MINCED MAID.

These require care in the handling and in the dressing, as they are very delicate. Chop fine with parsley and sweet herbs, and serve up hot.

OLD MAID.

Old maids are not recommended, as they are apt to be tough, but they will sometimes do when the others are not to be had; but they must not be too old, and they require a rich sauce to make them palatable; mint sauce is the best.

WIDOW BARBACUED.

These, when young, are sometimes much sought after, but they are not always worth the troubling of dressing. The best way is to expose them to a brisk fire, and eat them while they are hot; for if they are allowed to cool they are apt to grow mawkish. Don't spare spice.

BOILED MISSIONARY.

This is a favourite dish, and may be eaten at all times of the year, as they generally contrive to keep themselves in good condition. Boil them slowly over a moderate fire, and, if very fat, skim frequently. Serve up with mashed yams carefully peppered.-Cold boiled missionary makes a good side dish, and is always welcome.

PICKLED HEAD.

This may be called a national dish; but native heads are more used for ornament than for eating. Mind you make the pickle strong, or the head will not keep.

YANKEE BAKED.

The Americans eat best baked, but they must be well cleansed of tobacco juice before dressing, or they are apt to disagree. Take care when you roast them to avoid a spit.

FRENCHMAN FRICASSEED.

It is usual to fricassee a Frenchman, which is the best way, as by dividing him you can select the best pieces for dressing, taking care to throw aside the portions that are snuffy. At the best, however, they make but poor eating any way, and are scarcely worth the cooking, on account of their being for the most part so bony.

DUTCHMEN.

Some few Dutchmen have been caught, but they are generally too rank for eating, except by the common people. A young Dutchman, however, dried and salted, and properly smoked with the wood of the fern-root, is almost as good a relish as a red-herring.

ENGLISHMAN ROASTED.

The English should be always roasted, and, from their coming to us generally well fed on cleanly viands, they are delicious eating; their nature, however, is such that they will not bear to be basted; so that the best way is to put them before the fire and let them alone, only turning them occasionally, so that all sides may be done alike. An English young lady, when well dressed, is the handsomest dish that can be set

before a chief; they require neither sauce nor spice to help their flavour, but are best "au naturel."

DEVILLED LAWYER.

Very few of these have been tried; they are common in Europe, but here they are rare; and it is more on account of their scarcity than their fitness for eating that attempts have been made to render them palatable; but what they are most fit for is to be made a devil of, to which they readily lend themselves. The only way to treat them is to soak them well in boiling water, then dry them in a hot oven, and broil them over a sharp fire; they must then be well-peppered and made a devil of; but in this state it is impossible to digest them, as, indeed, it is in every other way that has been tried, for all those who have happened to taste them have, invariably, been disordered in their stomach and bowels; which in numerous cases has been followed by great exhaustion, poverty of blood, painful cramps, convulsions, locked-jaw, syncope, and death. All prudent persons, therefore, will do well to avoid them.

SHARKS.

Proceed as for lawyers; it is a coarse and unwholesome dish, but not productive of the evil consequences of the other; the English people use the same term indiscriminately for both species, but they may easily be distinguished from the teeth of the shark being visible before he gives his bite, but the teeth of the lawyer are concealed; the English people say, however, that the bite of the one is not less fatal than the bite of the other, and that, when once they get you between their jaws, they never let you go in either case before they have stripped you of all your substance, clean to the bones.

ENGLISH AUTHOR STEWED.

That species of the English people known by the name of "Authors" are represented as always being in a stew in their own country, which is the reason, most likely, of their always being recommended to be treated that way here. The good ones are exceedingly rare; and for the most part they are miserable objects, with a remarkable propensity to be seedy, and are seldom worth the picking. From their scarcely ever getting a good meal of victuals, and being generally deprived of air and sleep, they are usually in a state so emaciated that they have not an ounce of flesh on their bones. In their own country they are thought nothing of, and are never eaten, and they usually die soon of their own accord, when, in some cases, they are buried in the Great National Cemetery, where they are allowed to lie very comfortably and without being disturbed-to compensate them, as is conjectured, for the discomforts and privations which they have endured during their lifetime;-although our cunning men are at a loss to understand the benefit, to them, of being so cared for. For my own part, I think it would be wiser to give them good wholesome victuals while living, so as to enable them to work better and to write better books, instead of putting big stones with black marks over their graves when they are dead. But, after all, the English are a great people; they make the best knives and the best hatchets; and their women are the whitest and the tenderest, and their men are the fattest; and of all nations best bear being roasted.

