Chapter 3 No.3

Miss Danvers, it has been said, (from whatever motive her conduct proceeded, whether from any interest of her own, or merely a desire to serve the interest of her friend, Captain Garland,) showed a disposition to engross the attentions of Sir Frederic Beaumantle as often as he made his appearance at Lipscombe Park. Now, as that lady was undoubtedly of good family, and possessed of considerable fortune, the baronet was not a little flattered by the interest which a person who had these excellent qualifications for a judge, manifestly took in his conversation.

In an equal degree was his dignity offended at the preference shown by Miss Sherwood for Captain Garland, a man, as he said, but of yesterday, and not in any one point of view to be put in comparison with himself. He almost resolved to punish her levity by withdrawing his suit. The graver manner, and somewhat more mature age of Miss Danvers were also qualities which he was obliged to confess were somewhat in her favour.

The result of all this was, that one fine morning Sir Frederic Beaumantle might have been seen walking to and fro in his own park, with a troubled step, bearing in his hand a letter-most elaborately penned-carefully written out-sealed-but not directed. It was an explicit declaration of his love, a solemn offer of his hand; it was only not quite determined to whom it should be sent. As the letter contained very little that referred to the lady, and consisted almost entirely of an account, not at all disparaging, of himself and his own good qualities, it was easy for him to proceed thus far upon his delicate negotiation, although the main question-to whom the letter was to be addressed-was not yet decided. This letter had indeed been a labour of love. It was as little written for Miss Sherwood as for Miss Danvers. It was composed for the occasion whenever that might arise; and for these ten years past it had been lying in his desk, receiving from time to time fresh touches and emendations. The necessity of making use of this epistle, which had now attained a state of painful perfection, we venture to say had some share in impelling him into matrimony. To some one it must be sent, or how could it appear to any advantage in those "Memoirs of Sir Frederic Beaumantle," which, some future day, were to console the world for his decease, and the prospect of which (for he saw them already in beautiful hot-pressed quarto) almost consoled himself for the necessity of dying? The intended love-letter!--this would have an air of ridicule, while the real declaration of Sir Frederic Beaumantle, which would not only adorn the Memoirs above mentioned, but would ultimately form a part of the "History of the County of Huntingdon." We hope ourselves, by the way, to have the honour of editing those Memoirs, should we be so unfortunate as to survive Sir Frederic.

But we must leave our baronet with his letter in his hand, gazing profoundly and anxiously on the blank left for the superscription, and must follow the perplexities of Reginald Darcy.

That good understanding which apparently existed between Emily and Captain Garland seemed rather to increase than to diminish after the little adventure we recorded in the last chapter. It appeared that Miss Sherwood had taken Darcy at his word, and resolved not to think any the more kindly of him for his conduct on that occasion. The captain was plainly in the ascendant. It even appeared, from certain arrangements that were in stealthy preparation, that the happiness of the gallant lover would not long be delayed. Messages of a very suspicious purport had passed between the Park and the vicarage. The clerk of the parish had been seen several times at Lipscombe. There was something in the wind, as the sagacious housekeeper observed; surely her young missus was not going to be married on the sly to the captain! The same thought, however, occurred to Darcy. Was it to escape the suit of Sir Frederic Beaumantle, which had been in some measure countenanced by her father, that she had recourse to this stratagem?-hardly worthy of her, and quite unnecessary, as she possessed sufficient influence with her father to obtain his consent to any proposal she herself was likely to approve. Had not the state of his own feelings made him too interested a party to act as counsellor or mediator, he would at once have questioned Emily on the subject. As it was, his lips were closed. She herself, too, seemed resolved to make no communication to him. The captain, a man of frank and open nature, was far more disposed to reveal his secret: he was once on the point of speaking to Darcy about his "approaching marriage;" but Emily, laying her finger on her lip, suddenly imposed silence on him.

One morning, as Darcy entered the breakfast-room, it was evident that something unusual was about to take place. The carriage, at this early hour, was drawn up to the door, and the two young ladies, both dressed in bridal white, were stepping into it. Before it drove off Miss Sherwood beckoned to Darcy.

"I have not invited you," she said, "to the ceremony, because Captain Garland has wished it to be as private as possible. But we shall expect your company at breakfast, for which you must even have the patience to wait till we return." Without giving any opportunity for reply, she drew up the glass, and the carriage rolled off.

However Darcy might have hitherto borne himself up by a gloomy sense of duty, by pride, and a bitter-oh, what bitter resignation!--when the blow came, it utterly prostrated him. "She is gone!--lost!--Fool that I have been!--What was this man more than I?" Stung with such reflections as these, which were uttered in such broken sentences, he rapidly retreated to the library, where he knew he should be undisturbed. He threw himself into a chair, and planting his elbows on the table, pressed his doubled fists, with convulsive agony, to his brows. All his fortitude had forsaken him: he wept outright.

From this posture he was at length aroused by a gentle pressure on his shoulder, and a voice calling him by his name. He raised his head: it was Emily Sherwood, enquiring of him, quite calmly, why he was not at the breakfast-table. There she stood, radiant with beauty, and in all her bridal attire, except that she had thrown of her bonnet, and her beautiful hair was allowed to be free and unconfined. Her hand was still upon his shoulder.

"You are married, Emily," he said, as well as that horrible stifling sensation in the breast would let him speak; "you are married, and I must be for evermore a banished man. I leave you, Emily, and this roof, for ever. I pronounce my own sentence of exile, for I love you, Emily!--and ever shall-passionately-tenderly-love you. Surely I may say this now-now that it is a mere cry of anguish, and a misery exclusively my own. Never, never-I feel that this is no idle raving-shall I love another-never will this affection leave me-I shall never have a home-never care for another-or myself-I am alone-a wanderer-miserable. Farewell! I go-I know not exactly where-but I leave this place."

He was preparing to quit the room, when Emily, placing herself before him, prevented him. "And why," said she, "if you honoured me with this affection, why was I not to know of it till now?"

"Can the heiress of Lipscombe Park ask that question?"

"Ungenerous! unjust!" said Emily. "Tell me, if one who can himself feel and act nobly, denies to another the capability of a like disinterested conduct-denies it rashly, pertinaciously, without cause given for such a judgment-is he not ungenerous and unjust?"

"To whom have I acted thus? To whom have I been ungenerous or unjust?"

"To me, Reginald-to me! I am wealthy, and for this reason alone you have denied to me, it seems, the possession of every worthy sentiment. She has gold, you have said, let her gold content her, and you withheld your love. She will make much boast, and create a burdensome obligation, if she bestows her superfluous wealth upon another: you resolved not to give her the opportunity, and you withheld your love. She has gold-she has no heart-no old affections that have grown from childhood-no estimate of character: she has wealth-let her gratify its vanity and its caprice; and so you withheld your love. Yes, she has gold-let her have more of it-let her wed with gold-with any gilded fool-she has no need of love! This is what you have thought, what your conduct has implied, and it was ungenerous and unjust."

"No, by heaven! I never thought unworthily of you," exclaimed Darcy.

"Had you been the wealthy cousin, Reginald, of wealth so ample, that an addition to it could scarcely bring an additional pleasure, would you have left your old friend Emily to look out for some opulent alliance?"

"Oh, no! no!"

"Then, why should I?"

"I may have erred," said Darcy. "I may have thought too meanly of myself, or nourished a misplaced pride, but I never had a disparaging thought of you. It seemed that I was right-that I was fulfilling a severe-oh, how severe a duty! Even now I know not that I was wrong-I know only that I am miserable. But," added he in a calmer voice, "I, at all events, am the only sufferer. You, at least, are happy."

"Not, I think, if marriage is to make me so. I am not married, Reginald," she said, amidst a confusion of smiles and blushes. "Captain Garland was married this morning to Miss Julia Danvers, to whom he has been long engaged, but a silly selfish stepmother"--

"Not married!" cried Darcy, interrupting all further explanation.-"Not married! Then you are free-then you are"-- But the old train of thought rushed back upon his mind-the old objections were as strong as ever-Miss Sherwood was still the daughter of his guardian, and the heiress of Lipscombe Park. Instead of completing the sentence, he paused, and muttered something about "her father."

Emily saw the cloud that had come over him. Dropping playfully, and most gracefully, upon one knee, she took his hand, and looking up archly in his face, said, "You love me, coz-you have said it. Coz, will you marry me?-for I love you."

"Generous, generous girl!" and he clasped her to his bosom.

"Let us go in," said Emily, in a quite altered and tremulous voice, "let us join them in the other room." And as she put her arm in his, the little pressure said distinctly and triumphantly-"He is mine!--he is mine!"

* * *

We must take a parting glance into old Mr Sherwood's room. He is seated in his gouty chair; his daughter stands by his side. Apparently Emily's reasonings have almost prevailed; she has almost persuaded the old gentleman that Darcy is the very son-in-law whom, above all others, he ought to desire. For how could Emily leave her dear father, and how could he domicile himself with any other husband she could choose, half so well as with his own ward, and his old favourite, Reginald?

"But Sir Frederic Beaumantle," the old gentleman replied, "what is to be said to him? and what a fine property he has!"

As he was speaking, the door opened, and the party from the breakfast table, consisting of Captain Garland, and his bride, and Reginald, entered the room.

"Oh, as for Sir Frederic Beaumantle," said she who was formerly Miss Danvers, and now Mrs Garland, "I claim him as mine." And forthwith she displayed the famous declaration of the baronet-addressed to herself!

Their mirth had scarcely subsided, when the writer of the letter himself made his appearance. He had called early, for he had concluded, after much deliberation, that it was not consistent with the ardour and impetuosity of love, to wait till the formal hour of visiting, in order to receive the answer of Miss Danvers.

That answer the lady at once gave by presenting Captain Garland to him in the character of her husband. At the same time, she returned his epistle, and, explaining that circumstances had compelled the captain and herself to marry in a private and secret manner, apologized for the mistake into which the concealment of their engagement had led him.

"A mistake indeed-a mistake altogether!" exclaimed the baronet, catching at a straw as he fell-"a mistake into which this absurd fashion of envelopes has led us. The letter was never intended, madam, to be enclosed to you. It was designed for the hands"--

And he turned to Miss Sherwood, who, on her part, took the arm of Reginald with a significance of manner which proved to him that, for the present at least, his declaration of love might return into his own desk, there to receive still further emendations.

"No wonder, Sir Frederic," said Mr Sherwood, compassionating the baronet's situation-"no wonder your proposal is not wanted. These young ladies have taken their affairs into their own hands. It is Leap-Year. One of them, at least, (looking to his daughter,) has made good use of its privilege. The initiative, Sir Frederic, is taken from us."

The baronet had nothing left but to make his politest bow and retire.

"Reginald, my dear boy," continued the old gentleman, "give me your hand. Emily is right. I don't know how I should part with her. I will only make this bargain with you, Reginald-that you marry us both. You must not turn me out of doors."

Reginald returned the pressure of his hand, but he could say nothing. Mr Sherwood, however, saw his answer in eyes that were filling involuntarily with tears.

* * *

THE BATTLE OF THE BLOCKS.

THE PAVING QUESTION.

The subject of greatest metropolitan interest which has occurred for many years, is the introduction of wood paving. As the main battle has been fought in London, and nothing but a confused report of the great object in dispute may have penetrated beyond the sound of Bow bells, we think it will not be amiss to put on record, in the imperishable brass and marble of our pages, an account of the mighty struggle-of the doughty champions who couched the lance and drew the sword in the opposing ranks-and, finally, to what side victory seems to incline on this beautiful 1st of May in the year 1843.

Come, then, to our aid, oh ye heavenly Muses! who enabled Homer to sing in such persuasive words the fates of Troy and of its wooden horse; for surely a subject which is so deeply connected both with wood and horses, is not beneath your notice; but perhaps, as poetry is gone out of fashion at the present time, you will depute one of your humbler sisters, rejoicing in the name of Prose, to give us a few hints in the composition of our great history. The name of the first pavier, we fear, is unknown, unless we could identify him with Triptolemus, who was a great improver of Rhodes; but it is the fate of all the greatest benefactors of their kind to be neglected, and in time forgotten. The first regularly defined paths were probably footways-the first carriages broad-wheeled. No record remains of what materials were used for filling up the ruts; so it is likely, in those simple times when enclosure acts were unknown, that the cart was seldom taken in the same track. As houses were built, and something in the shape of streets began to be established, the access to them must have been more attended to. A mere smoothing of the inequalities of the surface over which the oxen had to be driven, that brought the grain home on the enormous plaustra of the husbandman, was the first idea of a street, whose very name is derived from stratum, levelled. As experience advanced, steps would be taken to prevent the softness of the road from interrupting the draught. A narrow rim of stone, just wide enough to sustain the wheel, would, in all probability, be the next improvement; and only when the gentle operations of the farm were exchanged for war, and the charger had to be hurried to the fight, with all the equipments necessary for an army, great roads were laid open, and covered with hard materials to sustain the wear and tear of men and animals. Roads were found to be no less necessary to retain a conquest than to make it; and the first true proof of the greatness of Rome was found in the long lines of military ways, by which she maintained her hold upon the provinces. You may depend on it, that no expense was spared in keeping the glorious street that led up her Triumphs to the Capitol in excellent repair. All the nations of the Orbis Antiquus ought to have trembled when they saw the beginning of the Appian road. It led to Britain and Persia, to Carthage and the White Sea. The Britons, however, in ancient days, seem to have been about the stupidest and least enterprising of all the savages hitherto discovered. After an intercourse of four hundred years with the most polished people in the world, they continued so miserably benighted, that they had not even acquired masonic knowledge enough to repair a wall. The rampart raised by their Roman protectors between them and the Picts and Scots, became in some places dilapidated. The unfortunate natives had no idea how to mend the breach, and had to send once more for their auxiliaries. If such their state in regard to masonry, we cannot suppose that their skill in road-making was very great; and yet we are told that, even on C?sar's invasion, the Britons careered about in war-chariots, which implies both good roads and some mechanical skill; but we think it a little too much in historians to ask us to believe BOTH these views of the condition of our predecessors in the tight little island; for it is quite clear that a people who had arrived at the art of coach-making, could not be so very ignorant as not to know how to build a wall. If it were not for the letters of Cicero, we should not believe a syllable about the war-chariots that carried amazement into the hearts of the Romans, even in Kent or Surrey. But we here boldly declare, that if twenty Ciceros were to make their affidavits to the fact of a set of outer barbarians, like Galgacus and his troops, "sweeping their fiery lines on rattling wheels" up and down the Grampians-where, at a later period, a celebrated shepherd fed his flocks-we should not believe a word of their declaration. Tacitus, in the same manner, we should prosecute for perjury.

The Saxons were a superior race, and when the eightsome-reel of the heptarchy became the pas-seul of the kingdom of England, we doubt not that Watling Street was kept in passable condition, and that Alfred, amidst his other noble institutions, invented a highway rate. The fortresses and vassal towns of the barons, after the Conquest, must have covered the country with tolerable cross-roads; and even the petty wars of those steel-clad marauders must have had a good effect in opening new communications. For how could Sir Reginald Front-de-B?uf, or Sir Hildebrand Bras-de-Fer, carry off the booty of their discomfited rival to their own granaries without loaded tumbrils, and roads fit to pass over?

Nor would it have been wise in rich abbots and fat monks to leave their monasteries and abbeys inaccessible to pious pilgrims, who came to admire thigh-bones of martyred virgins and skulls of beatified saints, and paid very handsomely for the exhibition. Finally, trade began, and paviers flourished. The first persons of that illustrious profession appear, from the sound of the name, to have been French, unless we take the derivation of a cockney friend of ours, who maintains that the origin of the word is not the French pavé, but the indigenous English pathway. However that may be, we are pretty sure that paving was known as one of the fine arts in the reign of Queen Elizabeth; for, not to mention the anecdote of Raleigh and his cloak-which could only happen where puddles formed the exception and not the rule-we read of Essex's horse stumbling on a paving-stone in his mad ride to his house in the Strand. We also prove, from Shakspeare's line-

"The very stones would rise in mutiny"-

the fact of stones forming the main body of the streets in his time; for it is absurd to suppose that he was so rigid an observer of the unities as to pay the slightest respect to the state of paving in the time of Julius C?sar at Rome.

Gradually London took the lead in improving its ways. It was no longer necessary for the fair and young to be carried through the mud upon costly pillions, on the backs of high-stepping Flanders mares. Beauty rolled over the stones in four-wheeled carriages, and it did not need more than half-a-dozen running footmen-the stoutest that could be found-to put their shoulders occasionally to the wheel, and help the eight black horses to drag the ponderous vehicle through the heavier parts of the road. Science came to the aid of beauty in these distressing circumstances. Springs were invented that yielded to every jolt; and, with the aid of cushions, rendered a visit to Highgate not much more fatiguing than we now find the journey to Edinburgh. Luxury went on-wealth flowed in-paviers were encouraged-coach-makers grew great men-and London, which our ancestors had left mud, was now stone. Year after year the granite quarries of Aberdeen poured themselves out on the streets of the great city, and a million and a half of people drove, and rode, and bustled, and bargained, and cheated, and throve, in the midst of a din that would have silenced the artillery of Trafalgar, and a mud which, if turned into bricks, would have built the tower of Babel. The citizens were now in possession of the "fumum et opes strepitumque Rom?;" but some of the more quietly disposed, though submitting patiently to the "fumum," and by no means displeased with the "opes," thought the "strepitumque" could be dispensed with, and plans of all kinds were proposed for obviating the noise and other inconveniences of granite blocks. Some proposed straw, rushes, sawdust; ingenuity was at a stand-still; and London appeared to be condemned to a perpetual atmosphere of smoke and sound. It is pleasant to look back on difficulties, when overcome-the best illustration of which is Columbus's egg; for, after convincing the sceptic, there can be no manner of doubt that he swallowed the yelk and white, leaving the shell to the pugnacious disputant. In the same way we look with a pleasing kind of pity on the quandaries of those whom we shall call-with no belief whatever in the pre-Adamite theory-the pre-Macadamites.

A man of talent and enterprise, Mr Macadam, proposed a means of getting quit of one of the objections to the granite causeways. By breaking them up into small pieces, and spreading them in sufficient quantity, he proved that a continuous hard surface would be formed, by which the uneasy jerks from stone to stone would be avoided, and the expense, if not diminished, at all events not materially increased. When the proposition was fairly brought before the public, it met the fate of all innovations. Timid people-the very persons, by the by, who had been the loudest in their exclamations against the ancient causeways-became alarmed the moment they saw a chance of getting quit of them. As we never know the value of a thing till we have lost it, their attachment to stone and noise became more intense in proportion as the certainty of being deprived of them became greater. It was proved to the satisfaction of all rational men, if Mr Macadam's experiment succeeded, and a level surface were furnished to the streets, that, besides noise, many other disadvantages of the rougher mode of paving would be avoided. Among these the most prominent was slipperiness; and it was impossible to be denied, that at many seasons of the year, not only in frost, when every terrestrial pathway must be unsafe; but in the dry months of summer, the smooth surfaces of the blocks of granite, polished and rounded by so many wheels, were each like a convex mass of ice, and caused unnumbered falls to the less adroit of the equestrian portion of the king's subjects. One of the most zealous advocates of the improvement was the present Sir Peter Laurie, not then elevated to a seat among the Equites, but imbued probably with a foreknowledge of his knighthood, and therefore anxious for the safety of his horse. Sir Peter was determined, in all senses of the word, to leave no stone unturned; and a very small mind, when directed to one object with all its force, has more effect than a large mind unactuated by the same zeal-as a needle takes a sharper point than a sword. Thanks, therefore, are due, in a great measure, to the activity and eloquence of the worthy alderman for the introduction of Macadam's system of road-making into the city.

Many evils were certainly got rid of by this alteration-the jolting motion from stone to stone-the slipperiness and unevenness of the road-and the chance, in case of an accident, of contesting the hardness of your skull with a mass of stone, which seemed as if it were made on purpose for knocking out people's brains. For some time contentment sat smiling over the city. But, as "man never is, but always to be, blest," perfect happiness appeared not to be secured even by Macadam. Ruts began to be formed-rain fell, and mud was generated at a prodigious rate; repairs were needed, and the road for a while was rough and almost impassable. Then it was found out that the change had only led to a different kind of noise, instead of destroying it altogether; and the perpetual grinding of wheels, sawing their way through the loose stones at the top, or ploughing through the wet foundation, was hardly an improvement on the music arising from the jolts and jerks along the causeway. Men's minds got confused in the immensity of the uproar, and deafness became epidemic. In winter, the surface of Macadam formed a series of little lakes, resembling on a small scale those of Canada; in summer, it formed a Sahara of dust, prodigiously like the great desert. Acres of the finest alluvial clay floated past the shops in autumn; in spring, clouds of the finest sand were wafted among the goods, and penetrated to every drawer and wareroom. And high over all, throughout all the main highways of commerce-the Strand-Fleet Street-Oxford Street-Holborn-raged a storm of sound, that made conversation a matter of extreme difficulty without such stentorian an effort as no ordinary lungs could make. As the inhabitants of Abdera went about sighing from morning to night, "Love! love!" so the persecuted dwellers in the great thoroughfares wished incessantly for cleanliness! smoothness! silence!

"Abra was present when they named her name," and, after a few gropings after truth-a few experiments that ended in nothing-a voice was heard in the city, that streets could be paved with wood. This was by no means a discovery in itself; for in many parts of the country ingenious individuals had laid down wooden floors upon their farm-yards; and, in other lands, it was a very common practice to use no other material for their public streets. But, in London, it was new; and all that was wanted, was science to use the material (at first sight so little calculated to bear the wear and tear of an enormous traffic) in the most eligible manner. The first who commenced an actual piece of paving was a Mr Skead-a perfectly simple and inartificial system, which it was soon seen was doomed to be superseded. His blocks were nothing but pieces of wood of a hexagon shape-with no cohesion, and no foundation-so that they trusted each to its own resources to resist the pressure of a wheel, or the blow of a horse's hoof; and, as might have been foreseen, they became very uneven after a short use, and had no recommendation except their cheapness and their exemption from noise. The fibre was vertical, and at first no grooves were introduced; they, of course, became rounded by wearing away at the edge, and as slippery as the ancient granite. The Metropolitan Company took warning from the defects of their predecessor, and adopted the patent of a scientific French gentleman of the name of De Lisle. The combination of the blocks is as elaborate as the structure of a ship of war, and yet perfectly easy, being founded on correct mechanical principles, and attaining the great objects required-viz. smoothness, durability, and quiet. The blocks, which are shaped at such an angle that they give the most perfect mutual support, are joined to each other by oaken dowels, and laid on a hard concrete foundation, presenting a level surface, over which the impact is so equally divided, that the whole mass resists the pressure on each particular block; and yet, from being formed in panels of about a yard square, they are laid down or lifted up with far greater ease than the causeway. Attention was immediately attracted to this invention, and all efforts have hitherto been vain to improve on it. Various projectors have appeared-some with concrete foundations, some with the blocks attached to each other, not by oak dowels, but by being alternately concave and convex at the side; but this system has the incurable defect of wearing off at the edges, where the fibre of the wood, of course, is weakest, and presents a succession of bald-pated surfaces, extremely slippery, and incapable of being permanently grooved. A specimen of this will be often referred to in the course of this account, being that which has attained such an unenviable degree of notoriety in the Poultry. Other inventors have shown ingenuity and perseverance; but the great representative of wooden paving we take to be the Metropolitan Company, and we proceed to a narrative of the attacks it has sustained, and the struggles it has gone through.

So long ago as July 1839, the inventor explained to a large public meeting of noblemen and men of science, presided over by the Duke of Sussex, the principle of his discovery. It consisted in a division of the cube, or, as he called it, the stereotomy of the cube. After observing, that "although the cube was the most regular of all solid bodies, and the most learned men amongst the Greeks and other nations had occupied themselves to ascertain and measure its proportions, he said it had never hitherto been regarded as a body, to be anatomized or explored in its internal parts. Some years ago, it had occurred to a French mathematician that the cube was divisible into six pyramidical forms; and it therefore had struck him, the inventor, that the natural formation of that figure was by a combination of those forms. Having detailed to his audience a number of experiments, and shown how the results thereby obtained accorded with mathematical principles, he proceeded to explain the various purposes to which diagonal portions of the cube might be applied. By cutting the body in half, and then dividing the half in a diagonal direction, he obtained a figure-namely, a quarter of the cube-in which, he observed, the whole strength or power of resistance of the entire body resided; and he showed the application of these sections of the cube to the purposes of paving by wood." Such is the first meagre report of the broaching of a scientific system of paving; and, with the patronage of such men of rank and eminence as took an interest in the subject, the progress was sure and rapid.

In December 1839, about 1100 square yards were laid down in Whitehall, and a triumph was never more complete; for since that period it has continued as smooth and level as when first it displaced the Macadam; it has never required repair, and has been a small basis of peace and quietness, amidst a desert of confusion and turmoil. Since that time, about sixty thousand yards in various parts of London, being about three-fourths of all the pavement hitherto introduced, attest the public appreciation of the Metropolitan Company's system. It may be interesting to those who watch the progress of great changes, to particularize the operations (amounting in the aggregate to forty thousand yards) that were carried out upon this system in 1842:-

St Giles's, Holborn

Foundling Estate

Hammersmith Bridge

St Andrew's, Holborn

Jermyn Street

Old Bailey

Piccadilly

Newgate Street, eastern end

Southampton Street

Lombard Street

Oxford Street

Regent Street;

besides several noblemen's court-yards, such as the Dukes of Somerset and Sutherland's, and a great number of stables, for which it is found peculiarly adapted.

The other projectors have specimens principally in the Strand; that near the Golden Cross, being by Mr Skead; that near Coutts's Bank, Mr Saunders; at St Giles's Church, in Holborn, Mr Rankin; and in the city, at Gracechurch Street, Cornhill, and the Poultry, Mr Cary. The Poultry is a short space lying between Cheapside and the Mansion-house, consisting altogether of only 378 square yards. It lies in a hollow, as if on purpose to receive the river of mud which rolls its majestic course from the causeway on each side. The traffic on it, though not fast, is perpetual, and the system from the first was faulty. In addition to these drawbacks, its cleansing was totally neglected; and on all these accounts, it offered an excellent point of attack to any person who determined to signalize himself by preaching a crusade against wood. Preachers, thank heaven! are seldom wanted; and on this occasion the part of Peter the Hermit was undertaken by Peter the Knight; for our old acquaintance, the opponent of causeways, the sworn enemy to granite, the favourer of Macadam, had worn the chain of office; had had his ears tickled for a whole year by the magic word, my lord, was as much of a knight as Sir Amadis de Gaul, and much more of an alderman; had been a great dispenser of justice, and sometimes a dispenser with law; had made himself a name, before which that of the Curtises and Waithmans grew pale; and, above all, was at that very moment in want of a grievance. Sir Peter Laurie gave notice of a motion on the subject of the Poultry. People began to think something had gone wrong with the chickens, or that Sir Robert had laid a high duty on foreign eggs. The alarm spread into Norfolk, and affected the price of turkeys. Bantams fell in value, and barn-door fowls were a drug. In the midst of all these fears, it began to be whispered about, that if any chickens were concerned in the motion, it was Cary's chickens; and that the attack, though nominally on the hen-roost, was in reality on the wood. It was now the depth of winter; snowy showers were succeeded by biting frosts; the very smoothness of the surface of the wooden pavement was against it; for as no steps were taken to prevent slipperiness, by cleansing or sanding the street-or better still, perhaps, by roughing the horses' shoes, many tumbles took place on this doomed little portion of the road; and some of the city police, having probably, in the present high state of English morals, little else to do, were employed to count the falls. Armed with a list of these accidents, which grew in exact proportion to the number of people who saw them-(for instance, if three people separately reported, "a grey horse down in the Poultry," it did duty for three grey horses)-Sir Peter opened the business of the day, at a meeting of the Commissioners of Sewers for the City of London, on the 14th of February 1843. Mr Alderman Gibbs was in the chair. Sir Peter, on this occasion, transcended his usual efforts; he was inspired with the genius of his subject, and was as great a specimen of slip-slop as the streets themselves. He requested a petition to be read, signed by a Mr Gray, and a considerable number of other jobmasters and livery stable-keepers, against wood pavement; and, as it formed the text on which he spoke, we quote it entire:-

"To the Commissioners of Sewers-

"The humble memorial of your memorialists, humbly showeth,-That in consequence of the introduction of wood pavements into the City of London, in lieu of granite, a very great number of accidents have occurred; and in drawing a comparison between the two from observations made, it is found where one accident happened on the granite pavement, that ten at least took place upon the wood. Your memorialists therefore pray, that, in consequence of the wood pavement being so extremely dangerous to travel over, you would be pleased to take the matter into your serious consideration, and cause it to be removed; by doing which you will, in the first place, be removing a great and dangerous nuisance; and, secondly, you will be setting a beneficial and humane example to other metropolitan districts."

Mr Gray, in addition to the memorial, begged fully to corroborate its statements, and said that he had himself twice been thrown out by the falling of his horse on the wood, and had broken his shafts both times. As he did not allude to his legs and arms, we conclude they escaped uninjured; and the only effect created by his observation, seemed to be a belief that his horse was probably addicted to falling, and preferred the wood to the rough and hard angles of the granite. Immediately after the reading of the stablemen's memorial, a petition was introduced in favour of wood pavement from Cornhill, signed by all the inhabitants of that wealthy and flourishing district, and, on the principles of fair play, we transcribe it as a pendant to the other:-

"Your petitioners, the undersigned inhabitants of the ward of Cornhill and Birchen Lane, beg again to bring before you their earnest request, that that part of Cornhill which is still paved with granite, and also Birchen Lane, may now be paved with wood.

"Your petitioners are well aware that many complaints have been received of the wood paving in the Poultry; but they beg to submit to you that no reports which have been, or which may be made, of the accidents which have occurred on that small spot, should be considered as in any way illustrative of the merits of the general question. From its minuteness, and its slope at both extremities, it is constantly covered with slippery mud from the granite at each end; and that, together with the sudden transition from one sort of paving to another, causes the horses continually to stumble on that spot. Your petitioners therefore submit that no place could have been selected for experiment so ill adapted to show a fair result. Since your petitioners laid their former petition before you, they have ascertained, by careful examination and enquiry, that in places where wood paving has been laid down continuously to a moderate extent-viz. in Regent Street, Jermyn Street, Holborn, Oxford Street, the Strand, Coventry Street, and Lombard Street-it has fully effected all that was expected from it; it has freed the streets from the distracting nuisance of incessant noise, has diminished mud, increased the value of property, and given full satisfaction to the inhabitants. Your petitioners, therefore, beg to urge upon you most strongly a compliance with their request, which they feel assured would be a further extension of a great public good."

In addition to the petition, Mr Fernie, who presented it, stated "that the inhabitants (whom he represented) had satisfied themselves of the advantages of wood paving before they wished its adoption at their own doors. That enquiries had been made of the inhabitants of streets in the enjoyment of wood paving, and they all approved of it; and said, that nothing would induce them to return to the old system of stone; that they were satisfied the number of accidents had not been greater on the wood than they had been on the granite; and that they were of a much less serious character and extent."

Sir Peter on this applied a red silk handkerchief to his nose; wound three blasts on that wild horn, as if to inspire him for the charge; and rushed into the middle of the fight. His first blow was aimed at Mr Prosser, the secretary of the Metropolitan Company, who had stated that in Russia, where wooden pavements were common, a sprinkling of pitch and strong sand had prevented the possibility of slipping. Orlando Furioso was a peaceful Quaker compared to the infuriate Laurie. "The admission of Mr Prosser," he said, "proves that, without pitch and sand, wood pavements are impassable;" and fearful was it to see the prodigious vigour with which the Prosser with two s's, was pressed and assaulted by the Proser with only one. Wonder took possession of the assemblage, at the catalogue of woes the impassioned orator had collected as the results of this most dangerous and murderous contrivance. An old woman had been run over by an omnibus-all owing to wood; a boy had been killed by a cab-all owing to wood; and it seemed never to have occurred to the speaker, in his anti-silvan fury, that boy's legs are occasionally broken by unruly cabs, and poles of omnibuses run into the backs of unsuspecting elderly gentlemen on the roads which continue under the protecting influence of granite or Macadam. He had seen horses fall on the wooden pavements in all directions; he had seen a troop of dragoons, in the midst of the frost, dismount and lead their un-roughed horses across Regent Street; the Recorder had gone round by the squares to avoid the wooden districts; one lady had ordered her coachman to stick constantly to stone; and another, when she required to go to Regent Street, dismissed her carriage and walked. The thanks he had received for his defence of granite were innumberable; an omnibus would not hold the compliments that had been paid him for his efforts against wood; and, as Lord Shaftesbury had expressed his obligations to him on the subject, he did not doubt that if the matter came before the House of Lords, he would bestow the degree of attention on it which his lordship bestowed on all matters of importance. Working himself us as he drew near his peroration, he broke out into a blaze of eloquence which put the Lord Mayor into some fear on account of the Thames, of which he is official conservator. "The thing cannot last!" he exclaimed; "and if you don't, in less than two years from this time, say I am a true prophet, put me on seven years' allowance." What the meaning of this latter expression may be, we cannot divine. It seems to us no very severe punishment to be forced to receive the allowance of seven years instead of one, the only explanation we can think of is, that it contains some delicate allusion to the dietary of gentlemen who are supposed to be visiting one of the colonies in New Holland, but in reality employ themselves in aquatic amusements in Portsmouth and Plymouth harbour "for the space of seven long years"-and are not supposed to fare in so sumptuous a manner as the aldermen of the city of London.

