with all their lungs. A group of giggling wayfarers surrounds the house of the father. Long lines of carriages, with coachmen radiant in rosettes and nosegays, are drawn up on each side of the road. The postman scruples not to let the public wait for their letters while he pauses to take a glance at the bridal guests; the august Bobby so far forgets his dignity as to relax into a smile; the greengrocer's boy gives over whistling that he may grin; and the hatless butcher-boy pulls up in his homicidal career to gaze delightedly at the splendid pageant. Everybody is laughing, as well indeed they may.

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Returned from the church, the guests sit down to the breakfast; and now, indeed, do the fun and festivity of the scene shine forth with dazzling effect. Within, or at times without the limits of becoming mirth, there are no bounds to the hilarity. The table is a picture, so brilliant and beautiful is its furniture of glass, flowers, and silver, and so costly are the viands with which it is laden. There is no bouquet" of them all to be compared to that of the wines. The merry jest goes round in sparkling circulation. The funny man of the party brings forth his most venerable jokes, and the laughter of the girls resounds even as the tinkling of silver bells. It is such fun, to be sure! And marriage is such a joke! The Bride's unsuccessful attempt to cut the wedding-cake-that sweetest of all the sweets of matrimony-enhances the gaiety of the scene, and occasions a charming ripple of titters. Then rises a guest of special honour to propose the health of the Bride and Bridegroom. Hip! hip! hurrah! Long life and happiness to them! May their substance increase, and their shadows never grow less! Peace be on their path, and may the stars wreath for their

name a diadem! Pelt them with slippers when they leave the banquet-hall! Let them go forth amid a shower of rice! They are the hero and heroine of an hour. Pray Heaven they may not be the martyrs of a life! Oh! the pity of it, the pity of it, if the day should ever come when the vow so tenderly plighted will be broken, and they shall be sundered who have called God and man to witness that they will never part! Yet such things have been, still are, and will not cease to be. How fatal is the vision of disenchantment

"Equipped for parting, see these quondam turtles ;
Dead are Love's roses, withered all his myrtles.
Such are the ups and downs of Love's short story,
"For better or for worse,'-'tis death or glory."

Marriage is, in some people's estimation, one of the most solemn affairs of life; yet there are, in this grave and awful union of a man and a woman, so many circumstances and situations which lend themselves to laughter, that the spirit of raillery has never perhaps been exercised with so much poignancy as upon this very matter. Take, for example, the following anecdotes and reflections, culled from many sources, to gladden your fancy withal:-One day Madame Geoffrin was quarrelling very bitterly with a man of letters, who returned her attacks with equal acrimony. In came the witty M. D'Holbach, who blandly inquired"Can it be possible that you two are married secretly?" Love and marriage are different states," says Dr. Johnson. "Those who are to suffer the evils together, and to suffer often for the sake of one another, soon lose that tenderness of look, and that benevolence of mind which arose from the participation of unmingled pleasure and successive amusement. It is so far from being

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natural for a man and woman to live in a state of marriage, that we find all the motives which they have for remaining in that connection, and the restraints which civilised society imposes to prevent separation, are hardly sufficient to keep them together." Marshal De Gaison, an inveterate old bachelor, was often twitted by his friends for not marrying. "Where's the use?" he would reply. "Life is but a cherry. It is barely enough for one. Why should I make two bites of a cherry?" Antiphanes was of opinion that no man sound in mind and body would ever dream of marrying. There must be something terribly wrong with him, to induce him to so fatal a step. When he heard that one of his friends had married, "What!" he exclaimed, "he married!-he whom I left in such good health only a week ago!"

In Eastern literature there is mention of a poor Indian who presented himself for admittance at the gate of Brahma's paradise. "Have you been in purgatory?" asked the deity. "No," said the applicant, "but I have been married." "It is all the same, poor fellow! You may come in," said Brahma. "You are yawning, sir," said a wife indignantly to her husband. "Yes, my dear," said he; "husband and wife are one, and when I am alone I always yawn, for I feel dull and tired." A Roman lady of old, whom her friends blamed for having separated from a rich and handsome husband, showed them her shoe. "It is polished and well made," she said, "but not one of you knows where it hurts me.' Once upon a time a father, to disgust his daughter with the wedded state, quoted these words of St. Paul's-"He that giveth her in marriage doeth well, but he that giveth her not in marriage doeth better." 'My dear papa," replied the artless child (she was an

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artless thing), "be content to do well, and leave who will to do better." In one of Shadwell's forgotten plays a lady replies to a gentleman's proposal with a powerful metaphor-" Marry you, sir! I had as lief go to sea in a ship on fire."

Marriage has been described in martial metaphor as a beleaguered castle-those who are out long to get in, and those who are in long to get out. Marriage springs from an insane desire on the part of a young man to pay for the board and lodging of a young woman. But a truce to these sallies! A dozen folios would not suffice to contain one-half the droll things that have been written and spoken on that most laughable of all topics-Matrimony.

These brilliant mots are introduced merely to give witty illustration to the contention of the present writer, which he feels assured is that of the present reader as well, that, after all, Marriage is no such serious matter as some common-place people would paint it, but simply a joke, designed for the life-long merriment of the persons who contract it. It is a paradise of comic enjoyment, and if it is true, as we know it to be, that no fewer than nineteen married couple-that is, thirty-eight people were divorced in the course of one day in London alone, not long ago, the fact is no argument against marriage. It only proves that the people in question were unfitted for it, having no adequate sense of fun. For my own poor part, I can only say that so keen is my appreciation of a joke, that I would get married to-morrow, if any lady would be funny enough to have me.

THE SEASON.

AM filled with a tender pity, yea, a tearful commiseration for those whom a hard fate

compels to pass their days out of the Metropolis; and more poignantly does the pang strike, as I reflect that it is for the benefit of nous autres, the happy "capitalists" (to borrow a word), that they are denied the supreme dignity and advantage of Englishmen. In order that we may be fed, clothed, warmed, sheltered, they till the fields, they tend the beeves, they shear the simple sheep, they dive into the deadly mine, they blast in the foundry, and fell the towering trees. They practise the arts and sciences, in order to attain a perfection that may enable them to paint the pictures, write the books, make the discoveries, and act the plays that "we happy few" require. Their roads and ways are well kept and guarded, their sanitary arrangements studied, so that we may not suffer inconvenience when we visit them, for pleasure or for health. They give their bravest to fight our battles, their best and noblest they train to serve our Legislative Council. Is there not something touchingly beautiful in this spectacle of the Provinces pouring their store, from a potato to a Member of Parliament, at our feet? It is a subject for a painter, a sculptor, a poet! We are not ungrateful; no, that would be terrible. We do not