rd

----"trod alone
The banquet hall deserted."

"Well, uncle," said the broker, bitterly, "the game's up. I have been
ruined, stock and fluke, by letting my wife have her own way, and
to-morrow I shall be a bankrupt."

"No you won't," said uncle Richard.

"Yes I shall," said the broker, angrily. "And Julia, abandoned by her
lover, will be broken hearted."

"No she won't," said uncle Richard.

"Who's to prevent it?" asked the broker.

"Uncle Richard," replied that personage. "What's the use of a friend,
unless he's a friend in need. I've got plenty of money, and neither
chick nor child in the world. I'll meet your liabilities with cash.
Young Merton loves Julia in spite of her temporary alienation--he will
gladly take her back. The rogues will get their deserts. Your wife,
sick and ashamed of her fashionable follies, will gladly gin' up this
house and the servants. You'll buy a little country seat on the
Hudson, and I'll come and live with you."

As every thing turned out exactly as uncle Richard promised and
predicted, we have no occasion to enlarge on the fortunate subsiding
of this "sea of troubles."

ACTING CHARADES.

But, masters, remember that I am an ass; though it be not
written down, yet forget not that I am an
ass.--SHAKSPEARE, _Much Ado about Nothing._

Many of our readers have doubtless witnessed, or perchance
participated in, the amusement of acting charades--a divertisement
much in vogue in social circles, and if cleverly done, productive of
much mirth. To the uninitiated, a brief description of an acted
charade may not be unacceptable. A word of two or more syllables is
selected, each part of which must make sense by itself--as, for
instance, the word inspector, which would be decomposed, thus; _inn
spectre_. The company of performers would then extemporize a scene at
a public house, leaving the spectators to guess at the first syllable,
_inn_. The second scene would represent the terror occasioned by the
apparition of a phantom, and give the second part of the word spectre.
The third scene would represent the whole word, and would perhaps be a
brigade inspector reviewing his troops, giving occasion for the humors
of a Yankee militia training. Much ingenuity is required in the
selection of a word, and in carrying out the representation, with
appropriate dialogue, &c.

Acting charades generally turns a house topsy turvy; wardrobes and
garrets