upon a flight of stairs leading down to the cellar.
Visitors on entering the house would suddenly shoot past the person who
had answered the door to them and disappear down these stairs. Those of
a nervous temperament used to imagine that it was a trap laid for them,
and would shout murder as they lay on their backs at the bottom till
somebody came and picked them up.

It is a long time ago now that I last saw the inside of an attic. I have
tried various floors since but I have not found that they have made much
difference to me. Life tastes much the same, whether we quaff it from a
golden goblet or drink it out of a stone mug. The hours come laden with
the same mixture of joy and sorrow, no matter where we wait for them. A
waistcoat of broadcloth or of fustian is alike to an aching heart, and
we laugh no merrier on velvet cushions than we did on wooden chairs.
Often have I sighed in those low-ceilinged rooms, yet disappointments
have come neither less nor lighter since I quitted them. Life works upon
a compensating balance, and the happiness we gain in one direction we
lose in another. As our means increase, so do our desires; and we ever
stand midway between the two. When we reside in an attic we enjoy a
supper of fried fish and stout. When we occupy the first floor it takes
an elaborate dinner at the Continental to give us the same amount of
satisfaction.

ON DRESS AND DEPORTMENT.

They say--people who ought to be ashamed of themselves do--that the
consciousness of being well dressed imparts a blissfulness to the human
heart that religion is powerless to bestow. I am afraid these cynical
persons are sometimes correct. I know that when I was a very young man
(many, many years ago, as the story-books say) and wanted cheering up,
I used to go and dress myself in all my best clothes. If I had been
annoyed in any manner--if my washerwoman had discharged me, for
instance; or my blank-verse poem had been returned for the tenth time,
with the editor's compliments "and regrets that owing to want of space
he is unable to avail himself of kind offer;" or I had been snubbed by
the woman I loved as man never loved before--by the way, it's really
extraordinary what a variety of ways of loving there must be. We all do
it as it was never done before. I don't know how our great-grandchildren
will manage. They will have to do it on their heads by their time if
they persist in not clashing with any previous method.

Well, as