than a Scotchman likely to do well in the world, even though his name be Campbell. And it is curious to mark the different ways in which thy multitudinous kith and kin infer a connection. Some are respectable by descent, some by dress, some by the situation of the dwellings in which they have temporarily located themselves. A man in very low circumstances, if he has no better claim, is consanguineous on the strength of a hat with a brim, or a stocking without a hole-" two precious items in a poor man's eye;" the spruce mechanic's dapper coat, or his wife's silk gown, leave no doubt in his own eyes at least, how closely he is allied; the small tradesman's snug house, tiny flower-spot before the door, and neat green railings, distinctly mark him for thine own; while the more aristocratical storekeeper in the wholesale or large retail way, getting above business, successful ship-brokers, cotton-speculators, lottery-office keepers, and other anomalies, forgetful of all thou hast done for them, look above thee, and creep into the back ranks of gentility and fashion, where they remain neither fish nor flesh-genteel in their own estimation, simply respectable in that of their neighbors.

Some men neglect their personal appearance, and concentrate their claims to respectability in a brass knocker, a plate with their name engraved thereon,

venetian blinds, or any other pretty additament to their domiciles; others are respectable by virtue of their connexions; others by going to the private boxes at the theatre; others by a pew next the parson at church; others by the people they visit; others by having every thing in season. Yet, difficult as it is for the mind of man to comprehend all these things, and to decide properly and justly, the women, taking advantage of their superior powers of penetration, and delicacy of discrimination, divide and subdivide respectability as easily as quicksilver. They have their "respectable sort of people --very respectable-highly respectable-extremely respectable--most respectable," which makes the thing about as difficult to understand or explain, as political economy or electro-magnetism. Indeed, there are some men, otherwise not deficient in intellect, who never have even a glimmering of light upon the subject. Think of the more than Egyptian darkness of Robert Burns, for instance-mark his heterodoxies,

"What though on hamely fare we dine,

Wear hodden gray and a' that,

Gie fools their silk, and knaves their wine,

A man's a man for a' that."

No, sir, he is not a man; he is only a poor devil. Or, grant that he is so by courtesy, what is a man

in these times, unless he is respectable according to some of the floating laws and regulations on the subject? "Oh, better had he ne'er been born!" for, as the Persian sage justly remarketh-" he shall drink of the waters of bitterness all the days of his life, and his bread shall be as ashes in his mouth; his face shall be near unto the earth, and he shall be so small that his friends will look over his head and see him not, even though the day be light— and his shadow shall be less than the shadow of a dog, or of a Russian, whom God destroy!"

Respectability is in and over all things. There are respectable substances to eat, and drink, and wear; there are respectable towns and streets and situations-for men and houses. There is a shade of respectability in colors. A black coat is more respectable than a brown one-a white handkerchief decidedly more so than a red one. Why this is we cannot tell, we only know that it is so.

One of the immutable laws of nature is, that doctors and lawyers shall wear black coats and white handkerchiefs, and perhaps to this, in a large degree, is owing the respectability which is so generally conceded to those bodies. I speak not here of lawyerlings and doctorlings-boys with scarcely a tinge of their profession, who are injudiciously abandoned in those matters to their own weak

judgments and perverted tastes, and who consequently go abroad in josephean garments "of many colors," but of full-grown responsible men of law and physic. Who would trust a life or a lawsuit of any importance to one of either profession in a pea-green coat, fancy waistcoat, and colored handkerchief? the idea is preposterous. There is more in those black and white habiliments than the unthinking dream of.

A FEW OF THE INCONVENIENCES OF SEEING

SHAKSPEARE ACTED.

In the mass of miscellaneous reading that is constantly meeting the eye and passing from the memory, you occasionally meet with a remark or odd saying of an adhesive quality-like a burr "it will stick." It is long ago since the following came in my way; so long, indeed, that I have forgotten the precise form of words in which the meaning was couched, but the purport of the sentence was— "that Shakspeare lost by representation in the same proportion that others gained by it;—that the one was like a spruce apprentice set off by his Sunday clothes the other like Apollo tricked out by a tailor." I dare say the same thought has struck many a man after reading or seeing Shakspeare, and been illustrated by many men in many modes before this time; still, let the reapers and gleaners go ever so carefully over the field, there are always some few stray ears to be picked up by a stragglerpatches, remnants of the bounteous harvest that