Chapter 4 THE BALL.

The ancient burg, or castle, of Gradiska had been originally on a larger scale, but, at this period, consisted only of a centre, flanked at right angles by two wings ending in square towers, large, grey, and massive, and embattled, with overhanging galleries for sentinels to pace along, while similar galleries, on a smaller scale, extended along the entire front and wings of the castle.

The central edifice contained, on the ground-floor, numerous apartments and offices for menials; above which arose a spacious saloon and other lofty apartments, lighted by windows high above the flooring, and terminating in the round-headed arches so commonly seen in the castellated mansions of northern Italy. In this palatial hall preparation had been busy for the ball, to which the wife of the archducal counsellor so impatiently looked forward, as an opportunity to eclipse all rivals by the splendour of her jewels. The hour of reception by the archduke had arrived. The exterior of the spacious edifice was illuminated from end to end by nunerous torches, and the capacious staircase was lighted by a double rank of torch-bearers, in splendid apparel. In the interior of the vast apartment huge waxen tapers were fixed above the chevron, or zig-zag moulding, which ran round the walls, and connected the casement of each window. Large crystal lamps, pendant from the point of each inverted pinnacle on the lofty roof, diffused a flood of brilliant light, and imparted life and colour to the rich tapestries, portraying stirring scenes from the Crusades, which covered the walls from floor to window. Complete suits of armour, exhibiting every known device of harness, and numerous weapons, fancifully arranged, decorated the spaces between the windows. And now began to appear, in this scene of splendour, groups of knights and nobles, arrayed in velvet and cloth of gold, and attending upon fair dames, sparkling with jewels, and bearing nodding plumes upon their braided hair. Conspicuous amidst these, and towering above all in stature, appeared the haughty mistress of Strasolda, attired in a robe of dark green velvet, which well relieved the fairness of her complexion, and displaying upon her finely moulded neck and arms a collar and bracelets of large and lustrous oriental pearls. Her firlgers were bedecked with costly rings, and upon her head she wore an ornament of singular device, which soon attracted universal attention. Above the rim of a golden comb, richly chased and studded with brilliants, arose a peacock with expanded tail. The body was of chased gold in imitation of feathers, the arching neck was mosaic work of precious stones, the eyes were sparkling diamonds of the purest water, and the feathers of the tail glittered with emeralds, rubies, and sapphires of singular beauty and lustre. So great was the curiosity excited by the dazzling splendour of these jewels, that the fair wearer was followed round the room by a train of ladies, anxious to observe at leisure a display of ornaments so extraordinary, and whispering to sympathizing ears conjectures not over charitable to the counsellor's wife. When, at length, she had seated herself upon one of the sofas which lined the walls, a circle of admiring gazers was formed, whose numbers were rapidly increased by the attendant cavaliers. While the lady was enjoying her triumph, a bustle at the entrance of the hall turned every head in that direction, when the cause appeared in the person of the young archduke, who entered in full costume, followed by a group of courtiers, and accompanied by a Venetian cavalier, of tall and commanding person, with whom he appeared to be in earnest discourse. The stranger was a large-boned, spare, and powerful man, of middle age, and attired in a black vest and pantaloons of woven silk, with a short cloak, of the same hue. The golden hilt of his rapier, and a gold chain and medallion round his neck, were his only ornaments. His features were large, regular, and grand, and the gaze of his full dark eyes serene, yet firm and potent; his complexion pale, and contrasting strongly with a dark beard which circled his visage like a frame. His high and massive forehead, and well closed lips, had a character of thought and decision, while his mien and tread were those of one long accustomed to authority. He seemed a man born after his time, and worthy to have lived and acted in the high and palmy days of Venice. After attending the archduke to the steps of the dais at the upper end of the hall, he made his bow, and began to pace the floor in seeming abstraction from the gay scene around him. Arrested in his progress by the numerous groups which, after saluting the archduke, had again collected around the counsellor's lady, he paused in returning conciousness; and, looking for the cause of such unwonted attraction, was enabled, by his lofty stature, to obtain a glimpse of the jewelled lady within the circle. Her features were unknown to him; but when his careless gaze fell upon the rare ornament which crowned her redundant tresses, his countenance became suddenly darkened by some strong emotion. Again, he looked more earnestly, and with increasing wonder and curiosity. Controlling, by a sudden effort, all outward evidence of feeling, he watched his opportunity, and at length penetrating within the crowd, stood for some moments before the object of attraction, and gazed, as if admiringly, upon her various adornments in succession; then, bowing gracefully, he addressed to her some words of compliment upon the splendour and value of the dazzling bird upon her head. "Fair lady," he continued, "I have a daughter whom I fondly love, and fain would I bestow upon her youthful beauty such ornaments as yours. But say, I pray you, where can the cunning hand be found which fashions such glorious birds? Was it in Venice or Vienna that you bought this materpiece of art?" Unsuspicious of evil, and bridling at gratified vanity at this attention from a stranger of such distinguished mien, the spoil-bedecked fair one replied to him as she had done to others.

"I bought this ornament, some weeks back, in Venice, at the store of a Greek trader from the Levant."

"Ha!" exclaimed the stranger; "and where dwelt this Greek, that I may see and ask him for another such?"

The concious lady, embarrassed by such close questioning, and somewhat alarmed by the kindling glances of the questioner, replied in haste-"Nay, signor, now I remember better, it was not a Greek I bought these gauds, but of a trading Jew, who walks the Merceria with a box of jewellry."

"Just now, methinks, you said a Greek, fair lady; and now you say a Jew. What next? Why not a Moslem, or perchance an Uzcoque?"

At this ominous conclusion, which the stranger muttered in tones of marked significance, the alarmed culprit started to her feet; and her fierce temper getting the better of her prudence, she boldly faced the cavalier, exclaiming, in a louder key than beseemed a courtier's wife-

"And who are you, signor, that dare thus question the lady of an archducal counsellor?"

"Lady!" he sternly answered, "here I am known to none save your husband's master; but in Venice men call me the Proveditore Marcello."

And now flashed upon the indignant signora a fearful reminiscence of Jurissa's unheeded and forgotten warning, to hide her jewels for a time, and to beware of the Proveditore Marcello. In utter dismay, and nearly fainting with alarm, she sank upon the sofa, and her eyes expanded into the wide stare of terror as she gazed at the menacing visage of the Venetian noble. Unwilling to expose the conscience-striken woman before so numerous an assemblage, he seated himself beside her, and in tones inaudible to others thus whispered in her ear-"Lady! but eight days back the jewels that you wear were mine. That peacock was my own design, and made for my daughter by a cunning artificer in Candia. Its like exists not in the world; for the mould was made by my order, and broken as soon as used. 'Twas mine until the base Uzcoques plundered my baggage. How thus quickly it passed from them to you, is as well known to me as to yourself. But mark me, lady! if all these jewels are not delivered at my apartments in the west wing of the castle ere midnight, I will denounce your husband and his colleagues as long-suspected and now-proved partakers with the Pirates of Segna. And, should redress be denied me here, the ambassador of Venice shall report this infamous collusion before a higher tribunal in Vienna."

Struck dumb by this terrible denunciation, the fair culprit gasped for breath, and her evident distress having been watched in growing wonder by the assembled ladies and cavaliers, the latter began to mutter threats of vengeance. One of them now stepped forward, and, grasping the hilt of his rapier, accused the Venetian of having insulted the wife of a nobleman high in the councils of the archduke, when the Proveditore, looking down upon the courtier with that riveted and intensely piercing gaze which staggers the beholder like a sudden blow, and may still be noted in many of Titian's portraits, answered with brief and startling emphasis-

"Signor! you do me grievous wrong. 'Tis I, and not the lady, who am the injured party."

Awed by his gathering brow, and the settled, stern, unsparing resolution which flashed from every feature, and indicated a man confident in his own resources, the courtiers did involuntary homage to his loftier spirit, and gave way. The proud Venetian strode through the yielding circle and quitted the hall, while the counsellor's wife, pleading illness and fatigue in reply to the pointed and numerous questions of surrounding friends and enemies, summoned her husband to attend her, and retired to her apartments.

Meanwhile the young Moslem and his companion in misfortune, who had been brought prisoners to Gradiska, were confined in one of the massive towers which flanked the castle. They had arrived not long before the comencement of the festival, and when going under guard along a corridor in the east wing, Ibrahim passed the open door of an apartment in which Strasolda was adjusting the rich jewels of the counsellor's lady before her appearance in the ball-room. Startled by the approaching tramp of armed men, the Uzcoque maiden raised her eyes, and beheld the noble and well-remembered features of the young Turk, whose captive she had been, and whose image had so strangely reappeared to her through the flitting cloud of smoke in the cavern. "Mother of Heaven!" she exclaimed, covering her eyes with her hands; "do I again behold that Moslem youth, ever appearing when least expected?" Again she gazed; but the prisoners, hurried onward by their guards, had proceeded to the end of the corridor, where a narrow winding staircase, fashioned in the immense thickness of the tower wall, led to their appointed prison, a large square apartment, the sides of which were panneled to a considerable height, and imperfectly lighted by small windows, or rather embrasures, perforating a wall many feet in thickness. Here they were left to their reflections, and to what comfort they could derive fron a lamp and a supply of provisions. Hassan, wearied with his journey, hastily swallowed his supper, and, stretching himself upon a paillasse, soon forgot his calamities in sound repose. Ibrahim, more vigilant and less apprehensive of future evil, as the Turks and Austrians were then at peace, paced awhile along the floor of his spacious prison, musing on the peerless charms of the Uzcoque maiden. From time to time he gazed upon the walls and windows as if calculating the chances of escape, when gradually the peculiar and regular design of the panneling caught and fixed his attention. It was divided by prominent mouldings into oblong squares, from the centres of which projected large diamond-shaped bosses of carved oak. This peculiarity at length roused into action some reminiscences of the early life and adventures of his beloved patron, the pacha of Bosnia, to the recital of which he had often, in his boyhood, listened with eager delight. These recollections, at first shadowy and indistinct, became gradually more vivid and accurate, until finally the full conviction flashed upon him that his benefactor, when taken prisoner in his youth by the Austrians, had been confined in this very tower and room, and, by a singular discovery, had been enabled to liberate himself and his fellow-prisoners. The pacha, then a subordinate in rank, in endeavouring to reach the level of one of the embrasures, had mounted upon the shoulders of a comrade, and was supporting himself by a firm grasp of the large boss in the centre of the pannel, when suddenly he felt it turning round in his hand. Surprised to find it not a fixture, he pulled it towards him, and found that it slowly yielded to the impulse. Drawing it out of the socket, he saw it followed by an iron chain, which for a time resisted all his efforts, but at length gave way, and he heard a grating sound like the drawing of a rusty bolt. Suddenly the entire pannel shook, and then the lower end started back sufficiently to betray a recess in the wall. Hastily descending on his comrade's shoulders, and pushing back the pannel, he discovered that it was supported by hinges, and was doubtless intended to conceal a secret issue from the castle, which he soon ascertained, and effected his escape. These facts were all that the memory of Ibrahim could supply; but they were enough to guide him in his search, and he immediately proceeded to sound the pannels in succession with his fist. Commencing with the southern or outer wall, which he supposed more massive and more likely to contain a secret passage, he sounded each pannel, and perceiving in the corner one more reverberation than in the others, he roused Hassan from his slumbers. "Hassan! Hassan!" he exclaimed, "Arouse thee, man! and listen to good tidings." The awakened sleeper gazed with half-opened eyes upon his excited companion, and would have dropped to sleep again had not a few words of explanation and the hope of escape fully roused him. Having with some difficulty perched his rotund person upon the ample shoulders of Ibrahim, he followed his directions and grasped the wooden boss, which, to the inexpressible delight of both, yielded, as it had done forty years before to the captive Turk, and displayed the iron chain. Bidding Hassan replace the boss, Ibrahim determined to postpone his attempt until the festival had collected all the guards and menials into the central edifice and its approaches. An hour before midnight, when the young Moslem expected the revelry would be at its height, Hassan again mounted upon his shoulders, and after many strenuous efforts, at length succeeded in drawing up the bolt. The pannel receded some inches, and Ibrahim raising it still further, seized the lamp and entered a small oblong recess in the wall, which was not less than ten or twelve feet in thickness. Perceiving no outlet, he examined the wooden flooring, and soon discovered a trap, which, when raised by the ring attached, exposed to view a steep and narrow descending staircase, leading apparently to some sally-port beyond the castle ditch. After carefully trimming his lamp, he was about to lead the way into this dark abyss, when a sound, sharp and sudden, as of something falling in the adjacent prison, caught his ear. Retracing his steps, he re-entered the apartment, where, after a brief search, he found beneath one of the embrasures a paper folded round a large pebble. Hastily opening it, the following lines, written in the lingua Franca so common in the Levant, were visible.

"Moslem! If thy soul belie not thy noble form and features, thou wilt not withhold thine aid from a bereaved and sorrowing daughter. Before to-morrow's sunset thou wilt be free, for Austria wars not with the Turk. Then straight repair to Venice, and there await the Battle of the Bridge. Take thy stand beneath the portal of St Barbara, and follow the man who whispers in thine ear,

"STRASOLDA."

"Mashallah!" shouted the enraptured youth, "these lines are from the Uzcoque maiden; and by the gates of Paradise I'll do her bidding, though it perils life."

For a time he was tempted to follow her guidance implicitly, and await the promised release from the authorities of Gradiska; recollecting, however, the proverbial slowness of Austrian counsellors, and too restless and ardent to endure suspense, he resumed his purpose of exploring the secret passage. After he had secured the pannel and replaced the boss, he bade Hassan follow him and began to descend. The staircase ended in a small passage round an angle, beyond which he discovered a similar descent, followed by another angle and staircase, proving that this secret issue from the castle penetrated through each of the four massive walls which formed the tower. At length their further progress was stopped by a door, originally strong and plated with iron, but now so much decayed, that although fastened by bolts without, the joint strength of the two captives forced it from its hinges. They now entered a vaulted passage of hewn stone, low and narrow, and with no visible termination. As they advanced, the long pent-up and dank unwholesome vapours made it difficult to breathe, and compelled Ibrahim to pause repeatedly and trim his lamp, which burned so dimly in this oppressive atmosphere as to be nearly extinguished. After a while the path began to slope upwards, and erelong they distinguished moonlight faintly streaming through a tangled mass of ivy which concealed the remains of an iron grating, broken probably in his patron's successful attempt to escape by this secret passage from the prison above. Gazing through the aperture, they perceived not many feet below what had once been the castle ditch, now dry, and forming a portion of the archduke's gardens. With a joyous heart and an elastic bound, Ibrahim reached the soft turf beneath. The more timid and helpless Hassan lowered himself by clinging to a remaining iron bar, and with the aid of his companion was soon on his feet, enjoying, with many thanks to Allah, the fresh air of heaven and the consciousness of escape from captivity. The gates of the palace gardens being unguarded during the festival, the liberated prisoners reached the coast without an obstacle, compelled a fisherman to take them in his bark across the Adriatic, and land them on the Lido, which forms the outward limit of the port of Venice. Then making free with an unwatched gondola, they sped across the bay, and were soon in safety, beneath the roof of a Turkish trader and correspondent of Hassan.

Before their escape was discovered on the following morning, the indignant Proveditore had departed for Venice, and Strasolda had disappeared.

* * *

COLONEL DAVIDSON'S TRAVELS IN INDIA.5

The appearance of this work was heralded some three months since, as divers of our readers may possibly remember, by a species of puff-preliminary, for which even the annals of Great Marlborough Street afforded no precedent-being nothing less than the appearance of Mr Colburn, in propria persona, at the bar of the police-office adjoining his premises, to answer the complaint of the gallant and irate author for what he was pleased to consider the unwarrantable detention of the MS. from which his narrative had been printed. It was alleged, in extenuation, that "the gallant colonel's MS. was so nearly undecipherable, that Mr Colburn had been put to considerable expense in revising the press;"-and a mysterious and curiosity-provoking hint was further thrown out, that "it was the custom of the trade, that, until a work was published, the MS. should not be parted with by the publisher, as it might turn out that some part of it was libellous, and in such case the publisher must produce the MS." In the end the gallant colonel (whom the newspaper reports described as "very much excited,") took nothing by his motion in regard to the recovery of the MS.; but though in this respect he may have been somewhat scurvily treated, we cannot equally sympathize with his complaints of the work not having been duly advertised; for surely all the little "neatly turned paragraphs" that ever proceeded from Mr Colburn's laboratory, could not have been so effectual as the method struck out by the impromptu genius of the colonel himself, in intimating to the public that something quite out of the common way might be expected from the forthcoming production thus brought before its notice.

And verily those who have been prepared for a queer volume, will not be disappointed in the diary of our choleric and corpulent colonel. If ever the assurance, which seems to be regarded as indispensable in the preface to works of this class, that the author "wrote the following pages purely for his own amusement," bore the stamp of unequivocal truth, it is in the present instance; and, notwithstanding the asseverations of Mr Colburn and his literary employés, it is difficult to conceive that any revision whatever can have been bestowed on the rough notes of the writer, since they were first hastily committed to paper amidst the scenes which they describe. The style is as rambling and unconnected as the incidents to which it refers; but wherever the author's devious footsteps lead us, from the jungles of Bundelcund to the holy ghats of Hurdwar, the principal figure is always that of the colonel himself, who, in the portly magnificence of twenty stone minus two pounds, fills up the whole foreground with himself and his accessories of servants, elephant, stud, Nagoree cows, and other component parts of the suwarree or suite of a Qui-hye, who can afford to make himself comfortable after the fashion of the country. The quantity (sometimes not trifling) and quality of his meals, the consequent state of his digestion, and his endless rows on the score of accommodations and forage with thannadars, darogahs, kutwals, and all the other designations for Hindoo and Hindoostani jacks-in-office, (for to Feringhi society he appears to have been not very partial,) may doubtless have been points of peculiar interest to the colonel himself, but are not likely to engage the attention of the world in general, and had better have been omitted in the revision of the diary, instead of being chronicled, as they are on all occasions, with wearisome minuteness of detail. But with all these drawbacks, a man who, as he says of himself, "has dwelt in India twenty-five years, and traversed it from the snowy range to Bombay on the west, must have seen something of the country, and may be supposed to know something of the natives"-among whom, by the way, he seems to have mingled more familiarly than most Feringhis; and in spite of all the egotism and rigmarole with which his pages abound, the rambles of this "stout gentleman" through Upper India, and some other parts of the country not much visited by Europeans, present us with a good deal of plain sense and sterling matter, viewed, it is true, with the eccentric eye of a humorist, and frequently couched in very odd phraseology; but not the less true on that account. His opinions on all men and all things are expressed with the same honesty and candour with which he narrates the various scrapes in which he was involved, while pushing right a-head like an elephant through a jungle;-and though laughing at him quite as often as with him, we have found the colonel, on the whole, far from an unpleasant travelling companion.

Bareilly, on the fronters of Oude and Rohilcund, was the colonel's starting-point;-and thence on St Patrick's day6 he set forward for Hurdwar, at the head of a retinue, the members of which, both quadruped and biped, he enumerates seriatim, giving the pas to the former-a precedence perhaps well merited by steeds up to such a welter weight under the climate of India, over such a set of unredeemed and thriftless knaves as he describes his native attendants. Accordingly, he gives the names and pedigrees of the whole stud, from "the buggy mare Maiden-head and my wicked little favourite Fish-Guts," up to "my favourite brood-mare Fair Amelia, purchased at a prize sale on the frontier, and bred by the king of Bokhara, with his royal stamp on her near flank-stands nearly fifteen and a half hands high, with magnificent action and great show of blood-had, when taken, four gold rings in her nostrils, now removed and replaced by silver, which will be stolen by her groom one by one." His first day's march was to Futtehgunge, ("the mart of victory," being the scene of the memorable battle in 1774, in which the English, as the bought allies of the Nawab Shoojah-ed-dowlah, defeated and slew the gallant Rohilla chief, Hafez-Rehmut;) and here he oracularly announced a discovery in gastronomy, of which it would be unpardonable not to give our readers the benefit. "I used my farourite condiment, tomata sauce, with my beef; and to all who are ignorant of this delicious vegetable I may venture to recommend its sauce, as at once both wholesome and savoury, if eaten with anything but cranberry tart or apple pie!" It is melancholy to reflect how often the best efforts of genius are anticipated and rendered of no avail. The colonel, when he penned this sentence with a heart overflowing with Epicurean philanthropy, was evidently unconscious that "chops and tomata sauce" were already familiar to the British public from the immortal researches of Mr Pickwick!

Rampore, in the territory of which the colonel now found himself, is still a semi-independent state, the Nawab of which has a revenue of sixteen lacs of rupees, (￡160,000,) while the city, being without the pale of English law, is "a city of refuge, a very Goshen of robbers, ... the streets are crowded with a mob of very handsome, idle, lounging fellows, having generally the fullest and finest jet-black beards and black mustaches in the world. Many of these were handsomely dressed, and many (which struck me as a very curious fact) appeared clean!" These were the Pathans and Rohillas, partly descended from the original Moslem conquerors of India, and partly from those who have more recently migrated from Affghanistan and the adjoining countries. The most athletic and warlike race among the Indian Mahommedans, and too proud of their blood to exercise any profession but that of arms, they are found in every town throughout Upper India, swaggering about with sword, shield, and matchlock, in the retinues of the native princes, and ready to join any enterprise, or flock to the standard of any invader, through whose means any prospect is afforded of shaking off the Feringhi yoke, and resuming their ancient predominance in the country which their forefathers won by their swords from the idolaters. "They hate us with the most intense bitterness, and can any one be surprised at it? We have taken their broad lands foot by foot." Few if any of these turbulent spirits are found in our European regular native army; their dislike to the cumbrous accoutrements and awkward European saddles operating equally, perhaps, with the severity of the drill and discipline to deter them; but they form the strength of the various corps of irregular horse-a force which, of late years, has most judiciously been greatly increased in numbers, and the uniform dashing bravery of which in the field, strongly contrasts with the misconduct of one at least of the regular native cavalry regiments in the late Affghan war. "I have seen," (says the colonel,) "a lineal descendant of Pathan Nawab's serving in the ranks of Hearsay's horse, as a common trooper on twenty rupees a-month, out of which he had merely to buy and feed his horse, procure clothes, arms, and harness, and sustain his hereditary dignity! By his commander and his fellow-soldiers he was always addressed by his title of Nawab Sahib!"

The small-pox was committing dreadful ravages in Rampore and its neighbourhood; and though vaccination was performed gratis at Bareilly, the fatalist prejudices of the natives, even of those of rank and education, prevented them from availing themselves of the boon. All the instances of the colonel, in behalf of a charming little girl, four years old, whose mother and sister had already taken the infection, could get from her father nothing more than a promise "to think of it! If it's her fate--" said he. "'You fool!' said I, in my civil way," (and the colonel's brusquerie was here, at least, not misplaced,) "'if a man throws himself into the fire or a well, or in the path of a tiger, is he without blame?'" Such apathy seems almost unaccountable to English minds; but it may find a parallel in Lady Chatterton's story of the Irish parents, 7 who, after refusing to spend fourpence in nourishment for a dying child, came in deep grief after its death to their employer, to solicit an advance of thirty shillings to wake the corpse! Perhaps some ingenious systematists might hence deduce a fresh argument in favour of the alleged oriental origin of the Irish.

The colonel's next stage was to Moradabad, another Pathan city, but under the raj of the Company, where, in a visit to a native original, named Meer Mahommed, he was greatly delighted by his new friend's introduction of the English word swap into a sentence of Hindoostani. And on the 25th he reached Dhampore, where the welcome proclamation, "that the new moon had been seen," terminated the fast of the Ramazan, to the uncontrollable joy of the Mussulmans, who would have been subjected to another day's abstinence if it had not been perceived till the succeeding evening. The colonel, however, slyly remarks, that "it was very odd that the Hindoos could not see the new moon," and hints that their imperfection of vision was shared by himself, but it was otherwise decided by the Faithful; and he proceeded, amid the noisy rejoicings of the Moslem feast of Bukra-Eed, (called by the Turks Bairam,) by Najeena, the Birmingham of Upper India, to Nujeebabad. Here resided, on a pension of 60,000 rupees (￡6000) a-year from the English government, the Nawab Gholam-ed-deen, better known by the nickname of Bumbo Khan, a brother of the once famous Rohilla chief Gholam-Khadir. Though past eighty years of age, and weighing upwards of twenty stone, he had not lost, any more than the equiponderant colonel, his taste for the good things of this world; and our traveller, on partaking of the Nawab's hospitality, records with infinite zest the glories of a peculiar preparation of lamb, called nargus, or the narcissus. But, alas! the reminiscences of the nargus were less grateful than the fruition, and the remorse of the colonel's guilty stomach (as poor Theodore Hooke, or some one else, used to call indigestion) continued to afflict him all the way to Hurdwar; and may probably account, by the consequent irritation of his temper, for various squabbles in which he was involved on the route.

The great fair of Hurdwar was in full swing at the colonel's arrival, with its vast concourse of Hindoo devotees from all parts of India, to whom it is in itself a spot of peculiar sanctity, besides lying in the way to the shrine of Gungotree, (the source of the Ganges,) in the Himmalaya-its crowds of merchants and adventurers of all sorts, even from Uzbek Tartary and the remote regions of Central Asia-Seiks by thousands from the Punjab, with their families-Affghan and Persian horse-dealers-and numerous grandees, both of the Hindoo and Moslem faith, who repair hither as to a scene of gaiety and general resort. The colonel found quarters in the tent of a friend employed in the purchase of horses for government, and seems to have entered with all his heart into the humours of the scene; his description of which, and of the varied characteristics of the motley groups composing the half million of human beings present, is one of the most graphic and picturesque sketches in his work. "Huge heaps of assafoetida, in bags, from the mountains beyond Cabool-tons of raisins of various sorts-almonds, pistachio nuts, sheep with four or five horns-Balkh8 cats, with long silken hair; of singular beauty-faqueers begging, and abusing the uncharitable with the grossest and most filthy language-long strings of elderly ladies, proceeding in a chant to the priests of the Lingam, to bargain for bodily issue-Ghat priests presenting their books for the presents and signatures of the European visitors-groups of Hindoos surrounding a Bramin, who gives each of them a certificate of his having performed the pilgrimage"-such are a few of the component parts of the scene; but the colonel's attention seems to have been principally fixed upon the horses, and the tricks of the dulals or brokers, to whom the purchase is generally confided, it being almost hopeless for an European to make a personal bargain with a native dealer. But among the greatest curiosities in this way were some tortoiseshell ponies-for we can call them nothing else-a peculiar race from Uzbek Tartary, which we never remember to have heard of before. "They were under thirteen hands high, and the most curious compound of colours and marks that can be imagined. Suppose the animal pure, snowy white; cover the white with large, irregular, light bay spots through which the white is visible; in the middle of these light bay let there be dark bay marbled spots; at every six or eight inches plant rhomboidal patches of a very dark iron-grey; then sprinkle the whole with dark flea-bites! There's a phooldar, ( flower-market,) as they call them;" and we agree with the colonel that such an animal would be a fortune at Bartlemy fair.

Among the distinguished visitors to Hurdwar at this season of festivity was the noted Begum Sombre, or Sumroo, whose face the colonel compares to that of an old Scotch highlander, and her person to a sackful of shawls, and who declared "that the Duke of Wellington must be at heart a Catholic, because he emancipated the Catholics!" He also renewed his gastronomic friendship with his friend Bumbo Khan, with whom the recollections of past indigestion did not prevent him from feasting on mahaseer, a delicious fish found in this part of the Ganges; and on this occasion his Apician ecstasies are not alloyed by subsequent regrets-"even now the recollection soothes me"-and he recommends such of his readers as are yet ignorant of this luxury to start forthwith for Hurdwar and repair the omission. The fair ended April 13; and the colonel having previously succeeded in disposing of his buggy to a potentate whom he calls "the Kheerea Thunnasir Rajah," (we believe, the ruler of one of the Seik protected states,) and buying a stout Turcomani pony for the hills, started the same day on the road to Suharunpoor. He favours his readers, en passant, with some exceedingly original speculations touching the Mosaic deluge, in reference to the hills about Hurdwar, which do not speak very highly for his attainments in geology, though in some other branches of natural history, and particularly in botany, he appears to be no mean proficient. The journey was disturbed by attempts to steal the colonel's new purchase, (which was not, like the rest of the stud, distinguished from the horses of the country by having its tail cut,) and by a quarrel at Secunderpore with a thannadar, or native police magistrate, whose European superior's neglect of the colonel's complaint he charitably attributes to "some (I hope slight) derangement of the stomach." At Suharunpore he visited the well-known botanist Dr Royle, the curator of the Company's botanic garden there, then engaged in those labours on the Flora of the Himmalayas which have been since given to the world; and at Boorea, leaving the British territory, he entered that of the protected Seik states, whose petty chieftains are secured in their semi-independence by the treaty with Runjeet in 1809, which confined the ruler of Lahore to the right bank of the Sutlej. But their reception of the colonel did not appear to indicate any great degree of gratitude for these favours to the British nation, as represented in his person; for not one of the five Seik chiefs, "each of whom has his own snug little fort close to the city," would supply him with a lodging; and it was only by perseverance and ingenuity that he secured a place to lay his head, after long wrangling with the subordinate functionaries. Matters improved, however, as he advanced further into the country; and, at the little mountain-city of Nahun, he was most hospitably received and entertained by the young rajah, Futteh Pur Grass Sing, "who had been educated almost entirely under the kind and fatherly superintendence of Captain Murray," the commissioner of the Seik states, and whose frank and gentlemanlike manners, "so unlike those of the ghee-fed wretches of the plains," did honour to his guardian's precepts. The town of Nahun, which is 3600 feet above the level of the sea, is described as clean and well paved; and the rajah, whose revenue had been increased under the management of Captain Murray from 37,000 to 53,000 rupees, was highly popular, and by the colonel's account deservedly so, with his subjects. He earnestly pressed "the fat gentleman" (whose caution in mounting an elephant, while two men on the other side of the howdah balanced his weight, vehemently excited his risibility) to return to the plains through Nahun, and have a month's shooting with him in the valley; but whether the invitation was accepted or not remains untold, as-"Alas for the literature of the age! when I was ordered to Bundelcund, a vile thief entered my tents at night, and robbed me of my second volume; and thus did I lose my carefully written account of the sub-Himmalayan range, which cost me fully eight months' labour."

Thus abruptly terminates the first part of the colonel's travels, and at the commencement of the second we find him crossing the Jumna to Calpee, the frontier town of Bundelcund, a wild and unsettled province, prolific in Thugs and bad characters of all sorts, and principally inhabited by a peculiar race called Bundelas, who have never been perfectly reconciled to the British supremacy, and who, at this present writing, are kept quiet only by the presence of a force of 15,000 men. Calpee is said to be the hottest place in India, the thermometer in June, according to the colonel, standing even on a cloudy day at 145 degrees-a degree of heat almost incredible; and it is also the principal mart for the cotton, which the rich black soil of Bundelcund produces of finer quality than any other part of Hindostan. But, notwithstanding its commercial inportance, the town was at this time left to the government of a native Darogah or chief of police, the nearest European courts being at Hameerpore, thirty miles distant, and the state of society seems to have been somewhat singular. Among its most conspicuous members is "Gopal, the celebrated robber, murderer, and smuggler, a tall athletic man about forty-two years of age, with a most hideous muddy eye, having the glare of hell itself. It is said that he has always fifteen servants in stated pay, and can in a few hours command the services of three hundred armed and desperate men; and the strength and vigour of the Calpee police may be estimated by the fact, that he has been known to walk into the house of a rich merchant in the centre of the town, when he was surrounded by his servants and family; he has very coolly selected the gold bangles of his children, and silenced the trembling remonstrances of the Mahajun by threats of vengeance; nor is this a solitary instance. When he murders, he is equally above all concealment; as in the recent case of a sepahee returning home with his savings, who was waylaid and murdered by our hero in open day. He very coolly gave himself up, acknowledging that he had killed the sepahee, who had first assaulted him. It was proved on the trial, that the sepahee was wholly unarmed, and he was condemned to be hung by the court of Hameerpore on his own confession, but released, from want of evidence, by the Sudder Court at Calcutta. Their objection was excellent, though curious; that if his confession was taken, it must be taken altogether, and not that part only which could lead to his conviction. He was released, and now walks about in his Sunday clothes, a living evidence of British tenderness."

Gopal was not the only amiable character with whom the colonel became acquainted at Calpee, as he sought and obtained an interview with a famous Thug approver, who had retired from the active exercise of his profession, and was travelling the country in company with a party of police, denouncing his former associates to justice. We cannot help suspecting, both from the traits recorded of him, and from the vicinity of Calpee to his former residence at Jalone, that this personage was no other than the celebrated Ameer Ali, whose adventures formed the ground of Captain Meadows Taylor's well-known "Confessions of a Thug;" and as a pendant to the already published descriptions of him, we here quote the impression he made upon the colonel. "I expected to see a great man, but at the first glance I saw that I was in the presence of a master. The Thug was tall, active, and slenderly formed; his head was nearly oval; his eye most strongly resembled that of a cobra di capello; its dart was perfectly wild and maniacal, restless, brilliant, metallic, and concentrated." The colonel had a narrow escape from irretrievably affronting this eminent professor of murder, by unguardedly enquiring whether he was in any way cognizant of a trifling robbery by which the colonel himself had been a sufferer. "No, sir!" he exclaimed with a look which might have frozen a less innocent querist; "murder, not robbery, is my profession ... and none but the merest novices would descend so low as to rob a tent or a dwelling-house." The colonel, however, expresses a shrewd suspicion, from circumstances which had come to his knowledge, that his distinguished visitor's esprit de corps led him to deviate from truth in this particular-a belief in which Captain Taylor's pages fully bear him out.

