littered with broken-up ships' timbers and broken spars; upon pyramids of casks, and batteries of sugarbags, and black mountains of coal, just disgorged from the clumsy lighters: upon the distant bridges seen through London's arch-cut sharply by Southwark's black iron span; the tiny penny steamers, the dancing wherries. The polluted river has even a transient gleam of blue on its surface to-day; the great pillar with the flaming top, the blue dome of St. Paul's, are solemn and regardful of the whole gay scene; and chief shines the bright sun upon the grand old Tower, calm and torpid-a gray stone tortoise, heedless how many thousands of tons weight are put upon it, how many broad-wheeled wagons of rolling centuries pass over it, and leave its granite carapace uninjured. Yes, Monsieur Crapaud, that is the Tower of London; that is the only fortalice of which London can boast. You will observe that plain brick dwellings and warehouses are mingled with hoary bastions and crenelated tourelles, the White Tower only rising proudly above all; that sentries are pacing along terraces that might be wharves; that Traitor's Gate is blocked up; that guns peer from between casks and piles of timber. That is a way we have in England to mingle the shop we keep with the very scant martial show we make.

Our three travellers, alive to the exigencies of the occasion, had each adopted a peculiar suit of travelling costume. The stout gentleman was resplendent. Look at him, and admit that he was a credit to the Batavier. That flowing mantle-light though warm, ample though convenient-possessed equally the characteristics of the Spanish grego, the Mexican poncho, the Arab bournous, the more modern Inverness wrapper, and the "upper Benjamin" of the old " Charlie." He wore, moreover, a gorgeous courier's pouch of large dimensions a pouch of softest leather and brightest framework and lock, and which being opened,

disclosed multifarious crimson morocco niches, furnished with tobacco, toilet appendages, small articles. of cutlery, his cigar case (Algerian wheat-straw, embroidered with amber beads), a passport case, with plenty of blank leaves for visas, and the precious document issued by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, a passport countersigned by the Netherlands Consul, and only obtained, it need scarcely be said, by the extensive personal interest possessed, and the high consideration enjoyed, by the stout gentleman at the Foreign Office. A felt hat of the aristocratically wide-awake pattern covered our stout one's brow; a diamond ring glittered on one finger, a cluster of watch-chains dangled from his waistcoat button-hole. He had a sketch-book in one hand, and a priceless meerschaum pipe (if its scientific colouring is to be. taken as a test of its value) was seldom absent from his manly lips. And let me not forget that-crosswise with the patent leather strap that held his courier's pouch, was suspended by a modest silken cord a gourd a gourd, sir, yellow, and untanned, such as you may see in Mr. Philip's pictures of life in sunny Seville. This gourd had a little cork and a little ventpeg, and, true to the traditions of its Iberian birthplace, it contained some most excellent Amontillado sherry, which the stout gentleman affably dispensed to his companions. He had a gold pencil-case, he had a gold pen-holder, he had a portentous morocco pocketbook, doubtless full of bank-notes and letters of credit. He was the pearl and pride of gallant young Englishmen taking their pleasure abroad. He laughed unceasingly, he told droll anecdotes, he sang snatches of merry songs, he spoke up quite boldly to the captain, slapped the second mate on the back, and called the steward "Theodore' "before he had been ten minutes on board. But he was very stout. The man with the iron chest (he had been sitting on that coffer since its arrival on board on the back of an ancient

C

porter, who grumbled horribly on receipt of his fee, and said that he "warn't used to carryin' coffins with paving stones inside") was slightly jealous of the magnificent "make up" of his stout friend, who, however, always anxious to pour oil on the troubled waters, promised to let him wear the gourd or the courier's pouch, whichever he preferred, all up the Rhine.

The slim gentleman, as became his philosophical temperament, was attired in a plain frock, a black neckerchief, and trousers and waistcoat of the ordinary check pattern. The common stove-pipe hat was at the back of his acute head; indeed, he looked very like a gentleman who was going into the City on business. Well-hadn't he come into the City in order to embark on board the Batavier, and wasn't going abroad his business just now? He was precisely the sort of equable individual who would have turned up in the trenches before Sebastopol, on the steps of the Astor House, New York, or at Shepherd's Hotel, Grand Cairo, in exactly the same costume, and with exactly the same unruffled demeanour.