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A PAIR OF TOP-BOOTS.

XIV.

THE commanding officer of the corps to which Captain Devereux belonged was Lieutenant-Colonel Bobtail, an officer who has since appeared before the public, not for distinguished and gallant service in India or elsewhere, but as the inventor and designer of those lovely ramoneur helmets, as well as the ludicrous coatees-a cross between a garçon's jacket and a circus man's coat-which now grace the figures of "the heavys," and as the form of the gallant officer himself very much resembled that attributed to god Bacchus in heathen mythology, or to that questionable gentleman the flying Dutchman, we naturally suppose our readers will arrive at a like conclusion with ourselves, and say that in his selection of uniform, as far as he was individually concerned, he did not exhibit that taste for appearance for which the Whitehall directors had given him credit when they constituted him the military dictator of dress.

The gallant colonel's father was a Brixton attorney, who had raised himself and his fortune to some extent by quill-driving and litigation, and the father thought he was perpetuating his family name and renown by placing his son in a crack cavalry corps, and that, if he gave him a good allowance wherewith to entertain an aristocratic acquaintance, the said acquaintance would forget his low birth in his good dinners; but, though circumstances and elegant society had to a certain degree tutored the gallant colonel in the ways and conduct of gentlemen, an observer, did he give himself the trouble, might have easily perceived the low meanness and pettifogging asperity of the Brixton attorney tussling through the polished exterior and this caused the colonel to be anything but respected by his officers. Asperius nihil est humili cum surgit in altum. The major was a rough diamond, one of those men whom the late Theodore Hook used to liken to a pine-apple, "rough without but rich within ;" and if he was allowed to pursue the even tenor of his way, drink his bottle of port every day, and now and then perpetrate a shocking pun, he cared not for man, woman, or child; and when in command was voted by officers and men "a trump," something like that creature in civilian life they call " good fellow;" meaning a quiet, inoffensive, good-tempered, lethargic man, with not two ideas of his own in his head.

a

The next officer was Captain O'Driscoll, an old and brave campaigner, who had exchanged from the Scotch Greys, having led the right squadron of that distinguished corps at the gallant, decisive, and evermemorable charge at the battle of Waterloo. It was to O'Driscoll then that Devereux applied to act as his friend in case Mr. Macgillicuddy should demand satisfaction.

“Bad luck to him !" replied O'Driscoll, when he heard the state of affairs. "A dirty mean ruffian. Didn't I know Mrs. Macgillicuddy, with all her fine airs, selling ropes and rags at one of those shops!—faith, and what do you call them-them wid the black dolls afore them, ay! down at Kingstown there, or rather her father, a commissioner, or commissariat, or whatnot. And as for old Macgillicuddy, och! and sure don't I recollect him a

quarter-session hack, ready to take up wid any dirty brief, or serve any blackguard latitat? Why, it makes mi blood boil to think his son should dare to speak to a friend and brother officer of mi own.

The old thief!

he wouldn't even join their mess-the father I mean-on the circuit, and swore he couldn't afford it. Bad cess, says I to the Irishman that can't afford any thing in the world. Talk of your army messes for fun. Away to the devil wid them when compared to the rollicking legal ones of fifty years ago; faith, there was fun then, and fighting, and singing, and drinking. Hoorush! wasn't there mi boys? However, Harry, you have a friend in me whenever you want one, and I'll just step over and tell that devil's pup, Mr. Conner, jist to oil the locks of my respected friends and mould a few pills; it is best to be prepared, the dirty mean ruffian, to want to fight a gentleman. Bad cess to him!"

XV.

"Mr. Ignatius Macgillicuddy," announced a servant, entering Devereux's room.

"Your servant, sir," said Mr. Macgillicuddy. "I am come, sir, relative to a serious and painful subject, sir. You, sir, have taken advantage of the innocence, sir, of my sister, and have, sir, trepanned her heart, sir; she is always talking about you, sir; she is an affectionate sister, sir; a dutiful daughter, sir; and now, sir, I wish to know your intentions ?" "To-morrow, if possible, to hunt with the Kildare hounds," replied Devereux, bowing low.