The colonel's movements, after quitting Calpee and its attractive circles, appear to have been somewhat desultory. We find him, successively, at Murgaon or Murgong, Julalpore, Keitah, &c., without being told what decided his route; but from some subsequent remarks, it appears probable that he was engaged on engineering service by order of Government. Between Julalpore and Keitah he fell in with a gang of nutts 9 or gipsies, whom the beauty of their women (a point to which the colonel is always alive) did not prevent him from suspecting of an intention to practise thuggee on his own portly person-a belief in which he was confirmed by hearing them speak in another tongue among themselves-no doubt the Ramasee, or cant language of the Thugs, subsequently made known to the world at large by the investigations of Major Sleeman. At Goraree he purchased some small cups, carved from the variegated serpentine of the rock on which the town is built; but, on proposing to employ the artist in making some larger vases, "he told me that he was a very poor man, and his efforts had never been directed to larger patterns; meaning to infer that it was impossible he could either try or succeed!" Such is Hindoo nature!

Churkaree, the capital of Ruttun Sing Buhadoor, one of the principal of the numerous rajahs among whom Bundelcund is divided, is described as "prettily situated on the side of the hill, over a lake covered with the white lotus flower, and having a very fine appearance from a distance, as most of the houses have their upper stories whitewashed, and are seen peeping through the dark-green leafy trees of the country, but the town, which contains perhaps 15,000 souls, of whom 1000 may be Mussulmen, is very straggling, irregular, and dirty." The male population were all fiercely mustached, and loaded with arms; but their repulsive exterior was more than compensated by the charms of the other sex, all of whom wore immense hollow ankle bangles of zinc, filled with bits of gravel, which tinkled as they walked. "I have never seen so many well-formed and handsome women together as I did at the wells outside the town, drawing water à la Rebecca. Some of their faces were strikingly intelligent, and their figures eminently graceful. The population is almost purely Hindoo; and I think the Hindoo females are more delicate in their forms than the Mussulmanees." The Rajah was, however, absent on a sporting excursion, and the darogah refused to provide the colonel with lodgings, alleging his master's orders that no Feringhis should be allowed in the town; and it was not till after a long altercation, of which the colonel gives himself greatly the best, that he succeeded in finding quarters in the house of a bunneea or grocer. But the next day's march (for Bundelcund is almost as thickly set with sovereign princes as Saxony itself) carried him out of the realm of this inhospitable potentate into the territories of the Rajah of Jalone, the once noted patron and protector of Thuggee, by whose agent he was most politely received at Mahoba, a once splendid but now ruined city, celebrated for its artificial lakes, which in long-past times were formed by a famous Rajpoot prince named Purmal, by damming up the narrow gorges of the hills. "Never had I seen, in the plains of India, a prospect more enchanting! Conceive a beautiful sheet of calm, clear, silvery water, of several miles in circumference, occasionally agitated by the splashing leaps of large fishes, or the gradual alighting of noble swan-like aquatic birds: its margin broken as if by the most skilful artist; now running into the centre, and ending in most romantic low rocky hills, covered with trees and embellished with black, antique Jain temples, deserted probably for hundreds of years, and at present the retreat of the elegant peafowl; in other places embanked with huge blocks of cut granite, embrowned by the shade of magnificent trees, under which small bright Hindoo temples, carefully whitewashed, might be seen in the shade; or bounded by abrupt rocky promontories, surmounted by many-pillared temples in ruins, hanging in the sky. A fine rich sunset gave an exquisite richness and classic magnificence to the scene. Many little boys with rod and line were ensnaring the sweet little singhee, or the golden rohoo or carp-bringing back to my heart the days, when, stealing from school, I was wont to sit on the rocks of the Dee, at Craglug, near Aberdeen, watching the motion of a float that was not under water once in the twenty-four hours."

The colonel's laudable habit of associating freely, whenever opportunity occurred, with the natives, gave him considerable insight into the state of the country, where the caprices of the native princes were not then much interfered with, and which consequently, as he says, "was pretty much in the situation of the Emerald Isle;" and verily if the tale told him by the Hindoo gosain or priest at Jouraho?, of the murder of his predecessor in the temple, and the impunity of the robbers, were correctly related, the Bundelas have not much to learn in the arts of bloodshed and depredation. "This village being a sort of corner to the territories of several Rajahs, robberies, murders, and all other diversions, are of daily occurrence; and when enquiries are made; each territory throws the blame on its neighbour." The maxim of government most current in Bundelcund, both with rulers and ruled, seems indeed to have been-

"The good old rule, the simple plan,

That those should take who have the power,

And those should keep who can;"

for while this strange confusion of meum and tuum prevailed among the peasantry, the country was ruined by the oppressive and irregular exactions of the rajahs, both zemindars and cultivators flying from their habitations to escape the levying of the rents, which were often demanded more than once by different collectors. At Chundla, the colonel was lodged in the house of an opulent zemindar, who had absconded for the reason just given; "and one of the thanna servants told me, that, by those means, Bundelcund was depopulated"-a statement corroborated by the numerous ruined brick houses remaining in the towns among the miserable hovels of the present day. The rajahs of Bundelcund are, almost without exception, of Rajpoot lineage, and thus of a different race from their Bundela subjects; but the condition of the country is much the same wherever it is left under the sway of the Hindoo princes, who are exempt even from the partial restraint which the Koran imposes on the despotism of Mahommedan rulers. The only effectual cure for the evils reigning in Bundelcund will be its formal incorporation with the dominions of the Company-a consummation which, from the refractory spirit shown in the province after our losses in Affghanistan, is probably not far distant.

The remainder of the colonel's notes on Bundelcund relate principally to his visits to the ancient hill-fortresses of Ajeegur and Kalingur, both formerly occupied in force by the British, but now-with the exception of a havildar's (sergeant's) party of sepoys posted at the former, and a single company at the latter-garrisoned solely by the lungoors, or large black monkeys, whom the colonel found holding solemn assembly in the Jain temples and the hall of audience, built by the famous Rajah Purmal at Ajeegur. While exploring his way along the ruined and overgrown ramparts, he had a narrow escape from the fangs of a large venomous serpent, ("the Katula Rekula Poda, No. 7 of Russell,") on which he was on the point of treading, and which, in commendable gratitude for its forbearance; he allowed to glide off unharmed by his fowling-piece; "but he was the first reptile that ever escaped without the chance of losing his life at my hands." On the road to Kalingur he had an interview with a petitioner, who offered him 400 rupees in cash, or a large diamond, for his interest in a certain case then pending before the judge at Bandah; "but I explained to my client that I was not in that line of business, and as I saw he had no intention of insulting me, we parted friends." Kalingur, which was taken by the British after a long siege in 1812, stands on a rock towering "upwards of 850 feet above the plain below, and probably about 3000 feet above the level of the sea;" but its strength as a fortress is as nothing in comparison to its sanctity, which entitles every one, who resides there only as long as it takes to milk a cow, to especial beatitude-the object of veneration being a lingam of black stone enshrined in a temple, the guardianship of which is jointly vested in five resident families of Bramins. "At this time," says the colonel, "the place is not worth keeping, the country being so thoroughly impoverished and desolate;" and he accordingly, after viewing the marvels of the locality, pursued his way to Banda, and thence laid a dak (or travelled by palanquin with relays of bearers) to Calpee, "there to sit from nine to four, writing filthy accounts of bricks and mortar, square feet, cubic feet, and running feet, rupees, annas, and pie; squabbling with wrinkled unromantic villains, whose cool-tempered and overwhelming patience amply deserve their unlawful gains-I mean as labourers in the vineyard of villany."

"A sporting excursion in Oude," in the spring of 1836, comes next in order of time; and in regular order we accordingly take it, though it has pleased either Mr Colburn or the colonel to place it after the voyage down the Ganges. The colonel left Lucknow, March 2; and three days later the whole party rendezvoused at Khyrabad, consisting of "Mrs, Miss, and Brigadier Churchill, Colonel Arnold, Major Cureton, Lieut. Waugh, Dr Ross of her Majesty's 16th Lancers, and the writer of these amiable records;" to whom was soon after added, in the capacity of guide and hanger-on, "Sam Lall, by birth a Chuttree or Rajpoot, by profession a zemindar, and by inclination a sycophant and shikarree, (hunter.)" Indian field sports, with their concomitants of hogs, hogdeer, jungles, elephants, tigers, and nullahs, have been of late years rendered so familiar to stay-at-home travellers, that we shall but concisely notice the colonel's exploits in this forest campaign, which present no remarkable novelty, though detailed con amore, and with the two-fold zest of a sportsman and an epicure. With all deference, indeed, to the colonel, we have shrewd doubts whether the latter feeling was not the predominant one; for the death of a tiger, nine of which fell during the three weeks' foray before the rifles of himself and his companions, is evidently chronicled with less of heart-felt enthusiasm than characterises his encomiums on the hogdeer soup, the delicate floricans and black partridges, (in the preparation of bread sauce, for which, with his own hands, he earned immortal renown,) and the other materials for good living poured forth from the cornucopia of an Indian game-bag. His gastronomic fervour during this jaunt reaches at times an ecstatic pitch, which, as old Weller says, "werges on the poetical." "For him (the gastronomist) the dark rocks and arid plains of the dry Dekkan produce their purple grapes, and cunning but goodly bustard; for him burning Bundelcund its wonderful rock pigeon and ortolan inimitable; the Jumna, most ancient of rivers, its large rich Kala banse, and tasty crabs; for him yields the low and marshy Terace her elegant florican; the mighty Gunga its melting mahaseer; the Goomtee its exquisite mullet. And shall he not eat and delight in her fruits? ... Let the ass eat its thistles, and the swallow its flies au naturel; you and I, reader, know better!"

One day, while wading on their elephants through a deep marsh in pursuit of a tiger, the chasseurs suddenly stumbled upon a pleasant family party-"a labyrinth of huge boa-constrictors or pythons, sound asleep, floating on a bed of crushed nurkool, (a gigantic species of reed,) the least of them twenty feet long, and two feet in circumference. A more beautiful natural mosaic cannot be imagined: they appeared, from being wet, as if recently varnished. Perhaps they were from twenty to thirty in number, and occupied a spot of about twenty feet square. No sooner did the dreadful glistening reptiles hear the click of my rifle, and feel its ball, than they shot forth with all their vigour, and diving, disappeared in an instant under the matted roots of the tall nurkool, and, although I tried, I could not get another glimpse." One of these giant serpents, seventeen feet long, and eighteen inches in circumference, which the colonel calls a small one, was shot a few days afterwards by Colonel Arnold. The marsh and jungle swarmed with peacocks, jungle-fowl, and wild-fowl of all sorts, affording glorious sport; and, besides the smaller kinds of deer, several specimens occurred of a magnificent species of stag with twelve-tyned horns, called baru-singa-apparently allied to the sambur and rusa of the Dekkan. The comparatively small number of tigers killed was, however, a source of disappointment; since the utility of these battues, in which the superior fire-arms and appliances of the English are brought into action for the destruction of these ferocious animals, may be estimated from the damage done by them in the wilder parts of India, "which is beyond the belief even of Indo-European residents, and must, consequently, appear an exaggeration to distant Englishmen. General (then Captain) Briggs, when resident at Dhoolia in Candeish, in 1821, where his potails, or head men, were obliged to keep a register of the oxen (exclusive of sheep and goats) destroyed in their villages, reported that no less than 21,000 had been killed in three years! As no register is kept in Oude, it is impossible to register the number."

On the banks of the Mohun-nuddee the party was joined by Rajah Ruttun Sing, a chief holding a considerable tract of country under the suzerainté of Oude, who favoured them with his company while they remained in his district-a compliment which he expected to be acknowledged, as he distinctly intimated on taking leave, by the gift of a valuable fowling-piece; but this modest request was parried by the rejoinder, that none of their guns were good enough for his highness! During one of the halts, an incident occurred which strongly illustrates the inhuman apathy of the Hindoos towards any one not connected with them by the ties of caste. A man was found sitting under a tree near the camp, uttering strange cries, and the servants were desired to order him to withdraw; "they returned, saying carelessly that he was a nutt, or gipsy, who had been robbed." A robbery from a gipsy was such a strange contradiction of terms, that the colonel went personally to enquire into the matter, when he was horror-struck by finding, that the man had been, not only plundered of his earnings by a band of Bunjarras, but frightfully mutilated and wounded, a trifle which the Hindoo servants had not thought worth mentioning. The poor wretch's arm was amputated by Dr Ross; and, being carried with the camp and carefully tended, he was at last dismissed, with a fair prospect of recovery, and with a gift of sixty rupees subscribed among the party; but not even the example of the sahibs could teach the Hindoos humanity, and only the peremptory commands of Dr Ross could prevail upon his bearer to place a mattress under the sufferer! On their return march, the party were further honoured by visits from several rajahs and zemindars, all of whom were "loud in complaint against the extortions of the aumils, who constantly attempted to gather more, and sometimes twice and a half as much, as the stipulated rent, in consequence of which the zemindars were compelled to rebel;" a view of the political condition of Oude which naturally results from its anomalous position, under a sovereign nominally independent, who is at once too weak to control his own subjects, and fearful of diminishing the shadow of authority left to him by calling in the only available aid. On the 29th of March the party again reached Khyrabad, the appointed place of their separation, as it had been of their meeting; and here the narrative, as before, breaks off abruptly.

The concluding part, in order of time, of the colonel's lucubrations, contains his narrative of a voyage on the Ganges, from Allahabad, by Dhacca, to Calcutta; but the features and incidents of this navigation have been so frequently described by travellers of all sorts and kinds, from Bishop Heber and Captain Bellew to our own much-esteemed Kerim Khan, that we shall devote but brief space to it. He quitted Allahabad, as he informs us, December 5, 1839, so deeply regretted by the native population, that they determined to perpetuate his memory by the erection of a new ghat or landing-place, every brick of which was to be stamped with the letter D-a distinction which he had, no doubt, deserved by the bonhommie towards both Hindoo and Moslem, which forms one of the most favourable traits in the jovial colonel's character. The Tribeenee Ghat, immediately below Allahabad, where the streams of the Jumna and the Ganges unite, is one of the holiest spots in India; to which pilgrims resort from all quarters, in the hope of securing paradise by dying at the junction of the sacred waters. The spirit of religious exclusiveness prevails here as well as in other places; and the colonel mentions his having been once an eyewitness of some rough treatment received by a chumar, or leather-dresser, (one of the lowest castes,) at the hands of some high caste sepoys, who were highly indignant that so mean a carcass should presume to defile the holy ground! Leaving the ghats and devotees behind him, however, and floating down the stream in his capacious three-roomed budgerow, he passed Mirzapoor, Chunar, and even the holy city of Benares, (which he perversely spells Bunarus,) without halting; and reached without adventure or mishap the mouth of the Goomtee, where his attention was attracted by a party of eighteen young elephants, the property of the king of Oude, bathing in the river. "Of all animals, saving the Bundela goat, there is none that suffers more from change of climate than the elephant: of the numbers caught on the eastern frontier, probably not one in four survives a journey to Delhi. Bred in the darkest and most gloomy forests, they are in a great measure sheltered from heat by the eternal moisture of the cool shady bower under which they rove; and are then expected to bear all on a sudden the most intense heat, acting directly on their jet-black skins, when brought into the plains of Upper India. A very clever native told me he could make money by any thing but young elephants." Another curious fact relative to the elephant, mentioned in a subsequent chapter on the authority of Captain Broadfoot of the Madras commissariat, is, that both wild and tame elephants are extremely subject to a pulmonary disease, which proved on dissection to be tubercular-in fact, consumption! It was found to yield, however, to copious bleedings, if taken in its early stages.

The colonel's pages, at this point, are filled with digressions and dissertations on subjects somewhat miscellaneous-Aberdeen pale ale-the enormities of Warren Hastings' government-the late James Prinsep and the moral precepts of the Rajah Piyadasee-and a most incomprehensible rhapsody about "a red mustached member of the Bengal civil service," of which we profess ourselves utterly incompetent to make either head or tail, and strongly recommend the colonel to expunge it if the work reaches another edition. The voyage presents no incidents but the usual ones of pelicans, alligators, and porpoises: and on January 15, he arrived at Dhacca, "the once famous city of muslins." But the muslin trade has now almost wholly disappeared; and with it "the thousands of families of muslin weavers, who, from the extreme delicacy of their manufacture, were obliged to work in pits, sheltered from the heat of the sun and changes of the weather; and even after that precaution, only while the dew lay on the ground, as the increasing heat destroyed the extremely delicate thread." The jungle is in consequence advancing close upon the city, which is thus rendered almost uninhabitable from malaria-the only manufacturers which continue to flourish being those of violins, bracelets, made from a peculiar shell resembling the Murex tulipa, and-idols for Hindoo worship!

The colonel remained at Dhacca till February 4, awaiting ulterior orders from headquarters, and had, consequently, abundance of leisure for making himself acquainted with the place and its people. These researches, however, were not always unattended with danger; for on one occasion, while viewing the city from an elevated building, a piece of plaster was struck from the cornice near where he stood by a matchlock ball-a delicate hint that the Mussulmans disliked being overlooked. The Nawab, apparently the son of Bishop Heber's acquaintance, Shumseddowlah, still resides in the palace of his ancestors, but is described as an extravagant, uneducated youth, who has mortgaged away his income from 5000 to 200 rupees per mensem-that is, from L.6000 to L.240 per annum. The inhabitants were a mixture of almost all the creeds and nations of Asia-Chinese, Thibetans, Mugs from Arracan, Burmese, Malays, etc.; but the great majority are Hindoos, whose sanguinary goddess Kalee is adored in not less than fifty temples. The Greeks and Armenians also have each a church, the services of which, as described by the colonel, are conducted in much the same form as at Constantinople:-"But among the (Armenian) matrons only was any appearance of devotion visible; one of them, most gorgeously appareled in the Armenian fashion, with a magnificent tiara of jewels on her brow, and wearing a superb shawl, threw herself on the ground, with her head sunk between her arms, towards the altar, and remained in that position nearly five minutes. The others, being dressed à l'Anglaise, with stiff stays and fashionable bonnets, could not afford to indulge in such a position." The Armenians were formerly numerous in Dhacca, and are still an influential and wealthy body; the Greeks are now "few and far between," but in the palmy days of Dhacca they were a flourishing community.

Dhacca was a place abounding in strange characters from all parts of the world; and among others whom the colonel encountered, was a singular specimen of a cosmopolite, a native of Fez, who called himself a Moslem, but whom our friend vehemently suspected of being a Jew. He had been almost as great a traveller as his countryman the famous Sheikh Ebn Batuta, whose wanderings are immortalized in the pages of Maga,10 and came last from Moulmein, with a cargo of black pepper and rubies. He had resided seventeen years in India, and proposed to the colonel, whom he claimed as a brother, "since from his own home he could reach England in ten days," that they should jointly freight a vessel with valuables, and go home together! And, among other scattered facts, a casual encounter with some Chinese in the employ of the Assam Tea Company, whom the colonel considerably astonished by addressing them in their own language, introduces "the very curious fact," that at Tipperah, a civil station not more than fifty or sixty miles from Dhacca, the natives have from time immemorial used the tea which grows there abundantly, and is prepared after a fashion of their own. "And yet" (continues the colonel-and we fear there is too much truth in his remarks) "the existence of the tea-plant is but a recent discovery! Any other nation would have established a tea-manufactory at Tipperah, immediately after the first settlement, and the Yankees would have 'progressed' railroads and steam-boats for its success. India is at this moment a mine of unexplored wealth. No sooner had steam-boats appeared than coal has been discovered in every direction!" The manufacture of native iron in Bengal, which had been pressed upon Lord Hastings, as the colonel seems to imply, by himself, and at first warmly adopted by him, was objected to in the council, and ultimately abandoned, "on the grounds that it would militate against the commercial interests of Great Britain-that is, against the profits of those India stockholders, possessing votes, who followed the trade of ironmongers!" There is many a true word spoken in jest; and this and other side-cuts of the colonel at the shortsighted proceedings of the Bahadurs at Calcutta, though sometimes queerly worded, contain now and then some unpalatable facts. The administration of the present Governor-General has shown at least some promise of a better state of things-and if the impulse now given to the development of the resources of India be steadily followed up, this reproach will erelong be taken away. The receipt of his final orders, however, which pointed out China as his destination, put an end to the colonel's speculations; and re-embarking on the stream of the Booree Gunga, he passed, with little incident worth noticing, through the numerous branches of the river, and the picturesque jungles of the Soonderbunds, and arrived safely, after an absence of twenty-one years, at the city of palaces-and there we leave him.

The subject of the manufactures and products of India, is not, however, the only point connected with the internal administration, respecting which some inconvenient facts find their way to light in the colonel's pages-and with one or two of these revelations, we shall conclude our extracts. The majority of those Anglo-Indian employés, who have favoured the world with "Reminiscences" and "Narratives," are singularly free from the charge of what is familiarly termed "telling tales out of school." According to their account, nowhere is justice so efficiently administered, or its functionaries so accessible, as in our Indian empire; but here, whether from the native frankness of the colonel's disposition, or from his having nothing more to hope or fear from the old Begum in Leadenhall Street, we find this important subject placed, on several occasions, in rather a different light from that in which it is usually represented. It is well known that Sir David Ochterlony, a short time before his death, discovered by mere accident that he was enrolled as a pensioner to a large amount on the civil list of almost every native prince in Upper India, from the emperor of Delhi downwards-his principal moonshee, or native secretary, having thrown out intelligible hints, as though from his master, that such douceurs would not be without their use in securing his powerful interest at Calcutta-the moonshee himself quietly pocketing the proceeds. This was certainly an outrageous instance; but it is the direct interest of every native subordinate to screen his own misdeeds and extortions, by promoting to the utmost, in his European superior, that inaccessibility to which he is naturally but too much inclined-and the extent to which this system of exclusion is carried, may be inferred from the following anecdote. The colonel had been requested by a native landholder of high respectability, to introduce him to the house of a civilian; and on asking why he could not go by himself, was told, "I dare not approach the very compound of the house he lives in! If his head man should hear that I ventured to present myself before the gentleman without his permission, he would immediately harass me by some false complaint, or even by instituting an enquiry into the very title-deeds of my estate, which might, however falsely, terminate in my ruin. It is not long since I paid eleven hundred rupees to -- to suppress false claims, which, if they had actually gone into court, would have cost me ten times the sum."

Of the practical effects of criminal punishments, the colonel does not speak more highly. "In the real Hindoostanee view of the subject, a convict in chains is nearly a native gentleman-a little roué, perhaps-employed on especial duties in the Company's service, for which he is well fed, and has little labour. A jail-bird can easily be distinguished after the first six months, by his superior bodily condition. On his head maybe seen either a kinkhab (brocade) or embroidered cap, or one of English flowered muslin, enriched with a border of gold or silver lace. Gros de Naples is coming into fashion, but slowly.... Was he low-spirited, he could, for a trifling present, send to the bazar, and enjoy a nautah from the hour the judge went to sleep till daybreak next morning-nay, under proper management, he might be gratified by the society of his wife and family.... See him at work, the burkandauze (policeman) is smoking his chillum, while he and his friends are sound asleep, sub tegmine fagi. All of a sudden there is an alarm-the judge is coming! up they all start, and work like devils for ten or fifteen seconds, and then again to repose. This is working in chains on the roads! In fact, after a man is once used to the comforts of an Indian prison, there's no keeping him out!"

All this, no doubt, is broad caricature-but "ridentem dicere verum quid vetat?" a motto which the colonel could not do better than adopt for any future edition of his eccentric lucubrations. And so Rookhsut! Colonel Sahib! may your favourite tomata sauce never pall upon your palate; and though perhaps you would hardly thank us for the usual oriental good wish, that your shadow may continue to increase, may it at least never be diminished by that worst of all fiends, indigestion!

* * *

BELFRONT CASTLE.

A RETROSPECTIVE REVIEW.

One half of the world was surprised that Reginald Belfront married Jane Holford-and the other half was equally surprised that Jane Holford married Reginald Belfront; for, considering the experience that both halves of the world must have had, it is amazing how subject they still are to surprise. To us, who have not the pleasure to belong to either half, there is very little surprising in the matter. Reginald had been for some time on a visit at the house of a distant relation-old Sir Hugh de Mawley. He had wandered through the great woods of the estate, and found them very tiresome; had strolled in the immense park, and found it dull; and, in the long evenings, had sat in the stately hall, and listened to the endless, whispered anecdotes of his host, and found them both intolerable. No wonder he started with joyful surprise when, one day in the drawing-room, he heard the rustle of a silk gown; caught the glancing of some beautiful real flowers on the top of a bright-green bonnet; and, more wonderful than all, the smile of the prettiest lips, and the glances of the clearest eyes he had ever seen in his life. The gown, the bonnet, the smiles, and eyes, all belonged to Jane Holford; and Reginald, who had, up to this time, made no great progress in the study of comparative physiology, now made such rapid strides, that he could have told you every point in which the possessor of the above-named attributes differed from the stiff and prim Miss de Mawley, who had hitherto been the sole representative of the female sex in Mawley Court. The neck and shoulders-the chin-nose-arms- ankles-feet-not to mention the hair and eyebrows-of the new specimen, were minutely studied; and, in spite of the usual antipathy he entertained against all scientific pursuits, he felt a strong inclination to be the owner of it himself, in order to pursue his investigations at full leisure. He was no genius-hated books-disliked clever people-but prided himself on his horsemanship, his play at quarterstaff, his personal strength, and, above all, in his fine old castle in a somewhat inaccessible part of Yorkshire, which had remained in the possession of his family ever since the Conquest. Jane, on the other hand, had no castle to boast of; and probably had no ancestor whatever at any period preceding the year 1750, when her grandfather had bought an estate near Mawley Court-which had gone on improving with the improvement of the times, till her father found himself the possessor of a rent-roll of fifteen hundred a year, four sons, and six grown-up daughters. It will easily be believed that no objections to the match were raised on the part of a middle-aged gentleman, with so many reasons for agreeing to the marriage settlement proposed by Reginald Belfront; consisting, as it did, of a jointure to the widow, and the use of Belfront Castle for life, without the remotest allusion to any portion or other contingent advantage on the other side; and as Jane herself was, if possible, still more satisfied on the subject than her father, all the arrangements were rapidly made, and in less than three months after the apparition of the silk gown and other etceteras in the drawing-room, the indissoluble knot was tied, and Miss Cecilia, the second daughter, was advanced to the dignity of Miss Holford, vice Jane-promoted.

The church was all decked out with roses and other pleasing emblems of the unfading nature of connubial bliss; wreaths of sunflowers, with the same comfortable moral, were hung up over the great gate of Mawley Court; while Miss de Mawley, representing in her own person the evergreens omitted in the garlands, received the happy couple on their return from the ceremony at the head of all the female domestics, from the housekeeper down to the kitchenmaid, and led the bride and bridegroom to the table in the great hall, where old Sir Hugh was sitting in great state. They kneeled down before his chair; and, laying his hand on their heads, he began blessing; but not having practised that style of oratory so much as he ought, it rapidly degenerated into a grace-and, as lunch in the mean time was brought in, and the Holford family, and one or two of the neighbours who had been present at the ceremony, had now arrived, the eloquence of Sir Hugh was not altogether thrown away. There were several speeches and toasts, and sundry attempts at jocularity; and Sir Hugh began the story of the French countess and the waterfall at Fountainbleau; and Reginald availed himself of the somnolency of the rest of the party to slip out with his bride without being observed, just as the royal family began to suspect the secret-and, long before the incensed husband sent the challenge, the happy pair were careering onward as fast as the postboy could drive, on the first stage of their wedding tour.

A month afterwards they were in a country inn in Wales. The window at which they sat commanded a view of the beautiful vale of Cwmcwyllchly-a small river glided down in winding mazes, hiding itself behind wooded knolls, and brawling over rocks in the most playful and picturesque manner imaginable. The sun had begun to set, and was taking a last look at the prospect, with his vast chin rested on the top of Penchymcrwm, presenting to the poetical mind an image of a redfaced farmer looking over a five-barred gate-every thing, in short, that is generally met with in Tourists' Guides, as constituting a splendid view, was assembled on this favoured spot; and yet Jane heaved a deep sigh, and appeared to take no notice of the landscape.

"You're tired, my love," said Reginald; "you have walked too far up these Welsh mountains."

"I hope to get used to climbing," answered Jane; "there are plenty of hills at Belfront-aren't there?"

"Yes, we have plenty of hills; but why don't you call it home, Jane?"

"Because I have never lived there," she replied; "and a place can scarcely be called home that one has never seen."

"But you have never said you wished to see it."

"Oh, but I have wished it all the same-may we-may we go-home?"

She said the word at last, and Reginald was delighted.

"Home! to be sure-to-morrow, at daybreak; for, to tell you the truth, I don't care sixpence for fine views-in fact, I don't think there is any difference between any two landscapes-except that there may be hills in one, and none in another, or woods, or a river-but they are all exactly the same in reality. So, let us go home, my love, as fast as we can, or I'm very much afraid Mr Peeper won't like it."

"Mr Peeper?" enquired Jane. "Who is Mr Peeper?"

"You will know him in good time," said Reginald; "and I hope he will like you."

"I hope he will-I hope all your friends will like me-I will do every thing in my power to please them."

"You're a very good girl, Jane; and Mr Peeper can't help but be pleased, and I am glad of it; for it ought to be our first study to make ourselves agreeable to him."

"Agreeable to Mr Peeper!" thought Jane. "How strange that I never was told about him before this moment! Does he live in the castle, Reginald?" she asked.

"Certainly. One of his family has lived there ever since one of mine did; so there is a connexion between us of a few hundred years."

"Have you any other friends who live in the castle?" enquired the bride.

"I don't know whether Phil Lorimer is there just now or not; he has a room whenever he comes; and a knife and fork at table."

"Who is he?"

"A capital fellow-full of wit-and makes funnier faces and better songs than any man in Yorkshire. You will like Phil Lorimer."

"And I hope he will like me!"

"If he don't, I'll break every bone in his body."

"Oh! I beg you won't," said the bride with a smile, and looking up in Reginald's face to assure herself he spoke in joke. It was as earnest a face as if it had been of cast-iron; and she saw that Mr Lorimer's only chance of preserving a whole skin was to like her with all his might.

"Is there any one else?"

"There's Mr Peeper's assistant, Mark Lutter-a clever man, and a great scholar. I hate scholars, so he dines in the servants' hall, or far down the table-below the salt."

"Are you serious?" enquired Jane.

"Do you not like scholars?"

"What's the use of them? I never could see what they were good for-and, besides, Mr Peeper hates them too."

"Then why does he keep this man as his assistant?"

"Because if he didn't, the fellow would rebel."

"Well, you could turn him off."

"We never turn any body off at Belfront Castle. If they go of their own accord, we punish them for it if we can-if they stay, they are welcome. Mr Peeper must look to it, or Lutter will make a disturbance."

"What a curious place this castle must be," thought Jane, "and what odd people they are that live in it!" She asked no more questions, but determined to restrain her curiosity till she could satisfy it on the spot; and, luckily, she had not long to wait. Next day they started on their homeward way. As they drew nearer their destination, Jane's anxiety to gain the first glimpse of her future home increased with every mile. She had, of course, formed many fancy pictures of it in her own mind; and, as love lent the brush and most obligingly compounded the colours, there can be no doubt they made out a very captivating landscape of it between them.

"At the top of the next hill," said Reginald, "you will see the keep."

Jane stretched her head forward, and looked through the front window as if she could pierce the hill that lay between her and home. On went the horses; but the next hill seemed an incredible way off; it was now getting late, and the shadows of evening, like a flock of tired black sheep, began to lie down and rest thenselves on the vast dreary moor they were travelling over. At last Jane felt that they were beginning an ascent; and a sickly moon, that seemed to have undergone a severe operation, and lost nearly all her limbs, lifted up her pale face in the sky. The wind, too, began to whistle in long low gusts, and Reginald, who was not of a poetical temperament, as we have already observed, was nearly asleep. They reached the hill top at last, and a great expanse of rugged and broken country lay before them.

"Where is it?-on which hand?" said Jane.

"Straight before you," replied the husband; "it is only three miles off; the high-road turns off to the left, but we go through fields right on."

Jane looked with almost feverish anxiety. At a good distance in front, rose a tall black structure, like the chimney of a shot manufactory-a single, square, gigantic tower-throwing a darker mass against the darkened sky, and sicklied o'er on one of the faces with the yellow-green moonlight. There were no lights in it, nor any sign of habitation; and Jane would have indulged in various enquiries and exclamations, if the carriage had allowed her; but it had by this time left the main road, and sank up to the axles in the ruts; it bounded against stones, and wallowed in mire alternately; and all that she could do, was to hold on by one of the arm rests, as if she had been in the cabin of a storm-toss'd ship.

"For mercy's sake, Reginald, will this last long?" she said, out of breath with her exertions.

"We are about a mile from the drawbridge. I hope they have not drawn it up."

"Could we not get into the castle if they have?"

"We might fall into the moat if we tried the postern."

"Oh, gracious!-is there a moat?"-and instinctively she put her hand to her throat, for her mother had brought her up with a salutary dread of colds, and she felt a sensation of choking at the very name.

