SCENE, _the Hall in Uncle Roland’s Tower_; TIME, _night_; SEASON, _winter_. Mr. Caxton is seated before a great geographical globe, which he is turning round leisurely, and “for his own recreation,” as, according to Sir Thomas Browne, a philosopher should turn round the orb, of which that globe professes to be the representation and effigies. My mother having just adorned a very small frock with a very smart braid, is holding it out at arm’s length, the more to admire the effect. Blanche, though leaning both hands on my mother’s shoulder, is not regarding the frock, but glances toward PISISTRATUS, who, seated near the fire leaning back in his chair, and his head bent over his breast, seems in a very bad humor. Uncle Roland, who has become a great novel reader, is deep in the mysteries of some fascinating Third Volume. Mr. Squills has brought _The Times_ in his pocket for his own special profit and delectation, and is now bending his brows over “the state of the money market” in great doubt whether railway shares can possibly fall lower. For Mr. Squills, happy man! has large savings, and does not know what to do with his money; or, to use his own phrase, “how to buy in at the cheapest, in order to sell out at the dearest.” Mr. Caxton, musingly.—“It must have been a monstrous long journey. It would be somewhere hereabouts, I take it, that they would split off.” My Mother, mechanically, and in order to show Austin that she paid him the compliment of attending to his remarks.—“Who split off, my dear?” “Bless me, Kitty,” said my father, in great admiration, “you ask just the question which it is most difficult to answer. An ingenious speculator on races contends that the Danes, whose descendants make the chief part of our northern population (and, indeed, if his hypothesis could be correct, we must suppose all the ancient worshipers of Odin), are of the same origin as the Etrurians. And why, Kitty? I just ask you, why?” My mother shook her head thoughtfully, and turned the frock to the other side of the light. “Because, forsooth,” cried my father, exploding—“because the Etrurians called their gods ‘the Æsar,’ and the Scandinavians called theirs the Æsir, or Aser! And where do you think he puts their cradle?” “Cradle!” said my mother, dreamily; “it must be in the nursery.”