than by Moore when he describes Holy Eyes which were

"As shining beacons, solely

To light to Heaven"?

Milton gives us an idea of the passion which burns without consuming in Hell by the aspect of those "baleful eyes," "that sparkling blazed." Every laughing look of Hero, says her poet, blooms with a hundred graces. The witchery of the Nereides' eyes and the petrifying glance of the Gorgons are the sole points in fables which prove that the ancients knew something of a modern mesmeric wonder.

THE VOICE.

The voice is produced by the finest possible musical instrument, capable of infinite modulation. Every one has a peculiar key and style of melody. When Pallas spoke, in the Iliad,

"The voice divine confessed the warlike maid." When Ulysses spoke,

"Soft as the fleeces of descending snows

The copious accents fell, with easy art."

We should as soon forget our friends' faces as their voices. There are some voices whose harsh tones grate upon the ear like prison chains; some steelly, distancing, putting to flight all sympathy; some smoothly gliding, reminding one of the slimy serpent; somemet with new and then- -so rich and fine in their lightest tone that one can listen to no evil about their owners.

"The devil hath not in his quiver's choice

An arrow for the heart like a sweet voice." The "silver voice" of Longfellow's "Spirit of Poetry"

"Is the rich music of a summer bird

Heard in the still night, with its passionate cadence."

The voice is a remarkably expressive organ of sentiment and emotion. There is not much mistake about the voices of affectation and conceit; servility and braggadocia have tones of their own; a peculiar ring marks hollowhearted selfishness; everybody knows the croak of discontent and the growl of irascibility; but of all the characteristic sounds of an unworthy thing the most despicable are those

of cant. What a vast variety of expression any person can give to the same words! You may utter the word "Indeed" in the most common, conversational way; you may exclaim "Indeed!" wonderingly, admiringly, contemptuously, or derisively; you may speak as if you were appalled or as if you were enraptured, as if fascinated or as if wearied, perplexed or enlightened; you may seem to mean by it just nothing at all, or cry "Indeed!"

"As if thou then hadst shut up in thy brain

Some horrible conceit."

The most common-place word is susceptible of as many meanings as the heart has moods of feeling. An acute student of the pathology of verbal expression might perhaps gain some hints of popular character by remarking the peculiarities of emphasis and accentuation that distinguish the natives of different provinces. Amongst the eccentric modes of speaking that a stranger in the United States quickly notices is the false expression with which an American colloquially repeats your words upon being told of something he did not know

before. The words which an Englishman would speak so as to convey the notion of surprise and inquiry do away with both in the mouth of an American, and are spoken as if he had been as wise as you, or as if what he heard could not well be otherwise. Candour, deceit, earnestness, indolence, power, feebleness, love, hate, courage, fear, joy, and the thousand-fold aspects of protean character are disclosed and observed every day in the tones of the voice; but there is always a dominant, seldom changing-that defines the

man.

TWO DISEASES.

Some people would almost as soon be caught pilfering an apple from a fruit-stall as speaking kindly to a beggar child. Some people act as if they would rather take pains to make themselves feared than take their ease and be loved. The different disorders under which these two classes are labouring often manifest themselves in the same way, to the discomfiture of the moral quacks. When uncivil manners and rough words spring from

mere pride, there is good hope of a cure; but when the diagnosis indicates a fatal want of generosity in the heart, the would-be physician must be careful how he meddles with the eruption.

66 CUPBOARD LOVE."

Friendship that has its origin in self-interest is sure to come to an abrupt termination some day. It is like the Treaty of Commerce between England and France: what we give by it is to benefit ourselves, what we get by it is to benefit our neighbours, and so they may say also on the other side. Attachment capable of outliving reverses of fortune was never bred over the counter.

TWO PRINCIPLES OF SOCIAL INTERCOURSE.

There are two principles adopted by two different classes of people in their treatment of new acquaintances. One principle is to treat every man as honest till he is proved to be a rogue; the other is to treat every man as a rogue till he is proved to be honest. The disposition of innocent childhood is to believe