soberly, "I hope he will do nothing of the sort. | home that night as much engaged to me as I What are you good for if you can't make your was to Bessy, and I went home a perjured man, own way in the world with so many advantages ?" with two women on my hands and a frightful "What advantages ?" said I, breathless. headache torturing my brain. "No matter," said she, shaking her head, and looking extremely roguish; "there is an heiress here, at this very ball, I have no doubt, whom people say Mr. Muddlar is very devoted to."

I may as well admit that I did not sleep any that night; indeed, I did not attempt it. Taking off my best coat, I wrapped myself in my traveling-shawl, and endeavored to meditate on my dreadful position. Finding this impossible, I put my head out of the window (my room is a sky-parlor in Bleecker Street, looking back), and tried to cool my fevered brow. Alas! there is a sailor living next door who keeps a parrot. This parrot was spending the night outside of the window, and hearing mine open be

"Upon my word, Bessy," said I, “it's all deuced nonsense! I have flirted a little with Adeline Forbes, but I don't care a pin for her, and you know it perfectly well. She is a tall, gawky-looking animal, and resembles a giraffe in crinoline. I can't bear her!" "And you never seriously thought of marry-gan, with his usual vulgarity, to swear in the ing her?" said Bessy, her large soft eyes looking larger and softer as they were bent full on my face.

"No, 'pon honor I never did; and if you will marry me, Bessy, I will promise never to see Adeline Forbes again!"

By this time the wine was so completely in my head that I do not hold myself responsible for any of the remarks that followed. I told Bessy a thousand things that I might better have kept to myself, and concluded by offering to show her at a distance her dethroned rival. All this time she said nothing but blushed, and looked rather frightened at my vehemence. She would not even give me any sort of an answer, but threw me over for a definite reply till the next morning at her hotel. When I proposed to hunt up Miss Forbes, however, she assented, and put her hand in my arm immediately.

most frightful manner. He informed me that I was a fool forty times over, and wound up by requesting me, in every tone of which his shrill voice was capable, to go to the devil. Unfortunate wretch that I was, had I not already reached that goal?

I concluded, as the morning began to dawn, that I would write a note to Bessy and explain my position. She was a warm-hearted, confiding, simple-minded country girl, and after dropping some tears over my unhappy fate and her own disappointment, would return in a few days to her own quiet home, and disappear from my path forever.

As to Adeline Forbes, I was not such a fool as to let her slip through my fingers. Heiresses are not to be met every day, or married by young men without fortune or profession. Plain as she was and unlovable, she was nevertheless a That was altogether the pleasantest night I prize, and after having gone as far, and sucever passed in my life. Bessy knew no one but ceeded as well as I had, no Bessy or any other her escort, a fat old lady who troubled nobody, woman should stand in the way of my happiness. and, taking her under my protection, I threw Happiness? Yes, I pondered over the word, expediency to the dogs and devoted myself ex-but after repeating it once or twice it seemed clusively to her. We danced together (I took good care not to introduce any one else), we walked together, and talked together till three o'clock in the morning, when tired, but radiant, I committed her to the care of the fat chaperon and bade her an affectionate adieu.

Then the excitement died away, and I knew that I had made an eternal fool of myself!

The reaction was sudden and complete. Had the floor opened for the second time that evening and swallowed me up I should have thanked my stars and gone down contented; Brown might have boarded me over, and I should have smothered and made no sign. As it was I groaned aloud in agony.

"What is the matter?" said Miss Forbes coming up, looking really anxious, "I have been standing near you for some time and you have not seen me. You look so ill, Mr. Muddlar, is any thing distressing you?"

altogether natural and proper. It is happiness to have one's debts paid, one's home palatial, and one's future secured. All this would come with Adeline Forbes, and even with such a drawback I could call it happiness.

