I used to think that a strange odoriferous vapour was spreading through the house, and my courage was stimulated by the strong desire that I felt to form an acquaintance with him, in some way or other. Often did I slip out to the corridor after my mother had retired, but I got nothing for all my watching, as he was always in the room before I could reach the spot where I might have seen him. Yielding, at last, to an irresistible impulse, I determined to conceal myself in my father's room and wait for the Sandman.

One evening I saw from my father's silence and my mother's dejection, that the Sandman was expected. Pretending, therefore, to be very fatigued, I left the room before nine o'clock, and hid myself in a corner close beside the door.

The outer door creaked, and I heard the sound of slow, heavy footsteps advancing towards the stair-case. My mother hurried past with the other children, and softly I opened the door of my father's room. He was sitting silent and motionless as usual, and with his back towards the door, so he did not observe me, and in a moment I got behind the curtain of an open press, in which his clothes hung. Nearer and nearer came the footsteps-then there was a singular coughing and scraping and growling on the outside. My heart quaked with fear and suspense. Close before the door a quick step-it springs rattling open. Collecting my courage with a great effort, I peep cautiously out of my retreat. The Sandman is standing before my father in the middle of the room, and the light is streaming full on his face. The Sandman, the dreadful Sandman is the old advocate Coppelius who frequently dines with us.

But no monster could have inspired me with greater horror than this Coppelius. Picture to yourself a gigantic, broad-shouldered man-with a thick, shapeless head-a skin like ochre-grey, bushy eyebrows-green, prominent, glittering eyes-a large nose drawn far over his upper lip; his mouth was naturally wry and often worked into a malicious grin, and, on these occasions, a dark red spot rose on each cheek, and a strange hissing sound came through his clenched teeth.

He always appeared in an old fashioned ash-grey coat, a vest and small clothes of the same colour, black stockings, and shoes with little stone buckles. His wig scarcely covered his crown; the pasted curls bristled high above his huge, red ears; and a broad, close hairbag shot out from his neck, disclosing the silver-buckles that fastened his cravat. In short, his figure in general was uncouth and repulsive; but I, as well as the other children, felt particular aversion for his great, hairy, knotty fists-so much indeed that we could not endure any thing they had touched. He had noticed this, and when our worthy mother had secretly deposited a choice piece of cake or fruit on our plates, he would delight to touch it, under some pretext or other, and then we could not taste it; and our eyes would fill with tears. He used to do the same thing on a holiday, when our father had treated us with a little glass of sweet wine. In a moment he would clap his hand upon it, or even lift it to his blue lips, and laugh most diabolically, as we durst only vent our chagrin in low sobs. He used to honour us with no other name than "the little beasts," and every kind of noise was forbidden in his presence; so it may be supposed, that we often execrated the "rough ill-favoured thing" that

could so deliberately mar our simple pleasures. My mother seemed to hate him no less, for, unprejudiced and cheerful as her nature was, he had no sooner entered the house, than she became sullen and melancholy. My father treated him like a superior being, whose disagreeable peculiarities ought to be borne with, and who ought by every means to be kept in good humour.

Now, when I saw this Coppelius, I felt an appalling conviction that no one but himself could be the Sandman. To me, however, the Sandman was no longer that nursery bug-bear with his owls' nest. No! a hideous demon with grief, suffering,-temporal and eternal destruction in his train.

I was spell-bound at the risk of being discovered, and, as I had no doubt of also being severely punished, I remained standing, and peering out from the curtain. My father received Coppelius with solemnity. "Up! to work!" exclaimed the latter in a hoarse, grating tone, and threw off his coat. My father gravely and silently took off his night gown, and both put on long black frocks. I noticed where they got these. My father opened the leaves of what I had supposed to be a cupboard, but I now saw that it was a dark recess containing a little fire-place. Coppelius went up to it, and a blue flame began to crackle on the hearth. A variety of singular implements were scattered around.