"The poor horses," he proceeded, "that are continually tumbling down on the wood pavement, cannot send their representatives, but I will represent them here whenever I have the opportunity"-(a horse laugh, as if from the orator's constituents, was excited by this sally.) "But, gentlemen, besides the danger of this atrocious system, we ought to pay a little attention to the expense. I maintain you have no right to make the inhabitants of those streets to which there is no idea of extending the wood paving, pay for the ease and comfort, as it is called, of persons residing in the larger thoroughfares, such as Newgate Street and Cheapside. But the promoters say, 'Oh I but we will have the whole town paved with it'-(hear, hear.) What would this cost? A friend of mine has made some calculations on this point, and he finds that, to pave the whole town with wood, an outlay of twenty-four millions of money must be incurred!"

It was generally supposed in the meeting that the friend here alluded to was either Mr Joseph Hume or the ingenious gentleman who furnished Lord Stanley with the statistics of the wheat-growing districts of Tamboff. It was afterwards discovered to be a Mr Cocker Munchausen.

Twenty-four millions of money! and all to be laid out on wood! The thought was so immense that it nearly choked the worthy orator, and he could not proceed for some time. When at last, by a great effort, he recovered the thread of his discourse, he became pathetic about the fate of one of the penny-post boys, (a relation-"we guess"-of the deceased H. Walker, Esq. of the Twopenny Post,)-who had broken his leg on the wooden pavement. The authorities had ordered the lads to avoid the wood in future. For all these reasons, Sir Peter concluded his speech with a motion, "That the wood pavement in the Poultry is dangerous and inconvenient to the public, and ought to be taken up and replaced with granite pavement."

"As in a theatre the eyes of men,

After some well-graced actor leaves the stage,

Are idly bent on him who enters next

Thinking his prattle to be tedious,

Even so, or with more scorn, men's eyes

Were turned on--Mr Deputy Godson!"

The benevolent reader may have observed that the second fiddle is generally a little louder and more sharp set than the first. On this occasion that instrument was played upon by the worthy deputy, to the amazement of all the connoisseurs in that species of music in which he and his leader are known to excel. From his speech it was gathered that he represented a district which has been immortalized by the genius of the author of Tom Thumb; and in the present unfortunate aspect of human affairs, when a comet is brandishing its tail in the heavens, and O'Connell seems to have been deprived of his upon earth-when poverty, distress, rebellion, and wooden pavements, are threatening the very existence of Great Britain, it is consolotary to reflect that under the guardianship of Deputy Godson Little Britain is safe; for he is resolved to form a cordon of granite round it, and keep it free from the contamination of Norway pines or Scottish fir. "I have been urged by my constituents," he says, "to ask for wood pavement in Little Britain; but I am adverse to it, as I think wood paving is calculated to produce the greatest injury to the public.

"I have seen twenty horses down on the wood pavement together-(laughter.) I am here to state what I have seen. I have seen horses down on the wood pavement, twenty at a time-(renewed laughter.) I say, and with great deference, that we are in the habit of conferring favours when we ought to withhold them. I think gentlemen ought to pause before they burden the consolidated rate with those matters, and make the poor inhabitants of the City pay for the fancies of the wealthy members of Cornhill and the Poultry. We ought to deal even-handed justice, and not introduce into the City, and that at a great expense, a pavement that is dirty, stinking, and everything that is bad."-(laughter.)

In Pope's Homer's Iliad, it is very distressing to the philanthropic mind to reflect on the feelings that must agitate the bosom of Mr Deputy Thersites when Ajax passes by. In the British Parliament it is a melancholy sight to see the countenance of some unfortunate orator when Sir Robert Peel rises to reply, with a smile of awful import on his lips, and a subdued cannibal expression of satisfaction in his eyes. Even so must it have been a harrowing spectacle to observe the effects of the answer of Mr R.L. Jones, who rose for the purpose of moving the previous question. He said, "I thought the worthy alderman who introduced this question would have attempted to support himself by bringing some petitions from citizens against wood paving-(hear.) He has not done so, and I may observe, that from not one of the wards where wood pavement has been laid down has there been a petition to take any of the wood pavement up. What the mover of these resolutions has done, has been to travel from one end of the town to the other, to prove to you that wood paving is bad in principle. Has that been established?-(Cries of 'no, no.') I venture to say they have not established any thing of the kind. All that has been done is this-it has been shown that wood pavement, which is comparatively a recent introduction, has not yet been brought to perfection-(hear, hear.) Now, every one knows that complaints have always been made against every new principle, till it has been brought to perfection. Look, for instance, at the steam-engine. How vastly different it now is, with the improvements which science has effected, from what it was when it was first introduced to the notice of the world! Wherever wood pavement has been laid down, it has been approved of. All who have enjoyed the advantage of its extension, acknowledge the comfort derived from it. Sir Peter Laurie asserts that he is continually receiving thanks for his agitation about wood paving, and that an omnibus would not hold the compliments he receives at the West End. Now, I can only say, that I find the contrary to be the case; and every body who meets me exclaims, 'Good God! what can Sir Peter Laurie be thinking about, to try and get the wood paving taken up, and stone paving substituted?' So far from thanking Sir Peter, every body is astonished at him. The wood pavement has not been laid down nearly three years, and I say here, in the face of the Commission, that there have not been ten blocks taken up; but had granite been put down, I will venture to say that it would, during the same period, have been taken up six or seven times. Your books will prove it, that the portion of granite pavement in the Poultry was taken up six or seven times during a period of three years. When the wood paving becomes a little slippery, go to your granite heaps which belong to this commission, or to your fine sifted cinder heaps, and let that be strewed over the surface; that contains no earthy particles, and will, when it becomes imbedded in the wood, form such a surface that there cannot be any possibility be any slipperiness-(hear, hear!) Do we not pursue this course in frosty weather even with our own stone paving? There used to be, before this plan was adopted, not a day pass but you would in frosty weather see two, three, four, and even five or six horses down together on the stone paving-('Oh! oh!' from Mr Deputy Godson.) My friend may cry 'oh! oh!' but I mean to say that this assertion is not so incongruous as the statement of my friend, that he saw twenty horses down at once on the wood pavement in Newgate Street, (laughter.) I may exclaim with my worthy friend the deputy on my left, who lives in Newgate Street, 'When the devil did it happen? I never heard of it.' I stand forward in support of wood paving as a great public principle, because I believe it to be most useful and advantageous to the public; which is proved by the fact, that the public at large are in favour of it. If we had given notice that this court would be open to hear the opinions of the citizens of London on the subject of wood paving, I am convinced that the number of petitions in its favour would have been so great, that the doors would not have been sufficiently wide to have received them."

Mr Jones next turned his attention to the arithmetical statements of Sir Peter; and a better specimen of what in the Scotch language is called a stramash, it has never been our good fortune to meet with:-

"We have been told by the worthy knight who introduced this motion, that to pave London with wood would cost twenty-four millions of money. Now, it so happens that, some time since, I directed the city surveyor to obtain for me a return of the number of square yards of paving-stone there are throughout all the streets in this city. I hold that return in my hand; and I find there are 400,000 yards, which, at fifteen shillings per yard, would not make the cost of wood paving come to twenty-four millions of money; no, gentlemen, nor to four millions, nor to three, nor even to one million-why, the cost, gentlemen, dwindles down from Sir Peter's twenty-four millions to ￡300,000-(hear, hear, and laughter.)

"If I go into Fore Street I find every body admiring the wood pavement. If I go on Cornhill I find the same-and all the great bankers in Lombard Street say, 'What a delightful thing this wood paving is! Sir Peter Laurie must be mad to endeavour to deprive us of it.' I told them not to be alarmed, for they might depend on it the good sense of this court would not allow so great and useful an improvement in street paving to retrograde in the manner sought to be effected by this revolution. I shall content myself with moving the previous question"-(cheers.)

It is probable that Mr Jones, in moving the previous question, contented himself a mighty deal more than he did Sir Peter; and the triumph of the woodites was increased when Mr Pewtress seconded the amendment:-

"If there is any time of the year when the wood pavement is more dangerous than another, probably the most dangerous is when the weather is of the damp, muggy, and foggy character which has been prevailing; and when all pavements are remarkably slippery. The worthy knight has shown great tact in choosing his time for bringing this matter before the public. We have had three or four weeks weather of the most extraordinary description I ever remember; not frosty nor wet, but damp and slippery; so that the granite has been found so inconvenient to horses, that they have not been driven at the common and usual pace. And I am free to confess that, under the peculiar state of the atmosphere to which I have alluded, the wood pavement is more affected than the granite pavement. But in ordinary weather there is very little difference. I am satisfied that, if the danger and inconvenience were as great as the worthy knight has represented, we should have had applications against the pavement; but all the applications we have had on the subject have been in favour of the extension of wood pavement."

The speaker then takes up the ground, that as wood, as a material for paving, is only recently introduced, it is natural that vested interests should be alarmed, and that great misapprehension should exist as to its nature and merits. On this subject he introduces an admirable illustration:-"In the early part of my life I remember attending a lecture-when gas was first introduced-by Mr Winson. The lecture was delivered in Pall-Mall, and the lecturer proposed to demonstrate that the introduction of gas would be destructive of life and property. I attended that lecture, and I never came away from a public lecture more fully convinced of any thing than I did that he had proved his position. He produced a quantity of gas, and placed a receiver on the table. He had with him some live birds, as well as some live mice and rabbits; and, introducing some gas into the receiver, he put one of the animals in it. In a few minutes life was extinct, and in this way he deprived about half a dozen of these animals of their life. 'Now, gentlemen,' said the lecturer, 'I have proved to you that gas is destructive to life; I will now show you that it is destructive to property.' He had a little pasteboard house, and said, 'I will suppose that it is lighted up with gas, and from the carelessness of the servant the stopcock of the burner has been so turned off as to allow an escape of gas, and that it has escaped and filled the house.' Having let the gas into the card house, he introduced a light and blew it up. 'Now,' said he, 'I think I have shown you that it is not only destructive to life and property; but that, if it is introduced into the metropolis, it will be blown up by it.'"

We have now given a short analysis of the speeches of the proposers and seconders on each side in this great debate; and after hearing Mr Frodsham on the opposition, and the Common Sergeant-whose objection, however, to wood was confined to its unsuitableness at some seasons for horsemanship-granting that a strong feeling in its favour existed among the owners and inhabitants of houses where it has been laid down; and on the other side, Sir Chapman Marshall-a strenuous woodite-who challenged Sir Peter Laurie to find fault with the pavement at Whitehall, "which he had no hesitation in saying was the finest piece of paving of any description in London;" Mr King, who gave a home thrust to Sir Peter, which it was impossible to parry-"We have heard a great deal about humanity and post-boys; does the worthy gentleman know, that the Postmaster has only within the last few weeks sent a petition here, begging that you would, with all possible speed, put wood paving round the Post-office?" and various other gentlemen pro and con-a division was taken, when Sir Peter was beaten by an immense majority.

Another meeting, of which no public notice was given, was held shortly after to further Sir Peter's object, by sundry stable-keepers and jobmasters, under the presidency of the same Mr Gray, whose horse had acquired the malicious habit of breaking its knees on the Poultry. As there was no opposition, there was no debate; and as no names of the parties attending were published, it fell dead-born, although advertised two or three times in the newspapers.

On Tuesday, the 4th of April, Sir Peter buckled on his armour once more, and led the embattled cherubim to war, on the modified question, "That wood-paving operations be suspended in the city for a year;" but after a repetition of the arguments on both sides, he was again defeated by the same overwhelming majority as before.

Such is the state of wood paving as a party question among the city authorities at the present date. The squabbles and struggles among the various projectors would form an amusing chapter in the history of street rows-for it is seen that it is a noble prize to strive for. If the experiment succeeds, all London will be paved with wood, and fortunes will be secured by the successful candidates for employment. Every day some fresh claimant starts up and professes to have remedied every defect hitherto discovered in the systems of his predecessors. Still confidence seems unshaken in the system which has hitherto shown the best results; and since the introduction of the very ingenious invention of Mr Whitworth of Manchester, of a cart, which by an adaptation of wheels and pullies, and brooms and buckets, performs the work of thirty-six street-sweepers, the perfection of the work in Regent Street has been seen to such advantage, and the objections of slipperiness so clearly proved to arise, not from the nature of wood, but from the want of cleansing, that even the most timid are beginning to believe that the opposition to the further introduction of it is injudicious. Among these even Sir Peter promises to enrol himself, if the public favour continues as strong towards it for another year as he perceives it to be at the present time.

And now, dismissing these efforts at resisting a change which we may safely take to be at some period or other inevitable, let us cast a cursory glance at some of the results of the general introduction of wood pavement.

In the first place, the facility of cleansing will be greatly increased. A smooth surface, between which and the subsoil is interposed a thick concrete-which grows as hard and impermeable as iron-will not generate mud and filth to one-fiftieth of the extent of either granite roads or Macadam. It is probable that if there were no importations of dirt from the wheels of carriages coming off the stone streets, little scavengering would be needed. Certainly not more than could be supplied by one of Whitworth's machines. And it is equally evident that if wood were kept unpolluted by the liquid mud-into which the surface of the other causeways is converted in the driest weather by water carts-the slipperiness would be effectually cured.

In the second place, the saving of expense in cleansing and repairing would be prodigious. Let us take as our text a document submitted to the Marylebone Vestry in 1840, and acted on by them in the case of Oxford Street; and remember that the expenses of cleansing were calculated at the cost of the manual labour-a cost, we believe, reduced two thirds by the invention of Mr Whitworth. The Report is dated 1837:-

"The cost of the last five years having been, ￡16,881

The present expense for 1837, about 2,000

The required outlay 4,000

And the cleansing for 1837 900

----

Gives a total for six years of ￡23,781

"Or an annual expenditure averaging ￡3963; so that the future expenses of Oxford Street, maintained as a Macadamized carriage-way, would be about ￡4000, or 2s. 4d per yard per annum.

"In contrast with this extract from the parochial documents, the results of which must have been greatly increased within the last three years, the Metropolitan Wood-Paving Company, who have already laid down above 4000 yards in Oxford Street, between Wells Street and Charles Street, are understood to be willing to complete the entire street in the best manner for 12s. per square yard, or about ￡14,000-for which they propose to take bonds bearing interest at the rate of four-and-a-half per cent per annum, whereby the parish will obtain ample time for ultimate payment; and further, to keep the whole in repair, inclusive of the cost of cleansing and watering, for one year gratuitously, and for twelve years following at ￡1900 per annum, being less than one-half the present outlay for these purposes."

Whether these were the terms finally agreed on we do not know; but we perceive by public tenders that the streets can be paved in the best possible manner for 13s. or 12s. 6d. a yard; and kept in repair for 6d. a yard additional. This is certainly much cheaper than Macadam, and we should think more economical than causeways. And, besides, it has the advantage-which one of the speakers suggested to Sir Peter Laurie-"that in case of an upset, it is far more satisfactory to contest the relative hardness of heads with a block of wood than a mass of granite."

We can only add in conclusion, that advertisements are published by the Commissioners of Sewers for contracts to pave with wood Cheapside, and Bishopsgate Street, and Whitechapel. Oh, Sir Peter!--how are the mighty fallen!

* * *

POEMS AND BALLADS OF SCHILLER. NO. VIII.

FIRST PERIOD CONTINUED.

A FUNERAL FANTASIE.

1.

Pale, at its ghastly noon,

Pauses above the death-still wood-the moon;

The night-sprite, sighing, through the dim air stirs;

The clouds descend in rain;

Mourning, the wan stars wane,

Flickering like dying lamps in sepulchres!

Haggard as spectres-vision-like and dumb,

Dark with the pomp of Death, and moving slow,

Towards that sad lair the pale Procession come

Where the Grave closes on the Night below.

2.

With dim, deep sunken eye,

Crutch'd on his staff, who trembles tottering by?

As wrung from out the shatter'd heart, one groan

Breaks the deep hush alone!

Crush'd by the iron Fate, he seems to gather

All life's last strength to stagger to the bier,

And hearken--Do those cold lips murmur "Father?"

The sharp rain, drizzling through that place of fear,

Pierces the bones gnaw'd fleshless by despair,

And the heart's horror stirs the silver hair.

3.

Fresh bleed the fiery wounds

Through all that agonizing heart undone-

Still on the voiceless lips "my Father" sounds,

And still the childless Father murmurs "Son!"

Ice-cold-ice-cold, in that white shroud he lies-

Thy sweet and golden dreams all vanish'd there-

The sweet and golden name of "Father" dies

Into thy curse,-ice-cold-ice-cold-he lies

Dead, what thy life's delight and Eden were!

4.

Mild, as when, fresh from the arms of Aurora,

When the air like Elysium is smiling above,

Steep'd in rose-breathing odours, the darling of Flora

Wantons over the blooms on his winglets of love.-

So gay, o'er the meads, went his footsteps in bliss,

The silver wave mirror'd the smile of his face;

Delight, like a flame, kindled up at his kiss,

And the heart of the maid was the prey of his chase.

5.

Boldly he sprang to the strife of the world,

As a deer to the mountain-top carelessly springs;

As an eagle whose plumes to the sun are unfurl'd,

Swept his Hope round the Heaven on its limitless wings.

Proud as a war-horse that chafes at the rein,

That kingly exults in the storm of the brave;

That throws to the wind the wild stream of its mane,

Strode he forth by the prince and the slave!

6.

Life, like a spring-day, serene and divine,

In the star of the morning went by as a trance;

His murmurs he drown'd in the gold of the wine,

And his sorrows were borne on the wave of the dance.

Worlds lay conceal'd in the hopes of his youth,

When once he shall ripen to manhood and fame!

Fond Father exult!--In the germs of his youth

What harvests are destined for Manhood and Fame!

7.

Not to be was that Manhood!--The death-bell is knelling

The hinge of the death-vault creaks harsh on the ears-

How dismal, O Death, is the place of thy dwelling!

Not to be was that Manhood!--Flow on bitter tears!

Go, beloved, thy path to the sun,

Rise, world upon world, with the perfect to rest;

Go-quaff the delight which thy spirit has won,

And escape from our grief in the halls of the blest.

8.

Again (in that thought what a healing is found!)

To meet in the Eden to which thou art fled!-

Hark, the coffin sinks down with a dull, sullen sound,

And the ropes rattle over the sleep of the dead.

And we cling to each other!--O Grave, he is thine!

The eye tells the woe that is mute to the ears-

And we dare to resent what we grudge to resign,

Till the heart's sinful murmur is choked in its tears.

Pale at its ghastly noon,

Pauses above the death-still wood-the moon!

The night-sprite, sighing, through the dim air stirs;

The clouds descend in rain;

Mourning, the wan stars wane,

Flickering like dying lamps in sepulchres.

The dull clods swell into the sullen mound;

Earth, one look yet upon the prey we gave!

The Grave locks up the treasure it has found;

Higher and higher swells the sullen mound-

Never gives back the Grave!

* * *

A GROUP IN TARTARUS.

Hark, as hoarse murmurs of a gathering sea-

As brooks that howling through black gorges go,

Groans sullen, hollow, and eternally,

One wailing Woe!

Sharp Anguish shrinks the shadows there;

And blasphemous Despair

Yells its wild curse from jaws that never close;

And ghastly eyes for ever

Stare on the bridge of the relentless River,

Or watch the mournful wave as year on year it flows,

And ask each other, with parch'd lips that writhe

Into a whisper, "When the end shall be!"

The end?-Lo, broken in Time's hand the scythe,

And round and round revolves Eternity!

* * *

ELYSIUM.

Past the despairing wail-

And the bright banquets of the Elysian Vale

Melt every care away!

Delight, that breathes and moves for ever,

Glides through sweet fields like some sweet river!

Elysian life survey!

There, fresh with youth, o'er jocund meads,

His youngest west-winds blithely leads

The ever-blooming May.

Thorough gold-woven dreams goes the dance of the Hours,

In space without bounds swell the soul and its powers,

And Truth, with no veil, gives her face to the day,

And joy to-day and joy to-morrow,

But wafts the airy soul aloft;

The very name is lost to Sorrow,

And Pain is Rapture tuned more exquisitely soft.

Here the Pilgrim reposes the world-weary limb,

And forgets in the shadow, cool-breathing and dim,

The load he shall bear never more;

Here the Mower, his sickle at rest, by the streams,

Lull'd with harp-strings, reviews, in the calm of his dreams,

The fields, when the harvest is o'er.

Here, He, whose ears drank in the battle-roar,

Whose banners stream'd upon the startled wind

A thunder-storm,-before whose thunder tread

The mountains trembled,-in soft sleep reclined,

By the sweet brook that o'er its pebbly bed

In silver plays, and murmurs to the shore,

Hears the stern clangour of wild spears no more!

Here the true Spouse the lost-beloved regains,

And on the enamell'd couch of summer-plains

Mingles sweet kisses with the west-wind's breath.

Here, crown'd at last-Love never knows decay,

Living through ages its one BRIDAL DAY,

Safe from the stroke of Death!

* * *

COUNT EBERHARD, THE GRUMBLER, OF WURTEMBERG.

Ha, ha I take heed-ha, ha! take heed,10

Ye knaves both South and North!

For many a man both bold in deed

And wise in peace, the land to lead,

Old Swabia has brought forth.

Proud boasts your Edward and your Charles,

Your Ludwig, Frederick-are!

Yet Eberhard's worth, ye bragging carles!

Your Ludwig, Frederick, Edward, Charles-

A thunder-storm in war.

And Ulrick, too, his noble son,

Ha, ha! his might ye know;

Old Eberhard's boast, his noble son,

Not he the boy, ye rogues, to run,

How stout soe'er the foe!

The Reutling lads with envy saw

Our glories, day by day;

The Reutling lads shall give the law-

The Reutling lads the sword shall draw-

O Lord-how hot were they!

Out Ulrick went and beat them not-

To Eberhard back he came-

A lowering look young Ulrick got-

Poor lad, his eyes with tears were hot-

He hung his head for shame.

"Ho-ho"-thought he-"ye rogues beware,

Nor you nor I forget-

For by my father's beard I swear

Your blood shall wash the blot I bear,

And Ulrick pay you yet!"

Soon came the hour! with steeds and men

The battle-field was gay;

Steel closed in steel at Duffingen-

And joyous was our stripling then,

And joyous the hurra!

"The battle lost" our battle-cry;

The foe once more advances:

As some fierce whirlwind cleaves the sky,

We skirr, through blood and slaughter, by,

Amidst a night of lances!

On, lion-like, grim Ulrick sweeps-

Bright shines his hero-glaive-

Her chase before him Fury keeps,

Far-heard behind him, Anguish weeps,

And round him-is the Grave!

Woe-woe! it gleams-the sabre-blow-

Swift-sheering down it sped-

Around, brave hearts the buckler throw-

Alas! our boast in dust is low!

Count Eberhard's boy is dead!

Grief checks the rushing Victor-van-

Fierce eyes strange moisture know-

On rides old Eberhard, stern and wan,

"My son is like another man-

March, children, on the Foe!"

And fiery lances whirr'd around,

Revenge, at least, undying-

Above the blood-red clay we bound-

Hurrah! the burghers break their ground,

Through vale and woodland flying!

Back to the camp, behold us throng,

Flags stream, and bugles play-

Woman and child with choral song,

And men, with dance and wine, prolong

The warrior's holyday.

And our old Count-and what doth he?

Before him lies his son,

Within his lone tent, lonelily,

The old man sits with eyes that see

Through one dim tear-his son!

So heart and soul, a loyal band,

Count Eberhard's band, we are!

His front the tower that guards the land,

A thunderbolt his red right hand-

His eye a guiding star!

Then take ye heed-Aha! take heed,

Ye knaves both South and North!

For many a man, both bold in deed

And wise in peace, the land to lead,

Old Swabia has brought forth!

* * *

TO A MORALIST.

Are the sports of our youth so displeasing?

Is love but the folly you say?

Benumb'd with the Winter, and freezing,

You scold at the revels of May.

For you once a nymph had her charms,

And oh! when the waltz you were wreathing,

All Olympus embraced in your arms-

All its nectar in Julia's breathing.

If Jove at that moment had hurl'd

The earth in some other rotation,

Along with your Julia whirl'd,

You had felt not the shock of creation.

Learn this-that Philosophy beats

Sure time with the pulse-quick or slow

As the blood from the heyday retreats,-

But it cannot make gods of us-No!

It is well, icy Reason should thaw

In the warm blood of Mirth now and then,

The Gods for themselves have a law

Which they never intended for men.

The spirit is bound by the ties

Of its jailer, the Flesh-if I can

Not reach, as an angel, the skies,

Let me feel, on the earth, as a Man.

* * *

ROUSSEAU.11

Oh, Monument of Shame to this our time,

Dishonouring record to thy Mother Clime!

Hail, Grave of Rousseau! Here thy sorrows cease.

Freedom and Peace from earth and earthly strife!

Vainly, sad seeker, didst thou search through life

To find-(found now)-the Freedom and the Peace.

When will the old wounds scar? In the dark age

Perish'd the wise. Light came; how fares the sage?

There's no abatement of the bigot's rage.

Still as the wise man bled, he bleeds again.

Sophists prepared for Socrates the bowl-

And Christians drove the steel through Rousseau's soul-

Rousseau who strove to render Christians-men.

* * *

FORTUNE AND WISDOM.

In a quarrel with her lover

To Wisdom Fortune flew;

"I'll all my hoards discover-

Be but my friend-to you.

Like a mother I presented

To one each fairest gift,

Who still is discontented,

And murmurs at my thrift.

Come, let's be friends. What say you?

Give up that weary plough,

My treasures shall repay you,

For both I have enow!"

"Nay, see thy Friend betake him

To death from grief for thee-

He dies if thou forsake him-

Thy gifts are nought to me!"

* * *

THE INFANTICIDE.

1.

Hark where the bells toll, chiming, dull and steady,

The clock's slow hand hath reach'd the appointed time.

Well, be it so-prepare! my soul is ready,

Companions of the grave-the rest for crime!

Now take, O world! my last farewell-receiving

My parting kisses-in these tears they dwell!

Sweet are thy poisons while we taste believing,

Now we are quits-heart-poisoner, fare-thee-well!

2.

Farewell, ye suns that once to joy invited,

Changed for the mould beneath the funeral shade

Farewell, farewell, thou rosy Time delighted,

Luring to soft desire the careless maid.

Pale gossamers of gold, farewell, sweet-dreaming

Fancies-the children that an Eden bore!

Blossoms that died while dawn itself was gleaming,

Opening in happy sunlight never more.

3.

Swanlike the robe which Innocence bestowing,

Deck'd with the virgin favours, rosy fair,

In the gay time when many a young rose glowing,

Blush'd through the loose train of the amber hair.

Woe, woe! as white the robe that decks me now-

The shroud-like robe Hell's destined victim wears;

Still shall the fillet bind this burning brow-

That sable braid the Doomsman's hand prepares!

4.

Weep, ye who never fell-for whom, unerring,

The soul's white lilies keep their virgin hue,

Ye who when thoughts so danger-sweet are stirring,

Take the stern strength that Nature gives the few

Woe, for too human was this fond heart's feeling-

Feeling!--my sin's avenger12 doom'd to be;

Woe-for the false man's arm around me stealing,

Stole the lull'd Virtue, charm'd to sleep, from me.

5.

Ah, he perhaps shall, round another sighing,

(Forgot the serpents stinging at my breast,)

Gaily, when I in the dumb grave am lying,

Pour the warm wish, or speed the wanton jest,

Or play, perchance, with his new maiden's tresses,

Answer the kiss her lip enamour'd brings,

When the dread block the head he cradled presses,

And high the blood his kiss once fever'd springs.

6.

Thee, Francis, Francis,13 league on league, shall follow

The death-dirge of the Lucy once so dear;

From yonder steeple, dismal, dull, and hollow,

Shall knell the warning horror on thy ear.

On thy fresh leman's lips when Love is dawning,

And the lisp'd music glides from that sweet well-

Lo, in that breast a red wound shall be yawning,

And, in the midst of rapture, warn of hell!

7.

Betrayer, what! thy soul relentless closing

To grief-the woman-shame no art can heal-

To that small life beneath my heart reposing!

Man, man, the wild beast for its young can feel!

Proud flew the sails-receding from the land,

I watch'd them waning from the wistful eye,

Round the gay maids on Seine's voluptuous strand,

Breathes the false incense of his fatal sigh.

8.

And there the Babe! there, on the mother's bosom,

Lull'd in its sweet and golden rest it lay,

Fresh in life's morning as a rosy blossom,

It smiled, poor harmless one, my tears away.

Deathlike yet lovely, every feature speaking

In such dear calm and beauty to my sadness,

And cradled still the mother's heart, in breaking,

The soft'ning love and the despairing madness.

9.

"Woman, where is my father?"-freezing through me,

Lisp'd the mute Innocence with thunder-sound;

"Woman, where is thy husband?"-called unto me,

In every look, word, whisper, busying round!

For thee, poor child, there is no father's kiss.

He fondleth other children on his knee.

How thou wilt curse our momentary bliss,

When Bastard on thy name shall branded be!

10.

Thy mother-oh, a hell her heart concealeth,

Lone-sitting, lone in social Nature's All!

Thirsting for that glad fount thy love revealeth,

While still thy look the glad fount turns to gall.

In every infant cry my soul is heark'ning,

The haunting happiness for ever o'er,

And all the bitterness of death is dark'ning

The heavenly looks that smiled mine eyes before.

11.

Hell, if my sight those looks a moment misses-

Hell, when my sight upon those looks is turn'd-

The avenging furies madden in thy kisses,

That slept in his what time my lips they burn'd.

Out from their graves his oaths spoke back in thunder!

The perjury stalk'd like murder in the sun-

For ever-God!--sense, reason, soul, sunk under-

The deed was done!

12.

Francis, O Francis! league on league, shall chase thee

The shadows hurrying grimly on thy flight-

Still with their icy arms they shall embrace thee,

And mutter thunder in thy dream's delight!

Down from the soft stars, in their tranquil glory,

Shall look thy dead child with a ghastly stare;

That shape shall haunt thee in its cerements gory,

And scourge thee back from heaven-its home is there!

13.

Lifeless-how lifeless!--see, oh see, before me

It lies cold-stiff!--O God!--and with that blood

I feel, as swoops the dizzy darkness o'er me,

Mine own life mingled-ebbing in the flood-

Hark, at the door they knock-more loud within me-

More awful still-its sound the dread heart gave!

Gladly I welcome the cold arms that win me-

Fire, quench thy tortures in the icy grave!

14.

Francis-a God that pardons dwells in heaven-

Francis, the sinner-yes-she pardons thee-

So let my wrongs unto the earth be given:

Flame seize the wood!--it burns-it kindles-see!

There-there his letters cast-behold are ashes-

His vows-the conquering fire consumes them here:

His kisses-see-see all-all are only ashes-

All, all-the all that once on earth were dear!

15.

Trust not the roses which your youth enjoyeth,

Sisters, to man's faith, changeful as the moon!

Beauty to me brought guilt-its bloom destroyeth:

Lo, in the judgment court I curse the boon:

Tears in the headsman's gaze-what tears?-tis spoken!

Quick, bind mine eyes-all soon shall be forgot-

Doomsman-the lily hast thou never broken?

Pale doomsman-tremble not!