At this moment, the agonized carriage, after several groans that would have moved the heart of a highway commissioner, gave a rush downward, and committed suicide in the most determined manner, by dashing its axle on the ground-the wheels endeavouring in vain to fathom the profundity of the ruts, and the horses totally unable to move the stranded equipage. The sudden jerk knocked Reginald's hat over his eyes against the roof of the carriage, and Jane screamed when she felt the top of her bonnet squeezed as flat as a pancake by the same process, but neither of them, luckily, was hurt.

"We must get out and walk," said the husband; "it isn't more than half a mile, and we will send Phil Lorimer, or some of them, for the trunks."

He put his arm round Jane's waist, and helped her over the almost impassable track.

"We must try to get the road mended," said Jane.

"It has never been mended in our time," was the reply; and it was said in a tone which showed that the fact so announced was an unanswerable argument against the proposition of the bride.

"A few stones well broken would do it all," she urged.

"We never break stones at Belfront," was the rejoinder; and in silence, and with some difficulty, they groped their unsteady way. At last they emerged from a thick overgrown copse, in which the accident had happened, and, after sundry narrow escapes from sprained ankles and broken arms, they reached the gate. It was an immense wooden barrier, supported at each end by little round buildings-like a slice of toast laid lengthways between two half pounds of butter. It was thickly studded with iron nails, and the round piers were of massive stone, partly overgrown with ivy, and as solid as if they had been formed of one mass.

"Does any body live in those lodges?" enquired Jane.

"There is a warder in the inner court," said Reginald. "These are merely the supporters of the outer gate."

"And how are we to get in?"

"We must blow, I suppose." And so saying, Reginald lifted up a horn that was hung by an iron chain from one of the piers, and executed a flourish that made Jane put her fingers to her ears.

In a short time the creaking of an iron chain-whose recollection of oil must have been of the most traditionary nature-gave intimation that its intentions were decidedly hospitable; and with many squeaks and grunts the enormous portal turned at last on its hinges, and exposed to view a narrow winding road between two walls, which, in a short time, conducted the visitors to a long wooden bridge over a piece of stagnant water-the said bridge having only that moment been let down from the lofty position in which its two halves were kept by an immense wooden erection, which bore an awful resemblance to a scaffold. When they got over the bridge, Reginald turned round, and, imprinting a kiss on the pale cheek of the astonished bride, said-

"Welcome home, dear Jane. This is Belfront Castle!"

Jane looked round a spacious courtyard, and saw a square of low dark-looking buildings, with the enormous tower she had seen from the top of the hill rearing its thick head above all at one corner. They proceeded across the roughly-paved quadrangle, and entered a low door; ascended three steps, and opened another door. They then found themselves in a large and lofty hall, with fitful flashes of red light flickering on the walls, as the flame of the wood fire on the hearth rose or fell beneath the efforts of a half distinguishable figure, extended at full length on the floor, and puffing the enormous log with a pair of gigantic bellows. In the palpable obscure, Jane could scarcely make out the persons of the occupants of the apartment; but when the flame burnt up a little more powerfully than usual, she observed the figure of a tall man dressed in black, who shook hands with Reginald, and bowed very coldly and formally to her, when he was introduced as Mr Peeper. He seemed about fifty or sixty years of age, but very much enfeebled. He stooped and coughed, and was very infirm in his motions; but when the red glare from the hearth fell upon his eyes, they fixed themselves on Jane with such a piercing expression, that she turned away her face almost in fear. His hair was snow-white, and yet it was impossible to decide whether he was a man of the years we have stated, with the premature appearance of age, or a person of extraordinary longevity, retaining the vigorous eyes and active spirit of youth. However it was, Mr Peeper was too harsh and haughty in his approaches, and exacted too much deference from the youthful bride, to be very captivating at first. He said no welcome to the new-comer, and was stiff and unkind even to the owner of the castle. Candles were soon brought in, and Jane took the opportunity of looking round. The individual who had been busy blowing the fire now rose from his humble position, and was presented to the lady as Phil Lorimer. He bowed and smiled, and was proceeding with a compliment, in which, however, he advanced no further than the summer sun bringing out the roses, when Reginald pushed him out of the hall, with orders to get the luggage brought in from the carriage, and to be back in time for supper. Phil Lorimer seemed a man of thirty, strongly built, with a sweet voice and friendly smile; but what station he filled in the household-whether a servant, a visitor, a poor relation, or what he could be, Jane could not make out, either from his manner or the way he was treated.

"Mr Lorimer is very good-natured-very obliging, to take care of the luggage, I am sure," said Jane.

"Better that than talking nonsense about roses," replied Reginald. "Did you expect us this evening, Mr Peeper?"

"I did, Mr Reginald, and have invited a few of the neighbours to meet you."

"Who are coming?"

"Sir Bryan De Barreilles, Hasket of Norland, Maulerer of Phascald, and old Dr Howlet. They will be here soon, so you had better make haste."

"I had better not appear, love," said Jane; "no ladies are coming, and among so many gentlemen my presence might be awkward."

"By no means," replied the husband. "It wouldn't be right, Mr Peeper, for my wife to be absent from the supper-table?"

"Certainly not. It is to see her the neighbours are coming."

Is this Mr Peeper to have the control of all my actions? thought Jane. Who can he be?

She took another glance at the object of her thoughts, but caught his eye fixed on her with the same penetrating brightness as before; and she cast her looks on the ground; and, whether from anger or fear, she felt her cheeks glowing with blushes.

"You will not be long gone, if you please," he said to Jane as she retired to change her dress.

"You don't seem pleased to see us, Mr Peeper," said Reginald, when Jane had gone to her room under the guidance of a very tall old woman, who walked before her, holding out a tremendously long candle, as if it were a sword, and she was at the head of a military procession.

"No, sir," replied Mr Peeper; "I am not pleased with the person you have brought here. You have gone too far from home for a wife. None of the Belfronts have ever married out of Yorkshire, and it may give rise to troubles."

"I am very sorry my wife's relations would not allow me to send for you to perform the ceremony."

"It is a bad omen," said the old man; "my predecessors have married your predecessors without a break since the conquest. It bodes no good."

"I trust no harm will happen, and that you will soon forget the disappointment."

"None of my family forget, but we will not talk of it." So saying, he turned away, and arranged a goodly array of bottles on the sideboard. Reginald sat down on an oak chair beside the fire, and gazed attentively into the log.

In the mean time, Jane had followed her gigantic conductor through half a mile of passages, and reached a small room at one end of the quadrangle, and through the window (of which half the panes were broken, as if on purpose) she caught the melodious murmur of a rapid river, that chafed against the foundation walls of the castle. On looking round, the prospect was not very encouraging. Tattered tapestries hung down the walls, and waved in a most melancholy and ghost-like fashion in the wind; the floor was thinly littered over with some plaited rushes, to supply the place of a carpet; and a few long high-backed oak chairs kept guard against the wall. The fire had died an infant in its iron cradle, the grate; and the curtain of the bed waved to and fro in mournful sympathy with the tapestry round the room. Jane was so cold that she could hardly go through her toilette, simple as it was; but having at last achieved a very slight alteration in her dress, and left her bonnet on the head of an owl, which formed the ornament of one of the high-backed chairs, she endeavoured to retrace her steps; and after a few pauses and mistakes, she found her way once more into the hall.

The guests in the mean time were assembled and had seated themselves at table. On Jane's entrance they all rose, and on being respectively named by their host, bowed with cold and stately courtesy, and sat down again. The four strangers seemed all of the same ages, fifty or thereabouts-tall, hale, and dignified in their manners. Sir Bryan de Barreilles had a patch on his right eye; Hasket of Norland a deep scar on his forehead, that cut his left eyebrow into two parts, and gave a very extraordinary expression to his rigid countenance; Maulerer of Phascald had the general effect of very handsome features, marred by the want of his nose; not that there was actually no nose, but that it did not occupy the prominent position it usually holds on the human face divine, but was inserted deep between the cheeks-in fact, was a nose not set on after the fashion of a knocker, but a fine specimen of basso-relievo, indented after the manner of Socrates's head on a seal, and would probably have made a very fine impression. Dr Howlet was perfectly blind, and from the tone in which he was addressed by the other gentlemen, Jane concluded he was also very nearly deaf. Besides these, there were present Mr Peeper, at the foot of the table next to Reginald, and on the other side of him a thick square-built man, with a fine hilarious open countenance, who was perhaps of too low a rank to be introduced to the lady of the castle-no other in fact than the redoubtable Mr Lutter, of whom Jane had heard on her journey home.

After the serving men, with some difficulty, had brought in the supper, consisting of enormous joints of meat, hot and cold, and deposited on the sideboard vast tankards of strong ale and other potent beverages, Mr Peeper rose, and folding his hands across his breast, and bending forward his head with every appearance of devotion, muttered some words evidently intended to represent a grace; but so indistinct that it was utterly impossible to make the slightest guess at their meaning, whereupon they all fell to with prodigious activity, and cut and slashed the enormous dishes as if they had been famished for a year. Mr Lutter, after making an observation that true thankfulness was as much shown by moderate enjoyment of good gifts as by long prayers said over them, made a most powerful assault on the cold sirloin, and, of all the party, was the only one who had the politeness to send a helping to Jane. She was tired and hungry, and felt really obliged by the attention, but could scarcely do justice to the viands from surprise at the conversation of the guests.

"Ho, ho!" said Sir Bryan de Barreilles, "I once knew a thing-such a thing it was too-ho! ho!" And partly the vividness of the recollection, and principally an enormous mouthful of beef, produced a long fit of coughing-"'twill make you laugh," he continued-"'twas a rare feat-ho! ho!-even this lady will be pleased to hear it."

Jane bowed in expectation of an amusing anecdote.

"One of my tenants was going to be married; his bride was a very young creature, not more than eighteen, and on the wedding-day, as I always was ready for a joke in those days-ah! 'tis thirty years ago, or more-I asked the bridal party to the Tower. Ho! ho! such laughing we had!-Giles Mallet and Robin Henslow fought with redhot brands out of the fire, till I thought we should all have died; and Giles-the cleverest fellow and the wittiest, ho! ho!-such a fellow was Giles!-he took up the poker instead of the fir-log, and watched his opportunity, ho! ho!-it was redhot too-a good stout poker as ever you saw-and ran it clean through his cheek-you heard the tongue fizz! as it licked the hot iron-'twas a famous play. How Robin roared, to be sure, and couldn't speak plain-ho! ho! Well, the games went on; and nothing would please some of the young ones but we should see the Oubliette. 'Twas a dark hole where my forefathers imprisoned their refractory vassals, and sad stories were told about it-how that voices were heard from the bottom of it, and groans, and sometimes gory heads were seen at the top of it, looking up to the skylight, and struggling to escape, but ever tumbling back into the deep dark hole, with screams and smothered cries; a rare place for a man's enemies-but it had not been used for many years. Well-nothing would do, but when we were all merry with ale, we should all go and see the Oubliette, and a kiss of the bride was promised to the one who should go down the furthest. Now, the stone steps were very narrow at best; and were all worn away-and that was the best of it-all along the passages we went, and past the dungeon grating, till we came to the open mouth of the Oubliette. Ho! ho! how you'll laugh. Down a step went one-no kiss from the bride for him-two steps went another-some went down six steps, and one bold fellow went down so far that we lost sight of him in the darkness. Then the bridegroom, a stout young yeoman-thought it shame to let anyone beat him in daring, for so rich a prize as a kiss from the rosy lips of his bride, and down-down-he went-step after step-till finally, far down in the gloom, we heard a loud scream-such a scream-ho! ho! I can't help laughing yet when I think of it-and in a minute or two, whose voice should we hear but Giles Mallet's! There was Giles, hollowing and roaring for us to send down a rope but how he had got down, or when he had gone down, nobody knew. However, a rope was got, and merrily, stoutly, we all pulled, but no Giles came up. Instead of him, we drew forth the bridegroom! but such a changed man. His eyes were fixed, and his face as white as silver-his mouth was wide open, and his great tongue went lolling about from side to side-and he shook his head, and mumbled and slavered-he was struck all of a sudden into idiocy, and knew nobody; not even his bride. She was sinking before him, but he never noticed her, but went moaning, and muttering, and shaking his head. Ho! ho! 'twas the comicalest thing I ever saw. And when Giles came up he explained it all. Giles had gone down deeper than any of them, and waited for the others on a ledge in the cavern; and just when the bridegroom reached it, Giles seized him by the leg, and said-'Your soul is mine'-ho! ho! 'Your soul is mine,' said Giles-and the bridegroom uttered only the loud, long scream we had all heard, and stood and shook and trembled. 'Twas a rare feat; and if you had come down last year"-he added, turning to Jane-"you would have seen the bridegroom going from door to door, followed by all the boys in the village-he never recovered. There he went, shake, shaking his head-and gape gaping with his mouth. "Twas good sport to teaze him. I've set my dogs on him myself; but he never took the least notice. 'Twas a good trick-I never knew better."

"And the bride?" enquired Jane.

"Oh, she died in a week or two after the adventure! A silly hussy-I wished to marry her, by the left hand, to my forester, but she kept on moping and looking at the idiotical bridegroom, and died-a poor fool."

"Ah! we've grown dull since those merry times," said Hasket of Norland, looking, round the empty hall, and then towards Reginald, as if reproaching him with the absence of the ancient joviality. "There were three men killed at my marriage-in fair give and take fight-in the hall, at the wedding supper. There is the mark of blood on the floor yet."

"I lost my eye at the celebration of a christening," said Sir Bryan de Barreilles. "My uncle of Malmescott pushed it in with the handle of his dagger."

"I got this wound on my forehead at a feast after a funeral," said Hasket of Norland. "I quarreled with Morley Poyntz, and he cut my eyebrow with an axe. 'Twas a merry party in spite of that."

"The Parson of Pynsent jumped on my face at a festival in honour of the birth of Sir Ranulph Berlingcourt's heir," said Maulerer of Phascald. "I had been knocked on the floor by the Archdeacon of Warleileigh, and the Parson of Pynsent trode on my nose. He was the biggest man in Yorkshire, and squeezed my nose out of sight-a rare jovial companion, was the Parson of Pynsent, and many is the joke we have had about the weight of his foot. Ah! we have no fun now-no fighting, no grinning through a horse-collar, no roasting before a fire, no singing"-

"Yes," said Reginald, "we have Phil Lorimer."

"Let him come-let us hear him," said some of the party.

"I hate songs," said Dr Howlet; "and think all ballads should be burned."

"And the writers of them, too," added Mr Peeper, with a fierce glance towards the fireplace, from which Phil Lorimer emerged.

"Oh no! I think songs an innocent diversion," said Mr Lutter, "and softening to the heart. Sit near me, Mr Lorimer."

"Make a face, Phil," cried the knight; "I would rather see a grin than hear your ballad."

"Jump, Phil," said Hasket of Norland, applying his fork to Phil's leg as he passed, "you are a better morris-dancer than a poet."

Phil, who was imperturbably good-natured, did as he was told. He opened his mouth to a preternatural size, turned one eye to the ceiling, and the other down to the floor, till Sir Bryan was in ecstasies at his achievement. He then sprang to an incredible height in that air, and danced once or twice through the hall, throwing himself into the most grotesque attitudes imaginable, and the table was nearly shaken in pieces by the thumpings with which the party showed their satisfaction.

"Now then, Phil; here's a cup of sherry-wine-drink it, boy, and sing a sweet song to the lady," said Reginald.

"Songs are an invention of the devil," said Mr Peeper.

"Unless they are sung through the nose," said Mr Lutter, with a sneer.

"You approve of songs then?" inquired Mr Peeper, with a fierce look.

"Certainly," said Mr Lutter, "when their subject is good, and the language modest."

"Then you are an atheist," retorted Mr Peeper.

"What has a ballad to do with atheism?" enquired Mr Lutter, looking angry.

"You approve of wicked songs, and therefore are an atheist."

"A man is more like an atheist," retorted Mr Lutter, "who is ungrateful to God for the gift of song, and shuts up the sweetest avenue by which the spirit approaches its Creator. I admire poetry, and respect poets."

"Any one who holds such diabolic doctrines is not fit to remain in Belfront Castle."

"Nay," replied Mr Lutter, "Belfront Castle would be infinitely improved if such doctrines were adopted in it."

"Gentlemen," said Reginald, "you are both learned men; and I know nothing about the questions you discuss."

"Your lady shall judge between us," said Mr Lutter.

"She shall not," said Mr Peeper; "I am the sole judge in matters of the kind."

"Let us hear Phil's song in the mean time," said Reginald. "Come, Lorimer."

"What shall it be?" said Phil.

"Something comic," said Sir Bryan.

"Something bloody," said Hasket of Norland.

"Something loving," said Maulerer of Phascald.

"Will the lady decide for us?" said Phil, with a smile. "Will you have the 'Silver Scarf,' madam; or 'the Knight and the Soldan of Bagdad?' They are both done into my poor English from the troubadours of Almeigne."

The lady fixed, at haphazard, on "the Knight and the Soldan of Bagdad:" and Phil prepared to obey her commands. He took a small harp in his hand, and sate down in the vacant chair next to Sir Bryan de Bareilles. The rest of the company composed themselves to listen; and, after a short prelude, Lorimer, in a fine manly voice, began-

"Oh, brightly bloom'd the orange flow'r,

And fair the roses round;

And the fountain, in its marble bed,

Leapt up with a happy sound;

And stately, stately was the hall,

And rich the feast outspread;

But the Soldan of Bagdad sigh'd full sore,

And never a word he said.

Never a word the Soldan said,

But many a tear let fall;

He had tried all the joys that life could give,

And was weary of them all.

The Soldan lift up his heavy eye-

And to that garden fair,

A stranger enter'd with harp in hand,

And with a winsome air;

Long locks of yellow molten gold

Hung over his cheek so brown,

And a red mantle of Venice silk

Fell from his shoulders down.

A weary wanderer he did seem,

Come from a distant land;

And over the harpstrings thoughtfully,

He moveth his cunning hand.

He opes his lips, and he poureth forth

Such a sweet stream of sound,

That the Soldan's heart leaps up in his breast,

And his eye he casts around.

'Was never a voice,' the Soldan said,

'So sweet-nor so blest a song;-

Sing on, kind minstrel,' the Soldan said,

'I have been sad too long.'

The minstrel sang, and soft and sweet

The Soldan's tears fell free;

'Oh, tell me, thou minstrel dear,' he said,

'What boon shall I give to thee?

Oh, stay with me but a year and a day,

And sing sweet songs to me;

And whatever the boon, by Allah, I swear,

I will freely give it to thee.'

The minstrel stay'd a year and a day,

And the Soldan loved him well;

'Now what is the boon thou askest of me-

I prithee, dear minstrel, tell.'

'A Christian knight in thy dungeon pines,

And his hope is nearly o'er;

His freedom is the boon I ask-

Oh, open his prison door!'

The minstrel went-and no more was seen;

And the Christian knight, set free,

Found a stately ship, that bore him safe

Home to his own countrie.

And his lady met him at the gate,

His lady fair and young;

And with a scream of pride and joy,

She in his bosom hung.

Oh, glad, glad was the Christian knight,

And glad was his lady fair,

And her pale cheek flush'd as he cast aside

The locks of her raven hair,

And kiss'd her brow, and told the tale

Of his dungeon, deep and strong;

And of the minstrel, too, he told

And of the power of song.

And they blest the minstrel, and blest his song,

And soon the feast was dight;

And prince and noble crowded in,

To welcome home the knight.

And when the brimming cup went round,

Spoke out an evil tongue,

And blamed that lady to her lord,

That lady fair and young;

And told, with many a bitter sneer,

How that, for many a day,

When he was prison'd in Paynim land,

That dame was far away,

And none knew where; but all could guess-

Up rose the knight, and kept

His hand close clutch'd on his dagger heft,

And down the hall he stept;

And onwards with the dagger bared,

He rush'd to the lady's bower-

'Thou hast been false, and left thy home-

Thou diest this very hour!'

'Oh! it is true, I left my home;

But yet, before I die,

Oh! look not on me with face so changed,

Nor with so fierce an eye!

Oh! let me, but for a minute's space,

Into my chamber hie;

One prayer I would say for thee and me-

One prayer-before I die!'

She left the bower; and as he stept

To and fro in ireful mood,

A stranger from the chamber came,

And close behind him stood.

Long locks of molten yellow gold

Hung over his cheek so brown,

And a red mantle of Venice silk,

Fell from his shoulder, down.

Dark frown'd the knight-'Vile churl!' he said;

But ere he utter'd more,

The stranger let the mantle fall

Unclasp'd upon the floor,-

And off he cast the yellow locks-

And, lo! the lady fair,

Blushing and casting from her cheek

Her glossy raven hair!

Down fell the dagger; down the knight

Sank kneeling and opprest;

And the lady oped her snow white arms,

And wept upon his breast!"

"A foul song!-a wanton woman!"-exclaimed Sir Bryan de Barreilles-"he should have stabbed her for living so long with a Jew villain like the Soldan of Bagdad."

"Was the villain a Jew?" enquired Dr Howlet, who had caught the word. "I did not know Bagdad was in Jewry. Is a heathen the same as a Jew, Mr Peeper?"

The gentleman thus appealed to, coughed as if to clear his throat, and though he usually spoke with the utmost clearness, he mumbled and muttered in the same unintelligible manner as he had done when he was saying grace; and it was a very peculiar habit of the learned individual, whenever he was applied to for an explanation, to betake himself to a mode of speech that would have puzzled a far wiser head than Dr Howlet's, to make head or tail of it.

Dr Howlett, however, appeared to be perfectly satisfied with the information; and by the indignant manner in which he struck his long gold-headed ebony walking-stick on the floor, seemed entirely to agree with the worthy knight in his estimate of the heroine of Phil Lorimer's ballad.

"I like the ballad about the jousting of Romulus the bold Roman, with Judas Maccabaeus in the Camp at Ascalon far better," said Hasket of Norland. "Sing it, Phil."

"No, no," cried Maulerer, who was far gone in intoxication. "Sing us the song of the Feasting at Glaston, when Eneas the Trojan married Arthur's daughter.-Sing the song, sirrah, this moment, or I'll cut your tongue in two, to make your note the sweeter.-Sing."

Thus adjured, Phil once more began:-

"There was feasting high and revelry

In Glaston's lofty hall;

And loud was the sound, as the cup went round,

Of joyous whoop and call;

And Arthur the king, in that noble ring,

Was the merriest of them all.

No thought, no care, found entrance there,

But beauty's smiles were won;

No sour Jack Priest to spoil the feast"-

"Ha!" cried Howlet, interrupting Mr Lorimer in a tremendous passion, "what says the varlet? He is a heathen Turk, and no Christian. How dares he talk so of the church?" The old man rose as he spoke, and, suddenly catching hold of the enormous ebony walking-stick, which generally reposed at the side of his chair, he aimed a blow with all his force at the unfortunate songster; but, being blind, and not calculating his distance, his staff fell with tremendous effect on the left eye of Sir Bryan de Barreilles.

"Is it so?" cried the Knight, stunned; but resisting the tendency to prostration produced by the stroke, and flinging a large silver flagon across the table, which missed Dr Howlet, and made a deep indentation in the skull of Maulerer of Phascald-"Now, then!"

Hasket of Norland attempted to hold Sir Bryan, and prevent his following up his attack; and Mr Maulerer recovered sufficiently to fling the heavy candlestick at his assailant; the branches of which hit the cheek of Hasket, while the massive bottom ejected the three front teeth of Sir Bryan.

There was now no possibility of preventing the quarrel; and while the four strangers were pounding each other with whatever weapons came first to hand, and Mr Peeper crept under the table for safety, and Reginald essayed to talk them into reason, Mr Lutter politely handed Jane to the door of the hall.

"Permit me, madam, to rescue you from this dreadful scene."

"Is it thus always?" enquired Jane, nearly weeping with fright.

"There are many things that may be improved in the castle," said Mr Lutter. "I have seen the necessity of an alteration for a long time, and, if you will favour me with your assistance, much may be done."

"Oh! I will help you to the utmost of my power."

"We must upset the influence of Mr Peeper," said Mr Lutter. "May I speak to you on the subject to-morrow?"

A month had passed since Jane's arrival at Belfront Castle, and she had had many private and confidential conversations with Mr Lutter. The ominous eyes of Mr Peeper grew fiercer and fiercer, and she many times thought of coming to an open rupture with him at once; but was deterred from doing so, by not yet having ascertained whether her influence over Reginald was sufficiently established to stand a contest with the authority of his ancient friend. She could not understand how her husband could have remained hoodwinked so long; or how he had submitted to the despotic proceedings of his former tutor, who persisted in assembling the same airs of authority over him, as he had exercised when he was a child. Such, however, was evidently the case; and Reginald had never entertained a thought of rescuing himself from the thraldom in which he had grown up. A look from Mr Peeper; a solemn statement from him, that such and such things had never been heard of before in Belfront; and, above all, the use of the muttered and unintelligible jargon to which Mr Peeper betook himself in matters of weight and difficulty, were quite sufficient: Reginald immediately gave up his own judgment, and felt in fact rather ashamed of himself for having hinted that he had a judgement at all. Under these circumstances, Mr Lutter had a very difficult part to play; and all that Jane could do, was to second him whenever she had the opportunity. One day, in the lovely month of April, Phil Lorimer sat on a sunny part of the enornous wall that guarded the castle, and leaning his back against one of the little square towers that rose at intervals in the circuit of the fortifications, sang song after song, as if for the edification of a number of crows that were perched on the trees on the other side of the moat. The audience were grossly inattentive, and paid no respect whatever to the performer, who still continued his exertions, as highly satisfied as if he were applauded by boxes, pit, and gallery of a crowded theatre:-Among others, he sang the ballad of the "Silver Scarf."

"It was a King's fair daughter,

With eyes of deepest blue,

She wove a scarf of silver

The whole long summer through-

"A stately chair she sat on

Before the castle door,

And ever in the calm moonlight

She work'd it o'er and o'er.

"And many a knight and noble

Went daily out and in,

And each one marvell'd in his heart

Which the fair scarf might win.

"She took no heed of questions,

From her work ne'er raised her head,

And on the snow-white border

Sew'd her name in blackest thread.

"Then came a tempest roaring,

From the high hills it came,

And bore the scarf far out to sea

From forth its fragile frame:

"The maiden sate unstartled,

As if it must be so-

She stood up from her stately chair,

And to her bower did go.

"She took from forth her wardrobe

Her dress of mourning hue-

Whoever for a scarf before

Such weight of sorrow knew?

"In robes of deepest mourning,

Three nights and days she sate;

On the third night, the warder's horn

Was sounded at the gate-

"A messenger stands at the door,

And sad news bringeth he;

The king and all his gallant ships

Are wreck'd upon the sea.

"And now the tide is rising,

And casts upon the shore

Full many a gallant hero's corse,

And many a golden store.

"Then up rose the king's daughter,

Drew to her window near;

'What is it glitters on thine arm,

In the moonlight so clear?'

"'It is a scarf of silver,

I brought it from the strand;

I took it from the closed grasp

Of a strong warrior's hand.'

"That feat thou ne'er shouldst boast of

If but alive were he;

Go take him back thy trophy

To the blue rolling sea.

"And when that knight you've buried,

The scarf his grave shall grace;

And next to where you've laid him,

Oh, leave a vacant place!"

"Here, you cursed old piper! leave off frightening the crows, and open the gate this moment. Who the devil, do you think, is to burst a bloodvessel by hollowing here all day?"

Mr Lorimer, though used to considerable indignities, as we have already seen, had still a little of the becoming poetical pride about him, and looked rather angrily over the wall. "Nobody wishes you to break bloodvessels, or have their own ears disturbed by your screaming," he said. "What do you want?"

"To get into your infernal house, to be sure. Where did you get such unchristian roads? My bones are sore with the jolting. Send somebody to open the gate."

"The drawbridge is up, and Mr Peeper must have his twopence."

"Who the devil is Mr Peeper?" said the stranger. "I sha'n't give him a fraction. Who made the drawbridge his? Is Mr Belfront at home?"

"Yes, he is in Mr Peeper's study."

"And Mrs Belfront?"-

"Pickling cod. It is Mr Peeper's favourite dish; so we all live on it sometimes for weeks together."

"With such a trout-stream at your door? He'll be a cleverer fellow than I think him if he gets me to eat his salted carrion. Open the door, I say, or you'll have the worst of it when my stick gets near your head. Tell Mrs Belfront her uncle is here-her Uncle Samson."

Phil Lorimer saw no great resemblance to the Jewish Hercules in the little, dapper, bustling-mannered man in a blue coat with bright brass buttons, pepper-and-salt knee-breeches, and long gaiters, who thus proclaimed his relationship to the lady of the castle. He hurried down from the wall to make the required announcement.

"My uncle Samson, the manufacturer, from Leeds! Oh, let him in, by all means!" exclaimed Jane; "he was always so kind to me when I was a child!"

"He can't get in, madam, unless Mr Peeper orders the drawbridge to be lowered; and he is now busy with Mr Belfront."

"Go for Mr Lutter; he will be glad to hear of uncle Samson's arrival."

Mr Lorimer discovered Mr Lutter comfortably regaling himself in the buttery; but on hearing in what respect his services were required, he left unfinished a large tankard of ale, with which he was washing down an enormous quantity of bread and cheese, and proceeded to the moat.

"Don't disturb Mr Peeper," he said, "but help me to launch the little punt."

By dint of a little labour, the small vessel was got into the water, and Mr Lutter, taking a scull in his hand, paddled over to the other side, and embarked the gentleman in the blue coat. Paddling towards an undefended part of the castle, he taught him how to clamber up the wall; and Mr Samson, wiping the stains of his climbing from the knees of his nether habiliments, looked round the castle-yard. "Well! who'd have thought that such a monstrous strong-looking place should be stormed by a middle-aged gentleman in a punt!"

"You've a friend in the garrison, you'll remember, sir, and the battlements have never been repaired."

"They ain't worth repairing. It's a regular waste of building materials to make such thick walls and pinnacles. Blowed, if them stones wouldn't build a mill; and a precious water-power, too," he added, as he saw the river sparkling downward at the northern side. "Oho! I must have a talk with Jane. Will you take me to Mrs Belfront? I haven't seen her for five years. She must be much changed since then, and I must prepare her for the arrival of her cousins."

Jane was sitting in the great hall, feeling disconsolate enough. Often, in her father's comfortable parlour, she had read accounts of baronial residences of the olden time; and one of the greatest pleasures she had felt in becoming Mrs Belfront, was to be the possessor of a real bona fide castle that had been actually a fortress in the days of knighthood. She had studied long ago the adventures of high-born dames and stately nobles, till she was nearly as far gone in romance as Don Quixote; and many questions she had asked about Belfront, and donjon-towers, and keeps, and tiltyards, and laboured very hard to acquire a correct idea of the mode of life and manners of the days of chivalry. Her imagination, we have seen, was too lively to be restrained by the more matter-of-fact nature of her husband; and she now felt with great bitterness the difference between presiding at a tournament, or being present at the Vow of the Peacock, and the slavish submission in which she, with the whole household, was held by Mr Pepper. Deeply she now regretted the feelings of superiority she had experienced over her own relations by her marriage into such an ancient race as the Belfronts. She felt ashamed of the contempt she had felt for the industrious founders of her own family's wealth, and at that moment would have preferred the blue coat and brass buttons of her uncle Samson, to all the escutcheons and shields of the Norman conquest; and at that moment, luckily, the identical coat and buttons made their appearance.

"Well, niece, here's a go!" exclaimed the angry uncle. "Is this a way to receive a near relation after such a journey?"

"Oh, uncle!"

"Why, did ye never hear tell of such a place as Kidderminster?-have you no carpets?"

"Mr Belfront says there were no carpets in his ancestor's time"-

"And no railroads, nor postchaises, nor books, nor nothing; and is that any reason why we shouldn't have lots of every thing now? By dad, before I've been here a week I'll have a reg'lar French Revolution! No Bastille! says I; let's have a Turkey carpet, and a telescope dining-table, good roads, and no infernal punts-and, above all, let's get quit of the villain Peeper."

"Oh! if Reginald would only consent!"

"Why not? by dad, I'll make his fortune. I'll give him a thousand a-year for the water-power that's now all thrown away. I'll have a nice village built down in the valley. I'll get him two guineas an acre for his land that's now lying waste. I'll dig for coal. We'll build a nice comfortable house, and leave this old ruin to the crows."

"And the neighbours, uncle Samson?"

"Why, we'll build a church, and the parson will be a good companion. When the roads are made, you'll give a jolly dinner once a-week to every squire within ten miles. You'll have a book club. You'll help in the Sunday school. You'll go to the county balls. Your husband will join the agricultural society, and act as a magistrate. He'll subscribe to the hounds. He'll attend to the registrations. He'll have shooting-parties in September. And as to any old-world, wretched talks about chivalry and antiquity, we'll show him that there never was a time like the present-commerce, land, property, and intelligence, all in the very best condition. We'll make Lutter superintendent of the whole estate, and send old Peeper about his business. And in all this you must help; for there's nothing to be done without the help of the ladies: so give me your hand, dear niece, and don't cry."

"It would make me so happy! I would never look into Amadis de Gaul again!"

"Hang Amadis de Gall and Amadi de Spurzheim, too! Where is your husband?"

"I seldom see him now. He is always in the oratory with Mr Peeper."

"The deuce he is!" said the uncle. "And how do you get on in other respects? Are you comfortable-happy-contented?" Jane told him all she had encountered since she had come to the castle, and the uncle seemed thunderstruck at the recital.

