EVENING DRESS.-The robe is composed of figured satin, of a very rich kind; the ground is a very pale pink, figured in a deeper shade of the same colour; the corsage cut low, square, and tight to the shape, is trimmed in front with a tulle drapery laid on, and arranged in the centre by coques of pink satin ribbon. A blond lace pelerine-mantilla encircles the back and shoulders; the ends of the drapery are gathered under it, and ornamented with coques of ribbon; smaller coques decorate the front of the corsage, which is pointed at the bottom. Short tight sleeves, trimmed à la Maintenon with tulle manchettes, edged with narrow blond lace. skirt made with a demi train, is finished round the with a bouillonnée of tulle, the bouillons form of pink satin ribbon. Coiffure à la Valliér posed in ringlets at the sides, flat on the and in low bows on one side. It is ornam and tasteful style with a ferroniére of wreath of delicate flowers at the flowers placed in different direc ORIGINAL COMMUNICATIONS, CONSISTING OF TALES, ROMANCES, ANECDOTES, AND POETRY. MRS. MAPLETOFT'S LODGER. inanimate luggage. Although the night was so unfavourable, the outside of the coach was filled with passengers, upon one of whom, an elderly, stout, rubicund-visaged personage, with one foot encased in an easy shoe, which, for the better accommodation of five gouty toes, was slashed in divers places, and BY LEIGH CLIFFE, ESQ., AUTHOR OF "THE SCEPTIC," displayed the white fleecy hosiery beneath, some 66 PILGRIM OF AVON," ETC. "I seem, ah me! deserted of my kind! Strange, miserable, destitute, forlorn!" LONGINUS, A TRAGEDY. MRS. MIRABEL MAPLETOFT was the proprietor of a receptacle for the accommodation of Metropolitan idlers at Brighton, to which place it is well known, at certain seasons of the year, the London fashionables and demi-fashionables emigrate like swallows, and remain until the proper period arrives to exhibit themselves in town. Mrs. Mirabel, who, by the way, only held brevet rank, was one of the most prudent and precise lodging-letters in that huge mass of buildings known by the name of the good town of Brighton, where, for the last twenty years, she had been celebrated as a very substantial, money-making personage, and was known to have refused the offers of the parish clerk, a furniture broker, who was in a fair way of doing well, in one of the narrow intersecting alleys; and a fag usher to one of the numerous educational establishments where young gentlemen are prepared, secundum artem, for civilized society. The domicile of Mrs. Mapletoft was of a very respectable description, within a bow-shot of the sea, and closely abutting on Russell-square, where, with the aid of one maid-servant, whom she was wont to dignify with the name of the Dab, she was always willing to take in those gentlemen and ladies who were content to take possession of such apartments as she had to dispose of. It was just at that very dull period at Brighton which intervenes between the summer and winter seasons, when an hiatus occurs in the list of emigrating pleasure-hunters, and the invalids are housed securely until the first beaming of the spring, that Mrs. Mapletoft was wandering in a pensive mood, through her now unoccupied apartments, and giving full scope to the unchristian feeling of envy against such of her neighbours from whose windows the glimmering of lights, above and below, announced the possession of some wintering inmates. The evening was as dull and cheerless as Mrs. Mapletoft herself; a drizzling rain commingled with the sea-fog; the moon had secluded herself beyond the distant clouds, and even the straggling gas-lights gave an undecided and spectral gleam. The distant sound of "We're a' noddin," emanating from the key'd bugle of the guard of the last Brighton coach of the evening, roused Mrs. Mapletoft from her reverie, and hastily putting on her black velvet bonnet, trimmed with bright cherry-coloured ribbons, and a cloak which had seen better days, she left the house to the care of the Dab, and under the shelter of a large cotton umbrella, made the best of her way to the coach office in North-street, where she arrived just in time to witness the discharge of all the animate and what after the fashion of the compressed puffing on the sleeve of a Spanish doublet, Mrs. Mapletoft pounced with the velocity of a hungry hawk, in want of a supper, and calling up one of those winning smiles which the craft in that highly civilized emporium of chicanery and palaver, know so well how to assume, she sidled up to the old gentleman, and, in an exceedingly soft and gentle tone of voice, said, "I suppose you want a lodging, sir?” To such a question, asked in such a tone, it was but natural to