[The poem we have just concluded was greatly admired at the time of its first publication, and it so far excels in art most of the earlier efforts by the author, that it attains one of the highest secrets in true pathos. It produces interest for the criminal while creating terror for the crime. This, indeed, is a triumph in art never achieved but by the highest genius. The inferior writer, when venturing upon the grandest stage of passion, (which unquestionably exists in the delineation of great guilt as of heroic virtue,) falls into the error either of gilding the crime in order to produce sympathy for the criminal, or, in the spirit of a spurious morality, of involving both crime and criminal in a common odium. It is to discrimination between the doer and the deed, that we owe the sublimest revelations of the human heart: in this discrimination lies the key to the emotions produced by the ?dipus and Macbeth. In the brief poem before us a whole drama is comprehended. Marvellous is the completeness of the pictures it presents-its mastery over emotions the most opposite-its fidelity to nature in its exposition of the disordered and despairing mind in which tenderness becomes cruelty, and remorse for error tortures itself into scarce conscious crime.

But the art employed, though admirable of its kind, still falls short of the perfection which, in his later works, Schiller aspired to achieve, viz. the point at which Pain ceases. The tears which Tragic Pathos, when purest and most elevated, calls forth, ought not to be tears of pain. In the ideal world, as Schiller has inculcated, even sorrow should have its charm-all that harrows, all that revolts, belongs but to that inferior school in which Schiller's fiery youth formed itself for nobler grades-the school "of Storm and Pressure"-(Stürm und Dr?ng-as the Germans have expressively described it.) If the reader will compare Schiller's poem of the 'Infanticide,' with the passages which represent a similar crime in the Medea, (and the author of 'Wallenstein' deserves comparison even with Euripides,) he will see the distinction between the art that seeks an elevated emotion, and the art which is satisfied with creating an intense one. In Euripides, the detail-the reality-all that can degrade terror into pain-are loftily dismissed. The Titan grandeur of the Sorceress removes us from too close an approach to the crime of the unnatural Mother-the emotion of pity changes into awe-just at the pitch before the coarse sympathy of actual pain can be effected. And it is the avoidance of reality-it is the all-purifying Presence of the Ideal, which make the vast distinction in our emotions between following, with shocked and displeasing pity, the crushed, broken-hearted, mortal criminal to the scaffold, and gazing-with an awe which has pleasure of its own-upon the Mighty Murderess-soaring out of the reach of Humanity, upon her Dragon Car!]

* * *

THE TRIUMPH OF LOVE.

A HYMN.

Blessed through love are the Gods above-

Through love like the Gods may man be;

Heavenlier through love is the heaven above,

Through love like a heaven earth can be!

Once, as the poet sung,

In Pyrrha's time, 'tis known,

From rocks Creation sprung,

And Men leapt up from stone;

Rock and stone, in night

The souls of men were seal'd,

Heaven's diviner light

Not as yet reveal'd;

As yet the Loves around them

Had never shone-nor bound them

With their rosy rings;

As yet their bosoms knew not

Soft song-and music grew not

Out of the silver strings.

No gladsome garlands cheerily

Were love-y-woven then;

And o'er Elysium drearily

The May-time flew for men;14

The morning rose ungreeted

From ocean's joyless breast;

Unhail'd the evening fleeted

To ocean's joyless breast-

Wild through the tangled shade,

By clouded moons they stray'd,

The iron race of Men!

Sources of mystic tears,

Yearnings for starry spheres,

No God awaken'd then!

Lo, mildly from the dark-blue water,

Comes forth the Heaven's divinest Daughter,

Borne by the Nymphs fair-floating o'er

To the intoxicated shore!

Like the light-scattering wings of morning

Soars universal May, adorning

As from the glory of that birth

Air and the ocean, heaven and earth!

Day's eye looks laughing, where the grim

Midnight lay coil'd in forests dim;

And gay narcissuses are sweet

Wherever glide those holy feet-

Now, pours the bird that haunts the eve

The earliest song of love,

Now in the heart-their fountain-heave

The waves that murmur love.

O blest Pygmalion-blest art thou-

It melts, it glows, thy marble now!

O Love, the God, thy world is won!

Embrace thy children, Mighty One.

Blessed through love are the Gods above-

Through love like the Gods may man be;

Heavenlier through love is the heaven above,

Through love like a heaven earth can be.

Where the nectar-bright streams,

Like the dawn's happy dreams,

Eternally one holiday,

The life of the Gods glides away.

Throned on his seat sublime,

Looks He whose years know not time;

At his nod, if his anger awaken,

At the wave of his hair all Olympus is shaken.

Yet He from the throne of his birth,

Bow'd down to the sons of the earth,

Through dim Arcadian glades to wander sighing,

Lull'd into dreams of bliss-

Lull'd by his Leda's kiss

Lo, at his feet the harmless thunders lying!

The Sun's majestic coursers go

Along the Light's transparent plain,

Curb'd by the Day-god's golden rein;

The nations perish at his bended bow;

Steeds that majestic go,

Death from the bended bow,

Gladly he leaves above-

For Melody and Love!

Low bend the dwellers of the sky,

When sweeps the stately Juno by;

Proud in her car, the Uncontroll'd

Curbs the bright birds that breast the air,

As flames the sovereign crown of gold

Amidst the ambrosial waves of hair-

Ev'n thou, fair Queen of Heaven's high throne,

Hast Love's subduing sweetness known;

From all her state, the Great One bends

To charm the Olympian's bright embraces,

The Heart-Enthraller only lends

The rapture-cestus of the Graces!

Blessed through love are the Gods above-

Through love like a God may man be;

Heavenlier through love is the heaven above,

Through love like a heaven earth can be!

Love can sun the Realms of Night-

Orcus owns the magic might-

Peaceful where She sits beside,

Smiles the swart King on his Bride;

Hell feels the smile in sudden light-

Love can sun the Realms of Night.

Heavenly o'er the startled Hell,

Holy, where the Accursed dwell,

O Thracian, went thy silver song!

Grim Minos, with unconscious tears,

Melts into mercy as he hears-

The serpents in Megara's hair,

Kiss, as they wreathe enamour'd there;

All harmless rests the madding thong;-

From the torn breast the Vulture mute

Flies, scared before the charmèd lute-

Lull'd into sighing from their roar

The dark waves woo the listening shore-

Listening the Thracian's silver song!-

Love was the Thracian's silver song!

Blessed through love are the Gods above-

Through love like a God may man be;

Heavenlier through love is the heaven above-

Through love like a heaven earth can be!

Through Nature blossom-strewing,

One footstep we are viewing,

One flash from golden pinions!-

If from Heaven's starry sea,

If from the moonlit sky;

If from the Sun's dominions,

Look'd not Love's laughing eye;

Then Sun and Moon and Stars would be

Alike, without one smile for me!

But, oh, wherever Nature lives

Below, around, above-

Her happy eye the mirror gives

To thy glad beauty, Love!

Love sighs through brooklets silver-clear,

Love bids their murmur woo the vale;

Listen, O list! Love's soul ye hear

In his own earnest nightingale.

No sound from Nature ever stirs,

But Love's sweet voice is heard with hers!

Bold Wisdom, with her sunlit eye,

Retreats when love comes whispering by-

For Wisdom's weak to love!

To victor stern or monarch proud,

Imperial Wisdom never bow'd

The knee she bows to Love!

Who through the steep and starry sky,

Goes onward to the gods on high,

Before thee, hero-brave?

Who halves for thee the land of Heaven;

Who shows thy heart, Elysium, given

Through the flame-rended Grave?

Below, if we were blind to Love,

Say, should we soar o'er Death, above?

Would the weak soul, did Love forsake her,

E'er gain the wing to seek the Maker?

Love, only Love, can guide the creature

Up to the Father-fount of Nature;

What were the soul did Love forsake her?

Love guides the Mortal to the Maker!

Blessed through love are the Gods above-

Through love like a God may man be:

Heavenlier through love is the heaven above,

Through love like a heaven earth can be!

* * *

FANTASIE TO LAURA.

What, Laura, say, the vortex that can draw

Body to body in its strong control;

Beloved Laura, what the charmèd law

That to the soul attracting plucks the soul?

It is the charm that rolls the stars on high,

For ever round the sun's majestic blaze-

When, gay as children round their parent, fly

Their circling dances in delighted maze.

Still, every star that glides its gladsome course,

Thirstily drinks the luminous golden rain;

Drinks the fresh vigour from the fiery source,

As limbs imbibe life's motion from the brain;

With sunny motes, the sunny motes united

Harmonious lustre both receive and give,

Love spheres with spheres still interchange delighted,

Only through love the starry systems live.

Take love from Nature's universe of wonder,

Each jarring each, rushes the mighty All.

See, back to Chaos shock'd, Creation thunder;

Weep, starry Newton-weep the giant fall!

Take from the spiritual scheme that Power away,

And the still'd body shrinks to Death's abode.

Never-love not-would blooms revive for May,

And, love extinct, all life were dead to God.

And what the charm that at my Laura's kiss,

Pours the diviner brightness to the cheek;

Makes the heart bound more swiftly to its bliss,

And bids the rushing blood the magnet seek-

Out from their bounds swell nerve, and pulse, and sense,

The veins in tumult would their shores o'erflow;

Body to body rapt-and charmèd thence,

Soul drawn to soul with intermingled glow.

Mighty alike to sway the flow and ebb

Of the inanimate Matter, or to move

The nerves that weave the Arachnèan web

Of Sentient Life-rules all-pervading Love!

Ev'n in the Moral World, embrace and meet

Emotions-Gladness clasps the extreme of Care;

And Sorrow, at the worst, upon the sweet

Breast of young Hope, is thaw'd from its despair.

Of sister-kin to melancholy Woe,

Voluptuous Pleasure comes, and with the birth

Of her gay children, (golden Wishes,) lo,

Night flies, and sunshine settles on the earth!15

The same great Law of Sympathy is given

To Evil as to Good, and if we swell

The dark account that life incurs with Heaven,

'Tis that our Vices are thy Wooers, Hell!

In turn those Vices are embraced by Shame

And fell Remorse, the twin Eumenides.

Danger still clings in fond embrace to Fame,

Mounts on her wing, and flies where'er she flees.

Destruction marries its dark self to Pride,

Envy to Fortune: when Desire most charms,

'Tis that her brother Death is by her side,

For him she opens those voluptuous arms.

The very Future to the Past but flies

Upon the wings of Love-as I to thee;

O, long swift Saturn, with unceasing sighs,

Hath sought his distant bride, Eternity!

When-so I heard the oracle declare-

When Saturn once shall clasp that bride sublime,

Wide-blazing worlds shall light his nuptials there-

'Tis thus Eternity shall wed with Time.

In those shall be our nuptials! ours to share

That bridenight, waken'd by no jealous sun;

Since Time, Creation, Nature, but declare

Love-in our love rejoice, Beloved One!

* * *

TO THE SPRING.

Welcome, gentle Stripling,

Nature's darling, thou-

With thy basket full of blossoms,

A happy welcome now!

Aha!--and thou returnest,

Heartily we greet thee-

The loving and the fair one,

Merrily we meet thee!

Think'st thou of my Maiden

In thy heart of glee?

I love her yet the Maiden-

And the Maiden yet loves me!

For the Maiden, many a blossom

I begg'd-and not in vain;

I came again, a-begging,

And thou-thou giv'st again:

Welcome, gentle stripling,

Nature's darling thou-

With thy basket full of blossoms,

A happy welcome, now!

* * *

NATURAL HISTORY OF SALMON AND SEA-TROUT.

[On the Growth of Grilse and Salmon. By Mr Andrew Young, Invershin, Sutherlandshire. (Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Vol. XV. Part III.) Edinburgh, 1843.]

[On the Growth and Migrations of the Sea-Trout of the Solway. By Mr John Shaw, Drumlanrig. (Ibid.) Edinburgh, 1843.]

The salmon is undoubtedly the finest and most magnificent of our fresh-water fishes, or rather of those anadromous kinds which, in accordance with the succession of the seasons, seek alternately the briny sea and the "rivers of water." It is also the most important, both in a commercial and culinary point of view as well as the most highly prized by the angler as an object of exciting recreation. Notwithstanding these and other long-continued claims upon our consideration, a knowledge of its natural history and habits has developed itself so slowly, that little or nothing was precisely ascertained till very recently regarding either its early state or its eventual changes. The salmon-trout, in certain districts of almost equal value with the true salmon, was also but obscurely known to naturalists, most of whom, in truth, are too apt to satisfy themselves rather by the extension than the increase of knowledge. They hand down to posterity, in their barren technicalities, a great deal of what is neither new nor true, even in relation to subjects which lie within the sphere of ordinary observation,-to birds and beasts, which almost dwell among us, and give utterance, by articulate or intelligible sounds, to a vast variety of instinctive, and as it were explanatory emotions:-what marvel, then, that they should so often fail to inform us of what we desire to know regarding the silent, because voiceless, inhabitants of the world of waters?

But that which naturalists have been unable to accomplish, has, so far as concerns the two invaluable species just alluded to, been achieved by others with no pretension to the name; and we now propose to present our readers with a brief sketch of what we conceive to be the completed biography of salmon and sea-trout. In stating that our information has been almost entirely derived from the researches of practical men, we wish it to be understood, and shall afterwards endeavour to demonstrate, that these researches have, nevertheless, been conducted upon those inductive principles which are so often characteristic of natural acuteness of perception, when combined with candour of mind and honesty of purpose. We believe it to be the opinion of many, that statements by comparatively uneducated persons are less to be relied upon than those of men of science. It may, perhaps, be somewhat difficult to define in all cases what really constitutes a man of science. Many sensible people suppose, that if a person pursues an original truth, and obtains it-that is, if he ascertains a previously unknown or obscure fact of importance, and states his observations with intelligence-he is entitled to that character, whatever his station may be. For ourselves, we would even say that if his researches are truly valuable, he is himself all the more a man of science in proportion to the difficulties or disadvantages by which his position in life may be surrounded.

The development and early growth of salmon, from the ovum to the smolt, were first successfully investigated by Mr John Shaw of Drumlanrig, one of the Duke of Buccleuch's gamekeepers in the south of Scotland. Its subsequent progress from the smolt to the adult condition, through the transitionary state of grilse, has been more recently traced, with corresponding care, by Mr Andrew Young of Invershin, the manager of the Duke of Sutherland's fisheries in the north. Although the fact of the parr being the young of the salmon had been vaguely surmised by many, and it was generally admitted that the smaller fish were never found to occur except in streams or tributaries to which the grown salmon had, in some way, the power of access, yet all who have any acquaintance with the works of naturalists, will acknowledge that the parr was universally described as a distinct species. It is equally certain that all who have written upon the subject of smolts or salmon-fry, maintained that these grew rapidly in fresh water, and made their way to the sea in the course of a few weeks after they were hatched.

Now, Mr Shaw's discovery in relation to these matters is in a manner twofold; first-he ascertained by a lengthened series of rigorous and frequently-repeated experimental observations, that parr are the early state of salmon, being afterwards converted into smolts; secondly,-he proved that such conversion does not, under ordinary circumstances take place until the second spring ensuing that in which the hatching has occurred, by which time the young are two years old. The fact is, that during early spring there are three distinct broods of parr or young salmon in our rivers.

1st, We have those which, recently excluded from the ova, are still invisible to common eyes; or, at least, are inconspicuous or unobservable. Being weak, in consequence of their recent emergence from the egg, and of extremely small dimensions, they are unable to withstand the rapid flow of water, and so betake themselves to the gentler eddies, and frequently enter "into the small hollows produced in the shingle by the hoofs of horses which have passed the fords." In these and similar resting-places, our little natural philosophers, instinctively aware that the current of a stream is less below than above, and along the sides than in the centre, remain for several months during spring, and the earlier portion of the summer, till they gain such an increase of size and strength as enables them to spread themselves abroad over other portions of the river, especially those shallow places where the bottom is composed of fine gravel. But at this time their shy and shingle-seeking habits in a great measure screen them from the observance of the uninitiated.

2dly, We have likewise, during the spring season, parr which have just completed their first year. As these have gained little or no accession of size during the winter months, owing to the low temperature both of the air and water, and the consequent deficiency of insect food, their dimensions are scarcely greater than at the end of the preceding October: that is, they measure in length little more than three inches.-(N.B. The old belief was that they grew nine inches in about three weeks, and as suddenly sought the turmoil of the sea.) They increase, however in size as the summer advances, and are then the declared and admitted parr of anglers and other men.

3dly, Simultaneously with the two preceding broods, our rivers are inhabited during March and April by parr which have completed their second year. These measure six or seven inches in length, and in the months of April and May they assume the fine silvery aspect which characterizes their migratory condition,-in other words, they are converted into smolts, (the admitted fry of salmon,) and immediately make their way towards the sea.

Now, the fundamental error which pervaded the views of previous observers of the subject, consisted in the sudden sequence which they chose to establish between the hatching of the ova in early spring, and the speedy appearance of the acknowledged salmon-fry in their lustrous dress of blue and silver. Observing, in the first place, the hatching of the ova, and, erelong, the seaward migration of the smolts, they imagined these two facts to take place in the relation of immediate or connected succession; whereas they had no more to do with each other than an infant in the nursery has to do with his elder, though not very ancient, brother, who may be going to school. The rapidity with which the two-year-old parr are converted into smolts, and the timid habits of the new-hatched fry, which render them almost entirely invisible during the first few months of their existence,-these two circumstances combined, have no doubt induced the erroneous belief that the silvery smolts were the actual produce of the very season in which they are first observed in their migratory dress: that is, that they were only a few weeks old, instead of being upwards of two years. It is certainly singular, however, that no enquirer of the old school should have ever bethought himself of the mysterious fate of the two-year-old parr, (supposing them not to be young salmon,) none of which, of course, are visible after the smolts have taken their departure to the sea. If the two fish, it may be asked, are not identical, how does it happen that the one so constantly disappears along with the other? Yet no one alleges that he has ever seen parr as such, making a journey towards the sea "They cannot do so" says Mr Shaw, "because they have been previously converted into smolts."

Mr Shaw's investigations were carried on for a series of years, both on the fry as it existed naturally in the river, and on captive broods produced from ova deposited by adult salmon, and conveyed to ingeniously-constructed experimental ponds, in which the excluded young were afterwards nourished till they threw off the livery of the parr, and underwent their final conversion into smolts. When this latter change took place, the migratory instinct became so strong that many of them, after searching in vain to escape from their prison-the little streamlet of the pond being barred by fine wire gratings-threw themselves by a kind of parabolic somerset upon the bank and perished. But, previous to this, he had repeatedly observed and recorded the slowly progressive growth to which we have alluded. The value of the parr, then, and the propriety of a judicious application of our statutory regulations to the preservation of that small, and, as hitherto supposed, insignificant fish, will be obvious without further comment.16

Having now exhibited the progress of the salmon fry from the ovum to the smolt, our next step shall be to show the connexion of the latter with the grilse. As no experimental observations regarding the future dimensions of the détenus of the ponds could be regarded as legitimate in relation to the usual increase of the species, (any more than we could judge of the growth of a young English guardsman in the prisons of Verdun,) after the period of their natural migration to the sea, and as Mr Shaw's distance from the salt water-twenty-five miles, we believe, windings included-debarred his carrying on his investigations much further with advantage, he wisely turned his attention to a different, though cognate subject, to which we shall afterwards refer. We are, however, fortunately enabled to proceed with our history of the adolescent salmon by means of another ingenious observer already named, Mr Andrew Young of Invershin.

It had always been the prevailing belief that smolts grew rapidly into grilse, and the latter into salmon. But as soon as we became assured of the gross errors of naturalists, and all other observers, regarding the progress of the fry in fresh water, and how a few weeks had been substituted for a period of a couple of years, it was natural that considerate people should suspect that equal errors might pervade the subsequent history of this important species. It appears, however, that marine influence (in whatever way it works) does indeed exercise a most extraordinary effect upon those migrants from our upland streams, and that the extremely rapid transit of a smolt to a grilse, and of the latter to an adult salmon, is strictly true. Although Mr Young's labours in this department differ from Mr Shaw's, in being rather confirmatory than original, we consider them of great value, as reducing the subject to a systematic form, and impressing it with the force and clearness of the most successful demonstration.

Mr Young's first experiments were commenced as far back as 1836, and were originally undertaken with a view to show whether the salmon of each particular river, after descending to the sea, returned again to their original spawning-beds, or whether, as some supposed, the main body, returning coastwards from their feeding grounds in more distant parts of the ocean, and advancing along our island shores, were merely thrown into, or induced to enter, estuaries and rivers by accidental circumstances; and that the numbers obtained in these latter localities thus depended mainly on wind and weather, or other physical conditions, being suitable to their upward progress at the time of their nearing the mouths of the fresher waters. To settle this point, he caught and marked all the spawned fish which he could obtain in the course of the winter months during their sojourn in the rivers. As soon as he had hauled the fish ashore, he made peculiar marks in their caudal fins by means of a pair of nipping-irons, and immediately threw then back into the water. In the course of the following fishing season great numbers were recaptured on their return from the sea, each in its own river bearing its peculiar mark. "We have also," Mr Young informs us, "another proof of the fact, that the different breeds or races of salmon continue to revisit their native streams. You are aware that the river Shin falls into the Oykel at Invershin, and that the conjoined waters of these rivers, with the Carron and other streams, form the estuary of the Oykel, which flows into the more open sea beyond, or eastwards of the bar, below the Gizzen Brigs. Now, were the salmon which enter the mouth of the estuary at the bar thrown in merely by accident or chance, we should expect to find the fish of all the various rivers which form the estuary of the same average weight; for, if it were a mere matter of chance, then a mixture of small and great would occur indifferently in each of the interior streams. But the reverse of this is the case. The salmon in the Shin will average from seventeen pounds to eighteen pounds in weight, while those of the Oykel scarcely attain an average of half that weight. I am, therefore, quite satisfied, as well by having marked spawned fish descending to the sea, and caught them ascending the same river, and bearing that river's mark, as by a long-continued general observation of the weight, size, and even something of the form, that every river has its own breed, and that breed continues, till captured and killed, to return from year to year into its native stream."

We have heard of a partial exception to this instinctive habit, which, however, essentially confirms the rule. We are informed that a Shin salmon (recognized as such by its shape and size) was, on a certain occasion, captured in the river Conon, a fine stream which flows into the upper portion of the neighbouring Frith of Cromarty. It was marked and returned to the river, and was taken next day in its native stream the Shin, having, on discovering its mistake, descended the Cromarty Frith, skirted the intermediate portion of the outer coast by Tarbet Ness, and ascended the estuary of the Oykel. The distance may be about sixty miles. On the other hand, we are informed by a Sutherland correspondent of a fact of another nature, which bears strongly upon the pertinacity with which these fine fish endeavour to regain their spawning ground. By the side of the river Helmsdale there was once a portion of an old channel forming an angular bend with the actual river. In summer, it was only partially filled by a detached or landlocked pool, but in winter, a more lively communication was renewed by the superabounding waters. This old channel was, however, not only resorted to by salmon as a piece of spawning ground during the colder season of the year, but was sought for again instinctively in summer during their upward migration, when there was no water running through it. The fish being, of course, unable to attain their object, have been seen, after various aerial boundings, to fall, in the course of their exertions, upon the dry gravel bank between the river and the pool of water, where they were picked up by the considerate natives.

No sooner had Mr Young satisfied himself that the produce of a river invariably returned to that river after descending to the sea, than he commenced his operations upon the smolts-taking up the subject where it was unavoidably left off by Mr Shaw17. His long-continued superintendence of the Duke of Sutherland's fisheries in the north of Scotland, and his peculiar position as residing almost within a few yards of the noted river Shin, afforded advantages of which he was not slow to make assiduous use. He has now performed numerous and varied experiments, and finds that, notwithstanding the slow growth of parr in fresh water, "such is the influence of the sea as a more enlarged and salubrious sphere of life, that the very smolts which descend into it from the rivers in spring, ascend into the fresh waters in the course of the immediate summer as grilse, varying in size in proportion to the length of their stay in salt water."

For example, in the spring of 1837, Mr Young marked a great quantity of descending smolts, by making a perforation in their caudal fins with a small pair of nipping-irons constructed for the purpose, and in the ensuing months of June and July he recaptured a considerable number on their return to the rivers, all in the condition of grilse, and varying from 3lbs. to 8lbs., "according to the time which had elapsed since their first departure from the fresh water, or, in other words, the length of their sojourn in the sea." In the spring of 1842, he likewise marked a number of descending smolts, by clipping off what is called the adipose fin upon the back. In the course of the ensuing June and July, he caught them returning up the river, bearing his peculiar mark, and agreeing with those of 1837 both in respect to size, and the relation which that size bore to the lapse of time.

The following list from Mr Young's note-book, affords a few examples of the rate of growth:-

List of Smolts marked in the River, and recaptured as Grilse on their first ascent from the Sea.

Period of marking. Period of recapture. Weight when retaken.

1842. April and May. 1842. June 28. 4 lb.

July 15. 5 lb

15. 5 lb.

25. 7 lb.18

25. 5 lb.

30. 3? lb.18

We may now proceed to consider the final change,-that of the grilse into the adult salmon. We have just seen that smolts return to the rivers as grilse, (of the weights above noted,) during the summer and autumn of the same season in which they had descended for the first time to the sea. Such as seek the rivers in the earlier part of summer are of small size, because they have sojourned for but a short time in the sea:-such as abide in the sea till autumn, attain of course a larger size. But it appears to be an established, though till now an unknown fact, that with the exception of the early state of parr, in which the growth has been shown to be extremely slow, salmon actually never do grow in fresh water at all, either as grilse or in the adult state. All their growth in these two most important later stages, takes place during their sojourn in the sea. "Not only," says Mr Young, "is this the case, but I have also ascertained that they actually decrease in dimensions after entering the river, and that the higher they ascend the more they deteriorate both in weight and quality. In corroboration of this I may refer to the extensive fisheries of the Duke of Sutherland, where the fish of each station of the same river are kept distinct from those of another station, and where we have had ample proof that salmon habitually decrease in weight in proportion to their time and distance from the sea."19

Mr Young commenced marking grilses, with a view to ascertain that they became salmon, as far back as 1837, and has continued to do so ever since, though never two seasons with the same mark. We shall here record only the results of the two preceding years. In the spring of 1841, he marked a number of spawned grilse soon after the conclusion of the spawning period. Taking his "net and coble," he fished the river for the special purpose, and all the spawned grilse of 4 lb. weight were marked by putting a peculiarly twisted piece of wire through the dorsal fin. They were immediately thrown into the river, and of course disappeared, making their way downwards with other spawned fish towards the sea. "In the course of the next summer we again caught several of those fish which we had thus marked with wire as 4 lb. grilse, grown in the short period of four or five months into beautiful full-formed salmon, ranging from 9 lb. to 14 lb. in weight, the difference still depending on the length of their sojourn in the sea."

In January 1842, he repeated the same process of marking 4 lb. grilse which had spawned, and were therefore about to seek the sea; but, instead of placing the wire in the back fin, he this year fixed it in the upper lobe of the tail, or caudal fin. On their return from the sea, he caught many of these quondam grilse converted into salmon as before. The following lists will serve to illustrate the rate of growth:-

List of Grilse marked after having spawned, and re-captured as Salmon, on their second ascent from the Sea.

Period of marking. Period of recapture. Weight when marked. Weight when retaken.

1841. Feb. 18. 1841. June 23. 4 lbs. 9 lbs.

18. 23. 4 lbs. 11 lbs.

18. 25. 4 lbs. 9 lbs.

18. 25. 4 lbs. 10 lbs.

18. July 27. 4 lbs. 13 lbs.

18. 28. 4 lbs. 10 lbs.

March 4. July 1. 4 lbs. 12 lbs.

4. 1. 4 lbs. 14 lbs.

4. 27. 4 lbs. 12 lbs.

1842. Jan. 29. 1842. July 4. 4 lbs. 8 lbs.20

29. 14. 4 lbs. 9 lbs.20

29. 14. 4 lbs. 8 lbs.

March 8. 23. 4 lbs. 9 lbs.

Jan. 29. 29. 4 lbs. 11 lbs.

March 8. Aug. 4. 4 lbs. 10 lbs.

Jan. 29. 11. 4 lbs. 12 lbs.

During both these seasons, Mr Young informs us, he caught far more marked grilse returning with the form and attributes of perfect salmon, than are recorded in the preceding lists. "In many specimens the wires had been torn from the fins, either by the action of the nets or other casualties; and, although I could myself recognise distinctly that they were the fish I had marked, I kept no note of them. All those recorded in my lists returned and were captured with the twisted wires complete, the same as the specimens transmitted for your examination."

We agree with Mr Young in thinking that the preceding facts, viewed in connexion with Mr Shaw's prior observations, entitle us to say, that we are now well acquainted with the history and habits of the salmon, and its usual rate of growth from the ovum to the adult state. The young are hatched after a period which admits of considerable range, according to the temperature of the season, or the modifying character of special localities.21 They usually burst the capsule of the egg in 90 to 100 days after deposition, but they still continue for a considerable time beneath the gravel, with the yelk or vitelline portion of the egg adhering to the body; and from this appendage, which Mr Shaw likens to a red currant, they probably derive their sole nourishment for several weeks. But though the lapse of 140 or even 150 days from the period of deposition is frequently required to perfect the form of these little fishes, which even then measure scarcely more than an inch in length, their subsequent growth is still extremely slow; and the silvery aspect of the smolt is seldom assumed till after the expiry of a couple of years. The great mass of these smolts descend to the sea during the months of April and May,-the varying range of the spawning and hatching season carrying with it a somewhat corresponding range in the assumption of the first signal change, and the consequent movement to the sea. They return under the greatly enlarged form of grilse, as already stated, and these grilse spawn that same season in common with the salmon, and then both the one and the other re-descend into the sea in the course of the winter or ensuing spring. They all return again to the rivers sooner or later, in accordance, as we believe, with the time they had previously left it after spawning, early or late. The grilse have now become salmon by the time of their second ascent from the sea; and no further change takes place in their character or attributes, except that such as survive the snares of the fishermen, the wily chambers of the cruives, the angler's gaudy hook, or the poacher's spear, continue to increase in size from year to year. Such, however, is now the perfection of our fisheries, and the facilities for conveying this princely species even from our northern rivers, and the "distant islands of the sea," to the luxurious cities of more populous districts, that we greatly doubt if any salmon ever attains a good old age, or is allowed to die a natural death. We are not possessed of sufficient data from which to judge either of their natural term of life, or of their ultimate increase of size. They are occasionally, though rarely, killed in Britain of the weight of forty and even fifty pounds. In the comparatively unfished rivers of Scandinavia large salmon are much more frequent, although the largest we ever heard of was an English fish which came into the possession of Mr Groves, of Bond Street. It was a female, and weighed eighty-three pounds. In the year 1841, Mr Young marked a few spawned salmon along with his grilse, employing as a distinctive mark copper wire instead of brass. One of these, weighing twelve pounds, was marked on the 4th of March, and was recaptured on returning from the sea on the 10th of July, weighing eighteen pounds. But as we know not whether it made its way to the sea immediately after being marked, we cannot accurately infer the rate of increase. It probably becomes slower every year, after the assumption of the adult state. Why the salmon of one river should greatly exceed the average weight of those of another into which it flows, is a problem which we cannot solve. The fact, for example, of the river Shin flowing from a large lake, with a course of only a few miles, into the Oykel, although it accounts for its being an early river, owing to the receptive depth, and consequently higher temperature of its great nursing mother, Loch Shin, in no way, so far at least as we can see, explains the great size of the Shin fish, which are taken in scores of twenty pounds' weight. They have little or nothing to do with the loch itself, haunting habitually the brawling stream, and spawning in the shallower fords, at some distance up, but still below the great basin;22 and there are no physical peculiarities which in any way distinguish the Shin from many other lake born northern rivers, where salmon do not average half the size.

Leaving the country of the Morer Chatt (the Celtic title of the Earls of Sutherland) we shall now return to the retainer of the "bold Buccleuch." We have already mentioned that Mr Shaw, having so successfully illustrated the early history of salmon, next turned his attention to a cognate subject, that of the sea-trout (Salmo-trutta?) Although no positive observations of any value, anterior to those now before us, had been made upon this species, it is obvious that as soon as his discoveries regarding salmon fry had afforded, as it were, the key to this portion of nature's secrets, it was easy for any one to infer that the old notions regarding the former fish were equally erroneous. Various modifications of these views took place accordingly; but no one ascertained the truth by observation. Mr Shaw was, therefore, entitled to proceed as if the matter were solely in his own hands; and he makes no mention either of the "vain imaginations" of Dr Knox, the more careful compilation of Mr Yarrell, or the still closer, but by no means approximate calculations of Richard Parnell, M.D. In this he has acted wisely, seeing that his own essay professes to be simply a statement of facts, and not an historical exposition of the progress of error.

