The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1839-08-16 00:00:00

A PLEASANT NIGHT'S REST.

" What on earth is the matter?" inquired Mr. Plumplee,
as he entered the room pale as a ghost in his night-shirt,
with a pistol in one hand and a lamp in the other.
'" Its all right," said Beagle, " 'twas I that made the noise.
I've been besieged by a cohort of cats. • They have been at
it here making most healthful music under my bed for the
last two hours, and in trying to make them hold their peace
with the bolster, I upset that noisy affair, that's all."
•" Cats !" cried Mr. Plumplee, cats !"—you eat a little
too much cucumber, my friend !—that and the crabs were
too heavy for your stomach !—you have been dreaming !
you'e had tik night mare ! We haven't a cat in the house ;
I can't bear them."

You are mistaken," rejoined Beagle, " they're about
here in swarms. If I've turned one cat out this night, I'm
sure that I've turned out twenty ! I've, in fact, done tho-'
thing else since I came up. In and out, in and out ! Upon,
my life, I think I can't have opened that blessed door less
than an hundred and fifty times ; and that young fellow there
has been all the while fast as a church !"

" I tell you, my friend, you've been dreaming ! We have
never had a cat about the premises."

" Meyow,—rneyow ?" cried Valentine quietly.
" Now, have I been dreaming.?" triumphantly exclaimed
Mr. Beagle, " now have I had the night mare ?
"God bless my life !" cried Mr. Plumplee, jumping upon
Mr. Beagle's bed, " they don't belong to me."
" I don't know whom they belong to," returned Mr. Bea-
gle, " nor do I much care : I only know that there they are."
If you'll just hook those breeches up here, I'll get out and
half murder them ! Only hook 'em this way !—l'll wring
their precious necks off !"
They're out of my react," cried Mr. Plurnblee, " Hish !
hish !" Finding, however, that harsh terms had no good
effect, he had recourse to the milder and more persuasive
cry of " Pussey, pussey, pussey, pussey ! tit, tit, tit !"
Hish ! you devils !" cried Mr. Jonas Beagle, who began
to be really enraged.
" Titty, titty, titty, titty !—puss, puss, puss !" repeated
Mr. Plumplee in the blandest and most seductive tones, as
he held the pistol by the muzzle to break the back or to knock
out the brains of the first unfortunate cat that made her ap-
pearance : but all this persuasion to come forth had no effect ;
they continued to be invisible, while the mewing proceeded
in the most melancholy strain.

" What on earth are we to do 1" inquired Plumplec, " I
myself have a horror of Cats."
"The same to me, and many of 'em !" observed Mr. Bea-
gle. " Let's wake that young fellow, perhaps he don't mind
them."
" Hollo 1" cried Plumplee.

" Hul-lo!" shouted Beagle ; but as neither could make
any impression upon Valentine, and as both were afraid to
get off the bed to shake him, they proceeded to roll up the
blankets and sheets into balls and to pelt him with infinite
zeal.

" Who's there ? What's the matter ?" cried Valentine at
length, in the coolest tone imaginable, although his exertions
made him sweat like a tinker.

" For Heaven's sake, my dear young friend," said Mr.
Plumplee, " do assist us in turning these cats out."
" Cats ! Where are they? Hish !" cried Valentine.
" Oh, that's no use whatever. I've tried the hishing bu-
siness myself. All the hishing in the world won't do. They
must be beaten out ; you're not afraid of them, are you !"
" Afraid of them ! afraid of a few cats ?" exclaimed Valen-
tine with the assumption of some considerable magnanimity.
" Where are they?'
" Under my bed," replied Beagle. " There's a brave fel-
low ! Break their blessed necks !" and Valentine leaped out
of bed and after striking at the :imaginary animals very fu-
riously with the bolster, he hissed with great violence and
scratched across the grain of the boards in humble imitation
of those domestic creatures scampering out of a room, when
he rushed to the door, and proceeded to make a very forlorn
meyowiiag die gradually away at the bottom of the stairs.—
Valentine Vox, the Ventriloquist.

A RECONCILIATION; AND MORE OF BOZ ON

" BABBIES."

