ng, and the clown a "very poor
fool" indeed. In this frame of mind, the conversation appeared to me to
have assumed such an essentially frivolous turn, that I soon ceased to
take any share in it, and, turning over the leaves of a book of prints
as an excuse for my silence, endeavoured to abstract my thoughts
altogether from the scene around me, and employ them on some subject
less dissonant to my present tone of feeling. As is usually the result
in such cases, the attempt proved a dead failure, and I soon found
~260~~ myself speculating on the lightness and frivolity of women in
general, and of Clara Saville in particular.

"How thoroughly absurd and misplaced," thought I, as her silvery laugh
rang harshly on my distempered ear, "were all my conjectures that she
was unhappy, and that, in the trustful and earnest expression of those
deep blue eyes, I could read the evidence of a secret grief, and a tacit
appeal for sympathy to those whom her instinct taught her were worthy of
her trust and confidence! Ah! well, I was young and foolish then (it was
not quite a year and a half ago), and imagination found an easy dupe in
me; one learns to see things in their true light as one grows older, but
it is sad how the doing so robs life of all its brightest illusions."

It did not occur to me at that moment that there was a slight injustice
in accusing Truth of petty larceny in regard to a _bright_ illusion in
the present instance, as the fact (if fact it were) of proving that Miss
Saville was happy instead of miserable could scarcely be reckoned among
that class of offences.

"Come, Freddy," exclaimed Mrs. Coleman, suddenly waking up to a sense of
duty, out of a dangerous little nap in which she had been indulging, and
which occasioned me great uneasiness, by reason of the opportunity it
afforded her for the display of an alarming suicidal propensity, which
threatened to leave Mr. Coleman a disconsolate widower, and Freddy
motherless.

As a warning to all somnolent old ladies, it may not be amiss to enter a
little more fully into detail. The attack commenced by her sitting bolt
upright in her chair, with her eyes so very particularly open, that
it seemed as if, in her case, Macbeth or some other wonder-worker had
effectually "murdered sleep". By slow degrees, however, her eyelids
began to close; she grew less and less "wide awake," and ere long was
fast as a church; her next move was to nod complacently to the company
in gener