"Well! bold measures are always the best," he said at last; "I'll kick Peeper into the moat!" and before his niece could interfere, the uncle had rushed across the quadrangle, guided, we are sorry to say, by Mr Lutter, and, grasping the venerable Peeper, whom he met near the drawbridge, he dragged him towards the water.

Jane ran to get assistance for the unfortunate victim; and crying "Help! help!" as she saw the wretched man forced over the walls, she looked in a state of distraction towards her husband. "Dear Jane," said that individual, smiling blandly, "I told you you had overtired yourself with walking." Jane gazed round; there was Reginald sitting beside her, with her head reclining on his shoulder, at the open window of the inn in Wales. The vale of Cwmcwyllchly was spread in a beautiful landscape below. They were still on their wedding tour.

"You have been asleep, Jane," said Reginald.

"And have had such dreadful dreams. Oh, Reginald! I have had such visions of horrid things and people. I shall never be romantic again about chivalry. Such coarseness!-such slavery!-such ignorance! Ah, how happy we ought to be that we are born in a civilized time, with no Mr Peepers for father confessors, nor fighting with firebrands for amusement!"

"You have been reading Hallam's Middle Ages-a present from your uncle Samson-till you have become a right-down Utilitarian. Come, let us ring for tea; and to-morrow we must start for Yorkshire! The Quarter-sessions are coming on."

* * *

DUMAS IN HIS CURRICLE.

We left M. Dumas at Marseilles: we find him again at Naples. Three volumes are the result of his visit to the last named city-volumes in which he manages to put a little of every thing, and a good deal of some things. Antiquarian, historian, virtuoso, novelist, he touches upon all subjects, flying from one to the other with a lightness and a facility of transition peculiarly his own, and peculiarly agreeable. English travellers and Italian composers, St Januarius and the opera, Masaniello and the gettatura, Pompeii, princes, police spies, Vesuvius, all have their turn-M. Dumas, with his usual tact, merely glancing at those subjects which are known and written about by every tourist, but giving himself full scope when he gets off the beaten track. His book is literally crammed with tales and anecdotes, to such a degree indeed, and most of them so good, that our principal difficulty in commencing a notice of it, is to know where to pick and choose our extracts; l'embarras des richesses, in short. The best way will probably be to begin at the beginning, and go as far as our limits allow us, referring our readers to the original for the many good things that want of space will compel us to exclude.

M. Dumas calls his book the Corricolo, and devotes a short and characteristic preface to an explanation of the title. This explanation we must give in his own words. It is so highly graphic, that, after reading it, we fancied we had seen a picture of what it describes.

"A corricolo is a sort of tilbury or gig, originally intended to hold one person, and be drawn by one horse. At Naples they harness two horses to it; and it conveys twelve or fifteen individuals, not at a walk nor at a trot, but at full gallop, and this, notwithstanding that only one of the horses does any work. The shaft horse draws, but the other, which is harnessed abreast of him, and called the bilancino, prances and curvets about, animates his companion, but does nothing else.

"Having said that the gig built to carry one is made to carry fifteen, I am, of course, expected to explain how this is accomplished. There is an old French proverb, according to which, when there is enough for one there is enough for two; but I am not aware of any proverb in any language which says, that when there is enough for one, there is enough for fifteen. Nevertheless, it is the case with the corricolo. In the present advanced state of civilization, every thing is diverted from its primitive destination. As it is impossible to say at what period, or in how long a time, the capacity of the vehicle in question was extended in the ratio of one to fifteen, I must content myself with describing the way of packing the passengers.

"In the first place, there is almost invariably a fat greasy monk seated in the middle, forming the centre of a sort of coil of human creatures. On one of his knees is some robust rosy-cheeked nurse from Aversa or Nettuno; on the other, a handsome peasant woman from Bauci or Procida. On either side of him, between the wheels and the body of the vehicle, stand the husbands of these two ladies. Standing on tiptoe behind the monk is the driver, holding in his left hand the reins, and in his right the long whip with which he keeps his horses at an equal rate of speed. Behind him are two or three lazzaroni, who get up and down, go away, and are succeeded by others, without any body taking notice of them, or expecting them to pay for their ride. On the shafts are seated two boys, picked up on the road from Torre del Greco or Pouzzoles, probably supernumerary ciceroni of the antiquities of Herculaneum and Pompeii. Finally, suspended under the carriage, in a sort of coarse rope network with large meshes, which swings backwards and forwards at every movement of the vehicle, is a shapeless and incomprehensible mass, which cries, laughs, sings, screams, shouts, and bellows, all by turns and none for long together, and the nature of which it is impossible to distinguish, dimly seen as it is through the clouds of dust raised by the horses' feet. This mass consists of three or four children, who belong to Heaven knows who, are going Heaven knows where, live Heaven knows how, and are there Heaven knows wherefore.

"Now then, put down, one above the other, monk, women, husbands, driver, lazzaroni, boys and children; add them up, include the infant in arms, which has been forgotten, and the total will be fifteen.

"It sometimes happens that the coricolo passes over a big stone, and upsets, pitching out its occupants to a greater or less distance, according to their respective gravity. But, on such occasions, nobody thinks of himself; the attention of every one is immediately turned to the monk. If he is hurt, the journey is over for the day; they carry him to the nearest house; the horses are put into the stable, and he is put to bed; the women nurse him, make much of him, cry and pray over him. If, on the other hand, the monk is safe and sound, nobody has a right to complain; he resumes his seat, the nurse and the peasant woman resume theirs, the others climb up into their respective places-a crack of the long whip, and a shout from the driver, and the corricolo is off again full speed."

From this we learn what a corricolo is, but we have not yet been told why M. Dumas should christen his book after the degenerate descendant of the Roman curriculum. Patience-we shall get to it in time. Materials crowd upon our traveller, and it is only in the second chapter that the desired explanation is given. In the first we are informed of M. Dumas's installation at the Hotel Vittoria, kept by M. Martin Zill, who, besides being an innkeeper, is a man of much taste in art, a distinguished antiquary, an amateur of pictures, a collector of autographs and curiosities. Apropos of the hotel we have an anecdote of the ex-dey of Algiers, who, on being dispossessed of his dominions by the French, took refuge at Naples, and established himself under M. Zill's hospitable roof. The third floor was entirely occupied by his suite and attendants, the fourth was for himself and his treasures, the fifth, or the garrets, he converted into his harem. The curious arms, costumes, and jewels which Hussein Pacha had brought with him, were a godsend to the virtuoso weary of examining and admiring them; and, before the African had been a week in the house, he and his host were sworn friends. Unfortunately this harmony was not destined to last very long.

"One morning Hussein Pacha's cook (a Nubian as black as ink, and as shining as if he had been polished with a shoe-brush) entered the kitchen of the hotel, and asked for the largest knife they had. The head-cook gave him a sort of carving-knife, some eighteen inches long, sharp as a razor, and pliant as a foil. The negro looked at it, shook his head as if in doubt whether it would do, but nevertheless took it up stairs with him. Presently he brought it down again, and asked for a larger one. The cook opened all his drawers, and at last found a sort of cutlass, which he hardly ever used on account of its enormous size. With this the Nubian appeared more satisfied, and again went up stairs. Five minutes afterwards he came down for the third time, and returned the knife, asking for a bigger one still. The cook's curiosity was excited, and he enquired who wanted the knife, and for what purpose.

"The African told him very coolly that the dey, having left his dominions rather in a hurry, had forgotten to bring an executioner with him, and had consequently ordered his cook to get a large knife and cut off the head of Osmin, chief of the eunuchs, who was convicted of having kept such negligent watch and ward over his highness's seraglio, that some presumptuous Giaour had made a hole in the wall, and established a communication with Zaida, the dey's favourite odalisque. Accordingly Osmin was to be decapitated; and as to the offending lady, the next time the dey took an airing in the bay of Naples, she would be put into the boat in a sack, and consigned to the keeping of the kelpies. Thunderstruck at such summary proceedings, the cook desired his Nubian brother to wait while he went for a larger knife; then hastening to M. Martin Zill, he told him what he had just heard.

"M. Martin Zill ran to the minister of police, and laid the matter before him. His excellency got into his carriage and went to call upon the dey.

He found his highness reclining upon a divan, his back supported by cushions, smoking latakia in a chibouque, while an icoglan scratched the soles of his feet, and two slaves fanned him. The minister made his three salaams; the dey nodded his head.

"'Your highness,' said his excellency, 'I am the minister of police.'

"'I know you are,' answered the dey.

"'Then your highness probably conjectures the motive of my visit.'

"'No. But you are welcome all the same.'

"'I come to prevent your highness from committing a crime.'

"'A crime! And what crime?' said the dey, taking the pipe from his mouth, and gazing at his interlocutor in the most profound astonishment.

"'I wonder your highness should ask the question,' replied the minister. 'Is it not your intention to cut off Osmin's head?'

"'That is no crime,' answered the dey.

"'Does not your highness purpose throwing Zaida into the sea?'

"'That is no crime,' repeated the dey. 'I bought Osmin for five hundred piasters, and Zaida for a thousand sequins, just as I bought this pipe for a hundred ducats.'

"'Well,' said the minister, 'what does your highness deduce from that?'

"'That as this pipe belongs to me, as I have bought it and paid for it, I may break it to atoms if I choose, and nobody has a right to object.' So saying, the pacha broke his pipe, and threw the fragments into the middle of the room.

"'All very well, as far as a pipe goes,' said the minister; 'but Osmin, but Zaida?'

"'Less than a pipe,' said the dey gravely.

"'How! less than a pipe! A man less than a pipe! A woman less than a pipe!'

"'Osmin is not a man, and Zaida is not a woman: they are slaves. I will cut off Osmin's head, and throw Zaida into the sea.'

"'No!' said the magistrate. 'Not at Naples at least.'

"'Dog of a Christian!' shouted the dey, 'do you know who I am?'

"'You are the ex-dey of Algiers, and I am the Neapolitan minister of police; and, if your deyship is impertinent, I shall send him to prison,' added the minister very coolly.

"'To prison!' repeated the dey, falling back upon his divan.

"'To prison,' replied the minister.

"'Very well,' said Hussein. 'I leave Naples to-night.'

"'Your highness is as free as air to go and to come. Nevertheless, I must make one condition. Before your departure, you will swear by the Prophet, that no harm shall be done to Osmin or Zaida.'

"'Osmin and Zaida belong to me, and I shall do what I please with them.'

"'Then your highness will be pleased to deliver them over to me, to be punished according to the laws of the country; and, until you do so, you will not be allowed to leave Naples.'

"'Who will prevent me?'

"'I will.'

"The pacha laid his hand on his dagger. The minister stepped to the window and made a sign. The next moment the tramp of heavy boots and jingle of spurs were heard upon the stairs; the door opened, and a gigantic corporal of gendarmes made his appearance, his right hand raised to his cocked hat, his left upon the seam of his trouser.

"'Gennaro,' said the minister of police, 'if I gave you an order to arrest this gentleman, would you see any difficulty in executing it?'

"'None, your excellency.'

"'You are aware that this gentleman's name is Hussein Pacha.'

"'I was not, your excellency.'

"'And that he is dey of Algiers.'

"'May it please your excellency, I don't know what that is.'

"'You see?' said the minister, turning to the dey.

"'The devil! exclaimed Hussein.

"'Shall I?' said Gennaro, taking a pair of handcuffs from his pocket, and advancing a pace towards the dey, who, on his part, took a step backwards.

"'No,' replied the minister, 'it will not be necessary. His highness will do as he is bid. Go and search the hotel for a man named Osmin, and a woman named Zaida, and take them both to the prefecture.'

"'What!' cried the dey; 'this man is to enter my harem?'

"'He is not a man,' replied the minister; 'he is a corporal of gendarmes. But if you do not wish him to go, send for Osmin and Zaida yourself.'

"'Will you promise to have them punished?' enquired the dey.

"'Certainly; according to the utmost rigour of the law.'

"Hussein Pacha clapped his hands. A door concealed behind a tapestry was opened, and a slave entered the room.

"'Bring down Osmin and Zaida,' said the dey.

"The slave crossed his hands on his breast, bowed his head, and disappeared without uttering a word. The next instant he came back with the two culprits.

"The eunuch was a little round fat fellow, with beardless face, and small hands and feet. Zaida was a beautiful Circassian, her eyelids painted with kool, her teeth blackened with betel, her nails reddened with henna. On perceiving Hussein Pacha, the eunuch fell upon his knees; Zaida raised her head. The dey's eyes flashed, and he clutched the hilt of his kangiar. Osmin grew pale; Zaida smiled. The minister of police made a sign to the gendarme, who stepped up to the two captives, handcuffed them, and led them out of the room. As the door closed behind them, the dey uttered a sound between a sigh and a roar.

"The magistrate looked out of the window, till he saw the prisoners and their escort disappear at the corner of the Strada Chiatamone. Then turning to the dey-

"'Your highness is now at liberty to leave Naples, if he wishes so to do,' said the imperturbable functionary with a low bow.

"'This very instant!' cried Hussein. 'I will not remain another moment in such a barbarous country as yours.'

"'A pleasant journey to your highness,' said the minister.

"'Go to the devil!' retorted Hussein.

"Before an hour had elapsed, the dey had chartered a small vessel, on board of which he embarked the same evening with his suite, his wives, and his treasures; and at midnight he set sail; cursing the tyranny that prevented a man from drowning his wife and cutting off the heads of his slaves. The next day the minister of police had the culprits brought before him and examined. Osmin was found guilty of having slept when he ought to have watched, and Zaida of having watched when she ought to have slept. But, by some strange omission, the Neapolitan code allots no punishment to such offences; and, consequently, Osmin and Zaida, to their infinite astonishment, were immediately set at liberty. Osmin took to selling pastilles for a livelihood, and the lady got employment as dame de comptoir in a coffeehouse. As to the dey, he had left Naples with the intention of going to England, in which country, as he had been informed, a man is at liberty to sell his wife, if he may not drown her. He was taken ill, however, on the road, and obliged to stop at Leghorn, where he died."

M. Dumas, not being in good odour with the Neapolitan authorities, on account of some supposed republican tendencies of his, is at Naples under an assumed name; and, as it is uncertain how long he may be able to preserve his incognito, he is desirous of seeing all that is to be seen in as short a time as possible. He finds that Naples, independently of its suburbs, consists of three streets where every body goes, and five hundred streets where nobody goes. The three streets are, the Chiaja, the Toledo, and the Forcella; the five hundred others are nameless-a labyrinth of houses, which might be compared to that of Crete, deducting the Minotaur, and adding the Lazzaroni. There are three ways of seeing Naples-on foot, in a corricolo or in a carriage. On foot, one goes every where, but one sees too much; in a carriage, one only goes through the three principal streets, and one sees too little-the corricolo is the happy medium, the juste milieu, to which M. Dumas for once determines to adhere. Having made up his mind, he sends for his host, and enquires where he can hire a corricolo by the week or month. His host tells him he had better buy one, horse and all. To this plan M. Dumas objects the expense.

"'It will cost you,' said M. Martin, after a momentary calculation in his head, 'it will cost you-the corricolo ten ducats, each horse thirty carlini, the harness a pistole; in all, eighty French francs.'

"'What! for ten ducats I shall have a corricolo?'

"'A magnificent one.'

"'New?'

"'Oh! you are asking too much. There are no such things as new corricoli. There is a standing order of the police forbidding coachmakers to build them.'

"'Indeed! How long has that order been in force?'

"'Fifty years, perhaps.'

"'How comes it, then, that there is such a thing as a corricolo in existence?'

"'Nothing easier. You know the story of Jeannot's knife?'

"'To be sure I do; it is one of our national chronicles. The blade had been changed fifteen times, and the handle fifteen times, but it was still the same knife.'

"'The case of the corricolo is exactly similar. It is forbidden to build new ones, but it is not forbidden to put new wheels to old bodies, and new bodies on old wheels. By these means the corricolo becomes immortal.'

"'I understand. An old body and new wheels for me, if you please. But the horses? Do you mean to say that for thirty francs I shall have a pair of horses?'

"'A superb pair, that will go like the wind.'

"'What sort of horses?'

"'Oh, dead ones, of course!'

"'Dead ones!'

"'Certainly. At that price you could hardly expect any thing better.'

"'My dear M. Martin, be kind enough to explain. I am travelling for my improvement, and information of all kinds is highly acceptable.'

"'You are acquainted with the history of the horse, I suppose?'

"'The natural history? Buffon's? Certainly. The horse is, after the lion, the noblest of all the beasts.'

"'No, no; the philosophical history. The different stages and vicissitudes in the existence of those noble quadrupeds.'

"'Oh yes! first the saddle, then a carriage or gig, thence to a stage-coach or omnibus, hackney-coach or cab, and finally-to the knacker's.'

"'And from the knacker's?'

"'To the Elysian fields, I suppose.'

"'No. Not here, at least. From the knacker's they go to the corricoli.'

"'How so?'

"'I will tell you. At the Ponte della Maddalena, where horses are taken to be killed, there are always persons waiting, who, when a horse is brought, buy the hide and hoofs for thirty carlini, which is the price regulated by law. Instead of killing the horse and skinning him, these persons take him with the skin on, and make the most of the time he yet has to live. They are sure of getting the skin sooner or later. And these are what I mean by dead horses.'

"'But what can they possibly do with the unfortunate brutes?'

"'They harness them to the corricoli.'

"'What! those with which I came from Salerno to Naples'-

"'Were the ghosts of horses; spectre steeds, in short.'

"'But they galloped the whole way.'

"'Why not? Les morts vont vite.'"

Et cetera, et cetera. For the price stated by his host, M. Dumas finds himself possessor of a magnificent corricolo of a bright red colour, with green trees and animals painted thereon. Two most fiery and impatient steeds, half concealed by harness, bells, and ribands, are included in his purchase. After a vain attempt to drive himself, the phantom coursers having apparently a supreme contempt for whipcord, he gives up the reins to a professional charioteer, and commences his perambulations. His first visit is to the Chiaja, the favourite promenade of the aristocracy and of foreigners; his second to the Toledo, the street of shops and loungers; his third to the Forcella, frequented by lawyers and their clients. He makes a chapter, and a long one too, out of each street; but not in the way usually adopted by those pitiless tour-writers who overwhelm their readers with dry architectural details, filling a page with a portico, and a chapter with a chapel-not letting one off a pane of a painted window or line of worm-eaten inscription however often those things may have been described already by previous travellers. M. Dumas prefers men to things as subjects for his pen; and the three chapters above named are filled with curious illustrations of Neapolitan manners, customs, and character. Apropos of the Toledo, we are introduced to the well-known impresario, Domenico Barbaja, who had his palazzo in that street, and who, from being waiter in a coffeehouse at Milan, became the manager of three theatres at one time, namely, San Carlo, La Scala, and the Vienna opera. He appears to have been a man of great energy and originality of character, concealing an excellent heart under the roughest manners and most choleric of tempers.

"It would be impossible," says M. Dumas, "to translate into any language the abuse with which Barbaja used to overwhelm the singers and musicians at his theatres when they displeased him. Yet not one of them bore him malice for it, knowing that, if they had the least triumph, Barbaja would be the first to embrace and congratulate them: if they were unsuccessful, he would console them with the utmost delicacy: if they were ill, he would watch over them with the tenderness of a father or brother. The fortune which he had amassed, little by little, and by strenuous exertions, he spent in the most generous and princely manner. His palace, his villa, and his table, were open to all.

"His genius was of a peculiar and extraordinary kind. Education he had none: he was unable to write the commonest letter, and did not know a note of music; yet he would give his composers the most valuable hints, and dictate with admirable skill the plan of a libretto. His own voice was of the harshest and most inharmonious texture; but by his advice and instructions he formed some of the first singers in Italy. His language was a Milanese patois; but he found means to make himself excellently understood by the kings and emperors, with whom he carried on negotiations upon a footing of perfect equality. It was a great treat to see him seated in his box at San Carlo, opposite that of the King of Naples, on the evening of a new opera; with grave and impartial aspect, now turning his face to the actors, then to the audience. If a singer went wrong, Barbaja was the first to crush him with a severity worthy of Brutus. His 'Can de Dio!' was shouted out in a voice that made the theatre shake and the poor actor tremble. If, on the other hand, the public disapproved without reason, Barbaja would start up in his box and address the audience. 'Figli d'una racca!' 'Will you hold your tongues? You don't deserve good singers.' If by chance the King himself omitted to applaud at the right time, Barbaja would shrug his shoulders and go grumbling out of his box.

"With all his peculiarities, he it was who formed and brought forward Lablache, Tamburini, Rubini, Donzelli, Colbran, Pasta, Fodor, Donizetti, Bellini, and the great Rossini himself, whose masterpieces were composed for Barbaja. It is impossible to form an idea of the amount of entreaties, stratagems, and even violence, expended by the impresario to make Rossini work. I will give an example of it, which is highly characteristic both of the manager and of the greatest and happiest, but most insouciant and idle, musical genius that ever drew breath under the bright sky of Italy."

We are sorry to tantalize our readers, but we have not space for the story that follows. It relates to the opera of Othello, which was composed by Rossini in an incredibly short time, whilst a prisoner in an apartment of Barbaja's house. For nearly six months had the composer been living vith the manager, entertaining his friends at his well-spread table, drinking his choicest wines, and occupying his best rooms-all this under promise of producing a new opera within the half-year, a promise which he showed little disposition to fulfil. Barbaja was in a fever of anxiety, and finding remonstrance unavailing, had recourse to stratagem. One morning, when Rossini was about to start on a party of pleasure, he found his doors secured outside; and, on putting his head out of the window, was informed by Barbaja that he must remain captive until his ransom was paid. The ransom, of course, was the opera.

Rossini subsequently revenges himself on his tyrant in a very piquant manner; and, finally, the morning after Othello has been performed with triumphant success, he starts for Bologna, taking with him, as travelling companion, the prima donna of the San Carlo theatre, Signora Colbran, whom he had privately married. All this is related very amusingly by M. Dumas, but at too great length for our limits.

We have a naval combat in the second volume, in which a French frigate is attacked by two English line-of-battle ships, one of which she sinks, and receives in return the entire point-blank broadside of the other, a three-decker; which broadside, we in our ignorance of nautical matters, should have thought sufficient to blow her either out of the water or under it. It has not that effect, however, and the frigate is captured; the captain of her, when he has hauled down his flag in order to save the lives of his men, stepping into his cabin and blowing his brains out. All this is very pretty, whatever may be said of its probability. But there are two subjects on which the majority of Frenchmen indulge in most singular delusions. These are, their invincibility upon the sea, and the battle of Waterloo. M. Dumas has not escaped the national monomania.

Our author is very hard upon the poor English in this book. He attacks them on all sides and with all weapons. Nelson and Lady Hamilton occupy a prominent position in his pages. The execution of Admiral Carraciolo, an undoubted blot on the character of our naval hero, is given in all its details, and with some little decorations and embellishments, for which we suspect that we have to thank our imaginative historian. Nelson's weakness, the ascendency exercised over him by Lady Hamilton, or Emma Lyonna, as M. Dumas prefers styling her, her intimacy with the Queen of Naples, and subservient to the wishes and interests of the Neapolitan court, are all set forth in the most glowing colours. This is the heavy artillery, the round-shot and shell; but M. Dumas is too skilful a general to leave any part of his forces unemployed, and does not omit to bring up his sharpshooters, and open a pretty little fire of ridicule upon English travellers in Italy, who, as it is well known, go thither to make the fortunes of innkeepers and purchase antiquities manufactured in the nineteenth century. Strange as it may appear, we should be heartily sorry if M. Dumas were to exchange his evident dislike of us for a more kindly feeling. We should then lose some of his best stories; for he is never more rich and amusing than when he shows up the sons and daughters of le perfide Albion. In support of our assertion, take the following sketch:-

"During my stay at Naples an Englishman arrived there, and took up his quarters at the hotel at which I was stopping. He was one of those phlegmatic, overbearing, obstinate Britons, who consider money the engine with which every thing is to be moved and all things accomplished, the argument in short which nothing can resist. Money was every thing in his estimation of mankind; talent, fame, titles, mere feathers that kicked the beam the moment a long rent-roll or inscription of three per cents were placed in the opposite scale. In proportion as men were rich or poor, did he esteem them much or little. Being very rich himself, he esteemed himself much.

"He had come direct to Naples by steam, and during the voyage had made this calculation: With money I shall say every thing, do every thing, and have every thing I please. He had not long to wait to find out his mistake. The steamer cast anchor in the port of Naples just half an hour too late for the passengers to land. The Englishman, who had been very sea-sick, and was particularly anxious to get on shore, sent to offer the captain of the port a hundred guineas if he would let him land directly. The quarantine laws of Naples are very strict; the captain of the port thought the Englishman was mad, and only laughed at his offer. He was therefore obliged to sleep on board in an excessively bad humour, cursing alike those who made the regulations and those who enforced them.

"The first thing he did when he got on shore, was to set off to visit the ruins of Pompeii. There happened to be no regular guide at hand, so he took a lazzarone instead. He had not forgotten his disappointment of the night before, and all the way to Pompeii he relieved his mind by abusing King Ferdinand in the best Italian he could muster. The lazzarone, whom he had taken into his carriage, took no notice of all this so long as they were on the high-road. Lazzaroni, in general, meddle very little in politics, and do not care how much you abuse king or kaiser so long as nothing disrespectful is said of the Virgin Mary, St Januarius, or Mount Vesuvius. On arriving, however, at the Via dei Sepolchri, the ragged guide put his finger on his lips as a signal to be silent. But his employer either did not understand the gesture, or considered it beneath his dignity to take notice of it, for he continued his invectives against Ferdinand the Well-beloved.

"'Pardon me, Eccellenza,' said the lazzarone at last, placing his hand upon the side of the barouche, and jumping out as lightly as a harlequin. 'Pardon me, Eccellenza, but I must return to Naples.'

"'And why so?' inquired the other in his broken Italian.

"'Because I do not wish to be hung.'

"'And who would dare to hang you?'

"'The king.'

"'Why?'

"'Because you are speaking ill of him.'

"'An Englishman has a right to say whatever he likes.'

"'It may be so, but a lazzarone has not.'

"'But you have said nothing.'

"'But I hear everything.'

"'Who will tell what you hear?'

"'The invalid soldier who accompanies us to visit Pompeii.'

"'I do not want an invalid soldier.'

"'Then you cannot visit Pompeii.'

"'Not by paying?'

"'No.'

"'But I will pay double, treble, four times, whatever they ask.'

"'No, no, no.'

"'Oh!' said the Englishman, and he fell into a brown study, during which the lazzarone amused himself by trying to jump over his own shadow.

"'I will take the invalid,' said the Englishman after a little reflection.

"'Very good,' replied the lazzarone, 'we will take him.'

"'But I shall say just what I please before him.'

"'In that case I wish you a good morning.'

"'No, no; you must remain.'

"'Allow me to give you a piece of advice then. If you want to say what you please before the invalid, take a deaf one.'

"'Ooh!' cried the Englishman, delighted with the advice, 'by all means a deaf one. Here is a piaster for you for having thought of it.' The lazzarone ran to the guard-house, and soon returned with an old soldier who was as deaf as a post.

"They began the usual round of the curiosities, during which the Englishman continued calling King Ferdinand any thing but a gentleman, of all which the invalid heard nothing, and the lazzarone took no notice. They visited the Via dei Sepolchri, the houses of Diomedes and Cicero. At last they came to Sallust's house, in one of the rooms of which was a fresco that hit the Englishman's fancy exceedingly. He immediately sat down, took a pencil and a blank book from his pocket, and began copying it. He had scarcely made a stroke, however, when the soldier and the lazzarone approached him. The former was going to speak, but the latter took the words out of his mouth.

"'Eccellenza,' said he, 'it is forbidden to copy the fresco.'

"'Oh!' said the Englishman, 'I must make this copy. I will pay for it.'

"'It is not allowed, even if you pay.'

"'But I will pay ten times its value if necessary; I must copy it, it is so funny.'

"'If you do, the invalid will put you in the guard-room.'

"'Pshaw! An Englishman has a right to draw any thing he likes.' And he went on with his sketch. The invalid approached him with an inexorable countenance.

"'Pardon me, Eccellenza,' said the lazzarone; 'but would you like to copy not only this fresco, but as many more as you please?'

"'Certainly I should, and I will too.'

"'Then, let me give you a word of advice. Take a blind invalid.'

"'Ooh!' cried the Englishman, still more enchanted with this second hint than with the first. 'By all means, a blind invalid. Here are two piasters for the idea.'

"They left Sallust's house, the deaf man was paid and discharged, and the lazzarone went to the guard-room, and brought back an invalid who was stone-blind and led by a black poodle.

"The Englishman wished to return immediately to continue his drawing, but the lazzarone persuaded him to delay it, in order to avoid exciting suspicion. They continued their rambles, therefore, guided by the invalid, or rather by his dog, who displayed a knowledge of Pompeii that might have qualified him to become a member of the antiquarian society. After visiting the blacksmith's shop, Fortunata's house, and the public oven, they returned to the abode of Sallust, where the Englishman finished his sketch, while the lazzarone chatted with the blind man, and kept him amused. Continuing their lounge, he made a number of other drawings, and in a couple of hours his book was half full.

"At last they arrived at a place where men were digging. There had been discovered a number of small busts and statues, bronzes, and curiosities of all kinds, which, as soon as they were dug up, were carried into a neighbouring house, and had his attention speedily attracted by a little statue of a satyr about six inches high. 'Oh!' cried he, 'I shall buy this figure.'

"'The king of Naples does not wish to sell it,' replied the lazzarone.

"'I will give its weight in sovereigns-double its weight even.'

"'I tell you it is not to be sold,' persisted the lazzarone; 'but,' added he, changing his tone, 'I have already given your excellence two pieces of advice which you liked, I will now give you a third: Do not buy the statue-steal it.'

"'Oh-oh! that will be very original, and we have a blind invalid too. Capital!'

"'Yes, but the invalid has a dog, who has two good eyes and sixteen good teeth, and who will fly at you if you so much as touch any thing with your little finger.'

"'I'll buy the dog, and hang him.'

"'Do better still; take a lame invalid. Then, as you have seen nearly every thing here, put the figure in your pocket and run away. He may call out as much as he likes, he will not be able to run after you.'

"'Ooh!' cried the Englishman, in convulsions of delight, 'here are three piasters for you. Fetch me a lame invalid.'

"And in order not to excite the suspicions of the blind man and his dog, he left the house, and pretended to be examining a fountain made of shell-work, while the lazzarone went for a third guide. In a quarter of an hour he returned, accompanied by an invalid with two wooden legs. They gave the blind man three carlini, two for him and one for his dog, and sent him away.

"The theatre and the temple of Isis were all that now remained to be seen. After visiting them, the Englishman, in the most careless tone he could assume, said he should like to return to the house in which were deposited the produce of the researches then making. The invalid, without the slightest suspicion, conducted them thither, and they entered the apartment in which the curiosities were arranged on shelves nailed against the wall.

"While the Englishman lounged about, pretending to be examining every thing with the greatest interest, the lazzarone busied himself in fastening a stout string across the doorway, at the height of a couple of feet from the ground. When he had done this, he made a sign to the Englishman, who seized the little statue that he coveted from under the very nose of the astounded invalid, put it into his pocket, and, jumping over the string, ran off as hard as he could, accompanied by the lazzarone. Darting through the Stabian gate, they found themselves on the Salerno road-an empty hackney-coach was passing, the Englishman jumped in, and had soon rejoined his carriage, which was waiting for him in Via dei Sepolchri. Two hours after he had left Pompeii he was at Torre del Greco, and in another hour at Naples.

"As to the invalid, he at first tried to step over the cord fastened across the door, but the height at which the lazzarone had fixed it was too great for wooden legs to accomplish. He then endeavoured to untie it, but with no better success; for the lazzarone had fastened it in a knot compared to which the one of Gordian celebrity would have appeared a mere slip-knot. Finally, the old soldier, who had perhaps read of Alexander the Great, determined to cut what he could not untie, and accordingly drew his sword. But the sword in its best days had never had much edge, and now it had none at all; so that the Englishman was halfway to Naples whilst the invalid was still sawing away at his cord.

"The same evening the Englishman left Naples on board a steamboat, and the lazzarone was lost in the crowd of his comrades; the six plasters he had got from his employer enabling him to live in what a lazzarone considers luxury for nearly as many months.

"The Englishman had been twelve hours at Naples, and had done the three things that are most expressly forbidden to be done there. He had abused the king, copied frescoes, and stolen a statue, and all owing, not to his money, but to the ingenuity of a lazzarone."

The lazzarone is a godsend for M. Dumas, an admirable peg upon which to hang his quaint conceit and sly satire; and he is accordingly frequently introduced in the course of the three volumes. We must make room for one more extract, in which he figures in conjunction with his friend the sbirro or gendarme, who before being invested with a uniform, and armed with carbine, pistols, and sabre, has frequently been a lazzarone himself, and usually preserves the instincts and tastes of his former station. The result of this is a coalition between the lazzarone and the sbirro-law-breaker and law-preserver uniting in a systematic attack upon the pockets of the public.

"I was one day passing down the Toledo, when I saw a sbirro arrested. Like La Fontaine's huntsman, he had been insatiable, and his greediness brought its own punishment. This is what had happened.

"A sbirro had caught a lazzarone in the fact.

"'What did you steal from that gentleman in black, who just went by?' he demanded he.

"'Nothing, your excellency,' replied the lazzarone. A lazzarone always addresses a sbirro as eccellenza.

