to take a hasty sketch, the three gentlemen strolled through the ruins; where their attention was attracted towards the remains of a very substantial luncheon, which showed that there was also another party there, and which some empty porter bottles seemed to mark as English.

"One can track the haunts of one's Countrymen, like the encampments of the Indian tribes, by the bones of the victims they have devoured," said Ormsby, pointing to some well-cleaned drumsticks and pinions.

"We are grown a dreadfully locomotive population," said Harry Wordsworth; "all our cits now desert the Thames for the Nile, shoot the cataracts instead of London Bridge, and instead of a chop at the Red House, pic nic among the pyramids. But this has been a most ravenous tribe, by the havoc they have made. Look at all these sacred shrouds, from which these mangled remains have been cruelly torn," added he, collecting, between the tips of the fingers of his French gloves, almost a file of Galignani's Messengers, which had served as covering to the profusion of food that had been despatched."

"Do you remember," said Ormsby, "Dr. Johnson's indignation at the feelings of that man, whose patriotism would not gain force on the plains of Marathon, or whose piety would not grow warmer among the ruins of Ionia.' What would he think

then of those who could pick chicken bones under the pillars of the Temples of Pæstum?

"Why," said Harry, "that in all probability they had that sort of philosophy which constitutes happiness; according to the Frenchman, who says, * pour bien jouir de la vie, il faut avoir un mauvais cœur et un bon estomac.""

66

"This is all very fine," said Colonel Canteen, who had been a silent, but not an inattentive listener to a conversation in which eating formed so principal a feature, but," added he, "one cannot consent to starve upon stones. These pillars would be rather hard of digestion, however well they may to ruminate upon."

do

At this moment, distant tittering and giggling announced the approach of the party, whose previous proceedings had excited so much attention, and, at the opposite angle of the building from that where the gentlemen had been standing, and nearer to the spot where Matilda was seated sketching, appeared a number of ladies and gentlemen, whose gay attire, merry tones, and confused chattering, seemed to show that they were enjoying that excess of excitement, which English people only experience at a genuine junket. A disagreeable impression, too, was made upon Matilda, that amongst this confusion of tongues, there were some voices that she had keard before; and this was painfully confirmed,

A a

when she distinguished, elevated above the rest, the shrill tones of Mrs. Hobson.

"Well, you may say what you please, but this temple, or house, or pest-town, or whatever you call it, is only fit for the lazarettos to live in, with nothing but their pillows for walls."

"Pæstum, Ma'am," said Mrs. Simperton on her right; and "Lazaronis you mean, Ma'am," said Mrs. Woodhead on her left. "And the Lazaroni,” added Tom, "have only walls for pillows, instead of pillows as you call them, for walls."

At these unwelcome sounds, Matilda drew her veil closer on the side from which they came, and continued intent upon her sketch book. But at the same time Miss Jemima Hobson, who was a bit of a romp, and was still of that innocent age, when a happy ignorance both of the manners and the morals of the world is at least supposed, cried out "Oh! look! here's a lady drawing! I must just run and have a peep;" then, skipping close up to our heroine, she exclaimed, "Law, mamma! if it a'nt aunt Matilda!" At this dreaded recognition, Matilda's pencil dropped from her hand, whilst her head sunk closer to her book.

"What!" cried Mrs. Hobson; "come here,

child."

"Come here, Jemima," said Mrs. Simperton. "Come away, directly," re-echoed Mrs. Wood

head; and all the females of the family immediately skuttled away, followed by their attendant beaux.

"And is it come to this?" thought Matilda, as she trembled in every joint. "Must I hide my head abashed, in the presence of a woman whose gross vulgarity of mind, as well as of manners, I used to despise and ridicule ? But it is as it should be. Selfrespect, once forfeited, the rest follows of course, Oh, my God!" she exclaimed, bursting into an agony of tears, "How am I fallen-how debassed."

When the Hobson party passed Lord Ormsby and his friends, there was a little awkwardness of deportment as they hurried by. Mr. Simperton stopped an instant, and his natural servility towards any great man, struggling with his sense of propriety, he hesitatingly addressed Ormsby;-“I hope your Ludship will not attribute any thing in our conduct to intentional disrespect, or spontaneous slight; but your Ludship must be aware, that in persons of my cloth, some attention to appearance is required."

For a moment, Lord Ormsby eyed this observer of appearances from head to foot, as he stood opposite to him, nearly two thousand miles from his cure. It was hard to say, whether his "cloth" was marked by his broad-brimmed white beaver, his sky blue neckcloth, or his light jean jacket, tight nankeen pantaloons, and buff boots.

"You are, no doubt, quite right, Sir, to act up to

your own ideas of attention to appearances," said Lord Ormsby, and passed on towards Matilda, after telling his two friends that he would return to them: for he imagined that she might have been discomposed by the suddenness of the meeting with the Hobsons, and he did not wish that they should witness her distress.

The Hobson party in the meantime prepared to depart. Old Hobson was not there, as he had insisted upon being left behind at Naples, though utterly helpless there by himself; because, in his business days at Manchester, he had always refused to be included in any junketing expedition. Squiro Woodhead had driven his lovely bride in a new phaeton, which he had sported upon their marriage ; and Tom, emulous of the charioteering fame of his friend, had undertaken to act as toolsman to Mr. and Mrs. Simperton, his mother, and youngest sister, in a hired caratella, drawh by two rather unmanageable half-broken Calabrian ponies.

Tom was a little out of humour at this precipitate departure; and his notions of decorum not being very distinct, he would willingly have compromised all the female propriety of the family (which had induced them to avoid Lady Matilda) for the chance of being noticed himself by any of the gentlemen of her party; a distinction he much desired, from what he considered such "tiptop first-rates."

"What an escape we have had," said Mrs. Sim