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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 70,
+No. 431, September 1851, by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 70, No. 431, September 1851
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: December 5, 2013 [EBook #44361]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE, SEPT 1851 ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Brendan OConnor, Jonathan Ingram and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Library of Early Journals.)
+
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
+
+Small capital text has been replaced with all capitals.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+  BLACKWOOD'S
+
+  EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.
+
+  NO. CCCCXXXI.       SEPTEMBER, 1851.       VOL. LXX.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+  A CAMPAIGN IN TAKA,                                      251
+
+  MY NOVEL; OR, VARIETIES IN ENGLISH LIFE. PART XIII,      275
+
+  DISFRANCHISEMENT OF THE BOROUGHS,                        296
+
+  PARIS IN 1851.--(_Continued_,)                           310
+
+  MR RUSKIN'S WORKS,                                       326
+
+  PORTUGUESE POLITICS,                                     349
+
+  THE CONGRESS AND THE AGAPEDOME.--A TALE OF PEACE
+  AND LOVE,                                                359
+
+
+  EDINBURGH:
+
+  WILLIAM BLACKWOOD & SONS, 45 GEORGE STREET;
+  AND 37 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON.
+
+  _To whom all communications (post paid) must be addressed._
+
+  SOLD BY ALL THE BOOKSELLERS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM.
+
+  PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, EDINBURGH.
+
+
+
+
+BLACKWOOD'S
+
+EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.
+
+  NO. CCCCXXXI.      September, 1851.       VOL. LXX.
+
+
+
+
+A CAMPAIGN IN TAKA.
+
+     _Feldzug von Sennaar nach Taka, Basa, und Beni-Amer, mit
+     besonderem Hinblick auf die Völker von Bellad-Sudan._--[Campaign
+     from Sennaar to Taka, Basa, and Beni-Amer; with a particular
+     Glance at the Nations of Bellad-Sudan.]--VON FERDINAND WERNE.
+     Stuttgart: Königl. Hofbuchdruckerei. London: Williams and
+     Norgate. 1851.
+
+
+Africa, the least explored division of the globe's surface, and the
+best field for travellers of bold and enterprising character, has
+been the scene of three of the most remarkable books of their class
+that have appeared within the last ten years. We refer to Major
+Harris's narrative of his Ethiopian expedition--to the marvellous
+adventures of that modern Nimrod, Mr Gordon Cumming--to Mr Ferdinand
+Werne's strange and exciting account of his voyage up the White
+Nile. In our review of the last-named interesting and valuable
+work,[1] we mentioned that Mr Werne, previously to his expedition up
+the Nile, had been for several months in the Taka country, a region
+previously untrodden by Europeans, with an army commanded by Achmet
+Bascha, governor-general of the Egyptian province of Bellad-Sudan,
+who was operating against refractory tributaries. He has just
+published an account of this campaign, which afforded him, however,
+little opportunity of expatiating on well-contested battles,
+signal victories, or feats of heroic valour. On the other hand,
+his narrative abounds in striking incidents, in curious details of
+tribes and localities that have never before been described, and
+in perils and hardships not the less real and painful that they
+proceeded from no efforts of a resolute and formidable foe, but from
+the effects of a pernicious climate, and the caprice and negligence
+of a wilful and indolent commander.
+
+  [1] _Blackwood's Magazine_, No. CCCXCIX., for January 1849.
+
+It was early in 1840, and Mr Werne and his youngest brother Joseph
+had been resident for a whole year at Chartum, chief town of the
+province of Sudan, in the country of Sennaar. Chartum, it will be
+remembered by the readers of the "Expedition for the Discovery of
+the Sources of the White Nile," is situated at the confluence of
+the White and Blue streams, which, there uniting, flow northwards
+through Nubia and Egypt Proper to Cairo and the Mediterranean; and
+at Chartum it was that the two Wernes had beheld, in the previous
+November, the departure of the first expedition up Nile, which they
+were forbidden to join, and which met with little success. The
+elder Werne, whose portrait--that of a very determined-looking
+man, bearded, and in Oriental costume--is appended to the present
+volume, appears to have been adventurous and a rambler from his
+youth upwards. In 1822 he had served in Greece, and had now been
+for many years in Eastern lands. Joseph Werne, his youngest and
+favourite brother, had come to Egypt at his instigation, after
+taking at Berlin his degree as Doctor of Medicine, to study, before
+commencing practice, some of the extraordinary diseases indigenous
+in that noxious climate. Unfortunately, as recorded in Mr Werne's
+former work, this promising young man, who seems to have possessed
+in no small degree the enterprise, perseverance, and fortitude so
+remarkable in his brother, ultimately fell a victim to one of those
+fatal maladies whose investigation was the principal motive of his
+visit to Africa. The first meeting in Egypt of the two brothers was
+at Cairo; and of it a characteristic account is given by the elder,
+an impetuous, we might almost say a pugnacious man, tolerably prompt
+to take offence, and upon whom, as he himself says at page 67, the
+Egyptian climate had a violently irritating effect.
+
+"Our meeting, at Guerra's tavern in Cairo, was so far remarkable,
+that my brother knew me immediately, whilst I took him for some
+impertinent Frenchman, disposed to make game of me, inasmuch as he,
+in the petulance of his joy, fixed his eyes upon me, measuring me
+from top to toe, and then laughed at the fury with which I rushed
+upon him, to call him to an account, and, if necessary, to have him
+out. We had not seen each other for eight years, during which he
+had grown into a man, and, moreover, his countenance had undergone
+a change, for, by a terrible cut, received in a duel, the muscle of
+risibility had been divided on one side, and the poor fellow could
+laugh only with half his face. In the first overpowering joy of our
+meeting in this distant quarter of the globe, we could not get the
+wine over our tongues, often as my Swiss friend De Salis (over whose
+cheeks the tears were chasing each other) and other acquaintances
+struck their glasses against ours, encouraging us to drink.... I now
+abandoned the hamlet of Tura--situated in the desert, but near the
+Nile, about three leagues above Cairo, and whither I had retreated
+to do penance and to work at my travels--as well as my good friend
+Dr Schledehaus of Osnabruck, (then holding an appointment at the
+military school, now director of the marine hospital of Alexandria,)
+with whom my brother had studied at Bonn, and I hired a little house
+in the Esbekie Square in Cairo. After half an hour's examination,
+Joseph was appointed surgeon-major, with the rank of a Sakulagassi
+or captain, in the central hospital of Kasr-el-Ain, with a thousand
+piastres a month, and rations for a horse and four servants. Our
+views constantly directed to the interior of Africa, we suffered
+a few months to glide by in the old city of the Khalifs, dwelling
+together in delightful brotherly harmony. But our thirst for
+travelling was unslaked; to it I had sacrificed my appointment as
+chancellor of the Prussian Consulate at Alexandria; Joseph received
+his nomination as regimental surgeon to the 1st regiment in Sennaar,
+including that of physician to the central hospital at Chartum. Our
+friends were concerned for us on account of the dangerous climate,
+but, nevertheless, we sailed with good courage up the Nile, happy
+to escape from the noise of the city, and to be on our way to new
+scenes."
+
+A stroke of the sun, received near the cataract of Ariman in
+Upper Nubia, and followed by ten days' delirium, soon convinced
+the younger Werne that his friends' anxiety on his behalf was
+not groundless. During the whole of their twelvemonth's stay at
+Chartum, they were mercilessly persecuted by intermittent fever,
+there most malignant, and under whose torturing and lowering attacks
+their sole consolation was that, as they never chanced both to be
+ill together, they were able alternately to nurse each other. At
+last, fearing that body or mind would succumb to these reiterated
+fever-fits, and the first expedition up the White Nile having, to
+their great disgust and disappointment, sailed without them, they
+made up their minds to quit for ever the pestiferous Chartum and the
+burning steppes of Bellad-Sudan. Whilst preparing for departure,
+they received a visit from the chief Cadi, who told them, over a
+glass of cardinal--administered by Dr Werne as medicine, to evade
+his Mahomedan scruples--that Effendina (Excellency) Achmet Bascha
+was well pleased with the brotherly love they manifested, taking
+care of each other in sickness, and that they would do well to pay
+their respects occasionally at the Divan. This communication was
+almost immediately followed by the arrival at Chartum of Dr Gand,
+physician to Abbas Bascha. This gentleman had been a comrade of
+Ferdinand Werne's in Greece, and he recommended the two brothers to
+Achmet, with whom he was intimate, in true Oriental style, as men
+of universal genius and perfect integrity, to whom he might intrust
+both his body and his soul. The consequence of this liberal encomium
+was, that Achmet fixed his eyes upon them to accompany him, in
+the capacity of confidential advisers, upon a projected campaign.
+Informed of this plan and of the advantages it included, the Wernes
+joyfully abandoned their proposed departure. Joseph was to be
+made house-physician to Achmet and his harem, as well as medical
+inspector of the whole province, in place of Soliman Effendi, (the
+renegade Baron di Pasquali of Palermo,) a notorious poisoner, in
+whose hands the Bascha did not consider himself safe. Ferdinand
+Werne, who had held the rank of captain in Greece, was made
+_bimbaschi_ or major, and was attached, as engineer, to Achmet's
+person, with good pay and many privileges. "At a later period he
+would have made me bey, if I--not on his account, for he was an
+enlightened Circassian, but on that of the Turkish jackasses--would
+have turned Mussulman. I laughed at this, and he said no more about
+it." Delighted to have secured the services of the two Germans,
+Achmet ordered it to be reported to his father-in-law, Mehemet Ali,
+for his approval, and took counsel with his new officers concerning
+the approaching campaign. Turk-like, he proposed commencing it in
+the rainy season. Mr Werne opposed this as likely to cost him half
+his army, the soldiers being exceedingly susceptible to rain, and
+advised the erection of blockhouses at certain points along the
+line of march where springs were to be found, to secure water for
+the troops. The Bascha thought this rather a roundabout mode of
+proceeding, held his men's lives very cheap, and boasted of his
+seven hundred dromedaries, every one of which, in case of need,
+could carry three soldiers. His counsellors were dismissed, with
+injunctions to secresy, and on their return home they found at their
+door, as a present from the Bascha, two beautiful dromedaries,
+tall, powerful, ready saddled for a march, and particularly adapted
+for a campaign, inasmuch as they started not when muskets were
+fired between their ears. A few days later, Mr Werne was sent
+for by Achmet, who, when the customary coffee had been taken,
+dismissed his attendants by a sign, and informed him, with a gloomy
+countenance, that the people of Taka refused to pay their _tulba_,
+or tribute. His predecessor, Churdschid Bascha, having marched into
+that country, had been totally defeated in a _chaaba_, or tract of
+forest. Since that time, Achmet mournfully declared, the tribes had
+not paid a single piastre, and he found himself grievously in want
+of money. So, instead of marching south-westward to Darfour, as he
+had intended, he would move north-eastward to Taka, chastise the
+stubborn insolvents, and replenish the coffers of the state. "Come
+with me," said he, to Mr Werne; "upon the march we shall all recover
+our health," (he also suffered from frequent and violent attacks of
+fever;) "yonder are water and forests, as in Germany and Circassia,
+and very high mountains." It mattered little to so restless and
+rambling a spirit as Mr Ferdinand Werne whether his route lay inland
+towards the Mountains of the Moon, or coastwards to the Red Sea. His
+brother was again sick, and spoke of leaving the country; but Mr
+Werne cheered him up, pointed out to him upon the map an imaginary
+duchy which he was to conquer in the approaching war, and revived
+an old plan of going to settle at Bagdad, there to practise as
+physician and apothecary. "We resolved, therefore, to take our
+passports with us, so that, if we chose, we might embark on the Red
+Sea. By this time I had seen through the Bascha, and I resolved to
+communicate to him an idea which I often, in the interest of these
+oppressed tribes, had revolved in my mind, namely, that he should
+place himself at their head, and renounce obedience to the Egyptian
+vampire. I did subsequently speak to him of the plan, and it might
+have been well and permanently carried out, had he not, instead of
+striving to win the confidence of the chiefs, tyrannised over them
+in every possible manner. Gold and regiments! was his motto."
+
+Meanwhile the influential Dr Gand had fallen seriously ill, and
+was so afflicted with the irritability already referred to as a
+consequence of the climate, that no one could go near him but the
+two Wernes. He neglected Joseph's good advice to quit Chartum at
+once, put it off till it was too late, and died on his journey
+northwards. His body lay buried for a whole year in the sand of the
+desert; then his family, who were going to France, dug it up to take
+with them. Always a very thin man, little more than skin and bone,
+the burning sand had preserved him like a mummy. There was no change
+in his appearance; not a hair gone from his mustaches. Strange is
+the confusion and alternation of life and death in that ardent
+and unwholesome land of Nubia. To-day in full health, to-morrow
+prostrate with fever, from which you recover only to be again
+attacked. Dead, in twenty-four hours or less corruption is busy on
+the corpse; bury it promptly in the sand, and in twelve months you
+may disinter it, perfect as if embalmed. At Chartum, the very focus
+of disease, death, it might be thought, is sufficiently supplied by
+fever to need no other purveyors. Nevertheless poisoning seems a
+pretty common practice there. Life in Chartum is altogether, by Mr
+Werne's account, a most curious thing. During the preparations for
+the campaign, a Wurtemberg prince, Duke Paul William of Mergentheim,
+arrived in the place, and was received with much pomp. "For the
+first time I saw the Bascha sit upon a chair; he was in full
+uniform, a red jacket adorned with gold, a great diamond crescent,
+and three brilliant stars upon his left breast, his sabre by his
+side." The prince, a fat good-humoured German, was considerably
+impressed by the state displayed, and left the presence with many
+obeisances. The next day he dined with the Bascha, whom he and the
+Wernes hoped to see squatted on the ground, and feeding with his
+fingers. They were disappointed; the table was arranged in European
+fashion; wine of various kinds was there, especially champagne,
+(which the servants, notwithstanding Werne's remonstrances, insisted
+on shaking before opening, and which consequently flew about the
+room in foaming fountains;) bumper-toasts were drunk; and the
+whole party, Franks and Turks, seem to have gradually risen into
+a glorious state of intoxication, during which they vowed eternal
+friendship to each other in all imaginable tongues; and the German
+prince declared he would make the campaign to Taka with the Bascha,
+draw out the plan, and overwhelm the enemy. This jovial meeting
+was followed by a quieter entertainment given by the Wernes to the
+prince, who declared he was travelling as a private gentleman, and
+wished to be treated accordingly; and then Soliman Effendi, the
+Sicilian renegade, made a respectful application for permission to
+invite the "_Altezza Tedesca_," for whom he had conceived a great
+liking. A passage from Mr Werne is here worth quoting, as showing
+the state of society at Chartum. "I communicated the invitation,
+with the remark that the Sicilian was notorious for his poisonings,
+but that I had less fear on his highness' account than on that of
+my brother, who was already designated to replace him in his post.
+The prince did not heed the danger; moreover, I had put myself on a
+peculiar footing with Soliman Effendi, and now told him plainly that
+he had better keep his vindictive manœuvres for others than us,
+for that my brother and I should go to dinner with loaded pistols
+in our pockets, and would shoot him through the head (_brucciare
+il cervello_) if one of us three felt as much as a belly-ache at
+his table. The dinner was served in the German fashion; all the
+guests came, except Vaissière (formerly a French captain, now a
+slave-dealer, with the cross of the legion of honour.) He would
+not trust Soliman, who was believed to have poisoned a favourite
+female-slave of his after a dispute they had about money matters.
+The dinner went off merrily and well. The duke changed his mind
+about going to Taka, but promised to join in the campaign on his
+return from Fàszogl, and bade me promise the Bascha in his name a
+crocodile-rifle and a hundred bottles of champagne."
+
+Long and costly were the preparations for the march; the more so
+that Mr Werne and his brother, who saw gleaming in the distance the
+golden cupolas of Bagdad, desired to take all their baggage with
+them, and also sufficient stores for the campaign--not implicitly
+trusting to the Bascha's promise that his kitchen and table should
+be always at their service. Ten camels were needed to carry the
+brothers' baggage. One of their greatest troubles was to know how
+to dispose of their collection of beasts and birds. "The young
+maneless lion, our greatest joy, was dead--Soliman Effendi, who
+was afraid of him, having dared to poison him, as I learned, after
+the renegade's death, from one of our own people." But of birds
+there were a host; eagles, vultures, king-cranes, (_grus pavonina_,
+Linn.;) a snake-killing secretary, with his beautiful eagle head,
+long tail, and heron legs; strange varieties of water-fowl, many
+of which had been shot, but had had the pellets extracted and the
+wounds healed by the skill of Dr Werne; and last, but most beloved,
+"a pet black horn-bird, (_buceros abyss._ L.,) who hopped up to us
+when we called out 'Jack!'--who picked up with his long curved beak
+the pieces of meat that were thrown to him, tossed them into the air
+and caught them again, (whereat the Prince of Wurtemberg laughed
+till he held his sides,) because nature has provided him with too
+short a tongue; but who did not despise frogs and lizards, and who
+called us at daybreak with his persevering '_Hum, hum_,' until we
+roused ourselves and answered 'Jack.'" Their anxiety on account of
+their aviary was relieved by the Bascha's wife, who condescendingly
+offered to take charge of it during their absence. Mehemet Ali's
+daughter suffered dreadfully from ennui in dull, unwholesome
+Chartum, and reckoned on the birds and beasts as pastime and
+diversion. Thus, little by little, difficulties were overcome, and
+all was made ready for the march. A Bolognese doctor of medicine,
+named Bellotti, and Dumont, a French apothecary, arrived at Chartum.
+They belonged to an Egyptian regiment, and must accompany it on the
+_chasua_.[2] Troops assembled in and around Chartum, the greater
+part of whose garrison, destined also to share in the campaign, were
+boated over to the right bank of the Blue Nile. Thence they were
+to march northwards to Damer--once a town, now a village amidst
+ruins--situated about three leagues above the place where the
+Atbara, a river that rises in Abyssinia, and flows north-westward
+through Sennaar, falls into the Nile. There the line of march
+changed its direction to the right, and took a tolerably straight
+route, but inclining a little to the south, in the direction of the
+Red Sea. The Bascha went by water down the Nile the greater part of
+the way to Damer, and was of course attended by his physician. Mr
+Werne, finding himself unwell, followed his example, sending their
+twelve camels by land, and accompanied by Bellotti, Dumont, and a
+Savoyard merchant from Chartum, Bruno Rollet by name. There was
+great difficulty in getting a vessel, all having been taken for the
+transport of provisions and military stores; but at last one was
+discovered, sunk by its owner to save it from the commissariat, and
+after eleven days of sickness, suffering, and peril--during which Mr
+Werne, when burning with fever, had been compelled to jump overboard
+to push the heavy laden boat off the reef on which the stupid Rëis
+had run it--the party rejoined headquarters. There Mr Werne was
+kindly received by Achmet, and most joyfully by his brother. Long
+and dolorous was the tale Dr Joseph had to tell of his sufferings
+with the wild-riding Bascha. Three days before reaching Damer, that
+impatient chieftain left his ship and ordered out the dromedaries.
+The Berlin doctor of medicine felt his heart sink within him; he had
+never yet ascended a dromedary's saddle, and the desperate riding
+of the Bascha made his own Turkish retinue fear to follow him. His
+forebodings were well-founded. Two hours' rough trot shook up his
+interior to such an extent, and so stripped his exterior of skin,
+that he was compelled to dismount and lie down upon some brushwood
+near the Nile, exposed to the burning sun, and with a compassionate
+Bedouin for sole attendant, until the servants and baggage came up.
+Headache, vomiting, terrible heat and parching thirst--for he had
+no drinking vessel, and the Bedouin would not leave him--were his
+portion the whole day, followed by fever and delirium during the
+night. At two o'clock the next day (the hottest time) the Bascha was
+again in the saddle, as if desirous to try to the utmost his own
+endurance and that of his suite. By this time the doctor had come
+up with him, (having felt himself better in the morning,) after a
+six hours' ride, and terrible loss of leather, the blood running
+down into his stockings. Partly on his dromedary, partly on foot,
+he managed to follow his leader through this second day's march,
+at the cost of another night's fever, but in the morning he was
+so weak that he was obliged to take boat and complete his journey
+to Damer by water. Of more slender frame and delicate complexion
+than his brother, the poor doctor was evidently ill-adapted for
+roughing it in African deserts, although his pluck and fortitude
+went far towards supplying his physical deficiencies. Most painful
+are the accounts of his constantly recurring sufferings during
+that arduous expedition; and one cannot but admire and wonder at
+the zeal for science, or ardent thirst for novelty, that supported
+him, and induced him to persevere in the teeth of such hardship and
+ill-health. At Damer he purchased a small dromedary of easy paces,
+and left the Bascha's rough-trotting gift for his brother's riding.
+
+  [2] "The word _chasua_ signifies an expedition along the frontier,
+  or rather _across_ the frontier, for the capture of men and beasts.
+  These slave-hunts are said to have been first introduced here by the
+  Turks, and the word chasua is not believed to be indigenous, since
+  for war and battle are otherwise used _harba_ (properly a lance)
+  and _schàmmata_. _Chasua_ and _razzia_ appear to be synonymous,
+  corrupted from the Italian _cazzia_, in French _chasse_."--_Feldzug
+  von Sennaar_, &c., p. 17.
+
+At three in the afternoon of the 20th March, a cannon-shot gave the
+signal for departure. The Wernes' water-skins were already filled
+and their baggage packed; in an instant their tents were struck and
+camels loaded; with baggage and servants they took their place at
+the head of the column and rode up to the Bascha, who was halted
+to the east of Damer, with his beautiful horses and dromedaries
+standing saddled behind him. He complained of the great disorder
+in the camp, but consoled himself with the reflection that things
+would go better by-and-by. "It was truly a motley scene," says
+Mr Werne. "The Turkish cavalry in their national costume of many
+colours, with yellow and green banners and small kettle-drums; the
+Schaïgië and Mograbin horsemen; Bedouins on horseback, on camels,
+and on foot; the Schechs and Moluks (little king) with their
+armour-bearers behind them on the dromedaries, carrying pikes and
+lances, straight swords and leather shields; the countless donkeys
+and camels--the former led by a great portion of the infantry, to
+ride in turn--drums and an ear-splitting band of music, The Chabir
+(caravan-leader) was seen in the distance mounted on his dromedary,
+and armed with a lance and round shield; the Bascha bestrode his
+horse, and we accompanied him in that direction, whilst gradually,
+and in picturesque disorder, the detachments emerged from the
+monstrous confusion and followed us. The artillery consisted of two
+field-pieces, drawn by camels, which the Bascha had had broken to
+the work, that in the desert they might relieve the customary team
+of mules.
+
+"Abd-el-Kader, the jovial Topschi Baschi, (chief of the artillery,)
+commanded them, and rode a mule. The Turks, (that is to say, chiefly
+Circassians, Kurds, and Arnauts or Albanians,) who shortly before
+could hardly put one leg before the other, seemed transformed
+into new men, as they once more found themselves at home in their
+saddles. They galloped round the Bascha like madmen, riding their
+horses as mercilessly as if they had been drunk with opium. This
+was a sort of honorary demonstration, intended to indicate to their
+chief their untameable valour. The road led through the desert, and
+was tolerably well beaten. Towards evening the Bascha rode forwards
+with the Chabir. We did not follow, for I felt myself unwell. It was
+dark night when we reached the left bank of the Atbara, where we
+threw ourselves down amongst the bushes, and went to sleep, without
+taking supper."
+
+The campaign might now be said to be beginning; at least the army
+was close upon tribes whose disposition, if not avowedly hostile,
+was very equivocal, and the Bascha placed a picket of forty men at
+the only ford over the Atbara, a clear stream of tolerable depth,
+and with lofty banks, covered with rich grass, with mimosas and
+lofty fruit-laden palm-trees. The next day's march was a severe
+one--ten hours without a halt--and was attended, after nightfall,
+with some danger, arising partly from the route lying through
+trees with barbed thorns, strong enough to tear the clothes off
+men's bodies and the eyes out of their heads, and partly from the
+crowding and pressure in the disorderly column during its progress
+amongst holes and chasms occasioned by the overflowing of the river.
+Upon halting, at midnight, a fire was lighted for the Bascha, and
+one of his attendants brought coffee to Mr Werne; but he, sick
+and weary, rejected it, and would have preferred, he says, so
+thoroughly exhausted did he feel, a nap under a bush to a supper
+upon a roasted angel. They were still ascending the bank of the
+Atbara, a winding stream, with wildly beautiful tree-fringed banks,
+containing few fish, but giving shelter, in its deep places, to
+the crocodile and hippopotamus. From the clefts of its sandstone
+bed, then partially exposed by the decline of the waters, sprang a
+lovely species of willow, with beautiful green foliage and white
+umbelliferous flowers, having a perfume surpassing that of jasmine.
+The Wernes would gladly, have explored the neighbourhood; but the
+tremendous heat, and a warm wind which played round their temples
+with a sickening effect, drove them into camp. Gunfire was at noon
+upon that day; but it was Mr Werne's turn to be on the sick-list.
+Suddenly he felt himself so ill, that it was with a sort of
+despairing horror he saw the tent struck from over him, loaded upon
+a camel, and driven off. In vain he endeavoured to rise; the sun
+seemed to dart coals of fire upon his head. His brother and servant
+carried him into the shadow of a neighbouring palm-tree, and he sank
+half-dead upon the glowing sand. It would suffice to abide there
+during the heat of the day, as they thought, but instead of that,
+they were compelled to remain till next morning, Werne suffering
+terribly from dysentery. "Never in my life," he says, "did I more
+ardently long for the setting of the sun than on that day; even
+its last rays exercised the same painful power on my hair, which
+seemed to be in a sort of electric connection with just as many
+sunbeams, and to bristle up upon my head. And no sooner had the
+luminary which inspired me with such horror sunk below the horizon,
+than I felt myself better, and was able to get on my legs and crawl
+slowly about. Some good-natured Arab shepherd-lads approached our
+fire, pitied me, and brought me milk and durra-bread. It was a
+lovely evening; the full moon was reflected in the Atbara, as were
+also the dark crowns of the palm-trees, wild geese shrieked around
+us; otherwise the stillness was unbroken, save at intervals by the
+cooing of doves. There is something beautiful in sleeping in the
+open air, when weather and climate are suitable. We awoke before
+sunrise, comforted, and got upon our dromedaries; but after a couple
+of hours' ride we mistrusted the sun, and halted with some wandering
+Arabs belonging to the Kabyle of the Kammarabs. We were hospitably
+received, and regaled with milk and bread."[3]
+
+  [3] These Kammarabs possess a tract on the left or south bank of
+  the Atbara. The distribution of the different tribes, as well as
+  the line of march and other particulars, are very clearly displayed
+  in the appropriate little map accompanying Mr Werne's volume.
+  Opposite to the Kammarabs, "on the right bank of the Atbara, are the
+  Anafidabs, of the race or family of the Bischari. They form a Kabyle
+  (band or community) under a Schech of their own. How it is that the
+  French in Algiers persist in using _Kabyle_ as the proper name of a
+  nation and a country, I cannot understand."--_Feldzug von Sennaar_,
+  p. 32.
+
+When our two Germans rejoined headquarters, after four days'
+absence, they found Achmet Bascha seated in the shade upon the
+ground in front of his tent, much burned by the sun, and looking
+fagged and suffering--as well he might be after the heat and
+exposure he had voluntarily undergone. Nothing could cure him,
+however, at least as yet, of his fancy for marching in the heat of
+the day. Although obstinate and despotic, the Bascha was evidently
+a dashing sort of fellow, well calculated to win the respect and
+admiration of his wild and heterogeneous army. Weary as were the
+two Wernes, (they reached the camp at noon,) at two o'clock they
+had to be again in the saddle. "A number of gazelles were started;
+the Bascha seized a gun and dashed after them upon his Arabian
+stallion, almost the whole of the cavalry scouring after him like
+a wild mob, and we ourselves riding a sharp trot to witness the
+chase. We thought he had fallen from his horse, so suddenly did he
+swing himself from saddle to ground, killing three gazelles with
+three shots, of which animals we consumed a considerable portion
+roasted for that night's supper." The river here widened, and
+crocodiles showed themselves upon the opposite shore. The day was
+terribly warm; the poor medico was ill again, suffering grievously
+from his head, and complaining of _his hair being so hot_; and as
+the Salamander Bascha persisted in marching under a sun which,
+through the canvass of the tents, heated sabres and musket-barrels
+till it was scarcely possible to grasp them, the brothers again
+lingered behind and followed in the cool of the evening, Joseph
+being mounted upon an easy-going mule lent him by Topschi Baschi,
+the good-humoured but dissolute captain of the guns. They were now
+divided but by the river's breadth from the hostile tribe of the
+Haddenda, and might at any moment be assailed; so two hours after
+sunset a halt was called and numerous camp-fires were lighted,
+producing a most picturesque effect amongst the trees, and by their
+illumination of the diversified costumes of the soldiery, and
+attracting a whole regiment of scorpions, "some of them remarkably
+fine specimens," says Mr Werne, who looks upon these unpleasant
+fireside companions with a scientific eye, "a finger and a half
+long, of a light colour, half of the tail of a brown black and
+covered with hair." It is a thousand pities that the adventurous Mrs
+Ida Pfeiffer did not accompany Mr Werne upon this expedition. She
+would have had the finest possible opportunities of curing herself
+of the prejudice which it will be remembered she was so weak as to
+entertain against the scorpion tribe. These pleasant reptiles were
+as plentiful all along Mr Werne's line of march as are cockchafers
+on a summer evening in an English oak-copse. Their visitations were
+pleasantly varied by those of snakes of all sizes, and of various
+degrees of venom. "At last," says Mr Werne, "one gets somewhat
+indifferent about scorpions and other wild animals." He had greater
+difficulty in accustoming himself to the sociable habits of the
+snakes, who used to glide about amongst tents and baggage, and by
+whom, in the course of the expedition, a great number of persons
+were bitten. On the 12th April "Mohammed Ladham sent us a remarkable
+scorpion--pity that it is so much injured--almost two fingers long,
+black-brown, tail and feet covered with prickly hair, claws as large
+as those of a small crab.... We had laid us down under a green tree
+beside a cotton plantation, whilst our servants unloaded the camels
+and pitched the tents, when a snake, six feet long, darted from
+under our carpet, passed over my leg, and close before my brother's
+face. But we were so exhausted that we lay still, and some time
+afterwards the snake was brought to us, one of Schech Defalla's
+people having killed it." About noon next day a similar snake sprang
+out of the said Defalla's own tent; it was killed also, and found to
+measure six feet two inches. The soldiers perceiving that the German
+physician and his brother were curious in the matter of reptiles,
+brought them masses of serpents; but they had got a notion that the
+flesh was the part coveted (not the skin) to make medicine, and most
+of the specimens were so defaced as to be valueless. Early in May
+"some soldiers assured us they had seen in the thicket a serpent
+twenty feet long, and as thick as a man's leg; probably a species
+of boa--a pity that they could not kill it. The great number of
+serpents with dangerous bites makes our bivouac very unsafe, and we
+cannot encamp with any feeling of security near bushes or amongst
+brushwood; the prick of a blade of straw, the sting of the smallest
+insect, causes a hasty movement, for one immediately fancies it
+is a snake or scorpion; and when out shooting, one's _second_
+glance is for the game, one's _first_ on the ground at his feet,
+for fear of trampling and irritating some venomous reptile." As
+we proceed through the volume we shall come to other accounts of
+beasts and reptiles, so remarkable as really almost to reconcile
+us to the possibility of some of the zoological marvels narrated
+by the Yankee Doctor Mayo in his rhapsody of Kaloolah.[4] For the
+present we must revert to the business of this curiously-conducted
+campaign. As the army advanced, various chiefs presented themselves,
+with retinues more or less numerous. The first of these was the
+Grand-Shech Mohammed Defalla, already named, who came up, with a
+great following, on the 28th March. He was a man of herculean frame;
+and assuredly such was very necessary to enable him to endure in
+that climate the weight of his defensive arms. He wore a double
+shirt of mail over a quilted doublet, arm-plates and beautifully
+wrought steel gauntlets; his casque fitted like a shell to the upper
+part of his head, and had in front, in lieu of a visor, an iron
+bar coming down over the nose--behind, for the protection of the
+nape, a fringe composed of small rings. His straight-bladed sword
+had a golden hilt. The whole equipment, which seems to correspond
+very closely with that of some of the Sikhs or other warlike Indian
+tribes, proceeded from India, and Defalla had forty or fifty such
+suits of arms. About the same time with him, arrived two Schechs
+from the refractory land of Taka, tall handsome men; whilst, from
+the environs of the neighbouring town of Gos-Rajeb, a number of
+people rode out on dromedaries to meet the Bascha, their hair quite
+white with camel-fat, which melted in the sun and streamed over
+their backs. Gos-Rajeb, situated at about a quarter of a mile from
+the left bank of the Atbara, consists of some two hundred _tokul_
+(huts) and clay-built houses, and in those parts is considered
+an important commercial depot, Indian goods being transported
+thither on camels from the port of Souakim, on the Red Sea. The
+inhabitants are of various tribes, more of them red than black
+or brown; but few were visible, many having fled at the approach
+of Achmet's army, which passed the town in imposing array--the
+infantry in double column in the centre, the Turkish cavalry on the
+right, the Schaïgiës and Mograbins on the left, the artillery, with
+kettledrums, cymbals, and other music, in the van--marched through
+the Atbara, there very shallow, and encamped on the right bank, in
+a stony and almost treeless plain, at the foot of two rocky hills.
+The Bascha ordered the Shech of Gos-Rajeb to act as guide to the
+Wernes in their examination of the vicinity, and to afford them all
+the information in his power. The most remarkable spot to which
+he conducted them was to the site of an ancient city, which once,
+according to tradition, had been as large as Cairo, and inhabited
+by Christians. The date of its existence must be very remote, for
+the ground was smooth, and the sole trace of buildings consisted in
+a few heaps of broken bricks. There were indications of a terrible
+conflagration, the bricks in one place being melted together into a
+black glazed mass. Mr Werne could trace nothing satisfactory with
+respect to former Christian occupants, and seems disposed to think
+that Burckhardt, who speaks of Christian monuments at that spot, (in
+the neighbourhood of the hill of Herrerem,) may have been misled by
+certain peculiarly formed rocks.
+
+  [4] _Blackwood's Magazine_, No. CCCCIV., for June 1849.
+
+The most renowned chief of the mutinous tribes of Taka, the
+conqueror of the Turks under Churdschid Bascha, was Mohammed Din,
+Grand-Schech of the Haddenda. This personage, awed by the approach
+of Achmet's formidable force, sent his son to the advancing
+Bascha, as a hostage for his loyalty and submission. Achmet sent
+the young man back to his father as bearer of his commands. The
+next day the army crossed the frontier of Taka, which is not
+very exactly defined, left the Atbara in their rear, and, moving
+still eastwards, beheld before them, in the far distance, the
+blue mountains of Abyssinia. The Bascha's suite was now swelled
+by the arrival of numerous Schechs, great and small, with their
+esquires and attendants. The route lay through a thick forest,
+interwoven with creeping plants and underwood, and with thorny
+mimosas, which grew to a great height. The path was narrow, the
+confusion of the march inconceivably great and perilous, and if
+the enemy had made a vigorous attack with their javelins, which
+they are skilled in throwing, the army must have endured great
+loss, with scarcely a possibility of inflicting any. At last the
+scattered column reached an open space, covered with grass, and
+intersected with deep narrow rills of water. The Bascha, who had
+outstripped his troops, was comfortably encamped, heedless of their
+fate, whilst they continued for a long time to emerge in broken
+parties from the wood. Mr Werne's good opinion of his generalship
+had been already much impaired, and this example of true Turkish
+indolence, and of the absence of any sort of military dispositions
+under such critical circumstances, completely destroyed it. The
+next day there was some appearance of establishing camp-guards,
+and of taking due precautions against the fierce and numerous
+foe, who on former occasions had thrice defeated Turkish armies,
+and from whom an attack might at any moment be expected. In the
+afternoon an alarm was given; the Bascha, a good soldier, although
+a bad general, was in the saddle in an instant, and gallopping
+to the spot, followed by all his cavalry, whilst the infantry
+rushed confusedly in the same direction. The uproar had arisen,
+however, not from Arab assailants, but from some soldiers who had
+discovered extensive corn magazines--_silos_, as they are called
+in Algeria--holes in the ground, filled with grain, and carefully
+covered over. By the Bascha's permission, the soldiers helped
+themselves from these abundant granaries, and thus the army found
+itself provided with corn for the next two months. In the course of
+the disorderly distribution, or rather scramble, occurred a little
+fight between the Schaïgië, a quarrelsome set of irregulars, and
+some of the Turks. Nothing could be worse than the discipline of
+Achmet's host. The Schaïgiës were active and daring horsemen, and
+were the first to draw blood in the campaign, in a skirmish upon
+the following day with some ambushed Arabs. The neighbouring woods
+swarmed with these javelin-bearing gentry, although they lay close,
+and rarely showed themselves, save when they could inflict injury
+at small risk. Mr Werne began to doubt the possibility of any
+extensive or effectual operations against these wild and wandering
+tribes, who, on the approach of the army, loaded their goods on
+camels, and fled into the _Chaaba_, or forest district, whither
+it was impossible to follow them. Where was the Bascha to find
+money and food for the support of his numerous army?--where was
+he to quarter it during the dangerous _Chariff_, or rainy season?
+He was very reserved as to his plans; probably, according to Mr
+Werne, because he had none. The Schechs who had joined and marched
+with him could hardly be depended upon, when it was borne in mind
+that they, formerly the independent rulers of a free people, had
+been despoiled of their power and privileges, and were now the
+ill-used vassals of the haughty and stupid Turks, who overwhelmed
+them with imposts, treated them contemptuously, and even subjected
+them to the bastinado. "Mohammed Din, seeing the hard lot of these
+gentlemen, seems disposed to preserve his freedom as long as
+possible, or to sell it as dearly as may be. Should it come to a
+war, there is, upon our side, a total want of efficient leaders, at
+any rate if we except the Bascha. Abdin Aga, chief of the Turkish
+cavalry, a bloated Arnaut; Sorop Effendi, a model of stupidity and
+covetousness; Hassan Effendi Bimbaschi, a quiet sot; Soliman Aga,
+greedy, and without the slightest education of any kind; Hassan
+Effendi of Sennaar, a Turk in the true sense of the word (these
+four are infantry commanders); Mohammed Ladjam, a good-natured but
+inexperienced fellow, chief of the Mograbin cavalry: amongst all
+these officers, the only difference is, that each is more ignorant
+than his neighbour. With such leaders, what can be expected from an
+army that, for the most part, knows no discipline--the Schaïgiës,
+for instance, doing just what they please, and being in a fair way
+to corrupt all the rest--and that is encumbered with an endless
+train of dangerous rabble, idlers, slaves, and women of pleasure,
+serving as a burthen and hindrance? Let us console ourselves with
+the _Allah kerim!_ (God is merciful.)" Mr Werne had not long to
+wait for a specimen of Turkish military skill. On the night of the
+7th April he was watching in his tent beside his grievously sick
+brother, when there suddenly arose an uproar in the camp, followed
+by firing. "I remained by our tent, for my brother was scarcely able
+to stir, and the infantry also remained quiet, trusting to their
+mounted comrades. But when I saw Bimbaschi Hassan Effendi lead a
+company past us, and madly begin to fire over the powder-waggons,
+as if these were meant to serve as barricades against the hostile
+lances, I ran up to him with my sabre drawn, and threatened him
+with the Bascha, as well as with the weapon, whereupon he came to
+his senses, and begged me not to betray him. The whole proved to
+be mere noise, but the harassed Bascha was again up and active.
+He seemed to make no use of his aides-de-camp, and only his own
+presence could inspire his troops with courage. Some of the enemy
+were killed, and there were many tracks of blood leading into the
+wood, although the firing had been at random in the darkness. As
+a specimen of the tactics of our Napoleon-worshipping Bascha, he
+allowed the wells, which were at two hundred yards from camp, to
+remain unguarded at night, so that they might easily have been
+filled up by the enemy. Truly fortunate was it that there were no
+great stones in the neighbourhood to choke them up, for we were
+totally without implements wherewith to have cleared them out
+again." Luckily for this most careless general and helpless army,
+the Arabs neglected to profit by their shortcomings, and on the 14th
+April, after many negotiations, the renowned Mohammed Din himself,
+awed, we must suppose, by the numerical strength of Achmet's troops,
+and over-estimating their real value, committed the fatal blunder
+of presenting himself in the Turkish camp. Great was the curiosity
+to see this redoubted chief, who alighted at Schech Defalla's
+tent, into which the soldiers impudently crowded, to get a view of
+the man before whom many of them had formerly trembled and fled.
+"Mohammed Din is of middle stature, and of a black-brown colour,
+like all his people; his countenance at first says little, but,
+on longer inspection, its expression is one of great cunning; his
+bald head is bare; his dress Arabian, with drawers of a fiery red
+colour. His retinue consists, without exception, of most ill-looking
+fellows, on whose countenances Nature seems to have done her best
+to express the faithless character attributed to the Haddenda.
+They are all above the middle height, and armed with shields and
+lances, or swords." Next morning Mr Werne saw the Bascha seated
+on his _angarèb_, (a sort of bedstead, composed of plaited strips
+of camel-hide, which, upon the march, served as a throne,) with a
+number of Shechs squatted upon the ground on either side of him,
+amongst them Mohammed Din, looking humbled, and as if half-repentant
+of his rash step. The Bascha appeared disposed to let him feel that
+he was now no better than a caged lion, whose claws the captor can
+cut at will. He showed him, however, marks of favour, gave him a red
+shawl for a turban, and a purple mantle with gold tassels, but no
+sabre, which Mr Werne thought a bad omen. The Schech was suffered to
+go to and fro between the camp and his own people, but under certain
+control--now with an escort of Schaïgiës, then leaving his son as
+hostage. He sent in some cattle and sheep as a present, and promised
+to bring the tribute due; this he failed to do, and a time was
+fixed to him and the other Shechs within which to pay up arrears.
+Notwithstanding the subjection of their chief, the Arabs continued
+their predatory practices, stealing camels from the camp, or taking
+them by force from the grooms who drove them out to pasture.
+
+Mr Werne's book is a journal, written daily during the campaign but,
+owing to the long interval between its writing and publication, he
+has found it necessary to make frequent parenthetical additions,
+corrective or explanatory. Towards the end of April, during great
+sickness in camp, he writes as follows:--"My brother's medical
+observations and experiments begin to excite in me a strong
+interest. He has promised me that he will keep a medical journal;
+but he must first get into better health, for now it is always with
+sickening disgust that he returns from visiting his patients; he
+complains of the insupportable effluvia from these people, sinks
+upon his _angarèb_ with depression depicted in his features, and
+falls asleep with open eyes, so that I often feel quite uneasy."
+Then comes the parenthesis of ten years' later date. "Subsequently,
+when I had joined the expedition for the navigation of the White
+Nile, he wrote to me from the camp of Kàssela-el-Lus to Chartum,
+that, with great diligence and industry, he had written some
+valuable papers on African diseases, and was inconsolable at having
+lost them. He had been for ten days dangerously ill, had missed me
+sadly, and, in a fit of delirium, when his servant asked him for
+paper to light the fire, had handed him his manuscript, which the
+stupid fellow had forthwith burned. At the same time, he lamented
+that, during his illness, our little menagerie had been starved to
+death. The Bascha had been to see him, and by his order Topschi
+Baschi had taken charge of his money, that he might not be robbed,
+giving the servants what was needful for their keep, and for the
+purchase of flesh for the animals. The servants had drunk the money
+intended for the beasts' food. When my brother recovered his health,
+he had the _fagged_, (a sort of lynx,) which had held out longest,
+and was only just dead, cut open, and so convinced himself that
+it had died of hunger. The annoyance one has to endure from these
+people is beyond conception, and the very mildest-tempered man--as,
+for instance, my late brother--is compelled at times to make use of
+the whip."
+
+Whilst Mohammed Din and the other Shechs, accompanied by detachments
+of Turkish troops, intended partly to support them in their demands,
+and partly to reconnoitre the country, endeavoured to get together
+the stipulated tribute, the army remained stationary. But repose
+did not entail monotony; strange incidents were of daily occurrence
+in this singular camp. The Wernes, always anxious for the increase
+of their cabinet of stuffed birds and beasts, sent their huntsman
+Abdallah with one of the detachments, remaining themselves, for the
+present at least, at headquarters, to collect whatever might come
+in their way. The commander of the Mograbins sent them an antelope
+as big as a donkey, having legs like a cow, and black twisted
+horns. From the natives little was to be obtained. They were very
+shy and ill-disposed, and could not be prevailed upon, even by
+tenfold payment, to supply the things most abundant with them, as
+for instance milk and honey. In hopes of alluring and conciliating
+them, the Bascha ordered those traders who had accompanied the army
+to establish a bazaar outside the fence enclosing the camp. The
+little mirrors that were there sold proved a great attraction. The
+Arabs would sit for whole days looking in them, and pulling faces.
+But no amount of reflection could render them amicable or honest:
+they continued to steal camels and asses whenever they could, and
+one of them caught a Schaigie's horse, led him up to the camp,
+and stabbed him to death. So great was the hatred of these tribes
+to their oppressors--a hatred which would have shown itself by
+graver aggressions, but for Achmet's large force, and above all,
+for their dread of firearms. Within the camp there was wild work
+enough at times. The good-hearted, hot-headed Werne was horribly
+scandalised by the ill-treatment of the slaves. Dumont, the French
+apothecary, had a poor lad named Amber, a mere boy, willing and
+industrious, whom he continually beat and kicked, until at last Mr
+Werne challenged him to a duel with sabres, and threatened to take
+away the slave, which he, as a Frenchman, had no legal right to
+possess. But this was nothing compared to the cruelties practised
+by other Europeans, and especially at Chartum by one Vigoureux, (a
+French corporal who had served under Napoleon, and was now adjutant
+of an Egyptian battalion,) and his wife, upon a poor black girl,
+only ten years of age, whom they first barbarously flogged, and
+then tied to a post, with her bleeding back exposed to the broiling
+sun. Informed of this atrocity by his brother, who had witnessed
+it, Mr Werne sprang from his sickbed, and flew to the rescue, armed
+with his sabre, and with a well-known iron stick, ten pounds in
+weight, which had earned him the nickname of Abu-Nabut, or Father
+of the Stick. A distant view of his incensed countenance sufficed,
+and the Frenchman, cowardly as cruel, hastened to release his
+victim, and to humble himself before her humane champion. Concerning
+this corporal and his dame, whom he had been to France to fetch,
+and who was brought to bed on camel-back, under a burning sun,
+in the midst of the desert, some curious reminiscences are set
+down in the _Feldzug_, as are also some diverting details of the
+improprieties of the dissipated gunner Topschi Baschi, who, on the
+1st May, brought dancing-girls into the hut occupied by the two
+Germans, and assembled a mob round it by the indecorous nature of
+his proceedings. Regulations for the internal order and security of
+the camp were unheard of. After a time, tents were pitched over the
+ammunition; a ditch was dug around it, and strict orders were given
+to light no fire in its vicinity. All fires, too, by command of the
+Bascha, were to be extinguished when the evening gun was fired.
+For a short time the orders were obeyed; then they were forgotten;
+fires were seen blazing late at night, and within fifteen paces of
+the powder. Nothing but the bastinado could give memory to these
+reckless fatalists. "I have often met ships upon the Nile, so laden
+with straw that there was scarcely room for the sailors to work
+the vessel. No matter for that; in the midst of the straw a mighty
+kitchen-fire was merrily blazing."
+
+On the 6th of May, the two Wernes mounted their dromedaries and set
+off, attended by one servant, and with a guide provided by Mohammed
+Defalla, for the village of El Soffra, at a distance of two and a
+half leagues, where they expected to find Mohammed Din and a large
+assemblage of his tribe. It was rather a daring thing to advance
+thus unescorted into the land of the treacherous Haddendas, and
+the Bascha gave his consent unwillingly; but Mussa, (Moses,) the
+Din's only son, was hostage in the camp, and they deemed themselves
+safer alone than with the half company of soldiers Achmet wanted
+to send with them. Their route lay due east, at first through
+fields of _durra_, (a sort of grain,) afterwards through forests of
+saplings. The natives they met greeted them courteously, and they
+reached El Soffra without molestation, but there learned, to their
+considerable annoyance, that Mohammed Din had gone two leagues and
+a half farther, to the camp of his nephew Shech Mussa, at Mitkenàb.
+So, after a short pause, they again mounted their camels, and rode
+off, loaded with maledictions by the Arabs, because they would
+not remain and supply them with medicine, although the same Arabs
+refused to requite the drugs with so much as a cup of milk. They
+rode for more than half an hour before emerging from the straggling
+village, which was composed of wretched huts made of palm-mats,
+having an earthen cooking-vessel, a leathern water-bottle, and two
+stones for bruising corn, for sole furniture. The scanty dress of
+the people--some of the men had nothing but a leathern apron round
+their hips, and a sheep-skin, with the wool inwards, over their
+shoulders--their long hair and wild countenances, gave them the
+appearance of thorough savages. In the middle of every village
+was an open place, where the children played stark naked in the
+burning sun, their colour and their extraordinarily nimble movements
+combining, says Mr Werne, to give them the appearance of a troop
+of young imps. Infants, which in Europe would lie helpless in the
+cradle, are there seen rolling in the sand, with none to mind them,
+and playing with the young goats and other domestic animals. In that
+torrid climate, the development of the human frame is wonderfully
+rapid. Those women of whom the travellers caught a sight in this
+large village, which consisted of upwards of two thousand huts and
+tents, were nearly all old and ugly. The young ones, when they by
+chance encountered the strangers, covered their faces, and ran away.
+On the road to Mitkenàb, however, some young and rather handsome
+girls showed themselves. "They all looked at us with great wonder,"
+says Mr Werne, "and took us for Turks, for we are the first Franks
+who have come into this country."
+
+Mitkenàb, pleasantly situated amongst lofty trees, seemed to
+invite the wanderers to cool shelter from the mid-day sun. They
+were parched with thirst when they entered it, but not one of the
+inquisitive Arabs who crowded around them would attend to their
+request for a draught of milk or water. Here, however, was Mohammed
+Din, and with him a party of Schaïgiës under Melek Mahmud, whom
+they found encamped under a great old tree, with his fifty horsemen
+around him. After they had taken some refreshment, the Din came to
+pay them a visit. He refused to take the place offered him on an
+_angarèb_, but sat down upon the ground, giving them to understand,
+with a sneering smile, that _that_ was now the proper place for
+him. "We had excellent opportunity to examine the physiognomy of
+this Schech, who is venerated like a demigod by all the Arabs
+between the Atbara and the Red Sea. 'He is a brave man,' they say,
+'full of courage; there is no other like him!' His face is fat and
+round, with small grey-brown, piercing, treacherous-looking eyes,
+expressing both the cunning and the obstinacy of his character;
+his nose is well-proportioned and slightly flattened; his small
+mouth constantly wears a satirical scornful smile. But for this
+expression and his thievish glance, his bald crown and well-fed
+middle-sized person would become a monk's hood. He goes with his
+head bare, wears a white cotton shirt and _ferda_, and sandals on
+his feet.... We told him that he was well known to the Franks as
+a great hero; he shook his head and said that on the salt lake,
+at Souakim, he had seen great ships with cannon, but that he did
+not wish the help of the Inglèb (English;) then he said something
+else, which was not translated to us. I incautiously asked him, how
+numerous his nation was. 'Count the trees,' he replied, glancing
+ironically around him; (a poll-tax constituted a portion of the
+tribute.) Conversation through an interpreter was so wearisome that
+we soon took our leave." At Mitkenàb they were upon the borders
+of the great forest (Chaaba) that extends from the banks of the
+Atbara to the shores of the Red Sea. It contains comparatively few
+lofty trees--most of these getting uprooted by hurricanes, when the
+rainy season has softened the ground round their roots--but a vast
+deal of thicket and dense brushwood, affording shelter to legions
+of wild beasts; innumerable herds of elephants, rhinoceroses,
+lions, tigers, giraffes, various inferior beasts, and multitudes
+of serpents of the most venomous description. For fear of these
+unpleasant neighbours, no Arab at Mitkenàb quits his dwelling after
+nightfall. "When we returned to the wells, a little before sundown,
+we found all the Schaïgiës on the move, to take up their quarters in
+an enclosure outside the village, partly on account of the beasts
+of prey, especially the lions, which come down to drink of a night,
+partly for safety from the unfriendly Arabs. We went with them
+and encamped with Mammud in the middle of the enclosure. We slept
+soundly the night through, only once aroused by the hoarse cries of
+the hyenas, which were sneaking about the village, setting all the
+dogs barking. To insure our safety, Mohammed Din himself slept at
+our door--so well-disposed were his people towards us." A rumour had
+gained credit amongst the Arabs, that the two mysterious strangers
+were, sent by Achmet to reconnoitre the country for the Bascha's own
+advance; and so incensed were they at this, that, although their
+beloved chief's son was a hostage in the Turkish camp, it was only
+by taking bypaths, under guidance of a young relative of Schech
+Mussa's, that the Wernes were able to regain their camp in safety.
+A few days after their return they were both attacked by bad fever,
+which for some time prevented them from writing. They lost their
+reckoning, and thenceforward the journal is continued without dates.
+
+The Bascha grew weary of life in camp, and pined after action. In
+vain did the Schaïgiës toss the djereed, and go through irregular
+tournaments and sham fights for his diversion; in vain did he
+rattle the dice with Topschi Baschi; vain were the blandishments
+of an Abyssinian beauty whom he had quartered in a hut surrounded
+with a high fence, and for whose amusement he not unfrequently had
+nocturnal serenades performed by the band of the 8th regiment; to
+which brassy and inharmonious challenge the six thousand donkeys
+assembled in camp never failed to respond by an ear-splitting bray,
+whilst the numerous camels bellowed a bass: despite all these
+amusements, the Bascha suffered from ennui. He was furious when
+he saw how slowly and scantily came in the tribute for which he
+had made this long halt. Some three hundred cows were all that had
+yet been delivered; a ridiculously small number contrasted with
+the vast herds possessed by those tribes. Achmet foamed with rage
+at this ungrateful return for his patience and consideration. He
+reproached the Schechs who were with him, and sent for Mohammed Din,
+Shech Mussa, and the two Shechs of Mitkenàb. Although their people,
+foreboding evil, endeavoured to dissuade them from obedience, they
+all four came and were forthwith put in irons and chained together.
+With all his cunning Mohammed Din had fallen into the snare. His
+plan had been, so Mr Werne believes, to cajole and detain the Turks
+by fair words and promises until the rainy season, when hunger
+and sickness would have proved his best allies. The Bascha had
+been beforehand with him, and the old marauder might now repent
+at leisure that he had not trusted to his impenetrable forests
+and to the javelins of his people, rather than to the word of a
+Turk. On the day of his arrest the usual evening gun was loaded
+with canister, and fired into the woods in the direction of the
+Haddendas, the sound of cannon inspiring the Arab and negro tribes
+with a panic fear. Firearms--to them incomprehensible weapons--have
+served more than anything else to daunt their courage. "When the
+Turks attacked a large and populous mountain near Faszogl, the
+blacks sent out spies to see how strong was the foe, and how armed.
+The spies came back laughing, and reported that there was no great
+number of men; that their sole arms were shining sticks upon their
+shoulders, and that they had neither swords, lances, nor shields.
+The poor fellows soon found how terrible an effect had the sticks
+they deemed so harmless. As they could not understand how it was
+that small pieces of lead should wound and kill, a belief got abroad
+amongst them, that the Afrite, Scheitàn, (the devil or evil spirit,)
+dwelt in the musket-barrels. With this conviction, a negro, grasping
+a soldier's musket, put his hand over the mouth of the barrel, that
+the afrite might not get out. The soldier pulled the trigger, and
+the leaden devil pierced the poor black's hand and breast. After
+an action, a negro collected the muskets of six or seven slain
+soldiers, and joyfully carried them home, there to forge them into
+lances in the presence of a party of his friends. But it happened
+that some of them were loaded, and soon getting heated in the fire,
+they went off, scattering death and destruction around them." Most
+of the people in Taka run from the mere report of a musket, but the
+Arabs of Hedjàs, a mountainous district near the Red Sea, possess
+firearms, and are slow but very good shots.
+
+In the way of tribute, nothing was gained by the imprisonment of
+Mahommed Din and his companions. No more contributions came in, and
+not an Arab showed himself upon the market-place outside the camp.
+Mohammed Din asked why his captors did not kill rather than confine
+him; he preferred death to captivity, and keeping him prisoner would
+lead, he said, to no result. The Arab chiefs in camp did not conceal
+their disgust at the Bascha's treatment of their Grand-Shech, and
+taxed Achmet with having broken his word, since he had given him the
+Amàhn--promise of pardon. Any possibility of conciliating the Arabs
+was destroyed by the step that had been taken. At night they swarmed
+round the camp, shrieking their war-cry. The utmost vigilance was
+necessary; a third of the infantry was under arms all night, the
+consequent fatigue increasing the amount of sickness. The general
+aspect of things was anything but cheering. The Wernes had their
+private causes of annoyance. Six of their camels, including the two
+excellent dromedaries given to them by the Bascha before quitting
+Chartum, were stolen whilst their camel-driver slept, and could
+not be recovered. They were compelled to buy others, and Mr Werne
+complains bitterly of the heavy expenses of the campaign--expenses
+greatly augmented by the sloth and dishonesty of their servants.
+The camel-driver, fearing to face his justly-incensed employers,
+disappeared and was no more heard of. Upon this and other occasions,
+Mr Werne was struck by the extraordinary skill of the Turks in
+tracing animals and men by their footsteps. In this manner his
+servants tracked his camels to an Arab village, although the road
+had been trampled by hundreds of beasts of the same sort. "If
+these people have once seen the footprint of a man, camel, horse,
+or ass, they are sure to recognise it amongst thousands of such
+impressions, and will follow the trail any distance, so long as the
+ground is tolerably favourable, and wind or rain has not obliterated
+the marks. In cases of loss, people send for a man who makes this
+kind of search his profession; they show him a footprint of the
+lost animal, and immediately, without asking any other indication,
+he follows the track through the streets of a town, daily trodden
+by thousands, and seldom falls to hunt out the game. He does not
+proceed slowly, or stoop to examine the ground, but his sharp eye
+follows the trail at a run. We ourselves saw the footstep of a
+runaway slave shown to one of these men, who caught the fugitive at
+the distance of three days' journey from that spot. My brother once
+went out of the Bascha's house at Chartum, to visit a patient who
+lived far off in the town. He had been gone an hour when the Bascha
+desired to see him, and the tschansch (orderly) traced him at once
+by his footmarks on the unpaved streets in which crowds had left
+similar signs. When, in consequence of my sickness, we lingered for
+some days on the Atbara, and then marched to overtake the army, the
+Schaïgiës who escorted us detected, amidst the hoof-marks of the
+seven or eight thousand donkeys accompanying the troops, those of a
+particular jackass belonging to one of their friends, and the event
+proved that they were right." Mr Werne fills his journal, during
+his long sojourn in camp, with a great deal of curious information
+concerning the habits and peculiarities of both Turks and Arabs,
+as well as with the interesting results of his observations on the
+brute creation. The soldiers continued to bring to him and his
+brother all manner of animals and reptiles--frogs, whole coils of
+snakes, and chameleons, which there abound, but whose changes of
+colour Mr Werne found to be much less numerous than is commonly
+believed. For two months he watched the variations of hue of these
+curious lizards, and found them limited to different shades of grey
+and green, with yellow stripes and spots. He made a great pet of
+a young wild cat, which was perfectly tame, and extraordinarily
+handsome. Its colour was grey, beautifully spotted with black,
+like a panther; its head was smaller and more pointed than that of
+European cats; its ears, of unusual size, were black, with white
+stripes. Many of the people in camp took it to be a young tiger, but
+the natives called it a _fagged_, and said it was a sort of cat, in
+which Mr Werne agreed with them. "Its companion and playfellow is a
+rat, about the size of a squirrel, with a long silvery tail, which,
+when angry, it swells out, and sets up over its back. This poor
+little beast was brought to us with two broken legs, and we gave it
+to the cat, thinking it was near death. But the cat, not recognising
+her natural prey--and moreover feeling the want of a companion--and
+the rat, tamed by pain and cured by splints, became inseparable
+friends, ate together, and slept arm in arm. The rat, which was not
+ugly like our house rats, but was rather to be considered handsome,
+by reason of its long frizzled tail, never made use of its liberty
+to escape." Notwithstanding the numerous devices put in practice
+by the Wernes to pass their time, it at last began to hang heavy,
+and their pipes were almost their sole resource and consolation.
+Smoking is little customary in Egypt, except amongst the Turks and
+Arabs. The Mograbins prefer chewing. The blacks of the Gesira make a
+concentrated infusion of this weed, which they call _bucca_; take a
+mouthful of it, and roll the savoury liquor round their teeth for a
+quarter of an hour before ejecting it. They are so addicted to this
+practice, that they invite their friends to "bucca" as Europeans do
+to dinner. The vessel containing the tobacco juice makes the round
+of the party, and a profound silence ensues, broken only by the
+harmonious gurgle of the delectable fluid. Conversation is carried
+on by signs.
+
+"We shall march to-morrow," had long been the daily assurance of
+those wiseacres, to be found in every army, who always know what
+the general means to do better than the general himself. At last
+the much-desired order was issued--of course when everybody least
+expected it--and, after a night of bustle and confusion, the army
+got into motion, in its usual disorderly array. Its destination was
+a mountain called Kassela-el-Lus, in the heart of the Taka country,
+whither the Bascha had sent stores of grain, and where he proposed
+passing the rainy season and founding a new town. The distance was
+about fourteen hours' march. The route led south-eastwards, at
+first through a level country, covered with boundless fields of
+tall _durra_. At the horizon, like a great blue cloud, rose the
+mountain of Kassela, a blessed sight to eyes that had long been
+weary of the monotonous level country. After a while the army got
+out of the durra-fields, and proceeded over a large plain scantily
+overgrown with grass, observing a certain degree of military
+order and discipline, in anticipation of an attempt, on the part
+of the angry Arabs, to rescue Mohammed Din and his companions in
+captivity. Numerous hares and jackals were started and ridden
+down. Even gazelles, swift as they are, were sometimes overtaken
+by the excellent Turkish horses. Presently the grass grew thicker
+and tall enough to conceal a small donkey, and they came to wooded
+tracts and jungles, and upon marks of elephants and other wild
+beasts. The foot-prints of the elephants, in places where the ground
+had been slightly softened by the rain, were often a foot deep,
+and from a foot and a half to two feet in length and breadth. Mr
+Werne regrets not obtaining a view of one of these giant brutes.
+The two-horned rhinoceros is also common in that region, and is
+said to be of extraordinary ferocity in its attacks upon men and
+beasts, and not unfrequently to come off conqueror in single combat
+with the elephant. "Suddenly the little Schaïgiës cavalry set up
+a great shouting, and every one handled his arms, anticipating an
+attack from the Arabs. But soon the cry of 'Asset! Asset!' (lion)
+was heard, and we gazed eagerly on every side, curious for the
+lion's appearance. The Bascha had already warned his chase-loving
+cavalry, under penalty of a thousand blows, not to quit their ranks
+on the appearance of wild beasts, for in that broken ground he
+feared disorder in the army and an attack from the enemy. I and
+my brother were at that moment with Melek Mahmud at the outward
+extremity of the left wing; suddenly a tolerably large lioness
+trotted out of a thicket beside us, not a hundred paces off. She
+seemed quite fearless, for she did not quicken her pace at sight
+of the army. The next minute a monstrous lion showed himself at
+the same spot, roaring frightfully, and apparently in great fury;
+his motions were still slower than those of his female; now and
+then he stood still to look at us, and after coming to within sixty
+or seventy paces--we all standing with our guns cocked, ready to
+receive him--he gave us a parting scowl, and darted away, with great
+bounds, in the track of his wife. In a moment both had disappeared."
+Soon after this encounter, which startled and delighted Dr Werne,
+and made his brother's little dromedary dance with alarm, they
+reached the banks of the great _gohr_, (the bed of a river, filled
+only in the rainy season,) known as El Gasch, which intersects
+the countries of Taka and Basa. With very little daring and still
+less risk, the Haddendas, who are said to muster eighty thousand
+fighting men, might have annihilated the Bascha's army, as it wound
+its toilsome way for nearly a league along the dry water-course,
+(whose high banks were crowned with trees and thick bushes,) the
+camels stumbling and occasionally breaking their legs in the deep
+holes left by the feet of the elephants, where the cavalry could
+not have acted, and where every javelin must have told upon the
+disorderly groups of weary infantry. The Arabs either feared the
+firearms, or dreaded lest their attack should be the signal for
+the instant slaughter of their Grand-Shech, who rode, in the midst
+of the infantry, upon a donkey, which had been given him out of
+consideration for his age, whilst the three other prisoners were
+cruelly forced to perform the whole march on foot, with heavy chains
+on their necks and feet, and exposed to the jibes of the pitiless
+soldiery. On quitting the Gohr, the march was through trees and
+brushwood, and then through a sort of labyrinthine swamp, where
+horses and camels stumbled at every step, and where the Arabs again
+had a glorious opportunity, which they again neglected, of giving
+Achmet such a lesson as they had given to his predecessor in the
+Baschalik. The army now entered the country of the Hallengas, and a
+six days' halt succeeded to their long and painful march.
+
+It would be of very little interest to trace the military operations
+of Achmet Bascha, which were altogether of the most contemptible
+description--consisting in the _chasuas_, or razzias already
+noticed, sudden and secret expeditions of bodies of armed men
+against defenceless tribes, whom they despoiled of their cattle
+and women. From his camp at the foot of Kassela-el-Lus, the Bascha
+directed many of these marauding parties, remaining himself safely
+in a large hut, which Mr Werne had had constructed for him, and
+usually cheating the men and officers, who had borne the fatigue and
+run the risk, out of their promised share of the booty. Sometimes
+the unfortunate natives, driven to the wall and rendered desperate
+by the cruelties of their oppressors, found courage for a stout
+resistance.
+
+"An expedition took place to the mountains of Basa, and the troops
+brought back a large number of prisoners of both sexes. The men
+were almost all wounded, and showed great fortitude under the
+painful operation of extracting the balls. Even the Turks confessed
+that these mountaineers had made a gallant defence with lances and
+stones. Of our soldiers several had musket-shot wounds, inflicted
+by their comrades' disorderly fire. The Turks asserted that the
+Mograbins and Schaïgiës sometimes fired intentionally at the
+soldiers, to drive them from their booty. It was a piteous sight to
+see the prisoners--especially the women and children--brought into
+camp bound upon camels, and with despair in their countenances.
+Before they were sold or allotted, they were taken near the tent of
+Topschi Baschi, where a fire was kept burning, and were all, even
+to the smallest children, branded on the shoulder with a red-hot
+iron in the form of a star. When their moans and lamentations
+reached our hut, we took our guns and hastened away out shooting
+with three servants. These, notwithstanding our exhortations, would
+ramble from us, and we had got exceedingly angry with them for so
+doing, when suddenly we heard three shots, and proceeded in that
+direction, thinking it was they who had fired. Instead of them, we
+found three soldiers, lying upon the ground, bathed in their blood
+and terribly torn. Two were already dead, and the third, whose whole
+belly was ripped up, told us they had been attacked by a lion.
+The three shots brought up our servants, whom we made carry the
+survivor into camp, although my brother entertained slight hopes
+of saving him. The Bascha no sooner heard of the incident than he
+got on horseback with Soliman Kaschef and his people, to hunt the
+lion, and I accompanied him with my huntsman Sale, a bold fellow,
+who afterwards went with me up the White Nile. On reaching the spot
+where the lion had been, the Turks galloped off to seek him, and I
+and Sale alone remained behind. Suddenly I heard a heavy trampling,
+and a crashing amongst the bushes, and I saw close beside me an
+elephant with its calf. Sale, who was at some distance, and had just
+shot a parrot, called out to know if he should fire at the elephant,
+which I loudly forbade him to do. The beast broke its way through
+the brushwood just at hand. I saw its high back, and took up a safe
+position amongst several palm-trees, which all grew from one root,
+and were so close together that the elephant could not get at me.
+Sale was already up a tree, and told me the elephant had turned
+round, and was going back into the chaaba. The brute seemed angry
+or anxious about its young one, for we found the ground dug up for
+a long distance by its tusk as by a plough. Some shots were fired,
+and we thought the Bascha and his horsemen were on the track of the
+lion, but they had seen the elephant, and formed a circle round
+it. A messenger galloped into camp, and in a twinkling the Arnaut
+Abdin Bey came up with part of his people. The elephant, assailed
+on all sides by a rain of bullets, charged first one horseman, then
+another; they delivered their fire and galloped off. The eyes were
+the point chiefly aimed at, and it soon was evident that he was
+blinded by the bullets, for when pursuing his foes he ran against
+the trees, the shock of his unwieldy mass shaking the fruit from
+the palms. The horsemen dismounted and formed a smaller circle
+around him. He must already have received some hundred bullets, and
+the ground over which he staggered was dyed red, when the Bascha
+crept quite near him, knelt down and sent a shot into his left eye,
+whereupon the colossus sank down upon his hinder end and died.
+Nothing was to be seen of the calf or of the lion, but a few days
+later a large male lion was killed by Soliman Kaschef's men, close
+to camp, where we often in the night-time heard the roaring of those
+brutes."
+
+Just about this time bad news reached the Wernes. Their huntsman
+Abdallah, to whom they were much attached by reason of his gallantry
+and fidelity, had gone a long time before to the country of the
+Beni-Amers, eastward from Taka, in company of a Schaïgië chief,
+mounted on one of their best camels, armed with a double-barrelled
+gun, and provided with a considerable sum of money for the
+purchase of giraffes. On his way back to his employers, with a
+valuable collection of stuffed birds and other curiosities, he was
+barbarously murdered, when travelling, unescorted, through the
+Hallenga country, and plundered of all his baggage. Sale, who went
+to identify his friend's mutilated corpse, attributed the crime
+to the Hallengas. Mr Werne was disposed to suspect Mohammed Ehle,
+a great villain, whom the Bascha at times employed as a secret
+stabber and assassin. This Ehle had been appointed Schech of the
+Hallengas by the Divan, in lieu of the rightful Schech, who had
+refused submission to the Turks. Three nephews of Mohammed Din (one
+of them the same youth who had escorted the Wernes safely back
+to camp when they were in peril of their lives in the Haddenda
+country) came to visit their unfortunate relative, who was still a
+prisoner, cruelly treated, lying upon the damp earth, chained to two
+posts, and awaiting with fortitude the cruel death by impalement
+with which the Bascha threatened him. Achmet received the young men
+very coldly, and towards evening they set out, greatly depressed
+by their uncle's sad condition, upon their return homewards. Early
+next morning the Wernes, when out shooting, found the dead bodies
+of their three friends. They had been set upon and slain after a
+gallant defence, as was testified by their bloody lances, and by
+other signs of a severe struggle. The birds of prey had already
+picked out their eyes, and their corpses presented a frightful
+spectacle. The Wernes, convinced that this assassination had taken
+place by the Bascha's order, loaded the bodies on a camel, took
+them to Achmet, and preferred an accusation against the Hallengas
+for this shameful breach of hospitality. The Bascha's indifference
+confirmed their suspicions. He testified no indignation, but there
+was great excitement amongst his officers; and when they left the
+Divan, Mr Werne violently reproached Mohammed Ehle, whom he was well
+assured was the murderer, and who endured his anger in silence. "The
+Albanian Abdin Bey was so enraged that he was only withheld by the
+united persuasions of the other officers from mounting his horse
+and charging Mohammed Ehle with his wild Albanians, the consequence
+of which would inevitably have been a general mutiny against the
+Bascha, for the soldiers had long been murmuring at their bad food
+and ill treatment." The last hundred pages of Mr Werne's very
+closely printed and compendious volume abound in instances of the
+Bascha's treachery and cruelty, and of the retaliation exercised
+by the Arabs. On one occasion a party of fifty Turkish cavalry
+were murdered by the Haddendas, who had invited them to a feast.
+The town of Gos-Rajeb was burned, twenty of the merchants there
+resident were killed, and the corn, stored there for the use of
+the army on its homeward march, was plundered. The Bascha had a
+long-cherished plan of cutting off the supply of water from the
+country of the Haddendas. This was to be done by damming up the
+Gohr-el-Gasch, and diverting the abundant stream which, in the rainy
+season, rushed along its deep gully, overflowing the tall banks
+and fertilising fields and forests. As the Bascha's engineer and
+confidential adviser, Mr Werne was compelled to direct this work.
+By the labour of thousands of men, extensive embankments were made,
+and the Haddendas began to feel the want of water, which had come
+down from the Abyssinian mountains, and already stood eight feet
+deep in the Gohr. Mr Werne repented his share in the cruel work,
+and purposely abstained from pressing the formation of a canal
+which was to carry off the superfluous water to the Atbara, there
+about three leagues distant from the Gohr. And one morning he was
+awakened by a great uproar in the camp, and by the shouts of the
+Bascha, who was on horseback before his hut, and he found that a
+party of Haddendas had thrashed a picket and made an opening in the
+dykes, which was the deathblow to Achmet's magnificent project of
+extracting an exorbitant tribute from Mohammed Din's tribe as the
+price of the supply of water essential to their very existence.
+The sole results of the cruel attempt were a fever to the Bascha,
+who had got wet, and the sickness of half the army, who had been
+compelled to work like galley-slaves under a burning sun and upon
+bad rations. The vicinity of Kassela is rich in curious birds
+and beasts. The mountain itself swarms with apes, and Mr Werne
+frequently saw groups of two or three hundred of them seated upon
+the cliffs. They are about the size of a large dog, with dark brown
+hair and hideous countenances. Awful was the screaming and howling
+they set up of a night, when they received the unwelcome visit of
+some hungry leopard or prowling panther. Once the Wernes went out
+with their guns for a day's sport amongst the monkeys, but were soon
+glad to beat a retreat under a tremendous shower of stones. Hassan,
+a Turk, who purveyed the brothers with hares, gazelles, and other
+savoury morsels, and who was a very good shot, promised to bring
+in--of course for good payment--not only a male and female monkey,
+but a whole camel-load if desired. He started off with this object,
+but did not again show himself for some days, and tried to sneak
+out of the Wernes' way when they at last met him in the bazaar. He
+had a hole in his head, and his shoulder badly hurt, and declared
+he would have nothing more to say to those _transformed men_ upon
+the mountain. Mr Werne was very desirous to catch a monkey alive,
+but was unsuccessful, and Mohammed Ehle refused to sell a tame one
+which he owned, and which usually sat upon his hut. Mr Werne thinks
+them a variety of the Chimpanzee. They fight amongst themselves
+with sticks, and defend themselves fiercely with stones against the
+attacks of men. Upon the whole the Wernes were highly fortunate in
+collecting zoological and ornithological specimens, of which they
+subsequently sent a large number, stuffed, to the Berlin museum.
+They also secured several birds and animals alive; amongst these
+a young lion and a civet cat. Regarding reptiles they were very
+curious, and nothing of that kind was too long or too large for
+them. As Ferdinand Werne was sitting one day upon his dromedary,
+in company with the Bascha, on the left bank of the Gasch, the
+animals shied at a large serpent which suddenly darted by. The
+Bascha ordered the men who were working at the dykes to capture it,
+which they at once proceeded to do, as unconcernedly as an English
+haymaker would assail a hedge snake. "Pursued by several men, the
+serpent plunged into the water, out of which it then boldly reared
+its head, and confronted an Arab who had jumped in after it, armed
+with a _hassaie_. With extraordinary skill and daring the Arab
+approached it, his club uplifted, and struck it over the head, so
+that the serpent fell down stunned and writhing mightily; whereupon
+another Arab came up with a cord; the club-bearer, without further
+ceremony, griped the reptile by the throat, just below the head;
+the noose was made fast, and the pair of them dragged their prize
+on shore. There it lay for a moment motionless, and we contemplated
+the terribly beautiful creature, which was more than eleven feet
+long and half-a-foot in diameter. But when they began to drag it
+away, by which the skin would of course be completely spoiled,
+orders were given to _carry_ it to camp. A jacket was tied over its
+head, and three men set to work to get it upon their shoulders;
+but the serpent made such violent convulsive movements that all
+three fell to the ground with it, and the same thing occurred again
+when several others had gone to their assistance. I accompanied
+them into camp, drove a big nail into the foremost great beam of
+our _recuba_, (hut,) and had the monster suspended from it. He
+hung down quite limp, as did also several other snakes, which were
+still alive, and which our servants had suspended inside our hut,
+intending to skin them the next morning, as it was now nearly
+dark. In the night I felt a most uncomfortable sensation. One of
+the snakes, which was hung up at the head of my bed, had smeared
+his cold tail over my face. But I sprang to my feet in real alarm,
+and thought I had been struck over the shin with a club, when the
+big serpent, now in the death agony, gave me a wipe with its tail
+through the open door, in front of which our servants were squatted,
+telling each other ghost stories of snake-kings and the like....
+They called this serpent _assala_, which, however, is a name they
+give to all large serpents. Soon afterwards we caught another, as
+thick, but only nine feet long, and with a short tail, like the
+_Vipera cerastes_; and this was said to be of that breed of short,
+thick snakes which can devour a man." In the mountains of Basa,
+two days' journey from the Gohr-el-Gasch, and on the road thither,
+snakes are said to exist, of no great length, but as thick as a
+crocodile, and which can conveniently swallow a man; and instances
+were related to Mr Werne of these monsters having swallowed persons
+when they lay sleeping on their angarèbs. Sometimes the victims had
+been rescued _when only half gorged_! Of course travellers hear
+strange stories, and some of those related by Mr Werne are tolerably
+astounding; but these are derived from his Turkish, Egyptian, or
+Arabian acquaintances, and there is no appearance of exaggeration
+or romancing in anything which he narrates as having occurred to
+or been witnessed by himself. A wild tradition was told him of a
+country called Bellad-el-Kelb, which signifies the Country of Dogs,
+where the women were in all respects human, but where the men had
+faces like dogs, claws on their feet, and tails like monkeys. They
+could not speak, but carried on conversation by wagging their tails.
+This ludicrous account appeared explicable by the fact, that the men
+of Bellad-el-Kelb are great robbers, living by plunder, and, like
+fierce and hungry dogs, never relinquishing their prey.
+
+The Hallengas, amongst whom the expedition now found itself, were
+far more frank and friendly, and much less wild, than the Haddendas
+and some other tribes, and they might probably have been converted
+into useful allies by a less cruel and capricious invader than the
+Bascha. But conciliation was no part of his scheme; if he one day
+caressed a tribe or a chief, it was only to betray them the next.
+Mr Werne was on good terms with some of the Hallenga sheiks, and
+went to visit the village of Hauathi, about three miles from camp,
+to see the birds of paradise which abounded there. On his road he
+saw from afar a great tree covered with those beautiful birds,
+and which glistened in the sunshine with all the colours of the
+rainbow. Some days later he and his brother went to drink _merissa_,
+a slightly intoxicating liquor, with one of the Fakis or priests
+of the country. The two Germans got very jovial, drinking to each
+other, student-fashion; and the faki, attempting to keep pace with
+them, got crying-drunk, and disclosed a well-matured plan for
+blowing up their powder-magazine. The ammunition had been stored in
+the village of Kadmin, which was a holy village, entirely inhabited
+by fakis. The Bascha had made sure that none of the natives would
+risk blowing up these holy men, even for the sake of destroying his
+ammunition, and he was unwilling to keep so large a quantity of
+powder amidst his numerous camp-fires and reckless soldiery. But
+the fakis had made their arrangements. On a certain night they were
+to depart, carrying away all their property into the great caverns
+of Mount Kassela, and fire was to be applied to the house that
+held the powder. Had the plot succeeded, the whole army was lost,
+isolated as it was in the midst of unfriendly tribes, embittered by
+its excesses, and by the aggressions and treachery of its chief,
+and who, stimulated by their priests, would in all probability have
+exterminated it to the last man, when it no longer had cartridges
+for its defence. The drunken faki's indiscretion saved Achmet and
+his troops; the village was forthwith surrounded, and the next day
+the ammunition was transferred to camp. Not to rouse the whole
+population against him, the Bascha abstained for the moment from
+punishing the conspirators, but he was not the man to let them
+escape altogether; and some time afterwards, Mr Werne, who had
+returned to Chartum, received a letter from his brother, informing
+him that nine fakis had been hung on palm-trees just outside the
+camp, and that the magnanimous Achmet proposed treating forty more
+in the same way.
+
+A mighty liar was Effendina Achmet Bascha, as ever ensnared a
+foe or broke faith with a friend. Greedy and cruel was he also,
+as only a Turkish despot can be. One of his most active and
+unscrupulous agents was a bloodsucker named Hassan Effendi, whom
+he sent to the country of the Beni-Amers to collect three thousand
+five hundred cows and thirteen hundred camels, the complement of
+their tribute. Although this tribe had upon the whole behaved
+very peaceably, Hassan's first act was to shoot down a couple of
+hundred of them like wild beasts. Then he seized a large number of
+camels belonging to the Haddendas, although the tribe was at that
+very time in friendly negotiation with the Bascha. The Haddendas
+revenged themselves by burning Gos-Rajeb. In proof of their valour,
+Hassan's men cut off the ears of the murdered Beni-Amers, and took
+them to Achmet, who gave them money for the trophies. "They had
+forced a slave to cut off the ears; yonder now lies the man--raving
+mad, and bound with cords. Camel-thieves, too--no matter to what
+tribe they belong--if caught _in flagranti_, lose their ears,
+for which the Bascha gives a reward. That many a man who never
+dreamed of committing a theft loses his ears in this way, is easy
+to understand, for the operation is performed on the spot." Dawson
+Borrer, in his _Campaign in the Kabylie_, mentions a very similar
+practice as prevailing in Marshal Bugeaud's camp, where ten francs
+was the fixed price for the head of a horse-stealer, it being
+left to the soldiers who severed the heads and received the money
+to discriminate between horse-stealers and honest men. Whether
+Bugeaud took a hint from the Bascha, or the Bascha was an admiring
+imitator of Bugeaud, remains a matter of doubt. "Besides many
+handsome women and children, Hassan Effendi brought in two thousand
+nine hundred cows, and seven thousand sheep." He might have been a
+French prince returning from a razzia. "For himself he kept eighty
+camels, _which he said he had bought_." A droll dog, this Hassan
+Effendi, but withal rather covetous--given to sell his soldier's
+rations, and to starve his servants, a single piastre--about
+twopence halfpenny--being his whole daily outlay for meat for his
+entire household, who lived for the most part upon durra and water.
+If his servants asked for wages, they received the bastinado. "The
+Bascha had given the poor camel-drivers sixteen cows. The vampire
+(Hassan) took upon himself to appropriate thirteen of them." Mr
+Werne reported this robbery to the Bascha, but Achmet merely replied
+"_malluch_"--signifying, "it matters not." When inferior officers
+received horses as their share of booty, Hassan bought them of them,
+but always forgot to pay, and the poor subalterns feared to complain
+to the Bascha, who favoured the rogue, and recommended him to the
+authorities at Cairo for promotion to the rank of Bey, because, as
+he told Mr Werne with an ironical smile, Hassan was getting very
+old and infirm, and when he died the Divan would bring charges
+against him, and inherit his wealth. Thus are things managed in
+Egypt. No wonder that, where such injustice and rascality prevail,
+many are found to rejoice at the prospect of a change of rulers.
+"News from Souakim (on the Red Sea) of the probable landing of the
+English, excite great interest in camp; from all sides they come
+to ask questions of us, thinking that we, as Franks, must know
+the intentions of the invaders. Upon the whole, they would not be
+displeased at such a change of government, particularly when we tell
+them of the good pay and treatment customary amongst the English;
+and that with them no officer has to endure indignities from his
+superiors in rank."
+
+"I have now," says Mr Werne, (page 256,) "been more than half a
+year away from Chartum, continually in the field, and not once
+have I enjoyed the great comfort of reposing, undressed, between
+clean white sheets, but have invariably slept in my clothes, on
+the ground, or on the short but practical angarèb. All clean linen
+disappears, for the constant perspiration and chalky dust burns
+everything; and the servants do not understand washing, inasmuch as,
+contrasted with their black hides, everything appears white to them,
+and for the last three months no soap has been obtainable. And in
+the midst of this dirty existence, which drags itself along like a
+slow fever, suddenly 'Julla!' is the word, and one hangs for four or
+five days, eighty or a hundred leagues, upon the camel's back, every
+bone bruised by the rough motion,--the broiling sun, thirst, hunger,
+and cold, for constant companions. Man can endure much: I have gone
+through far more than I ever thought I could,--vomiting and in a
+raging fever on the back of a dromedary, under a midday sun, more
+dead than alive, held upon my saddle by others, and yet I recovered.
+To have remained behind would have been to encounter certain death
+from the enemy, or from wild beasts. We have seen what a man can
+bear, under the pressure of necessity; in my present uniform and
+monotonous life I compare myself to the camels tied before my tent,
+which sometimes stand up, sometimes slowly stretch themselves on
+the ground, careless whether crows or ravens walk over their backs,
+constantly moving their jaws, looking up at the sun, and then, by
+way of a change, taking a mouthful of grass, but giving no signs of
+joy or curiosity."
+
+From this state of languid indifference Mr Werne was suddenly and
+pleasurably roused by intelligence that a second expedition was
+fitting out for the White Nile. He and his brother immediately
+petitioned the Bascha for leave to accompany it. The desired
+permission was granted to him, but refused to his brother. There
+was too much sickness in the camp, the Bascha said; he could not
+spare his doctor, and lacked confidence in the Italian, Bellotti.
+The fondly-attached brothers were thus placed in a painful dilemma:
+they had hoped to pursue their wanderings hand in hand, and to pass
+their lives together, and loth indeed were they to sunder in those
+sickly and perilous regions. At last they made up their minds to the
+parting. It has been already recorded in Mr Werne's former work,
+how, within ten days of their next meeting, his beloved brother's
+eyes were closed in death.
+
+In various respects, Mr Werne's _Feldzug_ is one of the most
+curious books of travel and adventure that, for a very long time,
+has appeared. It has three points of particular attraction and
+originality. In the first place, the author wanders in a region
+previously unexplored by Christian and educated travellers, and
+amongst tribes whose bare names have reached the ears of but few
+Europeans. Secondly, he campaigns as officer in such an army as we
+can hardly realise in these days of high civilisation and strict
+military discipline,--so wild, motley, and grotesque are its
+customs, composition, and equipment,--an army whose savage warriors,
+strange practices, and barbarous cruelties, make us fancy ourselves
+in presence of some fierce Moslem horde of the middle ages, marching
+to the assault of Italy or Hungary. Thirdly, during his long sojourn
+in camp he had opportunities such as few ordinary travellers enjoy,
+and of which he diligently profited, to study and note down the
+characteristics and social habits of many of the races of men that
+make up the heterogeneous population of the Ottoman empire. Some
+of the physiological and medical details with which he favours us,
+would certainly have been more in their place in his brother's
+professional journal, than in a book intended for the public at
+large; and passages are not wanting at which the squeamish will be
+apt to lay down the volume in disgust. For such persons Mr Werne
+does not write; and his occasional indelicacy and too crude details
+are compensated, to our thinking, by his manly honest tone, and by
+the extraordinary amount of useful and curious information he has
+managed to pack into two hundred and seventy pages. As a whole,
+the _Expedition to the White Nile_, which contains a vast deal
+of dry meteorological and geographical detail, is decidedly far
+less attractive than the present book, which is as amusing as any
+romance. We have read it with absorbing interest, well pleased with
+the hint its author throws out at its close, that the records of his
+African wanderings are not yet all exhausted.
+
+
+
+
+MY NOVEL; OR, VARIETIES IN ENGLISH LIFE.
+
+BY PISISTRATUS CAXTON.
+
+
+BOOK VII.--INITIAL CHAPTER.
+
+"What is courage?" said my uncle Roland, rousing himself from a
+reverie into which he had fallen after the Sixth Book in this
+history had been read to our family circle.
+
+"What is courage?" he repeated more earnestly. "Is it insensibility
+to fear? _That_ may be the mere accident of constitution; and, if
+so, there is no more merit in being courageous than in being this
+table."
+
+"I am very glad to hear you speak thus," observed Mr Caxton, "for I
+should not like to consider myself a coward; yet I am very sensible
+to fear in all dangers, bodily and moral."
+
+"La, Austin, how can you say so?" cried my mother, firing up; "was
+it not only last week that you faced the great bull that was rushing
+after Blanche and the children?"
+
+Blanche at that recollection stole to my father's chair, and,
+hanging over his shoulder, kissed his forehead.
+
+MR CAXTON, (sublimely unmoved by these flatteries.)--"I don't deny
+that I faced the bull, but I assert that I was horribly frightened."
+
+ROLAND.--"The sense of honour which conquers fear is the true
+courage of chivalry: you could not run away when others were looking
+on--no gentleman could."
+
+MR CAXTON.--"Fiddledee! It was not on my gentility that I stood,
+Captain. I should have run fast enough, if it had done any good. I
+stood upon my understanding. As the bull could run faster than I
+could, the only chance of escape was to make the brute as frightened
+as myself."
+
+BLANCHE.--"Ah, you did not think of that; your only thought was to
+save me and the children."
+
+MR CAXTON.--"Possibly, my dear--very possibly I might have been
+afraid for you too;--but I was very much afraid for myself. However,
+luckily I had the umbrella, and I sprang it up and spread it forth
+in the animal's stupid eyes, hurling at him simultaneously the
+biggest lines I could think of in the First Chorus of the 'Seven
+against Thebes.' I began with ELEDEMNAS PEDIOPLOKTUPOS; and when I
+came to the grand howl of Ἰὼ, ἰὼ, ἰὼ, ἰὼ--the beast stood appalled
+as at the roar of a lion. I shall never forget his amazed snort
+at the Greek. Then he kicked up his hind legs, and went bolt
+through the gap in the hedge. Thus, armed with Æschylus and the
+umbrella, I remained master of the field; but (continued Mr Caxton,
+ingenuously,) I should not like to go through that half minute
+again."
+
+"No man would," said the Captain kindly. "I should be very sorry to
+face a bull myself, even with a bigger umbrella than yours, and even
+though I had Æschylus, and Homer to boot, at my fingers' ends."
+
+MR CAXTON.--"You would not have minded if it had been a Frenchman
+with a sword in his hand?"
+
+CAPTAIN.--"Of course not. Rather liked it than otherwise," he added
+grimly.
+
+MR CAXTON.--"Yet many a Spanish matador, who doesn't care a button
+for a bull, would take to his heels at the first lunge _en carte_
+from a Frenchman. Therefore, in fact, if courage be a matter of
+constitution, it is also a matter of custom. We face calmly the
+dangers we are habituated to, and recoil from those of which we have
+no familiar experience. I doubt if Marshal Turenne himself would
+have been quite at his ease on the tight-rope; and a rope-dancer,
+who seems disposed to scale the heavens with Titanic temerity, might
+possibly object to charge on a cannon."
+
+CAPTAIN ROLAND.--"Still, either this is not the courage I mean,
+or there is another kind of it. I mean by courage that which is
+the especial force and dignity of the human character, without
+which there is no reliance on principle, no constancy in virtue--a
+something," continued my uncle gallantly, and with a half bow
+towards my mother, "which your sex shares with our own. When the
+lover, for instance, clasps the hand of his betrothed, and says,
+'Wilt thou be true to me, in spite of absence and time, in spite of
+hazard and fortune, though my foes malign me, though thy friends may
+dissuade thee, and our lot in life may be rough and rude?' and when
+the betrothed answers, 'I will be true,' does not the lover trust to
+her courage as well as her love?"
+
+"Admirably put, Roland," said my father. "But _apropos_ of what do
+you puzzle us with these queries on courage?"
+
+CAPTAIN ROLAND, (with a slight blush.)--"I was led to the inquiry
+(though, perhaps, it may be frivolous to take so much thought of
+what, no doubt, costs Pisistratus so little) by the last chapters
+in my nephew's story. I see this poor boy, Leonard, alone with his
+fallen hopes, (though very irrational they were,) and his sense of
+shame. And I read his heart, I dare say, better than Pisistratus
+does, for I could feel like that boy if I had been in the same
+position; and, conjecturing what he and thousands like him must go
+through, I asked myself, 'What can save him and them?' I answered,
+as a soldier would answer, 'Courage!' Very well. But pray, Austin,
+what is courage?"
+
+MR CAXTON, (prudently backing out of a reply.)--"_Papæ!_ Brother,
+since you have just complimented the ladies on that quality, you had
+better address your question to them."
+
+Blanche here leant both hands on my father's chair, and said,
+looking down at first bashfully, but afterwards warming with the
+subject, "Do you not think, sir, that little Helen has already
+suggested, if not what is courage, what at least is the real essence
+of all courage that endures and conquers, that ennobles, and
+hallows, and redeems? Is it not PATIENCE, father?--and that is why
+we women have a courage of our own. Patience does not affect to be
+superior to fear, but at least it never admits despair."
+
+PISISTRATUS.--"Kiss me, my Blanche, for you have come near to the
+truth which perplexed the soldier and puzzled the sage."
+
+MR CAXTON, (tartly.)--"If you mean me by the sage, I was not puzzled
+at all. Heaven knows you do right to inculcate patience--it is a
+virtue very much required in your readers. Nevertheless," added my
+father, softening with the enjoyment of his joke--"nevertheless
+Blanche and Helen are quite right. Patience is the courage
+of the conqueror; it is the virtue, _par excellence_, of Man
+against Destiny--of the One against the World, and of the Soul
+against Matter. Therefore this is the courage of the Gospel; and
+its importance, in a social view--its importance to races and
+institutions--cannot be too earnestly inculcated. What is it that
+distinguishes the Anglo-Saxon from all other branches of the human
+family, peoples deserts with his children, and consigns to them
+the heritage of rising worlds? What but his faculty to brave, to
+suffer, to endure--the patience that resists firmly, and innovates
+slowly. Compare him with the Frenchman. The Frenchman has plenty of
+valour--that there is no denying; but as for fortitude, he has not
+enough to cover the point of a pin. He is ready to rush out of the
+world if he is bit by a flea."
+
+CAPTAIN ROLAND.--"There was a case in the papers the other day,
+Austin, of a Frenchman who actually did destroy himself because he
+was so teased by the little creatures you speak of. He left a paper
+on his table, saying that 'life was not worth having at the price of
+such torments.'"[5]
+
+[5] Fact. In a work by M. GIBERT, a celebrated French physician, on
+diseases of the skin, he states that that minute troublesome kind
+of rash, known by the name of _prurigo_, though not dangerous in
+itself, has often driven the individual afflicted by it to--suicide.
+I believe that our more varying climate, and our more heating drinks
+and aliments, render this skin complaint more common in England than
+in France, yet I doubt if any English physician could state that it
+had ever driven one of his _English_ patients to suicide.
+
+MR CAXTON, (solemnly.)--"Sir, their whole political history, since
+the great meeting of the Tiers Etat, has been the history of men
+who would rather go to the devil than be bit by a flea. It is
+the record of human impatience, that seeks to force time, and
+expects to grow forests from the spawn of a mushroom. Wherefore,
+running through all extremes of constitutional experiment, when
+they are nearest to democracy they are next door to a despot; and
+all they have really done is to destroy whatever constitutes the
+foundation of every tolerable government. A constitutional monarchy
+cannot exist without aristocracy, nor a healthful republic endure
+with corruption of manners. The cry of Equality is incompatible
+with Civilisation, which, of necessity, contrasts poverty with
+wealth--and, in short, whether it be an emperor or a mob that is to
+rule, Force is the sole hope of order, and the government is but an
+army.
+
+"Impress, O Pisistratus! impress the value of patience as regards
+man and men. You touch there on the kernel of the social system--the
+secret that fortifies the individual and disciplines the million.
+I care not, for my part, if you are tedious so long as you are
+earnest. Be minute and detailed. Let the real human life, in its war
+with Circumstance, stand out. Never mind if one can read you but
+slowly--better chance of being less quickly forgotten. Patience,
+patience! By the soul of Epictetus, your readers shall set you an
+example!"
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+Leonard had written twice to Mrs Fairfield, twice to Riccabocca, and
+once to Mr Dale; and the poor proud boy could not bear to betray
+his humiliation. He wrote as with cheerful spirits--as if perfectly
+satisfied with his prospects. He said that he was well employed,
+in the midst of books, and that he had found kind friends. Then he
+turned from himself to write about those whom he addressed, and the
+affairs and interests of the quiet world wherein they lived. He did
+not give his own address, nor that of Mr Prickett. He dated his
+letters from a small coffeehouse near the bookseller, to which he
+occasionally went for his simple meals. He had a motive in this. He
+did not desire to be found out. Mr Dale replied for himself and for
+Mrs Fairfield, to the epistles addressed to these two. Riccabocca
+wrote also. Nothing could be more kind than the replies of both.
+They came to Leonard in a very dark period in his life, and they
+strengthened him in the noiseless battle with despair.
+
+If there be a good in the world that we do without knowing it,
+without conjecturing the effect it may have upon a human soul, it is
+when we show kindness to the young in the first barren footpath up
+the mountain of life.
+
+Leonard's face resumed its serenity in his intercourse with his
+employer; but he did not recover his boyish ingenuous frankness.
+The under-currents flowed again pure from the turbid soil and the
+splintered fragments uptorn from the deep; but they were still too
+strong and too rapid to allow transparency to the surface. And now
+he stood in the sublime world of books, still and earnest as a seer
+who invokes the dead. And thus, face to face with knowledge, hourly
+he discovered how little he knew. Mr Prickett lent him such works as
+he selected and asked to take home with him. He spent whole nights
+in reading; and no longer desultorily. He read no more poetry, no
+more Lives of Poets. He read what poets must read if they desire
+to be great--_Sapere principium et fons_--strict reasonings on the
+human mind; the relations between motive and conduct, thought and
+action; the grave and solemn truths of the past world; antiquities,
+history, philosophy. He was taken out of himself. He was carried
+along the ocean of the universe. In that ocean, O seeker, study
+the law of the tides; and seeing Chance nowhere--Thought presiding
+over all--Fate, that dread phantom, shall vanish from creation, and
+Providence alone be visible in heaven and on earth!
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+There was to be a considerable book-sale at a country house one
+day's journey from London. Mr Prickett meant to have attended it
+on his own behalf, and that of several gentlemen who had given
+him commissions for purchase; but, on the morning fixed for his
+departure, he was seized with a severe return of his old foe the
+rheumatism. He requested Leonard to attend instead of himself.
+Leonard went, and was absent for the three days during which the
+sale lasted. He returned late in the evening, and went at once to
+Mr Prickett's house. The shop was closed; he knocked at the private
+entrance; a strange person opened the door to him, and, in reply
+to his question if Mr Prickett was at home, said with a long and
+funereal face--"Young man, Mr Prickett senior is gone to his long
+home, but Mr Richard Prickett will see you."
+
+At this moment a very grave-looking man, with lank hair, looked
+forth from the side-door communicating between the shop and the
+passage, land then, stepped forward--"Come in, sir; you are my late
+uncle's assistant, Mr Fairfield, I suppose?"
+
+"Your late uncle! Heavens, sir, do I understand aright--can Mr
+Prickett be dead since I left London?"
+
+"Died, sir, suddenly last night. It was an affection of the heart;
+the Doctor thinks the rheumatism attacked that organ. He had small
+time to provide for his departure, and his account-books seem in sad
+disorder: I am his nephew and executor."
+
+Leonard had now followed the nephew into the shop. There, still
+burned the gas-lamp. The place seemed more dingy and cavernous than
+before. Death always makes its presence felt in the house it visits.
+
+Leonard was greatly affected--and yet more, perhaps, by the utter
+want of feeling which the nephew exhibited. In fact, the deceased
+had not been on friendly terms with this person, his nearest
+relative and heir-at-law, who was also a bookseller.
+
+"You were engaged but by the week I find, young man, on reference
+to my late uncle's papers. He gave you £1 a week--a monstrous
+sum! I shall not require your services any further. I shall move
+these books to my own house. You will be good enough to send
+me a list of those you bought at the sale, and your account of
+travelling-expenses, &c. What may be due to you shall be sent to
+your address. Good evening."
+
+Leonard went home, shocked and saddened at the sudden death of his
+kind employer. He did not think much of himself that night; but,
+when he rose the next day, he suddenly felt that the world of London
+lay before him, without a friend, without a calling, without an
+occupation for bread.
+
+This time it was no fancied sorrow, no poetic dream disappointed.
+Before him, gaunt and palpable, stood Famine.
+
+Escape!--yes. Back to the village; his mother's cottage; the exile's
+garden; the radishes and the fount. Why could he not escape? Ask why
+civilisation cannot escape its ills, and fly back to the wild and
+the wigwam?
+
+Leonard could not have returned to the cottage, even if the Famine
+that faced had already seized him with her skeleton hand. London
+releases not so readily her fated stepsons.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+One day three persons were standing before an old book-stall in a
+passage leading from Oxford Street into Tottenham Court Road. Two
+were gentlemen; the third, of the class and appearance of those who
+more habitually halt at old book-stalls.
+
+"Look," said one of the gentlemen to the other, "I have discovered
+here what I have searched for in vain the last ten years--the Horace
+of 1580, the Horace of the Forty Commentators--a perfect treasury of
+learning, and marked only fourteen shillings!"
+
+"Hush, Norreys," said the other, "and observe what is yet more worth
+your study;" and he pointed to the third bystander, whose face,
+sharp and attenuated, was bent with an absorbed, and, as it were,
+with a hungering attention over an old worm-eaten volume.
+
+"What is the book, my lord?" whispered Mr Norreys.
+
+His companion smiled, and replied by another question, "What is the
+man who reads the book?"
+
+Mr Norreys moved a few paces, and looked over the student's
+shoulder "Preston's translation of BOETHIUS, _The Consolations of
+Philosophy_," he said, coming back to his friend.
+
+"He looks as if he wanted all the consolations Philosophy can give
+him, poor boy."
+
+At this moment a fourth passenger paused at the book-stall, and,
+recognising the pale student, placed his hand on his shoulder and
+said, "Aha, young sir, we meet again. So poor Prickett is dead. But
+you are still haunted by associations. Books--books--magnets to
+which all iron minds move insensibly. What is this? BOETHIUS! Ah,
+a book written in prison, but a little time before the advent of
+the only philosopher who solves to the simplest understanding every
+mystery of life--"
+
+"And that philosopher?"
+
+"Is Death!" said Mr Burley. "How can you be dull enough to ask? Poor
+Boethius, rich, nobly born, a consul, his sons consuls--the world
+one smile to the Last Philosopher of Rome. Then suddenly, against
+this type of the old world's departing WISDOM, stands frowning the
+new world's grim genius, FORCE--Theodoric the Ostrogoth condemning
+Boethius the Schoolman; and Boethius, in his Pavian dungeon, holding
+a dialogue with the shade of Athenian Philosophy. It is the finest
+picture upon which lingers the glimmering of the Western golden day,
+before night rushes over time."
+
+"And," said Mr Norreys abruptly, "Boethius comes back to us with the
+faint gleam of returning light, translated by Alfred the Great. And,
+again, as the sun of knowledge bursts forth in all its splendour, by
+Queen Elizabeth. Boethius influences us as we stand in this passage;
+and that is the best of all the Consolations of Philosophy--eh, Mr
+Burley?"
+
+Mr Burley turned and bowed.
+
+The two men looked at each other; you could not see a greater
+contrast. Mr Burley, his gay green dress already shabby and soiled,
+with a rent in the skirts, and his face speaking of habitual
+night-cups. Mr Norreys, neat and somewhat precise in dress, with
+firm lean figure, and quiet, collected, vigorous energy in his eye
+and aspect.
+
+"If," replied Mr Burley, "a poor devil like me may argue with a
+gentleman who may command his own price with the booksellers, I
+should say it is no consolation at all, Mr Norreys. And I should
+like to see any man of sense accept the condition of Boethius in his
+prison, with some strangler or headsman waiting behind the door,
+upon the promised proviso that he should be translated, centuries
+afterwards, by Kings and Queens, and help indirectly to influence
+the minds of Northern barbarians, babbling about him in an alley,
+jostled by passers-by who never heard the name of Boethius, and who
+don't care a fig for philosophy. Your servant, sir--young man, come
+and talk."
+
+Burley hooked his arm within Leonard's, and led the boy passively
+away.
+
+"That is a clever man," said Harley L'Estrange. "But I am sorry to
+see yon young student, with his bright earnest eyes, and his lip
+that has the quiver of passion and enthusiasm, leaning on the arm of
+a guide who seems disenchanted of all that gives purpose to learning
+and links philosophy with use to the world. Who, and what is this
+clever man whom you call Burley?"
+
+"A man who might have been famous, if he had condescended to be
+respectable! The boy listening to us both so attentively interested
+_me_ too--I should like to have the making of him. But I must buy
+this Horace."
+
+The shopman, lurking within his hole like a spider for flies, was
+now called out. And when Mr Norreys had bought the Horace, and given
+an address where to send it, Harley asked the shopman if he knew the
+young man who had been reading Boethius.
+
+"Only by sight. He has come here every day the last week, and spends
+hours at the stall. When once he fastens on a book, he reads it
+through."
+
+"And never buys?" said Mr Norreys.
+
+"Sir," said the shopman with a good-natured smile, "they who buy
+seldom read. The poor boy pays me twopence a-day to read as long as
+he pleases. I would not take it, but he is proud."
+
+"I have known men amass great learning in that way," said Mr
+Norreys. "Yes, I should like to have that boy in my hands. And now,
+my lord, I am at your service, and we will go to the studio of your
+artist."
+
+The two gentlemen walked on towards one of the streets out of
+Fitzroy Square.
+
+In a few minutes more Harley L'Estrange was in his element, seated
+carelessly on a deal table, smoking his cigar, and discussing art
+with the gusto of a man who honestly loved, and the taste of a man
+who thoroughly understood it. The young artist, in his dressing
+robe, adding slow touch upon touch, paused often to listen the
+better. And Henry Norreys, enjoying the brief respite from a life of
+great labour, was gladly reminded of idle hours under rosy skies;
+for these three men had formed their friendship in Italy, where the
+bands of friendship are woven by the hands of the Graces.
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+Leonard and Mr Burley walked on into the suburbs round the north
+road from London, and Mr Burley offered to find literary employment
+for Leonard--an offer eagerly accepted.
+
+Then they went into a public house by the wayside. Burley demanded
+a private room, called for pen, ink, and paper; and, placing these
+implements before Leonard, said, "Write what you please in prose,
+five sheets of letter paper, twenty-two lines to a page--neither
+more nor less."
+
+"I cannot write so."
+
+"Tut, 'tis for bread."
+
+The boy's face crimsoned.
+
+"I must forget that," said he.
+
+"There is an arbour in the garden under a weeping ash," returned
+Burley. "Go there, and fancy yourself in Arcadia."
+
+Leonard was too pleased to obey. He found out the little arbour at
+one end of a deserted bowling-green. All was still--the hedgerow
+shut out the sight of the inn. The sun lay warm on the grass, and
+glinted pleasantly through the leaves of the ash. And Leonard there
+wrote the first essay from his hand as Author by profession. What
+was it that he wrote? His dreamy impressions of London? an anathema
+on its streets, and its hearts of stone? murmurs against poverty?
+dark elegies on fate?
+
+Oh, no! little knowest thou true genius, if thou askest such
+questions, or thinkest that there, under the weeping ash, the
+taskwork for bread was remembered; or that the sunbeam glinted but
+over the practical world, which, vulgar and sordid, lay around.
+Leonard wrote a fairy tale--one of the loveliest you can conceive,
+with a delicate touch of playful humour--in a style all flowered
+over with happy fancies. He smiled as he wrote the last word--he was
+happy. In rather more than an hour Mr Burley came to him, and found
+him with that smile on his lips.
+
+Mr Burley had a glass of brandy and water in his hand; it was
+his third. He too smiled--he too looked happy. He read the paper
+aloud, and well. He was very complimentary. "You will do!" said he,
+clapping Leonard on the back. "Perhaps some day you will catch my
+one-eyed perch." Then he folded up the MS., scribbled off a note,
+put the whole in one envelope--and they returned to London.
+
+Mr Burley disappeared within a dingy office near Fleet Street,
+on which was inscribed--"Office of the _Beehive_," and soon came
+forth with a golden sovereign in his hand--Leonard's first-fruits.
+Leonard thought Peru lay before him. He accompanied Mr Burley to
+that gentleman's lodging in Maida Hill. The walk had been very long;
+Leonard was not fatigued. He listened with a livelier attention
+than before to Burley's talk. And when they reached the apartments
+of the latter, and Mr Burley sent to the cookshop, and their joint
+supper was taken out of the golden sovereign, Leonard felt proud,
+and for the first time for weeks he laughed the heart's laugh. The
+two writers grew more and more intimate and cordial. And there was a
+vast deal in Burley by which any young man might be made the wiser.
+There was no apparent evidence of poverty in the apartments--clean,
+new, well furnished; but all things in the most horrible litter--all
+speaking of the huge literary sloven.
+
+For several days Leonard almost lived in those rooms. He wrote
+continuously--save when Burley's conversation fascinated him into
+idleness. Nay, it was not idleness--his knowledge grew larger as
+he listened; but the cynicism of the talker began slowly to work
+its way. That cynicism in which there was no faith, no hope, no
+vivifying breath from Glory--from Religion. The cynicism of the
+Epicurean, more degraded in his stye than ever was Diogenes in his
+tub; and yet presented with such ease and such eloquence--with such
+art and such mirth--so adorned with illustration and anecdote, so
+unconscious of debasement.
+
+Strange and dread philosophy--that made it a maxim to squander
+the gifts of mind on the mere care for matter, and fit the soul
+to live but as from day to day, with its scornful cry, "A fig
+for immortality and laurels!" An author for bread! Oh, miserable
+calling! was there something grand and holy, after all, even in
+Chatterton's despair!
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+The villanous _Beehive_! Bread was worked out of it, certainly; but
+fame, but hope for the future--certainly not. Milton's _Paradise
+Lost_ would have perished without a sound, had it appeared in the
+_Beehive_.
+
+Fine things were there in a fragmentary crude state, composed
+by Burley himself. At the end of a week they were dead and
+forgotten--never read by one man of education and taste; taken
+simultaneously and indifferently with shallow politics and wretched
+essays, yet selling, perhaps, twenty or thirty thousand copies--an
+immense sale;--and nothing got out of them but bread and brandy!
+
+"What more would you have?" cried John Burley. "Did not stern old
+Sam Johnson say he could never write but from want?"
+
+"He might say it," answered Leonard; "but he never meant posterity
+to believe him. And he would have died of want, I suspect, rather
+than have written _Rasselas_ for the _Beehive_! Want is a grand
+thing," continued the boy, thoughtfully. "A parent of grand things.
+Necessity is strong, and should give us its own strength; but Want
+should shatter asunder, with its very writhings, the walls of our
+prison-house, and not sit contented with the allowance the jail
+gives us in exchange for our work."
+
+"There is no prison-house to a man who calls upon Bacchus--stay--I
+will translate to you Schiller's Dithyramb. 'Then see I
+Bacchus--then up come Cupid and Phœbus, and all the Celestials are
+filling my dwelling.'"
+
+Breaking into impromptu careless rhymes, Burley threw off a rude but
+spirited translation of that divine lyric.
+
+"O materialist!" cried the boy, with his bright eyes suffused.
+"Schiller calls on the gods to take him to their heaven with him;
+and you would debase the gods to a gin palace."
+
+"Ho, ho!" cried Burley, with his giant laugh. "Drink, and you will
+understand the Dithyramb."
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+Suddenly one morning, as Leonard sate with Barley, a fashionable
+cabriolet, with a very handsome horse, stopped at the door--a loud
+knock--a quick step on the stairs, and Randal Leslie entered.
+Leonard recognised him, and started. Randal glanced at him in
+surprise, and then, with a tact that showed he had already learned
+to profit by London life, after shaking hands with Burley,
+approached, and said with some successful attempt at ease, "Unless
+I am not mistaken, sir, we have met before. If you remember me, I
+hope all boyish quarrels are forgotten?"
+
+Leonard bowed, and his heart was still good enough to be softened.
+
+"Where could you two ever have met?" asked Burley.
+
+"In a village green, and in single combat," answered Randal,
+smiling; and he told the story of the Battle of the Stocks, with
+a well-bred jest on himself. Burley laughed at the story. "But,"
+said he, when this laugh was over, "my young friend had better have
+remained guardian of the village stocks, than come to London in
+search of such fortune as lies at the bottom of an inkhorn."
+
+"Ah," said Randal, with the secret contempt which men elaborately
+cultivated are apt to feel for those who seek to educate
+themselves--"ah, you make literature your calling, sir? At what
+school did you conceive a taste for letters?--not very common at our
+great public schools."
+
+"I am at school now for the first time," answered Leonard, drily.
+
+"Experience is the best schoolmistress," said Burley; "and that
+was the maxim of Goethe, who had book-learning enough, in all
+conscience."
+
+Randal slightly shrugged his shoulders, and, without wasting another
+thought on Leonard, peasant-born and self-taught, took his seat, and
+began to talk to Burley upon a political question, which made then
+the war-cry between the two great Parliamentary parties. It was a
+subject in which Burley showed much general knowledge; and Randal,
+seeming to differ from him, drew forth alike his information and his
+argumentative powers. The conversation lasted more than an hour.
+
+"I can't quite agree with you," said Randal, taking his leave; "but
+you must allow me to call again--will the same hour to-morrow suit
+you?"
+
+"Yes," said Burley.
+
+Away went the young man in his cabriolet. Leonard watched him from
+the window.
+
+For five days, consecutively, did Randal call and discuss the
+question in all its bearings; and Burley, after the second day, got
+interested in the matter, looked up his authorities--refreshed his
+memory--and even spent an hour or two in the Library of the British
+Museum.
+
+By the fifth day, Burley had really exhausted all that could well be
+said on his side of the question.
+
+Leonard, during these colloquies, had sate apart, seemingly
+absorbed in reading, and secretly stung by Randal's disregard of
+his presence. For indeed that young man, in his superb self-esteem,
+and in the absorption of his ambitious projects, scarce felt even
+curiosity as to Leonard's rise above his earlier station, and looked
+on him as a mere journeyman of Burley's. But the self-taught are
+keen and quick observers. And Leonard had remarked, that Randal
+seemed more as one playing a part for some private purpose, than
+arguing in earnest; and that, when he rose and said, "Mr Burley,
+you have convinced me," it was not with the modesty of a sincere
+reasoner, but the triumph of one who has gained his end. But so
+struck, meanwhile, was our unheeded and silent listener, with
+Burley's power of generalisation, and the wide surface over which
+his information extended, that when Randal left the room the boy
+looked at the slovenly purposeless man, and said aloud--"True;
+knowledge is _not_ power."
+
+"Certainly not," said Burley, drily--"the weakest thing, in the
+world."
+
+"Knowledge is power," muttered Randal Leslie, as, with a smile on
+his lip, he drove from the door.
+
+Not many days after this last interview there appeared a short
+pamphlet; anonymous, but one which made a great impression on the
+town. It was on the subject discussed between Randal and Burley. It
+was quoted at great length in the newspapers. And Burley started
+to his feet one morning, and exclaimed, "My own thoughts! my very
+words! Who the devil is this pamphleteer?"
+
+Leonard took the newspaper from Burley's hand. The most flattering
+encomiums preceded the extracts, and the extracts were as
+stereotypes of Burley's talk.
+
+"Can you doubt the author?" cried Leonard, in deep disgust and
+ingenuous scorn. "The young man who came to steal your brains, and
+turn your knowledge--"
+
+"Into power," interrupted Burley, with a laugh, but it was a laugh
+of pain. "Well, this was very mean; I shall tell him so when he
+comes."
+
+"He will come no more," said Leonard. Nor did Randal come again. But
+he sent Mr Burley a copy of the pamphlet with a polite note, saying,
+with candid but careless acknowledgment, that "he had profited much
+by Mr Burley's hints and remarks."
+
+And now it was in all the papers, that the pamphlet which had made
+so great a noise was by a very young man, Mr Audley Egerton's
+relation. And high hopes were expressed of the future career of Mr
+Randal Leslie.
+
+Burley still attempted to laugh, and still his pain was visible.
+Leonard most cordially despised and hated Randal Leslie, and his
+heart moved to Burley with noble but perilous compassion. In his
+desire to soothe and comfort the man whom he deemed cheated out of
+fame, he forgot the caution he had hitherto imposed on himself,
+and yielded more and more to the charm of that wasted intellect.
+He accompanied Burley now where he went to spent his evenings,
+and more and more--though gradually, and with many a recoil and
+self-rebuke--there crept over him the cynic's contempt for glory,
+and miserable philosophy of debased content.
+
+Randal had risen into grave repute upon the strength of Burley's
+knowledge. But, had Burley written the pamphlet, would the same
+repute have attended _him_? Certainly not. Randal Leslie brought to
+that knowledge qualities all his own--a style simple, strong, and
+logical; a certain tone of good society, and allusions to men and
+to parties that showed his connection with a cabinet minister, and
+proved that he had profited no less by Egerton's talk than Burley's.
+
+Had Burley written the pamphlet, it would have showed more genius,
+it would have had humour and wit, but have been so full of whims and
+quips, sins against taste, and defects in earnestness, that it would
+have failed to create any serious sensation. Here, then, there was
+something else besides knowledge, by which knowledge became power.
+Knowledge must not smell of the brandy bottle.
+
+Randal Leslie might be mean in his plagiarism, but he turned the
+useless into use. And so far he was original.
+
+But one's admiration, after all, rests where Leonard's rested--with
+the poor, shabby, riotous, lawless, big fallen man.
+
+Burley took himself off to the Brent, and fished again for the
+one-eyed perch. Leonard accompanied him. His feelings were indeed
+different from what they had been when he had reclined under the
+old tree, and talked with Helen of the future. But it was almost
+pathetic to see how Burley's nature seemed to alter, as he strayed
+along the banks of the rivulet, and talked of his own boyhood.
+The man then seemed restored to something of the innocence of the
+child. He cared, in truth, little for the perch, which continued
+intractable, but he enjoyed the air and the sky, the rustling grass
+and the murmuring waters. These excursions to the haunts of youth
+seemed to rebaptise him, and then his eloquence took a pastoral
+character, and Isaac Walton himself would have loved to hear him.
+But as he got back into the smoke of the metropolis, and the gas
+lamps made him forget the ruddy sunset, and the soft evening star,
+the gross habits reassumed their sway; and on he went with his
+swaggering reckless step to the orgies in which his abused intellect
+flamed forth, and then sank into the socket quenched and rayless.
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+Helen was seized with profound and anxious sadness. Leonard had been
+three or four times to see her, and each time she saw a change in
+him that excited all her fears. He seemed, it is true, more shrewd,
+more worldly-wise, more fitted, it might be, for coarse daily life;
+but, on the other hand, the freshness and glory of his youth
+were waning slowly. His aspirings drooped earthward. He had not
+mastered the Practical, and moulded its uses with the strong hand
+of the Spiritual Architect, of the Ideal Builder: the Practical was
+overpowering himself. She grew pale when he talked of Burley, and
+shuddered, poor little Helen! when she found he was daily and almost
+nightly in a companionship which, with her native honest prudence,
+she saw so unsuited to strengthen him in his struggles, and aid him
+against temptation. She almost groaned when, pressing him as to his
+pecuniary means, she found his old terror of debt seemed fading
+away, and the solid healthful principles he had taken from his
+village were loosening fast. Under all, it is true, there was what a
+wiser and older person than Helen would have hailed as the redeeming
+promise. But that something was _grief_--a sublime grief in his
+own sense of falling--in his own impotence against the Fate he had
+provoked and coveted. The sublimity of that grief Helen could not
+detect: she saw only that it _was_ grief, and she grieved with it,
+letting it excuse every fault--making her more anxious to comfort,
+in order that she might save. Even from the first, when Leonard had
+exclaimed, "Ah, Helen, why did you ever leave me?" she had revolved
+the idea of return to him; and when in the boy's last visit he told
+her that Burley, persecuted by duns, was about to fly from his
+present lodgings, and take his abode with Leonard in the room she
+had left vacant, all doubt was over. She resolved to sacrifice the
+safety and shelter of the home assured her. She resolved to come
+back and share Leonard's penury and struggles, and save the old
+room, wherein she had prayed for him, from the tempter's dangerous
+presence. Should she burden him? No; she had assisted her father by
+many little female arts in needle and fancy work. She had improved
+herself in these during her sojourn with Miss Starke. She could
+bring her share to the common stock. Possessed with this idea, she
+determined to realise it before the day on which Leonard had told
+her Burley was to move his quarters. Accordingly she rose very
+early one morning; she wrote a pretty and grateful note to Miss
+Starke, who was fast asleep, left it on the table, and, before
+any one was astir, stole from the house, her little bundle on her
+arm. She lingered an instant at the garden-gate, with a remorseful
+sentiment--a feeling that she had ill-repaid the cold and prim
+protection that Miss Starke had shown her. But sisterly love carried
+all before it. She closed the gate with a sigh, and went on.
+
+She arrived at the lodging-house before Leonard was up, took
+possession of her old chamber, and, presenting herself to Leonard as
+he was about to go forth, said, (story-teller that she was,)--"I am
+sent away, brother, and I have, come to you to take care of me. Do
+not let us part again. But you must be very cheerful and very happy,
+or I shall think that I am sadly in your way."
+
+Leonard at first did look cheerful, and even happy; but then he
+thought of Burley, and then of his own means of supporting her, and
+was embarrassed, and began questioning Helen as to the possibility
+of reconciliation with Miss Starke. And Helen said gravely,
+"Impossible--do not ask it, and do not go near her."
+
+Then Leonard thought she had been humbled and insulted, and
+remembered that she was a gentleman's child, and felt for her
+wounded pride--he was so proud himself. Yet still he was embarrassed.
+
+"Shall I keep the purse again, Leonard?" said Helen coaxingly.
+
+"Alas!" replied Leonard, "the purse is empty."
+
+"That is very naughty in the purse," said Helen, "since you put so
+much into it."
+
+"I?"
+
+"Did not you say that you made, at least, a guinea a-week?"
+
+"Yes; but Burley takes the money; and then, poor fellow! as I owe
+all to him, I have not the heart to prevent his spending it as he
+likes."
+
+"Please, I wish you could settle the month's rent," said the
+landlady, suddenly showing herself. She said it civilly, but with
+firmness.
+
+Leonard coloured. "It shall be paid to-day."
+
+Then he pressed his hat on his head, and, putting Helen gently
+aside, went forth.
+
+"Speak to _me_ in future, kind Mrs Smedley," said Helen with the air
+of a housewife. "_He_ is always in study, and must not be disturbed."
+
+The landlady--a good woman, though she liked her rent--smiled
+benignly. She was fond of Helen, whom she had known of old.
+
+"I am so glad you are come back; and perhaps now the young man will
+not keep such late hours. I meant to give him warning, but--"
+
+"But he will be a great man one of these days, and you must bear
+with him now." And Helen kissed Mrs Smedley, and sent her away half
+inclined to cry.
+
+Then Helen busied herself in the rooms. She found her father's box,
+which had been duly forwarded. She re-examined its contents, and
+wept as she touched each humble and pious relic. But her father's
+memory itself thus seemed to give this home a sanction which the
+former had not; and she rose quietly and began mechanically to put
+things in order, sighing as she, saw all so neglected, till she
+came to the rose-tree, and that alone showed heed and care. "Dear
+Leonard!" she murmured, and the smile resettled on her lips.
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+Nothing, perhaps, could have severed Leonard from Burley but Helen's
+return to his care. It was impossible for him, even had there been
+another room in the house vacant, (which there was not,) to install
+this noisy riotous son of the Muse by Bacchus, talking at random,
+and smelling of spirits, in the same dwelling with an innocent,
+delicate, timid, female child. And Leonard could not leave her alone
+all the twenty-four hours. She restored a home to him, and imposed
+its duties. He therefore told Mr Burley that in future he should
+write and study in his own room, and hinted with many a blush, and
+as delicately as he could, that it seemed to him that whatever he
+obtained from his pen ought to be halved with Burley, to whose
+interest he owed the employment, and from whose books or whose
+knowledge he took what helped to maintain it; but that the other
+half, if his, he could no longer afford to spend upon feasts or
+libations. He had another to provide for.
+
+Burley pooh-poohed the notion of taking half his coadjutor's
+earning, with much grandeur, but spoke very fretfully of Leonard's
+sober appropriation of the other half; and, though a good-natured
+warm-hearted man, felt extremely indignant against the sudden
+interposition of poor Helen. However, Leonard was firm; and then
+Burley grew sullen, and so they parted. But the rent was still to
+be paid. How? Leonard for the first time thought of the pawnbroker.
+He had clothes to spare, and Riccabocca's watch. No; that last he
+shrank from applying to such base uses.
+
+He went home at noon, and met Helen at the street door. She too had
+been out, and her soft cheek was rosy red with unwonted exercise and
+the sense of joy. She had still preserved the few gold pieces which
+Leonard had taken back to her on his first visit to Miss Starke's.
+She had now gone out and bought wools and implements for work; and
+meanwhile she had paid the rent.
+
+Leonard did not object to the work, but he blushed deeply when he
+knew about the rent, and was very angry. He payed back to her that
+night what she had advanced; and Helen wept silently at his pride,
+and wept more when she saw the next day a woeful hiatus in his
+wardrobe.
+
+But Leonard now worked at home, and worked resolutely; and Helen
+sate by his side, working too; so that next day, and the next,
+slipped peacefully away, and in the evening of the second he
+asked her to walk out in the fields. She sprang up joyously at
+the invitation, when bang went the door, and in reeled John
+Burley--drunk:--And so drunk!
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+And with Burley there reeled in another man--a friend of his--a
+man who had been a wealthy trader and once well to do, but who,
+unluckily, had literary tastes, and was fond of hearing Burley talk.
+So, since he had known the wit, his business had fallen from him,
+and he had passed through the Bankrupt Court. A very shabby-looking
+dog he was, indeed, and his nose was redder than Burley's.
+
+John made a drunken dash at poor Helen. "So you are the Pentheus in
+petticoats who defies Bacchus," cried he; and therewith he roared
+out a verse from Euripides. Helen ran away, and Leonard interposed.
+
+"For shame, Burley!"
+
+"He's drunk," said Mr Douce the bankrupt trader--"very drunk--don't
+mind--him. I say, sir, I hope we don't intrude. Sit still, Burley,
+sit still, and talk, do--that's a good man. You should hear
+him--ta--ta--talk, sir."
+
+Leonard meanwhile had got Helen out of the room, into her own,
+and begged her not to be alarmed, and keep the door locked. He
+then returned to Burley, who had seated himself on the bed, trying
+wondrous hard to keep himself upright; while Mr Douce was striving
+to light a short pipe that he carried in his buttonhole--without
+having filled it--and, naturally failing in that attempt, was now
+beginning to weep.
+
+Leonard was deeply shocked and revolted for Helen's sake; but it was
+hopeless to make Burley listen to reason. And how could the boy turn
+out of his room the man to whom he was under obligations?
+
+Meanwhile there smote upon Helen's shrinking, ears loud jarring talk
+and maudlin laughter, and cracked attempts at jovial songs. Then she
+heard Mrs Smedley in Leonard's room, remonstrating, and Burley's
+laugh was louder than before, and Mrs Smedley, who was a meek woman,
+evidently got frightened, and was heard in precipitate retreat.
+Long and loud talk recommenced, Burley's great voice predominant,
+Mr Douce chiming in with hiccupy broken treble. Hour after hour
+this lasted, for want of the drink that would have brought it to a
+premature close. And Burley gradually began to talk himself somewhat
+sober. Then Mr Douce was heard descending the stairs, and silence
+followed. At dawn, Leonard knocked at Helen's door. She opened it at
+once, for she had not gone to bed.
+
+"Helen," said he very sadly, "you cannot continue here. I must find
+out some proper home for you. This man has served me when all London
+was friendless, and he tells me that he has nowhere else to go--that
+the bailiffs are after him. He has now fallen asleep. I will go and
+find you some lodging close at hand--for I cannot expel him who has
+protected me; and yet you cannot be under the same roof with him. My
+own good angel, I must lose you."
+
+He did not wait for her answer, but hurried down the stairs.
+
+The morning looked through the shutterless panes in Leonard's
+garret, and the birds began to chirp from the elm-tree, when Burley
+rose and shook himself, and stared round. He could not quite make
+out where he was. He got hold of the water-jug which he emptied
+at three draughts, and felt greatly refreshed. He then began to
+reconnoitre the chamber--looked at Leonard's MSS.--peeped into the
+drawers--wondered where the devil Leonard himself had gone to--and
+finally amused himself by throwing down the fire-irons, ringing the
+bell, and making all the noise he could, in the hopes of attracting
+the attention of somebody or other, and procuring himself his
+morning dram.
+
+In the midst of this _charivari_ the door opened softly, but as if
+with a resolute hand, and the small quiet form of Helen stood before
+the threshold. BURLEY turned round, and the two looked at each other
+for some moments with silent scrutiny.
+
+BURLEY, (composing his features into their most friendly
+expression.)--"Come hither, my dear. So you are the little girl whom
+I saw with Leonard on the banks of the Brent, and you have come
+back to live with him--and I have come to live with him too. You
+shall be our little housekeeper, and I will tell you the story of
+Prince Prettyman, and a great many others not to be found in _Mother
+Goose_. Meanwhile, my dear little girl, here's sixpence--just run
+out and change this for its worth in rum."
+
+HELEN, (coming slowly up to Mr Burley, and still gazing earnestly
+into his face.)--"Ah, sir, Leonard says you have a kind heart, and
+that you have served him--he cannot ask you to leave the house; and
+so I, who have never served him, am to go hence and live alone."
+
+BURLEY, (moved.)--"You go, my little lady?--and why? Can we not all
+live together?"
+
+HELEN.--"No, sir. I left everything to come to Leonard, for we had
+met first at my father's grave. But you rob me of him, and I have no
+other friend on earth."
+
+BURLEY, (discomposed.)--"Explain yourself. Why must you leave him
+because I come?"
+
+Helen looks at Mr Burley again, long and wistfully, but makes no
+answer.
+
+BURLEY, (with a gulp.)--"Is it because he thinks I am not fit
+company for you?"
+
+Helen bowed her head.
+
+Burley winced, and after a moment's pause said,--"He is right."
+
+HELEN, (obeying the impulse at her heart, springs forward and takes
+Burley's hand.)--"Ah, sir," she cried, "before he knew you he was
+so different--then he was cheerful--then, even when his first
+disappointment came, I grieved and wept; but I felt he would conquer
+still--for his heart was so good and pure. Oh, sir, don't think I
+reproach you; but what is to become of him if--if--No, it is not for
+myself I speak. I know that if I was here, that if he had me to care
+for, he would come home early--and work patiently--and--and--that
+I might save him. But now when I am gone, and you with him--you
+to whom he is grateful, you whom he would follow against his own
+conscience, (you must see that, sir)--what is to become of him?"
+
+Helen's voice died in sobs.
+
+Burley took three or four long strides through the room--he was
+greatly agitated. "I am a demon," he murmured. "I never saw it
+before--but it is true--I should be this boy's ruin." Tears stood in
+his eyes, he paused abruptly, made a clutch at his hat, and turned
+to the door.
+
+Helen stopped the way, and, taking him gently by the arm,
+said,--"Oh, sir, forgive me--I have pained you;" and looked up at
+him with a compassionate expression, that indeed made the child's
+sweet face as that of an angel.
+
+Burley bent down as if to kiss her, and then drew back--perhaps with
+a sentiment that his lips were not worthy to touch that innocent
+brow.
+
+"If I had had a sister--a child like you, little one," he muttered,
+"perhaps I too might have been saved in time. Now--"
+
+"Ah, now you may stay, sir; I don't fear you any more."
+
+"No, no; you would fear me again ere night-time, and I might not be
+always in the right mood to listen to a voice like yours, child.
+Your Leonard has a noble heart and rare gifts. He should rise yet,
+and he shall. I will not drag him into the mire. Good-bye--you will
+see me no more." He broke from Helen, cleared the stairs with a
+bound, and was out of the house.
+
+When Leonard returned he was surprised to hear his unwelcome
+guest was gone--but Helen did not venture to tell him of her
+interposition. She knew instinctively how such officiousness would
+mortify and offend the pride of man--but she never again spoke
+harshly of poor Burley. Leonard supposed that he should either see
+or hear of the humourist in the course of the day. Finding he did
+not, he went in search of him at his old haunts; but no trace. He
+inquired at the _Beehive_ if they knew there of his new address, but
+no tidings of Burley could be obtained.
+
+As he came home disappointed and anxious, for he felt uneasy as to
+the disappearance of his wild friend, Mrs Smedley met him at the
+door.
+
+"Please, sir, suit yourself with another lodging," said she. "I can
+have no such singings and shoutings going on at night in my house.
+And that poor little girl, too!--you should be ashamed of yourself."
+
+Leonard frowned, and passed by.
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+Meanwhile, on leaving Helen, Burley strode on; and, as if by some
+better instinct, for he was unconscious of his own steps, he took
+the way towards the still green haunts of his youth. When he paused
+at length, he was already before the door of a rural cottage,
+standing alone in the midst of fields, with a little farm-yard at
+the back; and far through the trees in front was caught a glimpse of
+the winding Brent.
+
+With this cottage Burley was familiar; it was inhabited by a good
+old couple who had known him from a boy. There he habitually
+left his rods and fishing-tackle; there, for intervals in his
+turbid riotous life, he had sojourned for two or three days
+together--fancying the first day that the country was a heaven, and
+convinced before the third that it was a purgatory.
+
+An old woman, of neat and tidy exterior, came forth to greet him.
+
+"Ah, Master John," said she clasping his nerveless hand--"well,
+the fields be pleasant now--I hope you are come to stay a bit? Do;
+it will freshen you: you lose all the fine colour you had once, in
+Lunnon town."
+
+"I will stay with you, my kind friend," said Burley with unusual
+meekness--"I can have the old room, then?"
+
+"Oh yes, come and look at it. I never let it now to any one but
+you--never have let it since the dear beautiful lady with the
+angel's face went away. Poor thing, what could have become of her?"
+
+Thus speaking, while Burley listened not, the old woman drew him
+within the cottage, and led him up the stairs into a room that might
+have well become a better house, for it was furnished with taste,
+and even elegance. A small cabinet pianoforte stood opposite the
+fireplace, and the window looked upon pleasant meads and tangled
+hedgerows, and the narrow windings of the blue rivulet. Burley sank
+down exhausted, and gazed wistfully from the casement.
+
+"You have not breakfasted?" said the hostess anxiously.
+
+"No."
+
+"Well, the eggs are fresh laid, and you would like a rasher of
+bacon, Master John? And if you _will_ have brandy in your tea, I
+have some that you left long ago in your own bottle."
+
+Burley shook his head. "No brandy, Mrs Goodyer; only fresh milk. I
+will see whether I can yet coax Nature."
+
+Mrs Goodyer did not know what was meant by coaxing Nature, but she
+said, "Pray do, Master John," and vanished.
+
+That day Burley went out with his rod, and he fished hard for the
+one-eyed perch: but in vain. Then he roved along the stream with
+his hands in his pockets, whistling. He returned to the cottage at
+sunset, partook of the fare provided for him, abstained from the
+brandy, and felt dreadfully low. He called for pen, ink, and paper,
+and sought to write, but could not achieve two lines. He summoned
+Mrs Goodyer, "Tell your husband to come and sit and talk."
+
+Up came old Jacob Goodyer, and the great wit bade him tell him all
+the news of the village. Jacob obeyed willingly, and Burley at last
+fell asleep. The next day it was much the same, only at dinner he
+had up the brandy bottle, and finished it; and he did _not_ have up
+Jacob, but he contrived to write.
+
+The third day it rained incessantly. "Have you no books, Mrs
+Goodyer?" asked poor John Burley.
+
+"Oh, yes, some that the dear lady left behind her; and perhaps you
+would like to look at some papers in her own writing?"
+
+"No, not the papers--all women scribble, and all scribble the same
+things. Get me the books."
+
+The books were brought up--poetry and essays--John knew them by
+heart. He looked out on the rain, and at evening the rain had
+ceased. He rushed to his hat and fled.
+
+"Nature, Nature!" he exclaimed when he was out in the air and
+hurrying by the dripping hedgerows, "you are not to be coaxed by
+me! I have jilted you shamefully, I own it; you are a female and
+unforgiving. I don't complain. You may be very pretty, but you are
+the stupidest and most tiresome companion that ever I met with.
+Thank heaven, I am not married to you!"
+
+Thus John Burley made his way into town, and paused at the first
+public house. Out of that house he came with a jovial air, and
+on he strode towards the heart of London. Now he is in Leicester
+Square, and he gazes on the foreigners who stalk that region, and
+hums a tune; and now from yonder alley two forms emerge, and dog
+his careless footsteps; now through the maze of passages towards St
+Martin's he threads his path, and, anticipating an orgy as he nears
+his favourite haunts, jingles the silver in his pockets; and now the
+two forms are at his heels.
+
+"Hail to thee, O Freedom!" muttered John Burley, "thy dwelling is in
+cities, and thy palace is the tavern."
+
+"In the king's name," quoth a gruff voice; and John Burley feels the
+horrid and familiar tap on the shoulder.
+
+The two bailiffs who dogged have seized their prey.
+
+"At whose suit?" asked John Burley falteringly.
+
+"Mr Cox, the wine-merchant."
+
+"Cox! A man to whom I gave a cheque on my bankers, not three months
+ago!"
+
+"But it warn't cashed."
+
+"What does that signify?--the intention was the same. A good heart
+takes the will for the deed. Cox is a monster of ingratitude; and I
+withdraw my custom."
+
+"Sarve him right. Would your honour like a jarvey?"
+
+"I would rather spend the money on something else," said John
+Burley. "Give me your arm, I am not proud. After all, thank heaven,
+I shall not sleep in the country."
+
+And John Burley made a night of it in the Fleet.
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+Miss Starke was one of those ladies who pass their lives in the
+direst of all civil strife--war with their servants. She looked upon
+the members of that class as the unrelenting and sleepless enemies
+of the unfortunate householders condemned to employ them. She
+thought they ate and drank to their villanous utmost, in order to
+ruin their benefactors--that they lived in one constant conspiracy
+with one another and the tradesmen, the object of which was to
+cheat and pilfer. Miss Starke was a miserable woman. As she had no
+relations or friends who cared enough for her to share her solitary
+struggle against her domestic foes; and her income, though easy,
+was an annuity that died with herself, thereby reducing various
+nephews, nieces, or cousins, to the strict bounds of a natural
+affection--that did not exist; and as she felt the want of some
+friendly face amidst this world of distrust and hate, so she had
+tried the resource of venal companions. But the venal companions
+had never staid long--either they disliked Miss Starke, or Miss
+Starke disliked them. Therefore the poor woman had resolved upon
+bringing up some little girl whose heart, as she said to herself,
+would be fresh and uncorrupted, and from whom she might expect
+gratitude. She had been contented, on the whole, with Helen, and
+had meant to keep that child in her house as long as she (Miss
+Starke) remained upon the earth--perhaps some thirty years longer;
+and then, having carefully secluded her from marriage, and other
+friendship, to leave her nothing but the regret of having lost so
+kind a benefactress. Agreeably with this notion, and in order to
+secure the affections of the child, Miss Starke had relaxed the
+frigid austerity natural to her manner and mode of thought, and been
+kind to Helen in an iron way. She had neither slapped nor pinched
+her, neither had she starved. She had allowed her to see Leonard,
+according to the agreement made with Dr Morgan, and had laid out
+tenpence on cakes, besides contributing fruit from her garden for
+the first interview--a hospitality she did not think it fit to renew
+on subsequent occasions. In return for this, she conceived she had
+purchased the right to Helen bodily and spiritually, and nothing
+could exceed her indignation when she rose one morning and found the
+child had gone. As it never had occurred to her to ask Leonard's
+address, though she suspected Helen had gone to him, she was at a
+loss what to do, and remained for twenty-four hours in a state of
+inane depression. But then she began to miss the child so much that
+her energies woke, and she persuaded herself that she was actuated
+by the purest benevolence in trying to reclaim this poor creature
+from the world into which Helen had thus rashly plunged.
+
+Accordingly, she put an advertisement into the _Times_, to the
+following effect, liberally imitated from one by which, in former
+years, she had recovered a favourite Blenheim.
+
+     TWO GUINEAS REWARD.
+
+     Strayed, from Ivy Cottage, Highgate, a Little Girl, answers to
+     the name of Helen; with blue eyes and brown hair; white muslin
+     frock, and straw hat with blue ribbons. Whoever will bring the
+     same to Ivy Cottage, shall receive the above Reward.
+
+     _N.B._--Nothing more will be offered.
+
+Now, it so happened that Mrs Smedley had put an advertisement in
+the _Times_ on her own account, relative to a niece of hers who
+was coming from the country, and for whom she desired to find
+a situation. So, contrary to her usual habit, she sent for the
+newspaper, and, close by her own advertisement, she saw Miss
+Starke's.
+
+It was impossible that she could mistake the description of Helen;
+and, as this advertisement caught her eye the very day after the
+whole house had been disturbed and scandalised by Burley's noisy
+visit, and on which she had resolved to get rid of a lodger who
+received such visitors, the goodhearted woman was delighted to think
+that she could restore Helen to some safe home. While thus thinking,
+Helen herself entered the kitchen where Mrs Smedley sate, and the
+landlady had the imprudence to point out the advertisement, and
+talk, as she called it, "seriously" to the little girl.
