BRIC-A-BRA C.

AN has been variously described as a clothing, a bargaining, and a cooking animal,

to the satisfaction at least of the several definers. The present writer had hoped to enjoy a similar pleasure by representing man as a collecting animal, but the circumstance that the magpie shares with humanity the habit of gathering unconsidered trifles unfortunately spoils what would have certainly been a very neat and telling piece of definition. It is sufficiently annoying to have your point blunted by a mere bird, and the circumstance of his also sharing another human * peculiarity—namely, speech-seems invested with some strange significance, to which the immediate attention of Dr. Darwin may be directed, but the essayist is not to be beaten from his ground by all the magpies that ever chattered "garrulous under a roof of pine." Nor is he to be dislodged from his position by considerations relating to those vile, larcenous proclivities of the pie-the particular rascal of a pie who well-nigh caused the execution of an unhappy maid, who had not the advantage of living in a land where justice is tempered by amateur newspaper correspondence. No! Man is the only true collecting animal, and if the magpie accumulates things, so much the worse for the magpie. He only does it, I believe,

with some idiotic notion that the articles he basely purloins are good to eat, or will get ripe and become so if he keeps them long enough. Therefore, the ground being cleared, I proceed. "But," you say, "there are many men who do not collect." There is nothing more annoying than to be met with trivial objections when you are enunciating a great truth. If men do not collect, they ought to do so. But how can I help it? I do not prevent them. And I should like to know how this essay is to be written, if people stop it at the commencement. Do let us get on.

In collecting objects interesting for their beauty, their quaintness, their antiquity, or even their rarity, man exercises a wise intelligence, for he not only provides himself with an innocent and absorbing pursuit, but renders his home, even though it be a garret, a delight to himself and others, while he cannot fail to cultivate his mind, without painful effort, and almost unconsciously. When to these advantages are added the prospect of getting the better of somebody in a bargain, and the pleasure of planting envy in the breast of a rival collector, it will be superfluous to point out that the acquisition of Bric-a-brac is an employment admirably calculated to insure the happiness of humanity. In the first place, as a pursuit, it has all the charms of the chase. You are both horse and hound, and if true-bred-high-spirited as the one, keen-scented as the other-you have your favourite covers; but sometimes you find your game in the most unlikely place, and you run it to earth or kill it in the open with varying fortune. There is a bit of blue china, of armour, of bronze, of paint that catches your wary eye. You attack the custodian, but he is too strong for you, and you prudently retreat. You reconnoitre.

There is the prize still. You hold a council of war between you and yourself. No, the place is too well defended. Another reconnaissance. It has gone; some one else has captured it. You think, "Why didn't I strain a point?" when lo! there it is, having taken up fresh ground. You hesitate no longer, and despite the amount of ammunition required, carry it by a coup de main. If it is cheap, you are gratified at your own astuteness; if dear, you are charmed at your courage. The effect of this penchant on a house is immense. It individualises it. This is verily your home. These odds and ends are the captives of your bow and spear. Each has a history, which is delightful to tell, pleasant to hear. "Next door" cannot possibly have the same things, nor "Over the way.'

But take the house of the non-collector. It is as a mortuary, cold, bare, and grim. It reflects nothing. It is furnished to order, like hundreds of others, and belongs to the upholsterer. It is perfectly proper, and shiny, and convenient, and -abominable. It is not thus, O Edwin, that you chose your Angelina! She was not supplied to order. It was the nameless charm distinguishing her from other young ladies, that fixed your roving eyes. O Angelina! you know that you would never have married Edwin, if articles of his description had been manufactured in dozens, and that you were only beguiled of your virgin affections because he was so different from other young men. The idea of either selecting the other through motives of convenience, because he or she was serviceable and would wear well, is too revolting almost to be mentioned. And a choice of surroundings from a base utilitarian motive is almost as objectionable. I can lay my hand upon the apparatus that distributes the vital fluid

through my body, and solemnly affirm that I had rather inhabit a neat cell in one of the model prisons-with which, upon my word of honour, my acquaintance is only non-professional-than dwell in the perfectly appointed habitations of the non-collector, where the six chairs, the two easy ditto, the elegant lounge, the curtains in green or crimson repp, the fringed mantelpiece, with handsome mirror, pair of lustres, marble clock, and Bohemian-glass vases, the highly respectable sideboard, and the unimpeachable table, with symmetrically arranged books-all as advertisedgladden the rectangular soul of the British Boeotian. In such a place you could only converse of the weather, the state of the money market, the rueful prospects of the Liberal or the Conservative party, according to your politics, and the treasonable practices of the local Board. But in the home of the hunter you can traverse the whole world and all ages, or like a butterfly in a rich garden, flutter from blossom to blossom, and extract sweets from each. With regard to the culture resulting from the eulogised métier, there can be no doubt that a knowledge of manners and customs, arts and manufactures, periods and events, is insensibly acquired in a pleasant disguise which robs wisdom of its natural terror, even as the insidious drug lurks in the toothsome cake of infancy, or the coveted confection conceals the healing balm "pulverizationly" prescribed.

Let it not be thought that the pleasures of picking-up are reserved for such as be of great estate, and have cash that is easily detached. On the contrary, riches are rather a drawback to the full enjoyment of Bric-à-Bracaism. Poor Dives sees something he likes. He asks the price, pays it from his apoplectic purse; the article is sent

Ꮓ

home, and his pulses beat no throb the quicker. Not for him are the agreeable titillations of temptation, the trembling hopes, the luxury of hardlearnt attainment which Lazarus feels when he longs, reflects, and ultimately dares to do without a certain amount of crumbs and diachylon, in order to purchase a pipe, pleasantly modelled in the semblance of a death's skull and cross-bones. Another of the charms incidental to our subject is the opportunity it affords for graceful acts of remembrance in the shape of presents to our friends. A bedstead, or a ton of Wallsend, or a set of false teeth, is doubtless each a useful gift, but slightly embarrassing. You could not give them to everybody without offence. But an elegant trifle, plastic, metallic, graphic, or ceramic, may be offered to the most susceptible without wounding them past surgery. I, whose delicacy perpetually places "halters in my pew, ratsbane in my porridge," will abide the test in my own person, if anyone doubt the above assertion. Can I say more? Spare me not. Pour on, I will endure. Moreover, compliments of this nature emanating from the skill of the expert, may have a value not to be measured by mere money. They are frequently things the like of which is not to be obtained in any market even by a millionaire. I do not know that any instance of this could be more forcible than the fact that a friend of the reader's humble servant positively laid a City Company-a City Company, I say, sir -under obligation, by presenting them with a something which they greatly desired, and he had picked up for a mere song. I think they made him free of the guild, and gave him a perpetual invitation to all the banquets, with the right of calling in the medical attendant afterwards.