For the sake of those who are not too much of the fool to learn wisdom, we give to the readers of the Guardian, another expose of a "common cheat." Some people will allow themselves to be humbugged, no matter how much care is taken in their behalf. For others there is still hope. We have lived long enough to be able to foretell" the certain failure of all such traps for the simple. It does not take a long life, either, to note examples enough of this kind, to enable any one's common sense to form a rule of wisdom in regard to all such humbugs. In this case we felt sure the end would come-but it was sooner than could be reasonably anticipated. The woman who was so wonderfully wise, because she was the seventh daughter of another seventh daughter; who could tell of the past, present and future; who could point the way to fortune and happiness; who could detect thieves and enemies; who could show girls their lovers; who could help you to shun disasters and escape troubles-could not foresee or foretell that the officers of the outraged law were after her.

In all her books of necromancy, in all the revelations of her diablerie, she saw no phantom, huge as the mist-form on the Hartz Mountains, with a star on its breast and a warrant in its hand, approaching her domicil. Her spiritual eyes were closed, and the seventh daughter of a seventh mother of a seventh grandmother became even as the first daughter of a first mother. So the officer went unawares and took the most renowned of modern astrologers, the far-seeing clairvoyant, healing medium, and psychometric delineator of character, with all the "mysteries" of the Pythoness, to the Mayor's office.

An affidavit was made against her charging that she is a common cheat. The police went to the house and there they found such piles of all sorts of things! There were books which tell the fate of all luckless or happy lovers; books on palmistry, on fortune-telling, on dreams, on marriage, and others of more questionable character even. In a drawer they found a couple of dollars or so, in counterfeit halves and quarters, for which doubtless, some body has learned his or her future fate. There was a bundle of bills or posters, at least half a bushel, which gave the various names under which Mad. Willis has practised upon the credulity of the gullible in various cities and States in the Union, and set forth her rare and wonderful powers.

A large box was found, into one end of which the curious visitor looked through a magnifying glass at the picture of the future husband or wife. The picture introduced at the other end of the box, the mistress of cercmonies, having prepared herself, flashed upon it some colored flame, such as is seen in show pieces on the stage, and the anxious body having seen the 'elephant,' paid the fee and was content.

We doubt whether Saul was more intensely agitated when the Witch of Endor called up the venerable form of the great judge in Israel, than were the young ladies who were permitted to gaze through the vista of a cheap box and a cloud of smoke, on the features, of their to-be lovers and husbands. It is to be doubted whether, of the thousand and one ladies who visited Madame Willis, provided they were unmarried—a single one left without talking a squint through that mysterious box. And some were rendered very unhappy thereby. One young lady saw, or thought she saw, the features of a person she detested-and he was foreordained to be her husband. She could not doubt it. Had not Madame Willis foretold the death of a near friend, and had not that event happened as predicted? It must be so, and the young lady felt strongly tempted to go into a convent. The arresting officers had laid irreverent hands upon the talismans of her power, and there, piled up in admirable disorder, were the foretelling cards--"the Fortune-teller's own Book," "Secret of Love and Beauty"— "the Wheel of Fortune," and a formidable array of handbills and placards, announcing Madame in various cities as Madame Wright, Madame Caprel, Mrs. Black, Madame Levante, and various aliases which we do not now recall. All over these papers was the unmistakable odor of camphor, for which Madame or her favorite devil must have an undue partiality.

There were visible on cheap pasteboard the visages of the husbands of an indefinite number of sighing maidens. There they were and are, bona fide pasteboard husbands, at which any young lady can have a satisfactory look by calling at the Mayor's office. They are four in number-one with a decided crisp in his hair, and a skin several shades darker than an olive, another a shade or two lighter, with one optic distended as though it had been rubbed with belladona, and a nose flaring up at the base like a pyramid of putty too suddenly squatted-a third that looks midway between a simpleton and a knave, and a fourth, fair-haired and blonde the very counterpart of a "nice young man." A young lady had but to express her desire for a husband, describing what his complexion, &c, should be, and presto! it was there. If prospective crime were actionable, what numberless indictments for bigamy could be entered up against these unfortunate and low-priced young men.