+
+Helen in vain and with tears entreated her to take no step in reply
+to the advertisement. Mrs Smedley felt it was an affair of duty,
+and was obdurate, and shortly afterwards put on her bonnet and
+left the house. Helen conjectured that she was on her way to Miss
+Starke's, and her whole soul was bent on flight. Leonard had gone
+to the office of the _Beehive_ with his MSS.; but she packed up all
+their joint effects, and, just as she had done so, he returned. She
+communicated the news of the advertisement, and said she should be
+so miserable if compelled to go back to Miss Starke's, and implored
+him so pathetically to save her from such sorrow that he at once
+assented to her proposal of flight. Luckily, little was owing to the
+landlady--that little was left with the maid-servant; and, profiting
+by Mrs Smedley's absence, they escaped without scene or conflict.
+Their effects were taken by Leonard to a stand of hackney vehicles,
+and then left at a coach-office, while they went in search of
+lodgings. It was wise to choose an entirely new and remote district;
+and before night they were settled in an attic in Lambeth.
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+As the reader will expect, no trace of Burley could Leonard find:
+the humourist had ceased to communicate with the _Beehive_. But
+Leonard grieved for Burley's sake; and indeed, he missed the
+intercourse of the large wrong mind. But he settled down by
+degrees to the simple loving society of his child companion, and
+in that presence grew more tranquil. The hours in the daytime
+that he did not pass at work he spent as before, picking up
+knowledge at bookstalls; and at dusk he and Helen would stroll
+out--sometimes striving to escape from the long suburb into fresh
+rural air; more often wandering to and fro the bridge that led
+to glorious Westminster--London's classic land--and watching the
+vague lamps reflected on the river. This haunt suited the musing
+melancholy boy. He would stand long and with wistful silence by the
+balustrade--seating Helen thereon, that she too might look along the
+dark mournful waters which, dark though they be, still have their
+charm of mysterious repose.
+
+As the river flowed between the world of roofs, and the roar of
+human passions on either side, so in those two hearts flowed
+Thought--and all they knew of London was its shadow.
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+There appeared in the _Beehive_ certain very truculent political
+papers--papers very like the tracts in the Tinker's bag. Leonard
+did not heed them much, but they made far more sensation in the
+public that read the _Beehive_ than Leonard's papers, full of rare
+promise though the last were. They greatly increased the sale of the
+periodical in the manufacturing towns, and began to awake the drowsy
+vigilance of the Home Office. Suddenly a descent was made upon the
+_Beehive_, and all its papers and plant. The editor saw himself
+threatened with a criminal prosecution, and the certainty of two
+years' imprisonment: he did not like the prospect, and disappeared.
+One evening, when Leonard, unconscious of these mischances, arrived
+at the door of the office, he found it closed. An agitated mob was
+before it, and a voice that was not new to his ear was haranguing
+the bystanders, with many imprecations against "tyrans." He looked,
+and, to his amaze, recognised in the orator Mr Sprott the Tinker.
+
+The police came in numbers to disperse the crowd, and Mr Sprott
+prudently vanished. Leonard learned then what had befallen, and
+again saw himself without employment and the means of bread.
+
+Slowly he walked back. "O, knowledge, knowledge!--powerless indeed!"
+he murmured.
+
+As he thus spoke, a handbill in large capitals met his eyes on a
+dead wall--"Wanted, a few smart young men for India."
+
+A crimp accosted him--"You would make a fine soldier, my man. You
+have stout limbs of your own." Leonard moved on.
+
+"It has come back, then, to this. Brute physical force after all! O
+Mind, despair! O Peasant, be a machine again."
+
+He entered his attic noiselessly, and gazed upon Helen as she sate
+at work, straining her eyes by the open window--with tender and deep
+compassion. She had not heard him enter, nor was she aware of his
+presence. Patient and still she sate, and the small fingers plied
+busily. He gazed, and saw that her cheek was pale and hollow, and
+the hands looked so thin! His heart was deeply touched, and at that
+moment he had not one memory of the baffled Poet, one thought that
+proclaimed the Egotist.
+
+He approached her gently, laid his hand on her shoulder--"Helen, put
+on your shawl and bonnet, and walk out--I have much to say."
+
+In a few moments she was ready, and they took their way to their
+favourite haunt upon the bridge. Pausing in one of the recesses or
+nooks, Leonard then began,--"Helen, we must part."
+
+"Part?--Oh, brother!"
+
+"Listen. All work that depends on mind is over for me; nothing
+remains but the labour of thews and sinews. I cannot go back to
+my village and say to all, 'My hopes were self-conceit, and my
+intellect a delusion!' I cannot. Neither in this sordid city can
+I turn menial or porter. I might be born to that drudgery, but my
+mind has, it may be unhappily, raised me above my birth. What, then,
+shall I do? I know not yet--serve as a soldier, or push my way to
+some wilderness afar, as an emigrant, perhaps. But whatever my
+choice, I must henceforth be alone; I have a home no more. But there
+is a home for you, Helen, a very humble one, (for you, too, so well
+born,) but very safe--the roof of--of--my peasant mother. She will
+love you for my sake, and--and--"
+
+Helen clung to him trembling, and sobbed out, "Anything, anything
+you will. But I can work; I can make money, Leonard. I do, indeed,
+make money--you do not know how much--but enough for us both till
+better times come to you. Do not let us part."
+
+"And I--a man, and born to labour, to be maintained by the work of
+an infant! No, Helen, do not so degrade me."
+
+She drew back as she looked on his flushed brow, bowed her head
+submissively, and murmured, "Pardon."
+
+"Ah," said Helen, after a pause, "if now we could but find my poor
+father's friend! I never so much cared for it before."
+
+"Yes, he would surely provide for you."
+
+"For _me_!" repeated Helen, in a tone of soft deep reproach, and she
+turned away her head to conceal her tears.
+
+"You are sure you would remember him, if we met him by chance?"
+
+"Oh yes. He was so different from all we see in this terrible city,
+and his eyes were like yonder stars, so clear and so bright; yet the
+light seemed to come from afar off, as the light does in yours, when
+your thoughts are away from all things round you. And then, too, his
+dog whom he called Nero--I could not forget that."
+
+"But his dog may not be always with him."
+
+"But the bright clear eyes are! Ah, now you look up to heaven, and
+yours seem to dream like his."
+
+Leonard did not answer, for his thoughts were indeed less on earth
+than struggling to pierce into that remote and mysterious heaven.
+
+Both were silent long; the crowd passed them by unheedingly. Night
+deepened over the river, but the reflection of the lamplights on
+its waves was more visible than that of the stars. The beams showed
+the darkness of the strong current, and the craft that lay eastward
+on the tide, with sail-less spectral masts and black dismal hulks,
+looked deathlike in their stillness.
+
+Leonard looked down, and the thought of Chatterton's grim suicide
+came back to his soul, and a pale scornful face with luminous
+haunting eyes seemed to look up from the stream, and murmur from
+livid lips,--"Struggle no more against the tides on the surface--all
+is calm and rest within the deep."
+
+Starting in terror from the gloom of his reverie, the boy began to
+talk fast to Helen, and tried to soothe her with descriptions of the
+lowly home which he had offered.
+
+He spoke of the light cares which she would participate with his
+mother--for by that name he still called the widow--and dwelt,
+with an eloquence that the contrast round him made sincere and
+strong, on the happy rural life, the shadowy woodlands, the rippling
+cornfields, the solemn lone church-spire soaring from the tranquil
+landscape. Flatteringly he painted the flowery terraces of the
+Italian exile, and the playful fountain that, even as he spoke, was
+flinging up its spray to the stars, through serene air untroubled
+by the smoke of cities, and untainted by the sinful sighs of men.
+He promised her the love and protection of natures akin to the
+happy scene: the simple affectionate mother--the gentle pastor--the
+exile wise and kind--Violante, with dark eyes full of the mystic
+thoughts that solitude calls from childhood,--Violante should be her
+companion.
+
+"And oh!" cried Helen, "if life be thus happy there, return with me,
+return--return!"
+
+"Alas!" murmured the boy, "if the hammer once strike the spark from
+the anvil, the spark must fly upward; it cannot fall back to earth
+until light has left it. Upward still, Helen--let me go upward
+still!"
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+The next morning Helen was very ill--so ill that, shortly after
+rising, she was forced to creep back to bed. Her frame shivered--her
+eyes were heavy--her hand burned like fire. Fever had set in.
+Perhaps she might have caught cold on the bridge--perhaps her
+emotions had proved too much for her frame. Leonard, in great
+alarm, called on the nearest apothecary. The apothecary looked
+grave, and said there was danger. And danger soon declared
+itself--Helen became delirious. For several days she lay in this
+state, between life and death. Leonard then felt that all the
+sorrows of earth are light, compared with the fear of losing what we
+love. How valueless the envied laurel seemed beside the dying rose.
+
+Thanks, perhaps, more to his heed and tending than to medical
+skill, she recovered sense at last--immediate peril was over.
+But she was very weak and reduced--her ultimate recovery
+doubtful--convalescence, at best, likely to be very slow.
+
+But when she learned how long she had been thus ill, she looked
+anxiously at Leonard's face as he bent over her, and faltered
+forth--"Give me my work; I am strong enough for that now--it would
+amuse me."
+
+Leonard burst into tears.
+
+Alas! he had no work himself; all their joint money had melted away;
+the apothecary was not like good Dr Morgan: the medicines were to
+be paid for, and the rent. Two days before, Leonard had pawned
+Riccabocca's watch; and when the last shilling thus raised was gone,
+how should he support Helen? Nevertheless he conquered his tears,
+and assured her that he had employment; and that so earnestly that
+she believed him, and sank into soft sleep. He listened to her
+breathing, kissed her forehead, and left the room. He turned into
+his own neigbouring garret, and, leaning his face on his hands,
+collected all his thoughts.
+
+He must be a beggar at last. He must write to Mr Dale for money--Mr
+Dale, too, who knew the secret of his birth. He would rather have
+begged of a stranger--it seemed to add a new dishonour to his
+mother's memory for the child to beg of one who was acquainted with
+her shame. Had he himself been the only one to want and to starve,
+he would have sunk inch by inch into the grave of famine, before he
+would have so subdued his pride. But Helen, there on that bed--Helen
+needing, for weeks perhaps, all support, and illness making luxuries
+themselves like necessaries! Beg he must. And when he so resolved,
+had you but seen the proud bitter soul he conquered, you would
+have said--"This which he thinks is degradation--this is heroism.
+Oh strange human heart!--no epic ever written achieves the Sublime
+and the Beautiful which are graven, unread by human eye, in thy
+secret leaves." Of whom else should he beg? His mother had nothing,
+Riccabocca was poor, and the stately Violante, who had exclaimed,
+"Would that I were a man!"--he could not endure the thought that she
+should pity him, and despise. The Avenels! No--thrice No. He drew
+towards him hastily ink and paper, and wrote rapid lines, that were
+wrung from him as from the bleeding strings of life.
+
+But the hour for the post had passed--the letter must wait till
+the next day; and three days at least would elapse before he
+could receive an answer. He left the letter on the table, and,
+stifling as for air, went forth. He crossed the bridge--he passed
+on mechanically--and was borne along by a crowd pressing towards
+the doors of Parliament. A debate that excited popular interest
+was fixed for that evening, and many bystanders collected in the
+street to see the members pass to and fro, or hear what speakers had
+yet risen to take part in the debate, or try to get orders for the
+gallery.
+
+He halted amidst these loiterers, with no interest, indeed, in
+common with them, but looking over their heads abstractedly towards
+the tall Funeral Abbey--Imperial Golgotha of Poets, and Chiefs, and
+Kings.
+
+Suddenly his attention was diverted to those around by the sound of
+a name--displeasingly known to him. "How are you, Randal Leslie?
+coming to hear the debate?" said a member who was passing through
+the street.
+
+"Yes; Mr Egerton promised to get me under the gallery. He is to
+speak himself to-night, and I have never heard him. As you are going
+into the House, will you remind him?"
+
+"I can't now, for he is speaking already--and well too. I hurried
+from the Athenæum, where I was dining, on purpose to be in time, as
+I heard that his speech was making a great effect."
+
+"This is very unlucky," said Randal. "I had no idea he would speak
+so early."
+
+"M---- brought him up by a direct personal attack. But follow me;
+perhaps I can get you into the House; and a man like you, Leslie,
+of whom we expect great things some day, I can tell you, should not
+miss any such opportunity of knowing what this House of ours is on a
+field night. Come on!"
+
+The member hurried towards the door; and as Randal followed him,
+a bystander cried--"That is the young man who wrote the famous
+pamphlet--Egerton's relation."
+
+"Oh, indeed!" said another. "Clever man, Egerton--I am waiting for
+him."
+
+"So am I."
+
+"Why, you are not a constituent, as I am."
+
+"No; but he has been very kind to my nephew, and I must thank him.
+You are a constituent--he is an honour to your town."
+
+"So he is: Enlightened man!"
+
+"And so generous!"
+
+"Brings forward really good measures," quoth the politician.
+
+"And clever young men," said the uncle.
+
+Therewith one or two others joined in the praise of Audley Egerton,
+and many anecdotes of his liberality were told.
+
+Leonard listened at first listlessly, at last with thoughtful
+attention. He had heard Burley, too, speak highly of this generous
+statesman, who, without pretending to genius himself, appreciated
+it in others. He suddenly remembered, too, that Egerton was
+half-brother to the Squire. Vague notions of some appeal to this
+eminent person, not for charity, but employ to his mind, gleamed
+across him--inexperienced boy that he yet was! And, while thus
+meditating, the door of the House opened, and out came Audley
+Egerton himself. A partial cheering, followed by a general murmur,
+apprised Leonard of the presence of the popular statesman. Egerton
+was caught hold of by some five or six persons in succession; a
+shake of the hand, a nod, a brief whispered word or two, sufficed
+the practised member for graceful escape; and soon, free from the
+crowd, his tall erect figure passed on, and turned towards the
+bridge. He paused at the angle and took out his watch, looking at it
+by the lamp-light.
+
+"Harley will be here soon," he muttered--"he is always punctual; and
+now that I have spoken, I can give him an hour or so. That is well."
+
+As he replaced his watch in his pocket, and re-buttoned his coat
+over his firm broad chest, he lifted his eyes, and saw a young man
+standing before him.
+
+"Do you want me?" asked the statesman, with the direct brevity of
+his practical character.
+
+"Mr Egerton," said the young man, with a voice that slightly
+trembled, and yet was manly amidst emotion, "you have a great name,
+and great power--I stand here in these streets of London without
+a friend, and without employ. I believe that I have it in me to
+do some nobler work than that of bodily labour, had I but one
+friend--one opening for my thoughts. And now I have said this, I
+scarcely know how, or why, but from despair, and the sudden impulse
+which that despair took from the praise that follows your success, I
+have nothing more to add."
+
+Audley Egerton was silent for a moment, struck by the tone and
+address of the stranger; but the consummate and wary man of the
+world, accustomed to all manner of strange applications, and all
+varieties of imposture, quickly recovered from a passing and slight
+effect.
+
+"Are you a native of ----?" (naming the town he represented as
+member.)
+
+"No, sir."
+
+"Well, young man, I am very sorry for you; but the good sense
+you must possess (for I judge of that by the education you have
+evidently received) must tell you that a public man, whatever be his
+patronage, has it too fully absorbed by claimants who have a right
+to demand it, to be able to listen to strangers."
+
+He paused a moment, and, as Leonard stood silent, added, with more
+kindness than most public men so accosted would have showed--
+
+"You say you are friendless--poor fellow. In early life that happens
+to many of us, who find friends enough before the close. Be honest,
+and well-conducted; lean on yourself, not on strangers; work with
+the body if you can't with the mind; and, believe me, that advice is
+all I can give you, unless this trifle,"--and the minister held out
+a crown piece.
+
+Leonard bowed, shook his head sadly, and walked away. Egerton looked
+after him with a slight pang.
+
+"Pooh!" said he to himself, "there must be thousands in the same
+state in these streets of London. I cannot redress the necessities
+of civilisation. Well educated! It is not from ignorance henceforth
+that society will suffer--it is from over-educating the hungry
+thousands who, thus unfitted for manual toil, and with no career for
+mental, will some day or other stand like that boy in our streets,
+and puzzle wiser ministers than I am."
+
+As Egerton thus mused, and passed on to the bridge, a bugle-horn
+rang merrily from the box of a gay four-in-hand. A drag-coach with
+superb blood-horses rattled over the causeway, and in the driver
+Egerton recognised his nephew--Frank Hazeldean.
+
+The young Guardsman was returning, with a lively party of men, from
+dining at Greenwich; and the careless laughter of these children of
+pleasure floated far over the still river.
+
+It vexed the ear of the careworn statesman--sad, perhaps, with all
+his greatness, lonely amidst all his crowd of friends. It reminded
+him, perhaps, of his own youth, when such parties and companionships
+were familiar to him, though through them all he bore an ambitious
+aspiring soul--"_Le jeu, vaut-il la chandelle?_" said he, shrugging
+his shoulders.
+
+The coach rolled rapidly past Leonard, as he stood leaning against
+the corner of the bridge, and the mire of the kennel splashed over
+him from the hoofs of the fiery horses. The laughter smote on his
+ear more discordantly than on the minister's, but it begot no envy.
+
+"Life is a dark riddle," said he, smiting his breast.
+
+And he walked slowly on, gained the recess where he had stood
+several nights before with Helen; and dizzy with want of food, and
+worn out for want of sleep, he sank down into the dark corner; while
+the river that rolled under the arch of stone muttered dirge-like
+in his ear;--as under the social key-stone wails and rolls on for
+ever the mystery of Human Discontent. Take comfort, O Thinker by the
+stream! 'Tis the river that founded and gave pomp to the city; and
+without the discontent, where were progress--what were Man? Take
+comfort, O THINKER! where ever the stream over which thou bendest,
+or beside which thou sinkest, weary and desolate, frets the arch
+that supports thee;--never dream that, by destroying the bridge,
+thou canst silence the moan of the wave!
+
+
+
+
+DISFRANCHISEMENT OF THE BOROUGHS.
+
+TO WALTER BINKIE, ESQ., PROVOST OF DREEPDAILY.
+
+
+MY DEAR PROVOST,--In the course of your communings with nature on
+the uplands of Dreepdaily, you must doubtless have observed that
+the advent of a storm is usually preceded by the appearance of a
+flight of seamaws, who, by their discordant screams, give notice of
+the approaching change of weather. For some time past it has been
+the opinion of those who are in the habit of watching the political
+horizon, that we should do well to prepare ourselves for a squall,
+and already the premonitory symptoms are distinctly audible. The
+Liberal press, headed by the _Times_, is clamorous for some sweeping
+change in the method of Parliamentary representation; and Lord John
+Russell, as you are well aware, proposes in the course of next
+Session to take up the subject. This is no mere _brutum fulmen_,
+or dodge to secure a little temporary popularity--it is a distinct
+party move for a very intelligible purpose; and is fraught, I
+think, with much danger and injustice to many of the constituencies
+which are now intrusted with the right of franchise. As you, my
+dear Provost, are a Liberal both by principle and profession,
+and moreover chief magistrate of a very old Scottish burgh, your
+opinion upon this matter must have great weight in determining the
+judgment of others; and, therefore, you will not, I trust, consider
+it too great a liberty, if, at this dull season of the year, I call
+your attention to one or two points which appear well worthy of
+consideration.
+
+In the first place, I think you will admit that extensive organic
+changes in the Constitution ought never to be attempted except in
+cases of strong necessity. The real interests of the country are
+never promoted by internal political agitation, which unsettles
+men's minds, is injurious to regular industry, and too often leaves
+behind it the seeds of jealousy and discord between different
+classes of the community, ready on some future occasion to burst
+into noxious existence. You would not, I think, wish to see annually
+renewed that sort of strife which characterised the era of the
+Reform Bill. I venture to pass no opinion whatever on the abstract
+merits of that measure. I accept it as a fact, just as I accept
+other changes in the Constitution of this country which took place
+before I was born; and I hope I shall ever comport myself as a loyal
+and independent elector. But I am sure you have far too lively
+a recollection of the ferment which that event created, to wish
+to see it renewed, without at least some urgent cause. You were
+consistently anxious for the suppression of rotten boroughs, and for
+the enlargement of the constituency upon a broad and popular basis;
+and you considered that the advantages to be gained by the adoption
+of the new system, justified the social risks which were incurred in
+the endeavour to supersede the old one. I do not say that you were
+wrong in this. The agitation for Parliamentary Reform had been going
+on for a great number of years; the voice of the majority of the
+country was undeniably in your favour, and you finally carried your
+point. Still, in consequence of that struggle, years elapsed before
+the heart-burnings and jealousies which were occasioned by it were
+allayed. Even now it is not uncommon to hear the reminiscences of
+the Reform Bill appealed to on the hustings by candidates who have
+little else to say for themselves by way of personal recommendation.
+A most ludicrous instance of this occurred very lately in the case
+of a young gentleman, who, being desirous of Parliamentary honours,
+actually requested the support of the electors on the ground that
+his father or grandfather--I forget which--had voted for the Reform
+Bill; a ceremony which he could not very well have performed in
+his own person, as at that time he had not been released from
+the bondage of swaddling-clothes! I need hardly add that he was
+rejected; but the anecdote is curious and instructive.
+
+In a country such as this, changes must be looked for in the course
+of years. One system dies out, or becomes unpopular, and is replaced
+by a new one. But I cannot charge my memory with any historical
+instance where a great change was attempted without some powerful
+or cogent reason. Still less can I recollect any great change being
+proposed, unless a large and powerful section of the community had
+unequivocally declared in its favour. The reason of this is quite
+obvious. The middle classes of Great Britain, however liberal they
+may be in their sentiments, have a just horror of revolutions. They
+know very well that organic changes are never effected without
+enormous loss and individual deprivation, and they will not move
+unless they are assured that the value of the object to be gained is
+commensurate with the extent of the sacrifice. In defence of their
+liberties, when these are attacked, the British people are ever
+ready to stand forward; but I mistake them much, if they will at any
+time allow themselves to be made the tools of a faction. The attempt
+to get up organic changes for the sole purpose of perpetuating the
+existence of a particular Ministry, or of maintaining the supremacy
+of a particular party, is a new feature in our history. It is an
+experiment which the nation ought not to tolerate for a single
+moment; and which I am satisfied it will not tolerate, when the
+schemes of its authors are laid bare.
+
+I believe, Provost, I am right in assuming that there has been no
+decided movement in favour of a New Parliamentary Reform Bill,
+either in Dreepdaily or in any of the other burghs with which you
+are connected. The electors are well satisfied with the operation of
+the ten-pound clause, which excludes from the franchise no man of
+decent ability and industry, whilst it secures property from those
+direct inroads which would be the inevitable result of a system of
+universal suffrage. Also, I suppose, you are reasonably indifferent
+on the subjects of Vote by Ballot and Triennial Parliaments, and
+that you view the idea of annual ones with undisguised reprobation.
+Difference of opinion undoubtedly may exist on some of these points:
+an eight-pound qualification may have its advocates, and the right
+of secret voting may be convenient for members of the clique; but,
+on the whole, you are satisfied with matters as they are; and,
+certainly, I do not see that you have any grievance to complain of.
+If I were a member of the Liberal party, I should be very sorry to
+see any change of the representation made in Scotland. Just observe
+how the matter stands. At the commencement of the present year the
+whole representation of the Scottish burghs was in the hands of the
+Liberal party. Since then, it is true, Falkirk has changed sides;
+but you are still remarkably well off; and I think that out of
+thirty county members, eighteen may be set down as supporters of
+the Free-trade policy. Remember, I do not guarantee the continuance
+of these proportions: I wish you simply to observe how you stand at
+present, under the working of your own Reform Bill; and really it
+appears to me that nothing could be more satisfactory. The Liberal
+who wishes to have more men of his own kidney from Scotland must
+indeed be an unconscionable glutton; and if, in the face of these
+facts, he asks for a reform in the representation, I cannot set him
+down as other than a consummate ass. He must needs admit that the
+system has worked well. Scotland sends to the support of the Whig
+Ministry, and the maintenance of progressive opinions, a brilliant
+phalanx of senators; amongst whom we point, with justifiable pride,
+to the distinguished names of Anderson, Bouverie, Ewart, Hume,
+Smith, M'Taggart, and M'Gregor. Are these gentlemen not liberal
+enough for the wants of the present age? Why, unless I am most
+egregiously mistaken--and not I only, but the whole of the Liberal
+press in Scotland--they are generally regarded as decidedly ahead
+even of my Lord John Russell. Why, then, should your representation
+be reformed, while it bears such admirable fruit? With such a
+growth of golden pippins on its boughs, would it not be madness
+to cut down the tree, on the mere chance of another arising from
+the stump, more especially when you cannot hope to gather from it
+a more abundant harvest? I am quite sure, Provost, that you agree
+with me in this. You have nothing to gain, but possibly a good deal
+to lose, by any alteration which may be made; and therefore it is,
+I presume, that in this part of the world not the slightest wish
+has been manifested for a radical change of the system. That very
+conceited and shallow individual, Sir Joshua Walmsley, made not
+long ago a kind of agitating tour through Scotland, for the purpose
+of getting up the steam; but except from a few unhappy Chartists,
+whose sentiments on the subject of property are identically the same
+with those professed by the gentlemen who plundered the Glasgow
+tradesmen's shops in 1848, he met with no manner of encouragement.
+The electors laughed in the face of this ridiculous caricature of
+Peter the Hermit, and advised him, instead of exposing his ignorance
+in the north, to go back to Bolton and occupy himself with his own
+affairs.
+
+This much I have said touching the necessity or call for a
+new Reform Bill, which is likely enough to involve us, for a
+considerable period at least, in unfortunate political strife. I
+have put it to you as a Liberal, but at the same time as a man of
+common sense and honesty, whether there are any circumstances,
+under your knowledge, which can justify such an attempt; and in
+the absence of these, you cannot but admit that such an experiment
+is eminently dangerous at the present time, and ought to be
+strongly discountenanced by all men, whatever may be their kind
+of political opinions. I speak now without any reference whatever
+to the details. It may certainly be possible to discover a better
+system of representation than that which at present exists. I never
+regarded Lord John Russell as the living incarnation of Minerva,
+nor can I consider any measure originated by him as conveying an
+assurance that the highest amount of human wisdom has been exhausted
+in its preparation. But what I do say is this, that in the absence
+of anything like general demand, and failing the allegation of
+any marked grievance to be redressed, no Ministry is entitled to
+propose an extensive or organic change in the representation of the
+country; and the men who shall venture upon such a step must render
+themselves liable to the imputation of being actuated by other
+motives than regard to the public welfare.
+
+You will, however, be slow to believe that Lord John Russell is
+moving in this matter without some special reason. In this you
+are perfectly right. He has a reason, and a very cogent one, but
+not such a reason as you, if you are truly a Liberal, and not a
+mere partisan, can accept. I presume it is the wish of the Liberal
+party--at least it used to be their watchword--that public opinion
+in this country is not to be slighted or suppressed. With the view
+of giving full effect to that public opinion, not of securing the
+supremacy of this or that political alliance, the Reform Act was
+framed; it being the declared object and intention of its founders
+that a full, fair, and free representation should be secured to the
+people of this country. The property qualification was fixed at a
+low rate; the balance of power as between counties and boroughs
+was carefully adjusted; and every precaution was taken--at least
+so we were told at the time--that no one great interest of the
+State should be allowed unduly to predominate over another. Many,
+however, were of opinion at the time, and have since seen no reason
+to alter it, that the adjustment then made, as between counties and
+boroughs, was by no means equitable, and that an undue share in the
+representation was given to the latter, more especially in England.
+That, you will observe, was a Conservative, not a Liberal objection;
+and it was over-ruled. Well, then, did the Representation, as fixed
+by the Reform Bill, fulfil its primary condition? You thought so;
+and so did my Lord John Russell, until some twelve months ago, when
+a new light dawned upon him. That light has since increased in
+intensity, and he now sees his way, clearly enough, to a new organic
+measure. Why is this? Simply, my dear Provost, because the English
+boroughs will no longer support him in his bungling legislation, or
+countenance his unnational policy!
+
+Public opinion, as represented through the operation of the Reform
+Act, is no longer favourable to Lord John Russell. The result of
+recent elections, in places which were formerly considered as
+the strongholds of Whiggery, have demonstrated to him that the
+Free-trade policy, to which he is irretrievably pledged, has become
+obnoxious to the bulk of the electors, and that they will no longer
+accord their support to any Ministry which is bent upon depressing
+British labour and sapping the foundations of national prosperity.
+So Lord John Russell, finding himself in this position, that he must
+either get rid of public opinion or resign his place, sets about
+the concoction of a new Reform Bill, by means of which he hopes to
+swamp the present electoral body! This is Whig liberty in its pure
+and original form. It implies, of course, that the Reform Bill did
+not give a full, fair, and free representation to the country, else
+there can be no excuse for altering its provisions. If we really
+have a fair representation; and if, notwithstanding, the majority of
+the electors are convinced that Free Trade is not for their benefit,
+it does appear to me a most monstrous thing that they are to be
+coerced into receiving it by the infusion of a new element into
+the Constitution, or a forcible change in the distribution of the
+electoral power, to suit the commercial views which are in favour
+with the Whig party. It is, in short, a most circuitous method of
+exercising despotic power; and I, for one, having the interests of
+the country at heart, would much prefer the institution at once of a
+pure despotism, and submit to be ruled and taxed henceforward at the
+sweet will of the scion of the house of Russell.
+
+I do not know what your individual sentiments may be on the subject
+of Free Trade; but whether you are for it or against it, my argument
+remains the same. It is essentially a question for the solution of
+the electoral body; and if the Whigs are right in their averment
+that its operation hitherto has been attended with marked success,
+and has even transcended the expectation of its promoters, you may
+rely upon it that there is no power in the British Empire which
+can overthrow it. No Protectionist ravings can damage a system
+which has been productive of real advantage to the great bulk of
+the people. But if, on the contrary, it is a bad system, is it to
+be endured that any man or body of men shall attempt to perpetuate
+it against the will of the majority of the electors, by a change
+in the representation of the country? I ask you this as a Liberal.
+Without having any undue diffidence in the soundness of your own
+judgment, I presume you do not, like his Holiness the Pope, consider
+yourself infallible, or entitled to coerce others who may differ
+from you in opinion. Yet this is precisely what Lord John Russell is
+now attempting to do; and I warn you and others who are similarly
+situated, to be wise in time, and to take care lest, under the
+operation of this new Reform Bill, you are not stripped of that
+political power and those political privileges which at present you
+enjoy.
+
+Don't suppose that I am speaking rashly or without consideration.
+All I know touching this new Reform Bill, is derived from the
+arguments and proposals which have been advanced and made by the
+Liberal press in consequence of the late indications of public
+feeling, as manifested by the result of recent elections. It
+is rather remarkable that we heard few or no proposals for an
+alteration in the electoral system, until it became apparent
+that the voice of the boroughs could no longer be depended on
+for the maintenance of the present commercial policy. You may
+recollect that the earliest of the victories which were achieved
+by the Protectionists, with respect to vacant seats in the House
+of Commons, were treated lightly by their opponents as mere
+casualties; but when borough after borough deliberately renounced
+its adherence to the cause of the League, and, not unfrequently
+under circumstances of very marked significance, declared openly in
+favour of Protection, the matter became serious. It was _then_, and
+then only, that we heard the necessity for some new and sweeping
+change in the representation of this country broadly asserted;
+and, singularly enough, the advocates of that change do not
+attempt to disguise their motives. They do not venture to say that
+the intelligence of the country is not adequately represented at
+present--what they complain of is, that the intelligence of the
+country is becoming every day more hostile to their commercial
+theories. In short, they want to get rid of that intelligence, and
+must get rid of it speedily, unless their system is to crumble to
+pieces. Such is their aim and declared object; and if you entertain
+any doubts on the matter, I beg leave to refer you to the recorded
+sentiments of the leading Ministerial and Free-trade organ--the
+_Times_. It is always instructive to notice the hints of the
+Thunderer. The writers in that journal are fully alive to the nature
+of the coming crisis. They have been long aware of the reaction
+which has taken place throughout the country on the subject of
+Free Trade, and they recognise distinctly the peril in which their
+favourite principle is placed, if some violent means are not used to
+counteract the conviction of the electoral body. They see that, in
+the event of a general election, the constituencies of the Empire
+are not likely to return a verdict hostile to the domestic interests
+of the country. They have watched with careful and anxious eyes the
+turning tide of opinion; and they can devise no means of arresting
+it, without having recourse to that peculiar mode of manipulation,
+which is dignified by the name of Burking. Let us hear what they say
+so late as the 21st of July last.
+
+     "With such a prospect before us, with unknown struggles and
+     unprecedented collisions within the bounds of possibility,
+     there is only one resource, and we must say that Her Majesty's
+     present advisers will be answerable for the consequences if they
+     do not adopt it. They must lay the foundation of an appeal to
+     the people with a large and liberal measure of Parliamentary
+     reform. It is high time that this great country should cease to
+     quake and to quail at the decisions of stupid and corrupt little
+     constituencies, of whom, as in the case before us, it would take
+     thirty to make one metropolitan borough. The great question
+     always before the nation in one shape or another is--whether
+     _the people_ are as happy as laws can make them? To what sort of
+     constituencies shall we appeal for the answer to this question?
+     To Harwich with its population of 3370; to St Albans with its
+     population of 6246; to Scarborough with its population of 9953;
+     to Knaresborough with its population of 5382; and to a score
+     other places still more insignificant? Or shall we insist on the
+     appeal being made to much larger bodies? The average population
+     of boroughs and counties is more than 60,000. Is it not high
+     time to require that no single borough shall fall below half or
+     a third of that number?"
+
+The meaning of this is clear enough. It points, if not to the
+absolute annihilation, most certainly to the concretion of the
+smaller boroughs throughout England--to an entire remarshalling of
+the electoral ranks--and, above all, to an enormous increase in the
+representation of the larger cities. In this way, you see, local
+interests will be made almost entirely to disappear; and London
+alone will secure almost as many representatives in Parliament
+as are at the present time returned for the whole kingdom of
+Scotland. Now, I confess to you, Provost, that I do not feel greatly
+exhilarated at the prospect of any such change. I believe that the
+prosperity of Great Britain depends upon the maintenance of many
+interests, and I cannot see how that can be secured if we are to
+deliver over the whole political power to the masses congregated
+within the towns. Moreover, I would very humbly remark, that past
+experience is little calculated to increase the measure of our
+faith in the wisdom or judgment of large constituencies. I may be
+wrong in my estimate of the talent and abilities of the several
+honourable members who at present sit for London and the adjacent
+districts; but, if so, I am only one out of many who labour under a
+similar delusion. We are told by the _Times_ to look to Marylebone
+as an example of a large and enlightened constituency. I obey
+the mandate; and on referring to the Parliamentary Companion, I
+find that Marylebone is represented by Lord Dudley Stuart and Sir
+Benjamin Hall. That fact does not, in my humble opinion, furnish a
+conclusive argument in favour of large constituencies. As I wish to
+avoid the Jew question, I shall say nothing about Baron Rothschild;
+but passing over to the Tower Hamlets, I find them in possession of
+Thomson and Clay; Lambeth rejoicing in d'Eyncourt and Williams; and
+Southwark in Humphrey and Molesworth. Capable senators though these
+may be, I should not like to see a Parliament composed entirely
+of men of their kidney; nor do I think that they afford undoubted
+materials for the construction of a new Cabinet.
+
+But perhaps I am undervaluing the abilities of these gentlemen;
+perhaps I am doing injustice to the discretion and wisdom of the
+metropolitan constituencies. Anxious to avoid any such imputation,
+I shall again invoke the assistance of the _Times_, whom I now cite
+as a witness, and a very powerful one, upon my side of the question.
+Let us hear the Thunderer on the subject of these same metropolitan
+constituencies, just twelve months ago, before Scarborough and
+Knaresborough had disgraced themselves by returning Protectionists
+to Parliament. I quote from a leader in the _Times_ of 8th August
+1850, referring to the Lambeth election, when Mr Williams was
+returned.
+
+     "When it was proposed some twenty years ago to extend the
+     franchise to the metropolitan boroughs, the presumption was,
+     that the quality of the representatives would bear something
+     like a proportion to the importance of the constituencies
+     called into play. In other words, if the political axioms from
+     which the principle of an extended representation is deduced
+     have any foundation in reality, it should follow that the most
+     numerous and most intelligent bodies of electors would return
+     to Parliament members of the highest mark for character and
+     capacity. Now, looking at the condition of the metropolitan
+     representation as it stands at present, or as it has stood any
+     time since the passing of the Reform Bill, has this expectation
+     been fulfilled? Lord John Russell, the First Minister of the
+     Crown, sits, indeed, as member for the city of London, and so
+     far it is well. Whatever difference of opinion may exist as to
+     the noble lord's capacity for government, or whatever may be the
+     views of this or that political party, it is beyond all dispute
+     that, in such a case as this, there is dignity and fitness in
+     the relation between the member and the constituency. But,
+     setting aside this one solitary instance, with what metropolitan
+     borough is the name of any very eminent Englishman associated at
+     the present time? It is of course as contrary to our inclination
+     as it would be unnecessary for the purposes of the argument, to
+     quote this or that man's name as an actual illustration of the
+     failure of a system, or of the decadence of a constituency. We
+     would, however, without any invidious or offensive personality,
+     invite attention to the present list of metropolitan members,
+     and ask what name is to be found among them, with the single
+     exception we have named, which is borne by a man with a shadow
+     of a pretension to be reckoned as among the leading Englishmen
+     of the age?"
+
+You see, Provost, I am by no means singular in my estimate of the
+quality of the metropolitan representatives. The _Times_ is with
+me, or was with me twelve months ago; and I suppose it will hardly
+be averred that, since that time, any enormous increase of wisdom
+or of ability has been manifested by the gentlemen referred to.
+But there is rather more than this. In the article from which I am
+quoting, the writer does not confine his strictures simply to the
+metropolitan boroughs. He goes a great deal further, for he attacks
+large constituencies in the mass, and points out very well and
+forcibly the evils which must inevitably follow should these obtain
+an accession to their power. Read, mark, and perpend the following
+paragraphs, and then reconcile their tenor--if you can--with the
+later proposals from the same quarter for the general suppression of
+small constituencies, and the establishment of larger tribunals of
+public opinion.
+
+     "Lambeth, then, on the occasion of the present election, is
+     likely to become another illustration of the downward tendencies
+     of the metropolitan constituencies. We use the word 'tendency'
+     advisedly, for matters are worse than they have been, and we
+     can perceive no symptom of a turning tide. Let us leave the
+     names of individuals aside, and simply consider the metropolitan
+     members as a body, and what is their main employment in the
+     House of Commons? _Is it not mainly to represent the selfish
+     interests and blind prejudices of the less patriotic or less
+     enlightened portion of their constituents whenever any change
+     is proposed manifestly for the public benefit?_ Looking at
+     their votes, one would suppose a metropolitan member to be
+     rather a Parliamentary agent of the drovers, and sextons, and
+     undertakers, than a representative of one of the most important
+     constituencies in the kingdom. Is this downward progress of
+     the metropolitan representation to remain unchanged? Will it
+     be extended to other constituencies as soon as they shall be
+     brought under conditions analogous to those under which the
+     metropolitan electors exercise the franchise? The question is of
+     no small interest. Whether the fault be with the electors, or
+     with those who should have the nerve to come forward and demand
+     their suffrages, matters not for the purposes of the argument.
+     The fact remains unaltered. Supposing England throughout its
+     area were represented as the various boroughs of the metropolis
+     are represented at the present time, what would be the effect?
+     That is the point for consideration. It may well be that men
+     of higher character, and of more distinguished intellectual
+     qualifications, would readily attract the sympathies and secure
+     the votes of these constituencies; but what does their absence
+     prove? _Simply that the same feeling of unwillingness to face
+     large electoral bodies, which is said to prevail in the United
+     States, is gradually rising up in this country._ On the other
+     side of the Atlantic, we are told by all who know the country
+     best, that the most distinguished citizens shrink from stepping
+     forward on the arena of public life, lest they be made the mark
+     for calumny and abuse. It would require more space than we can
+     devote to the subject to point out the correlative shortcomings
+     of the constituencies and the candidates; but, leaving these
+     aside, _we cannot but arrive at the conclusion that there is
+     something in the constitution of these great electoral masses
+     which renders a peaceful majority little better than a passive
+     instrument in the hands of a turbulent minority_, and affords an
+     explanation of the fact that such a person as Mr Williams should
+     aspire to represent the borough of Lambeth."
+
+What do you think of that, Provost, by way of an argument in favour
+of large constituencies? I agree with every word of it. I believe,
+in common with the eloquent writer, that matters are growing worse
+instead of better, and that there is something radically wrong in
+the constitution of these great electoral masses. I believe that
+they do not represent the real intelligence of the electors, and
+that they are liable to all those objections which are here so well
+and forcibly urged. It is not necessary to travel quite so far
+as London for an illustration. Look at Glasgow. Have the twelve
+thousand and odd electors of that great commercial and manufacturing
+city covered themselves with undying glory by their choice of their
+present representatives? Is the intelligence of the first commercial
+city in Scotland really embodied in the person of Mr M'Gregor? I
+should be very loth to think so. Far be it from me to impugn the
+propriety of any particular choice, or to speculate upon coming
+events; but I cannot help wondering whether, in the event of the
+suppression of some of the smaller burghs, and the transference of
+their power to the larger cities, it may come to pass that the city
+of St Mungo shall be represented by the wisdom of six M'Gregors? I
+repeat, that I wish to say nothing in disparagement of large urban
+constituencies, or of their choice in any one particular case--I
+simply desire to draw your attention to the fact, that we are not
+indebted to such constituencies for returning the men who, by common
+consent, are admitted to be the most valuable members, in point of
+talent, ability, and business habits, in the House of Commons. How
+far we should improve the character of our legislative assembly,
+by disfranchising smaller constituencies, and transferring their
+privileges to the larger ones,--open to such serious objections as
+have been urged against them by the _Times_, a journal not likely
+to err on the side of undervaluing popular opinion--appears to me a
+question decidedly open to discussion; and I hope that it will be
+discussed, pretty broadly and extensively, before any active steps
+are taken for suppressing boroughs which are not open to the charge
+of rank venality and corruption.
+
+The _Times_, you observe, talks in its more recent article, in which
+totally opposite views are advocated, of "stupid and corrupt little
+constituencies." This is a clever way of mixing up two distinct and
+separate matters. We all know what is meant by corruption, and I
+hope none of us are in favour of it. It means the purchase, either
+by money or promises, of the suffrages of those who are intrusted
+with the electoral franchise; and I am quite ready to join with the
+_Times_ in the most hearty denunciation of such villanous practices,
+whether used by Jew or Gentile. It may be, and probably is,
+impossible to prevent bribery altogether, for there are scoundrels
+in all constituencies; and if a candidate with a long purse is
+so lax in his morals as to hint at the purchase of votes, he is
+tolerably certain to find a market in which these commodities are
+sold. But if, in any case, general corruption can be proved against
+a borough, it ought to be forthwith disfranchised, and declared
+unworthy of exercising so important a public privilege. But of the
+"stupidity" of constituencies, who are to be the judges? Not, I
+hope, the Areopagites of the _Times_, else we may expect to see
+every constituency which does not pronounce in favour of Free Trade,
+placed under the general extinguisher! Scarborough, with some seven
+or eight hundred electors--a good many more, by the way, than are
+on the roll for the Dreepdaily burghs--has, in the opinion of the
+_Times_, stultified itself for ever by returning Mr George F. Young
+to Parliament, instead of a Whig lordling, who possessed great local
+influence. Therefore Scarborough is put down in the black list,
+not because it is "corrupt," but because it is "stupid," in having
+elected a gentleman of the highest political celebrity, who is at
+the same time one of the most extensive shipowners of Great Britain!
+I put it to you, Provost, whether this is not as cool an instance
+of audacity as you ever heard of. What would you think if it were
+openly proposed, upon our side, to disfranchise Greenwich, because
+the tea-and-shrimp population of that virtuous town has committed
+the stupid act of returning a Jew to Parliament? If stupidity is to
+go for anything in the way of cancelling privileges, I think I could
+name to you some half-dozen places on this side of the border which
+are in evident danger, at least if we are to accept the attainments
+of the representatives as any test of the mental acquirements of the
+electors; but perhaps it is better to avoid particulars in a matter
+so personal and delicate.
+
+I am not in the least degree surprised to find the Free-Traders
+turning round against the boroughs. Four years ago, you would
+certainly have laughed in the face of any one who might have
+prophesied such a result; but since then, times have altered. The
+grand experiment upon native industry has been made, and allowed
+to go on without check or impediment. The Free-Traders have had it
+all their own way; and if there had been one iota of truth in their
+statements, or if their calculations had been based upon secure and
+rational data, they must long ago have achieved a complete moral
+triumph. Pray, remember what they told us. They said that Free Trade
+in corn and in cattle would not permanently _lower_ the value of
+agricultural produce in Britain--it would only steady prices, and
+prevent extreme fluctuations. Then, again, we were assured that
+large imports from any part of the world could not by possibility be
+obtained; and those consummate blockheads, the statists, offered to
+prove by figures, that a deluge of foreign grain was as impossible
+as an overflow of the Mediterranean. I need not tell you that the
+results have entirely falsified such predictions, and that the
+agricultural interest has ever since been suffering under the
+effects of unexampled depression. No man denies that. The stiffest
+stickler for the cheap loaf does not venture now to assert that
+agriculture is a profitable profession in Britain; all he can do is
+to recommend economy, and to utter a hypocritical prayer, that the
+prosperity which he assumes to exist in other quarters may, at no
+distant date, and through some mysterious process which he cannot
+specify, extend itself to the suffering millions who depend for
+their subsistence on the produce of the soil of Britain, and who pay
+by far the largest share of the taxes and burdens of the kingdom.
+
+Now, it is perfectly obvious that agricultural distress, by which
+I mean the continuance of a range of unremunerative prices, cannot
+long prevail in any district, without affecting the traffic of the
+towns. You, who are an extensive retail merchant in Dreepdaily,
+know well that the business of your own trade depends in a great
+degree upon the state of the produce markets. So long as the farmer
+is thriving, he buys from you and your neighbours liberally, and you
+find him, I have no doubt, your best and steadiest customer. But if
+you reverse his circumstances, you must look for a corresponding
+change in his dealings. He cannot afford to purchase silks for his
+wife and daughters, as formerly; he grows penurious in his own
+personal expenditure, and denies himself every unnecessary luxury;
+he does nothing for the good of trade, and is impassable to all the
+temptations which you endeavour to throw in his way. To post your
+ledger is now no very difficult task. You find last year's stock
+remaining steadily on your hands; and when the season for the annual
+visit of the bagmen comes round, you dismiss them from your premises
+without gratifying their avidity by an order. This is a faithful
+picture of what has been going on for two years, at least, in the
+smaller inland boroughs. No doubt you are getting your bread cheap;
+but those whose importations have brought about that cheapness,
+never were, and never can be, customers of yours. Even supposing
+that they were to take goods in exchange for their imported grain,
+no profit or custom could accrue to the retail shopkeeper, who must
+necessarily look to the people around him for the consumption of
+his wares. In this way trade has been made to stagnate, and profits
+have of course declined, until the tradesmen, weary of awaiting
+the advent of a prosperity which never arrives, have come to the
+conclusion, that they will best consult their interest by giving
+their support to a policy the reverse of that which has crippled the
+great body of their customers.
+
+Watering-places, and towns of fashionable resort, have suffered in
+a like degree. The gentry, whose rents have been most seriously
+affected by the unnatural diminution of prices, are compelled to
+curtail their expenditure, and to deny themselves many things which
+formerly would have been esteemed legitimate indulgences. Economy is
+the order Of the day: equipages are given up, servants dismissed,
+and old furniture made to last beyond its appointed time. These
+things, I most freely admit, are no great hardships to the gentry;
+nor do I intend to awaken your compassion in behalf of the squire,
+who, by reason of his contracted rent-roll, has been compelled
+to part with his carriage and a couple of footmen, and to refuse
+his wife and daughters the pleasure of a trip to Cheltenham. The
+hardship lies elsewhere. I pity the footmen, the coach-builder, the
+upholsterer, the house proprietor in Cheltenham, and all the other
+people to whom the surplus of the squire's revenue found its way,
+much more than the old gentleman himself. I daresay he is quite
+as happy at home--perhaps far happier--than if he were compelled
+to racket elsewhere; and sure I am that he will not consume his
+dinner with less appetite because he lacks the attendance of a
+couple of knaves, with heads like full-blown cauliflowers. But is
+it consistent with the workings of human nature to expect that the
+people to whom he formerly gave employment and custom, let us say
+to the extent of a couple of thousand pounds, can be gratified by
+the cessation of that expenditure?--or is it possible to suppose
+that they will remain enamoured of a system which has caused them
+so heavy a loss? View the subject in this light, and you can have
+no difficulty in understanding why this formidable reaction has
+taken place in the English boroughs. It is simply a question of
+the pocket; and the electors now see, that unless the boroughs are
+to be left to rapid decay, something must be done to protect and
+foster that industry upon which they all depend. Such facts, which
+are open and patent to every man's experience, and tell upon his
+income and expenditure, are worth whole cargoes of theory. What
+reason has the trader, whose stock is remaining unsold upon his
+hands, to plume himself, because he is assured by Mr Porter, or
+some other similar authority, that some hundred thousand additional
+yards of flimsy calico have been shipped from the British shores
+in the course of the last twelve months? So far as the shopkeeper
+is concerned, the author of the _Progress of the Nation_ might as
+well have been reporting upon the traffic-tables of Tyre and Sidon.
+He is not even assured that all this export has been accompanied
+with a profit to the manufacturer. If he reads the _Economist_, he
+will find that exhilarating print filled with complaints of general
+distress and want of demand; he will be startled from time to time
+by the announcement that in some places, such as Dundee, trade
+has experienced a most decided check; or that in others, such as
+Nottingham and Leicester, the operatives are applying by hundreds
+for admission to the workhouse! Comfortable intelligence this,
+alongside of increasing exports! But he has been taught, to borrow
+a phrase from the writings of the late John Galt, to look upon your
+political arithmetician as "a mystery shrouded by a halo;" and he
+supposes that, somehow or other, somebody must be the gainer by all
+these exports, though it seems clearly impossible to specify the
+fortunate individual. However, this he knows, to his cost any time
+these three years back, that _he_ has not been the gainer; and, as
+he opines very justly that charity begins at home, and that the
+man who neglects the interest of his own family is rather worse
+than a heathen, he has made up his mind to support such candidates
+only as will stand by British industry, and protect him by means
+of protecting others. As for the men of the maritime boroughs--a
+large and influential class--I need not touch upon their feelings
+or sentiments with regard to Free Trade. I observe that the Liberal
+press, with peculiar taste and felicity of expression, designates
+them by the generic term of "crimps," just as it used to compliment
+the whole agriculturists of Britain by the comprehensive appellation
+of "chawbacons." I trust they feel the compliment so delicately
+conveyed; but, after all, it matters little. Hard words break no
+bones; and, in the mean time at least, the vote of a "crimp" is
+quite as good as that of the concocter of a paragraph.
+
+Perhaps now you understand why the Free-Traders are so wroth against
+the boroughs. They expected to play off the latter against the
+county constituencies; and, being disappointed in that, they want to
+swamp them altogether. This, I must own, strikes me as particularly
+unfair. Let it be granted that a large number of the smaller
+boroughs did, at the last general election, manifest a decided
+wish that the Free Trade experiment, then begun, should be allowed
+a fair trial; are they to be held so pledged to that commercial
+system, that, however disastrous may have been its results, they
+are not entitled to alter their minds? Are all the representations,
+promises, and prophecies of the leading advocates of Free Trade,
+to be set aside as if these were never uttered or written? Who
+were the cozeners in this case? Clearly the men who boasted of the
+enormous advantages which were immediately to arise from their
+policy--advantages whereof, up to the present moment, not a single
+glimpse has been vouchsafed. Free Trade, we were distinctly told,
+was to benefit the boroughs. Free Trade has done nothing of the
+kind; on the contrary, it has reduced their business and lowered
+their importance. And now, when this effect has become so plain and
+undeniable that the very men who subscribed to the funds of the
+League, and who were foremost in defending the conduct of the late
+Sir Robert Peel, are sending Protectionists to Parliament, it is
+calmly proposed to neutralise their conversion by depriving them of
+political power!
+
+Under the circumstances, I do not know that the Free-Traders could
+have hit upon a happier scheme. The grand tendency of their system
+is centralisation. They want to drive everything--paupers alone
+excepted, if they could by possibility compass that fortunate
+immunity--into the larger towns, which are the seats of export
+manufacture, and to leave the rest of the population to take care
+of themselves. You see how they have succeeded in Ireland, by
+the reports of the last census. They are doing the same thing in
+Scotland, as we shall ere long discover to our cost; and, indeed,
+the process is going on slowly, but surely, throughout the whole of
+the British islands. I chanced the other day to light upon a passage
+in a very dreary article in the last number of the _Edinburgh
+Review_, which seems to me to embody the chief economical doctrines
+of the gentlemen to whom we are indebted for the present posture of
+affairs. It is as follows:--
+
+     "The common watchword, or cuckoo-note of the advocates of
+     restriction in affairs of trade is, 'Protection to Native
+     Industry.' In the principle fairly involved in this motto we
+     cordially agree. We are as anxious as the most vehement advocate
+     for high import duties on foreign products can be, that the
+     industry of our fellow-countrymen should be protected(!) We only
+     differ as to the means. Their theory of protection is to guard
+     against competition those branches of industry which, without
+     such extraneous help, could never be successfully pursued:
+     ours, is that of enlarging, to the uttermost, those other
+     branches for the prosecution of which our countrymen possess the
+     greatest aptitude, and of thereby securing for their skill and
+     capital the greatest return. This protection is best afforded
+     by governments when they leave, without interference, the
+     productive industry of the country to find its true level; for
+     we may be certain that the interest of individuals will always
+     lead them to prefer those pursuits which they find most gainful.
+     There is, in fact, no mode of interference with entire freedom
+     of action which must not be, in some degree, hurtful; but _the
+     mischief which follows upon legislation in affairs of trade, in
+     any given country, is then most noxious when it tends to foster
+     branches of industry for which other countries have a greater
+     aptitude_."
+
+You will, I think, find some difficulty in discovering the
+protective principle enunciated by this sagacious scribe, who,
+like many others of his limited calibre, is fain to take refuge
+in nonsense when he cannot extricate his meaning. You may also,
+very reasonably, entertain doubts whether the protective theory,
+which our friend of the Blue and Yellow puts into the mouth of his
+opponents, was ever entertained or promulgated by any rational
+being, at least in the broad sense which he wishes to imply. The
+true protective theory has reference to the State burdens, which,
+in so far as they are exacted from the produce of native industry,
+or, in other words, from labour, we wish to see counterbalanced by
+a fair import-duty, which shall reduce the foreign and the native
+producer to an equality in the home market. When the reviewer talks
+of the non-interference of Government with regard to the productive
+industry of the country, he altogether omits mention of that most
+stringent interference which is the direct result of taxation. If
+the farmer were allowed to till the ground, to sow the seed, and to
+reap the harvest, without any interference from Government, then I
+admit at once that a demand for protection would be preposterous.
+But when Government requires him to pay income-tax, assessed taxes,
+church and poor-rates, besides other direct burdens, out of the
+fruit of his industry--when it prevents him from growing on his own
+land several kinds of crop, in order that the customs revenue may
+be maintained--when it taxes indirectly his tea, coffee, wines,
+spirits, tobacco, soap, and spiceries--then I say that Government
+_does_ interfere, and that most unmercifully, with the productive
+industry of the country. Just suppose that, by recurring to a
+primitive method of taxation, the Government should lay claim
+to one-third of the proceeds of every crop, and instruct its
+emissaries to remove it from the ground before another acre should
+be reaped--would _that_ not constitute interference in the eyes of
+the sapient reviewer? Well, then, since all taxes must ultimately be
+paid out of produce, what difference does the mere method of levying
+the burden make with regard to the burden itself? I call your
+attention to this point, because the Free-Traders invariably, but
+I fear wilfully, omit all mention of artificial taxation when they
+talk of artificial restrictions. They want you to believe that we,
+who maintain the opposite view, seek to establish an entire monopoly
+in Great Britain of all kinds of possible produce; and they are in
+the habit of putting asinine queries as to the propriety of raising
+the duties on foreign wine, so as to encourage the establishment of
+vineyards in Kent and Sussex, and also as to the proper protective
+duty which should be levied on pine-apples, in order that a due
+stimulus may be given to the cultivation of that luscious fruit. But
+these funny fellows take especial care never to hint to you that
+protection is and was demanded simply on account of the enormous
+nature of our imposts, which have the effect of raising the rates
+of labour. It is in this way, and no other, that agriculture,
+deprived of protection, but still subjected to taxation, has become
+an unremunerative branch of industry; and you observe how calmly
+the disciple of Ricardo condemns it to destruction. "The mischief,"
+quoth he, "which follows upon legislation in affairs of trade, in
+any given country, is then most noxious when it tends to foster
+branches of industry for which other countries have a greater
+aptitude." So, then, having taxed agriculture to that point when it
+can no longer bear the burden, we are, for the future, to draw our
+supplies from "other countries which have a greater aptitude" for
+growing corn; that aptitude consisting in their comparative immunity
+from taxation, and in the degraded moral and social condition of
+the serfs who constitute the tillers of the soil! We are to give up
+cultivation, and apply ourselves to the task "of enlarging to the
+uttermost those other branches, for the prosecution of which our
+countrymen possess the greatest aptitude"--by which, I presume, is
+meant the manufacture of cotton-twist!
+
+Now, then, consider for a moment what is the natural, nay, the
+inevitable effect of this narrowing of the range of employment.
+I shall not start the important point whether the concentration
+of labour does not tend to lower wages--I shall merely assume,
+what is indeed already abundantly established by facts, that the
+depression of agriculture in any district leads almost immediately
+to a large increase in the population of the greater towns. Places
+like Dreepdaily may remain stationary, but they do not receive any
+material increment to their population. You have, I believe, no
+export trade, at least very little, beyond the manufacture of an
+ingenious description of snuff-box, justly prized by those who are
+in the habit of stimulating their nostrils. The displaced stream of
+labour passes through you, but does not tarry with you--it rolls
+on towards Paisley and Glasgow, where it is absorbed in the living
+ocean. Year after year the same process is carried on. The older
+people, probably because it is not worth while at their years to
+attempt a change, tarry in their little villages and cots, and
+gradually acquire that appearance of utter apathy, which is perhaps
+the saddest aspect of humanity. The younger people, finding no
+employment at home, repair to the towns, marry or do worse, and
+propagate children for the service of the factories which are
+dedicated to the export trade. Of education they receive little or
+nothing; for they must be in attendance on their gaunt iron master
+during the whole of their waking hours; and religion seeks after
+them in vain. What wonder, then, if the condition of our operatives
+should be such as to suggest to thinking minds very serious doubts
+whether our boasted civilisation can be regarded in the light of a
+blessing? Certain it is that the bulk of these classes are neither
+better nor happier than their forefathers. Nay, if there be any
+truth in evidence--any reality in the appalling accounts which reach
+us from the heart of the towns, there exists an amount of crime,
+misery, drunkenness, and profligacy, which is unknown even among
+savages and heathen nations. Were we to recall from the four ends
+of the earth all the missionaries who have been despatched from the
+various churches, they would find more than sufficient work ready
+for them at home. Well-meaning men project sanitary improvements, as
+if these could avail to counteract the moral poison. New churches
+are built; new schools are founded; public baths are subscribed for,
+and public washing-houses are opened; the old rookeries are pulled
+down, and light and air admitted to the heart of the cities--but the
+heart of the people is not changed; and neither air nor water, nor
+religious warning, has the effect of checking crime, eradicating
+intemperance, or teaching man the duty which he owes to himself, his
+brethren, and his God! This is an awful picture, but it is a true
+one; and it well becomes us to consider why these things should be.
+There is no lukewarmness on the subject exhibited in any quarter.
+The evil is universally acknowledged, and every one would be ready
+to contribute to alleviate it, could a proper remedy be suggested.
+It is not my province to suggest remedies; but it does appear to
+me that the original fault is to be found in the system which has
+caused this unnatural pressure of our population into the towns. I
+am aware that in saying this, I am impugning the leading doctrines
+of modern political economy. I am aware that I am uttering what
+will be considered by many as a rank political heresy; still, not
+having the fear of fire and fagot before my eyes, I shall use the
+liberty of speech. It appears to me that the system which has been
+more or less adopted since the days of Mr Huskisson, of suppressing
+small trades for the encouragement of foreign importation, and of
+stimulating export manufactures to the uttermost, has proved very
+pernicious to the morals and the social condition of the people. The
+termination of the war found us with a large population, and with an
+enormous debt. If, on the one hand, it was for the advantage of the
+country that commerce should progress with rapid strides, and that
+our foreign trade should be augmented, it was, on the other, no less
+necessary that due regard should be had for the former occupations
+of the people, and that no great and violent displacements of
+labour should be occasioned, by fiscal relaxations which might have
+the effect of supplanting home industry by foreign produce in the
+British market. The mistake of the political economists lies in
+their obstinate determination to enforce a principle, which in the
+abstract is not only unobjectionable but unchallenged, without any
+regard whatever to the peculiar and pecuniary circumstances of the
+country. They will not look at what has gone before, in order to
+determine their line of conduct in any particular case. They admit
+of no exceptions. They start with their axiom that trade ought to
+be free, and they will not listen to any argument founded upon
+special circumstances in opposition to that doctrine. Now, this
+is not the way in which men have been, or ever can be, governed.
+They must be dealt with as rational beings, not regarded as mere
+senseless machinery, which may be treated as lumber, and cast aside
+to make way for some new improvement. Look at the case of our own
+Highlanders. We know very well that, from the commencement of
+the American war, it was considered by the British Government an
+important object to maintain the population of the Highlands, as
+the source from which they drew their hardiest and most serviceable
+recruits. So long as the manufacture of kelp existed, and the
+breeding of cattle was profitable, there was little difficulty in
+doing this; now, under this new commercial system, we are told that
+the population is infinitely too large for the natural resources of
+the country; we are shocked by accounts of periodical famine, and of
+deaths occurring from starvation; and our economists declare that
+there is no remedy except a general emigration of the inhabitants.
+This is the extreme case in Great Britain; but extreme cases often
+furnish us with the best tests of the operation of a particular
+system. Here you have a population fostered for an especial purpose,
+and abandoned so soon as that special purpose has been served.
+Without maintaining that the Gael is the most industrious of
+mankind, it strikes me forcibly that it would be a better national
+policy to give every reasonable encouragement to the development of
+the natural resources of that portion of the British islands, than
+to pursue the opposite system, and to reduce the Highlands to a
+wilderness. Not so think the political economists. They can derive
+their supplies cheaper from elsewhere, at the hands of strangers
+who contribute no share whatever to the national revenue; and for
+the sake of that cheapness they are content to reduce thousands of
+their countrymen to beggary. But emigration cannot, and will not,
+be carried out to an extent at all equal to the necessity which is
+engendered by the cessation of employment. The towns become the
+great centre-points and recipients of the displaced population; and
+so centralisation goes on, and, as a matter of course, pauperism and
+crime increase.
+
+To render this system perpetual, without any regard to ultimate
+consequences, is the leading object of the Free-Traders. Not
+converted, but on the contrary rendered more inveterate by
+the failure of their schemes, they are determined to allow no
+consideration whatever to stand in the way of their purpose; and
+of this you have a splendid instance in their late denunciation of
+the boroughs. They think--whether rightfully or wrongfully, it is
+not now necessary to inquire--that, by altering the proportions
+of Parliamentary power as established by the Reform Act--by
+taking away from the smaller boroughs, and by adding to the urban
+constituencies, they will still be able to command a majority in the
+House of Commons. In the present temper of the nation, and so long
+as its voice is expressed as heretofore, they know, feel, and admit
+that their policy is not secure. And why is it not secure? Simply
+because it has undergone the test of experience--because it has had
+a fair trial in the sight of the nation--and because it has not
+succeeded in realising the expectations of its founders.
+
+I have ventured to throw together these few crude remarks for your
+consideration during the recess, being quite satisfied that you will
+not feel indifferent upon any subject which touches the dignity,
+status, or privileges of the boroughs. Whether Lord John Russell
+agrees with the _Times_ as to the mode of effecting the threatened
+Parliamentary change, or whether he has some separate scheme of his
+own, is a question which I cannot solve. Possibly he has not yet
+made up his mind as to the course which it may be most advisable to
+pursue; for, in the absence of anything like general excitement or
+agitation, it is not easy to predict in what manner the proposal for
+any sweeping or organic change may be received by the constituencies
+of the Empire. There is far too much truth in the observations which
+I have already quoted from the great leading journal, relative to
+the dangers which must attend an increase of constituencies already
+too large, or a further extension of their power, to permit of our
+considering this as a light and unimportant matter. I view it as a
+very serious one indeed; and I cannot help thinking that Lord John
+Russell has committed an act of gross and unjustifiable rashness, in
+pledging himself, at the present time, to undertake a remodelment of
+the constitution. But whatever he does, I hope, for his own sake,
+and for the credit of the Liberal party, that he will be able to
+assign some better and more constitutional reason for the change,
+than the refusal of the English boroughs to bear arms in the crusade
+which is directed against the interests of Native Industry.
+
+
+
+
+PARIS IN 1851.--(_Continued._)
+
+
+THE OPERA.--In the evening I went to the French Opera, which is
+still one of the lions of Paris. It was once in the Rue Richelieu;
+but the atrocious assassination of the Duc de Berri, who was stabbed
+in its porch, threw a kind of horror over the spot: the theatre was
+closed, and the performance moved to its present site in the Rue
+Lepelletier, a street diverging from the Boulevard.
+
+Fond as the French are of decoration, the architecture of this
+building possesses no peculiar beauty, and would answer equally well
+for a substantial public hospital, a workhouse, or a barrack, if
+the latter were not the more readily suggested by the gendarmerie
+loitering about the doors, and the mounted dragoons at either end of
+the street.
+
+The passages of the interior are of the same character--spacious and
+substantial; but the door of the _salle_ opens, and the stranger,
+at a single step, enters from those murky passages into all the
+magic of a crowded theatre. The French have, within these few
+years, borrowed from us the art of lighting theatres. I recollect
+the French theatre lighted only by a few lamps scattered round the
+house, or a chandelier in the middle, which might have figured in
+the crypt of a cathedral. This they excused, as giving greater
+effect to the stage; but it threw the audience into utter gloom.
+They have now made the audience a part of the picture, and an
+indispensable part. The opera-house now shows the audience; and if
+not very dressy, or rather as dowdy, odd, and dishevelled a crowd as
+I ever recollect to have seen within theatrical walls, yet they are
+evidently human beings, which is much more picturesque than masses
+of spectres, seen only by an occasional flash from the stage.
+
+The French architects certainly have not made this national edifice
+grand; but they have made it a much better thing,--lively, showy,
+and rich. Neither majestic and monotonous, nor grand and Gothic,
+they have made it _riant_ and racy, like a place where men and
+women come to be happy, where beautiful dancers are to be seen,
+and where sweet songs are to be heard, and where the mind is for
+three or four hours to forget all its cares, and to carry away
+pleasant recollections for the time being. From pit to ceiling
+it is covered with paintings--all sorts of cupids, nymphs, and
+flower-garlands, and Greek urns--none of them wonders of the pencil,
+but all exhibiting that showy mediocrity of which every Frenchman is
+capable, and with which every Frenchman is in raptures. All looks
+rich, warm, and _operatic_.
+
+One characteristic change has struck me everywhere in Paris--the men
+dress better, and the women worse. When I was last here, the men
+dressed half bandit and half Hottentot. The revolutionary mystery
+was at work, and the hatred of the Bourbons was emblematised in a
+conical hat, a loose neckcloth, tremendous trousers, and the scowl
+of a stage conspirator. The Parisian men have since learned the
+decencies of _dress_.
+
+As I entered the house before the rising of the curtain, I had
+leisure to look about me, and I found even in the audience a strong
+contrast to those of London. By that kind of contradiction to
+everything rational and English which governs the Parisian, the
+women seem to choose _dishabille_ for the Opera.
+
+As the house was crowded, and the boxes are let high, and the
+performance of the night was popular, I might presume that some of
+the _élite_ were present, yet I never saw so many _ill-dressed_
+women under one roof. Bonnets, shawls, muffles of all kinds, were
+the _costume_. How different from the finish, the splendour, and
+the _fashion_ of the English opera-box. I saw hundreds of women who
+appeared, by their dress, scarcely above the rank of shopkeepers,
+yet, who probably were among the Parisian leaders of fashion, if in
+republican Paris there are _any_ leaders of fashion.
+
+But I came to be interested, to enjoy, to indulge in a feast of
+music and acting; with no fastidiousness of criticism, and with
+every inclination to be gratified. In the opera itself I was utterly
+disappointed. The Opera was _Zerline_, or, _The Basket of Oranges_.
+The composer was the first living musician of France, Auber; the
+writer was the most popular dramatist of his day, Scribe; the Prima
+Donna was Alboni, to whom the manager of the Opera in London had
+not thought it too much to give £4000 for a single season. I never
+paid my francs with more willing expectation: and I never saw a
+performance of which I so soon got weary.
+
+The plot is singularly trifling. Zerline, an orange-girl of Palermo,
+has had a daughter by Boccanera, a man of rank, who afterwards
+becomes Viceroy of Sicily. Zerline is captured by pirates, and
+carried to Algiers. The opera opens with her return to Palermo,
+after so many years that her daughter is grown up to womanhood; and
+Boccanera is emerged into public life, and has gradually became an
+officer of state.
+
+The commencing scene has all the animation of the French
+picturesque. The Port of Palermo is before the spectator; the
+location is the Fruit Market. Masses of fruits, with smart peasantry
+to take care of them, cover the front of the stage. The background
+is filled up with Lazzaroni lying on the ground, sleeping, or eating
+macaroni. The Prince Boccanera comes from the palace; the crowd
+observe 'Son air sombre;' the Prince sings--
+
+    "On a most unlucky day,
+     Satan threw her in my way;
+     I the princess took to wife,
+     Now the torture of my life," &c.
+
+After this matrimonial confession, which extends to details, the
+prime minister tells us of his love still existing for Zerline,
+whose daughter he has educated under the name of niece, and who is
+now the Princess Gemma, and about to be married to a court noble.
+
+A ship approaches the harbour; Boccanera disappears; the Lazzaroni
+hasten to discharge the cargo. Zerline lands from the vessel, and
+sings a cavatina in praise of Palermo:--
+
+    "O Palerme! O Sicile!
+     Beau ciel, plaine fertile!"
+
+Zerline is a dealer in oranges, and she lands her cargo, placing
+it in the market. The original tenants of the place dispute her
+right to come among them, and are about to expel her by force, when
+a marine officer, Rodolf, takes her part, and, drawing his sword,
+puts the whole crowd to flight. Zerline, moved by this instance of
+heroism, tells him her story, that she was coming "un beau matin"
+to the city to sell oranges, when a pitiless corsair captured her,
+and carried her to Africa, separating her from her child, whom she
+had not seen for fifteen years; that she escaped to Malta, laid in
+a stock of oranges there;--and thus the events of the day occurred.
+Rodolf, this young hero, is costumed in a tie-wig with powder, stiff
+skirts, and the dress of a century ago. What tempted the author
+to put not merely his hero, but all his court characters, into
+the costume of Queen Anne, is not easily conceivable, as there is
+nothing in the story which limits it in point of time.
+
+Zerline looks after him with sudden sympathy, says that she heard
+him sigh, that he must be unhappy, and that, if her daughter
+lives, he is just the _husband_ for her,--Zerline not having been
+particular as to marriage herself. She then rambles about the
+streets, singing,
+
+    "Achetez mes belles oranges,
+     Des fruits divins, des fruits exquis;
+     Des oranges comme les anges
+     N'en _goutent pas en Paradis_."
+
+After this "hommage aux oranges!" to the discredit of Paradise, on
+which turns the plot of the play, a succession of maids of honour
+appear, clad in the same unfortunate livery of fardingales, enormous
+flat hats, powdered wigs, and stomachers. The Princess follows them,
+apparently armed by her costume against all the assaults of Cupid.
+But she, too, has an "affaire du cœur" upon her hands. In fact,
+from the Orangewoman up to the Throne, Cupid is the Lord of Palermo,
+with its "beau ciel, plaine fertile." The object of the Princess's
+love is the Marquis de Buttura, the suitor of her husband's
+supposed niece. Here is a complication! The enamoured wife receives
+a billet-doux from the suitor, proposing a meeting on his return
+from hunting. She tears the billet for the purpose of concealment,
+and in her emotion drops the fragments on the floor. That billet
+performs all important part in the end. The enamoured lady buys an
+orange, and gives a gold piece for it. Zerline, not accustomed to
+be so well paid for her fruit, begins to suspect this outrageous
+liberality; and having had experience in these matters, picks up the
+fragments of the letter, and gets into the whole secret.
+
+The plot proceeds: the daughter of the orangewoman now appears. She
+is clad in the same preposterous habiliments. As the niece of the
+minister, she is created a princess, (those things are cheap in
+Italy,) and she, too, is in love with the officer in the tie-wig.
+She recognises the song of Zerline, "Achetez mes belles oranges,"
+and sings the half of it. On this, the mother and daughter now
+recognise each other. It is impossible to go further in such a
+_denouement_. If Italian operas are proverbially silly, we are to
+recollect that this is not an Italian, but a French one; and that it
+is by the most popular comic writer of France.
+
+The marriage of Gemma and Rodolf is forbidden by the pride of the
+King's sister, the wife of Boccanera, but Zerline interposes,
+reminds her of the orange _affair_, threatens her with the discovery
+of the billet-doux, and finally makes her give her consent: and thus
+the curtain drops. I grew tired of all this insipidity, and left the
+theatre before the catastrophe. The music seemed to me fitting for
+the plot--neither better nor worse; and I made my escape with right
+good-will from the clamour and crash of the orchestra, and from the
+loves and _faux pas_ of the belles of Palermo.
+
+_The Obelisk._--I strayed into the Place de la Concorde, beyond
+comparison the finest _space_ in Paris. I cannot call it a square,
+nor does it equal in animation the Boulevard; but in the _profusion_
+of noble architecture it has no rival in Paris, nor in Europe. _Vive
+la Despotisme!_ every inch of it is owing to Monarchy. Republics
+build nothing, if we except prisons and workhouses. They are
+proverbially squalid, bitter, and beggarly. What has America, with
+all her boasting, ever built, but a warehouse or a conventicle?
+The Roman Republic, after seven hundred years' existence, remained
+a collection hovels till an Emperor faced them with marble. If
+Athens exhibited her universal talents in the splendour of her
+architecture, we must recollect that Pericles was her _master_
+through life--as substantially _despotic_, by the aid of the
+populace, as an Asiatic king by his guards; and recollect, also,
+that an action of damages was brought against him for "wasting
+the public money on the Parthenon," the glory of Athens in every
+succeeding age. Louis Quatorze, Napoleon, and Louis Philippe--two
+openly, and the third secretly, as despotic as the Sultan--were the
+true builders of Paris.
+
+As I stood in the centre of this vast enclosure, I was fully struck
+with the effect of _scene_. The sun was sinking into a bed of gold
+and crimson clouds, that threw their hue over the long line of
+the Champs Elysées. Before me were the two great fountains, and
+the Obelisk of Luxor. The fountains had ceased to play, from the
+lateness of the hour, but still looked massive and gigantic; the
+obelisk looked shapely and superb. The gardens of the Tuilleries
+were on my left--deep dense masses of foliage, surmounted in the
+distance by the tall roofs of the old Palace; on my right, the
+verdure of the Champs Elysées, with the Arc de l'Etoile rising above
+it, at the end of its long and noble avenue; in my front the Palace
+of the Legislature, a chaste and elegant structure; and behind me,
+glowing in the sunbeams, the Madeleine, the noblest church--I think
+the noblest edifice, in Paris, and perhaps not surpassed in beauty
+and grandeur, for its size, by any place of worship in Europe.
+The air cool and sweet from the foliage, the vast _place_ almost
+solitary, and undisturbed by the cries which are incessant in this
+babel during the day, yet with that gentle confusion of sounds which
+makes the murmur and the music of a great city. All was calm, noble,
+and soothing.
+
+The obelisk of Luxor which stands in the centre of the "Place," is
+one of two Monoliths, or pillars of a single stone, which, with
+Cleopatra's Needle, were given by Mehemet Ali to the French,
+at the time when, by their alliance, he expected to have made
+himself independent. All the dates of Egyptian antiquities are
+uncertain--notwithstanding Young and his imitator Champollion--but
+the date _assigned_ to this pillar is 1550 years before the
+Christian era. The two obelisks stood in front of the great temple
+of Thebes, now named Luxor, and the hieroglyphics which cover this
+one, from top to bottom, are supposed to relate the exploits and
+incidents of the reign of Sesostris.
+
+It is of red Syenite; but, from time and weather, it is almost the
+colour of limestone. It has an original flaw up a third of its
+height, for which the Egyptian masons provided a remedy by wedges,
+and the summit is slightly broken. The height of the monolith is
+seventy-two feet three inches, which would look insignificant,
+fixed as it is in the centre of lofty buildings, but for its being
+raised on a plinth of granite, and that again raised on a pedestal
+of immense blocks of granite--the height of the plinth and the
+pedestal together being twenty-seven feet, making the entire height
+nearly one hundred. The weight of the monolith is five hundred
+thousand pounds; the weight of the pedestal is half that amount, and
+the weight of the blocks probably makes the whole amount to nine
+hundred thousand, which is the weight of the obelisk at Rome. It was
+erected in 1836, by drawing it up an inclined plane of masonry, and
+then raising it by cables and capstans to the perpendicular. The
+operation was tedious, difficult, and expensive; but it was worth
+the labour; and the monolith now forms a remarkable monument of the
+zeal of the king, and of the liberality of his government.
+
+There is, I understand, an obelisk remaining in Egypt, which
+was given by the Turkish government to the British army, on the
+expulsion of the French from Egypt, but which has been unclaimed,
+from the difficulty of carrying it to England.
+
+That difficulty, it must be acknowledged, is considerable. In
+transporting and erecting the obelisk of Luxor six years were
+employed. I have not heard the expense, but it must have been large.
+A vessel was especially constructed at Toulon, for its conveyance
+down the Nile. A long road was to be made from the Nile to the
+Temple. Then the obelisk required to be protected from the accidents
+of carriage, which was done by enclosing it in a wooden case. It was
+then drawn by manual force to the river--and this employed three
+months. Then came the trouble of embarking it, for which the vessel
+had to be nearly sawn through; then came the crossing of the bar
+at Rosetta--a most difficult operation at the season of the year;
+then the voyage down the Mediterranean, the vessel being towed by a
+steamer; then the landing at Cherbourg, in 1833; and, lastly, the
+passage up the Seine, which occupied nearly four months, reaching
+Paris in December; thenceforth its finishing and erection, which was
+completed only in three years after.
+
+This detail may have some interest, as we have a similar project
+before us. But the whole question is, whether the transport of the
+obelisk which remains in Egypt for us is worth the expense. We,
+without hesitation, say that it _is_. The French have shown that it
+is _practicable_, and it is a matter of _rational_ desire to show
+that we are not behind the French either in power, in ability, or
+in zeal, to adorn our cities. The obelisk transported to England
+would be a proud monument, without being an offensive one, of a
+great achievement of our armies; it would present to our eyes, and
+those of our children, a relic of the most civilised kingdom of the
+early ages; it would sustain the recollections of the scholar by its
+record, and might kindle the energy of the people by the sight of
+what had been accomplished by the prowess of Englishmen.
+
+If it be replied that such views are Utopian, may we not ask,
+what is the use of all antiquity, since we can eat and drink as
+well without it? But we cannot _feel_ as loftily without it; many
+a lesson of vigour, liberality, and virtue would be lost to us
+without it; we should lose the noblest examples of the arts, some
+of the finest displays of human genius in architecture, a large
+portion of the teaching of the public mind in all things great,
+and an equally large portion of the incentives to public virtue in
+all things self-denying. The labour, it is true, of conveying the
+obelisk would be serious, the expense considerable, and we might
+not see it erected before the gate of Buckingham Palace these ten
+years. But it would be erected at _last_. It would be a trophy--it
+would be an abiding memorial of the extraordinary country from which
+civilisation spread to the whole world.
+
+But the two grand fountains ought especially to stimulate our
+emulation. Those we can have without a voyage from Alexandria to
+Portsmouth, or a six years' delay.
+
+The fountains of the Place de la Concorde would deserve praise
+if it were only for their beauty. At a distance sufficient for
+the picturesque, and with the sun shining on them, they actually
+look like domes and cataracts of molten silver; and a nearer view
+does not diminish their right to admiration. They are both lofty,
+perhaps, fifty feet high, both consisting of three basins, lessening
+in size in proportion to their height, and all pouring out sheets
+of water from the trumpets of Tritons, from the mouths of dolphins,
+and from allegorical figures. One of those fountains is in honour of
+Maritime Navigation, and the other of the Navigation of Rivers. In
+the former the figures represent the Ocean and the Mediterranean,
+with the Genii of the fisheries; and in the upper basin are
+Commerce, Astronomy, Navigation, &c., all capital bronzes, and all
+spouting out floods of water. The fountain of River Navigation is
+not behind its rival in bronze or water. It exhibits the Rhine and
+the Rhone, with the Genii of fruits and flowers, of the vintage and
+the harvest, with the usual attendance of Tritons. Why the artist
+had no room for the Seine and the Garonne, while he introduced the
+Rhine, which is not a French river in any part of its course, must
+be left for his explanation; but the whole constitutes a beautiful
+and magnificent object, and, with the sister fountain, perhaps
+forms the finest display of the kind in Europe. I did not venture,
+while looking at those stately monuments of French art, to turn my
+thoughts to our own unhappy performances in Trafalgar Square--the
+rival of a soda-water bottle, yet the work of a people of boundless
+wealth, and the first machinists in the world.
+
+_The Jardin des Plantes._--I found this fine establishment crowded
+with the lower orders--fathers and mothers, nurses, old women, and
+soldiers. As it includes the popular attractions of a zoological
+garden, as well as a botanical, every day sees its visitants, and
+every holiday its crowds. The plants are for science, and for that
+I had no time, even had I possessed other qualifications; but the
+zoological collection were for curiosity, and of that the spectators
+had abundance. Yet the animals of pasture appeared to be languid,
+possibly tired of the perpetual bustle round them--for all animals
+love quiet at certain times, and escape from the eye of man, when
+escape is in their power. Possibly the heat of the weather, for
+the day was remarkably sultry, might have contributed to their
+exhaustion. But if they have memory--and why should they not?--they
+must have strangely felt the contrast of their free pastures, shady
+woods, and fresh streams, with the little patch of ground, the
+parched soil, and the clamour of ten thousand tongues round them.
+I could imagine the antelope's intelligent eye, as he lay panting
+before us on his brown patch of soil, comparing it with the ravines
+of the Cape, or the eternal forests clothing the hills of his native
+Abyssinia.
+
+But the object of all popular interest was the pit of the bears;
+there the crowd was incessant and delighted. But the bears, three
+or four huge brown beasts, by no means _reciprocated_ the popular
+feeling. They sat quietly on their hind-quarters, gazing grimly at
+the groups which lined their rails, and tossed cakes and apples to
+them from above. They had probably been saturated with sweets, for
+they scarcely noticed anything but by a growl. They were insensible
+to apples--even oranges could not make them move, and cakes they
+seemed to treat with scorn. It was difficult to conceive that
+those heavy and unwieldy-looking animals could be ferocious; but
+the Alpine hunter knows that they are as fierce as the tiger, and
+nearly as quick and dangerous in their spring.
+
+The carnivorous beasts were few, and, except in the instance of
+one lion, of no remarkable size or beauty. As they naturally doze
+during the day, their languor was no proof of their weariness; but
+I have never seen an exhibition of this kind without some degree of
+regret. The plea of the promotion of science is nothing. Even if
+it were important to science to be acquainted with the habits of
+the lion and tiger, which it is not, their native habits are not to
+be learned from the animal shut up in a cage. The chief exertion
+of their sagacity and their strength in the native state is in the
+pursuit of prey; yet what of these can be learned from the condition
+in which the animal dines as regularly as his keeper, and divides
+his time between feeding and sleep? Half-a-dozen lions let loose in
+the Bois de Boulogne would let the naturalist into more knowledge of
+their nature than a menagerie for fifty years.
+
+The present system is merely cruel; and the animals, without
+exercise, without air, without the common excitement of free motion,
+which all animals enjoy so highly--perhaps much more highly than the
+human race--fall into disease and die, no doubt miserably, though
+they cannot draw up a _rationale_ of their sufferings. I have been
+told that the lions in confinement die chiefly of consumption--a
+singularly sentimental disease for this proud ravager of the desert.
+But the whole purpose of display would be answered as effectually
+by exhibiting half-a-dozen lions' _skins_ stuffed, in the different
+attitudes of seizing their prey, or ranging the forest, or feeding.
+At present nothing is seen but a great beast asleep, or restlessly
+moving in a space of half-a-dozen square feet, and pining away in
+his confinement. An eagle on his perch and with a chain on his leg,
+in a menagerie, always appears to me like a dethroned monarch; and
+I have never seen him thus cast down from his "high estate" without
+longing to break his chain, and let him spread his wing, and delight
+his splendid eye with the full view of his kingdom of the Air.
+
+The Jardin dates its origin as far back as Louis XIII., when the
+king's physician recommended its foundation for science. The French
+are fond of gardening, and are good gardeners; and the climate is
+peculiarly favourable to flowers, as is evident from the market held
+every morning in summer by the side of the Madeleine, where the
+greatest abundance of the richest flowers I ever saw is laid out for
+the luxury of the Parisians.
+
+The Jardin, patronised by kings and nobles, flourished through
+successive reigns; but the appointment of Buffon, about the middle
+of the eighteenth century, suddenly raised it to the pinnacle of
+European celebrity. The most eloquent writer of his time, (in
+the style which the French call eloquence,) a man of family, and
+a man of opulence, he made Natural History the _fashion_, and
+in France that word is magic. It accomplishes everything--it
+includes everything. All France was frantic with the study of
+plants, animals, poultry-yards, and projects for driving tigers in
+cabriolets, and harnessing lions _à la Cybele_.
+
+But Buffon mixed good sense with his inevitable _charlatanrie_--he
+selected the ablest men whom he could find for his professors;
+and in France there is an extraordinary quantity of "ordinary"
+cleverness--they gave amusing lectures, and they won the hearts of
+the nation.
+
+But the Revolution came, and crushed all institutions alike. Buffon,
+fortunate in every way, had died in the year before, in 1788, and
+was thus spared the sight of the general ruin. The Jardin escaped,
+through some plea of its being national property; but the professors
+had fled, and were starving, or starved.
+
+The Consulate, and still more the Empire, restored the
+establishment. Napoleon was ambitious of the character of a man
+of science, he was a member of the Institute, he knew the French
+character, and he flattered the national vanity, by indulging it
+with the prospect of being at the head of human knowledge.
+
+The institution had by this time been so long regarded as a
+public show that it was beginning to be regarded as nothing else.
+Gratuitous lectures, which are always good for nothing, and to
+which all kinds of people crowd with corresponding profit, were
+gradually reducing the character of the Jardin; when Cuvier, a
+man of talent, was appointed to one of the departments of the
+institution, and he instantly revived its popularity; and, what was
+of more importance, its public use.
+
+Cuvier devoted himself to comparative anatomy and geology. The
+former was a study within human means, of which he had the materials
+round him, and which, being intended for the instruction of man, is
+evidently intended for his investigation. The latter, in attempting
+to fix the age of the world, to decide on the process of creation,
+and to contradict Scripture by the ignorance of man, is merely
+an instance of the presumption of _Sciolism_. Cuvier exhibited
+remarkable dexterity in discovering the species of the fossil
+fishes, reptiles, and animals. The science was not new, but he threw
+it into a new form--he made it interesting, and he made it probable.
+If a large proportion of his supposed discoveries were merely
+ingenious guesses, they were at least guesses which there was nobody
+to refute, and they _were ingenious_--that was enough. Fame followed
+him, and the lectures of the ingenious theorist were a popular
+novelty. The "Cabinet of Comparative Anatomy" in the Jardin is the
+monument of his diligence, and it does honour to the sagacity of his
+investigation.
+
+One remark, however, must be made. On a former visit to the Cabinet
+of Comparative Anatomy, among the collection of skeletons, I was
+surprised and disgusted with the sight of the skeleton of the Arab
+who killed General Kleber in Egypt. The Arab was impaled, and the
+iron spike was shown _still sticking in the_ spine! I do not know
+whether this hideous object is still to be seen, for I have not
+lately visited the apartment; but, if existing still, it ought to
+remain no longer in a museum of science. Of course, the assassin
+deserved death; but, in all probability, the murder which made him
+guilty, was of the same order as that which made Charlotte Corday
+famous. How many of his countrymen had died by the soldiery of
+France! In the eye of Christianity, this is no palliation; though in
+the eye of Mahometanism it might constitute a patriot and a hero. At
+all events, so frightful a spectacle ought _not_ to meet the public
+eye.
+
+_Hôtel des Invalides._--The depository of all that remains of
+Napoleon, the monument of almost two hundred years of war, and the
+burial-place of a whole host of celebrated names, is well worth
+the visit of strangers; and I entered the esplanade of the famous
+_hôtel_ with due veneration, and some slight curiosity to see the
+changes of time. I had visited this noble pile immediately after
+the fall of Napoleon, and while it still retained the honours of
+an imperial edifice. Its courts now appeared to me comparatively
+desolate; this, however, may be accounted for by the cessation
+of those wars which peopled them with military mutilation. The
+establishment was calculated to provide for five thousand men; and,
+at that period, probably, it was always full. At present, scarcely
+more than half the number are under its roof; and, as even the
+Algerine war is reduced to skirmishes with the mountaineers of the
+Atlas, that number must be further diminishing from year to year.
+
+The Cupola then shone with gilding. This was the work of Napoleon,
+who had a stately eye for the ornament of his imperial city. The
+cupola of the Invalides thus glittered above all the roofs of Paris,
+and was seen glittering to an immense distance. It might be taken
+for the dedication of the French capital to the genius of War. This
+gilding is now worn off practically, as well as metaphorically, and
+the _prestige_ is lost.
+
+The celebrated Edmund Burke, all whose ideas were grand, is said
+to have proposed gilding the cupola of St Paul's, which certainly
+would have been a splendid sight, and would have thrown a look of
+stateliness over that city to which the ends of the earth turn their
+eyes. But the civic spirit was not equal to the idea, and it has
+since gone on lavishing ten times the money on the embellishment of
+_lanes_.
+
+The Chapel of the Invalides looked gloomy, and even neglected; the
+great Magician was gone. Some service was performing, as it is in
+the Romish chapels at most hours of the day: some poor people were
+kneeling in different parts of the area; and some strangers were,
+like myself, wandering along the nave, looking at the monuments to
+the fallen military names of France. On the pillars in the nave are
+inscriptions to the memory of Jourdan, Lobau, and Oudinot. There is
+a bronze tablet to the memory of Marshal Mortier, who was killed by
+Fieschi's infernal machine, beside Louis Philippe; and to Damremont,
+who fell in Algiers.
+
+But the chapel is destined to exhibit a more superb instance of
+national recollection--the tomb of Napoleon, which is to be finished
+in 1852. A large circular crypt, dug in the centre of the second
+chapel (which is to be united with the first,) is the site of the
+sarcophagus in which the remains of Napoleon lie. Coryatides,
+columns, and bas-reliefs, commemorative of his battles, are to
+surround the sarcophagus. The coryatides are to represent War,
+Legislation, Art, and Science; and in front is to be raised an altar
+of black marble. The architect is Visconti, and the best statuaries
+in Paris are to contribute the decorations. The expense will be
+enormous. In the time of Louis Philippe it had already amounted to
+nearly four millions of francs. About three millions more are now
+demanded for the completion, including an equestrian statue. On the
+whole, the expense will be not much less than seven millions of
+francs!
+
+The original folly of the nation, and of Napoleon, in plundering the
+Continent of statues and pictures, inevitably led to retribution,
+on the first reverse of fortune. The plunder of money, or of
+arms, or of anything consumable, would have been exempt from this
+mortification; but pictures and statues are permanent things, and
+always capable of being re-demanded. Their plunder was an extension
+of the law of spoil unknown in European hostilities, or in history,
+except perhaps in the old Roman ravage of Greece. Napoleon, in
+adopting the practice of heathenism for his model, and the French
+nation--in their assumed love of the arts violating the sanctities
+of art, by removing the noblest works from the edifices for which
+they were created, and from the lights and positions for which the
+great artists of Italy designed them--fully deserved the vexation of
+seeing them thus carried back to their original cities. The moral
+will, it is to be presumed, be learned from this signal example,
+that the works of genius are _naturally_ exempt from the sweep of
+plunder; that even the violences of war must not be extended beyond
+the necessities of conquest; and that an act of injustice is _sure_
+to bring down its punishment in the most painful form of retribution.
+
+_The Artesian Well._--Near the Hôtel des Invalides is the celebrated
+well which has given the name to all the modern experiments of
+boring to great depths for water. The name of Artesian is said to
+be taken from the province of Artois, in which the practice has
+been long known. The want of water in Paris induced a M. Mulot to
+commence the work in 1834.
+
+The history of the process is instructive. For six years there was
+no prospect of success; yet M. Mulot gallantly persevered. All
+was inexorable chalk; the boring instrument had broken several
+times, and the difficulty thus occasioned may be imagined from its
+requiring a length of thirteen hundred feet! even in an early period
+of the operation. However, early in 1841 the chalk gave signs of
+change, and a greenish sand was drawn up. On the 26th of February
+this was followed by a slight effusion of water, and before night
+the stream burst up to the mouth of the excavation, which was now
+eighteen hundred feet in depth. Yet the water rapidly rose to a
+height of one hundred and twelve feet above the mouth of the well
+by a pipe, which is now supported by scaffolding, giving about six
+hundred gallons of water a minute.
+
+Even the memorable experiment confutes, so far as it goes, the
+geological notion of strata laid under each other in their
+proportions of gravity. The section of the boring shows chalk, sand,
+gravel, shells, &c., and this order sometimes reversed, in the most
+casual manner, down to a depth five times the height of the cupola
+of the Invalides.
+
+The heat of the water was 83° of Fahrenheit. In the theories
+with which the philosophers of the Continent have to feed their
+imaginations is that of a _central fire_, which is felt through all
+the strata, and which warms everything in proportion to its nearness
+to the centre. Thus, it was proposed to dig an Artesian well of
+three thousand feet, for the supply of hot water to the Jardin des
+Plantes and the neighbouring hospitals. It was supposed that, at
+this depth, the heat would range to upwards of 100° of Fahrenheit.
+But nothing has been done. Even the Well of Grenelle has rather
+disappointed the public expectation; of late the supply has been
+less constant, and the boring is to be renewed to a depth of two
+thousand feet.
+
+_The Napoleon Column._--This is the grand feature of the Place
+de Vendôme, once the site of the Hôtel Vendôme, built by the son
+of Henry IV. and Gabrielle d'Estrées; afterwards pulled down by
+Louis XIV., afterwards abandoned to the citizens, and afterwards
+surrounded, as it is at this day, with the formal and heavy
+architecture of Mansard. The "Place" has, like everything in
+Paris, changed its name from time to time. It was once the "Place
+des Conquêtes;" then it changed to "Louis le Grand;" and then it
+returned to the name of its original proprietor. An old figure of
+the "Great King," in all the glories of wig and feathers, stood in
+the centre, till justice and the rabble of the Revolution broke
+it down, in the first "energies" of Republicanism. But the German
+campaign of 1805 put all the nation in good humour, and the Napoleon
+Column was raised on the site of the dilapidated _monarch_.
+
+The design of the column is not original, for it is taken from
+the Trajan Column at Rome; but it is enlarged, and makes a very
+handsome object. When I first saw it, its decorations were in peril;
+for the Austrian soldiery were loud for its demolition, or at
+least for stripping off its bronze bas-reliefs, they representing
+their successive defeats in that ignominious campaign which, in
+three months from Boulogne, finished by the capture of Vienna. The
+Austrian troops, however, stoutly retrieved their disasters, and,
+as the proof, were then masters of Paris. It was possibly this
+effective feeling that prevailed at last to spare the column, which
+the practice of the French armies would have entitled them to strip
+without mercy.
+
+In the first instance, a statue of Napoleon, as emperor, stood on
+the summit of the pillar. This statue had its revolutions too, for
+it was melted down at the restoration of the Bourbons, to make a
+part of the equestrian statue of Henry IV. erected on the Pont Neuf.
+A _fleur-de-lis_ and flagstaff then took its place. The Revolution
+of 1830, which elevated Louis Philippe to a temporary throne, raised
+the statue of Napoleon to an elevation perhaps as temporary.
+
+It was the shortsighted policy of the new monarch to mingle royal
+power with "republican institutions." He thus introduced the
+tricolor once more, sent for Napoleon's remains to St Helena by
+permission of England, and erected his statue in the old "chapeau et
+redingote gris," the characteristics of his soldiership. The statue
+was inaugurated on one of the "three glorious days," in July 1833,
+in all the pomp of royalty,--princes, ministers, and troops. So much
+for the consistency of a brother of the Bourbon. The pageant passed
+away, and the sacrifice to popularity was made without obtaining the
+fruits. Louis Philippe disappeared from the scene before the fall
+of the curtain; and, as if to render his catastrophe more complete,
+he not merely left a republic behind him, but he lived to see the
+"prisoner of Ham" the president of that republic.
+
+How does it happen that an Englishman in France cannot stir a
+single step, hear a single word, or see a single face, without the
+conviction that he has landed among a people as far from him in all
+their feelings, habits, and nature, as if they were engendered in
+the moon? The feelings with which the Briton looks on the statue
+of Buonaparte may be mixed enough: he may acknowledge him for a
+great soldier, as well as a great knave--a great monarch, as well
+as a little intriguer--a mighty ruler of men, who would have made
+an adroit waiter at a _table d'hôte_ in the Palais Royal. But he
+never would have imagined him into a sentimentalist, a shepherd, a
+Corydon, to be hung round with pastoral garlands; an opera hero, to
+delight in the sixpenny tribute of bouquets from the galleries.
+
+Yet I found the image of this man of terror and mystery--this
+ravager of Europe--this stern, fierce, and subtle master of havoc,
+decorated like a milliner's shop, or the tombs of the citizen
+shopkeepers in the cemeteries, with garlands of all sizes!--the
+large to express copious sorrow, the smaller to express diminished
+anguish, and the smallest, like a visiting card, for simply leaving
+their compliments; and all this in the face of the people who once
+feared to look in his face, and followed his car as if it bore the
+Thunder!
+
+To this spot came the people to offer up their sixpenny homage--to
+this spot came processions of all kinds, to declare their republican
+love for the darkest despot of European memory, to sing a stave, to
+walk heroically round the railing, hang up their garlands, and then,
+having done their duty in the presence of their own grisettes, in
+the face of Paris, and to the admiration of Europe, march home, and
+ponder upon the glories of the day!
+
+As a work of imperial magnificence, the column is worthy of its
+founder, and of the only redeeming point of his character--his
+zeal for the ornament of Paris. It is a monument to the military
+successes of the Empire; a trophy one hundred and thirty-five feet
+high, covered with the representations of French victory over the
+Austrians and Russians in the campaign of 1805. The bas-reliefs
+are in bronze, rising in a continued spiral round the column. Yet
+this is an unfortunate sacrifice to the imitation of the Roman
+column. The spiral, a few feet above the head of the spectator,
+offers nothing to the eye but a roll of rough bronze; the figures
+are wholly and necessarily undistinguishable. The only portion of
+those castings which directly meets the eye is unfortunately given
+up to the mere uniforms, caps, and arms of the combatants. This is
+the pedestal, and it would make a showy decoration for a tailor's
+window. It is a clever work of the furnace, but a miserable one of
+invention.
+
+The bronze is said to have been the captured cannon of the enemy.
+On the massive bronze door is the inscription in Latin:--"Napoleon,
+Emperor, Augustus, dedicated to the glory of the Grand Army this
+memorial of the German War, finished in three months, in the year
+1805, under his command."
+
+On the summit stands the statue of Napoleon, to which, and its
+changes, I have adverted already. But the question has arisen,
+whether there is not an error in taste in placing the statue of an
+individual at a height which precludes the view of his _features_.
+This has been made an objection to the handsome Nelson Pillar in
+Trafalgar Square. But the obvious answer in both instances is,
+that the object is not merely the sight of the features, but the
+perfection of the memorial; that the pillar is the true _monument_,
+and the statue only an accessory, though the most _suitable_
+accessory. But even then the statue is not altogether inexpressive.
+We can see the figure and the costume of Napoleon nearly as well
+as they could be seen from the balcony of the Tuilleries, where
+all Paris assembled in the Carousel to worship him on Sundays, at
+the parade of "La Garde." In the spirited statue of Nelson we can
+recognise the figure as well as if we were gazing at him within a
+hundred yards in any other direction. It is true that pillars are
+not painters' easels, nor is Trafalgar Square a sculptor's yard; but
+the real question turns on the effect of the whole. If the pillar
+makes the monument, we will not quarrel with the sculptor for its
+not making a _miniature_. It answers its purpose--it is a noble
+one; it gives a national record of great events, and it realises,
+invigorates, and consecrates them by the images of the men by whom
+they were achieved.
+
+_Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile._--It is no small adventure, in a
+burning day of a French summer, to walk the length of the Champs
+Elysées, even to see the arch of the Star, (Napoleon's _Star_,)
+and climb to its summit. Yet this labour I accomplished with the
+fervour and the fatigue of a pilgrimage.
+
+Why should the name of Republic be ever heard in the mouth of a
+Frenchman? All the objects of his glory in the Capital of which he
+_glories_, everything that he can show to the stranger--everything
+that he recounts, standing on tip-toe, and looking down on the whole
+world besides--is the work of monarchy! The grand Republic left
+nothing behind but the guillotine. The Bourbons and Buonapartes were
+the creators of all to which he points, with an exaltation that
+throws earth into the shade from the Alps to the Andes. The Louvre,
+the Madeleine, the Tuilleries, the Hôtel de Ville, (now magnified
+and renovated into the most stately of town-houses,) the Hôtel
+des Invalides, Nôtre Dame, &c. &c. are all the work of Kings. If
+Napoleon had lived half a century longer, he would have made Paris
+a second Babylon. If the very clever President, who has hitherto
+managed France so dexterously, and whose name so curiously combines
+the monarchy and the despotism,--if Louis _Napoleon_ (a name which
+an old Roman would have pronounced an omen) should manage it into
+a Monarchy, we shall probably see Paris crowded with superb public
+edifices.
+
+The kings of France were peculiarly magnificent in the decoration
+of the entrances to their city. As no power on earth can prevent
+the French from crowding into hovels, from living ten families in
+one house, and from appending to their cities the most miserable,
+ragged, and forlorn-looking suburbs on the globe, the monarchs
+wisely let the national habits alone; and resolved, if the suburbs
+must be abandoned to the popular fondness for the wigwam, to
+impress strangers with the stateliness of their gates. The _Arc
+de St Denis_, once conducting from the most dismal of suburbs, is
+one of the finest portals in Paris, or in any European city; it
+is worthy of the Boulevard, and that is panegyric at once. Every
+one knows _that it was_ erected in honour of the short-lived
+inroad of Louis XIV. into Holland in 1672, and the taking of whole
+muster-rolls of forts and villages, left at his mercy, ungarrisoned
+and unprovisioned, by the Republican parsimony of the Dutch, till
+a princely defender arose, and the young Stadtholder sent back the
+coxcomb monarch faster than he came. But the Arc is a noble work,
+and its architecture might well set a redeeming example to the
+London _improvers_. Why not erect an arch in Southwark? Why not at
+all the great avenues to the capital? Why not, instead of leaving
+this task to the caprices, or even to the bad taste of the railway
+companies, make it a branch of the operations of the Woods and
+Forests, and ennoble all the entrances of the mightiest capital of
+earthly empire?
+
+The Arch of St Denis is now shining in all the novelty of
+reparation, for it was restored so lately as last year. In this
+quarter, which has been always of a stormy temperature, the
+insurrection of 1848 raged with especial fury; and if the spirits of
+the great ever hover about their monuments, Louis XIV. may have seen
+from its summit a more desperate conflict than ever figured on its
+bas-reliefs.
+
+On the Arch of the Porte St Martin is a minor monument to minor
+triumphs, but a handsome one. Louis XIV. is still the hero. The
+"Grand Monarque" is exhibited as Hercules with his club; but as
+even a monarch in those days was nothing without his wig, Hercules
+exhibits a huge mass of curls of the most courtly dimensions--he
+might pass for the presiding deity of _perruquiers_.
+
+The _Arc de Triomphe du Carousel_, erected in honour of the German
+campaign in 1805, is a costly performance, yet poor-looking, from
+its position in the centre of lofty buildings. What effect can
+an isolated arch, of but five-and-forty feet high, have in the
+immediate vicinity of masses of building, perhaps a hundred feet
+high? Its aspect is consequently meagre; and its being placed
+in the centre of a court makes it look useless, and, of course,
+ridiculous. On the summit is a figure of War, or Victory, in a
+chariot, with four bronze horses--the horses modelled from the
+four Constantinopolitan horses brought by the French from Venice,
+as part of the plunder of that luckless city, but sent back to
+Venice by the Allies in 1815. The design of the arch was from
+that of Severus, in Rome: this secured, at least, elegance in its
+construction; but the position is fatal to dignity.
+
+The _Arc de l'Etoile_ is the finest work of the kind in Paris. It
+has the advantage of being built on an elevation, from which it
+overlooks the whole city, with no building of any magnitude in its
+vicinity; and is seen from a considerable distance on all the roads
+leading to the capital. Its cost was excessive for a work of mere
+ornament, and is said to have amounted to nearly half a million
+sterling!
+
+As I stood glancing over the groups on the friezes and faces of
+this great monument, which exhibit war in every form of conflict,
+havoc, and victory, the homely thought of "_cui bono_?" struck me
+irresistibly. Who was the better for all this havoc?--Napoleon,
+whom it sent to a dungeon! or the miserable thousands and tens
+of thousands whom it crushed in the field?--or the perhaps more
+unfortunate hundreds of thousands whom it sent to the hospital, to
+die the slow death of exhaustion and pain, or to live the protracted
+life of mutilation? I have no affectation of sentiment at the
+sight of the soldier's grave; he has but taken his share of the
+common lot, with perhaps the advantage, which so few men possess,
+of having "done the state some service." But, to see this vast
+monument covered with the emblems of hostilities, continued through
+almost a quarter of a century, (for the groups commence with 1792;)
+to think of the devastation of the fairest countries of Europe,
+of which these hostilities were the cause; and to know the utter
+fruitlessness and failure of the result, the short-lived nature of
+the triumph, and the frightful depth of the defeat---Napoleon in
+ignominious bondage and hopeless banishment--Napoleon, after having
+lorded it over Europe, sent to linger out life on a rock in the
+centre of the ocean--the leader of military millions kept under the
+eye of a British sentinel, and no more suffered to stray beyond
+his bounds than a caged tiger--I felt as if the object before me
+was less a trophy than a tomb, less a monument of glory than of
+retribution, less the record of national triumph than of national
+frenzy.
+
+I had full liberty for reflection, for there was scarcely a human
+being to interrupt me. The bustle of the capital did not reach so
+far, the promenaders in the Champs Elysées did not venture here; the
+showy equipages of the Parisian "_nouveaux riches_" remained where
+the crowd was to be seen; and except a few peasants going on their
+avocations, and a bench full of soldiers, sleeping or smoking away
+the weariness of the hour, the _Arc de Triomphe_, which had cost so
+much treasure, and was the record of so much blood, seemed to be
+totally forgotten. I question, if there had been a decree of the
+Legislature to sell the stones, whether it would have occasioned
+more than a paragraph in the _Journal des Debats_.
+
+The ascent to the summit is by a long succession of dark and winding
+steps, for which a lamp is lighted by the porter; but the view from
+the parapet repays the trouble of the ascent. The whole basin in
+which Paris lies is spread out before the eye. The city is seen in
+the centre of a valley, surrounded on every side by a circle of low
+hills, sheeted with dark masses of wood. It was probably once the
+bed of a lake, in which the site of the city was an island. All the
+suburb villages came within the view, with the fortifications, which
+to a more scientific eye might appear formidable, but which to mine
+appeared mere dots in the vast landscape.
+
+This parapet is unhappily sometimes used for other purposes than
+the indulgence of the spectacle. A short time since, a determined
+suicide sprang from it, after making a speech to the soldiery below,
+assigning his reason for this tremendous act--if reason has anything
+to do in such a desperate determination to defy common sense. He
+acted with the quietest appearance of deliberation: let himself down
+on the coping of the battlement, from this made his speech, as if
+he had been in the tribune; and, having finished it, flung himself
+down a height of ninety feet, and was in an instant a crushed and
+lifeless heap on the pavement below.
+
+It is remarkable that, even in these crimes, there exists the
+distinction which seems to divide France from England in every
+better thing. In England, a wretch undone by poverty, broken down by
+incurable pain, afflicted by the stings of a conscience which she
+neither knows how to heal nor cares how to cure, woman, helpless,
+wretched, and desolate, takes her walk under cover of night by the
+nearest river, and, without a witness, plunges in. But, in France,
+the last dreadful scene is imperfect without its publicity; the
+suicide must exhibit before the people. There must be the _valete et
+plaudite_. The curtain must fall with dramatic effect, and the actor
+must make his exit with the cries of the audience, in admiration or
+terror, ringing in the ear.
+
+In other cases, however varied, the passion for publicity is
+still the same. No man can bear to perish in silence. If the
+atheist resolves on self-destruction, he writes a treatise for his
+publisher, or a letter to the journals. If he is a man of science,
+he takes his laudanum after supper, and, pen in hand, notes the
+gradual effects of the poison for the benefit of science; or he
+prepares a fire of charcoal, quietly inhales the vapour, and from
+his sofa continues to scribble the symptoms of dissolution, until
+the pen grows unsteady, the brain wanders, and half-a-dozen blots
+close the scene; the writing, however, being dedicated to posterity,
+and circulated next day in every journal of Paris, till it finally
+permeates through the provinces, and from thence through the
+European world.
+
+The number of suicides in Paris annually, of late years, has
+been about three hundred,--out of a population of a million,
+notwithstanding the suppression of the gaming-houses, which
+unquestionably had a large share in the temptation to this horrible
+and unatonable crime.
+
+The sculptures on the Arc are in the best style. They form a history
+of the Consulate and of the Empire. Napoleon, of course, is a
+prominent figure; but in the fine bas-relief which is peculiarly
+devoted to himself, in which he stands of colossal size, with Fame
+flying over his head, History writing the record of his exploits,
+and Victory crowning him, the artist has left his work liable to the
+sly sarcasm of a spectator of a similar design for the statue of
+Louis XIV. Victory was there holding the laurel at a slight distance
+from his head. An Englishman asked "whether she was putting it on
+_or taking it off_?" But another of the sculptures is still more
+unfortunate, for it has the unintentional effect of commemorating
+the Allied conquest of France in 1814. A young Frenchman is seen
+defending his family; and a soldier behind him is seen falling from
+his horse, and the Genius of the _future_ flutters over them all. We
+know what that future was.
+
+The building of this noble memorial occupied, at intervals, no
+less than thirty years, beginning in 1806, when Napoleon issued
+a decree for its erection. The invasion in 1814 put a stop to
+everything in France, and the building was suspended. The fruitless
+and foolish campaign of the Duc d'Angoulême, in Spain, was regarded
+by the Bourbons as a title to national glories, and the building
+was resumed as a trophy to the renown of the Duc. It was again
+interrupted by the expulsion of the Bourbons in 1830; but was
+resumed under Louis Philippe, and finished in 1836. It is altogether
+a very stately and very handsome tribute to the French armies.
+
+But, without affecting unnecessary severity of remark, may not the
+wisdom of such a tribute be justly doubted? The Romans, though the
+principle of their power was conquest, and though their security was
+almost incompatible with peace, yet are said to have never repaired
+a triumphal arch. It is true that they built those arches (in the
+latter period of the Empire) so solidly as to want no repairs. But
+we have no triumphal monuments of the Republic surviving. Why should
+it be the constant policy of Continental governments to pamper
+their people with the food of that most dangerous and diseased of
+all vanities, the passion for war? And this is not said in the
+declamatory spirit of the "Peace Congress," which seems to be
+nothing more than a pretext for a Continental ramble, an expedient
+for a little vulgar notoriety among foreigners, and an opportunity
+of getting rid of the greatest quantity of common-place in the
+shortest time. But, why should not France learn common sense from
+the experience of England? It is calculated that, of the last five
+hundred years of French history, two hundred and fifty have been
+spent in hostilities. In consequence, France has been invaded,
+trampled, and impoverished by war; while England, during the last
+three hundred years, has never seen the foot of a foreign invader.
+
+Let the people of France abolish the _Conscription_, and they
+will have made one advance to liberty. Till cabinets are deprived
+of that material of _aggressive_ war, they will leave war at the
+caprice of a weak monarch, an ambitious minister, or a vainglorious
+people. It is remarkable that, among all the attempts at reforming
+the constitution of France, her reformers have never touched upon
+the ulcer of the land, the Conscription, the legacy of a frantic
+Republic, taking the children of the country from their industry, to
+plunge them into the vices of idleness or the havoc of war, and at
+all times to furnish the means, as well as afford the temptation,
+to aggressive war. There is not at this hour a soldier of England
+who has been _forced_ into the service! Let the French, let all the
+Continental nations, abolish the Conscription, thus depriving their
+governments of the means of making war upon each other; and what an
+infinite security would not this illustrious abolition give to the
+whole of Europe!--what an infinite saving in the taxes which are now
+wrung from nations by the fear of each other!--and what an infinite
+triumph to the spirit of peace, industry, and mutual good-will!
+
+_The Theatres._--In the evening I wandered along the Boulevard,
+the great centre of the theatres, and was surprised at the crowds
+which, in a hot summer night, could venture to be stewed alive,
+amid the smell of lamps, the effluvia of orange-peel, the glare of
+lights, and the breathing of hundreds or thousands of human beings.
+I preferred the fresh air, the lively movement of the Boulevard, the
+glitter of the Cafés, and the glow, then tempered, of the declining
+sun--one of the prettiest moving panoramas of Paris.
+
+The French Government take a great interest in the popularity of
+the theatres, and exert that species of superintendence which is
+implied in a considerable supply of the theatrical expenditure. The
+French Opera receives annually from the National Treasury no less
+than 750,000 francs, besides 130,000 for retiring pensions. To the
+Théâtre Français, the allowance from the Treasury is 240,000 francs
+a-year. To the Italian Opera the sum granted was formerly 70,000,
+but is now 50,000. Allowances are made to the Opera Comique, a most
+amusing theatre, to the Odeon, and perhaps to some others--the whole
+demanding of the budget a sum of more than a million of francs.
+
+It is curious that the drama in France began with the clergy. In the
+time of Charles VI., a company, named "Confrères de la Passion,"
+performed plays founded on the events of Scripture, though grossly
+disfigured by the traditions of Monachism. The originals were
+probably the "_Mysteries_," or plays in the Convents, a species of
+absurd and fantastic representation common in all Popish countries.
+At length the life of Manners was added to the life of Superstition,
+and singers and grimacers were added to the "Confrères."
+
+In the sixteenth century an Italian company appeared in Paris, and
+brought with them their opera, the invention of the Florentines
+fifty years before. The cessation of the civil wars allowed France
+for a while to cultivate the arts of peace; and Richelieu, a man
+who, if it could be said of any statesman that he formed the mind
+of the nation, impressed his image and superscription upon his
+country, gave the highest encouragement to the drama by making it
+the fashion. He even wrote, or assisted in writing, popular dramas.
+Corneille now began to flourish, and French Tragedy was established.
+
+Mazarin, when minister, and, like Richelieu, master of the nation,
+invited or admitted the Italian Opera once more into France; and
+Molière, at the head of a new company, obtained leave to perform
+before Louis XIV., who thenceforth patronised the great comic
+writer, and gave his company a theatre. The Tragedy, Comedy, and
+Opera of France now led the way in Europe.
+
+In France, the Great Revolution, while it multiplied the theatres
+with the natural extravagance of the time, yet, by a consequence
+equally inevitable, degraded the taste of the nation. For a
+long period the legitimate drama was almost extinguished: it
+was unexciting to a people trained day by day to revolutionary
+convulsion; the pageants on the stage were tame to the processions
+in the streets; and the struggles of kings and nobles were
+ridiculous to the men who had been employed in destroying a dynasty.
+
+Napoleon at once perceived the evil, and adopted the only remedy. He
+found no less than _thirty_ theatres in Paris. He was not a man to
+pause where he saw his way clearly before him; he closed twenty-two
+of those theatres, leaving but eight, and those chiefly of the old
+establishments, making a species of compensation to the closed
+houses.
+
+On the return of the Bourbons the civil list, as in the old
+times, assisted in the support of the theatres. On the accession
+of Louis Philippe, the popular triumph infused its extravagance
+even into the system of the drama. The number of the theatres
+increased, and a succession of writers of the "New School" filled
+the theatres with abomination. Gallantry became the _spirit_ of
+the drama--everything before the scene was intrigue; married life
+was the perpetual burlesque. Wives were the habitual heroines of
+the intrigue, and husbands the habitual dupes! To keep faith with
+a husband was a standing jest on the stage, to keep it with a
+seducer was the height of human character. The former was always
+described as brutal, gross, dull, and born to be duped; the latter
+was captivating, generous, and irresistible by any matron alive.
+In fact, wives and widows were made for nothing else but to give
+way to the fascinations of this class of professors of the arts
+of "good society." The captivator was substantially described as
+a scoundrel, a gambler, and a vagabond of the basest kind, but
+withal so honourable, so tender, and so susceptible, that his
+atrocities disappeared, or rather were transmuted into virtues, by
+the brilliancy of his qualifications for seducing the wife of his
+friend. Perjury, profligacy, and the betrayal of confidence in the
+most essential tie of human nature, were supreme in popularity in
+the Novel and on the Stage.
+
+The direct consequence is, that the crime of adultery is lightly
+considered in France; even the pure speak of it without the
+abhorrence which, for every reason, it deserves. Its notoriety is
+rather thought of as an anecdote of the day, or the gossiping of the
+soirée; and the most acknowledged licentiousness does not exclude a
+man of a certain rank from general reception in good society.
+
+One thing may be observed on the most casual intercourse with
+Frenchmen--that the vices which, in our country, create disgust
+and offence in grave society, and laughter and levity in the more
+careless, seldom produce either the one or the other in France.
+The topic is alluded to with neither a frown nor a smile; it is
+treated, in general, as a matter of course, either too natural to
+deserve censure, or too common to excite ridicule. It is seldom
+peculiarly alluded to, for the general conversation of "Good
+Society" is decorous; but to denounce it would be unmannered. The
+result is an extent of illegitimacy enough to corrupt the whole
+rising population. By the registers of 1848, of 30,000 children born
+in Paris in that year, there were 10,000 illegitimate, of which but
+1700 were acknowledged by their parents!
+
+The theatrical profession forms an important element in the
+population. The actors and actresses amount to about 5000. In
+England they are probably not as many hundreds. And though the
+French population is 35,000,000, while Great Britain has little
+more than twenty, yet the disproportion is enormous, and forms a
+characteristic difference of the two countries. The persons occupied
+in the "working" of the theatrical system amount perhaps to 10,000,
+and the families dependent on the whole form a very large and very
+influential class among the general orders of society.
+
+But if the Treasury assists in their general support, it compels
+them to pay eight per cent of their receipts as a contribution to
+the hospitals. This sum averages annually a million of francs, or
+£40,000 sterling.
+
+In England we might learn something from the theatrical regulations
+of France. The trampling of our crowds at the doors of theatres, the
+occasional losses of life and limb, and the general inconvenience
+and confusion of the entrance on crowded nights, might be avoided by
+the were adoption of French _order_.
+
+But why should not higher objects be held in view? The drama is a
+public _necessity_; the people will have it, whether good or bad.
+Why should not Government offer prizes to the best drama, tragic or
+comic? Why should the most distinguished work of poetic genius find
+no encouragement from the Government of a nation boasting of its
+love of letters? Why shall that encouragement be left to the caprice
+of managers, to the finances of struggling establishments, or to the
+tastes of theatres, forced by their poverty to pander to the rabble.
+Why should not the mischievous performances of those theatres be put
+down, and dramas, founded on the higher principles of our nature,
+be the instruments of putting them down? Why should not heroism,
+honour, and patriotism, be taught on the national stage, as well as
+the triumphs of the highroad, laxity among the higher ranks, and
+vice among all? The drama has been charged with corruption. Is that
+corruption essential? It has been charged with being a _nucleus_
+of the loose principles, as its places of representation have been
+haunted by the loose characters, of society. But what are these
+but excrescences, generated by the carelessness of society, by
+the indolence of magistracy, and by the general misconception of
+the real purposes and possible power of the stage? That power is
+magnificent. It takes human nature in her most _impressible_ form,
+in the time of the glowing heart and the ready tear, of the senses
+animated by scenery, melted by music, and spelled by the living
+realities of representation. Why should not impressions be made
+in that hour which the man would carry with him through all the
+contingencies of life, and which would throw a light on every period
+of his being?
+
+The conditions of recompense to authors in France make _some_
+advance to justice. The author of a Drama is entitled to a profit on
+its performance in every theatre of France during his life, with a
+continuance for ten years after to his heirs. For a piece of three
+or five acts, the remuneration is _one twelfth part_ of the gross
+receipts, and for a piece in one act, one twenty-fourth. A similar
+compensation has been adopted in the English theatre, but seems to
+have become completely nugatory, from the managers' purchasing the
+author's rights--the transaction here being made a private one, and
+the remuneration being at the mercy of the manager. But in France
+it is a public matter, an affair of law, and looked to by an agent
+in Paris, who registers the performance of the piece at all the
+theatres in the city, and in the provinces.
+
+Still, this is injustice. Why should the labour of the intellect
+be less permanent than the labour of the hands? Why should not the
+author be entitled to make his full demand instead of this pittance?
+If his play is worth acting, why is it not worth paying for?--and
+why should he be prohibited from having the fruit of his brain as an
+inheritance to his family, as well as the fruit of any other toll?
+
+If, instead of being a man of genius, delighting and elevating the
+mind of a nation, he were a blacksmith, he might leave his tools and
+his trade to his children without any limit; or if, with the produce
+of his play, he purchased a cow, or a cabin, no man could lay a
+claim upon either. But he must be taxed for being a man of talent;
+and men of no talent must be entitled, by an absurd law and a
+palpable injustice, to tear the fruit of his intellectual supremacy
+from his children after ten short years of possession.
+
+No man leaves Paris without regret, and without a wish for the
+liberty and peace of its people.
+
+
+
+
+MR RUSKIN'S WORKS.
+
+     _Modern Painters_, vol. i. Second edition.----_Modern Painters_,
+     vol. ii.----_The Seven Lamps of Architecture._----_The Stones of
+     Venice._----_Notes on the Construction of Sheepfolds._ By JOHN
+     RUSKIN, M.A.
+
+
+On the publication of the first volume of Mr Ruskin's work on Modern
+Painters, a notice appeared of it in this Magazine. Since that
+time a second volume has been published of the same work, with two
+other works on architecture. It is the second volume of his _Modern
+Painters_ which will at present chiefly engage our attention. His
+architectural works can only receive a slight and casual notice; on
+some future occasion they may tempt us into a fuller examination.
+
+Although the second volume of the _Modern Painters_ will be the
+immediate subject of our review, we must permit ourselves to glance
+back upon the first, in order to connect together the topics treated
+by the two, and to prevent our paper from wearing quite the aspect
+of a metaphysical essay; for it is the nature of the sentiment of
+the beautiful, and its sources in the human mind, which is the main
+subject of this second volume. In the first, he had entered at once
+into the arena of criticism, elevating the modern artists, and one
+amongst them in particular, at the expense of the old masters, who,
+with some few exceptions, find themselves very rudely handled.
+
+As we have already intimated, we do not hold Mr Ruskin to be a
+safe guide in matters of art, and the present volume demonstrates
+that he is no safe guide in matters of philosophy. He is a man of
+undoubted power and vigour of mind; he feels strongly, and he thinks
+independently: but he is hasty and impetuous; can very rarely, on
+any subject, deliver a calm and temperate judgment; and, when he
+enters on the discussion of general principles, shows an utter
+inability to seize on, or to appreciate, the wide generalisations
+of philosophy. He is not, therefore, one of those men who can ever
+become an authority to be appealed to by the less instructed in any
+of the fine arts, or on any topic whatever; and this we say with the
+utmost confidence, because, although we may be unable in many cases
+to dispute his judgment--as where he speaks of paintings we have not
+seen, or technicalities of art we do not affect to understand--yet
+he so frequently stands forth on the broad arena where general and
+familiar principles are discussed, that it is utterly impossible _to
+be mistaken in the man_. On all these occasions he displays a very
+marked and rather peculiar combination of power and weakness--of
+power, the result of natural strength of mind; of weakness, the
+inevitable consequence of a passionate haste, and an overweening
+confidence. When we hear a person of this intellectual character
+throwing all but unmitigated abuse upon works which men have long
+consented to admire, and lavishing upon some other works encomiums
+which no conceivable perfection of human art could justify, it is
+utterly impossible to attach any weight to his opinion, on the
+ground that he has made an especial study of any one branch of art.
+Such a man we cannot trust out of our sight a moment; we cannot give
+him one inch of ground more than his reasoning covers, or our own
+experience would grant to him.
+
+We shall not here revive the controversy on the comparative merits
+of the ancient and modern landscape-painters, nor on the later
+productions of Mr Turner, whether they are the eccentricities of
+genius or its fullest development; we have said enough on these
+subjects before. It is Mr Ruskin's book, and not the pictures of
+Claude or Turner, that we have to criticise; it is his style, and
+his manner of thinking, that we have to pass judgment on.
+
+In all Mr Ruskin's works, and in almost every page of them, whether
+on painting, or architecture, or philosophy, or ecclesiastical
+controversy, two characteristics invariably prevail: an extreme
+dogmatism, and a passion for singularity. Every man who thinks
+earnestly would convert all the world to his own opinions; but while
+Mr Ruskin would convert all the world to his own tastes as well as
+opinions, he manifests the greatest repugnance to think for a moment
+like any one else. He has a mortal aversion to mingle with a crowd.
+It is quite enough for an opinion to be commonplace to insure it his
+contempt: if it has passed out of fashion, he may revive it; but
+to think with the existing multitude would be impossible. Yet that
+multitude are to think with him. He is as bent on unity in matters
+of taste as others are on unity in matters of religion; and he sets
+the example by diverging, wherever he can, from the tastes of others.
+
+Between these two characteristics there is no real contradiction;
+or rather the contradiction is quite familiar. The man who most
+affects singularity is generally the most dogmatic: he is the very
+man who expresses most surprise that others should differ from him.
+No one is so impatient of contradiction as he who is perpetually
+contradicting others; and on the gravest matters of religion those
+are often found to be most zealous for unity of belief who have
+some pet heresy of their own, for which they are battling all their
+lives. The same overweening confidence lies, in fact, at the basis
+of both these characteristics. In Mr Ruskin they are both seen in
+great force. No matter what the subject he discusses,--taste or
+ecclesiastical government--we always find the same combination of
+singularity, with a dogmatism approaching to intolerance. Thus, the
+Ionic pillar is universally admired. Mr Ruskin finds that the fluted
+shaft gives an appearance of weakness. No one ever felt this, so
+long as the fluted column is manifestly of sufficient diameter to
+sustain the weight imposed on it. But this objection of apparent
+insecurity has been very commonly made to the spiral or twisted
+column. Here, therefore, Mr Ruskin abruptly dismisses the objection.
+He was at liberty to defend the spiral column: we should say here,
+also, that if the weight imposed was evidently not too great for
+even a spiral column to support, _this_ objection has no place;
+but why cast the same objection, (which perhaps in all cases was
+a mere after-thought) against the Ionic shaft, when it had never
+been felt at all? It has been a general remark, that, amongst other
+results of the railway, it has given a new field to the architect,
+as well as to the engineer. Therefore Mr Ruskin resolves that our
+railroad stations ought to have no architecture at all. Of course,
+if he limited his objections to inappropriate ornament, he would
+be agreeing with all the world: he decides there should be no
+architecture whatever; merely buildings more or less spacious,
+to protect men and goods from the weather. He has never been so
+unfortunate, we suppose, as to come an hour too soon, or the unlucky
+five minutes too late, to a railway station, or he would have been
+glad enough to find himself in something better than the large shed
+he proposes. On the grave subject of ecclesiastical government he
+has stepped forward into controversy; and here he shows both his
+usual propensities in _high relief_. He has some quite peculiar
+projects of his own; the appointment of some hundreds of bishops--we
+know not what--and a Church discipline to be carried out by trial
+by jury. Desirable or not, they are manifestly as impracticable as
+the revival of chivalry. But let that pass. Let every man think
+and propose his best. But his dogmatism amounts to a disease,
+when, turning from his own novelties, he can speak in the flippant
+intolerant manner that he does of the national and now time-honoured
+Church of Scotland.
+
+It will be worth while to make, in passing, a single quotation
+from this pamphlet, _Notes on the Construction of Sheepfolds_. He
+tells us, in one place, that in the New Testament the ministers
+of the Church "are called, and call themselves, with absolute
+indifference, Deacons, Bishops, Elders, Evangelists, according to
+what they are doing at the time of speaking." With such a writer
+one might, at all events, have hoped to live in peace. But no. He
+discovers, nevertheless, that Episcopacy is the Scriptural form of
+Church government; and, having satisfied his own mind of this, no
+opposition or diversity of opinion is for a moment to be tolerated.
+
+     "But how," he says, "unite the two great sects of paralysed
+     Protestants? By keeping simply to Scripture. _The members of
+     the Scottish Church have not a shadow of excuse for refusing
+     Episcopacy_: it has indeed been abused among them, grievously
+     abused; but it is in the Bible, and that is all they have a
+     right to ask.
+
+     "_They have also no shadow of excuse for refusing to employ
+     a written form of prayer._ It may not be to their taste--it
+     may not be the way in which they like to pray; but it is no
+     question, at present, of likes or dislikes, but of duties; and
+     the acceptance of such a form on their part would go half way
+     to reconcile them with their brethren. Let them allege such
+     objections as they can reasonably advance against the English
+     form, and let these be carefully and humbly weighed by the
+     pastors of both Churches: some of them ought to be at once
+     forestalled. For the English Church, on the other hand, _must_,"
+     &c.
+
+Into Mr Ruskin's own religious tenets, further than he has chosen to
+reveal them in his works, we have no wish to pry. But he must cease
+to be Mr Ruskin if they do not exhibit some salient peculiarity,
+coupled with a confidence, unusual even amongst zealots, that his
+peculiar views will speedily triumph. If he can be presumed to
+belong to any sect, it must be the last and smallest one amongst
+us--some sect as exclusive as German mysticism, with pretensions as
+great as those of the Church of Rome.
+
+One word on the style of Mr Ruskin: it will save the trouble of
+alluding to it on particular occasions. It is very unequal. In
+both his architectural works he writes generally with great ease,
+spirit, and clearness. There is a racy vigour in the page. But when
+he would be very eloquent, as he is disposed to be in the _Modern
+Painters_, he becomes very verbose, tedious, obscure, extravagant.
+There is no discipline in his style, no moderation, no repose. Those
+qualities which he has known how to praise in art he has not aimed
+at in his own writing. A rank luxuriance of a semi-poetical diction
+lies about, perfectly unrestrained; metaphorical language comes
+before us in every species of disorder; and hyperbolical expressions
+are used till they become commonplace. Verbal criticism, he would
+probably look upon a very puerile business: he need fear nothing
+of the kind from us; we should as soon think of criticising or
+pruning a jungle. To add to the confusion, he appears at times to
+have proposed to himself the imitation of some of our older writers:
+pages are written in the rhythm of Jeremy Taylor; sometimes it is
+the venerable Hooker who seems to be his type; and he has even
+succeeded in combining whatever is most tedious and prolix in both
+these great writers. If the reader wishes a specimen of this sort of
+_modern antique_, he may turn to the fifteenth chapter of the second
+volume of the _Modern Painters_.
+
+Coupled with this matter of style, and almost inseparable from it,
+is the violence of his manner on subjects which cannot possibly
+justify so vehement a zeal. We like a generous enthusiasm on any
+art--we delight in it; but who can travel in sympathy with a writer
+who exhausts on so much paint and canvass every term of rapture
+that the Alps themselves could have called forth? One need not be
+a utilitarian philosopher--or what Mr Ruskin describes as such--to
+smile at the lofty position on which he puts the landscape-painter,
+and the egregious and impossible demands he makes upon the art
+itself. And the condemnation and opprobrium with which he overwhelms
+the luckless artist who has offended him is quite as violent. The
+bough of a tree, "in the left hand upper corner" of a landscape of
+Poussin's, calls forth this terrible denunciation:--
+
+     "This latter is a representation of an ornamental group of
+     elephants' tusks, with feathers tied to the ends of them.
+     Not the wildest imagination could ever conjure up in it the
+     remotest resemblance to the bough of a tree. It might be the
+     claws of a witch--the talons of an eagle--the horns of a fiend;
+     but it is a full assemblage of every conceivable falsehood
+     which can be told respecting foliage--a piece of work so
+     barbarous in every way _that one glance at it ought to prove
+     the complete charlatanism and trickery of the whole system of
+     the old landscape-painters_.... I will say here at once, that
+     such drawing as this is as ugly as it is childish, and as
+     painful as it is false; and that the man who could tolerate,
+     much more, who could deliberately set down such a thing on his
+     canvass, _had neither eye nor feeling for one single attribute
+     or excellence of God's works_. He might have drawn _the other
+     stem_ in excusable ignorance, or under some false impression of
+     being able to improve upon nature, but this is conclusive and
+     unpardonable."--(P. 382.)
+
+The great redeeming quality of Mr Ruskin--and we wish to give it
+conspicuous and honourable mention--is his love of nature. Here
+lies the charm of his works; to this may be traced whatever virtue
+is in them, or whatever utility they may possess. They will send
+the painter more than ever to the study of nature, and perhaps they
+will have a still more beneficial effect on the art, by sending the
+critic of painting to the same school. It would be almost an insult
+to the landscape-painter to suppose that he needed this lesson; the
+very love of his art must lead him perpetually, one would think,
+to his great and delightful study amongst the fields, under the
+open skies, before the rivers and the hills. But the critic of the
+picture-gallery is often one who goes from picture to picture, and
+very little from nature to the painting. Consequently, where an
+artist succeeds in imitating some effect in nature which had not
+been before represented on the canvass, such a critic is more likely
+to be displeased than gratified; and the artist, having to paint
+for a conventional taste, is in danger of sacrificing to it his own
+higher aspirations. Now it is most true that no man should pretend
+to be a critic upon pictures unless he understands the art itself
+of painting; he ought, we suspect, to have handled the pencil or
+the brush himself; at all events, he ought in some way to have been
+initiated into the mysteries of the pallet and the easel. Otherwise,
+not knowing the difficulties to be overcome, nor the means at hand
+for encountering them, he cannot possibly estimate the degree of
+merit due to the artist for the production of this or that effect.
+He may be loud in applause where nothing has been displayed but
+the old traditions of the art. But still this is only one-half the
+knowledge he ought to possess. He ought to have studied nature,
+and to have loved the study, or he can never estimate, and never
+feel, that _truth_ of effect which is the great aim of the artist.
+Mr Ruskin's works will help to shame out of the field all such
+half-informed and conventional criticism, the mere connoisseurship
+of the picture gallery. On the other hand, they will train men who
+have always been delighted spectators of nature to be also attentive
+observers. Our critics will learn how to admire, and mere admirers
+will learn how to criticise. Thus a public will be educated; and
+here, if anywhere, we may confidently assert that the art will
+prosper in proportion as there is an intelligent public to reward it.
+
+We like that bold enterprise of Mr Ruskin's which distinguishes the
+first volume, that daring enumeration of the great palpable facts
+of nature--the sky, the sea, the earth, the foliage--which the
+painter has to represent. His descriptions are often made indistinct
+by a multitude of words; but there is light in the haze--there is
+a genuine love of nature felt through them. This is almost the
+only point of sympathy we feel with Mr Ruskin; it is the only hold
+his volumes have had over us whilst perusing them; we may be,
+therefore, excused if we present here to our readers a specimen or
+two of his happier descriptions of nature. We will give them _the
+Cloud_ and _the Torrent_. They will confess that, after reading Mr
+Ruskin's description of the clouds, their first feeling will be an
+irresistible impulse to throw open the window, and look upon them
+again as they roll through the sky. The torrent may not be so near
+at hand, to make renewed acquaintance with. We must premise that he
+has been enforcing his favourite precept, the minute, and faithful,
+and perpetual study of nature. He very justly scouts the absurd
+idea that trees and rocks and clouds are, under any circumstances,
+to be _generalised_--so that a tree is not to stand for an oak or a
+poplar, a birch or an elm, but for a _general tree_. If a tree is
+at so great a distance that you cannot distinguish what it is, as
+you cannot paint more than you see, you must paint it indistinctly.
+But to make a purposed indistinctness where the kind of tree would
+be very plainly seen is a manifest absurdity. So, too, the forms
+of clouds should be studied, and as much as possible taken from
+nature, and not certain _general clouds_ substituted at the artist's
+pleasure.
+
+     "But it is not the outline only which is thus systematically
+     false. The drawing of the solid form is worse still; for it
+     is to be remembered that, although clouds of course arrange
+     themselves more or less into broad masses, with a light side
+     and a dark side, both their light and shade are invariably
+     composed of a series of divided masses, each of which has in
+     its outline as much variety and character as the great outline
+     of the cloud; presenting, therefore, a thousand times repeated,
+     all that I have described as the general form. Nor are these
+     multitudinous divisions a truth of slight importance in the
+     character of sky, for they are dependent on, and illustrative
+     of, a quality which is usually in a great degree overlooked--the
+     enormous retiring spaces of solid clouds. Between the illumined
+     edge of a heaped cloud and that part of its body which turns
+     into shadow, there will generally be a clear distance of several
+     miles--more or less, of course, according to the general size
+     of the cloud; but in such large masses as Poussin and others of
+     the old masters, which occupy the fourth or fifth of the visible
+     sky, the clear illumined breadth of vapour, from the edge to
+     the shadow, involves at least a distance of five or six miles.
+     We are little apt, in watching the changes of a mountainous
+     range of cloud, to reflect that the masses of vapour which
+     compose it are linger and higher than any mountain-range of the
+     earth; and the distances between mass and mass are not yards of
+     air, traversed in an instant by the flying form, but valleys
+     of changing atmosphere leagues over; that the slow motion of
+     ascending curves, which we can scarcely trace, is a boiling
+     energy of exulting vapour rushing into the heaven a thousand
+     feet in a minute; and that the topling angle, whose sharp edge
+     almost escapes notice in the multitudinous forms around it, is
+     a nodding precipice of storms, three thousand feet from base to
+     summit. It is not until we have actually compared the forms of
+     the sky with the hill-ranges of the earth, and seen the soaring
+     alp overtopped and buried in one surge of the sky, that we begin
+     to conceive or appreciate the colossal scale of the phenomena of
+     the latter. But of this there can be no doubt in the mind of any
+     one accustomed to trace the forms of cloud among hill-ranges--as
+     it is there a demonstrable and evident fact--that the space of
+     vapour visibly extended over an ordinarily clouded sky is not
+     less, from the point nearest to the observer to the horizon,
+     than twenty leagues; that the size of every mass of separate
+     form, if it be at all largely divided, is to be expressed in
+     terms of _miles_; and that every boiling heap of illuminated
+     mist in the nearer sky is an enormous mountain, fifteen or
+     twenty thousand feet in height, six or seven miles over in
+     illuminated surface, furrowed by a thousand colossal ravines,
+     torn by local tempests into peaks and promontories, and changing
+     its features with the majestic velocity of a volcano."--(Vol. i.
+     p. 228.)
+
+The forms of clouds, it seems, are worth studying: after reading
+this, no landscape-painter will be disposed, with hasty slight
+invention, to sketch in these "_mountains_" of the sky. Here is his
+description, or part of it, first of falling, then of running water.