"'I saw your hand in his pocket.'

"'His pocket was empty.'

"'What! Not a purse, a snuff-box, a handkerchief?'

"'Nothing, please your excellency. It was an author.'

"'Why do you go to those sort of people?'

"'I found out my mistake too late.'

"'Come along with me to the police-office.'

"'But, your excellency-since I have stolen nothing?'

"'Idiot, that's the very reason. If you had stolen something, we might have arranged matters.'

"'Only wait till next time. I shall not always be so unfortunate. I promise you the contents of the pocket of the next person who passes.'

"'Very good; but I will select the individual, or else you will be making a bad choice again.'

"'As your excellency pleases.'

"The sbirro folded his arms in a most dignified manner, and leaned his back against a post; the lazzarone stretched himself on the pavement at his feet. A priest came by, then a lawyer, then a poet; but the sbirro made no sign. At last there appeared a young officer, dressed in brilliant uniform, who passed gaily along, humming between his teeth a tune out of the last opera. The sbirro gave the signal. Up sprang the lazzarone and followed the officer. Both disappeared round a corner. Presently the lazzarone returned with his ransom in his hand.

"'What have you got there?' said the sbirro.

"'A handkerchief,' replied the other.

"'Is that all?'

"'That all! It is of the finest cambric.'

"'Had he only one?'11

"'Only one in that pocket.'

"'And in the other?'

"'In the other he had a silk handkerchief.'

"'Why didn't you bring it?'

"'I keep that for myself, excellency. It is fair that we should divide the profits. One pocket for you, the other for me.'

"'I have a right to both, and I must have the silk handkerchief.'

"'But, your excelleilcy'--

"'I must have the silk handkerchief.'

"'It is an injustice.'

"'Ha! Do you dare speak ill of his majesty's sbirri? Come along to prison.'

"'You shall have the silk handkerchief, your excellency.'

"'How will you find the officer again?'

"'He is gone to pay a visit in the Strada de Foria. I will go and wait for him at the door.'

"The lazzarone walked away, turned the corner of the street, and established himself in the recess of a doorway. Presently the young officer came out of a house opposite, and before he had gone ten paces, put his hand in his pocket, and found he was minus a handkerchief.

"'Pardon me, excellency,' said the lazzarone, stepping up to him; 'you have lost something, I think?'

"'I have lost a cambric handkerchief.'

"'Your excellency has not lost it; it has been stolen from him.'

"'And who stole it?'

"'What will your excellency give me if I find him the thief?'

"'I will give you a piastre.'

"'I must have two.'

"'You shall. Hallo! What are you doing?'

"'I am stealing your silk handkerchief.'

"'In order to find my cambric one?'

"'Yes.'

"'And where will both of them be?'

"'In the same pocket. The person to whom I shall give this handkerchief is the same to whom I have already given the other. Follow me, and observe what I do.'

"The officer followed the lazzarone, who gave the handkerchief to the sbirro, and walked away. The latter had hardly put his prize in his pocket when the officer came up and seized him by the collar. The sbirro fell on his knees, but the officer was inexorable, and he was sent to prison. As the sbirro had himself been a lazzarone, he saw at once the trick that had been played him. He wanted to cheat his confederate, and his confederate had cheated him; but far from bearing him malice for having done so, the sbirro views the conduct of the lazzarone in the light of an exploit, and feels an additional respect for him in consequence. When he is released from prison, he will seek him out, and they will be hand and glove together. When that time comes, look to your pockets."

We are introduced to Ferdinand IV. of Naples, King Nasone, as the lazzaroni nicknamed him; also to Padre Rocco, a popular preacher, and the idol of the lower classes of Neapolitans; and to Cardinal Perelli, remarkable for his simplicity, which quality, as may be supposed, loses nothing in passing through the hands of his present biographer. With his usual skill, M. Dumas glides from a ticklish story of which the cardinal is the hero, (a story that he does not tell, for which forbearance we give him due credit, since he is evidently sorely tempted thereto,) to an account of the Vardarelli, a band of outlaws which for some time infested Calabria and the Capitanato.

"Gaetano Vardarelli was a native of Calabria, and one of the earliest members of the revolutionary society of the Carbonari. When Murat, after for some time favouring that society, began to persecute it, Vardarelli fled to Sicily, and took service under King Ferdinand. He was then twenty-six years of age, possessing the muscles and courage of a lion, the agility of a chamois, the eye of an eagle. Such a recruit was not to be despised, and he was made sergeant in the Sicilian guards. On Ferdinand's restoration in 1815, he followed him to Naples; but finding that he was not likely ever to rise above a very subordinate grade, he became disgusted with the service, deserted, and took refuge in the mountains of Calabria. There two of his brothers, and some thirty brigands and outlaws, assembled around him and elected him their chief, with right of life and death over them. He had been a slave in the town; he found himself a king in the mountains.

"Proceeding according to the old formula observed by banditti chiefs both in Calabria and in melodramas, Vardarelli proclaimed himself redresser general of wrongs and grievances, and acted up to his profession by robbing the rich and assisting the poor. The consequence was, that he soon became exceedingly dreaded by the former, and exceedingly popular among the latter class; and at last his exploits reached the ears of King Ferdinand himself, who was highly indignant at such goings on, and gave orders that the bandit should immediately be hung. But there are three things necessary to hang a man-a rope, a gallows, and the man himself. In this instance, the first two were easily found, but the third was unfortunately wanting. Gendarmes and soldiers were sent after Vardarelli, but the latter was too cunning for them all, and slipped through their fingers at every turn. His success in eluding pursuit increased his reputation, and recruits flocked to his standard. His band soon doubled its numbers, and its leader became a formidable and important person, which of course was an additional reason for the authorities to wish to capture him. A price was set on his head, large bodies of troops sent in search of him, but all in vain. One day the Prince of Leperano, Colonel Calcedonio, Major Delponte, with a dozen other officers, and a score of attendants, were hunting in a forest a few leagues from Bari, when the cry of 'Vardarelli!' was suddenly heard. The party took to flight with the utmost precipitation, and all escaped except Major Delponte, who was one of the bravest, but, at the same time, one of the poorest, officers of the whole army. When he was told that he must pay a thousand ducats for his ransom, he only laughed, and asked where he was to get such a sum. Vardarelli then threatened to shoot him if it was not forthcoming by a certain day. The major replied that it was losing time to wait; and that, if he had a piece of advice to give his captor, it was to shoot him at once. The bandit at first felt half inclined to do so; but he reflected that the less Delponte cared about his life, the more ought Ferdinand to value it. He was right in his calculation; for no sooner did the king learn that his brave major was in the hands of the banditti, than he ordered the ransom to be paid out of his privy purse, and the major recovered his freedom.

"But Ferdinand had sworn the extermination of the banditti with whom he was thus obliged to treat as from one potentate to another. A certain colonel, whose name I forget, and who had heard this vow, pledged himself, if a battalion were put under his command, to bring in Vardarelli, his two brothers, and the sixty men composing his troop, bound hand and foot, and to place them in the dungeons of the Vicaria. The offer was too good to be refused; the minister of war put five hundred men at the disposal of the colonel, who started with them at once in pursuit of the outlaw. The latter was soon informed by his spies of this fresh expedition, and he also made a vow, to the effect that he would cure his pursuer, once and for all, of any disposition to interfere with the Vardarelli.

"He began by leading the poor colonel such a dance over hill and dale, that the unfortunate officer and his men were worn out with fatigue; then, when he saw them in the state that he wished, he caused some false intelligence to be conveyed to them at two o'clock one morning. The colonel fell into the snare, and started immediately to surprise Vardarelli, whom he was assured was in a little village at the further extremity of a narrow pass, through which only four men could pass abreast. He made such haste that he marched four leagues in two hours, and at daybreak found himself at the entrance of the pass, which, however, seemed so peculiarly well adapted for an ambuscade, that he halted his battalion, and sent on twenty men to reconnoitre. In a quarter of an hour the twenty men returned. They had not met a single living thing. The colonel hesitated no longer, and entered the defile; but, on reaching a spot about halfway through it, where the road widened out into a sort of platform surrounded by high rocks and steep precipices, a shout was suddenly heard, proceeding apparently from the clouds, and the poor colonel looking up, saw the summits of the rocks covered with brigands, who levelled their rifles at him and his soldiers. Nevertheless, he began forming up his men as well as the nature of the ground would permit, when Vardarelli himself appeared upon a projecting crag. 'Down with your arms, or you are dead men!' he shouted in a voice of thunder. The bandits repeated his summons, and the echoes repeated their voices, so that the troops, who had not made the same vow as their colonel, and who thought themselves surrounded by greatly superior numbers, cried out for quarter, in spite of the entreaties and menaces of their unfortunate commander. Then Vardarelli, without leaving his position, ordered them to pile their arms, and march to two different places which he pointed out to them. They obeyed; and Vardarelli, leaving twenty of his men in their ambush, came down with the remainder, who immediately proceeded to render the Neapolitan muskets useless (for the moment at least) by the same process which Gulliver employed to extinguish the conflagration of the palace at Lilliput.

"The news of this affair put the king in very bad humour for the first twenty-four hours; after which time, however, the love of a joke overcoming his anger, he laughed heartily, and told the story to every one he saw; and as there are always lots of listeners when a king narrates, three years elapsed before the poor colonel ventured to show his face at Naples and encounter the ridicule of the court."

The general commanding in Calabria takes the matter rather more seriously, and vows the destruction of the banditti. By offers of large pay and privileges, they are induced to enter the Neapolitan service, and prove highly efficient as a troop of gendarmes. But the general cannot forget his old grudge against them; although, for lack of an opportunity, and on account of the desperate character of the men, he is obliged to defer his revenge for some time. At last he succeeds in having their leaders assassinated, and by pretending great indignation, and imprisoning the perpetrators of the deed, he lulls the suspicions of the remaining bandits, who elect new officers, and on an appointed day, proceed to the town of Foggia to have their election confirmed. Only eight of them, apprehensive of treachery, refuse to accompany their comrades. The remaining thirty-one, and a woman who would not leave her husband, obey the general's summons.

"It was a Sunday, the review had been publicly announced, and the square was thronged with spectators. The Vardarelli entered the town in perfect order, armed to the very teeth, but giving no sign of hostility or mistrust. On reaching the square, they raised their sabres, and with one voice exclaimed-'Viva il Re!' The general appeared on his balcony to acknowledge their salute. The aide-de-camp on duty came down to receive them, and after complimenting them on the beauty of their horses and good state of their arms, desired them to file past under the general's window, which they did with a precision worthy of regular troops. They then formed up again in the middle of the square, and dismounted.

"The aide-de-camp went into the house again with the list of the three new officers; the Vardarelli were standing by their horses, when suddenly there was a great confusion and movement in the crowd, which opened in various places, and down every street leading to the square, a column of Neapolitan troops was seen advancing. The Vardarelli were surrounded on all sides. Perceiving at once that they were betrayed, they sprang upon their horses and drew their sabres; but at the same moment the general took off his hat, which was the signal agreed upon; the command, 'Faccia in terra,' was heard, and the spectators, throwing themselves on their faces, the soldiers fired over them, and nine of the brigands fell to the ground, dead or mortally wounded. Those who were unhurt, seeing that they had no quarter to expect, dismounted, and forming a compact body, fought their way to an old castle in which they took refuge. Two only, trusting to the speed of their horses, charged the group of soldiers that appeared the least numerous, shot down two of them, and succeeded in breaking through the others and escaping. The woman owed her life to a similar piece of daring, effected, however, on another point of the enemy's line. She broke through, and galloped off, after having discharged both her pistols with fatal effect.

"The attention of all was now turned to the remaining twenty Vardarelli, who had taken refuge in the ruined castle. The soldiers advanced against them, encouraging one another, and expecting to encounter an obstinate resistance; but, to their surprise, they reached the gate of the castle without a shot being fired at them. The gate was soon beaten in, and the soldiers spread themselves through the halls and galleries of the old building. But all was silence and solitude; the bandits had disappeared.

"After an hour passed in rummaging every corner of the place, the assailants were going away in despair, convinced that their prey had escaped them; when a soldier, who was stooping down to look through the air-hole of a cellar, fell, shot through the body.

"The Vardarelli were discovered; but still it was no easy matter to get at them. Instead of losing men by a direct attack, the soldiers blocked up the air-hole with stones, set a guard over it, and then going round to the door of the cellar, which was barricadoed on the inner side, they heaped lighted fagots and combustibles against it, so that the staircase was soon one immense furnace. After a time the door gave way, and the fire poured like a torrent into the retreat of the unfortunate bandits. Still a profound silence reigned in the vault. Presently two carbine shots were fired; two brothers, determined not to fall alive into the hands of their enemies, had shot each other to death. A moment afterwards an explosion was heard; a bandit had thrown himself into the flames, and his cartridge box had blown up. At last the remainder of the unfortunate men being nearly suffocated, and seeing that escape was impossible, surrendered at discretion, were dragged through the air-hole, and immediately bound hand and foot, and conveyed to prison.

"As to the eight who had refused to come to Foggia, and the two who had escaped, they were hunted down like wild beasts, tracked from cavern to cavern, and from forest to forest. Some were shot, others betrayed by the peasantry, some gave themselves up, so that, before the year was out, all the Vardarelli were dead or prisoners. The woman who had displayed such masculine courage, was the only one who finally escaped. She was never heard of afterwards."

M. Dumas finds that the climate of Naples, delightful as it is, has nevertheless its little drawbacks and disadvantages. He returns one night from an excursion in the environs, and has scarcely got into bed, when he is almost blown out of it again by a tornado of tropical violence.

"At midnight, when we returned to Naples, the weather was perfect, the sky cloudless, the sea without a ripple. At three in the morning I was awakened by the windows of my room bursting open, their eighteen panes of glass falling upon the floor with a frightful clatter. I jumped out of bed, and felt that the house was shaking. I thought of Pliny the Elder, and having no desire for a similar fate, I hastily pulled on my clothes and hurried out into the corridor. My first impulse had apparently been that of all the inmates of the hotel, who were all standing, more or less dressed, at the doors of their apartments; amongst others, Jadin, who made his appearance with a phosphorus box in his hand, and his dog Milord at his heels. 'What a terrible draught in the house!' said he to me. This same draught, as he called it, had just carried off the roof of the Prince of San Feodoro's palace, including the garrets and several servants who were sleeping in them.

"My first thought had been of an eruption of Vesuvius, but there was no such luck for us; it was merely a hurricane. A hurricane at Naples, however, is rather different from the same thing in any other European country.

"Out of the seventy windows of the hotel, three only had escaped damage. The ceilings of seven or eight rooms were rent across. There was a crack extending from top to bottom of the house. Eight shutters had been carried away, and the servants were running down the street after them, just as one runs after one's hat on a windy day. The broken glass was swept away; as for sending for glaziers to mend the windows, it was out of the question. At Naples nobody thinks of disturbing himself at three in the morning. Besides, even had new panes been put in, they would soon have shared the fate of the old ones. We were obliged, therefore, to manage as well as we could with the shutters. I was tolerably lucky, for I had only lost one of mine. I went to bed again, and tried to sleep; but a storm of thunder and lightning soon rendered that impossible, and I took refuge on the ground-floor, where the wind had done less damage. Then began one of those storms of which we have no idea in the more northern parts of Europe. It was accompanied by a deluge such as I had never witnessed, except perhaps in Calabria. In an instant the Villa Reale appeared to be a part of the sea; the water came up to the windows of the ground-floor, and flooded the parlours. A minute afterwards, the servants came to tell M. Zill that his cellars were full, and his casks of wine floating about and staving one another. Presently we saw a jackass laden with vegetables come swimming down the street, carried along by the current. He was swept away into a large open drain, and disappeared. The peasant who owned him, and who had also been carried away, only saved himself from a like fate by clinging to a lamp-post. In one hour there fell more water than there falls in Paris during the two wettest months in the year.

"Two hours after the cessation of the rain, the water had disappeared, and I then perceived the use of this kind of deluge. The streets were clean; which they never are in Naples except after a flood of this sort."

One short anecdote, and we have done. After a long account of St Januarius, including the well-known miracle of the liquefaction of his blood, and some amusing illustrations of his immense popularity with the Neapolitans, M. Dumas, in two pithy lines, gives us the length, breadth, and thickness of a lazzarone's religion.

"I was one day in a church at Naples," he says, "and I heard a lazzarone praying aloud. He entreated God to intercede with St Januarius to make him win in the lottery."

On the whole, we think this one of the most amusing of M. Dumas's works, very light and sketchy, as is evident from our extracts; but at the same time giving a great deal of information concerning Naples, its environs, inhabitants, and customs, of much interest, and calculated to be highly useful to the traveller. It is also very free from a fault with which we taxed its author in a former paper, and we can scarcely call to mind a single line which it would be necessary to expunge, in order to render it fit reading for the most fastidious. As far as we ourselves are concerned, we heartily wish M. Dumas would travel over all the kingdoms of the earth, and write a book about each of them; and if he is as good company in a post-chaise as his books are at the chimney-corner, there are few things we should like better than to accompany him on his pilgrimage.

* * *

MARSTON; OR, THE MEMOIRS OF A STATESMAN.

PART IX.

"Have I not in my time heard lions roar?

Have I not heard the sea, puft up with wind,

Rage like an angry boar chafed with sweat?

Have I not heard great ordnance in the field,

And heaven's artillery thunder in the skies?

Have I not in the pitched battle heard

Loud 'larums, neighing steeds, and trumpets clang?"

SHAKSPEARE.

The market-place was lighted up, and filled with dragoons. Leaving my hulans under cover of a dark street, and riding forward to reconnoitre, I saw with astonishment the utter carelessness with which they abandoned themselves to their indulgences in the midst of an irritated population. Some were drinking on horseback; some had thrown themselves on the benches of the market, and were evidently intoxicated. The people stood at the corners of the streets looking on, palpably in terror, yet as palpably indignant at the outrage of the military. From the excessive blaze in some of the windows, and the shrieks of females, I could perceive that plunder was going on, and that the intention was, after having ransacked the place, to set it on fire. Yet a strong body of cavalry mounted in the middle of the square, and keeping guard round a waggon on which a guillotine had been already erected, still made me feel that an attack would be hopeless. I soon saw a rush of the people from one of the side streets; a couple of dragoon helmets were visible above the crowd; and three or four carts followed, filled with young females in white robes and flowers, as if dressed for a ball. I gazed intently, to ascertain the meaning of this strange and melancholy spectacle. At this moment I felt my horse's bridle pulled, and saw the old noble at his head. "Now or never!" he cried, in a voice almost choked with emotion. "Those are destined for the guillotine. Barbarians! brigands!-they will murder my Amalia." He sank before me. "What! is this an execution?" I exclaimed. His answer was scarcely above a whisper, for he seemed fainting. "The villains have been sent," said he, "to burn the town; they have seized those children of our best families, compelled them to dress as they were dressed for the Prussian ball, and are now about to murder them by their accursed guillotine." Pointing to one lovely girl, who, pale as death, stood in the foremost of those vehicles of death, he exclaimed "Amalia! O, my Amalia!" The cart was already within a few feet of the scaffold when I gave the word to my troopers. The brave fellows answered my "Forward!" with a shout, charged sabre in hand, and in an instant had thrown themselves between the victims and the scaffold. Their escort, taken completely by surprise, was broken at the first shock; we dashed without loss of time on the squadrons scattered round the market, and swept it clear of them. Surprised, intoxicated, and unacquainted with our force-which they probably thought to be the advance of the whole Prussian cavalry-after having lost many men, for the peasantry showed no mercy on the dismounted, the regiment turned at full gallop to the open country. The townspeople now performed their part. The victims were hurried away by their families, among a storm of lamentations and rejoicings, tears and kisses. The old noble's daughter, half dead, was carried off in her father's arms, with a thousand benedictions on me. The guillotine was hewn down with a hundred axes, and I saw the fragments burning in the square. Its waggon was made to serve its country as a portion of a barricade; and with every vehicle, wheeled or unwheeled, which could be rolled out, the entrance to the streets was fortified with the national rapidity in any deed, good or ill, under the stars.

After having appeased our hunger and that of our famishing horses, and being offered all the purses, which the French dragoons, however, had lightened nearly to the last coin, we finished the exploit by a general chant in honour of the ladies, and marched on our route, followed by the prayers of the whole community. This ended the only productive skirmish of the retreat. It fed us, broke the monotony of the march, and gave us something to talk of-and the soldier asks but little more. A gallant action had certainly been done; not the less gallant for its being a humane one; and even my bold hulans gave me credit for being a "smart officer," a title of no slight value in their dashing service.

Yet what, as the poet Saadi says, is fortune but a peacock "a showy tail on a frightful pair of legs?" Our triumph was to be followed by a reverse. The burgundy and champagne of the old count's cellar had made us festive, and our voices were heard along the road with a gaiety imprudent in a hostile land. The sound of a trumpet in our front brought us to our senses and a dead stand. But we were in a vein of heroism and instead of taking to our old hussar habits, and slipping round the enemy's flanks, we determined to cut our way through them, if they had the whole cavalry of France as their appui. The word was given, and the spur carried us through a strong line of cavalry posted across the road. The moon had just risen enough to show that there was a still stronger line a few hundred yards beyond, which it would be folly to touch. There was now no resource but to return as we went, which we did at full speed, and again broke up our antagonists. But again we saw squadron after squadron blocking up the road. All was now desperate. But Frederick's law of arms was well known-"the officer of cavalry who waits to be charged, must be broke." We made a plunge at our living circumvallation; but the French dragoons had now learned common sense-they opened for us-and when we were once fairly in, enveloped us completely; it was then a troop to a brigade; fifty jaded men and horses to fifteen hundred fresh from camp. What happened further I know not. I saw for a minute or two a great deal of pistol firing and a great deal of sabre clashing; I felt my horse stagger under me, at the moment when I aimed a blow at a gigantic fellow covered all over with helmet and mustache; a pistol exploded close at my ear as I was going down, and I heard no more.

On opening my eyes again, I found the scene strangely altered. I was lying in a little chamber hung round with Parisian ornament-a sufficient contrast to a sky dark as pitch, or only illumined by carbines and the sparkles of sabres delving at each other. I was lying on an embroidered sofa-an equally strong contrast to my position under the bodies of fallen men and the heels of kicking horses. A showy Turkish cloak, or robe de chambre, had superseded my laced jacket, purple pantaloons, and hussar boots. I was completely altered as a warrior; and, from a glimpse which I cast on a mirror, surrounded with gilt nymphs and swains enough to have furnished a ballet, I saw in my haggard countenance, and a wound, which a riband but half concealed, across my forehead, that I was not less altered as a man.

All round me looked so perfectly like the scenes with which I had been familiar in my romance-reading days, that, bruised and feeble as I was, I almost expected to find my pillow attended by some of those slight figures in long white drapery with blue eyes, which of old ministered to so many ill-used knights and exhausted pilgrims. But my reveries were broken up by a rough voice in the outer chamber insisting on an entrance into mine, and replied to by a weak and garrulous female one, refusing the admission. The dialogue was something of this order-

"Strong or weak, well or ill, able or not able, I must send him, before twelve o'clock this night, to Paris."

"But the poor gentleman's wounds are still unhealed."

"Still he must set out. The 'malle poste' will be at the door; and, if he had fifty wounds on him, he must go. The marquis is halfway to Paris by this time; perhaps more than halfway to the guillotine."

This was followed by a burst of sobs and broken exclamtions from the female, whom I discovered, by her sorrowing confessions, to have been a nurse in the family.

"Well," was the ruffian's reply; "women of all ages are fools: what is it to you whether this young fellow is shot or hanged? He was taken in arms against the Republic-one and indivisible. All the enemies of France must perish!"

The old woman now partially opened the door, to see whether I slept; and I closed my eyes, for the purpose of hearing all that was to be heard without interruption. The speaker, whom I alternately took for the gendarme of the district, and the executioner, gave went to his swelling soul in the national style.

"What! leave me! leave Jean Jacques Louis Gilet in charge of this wretched aristocrat, while I should be marching with my battalion, and at its head too, if merit meets its reward, to sweep the foes of the Republic from the face of the earth. No; I shall not remain in this paltry place, solicitor of a village, when I ought to be on the highest seat of justice-or playing the part of arresting aristocrats, when I might be commandant of a brigade, marching over the bodies of the crowned tyrants of the earth to glory!"

As his harangue glowed, his pace quickened, and his voice grew more vehement; at length, probably impatient of the time which lay between him and the first offices of the Republic, he overpowered the resistance of the nurse, and rushed into the chamber. Throwng himself into a theatrical attitude before a mirror-for what Frenchman ever passes one without a glance of happy recognition?-"Rise, aristocrat!" he cried, in the tone of Talma calling up the shade of Caesar. "Rise, and account to the world for your crimes against the liberty of man!"

I looked with such surprise on this champion of the sons of Adam-a little meagre creature, who seemed to be shaped on the model of one of his own pens, stripped, withered, and ink-dried-that I actually burst into laughter. His indignation rose, and, pulling out a pistol with one hand, and a roll of paper from his bosom with the other, he presented them together. I perceived, as I lay on my pillow, that the pistol was without a lock, and thus was comforted; but the paper was of a more formidable description. It was the famous decree of "Fraternization," by which France pronounced the fall of her own monarchy, declared "that she would grant succour to every people who wished to recover their liberty," and commanded her generals "to aid all such, and to defend all citizens who might be troubled in the cause of freedom."

This paper indeed startled me; it was the consummation which I had dreaded so long. I saw at once that France, in those wild words, had declared war against every throne in Europe, and that we were now beginning the era of struggle and suffering which Mordecai's strong sense had predicted, and of which no human sagacity could foresee the end. My countenance probably showed the impression which this European anathema had made upon me; for Monsieur Gilet became more heroic than ever, tore his grizzled curls, throwing aside his pistol, which he had at length discovered to be hors de combat, and drawing the falchion which clattered at his heels, and was nearly as long as himself, flourished it in quick march backward and forward before the mirror-that mirror never forgotten!-in all the whirlwind of his rage, and panted for the conquest of "perfidious Albion," the "traitor" Pitt, and the whole brood of hoary power. I was too feeble to turn him out of the room, and too contemptuous to reply. But his overthrow was not the further off. The old nurse, who, old as she was, still retained some of the sinews and all the irritability of a stout Champenoise peasant, roused by his insults to the aristocracy, one of whom she probably regarded herself, from having lived so long under their roof, watched her opportunity, made a spring at him like a wild-cat, wrested the sabre from his hand, and, grasping the struggling and screaming little functionary in her strong arms, carried him like a child out of the room.

She then returned, and having locked the door to prevent his second inroad, sat down by the side of my couch, and, with the usual passion of women after strong excitement, burst into exclamations and tears. What I could collect from her broken narrative, was little more than the commonplace of national misery in that fearful time. She had been a servant in the family of the nobleman whose daughter I had saved from death. She had been the nurse of the young countess; and all the blessings that sorrow and gratitude ever gathered together, could not be exceeded by the praises which she poured upon my head. It had been rumoured in the town that I was attacked and killed by a body of cavalry sent to revenge the rout of their comrades. And the Marquis Lanfranc-I now first learned the name of my noble entertainer-had gone forth to look for my remains in the field. I was found still breathing, and to avoid further danger was carried to this dwelling, a hunting-lodge in the heart of the forest; there I had been attended by the family physician only, and, after a week of insensibility, had given signs of recovery. The marquis's humanity had brought evil on himself. His visits to the lodge had been remarked, and on this very morning he had been arrested, and conveyed with his daughter, in a carriage escorted by gendarmes to the capital. My detection followed of course; papers found on my person had proved that I was an agent of England; and the officious M. Gilet had spent the morning in exhibiting to the peasantry of the neighbourhood the order of the "Committee of Public Safety," a name which froze the blood, to take me under his charge, and conduct me forthwith to their tribunal. I tell all this in my own way; for the dame's sighs, sobs, and vehement indignation, would have defied all record.

My prospect was now black enough, for justice was a word unheard of in the present condition of things; and my plea of being an Englishman, and in the civil service of my country, would have been a death-warrant. I must acknowledge, too, that I had fairly thrown it away by my adoption of the Prussian sabre. I might well be now in low spirits; for the guillotine was crushing out life at that moment in every province of France, and the thirst of public curiosity was to be fed by nothing but blood. Yet, even in that moment, let me give myself credit for the recollection, my first enquiry was for the fate of my squadron. The old woman could tell me but little on the subject; but that little was consolatory. The French troopers, who had come back triumphing into the town, had not brought any Prussian prisoners: two or three foreigners, who had lost their horses, were sheltered in her master's stables until they could make their escape; and of them she had heard no more. The truth is, that nothing is more difficult in war than to catch a hussar who understands his business; and the probability was, that the chief part of them had slipped away, leaving the French to sabre each other in the dark. The fall of my horse had brought me down, otherwise I might have escaped the shot which stunned me, and been at that hour galloping to Berlin.

Monsieur Gilet, with some of the civic authorities, paid me a second visit in the evening, to prepare me for my journey. To me it was become indifferent whether I died in the carriage or by the edge of the guillotine; the journey was short in either case, and the shorter and sooner the better. I answered none of their interrogatories; told them I was at their disposal; directed the old woman to pack up whatever travelling matters remained to me, and to remember me to her master and mistress, if she ever should see them in this world; shook her strong old hand, and bade God bless her. In return, she kissed me on both cheeks, whispered a thousand benedictions, and left the room violently sobbing; yet with a parting glance at Monsieur Gilet and his collaborateurs, so mingled of wrath and ridicule, that it was beyond all my deciphering.

"Time and the hour run through the longest day,"

says the great poet; and, with the coming of midnight, a chaise de poste drew up at the door. As I was a prisoner of importance, M. Gilet was not suffered to take all the honour of my introduction to the axe on himself; and the mayor and deputy-mayor of the district insisted on this opportunity of making themselves known to the supreme Republic. They mounted the box in front, a couple of gendarmes sat behind, M. Gilet took his seat at my side, and, with an infinite cracking of whips, we rushed out upon the causeway.

I soon discovered that my companion was by no means satisfied with existing circumstances. The officiousness of the pair of mayors prodigiously displeased him. He broke forth-

"See these two beggars," he exclaimed, "pretending to patriotism! They have no energy, no courage, no civism. Why, you might have remained for a twelvemonth under their very nostrils before they would have found you out. Gilet is the man for the service of his country." Merely to stop the torrent of his complainings, I asked him some vague questions relative to the nobleman whom I was now following to Paris. But the patriot was not to be moved from his topic.

"Hah! Citizen Lanfranc. All is over with him. He once held his head high enough, but it will soon be as low as ever it was high. Yet I could have forgiven his aristocracy, if he had not put these two 'chiens' above me."

The position in which the mayor and his deputy sat, on the box of the chaise, continually presenting them to the eye of my companion, kept his choler peculiarly active.

"One of these fellows," he exclaimed, "was the Marquis's cook, another his perruquier! I was his tailor. Every man of taste and talent knows the superiority of my profession; for what is the first of noblemen without elegance of costume, or what indeed would man himself be without my art, the noblest and the earliest art of mankind? And yet he made these two 'brigands' mayor and deputy-peste! I did my duty. I denounced him on the spot. I did more. The aristocrat had a faction in the town. It was filled with his dependents. In fact, it had been built on his grounds, and tenanted by the old hangers-on of the family. So, to make a clear stage, I denounced the town." He clapped his hands with exultation at this civic triumph.

My recollection of the miseries which his malice had caused roused me into wrath, and, rash as the act was, I grasped him by the collar, with the full intent of throwing the little writhing wretch out of the window; but, while I was lifting him from the seat to which he clung screaming for help, and had already forced him halfway outside, a shot whistled close by the head of the postilion, which brought him to a full stop. "Mon Dieu!-Brigands!" exclaimed Monsieur Gilet; and, dropping back into the carriage, attempted to make a screen of my body by slipping his adroitly behind me. Two or three more discharges rattled through the trees, followed by a rush of peasants, who unceremoniously knocked down the two officials in front, and began a general scuffle with the gendarmes. The night was so dark, that I could discover nothing of the mêlée but by the blaze of the fusils. All, however, was quiet in a few moments, by the disappearance of the gendarmes, and the complete capture of the convoy-M. Gilet, mayors, and all. Whether we had fallen into the hands of highwaymen, or of stragglers from the French army, was doubtful for a while, as not a syllable was spoken, nor a sound uttered, except by the unhappy functionaries, who grumbled prodigiously as they were dragged along through "rough and smooth, moss and mire," and whose pace was evidently quickened by many a kick and blow of the fusil. This was a rude march for me, too, with my unhealed wound, and my week's sojourn in bed; but I was treated, if not with tenderness, without incivility, while my compagnons de voyage were insulted with every contemptuous phrase in a vocabulary at least as rich in those matters as any other in Europe. At length, after about an hour's rapid movement, we reached an open ground, and the door of one of the wide, old, staring, yet not uncomfortable farmhouses which are to be found in the northern provinces of France.

Signs of comfort within were visible even at a distance, and the light of a huge wood fire had been seen for the last quarter of an hour gleaming through the woods, and leaving us in doubt whether we were approaching a horde of gipsies, or about to realize the classic scenes of Gil Blas.