As Cæsar often tells us, a man easily believes what he wants to believe. So here doubtless those lovesick girls thought they saw their intended husbands. I know a man, who is no fortune teller, who yet has tact enough to tell the general character of a girl's love. He has been tried in the social circle where different ones were made to wonder how he knew.

By acute observation and a tolerable acquaintance of characters and temperament, almost any one, he says, can learn to tell the generalities given by those who pretend to tell such things which silly or curious people delight to hear. These are only given in very dim outlines, and the excited imagination of the inquirer fills up the particulars.

It is easy to tell, for instance, whether the girl who asks has been in love; what kind of a one it is who has been the object of her affection; dark or light hair. What kind of eyes; large or small; thin and spare, or full and ruddy, &c.

Madame Willis held daily levees for silly girls in want of lovers, and exhibited to fading maiden ladies, who feared they should die without the

sight, the shadowy-outlines of their longed for husbands. Madame flourished, too. She consulted cards, she told fortunes, she interpreted palmistry, she affrighted witless maidens by her familiarity with memories of their pap-spoon days, she painted for them such pictures of the future as accorded with their desires; she administered counsel to the anxious, consolation to the disappointed, and medicine to the sick. Madame is simply an ancient Pythoness, descended of astrologers, and adopted into the great circle of spiritual mediums. With such diversity of supernatural accomplishments, who can wonder that her rooms were thronged, or be surprised that she took in in a few days some five hundred dollars in sums of fifty cents each.

Some girls were in the house at the time of the arrest, one of whom crawled out of a back window and hid, or tried to hide in an ash hole in the back yard. Madame Willis was the person wanted, and the others were not molested. She had $300 in cash, a splendid outfit of rich jewelry, and a double handful of pieces of rich ear drops, finger rings, brooches, etc. These are probably stolen goods, paid to her by serving maids who levy upon their employers to gratify their taste for the marvellous.

But let us hear the end of this case. A woman in South Carolina sends $5 "to form a speedy marriage" for her. A young man also writes, proposing in his letter to employ Madame Willis to marry him to some young lady of fashion. His object is to better his fortune, and on condition that she would do what he desired, he will pay her one per cent. on the fortune of the lady whose hand she shall obtain for him. The way in which all the above came to light was on this wise. A couple of young ladies in this city went to Madame Willis, on Thursday. She told them of certain friends of theirs, whom she described, and who were about to die; there was to be great trouble in the family, and terrible things were to happen. The foolish girls, whose names, we will not give, were frightened so much at their impending fate that they were in a miserable state and unable to sleep all night. So a young man, who happened to learn the facts, made an affidavit before the Mayor, charging this woman to be a common cheat. When brought before the Mayor, she admitted that she knew the whole thing to be a cheat. He fined her $25, and discharged her, she giving her promise faithfully, to leave the city within 24 hours.

One of the papers says: "Madame has been an astrologist these many years, and if reports be true, has amassed quite a fortune. She can see as far into the future as a blind man can into a millstone, and knows as much of the future as an idol knows of the events of next year."

Wisdom may be won by turning such examples to the profit of those who need experience and caution.

THE events of the revolution in Tuscany have greatly encouraged the friends of the Protesant cause in Europe.

"I QUITE FORGOT IT."

BY OLD HUMPHREY.

A GOOD friend of mine, who has helped my pen to many a subject, is in the habit of adding to his communications the words, "Try what you can make of this, if the subject bites;" meaning that if the topic should lay hold of me, moving me to write energetically, I should at once enter upon it, and not otherwise.

A correspondent, who appears to be all alive to the importance of this subject, writes to me thus :-"I am a shopkeeper, with two shopmen and a son behind the counter; I have also a servant and a housekeeper, besides a family of five children. I say to James, 'Have you done so and so?' 'No, sir; I quite forgot it.' Charles, have you been on that errand ?' No, sir; I quite forgot it.' 'William, have you taken that letter to the post-office?' 'No, sir; I quite forgot it.' 'Susan, have you sent to the store for that article I wished you to get?' No, sir.' 'Why have you not?' 'Because, sir, I quite forgot it.' Ann, did you call at Mr. Thompson's, and tell him I should not be able to meet him to-day, as I proposed ?' 'No, sir; I quite forgot it.' Servants and children, as well as masters, are very forgetful; and the reply, 'Oh! I quite forgot it,' comes so readily and so frequently, that I determined to drop a note to Old Humphrey, to draw his attention to it, that he might give us a chapter on the subject of forgetfulness, or from the words, I quite forgot it ;' thinking that it might rouse the memory of some who quite forget, not only to such things of this world as they ought to remember, but to those also of the world to come."