"Sir! you are not going to play off your jests on me-no sir. I shall have satisfaction, sir; I will, sir. We will fight, sir, and if you dare shield yourself under the mutiny act, sir, I shall post you, sir, I shall horsewhip you, sir, I—”

"Stop-I am not going to shield myself under the mutiny act," interrupted Devereux, in mild accents, "but I don't think you will horsewhip me, at least, not this year."

Macgillicuddy eyed him. Devereux stood six feet, was strong and muscular in proportion; besides, the fact of his being the pet pupil of Spring and Burns and his fistic qualities, had already reached the city of Dublin; so the enraged brother thought, this time, discretion would be the best part of valour.

"But I will have satisfaction, sir," said Macgillicuddy.

"Certainly."

"In the Phanix, sir."

"In the Phoenix."

"At four in the morning, sir; (aside) I shall have a writ out against me at six. Curse it, why don't he settle the matter by paying my bill and marrying my sister."

"At four."

"Mr. O'Terence is my second, sir.

"Captain O'Driscoll mine, sir.

"Good morning, sir-four, sir-in the Phanix," said Macgillicuddy as he retired.

"Good morning, sir-four-in the Phoenix."

“The Irish are a curious race, and certainly it is not one of their least

striking peculiarities to horsewhip a man into matrimony," soliloquised Devereux, and then walked leisurely over to O'Driscoll's quarters.

The night before the duel must be one of painful anxiety to the right-minded man. It is that period when he beholds the earth and all he holds dear fading from his view; perhaps, ere another sun has set he will have left all the cares, and joys, and bright scenes of this world for ever. Then the past memories of childhood-innocence-home -mother-his faults-his transgressions-all come crowding, as the spring-tide, upon his "bitter fancy."

Devereux penned a farewell letter to his mother, breathing in every line of filial affection.

It was four o'clock on a dismal December morning that Devereux was aroused from his slumbers, and shown up to the dreary, cold, almost dark room of Captain O'Driscoll. Two cups of coffee, a brace of pistols, and a bottle of Cognac, stood on the clothless table. The snow kept beating in at the window, and the sentry's muffled tramp only added to the monotony of the scene.

"The top of the morning to you, Harry, mi boy," said O'Driscoll. "A cup of coffee and a liqueur-glass of burnt brandy to quiet the nerves. Faix, and I forgot to tell ye not to smoke a cigar last night. Hold out your arm. Ay, that will do-pretty firm. Now, mi boy, listen, Harry-whisper -I'm about to give you some good advice-the same advice Major MacDonald gave me when I fought little Davidson of the Buffs. Maybe, Harry, you have heard of putting your feet at right angles, and bearing your right foot on your antagonist's heart; maybe you have heard of bringing up your pistol from your knee and resting your elbow on your hip.

All

schoolboy nonsense-all balderdash. No, Harry, raise your arm steady, fire low, and keep your body firm-and may the devil guide your ball to the fifth rib-the lungs ain't far off then. Faith, I dare say you think me a cannibal or a heathen to talk so of life and death, but jist let a boy maintain the bloody argument,

And down the throats of their fellow men
Thrust the draught never drunk again,

and then, mi boy, a fig for your sorrow, or fear, or pity. Ah, Harry! I fleshed my maiden sword at Badajoz. I was in the feet' then-ah, 1812-ay, and any one who has seen the horrors of that siege by an infuriated, half-starved, half-drunken soldiery, will think but little after of blood, and life and death. I saw scenes I will not pollute my tongue with telling you. I saw-however, Harry, never mind-may Heaven forfend you, mi boy, from ever seeing a town given up to pillage! Oh, horror! the scenes!-why-but hark! there's the hack jingle. Come, Harry, on with yer coat, mi boy-it is cold."

The snow fell in lazy idle flakes, as if hardly awake yet, and froze wherever it stopped. The wind howled and whistled round the gable ends; the sentries growled out their "All's well," which was taken up till lost in the distance; and the carman whistled and swore, and thought the five minutes Devereux and his friend delayed a good half-hour. On the road to the Park by the bridge-side might have been seen a party of beggars sleeping together, gathering warmth from their own bodies; while a crowd of rustics-secret as the meeting was supposed to be -were bending their steps to the scene of action, to see one or the other "die game."