them sail on what tack they will, they make no way. The current, that bears others gallantly along, stagnates the moment their little bark tempts it: the gale slumbers, and their canvas flutters into rags. Theodoric was the probable heir, by the Armenian rule of succession, of his uncle Jacob's wealth. It was, therefore, to his heart's content that Doriclea remained so long childless. Each succeeding year increased his satisfaction, and lulled him in those delightful day-dreams, which they are in the habit of indulging who set their affections upon the possessions of another. His Armenian neighbours, indeed, took a pleasure occasionally in humbling his expectations, pretending to discover from time to time an enlargement in Doriclea's figure. I will take a respondentia bond on the freight,' said one. 'I will ensure the safe delivery of the cargo after a nine-months' voyage, said another. Theodoric's face expanded or fell with these hopes and alarms, for the fever of covetousness has its cold and hot fits without intermission. In a word, it is difficult to describe the wakeful, lingering solicitude with which he watched the countenance and the waist of Doriclea. If she yawned, sneezed, or hiccupped, she sounded the knell of his hopes.

"What, then, were the emotions of dread, hor

ror, and suspicion, with which he heard the unwelcome tidings of Doriclea's pregnancy! I have most agreeable news for you,' said Jacob to his nephew, taking him aside to a pleasant seat on the roof of his house, which faced the sea-breeze. 'I'll be sworn,' said Theodoric, rubbing his hands,

if it is not the return voyage of the punjums sent to Point de Galle, in which my uncle was good enough to give me a third of the venture.' But he changed his tone as Jacob, filling him a bumper of the acidulated beverage called claret, with which the Danes were formerly, during hostilities with France, kind enough to supply the Indian settlements, exclaimed, Theodoric, my boy, all my hopes are fulfilled: your aunt is pregnant, and probably the next intelligence we shall get from her will be that of her safe delivery.' Theodoric, indeed, swallowed the bumper, but Jacob's announcement gave it a nausea not its own, and stammering a word or two of feigned sympathy in his uncle's pride of paternity, he rushed down the stairs. 'Ah,' said Jacob, this Danish wine, though at two rupees the half dozen, is sad trash; but we must put up with it. Were I to send for a case of English claret from Hope and Card's, my creditors would take the alarm, and would think I was rushing to my ruin. Yet I see it has choked

the poor lad-and it is bad enough to choke the devil.'

"Theodoric was, indeed, choked, but it was with spite and disappointment, and a few more of those agreeable sensations we experience when the wiredrawn calculations of our avarice are snapt asunder.

Fool that I was !' said he, stamping with rage; 'why was I not beforehand with the archbishop to procure his prayers to avert from Doriclea the pangs and perils of child-birth? But stop-there may be some trick. This voyage-this pregnancy so well-timed. My life on it, it is all to procure some surreptitious child to palm upon Jacob at her return. Could she have a better associate in so vile an intrigue than Johanna, who, I well know, has served her apprenticeship to all the tricks of her sex?' Thus reasoned the half-witted and mercenary Theodoric.

"In every part of the East, whether amongst Hindoos, Mussulmans, Armenians, or Catholics, there are wise men, who, whilst they themselves are starving, can predict plenty and good fortune to their neighbours. Amongst the Armenians, judicial astrology has always been held in estimation. To one of these persons, who was not too well fed to commune with the stars,-for they say it is a science which can only be attained by an abstemious

diet,-Theodoric had frequent recourse, when he wished any peculiar problem of his destiny to be solved. After three nights' watching and consultation of the planets, and a donation of thirty rupees, Padré Joseph gave him what he was pleased to call a definite answer to the question propounded to him-whether the heir, which Doriclea had given his uncle Jacob reason to expect in due season, would be genuine or suppositious?' Old Joseph's response, preceded by the usual allowance of mystical jargon, went to this effect:-that Doriclea would produce a real heir, but that she would rear and nurture a fictitious one, who would inherit Jacob's wealth, unless some event, half-shadowed forth, half-veiled in the gloom of futurity, should intervene. Being pressed by Theodoric to point out that event more definitely, he shook his head, and became still more obscure and mystical. He is a goose,' said Theodoric, and talks nonsense.'

"A bright idea flashed suddenly across the confused brain of Theodoric. I myself may as well be on the spot, if any trick is meditated, and thus baffle the conspirators.' He had mercantile dealings at Batavia, and in different places on the coast of Sumatra. Determined to watch over Doriclea's proceedings, he freighted a small junk to Point de Galle, and went on board. When he was out at

sea, he steered direct towards Batavia; and having long carried on an intercourse of a somewhat tender nature with a Dutch widow, with whom he always lodged when he visited that settlement, in fourteen days Theodoric found himself comfortably lodged with Dame Wilhelmina Jansen, whose house, at least according to Dutch taste, was picturesquely situated on the banks of a stagnant dyke, that formed an outlet to one of the larger canals which intersect that salubrious city. It was, however, retired, and,—but for a full orchestra of frogs, that croaked the whole night long,-quiet, and out of all noise and bustle. In this seclusion, it was Theodoric's plan to lie perdu for awhile, and await the turning-up of the cards.

"It was as if Doriclea and Johanna were running a race of parturition. At length, the fulness of time arrived to the former, who was safely delivered of a fine boy, two or three days after Theodoric's arrival. To the joy of the parents and the gossips, the child was born with the sign of a cross below his right bosom; an omen of which their superstition made much, and their desire to flatter Doriclea more.

"Theodoric was wont, in the dusk and coolness of the evening, to wander near Johanna's residence, whose beautiful gardens, laid out with the regularity