Talking, or rather writing, of "puffs," those of our friend George Robins always excepted, there are few that are richer than the following, which we quote from a New York paper, and which was adopted by the "Stultz" of that town, recommending the attraction of his tailor's shop. The heading consisted of one word, "Niagara," in capitals an inch and a half long; and then the eloquence of the man of measures-the ninth portion of a human being-broke out in the following rhapsody ::

“Like the rush of the mighty waters of Niagara, bearing everything in its course, so has been the run of trade at Oak Hall during the last year and a half."

But to return to our ramble in the east. Leaving the Whitechapel and Bow road, I turned to my right towards Stepney Green, which spot, as well as the adjacent streets, was one dense mass of moving people. There was an unintermitting noise and din-men bawling, women screaming, children shrieking, donkeys braying, gongs sounding, trumpets playing, cymbals clashing, organs grinding, bagpipes droning, and fiddles squeaking. The two principal streets leading to the Green were decorated with flags and laurel-leaves; the popular games being "shying" at snuff-boxes upon sticks, and shooting for nuts. The owners of these gaudily-painted targets, with a bull's-eye and some half-dozen circles marked with figures, told the sportsmen that, for a halfpenny a shot, they would receive forty nuts, if they "vos fortunate enough for to hit the bull's-eye," and a proportionate number for the other circles. A small fowling, or rather "nutting" piece was then placed in the shooter's hands, with a copper cap, and loaded with a sharp-pointed iron arrow. With what anxiety was the countenance of many a young Tyro depicted, as he cocked his piece of ordnance, looked along the barrel, and pulled the trigger! luck this time, sir; you'll have better next," said the proprietor of the "shooting-gallery," as he again loaded the piece. At last perseverance is rewarded, the bull's-eye is hit, and, to use an old familiar phrase, it is nuts to the juvenile Tell. The most inveterate sportsman, after a successful day's deer-stalking in the Highlands, in which two noble "ten-tyned" stags have fallen to his unerring aim, never felt half so proud of his prowess as the young urchin I saw did at pocketing the prize of forty nuts.

"Bad

Upon consulting the proper authorities, I found that it is only two years ago that Stepney Fair, which for five-and-twenty years had laid under the magisterial interdict, was revived; and certainly, upon this occasion, it was renewed with all its pristine grandeur. Two large fields were appropriated to the fair, which are separated from each other by Charles-street. In the first, called Manor Field, behind the Prince of Wales Tavern, facing the Thames Police Court, was a splendidly-decorated booth, called "The Crown and Anchor," belonging to Gipsy Stevens, the Essex higgler. This monster booth was 350 feet in length, and 50 feet in breadth, and after sunset was brilliantly illuminated with variegated lamps and devices. Here the polka was danced in a manner worthy of Almack's. Beckett and Hicks, of The Cricketers, in London-street, also kept up the ball with great effect.

The fair itself had every sort of show, from Price's Equestrian and Gymnastic Company, which bore off the belt, down to the humblest penny "don't-blow-on-the-glasses" exhibition of the battle of HongKong in "Chiney." The veteran Clarke, well known in Bartlemy Fair, pitched a tent for horsemanship, scenes in the circle, tight-rope dancing, and vaulting, and was only rivalled by a name well known in the legitimate as well as illegitimate dramatic world-Price. The above-mentioned Price, Paterson, and Johnson opened a theatre, where the national drama was performed with the most brilliant success; and "The Way-side Murder; or, Blood will have Blood"-a domestic drama of overwhelming interest-with the comic pantomime of "The Blind Beggar of Bethnal Green; or, Harlequin Croesus," were acted no less than four-and-twenty times during the day. Then there was Hylton's menagerie of "undomitable, untameable hanimals, wot never yet was seen in a tranquil state:" the sagacious elephant, the undaunted lion, the wary lynx, the pelican of the wilderness, "wot feeds its young out of its own breast," the wonderful leopard, which "has more spots in its body than there is stars in the furmament," the laughing hyena, "wot grins and bears it." There were a horde of perambulating tradesmen, with galvanic rings, music for the deaf, and periwinkles for the million. I was rather amused at a conversation between a costermonger and a 66 gent," who was blading" it not

a little in a hired dog-cart, with a horse whose legs had evidently seen better days.

"I say, old chap," cried a costermonger, "vhy don't yer buy galwanic rings for that 'ere oss-he goes awful cripply upon his four legs? Mayhap it's rhumatis'; if so, the rings 'll do the trick, and

no mistake."