+With the incidental criticism upon painters we are not at present
+concerned:--
+
+     "A little crumbling white or lightly-rubbed paper will soon give
+     the effect of indiscriminate foam; but nature gives more than
+     foam--she shows beneath it, and through it, a peculiar character
+     of exquisitely studied form, bestowed on every wave and line of
+     fall; and it is this variety of definite character which Turner
+     always aims at, rejecting as much as possible everything that
+     conceals or overwhelms it. Thus, in the Upper Fall of the Tees,
+     though the whole basin of the fall is blue, and dim with the
+     rising vapour, yet the attention of the spectator is chiefly
+     directed to the concentric zones and delicate curves of the
+     falling water itself; and it is impossible to express with what
+     exquisite accuracy these are given. They are the characteristic
+     of a powerful stream descending without impediment or break, but
+     from a narrow channel, so as to expand as it falls. They are the
+     constant form which such a stream assumes as it descends; and
+     yet I think it would be difficult to point to another instance
+     of their being rendered in art. You will find nothing in the
+     waterfalls, even of our best painters, but springing lines of
+     parabolic descent, and splashing and shapeless foam; and, in
+     consequence, though they may make you understand the swiftness
+     of the water, they never let you feel the weight of it: the
+     stream, in their hands, looks _active_, not _supine_, as if
+     it leaped, not as if it fell. Now, water will leap a little
+     way--it will leap down a weir or over a stone--but it _tumbles_
+     over a high fall like this; and it is when we have lost the
+     parabolic line, and arrived at the catenary--when we have lost
+     the spring of the fall, and arrived at the _plunge_ of it--that
+     we begin really to feel its weight and wildness. Where water
+     takes its first leap from the top, it is cool and collected,
+     and uninteresting and mathematical; but it is when it finds
+     that it has got into a scrape, and has farther to go than it
+     thought for, that its character comes out; it is then that it
+     begins to writhe and twist, and sweep out, zone after zone, in
+     wilder stretching as it falls, and to send down the rocket-like,
+     lance-pointed, whizzing shafts at its sides sounding for the
+     bottom. And it is this prostration, the hopeless abandonment
+     of its ponderous power to the air, which is always peculiarly
+     expressed by Turner....
+
+     "When water, not in very great body, runs in a rocky bed much
+     interrupted by hollows, so that it can rest every now and then
+     in a pool as it goes long, it does not acquire a continuous
+     velocity of motion. It pauses after every leap, and curdles
+     about, and rests a little, and then goes on again; and if, in
+     this comparatively tranquil and rational state of mind, it meets
+     with any obstacle, as a rock or stone, it parts on each side of
+     it with a little bubbling foam, and goes round: if it comes to a
+     step in its bed, it leaps it lightly, and then, after a little
+     splashing at the bottom, stops again to take breath. But if its
+     bed be on a continuous slope, not much interrupted by hollows,
+     so that it cannot rest--or if its own mass be so increased by
+     flood that its usual resting-places are not sufficient for it,
+     but that it is perpetually pushed out of them by the following
+     current before it has had time to tranquillise itself--it of
+     course gains velocity with every yard that it runs; the impetus
+     got at one leap is carried to the credit of the next, until the
+     whole stream becomes one mass of unchecked accelerating motion.
+     Now, when water in this state comes to an obstacle, it does not
+     part at it, but clears it like a racehorse; and when it comes
+     to a hollow, it does not fill it up, and run out leisurely at
+     the other side, but it rushes down into it, and comes up again
+     on the other side, as a ship into the hollow of the sea. Hence
+     the whole appearance of the bed of the stream is changed, and
+     all the lines of the water altered in their nature. The quiet
+     stream is a succession of leaps and pools; the leaps are light
+     and springy and parabolic, and make a great deal of splashing
+     when they tumble into the pool; then we have a space of quiet
+     curdling water, and another similar leap below. But the stream,
+     when it has gained an impetus, takes the shape of its bed,
+     never stops, is equally deep and equally swift everywhere, goes
+     down into every hollow, not with a leap, but with a swing--not
+     foaming nor splashing, but in the bending line of a strong
+     sea-wave, and comes up again on the other side, over rock and
+     ridge, with the ease of a bounding leopard. If it meet a rock
+     three or four feet above the level of its bed, it will neither
+     part nor foam, nor express any concern about the matter, but
+     clear it in a smooth dome of water without apparent exertion,
+     coming down again as smoothly on the other side, the whole
+     surface of the surge being drawn into parallel lines by its
+     extreme velocity, but foamless, except in places where the
+     form of the bed opposes itself at some direct angle to such a
+     line of fall, and causes a breaker; so that the whole river
+     has the appearance of a deep and raging sea, with this only
+     difference, that the torrent waves always break backwards, and
+     sea-waves forwards. Thus, then, in the water which has gained
+     an impetus, we have the most exquisite arrangement of curved
+     lines, perpetually changing from convex to concave, following
+     every swell and hollow of the bed with their modulating grace,
+     and all in unison of motion, presenting perhaps the most
+     beautiful series of inorganic forms which nature can possibly
+     produce."--(Vol. i. p. 363.)
+
+It is the object of Mr Ruskin, in his first volume of _Modern
+Painters_, to show what the artist has to do in his imitation of
+nature. We have no material controversy to raise with him on this
+subject; but we cannot help expressing our surprise that he should
+have thought it necessary to combat, with so much energy, so very
+primitive a notion that the imitation of the artist partakes of
+the nature of a _deception_, and that the highest excellence is
+obtained when the representation of any object is taken for the
+object itself. We thought this matter had been long ago settled. In
+a page or two of Quatremère de Quincy's treatise on _Imitation in
+the Fine Arts_, the reader, if he has still to seek on this subject,
+will find it very briefly and lucidly treated. The aim of the artist
+is not to produce such a representation as shall be taken, even
+for a moment, for a real object. His aim is, by imitating certain
+qualities or attributes of the object, to reproduce for us those
+pleasing or elevating impressions which it is the nature of such
+qualities or attributes to excite. We have stated very briefly
+the accepted doctrine on this subject--so generally accepted and
+understood that Mr Ruskin was under no necessity to avoid the
+use of the word imitation, as he appears to have done, under the
+apprehension that it was incurably infected with this notion of an
+attempted deception. Hardly any reader of his book, even without a
+word of explanation, would have attached any other meaning to it
+than what he himself expresses by representation of certain "truths"
+of nature.
+
+With respect to the imitations of the landscape-painter, the
+notion of a deception cannot occur. His trees and rivers cannot be
+mistaken, for an instant, for real trees and rivers, and certainly
+not while they stand there in the gilt frame, and the gilt frame
+itself against the papered wall. His only chance of deception is to
+get rid of the frame, convert his picture into a transparency, and
+place it in the space which a window should occupy. In almost all
+cases, deception is obtained, not by painting well, but by those
+artifices which disguise that what we see _is_ a painting. At the
+same time, we are not satisfied with an expression which several
+writers, we remark, have lately used, and which Mr Ruskin very
+explicitly adopts. The imitations of the landscape-painter are not
+a "language" which he uses; they are not mere "signs," analogous
+to those which the poet or the orator employs. There is no analogy
+between them. Let us analyse our impressions as we stand before the
+artist's landscape, not thinking of the artist, or his dexterity,
+but simply absorbed in the pleasure which he procures us--we do not
+find ourselves reverting, in imagination, to _other_ trees or other
+rivers than those he has depicted. We certainly do not believe them
+to be real trees, but neither are they mere signs, or a language to
+recall such objects; but _what there is of tree there_ we enjoy.
+There is the coolness and the quiet of the shaded avenue, and we
+feel them; there is the sunlight on that bank, and we feel its
+cheerfulness; we feel the serenity of his river. He has brought
+the spirit of the trees around us; the imagination rests in the
+picture. In other departments of art the effect is the same. If we
+stand before a head of Rembrandt or Vandyke, we do not think that
+it lives; but neither do we think of some other head, of which that
+is the type. But there is majesty, there is thought, there is calm
+repose, there is some phase of humanity expressed before us, and we
+are occupied with so much of human life, or human character, as is
+then and there given us.
+
+Imitate as many qualities of the real object as you please, but
+always the highest, never sacrificing a truth of the mind, or the
+heart, for one only of the sense. Truth, as Mr Ruskin most justly
+says--truth always. When it is said that truth should not be
+always expressed, the maxim, if properly understood, resolves into
+this--that the higher truth is not to be sacrificed to the lower. In
+a landscape, the gradation of light and shade is a more important
+truth than the exact brilliancy (supposing it to be attainable,)
+of any individual object. The painter must calculate what means he
+has at his disposal for representing this gradation of light, and
+he must pitch his tone accordingly. Say he pitches it far below
+reality, he is still in search of truth--of contrast and degree.
+
+Sometimes it may happen that, by rendering one detail faithfully,
+an artist may give a false impression, simply because he cannot
+render other details or facts by which it is accompanied in nature.
+Here, too, he would only sacrifice truth _in the cause of truth_.
+The admirers of Constable will perhaps dispute the aptness of our
+illustration. Nevertheless his works appear to us to afford a
+curious example of a scrupulous accuracy or detail producing a false
+impression. Constable, looking at foliage under the sunlight, and
+noting that the leaf, especially after a shower, will reflect so
+much light that the tree will seem more white than green, determined
+to paint all the white he saw. Constable could paint white leaves.
+So far so well. But then these leaves in nature are almost always in
+motion: they are white at one moment and green the next. We never
+have the impression of a white leaf; for it is seen playing with
+the light--its mirror, for one instant, and glancing from it the
+next. Constable could not paint motion. He could not imitate this
+shower of light in the living tree. He must leave his white paint
+where he has once put it. Other artists before him had seen the same
+light, but, knowing that they could not bring the breeze into their
+canvass, they wisely concluded that less white paint than Constable
+uses would produce a more truthful impression.
+
+But we must no longer be detained from the more immediate task
+before us. We must now follow Mr Ruskin to his second volume of
+_Modern Painters_, where he explains his theory of the beautiful;
+and although this will not be to readers in general the most
+attractive portion of his writings, and we ourselves have to
+practise some sort of self-denial in fixing our attention upon
+it, yet manifestly it is here that we must look for the basis or
+fundamental principles of all his criticisms in art. The order in
+which his works have been published was apparently deranged by a
+generous zeal, which could brook no delay, to defend Mr Turner
+from the censures of the undiscerning public. If the natural or
+systematic order had been preserved, the materials of this second
+volume would have formed the first preliminary treatise, determining
+those broad principles of taste, or that philosophical theory of
+the beautiful, on which the whole of the subsequent works were to
+be modelled. Perhaps this broken and reversed order of publication
+has not been unfortunate for the success of the author--perhaps it
+was dimly foreseen to be not altogether impolitic; for the popular
+ear was gained by the bold and enthusiastic defence of a great
+painter; and the ear of the public, once caught, may be detained
+by matter which, in the first instance, would have appealed to it
+in vain. Whether the effect of chance or design, we may certainly
+congratulate Mr Ruskin on the fortunate succession, and the
+fortunate rapidity with which his publications have struck on the
+public ear. The popular feeling, won by the zeal and intrepidity of
+the first volume of _Modern Painters_, was no doubt a little tried
+by the graver discussions of the second. It was soon, however, to be
+again caught, and pleased by a bold and agreeable miscellany under
+the magical name of "The Seven Lamps;" and these Seven Lamps could
+hardly fail to throw some portion of their pleasant and bewildering
+light over a certain rudimentary treatise upon building, which was
+to appear under the title of "The Stones of Venice."
+
+We cannot, however, congratulate Mr Ruskin on the manner in which
+he has acquitted himself in this arena of philosophical inquiry,
+nor on the sort of theory of the Beautiful which he has contrived
+to construct. The least metaphysical of our readers is aware that
+there is a controversy of long standing upon this subject, between
+two different schools of philosophy. With the one the beautiful
+is described as a great "idea" of the reason, or an intellectual
+intuition, or a simple intuitive perception; different expressions
+are made use of, but all imply that it is a great primary feeling,
+or sentiment, or idea of the human mind, and as incapable of
+further analysis as the idea of space, or the simplest of our
+sensations. The rival school of theorists maintain, on the contrary,
+that no sentiment yields more readily to analysis; and that the
+beautiful, except in those rare cases where the whole charm lies
+in one sensation, as in that of colour, is a complex sentiment.
+They describe it as a pleasure resulting from the presence of the
+visible object, but of which the visible object is only in part the
+immediate cause. Of a great portion of the pleasure it is merely
+the vehicle; and they say that blended reminiscences, gathered from
+every sense, and every human affection, from the softness of touch
+of an infant's finger to the highest contemplations of a devotional
+spirit, have contributed, in their turn, to this delightful
+sentiment.
+
+Mr Ruskin was not bound to belong to either of these schools of
+philosophy; he was at liberty to construct an eclectic system
+of his own;--and he has done so. We shall take the precaution,
+in so delicate a matter, of quoting Mr Ruskin's own words for
+the exposition of his own theory. Meanwhile, as some clue to the
+reader, we may venture to say that he agrees with the first of
+these schools in adopting a primary intuitive sentiment of the
+beautiful; but then this primary intuition is only of a sensational
+or "animal" nature--a subordinate species of the beautiful, which
+is chiefly valuable as the necessary condition of the higher and
+truly beautiful; and this last he agrees with the opposite school
+in regarding as a derived sentiment--derived by contemplating the
+objects of external nature as types of the Divine attributes. This
+is a brief summary of the theory; for a fuller exposition we shall
+have recourse to his own words.
+
+The term _Æsthetic_, which has been applied to this branch of
+philosophy, Mr Ruskin discards; he offers as a substitute _Theoria_,
+or _The Theoretic Faculty_, the meaning of which he thus explains:--
+
+     "I proceed, therefore, first to examine the nature of what
+     I have called the theoretic faculty, and to justify my
+     substitution of the term 'Theoretic' for 'Æsthetic,' which is
+     the one commonly employed with reference to it.
+
+     "Now the term 'æsthesis' properly signifies mere sensual
+     perception of the outward qualities and necessary effects of
+     bodies; in which sense only, if we would arrive at any accurate
+     conclusions on this difficult subject, it should always be used.
+     But I wholly deny that the impressions of beauty _are in any
+     way sensual_;--they are neither sensual nor intellectual, _but
+     moral_; and for the faculty receiving them, whose difference
+     from mere perception I shall immediately endeavour to explain,
+     no terms can be more accurate or convenient than that employed
+     by the Greeks, 'Theoretic,' which I pray permission, therefore,
+     always to use, and to call the operation of the faculty itself,
+     Theoria."--(P. 11.)
+
+We are introduced to a new faculty of the human mind; let us see
+what new or especial sphere of operation is assigned to it. After
+some remarks on the superiority of the mere sensual pleasures of the
+eye and the ear, but particularly of the eye, to those derived from
+other organs of sense, he continues:--
+
+     "Herein, then, we find very sufficient ground for the higher
+     estimation of these delights: first, in their being eternal
+     and inexhaustible; and, secondly, in their being evidently
+     no meaner instrument of life, but an object of life. Now, in
+     whatever is an object of life, in whatever may be infinitely
+     and for itself desired, we may be sure there is something of
+     divine: for God will not make anything an object of life to his
+     creatures which does not point to, or partake of himself,"--[a
+     bold assertion.] "And so, though we were to regard the pleasures
+     of sight merely as the highest of sensual pleasures, and though
+     they were of rare occurrence--and, when occurring, isolated and
+     imperfect--there would still be supernatural character about
+     them, owing to their self-sufficiency. But when, instead of
+     being scattered, interrupted, or chance-distributed, they are
+     gathered together and so arranged to enhance each other, as by
+     chance they could not be, there is caused by them, not only a
+     feeling of strong affection towards the object in which they
+     exist, but a perception of purpose and adaptation of it to our
+     desires; a perception, therefore, of the immediate operation of
+     the Intelligence which so formed us and so feeds us.
+
+     "Out of what perception arise Joy, Admiration, and Gratitude?
+
+     "Now, the mere animal consciousness of the pleasantness I call
+     Æsthesis; but the exulting, reverent, and grateful perception
+     of it I call Theoria. For this, and this only, is the full
+     comprehension and contemplation of the beautiful as a gift
+     of God; a gift not necessary to our being, but adding to and
+     elevating it, and twofold--first, of the desire; and, secondly,
+     of the thing desired."
+
+We find, then, that in the production of the full sentiment of the
+beautiful _two_ faculties are employed, or two distinct operations
+denoted. First, there is the "animal pleasantness which we call
+Æsthesis,"--which sometimes appears confounded with the mere
+pleasures of sense, but which the whole current of his speculations
+obliges us to conclude is some separate intuition of a sensational
+character; and, secondly, there is "the exulting, reverent, and
+grateful perception of it, which we call Theoria," which alone is
+the truly beautiful, and which it is the function of the Theoretic
+Faculty to reveal to us. But this new Theoretic Faculty--what can
+it be but the old faculty of Human Reason, exercised upon the great
+subject of Divine beneficence?
+
+Mr Ruskin, as we shall see, discovers that external objects are
+beautiful because they are types of Divine attributes; but he
+admits, and is solicitous to impress upon our minds, that the
+"meaning" of these types is "learnt." When, in a subsequent part
+of his work, he feels himself pressed by the objection that many
+celebrated artists, who have shown a vivid appreciation and a great
+passion for the beautiful, have manifested no peculiar piety, have
+been rather deficient in spiritual-mindedness, he gives them over to
+that instinctive sense he has called Æsthesis, and says--"It will
+be remembered that I have, throughout the examination of typical
+beauty, asserted our instinctive sense of it; the moral _meaning_
+of it being only discoverable by reflection," (p. 127.) Now, there
+is no other conceivable manner in which the meaning of the type can
+be learnt than by the usual exercise of the human reason, detecting
+traces of the Divine power, and wisdom, and benevolence, in the
+external world, and then associating with the various objects of the
+external world the ideas we have thus acquired of the Divine wisdom
+and goodness. The rapid and habitual regard of certain facts or
+appearances in the visible world, as types of the attributes of God,
+_can_ be nothing else but one great instance (or class of instances)
+of that law of association of ideas on which the second school of
+philosophy we have alluded to so largely insist. And thus, whether
+Mr Ruskin chooses to acquiesce in it or not, his "Theoria" resolves
+itself into a portion, or fragment, of that theory of association
+of ideas, to which he declares, and perhaps believes, himself to be
+violently opposed.
+
+In a very curious manner, therefore, has Mr Ruskin selected his
+materials from the two rival schools of metaphysics. His _Æsthesis_
+is an intuitive perception, but of a mere sensual or animal
+nature--sometimes almost confounded with the mere pleasure of
+sense, at other times advanced into considerable importance, as
+where he has to explain the fact that men of very little piety have
+a very acute perception of beauty. His _Theoria_ is, and can be,
+nothing more than the results of human reason in its highest and
+noblest exercise, rapidly brought before the mind by a habitual
+association of ideas. For the lowest element of the beautiful he
+runs to the school of intuitions;--they will not thank him for
+the compliment;--for the higher to that analytic school, and that
+theory of association of ideas, to which throughout he is ostensibly
+opposed.
+
+This _Theoria_ divides itself into two parts. We shall quote Mr
+Ruskin's own words and take care to quote from them passages where
+he seems most solicitous to be accurate and explanatory:--
+
+     "The first thing, then, we have to do," he says, "is accurately
+     to discriminate and define those appearances from which we are
+     about to reason as belonging to beauty, properly so called, and
+     to clear the ground of all the confused ideas and erroneous
+     theories with which the misapprehension or metaphorical use of
+     the term has encumbered it.
+
+     "By the term Beauty, then, properly are signified two things:
+     first, that external quality of bodies, already so often spoken
+     of, and which, whether it occur in a stone, flower, beast,
+     or in man, is absolutely identical--which, as I have already
+     asserted, may be shown to be in some sort typical of the Divine
+     attributes, and which, therefore, I shall, for distinction's
+     sake, call Typical Beauty; and, secondarily, the appearance
+     of felicitous fulfilment of functions in living things, more
+     especially of the joyful and right exertion of perfect life in
+     man--and this kind of beauty I shall call Vital Beauty."--(P.
+     26.)
+
+The Vital Beauty, as well as the Typical, partakes essentially, as
+far as we can understand our author, of a religious character. On
+turning to that part of the volume where it is treated of at length,
+we find a universal sympathy and spirit of kindliness very properly
+insisted on, as one great element of the sentiment of beauty; but
+we are not permitted to dwell upon this element, or rest upon it
+a moment, without some reference to our relation to God. Even the
+animals themselves seem to be turned into types for us of our moral
+feelings or duties. We are expressly told that we cannot have this
+sympathy with life and enjoyment in other creatures, unless it takes
+the form of, or comes accompanied with, a sentiment of piety. In
+all cases where the beautiful is anything higher than a certain
+"animal pleasantness," we are to understand that it has a religious
+character. "In all cases," he says, summing up the functions of
+the Theoretic Faculty, "_it is something Divine_; either the
+approving voice of God, the glorious symbol of Him, the evidence
+of His kind presence, or the obedience to His will by Him induced
+and supported,"--(p. 126.) Now it is a delicate task, when a man
+errs by the exaggeration of a great truth or a noble sentiment, to
+combat his error; and yet as much mischief may ultimately arise from
+an error of this description as from any other. The thoughts and
+feelings which Mr Ruskin has described, form the noblest part of our
+sentiment of the beautiful, as they form the noblest phase of the
+human reason. But they are not the whole of it. The visible object,
+to adopt his phraseology, does become a type to the contemplative
+and pious mind of the attribute of God, and is thus exalted to our
+apprehension. But it is not beautiful solely or originally on this
+account. To assert this, is simply to falsify our human nature.
+
+Before, however, we enter into these _types_, or this typical
+beauty, it will be well to notice how Mr Ruskin deals with previous
+and opposing theories. It will be well also to remind our readers
+of the outline of that theory of association of ideas which is here
+presented to us in so very confused a manner. We shall then be
+better able to understand the very curious position our author has
+taken up in this domain of speculative philosophy.
+
+Mr Ruskin gives us the following summary of the "errors" which he
+thinks it necessary in the first place to clear from his path:--
+
+     "Those erring or inconsistent positions which I would at once
+     dismiss are, the first, that the beautiful is the true; the
+     second, that the beautiful is the useful; the third, that it is
+     dependent on custom; and the fourth, that it is dependent on the
+     association of ideas."
+
+The first of these theories, that the beautiful is the true, we
+leave entirely to the tender mercies of Mr Ruskin; we cannot gather
+from his refutation to what class of theorists he is alluding. The
+remaining three are, as we understand the matter, substantially one
+and the same theory. We believe that no one, in these days, would
+define beauty as solely resulting either from the apprehension
+of Utility, (that is, the adjustment of parts to a whole, or the
+application of the object to an ulterior purpose,) or to Familiarity
+and the affection which custom engenders; but they would regard both
+Utility and Familiarity as amongst the sources of those agreeable
+ideas or impressions, which, by the great law of association, became
+intimately connected with the visible object. We must listen,
+however, to Mr Ruskin's refutation of them:--
+
+     "That the beautiful is the _useful_ is an assertion evidently
+     based on that limited and false sense of the latter term which
+     I have already deprecated. As it is the most degrading and
+     dangerous supposition which can be advanced on the subject, so,
+     fortunately, it is the most palpably absurd. It is to confound
+     admiration with hunger, love with lust, and life with sensation;
+     it is to assert that the human creature has no ideas and no
+     feelings, except those ultimately referable to its brutal
+     appetites. It has not a single fact, nor appearance of fact, to
+     support it, and needs no combating--at least until its advocates
+     have obtained the consent of the majority of mankind that the
+     most beautiful productions of nature are seeds and roots; and of
+     art, spades and millstones.
+
+     "Somewhat more rational grounds appear for the assertion that
+     the sense of the beautiful arises from _familiarity_ with the
+     object, though even this could not long be maintained by a
+     thinking person. For all that can be alleged in defence of such
+     a supposition is, that familiarity deprives some objects which
+     at first appeared ugly of much of their repulsiveness; whence
+     it is as rational to conclude that familiarity is the cause of
+     beauty, as it would be to argue that, because it is possible to
+     acquire a taste for olives, therefore custom is the cause of
+     lusciousness in grapes....
+
+     "I pass to the last and most weighty theory, that the
+     agreeableness in objects which we call beauty is the result of
+     the association with them of agreeable or interesting ideas.
+
+     "Frequent has been the support and wide the acceptance of
+     this supposition, and yet I suppose that no two consecutive
+     sentences were ever written in defence of it, without involving
+     either a contradiction or a confusion of terms. Thus Alison,
+     'There are scenes undoubtedly more beautiful than Runnymede,
+     yet, to those who recollect the great event that passed
+     there, there is no scene perhaps which so strongly seizes on
+     the imagination,'--where we are wonder-struck at the bold
+     obtuseness which would prove the power of imagination by its
+     overcoming that very other power (of inherent beauty) whose
+     existence the arguer desires; for the only logical conclusion
+     which can possibly be drawn from the above sentence is, that
+     imagination is _not_ the source of beauty--for, although no
+     scene seizes so strongly on the imagination, yet there are
+     scenes 'more beautiful than Runnymede.' And though instances
+     of self-contradiction as laconic and complete as this are
+     rare, yet, if the arguments on the subject be fairly sifted
+     from the mass of confused language with which they are always
+     encumbered, they will be found invariably to fall into one of
+     these two forms: either association gives pleasure, and beauty
+     gives pleasure, therefore association is beauty; or the power of
+     association is stronger than the power of beauty, therefore the
+     power of association _is_ the power of beauty."
+
+Now this last sentence is sheer nonsense, and only proves that the
+author had never given himself the trouble to understand the theory
+he so flippantly discards. No one ever said that "association gives
+pleasure;" but very many, and Mr Ruskin amongst the rest, have said
+that associated thought adds its pleasure to an object pleasing in
+itself, and thus increases the complex sentiment of beauty. That it
+is a complex sentiment in all its higher forms, Mr Ruskin himself
+will tell us. As to the manner in which he deals with Alison, it
+is in the worst possible spirit of controversy. Alison was an
+elegant, but not a very precise writer; it was the easiest thing
+in the world to select an unfortunate illustration, and to convict
+_that_ of absurdity. Yet he might with equal ease have selected many
+other illustrations from Alison, which would have done justice to
+the theory he expounds. A hundred such will immediately occur to
+the reader. If, instead of a historical recollection of this kind,
+which could hardly make the stream itself of Runnymede look more
+beautiful, Alison had confined himself to those impressions which
+the generality of mankind receive from river scenery, he would have
+had no difficulty in showing (as we believe he has elsewhere done)
+how, in this case, ideas gathered from different sources flow into
+one harmonious and apparently simple feeling. That sentiment of
+beauty which arises as we look upon a river will be acknowledged by
+most persons to be composed of many associated thoughts, combining
+with the object before them. Its form and colour, its bright surface
+and its green banks, are all that the eye immediately gives us;
+but with these are combined the remembered coolness of the fluent
+stream, and of the breeze above it, and of the pleasant shade of its
+banks; and beside all this--as there are few persons who have not
+escaped with delight from town or village, to wander by the quiet
+banks of some neighbouring stream, so there are few persons who do
+not associate with river scenery ideas of peace and serenity. Now
+many of these thoughts or facts are such as the eye does not take
+cognisance of, yet they present themselves as instantaneously as the
+visible form, and so blended as to seem, for the moment, to belong
+to it.
+
+Why not have selected some such illustration as this, instead of
+the unfortunate Runnymede, from a work where so many abound as apt
+as they are elegantly expressed? As to Mr Ruskin's utilitarian
+philosopher, it is a fabulous creature--no such being exists.
+Nor need we detain ourselves with the quite departmental subject
+of Familiarity. But let us endeavour--without desiring to pledge
+ourselves or our readers to its final adoption--to relieve the
+theory of association of ideas from the obscurity our author has
+thrown around it. Our readers will not find that this is altogether
+a wasted labour.
+
+With Mr Ruskin we are of opinion that, in a discussion of this kind,
+the term Beauty ought to be limited to the impression derived,
+mediately or immediately, from the visible object. It would be
+useless affectation to attempt to restrict the use of the word,
+in general, to this application. We can have no objection to the
+term Beautiful being applied to a piece of music, or to an eloquent
+composition, prose or verse, or even to our moral feelings and
+heroic actions; the word has received this general application,
+and there is, at basis, a great deal in common between all these
+and the sentiment of beauty attendant on the visible object. For
+music, or sweet sounds, and poetry, and our moral feelings, have
+much to do (through the law of association) with our sentiment of
+the Beautiful. It is quite enough if, speaking of the subject of
+our analysis, we limit it to those impressions, however originated,
+which attend upon the visible object.
+
+One preliminary word on this association of ideas. It is from
+its very nature, and the nature of human life, of all degrees
+of intimacy--from the casual suggestion, or the case where the
+two ideas are at all times felt to be distinct, to those close
+combinations where the two ideas have apparently coalesced into
+one, or require an attentive analysis to separate them. You see a
+mass of iron; you may be said _to see its weight_, the impression
+of its weight is so intimately combined with its form. The _light_
+of the sun, and the _heat_ of the sun are learnt from different
+senses, yet we never see the one without thinking of the other, and
+the reflection of the sunbeam seen upon a bank immediately suggests
+the idea of _warmth_. But it is not necessary that the combination
+should be always so perfect as in this instance, in order to
+produce the effect we speak of under the name of Association of
+Ideas. It is hardly possible for us to abstract the _glow_ of the
+sunbeam from its light; but the fertility which follows upon the
+presence of the sun, though a suggestion which habitually occurs
+to reflective minds, is an association of a far less intimate
+nature. It is sufficiently intimate, however, to blend with that
+feeling of admiration we have when we speak of the beauty of the
+sun. There is the golden harvest in its summer beams. Again, the
+contemplative spirit in all ages has formed an association between
+the sun and the Deity, whether as the fittest symbol of God, or as
+being His greatest gift to man. Here we have an association still
+more refined, and of a somewhat less frequent character, but one
+which will be found to enter, in a very subtle manner, into that
+impression we receive from the great luminary.
+
+And thus it is that, in different minds, the same materials of
+thought may be combined in a closer or laxer relationship. This
+should be borne in mind by the candid inquirer. That in many
+instances ideas from different sources do coalesce, in the manner
+we have been describing, he cannot for an instant doubt. He seems
+_to see_ the coolness of that river; he seems _to see_ the warmth on
+that sunny bank. In many instances, however, he must make allowance
+for the different habitudes of life. The same illustration will not
+always have the same force to all men. Those who have cultivated
+their minds by different pursuits, or lived amongst scenery of a
+different character, cannot have formed exactly the same moral
+association with external nature.
+
+These preliminaries being adjusted, what, we ask, is that first
+original charm of the _visible object_ which serves as the
+foundation for this wonderful superstructure of the Beautiful, to
+which almost every department of feeling and of thought will be
+found to bring its contribution? What is it so pleasurable that the
+eye at once receives from the external world, that round _it_ should
+have gathered all these tributary pleasures? Light--colour--form;
+but, in reference to our discussion, pre-eminently the exquisite
+pleasure derived from the sense of light, pure or coloured. Colour,
+from infancy to old age, is one original, universal, perpetual
+source of delight, the first and constant element of the Beautiful.
+
+We are far from thinking that the eye does not at once take
+cognisance of form as well as colour. Some ingenious analysts have
+supposed that the sensation of colour is, in its origin, a mere
+mental affection, having no reference to space or external objects,
+and that it obtains this reference through the contemporaneous
+acquisition of the sense of touch. But there can be no more reason
+for supposing that the sense of touch informs us immediately of an
+external world than that the sense of colour does. If we do not
+allow to all the senses an intuitive reference to the external
+world, we shall get it from none of them. Dr Brown, who paid
+particular attention to this subject, and who was desirous to limit
+the first intimation of the sense of sight to an abstract sensation
+of unlocalised colour, failed entirely in his attempt to obtain
+from any other source the idea of space or _outness_; Kant would
+have given him certain subjective _forms of the sensitive faculty_,
+space and time. These he did not like: he saw that, if he denied
+to the eye an immediate perception of the external world, he must
+also deny it to the touch; he therefore prayed in aid certain
+muscular sensations from which the idea of _resistance_ would be
+obtained. But it seems to us evident that not till _after_ we have
+acquired a knowledge of the external world can we connect _volition_
+with muscular movement, and that, until that connection is made,
+the muscular sensations stand in the same predicament as other
+sensations, and could give him no aid in solving his problem. We
+cannot go further into this matter at present.[6] The mere flash of
+light which follows the touch upon the optic nerve represents itself
+as something _without_; nor was colour, we imagine, ever felt, but
+under some _form_ more or less distinct; although in the human being
+the eye seems to depend on the touch far more than in other animals,
+for its further instruction.
+
+[6] It is seldom any action of a limb is performed without the
+concurrence of several muscles; and, if the action is at all
+energetic, a number of muscles are brought into play as an equipoise
+or balance; the infant, therefore, would be sadly puzzled amongst
+its muscular sensations, supposing that it had them. Besides, it
+seems clear that those movements we see an infant make with its
+arms and legs are, in the first instance, as little _voluntary_ as
+the muscular movements it makes for the purpose of respiration.
+There is an animal life within us, dependent on its own laws of
+irritability. Over a portion of this the developed thought or reason
+gains dominion; over a large portion the will never has any hold;
+over another portion, as in the organs of respiration, it has an
+intermittent and divided empire. We learn voluntary movement by
+doing that instinctively and spontaneously which we afterwards do
+from forethought. We have moved our arm; we wish to do the like
+again, (and to our wonder, if we then had intelligence enough to
+wonder,) we do it.
+
+But although the eye is cognisant of form as well as colour, it is
+in the sensation of colour that we must seek the primitive pleasure
+derived from this organ. And probably the first reason why form
+pleases is this, that the boundaries of form are also the lines
+of contrast of colour. It is a general law of all sensation that,
+if it be continued, our susceptibility to it declines. It was
+necessary that the eye should be always open. Its susceptibility is
+sustained by the perpetual contrast of colours. Whether the contrast
+is sudden, or whether one hue shades gradually into another, we
+see here an original and primary source of pleasure. A constant
+variety, in some way produced, is essential to the maintenance of
+the pleasure derived from colour.
+
+It is not incumbent on us to inquire how far the beauty of form
+may be traceable to the sensation of touch;--a very small portion
+of it we suspect. In the human countenance, and in sculpture,
+the beauty of form is almost resolvable into expression; though
+possibly the soft and rounded outline may in some measure be
+associated with the sense of smoothness to the touch. All that we
+are concerned to show is, that there is here in colour, diffused
+as it is over the whole world, and perpetually varied, a _beauty_
+at once showered upon the visible object. We hear it said, if you
+resolve all into association, where will you begin? You have but a
+circle of feelings. If moral sentiment, for instance, be not itself
+the beautiful, why should it become so by association. There must
+be something else that is _the beautiful_, by association with
+which it passes for such. We answer, that we do not resolve _all_
+into association; that we have in this one gift of colour, shed so
+bountifully over the whole world, an original beauty, a delight
+which makes the external object pleasant and beloved; for how can we
+fail, in some sort, to love what produces so much pleasure?
+
+We are at a loss to understand how any one can speak with
+disparagement of colour as a source of the beautiful. The sculptor
+may, perhaps, by his peculiar education, grow comparatively
+indifferent to it: we know not how this may be; but let any man,
+of the most refined taste imaginable, think what he owes to this
+source, when he walks out at evening, and sees the sun set amongst
+the hills. The same concave sky, the same scene, so far as its form
+is concerned, was there a few hours before, and saddened him with
+its gloom; one leaden hue prevailed over all; and now in a clear sky
+the sun is setting, and the hills are purple, and the clouds are
+radiant with every colour that can be extracted from the sunbeam. He
+can hardly believe that it is the same scene, or he the same man.
+Here the grown-up man and the child stand always on the same level.
+As to the infant, note how its eye feeds upon a brilliant colour, or
+the living flame. If it had wings, it would assuredly do as the moth
+does. And take the most untutored rustic, let him be old, and dull,
+and stupid, yet, as long as the eye has vitality in it, will he look
+up with long untiring gaze at this blue vault of the sky, traversed
+by its glittering clouds, and pierced by the tall green trees around
+him.
+
+Is it any marvel now that round the _visible object_ should
+associate tributary feelings of pleasure? How many pleasing and
+tender sentiments gather round the rose! Yet the rose is beautiful
+in itself. It was beautiful to the child by its colour, its texture,
+its softly-shaded leaf, and the contrast between the flower and the
+foliage. Love, and poetry, and the tender regrets of advanced life,
+have contributed a second dower of beauty. The rose is more to the
+youth and to the old man than it was to the child; but still to the
+last they both feel the pleasure of the child.
+
+The more commonplace the illustration, the more suited it is to our
+purpose. If any one will reflect on the many ideas that cluster
+round this beautiful flower, he will not fail to see how numerous
+and subtle may be the association formed with the visible object.
+Even an idea painful in itself may, by way of contrast, serve
+to heighten the pleasure of others with which it is associated.
+Here the thought of decay and fragility, like a discord amongst
+harmonies, increases our sentiment of tenderness. We express, we
+believe, the prevailing taste when we say that there is nothing,
+in the shape of art, so disagreeable and repulsive as artificial
+flowers. The waxen flower may be an admirable imitation, but it
+is a detestable thing. This partly results from the nature of the
+imitation; a vulgar deception is often practised upon us: what is
+not a flower is intended to pass for one. But it is owing still
+more, we think, to the contradiction that is immediately afterwards
+felt between this preserved and imperishable waxen flower, and the
+transitory and perishable rose. It is the nature of the rose to bud,
+and blossom, and decay; it gives its beauty to the breeze and to the
+shower; it is mortal; it is _ours_; it bears our hopes, our loves,
+our regrets. This waxen substitute, that cannot change or decay, is
+a contradiction and a disgust.
+
+Amongst objects of man's contrivance, the sail seen upon the calm
+waters of a lake or a river is universally felt to be beautiful. The
+form is graceful, and the movement gentle, and its colour contrasts
+well either with the shore or the water. But perhaps the chief
+element of our pleasure is all association with human life, with
+peaceful enjoyment--
+
+    "This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing,
+     To waft me from distraction."
+
+Or take one of the noblest objects in nature--the mountain. There
+is no object except the sea and the sky that reflects to the sight
+colours so beautiful, and in such masses. But colour, and form, and
+magnitude, constitute but a part of the beauty or the sublimity of
+the mountain. Not only do the clouds encircle or rest upon it, but
+men have laid on it their grandest thoughts: we have associated
+with it our moral fortitude, and all we understand of greatness
+or elevation of mind; our phraseology seems half reflected from
+the mountain. Still more, we have made it holy ground. Has not God
+himself descended on the mountain? Are not the hills, once and
+for ever, "the unwalled temples of our earth?" And still there is
+another circumstance attendant upon mountain scenery, which adds a
+solemnity of its own, and is a condition of the enjoyment of other
+sources of the sublime--solitude. It seems to us that the feeling of
+solitude almost always associates itself with mountain scenery. Mrs
+Somerville, in the description which she gives or quotes, in her
+_Physical Geography_, of the Himalayas, says--
+
+     "The loftiest peaks being bare of snow gives great variety of
+     colour and beauty to the scenery, which in these passes is at
+     all times magnificent. During the day, the stupendous size of
+     the mountains, their interminable extent, the variety and the
+     sharpness of their forms, and, above all, the tender clearness
+     of their distant outline melting into the pale blue sky,
+     contrasted with the deep azure above, is described as a scene of
+     wild and wonderful beauty. At midnight, when myriads of stars
+     sparkle in the black sky, and the pure blue of the mountains
+     looks deeper still below the pale white gleam of the earth and
+     snow-light, the effect is of unparalleled sublimity, and no
+     language can describe the splendour of the sunbeams at daybreak,
+     streaming between the high peaks, and throwing their gigantic
+     shadows on the mountains below. There, far above the habitation
+     of man, no living thing exists, no sound is heard; the very
+     echo of the traveller's footsteps startles him in the awful
+     _solitude and silence_ that reigns in those august dwellings of
+     everlasting snow."
+
+No one can fail to recognise the effect of the last circumstance
+mentioned. Let those mountains be the scene of a gathering of any
+human multitude, and they would be more desecrated than if their
+peaks had been levelled to the ground. We have also quoted this
+description to show how large a share _colour_ takes in beautifying
+such a scene. Colour, either in large fields of it, or in sharp
+contrasts, or in gradual shading--the play of light, in short, upon
+this world--is the first element of beauty.
+
+Here would be the place, were we writing a formal treatise upon
+this subject, after showing that there is in the sense of sight
+itself a sufficient elementary beauty, whereto other pleasurable
+reminiscences may attach themselves, to point out some of these
+tributaries. Each sense--the touch, the ear, the smell, the
+taste--blend their several remembered pleasures with the object
+of vision. Even taste, we say, although Mr Ruskin will scorn
+the gross alliance. And we would allude to the fact to show the
+extreme subtilty of these mental processes. The fruit which you
+think of eating has lost its beauty from that moment--it assumes
+to you a quite different relation; but the reminiscence that there
+is sweetness in the peach or the grape, whilst it remains quite
+subordinate to the pleasure derived from the sense of sight, mingles
+with and increases that pleasure. Whilst the cluster of ripe grapes
+is looked at only for its beauty, the idea that they are pleasant
+to the taste as well steals in unobserved, and adds to the complex
+sentiment. If this idea grow distinct and prominent, the beauty of
+the grape is gone--you eat it. Here, too, would be the place to take
+notice of such sources of pleasure as are derived from adaptation
+of parts, or the adaptation of the whole to ulterior purposes;
+but here especially should we insist on human affections, human
+loves, human sympathies. Here, in the heart of man, his hopes,
+his regrets, his affections, do we find the great source of the
+beautiful--tributaries which take their name from the stream they
+join, but which often form the main current. On that sympathy with
+which nature has so wonderfully endowed us, which makes the pain and
+pleasure of all other living things our own pain and pleasure, which
+binds us not only to our fellow-men, but to every moving creature
+on the face of the earth, we should have much to say. How much, for
+instance, does its _life_ add to the beauty of the swan!--how much
+more its calm and placid life! Here, and on what would follow on
+the still more exalted mood of pious contemplation--when all nature
+seems as a hymn or song of praise to the Creator--we should be
+happy to borrow aid from Mr Ruskin; his essay supplying admirable
+materials for certain _chapters_ in a treatise on the beautiful
+which should embrace the whole subject.
+
+No such treatise, however, is it our object to compose. We have said
+enough to show the true nature of that theory of association, as a
+branch of which alone is it possible to take any intelligible view
+of Mr Ruskin's _Theoria_, or "Theoretic Faculty." His flagrant error
+is, that he will represent a part for the whole, and will distort
+and confuse everything for the sake of this representation. Viewed
+in their proper limitation, his remarks are often such as every
+wise and good man will approve of. Here and there too, there are
+shrewd intimations which the psychological student may profit by. He
+has pointed out several instances where the associations insisted
+upon by writers of the school of Alison have nothing whatever to
+do with the sentiment of beauty; and neither harmonise with, nor
+exalt it. Not all that may, in any way, _interest_ us in an object,
+adds to its beauty. "Thus," as Mr Ruskin we think very justly says,
+"where we are told that the leaves of a plant are occupied in
+decomposing carbonic acid, and preparing oxygen for us, we begin to
+look upon it with some such indifference as upon a gasometer. It
+has become a machine; some of our sense of its happiness is gone;
+its emanation of inherent life is no longer pure." The knowledge of
+the anatomical structure of the limb is very interesting, but it
+adds nothing to the beauty of its outline. Scientific associations,
+however, of this kind, will have a different æsthetic effect,
+according to the degree or the enthusiasm with which the science has
+been studied.
+
+It is not our business to advocate this theory of association of
+ideas, but briefly to expound it. But we may remark that those who
+adopt (as Mr Ruskin has done in one branch of his subject--his
+_Æsthesis_) the rival theory of an intuitive perception of the
+beautiful, must find a difficulty where to _insert_ this intuitive
+perception. The beauty of any one object is generally composed
+of several qualities and accessories--to which of these are we
+to connect this intuition? And if to the whole assemblage of
+them, then, as each of these qualities has been shown by its own
+virtue to administer to the general effect, we shall be explaining
+again by this new perception what has been already explained.
+Select any notorious instance of the beautiful--say the swan.
+How many qualities and accessories immediately occur to us as
+intimately blended in our minds with the form and white plumage
+of the bird! What were its arched neck and mantling wings if it
+were not _living_? And how the calm and inoffensive, and somewhat
+majestic life it leads, carries away our sympathies! Added to
+which, the snow-white form of the swan is imaged in clear waters,
+and is relieved by green foliage; and if the bird makes the river
+more beautiful, the river, in return, reflects its serenity and
+peacefulness upon the bird. Now all this we seem to see as we look
+upon the swan. To which of these facts separately will you attach
+this new intuition? And if you wait till all are assembled, the bird
+is already beautiful.
+
+We are all in the habit of _reasoning_ on the beautiful, of
+defending our own tastes, and this just in proportion as the beauty
+in question is of a high order. And why do we do this? Because,
+just in proportion as the beauty is of an elevated character, does
+it depend on some moral association. Every argument of this kind
+will be found to consist of an analysis of the sentiment. Nor is
+there anything derogatory, as some have supposed, in this analysis
+of the sentiment; for we learn from it, at every step, that in the
+same degree as men become more refined, more humane, more kind,
+equitable, and pious, will the visible world become more richly
+clad with beauty. We see here an admirable arrangement, whereby the
+external world grows in beauty, as men grow in goodness.
+
+We must now follow Mr Ruskin a step farther into the development
+of his _Theoria_. All beauty, he tell us, _is such_, in its high
+and only true character, because it is a type of one or more of
+God's attributes. This, as we have shown, is to represent one class
+of associated thought as absorbing and displacing all the rest.
+We protest against this egregious exaggeration of a great and
+sacred source of our emotions. With Mr Ruskin's own piety we can
+have no quarrel; but we enter a firm and calm protest against a
+falsification of our human nature, in obedience to one sentiment,
+however sublime. No good can come of it--no good, we mean, to
+religion itself. It is substantially the same error, though assuming
+a very different garb, which the Puritans committed. They disgusted
+men with religion, by introducing it into every law and custom, and
+detail of human life. Mr Ruskin would commit the same error in
+the department of taste, over which he would rule so despotically:
+he is not content that the highest beauty shall be religious; he
+will permit nothing to be beautiful, except as it partakes of a
+religious character. But there is a vast region lying between the
+"animal pleasantness" of his Æsthesis and the pious contemplation of
+his Theoria. There is much between the human animal and the saint;
+there are the domestic affections and the love they spring from,
+and hopes, and regrets, and aspirations, and the hour of peace and
+the hour of repose--in short, there is human life. From all human
+life, as we have seen, come contributions to the sentiment of the
+beautiful, quite as distinctly traced as the peculiar class on which
+Mr Ruskin insists.
+
+If any one descanting upon music should affirm, that, in the first
+place, there was a certain animal pleasantness in harmony or melody,
+or both, but that the real essence of music, that by which it truly
+becomes music, was the perception in harmony or melody of types of
+the Divine attributes, he would reason exactly in the same manner
+on music as Mr Ruskin does on beauty. Nevertheless, although sacred
+music is the highest, it is very plain that there is other music
+than the sacred, and that all songs are not hymns.
+
+Chapter v. of the present volume bears this title--_Of
+Typical Beauty. First, of Infinity, or the type of the Divine
+Incomprehensibility._--A boundless space will occur directly to
+the reader as a type of the infinite; perhaps it should be rather
+described as itself the infinite under one form. But Mr Ruskin finds
+the infinite in everything. That idea which he justly describes
+as the incomprehensible, and which is so profound and baffling a
+mystery to the finite being, is supposed to be thrust upon the mind
+on every occasion. Every instance of variety is made the type of the
+infinite, as well as every indication of space. We remember that,
+in the first volume of the _Modern Painters_, we were not a little
+startled at being told that the distinguishing character of every
+good artist was, that "he painted the infinite." Good or bad, we now
+see that he could scarcely fail to paint the infinite: it must be by
+some curious chance that the feat is not accomplished.
+
+     "Now, not only," writes Mr Ruskin, "is this expression of
+     infinity in distance most precious wherever we find it, however
+     solitary it may be, and however unassisted by other forms and
+     kinds of beauty; but it is of such value that no such other
+     forms will altogether recompense us for its loss; and much
+     as I dread the enunciation of anything that may seem like a
+     conventional rule, I have no hesitation in asserting that
+     no work of any art, in which this expression of infinity is
+     possible, can be perfect or supremely elevated without it; and
+     that, in proportion to its presence, _it will exalt and render
+     impressive even the most tame and trivial themes_. And I think
+     if there be any one grand division, by which it is at all
+     possible to set the productions of painting, so far as their
+     mere plan or system is concerned, on our right and left hands,
+     it is this of light and dark background, of heaven-light and
+     of object-light.... There is a spectral etching of Rembrandt,
+     a presentation of Christ in the Temple, where the figure of
+     a robed priest stands glaring by its gems out of the gloom,
+     holding a crosier. Behind it there is a subdued window-light
+     seen in the opening, between two columns, without which
+     the impressiveness of the whole subject would, I think, be
+     incalculably diminished. I cannot tell whether I am at present
+     allowing too much weight to my own fancies and predilections;
+     but, without so much escape into the outer air and open heaven
+     as this, I can take permanent pleasure in no picture.
+
+     "And I think I am supported in this feeling by the unanimous
+     practice, if not the confessed opinion, of all artists. The
+     painter of portrait _is unhappy without his conventional white
+     stroke under the sleeve_, or beside the arm-chair; the painter
+     of interiors feels like a caged bird unless he can throw a
+     window open, or set the door ajar; the landscapist dares not
+     lose himself in forest without a gleam of light under its
+     farthest branches, nor ventures out in rain unless he may
+     somewhere pierce to a better promise in the distance, or cling
+     to some closing gap of variable blue above."--(P. 39.)
+
+But if an open window, or "that conventional white stroke under the
+sleeve," is sufficient to indicate the Infinite, how few pictures
+there must be in which it is not indicated! and how many "a tame
+and trivial theme" must have been, by this indication, exalted and
+rendered impressive! And yet it seems that some very celebrated
+paintings want this open-window or conventional white stroke. The
+Madonna della Sediola of Raphael is known over all Europe; some
+print of it may be seen in every village; that virgin-mother, in her
+antique chair, embracing her child with so sweet and maternal an
+embrace, has found its way to the heart of every woman, Catholic or
+Protestant. But unfortunately it has a dark background, and there
+is no open window--nothing to typify infinity. To us it seemed that
+there was "heaven's light" over the whole picture. Though there
+is the chamber wall seen behind the chair, there is nothing to
+intimate that the door or the window is closed. One might in charity
+have imagined that the light came directly through an open door or
+window. However, Mr Ruskin is inexorable. "Raphael," he says, "_in
+his full_, betrayed the faith he had received from his father and
+his master, and substituted for the radiant sky of the Madonna del
+Cardellino the chamber wall of the Madonna della Sediola, and the
+brown wainscot of the Baldacchino."
+
+Of other modes in which the Infinite is represented, we have an
+instance in "The Beauty of Curvature."
+
+     "The first of these is the curvature of lines and surfaces,
+     wherein it at first appears futile to insist upon any
+     resemblance or suggestion of infinity, since there is certainly,
+     in our ordinary contemplation of it, no sensation of the kind.
+     But I have repeated again and again that the ideas of beauty
+     are instinctive, and that it is only upon consideration, and
+     even then in doubtful and disputable way, that they appear in
+     their typical character; neither do I intend at all to insist
+     upon the particular meaning which they appear to myself to bear,
+     but merely on their actual and demonstrable agreeableness; so
+     that in the present case, which I assert positively, and have
+     no fear of being able to prove--that a curve of any kind is
+     more beautiful than a right line--I leave it to the reader to
+     accept or not, as he pleases, _that reason of its agreeableness
+     which is the only one that I can at all trace: namely, that
+     every curve divides itself infinitely by its changes of
+     direction_."--(P. 63.)
+
+Our old friend Jacob Boehmen would have been delighted with this
+Theoria. But we must pass on to other types. Chapter vi. treats _of
+Unity, or the Type of the Divine Comprehensiveness_.
+
+     "Of the appearances of Unity, or of Unity itself, there are
+     several kinds, which it will be found hereafter convenient to
+     consider separately. Thus there is the unity of different and
+     separate things, subjected to one and the same influence, which
+     may be called Subjectional Unity; and this is the unity of the
+     clouds, as they are driven by the parallel winds, or as they
+     are ordered by the electric currents; this is the unity of the
+     sea waves; this, of the bending and undulation of the forest
+     masses; and in creatures capable of Will it is the Unity of
+     Will, or of Impulse. And there is Unity of Origin, which we may
+     call Original Unity, which is of things arising from one spring
+     or source, and speaking always of this their brotherhood; and
+     this in matter is the unity of the branches of the trees, and
+     of the petals and starry rays of flowers, and of the beams of
+     light; and in spiritual creatures it is their filial relation
+     to Him from whom they have their being. And there is Unity of
+     Sequence," &c.--
+
+down another half page. Very little to be got here, we think. Let
+us advance to the next chapter. This is entitled, _Of Repose, or the
+Type of Divine Permanence_.
+
+It will be admitted on all hands that nothing adds more frequently
+to the charms of the visible object than the associated feeling of
+repose. The hour of sunset is the hour of repose. Most beautiful
+things are enhanced by some reflected feeling of this kind. But
+surely one need not go farther than to human labour, and human
+restlessness, anxiety, and passion, to understand the charm of
+repose. Mr Ruskin carries us at once into the third heaven:--
+
+     "As opposed to passion, changefulness, or laborious exertion,
+     Repose is the especial and separating characteristic of the
+     eternal mind and power; it is the 'I am' of the Creator, opposed
+     to the 'I become' of all creatures; it is the sign alike of the
+     supreme knowledge which is incapable of surprise, the supreme
+     power which is incapable of labour, the supreme volition which
+     is incapable of change; it is the stillness of the beams of the
+     eternal chambers laid upon the variable waters of ministering
+     creatures."
+
+We must proceed. Chapter viii. treats _Of Symmetry, or the Type
+of Divine Justice_. Perhaps the nature of this chapter will be
+sufficiently indicated to the reader, now somewhat informed of Mr
+Ruskin's mode of thinking, by the title itself. At all events, we
+shall pass on to the next chapter, ix.--_Of Purity, or the Type
+of Divine Energy_. Here, the reader will perhaps expect to find
+himself somewhat more at home. One type, at all events, of Divine
+Purity has often been presented to his mind. Light has generally
+been considered as the fittest emblem or manifestation of the Divine
+Presence,
+
+    "That never but in unapproachëd light
+     Dwelt from eternity."
+
+But if the reader has formed any such agreeable expectation he
+will be disappointed. Mr Ruskin travels on no beaten track. He finds
+some reasons, partly theological, partly gathered from his own
+theory of the Beautiful, for discarding this ancient association of
+Light with Purity. As the _Divine_ attributes are those which the
+visible object typifies, and by no means the _human_, and as Purity,
+which is "sinlessness," cannot, he thinks, be predicted of the
+Divine nature, it follows that he cannot admit Light to be a type of
+Purity. We quote the passage, as it will display the working of his
+theory:--
+
+     "It may seem strange to many readers that I have not spoken
+     of purity in that sense in which it is most frequently used,
+     as a type of sinlessness. I do not deny that the frequent
+     metaphorical use of it in Scripture may have, and ought to have,
+     much influence on the sympathies with which we regard it; and
+     that probably the immediate agreeableness of it to most minds
+     arises far more from this source than from that to which I have
+     chosen to attribute it. But, in the first place, _if it be
+     indeed in the signs of Divine and not of human attributes that
+     beauty consists_, I see not how the idea of sin can be formed
+     with respect to the Deity; for it is the idea of a relation
+     borne by us to Him, and not in any way to be attached to His
+     abstract nature; while the Love, Mercifulness, and Justice of
+     God I have supposed to be symbolised by other qualities of
+     beauty: and I cannot trace any rational connection between them
+     and the idea of Spotlessness in matter, nor between this idea
+     nor any of the virtues which make up the righteousness of man,
+     except perhaps those of truth and openness, which have been
+     above spoken of as more expressed by the transparency than the
+     mere purity of matter. So that I conceive the use of the terms
+     purity, spotlessness, &c., on moral subjects, to be merely
+     metaphorical; and that it is rather that we illustrate these
+     virtues by the desirableness of material purity, than that we
+     desire material purity because it is illustrative of those
+     virtues. I repeat, then, that the only idea which I think can be
+     legitimately connected with purity of matter is this of vital
+     and energetic connection among its particles."
+
+We have been compelled to quote some strange passages, of most
+difficult and laborious perusal; but our task is drawing to an
+end. The last of these types we have to mention is that _Of
+Moderation, or the Type of Government by Law_. We suspect there are
+many persons who have rapidly perused Mr Ruskin's works (probably
+_skipping_ where the obscurity grew very thick) who would be very
+much surprised, if they gave a closer attention to them, at the
+strange conceits and absurdities which they had passed over without
+examination. Indeed, his very loose and declamatory style, and the
+habit of saying extravagant things, set all examination at defiance.
+But let any one pause a moment on the last title we have quoted
+from Mr Ruskin--let him read the chapter itself--let him reflect
+that he has been told in it that "what we express by the terms
+chasteness, refinement, and elegance," in any work of art, and more
+particularly "that finish" so dear to the intelligent critic, owe
+their attractiveness to being types of God's government by law!--we
+think he will confess that never in any book, ancient or modern, did
+he meet with an absurdity to outrival it.
+
+We have seen why the curve in general is beautiful; we have here the
+reason given us why one curve is more beautiful than another:--
+
+     "And herein we at last find the reason of that which has been so
+     often noted respecting the subtilty and almost invisibility of
+     natural curves and colours, and why it is that we look on those
+     lines as least beautiful which fall into wide and far license
+     of curvature, and as most beautiful which approach nearest (so
+     that the curvilinear character be distinctly asserted) to the
+     government of the right line, as in the pure and severe curves
+     of the draperies of the religious painters."
+
+There is still the subject of "vital beauty" before us, but we shall
+probably be excused from entering further into the development of
+"Theoria." It must be quite clear by this time to our readers, that,
+whatever there is in it really wise and intelligible, resolves
+itself into one branch of that general theory of association of
+ideas, of which Alison and others have treated. But we are now
+in a condition to understand more clearly that peculiar style of
+language which startled us so much in the first volume of the
+_Modern Painters_. There we frequently heard of the Divine mission
+of the artist, of the religious office of the painter, and how
+Mr Turner was delivering God's message to man. What seemed an
+oratorical climax, much too frequently repeated, proves to be a
+logical sequence of his theoretical principles. All true beauty is
+religious; therefore all true art, which is the reproduction of the
+beautiful, must be religious also. Every picture gallery is a sort
+of temple, every great painter a sort of prophet. If Mr Ruskin is
+conscious that he never admires anything beautiful in nature or art,
+without a reference to some attribute of God, or some sentiment
+of piety, he may be a very exalted person, but he is no type of
+humanity. If he asserts this, we must be sufficiently courteous
+to believe him; we must not suspect that he is hardly candid with
+us, or with himself; but we shall certainly not accept him as a
+representative of the _genus homo_. He finds "sermons in stones,"
+and sermons always; "books in the running brooks," and always books
+of divinity. Other men not deficient in reflection or piety do not
+find it thus. Let us hear the poet who, more than any other, has
+made a religion of the beauty of nature. Wordsworth, in a passage
+familiar to every one of his readers, runs his hand, as it were,
+over all the chords of the lyre. He finds other sources of the
+beautiful not unworthy his song, besides that high contemplative
+piety which he introduces as a noble and fit climax. He recalls the
+first ardours of his youth, when the beautiful object itself of
+nature seemed to him all, in all:--
+
+                "I cannot paint
+    What then I was. The sounding cataract
+    Haunted me like a passion; the tall rock,
+    The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood.
+    Their colours and their forms were thus to me
+    An appetite; a feeling and a love
+    That had no need of a remoter charm
+    By thought supplied, nor any interest
+    Unborrowed from the eye. That time is past,
+    And all its aching joys are now no more,
+    And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this
+    Faint I, nor mourn, nor murmur; other gifts
+    Have followed. I have learned
+    To look on nature not as in the hour
+    Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes
+    _The still sad music of humanity,
+    Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
+    To chasten and subdue_. And I have felt
+    A presence that disturbs me with the joy
+    Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
+    Of something far more deeply interfused,
+    Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
+    And the round ocean and the living air,
+    And the blue sky, and in the mind of man."
+
+Our poet sounds all the chords. He does not muffle any; he honours
+Nature in her own simple loveliness, and in the beauty she wins from
+the human heart, as well as when she is informed with that sublime
+spirit
+
+                      "that impels
+    All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
+    And rolls through all things."
+
+Sit down, by all means, amongst the fern and the wild-flowers, and
+look out upon the blue hills, or near you at the flowing brook, and
+thank God, the giver of all this beauty. But what manner of good
+will you do by endeavouring to persuade yourself that these objects
+_are_ only beautiful because you give thanks for them?--for to this
+strange logical inversion will you find yourself reduced. And surely
+you learned to esteem and love this benevolence itself, first as
+a human attribute, before you became cognisant of it as a Divine
+attribute. What other course can the mind take but to travel through
+humanity up to God?
+
+There is much more of metaphysics in the volume before us; there
+is, in particular, an elaborate investigation of the faculty of
+imagination; but we have no inducement to proceed further with
+Mr Ruskin in these psychological inquiries. We have given some
+attention to his theory of the Beautiful, because it lay at the
+basis of a series of critical works which, partly from their
+boldness, and partly from the talent of a certain kind which
+is manifestly displayed in them, have attained to considerable
+popularity. But we have not the same object for prolonging our
+examination into his theory of the Imaginative Faculty. "We say
+it advisedly," (as Mr Ruskin always adds when he is asserting
+anything particularly rash,) we say it advisedly, and with no
+rashness whatever, that though our author is a man of great natural
+ability, and enunciates boldly many an independent isolated truth,
+yet of the spirit of philosophy he is utterly destitute. The
+calm, patient, prolonged thinking, which Dugald Stewart somewhere
+describes as the one essential characteristic of the successful
+student of philosophy, he knows nothing of. He wastes his ingenuity
+in making knots where others had long since untied them. He rushes
+at a definition, makes a parade of classification; but for any
+great and wide generalisation he has no appreciation whatever. He
+appears to have no taste, but rather an antipathy for it; when it
+lies in his way he avoids it. On this subject of the Imaginative
+Faculty he writes and he raves, defines and poetises by turns; makes
+laborious distinctions where there is no essential difference; has
+his "Imagination Associative," and his "Imagination Penetrative;"
+and will not, or cannot, see those broad general principles which
+with most educated men have become familiar truths, or truisms. But
+what clear thinking can we expect of a writer who thus describes his
+"Imagination Penetrative?"--
+
+     "It may seem to the reader that I am incorrect in calling this
+     penetrating possession-taking faculty Imagination. Be it so:
+     the name is of little consequence; the Faculty itself, called
+     by what name it will, I insist upon as the highest intellectual
+     power of man. _There is no reasoning in it_; it works not by
+     algebra, nor by integral calculus; it is a piercing Pholas-like
+     mind's tongue, that works and tastes into the very rock-heart.
+     No matter what be the subject submitted to it, substance or
+     spirit--all is alike divided asunder, joint and marrow, whatever
+     utmost truth, life, principle, it has laid bare; and that which
+     has no truth, life, nor principle, dissipated into its original
+     smoke at a touch. The whispers at men's ears it lifts into
+     visible angels. Vials that have lain sealed in the deep sea a
+     thousand years it unseals, and brings out of them Genii."--(P.
+     156.)
+
+With such a wonder-working faculty man ought to do much. Indeed,
+unless it has been asleep all this time, it is difficult to
+understand why there should remain anything for him to do.
+
+Surveying Mr Ruskin's works on art, with the knowledge we have here
+acquired of his intellectual character and philosophical theory, we
+are at no loss to comprehend that mixture of shrewd and penetrating
+remark, of bold and well-placed censure, and of utter nonsense in
+the shape of general principles, with which they abound. In his
+_Seven Lamps of Architecture_, which is a very entertaining book,
+and in his _Stones of Venice_, the reader will find many single
+observations which will delight him, as well by their justice, as by
+the zeal and vigour with which they are expressed. But from neither
+work will he derive any satisfaction if he wishes to carry away with
+him broad general views on architecture.
+
+There is no subject Mr Ruskin has treated more largely than that
+of architectural ornament; there is none on which he has said more
+good things, or delivered juster criticisms; and there is none on
+which he has uttered more indisputable nonsense. Every reader of
+taste will be grateful to Mr Ruskin if he can pull down from St
+Paul's Cathedral, or wherever else they are to be found, those
+wreaths or festoons of carved flowers--"that mass of all manner
+of fruit and flowers tied heavily into a long bunch, thickest in
+the middle, and pinned up by both ends against a dead wall." Urns
+with pocket-handkerchiefs upon them, or a sturdy thick flame for
+ever issuing from the top, he will receive our thanks for utterly
+demolishing. But when Mr Ruskin expounds his principles--and he
+always has principles to expound--when he lays down rules for the
+government of our taste in this matter, he soon involves us in
+hopeless bewilderment. Our ornaments, he tells us, are to be taken
+from the works of nature, not of man; and, from some passages of his
+writings, we should infer that Mr Ruskin would cover the walls of
+our public buildings with representations botanical and geological.
+But in this we must be mistaken. At all events, nothing is to be
+admitted that is taken from the works of man.
+
+     "I conclude, then, with the reader's leave, that all ornament is
+     base which takes for its subject human work; that it is utterly
+     base--painful to every rightly toned mind, without, perhaps,
+     immediate sense of the reason, but for a reason palpable enough
+     when we do think of it. For to carve our own work, and set it up
+     for admiration, is a miserable self-complacency, a contentment
+     in our wretched doings, when we might have been looking at God's
+     doings."
+
+After this, can we venture to admire the building itself, which is,
+of necessity, man's own "wretched doing?"
+
+Perplexed by his own rules, he will sometimes break loose from the
+entanglement in some such strange manner as this:--"I believe the
+right question to ask, with respect to all ornament, is simply this:
+Was it done with enjoyment--_was the carver happy while he was about
+it_?" Happy art! where the workman is sure to give happiness if
+he is but happy at his work. Would that the same could be said of
+literature!
+
+How far _colour_ should be introduced into architecture is a
+question with men of taste, and a question which of late has been
+more than usually discussed. Mr Ruskin leans to the introduction
+of colour. His taste may be correct; but the fanciful reasoning
+which he brings to bear upon the subject will assist no one else in
+forming his own taste. Because there is no connection "between the
+spots of an animal's skin and its anatomical system," he lays it
+down as the first great principle which is to guide us in the use of
+colour in architecture--
+
+     "That it be _visibly independent of form_. Never paint a column
+     with vertical lines, but always cross it. Never give separate
+     mouldings separate colours," &c. "In certain places," he
+     continues, "you may run your two systems closer, and here and
+     there let them be parallel for a note or two, but see that the
+     colours and the forms coincide only as two orders of mouldings
+     do; the same for an instant, but each holding its own course. So
+     single members may sometimes have single colours; _as a bird's
+     head is sometimes of one colour, and its shoulders another, you
+     may make your capital one colour, and your shaft another_; but,
+     in general, the best place for colour is on broad surfaces, not
+     on the points of interest in form. _An animal is mottled on its
+     breast and back, and rarely on its paws and about its eyes_; so
+     put your variegation boldly on the flat wall and broad shaft,
+     but be shy of it on the capital and moulding."--(_Lamps of
+     Architecture_, p. 127.)
+
+We do not quite see what we have to do at all with the "anatomical
+system" of the animal, which is kept out of sight; but, in general,
+we apprehend there is, both in the animal and vegetable kingdom,
+considerable harmony betwixt colour and external form. Such
+fantastic reasoning as this, it is evident, will do little towards
+establishing that one standard of taste, or that "one school of
+architecture," which Mr Ruskin so strenuously insists upon. All
+architects are to resign their individual tastes and predilections,
+and enrol themselves in one school, which shall adopt one style. We
+need not say that the very first question--what that style should
+be, Greek or Gothic--would never be decided. Mr Ruskin decides it
+in favour of the "earliest English decorated Gothic;" but seems,
+in this case, to suspect that his decision will not carry us far
+towards unanimity. The scheme is utterly impossible; but he does his
+duty, he tells us, by proposing the impossibility.
+
+As a climax to his inconsistency and his abnormal ways of thinking,
+he concludes his _Seven Lamps of Architecture_ with a most ominous
+paragraph, implying that the time is at hand when no architecture of
+any kind will be wanted: man and his works will be both swept away
+from the face of the earth. How, with this impression on his mind,
+could he have the heart to tell us to build for posterity? Will it
+be a commentary on the Apocalypse that we shall next receive from
+the pen of Mr Ruskin?
+
+
+
+
+PORTUGUESE POLITICS.
+
+
+The dramatic and singular revolution of which Portugal has recently
+been the theatre, the strange fluctuations and ultimate success
+of Marshal Saldanha's insurrection, the narrow escape of Donna
+Maria from at least a temporary expulsion from her dominions, have
+attracted in this country more attention than is usually bestowed
+upon the oft-recurring convulsions of the Peninsula. Busy as the
+present year has been, and abounding in events of exciting interest
+nearer home, the English public has yet found time to deplore the
+anarchy to which Portugal is a prey, and to marvel once more, as it
+many times before has marvelled, at the tardy realisation of those
+brilliant promises of order, prosperity, and good government, so
+long held out to the two Peninsular nations by the promoters of the
+Quadruple Alliance. The statesmen who, for nearly a score of years,
+have assiduously guided Portugal and Spain in the seductive paths
+of modern Liberalism, can hardly feel much gratification at the
+results of their well-intended but most unprosperous endeavours.
+It is difficult to imagine them contemplating with pride and
+exultation, or even without a certain degree of self-reproach, the
+fruits of their officious exertions. Repudiating partisan views of
+Peninsular politics, putting persons entirely out of the question,
+declaring our absolute indifference as to who occupies the thrones
+of Spain and Portugal, so long as those countries are well-governed,
+casting no imputations upon the motives of those foreign governments
+and statesmen who were chiefly instrumental in bringing about the
+present state of things south of the Pyrenees, we would look only to
+facts, and crave an honest answer to a plain question. The question
+is this: After the lapse of seventeen years, what is the condition
+of the two nations upon which have been conferred, at grievous
+expense of blood and treasure, the much vaunted blessings of rulers
+nominally Liberal, and professedly patriotic? For the present we
+will confine this inquiry to Portugal, for the reason that the War
+of Succession terminated in that country when it was but beginning
+in the neighbouring kingdom, since which time the vanquished party,
+unlike the Carlists in Spain, have uniformly abstained--with the
+single exception of the rising in 1846-7--from armed aggression, and
+have observed a patient and peaceful policy. So that the Portuguese
+Liberals have had seventeen years' fair trial of their governing
+capacity, and cannot allege that their efforts for their country's
+welfare have been impeded or retarded by the acts of that party whom
+they denounced as incapable of achieving it,--however they may have
+been neutralised by dissensions and anarchy in their own ranks.
+
+At this particular juncture of Portuguese affairs, and as no
+inappropriate preface to the only reply that can veraciously be
+given to the question we have proposed, it will not be amiss to take
+a brief retrospective glance at some of the events that preceded
+and led to the reign of Donna Maria. It will be remembered that
+from the year 1828 to 1834, the Liberals in both houses of the
+British Parliament, supported by an overwhelming majority of the
+British press, fiercely and pertinaciously assailed the government
+and person of Don Miguel, then _de facto_ King of Portugal, king
+_de jure_ in the eyes of the Portuguese Legitimists and by the
+vote of the Legitimate Cortes of 1828, and recognised (in 1829) by
+Spain, by the United States, and by various inferior powers. Twenty
+years ago political passions ran high in this country: public men
+were, perhaps, less guarded in their language; newspapers were
+certainly far more intemperate in theirs; and we may safely say,
+that upon no foreign prince, potentate, or politician, has virulent
+abuse--proceeding from such respectable sources--ever since been
+showered in England, in one half the quantity in which it then
+descended upon the head of the unlucky Miguel. Unquestionably Don
+Miguel had acted, in many respects, neither well nor wisely: his
+early education had been ill-adapted to the high position he was
+one day to fill--at a later period of his life he was destined to
+take lessons of wisdom and moderation in the stern but wholesome
+school of adversity. But it is also beyond a doubt, now that time
+has cleared up much which then was purposely garbled and distorted,
+that the object of all this invective was by no means so black as
+he was painted, and that his character suffered in England from the
+malicious calumnies of Pedroite refugees, and from the exaggerated
+and easily-accepted statements of the Portuguese correspondents
+of English newspapers. The Portuguese nation, removed from such
+influence, formed its own opinions from what it saw and observed;
+and the respect and affection testified, even at the present
+day, to their dethroned sovereign, by a large number of its most
+distinguished and respectable members, are the best refutation of
+the more odious of the charges so abundantly brought against him,
+and so lightly credited in those days of rampant revolution. It is
+unnecessary, therefore, to argue that point, even were personal
+vindication or attack the objects of this article, instead of being
+entirely without its scope. Against the insupportable oppression
+exercised by the monster in human form, as which Don Miguel was
+then commonly depicted in England and France, innumerable engines
+were directed by the governments and press of those two countries.
+Insurrections were stirred up in Portugal, volunteers were recruited
+abroad, irregular military expeditions were encouraged, loans were
+fomented; money-lenders and stock-jobbers were all agog for Pedro,
+patriotism, and profit. Orators and newspapers foretold, in glowing
+speeches and enthusiastic paragraphs, unbounded prosperity to
+Portugal as the sure consequence of the triumph of the revolutionary
+party. Rapid progress of civilisation, impartial and economical
+administration, increase of commerce, development of the country's
+resources, a perfect avalanche of social and political blessings,
+were to descend, like manna from heaven, upon the fortunate nation,
+so soon as the Liberals obtained the sway of its destinies. It were
+beside our purpose here to investigate how it was that, with such
+alluring prospects held out to them, the people of Portugal were so
+blind to their interests as to supply Don Miguel with men and money,
+wherewith to defend himself for five years against the assaults
+and intrigues of foreign and domestic enemies. Deprived of support
+and encouragement from without, he still held his ground; and the
+formation of a quadruple alliance, including the two most powerful
+countries in Europe, the enlistment of foreign mercenaries of a
+dozen different nations, the entrance of a numerous Spanish army,
+were requisite finally to dispossess him of his crown. The anomaly
+of the abhorred persecutor and tyrant receiving so much support from
+his ill-used subjects, even then struck certain men in this country
+whose names stand pretty high upon the list of clear-headed and
+experienced politicians, and the Duke of Wellington, Lord Aberdeen,
+Sir Robert Peel, Lord Lyndhurst, and others, defended Miguel; but
+their arguments, however cogent, were of little avail against the
+fierce tide of popular prejudice, unremittingly stimulated by the
+declamations of the press. To be brief, in 1834 Don Miguel was
+driven from Portugal; and his enemies, put in possession of the
+kingdom and all its resources, were at full liberty to realise the
+salutary reforms they had announced and promised, and for which they
+had professed to fight. On taking the reins of government, they
+had everything in their favour; their position was advantageous
+and brilliant in the highest degree. They enjoyed the prestige of
+a triumph, undisputed authority, powerful foreign protection and
+influence. At their disposal was an immense mass of property taken
+from the church, as well as the produce of large foreign loans.
+Their credit, too, was _then_ unlimited. Lastly--and this was far
+from the least of their advantages--they had in their favour the
+great discouragement and discontent engendered amongst the partisans
+of the Miguelite government, by the numerous and gross blunders
+which that government had committed--blunders which contributed
+even more to its downfall than did the attacks of its foes, or the
+effects of foreign hostility. In short, the Liberals were complete
+and undisputed masters of the situation. But, notwithstanding all
+the facilities and advantages they enjoyed, what has been the
+condition of Portugal since they assumed the reins? What _is_ its
+condition at the present day? We need not go far to ascertain it.
+The wretched plight of that once prosperous little kingdom is
+deposed to by every traveller who visits it, and by every English
+journal that has a correspondent there; it is to be traced in the
+columns of every Portuguese newspaper, and is admitted and deplored
+by thousands who once were strenuous and influential supporters
+of the party who promised so much, and who have performed so
+little that is good. The reign of that party whose battle-cry is,
+or was, Donna Maria and the Constitution, has been an unbroken
+series of revolutions, illegalities, peculations, corruptions, and
+dilapidations. The immense amount of misnamed "national property"
+(the _Infantado_ and church estates,) which was part of their
+capital on their accession to power, has disappeared without benefit
+either to the country or to its creditors. The treasury is empty;
+the public revenues are eaten up by anticipation; civil and military
+officers, the court itself, are all in constant and considerable
+arrears of salaries and pay. The discipline of the troops is
+destroyed, the soldiers being demoralised by the bad example of
+their chiefs, including that of Marshal Saldanha himself; for it
+is one of the great misfortunes of the Peninsula, that there most
+officers of a certain rank consider their political predilections
+before their military duty. The "Liberal" party, divided and
+subdivided, and split into fractions, whose numbers fluctuate at the
+dictates of interest or caprice, presents a lamentable spectacle
+of anarchy and inconsistency; whilst the Queen herself, whose good
+intentions we by no means impugn, has completely forfeited, as a
+necessary consequence of the misconduct of her counsellors, and of
+the sufferings the country has endured under her reign, whatever
+amount of respect, affection, and influence the Portuguese nation
+may once have been disposed to accord her. Such is the sad picture
+now presented by Portugal; and none whose acquaintance with facts
+renders them competent to judge, will say that it is overcharged or
+highly coloured.
+
+The party in Portugal who advocate a return to the ancient
+constitution,[7] under which the country flourished--which fell into
+abeyance towards the close of the seventeenth century, but which it
+is now proposed to revive, as preferable to, and practically more
+liberal than, the present system--and who adopt as a banner, and
+couple with this scheme, the name of Don Miguel de Bragança, have
+not unnaturally derived great accession of strength, both moral and
+numerical, from the faults and dissensions of their adversaries. At
+the present day there are few things which the European public, and
+especially that of this country, sooner becomes indifferent to, and
+loses sight of, than the person and pretensions of a dethroned king;
+and owing to the lapse of years, to his unobtrusive manner of life,
+and to the storm of accusations amidst which he made his exit from
+power, Don Miguel would probably be considered, by those persons in
+this country who remember his existence, as the least likely member
+of the royal triumvirate, now assembled in Germany, to exchange his
+exile for a crown. But if we would take a fair and impartial view of
+the condition of Portugal, and calculate, as far as is possible in
+the case of either of the two Peninsular nations, the probabilities
+and chances of the future, we must not suffer ourselves to be
+run away with by preconceived prejudices, or to be influenced by
+the popular odium attached to a name. After beholding the most
+insignificant and unpromising of modern pretenders suddenly elevated
+to the virtual sovereignty--however transitory it may prove--of one
+of the most powerful and civilised of European nations, it were
+rash to denounce as impossible any restoration or enthronement.
+And it were especially rash so to do when with the person of the
+aspirant to the throne a nation is able to connect a reasonable hope
+of improvement in its condition. Of the principle of legitimacy we
+here say nothing, for it were vain to deny that in Europe it is
+daily less regarded, whilst it sinks into insignificance when put in
+competition with the rights and wellbeing of the people.
+
+[7] It is desirable here to explain that the old constitution of
+Portugal, whose restoration is the main feature of the scheme of
+the National or Royalist party, (it assumes both names,) gave the
+right of voting at the election of members of the popular assembly
+to every man who had a hearth of his own--whether he occupied a
+whole house or a single room--in fact, to all heads of families
+and self-supporting persons. Such extent of suffrage ought surely
+to content the most democratic, and certainly presents a strong
+contrast to the farce of national representation which has been so
+long enacting in the Peninsula.
+
+As far back as the period of its emigration, the Pedroite or
+Liberal party split into two fractions. One of these believed
+in the possible realisation of those ultra-liberal theories so
+abundantly promulgated in the proclamations, manifestoes, preambles
+of laws, &c., which Don Pedro issued from the Brazils, from England
+and France, and afterwards from Terceira and Oporto. The other
+fraction of the party had sanctioned the promulgation of these
+utopian theories as a means of delusion, and as leading to their
+own triumph; but they deemed their realisation impossible, and were
+quite decided, when the revolutionary tide should have borne them
+into power, to oppose to the unruly flood the barrier of a gradual
+but steady reaction. At a later period these divisions of the
+Liberal party became more distinctly defined, and resulted, in 1836,
+in their nominal classification as Septembrists and Chartists--the
+latter of whom (numerically very weak, but comprising Costa Cabral,
+and other men of talent and energy) may be compared to the Moderados
+of Spain--the former to the Progresistas, but with tendencies more
+decidedly republican. It is the ambitious pretensions, the struggles
+for power and constant dissensions of these two sets of men, and
+of the minor fractions into which they have subdivided themselves,
+that have kept Portugal for seventeen years in a state of anarchy,
+and have ended by reducing her to her present pitiable condition.
+So numerous are the divisions, so violent the quarrels of the two
+parties, that their utter dissolution appears inevitable; and it is
+in view of this that the National party, as it styles itself, which
+inscribes upon its flag the name of Don Miguel--not as an absolute
+sovereign, but with powers limited by legitimate constitutional
+forms, to whose strict observance they bind him as a condition of
+their support, and of his continuance upon the throne upon which
+they hope to place him--uplifts its head, reorganises its hosts,
+and more clearly defines its political principles. Whilst Chartists
+and Septembrists tear each other to pieces, the Miguelites not only
+maintain their numerical importance, but, closing their ranks and
+acting in strict unity, they give constant proofs of adhesion to Don
+Miguel as personifying a national principle, and at the same time
+give evidence of political vitality by the activity and progress of
+their ideas, which are adapting themselves to the Liberal sentiments
+and theories of the times.[8] And it were flying in the face of
+facts to deny that this party comprehends a very important portion
+of the intelligence and respectability of the nation. It ascribes
+to itself an overwhelming majority in the country, and asserts that
+five-sixths of the population of Portugal would joyfully hail its
+advent to power. This of course must be viewed as an _ex-parte_
+statement, difficult for foreigners to verify or refute. But of
+late there have been no lack of proofs that a large proportion of
+the higher orders of Portuguese are steadfast in their aversion
+to the government of the "Liberals," and in their adherence to him
+whom they still, after his seventeen years' dethronement, persist in
+calling their king, and whom they have supported, during his long
+exile, by their willing contributions. It is fresh in every one's
+memory that, only the other day, twenty five peers, or successors
+of peers, who had been excluded by Don Pedro from the peerage for
+having sworn allegiance to his brother, having been reinstated and
+invited to take their seats in the Chamber, signed and published
+a document utterly rejecting the boon. Some hundreds of officers
+of the old army of Don Miguel, who are living for the most part
+in penury and privation, were invited to demand from Saldanha the
+restitution of their grades, which would have entitled them to
+the corresponding pay. To a man they refused, and protested their
+devotion to their former sovereign. A new law of elections, with a
+very extended franchise--nearly amounting, it is said, to universal
+suffrage--having been the other day arbitrarily decreed by the
+Saldanha cabinet (certainly a most unconstitutional proceeding,)
+and the government having expressed a wish that all parties in the
+kingdom should exercise the electoral right, and give their votes
+for representatives in the new parliament, a numerous and highly
+respectable meeting of the Miguelites was convened at Lisbon.
+This meeting voted, with but two dissentient voices, a resolution
+of abstaining from all share in the elections, declaring their
+determination not to sanction, by coming forward either as voters
+or candidates, a system and an order of things which they utterly
+repudiated as illegal, oppressive, and forced upon the nation by
+foreign interference. The same resolution was adopted by large
+assemblages in every province of the kingdom. At various periods,
+during the last seventeen years, the Portuguese government has
+endeavoured to inveigle the Miguelites into the representative
+assembly, doubtless hoping that upon its benches they would be
+more accessible to seduction, or easier to intimidate. It is a
+remarkable and significant circumstance, that only in one instance
+(in the year 1842) have their efforts been successful, and that
+the person who was then induced so to deviate from the policy of
+his party, speedily gave unmistakable signs of shame and regret.
+Bearing in mind the undoubted and easily proved fact that the
+Miguelites, whether their numerical strength be or be not as great
+as they assert, comprise a large majority of the clergy, of the old
+nobility, and of the most highly educated classes of the nation,
+their steady and consistent refusal to sanction the present order of
+things, by their presence in its legislative assembly, shows a unity
+of purpose and action, and a staunch and dogged conviction, which
+cannot but be disquieting to their adversaries, and over which it is
+impossible lightly to pass in an impartial review of the condition
+and prospects of Portugal.
+
+[8] The principal Miguelite papers, _A Nação_ (Lisbon,) and _O
+Portugal_ (Oporto,) both of them highly respectable journals,
+conducted with much ability and moderation, unceasingly reiterate,
+whilst exposing the vices and corruption of the present system,
+their aversion to despotism, and their desire for a truly liberal
+and constitutional government.
+
+We have already declared our determination here to attach importance
+to the persons of none of the four princes and princesses who claim
+or occupy the thrones of Spain and Portugal, except in so far as
+they may respectively unite the greatest amount of the national
+suffrage and adhesion. As regards Don Miguel, we are far from
+exaggerating his personal claims--the question of legitimacy being
+here waived. His prestige _out_ of Portugal is of the smallest, and
+certainly he has never given proofs of great talents, although he is
+not altogether without kingly qualities, nor wanting in resolution
+and energy; whilst his friends assert, and it is fair to admit as
+probable, that he has long since repented and abjured the follies
+and errors of his youth. But we cannot be blind to the fact of the
+strong sympathy and regard entertained for him by a very large
+number of Portuguese. His presence in London during some weeks of
+the present summer was the signal for a pilgrimage of Portuguese
+noblemen and gentlemen of the best and most influential families in
+the country, many of whom openly declared the sole object of their
+journey to be to pay their respects to their exiled sovereign;
+whilst others, the chief motive of whose visit was the attraction
+of the Industrial Exhibition, gladly seized the opportunity to
+reiterate the assurances of their fidelity and allegiance. Strangely
+enough, the person who opened the procession was a nephew of Marshal
+Saldanha, Don Antonio C. de Seabra, a staunch and intelligent
+royalist, whose visit to London coincided, as nearly as might be,
+with his uncle's flight into Galicia, and with his triumphant
+return to Oporto after the victory gained for him as he was
+decamping. Senhor Seabra was followed by two of the Freires, nephew
+and grand-nephew of the Freire who was minister-plenipotentiary
+in London some thirty years ago; by the Marquis and Marchioness
+of Vianna, and the Countess of Lapa--all of the first nobility
+of Portugal; by the Marquis of Abrantes, a relative of the royal
+family of Portugal; by a host of gentlemen of the first families in
+the provinces of Beira, Minho, Tras-os-Montes, &c.--Albuquerques,
+Mellos, Taveiras, Pachecos, Albergarias, Cunhas, Correa-de-Sas,
+Beduidos, San Martinhos, Pereiras, and scores of other names, which
+persons acquainted with Portugal will recognise as comprehending
+much of the best blood and highest intelligence in the country. Such
+demonstrations are not to be overlooked, or regarded as trivial
+and unimportant. Men like the Marquis of Abrantes, for instance,
+not less distinguished for mental accomplishment and elevation of
+character than for illustrious descent,[9] men of large possessions
+and extensive influence, cannot be assumed to represent only their
+individual opinions. The remarkable step lately taken by a number of
+Portuguese of this class, must be regarded as an indication of the
+state of feeling of a large portion of the nation; as an indication,
+too, of something grievously faulty in the conduct or constitution
+of a government which, after seventeen years' sway, has been unable
+to rally, reconcile, or even to appease the animosity of any portion
+of its original opponents.
+
+[9] The Marquis of Abrantes is descended from the Dukes of
+Lancaster, through Philippa of Lancaster, Queen of John I., one of
+the greatest kings Portugal ever possessed.
+
+Between the state of Portugal and that of Spain there are, at the
+present moment, points of strong contrast, and others of striking
+similarity. The similarity is in the actual condition of the two
+countries--in their sufferings, misgovernment, and degradation; the
+contrast is in the state and prospects of the political parties
+they contain. What we have said of the wretched plight of Portugal
+applies, with few and unimportant differences, to the condition
+of Spain. If there has lately been somewhat less of open anarchy
+in the latter country than in the dominions of Donna Maria, there
+has not been one iota less of tyrannical government and scandalous
+malversation. The public revenue is still squandered and robbed,
+the heavy taxes extorted from the millions still flow into the
+pockets of a few thousand corrupt officials, ministers are still
+stock-jobbers, the liberty of the press is still a farce,[10]
+and the national representation an obscene comedy. A change of
+ministry in Spain is undoubtedly a most interesting event to those
+who go out and those who come in--far more so in Spain than in
+any other country, since in no other country does the possession
+of office enable a beggar so speedily to transform himself into a
+_millionaire_. In Portugal the will is not wanting, but the means
+are less ample. More may be safely pilfered out of a sack of corn
+than out of a sieveful, and poor little Portugal's revenue does not
+afford such scope to the itching palms of Liberal statesmen as does
+the more ample one of Spain, which of late years has materially
+increased--without, however, the tax-payer and public creditor
+experiencing one crumb of the benefit they might fairly expect in
+the shape of reduced imposts and augmented dividends. But, however
+interesting to the governing fraction, a change of administration in
+Spain is contemplated by the governed masses with supreme apathy and
+indifference. They used once to be excited by such changes; but they
+have long ago got over that weakness, and suffer their pockets to be
+picked and their bodies to be trampled with a placidity bordering
+on the sublime. As long as things do not get _worse_, they remain
+quiet; they have little hope of their getting _better_. Here, again,
+in this fertile and beautiful and once rich and powerful country of
+Spain, a most gratifying picture is presented to the instigators of
+the Quadruple Alliance, to the upholders of the virtuous Christina
+and the innocent Isabel! Pity that it is painted with so ensanguined
+a brush, and that strife and discord should be the main features
+of the composition! Upon the first panel is exhibited a civil war
+of seven years' duration, vying, for cold-blooded barbarity and
+gratuitous slaughter, with the fiercest and most fanatical contests
+that modern _Times_ have witnessed. Terminated by a strange act of
+treachery, even yet imperfectly understood, the war was succeeded by
+a brief period of well-meaning but inefficient government. By the
+daring and unscrupulous manœuvres of Louis Philippe and Christina
+this was upset--by means so extraordinary and so disgraceful to all
+concerned that scandalised Europe stood aghast, and almost refused
+to credit the proofs (which history will record) of the social
+degradation of Spaniards. For a moment Spain again stood divided and
+in arms, and on the brink of civil war. This danger over, the blood
+that had not been shed in the field flowed upon the scaffold: an
+iron hand and a pampered army crushed and silenced the disaffection
+and murmurs of the great body of the nation; and thus commenced a
+system of despotic and unscrupulous misrule and corruption, which
+still endures without symptom of improvement. As for the observance
+of the constitution, it is a mockery to speak of it, and has been so
+any time these eight years. In June 1850, Lord Palmerston, in the
+course of his celebrated defence of his foreign policy, declared
+himself happy to state that the government of Spain was at that time
+carried on more in accordance with the constitution than it had
+been two years previously. As ear-witnesses upon the occasion, we
+can do his lordship the justice to say that the assurance was less
+confidently and unhesitatingly spoken than were most other parts of
+his eloquent oration. It was duly cheered, however, by the Commons
+House--or at least by those Hispanophilists and philanthropists
+upon its benches who accepted the Foreign Secretary's assurance
+in lieu of any positive knowledge of their own. The grounds for
+applause and gratulation were really of the slenderest. In 1848,
+the _un_-constitutional period referred to by Lord Palmerston,
+the Narvaez and Christina government were in the full vigour of
+their repressive measures, shooting the disaffected by the dozen,
+and exporting hundreds to the Philippines or immuring them in
+dungeons. This, of course, could not go on for ever; the power was
+theirs, the malcontents were compelled to succumb; the paternal and
+constitutional government made a desert, and called it peace. Short
+time was necessary, when such violent means were employed, to crush
+Spain into obedience, and in 1850 she lay supine, still bleeding
+from many an inward wound, at her tyrants' feet. This morbid
+tranquillity might possibly be mistaken for an indication of an
+improved mode of government. As for any other sign of constitutional
+rule, we are utterly unable to discern it in either the past or
+the present year. The admirable observance of the constitution was
+certainly in process of proof, at the very time of Lord Palmerston's
+speech, by the almost daily violation of the liberty of the press,
+by the seizure of journals whose offending articles the authorities
+rarely condescended to designate, and whose incriminated editors
+were seldom allowed opportunity of exculpation before a fair
+tribunal. It was further testified to, less than four months later,
+by a general election, at which such effectual use was made of
+those means of intimidation and corruption which are manifold in
+Spain, that, when the popular Chamber assembled, the government was
+actually alarmed at the smallness of the opposition--limited, as it
+was, to about a dozen stray Progresistas, who, like the sleeping
+beauty in the fairy tale, rubbed their eyes in wonderment at finding
+themselves there. Nor were the ministerial forebodings groundless in
+the case of the unscrupulous and tyrannical Narvaez, who, within
+a few months, when seemingly more puissant than ever, and with
+an overwhelming majority in the Chamber obedient to his nod, was
+cast down by the wily hand that had set him up, and driven to seek
+safety in France from the vengeance of his innumerable enemies. The
+causes of this sudden and singular downfall are still a puzzle and a
+mystery to the world; but persons there are, claiming to see further
+than their neighbours into political millstones, who pretend that a
+distinguished diplomatist, of no very long standing at Madrid, had
+more to do than was patent to the world with the disgrace of the
+Spanish dictator, whom the wags of the Puerta del Sol declare to
+have exclaimed, as his carriage whirled him northwards through the
+gates of Madrid, "_Comme Henri Bulwer!_"
+
+[10] This remark, (regarding the press,) literally true in Spain,
+does not apply to Portugal.
+
+Passing from the misgovernment and sufferings of Spain to its
+political state, we experience some difficulty in clearly defining
+and exhibiting this, inasmuch as the various parties that have
+hitherto acted under distinct names are gradually blending and
+disappearing like the figures in dissolving views. In Portugal,
+as we have already shown, whilst Chartists and Septembrists
+distract the country, and damage themselves by constant quarrels
+and collisions, a third party, unanimous and determined in its
+opposition to those two, grows in strength, influence, and
+prestige. In Spain, _no_ party shows signs of healthy condition.
+In all three--Moderados, Progresistas, and Carlists--symptoms of
+dissolution are manifest. In the two countries, Chartists and
+Septembrists, Moderados and Progresistas, have alike split into two
+or more factions hostile to each other; but whilst, in Portugal,
+the Miguelites improve their position, in Spain the Carlist party
+is reduced to a mere shadow of its former self. Without recognised
+chiefs or able leaders, without political theory of government, it
+bases its pretensions solely upon the hereditary right of its head.
+For whilst Don Miguel, on several occasions,[11] has declared his
+adhesion to the liberal programme advocated by his party for the
+security of the national liberties, the Count de Montemolin, either
+from indecision of character, or influenced by evil counsels, has
+hitherto made no precise, public, and satisfactory declaration of
+his views in this particular,[12] and by such injudicious reserve
+has lost the suffrages of many whom a distinct pledge would have
+gathered round his banner. Thus has he partially neutralised the
+object of his father's abdication in his favour. Don Carlos was too
+completely identified with the old absolutist party, composed of
+intolerant bigots both in temporal and spiritual matters, ever to
+have reconciled himself with the progressive spirit of the century,
+or to have become acceptable to the present generation of Spaniards.
+Discerning or advised of this, he transferred his claims to his son,
+thus placing in his hands an excellent card, which the young prince
+has not known how to play. If, instead of encouraging a sullen and
+unprofitable emigration, fomenting useless insurrections, draining
+his adherents' purses, and squandering their blood, he had husbanded
+the resources of the party, clearly and publicly defined his plan of
+government--if ever seated upon the throne he claims--and awaited
+in dignified retirement the progress of events, he would not have
+supplied the present rulers of Spain with pretexts, eagerly taken
+advantage of, for shameful tyranny and persecution; and he would
+have spared himself the mortification of seeing his party dwindle,
+and his oldest and most trusted friends and adherents, with few
+exceptions, accept pardon and place from the enemies against whom
+they had long and bravely contended. But vacillation, incapacity,
+and treachery presided at his counsels. He had none to point out
+to him--or if any did, they were unheeded or overruled--the fact,
+of which experience and repeated disappointments have probably at
+last convinced him, that it is not by the armed hand alone--not by
+the sword of Cabrera, or by Catalonian guerilla risings--that he
+can reasonably hope ever to reach Madrid, but by aid of the moral
+force of public opinion, as a result of the misgovernment of Spain's
+present rulers, of an increasing confidence in his own merits and
+good intentions, and perhaps of such possible contingencies as a
+Bourbon restoration in France, or the triumph of the Miguelites in
+Portugal. This last-named event will very likely be considered,
+by that numerous class of persons who base their opinions of
+foreign politics upon hearsay and general impressions rather than
+upon accurate knowledge and investigation of facts, as one of the
+most improbable of possibilities. A careful and dispassionate
+examination of the present state of the Peninsula does not enable
+us to regard it as a case of such utter improbability. But for the
+intimate and intricate connection between the Spanish and Portuguese
+questions, it would by no means surprise us--bearing in mind all
+that Portugal has suffered and still suffers under her present
+rulers--to see the Miguelite party openly assume the preponderance
+in the country. England would not allow it, will be the reply. Let
+us try the exact value of this assertion. England has two reasons
+for hostility to Don Miguel--one founded on certain considerations
+connected with his conduct when formerly on the throne of Portugal,
+the other on the dynastic alliance between the two countries. The
+government of Donna Maria may reckon upon the sympathy, advice, and
+even upon the direct naval assistance of England--up to a certain
+point. That is to say, that the English government will do what it
+_conveniently_ and _suitably_ can, in favour of the Portuguese queen
+and her husband; but there is room for a strong doubt that it would
+_seriously_ compromise itself to maintain them upon the throne.
+Setting aside Donna Maria's matrimonial connection, Don Miguel, as
+a constitutional king, and with certain mercantile and financial
+arrangements, would suit English interests every bit as well. But
+the case is very different as regards Spain. The restoration of Don
+Miguel would be a terrible if not a fatal shock to the throne of
+Isabella II. and to the Moderado party, to whom the revival of the
+legitimist principle in Portugal would be so much the more dangerous
+if experience proved it to be compatible with the interests
+created by the Revolution. For the Spanish government, therefore,
+intervention against Don Miguel is an absolute necessity--we
+might perhaps say a condition of its existence; and thus is Spain
+the great stumbling-block in the way of his restoration, whereas
+England's objections might be found less invincible. So, in the
+civil war in Portugal, this country only co-operated indirectly
+against Don Miguel, and it is by no means certain he would have
+been overcome, but for the entrance of Rodil's Spaniards, which was
+the decisive blow to his cause. And so, the other day, the English
+government was seen patiently looking on at the progress of events,
+when it is well known that the question of immediate intervention
+was warmly debated in the Madrid cabinet, and might possibly have
+been carried, but for the moderating influence of English counsels.
+
+[11] Particularly by his "declaration" of the 24th June 1843, by
+his autograph letter of instructions of the 15th August of the same
+year, and by his "royal letter" of the 6th April 1847, which was
+widely circulated in Portugal.
+
+[12] We cannot attach value to the vague and most unsatisfactory
+manifesto signed "Carlos Luis," and issued from Bourges in May
+1845, or consider it as in the slightest degree disproving what
+we have advanced. It contains no distinct pledge or guarantee of
+constitutional government, but deals in frothy generalities and
+magniloquent protestations, binding to nothing the prince who signed
+it, and bearing more traces of the pen of a Jesuit priest than of
+that of a competent and statesmanlike adviser of a youthful aspirant
+to a throne.
+
+If we consider the critical and hazardous position of
+Marshal Saldanha, wavering as he is between Chartists and
+Septembrists--threatened to-day with a Cabralist insurrection,
+to-morrow with a Septembrist pronunciamiento--it is easy to foresee
+that the Miguelite party may soon find tempting opportunities of
+an active demonstration in the field. Such a movement, however,
+would be decidedly premature. Their game manifestly is to await
+with patience the development of the ultimate consequences of
+Saldanha's insurrection. It requires no great amount of judgment
+and experience in political matters judgment to foresee that he
+will be the victim of his own ill-considered movement, and that no
+long period will elapse before some new event--be it a Cabralist
+reaction or a Septembrist revolt--will prove the instability of the
+present order of things. With this certainty in view, the Miguelites
+are playing upon velvet. They have only to hold themselves in
+readiness to profit by the struggle between the two great divisions
+of the Liberal party. From this struggle they are not unlikely to
+derive an important accession of strength, if, as is by no means
+improbable, the Chartists should be routed and the Septembrists
+remain temporary masters of the field. To understand the possible
+coalition of a portion of the Chartists with the adherents of Don
+Miguel, it suffices to bear in mind that the former are supporters
+of constitutional monarchy, which principle would be endangered by
+the triumph of the Septembrists, whose republican tendencies are
+notorious, as is also--notwithstanding the momentary truce they have
+made with her--their hatred to Donna Maria.
+
+The first consequences of a Septembrist pronunciamiento would
+probably be the deposition of the Queen and the scattering of the
+Chartists; and in this case it is easy to conceive the latter
+beholding in an alliance with the Miguelite party their sole chance
+of escape from democracy, and from a destruction of the numerous
+interests they have acquired during their many years of power. It
+is no unfair inference that Costa Cabral, when he caused himself,
+shortly after his arrival in London, to be presented to Don Miguel
+in a particularly public place, anticipated the probability of some
+such events as we have just sketched, and thus indicated, to his
+friends and enemies, the new service to which he might one day be
+disposed to devote his political talents.
+
+The intricate and suggestive complications of Peninsular politics
+offer a wide field for speculation; but of this we are not at
+present disposed further to avail ourselves, our object being to
+elucidate facts rather than to theorise or indulge in predictions
+with respect to two countries by whose political eccentricities
+more competent prophets than ourselves have, upon so many occasions
+during the last twenty years, been puzzled and led astray. We
+sincerely wish that the governments of Spain and Portugal were now
+in the hands of men capable of conciliating all parties, and of
+averting future convulsions--of men sufficiently able and patriotic
+to conceive and carry out measures adapted to the character, temper,
+and wants of the two nations. If, by what we should be compelled
+to look upon almost as a miracle, such a state of things came
+about in the Peninsula, we should be far indeed from desiring to
+see it disturbed, and discord again introduced into the land, for
+the vindication of the principle of legitimacy, respectable though
+we hold that to be. But if Spain and Portugal are to continue a
+byword among the nations, the focus of administrative abuses and
+oligarchical tyranny; if the lower classes of society in those
+countries, by nature brave and generous, are to remain degraded
+into the playthings of egotistical adventurers, whilst the more
+respectable and intelligent portion of the higher orders stands
+aloof in disgust from the orgies of misgovernment; if this state of
+things is to endure, without prospect of amendment, until the masses
+throw themselves into the arms of the apostles of democracy--who,
+it were vain to deny, gain ground in the Peninsula--then, we ask,
+before it comes to that, would it not be well to give a chance to
+parties and to men whose character and principles at least unite
+some elements of stability, and who, whatever reliance may be placed
+on their promises for the future, candidly admit their past faults
+and errors? Assuredly those nations incur a heavy responsibility,
+and but poorly prove their attachment to the cause of constitutional
+freedom, who avail themselves of superior force to detain feeble
+allies beneath the yoke of intolerable abuses.
+
+
+
+
+THE CONGRESS AND THE AGAPEDOME.
+
+A TALE OF PEACE AND LOVE.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+If I were to commence my story by stating, in the manner of the
+military biographers, that Jack Wilkinson was as brave a man as
+ever pushed a bayonet into the brisket of a Frenchman, I should be
+telling a confounded lie, seeing that, to the best of my knowledge,
+Jack never had the opportunity of attempting practical phlebotomy.
+I shall content myself with describing him as one of the finest and
+best-hearted fellows that ever held her Majesty's commission; and no
+one who is acquainted with the general character of the officers of
+the British army, will require a higher eulogium.
+
+Jack and I were early cronies at school; but we soon separated,
+having been born under the influence of different planets. Mars, who
+had the charge of Jack, of course devoted him to the army; Jupiter,
+who was bound to look after my interests, could find nothing better
+for me than a situation in the Woods and Forests, with a faint
+chance of becoming in time a subordinate Commissioner--that is,
+provided the wrongs of Ann Hicks do not precipitate the abolition of
+the whole department. Ten years elapsed before we met; and I regret
+to say that, during that interval, neither of us had ascended many
+rounds of the ladder of promotion. As was most natural, I considered
+my own case as peculiarly hard, and yet Jack's was perhaps harder.
+He had visited with his regiment, in the course of duty, the Cape,
+the Ionian Islands, Gibraltar, and the West Indies. He had caught
+an ague in Canada, and had been transplanted to the north of
+Ireland by way of a cure; and yet he had not gained a higher rank
+in the service than that of Lieutenant. The fact is, that Jack was
+poor, and his brother officers as tough as though they had been
+made of caoutchouc. Despite the varieties of climate to which they
+were exposed, not one of them would give up the ghost; even the
+old colonel, who had been twice despaired of, recovered from the
+yellow fever, and within a week after was lapping his claret at the
+mess-table as jollily as if nothing had happened. The regiment had a
+bad name in the service: they called it, I believe, "the Immortals."
+
+Jack Wilkinson, as I have said, was poor, but he had an uncle
+who was enormously rich. This uncle, Mr Peter Pettigrew by name,
+was an old bachelor and retired merchant, not likely, according
+to the ordinary calculation of chances, to marry; and as he had
+no other near relative save Jack, to whom, moreover, he was
+sincerely attached, my friend was generally regarded in the light
+of a prospective proprietor, and might doubtless, had he been so
+inclined, have negotiated a loan, at or under seventy per cent,
+with one of those respectable gentlemen who are making such violent
+efforts to abolish Christian legislation. But Pettigrew also was
+tough as one of "the Immortals," and Jack was too prudent a fellow
+to intrust himself to hands so eminently accomplished in the art
+of wringing the last drop of moisture from a sponge. His uncle, he
+said, had always behaved handsomely to him, and he would see the
+whole tribe of Issachar drowned in the Dardanelles rather than abuse
+his kindness by raising money on a post-obit. Pettigrew, indeed, had
+paid for his commission, and, moreover, given him a fair allowance
+whilst he was quartered abroad--circumstances which rendered it
+extremely probable that he would come forward to assist his nephew
+so soon as the latter had any prospect of purchasing his company.
+
+Happening by accident to be in Hull, where the regiment was
+quartered, I encountered Wilkinson, whom I found not a whit altered
+for the worse, either in mind or body, since the days when we were
+at school together; and at his instance I agreed to prolong my
+stay, and partake of the hospitality of the Immortals. A merry set
+they were! The major told a capital story, the senior captain sung
+like Incledon, the _cuisine_ was beyond reproach, and the liquor
+only too alluring. But all things must have an end. It is wise to
+quit even the most delightful society before it palls upon you,
+and before it is accurately ascertained that you, clever fellow
+as you are, can be, on occasion, quite as prosy and ridiculous as
+your neighbours; therefore on the third day I declined a renewal
+of the ambrosial banquet, and succeeded in persuading Wilkinson to
+take a quiet dinner with me at my own hotel. He assented--the more
+readily, perhaps, that he appeared slightly depressed in spirits, a
+phenomenon not altogether unknown under similar circumstances.
+
+After the cloth was removed, we began to discourse upon our
+respective fortunes, not omitting the usual complimentary remarks
+which, in such moments of confidence, are applied to one's
+superiors, who may be very thankful that they do not possess a
+preternatural power of hearing. Jack informed me that at length
+a vacancy had occurred in his regiment, and that he had now an
+opportunity, could he deposit the money, of getting his captaincy.
+But there was evidently a screw loose somewhere.
+
+"I must own," said Jack, "that it _is_ hard, after having waited so
+long, to lose a chance which may not occur again for years; but what
+can I do? You see I haven't got the money; so I suppose I must just
+bend to my luck, and wait in patience for my company until my head
+is as bare as a billiard-ball!"
+
+"But, Jack," said I, "excuse me for making the remark--but won't
+your uncle, Mr Pettigrew, assist you?"
+
+"Not the slightest chance of it."
+
+"You surprise me," said I; "I am very sorry to hear you say so. I
+always understood that you were a prime favourite of his."
+
+"So I was; and so, perhaps, I am," replied Wilkinson; "but that
+don't alter the matter."
+
+"Why, surely," said I, "if he is inclined to help you at all, he
+will not be backward at a time like this. I am afraid, Jack, you
+allow your modesty to wrong you."
+
+"I shall permit my modesty," said Jack, "to take no such impertinent
+liberty. But I see you don't know my uncle Peter."
+
+"I have not that pleasure, certainly; but he bears the character of
+a good honest fellow, and everybody believes that you are to be his
+heir."
+
+"That may be, or may not, according to circumstances," said
+Wilkinson. "You are quite right as to his character, which I
+would advise no one to challenge in my presence; for, though I
+should never get another stiver from him, or see a farthing of his
+property, I am bound to acknowledge that he has acted towards me in
+the most generous manner. But I repeat that you don't understand my
+uncle."
+
+"Nor ever shall," said I, "unless you condescend to enlighten me."
+
+"Well, then, listen. Old Peter would be a regular trump, but for one
+besetting foible. He cannot resist a crotchet. The more palpably
+absurd and idiotical any scheme may be, the more eagerly he adopts
+it; nay, unless it _is_ absurd and idiotical, such as no man of
+common sense would listen to for a moment, he will have nothing
+to say to it. He is quite shrewd enough with regard to commercial
+matters. During the railway mania, he is supposed to have doubled
+his capital. Never having had any faith in the stability of the
+system, he sold out just at the right moment, alleging that it was
+full time to do so, when Sir Robert Peel introduced a bill giving
+the Government the right of purchasing any line when its dividends
+amounted to ten per cent. The result proved that he was correct."
+
+"It did, undoubtedly. But surely that is no evidence of his extreme
+tendency to be led astray by crotchets?"
+
+"Quite the reverse: the scheme was not sufficiently absurd for him.
+Besides, I must tell you, that in pure commercial matters it would
+be very difficult to overreach or deceive my uncle. He has a clear
+eye for pounds, shillings, and pence--principal and interest--and
+can look very well after himself when his purse is directly
+assailed. His real weakness lies in sentiment."
+
+"Not, I trust, towards the feminine gender? That might be awkward
+for you in a gentleman of his years!"
+
+"Not precisely--though I would not like to trust him in the hands
+of a designing female. His besetting weakness turns on the point of
+the regeneration of mankind. Forty or fifty years ago he would have
+been a follower of Johanna Southcote. He subscribed liberally to
+Owen's schemes, and was within an ace of turning out with Thom of
+Canterbury. Incredible as it may appear, he actually was for a time
+a regular and accepted Mormonite."
+
+"You don't mean to say so?"
+
+"Fact, I assure you, upon my honour! But for a swindle that Joe
+Smith tried to perpetrate about the discounting of a bill, Peter
+Pettigrew might at this moment have been a leading saint in the
+temple of Nauvoo, or whatever else they call the capital of that
+polygamous and promiscuous persuasion."
+
+"You amaze me. How any man of common sense--"
+
+"That's just the point. Where common sense ends, Uncle Pettigrew
+begins. Give him a mere thread of practicability, and he will arrive
+at a sound conclusion. Envelope him in the mist of theory, and he
+will walk headlong over a precipice."
+
+"Why, Jack," said I, "you seem to have improved in your figures
+of speech since you joined the army. That last sentence was worth
+preservation. But I don't clearly understand you yet. What is his
+present phase, which seems to stand in the way of your prospects?"
+
+"Can't you guess? What is the most absurd feature of the present
+time?"
+
+"That," said I, "is a very difficult question. There's Free Trade,
+and the proposed Exhibition--both of them absurd enough, if you
+look to their ultimate tendency. Then there are Sir Charles Wood's
+Budget, and the new Reform Bill, and the Encumbered Estates Act, and
+the whole rubbish of the Cabinet, which they have neither sense to
+suppress nor courage to carry through. Upon my word, Jack, it would
+be impossible for me to answer your question satisfactorily."
+
+"What do you think of the Peace Congress?" asked Wilkinson.
+
+"As Palmerston does," said I; "remarkably meanly. But why do you put
+that point? Surely Mr Pettigrew has not become a disciple of the
+blatant blacksmith?"
+
+"Read that, and judge for yourself," said Wilkinson, handing me over
+a letter.
+
+I read as follows:--
+
+     "MY DEAR NEPHEW,--I have your letter of the 15th, apprising me
+     of your wish to obtain what you term a step in the service. I
+     am aware that I am not entitled to blame you for a misguided
+     and lamentably mistaken zeal, which, to my shame be it said, I
+     was the means of originally kindling; still, you must excuse
+     me if, with the new lights which have been vouchsafed to me, I
+     decline to assist your progress towards wholesale homicide, or
+     lend any farther countenance to a profession which is subversive
+     of that universal brotherhood and entire fraternity which ought
+     to prevail among the nations. The fact is, Jack, that, up to
+     the present time, I have entertained ideas which were totally
+     false regarding the greatness of my country. I used to think
+     that England was quite as glorious from her renown in arms as
+     from her skill in arts--that she had reason to plume herself
+     upon her ancient and modern victories, and that patriotism
+     was a virtue which it was incumbent upon freemen to view with
+     respect and veneration. Led astray by these wretched prejudices,
+     I gave my consent to your enrolling yourself in the ranks of
+     the British army, little thinking that, by such a step, I was
+     doing a material injury to the cause of general pacification,
+     and, in fact, retarding the advent of that millennium which
+     will commence so soon as the military profession is entirely
+     suppressed throughout Europe. I am now also painfully aware
+     that, towards you individually, I have failed in performing my
+     duty. I have been the means of inoculating you with a thirst
+     for human blood, and of depriving you of that opportunity of
+     adding to the resources of your country, which you might have
+     enjoyed had I placed you early in one of those establishments
+     which, by sending exports to the uttermost parts of the earth,
+     have contributed so magnificently to the diffusion of British
+     patterns, and the growth of American cotton under a mild system
+     of servitude, which none, save the minions of royalty, dare
+     denominate as actual slavery.
+
+     "In short, Jack, I have wronged you; but I should wrong you
+     still more were I to furnish you with the means of advancing one
+     other step in your bloody and inhuman profession. It is full
+     time that we should discard all national recollections. We have
+     already given a glorious example to Europe and the world, by
+     throwing open our ports to their produce without requiring the
+     assurance of reciprocity--let us take another step in the same
+     direction, and, by a complete disarmament, convince them that
+     for the future we rely upon moral reason, instead of physical
+     force, as the means of deciding differences. I shall be glad,
+     my dear boy, to repair the injury which I have unfortunately
+     done you, by contributing a sum, equal to three times the
+     amount required for the purchase of a company, towards your
+     establishment as a partner in an exporting house, if you can
+     hear of an eligible offer. Pray keep an eye on the advertising
+     columns of the _Economist_. That journal is in every way
+     trustworthy, except, perhaps, when it deals in quotation. I must
+     now conclude, as I have to attend a meeting for the purpose of
+     denouncing the policy of Russia, and of warning the misguided
+     capitalists of London against the perils of an Austrian loan.
+     You cannot, I am sure, doubt my affection, but you must not
+     expect me to advance my money towards keeping up a herd of
+     locusts, without which there would be a general conversion of
+     swords and bayonets into machinery--ploughshares, spades, and
+     pruning-hooks being, for the present, rather at a discount.--I
+     remain always your affectionate uncle,
+
+     "PETER PETTIGREW.
+
+     "_P. S._--Address to me at Hesse Homberg, whither I am going as
+     a delegate to the Peace Congress."
+
+"Well, what do you think of that?" said Wilkinson, when I had
+finished this comfortable epistle. "I presume you agree with me,
+that I have no chance whatever of receiving assistance from that
+quarter."
+
+"Why, not much I should say, unless you can succeed in convincing Mr
+Pettigrew of the error of his ways. It seems to me a regular case of
+monomania."
+
+"Would you not suppose, after reading that letter, that I was a
+sort of sucking tiger, or at best an ogre, who never could sleep
+comfortably unless he had finished off the evening with a cup of
+gore?" said Wilkinson. "I like that coming from old Uncle Peter, who
+used to sing Rule Britannia till he was hoarse, and always dedicated
+his second glass of port to the health of the Duke of Wellington!"
+
+"But what do you intend to do?" said I. "Will you accept his offer,
+and become a fabricator of calicoes?"
+
+"I'd as soon become a field preacher, and hold forth on an inverted
+tub! But the matter is really very serious. In his present mood of
+mind, Uncle Peter will disinherit me to a certainty if I remain in
+the army."
+
+"Does he usually adhere long to any particular crotchet?" said I.
+
+"Why, no; and therein lies my hope. Judging from past experience,
+I should say that this fit is not likely to last above a month or
+two; still you see there may be danger in treating the matter too
+lightly: besides, there is no saying when such another opportunity
+of getting a step may occur. What would you advise under the
+circumstances?"
+
+"If I were in your place," said I, "I think I should go over to
+Hesse Homberg at once. You need not identify yourself entirely with
+the Peace gentry; you will be near your uncle, and ready to act as
+circumstances may suggest."
+
+"That is just my own notion; and I think I can obtain leave of
+absence. I say--could you not manage to go along with me? It would
+be a real act of friendship; for, to say the truth, I don't think I
+could trust any of our fellows in the company of the Quakers."
+
+"Well--I believe they can spare me for a little longer from my
+official duties; and as the weather is fine, I don't mind if I go."
+
+"That's a good fellow! I shall make my arrangements this evening;
+for the sooner we are off the better."
+
+Two days afterwards we were steaming up the Rhine, a river which, I
+trust, may persevere in its attempt to redeem its ancient character.
+In 1848, when I visited Germany last, you might just as well have
+navigated the Phlegethon in so far as pleasure was concerned. Those
+were the days of barricades and of Frankfort murders--of the obscene
+German Parliament, as the junta of rogues, fanatics, and imbeciles,
+who were assembled in St Paul's Church, denominated themselves; and
+of every phase and form of political quackery and insurrection.
+Now, however, matters were somewhat mended. The star of Gagern had
+waned. The popularity of the Archduke John had exhaled like the
+fume of a farthing candle. Hecker and Struve were hanged, shot, or
+expatriated; and the peaceably disposed traveller could once more
+retire to rest in his hotel, without being haunted by a horrid
+suspicion that ere morning some truculent waiter might experiment
+upon the toughness of his larynx. I was glad to observe that the
+Frankforters appeared a good deal humbled. They were always a
+pestilent set; but during the revolutionary year their insolence
+rose to such a pitch that it was hardly safe for a man of warm
+temperament to enter a shop, lest he should be provoked by the airs
+and impertinence of the owner to commit an assault upon Freedom in
+the person of her democratic votary. I suspect the Frankforters are
+now tolerably aware that revolutions are the reverse of profitable.
+They escaped sack and pillage by a sheer miracle, and probably they
+will not again exert themselves, at least for a considerable number
+of years, to hasten the approach of a similar crisis.
+
+Everybody knows Homberg. On one pretext or another--whether the
+mineral springs, the baths, the gaiety, or the gambling--the
+integral portions of that tide of voyagers which annually fluctuates
+through the Rheingau, find their way to that pleasant little
+pandemonium, and contribute, I have no doubt, very largely to
+the revenues of that high and puissant monarch who rules over a
+population not quite so large as that comprehended within the
+boundaries of Clackmannan. But various as its visitors always are,
+and diverse in language, habits, and morals, I question whether
+Homberg ever exhibited on any previous occasion so queer and
+incongruous a mixture. Doubtful counts, apocryphal barons, and
+chevaliers of the extremest industry, mingled with sleek Quakers,
+Manchester reformers, and clerical agitators of every imaginable
+species of dissent. Then there were women, for the most part of a
+middle age, who, although their complexions would certainly have
+been improved by a course of the medicinal waters, had evidently
+come to Homberg on a higher and holier mission. There was also a
+sprinkling of French deputies--Red Republicans by principle, who,
+if not the most ardent friends of pacification, are at least the
+loudest in their denunciation of standing armies--a fair proportion
+of political exiles, who found their own countries too hot to hold
+them in consequence of the caloric which they had been the means
+of evoking--and one or two of those unhappy personages, whose itch
+for notoriety is greater than their modicum of sense. We were not
+long in finding Mr Peter Pettigrew. He was solacing himself in
+the gardens, previous to the table-d'hôte, by listening to the
+exhilarating strains of the brass band which was performing a
+military march; and by his side was a lady attired, not in the usual
+costume of her sex, but in a polka jacket and wide trousers, which
+gave her all the appearance of a veteran duenna of a seraglio. Uncle
+Peter, however, beamed upon her as tenderly as though she were a
+Circassian captive. To this lady, by name Miss Lavinia Latchley, an
+American authoress of much renown, and a decided champion of the
+rights of woman, we were presented in due form. After the first
+greetings were over, Mr Pettigrew opened the trenches.
+
+"So Jack, my boy, you have come to Homberg to see how we carry on
+the war, eh? No--Lord forgive me--that's not what I mean. We don't
+intend to carry on any kind of war: we mean to put it down--clap
+the extinguisher upon it, you know; and have done with all kinds
+of cannons. Bad thing, gunpowder! I once sustained a heavy loss by
+sending out a cargo of it to Sierra Leone."
+
+"I should have thought that a paying speculation," observed Jack.
+
+"Not a whit of it! The cruisers spoiled the trade; and the
+missionaries--confound them for meddling with matters which they
+did not understand!--had patched up a peace among the chiefs of the
+cannibals; so that for two years there was not a slave to be had for
+love or money, and powder went down a hundred and seventy per cent."
+
+"Such are the effects," remarked Miss Latchley with a sarcastic
+smile, which disclosed a row of teeth as yellow as the buds
+of the crocus--"such are the effects of an ill regulated and
+unphilosophical yearning after the visionary theories of an
+unopportune emancipation! Oh that men, instead of squandering their
+sympathies upon the lower grades of creation, would emancipate
+themselves from that network of error and prejudice which
+reticulates over the whole surface of society, and by acknowledging
+the divine mission and hereditary claims of woman, construct a new,
+a fairer Eden than any which was fabled to exist within the confines
+of the primitive Chaldæa!"
+
+"Very true, indeed, ma'am!" replied Mr Pettigrew; "there is a great
+deal of sound sense and observation in what you say. But Jack--I
+hope you intend to become a member of Congress at once. I shall be
+glad to present you at our afternoon meeting in the character of a
+converted officer."
+
+"You are very good, uncle, I am sure," said Wilkinson, "but I would
+rather wait a little. I am certain you would not wish me to take
+so serious a step without mature deliberation; and I hope that my
+attendance here, in answer to your summons, will convince you that I
+am at least open to conviction. In fact, I wish to hear the argument
+of your friends before I come to a definite decision."
+
+"Very right, Jack; very right!" said Mr Pettigrew. "I don't like
+converts at a minute's notice, as I remarked to a certain M.P. when
+he followed in the wake of Peel. Take your time, and form your own
+judgment; I cannot doubt of the result, if you only listen to the
+arguments of the leading men of Europe."
+
+"And do you reckon America as nothing, dear Mr Pettigrew?" said
+Miss Latchley. "Columbia may not be able to contribute to the task
+so practical and masculine an intellect as yours, yet still within
+many a Transatlantic bosom burns a hate of tyranny not less intense,
+though perhaps less corruscating, than your own."
+
+"I know it, I know it, dear Miss Latchley!" replied the infatuated
+Peter. "A word from you is at any time worth a lecture, at least
+if I may judge from the effects which your magnificent eloquence
+has produced on my own mind. Jack, I suppose you have never had the
+privilege of listening to the lectures of Miss Latchley?"
+
+Jack modestly acknowledged the gap which had been left in his
+education; stating, at the same time, his intense desire to have it
+filled up at the first convenient opportunity. Miss Latchley heaved
+a sigh.
+
+"I hope you do not flatter me," she said, "as is too much the
+case with men whose thoughts have been led habitually to deviate
+from sincerity. The worst symptom of the present age lies in its
+acquiescence with axioms. Free us from that, and we are free indeed;
+perpetuate its thraldom, and Truth, which is the daughter of
+Innocence and Liberty, imps its wings in vain, and cannot emancipate
+itself from the pressure of that raiment which was devised to impede
+its glorious walk among the nations."
+
+Jack made no reply beyond a glance at the terminations of the lady,
+which showed that she at all events was resolved that no extra
+raiment should trammel her onward progress.
+
+As the customary hour of the table-d'hôte was approaching, we
+separated, Jack and I pledging ourselves to attend the afternoon
+meeting of the Peace Congress, for the purpose of receiving our
+first lesson in the mysteries of pacification.
+
+"Well, what do you think of that?" said Jack, as Mr Pettigrew and
+the Latchley walked off together. "Hang me if I don't suspect that
+old harpy in the breeches has a design on Uncle Peter!"
+
+"Small doubt of that," said I; "and you will find it rather
+a difficult job to get him out of her clutches. Your female
+philosopher adheres to her victim with all the tenacity of a
+polecat."
+
+"Here is a pretty business!" groaned Jack. "I'll tell you what it
+is--I have more than half a mind to put an end to it, by telling my
+uncle what I think of his conduct, and then leaving him to marry
+this harridan, and make a further fool of himself in any way he
+pleases!"
+
+"Don't be silly, Jack!" said I; "It will be time enough to do that
+after everything else has failed; and, for my own part, I see no
+reason to despair. In the mean time, if you please, let us secure
+places at the dinner-table."
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+"Dear friends and well-beloved brothers! I wish from the bottom
+of my heart that there was but one universal language, so that
+the general sentiments of love, equality, and fraternity, which
+animate the bosoms of all the pacificators and detesters of tyranny
+throughout the world, might find a simultaneous echo in your ears,
+by the medium of a common speech. The diversity of dialects, which
+now unfortunately prevails, was originally invented under cover of
+the feudal system, by the minions of despotism, who thought, by such
+despicable means, for ever to perpetuate their power. It is part of
+the same system which decrees that in different countries alien to
+each other in speech, those unhappy persons who have sold themselves
+to do the bidding of tyrants shall be distinguished by different
+uniforms. O my brothers! see what a hellish and deep-laid system is
+here! English and French--scarlet against blue--different tongues
+invented, and different garments prescribed, to inflame the passions
+of mankind against each other, and to stifle their common fraternity!
+
+"Take down, I say, from your halls and churches those wretched
+tatters of silk which you designate as national colours! Bring
+hither, from all parts of the earth, the butt of the gun and
+the shaft of the spear, and all combustible implements of
+destruction--your fascines, your scaling-ladders, and your terrible
+pontoons, that have made so many mothers childless! Heap them into
+one enormous pile--yea, heap them to the very stars--and on that
+blazing altar let there be thrown the Union Jack of Britain, the
+tricolor of France, the eagles of Russia, Austria, and Prussia, the
+American stripes and stars, and every other banner and emblem of
+that accursed nationality, through which alone mankind is defrauded
+of his birthright. Then let all men join hands together, and as they
+dance around the reeking pile, let them in one common speech chaunt
+a simultaneous hymn in honour of their universal deliverance, and in
+commemoration of their cosmopolitan triumph!
+
+"O my brothers, O my brothers! what shall I say further? Ha! I will
+not address myself to you whose hearts are already kindled within
+you by the purest of spiritual flames. I will uplift my voice, and
+in words of thunder exhort the debased minions of tyranny to arouse
+themselves ere it be too late, and to shake off those fetters which
+they wear for the purpose of enslaving others. Hear me, then, ye
+soldiers!--hear me, ye degraded serfs!--hear me, ye monsters of
+iniquity! Oh, if the earth could speak, what a voice would arise
+out of its desolate battle-fields, to testify against you and
+yours! Tell us not that you have fought for freedom. Was freedom
+ever won by the sword? Tell us not that you have defended your
+country's rights, for in the eye of the true philosopher there is
+no country save one, and that is the universal earth, to which all
+have an equal claim. Shelter not yourselves, night-prowling hyenas
+as you are, under such miserable pretexts as these! Hie ye to the
+charnel-houses, ye bats, ye vampires, ye ravens, ye birds of the
+foulest omen! Strive, if you can, in their dark recesses, to hide
+yourselves from the glare of that light which is now permeating
+the world. O the dawn! O the glory! O the universal illumination!
+See, my brothers, how they shrink, how they flee from its cheering
+influence! Tremble, minions of despotism! Your race is run, your
+very empires are tottering around you. See--with one grasp I crush
+them all, as I crush this flimsy scroll!"
+
+Here the eloquent gentleman, having made a paper ball of the last
+number of the _Allgemeine Zeitung_, sate down amidst the vociferous
+applause of the assembly. He was the first orator who had spoken,
+and I believe had been selected to lead the van on account of his
+platform experience, which was very great. I cannot say, however,
+that his arguments produced entire conviction upon my mind, or that
+of my companion, judging from certain muttered adjurations which
+fell from Wilkinson, to the effect that on the first convenient
+opportunity he would take means to make the crumpler-up of nations
+atone for his scurrilous abuse of the army. We were next favoured
+with addresses in Sclavonian, German, and French; and then another
+British orator came forward to enlighten the public. This last was
+a fellow of some fancy. Avoiding all stale topics about despotism,
+aristocracies, and standing armies, he went to the root of the
+matter, by asserting that in Vegetarianism alone lay the true escape
+from the horrors and miseries of war. Mr Belcher--for such was the
+name of this distinguished philanthropist--opined that without beef
+and mutton there never could be a battle.
+
+"Had Napoleon," said he, "been dieted from his youth upwards upon
+turnips, the world would have been spared those scenes of butchery,
+which must ever remain a blot upon the history of the present
+century. One of our oldest English annalists assures us that Jack
+Cade, than whom, perhaps, there never breathed a more uncompromising
+enemy of tyranny, subsisted entirely upon spinach. This fact has
+been beautifully treated by Shakspeare, whose passion for onions was
+proverbial, in his play of Henry VI., wherein he represents Cade,
+immediately before his death, as engaged in the preparation of a
+salad. I myself," continued Mr Belcher in a slightly flatulent tone,
+"can assure this honourable company, that for more than six months I
+have cautiously abstained from using any other kind of food, except
+broccoli, which I find at once refreshing and laxative, light, airy,
+and digestible!"
+
+Mr Belcher having ended, a bearded gentleman, who enjoyed the
+reputation of being the most notorious duellist in Europe, rose
+up for the purpose of addressing the audience; but by this time
+the afternoon was considerably advanced, and a large number of the
+Congress had silently seceded to the _roulette_ and _rouge-et-noir_
+tables. Among these, to my great surprise, were Miss Latchley and
+Mr Pettigrew: it being, as I afterwards understood, the invariable
+practice of this gifted lady, whenever she could secure a victim,
+to avail herself of his pecuniary resources; so that if fortune
+declared against her, the gentleman stood the loss, whilst, in the
+opposite event, she retained possession of the spoil. I daresay some
+of my readers may have been witnesses to a similar arrangement.
+
+As it was no use remaining after the departure of Mr Pettigrew,
+Wilkinson and I sallied forth for a stroll, not, as you may well
+conceive, in a high state of enthusiasm or rapture.
+
+"I would not have believed," said Wilkinson, "unless I had seen it
+with my own eyes, that it was possible to collect in one room so
+many samples of absolute idiocy. What a pleasant companion that
+Belcher fellow, who eats nothing but broccoli, must be!"
+
+"A little variety in the way of peas would probably render him
+perfect. But what do you say to the first orator?"
+
+"I shall reserve the expression of my opinion," replied Jack, "until
+I have the satisfaction of meeting that gentleman in private. But
+how are we to proceed? With this woman in the way, it entirely
+baffles my comprehension."
+
+"Do you know, Jack, I was thinking of that during the whole time of
+the meeting; and it does appear to me that there is a way open by
+which we may precipitate the crisis. Mind--I don't answer for the
+success of my scheme, but it has at least the merit of simplicity."
+
+"Out with it, my dear fellow! I am all impatience," cried Jack.
+
+"Well, then," said I, "did you remark the queer and heterogeneous
+nature of the company? I don't think, if you except the Quakers, who
+have the generic similarity of eels, that you could have picked out
+any two individuals with a tolerable resemblance to each other."
+
+"That's likely enough, for they are a most seedy set. But what of
+it?"
+
+"Why, simply this: I suspect the majority of them are political
+refugees. No person, who is not an absurd fanatic or a designing
+demagogue, can have any sympathy with the nonsense which is talked
+against governments and standing armies. The Red Republicans, of
+whom I can assure you there are plenty in every state in Europe,
+are naturally most desirous to get rid of the latter, by whom they
+are held in check; and if that were once accomplished, no kind of
+government could stand for a single day. They are now appealing,
+as they call it, to public opinion, by means of these congresses
+and gatherings; and they have contrived, under cover of a zeal for
+universal peace, to induce a considerable number of weak and foolish
+people to join with them in a cry which is simply the forerunner of
+revolution."
+
+"All that I understand; but I don't quite see your drift."
+
+"Every one of these bearded vagabonds hates the other like poison.
+Talk of fraternity, indeed! They want to have revolution first; and
+if they could get it, you would see them flying at each other's
+throats like a pack of wild dogs that have pulled down a deer.
+Now, my plan is this: Let us have a supper-party, and invite a
+deputy from each nation. My life upon it, that before they have
+been half-an-hour together, there will be such a row among the
+fraternisers as will frighten your uncle Peter out of his senses,
+or, still better, out of his present crotchet."
+
+"A capital idea! But how shall we get hold of the fellows?"
+
+"That's not very difficult. They are at this moment hard at work
+at roulette, and they will come readily enough to the call if you
+promise them lots of Niersteiner."
+
+"By George! they shall have it in bucketfuls, if that can produce
+the desired effect. I say--we must positively have that chap who
+abused the army."
+
+"I think it would be advisable to let him alone. I would rather
+stick to the foreigners."
+
+"O, by Jove, we must have him. I have a slight score to settle, for
+the credit of the service!"
+
+"Well, but be cautious. Recollect the great matter is to leave our
+guests to themselves."
+
+"Never fear me. I shall take care to keep within due bounds. Now let
+us look after Uncle Peter."
+
+We found that respected individual in a state of high glee. His
+own run of luck had not been extraordinary; but the Latchley,
+who appeared to possess a sort of second-sight in fixing on the
+fortunate numbers, had contrived to accumulate a perfect mountain
+of dollars, to the manifest disgust of a profane Quaker opposite,
+who, judging from the violence of his language, had been thoroughly
+cleaned out. Mr Pettigrew agreed at once to the proposal for a
+supper-party, which Jack excused himself for making, on the ground
+that he had a strong wish to cultivate the personal acquaintance of
+the gentlemen, who, in the event of his joining the Peace Society,
+would become his brethren. After some pressing, Mr Pettigrew agreed
+to take the chair, his nephew officiating as croupier. Miss Lavinia
+Latchley, so soon as she learned what was in contemplation, made a
+strong effort to be allowed to join the party; but, notwithstanding
+her assertion of the unalienable rights of woman to be present on
+all occasions of social hilarity, Jack would not yield; and even
+Pettigrew seemed to think that there were times and seasons when
+the female countenance might be withheld with advantage. We found
+no difficulty whatever in furnishing the complement of the guests.
+There were seventeen of us in all--four Britons, two Frenchmen, a
+Hungarian, a Lombard, a Piedmontese, a Sicilian, a Neapolitan, a
+Roman, an Austrian, a Prussian, a Dane, a Dutchman, and a Yankee.
+The majority exhibited beards of startling dimension, and few of
+them appeared to regard soap in the light of a justifiable luxury.
+
+Pettigrew made an admirable chairman. Although not conversant with
+any language save his own, he contrived, by means of altering the
+terminations of his words, to carry on a very animated conversation
+with all his neighbours. His Italian was superb, his Danish above
+par, and his Sclavonic, to say the least of it, passable. The viands
+were good, and the wine abundant; so that, by the time pipes were
+produced, we were all tolerably hilarious. The conversation, which
+at first was general, now took a political turn; and very grievous
+it was to listen to the tales of the outrages which some of the
+company had sustained at the hands of tyrannical governments.
+
+"I'll tell you what it is, gentlemen," said one of the Frenchmen,
+"republics are not a whit better than monarchies, in so far as the
+liberty of the people is concerned. Here am I obliged to leave
+France, because I was a friend of that gallant fellow, Ledru
+Rollin, whom I hope one day to see at the head of a real Socialist
+government. Ah, won't we set the guillotine once more in motion
+then!"
+
+"Property is theft," remarked the Neapolitan, sententiously.
+
+"I calculate, my fine chap, that you han't many dollars of your own,
+if you're of that way of thinking!" said the Yankee, considerably
+scandalised at this indifference to the rule of _meum_ and _tuum_.
+
+"O Roma!" sighed the gentleman from the eternal city, who was rather
+intoxicated.
+
+"_Peste!_ What is the matter with it?" asked one of the Frenchmen.
+"I presume it stands where it always did. _Garçon--un petit verre de
+rhom!_"
+
+"How can Rome be what it was, when it is profaned by the foot of the
+stranger?" replied he of the Papal States.
+
+"_Ah, bah!_ You never were better off than under the rule of
+Oudinot."
+
+"You are a German," said the Hungarian to the Austrian; "what think
+you of our brave Kossuth?"
+
+"I consider him a pragmatical ass," replied the Austrian curtly.
+
+"Perhaps in that case," interposed the Lombard, with a sneer that
+might have done credit to Mephistopheles, "the gentleman may
+feel inclined to palliate the conduct of that satrap of tyranny,
+Radetski?"
+
+"What!--old father Radetski! the victor in a hundred fights!" cried
+the Austrian. "That will I; and spit in the face of any cowardly
+Italian who dares to breathe a word against his honour!"
+
+The Italian clutched his knife.
+
+"Hold there!" cried the Piedmontese, who seemed really a decent
+sort of fellow. "None of your stiletto work here! Had you Lombards
+trusted more to the bayonet and less to the knife, we might have
+given another account of the Austrian in that campaign, which cost
+Piedmont its king!"
+
+"_Carlo Alberto!_" hissed the Lombard, "_sceleratissimo traditore!_"
+
+The reply of the Piedmontese was a pie-dish, which prostrated the
+Lombard on the floor.
+
+"Gentlemen! gentlemen! for Heaven's sake be calm!" screamed
+Pettigrew; "remember we are all brothers!"
+
+"Brothers!" roared the Dane, "do ye think I would fraternise with a
+Prussian? Remember Schleswig Holstein!"
+
+"I am perfectly calm," said the Prussian, with the stiff formality
+of his nation; "I never quarrel over the generous vintage of my
+fatherland. Come--let me give you a song--
+
+    'Sie sollen ihm nicht haben
+    Den Deutschen freien Rhein.'"
+
+"You never were more mistaken in your life, _mon cher_," said one of
+the Frenchmen, brusquely. "Before twelve months are over we shall
+see who has right to the Rhine!"
+
+"Ay, that is true!" remarked the Dutchman; "confound these
+Germans--they wanted to annex Luxembourg."
+
+"What says the frog?" asked the Prussian contemptuously.
+
+The frog said nothing, but he hit the Prussian on the teeth.
+
+I despair of giving even a feeble impression of the scene which
+took place. No single pair of ears was sufficient to catch one
+fourth of the general discord. There was first an interchange of
+angry words; then an interchange of blows; and immediately after,
+the guests were rolling, in groups of twos and threes, as suited
+their fancy, or the adjustment of national animosities, on the
+ground. The Lombard rose not again; the pie-dish had quieted him
+for the night. But the Sicilian and Neapolitan lay locked in deadly
+combat, each attempting with intense animosity to bite off the
+other's nose. The Austrian caught the Hungarian by the throat,
+and held him till he was black in the face. The Dane pommelled
+the Prussian. One of the Frenchmen broke a bottle over the head
+of the subject of the Pope; whilst his friend, thirsting for the
+combat, attempted in vain to insult the remaining non-belligerents.
+The Dutchman having done all that honour required, smoked in mute
+tranquillity. Meanwhile the cries of Uncle Peter were heard above
+the din of battle, entreating a cessation of hostilities. He might
+as well have preached to the storm--the row grew fiercer every
+moment.
+
+"This is a disgusting spectacle!" said the orator from Manchester.
+"These men cannot be true pacificators--they must have served in the
+army."
+
+"That reminds me, old fellow!" said Jack, turning up the cuffs of
+his coat with a very ominous expression of countenance, "that you
+were pleased this morning to use some impertinent expressions with
+regard to the British army. Do you adhere to what you said then?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"Then up with your mauleys; for, by the Lord Harry! I intend to have
+satisfaction out of your carcase!"
+
+And in less than a minute the Manchester apostle dropped with both
+his eyes bunged up, and did not come to time.
+
+"Stranger!" said the Yankee to the Piedmontese, "are you inclined
+for a turn at gouging? This child feels wolfish to raise hair!" But,
+to his credit be it said, the Piedmontese declined the proposal
+with a polite bow. Meanwhile the uproar had attracted the attention
+of the neighbourhood. Six or seven men in uniform, whom I strongly
+suspect to have been members of the brass band, entered the
+apartment armed with bayonets, and carried off the more obstreperous
+of the party to the guard-house. The others immediately retired, and
+at last Jack and I were left alone with Mr Pettigrew.
+
+"And this," said he, after a considerable pause, "is fraternity
+and peace! These are the men who intended to commence the reign
+of the millennium in Europe! Giver me your hand, Jack, my dear
+boy--you shan't leave the army--nay, if you do, rely upon it I
+shall cut you off with a shilling, and mortify my fortune to the
+Woolwich hospital. I begin to see that I am an old fool. Stop a
+moment. Here is a bottle of wine that has fortunately escaped the
+devastation--fill your glasses, and let us dedicate a full bumper to
+the health of the Duke of Wellington."
+
+I need hardly say that the toast was responded to with enthusiasm.
