The visitor is Mr. Incledon.

He is clad just as we have seen him upon former
occasion—with the same elegant simplicity; and his
countenance wears the same expression of grave dignity.
He presses Sansoucy's hand with friendly warmth, and sits

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down as one does in the apartment of a friend, without
ceremony or stiffness.

“I'm glad to see you, Ralph,” says Sansoucy, “and
you look quite hearty.”

“I'm well enough, Ernest. I was passing, and thought
I would come in.”

“A most excellent thought, and most manfully carried
into execution. The individual who mounts those two
flights of stairs, must possess a warmth of friendship, and
a vigor of determination, sufficient to set up a Damon, or
rival Robert Bruce!”

Having uttered which “chaste and elegant” sentence,
as say the gentlemen of letters, Sansoucy, or Ernest, if the
reader pleases, smiled with his whole countenance, including
his eyes.

“Why, your stairs are not so high,” said Incledon.

“But steep—deep I may say.”

“So they are.”

“Almost as deep as my reveries when you entered.”

“What were you thinking about?” said his friend, in
his habitual tone of gravity and calmness, which never
seemed to amount to stateliness. “What a meditator
you are.”

“True, but I am studying.”

“What subject?”

“Human nature.”

“That is deeper than anything else I know of.”

“Yes—try a cigar—but I forgot, you never smoke,”
said Sansoucy. “Yes, I really think this subject is deep,
and I am rapidly coming to the conclusion of one of my

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friends—Hope, you know—that there is a great amount
of human nature in this world—this `Pilgrim's Progress
of a mortal vale,' as Mrs. Gamp says, according to Mr.
Dickens, though not in near so elegant a way.”

“What a bitter book that is.”

“What? `Martin Chuzzlewit?”'

“Yes.”

“So it is; this hatred, almost, of America, is the only
blot I see upon the character of a man, who seems to me
the noblest genius of our age. What a beauty and glory
of pathos is there in Charles Dickens! All the world
cries and laughs with him, and Paul is the `little friend'
of everybody! That child walks hand in hand with
`Nell' through English literature, and so they will go on
forever—beautiful as pathos, and as dear as early love.”

“A great writer,” said Incledon.

“Yes,” said Sansoucy, “in his way, as others are great
in other ways. I bow to such men, and am glad to call
such maestro. They interpret the life of to-day, and this
will ever admit of clearer personation than historic life,
which makes it necessary for the artist to go back to the
period he chooses—leaving the present, wholly—and thus
throw himself heart and soul into the dead world of the
past.”

“I should consider it most difficult.”

“Yes, it must be. I scarcely ever dared to touch it,
though, as you know, I have written many tales for the
magazines—and money,” said Sansoucy, smiling.

“Oh, you slander yourself.”

“How?”

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“By this imputation.”

“The money—?”

“Yes: you write, Ernest, from a true love of Art.

“Art!” cried Sansoucy: “what is Art, my dear fellow?
Will Art put money in your purse?”

“No, but fame in your life.”

“What is fame?” said Sansoucy, philosophically;
“stay, let me repeat you what Colonel Henry Esmond,
according to Mr. Thackeray, says of worldly honors—I
have it by heart, and nothing could be finer. `What,'
he says, `do these profit a year hence, when other names
sound louder than yours; when you lie hidden away
under ground, along with the idle titles engraven on your
coffin? But only true love lives after you—follows your
memory with secret blessings—or precedes you, and intercedes
for you. Non omnis moriar—if dying—I yet
live in a tender heart or two; nor am lost and hopeless
living, if a sainted departed soul still loves and prays for
me!' Could anything be truer or more beautiful?”

“Your criticism is just—the philosophy perfect, and
the passage exquisite. I am glad you do not care for
vulgar fame.”

“Care! I despise it most enthusiastically, my dear
friend, and that because it is cloying in possession, and
transitory in character.”

“Yes, yes.”

“What fame of general or statesman, unless it be the
perfume of noble deeds lingering still, is worth having?—
where is all the brilliant society which used to carry itself

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on hereabouts? A little dust is the contents of the
crucible.”

“Why, you are in a profoundly philosophical mood,
Ernest; you are going to turn hermit.”

“Oh, no, I am too fond of my life; and some-day I
shall blaze out in an extraordinary way.”

“How?”

“Literary, of course. Authors are growing respectable,
and a literary friend of mine got a discount the
other day.”

Incledon smiled.

“True,” said his friend, lazily; “but it is proper to
say, our friend over there, the rich wig-maker, was on his
note. Between the beautifier of the head, internally and
externally, the Bank, you see, could not resist.”

“Pshaw, you are jesting. What new books?”