It would, indeed, have been singular if two species, in many respects so closely allied in their general structure any economy, had been found to differ very materially in any essential point. It now appears, however, that Mr Shaw's original discovery of the slow growth of salmon fry in fresh water, applies equally to sea trout; and, indeed, his observations on the latter are valuable not only in themselves, but as confirmatory of his remarks upon the former species. The same principle has been found to regulate the growth and migrations of both, and Mr Shaw's two contributions thus mutually strengthen and support each other.

The sea trout is well known to anglers as one of the liveliest of all the fishes subject to his lure. Two species are supposed by naturalists to haunt our rivers-Salmo eriox, the bull trout of the Tweed, comparatively rare on the western and northern coasts of Scotland, and Salmo trutta, commonly called the sea or white trout, but, like the other species, also known under a variety of provincial names, somewhat vaguely applied. In its various and progressive stages, it passes under the names of fry, smolt, orange-fin, phinock, herling, whitling, sea-trout, and salmon-trout. It is likewise the "Fordwich trout" of Izaak Walton, described by that poetical old piscator as "rare good meat." As an article of diet it indeed ranks next to the salmon, and is much superior in that respect to its near relation, S. eriox. It is taken in the more seaward pools of our northern rivers, sometimes in several hundreds at a single haul; and vast quantities, after being boiled, and hermetically sealed in tin cases, are extensively consumed both in our home and foreign markets. But, notwithstanding its great commercial value, naturalists have failed to present us with any accurate account of its consecutive history from the ovum to the adult state. This desideratum we are now enabled to supply through Mr Shaw.

On the 1st of November 1839, this ingenious observer perceived a pair of sea-trouts engaged together in depositing their spawn among the gravel of one of the tributaries of the river Nith, and being unprovided at the moment with any apparatus for their capture, he had recourse to his fowling-piece. Watching the moment when they lay parallel to each other, he fired across the heads of the devoted pair, and immediately secured them both, although, as it afterwards appeared, rather by the influence of concussion than the more immediate action of the shot. They were about six inches under water. Having obtained a sufficient supply of the impregnated spawn, he removed it in a bag of wire gauze to his experimental ponds. At this period the temperature of the water was about 47°, but in the course of the winter it ranged a few degrees lower. By the fortieth day the embryo fish were visible to the naked eye, and, on the 14th January, (seventy-five days after deposition,) the fry were excluded from the egg. At this early period, the brood exhibit no perceptible difference from that of the salmon, except that they are somewhat smaller, and of paler hue. In two months they were an inch long, and had then assumed those lateral markings so characteristic of the young of all the known Salmonid?. They increased in size slowly, measuring only three inches in length by the month of October, at which time they were nine months old. In January 1841, they had increased to three and a half inches, exhibiting a somewhat defective condition during the winter months, in one or more of which, Mr Shaw seems to think, they scarcely grow at all. We need not here go through the entire detail of these experiments.23 In October (twenty-one months) they measured six inches in length, and had lost those lateral bars, or transverse markings, which characterise the general family in their early state. At this period they greatly resembled certain varieties of the common river-trout, and the males had now attained the age of sexual completion, although none of the females had matured the roe. This physiological fact is also observable in the true salmon. In the month of May, three-fourths of the brood (being now upwards of two years old, and seven inches long) assumed the fine clear silvery lustre which characterises the migratory condition, being thus converted into smolts, closely resembling those of salmon in their general aspect, although easily to be distinguished by the orange tips of the pectoral fins, and other characters with which we shall not here afflict our readers.

The natural economy of the sea-trout thus far approximates that of the genuine salmon, but with the following exception. Mr Shaw is of opinion that about one-fourth of each brood never assume the silvery lustre; and, as they are never seen to migrate in a dusky state towards the sea, he infers that a certain portion of the species may be permanent residents in fresh water.24 In this respect, then, they resemble the river-trout, and afford an example of those numerous gradations, both of form and instinct, which compose the harmonious chain of nature's perfect kingdom. In support of this power of adaptation to fresh water possessed by sea-trout, Mr Shaw refers to a statement by the late Dr McCulloch, that these fish had become permanent inhabitants of a loch in the island of Lismore, Argyllshire. Similar facts have been recorded by other naturalists, though, upon the whole, in a somewhat vague and inconclusive manner. We have it in our power to mention a very marked example. When certain springs were conducted, about twenty years ago, from the slopes of the Pentland Hills, near Edinburgh, into that city, which Dr Johnson regarded as by no means abundantly supplied with the "pure element of water," it was necessary to compensate the mill-owners by another supply. Accordingly a valley, (the supposed scene of Allan Ramsay's "Gentle Shepherd,") through which there flowed a small stream, had a great embankment thrown across it. After this operation, of course the waters of the upper portion of the stream speedily rose to a level with the sluices, thus forming a small lake, commonly called the "Compensation Pond." The flow of water now escapes by throwing itself over the outer side of the embankment, which is lofty and precipitous, in the form of a cataract, up which no fish can possibly ascend. Yet in the pond itself we have recently ascertained the existence of sea-trout in a healthy state, although such as we have examined, being young, were of small size. These attributes, however, were all the more important as proving the breeding condition of the parents in a state of prolonged captivity. It is obvious that sea-trout must have made their way (in fulfilment of their natural migratory instinct) into the higher portions of the stream prior to the completion of the obstructing dam; and as none could have ascended since, it follows that the individuals in question (themselves and their descendants) must have lived and bred in fresh water, without access to the sea, for a continuous period of nearly twenty years. This is not only a curious fact in the natural history of the species, but it is one of some importance in an economical point of view. Sea-trout, as an article of diet, are much more valuable than river-trout; and if it can be ascertained that they breed freely, and live healthily, without the necessity of access to the sea, it would then become the duty, as it would doubtless be the desire, of those engaged in the construction of artificial ponds, to stock those receptacles rather with the former than the latter.25

Having narrated the result of Mr Shaw's experiment up to the migratory state of his brood, we shall now refer to the further progress of the species. This, of course, we can only do by turning our attention to the corresponding condition of the fry in their natural places in the river. So far back as the 9th of May 1836, our observer noticed salmon fry descending seawards, and he took occasion to capture a considerable number by admitting them into the salmon cruive. On examination, he found about one-fifth of each shoal to be what he considered sea-trout. Wisely regarding this as a favourable opportunity of ascertaining to what extent they would afterwards "suffer a sea change," he marked all the smolts of that species (about ninety in number) by cutting off the whole of the adipose fin, and three-quarters of the dorsal. At a distance, by the course of the river, of twenty-five miles from the sea, he was not sanguine of recapturing many of these individuals, and in this expectation he was not agreeably surprised by any better success than he expected. However, on the 16th of July, exactly eighty days afterwards, he recaptured as a herling (the next progressive stage) an individual bearing the marks he had inflicted on the young sea-trout in the previous May. It measured twelve inches in length, and weighed ten ounces. As the average weight of the migrating fry is about three and a half ounces, it had thus gained an increase of six and a half ounces in about eighty days' residence in salt water, supposing it to have descended to the sea immediately after its markings were imposed. In this condition of herlings or phinocks, young sea-trout enter many of our rivers in great abundance in the months of July and August.

On the 1st of August 1837-fifteen months after being marked as fry, on its way to the sea-another individual was caught, and recognised by the absence of one fin, and the curtailment of another. This specimen, as well as others, had no doubt returned, and escaped detection as a herling, in 1836; but it was born for greater things, and when captured, as above stated, weighed two pounds and a half. "He may be supposed," says Mr Shaw, "to represent pretty correctly the average size of sea-trout on their second migration from the sea." In this state they usually make their appearance in our rivers, (we refer at present particularly to those of Scotland,) in greatest abundance in the months of May and June. This view of the progress of the species clearly accounts for a fact well known to anglers, that in spring and the commencement of summer, larger sea-trout are caught than in July and August, which would not be the case if they were all fish of the same season. But the former are herlings which have descended, after spawning early, to the sea, and returned with the increase just mentioned; the latter were nothing more than smolts in May, and have only once enjoyed the benefit of sea bathing. They are a year younger than the others.

As herlings (sea-trout in their third year) abounded in the river Nith during the summer of 1834, Mr Shaw marked a great number (524) by cutting off the adipose fin. "During the following summer (1835) I recaptured sixty-eight of the above number as sea-trout, weighing on an average about two and a half pounds. On these I put a second distinct mark, and again returned them to the river, and on the next ensuing summer (1836) I recaptured a portion of them, about one in twenty, averaging a weight of four pounds. I now marked them distinctively for the third time, and once more returned them to the river, also for the third time. On the following season (23d day of August 1837) I recaptured the individual now exhibited, for the fourth time.26 It then weighed six pounds." This is indeed an eventful history, and we question if any Salmo trutta ever before felt himself so often out of his element. However, the individual referred to must undoubtedly be regarded as extremely interesting to the naturalist. It exhibits, at a single glance, the various marks put upon itself and its companions, as they were successively recaptured, from year to year, on their return to the river-viz. 1st, The absence of the adipose fin, (herling of ten or twelve ounces in 1834;) 2dly, One-third part of the dorsal fin removed, (sea-trout of two and a half pounds in 1835;) 3dly, A portion of the anal fin clipt off (large sea-trout of four pounds in 1836). In the 4th and last place, it shows, in its own proper person, as leader of the forlorn hope of 1837, the state in which it was finally captured and killed, of the weight of six pounds. It was then in its sixth year, and, representing the adult condition of this migratory species, we think it renders further investigation unnecessary.

From these and other experiments of a similar nature, which Mr Shaw has been conducting for many years, he has come to the conclusion, that the small fry called "Orange-fins," which are found journeying to the sea with smolts of the true salmon, are the young of sea-trout of the age of two years;-that the same individuals, after nine or ten weeks' sojourn in salt water, ascend the rivers as herlings, weighing ten or twelve ounces and on the approach of autumn pass into our smaller tributaries with a view to the continuance of their kind;-that, having spawned, they re-descend into the sea, where their increase of size (about one and a half pound per annum) is almost totally obtained;-and that they return annually, with an accession of size, for several seasons, to the rivers in which their parents gave them birth. In proof of this last point, Mr Shaw informs us, that of the many hundred sea-trout of different ages which he has marked in various modes, he is not aware that even a single individual has ever found its way into any tributary of the Solway, saving that of the river Nith.

* * *

CALEB STUKELY.

PART THE LAST.

TRANQUILITY.

The sudden and unlooked-for appearance of James Temple threw light upon a mystery. Further explanation awaited me in the house from which the unfortunate man had rushed to meet instant death and all its consequences. It will be remembered that, in the narrative of his victim, mention is made of one Mrs Wybrow, with whom the poor girl, upon the loss of her father and of all means of support, obtained a temporary home. It appeared that Fredrick Harrington, a few months after his flight, returned secretly to the village, and, at the house of that benevolent woman, made earnest application for his sister. He was then excited and half insane, speaking extravagantly of his views and his intentions in respect of her he came to take away. "She should be a duchess," he said, "and must take precedence of every lady in the land. He was a king himself and could command it so. He could perform wonders, if he chose to use the power with which he was invested; but he would wait until his sister might reap the benefit of his acquired wealth." In this strain he continued, alarming the placid Mrs Wybrow, who knew not what to do to moderate the wildness and the vehemence of his demeanour. Hoping, however, to appease him, she told him of the good fortune of his sister-how she had obtained a happy home, and how grateful he ought to be to Providence for its kind care of her. Much more she said, only to increase the anger of the man, whose insane pride was roused to fury the moment that he heard his sister was doomed to eat the bread of a dependent. He disdained the assistance of Mrs Temple-swore it was an artifice, a cheat, and that he would drag her from the net into which they had enticed her. When afterwards he learned that it was through the mediation of James Temple that his sister had been provided for, the truth burst instantly upon him, and he foresaw at once all that actually took place. He vowed that he would become himself the avenger of his sister, and that he would not let her betrayer sleep until he had wrung from him deep atonement for his crime. It was in vain that Mrs Wybrow sought to convince him of his delusion. He would not be advised-he would not listen-he would not linger another moment in the house, but quitted it, wrought to the highest pitch of rage, and speaking only of vengeance on the seducer. He set out for London. Mrs Wybrow, agitated more than she had been at any time since her birth, and herself almost deprived of reason by her fears for the safety of Miss Harrington, James Temple, and the furious lunatic himself, wrote immediately to Emma, then resident in Cambridge, explaining the sad condition of her brother, and warning her of his approach-Emma having already (without acquainting Mrs Wybrow with her fallen state) forwarded her address, with a strict injunction to her humble friend to convey to her all information of her absent brother which she could possibly obtain. The threatened danger was communicated to the lover-darkened his days for a time with anxiety and dread, but ceased as time wore on, and as no visitant appeared to affect the easy tenor of his immoral life. The reader will not have forgotten, perhaps, that when for the first time I beheld James Temple, he was accompanied by an elder brother. It was from the latter, his friend and confidant, that the above particulars, and those which follow in respect of the deceased, were gathered. The house in which, for a second time, I encountered my ancient college friends, was their uncle's. Parents they had none. Of father and of mother both they had been deprived in infancy; and, from that period, their home had been with their relative and guardian. The conduct of one charge, at least, had been from boyhood such as to cause the greatest pain to him who had assumed a parent's cares. Hypocrisy, sensuality, and-for his years and social station-unparalleled dishonesty, had characterised James Temple's short career. By some inexplicable tortuosity of mind, with every natural endowment, with every acquired advantage, graced with the borrowed as well as native ornaments of humanity, he found no joy in his inheritance, but sacrificed it all, and crawled through life a gross and earthy man. The seduction of Emma, young as he was when he committed that offence, was, by many, not the first crime for which-not, thank Heaven! without some preparation for his trial-he was called suddenly to answer. As a boy, he had grown aged is vice. It has been stated that he quitted the university the very instant he disencumbered himself of the girl whom he had sacrificed. He crept to the metropolis, and for a time there hid himself. But it was there that he was discovered by Frederick Harrington, who had pursued the destroyer with a perseverance that was indomitable, and scoffed at disappointment. How the lunatic existed no one knew; how he steered clear of transgression and restraint was equally difficult to explain. It was evident enough that he made himself acquainted with the haunts of his former schoolfellow; and, in one of them, he rushed furiously and unexpectedly upon him, affrighting his intended victim, but failing in his purpose of vengeance by the very impetuosity of his assault. Temple escaped. Then it was that the latter, shaken by fear, revealed to his brother the rise of progress of his intimacy with the discarded girl, and, in his extremity, called upon him for advice and help. He could afford him none; and the seducer found himself in the world without an hour's happiness or quiet. What quails so readily as the heartiest soul of the sensualist? Who so cowardly as the man only courageous in his oppression of the weak? The spirit of Temple was laid prostrate. He walked, and eat, and slept, in base and dastard fear. Locks and bolts could not secure him from dismal apprehensions. A sound shook him, as the unseen wind makes the tall poplar shudder-a voice struck terror in his ear, and sickness to recreant heart. He could not be alone-for alarm was heightened by the speaking conscience that pronounced it just. He journeyed from place to place, his brother ever at his side, and the shadow of the avenger ever stalking in the rear, and impelling the weary wanderer still onward. The health of the sufferer gave way. To preserve his life, he was ordered to the south-western coast. His faithful brother was his companion still. He had not received a week's benefit from the mild and grateful climate-he was scarcely settled in the tranquil village in which they had fixed their residence, before the old terror was made manifest, and hunted the unhappy man away. Whilst sitting at his window, and gazing with something of delight upon the broad and smooth blue sea-for who can look, criminal though he be, upon that glorious sheet in summer time, when the sky is bright with beauty, and the golden sun is high, and not lose somewhat of the heavy sense of guilt-not glow, it may be, with returning gush of childhood's innocence, long absent, and coming now only to reproach and then depart?-whilst sitting there and thus, the sick man's notice was invited to a crowd of yelling boys, who had amongst them one, the tallest of their number, whom they dragged along for punishment or sport. He was an idiot. Who he was none knew so well as the pale man that looked upon him, who could not drag his eye away, so lost was it in wonder, so transfixed with horror. The invalid remained no longer there. Fast as horses could convey him, he journeyed homeward; and, in the bosom of his natural protectors, he sought for peace he could not gain elsewhere. Here he remained, the slave of fear, the conscience-stricken, diseased in body-almost spent; and here he would have died, had not Providence directed the impotent mind of the imbecile to the spot, and willed it otherwise. I have narrated, as shortly as I might, the history of my earliest college friend, as I received it from his brother's lips. There remain but a few words to say-the pleasantest that I have had to speak of him James Temple did not die a hardened man. If there be truth in tears, in prayers of penitence that fall from him who stand upon the borders of eternity-who can gain nothing by hypocrisy, and may lose by it the priceless treasure of an immortal soul-if serenity and joy are signs of a repentance spoken, a forgiveness felt, then Heaven had assuredly been merciful with the culprit, and had remitted his offences, as Heaven can, and will, remit the vilest.

I remained in the village of Belton until I saw all that remained of the schoolfellows deposited in the earth. Their bodies had been easily obtained-that of the idiot, indeed, before life had quitted it. The evening that followed their burial, I passed with William Temple. Many a sad reminiscence occurred to him which he communicated to me without reserve, many a wanton act of coarse licentiousness, many a warning unheeded, laughed at, spurned. It is a mournful pleasure for the mind, as it dwells upon the doings of the departed, to build up its own theories, and to work out a history of what might have been in happier circumstances-a useless history of ifs. "If my brother had been looked to when he was young," said William Temple more than once, "he would have turned out differently. My uncle spoiled him. As a child, he was never corrected. If he wished for a toy, he had but to scream for it. If, at school, he had been fortunate enough to contract his friendships with young men of worth and character, their example would have won him to rectitude, for he was always a lad easily led." And again, "If he had but listened to the advice which, when it would have served him, I did not fail daily and hourly to offer him, he might have lived for years, and been respected-for many know, I lost no opportunity to draw him from his course of error." Alas! how vain, how idle was this talk-how little it could help the clod that was already crumbling in the earth-the soul already at the judgment-seat; yet with untiring earnestness the brother persisted in this strain, and with every new hypothesis found fresh satisfaction. There was more reason for gratification when, at the close of the evening, the surviving relative turned from his barren discourse and referred to the last days of the deceased. There was comfort and consolation to the living in the evidences which he produced of his most blessed change. It was a joy to me to hear of his repentance, and to listen to the terms in which he made it known. I did not easily forget them. I journeyed homeward. When I arrived at the house of Doctor Mayhew, I was surprised to find how little I could remember of the country over which I had travelled. The scenes through which I had passed were forgotten-had not been noticed. Absorbed by the thoughts which possessed my brain, I had suffered myself to be carried forward, conscious of nothing but the waking dreams. I was prepared, however, to see my friend. Still influenced by the latent hope of meeting once more with Miss Fairman, still believing in the happy issue of my love, I had resolved to keep my own connexion with the idiot as secret as the grave. There was no reason why I should betray myself. His fate was independent of my act-my conduct formed no link in the chain which must be presented to make the history clear: and shame would have withheld the gratuitous confession, had not the ever present, never-dying promise forbade the disclosure of one convicting syllable. As may be supposed, the surprise of Doctor Mayhew, upon hearing the narrative, was no less than the regret which he experienced at the violent death of the poor creature in whom he had taken so kind and deep an interest. But a few days sufficed to sustain his concern for one who had come to him a stranger, and whom he had known so short a time. The pursuits and cares of life gradually withdrew the incident from his mind, and all thoughts of the idiot. He ceased to speak of him. To me, the last scene of his life was present for many a year. I could not remove it. By day and night it came before my eyes, without one effort on my part to invoke it. It has started up, suddenly and mysteriously, in the midst of enjoyment and serene delight, to mingle bitterness in the cup of earthly bliss. It has come in the season of sorrow to heighten the distress. Amongst men, and in the din of business, the vision has intruded, and in solitude it has followed me to throw its shadows across the bright green fields, beautiful in their freshness. Night after night-I cannot count their number-it has been the form and substance of my dreams, and I have gone to rest-yes, for months-with the sure and natural expectation of beholding the melancholy repetition of an act which I would have given any thing, and all I had, to forget and drive away for ever.

A week passed pleasantly with my host. I spoke of departure at the end of it. He smiled when I did so, bade me hold my tongue and be patient. I suffered another week to glide away, and then hinted once more that I had trespassed long enough upon his hospitality. The doctor placed his hand upon my arm, and answered quickly, "all in good time-do not hurry." His tone and manner confirmed, I know not why, the strong hope within me, and his words passed with meaning to my heart. I already built upon the aerial foundation, and looked forward with joyous confidence and expectation. The arguments and shows of truth are few that love requires. The poorest logic is the soundest reasoning-if it conclude for him. The visits to the parsonage were, meanwhile, continued. Upon my return, I gained no news. I asked if all were well there, and the simple, monosyllable, "Yes," answered with unusual quickness and decision, was all that escaped the doctor's lips. He did not wish to be interrogated further, and was displeased. I perceived this and was silent. For some days, no mention was made of his dear friend the minister. He was accustomed to speak often of that man, and most affectionately. What was the inference? A breach had taken place. If I entertained the idea for a day, it was dissipated on the next; for the doctor, a week having elapsed since his last visit, rode over to the parsonage as usual, remained there some hours, and returned in his best and gayest spirits. He spoke of the Fairmans during the evening with the same kind feeling and good-humour that had always accompanied his allusions to them and their proceedings, and grew at length eloquent in the praises of them both. The increasing beauty of the young mistress, he said, was marvellous. "Ah," he added slyly, and with more truth, perhaps, than he suspected, "it would have done your eyes good to-day, only to have got one peep at her." I sighed, and he tantalized me further. He pretended to pity me for the inconsiderate haste with which I had thrown up my employment, and to condole with me for all I had lost in consequence. "As for himself," he said, "he had, upon further consideration, given up all thought of marriage for the present. He should live a little longer and grow wiser; but it was not a pleasant thing, by any means, to see so sweet a girl taken coolly off by a young fellow, who, if all he heard was true, was very likely to have an early opportunity." I sighed again, and asked permission to retire to rest; but my tormentor did not grant it, until he had spoken for half an hour longer, when he dismissed me in a state of misery incompatible with rest, in bed, or out of it. My heart was bursting when I left him. He could not fail to mark it. To my surprise, he made another excursion to the parsonage on the following day; and, as before, he joined me in the evening with nothing on his lips but commendation of the young lady whom he had seen, and complaint at the cruel act which was about to rob them of their treasure; for he said, regardless of my presence or the desperate state of my feelings, "that the matter was now all but settled. Fairman had made up his mind, and was ready to give his consent the very moment the young fellow was bold enough to ask it. And lucky dog he is too," added the kind physician, by way of a conclusion, "for little puss herself is over head and ears in love with him, or else I never made a right prognosis."

"I am much obliged to you, sir," I answered, when Doctor Mayhew paused; "very grateful for your hospitality. If you please, I will depart to-morrow. I trust you will ask me to remain no longer. I cannot do so. My business in London"--

"Oh, very well! but that can wait, you know," replied the doctor, interrupting me. "I can't spare you to-morrow. I have asked a friend to dinner, and you must meet him."

"Do not think me ungrateful, doctor," I answered; "but positively I must and will depart to-morrow. I cannot stay."

"Nonsense, man, you shall. Come, say you will, and I engage, if your intention holds, to release you as early as you like the next day. I have promised my friend that you will give him the meeting, and you must not refuse me. Let me have my way to-morrow, and you shall be your own master afterwards."

"Upon such terms, sir," I answered immediately, "it would he unpardonable if I persisted. You shall command me; on the following day, I will seek my fortunes in the world again."

"Just so," replied the doctor, and so we separated.

The character of Dr Mayhew was little known to me. His goodness of heart I had reason to be acquainted with, but his long established love of jesting, his intense appreciation of a joke, practical or otherwise, I had yet to learn. In few men are united, as happily as they were in him, a steady application to the business of the world, and an almost unrestrained indulgence in its harmless pleasantries. The grave doctor was a boy at his fireside. I spent my last day in preparing for my removal, and in rambling for some hours amongst the hills, with which I had become too familiar to separate without a pang. Long was our leave-taking. I lingered and hovered from nook to nook, until I had expended the latest moment which it was mine to give. With a burdened spirit I returned to the house, as my thoughts shifted to the less pleasing prospect afforded by my new position. I shuddered to think of London, and the fresh vicissitudes that awaited me.

It wanted but a few minutes to dinner when I stepped into the drawing-room. The doctor had just reached home, after being absent on professional duty since the morning. The visitor had already arrived; I had heard his knock whilst I was dressing. Having lost all interest in the doings of the place, I had not even cared to enquire his name. What was it to me? What difference could the chance visitor of a night make to me, who was on the eve of exile? None. I walked despondingly into the room, and advanced with distant civility towards the stranger. His face was from me, but he turned instantly upon hearing my step, and I beheld--Mr Fairman. I could scarcely trust my eyes. I started, and retreated. My reverend friend, however, betrayed neither surprise nor discomposure. He smiled kindly, held out his hand, and spoke as he was wont in the days of cordiality and confidence. What did it mean?

"It is a lovely afternoon, Stukely," began the minister, "worthy of the ripe summer in which it is born."

"It is, sir," I replied; "but I shall see no more of them," I added instantly, anxious to assure him that I was not lurking with sinister design so near the parsonage-that I was on the eve of flight. "I quit our friend to-morrow, and must travel many miles away."

"You will come to us, Caleb," answered Mr Fairman mildly.

"Sir!" said I, doubting if I heard aright.

"Has Dr Mayhew said nothing then?" he asked.

I trembled in every limb.

"Nothing, sir," I answered. "Oh, yes! I recollect-he did-he has-but what have I-I have no wish-no business"--

The door opened, and Dr Mayhew himself joined us, rubbing his hands, and smiling, in the best of good tempers. In his rear followed the faithful Williams. Before a word of explanation could be offered, the latter functionary announced "dinner," and summoned us away. The presence of the servants during the meal interfered with the gratification of my unutterable curiosity. Mr Fairman spoke most affably on different matters, but did not once revert to the previous subject of discourse. I was on thorns. I could not eat. I could not look at the minister without anxiety and shame, and whenever my eye caught that of the doctor, I was abashed by a look of meaning and good-humoured cunning, that was half intelligible and half obscure. Rays of hope penetrated to my heart's core, and illuminated my existence. The presence of Mr Fairman could not be without a purpose. What was it, then? Oh, I dared not trust myself to ask the question! The answer bred intoxication and delight, too sweet for earth. What meant that wicked smile upon the doctor's cheek? He was too generous and good to laugh at my calamity. He could not do it. Yet the undisturbed demeanour of the minister confounded me. If there had been connected with this visit so important an object as that which I longed to believe was linked with it, there surely would have been some evidence in his speech and manner, and he continued as cheerful and undisturbed as if his mind were free from every care and weighty thought. "What can it mean?" I asked myself, again and again. "How can he coolly bid me to his house, after what has passed, after his fearful anxiety to get me out of it? Will he hazard another meeting with his beloved daughter?-Ah, I see it!" I suddenly and mentally exclaimed; "it is clear enough-she is absent-she is away. He wishes to evince his friendly disposition at parting, and now he can do it without risk or cost." It was a plain elucidation of the mystery-it was enough, and all my airy castles tumbled to the earth, and left me there in wretchedness. Glad was I when the dinner was concluded, and eager to withdraw. I had resolved to decline, at the first opportunity, the invitation of the incumbent. I did not wish to grieve my heart in feasting my eyes upon a scene crowded with fond associations, to revoke feelings in which it would be folly to indulge again, and which it were well to annihilate and forget. I was about to beg permission to leave the table, when Dr Mayhew rose; he looked archly at me when I followed his example, and requested me not to be in haste; "he had business to transact, and would rejoin us shortly." Saying these words, he smiled and vanished. I remained silent. To be left alone with Mr Fairman, was the most annoying circumstance that could happen in my present mood. There were a hundred things which I burned to know, whilst I lacked the courage to enquire concerning one. But I had waited for an opportunity to decline his invitation. Here it was, and I had not power to lift my head and look at him. Mr Fairman himself did not speak for some minutes. He sat thoughtfully, resting his forehead in the palm of his hand-his elbow on the table. At length he raised his eyes, and whilst my own were still bent downward, I could feel that his were fixed upon me.

"Caleb," said the minister.

It was the first time that the incumbent had called me by my Christian name. How strangely it sounded from his lips! How exquisitely grateful it dropt upon my ear!

"Tell me, Caleb," continued Mr Fairman, "did I understand you right? Is it true that Mayhew has told you nothing?"

"Nothing distinctly, sir," I answered-"I have gathered something from his hints, but I know not what he says in jest and what in earnest."

"I have only her happiness at heart, Stukely-from the moment that you spoke to me on the subject, I have acted solely with regard to that. I hoped to have smothered this passion in the bud. In attempting it, I believed I was acting as a father should, and doing my duty by her."

The room began to swim round me, and my head grew dizzy.

"I am to blame, perhaps, as Mayhew says, for having brought you together, and for surrounding her with danger. I should have known that to trifle with a heart so guileless and so pure was cruel and unjust, and fraught with perilous consequences. I was blind, and I am punished for my act."

I looked at him at length.

"I use the word deliberately-punished, Stukely. It is a punishment to behold the affection of which I have ever been too jealous, departing from me, and ripening for another. Why have I cared to live since Heaven took her mother to itself-but for her sake, for her welfare, and her love? But sorrow and regret are useless now. You do not know, young man, a thousandth part of your attainment when I tell you, you have gained her young and virgin heart. I oppose you no longer-I thwart not-render yourself worthy of the precious gift."

"I cannot speak, sir!" I exclaimed, seizing the hand of the incumbent in the wildness of my joy. "I am stupified by this intelligence! Trust me, sir-believe me, you shall find me not undeserving of your generosity and"--

"No, Stukely. Call it not by such a name. It is any thing but that; there is no liberality, no nobility of soul, in giving you what I may not now withhold. I cannot see her droop and die, and live myself to know that a word from me had saved her. I have given my consent to the prosecution of your attachment at the latest moment-not because I wished it, but to prevent a greater evil. I have told you the truth! It was due to us both that you should hear it; for the future look upon me as your father, and I will endeavour to do you justice."

There was a stop. I was so oppressed with a sense of happiness, that I could find no voice to speak my joy or tell my thanks. Mr Fairman paused, and then continued.

"You will come to the parsonage to-morrow, and take part again in the instruction of the lads after their return. You will be received as my daughter's suitor. Arrangements will be made for a provision for you. Mayhew and I have it in consideration now. When our plan is matured, it shall be communicated to you. There need be no haste. You are both young-too young for marriage-and we shall not yet fix the period of your espousal."

My mind was overpowered with a host of dazzling visions, which rose spontaneously as the minister proceeded in his delightful talk. I soon lost all power of listening to details. The beloved Ellen, the faithful and confiding maiden, who had not deserted the wanderer although driven from her father's doors-she, the beautiful and priceless jewel of my heart, was present in every thought, and was the ornament and chief of every group that passed before my warm imagination. Whilst the incumbent continued to speak of the future, of his own sacrifice, and my great gain-whilst his words, without penetrating, touched my ears, and died away-my soul grew busy in the contemplation of the prize, which, now that it was mine, I scarce knew how to estimate. Where was she then? How had she been? To how many days of suffering and of trial may she have been doomed? How many pangs may have wrung that noble heart before its sad complaints were listened to, and mercifully answered? I craved to be at her side. The words which her father had spoken had loosened the heavy chain that tied me down-my limbs were conscious of their freedom-my spirit felt its liberty-what hindered instant flight? In the midst of my reverie Dr Mayhew entered the room-and I remember distinctly that my immediate impulse was to leave the two friends together, and to run as fast as love could urge and feet could carry me-to the favoured spot which held all that I cared for now on earth. The plans, however, of Doctor Mayhew interfered with this desire. He had done much for me, more than I knew, and he was not the man to go without his payment. A long evening was yet before us, time enough for a hundred jokes, which I must hear, and witness, and applaud or I was most unworthy of the kindness he had shown me. The business over for which Mr Fairman had come expressly, the promise given of an early visit to the parsonage on the following day, an affectionate parting at the garden gate, and the incumbent proceeded on his homeward road. The doctor and I returned together to the house in silence and one of us in partial fear; for I could see the coming sarcasm in the questionable smile that played about his lips. Not a word was spoken when we resumed our seats. At last he rang the bell, and Williams answered it--

"Book Mr Stukely by the London coach to-morrow, Williams," said the master; "he positively must and will depart to-morrow."