I sat down to write my note to Bessy. It was long, affectionate, and explanatory. I told her that had my uncle done the handsome and proper thing this painful conclusion to our friendship would never have occurred. I explained the miserable state of my finances, the constant calls and drains that society made upon my time and purse, how unfitted I was for a quiet domestic life, and how unable to push my own way in the world, as the more sordid and grasping of my contemporaries seemed so well able to do. The end of the note, however, was the most delicate part of the affair. In it I intimated that I knew that there was one person who loved me better even than her fortune; she had plainly showed me that her feelings were beyond her own control, and that in my brokenhearted condition I was uncertain what the issue would be of this complicated affair. She was plain, she was awkward, she never could have my heart-that altogether belonged to Bessy

but she loved me to distraction, and I pitied her. If Bessy ever saw me dragged into a hapless marriage, let her not blame me, but blame, as I did, my wretched destiny and a sordid relative. This was the end of the note. As I directed the envelope to the New York Hotel, where I knew Bessy was staying, I remembered that that too was the abiding-place of Miss Forbes.

"speak your whole mind; we shall be able to bear the information, whatever it may lead to." Just to think of that simple-minded child Bessy, talking to me in that style! I was petrified. "Bessy," said I, throwing into my voice all the pathos it was capable of, “did you get my note, and did you betray me?"

Here Adeline, who had said nothing so far, This young lady was in a delightful state of recovered her voice and spoke. "Bessy is my orphanage. She had an old aunt who chape-friend," she said, "Mr. Muddlar, and has done roned her and did her bidding; but she was de'pendent and harmless; such relatives count for nothing in the domestic drama. Adeline was therefore to all intents and purposes an independent female.

the kindest thing in her power in undeceiving me in this manner. Ugly as I am, a perfect giraffe in crinoline, I have a heart as well as a fortune. I do not wish to give one without the other. I believed you were sincere, why I know not, except that I am too credulous, and not a very good judge of character perhaps. Bessy has undeceived me, and I am eternally grateful-" She stopped, and the tears came into her eyes.

What a mistake I had made! This woman, after all, concealed real feeling beneath her uninviting exterior, while Bessy, little Bessy, was a viper, a vixen, and a termagant. What a

As early as was proper in the morning I made my appearance at the New York Hotel, and requested of the obsequious waiters admittance to Miss Forbes's parlor. Under the circumstances this was nothing out of the way, particularly as Adeline always saw her company in her own suit of apartments. I was informed, however, that Miss Forbes had left word that I was to be shown into the public reception-room, and there accordingly, "chewing the cud of painful med-double fool I had been! itation," I remained three-quarters of an hour at least. At the end of that time I rose to go in search of the waiter who had taken my card, when I beheld advancing toward me two forms whose appearance and contiguity sent cold chills over me in rapid succession.

Here were Bessy Graham and Adeline Forbes, arm in arm, talking together, and walking directly toward me.

My first impulse was to take my hat and run; my next to see what was the meaning of this extraordinary conjunction of circumstances, and whether it bore upon me or not. I still hoped, fool that I was! A man with two women in league against him had better give up the game as lost; and the moment they came near enough to show the expression of their faces I saw that I was their enemy, and that they had made common cause against me.

They shook hands with me, however, with an assumed cordiality, and almost leading me into an unoccupied corner, they each drew up a chair and waited silently, as if for me to begin the conversation. Of course I said nothing. What could a man say who had got himself into such a ridiculous position? I took up my hat and began to rub it round with my glove, in a most conscious state of confusion, I have no doubt.

"I was not aware," said I, at last casting a dagger-like glance at Bessy, "that you and Miss Forbes were friends."

"Thomas Muddlar," said Bessy, going on, and driving the iron still deeper into my soul with a malignity perfectly disgusting, "I consider your whole behavior in this matter as beneath contempt! I never did think much of you, since the first time I had the pleasure of meeting you under your uncle's roof. To eat a person's bread, and then to sneer and scoff at the bounty which keeps you alive, is a meanness of which I believe you alone are capable. This second development of character is, therefore, perfectly in keeping. It was a great restraint to listen to you last night in silence; I had a reason for it, however, and my self-control has proved extremely useful to all parties. I never had the least intention of accepting you for one moment; your pathetic note, therefore, was entirely thrown away."