“A whole cartload. Our literature, I repeat, is becoming
respectable. I was reflecting, as you came in,
that, probably, we should, some day, have a school of
historical romance.”

“I am sure we shall.”

“Why should we not?”

“I see no reason.”

“The past is rich enough in contrasts, and, but now, it
occured to me, that it ought to be worked.”

“It will be, some day.”

“Assuredly,” said Sansoucy: “and I will cradle the
new-born babe in the white sheets of the “Weekly Mammoth.”
Tender nursling! he will need protection and
encouragement, thrown on the roaring surges of this

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wicked world. True! why should not somebody come
and write about the great, the magnificent things which
flooded the Revolutionary period with splendor. Even
the lesser details of manners are in admirable contrast
with the present, and are like so many blocks hewn out,
and waiting for the master-workman to raise to the pinnacle
of Art. We laugh at them, but that proves that
they entertain us;—and, when you came in, I was thinking
what a crowd of worthies, male and female, had
promenaded on that piazza, yonder, over the house-tops,
in the ridiculous, pompous old times. Just think what a
delighful set of folks they were. Gallant cavaliers in silk
stockings and ruffles, and knee-breeches and powder—
with lengthy waistcoats, and embroidered coats, assembled
over yonder to talk in their pompous grand old way,
which amuses me so much, that I positively like them,
thinking of them. They talked with ladies, observe mon
ami, not at all resembling the fair dames of to-day.'

“They were much the same in character.”

“Very true—but in costume?”

“Very different.”

“I should think so. Fancy our respected grandfathers
waltzing, or in the middle of a polka, with some of our
modern misses! Faith! the old gentleman would dash
his wig in words, if not in deed. They were different
then—the ladies fair; and it was these dames of old days
that the pompous old fogies, as we call them, talked to.
Fair dames they were, in powder—with white chins,
patch-covered—with short waisted dresses, bare arms,
covered with diamond bracelets, girdles of velvet, with

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golden clasps, and high red heels to their shoes, which
clattered as they walked!”

“You are studying costume,” said Incledon.

`I? not at all. But that is but a part of my erudition.
They flirted variegated fans, my dear fellow, and ogled
and murmured, and laughed and sighed;—enslaving the
gay gallants much after the fashion of their fair descendants
in the present day. That old house yonder, saw all
this gayety and laughter, these bright forms and brilliant
eyes—observe my own, I grow poetical!—which shine
still in the air, and make the spot fairy ground. You
can't go there, and stand upon that portico, without seeing
all the past rise up again, and glow with the splendor
which it has not left to us, except as a memory, something
`i' the air,' subtle and delicate, like some delicious
odor!”

“Why, you are enthusiastic.”

“I am growing poetical, as I told you.”

“And you cling to the past?”

“Why not? The gay throng of to-day has no longer
anything to attract those who are fond of dreams, as I
am—and that, because the past is alive again with all its
glittering figures and enchanting eyes, its musical voices
and gay laughter—the past, mon ami, illustrated by its
cavaliers and dames, who went away before the advent of
the Prosaic Age!”

Sansoucy paused and smoked, for his pipe had nearly
gone out in the mean time: and for some minutes he was
silent.

“Good,” he said, at last, with his old smile, “here I am

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dreaming out loud, and that for your benefit. But why
not? Why not amuse ourselves with a mind-picture of
those tender and gracious phantoms shining through the
mist; and take our hats off and salute them? Beautiful
and lovely dames! they say untruly that you are dead,
and only memories—forgotten music, silent laughter! I
hold that nothing is less true. You live to-day as you did
in the old days, with your gracious smiles, and liquid eyes,
and soft lips, quite expert to shape the compliments or satire
of the elder day! The flattering or dreadful speeches
which you made sound for us still—the speeches which
raised the gallant in knee-breeches to the empyrean, or
made his reflections suicidal. Yes, beautiful and fair
dames! you live to-day, and reach out tender arms towards
us, showering gracious smiles! Most respected of grandmothers,
you move visibly still, with the most venerated
of grandfathers; and the comedy of to-day is but that of
your age played over again with all its joys and griefs—
its sighs and laughter! The drama is the same—the
Human Comedy—but the old actors—where are they?”

“Plain enough in your `mind's eye,' as Hamlet says,”
replied Incledon, when this apostrophe of Sansoucy was
gone through with; “for my part I am very glad the past
is what it is—passed. I love it so much that I wish to
increase my affection by absence and separation.”

“Ah, my friend! you are not a poet! You are so unfortunate
as not to sleep in a garret and live on moonbeams;
how unhappy!”

And Sansoucy laughed.

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