Here might be seen a wandering ballad-monger, "with a yard and a half of songs for a halfpenny:" "The Coal-black Rose," "Misletoe Bough," "Jenny Jones," "The fine old English Gentleman," "Woodman, spare that Tree," "Marble Halls," "Ere around the huge Oak," "Farewell, my trim-built Wherry," "Black-eyed Susan,” "I'm Jolly Dick the Lamplighter," and "Hot Codlins." There stood a shabby-genteel sort of a gent, in a very seedy suit of what had once been black, who was hawking about books of conundrums, price only one penny, containing every riddle, from the Sphinx of old down to the last "give it up" of Billy Black's. One or two attracted my attention, and which the vendor, in a deep-toned, gindrinking voice, gave as follows:-"Vy is the house of your opposite neighbour like curds? Becos it's over the whey' (way). Vy, if you vere to put your guvnor into a skalding cauldron, he'd take no hurt? Because he'd only be pa-boiled (par-boiled). Vot induced King Charles at Vitehall to suffer decapitation, vhilst the martyrs of old vere put to death by burning? The vun preferred a chop, the other a stake' (steak). And Vy is my coat called seedy? Becos'" (thrusting his fingers through a huge "rint") "it vants to be sewn' (sown)."

Exhibitions of legerdemain and wax-work, booths for giants, dwarfs, jugglers, posture-masters, prize-fighters, learned pigs, cannibals, cudgel-players, back-sword, wild beasts, and mountebanks, abounded.

Then there were donkey-races, merry-go-rounds, ups-and-downs, whirligigs, swings, aerial ships, scalding hasty-pudding eaters, lotteries "all prizes, no blanks. All sorts of edibles: "beef cut with an 'ammy knife for to give it a flavour," fried soles and sausages, "pologne," 'winkles, oysters, sprats, eels, roasted potatoes, red herrings, Yarmouth bloaters, saveloys, sandwiches, pickled salmon, savoury pies, plum-pudding. Every species of buvable, from humble "pop" to imperial tokay, ale, porter, cider, perry, lemonade, gingerbeer, and spruce. Booths with ginger-bread, oranges, nuts, pears, apples, toffey, peppermint-drops, barley-sugar, kisses, and lollipops. All kinds of beggars, trampers, strollers, gipsies, singers, dancers, and mountebanks.

It is almost impossible to give a guess at the numbers present; suffice it to say that all were in the highest spirits, and gaiety and good humour pervaded every countenance. Occasionally, it is true, the crowd round some favourite booth or exhibition was so full that some unluckly wight found it absolutely necessary to lay shoulders to in right good earnest, frequently at the expense of a coat-tail, a sleeve, shoe, hat, black eye, streaming proboscis, or some such mishap; the only consolation for which he received was-" All's fair in fair time," or "You'd better go home and tell your mother to chain up Ugly."

According to an official statement in the newspapers, we find that both Greenwich and Stepney fairs terminated on Wednesday night at twelve o'clock, and those places were soon cleared of the multitudes present. There was not a single instance of personal outrage at either place. The total number of charges from the Stepney fair, including four petty gamblers, were eleven only, and they were not of the slightest importance. The multitudes who attended Stepney fair each day were immense. From Whitechapel church to Stepney church every street was crowded with people, and every house was filled with the holiday folks. The receipts of the showmen and the landlords of houses of public entertainment were very great. Every exhibition was "only a penny," with the exception of Price's equestrian circus, where sixpence was charged for the pit and threepence for the gallery. Notwithstanding these comparatively high prices, fifteen thousand persons visited the performances.

A LETTER FROM NEW BRUNSWICK.

BY A SUBALTERN.

MY DEAR A.,-I mentioned, you may recollect, in my last, that the fiat had gone forth from Halifax for the removal of the regiment from pretty little Fredericton, to its more bustling neighbour, the populous city of St. John, distant by the river some eighty miles. Our active friends the commissariat (amongst the most energetic of whom figured that excellent fellow, and your fidus Achates, R-),

soon procured us the means of transport, by taking up for our accommodation the river steamers, and in them, by companies, we glided down the broad bosom of the St. John, over whose surface were wafted, in the shape of favourite tunes, our mournful adieus to the fair Sirens of the "capital," for to that title, as the residence of the governor, and seat of the provincial parliament, does the little town aspire, to the no small envy of the city to which we bent our way. The scenery about St. John presents a totally different character from that in the environs of Fredericton, being of a sterner and more bleak cast. The falls are certainly curious, and a visitor to them will find no difficulty in the belief (now general enough), that the vast waters of the river St. John once flowed through a far wider and smoother channel than that through which, by some convulsion of nature, they now force their way, boiling and foaming as if with anger at the narrow confines of their prison. The river is at this spot (the falls) not more than 100 yards wide, whilst at Grand Bay, a few miles from the mouth, it extends to a breadth of several miles, and at Fredericton, nearly eighty-five miles from the sea, presents a surface of upwards of half-a-mile across.