But it was only a farm-house after all. The good dame of the house, with an enormous cap, enormous petticoats, enormous earrings, and all the glaring good-humour of a countenance of domestic plenty and power, came to meet us on the threshold; and her reception of me was ardent, to the very verge of stranglulation. Nothing could exceed her rapture at the sight of me, or the fierceness of her embraces, except her indignation at the sight of my traveling companions. Her disgust at the mayor and his deputy-and certainly after their night trip they were not figures to charm the eye-was pitched in the highest key of scorn, so as to be surpassed only by the torrent of contempt which her well-practised elocution poured upon the "tra?tre tailleur." I really believe, that, if she could have boiled him in the huge soup-kettle which bubbled upon the fire, without spoiling our supper, she would have flung him in upon the spot. The peasants who had captured us-bold, tall fellows, well dressed and well armed with cutlass and fusil, in the style of the gardes-de-chasse-could scarcely be kept from taking them out to the next tree, to make marks of them; and it was probably by my intercession alone that they were consigned to an outer house for the night. How the scene was to end with me, I knew not; though the jovial visage of my protectress showed me that I was secure. But the prisoners had no sooner been flung out of the door than I was ushered into an inner room, prepared with somewhat more of attention; where, to my great surprise and delight, the Marquis Lanfranc came forward to shake my hand, and, with a thousand expressions of gratitude, made me known to his daughter. The adventure was of the simplest order. The arrest of the Marquis was, of course, known in an instant, and a party of his foresters had immediately determined to take the law into their own hands-had posted themselves on the road by which his carriage was to pass, and had released him without difficulty. My release was merely a sequel to the drama. I had been left in the hunting-lodge by its owner, under the impression that an individual who could not be moved without hazard to life, would escape the vengeance of village patriotism. But the nurse, whom he had placed in charge of me, had no sooner ascertained that I was arrested, than she sent an express to the farm-house. The consequence naturally followed in my liberty; and the night which I expected to have spent freezing on my way to the dungeon, presented me with the pleasant exchange of hospitable shelter, the society of a most accomplished man, and his graceful handsome daughter; and last, not least, a couple of kisses from my late nurse, according to the custom of the country, as glowing and remorseless as those of my portly landlady herself.

We sat for some hours, and scarcely felt them pass in the anxious topics which engrossed us; the perils of France, the prospects of the Allies, and the captivity of the unhappy Bourbons. Now and then the conversation turned on their own hair-breadth escapes, and those of their relatives and friends. Among the rest, the hazards of the De Tourville family were mentioned, and I heard the name of Clotilde pronounced with a sensation indescribable. The name was connected with such displays of fortitude, nobleness of spirit, and deep devotion to the royal cause, that, if I had loved before, I now honoured her. She had saved the lives of her household; she had, by an act of extraordinary, but most perilous affection, saved the life of her mother, at the moment when the first insurgency broke out; and, young as she was, she had exhibited so noble a union of generosity and strength of mind, that the Marquis's eyes filled with tears as he told it, and Amalia buried her forehead in her hands to conceal her convulsive emotions: what must have been mine!

Our conversation was not unfrequently interrupted by bursts of merriment from the outer room, where the peasants were at supper provided by the Marquis for his bold rescuers-an indulgence which they seemed to enjoy with the highest zest imaginable. Songs were sung with very various kinds of merit in the performer, but all well received. Healths were proposed, in which the existing Government was certainly not much honoured; and, if the good wishes of the party could have sent the "Committee of Public Safety," the butcher cabinet of France, to the darkest spot on earth, or under it, its time would have been brief. But even this died away; the laugh subsided, the mirth grew silent, and at length the gardes-de-chasse went away, making the forest ring with their professional whoops and holloas, the remnants of their honest revel. At length the Marquis and his daughter, who were to be on the wing at daybreak for the German frontier, and who had generously offered to take charge of my invalid frame in the same direction, retired; and wrapping myself up in a dark cloak, furnished by my mistress and formed to her showy proportions, I threw myself on the sofa, and was in the land of dreams.

But though I slept, I did not rest. My fever, or my lassitude, or probably some presentiment of the troubled career into which I was to be plunged, made "tired nature's sweet restorer" a stepmother to me. I can never endure hearing the dreams of others, and thus I cannot suffer myself to inflict them on my hearers; but on that night, Queen Mab, like Jehu, drove her horses furiously. Every possible kind of disappointment, vexation, and difficulty; every conceivable shape of things, past and present, rushed through my brain; and all pale, fierce, disastrous, and melancholy. I was beckoned along dim shades by shapeless phantoms; I was trampled in battle; I was brought before a tribunal; I was on board a ship which blew up, and was flung strangling down an infinite depth in a midnight ocean. But this exceeded the privilege even of dreams. I made one desperate effort to rise, and awoke with a bound on the floor. There I found a real obstacle-a ruffian in a red cap. One strong hand was on my throat; and by the glimmer of the dying lantern, which hung from the roof, I saw the glitter of a pistol-barrel in the other. "Surrender in the name of the Republic!" were the words which told me my fate. Four or five wearers of the same ominous emblem, with sabres and pistols, were round me at the moment, and after a brief struggle I was secured. Cries were now heard outside the door, and a wounded gendarme was carried in, borne in the arms of his comrades. From their confused clamour, I could merely ascertain that the gendarmes who had escaped in the original mêlée, had obtained assistance, and returned on their steps. The farm-house had been surrounded, and the Marquis was indebted only to the vigilance of his peasantry for a second escape with his daughter. The gardes-de-chasse had kept the gendarmes at bay until their retreat was secure; and the post-chaise which had brought M. Gilet and his coadjutors, was, by this time, some leagues off, at full speed, beyond the fangs of Republicanism.

This at least was comfort, though I was left behind. But it was clear that the gallant old noble was blameless in the matter, and that nothing was to be blamed but my habitual ill luck. "En route for Paris," was the last order which I heard; and with a gendarme, in the strange kind of post-waggon which was rolled out from the farmer's stable, I was dispatched, before daybreak, on my startling journey.

I found my gendarme a facetious fellow; though his merriment might not be well adapted to cheer his prisoner. He whistled, he sang, he screamed, he stamped, to get rid of the ennui of travelling with so silent a companion. He told stories of his own prowess; libeled M. Gilet, who had got him beaten on this service in the first instance, and who seemed to be in the worst possible odour with man and woman; and abused all, mayors, deputy-mayors, and authorities, with the tongue of a leveler. But my facetious friend had his especial chagrins.

"I have all my life," said he, "been longing to see Paris, and have never been able to stir a step beyond this stupid province. Yet I have had my chances too. I was once valet to a German count, and we were on the way to Paris together when the post-chaise was stopped, the baron was arrested as a swindler, and I was charged as his accomplice. He was sent to the galleys; I got off. I then had a second chance. I enlisted in a regiment of dragoons which was to be quartered in Versailles. But such was my fate, I had no sooner passed the first drill, when we were ordered off to Lorraine to watch old King Stanislaus, the Pole, who lived there like one of his own bears, frozen and fat. Still I was determined to see Paris. I asked leave of absence; the adjutant laughed at me, the colonel turned on his heel, and the provost-marshal gave me a week of the black-hole. But a week is but seven days after all, and on my seeing the parade again-I-"

"You deserted?"

"Not quite that," was the reply. "I took leave, and, as I had seen enough of the black hole already, I took good care to give the provost-marshal no notice on the subject. A fortnight's march brought me within sight of the towers of Notre-Dame. But as I was resting myself on the roadside, our adjutant, as ill luck would have it, came by in the coupe of the diligence. He jumped out. I was seized, given up to the next guard-house, and after fitting me with a pair of fetters, by way of boots, I was ordered to take my passage with a condemned regiment for the West Indies. There I served ten years; I saw the regiment reduced to a skeleton by short rations and new rum; and returned the tenth representative of fifteen hundred felons. At last I have a chance; the gendarme of the village was so desperately mauled by the foresters in the attempt to carry you prisoner, that he has been forced to take to his bed, and let me take his place. The thing is certain now. You will be guillotined, but I shall see Paris."

Yet what is certain in this most changeful of possible worlds?

"Fate granted half the prayer,

The rest the gods dispersed in empty air."

We had toiled through our long journey, rendered doubly long by the dreariest and deepest roads on earth, and were winding round the spur of Montmartre, when a troop of citizen heroes, coming forth to sweep the country of the retreating Prussians, and whose courage had risen to the boiling point by the news of the retreat, surrounded the carriage. My Prussian uniform was proof enough for the brains of the patriots; and the quick discovery of Parisian ears, that I had not learned my French in their capital, settled the question of my being a traitor. The gendarme joined in the charge with his natural volubility; but rather insisted rashly on his right to take his prisoner into Paris on his own behalf. I saw a cloud gathering on the brow of the chef, a short, stout, and grim-looking fellow, with the true Faubourg St Antoine physiognomy. The prize was evidently too valuable not to be turned to good account with the authorities; and he resolved on returning at the head of his brother patriots to present me as the first-fruits of his martial career. The dispute grew hot; my escort was foolish enough to clap his hand on the hilt of his sabre-an affront intolerable to a citizen, at the head of fifty or sixty braves from the counter or the shambles; the result was, a succession of blows from the whole troop, which closed in my seeing him stripped of every thing, and flung into the cachot of the corps de garde, from which his only view of his beloved Paris must have been through an iron grille.

My captor, determined to enter the capital for once with eclat, seated himself beside me in the chaise de poste, and, surrounded by his pike-bearers, we began our march down the descent of the hill.

My new friend was communicative. He gave his history in a breath. He had been a clerk in the office of one of the small tribunals in the south; inflamed with patriotism, and indignant at the idea of selling his talents at the rate of ten sous a-day, "in a rat-hole called a bureau," he had resolved on being known in the world, and to Paris he came. Paris was the true place for talent. His civisme had become conspicuous; he had "assisted" at the birth of liberty. He had carried a musket on the 10th of August, and had "been appointed by the Republic to the command of the civic force," which now moved, before and behind me. He was a "grand homme" already. Danton had told him so within the last fortnight, and France and Europe would no sooner read his last pamphlet on the "Crimes of Kings," than his fame would be fixed with posterity.

I believe that few men have passed through life without experiencing times when it would cost them little to lay it down. At least such times have occurred to me, and this was among them. Yet this feeling, whether it is to be called nonchalance or despair, has its advantages for the moment; it renders the individual considerably careless of the worst that man can do to him; and I began to question my oratorical judge's clerk on the events in the "city of cities." No man could take fuller advantage of having a listener at his command.

"We have cut down the throne," said he, clapping his hands with exultation, "and now you may buy it for firewood. But you are an aristocrat, and of course a slave; while we have got liberty, equality, and a triumvirate that shears off the heads of traitors at a sign. Suspicion of being suspected is quite sufficient. Away goes the culprit; a true patriot is ordered to take possession of his house until the national pleasure is known; and thus every thing goes on well. Of course, you have heard of the clearance of the prisons. A magnificent work. Five thousand aristocrats, rich, noble, and enemies to their country, sent headless to the shades of tyrants. Vive la Republique! But a grand idea strikes me. You shall see Danton himself, the genius of liberty, the hero of human nature, the terror of kings." The thought was new, and a new thought is enough to turn the brain of the Gaul at any time. He thrust his head out of the window, ordered a general halt; and, instead of taking me to the quarters of the National, resolved to have the merit of delivering up an "agent of Pitt and English guineas" to the master of the Republic alone. "A l'Abbaye!" was his cry. But a new obstacle now arose in his troop; they had reckoned on a civic supper with their comrades of the guard; and the notion of bivouacking in front of the Abbaye, under the chilling wind and fierce showers which now swept down the dismal streets, was too much for their sense of discipline. The dispute grew angry. At length one of them, a huge and savage-looking fellow, who, by way of illustration, thrust his pike close to the little commandant's shrinking visage, bellowed out-

"The people are not to be insulted. The people order, and all must obey!" Nothing could be more unanswerable, and no attempt was made to answer. The captain dropped back into the chaise, the troop took their own way, and my next glance showed the street empty. But the Frenchman finds comfort under all calamities. After venting his wrath in no measured terms on "rabble insolence," and declaring that laws were of no use when "gueux" like these could take them into their hands, he consoled himself by observing that, stripped as he was of his honours, the loss might be compensated by his profits; that the "vagabonds" might have expected to share the reward which the "grand Danton would infallibly be rejoiced to give for my capture, and that both the purse and the praise would be his own." "A l'Abbaye!" was the cry once more.

We now were in motion again; and, after threading a labyrinth of streets, so dreary and so dilapidated as almost to give me the conception that I had never been in Paris before, we drove up to the grim entrance of the Abbaye. My companion left me in charge of the sentinel, and rushed in. "And is this," thought I, as I looked round the narrow space of the four walls, "the spot where so many hundreds were butchered; this the scene of the first desperate triumph of massacre; this miserable court the last field of so many gallant lives; these stones the last resting-place of so many whose tread had been on cloth of gold; these old and crumbling walls giving the last echo to the voices of statesmen and nobles, the splendid courtiers, the brilliant orators, and the hoary ecclesiastics, of the most superb kingdom of Europe!" Even by the feeble lamp-light, that rather showed the darkness than the forms of the surrounding buildings, it seemed to me that I could discover the colour of the slaughter on the ground; and there were still heaps in corners, which looked to me like clay suddenly flung over the remnants of the murdered.

But my reveries were suddenly broken up by the return of the little captain, more angry than ever. He had missed the opportunity of seeing the "great man," who had gone to the Salpetrière. And some of the small men who performed as his jackals, having discovered that the captain was looking for a share in their plunder, had thought proper to treat him, his commission, and even his civism, with extreme contempt. In short, as he avowed to me, the very first use which he was determined to make of that supreme power to which his ascent was inevitable, would be to clear the bureaux of France, beginning with Paris, of all those insolent and idle hangers-on, who lived only to purloin the profits, and libel the services, of "good citizens."

"A la Salpetrière." There again disappointment met us. The great man had been there "but a few minutes before," and we dragged our slow way through mire and ruts that would have been formidable to an artillery waggon with all its team. My heart, buoyant as it had been, sank within me as I looked up at the frowning battlements, the huge towers, more resembling those of a fortress than of even a prison, the gloomy gates, and the general grim aspect of the whole vast circumference, giving so emphatic a resemblance of the dreariness and the despair within.

"Aux Carmes!" was now the direction; for my conductor's resolve to earn his reward before daybreak, was rendered more pungent by this interview with the gens de bureau at the Abbaye. He was sure that they would be instantly on the scent; and if they once took me out of his hands, adieu to dreams, of which Alnaschar, the glassman's, were only a type. He grew nervous with the thought, and poured out his whole vision of hopes and fears with a volubility which I should have set down for frenzy, if in any man but a wretch in the fever of a time when gold and blood were the universal and combined idolatries of the land.

"You may think yourself fortunate," he exclaimed, "in having been in my charge! That brute of a country gendarme could have shown you nothing. Now, I know every jail in Paris. I have studied them. They form the true knowledge of a citizen. To crush tyrants, to extinguish nobles, to avenge the cause of reason on priests, and to raise the people to a knowledge of their rights-these are the triumphs of a patriot. Yet, what teacher is equal to the jail for them all? Mais voilà les Carmes!"

I saw a low range of blank wall, beyond which rose an ancient tower.

"Here," said he, "liberty had a splendid triumph. A hundred and fifty tonsured apostles of incivism here fell in one day beneath the two-handed sword of freedom. A cardinal, two archbishops, dignitaries, monks, hoary with prejudices, antiquated with abuses, extinguishers of the new light of liberty, here were offered on the national shrine! Chantons la Carmagnole."

But he was destined to be disappointed once more. Danton had been there, but was suddenly called away by a messenger from the Jacobins. Our direction was now changed again. "Now we shall be disappointed no longer. Once engaged in debate, he will be fixed for the night. Allons, you shall see the 'grand patriote,' 'the regenerator,' 'the first man in the world.' Aux Jacobins!"

Our unfortunate postilion falling with fatigue on his horses' neck, attempted to propose going to an inn, and renewing our search in the morning; but the captain had made up his mind for the night, and, drawing a pistol from his breast, exhibited this significant sign pointed at his head. The horses, as tired as their driver, were lashed on. I had for some time been considering, as we passed through the deserted streets, whether it was altogether consistent with the feelings of my country, to suffer myself to be dragged round the capital at the mercy of this lover of lucre; but an apathy had come over my whole frame, which made me contemptuous of life. The sight of his pistol rather excited me to make the attempt, from the very insolence of his carrying it. But we still rolled on. At length, in one of the streets, which seemed darker and more miserable than all the rest, we were brought to a full stop by the march of a strong body of the National Guard, which halted in front of an enormous old building, furnished with battlement and bartizan. "Le Temple!" exclaimed my companion, with almost a shriek of exultation. I glanced upward, and saw a light with the pale glimmer which, in my boyish days, I had heard always attributed to spectres passing along the dim casements of a gallery. I cannot express how deeply this image sank upon me. I saw there only a huge tomb-the tomb of living royalty, of a line of monarchs, of all the feelings that still bound the heart of man to the cause of France. All now spectral. But, whatever might be the work of my imagination, there was terrible truth; enough before me to depress, and sting, and wring the mind. Within a step of the spot where I sat, were the noblest and the most unhappy beings in existence-the whole family of the throne caught in the snare of treason. Father, mother, sister, children! Not one rescued, not one safe, to relieve the wretchedness of their ruin by the hope that there was an individual of their circle beyond their prison bars-all consigned to the grave together-all alike conscious that every day which sent its light through their melancholy casements, only brought them nearer to a death of misery! But I must say no more of this. My heart withered within me as I looked at the towers of the Temple. It almost withers within me, at this moment, when I think of them. They are leveled long since; but while I write I see them before me again, a sepulchre; I see the mustering of that crowd of more than savages before the grim gate; and I see the pale glimmer of that floating lamp, which was then, perhaps, lighting the steps of Marie Antoinette to her solitary cell.

Of all the sights of that melancholy traverse, this the most disheartened me, whatever had been my carelessness of life before. It was now almost scorn. The thoughts fell heavy on my mind. What was I, when such victims were prepared for sacrifice? What was the crush of my obscure hopes, when the sitters on thrones were thus leveled with the earth? If I perished in the next moment, no chasm would be left in society; perhaps but one or two human beings, if even they, would give a recollection to my grave. But here the objects of national homage and gallant loyalty, beings whose rising radiance had filled the eye of nations, and whose sudden fall was felt as an eclipse of European light, were exposed to the deepest sufferings of the captive. What, then, was I, that I should murmur; or, still more, that I should resist; or, most of all, that I should desire to protract an existence which, to this hour, had been one of a vexed spirit, and which, to the last hour of my career, looked but cloud on cloud?

Some of this depression may have been the physical result of fatigue, for I had been now four-and-twenty hours without rest; and the dismal streets, the dashing rain, and the utter absence of human movement as we dragged our dreary way along, would have made even the floor of a dungeon welcome. I was as cold as its stone.

At length our postilion, after nearly relieving us of all the troubles of this world, by running on the verge of the moat which once surrounded the Bastile, and where nothing but the screams of my companion prevented him from plunging in, wholly lost his way. The few lamps in this intricate and miserable quarter of the city had been blown out by the tempest, and our only resource appeared to be patience, until the tardy break of winter's morn should guide us through the labyrinth of the Faubourg St Antoine. However, this my companion's patriotism would not suffer. "The Club would be adjourned! Danton would be gone!" In short, he should not hear the Jacobin lion roar, nor have the reward on which he reckoned for flinging me into his jaws. The postilion was again ordered to move, and the turn of a street showing a light at a distance, he lashed his unfortunate horses towards it. Utterly indifferent as to where I was to be deposited, I saw and heard nothing, until I was roused by the postilion's cry of "Place de Grève."

A large fire was burning in the midst of the gloomy square, round which a party of the National Guard were standing, with their muskets piled, and wrapped in their cloaks, against the inclemency of the night. Further off, and in the centre, feebly seen by the low blaze, was a wooden structure, on whose corners torches were flaring in the wind. "Voilà, la guillotine!" exclaimed my captor with the sort of ecstasy which might issue from the lips of a worshipper. As I raised my eyes, an accidental flash of the fire showed the whole outline of the horrid machine. I saw the glitter of the very axe that was to drop upon my head. My first sensation was that of deadly faintless. Ghastly as was the purpose of that axe, my imagination saw even new ghastliness in the shape of its huge awkward scythe-like steel; it seemed made for massacre. The faintness went off in the next moment, and I was another man. In the whole course of a life of excitement, I have never experienced so total a change. All my apathy was gone. The horrors of public execution stood in a visible shape before me at once. I might have fallen in the field with fortitude; I might have submitted to the deathbed, as the course of nature; I might have even died with exultation in some great public cause. But to perish by the frightful thing which shot up its spectral height before me; to be dragged as a spectacle to scoffing and scorning crowds-dragged, perhaps, in the feebleness and squalid helplessness of a confinement which might have exhibited me to the world in imbecility or cowardice; to be grasped by the ruffian executioner, and flung, stigmatized as a felon, into the common grave of felons-the thought darted through my mind like a jet of fire; but it gave me the strength of fire. I determined to die by the bayonets of the guard, or by any other death than this. My captor perceived my agitation, and my eye glanced on his withered and malignant visage, as with a smile he was cocking his pistol. I sprang on him like a tiger. In our struggle the pistol went off, and a gush of blood from his cheek showed that it had inflicted a severe wound. I was now his master, and, grasping him by the throat with one hand, with the other I threw open the door and leaped upon the pavement. For the moment, I looked round bewildered; but the report of the pistol had caught the ears of the guard, whom I saw hurrying to unpile their muskets. But this was a work of confusion, and, before they could snatch up their arms, I had made my choice of the darkest and narrowest of the wretched lanes which issue into the square. A shot or two fired after me sent me at my full speed, and I darted forward, leaving them as they might, to follow.

How long I scrambled, or how often I felt sinking from mere weariness in that flight, I knew not. In the fever of my mind, I only knew that I twined my way through numberless streets, most of which have been since swept away; but, on turning the corner of a street which led into the Boulevard, and when I had some hope of taking refuge in my old hotel, I found that I had plunged into the heart of a considerable crowd of persons hurrying along, apparently on some business which strongly excited them. Some carried lanterns, some pikes, and there was a general appearance of more than republican enthusiasm, even savage ferocity, among them, that gave sufficient evidence of my having fallen into no good company. I attempted to draw back, but this would not be permitted; the words, "Spy, traitor, slave of the Monarchiques!" and, apparently as the blackest charge of all, "Cordelier!" were heaped upon me, and I ran the closest possible chance of being put to death on the spot. It may naturally be supposed that I made all kinds of protestations to escape being piked or pistoled. But they had no time to wait for apologies. The cry of "Death to the traitor!" was followed by the brandishing of half a dozen knives in the circle round me. At that moment, when I must have fallen helplessly, a figure stepped forward, and opening the slide of his dark lantern directly on his own face, whispered the word Mordecai. I recognised, I shall not say with what feelings, the police agent who had formerly conveyed me out of the city. He was dressed, like the majority of the crowd, in the republican costume; and certainly there never was a more extraordinary costume. He wore a red cap, like the cap of the butchers of the Faubourgs; an enormous beard covered his breast, a short Spanish mantle hung from his shoulders, a short leathern doublet, with a belt like an armoury, stuck with knives and pistols, a sabre, and huge trousers striped with red, in imitation of streams of gore, completed the patriot uniform. Some wore broad bands of linen round their waists, inscribed, "2d, 3d and 4th September,"-the days of massacre. These were its heros. I was in the midst of the élite of murder.

"Citizens," exclaimed the Jew in a voice of thunder, driving back the foremost, "hold your hands up; are you about to destroy a friend of freedom? Your knives have drunk the blood of aristocrats; but they are the defence of liberty. This citizen, against whom they are now unsheathed, is one of ourselves. He has returned from the frontier, to join the brave men of Paris, in their march to the downfall of tyrants. But out friends await us in the glorious club of the Jacobins. This is the hour of victory. Advance, regenerated sons of freedom! Forward, Frenchmen!"

His speech had the effect. The rapid executors of public vengeance fell back; and the Jew, whispering to me, "You must follow us, or be killed,"-I chose the easier alternative at once, and stepped forward like a good citizen. As my protector pushed the crowd before him, in which he seemed to be a leader, he said to me from time to time, "Show no resistance. A word from you would be the signal for your death-we are going to the hall of the Jacobins. This is a great night among them, and the heads of the party will either be ruined to-night, or by morning will be masters of every thing. I pledge myself, if not for your safety, at least for doing all that I can to save you." I remained silent, as I was ordered; and we hurried on, until there was a halt in front of a huge old building. "The hall of the Jacobins," whispered the Jew, and again cautioned me against saying or doing any thing in the shape of reluctance.

We now plunged into the darkness of a vast pile, evidently once a convent, and where the chill of the massive walls struck to the marrow. I felt as if walking through a charnel-house. We hurried on; a trembling light, towards the end of an immense and lofty aisle, was our guide; and the crowd, long familiar with the way, rushed through the intricacies where so many feet of monks had trod before them, and where, perhaps, many a deed that shunned the day had been perpetrated. At length a spiral stair brought us to a large gallery, where our entrance was marked with a shout of congratulation; and tumbling over the benches and each other, we at length took our seats in the highest part, which, in both the club and the National Assembly, was called, from its height, the Mountain, and from the characters which generally held it, was a mountain of flame. In the area below, once the nave of the church, sat the Jacobin club. I now, for the first time, saw that memorable and terrible assemblage. And nothing could be more suited than its aspect to its deeds. The hall was of such extent that a large portion of it was scarcely visible, and few lights which hung from the walls scarcely displayed even the remainder. The French love of decoration had no place here; neither statues nor pictures, neither gilding nor sculpture, relieved the heaviness of the building. Nothing of the arts was visible but their rudest specimens; the grim effigies of monks and martyrs, or the coarse and blackened carvings of a barbarous age. The hall was full; for the club contained nearly two thousand members, and on this night all were present. Yet, except for the occasional cries of approval or anger when any speaker had concluded, and the habitual murmur of every huge assembly, they might have been taken for a host of spectres; the area had so entirely the aspect of a huge vault, the air felt so thick, and the gloom was so feebly dispersed by the chandeliers. All was sepulchral. The chair of the president even stood on a tomb, an antique structure of black marble. The elevated stand, from which the speakers generally addressed the assembly, had the strongest resemblance to a scaffold, and behind it, covering the wall, were suspended chains, and instruments of torture of every horrid kind, used in the dungeons of old times; and though placed there for the sake of contrast with the mercies of a more enlightened age, yet enhancing the general idea of a scene of death. It required no addition to render the hall of the Jacobins fearful; but the meetings were always held at night, often prolonged through the whole night. Always stormy, and often sanguinary, daggers were drawn and pistols fired-assassination in the streets sometimes followed bitter attacks on the benches; and at this period, the mutual wrath and terror of the factions had risen to such height, that every meeting might be only a prelude to exile or the axe; and the deliberation of this especial night must settle the question, whether the Monarchy or the Jacobin club was to ascend the scaffold. It was the debate on the execution of the unhappy Louis XVI.

The arrival of the crowd, among whom I had taken my unwilling seat, evidently gave new spirits to the regicides; the moment was critical. Even in Jacobinism all were not equally black, and the fear of the national revulsion at so desperate a deed startled many, who might not have been withheld by feelings of humanity. The leaders had held a secret consultation while the debate was drawing on its slow length, and Danton's old expedient of "terror" was resolved on. His emissaries had been sent round Paris to summon all his banditti; and the low cafés, the Faubourg taverns, and every haunt of violence, and the very drunkenness of crime, had poured forth. The remnant of the Marseillois-a gang of actual galley-slaves, who had led the late massacres-the paid assassins of the Marais, and the sabreurs of the Royal Guard, who after treason to their king, had found profitable trade in living on the robbery and blood of the nobles and priests, formed this reinforcement; and their entrance into the gallery was recognised by a clapping of hands from below, which they answered by a roar, accompanied with the significant sign of clashing their knives and sabres.

Danton immediately rushed into the Tribune. I had seen him before, on the fearful night which prepared the attack on the palace; but he was then in the haste and affected savageness of the rabble. He now played the part of leader of a political sect; and the commencement of his address adopted something of the decorum of public council. In this there was an artifice; for, resistless as the club was, it still retained a jealousy of the superior legislative rank of the assembly of national representatives, the Convention. The forms of the Convention were strictly imitated; and even those Jacobins who usually led the debate, scrupulously wore the dress of the better orders. Robespierre was elaborately dressed whenever he appeared in the Tribune, and even Danton abandoned the canaille costume for the time. I was struck with his showy stature, his bold forehead, and his commanding attitude, as he stood waving his hand over the multitude below, as if he waved a sceptre. His appearance was received with a general shout from the gallery, which he returned by one profound bow, and then stood erect, till all sounds had sunk. His powerful voice then rang through the extent of the hall. He began with congratulating the people on their having relieved the Republic from its external dangers. His language at first was moderate, and his recapitulation of the perils which must have befallen a conquered country, was sufficiently true and even touching; but his tone soon changed, and I saw the true democrat. "What!" he cried, "are those perils to the horrors of domestic perfidy? What are the ravages on the frontier to poison and the dagger at our firesides? What is the gallant death in the field to assassination in cold blood? Listen, fellow-citizens, there is at this hour a plot deeper laid for your destruction than ever existed in the shallow heads of, or could ever be executed by the coward hearts of, their soldiery. Where is that plot? In the streets? No. The courage of our brave patriots is as proof against corruption as against fear." This was followed by a shout from the gallery. "Is it in the Tuileries? No; there the national sabre has cut down the tree which cast its deadly fruits among the nation. Where then is the focus of the plot-where the gathering of the storm that is to shake the battlements of the Republic-where that terrible deposit of combustibles which the noble has gathered, the priest has piled, and the king has prepared to kindle? Brave citizens, that spot is --," he paused, looking mysteriously round, while a silence deep as death pervaded the multitude; then, as if suddenly recovering himself, he thundered out-"The Temple!" No language can describe the shout or the scene that followed. The daring word was now spoken which all anticipated; but which Danton alone had the desperate audacity to utter. The gallery screamed, howled, roared, embraced each other, danced, flourished their weapons, and sang the Marseillaise and the Carmagnole. The club below were scarcely less violent in their demonstrations of furious joy. Danton had now accomplished his task; but his vanity thirsted for additional applause, and he entered into a catalogue of his services to Republicanism. In the midst of the detail, a low but singularly clear voice was heard, from the extremity of the hall.

"Descend, man of massacre!"

I saw Danton start back as if he had been shot. At length, recovering his breath, he said feebly-

"Citizens, of what am I accused?"

"Of the three days of September," uttered the voice again, in a tone so strongly sepulchral, that it palpably awed the whole assemblage.

"Who is it that insults me? who dares to malign me? What spy of the Girondists, what traitor of the Bourbons, what hireling of the gold of Pitt, is among us?" exclaimed the bold ruffian, yet with a visage which, even at the distance, I could observe had lost its usual fiery hue, and turned clay-colour. "Who accuses me?"

"I!" replied the voice, and I saw a thin tall figure stalk up the length of the hall, and stand at the foot of the tribune. "Descend!" was the only word which he spoke; and Danton, as if under a spell, to my astonishment, obeyed without a word, and came down. The stranger took his place, none knew his name; and the rapidity and boldness of his assault suspended all in wonder like my own. I can give but a most incomplete conception of the extraordinary eloquence of this mysterious intruder. He openly charged Danton with having constructed the whole conspiracy against the unfortunate prisoners of September; with having deceived the people by imaginary alarms of the approach of the enemy; with having plundered the national treasury to pay the assassins; and, last and most deadly charge of all, with having formed a plan for a National Dictatorship, of which he himself was to be the first possessor. The charge was sufficiently probable, and was not now heard for the first time. But the keenness and fiery promptitude with which the speaker poured the charge upon him, gave it a new aspect; and I could see in the changing physiognomies round me, that the great democrat was already in danger. He obviously felt this himself; for starting up from the bench to which he had returned, he cried out, or rather yelled-

"Citizens, this man thirsts for my blood. Am I to be sacrificed? Am I to be exposed to the daggers of assassins!" But no answering shout now arose; a dead silence reigned: all eyes were still turned on the tribune. I saw Danton, after a gaze of total helplessness on all sides, throw up his hands like a drowning man, and stagger back to his seat. Nothing could be more unfortunate than his interruption; for the speaker now poured the renewed invective, like a stream of molten iron, full on his personal character and career.

"Born a beggar, your only hope of bread was crime. Adopting the profession of an advocate, your only conception of law was chicanery. Coming to Paris, you took up patriotism as a trade, and turned the trade into an imposture. Trained to dependence, you always hung on some one till he spurned you. You licked the dust before Mirabeau; you betrayed him, and he trampled on you; you took refuge in the cavern of Marat, until he found you too base even for his base companionship, and he, too, spurned you; you then clung to the skirts of Robespierre, and clung only to ruin. Viper! known only by your coils and your poison; like the original serpent, degraded even from the brute into the reptile, you already feel your sentence. I pronounce it before all. The man to whom you now cling will crush you. Maximilien Robespierre, is not your heel already lifted up to tread out the life of this traitor? Maximilien Robespierre," he repeated with a still more piercing sound, "do I not speak the truth?" "Have I not stripped the veil from your thoughts? Am I not looking on your heart?" He then addressed each of the Jacobin leaders in a brief appeal. "Billaud Varennes, stand forth-do you not long to drive your dagger into the bosom of this new tyrant? Collot d'Herbois, are you not sworn to destroy him? Couthon, have you not pronounced him perjured, perfidious, and unfit to live? St Just, have you not in your bosom the list of those who have pledged themselves that Danton shall never be Dictator; that his grave shall be dug before he shall tread on the first step of the throne; that his ashes shall be scattered to the four winds of heaven; that he shall never gorge on France?"

