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I sat one December morning in the library of the Speculative; a very humble-minded youth, though it was a virtue I never had much credit for; yet proud of my privileges as a member of the Spec.; proud of the pipe I was smoking in the teeth of the Senatus; and in particular, proud of being in the next room to three very distinguished students, who were then conversing beside the corridor fire.

Here a member can warm himself and loaf and read; here, in defiance of Senatus-consults, he can smoke. The Senatus looks askance at these privileges; looks even with a somewhat vinegar aspect on the whole society; which argues a lack of proportion in the learned mind, for the world, we may be sure, will prize far higher this haunt of dead lions than all the living dogs of the professorate.

"What you propose," said the Cardinal, "is either a piece of theatrical tomfoolery, in which case it is unfit to be performed in a church, or it is flat treason, in which case you should be sent to the Tower!" They went away, like the Senatus of Augsburg from the presence of Napoleon "très mortifiés et peu contents."

The word prandium, in short, converted the palace into the imperial tent; and Cæsar was no longer a civil emperor and princeps senatûs, but became a commander-in-chief amongst a council of his staff, all belted and plumed, and in full military fig.

Napoleon cannot, therefore, well be ignorant of the many other dynasties here now rivalling that of the Bonapartes, and who wait only for his exit to tear his Senatus Consultum, his will, and his family, as well as each other, to pieces. PARIS, September, 1805.

"I wish to call out 30,000 men by the conscription of 1810," he wrote on the 21st March to General Lacuee, director-general of the reviews and conscription; "I am obliged to delay the publication of the 'Senatus- consulte, which can only be done when all the documents are published. Let the good departments be preferred in choosing.

We will content our selves with our stock in hand of humble Rhenish, of about three shillings a-bottle. However, 'pour la rarity du fait, I will lay out twelve ducats', for twelve bottles of the wine of 1665, by way of an eventual cordial, if you can obtain a 'senatus consultum' for it. I am in no hurry for it, so send it me only when you can conveniently; well packed up 's'entend'.

To go no further back than the living members of the Senatus Academicus, it will be admitted that Caird in Divinity, Lushington in Greek, Sir William Thomson in Natural Philosophy, Allen Thomson in Anatomy, Rankine in Mechanics, Grant in Astronomy, and Gairdner in Medicine, are names to conjure with.

Grace was said by the Professor of Divinity, in a macaronic Latin, which I could by no means follow, only I could hear it rhymed, and I guessed it to be more witty than reverent. After which the Senatus Academicus sat down to rough plenty in the shape of rizzar'd haddocks and mustard, a sheep's head, a haggis, and other delicacies of Scotland.

It is not my purpose to say much about the laws, decrees, and 'Senatus- Consultes', which the First Consul either passed, or caused to be passed, after his accession to power, what were they all, with the exception of the Civil Code?