evidently one of great pleasure to the founder himself, as appears from the wording of his will, in which he exhorts his nephews to buy four thousand pounds of stock for the permanent provision of these portions.  “I doubt not,” he says, “but my nephews would cheerfully purchase the said stock if they had seen, as I have, six poor innocent maidens come trembling to draw the prize, and the fortunate maiden that got it burst into tears with excess of joy.”  It is likely that even before he had founded and endowed the Asylum, Henry Raine had often given away portions to deserving young girls.  That drawn on May Day is not given until after the wedding on November 5, and that drawn in November is given in May.  The dowry consists of gold pieces in an old-fashioned silk purse, and is formally presented to the young couple at the committee dinner which takes place after the drawing.  Of course, the husband’s character is quite as strictly inquired into as that of the bride, and unless this is perfectly satisfactory to the rector, treasurer and trustees the portion is withheld—­a wise provision against fortune-hunting.  A wedding-repast is also provided for the bridal party at the same time, but in a separate room, and to neither of these banquets are the public admitted:  a few personal friends of the trustees are sometimes asked.  The dinner is a pretty sight, the girls of the lower school waiting on the committee.  The treasurer, the rector and a few others accompany the presentation of the portion with kind and congratulatory speeches, and the girls sing appropriate hymns in the intervals.

The building called Raine’s Asylum (or sometimes Hospital) is a plain, ugly, square mass, as all specimens of the so-called Georgian “architecture” are apt to be.  The London atmosphere has rather blackened than mellowed its crude tone of red brick and white stone till the whole is of the uniform color of India ink.  Over the projecting portico stands the bust of the founder in wig and bands, looking more like a scholar or a divine than a brewer, and leaving the impression of a good, truthful, thoughtful face, with a long slender nose, thin mouth and broad and massive forehead.  Behind the Asylum stretches a garden—­not a small one for such a locality—­and, though London gardens are not apt to be cheery places, this one has at least the merit of standing as evidence of the kind-hearted founder’s intention to bestow as much fresh air as possible on his protegees.

B.M.

NOTES.

TURKEY is the piece de resistance of European politics.  It has lasted through the sitting of a century.  At intervals the assembled gourmands would simultaneously bend their eyes upon it; and an energetic sharpening of carving-knives and poising of forks would spring up with a synchronous shuffling of plates.  Slashing would sometimes follow, and slices were served round with more or less impartiality