A hollow murmur, like an echo of the vaults beneath, repeated the concluding words. The murmur had scarcely subsided when this extraordinary apparition, flinging round him a long white cloak, which he had hitherto carried on his arm, and which, in the dim light, gave him the look of one covered with a shroud, cried out in a voice of still deeper solemnity, "George Jacques Danton, you have this night pronounced the death of your king-I now pronounce your own. By the victims of the 20th of June-by the victims of the 10th of August-by the victims of the 2d of September-by the thousands whom your thirst of blood has slain-by the tens of thousands whom your treachery has sent to perish in a foreign grave-by the millions whom the war which you have kindled will lay in the field of slaughter-I cite you to appear before a tribunal, where sits a judge whom none can elude and none can defy. Within a year and a month, I cite you to meet the spirits of your victims before the throne of the Eternal."

He stopped; not a voice was heard. He descended the steps of the Tribune, and stalked slowly through the hall; not a hand was raised against him. He pursued his way with as much calmness and security as if he had been a supernatural visitant, until he vanished in the darkness.

This singular occurrence threw a complete damp on the regicidal ardour; and, as no one seemed inclined to mount the Tribune, the club would probably have broken up for the night, when a loud knocking at one of the gates, and the beating of drums, aroused the drowsy sitters on the benches. The gallery was as much awake as ever; but seemed occupied with evident expectation of either a new revolt, or a spectacle; pistols were taken out to be new primed, and the points and edges of knives duly examined. The doors at length were thrown open, and a crowd, one half of whom appeared to be in the last stage of intoxication, and the other half not far from insanity, came dancing and chorusing into the body of the building. In the midst of their troop they carried two busts covered with laurels-the busts of the regicides Ravaillac and Clement, with flags before them, inscribed, "They were glorious; for they slew kings!" The busts were presented to the president, and their bearers, a pair of poissardes, insisted on giving him the republican embrace, in sign of fraternization. The president, in return, invited them to the "honours of a sitting;" and thus reinforced, the discussion on the death of the unhappy monarch commenced once more, and the vote was carried by acclamation. The National Convention was still to be applied to for the completion of the sentence; but the decree of the Jacobins was the law of the land.

I had often looked towards the gallery door, during the night, for the means of escape; but my police friend had forbade my moving before his return. I therefore remained until the club were breaking up, and the gallery began to clear. Cautious as I had been, I could not help exhibiting, from time to time, some disturbance at the atrocities of the night, and especially at the condemnation of the helpless king. In all this I had found a sympathizing neighbour, who had exhibited marked civility in explaining the peculiarities of the place, and giving me brief sketches of the speakers as they rose in succession. He had especially agreed with me in deprecating the cruelty of the regicidal sentence. I now rose to bid my gentlemanlike cicerone good-night; but, to my surprise, I saw him make a sign to two loiterers near the door, who instantly pinioned me.

"We cannot part quite so soon, Monsieur l'Aristocrat," said he; "and, though I much regret that I cannot have the honour of accommodating you in the Temple, near your friend Monsieur Louis Capet, yet you may rely on my services in procuring a lodging for you in one of the most agreeable prisons in Paris."

I had been entrapped in the most established style, and I had nothing to thank for it but fortune. Resistance was in vain, for they pointed to the pistols within their coats; and with a vexed heart, and making many an angry remark on the treachery of the villain who had ensnared me-matters which fell on his ear probably with about the same effect as water on the pavement at my feet-I was put into a close carriage, and, with ny captors, carried off to the nearest barrier, and consigned to the governor of the well-known and hideous St Lazare.

* * *

THE OLYMPIC JUPITER.

Calm the Olympian God sat in his marble fane,

High and complete in beauty too pure and vast to wane;

Full in his ample form, Nature appear'd to spread;

Thought and sovran Rule beam'd in his earnest head;

From the lofty foliaged brow, and the mightily bearded chin,

Down over all his frame was the strength of a life within.

Lovely a maid in twilight before the vision knelt,

Looking with upturn'd gaze the awe that her spirit felt.

Hung like the skies above her was bow'd the monarch mild,

Hearing the whisper'd words of the fair and panting child.

-Could she be dear to him as dews to ocean are,

Be in his wreath a leaf, on his robes a golden star!

Could she as incense float around his eternal throne,

Sound as the note of a hymn to his deep ear alone!

Lo! while her heart adoring still to the God exhales,

Speech from his glimmering lips on the silent air prevails:

-"Child of this earth, bewilder'd in thine a?rial dream,

Turn thee to Powers that are, and not to those that seem.

All of fairest and noblest filling my graven form

First in a human spirit was breathing alive and warm.

Seek thou in him all else that he can evoke from nought,

Seek the creative master, the king of beautiful thought."

-Down the eyes of the maiden sank from the Thunderer's look,

Pale in her shame and terror, and yet with delight she shook

Swift on her brow she felt a crown by the God bestow'd,

Shading her face that now with a hope too lively glow'd.

Bending the Sculptor stood who wrought the work divine,

Godlike in voice he spake-Ever, oh, maid be mine!

J. S.

* * *

A ROMAN IDYL.

Oh! blame not, friend, with scoff unfeeling,

The gentle tale of grief and wrong,

Which, all the pain of life revealing,

Yet teaches peace by thoughtful song.

The landscape round us wide expanded

As ere was heard the name of Rome;

And Rome, though fallen, our souls commanded,

In this her empire's earliest home.

Her brightness beam'd on each far mountain,

Her life made green the grass we trode,

Her memory haunted still the fountain,

And spread her shadows o'er the sod.

Her ruins told their tale of glory,

Decreed to that eternal sky;

And through that ancient grove, her story

With sibyl whisper seem'd to sigh.

The pile her wealthiest mourner builded,

In glimpse we caught through ilex gloom-

Metella's Tower, by sunshine gilded,

That beams alike on feast or tomb.

And on this plain, not yet benighted,

'Mid awful ages mouldering there,

Young hands in new-bloom flowers delighted,

Young eyes look'd bright in sunniest air.

Till we, Viterbo's wine-cup quaffing,

Which fairer lips refused to grace,

Could win by jest those lips to laughing,

And veil'd in folly wisdom's face.

But say, my friend, thou sage mysterious,

What Nymph, what Muse disown'd the strain

Which bade our heedless mirth be serious,

And woke our ears to nobler pain?

That region grave of plain and highland,

With Rome's grey ruin strewn around,

Is not a soft Calypso's island,

Nor fades at Truth's evoking sound.

High thoughts in words of quiet beauty

Accord with visions grand as these,

And song's imperishable duty

Has holier aims than but to please.

By word and image deeply wedded,

By cadence apt and varied rhyme,

To rouse the soul in sloth imbedded,

And tune its powers to life sublime.

By loftier shows of man's large being

Than man's dim actual hour displays,

To clear our eyes for purer seeing,

And nerve the flagging spirit's gaze.

By strains of bold heroic pleasure,

And action strong as thought conceives,

By many a doom-resounding measure

That best our selfish woes relieves;

By these to stir, by these to brighten,

By these to lift the soul from earth,

The Poet dares our joys to frighten,

And thrills the dirge of lazy mirth.

Ye Ruins, dust of empires vanish'd,

Ye mountains, clad with countless years,

From your great presence ne'er be banish'd

Sad songs that live in earnest ears:

Sad songs, the music of all sorrow,

Profound and calm as night's blue deep:

Accurst the dreams of any morrow

When man will feel he cannot weep.

J. S.

* * *

GOETHE

Alas! on earth his marvels done,

The noble German bosom lies,

His fatherland's Athenian son,

Amid the sage must largely rise!

Amid the sage the generous race

Of soaring thought and steadfast glow,

He breathes no more who gave a grace

To all our daily lot below.

He gave to man's encumber'd hours

The tuneful joys of truth serene,

And twined our life's neglected flowers

With nature's holiest evergreen.

Alas! for him the soul of fire,

For him of fancy's golden rays,

For him whose aims ascended higher

Than all that won a nation's praise!

We pause and ask-Why gloom'd the grave

For one of light so broadly mild?

And wonder beauty could not save

From death's deep night her eager child.

But could the lyre be heard again,

Its widow'd notes would seem to cry-

In all was he a man of men,

For them to live, like them to die.

What life inspires 'twas his to feel,

With ampler soul than all beside;

What earth's bright shows to few reveal,

His art for all expanded wide.

With earnest heed from hour to hour,

Through all his years of striving hope,

He fed his lamp, its light to shower

On paths where myriads dimly grope.

He taught nankind by toil, by love,

To cheer the world that must be theirs;

And ne'er to look for peace above,

By scorning earthly joys and cares.

Ah! pages full of grief and fear,

But all attuned to melody,

Vesuvio's flame reflected clear

In glassy seas of Napoli.

And on that sea we seem to float

In amber light, and catch from far,

'Mid ocean's boundless Voice, the note

Of girl who hymns the evening-star.

The sweetest word, the melting tone,

The pictured wisdom bright as day,

And Faust's remorse, and Tasso's groan,

And Dorothea's morning lay,

Glad Egmont, light of Clara's eyes,

Free Goetz, the warmth of manhood's noon,

And Mignon, all a tune of sighs,

And lorn Ottilia crush'd so soon.

Ah! tale that tells the life of all

To lovelier truth by fancy wrought,

And songs that e'en to us recall

The bliss a poet's vision caught!

All these are ours, yes, all-but he.

And who that lives can find a strain

Of worth like his the soul to free

From bonds of sublunary pain?

A strain like his we vainly seek

To sound above the singer's grave,

A voice empower'd like his to speak

The word our aching bosoms crave.

That word is not-Oh! not, farewell!

To thee whom all thy lays restore;

But deeply longs the heart to tell

A love thy smile accepts no more.

J. S.

* * *

HYMN OF A HERMIT.

Long the day, the task is longer;

Earth the strong by heaven the stronger.

Still is call'd to rise and brighten,

But, alas! how weak the soul;

While its inbred phantoms frighten,

While the past obscures the whole.

Shadows of the wise departed,

Be the brave, the loving-hearted;

Deathless dead, resounding, rushing,

From the morning-land of hope

Come, with viewless footsteps, crushing

Dreams that make the wing'd ones grope.

Socrates, the keen, the truthful,

In thy hoary wisdom youthful;

Smiling, fear-defying spirit,

From beside thy Grecian waves,

Teach us Norsemen to inherit

Thoughts whose dawn is life to graves.

Rome's Aurelius, thou the holy

King of earth, in goodness lowly,

From thy ruins by the Tiber,

Look with tearless aspect mild,

Till each agonizing fibre

Like thine own is reconciled.

Augustinus, bright and torrid,

Isles of green in deserts horrid

Once thy home, thy likeness ever!

We with sword no less divine

Would the good and evil sever,

In a larger world than thine.

Soft Petrarca, sweet and subtle,

Weaving still, with silver shuttle,

Moony veils for human feeling-

Thine the radiance from above,

Half-transfiguring, half-concealing,

Wounds and tears of earthly love.

Saxon rude, of thundering stammer,

Iron heart, by sin's dread hammer

Ground to better dust than golden,

May thy prophecy be true.

Melt the stern, the weak embolden;

Teach what Luther never knew.

Pale Spinosa, nursed in fable,

Painted hopes and portent sable,

Then an opener wisdom finding,

Let thy round and wintry sun

Chase the lurid vapour, blinding

Souls that seek the Holy One.

Thou from green Helvetia roaming,

Meteor pale in misty gloaming,

With a breast too fiercely burning;

Generous, tuneful, frail Rousseau!

Would that all to truth returning,

Gave, like thee, a tear to woe!

Eye of clear and diamond sparkle,

Where the Baltic waters darkle,

Lonely German seer of Reason,

Great and calm as Atlas old;

Through our formless foggy season,

Short thine adamantine cold.

Shelley, born of faith and passion,

Nobler far than gain and fashion;

Daring eaglet arm'd with lightning,

Firing soon thy native nest,

Still the eternal blaze is brightening

Ocean where thy pinions rest.

Heroes, prophets, bards, and sages,

Gods and men of climes and ages,

Conquerors of lifelong sorrow,

Torment that ye made your throne,

Help, Oh! help in us the morrow,

Full of triumph like your own.

J. S.

* * *

THE LUCKLESS LOVER

"If aught on earth assault may bide

Of ceaseless time and shifting tide,

Beloved! I swear to thee

It is the truth of hearts that love,

United in a world above

The moment's misty sea.

"Oh! sweeter than the light of dawn,

Than music in the woods withdrawn

From clamours of the crowd,

A new creation all our own,

Unvisited by scoff or groan,

Is faith in silence vow'd.

"Two hearts by reason nobly sad,

Nor rashly blind, nor lightly glad,

Possess they not a bliss

In their communion, felt and full,

Beyond all custom's deadly rule?

For life is only this.

"In sighs we met, in sighs and sobs,

Such grief as from the wretched robs

The hope to heaven allied:

Great calm was ours, a strength severe,

Though wet with many a scalding tear,

When soul to soul replied.

"Of thy dark eyes and gentle speech,

The memory has a power to teach

What know not many wise.

New stars may rise, the ancient fade,

But not for us, my own pale maid,

Be lost that pure surprise-

"The pure delight, the awful change,

Chief miracle in wonder's range,

That binds the twain in one;

While fear, foes, friends, and angry Fate,

And all that wreck our mortal state

Shall pass, like motes i' the sun.

"In his fine frame the throstle feels

The music that his note reveals;

And spite of shafts and nets,

How better is the dying bird

Than some dumb stone that ne'er was heard,

That arrow never threats?

"Disdaining man, the mountains rise;

Is love less kindred with the skies,

Or less their Maker's will?

The strains, without a human cause,

Flow on, unheeding lies and laws-

Will hearts for words be still?

"What cliffs oppose, what oceans roll,

What frowns o'ershade the weeping soul,

Alas! were long to tell.

But something is there more than these,

Than frowns and coldness, rocks and seas:

Until its hour-farewell!"

So sang the vassal bard by night,

Beneath his high-born lady's light

That from her turret shone.

Next morning in the forest glade

His corpse was found. Her brother's blade

Had cut his bosom's bone.

What reap'd Lord Wilfrid by the stroke?

Before another morning broke,

She, too, was with the blest:

And 'twas her last and only prayer,

That her sweet limbs might slumber where

The minstrel had his rest.

J. S.

* * *

FREE TRADE AND PROTECTION

THE CORN LAWS.

It is remarkable that, while we hear so much of the advantages of free trade, the reciprocity of them is always in prospect only. By throwing open our harbours to foreign nations, indeed, we give them an immediate and obvious advantage over ourselves; but as to any corresponding advantages we are to gain in our intercourse with them, we are still waiting, in patient expectation of the anticipated benefit. Our patience is truly exemplary; it might furnish a model to Job himself. We resent nothing. No sooner do we receive a blow on one cheek, than we turn up the other to some new smiter. No sooner are we excluded, in return for our concessions, from the harbours of one state, than we begin making concessions to another. We are constantly in expectation of seeing the stream of human envy and jealousy run out:-

"Rusticus expectat dum defluat amnis: at ille

Labitur et labetur in omne volubilis aevum."

We are imitating the man who made the experiment of constantly reducing the food on which his horse is to live. Let us take care that, just as he is learning to live on nothing, we do not find him dead in his stall.

This, however, is no joking matter. The total failure of the free trade system to procure any, even the smallest return, coupled with the very serious injury it has inflicted on many of the staple branches of our industry, has now been completely demonstrated by experience, and is matter of universal notoriety. If any proof on the subject were required, it would be furnished by Porter's Parliamentary Tables, to which we earnestly request the attention of our readers. The first exhibits the effect of the reciprocity system, introduced by Mr Huskisson in Feb. 1823, in destroying our shipping with the Baltic powers, and quadrupling theirs with us. The second shows the trifling amount of our exports to these countries during the five last years, and thereby demonstrates the entire failure of the attempt to, extend our traffic with them by this gratuitous destruction of our shipping. The third shows the progress of our whole exports to Europe during the six years from 1814 to 1820, before the free trade began, and from 1833 to 1839, after it had been fifteen years in operation, and proves that it had declined in the latter period as compared with the former, despite all our gratuitous sacrifices by free trade to augment our commerce.12

The free traders fully admit, and deeply deplore, as we have shown on a former occasion, these unfavourable results; but they say that it is to be hoped they will not continue: that foreign nations must, in the end, come to see that they are as much interested as we are in enlightened system of free trade; and that, meantime, it is for our interest to continue the system; or even though it totally fails in producing any augmentation in our exports, it is obviously for our advantage to continue it, as it brings in the immediate benefit of purchasing articles imported at a cheaper rate. Supposing, say they, we obtain no corresponding advantage from other states, there is an immense benefit accrues to ourselves from admitting foreign goods at a nominal duty, from the low price at which they may be purchased by the British consumer. To that point we shall advert in the sequel; in the mean time, it may be considered as demonstrated, that the free trade system has entirely failed in procuring for us the slightest extension of our foreign exports, or abating in the slightest degree the jealousy of foreign nations at our maritime and manufacturing superiority. Nor is there any difficulty in discovering to what this failure has been owing. It arises from laws inherent in the nature of things, and which will remain unabated as long as we continue a great and prosperous nation.

It is related of the Lacedemonians, that while all the other citizens of Greece were careful to surround their towns with walls, they alone left a part open on all sides. Thus, superiority in the field rendered them indifferent to the adventitious protection of ramparts. It is for a similar reason that England is now willing to throw down the barriers of tariffs, and the impediments of custom-houses; and that all other nations are fain to raise them up. It is a secret sense of superiority on the one side, and of inferiority on the other, which is the cause of the difference. We advocate freedom of trade, because we are conscious that, in a fair unrestricted competition, we should succeed in beating them out of their own market. They resist it, and loudly clamour for protection, because they are aware that such a result would speedily take place, and that the superiority of the old commercial state is such, that on an open trial of strength, it must at once prove fatal to its younger rivals. As this effect is thus the result of permanent causes affecting both sides, it may fairly be presumed that it will be lasting; and that the more anxiously the old manufacturing state advocates or acts upon freedom of commercial intercourse, the more strenuously will the younger and rising ones advocate protection. Reciprocity, therefore, is out of the question between them: for it never could exist without the destruction of the manufactures of the younger state; and if that state has begun to enter on the path of manufacturing industry, it never will be permitted by its government.

But this is not all. If free trade must of necessity prove fatal to the manufactures of the younger state, it as certainly leads to the destruction of the agriculture of the older; and it is this double effect this RECIPROCITY OF EVIL, which renders it so disastrous and impracticable an experiment for both the older and the younger community. The reason of this has not hitherto been generally attended to; but when once it is stated, its force becomes obvious, and it furnishes the true answer on principle to the delusive doctrines of free trade.

Nature has established, and, as it will immediately be shown, for very wise and important purposes, a permanent and indelible distinction between the effect of civilization and opulence on the production of food, and on the preparation of manufactures. In the latter, the discoveries of science, the exertions of skill, the application of capital, the introduction of machinery, are all-powerful, and give the older and more advanced state an immediate and decisive advantage over the younger and the ruder. In the former, the very reverse takes place: the additions made to productive power are comparatively inconsiderable, even by the most important discoveries; and as this capital and industry have in the end a powerful effect, and always enable the power of raising food for the human race to keep far a-head of the wants of mankind; yet this effect takes place very slowly, and the annual addition that can be made to the produce of the earth by such means is by no means considerable. The introduction of thorough draining will probably increase the productive power of the soil in Great Britain a third: scientific discovery may perhaps add another third; but at least ten years must elapse in the most favourable view before these effects generally take place-ere the judicious and well-directed labours of our husbandmen have formed rivulets for the superfluous wet of our fields, or overspread the soil with the now wasted animal remains of our cities. But our manufactures can in a few years quadruple their produce. So vast is the power which the steam-engine has made to the powers of production in commercial industry, that it is susceptible to almost indefinite and immediate extension; and the great difficulty always felt is, not to get hands to keep pace with the demand of the consumers, but to get a demand to keep pace with the hands employed in the production. Manchester and Glasgow could, in a few years, furnish muslin and cotton goods for the whole world.

Nor is the difference less important and conspicuous in the price at which manufacturing and agricultural produce can be raised in the old and the young state. This is the decisive circumstance which renders reciprocity between them impossible. The rich old state is as superior to the young one in the production of manufactures, as the poor young state is to the rich old one in that of subsistence. The steam-engine, capital, and machinery, have so enormously increased the power of manufacturing production, that they have rendered the old commercial state omnipotent in the foreign market in the supply of its articles. Nothing but fiscal regulations and heavy duties can protect the young state from ruin in those branches of industry. Heavy taxes, high wages, costly rents, dear rude produce, all are at once compensated, and more than compensated, by the gigantic powers of the steam-engine. Cotton goods are raised now in Great Britain at a fifth of the price which they were during the war. A gown, which formerly was cheap at ￡2, 10s., is now sold for ten shillings. Silks, muslins, and all other articles of female apparel, have been reduced in price in the same proportion. Colossal fortunes have been made by the master manufacturers, unbounded wealth diffused through the operative workmen in Lancashire and Lanarkshire, even at these extremely reduced prices. This is the real reason of the universal effort made by all nations which have the least pretensions to commercial industry, of late years to exclude, by fixed duties, our staple manufactures; of which the President of the Board of Trade so feelingly complains, and which the advocates of free trade consider as so inexplicable. A very clear principle has led to it, and will lead to it. It is the instinct of SELF-PRESERVATION.

But there is no steam-engine in agriculture. The old state has no superiority over the young one in the price of producing food; on the contrary, it is decidedly its inferior. There, as in love, the apprentice is the master. The proof of this is decisive. Poland can raise wheat with ease at fifteen or twenty shillings a quarter, while England requires fifty. The serf of the Ukraine would make a fortune on the price at which the farmer of Kent or East Lothian would be rendered bankrupt. The Polish cultivators have no objection whatever to a free competition with the British; but the British anticipate, and with reason, total destruction from the free admission of Polish grain. These facts are so notorious, that they require no illustration; but nevertheless the conclusion to which they point is of the highest importance, and bears, with overwhelming force, on the theory of free trade as between an old and a young community. They demonstrate that that theory is not only practically pernicious, but on principle erroneous. It involves an oblivion of the fundamental law of nature as to the difference between the effect of wealth and civilization on the production of food and the raising of manufactures. It proceeds on insensibility to the difference in the age and advancement of nations, and the impossibility of a reciprocity being established between them without the ruin of an important branch of industry in each. It supposes nations to be of the same genus and age, like the trees in the larch plantation, not of all varieties and ages, as in the natural forest. If established in complete operation, it would only lead to the ruin of the manufactures of the younger state, and of the agriculture of the old one. The only reciprocity which it can ever introduce between such states is the reciprocity of evil.

Illustrations from everyday life occur on all sides to elucidate the utter absurdity, and, in fact, total impracticapability of the system of free trade, as applied to nations who are, or are becoming, rivals of each other in manufacturing industry. Those who have the advantage, will always advocate free competition; those who are labouring under impediments, will always exclaim against them. In some cases the young have the advantage, in others the old; but in all the free system is applauded by those in the sunshine, and execrated by those in the shade. The fair debutante of eighteen, basking in the bright light of youth, beauty, birth, and connections, has no sort of objection to the freedom of choice in the ball-room. If the mature spinster of forty would divulge her real opinion, what would it be on the same scene of competition? Experience proves that she is glad to retire, in the general case, from the unequal struggle, and finds the system of established precedence and fixed rank at dinner parties, much more rational. The leaders on the North Circuit-Sir James Scarlett or Lord Brongham-have no objections to the free choice, by solicitors and attorneys, for professional talent; but their younger brethren of the gown are fain to take shelter from such formidable rivals in the exclusive employment of the Crown, the East India Company, the Bank of England, or some of the numerous chartered companies in the country. England is the old lawyer on the Cirucuit in manufactures-but Poland is the young beauty of the ball-room in agriculture. We should like to see what sort of reciprocity could be established between them. Possibly the young belle may exchange her beauty for the old lawyer's guineas, but it will prove a bad reciprocity for both.

It is usual for both philosophers and practical men to ascribe the superior cheapness with which subsistence can be raised in the young state to the old one, to the weight of taxes and of debt, public and private, with which the latter is burdened, from which the former is, in general, relieved. But, without disputing that these circumstances enter with considerable weight into the general result, it may safely be affirmed that the main cause of it is to be found in two laws of nature, of universal and permanent application. These are the low value of money in the rich state, in consequence of its plenty, compared with its high value in the poor one, in consequence of its poverty, and the experienced inapplicability of machinery or the division of labour to agricultural operations.

Labour is cheap in the poor state, such as Poland, Prussia, and the Ukraine, becuase guineas are few.-"It is not," as Johnson said of the Highlands, "that eggs are many, but that pence are few." Commercial transactions being scanty, and the want of a circulating medium inconsiderable, it exists to a very limited extent in the country. People do not need a large circulating medium, therefore they do not buy it; they are poor, therefore they cannot. In the opulent and highly advanced community, on the other hand, the reverse of all this takes place. Transactions are so frequent, the necessities of commerce so extensive, that a large circulating medium is soon felt to be indispensable. In addition to a considerable amount of specie, the aid of bank-notes, public and private, of Government securities and exchequer bills, and of private bills to an immense ammount, bcomes necessary. McCulloch calculates the circulating medium of Great Britain, including paper and gold, at L.72,000,000. The bills in circulation are probably in amount nearly as much more. A hundred and forty, or a hundred and fifty millions, between specie, bank-notes, exchequer bills, Government securities, on which advances are made, and private bills, constitute the ordinary circulating medium of twenty-seven millions in the British empire. The total circulation of Russia, with sixty millions of inhabitants, is not forty millions sterling. The effect of this difference is prodigions. It is no wonder, whten it is taken into account, that wages are 5-1/2d. or 6d. a-day in Poland or the Ukraine, and 2s. or 2s. 6d. a-day in England.

The clearest proof that this is the great cause of the superior cost of raising subsistence in the old than the young state, is afforded by the different value which money bears in different parts of the same community. Ask any housekeeper what is the difference between the expense of living in London, Edinburgh, and Aberdeen, and he will answer, that L.1500 a-year in Edingburgh, or L.750 in Aberdeen. Yet these different places are all situated in the same community, and their inhabitants pay the same public taxes, and very nearly the same of local ones. It is the vast results arising from the concentration of wealth and expediture in one place, compared with its abstraction from others, which occasions the difference. But if this effect is conspicuous, and matter of daily observation, in different parts of the same compact and moderately sized country, how much more must it obtain in regard to different countries, situated in different latitudes and politcal circumstances, and in different stages of wealth, civilization, and commercial opulence? Between England for example, and Poland or the Ukraine? The difference is there important and durable. Wheat can be raised with as good a profit to the cultivator for sixteen shillings per quarter in Poland, as for forty-eight shillings in England or Scotland.

This superior weight of wages, rent and all the elements of cost, in the old, when compared with the young community, affects the manufacturer as well as the farmer; and in some branches of manufactures it does so with an overwhelming effect. But, generally speaking, the advantages of capital, machinery, and the division of labour, render the old state altogether predominant over the young one in these particulars. It would seem to be a fixed law of nature, that the progress of society adds almost nothing to the application of machinery to agriculture, but indefinitely to its importance in manufactures. Observe an old man digging his garden with a spade-that is the most productive species of cultivation; it is the last stage of agricultural progress to return to it. No steam engines or steam ploughs will ever rival it. But what is the old weaver toiling with his hands, to the large steam-power mill, turning at once ten thousand spindles? As dust in the balance. Man, by a beneficent law of his Maker, is permanently secured in his first and best pursuit. It is in those which demoralize and degrade, that machinery progressively encroaches on the labour of his hands. England can undersell India in muslins and printed goods, manufactured in Lancashire or Lanarkshire, out of cotton which grew on the banks of the Ganges; for England though younger in years compared to India, is old in civilization, wealth, and power. We should like to see what profit would be made by exporting wheat from England, raised on land paying thirty shillings an acre of rent, by labourers paid at two shillings a-day, to Hindostan, where rice is raised twice a-year, on land paying five shillings an acre rent, by labourers receiving twopence a-day each.

It is the constant operation of this law of nature which ensures the equalization of empires, the happiness of society, and the dispersion of mankind. To be convinced of this, we have only to reflect on the results which would ensue if this were not the case; if no unvarying law gave man in remote situations an advantage in raising subsistence over what they enjoy in the centres of opulence; and agriculture, in the aged and wealthy community, was able to acquire the same decisive superiority over distant and comparatively poor ones, which we see daily examplified in the production of manufactures. Suppose, for example, that in consequence of the application of the steam-engine, capital, and machinery to the raising of subsistence, Great Britian could undersell the cultivatiors of Poland and the Ukraine as effectually as she does their manufacturers in the production of cotton goods; that she could sell in the Polish market wheat at five shillings a quarter, when they require fifteen shillings to remunerate the cost of production. Would not the result be, that commerce between them would be entirely destroyed; that subsistence would be exclusively raised in the old opulent community; that mankind would congregate in fearful multitudes round the great commercial emporium of the world; and that the industry and progress of the more distant nations would be irrevocably blighted? Whereas, by the operation of the present law of nature, that the rich state can always undersell the poor one in maufactures, and the poor one always undersell the rich one in subsistence, those dangers are removed, a check is provided to the undue multiplication of the species in particular situations, and the dispersion of mankind over the globe-a vital object in the system of nature-is secured, from the very necessities and difficulties in which, in the progress of society, the old and wealthy community becomes involved.

These considerations point out an important limitation to which, on principle, the doctrines of free trade must be subjected. Perfectly just in reference to a single community, or a compact empire of reasonable extent, they wholly fail when applied to separate nations in different degrees of civilization, or even to different provinces of the same empire, when it is of such an extent as to bring such different nations, in various degrees of progress, under one common dominion. They were suggested, in the first instance, to philosophers, by the absurd restrictions on the commerce of grain which existed in France under the old monarchy, and which Turgot and the Economists laboured so assiduously to abolish. There can be no doubt that they were perfectly right in doing so; for France is a compact, homogeneous country, in which the cost of producing subsistence is not materially different in one part from another, and the interests of the whole community are closely identified. The same holds with the interchange of grain between the different provinces of Spain, or for the various parts of the British islands. But the case is widely different with an empire so extensive as, like the British in modern or the Roman in ancient times, to embrace separate kingdoms, in wholly different circumstances of climate, progress, and social condition. Free trade, in such circumstances, must lead to a destruction of important interests, and a total subversion of the balance of society in both the kingdoms subjected to it. To be conviced of this, we have only to look at the present condition of the British, or the past fate of the Roman empire.

It is the boast of our manufacturers-and such a marvel may well afford a subject for exultation-that with cotton which grew on the banks of the Ganges, they can, by the aid of British capital, machinery, and enterprise, undersell, in the production of muslin and cotton goods, the native Indian manufacturers, who work up their fabrics in the close vicinity of the original cotton-fields. The constant and increasing export of Britsh goods to India, two-thirds of which are cotton, demonstrates that this superiority really exists; and that the muslin manufacturers in Hindostan, who work for 3d. a-day on their own cotton, cannot stand the competition of the British operatives, who receive 3s. 6d. a-day, aided as they are by the almost miraculous powers of the steam-engine. Free trade, therefore, is ruinous to the manufacturing interests of India; and accordingly the Parliamentary proceedings are filled with evidence of the extreme misery which has been brought on the native manufacturers of Hindostan by that free importation of British goods, in which our political economists so much and so fully exult.

The great distance of India from the British islands, the vast expense of transporting bulky articles eight thousand miles accross the ocean, have prevented the counterpart of this effect taking place; and the British farmers feeling the depressing influence of the Indian plough, in like manner as the Indian manufacturers have the ruinous competition of the British steam-engine. But it is clear that, if India had been nearer, the former effect would have taken place as well as the latter. If the shores of Hindostan were within a few days sail of London and Liverpool, and the Indian cultivators, labouring at 2d. or 3d. a-day, had been brought into direct competition with the British farmers, employing labourers who received two or three shillings, can there be a doubt that the British farmers would have been totally destroyed in the struggle? The English farmers would have been prostrated by the same cause which has ruined the Indian muslin manufacturers. Cheap grain, the fruit of free trade, would have demolished British agriculture as completely as cheap cotton goods, the fruits of unlimited importation, has ruined Indian manufacturing industry.

Is, then, commercial intercourse impossible, on terms of mutual benefit, between states in widely different circumstatnces of commercial or agricultural advancement; and is the only reciprocity which can exist between them and reciprocity of evil? It is by no means necessary to rest in so unsatisfatory a conclusion. A most advantageous commercial intercourse to both parties may be carried on, but it must not be on the footing of free trade. The foundation of such an intercourse should be, that each should take, on the most favourable terms, the articles which it wants and does not produce, and impose restrictions on those which it wants and does produce. On this priciple, trade would be conducted so as to benefit both countries, and injure neither. Thus England may take from India to the utmost extent, and with perfect safety, sugar, indigo, cotton, tea, spices, cinnamon, and the more costly species of shawls; while India might take from England some species of cotton manufacture in which they have no fabrics of their own, cutlery, hardware, and all of the various luxuries of European manufacture. But a paternal and just government, equally alive to the interests of all its provinces, how far removed soever from the seat of power, would impose restrictions to prevent India being deluged with British cottons, to the ruin of its native manufactures, and to prevent Britian-if the distance did not operate, which it certainly would, as a sufficient protection-from being flooded with Indian grain. The varieties of climate, productions, and wants, in different countries, are such, that commerce, regulated on these principles, might be carried to the greatest extent consistent with the paramount duty of providing in each state for the preservation of its staple articles of industry.

