just and upright spirit has entered the glorious liberty of the sons
of God. Yes, the good man may have had opinions which the philosophical
scorn, weaknesses at which the thoughtless smile; but death shall change
him into all that is enlightened, wise, and refined; for he shall awake
in "His" likeness, and "be satisfied."

AUNT MARY.

Since sketching character is the mode, I too take up my pencil, not to
make you laugh, though peradventure it may be--to get you to sleep.

I am now a tolerably old gentleman--an old bachelor, moreover--and, what
is more to the point, an unpretending and sober-minded one. Lest,
however, any of the ladies should take exceptions against me in the very
outset, I will merely remark, _en passant_, that a man can sometimes
become an old bachelor because he has _too much_ heart as well as too
little.

Years ago--before any of my readers were born--I was a little
good-for-nought of a boy, of precisely that unlucky kind who are always
in every body's way, and always in mischief. I had, to watch over my
uprearing, a father and mother, and a whole army of older brothers and
sisters. My relatives bore a very great resemblance to other human
beings, neither good angels nor the opposite class, but, as
mathematicians say, "in the mean proportion."

As I have before insinuated, I was a sort of family scape-grace among
them, and one on whose head all the domestic trespasses were regularly
visited, either by real, actual desert or by imputation.

For this order of things, there was, I confess, a very solid and serious
foundation, in the constitution of my mind. Whether I was born under
some cross-eyed planet, or whether I was fairy-smitten in my cradle,
certain it is that I was, from the dawn of existence, a sort of "Murad
the Unlucky;" an out-of-time, out-of-place, out-of-form sort of a boy,
with whom nothing prospered.

Who always left open doors in cold weather? It was Henry. Who was sure
to upset his coffee cup at breakfast, or to knock over his tumbler at
dinner, or to prostrate saltcellar, pepper box, and mustard pot, if he
only happened to move his arm? Why, Henry. Who was plate breaker general
for the family? It was Henry. Who tangled mamma's silks and cottons, and
tore up the last newspaper for papa, or threw down old Ph[oe]be's
clothes horse, with all her clean ironing thereupon? Why, Henry.

Now all this was no "malice prepense" in me, for I solemnly believe that
I was the best