MEL. Worth! What is a riband worth to a soldier? Worth! everything! Glory is priceless!

WIDOW. Leave glory to great folks.

Ah! Claude, Claude, castles in the air cost a vast deal to keep up! How is all this to end? What good does it do thee to learn Latin, and sing songs, and play on the guitar, and fence, and dance, and paint pictures? All very fine; but what does it bring in?

MEL. Wealth! wealth, my mother! Wealth to the mind-wealth to the heart-high thoughts-bright dreams-the hope of fame-the ambition to be worthier, to love Pauline.

WIDOW. My poor son! The young lady will never think of thee. MEL. Do the stars think of us? Yet if the prisoner see them shine into his dungeon, would'st thou bid him turn away from their lustre? Even so from this low cell, poverty, I lift my eyes to Pauline and forget my chains. (puts down his gun and cap near the staircase; the WIDOW takes a chair and sits. Goes to the picture and draws aside the curtain.) See, this is her image-painted from memory. Oh, how the canvas wrongs her! (Takes up the brush and throws it aside.) I shall never be a painter! I can paint no likeness but one, and that is above all art. I would turn soldier-France needs soldiers! But to leave the air that Pauline breathes! What is the hour? -so late? (Takes a chair and sits.) I will tell thee a secret, mother. Thou knowest that for the last six weeks I have sent every day the rarest flowers to Pauline?-she wears them. I have seen them on her breast. Ah, and then the whole universe seemed filled with odors! I have now grown more bold-I have poured worship into poetry-I have sent the verses to Pauline-I have signed them with my own name. My messenger ought to be back by this time. I bade him wait for the answer.

WIDOW. And what answer do you expect, Claude?

MEL. (rises). That which the Queen of Navarre sent to the poor troubadour: "Let me see the oracle that can tell nations I am beautiful!" She will admit me. I shall hear her speak-I shall meet her eyes-I shall read upon her cheek the sweet thoughts that translate themselves into blushes. Then-then, oh, then-she may forget that I am the peasant's son!

WIDOW. Nay, if she will but hear thee talk, Claude.

MEL. I foresee it all. She will tell me that desert is the true rank. She will give me a badge-a flower-a glove! Oh, rapture! I shall join the armies of the Republic-I shall rise-I shall win a name that

beauty will not blush to hear. I shall return with the right to say to her, "See, how love does not level the proud, but raises the humble!" Oh, how my heart swells within me! Oh, what glorious prophets of the future are youth and hope! Who's there?

GASPAR (without). Gaspar.

MEL. Come in. (The WIDOW opens the door.)

Enter GASPAR.

MEL. Welcome, Gaspar, welcome. Where is the letter? Why do you turn away, man? Where is the letter? (GASPAR gives him one.) This! This is mine, the one I intrusted to thee. Didst thou not leave it?

GASPAR. Yes, I left it.

MEL. My own verses returned to me. Nothing else!

GASPAR. Thou wilt be proud to hear how thy messenger was horored. For thy sake, Melnotte, I have borne that which no Frenchman can bear without disgrace.

MEL. Disgrace, Gaspar! Disgrace?

GASPAR. I gave thy letter to the porter, who passed it from lackey to lackey till it reached the lady it was meant for.

MEL. It reached her, then; you are sure of that! It reached her -well, well!

GASPAR. It reached her, and was returned to me with blows. Dost hear, Melnotte? with blows! Death! are we slaves still that we are to be thus dealt with, we peasants!

MEL. With blows? No, Gaspar, no; not blows!

GASPAR. I could shew thee the marks if it were not so deep a shame to bear them. The lackey who tossed thy letter into the mire swore that his lady and her mother never were so insulted. What could thy letter contain, Claude?

MEL. (looking over the letter). Not a line that a serf might not have written to an empress. No, not one.

GASPAR. They promise thee the same greeting they gave me, if you will pass that way. Shall we endure this, Claude?

MEL. (wringing GASPAR's hand). Forgive me, the fault was mine; I have brought this on thee; I will not forget it; thou shalt be avenged! The heartless insolence.

GASPAR. Thou art moved, Melnotte; think not of me; would go through fire and water to serve thee; but,--a blow! It i not the bruise that galls,-it is the blush, Melnotte. (going)

MEL. Say, what message?--How insulted?--Wherefore?--What the offense?

GASPAR. Did you not write to Pauline Deschappelles, the daughter of the rich merchant?

MEL. Well?

GASPAR. And are you not a peasant--a gardener's son ?--that was the offense. Sleep on it, Melnotte. Blows to a French citizen,

blows! (Exit.)

WIDOW. Now you are cured, Claude!

MEL. (tearing the letter). So do I scatter her image to the winds— I will stop her in the open streets-I will insult her--I will beat her menial ruffians—I will--(turns suddenly to WIDOW) Mother, am I humpbacked--deformed-hideous?

