel

M. Gambetta. He was looking for some man of sober sense by conversation with whom he could refresh his excited mind. He stumbled across an English Lewspaper correspondent who was skurrying along with a note-book in one hand, an umbrella in the other, and a field-glass at his side. He knew this gentleman, and stopped him.

to a division in the Cabinet they could not well help supporting it, and this must lead to a trial of strength, after which one or other section of the Cabinet must retire.hurst, and he had but a moderate faith in And they were all so comfortable where they were, and the compromise system that had been in force for a year, had worked so well; and there really was so little need for sensational programmes, or for reform in any shape! An icy silence followed the reading of the document, and the Great Personage sitting at the head of table wiped his brow despairingly with his silk handkerchief. The Count had not quite been able to understand the silence, but he understood the handkerchief: one has not been a man of the world all one's life for nothing. He rose with an agreeable, though superficial smile, and said their Excellencies would have time to think about it. Then the Council being over he went out and drove to the House..

"If you wished to found a republic in England, monsieur," he asked, how

should you do it?"

"We have a republic," smiled the correspondent: "every country where freedom exists with a respect for the law is a republic. The style of the person who nominally governs matters little."

66

66

Then, how do you define republican

It is indefinable," answered the Englishman; "but is practicable to those who hold to substance instead of shadow."

The correspondent vanished, he and his field-glass; and the Minister walked on until he came to the model of Bayard's tomb, where, scribbling notes in a book resting on the head of that warrior, stood a chroniqueur of the Cigare, M. Timoleon Tartine. It was Tartine who had written that the Count's trousers were ill-cut. He would have escaped, if possible, but the Count had taken him unawares, so he brazened it out.

But he knew that his days in the Cab-ism?" inet were numbered, perhaps even his hours. If not sacrificed by the compromise proclivities of his colleagues, he would retire of his own free will, for what could he do in a Cabinet where every effort of patriotism on his part was rebuffed. It must be noticed that the Court, being a Frenchman, was little imbued with the parliamentary spirit, based on mutual concessession and the strong pull, the long pull, and the pull altogether system. He was little able to perceive the ludicrous feature of a Minister arriving with a constitution on foolscap, and demanding all his colleagues to swallow it entire, under pain of Cabinet dismemberment. He did not stop to inquire what it would come to if every Minister drew up a constitution, nor how far Government would be possible, if each Minister absolutely refused to consider office tenable unless all his schemes were submitted to by the rest. He entered the House and made a very freezing answer, in fifty words, to the honourable member who wished to know about the republican who had escaped from the hulks. Then, with his portfolio under his arm, he went to walk about the Galerie des Tombeaux, which acts as principal lobby.

a

"I know I have been attacking your Excellency," he laughed; but I had grudge against your tailor, an old enemy of mine."

"You shouldn't attack those who are for freedom of the press, as I am; besides, trousers are not politics."

"They are French politics," answered M. Tartine; "but," added he in huge disgust, "freedom of the press, who cares for that, M. le Comte? Every day of my life, and of a Sunday in church, when I go there, I pray for a press-law which may make of journalists something higher in the social scale than they are now. Some A Minister inspires so much respect to years ago I held my head high; I had the French mind that deputies uncovered been twice imprisoned, and every line I themselves right and left as Count de Ris wrote was gold. Now my editor tells me passed, and many pressed forward to give every day that he didn't quite like that him news of Count de Chambord, or of the last article of mine. And why? Is it that Count de Paris, or of Chiselhurst, hoping I write worse? Not I; but four years that such might please him, and perhaps ago it was despotism, and as you dared not induce him to make a statement indicative say much, everything that you did dare of Monarchist tendencies. M. Gambet- say was listened to, even when it was bad ta, also, having somehow heard that he grammar. Give me back despotism and

Sté. Pelagie; that's the only enjoyable government for a chroniqueur."

From Temple Bar.

BEAU BRUMMEL.

The Minister laughed. "France and AN almost unparalleled social success England; there we have them. It will and popularity, an acknowledged and high perhaps be an uphill work to rear an en- position in that inscrutable realm known as lightened republic with such cariatides as "the first society," and at a time too when M. Tartine." He had got so far in his its portals were much narrower and more soliloquy when a silver-chained usher jealously guarded than in these degenerate touched him on the arm and handed a days of successful merchandise and noucard: - "A lady desires to see your Ex-veaux riches; an intimate acquaintance cellency."

He explained briefly, and she listened with her large liquid eyes so open that he could see himself in them. He felt a little ashamed of himself for having so poor an account to give of two month's power. "But it was not power," added he apologetically. "It has been like stiff ploughing on a hard land which I now see is sterile. It is no good casting republican seed there."

"Oh, if only I had the chance!" she exclaimed naïvely, and then checked herself, blushing.

But the words were out, and he was not slow to profit by them.

earnestness

" if

"I might try again," he said, looking at her, and speaking cheerfully, yet with He paused for a word, and said in a lower voice if the power were made lighter to me by being shared."

-

with "the first gentleman in Europe," and a welcome reception in half the best houses in England, unassisted too by either wealth or connections; surely, with such a combination of distinctions, George Brummel might well lay just claims to the position sarcastically allotted him by Lord Byron, as one of the greatest men of the nineteenth century.

His name is now almost forgotten. We have merged into a totally different phase of society a society that refuses to award notoriety to the wearer of a perfectlystarched cravat, or creaseless coat; yet still a glimpse into those "good old times," and a slight sketch of the life of the once famous Beau, may not, I hope, prove wholly devoid of interest.