expect an answer, but the old gentleman did not appear to have paid the slightest attention to the proffered civilities of the lodger-seeker, and remained provokingly silent. Mrs. Mapletoft was inclined to resent his want of gallantry to her sex, but prudence stepped in and whispered good counsel in her ear:-she was but a lone woman, and why should she charge herself with the affairs of the whole female population of the kingdom, when obtaining a lodger would be of more essenSelf is the predominant tial service to herself! feeling not only of persons in the class of life in which Mrs. Mirabel Mapletoft moved, but also of if she could secure an inmate for the winter-the those by whom she was patronized, and she thought do much better than by starting as the champion of dreary, dull, stupid Brighton winter,--she should her sex. Impressed with this idea, she again ad dressed the new-comer in a more decided manner, and in a more imperative tone of voice "I have very comfortable lodgings, sir, and if you have no friend's house to go to, you had better just look at my apartments; they are close byand I will tell the porter where to bring your luggage." The gentleman smiled and nodded in that smile Mrs. Mapletoft saw something like a hope, to which the nod gave confirmation, and, desiring the porter to follow with bag and baggage, she unceremoniously carried off the stranger to her refuge for the uninitiated visitors to Brighton. Mrs. Mapletoft was a thin diminutive body, a kind of cased skeleton, whose covering appeared to have belonged to some person of larger dimensions, for it hung in loose folds about her face and neck, somewhat in the fashion of the draperies which we sometimes see surmounting the windows of those drawing-rooms which were fitted up about twenty years ago. She was, moreover, specious and fawning, and her heart, like the Aleppo-nut, though it appeared brilliantly red when uncased of its shell, had that green, gangrenous tint within, which spoke of the decomposition of all the finer feelings. In short, she was a specimen of worldly mindedness-a being who "concentered all in self." Having thus adroitly carried off an occupant for her vacant apartments, her first care was to see him duly installed in them, and, knocking consequentially at her own door, in a style somewhat between the loud summons of a well-tutored physician's footman, and the dubious double rattat of a daily governess, she was quickly admitted by the well satisfied Dab, who already heard, in imagination, the jingling of sundry shillings, which she anticipated would travel from his pockets to her own. quiring further assistance, and the maid was dis- The civilities of Mrs. Mapletoft knew no bounds: -a fire soon shed its welcome warmth through the little space of the scantily furnished parlour, and Mrs. Mapletoft was seated at the tea-table, dispensing pure Bohea infusion, to gratify the palate of her new acquisition, who had as yet only replied to her civilities with smiles and bows. She considered this conduct somewhat singular, but as she was acknowledged by her neighbours to be a person of great discernment, and had been told by Mr. H, the incomprehensible phrenological professor, that she possessed the organs of perception, which exhibited in her case an unusual developement, she soon decided that he must be a foreigner, and attempted, in a strange jargon, compounded of very bad French, which she had picked up, one word at a time, from the valet of one of her former inmates, and equally indifferent English, to make him understand that she required a certain sum per week for the apartments and attendance. The tone of voice of an English person, "I am not very lucky now, it seems," replied when addressing a foreigner is generally raised to a Mrs. Mapletoft, for that man would stand the higher pitch than usual; Mrs. Mapletoft ele-noise of a siege, or a thunder-storm, without movvated hers nearly to a shrill shriek, which actually appeared to strike upon the ear of the stranger, who, with his usual bow and smile, said, "Be so kind as to speak rather louder, ma'am, for I am unfortunately a little deaf." "A little deaf, indeed," muttered Mrs. Mapletoft, sotto voce, "I believe if a cannon were to be fired off close beside you, you would require the whole battery to be discharged after it before you could hear any thing distinctly." However, she spoke as loudly as she could, and the Dab echoed in his ear on the other side a recapitulation of her mistress's harangue. Still there appeared no possibility of making him comprehend, though their united exertions would have sent a sensitive person to bed with a distracting headache, if he was happily fortunate enough to escape a nervous