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we are now even: you have made verses on my pies, and I have made pies on your verses."

LX.

THE SPANISH NOBLEMAN.

A certain cavalier, as noble as the King, catholic as the Pope, and poor as Job, having arrived during the night at an inn in France, knocked for a long time before being able to awake the host. At last he made him rise by dint of making a thundering noise. "Who is there?" said the host through the window.

"It is," said the Spaniard, "Don Juan PedroHermandez-Rodriguez de Villa-Nova, Count of Malafra, Cabalerro de Santiago y d'Alcantara.” Then the host replied to him, in shutting the window:- "Sir, I am very sorry for it, but we have not a sufficient number of rooms to lodge all those gentlemen.”

LXI.

THE NEWFOUNDLAND DOG.

A very romantic young lady, having fallen into a river, was on the point of being drowned. A preserver is found by chance, who brings her out in a swoon, and she is carried home. When she came to herself, she declares to her family

that she wishes to marry the one who saved her. "Impossible," said the father. "He is married then?" "No." "Is it not that young man who lives in our neighbourhood?" no! it is a Newfoundland dog!"

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LXII.

SWIFT AND HIS SERVANT.

Swift being ready to mount his horse, asked for his boots; his servant brought them to him. 'Why are they not cleaned?" said the Dean of St. Patrick to him. "It is because, as you are going to soil them immediately on the roads, I thought it was not worth while cleaning them."

A short time after, the servant having asked Swift for the key of the press; "What for?" said his master to him. "For breakfast." "Oh!" replied the Doctor, "as you will still be hungry two hours hence, it is not worth while eating at present."

LXIII.

CHARLES XII.

One day that Charles XII., besieged in Straslund, was dictating some letters to a secretary, a shell fell on the house, pierced the roof, and came and burst near the very room of the King.

At the noise of the shell, and at the crash of the house, which seemed to fall, the pen escaped from the hands of the secretary.

"What is the matter, then?" said the King to him in a tranquil air; “why do you not write?" The latter could only answer these words: “Ah, sire, the shell!” “Well,” replied the King, “what has the shell to do with the letter which I am dictating to you? Continue."

LXIV.

TRUE HEROISM.

The army of Mayence, attacked at Torfou, in 1793, by Charette and Bonchamp, had not been able to resist the effort of the Vendéens, and was falling back after having lost its artillery in sustaining the reiterated attacks of an enemy superior in number.

The Republicans were on the point of yielding; their retreat was going to be cut off. Kleber calls the lieutenant-colonel Chevardin. "Take a company of grenadiers," said he to him; "stop the enemy before this ravine; allow yourself to be killed, and you will save your companions." "Yes, General," replies Chevardin. He wheels about, stops for a long time the Vendéens, and dies with the hundred men whom he commands.

LXV.

HOW GOES THE DONKEY?

The Marquis of C...., an officer in the Guards, was prancing in the country on a fine horse. A priest of the neighbourhood, trotting modestly on his ass, happened to pass. “How goes the ass, Monsieur le Curé?" (or Reverend Sir), cried the officer to him. "On horseback, Mr. Officer-on horseback!"

LXVI.

THE PEASANT WHO DOES NOT BELONG

TO THE PARISH.

At the last missionary sermon, in a country parish, every one was weeping except one peasant. They asked him why he was not weeping like the others; he replied, "I do not belong to the parish."

LXVII.

HUMANITY OF WASHINGTON.

A soldier in the

demned to be shot.

American army was con-
This unfortunate person,

by his savings, had been for several years the support of a very old father and mother.

General Washington, informed of the filial

piety of the culprit, commuted the sentence, and only caused him to be expelled the regiment. "If we were to make him die," he said, "we would run the risk of killing three persons instead of one."

LXVIII.

THE DISCREET PRIEST.

A theft had been committed in a little country parish; the priest, to whom some one had revealed the deed, assembles his parishioners, and said to them :-"My beloved brethren, there is a thief among you. As you would overwhelm the guilty one with all the weight of your scorn, I shall take very good care not to name him; but there is his dog, which is quietly sleeping at the foot of this pulpit."

LXIX.

A DELICATE ATTENTION.

A preacher who had generally very few hearers, reproached one of his friends because he had not come to hear him. The latter excused himself by saying that he had not wished to go and disturb his solitude.