+We finished not only that bottle, but another; and I had the
+satisfaction of hearing Mr Pettigrew announce to my friend Wilkinson
+that the purchase-money for his company would be forthcoming at
+Coutts's before he was a fortnight older.
+
+"I won't affect to deny," said Uncle Peter, "that this is a great
+disappointment to me. I had hoped better things of human nature; but
+I now perceive that I was wrong. Good night, my dear boys! I am a
+good deal agitated, as you may see; and perhaps this sour wine has
+not altogether agreed with me--I had better have taken brandy and
+water. I shall seek refuge on my pillow, and I trust we may soon
+meet again!"
+
+"What did the venerable Peter mean by that impressive farewell?"
+said I, after the excellent old man had departed, shaking his head
+mournfully as he went.
+
+"O, nothing at all," said Jack; "only the Niersteiner has been
+rather too potent for him. Have you any sticking-plaster about you?
+I have damaged my knuckles a little on the _os frontis_ of that
+eloquent pacificator."
+
+Next morning I was awoke about ten o'clock by Jack, who came rushing
+into my room.
+
+"He's off!" he cried.
+
+"Who's off?" said I.
+
+"Uncle Peter; and, what is far worse, he has taken Miss Latchley
+with him!"
+
+"Impossible!"
+
+However, it was perfectly true. On inquiry we found that the
+enamored pair had left at six in the morning.
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+"Well, Jack," said I, "any tidings of Uncle Peter?" as Wilkinson
+entered my official apartment in London, six weeks after the
+dissolution of the Congress.
+
+"Why, yes--and the case is rather worse than I supposed," replied
+Jack despondingly.
+
+"You don't mean to say that he has married that infernal woman in
+pantaloons?"
+
+"Not quite so bad as that, but very nearly. She has carried him
+off to her den; and what she may make of him there, it is quite
+impossible to predict."
+
+"Her den? Has she actually inveigled him to America?"
+
+"Not at all. These kind of women have stations established over the
+whole face of the earth."
+
+"Where, then, is he located?"
+
+"I shall tell you. In the course of my inquiries, which, you are
+aware, were rather extensive, I chanced to fall in with a Yarmouth
+Bloater."
+
+"A what?"
+
+"I beg your pardon--I meant to say a Plymouth Brother. Now, these
+fellows are a sort of regular kidnappers, who lie in wait to catch
+up any person of means and substance: they don't meddle with
+paupers, for, as you are aware, they share their property in common:
+and it occurred to me rather forcibly, that by means of my friend,
+who was a regular trapping missionary, I might learn something
+about my uncle. It cost me an immensity of brandy to elicit the
+information; but at last I succeeded in bringing out the fact,
+that my uncle is at this moment the inmate of an Agapedome in the
+neighbourhood of Southampton, and that the Latchley is his appointed
+keeper."
+
+"An Agapedome!--what the mischief is that?"
+
+"You may well ask," said Jack; "but I won't give it a coarser
+name. However, from all I can learn, it is as bad as a Mormonite
+institution."
+
+"And what the deuce may they intend to do with him, now they have
+him in their power?"
+
+"Fleece him out of every sixpence of property which he possesses in
+the world," replied Jack.
+
+"That won't do, Jack! We must get him out by some means or other."
+
+"I suspect it would be an easier job to scale a nunnery. So far as I
+can learn, they admit no one into their premises, unless they have
+hopes of catching him as a convert; and I am afraid that neither you
+nor I have the look of likely pupils. Besides, the Latchley could
+not fail to recognise me in a moment."
+
+"That's true enough," said I. "I think, however, that I might escape
+detection by a slight alteration of attire. The lady did not honour
+me with much notice during the half-hour we spent in her company. I
+must own, however, that I should not like to go alone."
+
+"My dear friend!" cried Jack, "if you will really be kind enough
+to oblige me in this matter, I know the very man to accompany you.
+Rogers of ours is in town just now. He is a famous follow--rather
+fast, perhaps, and given to larking--but as true as steel. You shall
+meet him to-day at dinner, and then we can arrange our plans."
+
+I must own that I did not feel very sanguine of success this time.
+Your genuine rogue is the most suspicious character on the face
+of the earth, wide awake to a thousand little discrepancies which
+would escape the observation of the honest; and I felt perfectly
+convinced that the superintendent of the Agapedome was likely to
+prove a rogue of the first water. Then I did not see my way clearly
+to the characters which we ought to assume. Of course it was no use
+for me to present myself as a scion of the Woods and Forests; I
+should be treated as a Government spy, and have the door slapped in
+my face. To appear as an emissary of the Jesuits would be dangerous;
+that body being well known for their skill in annexing property.
+In short, I came to the conclusion, that unless I could work upon
+the cupidity of the head Agapedomian, there was no chance whatever
+of effecting Mr Pettigrew's release. To this point, therefore, I
+resolved to turn my attention.
+
+At dinner, according to agreement, I met Rogers of ours. Rogers was
+not gifted with any powerful inventive faculties; but he was a fine
+specimen of the British breed, ready to take a hand at anything
+which offered a prospect of fun. You would not probably have
+selected him as a leading conspirator; but, though no Macchiavelli,
+he appeared most valuable as an accomplice.
+
+Our great difficulty was to pitch upon proper characters. After
+much discussion, it was resolved that Rogers of ours should appear
+as a young nobleman of immense wealth, but exceedingly eccentric
+habits, and that I should act as bear-leader, with an eye to my
+own interest. What we were to do when we should succeed in getting
+admission to the establishment, was not very clear to the perception
+of any of us. We resolved to be regulated entirely by circumstances,
+the great point being the rescue of Mr Peter Pettigrew.
+
+Accordingly, we all started for Southampton on the following
+morning. On arriving there, we were informed that the Agapedome
+was situated some three miles from the town, and that the most
+extraordinary legends of the habits and pursuits of its inmates
+were current in the neighbourhood. Nobody seemed to know exactly
+what the Agapedomians were. They seemed to constitute a tolerably
+large society of persons, both male and female; but whether they
+were Christians, Turks, Jews, or Mahometans, was matter of exceeding
+disputation. They were known, however to be rich, and occasionally
+went out airing in carriages-and-four--the women all wearing
+pantaloons, to the infinite scandal of the peasantry. So far as
+we could learn, no gentleman answering to the description of Mr
+Pettigrew had been seen among them.
+
+After agreeing to open communications with Jack as speedily as
+possible, and emptying a bottle of champagne towards the success
+of our expedition, Rogers and I started in a postchaise for the
+Agapedome. Rogers was curiously arrayed in garments of chequered
+plaid, a mere glance at which would have gone far to impress any
+spectator with a strong notion of his eccentricity; whilst, for my
+part, I had donned a suit of black, and assumed a massive pair of
+gold spectacles, and a beaver with a portentous rim.
+
+This Agapedome was a large building surrounded by a high wall,
+and looked, upon the whole, like a convent. Deeming it prudent to
+ascertain how the land lay before introducing the eccentric Rogers,
+I requested that gallant individual to remain in the postchaise,
+whilst I solicited an interview with Mr Aaron B. Hyams, the reputed
+chief of the establishment. The card I sent in was inscribed with
+the name of Dr Hiram Smith, which appeared to me a sufficiently
+innocuous appellation. After some delay, I was admitted through a
+very strong gateway into the courtyard; and was then conducted by a
+servant in a handsome livery to a library, where I was received by
+Mr Hyams.
+
+As the Agapedome has since been broken up, and its members
+dispersed, it may not be uninteresting to put on record a slight
+sketch of its founder. Judging from his countenance, the progenitors
+of Mr Aaron B. Hyams must have been educated in the Jewish
+persuasion. His nose and lip possessed that graceful curve which is
+so characteristic of the Hebrew race; and his eye, if not altogether
+of that kind which the poets designate as "eagle," might not unaptly
+be compared to that of the turkey-buzzard. In certain circles of
+society Mr Hyams would have been esteemed a handsome man. In the
+doorway of a warehouse in Holywell Street he would have committed
+large havoc on the hearts of the passing Leahs and Dalilahs--for
+he was a square-built powerful man, with broad shoulders and
+bandy legs, and displayed on his person as much ostentatious
+jewellery as though he had been concerned in a new spoiling of the
+Egyptians. Apparently he was in a cheerful mood; for before him
+stood a half-emptied decanter of wine, and an odour as of recently
+extinguished Cubas was agreeably disseminated through the apartment.
+
+"Dr Hiram Smith, I presume?" said he. "Well, Dr Hiram Smith, to what
+fortunate circumstance am I indebted for the honour of this visit?"
+
+"Simply, sir, to this," said I, "that I want to know you, and know
+about you. Nobody without can tell me precisely what your Agapedome
+is, so I have come for information to headquarters. I have formed my
+own conclusion. If I am wrong, there is no harm done; if I am right,
+we may be able to make a bargain."
+
+"Hallo!" cried Hyams, taken rather aback by this curt style of
+exordium, "you are a rum customer, I reckon. So you want to deal,
+do ye? Well then, tell us what sort of doctor you may be? No use
+standing on ceremony with a chap like you. Is it M.D. or LL.D. or
+D.D., or a mere walking-stick title?"
+
+"The title," said I, "is conventional; so you may attribute it to
+any origin you please. In brief, I want to know if I can board a
+pupil here?"
+
+"That depends entirely upon circumstances," replied Hyams. "Who and
+what is the subject?"
+
+"A young nobleman of the highest distinction, but of slightly
+eccentric habits." Here Hyams pricked up his ears. "I am not
+authorised to tell his name; but otherwise, you shall have the most
+satisfactory references."
+
+"There is only one kind of reference I care about," interrupted
+Hyams, imitating at the same time the counting out of imaginary
+sovereigns into his palm.
+
+"So much the better--there will be trouble saved," said I. "I
+perceive, Mr Hyams, you are a thorough man of business. In a word,
+then, my pupil has been going it too fast."
+
+"Flying kites and post-obits?"
+
+"And all the rest of it," said I; "black-legs innumerable, and no
+end of scrapes in the green-room. Things have come to such a pass
+that his father, the Duke, insists on his being kept out of the way
+at present; and, as taking him to Paris would only make matters
+worse, it occurred to me that I might locate him for a time in some
+quiet but cheerful establishment, where he could have his reasonable
+swing, and no questions asked."
+
+"Dr Hiram Smith!" cried Hyams with enthusiasm, "you're a regular
+trump! I wish all the noblemen in England would look out for tutors
+like you."
+
+"You are exceedingly complimentary, Mr Hyams. And now that you know
+my errand, may I ask what the Agapedome is?"
+
+"The Home of Love," replied Hyams; "at least so I was told by the
+Oxford gent, to whom I gave half-a-guinea for the title."
+
+"And your object?"
+
+"A pleasant retreat--comfortable home--no sort of bother of
+ceremony--innocent attachments encouraged--and, in the general case,
+community of goods."
+
+"Of which latter, I presume, Mr Hyams is the sole administrator?"
+
+"Right again, Doctor!" said Hyams with a leer of intelligence; "no
+use beating about the bush with you, I perceive. A single cashier
+for the whole concern saves a world of unnecessary trouble. Then,
+you see, we have our little matrimonial arrangements. A young
+lady in search of an eligible domicile comes here and deposits
+her fortune. We provide her by-and-by with a husband of suitable
+tastes, so that all matters are arranged comfortably. No luxury
+or enjoyment is denied to the inmates of the establishment, which
+may be compared, in short, to a perfect aviary, in which you hear
+nothing from morning to evening save one continuous sound of billing
+and cooing."
+
+"You draw a fascinating picture, Mr Hyams," said I: "too
+fascinating, in fact; for, after what you have said, I doubt whether
+I should be fulfilling my duty to my noble patron the Duke, were I
+to expose his heir to the influence of such powerful temptations."
+
+"Don't be in the least degree alarmed about that," said Hyams. "I
+shall take care that in this case there is no chance of marriage.
+Harkye, Doctor, it is rather against our rules to admit parlour
+boarders; but I don't mind doing it in this case, if you agree to my
+terms, which are one hundred and twenty guineas per month."
+
+"On the part of the Duke," said I, "I anticipate no objection; nor
+shall I refuse your stamped receipts at that rate. But as I happen
+to be paymaster, I shall certainly not give you in exchange for
+each of them more than seventy guineas, which will leave you a very
+pretty profit over and above your expenses."
+
+"What a screw you are, Doctor!" cried Hyams. "Would you have the
+conscience to pocket fifty for nothing? Come, come--make it eighty
+and it's a bargain."
+
+"Seventy is my last word. Beard of Mordecai, man! do you think I am
+going to surrender this pigeon to your hands gratis? Have I not told
+you already that he has a natural turn for _ecarté_!"
+
+"Ah, Doctor, Doctor! you must be one of our people--you must
+indeed!" said Hyams. "Well, is it a bargain?"
+
+"Not yet," said I. "In common decency, and for the sake of
+appearances, I must stay for a couple of days in the house, in order
+that I may be able to give a satisfactory report to the Duke. By the
+way, I hope everything is quite orthodox here--nothing contrary to
+the tenets of the church?"
+
+"O quite," replied Hyams; "it is a beautiful establishment in point
+of order. The bell rings every day punctually at four o'clock."
+
+"For prayers?"
+
+"No, sir--for hockey. We find that a little lively exercise gives a
+cheerful tone to the mind, and promotes those animal spirits which
+are the peculiar boast of the Agapedome."
+
+"I am quite satisfied," said I. "So now, if you please, I shall
+introduce my pupil."
+
+I need not dwell minutely upon the particulars of the interview
+which took place between Rogers of ours and the superintendent of
+the Agapedome. Indeed there is little to record. Rogers received the
+intimation that this was to be his residence for a season with the
+utmost nonchalance, simply remarking that he thought it would be
+rather slow; and then, by way of keeping up his character, filled
+himself a bumper of sherry. Mr Hyams regarded him as a spider might
+do when some unknown but rather powerful insect comes within the
+precincts of his net.
+
+"Well," said Rogers, "since it seems I am to be quartered here, what
+sort of fun is to be had? Any racket-court, eh?"
+
+"I am sorry to say, my Lord, ours is not built as yet. But at four
+o'clock we shall have hockey--"
+
+"Hang hockey! I have no fancy for getting my shins bruised. Any body
+in the house except myself?"
+
+"If your Lordship would like to visit the ladies--"
+
+"Say no more!" cried Rogers impetuously. "I shall manage to kill
+time now! 'Hallo, you follow with the shoulder-knot! show me the way
+to the drawing-room;" and Rogers straightway disappeared.
+
+"Doctor Hiram Smith!" said Hyams, looking rather discomposed, "this
+is most extraordinary conduct on the part of your pupil."
+
+"Not at all extraordinary, I assure you," I replied; "I told you he
+was rather eccentric, but at present he is in a peculiarly quiet
+mood. Wait till you see his animal spirits up!"
+
+"Why, he'll be the ruin of the Agapedome!" cried Hyams; "I cannot
+possibly permit this."
+
+"It will rather puzzle you to stop it," said I.
+
+Here a faint squall, followed by a sound of suppressed giggling, was
+heard in the passage without.
+
+"Holy Moses!" cried the Agapedomian, starting up, "if Mrs Hyams
+should happen to be there!"
+
+"You may rely upon it she will very soon become accustomed to his
+Lordship's eccentricities. Why, you told me you admitted of no sort
+of bother or ceremony."
+
+"Yes--but a joke maybe carried too far. As I live, he is pursuing
+one of the ladies down stairs into the courtyard!"
+
+"Is he?" said I; "then you may be tolerably certain he will
+overtake her."
+
+"Surely some of the servants will stop him!" cried Hyams, rushing
+to the window. "Yes--here comes one of them. Father Abraham! is it
+possible? He has knocked Adoniram down!"
+
+"Nothing more likely," said I; "his Lordship had lessons from
+Mendoza."
+
+"I must look to this myself," cried Hyams.
+
+"Then I'll follow and see fair play," said I.
+
+We rushed into the court; but by this time it was empty. The pursued
+and the pursuer--Daphne and Apollo--had taken flight into the
+garden. Thither we followed them, Hyams red with ire; but no trace
+was seen of the fugitives. At last in an acacia bower we heard
+murmurs. Hyams dashed on; I followed; and there, to my unutterable
+surprise, I beheld Rogers of ours kneeling at the feet of the
+Latchley!
+
+"Beautiful Lavinia!" he was saying, just as we turned the corner.
+
+"Sister Latchley!" cried Hyams, "what is the meaning of all this?"
+
+"Rather let me ask, brother Hyams," said the Latchley in unabashed
+serenity, "what means this intrusion, so foreign to the time, and so
+subversive of the laws of our society?"
+
+"Shall I pound him, Lavinia?" said Rogers, evidently anxious to
+discharge a slight modicum of the debt which he owed to the Jewish
+fraternity.
+
+"I command--I beseech you, no! Speak, brother Hyams! I again require
+of you to state why and wherefore you have chosen to violate the
+fundamental rules of the Agapedome?"
+
+"Sister Latchley, you will drive me mad! This young man has not been
+ten minutes in the house, and yet I find him scampering after you
+like a tom-cat, and knocking down Adoniram because he came in his
+way, and you are apparently quite pleased!"
+
+"Is the influence of love measured by hours?" asked the Latchley in
+a tone of deep sentiment. "Count we electricity by time--do we mete
+out sympathy by the dial? Brother Hyams, were not your intellectual
+vision obscured by a dull and earthly film, you would know that the
+passage of the lightning is not more rapid than the flash of kindled
+love."
+
+"That sounds all very fine," said Hyams, "but I shall allow no such
+doings here; and you, in particular, Sister Latchley, considering
+how you are situated, ought to be ashamed of yourself!"
+
+"Aaron, my man," said Rogers of ours, "will you be good enough to
+explain what you mean by making such insinuations?"
+
+"Stay, my Lord," said I; "I really must interpose. Mr Hyams is about
+to explain."
+
+"May I never discount bill again," cried the Jew, "if this is not
+enough to make a man forswear the faith of his fathers! Look you
+here, Miss Latchley; you are part of the establishment, and I expect
+you to obey orders."
+
+"I was not aware, sir, until this moment," said Miss Latchley,
+loftily, "that I was subject to the orders of any one."
+
+"Now, don't be a fool; there's a dear!" said Hyams. "You know well
+enough what I mean. Haven't you enough on hand with Pettigrew,
+without encumbering yourself--?" and he stopped short.
+
+"It is a pity, sir," said Miss Latchley, still more magnificently,
+"it is a vast pity, that since you have the meanness to invent
+falsehoods, you cannot at the same time command the courage to utter
+them. Why am I thus insulted? Who is this Pettigrew you speak of?"
+
+"Pettigrew--Pettigrew?" remarked Rogers; "I say, Dr Smith, was
+not that the name of the man who is gone amissing, and for whose
+discovery his friends are offering a reward?"
+
+Hyams started as if stung by an adder. "Sister Latchley," he said,
+"I fear I was in the wrong."
+
+"You have made the discovery rather too late, Mr Hyams," replied
+the irate Lavinia. "After the insults you have heaped upon me, it
+is full time we should part. Perhaps these gentlemen will be kind
+enough to conduct an unprotected female to a temporary home."
+
+"If you will go, you go alone, madam," said Hyams; "his Lordship
+intends to remain here."
+
+"His Lordship intends to do nothing of the sort, you rascal," said
+Rogers. "Hockey don't agree with my constitution."
+
+"Before I depart, Mr Hyams," said Miss Latchley, "let me remark that
+you are indebted to me in the sum of two thousand pounds as my share
+of the profits of the establishment. Will you pay it now, or would
+you prefer to wait till you hear from my solicitor?"
+
+"Anything more?" asked the Agapedomian.
+
+"Merely this," said I: "I am now fully aware that Mr Peter Pettigrew
+is detained within these walls. Surrender him instantly, or prepare
+yourself for the worst penalties of the law."
+
+I made a fearful blunder in betraying my secret before I was clear
+of the premises, and the words had scarcely passed my lips before
+I was aware of my mistake. With the look of a detected demon Hyams
+confronted us.
+
+"Ho, ho! this is a conspiracy, is it? But you have reckoned without
+your host. Ho, there! Jonathan--Asahel! close the doors, ring the
+great bell, and let no man pass on your lives! And now let's see
+what stuff you are made of!"
+
+So saying, the ruffian drew a life-preserver from his pocket, and
+struck furiously at my head before I had time to guard myself. But
+quick as he was, Rogers of ours was quicker. With his left hand he
+caught the arm of Hyams as the blow descended, whilst with the right
+he dealt him a fearful blow on the temple, which made the Hebrew
+stagger. But Hyams, amongst his other accomplishments, had practised
+in the ring. He recovered himself almost immediately, and rushed
+upon Rogers. Several heavy hits were interchanged; and there is no
+saying how the combat might have terminated, but for the presence
+of mind of the Latchley. That gifted female, superior to the
+weakness of her sex, caught up the life-preserver from the ground,
+and applied it so effectually to the back of Hyams' skull, that he
+dropped like an ox in the slaughter-house.
+
+Meanwhile the alarum bell was ringing--women were screaming at
+the windows, from which also several crazy-looking gentlemen were
+gesticulating; and three or four truculent Israelites were rushing
+through the courtyard. The whole Agapedome was in an uproar.
+
+"Keep together and fear nothing!" cried Rogers. "I never stir on
+these kind of expeditions without my pistols. Smith--give your arm
+to Miss Latchley, who has behaved like the heroine of Saragossa; and
+now let us see if any of these scoundrels will venture to dispute
+our way!"
+
+But for the firearms which Rogers carried, I suspect our egress
+would have been disputed. Jonathan and Asahel, red-headed ruffians
+both, stood ready with iron bars in their hands to oppose our exit;
+but a glimpse of the bright glittering barrel caused them to change
+their purpose. Rogers commanded them, on pain of instant death, to
+open the door. They obeyed; and we emerged from the Agapedome as
+joyfully as the Ithacans from the cave of Polyphemus. Fortunately
+the chaise was still in waiting: we assisted Miss Latchley in, and
+drove off, as fast as the horses could gallop, to Southampton.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+"Is it possible they can have murdered him?" said Jack.
+
+"That, I think," said I, "is highly improbable. I rather imagine
+that he has refused to conform to some of the rules of the
+association, and has been committed to the custody of Messrs
+Jonathan and Asahel."
+
+"Shall I ask Lavinia?" said Rogers. "I daresay she would tell me all
+about it."
+
+"Better not," said I, "in the mean time. Poor thing! her nerves must
+be shaken."
+
+"Not a whit of them," replied Rogers. "I saw no symptom of nerves
+about her. She was as cool as a cucumber when she floored that
+infernal Jew; and if she should be a little agitated or so, she is
+calming herself at this moment with a glass of brandy and water. I
+mixed it for her. Do you know she's a capital fellow, only 'tis a
+pity she's so very plain."
+
+"I wish the police would arrive!" said Jack. "We have really not a
+minute to lose. Poor Uncle Peter! I devoutly trust this may be the
+last of his freaks."
+
+"I hope so too, Jack, for your sake: it is no joke rummaging him out
+of such company. But for Rogers there, we should all of us have been
+as dead as pickled herrings."
+
+"I bear a charmed life," said Rogers. "Remember I belong to 'the
+Immortals.' But there come the blue-coats in a couple of carriages.
+'Gad, Wilkinson, I wish it were our luck to storm the Agapedome with
+a score of our own fellows!"
+
+During our drive, Rogers enlightened us as to his encounter with the
+Latchley. It appeared that he had bestowed considerable attention
+to our conversation in London; and that, when he hurried to the
+drawing-room in the Agapedome, as already related, he thought he
+recognised the Latchley at once, in the midst of half-a-dozen more
+juvenile and blooming sisters.
+
+"Of course, I never read a word of the woman's works," said Rogers,
+"and I hope I never shall; but I know that female vanity will stand
+any amount of butter. So I bolted into the room, without caring for
+the rest--though, by the way, there was one little girl with fair
+hair and blue eyes, who, I hope, has not left the Agapedome--threw
+myself at the feet of Lavinia; declared that I was a young nobleman,
+enamoured of her writings, who was resolved to force my way through
+iron bars to gain a glimpse of the bright original: and, upon
+the whole, I think you must allow that I managed matters rather
+successfully."
+
+There could be but one opinion as to that. In fact, without Rogers,
+the whole scheme must have miscarried. It was Kellermann's charge,
+unexpected and unauthorised--but altogether triumphant.
+
+On arriving at the Agapedome we found the door open, and three or
+four peasants loitering round the gateway.
+
+"Are they here still?" cried Jack, springing from the chaise.
+
+"Noa, measter," replied one of the bystanders; "they be gone an hour
+past in four carrutches, wi' all their goods and chuckles."
+
+"Did they carry any one with them by force?"
+
+"Noa, not by force, as I seed; but there wore one chap among them
+woundily raddled on the sconce."
+
+"Hyams to wit, I suppose. Come, gentlemen; as we have a
+search-warrant, let us in and examine the premises thoroughly."
+
+Short as was the interval which had elapsed between our exit and
+return, Messrs Jonathan, Asahel, and Co. had availed themselves
+of it to the utmost. Every portable article of any value had been
+removed. Drawers were open, and papers scattered over the floors,
+along with a good many pairs of bloomers rather the worse for the
+wear: in short, every thing seemed to indicate that the nest was
+finally abandoned. What curious discoveries we made during the
+course of our researches, as to the social habits and domestic
+economy of this happy family, I shall not venture to recount; we
+came there not to gratify either private or public curiosity, but to
+perform a sacred duty by emancipating Mr Peter Pettigrew.
+
+Neither in the cellars nor the closets, nor even in the garrets,
+could we find any trace of the lost one. The contents of one
+bedroom, indeed, showed that it had been formerly tenanted by Mr
+Pettigrew, for there were his portmanteaus with his name engraved
+upon them; his razors, and his wearing apparel, all seemingly
+untouched: but there were no marks of any recent occupancy; the dust
+was gathering on the table, and the ewer perfectly dry. It was the
+opinion of the detective officer that at least ten days had elapsed
+since any one had slept in the room. Jack became greatly alarmed.
+
+"I suppose," said he, "there is nothing for it but to proceed
+immediately in pursuit of Hyams: do you think you will be able to
+apprehend him?"
+
+"I doubt it very much, sir," replied the detective officer. "These
+sort of fellows are wide awake, and are always prepared for
+accidents. I expect that, by this time, he is on his way to France.
+But hush!--what was that?"
+
+A dull sound as of the clapper of a large bell boomed overhead.
+There was silence for about a minute, and again it was repeated.
+
+"Here is a clue, at all events!" cried the officer. "My life on it,
+there is some one in the belfry."
+
+We hastened up the narrow stairs which led to the tower. Half way
+up, the passage was barred by a stout door, double locked, which the
+officers had some difficulty in forcing with the aid of a crow-bar.
+This obstacle removed, we reached the lofty room where the bell
+was suspended; and there, right under the clapper, on a miserable
+truckle bed, lay the emaciated form of Mr Pettigrew.
+
+"My poor uncle!" said Jack, stooping tenderly to embrace his
+relative, "what can have brought you here?"
+
+"Speak louder, Jack!" said Mr Pettigrew; "I can't hear you. For
+twelve long days that infernal bell has been tolling just above my
+head for hockey and other villanous purposes. I am as deaf as a
+doornail!"
+
+"And so thin, dear uncle! You must have been most shamefully abused."
+
+"Simply starved; that's all."
+
+"What! starved? The monsters! Did they give you nothing to eat?"
+
+"Yes--broccoli. I wish you would try it for a week: it is a rare
+thing to bring out the bones."
+
+"And why did they commit this outrage upon you?"
+
+"For two especial reasons, I suppose--first, because I would not
+surrender my whole property; and, secondly, because I would not
+marry Miss Latchley."
+
+"My dear uncle! when I saw you last, it appeared to me that you
+would have had no objections to perform the latter ceremony."
+
+"Not on compulsion, Jack--not on compulsion!" said Mr Pettigrew,
+with a touch of his old humour. "I won't deny that I was humbugged
+by her at first, but this was over long ago."
+
+"Indeed! Pray, may I venture to ask what changed your opinion of the
+lady?"
+
+"Her works, Jack--her own works!" replied Uncle Peter. "She gave me
+them to read as soon as I was fairly trapped into the Agapedome,
+and such an awful collection of impiety and presumption I never saw
+before. She is ten thousand times worse than the deceased Thomas
+Paine."
+
+"Was she, then, party to your incarceration?"
+
+"I won't say that. I hardly think she would have consented to
+let them harm me, or that she knew exactly how I was used; but
+that fellow Hyams is wicked enough to have been an officer under
+King Herod. Now, pray help me up, and lift me down stairs, for my
+legs are so cramped that I can't walk, and my head is as dizzy
+as a wheel. That confounded broccoli, too, has disagreed with my
+constitution, and I shall feel particularly obliged to any one who
+can assist me to a drop of brandy."
+
+After having ministered to the immediate wants of Mr Pettigrew,
+and secured his effects, we returned to Southampton, leaving the
+deserted Agapedome in the charge of a couple of police. In spite of
+every entreaty Mr Pettigrew would not hear of entering a prosecution
+against Hyams.
+
+"I feel," said he, "that I have made a thorough ass of myself;
+and I should not be able to stand the ridicule that must follow a
+disclosure of the consequences. In fact, I begin to think that I am
+not fit to look after my own affairs. The man who has spent twelve
+days, as I have, under the clapper of a bell, without any other
+sustenance than broccoli--is there any more brandy in the flask?
+I should like the merest drop--the man, I say, who has undergone
+these trials, has ample time for meditation upon the past. I see
+my weakness, and I acknowledge it. So Jack, my dear boy, as you
+have always behaved to me more like a son than a nephew, I intend,
+immediately on my return to London, to settle my whole property upon
+you, merely reserving an annuity. Don't say a word on the subject.
+My mind is made up, and nothing can alter my resolution."
+
+On arriving at Southampton we considered it our duty to communicate
+immediately with Miss Latchley, for the purpose of ascertaining if
+we could render her any temporary assistance. Perhaps it was more
+than she deserved; but we could not forget her sex, though she had
+done everything in her power to disguise it; and, besides, the lucky
+blow with the life-preserver, which she administered to Hyams, was
+a service for which we could not be otherwise than grateful. Jack
+Wilkinson was selected as the medium of communication. He found the
+strong Lavinia alone, and perfectly composed.
+
+"I wish never more," said she, "to hear the name of Pettigrew. It is
+associated in my mind with weakness, fanaticism, and vacillation;
+and I shall ever feel humbled at the reflection that I bowed my
+woman's pride to gaze on the surface of so shallow and opaque a
+pool! And yet, why regret? The image of the sun is reflected equally
+from the BÅ“otian marsh and the mirror of the clear Ontario! Tell
+your uncle," continued she, after a pause, "that as he is nothing
+to me, so I wish to be nothing to him. Let us mutually extinguish
+memory. Ha, ha, ha!--so they fed him, you say, upon broccoli?
+
+"But I have one message to give, though not to him. The youth
+who, in the nobility of his soul, declared his passion for my
+intellect--where is he? I tarry beneath this roof but for him. Do
+my message fairly, and say to him that if he seeks a communion of
+soul--no! that is the common phrase of the slaves of antiquated
+superstition--if he yearns for a grand amalgamation of essential
+passion and power, let him hasten hither, and Lavinia Latchley is
+ready to accompany him to the prairie or the forest, to the torrid
+zone, or to the confines of the arctic seas!"
+
+"I shall deliver your message, ma'am," said Jack, "as accurately as
+my abilities will allow." And he did so.
+
+Rogers of ours writhed uneasily in his seat.
+
+"I'll tell you what it is, my fine fellows," said he, "I don't look
+upon this quite as a laughing matter. I am really sorry to have
+taken in the old woman, though I don't see how we could well have
+helped it; and I would far rather, Jack, that she had fixed her
+affections upon you than on me. I shall get infernally roasted at
+the mess if this story should transpire. However, I suppose there's
+only one answer to be given. Pray, present my most humble respects,
+and say how exceedingly distressed I feel that my professional
+engagements will not permit me to accompany her in her proposed
+expedition."
+
+Jack reported the answer in due form.
+
+"Then," said Lavinia, drawing herself up to her full height, and
+shrouding her visage in a black veil, "tell him that for his sake I
+am resolved to die a virgin!"
+
+I presume she will keep her word; at least I have not yet heard that
+any one has been courageous enough to request her to change her
+situation. She has since returned to America, and is now, I believe,
+the president of a female college, the students of which may be
+distinguished from the rest of their sex, by their uniform adoption
+of bloomers.
+
+
+_Printed by William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh._
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+Mismatched quotes are not fixed if it's not sufficiently clear where
+the missing quote should be placed.
+
+The cover for the eBook version of this book was created by the
+transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
+
+Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note.
+Irregularities and inconsistencies in the text have been retained as
+printed, ecept for the following:
+
+The transcriber has made accents consistent for "Schaïgië" and
+"Schaïgië's".
+
+Page 328: "But he must cease to be Mr Ruskin if they ..." The
+transcriber has inserted "be".
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol.
+70, No. 431, September 1851, by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE, SEPT 1851 ***
+
+***** This file should be named 44361-0.txt or 44361-0.zip *****
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 70,
+No. 431, September 1851, by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 70, No. 431, September 1851
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: December 5, 2013 [EBook #44361]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE, SEPT 1851 ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Brendan OConnor, Jonathan Ingram and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Library of Early Journals.)
+
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
+
+Text enclosed in plus signs is transliterated Greek
+(+Iô, iô, iô, iô+).
+
+Small capital text has been replaced with all capitals.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+  BLACKWOOD'S
+
+  EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.
+
+  NO. CCCCXXXI.       SEPTEMBER, 1851.       VOL. LXX.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+  A CAMPAIGN IN TAKA,                                      251
+
+  MY NOVEL; OR, VARIETIES IN ENGLISH LIFE. PART XIII,      275
+
+  DISFRANCHISEMENT OF THE BOROUGHS,                        296
+
+  PARIS IN 1851.--(_Continued_,)                           310
+
+  MR RUSKIN'S WORKS,                                       326
+
+  PORTUGUESE POLITICS,                                     349
+
+  THE CONGRESS AND THE AGAPEDOME.--A TALE OF PEACE
+  AND LOVE,                                                359
+
+
+  EDINBURGH:
+
+  WILLIAM BLACKWOOD & SONS, 45 GEORGE STREET;
+  AND 37 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON.
+
+  _To whom all communications (post paid) must be addressed._
+
+  SOLD BY ALL THE BOOKSELLERS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM.
+
+  PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, EDINBURGH.
+
+
+
+
+BLACKWOOD'S
+
+EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.
+
+  NO. CCCCXXXI.      September, 1851.       VOL. LXX.
+
+
+
+
+A CAMPAIGN IN TAKA.
+
+     _Feldzug von Sennaar nach Taka, Basa, und Beni-Amer, mit
+     besonderem Hinblick auf die Völker von Bellad-Sudan._--[Campaign
+     from Sennaar to Taka, Basa, and Beni-Amer; with a particular
+     Glance at the Nations of Bellad-Sudan.]--VON FERDINAND WERNE.
+     Stuttgart: Königl. Hofbuchdruckerei. London: Williams and
+     Norgate. 1851.
+
+
+Africa, the least explored division of the globe's surface, and the
+best field for travellers of bold and enterprising character, has
+been the scene of three of the most remarkable books of their class
+that have appeared within the last ten years. We refer to Major
+Harris's narrative of his Ethiopian expedition--to the marvellous
+adventures of that modern Nimrod, Mr Gordon Cumming--to Mr Ferdinand
+Werne's strange and exciting account of his voyage up the White
+Nile. In our review of the last-named interesting and valuable
+work,[1] we mentioned that Mr Werne, previously to his expedition up
+the Nile, had been for several months in the Taka country, a region
+previously untrodden by Europeans, with an army commanded by Achmet
+Bascha, governor-general of the Egyptian province of Bellad-Sudan,
+who was operating against refractory tributaries. He has just
+published an account of this campaign, which afforded him, however,
+little opportunity of expatiating on well-contested battles,
+signal victories, or feats of heroic valour. On the other hand,
+his narrative abounds in striking incidents, in curious details of
+tribes and localities that have never before been described, and
+in perils and hardships not the less real and painful that they
+proceeded from no efforts of a resolute and formidable foe, but from
+the effects of a pernicious climate, and the caprice and negligence
+of a wilful and indolent commander.
+
+  [1] _Blackwood's Magazine_, No. CCCXCIX., for January 1849.
+
+It was early in 1840, and Mr Werne and his youngest brother Joseph
+had been resident for a whole year at Chartum, chief town of the
+province of Sudan, in the country of Sennaar. Chartum, it will be
+remembered by the readers of the "Expedition for the Discovery of
+the Sources of the White Nile," is situated at the confluence of
+the White and Blue streams, which, there uniting, flow northwards
+through Nubia and Egypt Proper to Cairo and the Mediterranean; and
+at Chartum it was that the two Wernes had beheld, in the previous
+November, the departure of the first expedition up Nile, which they
+were forbidden to join, and which met with little success. The
+elder Werne, whose portrait--that of a very determined-looking
+man, bearded, and in Oriental costume--is appended to the present
+volume, appears to have been adventurous and a rambler from his
+youth upwards. In 1822 he had served in Greece, and had now been
+for many years in Eastern lands. Joseph Werne, his youngest and
+favourite brother, had come to Egypt at his instigation, after
+taking at Berlin his degree as Doctor of Medicine, to study, before
+commencing practice, some of the extraordinary diseases indigenous
+in that noxious climate. Unfortunately, as recorded in Mr Werne's
+former work, this promising young man, who seems to have possessed
+in no small degree the enterprise, perseverance, and fortitude so
+remarkable in his brother, ultimately fell a victim to one of those
+fatal maladies whose investigation was the principal motive of his
+visit to Africa. The first meeting in Egypt of the two brothers was
+at Cairo; and of it a characteristic account is given by the elder,
+an impetuous, we might almost say a pugnacious man, tolerably prompt
+to take offence, and upon whom, as he himself says at page 67, the
+Egyptian climate had a violently irritating effect.
+
+"Our meeting, at Guerra's tavern in Cairo, was so far remarkable,
+that my brother knew me immediately, whilst I took him for some
+impertinent Frenchman, disposed to make game of me, inasmuch as he,
+in the petulance of his joy, fixed his eyes upon me, measuring me
+from top to toe, and then laughed at the fury with which I rushed
+upon him, to call him to an account, and, if necessary, to have him
+out. We had not seen each other for eight years, during which he
+had grown into a man, and, moreover, his countenance had undergone
+a change, for, by a terrible cut, received in a duel, the muscle of
+risibility had been divided on one side, and the poor fellow could
+laugh only with half his face. In the first overpowering joy of our
+meeting in this distant quarter of the globe, we could not get the
+wine over our tongues, often as my Swiss friend De Salis (over whose
+cheeks the tears were chasing each other) and other acquaintances
+struck their glasses against ours, encouraging us to drink.... I now
+abandoned the hamlet of Tura--situated in the desert, but near the
+Nile, about three leagues above Cairo, and whither I had retreated
+to do penance and to work at my travels--as well as my good friend
+Dr Schledehaus of Osnabruck, (then holding an appointment at the
+military school, now director of the marine hospital of Alexandria,)
+with whom my brother had studied at Bonn, and I hired a little house
+in the Esbekie Square in Cairo. After half an hour's examination,
+Joseph was appointed surgeon-major, with the rank of a Sakulagassi
+or captain, in the central hospital of Kasr-el-Ain, with a thousand
+piastres a month, and rations for a horse and four servants. Our
+views constantly directed to the interior of Africa, we suffered
+a few months to glide by in the old city of the Khalifs, dwelling
+together in delightful brotherly harmony. But our thirst for
+travelling was unslaked; to it I had sacrificed my appointment as
+chancellor of the Prussian Consulate at Alexandria; Joseph received
+his nomination as regimental surgeon to the 1st regiment in Sennaar,
+including that of physician to the central hospital at Chartum. Our
+friends were concerned for us on account of the dangerous climate,
+but, nevertheless, we sailed with good courage up the Nile, happy
+to escape from the noise of the city, and to be on our way to new
+scenes."
+
+A stroke of the sun, received near the cataract of Ariman in
+Upper Nubia, and followed by ten days' delirium, soon convinced
+the younger Werne that his friends' anxiety on his behalf was
+not groundless. During the whole of their twelvemonth's stay at
+Chartum, they were mercilessly persecuted by intermittent fever,
+there most malignant, and under whose torturing and lowering attacks
+their sole consolation was that, as they never chanced both to be
+ill together, they were able alternately to nurse each other. At
+last, fearing that body or mind would succumb to these reiterated
+fever-fits, and the first expedition up the White Nile having, to
+their great disgust and disappointment, sailed without them, they
+made up their minds to quit for ever the pestiferous Chartum and the
+burning steppes of Bellad-Sudan. Whilst preparing for departure,
+they received a visit from the chief Cadi, who told them, over a
+glass of cardinal--administered by Dr Werne as medicine, to evade
+his Mahomedan scruples--that Effendina (Excellency) Achmet Bascha
+was well pleased with the brotherly love they manifested, taking
+care of each other in sickness, and that they would do well to pay
+their respects occasionally at the Divan. This communication was
+almost immediately followed by the arrival at Chartum of Dr Gand,
+physician to Abbas Bascha. This gentleman had been a comrade of
+Ferdinand Werne's in Greece, and he recommended the two brothers to
+Achmet, with whom he was intimate, in true Oriental style, as men
+of universal genius and perfect integrity, to whom he might intrust
+both his body and his soul. The consequence of this liberal encomium
+was, that Achmet fixed his eyes upon them to accompany him, in
+the capacity of confidential advisers, upon a projected campaign.
+Informed of this plan and of the advantages it included, the Wernes
+joyfully abandoned their proposed departure. Joseph was to be
+made house-physician to Achmet and his harem, as well as medical
+inspector of the whole province, in place of Soliman Effendi, (the
+renegade Baron di Pasquali of Palermo,) a notorious poisoner, in
+whose hands the Bascha did not consider himself safe. Ferdinand
+Werne, who had held the rank of captain in Greece, was made
+_bimbaschi_ or major, and was attached, as engineer, to Achmet's
+person, with good pay and many privileges. "At a later period he
+would have made me bey, if I--not on his account, for he was an
+enlightened Circassian, but on that of the Turkish jackasses--would
+have turned Mussulman. I laughed at this, and he said no more about
+it." Delighted to have secured the services of the two Germans,
+Achmet ordered it to be reported to his father-in-law, Mehemet Ali,
+for his approval, and took counsel with his new officers concerning
+the approaching campaign. Turk-like, he proposed commencing it in
+the rainy season. Mr Werne opposed this as likely to cost him half
+his army, the soldiers being exceedingly susceptible to rain, and
+advised the erection of blockhouses at certain points along the
+line of march where springs were to be found, to secure water for
+the troops. The Bascha thought this rather a roundabout mode of
+proceeding, held his men's lives very cheap, and boasted of his
+seven hundred dromedaries, every one of which, in case of need,
+could carry three soldiers. His counsellors were dismissed, with
+injunctions to secresy, and on their return home they found at their
+door, as a present from the Bascha, two beautiful dromedaries,
+tall, powerful, ready saddled for a march, and particularly adapted
+for a campaign, inasmuch as they started not when muskets were
+fired between their ears. A few days later, Mr Werne was sent
+for by Achmet, who, when the customary coffee had been taken,
+dismissed his attendants by a sign, and informed him, with a gloomy
+countenance, that the people of Taka refused to pay their _tulba_,
+or tribute. His predecessor, Churdschid Bascha, having marched into
+that country, had been totally defeated in a _chaaba_, or tract of
+forest. Since that time, Achmet mournfully declared, the tribes had
+not paid a single piastre, and he found himself grievously in want
+of money. So, instead of marching south-westward to Darfour, as he
+had intended, he would move north-eastward to Taka, chastise the
+stubborn insolvents, and replenish the coffers of the state. "Come
+with me," said he, to Mr Werne; "upon the march we shall all recover
+our health," (he also suffered from frequent and violent attacks of
+fever;) "yonder are water and forests, as in Germany and Circassia,
+and very high mountains." It mattered little to so restless and
+rambling a spirit as Mr Ferdinand Werne whether his route lay inland
+towards the Mountains of the Moon, or coastwards to the Red Sea. His
+brother was again sick, and spoke of leaving the country; but Mr
+Werne cheered him up, pointed out to him upon the map an imaginary
+duchy which he was to conquer in the approaching war, and revived
+an old plan of going to settle at Bagdad, there to practise as
+physician and apothecary. "We resolved, therefore, to take our
+passports with us, so that, if we chose, we might embark on the Red
+Sea. By this time I had seen through the Bascha, and I resolved to
+communicate to him an idea which I often, in the interest of these
+oppressed tribes, had revolved in my mind, namely, that he should
+place himself at their head, and renounce obedience to the Egyptian
+vampire. I did subsequently speak to him of the plan, and it might
+have been well and permanently carried out, had he not, instead of
+striving to win the confidence of the chiefs, tyrannised over them
+in every possible manner. Gold and regiments! was his motto."
+
+Meanwhile the influential Dr Gand had fallen seriously ill, and
+was so afflicted with the irritability already referred to as a
+consequence of the climate, that no one could go near him but the
+two Wernes. He neglected Joseph's good advice to quit Chartum at
+once, put it off till it was too late, and died on his journey
+northwards. His body lay buried for a whole year in the sand of the
+desert; then his family, who were going to France, dug it up to take
+with them. Always a very thin man, little more than skin and bone,
+the burning sand had preserved him like a mummy. There was no change
+in his appearance; not a hair gone from his mustaches. Strange is
+the confusion and alternation of life and death in that ardent
+and unwholesome land of Nubia. To-day in full health, to-morrow
+prostrate with fever, from which you recover only to be again
+attacked. Dead, in twenty-four hours or less corruption is busy on
+the corpse; bury it promptly in the sand, and in twelve months you
+may disinter it, perfect as if embalmed. At Chartum, the very focus
+of disease, death, it might be thought, is sufficiently supplied by
+fever to need no other purveyors. Nevertheless poisoning seems a
+pretty common practice there. Life in Chartum is altogether, by Mr
+Werne's account, a most curious thing. During the preparations for
+the campaign, a Wurtemberg prince, Duke Paul William of Mergentheim,
+arrived in the place, and was received with much pomp. "For the
+first time I saw the Bascha sit upon a chair; he was in full
+uniform, a red jacket adorned with gold, a great diamond crescent,
+and three brilliant stars upon his left breast, his sabre by his
+side." The prince, a fat good-humoured German, was considerably
+impressed by the state displayed, and left the presence with many
+obeisances. The next day he dined with the Bascha, whom he and the
+Wernes hoped to see squatted on the ground, and feeding with his
+fingers. They were disappointed; the table was arranged in European
+fashion; wine of various kinds was there, especially champagne,
+(which the servants, notwithstanding Werne's remonstrances, insisted
+on shaking before opening, and which consequently flew about the
+room in foaming fountains;) bumper-toasts were drunk; and the
+whole party, Franks and Turks, seem to have gradually risen into
+a glorious state of intoxication, during which they vowed eternal
+friendship to each other in all imaginable tongues; and the German
+prince declared he would make the campaign to Taka with the Bascha,
+draw out the plan, and overwhelm the enemy. This jovial meeting
+was followed by a quieter entertainment given by the Wernes to the
+prince, who declared he was travelling as a private gentleman, and
+wished to be treated accordingly; and then Soliman Effendi, the
+Sicilian renegade, made a respectful application for permission to
+invite the "_Altezza Tedesca_," for whom he had conceived a great
+liking. A passage from Mr Werne is here worth quoting, as showing
+the state of society at Chartum. "I communicated the invitation,
+with the remark that the Sicilian was notorious for his poisonings,
+but that I had less fear on his highness' account than on that of
+my brother, who was already designated to replace him in his post.
+The prince did not heed the danger; moreover, I had put myself on a
+peculiar footing with Soliman Effendi, and now told him plainly that
+he had better keep his vindictive manoeuvres for others than us,
+for that my brother and I should go to dinner with loaded pistols
+in our pockets, and would shoot him through the head (_brucciare
+il cervello_) if one of us three felt as much as a belly-ache at
+his table. The dinner was served in the German fashion; all the
+guests came, except Vaissière (formerly a French captain, now a
+slave-dealer, with the cross of the legion of honour.) He would
+not trust Soliman, who was believed to have poisoned a favourite
+female-slave of his after a dispute they had about money matters.
+The dinner went off merrily and well. The duke changed his mind
+about going to Taka, but promised to join in the campaign on his
+return from Fàszogl, and bade me promise the Bascha in his name a
+crocodile-rifle and a hundred bottles of champagne."
+
+Long and costly were the preparations for the march; the more so
+that Mr Werne and his brother, who saw gleaming in the distance the
+golden cupolas of Bagdad, desired to take all their baggage with
+them, and also sufficient stores for the campaign--not implicitly
+trusting to the Bascha's promise that his kitchen and table should
+be always at their service. Ten camels were needed to carry the
+brothers' baggage. One of their greatest troubles was to know how
+to dispose of their collection of beasts and birds. "The young
+maneless lion, our greatest joy, was dead--Soliman Effendi, who
+was afraid of him, having dared to poison him, as I learned, after
+the renegade's death, from one of our own people." But of birds
+there were a host; eagles, vultures, king-cranes, (_grus pavonina_,
+Linn.;) a snake-killing secretary, with his beautiful eagle head,
+long tail, and heron legs; strange varieties of water-fowl, many
+of which had been shot, but had had the pellets extracted and the
+wounds healed by the skill of Dr Werne; and last, but most beloved,
+"a pet black horn-bird, (_buceros abyss._ L.,) who hopped up to us
+when we called out 'Jack!'--who picked up with his long curved beak
+the pieces of meat that were thrown to him, tossed them into the air
+and caught them again, (whereat the Prince of Wurtemberg laughed
+till he held his sides,) because nature has provided him with too
+short a tongue; but who did not despise frogs and lizards, and who
+called us at daybreak with his persevering '_Hum, hum_,' until we
+roused ourselves and answered 'Jack.'" Their anxiety on account of
+their aviary was relieved by the Bascha's wife, who condescendingly
+offered to take charge of it during their absence. Mehemet Ali's
+daughter suffered dreadfully from ennui in dull, unwholesome
+Chartum, and reckoned on the birds and beasts as pastime and
+diversion. Thus, little by little, difficulties were overcome, and
+all was made ready for the march. A Bolognese doctor of medicine,
+named Bellotti, and Dumont, a French apothecary, arrived at Chartum.
+They belonged to an Egyptian regiment, and must accompany it on the
+_chasua_.[2] Troops assembled in and around Chartum, the greater
+part of whose garrison, destined also to share in the campaign, were
+boated over to the right bank of the Blue Nile. Thence they were
+to march northwards to Damer--once a town, now a village amidst
+ruins--situated about three leagues above the place where the
+Atbara, a river that rises in Abyssinia, and flows north-westward
+through Sennaar, falls into the Nile. There the line of march
+changed its direction to the right, and took a tolerably straight
+route, but inclining a little to the south, in the direction of the
+Red Sea. The Bascha went by water down the Nile the greater part of
+the way to Damer, and was of course attended by his physician. Mr
+Werne, finding himself unwell, followed his example, sending their
+twelve camels by land, and accompanied by Bellotti, Dumont, and a
+Savoyard merchant from Chartum, Bruno Rollet by name. There was
+great difficulty in getting a vessel, all having been taken for the
+transport of provisions and military stores; but at last one was
+discovered, sunk by its owner to save it from the commissariat, and
+after eleven days of sickness, suffering, and peril--during which Mr
+Werne, when burning with fever, had been compelled to jump overboard
+to push the heavy laden boat off the reef on which the stupid Rëis
+had run it--the party rejoined headquarters. There Mr Werne was
+kindly received by Achmet, and most joyfully by his brother. Long
+and dolorous was the tale Dr Joseph had to tell of his sufferings
+with the wild-riding Bascha. Three days before reaching Damer, that
+impatient chieftain left his ship and ordered out the dromedaries.
+The Berlin doctor of medicine felt his heart sink within him; he had
+never yet ascended a dromedary's saddle, and the desperate riding
+of the Bascha made his own Turkish retinue fear to follow him. His
+forebodings were well-founded. Two hours' rough trot shook up his
+interior to such an extent, and so stripped his exterior of skin,
+that he was compelled to dismount and lie down upon some brushwood
+near the Nile, exposed to the burning sun, and with a compassionate
+Bedouin for sole attendant, until the servants and baggage came up.
+Headache, vomiting, terrible heat and parching thirst--for he had
+no drinking vessel, and the Bedouin would not leave him--were his
+portion the whole day, followed by fever and delirium during the
+night. At two o'clock the next day (the hottest time) the Bascha was
+again in the saddle, as if desirous to try to the utmost his own
+endurance and that of his suite. By this time the doctor had come
+up with him, (having felt himself better in the morning,) after a
+six hours' ride, and terrible loss of leather, the blood running
+down into his stockings. Partly on his dromedary, partly on foot,
+he managed to follow his leader through this second day's march,
+at the cost of another night's fever, but in the morning he was
+so weak that he was obliged to take boat and complete his journey
+to Damer by water. Of more slender frame and delicate complexion
+than his brother, the poor doctor was evidently ill-adapted for
+roughing it in African deserts, although his pluck and fortitude
+went far towards supplying his physical deficiencies. Most painful
+are the accounts of his constantly recurring sufferings during
+that arduous expedition; and one cannot but admire and wonder at
+the zeal for science, or ardent thirst for novelty, that supported
+him, and induced him to persevere in the teeth of such hardship and
+ill-health. At Damer he purchased a small dromedary of easy paces,
+and left the Bascha's rough-trotting gift for his brother's riding.
+
+  [2] "The word _chasua_ signifies an expedition along the frontier,
+  or rather _across_ the frontier, for the capture of men and beasts.
+  These slave-hunts are said to have been first introduced here by the
+  Turks, and the word chasua is not believed to be indigenous, since
+  for war and battle are otherwise used _harba_ (properly a lance)
+  and _schàmmata_. _Chasua_ and _razzia_ appear to be synonymous,
+  corrupted from the Italian _cazzia_, in French _chasse_."--_Feldzug
+  von Sennaar_, &c., p. 17.
+
+At three in the afternoon of the 20th March, a cannon-shot gave the
+signal for departure. The Wernes' water-skins were already filled
+and their baggage packed; in an instant their tents were struck and
+camels loaded; with baggage and servants they took their place at
+the head of the column and rode up to the Bascha, who was halted
+to the east of Damer, with his beautiful horses and dromedaries
+standing saddled behind him. He complained of the great disorder
+in the camp, but consoled himself with the reflection that things
+would go better by-and-by. "It was truly a motley scene," says
+Mr Werne. "The Turkish cavalry in their national costume of many
+colours, with yellow and green banners and small kettle-drums; the
+Schaïgië and Mograbin horsemen; Bedouins on horseback, on camels,
+and on foot; the Schechs and Moluks (little king) with their
+armour-bearers behind them on the dromedaries, carrying pikes and
+lances, straight swords and leather shields; the countless donkeys
+and camels--the former led by a great portion of the infantry, to
+ride in turn--drums and an ear-splitting band of music, The Chabir
+(caravan-leader) was seen in the distance mounted on his dromedary,
+and armed with a lance and round shield; the Bascha bestrode his
+horse, and we accompanied him in that direction, whilst gradually,
+and in picturesque disorder, the detachments emerged from the
+monstrous confusion and followed us. The artillery consisted of two
+field-pieces, drawn by camels, which the Bascha had had broken to
+the work, that in the desert they might relieve the customary team
+of mules.
+
+"Abd-el-Kader, the jovial Topschi Baschi, (chief of the artillery,)
+commanded them, and rode a mule. The Turks, (that is to say, chiefly
+Circassians, Kurds, and Arnauts or Albanians,) who shortly before
+could hardly put one leg before the other, seemed transformed
+into new men, as they once more found themselves at home in their
+saddles. They galloped round the Bascha like madmen, riding their
+horses as mercilessly as if they had been drunk with opium. This
+was a sort of honorary demonstration, intended to indicate to their
+chief their untameable valour. The road led through the desert, and
+was tolerably well beaten. Towards evening the Bascha rode forwards
+with the Chabir. We did not follow, for I felt myself unwell. It was
+dark night when we reached the left bank of the Atbara, where we
+threw ourselves down amongst the bushes, and went to sleep, without
+taking supper."
+
+The campaign might now be said to be beginning; at least the army
+was close upon tribes whose disposition, if not avowedly hostile,
+was very equivocal, and the Bascha placed a picket of forty men at
+the only ford over the Atbara, a clear stream of tolerable depth,
+and with lofty banks, covered with rich grass, with mimosas and
+lofty fruit-laden palm-trees. The next day's march was a severe
+one--ten hours without a halt--and was attended, after nightfall,
+with some danger, arising partly from the route lying through
+trees with barbed thorns, strong enough to tear the clothes off
+men's bodies and the eyes out of their heads, and partly from the
+crowding and pressure in the disorderly column during its progress
+amongst holes and chasms occasioned by the overflowing of the river.
+Upon halting, at midnight, a fire was lighted for the Bascha, and
+one of his attendants brought coffee to Mr Werne; but he, sick
+and weary, rejected it, and would have preferred, he says, so
+thoroughly exhausted did he feel, a nap under a bush to a supper
+upon a roasted angel. They were still ascending the bank of the
+Atbara, a winding stream, with wildly beautiful tree-fringed banks,
+containing few fish, but giving shelter, in its deep places, to
+the crocodile and hippopotamus. From the clefts of its sandstone
+bed, then partially exposed by the decline of the waters, sprang a
+lovely species of willow, with beautiful green foliage and white
+umbelliferous flowers, having a perfume surpassing that of jasmine.
+The Wernes would gladly, have explored the neighbourhood; but the
+tremendous heat, and a warm wind which played round their temples
+with a sickening effect, drove them into camp. Gunfire was at noon
+upon that day; but it was Mr Werne's turn to be on the sick-list.
+Suddenly he felt himself so ill, that it was with a sort of
+despairing horror he saw the tent struck from over him, loaded upon
+a camel, and driven off. In vain he endeavoured to rise; the sun
+seemed to dart coals of fire upon his head. His brother and servant
+carried him into the shadow of a neighbouring palm-tree, and he sank
+half-dead upon the glowing sand. It would suffice to abide there
+during the heat of the day, as they thought, but instead of that,
+they were compelled to remain till next morning, Werne suffering
+terribly from dysentery. "Never in my life," he says, "did I more
+ardently long for the setting of the sun than on that day; even
+its last rays exercised the same painful power on my hair, which
+seemed to be in a sort of electric connection with just as many
+sunbeams, and to bristle up upon my head. And no sooner had the
+luminary which inspired me with such horror sunk below the horizon,
+than I felt myself better, and was able to get on my legs and crawl
+slowly about. Some good-natured Arab shepherd-lads approached our
+fire, pitied me, and brought me milk and durra-bread. It was a
+lovely evening; the full moon was reflected in the Atbara, as were
+also the dark crowns of the palm-trees, wild geese shrieked around
+us; otherwise the stillness was unbroken, save at intervals by the
+cooing of doves. There is something beautiful in sleeping in the
+open air, when weather and climate are suitable. We awoke before
+sunrise, comforted, and got upon our dromedaries; but after a couple
+of hours' ride we mistrusted the sun, and halted with some wandering
+Arabs belonging to the Kabyle of the Kammarabs. We were hospitably
+received, and regaled with milk and bread."[3]
+
+  [3] These Kammarabs possess a tract on the left or south bank of
+  the Atbara. The distribution of the different tribes, as well as
+  the line of march and other particulars, are very clearly displayed
+  in the appropriate little map accompanying Mr Werne's volume.
+  Opposite to the Kammarabs, "on the right bank of the Atbara, are the
+  Anafidabs, of the race or family of the Bischari. They form a Kabyle
+  (band or community) under a Schech of their own. How it is that the
+  French in Algiers persist in using _Kabyle_ as the proper name of a
+  nation and a country, I cannot understand."--_Feldzug von Sennaar_,
+  p. 32.
+
+When our two Germans rejoined headquarters, after four days'
+absence, they found Achmet Bascha seated in the shade upon the
+ground in front of his tent, much burned by the sun, and looking
+fagged and suffering--as well he might be after the heat and
+exposure he had voluntarily undergone. Nothing could cure him,
+however, at least as yet, of his fancy for marching in the heat of
+the day. Although obstinate and despotic, the Bascha was evidently
+a dashing sort of fellow, well calculated to win the respect and
+admiration of his wild and heterogeneous army. Weary as were the
+two Wernes, (they reached the camp at noon,) at two o'clock they
+had to be again in the saddle. "A number of gazelles were started;
+the Bascha seized a gun and dashed after them upon his Arabian
+stallion, almost the whole of the cavalry scouring after him like
+a wild mob, and we ourselves riding a sharp trot to witness the
+chase. We thought he had fallen from his horse, so suddenly did he
+swing himself from saddle to ground, killing three gazelles with
+three shots, of which animals we consumed a considerable portion
+roasted for that night's supper." The river here widened, and
+crocodiles showed themselves upon the opposite shore. The day was
+terribly warm; the poor medico was ill again, suffering grievously
+from his head, and complaining of _his hair being so hot_; and as
+the Salamander Bascha persisted in marching under a sun which,
+through the canvass of the tents, heated sabres and musket-barrels
+till it was scarcely possible to grasp them, the brothers again
+lingered behind and followed in the cool of the evening, Joseph
+being mounted upon an easy-going mule lent him by Topschi Baschi,
+the good-humoured but dissolute captain of the guns. They were now
+divided but by the river's breadth from the hostile tribe of the
+Haddenda, and might at any moment be assailed; so two hours after
+sunset a halt was called and numerous camp-fires were lighted,
+producing a most picturesque effect amongst the trees, and by their
+illumination of the diversified costumes of the soldiery, and
+attracting a whole regiment of scorpions, "some of them remarkably
+fine specimens," says Mr Werne, who looks upon these unpleasant
+fireside companions with a scientific eye, "a finger and a half
+long, of a light colour, half of the tail of a brown black and
+covered with hair." It is a thousand pities that the adventurous Mrs
+Ida Pfeiffer did not accompany Mr Werne upon this expedition. She
+would have had the finest possible opportunities of curing herself
+of the prejudice which it will be remembered she was so weak as to
+entertain against the scorpion tribe. These pleasant reptiles were
+as plentiful all along Mr Werne's line of march as are cockchafers
+on a summer evening in an English oak-copse. Their visitations were
+pleasantly varied by those of snakes of all sizes, and of various
+degrees of venom. "At last," says Mr Werne, "one gets somewhat
+indifferent about scorpions and other wild animals." He had greater
+difficulty in accustoming himself to the sociable habits of the
+snakes, who used to glide about amongst tents and baggage, and by
+whom, in the course of the expedition, a great number of persons
+were bitten. On the 12th April "Mohammed Ladham sent us a remarkable
+scorpion--pity that it is so much injured--almost two fingers long,
+black-brown, tail and feet covered with prickly hair, claws as large
+as those of a small crab.... We had laid us down under a green tree
+beside a cotton plantation, whilst our servants unloaded the camels
+and pitched the tents, when a snake, six feet long, darted from
+under our carpet, passed over my leg, and close before my brother's
+face. But we were so exhausted that we lay still, and some time
+afterwards the snake was brought to us, one of Schech Defalla's
+people having killed it." About noon next day a similar snake sprang
+out of the said Defalla's own tent; it was killed also, and found to
+measure six feet two inches. The soldiers perceiving that the German
+physician and his brother were curious in the matter of reptiles,
+brought them masses of serpents; but they had got a notion that the
+flesh was the part coveted (not the skin) to make medicine, and most
+of the specimens were so defaced as to be valueless. Early in May
+"some soldiers assured us they had seen in the thicket a serpent
+twenty feet long, and as thick as a man's leg; probably a species
+of boa--a pity that they could not kill it. The great number of
+serpents with dangerous bites makes our bivouac very unsafe, and we
+cannot encamp with any feeling of security near bushes or amongst
+brushwood; the prick of a blade of straw, the sting of the smallest
+insect, causes a hasty movement, for one immediately fancies it
+is a snake or scorpion; and when out shooting, one's _second_
+glance is for the game, one's _first_ on the ground at his feet,
+for fear of trampling and irritating some venomous reptile." As
+we proceed through the volume we shall come to other accounts of
+beasts and reptiles, so remarkable as really almost to reconcile
+us to the possibility of some of the zoological marvels narrated
+by the Yankee Doctor Mayo in his rhapsody of Kaloolah.[4] For the
+present we must revert to the business of this curiously-conducted
+campaign. As the army advanced, various chiefs presented themselves,
+with retinues more or less numerous. The first of these was the
+Grand-Shech Mohammed Defalla, already named, who came up, with a
+great following, on the 28th March. He was a man of herculean frame;
+and assuredly such was very necessary to enable him to endure in
+that climate the weight of his defensive arms. He wore a double
+shirt of mail over a quilted doublet, arm-plates and beautifully
+wrought steel gauntlets; his casque fitted like a shell to the upper
+part of his head, and had in front, in lieu of a visor, an iron
+bar coming down over the nose--behind, for the protection of the
+nape, a fringe composed of small rings. His straight-bladed sword
+had a golden hilt. The whole equipment, which seems to correspond
+very closely with that of some of the Sikhs or other warlike Indian
+tribes, proceeded from India, and Defalla had forty or fifty such
+suits of arms. About the same time with him, arrived two Schechs
+from the refractory land of Taka, tall handsome men; whilst, from
+the environs of the neighbouring town of Gos-Rajeb, a number of
+people rode out on dromedaries to meet the Bascha, their hair quite
+white with camel-fat, which melted in the sun and streamed over
+their backs. Gos-Rajeb, situated at about a quarter of a mile from
+the left bank of the Atbara, consists of some two hundred _tokul_
+(huts) and clay-built houses, and in those parts is considered
+an important commercial depot, Indian goods being transported
+thither on camels from the port of Souakim, on the Red Sea. The
+inhabitants are of various tribes, more of them red than black
+or brown; but few were visible, many having fled at the approach
+of Achmet's army, which passed the town in imposing array--the
+infantry in double column in the centre, the Turkish cavalry on the
+right, the Schaïgiës and Mograbins on the left, the artillery, with
+kettledrums, cymbals, and other music, in the van--marched through
+the Atbara, there very shallow, and encamped on the right bank, in
+a stony and almost treeless plain, at the foot of two rocky hills.
+The Bascha ordered the Shech of Gos-Rajeb to act as guide to the
+Wernes in their examination of the vicinity, and to afford them all
+the information in his power. The most remarkable spot to which
+he conducted them was to the site of an ancient city, which once,
+according to tradition, had been as large as Cairo, and inhabited
+by Christians. The date of its existence must be very remote, for
+the ground was smooth, and the sole trace of buildings consisted in
+a few heaps of broken bricks. There were indications of a terrible
+conflagration, the bricks in one place being melted together into a
+black glazed mass. Mr Werne could trace nothing satisfactory with
+respect to former Christian occupants, and seems disposed to think
+that Burckhardt, who speaks of Christian monuments at that spot, (in
+the neighbourhood of the hill of Herrerem,) may have been misled by
+certain peculiarly formed rocks.
+
+  [4] _Blackwood's Magazine_, No. CCCCIV., for June 1849.
+
+The most renowned chief of the mutinous tribes of Taka, the
+conqueror of the Turks under Churdschid Bascha, was Mohammed Din,
+Grand-Schech of the Haddenda. This personage, awed by the approach
+of Achmet's formidable force, sent his son to the advancing
+Bascha, as a hostage for his loyalty and submission. Achmet sent
+the young man back to his father as bearer of his commands. The
+next day the army crossed the frontier of Taka, which is not
+very exactly defined, left the Atbara in their rear, and, moving
+still eastwards, beheld before them, in the far distance, the
+blue mountains of Abyssinia. The Bascha's suite was now swelled
+by the arrival of numerous Schechs, great and small, with their
+esquires and attendants. The route lay through a thick forest,
+interwoven with creeping plants and underwood, and with thorny
+mimosas, which grew to a great height. The path was narrow, the
+confusion of the march inconceivably great and perilous, and if
+the enemy had made a vigorous attack with their javelins, which
+they are skilled in throwing, the army must have endured great
+loss, with scarcely a possibility of inflicting any. At last the
+scattered column reached an open space, covered with grass, and
+intersected with deep narrow rills of water. The Bascha, who had
+outstripped his troops, was comfortably encamped, heedless of their
+fate, whilst they continued for a long time to emerge in broken
+parties from the wood. Mr Werne's good opinion of his generalship
+had been already much impaired, and this example of true Turkish
+indolence, and of the absence of any sort of military dispositions
+under such critical circumstances, completely destroyed it. The
+next day there was some appearance of establishing camp-guards,
+and of taking due precautions against the fierce and numerous
+foe, who on former occasions had thrice defeated Turkish armies,
+and from whom an attack might at any moment be expected. In the
+afternoon an alarm was given; the Bascha, a good soldier, although
+a bad general, was in the saddle in an instant, and gallopping
+to the spot, followed by all his cavalry, whilst the infantry
+rushed confusedly in the same direction. The uproar had arisen,
+however, not from Arab assailants, but from some soldiers who had
+discovered extensive corn magazines--_silos_, as they are called
+in Algeria--holes in the ground, filled with grain, and carefully
+covered over. By the Bascha's permission, the soldiers helped
+themselves from these abundant granaries, and thus the army found
+itself provided with corn for the next two months. In the course of
+the disorderly distribution, or rather scramble, occurred a little
+fight between the Schaïgië, a quarrelsome set of irregulars, and
+some of the Turks. Nothing could be worse than the discipline of
+Achmet's host. The Schaïgiës were active and daring horsemen, and
+were the first to draw blood in the campaign, in a skirmish upon
+the following day with some ambushed Arabs. The neighbouring woods
+swarmed with these javelin-bearing gentry, although they lay close,
+and rarely showed themselves, save when they could inflict injury
+at small risk. Mr Werne began to doubt the possibility of any
+extensive or effectual operations against these wild and wandering
+tribes, who, on the approach of the army, loaded their goods on
+camels, and fled into the _Chaaba_, or forest district, whither
+it was impossible to follow them. Where was the Bascha to find
+money and food for the support of his numerous army?--where was
+he to quarter it during the dangerous _Chariff_, or rainy season?
+He was very reserved as to his plans; probably, according to Mr
+Werne, because he had none. The Schechs who had joined and marched
+with him could hardly be depended upon, when it was borne in mind
+that they, formerly the independent rulers of a free people, had
+been despoiled of their power and privileges, and were now the
+ill-used vassals of the haughty and stupid Turks, who overwhelmed
+them with imposts, treated them contemptuously, and even subjected
+them to the bastinado. "Mohammed Din, seeing the hard lot of these
+gentlemen, seems disposed to preserve his freedom as long as
+possible, or to sell it as dearly as may be. Should it come to a
+war, there is, upon our side, a total want of efficient leaders, at
+any rate if we except the Bascha. Abdin Aga, chief of the Turkish
+cavalry, a bloated Arnaut; Sorop Effendi, a model of stupidity and
+covetousness; Hassan Effendi Bimbaschi, a quiet sot; Soliman Aga,
+greedy, and without the slightest education of any kind; Hassan
+Effendi of Sennaar, a Turk in the true sense of the word (these
+four are infantry commanders); Mohammed Ladjam, a good-natured but
+inexperienced fellow, chief of the Mograbin cavalry: amongst all
+these officers, the only difference is, that each is more ignorant
+than his neighbour. With such leaders, what can be expected from an
+army that, for the most part, knows no discipline--the Schaïgiës,
+for instance, doing just what they please, and being in a fair way
+to corrupt all the rest--and that is encumbered with an endless
+train of dangerous rabble, idlers, slaves, and women of pleasure,
+serving as a burthen and hindrance? Let us console ourselves with
+the _Allah kerim!_ (God is merciful.)" Mr Werne had not long to
+wait for a specimen of Turkish military skill. On the night of the
+7th April he was watching in his tent beside his grievously sick
+brother, when there suddenly arose an uproar in the camp, followed
+by firing. "I remained by our tent, for my brother was scarcely able
+to stir, and the infantry also remained quiet, trusting to their
+mounted comrades. But when I saw Bimbaschi Hassan Effendi lead a
+company past us, and madly begin to fire over the powder-waggons,
+as if these were meant to serve as barricades against the hostile
+lances, I ran up to him with my sabre drawn, and threatened him
+with the Bascha, as well as with the weapon, whereupon he came to
+his senses, and begged me not to betray him. The whole proved to
+be mere noise, but the harassed Bascha was again up and active.
+He seemed to make no use of his aides-de-camp, and only his own
+presence could inspire his troops with courage. Some of the enemy
+were killed, and there were many tracks of blood leading into the
+wood, although the firing had been at random in the darkness. As
+a specimen of the tactics of our Napoleon-worshipping Bascha, he
+allowed the wells, which were at two hundred yards from camp, to
+remain unguarded at night, so that they might easily have been
+filled up by the enemy. Truly fortunate was it that there were no
+great stones in the neighbourhood to choke them up, for we were
+totally without implements wherewith to have cleared them out
+again." Luckily for this most careless general and helpless army,
+the Arabs neglected to profit by their shortcomings, and on the 14th
+April, after many negotiations, the renowned Mohammed Din himself,
+awed, we must suppose, by the numerical strength of Achmet's troops,
+and over-estimating their real value, committed the fatal blunder
+of presenting himself in the Turkish camp. Great was the curiosity
+to see this redoubted chief, who alighted at Schech Defalla's
+tent, into which the soldiers impudently crowded, to get a view of
+the man before whom many of them had formerly trembled and fled.
+"Mohammed Din is of middle stature, and of a black-brown colour,
+like all his people; his countenance at first says little, but,
+on longer inspection, its expression is one of great cunning; his
+bald head is bare; his dress Arabian, with drawers of a fiery red
+colour. His retinue consists, without exception, of most ill-looking
+fellows, on whose countenances Nature seems to have done her best
+to express the faithless character attributed to the Haddenda.
+They are all above the middle height, and armed with shields and
+lances, or swords." Next morning Mr Werne saw the Bascha seated
+on his _angarèb_, (a sort of bedstead, composed of plaited strips
+of camel-hide, which, upon the march, served as a throne,) with a
+number of Shechs squatted upon the ground on either side of him,
+amongst them Mohammed Din, looking humbled, and as if half-repentant
+of his rash step. The Bascha appeared disposed to let him feel that
+he was now no better than a caged lion, whose claws the captor can
+cut at will. He showed him, however, marks of favour, gave him a red
+shawl for a turban, and a purple mantle with gold tassels, but no
+sabre, which Mr Werne thought a bad omen. The Schech was suffered to
+go to and fro between the camp and his own people, but under certain
+control--now with an escort of Schaïgiës, then leaving his son as
+hostage. He sent in some cattle and sheep as a present, and promised
+to bring the tribute due; this he failed to do, and a time was
+fixed to him and the other Shechs within which to pay up arrears.
+Notwithstanding the subjection of their chief, the Arabs continued
+their predatory practices, stealing camels from the camp, or taking
+them by force from the grooms who drove them out to pasture.
+
+Mr Werne's book is a journal, written daily during the campaign but,
+owing to the long interval between its writing and publication, he
+has found it necessary to make frequent parenthetical additions,
+corrective or explanatory. Towards the end of April, during great
+sickness in camp, he writes as follows:--"My brother's medical
+observations and experiments begin to excite in me a strong
+interest. He has promised me that he will keep a medical journal;
+but he must first get into better health, for now it is always with
+sickening disgust that he returns from visiting his patients; he
+complains of the insupportable effluvia from these people, sinks
+upon his _angarèb_ with depression depicted in his features, and
+falls asleep with open eyes, so that I often feel quite uneasy."
+Then comes the parenthesis of ten years' later date. "Subsequently,
+when I had joined the expedition for the navigation of the White
+Nile, he wrote to me from the camp of Kàssela-el-Lus to Chartum,
+that, with great diligence and industry, he had written some
+valuable papers on African diseases, and was inconsolable at having
+lost them. He had been for ten days dangerously ill, had missed me
+sadly, and, in a fit of delirium, when his servant asked him for
+paper to light the fire, had handed him his manuscript, which the
+stupid fellow had forthwith burned. At the same time, he lamented
+that, during his illness, our little menagerie had been starved to
+death. The Bascha had been to see him, and by his order Topschi
+Baschi had taken charge of his money, that he might not be robbed,
+giving the servants what was needful for their keep, and for the
+purchase of flesh for the animals. The servants had drunk the money
+intended for the beasts' food. When my brother recovered his health,
+he had the _fagged_, (a sort of lynx,) which had held out longest,
+and was only just dead, cut open, and so convinced himself that
+it had died of hunger. The annoyance one has to endure from these
+people is beyond conception, and the very mildest-tempered man--as,
+for instance, my late brother--is compelled at times to make use of
+the whip."
+
+Whilst Mohammed Din and the other Shechs, accompanied by detachments
+of Turkish troops, intended partly to support them in their demands,
+and partly to reconnoitre the country, endeavoured to get together
+the stipulated tribute, the army remained stationary. But repose
+did not entail monotony; strange incidents were of daily occurrence
+in this singular camp. The Wernes, always anxious for the increase
+of their cabinet of stuffed birds and beasts, sent their huntsman
+Abdallah with one of the detachments, remaining themselves, for the
+present at least, at headquarters, to collect whatever might come
+in their way. The commander of the Mograbins sent them an antelope
+as big as a donkey, having legs like a cow, and black twisted
+horns. From the natives little was to be obtained. They were very
+shy and ill-disposed, and could not be prevailed upon, even by
+tenfold payment, to supply the things most abundant with them, as
+for instance milk and honey. In hopes of alluring and conciliating
+them, the Bascha ordered those traders who had accompanied the army
+to establish a bazaar outside the fence enclosing the camp. The
+little mirrors that were there sold proved a great attraction. The
+Arabs would sit for whole days looking in them, and pulling faces.
+But no amount of reflection could render them amicable or honest:
+they continued to steal camels and asses whenever they could, and
+one of them caught a Schaigie's horse, led him up to the camp,
+and stabbed him to death. So great was the hatred of these tribes
+to their oppressors--a hatred which would have shown itself by
+graver aggressions, but for Achmet's large force, and above all,
+for their dread of firearms. Within the camp there was wild work
+enough at times. The good-hearted, hot-headed Werne was horribly
+scandalised by the ill-treatment of the slaves. Dumont, the French
+apothecary, had a poor lad named Amber, a mere boy, willing and
+industrious, whom he continually beat and kicked, until at last Mr
+Werne challenged him to a duel with sabres, and threatened to take
+away the slave, which he, as a Frenchman, had no legal right to
+possess. But this was nothing compared to the cruelties practised
+by other Europeans, and especially at Chartum by one Vigoureux, (a
+French corporal who had served under Napoleon, and was now adjutant
+of an Egyptian battalion,) and his wife, upon a poor black girl,
+only ten years of age, whom they first barbarously flogged, and
+then tied to a post, with her bleeding back exposed to the broiling
+sun. Informed of this atrocity by his brother, who had witnessed
+it, Mr Werne sprang from his sickbed, and flew to the rescue, armed
+with his sabre, and with a well-known iron stick, ten pounds in
+weight, which had earned him the nickname of Abu-Nabut, or Father
+of the Stick. A distant view of his incensed countenance sufficed,
+and the Frenchman, cowardly as cruel, hastened to release his
+victim, and to humble himself before her humane champion. Concerning
+this corporal and his dame, whom he had been to France to fetch,
+and who was brought to bed on camel-back, under a burning sun,
+in the midst of the desert, some curious reminiscences are set
+down in the _Feldzug_, as are also some diverting details of the
+improprieties of the dissipated gunner Topschi Baschi, who, on the
+1st May, brought dancing-girls into the hut occupied by the two
+Germans, and assembled a mob round it by the indecorous nature of
+his proceedings. Regulations for the internal order and security of
+the camp were unheard of. After a time, tents were pitched over the
+ammunition; a ditch was dug around it, and strict orders were given
+to light no fire in its vicinity. All fires, too, by command of the
+Bascha, were to be extinguished when the evening gun was fired.
+For a short time the orders were obeyed; then they were forgotten;
+fires were seen blazing late at night, and within fifteen paces of
+the powder. Nothing but the bastinado could give memory to these
+reckless fatalists. "I have often met ships upon the Nile, so laden
+with straw that there was scarcely room for the sailors to work
+the vessel. No matter for that; in the midst of the straw a mighty
+kitchen-fire was merrily blazing."
+
+On the 6th of May, the two Wernes mounted their dromedaries and set
+off, attended by one servant, and with a guide provided by Mohammed
+Defalla, for the village of El Soffra, at a distance of two and a
+half leagues, where they expected to find Mohammed Din and a large
+assemblage of his tribe. It was rather a daring thing to advance
+thus unescorted into the land of the treacherous Haddendas, and
+the Bascha gave his consent unwillingly; but Mussa, (Moses,) the
+Din's only son, was hostage in the camp, and they deemed themselves
+safer alone than with the half company of soldiers Achmet wanted
+to send with them. Their route lay due east, at first through
+fields of _durra_, (a sort of grain,) afterwards through forests of
+saplings. The natives they met greeted them courteously, and they
+reached El Soffra without molestation, but there learned, to their
+considerable annoyance, that Mohammed Din had gone two leagues and
+a half farther, to the camp of his nephew Shech Mussa, at Mitkenàb.
+So, after a short pause, they again mounted their camels, and rode
+off, loaded with maledictions by the Arabs, because they would
+not remain and supply them with medicine, although the same Arabs
+refused to requite the drugs with so much as a cup of milk. They
+rode for more than half an hour before emerging from the straggling
+village, which was composed of wretched huts made of palm-mats,
+having an earthen cooking-vessel, a leathern water-bottle, and two
+stones for bruising corn, for sole furniture. The scanty dress of
+the people--some of the men had nothing but a leathern apron round
+their hips, and a sheep-skin, with the wool inwards, over their
+shoulders--their long hair and wild countenances, gave them the
+appearance of thorough savages. In the middle of every village
+was an open place, where the children played stark naked in the
+burning sun, their colour and their extraordinarily nimble movements
+combining, says Mr Werne, to give them the appearance of a troop
+of young imps. Infants, which in Europe would lie helpless in the
+cradle, are there seen rolling in the sand, with none to mind them,
+and playing with the young goats and other domestic animals. In that
+torrid climate, the development of the human frame is wonderfully
+rapid. Those women of whom the travellers caught a sight in this
+large village, which consisted of upwards of two thousand huts and
+tents, were nearly all old and ugly. The young ones, when they by
+chance encountered the strangers, covered their faces, and ran away.
+On the road to Mitkenàb, however, some young and rather handsome
+girls showed themselves. "They all looked at us with great wonder,"
+says Mr Werne, "and took us for Turks, for we are the first Franks
+who have come into this country."
+
+Mitkenàb, pleasantly situated amongst lofty trees, seemed to
+invite the wanderers to cool shelter from the mid-day sun. They
+were parched with thirst when they entered it, but not one of the
+inquisitive Arabs who crowded around them would attend to their
+request for a draught of milk or water. Here, however, was Mohammed
+Din, and with him a party of Schaïgiës under Melek Mahmud, whom
+they found encamped under a great old tree, with his fifty horsemen
+around him. After they had taken some refreshment, the Din came to
+pay them a visit. He refused to take the place offered him on an
+_angarèb_, but sat down upon the ground, giving them to understand,
+with a sneering smile, that _that_ was now the proper place for
+him. "We had excellent opportunity to examine the physiognomy of
+this Schech, who is venerated like a demigod by all the Arabs
+between the Atbara and the Red Sea. 'He is a brave man,' they say,
+'full of courage; there is no other like him!' His face is fat and
+round, with small grey-brown, piercing, treacherous-looking eyes,
+expressing both the cunning and the obstinacy of his character;
+his nose is well-proportioned and slightly flattened; his small
+mouth constantly wears a satirical scornful smile. But for this
+expression and his thievish glance, his bald crown and well-fed
+middle-sized person would become a monk's hood. He goes with his
+head bare, wears a white cotton shirt and _ferda_, and sandals on
+his feet.... We told him that he was well known to the Franks as
+a great hero; he shook his head and said that on the salt lake,
+at Souakim, he had seen great ships with cannon, but that he did
+not wish the help of the Inglèb (English;) then he said something
+else, which was not translated to us. I incautiously asked him, how
+numerous his nation was. 'Count the trees,' he replied, glancing
+ironically around him; (a poll-tax constituted a portion of the
+tribute.) Conversation through an interpreter was so wearisome that
+we soon took our leave." At Mitkenàb they were upon the borders
+of the great forest (Chaaba) that extends from the banks of the
+Atbara to the shores of the Red Sea. It contains comparatively few
+lofty trees--most of these getting uprooted by hurricanes, when the
+rainy season has softened the ground round their roots--but a vast
+deal of thicket and dense brushwood, affording shelter to legions
+of wild beasts; innumerable herds of elephants, rhinoceroses,
+lions, tigers, giraffes, various inferior beasts, and multitudes
+of serpents of the most venomous description. For fear of these
+unpleasant neighbours, no Arab at Mitkenàb quits his dwelling after
+nightfall. "When we returned to the wells, a little before sundown,
+we found all the Schaïgiës on the move, to take up their quarters in
+an enclosure outside the village, partly on account of the beasts
+of prey, especially the lions, which come down to drink of a night,
+partly for safety from the unfriendly Arabs. We went with them
+and encamped with Mammud in the middle of the enclosure. We slept
+soundly the night through, only once aroused by the hoarse cries of
+the hyenas, which were sneaking about the village, setting all the
+dogs barking. To insure our safety, Mohammed Din himself slept at
+our door--so well-disposed were his people towards us." A rumour had
+gained credit amongst the Arabs, that the two mysterious strangers
+were, sent by Achmet to reconnoitre the country for the Bascha's own
+advance; and so incensed were they at this, that, although their
+beloved chief's son was a hostage in the Turkish camp, it was only
+by taking bypaths, under guidance of a young relative of Schech
+Mussa's, that the Wernes were able to regain their camp in safety.
+A few days after their return they were both attacked by bad fever,
+which for some time prevented them from writing. They lost their
+reckoning, and thenceforward the journal is continued without dates.
+
+The Bascha grew weary of life in camp, and pined after action. In
+vain did the Schaïgiës toss the djereed, and go through irregular
+tournaments and sham fights for his diversion; in vain did he
+rattle the dice with Topschi Baschi; vain were the blandishments
+of an Abyssinian beauty whom he had quartered in a hut surrounded
+with a high fence, and for whose amusement he not unfrequently had
+nocturnal serenades performed by the band of the 8th regiment; to
+which brassy and inharmonious challenge the six thousand donkeys
+assembled in camp never failed to respond by an ear-splitting bray,
+whilst the numerous camels bellowed a bass: despite all these
+amusements, the Bascha suffered from ennui. He was furious when
+he saw how slowly and scantily came in the tribute for which he
+had made this long halt. Some three hundred cows were all that had
+yet been delivered; a ridiculously small number contrasted with
+the vast herds possessed by those tribes. Achmet foamed with rage
+at this ungrateful return for his patience and consideration. He
+reproached the Schechs who were with him, and sent for Mohammed Din,
+Shech Mussa, and the two Shechs of Mitkenàb. Although their people,
+foreboding evil, endeavoured to dissuade them from obedience, they
+all four came and were forthwith put in irons and chained together.
+With all his cunning Mohammed Din had fallen into the snare. His
+plan had been, so Mr Werne believes, to cajole and detain the Turks
+by fair words and promises until the rainy season, when hunger
+and sickness would have proved his best allies. The Bascha had
+been beforehand with him, and the old marauder might now repent
+at leisure that he had not trusted to his impenetrable forests
+and to the javelins of his people, rather than to the word of a
+Turk. On the day of his arrest the usual evening gun was loaded
+with canister, and fired into the woods in the direction of the
+Haddendas, the sound of cannon inspiring the Arab and negro tribes
+with a panic fear. Firearms--to them incomprehensible weapons--have
+served more than anything else to daunt their courage. "When the
+Turks attacked a large and populous mountain near Faszogl, the
+blacks sent out spies to see how strong was the foe, and how armed.
+The spies came back laughing, and reported that there was no great
+number of men; that their sole arms were shining sticks upon their
+shoulders, and that they had neither swords, lances, nor shields.
+The poor fellows soon found how terrible an effect had the sticks
+they deemed so harmless. As they could not understand how it was
+that small pieces of lead should wound and kill, a belief got abroad
+amongst them, that the Afrite, Scheitàn, (the devil or evil spirit,)
+dwelt in the musket-barrels. With this conviction, a negro, grasping
+a soldier's musket, put his hand over the mouth of the barrel, that
+the afrite might not get out. The soldier pulled the trigger, and
+the leaden devil pierced the poor black's hand and breast. After
+an action, a negro collected the muskets of six or seven slain
+soldiers, and joyfully carried them home, there to forge them into
+lances in the presence of a party of his friends. But it happened
+that some of them were loaded, and soon getting heated in the fire,
+they went off, scattering death and destruction around them." Most
+of the people in Taka run from the mere report of a musket, but the
+Arabs of Hedjàs, a mountainous district near the Red Sea, possess
+firearms, and are slow but very good shots.
+
+In the way of tribute, nothing was gained by the imprisonment of
+Mahommed Din and his companions. No more contributions came in, and
+not an Arab showed himself upon the market-place outside the camp.
+Mohammed Din asked why his captors did not kill rather than confine
+him; he preferred death to captivity, and keeping him prisoner would
+lead, he said, to no result. The Arab chiefs in camp did not conceal
+their disgust at the Bascha's treatment of their Grand-Shech, and
+taxed Achmet with having broken his word, since he had given him the
+Amàhn--promise of pardon. Any possibility of conciliating the Arabs
+was destroyed by the step that had been taken. At night they swarmed
+round the camp, shrieking their war-cry. The utmost vigilance was
+necessary; a third of the infantry was under arms all night, the
+consequent fatigue increasing the amount of sickness. The general
+aspect of things was anything but cheering. The Wernes had their
+private causes of annoyance. Six of their camels, including the two
+excellent dromedaries given to them by the Bascha before quitting
+Chartum, were stolen whilst their camel-driver slept, and could
+not be recovered. They were compelled to buy others, and Mr Werne
+complains bitterly of the heavy expenses of the campaign--expenses
+greatly augmented by the sloth and dishonesty of their servants.
+The camel-driver, fearing to face his justly-incensed employers,
+disappeared and was no more heard of. Upon this and other occasions,
+Mr Werne was struck by the extraordinary skill of the Turks in
+tracing animals and men by their footsteps. In this manner his
+servants tracked his camels to an Arab village, although the road
+had been trampled by hundreds of beasts of the same sort. "If
+these people have once seen the footprint of a man, camel, horse,
+or ass, they are sure to recognise it amongst thousands of such
+impressions, and will follow the trail any distance, so long as the
+ground is tolerably favourable, and wind or rain has not obliterated
+the marks. In cases of loss, people send for a man who makes this
+kind of search his profession; they show him a footprint of the
+lost animal, and immediately, without asking any other indication,
+he follows the track through the streets of a town, daily trodden
+by thousands, and seldom falls to hunt out the game. He does not
+proceed slowly, or stoop to examine the ground, but his sharp eye
+follows the trail at a run. We ourselves saw the footstep of a
+runaway slave shown to one of these men, who caught the fugitive at
+the distance of three days' journey from that spot. My brother once
+went out of the Bascha's house at Chartum, to visit a patient who
+lived far off in the town. He had been gone an hour when the Bascha
+desired to see him, and the tschansch (orderly) traced him at once
+by his footmarks on the unpaved streets in which crowds had left
+similar signs. When, in consequence of my sickness, we lingered for
+some days on the Atbara, and then marched to overtake the army, the
+Schaïgiës who escorted us detected, amidst the hoof-marks of the
+seven or eight thousand donkeys accompanying the troops, those of a
+particular jackass belonging to one of their friends, and the event
+proved that they were right." Mr Werne fills his journal, during
+his long sojourn in camp, with a great deal of curious information
+concerning the habits and peculiarities of both Turks and Arabs,
+as well as with the interesting results of his observations on the
+brute creation. The soldiers continued to bring to him and his
+brother all manner of animals and reptiles--frogs, whole coils of
+snakes, and chameleons, which there abound, but whose changes of
+colour Mr Werne found to be much less numerous than is commonly
+believed. For two months he watched the variations of hue of these
+curious lizards, and found them limited to different shades of grey
+and green, with yellow stripes and spots. He made a great pet of
+a young wild cat, which was perfectly tame, and extraordinarily
+handsome. Its colour was grey, beautifully spotted with black,
+like a panther; its head was smaller and more pointed than that of
+European cats; its ears, of unusual size, were black, with white
+stripes. Many of the people in camp took it to be a young tiger, but
+the natives called it a _fagged_, and said it was a sort of cat, in
+which Mr Werne agreed with them. "Its companion and playfellow is a
+rat, about the size of a squirrel, with a long silvery tail, which,
+when angry, it swells out, and sets up over its back. This poor
+little beast was brought to us with two broken legs, and we gave it
+to the cat, thinking it was near death. But the cat, not recognising
+her natural prey--and moreover feeling the want of a companion--and
+the rat, tamed by pain and cured by splints, became inseparable
+friends, ate together, and slept arm in arm. The rat, which was not
+ugly like our house rats, but was rather to be considered handsome,
+by reason of its long frizzled tail, never made use of its liberty
+to escape." Notwithstanding the numerous devices put in practice
+by the Wernes to pass their time, it at last began to hang heavy,
+and their pipes were almost their sole resource and consolation.
+Smoking is little customary in Egypt, except amongst the Turks and
+Arabs. The Mograbins prefer chewing. The blacks of the Gesira make a
+concentrated infusion of this weed, which they call _bucca_; take a
+mouthful of it, and roll the savoury liquor round their teeth for a
+quarter of an hour before ejecting it. They are so addicted to this
+practice, that they invite their friends to "bucca" as Europeans do
+to dinner. The vessel containing the tobacco juice makes the round
+of the party, and a profound silence ensues, broken only by the
+harmonious gurgle of the delectable fluid. Conversation is carried
+on by signs.
+
+"We shall march to-morrow," had long been the daily assurance of
+those wiseacres, to be found in every army, who always know what
+the general means to do better than the general himself. At last
+the much-desired order was issued--of course when everybody least
+expected it--and, after a night of bustle and confusion, the army
+got into motion, in its usual disorderly array. Its destination was
+a mountain called Kassela-el-Lus, in the heart of the Taka country,
+whither the Bascha had sent stores of grain, and where he proposed
+passing the rainy season and founding a new town. The distance was
+about fourteen hours' march. The route led south-eastwards, at
+first through a level country, covered with boundless fields of
+tall _durra_. At the horizon, like a great blue cloud, rose the
+mountain of Kassela, a blessed sight to eyes that had long been
+weary of the monotonous level country. After a while the army got
+out of the durra-fields, and proceeded over a large plain scantily
+overgrown with grass, observing a certain degree of military
+order and discipline, in anticipation of an attempt, on the part
+of the angry Arabs, to rescue Mohammed Din and his companions in
+captivity. Numerous hares and jackals were started and ridden
+down. Even gazelles, swift as they are, were sometimes overtaken
+by the excellent Turkish horses. Presently the grass grew thicker
+and tall enough to conceal a small donkey, and they came to wooded
+tracts and jungles, and upon marks of elephants and other wild
+beasts. The foot-prints of the elephants, in places where the ground
+had been slightly softened by the rain, were often a foot deep,
+and from a foot and a half to two feet in length and breadth. Mr
+Werne regrets not obtaining a view of one of these giant brutes.
+The two-horned rhinoceros is also common in that region, and is
+said to be of extraordinary ferocity in its attacks upon men and
+beasts, and not unfrequently to come off conqueror in single combat
+with the elephant. "Suddenly the little Schaïgiës cavalry set up
+a great shouting, and every one handled his arms, anticipating an
+attack from the Arabs. But soon the cry of 'Asset! Asset!' (lion)
+was heard, and we gazed eagerly on every side, curious for the
+lion's appearance. The Bascha had already warned his chase-loving
+cavalry, under penalty of a thousand blows, not to quit their ranks
+on the appearance of wild beasts, for in that broken ground he
+feared disorder in the army and an attack from the enemy. I and
+my brother were at that moment with Melek Mahmud at the outward
+extremity of the left wing; suddenly a tolerably large lioness
+trotted out of a thicket beside us, not a hundred paces off. She
+seemed quite fearless, for she did not quicken her pace at sight
+of the army. The next minute a monstrous lion showed himself at
+the same spot, roaring frightfully, and apparently in great fury;
+his motions were still slower than those of his female; now and
+then he stood still to look at us, and after coming to within sixty
+or seventy paces--we all standing with our guns cocked, ready to
+receive him--he gave us a parting scowl, and darted away, with great
+bounds, in the track of his wife. In a moment both had disappeared."
+Soon after this encounter, which startled and delighted Dr Werne,
+and made his brother's little dromedary dance with alarm, they
+reached the banks of the great _gohr_, (the bed of a river, filled
+only in the rainy season,) known as El Gasch, which intersects
+the countries of Taka and Basa. With very little daring and still
+less risk, the Haddendas, who are said to muster eighty thousand
+fighting men, might have annihilated the Bascha's army, as it wound
+its toilsome way for nearly a league along the dry water-course,
+(whose high banks were crowned with trees and thick bushes,) the
+camels stumbling and occasionally breaking their legs in the deep
+holes left by the feet of the elephants, where the cavalry could
+not have acted, and where every javelin must have told upon the
+disorderly groups of weary infantry. The Arabs either feared the
+firearms, or dreaded lest their attack should be the signal for
+the instant slaughter of their Grand-Shech, who rode, in the midst
+of the infantry, upon a donkey, which had been given him out of
+consideration for his age, whilst the three other prisoners were
+cruelly forced to perform the whole march on foot, with heavy chains
+on their necks and feet, and exposed to the jibes of the pitiless
+soldiery. On quitting the Gohr, the march was through trees and
+brushwood, and then through a sort of labyrinthine swamp, where
+horses and camels stumbled at every step, and where the Arabs again
+had a glorious opportunity, which they again neglected, of giving
+Achmet such a lesson as they had given to his predecessor in the
+Baschalik. The army now entered the country of the Hallengas, and a
+six days' halt succeeded to their long and painful march.
+
+It would be of very little interest to trace the military operations
+of Achmet Bascha, which were altogether of the most contemptible
+description--consisting in the _chasuas_, or razzias already
+noticed, sudden and secret expeditions of bodies of armed men
+against defenceless tribes, whom they despoiled of their cattle
+and women. From his camp at the foot of Kassela-el-Lus, the Bascha
+directed many of these marauding parties, remaining himself safely
+in a large hut, which Mr Werne had had constructed for him, and
+usually cheating the men and officers, who had borne the fatigue and
+run the risk, out of their promised share of the booty. Sometimes
+the unfortunate natives, driven to the wall and rendered desperate
+by the cruelties of their oppressors, found courage for a stout
+resistance.
+
+"An expedition took place to the mountains of Basa, and the troops
+brought back a large number of prisoners of both sexes. The men
+were almost all wounded, and showed great fortitude under the
+painful operation of extracting the balls. Even the Turks confessed
+that these mountaineers had made a gallant defence with lances and
+stones. Of our soldiers several had musket-shot wounds, inflicted
+by their comrades' disorderly fire. The Turks asserted that the
+Mograbins and Schaïgiës sometimes fired intentionally at the
+soldiers, to drive them from their booty. It was a piteous sight to
+see the prisoners--especially the women and children--brought into
+camp bound upon camels, and with despair in their countenances.
+Before they were sold or allotted, they were taken near the tent of
+Topschi Baschi, where a fire was kept burning, and were all, even
+to the smallest children, branded on the shoulder with a red-hot
+iron in the form of a star. When their moans and lamentations
+reached our hut, we took our guns and hastened away out shooting
+with three servants. These, notwithstanding our exhortations, would
+ramble from us, and we had got exceedingly angry with them for so
+doing, when suddenly we heard three shots, and proceeded in that
+direction, thinking it was they who had fired. Instead of them, we
+found three soldiers, lying upon the ground, bathed in their blood
+and terribly torn. Two were already dead, and the third, whose whole
+belly was ripped up, told us they had been attacked by a lion.
+The three shots brought up our servants, whom we made carry the
+survivor into camp, although my brother entertained slight hopes
+of saving him. The Bascha no sooner heard of the incident than he
+got on horseback with Soliman Kaschef and his people, to hunt the
+lion, and I accompanied him with my huntsman Sale, a bold fellow,
+who afterwards went with me up the White Nile. On reaching the spot
+where the lion had been, the Turks galloped off to seek him, and I
+and Sale alone remained behind. Suddenly I heard a heavy trampling,
+and a crashing amongst the bushes, and I saw close beside me an
+elephant with its calf. Sale, who was at some distance, and had just
+shot a parrot, called out to know if he should fire at the elephant,
+which I loudly forbade him to do. The beast broke its way through
+the brushwood just at hand. I saw its high back, and took up a safe
+position amongst several palm-trees, which all grew from one root,
+and were so close together that the elephant could not get at me.
+Sale was already up a tree, and told me the elephant had turned
+round, and was going back into the chaaba. The brute seemed angry
+or anxious about its young one, for we found the ground dug up for
+a long distance by its tusk as by a plough. Some shots were fired,
+and we thought the Bascha and his horsemen were on the track of the
+lion, but they had seen the elephant, and formed a circle round
+it. A messenger galloped into camp, and in a twinkling the Arnaut
+Abdin Bey came up with part of his people. The elephant, assailed
+on all sides by a rain of bullets, charged first one horseman, then
+another; they delivered their fire and galloped off. The eyes were
+the point chiefly aimed at, and it soon was evident that he was
+blinded by the bullets, for when pursuing his foes he ran against
+the trees, the shock of his unwieldy mass shaking the fruit from
+the palms. The horsemen dismounted and formed a smaller circle
+around him. He must already have received some hundred bullets, and
+the ground over which he staggered was dyed red, when the Bascha
+crept quite near him, knelt down and sent a shot into his left eye,
+whereupon the colossus sank down upon his hinder end and died.
+Nothing was to be seen of the calf or of the lion, but a few days
+later a large male lion was killed by Soliman Kaschef's men, close
+to camp, where we often in the night-time heard the roaring of those
+brutes."
+
+Just about this time bad news reached the Wernes. Their huntsman
+Abdallah, to whom they were much attached by reason of his gallantry
+and fidelity, had gone a long time before to the country of the
+Beni-Amers, eastward from Taka, in company of a Schaïgië chief,
+mounted on one of their best camels, armed with a double-barrelled
+gun, and provided with a considerable sum of money for the
+purchase of giraffes. On his way back to his employers, with a
+valuable collection of stuffed birds and other curiosities, he was
+barbarously murdered, when travelling, unescorted, through the
+Hallenga country, and plundered of all his baggage. Sale, who went
+to identify his friend's mutilated corpse, attributed the crime
+to the Hallengas. Mr Werne was disposed to suspect Mohammed Ehle,
+a great villain, whom the Bascha at times employed as a secret
+stabber and assassin. This Ehle had been appointed Schech of the
+Hallengas by the Divan, in lieu of the rightful Schech, who had
+refused submission to the Turks. Three nephews of Mohammed Din (one
+of them the same youth who had escorted the Wernes safely back
+to camp when they were in peril of their lives in the Haddenda
+country) came to visit their unfortunate relative, who was still a
+prisoner, cruelly treated, lying upon the damp earth, chained to two
+posts, and awaiting with fortitude the cruel death by impalement
+with which the Bascha threatened him. Achmet received the young men
+very coldly, and towards evening they set out, greatly depressed
+by their uncle's sad condition, upon their return homewards. Early
+next morning the Wernes, when out shooting, found the dead bodies
+of their three friends. They had been set upon and slain after a
+gallant defence, as was testified by their bloody lances, and by
+other signs of a severe struggle. The birds of prey had already
+picked out their eyes, and their corpses presented a frightful
+spectacle. The Wernes, convinced that this assassination had taken
+place by the Bascha's order, loaded the bodies on a camel, took
+them to Achmet, and preferred an accusation against the Hallengas
+for this shameful breach of hospitality. The Bascha's indifference
+confirmed their suspicions. He testified no indignation, but there
+was great excitement amongst his officers; and when they left the
+Divan, Mr Werne violently reproached Mohammed Ehle, whom he was well
+assured was the murderer, and who endured his anger in silence. "The
+Albanian Abdin Bey was so enraged that he was only withheld by the
+united persuasions of the other officers from mounting his horse
+and charging Mohammed Ehle with his wild Albanians, the consequence
+of which would inevitably have been a general mutiny against the
+Bascha, for the soldiers had long been murmuring at their bad food
+and ill treatment." The last hundred pages of Mr Werne's very
+closely printed and compendious volume abound in instances of the
+Bascha's treachery and cruelty, and of the retaliation exercised
+by the Arabs. On one occasion a party of fifty Turkish cavalry
+were murdered by the Haddendas, who had invited them to a feast.
+The town of Gos-Rajeb was burned, twenty of the merchants there
+resident were killed, and the corn, stored there for the use of
+the army on its homeward march, was plundered. The Bascha had a
+long-cherished plan of cutting off the supply of water from the
+country of the Haddendas. This was to be done by damming up the
+Gohr-el-Gasch, and diverting the abundant stream which, in the rainy
+season, rushed along its deep gully, overflowing the tall banks
+and fertilising fields and forests. As the Bascha's engineer and
+confidential adviser, Mr Werne was compelled to direct this work.
+By the labour of thousands of men, extensive embankments were made,
+and the Haddendas began to feel the want of water, which had come
+down from the Abyssinian mountains, and already stood eight feet
+deep in the Gohr. Mr Werne repented his share in the cruel work,
+and purposely abstained from pressing the formation of a canal
+which was to carry off the superfluous water to the Atbara, there
+about three leagues distant from the Gohr. And one morning he was
+awakened by a great uproar in the camp, and by the shouts of the
+Bascha, who was on horseback before his hut, and he found that a
+party of Haddendas had thrashed a picket and made an opening in the
+dykes, which was the deathblow to Achmet's magnificent project of
+extracting an exorbitant tribute from Mohammed Din's tribe as the
+price of the supply of water essential to their very existence.
+The sole results of the cruel attempt were a fever to the Bascha,
+who had got wet, and the sickness of half the army, who had been
+compelled to work like galley-slaves under a burning sun and upon
+bad rations. The vicinity of Kassela is rich in curious birds
+and beasts. The mountain itself swarms with apes, and Mr Werne
+frequently saw groups of two or three hundred of them seated upon
+the cliffs. They are about the size of a large dog, with dark brown
+hair and hideous countenances. Awful was the screaming and howling
+they set up of a night, when they received the unwelcome visit of
+some hungry leopard or prowling panther. Once the Wernes went out
+with their guns for a day's sport amongst the monkeys, but were soon
+glad to beat a retreat under a tremendous shower of stones. Hassan,
+a Turk, who purveyed the brothers with hares, gazelles, and other
+savoury morsels, and who was a very good shot, promised to bring
+in--of course for good payment--not only a male and female monkey,
+but a whole camel-load if desired. He started off with this object,
+but did not again show himself for some days, and tried to sneak
+out of the Wernes' way when they at last met him in the bazaar. He
+had a hole in his head, and his shoulder badly hurt, and declared
+he would have nothing more to say to those _transformed men_ upon
+the mountain. Mr Werne was very desirous to catch a monkey alive,
+but was unsuccessful, and Mohammed Ehle refused to sell a tame one
+which he owned, and which usually sat upon his hut. Mr Werne thinks
+them a variety of the Chimpanzee. They fight amongst themselves
+with sticks, and defend themselves fiercely with stones against the
+attacks of men. Upon the whole the Wernes were highly fortunate in
+collecting zoological and ornithological specimens, of which they
+subsequently sent a large number, stuffed, to the Berlin museum.
+They also secured several birds and animals alive; amongst these
+a young lion and a civet cat. Regarding reptiles they were very
+curious, and nothing of that kind was too long or too large for
+them. As Ferdinand Werne was sitting one day upon his dromedary,
+in company with the Bascha, on the left bank of the Gasch, the
+animals shied at a large serpent which suddenly darted by. The
+Bascha ordered the men who were working at the dykes to capture it,
+which they at once proceeded to do, as unconcernedly as an English
+haymaker would assail a hedge snake. "Pursued by several men, the
+serpent plunged into the water, out of which it then boldly reared
+its head, and confronted an Arab who had jumped in after it, armed
+with a _hassaie_. With extraordinary skill and daring the Arab
+approached it, his club uplifted, and struck it over the head, so
+that the serpent fell down stunned and writhing mightily; whereupon
+another Arab came up with a cord; the club-bearer, without further
+ceremony, griped the reptile by the throat, just below the head;
+the noose was made fast, and the pair of them dragged their prize
+on shore. There it lay for a moment motionless, and we contemplated
+the terribly beautiful creature, which was more than eleven feet
+long and half-a-foot in diameter. But when they began to drag it
+away, by which the skin would of course be completely spoiled,
+orders were given to _carry_ it to camp. A jacket was tied over its
+head, and three men set to work to get it upon their shoulders;
+but the serpent made such violent convulsive movements that all
+three fell to the ground with it, and the same thing occurred again
+when several others had gone to their assistance. I accompanied
+them into camp, drove a big nail into the foremost great beam of
+our _recuba_, (hut,) and had the monster suspended from it. He
+hung down quite limp, as did also several other snakes, which were
+still alive, and which our servants had suspended inside our hut,
+intending to skin them the next morning, as it was now nearly
+dark. In the night I felt a most uncomfortable sensation. One of
+the snakes, which was hung up at the head of my bed, had smeared
+his cold tail over my face. But I sprang to my feet in real alarm,
+and thought I had been struck over the shin with a club, when the
+big serpent, now in the death agony, gave me a wipe with its tail
+through the open door, in front of which our servants were squatted,
+telling each other ghost stories of snake-kings and the like....
+They called this serpent _assala_, which, however, is a name they
+give to all large serpents. Soon afterwards we caught another, as
+thick, but only nine feet long, and with a short tail, like the
+_Vipera cerastes_; and this was said to be of that breed of short,
+thick snakes which can devour a man." In the mountains of Basa,
+two days' journey from the Gohr-el-Gasch, and on the road thither,
+snakes are said to exist, of no great length, but as thick as a
+crocodile, and which can conveniently swallow a man; and instances
+were related to Mr Werne of these monsters having swallowed persons
+when they lay sleeping on their angarèbs. Sometimes the victims had
+been rescued _when only half gorged_! Of course travellers hear
+strange stories, and some of those related by Mr Werne are tolerably
+astounding; but these are derived from his Turkish, Egyptian, or
+Arabian acquaintances, and there is no appearance of exaggeration
+or romancing in anything which he narrates as having occurred to
+or been witnessed by himself. A wild tradition was told him of a
+country called Bellad-el-Kelb, which signifies the Country of Dogs,
+where the women were in all respects human, but where the men had
+faces like dogs, claws on their feet, and tails like monkeys. They
+could not speak, but carried on conversation by wagging their tails.
+This ludicrous account appeared explicable by the fact, that the men
+of Bellad-el-Kelb are great robbers, living by plunder, and, like
+fierce and hungry dogs, never relinquishing their prey.
+
+The Hallengas, amongst whom the expedition now found itself, were
+far more frank and friendly, and much less wild, than the Haddendas
+and some other tribes, and they might probably have been converted
+into useful allies by a less cruel and capricious invader than the
+Bascha. But conciliation was no part of his scheme; if he one day
+caressed a tribe or a chief, it was only to betray them the next.
+Mr Werne was on good terms with some of the Hallenga sheiks, and
+went to visit the village of Hauathi, about three miles from camp,
+to see the birds of paradise which abounded there. On his road he
+saw from afar a great tree covered with those beautiful birds,
+and which glistened in the sunshine with all the colours of the
+rainbow. Some days later he and his brother went to drink _merissa_,
+a slightly intoxicating liquor, with one of the Fakis or priests
+of the country. The two Germans got very jovial, drinking to each
+other, student-fashion; and the faki, attempting to keep pace with
+them, got crying-drunk, and disclosed a well-matured plan for
+blowing up their powder-magazine. The ammunition had been stored in
+the village of Kadmin, which was a holy village, entirely inhabited
+by fakis. The Bascha had made sure that none of the natives would
+risk blowing up these holy men, even for the sake of destroying his
+ammunition, and he was unwilling to keep so large a quantity of
+powder amidst his numerous camp-fires and reckless soldiery. But
+the fakis had made their arrangements. On a certain night they were
+to depart, carrying away all their property into the great caverns
+of Mount Kassela, and fire was to be applied to the house that
+held the powder. Had the plot succeeded, the whole army was lost,
+isolated as it was in the midst of unfriendly tribes, embittered by
+its excesses, and by the aggressions and treachery of its chief,
+and who, stimulated by their priests, would in all probability have
+exterminated it to the last man, when it no longer had cartridges
+for its defence. The drunken faki's indiscretion saved Achmet and
+his troops; the village was forthwith surrounded, and the next day
+the ammunition was transferred to camp. Not to rouse the whole
+population against him, the Bascha abstained for the moment from
+punishing the conspirators, but he was not the man to let them
+escape altogether; and some time afterwards, Mr Werne, who had
+returned to Chartum, received a letter from his brother, informing
+him that nine fakis had been hung on palm-trees just outside the
+camp, and that the magnanimous Achmet proposed treating forty more
+in the same way.
+
+A mighty liar was Effendina Achmet Bascha, as ever ensnared a
+foe or broke faith with a friend. Greedy and cruel was he also,
+as only a Turkish despot can be. One of his most active and
+unscrupulous agents was a bloodsucker named Hassan Effendi, whom
+he sent to the country of the Beni-Amers to collect three thousand
+five hundred cows and thirteen hundred camels, the complement of
+their tribute. Although this tribe had upon the whole behaved
+very peaceably, Hassan's first act was to shoot down a couple of
+hundred of them like wild beasts. Then he seized a large number of
+camels belonging to the Haddendas, although the tribe was at that
+very time in friendly negotiation with the Bascha. The Haddendas
+revenged themselves by burning Gos-Rajeb. In proof of their valour,
+Hassan's men cut off the ears of the murdered Beni-Amers, and took
+them to Achmet, who gave them money for the trophies. "They had
+forced a slave to cut off the ears; yonder now lies the man--raving
+mad, and bound with cords. Camel-thieves, too--no matter to what
+tribe they belong--if caught _in flagranti_, lose their ears,
+for which the Bascha gives a reward. That many a man who never
+dreamed of committing a theft loses his ears in this way, is easy
+to understand, for the operation is performed on the spot." Dawson
+Borrer, in his _Campaign in the Kabylie_, mentions a very similar
+practice as prevailing in Marshal Bugeaud's camp, where ten francs
+was the fixed price for the head of a horse-stealer, it being
+left to the soldiers who severed the heads and received the money
+to discriminate between horse-stealers and honest men. Whether
+Bugeaud took a hint from the Bascha, or the Bascha was an admiring
+imitator of Bugeaud, remains a matter of doubt. "Besides many
+handsome women and children, Hassan Effendi brought in two thousand
+nine hundred cows, and seven thousand sheep." He might have been a
+French prince returning from a razzia. "For himself he kept eighty
+camels, _which he said he had bought_." A droll dog, this Hassan
+Effendi, but withal rather covetous--given to sell his soldier's
+rations, and to starve his servants, a single piastre--about
+twopence halfpenny--being his whole daily outlay for meat for his
+entire household, who lived for the most part upon durra and water.
+If his servants asked for wages, they received the bastinado. "The
+Bascha had given the poor camel-drivers sixteen cows. The vampire
+(Hassan) took upon himself to appropriate thirteen of them." Mr
+Werne reported this robbery to the Bascha, but Achmet merely replied
+"_malluch_"--signifying, "it matters not." When inferior officers
+received horses as their share of booty, Hassan bought them of them,
+but always forgot to pay, and the poor subalterns feared to complain
+to the Bascha, who favoured the rogue, and recommended him to the
+authorities at Cairo for promotion to the rank of Bey, because, as
+he told Mr Werne with an ironical smile, Hassan was getting very
+old and infirm, and when he died the Divan would bring charges
+against him, and inherit his wealth. Thus are things managed in
+Egypt. No wonder that, where such injustice and rascality prevail,
+many are found to rejoice at the prospect of a change of rulers.
+"News from Souakim (on the Red Sea) of the probable landing of the
+English, excite great interest in camp; from all sides they come
+to ask questions of us, thinking that we, as Franks, must know
+the intentions of the invaders. Upon the whole, they would not be
+displeased at such a change of government, particularly when we tell
+them of the good pay and treatment customary amongst the English;
+and that with them no officer has to endure indignities from his
+superiors in rank."
+
+"I have now," says Mr Werne, (page 256,) "been more than half a
+year away from Chartum, continually in the field, and not once
+have I enjoyed the great comfort of reposing, undressed, between
+clean white sheets, but have invariably slept in my clothes, on
+the ground, or on the short but practical angarèb. All clean linen
+disappears, for the constant perspiration and chalky dust burns
+everything; and the servants do not understand washing, inasmuch as,
+contrasted with their black hides, everything appears white to them,
+and for the last three months no soap has been obtainable. And in
+the midst of this dirty existence, which drags itself along like a
+slow fever, suddenly 'Julla!' is the word, and one hangs for four or
+five days, eighty or a hundred leagues, upon the camel's back, every
+bone bruised by the rough motion,--the broiling sun, thirst, hunger,
+and cold, for constant companions. Man can endure much: I have gone
+through far more than I ever thought I could,--vomiting and in a
+raging fever on the back of a dromedary, under a midday sun, more
+dead than alive, held upon my saddle by others, and yet I recovered.
+To have remained behind would have been to encounter certain death
+from the enemy, or from wild beasts. We have seen what a man can
+bear, under the pressure of necessity; in my present uniform and
+monotonous life I compare myself to the camels tied before my tent,
+which sometimes stand up, sometimes slowly stretch themselves on
+the ground, careless whether crows or ravens walk over their backs,
+constantly moving their jaws, looking up at the sun, and then, by
+way of a change, taking a mouthful of grass, but giving no signs of
+joy or curiosity."
+
+From this state of languid indifference Mr Werne was suddenly and
+pleasurably roused by intelligence that a second expedition was
+fitting out for the White Nile. He and his brother immediately
+petitioned the Bascha for leave to accompany it. The desired
+permission was granted to him, but refused to his brother. There
+was too much sickness in the camp, the Bascha said; he could not
+spare his doctor, and lacked confidence in the Italian, Bellotti.
+The fondly-attached brothers were thus placed in a painful dilemma:
+they had hoped to pursue their wanderings hand in hand, and to pass
+their lives together, and loth indeed were they to sunder in those
+sickly and perilous regions. At last they made up their minds to the
+parting. It has been already recorded in Mr Werne's former work,
+how, within ten days of their next meeting, his beloved brother's
+eyes were closed in death.
+
+In various respects, Mr Werne's _Feldzug_ is one of the most
+curious books of travel and adventure that, for a very long time,
+has appeared. It has three points of particular attraction and
+originality. In the first place, the author wanders in a region
+previously unexplored by Christian and educated travellers, and
+amongst tribes whose bare names have reached the ears of but few
+Europeans. Secondly, he campaigns as officer in such an army as we
+can hardly realise in these days of high civilisation and strict
+military discipline,--so wild, motley, and grotesque are its
+customs, composition, and equipment,--an army whose savage warriors,
+strange practices, and barbarous cruelties, make us fancy ourselves
+in presence of some fierce Moslem horde of the middle ages, marching
+to the assault of Italy or Hungary. Thirdly, during his long sojourn
+in camp he had opportunities such as few ordinary travellers enjoy,
+and of which he diligently profited, to study and note down the
+characteristics and social habits of many of the races of men that
+make up the heterogeneous population of the Ottoman empire. Some
+of the physiological and medical details with which he favours us,
+would certainly have been more in their place in his brother's
+professional journal, than in a book intended for the public at
+large; and passages are not wanting at which the squeamish will be
+apt to lay down the volume in disgust. For such persons Mr Werne
+does not write; and his occasional indelicacy and too crude details
+are compensated, to our thinking, by his manly honest tone, and by
+the extraordinary amount of useful and curious information he has
+managed to pack into two hundred and seventy pages. As a whole,
+the _Expedition to the White Nile_, which contains a vast deal
+of dry meteorological and geographical detail, is decidedly far
+less attractive than the present book, which is as amusing as any
+romance. We have read it with absorbing interest, well pleased with
+the hint its author throws out at its close, that the records of his
+African wanderings are not yet all exhausted.
+
+
+
+
+MY NOVEL; OR, VARIETIES IN ENGLISH LIFE.
+
+BY PISISTRATUS CAXTON.
+
+
+BOOK VII.--INITIAL CHAPTER.
+
+"What is courage?" said my uncle Roland, rousing himself from a
+reverie into which he had fallen after the Sixth Book in this
+history had been read to our family circle.
+
+"What is courage?" he repeated more earnestly. "Is it insensibility
+to fear? _That_ may be the mere accident of constitution; and, if
+so, there is no more merit in being courageous than in being this
+table."
+
+"I am very glad to hear you speak thus," observed Mr Caxton, "for I
+should not like to consider myself a coward; yet I am very sensible
+to fear in all dangers, bodily and moral."
+
+"La, Austin, how can you say so?" cried my mother, firing up; "was
+it not only last week that you faced the great bull that was rushing
+after Blanche and the children?"
+
+Blanche at that recollection stole to my father's chair, and,
+hanging over his shoulder, kissed his forehead.
+
+MR CAXTON, (sublimely unmoved by these flatteries.)--"I don't deny
+that I faced the bull, but I assert that I was horribly frightened."
+
+ROLAND.--"The sense of honour which conquers fear is the true
+courage of chivalry: you could not run away when others were looking
+on--no gentleman could."
+
+MR CAXTON.--"Fiddledee! It was not on my gentility that I stood,
+Captain. I should have run fast enough, if it had done any good. I
+stood upon my understanding. As the bull could run faster than I
+could, the only chance of escape was to make the brute as frightened
+as myself."
+
+BLANCHE.--"Ah, you did not think of that; your only thought was to
+save me and the children."
+
+MR CAXTON.--"Possibly, my dear--very possibly I might have been
+afraid for you too;--but I was very much afraid for myself. However,
+luckily I had the umbrella, and I sprang it up and spread it forth
+in the animal's stupid eyes, hurling at him simultaneously the
+biggest lines I could think of in the First Chorus of the 'Seven
+against Thebes.' I began with ELEDEMNAS PEDIOPLOKTUPOS; and when I
+came to the grand howl of +Iô, iô, iô, iô+--the beast stood
+appalled as at the roar of a lion. I shall never forget his amazed
+snort at the Greek. Then he kicked up his hind legs, and went bolt
+through the gap in the hedge. Thus, armed with Æschylus and the
+umbrella, I remained master of the field; but (continued Mr Caxton,
+ingenuously,) I should not like to go through that half minute
+again."
+
+"No man would," said the Captain kindly. "I should be very sorry to
+face a bull myself, even with a bigger umbrella than yours, and even
+though I had Æschylus, and Homer to boot, at my fingers' ends."
+
+MR CAXTON.--"You would not have minded if it had been a Frenchman
+with a sword in his hand?"
+
+CAPTAIN.--"Of course not. Rather liked it than otherwise," he added
+grimly.
+
+MR CAXTON.--"Yet many a Spanish matador, who doesn't care a button
+for a bull, would take to his heels at the first lunge _en carte_
+from a Frenchman. Therefore, in fact, if courage be a matter of
+constitution, it is also a matter of custom. We face calmly the
+dangers we are habituated to, and recoil from those of which we have
+no familiar experience. I doubt if Marshal Turenne himself would
+have been quite at his ease on the tight-rope; and a rope-dancer,
+who seems disposed to scale the heavens with Titanic temerity, might
+possibly object to charge on a cannon."
+
+CAPTAIN ROLAND.--"Still, either this is not the courage I mean,
+or there is another kind of it. I mean by courage that which is
+the especial force and dignity of the human character, without
+which there is no reliance on principle, no constancy in virtue--a
+something," continued my uncle gallantly, and with a half bow
+towards my mother, "which your sex shares with our own. When the
+lover, for instance, clasps the hand of his betrothed, and says,
+'Wilt thou be true to me, in spite of absence and time, in spite of
+hazard and fortune, though my foes malign me, though thy friends may
+dissuade thee, and our lot in life may be rough and rude?' and when
+the betrothed answers, 'I will be true,' does not the lover trust to
+her courage as well as her love?"
+
+"Admirably put, Roland," said my father. "But _apropos_ of what do
+you puzzle us with these queries on courage?"
+
+CAPTAIN ROLAND, (with a slight blush.)--"I was led to the inquiry
+(though, perhaps, it may be frivolous to take so much thought of
+what, no doubt, costs Pisistratus so little) by the last chapters
+in my nephew's story. I see this poor boy, Leonard, alone with his
+fallen hopes, (though very irrational they were,) and his sense of
+shame. And I read his heart, I dare say, better than Pisistratus
+does, for I could feel like that boy if I had been in the same
+position; and, conjecturing what he and thousands like him must go
+through, I asked myself, 'What can save him and them?' I answered,
+as a soldier would answer, 'Courage!' Very well. But pray, Austin,
+what is courage?"
+
+MR CAXTON, (prudently backing out of a reply.)--"_Papæ!_ Brother,
+since you have just complimented the ladies on that quality, you had
+better address your question to them."
+
+Blanche here leant both hands on my father's chair, and said,
+looking down at first bashfully, but afterwards warming with the
+subject, "Do you not think, sir, that little Helen has already
+suggested, if not what is courage, what at least is the real essence
+of all courage that endures and conquers, that ennobles, and
+hallows, and redeems? Is it not PATIENCE, father?--and that is why
+we women have a courage of our own. Patience does not affect to be
+superior to fear, but at least it never admits despair."
+
+PISISTRATUS.--"Kiss me, my Blanche, for you have come near to the
+truth which perplexed the soldier and puzzled the sage."
+
+MR CAXTON, (tartly.)--"If you mean me by the sage, I was not puzzled
+at all. Heaven knows you do right to inculcate patience--it is a
+virtue very much required in your readers. Nevertheless," added my
+father, softening with the enjoyment of his joke--"nevertheless
+Blanche and Helen are quite right. Patience is the courage
+of the conqueror; it is the virtue, _par excellence_, of Man
+against Destiny--of the One against the World, and of the Soul
+against Matter. Therefore this is the courage of the Gospel; and
+its importance, in a social view--its importance to races and
+institutions--cannot be too earnestly inculcated. What is it that
+distinguishes the Anglo-Saxon from all other branches of the human
+family, peoples deserts with his children, and consigns to them
+the heritage of rising worlds? What but his faculty to brave, to
+suffer, to endure--the patience that resists firmly, and innovates
+slowly. Compare him with the Frenchman. The Frenchman has plenty of
+valour--that there is no denying; but as for fortitude, he has not
+enough to cover the point of a pin. He is ready to rush out of the
+world if he is bit by a flea."
+
+CAPTAIN ROLAND.--"There was a case in the papers the other day,
+Austin, of a Frenchman who actually did destroy himself because he
+was so teased by the little creatures you speak of. He left a paper
+on his table, saying that 'life was not worth having at the price of
+such torments.'"[5]
+
+[5] Fact. In a work by M. GIBERT, a celebrated French physician, on
+diseases of the skin, he states that that minute troublesome kind
+of rash, known by the name of _prurigo_, though not dangerous in
+itself, has often driven the individual afflicted by it to--suicide.
+I believe that our more varying climate, and our more heating drinks
+and aliments, render this skin complaint more common in England than
+in France, yet I doubt if any English physician could state that it
+had ever driven one of his _English_ patients to suicide.
+
+MR CAXTON, (solemnly.)--"Sir, their whole political history, since
+the great meeting of the Tiers Etat, has been the history of men
+who would rather go to the devil than be bit by a flea. It is
+the record of human impatience, that seeks to force time, and
+expects to grow forests from the spawn of a mushroom. Wherefore,
+running through all extremes of constitutional experiment, when
+they are nearest to democracy they are next door to a despot; and
+all they have really done is to destroy whatever constitutes the
+foundation of every tolerable government. A constitutional monarchy
+cannot exist without aristocracy, nor a healthful republic endure
+with corruption of manners. The cry of Equality is incompatible
+with Civilisation, which, of necessity, contrasts poverty with
+wealth--and, in short, whether it be an emperor or a mob that is to
+rule, Force is the sole hope of order, and the government is but an
+army.
+
+"Impress, O Pisistratus! impress the value of patience as regards
+man and men. You touch there on the kernel of the social system--the
+secret that fortifies the individual and disciplines the million.
+I care not, for my part, if you are tedious so long as you are
+earnest. Be minute and detailed. Let the real human life, in its war
+with Circumstance, stand out. Never mind if one can read you but
+slowly--better chance of being less quickly forgotten. Patience,
+patience! By the soul of Epictetus, your readers shall set you an
+example!"
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+Leonard had written twice to Mrs Fairfield, twice to Riccabocca, and
+once to Mr Dale; and the poor proud boy could not bear to betray
+his humiliation. He wrote as with cheerful spirits--as if perfectly
+satisfied with his prospects. He said that he was well employed,
+in the midst of books, and that he had found kind friends. Then he
+turned from himself to write about those whom he addressed, and the
+affairs and interests of the quiet world wherein they lived. He did
+not give his own address, nor that of Mr Prickett. He dated his
+letters from a small coffeehouse near the bookseller, to which he
+occasionally went for his simple meals. He had a motive in this. He
+did not desire to be found out. Mr Dale replied for himself and for
+Mrs Fairfield, to the epistles addressed to these two. Riccabocca
+wrote also. Nothing could be more kind than the replies of both.
+They came to Leonard in a very dark period in his life, and they
+strengthened him in the noiseless battle with despair.
+
+If there be a good in the world that we do without knowing it,
+without conjecturing the effect it may have upon a human soul, it is
+when we show kindness to the young in the first barren footpath up
+the mountain of life.
+
+Leonard's face resumed its serenity in his intercourse with his
+employer; but he did not recover his boyish ingenuous frankness.
+The under-currents flowed again pure from the turbid soil and the
+splintered fragments uptorn from the deep; but they were still too
+strong and too rapid to allow transparency to the surface. And now
+he stood in the sublime world of books, still and earnest as a seer
+who invokes the dead. And thus, face to face with knowledge, hourly
+he discovered how little he knew. Mr Prickett lent him such works as
+he selected and asked to take home with him. He spent whole nights
+in reading; and no longer desultorily. He read no more poetry, no
+more Lives of Poets. He read what poets must read if they desire
+to be great--_Sapere principium et fons_--strict reasonings on the
+human mind; the relations between motive and conduct, thought and
+action; the grave and solemn truths of the past world; antiquities,
+history, philosophy. He was taken out of himself. He was carried
+along the ocean of the universe. In that ocean, O seeker, study
+the law of the tides; and seeing Chance nowhere--Thought presiding
+over all--Fate, that dread phantom, shall vanish from creation, and
+Providence alone be visible in heaven and on earth!
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+There was to be a considerable book-sale at a country house one
+day's journey from London. Mr Prickett meant to have attended it
+on his own behalf, and that of several gentlemen who had given
+him commissions for purchase; but, on the morning fixed for his
+departure, he was seized with a severe return of his old foe the
+rheumatism. He requested Leonard to attend instead of himself.
+Leonard went, and was absent for the three days during which the
+sale lasted. He returned late in the evening, and went at once to
+Mr Prickett's house. The shop was closed; he knocked at the private
+entrance; a strange person opened the door to him, and, in reply
+to his question if Mr Prickett was at home, said with a long and
+funereal face--"Young man, Mr Prickett senior is gone to his long
+home, but Mr Richard Prickett will see you."
+
+At this moment a very grave-looking man, with lank hair, looked
+forth from the side-door communicating between the shop and the
+passage, land then, stepped forward--"Come in, sir; you are my late
+uncle's assistant, Mr Fairfield, I suppose?"
+
+"Your late uncle! Heavens, sir, do I understand aright--can Mr
+Prickett be dead since I left London?"
+
+"Died, sir, suddenly last night. It was an affection of the heart;
+the Doctor thinks the rheumatism attacked that organ. He had small
+time to provide for his departure, and his account-books seem in sad
+disorder: I am his nephew and executor."
+
+Leonard had now followed the nephew into the shop. There, still
+burned the gas-lamp. The place seemed more dingy and cavernous than
+before. Death always makes its presence felt in the house it visits.
+
+Leonard was greatly affected--and yet more, perhaps, by the utter
+want of feeling which the nephew exhibited. In fact, the deceased
+had not been on friendly terms with this person, his nearest
+relative and heir-at-law, who was also a bookseller.
+
+"You were engaged but by the week I find, young man, on reference
+to my late uncle's papers. He gave you £1 a week--a monstrous
+sum! I shall not require your services any further. I shall move
+these books to my own house. You will be good enough to send
+me a list of those you bought at the sale, and your account of
+travelling-expenses, &c. What may be due to you shall be sent to
+your address. Good evening."
+
+Leonard went home, shocked and saddened at the sudden death of his
+kind employer. He did not think much of himself that night; but,
+when he rose the next day, he suddenly felt that the world of London
+lay before him, without a friend, without a calling, without an
+occupation for bread.
+
+This time it was no fancied sorrow, no poetic dream disappointed.
+Before him, gaunt and palpable, stood Famine.
+
+Escape!--yes. Back to the village; his mother's cottage; the exile's
+garden; the radishes and the fount. Why could he not escape? Ask why
+civilisation cannot escape its ills, and fly back to the wild and
+the wigwam?
+
+Leonard could not have returned to the cottage, even if the Famine
+that faced had already seized him with her skeleton hand. London
+releases not so readily her fated stepsons.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+One day three persons were standing before an old book-stall in a
+passage leading from Oxford Street into Tottenham Court Road. Two
+were gentlemen; the third, of the class and appearance of those who
+more habitually halt at old book-stalls.
+
+"Look," said one of the gentlemen to the other, "I have discovered
+here what I have searched for in vain the last ten years--the Horace
+of 1580, the Horace of the Forty Commentators--a perfect treasury of
+learning, and marked only fourteen shillings!"
+
+"Hush, Norreys," said the other, "and observe what is yet more worth
+your study;" and he pointed to the third bystander, whose face,
+sharp and attenuated, was bent with an absorbed, and, as it were,
+with a hungering attention over an old worm-eaten volume.
+
+"What is the book, my lord?" whispered Mr Norreys.
+
+His companion smiled, and replied by another question, "What is the
+man who reads the book?"
+
+Mr Norreys moved a few paces, and looked over the student's
+shoulder "Preston's translation of BOETHIUS, _The Consolations of
+Philosophy_," he said, coming back to his friend.
+
+"He looks as if he wanted all the consolations Philosophy can give
+him, poor boy."
+
+At this moment a fourth passenger paused at the book-stall, and,
+recognising the pale student, placed his hand on his shoulder and
+said, "Aha, young sir, we meet again. So poor Prickett is dead. But
+you are still haunted by associations. Books--books--magnets to
+which all iron minds move insensibly. What is this? BOETHIUS! Ah,
+a book written in prison, but a little time before the advent of
+the only philosopher who solves to the simplest understanding every
+mystery of life--"
+
+"And that philosopher?"
+
+"Is Death!" said Mr Burley. "How can you be dull enough to ask? Poor
+Boethius, rich, nobly born, a consul, his sons consuls--the world
+one smile to the Last Philosopher of Rome. Then suddenly, against
+this type of the old world's departing WISDOM, stands frowning the
+new world's grim genius, FORCE--Theodoric the Ostrogoth condemning
+Boethius the Schoolman; and Boethius, in his Pavian dungeon, holding
+a dialogue with the shade of Athenian Philosophy. It is the finest
+picture upon which lingers the glimmering of the Western golden day,
+before night rushes over time."
+
+"And," said Mr Norreys abruptly, "Boethius comes back to us with the
+faint gleam of returning light, translated by Alfred the Great. And,
+again, as the sun of knowledge bursts forth in all its splendour, by
+Queen Elizabeth. Boethius influences us as we stand in this passage;
+and that is the best of all the Consolations of Philosophy--eh, Mr
+Burley?"
+
+Mr Burley turned and bowed.
+
+The two men looked at each other; you could not see a greater
+contrast. Mr Burley, his gay green dress already shabby and soiled,
+with a rent in the skirts, and his face speaking of habitual
+night-cups. Mr Norreys, neat and somewhat precise in dress, with
+firm lean figure, and quiet, collected, vigorous energy in his eye
+and aspect.
+
+"If," replied Mr Burley, "a poor devil like me may argue with a
+gentleman who may command his own price with the booksellers, I
+should say it is no consolation at all, Mr Norreys. And I should
+like to see any man of sense accept the condition of Boethius in his
+prison, with some strangler or headsman waiting behind the door,
+upon the promised proviso that he should be translated, centuries
+afterwards, by Kings and Queens, and help indirectly to influence
+the minds of Northern barbarians, babbling about him in an alley,
+jostled by passers-by who never heard the name of Boethius, and who
+don't care a fig for philosophy. Your servant, sir--young man, come
+and talk."
+
+Burley hooked his arm within Leonard's, and led the boy passively
+away.
+
+"That is a clever man," said Harley L'Estrange. "But I am sorry to
+see yon young student, with his bright earnest eyes, and his lip
+that has the quiver of passion and enthusiasm, leaning on the arm of
+a guide who seems disenchanted of all that gives purpose to learning
+and links philosophy with use to the world. Who, and what is this
+clever man whom you call Burley?"
+
+"A man who might have been famous, if he had condescended to be
+respectable! The boy listening to us both so attentively interested
+_me_ too--I should like to have the making of him. But I must buy
+this Horace."
+
+The shopman, lurking within his hole like a spider for flies, was
+now called out. And when Mr Norreys had bought the Horace, and given
+an address where to send it, Harley asked the shopman if he knew the
+young man who had been reading Boethius.
+
+"Only by sight. He has come here every day the last week, and spends
+hours at the stall. When once he fastens on a book, he reads it
+through."
+
+"And never buys?" said Mr Norreys.
+
+"Sir," said the shopman with a good-natured smile, "they who buy
+seldom read. The poor boy pays me twopence a-day to read as long as
+he pleases. I would not take it, but he is proud."
+
+"I have known men amass great learning in that way," said Mr
+Norreys. "Yes, I should like to have that boy in my hands. And now,
+my lord, I am at your service, and we will go to the studio of your
+artist."
+
+The two gentlemen walked on towards one of the streets out of
+Fitzroy Square.
+
+In a few minutes more Harley L'Estrange was in his element, seated
+carelessly on a deal table, smoking his cigar, and discussing art
+with the gusto of a man who honestly loved, and the taste of a man
+who thoroughly understood it. The young artist, in his dressing
+robe, adding slow touch upon touch, paused often to listen the
+better. And Henry Norreys, enjoying the brief respite from a life of
+great labour, was gladly reminded of idle hours under rosy skies;
+for these three men had formed their friendship in Italy, where the
+bands of friendship are woven by the hands of the Graces.
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+Leonard and Mr Burley walked on into the suburbs round the north
+road from London, and Mr Burley offered to find literary employment
+for Leonard--an offer eagerly accepted.
+
+Then they went into a public house by the wayside. Burley demanded
+a private room, called for pen, ink, and paper; and, placing these
+implements before Leonard, said, "Write what you please in prose,
+five sheets of letter paper, twenty-two lines to a page--neither
+more nor less."
+
+"I cannot write so."
+
+"Tut, 'tis for bread."
+
+The boy's face crimsoned.
+
+"I must forget that," said he.
+
+"There is an arbour in the garden under a weeping ash," returned
+Burley. "Go there, and fancy yourself in Arcadia."
+
+Leonard was too pleased to obey. He found out the little arbour at
+one end of a deserted bowling-green. All was still--the hedgerow
+shut out the sight of the inn. The sun lay warm on the grass, and
+glinted pleasantly through the leaves of the ash. And Leonard there
+wrote the first essay from his hand as Author by profession. What
+was it that he wrote? His dreamy impressions of London? an anathema
+on its streets, and its hearts of stone? murmurs against poverty?
+dark elegies on fate?
+
+Oh, no! little knowest thou true genius, if thou askest such
+questions, or thinkest that there, under the weeping ash, the
+taskwork for bread was remembered; or that the sunbeam glinted but
+over the practical world, which, vulgar and sordid, lay around.
+Leonard wrote a fairy tale--one of the loveliest you can conceive,
+with a delicate touch of playful humour--in a style all flowered
+over with happy fancies. He smiled as he wrote the last word--he was
+happy. In rather more than an hour Mr Burley came to him, and found
+him with that smile on his lips.
+
+Mr Burley had a glass of brandy and water in his hand; it was
+his third. He too smiled--he too looked happy. He read the paper
+aloud, and well. He was very complimentary. "You will do!" said he,
+clapping Leonard on the back. "Perhaps some day you will catch my
+one-eyed perch." Then he folded up the MS., scribbled off a note,
+put the whole in one envelope--and they returned to London.
+
+Mr Burley disappeared within a dingy office near Fleet Street,
+on which was inscribed--"Office of the _Beehive_," and soon came
+forth with a golden sovereign in his hand--Leonard's first-fruits.