At sight of their perjured relative, Mrs. Kenwigs turned
faint and pale, and Mr. Kenwigs rose majestically.
"Kenwigs," said the collector, " shake hands."
" Sir," said Mr. Kenwigs, " the time has been when I was
proud to shake hands with such a man as that man as now
surweys me. The time has been, Sir, said Mr. Kenwigs,
" when a wisit from that man has excited in me and my fa-
mily's boozums sensations both nateral-and awakening. But
now 1 look upon that man with emotions totally surpassing
every thing, and I ask myself where is his honour, where is
his straight-for'ardness, and where is his human natur ?"
" Susan Kenwigs," said Mr. Lillyvick, turning humbly to
his niece, " don't you say anything to me ?"
" She is not equal,to it, Sir," said Mr. Kenwigs striking
the table emphatically. " What with the nursing of a healthy
babby, and the reflexions upon your cruel conduct, four pints
of malt liquor a day is hardly able to sustain her."
" I am glad," said the poor collector meekly,
baby is a healthy one. lam very glad of that."
This was touching the Kenwigses on their tenderest point.
Mrs. Kenwigs instantly burst into tears, and Mr. Kenwigs
evinced great emotion.
" My pleasantest feeling all the time that child was ex-
pected," said Mr. Kenwigs, mournfully, " was a thinking,
if its a boy, as I hope it may be, for I have heard its uncle
Lillyvick say again and again he would prefer our having a
boy next—if it's a boy, what will his uncle Lillyvick say—
what will he like him to be called—will he be Peter, or Alex-
ander, or Pompey, or Diorgeenes, or what will he be ? and
now when I look at him—a precious, unconscious, helpless
infant, with no use in his little arms but to tear his little cap,
and no use in his little legs but to kick his little self—when
I see him a lying on his mother's lap cooing and cooing, and
in his innocent state almost a choking himself with his little
fist—when I see him such an infant as he is, and think that
that uncle Lillyvick, as was once a going to be so fond of
him has withdrawed himself away, such a feeling of wen-
geance comes over me as no language can depicter, and I feel
as if even that holy babe was a telling me to hate him."
This affecting picture moved Mrs. Kenwigs deeply. After
several imperfect words which vainly attempted to struggle
to the surface, but were drowned and washed away by the
strong tide of her tears, she spake.
" Uncle," said Mrs. Kenwigs, " to think that you should
have turned your back upon me and my dear children, and
upon Kenwigs which is the author of their being—you who
was once so kind and affectionate, and who, if any body had
told us such a thing of, we should have withered with scorn
like lightening—yo;;, that little Lillyvick our first and earliest
boy was named after at the very alter—oh gracious !"
` Was it money that we cared for ?" said Mr. Kenwigs.
" Was it property that we ever thought of ?"
" No," cried Mrs. Kenwigs, " I scorn it."
" So do I," said Mr. Kenwigs, " and always did."
" My feelings have been lancerated," said Mrs. Kenwigs,
"my heart has been torn asunder with anguish, I have been
thrown back in my confinement, my unoffending infant has
been rendered uncomfortable and fractions, Morleena has
pined herself away to nothing ; all this I forget and forgive,
and with you, uncle, I never can quarrel. But never ask me
to receive her—never do it, uncle. For I will not, I won't;
I won't, I won't—"
" Susan, my dear," said Mr. Kenwigs,
child."

" that the

" consider your

" Yes," shrieked Mrs. Kenwigs, f` I will consider my
child !" I will consider my child! my own child, that no
uncle can :deprive me of. my own hated, despised, cut-off
little child !" And here the emotions of Mrs. Kenwigs be-
came so violent that Mr. Kenwigs was fain to administer
hartshorn internally and vinegar externally, and to destroy
a staylace, four petticoat strings, and several small buttons.
Newman had been a silent spectator of this scene, for Mr.
Lillyvick had signed to him not to withdraw, and Mr. Ken-
wigs had further solicited his presence by a nod of invitation.
When Mrs. Kenwigs had been in some degree restored, and
Newman, as a person possessed of some influence with her,
had remonstrated and begged her to compose herself, Mr.
Lillyvick said in a faultering voice :

"-I never shall ask any body to receive my- I need'nt
mention the word, you know what I mean. Kenwigs and
Susan, yesterday was a week she eloped with a half-pay
captain." _

Mr. and Mrs. Kenwigs started together.
" Eloped with a half-pay captain," repeated Mr. Lillyvick,
" basely and falsely eloped with a half-pay captain—with a
bottle-nosed captain that any man might have considered
himself safe from. It was in this room, said Mr. Lillyvick,
looking sternly round, " that I first see Henrietta Petowker.
It is in this room that I turn her off for ever."
This declaration completely changed the whole posture of
affairs. Mrs. Kenwigs threw herself upon the old gentle-
man's neck, bitterly reproaching herself for her late harsh-
ness, and exclaiming if she had suffered, what must his suf-
ferings have been ! Mr. Kenwigs grasped his hand and vowed
eternal friendship and remorse.---Nicholas Nickleby, No. 17.

