from a snuff-taker. This raised the concealed anger of the
snuff-takers, who had hitherto maintained a stubborn neutrality while
the argument was kept to smoke. They replied both by wit and
invective--they affirmed snuff to have a moral use--"Dust to
dust"--would remind them of the brevity of life--that the king and
ministers patronized the habit, and gave away L10,000 worth of
snuff-boxes in every year--that as to the nose being blockaded, that was
a happy circumstance to London residents, and enabled them to acquire
the French accent more naturally--that as to the assumed yellowness of
complexion complained of, it was only studious and Werter-like--and that
as to the ladies refusing to be saluted by snuff-takers, that was a
thing which modesty and prudence required them to sneeze at. The
historian might add by way of reflection, that nothing could more
clearly show the national freedom from anxious cares, when it was
thought that the public took interest in the comparative merits of
blackened teeth or a snuffy pocket-handkerchief.--_The Inspector._

* * * * *

FASHIONABLE NOVELS.

Of the slip-slop reading, under this denomination, with which the town
has lately been inundated, the following is a fair specimen:--

_Hyde Nugent._--The book is made up completely of the gossip of
drawing-rooms, hotels, dinners, and balls. As to the hero, if any one
has a grain of curiosity about him--gratify it. Hyde is the son of a man
of family and fortune; he goes to Oxford, fights a duel, and is
expelled--prevails upon a marquess to break the matter to the
father--falls in love with the marquess's daughter--goes large and loose
about town--is every where introduced--and one of every party.
Notwithstanding certain warnings, and his own disgusts, he frequents
Crockford's--gets plucked, and moreover deeply involved with the Jews.
In the meanwhile he does not neglect the marquess's daughter. They soon
come to an understanding. He is irresistible--she is an houri. But the
consciousness of his embarrassments press heavily upon him, and he is on
the point of taking some desperate step, when he is summoned to attend a
friend in a duel, who kills his antagonist; and he and Hyde are obliged
to fly. This rescues him from his gaming associates; though he gets
among others at Lisbon, and narrowly escapes assassination. On his
return to England, his sister has married a duke's eldest son, and all
the fami