The Young Lady's Book. 317 



have been, comparatively speaking, but just ushered into hfe. 

 It may be, I have thought, when looking at an amethyst, that 

 thou wert once contemplated by Phny, and wilt be looked upon, 

 a thousand years hence, by some one abiding in what are now the 

 wilds of the New World, but then the heart of a populous city, 

 and the mistress of the earth, with feehngs precisely similar to 

 my own! And what a harvest of rich recollections may be gath- 

 ered from the sight of a suit of family diamonds ! At how many 

 birth-days have they been admired! How many brows have they 

 adorned! The hoops and furbelows with which they were once 

 accompanied; the myriads of fashions, — nay, whole generations 

 of their wearers, — have passed away and are forgotten ; their 

 names are only found on musty parchments, pedigrees, or monu- 

 ments: but the diamonds are the same; brilhant as ever, they 

 mock their transient wearers by their durability, — sparkling on 

 the bosom of the Lady Jane of to-day, as they will, in all proba- 

 bihty, sparkle on the brow, the wrist, or the zone, of some equally 

 young and admired Lady Jane, some centuries to come. They 

 have been in a side-box when Garrick played Richard, and will 

 be worn, it may be, at the performance of some Cherokee Ros- 

 cius a thousand years hence.' 



' Why Pen! ' said Lady Mary, almost staring at her cousin, ' I 

 never heard you talk at this rate, and in this style, before. What 

 has possessed you? ' 



' Simply a desire to make a fellow-student. I have merely 

 adopted your own manner, because I thought it would be more 

 likely to attract you, than the usual plain hundrum level of my 

 discourse. You look as though you were astonished, that your 

 Cousin Pen could mount the stilts, or rise into heroics ; but, be- 

 lieve me, coz, ' an thou'lt mouth, I'll rant as well as thou.' 



' The other science,' said the Editor, ' to which, I imagine. 

 Lady Mary alluded, is Ornithology. It is certainly my intention 

 to admit the class-mates of the humming-bird, with those of the 

 nautilus, the butterfly, the emerald, and the rose. The mineral 

 and vegetable kingdoms have each been so finely advocated, that 

 it would be superfluous in me to utter a sentence in their favor. 

 You are both, I know, very much attached to Conchology and 

 Entomology. The degree of eloquence either of you might dis- 

 play, in defence of those sciences, may be easily imagined, on 

 considering for a moment the fertility of the theme. There is a 

 fine halo of poetry in the imagination, round the conch, the nauti- 

 lus, and the pearls, as well as the lily and the amethyst; and it 

 cannot be denied that the insect world is endowed with as much 

 beauty as, and more .interest than, either the rose or the diamond. 