The criminal reprieved-the child, hopeless and despairing at the suffering parent's bed, and blessed at length with a firm promise of amendment and recovery, can tell the feelings that sustained my fluttering heart, beating more anxiously the nearer it approached its home. I woke that morning with the lark-yes, ere that joyous bird had spread its wing, and broke upon the day with its mad note-and I left the doctor's house whilst all within were sleeping. There was no rest for me away from that abode, whose gates of adamant, with all their bars and fastenings, one magic word had opened-whose sentinels were withdrawn-whose terrors had departed. The hours were all too long until I claimed my newfound privilege. Morn of the mellow summer, how beautiful is thy birth! How soft-how calm-how breathlessly and blushingly thou stealest upon a slumbering world! fearful, as it seems, of startling it. How deeply quiet, and how soothing, are thy earliest sounds-scarce audible-by no peculiar quality distinguishable, yet thrilling and intense! How doubly potent falls thy witching influence on him whose spirit passion has attuned to all the harmonies of earth, and made but too susceptible! Disturbed as I was by the anticipation of my joy, and by the consequent unrest, with the first sight of day, and all its charms, came peace-actual and profound. The agitation of my soul was overwhelmed by the prevailing stillness, and I grew tranquil and subdued. Love existed yet-what could extinguish that?-but heightened and sublimed. It was as though, in contemplating the palpable and lovely work of heaven, all selfishness had at once departed from my breast-all dross had separated from my best affections, and left them pure and free. And so I walked on, happiest of the happy, from field to field, from hill to hill, with no companion on the way, no traveller within my view-alone with nature and my heart's delight. "And men pent up in cities," thought I, as I went along, "would call this-solitude." I remembered how lonely I had felt in the busy crowds of London-how chill, how desolate and forlorn, and marvelled at the reasoning of man. And came no other thoughts of London and the weary hours passed there, as I proceeded on my delightful walk? Yes, many, as Heaven knows, who heard the involuntary matin prayer, offered in gratefulness of heart, upon my knees, and in the open fields, where no eye but one could look upon the worshipper, and call the fitness of the time and place in question. The early mowers were soon a-foot; they saluted me and passed. Then, from the humblest cottages issued the straight thin column of white smoke-white as the snowy cloud-telling of industry within, and the return of toil. Now labourers were busy in their garden plots, labouring for pleasure and delight, ere they strove abroad for hire, their children at their side, giving the utmost of their small help-young, ruddy, wild, and earnest workmen all! The country day is up some hours before the day in town. Life sleeps in cities, whilst it moves in active usefulness away from them. The hills were dotted with the forms of men before I reached the parsonage, and when I reached it, a golden lustre from the mounting sun lit up the lovely house with fire-streaming through the casements already opened to the sweet and balmy air.

If I had found it difficult to rest on this eventful morning, so also had another-even here-in this most peaceful mansion. The parsonage gate was at this early hour unclosed. I entered. Upon the borders of the velvet lawn, bathed in the dews of night, I beheld the gentle lady of the place; she was alone, and walking pensively-now stooping, not to pluck, but to admire, and then to leave amongst its mates, some crimson beauty of the earth-now looking to the mountains of rich gold piled in the heavens, one upon another, changing in form and colour, blending and separating, as is their wondrous power and custom, filling the maiden's soul with joy. Her back was toward me: should I advance, or now retire? Vain question, when, ere an answer could be given, I was already at the lady's side. Shall I tell of her virgin bashfulness, her blushes, her trembling consciousness of pure affection? Shall I say how little her tongue could speak her love, and how eloquently the dropping tear told all! Shall I describe our morning's walk, her downward gaze-my pride?-her deep, deep silence, my impassioned tones, the insensibilty to all external things-the rushing on of envious Time, jealous of the perfect happiness of man? The heart is wanting for the task-the pen is shaking in the tremulous hand.-Beautiful vision! long associate of my rest, sweetener of the daily cares of life, shade of the heavenly one-beloved Ellen! hover still around me, and sustain my aching soul-carry me back to the earliest days of our young love, quicken every moment with enthusiasm-be my fond companion once again, and light up the old man's latest hour with the fire that ceased to burn when thou fleed'st heavenward! Thou hast been near me often since we parted here! Whose smile but thine has cheered the labouring pilgrim through the lagging day? In tribulation, whose voice has whispered peace-whose eye hath shone upon him, like a star, tranquil and steady in the gloomy night? Linger yet, and strengthen and hallow the feeble words, that chronicle our love!

It would be impossible to conceive a woman more eminently fitted to fulfil the duties of her station, than the gentle creature whose heart it had been my happiness and fortune to make my own. Who could speak so well of the daughter's obedience as he who was the object of her hourly solicitude? Who could behold her tenderness, her watchfulness and care and not revere the filial piety that sanctified the maid? The poor, most difficult of mankind to please, the easily offended, the jealous and the peevish, were unanimous in their loud praise of her, whose presence filled the foulest hut with light, and was the harbinger of good. It is well to doubt the indigent when they speak evil of their fellows; but trust them when, with one voice, they pray for blessings, as they did for her, who came amongst them as a sister and a child. If a spotless mind be a treasure in the wife, if simplicity and truth, virtue and steadfast love, are to be prized in her who plights her troth to man, what had I more to ask-what had kind nature more to grant?

Had all my previous sufferings been multiplied a hundred times, I should have been indemnified for all in the month that followed my restoration to the parsonage. Evening after evening, when the business of the day was closed, did we together wander amongst the scenes that were so dear to us-too happy in the enjoyment of the present, dwelling with pleasure on the past, dreaming wildly-as the young must dream-of the uncreated future. I spoke of earthly happiness, and believed it not a fable. What could be brighter than our promises? What looked more real-less likely to be broken? How sweet was our existence! My tongue would never cease to paint in dazzling colours the days that yet awaited us. I numbered over the joys of a domestic life, told her of the divine favour that accompanies contentment, and how angels of heaven hover over the house in which it dwells united to true love. Nor was there wanting extravagant and fanciful discourse, such as may be spoken by the prodigal heart to its co-mate, when none are by to smile and wonder at blind feeling.

"Dear Ellen," have I said, in all the fulness of my passion-"what a life is this we lead! what heavenly joy! To be for ever only as we are, were to have more of God's kindness and beloved care than most of earthly creatures may. Indissolubly joined, and in each other's light to live, and in each other's sight alone to seek those blessings wedded feelings may bestow-to perceive and know ourselves as one-to breathe as one the ripe delicious air-to fix on every object of our mutual love the stamp and essence of one living heart-to walk abroad, and find glad sympathy in all created things-this, this is to be conscious of more lasting joy-to have more comfort in the sight of God, than they did know, the happy parent pair, when heaven smiled on earth, and earth was heaven, connected both by tenderest links of love."

She did not answer, when my soul ran riot in its bliss. She listened, and she sighed, as though experience cut off the promises of hope, or as if intimations of evil began already to cast their shadows, and to press upon her soul!

Time flew as in a dream. The sunny days passed on, finding and leaving me without a trouble or a fear-happy and entranced. Each hour discovered new charms in my betrothed, and every day unveiled a latent grace. How had I merited my great good fortune? How could I render myself worthy of her love? It was not long before the object of my thoughts, sleeping and waking, became a living idol, and I, a reckless worshipper.

Doctor Mayhew had been a faithful friend, and such he continued, looking to the interests of the friendless, which might have suffered in the absence of so good an advocate. It was he, as I learnt, who had drawn from the incumbent his reluctant consent to my return. My departure following my thoughtless declaration so quickly, was not without visible effect on her who had such deep concern in it. Her trouble was not lost upon the experienced doctor; he mentioned his suspicion to her father, and recommended my recall. The latter would not listen to his counsel, and pronounced his diagnosis hasty and incorrect. The physician bade him wait. The patient did not rally, and her melancholy increased. The doctor once more interceded, but not successfully. Mr Fairman received his counsel with a hasty word, and Dr Mayhew left the parsonage in anger, telling the minister he would himself be answerable no longer for her safety. A week elapsed, and Doctor Mayhew found it impossible to keep away. The old friends met, more attached than ever for the parting which both had found it difficult to bear. The lady was no better. They held a conference-it ended in my favour. I had been exactly a month reinstated, when Doctor Mayhew, who could not rest thoroughly easy until our marriage was concluded, and, as he said, "the affair was off his hands," took a convenient opportunity to intimate to Mr Fairman the many advantages of an early union. The minister was anxious to postpone the ceremony to a distant period, which he had not courage himself to name. This Mayhew saw, and was well satisfied that, if my happiness depended on the word of the incumbent, I should wait long before I heard it voluntarily given. He told me so, and undertook "to bring the matter to a head" with all convenient speed. He met with a hundred objections, for all of which he was prepared. He heard his friend attentively, and with great deference, and then he answered. What his answers were, I cannot tell-powerful his reasoning must have been, since it argued the jealous parent into the necessity of arranging for an early marriage, and communicating with me that same day upon the views which he had for our future maintenance and comfort.

Nothing could exceed the gratification of Doctor Mayhew, that best and most successful of ambassadors, when he ran to me-straight from the incumbent's study-to announce the perfect success of his diplomacy. Had he been negotiating for himself, he could not have been in higher spirits. Ellen was with me when he acquainted me, that in three months the treasure would be my own, and mine would be the privilege and right to cherish it. He insisted that he should be rewarded on the instant with a kiss; and, in the exuberance of his feelings, was immodest enough to add, that "if he wasn't godfather to the first, and if we did not call him Jacob after him, he'd give us over to our ingratitude, and not have another syllable to say to us."

It was a curious occupation to contemplate the parent during the weeks that followed-to observe all-powerful nature working in him, the chastened and the upright minister of heaven, as she operates upon the weakest and the humblest of mankind. He lived for the happiness and prosperity of his child. For that he was prepared to make every sacrifice a father might-even the greatest-that of parting with her. Was it to be expected that he should be insensible to the heavy cost? Could it be supposed that he would all at once resign the dear one without a quiver or a pang? There is a tremor of the soul as well as of the body, when the knife is falling on the limb to sever it, and this he suffered, struggling for composure as a martyr, and yet with all the weakness of a man. I have watched him closely, and I have known his heart wringing with pain, as the eye of his child sparkled with joy at my approach, whilst the visible features of his face strove fiercely to suppress the rising selfishness. He has gazed upon her, as we have sat together in the cheerful night, wondering, as it seemed, by what fascination the natural and deep-rooted love of years could be surpassed and superseded by the immature affection of a day-forgetful of her mother's love, that once preferred him to her sire. In our evening walks I have seen him in our track, following from afar, eager to overtake and join us, and yet resisting the strong impulse, and forbearing. He could not hide from me the glaring fact, that he was envious of my fortune, manifest as it was in every trifling act; nor was it, in truth, easier for him to conceal the strong determination which he had formed to act with honour and with justice. No angry or reproachful word escaped his lips; every favour that he could show me he gladly proffered; nay, many uncalled-for and unexpected, he insisted upon my receiving, apparently, or, as I guessed, because he wished to mortify his own poor heart, and to remove from me the smallest cause for murmuring or complaint. I endeavoured not to be unworthy of his liberality and confidence; and the daughter, who perceived the conflict in his breast, redoubled her attention, and made more evident her unimpaired and childlike love.

It wanted but a month to the time fixed for our union, when Ellen reached her twentieth year. On that occasion, Doctor Mayhew dined with us, and passed the evening at the parsonage. He was in high spirits; and the minister himself more gay than I had known him since our engagement. Ellen reflected her father's cheerfulness, and was busy in sustaining it. All went merry as a marriage-bell. Ellen sang her father's favourite airs-played the tunes that pleased him best, and acquired new energy and power as she proceeded. The parent looked upon her with just pride, and took occasion, when the music was at its loudest, to turn to Mayhew, and to speak of her.

"How well she looks!" said he; "how beautiful she grows!"

"Yes," answered the physician; "I don't wonder that she made young Stukely's heart ache. What a figure the puss has got!"

"And her health seems quite restored!"

"Well, you are not surprised at that, I reckon. Rest assured, my friend, if we could only let young ladies have their way, our patients would diminish rapidly. Why, how she sings to-night! I never knew her voice so good-did you?"

"Oh, she is happy, Mayhew; all her thoughts are joyful! Her heart is revelling. It was very sinful to be so anxious on her account."

"So I always told you; but you wouldn't mind me. She'll make old bones."

"You think so, do you?"

"Why, look at her yourself, and say whether we should be justified in thinking otherwise. Is she not the picture of health and animation?"

"Yes, Mayhew, but her mother"--

"There, be quiet will you? The song is over."

Ellen returned to her father's side, sat upon a stool before him, and placed her arms upon his knee. The incumbent drew her head there, and touched her cheek in playfulness.

"Come, my friend," exclaimed the physician, "that isn't allowable by any means. Recollect two young gentlemen are present, and we can't be tantalized."

The minister smiled, and Ellen looked at me.

"Do you remember, doctor," enquired the latter, "this very day eleven years, when you came over on the grey pony, that walked into this room after you, and frightened us all so?"

"Yes, puss, I do very well; and don't I recollect your tying my wig to the chair, and then calling me to the window, to see how I should look when I had left it behind me, you naughty little girl!"

"That was very wrong, sir; but you know you forgave me for it."

"No, I didn't. Come here, though, and I will now."

She left her stool, and ran laughing to him. The doctor professed to whisper in her ear, but kissed her cheek. He coughed and hemmed, and, with a serious air, asked me what I meant by grinning at him.

"Do you know, doctor," continued Ellen, "that this is my first birth-day, since that one, which we have kept without an interruption. Either papa or you have been always called away before half the evening was over."

"Well, and very sorry you would be, I imagine, if both of us were called away now. It would be very distressing to you; wouldn't it?"

"It would hardly render her happy, Mayhew," said Mr Fairman, "to be deprived of her father's society on such an occasion."

"No, indeed, papa," said Ellen, earnestly; "and the good doctor does not think so either."

"Doesn't he, though, you wicked pussy? You would be very wretched, then, if we were obliged to go? No doubt of it, especially if we happened to leave that youngster there behind us."

"Ellen shall read to us, Mayhew," said the incumbent, turning from the subject. "You will find Milton on my table, Caleb."

As he spoke, Ellen imparted to her friend a look of tenderest remonstrance, and the doctor said no more.

The incumbent, himself a fine reader, had taken great pains to teach his child the necessary and simple, but much neglected art of reading well. There was much grace and sweetness in her utterance, correct emphasis, and no effort. An hour passed delightfully with the minister's favourite and beloved author; now the maiden read, now he. He listened with greater pleasure to her voice than to his own or any other, but he watched the smallest diminution of its power-the faintest evidence of failing strength-and released her instantly, most anxious for her health and safety, then and always.

Then arose, as will arise from the contented bosom of domestic piety, grateful rejoicings-the incense of an altar glowing with love's own offerings! Past time was summoned up, weighed with the present, and, with all the mercies which accompanied it, was still found wanting in the perfect and unsullied happiness that existed now. "The love of heaven," said the minister, "had never been so manifest and clear. His labours in the service of his people, his prayers on their behalf, were not unanswered. Improvement was taking place around him; even those who had given him cause for deepest sorrow, were already turning from the path of error into that of rectitude and truth. The worst characters in the village had been checked by the example of their fellows, and by the voice of their own conscience, (he might have added, by the working of their minister's most affectionate zeal) and his heart was joyful-how joyful he could not say-on their account. His family was blessed-(and he looked at Ellen with a moistened eye)-with health, and with the promise of its continuance. His best and oldest friend was at his side; and he, who was dear to them all on her account whose life would soon be linked with his, was about to add to every other blessing, the advantages which must follow the possession of so good a son. What more could he require? How much more was this than the most he could deserve!"

Doctor Mayhew, touched with the solemn feeling of the moment, became a serious man. He took the incumbent by the hand, and spoke.

"Yes, Fairman, we have cause for gratitude. You and I have roughed it many years, and gently enough do we go down the hill. To behold the suffering of other men, and to congratulate ourselves upon our exemption, is not the rational mode of receiving goodness from Almighty God-yet it is impossible for a human being to look about him, and to see family after family worn down by calamity, whilst he himself is free from any, and not have his heart yearning with thankfulness, knowing, as he must, how little he merits his condition. You and I are happy fellows, both of us; and all we have to do, is to think so, and to prepare quietly to leave our places, whilst the young folks grow up to take them. As for the boy there, if he doesn't smooth your pillow, and lighten for you the weight of old age as it comes on, then am I much mistaken, and ready to regret the steps which I have taken to bring you all together."

There was little spoken after this. The hearts were full to the brink-to speak was to interfere with their consummate joy. The doctor was the only one who made the attempt, and he, after a very ineffectual endeavour to be jocose, held his peace. The Bible was produced. The servants of the house appeared. A chapter was read from it by the incumbent-a prayer was offered up, then we separated.

I stole to Ellen as she was about to quit us for the night. "And you, dear Ellen," I whispered in her ear, "are you, too, happy?"

"Yes, dearest," she murmured with a gentle pressure, that passed like wildfire to my heart. "I fear too happy. Earth will not suffer it"

We parted, and in twelve hours those words were not without their meaning.

We met on the following morning at the usual breakfast hour. The moment that I entered the apartment, I perceived that Ellen was indisposed-that something had occurred, since the preceding night, to give her anxiety or pain. Her hand trembled slightly, and a degree of perturbation was apparent in her movements. My first impression was, that she had received ill news, for there was nothing in her appearance to indicate the existence of bodily suffering. It soon occurred to me, however, that the unwonted recent excitement might account for all her symptoms-that they were, in fact, the natural consequence of that sudden abundance of joyous spirits which I had remarked in her during the early part of the evening. I satisfied myself with this belief, or strove to do so-the more easily, perhaps, because I saw her father indifferent to her state, if not altogether ignorant of it. He who was ever lying in wait-ever watching-ever ready to apprehend the smallest evidence of ill health, was, on this morning, as insensible to the alteration which had taken place in the darling object of his solicitude, as though he had no eyes to see, or object to behold; so easy is it for a too anxious diligence in a pursuit to overshoot and miss the point at which it aims. Could he, as we sat, have guessed the cause of all her grief-could some dark spirit, gloating on man's misery, have breathed one fearful word into his ear, bringing to life and light the melancholy tale of distant years-how would his nature have supported the announcement-how bore the?--but let me not anticipate. I say that I dismissed all thought of serious mischief, by attributing at once all signs of it to the undue excitement of the festive night. As the breakfast proceeded, I believed that her anxiety diminished, and with that passed away my fears.

At the end of the pleasure garden of the parsonage was a paddock, and, immediately beyond this, another field, leading to a small valley of great beauty. On one side of "the Dell," as it was called, was a summer-house, which the incumbent had erected for the sake of the noble prospect which the elevation commanded. To this retreat Ellen and I had frequently wandered with our books during the progress of our love. Here I had read to her of affection and constancy, consecrated by the immortal poet's song. Here we had passed delightful hours, bestowing on the future the same golden lustre that made so bright the present. In joy, I had called this summer-house "the Lover's Bower," and it was pleasing to us both to think that we should visit in our after days, for many a year, and with increasing love, a spot endeared to us by the fondest recollections. Thither I bent my steps at the close of our repast. It wanted but two days to the time fixed for the resumption of our studies. The boys had returned, and the note of preparation was already sounded. I carried my task to the retreat, and there commenced my labours. An hour fled quickly whilst I was occupied somewhat in Greek, but more in contemplation of the gorgeous scene before me, and in lingering thoughts of her whose form was never absent, but hovered still about the pleasure or the business of the day. The shadow of that form was yet present, when the substance became visible to the bodily eye. Ellen followed me to the "Lover's Bower," and there surprised me. She was even paler than before-and the burden of some disquietude was written on her gentle brow; but a smile was on her lips-one of a languid cast-and also of encouragement and hope. I drew her to my side. Lovers are egotists; their words point ever to themselves. She spoke of the birth-day that had just gone by; the tranquil and blissful celebration of it. My expectant soul was already dreaming of the next that was to come, and speaking of the increased happiness that must accompany it.

Ellen sighed.

"It is a lover's sigh!" thought I, not heeding it.

"Whatever may be the future, Caleb," said Ellen seriously, but very calmly, "we ought to be prepared for it. Earth is not our resting-place. We should never forget that. Should we, dearest?"

"No, love; but earth has happiness of her kind, of which her children are most sensible. Whilst we are here, we live upon her promises."

"But oh, not to the exclusion of the brighter promises that come from heaven! You do not say that, dear Caleb?"

"No, Ellen. You could not give your heart to him who thought so; howbeit, you have bestowed it upon one unworthy of your piety and excellence."

"Do not mock me, Caleb," said Ellen, blushing. "I have the heart of a sinner, that needs all the mercy of heaven for its weaknesses and faults. I have ever fallen short of my duty."

"You are the only one who says it. Your father will not say so, and I question if the villagers would take your part in this respect."

"Do not misunderstand me, Caleb. I am not, I trust, a hypocrite. I have endeavoured to be useful to the poor and helpless in our neighbourhood-I have been anxious to lighten the heaviness of a parent's days, and, as far as I could, to indemnify him for my mother's loss. I believe that I have done the utmost my imperfect faculties permitted. I have nothing to charge myself with on these accounts. But my Heavenly Father," continued the maiden, her cheeks flushing, her eyes filling with tears-"oh! I have been backward in my affection and duty to him. I have not ever had before my eyes his honour and glory in my daily walk-I have not done every act in subordination to his will, for his sake, and with a view to his blessing. But He is merciful as well as just, and if his punishment falls now upon my head, it is assuredly to wean me from my error, and to bring me to himself."

The maid covered her moistened cheek, and sobbed loudly. I was fully convinced that she was suffering from the reaction consequent upon extreme joy. I was rather relieved than distressed by her burst of feeling, and I did not attempt for a time to check her tears.

"Tell me, dear Caleb," she said herself at length, "if I were to lose you-if it were to please Heaven to take you suddenly from this earth, would it not be sinful to murmur at his act? Would it not be my duty to bend to his decree, and to prepare to follow you?"

"You would submit to such a trial as a Christian woman ought. I am sure you would, dear Ellen-parted, as we should be, but for a season, and sure of a reunion."

"And would you do this?" enquired the maiden quickly. "Oh, say that you would, dear Caleb! Let me hear it."

"You are agitated, dearest. We will not talk of this now. There is grace in heaven appointed for the bitterest seasons of adversity. It does not fail when needed. Let us pray that the hour may be distant which shall bring home to either so great a test of resignation."

"Yes, pray, dear Stukely; but, should it come suddenly and quickly-oh, let us be prepared to meet it!"

"We will endeavour, then; and now to a more cheerful theme. Do we go to Dr Mayhew's, as proposed? We shall spend a happy day with our facetious, but most kind-hearted friend."

Ellen burst again into a flood of tears.

"What is the matter, love?" I exclaimed. "Confide to me, and tell the grief that preys upon your mind."

"Do not be alarmed, Stukely," she answered rapidly; "it may be nothing after all; but when I woke this morning-it may, I hope for your sake that it is nothing serious-but my dear mother, it was the commencement of her own last fatal illness."

She stopped suddenly, as if her speech had failed her-coughed sharply, and raised her handkerchief to her mouth. I perceived a thick, broad spot of BLOOD, and shuddered.

"Do not be frightened, Stukely," she continued, shocked fearfully herself. "I shall recover soon. It is the suddenness-I was unprepared. So it was when I awoke this morning-and it startled me, because I heard it was the first bad symptom that my poor mother showed. Now, I pray you, Stukely, to be calm. Perhaps I shall get well; but if I do not, I shall be so happy-preparing for eternity, with you, dear Caleb, at my side. You promised to be tranquil, and to bear up against this day; and I am sure you will-yes, for my sake-that I may see you so, and have no sorrow."

I took the dear one to my bosom, and, like a child, cried upon her neck. What could I say? In one moment I was a bankrupt and a beggar-my fortunes were scattered to the winds-my solid edifice as stricken by the thunder-bolt, and lay in ruins before me! Was it real?

Ellen grew calmer as she looked at me, and spoke.

"Listen to me, dearest Stukely. It was my duty to acquaint you with this circumstance, and I have done so, relying on your manliness and love. You have already guessed what I am about to add. My poor father"-her lips quivered as she said the word-"he must know nothing for the present. It would be cruel unnecessarily to alarm him. His heart would break. He MUST be kept in ignorance of this. You shall see Mayhew; he will, I trust, remove our fears. Should he confirm them, he can communicate to papa." Again she paused, and her tears trickled to her lips, which moved convulsively.

"Do not speak, my beloved," I exclaimed. "Compose yourself. We will return home. Be it as you wish. I will see Mayhew immediately, and bring him with me to the parsonage. Seek rest-avoid exertion."

I know not what conversation followed this. I know not how we reached our home again. I have no recollection of it. Three times upon our road was the cough repeated, and, as at first, it was accompanied by that hideous sight. In vain she turned her head away to escape detection. It was impossible to deceive my keen and piercing gaze. I grew pale as death as I beheld on each occasion the frightful evidence of disease; but the maiden pressed my hand, and smiled sweetly and encouragingly to drive away my fears. She did not speak-I had forbidden her to do so; but her looks-full of tenderness and love-told how all her thoughts were for her lover-all her anxiety and care.

At my request, as soon as we arrived at home, she went to bed. I saw the incumbent-acquainted him with her sudden illness-taking care to keep its nature secret-and then ran for my life to Dr Mayhew's residence. The very appearance of blood was to me, as it is always to the common and uninformed observer, beyond all doubt confirmatory of the worst suspicions-the harbinger of certain death. There is something horrible in its sight, presented in such a form; but not for itself do we shrink as we behold it-not for what it is, but for what it awfully proclaims. I was frantic and breathless when I approached the doctor's house, and half stupified when I at length stood before him.

I told my errand quickly.

The doctor attempted instantly to mislead me, but he failed in his design. I saw, in spite of the forced smile that would not rest upon his lips, how unexpectedly and powerfully this news had come upon him-how seriously he viewed it. He could not remove my miserable convictions by his own abortive efforts at cheerfulness and unconcern. He moved to his window, and strove to whistle, and to speak of the haymakers who were busy in the fields, and of the weather; but the more he feigned to regard my information as undeserving of alarm, the more convinced I grew that deadly mischief had already taken place. There was an air about him that showed him ill at ease; and, in the midst of all his quietude and indifference, he betrayed an anxiety to appear composed, unwarranted by an ordinary event. Had the illness been trifling indeed, he could have afforded to be more serious and heedful.

"I will be at the parsonage some time to-day. You can return without me, Stukely."

"Dr Mayhew," I exclaimed, "I entreat, I implore you not to trifle with me! I can bear any thing but that. Tell me the worst, and I will not shrink from it. You must not think to deceive me. You are satisfied that there is no hope for us; I am sure you are, and you will not be just and say so."

"I am satisfied of no such thing," answered the doctor quickly. "I should be a fool, a madman, to speak so rashly. There is every reason to hope, I do believe, at present. Tell me one thing-does her father know of it?"

"He does not."

"Then let it still be kept a secret from him. Her very life may depend upon his ignorance. She must be kept perfectly composed-no agitation-no frightened faces around her. But I will go with you, and see what can be done. I'll warrant it is nothing at all, and that puss is well over her fright before we get to her."

Again the doctor smiled unhealthfully, and tried, awkwardly enough, to appear wholly free from apprehension, whilst he was most uncomfortable with the amount of it.

The physician remained for half an hour with his patient, and rejoined me in the garden when he quitted her. He looked serious and thoughtful.

"There is no hope, then?" I exclaimed immediately.

"Tush, boy," he answered; "quiet-quiet. She will do well, I hope-eventually. She has fever on her now, which must be brought down. While that remains there will be anxiety, as there must be always-when it leaves her, I trust she will be well again. Do you know if she has undergone any unusual physical exertion?"

"I do not."

"I confess to you that I do not like this accident; but it is impossible to speak positively now. Whilst the fever lasts, symptoms may be confounded and mistaken. I will watch her closely."

"Have you seen her father?"

"I have; but I have told him nothing further than he knew. He believes her slightly indisposed. I have calmed him, and have told him not to have the child disturbed. You will see to that?"

"I will."

"And now mark me, Stukely. I expect that you will behave like a man, and as you ought. We cannot keep Fairman ignorant of this business. Should it go on, as it may-in spite of every thing we can do-he must know it. You have seen sufficient of his character to judge how he will receive the information which it may be my painful lot to take to him. I think of it with dread. It has been my pleasure to stand your friend-you must prove mine. I shall expect you to act with fortitude and calmness, and not, by weakness and self-indulgence, to increase the pain that will afflict the parent's heart-for it will be sufficient for Fairman to know only what has happened to give up every hope and consolation. You must be firm on his account and chiefly for the sake of the dear girl, who should not see your face without a smile of confidence and love upon it. Do you hear me? I will let you weep now," he continued, noticing the tears which prevented my reply, "provided that you dry your eyes, and keep them so from this time forward. Do you hear me?"

"Yes," I faltered.

"And will you heed me?"

"I will try," I answered, as firmly as I might, with every hope within me crushed and killed by the words which he had spoken.

"Very well. Then let us say no more, until we see what Providence is doing for us."

The fever of Ellen did not abate that day. The doctor did not leave the house, but remained with the incumbent-not, as he told his friend, because he thought it necessary so to do, but to keep the word which he had given the night before-viz., to pass the day with him. He was sorry that he had been deprived of their company at his own abode, but he could make himself quite comfortable where he was. About eleven o'clock at night the doctor thought it strange that Robin had not brought his pony over, and wondered what had happened.

"Shall we send to enquire?" asked Mr Fairman.

"Oh no!" was the quick answer, "that never can be worth while. We'll wait a little longer."

At twelve the doctor spoke again. "Well, he must think of moving; but he was very tired, and did not care to walk."

"Why not stay here, then? I cannot see, Mayhew, why you should be so uneasy at the thought of sleeping out. Come, take your bed with us for once."

"Eh?-well-it's very late-suppose I do."

Mayhew had not been shrewd enough, and, with his ready acquiescence, the minister learned all.

I did not go to bed. My place was at her door, and there I lingered till the morning. The physician had paid his last visit shortly after midnight, and had given orders to the nurse who waited on the patient, to call him up if necessary, but on no account to disturb the lady if she slept or was composed. The gentle sufferer did not require his services, or, if she did, was too thoughtful and too kind to make it known. Early in the morning Doctor Mayhew came-the fever had increased-and she had experienced a new attack of h?moptysis the moment she awoke. The doctor stepped softly from her room, and deep anxiety was written on his brow. I followed him with eagerness. He put his finger to his lips, and said, "Remember, Stukely."

"Yes, I will-I do; but, is she better?"

"No-but I am not discouraged yet. Every thing depends upon extreme tranquillity. No one must see her. Dear me, dear me! what is to be said to Fairman, should he ask?"

"Is she placid?" I enquired.

"She is an angel, Stukely," said the good doctor, pressing my hands, and passing on. When we met at breakfast, the incumbent looked hard at me, and seemed to gather something from my pale and careworn face. When Mayhew came, full of bustle, assumed, and badly too, as the shallowest observer could perceive, he turned to him, and in a quiet voice asked "if his child was much worse since the previous night."

"Not much," said Mayhew. "She will be better in a short time, I trust."

"May I see her?" enquired the father in the same soft tone.

"Not now-by and by perhaps-I hope to-morrow. This is a sudden attack-you see-any excitement may prolong it-it wouldn't be well to give a chance away. Don't you see that, Fairman?"

"Yes," said the minister, and from that moment made no further mention of his daughter during breakfast. The meal was soon dispatched. Mr Fairman retired to his study-and the doctor prepared for his departure. He promised to return in the afternoon.

"Thank God!" he exclaimed, as he took leave of me at the gate, "that Fairman remains so very unsuspicious. This is not like him. I expected to find him more inquisitive."

"I am surprised," I answered; "but it is most desirable that he should continue so."

"Yes-yes-by all means-for the present at all events."

Throughout the day there was no improvement in the patient's symptoms. The physician came according to his promise, and again at night. He slept at the parsonage for the second time. The minister betrayed no wonder at this unusual act, showed no agitation, made no importunate enquiries. He asked frequently during the day if any amendment had taken place; but always in a gentle voice, and without any other reference to her illness. As often as the doctor came, he repeated his wish to visit his dear child, but, receiving for answer "that he had better not at present," he retired to his study with a tremulous sigh, but offering no remonstrance.