When my father was bending over the fire, I almost doubted his identity. His mild, open countenance seemed to have been distorted by some convulsive pain into the most fierce and demoniacal expres sion. He resembled Coppelius. The latter brandished a pair of redhot tongs, and brought out, from the thick smoke, glittering masses, which he hammered with great assiduity. I felt as if I were surrounded by a chaos of human faces without eyes-deep, unsightly black holes instead of them. 66 Eyes here! Eyes here!" exclaimed Coppelius in a hollow, menacing tone-I shrieked out under a wild impulse which I could not resist, and rushed out of my hiding-place. Coppelius seized me. "Little beast! Little beast!" he muttered with a grin, and lifting me up, he threw me on the hearth, and the flames began to singe my hair,-" now we have eyes-eyes-a fine pair of children's eyes." He then took some red-hot particles from the fire, intending apparently to put them into my eyes. But my father lifted up his hands with an imploring look, and exclaimed, "Master! Master! Forbear! Oh, forbear!" "Well then!" said Coppelius with a shrill laugh, "the lad may keep his eyes and weep out his quantum in the world; but we must at all events examine the mechanism of his hands and feet." With this he grasped me so firmly that all my joints cracked, and screwed my hands and feet in every direction. "Every thing is right after all! Is it not?" All about me grew dark and darker; a sudden cramp shot through my whole body. I felt no more.-A soft warm breath glided over my face, and I awoke, as it were from a state of total insensibility, and saw my mother hanging over me. "Is the Sandman still there?" stammered I. "No, my dear child, he has been long, long away; he will do you no harm." So said my mother, and kissed and embraced her restored darling.

Why should I weary you, my dear Lothar-why should I dwell so

long on a single incident when so much yet remains to be said! It is enough for you to know, that I was detected and roughly handled by Coppelius, and that my panic had thrown me into a fever, which lasted for several weeks. "Is the Sandman still there?" were the first rational words I uttered, and the symptom of returning health. I must now come to the most fearful epoch in the history of my youth. It was said that Coppelius had left the town.

One evening, about a year after this, all of us were sitting, as usual, at the round table. My father had been very cheerful, and when he was amusing us with an account of his travels in his youth, the clock struck nine, and we heard the street-door grate on its hinges, and the sound of slow and heavy steps on the passage, and then on the stair-case. "That is Coppelius," said my mother turning pale. "Yes! It is Coppelius," repeated my father with a feeble, broken voice. Tears gushed from my mother's eyes. "But my dear! my dear!" exclaimed she, "must it then be so?" «For the last time" he replied; "Coppelius shall come no more. Go, go, with the children. Go-go to bed. Good night!"

I felt as if I were squeezed under a cold, heavy stone. My breath stopped and I could not stir. "Come, Nathaniel, come," said my mother, taking hold of my arm, and I allowed myself to be led away and went into my room. "Be composed-be composed, lie down in your bed! Sleep, sleep"-cried my mother after me; but I could not shut an eyelid. The loathsome Coppelius with his glittering eyes and his malicious laugh was constantly before my imagination in spite of all my efforts.

"That

It might be about midnight when I heard a dreadful sound-like the report of a cannon. The whole house shook-something rushed past my door-and the house-door was slammed violently. is Coppelius!" I exclaimed with horror, and sprang from my bed. A shriek of the wildest agony succeeded, and I hastened to my father's room. The door was open, and a suffocating vapour issuing from it, and the servant-maid was screaming-" Ah, my master! my master!" Before the smoking hearth lay my father dead-his face burned black, and horribly distorted. My sisters were shrieking and moaning around him, and my mother had fallen into a swoon. "Coppelius-Satan! Thou hast murdered my father!" I exclaimed, and my senses deserted me. Two days after, when my father was laid in his coffin, his features had regained their native softness and benignity and I consoled myself with the thought that his interCourse with Coppelius could not have subjected him to everlasting wrath.

The explosion had awakened the neighbours, and the circumstance was so much talked of that it reached the ears of the magistrate, and he wished to call Coppelius to account.

Coppelius, however, had disappeared, and was no where to be found.

