ILLUSTRATIONS OF MOORE'S IRISH MELODIES,

BY THE LATE THOMAS STOTHARD, R. A.

No. I.-NORA CREINA.

Lesbia hath a beaming eye,

But no one knows for whom it beameth;
Right and left its arrows fly,

But what they aim at no one dreameth;
Sweeter 'tis to gaze upon

My Nora's lid that seldom rises;
Few its looks, but every one
Like unsuspected light surprises;
Oh, my Nora Creina dear,
My gentle bashful Nora Creina;
Beauty lies in many eyes,

But love in yours, my Nora Creina,

Lesbia wears a robe of gold,

But all so close the nymph hath laced it,
Not a charm of beauty's mould
Presumes to stay where nature placed it;
Oh, my Nora's gown for me,
That floats as wild as mountain breezes';
Leaving every beauty free
To sink or swell as heaven pleases;
Yes my Nora Creina dear,

My simple graceful Nora Creina;
Nature's dress in loveliness,

The dress you wear, my Nora Creina.

Lesbia hath a wit refined,

But, when its points are gleaming round us,
Who can tell if they're designed
To dazzle merely, or to wound us?
Pillow'd on my Nora's heart,
In safer slumber love reposes:-
Bed of peace, whose roughest part
Is but the crumpling of the roses;
Oh, my Nora Creina dear,
My mild, my artless Nora Creina;

Wit, though bright, hath not the light,
That warms your eyes, my Nora Creina.

SKETCHES IN THE LIFE OF MADAME CAMPAN.

Madame Campan, the daughter of M. Genet, clerk to the minister for Foreign Affairs. Having received an excellent education, was appointed at the early age of fifteen, lectrice to the Princesses. In her Memoirés she acknowledges the pleasure she experienced on her first presentatation at the court of Versailles. Her long trains, her hoop, and even the rouge, which at that period was an indispensable adjunct to the toilette of a woman of quality, however young, almost turned her brain. She seized the first opportunity of presenting herself in her father's house, arrayed in her court paraphernalia. Her father, while he smiled at her girlish vanity, made the following remark :"Have a care, my dear child, of the inevitable troubles attached to your new career; and I candidly declare to you, that, elated as you now are by your change of situation, if I could have established you in any other way, I would never have exposed my beloved daughter to the torments and dangers of a court.'

The presence of Louis XV. was always embarrassing to the young lectrice, for the monarch was fond of indulging in sarcastic jokes, as the following related by herself, sufficiently testify.

"One day, while we were at the Castle of Compeigne, the King entered the apartment in which I was reading to Madame. I immediately rose, and withdrew to an adjoining apartment. Being alone, with nothing to amuse me but a volume of Masillon, which I had just been reading to the Princess, I stepped up to a mirror to view my elegant dress. With the gaiety and buoyancy of spirits natural in a girl of fifteen, I diverted myself by pirouetting on one toe, and then suddenly kneeling down, to admire the full folds of my pink silk jupe, swelling in immense amplitude round my figure. While I was engaged in this grave occupation, the King entered, followed by the Princess. His Majesty burst into a fit of laughter, and turning to the Princess, said: Daughter, I think a lectrice who amuses herself by making cheeses should be sent to school again.""

But the following raillerie was still more severe :

"One day, says Madame Campan, I met the King as he was going out to hunt, followed by a numerous retinue. On seeing me, he stopped short, and thus addressed me :Madlle. Genet, I am told that you are very clever, and that you understand four or five foreign languages.'—' I know only two, Sire,' replied I, trembling.-' What are they?' English and Italian.' - Can you speak them fluently? Yes, Sire.' 'Why, that would suffice to drive any husband mad!' After paying me this pretty compliment, the king walked on, the persons in his suite laughed beartily, and I stood for some moments confounded and abashed."

Through the influence of Marie Antoinette, Madlle. Genet was married in 1770, to M. Campan, private secretary to the Queen. For twenty years she never quitted her royal mistress, until the disasters of the Revolution tore them asunder, and even then Mad. Campan wished to share the captivity in the Temple, but was not allowed. Finding herself suspected, she fled to the valley of Che vreuse; whilst her sister was arrested, and only eluded the guillotine by a violent and voluntary death. After this she lost her brother in law, and her royal mistress, but she had still ties which bound her to life; an aged mother, a sick husband, and a son of nine years of age. She had always had a decided taste for teaching. When but a child herself, she was the instructress of her juvenile companions. In the circumstances in which she was now placed, ber only fortune being an assignat of 500 francs, and having debts amounting to 30,000 francs, her talent for teaching became a useful resource to her. She hired a small house at St. Germain, and circulated among her friends a hun dred prospectuses, which she wrote with her own hand, because she had not money to get them printed. At the expiration of a year, she had 60 pupils, and they soon encreased to upwards of a hundred. Many were sent to her from distant parts of the world, and she soon received into her establishment the daughters of the most distinguished families in France.

Madame de Beauharnais," says Madame Campan, "sent me her daughter Hortense and her niece Emilie. In about six months after this she came to inform me that she