+Leonard thought Peru lay before him. He accompanied Mr Burley to
+that gentleman's lodging in Maida Hill. The walk had been very long;
+Leonard was not fatigued. He listened with a livelier attention
+than before to Burley's talk. And when they reached the apartments
+of the latter, and Mr Burley sent to the cookshop, and their joint
+supper was taken out of the golden sovereign, Leonard felt proud,
+and for the first time for weeks he laughed the heart's laugh. The
+two writers grew more and more intimate and cordial. And there was a
+vast deal in Burley by which any young man might be made the wiser.
+There was no apparent evidence of poverty in the apartments--clean,
+new, well furnished; but all things in the most horrible litter--all
+speaking of the huge literary sloven.
+
+For several days Leonard almost lived in those rooms. He wrote
+continuously--save when Burley's conversation fascinated him into
+idleness. Nay, it was not idleness--his knowledge grew larger as
+he listened; but the cynicism of the talker began slowly to work
+its way. That cynicism in which there was no faith, no hope, no
+vivifying breath from Glory--from Religion. The cynicism of the
+Epicurean, more degraded in his stye than ever was Diogenes in his
+tub; and yet presented with such ease and such eloquence--with such
+art and such mirth--so adorned with illustration and anecdote, so
+unconscious of debasement.
+
+Strange and dread philosophy--that made it a maxim to squander
+the gifts of mind on the mere care for matter, and fit the soul
+to live but as from day to day, with its scornful cry, "A fig
+for immortality and laurels!" An author for bread! Oh, miserable
+calling! was there something grand and holy, after all, even in
+Chatterton's despair!
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+The villanous _Beehive_! Bread was worked out of it, certainly; but
+fame, but hope for the future--certainly not. Milton's _Paradise
+Lost_ would have perished without a sound, had it appeared in the
+_Beehive_.
+
+Fine things were there in a fragmentary crude state, composed
+by Burley himself. At the end of a week they were dead and
+forgotten--never read by one man of education and taste; taken
+simultaneously and indifferently with shallow politics and wretched
+essays, yet selling, perhaps, twenty or thirty thousand copies--an
+immense sale;--and nothing got out of them but bread and brandy!
+
+"What more would you have?" cried John Burley. "Did not stern old
+Sam Johnson say he could never write but from want?"
+
+"He might say it," answered Leonard; "but he never meant posterity
+to believe him. And he would have died of want, I suspect, rather
+than have written _Rasselas_ for the _Beehive_! Want is a grand
+thing," continued the boy, thoughtfully. "A parent of grand things.
+Necessity is strong, and should give us its own strength; but Want
+should shatter asunder, with its very writhings, the walls of our
+prison-house, and not sit contented with the allowance the jail
+gives us in exchange for our work."
+
+"There is no prison-house to a man who calls upon Bacchus--stay--I
+will translate to you Schiller's Dithyramb. 'Then see I
+Bacchus--then up come Cupid and Phoebus, and all the Celestials are
+filling my dwelling.'"
+
+Breaking into impromptu careless rhymes, Burley threw off a rude but
+spirited translation of that divine lyric.
+
+"O materialist!" cried the boy, with his bright eyes suffused.
+"Schiller calls on the gods to take him to their heaven with him;
+and you would debase the gods to a gin palace."
+
+"Ho, ho!" cried Burley, with his giant laugh. "Drink, and you will
+understand the Dithyramb."
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+Suddenly one morning, as Leonard sate with Barley, a fashionable
+cabriolet, with a very handsome horse, stopped at the door--a loud
+knock--a quick step on the stairs, and Randal Leslie entered.
+Leonard recognised him, and started. Randal glanced at him in
+surprise, and then, with a tact that showed he had already learned
+to profit by London life, after shaking hands with Burley,
+approached, and said with some successful attempt at ease, "Unless
+I am not mistaken, sir, we have met before. If you remember me, I
+hope all boyish quarrels are forgotten?"
+
+Leonard bowed, and his heart was still good enough to be softened.
+
+"Where could you two ever have met?" asked Burley.
+
+"In a village green, and in single combat," answered Randal,
+smiling; and he told the story of the Battle of the Stocks, with
+a well-bred jest on himself. Burley laughed at the story. "But,"
+said he, when this laugh was over, "my young friend had better have
+remained guardian of the village stocks, than come to London in
+search of such fortune as lies at the bottom of an inkhorn."
+
+"Ah," said Randal, with the secret contempt which men elaborately
+cultivated are apt to feel for those who seek to educate
+themselves--"ah, you make literature your calling, sir? At what
+school did you conceive a taste for letters?--not very common at our
+great public schools."
+
+"I am at school now for the first time," answered Leonard, drily.
+
+"Experience is the best schoolmistress," said Burley; "and that
+was the maxim of Goethe, who had book-learning enough, in all
+conscience."
+
+Randal slightly shrugged his shoulders, and, without wasting another
+thought on Leonard, peasant-born and self-taught, took his seat, and
+began to talk to Burley upon a political question, which made then
+the war-cry between the two great Parliamentary parties. It was a
+subject in which Burley showed much general knowledge; and Randal,
+seeming to differ from him, drew forth alike his information and his
+argumentative powers. The conversation lasted more than an hour.
+
+"I can't quite agree with you," said Randal, taking his leave; "but
+you must allow me to call again--will the same hour to-morrow suit
+you?"
+
+"Yes," said Burley.
+
+Away went the young man in his cabriolet. Leonard watched him from
+the window.
+
+For five days, consecutively, did Randal call and discuss the
+question in all its bearings; and Burley, after the second day, got
+interested in the matter, looked up his authorities--refreshed his
+memory--and even spent an hour or two in the Library of the British
+Museum.
+
+By the fifth day, Burley had really exhausted all that could well be
+said on his side of the question.
+
+Leonard, during these colloquies, had sate apart, seemingly
+absorbed in reading, and secretly stung by Randal's disregard of
+his presence. For indeed that young man, in his superb self-esteem,
+and in the absorption of his ambitious projects, scarce felt even
+curiosity as to Leonard's rise above his earlier station, and looked
+on him as a mere journeyman of Burley's. But the self-taught are
+keen and quick observers. And Leonard had remarked, that Randal
+seemed more as one playing a part for some private purpose, than
+arguing in earnest; and that, when he rose and said, "Mr Burley,
+you have convinced me," it was not with the modesty of a sincere
+reasoner, but the triumph of one who has gained his end. But so
+struck, meanwhile, was our unheeded and silent listener, with
+Burley's power of generalisation, and the wide surface over which
+his information extended, that when Randal left the room the boy
+looked at the slovenly purposeless man, and said aloud--"True;
+knowledge is _not_ power."
+
+"Certainly not," said Burley, drily--"the weakest thing, in the
+world."
+
+"Knowledge is power," muttered Randal Leslie, as, with a smile on
+his lip, he drove from the door.
+
+Not many days after this last interview there appeared a short
+pamphlet; anonymous, but one which made a great impression on the
+town. It was on the subject discussed between Randal and Burley. It
+was quoted at great length in the newspapers. And Burley started
+to his feet one morning, and exclaimed, "My own thoughts! my very
+words! Who the devil is this pamphleteer?"
+
+Leonard took the newspaper from Burley's hand. The most flattering
+encomiums preceded the extracts, and the extracts were as
+stereotypes of Burley's talk.
+
+"Can you doubt the author?" cried Leonard, in deep disgust and
+ingenuous scorn. "The young man who came to steal your brains, and
+turn your knowledge--"
+
+"Into power," interrupted Burley, with a laugh, but it was a laugh
+of pain. "Well, this was very mean; I shall tell him so when he
+comes."
+
+"He will come no more," said Leonard. Nor did Randal come again. But
+he sent Mr Burley a copy of the pamphlet with a polite note, saying,
+with candid but careless acknowledgment, that "he had profited much
+by Mr Burley's hints and remarks."
+
+And now it was in all the papers, that the pamphlet which had made
+so great a noise was by a very young man, Mr Audley Egerton's
+relation. And high hopes were expressed of the future career of Mr
+Randal Leslie.
+
+Burley still attempted to laugh, and still his pain was visible.
+Leonard most cordially despised and hated Randal Leslie, and his
+heart moved to Burley with noble but perilous compassion. In his
+desire to soothe and comfort the man whom he deemed cheated out of
+fame, he forgot the caution he had hitherto imposed on himself,
+and yielded more and more to the charm of that wasted intellect.
+He accompanied Burley now where he went to spent his evenings,
+and more and more--though gradually, and with many a recoil and
+self-rebuke--there crept over him the cynic's contempt for glory,
+and miserable philosophy of debased content.
+
+Randal had risen into grave repute upon the strength of Burley's
+knowledge. But, had Burley written the pamphlet, would the same
+repute have attended _him_? Certainly not. Randal Leslie brought to
+that knowledge qualities all his own--a style simple, strong, and
+logical; a certain tone of good society, and allusions to men and
+to parties that showed his connection with a cabinet minister, and
+proved that he had profited no less by Egerton's talk than Burley's.
+
+Had Burley written the pamphlet, it would have showed more genius,
+it would have had humour and wit, but have been so full of whims and
+quips, sins against taste, and defects in earnestness, that it would
+have failed to create any serious sensation. Here, then, there was
+something else besides knowledge, by which knowledge became power.
+Knowledge must not smell of the brandy bottle.
+
+Randal Leslie might be mean in his plagiarism, but he turned the
+useless into use. And so far he was original.
+
+But one's admiration, after all, rests where Leonard's rested--with
+the poor, shabby, riotous, lawless, big fallen man.
+
+Burley took himself off to the Brent, and fished again for the
+one-eyed perch. Leonard accompanied him. His feelings were indeed
+different from what they had been when he had reclined under the
+old tree, and talked with Helen of the future. But it was almost
+pathetic to see how Burley's nature seemed to alter, as he strayed
+along the banks of the rivulet, and talked of his own boyhood.
+The man then seemed restored to something of the innocence of the
+child. He cared, in truth, little for the perch, which continued
+intractable, but he enjoyed the air and the sky, the rustling grass
+and the murmuring waters. These excursions to the haunts of youth
+seemed to rebaptise him, and then his eloquence took a pastoral
+character, and Isaac Walton himself would have loved to hear him.
+But as he got back into the smoke of the metropolis, and the gas
+lamps made him forget the ruddy sunset, and the soft evening star,
+the gross habits reassumed their sway; and on he went with his
+swaggering reckless step to the orgies in which his abused intellect
+flamed forth, and then sank into the socket quenched and rayless.
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+Helen was seized with profound and anxious sadness. Leonard had been
+three or four times to see her, and each time she saw a change in
+him that excited all her fears. He seemed, it is true, more shrewd,
+more worldly-wise, more fitted, it might be, for coarse daily life;
+but, on the other hand, the freshness and glory of his youth
+were waning slowly. His aspirings drooped earthward. He had not
+mastered the Practical, and moulded its uses with the strong hand
+of the Spiritual Architect, of the Ideal Builder: the Practical was
+overpowering himself. She grew pale when he talked of Burley, and
+shuddered, poor little Helen! when she found he was daily and almost
+nightly in a companionship which, with her native honest prudence,
+she saw so unsuited to strengthen him in his struggles, and aid him
+against temptation. She almost groaned when, pressing him as to his
+pecuniary means, she found his old terror of debt seemed fading
+away, and the solid healthful principles he had taken from his
+village were loosening fast. Under all, it is true, there was what a
+wiser and older person than Helen would have hailed as the redeeming
+promise. But that something was _grief_--a sublime grief in his
+own sense of falling--in his own impotence against the Fate he had
+provoked and coveted. The sublimity of that grief Helen could not
+detect: she saw only that it _was_ grief, and she grieved with it,
+letting it excuse every fault--making her more anxious to comfort,
+in order that she might save. Even from the first, when Leonard had
+exclaimed, "Ah, Helen, why did you ever leave me?" she had revolved
+the idea of return to him; and when in the boy's last visit he told
+her that Burley, persecuted by duns, was about to fly from his
+present lodgings, and take his abode with Leonard in the room she
+had left vacant, all doubt was over. She resolved to sacrifice the
+safety and shelter of the home assured her. She resolved to come
+back and share Leonard's penury and struggles, and save the old
+room, wherein she had prayed for him, from the tempter's dangerous
+presence. Should she burden him? No; she had assisted her father by
+many little female arts in needle and fancy work. She had improved
+herself in these during her sojourn with Miss Starke. She could
+bring her share to the common stock. Possessed with this idea, she
+determined to realise it before the day on which Leonard had told
+her Burley was to move his quarters. Accordingly she rose very
+early one morning; she wrote a pretty and grateful note to Miss
+Starke, who was fast asleep, left it on the table, and, before
+any one was astir, stole from the house, her little bundle on her
+arm. She lingered an instant at the garden-gate, with a remorseful
+sentiment--a feeling that she had ill-repaid the cold and prim
+protection that Miss Starke had shown her. But sisterly love carried
+all before it. She closed the gate with a sigh, and went on.
+
+She arrived at the lodging-house before Leonard was up, took
+possession of her old chamber, and, presenting herself to Leonard as
+he was about to go forth, said, (story-teller that she was,)--"I am
+sent away, brother, and I have, come to you to take care of me. Do
+not let us part again. But you must be very cheerful and very happy,
+or I shall think that I am sadly in your way."
+
+Leonard at first did look cheerful, and even happy; but then he
+thought of Burley, and then of his own means of supporting her, and
+was embarrassed, and began questioning Helen as to the possibility
+of reconciliation with Miss Starke. And Helen said gravely,
+"Impossible--do not ask it, and do not go near her."
+
+Then Leonard thought she had been humbled and insulted, and
+remembered that she was a gentleman's child, and felt for her
+wounded pride--he was so proud himself. Yet still he was embarrassed.
+
+"Shall I keep the purse again, Leonard?" said Helen coaxingly.
+
+"Alas!" replied Leonard, "the purse is empty."
+
+"That is very naughty in the purse," said Helen, "since you put so
+much into it."
+
+"I?"
+
+"Did not you say that you made, at least, a guinea a-week?"
+
+"Yes; but Burley takes the money; and then, poor fellow! as I owe
+all to him, I have not the heart to prevent his spending it as he
+likes."
+
+"Please, I wish you could settle the month's rent," said the
+landlady, suddenly showing herself. She said it civilly, but with
+firmness.
+
+Leonard coloured. "It shall be paid to-day."
+
+Then he pressed his hat on his head, and, putting Helen gently
+aside, went forth.
+
+"Speak to _me_ in future, kind Mrs Smedley," said Helen with the air
+of a housewife. "_He_ is always in study, and must not be disturbed."
+
+The landlady--a good woman, though she liked her rent--smiled
+benignly. She was fond of Helen, whom she had known of old.
+
+"I am so glad you are come back; and perhaps now the young man will
+not keep such late hours. I meant to give him warning, but--"
+
+"But he will be a great man one of these days, and you must bear
+with him now." And Helen kissed Mrs Smedley, and sent her away half
+inclined to cry.
+
+Then Helen busied herself in the rooms. She found her father's box,
+which had been duly forwarded. She re-examined its contents, and
+wept as she touched each humble and pious relic. But her father's
+memory itself thus seemed to give this home a sanction which the
+former had not; and she rose quietly and began mechanically to put
+things in order, sighing as she, saw all so neglected, till she
+came to the rose-tree, and that alone showed heed and care. "Dear
+Leonard!" she murmured, and the smile resettled on her lips.
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+Nothing, perhaps, could have severed Leonard from Burley but Helen's
+return to his care. It was impossible for him, even had there been
+another room in the house vacant, (which there was not,) to install
+this noisy riotous son of the Muse by Bacchus, talking at random,
+and smelling of spirits, in the same dwelling with an innocent,
+delicate, timid, female child. And Leonard could not leave her alone
+all the twenty-four hours. She restored a home to him, and imposed
+its duties. He therefore told Mr Burley that in future he should
+write and study in his own room, and hinted with many a blush, and
+as delicately as he could, that it seemed to him that whatever he
+obtained from his pen ought to be halved with Burley, to whose
+interest he owed the employment, and from whose books or whose
+knowledge he took what helped to maintain it; but that the other
+half, if his, he could no longer afford to spend upon feasts or
+libations. He had another to provide for.
+
+Burley pooh-poohed the notion of taking half his coadjutor's
+earning, with much grandeur, but spoke very fretfully of Leonard's
+sober appropriation of the other half; and, though a good-natured
+warm-hearted man, felt extremely indignant against the sudden
+interposition of poor Helen. However, Leonard was firm; and then
+Burley grew sullen, and so they parted. But the rent was still to
+be paid. How? Leonard for the first time thought of the pawnbroker.
+He had clothes to spare, and Riccabocca's watch. No; that last he
+shrank from applying to such base uses.
+
+He went home at noon, and met Helen at the street door. She too had
+been out, and her soft cheek was rosy red with unwonted exercise and
+the sense of joy. She had still preserved the few gold pieces which
+Leonard had taken back to her on his first visit to Miss Starke's.
+She had now gone out and bought wools and implements for work; and
+meanwhile she had paid the rent.
+
+Leonard did not object to the work, but he blushed deeply when he
+knew about the rent, and was very angry. He payed back to her that
+night what she had advanced; and Helen wept silently at his pride,
+and wept more when she saw the next day a woeful hiatus in his
+wardrobe.
+
+But Leonard now worked at home, and worked resolutely; and Helen
+sate by his side, working too; so that next day, and the next,
+slipped peacefully away, and in the evening of the second he
+asked her to walk out in the fields. She sprang up joyously at
+the invitation, when bang went the door, and in reeled John
+Burley--drunk:--And so drunk!
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+And with Burley there reeled in another man--a friend of his--a
+man who had been a wealthy trader and once well to do, but who,
+unluckily, had literary tastes, and was fond of hearing Burley talk.
+So, since he had known the wit, his business had fallen from him,
+and he had passed through the Bankrupt Court. A very shabby-looking
+dog he was, indeed, and his nose was redder than Burley's.
+
+John made a drunken dash at poor Helen. "So you are the Pentheus in
+petticoats who defies Bacchus," cried he; and therewith he roared
+out a verse from Euripides. Helen ran away, and Leonard interposed.
+
+"For shame, Burley!"
+
+"He's drunk," said Mr Douce the bankrupt trader--"very drunk--don't
+mind--him. I say, sir, I hope we don't intrude. Sit still, Burley,
+sit still, and talk, do--that's a good man. You should hear
+him--ta--ta--talk, sir."
+
+Leonard meanwhile had got Helen out of the room, into her own,
+and begged her not to be alarmed, and keep the door locked. He
+then returned to Burley, who had seated himself on the bed, trying
+wondrous hard to keep himself upright; while Mr Douce was striving
+to light a short pipe that he carried in his buttonhole--without
+having filled it--and, naturally failing in that attempt, was now
+beginning to weep.
+
+Leonard was deeply shocked and revolted for Helen's sake; but it was
+hopeless to make Burley listen to reason. And how could the boy turn
+out of his room the man to whom he was under obligations?
+
+Meanwhile there smote upon Helen's shrinking, ears loud jarring talk
+and maudlin laughter, and cracked attempts at jovial songs. Then she
+heard Mrs Smedley in Leonard's room, remonstrating, and Burley's
+laugh was louder than before, and Mrs Smedley, who was a meek woman,
+evidently got frightened, and was heard in precipitate retreat.
+Long and loud talk recommenced, Burley's great voice predominant,
+Mr Douce chiming in with hiccupy broken treble. Hour after hour
+this lasted, for want of the drink that would have brought it to a
+premature close. And Burley gradually began to talk himself somewhat
+sober. Then Mr Douce was heard descending the stairs, and silence
+followed. At dawn, Leonard knocked at Helen's door. She opened it at
+once, for she had not gone to bed.
+
+"Helen," said he very sadly, "you cannot continue here. I must find
+out some proper home for you. This man has served me when all London
+was friendless, and he tells me that he has nowhere else to go--that
+the bailiffs are after him. He has now fallen asleep. I will go and
+find you some lodging close at hand--for I cannot expel him who has
+protected me; and yet you cannot be under the same roof with him. My
+own good angel, I must lose you."
+
+He did not wait for her answer, but hurried down the stairs.
+
+The morning looked through the shutterless panes in Leonard's
+garret, and the birds began to chirp from the elm-tree, when Burley
+rose and shook himself, and stared round. He could not quite make
+out where he was. He got hold of the water-jug which he emptied
+at three draughts, and felt greatly refreshed. He then began to
+reconnoitre the chamber--looked at Leonard's MSS.--peeped into the
+drawers--wondered where the devil Leonard himself had gone to--and
+finally amused himself by throwing down the fire-irons, ringing the
+bell, and making all the noise he could, in the hopes of attracting
+the attention of somebody or other, and procuring himself his
+morning dram.
+
+In the midst of this _charivari_ the door opened softly, but as if
+with a resolute hand, and the small quiet form of Helen stood before
+the threshold. BURLEY turned round, and the two looked at each other
+for some moments with silent scrutiny.
+
+BURLEY, (composing his features into their most friendly
+expression.)--"Come hither, my dear. So you are the little girl whom
+I saw with Leonard on the banks of the Brent, and you have come
+back to live with him--and I have come to live with him too. You
+shall be our little housekeeper, and I will tell you the story of
+Prince Prettyman, and a great many others not to be found in _Mother
+Goose_. Meanwhile, my dear little girl, here's sixpence--just run
+out and change this for its worth in rum."
+
+HELEN, (coming slowly up to Mr Burley, and still gazing earnestly
+into his face.)--"Ah, sir, Leonard says you have a kind heart, and
+that you have served him--he cannot ask you to leave the house; and
+so I, who have never served him, am to go hence and live alone."
+
+BURLEY, (moved.)--"You go, my little lady?--and why? Can we not all
+live together?"
+
+HELEN.--"No, sir. I left everything to come to Leonard, for we had
+met first at my father's grave. But you rob me of him, and I have no
+other friend on earth."
+
+BURLEY, (discomposed.)--"Explain yourself. Why must you leave him
+because I come?"
+
+Helen looks at Mr Burley again, long and wistfully, but makes no
+answer.
+
+BURLEY, (with a gulp.)--"Is it because he thinks I am not fit
+company for you?"
+
+Helen bowed her head.
+
+Burley winced, and after a moment's pause said,--"He is right."
+
+HELEN, (obeying the impulse at her heart, springs forward and takes
+Burley's hand.)--"Ah, sir," she cried, "before he knew you he was
+so different--then he was cheerful--then, even when his first
+disappointment came, I grieved and wept; but I felt he would conquer
+still--for his heart was so good and pure. Oh, sir, don't think I
+reproach you; but what is to become of him if--if--No, it is not for
+myself I speak. I know that if I was here, that if he had me to care
+for, he would come home early--and work patiently--and--and--that
+I might save him. But now when I am gone, and you with him--you
+to whom he is grateful, you whom he would follow against his own
+conscience, (you must see that, sir)--what is to become of him?"
+
+Helen's voice died in sobs.
+
+Burley took three or four long strides through the room--he was
+greatly agitated. "I am a demon," he murmured. "I never saw it
+before--but it is true--I should be this boy's ruin." Tears stood in
+his eyes, he paused abruptly, made a clutch at his hat, and turned
+to the door.
+
+Helen stopped the way, and, taking him gently by the arm,
+said,--"Oh, sir, forgive me--I have pained you;" and looked up at
+him with a compassionate expression, that indeed made the child's
+sweet face as that of an angel.
+
+Burley bent down as if to kiss her, and then drew back--perhaps with
+a sentiment that his lips were not worthy to touch that innocent
+brow.
+
+"If I had had a sister--a child like you, little one," he muttered,
+"perhaps I too might have been saved in time. Now--"
+
+"Ah, now you may stay, sir; I don't fear you any more."
+
+"No, no; you would fear me again ere night-time, and I might not be
+always in the right mood to listen to a voice like yours, child.
+Your Leonard has a noble heart and rare gifts. He should rise yet,
+and he shall. I will not drag him into the mire. Good-bye--you will
+see me no more." He broke from Helen, cleared the stairs with a
+bound, and was out of the house.
+
+When Leonard returned he was surprised to hear his unwelcome
+guest was gone--but Helen did not venture to tell him of her
+interposition. She knew instinctively how such officiousness would
+mortify and offend the pride of man--but she never again spoke
+harshly of poor Burley. Leonard supposed that he should either see
+or hear of the humourist in the course of the day. Finding he did
+not, he went in search of him at his old haunts; but no trace. He
+inquired at the _Beehive_ if they knew there of his new address, but
+no tidings of Burley could be obtained.
+
+As he came home disappointed and anxious, for he felt uneasy as to
+the disappearance of his wild friend, Mrs Smedley met him at the
+door.
+
+"Please, sir, suit yourself with another lodging," said she. "I can
+have no such singings and shoutings going on at night in my house.
+And that poor little girl, too!--you should be ashamed of yourself."
+
+Leonard frowned, and passed by.
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+Meanwhile, on leaving Helen, Burley strode on; and, as if by some
+better instinct, for he was unconscious of his own steps, he took
+the way towards the still green haunts of his youth. When he paused
+at length, he was already before the door of a rural cottage,
+standing alone in the midst of fields, with a little farm-yard at
+the back; and far through the trees in front was caught a glimpse of
+the winding Brent.
+
+With this cottage Burley was familiar; it was inhabited by a good
+old couple who had known him from a boy. There he habitually
+left his rods and fishing-tackle; there, for intervals in his
+turbid riotous life, he had sojourned for two or three days
+together--fancying the first day that the country was a heaven, and
+convinced before the third that it was a purgatory.
+
+An old woman, of neat and tidy exterior, came forth to greet him.
+
+"Ah, Master John," said she clasping his nerveless hand--"well,
+the fields be pleasant now--I hope you are come to stay a bit? Do;
+it will freshen you: you lose all the fine colour you had once, in
+Lunnon town."
+
+"I will stay with you, my kind friend," said Burley with unusual
+meekness--"I can have the old room, then?"
+
+"Oh yes, come and look at it. I never let it now to any one but
+you--never have let it since the dear beautiful lady with the
+angel's face went away. Poor thing, what could have become of her?"
+
+Thus speaking, while Burley listened not, the old woman drew him
+within the cottage, and led him up the stairs into a room that might
+have well become a better house, for it was furnished with taste,
+and even elegance. A small cabinet pianoforte stood opposite the
+fireplace, and the window looked upon pleasant meads and tangled
+hedgerows, and the narrow windings of the blue rivulet. Burley sank
+down exhausted, and gazed wistfully from the casement.
+
+"You have not breakfasted?" said the hostess anxiously.
+
+"No."
+
+"Well, the eggs are fresh laid, and you would like a rasher of
+bacon, Master John? And if you _will_ have brandy in your tea, I
+have some that you left long ago in your own bottle."
+
+Burley shook his head. "No brandy, Mrs Goodyer; only fresh milk. I
+will see whether I can yet coax Nature."
+
+Mrs Goodyer did not know what was meant by coaxing Nature, but she
+said, "Pray do, Master John," and vanished.
+
+That day Burley went out with his rod, and he fished hard for the
+one-eyed perch: but in vain. Then he roved along the stream with
+his hands in his pockets, whistling. He returned to the cottage at
+sunset, partook of the fare provided for him, abstained from the
+brandy, and felt dreadfully low. He called for pen, ink, and paper,
+and sought to write, but could not achieve two lines. He summoned
+Mrs Goodyer, "Tell your husband to come and sit and talk."
+
+Up came old Jacob Goodyer, and the great wit bade him tell him all
+the news of the village. Jacob obeyed willingly, and Burley at last
+fell asleep. The next day it was much the same, only at dinner he
+had up the brandy bottle, and finished it; and he did _not_ have up
+Jacob, but he contrived to write.
+
+The third day it rained incessantly. "Have you no books, Mrs
+Goodyer?" asked poor John Burley.
+
+"Oh, yes, some that the dear lady left behind her; and perhaps you
+would like to look at some papers in her own writing?"
+
+"No, not the papers--all women scribble, and all scribble the same
+things. Get me the books."
+
+The books were brought up--poetry and essays--John knew them by
+heart. He looked out on the rain, and at evening the rain had
+ceased. He rushed to his hat and fled.
+
+"Nature, Nature!" he exclaimed when he was out in the air and
+hurrying by the dripping hedgerows, "you are not to be coaxed by
+me! I have jilted you shamefully, I own it; you are a female and
+unforgiving. I don't complain. You may be very pretty, but you are
+the stupidest and most tiresome companion that ever I met with.
+Thank heaven, I am not married to you!"
+
+Thus John Burley made his way into town, and paused at the first
+public house. Out of that house he came with a jovial air, and
+on he strode towards the heart of London. Now he is in Leicester
+Square, and he gazes on the foreigners who stalk that region, and
+hums a tune; and now from yonder alley two forms emerge, and dog
+his careless footsteps; now through the maze of passages towards St
+Martin's he threads his path, and, anticipating an orgy as he nears
+his favourite haunts, jingles the silver in his pockets; and now the
+two forms are at his heels.
+
+"Hail to thee, O Freedom!" muttered John Burley, "thy dwelling is in
+cities, and thy palace is the tavern."
+
+"In the king's name," quoth a gruff voice; and John Burley feels the
+horrid and familiar tap on the shoulder.
+
+The two bailiffs who dogged have seized their prey.
+
+"At whose suit?" asked John Burley falteringly.
+
+"Mr Cox, the wine-merchant."
+
+"Cox! A man to whom I gave a cheque on my bankers, not three months
+ago!"
+
+"But it warn't cashed."
+
+"What does that signify?--the intention was the same. A good heart
+takes the will for the deed. Cox is a monster of ingratitude; and I
+withdraw my custom."
+
+"Sarve him right. Would your honour like a jarvey?"
+
+"I would rather spend the money on something else," said John
+Burley. "Give me your arm, I am not proud. After all, thank heaven,
+I shall not sleep in the country."
+
+And John Burley made a night of it in the Fleet.
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+Miss Starke was one of those ladies who pass their lives in the
+direst of all civil strife--war with their servants. She looked upon
+the members of that class as the unrelenting and sleepless enemies
+of the unfortunate householders condemned to employ them. She
+thought they ate and drank to their villanous utmost, in order to
+ruin their benefactors--that they lived in one constant conspiracy
+with one another and the tradesmen, the object of which was to
+cheat and pilfer. Miss Starke was a miserable woman. As she had no
+relations or friends who cared enough for her to share her solitary
+struggle against her domestic foes; and her income, though easy,
+was an annuity that died with herself, thereby reducing various
+nephews, nieces, or cousins, to the strict bounds of a natural
+affection--that did not exist; and as she felt the want of some
+friendly face amidst this world of distrust and hate, so she had
+tried the resource of venal companions. But the venal companions
+had never staid long--either they disliked Miss Starke, or Miss
+Starke disliked them. Therefore the poor woman had resolved upon
+bringing up some little girl whose heart, as she said to herself,
+would be fresh and uncorrupted, and from whom she might expect
+gratitude. She had been contented, on the whole, with Helen, and
+had meant to keep that child in her house as long as she (Miss
+Starke) remained upon the earth--perhaps some thirty years longer;
+and then, having carefully secluded her from marriage, and other
+friendship, to leave her nothing but the regret of having lost so
+kind a benefactress. Agreeably with this notion, and in order to
+secure the affections of the child, Miss Starke had relaxed the
+frigid austerity natural to her manner and mode of thought, and been
+kind to Helen in an iron way. She had neither slapped nor pinched
+her, neither had she starved. She had allowed her to see Leonard,
+according to the agreement made with Dr Morgan, and had laid out
+tenpence on cakes, besides contributing fruit from her garden for
+the first interview--a hospitality she did not think it fit to renew
+on subsequent occasions. In return for this, she conceived she had
+purchased the right to Helen bodily and spiritually, and nothing
+could exceed her indignation when she rose one morning and found the
+child had gone. As it never had occurred to her to ask Leonard's
+address, though she suspected Helen had gone to him, she was at a
+loss what to do, and remained for twenty-four hours in a state of
+inane depression. But then she began to miss the child so much that
+her energies woke, and she persuaded herself that she was actuated
+by the purest benevolence in trying to reclaim this poor creature
+from the world into which Helen had thus rashly plunged.
+
+Accordingly, she put an advertisement into the _Times_, to the
+following effect, liberally imitated from one by which, in former
+years, she had recovered a favourite Blenheim.
+
+     TWO GUINEAS REWARD.
+
+     Strayed, from Ivy Cottage, Highgate, a Little Girl, answers to
+     the name of Helen; with blue eyes and brown hair; white muslin
+     frock, and straw hat with blue ribbons. Whoever will bring the
+     same to Ivy Cottage, shall receive the above Reward.
+
+     _N.B._--Nothing more will be offered.
+
+Now, it so happened that Mrs Smedley had put an advertisement in
+the _Times_ on her own account, relative to a niece of hers who
+was coming from the country, and for whom she desired to find
+a situation. So, contrary to her usual habit, she sent for the
+newspaper, and, close by her own advertisement, she saw Miss
+Starke's.
+
+It was impossible that she could mistake the description of Helen;
+and, as this advertisement caught her eye the very day after the
+whole house had been disturbed and scandalised by Burley's noisy
+visit, and on which she had resolved to get rid of a lodger who
+received such visitors, the goodhearted woman was delighted to think
+that she could restore Helen to some safe home. While thus thinking,
+Helen herself entered the kitchen where Mrs Smedley sate, and the
+landlady had the imprudence to point out the advertisement, and
+talk, as she called it, "seriously" to the little girl.
+
+Helen in vain and with tears entreated her to take no step in reply
+to the advertisement. Mrs Smedley felt it was an affair of duty,
+and was obdurate, and shortly afterwards put on her bonnet and
+left the house. Helen conjectured that she was on her way to Miss
+Starke's, and her whole soul was bent on flight. Leonard had gone
+to the office of the _Beehive_ with his MSS.; but she packed up all
+their joint effects, and, just as she had done so, he returned. She
+communicated the news of the advertisement, and said she should be
+so miserable if compelled to go back to Miss Starke's, and implored
+him so pathetically to save her from such sorrow that he at once
+assented to her proposal of flight. Luckily, little was owing to the
+landlady--that little was left with the maid-servant; and, profiting
+by Mrs Smedley's absence, they escaped without scene or conflict.
+Their effects were taken by Leonard to a stand of hackney vehicles,
+and then left at a coach-office, while they went in search of
+lodgings. It was wise to choose an entirely new and remote district;
+and before night they were settled in an attic in Lambeth.
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+As the reader will expect, no trace of Burley could Leonard find:
+the humourist had ceased to communicate with the _Beehive_. But
+Leonard grieved for Burley's sake; and indeed, he missed the
+intercourse of the large wrong mind. But he settled down by
+degrees to the simple loving society of his child companion, and
+in that presence grew more tranquil. The hours in the daytime
+that he did not pass at work he spent as before, picking up
+knowledge at bookstalls; and at dusk he and Helen would stroll
+out--sometimes striving to escape from the long suburb into fresh
+rural air; more often wandering to and fro the bridge that led
+to glorious Westminster--London's classic land--and watching the
+vague lamps reflected on the river. This haunt suited the musing
+melancholy boy. He would stand long and with wistful silence by the
+balustrade--seating Helen thereon, that she too might look along the
+dark mournful waters which, dark though they be, still have their
+charm of mysterious repose.
+
+As the river flowed between the world of roofs, and the roar of
+human passions on either side, so in those two hearts flowed
+Thought--and all they knew of London was its shadow.
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+There appeared in the _Beehive_ certain very truculent political
+papers--papers very like the tracts in the Tinker's bag. Leonard
+did not heed them much, but they made far more sensation in the
+public that read the _Beehive_ than Leonard's papers, full of rare
+promise though the last were. They greatly increased the sale of the
+periodical in the manufacturing towns, and began to awake the drowsy
+vigilance of the Home Office. Suddenly a descent was made upon the
+_Beehive_, and all its papers and plant. The editor saw himself
+threatened with a criminal prosecution, and the certainty of two
+years' imprisonment: he did not like the prospect, and disappeared.
+One evening, when Leonard, unconscious of these mischances, arrived
+at the door of the office, he found it closed. An agitated mob was
+before it, and a voice that was not new to his ear was haranguing
+the bystanders, with many imprecations against "tyrans." He looked,
+and, to his amaze, recognised in the orator Mr Sprott the Tinker.
+
+The police came in numbers to disperse the crowd, and Mr Sprott
+prudently vanished. Leonard learned then what had befallen, and
+again saw himself without employment and the means of bread.
+
+Slowly he walked back. "O, knowledge, knowledge!--powerless indeed!"
+he murmured.
+
+As he thus spoke, a handbill in large capitals met his eyes on a
+dead wall--"Wanted, a few smart young men for India."
+
+A crimp accosted him--"You would make a fine soldier, my man. You
+have stout limbs of your own." Leonard moved on.
+
+"It has come back, then, to this. Brute physical force after all! O
+Mind, despair! O Peasant, be a machine again."
+
+He entered his attic noiselessly, and gazed upon Helen as she sate
+at work, straining her eyes by the open window--with tender and deep
+compassion. She had not heard him enter, nor was she aware of his
+presence. Patient and still she sate, and the small fingers plied
+busily. He gazed, and saw that her cheek was pale and hollow, and
+the hands looked so thin! His heart was deeply touched, and at that
+moment he had not one memory of the baffled Poet, one thought that
+proclaimed the Egotist.
+
+He approached her gently, laid his hand on her shoulder--"Helen, put
+on your shawl and bonnet, and walk out--I have much to say."
+
+In a few moments she was ready, and they took their way to their
+favourite haunt upon the bridge. Pausing in one of the recesses or
+nooks, Leonard then began,--"Helen, we must part."
+
+"Part?--Oh, brother!"
+
+"Listen. All work that depends on mind is over for me; nothing
+remains but the labour of thews and sinews. I cannot go back to
+my village and say to all, 'My hopes were self-conceit, and my
+intellect a delusion!' I cannot. Neither in this sordid city can
+I turn menial or porter. I might be born to that drudgery, but my
+mind has, it may be unhappily, raised me above my birth. What, then,
+shall I do? I know not yet--serve as a soldier, or push my way to
+some wilderness afar, as an emigrant, perhaps. But whatever my
+choice, I must henceforth be alone; I have a home no more. But there
+is a home for you, Helen, a very humble one, (for you, too, so well
+born,) but very safe--the roof of--of--my peasant mother. She will
+love you for my sake, and--and--"
+
+Helen clung to him trembling, and sobbed out, "Anything, anything
+you will. But I can work; I can make money, Leonard. I do, indeed,
+make money--you do not know how much--but enough for us both till
+better times come to you. Do not let us part."
+
+"And I--a man, and born to labour, to be maintained by the work of
+an infant! No, Helen, do not so degrade me."
+
+She drew back as she looked on his flushed brow, bowed her head
+submissively, and murmured, "Pardon."
+
+"Ah," said Helen, after a pause, "if now we could but find my poor
+father's friend! I never so much cared for it before."
+
+"Yes, he would surely provide for you."
+
+"For _me_!" repeated Helen, in a tone of soft deep reproach, and she
+turned away her head to conceal her tears.
+
+"You are sure you would remember him, if we met him by chance?"
+
+"Oh yes. He was so different from all we see in this terrible city,
+and his eyes were like yonder stars, so clear and so bright; yet the
+light seemed to come from afar off, as the light does in yours, when
+your thoughts are away from all things round you. And then, too, his
+dog whom he called Nero--I could not forget that."
+
+"But his dog may not be always with him."
+
+"But the bright clear eyes are! Ah, now you look up to heaven, and
+yours seem to dream like his."
+
+Leonard did not answer, for his thoughts were indeed less on earth
+than struggling to pierce into that remote and mysterious heaven.
+
+Both were silent long; the crowd passed them by unheedingly. Night
+deepened over the river, but the reflection of the lamplights on
+its waves was more visible than that of the stars. The beams showed
+the darkness of the strong current, and the craft that lay eastward
+on the tide, with sail-less spectral masts and black dismal hulks,
+looked deathlike in their stillness.
+
+Leonard looked down, and the thought of Chatterton's grim suicide
+came back to his soul, and a pale scornful face with luminous
+haunting eyes seemed to look up from the stream, and murmur from
+livid lips,--"Struggle no more against the tides on the surface--all
+is calm and rest within the deep."
+
+Starting in terror from the gloom of his reverie, the boy began to
+talk fast to Helen, and tried to soothe her with descriptions of the
+lowly home which he had offered.
+
+He spoke of the light cares which she would participate with his
+mother--for by that name he still called the widow--and dwelt,
+with an eloquence that the contrast round him made sincere and
+strong, on the happy rural life, the shadowy woodlands, the rippling
+cornfields, the solemn lone church-spire soaring from the tranquil
+landscape. Flatteringly he painted the flowery terraces of the
+Italian exile, and the playful fountain that, even as he spoke, was
+flinging up its spray to the stars, through serene air untroubled
+by the smoke of cities, and untainted by the sinful sighs of men.
+He promised her the love and protection of natures akin to the
+happy scene: the simple affectionate mother--the gentle pastor--the
+exile wise and kind--Violante, with dark eyes full of the mystic
+thoughts that solitude calls from childhood,--Violante should be her
+companion.
+
+"And oh!" cried Helen, "if life be thus happy there, return with me,
+return--return!"
+
+"Alas!" murmured the boy, "if the hammer once strike the spark from
+the anvil, the spark must fly upward; it cannot fall back to earth
+until light has left it. Upward still, Helen--let me go upward
+still!"
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+The next morning Helen was very ill--so ill that, shortly after
+rising, she was forced to creep back to bed. Her frame shivered--her
+eyes were heavy--her hand burned like fire. Fever had set in.
+Perhaps she might have caught cold on the bridge--perhaps her
+emotions had proved too much for her frame. Leonard, in great
+alarm, called on the nearest apothecary. The apothecary looked
+grave, and said there was danger. And danger soon declared
+itself--Helen became delirious. For several days she lay in this
+state, between life and death. Leonard then felt that all the
+sorrows of earth are light, compared with the fear of losing what we
+love. How valueless the envied laurel seemed beside the dying rose.
+
+Thanks, perhaps, more to his heed and tending than to medical
+skill, she recovered sense at last--immediate peril was over.
+But she was very weak and reduced--her ultimate recovery
+doubtful--convalescence, at best, likely to be very slow.
+
+But when she learned how long she had been thus ill, she looked
+anxiously at Leonard's face as he bent over her, and faltered
+forth--"Give me my work; I am strong enough for that now--it would
+amuse me."
+
+Leonard burst into tears.
+
+Alas! he had no work himself; all their joint money had melted away;
+the apothecary was not like good Dr Morgan: the medicines were to
+be paid for, and the rent. Two days before, Leonard had pawned
+Riccabocca's watch; and when the last shilling thus raised was gone,
+how should he support Helen? Nevertheless he conquered his tears,
+and assured her that he had employment; and that so earnestly that
+she believed him, and sank into soft sleep. He listened to her
+breathing, kissed her forehead, and left the room. He turned into
+his own neigbouring garret, and, leaning his face on his hands,
+collected all his thoughts.
+
+He must be a beggar at last. He must write to Mr Dale for money--Mr
+Dale, too, who knew the secret of his birth. He would rather have
+begged of a stranger--it seemed to add a new dishonour to his
+mother's memory for the child to beg of one who was acquainted with
+her shame. Had he himself been the only one to want and to starve,
+he would have sunk inch by inch into the grave of famine, before he
+would have so subdued his pride. But Helen, there on that bed--Helen
+needing, for weeks perhaps, all support, and illness making luxuries
+themselves like necessaries! Beg he must. And when he so resolved,
+had you but seen the proud bitter soul he conquered, you would
+have said--"This which he thinks is degradation--this is heroism.
+Oh strange human heart!--no epic ever written achieves the Sublime
+and the Beautiful which are graven, unread by human eye, in thy
+secret leaves." Of whom else should he beg? His mother had nothing,
+Riccabocca was poor, and the stately Violante, who had exclaimed,
+"Would that I were a man!"--he could not endure the thought that she
+should pity him, and despise. The Avenels! No--thrice No. He drew
+towards him hastily ink and paper, and wrote rapid lines, that were
+wrung from him as from the bleeding strings of life.
+
+But the hour for the post had passed--the letter must wait till
+the next day; and three days at least would elapse before he
+could receive an answer. He left the letter on the table, and,
+stifling as for air, went forth. He crossed the bridge--he passed
+on mechanically--and was borne along by a crowd pressing towards
+the doors of Parliament. A debate that excited popular interest
+was fixed for that evening, and many bystanders collected in the
+street to see the members pass to and fro, or hear what speakers had
+yet risen to take part in the debate, or try to get orders for the
+gallery.
+
+He halted amidst these loiterers, with no interest, indeed, in
+common with them, but looking over their heads abstractedly towards
+the tall Funeral Abbey--Imperial Golgotha of Poets, and Chiefs, and
+Kings.
+
+Suddenly his attention was diverted to those around by the sound of
+a name--displeasingly known to him. "How are you, Randal Leslie?
+coming to hear the debate?" said a member who was passing through
+the street.
+
+"Yes; Mr Egerton promised to get me under the gallery. He is to
+speak himself to-night, and I have never heard him. As you are going
+into the House, will you remind him?"
+
+"I can't now, for he is speaking already--and well too. I hurried
+from the Athenæum, where I was dining, on purpose to be in time, as
+I heard that his speech was making a great effect."
+
+"This is very unlucky," said Randal. "I had no idea he would speak
+so early."
+
+"M---- brought him up by a direct personal attack. But follow me;
+perhaps I can get you into the House; and a man like you, Leslie,
+of whom we expect great things some day, I can tell you, should not
+miss any such opportunity of knowing what this House of ours is on a
+field night. Come on!"
+
+The member hurried towards the door; and as Randal followed him,
+a bystander cried--"That is the young man who wrote the famous
+pamphlet--Egerton's relation."
+
+"Oh, indeed!" said another. "Clever man, Egerton--I am waiting for
+him."
+
+"So am I."
+
+"Why, you are not a constituent, as I am."
+
+"No; but he has been very kind to my nephew, and I must thank him.
+You are a constituent--he is an honour to your town."
+
+"So he is: Enlightened man!"
+
+"And so generous!"
+
+"Brings forward really good measures," quoth the politician.
+
+"And clever young men," said the uncle.
+
+Therewith one or two others joined in the praise of Audley Egerton,
+and many anecdotes of his liberality were told.
+
+Leonard listened at first listlessly, at last with thoughtful
+attention. He had heard Burley, too, speak highly of this generous
+statesman, who, without pretending to genius himself, appreciated
+it in others. He suddenly remembered, too, that Egerton was
+half-brother to the Squire. Vague notions of some appeal to this
+eminent person, not for charity, but employ to his mind, gleamed
+across him--inexperienced boy that he yet was! And, while thus
+meditating, the door of the House opened, and out came Audley
+Egerton himself. A partial cheering, followed by a general murmur,
+apprised Leonard of the presence of the popular statesman. Egerton
+was caught hold of by some five or six persons in succession; a
+shake of the hand, a nod, a brief whispered word or two, sufficed
+the practised member for graceful escape; and soon, free from the
+crowd, his tall erect figure passed on, and turned towards the
+bridge. He paused at the angle and took out his watch, looking at it
+by the lamp-light.
+
+"Harley will be here soon," he muttered--"he is always punctual; and
+now that I have spoken, I can give him an hour or so. That is well."
+
+As he replaced his watch in his pocket, and re-buttoned his coat
+over his firm broad chest, he lifted his eyes, and saw a young man
+standing before him.
+
+"Do you want me?" asked the statesman, with the direct brevity of
+his practical character.
+
+"Mr Egerton," said the young man, with a voice that slightly
+trembled, and yet was manly amidst emotion, "you have a great name,
+and great power--I stand here in these streets of London without
+a friend, and without employ. I believe that I have it in me to
+do some nobler work than that of bodily labour, had I but one
+friend--one opening for my thoughts. And now I have said this, I
+scarcely know how, or why, but from despair, and the sudden impulse
+which that despair took from the praise that follows your success, I
+have nothing more to add."
+
+Audley Egerton was silent for a moment, struck by the tone and
+address of the stranger; but the consummate and wary man of the
+world, accustomed to all manner of strange applications, and all
+varieties of imposture, quickly recovered from a passing and slight
+effect.
+
+"Are you a native of ----?" (naming the town he represented as
+member.)
+
+"No, sir."
+
+"Well, young man, I am very sorry for you; but the good sense
+you must possess (for I judge of that by the education you have
+evidently received) must tell you that a public man, whatever be his
+patronage, has it too fully absorbed by claimants who have a right
+to demand it, to be able to listen to strangers."
+
+He paused a moment, and, as Leonard stood silent, added, with more
+kindness than most public men so accosted would have showed--
+
+"You say you are friendless--poor fellow. In early life that happens
+to many of us, who find friends enough before the close. Be honest,
+and well-conducted; lean on yourself, not on strangers; work with
+the body if you can't with the mind; and, believe me, that advice is
+all I can give you, unless this trifle,"--and the minister held out
+a crown piece.
+
+Leonard bowed, shook his head sadly, and walked away. Egerton looked
+after him with a slight pang.
+
+"Pooh!" said he to himself, "there must be thousands in the same
+state in these streets of London. I cannot redress the necessities
+of civilisation. Well educated! It is not from ignorance henceforth
+that society will suffer--it is from over-educating the hungry
+thousands who, thus unfitted for manual toil, and with no career for
+mental, will some day or other stand like that boy in our streets,
+and puzzle wiser ministers than I am."
+
+As Egerton thus mused, and passed on to the bridge, a bugle-horn
+rang merrily from the box of a gay four-in-hand. A drag-coach with
+superb blood-horses rattled over the causeway, and in the driver
+Egerton recognised his nephew--Frank Hazeldean.
+
+The young Guardsman was returning, with a lively party of men, from
+dining at Greenwich; and the careless laughter of these children of
+pleasure floated far over the still river.
+
+It vexed the ear of the careworn statesman--sad, perhaps, with all
+his greatness, lonely amidst all his crowd of friends. It reminded
+him, perhaps, of his own youth, when such parties and companionships
+were familiar to him, though through them all he bore an ambitious
+aspiring soul--"_Le jeu, vaut-il la chandelle?_" said he, shrugging
+his shoulders.
+
+The coach rolled rapidly past Leonard, as he stood leaning against
+the corner of the bridge, and the mire of the kennel splashed over
+him from the hoofs of the fiery horses. The laughter smote on his
+ear more discordantly than on the minister's, but it begot no envy.
+
+"Life is a dark riddle," said he, smiting his breast.
+
+And he walked slowly on, gained the recess where he had stood
+several nights before with Helen; and dizzy with want of food, and
+worn out for want of sleep, he sank down into the dark corner; while
+the river that rolled under the arch of stone muttered dirge-like
+in his ear;--as under the social key-stone wails and rolls on for
+ever the mystery of Human Discontent. Take comfort, O Thinker by the
+stream! 'Tis the river that founded and gave pomp to the city; and
+without the discontent, where were progress--what were Man? Take
+comfort, O THINKER! where ever the stream over which thou bendest,
+or beside which thou sinkest, weary and desolate, frets the arch
+that supports thee;--never dream that, by destroying the bridge,
+thou canst silence the moan of the wave!
+
+
+
+
+DISFRANCHISEMENT OF THE BOROUGHS.
+
+TO WALTER BINKIE, ESQ., PROVOST OF DREEPDAILY.
+
+
+MY DEAR PROVOST,--In the course of your communings with nature on
+the uplands of Dreepdaily, you must doubtless have observed that
+the advent of a storm is usually preceded by the appearance of a
+flight of seamaws, who, by their discordant screams, give notice of
+the approaching change of weather. For some time past it has been
+the opinion of those who are in the habit of watching the political
+horizon, that we should do well to prepare ourselves for a squall,
+and already the premonitory symptoms are distinctly audible. The
+Liberal press, headed by the _Times_, is clamorous for some sweeping
+change in the method of Parliamentary representation; and Lord John
+Russell, as you are well aware, proposes in the course of next
+Session to take up the subject. This is no mere _brutum fulmen_,
+or dodge to secure a little temporary popularity--it is a distinct
+party move for a very intelligible purpose; and is fraught, I
+think, with much danger and injustice to many of the constituencies
+which are now intrusted with the right of franchise. As you, my
+dear Provost, are a Liberal both by principle and profession,
+and moreover chief magistrate of a very old Scottish burgh, your
+opinion upon this matter must have great weight in determining the
+judgment of others; and, therefore, you will not, I trust, consider
+it too great a liberty, if, at this dull season of the year, I call
+your attention to one or two points which appear well worthy of
+consideration.
+
+In the first place, I think you will admit that extensive organic
+changes in the Constitution ought never to be attempted except in
+cases of strong necessity. The real interests of the country are
+never promoted by internal political agitation, which unsettles
+men's minds, is injurious to regular industry, and too often leaves
+behind it the seeds of jealousy and discord between different
+classes of the community, ready on some future occasion to burst
+into noxious existence. You would not, I think, wish to see annually
+renewed that sort of strife which characterised the era of the
+Reform Bill. I venture to pass no opinion whatever on the abstract
+merits of that measure. I accept it as a fact, just as I accept
+other changes in the Constitution of this country which took place
+before I was born; and I hope I shall ever comport myself as a loyal
+and independent elector. But I am sure you have far too lively
+a recollection of the ferment which that event created, to wish
+to see it renewed, without at least some urgent cause. You were
+consistently anxious for the suppression of rotten boroughs, and for
+the enlargement of the constituency upon a broad and popular basis;
+and you considered that the advantages to be gained by the adoption
+of the new system, justified the social risks which were incurred in
+the endeavour to supersede the old one. I do not say that you were
+wrong in this. The agitation for Parliamentary Reform had been going
+on for a great number of years; the voice of the majority of the
+country was undeniably in your favour, and you finally carried your
+point. Still, in consequence of that struggle, years elapsed before
+the heart-burnings and jealousies which were occasioned by it were
+allayed. Even now it is not uncommon to hear the reminiscences of
+the Reform Bill appealed to on the hustings by candidates who have
+little else to say for themselves by way of personal recommendation.
+A most ludicrous instance of this occurred very lately in the case
+of a young gentleman, who, being desirous of Parliamentary honours,
+actually requested the support of the electors on the ground that
+his father or grandfather--I forget which--had voted for the Reform
+Bill; a ceremony which he could not very well have performed in
+his own person, as at that time he had not been released from
+the bondage of swaddling-clothes! I need hardly add that he was
+rejected; but the anecdote is curious and instructive.
+
+In a country such as this, changes must be looked for in the course
+of years. One system dies out, or becomes unpopular, and is replaced
+by a new one. But I cannot charge my memory with any historical
+instance where a great change was attempted without some powerful
+or cogent reason. Still less can I recollect any great change being
+proposed, unless a large and powerful section of the community had
+unequivocally declared in its favour. The reason of this is quite
+obvious. The middle classes of Great Britain, however liberal they
+may be in their sentiments, have a just horror of revolutions. They
+know very well that organic changes are never effected without
+enormous loss and individual deprivation, and they will not move
+unless they are assured that the value of the object to be gained is
+commensurate with the extent of the sacrifice. In defence of their
+liberties, when these are attacked, the British people are ever
+ready to stand forward; but I mistake them much, if they will at any
+time allow themselves to be made the tools of a faction. The attempt
+to get up organic changes for the sole purpose of perpetuating the
+existence of a particular Ministry, or of maintaining the supremacy
+of a particular party, is a new feature in our history. It is an
+experiment which the nation ought not to tolerate for a single
+moment; and which I am satisfied it will not tolerate, when the
+schemes of its authors are laid bare.
+
+I believe, Provost, I am right in assuming that there has been no
+decided movement in favour of a New Parliamentary Reform Bill,
+either in Dreepdaily or in any of the other burghs with which you
+are connected. The electors are well satisfied with the operation of
+the ten-pound clause, which excludes from the franchise no man of
+decent ability and industry, whilst it secures property from those
+direct inroads which would be the inevitable result of a system of
+universal suffrage. Also, I suppose, you are reasonably indifferent
+on the subjects of Vote by Ballot and Triennial Parliaments, and
+that you view the idea of annual ones with undisguised reprobation.
+Difference of opinion undoubtedly may exist on some of these points:
+an eight-pound qualification may have its advocates, and the right
+of secret voting may be convenient for members of the clique; but,
+on the whole, you are satisfied with matters as they are; and,
+certainly, I do not see that you have any grievance to complain of.
+If I were a member of the Liberal party, I should be very sorry to
+see any change of the representation made in Scotland. Just observe
+how the matter stands. At the commencement of the present year the
+whole representation of the Scottish burghs was in the hands of the
+Liberal party. Since then, it is true, Falkirk has changed sides;
+but you are still remarkably well off; and I think that out of
+thirty county members, eighteen may be set down as supporters of
+the Free-trade policy. Remember, I do not guarantee the continuance
+of these proportions: I wish you simply to observe how you stand at
+present, under the working of your own Reform Bill; and really it
+appears to me that nothing could be more satisfactory. The Liberal
+who wishes to have more men of his own kidney from Scotland must
+indeed be an unconscionable glutton; and if, in the face of these
+facts, he asks for a reform in the representation, I cannot set him
+down as other than a consummate ass. He must needs admit that the
+system has worked well. Scotland sends to the support of the Whig
+Ministry, and the maintenance of progressive opinions, a brilliant
+phalanx of senators; amongst whom we point, with justifiable pride,
+to the distinguished names of Anderson, Bouverie, Ewart, Hume,
+Smith, M'Taggart, and M'Gregor. Are these gentlemen not liberal
+enough for the wants of the present age? Why, unless I am most
+egregiously mistaken--and not I only, but the whole of the Liberal
+press in Scotland--they are generally regarded as decidedly ahead
+even of my Lord John Russell. Why, then, should your representation
+be reformed, while it bears such admirable fruit? With such a
+growth of golden pippins on its boughs, would it not be madness
+to cut down the tree, on the mere chance of another arising from
+the stump, more especially when you cannot hope to gather from it
+a more abundant harvest? I am quite sure, Provost, that you agree
+with me in this. You have nothing to gain, but possibly a good deal
+to lose, by any alteration which may be made; and therefore it is,
+I presume, that in this part of the world not the slightest wish
+has been manifested for a radical change of the system. That very
+conceited and shallow individual, Sir Joshua Walmsley, made not
+long ago a kind of agitating tour through Scotland, for the purpose
+of getting up the steam; but except from a few unhappy Chartists,
+whose sentiments on the subject of property are identically the same
+with those professed by the gentlemen who plundered the Glasgow
+tradesmen's shops in 1848, he met with no manner of encouragement.
+The electors laughed in the face of this ridiculous caricature of
+Peter the Hermit, and advised him, instead of exposing his ignorance
+in the north, to go back to Bolton and occupy himself with his own
+affairs.
+
+This much I have said touching the necessity or call for a
+new Reform Bill, which is likely enough to involve us, for a
+considerable period at least, in unfortunate political strife. I
+have put it to you as a Liberal, but at the same time as a man of
+common sense and honesty, whether there are any circumstances,
+under your knowledge, which can justify such an attempt; and in
+the absence of these, you cannot but admit that such an experiment
+is eminently dangerous at the present time, and ought to be
+strongly discountenanced by all men, whatever may be their kind
+of political opinions. I speak now without any reference whatever
+to the details. It may certainly be possible to discover a better
+system of representation than that which at present exists. I never
+regarded Lord John Russell as the living incarnation of Minerva,
+nor can I consider any measure originated by him as conveying an
+assurance that the highest amount of human wisdom has been exhausted
+in its preparation. But what I do say is this, that in the absence
+of anything like general demand, and failing the allegation of
+any marked grievance to be redressed, no Ministry is entitled to
+propose an extensive or organic change in the representation of the
+country; and the men who shall venture upon such a step must render
+themselves liable to the imputation of being actuated by other
+motives than regard to the public welfare.
+
+You will, however, be slow to believe that Lord John Russell is
+moving in this matter without some special reason. In this you
+are perfectly right. He has a reason, and a very cogent one, but
+not such a reason as you, if you are truly a Liberal, and not a
+mere partisan, can accept. I presume it is the wish of the Liberal
+party--at least it used to be their watchword--that public opinion
+in this country is not to be slighted or suppressed. With the view
+of giving full effect to that public opinion, not of securing the
+supremacy of this or that political alliance, the Reform Act was
+framed; it being the declared object and intention of its founders
+that a full, fair, and free representation should be secured to the
+people of this country. The property qualification was fixed at a
+low rate; the balance of power as between counties and boroughs
+was carefully adjusted; and every precaution was taken--at least
+so we were told at the time--that no one great interest of the
+State should be allowed unduly to predominate over another. Many,
+however, were of opinion at the time, and have since seen no reason
+to alter it, that the adjustment then made, as between counties and
+boroughs, was by no means equitable, and that an undue share in the
+representation was given to the latter, more especially in England.
+That, you will observe, was a Conservative, not a Liberal objection;
+and it was over-ruled. Well, then, did the Representation, as fixed
+by the Reform Bill, fulfil its primary condition? You thought so;
+and so did my Lord John Russell, until some twelve months ago, when
+a new light dawned upon him. That light has since increased in
+intensity, and he now sees his way, clearly enough, to a new organic
+measure. Why is this? Simply, my dear Provost, because the English
+boroughs will no longer support him in his bungling legislation, or
+countenance his unnational policy!
+
+Public opinion, as represented through the operation of the Reform
+Act, is no longer favourable to Lord John Russell. The result of
+recent elections, in places which were formerly considered as
+the strongholds of Whiggery, have demonstrated to him that the
+Free-trade policy, to which he is irretrievably pledged, has become
+obnoxious to the bulk of the electors, and that they will no longer
+accord their support to any Ministry which is bent upon depressing
+British labour and sapping the foundations of national prosperity.
+So Lord John Russell, finding himself in this position, that he must
+either get rid of public opinion or resign his place, sets about
+the concoction of a new Reform Bill, by means of which he hopes to
+swamp the present electoral body! This is Whig liberty in its pure
+and original form. It implies, of course, that the Reform Bill did
+not give a full, fair, and free representation to the country, else
+there can be no excuse for altering its provisions. If we really
+have a fair representation; and if, notwithstanding, the majority of
+the electors are convinced that Free Trade is not for their benefit,
+it does appear to me a most monstrous thing that they are to be
+coerced into receiving it by the infusion of a new element into
+the Constitution, or a forcible change in the distribution of the
+electoral power, to suit the commercial views which are in favour
+with the Whig party. It is, in short, a most circuitous method of
+exercising despotic power; and I, for one, having the interests of
+the country at heart, would much prefer the institution at once of a
+pure despotism, and submit to be ruled and taxed henceforward at the
+sweet will of the scion of the house of Russell.
+
+I do not know what your individual sentiments may be on the subject
+of Free Trade; but whether you are for it or against it, my argument
+remains the same. It is essentially a question for the solution of
+the electoral body; and if the Whigs are right in their averment
+that its operation hitherto has been attended with marked success,
+and has even transcended the expectation of its promoters, you may
+rely upon it that there is no power in the British Empire which
+can overthrow it. No Protectionist ravings can damage a system
+which has been productive of real advantage to the great bulk of
+the people. But if, on the contrary, it is a bad system, is it to
+be endured that any man or body of men shall attempt to perpetuate
+it against the will of the majority of the electors, by a change
+in the representation of the country? I ask you this as a Liberal.
+Without having any undue diffidence in the soundness of your own
+judgment, I presume you do not, like his Holiness the Pope, consider
+yourself infallible, or entitled to coerce others who may differ
+from you in opinion. Yet this is precisely what Lord John Russell is
+now attempting to do; and I warn you and others who are similarly
+situated, to be wise in time, and to take care lest, under the
+operation of this new Reform Bill, you are not stripped of that
+political power and those political privileges which at present you
+enjoy.
+
+Don't suppose that I am speaking rashly or without consideration.
+All I know touching this new Reform Bill, is derived from the
+arguments and proposals which have been advanced and made by the
+Liberal press in consequence of the late indications of public
+feeling, as manifested by the result of recent elections. It
+is rather remarkable that we heard few or no proposals for an
+alteration in the electoral system, until it became apparent
+that the voice of the boroughs could no longer be depended on
+for the maintenance of the present commercial policy. You may
+recollect that the earliest of the victories which were achieved
+by the Protectionists, with respect to vacant seats in the House
+of Commons, were treated lightly by their opponents as mere
+casualties; but when borough after borough deliberately renounced
+its adherence to the cause of the League, and, not unfrequently
+under circumstances of very marked significance, declared openly in
+favour of Protection, the matter became serious. It was _then_, and
+then only, that we heard the necessity for some new and sweeping
+change in the representation of this country broadly asserted;
+and, singularly enough, the advocates of that change do not
+attempt to disguise their motives. They do not venture to say that
+the intelligence of the country is not adequately represented at
+present--what they complain of is, that the intelligence of the
+country is becoming every day more hostile to their commercial
+theories. In short, they want to get rid of that intelligence, and
+must get rid of it speedily, unless their system is to crumble to
+pieces. Such is their aim and declared object; and if you entertain
+any doubts on the matter, I beg leave to refer you to the recorded
+sentiments of the leading Ministerial and Free-trade organ--the
+_Times_. It is always instructive to notice the hints of the
+Thunderer. The writers in that journal are fully alive to the nature
+of the coming crisis. They have been long aware of the reaction
+which has taken place throughout the country on the subject of
+Free Trade, and they recognise distinctly the peril in which their
+favourite principle is placed, if some violent means are not used to
+counteract the conviction of the electoral body. They see that, in
+the event of a general election, the constituencies of the Empire
+are not likely to return a verdict hostile to the domestic interests
+of the country. They have watched with careful and anxious eyes the
+turning tide of opinion; and they can devise no means of arresting
+it, without having recourse to that peculiar mode of manipulation,
+which is dignified by the name of Burking. Let us hear what they say
+so late as the 21st of July last.
+
+     "With such a prospect before us, with unknown struggles and
+     unprecedented collisions within the bounds of possibility,
+     there is only one resource, and we must say that Her Majesty's
+     present advisers will be answerable for the consequences if they
+     do not adopt it. They must lay the foundation of an appeal to
+     the people with a large and liberal measure of Parliamentary
+     reform. It is high time that this great country should cease to
+     quake and to quail at the decisions of stupid and corrupt little
+     constituencies, of whom, as in the case before us, it would take
+     thirty to make one metropolitan borough. The great question
+     always before the nation in one shape or another is--whether
+     _the people_ are as happy as laws can make them? To what sort of
+     constituencies shall we appeal for the answer to this question?
+     To Harwich with its population of 3370; to St Albans with its
+     population of 6246; to Scarborough with its population of 9953;
+     to Knaresborough with its population of 5382; and to a score
+     other places still more insignificant? Or shall we insist on the
+     appeal being made to much larger bodies? The average population
+     of boroughs and counties is more than 60,000. Is it not high
+     time to require that no single borough shall fall below half or
+     a third of that number?"
+
+The meaning of this is clear enough. It points, if not to the
+absolute annihilation, most certainly to the concretion of the
+smaller boroughs throughout England--to an entire remarshalling of
+the electoral ranks--and, above all, to an enormous increase in the
+representation of the larger cities. In this way, you see, local
+interests will be made almost entirely to disappear; and London
+alone will secure almost as many representatives in Parliament
+as are at the present time returned for the whole kingdom of
+Scotland. Now, I confess to you, Provost, that I do not feel greatly
+exhilarated at the prospect of any such change. I believe that the
+prosperity of Great Britain depends upon the maintenance of many
+interests, and I cannot see how that can be secured if we are to
+deliver over the whole political power to the masses congregated
+within the towns. Moreover, I would very humbly remark, that past
+experience is little calculated to increase the measure of our
+faith in the wisdom or judgment of large constituencies. I may be
+wrong in my estimate of the talent and abilities of the several
+honourable members who at present sit for London and the adjacent
+districts; but, if so, I am only one out of many who labour under a
+similar delusion. We are told by the _Times_ to look to Marylebone
+as an example of a large and enlightened constituency. I obey
+the mandate; and on referring to the Parliamentary Companion, I
+find that Marylebone is represented by Lord Dudley Stuart and Sir
+Benjamin Hall. That fact does not, in my humble opinion, furnish a
+conclusive argument in favour of large constituencies. As I wish to
+avoid the Jew question, I shall say nothing about Baron Rothschild;
+but passing over to the Tower Hamlets, I find them in possession of
+Thomson and Clay; Lambeth rejoicing in d'Eyncourt and Williams; and
+Southwark in Humphrey and Molesworth. Capable senators though these
+may be, I should not like to see a Parliament composed entirely
+of men of their kidney; nor do I think that they afford undoubted
+materials for the construction of a new Cabinet.
+
+But perhaps I am undervaluing the abilities of these gentlemen;
+perhaps I am doing injustice to the discretion and wisdom of the
+metropolitan constituencies. Anxious to avoid any such imputation,
+I shall again invoke the assistance of the _Times_, whom I now cite
+as a witness, and a very powerful one, upon my side of the question.
+Let us hear the Thunderer on the subject of these same metropolitan
+constituencies, just twelve months ago, before Scarborough and
+Knaresborough had disgraced themselves by returning Protectionists
+to Parliament. I quote from a leader in the _Times_ of 8th August
+1850, referring to the Lambeth election, when Mr Williams was
+returned.
+
+     "When it was proposed some twenty years ago to extend the
+     franchise to the metropolitan boroughs, the presumption was,
+     that the quality of the representatives would bear something
+     like a proportion to the importance of the constituencies
+     called into play. In other words, if the political axioms from
+     which the principle of an extended representation is deduced
+     have any foundation in reality, it should follow that the most
+     numerous and most intelligent bodies of electors would return
+     to Parliament members of the highest mark for character and
+     capacity. Now, looking at the condition of the metropolitan
+     representation as it stands at present, or as it has stood any
+     time since the passing of the Reform Bill, has this expectation
+     been fulfilled? Lord John Russell, the First Minister of the
+     Crown, sits, indeed, as member for the city of London, and so
+     far it is well. Whatever difference of opinion may exist as to
+     the noble lord's capacity for government, or whatever may be the
+     views of this or that political party, it is beyond all dispute
+     that, in such a case as this, there is dignity and fitness in
+     the relation between the member and the constituency. But,
+     setting aside this one solitary instance, with what metropolitan
+     borough is the name of any very eminent Englishman associated at
+     the present time? It is of course as contrary to our inclination
+     as it would be unnecessary for the purposes of the argument, to
+     quote this or that man's name as an actual illustration of the
+     failure of a system, or of the decadence of a constituency. We
+     would, however, without any invidious or offensive personality,
+     invite attention to the present list of metropolitan members,
+     and ask what name is to be found among them, with the single
+     exception we have named, which is borne by a man with a shadow
+     of a pretension to be reckoned as among the leading Englishmen
+     of the age?"
+
+You see, Provost, I am by no means singular in my estimate of the
+quality of the metropolitan representatives. The _Times_ is with
+me, or was with me twelve months ago; and I suppose it will hardly
+be averred that, since that time, any enormous increase of wisdom
+or of ability has been manifested by the gentlemen referred to.
+But there is rather more than this. In the article from which I am
+quoting, the writer does not confine his strictures simply to the
+metropolitan boroughs. He goes a great deal further, for he attacks
+large constituencies in the mass, and points out very well and
+forcibly the evils which must inevitably follow should these obtain
+an accession to their power. Read, mark, and perpend the following
+paragraphs, and then reconcile their tenor--if you can--with the
+later proposals from the same quarter for the general suppression of
+small constituencies, and the establishment of larger tribunals of
+public opinion.
+
+     "Lambeth, then, on the occasion of the present election, is
+     likely to become another illustration of the downward tendencies
+     of the metropolitan constituencies. We use the word 'tendency'
+     advisedly, for matters are worse than they have been, and we
+     can perceive no symptom of a turning tide. Let us leave the
+     names of individuals aside, and simply consider the metropolitan
+     members as a body, and what is their main employment in the
+     House of Commons? _Is it not mainly to represent the selfish
+     interests and blind prejudices of the less patriotic or less
+     enlightened portion of their constituents whenever any change
+     is proposed manifestly for the public benefit?_ Looking at
+     their votes, one would suppose a metropolitan member to be
+     rather a Parliamentary agent of the drovers, and sextons, and
+     undertakers, than a representative of one of the most important
+     constituencies in the kingdom. Is this downward progress of
+     the metropolitan representation to remain unchanged? Will it
+     be extended to other constituencies as soon as they shall be
+     brought under conditions analogous to those under which the
+     metropolitan electors exercise the franchise? The question is of
+     no small interest. Whether the fault be with the electors, or
+     with those who should have the nerve to come forward and demand
+     their suffrages, matters not for the purposes of the argument.
+     The fact remains unaltered. Supposing England throughout its
+     area were represented as the various boroughs of the metropolis
+     are represented at the present time, what would be the effect?
+     That is the point for consideration. It may well be that men
+     of higher character, and of more distinguished intellectual
+     qualifications, would readily attract the sympathies and secure
+     the votes of these constituencies; but what does their absence
+     prove? _Simply that the same feeling of unwillingness to face
+     large electoral bodies, which is said to prevail in the United
+     States, is gradually rising up in this country._ On the other
+     side of the Atlantic, we are told by all who know the country
+     best, that the most distinguished citizens shrink from stepping
+     forward on the arena of public life, lest they be made the mark
+     for calumny and abuse. It would require more space than we can
+     devote to the subject to point out the correlative shortcomings
+     of the constituencies and the candidates; but, leaving these
+     aside, _we cannot but arrive at the conclusion that there is
+     something in the constitution of these great electoral masses
+     which renders a peaceful majority little better than a passive
+     instrument in the hands of a turbulent minority_, and affords an
+     explanation of the fact that such a person as Mr Williams should
+     aspire to represent the borough of Lambeth."
+
+What do you think of that, Provost, by way of an argument in favour
+of large constituencies? I agree with every word of it. I believe,
+in common with the eloquent writer, that matters are growing worse
+instead of better, and that there is something radically wrong in
+the constitution of these great electoral masses. I believe that
+they do not represent the real intelligence of the electors, and
+that they are liable to all those objections which are here so well
+and forcibly urged. It is not necessary to travel quite so far
+as London for an illustration. Look at Glasgow. Have the twelve
+thousand and odd electors of that great commercial and manufacturing
+city covered themselves with undying glory by their choice of their
+present representatives? Is the intelligence of the first commercial
+city in Scotland really embodied in the person of Mr M'Gregor? I
+should be very loth to think so. Far be it from me to impugn the
+propriety of any particular choice, or to speculate upon coming
+events; but I cannot help wondering whether, in the event of the
+suppression of some of the smaller burghs, and the transference of
+their power to the larger cities, it may come to pass that the city
+of St Mungo shall be represented by the wisdom of six M'Gregors? I
+repeat, that I wish to say nothing in disparagement of large urban
+constituencies, or of their choice in any one particular case--I
+simply desire to draw your attention to the fact, that we are not
+indebted to such constituencies for returning the men who, by common
+consent, are admitted to be the most valuable members, in point of
+talent, ability, and business habits, in the House of Commons. How
+far we should improve the character of our legislative assembly,
+by disfranchising smaller constituencies, and transferring their
+privileges to the larger ones,--open to such serious objections as
+have been urged against them by the _Times_, a journal not likely
+to err on the side of undervaluing popular opinion--appears to me a
+question decidedly open to discussion; and I hope that it will be
+discussed, pretty broadly and extensively, before any active steps
+are taken for suppressing boroughs which are not open to the charge
+of rank venality and corruption.
+
+The _Times_, you observe, talks in its more recent article, in which
+totally opposite views are advocated, of "stupid and corrupt little
+constituencies." This is a clever way of mixing up two distinct and
+separate matters. We all know what is meant by corruption, and I
+hope none of us are in favour of it. It means the purchase, either
+by money or promises, of the suffrages of those who are intrusted
+with the electoral franchise; and I am quite ready to join with the
+_Times_ in the most hearty denunciation of such villanous practices,
+whether used by Jew or Gentile. It may be, and probably is,
+impossible to prevent bribery altogether, for there are scoundrels
+in all constituencies; and if a candidate with a long purse is
+so lax in his morals as to hint at the purchase of votes, he is
+tolerably certain to find a market in which these commodities are
+sold. But if, in any case, general corruption can be proved against
+a borough, it ought to be forthwith disfranchised, and declared
+unworthy of exercising so important a public privilege. But of the
+"stupidity" of constituencies, who are to be the judges? Not, I
+hope, the Areopagites of the _Times_, else we may expect to see
+every constituency which does not pronounce in favour of Free Trade,
+placed under the general extinguisher! Scarborough, with some seven
+or eight hundred electors--a good many more, by the way, than are
+on the roll for the Dreepdaily burghs--has, in the opinion of the
+_Times_, stultified itself for ever by returning Mr George F. Young
+to Parliament, instead of a Whig lordling, who possessed great local
+influence. Therefore Scarborough is put down in the black list,
+not because it is "corrupt," but because it is "stupid," in having
+elected a gentleman of the highest political celebrity, who is at
+the same time one of the most extensive shipowners of Great Britain!
+I put it to you, Provost, whether this is not as cool an instance
+of audacity as you ever heard of. What would you think if it were
+openly proposed, upon our side, to disfranchise Greenwich, because
+the tea-and-shrimp population of that virtuous town has committed
+the stupid act of returning a Jew to Parliament? If stupidity is to
+go for anything in the way of cancelling privileges, I think I could
+name to you some half-dozen places on this side of the border which
+are in evident danger, at least if we are to accept the attainments
+of the representatives as any test of the mental acquirements of the
+electors; but perhaps it is better to avoid particulars in a matter
+so personal and delicate.
+
+I am not in the least degree surprised to find the Free-Traders
+turning round against the boroughs. Four years ago, you would
+certainly have laughed in the face of any one who might have
+prophesied such a result; but since then, times have altered. The
+grand experiment upon native industry has been made, and allowed
+to go on without check or impediment. The Free-Traders have had it
+all their own way; and if there had been one iota of truth in their
+statements, or if their calculations had been based upon secure and
+rational data, they must long ago have achieved a complete moral
+triumph. Pray, remember what they told us. They said that Free Trade
+in corn and in cattle would not permanently _lower_ the value of
+agricultural produce in Britain--it would only steady prices, and
+prevent extreme fluctuations. Then, again, we were assured that
+large imports from any part of the world could not by possibility be
+obtained; and those consummate blockheads, the statists, offered to
+prove by figures, that a deluge of foreign grain was as impossible
+as an overflow of the Mediterranean. I need not tell you that the
+results have entirely falsified such predictions, and that the
+agricultural interest has ever since been suffering under the
+effects of unexampled depression. No man denies that. The stiffest
+stickler for the cheap loaf does not venture now to assert that
+agriculture is a profitable profession in Britain; all he can do is
+to recommend economy, and to utter a hypocritical prayer, that the
+prosperity which he assumes to exist in other quarters may, at no
+distant date, and through some mysterious process which he cannot
+specify, extend itself to the suffering millions who depend for
+their subsistence on the produce of the soil of Britain, and who pay
+by far the largest share of the taxes and burdens of the kingdom.
+
+Now, it is perfectly obvious that agricultural distress, by which
+I mean the continuance of a range of unremunerative prices, cannot
+long prevail in any district, without affecting the traffic of the
+towns. You, who are an extensive retail merchant in Dreepdaily,
+know well that the business of your own trade depends in a great
+degree upon the state of the produce markets. So long as the farmer
+is thriving, he buys from you and your neighbours liberally, and you
+find him, I have no doubt, your best and steadiest customer. But if
+you reverse his circumstances, you must look for a corresponding
+change in his dealings. He cannot afford to purchase silks for his
+wife and daughters, as formerly; he grows penurious in his own
+personal expenditure, and denies himself every unnecessary luxury;
+he does nothing for the good of trade, and is impassable to all the
+temptations which you endeavour to throw in his way. To post your
+ledger is now no very difficult task. You find last year's stock
+remaining steadily on your hands; and when the season for the annual
+visit of the bagmen comes round, you dismiss them from your premises
+without gratifying their avidity by an order. This is a faithful
+picture of what has been going on for two years, at least, in the
+smaller inland boroughs. No doubt you are getting your bread cheap;
+but those whose importations have brought about that cheapness,
+never were, and never can be, customers of yours. Even supposing
+that they were to take goods in exchange for their imported grain,
+no profit or custom could accrue to the retail shopkeeper, who must
+necessarily look to the people around him for the consumption of
+his wares. In this way trade has been made to stagnate, and profits
+have of course declined, until the tradesmen, weary of awaiting
+the advent of a prosperity which never arrives, have come to the
+conclusion, that they will best consult their interest by giving
+their support to a policy the reverse of that which has crippled the
+great body of their customers.
+
+Watering-places, and towns of fashionable resort, have suffered in
+a like degree. The gentry, whose rents have been most seriously
+affected by the unnatural diminution of prices, are compelled to
+curtail their expenditure, and to deny themselves many things which
+formerly would have been esteemed legitimate indulgences. Economy is
+the order Of the day: equipages are given up, servants dismissed,
+and old furniture made to last beyond its appointed time. These
+things, I most freely admit, are no great hardships to the gentry;
+nor do I intend to awaken your compassion in behalf of the squire,
+who, by reason of his contracted rent-roll, has been compelled
+to part with his carriage and a couple of footmen, and to refuse
+his wife and daughters the pleasure of a trip to Cheltenham. The
+hardship lies elsewhere. I pity the footmen, the coach-builder, the
+upholsterer, the house proprietor in Cheltenham, and all the other
+people to whom the surplus of the squire's revenue found its way,
+much more than the old gentleman himself. I daresay he is quite
+as happy at home--perhaps far happier--than if he were compelled
+to racket elsewhere; and sure I am that he will not consume his
+dinner with less appetite because he lacks the attendance of a
+couple of knaves, with heads like full-blown cauliflowers. But is
+it consistent with the workings of human nature to expect that the
+people to whom he formerly gave employment and custom, let us say
+to the extent of a couple of thousand pounds, can be gratified by
+the cessation of that expenditure?--or is it possible to suppose
+that they will remain enamoured of a system which has caused them
+so heavy a loss? View the subject in this light, and you can have
+no difficulty in understanding why this formidable reaction has
+taken place in the English boroughs. It is simply a question of
+the pocket; and the electors now see, that unless the boroughs are
+to be left to rapid decay, something must be done to protect and
+foster that industry upon which they all depend. Such facts, which
+are open and patent to every man's experience, and tell upon his
+income and expenditure, are worth whole cargoes of theory. What
+reason has the trader, whose stock is remaining unsold upon his
+hands, to plume himself, because he is assured by Mr Porter, or
+some other similar authority, that some hundred thousand additional
+yards of flimsy calico have been shipped from the British shores
+in the course of the last twelve months? So far as the shopkeeper
+is concerned, the author of the _Progress of the Nation_ might as
+well have been reporting upon the traffic-tables of Tyre and Sidon.
+He is not even assured that all this export has been accompanied
+with a profit to the manufacturer. If he reads the _Economist_, he
+will find that exhilarating print filled with complaints of general
+distress and want of demand; he will be startled from time to time
+by the announcement that in some places, such as Dundee, trade
+has experienced a most decided check; or that in others, such as
+Nottingham and Leicester, the operatives are applying by hundreds
+for admission to the workhouse! Comfortable intelligence this,
+alongside of increasing exports! But he has been taught, to borrow
+a phrase from the writings of the late John Galt, to look upon your
+political arithmetician as "a mystery shrouded by a halo;" and he
+supposes that, somehow or other, somebody must be the gainer by all
+these exports, though it seems clearly impossible to specify the
+fortunate individual. However, this he knows, to his cost any time
+these three years back, that _he_ has not been the gainer; and, as
+he opines very justly that charity begins at home, and that the
+man who neglects the interest of his own family is rather worse
+than a heathen, he has made up his mind to support such candidates
+only as will stand by British industry, and protect him by means
+of protecting others. As for the men of the maritime boroughs--a
+large and influential class--I need not touch upon their feelings
+or sentiments with regard to Free Trade. I observe that the Liberal
+press, with peculiar taste and felicity of expression, designates
+them by the generic term of "crimps," just as it used to compliment
+the whole agriculturists of Britain by the comprehensive appellation
+of "chawbacons." I trust they feel the compliment so delicately
+conveyed; but, after all, it matters little. Hard words break no
+bones; and, in the mean time at least, the vote of a "crimp" is
+quite as good as that of the concocter of a paragraph.
+
+Perhaps now you understand why the Free-Traders are so wroth against
+the boroughs. They expected to play off the latter against the
+county constituencies; and, being disappointed in that, they want to
+swamp them altogether. This, I must own, strikes me as particularly
+unfair. Let it be granted that a large number of the smaller
+boroughs did, at the last general election, manifest a decided
+wish that the Free Trade experiment, then begun, should be allowed
+a fair trial; are they to be held so pledged to that commercial
+system, that, however disastrous may have been its results, they
+are not entitled to alter their minds? Are all the representations,
+promises, and prophecies of the leading advocates of Free Trade,
+to be set aside as if these were never uttered or written? Who
+were the cozeners in this case? Clearly the men who boasted of the
+enormous advantages which were immediately to arise from their
+policy--advantages whereof, up to the present moment, not a single
+glimpse has been vouchsafed. Free Trade, we were distinctly told,
+was to benefit the boroughs. Free Trade has done nothing of the
+kind; on the contrary, it has reduced their business and lowered
+their importance. And now, when this effect has become so plain and
+undeniable that the very men who subscribed to the funds of the
+League, and who were foremost in defending the conduct of the late
+Sir Robert Peel, are sending Protectionists to Parliament, it is
+calmly proposed to neutralise their conversion by depriving them of
+political power!
+
+Under the circumstances, I do not know that the Free-Traders could
+have hit upon a happier scheme. The grand tendency of their system
+is centralisation. They want to drive everything--paupers alone
+excepted, if they could by possibility compass that fortunate
+immunity--into the larger towns, which are the seats of export
+manufacture, and to leave the rest of the population to take care
+of themselves. You see how they have succeeded in Ireland, by
+the reports of the last census. They are doing the same thing in
+Scotland, as we shall ere long discover to our cost; and, indeed,
+the process is going on slowly, but surely, throughout the whole of
+the British islands. I chanced the other day to light upon a passage
+in a very dreary article in the last number of the _Edinburgh
+Review_, which seems to me to embody the chief economical doctrines
+of the gentlemen to whom we are indebted for the present posture of
+affairs. It is as follows:--
+
+     "The common watchword, or cuckoo-note of the advocates of
+     restriction in affairs of trade is, 'Protection to Native
+     Industry.' In the principle fairly involved in this motto we
+     cordially agree. We are as anxious as the most vehement advocate
+     for high import duties on foreign products can be, that the
+     industry of our fellow-countrymen should be protected(!) We only
+     differ as to the means. Their theory of protection is to guard
+     against competition those branches of industry which, without
+     such extraneous help, could never be successfully pursued:
+     ours, is that of enlarging, to the uttermost, those other
+     branches for the prosecution of which our countrymen possess the
+     greatest aptitude, and of thereby securing for their skill and
+     capital the greatest return. This protection is best afforded
+     by governments when they leave, without interference, the
+     productive industry of the country to find its true level; for
+     we may be certain that the interest of individuals will always
+     lead them to prefer those pursuits which they find most gainful.
+     There is, in fact, no mode of interference with entire freedom
+     of action which must not be, in some degree, hurtful; but _the
+     mischief which follows upon legislation in affairs of trade, in
+     any given country, is then most noxious when it tends to foster
+     branches of industry for which other countries have a greater
+     aptitude_."
+
+You will, I think, find some difficulty in discovering the
+protective principle enunciated by this sagacious scribe, who,
+like many others of his limited calibre, is fain to take refuge
+in nonsense when he cannot extricate his meaning. You may also,
+very reasonably, entertain doubts whether the protective theory,
+which our friend of the Blue and Yellow puts into the mouth of his
+opponents, was ever entertained or promulgated by any rational
+being, at least in the broad sense which he wishes to imply. The
+true protective theory has reference to the State burdens, which,
+in so far as they are exacted from the produce of native industry,
+or, in other words, from labour, we wish to see counterbalanced by
+a fair import-duty, which shall reduce the foreign and the native
+producer to an equality in the home market. When the reviewer talks
+of the non-interference of Government with regard to the productive
+industry of the country, he altogether omits mention of that most
+stringent interference which is the direct result of taxation. If
+the farmer were allowed to till the ground, to sow the seed, and to
+reap the harvest, without any interference from Government, then I
+admit at once that a demand for protection would be preposterous.
+But when Government requires him to pay income-tax, assessed taxes,
+church and poor-rates, besides other direct burdens, out of the
+fruit of his industry--when it prevents him from growing on his own
+land several kinds of crop, in order that the customs revenue may
+be maintained--when it taxes indirectly his tea, coffee, wines,
+spirits, tobacco, soap, and spiceries--then I say that Government
+_does_ interfere, and that most unmercifully, with the productive
+industry of the country. Just suppose that, by recurring to a
+primitive method of taxation, the Government should lay claim
+to one-third of the proceeds of every crop, and instruct its
+emissaries to remove it from the ground before another acre should
+be reaped--would _that_ not constitute interference in the eyes of
+the sapient reviewer? Well, then, since all taxes must ultimately be
+paid out of produce, what difference does the mere method of levying
+the burden make with regard to the burden itself? I call your
+attention to this point, because the Free-Traders invariably, but
+I fear wilfully, omit all mention of artificial taxation when they
+talk of artificial restrictions. They want you to believe that we,
+who maintain the opposite view, seek to establish an entire monopoly
+in Great Britain of all kinds of possible produce; and they are in
+the habit of putting asinine queries as to the propriety of raising
+the duties on foreign wine, so as to encourage the establishment of
+vineyards in Kent and Sussex, and also as to the proper protective
+duty which should be levied on pine-apples, in order that a due
+stimulus may be given to the cultivation of that luscious fruit. But
+these funny fellows take especial care never to hint to you that
+protection is and was demanded simply on account of the enormous
+nature of our imposts, which have the effect of raising the rates
+of labour. It is in this way, and no other, that agriculture,
+deprived of protection, but still subjected to taxation, has become
+an unremunerative branch of industry; and you observe how calmly
+the disciple of Ricardo condemns it to destruction. "The mischief,"
+quoth he, "which follows upon legislation in affairs of trade, in
+any given country, is then most noxious when it tends to foster
+branches of industry for which other countries have a greater
+aptitude." So, then, having taxed agriculture to that point when it
+can no longer bear the burden, we are, for the future, to draw our
+supplies from "other countries which have a greater aptitude" for
+growing corn; that aptitude consisting in their comparative immunity
+from taxation, and in the degraded moral and social condition of
+the serfs who constitute the tillers of the soil! We are to give up
+cultivation, and apply ourselves to the task "of enlarging to the
+uttermost those other branches, for the prosecution of which our
+countrymen possess the greatest aptitude"--by which, I presume, is
+meant the manufacture of cotton-twist!
+
+Now, then, consider for a moment what is the natural, nay, the
+inevitable effect of this narrowing of the range of employment.
+I shall not start the important point whether the concentration
+of labour does not tend to lower wages--I shall merely assume,
+what is indeed already abundantly established by facts, that the
+depression of agriculture in any district leads almost immediately
+to a large increase in the population of the greater towns. Places
+like Dreepdaily may remain stationary, but they do not receive any
+material increment to their population. You have, I believe, no
+export trade, at least very little, beyond the manufacture of an
+ingenious description of snuff-box, justly prized by those who are
+in the habit of stimulating their nostrils. The displaced stream of
+labour passes through you, but does not tarry with you--it rolls
+on towards Paisley and Glasgow, where it is absorbed in the living
+ocean. Year after year the same process is carried on. The older
+people, probably because it is not worth while at their years to
+attempt a change, tarry in their little villages and cots, and
+gradually acquire that appearance of utter apathy, which is perhaps
+the saddest aspect of humanity. The younger people, finding no
+employment at home, repair to the towns, marry or do worse, and
+propagate children for the service of the factories which are
+dedicated to the export trade. Of education they receive little or
+nothing; for they must be in attendance on their gaunt iron master
+during the whole of their waking hours; and religion seeks after
+them in vain. What wonder, then, if the condition of our operatives
+should be such as to suggest to thinking minds very serious doubts
+whether our boasted civilisation can be regarded in the light of a
+blessing? Certain it is that the bulk of these classes are neither
+better nor happier than their forefathers. Nay, if there be any
+truth in evidence--any reality in the appalling accounts which reach
+us from the heart of the towns, there exists an amount of crime,
+misery, drunkenness, and profligacy, which is unknown even among
+savages and heathen nations. Were we to recall from the four ends
+of the earth all the missionaries who have been despatched from the
+various churches, they would find more than sufficient work ready
+for them at home. Well-meaning men project sanitary improvements, as
+if these could avail to counteract the moral poison. New churches
+are built; new schools are founded; public baths are subscribed for,
+and public washing-houses are opened; the old rookeries are pulled
+down, and light and air admitted to the heart of the cities--but the
+heart of the people is not changed; and neither air nor water, nor
+religious warning, has the effect of checking crime, eradicating
+intemperance, or teaching man the duty which he owes to himself, his
+brethren, and his God! This is an awful picture, but it is a true
+one; and it well becomes us to consider why these things should be.
+There is no lukewarmness on the subject exhibited in any quarter.
+The evil is universally acknowledged, and every one would be ready
+to contribute to alleviate it, could a proper remedy be suggested.
+It is not my province to suggest remedies; but it does appear to
+me that the original fault is to be found in the system which has
+caused this unnatural pressure of our population into the towns. I
+am aware that in saying this, I am impugning the leading doctrines
+of modern political economy. I am aware that I am uttering what
+will be considered by many as a rank political heresy; still, not
+having the fear of fire and fagot before my eyes, I shall use the
+liberty of speech. It appears to me that the system which has been
+more or less adopted since the days of Mr Huskisson, of suppressing
+small trades for the encouragement of foreign importation, and of
+stimulating export manufactures to the uttermost, has proved very
+pernicious to the morals and the social condition of the people. The
+termination of the war found us with a large population, and with an
+enormous debt. If, on the one hand, it was for the advantage of the
+country that commerce should progress with rapid strides, and that
+our foreign trade should be augmented, it was, on the other, no less
+necessary that due regard should be had for the former occupations
+of the people, and that no great and violent displacements of
+labour should be occasioned, by fiscal relaxations which might have
+the effect of supplanting home industry by foreign produce in the
+British market. The mistake of the political economists lies in
+their obstinate determination to enforce a principle, which in the
+abstract is not only unobjectionable but unchallenged, without any
+regard whatever to the peculiar and pecuniary circumstances of the
+country. They will not look at what has gone before, in order to
+determine their line of conduct in any particular case. They admit
+of no exceptions. They start with their axiom that trade ought to
+be free, and they will not listen to any argument founded upon
+special circumstances in opposition to that doctrine. Now, this
+is not the way in which men have been, or ever can be, governed.
+They must be dealt with as rational beings, not regarded as mere
+senseless machinery, which may be treated as lumber, and cast aside
+to make way for some new improvement. Look at the case of our own
+Highlanders. We know very well that, from the commencement of
+the American war, it was considered by the British Government an
+important object to maintain the population of the Highlands, as
+the source from which they drew their hardiest and most serviceable
+recruits. So long as the manufacture of kelp existed, and the
+breeding of cattle was profitable, there was little difficulty in
+doing this; now, under this new commercial system, we are told that
+the population is infinitely too large for the natural resources of
+the country; we are shocked by accounts of periodical famine, and of
+deaths occurring from starvation; and our economists declare that
+there is no remedy except a general emigration of the inhabitants.
+This is the extreme case in Great Britain; but extreme cases often
+furnish us with the best tests of the operation of a particular
+system. Here you have a population fostered for an especial purpose,
+and abandoned so soon as that special purpose has been served.
+Without maintaining that the Gael is the most industrious of
+mankind, it strikes me forcibly that it would be a better national
+policy to give every reasonable encouragement to the development of
+the natural resources of that portion of the British islands, than
+to pursue the opposite system, and to reduce the Highlands to a
+wilderness. Not so think the political economists. They can derive
+their supplies cheaper from elsewhere, at the hands of strangers
+who contribute no share whatever to the national revenue; and for
+the sake of that cheapness they are content to reduce thousands of
+their countrymen to beggary. But emigration cannot, and will not,
+be carried out to an extent at all equal to the necessity which is
+engendered by the cessation of employment. The towns become the
+great centre-points and recipients of the displaced population; and
+so centralisation goes on, and, as a matter of course, pauperism and
+crime increase.
+
+To render this system perpetual, without any regard to ultimate
+consequences, is the leading object of the Free-Traders. Not
+converted, but on the contrary rendered more inveterate by
+the failure of their schemes, they are determined to allow no
+consideration whatever to stand in the way of their purpose; and
+of this you have a splendid instance in their late denunciation of
+the boroughs. They think--whether rightfully or wrongfully, it is
+not now necessary to inquire--that, by altering the proportions
+of Parliamentary power as established by the Reform Act--by
+taking away from the smaller boroughs, and by adding to the urban
+constituencies, they will still be able to command a majority in the
+House of Commons. In the present temper of the nation, and so long
+as its voice is expressed as heretofore, they know, feel, and admit
+that their policy is not secure. And why is it not secure? Simply
+because it has undergone the test of experience--because it has had
+a fair trial in the sight of the nation--and because it has not
+succeeded in realising the expectations of its founders.
+
+I have ventured to throw together these few crude remarks for your
+consideration during the recess, being quite satisfied that you will
+not feel indifferent upon any subject which touches the dignity,
+status, or privileges of the boroughs. Whether Lord John Russell
+agrees with the _Times_ as to the mode of effecting the threatened
+Parliamentary change, or whether he has some separate scheme of his
+own, is a question which I cannot solve. Possibly he has not yet
+made up his mind as to the course which it may be most advisable to
+pursue; for, in the absence of anything like general excitement or
+agitation, it is not easy to predict in what manner the proposal for
+any sweeping or organic change may be received by the constituencies
+of the Empire. There is far too much truth in the observations which
+I have already quoted from the great leading journal, relative to
+the dangers which must attend an increase of constituencies already
+too large, or a further extension of their power, to permit of our
+considering this as a light and unimportant matter. I view it as a
+very serious one indeed; and I cannot help thinking that Lord John
+Russell has committed an act of gross and unjustifiable rashness, in
+pledging himself, at the present time, to undertake a remodelment of
+the constitution. But whatever he does, I hope, for his own sake,
+and for the credit of the Liberal party, that he will be able to
+assign some better and more constitutional reason for the change,
+than the refusal of the English boroughs to bear arms in the crusade
+which is directed against the interests of Native Industry.
+
+
+
+
+PARIS IN 1851.--(_Continued._)
+
+
+THE OPERA.--In the evening I went to the French Opera, which is
+still one of the lions of Paris. It was once in the Rue Richelieu;
+but the atrocious assassination of the Duc de Berri, who was stabbed
+in its porch, threw a kind of horror over the spot: the theatre was
+closed, and the performance moved to its present site in the Rue
+Lepelletier, a street diverging from the Boulevard.
+
+Fond as the French are of decoration, the architecture of this
+building possesses no peculiar beauty, and would answer equally well
+for a substantial public hospital, a workhouse, or a barrack, if
+the latter were not the more readily suggested by the gendarmerie
+loitering about the doors, and the mounted dragoons at either end of
+the street.
+
+The passages of the interior are of the same character--spacious and
+substantial; but the door of the _salle_ opens, and the stranger,
+at a single step, enters from those murky passages into all the
+magic of a crowded theatre. The French have, within these few
+years, borrowed from us the art of lighting theatres. I recollect
+the French theatre lighted only by a few lamps scattered round the
+house, or a chandelier in the middle, which might have figured in
+the crypt of a cathedral. This they excused, as giving greater
+effect to the stage; but it threw the audience into utter gloom.
+They have now made the audience a part of the picture, and an
+indispensable part. The opera-house now shows the audience; and if
+not very dressy, or rather as dowdy, odd, and dishevelled a crowd as
+I ever recollect to have seen within theatrical walls, yet they are
+evidently human beings, which is much more picturesque than masses
+of spectres, seen only by an occasional flash from the stage.
+
+The French architects certainly have not made this national edifice
+grand; but they have made it a much better thing,--lively, showy,
+and rich. Neither majestic and monotonous, nor grand and Gothic,
+they have made it _riant_ and racy, like a place where men and
+women come to be happy, where beautiful dancers are to be seen,
+and where sweet songs are to be heard, and where the mind is for
+three or four hours to forget all its cares, and to carry away
+pleasant recollections for the time being. From pit to ceiling
+it is covered with paintings--all sorts of cupids, nymphs, and
+flower-garlands, and Greek urns--none of them wonders of the pencil,
+but all exhibiting that showy mediocrity of which every Frenchman is
+capable, and with which every Frenchman is in raptures. All looks
+rich, warm, and _operatic_.
+
+One characteristic change has struck me everywhere in Paris--the men
+dress better, and the women worse. When I was last here, the men
+dressed half bandit and half Hottentot. The revolutionary mystery
+was at work, and the hatred of the Bourbons was emblematised in a
+conical hat, a loose neckcloth, tremendous trousers, and the scowl
+of a stage conspirator. The Parisian men have since learned the
+decencies of _dress_.
+
+As I entered the house before the rising of the curtain, I had
+leisure to look about me, and I found even in the audience a strong
+contrast to those of London. By that kind of contradiction to
+everything rational and English which governs the Parisian, the
+women seem to choose _dishabille_ for the Opera.
+
+As the house was crowded, and the boxes are let high, and the
+performance of the night was popular, I might presume that some of
+the _élite_ were present, yet I never saw so many _ill-dressed_
+women under one roof. Bonnets, shawls, muffles of all kinds, were
+the _costume_. How different from the finish, the splendour, and
+the _fashion_ of the English opera-box. I saw hundreds of women who
+appeared, by their dress, scarcely above the rank of shopkeepers,
+yet, who probably were among the Parisian leaders of fashion, if in
+republican Paris there are _any_ leaders of fashion.
+
+But I came to be interested, to enjoy, to indulge in a feast of
+music and acting; with no fastidiousness of criticism, and with
+every inclination to be gratified. In the opera itself I was utterly
+disappointed. The Opera was _Zerline_, or, _The Basket of Oranges_.
+The composer was the first living musician of France, Auber; the
+writer was the most popular dramatist of his day, Scribe; the Prima
+Donna was Alboni, to whom the manager of the Opera in London had
+not thought it too much to give £4000 for a single season. I never
+paid my francs with more willing expectation: and I never saw a
+performance of which I so soon got weary.
+
+The plot is singularly trifling. Zerline, an orange-girl of Palermo,
+has had a daughter by Boccanera, a man of rank, who afterwards
+becomes Viceroy of Sicily. Zerline is captured by pirates, and
+carried to Algiers. The opera opens with her return to Palermo,
+after so many years that her daughter is grown up to womanhood; and
+Boccanera is emerged into public life, and has gradually became an
+officer of state.
+
+The commencing scene has all the animation of the French
+picturesque. The Port of Palermo is before the spectator; the
+location is the Fruit Market. Masses of fruits, with smart peasantry
+to take care of them, cover the front of the stage. The background
+is filled up with Lazzaroni lying on the ground, sleeping, or eating
+macaroni. The Prince Boccanera comes from the palace; the crowd
+observe 'Son air sombre;' the Prince sings--
+
+    "On a most unlucky day,
+     Satan threw her in my way;
+     I the princess took to wife,
+     Now the torture of my life," &c.
+
+After this matrimonial confession, which extends to details, the
+prime minister tells us of his love still existing for Zerline,
+whose daughter he has educated under the name of niece, and who is
+now the Princess Gemma, and about to be married to a court noble.
+
+A ship approaches the harbour; Boccanera disappears; the Lazzaroni
+hasten to discharge the cargo. Zerline lands from the vessel, and
+sings a cavatina in praise of Palermo:--
+
+    "O Palerme! O Sicile!
+     Beau ciel, plaine fertile!"
+
+Zerline is a dealer in oranges, and she lands her cargo, placing
+it in the market. The original tenants of the place dispute her
+right to come among them, and are about to expel her by force, when
+a marine officer, Rodolf, takes her part, and, drawing his sword,
+puts the whole crowd to flight. Zerline, moved by this instance of
+heroism, tells him her story, that she was coming "un beau matin"
+to the city to sell oranges, when a pitiless corsair captured her,
+and carried her to Africa, separating her from her child, whom she
+had not seen for fifteen years; that she escaped to Malta, laid in
+a stock of oranges there;--and thus the events of the day occurred.
+Rodolf, this young hero, is costumed in a tie-wig with powder, stiff
+skirts, and the dress of a century ago. What tempted the author
+to put not merely his hero, but all his court characters, into
+the costume of Queen Anne, is not easily conceivable, as there is
+nothing in the story which limits it in point of time.
+
+Zerline looks after him with sudden sympathy, says that she heard
+him sigh, that he must be unhappy, and that, if her daughter
+lives, he is just the _husband_ for her,--Zerline not having been
+particular as to marriage herself. She then rambles about the
+streets, singing,
+
+    "Achetez mes belles oranges,
+     Des fruits divins, des fruits exquis;
+     Des oranges comme les anges
+     N'en _goutent pas en Paradis_."
+
+After this "hommage aux oranges!" to the discredit of Paradise, on
+which turns the plot of the play, a succession of maids of honour
+appear, clad in the same unfortunate livery of fardingales, enormous
+flat hats, powdered wigs, and stomachers. The Princess follows them,
+apparently armed by her costume against all the assaults of Cupid.
+But she, too, has an "affaire du coeur" upon her hands. In fact,
+from the Orangewoman up to the Throne, Cupid is the Lord of Palermo,
+with its "beau ciel, plaine fertile." The object of the Princess's
+love is the Marquis de Buttura, the suitor of her husband's
+supposed niece. Here is a complication! The enamoured wife receives
+a billet-doux from the suitor, proposing a meeting on his return
+from hunting. She tears the billet for the purpose of concealment,
+and in her emotion drops the fragments on the floor. That billet
+performs all important part in the end. The enamoured lady buys an
+orange, and gives a gold piece for it. Zerline, not accustomed to
+be so well paid for her fruit, begins to suspect this outrageous
+liberality; and having had experience in these matters, picks up the
+fragments of the letter, and gets into the whole secret.
+
+The plot proceeds: the daughter of the orangewoman now appears. She
+is clad in the same preposterous habiliments. As the niece of the
+minister, she is created a princess, (those things are cheap in
+Italy,) and she, too, is in love with the officer in the tie-wig.
+She recognises the song of Zerline, "Achetez mes belles oranges,"
+and sings the half of it. On this, the mother and daughter now
+recognise each other. It is impossible to go further in such a
+_denouement_. If Italian operas are proverbially silly, we are to
+recollect that this is not an Italian, but a French one; and that it
+is by the most popular comic writer of France.
+
+The marriage of Gemma and Rodolf is forbidden by the pride of the
+King's sister, the wife of Boccanera, but Zerline interposes,
+reminds her of the orange _affair_, threatens her with the discovery
+of the billet-doux, and finally makes her give her consent: and thus
+the curtain drops. I grew tired of all this insipidity, and left the
+theatre before the catastrophe. The music seemed to me fitting for
+the plot--neither better nor worse; and I made my escape with right
+good-will from the clamour and crash of the orchestra, and from the
+loves and _faux pas_ of the belles of Palermo.
+
+_The Obelisk._--I strayed into the Place de la Concorde, beyond
+comparison the finest _space_ in Paris. I cannot call it a square,
+nor does it equal in animation the Boulevard; but in the _profusion_
+of noble architecture it has no rival in Paris, nor in Europe. _Vive
+la Despotisme!_ every inch of it is owing to Monarchy. Republics
+build nothing, if we except prisons and workhouses. They are
+proverbially squalid, bitter, and beggarly. What has America, with
+all her boasting, ever built, but a warehouse or a conventicle?
+The Roman Republic, after seven hundred years' existence, remained
+a collection hovels till an Emperor faced them with marble. If
+Athens exhibited her universal talents in the splendour of her
+architecture, we must recollect that Pericles was her _master_
+through life--as substantially _despotic_, by the aid of the
+populace, as an Asiatic king by his guards; and recollect, also,
+that an action of damages was brought against him for "wasting
+the public money on the Parthenon," the glory of Athens in every
+succeeding age. Louis Quatorze, Napoleon, and Louis Philippe--two
+openly, and the third secretly, as despotic as the Sultan--were the
+true builders of Paris.
+
+As I stood in the centre of this vast enclosure, I was fully struck
+with the effect of _scene_. The sun was sinking into a bed of gold
+and crimson clouds, that threw their hue over the long line of
+the Champs Elysées. Before me were the two great fountains, and
+the Obelisk of Luxor. The fountains had ceased to play, from the
+lateness of the hour, but still looked massive and gigantic; the
+obelisk looked shapely and superb. The gardens of the Tuilleries
+were on my left--deep dense masses of foliage, surmounted in the
+distance by the tall roofs of the old Palace; on my right, the
+verdure of the Champs Elysées, with the Arc de l'Etoile rising above
+it, at the end of its long and noble avenue; in my front the Palace
+of the Legislature, a chaste and elegant structure; and behind me,
+glowing in the sunbeams, the Madeleine, the noblest church--I think
+the noblest edifice, in Paris, and perhaps not surpassed in beauty
+and grandeur, for its size, by any place of worship in Europe.
+The air cool and sweet from the foliage, the vast _place_ almost
+solitary, and undisturbed by the cries which are incessant in this
+babel during the day, yet with that gentle confusion of sounds which
+makes the murmur and the music of a great city. All was calm, noble,
+and soothing.
+
+The obelisk of Luxor which stands in the centre of the "Place," is
+one of two Monoliths, or pillars of a single stone, which, with
+Cleopatra's Needle, were given by Mehemet Ali to the French,
+at the time when, by their alliance, he expected to have made
+himself independent. All the dates of Egyptian antiquities are
+uncertain--notwithstanding Young and his imitator Champollion--but
+the date _assigned_ to this pillar is 1550 years before the
+Christian era. The two obelisks stood in front of the great temple
+of Thebes, now named Luxor, and the hieroglyphics which cover this
+one, from top to bottom, are supposed to relate the exploits and
+incidents of the reign of Sesostris.
+
+It is of red Syenite; but, from time and weather, it is almost the
+colour of limestone. It has an original flaw up a third of its
+height, for which the Egyptian masons provided a remedy by wedges,
+and the summit is slightly broken. The height of the monolith is
+seventy-two feet three inches, which would look insignificant,
+fixed as it is in the centre of lofty buildings, but for its being
+raised on a plinth of granite, and that again raised on a pedestal
+of immense blocks of granite--the height of the plinth and the
+pedestal together being twenty-seven feet, making the entire height
+nearly one hundred. The weight of the monolith is five hundred
+thousand pounds; the weight of the pedestal is half that amount, and
+the weight of the blocks probably makes the whole amount to nine
+hundred thousand, which is the weight of the obelisk at Rome. It was
+erected in 1836, by drawing it up an inclined plane of masonry, and
+then raising it by cables and capstans to the perpendicular. The
+operation was tedious, difficult, and expensive; but it was worth
+the labour; and the monolith now forms a remarkable monument of the
+zeal of the king, and of the liberality of his government.
+
+There is, I understand, an obelisk remaining in Egypt, which
+was given by the Turkish government to the British army, on the
+expulsion of the French from Egypt, but which has been unclaimed,
+from the difficulty of carrying it to England.
+
+That difficulty, it must be acknowledged, is considerable. In
+transporting and erecting the obelisk of Luxor six years were
+employed. I have not heard the expense, but it must have been large.
+A vessel was especially constructed at Toulon, for its conveyance
+down the Nile. A long road was to be made from the Nile to the
+Temple. Then the obelisk required to be protected from the accidents
+of carriage, which was done by enclosing it in a wooden case. It was
+then drawn by manual force to the river--and this employed three
+months. Then came the trouble of embarking it, for which the vessel
+had to be nearly sawn through; then came the crossing of the bar
+at Rosetta--a most difficult operation at the season of the year;
+then the voyage down the Mediterranean, the vessel being towed by a
+steamer; then the landing at Cherbourg, in 1833; and, lastly, the
+passage up the Seine, which occupied nearly four months, reaching
+Paris in December; thenceforth its finishing and erection, which was
+completed only in three years after.
+
+This detail may have some interest, as we have a similar project
+before us. But the whole question is, whether the transport of the
+obelisk which remains in Egypt for us is worth the expense. We,
+without hesitation, say that it _is_. The French have shown that it
+is _practicable_, and it is a matter of _rational_ desire to show
+that we are not behind the French either in power, in ability, or
+in zeal, to adorn our cities. The obelisk transported to England
+would be a proud monument, without being an offensive one, of a
+great achievement of our armies; it would present to our eyes, and
+those of our children, a relic of the most civilised kingdom of the
+early ages; it would sustain the recollections of the scholar by its
+record, and might kindle the energy of the people by the sight of
+what had been accomplished by the prowess of Englishmen.
+
+If it be replied that such views are Utopian, may we not ask,
+what is the use of all antiquity, since we can eat and drink as
+well without it? But we cannot _feel_ as loftily without it; many
+a lesson of vigour, liberality, and virtue would be lost to us
+without it; we should lose the noblest examples of the arts, some
+of the finest displays of human genius in architecture, a large
+portion of the teaching of the public mind in all things great,
+and an equally large portion of the incentives to public virtue in
+all things self-denying. The labour, it is true, of conveying the
+obelisk would be serious, the expense considerable, and we might
+not see it erected before the gate of Buckingham Palace these ten
+years. But it would be erected at _last_. It would be a trophy--it
+would be an abiding memorial of the extraordinary country from which
+civilisation spread to the whole world.
+
+But the two grand fountains ought especially to stimulate our
+emulation. Those we can have without a voyage from Alexandria to
+Portsmouth, or a six years' delay.
+
+The fountains of the Place de la Concorde would deserve praise
+if it were only for their beauty. At a distance sufficient for
+the picturesque, and with the sun shining on them, they actually
+look like domes and cataracts of molten silver; and a nearer view
+does not diminish their right to admiration. They are both lofty,
+perhaps, fifty feet high, both consisting of three basins, lessening
+in size in proportion to their height, and all pouring out sheets
+of water from the trumpets of Tritons, from the mouths of dolphins,
+and from allegorical figures. One of those fountains is in honour of
+Maritime Navigation, and the other of the Navigation of Rivers. In
+the former the figures represent the Ocean and the Mediterranean,
+with the Genii of the fisheries; and in the upper basin are
+Commerce, Astronomy, Navigation, &c., all capital bronzes, and all
+spouting out floods of water. The fountain of River Navigation is
+not behind its rival in bronze or water. It exhibits the Rhine and
+the Rhone, with the Genii of fruits and flowers, of the vintage and
+the harvest, with the usual attendance of Tritons. Why the artist
+had no room for the Seine and the Garonne, while he introduced the
+Rhine, which is not a French river in any part of its course, must
+be left for his explanation; but the whole constitutes a beautiful
+and magnificent object, and, with the sister fountain, perhaps
+forms the finest display of the kind in Europe. I did not venture,
+while looking at those stately monuments of French art, to turn my
+thoughts to our own unhappy performances in Trafalgar Square--the
+rival of a soda-water bottle, yet the work of a people of boundless
+wealth, and the first machinists in the world.
+
+_The Jardin des Plantes._--I found this fine establishment crowded
+with the lower orders--fathers and mothers, nurses, old women, and
+soldiers. As it includes the popular attractions of a zoological
+garden, as well as a botanical, every day sees its visitants, and
+every holiday its crowds. The plants are for science, and for that
+I had no time, even had I possessed other qualifications; but the
+zoological collection were for curiosity, and of that the spectators
+had abundance. Yet the animals of pasture appeared to be languid,
+possibly tired of the perpetual bustle round them--for all animals
+love quiet at certain times, and escape from the eye of man, when
+escape is in their power. Possibly the heat of the weather, for
+the day was remarkably sultry, might have contributed to their
+exhaustion. But if they have memory--and why should they not?--they
+must have strangely felt the contrast of their free pastures, shady
+woods, and fresh streams, with the little patch of ground, the
+parched soil, and the clamour of ten thousand tongues round them.
+I could imagine the antelope's intelligent eye, as he lay panting
+before us on his brown patch of soil, comparing it with the ravines
+of the Cape, or the eternal forests clothing the hills of his native
+Abyssinia.
+
+But the object of all popular interest was the pit of the bears;
+there the crowd was incessant and delighted. But the bears, three
+or four huge brown beasts, by no means _reciprocated_ the popular
+feeling. They sat quietly on their hind-quarters, gazing grimly at
+the groups which lined their rails, and tossed cakes and apples to
+them from above. They had probably been saturated with sweets, for
+they scarcely noticed anything but by a growl. They were insensible
+to apples--even oranges could not make them move, and cakes they
+seemed to treat with scorn. It was difficult to conceive that
+those heavy and unwieldy-looking animals could be ferocious; but
+the Alpine hunter knows that they are as fierce as the tiger, and
+nearly as quick and dangerous in their spring.
+
+The carnivorous beasts were few, and, except in the instance of
+one lion, of no remarkable size or beauty. As they naturally doze
+during the day, their languor was no proof of their weariness; but
+I have never seen an exhibition of this kind without some degree of
+regret. The plea of the promotion of science is nothing. Even if
+it were important to science to be acquainted with the habits of
+the lion and tiger, which it is not, their native habits are not to
+be learned from the animal shut up in a cage. The chief exertion
+of their sagacity and their strength in the native state is in the
+pursuit of prey; yet what of these can be learned from the condition
+in which the animal dines as regularly as his keeper, and divides
+his time between feeding and sleep? Half-a-dozen lions let loose in
+the Bois de Boulogne would let the naturalist into more knowledge of
+their nature than a menagerie for fifty years.
+
+The present system is merely cruel; and the animals, without
+exercise, without air, without the common excitement of free motion,
+which all animals enjoy so highly--perhaps much more highly than the
+human race--fall into disease and die, no doubt miserably, though
+they cannot draw up a _rationale_ of their sufferings. I have been
+told that the lions in confinement die chiefly of consumption--a
+singularly sentimental disease for this proud ravager of the desert.
+But the whole purpose of display would be answered as effectually
+by exhibiting half-a-dozen lions' _skins_ stuffed, in the different
+attitudes of seizing their prey, or ranging the forest, or feeding.
+At present nothing is seen but a great beast asleep, or restlessly
+moving in a space of half-a-dozen square feet, and pining away in
+his confinement. An eagle on his perch and with a chain on his leg,
+in a menagerie, always appears to me like a dethroned monarch; and
+I have never seen him thus cast down from his "high estate" without
+longing to break his chain, and let him spread his wing, and delight
+his splendid eye with the full view of his kingdom of the Air.
+
+The Jardin dates its origin as far back as Louis XIII., when the
+king's physician recommended its foundation for science. The French
+are fond of gardening, and are good gardeners; and the climate is
+peculiarly favourable to flowers, as is evident from the market held
+every morning in summer by the side of the Madeleine, where the
+greatest abundance of the richest flowers I ever saw is laid out for
+the luxury of the Parisians.
+
+The Jardin, patronised by kings and nobles, flourished through
+successive reigns; but the appointment of Buffon, about the middle
+of the eighteenth century, suddenly raised it to the pinnacle of
+European celebrity. The most eloquent writer of his time, (in
+the style which the French call eloquence,) a man of family, and
+a man of opulence, he made Natural History the _fashion_, and
+in France that word is magic. It accomplishes everything--it
+includes everything. All France was frantic with the study of
+plants, animals, poultry-yards, and projects for driving tigers in
+cabriolets, and harnessing lions _à la Cybele_.
+
+But Buffon mixed good sense with his inevitable _charlatanrie_--he
+selected the ablest men whom he could find for his professors;
+and in France there is an extraordinary quantity of "ordinary"
+cleverness--they gave amusing lectures, and they won the hearts of
+the nation.
+
+But the Revolution came, and crushed all institutions alike. Buffon,
+fortunate in every way, had died in the year before, in 1788, and
+was thus spared the sight of the general ruin. The Jardin escaped,
+through some plea of its being national property; but the professors
+had fled, and were starving, or starved.
+
+The Consulate, and still more the Empire, restored the
+establishment. Napoleon was ambitious of the character of a man
+of science, he was a member of the Institute, he knew the French
+character, and he flattered the national vanity, by indulging it
+with the prospect of being at the head of human knowledge.
+
+The institution had by this time been so long regarded as a
+public show that it was beginning to be regarded as nothing else.
+Gratuitous lectures, which are always good for nothing, and to
+which all kinds of people crowd with corresponding profit, were
+gradually reducing the character of the Jardin; when Cuvier, a
+man of talent, was appointed to one of the departments of the
+institution, and he instantly revived its popularity; and, what was
+of more importance, its public use.
+
+Cuvier devoted himself to comparative anatomy and geology. The
+former was a study within human means, of which he had the materials
+round him, and which, being intended for the instruction of man, is
+evidently intended for his investigation. The latter, in attempting
+to fix the age of the world, to decide on the process of creation,
+and to contradict Scripture by the ignorance of man, is merely
+an instance of the presumption of _Sciolism_. Cuvier exhibited
+remarkable dexterity in discovering the species of the fossil
+fishes, reptiles, and animals. The science was not new, but he threw
+it into a new form--he made it interesting, and he made it probable.
+If a large proportion of his supposed discoveries were merely
+ingenious guesses, they were at least guesses which there was nobody
+to refute, and they _were ingenious_--that was enough. Fame followed
+him, and the lectures of the ingenious theorist were a popular
+novelty. The "Cabinet of Comparative Anatomy" in the Jardin is the
+monument of his diligence, and it does honour to the sagacity of his
+investigation.
+
+One remark, however, must be made. On a former visit to the Cabinet
+of Comparative Anatomy, among the collection of skeletons, I was
+surprised and disgusted with the sight of the skeleton of the Arab
+who killed General Kleber in Egypt. The Arab was impaled, and the
+iron spike was shown _still sticking in the_ spine! I do not know
+whether this hideous object is still to be seen, for I have not
+lately visited the apartment; but, if existing still, it ought to
+remain no longer in a museum of science. Of course, the assassin
+deserved death; but, in all probability, the murder which made him
+guilty, was of the same order as that which made Charlotte Corday
+famous. How many of his countrymen had died by the soldiery of
+France! In the eye of Christianity, this is no palliation; though in
+the eye of Mahometanism it might constitute a patriot and a hero. At
+all events, so frightful a spectacle ought _not_ to meet the public
+eye.
+
+_Hôtel des Invalides._--The depository of all that remains of
+Napoleon, the monument of almost two hundred years of war, and the
+burial-place of a whole host of celebrated names, is well worth
+the visit of strangers; and I entered the esplanade of the famous
+_hôtel_ with due veneration, and some slight curiosity to see the
+changes of time. I had visited this noble pile immediately after
+the fall of Napoleon, and while it still retained the honours of
+an imperial edifice. Its courts now appeared to me comparatively
+desolate; this, however, may be accounted for by the cessation
+of those wars which peopled them with military mutilation. The
+establishment was calculated to provide for five thousand men; and,
+at that period, probably, it was always full. At present, scarcely
+more than half the number are under its roof; and, as even the
+Algerine war is reduced to skirmishes with the mountaineers of the
+Atlas, that number must be further diminishing from year to year.
+
+The Cupola then shone with gilding. This was the work of Napoleon,
+who had a stately eye for the ornament of his imperial city. The
+cupola of the Invalides thus glittered above all the roofs of Paris,
+and was seen glittering to an immense distance. It might be taken
+for the dedication of the French capital to the genius of War. This
+gilding is now worn off practically, as well as metaphorically, and
+the _prestige_ is lost.
+
+The celebrated Edmund Burke, all whose ideas were grand, is said
+to have proposed gilding the cupola of St Paul's, which certainly
+would have been a splendid sight, and would have thrown a look of
+stateliness over that city to which the ends of the earth turn their
+eyes. But the civic spirit was not equal to the idea, and it has
+since gone on lavishing ten times the money on the embellishment of
+_lanes_.
+
+The Chapel of the Invalides looked gloomy, and even neglected; the
+great Magician was gone. Some service was performing, as it is in
+the Romish chapels at most hours of the day: some poor people were
+kneeling in different parts of the area; and some strangers were,
+like myself, wandering along the nave, looking at the monuments to
+the fallen military names of France. On the pillars in the nave are
+inscriptions to the memory of Jourdan, Lobau, and Oudinot. There is
+a bronze tablet to the memory of Marshal Mortier, who was killed by
+Fieschi's infernal machine, beside Louis Philippe; and to Damremont,
+who fell in Algiers.
+
+But the chapel is destined to exhibit a more superb instance of
+national recollection--the tomb of Napoleon, which is to be finished
+in 1852. A large circular crypt, dug in the centre of the second
+chapel (which is to be united with the first,) is the site of the
+sarcophagus in which the remains of Napoleon lie. Coryatides,
+columns, and bas-reliefs, commemorative of his battles, are to
+surround the sarcophagus. The coryatides are to represent War,
+Legislation, Art, and Science; and in front is to be raised an altar
+of black marble. The architect is Visconti, and the best statuaries
+in Paris are to contribute the decorations. The expense will be
+enormous. In the time of Louis Philippe it had already amounted to
+nearly four millions of francs. About three millions more are now
+demanded for the completion, including an equestrian statue. On the
+whole, the expense will be not much less than seven millions of
+francs!
+
+The original folly of the nation, and of Napoleon, in plundering the
+Continent of statues and pictures, inevitably led to retribution,
+on the first reverse of fortune. The plunder of money, or of
+arms, or of anything consumable, would have been exempt from this
+mortification; but pictures and statues are permanent things, and
+always capable of being re-demanded. Their plunder was an extension
+of the law of spoil unknown in European hostilities, or in history,
+except perhaps in the old Roman ravage of Greece. Napoleon, in
+adopting the practice of heathenism for his model, and the French
+nation--in their assumed love of the arts violating the sanctities
+of art, by removing the noblest works from the edifices for which
+they were created, and from the lights and positions for which the
+great artists of Italy designed them--fully deserved the vexation of
+seeing them thus carried back to their original cities. The moral
+will, it is to be presumed, be learned from this signal example,
+that the works of genius are _naturally_ exempt from the sweep of
+plunder; that even the violences of war must not be extended beyond
+the necessities of conquest; and that an act of injustice is _sure_
+to bring down its punishment in the most painful form of retribution.
+
+_The Artesian Well._--Near the Hôtel des Invalides is the celebrated
+well which has given the name to all the modern experiments of
+boring to great depths for water. The name of Artesian is said to
+be taken from the province of Artois, in which the practice has
+been long known. The want of water in Paris induced a M. Mulot to
+commence the work in 1834.
+
+The history of the process is instructive. For six years there was
+no prospect of success; yet M. Mulot gallantly persevered. All
+was inexorable chalk; the boring instrument had broken several
+times, and the difficulty thus occasioned may be imagined from its
+requiring a length of thirteen hundred feet! even in an early period
+of the operation. However, early in 1841 the chalk gave signs of
+change, and a greenish sand was drawn up. On the 26th of February
+this was followed by a slight effusion of water, and before night
+the stream burst up to the mouth of the excavation, which was now
+eighteen hundred feet in depth. Yet the water rapidly rose to a
+height of one hundred and twelve feet above the mouth of the well
+by a pipe, which is now supported by scaffolding, giving about six
+hundred gallons of water a minute.
+
+Even the memorable experiment confutes, so far as it goes, the
+geological notion of strata laid under each other in their
+proportions of gravity. The section of the boring shows chalk, sand,
+gravel, shells, &c., and this order sometimes reversed, in the most
+casual manner, down to a depth five times the height of the cupola
+of the Invalides.
+
+The heat of the water was 83° of Fahrenheit. In the theories
+with which the philosophers of the Continent have to feed their
+imaginations is that of a _central fire_, which is felt through all
+the strata, and which warms everything in proportion to its nearness
+to the centre. Thus, it was proposed to dig an Artesian well of
+three thousand feet, for the supply of hot water to the Jardin des
+Plantes and the neighbouring hospitals. It was supposed that, at
+this depth, the heat would range to upwards of 100° of Fahrenheit.
+But nothing has been done. Even the Well of Grenelle has rather
+disappointed the public expectation; of late the supply has been
+less constant, and the boring is to be renewed to a depth of two
+thousand feet.
+
+_The Napoleon Column._--This is the grand feature of the Place
+de Vendôme, once the site of the Hôtel Vendôme, built by the son
+of Henry IV. and Gabrielle d'Estrées; afterwards pulled down by
+Louis XIV., afterwards abandoned to the citizens, and afterwards
+surrounded, as it is at this day, with the formal and heavy
+architecture of Mansard. The "Place" has, like everything in
+Paris, changed its name from time to time. It was once the "Place
+des Conquêtes;" then it changed to "Louis le Grand;" and then it
+returned to the name of its original proprietor. An old figure of
+the "Great King," in all the glories of wig and feathers, stood in
+the centre, till justice and the rabble of the Revolution broke
+it down, in the first "energies" of Republicanism. But the German
+campaign of 1805 put all the nation in good humour, and the Napoleon
+Column was raised on the site of the dilapidated _monarch_.
+
+The design of the column is not original, for it is taken from
+the Trajan Column at Rome; but it is enlarged, and makes a very
+handsome object. When I first saw it, its decorations were in peril;
+for the Austrian soldiery were loud for its demolition, or at
+least for stripping off its bronze bas-reliefs, they representing
+their successive defeats in that ignominious campaign which, in
+three months from Boulogne, finished by the capture of Vienna. The
+Austrian troops, however, stoutly retrieved their disasters, and,
+as the proof, were then masters of Paris. It was possibly this
+effective feeling that prevailed at last to spare the column, which
+the practice of the French armies would have entitled them to strip
+without mercy.
+
+In the first instance, a statue of Napoleon, as emperor, stood on
+the summit of the pillar. This statue had its revolutions too, for
+it was melted down at the restoration of the Bourbons, to make a
+part of the equestrian statue of Henry IV. erected on the Pont Neuf.
+A _fleur-de-lis_ and flagstaff then took its place. The Revolution
+of 1830, which elevated Louis Philippe to a temporary throne, raised
+the statue of Napoleon to an elevation perhaps as temporary.
+
+It was the shortsighted policy of the new monarch to mingle royal
+power with "republican institutions." He thus introduced the
+tricolor once more, sent for Napoleon's remains to St Helena by
+permission of England, and erected his statue in the old "chapeau et
+redingote gris," the characteristics of his soldiership. The statue
+was inaugurated on one of the "three glorious days," in July 1833,
+in all the pomp of royalty,--princes, ministers, and troops. So much
+for the consistency of a brother of the Bourbon. The pageant passed
+away, and the sacrifice to popularity was made without obtaining the
+fruits. Louis Philippe disappeared from the scene before the fall
+of the curtain; and, as if to render his catastrophe more complete,
+he not merely left a republic behind him, but he lived to see the
+"prisoner of Ham" the president of that republic.
+
+How does it happen that an Englishman in France cannot stir a
+single step, hear a single word, or see a single face, without the
+conviction that he has landed among a people as far from him in all
+their feelings, habits, and nature, as if they were engendered in
+the moon? The feelings with which the Briton looks on the statue
+of Buonaparte may be mixed enough: he may acknowledge him for a
+great soldier, as well as a great knave--a great monarch, as well
+as a little intriguer--a mighty ruler of men, who would have made
+an adroit waiter at a _table d'hôte_ in the Palais Royal. But he
+never would have imagined him into a sentimentalist, a shepherd, a
+Corydon, to be hung round with pastoral garlands; an opera hero, to
+delight in the sixpenny tribute of bouquets from the galleries.
+
+Yet I found the image of this man of terror and mystery--this
+ravager of Europe--this stern, fierce, and subtle master of havoc,
+decorated like a milliner's shop, or the tombs of the citizen
+shopkeepers in the cemeteries, with garlands of all sizes!--the
+large to express copious sorrow, the smaller to express diminished
+anguish, and the smallest, like a visiting card, for simply leaving
+their compliments; and all this in the face of the people who once
+feared to look in his face, and followed his car as if it bore the
+Thunder!
+
+To this spot came the people to offer up their sixpenny homage--to
+this spot came processions of all kinds, to declare their republican
+love for the darkest despot of European memory, to sing a stave, to
+walk heroically round the railing, hang up their garlands, and then,
+having done their duty in the presence of their own grisettes, in
+the face of Paris, and to the admiration of Europe, march home, and
+ponder upon the glories of the day!
+
+As a work of imperial magnificence, the column is worthy of its
+founder, and of the only redeeming point of his character--his
+zeal for the ornament of Paris. It is a monument to the military
+successes of the Empire; a trophy one hundred and thirty-five feet
+high, covered with the representations of French victory over the
+Austrians and Russians in the campaign of 1805. The bas-reliefs
+are in bronze, rising in a continued spiral round the column. Yet
+this is an unfortunate sacrifice to the imitation of the Roman
+column. The spiral, a few feet above the head of the spectator,
+offers nothing to the eye but a roll of rough bronze; the figures
+are wholly and necessarily undistinguishable. The only portion of
+those castings which directly meets the eye is unfortunately given
+up to the mere uniforms, caps, and arms of the combatants. This is
+the pedestal, and it would make a showy decoration for a tailor's
+window. It is a clever work of the furnace, but a miserable one of
+invention.
+
+The bronze is said to have been the captured cannon of the enemy.
+On the massive bronze door is the inscription in Latin:--"Napoleon,
+Emperor, Augustus, dedicated to the glory of the Grand Army this
+memorial of the German War, finished in three months, in the year
+1805, under his command."
+
+On the summit stands the statue of Napoleon, to which, and its
+changes, I have adverted already. But the question has arisen,
+whether there is not an error in taste in placing the statue of an
+individual at a height which precludes the view of his _features_.
+This has been made an objection to the handsome Nelson Pillar in
+Trafalgar Square. But the obvious answer in both instances is,
+that the object is not merely the sight of the features, but the
+perfection of the memorial; that the pillar is the true _monument_,
+and the statue only an accessory, though the most _suitable_
+accessory. But even then the statue is not altogether inexpressive.
+We can see the figure and the costume of Napoleon nearly as well
+as they could be seen from the balcony of the Tuilleries, where
+all Paris assembled in the Carousel to worship him on Sundays, at
+the parade of "La Garde." In the spirited statue of Nelson we can
+recognise the figure as well as if we were gazing at him within a
+hundred yards in any other direction. It is true that pillars are
+not painters' easels, nor is Trafalgar Square a sculptor's yard; but
+the real question turns on the effect of the whole. If the pillar
+makes the monument, we will not quarrel with the sculptor for its
+not making a _miniature_. It answers its purpose--it is a noble
+one; it gives a national record of great events, and it realises,
+invigorates, and consecrates them by the images of the men by whom
+they were achieved.
+
+_Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile._--It is no small adventure, in a
+burning day of a French summer, to walk the length of the Champs
+Elysées, even to see the arch of the Star, (Napoleon's _Star_,)
+and climb to its summit. Yet this labour I accomplished with the
+fervour and the fatigue of a pilgrimage.
+
+Why should the name of Republic be ever heard in the mouth of a
+Frenchman? All the objects of his glory in the Capital of which he
+_glories_, everything that he can show to the stranger--everything
+that he recounts, standing on tip-toe, and looking down on the whole
+world besides--is the work of monarchy! The grand Republic left
+nothing behind but the guillotine. The Bourbons and Buonapartes were
+the creators of all to which he points, with an exaltation that
+throws earth into the shade from the Alps to the Andes. The Louvre,
+the Madeleine, the Tuilleries, the Hôtel de Ville, (now magnified
+and renovated into the most stately of town-houses,) the Hôtel
+des Invalides, Nôtre Dame, &c. &c. are all the work of Kings. If
+Napoleon had lived half a century longer, he would have made Paris
+a second Babylon. If the very clever President, who has hitherto
+managed France so dexterously, and whose name so curiously combines
+the monarchy and the despotism,--if Louis _Napoleon_ (a name which
+an old Roman would have pronounced an omen) should manage it into
+a Monarchy, we shall probably see Paris crowded with superb public
+edifices.
+
+The kings of France were peculiarly magnificent in the decoration
+of the entrances to their city. As no power on earth can prevent
+the French from crowding into hovels, from living ten families in
+one house, and from appending to their cities the most miserable,
+ragged, and forlorn-looking suburbs on the globe, the monarchs
+wisely let the national habits alone; and resolved, if the suburbs
+must be abandoned to the popular fondness for the wigwam, to
+impress strangers with the stateliness of their gates. The _Arc
+de St Denis_, once conducting from the most dismal of suburbs, is
+one of the finest portals in Paris, or in any European city; it
+is worthy of the Boulevard, and that is panegyric at once. Every
+one knows _that it was_ erected in honour of the short-lived
+inroad of Louis XIV. into Holland in 1672, and the taking of whole
+muster-rolls of forts and villages, left at his mercy, ungarrisoned
+and unprovisioned, by the Republican parsimony of the Dutch, till
+a princely defender arose, and the young Stadtholder sent back the
+coxcomb monarch faster than he came. But the Arc is a noble work,
+and its architecture might well set a redeeming example to the
+London _improvers_. Why not erect an arch in Southwark? Why not at
+all the great avenues to the capital? Why not, instead of leaving
+this task to the caprices, or even to the bad taste of the railway
+companies, make it a branch of the operations of the Woods and
+Forests, and ennoble all the entrances of the mightiest capital of
+earthly empire?
+
+The Arch of St Denis is now shining in all the novelty of
+reparation, for it was restored so lately as last year. In this
+quarter, which has been always of a stormy temperature, the
+insurrection of 1848 raged with especial fury; and if the spirits of
+the great ever hover about their monuments, Louis XIV. may have seen
+from its summit a more desperate conflict than ever figured on its
+bas-reliefs.
+
+On the Arch of the Porte St Martin is a minor monument to minor
+triumphs, but a handsome one. Louis XIV. is still the hero. The
+"Grand Monarque" is exhibited as Hercules with his club; but as
+even a monarch in those days was nothing without his wig, Hercules
+exhibits a huge mass of curls of the most courtly dimensions--he
+might pass for the presiding deity of _perruquiers_.
+
+The _Arc de Triomphe du Carousel_, erected in honour of the German
+campaign in 1805, is a costly performance, yet poor-looking, from
+its position in the centre of lofty buildings. What effect can
+an isolated arch, of but five-and-forty feet high, have in the
+immediate vicinity of masses of building, perhaps a hundred feet
+high? Its aspect is consequently meagre; and its being placed
+in the centre of a court makes it look useless, and, of course,
+ridiculous. On the summit is a figure of War, or Victory, in a
+chariot, with four bronze horses--the horses modelled from the
+four Constantinopolitan horses brought by the French from Venice,
+as part of the plunder of that luckless city, but sent back to
+Venice by the Allies in 1815. The design of the arch was from
+that of Severus, in Rome: this secured, at least, elegance in its
+construction; but the position is fatal to dignity.
+
+The _Arc de l'Etoile_ is the finest work of the kind in Paris. It
+has the advantage of being built on an elevation, from which it
+overlooks the whole city, with no building of any magnitude in its
+vicinity; and is seen from a considerable distance on all the roads
+leading to the capital. Its cost was excessive for a work of mere
+ornament, and is said to have amounted to nearly half a million
+sterling!
+
+As I stood glancing over the groups on the friezes and faces of
+this great monument, which exhibit war in every form of conflict,
+havoc, and victory, the homely thought of "_cui bono_?" struck me
+irresistibly. Who was the better for all this havoc?--Napoleon,
+whom it sent to a dungeon! or the miserable thousands and tens
+of thousands whom it crushed in the field?--or the perhaps more
+unfortunate hundreds of thousands whom it sent to the hospital, to
+die the slow death of exhaustion and pain, or to live the protracted
+life of mutilation? I have no affectation of sentiment at the
+sight of the soldier's grave; he has but taken his share of the
+common lot, with perhaps the advantage, which so few men possess,
+of having "done the state some service." But, to see this vast
+monument covered with the emblems of hostilities, continued through
+almost a quarter of a century, (for the groups commence with 1792;)
+to think of the devastation of the fairest countries of Europe,
+of which these hostilities were the cause; and to know the utter
+fruitlessness and failure of the result, the short-lived nature of
+the triumph, and the frightful depth of the defeat---Napoleon in
+ignominious bondage and hopeless banishment--Napoleon, after having
+lorded it over Europe, sent to linger out life on a rock in the
+centre of the ocean--the leader of military millions kept under the
+eye of a British sentinel, and no more suffered to stray beyond
+his bounds than a caged tiger--I felt as if the object before me
+was less a trophy than a tomb, less a monument of glory than of
+retribution, less the record of national triumph than of national
+frenzy.
+
+I had full liberty for reflection, for there was scarcely a human
+being to interrupt me. The bustle of the capital did not reach so
+far, the promenaders in the Champs Elysées did not venture here; the
+showy equipages of the Parisian "_nouveaux riches_" remained where
+the crowd was to be seen; and except a few peasants going on their
+avocations, and a bench full of soldiers, sleeping or smoking away
+the weariness of the hour, the _Arc de Triomphe_, which had cost so
+much treasure, and was the record of so much blood, seemed to be
+totally forgotten. I question, if there had been a decree of the
+Legislature to sell the stones, whether it would have occasioned
+more than a paragraph in the _Journal des Debats_.
