Chamberss Edinburgh Journal, No. 431 | Page 2

agreeable and attractive about him. Going down a peg in reputation seems somehow to have a specific effect upon the temper. From a bear it will convert a man into a perfect lamb. He becomes obliging to the last degree, has a kind word for everybody, and is never so happy as when he is allowed to render you some disagreeable piece of service. Scott, who knew everything, knew this, and hence it was that he made Glossin so very polite to the ostler at Kippletringan. When a stranger comes to settle in a country place, the imperfect respectability is sure to be amongst the first to call and offer his services. He likes a new family, and thinks it a duty to be ready to do the honours of the place. He is also, to a remarkable degree, a family man. None is seen so often going about with wife and daughters. In fact, he is exemplary in this respect. Few pews, moreover, so regularly filled as his. When a subscription is got up, it is a positive pleasure to him to subscribe; ten times more to be allowed to come upon the committee, and join other two in going about with a paper. The effect of all this is, that the imperfect respectable is often a highly popular character. Everybody likes him, and wishes him at the devil.
When the case is so strong that disappearance is imperatively necessary, then of course disappear he must. Every now and then, some one of our old friends is thus dropping through the trap-doors of the social stage, to be seen and heard of no more. In travelling, one is apt to come upon some old-remembered face, which he had been accustomed to in such different circumstances that he has a difficulty in recognising it. It may be in some village obscurity of our own country, some German watering-place, or some American wilderness. There it is, however, the once familiar face; and you cannot pass it unheeded. You soon discover that you have lighted upon an imperfect respectability in exile. He is delighted to see you, seems in the highest spirits, and insists on your coming home to see Mrs ----, and dine or spend the night. He has never been better off anywhere. All goes well with him. It was worth his while to come here, if only for the education of his family. As he rattles on, speaking of everything but the one thing you chiefly think of, you cannot help being touched in spirit. You feel that there may be things you can respect more, but many you respect that you cannot love so much.
While the imperfect respectability bears up so well before his old acquaintance, who can tell what may be the reflections that visit his breast in moments of retirement? Let us not be too ready to set him down as indifferent to the consequences of the sin which once so unfortunately beset him. Let us not too easily assume that he has not felt the loss of place and reputation, because he laughs and chats somewhat more than he used to do. I follow my poor old friend to his home, and there see him in his solitary hours brooding over the great forfeit he has made, and bitterly taxing himself with errors which he would be right loath to confess to the world. He knows what men think and say of him behind his back, notwithstanding that not a symptom of the consciousness escapes him. And let us hope that, in many cases, the contrite confession which is withheld from men is yielded where it is more fitly due.

TALES OF THE COAST-GUARD.
THE LAST REVEL.
When I was quite a lad, a servant lived with us of the name of Anne Stacey. She had been in the service of William Cobbett, the political writer, who resided for some years at Botley, a village a few miles distant from Itchen. Anne might be about two or three and twenty years of age when she came to us; and a very notable, industrious servant she was, and remarked, moreover, as possessing a strong religious bias. Her features, everybody agreed, were comely and intelligent. But that advantage in the matrimonial market was more than neutralised by her unfortunate figure, which, owing, as we understood, to a fall in her childhood, was hopelessly deformed, though still strongly set and muscular. Albeit, a sum of money--about fifty pounds--scraped together by thrifty self-denial during a dozen years of servitude, amply compensated in the eyes of several idle and needy young fellows for the unlovely outline of her person; and Anne, with an infatuation too common with persons of her class and condition, and in spite of repeated warning, and the secret misgivings, one