"Then you have been deceiving me in the most shameful manner!" I said, angrily; "and what is more, I do not believe you now, it is all jealousy!"

Miss Forbes looked at me sharply.

"Mr. Muddlar," said she, "if I believed you capable of real love for Bessy I could forgive you all your sins against me. Heiresses," and she sighed softly, "are the natural prey of society, and must suffer in silence. If," she added, with much dignity, "want of money is the only bar between you two say so at once; I have influence, and can get some position for you, if that is the only difficulty in the way. I am entirely above petty enmity in a matter like this."

"I

Bessy smiled a wicked, contemptuous smile. "Yes, we are the best of friends," she said; "her aunt is also an aunt of mine, so we may "Well, I am not," said Bessy, quickly. be said to be almost related. That is not the despise such characters from the bottom of my point, however, Tommy Muddlar. You have heart; and as to marrying Mr. Muddlar, I would offered yourself last night to two young women, not do it if he were like a Hindoo idol, incrusted and naturally they feel somewhat curious to in gold. I abhor fortune-hunters, and heiressknow which offer you mean to stand by. Don't seekers, and men who live on other people's be afraid, my dear Sir," she added, blandly; money. The man I marry must be honorable

and independent as the day. Sneaks and parasites I detest!"

Bessy looked as angry as I ever saw a woman when she said this, but so handsome that I forgot every thing else as I looked at her.

"Where will you find this paragon ?" said I, with a sneer.

"I have found him!" said she, abruptly, stopped and added with a smile that lit up her whole face like an illumination, "he is your uncle!"

Here was a death-blow. My heart died within me as I thought of my allowance; however, there was no use in compromising myself farther. I only said, hoping for a brief moment that it might be a hoax:

66

But

Of course the women would have nothing more to say to me, and the men were glad to have an opportunity to laugh and sneer. it did not make so much difference after all. Adeline Forbes, in an unobtrusive way, got me a lucrative position in a friend's banking-house, which has rendered me for some years independent of my uncle and Bessy. My business this summer will take me abroad for a year or two, and when I return, if Adeline Forbes is still unmarried (she has refused Staples I know), who can tell, after all, what may be the upshot of Mr. Muddlar's Mistake?

A STUDY OF LEGS.

you going to marry my uncle, Bessy looking place in the basement. Now for a

IX o'clock and ten minutes.-Here's a nice

"Are Graham? I do not believe it."

"It is quite true, and your uncle is not very far off, and will confirm the statement if necessary, also my friend Adeline."

I turned to Miss Forbes, but not for farther information; I felt that that was useless.

"I owe you a humble apology, Miss Forbes," I said, taking my hat and preparing for departure. "Bessy has nothing to complain of in me that her vindictive nature has not been fully able to revenge; but to you I feel, and ever shall feel, grateful. You have a heart, and in this trying moment you have neither reproached nor contemned me. I only wish I could prove to you how much more attractive your kindness makes you appear in my eyes than any external advantages."

"It is no matter," said she, drawing away from my offered hand; "your opinions now can not influence me, and should never have done so. I have been weak, short-sighted, and I blame myself more than I do you; but you have been unkind, most unkind!"

little refreshment. I'll pop down here a mo-
ment. "Coffee and toast, my lad, as quick as
luck." I wish this stool had a back. I'd give a
dollar to lie down a quarter of an hour. What,
Legs-all Legs! People on the sidewalk above
me, all hurrying along Broadway, are nothing
to me but legs. Brown legs, blue legs, gray
legs, and black legs; big legs, little legs, long
legs, short legs-all kinds of legs. I see no-
thing of their bodies or arms from my seat, but
I seem to make out the whole of each man.
What nonsense! What I see is only shaking
trowsers of various hues and dimensions.
there are limbs in each, and in each limb a
thousand pulses and a thousand nerves.