SINGULAR DELUSION.—It is a singular fact, that there
are now confined, in the public and private establishments
for the treatment of insanity, in London and the neighbour-
hood, no less than sixty men and women, who consider them-
selves the legitimate but unacknowledged sovereigns of the
country ! One female patient insists upon asserting that she
is the real Victoria, and that she was confined in a mad-
house, in order to prevent her from ascending the throne of
her forefathers. This patient most pertinaciously affirms
that she was sent to the asylum by Lord Melbourne, in or-
der to make way for a lady with whom he is in love, and who
now occupies the throne. It is most laughable to witness
the pomposity with which this poor mad creature struts
about the ward, exclaiming, " fall back, clear the way for
your illustrious Queen Victoria."—Phyeie and Physicians.
CLOSING SCENES OF MRS. HEMAN'S LIFE.—She would
converse with much of her own kindly cheerfulness, sending
affectionate messages to her various friends, and'recalling old
remembrances with vivid and endearing minntenesl: Here
thoughts reverted frequently to the days of childhood-•-to the
old house by the sea-shore--the mountain' rambles—the
haunts and the books which had formed the delight of her
girlish years. One evening, whilst her sister was sitting by
her bedside, a yellow gleam from the setting sun, which
streamed through the half-closed shutters, produced a pecu-
liar effect upon the wall, exactly similar to what used to he
observed at sun-set in their old -school-rooni at Gwrych.
They both remarked the circumstance; and what a gush of
recollections was thus called forth !' The association warlike
that so often produced by a peculiar scent, or a remembered
strain of music. Yet, in all, save that streak of light, how
different were the two scenes ! The one, a chamber of sick-
ness in a busy city—its windows (for a back room had been
chosen for the sake of quietness) looking down into a dull court;
the other, a cheerful apartment in an old country house,
everything about it speaks the presence of happy childhood,
and the wide, pleasant window, opening out upon fresh green
fields ; beyond them the silver sea ; and, far in the west, the
sun sinking behind the dark, bold promontary of the Orme's
Head. And in the inmates of those two rooms, the contrast
was no less striking. Of the two joyous children, one, " the
favourite and the flower," now a worn and faded form, lay
on her dying bed ; the other, on the eve of parting worse
than death, destined to feel the sad force of the affecting old
epitaph :
" Why do I live in life a thralle,
Of joy and alle berefte ?
Their wings were growne, to heaven they're flowne—
'Cause I had none, I'm lefte."
Memoirs of Mrs. Hemans, by her Sister.
AMERICAN LIBERALITY.—Here I cannot help making a
few remarks upon a subject on which I think the general
opinion in Britain is erroneous. We are taught to believe
that the Yankee is invariably a suspicious and avaricious
man in his money transactions, and incapable of those feel-
ings and acts of liberality for which the British character is
distinguished. I shall mention two instances that occurred
to me in the space of four days, which showed a very diffe-
rent character from that of which the New Englanders are
accused. The change in the route which the prevalence of
the cholera at Montreal induced me to adopt, had prevented
me from drawing any of the money which I intended to get
in that city, and my finances were, therefore, so much re-
duced as to leave me only just sufficient to take me as far as
Boston. Upon my mentioning the circumstance to Mr.
T ,my landlord at Burlington, as my reason for not
making some trifling purchases in that town, he at once ad-
vanced me fifty dollars, by indorsing my draft on New -York,
and presenting the bill to the Burlington Bank. The second
instance which I shall quote was in the purchase of the Indian
pony. Mr. C ,of Montpelier, understanding that it
would be inconvenient for me to pay his price out of my tra-
velling pocket money, offered at once to accept my draft on
New -York for the sum, in which manner the purchase was
made. Neither of these gentlemen had ever seen or heard
of me before, and neither of them asked even for a letter of
introduction or other papers to satisfy them as to any par-
ticulars
respecting me ; and with all due and modest allow-
ance
for my gentlemanly appearance, I very much doubt ,
whether I should have met with the some liberal treatment,
under similar circumstances, at a country town in Yorkshire
or Lancashire.—.lllurray's North America.

TIDE TABLE.
Days. Mm. Etin. Height.
H. at. n. M. F. 1.
Friday 16 258 316 13 2 Moon in Apogee 2h. morn.
Saturday 17 337 359 11 10 First Qr. 824 morn.
Sunday 18 524 455 10 5 12th Sunday atter Trinity,
Monday 19 534 616 9 8 Mercury stationary.
Tuesday 20 7 4 744 9 6 Mars sets 853 even.
Wednes. 21 825 856 10 4 Jupiter rises 10 34 morn.
Thursday 22 925 950 11 10 Jupiter sets 882 even.