fever. Mrs. Mapletoft began to wish, with her usual Christian charity, that some one of her neighbours had the troublesome old man, when he drew forth from his pocket one of those asses-skin tablets, upon which he wrote a few sentences, and placed it in the hands of the hostess. Now, the education of Mrs. Mapletoft had not been of the very best description; she could read writing, but not of that modern and fashionable kind which she now attempted in vain to decypher. The style of penmanship in which she delighted was of a more distinct and independent character:-letters that strayed over the paper in beautiful confusion, inviting attention not only from the irregutarity of their position, but also from their unique formation, and which a Chinese or a Hindoo might, without being at all blameable for the mistake, deem to be the production of one of their hieroglyphic scribes. After wasting some minutes in the attempt to discover the purport of the written sentence, over which her eyes had been restlessly wandering, she came to the resolution of re "I am so glad you are come," said Mrs. Mapletoft, " for I have got such a new lodger." Very happy to hear it, ma'am. Rather bad times for letting now, ma'am; but you are always so very lucky.' ing a muscle, he is so deadly deaf, and is obliged, forsooth, to write down what he wishes to say. It was a sin and a shame of his parents not to have had him taught how to write, seeing what a shocking infirmity he labours under. Do see if you can make out this scrawl, for neither I nor Dab can read it, it is written so wretchedly bad." "Bad, ma'am," returned Mr. Maclaurin, as he gazed on the tablets, "why, I should call it a beautiful hand-the pure Italian style of penmanship-almost as good as copper-plate, ma'am. should think he must be one of the great London writing-masters." I "I don't want to know what he is just now, but what he has written on that white slate, if you can contrive to read it to me." "Oh, ma'am! that is very easily done; he desires to know the terms of your apartments, ma'am, and requests you to write down the particulars. The eyes of Mrs. Mapletoft brightened :--with the aid of Mr. Maclaurin, she came to terms with the stranger, and for once in her life, considered herself a very fortunate woman. Mrs. Mapletoft, was one of those estimable personages who not only accomodate gentlemen with half-furnished apartments in consideration of receiving a more than adequate remuneration, but also deem it a point of duty to allow them the honourable, though secret, privilege, of finding firing and provision for the establishment in which they may fortunately happen to be domiciled. To those who have not been initiated in the customs of sea-bathing places, such proceedings might give rather a suspicious aspect to the character of the person so acting, but to those who know the " secrets of the prison house," it causes not even an incredulous smile. To the great delight of Mrs. Mapletoft, her new lodger was what she termed a good liver, which does not bear the same interpretation in the Brigh ton vocabulary as it does according to its general acceptation throughout the nation, There it is literally a good feeder, not a morally conducted, church-going person, but one whose palate delighteth to indulge in those luxurious delicacies which at once pamper and destroy the healthiness of the appetite. her loss on the occasion. with applied them to the lock of the little corner cupboard which held the precious elixir for which her appetite had been excited. Whether she had chosen an unpropitious moment, or whether, as the Moslems believe, it was written that misfortune should assail her at that period, must be left solely to conjecture, but the wards of Though Mrs. Mapletoft was, as has been be- the clock no sooner yielded to the key, than with fore shown, somewhat deficient in polite learning, a crash which rivetted Mrs. Mapletoft to the spot, she soon contrived to carry on matters of business all her best goblets and wine-glasses, shivered without the intervention of her friendly neigh-into a thousand splinters, were precipitated, withbours, as the gentleman always understood her out even a momentary notice, at her feet. A cry weekly bills, and wrote down his orders in a of anguish burst from Mrs. Mapletoft as soon as legible round-text hand, in white letters, on the she recovered the power of speech, which the black ground of a new slate, which she had pro- surprise had for a moment deprived her of, and cured for that especial purpose. One very cold was followed by something like a condemnatory winter's morning, willing to take advantage of the denunciation against her lodger, not exactly suittemporary absence