But

There goes a leg. It is gone. My hat upon it, that leg is after the doctor. It moved with an indescribable anxiety and urgency. There was a tongue higher up thronged with unspoken words of announcement and appeal. The heart that was pumping the blood into that leg was leaping with burdensome solicitude. A

"I know it, and you most generous; but for-wife was dying. I see her. She knows she is give me, Adeline, I will never trouble you again; let us part as friends."

I put out my hand again, and she took it, and let me hold hers a moment with a most loverlike pressure. I really believe if that confounded giggling Bessy had not been looking on I should have carried the day after all! I really loved Adeline Forbes in my heart at that moment, and with nobody standing by I could have made her believe it; but no, the Fates were against me. Two gentlemen entered together at the moment and greeted us with many smiles and much boisterous warmth. My uncle and Mr. Staples.

I am quite certain that the latter had been within hearing of the best part of the conversation, for Bessy, I think, would not have told and Adeline dared not; but any way it was all over town the next day, and my chance of a rich marriage was gone completely.

This is the story of my great mistake; and as every body has joked me about it until all shame was lost on the subject, I determined to tell the whole truth of the case, and so make an end of it forever.

to go. The doctor said as much days ago. She tells her husband not to seek the physician. But is there no hope? She might be saved if the doctor would hurry. She might die before he could return. What anguish in his hesita-' tion! A kiss and an embrace, passionate to violence, and he goes. "Don't leave me, John!" John's answer is a choking sob and a burst of tears as he rushes to the crowded and heedless street to fight a way through the throng with those poor aching legs I saw. Oh, John, turn back

There goes a leg of substance. There is good rich fat in those pantaloons. Tenderloins rare, fine old Madeira, with now and then a nip or so of the pure vinum adustum straight from the Custom-house-all have a say in it. That leg is on its way to a carriage. It was in favor of every forward movement of the Army of the Potomac, regardless of loss of life. It was not a leg to be daunted while substitutes averaged $600 and railroad stock was high. That was a loyal leg, and, with the blessings of Providence and a lucky turn in the Stock Exchange, it staid | loyal throughout the war.

There is a blue leg-two of them, though not | years past, man, is that you would not cheat well matched. I see whose they are. They the world out of its honors. But then if you are carrying a soldier to his agent for the fifti- had done so, by this time you would have been eth time to inquire whether the Pension-office found out. Jog on, long leg. The French has placed him on the roll. The last time he Academicians are talking about you now, a litinquired a letter from the Commissioner was tle, though they know nothing about your name shown him to the effect that the sworn affida- or person. Prepare yourself, old glum, with vits of three respectable soldiers who saw him some babies and a fireside. Without an Aurobayoneted did not prove any thing, but he mustra the fogs of your long night will hover over get the captain or some other officer he served your coming noon; but she would shine them under to certify to the facts "on his honor." away, and give you a morning for the long and He is thinking now whether his agent wrote to cheerful day which will come for you yet. But the Commissioner what he told him to say, viz.: he is gone to his star-gazing. That one of his officers was a man of honor, and would not certify because he did not personally witness the wounding; and the other, who did, refused the favor of a certificate. And he told him to say, moreover, that the oath of a private soldier was better than the word of honor of an officer. But, poor fellow! what do you know of law? You had better give up looking for your pension. Every body knows you were hurt in battle, but you are an unpopular fellow with your officers, and you can not get your pension without them.