The doctor went early to rest. He had no inclination to spend the evening with his friend, whom he hardly cared to see until he could meet him as the messenger of good tidings. I had resolved to hover, as I did before, near the mournful chamber in which she lay; and there I kept a weary watch until my eyes refused to serve me longer, and I was forced against my will, and for the sake of others, to yield my place and crawl to my repose. As I walked stealthily through the house, and on tiptoe, fearful of disturbing one beloved inmate even by a breath-I passed the incumbent's study. The door was open, and a glare of light broke from it, and stretched across the passage. I hesitated for a moment-then listened-but, hearing nothing, pursued my way. It was very strange. The clock had just before struck three, and the minister, it was supposed, had been in bed since midnight. "His lamp is burning," thought I-"he has forgotten it." I was on the point of entering the apartment-when I was deterred and startled by his voice. My hand was already on the door, and I looked in. Before me, on his knees, with his back towards me, was my revered friend-his hands clasped, and his head raised in supplication. He was in his dress of day, and had evidently not yet visited his pillow. I waited, and he spoke-

"Not my will," he exclaimed in a piercing tone of prayer-"not mine, but thy kind will be done, O Lord! If it be possible, let the bitter cup pass from me-but spare not, if thy glory must needs be vindicated. Bring me to thy feet in meek, and humble, and believing confidence-all is well, then, for time and for eternity. It is merciful and good to remove the idol that stands between our love and God. Father of mercy-enable me to bring the truth home, home to this most traitorous-this lukewarm, earthy heart of mine-a heart not worthy of thy care and help. Let me not murmur at thy gracious will-oh, rather bend and bow to it-and kiss the rod that punishes. I need chastisement-for I have loved too well-too fondly. I am a rebel, and thy all-searching eye hath found me faithless in thy service. Take her, Father and Saviour-I will resign her-I will bless the hand that smites me-I will"-he stopped; and big tears, such as drop fearfully from manhood's eye, made known to heaven the agony that tears a parent's heart, whilst piety is occupied in healing it.

It is not my purpose to recite the doubts and fears, the terrible suspense, the anxious hopes, that filled the hours which passed whilst the condition of the patient remained critical. It is a recital which the reader may well spare, and I avoid most gladly. At the end of a week, the fever departed from the sufferer. The alarming symptoms disappeared, and confidence flowed rapidly to the soul again. At this time the father paid his first visit to his child. He found her weak and wasted; the violent applications which had been necessary for safety had robbed her of all strength-had effected, in fact, a prostration of power, which she never recovered, from which she never rallied. Mr Fairman was greatly shocked, and asked the physician for his opinion now. The latter declined giving it until, as he expressed himself, "the effects of the fever, and her attack, had left him a fair and open field for observation. There was a slight cough upon her. It was impossible for the present to say, whether it was temporary and dependent upon what had happened, or whether it resulted from actual mischief in her lung."

* * *

A month has passed away since the physician spoke these words, and to doubt longer would be to gaze upon the sun and to question its brightness. Mayhew has told the father his worst fears, and bids him prepare like a Christian and a man for the loss of his earthly treasure. It was he who watched the decay of her mother. The case is a similar one. He has no consolation to offer. It must be sought at the throne of Him who giveth, and hath the right to take away. The minister receives the intelligence with admirable fortitude. We are sitting together, and the doctor has just spoken as becomes him, seriously and well. There is a spasm on the cheek of the incumbent, whilst I sob loudly. The latter takes me by the hand, and speaks to the physician in a low and hesitating tone.

"Mayhew," said he, "I thank you for this sincerity. I will endeavour to look the terror in the face, as I have struggled to do for many days. It is hard-but through the mercy of Christ it is not impracticable. Dear and oldest friend, unite your prayers with mine, for strength, and holiness, and resignation. Cloud and agitation are at our feet. Heaven is above us. Let us look there, and all is well."

We knelt. The minister prayed. He did not ask his Master to suspend his judgments. He implored him to prepare the soul of the afflicted one for its early flight, and to subdue the hearts of them all with his grace and holy spirit. Let him who doubts the efficacy of prayer seek to clear his difficulty in the season of affliction, or when death sits grimly at the hearth-he shall be satisfied.

If it were a consolation and a joy in the midst of our tribulation to behold the father chastened by the heavy blow which had fallen so suddenly upon his age, how shall I express the ineffable delight-yes, delight, amidst sorrow the most severe-with which I contemplated the beloved maiden, upon whose tender years Providence had allowed to fall so great a trial. Fully sensible of her position, and of the near approach of death, she was, so long as she could see her parent and her lover without distress, patient, cheerful, and rejoicing. Yes, weaker and weaker as she grew, happier and happier she became in the consciousness of her pure soul's increase. Into her ear had been whispered, and before her eyes holy spirits had appeared with the mysterious communication, which, hidden as it is from us, we find animating and sustaining feeble nature, which else would sink, appalled and overwhelmed. There was not one of us who did not live a witness to the truth of the heavenly promise, "as thy days, so shall thy strength be;" not one amongst the dearest friends of the sufferer, who did not feel, in the height of his affliction, that God would not cast upon his creatures a burden which a Christian might not bear. But to her especially came the celestial declaration with power and might. An angel, sojourning for a day upon the earth, and preparing for his homeward flight, could not have spread his ready wing more joyfully, with livelier anticipation of his native bliss, than did the maiden look for her recall and blest ascension to the skies. In her presence I had seldom any grief; it was swallowed up and lost in gratitude for the victory which the dear one had achieved, in virtue of her faith, over all the horrors of her situation. It was when alone that I saw, in its reality and naked wretchedness, the visitation that I, more than any other, was doomed to suffer. For days I could scarcely bring myself to the calm consideration of it. It seemed unreal, impossible, a dream-any thing but what it was-the direst of worldly woes-the most tremendous of human punishments.

I remember vividly a day passed in the chamber of the resigned creature, about two months after the first indication of her illness. Her disease had increased rapidly, and the signs of its ravages were painfully manifest in her sunken eye, her hectic cheek, her hollow voice, her continual cough. Her spirit became more tranquil as her body retreated from the world-her hopes more firm, her belief in the love of her Saviour-his will and power to save her, more clear, and free from all perplexity. I had never beheld so beautiful a sight as the devoted maid presented to my view. I had never supposed it possible to exist; and thus, as I sat at her side, though the thought of death was ever present, it was as of a terror in a milkwhite shroud-a monster enveloped and concealed beneath a robe of beauty. I listened to her with enchantment whilst she spoke of the littleness of this world, and the boundless happiness that awaited true believers in the next-of the unutterable mercy of God, in removing us from a scene of trouble whilst our views were cloudless, and our hopes sure and abiding. Yes, charmed by the unruffled air, the angelic look, I could forget even my mortality for a moment, and feel my living soul in deep communion with a superior and brighter spirit. It was when she recalled me to earth by a reminiscence of our first days of love, that the bruised heart was made sensible of pain, and of its lonely widowed lot. Then the tears would not be checked, but rushed passionately forth, and, as the clouds shut out and hid the one brief glimpse of heaven, flowed unrestrained.

Her mind was in a sweet composed state during the interview to which I allude. She had pleasure in referring to the days of her childhood, and in speaking of the happiness which she had found amongst her native hills.

"How little, Caleb," she said, "is the mind occupied with thoughts of death in childhood-with any thoughts of actual lasting evil! We cannot see these things in childhood-we cannot penetrate so deeply or throw our gaze so far, we are so occupied with the joys that are round about us. Is it not so? Our parents are ever with us. Day succeeds to day-one so like the other-and our home becomes our world. A sorrow comes at length-a parent dies-the first and dearest object in that world; then all is known, and the stability of life becomes suspected."

"The home of many," I replied, "is undisturbed for years!"

"Yes, and how sweet a thing is love of home! It is not acquired, I am sure. It is a feeling that has its origin elsewhere. It is born with us; brought from another world, to carry us on in this with joy. It attaches to the humblest heart that ever throbbed."

"Dear Ellen!" I exclaimed, "how little has sorrow to do with your affliction!"

"And why, dear Caleb? Have you never found that the difficulties of the broad day melt away beneath the influences of the quiet lovely night? Have you never been perplexed in the bustle and tumult of the day, and has not truth revealed itself when all was dark and still? This is my night, and in sickness I have seen the eye of God upon me, and heard his words, as I have never seen and heard before?"

It was in this manner that she would talk, not more disturbed, nay, not so much, as when in happier times I never heard her speak of the troubles and anxieties of her poor villagers. No complaint-no mournful accents escaped her lips. If at times the soaring spirit was repressed, dejected, the living-the loved ones whom she must leave behind her had possession of her thoughts, and loaded them with pain. Who would wait upon her father? Who would attend to all his little wants? Who could understand his nature as she had learnt it-and who would live to comfort and to cheer his days? These questions she has asked herself, whilst her only answers have been her struggling tears.

The days were travelling fast; each one taking from the doomed girl-years of life. She dwindled and wasted; and became at length less than a shadow of her former self. Why linger on the narrative? Autumn arrived, and, with the general decay-she died. A few hours before her death she summoned me to her bedside, and acquainted me with her fast-approaching dissolution. "It is the day," she said, speaking with difficulty-"I am sure of it. I have watched that branch for many days-look-it is quite bare. Its last yellow leaf has fallen-I shall not survive it." I gazed upon her; her eye was brighter than ever. It sparkled again, and most beautiful she looked. But death was there-and her soul eager to give him all that he could claim!

"You are quite happy, dearest Ellen!" I exclaimed, weeping on her thin emaciated hand.

"Most happy, beloved. Do not grieve-be resigned-be joyful. I have a word to say. Nurse," she continued, calling to her attendant-"the drawing."

The nurse placed in her hand the sketch which she had taken of my favourite scene.

"Do you remember, love?" said she. "Keep it, for Ellen-you loved that spot-oh, so did I!--and you will love it still. There is another sketch, you will find it by and by-afterwards-when I am--It is in my desk. Keep that too, for Ellen, will you? It is the last drawing I have made."

I sat by and bit my lips to crush my grief, but I would not be silent whilst my heart as breaking.

"You should rejoice, dear," continued Ellen solemnly. "We did not expect this separation so very soon; but it is better now than later. Be sure it is merciful and good. Prepare for this hour, Caleb; and when it comes, you will be so calm, so ready to depart. How short is life! Do not waste the precious hours. Read from St John, dearest-the eleventh chapter. It is all sweetness and consolation."

The sun was dropping slowly into the west, leaving behind him a deep red glow that illuminated the hills, and burnished the windows of the sick-chamber. The wind moaned, and, sweeping the sere leaves at intervals, threatened a tempest. There was a solemn stillness in the parsonage, around whose gate-weeping in silence, without heart to speak, or wish to make their sorrow known-were collected a host of humble creatures-the poorest but sincerest friends of Ellen-the villagers who had been her care. They waited and lingered for the heavy news, which they were told must come to them this day; and prayed secretly-every one of them, old and young-for mercy on the sufferer's soul! And she, whose gentle spirit is about to flit, lies peacefully, and but half-conscious of the sounds that pass to heaven on her behalf. Her father, Mayhew, and I, kneel round her bed, and the minister in supplicating tones, where nature does not interpose, dedicates the virgin to His favour whose love she has applied so well. He ceases, for a whisper has escaped her lips. We listen all. "Oh, this is peace!" she utters faintly, but most audibly, and the scene is over.

"It is a dream," said the minister, when we parted for the night-I with the vain hope to forget in sleep the circumstances of the day-the father to stray unwittingly into her former room, and amongst the hundred objects connected with the happy memory of the departed.

The picture of which my Ellen had spoken, I obtained on the following day. It was a drawing of the church and the burial-ground adjoining it. One grave was open. It represented that in which her own mortal remains were deposited, amidst the unavailing lamentations of a mourning village.

In three months the incumbent quitted Devonshire. The scenery had no pleasure for him, associated as it was with all the sorrows of his life. His pupils returned to their homes. He had offered to retain them, and to retain his incumbency for the sake of my advancement; but, whilst I saw that every hour spent in the village brought with it new bitterness and grief, I was not willing to call upon him for so great a sacrifice. Such a step, indeed, was rendered unnecessary through the kind help of Dr Mayhew, to whom I owe my present situation, which I have held for forty years with pleasure and contentment. Mr Fairman retired to a distant part of the kingdom, where the condition of the people rendered the presence of an active minister of God a privilege and a blessing. In the service of his Master, in the securing of the happiness of other men, he strove for years to deaden the pain of his own crushed heart. And he succeeded-living to bless the wisdom which had carried him through temptation; and dying, at last, to meet with the reward conferred upon the man who, by patient continuance in well-doing, seeks for glory, and honour, and immortality-ETERNAL LIFE.

The employment obtained for me by the kind interest of Dr Mayhew, which the return of so many summers and winters has found me steadily prosecuting, was in the house of his brother-a gentleman whose name is amongst the first in a profession adorned by a greater number of high-minded, honourable men, than the world generally is willing to allow. Glad to avail myself of comparative repose, an active occupation, and a certain livelihood, I did not hesitate to enter his office in the humble capacity of clerk. I have lived to become the confidential secretary and faithful friend of my respected principal.

As I have progressed noiselessly in the world, and rather as a spectator than an actor on the broad stage of life, it has been no unprofitable task to trace the career of those with whom I formed an intimacy during the bustle and excitement of my boyhood. Not many months after my introduction into the mysteries of law, tidings reached my ears concerning Mr Clayton. He had left his chapel suddenly. His avarice had led him deeper and deeper into guilt; speculation followed speculation, until he found himself entangled in difficulties, from which, by lawful means, he was unable to extricate himself. He forged the signature of a wealthy member of his congregation, and thus added another knot to the complicated string of his delinquencies. He was discovered. There was not a man aware of the circumstances of the case who was not satisfied of his guilt; but a legal quibble saved him, and he was sent into the world again, branded with the solemn reprimand of the judge who tried him for his life, and who bade him seek existence honestly-compelled to labour, as he would be, in a humbler sphere of life than that in which he had hitherto employed his undoubted talents. To those acquainted with the working of the unhappy system of dissent, it will not be a matter of surprise that the result was not such as the good judge anticipated. It so happened that, at the time of Mr Clayton's acquittal, a dispute arose between the minister of his former congregation and certain influential members of the same. The latter, headed by a fruiterer, a very turbulent and conceited personage, separated from what they called the church, and set up another church in opposition. The meeting-house was built, and the only question that remained to agitate the pious minds of the half-dozen founders was-How to let the pews! Mr CLAYTON, more popular amongst his set than ever, was invited to accept the duties of a pastor. He consented, and had the pews been trebled they would not have satisfied one half the applications which, in one month, were showered on the victorious schismatics. Here, for a few years, Mr Clayton continued; his character improved, his fame more triumphant, his godliness more spiritual and pure than it had been even before he committed the crime of forgery. His ruling passion, notwithstanding, kept firm hold of his soul, and very soon betrayed him into the commission of new offences. He fled from London, and I lost sight of him. At length I discovered that he was preaching in one of the northern counties, and with greater success than ever-yes, such is the fallacy of the system-with the approbation of men, and the idolatry of women, to whom the history of his career was as familiar as their own. Again circumstances compelled him to decamp. I know not what these were, nor could I ever learn; satisfied, however, that from his nature money must have been in close connexion with them, I expected soon to hear of him again; and I did hear, but not for years. The information that last of all I gained was, that he had sold his noble faculties undisguisedly to the arch enemy of man. He had become the editor of one of the lowest newspaper of the metropolis, notorious for its Radical politics and atheistical blasphemies.

Honest, faithful and unimpeachable John Thompson! Friend, husband, father-sound in every relation of this life-thou noble-hearted Englishman! Let me not say thy race is yet extinct. No; in spite of the change that has come over the spirit of our land-in spite of the rust that eats into men's souls, eternally racked with thoughts of gain and traffic-in spite of the cursed poison insidiously dropped beneath the cottage eaves, by reckless, needy demagogues, I trust my native land, and still believe, that on her lap she cherishes whole bands of faithful children, and firm patriots. Not amongst the least inducements to return to London was the advantage of a residence near to that of my best friend and truest counsellor. I cannot number the days which I have spent with him and his unequalled family-unequalled in their unanimity and love. For years, no Sunday passed which did not find me at their hospitable board; a companion afterwards in their country walks, and at the evening service of their parish church. The children were men and women before it pleased Providence to remove their sire. How like his life was good John Thompson's death! Full of years, but with his mental vision clear as in its dawn, aware of his decline, he called his family about his bed, and to the weeping group spoke firmly and most cheerfully.

"He had lived his time," he said, "and long enough to see his children doing well. There was not one who caused him pain and fear-and that was more than every father of a family could say-thank God for it! He didn't know that he had much to ask of any one of them. If they continued to work hard, he left enough behind to buy them tools; and if they didn't, the little money he had saved would be of very little use. There was their mother. He needn't tell 'em to be kind to her, because their feelings wouldn't let them do no otherwise. As for advice, he'd give it to them in his own plain way. First and foremost, he hoped they never would sew their mouths up-never act in such a way as to make themselves ashamed of speaking like a man;" and then he recommended strongly that they should touch no bills but such as they might cut wood with. The worst that could befall 'em would be a cut upon the finger; and if they handled other bills they'd cut their heads off in the end, be sure of it. "Alec," said he at last,-"you fetch me bundle of good sticks. Get them from the workshop." Alec brought them, and the sire continued,-"Now, just break one a-piece. There, that's right-now, try and break them altogether. No, no, my boys, you can't do that, nor can the world break you so long as you hold fast and well together. Disagree and separate, and nothing is more easy. If a year goes bad with one, let the others see to make it up. Live united, do your duty, and leave the rest to heaven." So Thompson spake; such was the legacy he left to those who knew from his good precept and example how to profit by it. My friendship with his children has grown and ripened. They are thriving men. Alec has inherited the nature of his father more than any other son. All go smoothly on in life, paying little regard to the broils and contests of external life, but most attentive to the in-door business. All, did I say?-I err. Exception must be made in favour of my excellent good friend, Mr Robert Thompson. He has in him something of the spirit of his mother, and finds fault where his brethren are most docile. Catholic emancipation he regarded with horror-the Reform bill with indignation; and the onward movement of the present day he looks at with the feelings of an individual waiting for an earthquake. He is sure that the world is going round the other way, or is turned topsy-turvy, or is coming to an end. He is the quietest and best disposed man in his parish-his moral character is without a flaw-his honesty without a blemish, yet is his mind filled with designs which would astonish the strongest head that rebel ever wore. He talks calmly of the propriety of hanging, without trial, all publishers of immorality and sedition-of putting embryo rioters to death, and granting them a judicial examination as soon as possible afterwards. Dissenting meeting-houses he would shut up instanter, and guard with soldiers to prevent irregularity or disobedience. "Things," he says, "are twisted since his father was a boy, and must be twisted back-by force-to their right place again. Ordinary measures are less than useless for extraordinary times, and he only wishes he had power, or was prime-minister for a day or two." But for this unfortunate monomania, the Queen has not a better subject, London has not a worthier citizen than the plain spoken, simple-hearted Robert Thompson.

In one of the most fashionable streets of London, and within a few doors of the residence of royalty, is a stylish house, which always looks as if it were newly painted, furnished, and decorated. The very imperfect knowledge which a passer-by may gain, denotes the existence of great wealth within the clean and shining walls. Nine times out of ten shall you behold, standing at the door, a splendid equipage-a britzka or barouche. The appointments are of the richest kind-the servants' livery gaudiest of the gaudy-silvery are their buttons, and silver-gilt the horses' harness. Stay, whilst the big door opens, and then mark the owner of the house and britzka. A distinguished foreigner, you say, of forty, or thereabouts. He seems dressed in livery himself; for all the colours of the rainbow are upon him. Gold chains across his breast-how many you cannot count at once-intersect each other curiously; and on every finger sparkles a precious jewel, or a host of jewels. Thick mustaches and a thicker beard adorn the foreign face; but a certain air which it assumes, convinces you without delay that it is the property of an unmitigated blackguard. Reader, you see the ready Ikey, whom we have met oftener than once in this short history. Would you know more? Be satisfied to learn, that he exists upon the follies and the vices of our high nobility. He has made good the promises of his childhood and his youth. He rolls in riches, and is--a fashionable money-lender.

Dark were the shadows which fell upon my youth. The indulgent reader has not failed to note them-with pain it may be-and yet, I trust, not without improvement. Yes, sad and gloomy has been the picture, and light has gleamed but feebly there. It has been otherwise since I carried, for my comfort and support, the memory of my beloved Ellen into the serious employment of my later years. With the catastrophe of her decease, commenced another era of my existence-the era of self-denial, patience, sobriety, and resignation. Her example dropped with silent power into my soul, and wrought its preservation. Struck to the earth by the immediate blow, and rising slowly from it, I did not mourn her loss as men are wont to grieve at the departure of all they hold most dear. Think when I would of her, in the solemn watches of the night, in the turmoil of the bustling day-a saint beatified, a spirit of purity and love-hovered above me, smiling in its triumphant bliss, and whispering--peace. My lamentation was intercepted by my joy. And so throughout have I been irritated by the small annoyances of the world, her radiant countenance-as it looked sweetly even upon death-has risen to shame and silence my complaint. Repining at my humble lot, her words-that estimated well the value, the nothingness of life compared with life eternal-have spoken the effectual reproof. As we advance in years, the old familiar faces gradually retreat and fade at length entirely. Forty long years have passed, and on this bright spring morning the gentle Ellen steals upon the lawn, unaltered by the lapse of time. Her slender arm is twined in mine, and her eye fills with innocent delight. Not an hour of age is added to her face, although the century was not yet born when last I gazed upon its meek and simple loveliness. She vanishes. Is it her voice that through the window flows, borne on the bosom of the vernal wind? Angel of Light, I wait thy bidding to rejoin thee!

* * *

COMMERCIAL POLICY.

SPAIN.

The extraordinary breadth and boldness of the fiscal measures propounded and carried out at once in the past year with vigour and promptitude no less extraordinary, wisely calculated of themselves, as they may be, perhaps, and so far experience is assumed to have confirmed, to exercise a salutary bearing upon the physical condition of the people, and to reanimate the drooping energies of the country, can, however, receive the full, the just development of all the large and beneficial consequences promised, only as commercial intercourse is extended, as new marts are opened, and as hostile tariffs are mitigated or abated, by which former markets have been comparatively closed against the products of British industry. The fiscal changes already operated, may be said to have laid the foundation, and prepared the way, for this extension and revival of our foreign commercial relations; but it remains alone for our commercial policy to raise the superstructure and consummate the work, if the foundations be of such solidity as we are assured on high authority they are. In the promotion of national prosperity, colonization may prove a gradually efficient auxiliary; but as a remedy for present ills, its action must evidently be too slow and restricted; and even though it should be impelled to a geometrical ratio of progression, still would the prospect of effectual relief be discernible only through a vista of years. Meanwhile, time presses, and the patient might perish if condemned alone to the hom?opathic process of infinitesimal doses of relief.

The statesman who entered upon the Government with his scheme of policy, reflected and silently matured as a whole, (as we may take for granted,) with principles determined, and his course chalked out in a right line, was not, assuredly, tardy, whilst engaged with the work of fiscal revision, in proceeding practically to the enlargement of the basis of the commercial system of the empire. An advantageous treaty of commerce with the young but rising republic of Monte Video, rewarded his first exertions, and is there to attest also the zealous co-operation of his able and accomplished colleague, Lord Aberdeen. This treaty is not important only in reference to the greater facilities and increase of trade, conceded with the provinces on the right bank of the river Plate, and of the Uruguay and Parana, but inasmuch also as, in the possible failure of the negotiations for the renewal of the commercial treaty with Brazil, now approaching its term, it cannot fail to secure easy access for British wares in the territory of Rio Grande, lying on the borders of the republic of the Uruguay, and far the most extensive, though not the most populous, of Brazilian provinces; and this in despite of the Government of Brazil, which does not, and cannot, possess the means for repressing its intercourse with Monte Video, even though its possession and authority were as absolute and acknowledged in Rio Grande as they are decidedly the reverse. The next, and the more difficult, achievement of Conservative diplomacy resulted in the ratification of a supplementary commercial convention with Russia. We say difficult, because the iron-bound exclusiveness and isolation of the commercial, as well as of the political, system of St Petersburg, is sufficiently notorious; and it must have required no small exercise of sagacity and address to overcome the known disinclination of that Cabinet to any relaxation of the restrictive policy which, as the Autocrat lately observed to a distinguished personage, "had been handed down to him from his ancestors, and was found to work well for the interests of his empire." The peculiar merits of this treaty are as little understood, however, as they have been unjustly depreciated in some quarters, and the obstacles to the accomplishment overlooked. It will be sufficient to state, on the present occasion, that notice had been given by the Russian Government, of the resolution to subject British shipping, importing produce other than of British, or British colonial origin, to the payment of differential or discriminating duties on entrance into Russian ports. The result of such a measure would have been to put an entire stop to that branch of the carrying trade, which consisted in supplying the Russian market with the produce of other European countries, and of Brazil, Cuba, and elsewhere, direct in British bottoms. To avert this determination, representations were not spared, and at length negotiations were consented to. But for some time they wore but an unpromising appearance, were more than once suspended, if not broken off, and little, if any, disposition was exhibited on the part of the Russian Government to listen to terms of compromise. After upwards of twelvemonths' delay, hesitation, and diplomacy, the arrangement was finally completed, which was laid before Parliament at the commencement of the session. It may be accepted as conclusive evidence of the tact and skill of the British negotiators, that, in return for waiving the alterations before alluded to, and leaving British shipping entitled to the same privileges as before, it was agreed that the produce of Russian Poland, shipped from Prussian ports in Russian vessels, should be admissible into the ports of Great Britain on the same conditions of duty as if coming direct and loaded from Russian ports. As the greater part of Russian Poland lies inland, and communicates with the sea only through the Prussian ports, it was no more than just and reasonable that Russian Polish produce so brought to the coast-to Dantzig, for example-should be admissible here in Russian bottoms on the same footing as if from a Russian port. To this country it could be a matter of slight import whether such portion of the produce so shipped in Prussian ports as was carried in foreign, and not in British bottoms, came in Russian vessels or in those of Prussia, as before. To Russia, however, the boon was clearly of considerable interest, and valued accordingly. In the mean time, British shipping retains its former position, in respect of the carriage of foreign produce; and, however hostile Russian tariffs may be to British manufactured products-as hostile to the last degree they are, as well as against the manufactured wares of all other States-it is undeniable that our commercial marine enjoys a large proportion of the carrying trade with Russia-almost a monopoly, in fact, of the carrying trade between the two countries direct. Of 1147 foreign ships which sailed with cargoes during the year 1842 from the port of Cronstadt, 515 were British, with destination direct to the ports of the United Kingdom, whilst only forty-one foreign or Russian vessels were loaded and left during that year for British ports. Of 525 British vessels, of the aggregate burden of nearly 118,000 tons, which anchored in the roadstead of Cronstadt in that year, 472 were direct from the United Kingdom, and fifty-three from various other countries, such as the two Sicilies, Spain, Cuba, South America, &c. The number of British vessels which entered the port of St Petersburg, as Cronstadt in fact is, was more considerable still in 1840 and 1841-having been in the first year, 662, of the aggregate burden of 146,682 tons; in the latter, of 645 ships and 146,415 tons. Of the total average number of vessels by which the foreign trade of that empire is carried on, and load and leave the ports of Russia yearly, which, in round numbers, may be taken at about 6000, of an aggregate tonnage of 1,000,000-ships sailing on ballast not comprehended-the average number of ships under the Russian flag, comprised in the estimate, does not much, if any, exceed 1000, of the aggregate burden of 150 or 160,000 tons. This digression, though it has led us further astray from our main object than we had contemplated, will not be without its uses, if it serve to correct some exaggerated notions which prevail about the comparative valuelessness of our commerce with Russia, because of its assumed entire one-sidedness-losing sight altogether of its vast consequence to the shipping interest; and of the freightage, which is as much an article of commerce and profit as cottons and woollens; oblivious, moreover, of the great political question involved in the maintenance and aggrandisement of that shipping interest, which must be taken to account by the statesman and the patriot as redressing to no inconsiderable extent the adverse action of unfriendly tariffs. It is only after careful ponderance of these and other combined considerations, that the value of any trading relations with Russia can be clearly understood, and that the importance of the supplementary treaty of navigation recently carried through, with success proportioned to the remarkable ability and perseverance displayed, can be duly appreciated. It is, undoubtedly, the special economical event of the day, upon which the commercial, and scarcely less the political, diplomacy of the Government may be most justly complimented for its mastery of prejudices and impediments, which, under the circumstances, and in view of the peculiar system to be combated, appeared almost insurmountable. Common honesty and candour must compel this acknowledgment, even from men so desperate in their antipathies to the political system of Russia, as Mr Urquhart or Mr Cargill-antipathies, by the way, with which we shall not hesitate to express a certain measure of participation.

We shall not dwell upon those other negotiations, now and for some time past in active progress with France, with Brazil, with Naples, with Austria, and with Portugal, by which Sir Robert Peel is so zealously labouring to fill up the broad outlines of his economical policy-a policy which represents the restoration of peace to the nation, progress to industry, and plenty to the cottage; but which also otherwise is not without its dangers. Amidst the whirlwind of passions, the storm of hatred and envy, conjured by the evil genius of his predecessors in office, and most notably by the malignant star which lately ruled over the foreign destinies of England, the task has necessarily been, yet is, and will be, Herculean; but the force of Hercules is there also, as may be hoped, to wrestle with and overthrow the hydra-the ?olus to recall and encage the tempestuous elements of strife. A host in himself, hosts also the premier has with him in his cabinet; for such singly are the illustrious Wellington, the Aberdeen, the Stanley, the Graham, the Ripon, and, though last, though youngest, scarcely least, the Gladstone.

Great as is our admiration, deeply impressed as we are with a sense of the extraordinary qualifications, of the varied acquirements, of the conscientious convictions, and the singleness and rightmindedness of purpose of the right honourable the vice-president of the Board of Trade, we must yet presume to hesitate before we give an implicit adherence upon all the points in the confession of economical faith expressed and implied in an article attributed to him, and not without cause, which ushered into public notice the first number of a new quarterly periodical, "The Foreign and Colonial Quarterly Review," in January last, and was generally accepted as a programme of ministerial faith and action. Our points of dissonance are, however, few; but, as involving questions of principle, whilst we are generally at one on matters of detail, we hold them to be of some importance. This, however, is not the occasion proper for urging them, when engaged on a special theme. But on a question of fact, which has a bearing upon the subject in hand, we may be allowed to express our decided dissent from the dictum somewhat arbitrarily launched, in the article referred to, in the following terms:-"We shall urge that foreign countries neither have combined, nor ought to combine, nor can combine, against the commerce of Great Britain; and we shall treat as a calumny the imputation that they are disposed to enter into such a combination." The italics, it must be observed, are ours.

We have at this moment evidence lying on our table sufficiently explanatory and decisive to our minds that such a spirit of combination is abroad against British commercial interests. We might indeed appeal to events of historical publicity, which would seem confirmatory of a tacitly understood combination, from the simultaneity of action apparent. We have, for example, France reducing the duties on Belgian iron, coal, linen, yarn, and cloths, whilst she raises those on similar British products; the German Customs' League imposing higher and prohibitory duties on British fabrics of mixed materials, such as wool, cotton, silk, &c.; puny Portugal interdicting woollens by exorbitant rates of impost, and scarcely tolerating the admission of cotton manufactures; the United States, with sweeping action, passing a whole tariff of prohibitory imposts; and, in several of these instances, this war of restrictions against British industry commenced, or immediately followed upon, those remarkable changes and reductions in the tariff of this country which signalized the very opening of Sir Robert Peel's administration. Conceding, however, this seeming concert of action to be merely fortuitous, what will the vice-president of the Board of Trade say to the long-laboured, but still unconsummated customs' union between France and Belgium? Was that in the nature of a combination against British commercial interests, or was it the reverse? It is no cabinet secret-it has been publicly proclaimed, both by the French and Belgian Governments and press, that the indispensable basis, the sine qua non of that union, must be, not a calculated amalgamation of, not a compromise between the differing and inconsistent tariffs of Belgium and France, but the adoption, the imposition, of the tariff of France for both countries in all its integrity, saving in some exceptional cases of very slight importance, in deference to municipal dues and octrois in Belgium. When, after previous parley and cajoleries at Brussels, commissioners were at length procured to be appointed by the French ministry, and proceeded to meet and discuss the conditions of the long-cherished project of the union, with the officials deputed on the part of France to assist in the conference, it is well known that the final cause of rupture was the dogged persistance of the French members of the joint commission in urging the tariff of France, in all its nakedness of prohibition, deformity, and fiscal rigour, as the one sole and exclusive régime for the union debated, without modification or mitigation. On this ground alone the Belgian deputies withdrew from their mission. How this result, this check, temporary only as it may prove, chagrined the Government, if not the people, and the mining and manufacturing interests of France, may be understood by the simple citation of a few short but pithy sentences from the Journal des Débats, certainly the most influential, as it is the most ably conducted, of Parisian journals:-

"Le 'ZOLLVEREIN,'" observes the Débats, "a prodigieusement rehaussé la Prusse; l'union douanière avec la Belgique aurait, à un degré moindre cependant, le même résultat pour nous.... Nous sommes, donc, les partisans de cette union, ses partisans prononcés, à deux conditions: la première, c'est qu'il ne faille pas payer ces beaux résultats par le bouleversement de l'industrie rationale; la seconde, c'est que la Belgique en accepte sincèrement es charges en même temps qu'elle en recuiellera les profits, et qu'en consequence elle se prête à tout ce qui sera nécessaire pour mettre NOTRE INDUSTRIE A L'ABRI DE L'INVASION DES PRODUITS ETRANGERS, et pour que les intérêts de notre Trésor soient à couvert."

