Litchfield enquirer., 1872-05-30

good -hnmored i.npadenee converted tue impending storm into a mild drigzle of feproof. ending in his complete restora- ton to favor $.
 This yontE had brought with him from England a letter from his mother, a widow lady, n old friend of my grandfa, hsf, who had some thirty wears before held with her juvenile fl:ftation It recommend ed to his protection her son Frank, about to join the regiment as an ensign, pathet- ically enlarging on the various excellen- cies. domestic and religious, which shone forth eonspicuously in the youths char acter, and Of the comfort Of contsmplat- ing and experimenting which she was about to be deprived In fact, 1t had led my grandfather to expect youth of e4- treme dOciiity and modesty, requiring 8 protector rather to embolden than to re- strain him. After in vain attempting to espy Ill his young acquaintance any of the characteristics ascribed to him in his mother 8 letter. the Ma ior, naturally good
 natured, and accessible to his youthful comrades, very soon suffered himself to be influenced by the good -hamor, vigor- ous vitality, and careless cleverness of the Ensign, to an extent that caused him sometimes to wonder secretly at his own transformation. His retired habits were broken ill upon, one after the other, till he had scarcely secluded hour in his sixteen waking ones to enjoy alone his book and his pipe. His peaceful quarters, silent, in general, as monks cell, would now be invaded at all sorts of hours by the joviab Garry, followed by the admir- ing satellites who usually revolyed around him; and the Major, with a sound be- tween groan and chuckle, would close his well-beloved volume to listen to the facetious details of and sometimes to par tlclpate in the uncongenial freaks of the humorous subaltern. Once he had actu- ally consented, at about the hour he usu- ally went to bed, to accompany the youth to Carnival ball-one of 2 series of entertainments at which the Catholic youth of the city ars.A~ won't toa sintlamRifB themselves for the mortifcations of Lent, and where masks, dominoes, and fancy dresses lend their aid to defeat the vig;- lance of the lynx-eyed dueanas and man. mas who look anxiously on, perfectly aware, ill general, that their own watch fulness is more to be relied on for nipping in the bud an indiscreet amour, than any innate iciness of temperament or austere propriety i'll the objects of their care. Not only did the Major mingle ill the scene, but he actually, about midnight, found himself figuring in 8 cotillion with well-developed senorita of thirteen years, whose glances and department showed pfecocious proficiency ill the art of -fiirt- ation. At this ball Garry had become enamored beyond all former passions (and they were numerous and inconstant, in general, as if he had been Grand Turk of one of his partners, young Spanish lady. Her graceful figure and motions in the dance had at first captivated him and when, after dancing with her himself, his eloquent entreaties, delivered in in- different Spanish, had prevailed on her to lit her mask for one coy moment, the vision of eyes and eyebrows, the common beauties of Spanish countenance, and the clear rosy complexion, a much more rare perfection, then revealed, had accom- plished the utter subiugatien of his er- rant fancy. She had vanished from the ball silently and irremediably, as & houri of sParadise from the awakening eyes of an opium-eating Pacha; and all his attempts to trace her, continued unceasingly for a couple of months afterwards, had proved in vain .s...-t-..s ....,.
 One morning my grandfather was seat ed at breakfast in the verandah of his quarters, situated up the rock above the town. Below him lay the roofs, terraced and balconied, and populous with cats, for whose convenience the little flat stone squares at the top of most of the houses appeared to have been devised Tall tow CTS called mirandas shot up at intervals, from whose summits the half-baked in- habitants, pent within close walls and streets might catch refreshing glimpses of the blue sea and the hills of Spain-con- veniences destined soon afterwards to be ruined by the enemy's fire, or pulled down to avoid attracting 1t, and never rebuilt Beyond the white sunny ridge of the line wall came the sharp edge of the bay, ris- ing in high. perspective to the purple coast of Spain opposite, which was sprink- led with buildings white as the sails that dotted the water. My grandfather was in a state of great'sensual enjoyment, sniff ing up the odor of the large geranium bushes that grew in clumps in the little garden in front, and the roses that twined thickly round the trellis of the vine-roof- ed yerandah; sipplng thick creamy Span ish chocolate between the mouthfuls of red mullet, broiled in white paper, the flavor of which he was diligently compar- ing with that of some specimens of the same fish which he remembered to have eaten in his youth in Devonshire; and glancing sideways over the cup at an open volume of Shakespeare, leaned slopingly on the edge of a plate of black figs burst ing with ripeness, like trunk hosa slashed with crimson. The Major was none of your skimming readers, who. glance through work of art as if it were anews- paper-measure, weigh it, and deliver a critical opinion on 1t, before the most rev. erentlal student has extricated himself from the tolls of the first act or opening chapter; not he; he read every word, and affixed meaning, right or wrong, to all the hard, obsolete ones. The dramatic fitness of the characters was not to be questioned by him, any more than that of the authentic personages of history. He would reason on their acts and proceed ings as on those of his own intimate &C.,
 quaintances. He never could account for Hamlet's madness otherwise than by SUD- posing the Prince must have, sometime or other, got an ugly rap on the head-let fall, perhaps, when . baby, by gin- drinking nurse producing, as in some persons he had himself from time to time been acquainted with, q temporary aber- ration of the wits; piece of original crit icism that has not occurred to any of the other commentators on this much-dis- cussed point. Of Iago he has recorded an opinion in an old note book still extant. where his observations appear in indiffer- ent orthography. and ink yellow with age, that he was cursed sooundrel-an opin- ion delivered with all the emphasis of an original detector of crime, anxions that full though tardy justice should be done to the delinquent's memory. But his great fayorite was Falstaff: "A wonderful clever fellow, sir, he would say, ssand no more coyard than you or I, sir. My grandfather proceeded slowly with one hand and turning leaf with the oth- er-and operation which he was delaying till a great mosquito-hawk Ca beautiful brown moth mottled like pheasant) that had settled on the page, should think proper to take flight. He had lately
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