CLARA TO NATHANIEL.

I will now frankly confess to you that, in my opinion, all the horrors, of which you speak, were principally the effect of

your own imagination. Coppelius may have been disagreeable enough, but his dislike to children created real terror in you..

The Sandman of the nursery was naturally connected in your young mind with the old gentleman, and, even when you disbelieved the legend, you continued to regard him as a sort of monster particularly dangerous to children. He visited your father at night simply for this reason, that both were alchemists, and wished to perform their experiments in secret. Your mother must not have been satisfied with this, for much money was, doubtless, unprofitably spent, and your father's mind would be estranged from his family, (as it uniformly happens under such circumstances,) by his unfortunate passion for the occult sciences. Your father's death was certainly occasioned by his own imprudence, and Coppelius is not to be blamed for it.*

LONGINGS OF A YOUNG ENTHUSIAST.

BY DELLA CRUSCA.

I.

O FOR the wing of the wandering bird,

That comes when the voice of Spring is heard
From the isles across the sea, in chase
Of the flowery Summer's sunny face!

The blue ether then would become my home,
When I took my flight over ocean's foam,
And the bow of God in the clouds would be
Like the glorious portal of bliss to me!

O to sport 'neath its arch when it gleams
O'er the emerald sea with its purple beams,-
And to vail 'mid the radiance bright and fair,
Till it melt away in the hueless air!

II.

O for the wing of the wild curlew,

That journeys the waste of old ocean through;
And explores with her eye of bright disdain
The sounding caves of the haughty main!

When the tempest shouts and the waters dark

Throw their foam-wreath'd curls o'er the found'ring bark,
She plumes on the billows' crest her form,—

And careers on the outskirts of the storm!

• The Translator regrets, that his extract begins and terminates so abruptly. But the rest of the tale merely exhibits Nathaniel under a species of the most inconceivable hallucination, and in a series of circumstances which throw no farther light on the character of the Sandman.

O for a path where her pinions, borne

On the rushing wind, meet the seas in their scorn,
For the voice of awe and of pow'r can ne'er

In the dauntless bird wake a throb of fear.

III.

O for the wing of the regal bird,

Whose cry in the deep-deep glen is heard,

When he cleaves the heav'ns, with his rush of wings-
Scorning the earth and its meaner things!

Above the region of clouds I'd rise,

And shoot away through the boundless skies,
Till the fount of light and its splendours roll'd
Like a lambent stream from a sea of gold!

Then poised in empyreal air I'd raise
My ravish'd heart in a hymn of praise,
While in my cerulean temple none
Should see or hear but the HOLY ONE.

CONFESSION OF AN INCONSTANT.

I SPEAK not at present of grey hairs,-let those who are far-far my juniors, shelter themselves under the privileges of that venerable emblazonry; but let eighty years and upwards plead my excuse for introducing my garrulity upon public notice. More especially do I claim attention on account of the disinterestedness of my motive;— which is, that before I leave the face of this busy and thoughtful world, I may furnish some hints which may possibly be useful to its inhabitants particularly to that tender sex to which I owe so much. Yes! to my shame be it declared! not one fraction of the deep debt I owe to woman has, during the lapse of a period of fourscore years, been even begun to be discharged! But let me to my Confession.

Are all men's minds constituted alike? To me it seems, that every man has in him some of what every other man possesses; and that it is merely the difference of proportions which constitutes all the countless varieties of human character. If this be so, then every one, as he peruses the following Confession, may derive instruction of no slight value, from witnessing the growth of one, at first apparently trifling, propensity-proceeding by rapid degrees, till, the whole fa culties becoming absorbed and altered in their nature, the mind assumed the singular appearance of one unreasoning and despotic passion.

Even in my infant days I was distinguished by a restless vivacity, which hurried me from place to place, and from toy to toy with incessant alternation. At school the same tendency manifested itself in a somewhat different manner. If a new method of play was to be introduced, I undertook to manage its arrangement. If a deed of daring or folly were thought of, which had never been accomplished,