the flames; and once more it was lifted into the air, a blackened, burning cinder. Again and again this fiendish mockery of baptism was repeated; till the martyr, with a despairing, suffocating voice, exclaimed,— "O God! I cannot die!" The chief executioner came forward, and, either in mercy to the dying man or through fear of the populace, threw a noose over his neck, and strangled the almost lifeless victim. At the same moment the cord which held the body was loosened, and it fell into the fire to rise no more. And thus was consummated the martyrdom of the Baptism of Fire. COQ-À-L'ÂNE. My brain, methinks, is like an hour-glass, Filling up time; but then are turn'd, and turn'd, And less to put in art. BEN JONSON. A RAINY and gloomy winter was just drawing to its close, when I left Paris for the south of France. We started at sunrise; and as we passed along the solitary streets of the vast and silent metropolis, drowsily one by one its clanging horologes chimed the hour of six. Beyond the city gates the wide landscape was covered with a silvery network of frost; a wreath of vapour overhung the windings of the Seine; and every twig and shrub, with its sheath of crystal, flashed in the level rays of the rising sun. The sharp frosty air seemed to |