WIDOW. You?

MEL. A coward-a thief-a liar?

WIDOW. You?

MEL. Or a dull fool--a vain, driveling, brainless idiot?
WIDOW. No, no.

MEL. What am I then-worse than all these? Why, I am a peasant! What has a peasant to do with love? Vain revolutions, why lavish your cruelty on the great? Oh, that we-we, the hewers of wood and drawers of water--had been swept away, so that the proud might learn what the world would be without us! (paces the stage excitedly.)

Enter SERVANT from the Inn.

SERVANT. A letter for Citizen Melnotte.

MEL. A letter! from her perhaps--who sent thee?

SERVANT. Why, Monsieur--I mean Citizen--Beauseant, who stops to dine at the Golden Lion, on his way to his château.

MEL. Beauseant! (reads) "Young man, I know thy secret-thou lovest above thy station; if thou hast wit, courage, and discretion, I can secure to thee the realization of thy most sanguine hopes; and the sole condition I ask in return is, that thou shalt be steadfast in thine own ends. I shall demand from thee a solemn oath to marry her whom thou lovest; to bear her to thine home on thy wedding night. I am serious—if thou wouldst learn more, lose not a moment, but follow the bearer of this letter to thy friend and patron,-CHARLES BEAUSEANT."

MEL. Can I believe my eyes? Are our own passions the sorcerers

that raise up for us spirits of good or evil? I will go instantly. (Exit SERVANT.)

WIDOW. What is this, Claude?

MEL. "Marry her whom thou lovest". -"bear her to thine own home."-Oh, revenge and love; which of you is the stronger? (gazing on the picture) Sweet face, thou smilest on me from the canvas; weak fool that I am, do I then love her still? No, it is the vision of my own romance that I have worshiped; it is the reality to which I bring scorn for scorn. anon. (exit WIDOW up the staircase) before me. (looks again at the letter) No, it is not a mockery. I do not dream! (Exit.)

Adieu, mother! I will return My brain reels-the earth swims "Marry her whom thou lovest:"

ALICE'S ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND.

CHAPTER I.

DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE.

Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, "and what is the use of a book," thought Alice, "without pictures or conversations?"

So she was considering in her own mind (as well as she could, for the hot day made her feel very sleepy and stupid), whether the pleasure of making a daisy-chain would be worth the trouble of getting up and picking the daisies, when suddenly a white rabbit with pink eyes ran close by her.

There was nothing so very remarkable in that; nor did Alice think it so very much out of the way to hear the rabbit say to itself, “Oh, dear! Oh, dear! I shall be too late!" (when she thought it over afterward, it occurred to her that she ought to have wondered at this, but at the time it all seemed quite natural); but when the rabbit actually took a watch out of its waistcoat pocket, and looked at it, and then hurried on, Alice started to her feet, for it flashed across her mind that

she had never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat pocket or a watch to take out of it, and burning with curiosity, she ran across the field after it, and was just in time to see it pop down a large rabbit hole under the hedge.

In another moment down went Alice after it, never once considering how in the world she was going to get out again.

The rabbit hole went straight on like a tunnel for some way, and then dipped suddenly down, so suddenly that Alice had not a moment to think about stopping herself before she found herself falling down what seemed to be a very deep well.

Either the well was very deep, or she fell very slowly, for she had plenty of time as she went down to look about her, and to wonder what was going to happen next. First, she tried to look down and make out what she was coming to, but it was too dark to see anything: then she looked at the sides of the well, and noticed that they were filled with cupboards and book-shelves: here and there she saw maps and pictures hung upon pegs. She took down a jar from one of the shelves as she passed; it was labeled "ORANGE MARMALADE,” but to her great disappointment it was empty: she did not like to drop the jar for fear of killing somebody underneath, so managed to put it into one of the cupboards as she fell past it.

"Well!" thought Alice to herself, "after such a fall as this, I shall think nothing of tumbling down stairs! How brave they'll all think me at home! Why I wouldn't say anything about it, even if I fell off the top of the house!" (Which was very likely true.)

Down, down, down. Would the fall never come to an end? "I wonder how many miles I've fallen by this time?" she said aloud. "I must be getting somewhere near the centre of the earth. Let me see: that would be four thousand miles down, I think—” (for, you see, Alice had learnt several things of this sort in her lessons in the schoolroom, and though this was not a very good opportunity for showing off her knowledge, as there was no one to listen to her, still it was good practice to say it over) "—yes, that's about the right distance-but then I wonder what latitude or longitude I've got to!" (Alice had not the slightest idea what latitude was, or longitude either, but she thought they were nice grand words to say.)

Presently she began again. "I wonder if I shall fall right through the earth! How funny it'll seem to come out among the people that walk with their heads downward! The Antipathies, I think-" (she was rather glad there was no one listening this time, as it didn't