many other charming minauderies, and lives in an exclusive circle--so tremendously exclusive, indeed, that it is possible she may at last draw the _cordon sanitaire_ so _very_ tight, that she will be left alone with the pretty woman her mirrors reflect. They have each of them attained to what the world calls a "good position"--an eminence the world dearly reveres; if you can climb to it, _do_; never mind what dirt may cling to your feet, or what you may chance to pull down in your ascent, so questions will be asked you at the top, when you wave your flag victoriously from a plateau at a good elevation. They haven't all their ambitions--who has? If a fresh Alexander conquered the world he would fret out his life for a standing-place to be able to try Archimedes' little experiment on his newly-won globe. Lady Maréchale dies for entrance to certain salons which are closed to her; she is but a Baronet's wife, and, though so heavenly-minded, has _some_ weaknesses of earth. Mrs. Protocol grieves because she thinks a grateful country ought to wreathe her lord's brow with laurels--_Anglicè_, strawberry-leaves--and the country remains ungrateful, and the brows bare. Lady Frederic frets because her foe and rival, Lady Maria Fitz-Sachet, has footmen an inch taller than her own. They haven't all their ambitions satisfied. We are too occupied with kicking our dear friends and neighbors down off the rounds of the social ladder to advance ourselves always perhaps as entirely as we otherwise might do. But still they occupy "unexceptionable positions," and from those fortified and impregnable citadels are very severe upon those who are not, and very jealous of those who are, similarly favored by fortune. When St. Peter lets ladies through the celestial portals, he'll never please them unless he locks out all their acquaintance, and indulges them with a gratifying peep at the rejected candidates. The triad regard each other after the manner of ladies; that is to say, Lady Maréchale holds Mrs. Protocol and Lady Frederic "frivolous and worldly;" Lady Frederic gives them both one little supercilious expressive epithet, "_précieuses_;" Mrs. Protocol considers Lady Maréchale a "pharisee," and Lady Frederic a "butterfly;"--in a word, there is that charming family love to one another which ladies so delight to evince, that I suppose we must excuse them for it on the plea that 'Tis their nature to! which Dr. Watts puts forward so amiably and grammatically in excuse for the bellicose propensities of the canine race, but which is never remembered by priest or layman in extenuation of the human.