The Roman empire in ancient times afforded the clearest demonstration of the truth of these principles; and the fate of their vast dominion shows, in the most decisive manner, what is the inevitable consequence to which the free trade principles, now so strongly contended for by a party in this country, must lead. Alison is the first modern author with whom we are acquainted, who has traced the decline of the Roman empire in great part to this source. In the tenth volume of his "History of Europe," p. 752, we find the following passage:-

"No nation can pretend to independence which rests for any sensible protion of its subsistence in ordinary seasons on foreign, who may become hostile, nations. And if we would see a memorable example of the manner in which the greatest and most powerful nation may, in the course of ages, come to be paralysed by this cause, we have only to cast our eyes on imperial Rome, when the vast extent of the empire had practically established a free trade in grain with the whole civilized world; and the result was, that cultivation disappeared from the Italian plains, that the race of Roman agriculturists, the strength of the empire, became extinct, that the fields were laboured only by slaves and cattle. The legions could no longer be recruited but from foreign bands, vast tracts of pasturage overspread even the fields of Lombardy and the Compagna of Naples, and it was the plaintive confession of the Roman annalist, that the mistress of the world had come to depend for her subsistence on the floods of the Nile."

This observation has excited, as well it might, the vehement indignation of the free trade journals. The example of the greates and most powerful nation that ever existed being weakened, and at length ruined by a free trade in corn, afforded too cogent an argument, and was too striking a warning, not to excite the wrath of those who would precipitate Great Britain into a similar course of policy. They have attacked the author, accordingly, with unwonted asperity; and, while they admint the ruin of Italian agriculture in the later stages of the Roman empire, endeavour to ascribe it to the gratuitous distribution of grain to the Roman populace, not the effect of a free importation of grain from its Egyptian and African provinces. The vast importance of the subject has induced us to look into the original authorities to whom Alison refers in support of his observation, and from among them we select three-Tacitus, Gibbon, and Michelet. Tacitus says,

"At Hercule olim ex Itaila legionibus longinquas in provincias commeatus portabantur, nec nunc infecunditate laboratur; sed Africam potius et Egyptum exercemus, navibusque et casibus vita populi Romani permissa est."-TACITUS, Annal. xii. 43.

Antiquity does not contain a more pregnant and important passage, or one more directly bearing on the present policy of the Britsh emprire, than this. It demonstrates: 1, That in former times Italy had been an exporting country: "olim ex Italia commeatus in longinquas provincias portabantur." 2, That at the time when Tacitus wrote, in the days of the Emperor Trajan, it had ceased to be so, and had come to import largely from Africa and Lybia, "sed nunc Africam potius et Egyptum exercemus." 3, That this was not the result of any supervening sterility or unfruitfulness, "nec nunc infecunditate laboratur," but was from causes which made it more profitable to purchase grain in the Egyptian or Lybian markets, "sed Africam POTIUS et Egyptum exercemus."

Of the extent to which this decay of agriculture in the central provinces of the Roman empire went, in the latter stages of its history, we have the following striking account in the authentic pages of Gibbon:-

"Since the age of Tiberius the decay of agriculture had been felt in Italy; and it was a just subject of complaint that the life of the Roman people depended on the accidents of the winds and the waves. In the division and decline of the empire, the tributary harvests of Egypt and Africa were withdrawn; the numbers of the inhabitants continually diminished with the means of subsistence; and the country was exhausted by the irretrievable losses of war, pestilence, and famine. Pope Gelasius was a subject of Odoacer, and he affirms, with strong exaggeration, that, in Emilia, Tuscany, and the adjacent provinces, the human species was almost extirpated."-GIBBON, vol. vi. c. xxxvi. p. 235.

Of the progress and extent of this decay, Gibbon gives the following account in another part of his great work:-

"The agriculture of the Roman provinces was insensibly ruined; and in the progress of despotism, which tends to disappoint its own purpose, the emperors were obliged to derive some merit from the forgiveness of debts, or the remission of tributes, which their subjects were utterly incapable of paying. According to the new division of Italy, the fertile and happy province of Campania, the scene of the early victories and of the delicious retirements of the citizens of Rome, extended between the sea and the Apennines, from the Tiber to the Silarius. Within sixty years after the death of Constantine, and on the evidence of an actual survey, an exemption was granted in favour of 330,000 English acres of desert and uncultivated land, which amounted to one-eighth of the whole surface of the province. As the footsteps of the barbarians had not yet been seen in Italy, the cause of this amazing desolation, which is recorded in the laws, (Cod. Theod. lxi. t. 38, l. 2,) can be ascribed only to the administration of the Roman emperors."-GIBBON, vol. iii. c. xviii. p. 87. Edition in 12 volumes.

Michelet observes, in his late profound and able History of France-

"The Christian emperors could not remedy the growing depopulation of the country any more than their heathen predecessors. All their efforts only showed the impotence of government to arrest that dreadful evil. Sometimes, alarmed at the depopulation, they tried to mitigate the lot of the farmer, to shield him against the landlord; upon this the proprietor exclaimed he could no longer pay the taxes. At other times they abandoned the farmer, surrendered him to the landlord, and strove to chain him to the soil; but the unhappy cultivators perished or fled, and the land became deserted. Even in the time of Augustus, efforts were made to arrest the depopulation at the expense of morals, by encouraging concubinage. Pertinax granted an immunity from taxes to those who could occupy the desert lands of Italy, to the cultivators of the distant provinces, and the allied kings. Aurelian did the same. Probus was obliged to transport from Germany men and oxen to cultivate Gaul.13 Maximian and Constantius transported the Franks and Germans from Picardy and Hainault into Italy: but the depopulation in the towns and the country alike continued. The people surrendered themselves in the fields to despair, as a beast of burden lies down beneath his load and refuses to rise. In vain the emperor strove, by offers of immunities and exemptions, to recall the cultivator to his deserted fields. Nothing could do so. The desert extended daily. At the commencement of the fifth century there was, in the happy Campania, the most fertile province of the empire, 520,000 jugera in a state of nature."-MICHELET, Histoire de France, i. 104-108.

Pursued to its very grave by the same deep-rooted cause of evil, the strength of Italy, even in the last stages of its decay, was still prostrated by the importation of grain from Egypt and Lybia. "The Campagna of Rome," says Gibbon, "about the close of the sixth century, was reduced to the state of a dreary wilderness, in which the land was barren, the waters impure, and the air infectious. Yet the number of citizens still exceeded the measure of subsistence; their precarious food was supplied from the harvests of Egypt and Lybia; and the frequent repetitions of famine betray the inattention of the emperors to a distant provice."-GIBBON, vil. viii. c. xlv. 162.

Nor was this desolating scourge of foreign importation confined to Italy; it obtained also in Greece equally with the Ausonian fields, the abode of early riches, opulence, and prosperity. "In the later stages of the empire," says Michelet, "Greece was almost entirely supported by corn raised in the fields of Podolia," (Poland.)-MICHELET, i. 277.

Now let it be recollected that this continual and astonishing decline of agriculture, and disappearance of the rural cultivators in the latter stages of the Roman empire, took place in an empire which contained, as Gibbon tells us, 120,000,000 of inhabitants, and 1600 great cities, was 3000 miles long and 2000 miles broad, contained 1,600,000 square miles, chiefly fertile and well cultivated land, which embraced the fairest and most fertile portions of the earth, and which had been governed for eighty yers under the successive sway of Nerva, Adrian, Trajan, and the two Antonines, with consummate wisdon and the most paternal spirit. 14 The scourge of foreign war, the devastation of foreign armies, were alike unknown; profound tranquillity pervaded every part of the empire; and a vast inland lake, spreading its ample waters through the heart of the dominion, afforded to all its provinces the most perfect facility of intercourse with the metropolis and the central parts of the empire. Yet this period-the period which Mr Hume has told us the philosophers would select as the happiest the human race had ever known-was precisely that during which agriculture so rapidly declined in the Italian and Grecian fields, during which the sturdy race of free cultivators disappeared, and the plains of Italy were entirely absorbed by pasturage, and maintained only vast herds of cattle tended by slaves.

What was it, then, which in an empire containing so immense a population, and such boundless resources, drawn forth and developed under so wise and beneficent a race of emperors, occasioned this constant and uninterrupted decay of agriculture, and at length the total destruction of the rural population in the heart of the empire? How did it happen that Italian cultivation receded, as Tacitus and Gibbon tell us it did, from the time of Tiberius; and equally under the wisdom of the Antonines, as the tyranny of Nero, or the civil wars of Vitellius? Some general and durable cause must have been in operation during all this period, which at firest depressed, and at length totally destroyed, the numerous body of free Italian cultivators who so long had constituted the strength of the legions, and had borne the Roman eagles, conquering and to conquer, to the very extremities of the habitable earth. The cause is apparent. It was the free importation of Egyptian and Lybian grain, consequent on the extension of the Roman dominion over their fertile fields, which effected the result. Were England to extend its conquering arms over Poland and the Ukraine, and, as a necessary consequence, expose the British farmer to the unrestrained competition of Polish and Russian wheat, precisely the same result would ensue. If the shores of Hindostan were within three or four days' sail of the Tiber, this result would long ago have taken place. Let Polish and Russian grain be admitted without a protecting duty into the British harbours, as Lybian and Egyptian were into those of Italy, and we shall soon see the race of cultivators disappear from the fields of England as they did from those of old Rome, and the words of Tacitus will, by a mere change of proper names, become a picture of our condition; three hundred thousand acres will soon be reduced to a state of nature in Kent and Norfolk, as they were in the Campania Felix. "Nec nunc infecunditate laboramur, Podoliam potius et Scythiam exercemus, navibusque et casibus vita populi Anglici permissa est."

The free traders allege that the decay of agriculture in the central provinces of the Roman empire, to which, by the concurring testimony of all historians, the ruin of the dominion of the Caesars was chiefly owing, is to be ascribed, not to the free importation of grain from Egypt, Podolia, and Lybia, but to the tyranny of the emperors, the gratuitous distribution of grain to the Roman populace, and the dreadful evils of domestic slavery. A very slight consideration, however, must be sufficient to show that these causes, how powerful soever in producing general evils over the empire, could not have been instrumental in occasioning those peculiar and separate causes of depression, which so early began to check, and at length totally destroyed, the agriculture of its central provinces.

The tyranny of the Caesars, the oppression of the Proconsuls, the avarice of the Patricians, were general evils, affecting alike every part of the empire; or rather they were felt with more severity in the remote provinces than the districts nearer home, in consequence of the superior opportunities of escape which distance from the central government afforded to iniquity, and the lesser chance of success which the insurrection of a remote province held forth to the "wild revenge" of rebellion. Muscovite oppression, accordingly, is more severely felt at Odessa or Taganrog than St Petersburg; and British rule is far from being restrained by the same considerations of justice on the banks of the Ganges or the Indus, as on those of the Thames. The gratuitous distribution of grain by the emperors to the populace of Rome, could never have occasioned the ruin of the Italian cultivators. Supposing that the two or three hundred thousand lazy and turbulent plebeians, who were nourished by the bounty or fed by the terrors of the Caesars, were the most useless, worthless, and dangerous set of men that ever existed, (which they probably were,) that circumstance could never have uprooted the race of cultivators from the plains of Lombardy, Umbria, or the Campania Felix. The greatest possible good to a nation, according to the free trader, is cheap grain, and never more so than when it is purchased or imported from foreign growers. If this be true, the importation of the harvests of Egypt and Africa into the Italian harbours, either by the voluntary purchase of the Roman emperors, or the forced tribute in grain which they exacted from those provinces, must have been the greatest possible benefit to the Italian people. How then, if there be no mischief in such foreign importations, is it possible to ascribe the ruin of Italian cultivation, and with it of the Roman empire, to these forced contributions? If the free traders have recourse to such an argument, they concede the very point in dispute, and admit that the introduction of foreign grain is injurious, and may in the end prove fatal, to the agriculture and existence of a state.

Slavery, though a great evil, will as little explain the peculiar and extraordinary decline of Italian and Grecian cultivation in the later stages of the Roman empire. The greater part of the labour of the ancient world, as every one knows, was conducted by means of slaves. They were slaves who held the plough, and tilled the land, and tended the flocks, equally in Lybia, in Campania, in Egypt, as in Umbria. Nay, the number of freemen, at least in the days of the Roman Republic, and the earlier periods of the empire, was incomparably greater in Italy and Greece, the abode of celebrated, powerful, and immortal republics, than in Lybia and Egypt, which from the earliest times had been subject to the despotic sway of satraps, kings, and tyrants. So numerous were the free citizens of Rome in the early days of the empire, that, by the census of Claudius, we are told by Gibbon they amounted to 6,945,000 men,15 the greater proportion of whom, of course, were residents in Italy, the seat of government, and the centre of wealth, power, and enjoyment. While so great was the multitude of free citizens which the Republic bequeathed to the empire, resident and exercising unfettered industry in Italy, the cultivators of Africa and Egypt were all serfs and slaves, toiling, like the West Indian negroes, beneath the lash of a master. How, then, did it happen that the labour of the Italian freeman was disused, and at length extinguished, while that of the African and Egyptian slaves continued to furnish grain for Italy down to the very latest period of the empire? We are told that the labour of freemen is cheaper than that of slaves; and the free traders will probably not dispute that proposition. It could not, therefore, have been the slavery of antiquity which ruined Italian agriculture, carried on, in part at least, by freemen; since African agriculture, the fruits entirely of slavery, continued to flourish down to the very last days of the Roman world.

The severe taxation of the emperors is justly stated by Gibbon and Sismondi, as well as Michelet, as a principal cause of the decline of Italian agriculture: but very little consideration is required to show, that this cause is inadequate to explain this ruin of cultivation in the Italian plains, when it continued to flourish and maintain the chief cities of the empire with food, in Egypt and Lybia. Heavy as it was, and oppressive as it ultimately became, it was equal; it was the same every where; it might, therefore, satisfactorily explain the general decline of rural industry through the empire, and doubtless had a large share in contributing to its downfall; but it cannot explain the particular ruin of it, in the central provinces of this vast dominion, while it continued, down to the very last moment, to flourish in its remote dependencies.

But the taxation of the empire, when coupled with the free importation of grain from these distant dependencies, does afford a most satisfactory, and, in truth, the true explanation of the ruin of Italian and Grecian cultivation. It was a fixed principle of Roman taxation, that the duties allotted on a particular district should remain fixed, how much lower the inhabitants or industry of the province might decline. When, therefore, by the constant importation of Egyptian and African grain, raised at half the cost at which they could produce it, the Italian cultivators were deprived of a remunerating return, and the taxes exacted from each district underwent no diminution, it is not surprising that the small farmers and proprietors were ruined; that they took refuge in the industry and crowds of cities, and that the race of freemen disappeared from the country. A similar process is now going on in the Turkish provinces. But without undervaluing-on the contrary, attaching full weight to this circumstance-nothing can be clearer than that it was the ruinous competition of foreign grain, raised cheaper than they could produce it, which rendered the same taxation crushing on the Italian farmers, which was borne with comparative facility in the remoter provinces, where land was more fertile, and labour less expensive. An example, à fortiori, applied to the British empire, where the free traders wish us to admit a free importation of grain from Poland and the Ukraine, where not only is labour cheap but taxation trifling, into the British islands, where not only is labour dear but taxation is five times more burdensome.

And for a decisive proof that it was the superior advantages which Egypt and Lybia enjoyed in the production of grain, and not any other causes, which occasioned the ruin of Italian agriculture, and with it the fall of the Roman empire, we have only to look to the condition of the Italian fields in the last stages of the government of the Caesars. Already, in the time of the elder Pliny, it had become a subject of complaint that the great properties were ruining Italy16-a sure proof, when the great division of estates in the days of the Republic-when, literally speaking, "every rood had its man"-that some general and irresistible cause, affecting the remuneration of their industry, was exterminating the small proprietors. Erelong, cultivators ceased entirely in the country, and the huge estates of the nobles were cultivated exclusively in pasturage, and by means of slaves. "La classe," says Michelet, "des petits cultivateurs peu à pee a disparu; les grands proprietaires qui leur succedèrent y suppleèrent par des esclaves."17It is recorded by Ammianus Marcellinus, that when Rome was taken by the Goths, it contained 1,200,000 inhabitants, and was mainly supported by 1780 great families, who cultivated their ample estates in Italy in pasturage, by means of slaves.18 For centuries before, the threat of blockading the Tiber had been found to be the most effectual way of coercing the Roman populace; and whenever it took place, famine ensued, not only in Rome, but the Italian provinces. The diminution of its agricultural produce had, long before, been stated by Columella at nine-tenths, and by Varro at three-fourths, of what at one period had been raised. Yet such was the wealth of the Roman nobles, derived from pasturage, that some of them had L.160,000 a-year.19 Agriculture, therefore, was destroyed; grain was no longer raised in Italy; Rome was wholly dependent on foreign supplies-but pasturage was undecayed; and colossal fortunes were enjoyed by a wealthy race of great proprietors, who managed their vast estates by means of slaves, and had bought up and absorbed the properties of the whole free cultivators in the country. Such was the effect-such was the result-of a free trade in grain in ancient times.

The free traders seem not insensible to these inevitable results of their favourite principles; but they meet them by describing such consequences as rather advantageous than injurious. If England, say they, can raise iron and cotton goods cheaper than Poland, and Poland and Russia grain cheaper than England, then the interest of each require tht they should follow out these branches of industry, and it is impolitic to strive against it. Let, then, England admit foreign grain on a nominal duty, and this will in the end induce Russia and Prussia to admit English manufactured goods on equally favourable terms; and thus the real interests of both countries will in the end be promoted.

There are two objections to this system. In the first place, it is impracticable if it were expedient. In the second, it is inexpedient if it were practicable.

It is impracticable if it were expedient. Theoretical writers may coolly discuss in their closets the total destruction of various important branches of industry, the "absorption" of the persons engaged in them in other pursuits, and the transference of national capital and industry from agriculture to manufactures, and vice versà; but it is impossible to effect such changes by the voluntary act of government, even in the most despotic country. We say by the voluntary act of government; because there is no doubt that it may be effected, though at an enormous sacrifice of life, wealth, and happiness, by the silent and unobserved operation of the laws of nature, which are irresistible; as was the case with the transference of industry from agriculture to pasturage, under the effect of free trade in grain in the countries bordering on the Mediterranean, in the later stages of the Roman empire; or from manufactures to agriculture, from the consequences of the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope in the Italian republics in modern times. But no government, not even that of the Czar Peter or Sultaun Mahmoud, could succeed in destroying or nipping in the bud brances of national industry, by simple acts of the legislature or sovereign authority, not imposed by external and irresistible authority. The Emperor Paul tried it, and got a sash twisted about his neck, according to the established fashion of that country, for his pains. The Whigs tried it, and were turned out of office in consequence. All the governments of Europe, despotic, constitutional, and democratic, meet our concessions, in favour of free trade, by increased protection to their manufacturers. They dare not destroy their rising commercial wealth any more than we dare destroy our old colossal agricultural investments. The republicans of America even exceed them in the race of tariffs and protection. Sixty-two per cent has lately been laid on our British iron goods in return for Sir Robert Peel's tariff; a similar duty on iron and cotton goods, it is well known, is contemplated in the Prussian leagues in Germany. The British government has at length, through its prime minister, spoken out firmly in support of the existing corn-laws. The feeling of the agricultural counties, as evinced at the late meetings, left them no alternative. All nations, under all varieties of government, situation, race, and political circumstances, concur in rising up to resist the doctrines of free trade. Necessity has enlightened, experience has taught them: a very clear motive urges them on, which is not likely to decline in strength with the progress of time-it is the instinct of self-preservation.

Such a system as the free traders advocate, if practicable, would be to the last degree inexpedient.

What would be the result? Why, that one country would become wholly, or in great part, agricultural, and the other wholly, or in great part, manufacturing. Is this a result desirable to either? Admitting that a city or small state, which has no territory which can furnish any considerable proportion of the subsistence which it requires, like Holland, may do well to attend exclusively to manufactures and commerce; or a country which, by the rigour of nature, or the remoteness of its situation, cannot attain to commercial or manufacturing greatness, would do well to attend exclusively to the cultivation or productions of the earth; the question which here occurs-Is such a system advisable or expedient for a nation which has received from the bounty of nature the means of rising to greatness in both-such as Great Britain, Russia, or Prussia? The free traders would have England sacrifice its agriculture to its manufactures, and Russia sacrifice its manufactures to its agriculture. Would such a system benefit either? Would England be happier or richer, more stable or more moral, if the already colossal amount of its manufactures were trebled; or Russia, if its rising iron and woolen fabrics were destroyed, and its industry confined exclusively to the slow return of agricultural labour? Is it desirable that the zone of tall chimneys, sickly faces, brick houses, and crowded jails, which at present spans across the whole of England and part of Scotland, should be doubled and trebled in breadth; and the fertile fields of Kent, Norfolk, and East Lothian, be reduced to vast unenclosed pastures, such as overspread Italy in the later stages of the Roman empire? Or is it desirable to Russia and Prussia that they should be for ever chained to the labour of boors, serfs, and shepherds, and all the vivifying and unimportant effects of commercial wealth be denied to their exertions? Nature has designed, experience recommends, a very different system. History tells us in all parts of the world, that it is in the intermixture of commerce and agriculture that the best security is to be found for social happiness and advancement, and the most effectual antidote provided to the evils with which either, when existing alone, is so prone. Mr McCulloch has told us, that the commerce and manufactures of Great Britain have now risen to such a prodigious height, that any further extension of them is undesirable, and that no real patriot would have desired them to have become so extensive as they already are. Is it desirable, in such a state of matters, to go on increasing the same splendid but perilous system, and to do so at the expense of the great pillar of national wealth, security, and independence-the land of the state?

Further, the proposed system is pernicious even with reference to the national wealth and interests of the manufacturers themselves, as tending to undermine the main branches of our national resources, and substitute encouragement to an inferior, to upholding of the superior market for our manufacturing industry.

Although in the meetings where they address the agricultural constituencies, the free traders hold out that their measures would benefit the manufacturers, and not injure the agriculturists; yet nothing can be clearer than that this is a mere shallow pretext, put forth to conceal their real objects and the effect of their measures, and that the result they really anticipate is as different from that as the poles are asunder. What is the benefit they hold out to the community as an inducement to go into their measures? Cheap grain. What is the motive which stimulates all their efforts, and which, among themselves and in private conversation with all men of sense, they at once admit is their ruling object? Reduced wages; the hope of extending our export in foreign countries by taking an additional quantity of their rude produce; and diminishing the cost of production to our manufacturers by lowering the price of food, and with it the wages of labour. The whole strength of their case rests in these propositions. Their influence over the urban multitudes arises solely from the continual reiteration of these alluring hopes. If these effects are not to follow free trade and the efforts of the League, in the name of Heaven, what good are they to do, and why do they agitate the country and subscribe to the League fund? Sensible men do not throw away ￡100,000 for nothing, for no benefit to themselves or others. But these prospects are as fallacious as they are alluring, and so a very few observations will demonstrate.

Considered in a national point of view, if the matter is brought to this issue, the great question is-Whether agriculture or manufactures are the superior interests in the production of national wealth. Admitting that the true policy for government is to protect all the branches of national industry, and stoutly contending, as we do, and ever shall do, that the real and ultimate interests of all is the same, and cannot be separated-the question comes to be, if one fiercely demands the sacrifice of the other, and insists that its interests are so weighty and momentous that all others must be sacrificed to them, which of the two thus placed in jeopardy is the most momentous? which brings in most to the national treasury? Now, on this point the facts are as adverse to the arguments of the League, as on all other branches of their case.

Take the sum total of manufactures in Great Britain and Ireland, accompanied with the sum total of agricultural production, in order to discover which of the two is the more valuable interest-in order that it may be discovered, if matters are brought to that issue that one or other must be abandoned, which is to be sacrificed. The choice of a wise government could not be doubtful, if it were necessary to make the selection. The agricultural productions of the British islands amount to L.300,000,000 a-year, while the sum total of manufactures of every description is only L.180,000,000. Nor can it be said, with any degree of truth, that the agriculture of the country is dependent for its existence on its manufactures, and would decline if they were materially injured; for the example of modern Italy and Flanders proves, that three centuries after a country has ceased to be the chief in manufacturing or commercial industry, it may advance with undiminished vigour and success in the production of agricultural riches.

But this is not all. The statistical documents which have now been prepared with so much care by Parliament, and published by the accurate and indefatigable Mr Porter, himself a decided free trader, demonstrate that, of the manufacturing productions, nearly three-fourths are taken off by the home market, and four-fifths by the home and colonial market taken together, leaving only ONE-FIFTH for the whole foreign markets of the world put together-

"The total amount of British manufactures annually produced is about ￡180,000,000 worth, of which only ￡47,000,000 is taken off by the whole external trade of the world put together, while no less than ￡133,000, 000 is consumed in the home market; and of the foreign consumption, fully a third is absorbed by the British Colonies, in different parts of the world. So that the home and colonial trade is to the whole foreign put together as 5 to 1. And, whle the total produce of manufactures is ￡180,000,000 annually, and of mines and minerals ￡13,776,000, the amount of agricultural produce annually extracted from the soil is not less than ￡300,000,000; or a half more than the whole manufactures and mines put together."

Further, if we compare the proportion purchased of our manufactures, which is taken off by foreign nations, for the export to whom we are required to make the sacrifice of our domestic agriculture, with what is consumed by our own native population, whether in the British islands or in our colonies of British descent, the difference is prodigious, and such as might well, even for their own sake, make the Anti-corn-law League pause in their career of violence. From the tables compiled from Porter's Parliamentary Tables, and the population of the different states to whom we export, taken from Malte Brun and Balbi, it appears, that while the British population, whether at home or abroad, consume from ￡3 to ￡5 a-head worth of our manufactures, the foreign nations to whom we are willing to sacrifice the British agriculturists, take off per head ONLY AS MANY PENCE. In preferring the one to the other, therefore, we are, literally speaking, penny wise and pound foolish.

We have shown how agriculture was ruined in the Roman empire in Italy, by the free importation of grain from the Lybian and Egyptian provinces of the empire. As a contrast to that woful progress, the main cause of the destruction of the empire of the Caesars, we request the attention of our readers to the progress of British exports in official value, which indicates their amount from 1790 to 1840, premising that the whole of that period was one of protection to the British agriculturist; during the first twenty years of the period, by the effects of the war-during the last twenty-five, by the operation of the corn law and sliding scale, introduced in 1814. We recommend the advocates of free trade to search the annals of the world for a similar instance of progress and prosperity flowing from, or co-existent with, the practical adoption of their principles.

These facts, which, in truth, are altogether decisive of the present question, point to the great source from which the errors of the free trade party are derived, and which appears, in an especial manner, their favourite position, that cheap prices is an unmitigated blessing, and that the great thing to attend to is to increase our imports. Cheap prices of grain are like the Amreeta cap in Kehama; the greatest of all blessings is the greatest of all curses, according as they arise from magnitude of domestic production, or magnitude of foreign importation. Of the first we had an example during the five fine years in succession, from 1830 to 1835, during which the foreign importation was practically abolished by the abundant harvests, and consequent high duty on grain under the sliding scale. This was a period, as all the world knows, of universal and unexampled commercial prosperity. Of the second we had a memorable example during the five bad years in succession, which elapsed fiom 1836 to 1840, in the course of which the corn laws, from the effect of the same sliding scale, and the continued low prices, were practically abolished; and importations, at the close of the period, amounted to 2,500,000 quarters, and, on an average of the whole, was little short of 2,000,000 of quarters. And what was the result? The exportation of 6,000,000 of sovereigns in a single year to buy grain; an unexampled pressure on the money market; commercial embarrassments, long-continued, and severe beyond all former precedent; the contraction of ten millions of additional debt in four years, and the creation of a deficit which at length rose to the formidable amount, in 1842, of L.4,000,000 sterling! And what first dispelled this distress, and arrested this downward and disastrous progress? The fine harvests of 1842-the blessed sun of its long summer, followed by the more checkered, but also fine summer of 1843, which again gave us plenty, derived from domestic production, and consequent general and increasing manufacturing as well as rural prosperity.

It is in vain, therefore, to say, cheap prices are a blessing in themselves, and the consumers at least are ever benefited by a fall in the cost of grain. Cheap prices are a real blessing if that effect consists with prosperity to the producer, as by improved methods of cultivation or manufacture, or the benignity of nature in giving fine seasons. But cheap prices are the greatest of all evils, and to none more shall the consumers, if they are the result, not of the magnitude of domestic production, but of the magnitude of foreign importation. It was that sort of cheap prices which ruined the Roman empire, from the destruction of the agriculture of Italy; it is that sort of cheap prices which has ruined the Indian weavers, from the disastrous competition of the British steam-engine; it is that sort of low prices which has so grievously depressed British shipping, from the disastrous competition of the Baltic vessels under the reciprocity system. It is in vain for the consumers to say, we will separate our case from that of the producers, and care not, so as we get low prices, what comes of them. Where will the consumers be, and that erelong, if the producers are destroyed? What will be the condition of the landlords if their farmers are ruined? or of bondholders if their debtors are bankrupt? or of railway proprietors if traffic ceases? or of owners of bank stock if bills are no longer presented for discount? or of the 3 per cents if Government, by the failure of the productive industry of the country, is rendered bankrupt? The consumers all rest on the producers, and must sink or swim with them.

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FOOTNOTES

Footnote 1: (return)

The Highlands of Ethiopa. by Major W. CORNWALLIS HARRIS, H.E. I.C. Engineers. 3 vols.

Footnote 2: (return)

Reunell, p. 682.

Footnote 3: (return)

The Turks, finding their own troops not well adapted to the irregular and desperate kind of warfare waged by the Uzcoques, and also unable to compete with them in the rapidity of their movements, formed a corps expressly for the pursuit of the freebooters, which was composed of men as wild and desperate as themselves. With these Martellossi, as they were called, the Uzcoques had frequent and sanguinary conflicts. Minucci says of the Martellossi, in his Historia degli Uscochi, that they were "Scelerati barbari anco 'ordine de' medesime Scochi."

Footnote 4: (return)

In Minucci's History of the Uzcoques, continued by Paola Sarpi, we find the following:-"Segna, through its position on a cragged rock, was unapproachable by carts or horses, and consequently by artillery. The harbour appertaining to it, however, was tolerably good, but exceedingly difficult of access on account of the north wind, (vento di Buora,) which blew almost incessantly in the channel leading to it. According to popular belief, the Segnarese had the power of causing this wind to blow at will, by merely kindling a fire in a certain hollow of the cliffs. The mysterious operation of this fire was to heat the veins of the earth, which then, through pain or fury, sent out the raging hurricanes that rendered those narrow seas in the highest degree dangerous, and indeed untenable."

Footnote 5: (return)

Diary of Travels and Adventures in Upper India, from Bareilly, in Rohilcund, to Hurdwar and Nahun, in the Himalaya Mountains; with a Tour in Bundelcund, a Sporting Excursion in the Kingdom of Oude, and a Voyage down the Ganges. By C.J.C. DAVIDSON, Esq., late Lieut.-Col. of Engineers, Bengal.

Footnote 6: (return)

The year is not specified; but as the Ramazan is subsequently said to have ended March 25, it must have been in the year of the Hejra 1245, ansering to A.D. 1830.

Footnote 7: (return)

Rambles in the South of Ireland; ii. 143.

Footnote 8: (return)

In the original "bulkh," which we have ventured to amend as above. The Oriental words and phrases are, in several instances, very incorrectly printed; but whether the fault rests with the colonel's "undecipherable" MS., or the correctors of the press, it is not for us to decide.

Footnote 9: (return)

The Indian gipsies are several times mentioned in the journal of Bishop Heber, who says they are called Kunjas in Bengal. Colonel Davidson also mentions a race in Bundelcund called Kunjurs who were in the habit, as he was informed by the Bramins, of "catching lizards, scorpions, snakes, and foxes," which, if it is meant that they use them for food, is analogous to the omnivorous propensities of the gipsies.

Footnote 10: (return)

May 1841.

Footnote 11: (return)

At Naples, it is customary to carry two handkerchiefs, one of silk, and the other of cambric; the latter being used to wipe the forehead.

Footnote 12: (return)

See No. CCCXL, Blackwood's Magazine, p. 261.

Footnote 13: (return)

"Arantur Gallicana rura barbaris bobus, et juga Germanica captiva praebent colla nostris cultoribus."-Probi Epist. ad Senatum in Vopesio.

Footnote 14: (return)

"Quingena viginti octo millia quadringinta duo jugera, quae Campania provincia, juxta inspectorum relationem, in desertis et squalidis locis habero dignoscitur, iisdem provincialibus concessum."-Cod. Theod. lxi. i. 2382.

Footnote 15: (return)

GIBBON, chap. i. 68.

Footnote 16: (return)

"Verumque confitentibus latifundia perdidere Italiam."-PLINY, Hist. Nat.xviii. 7.

Footnote 17: (return)

MICHELET, i. 96.

Footnote 18: (return)

AMMIANUS MARCELLINUS, c. xvi.-See also GIBBON, vi. 264.

Footnote 19: (return)

GIBBON, vi. 262.

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Edinburgh: Printed by Ballantyne and Hughes, Paul's Work.

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