+
+The ascent to the summit is by a long succession of dark and winding
+steps, for which a lamp is lighted by the porter; but the view from
+the parapet repays the trouble of the ascent. The whole basin in
+which Paris lies is spread out before the eye. The city is seen in
+the centre of a valley, surrounded on every side by a circle of low
+hills, sheeted with dark masses of wood. It was probably once the
+bed of a lake, in which the site of the city was an island. All the
+suburb villages came within the view, with the fortifications, which
+to a more scientific eye might appear formidable, but which to mine
+appeared mere dots in the vast landscape.
+
+This parapet is unhappily sometimes used for other purposes than
+the indulgence of the spectacle. A short time since, a determined
+suicide sprang from it, after making a speech to the soldiery below,
+assigning his reason for this tremendous act--if reason has anything
+to do in such a desperate determination to defy common sense. He
+acted with the quietest appearance of deliberation: let himself down
+on the coping of the battlement, from this made his speech, as if
+he had been in the tribune; and, having finished it, flung himself
+down a height of ninety feet, and was in an instant a crushed and
+lifeless heap on the pavement below.
+
+It is remarkable that, even in these crimes, there exists the
+distinction which seems to divide France from England in every
+better thing. In England, a wretch undone by poverty, broken down by
+incurable pain, afflicted by the stings of a conscience which she
+neither knows how to heal nor cares how to cure, woman, helpless,
+wretched, and desolate, takes her walk under cover of night by the
+nearest river, and, without a witness, plunges in. But, in France,
+the last dreadful scene is imperfect without its publicity; the
+suicide must exhibit before the people. There must be the _valete et
+plaudite_. The curtain must fall with dramatic effect, and the actor
+must make his exit with the cries of the audience, in admiration or
+terror, ringing in the ear.
+
+In other cases, however varied, the passion for publicity is
+still the same. No man can bear to perish in silence. If the
+atheist resolves on self-destruction, he writes a treatise for his
+publisher, or a letter to the journals. If he is a man of science,
+he takes his laudanum after supper, and, pen in hand, notes the
+gradual effects of the poison for the benefit of science; or he
+prepares a fire of charcoal, quietly inhales the vapour, and from
+his sofa continues to scribble the symptoms of dissolution, until
+the pen grows unsteady, the brain wanders, and half-a-dozen blots
+close the scene; the writing, however, being dedicated to posterity,
+and circulated next day in every journal of Paris, till it finally
+permeates through the provinces, and from thence through the
+European world.
+
+The number of suicides in Paris annually, of late years, has
+been about three hundred,--out of a population of a million,
+notwithstanding the suppression of the gaming-houses, which
+unquestionably had a large share in the temptation to this horrible
+and unatonable crime.
+
+The sculptures on the Arc are in the best style. They form a history
+of the Consulate and of the Empire. Napoleon, of course, is a
+prominent figure; but in the fine bas-relief which is peculiarly
+devoted to himself, in which he stands of colossal size, with Fame
+flying over his head, History writing the record of his exploits,
+and Victory crowning him, the artist has left his work liable to the
+sly sarcasm of a spectator of a similar design for the statue of
+Louis XIV. Victory was there holding the laurel at a slight distance
+from his head. An Englishman asked "whether she was putting it on
+_or taking it off_?" But another of the sculptures is still more
+unfortunate, for it has the unintentional effect of commemorating
+the Allied conquest of France in 1814. A young Frenchman is seen
+defending his family; and a soldier behind him is seen falling from
+his horse, and the Genius of the _future_ flutters over them all. We
+know what that future was.
+
+The building of this noble memorial occupied, at intervals, no
+less than thirty years, beginning in 1806, when Napoleon issued
+a decree for its erection. The invasion in 1814 put a stop to
+everything in France, and the building was suspended. The fruitless
+and foolish campaign of the Duc d'Angoulême, in Spain, was regarded
+by the Bourbons as a title to national glories, and the building
+was resumed as a trophy to the renown of the Duc. It was again
+interrupted by the expulsion of the Bourbons in 1830; but was
+resumed under Louis Philippe, and finished in 1836. It is altogether
+a very stately and very handsome tribute to the French armies.
+
+But, without affecting unnecessary severity of remark, may not the
+wisdom of such a tribute be justly doubted? The Romans, though the
+principle of their power was conquest, and though their security was
+almost incompatible with peace, yet are said to have never repaired
+a triumphal arch. It is true that they built those arches (in the
+latter period of the Empire) so solidly as to want no repairs. But
+we have no triumphal monuments of the Republic surviving. Why should
+it be the constant policy of Continental governments to pamper
+their people with the food of that most dangerous and diseased of
+all vanities, the passion for war? And this is not said in the
+declamatory spirit of the "Peace Congress," which seems to be
+nothing more than a pretext for a Continental ramble, an expedient
+for a little vulgar notoriety among foreigners, and an opportunity
+of getting rid of the greatest quantity of common-place in the
+shortest time. But, why should not France learn common sense from
+the experience of England? It is calculated that, of the last five
+hundred years of French history, two hundred and fifty have been
+spent in hostilities. In consequence, France has been invaded,
+trampled, and impoverished by war; while England, during the last
+three hundred years, has never seen the foot of a foreign invader.
+
+Let the people of France abolish the _Conscription_, and they
+will have made one advance to liberty. Till cabinets are deprived
+of that material of _aggressive_ war, they will leave war at the
+caprice of a weak monarch, an ambitious minister, or a vainglorious
+people. It is remarkable that, among all the attempts at reforming
+the constitution of France, her reformers have never touched upon
+the ulcer of the land, the Conscription, the legacy of a frantic
+Republic, taking the children of the country from their industry, to
+plunge them into the vices of idleness or the havoc of war, and at
+all times to furnish the means, as well as afford the temptation,
+to aggressive war. There is not at this hour a soldier of England
+who has been _forced_ into the service! Let the French, let all the
+Continental nations, abolish the Conscription, thus depriving their
+governments of the means of making war upon each other; and what an
+infinite security would not this illustrious abolition give to the
+whole of Europe!--what an infinite saving in the taxes which are now
+wrung from nations by the fear of each other!--and what an infinite
+triumph to the spirit of peace, industry, and mutual good-will!
+
+_The Theatres._--In the evening I wandered along the Boulevard,
+the great centre of the theatres, and was surprised at the crowds
+which, in a hot summer night, could venture to be stewed alive,
+amid the smell of lamps, the effluvia of orange-peel, the glare of
+lights, and the breathing of hundreds or thousands of human beings.
+I preferred the fresh air, the lively movement of the Boulevard, the
+glitter of the Cafés, and the glow, then tempered, of the declining
+sun--one of the prettiest moving panoramas of Paris.
+
+The French Government take a great interest in the popularity of
+the theatres, and exert that species of superintendence which is
+implied in a considerable supply of the theatrical expenditure. The
+French Opera receives annually from the National Treasury no less
+than 750,000 francs, besides 130,000 for retiring pensions. To the
+Théâtre Français, the allowance from the Treasury is 240,000 francs
+a-year. To the Italian Opera the sum granted was formerly 70,000,
+but is now 50,000. Allowances are made to the Opera Comique, a most
+amusing theatre, to the Odeon, and perhaps to some others--the whole
+demanding of the budget a sum of more than a million of francs.
+
+It is curious that the drama in France began with the clergy. In the
+time of Charles VI., a company, named "Confrères de la Passion,"
+performed plays founded on the events of Scripture, though grossly
+disfigured by the traditions of Monachism. The originals were
+probably the "_Mysteries_," or plays in the Convents, a species of
+absurd and fantastic representation common in all Popish countries.
+At length the life of Manners was added to the life of Superstition,
+and singers and grimacers were added to the "Confrères."
+
+In the sixteenth century an Italian company appeared in Paris, and
+brought with them their opera, the invention of the Florentines
+fifty years before. The cessation of the civil wars allowed France
+for a while to cultivate the arts of peace; and Richelieu, a man
+who, if it could be said of any statesman that he formed the mind
+of the nation, impressed his image and superscription upon his
+country, gave the highest encouragement to the drama by making it
+the fashion. He even wrote, or assisted in writing, popular dramas.
+Corneille now began to flourish, and French Tragedy was established.
+
+Mazarin, when minister, and, like Richelieu, master of the nation,
+invited or admitted the Italian Opera once more into France; and
+Molière, at the head of a new company, obtained leave to perform
+before Louis XIV., who thenceforth patronised the great comic
+writer, and gave his company a theatre. The Tragedy, Comedy, and
+Opera of France now led the way in Europe.
+
+In France, the Great Revolution, while it multiplied the theatres
+with the natural extravagance of the time, yet, by a consequence
+equally inevitable, degraded the taste of the nation. For a
+long period the legitimate drama was almost extinguished: it
+was unexciting to a people trained day by day to revolutionary
+convulsion; the pageants on the stage were tame to the processions
+in the streets; and the struggles of kings and nobles were
+ridiculous to the men who had been employed in destroying a dynasty.
+
+Napoleon at once perceived the evil, and adopted the only remedy. He
+found no less than _thirty_ theatres in Paris. He was not a man to
+pause where he saw his way clearly before him; he closed twenty-two
+of those theatres, leaving but eight, and those chiefly of the old
+establishments, making a species of compensation to the closed
+houses.
+
+On the return of the Bourbons the civil list, as in the old
+times, assisted in the support of the theatres. On the accession
+of Louis Philippe, the popular triumph infused its extravagance
+even into the system of the drama. The number of the theatres
+increased, and a succession of writers of the "New School" filled
+the theatres with abomination. Gallantry became the _spirit_ of
+the drama--everything before the scene was intrigue; married life
+was the perpetual burlesque. Wives were the habitual heroines of
+the intrigue, and husbands the habitual dupes! To keep faith with
+a husband was a standing jest on the stage, to keep it with a
+seducer was the height of human character. The former was always
+described as brutal, gross, dull, and born to be duped; the latter
+was captivating, generous, and irresistible by any matron alive.
+In fact, wives and widows were made for nothing else but to give
+way to the fascinations of this class of professors of the arts
+of "good society." The captivator was substantially described as
+a scoundrel, a gambler, and a vagabond of the basest kind, but
+withal so honourable, so tender, and so susceptible, that his
+atrocities disappeared, or rather were transmuted into virtues, by
+the brilliancy of his qualifications for seducing the wife of his
+friend. Perjury, profligacy, and the betrayal of confidence in the
+most essential tie of human nature, were supreme in popularity in
+the Novel and on the Stage.
+
+The direct consequence is, that the crime of adultery is lightly
+considered in France; even the pure speak of it without the
+abhorrence which, for every reason, it deserves. Its notoriety is
+rather thought of as an anecdote of the day, or the gossiping of the
+soirée; and the most acknowledged licentiousness does not exclude a
+man of a certain rank from general reception in good society.
+
+One thing may be observed on the most casual intercourse with
+Frenchmen--that the vices which, in our country, create disgust
+and offence in grave society, and laughter and levity in the more
+careless, seldom produce either the one or the other in France.
+The topic is alluded to with neither a frown nor a smile; it is
+treated, in general, as a matter of course, either too natural to
+deserve censure, or too common to excite ridicule. It is seldom
+peculiarly alluded to, for the general conversation of "Good
+Society" is decorous; but to denounce it would be unmannered. The
+result is an extent of illegitimacy enough to corrupt the whole
+rising population. By the registers of 1848, of 30,000 children born
+in Paris in that year, there were 10,000 illegitimate, of which but
+1700 were acknowledged by their parents!
+
+The theatrical profession forms an important element in the
+population. The actors and actresses amount to about 5000. In
+England they are probably not as many hundreds. And though the
+French population is 35,000,000, while Great Britain has little
+more than twenty, yet the disproportion is enormous, and forms a
+characteristic difference of the two countries. The persons occupied
+in the "working" of the theatrical system amount perhaps to 10,000,
+and the families dependent on the whole form a very large and very
+influential class among the general orders of society.
+
+But if the Treasury assists in their general support, it compels
+them to pay eight per cent of their receipts as a contribution to
+the hospitals. This sum averages annually a million of francs, or
+£40,000 sterling.
+
+In England we might learn something from the theatrical regulations
+of France. The trampling of our crowds at the doors of theatres, the
+occasional losses of life and limb, and the general inconvenience
+and confusion of the entrance on crowded nights, might be avoided by
+the were adoption of French _order_.
+
+But why should not higher objects be held in view? The drama is a
+public _necessity_; the people will have it, whether good or bad.
+Why should not Government offer prizes to the best drama, tragic or
+comic? Why should the most distinguished work of poetic genius find
+no encouragement from the Government of a nation boasting of its
+love of letters? Why shall that encouragement be left to the caprice
+of managers, to the finances of struggling establishments, or to the
+tastes of theatres, forced by their poverty to pander to the rabble.
+Why should not the mischievous performances of those theatres be put
+down, and dramas, founded on the higher principles of our nature,
+be the instruments of putting them down? Why should not heroism,
+honour, and patriotism, be taught on the national stage, as well as
+the triumphs of the highroad, laxity among the higher ranks, and
+vice among all? The drama has been charged with corruption. Is that
+corruption essential? It has been charged with being a _nucleus_
+of the loose principles, as its places of representation have been
+haunted by the loose characters, of society. But what are these
+but excrescences, generated by the carelessness of society, by
+the indolence of magistracy, and by the general misconception of
+the real purposes and possible power of the stage? That power is
+magnificent. It takes human nature in her most _impressible_ form,
+in the time of the glowing heart and the ready tear, of the senses
+animated by scenery, melted by music, and spelled by the living
+realities of representation. Why should not impressions be made
+in that hour which the man would carry with him through all the
+contingencies of life, and which would throw a light on every period
+of his being?
+
+The conditions of recompense to authors in France make _some_
+advance to justice. The author of a Drama is entitled to a profit on
+its performance in every theatre of France during his life, with a
+continuance for ten years after to his heirs. For a piece of three
+or five acts, the remuneration is _one twelfth part_ of the gross
+receipts, and for a piece in one act, one twenty-fourth. A similar
+compensation has been adopted in the English theatre, but seems to
+have become completely nugatory, from the managers' purchasing the
+author's rights--the transaction here being made a private one, and
+the remuneration being at the mercy of the manager. But in France
+it is a public matter, an affair of law, and looked to by an agent
+in Paris, who registers the performance of the piece at all the
+theatres in the city, and in the provinces.
+
+Still, this is injustice. Why should the labour of the intellect
+be less permanent than the labour of the hands? Why should not the
+author be entitled to make his full demand instead of this pittance?
+If his play is worth acting, why is it not worth paying for?--and
+why should he be prohibited from having the fruit of his brain as an
+inheritance to his family, as well as the fruit of any other toll?
+
+If, instead of being a man of genius, delighting and elevating the
+mind of a nation, he were a blacksmith, he might leave his tools and
+his trade to his children without any limit; or if, with the produce
+of his play, he purchased a cow, or a cabin, no man could lay a
+claim upon either. But he must be taxed for being a man of talent;
+and men of no talent must be entitled, by an absurd law and a
+palpable injustice, to tear the fruit of his intellectual supremacy
+from his children after ten short years of possession.
+
+No man leaves Paris without regret, and without a wish for the
+liberty and peace of its people.
+
+
+
+
+MR RUSKIN'S WORKS.
+
+     _Modern Painters_, vol. i. Second edition.----_Modern Painters_,
+     vol. ii.----_The Seven Lamps of Architecture._----_The Stones of
+     Venice._----_Notes on the Construction of Sheepfolds._ By JOHN
+     RUSKIN, M.A.
+
+
+On the publication of the first volume of Mr Ruskin's work on Modern
+Painters, a notice appeared of it in this Magazine. Since that
+time a second volume has been published of the same work, with two
+other works on architecture. It is the second volume of his _Modern
+Painters_ which will at present chiefly engage our attention. His
+architectural works can only receive a slight and casual notice; on
+some future occasion they may tempt us into a fuller examination.
+
+Although the second volume of the _Modern Painters_ will be the
+immediate subject of our review, we must permit ourselves to glance
+back upon the first, in order to connect together the topics treated
+by the two, and to prevent our paper from wearing quite the aspect
+of a metaphysical essay; for it is the nature of the sentiment of
+the beautiful, and its sources in the human mind, which is the main
+subject of this second volume. In the first, he had entered at once
+into the arena of criticism, elevating the modern artists, and one
+amongst them in particular, at the expense of the old masters, who,
+with some few exceptions, find themselves very rudely handled.
+
+As we have already intimated, we do not hold Mr Ruskin to be a
+safe guide in matters of art, and the present volume demonstrates
+that he is no safe guide in matters of philosophy. He is a man of
+undoubted power and vigour of mind; he feels strongly, and he thinks
+independently: but he is hasty and impetuous; can very rarely, on
+any subject, deliver a calm and temperate judgment; and, when he
+enters on the discussion of general principles, shows an utter
+inability to seize on, or to appreciate, the wide generalisations
+of philosophy. He is not, therefore, one of those men who can ever
+become an authority to be appealed to by the less instructed in any
+of the fine arts, or on any topic whatever; and this we say with the
+utmost confidence, because, although we may be unable in many cases
+to dispute his judgment--as where he speaks of paintings we have not
+seen, or technicalities of art we do not affect to understand--yet
+he so frequently stands forth on the broad arena where general and
+familiar principles are discussed, that it is utterly impossible _to
+be mistaken in the man_. On all these occasions he displays a very
+marked and rather peculiar combination of power and weakness--of
+power, the result of natural strength of mind; of weakness, the
+inevitable consequence of a passionate haste, and an overweening
+confidence. When we hear a person of this intellectual character
+throwing all but unmitigated abuse upon works which men have long
+consented to admire, and lavishing upon some other works encomiums
+which no conceivable perfection of human art could justify, it is
+utterly impossible to attach any weight to his opinion, on the
+ground that he has made an especial study of any one branch of art.
+Such a man we cannot trust out of our sight a moment; we cannot give
+him one inch of ground more than his reasoning covers, or our own
+experience would grant to him.
+
+We shall not here revive the controversy on the comparative merits
+of the ancient and modern landscape-painters, nor on the later
+productions of Mr Turner, whether they are the eccentricities of
+genius or its fullest development; we have said enough on these
+subjects before. It is Mr Ruskin's book, and not the pictures of
+Claude or Turner, that we have to criticise; it is his style, and
+his manner of thinking, that we have to pass judgment on.
+
+In all Mr Ruskin's works, and in almost every page of them, whether
+on painting, or architecture, or philosophy, or ecclesiastical
+controversy, two characteristics invariably prevail: an extreme
+dogmatism, and a passion for singularity. Every man who thinks
+earnestly would convert all the world to his own opinions; but while
+Mr Ruskin would convert all the world to his own tastes as well as
+opinions, he manifests the greatest repugnance to think for a moment
+like any one else. He has a mortal aversion to mingle with a crowd.
+It is quite enough for an opinion to be commonplace to insure it his
+contempt: if it has passed out of fashion, he may revive it; but
+to think with the existing multitude would be impossible. Yet that
+multitude are to think with him. He is as bent on unity in matters
+of taste as others are on unity in matters of religion; and he sets
+the example by diverging, wherever he can, from the tastes of others.
+
+Between these two characteristics there is no real contradiction;
+or rather the contradiction is quite familiar. The man who most
+affects singularity is generally the most dogmatic: he is the very
+man who expresses most surprise that others should differ from him.
+No one is so impatient of contradiction as he who is perpetually
+contradicting others; and on the gravest matters of religion those
+are often found to be most zealous for unity of belief who have
+some pet heresy of their own, for which they are battling all their
+lives. The same overweening confidence lies, in fact, at the basis
+of both these characteristics. In Mr Ruskin they are both seen in
+great force. No matter what the subject he discusses,--taste or
+ecclesiastical government--we always find the same combination of
+singularity, with a dogmatism approaching to intolerance. Thus, the
+Ionic pillar is universally admired. Mr Ruskin finds that the fluted
+shaft gives an appearance of weakness. No one ever felt this, so
+long as the fluted column is manifestly of sufficient diameter to
+sustain the weight imposed on it. But this objection of apparent
+insecurity has been very commonly made to the spiral or twisted
+column. Here, therefore, Mr Ruskin abruptly dismisses the objection.
+He was at liberty to defend the spiral column: we should say here,
+also, that if the weight imposed was evidently not too great for
+even a spiral column to support, _this_ objection has no place;
+but why cast the same objection, (which perhaps in all cases was
+a mere after-thought) against the Ionic shaft, when it had never
+been felt at all? It has been a general remark, that, amongst other
+results of the railway, it has given a new field to the architect,
+as well as to the engineer. Therefore Mr Ruskin resolves that our
+railroad stations ought to have no architecture at all. Of course,
+if he limited his objections to inappropriate ornament, he would
+be agreeing with all the world: he decides there should be no
+architecture whatever; merely buildings more or less spacious,
+to protect men and goods from the weather. He has never been so
+unfortunate, we suppose, as to come an hour too soon, or the unlucky
+five minutes too late, to a railway station, or he would have been
+glad enough to find himself in something better than the large shed
+he proposes. On the grave subject of ecclesiastical government he
+has stepped forward into controversy; and here he shows both his
+usual propensities in _high relief_. He has some quite peculiar
+projects of his own; the appointment of some hundreds of bishops--we
+know not what--and a Church discipline to be carried out by trial
+by jury. Desirable or not, they are manifestly as impracticable as
+the revival of chivalry. But let that pass. Let every man think
+and propose his best. But his dogmatism amounts to a disease,
+when, turning from his own novelties, he can speak in the flippant
+intolerant manner that he does of the national and now time-honoured
+Church of Scotland.
+
+It will be worth while to make, in passing, a single quotation
+from this pamphlet, _Notes on the Construction of Sheepfolds_. He
+tells us, in one place, that in the New Testament the ministers
+of the Church "are called, and call themselves, with absolute
+indifference, Deacons, Bishops, Elders, Evangelists, according to
+what they are doing at the time of speaking." With such a writer
+one might, at all events, have hoped to live in peace. But no. He
+discovers, nevertheless, that Episcopacy is the Scriptural form of
+Church government; and, having satisfied his own mind of this, no
+opposition or diversity of opinion is for a moment to be tolerated.
+
+     "But how," he says, "unite the two great sects of paralysed
+     Protestants? By keeping simply to Scripture. _The members of
+     the Scottish Church have not a shadow of excuse for refusing
+     Episcopacy_: it has indeed been abused among them, grievously
+     abused; but it is in the Bible, and that is all they have a
+     right to ask.
+
+     "_They have also no shadow of excuse for refusing to employ
+     a written form of prayer._ It may not be to their taste--it
+     may not be the way in which they like to pray; but it is no
+     question, at present, of likes or dislikes, but of duties; and
+     the acceptance of such a form on their part would go half way
+     to reconcile them with their brethren. Let them allege such
+     objections as they can reasonably advance against the English
+     form, and let these be carefully and humbly weighed by the
+     pastors of both Churches: some of them ought to be at once
+     forestalled. For the English Church, on the other hand, _must_,"
+     &c.
+
+Into Mr Ruskin's own religious tenets, further than he has chosen to
+reveal them in his works, we have no wish to pry. But he must cease
+to be Mr Ruskin if they do not exhibit some salient peculiarity,
+coupled with a confidence, unusual even amongst zealots, that his
+peculiar views will speedily triumph. If he can be presumed to
+belong to any sect, it must be the last and smallest one amongst
+us--some sect as exclusive as German mysticism, with pretensions as
+great as those of the Church of Rome.
+
+One word on the style of Mr Ruskin: it will save the trouble of
+alluding to it on particular occasions. It is very unequal. In
+both his architectural works he writes generally with great ease,
+spirit, and clearness. There is a racy vigour in the page. But when
+he would be very eloquent, as he is disposed to be in the _Modern
+Painters_, he becomes very verbose, tedious, obscure, extravagant.
+There is no discipline in his style, no moderation, no repose. Those
+qualities which he has known how to praise in art he has not aimed
+at in his own writing. A rank luxuriance of a semi-poetical diction
+lies about, perfectly unrestrained; metaphorical language comes
+before us in every species of disorder; and hyperbolical expressions
+are used till they become commonplace. Verbal criticism, he would
+probably look upon a very puerile business: he need fear nothing
+of the kind from us; we should as soon think of criticising or
+pruning a jungle. To add to the confusion, he appears at times to
+have proposed to himself the imitation of some of our older writers:
+pages are written in the rhythm of Jeremy Taylor; sometimes it is
+the venerable Hooker who seems to be his type; and he has even
+succeeded in combining whatever is most tedious and prolix in both
+these great writers. If the reader wishes a specimen of this sort of
+_modern antique_, he may turn to the fifteenth chapter of the second
+volume of the _Modern Painters_.
+
+Coupled with this matter of style, and almost inseparable from it,
+is the violence of his manner on subjects which cannot possibly
+justify so vehement a zeal. We like a generous enthusiasm on any
+art--we delight in it; but who can travel in sympathy with a writer
+who exhausts on so much paint and canvass every term of rapture
+that the Alps themselves could have called forth? One need not be
+a utilitarian philosopher--or what Mr Ruskin describes as such--to
+smile at the lofty position on which he puts the landscape-painter,
+and the egregious and impossible demands he makes upon the art
+itself. And the condemnation and opprobrium with which he overwhelms
+the luckless artist who has offended him is quite as violent. The
+bough of a tree, "in the left hand upper corner" of a landscape of
+Poussin's, calls forth this terrible denunciation:--
+
+     "This latter is a representation of an ornamental group of
+     elephants' tusks, with feathers tied to the ends of them.
+     Not the wildest imagination could ever conjure up in it the
+     remotest resemblance to the bough of a tree. It might be the
+     claws of a witch--the talons of an eagle--the horns of a fiend;
+     but it is a full assemblage of every conceivable falsehood
+     which can be told respecting foliage--a piece of work so
+     barbarous in every way _that one glance at it ought to prove
+     the complete charlatanism and trickery of the whole system of
+     the old landscape-painters_.... I will say here at once, that
+     such drawing as this is as ugly as it is childish, and as
+     painful as it is false; and that the man who could tolerate,
+     much more, who could deliberately set down such a thing on his
+     canvass, _had neither eye nor feeling for one single attribute
+     or excellence of God's works_. He might have drawn _the other
+     stem_ in excusable ignorance, or under some false impression of
+     being able to improve upon nature, but this is conclusive and
+     unpardonable."--(P. 382.)
+
+The great redeeming quality of Mr Ruskin--and we wish to give it
+conspicuous and honourable mention--is his love of nature. Here
+lies the charm of his works; to this may be traced whatever virtue
+is in them, or whatever utility they may possess. They will send
+the painter more than ever to the study of nature, and perhaps they
+will have a still more beneficial effect on the art, by sending the
+critic of painting to the same school. It would be almost an insult
+to the landscape-painter to suppose that he needed this lesson; the
+very love of his art must lead him perpetually, one would think,
+to his great and delightful study amongst the fields, under the
+open skies, before the rivers and the hills. But the critic of the
+picture-gallery is often one who goes from picture to picture, and
+very little from nature to the painting. Consequently, where an
+artist succeeds in imitating some effect in nature which had not
+been before represented on the canvass, such a critic is more likely
+to be displeased than gratified; and the artist, having to paint
+for a conventional taste, is in danger of sacrificing to it his own
+higher aspirations. Now it is most true that no man should pretend
+to be a critic upon pictures unless he understands the art itself
+of painting; he ought, we suspect, to have handled the pencil or
+the brush himself; at all events, he ought in some way to have been
+initiated into the mysteries of the pallet and the easel. Otherwise,
+not knowing the difficulties to be overcome, nor the means at hand
+for encountering them, he cannot possibly estimate the degree of
+merit due to the artist for the production of this or that effect.
+He may be loud in applause where nothing has been displayed but
+the old traditions of the art. But still this is only one-half the
+knowledge he ought to possess. He ought to have studied nature,
+and to have loved the study, or he can never estimate, and never
+feel, that _truth_ of effect which is the great aim of the artist.
+Mr Ruskin's works will help to shame out of the field all such
+half-informed and conventional criticism, the mere connoisseurship
+of the picture gallery. On the other hand, they will train men who
+have always been delighted spectators of nature to be also attentive
+observers. Our critics will learn how to admire, and mere admirers
+will learn how to criticise. Thus a public will be educated; and
+here, if anywhere, we may confidently assert that the art will
+prosper in proportion as there is an intelligent public to reward it.
+
+We like that bold enterprise of Mr Ruskin's which distinguishes the
+first volume, that daring enumeration of the great palpable facts
+of nature--the sky, the sea, the earth, the foliage--which the
+painter has to represent. His descriptions are often made indistinct
+by a multitude of words; but there is light in the haze--there is
+a genuine love of nature felt through them. This is almost the
+only point of sympathy we feel with Mr Ruskin; it is the only hold
+his volumes have had over us whilst perusing them; we may be,
+therefore, excused if we present here to our readers a specimen or
+two of his happier descriptions of nature. We will give them _the
+Cloud_ and _the Torrent_. They will confess that, after reading Mr
+Ruskin's description of the clouds, their first feeling will be an
+irresistible impulse to throw open the window, and look upon them
+again as they roll through the sky. The torrent may not be so near
+at hand, to make renewed acquaintance with. We must premise that he
+has been enforcing his favourite precept, the minute, and faithful,
+and perpetual study of nature. He very justly scouts the absurd
+idea that trees and rocks and clouds are, under any circumstances,
+to be _generalised_--so that a tree is not to stand for an oak or a
+poplar, a birch or an elm, but for a _general tree_. If a tree is
+at so great a distance that you cannot distinguish what it is, as
+you cannot paint more than you see, you must paint it indistinctly.
+But to make a purposed indistinctness where the kind of tree would
+be very plainly seen is a manifest absurdity. So, too, the forms
+of clouds should be studied, and as much as possible taken from
+nature, and not certain _general clouds_ substituted at the artist's
+pleasure.
+
+     "But it is not the outline only which is thus systematically
+     false. The drawing of the solid form is worse still; for it
+     is to be remembered that, although clouds of course arrange
+     themselves more or less into broad masses, with a light side
+     and a dark side, both their light and shade are invariably
+     composed of a series of divided masses, each of which has in
+     its outline as much variety and character as the great outline
+     of the cloud; presenting, therefore, a thousand times repeated,
+     all that I have described as the general form. Nor are these
+     multitudinous divisions a truth of slight importance in the
+     character of sky, for they are dependent on, and illustrative
+     of, a quality which is usually in a great degree overlooked--the
+     enormous retiring spaces of solid clouds. Between the illumined
+     edge of a heaped cloud and that part of its body which turns
+     into shadow, there will generally be a clear distance of several
+     miles--more or less, of course, according to the general size
+     of the cloud; but in such large masses as Poussin and others of
+     the old masters, which occupy the fourth or fifth of the visible
+     sky, the clear illumined breadth of vapour, from the edge to
+     the shadow, involves at least a distance of five or six miles.
+     We are little apt, in watching the changes of a mountainous
+     range of cloud, to reflect that the masses of vapour which
+     compose it are linger and higher than any mountain-range of the
+     earth; and the distances between mass and mass are not yards of
+     air, traversed in an instant by the flying form, but valleys
+     of changing atmosphere leagues over; that the slow motion of
+     ascending curves, which we can scarcely trace, is a boiling
+     energy of exulting vapour rushing into the heaven a thousand
+     feet in a minute; and that the topling angle, whose sharp edge
+     almost escapes notice in the multitudinous forms around it, is
+     a nodding precipice of storms, three thousand feet from base to
+     summit. It is not until we have actually compared the forms of
+     the sky with the hill-ranges of the earth, and seen the soaring
+     alp overtopped and buried in one surge of the sky, that we begin
+     to conceive or appreciate the colossal scale of the phenomena of
+     the latter. But of this there can be no doubt in the mind of any
+     one accustomed to trace the forms of cloud among hill-ranges--as
+     it is there a demonstrable and evident fact--that the space of
+     vapour visibly extended over an ordinarily clouded sky is not
+     less, from the point nearest to the observer to the horizon,
+     than twenty leagues; that the size of every mass of separate
+     form, if it be at all largely divided, is to be expressed in
+     terms of _miles_; and that every boiling heap of illuminated
+     mist in the nearer sky is an enormous mountain, fifteen or
+     twenty thousand feet in height, six or seven miles over in
+     illuminated surface, furrowed by a thousand colossal ravines,
+     torn by local tempests into peaks and promontories, and changing
+     its features with the majestic velocity of a volcano."--(Vol. i.
+     p. 228.)
+
+The forms of clouds, it seems, are worth studying: after reading
+this, no landscape-painter will be disposed, with hasty slight
+invention, to sketch in these "_mountains_" of the sky. Here is his
+description, or part of it, first of falling, then of running water.
+With the incidental criticism upon painters we are not at present
+concerned:--
+
+     "A little crumbling white or lightly-rubbed paper will soon give
+     the effect of indiscriminate foam; but nature gives more than
+     foam--she shows beneath it, and through it, a peculiar character
+     of exquisitely studied form, bestowed on every wave and line of
+     fall; and it is this variety of definite character which Turner
+     always aims at, rejecting as much as possible everything that
+     conceals or overwhelms it. Thus, in the Upper Fall of the Tees,
+     though the whole basin of the fall is blue, and dim with the
+     rising vapour, yet the attention of the spectator is chiefly
+     directed to the concentric zones and delicate curves of the
+     falling water itself; and it is impossible to express with what
+     exquisite accuracy these are given. They are the characteristic
+     of a powerful stream descending without impediment or break, but
+     from a narrow channel, so as to expand as it falls. They are the
+     constant form which such a stream assumes as it descends; and
+     yet I think it would be difficult to point to another instance
+     of their being rendered in art. You will find nothing in the
+     waterfalls, even of our best painters, but springing lines of
+     parabolic descent, and splashing and shapeless foam; and, in
+     consequence, though they may make you understand the swiftness
+     of the water, they never let you feel the weight of it: the
+     stream, in their hands, looks _active_, not _supine_, as if
+     it leaped, not as if it fell. Now, water will leap a little
+     way--it will leap down a weir or over a stone--but it _tumbles_
+     over a high fall like this; and it is when we have lost the
+     parabolic line, and arrived at the catenary--when we have lost
+     the spring of the fall, and arrived at the _plunge_ of it--that
+     we begin really to feel its weight and wildness. Where water
+     takes its first leap from the top, it is cool and collected,
+     and uninteresting and mathematical; but it is when it finds
+     that it has got into a scrape, and has farther to go than it
+     thought for, that its character comes out; it is then that it
+     begins to writhe and twist, and sweep out, zone after zone, in
+     wilder stretching as it falls, and to send down the rocket-like,
+     lance-pointed, whizzing shafts at its sides sounding for the
+     bottom. And it is this prostration, the hopeless abandonment
+     of its ponderous power to the air, which is always peculiarly
+     expressed by Turner....
+
+     "When water, not in very great body, runs in a rocky bed much
+     interrupted by hollows, so that it can rest every now and then
+     in a pool as it goes long, it does not acquire a continuous
+     velocity of motion. It pauses after every leap, and curdles
+     about, and rests a little, and then goes on again; and if, in
+     this comparatively tranquil and rational state of mind, it meets
+     with any obstacle, as a rock or stone, it parts on each side of
+     it with a little bubbling foam, and goes round: if it comes to a
+     step in its bed, it leaps it lightly, and then, after a little
+     splashing at the bottom, stops again to take breath. But if its
+     bed be on a continuous slope, not much interrupted by hollows,
+     so that it cannot rest--or if its own mass be so increased by
+     flood that its usual resting-places are not sufficient for it,
+     but that it is perpetually pushed out of them by the following
+     current before it has had time to tranquillise itself--it of
+     course gains velocity with every yard that it runs; the impetus
+     got at one leap is carried to the credit of the next, until the
+     whole stream becomes one mass of unchecked accelerating motion.
+     Now, when water in this state comes to an obstacle, it does not
+     part at it, but clears it like a racehorse; and when it comes
+     to a hollow, it does not fill it up, and run out leisurely at
+     the other side, but it rushes down into it, and comes up again
+     on the other side, as a ship into the hollow of the sea. Hence
+     the whole appearance of the bed of the stream is changed, and
+     all the lines of the water altered in their nature. The quiet
+     stream is a succession of leaps and pools; the leaps are light
+     and springy and parabolic, and make a great deal of splashing
+     when they tumble into the pool; then we have a space of quiet
+     curdling water, and another similar leap below. But the stream,
+     when it has gained an impetus, takes the shape of its bed,
+     never stops, is equally deep and equally swift everywhere, goes
+     down into every hollow, not with a leap, but with a swing--not
+     foaming nor splashing, but in the bending line of a strong
+     sea-wave, and comes up again on the other side, over rock and
+     ridge, with the ease of a bounding leopard. If it meet a rock
+     three or four feet above the level of its bed, it will neither
+     part nor foam, nor express any concern about the matter, but
+     clear it in a smooth dome of water without apparent exertion,
+     coming down again as smoothly on the other side, the whole
+     surface of the surge being drawn into parallel lines by its
+     extreme velocity, but foamless, except in places where the
+     form of the bed opposes itself at some direct angle to such a
+     line of fall, and causes a breaker; so that the whole river
+     has the appearance of a deep and raging sea, with this only
+     difference, that the torrent waves always break backwards, and
+     sea-waves forwards. Thus, then, in the water which has gained
+     an impetus, we have the most exquisite arrangement of curved
+     lines, perpetually changing from convex to concave, following
+     every swell and hollow of the bed with their modulating grace,
+     and all in unison of motion, presenting perhaps the most
+     beautiful series of inorganic forms which nature can possibly
+     produce."--(Vol. i. p. 363.)
+
+It is the object of Mr Ruskin, in his first volume of _Modern
+Painters_, to show what the artist has to do in his imitation of
+nature. We have no material controversy to raise with him on this
+subject; but we cannot help expressing our surprise that he should
+have thought it necessary to combat, with so much energy, so very
+primitive a notion that the imitation of the artist partakes of
+the nature of a _deception_, and that the highest excellence is
+obtained when the representation of any object is taken for the
+object itself. We thought this matter had been long ago settled. In
+a page or two of Quatremère de Quincy's treatise on _Imitation in
+the Fine Arts_, the reader, if he has still to seek on this subject,
+will find it very briefly and lucidly treated. The aim of the artist
+is not to produce such a representation as shall be taken, even
+for a moment, for a real object. His aim is, by imitating certain
+qualities or attributes of the object, to reproduce for us those
+pleasing or elevating impressions which it is the nature of such
+qualities or attributes to excite. We have stated very briefly
+the accepted doctrine on this subject--so generally accepted and
+understood that Mr Ruskin was under no necessity to avoid the
+use of the word imitation, as he appears to have done, under the
+apprehension that it was incurably infected with this notion of an
+attempted deception. Hardly any reader of his book, even without a
+word of explanation, would have attached any other meaning to it
+than what he himself expresses by representation of certain "truths"
+of nature.
+
+With respect to the imitations of the landscape-painter, the
+notion of a deception cannot occur. His trees and rivers cannot be
+mistaken, for an instant, for real trees and rivers, and certainly
+not while they stand there in the gilt frame, and the gilt frame
+itself against the papered wall. His only chance of deception is to
+get rid of the frame, convert his picture into a transparency, and
+place it in the space which a window should occupy. In almost all
+cases, deception is obtained, not by painting well, but by those
+artifices which disguise that what we see _is_ a painting. At the
+same time, we are not satisfied with an expression which several
+writers, we remark, have lately used, and which Mr Ruskin very
+explicitly adopts. The imitations of the landscape-painter are not
+a "language" which he uses; they are not mere "signs," analogous
+to those which the poet or the orator employs. There is no analogy
+between them. Let us analyse our impressions as we stand before the
+artist's landscape, not thinking of the artist, or his dexterity,
+but simply absorbed in the pleasure which he procures us--we do not
+find ourselves reverting, in imagination, to _other_ trees or other
+rivers than those he has depicted. We certainly do not believe them
+to be real trees, but neither are they mere signs, or a language to
+recall such objects; but _what there is of tree there_ we enjoy.
+There is the coolness and the quiet of the shaded avenue, and we
+feel them; there is the sunlight on that bank, and we feel its
+cheerfulness; we feel the serenity of his river. He has brought
+the spirit of the trees around us; the imagination rests in the
+picture. In other departments of art the effect is the same. If we
+stand before a head of Rembrandt or Vandyke, we do not think that
+it lives; but neither do we think of some other head, of which that
+is the type. But there is majesty, there is thought, there is calm
+repose, there is some phase of humanity expressed before us, and we
+are occupied with so much of human life, or human character, as is
+then and there given us.
+
+Imitate as many qualities of the real object as you please, but
+always the highest, never sacrificing a truth of the mind, or the
+heart, for one only of the sense. Truth, as Mr Ruskin most justly
+says--truth always. When it is said that truth should not be
+always expressed, the maxim, if properly understood, resolves into
+this--that the higher truth is not to be sacrificed to the lower. In
+a landscape, the gradation of light and shade is a more important
+truth than the exact brilliancy (supposing it to be attainable,)
+of any individual object. The painter must calculate what means he
+has at his disposal for representing this gradation of light, and
+he must pitch his tone accordingly. Say he pitches it far below
+reality, he is still in search of truth--of contrast and degree.
+
+Sometimes it may happen that, by rendering one detail faithfully,
+an artist may give a false impression, simply because he cannot
+render other details or facts by which it is accompanied in nature.
+Here, too, he would only sacrifice truth _in the cause of truth_.
+The admirers of Constable will perhaps dispute the aptness of our
+illustration. Nevertheless his works appear to us to afford a
+curious example of a scrupulous accuracy or detail producing a false
+impression. Constable, looking at foliage under the sunlight, and
+noting that the leaf, especially after a shower, will reflect so
+much light that the tree will seem more white than green, determined
+to paint all the white he saw. Constable could paint white leaves.
+So far so well. But then these leaves in nature are almost always in
+motion: they are white at one moment and green the next. We never
+have the impression of a white leaf; for it is seen playing with
+the light--its mirror, for one instant, and glancing from it the
+next. Constable could not paint motion. He could not imitate this
+shower of light in the living tree. He must leave his white paint
+where he has once put it. Other artists before him had seen the same
+light, but, knowing that they could not bring the breeze into their
+canvass, they wisely concluded that less white paint than Constable
+uses would produce a more truthful impression.
+
+But we must no longer be detained from the more immediate task
+before us. We must now follow Mr Ruskin to his second volume of
+_Modern Painters_, where he explains his theory of the beautiful;
+and although this will not be to readers in general the most
+attractive portion of his writings, and we ourselves have to
+practise some sort of self-denial in fixing our attention upon
+it, yet manifestly it is here that we must look for the basis or
+fundamental principles of all his criticisms in art. The order in
+which his works have been published was apparently deranged by a
+generous zeal, which could brook no delay, to defend Mr Turner
+from the censures of the undiscerning public. If the natural or
+systematic order had been preserved, the materials of this second
+volume would have formed the first preliminary treatise, determining
+those broad principles of taste, or that philosophical theory of
+the beautiful, on which the whole of the subsequent works were to
+be modelled. Perhaps this broken and reversed order of publication
+has not been unfortunate for the success of the author--perhaps it
+was dimly foreseen to be not altogether impolitic; for the popular
+ear was gained by the bold and enthusiastic defence of a great
+painter; and the ear of the public, once caught, may be detained
+by matter which, in the first instance, would have appealed to it
+in vain. Whether the effect of chance or design, we may certainly
+congratulate Mr Ruskin on the fortunate succession, and the
+fortunate rapidity with which his publications have struck on the
+public ear. The popular feeling, won by the zeal and intrepidity of
+the first volume of _Modern Painters_, was no doubt a little tried
+by the graver discussions of the second. It was soon, however, to be
+again caught, and pleased by a bold and agreeable miscellany under
+the magical name of "The Seven Lamps;" and these Seven Lamps could
+hardly fail to throw some portion of their pleasant and bewildering
+light over a certain rudimentary treatise upon building, which was
+to appear under the title of "The Stones of Venice."
+
+We cannot, however, congratulate Mr Ruskin on the manner in which
+he has acquitted himself in this arena of philosophical inquiry,
+nor on the sort of theory of the Beautiful which he has contrived
+to construct. The least metaphysical of our readers is aware that
+there is a controversy of long standing upon this subject, between
+two different schools of philosophy. With the one the beautiful
+is described as a great "idea" of the reason, or an intellectual
+intuition, or a simple intuitive perception; different expressions
+are made use of, but all imply that it is a great primary feeling,
+or sentiment, or idea of the human mind, and as incapable of
+further analysis as the idea of space, or the simplest of our
+sensations. The rival school of theorists maintain, on the contrary,
+that no sentiment yields more readily to analysis; and that the
+beautiful, except in those rare cases where the whole charm lies
+in one sensation, as in that of colour, is a complex sentiment.
+They describe it as a pleasure resulting from the presence of the
+visible object, but of which the visible object is only in part the
+immediate cause. Of a great portion of the pleasure it is merely
+the vehicle; and they say that blended reminiscences, gathered from
+every sense, and every human affection, from the softness of touch
+of an infant's finger to the highest contemplations of a devotional
+spirit, have contributed, in their turn, to this delightful
+sentiment.
+
+Mr Ruskin was not bound to belong to either of these schools of
+philosophy; he was at liberty to construct an eclectic system
+of his own;--and he has done so. We shall take the precaution,
+in so delicate a matter, of quoting Mr Ruskin's own words for
+the exposition of his own theory. Meanwhile, as some clue to the
+reader, we may venture to say that he agrees with the first of
+these schools in adopting a primary intuitive sentiment of the
+beautiful; but then this primary intuition is only of a sensational
+or "animal" nature--a subordinate species of the beautiful, which
+is chiefly valuable as the necessary condition of the higher and
+truly beautiful; and this last he agrees with the opposite school
+in regarding as a derived sentiment--derived by contemplating the
+objects of external nature as types of the Divine attributes. This
+is a brief summary of the theory; for a fuller exposition we shall
+have recourse to his own words.
+
+The term _Æsthetic_, which has been applied to this branch of
+philosophy, Mr Ruskin discards; he offers as a substitute _Theoria_,
+or _The Theoretic Faculty_, the meaning of which he thus explains:--
+
+     "I proceed, therefore, first to examine the nature of what
+     I have called the theoretic faculty, and to justify my
+     substitution of the term 'Theoretic' for 'Æsthetic,' which is
+     the one commonly employed with reference to it.
+
+     "Now the term 'æsthesis' properly signifies mere sensual
+     perception of the outward qualities and necessary effects of
+     bodies; in which sense only, if we would arrive at any accurate
+     conclusions on this difficult subject, it should always be used.
+     But I wholly deny that the impressions of beauty _are in any
+     way sensual_;--they are neither sensual nor intellectual, _but
+     moral_; and for the faculty receiving them, whose difference
+     from mere perception I shall immediately endeavour to explain,
+     no terms can be more accurate or convenient than that employed
+     by the Greeks, 'Theoretic,' which I pray permission, therefore,
+     always to use, and to call the operation of the faculty itself,
+     Theoria."--(P. 11.)
+
+We are introduced to a new faculty of the human mind; let us see
+what new or especial sphere of operation is assigned to it. After
+some remarks on the superiority of the mere sensual pleasures of the
+eye and the ear, but particularly of the eye, to those derived from
+other organs of sense, he continues:--
+
+     "Herein, then, we find very sufficient ground for the higher
+     estimation of these delights: first, in their being eternal
+     and inexhaustible; and, secondly, in their being evidently
+     no meaner instrument of life, but an object of life. Now, in
+     whatever is an object of life, in whatever may be infinitely
+     and for itself desired, we may be sure there is something of
+     divine: for God will not make anything an object of life to his
+     creatures which does not point to, or partake of himself,"--[a
+     bold assertion.] "And so, though we were to regard the pleasures
+     of sight merely as the highest of sensual pleasures, and though
+     they were of rare occurrence--and, when occurring, isolated and
+     imperfect--there would still be supernatural character about
+     them, owing to their self-sufficiency. But when, instead of
+     being scattered, interrupted, or chance-distributed, they are
+     gathered together and so arranged to enhance each other, as by
+     chance they could not be, there is caused by them, not only a
+     feeling of strong affection towards the object in which they
+     exist, but a perception of purpose and adaptation of it to our
+     desires; a perception, therefore, of the immediate operation of
+     the Intelligence which so formed us and so feeds us.
+
+     "Out of what perception arise Joy, Admiration, and Gratitude?
+
+     "Now, the mere animal consciousness of the pleasantness I call
+     Æsthesis; but the exulting, reverent, and grateful perception
+     of it I call Theoria. For this, and this only, is the full
+     comprehension and contemplation of the beautiful as a gift
+     of God; a gift not necessary to our being, but adding to and
+     elevating it, and twofold--first, of the desire; and, secondly,
+     of the thing desired."
+
+We find, then, that in the production of the full sentiment of the
+beautiful _two_ faculties are employed, or two distinct operations
+denoted. First, there is the "animal pleasantness which we call
+Æsthesis,"--which sometimes appears confounded with the mere
+pleasures of sense, but which the whole current of his speculations
+obliges us to conclude is some separate intuition of a sensational
+character; and, secondly, there is "the exulting, reverent, and
+grateful perception of it, which we call Theoria," which alone is
+the truly beautiful, and which it is the function of the Theoretic
+Faculty to reveal to us. But this new Theoretic Faculty--what can
+it be but the old faculty of Human Reason, exercised upon the great
+subject of Divine beneficence?
+
+Mr Ruskin, as we shall see, discovers that external objects are
+beautiful because they are types of Divine attributes; but he
+admits, and is solicitous to impress upon our minds, that the
+"meaning" of these types is "learnt." When, in a subsequent part
+of his work, he feels himself pressed by the objection that many
+celebrated artists, who have shown a vivid appreciation and a great
+passion for the beautiful, have manifested no peculiar piety, have
+been rather deficient in spiritual-mindedness, he gives them over to
+that instinctive sense he has called Æsthesis, and says--"It will
+be remembered that I have, throughout the examination of typical
+beauty, asserted our instinctive sense of it; the moral _meaning_
+of it being only discoverable by reflection," (p. 127.) Now, there
+is no other conceivable manner in which the meaning of the type can
+be learnt than by the usual exercise of the human reason, detecting
+traces of the Divine power, and wisdom, and benevolence, in the
+external world, and then associating with the various objects of the
+external world the ideas we have thus acquired of the Divine wisdom
+and goodness. The rapid and habitual regard of certain facts or
+appearances in the visible world, as types of the attributes of God,
+_can_ be nothing else but one great instance (or class of instances)
+of that law of association of ideas on which the second school of
+philosophy we have alluded to so largely insist. And thus, whether
+Mr Ruskin chooses to acquiesce in it or not, his "Theoria" resolves
+itself into a portion, or fragment, of that theory of association
+of ideas, to which he declares, and perhaps believes, himself to be
+violently opposed.
+
+In a very curious manner, therefore, has Mr Ruskin selected his
+materials from the two rival schools of metaphysics. His _Æsthesis_
+is an intuitive perception, but of a mere sensual or animal
+nature--sometimes almost confounded with the mere pleasure of
+sense, at other times advanced into considerable importance, as
+where he has to explain the fact that men of very little piety have
+a very acute perception of beauty. His _Theoria_ is, and can be,
+nothing more than the results of human reason in its highest and
+noblest exercise, rapidly brought before the mind by a habitual
+association of ideas. For the lowest element of the beautiful he
+runs to the school of intuitions;--they will not thank him for
+the compliment;--for the higher to that analytic school, and that
+theory of association of ideas, to which throughout he is ostensibly
+opposed.
+
+This _Theoria_ divides itself into two parts. We shall quote Mr
+Ruskin's own words and take care to quote from them passages where
+he seems most solicitous to be accurate and explanatory:--
+
+     "The first thing, then, we have to do," he says, "is accurately
+     to discriminate and define those appearances from which we are
+     about to reason as belonging to beauty, properly so called, and
+     to clear the ground of all the confused ideas and erroneous
+     theories with which the misapprehension or metaphorical use of
+     the term has encumbered it.
+
+     "By the term Beauty, then, properly are signified two things:
+     first, that external quality of bodies, already so often spoken
+     of, and which, whether it occur in a stone, flower, beast,
+     or in man, is absolutely identical--which, as I have already
+     asserted, may be shown to be in some sort typical of the Divine
+     attributes, and which, therefore, I shall, for distinction's
+     sake, call Typical Beauty; and, secondarily, the appearance
+     of felicitous fulfilment of functions in living things, more
+     especially of the joyful and right exertion of perfect life in
+     man--and this kind of beauty I shall call Vital Beauty."--(P.
+     26.)
+
+The Vital Beauty, as well as the Typical, partakes essentially, as
+far as we can understand our author, of a religious character. On
+turning to that part of the volume where it is treated of at length,
+we find a universal sympathy and spirit of kindliness very properly
+insisted on, as one great element of the sentiment of beauty; but
+we are not permitted to dwell upon this element, or rest upon it
+a moment, without some reference to our relation to God. Even the
+animals themselves seem to be turned into types for us of our moral
+feelings or duties. We are expressly told that we cannot have this
+sympathy with life and enjoyment in other creatures, unless it takes
+the form of, or comes accompanied with, a sentiment of piety. In
+all cases where the beautiful is anything higher than a certain
+"animal pleasantness," we are to understand that it has a religious
+character. "In all cases," he says, summing up the functions of
+the Theoretic Faculty, "_it is something Divine_; either the
+approving voice of God, the glorious symbol of Him, the evidence
+of His kind presence, or the obedience to His will by Him induced
+and supported,"--(p. 126.) Now it is a delicate task, when a man
+errs by the exaggeration of a great truth or a noble sentiment, to
+combat his error; and yet as much mischief may ultimately arise from
+an error of this description as from any other. The thoughts and
+feelings which Mr Ruskin has described, form the noblest part of our
+sentiment of the beautiful, as they form the noblest phase of the
+human reason. But they are not the whole of it. The visible object,
+to adopt his phraseology, does become a type to the contemplative
+and pious mind of the attribute of God, and is thus exalted to our
+apprehension. But it is not beautiful solely or originally on this
+account. To assert this, is simply to falsify our human nature.
+
+Before, however, we enter into these _types_, or this typical
+beauty, it will be well to notice how Mr Ruskin deals with previous
+and opposing theories. It will be well also to remind our readers
+of the outline of that theory of association of ideas which is here
+presented to us in so very confused a manner. We shall then be
+better able to understand the very curious position our author has
+taken up in this domain of speculative philosophy.
+
+Mr Ruskin gives us the following summary of the "errors" which he
+thinks it necessary in the first place to clear from his path:--
+
+     "Those erring or inconsistent positions which I would at once
+     dismiss are, the first, that the beautiful is the true; the
+     second, that the beautiful is the useful; the third, that it is
+     dependent on custom; and the fourth, that it is dependent on the
+     association of ideas."
+
+The first of these theories, that the beautiful is the true, we
+leave entirely to the tender mercies of Mr Ruskin; we cannot gather
+from his refutation to what class of theorists he is alluding. The
+remaining three are, as we understand the matter, substantially one
+and the same theory. We believe that no one, in these days, would
+define beauty as solely resulting either from the apprehension
+of Utility, (that is, the adjustment of parts to a whole, or the
+application of the object to an ulterior purpose,) or to Familiarity
+and the affection which custom engenders; but they would regard both
+Utility and Familiarity as amongst the sources of those agreeable
+ideas or impressions, which, by the great law of association, became
+intimately connected with the visible object. We must listen,
+however, to Mr Ruskin's refutation of them:--
+
+     "That the beautiful is the _useful_ is an assertion evidently
+     based on that limited and false sense of the latter term which
+     I have already deprecated. As it is the most degrading and
+     dangerous supposition which can be advanced on the subject, so,
+     fortunately, it is the most palpably absurd. It is to confound
+     admiration with hunger, love with lust, and life with sensation;
+     it is to assert that the human creature has no ideas and no
+     feelings, except those ultimately referable to its brutal
+     appetites. It has not a single fact, nor appearance of fact, to
+     support it, and needs no combating--at least until its advocates
+     have obtained the consent of the majority of mankind that the
+     most beautiful productions of nature are seeds and roots; and of
+     art, spades and millstones.
+
+     "Somewhat more rational grounds appear for the assertion that
+     the sense of the beautiful arises from _familiarity_ with the
+     object, though even this could not long be maintained by a
+     thinking person. For all that can be alleged in defence of such
+     a supposition is, that familiarity deprives some objects which
+     at first appeared ugly of much of their repulsiveness; whence
+     it is as rational to conclude that familiarity is the cause of
+     beauty, as it would be to argue that, because it is possible to
+     acquire a taste for olives, therefore custom is the cause of
+     lusciousness in grapes....
+
+     "I pass to the last and most weighty theory, that the
+     agreeableness in objects which we call beauty is the result of
+     the association with them of agreeable or interesting ideas.
+
+     "Frequent has been the support and wide the acceptance of
+     this supposition, and yet I suppose that no two consecutive
+     sentences were ever written in defence of it, without involving
+     either a contradiction or a confusion of terms. Thus Alison,
+     'There are scenes undoubtedly more beautiful than Runnymede,
+     yet, to those who recollect the great event that passed
+     there, there is no scene perhaps which so strongly seizes on
+     the imagination,'--where we are wonder-struck at the bold
+     obtuseness which would prove the power of imagination by its
+     overcoming that very other power (of inherent beauty) whose
+     existence the arguer desires; for the only logical conclusion
+     which can possibly be drawn from the above sentence is, that
+     imagination is _not_ the source of beauty--for, although no
+     scene seizes so strongly on the imagination, yet there are
+     scenes 'more beautiful than Runnymede.' And though instances
+     of self-contradiction as laconic and complete as this are
+     rare, yet, if the arguments on the subject be fairly sifted
+     from the mass of confused language with which they are always
+     encumbered, they will be found invariably to fall into one of
+     these two forms: either association gives pleasure, and beauty
+     gives pleasure, therefore association is beauty; or the power of
+     association is stronger than the power of beauty, therefore the
+     power of association _is_ the power of beauty."
+
+Now this last sentence is sheer nonsense, and only proves that the
+author had never given himself the trouble to understand the theory
+he so flippantly discards. No one ever said that "association gives
+pleasure;" but very many, and Mr Ruskin amongst the rest, have said
+that associated thought adds its pleasure to an object pleasing in
+itself, and thus increases the complex sentiment of beauty. That it
+is a complex sentiment in all its higher forms, Mr Ruskin himself
+will tell us. As to the manner in which he deals with Alison, it
+is in the worst possible spirit of controversy. Alison was an
+elegant, but not a very precise writer; it was the easiest thing
+in the world to select an unfortunate illustration, and to convict
+_that_ of absurdity. Yet he might with equal ease have selected many
+other illustrations from Alison, which would have done justice to
+the theory he expounds. A hundred such will immediately occur to
+the reader. If, instead of a historical recollection of this kind,
+which could hardly make the stream itself of Runnymede look more
+beautiful, Alison had confined himself to those impressions which
+the generality of mankind receive from river scenery, he would have
+had no difficulty in showing (as we believe he has elsewhere done)
+how, in this case, ideas gathered from different sources flow into
+one harmonious and apparently simple feeling. That sentiment of
+beauty which arises as we look upon a river will be acknowledged by
+most persons to be composed of many associated thoughts, combining
+with the object before them. Its form and colour, its bright surface
+and its green banks, are all that the eye immediately gives us;
+but with these are combined the remembered coolness of the fluent
+stream, and of the breeze above it, and of the pleasant shade of its
+banks; and beside all this--as there are few persons who have not
+escaped with delight from town or village, to wander by the quiet
+banks of some neighbouring stream, so there are few persons who do
+not associate with river scenery ideas of peace and serenity. Now
+many of these thoughts or facts are such as the eye does not take
+cognisance of, yet they present themselves as instantaneously as the
+visible form, and so blended as to seem, for the moment, to belong
+to it.
+
+Why not have selected some such illustration as this, instead of
+the unfortunate Runnymede, from a work where so many abound as apt
+as they are elegantly expressed? As to Mr Ruskin's utilitarian
+philosopher, it is a fabulous creature--no such being exists.
+Nor need we detain ourselves with the quite departmental subject
+of Familiarity. But let us endeavour--without desiring to pledge
+ourselves or our readers to its final adoption--to relieve the
+theory of association of ideas from the obscurity our author has
+thrown around it. Our readers will not find that this is altogether
+a wasted labour.
+
+With Mr Ruskin we are of opinion that, in a discussion of this kind,
+the term Beauty ought to be limited to the impression derived,
+mediately or immediately, from the visible object. It would be
+useless affectation to attempt to restrict the use of the word,
+in general, to this application. We can have no objection to the
+term Beautiful being applied to a piece of music, or to an eloquent
+composition, prose or verse, or even to our moral feelings and
+heroic actions; the word has received this general application,
+and there is, at basis, a great deal in common between all these
+and the sentiment of beauty attendant on the visible object. For
+music, or sweet sounds, and poetry, and our moral feelings, have
+much to do (through the law of association) with our sentiment of
+the Beautiful. It is quite enough if, speaking of the subject of
+our analysis, we limit it to those impressions, however originated,
+which attend upon the visible object.
+
+One preliminary word on this association of ideas. It is from
+its very nature, and the nature of human life, of all degrees
+of intimacy--from the casual suggestion, or the case where the
+two ideas are at all times felt to be distinct, to those close
+combinations where the two ideas have apparently coalesced into
+one, or require an attentive analysis to separate them. You see a
+mass of iron; you may be said _to see its weight_, the impression
+of its weight is so intimately combined with its form. The _light_
+of the sun, and the _heat_ of the sun are learnt from different
+senses, yet we never see the one without thinking of the other, and
+the reflection of the sunbeam seen upon a bank immediately suggests
+the idea of _warmth_. But it is not necessary that the combination
+should be always so perfect as in this instance, in order to
+produce the effect we speak of under the name of Association of
+Ideas. It is hardly possible for us to abstract the _glow_ of the
+sunbeam from its light; but the fertility which follows upon the
+presence of the sun, though a suggestion which habitually occurs
+to reflective minds, is an association of a far less intimate
+nature. It is sufficiently intimate, however, to blend with that
+feeling of admiration we have when we speak of the beauty of the
+sun. There is the golden harvest in its summer beams. Again, the
+contemplative spirit in all ages has formed an association between
+the sun and the Deity, whether as the fittest symbol of God, or as
+being His greatest gift to man. Here we have an association still
+more refined, and of a somewhat less frequent character, but one
+which will be found to enter, in a very subtle manner, into that
+impression we receive from the great luminary.
+
+And thus it is that, in different minds, the same materials of
+thought may be combined in a closer or laxer relationship. This
+should be borne in mind by the candid inquirer. That in many
+instances ideas from different sources do coalesce, in the manner
+we have been describing, he cannot for an instant doubt. He seems
+_to see_ the coolness of that river; he seems _to see_ the warmth on
+that sunny bank. In many instances, however, he must make allowance
+for the different habitudes of life. The same illustration will not
+always have the same force to all men. Those who have cultivated
+their minds by different pursuits, or lived amongst scenery of a
+different character, cannot have formed exactly the same moral
+association with external nature.
+
+These preliminaries being adjusted, what, we ask, is that first
+original charm of the _visible object_ which serves as the
+foundation for this wonderful superstructure of the Beautiful, to
+which almost every department of feeling and of thought will be
+found to bring its contribution? What is it so pleasurable that the
+eye at once receives from the external world, that round _it_ should
+have gathered all these tributary pleasures? Light--colour--form;
+but, in reference to our discussion, pre-eminently the exquisite
+pleasure derived from the sense of light, pure or coloured. Colour,
+from infancy to old age, is one original, universal, perpetual
+source of delight, the first and constant element of the Beautiful.
+
+We are far from thinking that the eye does not at once take
+cognisance of form as well as colour. Some ingenious analysts have
+supposed that the sensation of colour is, in its origin, a mere
+mental affection, having no reference to space or external objects,
+and that it obtains this reference through the contemporaneous
+acquisition of the sense of touch. But there can be no more reason
+for supposing that the sense of touch informs us immediately of an
+external world than that the sense of colour does. If we do not
+allow to all the senses an intuitive reference to the external
+world, we shall get it from none of them. Dr Brown, who paid
+particular attention to this subject, and who was desirous to limit
+the first intimation of the sense of sight to an abstract sensation
+of unlocalised colour, failed entirely in his attempt to obtain
+from any other source the idea of space or _outness_; Kant would
+have given him certain subjective _forms of the sensitive faculty_,
+space and time. These he did not like: he saw that, if he denied
+to the eye an immediate perception of the external world, he must
+also deny it to the touch; he therefore prayed in aid certain
+muscular sensations from which the idea of _resistance_ would be
+obtained. But it seems to us evident that not till _after_ we have
+acquired a knowledge of the external world can we connect _volition_
+with muscular movement, and that, until that connection is made,
+the muscular sensations stand in the same predicament as other
+sensations, and could give him no aid in solving his problem. We
+cannot go further into this matter at present.[6] The mere flash of
+light which follows the touch upon the optic nerve represents itself
+as something _without_; nor was colour, we imagine, ever felt, but
+under some _form_ more or less distinct; although in the human being
+the eye seems to depend on the touch far more than in other animals,
+for its further instruction.
+
+[6] It is seldom any action of a limb is performed without the
+concurrence of several muscles; and, if the action is at all
+energetic, a number of muscles are brought into play as an equipoise
+or balance; the infant, therefore, would be sadly puzzled amongst
+its muscular sensations, supposing that it had them. Besides, it
+seems clear that those movements we see an infant make with its
+arms and legs are, in the first instance, as little _voluntary_ as
+the muscular movements it makes for the purpose of respiration.
+There is an animal life within us, dependent on its own laws of
+irritability. Over a portion of this the developed thought or reason
+gains dominion; over a large portion the will never has any hold;
+over another portion, as in the organs of respiration, it has an
+intermittent and divided empire. We learn voluntary movement by
+doing that instinctively and spontaneously which we afterwards do
+from forethought. We have moved our arm; we wish to do the like
+again, (and to our wonder, if we then had intelligence enough to
+wonder,) we do it.
+
+But although the eye is cognisant of form as well as colour, it is
+in the sensation of colour that we must seek the primitive pleasure
+derived from this organ. And probably the first reason why form
+pleases is this, that the boundaries of form are also the lines
+of contrast of colour. It is a general law of all sensation that,
+if it be continued, our susceptibility to it declines. It was
+necessary that the eye should be always open. Its susceptibility is
+sustained by the perpetual contrast of colours. Whether the contrast
+is sudden, or whether one hue shades gradually into another, we
+see here an original and primary source of pleasure. A constant
+variety, in some way produced, is essential to the maintenance of
+the pleasure derived from colour.
+
+It is not incumbent on us to inquire how far the beauty of form
+may be traceable to the sensation of touch;--a very small portion
+of it we suspect. In the human countenance, and in sculpture,
+the beauty of form is almost resolvable into expression; though
+possibly the soft and rounded outline may in some measure be
+associated with the sense of smoothness to the touch. All that we
+are concerned to show is, that there is here in colour, diffused
+as it is over the whole world, and perpetually varied, a _beauty_
+at once showered upon the visible object. We hear it said, if you
+resolve all into association, where will you begin? You have but a
+circle of feelings. If moral sentiment, for instance, be not itself
+the beautiful, why should it become so by association. There must
+be something else that is _the beautiful_, by association with
+which it passes for such. We answer, that we do not resolve _all_
+into association; that we have in this one gift of colour, shed so
+bountifully over the whole world, an original beauty, a delight
+which makes the external object pleasant and beloved; for how can we
+fail, in some sort, to love what produces so much pleasure?
+
+We are at a loss to understand how any one can speak with
+disparagement of colour as a source of the beautiful. The sculptor
+may, perhaps, by his peculiar education, grow comparatively
+indifferent to it: we know not how this may be; but let any man,
+of the most refined taste imaginable, think what he owes to this
+source, when he walks out at evening, and sees the sun set amongst
+the hills. The same concave sky, the same scene, so far as its form
+is concerned, was there a few hours before, and saddened him with
+its gloom; one leaden hue prevailed over all; and now in a clear sky
+the sun is setting, and the hills are purple, and the clouds are
+radiant with every colour that can be extracted from the sunbeam. He
+can hardly believe that it is the same scene, or he the same man.
+Here the grown-up man and the child stand always on the same level.
+As to the infant, note how its eye feeds upon a brilliant colour, or
+the living flame. If it had wings, it would assuredly do as the moth
+does. And take the most untutored rustic, let him be old, and dull,
+and stupid, yet, as long as the eye has vitality in it, will he look
+up with long untiring gaze at this blue vault of the sky, traversed
+by its glittering clouds, and pierced by the tall green trees around
+him.
+
+Is it any marvel now that round the _visible object_ should
+associate tributary feelings of pleasure? How many pleasing and
+tender sentiments gather round the rose! Yet the rose is beautiful
+in itself. It was beautiful to the child by its colour, its texture,
+its softly-shaded leaf, and the contrast between the flower and the
+foliage. Love, and poetry, and the tender regrets of advanced life,
+have contributed a second dower of beauty. The rose is more to the
+youth and to the old man than it was to the child; but still to the
+last they both feel the pleasure of the child.
+
+The more commonplace the illustration, the more suited it is to our
+purpose. If any one will reflect on the many ideas that cluster
+round this beautiful flower, he will not fail to see how numerous
+and subtle may be the association formed with the visible object.
+Even an idea painful in itself may, by way of contrast, serve
+to heighten the pleasure of others with which it is associated.
+Here the thought of decay and fragility, like a discord amongst
+harmonies, increases our sentiment of tenderness. We express, we
+believe, the prevailing taste when we say that there is nothing,
+in the shape of art, so disagreeable and repulsive as artificial
+flowers. The waxen flower may be an admirable imitation, but it
+is a detestable thing. This partly results from the nature of the
+imitation; a vulgar deception is often practised upon us: what is
+not a flower is intended to pass for one. But it is owing still
+more, we think, to the contradiction that is immediately afterwards
+felt between this preserved and imperishable waxen flower, and the
+transitory and perishable rose. It is the nature of the rose to bud,
+and blossom, and decay; it gives its beauty to the breeze and to the
+shower; it is mortal; it is _ours_; it bears our hopes, our loves,
+our regrets. This waxen substitute, that cannot change or decay, is
+a contradiction and a disgust.
+
+Amongst objects of man's contrivance, the sail seen upon the calm
+waters of a lake or a river is universally felt to be beautiful. The
+form is graceful, and the movement gentle, and its colour contrasts
+well either with the shore or the water. But perhaps the chief
+element of our pleasure is all association with human life, with
+peaceful enjoyment--
+
+    "This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing,
+     To waft me from distraction."
+
+Or take one of the noblest objects in nature--the mountain. There
+is no object except the sea and the sky that reflects to the sight
+colours so beautiful, and in such masses. But colour, and form, and
+magnitude, constitute but a part of the beauty or the sublimity of
+the mountain. Not only do the clouds encircle or rest upon it, but
+men have laid on it their grandest thoughts: we have associated
+with it our moral fortitude, and all we understand of greatness
+or elevation of mind; our phraseology seems half reflected from
+the mountain. Still more, we have made it holy ground. Has not God
+himself descended on the mountain? Are not the hills, once and
+for ever, "the unwalled temples of our earth?" And still there is
+another circumstance attendant upon mountain scenery, which adds a
+solemnity of its own, and is a condition of the enjoyment of other
+sources of the sublime--solitude. It seems to us that the feeling of
+solitude almost always associates itself with mountain scenery. Mrs
+Somerville, in the description which she gives or quotes, in her
+_Physical Geography_, of the Himalayas, says--
+
+     "The loftiest peaks being bare of snow gives great variety of
+     colour and beauty to the scenery, which in these passes is at
+     all times magnificent. During the day, the stupendous size of
+     the mountains, their interminable extent, the variety and the
+     sharpness of their forms, and, above all, the tender clearness
+     of their distant outline melting into the pale blue sky,
+     contrasted with the deep azure above, is described as a scene of
+     wild and wonderful beauty. At midnight, when myriads of stars
+     sparkle in the black sky, and the pure blue of the mountains
+     looks deeper still below the pale white gleam of the earth and
+     snow-light, the effect is of unparalleled sublimity, and no
+     language can describe the splendour of the sunbeams at daybreak,
+     streaming between the high peaks, and throwing their gigantic
+     shadows on the mountains below. There, far above the habitation
+     of man, no living thing exists, no sound is heard; the very
+     echo of the traveller's footsteps startles him in the awful
+     _solitude and silence_ that reigns in those august dwellings of
+     everlasting snow."
+
+No one can fail to recognise the effect of the last circumstance
+mentioned. Let those mountains be the scene of a gathering of any
+human multitude, and they would be more desecrated than if their
+peaks had been levelled to the ground. We have also quoted this
+description to show how large a share _colour_ takes in beautifying
+such a scene. Colour, either in large fields of it, or in sharp
+contrasts, or in gradual shading--the play of light, in short, upon
+this world--is the first element of beauty.
+
+Here would be the place, were we writing a formal treatise upon
+this subject, after showing that there is in the sense of sight
+itself a sufficient elementary beauty, whereto other pleasurable
+reminiscences may attach themselves, to point out some of these
+tributaries. Each sense--the touch, the ear, the smell, the
+taste--blend their several remembered pleasures with the object
+of vision. Even taste, we say, although Mr Ruskin will scorn
+the gross alliance. And we would allude to the fact to show the
+extreme subtilty of these mental processes. The fruit which you
+think of eating has lost its beauty from that moment--it assumes
+to you a quite different relation; but the reminiscence that there
+is sweetness in the peach or the grape, whilst it remains quite
+subordinate to the pleasure derived from the sense of sight, mingles
+with and increases that pleasure. Whilst the cluster of ripe grapes
+is looked at only for its beauty, the idea that they are pleasant
+to the taste as well steals in unobserved, and adds to the complex
+sentiment. If this idea grow distinct and prominent, the beauty of
+the grape is gone--you eat it. Here, too, would be the place to take
+notice of such sources of pleasure as are derived from adaptation
+of parts, or the adaptation of the whole to ulterior purposes;
+but here especially should we insist on human affections, human
+loves, human sympathies. Here, in the heart of man, his hopes,
+his regrets, his affections, do we find the great source of the
+beautiful--tributaries which take their name from the stream they
+join, but which often form the main current. On that sympathy with
+which nature has so wonderfully endowed us, which makes the pain and
+pleasure of all other living things our own pain and pleasure, which
+binds us not only to our fellow-men, but to every moving creature
+on the face of the earth, we should have much to say. How much, for
+instance, does its _life_ add to the beauty of the swan!--how much
+more its calm and placid life! Here, and on what would follow on
+the still more exalted mood of pious contemplation--when all nature
+seems as a hymn or song of praise to the Creator--we should be
+happy to borrow aid from Mr Ruskin; his essay supplying admirable
+materials for certain _chapters_ in a treatise on the beautiful
+which should embrace the whole subject.
+
+No such treatise, however, is it our object to compose. We have said
+enough to show the true nature of that theory of association, as a
+branch of which alone is it possible to take any intelligible view
+of Mr Ruskin's _Theoria_, or "Theoretic Faculty." His flagrant error
+is, that he will represent a part for the whole, and will distort
+and confuse everything for the sake of this representation. Viewed
+in their proper limitation, his remarks are often such as every
+wise and good man will approve of. Here and there too, there are
+shrewd intimations which the psychological student may profit by. He
+has pointed out several instances where the associations insisted
+upon by writers of the school of Alison have nothing whatever to
+do with the sentiment of beauty; and neither harmonise with, nor
+exalt it. Not all that may, in any way, _interest_ us in an object,
+adds to its beauty. "Thus," as Mr Ruskin we think very justly says,
+"where we are told that the leaves of a plant are occupied in
+decomposing carbonic acid, and preparing oxygen for us, we begin to
+look upon it with some such indifference as upon a gasometer. It
+has become a machine; some of our sense of its happiness is gone;
+its emanation of inherent life is no longer pure." The knowledge of
+the anatomical structure of the limb is very interesting, but it
+adds nothing to the beauty of its outline. Scientific associations,
+however, of this kind, will have a different æsthetic effect,
+according to the degree or the enthusiasm with which the science has
+been studied.
+
+It is not our business to advocate this theory of association of
+ideas, but briefly to expound it. But we may remark that those who
+adopt (as Mr Ruskin has done in one branch of his subject--his
+_Æsthesis_) the rival theory of an intuitive perception of the
+beautiful, must find a difficulty where to _insert_ this intuitive
+perception. The beauty of any one object is generally composed
+of several qualities and accessories--to which of these are we
+to connect this intuition? And if to the whole assemblage of
+them, then, as each of these qualities has been shown by its own
+virtue to administer to the general effect, we shall be explaining
+again by this new perception what has been already explained.
+Select any notorious instance of the beautiful--say the swan.
+How many qualities and accessories immediately occur to us as
+intimately blended in our minds with the form and white plumage
+of the bird! What were its arched neck and mantling wings if it
+were not _living_? And how the calm and inoffensive, and somewhat
+majestic life it leads, carries away our sympathies! Added to
+which, the snow-white form of the swan is imaged in clear waters,
+and is relieved by green foliage; and if the bird makes the river
+more beautiful, the river, in return, reflects its serenity and
+peacefulness upon the bird. Now all this we seem to see as we look
+upon the swan. To which of these facts separately will you attach
+this new intuition? And if you wait till all are assembled, the bird
+is already beautiful.
+
+We are all in the habit of _reasoning_ on the beautiful, of
+defending our own tastes, and this just in proportion as the beauty
+in question is of a high order. And why do we do this? Because,
+just in proportion as the beauty is of an elevated character, does
+it depend on some moral association. Every argument of this kind
+will be found to consist of an analysis of the sentiment. Nor is
+there anything derogatory, as some have supposed, in this analysis
+of the sentiment; for we learn from it, at every step, that in the
+same degree as men become more refined, more humane, more kind,
+equitable, and pious, will the visible world become more richly
+clad with beauty. We see here an admirable arrangement, whereby the
+external world grows in beauty, as men grow in goodness.
+
+We must now follow Mr Ruskin a step farther into the development
+of his _Theoria_. All beauty, he tell us, _is such_, in its high
+and only true character, because it is a type of one or more of
+God's attributes. This, as we have shown, is to represent one class
+of associated thought as absorbing and displacing all the rest.
+We protest against this egregious exaggeration of a great and
+sacred source of our emotions. With Mr Ruskin's own piety we can
+have no quarrel; but we enter a firm and calm protest against a
+falsification of our human nature, in obedience to one sentiment,
+however sublime. No good can come of it--no good, we mean, to
+religion itself. It is substantially the same error, though assuming
+a very different garb, which the Puritans committed. They disgusted
+men with religion, by introducing it into every law and custom, and
+detail of human life. Mr Ruskin would commit the same error in
+the department of taste, over which he would rule so despotically:
+he is not content that the highest beauty shall be religious; he
+will permit nothing to be beautiful, except as it partakes of a
+religious character. But there is a vast region lying between the
+"animal pleasantness" of his Æsthesis and the pious contemplation of
+his Theoria. There is much between the human animal and the saint;
+there are the domestic affections and the love they spring from,
+and hopes, and regrets, and aspirations, and the hour of peace and
+the hour of repose--in short, there is human life. From all human
+life, as we have seen, come contributions to the sentiment of the
+beautiful, quite as distinctly traced as the peculiar class on which
+Mr Ruskin insists.
+
+If any one descanting upon music should affirm, that, in the first
+place, there was a certain animal pleasantness in harmony or melody,
+or both, but that the real essence of music, that by which it truly
+becomes music, was the perception in harmony or melody of types of
+the Divine attributes, he would reason exactly in the same manner
+on music as Mr Ruskin does on beauty. Nevertheless, although sacred
+music is the highest, it is very plain that there is other music
+than the sacred, and that all songs are not hymns.
+
+Chapter v. of the present volume bears this title--_Of
+Typical Beauty. First, of Infinity, or the type of the Divine
+Incomprehensibility._--A boundless space will occur directly to
+the reader as a type of the infinite; perhaps it should be rather
+described as itself the infinite under one form. But Mr Ruskin finds
+the infinite in everything. That idea which he justly describes
+as the incomprehensible, and which is so profound and baffling a
+mystery to the finite being, is supposed to be thrust upon the mind
+on every occasion. Every instance of variety is made the type of the
+infinite, as well as every indication of space. We remember that,
+in the first volume of the _Modern Painters_, we were not a little
+startled at being told that the distinguishing character of every
+good artist was, that "he painted the infinite." Good or bad, we now
+see that he could scarcely fail to paint the infinite: it must be by
+some curious chance that the feat is not accomplished.
+
+     "Now, not only," writes Mr Ruskin, "is this expression of
+     infinity in distance most precious wherever we find it, however
+     solitary it may be, and however unassisted by other forms and
+     kinds of beauty; but it is of such value that no such other
+     forms will altogether recompense us for its loss; and much
+     as I dread the enunciation of anything that may seem like a
+     conventional rule, I have no hesitation in asserting that
+     no work of any art, in which this expression of infinity is
+     possible, can be perfect or supremely elevated without it; and
+     that, in proportion to its presence, _it will exalt and render
+     impressive even the most tame and trivial themes_. And I think
+     if there be any one grand division, by which it is at all
+     possible to set the productions of painting, so far as their
+     mere plan or system is concerned, on our right and left hands,
+     it is this of light and dark background, of heaven-light and
+     of object-light.... There is a spectral etching of Rembrandt,
+     a presentation of Christ in the Temple, where the figure of
+     a robed priest stands glaring by its gems out of the gloom,
+     holding a crosier. Behind it there is a subdued window-light
+     seen in the opening, between two columns, without which
+     the impressiveness of the whole subject would, I think, be
+     incalculably diminished. I cannot tell whether I am at present
+     allowing too much weight to my own fancies and predilections;
+     but, without so much escape into the outer air and open heaven
+     as this, I can take permanent pleasure in no picture.
+
+     "And I think I am supported in this feeling by the unanimous
+     practice, if not the confessed opinion, of all artists. The
+     painter of portrait _is unhappy without his conventional white
+     stroke under the sleeve_, or beside the arm-chair; the painter
+     of interiors feels like a caged bird unless he can throw a
+     window open, or set the door ajar; the landscapist dares not
+     lose himself in forest without a gleam of light under its
+     farthest branches, nor ventures out in rain unless he may
+     somewhere pierce to a better promise in the distance, or cling
+     to some closing gap of variable blue above."--(P. 39.)
+
+But if an open window, or "that conventional white stroke under the
+sleeve," is sufficient to indicate the Infinite, how few pictures
+there must be in which it is not indicated! and how many "a tame
+and trivial theme" must have been, by this indication, exalted and
+rendered impressive! And yet it seems that some very celebrated
+paintings want this open-window or conventional white stroke. The
+Madonna della Sediola of Raphael is known over all Europe; some
+print of it may be seen in every village; that virgin-mother, in her
+antique chair, embracing her child with so sweet and maternal an
+embrace, has found its way to the heart of every woman, Catholic or
+Protestant. But unfortunately it has a dark background, and there
+is no open window--nothing to typify infinity. To us it seemed that
+there was "heaven's light" over the whole picture. Though there
+is the chamber wall seen behind the chair, there is nothing to
+intimate that the door or the window is closed. One might in charity
+have imagined that the light came directly through an open door or
+window. However, Mr Ruskin is inexorable. "Raphael," he says, "_in
+his full_, betrayed the faith he had received from his father and
+his master, and substituted for the radiant sky of the Madonna del
+Cardellino the chamber wall of the Madonna della Sediola, and the
+brown wainscot of the Baldacchino."
+
+Of other modes in which the Infinite is represented, we have an
+instance in "The Beauty of Curvature."
+
+     "The first of these is the curvature of lines and surfaces,
+     wherein it at first appears futile to insist upon any
+     resemblance or suggestion of infinity, since there is certainly,
+     in our ordinary contemplation of it, no sensation of the kind.
+     But I have repeated again and again that the ideas of beauty
+     are instinctive, and that it is only upon consideration, and
+     even then in doubtful and disputable way, that they appear in
+     their typical character; neither do I intend at all to insist
+     upon the particular meaning which they appear to myself to bear,
+     but merely on their actual and demonstrable agreeableness; so
+     that in the present case, which I assert positively, and have
+     no fear of being able to prove--that a curve of any kind is
+     more beautiful than a right line--I leave it to the reader to
+     accept or not, as he pleases, _that reason of its agreeableness
+     which is the only one that I can at all trace: namely, that
+     every curve divides itself infinitely by its changes of
+     direction_."--(P. 63.)
+
+Our old friend Jacob Boehmen would have been delighted with this
+Theoria. But we must pass on to other types. Chapter vi. treats _of
+Unity, or the Type of the Divine Comprehensiveness_.
+
+     "Of the appearances of Unity, or of Unity itself, there are
+     several kinds, which it will be found hereafter convenient to
+     consider separately. Thus there is the unity of different and
+     separate things, subjected to one and the same influence, which
+     may be called Subjectional Unity; and this is the unity of the
+     clouds, as they are driven by the parallel winds, or as they
+     are ordered by the electric currents; this is the unity of the
+     sea waves; this, of the bending and undulation of the forest
+     masses; and in creatures capable of Will it is the Unity of
+     Will, or of Impulse. And there is Unity of Origin, which we may
+     call Original Unity, which is of things arising from one spring
+     or source, and speaking always of this their brotherhood; and
+     this in matter is the unity of the branches of the trees, and
+     of the petals and starry rays of flowers, and of the beams of
+     light; and in spiritual creatures it is their filial relation
+     to Him from whom they have their being. And there is Unity of
+     Sequence," &c.--
+
+down another half page. Very little to be got here, we think. Let
+us advance to the next chapter. This is entitled, _Of Repose, or the
+Type of Divine Permanence_.
+
+It will be admitted on all hands that nothing adds more frequently
+to the charms of the visible object than the associated feeling of
+repose. The hour of sunset is the hour of repose. Most beautiful
+things are enhanced by some reflected feeling of this kind. But
+surely one need not go farther than to human labour, and human
+restlessness, anxiety, and passion, to understand the charm of
+repose. Mr Ruskin carries us at once into the third heaven:--
+
+     "As opposed to passion, changefulness, or laborious exertion,
+     Repose is the especial and separating characteristic of the
+     eternal mind and power; it is the 'I am' of the Creator, opposed
+     to the 'I become' of all creatures; it is the sign alike of the
+     supreme knowledge which is incapable of surprise, the supreme
+     power which is incapable of labour, the supreme volition which
+     is incapable of change; it is the stillness of the beams of the
+     eternal chambers laid upon the variable waters of ministering
+     creatures."
+
+We must proceed. Chapter viii. treats _Of Symmetry, or the Type
+of Divine Justice_. Perhaps the nature of this chapter will be
+sufficiently indicated to the reader, now somewhat informed of Mr
+Ruskin's mode of thinking, by the title itself. At all events, we
+shall pass on to the next chapter, ix.--_Of Purity, or the Type
+of Divine Energy_. Here, the reader will perhaps expect to find
+himself somewhat more at home. One type, at all events, of Divine
+Purity has often been presented to his mind. Light has generally
+been considered as the fittest emblem or manifestation of the Divine
+Presence,
+
+    "That never but in unapproachëd light
+     Dwelt from eternity."
+
+But if the reader has formed any such agreeable expectation he
+will be disappointed. Mr Ruskin travels on no beaten track. He finds
+some reasons, partly theological, partly gathered from his own
+theory of the Beautiful, for discarding this ancient association of
+Light with Purity. As the _Divine_ attributes are those which the
+visible object typifies, and by no means the _human_, and as Purity,
+which is "sinlessness," cannot, he thinks, be predicted of the
+Divine nature, it follows that he cannot admit Light to be a type of
+Purity. We quote the passage, as it will display the working of his
+theory:--
+
+     "It may seem strange to many readers that I have not spoken
+     of purity in that sense in which it is most frequently used,
+     as a type of sinlessness. I do not deny that the frequent
+     metaphorical use of it in Scripture may have, and ought to have,
+     much influence on the sympathies with which we regard it; and
+     that probably the immediate agreeableness of it to most minds
+     arises far more from this source than from that to which I have
+     chosen to attribute it. But, in the first place, _if it be
+     indeed in the signs of Divine and not of human attributes that
+     beauty consists_, I see not how the idea of sin can be formed
+     with respect to the Deity; for it is the idea of a relation
+     borne by us to Him, and not in any way to be attached to His
+     abstract nature; while the Love, Mercifulness, and Justice of
+     God I have supposed to be symbolised by other qualities of
+     beauty: and I cannot trace any rational connection between them
+     and the idea of Spotlessness in matter, nor between this idea
+     nor any of the virtues which make up the righteousness of man,
+     except perhaps those of truth and openness, which have been
+     above spoken of as more expressed by the transparency than the
+     mere purity of matter. So that I conceive the use of the terms
+     purity, spotlessness, &c., on moral subjects, to be merely
+     metaphorical; and that it is rather that we illustrate these
+     virtues by the desirableness of material purity, than that we
+     desire material purity because it is illustrative of those
+     virtues. I repeat, then, that the only idea which I think can be
+     legitimately connected with purity of matter is this of vital
+     and energetic connection among its particles."
+
+We have been compelled to quote some strange passages, of most
+difficult and laborious perusal; but our task is drawing to an
+end. The last of these types we have to mention is that _Of
+Moderation, or the Type of Government by Law_. We suspect there are
+many persons who have rapidly perused Mr Ruskin's works (probably
+_skipping_ where the obscurity grew very thick) who would be very
+much surprised, if they gave a closer attention to them, at the
+strange conceits and absurdities which they had passed over without
+examination. Indeed, his very loose and declamatory style, and the
+habit of saying extravagant things, set all examination at defiance.
+But let any one pause a moment on the last title we have quoted
+from Mr Ruskin--let him read the chapter itself--let him reflect
+that he has been told in it that "what we express by the terms
+chasteness, refinement, and elegance," in any work of art, and more
+particularly "that finish" so dear to the intelligent critic, owe
+their attractiveness to being types of God's government by law!--we
+think he will confess that never in any book, ancient or modern, did
+he meet with an absurdity to outrival it.
+
+We have seen why the curve in general is beautiful; we have here the
+reason given us why one curve is more beautiful than another:--
+
+     "And herein we at last find the reason of that which has been so
+     often noted respecting the subtilty and almost invisibility of
+     natural curves and colours, and why it is that we look on those
+     lines as least beautiful which fall into wide and far license
+     of curvature, and as most beautiful which approach nearest (so
+     that the curvilinear character be distinctly asserted) to the
+     government of the right line, as in the pure and severe curves
+     of the draperies of the religious painters."
+
+There is still the subject of "vital beauty" before us, but we shall
+probably be excused from entering further into the development of
+"Theoria." It must be quite clear by this time to our readers, that,
+whatever there is in it really wise and intelligible, resolves
+itself into one branch of that general theory of association of
+ideas, of which Alison and others have treated. But we are now
+in a condition to understand more clearly that peculiar style of
+language which startled us so much in the first volume of the
+_Modern Painters_. There we frequently heard of the Divine mission
+of the artist, of the religious office of the painter, and how
+Mr Turner was delivering God's message to man. What seemed an
+oratorical climax, much too frequently repeated, proves to be a
+logical sequence of his theoretical principles. All true beauty is
+religious; therefore all true art, which is the reproduction of the
+beautiful, must be religious also. Every picture gallery is a sort
+of temple, every great painter a sort of prophet. If Mr Ruskin is
+conscious that he never admires anything beautiful in nature or art,
+without a reference to some attribute of God, or some sentiment
+of piety, he may be a very exalted person, but he is no type of
+humanity. If he asserts this, we must be sufficiently courteous
+to believe him; we must not suspect that he is hardly candid with
+us, or with himself; but we shall certainly not accept him as a
+representative of the _genus homo_. He finds "sermons in stones,"
+and sermons always; "books in the running brooks," and always books
+of divinity. Other men not deficient in reflection or piety do not
+find it thus. Let us hear the poet who, more than any other, has
+made a religion of the beauty of nature. Wordsworth, in a passage
+familiar to every one of his readers, runs his hand, as it were,
+over all the chords of the lyre. He finds other sources of the
+beautiful not unworthy his song, besides that high contemplative
+piety which he introduces as a noble and fit climax. He recalls the
+first ardours of his youth, when the beautiful object itself of
+nature seemed to him all, in all:--
+
+                "I cannot paint
+    What then I was. The sounding cataract
+    Haunted me like a passion; the tall rock,
+    The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood.
+    Their colours and their forms were thus to me
+    An appetite; a feeling and a love
+    That had no need of a remoter charm
+    By thought supplied, nor any interest
+    Unborrowed from the eye. That time is past,
+    And all its aching joys are now no more,
+    And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this
+    Faint I, nor mourn, nor murmur; other gifts
+    Have followed. I have learned
+    To look on nature not as in the hour
+    Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes
+    _The still sad music of humanity,
+    Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
+    To chasten and subdue_. And I have felt
+    A presence that disturbs me with the joy
+    Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
+    Of something far more deeply interfused,
+    Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
+    And the round ocean and the living air,
+    And the blue sky, and in the mind of man."
+
+Our poet sounds all the chords. He does not muffle any; he honours
+Nature in her own simple loveliness, and in the beauty she wins from
+the human heart, as well as when she is informed with that sublime
+spirit
+
+                      "that impels
+    All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
+    And rolls through all things."
+
+Sit down, by all means, amongst the fern and the wild-flowers, and
+look out upon the blue hills, or near you at the flowing brook, and
+thank God, the giver of all this beauty. But what manner of good
+will you do by endeavouring to persuade yourself that these objects
+_are_ only beautiful because you give thanks for them?--for to this
+strange logical inversion will you find yourself reduced. And surely
+you learned to esteem and love this benevolence itself, first as
+a human attribute, before you became cognisant of it as a Divine
+attribute. What other course can the mind take but to travel through
+humanity up to God?
+
+There is much more of metaphysics in the volume before us; there
+is, in particular, an elaborate investigation of the faculty of
+imagination; but we have no inducement to proceed further with
+Mr Ruskin in these psychological inquiries. We have given some
+attention to his theory of the Beautiful, because it lay at the
+basis of a series of critical works which, partly from their
+boldness, and partly from the talent of a certain kind which
+is manifestly displayed in them, have attained to considerable
+popularity. But we have not the same object for prolonging our
+examination into his theory of the Imaginative Faculty. "We say
+it advisedly," (as Mr Ruskin always adds when he is asserting
+anything particularly rash,) we say it advisedly, and with no
+rashness whatever, that though our author is a man of great natural
+ability, and enunciates boldly many an independent isolated truth,
+yet of the spirit of philosophy he is utterly destitute. The
+calm, patient, prolonged thinking, which Dugald Stewart somewhere
+describes as the one essential characteristic of the successful
+student of philosophy, he knows nothing of. He wastes his ingenuity
+in making knots where others had long since untied them. He rushes
+at a definition, makes a parade of classification; but for any
+great and wide generalisation he has no appreciation whatever. He
+appears to have no taste, but rather an antipathy for it; when it
+lies in his way he avoids it. On this subject of the Imaginative
+Faculty he writes and he raves, defines and poetises by turns; makes
+laborious distinctions where there is no essential difference; has
+his "Imagination Associative," and his "Imagination Penetrative;"
+and will not, or cannot, see those broad general principles which
+with most educated men have become familiar truths, or truisms. But
+what clear thinking can we expect of a writer who thus describes his
+"Imagination Penetrative?"--
+
+     "It may seem to the reader that I am incorrect in calling this
+     penetrating possession-taking faculty Imagination. Be it so:
+     the name is of little consequence; the Faculty itself, called
+     by what name it will, I insist upon as the highest intellectual
+     power of man. _There is no reasoning in it_; it works not by
+     algebra, nor by integral calculus; it is a piercing Pholas-like
+     mind's tongue, that works and tastes into the very rock-heart.
+     No matter what be the subject submitted to it, substance or
+     spirit--all is alike divided asunder, joint and marrow, whatever
+     utmost truth, life, principle, it has laid bare; and that which
+     has no truth, life, nor principle, dissipated into its original
+     smoke at a touch. The whispers at men's ears it lifts into
+     visible angels. Vials that have lain sealed in the deep sea a
+     thousand years it unseals, and brings out of them Genii."--(P.
+     156.)
+
+With such a wonder-working faculty man ought to do much. Indeed,
+unless it has been asleep all this time, it is difficult to
+understand why there should remain anything for him to do.
+
+Surveying Mr Ruskin's works on art, with the knowledge we have here
+acquired of his intellectual character and philosophical theory, we
+are at no loss to comprehend that mixture of shrewd and penetrating
+remark, of bold and well-placed censure, and of utter nonsense in
+the shape of general principles, with which they abound. In his
+_Seven Lamps of Architecture_, which is a very entertaining book,
+and in his _Stones of Venice_, the reader will find many single
+observations which will delight him, as well by their justice, as by
+the zeal and vigour with which they are expressed. But from neither
+work will he derive any satisfaction if he wishes to carry away with
+him broad general views on architecture.
+
+There is no subject Mr Ruskin has treated more largely than that
+of architectural ornament; there is none on which he has said more
+good things, or delivered juster criticisms; and there is none on
+which he has uttered more indisputable nonsense. Every reader of
+taste will be grateful to Mr Ruskin if he can pull down from St
+Paul's Cathedral, or wherever else they are to be found, those
+wreaths or festoons of carved flowers--"that mass of all manner
+of fruit and flowers tied heavily into a long bunch, thickest in
+the middle, and pinned up by both ends against a dead wall." Urns
+with pocket-handkerchiefs upon them, or a sturdy thick flame for
+ever issuing from the top, he will receive our thanks for utterly
+demolishing. But when Mr Ruskin expounds his principles--and he
+always has principles to expound--when he lays down rules for the
+government of our taste in this matter, he soon involves us in
+hopeless bewilderment. Our ornaments, he tells us, are to be taken
+from the works of nature, not of man; and, from some passages of his
+writings, we should infer that Mr Ruskin would cover the walls of
+our public buildings with representations botanical and geological.
+But in this we must be mistaken. At all events, nothing is to be
+admitted that is taken from the works of man.
+
+     "I conclude, then, with the reader's leave, that all ornament is
+     base which takes for its subject human work; that it is utterly
+     base--painful to every rightly toned mind, without, perhaps,
+     immediate sense of the reason, but for a reason palpable enough
+     when we do think of it. For to carve our own work, and set it up
+     for admiration, is a miserable self-complacency, a contentment
+     in our wretched doings, when we might have been looking at God's
+     doings."
+
+After this, can we venture to admire the building itself, which is,
+of necessity, man's own "wretched doing?"
+
+Perplexed by his own rules, he will sometimes break loose from the
+entanglement in some such strange manner as this:--"I believe the
+right question to ask, with respect to all ornament, is simply this:
+Was it done with enjoyment--_was the carver happy while he was about
+it_?" Happy art! where the workman is sure to give happiness if
+he is but happy at his work. Would that the same could be said of
+literature!
+
+How far _colour_ should be introduced into architecture is a
+question with men of taste, and a question which of late has been
+more than usually discussed. Mr Ruskin leans to the introduction
+of colour. His taste may be correct; but the fanciful reasoning
+which he brings to bear upon the subject will assist no one else in
+forming his own taste. Because there is no connection "between the
+spots of an animal's skin and its anatomical system," he lays it
+down as the first great principle which is to guide us in the use of
+colour in architecture--
+
+     "That it be _visibly independent of form_. Never paint a column
+     with vertical lines, but always cross it. Never give separate
+     mouldings separate colours," &c. "In certain places," he
+     continues, "you may run your two systems closer, and here and
+     there let them be parallel for a note or two, but see that the
+     colours and the forms coincide only as two orders of mouldings
+     do; the same for an instant, but each holding its own course. So
+     single members may sometimes have single colours; _as a bird's
+     head is sometimes of one colour, and its shoulders another, you
+     may make your capital one colour, and your shaft another_; but,
+     in general, the best place for colour is on broad surfaces, not
+     on the points of interest in form. _An animal is mottled on its
+     breast and back, and rarely on its paws and about its eyes_; so
+     put your variegation boldly on the flat wall and broad shaft,
+     but be shy of it on the capital and moulding."--(_Lamps of
+     Architecture_, p. 127.)
+
+We do not quite see what we have to do at all with the "anatomical
+system" of the animal, which is kept out of sight; but, in general,
+we apprehend there is, both in the animal and vegetable kingdom,
+considerable harmony betwixt colour and external form. Such
+fantastic reasoning as this, it is evident, will do little towards
+establishing that one standard of taste, or that "one school of
+architecture," which Mr Ruskin so strenuously insists upon. All
+architects are to resign their individual tastes and predilections,
+and enrol themselves in one school, which shall adopt one style. We
+need not say that the very first question--what that style should
+be, Greek or Gothic--would never be decided. Mr Ruskin decides it
+in favour of the "earliest English decorated Gothic;" but seems,
+in this case, to suspect that his decision will not carry us far
+towards unanimity. The scheme is utterly impossible; but he does his
+duty, he tells us, by proposing the impossibility.
+
+As a climax to his inconsistency and his abnormal ways of thinking,
+he concludes his _Seven Lamps of Architecture_ with a most ominous
+paragraph, implying that the time is at hand when no architecture of
+any kind will be wanted: man and his works will be both swept away
+from the face of the earth. How, with this impression on his mind,
+could he have the heart to tell us to build for posterity? Will it
+be a commentary on the Apocalypse that we shall next receive from
+the pen of Mr Ruskin?
+
+
+
+
+PORTUGUESE POLITICS.
+
+
+The dramatic and singular revolution of which Portugal has recently
+been the theatre, the strange fluctuations and ultimate success
+of Marshal Saldanha's insurrection, the narrow escape of Donna
+Maria from at least a temporary expulsion from her dominions, have
+attracted in this country more attention than is usually bestowed
+upon the oft-recurring convulsions of the Peninsula. Busy as the
+present year has been, and abounding in events of exciting interest
+nearer home, the English public has yet found time to deplore the
+anarchy to which Portugal is a prey, and to marvel once more, as it
+many times before has marvelled, at the tardy realisation of those
+brilliant promises of order, prosperity, and good government, so
+long held out to the two Peninsular nations by the promoters of the
+Quadruple Alliance. The statesmen who, for nearly a score of years,
+have assiduously guided Portugal and Spain in the seductive paths
+of modern Liberalism, can hardly feel much gratification at the
+results of their well-intended but most unprosperous endeavours.
+It is difficult to imagine them contemplating with pride and
+exultation, or even without a certain degree of self-reproach, the
+fruits of their officious exertions. Repudiating partisan views of
+Peninsular politics, putting persons entirely out of the question,
+declaring our absolute indifference as to who occupies the thrones
+of Spain and Portugal, so long as those countries are well-governed,
+casting no imputations upon the motives of those foreign governments
+and statesmen who were chiefly instrumental in bringing about the
+present state of things south of the Pyrenees, we would look only to
+facts, and crave an honest answer to a plain question. The question
+is this: After the lapse of seventeen years, what is the condition
+of the two nations upon which have been conferred, at grievous
+expense of blood and treasure, the much vaunted blessings of rulers
+nominally Liberal, and professedly patriotic? For the present we
+will confine this inquiry to Portugal, for the reason that the War
+of Succession terminated in that country when it was but beginning
+in the neighbouring kingdom, since which time the vanquished party,
+unlike the Carlists in Spain, have uniformly abstained--with the
+single exception of the rising in 1846-7--from armed aggression, and
+have observed a patient and peaceful policy. So that the Portuguese
+Liberals have had seventeen years' fair trial of their governing
+capacity, and cannot allege that their efforts for their country's
+welfare have been impeded or retarded by the acts of that party whom
+they denounced as incapable of achieving it,--however they may have
+been neutralised by dissensions and anarchy in their own ranks.
+
+At this particular juncture of Portuguese affairs, and as no
+inappropriate preface to the only reply that can veraciously be
+given to the question we have proposed, it will not be amiss to take
+a brief retrospective glance at some of the events that preceded
+and led to the reign of Donna Maria. It will be remembered that
+from the year 1828 to 1834, the Liberals in both houses of the
+British Parliament, supported by an overwhelming majority of the
+British press, fiercely and pertinaciously assailed the government
+and person of Don Miguel, then _de facto_ King of Portugal, king
+_de jure_ in the eyes of the Portuguese Legitimists and by the
+vote of the Legitimate Cortes of 1828, and recognised (in 1829) by
+Spain, by the United States, and by various inferior powers. Twenty
+years ago political passions ran high in this country: public men
+were, perhaps, less guarded in their language; newspapers were
+certainly far more intemperate in theirs; and we may safely say,
+that upon no foreign prince, potentate, or politician, has virulent
+abuse--proceeding from such respectable sources--ever since been
+showered in England, in one half the quantity in which it then
+descended upon the head of the unlucky Miguel. Unquestionably Don
+Miguel had acted, in many respects, neither well nor wisely: his
+early education had been ill-adapted to the high position he was
+one day to fill--at a later period of his life he was destined to
+take lessons of wisdom and moderation in the stern but wholesome
+school of adversity. But it is also beyond a doubt, now that time
+has cleared up much which then was purposely garbled and distorted,
+that the object of all this invective was by no means so black as
+he was painted, and that his character suffered in England from the
+malicious calumnies of Pedroite refugees, and from the exaggerated
+and easily-accepted statements of the Portuguese correspondents
+of English newspapers. The Portuguese nation, removed from such
+influence, formed its own opinions from what it saw and observed;
+and the respect and affection testified, even at the present
+day, to their dethroned sovereign, by a large number of its most
+distinguished and respectable members, are the best refutation of
+the more odious of the charges so abundantly brought against him,
+and so lightly credited in those days of rampant revolution. It is
+unnecessary, therefore, to argue that point, even were personal
+vindication or attack the objects of this article, instead of being
+entirely without its scope. Against the insupportable oppression
+exercised by the monster in human form, as which Don Miguel was
+then commonly depicted in England and France, innumerable engines
+were directed by the governments and press of those two countries.
+Insurrections were stirred up in Portugal, volunteers were recruited
+abroad, irregular military expeditions were encouraged, loans were
+fomented; money-lenders and stock-jobbers were all agog for Pedro,
+patriotism, and profit. Orators and newspapers foretold, in glowing
+speeches and enthusiastic paragraphs, unbounded prosperity to
+Portugal as the sure consequence of the triumph of the revolutionary
+party. Rapid progress of civilisation, impartial and economical
+administration, increase of commerce, development of the country's
+resources, a perfect avalanche of social and political blessings,
+were to descend, like manna from heaven, upon the fortunate nation,
+so soon as the Liberals obtained the sway of its destinies. It were
+beside our purpose here to investigate how it was that, with such
+alluring prospects held out to them, the people of Portugal were so
+blind to their interests as to supply Don Miguel with men and money,
+wherewith to defend himself for five years against the assaults
+and intrigues of foreign and domestic enemies. Deprived of support
+and encouragement from without, he still held his ground; and the
+formation of a quadruple alliance, including the two most powerful
+countries in Europe, the enlistment of foreign mercenaries of a
+dozen different nations, the entrance of a numerous Spanish army,
+were requisite finally to dispossess him of his crown. The anomaly
+of the abhorred persecutor and tyrant receiving so much support from
+his ill-used subjects, even then struck certain men in this country
+whose names stand pretty high upon the list of clear-headed and
+experienced politicians, and the Duke of Wellington, Lord Aberdeen,
+Sir Robert Peel, Lord Lyndhurst, and others, defended Miguel; but
+their arguments, however cogent, were of little avail against the
+fierce tide of popular prejudice, unremittingly stimulated by the
+declamations of the press. To be brief, in 1834 Don Miguel was
+driven from Portugal; and his enemies, put in possession of the
+kingdom and all its resources, were at full liberty to realise the
+salutary reforms they had announced and promised, and for which they
+had professed to fight. On taking the reins of government, they
+had everything in their favour; their position was advantageous
+and brilliant in the highest degree. They enjoyed the prestige of
+a triumph, undisputed authority, powerful foreign protection and
+influence. At their disposal was an immense mass of property taken
+from the church, as well as the produce of large foreign loans.
+Their credit, too, was _then_ unlimited. Lastly--and this was far
+from the least of their advantages--they had in their favour the
+great discouragement and discontent engendered amongst the partisans
+of the Miguelite government, by the numerous and gross blunders
+which that government had committed--blunders which contributed
+even more to its downfall than did the attacks of its foes, or the
+effects of foreign hostility. In short, the Liberals were complete
+and undisputed masters of the situation. But, notwithstanding all
+the facilities and advantages they enjoyed, what has been the
+condition of Portugal since they assumed the reins? What _is_ its
+condition at the present day? We need not go far to ascertain it.
+The wretched plight of that once prosperous little kingdom is
+deposed to by every traveller who visits it, and by every English
+journal that has a correspondent there; it is to be traced in the
+columns of every Portuguese newspaper, and is admitted and deplored
+by thousands who once were strenuous and influential supporters
+of the party who promised so much, and who have performed so
+little that is good. The reign of that party whose battle-cry is,
+or was, Donna Maria and the Constitution, has been an unbroken
+series of revolutions, illegalities, peculations, corruptions, and
+dilapidations. The immense amount of misnamed "national property"
+(the _Infantado_ and church estates,) which was part of their
+capital on their accession to power, has disappeared without benefit
+either to the country or to its creditors. The treasury is empty;
+the public revenues are eaten up by anticipation; civil and military
+officers, the court itself, are all in constant and considerable
+arrears of salaries and pay. The discipline of the troops is
+destroyed, the soldiers being demoralised by the bad example of
+their chiefs, including that of Marshal Saldanha himself; for it
+is one of the great misfortunes of the Peninsula, that there most
+officers of a certain rank consider their political predilections
+before their military duty. The "Liberal" party, divided and
+subdivided, and split into fractions, whose numbers fluctuate at the
+dictates of interest or caprice, presents a lamentable spectacle
+of anarchy and inconsistency; whilst the Queen herself, whose good
+intentions we by no means impugn, has completely forfeited, as a
+necessary consequence of the misconduct of her counsellors, and of
+the sufferings the country has endured under her reign, whatever
+amount of respect, affection, and influence the Portuguese nation
+may once have been disposed to accord her. Such is the sad picture
+now presented by Portugal; and none whose acquaintance with facts
+renders them competent to judge, will say that it is overcharged or
+highly coloured.
+
+The party in Portugal who advocate a return to the ancient
+constitution,[7] under which the country flourished--which fell into
+abeyance towards the close of the seventeenth century, but which it
+is now proposed to revive, as preferable to, and practically more
+liberal than, the present system--and who adopt as a banner, and
+couple with this scheme, the name of Don Miguel de Bragança, have
+not unnaturally derived great accession of strength, both moral and
+numerical, from the faults and dissensions of their adversaries. At
+the present day there are few things which the European public, and
+especially that of this country, sooner becomes indifferent to, and
+loses sight of, than the person and pretensions of a dethroned king;
+and owing to the lapse of years, to his unobtrusive manner of life,
+and to the storm of accusations amidst which he made his exit from
+power, Don Miguel would probably be considered, by those persons in
+this country who remember his existence, as the least likely member
+of the royal triumvirate, now assembled in Germany, to exchange his
+exile for a crown. But if we would take a fair and impartial view of
+the condition of Portugal, and calculate, as far as is possible in
+the case of either of the two Peninsular nations, the probabilities
+and chances of the future, we must not suffer ourselves to be
+run away with by preconceived prejudices, or to be influenced by
+the popular odium attached to a name. After beholding the most
+insignificant and unpromising of modern pretenders suddenly elevated
+to the virtual sovereignty--however transitory it may prove--of one
+of the most powerful and civilised of European nations, it were
+rash to denounce as impossible any restoration or enthronement.
+And it were especially rash so to do when with the person of the
+aspirant to the throne a nation is able to connect a reasonable hope
+of improvement in its condition. Of the principle of legitimacy we
+here say nothing, for it were vain to deny that in Europe it is
+daily less regarded, whilst it sinks into insignificance when put in
+competition with the rights and wellbeing of the people.
+
+[7] It is desirable here to explain that the old constitution of
+Portugal, whose restoration is the main feature of the scheme of
+the National or Royalist party, (it assumes both names,) gave the
+right of voting at the election of members of the popular assembly
+to every man who had a hearth of his own--whether he occupied a
+whole house or a single room--in fact, to all heads of families
+and self-supporting persons. Such extent of suffrage ought surely
+to content the most democratic, and certainly presents a strong
+contrast to the farce of national representation which has been so
+long enacting in the Peninsula.
+
+As far back as the period of its emigration, the Pedroite or
+Liberal party split into two fractions. One of these believed
+in the possible realisation of those ultra-liberal theories so
+abundantly promulgated in the proclamations, manifestoes, preambles
+of laws, &c., which Don Pedro issued from the Brazils, from England
+and France, and afterwards from Terceira and Oporto. The other
+fraction of the party had sanctioned the promulgation of these
+utopian theories as a means of delusion, and as leading to their
+own triumph; but they deemed their realisation impossible, and were
+quite decided, when the revolutionary tide should have borne them
+into power, to oppose to the unruly flood the barrier of a gradual
+but steady reaction. At a later period these divisions of the
+Liberal party became more distinctly defined, and resulted, in 1836,
+in their nominal classification as Septembrists and Chartists--the
+latter of whom (numerically very weak, but comprising Costa Cabral,
+and other men of talent and energy) may be compared to the Moderados
+of Spain--the former to the Progresistas, but with tendencies more
+decidedly republican. It is the ambitious pretensions, the struggles
+for power and constant dissensions of these two sets of men, and
+of the minor fractions into which they have subdivided themselves,
+that have kept Portugal for seventeen years in a state of anarchy,
+and have ended by reducing her to her present pitiable condition.
+So numerous are the divisions, so violent the quarrels of the two
+parties, that their utter dissolution appears inevitable; and it is
+in view of this that the National party, as it styles itself, which
+inscribes upon its flag the name of Don Miguel--not as an absolute
+sovereign, but with powers limited by legitimate constitutional
+forms, to whose strict observance they bind him as a condition of
+their support, and of his continuance upon the throne upon which
+they hope to place him--uplifts its head, reorganises its hosts,
+and more clearly defines its political principles. Whilst Chartists
+and Septembrists tear each other to pieces, the Miguelites not only
+maintain their numerical importance, but, closing their ranks and
+acting in strict unity, they give constant proofs of adhesion to Don
+Miguel as personifying a national principle, and at the same time
+give evidence of political vitality by the activity and progress of
+their ideas, which are adapting themselves to the Liberal sentiments
+and theories of the times.[8] And it were flying in the face of
+facts to deny that this party comprehends a very important portion
+of the intelligence and respectability of the nation. It ascribes
+to itself an overwhelming majority in the country, and asserts that
+five-sixths of the population of Portugal would joyfully hail its
+advent to power. This of course must be viewed as an _ex-parte_
+statement, difficult for foreigners to verify or refute. But of
+late there have been no lack of proofs that a large proportion of
+the higher orders of Portuguese are steadfast in their aversion
+to the government of the "Liberals," and in their adherence to him
+whom they still, after his seventeen years' dethronement, persist in
+calling their king, and whom they have supported, during his long
+exile, by their willing contributions. It is fresh in every one's
+memory that, only the other day, twenty five peers, or successors
+of peers, who had been excluded by Don Pedro from the peerage for
+having sworn allegiance to his brother, having been reinstated and
+invited to take their seats in the Chamber, signed and published
+a document utterly rejecting the boon. Some hundreds of officers
+of the old army of Don Miguel, who are living for the most part
+in penury and privation, were invited to demand from Saldanha the
+restitution of their grades, which would have entitled them to
+the corresponding pay. To a man they refused, and protested their
+devotion to their former sovereign. A new law of elections, with a
+very extended franchise--nearly amounting, it is said, to universal
+suffrage--having been the other day arbitrarily decreed by the
+Saldanha cabinet (certainly a most unconstitutional proceeding,)
+and the government having expressed a wish that all parties in the
+kingdom should exercise the electoral right, and give their votes
+for representatives in the new parliament, a numerous and highly
+respectable meeting of the Miguelites was convened at Lisbon.
+This meeting voted, with but two dissentient voices, a resolution
+of abstaining from all share in the elections, declaring their
+determination not to sanction, by coming forward either as voters
+or candidates, a system and an order of things which they utterly
+repudiated as illegal, oppressive, and forced upon the nation by
+foreign interference. The same resolution was adopted by large
+assemblages in every province of the kingdom. At various periods,
+during the last seventeen years, the Portuguese government has
+endeavoured to inveigle the Miguelites into the representative
+assembly, doubtless hoping that upon its benches they would be
+more accessible to seduction, or easier to intimidate. It is a
+remarkable and significant circumstance, that only in one instance
+(in the year 1842) have their efforts been successful, and that
+the person who was then induced so to deviate from the policy of
+his party, speedily gave unmistakable signs of shame and regret.
+Bearing in mind the undoubted and easily proved fact that the
+Miguelites, whether their numerical strength be or be not as great
+as they assert, comprise a large majority of the clergy, of the old
+nobility, and of the most highly educated classes of the nation,
+their steady and consistent refusal to sanction the present order of
+things, by their presence in its legislative assembly, shows a unity
+of purpose and action, and a staunch and dogged conviction, which
+cannot but be disquieting to their adversaries, and over which it is
+impossible lightly to pass in an impartial review of the condition
+and prospects of Portugal.
+
+[8] The principal Miguelite papers, _A Nação_ (Lisbon,) and _O
+Portugal_ (Oporto,) both of them highly respectable journals,
+conducted with much ability and moderation, unceasingly reiterate,
+whilst exposing the vices and corruption of the present system,
+their aversion to despotism, and their desire for a truly liberal
+and constitutional government.
+
+We have already declared our determination here to attach importance
+to the persons of none of the four princes and princesses who claim
+or occupy the thrones of Spain and Portugal, except in so far as
+they may respectively unite the greatest amount of the national
+suffrage and adhesion. As regards Don Miguel, we are far from
+exaggerating his personal claims--the question of legitimacy being
+here waived. His prestige _out_ of Portugal is of the smallest, and
+certainly he has never given proofs of great talents, although he is
+not altogether without kingly qualities, nor wanting in resolution
+and energy; whilst his friends assert, and it is fair to admit as
+probable, that he has long since repented and abjured the follies
+and errors of his youth. But we cannot be blind to the fact of the
+strong sympathy and regard entertained for him by a very large
+number of Portuguese. His presence in London during some weeks of
+the present summer was the signal for a pilgrimage of Portuguese
+noblemen and gentlemen of the best and most influential families in
+the country, many of whom openly declared the sole object of their
+journey to be to pay their respects to their exiled sovereign;
+whilst others, the chief motive of whose visit was the attraction
+of the Industrial Exhibition, gladly seized the opportunity to
+reiterate the assurances of their fidelity and allegiance. Strangely
+enough, the person who opened the procession was a nephew of Marshal
+Saldanha, Don Antonio C. de Seabra, a staunch and intelligent
+royalist, whose visit to London coincided, as nearly as might be,
+with his uncle's flight into Galicia, and with his triumphant
+return to Oporto after the victory gained for him as he was
+decamping. Senhor Seabra was followed by two of the Freires, nephew
+and grand-nephew of the Freire who was minister-plenipotentiary
+in London some thirty years ago; by the Marquis and Marchioness
+of Vianna, and the Countess of Lapa--all of the first nobility
+of Portugal; by the Marquis of Abrantes, a relative of the royal
+family of Portugal; by a host of gentlemen of the first families in
+the provinces of Beira, Minho, Tras-os-Montes, &c.--Albuquerques,
+Mellos, Taveiras, Pachecos, Albergarias, Cunhas, Correa-de-Sas,
+Beduidos, San Martinhos, Pereiras, and scores of other names, which
+persons acquainted with Portugal will recognise as comprehending
+much of the best blood and highest intelligence in the country. Such
+demonstrations are not to be overlooked, or regarded as trivial
+and unimportant. Men like the Marquis of Abrantes, for instance,
+not less distinguished for mental accomplishment and elevation of
+character than for illustrious descent,[9] men of large possessions
+and extensive influence, cannot be assumed to represent only their
+individual opinions. The remarkable step lately taken by a number of
+Portuguese of this class, must be regarded as an indication of the
+state of feeling of a large portion of the nation; as an indication,
+too, of something grievously faulty in the conduct or constitution
+of a government which, after seventeen years' sway, has been unable
+to rally, reconcile, or even to appease the animosity of any portion
+of its original opponents.
+
+[9] The Marquis of Abrantes is descended from the Dukes of
+Lancaster, through Philippa of Lancaster, Queen of John I., one of
+the greatest kings Portugal ever possessed.
+
+Between the state of Portugal and that of Spain there are, at the
+present moment, points of strong contrast, and others of striking
+similarity. The similarity is in the actual condition of the two
+countries--in their sufferings, misgovernment, and degradation; the
+contrast is in the state and prospects of the political parties
+they contain. What we have said of the wretched plight of Portugal
+applies, with few and unimportant differences, to the condition
+of Spain. If there has lately been somewhat less of open anarchy
+in the latter country than in the dominions of Donna Maria, there
+has not been one iota less of tyrannical government and scandalous
+malversation. The public revenue is still squandered and robbed,
+the heavy taxes extorted from the millions still flow into the
+pockets of a few thousand corrupt officials, ministers are still
+stock-jobbers, the liberty of the press is still a farce,[10]
+and the national representation an obscene comedy. A change of
+ministry in Spain is undoubtedly a most interesting event to those
+who go out and those who come in--far more so in Spain than in
+any other country, since in no other country does the possession
+of office enable a beggar so speedily to transform himself into a
+_millionaire_. In Portugal the will is not wanting, but the means
+are less ample. More may be safely pilfered out of a sack of corn
+than out of a sieveful, and poor little Portugal's revenue does not
+afford such scope to the itching palms of Liberal statesmen as does
+the more ample one of Spain, which of late years has materially
+increased--without, however, the tax-payer and public creditor
+experiencing one crumb of the benefit they might fairly expect in
+the shape of reduced imposts and augmented dividends. But, however
+interesting to the governing fraction, a change of administration in
+Spain is contemplated by the governed masses with supreme apathy and
+indifference. They used once to be excited by such changes; but they
+have long ago got over that weakness, and suffer their pockets to be
+picked and their bodies to be trampled with a placidity bordering
+on the sublime. As long as things do not get _worse_, they remain
+quiet; they have little hope of their getting _better_. Here, again,
+in this fertile and beautiful and once rich and powerful country of
+Spain, a most gratifying picture is presented to the instigators of
+the Quadruple Alliance, to the upholders of the virtuous Christina
+and the innocent Isabel! Pity that it is painted with so ensanguined
+a brush, and that strife and discord should be the main features
+of the composition! Upon the first panel is exhibited a civil war
+of seven years' duration, vying, for cold-blooded barbarity and
+gratuitous slaughter, with the fiercest and most fanatical contests
+that modern _Times_ have witnessed. Terminated by a strange act of
+treachery, even yet imperfectly understood, the war was succeeded by
+a brief period of well-meaning but inefficient government. By the
+daring and unscrupulous manoeuvres of Louis Philippe and Christina
+this was upset--by means so extraordinary and so disgraceful to all
+concerned that scandalised Europe stood aghast, and almost refused
+to credit the proofs (which history will record) of the social
+degradation of Spaniards. For a moment Spain again stood divided and
+in arms, and on the brink of civil war. This danger over, the blood
+that had not been shed in the field flowed upon the scaffold: an
+iron hand and a pampered army crushed and silenced the disaffection
+and murmurs of the great body of the nation; and thus commenced a
+system of despotic and unscrupulous misrule and corruption, which
+still endures without symptom of improvement. As for the observance
+of the constitution, it is a mockery to speak of it, and has been so
+any time these eight years. In June 1850, Lord Palmerston, in the
+course of his celebrated defence of his foreign policy, declared
+himself happy to state that the government of Spain was at that time
+carried on more in accordance with the constitution than it had
+been two years previously. As ear-witnesses upon the occasion, we
+can do his lordship the justice to say that the assurance was less
+confidently and unhesitatingly spoken than were most other parts of
+his eloquent oration. It was duly cheered, however, by the Commons
+House--or at least by those Hispanophilists and philanthropists
+upon its benches who accepted the Foreign Secretary's assurance
+in lieu of any positive knowledge of their own. The grounds for
+applause and gratulation were really of the slenderest. In 1848,
+the _un_-constitutional period referred to by Lord Palmerston,
+the Narvaez and Christina government were in the full vigour of
+their repressive measures, shooting the disaffected by the dozen,
+and exporting hundreds to the Philippines or immuring them in
+dungeons. This, of course, could not go on for ever; the power was
+theirs, the malcontents were compelled to succumb; the paternal and
+constitutional government made a desert, and called it peace. Short
+time was necessary, when such violent means were employed, to crush
+Spain into obedience, and in 1850 she lay supine, still bleeding
+from many an inward wound, at her tyrants' feet. This morbid
+tranquillity might possibly be mistaken for an indication of an
+improved mode of government. As for any other sign of constitutional
+rule, we are utterly unable to discern it in either the past or
+the present year. The admirable observance of the constitution was
+certainly in process of proof, at the very time of Lord Palmerston's
+speech, by the almost daily violation of the liberty of the press,
+by the seizure of journals whose offending articles the authorities
+rarely condescended to designate, and whose incriminated editors
+were seldom allowed opportunity of exculpation before a fair
+tribunal. It was further testified to, less than four months later,
+by a general election, at which such effectual use was made of
+those means of intimidation and corruption which are manifold in
+Spain, that, when the popular Chamber assembled, the government was
+actually alarmed at the smallness of the opposition--limited, as it
+was, to about a dozen stray Progresistas, who, like the sleeping
+beauty in the fairy tale, rubbed their eyes in wonderment at finding
+themselves there. Nor were the ministerial forebodings groundless in
+the case of the unscrupulous and tyrannical Narvaez, who, within
+a few months, when seemingly more puissant than ever, and with
+an overwhelming majority in the Chamber obedient to his nod, was
+cast down by the wily hand that had set him up, and driven to seek
+safety in France from the vengeance of his innumerable enemies. The
+causes of this sudden and singular downfall are still a puzzle and a
+mystery to the world; but persons there are, claiming to see further
+than their neighbours into political millstones, who pretend that a
+distinguished diplomatist, of no very long standing at Madrid, had
+more to do than was patent to the world with the disgrace of the
+Spanish dictator, whom the wags of the Puerta del Sol declare to
+have exclaimed, as his carriage whirled him northwards through the
+gates of Madrid, "_Comme Henri Bulwer!_"
+
+[10] This remark, (regarding the press,) literally true in Spain,
+does not apply to Portugal.
+
+Passing from the misgovernment and sufferings of Spain to its
+political state, we experience some difficulty in clearly defining
+and exhibiting this, inasmuch as the various parties that have
+hitherto acted under distinct names are gradually blending and
+disappearing like the figures in dissolving views. In Portugal,
+as we have already shown, whilst Chartists and Septembrists
+distract the country, and damage themselves by constant quarrels
+and collisions, a third party, unanimous and determined in its
+opposition to those two, grows in strength, influence, and
+prestige. In Spain, _no_ party shows signs of healthy condition.
+In all three--Moderados, Progresistas, and Carlists--symptoms of
+dissolution are manifest. In the two countries, Chartists and
+Septembrists, Moderados and Progresistas, have alike split into two
+or more factions hostile to each other; but whilst, in Portugal,
+the Miguelites improve their position, in Spain the Carlist party
+is reduced to a mere shadow of its former self. Without recognised
+chiefs or able leaders, without political theory of government, it
+bases its pretensions solely upon the hereditary right of its head.
+For whilst Don Miguel, on several occasions,[11] has declared his
+adhesion to the liberal programme advocated by his party for the
+security of the national liberties, the Count de Montemolin, either
+from indecision of character, or influenced by evil counsels, has
+hitherto made no precise, public, and satisfactory declaration of
+his views in this particular,[12] and by such injudicious reserve
+has lost the suffrages of many whom a distinct pledge would have
+gathered round his banner. Thus has he partially neutralised the
+object of his father's abdication in his favour. Don Carlos was too
+completely identified with the old absolutist party, composed of
+intolerant bigots both in temporal and spiritual matters, ever to
+have reconciled himself with the progressive spirit of the century,
+or to have become acceptable to the present generation of Spaniards.
+Discerning or advised of this, he transferred his claims to his son,
+thus placing in his hands an excellent card, which the young prince
+has not known how to play. If, instead of encouraging a sullen and
+unprofitable emigration, fomenting useless insurrections, draining
+his adherents' purses, and squandering their blood, he had husbanded
+the resources of the party, clearly and publicly defined his plan of
+government--if ever seated upon the throne he claims--and awaited
+in dignified retirement the progress of events, he would not have
+supplied the present rulers of Spain with pretexts, eagerly taken
+advantage of, for shameful tyranny and persecution; and he would
+have spared himself the mortification of seeing his party dwindle,
+and his oldest and most trusted friends and adherents, with few
+exceptions, accept pardon and place from the enemies against whom
+they had long and bravely contended. But vacillation, incapacity,
+and treachery presided at his counsels. He had none to point out
+to him--or if any did, they were unheeded or overruled--the fact,
+of which experience and repeated disappointments have probably at
+last convinced him, that it is not by the armed hand alone--not by
+the sword of Cabrera, or by Catalonian guerilla risings--that he
+can reasonably hope ever to reach Madrid, but by aid of the moral
+force of public opinion, as a result of the misgovernment of Spain's
+present rulers, of an increasing confidence in his own merits and
+good intentions, and perhaps of such possible contingencies as a
+Bourbon restoration in France, or the triumph of the Miguelites in
+Portugal. This last-named event will very likely be considered,
+by that numerous class of persons who base their opinions of
+foreign politics upon hearsay and general impressions rather than
+upon accurate knowledge and investigation of facts, as one of the
+most improbable of possibilities. A careful and dispassionate
+examination of the present state of the Peninsula does not enable
+us to regard it as a case of such utter improbability. But for the
+intimate and intricate connection between the Spanish and Portuguese
+questions, it would by no means surprise us--bearing in mind all
+that Portugal has suffered and still suffers under her present
+rulers--to see the Miguelite party openly assume the preponderance
+in the country. England would not allow it, will be the reply. Let
+us try the exact value of this assertion. England has two reasons
+for hostility to Don Miguel--one founded on certain considerations
+connected with his conduct when formerly on the throne of Portugal,
+the other on the dynastic alliance between the two countries. The
+government of Donna Maria may reckon upon the sympathy, advice, and
+even upon the direct naval assistance of England--up to a certain
+point. That is to say, that the English government will do what it
+_conveniently_ and _suitably_ can, in favour of the Portuguese queen
+and her husband; but there is room for a strong doubt that it would
+_seriously_ compromise itself to maintain them upon the throne.
+Setting aside Donna Maria's matrimonial connection, Don Miguel, as
+a constitutional king, and with certain mercantile and financial
+arrangements, would suit English interests every bit as well. But
+the case is very different as regards Spain. The restoration of Don
+Miguel would be a terrible if not a fatal shock to the throne of
+Isabella II. and to the Moderado party, to whom the revival of the
+legitimist principle in Portugal would be so much the more dangerous
+if experience proved it to be compatible with the interests
+created by the Revolution. For the Spanish government, therefore,
+intervention against Don Miguel is an absolute necessity--we
+might perhaps say a condition of its existence; and thus is Spain
+the great stumbling-block in the way of his restoration, whereas
+England's objections might be found less invincible. So, in the
+civil war in Portugal, this country only co-operated indirectly
+against Don Miguel, and it is by no means certain he would have
+been overcome, but for the entrance of Rodil's Spaniards, which was
+the decisive blow to his cause. And so, the other day, the English
+government was seen patiently looking on at the progress of events,
+when it is well known that the question of immediate intervention
+was warmly debated in the Madrid cabinet, and might possibly have
+been carried, but for the moderating influence of English counsels.
+
+[11] Particularly by his "declaration" of the 24th June 1843, by
+his autograph letter of instructions of the 15th August of the same
+year, and by his "royal letter" of the 6th April 1847, which was
+widely circulated in Portugal.
+
+[12] We cannot attach value to the vague and most unsatisfactory
+manifesto signed "Carlos Luis," and issued from Bourges in May
+1845, or consider it as in the slightest degree disproving what
+we have advanced. It contains no distinct pledge or guarantee of
+constitutional government, but deals in frothy generalities and
+magniloquent protestations, binding to nothing the prince who signed
+it, and bearing more traces of the pen of a Jesuit priest than of
+that of a competent and statesmanlike adviser of a youthful aspirant
+to a throne.
+
+If we consider the critical and hazardous position of
+Marshal Saldanha, wavering as he is between Chartists and
+Septembrists--threatened to-day with a Cabralist insurrection,
+to-morrow with a Septembrist pronunciamiento--it is easy to foresee
+that the Miguelite party may soon find tempting opportunities of
+an active demonstration in the field. Such a movement, however,
+would be decidedly premature. Their game manifestly is to await
+with patience the development of the ultimate consequences of
+Saldanha's insurrection. It requires no great amount of judgment
+and experience in political matters judgment to foresee that he
+will be the victim of his own ill-considered movement, and that no
+long period will elapse before some new event--be it a Cabralist
+reaction or a Septembrist revolt--will prove the instability of the
+present order of things. With this certainty in view, the Miguelites
+are playing upon velvet. They have only to hold themselves in
+readiness to profit by the struggle between the two great divisions
+of the Liberal party. From this struggle they are not unlikely to
+derive an important accession of strength, if, as is by no means
+improbable, the Chartists should be routed and the Septembrists
+remain temporary masters of the field. To understand the possible
+coalition of a portion of the Chartists with the adherents of Don
+Miguel, it suffices to bear in mind that the former are supporters
+of constitutional monarchy, which principle would be endangered by
+the triumph of the Septembrists, whose republican tendencies are
+notorious, as is also--notwithstanding the momentary truce they have
+made with her--their hatred to Donna Maria.
+
+The first consequences of a Septembrist pronunciamiento would
+probably be the deposition of the Queen and the scattering of the
+Chartists; and in this case it is easy to conceive the latter
+beholding in an alliance with the Miguelite party their sole chance
+of escape from democracy, and from a destruction of the numerous
+interests they have acquired during their many years of power. It
+is no unfair inference that Costa Cabral, when he caused himself,
+shortly after his arrival in London, to be presented to Don Miguel
+in a particularly public place, anticipated the probability of some
+such events as we have just sketched, and thus indicated, to his
+friends and enemies, the new service to which he might one day be
+disposed to devote his political talents.
+
+The intricate and suggestive complications of Peninsular politics
+offer a wide field for speculation; but of this we are not at
+present disposed further to avail ourselves, our object being to
+elucidate facts rather than to theorise or indulge in predictions
+with respect to two countries by whose political eccentricities
+more competent prophets than ourselves have, upon so many occasions
+during the last twenty years, been puzzled and led astray. We
+sincerely wish that the governments of Spain and Portugal were now
+in the hands of men capable of conciliating all parties, and of
+averting future convulsions--of men sufficiently able and patriotic
+to conceive and carry out measures adapted to the character, temper,
+and wants of the two nations. If, by what we should be compelled
+to look upon almost as a miracle, such a state of things came
+about in the Peninsula, we should be far indeed from desiring to
+see it disturbed, and discord again introduced into the land, for
+the vindication of the principle of legitimacy, respectable though
+we hold that to be. But if Spain and Portugal are to continue a
+byword among the nations, the focus of administrative abuses and
+oligarchical tyranny; if the lower classes of society in those
+countries, by nature brave and generous, are to remain degraded
+into the playthings of egotistical adventurers, whilst the more
+respectable and intelligent portion of the higher orders stands
+aloof in disgust from the orgies of misgovernment; if this state of
+things is to endure, without prospect of amendment, until the masses
+throw themselves into the arms of the apostles of democracy--who,
+it were vain to deny, gain ground in the Peninsula--then, we ask,
+before it comes to that, would it not be well to give a chance to
+parties and to men whose character and principles at least unite
+some elements of stability, and who, whatever reliance may be placed
+on their promises for the future, candidly admit their past faults
+and errors? Assuredly those nations incur a heavy responsibility,
+and but poorly prove their attachment to the cause of constitutional
+freedom, who avail themselves of superior force to detain feeble
+allies beneath the yoke of intolerable abuses.
+
+
+
+
+THE CONGRESS AND THE AGAPEDOME.
+
+A TALE OF PEACE AND LOVE.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+If I were to commence my story by stating, in the manner of the
+military biographers, that Jack Wilkinson was as brave a man as
+ever pushed a bayonet into the brisket of a Frenchman, I should be
+telling a confounded lie, seeing that, to the best of my knowledge,
+Jack never had the opportunity of attempting practical phlebotomy.
+I shall content myself with describing him as one of the finest and
+best-hearted fellows that ever held her Majesty's commission; and no
+one who is acquainted with the general character of the officers of
+the British army, will require a higher eulogium.
+
+Jack and I were early cronies at school; but we soon separated,
+having been born under the influence of different planets. Mars, who
+had the charge of Jack, of course devoted him to the army; Jupiter,
+who was bound to look after my interests, could find nothing better
+for me than a situation in the Woods and Forests, with a faint
+chance of becoming in time a subordinate Commissioner--that is,
+provided the wrongs of Ann Hicks do not precipitate the abolition of
+the whole department. Ten years elapsed before we met; and I regret
+to say that, during that interval, neither of us had ascended many
+rounds of the ladder of promotion. As was most natural, I considered
+my own case as peculiarly hard, and yet Jack's was perhaps harder.
+He had visited with his regiment, in the course of duty, the Cape,
+the Ionian Islands, Gibraltar, and the West Indies. He had caught
+an ague in Canada, and had been transplanted to the north of
+Ireland by way of a cure; and yet he had not gained a higher rank
+in the service than that of Lieutenant. The fact is, that Jack was
+poor, and his brother officers as tough as though they had been
+made of caoutchouc. Despite the varieties of climate to which they
+were exposed, not one of them would give up the ghost; even the
+old colonel, who had been twice despaired of, recovered from the
+yellow fever, and within a week after was lapping his claret at the
+mess-table as jollily as if nothing had happened. The regiment had a
+bad name in the service: they called it, I believe, "the Immortals."
+
+Jack Wilkinson, as I have said, was poor, but he had an uncle
+who was enormously rich. This uncle, Mr Peter Pettigrew by name,
+was an old bachelor and retired merchant, not likely, according
+to the ordinary calculation of chances, to marry; and as he had
+no other near relative save Jack, to whom, moreover, he was
+sincerely attached, my friend was generally regarded in the light
+of a prospective proprietor, and might doubtless, had he been so
+inclined, have negotiated a loan, at or under seventy per cent,
+with one of those respectable gentlemen who are making such violent
+efforts to abolish Christian legislation. But Pettigrew also was
+tough as one of "the Immortals," and Jack was too prudent a fellow
+to intrust himself to hands so eminently accomplished in the art
+of wringing the last drop of moisture from a sponge. His uncle, he
+said, had always behaved handsomely to him, and he would see the
+whole tribe of Issachar drowned in the Dardanelles rather than abuse
+his kindness by raising money on a post-obit. Pettigrew, indeed, had
+paid for his commission, and, moreover, given him a fair allowance
+whilst he was quartered abroad--circumstances which rendered it
+extremely probable that he would come forward to assist his nephew
+so soon as the latter had any prospect of purchasing his company.
+
+Happening by accident to be in Hull, where the regiment was
+quartered, I encountered Wilkinson, whom I found not a whit altered
+for the worse, either in mind or body, since the days when we were
+at school together; and at his instance I agreed to prolong my
+stay, and partake of the hospitality of the Immortals. A merry set
+they were! The major told a capital story, the senior captain sung
+like Incledon, the _cuisine_ was beyond reproach, and the liquor
+only too alluring. But all things must have an end. It is wise to
+quit even the most delightful society before it palls upon you,
+and before it is accurately ascertained that you, clever fellow
+as you are, can be, on occasion, quite as prosy and ridiculous as
+your neighbours; therefore on the third day I declined a renewal
+of the ambrosial banquet, and succeeded in persuading Wilkinson to
+take a quiet dinner with me at my own hotel. He assented--the more
+readily, perhaps, that he appeared slightly depressed in spirits, a
+phenomenon not altogether unknown under similar circumstances.
+
+After the cloth was removed, we began to discourse upon our
+respective fortunes, not omitting the usual complimentary remarks
+which, in such moments of confidence, are applied to one's
+superiors, who may be very thankful that they do not possess a
+preternatural power of hearing. Jack informed me that at length
+a vacancy had occurred in his regiment, and that he had now an
+opportunity, could he deposit the money, of getting his captaincy.
+But there was evidently a screw loose somewhere.
+
+"I must own," said Jack, "that it _is_ hard, after having waited so
+long, to lose a chance which may not occur again for years; but what
+can I do? You see I haven't got the money; so I suppose I must just
+bend to my luck, and wait in patience for my company until my head
+is as bare as a billiard-ball!"
+
+"But, Jack," said I, "excuse me for making the remark--but won't
+your uncle, Mr Pettigrew, assist you?"
+
+"Not the slightest chance of it."
+
+"You surprise me," said I; "I am very sorry to hear you say so. I
+always understood that you were a prime favourite of his."
+
+"So I was; and so, perhaps, I am," replied Wilkinson; "but that
+don't alter the matter."
+
+"Why, surely," said I, "if he is inclined to help you at all, he
+will not be backward at a time like this. I am afraid, Jack, you
+allow your modesty to wrong you."
+
+"I shall permit my modesty," said Jack, "to take no such impertinent
+liberty. But I see you don't know my uncle Peter."
+
+"I have not that pleasure, certainly; but he bears the character of
+a good honest fellow, and everybody believes that you are to be his
+heir."
