and he was sometimes compelled to lie in bed, in order that it might be washed. He dwelt in a large house, whose exterior, though not splendid, was much preferable to some of the rooms within; it was surrounded by a white fence with some of the parts broken down; a front gate swinging on one hinge; several of the window panes were broken; on two of the front windows swung two shattered blinds, which had once been green; and before the house, as you entered the garden, grew two spacious lime trees, forming a grateful shade. As you entered the house, you came to a large, massy, oak door, big enough to be the gate of a castle, with an iron knocker on it, shaped for a lion but looking more like a dog; and as you entered the building, you saw a front entry, the paper torn and colored by the rain; on your left hand was one room covered with a carpet, containing an eight-day clock, reaching from the floor to the ceiling, and telling the age of the moon; the other furniture passable; but the rest of the rooms in a condition which I blush to name. There, in this stately mansion, dwelt my venerable sire, who might justly be denominated a poor gentleman; that is, he was a gentleman in his own estimation, and poor in the esteem of every body else.

My father was a man of expedients, and had spent his whole life, and exhausted all his ingenuity, in that adroit presentation of pretences, which, in common speech, is called keeping up appearances. In this

art he was really skilful; and I often suspected then, and have really concluded since, if he had turned half the talent to procuring an honest livelihood, which he used to slobber over his ill-dissembled poverty, it would have been better for his soul and body both. He was a man that never told a lie, unless it was to keep up appearances.

I forewarn the reader that I am now entering on the tragic part of my story, and if he has sympathy or pity for me, I hope he will bestow it here. I know how hard-hearted the world is to such miseries, and I hope none of my readers will be so unfeeling as to smile as they peruse this paper. Still, much as I value the sympathy of a kindred heart, I will not be so cruel as to hope any of my readers have been taught such afflictions by experience. I hope none who hold this book, have been reduced to the miserable necessity of tying up their pantaloons with packthread, instead of lawful suspenders; of using a remnant of a pillow-case for a pocket-handkerchief; of sticking a bur on their rent stocking to cover up a hole; and after slitting their worn pantaloons on the knee, when they had got half way to meeting on the Sabbath, of being obliged to tie a pretended pockethandkerchief over a pretended wound, seeming to be lame, and perhaps before they had walked ten rods, forgetting in which leg the lameness was seated. No, these are the incommunicable sorrows of me, of me the sad hero of a sad family; the prince and

heir-apparent to the ragged generation. To me, and to me alone, was reserved the awful destiny of being invited to a party, where were to assemble the first beauties of a country village-not daring to go until evening, lest the light of heaven should expose a threadbare coat-having no clean shirt-not even a dickey which had not been worn ten times-supplying its place with a piece of writing paper—afraid to turn my head lest the paper should rattle or be displaced— and then just as a poor wretch was exulting in the hope, that the stratagems of poverty were to pass undetected, to have a lady, perhaps the youngest and most beautiful in the whole party, come provokingly near, and beg to examine your collar, because she admires the pattern. Often has it been my lot to return home from the company, where all hearts seemed to bound with gladness, to water my couch with tears, amid sorrows which I could tell to none, and with which none would sympathize. I thought it poverty. But I was mistaken. It was something else which begins with a P.

And then the awkward apologies to which one is reduced in such a situation, come very near to a mendacious violation of real verity. O how often have I seen my honored father put to his trumps, steering between Scylla and Charybdis, adroitly adjusting his language so as to make an impression, without incurring a lie, and reduced to shifts by which none were deceived, because all understood

them. Once on a time, after a week's starvation to procure a velvet collar for my father's best coat, we were sitting down to a dinner of hastypudding and molasses, when, unluckily, one of our neighbors happened to walk in without knocking, (a very improper act,) and we had no time to slip away the plates and table-cloth; we were taken in the very fact. I never saw my poor father more confounded. A hectic flush passed over his long, sallow cheek, like the last, sad bloom on the visage of a consumptive man. He looked, for a moment, almost like a convicted criminal; but, however, he soon recovered himself, and returned to his expedients. "We thought," said he, "we would have a plain dinner to-day; always to eat roast turkeys, makes one sick." There was no disputing this broad maxim. But happy would it have been for our ill-fated family, if there had been no sickness among its members, either of the head or heart, but such as is produced by eating roasted turkey.

In our town, at the period of my boyhood, the severity of puritan manners was relaxing into a species of gentility; and though my father and mother never went to balls and theatres, they were very fond of evening parties, where, after cards and conversation, they closed their enjoyments with an elegant supper. But, O at what an expense on our poor purse, were these pleasures bought! Once, I remember, to buy my mother's muslin gown, we sold

our pig, our only pig, and our only hope of animal food through the winter. And mark the malice of mankind, when you are trying to tower over them! The very next week were written by a piece of chalk, on the door of Bob Gill's gristmill, the following lines, where every body could read them. They were the production of some cruel, country wit, whom I could almost have murdered, had I known him.

A pig is raised for food ;-it makes you stare
To know that pigs are ever raised to wear;
But madam Oldbug puts her brains to rack,
And wears her pig, transformed, upon her back.

How the writer came to know the fact, I never could guess; only that hypocrisy, in poverty as well as in religion, is seldom long successful. Sometimes my mother would borrow her shawl at one place, and her tippet at another, and her cap at a third. Often would they come home late at night, on a winter evening, without a spark of fire on the hearth, or wood to kindle it; my mother shivering in her airy dress; I was sent down cellar to pull off the boards from the potato crib, or to bring up an old flour barrel, to light a transient flame, blazing and dying, like the fading joys on which our hearts were set. Sometimes we would pull down one part of the house to warm the other, so that the old mansion was made to perform a double office, yielding us at once shelter and fuel.