"If that severe doom of Synesius be true -- 'it is a greater offence to
steal dead men's labors than their clothes,' -- what shall become of most
writers?"

BURTON'S Anatomy of Melancholy.

I HAVE often wondered at the extreme fecundity of the
press, and how it comes to pass that so many heads, on which
Nature seems to have inflicted the curse of barrenness, yet
teem with voluminous productions. As a man travels on,
however, in the journey of life, his objects of wonder daily
diminish, and he is continually finding out some very simple
cause for some great matter of marvel. Thus have I chanced
in my peregrinations about this great metropolis, to blunder
upon a scene which unfolded to me some of the mysteries of
the book-making craft, and at once put an end to my astonish-
ment.

I was one summer's day loitering through the great saloons
of the British Museum, with that listlessness with which one
is apt to saunter about a room in warm weather; sometimes
lolling over the glass cases of minerals, sometimes studying the
hieroglyphics on an Egyptian mummy, and sometimes trying,
with nearly equal success, to comprehend the allegorical
paintings on the lofty ceilings. While I was gazing about in
this idle way, my attention was attracted to a distant floor, at
the end of a suite of apartments. It was closed, but every
now and then it would open, and some strange-favored being,
generally clothed in black, would steal forth, and glide through
the rooms, without noticing any of the surrounding objects.
There was an air of mystery about this that piqued my languid

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