deigned to purse themselves up into a welldefined circle, and marshal the regal breath as it passed them into a low whistle; and albeit, a somewhat merry one. That the royal mind was tickled, we cannot presume to say; but we may fairly presume that the royal nose was, for it was considerately rubbed by the forefinger of the royal right-hand.

But the Queen was still to be enlightened. She asked Sir Rigglesby, in her pretty German-English, which we are too respectfully loyal to imitate, how it was that this barbarous Commodore was to come to her court-the most decorous, the best regulated, and chastest court in Christendom. After a deal of circumlocution, her Majesty at length understood, that from the time of the fifth Harry, the head of the family of Bacuissart claimed the privilege of coming to court not much more alarmingly dressed than an officer of the Highland regiments, a privilege that it was at the option of the Baronet to permit royalty to buy off from

year to year, but which might be exerted at any time, if the permission were not given to redeem it.

Everybody who has the least tinge of philosophy must know that what such a convulsion as an earthquake is to the mountain, this news was to the court. It was something awful, indistinct, incomprehensible. The elderly ladies, especially, felt their grey hairs stiffen, and their indignant stomachers rise high over their scraggy throats. The news flew like the combustion of a train of gunpowder through every avenue of the palace: cooks, scullions, and scullions'-assistants, each received and commented on the astounding intelligence; and, what with commentaries, additions, and versions, when the rumour reached the sentinels at the different outlets of the palace, it had increased to the terrifying announcement that the mutiny of the Nore had been revived, and that the fighting old Commodore was coming up to St. James's with a petition for redress of grievances, fifteen yards

long, at the head of his barge's crew, all of them in an Adamite state.

This report having circulated through the guard-room was, as it ought to have been, returned to the interior of the palace through the avenues by which it had issued, very much amended. The whole ship's company of the Terrific was on their way to court, girt round with cabbage-leaves- why and wherefore we must leave to naturalists to explain; they were to be met at Temple Bar by a cockney-mob, who were to parade before them, a loaf steeped in blood, at the top of a pole thirty feet long.

These were, truly, times of great excite

ment.

At all this our sensible monarch was highly amused. He had some recollection of Sir Octavius Bacuissart having one day, at Portsmouth, for some impetinence on the part of Sir Rigglesby, knocked him into the kennel with one hand, and then hooked him out, when

half suffocated, by the other hand-" if hand that could be called, which hand was not." So his Majesty, before reverting to the very strange claim that the courtier avowed the old Commodore was going to put forward, asked him to relate the whole of this anecdote. The hangeron made as great a mess of it as the old Commodore had made of him when he rolled him in the mud. The King was satisfied if SirRigglesby was not; and the whist party shortly after broke up without the conveyancer of scandal scoring many for honours.

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CHAPTER II.

Obliging sir, for courts you sure were made; Why should such virtue ever seek the shade?

The king would smile on you-at least the queen."

Ah, gentle sir, you courtiers so cajole us,

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But Tully has it, “ Nunquam minus solus."

I LOVE the constitution, I honour its feudal origin. Its blemishes are, to me, beauty-spots; its rottenness is, to me, the quintessence of the freshest perfumes. I honour feudal services, and gloat over the nice distinctions of a nobleman's, a knight's, and a franklin's fee. I look upon those as the most distinguished families in whom are vested those imperishable and inalienable rights of holding the towel whilst his Majesty washes his sacred hands, the more