George Bryan Brummel was born in June, 1778. Much has been said as to the obscurity of his birth and parentage. According to some statements his father was a confectioner; others declare him to have been one of Lord Bute's household servants; but these and many similar assertions are without foundation. His grandfather, however, certainly appears to have been in trade, though what his calling I cannot say; he lived in Bury Street, St. James's, and supplemented his modest income by letting apartments. Mr. Jenkinson, afterwards Lord Liverpool, was one of his first lodgers. The Beau's father, She did not ask, "Shared with whom?" then a boy, would seem to have attracted nor was her expression so discouraging this gentleman's notice, for he employed that he felt it necessary to tell her. The him for some time as an amanuensis, and Boulevard wits in Paris say that Madame afterwards obtained him a clerkship in the la Comtesse de Ris will make an excellent republican Minister when her husband takes office again: for, on the whole, he thought it better to resign for the present. Every time he took his seat at the council board his colleagues looked apprehensively at him, as if they feared he was going to draw a new constitution from his pocket, or worse than all, suggest some new reforms.

Treasury. He here acquitted himself so creditably as to be later recommended as secretary to Lord North. He occupied this position until his patron's resignation, in 1788, when he retired from office and purchased a comfortable estate, known as The Grove, near Donnington. He had some years before married a Miss Richardson, reckoned one of the prettiest women of her time.

The Grove appears to have been a popular house, for not only were Fox and Sheridan among its frequent visitors, but many also of the celebrated wits and literary men of the day; and to his early intercourse

with such society may I think be traced
much of George Brummel's ready wit and
excellent conversational powers. The Beau
and an elder brother were both sent to
Eton. Of his school days there is bnt
little to relate. His contemporaries de-
scribe him as a handsome, pleasant, gentle-
manly boy, and one who made plenty of
friends, but did not specially distinguish
himself, either in school or playground.
At Oxford, where he completed his educa-
tion, his career was much the same. His
leaving the university was almost immedi-
ately followed by a most important event
in his life his introduction to the Regent.
One of the many titled friends whom Brum-
mel had so assiduously cultivated, both at
Eton and Oxford, contrived a dinner-party
for this purpose. The particulars of the
interview have not transpired, but it would
seem that the Beau's excellent manners
and cool, self-possessed bearing on this
occasion, though a mere boy, barely seven-
teen years old, met with His Royal High-
ness's more than common approval, for al-
most immediately followed the present of
a cornetcy in the 10th Huzzars, a regiment
then commanded by the Prince himself.
So marked a preference from such a quar-
ter of course made Brummel at once the
centre of all notice and attention, and many
absurd anecdotes are told of the conse-
quent assurance, not to say impudence, of
his manner at this time. One of these,
though perhaps well known, I cannot for-
bear relating. At a great ball given by a
certain law lord, one of the handsomest as
well as the most difficile girls in the room
was observed to refuse every dance. Late
in the evening, however, Cornet Brummel
made his appearance, when this haughty
beauty at once yielded him her hand and
joined the dancers. The dance over, the
Beau sauntered up to a friend and inquired
with some curiosity who the very ugly man
standing near the mantlepiece might be.
"Why surely you must know him," said
his acquaintance; "that is the master of
the house." 66
Really?" replied the Cor-
net, nonchalantly. "How should I?
never was invited."

was a contingency specially distasteful to Brummel. The reason he himself gave to the Prince was the fact that the regiment was suddenly ordered to Manchester. "I have heard, your Royal Highness," he said, "that we are ordered to Manchester. Now you must be aware how disagreeable this would be to me. I really could not go. Think, your Royal Highness - Manchester! Besides, you would not be there. I have, therefore, with your Royal Highness's permission, determined to sell out." Oh, by all means, Brummel," said the Prince; "do as you please, do as you please."

66

Before following George Brummel's further fortunes it may be worth while to consider his right to the sobriquet of Beau, and how he obtained it. The term "beau," in those days, was synonymous with our more modern word "dandy," and was applied without distinction to all who were remarkable for care in the style and taste of their attire.

Dress had at that time become very untidy. Fox and many of the leading men of the day, affected a supreme contempt for all outward adornment; and it consequently grew to be considered the mode for a gentleman's appearance to be as négligé, or to speak more correctly, as slovenly, as possible. But a reaction was gradually setting in, and Brummel, who had been conspicuous from boyhood for the scrupulous neatness of his appearance, now determined to be the best dressed man in London. His figure was remarkably good, and he took care that it should always be displayed to the fullest advantage, by a perfectly fitting coat. His special aim, however, was to avoid anything marked, considering it a great mortification for any gentleman, that his dress should attract observation in the street. In this particular he was most successful, being distinguished only, as Lord Byron truly said of him, by "the exquisite propriety of his appearance." His chief forte lay in his cravat; this important article had hitherto consisted of a piece of limp camIbric, loosely fastened round the throat. Brummel, however, took care to have his slightly starched, and the arrangement of this part of his dress would seem to have been fraught with the deepest anxiety; for it is related that a friend, calling upon him one morning before the completion of his toilet, met his valet coming down stairs with a quantity of neck-cloths, slightly tumbled, under his arm. On being questioned on the subject, the man replied with great gravity, "Oh, these are our failures." But enough has, I think been said to jus

Brummel only remained in the 10th until 1798. His reasons for selling out have never been thoroughly ascertained, and it certainly does seem incomprehensible that he should thus early have given up a position so much coveted by others, and which must too have been such a pleasant one to himself. The unsettled state of Europe at that time rendered it highly probable that the regiment might be required for active service, and it is said by many that this'