This is plain speaking; the Government journal of France worthily disdains to practise mystery or attempt deception, for its mission is to contend for the interests, one-sided, exclusive, and egoistical, as they may be, and establish the supremacy of France-quand même; at whatever resulting prejudice to Belgium-at whatever total exclusion of Great Britain from commercial intercourse with, and commercial transit through Belgium, must inevitably flow from a customs' union, the absolute preliminary condition of which is to be, that Belgium "shall be ready to do every thing necessary to place our commerce beyond the reach of invasion by foreign products." Mr Gladstone may rest assured that the achievement of this Franco-Belgiac customs' union will still be pursued with all the indomitable perseverance, the exhaustless and ingenious devices, the little-scrupulous recources, for which the policy of the Tuileries in times present does not belie the transmitted traditions of the past. And it will be achieved, to the signal detriment of British interests, both commercial and political, unless all the energies and watchfulness of the distinguished statesmen who preside at the Foreign Office and the Board of Trade be not unceasingly on the alert.

Other and unmistakeable signs of the spirit of commercial combination, or confederation, abroad, and more or less explicitly avowed and directed against this country, are, and have been for some time past, only too patent, day by day, in most of those continental journals, the journals of confederated Germany, of France, with some of those of Spain and of Portugal, which exercise the largest measure of influence upon, and represent with most authority the voice of, public opinion. Nor are such demonstrations confined to journalism. Collaborateurs, in serial or monthly publications, are found as earnest auxiliaries in the same cause-as redacteurs and redactores; pamphleteers, like light irregulars, lead the skirmish in front, whilst the main battle is brought up with the heavy artillery of tome and works voluminous. Of these, as of brochures, filletas, and journals, we have various specimens now on our library table. All manner of customs, or commercial unions, between states are projected, proposed, and discussed, but from each and all of these proposed unions Great Britain is studiously isolated and excluded. We have the "Austrian union" planned out and advocated, comprising, with the hereditary states of that empire, Moldavia, Wallachia, Bulgaria, Servia, Bosnia, as well as those provinces of ancient Greece, which, like Macedonia, remain subject to Turkey, with, perhaps, the modern kingdom of Greece. We have the "Italian union," to be composed of Sardinia, Lombardy, Lucca, Parma, and Modena, Tuscany, the two Sicilies, and the Papal States. There is the "Peninsular union" of Spain and Portugal. Then we have one "French union" sketched out, modestly projected for France, Belgium, Switzerland, and Savoy only. And we have another of more ambitious aspirations, which should unite Belgium, Switzerland, and Spain under the commercial standard of France. One of the works treating of projects of this kind was, we believe, crowned with a prize by some learned institution in France.

From this slight sketch of what is passing abroad-and we cannot afford the space at present for more ample development-the right honourable Vice President of the Board of Trade will perhaps see cause to revise the opinion too positively enounced, that "foreign countries neither have combined, nor ought to combine, nor can combine, against the commerce of Great Britain;" and that it is a "calumny" to conceive that they are "disposed to enter into such a combination."

With these preliminary remarks, we now proceed to the consideration of the commercial relations between Spain and Great Britain, and of the policy in the interest of both countries, but transcendently in that of Spain, by which those relations, now reposing on the narrowest basis, at least on the one side, on that of Spain herself, may be beneficially improved and enlarged. It may be safely asserted, that there are no two nations in the old world-nay more, no two nations in either, or both, the old world and the new-more desirably situated and circumstanced for an intimate union of industrial interests, for so direct and perfect an interchange of their respective products. The interchange would, indeed, under a wise combination of reciprocal dealing, resolve itself purely almost into the primitive system of barter; for the wants of Spain are such as can be best, sometimes only, supplied from England, whilst Spain is rich in products which ensure a large, sometimes an exclusive, command of British consumption. Spain is eminently agricultural, pastoral, and mining; Great Britain more eminently ascendant still in the arts and science of manufacture and commerce. With a diversity of soil and climate, in which almost spontaneously flourish the chief productions of the tropical as of the temperate zone; with mineral riches which may compete with, nay, which greatly surpass in their variety, and might, if well cultivated, in their value, those of the Americas which she has lost; with a territory vast and virgin in proportion to the population; with a sea-board extensively ranging along two of the great high-ways of nations-the Atlantic and the Mediterranean-and abundantly endowed with noble and capacious harbours; there is no conceivable limit to the boundless production and creation of exchangeable wealth, of which, with her immense natural resources, still so inadequately explored, Spain is susceptible, that can be imagined, save from that deficient supply of labour as compared with the territorial expanse which would gradually come to be redressed as industry was promoted, the field of employment extended, and labour remunerated. With an estimated area of 182,758 square miles, the population of Spain does not exceed, probably, thirteen millions and a half of souls, whilst Great Britain and Ireland, with an area of 115,702 square miles, support a population of double the number. Production, however, squares still less with territorial extent than does population; for the stimulus to capital and industry is wanting when the facilities of exchanges are checked by fiscal prohibitions and restrictions. Agricultural produce, the growth of the vine and the olive, is not unfrequently known to run to waste, to be abandoned, as not worth the toil of gathering and preparation, because markets are closed and consumption checked in countries from which exchangeable commodities are prohibited. The extent of these prohibitions and restrictions, almost unparalleled even by the arbitrary tariff of Russia, may be estimated in part by the following extract from a pamphlet, published last year by Mr James Henderson, formerly consul-general to the Republic of New Granada, entitled "A Review of the Commercial Code and Tariffs of Spain;" a writer, by the way, guilty of much exaggeration of fact and opinion when not quoting from, or supported by, official documents.

"The 'Aranceles,' or Tariffs, are four in number; 1st, of foreign importations; 2d, of importations from America; 3d, from Asia; and, 4th, of exportations from Spain.

"The Tariff of foreign importations contains 1326 articles alphabetically arranged:-

800 to pay a duty of 15 per cent in Spanish vessels,

230 " 20 "

80 " 25 "

55 " 10 "

26 " 30 "

3 " 36 "

2 " 24 "

2 " 45 "

about 50 from 1 to 8 per cent, and the rest free of duty.

"The preceding articles imported in foreign vessels are subject to an increased duty, at the following rates:-

1150 articles at the rate of 1/8 more,

80 " 1/4 more,

10 " 1/2 more.

"There is, besides, a duty of 'consumo,' principally at the rate of 1/8 of the respective duties, and in some very few cases at the rate of 1/4 and 1/2.

"Thus the duty of 15 per cent levied, if the importation is by a Spanish vessel, will be increased by the 'consumo' to 20 per cent. And the duty of 20 per cent on the same articles, in foreign vessels, will be augmented to 27 per cent.

"The duty of 20 per cent will be about 27 in Spanish vessels, and in foreign vessels, on the same articles, 36 per cent. The duty of 25 per cent, will in the whole be 33 per cent by Spanish, and by foreign vessels 44 per cent.

"The duty on articles, amounting to seventy-three, imported from America, vary from 1 to 15 per cent, with double the duty if in foreign vessels.

"The articles of importation from Asia are-sixty-nine from the Phillipines at 1 to 5 per cent duty, and thirty-six from China at 5 to 25 per cent duty, and can only be imported in Spanish ships.

"The articles of export are fourteen, with duties at 1 to 80 per cent, with one-third increase if by foreign vessels.

"There are eighty-six articles of importation prohibited, amongst which are wrought iron, tobacco, spirits, quicksilver, ready-made clothing, corn, salt, hats, soap, wax, wools, leather, vessels under 400 tons, &c. &c. &c.

"There are eleven articles of exportation prohibited, amongst which are hides, skins, and timber for naval purposes."

Such a tariff contrasts strangely with that of this country, in which 10 per cent is the basis of duty adopted for importations of foreign manufactures, and 5 per cent for foreign raw products.

Can we wonder that, with such a tariff, legitimate imports are of so small account, and that the smuggler intervenes to redress the enormously disproportionate balance, and administer to the wants of the community? Can we wonder that the powers of native production should be so bound down, and territorial revenue so comparatively diminutive, when exchanges are so hampered by fiscal and protective rapacity? Canga Arguelles, the first Spanish financier and statistician of his day, calculated the territorial revenue of Spain at 8,572,220,592 reals, say, in sterling, L.85,722,200; whilst he asserts, with better cultivation, population the same, the soil is capable of returning ten times the value. As a considerable proportion of the revenue of Spain is derived from the taxation of land, the prejudice resulting to the treasury is alone a subject of most important consideration. For the proprietary, and, in the national point of view, as affecting the well-being of the masses, it is of far deeper import still. And what is the financial condition of Spain, that her vast resources should be apparently so idle, sported with, or cramped? Take the estimates, the budget, presented by the minister De ca Hacienda, for the past year of 1842:-

Revenue 1842, 879,193,400 reals

Id. expenditure, 1,541,639,800 id.

------

Deficit on the year, 662,446,400

Thus, with a revenue of L.8,791,934, an expenditure of L.15,416,398, and a deficit of L.6,624,460, the debt of Spain, foreign and domestic, is almost an unfathomable mystery as to its real amount. Even at this present moment, it cannot be said to be determined; for that amount varies with every successive minister who ventures to approach the question. Multifarious have been the attempts to arrive at a clear liquidation-that is, classification and ascertainment of claims; but hitherto with no better success than to find the sum swelling under the labour, notwithstanding national and church properties confiscated, appropriated, and exchanged away against titulos of debt by millions. It is variously estimated at from 120 to 200 millions sterling, but say 150 millions, under the different heads of debt active, passive, and deferred; debt bearing interest, debt without interest, and debt exchangeable in part-that is, payable in certain fixed proportions, for the purchase of national and church properties. For a partial approximation to relative quantities, we must refer the reader, for want of better authority, to Fenn's "Compendium of the English and Foreign Funds"-a work containing much valuable information, although not altogether drawn from the best sources.

In the revenues of Spain, the customs enter for about 70,000,000 of reals, say L.700,000 only, including duties on exports as well as imports. Now, assuming the contraband imports to amount only to the value of L.6,000,000, a moderate estimate, seeing that some writers, Mr Henderson among the number, rashly calculate the contraband imports alone at eight, and even as high as ten, millions sterling, it should follow that, at an average rate of duty of twenty per cent, the customs should yield additionally L.1,200,000, or nearly double the amount now received under that head. As, through the cessation of the civil war, a considerable portion of the war expenditure will be, and is being reduced, the additional L.1,200,000 gained, by an equitable adjustment of the tariff, on imports alone, perhaps we should be justified in saying one million and a half, or not far short of two millions sterling, import and export duties combined, would go far to remedy the desperation of Spanish financial embarrassments-the perfect solution and clearance of which, however, must be, under the most favourable circumstances, an affair of many years. It is not readily or speedily that the prodigalities of Toreno, or the unscrupulous, but more patriotic financial impostures of Mendizabal, can be retrieved, and the national faith redeemed. The case is, to appearance, one past relief; but, with honest and incorruptible ministers of finance like Ramon Calatrava, hope still lingers in the long perspective. With an enlightened commercial policy on the one hand, with the retrenchment of a war expenditure on the other, the balance between receipts and expenditure may come to be struck, an excess of revenue perhaps created; whilst the sales of national domains against titulos of debt, if managed with integrity, should make way towards its gradual diminution.

As there is much misapprehension, and many exaggerations, afloat respecting the special participation of Great Britain in the contraband trade of Spain, its extraordinary amount, and the interest assumed therefrom which would result exclusively from, and therefore induces the urgency for, an equitable reform of the tariff of Spain, we shall briefly take occasion to show the real extent of the British share in that illicit trade, so far as under the principal heads charged; and having exhibited that part of the case in its true, or approximately true, light, we shall also prove that it is, as it should be, the primary interest of this country to regain its due proportion in the regular trade with Spain, and which can only be regained by legitimate intercourse, founded on a reciprocal, and therefore identical, combination of interests. In this strife of facts we shall have to contend against Se?or Marliani, and others of the best and most steadfast advocates of a more enlightened policy, of sympathies entirely and patriotically favourable towards a policy which shall cement and interweave indissolubly the material interests and prosperity of Spain and Great Britain-of two realms which possess each those products and peculiar advantages in which the other is wanting, and therefore stand seized of the special elements required for the successful progress of each other. Our contest will, however, be one of friendly character, our differences will be of facts, but not of principles. But we hold it to be of importance to re-establish facts, as far as possible, in all their correctness; or rather, to reclaim them from the domain of vague conjecture and speculation in which they have been involved and lost sight of. The task will not be without its difficulties; for the position and precise data are wanting on which to found, with even a reasonable approximation to mathematical accuracy, a comprehensive estimate, to resolve into shape the various and complex elements of Spanish industry and commerce, legitimate and contraband. Statistical science-for which Spain achieved an honourable renown in the last century, and may cite with pride her Varela, Musquiz, Gabarrus, Ulloa, Jovellanos, &c., was little cultivated or encouraged in that decay of the Spanish monarchy which commenced with the reign of the idiotic Carlos IV., and his venal minister Godoy, and in the wars and revolutions which followed the accession, and ended not with the death of Fernando his son, the late monarch-was almost lost sight of; though Canga Arguelles, lately deceased only, might compete with the most erudite economist, here or elsewhere, of his day. Therefore it is, that few are the statistical documents or returns existing in Spain which throw any clear light upon the progress of industry, or the extent and details of her foreign commerce. Latterly, indeed, the Government has manifested a commendable solicitude to repair this unfortunate defect of administrative detail, and has commenced with the periodical collection and verification of returns and information from the various ports, which may serve as the basis-and indispensable for that end they must be-on which to reform the errors of the present, or raise the superstructure of a new, fiscal and commercial system. Notwithstanding, however, the difficulties we are thus exposed to from the lack or incompleteness of official data on the side of Spain, we hope to present a body of useful information illustrative of her commerce, industry, and policy; in especial, we hope to dispel certain grave misconceptions, to redress signal exaggeration about the extent of the contraband trade, rankly as it flourishes, carried on along the coasts, and more largely still, perhaps, by the land frontiers of that country, at least so far as British participation. Various have been the attempts to establish correct conclusions, to arrive at some fixed notions of the precise quantities of that illicit traffic; but hitherto the results generally have been far from successful, except in one instance. In a series of articles on the commerce of Spain, published under the head of "Money Market and City Intelligence," in the months of December and January last, the Morning Herald was the first to observe and to apply the data in existence by which such an enquiry could be carried out, and which we purpose here to follow out on a larger scale, and with materials probably more abundant and of more recent date.

The whole subject of Spanish commerce is one of peculiar interest, and, through the more rigorous regulations recently adopted against smuggling, is at this moment exciting marked attention in France, which, it will be found with some surprise, is far the largest smuggler of prohibited commodities into Spain, although the smallest consumer of Spanish products in return. It is in no trifling degree owing to the jealous and exclusive views which unhappily prevail with our nearest neighbour across the Channel, that the prohibitory tariff, scarcely more adverse to commercial intercourse than that of France after all, which robs the revenue of Spain, whilst it covers the country with hosts of smugglers, has not sooner been revised and reformed. France is not willing to enter into a confederacy of interests with Spain herself, nor to permit other nations, on any fair equality of conditions, and with the abandonment of those unjust pretensions to special privileges in her own behalf, which, still tenaciously clinging to Bourbonic traditions of by-gone times, would affect to annihilate the Pyrenees, and regard Spain as a dependent possession, reserved for the exclusive profit and the commercial and political aggrandisement of France. That these exaggerated pretensions are still entertained as an article of national faith, from the sovereign on his throne to the meanest of his subjects, we have before us, at this moment of writing, conclusive evidence in the report of M. Chégaray, read in the Chamber of Deputies on the 11th of April last, (vide Moniteur of the 12th,) drawn up by a commission, to whom was referred the consideration of the actual commercial relations of France with Spain-provoked by various petitions of the merchants of Bayonne, and other places, complaining of the prejudice resulting to their commerce and shipping from certain alterations in the Spanish customs' laws, decreed by the Regent in 1841. We may have occasion hereafter to make further reference to this report.

The population of Spain may be rated in round numbers at thirteen millions and a half, whilst that of the United Kingdom may be taken at about double the number. With a wise policy, therefore, the interchange should be of an active and most extensive nature betwixt two countries, reckoning together more than forty millions of inhabitants, one of which, with a superficial breadth of territory out of all proportion with a comparatively thinly-scattered community, abounding with raw products and natural riches of almost spontaneous growth; whilst the other, as densely peopled, on the contrary, in comparison with its territorial limits, is stored with all the elements, and surpasses in all the arts and productions of manufacturing industry. Unlike France, Great Britain does not rival Spain in wines, oils, fruits, and other indigenous products of southern skies, and therefore is the more free to act upon the equitable principle of fair exchange in values for values. Great Britain has a market among twenty-seven millions of an active and intelligent people, abounding in wealth and advanced in the tastes of luxurious living, to offer against one presenting little more than half the range of possible customers. She has more; she has the markets of the millions of her West Indies and Americas-of the tens of millions of British India, amongst whom a desire for the various fruits and delicious wines of Spain might gradually become diffused for a thousand of varieties of wines which, through the pressure of restrictive duties, are little if at all known to European consumption beyond the boundaries of Spain herself. With such vast fields of commercial intercourse open on the one side and the other, with the bands of mutual material interests combining so happily to bind two nations together which can have no political causes of distrust and estrangement, it is really marvellous that the direct relations should be of so small account, and so hampered by jealous adherence to the strict letter of an absurd legislation, as in consequence to be diverted from their natural course into other and objectionable channels-as the waters of the river artificially dammed up will overflow its banks, and, regaining their level, speed on by other pathways to the ocean. We shall briefly exemplify the force of these truths by the citation of official figures representing the actual state of the trade between Spain and the United Kingdom antecedent to and concluding with the year 1840, which is the last year for which in detail the returns have yet issued from the Board of Trade. That term, however, would otherwise be preferentially selected, because affording facilities for comparison with similar but partial returns only of foreign commerce made up in Spain to the same period, little known in this country, and with the French customhouse returns of the trade of France with Spain. It must be premised that the tables of the Board of Trade in respect of import trade, as well as of foreign and colonial re-exports, state quantities only, but not values; nor do they present any criteria by which values approximately might be determined. Where, therefore, such values are attempted to be arrived at, it will be understood that the calculations are our own, and pretend no more-for no more could be achieved-than a rough estimate of probable approximation.

Total declared value of British and Irish produce and manufactures exported to Spain and the Balearic Isles in-

1840, amounted to L.404,252

1835, ... 405,065

1831, ... 597,848

From the first to the last year of the decennial term, the regular trade, therefore, had declined to the extent of above L.193,000, or at the rate of about 33 per cent. But as for three of the intermediate years 1837, 1838, and 1839, the exports are returned at L.286,636, L.243,839, and L.262,231, exclusive of fluctuations downwards in previous years, it will be more satisfactory to take the averages for five years each, of the term. Thus from-

1831 to 1835, both inclusive, the average was L.442,916

1836 to 1840, ... 320,007

The average decline in the latter term, was therefore above 27? per cent.

Of the Foreign and Colonial merchandise re-exported within the same period it is difficult to say what proportion was for British account, and, as such, should therefore be classed under the head of trade with Spain. It may be assumed, however, that the following were the products of British colonial possessions, whose exports to Spain are thus stated in quantities:-

1831. 1835. 1840.

Cinnamon, 284,201 123,590 144,291 lbs.

Cloves, 15,831 9,470 23,504 ...

India Cottons, 38,969 3,267 10,067 pieces

India Bandannas, 17,386 11,864 16,049 ...

Indigo, 16,641 5,231 8,623 lbs.

Pepper, 227,305 69,365 194,254 ...

To which may be added-

Tobacco, 64,851 2,252,356 1,729,552 ...

The tobacco, being of United States' growth, may, to a considerable extent, be bonded here for re-exportation on foreign account merely. The foregoing, though the heaviest, are not the whole of the foreign and colonial products re-exported for Spain, but they constitute the great bulk of value. Taking those of the last year, their value may be approximatively estimated in round numbers, as calculated upon what may be assumed a fair average of the rates of the prices current in the market, as they appear quoted in the London Mercantile Journal of the 4th of April. It is only necessary to take the more weighty articles.

Cinnamon, 144,290 lbs. at 5s. 6d. L.39,679

Indigo, 8,620 - at 6s. 2,586

Pepper, 194,250 - at 4d. 3,232

Tobacco, 1,729,550 - at 4d. 28,825

Indian Bandannas, 16,049 pieces at 25s. 20,061

It may, we conceive, be assumed from these citations of some few of the larger values exported to Spain under the head of "Foreign and Colonial Merchandise," that the total amount of such values, inclusive of all the commodities non-enumerated here, would not exceed L.150,000, which, added to the L.404,252 already stated as the "declared values" of "British and Irish produce" also exported, would give a total export for 1840 of L.554,250.

We come now to the imports from Spain and the Balearic Isles, direct also into the United Kingdom, as stated in the Board of Trade tables in quantities; selecting the chief articles only, however:-

1831. 1835. 1840.

Barilla, 61,921 64,175 36,585 cwts.

Lemons and Oranges, 28,266 30,548 30,171 packages.

Madder, 1,569 3,418 6,174 cwts.

Olive Oil, 1,243,686 1,793 1,305,384 galls.

Quicksilver, 269,558 1,438,869 2,157,823 lbs.

Raisins, 105,066 104,334 166,505 cwts.

Brandy, 69,319 15,880 223,268 galls.

Wines, 2,537,968 2,641,547 3,945,161 galls.

Wool, 3,474,823 1,602,752 1,266,905 lbs.

Applying the same plan of calculation upon an average of the prices ruling in the London market, we arrive at the following approximate results:-

Barilla, 36,585 cwts. at 10s. per cwt. L.18,292

Lemons and oranges, 30,170 packages, at 30s. per packet, 45,255

Madder, 6174 cwts. at 30s per cwt. 9,261

Olive oil, 1,305,384 gallons, at L.45 per 252 gallons 233,100

Quicksilver, 2,157,823 lbs., at 4s. per lb., 431,564

Raisins, 166,505 cwts., at 40s. per cwt. 333,000

Brandy, 223,268 gallons, at 2s. 6d. per gallon, 27,900

Wines, 3,945,160, gallons, at L.20 per butt, 730,580

Wool, 1,266,900 lbs., at 2s. per lb., 126,690

-----

L.1,965,642

The value of the other articles of import from Spain, which need not be enumerated here, amongst which corn, skins, pig-lead, bark for tanning, &c., would certainly swell this amount more by 200,000.

-----

Total direct imports from Spain, L.2,165,642

On several of the foregoing commodities the average rates of price on which they are calculated may be esteemed as moderate, such as wines, brandies, raisins, &c.; and several are exclusive of duty charge, as where the averages are estimated at the prices in bond. In other commodities the average rates are inclusive of duty. Wines, brandies, quicksilver, barilla, are exclusive of duty, for example; the others, duty paid, but in some instances duties scarcely more than nominal. On the other hand, it must be taken into the account, for the purpose of a fair comparison, that these average estimates of the prices of imported merchandise do include and are enhanced by the expense of freights and the profits of the importer, and therefore all the difference must be in excess of the cost price at which shipped, and by which estimated in Spain. The "declared values" of British exports to Spain embrace but a small proportion, perhaps, of these shipping charges, and are altogether irrespective of duties levied on arrival in Spanish ports. As not only a fair, but probably an outside allowance, let us, therefore, redress the balance by striking off 20 per cent from the total estimated values of imports from Spain to cover shipping charges, profits, and port-dues, whether included in prices or not. The account will then stand thus:-

Estimated imports from Spain in round numbers L.2,165,000

Deduct 20 per cent, 433,000

-----

Value of imports shipped, L.1,732,000

Deduct declared value of British exports to Spain, 554,000

-----

Excess of Spanish imports direct on equalized estimates of values, L.1,178,000

The acceptation is so common, it has been so long received as a truism unquestionable as unquestioned, as well in Spain as in Great Britain, of British commerce being one-sided, and carrying a large yearly balance against the Peninsular state, that these figures of relative and approximate quantities can hardly fail to excite a degree of astonishment and of doubt also. It will be, as it ought to be, observed at once, that the trade with Spain direct represents one part of the question only; that the indirect trade through Gibraltar, and elsewhere, might, in its results, reverse the picture. The objection is reasonable, and we proceed to enquire how far it is calculated to affect the statement.

The total "declared value" of the exports of British and Irish produce, and manufactures to Gibraltar, for the year 1840, is stated at

￡1,111,176

Of which, as more or less destined for Spain, licitly or illicitly, cotton manufactures, 635,821

Linens, &c., &c., 224,061

Woollens, 97,092

It may be asserted as a fact, for, although not on official authority, yet we have it from respectable parties who have been resident on, and well conversant with the commerce of that rock, that, of the cotton goods thus imported into Gibraltar, the exports to Ceuta and the opposite coast of Africa amount, on the average, to L.70,000 per annum. Of linens and woollens a considerable proportion find their way there also, and to Italian ports. Of British and colonial merchandise exported to Gibraltar in the same year, the following may be considered to be mainly, or to some extent, designed for introduction into Spain:-

Cinnamon value, 77,352 lbs., say value L.21,000

Indigo 26,000 lbs., say 7,800

Tobacco 610,000 lbs., say 10,166

Some cotton piece-goods from India, and silk goods, such as bandannas, &c., pepper, cloves, &c., &c., were also exported there; say, inclusive of the quantities enumerated above, to the total value of L.100,000 of commodities, of which a considerable proportion was destined for Spain. Assuming the whole of the cotton goods to be for introduction into Spain, minus the quantity dispatched to the African coast, we have in round numbers the value of

L.565,800

Say of linens one-third, 74,660

Of woollens, ib., 32,360

Of cinnamon, India goods, and other articles, in value

L.90,000, minus tobacco, one-half, 45,000

----

L.717,820

Tobacco, the whole, 10,166

----

Total indirect exports 727,986

To which add direct 554,000

----

L.1,281,986

Again, however, various products of Spain are also imported into the United Kingdom via Gibraltar, such as-

Bark for tanning or dyeing, 5,724 tons, say value, L.51,500

Wool, 292,730 lbs. ib., 29,270

It may be fairly assumed, therefore, that to the extent of L.100,000 of Spanish products, consisting, besides the foregoing, of wines, skins, pig-lead, &c., &c., is brought here through Gibraltar, which, added to the amount of the imports from Spain direct, will sum up the account thus:-

Imports from Spain direct, L.1,732,000

Via Gibraltar, 100,000

-----

Total, L.1,832,000

Exports to Spain direct, L.554,000

Via Gibraltar, 727,900

-----

L.1,281,900

-----

Excess in favour of Spain,

and against England, L.550,100

-A sum nearly equal to the amount of the exports to Spain direct. As we remarked before, these figures and valuations, which are sufficiently approximative of accuracy for any useful purpose, will take public men and economists, both here and in Spain, by surprise. Amongst other of the more distinguished men of the Peninsula, Se?or Marliani, enlightened statesman, and well studied in the facts of detail and the philosophy of commercial legislation as he undoubtedly is, does not appear to have exactly suspected the existence of evidence leading to such results.

From the incompleteness of the Spanish returns of foreign trade, it is unfortunately not possible to test the complete accuracy of those given here by collation. The returns before us, and they are the only ones yet undertaken in Spain, and in order, embrace in detail nine only of the principal ports:-

For Cadiz, Malaga, Carthagena, St Sebastian, Bilboa, Santander, Gijon, Corunna, and the Balearic Isles, the total imports and exports united are stated to have amounted, in 1840, to about L.6,147,280

Employing 5782 vessels of the aggregate tonnage of 584,287

Of the foreign trade of other ports and provinces no returns are made out. All known of the important seaport of Barcelona was, that its foreign trade in the same year occupied 1,645 vessels of 173,790 tonnage. The special aggregate exports from the nine ports cited to the United Kingdom-the separate commodities composing which, as of imports, are given with exactness of detail-are stated for 1840 in value at L.1,476,000

To which add, of raisins alone, from Valencia, about 184,000 cwts, (other exports not given,) value 185,000

Exports from Almeria, 13,000

-----

L.1,674,000

Although these are the principal ports of Spain, yet they are not the only ports open to foreign trade, although, comparatively, the proportion of foreign traffic shared by the others would be much less considerable. It is remarkable, under the circumstances, how closely these Spanish returns of exports to Great Britain approach to our own valuations of the total imports from Spain direct, as calculated from market prices upon the quantities alone rendered in the tables of the Board of Trade.

Our valuation of the direct imports from Spain being L.1,732,000

The Spanish valuation, 1,674,000

The public writers and statesmen of Spain have long held, and still maintain the opinion, that the illicit introduction into that country of British manufactures whose legal import is prohibited, or greatly restricted by heavy duties, is carried on upon a much more extensive scale than what is, or can be, the case. In respect of cotton goods, the fact is particularly insisted upon. It may be confidently asserted, for it is susceptible of proof, that much exaggeration is abroad on the subject. We shall bring some evidence upon the point. There can be no question that, so far as British agency is directly concerned, or British interest involved, in the contraband introduction of cottons, or other manufactures, or tobacco, it is almost exclusively represented by the trade with Gibraltar. We are satisfied, moreover, that the Spanish consumption of cotton goods is overrated, as well as the amount of the clandestine traffic. Se?or Marliani an authority generally worthy of great respect, errs on this head with many others of his countrymen. In a late work, entitled De la Influencia del Sistema prohibitiva en la Agricultura, Commercio, y rentas Publicas, he comes to the following calculation:-

Imported direct to Spain, L.34,687

To Gibraltar, 608,581

To Portugal, ￡731,673, of which three-fourths find their way to Spain, 540,000

-----

Total, L.1,183,268

Again, Great Britain imports annually into Italy to the amount of ￡2,005,785 in cotton goods, ￡500,000 worth of which, it is not too much to assume, go into Spain through the ports of Leghorn and Genoa. Adding together, then, these several items of cotton goods introduced from France and England into Spain by contraband, we arrive at the following startling result:-

FRANCE.

Cotton goods imported into Spain, according to the Government returns, L.1,331,608

ENGLAND.

Cotton goods through Spanish ports, 34,637

Through Gibraltar, 608,581

Through Portugal, 540,000

Through Leghorn, Genoa, &c. &c. 500,000

-----

Total, L.3,014,826

An extravagant writer, of the name of Pebrer, carried the estimate up to ￡5,850,000. Se?or Inclan, more moderate, still valued the import and consumption at ￡2,720,000. A "Cadiz merchant," with another anonymous writer of practical authority, calculated the amount, with more sagacity, at ￡2,000,000 and ￡2,110,000 respectively. Se?or Marliani is, moreover, of opinion-considering the weight of tobacco, from six to eight millions of pounds, assumed to be imported into Gibraltar for illicit entrance into Spain, on the authority of Mr Porter, but the words and work not expressly quoted; the tobacco, dressed skins, corn, flour, &c. from France, with the illegal import of cottons-that the whole contraband trade carried on in Spain cannot amount to less than the enormous mass of one thousand millions of reals, or say ten millions sterling a-year. Conceding to the full the millions of pounds of tobacco here registered as smuggled from Gibraltar, of which, notwithstanding, we cannot stumble upon the official trace for half the quantity, we must, after due reflection, withhold our assent wholly to this very wide, if not wild, assumption of our Spanish friend. We are inclined, on no slight grounds, to come to the conclusion, that the amount of contraband trade really carried on is here surcharged by not far short of one-half; that it cannot in any case exceed six millions sterling-certainly still a bulk of illegitimate values sufficiently monstrous, and almost incredible. We shall proceed to deal conclusively, however, with that special branch of the traffic for which the materials are most accessible and irrecusable, and the verification of truth therefore scarcely left to the chances of speculation.