+
+"That may be, or may not, according to circumstances," said
+Wilkinson. "You are quite right as to his character, which I
+would advise no one to challenge in my presence; for, though I
+should never get another stiver from him, or see a farthing of his
+property, I am bound to acknowledge that he has acted towards me in
+the most generous manner. But I repeat that you don't understand my
+uncle."
+
+"Nor ever shall," said I, "unless you condescend to enlighten me."
+
+"Well, then, listen. Old Peter would be a regular trump, but for one
+besetting foible. He cannot resist a crotchet. The more palpably
+absurd and idiotical any scheme may be, the more eagerly he adopts
+it; nay, unless it _is_ absurd and idiotical, such as no man of
+common sense would listen to for a moment, he will have nothing
+to say to it. He is quite shrewd enough with regard to commercial
+matters. During the railway mania, he is supposed to have doubled
+his capital. Never having had any faith in the stability of the
+system, he sold out just at the right moment, alleging that it was
+full time to do so, when Sir Robert Peel introduced a bill giving
+the Government the right of purchasing any line when its dividends
+amounted to ten per cent. The result proved that he was correct."
+
+"It did, undoubtedly. But surely that is no evidence of his extreme
+tendency to be led astray by crotchets?"
+
+"Quite the reverse: the scheme was not sufficiently absurd for him.
+Besides, I must tell you, that in pure commercial matters it would
+be very difficult to overreach or deceive my uncle. He has a clear
+eye for pounds, shillings, and pence--principal and interest--and
+can look very well after himself when his purse is directly
+assailed. His real weakness lies in sentiment."
+
+"Not, I trust, towards the feminine gender? That might be awkward
+for you in a gentleman of his years!"
+
+"Not precisely--though I would not like to trust him in the hands
+of a designing female. His besetting weakness turns on the point of
+the regeneration of mankind. Forty or fifty years ago he would have
+been a follower of Johanna Southcote. He subscribed liberally to
+Owen's schemes, and was within an ace of turning out with Thom of
+Canterbury. Incredible as it may appear, he actually was for a time
+a regular and accepted Mormonite."
+
+"You don't mean to say so?"
+
+"Fact, I assure you, upon my honour! But for a swindle that Joe
+Smith tried to perpetrate about the discounting of a bill, Peter
+Pettigrew might at this moment have been a leading saint in the
+temple of Nauvoo, or whatever else they call the capital of that
+polygamous and promiscuous persuasion."
+
+"You amaze me. How any man of common sense--"
+
+"That's just the point. Where common sense ends, Uncle Pettigrew
+begins. Give him a mere thread of practicability, and he will arrive
+at a sound conclusion. Envelope him in the mist of theory, and he
+will walk headlong over a precipice."
+
+"Why, Jack," said I, "you seem to have improved in your figures
+of speech since you joined the army. That last sentence was worth
+preservation. But I don't clearly understand you yet. What is his
+present phase, which seems to stand in the way of your prospects?"
+
+"Can't you guess? What is the most absurd feature of the present
+time?"
+
+"That," said I, "is a very difficult question. There's Free Trade,
+and the proposed Exhibition--both of them absurd enough, if you
+look to their ultimate tendency. Then there are Sir Charles Wood's
+Budget, and the new Reform Bill, and the Encumbered Estates Act, and
+the whole rubbish of the Cabinet, which they have neither sense to
+suppress nor courage to carry through. Upon my word, Jack, it would
+be impossible for me to answer your question satisfactorily."
+
+"What do you think of the Peace Congress?" asked Wilkinson.
+
+"As Palmerston does," said I; "remarkably meanly. But why do you put
+that point? Surely Mr Pettigrew has not become a disciple of the
+blatant blacksmith?"
+
+"Read that, and judge for yourself," said Wilkinson, handing me over
+a letter.
+
+I read as follows:--
+
+     "MY DEAR NEPHEW,--I have your letter of the 15th, apprising me
+     of your wish to obtain what you term a step in the service. I
+     am aware that I am not entitled to blame you for a misguided
+     and lamentably mistaken zeal, which, to my shame be it said, I
+     was the means of originally kindling; still, you must excuse
+     me if, with the new lights which have been vouchsafed to me, I
+     decline to assist your progress towards wholesale homicide, or
+     lend any farther countenance to a profession which is subversive
+     of that universal brotherhood and entire fraternity which ought
+     to prevail among the nations. The fact is, Jack, that, up to
+     the present time, I have entertained ideas which were totally
+     false regarding the greatness of my country. I used to think
+     that England was quite as glorious from her renown in arms as
+     from her skill in arts--that she had reason to plume herself
+     upon her ancient and modern victories, and that patriotism
+     was a virtue which it was incumbent upon freemen to view with
+     respect and veneration. Led astray by these wretched prejudices,
+     I gave my consent to your enrolling yourself in the ranks of
+     the British army, little thinking that, by such a step, I was
+     doing a material injury to the cause of general pacification,
+     and, in fact, retarding the advent of that millennium which
+     will commence so soon as the military profession is entirely
+     suppressed throughout Europe. I am now also painfully aware
+     that, towards you individually, I have failed in performing my
+     duty. I have been the means of inoculating you with a thirst
+     for human blood, and of depriving you of that opportunity of
+     adding to the resources of your country, which you might have
+     enjoyed had I placed you early in one of those establishments
+     which, by sending exports to the uttermost parts of the earth,
+     have contributed so magnificently to the diffusion of British
+     patterns, and the growth of American cotton under a mild system
+     of servitude, which none, save the minions of royalty, dare
+     denominate as actual slavery.
+
+     "In short, Jack, I have wronged you; but I should wrong you
+     still more were I to furnish you with the means of advancing one
+     other step in your bloody and inhuman profession. It is full
+     time that we should discard all national recollections. We have
+     already given a glorious example to Europe and the world, by
+     throwing open our ports to their produce without requiring the
+     assurance of reciprocity--let us take another step in the same
+     direction, and, by a complete disarmament, convince them that
+     for the future we rely upon moral reason, instead of physical
+     force, as the means of deciding differences. I shall be glad,
+     my dear boy, to repair the injury which I have unfortunately
+     done you, by contributing a sum, equal to three times the
+     amount required for the purchase of a company, towards your
+     establishment as a partner in an exporting house, if you can
+     hear of an eligible offer. Pray keep an eye on the advertising
+     columns of the _Economist_. That journal is in every way
+     trustworthy, except, perhaps, when it deals in quotation. I must
+     now conclude, as I have to attend a meeting for the purpose of
+     denouncing the policy of Russia, and of warning the misguided
+     capitalists of London against the perils of an Austrian loan.
+     You cannot, I am sure, doubt my affection, but you must not
+     expect me to advance my money towards keeping up a herd of
+     locusts, without which there would be a general conversion of
+     swords and bayonets into machinery--ploughshares, spades, and
+     pruning-hooks being, for the present, rather at a discount.--I
+     remain always your affectionate uncle,
+
+     "PETER PETTIGREW.
+
+     "_P. S._--Address to me at Hesse Homberg, whither I am going as
+     a delegate to the Peace Congress."
+
+"Well, what do you think of that?" said Wilkinson, when I had
+finished this comfortable epistle. "I presume you agree with me,
+that I have no chance whatever of receiving assistance from that
+quarter."
+
+"Why, not much I should say, unless you can succeed in convincing Mr
+Pettigrew of the error of his ways. It seems to me a regular case of
+monomania."
+
+"Would you not suppose, after reading that letter, that I was a
+sort of sucking tiger, or at best an ogre, who never could sleep
+comfortably unless he had finished off the evening with a cup of
+gore?" said Wilkinson. "I like that coming from old Uncle Peter, who
+used to sing Rule Britannia till he was hoarse, and always dedicated
+his second glass of port to the health of the Duke of Wellington!"
+
+"But what do you intend to do?" said I. "Will you accept his offer,
+and become a fabricator of calicoes?"
+
+"I'd as soon become a field preacher, and hold forth on an inverted
+tub! But the matter is really very serious. In his present mood of
+mind, Uncle Peter will disinherit me to a certainty if I remain in
+the army."
+
+"Does he usually adhere long to any particular crotchet?" said I.
+
+"Why, no; and therein lies my hope. Judging from past experience,
+I should say that this fit is not likely to last above a month or
+two; still you see there may be danger in treating the matter too
+lightly: besides, there is no saying when such another opportunity
+of getting a step may occur. What would you advise under the
+circumstances?"
+
+"If I were in your place," said I, "I think I should go over to
+Hesse Homberg at once. You need not identify yourself entirely with
+the Peace gentry; you will be near your uncle, and ready to act as
+circumstances may suggest."
+
+"That is just my own notion; and I think I can obtain leave of
+absence. I say--could you not manage to go along with me? It would
+be a real act of friendship; for, to say the truth, I don't think I
+could trust any of our fellows in the company of the Quakers."
+
+"Well--I believe they can spare me for a little longer from my
+official duties; and as the weather is fine, I don't mind if I go."
+
+"That's a good fellow! I shall make my arrangements this evening;
+for the sooner we are off the better."
+
+Two days afterwards we were steaming up the Rhine, a river which, I
+trust, may persevere in its attempt to redeem its ancient character.
+In 1848, when I visited Germany last, you might just as well have
+navigated the Phlegethon in so far as pleasure was concerned. Those
+were the days of barricades and of Frankfort murders--of the obscene
+German Parliament, as the junta of rogues, fanatics, and imbeciles,
+who were assembled in St Paul's Church, denominated themselves; and
+of every phase and form of political quackery and insurrection.
+Now, however, matters were somewhat mended. The star of Gagern had
+waned. The popularity of the Archduke John had exhaled like the
+fume of a farthing candle. Hecker and Struve were hanged, shot, or
+expatriated; and the peaceably disposed traveller could once more
+retire to rest in his hotel, without being haunted by a horrid
+suspicion that ere morning some truculent waiter might experiment
+upon the toughness of his larynx. I was glad to observe that the
+Frankforters appeared a good deal humbled. They were always a
+pestilent set; but during the revolutionary year their insolence
+rose to such a pitch that it was hardly safe for a man of warm
+temperament to enter a shop, lest he should be provoked by the airs
+and impertinence of the owner to commit an assault upon Freedom in
+the person of her democratic votary. I suspect the Frankforters are
+now tolerably aware that revolutions are the reverse of profitable.
+They escaped sack and pillage by a sheer miracle, and probably they
+will not again exert themselves, at least for a considerable number
+of years, to hasten the approach of a similar crisis.
+
+Everybody knows Homberg. On one pretext or another--whether the
+mineral springs, the baths, the gaiety, or the gambling--the
+integral portions of that tide of voyagers which annually fluctuates
+through the Rheingau, find their way to that pleasant little
+pandemonium, and contribute, I have no doubt, very largely to
+the revenues of that high and puissant monarch who rules over a
+population not quite so large as that comprehended within the
+boundaries of Clackmannan. But various as its visitors always are,
+and diverse in language, habits, and morals, I question whether
+Homberg ever exhibited on any previous occasion so queer and
+incongruous a mixture. Doubtful counts, apocryphal barons, and
+chevaliers of the extremest industry, mingled with sleek Quakers,
+Manchester reformers, and clerical agitators of every imaginable
+species of dissent. Then there were women, for the most part of a
+middle age, who, although their complexions would certainly have
+been improved by a course of the medicinal waters, had evidently
+come to Homberg on a higher and holier mission. There was also a
+sprinkling of French deputies--Red Republicans by principle, who,
+if not the most ardent friends of pacification, are at least the
+loudest in their denunciation of standing armies--a fair proportion
+of political exiles, who found their own countries too hot to hold
+them in consequence of the caloric which they had been the means
+of evoking--and one or two of those unhappy personages, whose itch
+for notoriety is greater than their modicum of sense. We were not
+long in finding Mr Peter Pettigrew. He was solacing himself in
+the gardens, previous to the table-d'hôte, by listening to the
+exhilarating strains of the brass band which was performing a
+military march; and by his side was a lady attired, not in the usual
+costume of her sex, but in a polka jacket and wide trousers, which
+gave her all the appearance of a veteran duenna of a seraglio. Uncle
+Peter, however, beamed upon her as tenderly as though she were a
+Circassian captive. To this lady, by name Miss Lavinia Latchley, an
+American authoress of much renown, and a decided champion of the
+rights of woman, we were presented in due form. After the first
+greetings were over, Mr Pettigrew opened the trenches.
+
+"So Jack, my boy, you have come to Homberg to see how we carry on
+the war, eh? No--Lord forgive me--that's not what I mean. We don't
+intend to carry on any kind of war: we mean to put it down--clap
+the extinguisher upon it, you know; and have done with all kinds
+of cannons. Bad thing, gunpowder! I once sustained a heavy loss by
+sending out a cargo of it to Sierra Leone."
+
+"I should have thought that a paying speculation," observed Jack.
+
+"Not a whit of it! The cruisers spoiled the trade; and the
+missionaries--confound them for meddling with matters which they
+did not understand!--had patched up a peace among the chiefs of the
+cannibals; so that for two years there was not a slave to be had for
+love or money, and powder went down a hundred and seventy per cent."
+
+"Such are the effects," remarked Miss Latchley with a sarcastic
+smile, which disclosed a row of teeth as yellow as the buds
+of the crocus--"such are the effects of an ill regulated and
+unphilosophical yearning after the visionary theories of an
+unopportune emancipation! Oh that men, instead of squandering their
+sympathies upon the lower grades of creation, would emancipate
+themselves from that network of error and prejudice which
+reticulates over the whole surface of society, and by acknowledging
+the divine mission and hereditary claims of woman, construct a new,
+a fairer Eden than any which was fabled to exist within the confines
+of the primitive Chaldæa!"
+
+"Very true, indeed, ma'am!" replied Mr Pettigrew; "there is a great
+deal of sound sense and observation in what you say. But Jack--I
+hope you intend to become a member of Congress at once. I shall be
+glad to present you at our afternoon meeting in the character of a
+converted officer."
+
+"You are very good, uncle, I am sure," said Wilkinson, "but I would
+rather wait a little. I am certain you would not wish me to take
+so serious a step without mature deliberation; and I hope that my
+attendance here, in answer to your summons, will convince you that I
+am at least open to conviction. In fact, I wish to hear the argument
+of your friends before I come to a definite decision."
+
+"Very right, Jack; very right!" said Mr Pettigrew. "I don't like
+converts at a minute's notice, as I remarked to a certain M.P. when
+he followed in the wake of Peel. Take your time, and form your own
+judgment; I cannot doubt of the result, if you only listen to the
+arguments of the leading men of Europe."
+
+"And do you reckon America as nothing, dear Mr Pettigrew?" said
+Miss Latchley. "Columbia may not be able to contribute to the task
+so practical and masculine an intellect as yours, yet still within
+many a Transatlantic bosom burns a hate of tyranny not less intense,
+though perhaps less corruscating, than your own."
+
+"I know it, I know it, dear Miss Latchley!" replied the infatuated
+Peter. "A word from you is at any time worth a lecture, at least
+if I may judge from the effects which your magnificent eloquence
+has produced on my own mind. Jack, I suppose you have never had the
+privilege of listening to the lectures of Miss Latchley?"
+
+Jack modestly acknowledged the gap which had been left in his
+education; stating, at the same time, his intense desire to have it
+filled up at the first convenient opportunity. Miss Latchley heaved
+a sigh.
+
+"I hope you do not flatter me," she said, "as is too much the
+case with men whose thoughts have been led habitually to deviate
+from sincerity. The worst symptom of the present age lies in its
+acquiescence with axioms. Free us from that, and we are free indeed;
+perpetuate its thraldom, and Truth, which is the daughter of
+Innocence and Liberty, imps its wings in vain, and cannot emancipate
+itself from the pressure of that raiment which was devised to impede
+its glorious walk among the nations."
+
+Jack made no reply beyond a glance at the terminations of the lady,
+which showed that she at all events was resolved that no extra
+raiment should trammel her onward progress.
+
+As the customary hour of the table-d'hôte was approaching, we
+separated, Jack and I pledging ourselves to attend the afternoon
+meeting of the Peace Congress, for the purpose of receiving our
+first lesson in the mysteries of pacification.
+
+"Well, what do you think of that?" said Jack, as Mr Pettigrew and
+the Latchley walked off together. "Hang me if I don't suspect that
+old harpy in the breeches has a design on Uncle Peter!"
+
+"Small doubt of that," said I; "and you will find it rather
+a difficult job to get him out of her clutches. Your female
+philosopher adheres to her victim with all the tenacity of a
+polecat."
+
+"Here is a pretty business!" groaned Jack. "I'll tell you what it
+is--I have more than half a mind to put an end to it, by telling my
+uncle what I think of his conduct, and then leaving him to marry
+this harridan, and make a further fool of himself in any way he
+pleases!"
+
+"Don't be silly, Jack!" said I; "It will be time enough to do that
+after everything else has failed; and, for my own part, I see no
+reason to despair. In the mean time, if you please, let us secure
+places at the dinner-table."
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+"Dear friends and well-beloved brothers! I wish from the bottom
+of my heart that there was but one universal language, so that
+the general sentiments of love, equality, and fraternity, which
+animate the bosoms of all the pacificators and detesters of tyranny
+throughout the world, might find a simultaneous echo in your ears,
+by the medium of a common speech. The diversity of dialects, which
+now unfortunately prevails, was originally invented under cover of
+the feudal system, by the minions of despotism, who thought, by such
+despicable means, for ever to perpetuate their power. It is part of
+the same system which decrees that in different countries alien to
+each other in speech, those unhappy persons who have sold themselves
+to do the bidding of tyrants shall be distinguished by different
+uniforms. O my brothers! see what a hellish and deep-laid system is
+here! English and French--scarlet against blue--different tongues
+invented, and different garments prescribed, to inflame the passions
+of mankind against each other, and to stifle their common fraternity!
+
+"Take down, I say, from your halls and churches those wretched
+tatters of silk which you designate as national colours! Bring
+hither, from all parts of the earth, the butt of the gun and
+the shaft of the spear, and all combustible implements of
+destruction--your fascines, your scaling-ladders, and your terrible
+pontoons, that have made so many mothers childless! Heap them into
+one enormous pile--yea, heap them to the very stars--and on that
+blazing altar let there be thrown the Union Jack of Britain, the
+tricolor of France, the eagles of Russia, Austria, and Prussia, the
+American stripes and stars, and every other banner and emblem of
+that accursed nationality, through which alone mankind is defrauded
+of his birthright. Then let all men join hands together, and as they
+dance around the reeking pile, let them in one common speech chaunt
+a simultaneous hymn in honour of their universal deliverance, and in
+commemoration of their cosmopolitan triumph!
+
+"O my brothers, O my brothers! what shall I say further? Ha! I will
+not address myself to you whose hearts are already kindled within
+you by the purest of spiritual flames. I will uplift my voice, and
+in words of thunder exhort the debased minions of tyranny to arouse
+themselves ere it be too late, and to shake off those fetters which
+they wear for the purpose of enslaving others. Hear me, then, ye
+soldiers!--hear me, ye degraded serfs!--hear me, ye monsters of
+iniquity! Oh, if the earth could speak, what a voice would arise
+out of its desolate battle-fields, to testify against you and
+yours! Tell us not that you have fought for freedom. Was freedom
+ever won by the sword? Tell us not that you have defended your
+country's rights, for in the eye of the true philosopher there is
+no country save one, and that is the universal earth, to which all
+have an equal claim. Shelter not yourselves, night-prowling hyenas
+as you are, under such miserable pretexts as these! Hie ye to the
+charnel-houses, ye bats, ye vampires, ye ravens, ye birds of the
+foulest omen! Strive, if you can, in their dark recesses, to hide
+yourselves from the glare of that light which is now permeating
+the world. O the dawn! O the glory! O the universal illumination!
+See, my brothers, how they shrink, how they flee from its cheering
+influence! Tremble, minions of despotism! Your race is run, your
+very empires are tottering around you. See--with one grasp I crush
+them all, as I crush this flimsy scroll!"
+
+Here the eloquent gentleman, having made a paper ball of the last
+number of the _Allgemeine Zeitung_, sate down amidst the vociferous
+applause of the assembly. He was the first orator who had spoken,
+and I believe had been selected to lead the van on account of his
+platform experience, which was very great. I cannot say, however,
+that his arguments produced entire conviction upon my mind, or that
+of my companion, judging from certain muttered adjurations which
+fell from Wilkinson, to the effect that on the first convenient
+opportunity he would take means to make the crumpler-up of nations
+atone for his scurrilous abuse of the army. We were next favoured
+with addresses in Sclavonian, German, and French; and then another
+British orator came forward to enlighten the public. This last was
+a fellow of some fancy. Avoiding all stale topics about despotism,
+aristocracies, and standing armies, he went to the root of the
+matter, by asserting that in Vegetarianism alone lay the true escape
+from the horrors and miseries of war. Mr Belcher--for such was the
+name of this distinguished philanthropist--opined that without beef
+and mutton there never could be a battle.
+
+"Had Napoleon," said he, "been dieted from his youth upwards upon
+turnips, the world would have been spared those scenes of butchery,
+which must ever remain a blot upon the history of the present
+century. One of our oldest English annalists assures us that Jack
+Cade, than whom, perhaps, there never breathed a more uncompromising
+enemy of tyranny, subsisted entirely upon spinach. This fact has
+been beautifully treated by Shakspeare, whose passion for onions was
+proverbial, in his play of Henry VI., wherein he represents Cade,
+immediately before his death, as engaged in the preparation of a
+salad. I myself," continued Mr Belcher in a slightly flatulent tone,
+"can assure this honourable company, that for more than six months I
+have cautiously abstained from using any other kind of food, except
+broccoli, which I find at once refreshing and laxative, light, airy,
+and digestible!"
+
+Mr Belcher having ended, a bearded gentleman, who enjoyed the
+reputation of being the most notorious duellist in Europe, rose
+up for the purpose of addressing the audience; but by this time
+the afternoon was considerably advanced, and a large number of the
+Congress had silently seceded to the _roulette_ and _rouge-et-noir_
+tables. Among these, to my great surprise, were Miss Latchley and
+Mr Pettigrew: it being, as I afterwards understood, the invariable
+practice of this gifted lady, whenever she could secure a victim,
+to avail herself of his pecuniary resources; so that if fortune
+declared against her, the gentleman stood the loss, whilst, in the
+opposite event, she retained possession of the spoil. I daresay some
+of my readers may have been witnesses to a similar arrangement.
+
+As it was no use remaining after the departure of Mr Pettigrew,
+Wilkinson and I sallied forth for a stroll, not, as you may well
+conceive, in a high state of enthusiasm or rapture.
+
+"I would not have believed," said Wilkinson, "unless I had seen it
+with my own eyes, that it was possible to collect in one room so
+many samples of absolute idiocy. What a pleasant companion that
+Belcher fellow, who eats nothing but broccoli, must be!"
+
+"A little variety in the way of peas would probably render him
+perfect. But what do you say to the first orator?"
+
+"I shall reserve the expression of my opinion," replied Jack, "until
+I have the satisfaction of meeting that gentleman in private. But
+how are we to proceed? With this woman in the way, it entirely
+baffles my comprehension."
+
+"Do you know, Jack, I was thinking of that during the whole time of
+the meeting; and it does appear to me that there is a way open by
+which we may precipitate the crisis. Mind--I don't answer for the
+success of my scheme, but it has at least the merit of simplicity."
+
+"Out with it, my dear fellow! I am all impatience," cried Jack.
+
+"Well, then," said I, "did you remark the queer and heterogeneous
+nature of the company? I don't think, if you except the Quakers, who
+have the generic similarity of eels, that you could have picked out
+any two individuals with a tolerable resemblance to each other."
+
+"That's likely enough, for they are a most seedy set. But what of
+it?"
+
+"Why, simply this: I suspect the majority of them are political
+refugees. No person, who is not an absurd fanatic or a designing
+demagogue, can have any sympathy with the nonsense which is talked
+against governments and standing armies. The Red Republicans, of
+whom I can assure you there are plenty in every state in Europe,
+are naturally most desirous to get rid of the latter, by whom they
+are held in check; and if that were once accomplished, no kind of
+government could stand for a single day. They are now appealing,
+as they call it, to public opinion, by means of these congresses
+and gatherings; and they have contrived, under cover of a zeal for
+universal peace, to induce a considerable number of weak and foolish
+people to join with them in a cry which is simply the forerunner of
+revolution."
+
+"All that I understand; but I don't quite see your drift."
+
+"Every one of these bearded vagabonds hates the other like poison.
+Talk of fraternity, indeed! They want to have revolution first; and
+if they could get it, you would see them flying at each other's
+throats like a pack of wild dogs that have pulled down a deer.
+Now, my plan is this: Let us have a supper-party, and invite a
+deputy from each nation. My life upon it, that before they have
+been half-an-hour together, there will be such a row among the
+fraternisers as will frighten your uncle Peter out of his senses,
+or, still better, out of his present crotchet."
+
+"A capital idea! But how shall we get hold of the fellows?"
+
+"That's not very difficult. They are at this moment hard at work
+at roulette, and they will come readily enough to the call if you
+promise them lots of Niersteiner."
+
+"By George! they shall have it in bucketfuls, if that can produce
+the desired effect. I say--we must positively have that chap who
+abused the army."
+
+"I think it would be advisable to let him alone. I would rather
+stick to the foreigners."
+
+"O, by Jove, we must have him. I have a slight score to settle, for
+the credit of the service!"
+
+"Well, but be cautious. Recollect the great matter is to leave our
+guests to themselves."
+
+"Never fear me. I shall take care to keep within due bounds. Now let
+us look after Uncle Peter."
+
+We found that respected individual in a state of high glee. His
+own run of luck had not been extraordinary; but the Latchley,
+who appeared to possess a sort of second-sight in fixing on the
+fortunate numbers, had contrived to accumulate a perfect mountain
+of dollars, to the manifest disgust of a profane Quaker opposite,
+who, judging from the violence of his language, had been thoroughly
+cleaned out. Mr Pettigrew agreed at once to the proposal for a
+supper-party, which Jack excused himself for making, on the ground
+that he had a strong wish to cultivate the personal acquaintance of
+the gentlemen, who, in the event of his joining the Peace Society,
+would become his brethren. After some pressing, Mr Pettigrew agreed
+to take the chair, his nephew officiating as croupier. Miss Lavinia
+Latchley, so soon as she learned what was in contemplation, made a
+strong effort to be allowed to join the party; but, notwithstanding
+her assertion of the unalienable rights of woman to be present on
+all occasions of social hilarity, Jack would not yield; and even
+Pettigrew seemed to think that there were times and seasons when
+the female countenance might be withheld with advantage. We found
+no difficulty whatever in furnishing the complement of the guests.
+There were seventeen of us in all--four Britons, two Frenchmen, a
+Hungarian, a Lombard, a Piedmontese, a Sicilian, a Neapolitan, a
+Roman, an Austrian, a Prussian, a Dane, a Dutchman, and a Yankee.
+The majority exhibited beards of startling dimension, and few of
+them appeared to regard soap in the light of a justifiable luxury.
+
+Pettigrew made an admirable chairman. Although not conversant with
+any language save his own, he contrived, by means of altering the
+terminations of his words, to carry on a very animated conversation
+with all his neighbours. His Italian was superb, his Danish above
+par, and his Sclavonic, to say the least of it, passable. The viands
+were good, and the wine abundant; so that, by the time pipes were
+produced, we were all tolerably hilarious. The conversation, which
+at first was general, now took a political turn; and very grievous
+it was to listen to the tales of the outrages which some of the
+company had sustained at the hands of tyrannical governments.
+
+"I'll tell you what it is, gentlemen," said one of the Frenchmen,
+"republics are not a whit better than monarchies, in so far as the
+liberty of the people is concerned. Here am I obliged to leave
+France, because I was a friend of that gallant fellow, Ledru
+Rollin, whom I hope one day to see at the head of a real Socialist
+government. Ah, won't we set the guillotine once more in motion
+then!"
+
+"Property is theft," remarked the Neapolitan, sententiously.
+
+"I calculate, my fine chap, that you han't many dollars of your own,
+if you're of that way of thinking!" said the Yankee, considerably
+scandalised at this indifference to the rule of _meum_ and _tuum_.
+
+"O Roma!" sighed the gentleman from the eternal city, who was rather
+intoxicated.
+
+"_Peste!_ What is the matter with it?" asked one of the Frenchmen.
+"I presume it stands where it always did. _Garçon--un petit verre de
+rhom!_"
+
+"How can Rome be what it was, when it is profaned by the foot of the
+stranger?" replied he of the Papal States.
+
+"_Ah, bah!_ You never were better off than under the rule of
+Oudinot."
+
+"You are a German," said the Hungarian to the Austrian; "what think
+you of our brave Kossuth?"
+
+"I consider him a pragmatical ass," replied the Austrian curtly.
+
+"Perhaps in that case," interposed the Lombard, with a sneer that
+might have done credit to Mephistopheles, "the gentleman may
+feel inclined to palliate the conduct of that satrap of tyranny,
+Radetski?"
+
+"What!--old father Radetski! the victor in a hundred fights!" cried
+the Austrian. "That will I; and spit in the face of any cowardly
+Italian who dares to breathe a word against his honour!"
+
+The Italian clutched his knife.
+
+"Hold there!" cried the Piedmontese, who seemed really a decent
+sort of fellow. "None of your stiletto work here! Had you Lombards
+trusted more to the bayonet and less to the knife, we might have
+given another account of the Austrian in that campaign, which cost
+Piedmont its king!"
+
+"_Carlo Alberto!_" hissed the Lombard, "_sceleratissimo traditore!_"
+
+The reply of the Piedmontese was a pie-dish, which prostrated the
+Lombard on the floor.
+
+"Gentlemen! gentlemen! for Heaven's sake be calm!" screamed
+Pettigrew; "remember we are all brothers!"
+
+"Brothers!" roared the Dane, "do ye think I would fraternise with a
+Prussian? Remember Schleswig Holstein!"
+
+"I am perfectly calm," said the Prussian, with the stiff formality
+of his nation; "I never quarrel over the generous vintage of my
+fatherland. Come--let me give you a song--
+
+    'Sie sollen ihm nicht haben
+    Den Deutschen freien Rhein.'"
+
+"You never were more mistaken in your life, _mon cher_," said one of
+the Frenchmen, brusquely. "Before twelve months are over we shall
+see who has right to the Rhine!"
+
+"Ay, that is true!" remarked the Dutchman; "confound these
+Germans--they wanted to annex Luxembourg."
+
+"What says the frog?" asked the Prussian contemptuously.
+
+The frog said nothing, but he hit the Prussian on the teeth.
+
+I despair of giving even a feeble impression of the scene which
+took place. No single pair of ears was sufficient to catch one
+fourth of the general discord. There was first an interchange of
+angry words; then an interchange of blows; and immediately after,
+the guests were rolling, in groups of twos and threes, as suited
+their fancy, or the adjustment of national animosities, on the
+ground. The Lombard rose not again; the pie-dish had quieted him
+for the night. But the Sicilian and Neapolitan lay locked in deadly
+combat, each attempting with intense animosity to bite off the
+other's nose. The Austrian caught the Hungarian by the throat,
+and held him till he was black in the face. The Dane pommelled
+the Prussian. One of the Frenchmen broke a bottle over the head
+of the subject of the Pope; whilst his friend, thirsting for the
+combat, attempted in vain to insult the remaining non-belligerents.
+The Dutchman having done all that honour required, smoked in mute
+tranquillity. Meanwhile the cries of Uncle Peter were heard above
+the din of battle, entreating a cessation of hostilities. He might
+as well have preached to the storm--the row grew fiercer every
+moment.
+
+"This is a disgusting spectacle!" said the orator from Manchester.
+"These men cannot be true pacificators--they must have served in the
+army."
+
+"That reminds me, old fellow!" said Jack, turning up the cuffs of
+his coat with a very ominous expression of countenance, "that you
+were pleased this morning to use some impertinent expressions with
+regard to the British army. Do you adhere to what you said then?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"Then up with your mauleys; for, by the Lord Harry! I intend to have
+satisfaction out of your carcase!"
+
+And in less than a minute the Manchester apostle dropped with both
+his eyes bunged up, and did not come to time.
+
+"Stranger!" said the Yankee to the Piedmontese, "are you inclined
+for a turn at gouging? This child feels wolfish to raise hair!" But,
+to his credit be it said, the Piedmontese declined the proposal
+with a polite bow. Meanwhile the uproar had attracted the attention
+of the neighbourhood. Six or seven men in uniform, whom I strongly
+suspect to have been members of the brass band, entered the
+apartment armed with bayonets, and carried off the more obstreperous
+of the party to the guard-house. The others immediately retired, and
+at last Jack and I were left alone with Mr Pettigrew.
+
+"And this," said he, after a considerable pause, "is fraternity
+and peace! These are the men who intended to commence the reign
+of the millennium in Europe! Giver me your hand, Jack, my dear
+boy--you shan't leave the army--nay, if you do, rely upon it I
+shall cut you off with a shilling, and mortify my fortune to the
+Woolwich hospital. I begin to see that I am an old fool. Stop a
+moment. Here is a bottle of wine that has fortunately escaped the
+devastation--fill your glasses, and let us dedicate a full bumper to
+the health of the Duke of Wellington."
+
+I need hardly say that the toast was responded to with enthusiasm.
+We finished not only that bottle, but another; and I had the
+satisfaction of hearing Mr Pettigrew announce to my friend Wilkinson
+that the purchase-money for his company would be forthcoming at
+Coutts's before he was a fortnight older.
+
+"I won't affect to deny," said Uncle Peter, "that this is a great
+disappointment to me. I had hoped better things of human nature; but
+I now perceive that I was wrong. Good night, my dear boys! I am a
+good deal agitated, as you may see; and perhaps this sour wine has
+not altogether agreed with me--I had better have taken brandy and
+water. I shall seek refuge on my pillow, and I trust we may soon
+meet again!"
+
+"What did the venerable Peter mean by that impressive farewell?"
+said I, after the excellent old man had departed, shaking his head
+mournfully as he went.
+
+"O, nothing at all," said Jack; "only the Niersteiner has been
+rather too potent for him. Have you any sticking-plaster about you?
+I have damaged my knuckles a little on the _os frontis_ of that
+eloquent pacificator."
+
+Next morning I was awoke about ten o'clock by Jack, who came rushing
+into my room.
+
+"He's off!" he cried.
+
+"Who's off?" said I.
+
+"Uncle Peter; and, what is far worse, he has taken Miss Latchley
+with him!"
+
+"Impossible!"
+
+However, it was perfectly true. On inquiry we found that the
+enamored pair had left at six in the morning.
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+"Well, Jack," said I, "any tidings of Uncle Peter?" as Wilkinson
+entered my official apartment in London, six weeks after the
+dissolution of the Congress.
+
+"Why, yes--and the case is rather worse than I supposed," replied
+Jack despondingly.
+
+"You don't mean to say that he has married that infernal woman in
+pantaloons?"
+
+"Not quite so bad as that, but very nearly. She has carried him
+off to her den; and what she may make of him there, it is quite
+impossible to predict."
+
+"Her den? Has she actually inveigled him to America?"
+
+"Not at all. These kind of women have stations established over the
+whole face of the earth."
+
+"Where, then, is he located?"
+
+"I shall tell you. In the course of my inquiries, which, you are
+aware, were rather extensive, I chanced to fall in with a Yarmouth
+Bloater."
+
+"A what?"
+
+"I beg your pardon--I meant to say a Plymouth Brother. Now, these
+fellows are a sort of regular kidnappers, who lie in wait to catch
+up any person of means and substance: they don't meddle with
+paupers, for, as you are aware, they share their property in common:
+and it occurred to me rather forcibly, that by means of my friend,
+who was a regular trapping missionary, I might learn something
+about my uncle. It cost me an immensity of brandy to elicit the
+information; but at last I succeeded in bringing out the fact,
+that my uncle is at this moment the inmate of an Agapedome in the
+neighbourhood of Southampton, and that the Latchley is his appointed
+keeper."
+
+"An Agapedome!--what the mischief is that?"
+
+"You may well ask," said Jack; "but I won't give it a coarser
+name. However, from all I can learn, it is as bad as a Mormonite
+institution."
+
+"And what the deuce may they intend to do with him, now they have
+him in their power?"
+
+"Fleece him out of every sixpence of property which he possesses in
+the world," replied Jack.
+
+"That won't do, Jack! We must get him out by some means or other."
+
+"I suspect it would be an easier job to scale a nunnery. So far as I
+can learn, they admit no one into their premises, unless they have
+hopes of catching him as a convert; and I am afraid that neither you
+nor I have the look of likely pupils. Besides, the Latchley could
+not fail to recognise me in a moment."
+
+"That's true enough," said I. "I think, however, that I might escape
+detection by a slight alteration of attire. The lady did not honour
+me with much notice during the half-hour we spent in her company. I
+must own, however, that I should not like to go alone."
+
+"My dear friend!" cried Jack, "if you will really be kind enough
+to oblige me in this matter, I know the very man to accompany you.
+Rogers of ours is in town just now. He is a famous follow--rather
+fast, perhaps, and given to larking--but as true as steel. You shall
+meet him to-day at dinner, and then we can arrange our plans."
+
+I must own that I did not feel very sanguine of success this time.
+Your genuine rogue is the most suspicious character on the face
+of the earth, wide awake to a thousand little discrepancies which
+would escape the observation of the honest; and I felt perfectly
+convinced that the superintendent of the Agapedome was likely to
+prove a rogue of the first water. Then I did not see my way clearly
+to the characters which we ought to assume. Of course it was no use
+for me to present myself as a scion of the Woods and Forests; I
+should be treated as a Government spy, and have the door slapped in
+my face. To appear as an emissary of the Jesuits would be dangerous;
+that body being well known for their skill in annexing property.
+In short, I came to the conclusion, that unless I could work upon
+the cupidity of the head Agapedomian, there was no chance whatever
+of effecting Mr Pettigrew's release. To this point, therefore, I
+resolved to turn my attention.
+
+At dinner, according to agreement, I met Rogers of ours. Rogers was
+not gifted with any powerful inventive faculties; but he was a fine
+specimen of the British breed, ready to take a hand at anything
+which offered a prospect of fun. You would not probably have
+selected him as a leading conspirator; but, though no Macchiavelli,
+he appeared most valuable as an accomplice.
+
+Our great difficulty was to pitch upon proper characters. After
+much discussion, it was resolved that Rogers of ours should appear
+as a young nobleman of immense wealth, but exceedingly eccentric
+habits, and that I should act as bear-leader, with an eye to my
+own interest. What we were to do when we should succeed in getting
+admission to the establishment, was not very clear to the perception
+of any of us. We resolved to be regulated entirely by circumstances,
+the great point being the rescue of Mr Peter Pettigrew.
+
+Accordingly, we all started for Southampton on the following
+morning. On arriving there, we were informed that the Agapedome
+was situated some three miles from the town, and that the most
+extraordinary legends of the habits and pursuits of its inmates
+were current in the neighbourhood. Nobody seemed to know exactly
+what the Agapedomians were. They seemed to constitute a tolerably
+large society of persons, both male and female; but whether they
+were Christians, Turks, Jews, or Mahometans, was matter of exceeding
+disputation. They were known, however to be rich, and occasionally
+went out airing in carriages-and-four--the women all wearing
+pantaloons, to the infinite scandal of the peasantry. So far as
+we could learn, no gentleman answering to the description of Mr
+Pettigrew had been seen among them.
+
+After agreeing to open communications with Jack as speedily as
+possible, and emptying a bottle of champagne towards the success
+of our expedition, Rogers and I started in a postchaise for the
+Agapedome. Rogers was curiously arrayed in garments of chequered
+plaid, a mere glance at which would have gone far to impress any
+spectator with a strong notion of his eccentricity; whilst, for my
+part, I had donned a suit of black, and assumed a massive pair of
+gold spectacles, and a beaver with a portentous rim.
+
+This Agapedome was a large building surrounded by a high wall,
+and looked, upon the whole, like a convent. Deeming it prudent to
+ascertain how the land lay before introducing the eccentric Rogers,
+I requested that gallant individual to remain in the postchaise,
+whilst I solicited an interview with Mr Aaron B. Hyams, the reputed
+chief of the establishment. The card I sent in was inscribed with
+the name of Dr Hiram Smith, which appeared to me a sufficiently
+innocuous appellation. After some delay, I was admitted through a
+very strong gateway into the courtyard; and was then conducted by a
+servant in a handsome livery to a library, where I was received by
+Mr Hyams.
+
+As the Agapedome has since been broken up, and its members
+dispersed, it may not be uninteresting to put on record a slight
+sketch of its founder. Judging from his countenance, the progenitors
+of Mr Aaron B. Hyams must have been educated in the Jewish
+persuasion. His nose and lip possessed that graceful curve which is
+so characteristic of the Hebrew race; and his eye, if not altogether
+of that kind which the poets designate as "eagle," might not unaptly
+be compared to that of the turkey-buzzard. In certain circles of
+society Mr Hyams would have been esteemed a handsome man. In the
+doorway of a warehouse in Holywell Street he would have committed
+large havoc on the hearts of the passing Leahs and Dalilahs--for
+he was a square-built powerful man, with broad shoulders and
+bandy legs, and displayed on his person as much ostentatious
+jewellery as though he had been concerned in a new spoiling of the
+Egyptians. Apparently he was in a cheerful mood; for before him
+stood a half-emptied decanter of wine, and an odour as of recently
+extinguished Cubas was agreeably disseminated through the apartment.
+
+"Dr Hiram Smith, I presume?" said he. "Well, Dr Hiram Smith, to what
+fortunate circumstance am I indebted for the honour of this visit?"
+
+"Simply, sir, to this," said I, "that I want to know you, and know
+about you. Nobody without can tell me precisely what your Agapedome
+is, so I have come for information to headquarters. I have formed my
+own conclusion. If I am wrong, there is no harm done; if I am right,
+we may be able to make a bargain."
+
+"Hallo!" cried Hyams, taken rather aback by this curt style of
+exordium, "you are a rum customer, I reckon. So you want to deal,
+do ye? Well then, tell us what sort of doctor you may be? No use
+standing on ceremony with a chap like you. Is it M.D. or LL.D. or
+D.D., or a mere walking-stick title?"
+
+"The title," said I, "is conventional; so you may attribute it to
+any origin you please. In brief, I want to know if I can board a
+pupil here?"
+
+"That depends entirely upon circumstances," replied Hyams. "Who and
+what is the subject?"
+
+"A young nobleman of the highest distinction, but of slightly
+eccentric habits." Here Hyams pricked up his ears. "I am not
+authorised to tell his name; but otherwise, you shall have the most
+satisfactory references."
+
+"There is only one kind of reference I care about," interrupted
+Hyams, imitating at the same time the counting out of imaginary
+sovereigns into his palm.
+
+"So much the better--there will be trouble saved," said I. "I
+perceive, Mr Hyams, you are a thorough man of business. In a word,
+then, my pupil has been going it too fast."
+
+"Flying kites and post-obits?"
+
+"And all the rest of it," said I; "black-legs innumerable, and no
+end of scrapes in the green-room. Things have come to such a pass
+that his father, the Duke, insists on his being kept out of the way
+at present; and, as taking him to Paris would only make matters
+worse, it occurred to me that I might locate him for a time in some
+quiet but cheerful establishment, where he could have his reasonable
+swing, and no questions asked."
+
+"Dr Hiram Smith!" cried Hyams with enthusiasm, "you're a regular
+trump! I wish all the noblemen in England would look out for tutors
+like you."
+
+"You are exceedingly complimentary, Mr Hyams. And now that you know
+my errand, may I ask what the Agapedome is?"
+
+"The Home of Love," replied Hyams; "at least so I was told by the
+Oxford gent, to whom I gave half-a-guinea for the title."
+
+"And your object?"
+
+"A pleasant retreat--comfortable home--no sort of bother of
+ceremony--innocent attachments encouraged--and, in the general case,
+community of goods."
+
+"Of which latter, I presume, Mr Hyams is the sole administrator?"
+
+"Right again, Doctor!" said Hyams with a leer of intelligence; "no
+use beating about the bush with you, I perceive. A single cashier
+for the whole concern saves a world of unnecessary trouble. Then,
+you see, we have our little matrimonial arrangements. A young
+lady in search of an eligible domicile comes here and deposits
+her fortune. We provide her by-and-by with a husband of suitable
+tastes, so that all matters are arranged comfortably. No luxury
+or enjoyment is denied to the inmates of the establishment, which
+may be compared, in short, to a perfect aviary, in which you hear
+nothing from morning to evening save one continuous sound of billing
+and cooing."
+
+"You draw a fascinating picture, Mr Hyams," said I: "too
+fascinating, in fact; for, after what you have said, I doubt whether
+I should be fulfilling my duty to my noble patron the Duke, were I
+to expose his heir to the influence of such powerful temptations."
+
+"Don't be in the least degree alarmed about that," said Hyams. "I
+shall take care that in this case there is no chance of marriage.
+Harkye, Doctor, it is rather against our rules to admit parlour
+boarders; but I don't mind doing it in this case, if you agree to my
+terms, which are one hundred and twenty guineas per month."
+
+"On the part of the Duke," said I, "I anticipate no objection; nor
+shall I refuse your stamped receipts at that rate. But as I happen
+to be paymaster, I shall certainly not give you in exchange for
+each of them more than seventy guineas, which will leave you a very
+pretty profit over and above your expenses."
+
+"What a screw you are, Doctor!" cried Hyams. "Would you have the
+conscience to pocket fifty for nothing? Come, come--make it eighty
+and it's a bargain."
+
+"Seventy is my last word. Beard of Mordecai, man! do you think I am
+going to surrender this pigeon to your hands gratis? Have I not told
+you already that he has a natural turn for _ecarté_!"
+
+"Ah, Doctor, Doctor! you must be one of our people--you must
+indeed!" said Hyams. "Well, is it a bargain?"
+
+"Not yet," said I. "In common decency, and for the sake of
+appearances, I must stay for a couple of days in the house, in order
+that I may be able to give a satisfactory report to the Duke. By the
+way, I hope everything is quite orthodox here--nothing contrary to
+the tenets of the church?"
+
+"O quite," replied Hyams; "it is a beautiful establishment in point
+of order. The bell rings every day punctually at four o'clock."
+
+"For prayers?"
+
+"No, sir--for hockey. We find that a little lively exercise gives a
+cheerful tone to the mind, and promotes those animal spirits which
+are the peculiar boast of the Agapedome."
+
+"I am quite satisfied," said I. "So now, if you please, I shall
+introduce my pupil."
+
+I need not dwell minutely upon the particulars of the interview
+which took place between Rogers of ours and the superintendent of
+the Agapedome. Indeed there is little to record. Rogers received the
+intimation that this was to be his residence for a season with the
+utmost nonchalance, simply remarking that he thought it would be
+rather slow; and then, by way of keeping up his character, filled
+himself a bumper of sherry. Mr Hyams regarded him as a spider might
+do when some unknown but rather powerful insect comes within the
+precincts of his net.
+
+"Well," said Rogers, "since it seems I am to be quartered here, what
+sort of fun is to be had? Any racket-court, eh?"
+
+"I am sorry to say, my Lord, ours is not built as yet. But at four
+o'clock we shall have hockey--"
+
+"Hang hockey! I have no fancy for getting my shins bruised. Any body
+in the house except myself?"
+
+"If your Lordship would like to visit the ladies--"
+
+"Say no more!" cried Rogers impetuously. "I shall manage to kill
+time now! 'Hallo, you follow with the shoulder-knot! show me the way
+to the drawing-room;" and Rogers straightway disappeared.
+
+"Doctor Hiram Smith!" said Hyams, looking rather discomposed, "this
+is most extraordinary conduct on the part of your pupil."
+
+"Not at all extraordinary, I assure you," I replied; "I told you he
+was rather eccentric, but at present he is in a peculiarly quiet
+mood. Wait till you see his animal spirits up!"
+
+"Why, he'll be the ruin of the Agapedome!" cried Hyams; "I cannot
+possibly permit this."
+
+"It will rather puzzle you to stop it," said I.
+
+Here a faint squall, followed by a sound of suppressed giggling, was
+heard in the passage without.
+
+"Holy Moses!" cried the Agapedomian, starting up, "if Mrs Hyams
+should happen to be there!"
+
+"You may rely upon it she will very soon become accustomed to his
+Lordship's eccentricities. Why, you told me you admitted of no sort
+of bother or ceremony."
+
+"Yes--but a joke maybe carried too far. As I live, he is pursuing
+one of the ladies down stairs into the courtyard!"
+
+"Is he?" said I; "then you may be tolerably certain he will
+overtake her."
+
+"Surely some of the servants will stop him!" cried Hyams, rushing
+to the window. "Yes--here comes one of them. Father Abraham! is it
+possible? He has knocked Adoniram down!"
+
+"Nothing more likely," said I; "his Lordship had lessons from
+Mendoza."
+
+"I must look to this myself," cried Hyams.
+
+"Then I'll follow and see fair play," said I.
+
+We rushed into the court; but by this time it was empty. The pursued
+and the pursuer--Daphne and Apollo--had taken flight into the
+garden. Thither we followed them, Hyams red with ire; but no trace
+was seen of the fugitives. At last in an acacia bower we heard
+murmurs. Hyams dashed on; I followed; and there, to my unutterable
+surprise, I beheld Rogers of ours kneeling at the feet of the
+Latchley!
+
+"Beautiful Lavinia!" he was saying, just as we turned the corner.
+
+"Sister Latchley!" cried Hyams, "what is the meaning of all this?"
+
+"Rather let me ask, brother Hyams," said the Latchley in unabashed
+serenity, "what means this intrusion, so foreign to the time, and so
+subversive of the laws of our society?"
+
+"Shall I pound him, Lavinia?" said Rogers, evidently anxious to
+discharge a slight modicum of the debt which he owed to the Jewish
+fraternity.
+
+"I command--I beseech you, no! Speak, brother Hyams! I again require
+of you to state why and wherefore you have chosen to violate the
+fundamental rules of the Agapedome?"
+
+"Sister Latchley, you will drive me mad! This young man has not been
+ten minutes in the house, and yet I find him scampering after you
+like a tom-cat, and knocking down Adoniram because he came in his
+way, and you are apparently quite pleased!"
+
+"Is the influence of love measured by hours?" asked the Latchley in
+a tone of deep sentiment. "Count we electricity by time--do we mete
+out sympathy by the dial? Brother Hyams, were not your intellectual
+vision obscured by a dull and earthly film, you would know that the
+passage of the lightning is not more rapid than the flash of kindled
+love."
+
+"That sounds all very fine," said Hyams, "but I shall allow no such
+doings here; and you, in particular, Sister Latchley, considering
+how you are situated, ought to be ashamed of yourself!"
+
+"Aaron, my man," said Rogers of ours, "will you be good enough to
+explain what you mean by making such insinuations?"
+
+"Stay, my Lord," said I; "I really must interpose. Mr Hyams is about
+to explain."
+
+"May I never discount bill again," cried the Jew, "if this is not
+enough to make a man forswear the faith of his fathers! Look you
+here, Miss Latchley; you are part of the establishment, and I expect
+you to obey orders."
+
+"I was not aware, sir, until this moment," said Miss Latchley,
+loftily, "that I was subject to the orders of any one."
+
+"Now, don't be a fool; there's a dear!" said Hyams. "You know well
+enough what I mean. Haven't you enough on hand with Pettigrew,
+without encumbering yourself--?" and he stopped short.
+
+"It is a pity, sir," said Miss Latchley, still more magnificently,
+"it is a vast pity, that since you have the meanness to invent
+falsehoods, you cannot at the same time command the courage to utter
+them. Why am I thus insulted? Who is this Pettigrew you speak of?"
+
+"Pettigrew--Pettigrew?" remarked Rogers; "I say, Dr Smith, was
+not that the name of the man who is gone amissing, and for whose
+discovery his friends are offering a reward?"
+
+Hyams started as if stung by an adder. "Sister Latchley," he said,
+"I fear I was in the wrong."
+
+"You have made the discovery rather too late, Mr Hyams," replied
+the irate Lavinia. "After the insults you have heaped upon me, it
+is full time we should part. Perhaps these gentlemen will be kind
+enough to conduct an unprotected female to a temporary home."
+
+"If you will go, you go alone, madam," said Hyams; "his Lordship
+intends to remain here."
+
+"His Lordship intends to do nothing of the sort, you rascal," said
+Rogers. "Hockey don't agree with my constitution."
+
+"Before I depart, Mr Hyams," said Miss Latchley, "let me remark that
+you are indebted to me in the sum of two thousand pounds as my share
+of the profits of the establishment. Will you pay it now, or would
+you prefer to wait till you hear from my solicitor?"
+
+"Anything more?" asked the Agapedomian.
+
+"Merely this," said I: "I am now fully aware that Mr Peter Pettigrew
+is detained within these walls. Surrender him instantly, or prepare
+yourself for the worst penalties of the law."
+
+I made a fearful blunder in betraying my secret before I was clear
+of the premises, and the words had scarcely passed my lips before
+I was aware of my mistake. With the look of a detected demon Hyams
+confronted us.
+
+"Ho, ho! this is a conspiracy, is it? But you have reckoned without
+your host. Ho, there! Jonathan--Asahel! close the doors, ring the
+great bell, and let no man pass on your lives! And now let's see
+what stuff you are made of!"
+
+So saying, the ruffian drew a life-preserver from his pocket, and
+struck furiously at my head before I had time to guard myself. But
+quick as he was, Rogers of ours was quicker. With his left hand he
+caught the arm of Hyams as the blow descended, whilst with the right
+he dealt him a fearful blow on the temple, which made the Hebrew
+stagger. But Hyams, amongst his other accomplishments, had practised
+in the ring. He recovered himself almost immediately, and rushed
+upon Rogers. Several heavy hits were interchanged; and there is no
+saying how the combat might have terminated, but for the presence
+of mind of the Latchley. That gifted female, superior to the
+weakness of her sex, caught up the life-preserver from the ground,
+and applied it so effectually to the back of Hyams' skull, that he
+dropped like an ox in the slaughter-house.
+
+Meanwhile the alarum bell was ringing--women were screaming at
+the windows, from which also several crazy-looking gentlemen were
+gesticulating; and three or four truculent Israelites were rushing
+through the courtyard. The whole Agapedome was in an uproar.
+
+"Keep together and fear nothing!" cried Rogers. "I never stir on
+these kind of expeditions without my pistols. Smith--give your arm
+to Miss Latchley, who has behaved like the heroine of Saragossa; and
+now let us see if any of these scoundrels will venture to dispute
+our way!"
+
+But for the firearms which Rogers carried, I suspect our egress
+would have been disputed. Jonathan and Asahel, red-headed ruffians
+both, stood ready with iron bars in their hands to oppose our exit;
+but a glimpse of the bright glittering barrel caused them to change
+their purpose. Rogers commanded them, on pain of instant death, to
+open the door. They obeyed; and we emerged from the Agapedome as
+joyfully as the Ithacans from the cave of Polyphemus. Fortunately
+the chaise was still in waiting: we assisted Miss Latchley in, and
+drove off, as fast as the horses could gallop, to Southampton.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+"Is it possible they can have murdered him?" said Jack.
+
+"That, I think," said I, "is highly improbable. I rather imagine
+that he has refused to conform to some of the rules of the
+association, and has been committed to the custody of Messrs
+Jonathan and Asahel."
+
+"Shall I ask Lavinia?" said Rogers. "I daresay she would tell me all
+about it."
+
+"Better not," said I, "in the mean time. Poor thing! her nerves must
+be shaken."
+
+"Not a whit of them," replied Rogers. "I saw no symptom of nerves
+about her. She was as cool as a cucumber when she floored that
+infernal Jew; and if she should be a little agitated or so, she is
+calming herself at this moment with a glass of brandy and water. I
+mixed it for her. Do you know she's a capital fellow, only 'tis a
+pity she's so very plain."
+
+"I wish the police would arrive!" said Jack. "We have really not a
+minute to lose. Poor Uncle Peter! I devoutly trust this may be the
+last of his freaks."
+
+"I hope so too, Jack, for your sake: it is no joke rummaging him out
+of such company. But for Rogers there, we should all of us have been
+as dead as pickled herrings."
+
+"I bear a charmed life," said Rogers. "Remember I belong to 'the
+Immortals.' But there come the blue-coats in a couple of carriages.
+'Gad, Wilkinson, I wish it were our luck to storm the Agapedome with
+a score of our own fellows!"
+
+During our drive, Rogers enlightened us as to his encounter with the
+Latchley. It appeared that he had bestowed considerable attention
+to our conversation in London; and that, when he hurried to the
+drawing-room in the Agapedome, as already related, he thought he
+recognised the Latchley at once, in the midst of half-a-dozen more
+juvenile and blooming sisters.
+
+"Of course, I never read a word of the woman's works," said Rogers,
+"and I hope I never shall; but I know that female vanity will stand
+any amount of butter. So I bolted into the room, without caring for
+the rest--though, by the way, there was one little girl with fair
+hair and blue eyes, who, I hope, has not left the Agapedome--threw
+myself at the feet of Lavinia; declared that I was a young nobleman,
+enamoured of her writings, who was resolved to force my way through
+iron bars to gain a glimpse of the bright original: and, upon
+the whole, I think you must allow that I managed matters rather
+successfully."
+
+There could be but one opinion as to that. In fact, without Rogers,
+the whole scheme must have miscarried. It was Kellermann's charge,
+unexpected and unauthorised--but altogether triumphant.
+
+On arriving at the Agapedome we found the door open, and three or
+four peasants loitering round the gateway.
+
+"Are they here still?" cried Jack, springing from the chaise.
+
+"Noa, measter," replied one of the bystanders; "they be gone an hour
+past in four carrutches, wi' all their goods and chuckles."
+
+"Did they carry any one with them by force?"
+
+"Noa, not by force, as I seed; but there wore one chap among them
+woundily raddled on the sconce."
+
+"Hyams to wit, I suppose. Come, gentlemen; as we have a
+search-warrant, let us in and examine the premises thoroughly."
+
+Short as was the interval which had elapsed between our exit and
+return, Messrs Jonathan, Asahel, and Co. had availed themselves
+of it to the utmost. Every portable article of any value had been
+removed. Drawers were open, and papers scattered over the floors,
+along with a good many pairs of bloomers rather the worse for the
+wear: in short, every thing seemed to indicate that the nest was
+finally abandoned. What curious discoveries we made during the
+course of our researches, as to the social habits and domestic
+economy of this happy family, I shall not venture to recount; we
+came there not to gratify either private or public curiosity, but to
+perform a sacred duty by emancipating Mr Peter Pettigrew.
+
+Neither in the cellars nor the closets, nor even in the garrets,
+could we find any trace of the lost one. The contents of one
+bedroom, indeed, showed that it had been formerly tenanted by Mr
+Pettigrew, for there were his portmanteaus with his name engraved
+upon them; his razors, and his wearing apparel, all seemingly
+untouched: but there were no marks of any recent occupancy; the dust
+was gathering on the table, and the ewer perfectly dry. It was the
+opinion of the detective officer that at least ten days had elapsed
+since any one had slept in the room. Jack became greatly alarmed.
+
+"I suppose," said he, "there is nothing for it but to proceed
+immediately in pursuit of Hyams: do you think you will be able to
+apprehend him?"
+
+"I doubt it very much, sir," replied the detective officer. "These
+sort of fellows are wide awake, and are always prepared for
+accidents. I expect that, by this time, he is on his way to France.
+But hush!--what was that?"
+
+A dull sound as of the clapper of a large bell boomed overhead.
+There was silence for about a minute, and again it was repeated.
+
+"Here is a clue, at all events!" cried the officer. "My life on it,
+there is some one in the belfry."
+
+We hastened up the narrow stairs which led to the tower. Half way
+up, the passage was barred by a stout door, double locked, which the
+officers had some difficulty in forcing with the aid of a crow-bar.
+This obstacle removed, we reached the lofty room where the bell
+was suspended; and there, right under the clapper, on a miserable
+truckle bed, lay the emaciated form of Mr Pettigrew.
+
+"My poor uncle!" said Jack, stooping tenderly to embrace his
+relative, "what can have brought you here?"
+
+"Speak louder, Jack!" said Mr Pettigrew; "I can't hear you. For
+twelve long days that infernal bell has been tolling just above my
+head for hockey and other villanous purposes. I am as deaf as a
+doornail!"
+
+"And so thin, dear uncle! You must have been most shamefully abused."
+
+"Simply starved; that's all."
+
+"What! starved? The monsters! Did they give you nothing to eat?"
+
+"Yes--broccoli. I wish you would try it for a week: it is a rare
+thing to bring out the bones."
+
+"And why did they commit this outrage upon you?"
+
+"For two especial reasons, I suppose--first, because I would not
+surrender my whole property; and, secondly, because I would not
+marry Miss Latchley."
+
+"My dear uncle! when I saw you last, it appeared to me that you
+would have had no objections to perform the latter ceremony."
+
+"Not on compulsion, Jack--not on compulsion!" said Mr Pettigrew,
+with a touch of his old humour. "I won't deny that I was humbugged
+by her at first, but this was over long ago."
+
+"Indeed! Pray, may I venture to ask what changed your opinion of the
+lady?"
+
+"Her works, Jack--her own works!" replied Uncle Peter. "She gave me
+them to read as soon as I was fairly trapped into the Agapedome,
+and such an awful collection of impiety and presumption I never saw
+before. She is ten thousand times worse than the deceased Thomas
+Paine."
+
+"Was she, then, party to your incarceration?"
+
+"I won't say that. I hardly think she would have consented to
+let them harm me, or that she knew exactly how I was used; but
+that fellow Hyams is wicked enough to have been an officer under
+King Herod. Now, pray help me up, and lift me down stairs, for my
+legs are so cramped that I can't walk, and my head is as dizzy
+as a wheel. That confounded broccoli, too, has disagreed with my
+constitution, and I shall feel particularly obliged to any one who
+can assist me to a drop of brandy."
+
+After having ministered to the immediate wants of Mr Pettigrew,
+and secured his effects, we returned to Southampton, leaving the
+deserted Agapedome in the charge of a couple of police. In spite of
+every entreaty Mr Pettigrew would not hear of entering a prosecution
+against Hyams.
+
+"I feel," said he, "that I have made a thorough ass of myself;
+and I should not be able to stand the ridicule that must follow a
+disclosure of the consequences. In fact, I begin to think that I am
+not fit to look after my own affairs. The man who has spent twelve
+days, as I have, under the clapper of a bell, without any other
+sustenance than broccoli--is there any more brandy in the flask?
+I should like the merest drop--the man, I say, who has undergone
+these trials, has ample time for meditation upon the past. I see
+my weakness, and I acknowledge it. So Jack, my dear boy, as you
+have always behaved to me more like a son than a nephew, I intend,
+immediately on my return to London, to settle my whole property upon
+you, merely reserving an annuity. Don't say a word on the subject.
+My mind is made up, and nothing can alter my resolution."
+
+On arriving at Southampton we considered it our duty to communicate
+immediately with Miss Latchley, for the purpose of ascertaining if
+we could render her any temporary assistance. Perhaps it was more
+than she deserved; but we could not forget her sex, though she had
+done everything in her power to disguise it; and, besides, the lucky
+blow with the life-preserver, which she administered to Hyams, was
+a service for which we could not be otherwise than grateful. Jack
+Wilkinson was selected as the medium of communication. He found the
+strong Lavinia alone, and perfectly composed.
+
+"I wish never more," said she, "to hear the name of Pettigrew. It is
+associated in my mind with weakness, fanaticism, and vacillation;
+and I shall ever feel humbled at the reflection that I bowed my
+woman's pride to gaze on the surface of so shallow and opaque a
+pool! And yet, why regret? The image of the sun is reflected equally
+from the Boeotian marsh and the mirror of the clear Ontario! Tell
+your uncle," continued she, after a pause, "that as he is nothing
+to me, so I wish to be nothing to him. Let us mutually extinguish
+memory. Ha, ha, ha!--so they fed him, you say, upon broccoli?
+
+"But I have one message to give, though not to him. The youth
+who, in the nobility of his soul, declared his passion for my
+intellect--where is he? I tarry beneath this roof but for him. Do
+my message fairly, and say to him that if he seeks a communion of
+soul--no! that is the common phrase of the slaves of antiquated
+superstition--if he yearns for a grand amalgamation of essential
+passion and power, let him hasten hither, and Lavinia Latchley is
+ready to accompany him to the prairie or the forest, to the torrid
+zone, or to the confines of the arctic seas!"
+
+"I shall deliver your message, ma'am," said Jack, "as accurately as
+my abilities will allow." And he did so.
+
+Rogers of ours writhed uneasily in his seat.
+
+"I'll tell you what it is, my fine fellows," said he, "I don't look
+upon this quite as a laughing matter. I am really sorry to have
+taken in the old woman, though I don't see how we could well have
+helped it; and I would far rather, Jack, that she had fixed her
+affections upon you than on me. I shall get infernally roasted at
+the mess if this story should transpire. However, I suppose there's
+only one answer to be given. Pray, present my most humble respects,
+and say how exceedingly distressed I feel that my professional
+engagements will not permit me to accompany her in her proposed
+expedition."
+
+Jack reported the answer in due form.
+
+"Then," said Lavinia, drawing herself up to her full height, and
+shrouding her visage in a black veil, "tell him that for his sake I
+am resolved to die a virgin!"
+
+I presume she will keep her word; at least I have not yet heard that
+any one has been courageous enough to request her to change her
+situation. She has since returned to America, and is now, I believe,
+the president of a female college, the students of which may be
+distinguished from the rest of their sex, by their uniform adoption
+of bloomers.
+
+
+_Printed by William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh._
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+Mismatched quotes are not fixed if it's not sufficiently clear where
+the missing quote should be placed.
+
+The cover for the eBook version of this book was created by the
+transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
+
+Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note.
+Irregularities and inconsistencies in the text have been retained as
+printed, ecept for the following:
+
+The transcriber has made accents consistent for "Schaïgië" and
+"Schaïgië's".
+
+Page 328: "But he must cease to be Mr Ruskin if they ..." The
+transcriber has inserted "be".
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol.
+70, No. 431, September 1851, by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE, SEPT 1851 ***
+
+***** This file should be named 44361-8.txt or 44361-8.zip *****
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+      The Project Gutenberg eBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 70,  No. 431  September 1851, by Various.
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 70,
+No. 431, September 1851, by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 70, No. 431, September 1851
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: December 5, 2013 [EBook #44361]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE, SEPT 1851 ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Brendan OConnor, Jonathan Ingram and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Library of Early Journals.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+
+<hr class="chap" />
+
+
+
+
+<h1>BLACKWOOD'S<br />
+
+EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.</h1>
+
+<p class="center">
+<span class="smcap">No. CCCCXXXI.</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;SEPTEMBER, 1851.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<span class="smcap">Vol. LXX.</span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<h2>CONTENTS.</h2>
+
+
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="contents">
+<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">A Campaign in Taka</span>,</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_251">251</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">My Novel; or, Varieties in English Life. Part XIII</span>,</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_275">275</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Disfranchisement of the Boroughs</span>,</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_296">296</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Paris in 1851.</span>&mdash;(<em>Continued</em>,)</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_310">310</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Mr Ruskin's Works</span>,</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_326">326</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Portuguese Politics</span>,</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_349">349</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Congress and the Agapedome.&mdash;A Tale of Peace and Love</span>,</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_359">359</a></td></tr>
+</table></div>
+
+<p class="center space-above">&mdash;&mdash;&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p class="center space-above"><big>EDINBURGH:</big></p>
+
+<p class="center">WILLIAM BLACKWOOD &amp; SONS, 45 GEORGE STREET;<br />
+AND 37 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><em>To whom all communications (post paid) must be addressed.</em></p>
+
+<p class="center">SOLD BY ALL THE BOOKSELLERS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM.</p>
+
+<p class="center">&mdash;&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+<p class="center"><small>PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, EDINBURGH.</small></p>
+
+
+<hr class="chap" />
+
+
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">&nbsp;</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<h2>BLACKWOOD'S<br />
+
+EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.</h2>
+
+<p class="center">
+<span class="smcap">No. CCCCXXXI.</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;SEPTEMBER, 1851.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<span class="smcap">Vol. LXX.</span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+<h2><br />A CAMPAIGN IN TAKA.</h2>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p><cite>Feldzug von Sennaar nach Taka, Basa, und Beni-Amer, mit besonderem Hinblick
+auf die Völker von Bellad-Sudan.</cite>&mdash;[Campaign from Sennaar to Taka, Basa, and
+Beni-Amer; with a particular Glance at the Nations of Bellad-Sudan.]&mdash;<span class="smcap">Von Ferdinand
+Werne.</span> Stuttgart: Königl. Hofbuchdruckerei. London: Williams and
+Norgate. 1851.</p></blockquote>
+
+
+<p>Africa, the least explored division
+of the globe's surface, and the best
+field for travellers of bold and enterprising
+character, has been the scene
+of three of the most remarkable books
+of their class that have appeared
+within the last ten years. We refer
+to Major Harris's narrative of his
+Ethiopian expedition&mdash;to the marvellous
+adventures of that modern Nimrod,
+Mr Gordon Cumming&mdash;to Mr
+Ferdinand Werne's strange and exciting
+account of his voyage up the
+White Nile. In our review of the
+last-named interesting and valuable
+work,<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> we mentioned that Mr Werne,
+previously to his expedition up the
+Nile, had been for several months in
+the Taka country, a region previously
+untrodden by Europeans, with an
+army commanded by Achmet Bascha,
+governor-general of the Egyptian province
+of Bellad-Sudan, who was operating
+against refractory tributaries.
+He has just published an account of
+this campaign, which afforded him,
+however, little opportunity of expatiating
+on well-contested battles,
+signal victories, or feats of heroic
+valour. On the other hand, his
+narrative abounds in striking incidents,
+in curious details of tribes
+and localities that have never before
+been described, and in perils and
+hardships not the less real and painful
+that they proceeded from no
+efforts of a resolute and formidable
+foe, but from the effects of a pernicious
+climate, and the caprice and
+negligence of a wilful and indolent
+commander.</p>
+
+<p>It was early in 1840, and Mr Werne
+and his youngest brother Joseph had
+been resident for a whole year at
+Chartum, chief town of the province
+of Sudan, in the country of Sennaar.
+Chartum, it will be remembered by
+the readers of the "Expedition for
+the Discovery of the Sources of the
+White Nile," is situated at the confluence
+of the White and Blue streams,
+which, there uniting, flow northwards
+through Nubia and Egypt Proper to
+Cairo and the Mediterranean; and at
+Chartum it was that the two Wernes
+had beheld, in the previous November,
+the departure of the first expedition
+up Nile, which they were forbidden
+to join, and which met with
+little success. The elder Werne,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span>
+whose portrait&mdash;that of a very determined-looking
+man, bearded, and in
+Oriental costume&mdash;is appended to the
+present volume, appears to have been
+adventurous and a rambler from his
+youth upwards. In 1822 he had
+served in Greece, and had now been
+for many years in Eastern lands.
+Joseph Werne, his youngest and favourite
+brother, had come to Egypt
+at his instigation, after taking at Berlin
+his degree as Doctor of Medicine,
+to study, before commencing practice,
+some of the extraordinary diseases
+indigenous in that noxious climate.
+Unfortunately, as recorded in Mr
+Werne's former work, this promising
+young man, who seems to have possessed
+in no small degree the enterprise,
+perseverance, and fortitude so
+remarkable in his brother, ultimately
+fell a victim to one of those fatal maladies
+whose investigation was the
+principal motive of his visit to Africa.
+The first meeting in Egypt of the two
+brothers was at Cairo; and of it a
+characteristic account is given by the
+elder, an impetuous, we might almost
+say a pugnacious man, tolerably
+prompt to take offence, and upon
+whom, as he himself says at page 67,
+the Egyptian climate had a violently
+irritating effect.</p>
+
+<p>"Our meeting, at Guerra's tavern
+in Cairo, was so far remarkable, that
+my brother knew me immediately,
+whilst I took him for some impertinent
+Frenchman, disposed to make
+game of me, inasmuch as he, in the
+petulance of his joy, fixed his eyes
+upon me, measuring me from top to
+toe, and then laughed at the fury
+with which I rushed upon him, to
+call him to an account, and, if necessary,
+to have him out. We had not
+seen each other for eight years, during
+which he had grown into a man,
+and, moreover, his countenance had
+undergone a change, for, by a terrible
+cut, received in a duel, the muscle of
+risibility had been divided on one
+side, and the poor fellow could laugh
+only with half his face. In the first
+overpowering joy of our meeting in
+this distant quarter of the globe, we
+could not get the wine over our
+tongues, often as my Swiss friend De
+Salis (over whose cheeks the tears
+were chasing each other) and other
+acquaintances struck their glasses
+against ours, encouraging us to drink....
+I now abandoned the hamlet
+of Tura&mdash;situated in the desert, but
+near the Nile, about three leagues
+above Cairo, and whither I had
+retreated to do penance and to work
+at my travels&mdash;as well as my good
+friend Dr Schledehaus of Osnabruck,
+(then holding an appointment at the
+military school, now director of the
+marine hospital of Alexandria,) with
+whom my brother had studied at
+Bonn, and I hired a little house in
+the Esbekie Square in Cairo. After
+half an hour's examination, Joseph
+was appointed surgeon-major, with
+the rank of a Sakulagassi or captain,
+in the central hospital of Kasr-el-Ain,
+with a thousand piastres a
+month, and rations for a horse and
+four servants. Our views constantly
+directed to the interior of Africa, we
+suffered a few months to glide by in
+the old city of the Khalifs, dwelling
+together in delightful brotherly harmony.
+But our thirst for travelling
+was unslaked; to it I had sacrificed
+my appointment as chancellor of the
+Prussian Consulate at Alexandria;
+Joseph received his nomination as
+regimental surgeon to the 1st regiment
+in Sennaar, including that of
+physician to the central hospital at
+Chartum. Our friends were concerned
+for us on account of the
+dangerous climate, but, nevertheless,
+we sailed with good courage up the
+Nile, happy to escape from the noise
+of the city, and to be on our way to
+new scenes."</p>
+
+<p>A stroke of the sun, received near
+the cataract of Ariman in Upper
+Nubia, and followed by ten days'
+delirium, soon convinced the younger
+Werne that his friends' anxiety on
+his behalf was not groundless. During
+the whole of their twelvemonth's
+stay at Chartum, they were mercilessly
+persecuted by intermittent
+fever, there most malignant, and
+under whose torturing and lowering
+attacks their sole consolation was
+that, as they never chanced both to
+be ill together, they were able
+alternately to nurse each other. At
+last, fearing that body or mind would
+succumb to these reiterated fever-fits,
+and the first expedition up the
+White Nile having, to their great
+disgust and disappointment, sailed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span>
+without them, they made up their
+minds to quit for ever the pestiferous
+Chartum and the burning steppes of
+Bellad-Sudan. Whilst preparing for
+departure, they received a visit from
+the chief Cadi, who told them, over
+a glass of cardinal&mdash;administered by
+Dr Werne as medicine, to evade his
+Mahomedan scruples&mdash;that Effendina
+(Excellency) Achmet Bascha was
+well pleased with the brotherly love
+they manifested, taking care of each
+other in sickness, and that they would
+do well to pay their respects occasionally
+at the Divan. This communication
+was almost immediately
+followed by the arrival at Chartum of
+Dr Gand, physician to Abbas Bascha.
+This gentleman had been a comrade
+of Ferdinand Werne's in Greece, and
+he recommended the two brothers to
+Achmet, with whom he was intimate,
+in true Oriental style, as men of universal
+genius and perfect integrity, to
+whom he might intrust both his body
+and his soul. The consequence of this
+liberal encomium was, that Achmet
+fixed his eyes upon them to accompany
+him, in the capacity of confidential
+advisers, upon a projected campaign.
+Informed of this plan and of the
+advantages it included, the Wernes
+joyfully abandoned their proposed
+departure. Joseph was to be made
+house-physician to Achmet and his
+harem, as well as medical inspector
+of the whole province, in place of
+Soliman Effendi, (the renegade Baron
+di Pasquali of Palermo,) a notorious
+poisoner, in whose hands the Bascha
+did not consider himself safe. Ferdinand
+Werne, who had held the rank of
+captain in Greece, was made <i>bimbaschi</i>
+or major, and was attached, as
+engineer, to Achmet's person, with
+good pay and many privileges. "At
+a later period he would have made
+me bey, if I&mdash;not on his account,
+for he was an enlightened Circassian,
+but on that of the Turkish jackasses&mdash;would
+have turned Mussulman. I
+laughed at this, and he said no more
+about it." Delighted to have secured
+the services of the two Germans,
+Achmet ordered it to be reported
+to his father-in-law, Mehemet Ali,
+for his approval, and took counsel
+with his new officers concerning the
+approaching campaign. Turk-like,
+he proposed commencing it in the
+rainy season. Mr Werne opposed
+this as likely to cost him half his
+army, the soldiers being exceedingly
+susceptible to rain, and advised the
+erection of blockhouses at certain
+points along the line of march where
+springs were to be found, to secure
+water for the troops. The Bascha
+thought this rather a roundabout
+mode of proceeding, held his men's
+lives very cheap, and boasted of his
+seven hundred dromedaries, every one
+of which, in case of need, could carry
+three soldiers. His counsellors were
+dismissed, with injunctions to secresy,
+and on their return home they found
+at their door, as a present from the
+Bascha, two beautiful dromedaries,
+tall, powerful, ready saddled for a
+march, and particularly adapted for a
+campaign, inasmuch as they started
+not when muskets were fired between
+their ears. A few days later, Mr
+Werne was sent for by Achmet, who,
+when the customary coffee had been
+taken, dismissed his attendants by a
+sign, and informed him, with a gloomy
+countenance, that the people of Taka
+refused to pay their <i>tulba</i>, or tribute.
+His predecessor, Churdschid Bascha,
+having marched into that country,
+had been totally defeated in a <i>chaaba</i>,
+or tract of forest. Since that time,
+Achmet mournfully declared, the
+tribes had not paid a single piastre,
+and he found himself grievously in
+want of money. So, instead of marching
+south-westward to Darfour, as he
+had intended, he would move north-eastward
+to Taka, chastise the stubborn
+insolvents, and replenish the
+coffers of the state. "Come with
+me," said he, to Mr Werne; "upon
+the march we shall all recover our
+health," (he also suffered from frequent
+and violent attacks of fever;)
+"yonder are water and forests, as in
+Germany and Circassia, and very
+high mountains." It mattered little
+to so restless and rambling a spirit as
+Mr Ferdinand Werne whether his
+route lay inland towards the Mountains
+of the Moon, or coastwards to
+the Red Sea. His brother was again
+sick, and spoke of leaving the country;
+but Mr Werne cheered him up,
+pointed out to him upon the map an
+imaginary duchy which he was to
+conquer in the approaching war, and
+revived an old plan of going to settle<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span>
+at Bagdad, there to practise as physician
+and apothecary. "We resolved,
+therefore, to take our passports with
+us, so that, if we chose, we might
+embark on the Red Sea. By this
+time I had seen through the Bascha,
+and I resolved to communicate to him
+an idea which I often, in the interest
+of these oppressed tribes, had revolved
+in my mind, namely, that he should
+place himself at their head, and renounce
+obedience to the Egyptian
+vampire. I did subsequently speak
+to him of the plan, and it might have
+been well and permanently carried
+out, had he not, instead of striving to
+win the confidence of the chiefs,
+tyrannised over them in every possible
+manner. Gold and regiments!
+was his motto."</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile the influential Dr Gand
+had fallen seriously ill, and was so
+afflicted with the irritability already
+referred to as a consequence of the
+climate, that no one could go near
+him but the two Wernes. He neglected
+Joseph's good advice to quit
+Chartum at once, put it off till it was
+too late, and died on his journey
+northwards. His body lay buried for
+a whole year in the sand of the desert;
+then his family, who were going to
+France, dug it up to take with them.
+Always a very thin man, little more
+than skin and bone, the burning sand
+had preserved him like a mummy.
+There was no change in his appearance;
+not a hair gone from his mustaches.
+Strange is the confusion and
+alternation of life and death in that
+ardent and unwholesome land of
+Nubia. To-day in full health, to-morrow
+prostrate with fever, from
+which you recover only to be again
+attacked. Dead, in twenty-four
+hours or less corruption is busy on
+the corpse; bury it promptly in the
+sand, and in twelve months you may
+disinter it, perfect as if embalmed.
+At Chartum, the very focus of disease,
+death, it might be thought, is
+sufficiently supplied by fever to need
+no other purveyors. Nevertheless
+poisoning seems a pretty common
+practice there. Life in Chartum is
+altogether, by Mr Werne's account,
+a most curious thing. During the
+preparations for the campaign, a
+Wurtemberg prince, Duke Paul William
+of Mergentheim, arrived in the
+place, and was received with much
+pomp. "For the first time I saw the
+Bascha sit upon a chair; he was in
+full uniform, a red jacket adorned
+with gold, a great diamond crescent,
+and three brilliant stars upon his left
+breast, his sabre by his side." The
+prince, a fat good-humoured German,
+was considerably impressed by the
+state displayed, and left the presence
+with many obeisances. The next
+day he dined with the Bascha, whom
+he and the Wernes hoped to see
+squatted on the ground, and feeding
+with his fingers. They were disappointed;
+the table was arranged in
+European fashion; wine of various
+kinds was there, especially champagne,
+(which the servants, notwithstanding
+Werne's remonstrances, insisted
+on shaking before opening, and
+which consequently flew about the
+room in foaming fountains;) bumper-toasts
+were drunk; and the whole
+party, Franks and Turks, seem to
+have gradually risen into a glorious
+state of intoxication, during which
+they vowed eternal friendship to each
+other in all imaginable tongues; and
+the German prince declared he would
+make the campaign to Taka with the
+Bascha, draw out the plan, and overwhelm
+the enemy. This jovial meeting
+was followed by a quieter entertainment
+given by the Wernes to the
+prince, who declared he was travelling
+as a private gentleman, and
+wished to be treated accordingly;
+and then Soliman Effendi, the Sicilian
+renegade, made a respectful application
+for permission to invite the
+"<i lang="it" xml:lang="it">Altezza Tedesca</i>," for whom he had
+conceived a great liking. A passage
+from Mr Werne is here worth quoting,
+as showing the state of society at
+Chartum. "I communicated the
+invitation, with the remark that the
+Sicilian was notorious for his poisonings,
+but that I had less fear on his
+highness' account than on that of my
+brother, who was already designated
+to replace him in his post. The
+prince did not heed the danger;
+moreover, I had put myself on a
+peculiar footing with Soliman Effendi,
+and now told him plainly that he had
+better keep his vindictive man&oelig;uvres
+for others than us, for that my brother
+and I should go to dinner with loaded
+pistols in our pockets, and would<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span>
+shoot him through the head (<i lang="it" xml:lang="it">brucciare
+il cervello</i>) if one of us three felt as
+much as a belly-ache at his table.
+The dinner was served in the German
+fashion; all the guests came, except
+Vaissière (formerly a French captain,
+now a slave-dealer, with the cross of
+the legion of honour.) He would not
+trust Soliman, who was believed to
+have poisoned a favourite female-slave
+of his after a dispute they had
+about money matters. The dinner
+went off merrily and well. The duke
+changed his mind about going to Taka,
+but promised to join in the campaign
+on his return from Fàszogl, and bade
+me promise the Bascha in his name
+a crocodile-rifle and a hundred bottles
+of champagne."</p>
+
+<p>Long and costly were the preparations
+for the march; the more so that
+Mr Werne and his brother, who saw
+gleaming in the distance the golden
+cupolas of Bagdad, desired to take all
+their baggage with them, and also
+sufficient stores for the campaign&mdash;not
+implicitly trusting to the Bascha's
+promise that his kitchen and table
+should be always at their service.
+Ten camels were needed to carry the
+brothers' baggage. One of their
+greatest troubles was to know how to
+dispose of their collection of beasts
+and birds. "The young maneless
+lion, our greatest joy, was dead&mdash;Soliman
+Effendi, who was afraid of
+him, having dared to poison him, as
+I learned, after the renegade's death,
+from one of our own people." But of
+birds there were a host; eagles, vultures,
+king-cranes, (<i>grus pavonina</i>,
+Linn.;) a snake-killing secretary, with
+his beautiful eagle head, long tail, and
+heron legs; strange varieties of water-fowl,
+many of which had been shot,
+but had had the pellets extracted and
+the wounds healed by the skill of Dr
+Werne; and last, but most beloved,
+"a pet black horn-bird, (<i>buceros
+abyss.</i> L.,) who hopped up to us when
+we called out 'Jack!'&mdash;who picked up
+with his long curved beak the pieces of
+meat that were thrown to him, tossed
+them into the air and caught them
+again, (whereat the Prince of Wurtemberg
+laughed till he held his sides,)
+because nature has provided him with
+too short a tongue; but who did not
+despise frogs and lizards, and who
+called us at daybreak with his persevering
+'<em>Hum, hum</em>,' until we roused
+ourselves and answered 'Jack.'"
+Their anxiety on account of their
+aviary was relieved by the Bascha's
+wife, who condescendingly offered to
+take charge of it during their absence.
+Mehemet Ali's daughter suffered
+dreadfully from ennui in dull, unwholesome
+Chartum, and reckoned
+on the birds and beasts as pastime
+and diversion. Thus, little by little,
+difficulties were overcome, and all
+was made ready for the march. A
+Bolognese doctor of medicine, named
+Bellotti, and Dumont, a French apothecary,
+arrived at Chartum. They
+belonged to an Egyptian regiment,
+and must accompany it on the <i>chasua</i>.<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a>
+Troops assembled in and around
+Chartum, the greater part of whose
+garrison, destined also to share in the
+campaign, were boated over to the
+right bank of the Blue Nile. Thence
+they were to march northwards to
+Damer&mdash;once a town, now a village
+amidst ruins&mdash;situated about three
+leagues above the place where the
+Atbara, a river that rises in Abyssinia,
+and flows north-westward through
+Sennaar, falls into the Nile. There
+the line of march changed its direction
+to the right, and took a tolerably
+straight route, but inclining a little to
+the south, in the direction of the Red
+Sea. The Bascha went by water
+down the Nile the greater part of the
+way to Damer, and was of course
+attended by his physician. Mr Werne,
+finding himself unwell, followed his
+example, sending their twelve camels
+by land, and accompanied by Bellotti,
+Dumont, and a Savoyard merchant
+from Chartum, Bruno Rollet by name.
+There was great difficulty in getting
+a vessel, all having been taken for the
+transport of provisions and military<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span>
+stores; but at last one was discovered,
+sunk by its owner to save it from the
+commissariat, and after eleven days
+of sickness, suffering, and peril&mdash;during
+which Mr Werne, when burning
+with fever, had been compelled to
+jump overboard to push the heavy
+laden boat off the reef on which the
+stupid Rëis had run it&mdash;the party
+rejoined headquarters. There Mr
+Werne was kindly received by Achmet,
+and most joyfully by his brother.
+Long and dolorous was the tale Dr
+Joseph had to tell of his sufferings
+with the wild-riding Bascha. Three
+days before reaching Damer, that impatient
+chieftain left his ship and
+ordered out the dromedaries. The
+Berlin doctor of medicine felt his heart
+sink within him; he had never yet
+ascended a dromedary's saddle, and the
+desperate riding of the Bascha made
+his own Turkish retinue fear to follow
+him. His forebodings were well-founded.
+Two hours' rough trot shook
+up his interior to such an extent, and
+so stripped his exterior of skin, that
+he was compelled to dismount and lie
+down upon some brushwood near the
+Nile, exposed to the burning sun, and
+with a compassionate Bedouin for sole
+attendant, until the servants and
+baggage came up. Headache, vomiting,
+terrible heat and parching thirst&mdash;for
+he had no drinking vessel, and
+the Bedouin would not leave him&mdash;were
+his portion the whole day, followed
+by fever and delirium during
+the night. At two o'clock the next
+day (the hottest time) the Bascha
+was again in the saddle, as if desirous
+to try to the utmost his own endurance
+and that of his suite. By this
+time the doctor had come up with
+him, (having felt himself better in the
+morning,) after a six hours' ride, and
+terrible loss of leather, the blood running
+down into his stockings. Partly
+on his dromedary, partly on foot, he
+managed to follow his leader through
+this second day's march, at the cost
+of another night's fever, but in the
+morning he was so weak that he was
+obliged to take boat and complete his
+journey to Damer by water. Of more
+slender frame and delicate complexion
+than his brother, the poor doctor was
+evidently ill-adapted for roughing it
+in African deserts, although his pluck
+and fortitude went far towards supplying
+his physical deficiencies. Most
+painful are the accounts of his constantly
+recurring sufferings during
+that arduous expedition; and one
+cannot but admire and wonder at the
+zeal for science, or ardent thirst for
+novelty, that supported him, and
+induced him to persevere in the teeth
+of such hardship and ill-health. At
+Damer he purchased a small dromedary
+of easy paces, and left the
+Bascha's rough-trotting gift for his
+brother's riding.</p>
+
+<p>At three in the afternoon of the
+20th March, a cannon-shot gave the
+signal for departure. The Wernes'
+water-skins were already filled and
+their baggage packed; in an instant
+their tents were struck and camels
+loaded; with baggage and servants
+they took their place at the head of
+the column and rode up to the Bascha,
+who was halted to the east of Damer,
+with his beautiful horses and dromedaries
+standing saddled behind him.
+He complained of the great disorder
+in the camp, but consoled himself
+with the reflection that things would
+go better by-and-by. "It was truly
+a motley scene," says Mr Werne.
+"The Turkish cavalry in their national
+costume of many colours, with
+yellow and green banners and small
+kettle-drums; the Schaïgië and Mograbin
+horsemen; Bedouins on horseback,
+on camels, and on foot; the
+Schechs and Moluks (little king) with
+their armour-bearers behind them on
+the dromedaries, carrying pikes and
+lances, straight swords and leather
+shields; the countless donkeys and
+camels&mdash;the former led by a great
+portion of the infantry, to ride in
+turn&mdash;drums and an ear-splitting
+band of music, The Chabir (caravan-leader)
+was seen in the distance
+mounted on his dromedary, and armed
+with a lance and round shield; the
+Bascha bestrode his horse, and we
+accompanied him in that direction,
+whilst gradually, and in picturesque
+disorder, the detachments emerged
+from the monstrous confusion and followed
+us. The artillery consisted of
+two field-pieces, drawn by camels,
+which the Bascha had had broken to
+the work, that in the desert they
+might relieve the customary team of
+mules.</p>
+
+<p>"Abd-el-Kader, the jovial Topschi<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span>
+Baschi, (chief of the artillery,) commanded
+them, and rode a mule. The
+Turks, (that is to say, chiefly Circassians,
+Kurds, and Arnauts or Albanians,)
+who shortly before could hardly
+put one leg before the other, seemed
+transformed into new men, as they
+once more found themselves at home
+in their saddles. They galloped
+round the Bascha like madmen, riding
+their horses as mercilessly as if they
+had been drunk with opium. This
+was a sort of honorary demonstration,
+intended to indicate to their chief their
+untameable valour. The road led
+through the desert, and was tolerably
+well beaten. Towards evening
+the Bascha rode forwards with the
+Chabir. We did not follow, for I
+felt myself unwell. It was dark
+night when we reached the left bank
+of the Atbara, where we threw
+ourselves down amongst the bushes,
+and went to sleep, without taking
+supper."</p>
+
+<p>The campaign might now be said
+to be beginning; at least the army
+was close upon tribes whose disposition,
+if not avowedly hostile, was very
+equivocal, and the Bascha placed a
+picket of forty men at the only ford
+over the Atbara, a clear stream of
+tolerable depth, and with lofty banks,
+covered with rich grass, with mimosas
+and lofty fruit-laden palm-trees. The
+next day's march was a severe one&mdash;ten
+hours without a halt&mdash;and was
+attended, after nightfall, with some
+danger, arising partly from the route
+lying through trees with barbed
+thorns, strong enough to tear the
+clothes off men's bodies and the eyes
+out of their heads, and partly from the
+crowding and pressure in the disorderly
+column during its progress
+amongst holes and chasms occasioned
+by the overflowing of the river. Upon
+halting, at midnight, a fire was
+lighted for the Bascha, and one of his
+attendants brought coffee to Mr
+Werne; but he, sick and weary, rejected
+it, and would have preferred,
+he says, so thoroughly exhausted did
+he feel, a nap under a bush to a supper
+upon a roasted angel. They were
+still ascending the bank of the Atbara,
+a winding stream, with wildly beautiful
+tree-fringed banks, containing
+few fish, but giving shelter, in its
+deep places, to the crocodile and hippopotamus.
+From the clefts of its
+sandstone bed, then partially exposed
+by the decline of the waters, sprang
+a lovely species of willow, with beautiful
+green foliage and white umbelliferous
+flowers, having a perfume surpassing
+that of jasmine. The Wernes
+would gladly, have explored the
+neighbourhood; but the tremendous
+heat, and a warm wind which played
+round their temples with a sickening
+effect, drove them into camp. Gunfire
+was at noon upon that day; but
+it was Mr Werne's turn to be on the
+sick-list. Suddenly he felt himself so
+ill, that it was with a sort of despairing
+horror he saw the tent struck from
+over him, loaded upon a camel, and
+driven off. In vain he endeavoured
+to rise; the sun seemed to dart coals
+of fire upon his head. His brother and
+servant carried him into the shadow
+of a neighbouring palm-tree, and he
+sank half-dead upon the glowing sand.
+It would suffice to abide there during
+the heat of the day, as they thought,
+but instead of that, they were compelled
+to remain till next morning,
+Werne suffering terribly from dysentery.
+"Never in my life," he says,
+"did I more ardently long for the setting
+of the sun than on that day; even
+its last rays exercised the same painful
+power on my hair, which seemed to
+be in a sort of electric connection
+with just as many sunbeams, and to
+bristle up upon my head. And no
+sooner had the luminary which inspired
+me with such horror sunk below
+the horizon, than I felt myself
+better, and was able to get on my
+legs and crawl slowly about. Some
+good-natured Arab shepherd-lads approached
+our fire, pitied me, and
+brought me milk and durra-bread.
+It was a lovely evening; the full moon
+was reflected in the Atbara, as were
+also the dark crowns of the palm-trees,
+wild geese shrieked around us;
+otherwise the stillness was unbroken,
+save at intervals by the cooing of
+doves. There is something beautiful
+in sleeping in the open air, when
+weather and climate are suitable.
+We awoke before sunrise, comforted,
+and got upon our dromedaries; but
+after a couple of hours' ride we mistrusted
+the sun, and halted with some
+wandering Arabs belonging to the
+Kabyle of the Kammarabs. We<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span>
+were hospitably received, and regaled
+with milk and bread."<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p>
+
+<p>When our two Germans rejoined
+headquarters, after four days' absence,
+they found Achmet Bascha seated in
+the shade upon the ground in front of
+his tent, much burned by the sun, and
+looking fagged and suffering&mdash;as well
+he might be after the heat and exposure
+he had voluntarily undergone.
+Nothing could cure him, however, at
+least as yet, of his fancy for marching
+in the heat of the day. Although
+obstinate and despotic, the Bascha
+was evidently a dashing sort of fellow,
+well calculated to win the respect and
+admiration of his wild and heterogeneous
+army. Weary as were the
+two Wernes, (they reached the camp
+at noon,) at two o'clock they had to
+be again in the saddle. "A number
+of gazelles were started; the Bascha
+seized a gun and dashed after them
+upon his Arabian stallion, almost the
+whole of the cavalry scouring after
+him like a wild mob, and we ourselves
+riding a sharp trot to witness the
+chase. We thought he had fallen
+from his horse, so suddenly did he
+swing himself from saddle to ground,
+killing three gazelles with three shots,
+of which animals we consumed a considerable
+portion roasted for that
+night's supper." The river here
+widened, and crocodiles showed themselves
+upon the opposite shore. The
+day was terribly warm; the poor
+medico was ill again, suffering grievously
+from his head, and complaining
+of <em>his hair being so hot</em>; and as the
+Salamander Bascha persisted in marching
+under a sun which, through the
+canvass of the tents, heated sabres
+and musket-barrels till it was scarcely
+possible to grasp them, the brothers
+again lingered behind and followed in
+the cool of the evening, Joseph being
+mounted upon an easy-going mule
+lent him by Topschi Baschi, the good-humoured
+but dissolute captain of
+the guns. They were now divided
+but by the river's breadth from the
+hostile tribe of the Haddenda, and
+might at any moment be assailed;
+so two hours after sunset a halt was
+called and numerous camp-fires were
+lighted, producing a most picturesque
+effect amongst the trees, and by their
+illumination of the diversified costumes
+of the soldiery, and attracting
+a whole regiment of scorpions, "some
+of them remarkably fine specimens,"
+says Mr Werne, who looks upon these
+unpleasant fireside companions with a
+scientific eye, "a finger and a half
+long, of a light colour, half of the tail
+of a brown black and covered with
+hair." It is a thousand pities that
+the adventurous Mrs Ida Pfeiffer did
+not accompany Mr Werne upon this
+expedition. She would have had the
+finest possible opportunities of curing
+herself of the prejudice which it will
+be remembered she was so weak as
+to entertain against the scorpion
+tribe. These pleasant reptiles were
+as plentiful all along Mr Werne's line
+of march as are cockchafers on a
+summer evening in an English oak-copse.
+Their visitations were pleasantly
+varied by those of snakes of
+all sizes, and of various degrees of
+venom. "At last," says Mr Werne,
+"one gets somewhat indifferent about
+scorpions and other wild animals."
+He had greater difficulty in accustoming
+himself to the sociable habits of
+the snakes, who used to glide about
+amongst tents and baggage, and by
+whom, in the course of the expedition,
+a great number of persons were
+bitten. On the 12th April "Mohammed
+Ladham sent us a remarkable
+scorpion&mdash;pity that it is so much
+injured&mdash;almost two fingers long,
+black-brown, tail and feet covered
+with prickly hair, claws as large as
+those of a small crab.... We
+had laid us down under a green tree
+beside a cotton plantation, whilst our
+servants unloaded the camels and
+pitched the tents, when a snake, six<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span>
+feet long, darted from under our carpet,
+passed over my leg, and close
+before my brother's face. But we
+were so exhausted that we lay still,
+and some time afterwards the snake
+was brought to us, one of Schech
+Defalla's people having killed it."
+About noon next day a similar snake
+sprang out of the said Defalla's own
+tent; it was killed also, and found to
+measure six feet two inches. The
+soldiers perceiving that the German
+physician and his brother were curious
+in the matter of reptiles, brought
+them masses of serpents; but they
+had got a notion that the flesh was
+the part coveted (not the skin) to
+make medicine, and most of the specimens
+were so defaced as to be valueless.
+Early in May "some soldiers
+assured us they had seen in the
+thicket a serpent twenty feet long,
+and as thick as a man's leg; probably
+a species of boa&mdash;a pity that they
+could not kill it. The great number
+of serpents with dangerous bites
+makes our bivouac very unsafe, and
+we cannot encamp with any feeling
+of security near bushes or amongst
+brushwood; the prick of a blade of
+straw, the sting of the smallest
+insect, causes a hasty movement, for
+one immediately fancies it is a snake
+or scorpion; and when out shooting,
+one's <em>second</em> glance is for the game,
+one's <em>first</em> on the ground at his feet,
+for fear of trampling and irritating
+some venomous reptile." As we proceed
+through the volume we shall
+come to other accounts of beasts and
+reptiles, so remarkable as really
+almost to reconcile us to the possibility
+of some of the zoological marvels
+narrated by the Yankee Doctor
+Mayo in his rhapsody of Kaloolah.<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a>
+For the present we must revert to
+the business of this curiously-conducted
+campaign. As the army
+advanced, various chiefs presented
+themselves, with retinues more or
+less numerous. The first of these
+was the Grand-Shech Mohammed
+Defalla, already named, who came
+up, with a great following, on the
+28th March. He was a man of
+herculean frame; and assuredly such
+was very necessary to enable him to
+endure in that climate the weight of
+his defensive arms. He wore a
+double shirt of mail over a quilted
+doublet, arm-plates and beautifully
+wrought steel gauntlets; his casque
+fitted like a shell to the upper part of
+his head, and had in front, in lieu of
+a visor, an iron bar coming down
+over the nose&mdash;behind, for the protection
+of the nape, a fringe composed
+of small rings. His straight-bladed
+sword had a golden hilt. The whole
+equipment, which seems to correspond
+very closely with that of some
+of the Sikhs or other warlike Indian
+tribes, proceeded from India, and
+Defalla had forty or fifty such suits
+of arms. About the same time with
+him, arrived two Schechs from the
+refractory land of Taka, tall handsome
+men; whilst, from the environs
+of the neighbouring town of Gos-Rajeb,
+a number of people rode out on
+dromedaries to meet the Bascha, their
+hair quite white with camel-fat, which
+melted in the sun and streamed over
+their backs. Gos-Rajeb, situated at
+about a quarter of a mile from the
+left bank of the Atbara, consists of
+some two hundred <i>tokul</i> (huts) and
+clay-built houses, and in those parts
+is considered an important commercial
+depot, Indian goods being transported
+thither on camels from the
+port of Souakim, on the Red Sea.
+The inhabitants are of various tribes,
+more of them red than black or brown;
+but few were visible, many having
+fled at the approach of Achmet's
+army, which passed the town in imposing
+array&mdash;the infantry in double
+column in the centre, the Turkish
+cavalry on the right, the Schaïgiës and
+Mograbins on the left, the artillery,
+with kettledrums, cymbals, and other
+music, in the van&mdash;marched through
+the Atbara, there very shallow, and
+encamped on the right bank, in a
+stony and almost treeless plain, at
+the foot of two rocky hills. The
+Bascha ordered the Shech of Gos-Rajeb
+to act as guide to the Wernes
+in their examination of the vicinity,
+and to afford them all the information
+in his power. The most remarkable
+spot to which he conducted them
+was to the site of an ancient city,
+which once, according to tradition,
+had been as large as Cairo, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span>
+inhabited by Christians. The date
+of its existence must be very remote,
+for the ground was smooth,
+and the sole trace of buildings
+consisted in a few heaps of broken
+bricks. There were indications of a
+terrible conflagration, the bricks in
+one place being melted together into
+a black glazed mass. Mr Werne
+could trace nothing satisfactory with
+respect to former Christian occupants,
+and seems disposed to think that
+Burckhardt, who speaks of Christian
+monuments at that spot, (in the neighbourhood
+of the hill of Herrerem,)
+may have been misled by certain
+peculiarly formed rocks.</p>
+
+<p>The most renowned chief of the
+mutinous tribes of Taka, the conqueror
+of the Turks under Churdschid
+Bascha, was Mohammed Din, Grand-Schech
+of the Haddenda. This personage,
+awed by the approach of
+Achmet's formidable force, sent his
+son to the advancing Bascha, as a
+hostage for his loyalty and submission.
+Achmet sent the young
+man back to his father as bearer
+of his commands. The next day
+the army crossed the frontier of
+Taka, which is not very exactly defined,
+left the Atbara in their rear,
+and, moving still eastwards, beheld
+before them, in the far distance, the
+blue mountains of Abyssinia. The
+Bascha's suite was now swelled by
+the arrival of numerous Schechs, great
+and small, with their esquires and attendants.
+The route lay through a
+thick forest, interwoven with creeping
+plants and underwood, and with
+thorny mimosas, which grew to a
+great height. The path was narrow,
+the confusion of the march inconceivably
+great and perilous, and if the
+enemy had made a vigorous attack
+with their javelins, which they are
+skilled in throwing, the army must
+have endured great loss, with scarcely
+a possibility of inflicting any. At last
+the scattered column reached an open
+space, covered with grass, and intersected
+with deep narrow rills of
+water. The Bascha, who had outstripped
+his troops, was comfortably
+encamped, heedless of their fate,
+whilst they continued for a long time
+to emerge in broken parties from the
+wood. Mr Werne's good opinion of
+his generalship had been already much
+impaired, and this example of true
+Turkish indolence, and of the absence
+of any sort of military dispositions
+under such critical circumstances,
+completely destroyed it. The next
+day there was some appearance of
+establishing camp-guards, and of taking
+due precautions against the fierce
+and numerous foe, who on former
+occasions had thrice defeated Turkish
+armies, and from whom an attack might
+at any moment be expected. In the
+afternoon an alarm was given; the
+Bascha, a good soldier, although a
+bad general, was in the saddle in an
+instant, and gallopping to the spot,
+followed by all his cavalry, whilst the
+infantry rushed confusedly in the
+same direction. The uproar had
+arisen, however, not from Arab assailants,
+but from some soldiers who
+had discovered extensive corn magazines&mdash;<em>silos</em>,
+as they are called in Algeria&mdash;holes
+in the ground, filled with
+grain, and carefully covered over.
+By the Bascha's permission, the soldiers
+helped themselves from these
+abundant granaries, and thus the
+army found itself provided with corn
+for the next two months. In the
+course of the disorderly distribution,
+or rather scramble, occurred a little
+fight between the Schaïgië, a quarrelsome
+set of irregulars, and some of
+the Turks. Nothing could be worse
+than the discipline of Achmet's host.
+The Schaïgiës were active and daring
+horsemen, and were the first to draw
+blood in the campaign, in a skirmish
+upon the following day with some
+ambushed Arabs. The neighbouring
+woods swarmed with these javelin-bearing
+gentry, although they lay
+close, and rarely showed themselves,
+save when they could inflict injury
+at small risk. Mr Werne began to
+doubt the possibility of any extensive
+or effectual operations against
+these wild and wandering tribes,
+who, on the approach of the army,
+loaded their goods on camels, and
+fled into the <i>Chaaba</i>, or forest district,
+whither it was impossible to
+follow them. Where was the Bascha
+to find money and food for the support
+of his numerous army?&mdash;where
+was he to quarter it during the dangerous
+<i>Chariff</i>, or rainy season? He
+was very reserved as to his plans;
+probably, according to Mr Werne,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span>
+because he had none. The Schechs
+who had joined and marched with
+him could hardly be depended upon,
+when it was borne in mind that they,
+formerly the independent rulers of a
+free people, had been despoiled of
+their power and privileges, and were
+now the ill-used vassals of the haughty
+and stupid Turks, who overwhelmed
+them with imposts, treated them contemptuously,
+and even subjected them
+to the bastinado. "Mohammed Din,
+seeing the hard lot of these gentlemen,
+seems disposed to preserve his
+freedom as long as possible, or to sell
+it as dearly as may be. Should it
+come to a war, there is, upon our side,
+a total want of efficient leaders, at
+any rate if we except the Bascha.
+Abdin Aga, chief of the Turkish cavalry,
+a bloated Arnaut; Sorop Effendi,
+a model of stupidity and covetousness;
+Hassan Effendi Bimbaschi,
+a quiet sot; Soliman Aga, greedy,
+and without the slightest education of
+any kind; Hassan Effendi of Sennaar,
+a Turk in the true sense of the word
+(these four are infantry commanders);
+Mohammed Ladjam, a good-natured
+but inexperienced fellow, chief of the
+Mograbin cavalry: amongst all these
+officers, the only difference is, that
+each is more ignorant than his neighbour.
+With such leaders, what can
+be expected from an army that, for
+the most part, knows no discipline&mdash;the
+Schaïgiës, for instance, doing just
+what they please, and being in a fair
+way to corrupt all the rest&mdash;and that
+is encumbered with an endless train
+of dangerous rabble, idlers, slaves,
+and women of pleasure, serving as
+a burthen and hindrance? Let us
+console ourselves with the <i>Allah
+kerim!</i> (God is merciful.)" Mr
+Werne had not long to wait for a
+specimen of Turkish military skill.
+On the night of the 7th April he was
+watching in his tent beside his grievously
+sick brother, when there suddenly
+arose an uproar in the camp,
+followed by firing. "I remained by
+our tent, for my brother was scarcely
+able to stir, and the infantry also
+remained quiet, trusting to their
+mounted comrades. But when I saw
+Bimbaschi Hassan Effendi lead a
+company past us, and madly begin to
+fire over the powder-waggons, as if
+these were meant to serve as barricades
+against the hostile lances, I
+ran up to him with my sabre drawn,
+and threatened him with the Bascha,
+as well as with the weapon, whereupon
+he came to his senses, and
+begged me not to betray him. The
+whole proved to be mere noise, but
+the harassed Bascha was again up
+and active. He seemed to make no
+use of his aides-de-camp, and only
+his own presence could inspire his
+troops with courage. Some of the
+enemy were killed, and there were
+many tracks of blood leading into the
+wood, although the firing had been at
+random in the darkness. As a specimen
+of the tactics of our Napoleon-worshipping
+Bascha, he allowed the
+wells, which were at two hundred
+yards from camp, to remain unguarded
+at night, so that they might
+easily have been filled up by the
+enemy. Truly fortunate was it that
+there were no great stones in the
+neighbourhood to choke them up, for
+we were totally without implements
+wherewith to have cleared them out
+again." Luckily for this most careless
+general and helpless army, the
+Arabs neglected to profit by their
+shortcomings, and on the 14th April,
+after many negotiations, the renowned
+Mohammed Din himself, awed, we
+must suppose, by the numerical
+strength of Achmet's troops, and
+over-estimating their real value, committed
+the fatal blunder of presenting
+himself in the Turkish camp. Great
+was the curiosity to see this redoubted
+chief, who alighted at Schech Defalla's
+tent, into which the soldiers impudently
+crowded, to get a view of the
+man before whom many of them had
+formerly trembled and fled. "Mohammed
+Din is of middle stature,
+and of a black-brown colour, like all
+his people; his countenance at first
+says little, but, on longer inspection,
+its expression is one of great
+cunning; his bald head is bare; his
+dress Arabian, with drawers of a fiery
+red colour. His retinue consists,
+without exception, of most ill-looking
+fellows, on whose countenances Nature
+seems to have done her best to
+express the faithless character attributed
+to the Haddenda. They are
+all above the middle height, and
+armed with shields and lances, or
+swords." Next morning Mr Werne<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span>
+saw the Bascha seated on his <i>angarèb</i>,
+(a sort of bedstead, composed of
+plaited strips of camel-hide, which,
+upon the march, served as a throne,)
+with a number of Shechs squatted
+upon the ground on either side of
+him, amongst them Mohammed Din,
+looking humbled, and as if half-repentant
+of his rash step. The Bascha
+appeared disposed to let him feel that
+he was now no better than a caged
+lion, whose claws the captor can cut
+at will. He showed him, however,
+marks of favour, gave him a red
+shawl for a turban, and a purple
+mantle with gold tassels, but no
+sabre, which Mr Werne thought a
+bad omen. The Schech was suffered
+to go to and fro between the camp
+and his own people, but under certain
+control&mdash;now with an escort of
+Schaïgiës, then leaving his son as
+hostage. He sent in some cattle and
+sheep as a present, and promised to
+bring the tribute due; this he failed
+to do, and a time was fixed to him
+and the other Shechs within which to
+pay up arrears. Notwithstanding the
+subjection of their chief, the Arabs
+continued their predatory practices,
+stealing camels from the camp, or
+taking them by force from the grooms
+who drove them out to pasture.</p>
+
+<p>Mr Werne's book is a journal,
+written daily during the campaign
+but, owing to the long interval between
+its writing and publication, he
+has found it necessary to make frequent
+parenthetical additions, corrective
+or explanatory. Towards the
+end of April, during great sickness in
+camp, he writes as follows:&mdash;"My
+brother's medical observations and
+experiments begin to excite in me a
+strong interest. He has promised me
+that he will keep a medical journal;
+but he must first get into better health,
+for now it is always with sickening
+disgust that he returns from visiting
+his patients; he complains of the insupportable
+effluvia from these people,
+sinks upon his <i>angarèb</i> with depression
+depicted in his features, and falls
+asleep with open eyes, so that I often
+feel quite uneasy." Then comes the
+parenthesis of ten years' later date.
+"Subsequently, when I had joined the
+expedition for the navigation of the
+White Nile, he wrote to me from the
+camp of Kàssela-el-Lus to Chartum,
+that, with great diligence and industry,
+he had written some valuable
+papers on African diseases, and was
+inconsolable at having lost them. He
+had been for ten days dangerously
+ill, had missed me sadly, and, in a fit
+of delirium, when his servant asked
+him for paper to light the fire, had
+handed him his manuscript, which the
+stupid fellow had forthwith burned.
+At the same time, he lamented that,
+during his illness, our little menagerie
+had been starved to death. The
+Bascha had been to see him, and by
+his order Topschi Baschi had taken
+charge of his money, that he might not
+be robbed, giving the servants what
+was needful for their keep, and for the
+purchase of flesh for the animals. The
+servants had drunk the money intended
+for the beasts' food. When my
+brother recovered his health, he had
+the <em>fagged</em>, (a sort of lynx,) which had
+held out longest, and was only just
+dead, cut open, and so convinced himself
+that it had died of hunger. The
+annoyance one has to endure from
+these people is beyond conception,
+and the very mildest-tempered man&mdash;as,
+for instance, my late brother&mdash;is
+compelled at times to make use of the
+whip."</p>
+
+<p>Whilst Mohammed Din and the
+other Shechs, accompanied by detachments
+of Turkish troops, intended
+partly to support them in their demands,
+and partly to reconnoitre the
+country, endeavoured to get together
+the stipulated tribute, the army remained
+stationary. But repose did
+not entail monotony; strange incidents
+were of daily occurrence in this singular
+camp. The Wernes, always
+anxious for the increase of their cabinet
+of stuffed birds and beasts, sent
+their huntsman Abdallah with one of
+the detachments, remaining themselves,
+for the present at least, at headquarters,
+to collect whatever might
+come in their way. The commander
+of the Mograbins sent them an antelope
+as big as a donkey, having legs
+like a cow, and black twisted horns.
+From the natives little was to be
+obtained. They were very shy and
+ill-disposed, and could not be prevailed
+upon, even by tenfold payment,
+to supply the things most abundant
+with them, as for instance milk and
+honey. In hopes of alluring and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span>
+conciliating them, the Bascha ordered
+those traders who had accompanied
+the army to establish a bazaar outside
+the fence enclosing the camp. The
+little mirrors that were there sold
+proved a great attraction. The Arabs
+would sit for whole days looking in
+them, and pulling faces. But no
+amount of reflection could render them
+amicable or honest: they continued to
+steal camels and asses whenever they
+could, and one of them caught a
+Schaigie's horse, led him up to the
+camp, and stabbed him to death. So
+great was the hatred of these tribes to
+their oppressors&mdash;a hatred which
+would have shown itself by graver
+aggressions, but for Achmet's large
+force, and above all, for their dread
+of firearms. Within the camp there
+was wild work enough at times. The
+good-hearted, hot-headed Werne was
+horribly scandalised by the ill-treatment
+of the slaves. Dumont, the
+French apothecary, had a poor lad
+named Amber, a mere boy, willing
+and industrious, whom he continually
+beat and kicked, until at last Mr
+Werne challenged him to a duel with
+sabres, and threatened to take away
+the slave, which he, as a Frenchman,
+had no legal right to possess. But
+this was nothing compared to the
+cruelties practised by other Europeans,
+and especially at Chartum by
+one Vigoureux, (a French corporal
+who had served under Napoleon, and
+was now adjutant of an Egyptian
+battalion,) and his wife, upon a poor
+black girl, only ten years of age,
+whom they first barbarously flogged,
+and then tied to a post, with her
+bleeding back exposed to the broiling
+sun. Informed of this atrocity by his
+brother, who had witnessed it, Mr
+Werne sprang from his sickbed, and
+flew to the rescue, armed with his
+sabre, and with a well-known iron
+stick, ten pounds in weight, which
+had earned him the nickname of Abu-Nabut,
+or Father of the Stick. A
+distant view of his incensed countenance
+sufficed, and the Frenchman,
+cowardly as cruel, hastened to release
+his victim, and to humble himself
+before her humane champion. Concerning
+this corporal and his dame,
+whom he had been to France to fetch,
+and who was brought to bed on camel-back,
+under a burning sun, in the
+midst of the desert, some curious
+reminiscences are set down in the
+<cite>Feldzug</cite>, as are also some diverting
+details of the improprieties of the dissipated
+gunner Topschi Baschi, who,
+on the 1st May, brought dancing-girls
+into the hut occupied by the two
+Germans, and assembled a mob round
+it by the indecorous nature of his
+proceedings. Regulations for the internal
+order and security of the camp
+were unheard of. After a time, tents
+were pitched over the ammunition; a
+ditch was dug around it, and strict
+orders were given to light no fire in its
+vicinity. All fires, too, by command
+of the Bascha, were to be extinguished
+when the evening gun was fired. For
+a short time the orders were obeyed;
+then they were forgotten; fires were
+seen blazing late at night, and within
+fifteen paces of the powder. Nothing
+but the bastinado could give memory
+to these reckless fatalists. "I have
+often met ships upon the Nile, so laden
+with straw that there was scarcely
+room for the sailors to work the vessel.
+No matter for that; in the midst of
+the straw a mighty kitchen-fire was
+merrily blazing."</p>
+
+<p>On the 6th of May, the two Wernes
+mounted their dromedaries and set off,
+attended by one servant, and with a
+guide provided by Mohammed Defalla,
+for the village of El Soffra, at a distance
+of two and a half leagues, where
+they expected to find Mohammed Din
+and a large assemblage of his tribe.
+It was rather a daring thing to advance
+thus unescorted into the land
+of the treacherous Haddendas, and the
+Bascha gave his consent unwillingly;
+but Mussa, (Moses,) the Din's only
+son, was hostage in the camp, and
+they deemed themselves safer alone
+than with the half company of soldiers
+Achmet wanted to send with them.
+Their route lay due east, at first through
+fields of <i>durra</i>, (a sort of grain,)
+afterwards through forests of saplings.
+The natives they met greeted
+them courteously, and they reached
+El Soffra without molestation, but
+there learned, to their considerable
+annoyance, that Mohammed Din
+had gone two leagues and a half
+farther, to the camp of his nephew
+Shech Mussa, at Mitkenàb. So, after
+a short pause, they again mounted
+their camels, and rode off, loaded with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span>
+maledictions by the Arabs, because
+they would not remain and supply
+them with medicine, although the same
+Arabs refused to requite the drugs
+with so much as a cup of milk. They
+rode for more than half an hour before
+emerging from the straggling village,
+which was composed of wretched huts
+made of palm-mats, having an earthen
+cooking-vessel, a leathern water-bottle,
+and two stones for bruising corn,
+for sole furniture. The scanty dress
+of the people&mdash;some of the men had
+nothing but a leathern apron round
+their hips, and a sheep-skin, with the
+wool inwards, over their shoulders&mdash;their
+long hair and wild countenances,
+gave them the appearance of thorough
+savages. In the middle of every village
+was an open place, where the
+children played stark naked in the
+burning sun, their colour and their
+extraordinarily nimble movements
+combining, says Mr Werne, to give
+them the appearance of a troop of
+young imps. Infants, which in Europe
+would lie helpless in the cradle, are
+there seen rolling in the sand, with none
+to mind them, and playing with the
+young goats and other domestic
+animals. In that torrid climate, the
+development of the human frame is
+wonderfully rapid. Those women of
+whom the travellers caught a sight in
+this large village, which consisted of
+upwards of two thousand huts and
+tents, were nearly all old and ugly.
+The young ones, when they by chance
+encountered the strangers, covered
+their faces, and ran away. On the
+road to Mitkenàb, however, some
+young and rather handsome girls
+showed themselves. "They all looked
+at us with great wonder," says Mr
+Werne, "and took us for Turks, for
+we are the first Franks who have come
+into this country."</p>
+
+<p>Mitkenàb, pleasantly situated
+amongst lofty trees, seemed to invite
+the wanderers to cool shelter from
+the mid-day sun. They were parched
+with thirst when they entered it, but
+not one of the inquisitive Arabs who
+crowded around them would attend to
+their request for a draught of milk or
+water. Here, however, was Mohammed
+Din, and with him a party of
+Schaïgiës under Melek Mahmud,
+whom they found encamped under a
+great old tree, with his fifty horsemen
+around him. After they had
+taken some refreshment, the Din
+came to pay them a visit. He refused
+to take the place offered him on an
+<i>angarèb</i>, but sat down upon the
+ground, giving them to understand,
+with a sneering smile, that <em>that</em>
+was now the proper place for him.
+"We had excellent opportunity to
+examine the physiognomy of this
+Schech, who is venerated like a
+demigod by all the Arabs between
+the Atbara and the Red Sea. 'He
+is a brave man,' they say, 'full of
+courage; there is no other like him!'
+His face is fat and round, with small
+grey-brown, piercing, treacherous-looking
+eyes, expressing both the
+cunning and the obstinacy of his
+character; his nose is well-proportioned
+and slightly flattened; his
+small mouth constantly wears a
+satirical scornful smile. But for this
+expression and his thievish glance,
+his bald crown and well-fed middle-sized
+person would become a monk's
+hood. He goes with his head bare,
+wears a white cotton shirt and <em>ferda</em>,
+and sandals on his feet.... We
+told him that he was well known to
+the Franks as a great hero; he shook
+his head and said that on the salt
+lake, at Souakim, he had seen great
+ships with cannon, but that he did
+not wish the help of the Inglèb (English;)
+then he said something else,
+which was not translated to us. I
+incautiously asked him, how numerous
+his nation was. 'Count the trees,'
+he replied, glancing ironically around
+him; (a poll-tax constituted a portion
+of the tribute.) Conversation through
+an interpreter was so wearisome that
+we soon took our leave." At Mitkenàb
+they were upon the borders of
+the great forest (Chaaba) that extends
+from the banks of the Atbara to the
+shores of the Red Sea. It contains
+comparatively few lofty trees&mdash;most
+of these getting uprooted by hurricanes,
+when the rainy season has
+softened the ground round their roots&mdash;but
+a vast deal of thicket and dense
+brushwood, affording shelter to legions
+of wild beasts; innumerable herds of
+elephants, rhinoceroses, lions, tigers,
+giraffes, various inferior beasts, and
+multitudes of serpents of the most
+venomous description. For fear of
+these unpleasant neighbours, no Arab<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span>
+at Mitkenàb quits his dwelling after
+nightfall. "When we returned to
+the wells, a little before sundown, we
+found all the Schaïgiës on the move,
+to take up their quarters in an enclosure
+outside the village, partly on
+account of the beasts of prey, especially
+the lions, which come down to
+drink of a night, partly for safety
+from the unfriendly Arabs. We went
+with them and encamped with Mammud
+in the middle of the enclosure.
+We slept soundly the night through,
+only once aroused by the hoarse cries
+of the hyenas, which were sneaking
+about the village, setting all the
+dogs barking. To insure our safety,
+Mohammed Din himself slept at our
+door&mdash;so well-disposed were his
+people towards us." A rumour had
+gained credit amongst the Arabs, that
+the two mysterious strangers were,
+sent by Achmet to reconnoitre the
+country for the Bascha's own advance;
+and so incensed were they at this,
+that, although their beloved chief's
+son was a hostage in the Turkish
+camp, it was only by taking bypaths,
+under guidance of a young
+relative of Schech Mussa's, that the
+Wernes were able to regain their
+camp in safety. A few days after
+their return they were both attacked
+by bad fever, which for some time
+prevented them from writing. They
+lost their reckoning, and thenceforward
+the journal is continued without
+dates.</p>
+
+<p>The Bascha grew weary of life in
+camp, and pined after action. In vain
+did the Schaïgiës toss the djereed, and
+go through irregular tournaments and
+sham fights for his diversion; in vain
+did he rattle the dice with Topschi
+Baschi; vain were the blandishments
+of an Abyssinian beauty whom he
+had quartered in a hut surrounded
+with a high fence, and for whose
+amusement he not unfrequently had
+nocturnal serenades performed by the
+band of the 8th regiment; to which
+brassy and inharmonious challenge
+the six thousand donkeys assembled
+in camp never failed to respond by an
+ear-splitting bray, whilst the numerous
+camels bellowed a bass: despite all
+these amusements, the Bascha suffered
+from ennui. He was furious when
+he saw how slowly and scantily came
+in the tribute for which he had made
+this long halt. Some three hundred
+cows were all that had yet been delivered;
+a ridiculously small number
+contrasted with the vast herds possessed
+by those tribes. Achmet foamed
+with rage at this ungrateful return
+for his patience and consideration.
+He reproached the Schechs who were
+with him, and sent for Mohammed
+Din, Shech Mussa, and the two
+Shechs of Mitkenàb. Although their
+people, foreboding evil, endeavoured to
+dissuade them from obedience, they
+all four came and were forthwith put
+in irons and chained together. With
+all his cunning Mohammed Din had
+fallen into the snare. His plan had
+been, so Mr Werne believes, to cajole
+and detain the Turks by fair words
+and promises until the rainy season,
+when hunger and sickness would have
+proved his best allies. The Bascha
+had been beforehand with him, and
+the old marauder might now repent at
+leisure that he had not trusted to his
+impenetrable forests and to the javelins
+of his people, rather than to the word
+of a Turk. On the day of his arrest
+the usual evening gun was loaded
+with canister, and fired into the
+woods in the direction of the Haddendas,
+the sound of cannon inspiring
+the Arab and negro tribes with a
+panic fear. Firearms&mdash;to them incomprehensible
+weapons&mdash;have served
+more than anything else to daunt
+their courage. "When the Turks
+attacked a large and populous mountain
+near Faszogl, the blacks sent out
+spies to see how strong was the foe,
+and how armed. The spies came
+back laughing, and reported that
+there was no great number of men;
+that their sole arms were shining sticks
+upon their shoulders, and that they
+had neither swords, lances, nor shields.
+The poor fellows soon found how
+terrible an effect had the sticks they
+deemed so harmless. As they could
+not understand how it was that small
+pieces of lead should wound and kill,
+a belief got abroad amongst them,
+that the Afrite, Scheitàn, (the devil or
+evil spirit,) dwelt in the musket-barrels.
+With this conviction, a
+negro, grasping a soldier's musket,
+put his hand over the mouth of the
+barrel, that the afrite might not get
+out. The soldier pulled the trigger,
+and the leaden devil pierced the poor<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span>
+black's hand and breast. After an
+action, a negro collected the muskets
+of six or seven slain soldiers, and joyfully
+carried them home, there to
+forge them into lances in the presence
+of a party of his friends. But it
+happened that some of them were
+loaded, and soon getting heated in
+the fire, they went off, scattering
+death and destruction around them."
+Most of the people in Taka run from
+the mere report of a musket, but the
+Arabs of Hedjàs, a mountainous
+district near the Red Sea, possess
+firearms, and are slow but very good
+shots.</p>
+
+<p>In the way of tribute, nothing was
+gained by the imprisonment of Mahommed
+Din and his companions.
+No more contributions came in, and
+not an Arab showed himself upon
+the market-place outside the camp.
+Mohammed Din asked why his captors
+did not kill rather than confine
+him; he preferred death to captivity,
+and keeping him prisoner would lead,
+he said, to no result. The Arab
+chiefs in camp did not conceal their
+disgust at the Bascha's treatment of
+their Grand-Shech, and taxed Achmet
+with having broken his word, since
+he had given him the Amàhn&mdash;promise
+of pardon. Any possibility of
+conciliating the Arabs was destroyed
+by the step that had been taken. At
+night they swarmed round the camp,
+shrieking their war-cry. The utmost
+vigilance was necessary; a third of
+the infantry was under arms all night,
+the consequent fatigue increasing the
+amount of sickness. The general
+aspect of things was anything but
+cheering. The Wernes had their
+private causes of annoyance. Six of
+their camels, including the two excellent
+dromedaries given to them by the
+Bascha before quitting Chartum, were
+stolen whilst their camel-driver slept,
+and could not be recovered. They
+were compelled to buy others, and
+Mr Werne complains bitterly of the
+heavy expenses of the campaign&mdash;expenses
+greatly augmented by the
+sloth and dishonesty of their servants.
+The camel-driver, fearing to face his
+justly-incensed employers, disappeared
+and was no more heard of. Upon
+this and other occasions, Mr Werne
+was struck by the extraordinary skill
+of the Turks in tracing animals and
+men by their footsteps. In this manner
+his servants tracked his camels to an
+Arab village, although the road had
+been trampled by hundreds of beasts
+of the same sort. "If these people
+have once seen the footprint of a man,
+camel, horse, or ass, they are sure to
+recognise it amongst thousands of
+such impressions, and will follow the
+trail any distance, so long as the
+ground is tolerably favourable, and
+wind or rain has not obliterated the
+marks. In cases of loss, people send
+for a man who makes this kind of
+search his profession; they show him
+a footprint of the lost animal, and
+immediately, without asking any
+other indication, he follows the track
+through the streets of a town, daily
+trodden by thousands, and seldom
+falls to hunt out the game. He does
+not proceed slowly, or stoop to examine
+the ground, but his sharp eye
+follows the trail at a run. We ourselves
+saw the footstep of a runaway
+slave shown to one of these men, who
+caught the fugitive at the distance of
+three days' journey from that spot.
+My brother once went out of the
+Bascha's house at Chartum, to visit a
+patient who lived far off in the town.
+He had been gone an hour when the
+Bascha desired to see him, and the
+tschansch (orderly) traced him at
+once by his footmarks on the unpaved
+streets in which crowds had left
+similar signs. When, in consequence
+of my sickness, we lingered for some
+days on the Atbara, and then marched
+to overtake the army, the Schaïgiës
+who escorted us detected, amidst the
+hoof-marks of the seven or eight
+thousand donkeys accompanying the
+troops, those of a particular jackass
+belonging to one of their friends, and
+the event proved that they were
+right." Mr Werne fills his journal,
+during his long sojourn in camp, with
+a great deal of curious information
+concerning the habits and peculiarities
+of both Turks and Arabs, as well as
+with the interesting results of his
+observations on the brute creation.
+The soldiers continued to bring to
+him and his brother all manner of
+animals and reptiles&mdash;frogs, whole
+coils of snakes, and chameleons, which
+there abound, but whose changes of
+colour Mr Werne found to be much less
+numerous than is commonly believed.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span>
+For two months he watched the
+variations of hue of these curious
+lizards, and found them limited to
+different shades of grey and green,
+with yellow stripes and spots. He
+made a great pet of a young wild cat,
+which was perfectly tame, and extraordinarily
+handsome. Its colour was
+grey, beautifully spotted with black,
+like a panther; its head was smaller
+and more pointed than that of European
+cats; its ears, of unusual size,
+were black, with white stripes.
+Many of the people in camp took it
+to be a young tiger, but the natives
+called it a <em>fagged</em>, and said it was a
+sort of cat, in which Mr Werne
+agreed with them. "Its companion
+and playfellow is a rat, about the
+size of a squirrel, with a long silvery
+tail, which, when angry, it swells out,
+and sets up over its back. This poor
+little beast was brought to us with
+two broken legs, and we gave it to
+the cat, thinking it was near death.
+But the cat, not recognising her
+natural prey&mdash;and moreover feeling
+the want of a companion&mdash;and the
+rat, tamed by pain and cured by
+splints, became inseparable friends,
+ate together, and slept arm in arm.
+The rat, which was not ugly like our
+house rats, but was rather to be considered
+handsome, by reason of its
+long frizzled tail, never made use of
+its liberty to escape." Notwithstanding
+the numerous devices put in practice
+by the Wernes to pass their
+time, it at last began to hang heavy,
+and their pipes were almost their sole
+resource and consolation. Smoking
+is little customary in Egypt, except
+amongst the Turks and Arabs. The
+Mograbins prefer chewing. The blacks
+of the Gesira make a concentrated
+infusion of this weed, which they call
+<em>bucca</em>; take a mouthful of it, and roll
+the savoury liquor round their teeth
+for a quarter of an hour before ejecting
+it. They are so addicted to this
+practice, that they invite their friends
+to "bucca" as Europeans do to
+dinner. The vessel containing the
+tobacco juice makes the round of the
+party, and a profound silence ensues,
+broken only by the harmonious gurgle
+of the delectable fluid. Conversation
+is carried on by signs.</p>
+
+<p>"We shall march to-morrow," had
+long been the daily assurance of those
+wiseacres, to be found in every army,
+who always know what the general
+means to do better than the general
+himself. At last the much-desired
+order was issued&mdash;of course when
+everybody least expected it&mdash;and,
+after a night of bustle and confusion,
+the army got into motion, in its usual
+disorderly array. Its destination was
+a mountain called Kassela-el-Lus, in
+the heart of the Taka country, whither
+the Bascha had sent stores of grain,
+and where he proposed passing the
+rainy season and founding a new
+town. The distance was about fourteen
+hours' march. The route led
+south-eastwards, at first through a
+level country, covered with boundless
+fields of tall <em>durra</em>. At the horizon,
+like a great blue cloud, rose the
+mountain of Kassela, a blessed sight
+to eyes that had long been weary of
+the monotonous level country. After
+a while the army got out of the durra-fields,
+and proceeded over a large
+plain scantily overgrown with grass,
+observing a certain degree of military
+order and discipline, in anticipation
+of an attempt, on the part of the
+angry Arabs, to rescue Mohammed
+Din and his companions in captivity.
+Numerous hares and jackals were
+started and ridden down. Even
+gazelles, swift as they are, were sometimes
+overtaken by the excellent
+Turkish horses. Presently the grass
+grew thicker and tall enough to conceal
+a small donkey, and they came
+to wooded tracts and jungles, and
+upon marks of elephants and other
+wild beasts. The foot-prints of the
+elephants, in places where the ground
+had been slightly softened by the
+rain, were often a foot deep, and from
+a foot and a half to two feet in length
+and breadth. Mr Werne regrets not
+obtaining a view of one of these giant
+brutes. The two-horned rhinoceros
+is also common in that region, and is
+said to be of extraordinary ferocity
+in its attacks upon men and beasts,
+and not unfrequently to come off conqueror
+in single combat with the elephant.
+"Suddenly the little Schaïgiës
+cavalry set up a great shouting, and
+every one handled his arms, anticipating
+an attack from the Arabs.
+But soon the cry of 'Asset! Asset!'
+(lion) was heard, and we gazed eagerly
+on every side, curious for the lion's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span>
+appearance. The Bascha had already
+warned his chase-loving cavalry,
+under penalty of a thousand blows, not
+to quit their ranks on the appearance
+of wild beasts, for in that broken
+ground he feared disorder in the army
+and an attack from the enemy. I
+and my brother were at that moment
+with Melek Mahmud at the outward
+extremity of the left wing; suddenly
+a tolerably large lioness trotted out of
+a thicket beside us, not a hundred
+paces off. She seemed quite fearless,
+for she did not quicken her pace at
+sight of the army. The next minute
+a monstrous lion showed himself at
+the same spot, roaring frightfully, and
+apparently in great fury; his motions
+were still slower than those of his
+female; now and then he stood still
+to look at us, and after coming to
+within sixty or seventy paces&mdash;we all
+standing with our guns cocked, ready
+to receive him&mdash;he gave us a parting
+scowl, and darted away, with great
+bounds, in the track of his wife. In
+a moment both had disappeared."
+Soon after this encounter, which
+startled and delighted Dr Werne, and
+made his brother's little dromedary
+dance with alarm, they reached the
+banks of the great <i>gohr</i>, (the bed of
+a river, filled only in the rainy season,)
+known as El Gasch, which
+intersects the countries of Taka and
+Basa. With very little daring and
+still less risk, the Haddendas, who
+are said to muster eighty thousand
+fighting men, might have annihilated
+the Bascha's army, as it wound its
+toilsome way for nearly a league
+along the dry water-course, (whose
+high banks were crowned with trees
+and thick bushes,) the camels stumbling
+and occasionally breaking their
+legs in the deep holes left by the feet
+of the elephants, where the cavalry
+could not have acted, and where
+every javelin must have told upon
+the disorderly groups of weary infantry.
+The Arabs either feared the
+firearms, or dreaded lest their attack
+should be the signal for the
+instant slaughter of their Grand-Shech,
+who rode, in the midst of the
+infantry, upon a donkey, which had
+been given him out of consideration
+for his age, whilst the three other
+prisoners were cruelly forced to perform
+the whole march on foot, with
+heavy chains on their necks and feet,
+and exposed to the jibes of the
+pitiless soldiery. On quitting the
+Gohr, the march was through trees
+and brushwood, and then through a
+sort of labyrinthine swamp, where
+horses and camels stumbled at every
+step, and where the Arabs again had
+a glorious opportunity, which they
+again neglected, of giving Achmet
+such a lesson as they had given to his
+predecessor in the Baschalik. The
+army now entered the country of the
+Hallengas, and a six days' halt succeeded
+to their long and painful
+march.</p>
+
+<p>It would be of very little interest
+to trace the military operations of
+Achmet Bascha, which were altogether
+of the most contemptible
+description&mdash;consisting in the <i>chasuas</i>,
+or razzias already noticed, sudden
+and secret expeditions of bodies of
+armed men against defenceless tribes,
+whom they despoiled of their cattle
+and women. From his camp at the
+foot of Kassela-el-Lus, the Bascha
+directed many of these marauding
+parties, remaining himself safely in a
+large hut, which Mr Werne had had
+constructed for him, and usually
+cheating the men and officers, who had
+borne the fatigue and run the risk,
+out of their promised share of the
+booty. Sometimes the unfortunate
+natives, driven to the wall and rendered
+desperate by the cruelties of
+their oppressors, found courage for a
+stout resistance.</p>
+
+<p>"An expedition took place to the
+mountains of Basa, and the troops
+brought back a large number of
+prisoners of both sexes. The men
+were almost all wounded, and showed
+great fortitude under the painful
+operation of extracting the balls.
+Even the Turks confessed that these
+mountaineers had made a gallant
+defence with lances and stones. Of
+our soldiers several had musket-shot
+wounds, inflicted by their comrades'
+disorderly fire. The Turks asserted
+that the Mograbins and Schaïgiës
+sometimes fired intentionally at the
+soldiers, to drive them from their
+booty. It was a piteous sight to see
+the prisoners&mdash;especially the women
+and children&mdash;brought into camp
+bound upon camels, and with despair
+in their countenances. Before they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span>
+were sold or allotted, they were taken
+near the tent of Topschi Baschi,
+where a fire was kept burning, and
+were all, even to the smallest children,
+branded on the shoulder with a red-hot
+iron in the form of a star.
+When their moans and lamentations
+reached our hut, we took our
+guns and hastened away out shooting
+with three servants. These, notwithstanding
+our exhortations, would
+ramble from us, and we had got
+exceedingly angry with them for so
+doing, when suddenly we heard three
+shots, and proceeded in that direction,
+thinking it was they who had
+fired. Instead of them, we found
+three soldiers, lying upon the
+ground, bathed in their blood and
+terribly torn. Two were already
+dead, and the third, whose whole
+belly was ripped up, told us they had
+been attacked by a lion. The three
+shots brought up our servants, whom
+we made carry the survivor into camp,
+although my brother entertained
+slight hopes of saving him. The
+Bascha no sooner heard of the incident
+than he got on horseback with
+Soliman Kaschef and his people, to
+hunt the lion, and I accompanied him
+with my huntsman Sale, a bold fellow,
+who afterwards went with me up the
+White Nile. On reaching the spot
+where the lion had been, the Turks
+galloped off to seek him, and I and
+Sale alone remained behind. Suddenly
+I heard a heavy trampling, and
+a crashing amongst the bushes, and I
+saw close beside me an elephant with
+its calf. Sale, who was at some distance,
+and had just shot a parrot,
+called out to know if he should fire at
+the elephant, which I loudly forbade
+him to do. The beast broke its way
+through the brushwood just at hand.
+I saw its high back, and took up a
+safe position amongst several palm-trees,
+which all grew from one root,
+and were so close together that the
+elephant could not get at me. Sale
+was already up a tree, and told me
+the elephant had turned round, and
+was going back into the chaaba. The
+brute seemed angry or anxious about
+its young one, for we found the
+ground dug up for a long distance by
+its tusk as by a plough. Some shots
+were fired, and we thought the Bascha
+and his horsemen were on the track
+of the lion, but they had seen the elephant,
+and formed a circle round it.
+A messenger galloped into camp,
+and in a twinkling the Arnaut Abdin
+Bey came up with part of his people.
+The elephant, assailed on all sides by
+a rain of bullets, charged first one
+horseman, then another; they delivered
+their fire and galloped off.
+The eyes were the point chiefly aimed
+at, and it soon was evident that he
+was blinded by the bullets, for when
+pursuing his foes he ran against the
+trees, the shock of his unwieldy mass
+shaking the fruit from the palms.
+The horsemen dismounted and
+formed a smaller circle around him.
+He must already have received some
+hundred bullets, and the ground over
+which he staggered was dyed red,
+when the Bascha crept quite near
+him, knelt down and sent a shot into
+his left eye, whereupon the colossus
+sank down upon his hinder end and
+died. Nothing was to be seen of the
+calf or of the lion, but a few days
+later a large male lion was killed by
+Soliman Kaschef's men, close to camp,
+where we often in the night-time
+heard the roaring of those brutes."</p>
+
+<p>Just about this time bad news
+reached the Wernes. Their huntsman
+Abdallah, to whom they were
+much attached by reason of his gallantry
+and fidelity, had gone a long
+time before to the country of the Beni-Amers,
+eastward from Taka, in company
+of a Schaïgië chief, mounted
+on one of their best camels, armed
+with a double-barrelled gun, and provided
+with a considerable sum of
+money for the purchase of giraffes.
+On his way back to his employers,
+with a valuable collection of stuffed
+birds and other curiosities, he was
+barbarously murdered, when travelling,
+unescorted, through the Hallenga
+country, and plundered of all his baggage.
