quoth I, "to the home of my aunts next vacation and there learn how we became mighty, and discover precisely why we don't practise to day our inherited claims to glory."

I went to Snowborough.

Aunt Patience was now anxious to lay before her impatient nephew the proof he burned to behold. But first she must explain. All the old family documents and letters were, no doubt, destroyed in the great fire of '98, as nothing in the shape of parchment or paper implying nobility had ever been discovered in Snowborough, or elsewhere. But there had been preserved, for many years, a suit of imperial clothes that had been worn by their greatgrandfather in England, and, no doubt, in the New World also. These garments had been carefully watched and guarded, for were they not the proof that their owner belonged to a station in life second, if second at all, to the royal court of King George itself? Precious casket, into which I was soon to have the privilege of gazing! Through how many long years these fond, foolish virgins had lighted their unflickering lamps of expectation and hope at this cherished old shrine!

I was now on my way to the family repository

of all our greatness. I went up stairs "on the jump." We all knelt down before the wellpreserved box; and my proud Aunt Patience, in a somewhat reverent manner, turned the key. My heart,—I am not ashamed to confess it now, although it is forty years since the quartet, in search of family honors, were on their knees that summer afternoon in Snowborough, my heart beat high. I was about to look on that which might be a duke's or an earl's regalia. And I was descended from the owner in a direct line! I had lately been reading Shakspeare's "Titus Andronicus"; and I remembered, there before the trunk, the lines,—

O sacred receptacle of my joys,
Sweet cell of virtue and nobility!"

The lid went up, and the sisters began to unroll the precious garments, which seemed all enshrined in aromatic gums and spices. The odor of that interior lives with me to this day; and I grow faint with the memory of that hour. With pious precision the clothes were uncovered, and at last the whole suit was laid before my expectant eyes.

Reader! I am an old man now, and have not long to walk this planet. But, whatever dread

ful shock may be in reserve for my declining years, I am certain I can bear it; for I went through that scene at Snowborough, and still live!

When the garments were fully displayed, all the aunts looked at me. I had been to college; I had studied Burke's "Peerage"; I had been once to New York. Perhaps I could immediately name the exact station in noble British life to which that suit of clothes belonged. I could; I saw it all at a glance. I grew flustered and pale. I dared not look my poor deluded female relatives in the face.

"What rank in the peerage do these goldlaced garments and big buttons betoken?” cried all three.

"It is a suit of servant's livery!" gasped I, and fell back with a shudder.

That evening, after the sun had gone down, we buried those hateful garments in a ditch at the bottom of the garden. Rest there perturbed body-coat, yellow trousers, brown gaiters, and all!

"Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye!"

-Atlantic Monthly, April, 1865.

FREDERICK S. COZZENS.'

(BORN, 1818-DIED, 1869.)

THE FAMILY HORSE.

HAVE bought me a horse. As I had ob tained some skill in the manége during my younger days, it was a matter of consideration to have a saddle-horse. It surprised me to find good saddle-horses very abundant soon after my consultation with the stage proprietor upon this topic. There were strange saddlehorses to sell almost every day. One man was very candid about his horse: he told me, if his horse had a blemish, he would n't wait to be asked about it; he would tell it right out; and, if a man did n't want him then, he need n't take him. He also proposed to put him on trial for sixty days, giving his note for the amount paid him for the horse, to be taken up in case the animal were returned. I asked him what were the principal defects of the horse. He said he'd been fired once, because they 1 See Biographical Sketch, p. xxii.

thought he was spavined; but there was no more spavin to him than there was to a freshlaid egg-he was as sound as a dollar. I asked him if he would just state what were the defects of the horse. He answered, that he once had the pink-eye, and added, "now that 's honest." I thought so, but proceeded to question him closely. I asked him if he had the bots. He said, not a bot. I asked him if he would go. He said he would go till he dropped down dead; just touch him with a whip, and he 'll jump out of his hide. I inquired how old he was. He answered, just eight years, exactly-some men, he said, wanted to make their horses younger than they be; he was willing to speak right out, and own up he was eight years. I asked him if there were any other objections. He said no, except that he was inclined to be a little gay; "but," he added, "he is so kind, a child can drive him with a thread." I asked him if he was a good family horse. He replied that no lady that ever drew rein over him would be willing to part with him. Then I asked him his price. He answered that no man could have bought him for one hundred dollars a month ago, but now he was willing to sell him for seventy-five, on ac