There's a leg that will win. It is a long leg, with a bad piece of old dry-goods on it. It is not springy, agile, or quick; yet not sluggish, nerveless, and insensible. It carries an unhappy man, who has always been worsted, but who never stays whipped. He takes long, camellike strides, putting his foot here and there irregularly, but always-just like that nowwith a dogged conclusiveness and a fair, flat emphasis. He is all head and feet when he walks, the rest of him taking all adventitious shapes, but these two extremities being ever consistent with each other, like opposite poles of a battery. His voice is unmusical-I can see it in the crook of his knee now-and his manners undignified. His clothes are decent, for he is too unaffected to dress in ostentatious rags, and too negligent of social favor to dress genteelly; and as barely decent, he is never looked at except when he unconsciously provokes derision by acting as if he were somebody. He never can comprehend how he should be so strangely misunderstood by all the world; and now, at forty, he begins to feel as if he did not care. He does not see his way clearly through the world, but plods on. He will not conform to the world, and does not dream of the world conforming to him. He does not care much about it. His ambition died with his youth, and he is a lonely bachelor. That leg has length of days and invincible tenacity. Other men will be declining when his strength will be at its height. Go, old fellow, and marry! Forty is only a little too old for you. For the world will shortly take a turn that will give you some hand in its affairs. Such a leg as that never got cold since the world was made without a great fuss being made over it by the king, the bishop, and the biographer, unless casualty locked its pulse before old age. The reason you have not been famous for twenty

There's a leg that does me good. It is clothed in coarse and dirty cloth, but comes to a neat, fair fit. It is rapid, yet I see by the passive instep that it is fatigued. It is going home to sweet kisses and a hot supper. It has bustled about a shop all day, and was glad when the six o'clock bell rang. The industrious and skillful mechanic always adjusts his clothes, washes his hands, and presents a respectable mien when he goes home. He knows where little Kitty will meet him, how Neddy will run, and the baby will peep. His wife is not waiting for him, for I see by that leg that I am thinking about the right man. She will look at the clock, and then bring in the tea, because she knows just when he will come. This evening she allows fifteen minutes later, because George is to go to a bookstore over on Grand Street for a copy of a new book of the rudiments of science for children, and to see a sick woman over on the Bowery. She feels pleased, for she has good news to tell him. She has just been told by the agent that the landlord (mirabile dictu!) has lowered the rent in consideration of their careful tenancy, and agreed for another year at a handsome abatement. With this difference George is to buy drawing materials for Jane, some additional furniture for the parlor, and pay for photographs for distribution among kindred and friends, besides an increase in the amount of the customary charities, and have yet a smart sum for the savings-bank. Go on, George! You are the typical citizen. On you and your likes rest all the glories of nations and peoples. From firesides such as yours emanate all the institutes of public order, public good, and public will. Let all the learned, the great, and the rich pass away, and you would still be a nation, great as ever, a society perfect as ever, a people mighty as ever. Go home, George, where you belong.

That leg, now, is a brisk one. Pretty as a patent medicine bottle, it comes down into the neatest little boot of all the world, and pats along with a thousand supernumerary little jerks, as if, like an echo, it would die if it stopped, or as if, like the dancing moon in the water, it had so many motions that it did not know what to do with them. leg. Its nerves are strung at the golden thumbscrews by the rosy fingers of Hope, who trails her shining gossamers, thick as hair on the head, through the soul of that youngster, and shuts out all winds but the breeze of her own

