kind, to turn to the coarse fun and ludicrous descriptions of Paul de Kock.  And, after all, our friend Paul has not many more sins than coarseness and buffoonery to answer for.  As to his attempting, of set purpose, to corrupt people’s morals, it never entered into his head.  He does not know what morals are; they never form any part of his idea of manners or character.  If a good man comes in his way, he looks at him with a strange kind of unacquaintance that almost rises into respect; but he is certainly more affectionate, and on far better terms, with men about town—­amative hairdressers, flirting grisettes, and the whole genus, male and female, of the epiciers.  It would no doubt be an improvement if the facetious Paul could believe in the existence of an honest woman; but such women as come in his way he describes to the life.  A ball in a dancing-master’s private room up six pairs of stairs, a pic-nic to one of the suburbs, a dinner at a restaurateur’s, or a family consultation on a proposal of marriage, are far more in Paul’s way than tales of open horror or silk-and-satin depravity.  One is only sorry, in the midst of so much gaiety and good-humour, to stumble on some scene or sentiment that gives on the inclination to throw the book in the fire, or start, like Caesar, on the top of the diligence to pull the author’s ears.  But the next page sets all right again; and you go on laughing at the disasters of my neighbour Raymond, or admiring the graces or Chesterfieldian politeness of M. Bellequeue.  French nature seems essentially different from all the other natures hitherto known; and yet, though so new, there never rises any doubt that it is a nature, a reality, as Thomas Carlyle says, and not a sham.  The personages presented to us by Paul de Kock can scarcely, in the strict sense of the word, be called human beings; but they are French beings of real flesh and blood, speaking and thinking French in the most decided possible manner, and at intervals possessed of feelings which make us inclined to include them in the great genus homo, though with so many inseparable accidents, that it is impossible for a moment to shut one’s eyes to the species to which they belong.  But such as they are in their shops, and back-parlours, and ball-rooms, and fetes champetres, there they are in Paul de Kock—­nothing extenuated, little set down in malice—­vain, empty, frivolous, good-tempered, gallant, lively, and absurd.  Let us go to the wood of Romainville to celebrate the anniversary of the marriage of M. and Madame Moutonnet on the day of St Eustache.

“At a little distance from the ball, towards the middle of the wood, a numerous party is seated on the grass, or rather on the sand; napkins are spread on the ground, and covered with plates and cold meat and fruits.  The bottles are placed in the cool shade, the glasses are filled and emptied rapidly; good appetites and open air make every thing appear excellent.  They make plates out of paper, and