The city itself has, since your flying passage through it, much improved in appearance, brick houses having in most of the principal streets usurped the place of wooden ones. This circumstance may be mainly attributed to the number of fires by which this devoted city has been visited. The custom-house, an entirely new building, and in the interior yet unfinished, now presents a fine and imposing appearance from the harbour; but viewed from the street, which is narrow, its proportions are nearly lost.

"Enough," you will say, of the good city, its beauties, and deformities; however, not having yet introduced you to the barracks, I will take you up from the large hotel where we last dined together, and hurrying along for nearly a mile towards the sea, will place you on an open esplanade, where the stone building, flanked on either side by long wooden habitations, must pass for the quarters of her Majesty's officers. The view from them to the south, which they face, is, as you may suppose, fine in the extreme; the foreground consisting of the bay and harbour of the city, enlivened, as it generally is, by the tall spars and white canvass of many a goodly vessel; beyond, Partridge island with its lighthouse; while in the distance, the bold outline of the Nova Scotia coast forms a befitting boundary to the waters of the Bay of Fundy, whose foggy seas and iron-bound shores have so oft dismayed the hardy

mariner.

Having now recalled to your mind's eye the commercial capital of New Brunswick, I must tell you that as a quarter it is not popular. Business being the order of the day, the inhabitants, generally speaking, have not either time or inclination to attend much to the pleasures and duties of society; gaiety in consequence languishes under its cloudy atmosphere, in spite of the resolute attempts made by some of the younger portion of its community to shake off the ennui so frequently a visitor. I will not say that they are altogether unsuccessful, as I have passed many a pleasant evening amongst some

whom I yet hope to meet again; but what I mean you to understand is, that any thing like gaiety in St. John seems to be an effort, not a part as it were of one's daily existence, as in little Fredericton.

As regards sporting, the only amusement we found there was the trout fishing, which about August and September is very good; and as by that time the curse of the country, the flies and musquitoes, has disappeared, it may be enjoyed greatly and with considerable success. Amongst the numerous lakes with which the neighbourhood abounds, Beaver Lake, about nine miles from the city, used to be the great rendezvous for the admirers of the gentle art; and certainly, the trout there, besides being plentiful, were of a description equal, if not superior, in flavour to any that I have tasted in any part of the world; they hardly ever exceed a pound in weight, but the memory of their beautifully pink flesh, peeping from out its crisped and speckled skin, as I see it served up for supper fresh from the stream, on our return to barracks, might fully justify the fisherman or the epicure in his enthusiasm for the new world and its sports.

The expected coming of the commander of the forces from Halifax put a stop for a time to our piscatory amusements. He came, and inspected the regiment-a process in which as you have as often taken a part, I shall not now fatigue you with its details; suffice it to say, that all went off well, or to give it in the language of the veteran from the Emerald Isle, who, in the absence of our gallant chief, commanded us, "nothing could be better, particularly the firing." This ceremony over, not forgetting the dinner with its bumpers and speeches, and the general having taken his departure for the seat of government, I prepared at once to carry into effect a fishing tour, which I had some time since projected, and which a few weeks' leave just obtained had left me at liberty to accomplish. My friend and brother officer a crack sportsman in every line and branch of the profession, was my only companion; we had engaged Indians, with two canoes, which were to meet us at the mouth of the Restigouche river, emptying into the Bay of Chaleurs, on the Gulph of St. Lawrence, ourselves making our way from St. John by land through Miramichi and Bathurst to Dalhousie. At that place we launched our frail barks on the magnificent stream, and with the aid of our wild attendants, poled and paddled up the river towards its source; there carrying the canoes over the Portage, between it and "Rivière Verte," and following the latter stream to its mouth, we struck the great river St. John (or by its Indian name, the "Wallostook") above the grand falls; avoiding which, we gradually descended with the stream towards the city and the sea.

I cannot imagine an expedition (to one fond of fishing and the charms of scenery) that could afford more sport and pleasure than the one I have just related. My companion was most expert both with rod and gun; whilst I, though not possessing much skill, could yet manage to fill a basket without trouble. The scenery, too, about the Restigouche is grand in the extreme, exhibiting more of the bold features of a mountain land, than the more cultivated south of the province can shew. The falls and rapids along the river possess great beauty, independent of the excitement attendant on a passage