As for the man with the iron chest, it had seemed good to that inexplicable individual to attire himself after the manner of an English groom who had taken to the society of gentlemen professing the noble science of self-defence. The stout gentleman christened him Jemmy Shaw on the spot. The slouching cap, the trousers tight from the knee downwards, and the remarkable monkey jacket of a thick, hard material, which he triumphantly declared "couldn't be cut with a knife," were as sporting as they were pugilistic in appearance. The slight hirsute appendage which he permitted to appear on his upper lip-being "otherwise clean shaven," as the celebrated literary gentleman observed of the other celebrated literary gentleman-gave him rather the guise, the slim one

whispered to the stout one, of Jack Sheppard with moustaches.

As for luggage, the stout and slim gentlemen had each brought a handsome and shapely "solid leather" portmanteau. The third traveller would have belied his na me, had he carried aught else beyond that memorable iron chest.

"At all events," the slim gentleman remarked, rubbing his hands, we shall know what that chest contains, when it comes to be examined at the customhouse at Rotterdam."

"Perhaps," was the brief reply of the man with the iron chest.

No need, I think, to describe, for the nine hundred and ninety-ninth time, the petty incidents of a steamboat passage down the river, and across the German Ocean (the pretension of calling it an ocean!), to Rotterdam-how the three wanderers passed Erith, and Gravesend and Tilbury, and made sage remarks about railways and steam navigation; how they expatiated on the beauty of the weather, and the calmness of the water (oh, fallacies of hope! and vanity of human wishes); how they moved the steward to bring a little tray on deck, bearing biscuits and cool refreshments, of which they partook, smoking, chattering, and signalling, by voice and finger, familiar places on either bank; how, at about three in the afternoon, they were summoned to dinner-they were getting towards the Nore light-ship by this time-and though the sea was still very blue, and the sun very bright, the water was not quite so calm as it had been in Limehouse-reach; how they partook of a dubious soup, that was rather mock-water than mock-turtle, and eschewed that inevitable boiled mutton, wisely adhering to beef; how they manfully ordered a bottle of red port wine, after sundry libations of bottled stout, and drank to and with the captain. I might fill columns with the narrative of these often-recounted

adventures. Dutch painting might perhaps be tolerated in the description of a voyage to the shores of Holland; but I am afraid that I should "make" neither my readers' game nor my own were I to indulge in very minute detail.

But no matter to whatever length this chapter runs, something must still be said about the FAWN.

"The wanton troopers, riding by,

Have shot my Fawn, and it will die,"

sings Andrew Marvell in his exquisite pastoral. She was not this Fawn; nay, nor the White Doe of Rylstone, nor Dryden's "milk-white hind," nor Shakspeare's leathern-coated stag that wept such piteous tears, and whom the melancholy Jacques watched. She was not the hart that desireth the water-brooks; nor the stricken deer that the herd had left, and the maiden bade come home to her bosom ; not the wild roe, which the individual who declared his or her heart to be "in the Highlands," desired to chase; not the gazelle which the author of "Eöthen took up tenderly in the desert, and placed across his saddle-bow, looking lovingly into the darling's eyes. What is the good of my expatiating upon what she was not? I tell you that she was a Fawn. If she resembled any pictured fawn, it was the pretty creature that the little girl is tending in Edwin Landseer's picture. But besides being a fawn, she was an exceedingly pretty girl, and a passenger on board the Batavier. Oh, those melting velvet eyes of hers! Oh, that timorous mouth, that imploring mouth, that seemed to join its cherry lips in supplication, saying, "Don't kiss me, please, because it isn't proper; but if you can't help it, and must do it, wait, oh, wait! till papa has turned his face to the binnacle!". Such a tender, trembling, svelte, and graceful form she had, such little hands and feet peeping in and out, "like little mice," to use