le King Pippin," and of the
Madam Blaize of Goldsmith (who, by the way, must have taken the hint of
it from a pleasant poem, "Monsieur de la Palisse," attributed to De la
Monnoye, in the collection of French songs before me). There was some
story of an old romance in which the Beauty had played her part. Perhaps
they all had had lovers; for, as I said, they were shapely and seemly
personages, as I remember them; but their lives were out of the flower
and in the berry at the time of my first recollections.

One after another they all three dropped away, objects of kindly
attention to the good people round, leaving little or almost nothing,
and nobody to inherit it. Not absolutely nothing, of course. There must
have been a few old dresses--perhaps some bits of furniture, a Bible,
and the spectacles the good old souls read it through, and little
keepsakes, such as make us cry to look at, when we find them in old
drawers;--such relics there must have been. But there was more. There
was a manuscript of some hundred pages, closely written, in which the
poor things had chronicled for many years the incidents of their daily
life. After their death it was passed round somewhat freely, and fell
into my hands. How I have cried and laughed and colored over it! There
was nothing in it to be ashamed of, perhaps there was nothing in it to
laugh at, but such a picture of the mode of being of poor simple good
old women I do believe was never drawn before. And there were all the
smallest incidents recorded, such as do really make up humble life,
but which die out of all mere literary memoirs, as the houses where the
Egyptians or the Athenians lived crumble and leave only their temples
standing. I know, for instance, that on a given day of a certain year,
a kindly woman, herself a poor widow, now, I trust, not without special
mercies in heaven for her good deeds,--for I read her name on a proper
tablet in the churchyard a week ago,--sent a fractional pudding from her
own table to the Maiden Sisters, who, I fear, from the warmth and detail
of their description, were fasting, or at least on short allowance,
about that time. I know who sent them the segment of melon, which in her
riotous fancy one of them compared to those huge barges to which we give
the ungracious name of mudscows. But why should I illustrate further
what it seems almost a breach of confidence to speak of? Some kind
friend, who could challenge a nearer interest than the cur