Now, there is such an apparent singleness of purpose, such an honesty of intention, and withal so much that may be made practically useful in the remarks of my correspondent, that I am quite inclined to add to them a few brief observations, with the hope that, together, they may induce some to remember what now they are too much in the habit of forgetting.

On the first view of the case, it seems hard to blame any one for a defective memory. Are we not all in the habit of forgetting things, in spite of our best resolutions to remember them? Can we forget half of what we would willingly bury in oblivion? or remember half of those things which we desire to be ever present to our recollection? A bad memory, surely, is an affliction heavy enough of itself, without reproach being added to the burden.

I am afraid, however, that this kind of reasoning, though it serves our purpose excellently in apologizing for ourselves, is far from being satisfactory when offered to us as an excuse for others. When we have neglected an important letter, we may be satisfied in making the observation, "It was an oversight of mine, I quite forgot it;" but when any one neglects to deliver an important letter or communication to us, and offers us such an unsatisfactory apology, what heart-burnings, what un

charitable thoughts, and what bitter words does it not unfrequently occasion!

You must allow me to strip the phrase, "I quite forgot it," of all the false reasoning that is usually attached to it, and to show it up in all its naked deformity. I admit that a bad memory may often be made better by a judicious and persevering effort, that it is sometimes an infirmity, and that those who have a bad memory, and cannot help it, are not fit objects of censure; but I do not admit that a bad memory is the cause of, or has, of necessity, anything to do with the frequent observation, "I quite forgot it."

If I am told that a man, whom I am in the habit of seeing with a bag of flour on his back, is weak in the body, or that another whom I frequently meet walking at the rate of four or five miles an hour, can hardly creep along, I do not believe what is said of them. It may suit the purpose of the one to be thought weak in body, and of the other to be considered almost incapable of walking; but I have positive proof that the contrary is the fact. Is not this clear? Can we arrive at any

other conclusion? I think not.

But what has this to do, say you, with the matter? How do you apply this reasoning to the case of those who are in the habit of saying "I quite forgot it." In this manner. If I observe that such as most frequently excuse themselves on account of a bad memory, in things in which others are interested, have no deficiency of memory in things in which they themselves have an advantage, I am as much justified in asserting the strength of their memory, as I am in declaring the man who carried the sack of flour to be a strong man, and he who walked at the rate of four or five miles an hour to be a fast walker.

We now, then, come to the root of the matter, and must perceive that though the habit of quite forgetting things appears to spring from the want of a good memory, it really arises from the want of a good principle. This may sound harshly in the ears of my readers; but as I would apply it to myself as freely as to others, I must be at liberty to repeat my observation, that the habits of excusing a neglect of duty by the remark, "I quite forgot it," is much more to be attributed to a deficiency of principle than to a deficiency of memory.

If the same "Charles," who quite forgot to go on the errand of his master, is in the habit of forgetting to go on his own errands; if the same "William," who quite forgot to take the letter to the post, is in the habit of forgetting to send his own letters; and if the identical "Susan," who quite forgot to go to the shop for the article wanted, is very much accustomed to forget to go shopping herself when she requires, or thinks she requires, a new bonnet or fresh ribands, why then I shall be quite disposed to admit the plea of a bad memory; but if, on the contrary, they never do forget these things, then I am compelled to ascribe their errors to a defective principle, and not to a defective memory.

"I quite forgot it." Indeed! I have no patience with such an idle excuse. Where things which ought to be remembered are forgotten once through a bad memory, they are forgotten half a dozen times for want of a disposition to do to others as we would have them do to us. One or two questions would I fain put to those who are in the habit of neglecting a duty, and of apologizing for it with the pitiful excuse,