First, for the rectification for exact, or official, quantities and values, we give the returns of the total exports of cotton manufactures, taken from the tables of the Board of Trade:-

1840. Cotton manufactures, L.17,567,310

Yarns, 7,101,308

And for 1840 here are the exports to the countries specified:-

Declared Value.

1840. Cottons to Portugal, yards 37,002,209 L.681,787

Hosiery, lace, small wares, - 20,403

Yarn, lbs. 175,545 2,796

Id. Cottons to Spain, yards 355,040 7,987

Hosiery, &c. - 2,819

Yarn, lbs. - 345

Id. Cottons to Gibraltar, yards 27,609,345 610,456

Hosiery, &c. - 21,996

Yarn, lbs. - 3,369

Id. Cottons to Italy and Italian Islands, yds. 58,866,278 1,119,135

Hosiery, &c. - 41,197

Yarn, lbs. 11,490,034 510,040

-----

Total, L.3,022,430

The discrepancies between some of the figures in these returns and those cited by Se?or Marliani, arise probably from their respective reference to different years; they are, however, unimportant. We have already shown, that, deducting the re-exports of cottons to Ceuta and the coast of Africa opposite to Gibraltar, the value of those destined for Spain, by way of the Rock; in 1840, could not exceed

L.565,800

We shall assume that one-fourth only of the cottons exported to Portugal find their way fraudulently into Spain-say 176,290

Say re-exports of cottons from Genoa to Gibraltar, assumed to be for Spain, as per official return of that port for 1839, 31,400

Cotton goods direct to Spain from the United Kingdom, 11,150

-----

Total value of British cottons which could find their way into Spain, direct and indirect, in 1840, L.784,640

-----

Instead of the amount exaggerated of Se?or Marliani, L.1,663,268

Or the large excess in estimation, of 898,628

We have the official returns of the whole imports of cotton manufactures, with the exports, of the Sardinian States for 1840, now lying before us.

The imports were to the value of only L.443,360

Of which from the United Kingdom 242,680

Exported, or re-exported, 458,680

The whole of which to Tuscany, the Two Sicilies, the Roman States, Parma and Placentia, the Isle of Sardinia, and Austria. It will be observed that there had been a great falling off in the trade with the Sardinian States in 1840, as compared with 1838 and 1839; and here, for greater convenience, we make free to extract the following remarks and returns from our esteemed contemporary of the Morning Herald, with some slight corrections of our own, when appropriately correcting certain misrepresentations of Mr Henderson, similar to those of Se?or Marliani, respecting the assumed clandestine ingress of British cotton goods into Spain from the Italian states:-

"Now the official customhouse returns of most of the Italian states are lying before us-the returns of the Governments themselves-but unfortunately none of them come down later than 1839, so that it is impossible, however desirable, to carry out fully the comparison for 1840. Not that it is of any signification for more than uniformity, because, on referring to years antecedent to 1839, the relation between imports of cottons and re-exports, with the places from which imported and to which re-exports took place, is not sensibly disturbed. The returns for the whole of Sardinia are not possessed later than 1838, but those for Genoa, its chief port, are for 1839, and nearly the whole imports into Sardinia, as well as exports, are effected at Genoa. Thus of the total imports of cotton goods into Sardinia in 1838, to the value of about L.843,000, the amount into Genoa alone was L.823,000. That year was one of excessive imports and 1839 one of equal depression, but this can only bear upon the facts of the case so far as proportionate quantities.

In 1839, total imports of cottons into Genoa-value L.494,000

Of which from England 313,680

Total re-exports 475,000

Of which to Tuscany L.131,760

Naples and Sicily 110,800

Austria 61,080

Parma and Placentia 40,840

Sardinia Island 28,320

Switzerland 22,240

Roman States 14,880

GIBRALTAR 31,440

The total value of cottons introduced into the Roman states is stated for 1839 at L.108,640, of which the whole imported from France, Sardinia, and Tuscany-

1839. Total imports of cotton and hempen manufactures classed together into Tuscany (Leghorn) L.440,000

Of woollens 117,200

"The total imports of woollen, cotton, and hempen goods together, in the same year, were to the amount of L.155,000.

"Of the imports and exports of Naples, unfortunately, no accounts are possessed; but the imports of cottons into the island of Sicily for 1839 were only to the extent of L.26,000, of which to the value of L.8,000 only from England. In 1838 the total imports of cottons were for L.170,720, but no re-exportation from the island. The whole of the inconsiderable exports of cottons from Malta are made to Turkey, Greece, the Barbary States, Egypt, and the Ionian Isles, according to the returns of 1839."

From these facts and figures, derived from official documents, of the existence of which it is probable Se?or Marliani was not aware, it will be observed at once how extremely light and fallacious are the grounds on which he jumps to conclusions. What more preposterous than the vague assumption founded on data little better then guess-work, that one-fourth of the whole exports of British cottons to Italy and the Italian islands, say L.500,000 out of L.2,000,000, go to Spain, when, in point of fact, not one-tenth of the amount does, or can find its way there-or could, under any conceivable circumstances short of an absolute famine crop of fabrics in France and England. Neither prices nor commercial profits could support the extra charges of a longer voyage out, landing charges, transhipment and return voyage to the coasts of Spain. It has been shown that in the year 1840, not the shipment of a single yard of cottons took place from Genoa, the only port admitting of the probability of such an operation.

Not less preposterous is the allegation, that three-fourths of the whole exports of British cottons to Portugal are destined for, and introduced into Spain by contraband. Assuming that Spain, with thirteen and a half millions of people, consumes, in the whole, cotton goods to the value of

L.2,200,000

Why should not Portugal, with more than three and a half millions of inhabitants, that is more than one-fourth the population of Spain, consume also more than one-fourth the value of cotton goods, or say only 550,000?

Brazil, a ci-devant colony of Portugal, and with a Portuguese population, as may be said, of 5,400,000, consumed British cotton fabrics to the value, in 1840, of 1,525,000

So, also, why should not Italy and the Italian islands, with twenty-two millions of people, be able to consume as much cotton values as Spain with 13? millions; or say only the whole amount really exported there from this country of 2,005,000?

It is necessary for the interests of truth, for the interests also of both countries, that the popular mind, the mind of the public men of Spain also, should be disabused in respect of two important errors. The first is, that an enormous balance of trade against Spain, that is, of British exports, licit and illicit too, compared with imports from Spain-results annually in favour of this country, from the present state of our commercial exchanges with her. The second is, the greatly exaggerated notion of the transcendant amount of the illicit trade carried on with Spain in British commodities, cottons more especially. In correction of the latter misconception, we have shown that the amount of British cotton introduced by contraband cannot exceed, nor equal,

L.780,640

Instead, as asserted by Se?or Marliani, of 1,683,268

And, in correction of the first error relative to the balance of trade, we have established the feet by calculations of approximate fidelity-for exactitude is out of the question and unattainable with the materials to be worked up-that an excess of values, that is, of exports, results to Spain upon such balance as against imports, licit and illicit, to the extent per annum of 550,000

It is therefore Great Britain, and not Spain, which is entitled to demand that this adverse balance be redressed, and which would stand justified in retaliating the restrictions and prohibitions on Spanish products, with which, so unjustly, Spain now visits those of Great Britain. Far from us be the advocacy of a policy so harsh-we will add, so unwise; but at least let our disinterested friendship and moderation be appreciated, and provoke, in reason meet, their appropriate consideration.

The more formidable, because far more extensive and facile abuses, arising out of the unparalleled contraband traffic of which Spain is, and long has been, the theatre, and the attempted repression of which requires the constant employment of entire armies of regular troops, are elsewhere to be found in action and guarded against; they concern a neighbour nearer than Great Britain. According to an official report made to his Government by Don Mateo Durou, the active and intelligent consul for Spain at Bordeaux, and the materials for which were extracted from the customhouse returns of France, the trade betwixt France and Spain is thus stated, but necessarily abridged:-

Francs.

1840.-Total exports from France into Spain, 104,679,141

1840.-Total imports into France from Spain, 42,684,761

-----

Deficit against Spain, 61,994,380

France, therefore, exported nearly two and a half times as much as she imported from Spain; a result greatly the reverse of that established in the trade of Spain with Great Britain. In these exports from France, cotton manufactures figure for a total of

34,251,068 fr.

Or, in sterling, L.1,427,000

Of which smuggled in by the land or Pyrennean frontier, 32,537,992 fr.

By sea, only 1,713,076 ...

Linen yarns, entered for 15,534,391 ...

Silks, for 8,953,423 ...

Woollens, for 8,919,760 ...

Among these imports from France, various other prohibited articles are enumerated besides cottons. As here exhibited, the illicit introduction of cotton goods from France into Spain is almost double in amount that of British cottons. The fact may be accounted for from the closer proximity of France, the superior facilities and economy of land transit, the establishment of stores of goods in Bayonne, Bordeaux, &c., from which the Spanish dealers may be supplied in any quantity and assortment to order, however small; whilst from Great Britain heavy cargoes only can be dispatched, and from Gibraltar quantities in bulk could alone repay the greater risk of the smuggler by sea.

Se?or Durou adds the following brief reflections upon this exposé of the French contraband trade. "Let the manufactures of Catalonia be protected; but there is no need to make all Spain tributary to one province, when it cannot satisfy the necessities of the others, neither in the quantity, the quality, nor the cost of its fabrics. What would result from a protecting duty? Why, that contraband trade would be stopped, and the premiums paid by the assurance companies established in Bayonne, Oleron, and Perpignan, would enter into the Exchequer of the State."

The active measures decreed by the Spanish Government in July and October 1841, supported by cordons of troops at the foot of the Pyrenees, have, indeed, very materially interfered with and checked the progress of this contraband trade. In consequence of ancient compact, the Basque, that is frontier provinces of Spain, enjoyed, among other exclusive privileges, that of being exempt from Government customhouses, or customs' regulations. For this privilege, a certain inconsiderable subsidy was periodically voted for the service of the State. Regent Espartero resolutely suspended first, and then abrogated, this branch of the fueros. He carried the line of the customhouses from the Ebro, where they were comparatively useless and scarcely possible to guard, to the very foot and passes of the Pyrenees. The advantageous effect of these vigorous proceedings was not long to wait for, and it may be found developed in the Report to the Chamber of Deputies in Paris, before referred to; in which M. Chégaray, the rapporteur on the part of the complaining petitioners of Bayonne, Bordeaux, &c., after stating that the general exports of France to Spain in

1839 represented the aggregate sum of 83,000,000 francs,

1840 " 104,000,000 francs,

1841 " 101,000,000 francs,

proceeds to say, that the general returns for 1842 were not yet (April 11) made up, but that "M. le directeur-général des douanes nous a declaré que la diminution avait été enorme." But although the general returns could not be given, those specially referring to the single customhouse of Bayonne had been obtained, and they amply confirmed the assertion of the enormous diminution. The export of cottons, woollens, silks, and linens, from that port to Spain, which in

1840 amounted in value to 15,800,000 francs,

1841 also 15,800,000 francs,

1842 had fallen to 5,700,000 francs.

A fall, really tremendous, of nearly two-thirds.

M. Chégaray, unfortunately, can find no other grievance to complain of but the too strict enforcement of the Spanish custom laws, by which French and Spanish contrabandists are harassed and damaged-can suggest no other remedy than the renewal of the "family compact" of the Bourbons-no hopes for the revival of smuggling prosperity from the perpetuation of the French reciprocity system of trade all on one side, but in the restoration of the commercial privileges so long enjoyed exclusively by French subjects and shipping, but now broken or breaking down under the hammering blows of Espartero-nor discover any prospect of relief until the Spanish customhouse lines are transferred to their old quarters on the other side of the Ebro, and the fueros of the Biscaiano provinces, which, by ancient treaty, he claims to be under the guarantee of France, re-established in all their pristine plenitude.

It is surely time for the intelligence, if not the good sense, of France to do justice by these day-dreams. The tutelage of Spain has escaped from the Bourbons of Paris, and the ward of full majority will not be allowed, cannot be, if willing, to return or remain under the trammels of an interested guardian, with family pretensions to the property in default of heirs direct. France, above all countries, has the least right to remonstrate against the reign of prohibitions and restrictions, being herself the classic land of both. Let her commence rather the work of reform at home, and render tardy justice to Spain, which she has drained so long, and redress to Great Britain, against whose more friendly commercial code she is constantly warring by differential preferences of duties in favour of the same commodities produced in other countries, which consume less of what she abounds in, and have less the means of consumption. Beyond all, let her cordially join this country in urging upon the Spanish Government, known to be nowise averse to the urgency of a wise revision and an enlightened modification of the obsolete principles of an absurd and impracticable policy both fiscal and commercial-a policy which beggars the treasury, whilst utterly failing to protect native industry, and demoralizes at the same time that it impoverishes the people. We are not of the number of those who would abandon the assertion of a principle quoad another country, the wisdom and expediency of which we have advocated, and are still prepared to advocate, in its regulated application to our own, from the sordid motive of benefiting British manufactures to the ruin of those of Spain. Rather, we say to the government of Spain, let a fair protection be the rule, restrictions the exceptions, prohibition the obsolete outcast, of your fiscal and commercial policy. We import into this country, the chief and most valuable products of Spain, those which compose the elements and a very considerable proportion of her wealth and industry, are either untaxed, or taxed little more than nominally. We may still afford, with proper encouragement and return in kind, to abate duties on such Spanish products as are taxed chiefly because coming into competition with those of our own colonial possessions, and on those highly taxed as luxuries, for revenue; and this we can do, and are prepared to do, although Spain is so enormously indebted to us already on the balance of commercial exchanges.

This revision of her fiscal system, and reconstruction, on fair and reciprocal conditions, of her commercial code, are questions of far deeper import-and they are of vital import-to Spain than to this empire. Look at the following statement of her gigantic debt, upon which, beyond some three or four hundred thousand pounds annually, for the present, on the capitalized coupons of over-due interest accruing on the conversion and consolidation operation of 1834, the Toreno abomination, not one sueldo of interest is now paying, has been paid for years, or can be paid for years to come, and then only as industry furnishes the means by extended trade, and more abundant customhouse revenues, resulting from an improved tariff.

Statement of the Spanish Debt at commencement of 1842:-

Internal- Liquidated, that is verified, L.50,130,565 Without interest.

Not liquidated 9,364,228 with 5 per cent in paper.

Not consolidated, 2,609,832

Bearing 5 per cent, 15,242,593 Interest, L.762,128

Do. 3 do. 5,842,632 - 233,705

----- -----

L.83,189,850 L.995,833

----- -----

External Loan of 1834, and the conversion of old debt, L.33,985,939 5 per cent, L.1,699,296

Balance of inscription to the public treasury of France, 2,782,681 - 160,000

Inscriptions in payment of English claims, 600,000 - 30,000

Ditto for American claims, 120,000 - 6,000

----- -----

L.37,488,620 L.1,895,296

Capitalized coupons, treasury bonds, &c., amount not stated, but some millions more 3 per cent,

Deferred, 5,944,584

Ditto, 4,444,040 Calculated at 100 reals

Passive, 10,542,582 per L. sterling.

-----

20,931,206

-----

Grand total, exclusive of capitalization L.141,669,676

The latest account of Spanish finance, that for 1842 before referred to, exhibits an almost equally hopeless prospect of annual deficit, as between revenue and expenditure; 1st, the actual receipts of revenue being stated at

879,193,475 reals

The expenditure, 1,541,639,879

-----

Deficit, 662,446,404

That is, with a revenue sterling of L.8,791,934

A deficiency besides uncovered, of 6,624,464

Assuming the amount of the contraband traffic in Spain at six millions sterling per annum, instead of the ten millions estimated, we think most erroneously, by Se?or Marliani, the result of an average duty on the amount of 25 per cent, would produce to the treasury L.1,500,000 per annum; and more in proportion as the traffic, when legitimated, should naturally extend, as the trade would be sure to extend, between two countries like Great Britain and Spain, alone capable of exchanging millions with each other for every million now operated. The L.1,500,000 thus gained would almost suffice to meet the annual interest on the L.34,000,000 loan conversion of 1834, still singularly classed in stock exchange parlance as "active stock." As for the remaining mass of domestic and foreign debt, there can be no hope for its gradual extinction but by the sale of national domains, in payment for which the titles of debt of all classes may be, as some now are, receivable in payment. As upwards of two thousand millions of reals of debt are said to be thus already extinguished, and the national domains yet remaining for disposal are valued at nearly the same sum, say L.20,000,000, it is clear that the final extinction of the debt is a hopeless prospect, although a very large reduction might be accomplished by that enhanced value of these domains which can only flow from increase of population and the rapid progression of industrial prosperity.

All Spain, excepting the confining provinces in the side of France, and especially the provinces where are the great commercial ports, such as Cadiz, Malaga,27 Corunna, &c., have laid before the Cortes and Government the most energetic memorials and remonstrances against the prohibition system of tariffs in force, and ask why they, who, in favour of their own industry and products, never asked for prohibitions, are to be sacrificed to Catalonia and Biscay? The Spanish Government and the most distinguished public men are well known to be favourable, to be anxiously meditating, an enlightened change of system, and negotiations are progressing prosperously, or would progress, but for France. When will France learn to imitate the generous policy which announced to her on the conclusion of peace with China-We have stipulated no conditions for ourselves from which we desire to exclude you or other nations?

We could have desired, for the pleasure and profit of the public, to extend our notice of, and extracts from, the excellent work of Se?or Marliani, so often referred to, but our limits forbid. To show, however, the state and progress of the cotton manufacture in Catalonia, how little it gains by prohibitions, and how much it is prejudiced by the contraband trade, we beg attention to the following extract:-

"Since the year 1769, when the cotton manufacture commenced in Catalonia, the trade enjoyed a complete monopoly, not only in Spain, but also in her colonies. To this protection were added the fostering and united efforts of private individuals. In 1780, a society for the encouragement of the cotton manufacture was established in Barcelona. Well, what has been the result? Let us take the unerring test of figures for our guide. Let us take the medium importation of raw cotton from 1834 to 1840 inclusive, (although the latter year presents an inadmissible augmentation,) and we shall have an average amount of 9,909,261 lbs. of raw cotton. This quantity is little more than half that imported by the English in the year 1784. The sixteen millions of pounds imported that year by the English are less than the third part imported by the same nation in 1790, which amounted in all to thirty-one millions; it is only the sixth part of that imported in 1800, when it rose to 56,010,732 lbs.; it is less than the seventh part of the British importations in 1810, which amounted to seventy-two millions of pounds; it is less than the fifteenth part of the cotton imported into the same country in 1820, when the sum amounted to 150,672,655 pounds; it is the twenty-sixth part of the British importation in 1830, which was that year 263,961,452 lbs.; and lastly, the present annual importation into Catalonia is about the sixty-sixth part of that into Great Britain for the year 1840, when the latter amounted to 592,965,504 lbs. of raw cotton. Though the comparative difference of progress is not so great with France, still it shows the slow progress of the Catalonian manufactures in a striking degree. The quantity now imported of raw cotton into Spain is about the half of that imported into France from 1803 to 1807; a fourth part compared with French importations of that material from 1807 to 1820; seventh-and-a-half with respect to those of 1830; and a twenty-seventh part of the quantity introduced into France in 1840."

And we conclude with the following example, one among several which Se?or Marliani gives, of the daring and open manner in which the operations of the contrabandistas are conducted, and of the scandalous participation of authorities and people-incontestable evidences of a wide-spread depravation of moral sentiments.

"Don Juan Prim, inspector of preventive service, gave information to the Government and revenue board in Madrid, on the 22d of November 1841, that having attempted to make a seizure of contraband goods in the town of Estepona, in the province of Malaga, where he was aware a large quantity of smuggled goods existed, he entered the town with a force of carabineers and troops of the line. On entering, he ordered the suspected dep?t of goods to be surrounded, and gave notice to the second alcalde of the town to attend to assist him in the search. In some time the second alcalde presented himself, and at the instance of M. Prim dispersed some groups of the inhabitants who had assumed a hostile attitude. In a few minutes after, and just as some shots were fired, the first alcalde of the town appeared, and stated that the whole population was in a state of complete excitement, and that he could not answer for the consequences; whereupon he resigned his authority. While this was passing, about 200 men, well armed, took up a position upon a neighbouring eminence, and assumed a hostile attitude. At the same time a carabineer, severely wounded from the discharge of a blunderbuss, was brought up, so that there was nothing left for M. Prim but to withdraw his force immediately out of the town, leaving the smugglers and their goods to themselves, since neither the alcaldes nor national guards of the town, though demanded in the name of the law, the regent, and the nation, would aid M. Prim's force against them!"

All that consummate statesmanship can do, will be done, doubtless, by the present Government of Great Britain, to carry out and complete the economical system on which they have so courageously thrown themselves en avant, by the negotiation and completion of commercial treaties on every side, and by the consequent mitigation or extinction of hostile tariffs. Without this indispensable complement of their own tariff reform, and low prices consequent, he must be a bold man who can reflect upon the consequences without dismay. Those consequences can benefit no one class, and must involve in ruin every class in the country, excepting the manufacturing mammons of the Anti-corn-law league, who, Saturn-like, devour their own kindred, and salute every fall of prices as an apology for grinding down wages and raising profits. It may be well, too, for sanguine young statesmen like Mr Gladstone to turn to the DEBT, and cast about how interest is to be forthcoming with falling prices, falling rents, falling profits, (the exception above apart,) excise in a rapid state of decay, and customs' revenue a blank!

* * *

FOOTNOTES.

Footnote 1: (return) This was not the only case of compensation made out against this travelling companion. "Milord," says our tourist, "in his quality of bulldog, was so great a destroyer of cats, that we judged it wise to take some precautions against overcharges in this particular. Therefore, on our departure from Genoa, in which town Milord had commenced his practices upon the feline race of Italy, we enquired the price of a full-grown, well-conditioned cat, and it was agreed on all hands that a cat of the ordinary species-grey, white, and tortoiseshell-was worth two pauls-(learned cats, Angora cats, cats with two heads or three tails, are not, of course, included in this tariff.) Paying down this sum for two several Genoese cats which had been just strangled by our friend, we demanded a legal receipt, and we added successively other receipts of the same kind, so that this document became at length an indisputable authority for the price of cats throughout all Italy. As often as Milord committed a new assassination, and the attempt was made to extort from us more than two pauls as the price of blood, we drew this document from our pocket, and proved beyond a cavil that two pauls was what we were accustomed to pay on such occasions, and obstinate indeed must have been the man or woman who did not yield to such a weight of precedent."

Footnote 2: (return) It is amusing to contrast the artistic manner in which our author makes all his statements, with the style of a guide-book, speaking on the manufactures and industry of Florence. It is from Richard's Italy we quote. Mark the exquisite medley of humdrum, matter-of-fact details, jotted down as if by some unconscious piece of mechanism:-"Florence manufactures excellent silks, woollen cloths, elegant carriages, bronze articles, earthenware, straw hats, perfumes, essences, and candied fruits; also, all kinds of turnery and inlaid work, piano-fortes, philosophical and mathematical instruments, &c. The dyes used at this city are much admired, particularly the black, and its sausages are famous throughout all Italy."

Footnote 3: (return) The extreme misery of the paupers in Sicily, who form, he tells us, a tenth part of the population, quite haunts the imagination of M. Dumas. He recurs to it several times. At one place he witnesses the distribution, at the door of a convent, of soup to these poor wretches, and gives a terrible description of the famine-stricken group. "All these creatures," he continues, "had eaten nothing since yesterday evening. They had come there to receive their porringer of soup, as they had come to-day, as they would come to-morrow. This was all their nourishment for twenty-four hours, unless some of them might obtain a few grani from their fellow-citizens, or the compassion of strangers; but this is very rare, as the Syracusans are familiarized with the spectacle, and few strangers visit Syracuse. When the distributor of this blessed soup appeared, there were unheard-of cries, and each one rushed forward with his wooden bowl in his hand. Only there were some too feeble to exclaim, or to run, and who dragged themselves forward, groaning, upon their hands and knees. There was in the midst of all, a child clothed, not in anything that could be called a shirt, but a kind of spider's web, with a thousand holes, who had no wooden bowl, and who wept with hunger. It stretched out its poor little meagre hands, and joined them together, to supply as well as it could, by this natural receptacle, the absent bowl. The cook poured in a spoonful of the soup. The soup was boiling, and burned the child's hand. It uttered a cry of pain, and was compelled to open its fingers, and the soup fell upon the pavement. The child threw itself on all fours, and began to eat in the manner of a dog."-Vol. iii. p. 58.

And in another place he says, "Alas, this cry of hunger! it is the eternal cry of Sicily; I have heard nothing else for three months. There are miserable wretches, whose hunger has never been appeased, from the day when, lying in their cradle, they began to draw the milk from their exhausted mothers, to the last hour when, stretched on their bed of death, they have expired endeavouring to swallow the sacred host which the priest had laid upon their lips. Horrible to think of! there are human beings to whom, to have eaten once sufficiently, would be a remembrance for all their lives to come."-Vol. iv. p. 108.

Footnote 4: (return) Lar is the Tartar plural of all substantives.

Footnote 5: (return) Beaters for the game.

Footnote 6: (return) Rather less than an English yard.

Footnote 7: (return) The Tartars have an invariable custom, of taking off some part of their dress and giving it to the bearer of good news.

Footnote 8: (return) Coin.

Footnote 9: (return) Shakhéeds, traders of the sect of Souni. Yakhoúnt the senior moóllah.

Footnote 10: (return) Of the two opening lines we subjoin the original-to the vivacity and spirit of which it is, perhaps, impossible to do justice in translation:-

"Ihr-Ihr dort aussen in der Welt,

Die Nasen einges pannt!"

Eberhard, Count of Wurtemberg, reigned from 1344 to 1392. Schiller was a Swabian, and this poem seems a patriotic effusion to exalt one of the heroes of his country, of whose fame (to judge by the lines we have just quoted) the rest of the Germans might be less reverentially aware.

Footnote 11: (return) Schiller lived to reverse, in the third period of his intellectual career, many of the opinions expressed in the first. The sentiment conveyed in these lines on Rousseau is natural enough to the author of "The Robbers," but certainly not to the poet of "Wallenstein" and the "Lay of the Bell." We confess we doubt the maturity of any mind that can find either a saint or a martyr in Jean Jacques.

Footnote 12: (return) "Und Empfindung soll mein Richtschwert seyn."

A line of great vigour in the original, but which, if literally translated, would seem extravagant in English.

Footnote 13: (return) Joseph, in the original.

Footnote 14: (return)

"The World was sad, the garden was a wild,

And Man, the Hermit, sigh'd-till Woman smiled."

CAMPBELL.

Footnote 15: (return) Literally, "the eye beams its sun-splendour," or, "beams like a sun." For the construction that the Translator has put upon the original (which is extremely obscure) in the preceding lines of the stanza, he is indebted to Mr Carlyle. The general meaning of the Poet is, that Love rules all things in the inanimate or animate creation; that, even in the moral world, opposite emotions or principles meet and embrace each other. The idea is pushed into an extravagance natural to the youth, and redeemed by the passion, of the Author. But the connecting links are so slender, nay, so frequently omitted, in the original, that a certain degree of paraphrase in many of the stanzas is absolutely necessary to supply them, and render the general sense and spirit of the poem intelligible to the English reader.

Footnote 16: (return) Mr Shaw's researches include some curious physiological and other details, for an exposition of which our pages are not appropriate. But we shall here give the titles of his former papers. "An account of some Experiments and Observations on the Parr, and on the Ova of the Salmon, proving the Parr to be the Young of the Salmon."-Edinburgh New Phil. Journ. vol. xxi. p. 99. "Experiments on the Development and Growth of the Fry of the Salmon, from the Exclusion of the Ovum to the Age of Six Months."-Ibid. vol. xxiv. p. 165. "Account of Experimental Observations on the Development and Growth of Salmon Fry, from the Exclusion of the Ova to the Age of Two Years."-Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, vol. xiv. part ii. (1840.) The reader will find an abstract of these discoveries in the No. of this Magazine for April 1840.

Footnote 17: (return) Mr Young has, however, likewise repeated and confirmed Mr Shaw's earlier experiments regarding the slow growth of salmon fry in fresh water, and the conversion of parr into smolts. We may add, that Sir William Jardine, a distinguished Ichthyologist and experienced angler, has also corroborated Mr Shaw's observations.

Footnote 18: (return) These two specimens are now preserved in the Museum of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

Footnote 19: (return) The existence in the rivers during spring, of grilse which have spawned, and which weigh only three or four pounds, is itself a conclusive proof of this retardation of growth in fresh water. These fish had run, as anglers say-that is, had entered the rivers about midsummer of the preceding year-and yet had made no progress. Had they remained in the sea till autumn, their size on entering the fresh waters would have been much greater; or had they spawned early in winter, and descended speedily to the sea, they might have returned again to the river in spring as small salmon, while their more sluggish brethren of the same age were still in the streams under the form of grilse. All their growth, then, seems to take place during their sojourn in the sea, usually from eight to twelve weeks. The length of time spent in the salt waters, by grilse and salmon which have spawned, corresponds nearly to the time during which smolts remain in these waters; the former two returning as clean salmon, the last-named making their first appearance in our rivers as grilse.

Footnote 20: (return) These two specimens, with their wire marks in situ, may now be seen in the Museum of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

Footnote 21: (return) Mr Shaw, for example, states the following various periods as those which he found to elapse between the deposition of the ova and the hatching of the fry-90, 101, 108, and 131 days. In the last instance, the average temperature of the river for eight weeks, had not exceeded 33°.

Footnote 22: (return) If we are rightly informed, salmon were not in the habit of spawning in the rivulets which run into Loch Shin, till under the direction of Lord Francis Egerton some full-grown fish were carried there previous to the breeding season. These spawned; and their produce, as was to be expected, after descending to the sea, returned in due course, and, making their way through the loch, ascended their native tributaries.

Footnote 23: (return) A complete series of specimens, from the day of hatching till about the middle of the sixth year, has been deposited by Mr Shaw in the Museum of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

Footnote 24: (return) Mr Shaw informs us, moreover, that if those individuals which have assumed the silvery lustre be forcibly detained for a month or two in fresh water, they will resume the coloured coating which they formerly bore. The captive females, he adds, manifested symptoms of being in a breeding state by the beginning of the autumn of their third year. They were, in truth, at this time as old as herlings, though not of corresponding size, owing to the entire absence of marine agency.

Footnote 25: (return) Another interesting result may be noticed in connexion with this Compensation Pond. The original streamlet, like most others, was naturally stocked with small "burn-trout," which never exceeded a few ounces in weight, as their ultimate term of growth. But, in consequence of the formation above referred to, and the great increase of their productive feeding-ground, and tranquil places for repose and play, these tiny creatures have, in some instances, attained to an enormous size. We lately examined one which weighed six pounds. It was not a sea-trout, but a common fresh-water one-Salmo fario. This strongly exemplifies the conformable nature of fishes; that is, their power of adaptation to a change of external circumstances. It is as if a small Shetland pony, by being turned into a clover field, could be expanded into the gigantic dimensions of a brewer's horse.

Footnote 26: (return) The specimen is preserved in the Museum of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

Footnote 27: (return) See Exposicion de que dirige á las Cortes et Ayuntamiento Constitucional de Malaga, from which the following are extracts:-"El ayuntamiento no puede menos de indicar, que entre los infinitos renglones fabriles aclimatados ya en Espana, las sedas de Valencia, los panos de muchas provincias, los hilados de Galicia, las blondas de Cataluna, las bayetas de Antequera, los hierros de Vizcaya y los elaborados por maquinaria en las ferrerías á un lado y otro de esta ciudad, han adelantado, prosperan y compiten con los efectos extranjeros mas acreditados. ?Y han solicitado acaso una prohibicion? Nó jamas: un derecho protector, sí; á su sombra se criaron, con la competencia se formaron y llegaron á su robustez.... Ingleterra figura en la exportacion por el mayor valor sin admitir comparacion alguna. Su gobierno piensa en reducir muy considerablemente todos los renglones de su arancil; pero se ha espresado con reserva para negar ó conceder, si lo estima conveniente, esta reduccion á las naciones que no correspondan á los beneficios que les ofrece; ninguno puede esperar que le favorezcan sin compensacion."

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Edinburgh; Printed by Ballantyne and Hughes Paul's Work.

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