of her inmate, who had suffi- able to be repeated to "ears polite," when, ciently recovered from the gouty affection of his suddenly turning her head round, she perceived foot to be enabled to take a daily ramble on the him standing just withoutside the door of the Steyne, Mrs. Mapletoft employed herself in arapartment, and, by the smile which lighted up his ranging his apartments, as, to do her justice, let countenance, evidently enjoying the scene before him. Misfortunes are said seldom to come single; me state, careful, attentive creature, she was regularly wont to do; or if she trusted that duty to and, by the way, that lady seems to be of a very her servant in the earlie: part of the day, whenever doubtful reputation, and ought not to be admitted the outer door was closed on any of her lodgers, into society. In this instance her intrusiveness she was always to be found with a clean duster in almost paralyzed the powers of Mrs. Mapletoft, hand in the rooms they had departed from. The but, willing to convince the old gentleman that morning was very cold, icicles hung pendant the accident was purely a bona fide accident, she from the roof, and a thousand fantastic figures were began, at the very highest pitch of her voice, to to be traced in the congealed vapours which had give him a most elaborate account of the door rested on the glass of the windows, as if a fairy opening of its own accord, and the sum total of hand had been busy in depicting the mimic semblance of some favourite haunt-some green and grassy vale, bounded by mountains, girt with thousand trees-and Mrs. Mapletoft felt as chilly as if the frosty artist had been amusing himself by an effort of his skill in the interior of her bosom. Perhaps she felt that an immediate internal application was necessary, to prevent the evil consequences which might arise from being frostbitten; but whether such was the idea she entertained, or whether she stood in need of her accustomed morning glass of liqueur, she thought for once it would be a sinless misdemeanour to tithe the bottle of pure Cognac which the old gentleman had uncorked to furnish forth his last libation to the jolly god on the preceding night. To resist temptation is difficult-very difficult in some cases-and as Mrs. Mapletoft had not as yet entered her name on the books of the Temperance Society, she conceived a little dereliction from that abstinence from strong waters and distillations that enervate the system and weaken the intellect, might be permitted on this particular occasion, under the abovementioned peculiar circumstances. It has been said, that a certain person never deserts his friends when they need his assistance. However flattering such a belief may be to the illustrious personage in question, on this occasion he was a defaulter, and evinced a vast deal of princely ingratitude. Mrs. Mapletoft, although warned by the Psalmist not to put her trust in princes, gave too much credence to her own influence with the master-spirit to consider probable the very possibility of detection, and, drawing forth from her pocket a talisman in the similitude of a bunch of keys, she forth "Been served so before," said the old gentleman, shaking his head, as he withdrew it from the oracular battery which was thus remorselessly opened upon him, "been served so before." "Never, sir, never," reiterated Mrs. Mapletoft, gathering up the fragments of glass from the floor, "I never had such a breakage before," and she added in a minor keg, "I can't think what the devil brought him home." "Would you wish to know why I came home, Mrs. Mapletoft ?" "Good Lord?" shrieked Mirabel, "the man can hear!" and sundry reminiscences of what she had said rushed in a moment to her mind; for, in the fancied security of his deafness, she had in conversation with "the Dab," betrayed more of the secrets of her profession than she would have been desirous of publishing for the benefit of the world in general. This discovery added to the trepidation of mine hostess; but all her efforts to make him understand her when she spoke in gentle tones were vain, and he again relapsed into that state of imperturbable deafness which had formerly excited the animadversion of Mrs. Mapletoft. Perhaps her sotto voce tones had been louder than she was herself aware of, for persons who are accustomed to associate with those afflicted with deafness acquire unconsciously a habit of speaking in a louder and more imperative tone of voice than others who are not so circumstanced: but she was compelled to remain unsatisfied as to whether his auricular faculties were quickened or not since his residence at Brighton. His pocket-book she had frequently seen left carelessly upon the table, |