That is a young

impalpable wand with which she shakes the | having-as those legs unmistakably have on shining delusion into infinite complexions for all occasions-self-possession enough about him his rapture. Is she a deceiver? No. He de- to know how to escape. Yet those legs are del ceives her. He abjures conscience and reason icately moulded-I see by the knee-pan-but and devolves upon Hope the responsibility for muscular, I see by the calf. The instep is flathis happiness through life. She is doing as best tened by the habit of gait, but its mobility in the she may. But, young man, hold still a mo- air shows its high arch, an unerring mark of ment. Listen! If only you could keep your manhood, of nerve, and of daring. This cowlegs still, your head would soon reckon up your ard was born to no weakness but a humane horaccount. Whose boots are those? Whose ror of the brutal and sanguinary, and an exquiwatch is that? Whose money is in your pock- site sense of outward contact, spiritual or physet? "Necessities to a gentleman." Eh? No- ical. That he should shrink from violence thing is necessary that is not right. "Trifles should have but exalted the courage to which easy to reimburse." Yes, but to whom easy? he was born. But the vulgar notion of courNot to the poor, and the rich are those who age-that is, a love of fighting, he never thought have, not those who expect riches. I see you, of questioning; for what priest, or poet, or hislong years hence, in situations too terrible to de- torian ever did? and as he was most distinctly scribe to you. But I see you, at the best, long conscious of an unspeakable horror of a fight, years hence, in shabby and threadbare clothes, he never undertook to withstand danger like with cast-down countenance, wasted form, and others, until, in course of time, he acquired a feeble step, soliciting humble but honest employ-habit of living in a state of apprehension, which ment, with a real desire to begin a new life. But your heart will be too heavy with its burden of bitter regrets. Gentlemen's clothes, watches, and pocket-money you will not have. That leg I see now, so elastic and elegant, will be trembling and languid, awkward with shame and ugly with premature age. Why not put off the fine things now? Think what you would make by it. All prepossessions in your favor, years of industry and opportunity before you, and all the blessings and powers of youth still yours-cellence, and, especially, your love for her. what should you care for boots, watches, and pocket-money with that leg I see on you now? Take the habiliments and lose the legs, or throw aside the habiliments for a while and save both them and the legs. Save your legs, did I say? Your honor-your soul, boy! Save it. But he don't hear me. He's gone.

More legs-that is a coward's. His knees are lifted high at each step, while the lower leg and foot dangle, and the latter slaps the ground like a shingle. He walks with his abdominal muscles and helps them with his shoulders, which he does by relaxing the breast muscles and turning his elbows outward. The step is heavy and decisive once made, because the creature has not courage enough to qualify it. Poor coward! The scorn of women, the sport of wags, the tool of tyrants. Cowards are not always born so, as it is certain that the brave were not always born to intrepidity. Will nobody speak a word for this worst punished of all offenders? Shrinking sensibility in childhood can be turned into cowardice by calling it by so shameful a name. The child does not doubt that it is really natural irresolution; and to believe you have not the courage to do it, is saying that you are afraid to do it. These legs in all their life, perhaps, have encountered no danger but what it was possible to fly from; and they fled, of course, because their owner, believing himself a born coward, had sense enough not to expose himself. That his passion of resistance is moderate argues not against his capacity for iron firmness, but conclusively in favor of his

made it the principal business of his life to foresce and escape danger from every thing. Come, man, don't be afraid; you are young yet-put down your foot like a man, walk with your legs, swing your arms, look straight ahead, fill your lungs and allow your abdomen to go about its business. There's pluck enough in you for a terrier; though your wife don't believe a word of it, and never did, poor girl! She found out your imagination, your taste, your love of ex

But that you concealed three years for fear Bob
Davis, a rival, would knock you down. Now
I'll give you a definition of bravery. You go
home and ask your wife whether it is satisfac-
tory. If she says so, all right. Act on it. Say
this: A brave man is one who will not desist
from a just purpose in consequence of peril to
his person. If you stick to that your neighbors
will find you as brave as themselves.
you stick faithfully to it you will, as any man-
but particularly the great murderers of history
would have been-be pretty sure to get to the
end of life without one single fight. But slap,
slap goes the poor fellow's feet on the sidewalk,
and other men's legs thicken the throng.

And if

That is a

Here is a leg to write a book on. thing of power. It is long, sinewy, and easy in motion, but with a marching precision that wastes not a fibre's tension. The foot is planted so firmly and regularly that the ground seems always to smooth itself where this man walks. No inequality in the pavement disconcerts the perfect action of the limb; and there is a consciousness of power in the gait that inspires an instinctive action in all the neighboring legs to get out of the way. The person moves fast, but the legs do not seem to be quick because they measure the time and space, and fit both without any jerking. That man is a born leader. Among all mankind he is most certain to find his level. Men, however proud, delight in being proud of some greater object than themselves. What is voluntarily conceded is not so great as what can oblige concession. Greater self-confidence than