Beatrice.

Brummer and Twamley , and that merry girl Agnes Miller , and that good-looking young woman Kate Merewether , and Molesey , ancl myself , and young Merewether , had made up a right pleasant group , ivhich then was really able to laugh , though some of us , God knows , have become anxious and out of spirits since those genial days of old . Happy privilege of mortals , to be able to laugh ! aud if I do not say , like Prae ' d , " laugh and grow fat , " I yet envy all who still can really laugh , and laugh heartily , and laugh in

good earnest . I trust that I have not said too much in this chapter . I am somewhat like the elderly maiden lady who would look to the third volume always , to see how the story ended , before she read the first or the second . If the end was as she thought it should be , she read the book through ; but if it all went across , if true love did not run smooth , if virtue was not rewarded , she cried ancl would read no more . ¦ That good old maiden lady is not , however , the only person , as I well know , who has looked to the end

of a story to see how it would all " turn out . " Do any of my readers remember a charming story of that admirable writer Miss Yonge , " The Chaplet of Pearls , or the White and Black Ribeaumont . " I do confess me , in my interest , to have basely looked on to the end to ascertain the fate of hero and heroine , and then calmly finished one of the best stories ivhich our age has witnessed . I cannot help it , then , if my readers think that already they can discern the

" golden thread " of this little tale . I can only ask them to be patient ancl read to tho end ; though perhaps , alas , they may be tempted to say that the "Finis" does not " coronat opus . " I am sorry to add that both Brummer and Twamley made many jokes that afternoon about those little attentions ivhich croquet produces , and which , as some one has put itare " accessories before and after the fact to agreeable flirtation . "

, Brtunmer declared , for instance , that he thought the placing the feet on the croquet balls was only for the purpose of " displaying neat ankles ancl open lacework , " while Twamley asserted that croquet matches led to more hymeneal arrangements than any other institution he was aware of , and that he knew as a fact that " croquet" was invented by a young lady who " croquetted " her young man at the first throw off .

Perhaps these light words may seem somewhat insipid to our high-spiced tastes to-day , when our young men talk the language of the racing stable , and even our younoladies have a patois of their own ; when crimes and " heathen Chinee" seem to be the order of the clay ; when our young men think it a bore to laugh ; and when conversation has become vapid to a degree almost incredible ! We could laugh at most things in those days , frivolous ancl slight as they were , silly people that we were too . often wish that to

I -day our young people laughed at our innocent jests , and were not an fait of much of which they ought to know nothing . How much ' better it would be for us all if our yoimg ladies , clear girls , as they are , never forgot that they were ladies ; if our boys ( yes , my clear boys , I say it , ad Imminent , remember ) never forgot that they were gentlemen ! Let them leave stable chaff for stable boys , and thieves' lino-o for thievesand try ancl speak once more the pure old Anglo-Saxon " undefiled "

, . The Puritan may denounce laughter as a sin of the flesh , the tongue , or the mind . I care not a jot . I prefer to be a laughing not a crying philosopher , and I am quite sure of this , and Dr . Baily , who is a great authority , says so too , that laughter is good for man and beast .

A dear old friend used to like to declare that it not only exercised the muscles , but warmed up the cockles of the heart . Some of the greatest hypocrites I ever knew were men of sour countenances and snarling utterances , who never laughed at anything , and who really could not apparently understand , ancl certainly did not relish a joke . ( To be continued . )