+Sale, who went to identify his
+friend's mutilated corpse, attributed
+the crime to the Hallengas. Mr
+Werne was disposed to suspect Mohammed
+Ehle, a great villain, whom
+the Bascha at times employed as a
+secret stabber and assassin. This
+Ehle had been appointed Schech of
+the Hallengas by the Divan, in lieu
+of the rightful Schech, who had refused
+submission to the Turks. Three
+nephews of Mohammed Din (one of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span>
+them the same youth who had escorted
+the Wernes safely back to camp
+when they were in peril of their
+lives in the Haddenda country) came
+to visit their unfortunate relative, who
+was still a prisoner, cruelly treated,
+lying upon the damp earth, chained to
+two posts, and awaiting with fortitude
+the cruel death by impalement with
+which the Bascha threatened him.
+Achmet received the young men very
+coldly, and towards evening they set
+out, greatly depressed by their uncle's
+sad condition, upon their return homewards.
+Early next morning the
+Wernes, when out shooting, found
+the dead bodies of their three friends.
+They had been set upon and slain
+after a gallant defence, as was testified
+by their bloody lances, and by
+other signs of a severe struggle. The
+birds of prey had already picked out
+their eyes, and their corpses presented
+a frightful spectacle. The Wernes,
+convinced that this assassination had
+taken place by the Bascha's order,
+loaded the bodies on a camel, took
+them to Achmet, and preferred an
+accusation against the Hallengas for
+this shameful breach of hospitality.
+The Bascha's indifference confirmed
+their suspicions. He testified no indignation,
+but there was great excitement
+amongst his officers; and when
+they left the Divan, Mr Werne violently
+reproached Mohammed Ehle,
+whom he was well assured was the
+murderer, and who endured his anger
+in silence. "The Albanian Abdin
+Bey was so enraged that he was only
+withheld by the united persuasions of
+the other officers from mounting his
+horse and charging Mohammed Ehle
+with his wild Albanians, the consequence
+of which would inevitably
+have been a general mutiny against
+the Bascha, for the soldiers had long
+been murmuring at their bad food and
+ill treatment." The last hundred
+pages of Mr Werne's very closely
+printed and compendious volume
+abound in instances of the Bascha's
+treachery and cruelty, and of the retaliation
+exercised by the Arabs. On
+one occasion a party of fifty Turkish
+cavalry were murdered by the Haddendas,
+who had invited them to a
+feast. The town of Gos-Rajeb was
+burned, twenty of the merchants there
+resident were killed, and the corn,
+stored there for the use of the army
+on its homeward march, was plundered.
+The Bascha had a long-cherished
+plan of cutting off the supply of
+water from the country of the
+Haddendas. This was to be done by
+damming up the Gohr-el-Gasch, and
+diverting the abundant stream which,
+in the rainy season, rushed along its
+deep gully, overflowing the tall
+banks and fertilising fields and forests.
+As the Bascha's engineer and confidential
+adviser, Mr Werne was
+compelled to direct this work. By the
+labour of thousands of men, extensive
+embankments were made, and the
+Haddendas began to feel the want of
+water, which had come down from
+the Abyssinian mountains, and already
+stood eight feet deep in the
+Gohr. Mr Werne repented his share
+in the cruel work, and purposely
+abstained from pressing the formation
+of a canal which was to carry off the
+superfluous water to the Atbara, there
+about three leagues distant from the
+Gohr. And one morning he was
+awakened by a great uproar in the
+camp, and by the shouts of the Bascha,
+who was on horseback before his
+hut, and he found that a party of Haddendas
+had thrashed a picket and
+made an opening in the dykes, which
+was the deathblow to Achmet's magnificent
+project of extracting an exorbitant
+tribute from Mohammed Din's
+tribe as the price of the supply of
+water essential to their very existence.
+The sole results of the cruel
+attempt were a fever to the Bascha,
+who had got wet, and the sickness of
+half the army, who had been compelled
+to work like galley-slaves under
+a burning sun and upon bad rations.
+The vicinity of Kassela is rich in
+curious birds and beasts. The mountain
+itself swarms with apes, and Mr
+Werne frequently saw groups of two
+or three hundred of them seated upon
+the cliffs. They are about the size
+of a large dog, with dark brown hair
+and hideous countenances. Awful
+was the screaming and howling they
+set up of a night, when they received
+the unwelcome visit of some hungry
+leopard or prowling panther. Once
+the Wernes went out with their guns
+for a day's sport amongst the monkeys,
+but were soon glad to beat a retreat
+under a tremendous shower of stones.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span>
+Hassan, a Turk, who purveyed the
+brothers with hares, gazelles, and
+other savoury morsels, and who was
+a very good shot, promised to bring
+in&mdash;of course for good payment&mdash;not
+only a male and female monkey, but
+a whole camel-load if desired. He
+started off with this object, but did
+not again show himself for some days,
+and tried to sneak out of the Wernes'
+way when they at last met him in the
+bazaar. He had a hole in his head,
+and his shoulder badly hurt, and declared
+he would have nothing more
+to say to those <em>transformed men</em> upon
+the mountain. Mr Werne was very
+desirous to catch a monkey alive, but
+was unsuccessful, and Mohammed
+Ehle refused to sell a tame one which
+he owned, and which usually sat upon
+his hut. Mr Werne thinks them a
+variety of the Chimpanzee. They
+fight amongst themselves with sticks,
+and defend themselves fiercely with
+stones against the attacks of men.
+Upon the whole the Wernes were
+highly fortunate in collecting zoological
+and ornithological specimens, of
+which they subsequently sent a large
+number, stuffed, to the Berlin museum.
+They also secured several birds and
+animals alive; amongst these a young
+lion and a civet cat. Regarding reptiles
+they were very curious, and nothing of
+that kind was too long or too large
+for them. As Ferdinand Werne was
+sitting one day upon his dromedary, in
+company with the Bascha, on the left
+bank of the Gasch, the animals shied
+at a large serpent which suddenly
+darted by. The Bascha ordered the
+men who were working at the dykes
+to capture it, which they at once proceeded
+to do, as unconcernedly as an
+English haymaker would assail a
+hedge snake. "Pursued by several
+men, the serpent plunged into the
+water, out of which it then boldly
+reared its head, and confronted an
+Arab who had jumped in after it,
+armed with a <i>hassaie</i>. With extraordinary
+skill and daring the Arab
+approached it, his club uplifted, and
+struck it over the head, so that the
+serpent fell down stunned and writhing
+mightily; whereupon another
+Arab came up with a cord; the club-bearer,
+without further ceremony,
+griped the reptile by the throat, just
+below the head; the noose was made
+fast, and the pair of them dragged
+their prize on shore. There it lay for
+a moment motionless, and we contemplated
+the terribly beautiful creature,
+which was more than eleven
+feet long and half-a-foot in diameter.
+But when they began to drag it away,
+by which the skin would of course be
+completely spoiled, orders were given
+to <em>carry</em> it to camp. A jacket was
+tied over its head, and three men set
+to work to get it upon their shoulders;
+but the serpent made such violent
+convulsive movements that all three
+fell to the ground with it, and the
+same thing occurred again when
+several others had gone to their
+assistance. I accompanied them into
+camp, drove a big nail into the foremost
+great beam of our <i>recuba</i>, (hut,)
+and had the monster suspended from
+it. He hung down quite limp, as did
+also several other snakes, which were
+still alive, and which our servants had
+suspended inside our hut, intending
+to skin them the next morning, as
+it was now nearly dark. In the
+night I felt a most uncomfortable
+sensation. One of the snakes, which
+was hung up at the head of my
+bed, had smeared his cold tail over
+my face. But I sprang to my feet in
+real alarm, and thought I had been
+struck over the shin with a club, when
+the big serpent, now in the death
+agony, gave me a wipe with its tail
+through the open door, in front of
+which our servants were squatted,
+telling each other ghost stories of
+snake-kings and the like....
+They called this serpent <i>assala</i>, which,
+however, is a name they give to all
+large serpents. Soon afterwards we
+caught another, as thick, but only
+nine feet long, and with a short tail,
+like the <i>Vipera cerastes</i>; and this was
+said to be of that breed of short, thick
+snakes which can devour a man." In
+the mountains of Basa, two days'
+journey from the Gohr-el-Gasch, and
+on the road thither, snakes are said
+to exist, of no great length, but as
+thick as a crocodile, and which can
+conveniently swallow a man; and
+instances were related to Mr Werne
+of these monsters having swallowed
+persons when they lay sleeping on
+their angarèbs. Sometimes the victims
+had been rescued <em>when only half
+gorged</em>! Of course travellers hear<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span>
+strange stories, and some of those
+related by Mr Werne are tolerably
+astounding; but these are derived
+from his Turkish, Egyptian, or Arabian
+acquaintances, and there is no
+appearance of exaggeration or romancing
+in anything which he narrates as
+having occurred to or been witnessed
+by himself. A wild tradition was
+told him of a country called Bellad-el-Kelb,
+which signifies the Country
+of Dogs, where the women were in all
+respects human, but where the men
+had faces like dogs, claws on their feet,
+and tails like monkeys. They could
+not speak, but carried on conversation
+by wagging their tails. This ludicrous
+account appeared explicable by
+the fact, that the men of Bellad-el-Kelb
+are great robbers, living by
+plunder, and, like fierce and hungry
+dogs, never relinquishing their prey.</p>
+
+<p>The Hallengas, amongst whom the
+expedition now found itself, were far
+more frank and friendly, and much
+less wild, than the Haddendas and
+some other tribes, and they might
+probably have been converted into
+useful allies by a less cruel and capricious
+invader than the Bascha. But
+conciliation was no part of his scheme;
+if he one day caressed a tribe or a
+chief, it was only to betray them the
+next. Mr Werne was on good terms
+with some of the Hallenga sheiks, and
+went to visit the village of Hauathi,
+about three miles from camp, to see
+the birds of paradise which abounded
+there. On his road he saw from afar
+a great tree covered with those beautiful
+birds, and which glistened in the
+sunshine with all the colours of the
+rainbow. Some days later he and
+his brother went to drink <i>merissa</i>, a
+slightly intoxicating liquor, with one
+of the Fakis or priests of the country.
+The two Germans got very jovial,
+drinking to each other, student-fashion;
+and the faki, attempting to
+keep pace with them, got crying-drunk,
+and disclosed a well-matured
+plan for blowing up their powder-magazine.
+The ammunition had been
+stored in the village of Kadmin, which
+was a holy village, entirely inhabited
+by fakis. The Bascha had made sure
+that none of the natives would risk
+blowing up these holy men, even for
+the sake of destroying his ammunition,
+and he was unwilling to keep so
+large a quantity of powder amidst
+his numerous camp-fires and reckless
+soldiery. But the fakis had
+made their arrangements. On a certain
+night they were to depart, carrying
+away all their property into the
+great caverns of Mount Kassela, and
+fire was to be applied to the house
+that held the powder. Had the plot
+succeeded, the whole army was lost,
+isolated as it was in the midst of
+unfriendly tribes, embittered by its
+excesses, and by the aggressions and
+treachery of its chief, and who, stimulated
+by their priests, would in all
+probability have exterminated it to
+the last man, when it no longer had
+cartridges for its defence. The drunken
+faki's indiscretion saved Achmet and
+his troops; the village was forthwith
+surrounded, and the next day the
+ammunition was transferred to camp.
+Not to rouse the whole population
+against him, the Bascha abstained for
+the moment from punishing the conspirators,
+but he was not the man to
+let them escape altogether; and some
+time afterwards, Mr Werne, who had
+returned to Chartum, received a letter
+from his brother, informing him that
+nine fakis had been hung on palm-trees
+just outside the camp, and that
+the magnanimous Achmet proposed
+treating forty more in the same
+way.</p>
+
+<p>A mighty liar was Effendina Achmet
+Bascha, as ever ensnared a foe
+or broke faith with a friend. Greedy
+and cruel was he also, as only a
+Turkish despot can be. One of his
+most active and unscrupulous agents
+was a bloodsucker named Hassan
+Effendi, whom he sent to the country
+of the Beni-Amers to collect three
+thousand five hundred cows and thirteen
+hundred camels, the complement
+of their tribute. Although this tribe
+had upon the whole behaved very
+peaceably, Hassan's first act was to
+shoot down a couple of hundred of
+them like wild beasts. Then he seized
+a large number of camels belonging to
+the Haddendas, although the tribe
+was at that very time in friendly negotiation
+with the Bascha. The Haddendas
+revenged themselves by burning
+Gos-Rajeb. In proof of their
+valour, Hassan's men cut off the ears
+of the murdered Beni-Amers, and took
+them to Achmet, who gave them<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span>
+money for the trophies. "They had
+forced a slave to cut off the ears;
+yonder now lies the man&mdash;raving
+mad, and bound with cords. Camel-thieves,
+too&mdash;no matter to what tribe
+they belong&mdash;if caught <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">in flagranti</i>,
+lose their ears, for which the Bascha
+gives a reward. That many a man
+who never dreamed of committing a
+theft loses his ears in this way, is
+easy to understand, for the operation
+is performed on the spot." Dawson
+Borrer, in his <cite>Campaign in the Kabylie</cite>,
+mentions a very similar practice
+as prevailing in Marshal Bugeaud's
+camp, where ten francs was the fixed
+price for the head of a horse-stealer,
+it being left to the soldiers who severed
+the heads and received the money to
+discriminate between horse-stealers
+and honest men. Whether Bugeaud
+took a hint from the Bascha, or the
+Bascha was an admiring imitator of
+Bugeaud, remains a matter of doubt.
+"Besides many handsome women and
+children, Hassan Effendi brought in
+two thousand nine hundred cows, and
+seven thousand sheep." He might
+have been a French prince returning
+from a razzia. "For himself he kept
+eighty camels, <em>which he said he had
+bought</em>." A droll dog, this Hassan
+Effendi, but withal rather covetous&mdash;given
+to sell his soldier's rations, and
+to starve his servants, a single piastre&mdash;about
+twopence halfpenny&mdash;being
+his whole daily outlay for meat for
+his entire household, who lived for
+the most part upon durra and water.
+If his servants asked for wages, they
+received the bastinado. "The Bascha
+had given the poor camel-drivers
+sixteen cows. The vampire (Hassan)
+took upon himself to appropriate thirteen
+of them." Mr Werne reported
+this robbery to the Bascha, but Achmet
+merely replied "<i>malluch</i>"&mdash;signifying,
+"it matters not." When
+inferior officers received horses as
+their share of booty, Hassan bought
+them of them, but always forgot to
+pay, and the poor subalterns feared
+to complain to the Bascha, who favoured
+the rogue, and recommended
+him to the authorities at Cairo for
+promotion to the rank of Bey, because,
+as he told Mr Werne with an
+ironical smile, Hassan was getting
+very old and infirm, and when he
+died the Divan would bring charges
+against him, and inherit his wealth.
+Thus are things managed in Egypt.
+No wonder that, where such injustice
+and rascality prevail, many are found
+to rejoice at the prospect of a change
+of rulers. "News from Souakim (on
+the Red Sea) of the probable landing
+of the English, excite great interest
+in camp; from all sides they come to
+ask questions of us, thinking that we,
+as Franks, must know the intentions
+of the invaders. Upon the whole,
+they would not be displeased at such
+a change of government, particularly
+when we tell them of the good pay
+and treatment customary amongst the
+English; and that with them no officer
+has to endure indignities from his
+superiors in rank."</p>
+
+<p>"I have now," says Mr Werne,
+(page 256,) "been more than half
+a year away from Chartum, continually
+in the field, and not once have I
+enjoyed the great comfort of reposing,
+undressed, between clean white sheets,
+but have invariably slept in my clothes,
+on the ground, or on the short but
+practical angarèb. All clean linen
+disappears, for the constant perspiration
+and chalky dust burns everything;
+and the servants do not understand
+washing, inasmuch as, contrasted
+with their black hides, everything
+appears white to them, and for
+the last three months no soap has
+been obtainable. And in the midst
+of this dirty existence, which drags
+itself along like a slow fever, suddenly
+'Julla!' is the word, and one
+hangs for four or five days, eighty or
+a hundred leagues, upon the camel's
+back, every bone bruised by the rough
+motion,&mdash;the broiling sun, thirst, hunger,
+and cold, for constant companions.
+Man can endure much: I have
+gone through far more than I ever
+thought I could,&mdash;vomiting and in a
+raging fever on the back of a dromedary,
+under a midday sun, more dead
+than alive, held upon my saddle by
+others, and yet I recovered. To have
+remained behind would have been to
+encounter certain death from the enemy,
+or from wild beasts. We have
+seen what a man can bear, under the
+pressure of necessity; in my present
+uniform and monotonous life I compare
+myself to the camels tied before
+my tent, which sometimes stand up,
+sometimes slowly stretch themselves<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span>
+on the ground, careless whether crows
+or ravens walk over their backs, constantly
+moving their jaws, looking up
+at the sun, and then, by way of a
+change, taking a mouthful of grass,
+but giving no signs of joy or curiosity."</p>
+
+<p>From this state of languid indifference
+Mr Werne was suddenly and
+pleasurably roused by intelligence
+that a second expedition was fitting
+out for the White Nile. He and his
+brother immediately petitioned the
+Bascha for leave to accompany it.
+The desired permission was granted
+to him, but refused to his brother.
+There was too much sickness in the
+camp, the Bascha said; he could not
+spare his doctor, and lacked confidence
+in the Italian, Bellotti. The
+fondly-attached brothers were thus
+placed in a painful dilemma: they
+had hoped to pursue their wanderings
+hand in hand, and to pass their
+lives together, and loth indeed were
+they to sunder in those sickly and
+perilous regions. At last they made
+up their minds to the parting. It has
+been already recorded in Mr Werne's
+former work, how, within ten days
+of their next meeting, his beloved
+brother's eyes were closed in death.</p>
+
+<p>In various respects, Mr Werne's
+<cite>Feldzug</cite> is one of the most curious
+books of travel and adventure that,
+for a very long time, has appeared.
+It has three points of particular attraction
+and originality. In the first
+place, the author wanders in a region
+previously unexplored by Christian
+and educated travellers, and amongst
+tribes whose bare names have reached
+the ears of but few Europeans. Secondly,
+he campaigns as officer in
+such an army as we can hardly realise
+in these days of high civilisation and
+strict military discipline,&mdash;so wild,
+motley, and grotesque are its customs,
+composition, and equipment,&mdash;an
+army whose savage warriors, strange
+practices, and barbarous cruelties,
+make us fancy ourselves in presence
+of some fierce Moslem horde of the
+middle ages, marching to the assault
+of Italy or Hungary. Thirdly, during
+his long sojourn in camp he
+had opportunities such as few ordinary
+travellers enjoy, and of which
+he diligently profited, to study and
+note down the characteristics and
+social habits of many of the races of
+men that make up the heterogeneous
+population of the Ottoman empire.
+Some of the physiological and medical
+details with which he favours us,
+would certainly have been more in
+their place in his brother's professional
+journal, than in a book intended for
+the public at large; and passages
+are not wanting at which the squeamish
+will be apt to lay down the volume
+in disgust. For such persons
+Mr Werne does not write; and his
+occasional indelicacy and too crude
+details are compensated, to our thinking,
+by his manly honest tone, and by
+the extraordinary amount of useful
+and curious information he has managed
+to pack into two hundred and
+seventy pages. As a whole, the <cite>Expedition
+to the White Nile</cite>, which contains
+a vast deal of dry meteorological
+and geographical detail, is decidedly
+far less attractive than the present
+book, which is as amusing as
+any romance. We have read it with
+absorbing interest, well pleased with
+the hint its author throws out at its
+close, that the records of his African
+wanderings are not yet all exhausted.</p>
+
+<hr class="chap" />
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<h2>MY NOVEL; OR, VARIETIES IN ENGLISH LIFE.</h2>
+
+<h3>BY PISISTRATUS CAXTON.</h3>
+
+
+<h4>BOOK VII.&mdash;INITIAL CHAPTER.</h4>
+
+<p>"What is courage?" said my uncle
+Roland, rousing himself from a reverie
+into which he had fallen after the
+Sixth Book in this history had been
+read to our family circle.</p>
+
+<p>"What is courage?" he repeated
+more earnestly. "Is it insensibility
+to fear? <em>That</em> may be the mere
+accident of constitution; and, if so,
+there is no more merit in being courageous
+than in being this table."</p>
+
+<p>"I am very glad to hear you speak
+thus," observed Mr Caxton, "for I
+should not like to consider myself a
+coward; yet I am very sensible to
+fear in all dangers, bodily and moral."</p>
+
+<p>"La, Austin, how can you say so?"
+cried my mother, firing up; "was it
+not only last week that you faced the
+great bull that was rushing after
+Blanche and the children?"</p>
+
+<p>Blanche at that recollection stole to
+my father's chair, and, hanging over
+his shoulder, kissed his forehead.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Mr Caxton</span>, (sublimely unmoved
+by these flatteries.)&mdash;"I don't deny
+that I faced the bull, but I assert that
+I was horribly frightened."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Roland.</span>&mdash;"The sense of honour
+which conquers fear is the true courage
+of chivalry: you could not run away
+when others were looking on&mdash;no
+gentleman could."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Mr Caxton.</span>&mdash;"Fiddledee! It
+was not on my gentility that I stood,
+Captain. I should have run fast
+enough, if it had done any good. I
+stood upon my understanding. As
+the bull could run faster than I could,
+the only chance of escape was to make
+the brute as frightened as myself."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Blanche.</span>&mdash;"Ah, you did not
+think of that; your only thought was
+to save me and the children."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Mr Caxton.</span>&mdash;"Possibly, my
+dear&mdash;very possibly I might have
+been afraid for you too;&mdash;but I was
+very much afraid for myself. However,
+luckily I had the umbrella, and
+I sprang it up and spread it forth in
+the animal's stupid eyes, hurling at
+him simultaneously the biggest lines
+I could think of in the First Chorus of
+the 'Seven against Thebes.' I began
+with <span class="smcap">Eledemnas pedioploktupos</span>;
+and when I came to the grand howl of
+Ἰὼ, ἰὼ, ἰὼ, ἰὼ&mdash;the beast stood appalled
+as at the roar of a lion. I shall
+never forget his amazed snort at the
+Greek. Then he kicked up his hind
+legs, and went bolt through the gap in
+the hedge. Thus, armed with Æschylus
+and the umbrella, I remained master
+of the field; but (continued Mr Caxton,
+ingenuously,) I should not like
+to go through that half minute again."</p>
+
+<p>"No man would," said the Captain
+kindly. "I should be very sorry to
+face a bull myself, even with a bigger
+umbrella than yours, and even
+though I had Æschylus, and Homer
+to boot, at my fingers' ends."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Mr Caxton.</span>&mdash;"You would not
+have minded if it had been a Frenchman
+with a sword in his hand?"</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Captain.</span>&mdash;"Of course not. Rather
+liked it than otherwise," he added
+grimly.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Mr Caxton.</span>&mdash;"Yet many a
+Spanish matador, who doesn't care a
+button for a bull, would take to his
+heels at the first lunge <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">en carte</i> from
+a Frenchman. Therefore, in fact, if
+courage be a matter of constitution, it
+is also a matter of custom. We face
+calmly the dangers we are habituated
+to, and recoil from those of which we
+have no familiar experience. I doubt
+if Marshal Turenne himself would
+have been quite at his ease on the
+tight-rope; and a rope-dancer, who
+seems disposed to scale the heavens
+with Titanic temerity, might possibly
+object to charge on a cannon."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Captain Roland.</span>&mdash;"Still, either
+this is not the courage I mean, or
+there is another kind of it. I mean
+by courage that which is the especial
+force and dignity of the human character,
+without which there is no
+reliance on principle, no constancy in
+virtue&mdash;a something," continued my
+uncle gallantly, and with a half bow
+towards my mother, "which your<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span>
+sex shares with our own. When the
+lover, for instance, clasps the hand
+of his betrothed, and says, 'Wilt thou
+be true to me, in spite of absence and
+time, in spite of hazard and fortune,
+though my foes malign me, though thy
+friends may dissuade thee, and our lot
+in life may be rough and rude?' and
+when the betrothed answers, 'I will
+be true,' does not the lover trust to
+her courage as well as her love?"</p>
+
+<p>"Admirably put, Roland," said my
+father. "But <i>apropos</i> of what do
+you puzzle us with these queries on
+courage?"</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Captain Roland</span>, (with a slight
+blush.)&mdash;"I was led to the inquiry
+(though, perhaps, it may be frivolous
+to take so much thought of what, no
+doubt, costs Pisistratus so little) by
+the last chapters in my nephew's
+story. I see this poor boy, Leonard,
+alone with his fallen hopes, (though
+very irrational they were,) and his
+sense of shame. And I read his heart,
+I dare say, better than Pisistratus
+does, for I could feel like that boy if
+I had been in the same position; and,
+conjecturing what he and thousands
+like him must go through, I asked
+myself, 'What can save him and
+them?' I answered, as a soldier would
+answer, 'Courage!' Very well. But
+pray, Austin, what is courage?"</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Mr Caxton</span>, (prudently backing
+out of a reply.)&mdash;"<i>Papæ!</i> Brother,
+since you have just complimented the
+ladies on that quality, you had better
+address your question to them."</p>
+
+<p>Blanche here leant both hands on
+my father's chair, and said, looking
+down at first bashfully, but afterwards
+warming with the subject,
+"Do you not think, sir, that little
+Helen has already suggested, if not
+what is courage, what at least is the
+real essence of all courage that endures
+and conquers, that ennobles,
+and hallows, and redeems? Is it not
+<span class="smcap">Patience</span>, father?&mdash;and that is why
+we women have a courage of our own.
+Patience does not affect to be superior
+to fear, but at least it never
+admits despair."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Pisistratus.</span>&mdash;"Kiss me, my
+Blanche, for you have come near to
+the truth which perplexed the soldier
+and puzzled the sage."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Mr Caxton</span>, (tartly.)&mdash;"If you
+mean me by the sage, I was not
+puzzled at all. Heaven knows you
+do right to inculcate patience&mdash;it is a
+virtue very much required in your
+readers. Nevertheless," added my
+father, softening with the enjoyment
+of his joke&mdash;"nevertheless Blanche
+and Helen are quite right. Patience
+is the courage of the conqueror; it is
+the virtue, <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">par excellence</i>, of Man
+against Destiny&mdash;of the One against
+the World, and of the Soul against
+Matter. Therefore this is the courage
+of the Gospel; and its importance, in
+a social view&mdash;its importance to races
+and institutions&mdash;cannot be too
+earnestly inculcated. What is it that
+distinguishes the Anglo-Saxon from
+all other branches of the human
+family, peoples deserts with his children,
+and consigns to them the heritage
+of rising worlds? What but his
+faculty to brave, to suffer, to endure&mdash;the
+patience that resists firmly, and
+innovates slowly. Compare him with
+the Frenchman. The Frenchman has
+plenty of valour&mdash;that there is no
+denying; but as for fortitude, he has
+not enough to cover the point of a
+pin. He is ready to rush out of the
+world if he is bit by a flea."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Captain Roland.</span>&mdash;"There was
+a case in the papers the other day,
+Austin, of a Frenchman who actually
+did destroy himself because he was so
+teased by the little creatures you
+speak of. He left a paper on his
+table, saying that 'life was not worth
+having at the price of such torments.'"<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a></p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Mr Caxton</span>, (solemnly.)&mdash;"Sir,
+their whole political history, since the
+great meeting of the Tiers Etat, has
+been the history of men who would
+rather go to the devil than be bit by a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span>
+flea. It is the record of human impatience,
+that seeks to force time, and
+expects to grow forests from the
+spawn of a mushroom. Wherefore,
+running through all extremes of constitutional
+experiment, when they are
+nearest to democracy they are next
+door to a despot; and all they have
+really done is to destroy whatever
+constitutes the foundation of every
+tolerable government. A constitutional
+monarchy cannot exist without
+aristocracy, nor a healthful republic
+endure with corruption of manners.
+The cry of Equality is incompatible
+with Civilisation, which, of necessity,
+contrasts poverty with wealth&mdash;and,
+in short, whether it be an emperor or
+a mob that is to rule, Force is the
+sole hope of order, and the government
+is but an army.</p>
+
+<p>"Impress, O Pisistratus! impress
+the value of patience as regards man
+and men. You touch there on the
+kernel of the social system&mdash;the secret
+that fortifies the individual and disciplines
+the million. I care not, for
+my part, if you are tedious so long as
+you are earnest. Be minute and
+detailed. Let the real human life, in
+its war with Circumstance, stand out.
+Never mind if one can read you but
+slowly&mdash;better chance of being less
+quickly forgotten. Patience, patience!
+By the soul of Epictetus, your readers
+shall set you an example!"</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER II.</h4>
+
+<p>Leonard had written twice to Mrs
+Fairfield, twice to Riccabocca, and
+once to Mr Dale; and the poor proud
+boy could not bear to betray his humiliation.
+He wrote as with cheerful
+spirits&mdash;as if perfectly satisfied with
+his prospects. He said that he was
+well employed, in the midst of books,
+and that he had found kind friends.
+Then he turned from himself to write
+about those whom he addressed, and
+the affairs and interests of the quiet
+world wherein they lived. He did
+not give his own address, nor that of
+Mr Prickett. He dated his letters
+from a small coffeehouse near the
+bookseller, to which he occasionally
+went for his simple meals. He had a
+motive in this. He did not desire to
+be found out. Mr Dale replied for
+himself and for Mrs Fairfield, to the
+epistles addressed to these two. Riccabocca
+wrote also. Nothing could
+be more kind than the replies of both.
+They came to Leonard in a very dark
+period in his life, and they strengthened
+him in the noiseless battle with
+despair.</p>
+
+<p>If there be a good in the world that
+we do without knowing it, without
+conjecturing the effect it may have
+upon a human soul, it is when we show
+kindness to the young in the first
+barren footpath up the mountain of life.</p>
+
+<p>Leonard's face resumed its serenity
+in his intercourse with his employer;
+but he did not recover his boyish
+ingenuous frankness. The under-currents
+flowed again pure from the turbid
+soil and the splintered fragments
+uptorn from the deep; but they were
+still too strong and too rapid to allow
+transparency to the surface. And now
+he stood in the sublime world of books,
+still and earnest as a seer who invokes
+the dead. And thus, face to face with
+knowledge, hourly he discovered how
+little he knew. Mr Prickett lent him
+such works as he selected and asked
+to take home with him. He spent
+whole nights in reading; and no longer
+desultorily. He read no more poetry,
+no more Lives of Poets. He read what
+poets must read if they desire to be
+great&mdash;<cite>Sapere principium et fons</cite>&mdash;strict
+reasonings on the human mind;
+the relations between motive and conduct,
+thought and action; the grave
+and solemn truths of the past world;
+antiquities, history, philosophy. He
+was taken out of himself. He was
+carried along the ocean of the universe.
+In that ocean, O seeker, study the law
+of the tides; and seeing Chance nowhere&mdash;Thought
+presiding over all&mdash;Fate,
+that dread phantom, shall vanish
+from creation, and Providence alone
+be visible in heaven and on earth!</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER III.</h4>
+
+<p>There was to be a considerable
+book-sale at a country house one day's
+journey from London. Mr Prickett
+meant to have attended it on his own<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span>
+behalf, and that of several gentlemen
+who had given him commissions for
+purchase; but, on the morning fixed
+for his departure, he was seized with
+a severe return of his old foe the
+rheumatism. He requested Leonard
+to attend instead of himself. Leonard
+went, and was absent for the three
+days during which the sale lasted.
+He returned late in the evening, and
+went at once to Mr Prickett's house.
+The shop was closed; he knocked at
+the private entrance; a strange person
+opened the door to him, and, in reply
+to his question if Mr Prickett was at
+home, said with a long and funereal
+face&mdash;"Young man, Mr Prickett
+senior is gone to his long home, but
+Mr Richard Prickett will see you."</p>
+
+<p>At this moment a very grave-looking
+man, with lank hair, looked forth
+from the side-door communicating
+between the shop and the passage,
+land then, stepped forward&mdash;"Come
+in, sir; you are my late uncle's assistant,
+Mr Fairfield, I suppose?"</p>
+
+<p>"Your late uncle! Heavens, sir, do
+I understand aright&mdash;can Mr Prickett
+be dead since I left London?"</p>
+
+<p>"Died, sir, suddenly last night. It
+was an affection of the heart; the
+Doctor thinks the rheumatism attacked
+that organ. He had small time to
+provide for his departure, and his
+account-books seem in sad disorder:
+I am his nephew and executor."</p>
+
+<p>Leonard had now followed the
+nephew into the shop. There, still
+burned the gas-lamp. The place
+seemed more dingy and cavernous
+than before. Death always makes its
+presence felt in the house it visits.</p>
+
+<p>Leonard was greatly affected&mdash;and
+yet more, perhaps, by the utter want
+of feeling which the nephew exhibited.
+In fact, the deceased had not been on
+friendly terms with this person, his
+nearest relative and heir-at-law, who
+was also a bookseller.</p>
+
+<p>"You were engaged but by the
+week I find, young man, on reference
+to my late uncle's papers. He gave
+you £1 a week&mdash;a monstrous sum! I
+shall not require your services any
+further. I shall move these books
+to my own house. You will be good
+enough to send me a list of those you
+bought at the sale, and your account
+of travelling-expenses, &amp;c. What may
+be due to you shall be sent to your
+address. Good evening."</p>
+
+<p>Leonard went home, shocked and
+saddened at the sudden death of his
+kind employer. He did not think
+much of himself that night; but, when
+he rose the next day, he suddenly felt
+that the world of London lay before
+him, without a friend, without a calling,
+without an occupation for bread.</p>
+
+<p>This time it was no fancied sorrow,
+no poetic dream disappointed. Before
+him, gaunt and palpable, stood
+Famine.</p>
+
+<p>Escape!&mdash;yes. Back to the village;
+his mother's cottage; the exile's garden;
+the radishes and the fount. Why
+could he not escape? Ask why civilisation
+cannot escape its ills, and fly
+back to the wild and the wigwam?</p>
+
+<p>Leonard could not have returned to
+the cottage, even if the Famine that
+faced had already seized him with her
+skeleton hand. London releases not
+so readily her fated stepsons.</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER IV.</h4>
+
+<p>One day three persons were standing
+before an old book-stall in a
+passage leading from Oxford Street
+into Tottenham Court Road. Two
+were gentlemen; the third, of the class
+and appearance of those who more
+habitually halt at old book-stalls.</p>
+
+<p>"Look," said one of the gentlemen
+to the other, "I have discovered here
+what I have searched for in vain the
+last ten years&mdash;the Horace of 1580,
+the Horace of the Forty Commentators&mdash;a
+perfect treasury of learning,
+and marked only fourteen shillings!"</p>
+
+<p>"Hush, Norreys," said the other,
+"and observe what is yet more
+worth your study;" and he pointed to
+the third bystander, whose face,
+sharp and attenuated, was bent with
+an absorbed, and, as it were, with
+a hungering attention over an old
+worm-eaten volume.</p>
+
+<p>"What is the book, my lord?"
+whispered Mr Norreys.</p>
+
+<p>His companion smiled, and replied
+by another question, "What
+is the man who reads the book?"</p>
+
+<p>Mr Norreys moved a few paces,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span>
+and looked over the student's shoulder
+"Preston's translation of <span class="smcap">Boethius</span>,
+<cite>The Consolations of Philosophy</cite>," he
+said, coming back to his friend.</p>
+
+<p>"He looks as if he wanted all the
+consolations Philosophy can give him,
+poor boy."</p>
+
+<p>At this moment a fourth passenger
+paused at the book-stall, and, recognising
+the pale student, placed his
+hand on his shoulder and said, "Aha,
+young sir, we meet again. So poor
+Prickett is dead. But you are still
+haunted by associations. Books&mdash;books&mdash;magnets
+to which all iron
+minds move insensibly. What is
+this? <span class="smcap">Boethius!</span> Ah, a book written
+in prison, but a little time before
+the advent of the only philosopher
+who solves to the simplest understanding
+every mystery of life&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"And that philosopher?"</p>
+
+<p>"Is Death!" said Mr Burley.
+"How can you be dull enough to
+ask? Poor Boethius, rich, nobly
+born, a consul, his sons consuls&mdash;the
+world one smile to the Last Philosopher
+of Rome. Then suddenly, against
+this type of the old world's departing
+<small>WISDOM</small>, stands frowning the new
+world's grim genius, <small>FORCE</small>&mdash;Theodoric
+the Ostrogoth condemning Boethius
+the Schoolman; and Boethius,
+in his Pavian dungeon, holding a
+dialogue with the shade of Athenian
+Philosophy. It is the finest picture
+upon which lingers the glimmering
+of the Western golden day, before
+night rushes over time."</p>
+
+<p>"And," said Mr Norreys abruptly,
+"Boethius comes back to us with the
+faint gleam of returning light, translated
+by Alfred the Great. And,
+again, as the sun of knowledge bursts
+forth in all its splendour, by Queen
+Elizabeth. Boethius influences us as
+we stand in this passage; and that is
+the best of all the Consolations of
+Philosophy&mdash;eh, Mr Burley?"</p>
+
+<p>Mr Burley turned and bowed.</p>
+
+<p>The two men looked at each other;
+you could not see a greater contrast.
+Mr Burley, his gay green dress
+already shabby and soiled, with a rent
+in the skirts, and his face speaking of
+habitual night-cups. Mr Norreys,
+neat and somewhat precise in dress,
+with firm lean figure, and quiet, collected,
+vigorous energy in his eye and
+aspect.</p>
+
+<p>"If," replied Mr Burley, "a poor
+devil like me may argue with a
+gentleman who may command his
+own price with the booksellers, I
+should say it is no consolation at all,
+Mr Norreys. And I should like to
+see any man of sense accept the condition
+of Boethius in his prison, with
+some strangler or headsman waiting
+behind the door, upon the promised
+proviso that he should be translated,
+centuries afterwards, by Kings and
+Queens, and help indirectly to influence
+the minds of Northern barbarians,
+babbling about him in an alley, jostled
+by passers-by who never heard the
+name of Boethius, and who don't care
+a fig for philosophy. Your servant,
+sir&mdash;young man, come and talk."</p>
+
+<p>Burley hooked his arm within Leonard's,
+and led the boy passively away.</p>
+
+<p>"That is a clever man," said
+Harley L'Estrange. "But I am sorry
+to see yon young student, with his
+bright earnest eyes, and his lip that
+has the quiver of passion and enthusiasm,
+leaning on the arm of a guide
+who seems disenchanted of all that
+gives purpose to learning and links
+philosophy with use to the world.
+Who, and what is this clever man
+whom you call Burley?"</p>
+
+<p>"A man who might have been
+famous, if he had condescended to be
+respectable! The boy listening to
+us both so attentively interested <em>me</em>
+too&mdash;I should like to have the making
+of him. But I must buy this Horace."</p>
+
+<p>The shopman, lurking within his
+hole like a spider for flies, was now
+called out. And when Mr Norreys
+had bought the Horace, and given an
+address where to send it, Harley
+asked the shopman if he knew the
+young man who had been reading
+Boethius.</p>
+
+<p>"Only by sight. He has come
+here every day the last week, and
+spends hours at the stall. When once
+he fastens on a book, he reads it
+through."</p>
+
+<p>"And never buys?" said Mr Norreys.</p>
+
+<p>"Sir," said the shopman with a
+good-natured smile, "they who buy
+seldom read. The poor boy pays me
+twopence a-day to read as long as he
+pleases. I would not take it, but he
+is proud."</p>
+
+<p>"I have known men amass great<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span>
+learning in that way," said Mr
+Norreys. "Yes, I should like to
+have that boy in my hands. And
+now, my lord, I am at your service,
+and we will go to the studio of your
+artist."</p>
+
+<p>The two gentlemen walked on
+towards one of the streets out of
+Fitzroy Square.</p>
+
+<p>In a few minutes more Harley
+L'Estrange was in his element,
+seated carelessly on a deal table,
+smoking his cigar, and discussing art
+with the gusto of a man who honestly
+loved, and the taste of a man who
+thoroughly understood it. The young
+artist, in his dressing robe, adding
+slow touch upon touch, paused often
+to listen the better. And Henry
+Norreys, enjoying the brief respite
+from a life of great labour, was gladly
+reminded of idle hours under rosy
+skies; for these three men had
+formed their friendship in Italy, where
+the bands of friendship are woven
+by the hands of the Graces.</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER V.</h4>
+
+<p>Leonard and Mr Burley walked on
+into the suburbs round the north
+road from London, and Mr Burley
+offered to find literary employment
+for Leonard&mdash;an offer eagerly accepted.</p>
+
+<p>Then they went into a public house
+by the wayside. Burley demanded a
+private room, called for pen, ink, and
+paper; and, placing these implements
+before Leonard, said, "Write what
+you please in prose, five sheets of
+letter paper, twenty-two lines to a
+page&mdash;neither more nor less."</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot write so."</p>
+
+<p>"Tut, 'tis for bread."</p>
+
+<p>The boy's face crimsoned.</p>
+
+<p>"I must forget that," said he.</p>
+
+<p>"There is an arbour in the garden
+under a weeping ash," returned
+Burley. "Go there, and fancy yourself
+in Arcadia."</p>
+
+<p>Leonard was too pleased to obey.
+He found out the little arbour at one
+end of a deserted bowling-green. All
+was still&mdash;the hedgerow shut out the
+sight of the inn. The sun lay warm
+on the grass, and glinted pleasantly
+through the leaves of the ash. And
+Leonard there wrote the first essay
+from his hand as Author by profession.
+What was it that he wrote?
+His dreamy impressions of London?
+an anathema on its streets, and its
+hearts of stone? murmurs against
+poverty? dark elegies on fate?</p>
+
+<p>Oh, no! little knowest thou true
+genius, if thou askest such questions,
+or thinkest that there, under
+the weeping ash, the taskwork for
+bread was remembered; or that the
+sunbeam glinted but over the practical
+world, which, vulgar and sordid,
+lay around. Leonard wrote a fairy
+tale&mdash;one of the loveliest you can
+conceive, with a delicate touch of
+playful humour&mdash;in a style all flowered
+over with happy fancies. He smiled
+as he wrote the last word&mdash;he was
+happy. In rather more than an hour
+Mr Burley came to him, and found
+him with that smile on his lips.</p>
+
+<p>Mr Burley had a glass of brandy
+and water in his hand; it was his
+third. He too smiled&mdash;he too looked
+happy. He read the paper aloud,
+and well. He was very complimentary.
+"You will do!" said he, clapping
+Leonard on the back. "Perhaps
+some day you will catch my
+one-eyed perch." Then he folded up
+the MS., scribbled off a note, put
+the whole in one envelope&mdash;and they
+returned to London.</p>
+
+<p>Mr Burley disappeared within a
+dingy office near Fleet Street, on
+which was inscribed&mdash;"Office of
+the <cite>Beehive</cite>," and soon came forth
+with a golden sovereign in his hand&mdash;Leonard's
+first-fruits. Leonard
+thought Peru lay before him. He accompanied
+Mr Burley to that gentleman's
+lodging in Maida Hill. The
+walk had been very long; Leonard
+was not fatigued. He listened
+with a livelier attention than before
+to Burley's talk. And when they
+reached the apartments of the latter,
+and Mr Burley sent to the cookshop,
+and their joint supper was taken out
+of the golden sovereign, Leonard
+felt proud, and for the first time for
+weeks he laughed the heart's laugh.
+The two writers grew more and more
+intimate and cordial. And there was
+a vast deal in Burley by which any<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span>
+young man might be made the wiser.
+There was no apparent evidence of
+poverty in the apartments&mdash;clean,
+new, well furnished; but all things
+in the most horrible litter&mdash;all speaking
+of the huge literary sloven.</p>
+
+<p>For several days Leonard almost
+lived in those rooms. He wrote continuously&mdash;save
+when Burley's conversation
+fascinated him into idleness.
+Nay, it was not idleness&mdash;his knowledge
+grew larger as he listened; but
+the cynicism of the talker began slowly
+to work its way. That cynicism in
+which there was no faith, no hope,
+no vivifying breath from Glory&mdash;from
+Religion. The cynicism of the Epicurean,
+more degraded in his stye than
+ever was Diogenes in his tub; and
+yet presented with such ease and
+such eloquence&mdash;with such art and
+such mirth&mdash;so adorned with illustration
+and anecdote, so unconscious of
+debasement.</p>
+
+<p>Strange and dread philosophy&mdash;that
+made it a maxim to squander the
+gifts of mind on the mere care for
+matter, and fit the soul to live but as
+from day to day, with its scornful
+cry, "A fig for immortality and
+laurels!" An author for bread! Oh,
+miserable calling! was there something
+grand and holy, after all, even
+in Chatterton's despair!</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER VI.</h4>
+
+<p>The villanous <cite>Beehive</cite>! Bread was
+worked out of it, certainly; but
+fame, but hope for the future&mdash;certainly
+not. Milton's <cite>Paradise Lost</cite>
+would have perished without a sound,
+had it appeared in the <cite>Beehive</cite>.</p>
+
+<p>Fine things were there in a fragmentary
+crude state, composed by
+Burley himself. At the end of a
+week they were dead and forgotten&mdash;never
+read by one man of education
+and taste; taken simultaneously and
+indifferently with shallow politics and
+wretched essays, yet selling, perhaps,
+twenty or thirty thousand copies&mdash;an
+immense sale;&mdash;and nothing got out
+of them but bread and brandy!</p>
+
+<p>"What more would you have?"
+cried John Burley. "Did not stern
+old Sam Johnson say he could never
+write but from want?"</p>
+
+<p>"He might say it," answered
+Leonard; "but he never meant posterity
+to believe him. And he would
+have died of want, I suspect, rather
+than have written <cite>Rasselas</cite> for the
+<cite>Beehive</cite>! Want is a grand thing," continued
+the boy, thoughtfully. "A
+parent of grand things. Necessity is
+strong, and should give us its own
+strength; but Want should shatter
+asunder, with its very writhings, the
+walls of our prison-house, and not
+sit contented with the allowance
+the jail gives us in exchange for our
+work."</p>
+
+<p>"There is no prison-house to a
+man who calls upon Bacchus&mdash;stay&mdash;I
+will translate to you Schiller's
+Dithyramb. 'Then see I Bacchus&mdash;then
+up come Cupid and Ph&oelig;bus, and
+all the Celestials are filling my dwelling.'"</p>
+
+<p>Breaking into impromptu careless
+rhymes, Burley threw off a rude but
+spirited translation of that divine
+lyric.</p>
+
+<p>"O materialist!" cried the boy,
+with his bright eyes suffused.
+"Schiller calls on the gods to take
+him to their heaven with him; and
+you would debase the gods to a gin
+palace."</p>
+
+<p>"Ho, ho!" cried Burley, with his
+giant laugh. "Drink, and you will
+understand the Dithyramb."</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER VII.</h4>
+
+<p>Suddenly one morning, as Leonard
+sate with Barley, a fashionable cabriolet,
+with a very handsome horse,
+stopped at the door&mdash;a loud knock&mdash;a
+quick step on the stairs, and Randal
+Leslie entered. Leonard recognised
+him, and started. Randal glanced at
+him in surprise, and then, with a tact
+that showed he had already learned
+to profit by London life, after shaking
+hands with Burley, approached,
+and said with some successful attempt
+at ease, "Unless I am not
+mistaken, sir, we have met before.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span>
+If you remember me, I hope all boyish
+quarrels are forgotten?"</p>
+
+<p>Leonard bowed, and his heart was
+still good enough to be softened.</p>
+
+<p>"Where could you two ever have
+met?" asked Burley.</p>
+
+<p>"In a village green, and in single
+combat," answered Randal, smiling;
+and he told the story of the Battle of
+the Stocks, with a well-bred jest on
+himself. Burley laughed at the story.
+"But," said he, when this laugh was
+over, "my young friend had better
+have remained guardian of the village
+stocks, than come to London in search
+of such fortune as lies at the bottom
+of an inkhorn."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah," said Randal, with the secret
+contempt which men elaborately
+cultivated are apt to feel for those
+who seek to educate themselves&mdash;"ah,
+you make literature your calling,
+sir? At what school did you
+conceive a taste for letters?&mdash;not very
+common at our great public schools."</p>
+
+<p>"I am at school now for the first
+time," answered Leonard, drily.</p>
+
+<p>"Experience is the best schoolmistress,"
+said Burley; "and that
+was the maxim of Goethe, who had
+book-learning enough, in all conscience."</p>
+
+<p>Randal slightly shrugged his
+shoulders, and, without wasting another
+thought on Leonard, peasant-born
+and self-taught, took his seat,
+and began to talk to Burley upon a
+political question, which made then
+the war-cry between the two great
+Parliamentary parties. It was a
+subject in which Burley showed much
+general knowledge; and Randal, seeming
+to differ from him, drew forth
+alike his information and his argumentative
+powers. The conversation
+lasted more than an hour.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't quite agree with you,"
+said Randal, taking his leave; "but
+you must allow me to call again&mdash;will
+the same hour to-morrow suit
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," said Burley.</p>
+
+<p>Away went the young man in his
+cabriolet. Leonard watched him from
+the window.</p>
+
+<p>For five days, consecutively, did
+Randal call and discuss the question
+in all its bearings; and Burley, after
+the second day, got interested in the
+matter, looked up his authorities&mdash;refreshed
+his memory&mdash;and even spent
+an hour or two in the Library of the
+British Museum.</p>
+
+<p>By the fifth day, Burley had really
+exhausted all that could well be said
+on his side of the question.</p>
+
+<p>Leonard, during these colloquies,
+had sate apart, seemingly absorbed
+in reading, and secretly stung by
+Randal's disregard of his presence.
+For indeed that young man, in his
+superb self-esteem, and in the absorption
+of his ambitious projects, scarce
+felt even curiosity as to Leonard's
+rise above his earlier station, and
+looked on him as a mere journeyman
+of Burley's. But the self-taught are
+keen and quick observers. And
+Leonard had remarked, that Randal
+seemed more as one playing a part
+for some private purpose, than arguing
+in earnest; and that, when he rose
+and said, "Mr Burley, you have convinced
+me," it was not with the
+modesty of a sincere reasoner, but the
+triumph of one who has gained his
+end. But so struck, meanwhile, was
+our unheeded and silent listener, with
+Burley's power of generalisation, and
+the wide surface over which his information
+extended, that when Randal
+left the room the boy looked at
+the slovenly purposeless man, and
+said aloud&mdash;"True; knowledge is <em>not</em>
+power."</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly not," said Burley, drily&mdash;"the
+weakest thing, in the world."</p>
+
+<p>"Knowledge is power," muttered
+Randal Leslie, as, with a smile on his
+lip, he drove from the door.</p>
+
+<p>Not many days after this last
+interview there appeared a short
+pamphlet; anonymous, but one which
+made a great impression on the town.
+It was on the subject discussed
+between Randal and Burley. It was
+quoted at great length in the newspapers.
+And Burley started to his
+feet one morning, and exclaimed,
+"My own thoughts! my very
+words! Who the devil is this pamphleteer?"</p>
+
+<p>Leonard took the newspaper from
+Burley's hand. The most flattering
+encomiums preceded the extracts,
+and the extracts were as stereotypes
+of Burley's talk.</p>
+
+<p>"Can you doubt the author?" cried
+Leonard, in deep disgust and ingenuous
+scorn. "The young man<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span>
+who came to steal your brains, and
+turn your knowledge&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Into power," interrupted Burley,
+with a laugh, but it was a laugh of
+pain. "Well, this was very mean; I
+shall tell him so when he comes."</p>
+
+<p>"He will come no more," said
+Leonard. Nor did Randal come
+again. But he sent Mr Burley a copy
+of the pamphlet with a polite note,
+saying, with candid but careless acknowledgment,
+that "he had profited
+much by Mr Burley's hints and
+remarks."</p>
+
+<p>And now it was in all the papers,
+that the pamphlet which had made so
+great a noise was by a very young
+man, Mr Audley Egerton's relation.
+And high hopes were expressed of
+the future career of Mr Randal
+Leslie.</p>
+
+<p>Burley still attempted to laugh, and
+still his pain was visible. Leonard
+most cordially despised and hated
+Randal Leslie, and his heart moved
+to Burley with noble but perilous
+compassion. In his desire to soothe
+and comfort the man whom he deemed
+cheated out of fame, he forgot the
+caution he had hitherto imposed on
+himself, and yielded more and more
+to the charm of that wasted intellect.
+He accompanied Burley now where
+he went to spent his evenings, and
+more and more&mdash;though gradually,
+and with many a recoil and self-rebuke&mdash;there
+crept over him the
+cynic's contempt for glory, and miserable
+philosophy of debased content.</p>
+
+<p>Randal had risen into grave repute
+upon the strength of Burley's knowledge.
+But, had Burley written the
+pamphlet, would the same repute
+have attended <em>him</em>? Certainly not.
+Randal Leslie brought to that knowledge
+qualities all his own&mdash;a style
+simple, strong, and logical; a certain
+tone of good society, and allusions to
+men and to parties that showed his
+connection with a cabinet minister,
+and proved that he had profited no
+less by Egerton's talk than Burley's.</p>
+
+<p>Had Burley written the pamphlet,
+it would have showed more genius,
+it would have had humour and wit,
+but have been so full of whims and
+quips, sins against taste, and defects
+in earnestness, that it would have
+failed to create any serious sensation.
+Here, then, there was something
+else besides knowledge, by which
+knowledge became power. Knowledge
+must not smell of the brandy
+bottle.</p>
+
+<p>Randal Leslie might be mean in
+his plagiarism, but he turned the
+useless into use. And so far he was
+original.</p>
+
+<p>But one's admiration, after all, rests
+where Leonard's rested&mdash;with the
+poor, shabby, riotous, lawless, big
+fallen man.</p>
+
+<p>Burley took himself off to the Brent,
+and fished again for the one-eyed
+perch. Leonard accompanied him.
+His feelings were indeed different
+from what they had been when he
+had reclined under the old tree, and
+talked with Helen of the future. But
+it was almost pathetic to see how
+Burley's nature seemed to alter, as he
+strayed along the banks of the rivulet,
+and talked of his own boyhood. The
+man then seemed restored to something
+of the innocence of the child.
+He cared, in truth, little for the perch,
+which continued intractable, but he
+enjoyed the air and the sky, the
+rustling grass and the murmuring
+waters. These excursions to the
+haunts of youth seemed to rebaptise
+him, and then his eloquence took a
+pastoral character, and Isaac Walton
+himself would have loved to hear
+him. But as he got back into the
+smoke of the metropolis, and the gas
+lamps made him forget the ruddy
+sunset, and the soft evening star, the
+gross habits reassumed their sway;
+and on he went with his swaggering
+reckless step to the orgies in which
+his abused intellect flamed forth, and
+then sank into the socket quenched
+and rayless.</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER VIII.</h4>
+
+<p>Helen was seized with profound
+and anxious sadness. Leonard had
+been three or four times to see her,
+and each time she saw a change in
+him that excited all her fears. He
+seemed, it is true, more shrewd,
+more worldly-wise, more fitted, it
+might be, for coarse daily life; but, on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span>
+the other hand, the freshness and glory
+of his youth were waning slowly.
+His aspirings drooped earthward.
+He had not mastered the Practical,
+and moulded its uses with the
+strong hand of the Spiritual Architect,
+of the Ideal Builder: the Practical was
+overpowering himself. She grew pale
+when he talked of Burley, and shuddered,
+poor little Helen! when she
+found he was daily and almost nightly
+in a companionship which, with her
+native honest prudence, she saw so unsuited
+to strengthen him in his struggles,
+and aid him against temptation. She
+almost groaned when, pressing him as
+to his pecuniary means, she found his
+old terror of debt seemed fading away,
+and the solid healthful principles he
+had taken from his village were
+loosening fast. Under all, it is true,
+there was what a wiser and older
+person than Helen would have hailed
+as the redeeming promise. But that
+something was <em>grief</em>&mdash;a sublime grief
+in his own sense of falling&mdash;in his own
+impotence against the Fate he had
+provoked and coveted. The sublimity
+of that grief Helen could not detect:
+she saw only that it <em>was</em> grief, and she
+grieved with it, letting it excuse every
+fault&mdash;making her more anxious to
+comfort, in order that she might save.
+Even from the first, when Leonard
+had exclaimed, "Ah, Helen, why did
+you ever leave me?" she had revolved
+the idea of return to him; and
+when in the boy's last visit he told her
+that Burley, persecuted by duns, was
+about to fly from his present lodgings,
+and take his abode with Leonard in
+the room she had left vacant, all doubt
+was over. She resolved to sacrifice
+the safety and shelter of the home
+assured her. She resolved to come back
+and share Leonard's penury and
+struggles, and save the old room,
+wherein she had prayed for him, from
+the tempter's dangerous presence.
+Should she burden him? No; she
+had assisted her father by many little
+female arts in needle and fancy work.
+She had improved herself in these
+during her sojourn with Miss Starke.
+She could bring her share to the common
+stock. Possessed with this idea,
+she determined to realise it before the
+day on which Leonard had told her
+Burley was to move his quarters.
+Accordingly she rose very early one
+morning; she wrote a pretty and
+grateful note to Miss Starke, who
+was fast asleep, left it on the table,
+and, before any one was astir, stole
+from the house, her little bundle on
+her arm. She lingered an instant at
+the garden-gate, with a remorseful
+sentiment&mdash;a feeling that she had ill-repaid
+the cold and prim protection
+that Miss Starke had shown her. But
+sisterly love carried all before it. She
+closed the gate with a sigh, and
+went on.</p>
+
+<p>She arrived at the lodging-house
+before Leonard was up, took possession
+of her old chamber, and, presenting
+herself to Leonard as he was
+about to go forth, said, (story-teller
+that she was,)&mdash;"I am sent away,
+brother, and I have, come to you to
+take care of me. Do not let us part
+again. But you must be very cheerful
+and very happy, or I shall think
+that I am sadly in your way."</p>
+
+<p>Leonard at first did look cheerful,
+and even happy; but then he thought
+of Burley, and then of his own means
+of supporting her, and was embarrassed,
+and began questioning Helen
+as to the possibility of reconciliation
+with Miss Starke. And Helen said
+gravely, "Impossible&mdash;do not ask it,
+and do not go near her."</p>
+
+<p>Then Leonard thought she had
+been humbled and insulted, and remembered
+that she was a gentleman's
+child, and felt for her wounded pride&mdash;he
+was so proud himself. Yet still
+he was embarrassed.</p>
+
+<p>"Shall I keep the purse again,
+Leonard?" said Helen coaxingly.</p>
+
+<p>"Alas!" replied Leonard, "the
+purse is empty."</p>
+
+<p>"That is very naughty in the
+purse," said Helen, "since you put
+so much into it."</p>
+
+<p>"I?"</p>
+
+<p>"Did not you say that you made,
+at least, a guinea a-week?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; but Burley takes the money;
+and then, poor fellow! as I owe all to
+him, I have not the heart to prevent
+his spending it as he likes."</p>
+
+<p>"Please, I wish you could settle
+the month's rent," said the landlady,
+suddenly showing herself. She said
+it civilly, but with firmness.</p>
+
+<p>Leonard coloured. "It shall be
+paid to-day."</p>
+
+<p>Then he pressed his hat on his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span>
+head, and, putting Helen gently aside,
+went forth.</p>
+
+<p>"Speak to <em>me</em> in future, kind Mrs
+Smedley," said Helen with the air of
+a housewife. "<em>He</em> is always in study,
+and must not be disturbed."</p>
+
+<p>The landlady&mdash;a good woman,
+though she liked her rent&mdash;smiled
+benignly. She was fond of Helen,
+whom she had known of old.</p>
+
+<p>"I am so glad you are come back;
+and perhaps now the young man will
+not keep such late hours. I meant to
+give him warning, but&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"But he will be a great man one
+of these days, and you must bear with
+him now." And Helen kissed Mrs
+Smedley, and sent her away half inclined
+to cry.</p>
+
+<p>Then Helen busied herself in the
+rooms. She found her father's box,
+which had been duly forwarded. She
+re-examined its contents, and wept as
+she touched each humble and pious
+relic. But her father's memory itself
+thus seemed to give this home a sanction
+which the former had not; and she
+rose quietly and began mechanically
+to put things in order, sighing as she,
+saw all so neglected, till she came to
+the rose-tree, and that alone showed
+heed and care. "Dear Leonard!"
+she murmured, and the smile resettled
+on her lips.</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER IX.</h4>
+
+<p>Nothing, perhaps, could have
+severed Leonard from Burley but
+Helen's return to his care. It was
+impossible for him, even had there
+been another room in the house
+vacant, (which there was not,) to install
+this noisy riotous son of the
+Muse by Bacchus, talking at random,
+and smelling of spirits, in the same
+dwelling with an innocent, delicate,
+timid, female child. And Leonard
+could not leave her alone all the
+twenty-four hours. She restored a
+home to him, and imposed its duties.
+He therefore told Mr Burley that in
+future he should write and study in
+his own room, and hinted with many
+a blush, and as delicately as he could,
+that it seemed to him that whatever
+he obtained from his pen ought to be
+halved with Burley, to whose interest
+he owed the employment, and from
+whose books or whose knowledge he
+took what helped to maintain it; but
+that the other half, if his, he could no
+longer afford to spend upon feasts or
+libations. He had another to provide
+for.</p>
+
+<p>Burley pooh-poohed the notion
+of taking half his coadjutor's earning,
+with much grandeur, but spoke
+very fretfully of Leonard's sober
+appropriation of the other half; and,
+though a good-natured warm-hearted
+man, felt extremely indignant against
+the sudden interposition of poor
+Helen. However, Leonard was firm;
+and then Burley grew sullen, and
+so they parted. But the rent was
+still to be paid. How? Leonard
+for the first time thought of the pawnbroker.
+He had clothes to spare,
+and Riccabocca's watch. No; that
+last he shrank from applying to such
+base uses.</p>
+
+<p>He went home at noon, and met
+Helen at the street door. She too
+had been out, and her soft cheek was
+rosy red with unwonted exercise and
+the sense of joy. She had still preserved
+the few gold pieces which
+Leonard had taken back to her on
+his first visit to Miss Starke's. She
+had now gone out and bought wools
+and implements for work; and meanwhile
+she had paid the rent.</p>
+
+<p>Leonard did not object to the work,
+but he blushed deeply when he knew
+about the rent, and was very angry.
+He payed back to her that night
+what she had advanced; and Helen
+wept silently at his pride, and wept
+more when she saw the next day a
+woeful hiatus in his wardrobe.</p>
+
+<p>But Leonard now worked at home,
+and worked resolutely; and Helen
+sate by his side, working too; so
+that next day, and the next, slipped
+peacefully away, and in the evening of
+the second he asked her to walk out
+in the fields. She sprang up joyously
+at the invitation, when bang went the
+door, and in reeled John Burley&mdash;drunk:&mdash;And
+so drunk!</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER X.</h4>
+
+<p>And with Burley there reeled in
+another man&mdash;a friend of his&mdash;a man
+who had been a wealthy trader and
+once well to do, but who, unluckily,
+had literary tastes, and was fond of
+hearing Burley talk. So, since he had
+known the wit, his business had fallen
+from him, and he had passed through
+the Bankrupt Court. A very shabby-looking
+dog he was, indeed, and his
+nose was redder than Burley's.</p>
+
+<p>John made a drunken dash at poor
+Helen. "So you are the Pentheus in
+petticoats who defies Bacchus," cried
+he; and therewith he roared out a
+verse from Euripides. Helen ran
+away, and Leonard interposed.</p>
+
+<p>"For shame, Burley!"</p>
+
+<p>"He's drunk," said Mr Douce the
+bankrupt trader&mdash;"very drunk&mdash;don't
+mind&mdash;him. I say, sir, I hope we
+don't intrude. Sit still, Burley, sit
+still, and talk, do&mdash;that's a good man.
+You should hear him&mdash;ta&mdash;ta&mdash;talk,
+sir."</p>
+
+<p>Leonard meanwhile had got Helen
+out of the room, into her own, and
+begged her not to be alarmed, and
+keep the door locked. He then returned
+to Burley, who had seated
+himself on the bed, trying wondrous
+hard to keep himself upright; while
+Mr Douce was striving to light a short
+pipe that he carried in his buttonhole&mdash;without
+having filled it&mdash;and,
+naturally failing in that attempt, was
+now beginning to weep.</p>
+
+<p>Leonard was deeply shocked and
+revolted for Helen's sake; but it was
+hopeless to make Burley listen to
+reason. And how could the boy turn
+out of his room the man to whom he
+was under obligations?</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile there smote upon Helen's
+shrinking, ears loud jarring talk and
+maudlin laughter, and cracked attempts
+at jovial songs. Then she
+heard Mrs Smedley in Leonard's
+room, remonstrating, and Burley's
+laugh was louder than before, and Mrs
+Smedley, who was a meek woman,
+evidently got frightened, and was heard
+in precipitate retreat. Long and loud
+talk recommenced, Burley's great
+voice predominant, Mr Douce chiming
+in with hiccupy broken treble.
+Hour after hour this lasted, for want
+of the drink that would have brought
+it to a premature close. And Burley
+gradually began to talk himself somewhat
+sober. Then Mr Douce was
+heard descending the stairs, and
+silence followed. At dawn, Leonard
+knocked at Helen's door. She opened
+it at once, for she had not gone to
+bed.</p>
+
+<p>"Helen," said he very sadly, "you
+cannot continue here. I must find
+out some proper home for you. This
+man has served me when all London
+was friendless, and he tells me that he
+has nowhere else to go&mdash;that the
+bailiffs are after him. He has now
+fallen asleep. I will go and find you
+some lodging close at hand&mdash;for I cannot
+expel him who has protected me;
+and yet you cannot be under the same
+roof with him. My own good angel,
+I must lose you."</p>
+
+<p>He did not wait for her answer,
+but hurried down the stairs.</p>
+
+<p>The morning looked through the
+shutterless panes in Leonard's garret,
+and the birds began to chirp from the
+elm-tree, when Burley rose and shook
+himself, and stared round. He could
+not quite make out where he was.
+He got hold of the water-jug which he
+emptied at three draughts, and felt
+greatly refreshed. He then began to
+reconnoitre the chamber&mdash;looked at
+Leonard's MSS.&mdash;peeped into the
+drawers&mdash;wondered where the devil
+Leonard himself had gone to&mdash;and
+finally amused himself by throwing
+down the fire-irons, ringing the bell,
+and making all the noise he could, in
+the hopes of attracting the attention
+of somebody or other, and procuring
+himself his morning dram.</p>
+
+<p>In the midst of this <i>charivari</i> the door
+opened softly, but as if with a resolute
+hand, and the small quiet form of
+Helen stood before the threshold.
+<span class="smcap">Burley</span> turned round, and the two
+looked at each other for some moments
+with silent scrutiny.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Burley</span>, (composing his features
+into their most friendly expression.)&mdash;"Come
+hither, my dear. So you are
+the little girl whom I saw with Leonard
+on the banks of the Brent, and you
+have come back to live with him&mdash;and
+I have come to live with him too. You<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span>
+shall be our little housekeeper, and I
+will tell you the story of Prince
+Prettyman, and a great many others
+not to be found in <cite>Mother Goose</cite>.
+Meanwhile, my dear little girl, here's
+sixpence&mdash;just run out and change this
+for its worth in rum."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Helen</span>, (coming slowly up to Mr
+Burley, and still gazing earnestly into
+his face.)&mdash;"Ah, sir, Leonard says
+you have a kind heart, and that you
+have served him&mdash;he cannot ask you
+to leave the house; and so I, who have
+never served him, am to go hence and
+live alone."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Burley</span>, (moved.)&mdash;"You go, my
+little lady?&mdash;and why? Can we not
+all live together?"</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Helen.</span>&mdash;"No, sir. I left everything
+to come to Leonard, for we had
+met first at my father's grave. But
+you rob me of him, and I have no
+other friend on earth."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Burley</span>, (discomposed.)&mdash;"Explain
+yourself. Why must you leave
+him because I come?"</p>
+
+<p>Helen looks at Mr Burley again, long
+and wistfully, but makes no answer.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Burley</span>, (with a gulp.)&mdash;"Is it
+because he thinks I am not fit company
+for you?"</p>
+
+<p>Helen bowed her head.</p>
+
+<p>Burley winced, and after a moment's
+pause said,&mdash;"He is right."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Helen</span>, (obeying the impulse at her
+heart, springs forward and takes
+Burley's hand.)&mdash;"Ah, sir," she
+cried, "before he knew you he was so
+different&mdash;then he was cheerful&mdash;then,
+even when his first disappointment
+came, I grieved and wept; but I felt
+he would conquer still&mdash;for his heart
+was so good and pure. Oh, sir, don't
+think I reproach you; but what is to
+become of him if&mdash;if&mdash;No, it is not for
+myself I speak. I know that if I
+was here, that if he had me to care
+for, he would come home early&mdash;and
+work patiently&mdash;and&mdash;and&mdash;that I
+might save him. But now when I am
+gone, and you with him&mdash;you to whom
+he is grateful, you whom he would
+follow against his own conscience,
+(you must see that, sir)&mdash;what is to
+become of him?"</p>
+
+<p>Helen's voice died in sobs.</p>
+
+<p>Burley took three or four long
+strides through the room&mdash;he was
+greatly agitated. "I am a demon,"
+he murmured. "I never saw it before&mdash;but
+it is true&mdash;I should be this boy's
+ruin." Tears stood in his eyes, he
+paused abruptly, made a clutch at his
+hat, and turned to the door.</p>
+
+<p>Helen stopped the way, and, taking
+him gently by the arm, said,&mdash;"Oh, sir,
+forgive me&mdash;I have pained you;" and
+looked up at him with a compassionate
+expression, that indeed made the
+child's sweet face as that of an
+angel.</p>
+
+<p>Burley bent down as if to kiss her,
+and then drew back&mdash;perhaps with a
+sentiment that his lips were not worthy
+to touch that innocent brow.</p>
+
+<p>"If I had had a sister&mdash;a child
+like you, little one," he muttered,
+"perhaps I too might have been
+saved in time. Now&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, now you may stay, sir; I
+don't fear you any more."</p>
+
+<p>"No, no; you would fear me again
+ere night-time, and I might not be
+always in the right mood to listen to
+a voice like yours, child. Your
+Leonard has a noble heart and rare
+gifts. He should rise yet, and he
+shall. I will not drag him into the
+mire. Good-bye&mdash;you will see me no
+more." He broke from Helen, cleared
+the stairs with a bound, and was out
+of the house.</p>
+
+<p>When Leonard returned he was
+surprised to hear his unwelcome guest
+was gone&mdash;but Helen did not venture
+to tell him of her interposition. She
+knew instinctively how such officiousness
+would mortify and offend
+the pride of man&mdash;but she never
+again spoke harshly of poor Burley.
+Leonard supposed that he should
+either see or hear of the humourist
+in the course of the day. Finding
+he did not, he went in search of
+him at his old haunts; but no trace.
+He inquired at the <cite>Beehive</cite> if they
+knew there of his new address, but no
+tidings of Burley could be obtained.</p>
+
+<p>As he came home disappointed
+and anxious, for he felt uneasy as
+to the disappearance of his wild
+friend, Mrs Smedley met him at the
+door.</p>
+
+<p>"Please, sir, suit yourself with
+another lodging," said she. "I can
+have no such singings and shoutings
+going on at night in my house. And
+that poor little girl, too!&mdash;you should
+be ashamed of yourself."</p>
+
+<p>Leonard frowned, and passed by.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[288]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER XI.</h4>
+
+<p>Meanwhile, on leaving Helen, Burley
+strode on; and, as if by some better
+instinct, for he was unconscious of his
+own steps, he took the way towards
+the still green haunts of his youth.
+When he paused at length, he was
+already before the door of a rural
+cottage, standing alone in the midst
+of fields, with a little farm-yard at
+the back; and far through the trees
+in front was caught a glimpse of the
+winding Brent.</p>
+
+<p>With this cottage Burley was familiar;
+it was inhabited by a good old
+couple who had known him from a
+boy. There he habitually left his
+rods and fishing-tackle; there, for
+intervals in his turbid riotous life, he
+had sojourned for two or three days
+together&mdash;fancying the first day
+that the country was a heaven, and
+convinced before the third that it was
+a purgatory.</p>
+
+<p>An old woman, of neat and tidy
+exterior, came forth to greet him.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, Master John," said she clasping
+his nerveless hand&mdash;"well, the
+fields be pleasant now&mdash;I hope you
+are come to stay a bit? Do; it will
+freshen you: you lose all the fine
+colour you had once, in Lunnon
+town."</p>
+
+<p>"I will stay with you, my kind
+friend," said Burley with unusual
+meekness&mdash;"I can have the old room,
+then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes, come and look at it. I
+never let it now to any one but you&mdash;never
+have let it since the dear
+beautiful lady with the angel's face
+went away. Poor thing, what could
+have become of her?"</p>
+
+<p>Thus speaking, while Burley listened
+not, the old woman drew him
+within the cottage, and led him up
+the stairs into a room that might
+have well become a better house, for
+it was furnished with taste, and even
+elegance. A small cabinet pianoforte
+stood opposite the fireplace, and the
+window looked upon pleasant meads
+and tangled hedgerows, and the narrow
+windings of the blue rivulet.
+Burley sank down exhausted, and
+gazed wistfully from the casement.</p>
+
+<p>"You have not breakfasted?" said
+the hostess anxiously.</p>
+
+<p>"No."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, the eggs are fresh laid, and
+you would like a rasher of bacon, Master
+John? And if you <em>will</em> have brandy
+in your tea, I have some that you left
+long ago in your own bottle."</p>
+
+<p>Burley shook his head. "No
+brandy, Mrs Goodyer; only fresh
+milk. I will see whether I can yet
+coax Nature."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs Goodyer did not know what
+was meant by coaxing Nature, but
+she said, "Pray do, Master John,"
+and vanished.</p>
+
+<p>That day Burley went out with his
+rod, and he fished hard for the one-eyed
+perch: but in vain. Then he
+roved along the stream with his
+hands in his pockets, whistling. He
+returned to the cottage at sunset,
+partook of the fare provided for him,
+abstained from the brandy, and felt
+dreadfully low. He called for pen,
+ink, and paper, and sought to write,
+but could not achieve two lines. He
+summoned Mrs Goodyer, "Tell your
+husband to come and sit and talk."</p>
+
+<p>Up came old Jacob Goodyer, and
+the great wit bade him tell him all
+the news of the village. Jacob
+obeyed willingly, and Burley at last
+fell asleep. The next day it was
+much the same, only at dinner he had
+up the brandy bottle, and finished it;
+and he did <em>not</em> have up Jacob, but
+he contrived to write.</p>
+
+<p>The third day it rained incessantly.
+"Have you no books, Mrs Goodyer?"
+asked poor John Burley.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, some that the dear lady
+left behind her; and perhaps you
+would like to look at some papers in
+her own writing?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, not the papers&mdash;all women
+scribble, and all scribble the same
+things. Get me the books."</p>
+
+<p>The books were brought up&mdash;poetry
+and essays&mdash;John knew them by
+heart. He looked out on the rain,
+and at evening the rain had ceased.
+He rushed to his hat and fled.</p>
+
+<p>"Nature, Nature!" he exclaimed
+when he was out in the air and hurrying
+by the dripping hedgerows,
+"you are not to be coaxed by me!
+I have jilted you shamefully, I own
+it; you are a female and unforgiving.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[289]</a></span>
+I don't complain. You may
+be very pretty, but you are the stupidest
+and most tiresome companion
+that ever I met with. Thank heaven,
+I am not married to you!"</p>
+
+<p>Thus John Burley made his way
+into town, and paused at the first
+public house. Out of that house he
+came with a jovial air, and on he
+strode towards the heart of London.
+Now he is in Leicester Square, and
+he gazes on the foreigners who stalk
+that region, and hums a tune; and
+now from yonder alley two forms
+emerge, and dog his careless footsteps;
+now through the maze of passages
+towards St Martin's he threads his
+path, and, anticipating an orgy as he
+nears his favourite haunts, jingles the
+silver in his pockets; and now the
+two forms are at his heels.</p>
+
+<p>"Hail to thee, O Freedom!" muttered
+John Burley, "thy dwelling is
+in cities, and thy palace is the
+tavern."</p>
+
+<p>"In the king's name," quoth a
+gruff voice; and John Burley feels
+the horrid and familiar tap on the
+shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>The two bailiffs who dogged have
+seized their prey.</p>
+
+<p>"At whose suit?" asked John
+Burley falteringly.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr Cox, the wine-merchant."</p>
+
+<p>"Cox! A man to whom I gave a
+cheque on my bankers, not three
+months ago!"</p>
+
+<p>"But it warn't cashed."</p>
+
+<p>"What does that signify?&mdash;the
+intention was the same. A good
+heart takes the will for the deed.
+Cox is a monster of ingratitude; and
+I withdraw my custom."</p>
+
+<p>"Sarve him right. Would your
+honour like a jarvey?"</p>
+
+<p>"I would rather spend the money
+on something else," said John Burley.
+"Give me your arm, I am not proud.
+After all, thank heaven, I shall not
+sleep in the country."</p>
+
+<p>And John Burley made a night of
+it in the Fleet.</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER XII.</h4>
+
+<p>Miss Starke was one of those ladies
+who pass their lives in the direst of
+all civil strife&mdash;war with their servants.
+She looked upon the members
+of that class as the unrelenting
+and sleepless enemies of the unfortunate
+householders condemned to
+employ them. She thought they ate
+and drank to their villanous utmost,
+in order to ruin their benefactors&mdash;that
+they lived in one constant
+conspiracy with one another and the
+tradesmen, the object of which was
+to cheat and pilfer. Miss Starke
+was a miserable woman. As she
+had no relations or friends who
+cared enough for her to share her
+solitary struggle against her domestic
+foes; and her income, though easy,
+was an annuity that died with herself,
+thereby reducing various nephews,
+nieces, or cousins, to the strict bounds
+of a natural affection&mdash;that did not
+exist; and as she felt the want of
+some friendly face amidst this world
+of distrust and hate, so she had tried
+the resource of venal companions.
+But the venal companions had never
+staid long&mdash;either they disliked Miss
+Starke, or Miss Starke disliked them.
+Therefore the poor woman had resolved
+upon bringing up some little
+girl whose heart, as she said to herself,
+would be fresh and uncorrupted,
+and from whom she might expect
+gratitude. She had been contented,
+on the whole, with Helen, and had
+meant to keep that child in her house
+as long as she (Miss Starke) remained
+upon the earth&mdash;perhaps some thirty
+years longer; and then, having carefully
+secluded her from marriage, and
+other friendship, to leave her nothing
+but the regret of having lost so kind
+a benefactress. Agreeably with this
+notion, and in order to secure the
+affections of the child, Miss Starke
+had relaxed the frigid austerity natural
+to her manner and mode of
+thought, and been kind to Helen in
+an iron way. She had neither slapped
+nor pinched her, neither had she
+starved. She had allowed her to
+see Leonard, according to the agreement
+made with Dr Morgan, and had
+laid out tenpence on cakes, besides
+contributing fruit from her garden for
+the first interview&mdash;a hospitality she
+did not think it fit to renew on subsequent
+occasions. In return for this,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[290]</a></span>
+she conceived she had purchased the
+right to Helen bodily and spiritually,
+and nothing could exceed her indignation
+when she rose one morning
+and found the child had gone. As it
+never had occurred to her to ask
+Leonard's address, though she suspected
+Helen had gone to him, she
+was at a loss what to do, and remained
+for twenty-four hours in a
+state of inane depression. But then
+she began to miss the child so much
+that her energies woke, and she persuaded
+herself that she was actuated
+by the purest benevolence in trying
+to reclaim this poor creature from the
+world into which Helen had thus
+rashly plunged.</p>
+
+<p>Accordingly, she put an advertisement
+into the <cite>Times</cite>, to the following
+effect, liberally imitated from
+one by which, in former years, she had
+recovered a favourite Blenheim.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p class="center">TWO GUINEAS REWARD.</p>
+
+<p>Strayed, from Ivy Cottage, Highgate,
+a Little Girl, answers to the
+name of Helen; with blue eyes and
+brown hair; white muslin frock, and
+straw hat with blue ribbons. Whoever
+will bring the same to Ivy Cottage, shall
+receive the above Reward.</p>
+
+<p><em>N.B.</em>&mdash;Nothing more will be offered.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Now, it so happened that Mrs
+Smedley had put an advertisement in
+the <cite>Times</cite> on her own account, relative
+to a niece of hers who was coming
+from the country, and for whom she
+desired to find a situation. So, contrary
+to her usual habit, she sent for
+the newspaper, and, close by her
+own advertisement, she saw Miss
+Starke's.</p>
+
+<p>It was impossible that she could
+mistake the description of Helen;
+and, as this advertisement caught her
+eye the very day after the whole
+house had been disturbed and scandalised
+by Burley's noisy visit, and
+on which she had resolved to get rid
+of a lodger who received such visitors,
+the goodhearted woman was delighted
+to think that she could restore Helen
+to some safe home. While thus
+thinking, Helen herself entered the
+kitchen where Mrs Smedley sate,
+and the landlady had the imprudence
+to point out the advertisement, and
+talk, as she called it, "seriously" to
+the little girl.</p>
+
+<p>Helen in vain and with tears entreated
+her to take no step in reply to the
+advertisement. Mrs Smedley felt it
+was an affair of duty, and was obdurate,
+and shortly afterwards put on her
+bonnet and left the house. Helen conjectured
+that she was on her way to
+Miss Starke's, and her whole soul was
+bent on flight. Leonard had gone to
+the office of the <cite>Beehive</cite> with his MSS.;
+but she packed up all their joint
+effects, and, just as she had done so, he
+returned. She communicated the
+news of the advertisement, and said
+she should be so miserable if compelled
+to go back to Miss Starke's,
+and implored him so pathetically to
+save her from such sorrow that he at
+once assented to her proposal of flight.
+Luckily, little was owing to the landlady&mdash;that
+little was left with the
+maid-servant; and, profiting by Mrs
+Smedley's absence, they escaped
+without scene or conflict. Their
+effects were taken by Leonard to a
+stand of hackney vehicles, and then
+left at a coach-office, while they went
+in search of lodgings. It was wise to
+choose an entirely new and remote
+district; and before night they were
+settled in an attic in Lambeth.</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER XIII.</h4>
+
+<p>As the reader will expect, no
+trace of Burley could Leonard find:
+the humourist had ceased to communicate
+with the <cite>Beehive</cite>. But Leonard
+grieved for Burley's sake; and
+indeed, he missed the intercourse of
+the large wrong mind. But he settled
+down by degrees to the simple loving
+society of his child companion, and in
+that presence grew more tranquil.
+The hours in the daytime that he did
+not pass at work he spent as before,
+picking up knowledge at bookstalls;
+and at dusk he and Helen would
+stroll out&mdash;sometimes striving to
+escape from the long suburb into
+fresh rural air; more often wandering
+to and fro the bridge that led
+to glorious Westminster&mdash;London's
+classic land&mdash;and watching the vague<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[291]</a></span>
+lamps reflected on the river. This
+haunt suited the musing melancholy
+boy. He would stand long and with
+wistful silence by the balustrade&mdash;seating
+Helen thereon, that she too
+might look along the dark mournful
+waters which, dark though they be,
+still have their charm of mysterious
+repose.</p>
+
+<p>As the river flowed between the
+world of roofs, and the roar of human
+passions on either side, so in those
+two hearts flowed Thought&mdash;and all
+they knew of London was its shadow.</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER XIV.</h4>
+
+<p>There appeared in the <cite>Beehive</cite> certain
+very truculent political papers&mdash;papers
+very like the tracts in the
+Tinker's bag. Leonard did not heed
+them much, but they made far more
+sensation in the public that read the
+<cite>Beehive</cite> than Leonard's papers, full
+of rare promise though the last were.
+They greatly increased the sale of the
+periodical in the manufacturing towns,
+and began to awake the drowsy vigilance
+of the Home Office. Suddenly
+a descent was made upon the <cite>Beehive</cite>,
+and all its papers and plant.
+The editor saw himself threatened
+with a criminal prosecution, and the
+certainty of two years' imprisonment:
+he did not like the prospect, and disappeared.
+One evening, when Leonard,
+unconscious of these mischances,
+arrived at the door of the office, he
+found it closed. An agitated mob was
+before it, and a voice that was not
+new to his ear was haranguing the
+bystanders, with many imprecations
+against "tyrans." He looked, and,
+to his amaze, recognised in the orator
+Mr Sprott the Tinker.</p>
+
+<p>The police came in numbers to disperse
+the crowd, and Mr Sprott
+prudently vanished. Leonard learned
+then what had befallen, and again
+saw himself without employment
+and the means of bread.</p>
+
+<p>Slowly he walked back. "O,
+knowledge, knowledge!&mdash;powerless
+indeed!" he murmured.</p>
+
+<p>As he thus spoke, a handbill in
+large capitals met his eyes on a dead
+wall&mdash;"Wanted, a few smart young
+men for India."</p>
+
+<p>A crimp accosted him&mdash;"You
+would make a fine soldier, my man.
+You have stout limbs of your own."
+Leonard moved on.</p>
+
+<p>"It has come back, then, to this.
+Brute physical force after all! O
+Mind, despair! O Peasant, be a
+machine again."</p>
+
+<p>He entered his attic noiselessly,
+and gazed upon Helen as she sate at
+work, straining her eyes by the open
+window&mdash;with tender and deep compassion.
+She had not heard him
+enter, nor was she aware of his presence.
+Patient and still she sate,
+and the small fingers plied busily.
+He gazed, and saw that her cheek
+was pale and hollow, and the hands
+looked so thin! His heart was deeply
+touched, and at that moment he had
+not one memory of the baffled Poet,
+one thought that proclaimed the
+Egotist.</p>
+
+<p>He approached her gently, laid his
+hand on her shoulder&mdash;"Helen, put
+on your shawl and bonnet, and walk
+out&mdash;I have much to say."</p>
+
+<p>In a few moments she was ready,
+and they took their way to their
+favourite haunt upon the bridge.
+Pausing in one of the recesses or
+nooks, Leonard then began,&mdash;"Helen,
+we must part."</p>
+
+<p>"Part?&mdash;Oh, brother!"</p>
+
+<p>"Listen. All work that depends
+on mind is over for me; nothing remains
+but the labour of thews and
+sinews. I cannot go back to my village
+and say to all, 'My hopes were
+self-conceit, and my intellect a delusion!'
+I cannot. Neither in this sordid
+city can I turn menial or porter.
+I might be born to that drudgery,
+but my mind has, it may be unhappily,
+raised me above my birth. What,
+then, shall I do? I know not yet&mdash;serve
+as a soldier, or push my way
+to some wilderness afar, as an emigrant,
+perhaps. But whatever my
+choice, I must henceforth be alone;
+I have a home no more. But there
+is a home for you, Helen, a very
+humble one, (for you, too, so well
+born,) but very safe&mdash;the roof of&mdash;of&mdash;my
+peasant mother. She will love
+you for my sake, and&mdash;and&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Helen clung to him trembling, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[292]</a></span>
+sobbed out, "Anything, anything
+you will. But I can work; I can
+make money, Leonard. I do, indeed,
+make money&mdash;you do not know how
+much&mdash;but enough for us both till
+better times come to you. Do not let
+us part."</p>
+
+<p>"And I&mdash;a man, and born to
+labour, to be maintained by the work
+of an infant! No, Helen, do not so
+degrade me."</p>
+
+<p>She drew back as she looked on his
+flushed brow, bowed her head submissively,
+and murmured, "Pardon."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah," said Helen, after a pause,
+"if now we could but find my poor
+father's friend! I never so much
+cared for it before."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, he would surely provide for
+you."</p>
+
+<p>"For <em>me</em>!" repeated Helen, in a
+tone of soft deep reproach, and she
+turned away her head to conceal her
+tears.</p>
+
+<p>"You are sure you would remember
+him, if we met him by chance?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes. He was so different
+from all we see in this terrible city,
+and his eyes were like yonder stars,
+so clear and so bright; yet the light
+seemed to come from afar off, as the
+light does in yours, when your
+thoughts are away from all things
+round you. And then, too, his dog
+whom he called Nero&mdash;I could not
+forget that."</p>
+
+<p>"But his dog may not be always
+with him."</p>
+
+<p>"But the bright clear eyes are!
+Ah, now you look up to heaven,
+and yours seem to dream like his."</p>
+
+<p>Leonard did not answer, for his
+thoughts were indeed less on earth
+than struggling to pierce into that
+remote and mysterious heaven.</p>
+
+<p>Both were silent long; the crowd
+passed them by unheedingly. Night
+deepened over the river, but the reflection
+of the lamplights on its waves
+was more visible than that of the
+stars. The beams showed the darkness
+of the strong current, and the
+craft that lay eastward on the tide,
+with sail-less spectral masts and black
+dismal hulks, looked deathlike in their
+stillness.</p>
+
+<p>Leonard looked down, and the
+thought of Chatterton's grim suicide
+came back to his soul, and a pale
+scornful face with luminous haunting
+eyes seemed to look up from the stream,
+and murmur from livid lips,&mdash;"Struggle
+no more against the tides
+on the surface&mdash;all is calm and rest
+within the deep."</p>
+
+<p>Starting in terror from the gloom
+of his reverie, the boy began to talk
+fast to Helen, and tried to soothe her
+with descriptions of the lowly home
+which he had offered.</p>
+
+<p>He spoke of the light cares which
+she would participate with his
+mother&mdash;for by that name he still
+called the widow&mdash;and dwelt, with
+an eloquence that the contrast round
+him made sincere and strong, on
+the happy rural life, the shadowy
+woodlands, the rippling cornfields,
+the solemn lone church-spire soaring
+from the tranquil landscape. Flatteringly
+he painted the flowery terraces
+of the Italian exile, and the playful
+fountain that, even as he spoke, was
+flinging up its spray to the stars,
+through serene air untroubled by the
+smoke of cities, and untainted by the
+sinful sighs of men. He promised her
+the love and protection of natures
+akin to the happy scene: the simple
+affectionate mother&mdash;the gentle pastor&mdash;the
+exile wise and kind&mdash;Violante,
+with dark eyes full of the
+mystic thoughts that solitude calls
+from childhood,&mdash;Violante should be
+her companion.</p>
+
+<p>"And oh!" cried Helen, "if life
+be thus happy there, return with me,
+return&mdash;return!"</p>
+
+<p>"Alas!" murmured the boy, "if
+the hammer once strike the spark
+from the anvil, the spark must fly
+upward; it cannot fall back to earth
+until light has left it. Upward still,
+Helen&mdash;let me go upward still!"</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER XV.</h4>
+
+<p>The next morning Helen was very
+ill&mdash;so ill that, shortly after rising,
+she was forced to creep back to bed.
+Her frame shivered&mdash;her eyes were
+heavy&mdash;her hand burned like fire.
+Fever had set in. Perhaps she might
+have caught cold on the bridge&mdash;perhaps
+her emotions had proved too<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[293]</a></span>
+much for her frame. Leonard, in
+great alarm, called on the nearest
+apothecary. The apothecary looked
+grave, and said there was danger.
+And danger soon declared itself&mdash;Helen
+became delirious. For several
+days she lay in this state, between
+life and death. Leonard then felt
+that all the sorrows of earth are
+light, compared with the fear of
+losing what we love. How valueless
+the envied laurel seemed beside the
+dying rose.</p>
+
+<p>Thanks, perhaps, more to his heed
+and tending than to medical skill, she
+recovered sense at last&mdash;immediate
+peril was over. But she was very
+weak and reduced&mdash;her ultimate recovery
+doubtful&mdash;convalescence, at
+best, likely to be very slow.</p>
+
+<p>But when she learned how long she
+had been thus ill, she looked anxiously
+at Leonard's face as he bent over
+her, and faltered forth&mdash;"Give me my
+work; I am strong enough for that
+now&mdash;it would amuse me."</p>
+
+<p>Leonard burst into tears.</p>
+
+<p>Alas! he had no work himself; all
+their joint money had melted away;
+the apothecary was not like good Dr
+Morgan: the medicines were to be
+paid for, and the rent. Two days
+before, Leonard had pawned Riccabocca's
+watch; and when the last
+shilling thus raised was gone, how
+should he support Helen? Nevertheless
+he conquered his tears, and assured
+her that he had employment; and
+that so earnestly that she believed
+him, and sank into soft sleep. He
+listened to her breathing, kissed her
+forehead, and left the room. He
+turned into his own neigbouring
+garret, and, leaning his face on his
+hands, collected all his thoughts.</p>
+
+<p>He must be a beggar at last. He
+must write to Mr Dale for money&mdash;Mr
+Dale, too, who knew the secret
+of his birth. He would rather have
+begged of a stranger&mdash;it seemed to
+add a new dishonour to his mother's
+memory for the child to beg of one
+who was acquainted with her shame.
+Had he himself been the only one to want
+and to starve, he would have sunk inch
+by inch into the grave of famine, before
+he would have so subdued his pride.
+But Helen, there on that bed&mdash;Helen
+needing, for weeks perhaps, all support,
+and illness making luxuries
+themselves like necessaries! Beg he
+must. And when he so resolved, had
+you but seen the proud bitter soul he
+conquered, you would have said&mdash;"This
+which he thinks is degradation&mdash;this
+is heroism. Oh strange human
+heart!&mdash;no epic ever written achieves
+the Sublime and the Beautiful which
+are graven, unread by human eye,
+in thy secret leaves." Of whom else
+should he beg? His mother had nothing,
+Riccabocca was poor, and the
+stately Violante, who had exclaimed,
+"Would that I were a man!"&mdash;he
+could not endure the thought that she
+should pity him, and despise. The
+Avenels! No&mdash;thrice No. He drew
+towards him hastily ink and paper,
+and wrote rapid lines, that were
+wrung from him as from the bleeding
+strings of life.</p>
+
+<p>But the hour for the post had
+passed&mdash;the letter must wait till the
+next day; and three days at least
+would elapse before he could receive
+an answer. He left the letter on the
+table, and, stifling as for air, went
+forth. He crossed the bridge&mdash;he
+passed on mechanically&mdash;and was
+borne along by a crowd pressing
+towards the doors of Parliament.
+A debate that excited popular interest
+was fixed for that evening, and many
+bystanders collected in the street to
+see the members pass to and fro,
+or hear what speakers had yet risen to
+take part in the debate, or try to get
+orders for the gallery.</p>
+
+<p>He halted amidst these loiterers, with
+no interest, indeed, in common with
+them, but looking over their heads
+abstractedly towards the tall Funeral
+Abbey&mdash;Imperial Golgotha of Poets,
+and Chiefs, and Kings.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly his attention was diverted
+to those around by the sound of a
+name&mdash;displeasingly known to him.
+"How are you, Randal Leslie?
+coming to hear the debate?" said a
+member who was passing through
+the street.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; Mr Egerton promised to get
+me under the gallery. He is to speak
+himself to-night, and I have never
+heard him. As you are going into
+the House, will you remind him?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't now, for he is speaking
+already&mdash;and well too. I hurried from
+the Athenæum, where I was dining,
+on purpose to be in time, as I heard<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[294]</a></span>
+that his speech was making a great
+effect."</p>
+
+<p>"This is very unlucky," said Randal.
+"I had no idea he would speak
+so early."</p>
+
+<p>"M&mdash;&mdash; brought him up by a direct
+personal attack. But follow me; perhaps
+I can get you into the House;
+and a man like you, Leslie, of whom
+we expect great things some day, I
+can tell you, should not miss any
+such opportunity of knowing what
+this House of ours is on a field night.
+Come on!"</p>
+
+<p>The member hurried towards the
+door; and as Randal followed him, a
+bystander cried&mdash;"That is the young
+man who wrote the famous pamphlet&mdash;Egerton's
+relation."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, indeed!" said another.
+"Clever man, Egerton&mdash;I am waiting
+for him."</p>
+
+<p>"So am I."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, you are not a constituent,
+as I am."</p>
+
+<p>"No; but he has been very kind to
+my nephew, and I must thank him.
+You are a constituent&mdash;he is an
+honour to your town."</p>
+
+<p>"So he is: Enlightened man!"</p>
+
+<p>"And so generous!"</p>
+
+<p>"Brings forward really good measures,"
+quoth the politician.</p>
+
+<p>"And clever young men," said the
+uncle.</p>
+
+<p>Therewith one or two others joined
+in the praise of Audley Egerton, and
+many anecdotes of his liberality were
+told.</p>
+
+<p>Leonard listened at first listlessly,
+at last with thoughtful attention. He
+had heard Burley, too, speak highly
+of this generous statesman, who,
+without pretending to genius himself,
+appreciated it in others. He suddenly
+remembered, too, that Egerton was
+half-brother to the Squire. Vague
+notions of some appeal to this eminent
+person, not for charity, but employ
+to his mind, gleamed across him&mdash;inexperienced
+boy that he yet was! And,
+while thus meditating, the door of the
+House opened, and out came Audley
+Egerton himself. A partial cheering,
+followed by a general murmur, apprised
+Leonard of the presence of the
+popular statesman. Egerton was
+caught hold of by some five or six
+persons in succession; a shake of the
+hand, a nod, a brief whispered word
+or two, sufficed the practised member
+for graceful escape; and soon, free
+from the crowd, his tall erect figure
+passed on, and turned towards the
+bridge. He paused at the angle and
+took out his watch, looking at it by
+the lamp-light.</p>
+
+<p>"Harley will be here soon," he
+muttered&mdash;"he is always punctual;
+and now that I have spoken, I can
+give him an hour or so. That is well."</p>
+
+<p>As he replaced his watch in his
+pocket, and re-buttoned his coat over
+his firm broad chest, he lifted his eyes,
+and saw a young man standing before
+him.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you want me?" asked the
+statesman, with the direct brevity of
+his practical character.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr Egerton," said the young
+man, with a voice that slightly trembled,
+and yet was manly amidst
+emotion, "you have a great name,
+and great power&mdash;I stand here in
+these streets of London without a
+friend, and without employ. I believe
+that I have it in me to do some
+nobler work than that of bodily labour,
+had I but one friend&mdash;one opening for
+my thoughts. And now I have said
+this, I scarcely know how, or why,
+but from despair, and the sudden impulse
+which that despair took from the
+praise that follows your success, I
+have nothing more to add."</p>
+
+<p>Audley Egerton was silent for a moment,
+struck by the tone and address
+of the stranger; but the consummate
+and wary man of the world, accustomed
+to all manner of strange applications,
+and all varieties of imposture,
+quickly recovered from a passing
+and slight effect.</p>
+
+<p>"Are you a native of &mdash;&mdash;?" (naming
+the town he represented as member.)</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, young man, I am very
+sorry for you; but the good sense you
+must possess (for I judge of that by the
+education you have evidently received)
+must tell you that a public man,
+whatever be his patronage, has it too
+fully absorbed by claimants who have
+a right to demand it, to be able to
+listen to strangers."</p>
+
+<p>He paused a moment, and, as
+Leonard stood silent, added, with
+more kindness than most public men
+so accosted would have showed&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[295]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"You say you are friendless&mdash;poor
+fellow. In early life that happens to
+many of us, who find friends enough
+before the close. Be honest, and
+well-conducted; lean on yourself, not
+on strangers; work with the body if
+you can't with the mind; and, believe
+me, that advice is all I can give you,
+unless this trifle,"&mdash;and the minister
+held out a crown piece.</p>
+
+<p>Leonard bowed, shook his head
+sadly, and walked away. Egerton
+looked after him with a slight
+pang.</p>
+
+<p>"Pooh!" said he to himself, "there
+must be thousands in the same state
+in these streets of London. I cannot
+redress the necessities of civilisation.
+Well educated! It is not from ignorance
+henceforth that society will suffer&mdash;it
+is from over-educating the
+hungry thousands who, thus unfitted
+for manual toil, and with no career
+for mental, will some day or other
+stand like that boy in our streets,
+and puzzle wiser ministers than I
+am."</p>
+
+<p>As Egerton thus mused, and passed
+on to the bridge, a bugle-horn rang
+merrily from the box of a gay four-in-hand.
+A drag-coach with superb
+blood-horses rattled over the causeway,
+and in the driver Egerton recognised
+his nephew&mdash;Frank Hazeldean.</p>
+
+<p>The young Guardsman was returning,
+with a lively party of men, from
+dining at Greenwich; and the careless
+laughter of these children of pleasure
+floated far over the still river.</p>
+
+<p>It vexed the ear of the careworn
+statesman&mdash;sad, perhaps, with all his
+greatness, lonely amidst all his crowd
+of friends. It reminded him, perhaps,
+of his own youth, when such parties
+and companionships were familiar to
+him, though through them all he bore
+an ambitious aspiring soul&mdash;"<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Le jeu,
+vaut-il la chandelle?</i>" said he, shrugging
+his shoulders.</p>
+
+<p>The coach rolled rapidly past Leonard,
+as he stood leaning against the
+corner of the bridge, and the mire of
+the kennel splashed over him from the
+hoofs of the fiery horses. The laughter
+smote on his ear more discordantly
+than on the minister's, but it begot no
+envy.</p>
+
+<p>"Life is a dark riddle," said he,
+smiting his breast.</p>
+
+<p>And he walked slowly on, gained
+the recess where he had stood several
+nights before with Helen; and dizzy
+with want of food, and worn out for
+want of sleep, he sank down into
+the dark corner; while the river that
+rolled under the arch of stone muttered
+dirge-like in his ear;&mdash;as under
+the social key-stone wails and rolls
+on for ever the mystery of Human
+Discontent. Take comfort, O Thinker
+by the stream! 'Tis the river that
+founded and gave pomp to the city;
+and without the discontent, where
+were progress&mdash;what were Man?
+Take comfort, O <span class="smcap">Thinker</span>! where ever
+the stream over which thou
+bendest, or beside which thou sinkest,
+weary and desolate, frets the arch
+that supports thee;&mdash;never dream
+that, by destroying the bridge, thou
+canst silence the moan of the wave!</p>
+
+<hr class="chap" />
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[296]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<h2>DISFRANCHISEMENT OF THE BOROUGHS.</h2>
+
+<h3>TO WALTER BINKIE, ESQ., PROVOST OF DREEPDAILY.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">My dear Provost</span>,&mdash;In the course
+of your communings with nature on
+the uplands of Dreepdaily, you must
+doubtless have observed that the
+advent of a storm is usually preceded
+by the appearance of a flight of seamaws,
+who, by their discordant
+screams, give notice of the approaching
+change of weather. For some
+time past it has been the opinion of
+those who are in the habit of watching
+the political horizon, that we
+should do well to prepare ourselves
+for a squall, and already the premonitory
+symptoms are distinctly audible.
+The Liberal press, headed by the
+<cite>Times</cite>, is clamorous for some sweeping
+change in the method of Parliamentary
+representation; and Lord
+John Russell, as you are well aware,
+proposes in the course of next Session
+to take up the subject. This is no
+mere <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">brutum fulmen</i>, or dodge to
+secure a little temporary popularity&mdash;it
+is a distinct party move for a
+very intelligible purpose; and is
+fraught, I think, with much danger
+and injustice to many of the constituencies
+which are now intrusted with
+the right of franchise. As you, my
+dear Provost, are a Liberal both by
+principle and profession, and moreover
+chief magistrate of a very old
+Scottish burgh, your opinion upon
+this matter must have great weight
+in determining the judgment of others;
+and, therefore, you will not, I trust,
+consider it too great a liberty, if, at
+this dull season of the year, I call
+your attention to one or two points
+which appear well worthy of consideration.</p>
+
+<p>In the first place, I think you will
+admit that extensive organic changes
+in the Constitution ought never to be
+attempted except in cases of strong
+necessity. The real interests of the
+country are never promoted by internal
+political agitation, which unsettles
+men's minds, is injurious to regular
+industry, and too often leaves behind
+it the seeds of jealousy and discord
+between different classes of the community,
+ready on some future occasion
+to burst into noxious existence.
+You would not, I think, wish to see
+annually renewed that sort of strife
+which characterised the era of the
+Reform Bill. I venture to pass no
+opinion whatever on the abstract
+merits of that measure. I accept it
+as a fact, just as I accept other changes
+in the Constitution of this country
+which took place before I was born;
+and I hope I shall ever comport myself
+as a loyal and independent
+elector. But I am sure you have far
+too lively a recollection of the ferment
+which that event created, to wish to
+see it renewed, without at least some
+urgent cause. You were consistently
+anxious for the suppression of rotten
+boroughs, and for the enlargement of
+the constituency upon a broad and
+popular basis; and you considered
+that the advantages to be gained by
+the adoption of the new system, justified
+the social risks which were incurred
+in the endeavour to supersede
+the old one. I do not say that you
+were wrong in this. The agitation
+for Parliamentary Reform had been
+going on for a great number of years;
+the voice of the majority of the country
+was undeniably in your favour,
+and you finally carried your point.
+Still, in consequence of that struggle,
+years elapsed before the heart-burnings
+and jealousies which were occasioned
+by it were allayed. Even now
+it is not uncommon to hear the reminiscences
+of the Reform Bill appealed
+to on the hustings by candidates who
+have little else to say for themselves
+by way of personal recommendation.
+A most ludicrous instance of this
+occurred very lately in the case of a
+young gentleman, who, being desirous
+of Parliamentary honours, actually
+requested the support of the electors
+on the ground that his father or grandfather&mdash;I
+forget which&mdash;had voted for
+the Reform Bill; a ceremony which
+he could not very well have performed
+in his own person, as at that time
+he had not been released from the
+bondage of swaddling-clothes! I
+need hardly add that he was rejected;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[297]</a></span>
+but the anecdote is curious and instructive.</p>
+
+<p>In a country such as this, changes
+must be looked for in the course of
+years. One system dies out, or becomes
+unpopular, and is replaced by
+a new one. But I cannot charge my
+memory with any historical instance
+where a great change was attempted
+without some powerful or cogent
+reason. Still less can I recollect any
+great change being proposed, unless a
+large and powerful section of the
+community had unequivocally declared
+in its favour. The reason of this is
+quite obvious. The middle classes of
+Great Britain, however liberal they
+may be in their sentiments, have a
+just horror of revolutions. They
+know very well that organic changes
+are never effected without enormous
+loss and individual deprivation, and
+they will not move unless they are
+assured that the value of the object to
+be gained is commensurate with the
+extent of the sacrifice. In defence of
+their liberties, when these are attacked,
+the British people are ever
+ready to stand forward; but I mistake
+them much, if they will at any
+time allow themselves to be made the
+tools of a faction. The attempt to
+get up organic changes for the sole
+purpose of perpetuating the existence
+of a particular Ministry, or of maintaining
+the supremacy of a particular
+party, is a new feature in our history.
+It is an experiment which the nation
+ought not to tolerate for a single
+moment; and which I am satisfied it
+will not tolerate, when the schemes
+of its authors are laid bare.</p>
+
+<p>I believe, Provost, I am right in
+assuming that there has been no decided
+movement in favour of a New
+Parliamentary Reform Bill, either in
+Dreepdaily or in any of the other
+burghs with which you are connected.
+The electors are well satisfied with
+the operation of the ten-pound clause,
+which excludes from the franchise no
+man of decent ability and industry,
+whilst it secures property from those
+direct inroads which would be the
+inevitable result of a system of universal
+suffrage. Also, I suppose, you
+are reasonably indifferent on the subjects
+of Vote by Ballot and Triennial
+Parliaments, and that you view the
+idea of annual ones with undisguised
+reprobation. Difference of opinion
+undoubtedly may exist on some of
+these points: an eight-pound qualification
+may have its advocates, and
+the right of secret voting may be convenient
+for members of the clique;
+but, on the whole, you are satisfied
+with matters as they are; and, certainly,
+I do not see that you have any
+grievance to complain of. If I were
+a member of the Liberal party, I
+should be very sorry to see any
+change of the representation made in
+Scotland. Just observe how the
+matter stands. At the commencement
+of the present year the whole
+representation of the Scottish burghs
+was in the hands of the Liberal party.
+Since then, it is true, Falkirk has
+changed sides; but you are still remarkably
+well off; and I think that
+out of thirty county members, eighteen
+may be set down as supporters of the
+Free-trade policy. Remember, I do
+not guarantee the continuance of
+these proportions: I wish you simply
+to observe how you stand at present,
+under the working of your own Reform
+Bill; and really it appears to me
+that nothing could be more satisfactory.
+The Liberal who wishes to
+have more men of his own kidney
+from Scotland must indeed be an unconscionable
+glutton; and if, in the
+face of these facts, he asks for a reform
+in the representation, I cannot
+set him down as other than a consummate
+ass. He must needs admit
+that the system has worked well.
+Scotland sends to the support of the
+Whig Ministry, and the maintenance
+of progressive opinions, a brilliant
+phalanx of senators; amongst whom
+we point, with justifiable pride, to
+the distinguished names of Anderson,
+Bouverie, Ewart, Hume, Smith,
+M'Taggart, and M'Gregor. Are
+these gentlemen not liberal enough
+for the wants of the present age?
+Why, unless I am most egregiously
+mistaken&mdash;and not I only, but the
+whole of the Liberal press in Scotland&mdash;they
+are generally regarded as
+decidedly ahead even of my Lord John
+Russell. Why, then, should your
+representation be reformed, while it
+bears such admirable fruit? With
+such a growth of golden pippins on
+its boughs, would it not be madness
+to cut down the tree, on the mere<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[298]</a></span>
+chance of another arising from the
+stump, more especially when you
+cannot hope to gather from it a more
+abundant harvest? I am quite sure,
+Provost, that you agree with me in
+this. You have nothing to gain, but
+possibly a good deal to lose, by any
+alteration which may be made; and
+therefore it is, I presume, that in this
+part of the world not the slightest
+wish has been manifested for a radical
+change of the system. That very
+conceited and shallow individual, Sir
+Joshua Walmsley, made not long
+ago a kind of agitating tour through
+Scotland, for the purpose of getting
+up the steam; but except from a few
+unhappy Chartists, whose sentiments
+on the subject of property are identically
+the same with those professed
+by the gentlemen who plundered the
+Glasgow tradesmen's shops in 1848,
+he met with no manner of encouragement.
+The electors laughed in the
+face of this ridiculous caricature of
+Peter the Hermit, and advised him,
+instead of exposing his ignorance in
+the north, to go back to Bolton
+and occupy himself with his own
+affairs.</p>
+
+<p>This much I have said touching
+the necessity or call for a new Reform
+Bill, which is likely enough to
+involve us, for a considerable period
+at least, in unfortunate political strife.
+I have put it to you as a Liberal, but
+at the same time as a man of common
+sense and honesty, whether there are
+any circumstances, under your knowledge,
+which can justify such an
+attempt; and in the absence of these,
+you cannot but admit that such an
+experiment is eminently dangerous
+at the present time, and ought to be
+strongly discountenanced by all men,
+whatever may be their kind of political
+opinions. I speak now without any
+reference whatever to the details. It
+may certainly be possible to discover
+a better system of representation than
+that which at present exists. I never
+regarded Lord John Russell as the
+living incarnation of Minerva, nor
+can I consider any measure originated
+by him as conveying an assurance
+that the highest amount of human
+wisdom has been exhausted in its
+preparation. But what I do say is
+this, that in the absence of anything
+like general demand, and failing the
+allegation of any marked grievance
+to be redressed, no Ministry is entitled
+to propose an extensive or
+organic change in the representation
+of the country; and the men who
+shall venture upon such a step must
+render themselves liable to the imputation
+of being actuated by other
+motives than regard to the public
+welfare.</p>
+
+<p>You will, however, be slow to
+believe that Lord John Russell is
+moving in this matter without some
+special reason. In this you are perfectly
+right. He has a reason, and a
+very cogent one, but not such a reason
+as you, if you are truly a Liberal,
+and not a mere partisan, can accept.
+I presume it is the wish of the Liberal
+party&mdash;at least it used to be their
+watchword&mdash;that public opinion in
+this country is not to be slighted
+or suppressed. With the view of
+giving full effect to that public opinion,
+not of securing the supremacy of this
+or that political alliance, the Reform
+Act was framed; it being the declared
+object and intention of its founders that
+a full, fair, and free representation
+should be secured to the people of
+this country. The property qualification
+was fixed at a low rate; the
+balance of power as between counties
+and boroughs was carefully adjusted;
+and every precaution was taken&mdash;at
+least so we were told at the time&mdash;that
+no one great interest of the State
+should be allowed unduly to predominate
+over another. Many, however,
+were of opinion at the time, and have
+since seen no reason to alter it, that
+the adjustment then made, as between
+counties and boroughs, was by no
+means equitable, and that an undue
+share in the representation was given
+to the latter, more especially in England.
+That, you will observe, was a
+Conservative, not a Liberal objection;
+and it was over-ruled. Well, then,
+did the Representation, as fixed by
+the Reform Bill, fulfil its primary
+condition? You thought so; and so
+did my Lord John Russell, until some
+twelve months ago, when a new light
+dawned upon him. That light has
+since increased in intensity, and he
+now sees his way, clearly enough, to
+a new organic measure. Why is
+this? Simply, my dear Provost,
+because the English boroughs will no<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[299]</a></span>
+longer support him in his bungling
+legislation, or countenance his unnational
+policy!</p>
+
+<p>Public opinion, as represented
+through the operation of the Reform
+Act, is no longer favourable to Lord
+John Russell. The result of recent
+elections, in places which were formerly
+considered as the strongholds
+of Whiggery, have demonstrated to
+him that the Free-trade policy, to
+which he is irretrievably pledged, has
+become obnoxious to the bulk of the
+electors, and that they will no longer
+accord their support to any Ministry
+which is bent upon depressing British
+labour and sapping the foundations of
+national prosperity. So Lord John
+Russell, finding himself in this position,
+that he must either get rid of public
+opinion or resign his place, sets about
+the concoction of a new Reform Bill,
+by means of which he hopes to swamp
+the present electoral body! This is
+Whig liberty in its pure and original
+form. It implies, of course, that the
+Reform Bill did not give a full, fair,
+and free representation to the country,
+else there can be no excuse for altering
+its provisions. If we really have
+a fair representation; and if, notwithstanding,
+the majority of the electors
+are convinced that Free Trade is not
+for their benefit, it does appear to me
+a most monstrous thing that they are
+to be coerced into receiving it by
+the infusion of a new element into the
+Constitution, or a forcible change in
+the distribution of the electoral power,
+to suit the commercial views which
+are in favour with the Whig party.
+It is, in short, a most circuitous
+method of exercising despotic power;
+and I, for one, having the interests of
+the country at heart, would much
+prefer the institution at once of a pure
+despotism, and submit to be ruled and
+taxed henceforward at the sweet will
+of the scion of the house of Russell.</p>
+
+<p>I do not know what your individual
+sentiments may be on the subject of
+Free Trade; but whether you are for
+it or against it, my argument remains
+the same. It is essentially a question
+for the solution of the electoral body;
+and if the Whigs are right in their
+averment that its operation hitherto
+has been attended with marked success,
+and has even transcended the
+expectation of its promoters, you
+may rely upon it that there is no
+power in the British Empire which can
+overthrow it. No Protectionist ravings
+can damage a system which has
+been productive of real advantage to
+the great bulk of the people. But if,
+on the contrary, it is a bad system, is
+it to be endured that any man or
+body of men shall attempt to perpetuate
+it against the will of the majority
+of the electors, by a change in
+the representation of the country?
+I ask you this as a Liberal. Without
+having any undue diffidence in the
+soundness of your own judgment, I
+presume you do not, like his Holiness
+the Pope, consider yourself infallible,
+or entitled to coerce others who may
+differ from you in opinion. Yet this
+is precisely what Lord John Russell
+is now attempting to do; and I warn
+you and others who are similarly
+situated, to be wise in time, and to
+take care lest, under the operation of
+this new Reform Bill, you are not
+stripped of that political power and
+those political privileges which at
+present you enjoy.</p>
+
+<p>Don't suppose that I am speaking
+rashly or without consideration. All
+I know touching this new Reform
+Bill, is derived from the arguments
+and proposals which have been advanced
+and made by the Liberal press
+in consequence of the late indications
+of public feeling, as manifested by
+the result of recent elections. It is
+rather remarkable that we heard few
+or no proposals for an alteration in
+the electoral system, until it became
+apparent that the voice of the boroughs
+could no longer be depended on for
+the maintenance of the present commercial
+policy. You may recollect
+that the earliest of the victories which
+were achieved by the Protectionists,
+with respect to vacant seats in the
+House of Commons, were treated
+lightly by their opponents as mere
+casualties; but when borough after
+borough deliberately renounced its
+adherence to the cause of the League,
+and, not unfrequently under circumstances
+of very marked significance,
+declared openly in favour of Protection,
+the matter became serious. It
+was <em>then</em>, and then only, that we
+heard the necessity for some new and
+sweeping change in the representation
+of this country broadly asserted; and,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[300]</a></span>
+singularly enough, the advocates of
+that change do not attempt to disguise
+their motives. They do not
+venture to say that the intelligence of
+the country is not adequately represented
+at present&mdash;what they complain
+of is, that the intelligence of the
+country is becoming every day more
+hostile to their commercial theories.
+In short, they want to get rid of that
+intelligence, and must get rid of it
+speedily, unless their system is to
+crumble to pieces. Such is their aim
+and declared object; and if you entertain
+any doubts on the matter, I
+beg leave to refer you to the recorded
+sentiments of the leading Ministerial
+and Free-trade organ&mdash;the <cite>Times</cite>. It
+is always instructive to notice the
+hints of the Thunderer. The writers
+in that journal are fully alive to the
+nature of the coming crisis. They
+have been long aware of the reaction
+which has taken place throughout the
+country on the subject of Free Trade,
+and they recognise distinctly the peril
+in which their favourite principle is
+placed, if some violent means are not
+used to counteract the conviction of
+the electoral body. They see that,
+in the event of a general election, the
+constituencies of the Empire are not
+likely to return a verdict hostile to
+the domestic interests of the country.
+They have watched with careful and
+anxious eyes the turning tide of
+opinion; and they can devise no
+means of arresting it, without having
+recourse to that peculiar mode of
+manipulation, which is dignified by the
+name of Burking. Let us hear what
+they say so late as the 21st of July
+last.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"With such a prospect before us, with
+unknown struggles and unprecedented
+collisions within the bounds of possibility,
+there is only one resource, and we must
+say that Her Majesty's present advisers
+will be answerable for the consequences
+if they do not adopt it. They must lay
+the foundation of an appeal to the people
+with a large and liberal measure of
+Parliamentary reform. It is high time
+that this great country should cease to
+quake and to quail at the decisions of stupid
+and corrupt little constituencies, of whom,
+as in the case before us, it would take
+thirty to make one metropolitan borough.
+The great question always before the
+nation in one shape or another is&mdash;whether
+<em>the people</em> are as happy as laws
+can make them? To what sort of constituencies
+shall we appeal for the answer
+to this question? To Harwich with its
+population of 3370; to St Albans with
+its population of 6246; to Scarborough
+with its population of 9953; to Knaresborough
+with its population of 5382; and
+to a score other places still more insignificant?
+Or shall we insist on the appeal
+being made to much larger bodies? The
+average population of boroughs and
+counties is more than 60,000. Is it not
+high time to require that no single
+borough shall fall below half or a third
+of that number?"</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The meaning of this is clear enough.
+It points, if not to the absolute annihilation,
+most certainly to the concretion
+of the smaller boroughs
+throughout England&mdash;to an entire
+remarshalling of the electoral ranks&mdash;and,
+above all, to an enormous increase
+in the representation of the
+larger cities. In this way, you see,
+local interests will be made almost
+entirely to disappear; and London
+alone will secure almost as many
+representatives in Parliament as are
+at the present time returned for the
+whole kingdom of Scotland. Now, I
+confess to you, Provost, that I do not
+feel greatly exhilarated at the prospect
+of any such change. I believe
+that the prosperity of Great Britain
+depends upon the maintenance of
+many interests, and I cannot see how
+that can be secured if we are to deliver
+over the whole political power
+to the masses congregated within the
+towns. Moreover, I would very
+humbly remark, that past experience
+is little calculated to increase the
+measure of our faith in the wisdom or
+judgment of large constituencies. I
+may be wrong in my estimate of the
+talent and abilities of the several
+honourable members who at present
+sit for London and the adjacent districts;
+but, if so, I am only one out
+of many who labour under a similar
+delusion. We are told by the <cite>Times</cite>
+to look to Marylebone as an example
+of a large and enlightened constituency.
+I obey the mandate; and on
+referring to the Parliamentary Companion,
+I find that Marylebone
+is represented by Lord Dudley Stuart
+and Sir Benjamin Hall. That fact
+does not, in my humble opinion,
+furnish a conclusive argument in
+favour of large constituencies. As I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[301]</a></span>
+wish to avoid the Jew question, I
+shall say nothing about Baron Rothschild;
+but passing over to the Tower
+Hamlets, I find them in possession of
+Thomson and Clay; Lambeth rejoicing
+in d'Eyncourt and Williams;
+and Southwark in Humphrey and
+Molesworth. Capable senators though
+these may be, I should not like to
+see a Parliament composed entirely
+of men of their kidney; nor do I think
+that they afford undoubted materials
+for the construction of a new Cabinet.</p>
+
+<p>But perhaps I am undervaluing the
+abilities of these gentlemen; perhaps
+I am doing injustice to the discretion
+and wisdom of the metropolitan constituencies.
+Anxious to avoid any
+such imputation, I shall again invoke
+the assistance of the <cite>Times</cite>, whom I
+now cite as a witness, and a very
+powerful one, upon my side of the
+question. Let us hear the Thunderer
+on the subject of these same metropolitan
+constituencies, just twelve
+months ago, before Scarborough and
+Knaresborough had disgraced themselves
+by returning Protectionists to
+Parliament. I quote from a leader in
+the <cite>Times</cite> of 8th August 1850, referring
+to the Lambeth election, when
+Mr Williams was returned.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"When it was proposed some twenty
+years ago to extend the franchise to the
+metropolitan boroughs, the presumption
+was, that the quality of the representatives
+would bear something like a proportion
+to the importance of the constituencies
+called into play. In other words,
+if the political axioms from which the
+principle of an extended representation is
+deduced have any foundation in reality,
+it should follow that the most numerous
+and most intelligent bodies of electors
+would return to Parliament members of
+the highest mark for character and capacity.
+Now, looking at the condition of
+the metropolitan representation as it
+stands at present, or as it has stood any
+time since the passing of the Reform Bill,
+has this expectation been fulfilled? Lord
+John Russell, the First Minister of the
+Crown, sits, indeed, as member for the
+city of London, and so far it is well.
+Whatever difference of opinion may exist
+as to the noble lord's capacity for government,
+or whatever may be the views
+of this or that political party, it is beyond
+all dispute that, in such a case as this,
+there is dignity and fitness in the relation
+between the member and the constituency.
+But, setting aside this one solitary instance,
+with what metropolitan borough
+is the name of any very eminent Englishman
+associated at the present time? It is
+of course as contrary to our inclination
+as it would be unnecessary for the purposes
+of the argument, to quote this or that
+man's name as an actual illustration of the
+failure of a system, or of the decadence
+of a constituency. We would, however,
+without any invidious or offensive personality,
+invite attention to the present list
+of metropolitan members, and ask what
+name is to be found among them, with
+the single exception we have named,
+which is borne by a man with a shadow
+of a pretension to be reckoned as among
+the leading Englishmen of the age?"</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>You see, Provost, I am by no
+means singular in my estimate of the
+quality of the metropolitan representatives.
+The <cite>Times</cite> is with me, or
+was with me twelve months ago; and
+I suppose it will hardly be averred
+that, since that time, any enormous
+increase of wisdom or of ability has
+been manifested by the gentlemen referred
+to. But there is rather more
+than this. In the article from which
+I am quoting, the writer does not confine
+his strictures simply to the metropolitan
+boroughs. He goes a great deal
+further, for he attacks large constituencies
+in the mass, and points out
+very well and forcibly the evils which
+must inevitably follow should these
+obtain an accession to their power.
+Read, mark, and perpend the following
+paragraphs, and then reconcile
+their tenor&mdash;if you can&mdash;with the later
+proposals from the same quarter for
+the general suppression of small constituencies,
+and the establishment of
+larger tribunals of public opinion.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"Lambeth, then, on the occasion of the
+present election, is likely to become another
+illustration of the downward tendencies
+of the metropolitan constituencies.
+We use the word 'tendency' advisedly,
+for matters are worse than they have
+been, and we can perceive no symptom of
+a turning tide. Let us leave the names
+of individuals aside, and simply consider
+the metropolitan members as a body, and
+what is their main employment in the
+House of Commons? <em>Is it not mainly to
+represent the selfish interests and blind prejudices
+of the less patriotic or less enlightened
+portion of their constituents whenever
+any change is proposed manifestly for the
+public benefit?</em> Looking at their votes,
+one would suppose a metropolitan member<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[302]</a></span>
+to be rather a Parliamentary agent
+of the drovers, and sextons, and undertakers,
+than a representative of one of
+the most important constituencies in the
+kingdom. Is this downward progress of
+the metropolitan representation to remain
+unchanged? Will it be extended to
+other constituencies as soon as they shall
+be brought under conditions analogous to
+those under which the metropolitan electors
+exercise the franchise? The question
+is of no small interest. Whether the
+fault be with the electors, or with those
+who should have the nerve to come forward
+and demand their suffrages, matters
+not for the purposes of the argument.
+The fact remains unaltered. Supposing
+England throughout its area were represented
+as the various boroughs of the metropolis
+are represented at the present
+time, what would be the effect? That is
+the point for consideration. It may well
+be that men of higher character, and of
+more distinguished intellectual qualifications,
+would readily attract the sympathies
+and secure the votes of these constituencies;
+but what does their absence prove?
+<em>Simply that the same feeling of unwillingness
+to face large electoral bodies, which is
+said to prevail in the United States, is gradually
+rising up in this country.</em> On the
+other side of the Atlantic, we are told by
+all who know the country best, that the
+most distinguished citizens shrink from
+stepping forward on the arena of public
+life, lest they be made the mark for calumny
+and abuse. It would require more
+space than we can devote to the subject
+to point out the correlative shortcomings
+of the constituencies and the candidates;
+but, leaving these aside, <em>we cannot but arrive
+at the conclusion that there is something
+in the constitution of these great electoral
+masses which renders a peaceful majority
+little better than a passive instrument
+in the hands of a turbulent minority</em>, and
+affords an explanation of the fact that
+such a person as Mr Williams should
+aspire to represent the borough of Lambeth."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>What do you think of that, Provost,
+by way of an argument in favour
+of large constituencies? I agree
+with every word of it. I believe, in
+common with the eloquent writer,
+that matters are growing worse instead
+of better, and that there is
+something radically wrong in the constitution
+of these great electoral
+masses. I believe that they do not
+represent the real intelligence of the
+electors, and that they are liable to
+all those objections which are here
+so well and forcibly urged. It is
+not necessary to travel quite so far
+as London for an illustration. Look
+at Glasgow. Have the twelve thousand
+and odd electors of that great
+commercial and manufacturing city
+covered themselves with undying
+glory by their choice of their present
+representatives? Is the intelligence
+of the first commercial city in Scotland
+really embodied in the person of
+Mr M'Gregor? I should be very loth
+to think so. Far be it from me to
+impugn the propriety of any particular
+choice, or to speculate upon
+coming events; but I cannot help
+wondering whether, in the event of
+the suppression of some of the smaller
+burghs, and the transference of their
+power to the larger cities, it may come
+to pass that the city of St Mungo
+shall be represented by the wisdom
+of six M'Gregors? I repeat, that I
+wish to say nothing in disparagement
+of large urban constituencies, or of
+their choice in any one particular
+case&mdash;I simply desire to draw your
+attention to the fact, that we are not
+indebted to such constituencies for
+returning the men who, by common
+consent, are admitted to be the most
+valuable members, in point of talent,
+ability, and business habits, in the
+House of Commons. How far we
+should improve the character of our
+legislative assembly, by disfranchising
+smaller constituencies, and transferring
+their privileges to the larger ones,&mdash;open
+to such serious objections as
+have been urged against them by the
+<cite>Times</cite>, a journal not likely to err on the
+side of undervaluing popular opinion&mdash;appears
+to me a question decidedly
+open to discussion; and I hope that
+it will be discussed, pretty broadly
+and extensively, before any active
+steps are taken for suppressing
+boroughs which are not open to the
+charge of rank venality and corruption.</p>
+
+<p>The <cite>Times</cite>, you observe, talks in
+its more recent article, in which
+totally opposite views are advocated,
+of "stupid and corrupt little constituencies."
+This is a clever way of
+mixing up two distinct and separate
+matters. We all know what is meant
+by corruption, and I hope none of us
+are in favour of it. It means the
+purchase, either by money or promises,
+of the suffrages of those who<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[303]</a></span>
+are intrusted with the electoral
+franchise; and I am quite ready to
+join with the <cite>Times</cite> in the most
+hearty denunciation of such villanous
+practices, whether used by Jew or
+Gentile. It may be, and probably is,
+impossible to prevent bribery altogether,
+for there are scoundrels in all
+constituencies; and if a candidate
+with a long purse is so lax in his
+morals as to hint at the purchase of
+votes, he is tolerably certain to find a
+market in which these commodities
+are sold. But if, in any case, general
+corruption can be proved against
+a borough, it ought to be forthwith
+disfranchised, and declared unworthy
+of exercising so important a public
+privilege. But of the "stupidity" of
+constituencies, who are to be the
+judges? Not, I hope, the Areopagites
+of the <cite>Times</cite>, else we may
+expect to see every constituency
+which does not pronounce in favour
+of Free Trade, placed under the
+general extinguisher! Scarborough,
+with some seven or eight hundred
+electors&mdash;a good many more, by the
+way, than are on the roll for the
+Dreepdaily burghs&mdash;has, in the
+opinion of the <cite>Times</cite>, stultified itself
+for ever by returning Mr George F.
+Young to Parliament, instead of a
+Whig lordling, who possessed great
+local influence. Therefore Scarborough
+is put down in the black list,
+not because it is "corrupt," but because
+it is "stupid," in having elected
+a gentleman of the highest political
+celebrity, who is at the same time
+one of the most extensive shipowners
+of Great Britain! I put it to you,
+Provost, whether this is not as cool
+an instance of audacity as you ever
+heard of. What would you think
+if it were openly proposed, upon
+our side, to disfranchise Greenwich,
+because the tea-and-shrimp
+population of that virtuous town has
+committed the stupid act of returning
+a Jew to Parliament? If stupidity is
+to go for anything in the way of cancelling
+privileges, I think I could
+name to you some half-dozen places
+on this side of the border which are
+in evident danger, at least if we are
+to accept the attainments of the
+representatives as any test of the
+mental acquirements of the electors;
+but perhaps it is better to avoid
+particulars in a matter so personal
+and delicate.</p>
+
+<p>I am not in the least degree surprised
+to find the Free-Traders turning
+round against the boroughs. Four
+years ago, you would certainly have
+laughed in the face of any one who
+might have prophesied such a result;
+but since then, times have altered.
+The grand experiment upon native
+industry has been made, and allowed
+to go on without check or impediment.
+The Free-Traders have had
+it all their own way; and if there had
+been one iota of truth in their statements,
+or if their calculations had
+been based upon secure and rational
+data, they must long ago have
+achieved a complete moral triumph.
+Pray, remember what they told us.
+They said that Free Trade in corn
+and in cattle would not permanently
+<em>lower</em> the value of agricultural produce
+in Britain&mdash;it would only steady
+prices, and prevent extreme fluctuations.
+Then, again, we were assured
+that large imports from any part of
+the world could not by possibility
+be obtained; and those consummate
+blockheads, the statists, offered to
+prove by figures, that a deluge of
+foreign grain was as impossible as an
+overflow of the Mediterranean. I
+need not tell you that the results have
+entirely falsified such predictions,
+and that the agricultural interest has
+ever since been suffering under the
+effects of unexampled depression.
+No man denies that. The stiffest
+stickler for the cheap loaf does not
+venture now to assert that agriculture
+is a profitable profession in
+Britain; all he can do is to recommend
+economy, and to utter a hypocritical
+prayer, that the prosperity which he
+assumes to exist in other quarters
+may, at no distant date, and through
+some mysterious process which he
+cannot specify, extend itself to the
+suffering millions who depend for
+their subsistence on the produce of the
+soil of Britain, and who pay by far
+the largest share of the taxes and
+burdens of the kingdom.</p>
+
+<p>Now, it is perfectly obvious that
+agricultural distress, by which I mean
+the continuance of a range of unremunerative
+prices, cannot long prevail
+in any district, without affecting the
+traffic of the towns. You, who are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[304]</a></span>
+an extensive retail merchant in Dreepdaily,
+know well that the business of
+your own trade depends in a great
+degree upon the state of the produce
+markets. So long as the farmer is
+thriving, he buys from you and your
+neighbours liberally, and you find
+him, I have no doubt, your best and
+steadiest customer. But if you reverse
+his circumstances, you must
+look for a corresponding change in
+his dealings. He cannot afford to
+purchase silks for his wife and
+daughters, as formerly; he grows
+penurious in his own personal expenditure,
+and denies himself every unnecessary
+luxury; he does nothing
+for the good of trade, and is impassable
+to all the temptations which
+you endeavour to throw in his way.
+To post your ledger is now no very
+difficult task. You find last year's
+stock remaining steadily on your
+hands; and when the season for the
+annual visit of the bagmen comes
+round, you dismiss them from your premises
+without gratifying their avidity
+by an order. This is a faithful picture
+of what has been going on for two
+years, at least, in the smaller inland
+boroughs. No doubt you are getting
+your bread cheap; but those whose
+importations have brought about that
+cheapness, never were, and never can
+be, customers of yours. Even supposing
+that they were to take goods
+in exchange for their imported grain,
+no profit or custom could accrue to
+the retail shopkeeper, who must
+necessarily look to the people around
+him for the consumption of his wares.
+In this way trade has been made to
+stagnate, and profits have of course
+declined, until the tradesmen, weary
+of awaiting the advent of a prosperity
+which never arrives, have come to
+the conclusion, that they will best
+consult their interest by giving their
+support to a policy the reverse of that
+which has crippled the great body of
+their customers.</p>
+
+<p>Watering-places, and towns of
+fashionable resort, have suffered in a
+like degree. The gentry, whose rents
+have been most seriously affected by
+the unnatural diminution of prices,
+are compelled to curtail their expenditure,
+and to deny themselves many
+things which formerly would have
+been esteemed legitimate indulgences.
+Economy is the order Of the day:
+equipages are given up, servants dismissed,
+and old furniture made to last
+beyond its appointed time. These
+things, I most freely admit, are no
+great hardships to the gentry; nor do
+I intend to awaken your compassion
+in behalf of the squire, who, by reason
+of his contracted rent-roll, has been
+compelled to part with his carriage and
+a couple of footmen, and to refuse his
+wife and daughters the pleasure of a
+trip to Cheltenham. The hardship
+lies elsewhere. I pity the footmen,
+the coach-builder, the upholsterer,
+the house proprietor in Cheltenham,
+and all the other people to whom the
+surplus of the squire's revenue found
+its way, much more than the old
+gentleman himself. I daresay he is
+quite as happy at home&mdash;perhaps far
+happier&mdash;than if he were compelled
+to racket elsewhere; and sure I am
+that he will not consume his dinner
+with less appetite because he lacks
+the attendance of a couple of knaves,
+with heads like full-blown cauliflowers.
+But is it consistent with the workings
+of human nature to expect that the
+people to whom he formerly gave
+employment and custom, let us say
+to the extent of a couple of thousand
+pounds, can be gratified by the cessation
+of that expenditure?&mdash;or is it
+possible to suppose that they will
+remain enamoured of a system which
+has caused them so heavy a loss?
+View the subject in this light, and
+you can have no difficulty in understanding
+why this formidable reaction
+has taken place in the English
+boroughs. It is simply a question of
+the pocket; and the electors now
+see, that unless the boroughs are to
+be left to rapid decay, something must
+be done to protect and foster that
+industry upon which they all depend.
+Such facts, which are open and patent
+to every man's experience, and tell
+upon his income and expenditure, are
+worth whole cargoes of theory. What
+reason has the trader, whose stock is
+remaining unsold upon his hands, to
+plume himself, because he is assured
+by Mr Porter, or some other similar
+authority, that some hundred thousand
+additional yards of flimsy calico have
+been shipped from the British shores
+in the course of the last twelve months?
+So far as the shopkeeper is concerned,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[305]</a></span>
+the author of the <cite>Progress of the Nation</cite>
+might as well have been reporting upon
+the traffic-tables of Tyre and Sidon.
+He is not even assured that all this
+export has been accompanied with a
+profit to the manufacturer. If he
+reads the <cite>Economist</cite>, he will find that
+exhilarating print filled with complaints
+of general distress and want
+of demand; he will be startled from
+time to time by the announcement
+that in some places, such as Dundee,
+trade has experienced a most decided
+check; or that in others, such as
+Nottingham and Leicester, the operatives
+are applying by hundreds for
+admission to the workhouse! Comfortable
+intelligence this, alongside of
+increasing exports! But he has been
+taught, to borrow a phrase from the
+writings of the late John Galt, to
+look upon your political arithmetician
+as "a mystery shrouded by a halo;"
+and he supposes that, somehow or
+other, somebody must be the gainer
+by all these exports, though it seems
+clearly impossible to specify the
+fortunate individual. However, this
+he knows, to his cost any time these
+three years back, that <em>he</em> has not been
+the gainer; and, as he opines very
+justly that charity begins at home,
+and that the man who neglects the
+interest of his own family is rather
+worse than a heathen, he has made
+up his mind to support such candidates
+only as will stand by British
+industry, and protect him by means
+of protecting others. As for the men
+of the maritime boroughs&mdash;a large and
+influential class&mdash;I need not touch
+upon their feelings or sentiments
+with regard to Free Trade. I observe
+that the Liberal press, with peculiar
+taste and felicity of expression, designates
+them by the generic term of
+"crimps," just as it used to compliment
+the whole agriculturists of
+Britain by the comprehensive appellation
+of "chawbacons." I trust they
+feel the compliment so delicately conveyed;
+but, after all, it matters little.
+Hard words break no bones; and, in
+the mean time at least, the vote of a
+"crimp" is quite as good as that of
+the concocter of a paragraph.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps now you understand why
+the Free-Traders are so wroth against
+the boroughs. They expected to
+play off the latter against the county
+constituencies; and, being disappointed
+in that, they want to swamp
+them altogether. This, I must own,
+strikes me as particularly unfair. Let
+it be granted that a large number of
+the smaller boroughs did, at the last
+general election, manifest a decided
+wish that the Free Trade experiment,
+then begun, should be allowed a fair
+trial; are they to be held so pledged
+to that commercial system, that,
+however disastrous may have been
+its results, they are not entitled to
+alter their minds? Are all the representations,
+promises, and prophecies
+of the leading advocates of Free
+Trade, to be set aside as if these
+were never uttered or written? Who
+were the cozeners in this case?
+Clearly the men who boasted of the
+enormous advantages which were
+immediately to arise from their policy&mdash;advantages
+whereof, up to the present
+moment, not a single glimpse has
+been vouchsafed. Free Trade, we
+were distinctly told, was to benefit
+the boroughs. Free Trade has done
+nothing of the kind; on the contrary,
+it has reduced their business and
+lowered their importance. And now,
+when this effect has become so plain
+and undeniable that the very men
+who subscribed to the funds of the
+League, and who were foremost in
+defending the conduct of the late Sir
+Robert Peel, are sending Protectionists
+to Parliament, it is calmly
+proposed to neutralise their conversion
+by depriving them of political
+power!</p>
+
+<p>Under the circumstances, I do not
+know that the Free-Traders could have
+hit upon a happier scheme. The grand
+tendency of their system is centralisation.
+They want to drive everything&mdash;paupers
+alone excepted, if they
+could by possibility compass that fortunate
+immunity&mdash;into the larger
+towns, which are the seats of export
+manufacture, and to leave the rest of
+the population to take care of themselves.
+You see how they have succeeded
+in Ireland, by the reports of
+the last census. They are doing the
+same thing in Scotland, as we shall
+ere long discover to our cost; and,
+indeed, the process is going on slowly,
+but surely, throughout the whole of the
+British islands. I chanced the other
+day to light upon a passage in a very<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[306]</a></span>
+dreary article in the last number of
+the <cite>Edinburgh Review</cite>, which seems to
+me to embody the chief economical
+doctrines of the gentlemen to whom
+we are indebted for the present posture
+of affairs. It is as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"The common watchword, or cuckoo-note
+of the advocates of restriction in
+affairs of trade is, 'Protection to Native
+Industry.' In the principle fairly involved
+in this motto we cordially agree.
+We are as anxious as the most vehement
+advocate for high import duties on foreign
+products can be, that the industry of our
+fellow-countrymen should be protected(!)
+We only differ as to the means. Their
+theory of protection is to guard against
+competition those branches of industry
+which, without such extraneous help,
+could never be successfully pursued:
+ours, is that of enlarging, to the uttermost,
+those other branches for the prosecution
+of which our countrymen possess the
+greatest aptitude, and of thereby securing
+for their skill and capital the greatest
+return. This protection is best afforded
+by governments when they leave, without
+interference, the productive industry
+of the country to find its true level; for
+we may be certain that the interest of
+individuals will always lead them to prefer
+those pursuits which they find most gainful.
+There is, in fact, no mode of interference
+with entire freedom of action
+which must not be, in some degree, hurtful;
+but <em>the mischief which follows upon
+legislation in affairs of trade, in any given
+country, is then most noxious when it tends
+to foster branches of industry for which
+other countries have a greater aptitude</em>."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>You will, I think, find some difficulty
+in discovering the protective
+principle enunciated by this sagacious
+scribe, who, like many others of his
+limited calibre, is fain to take refuge
+in nonsense when he cannot extricate
+his meaning. You may also, very
+reasonably, entertain doubts whether
+the protective theory, which our friend
+of the Blue and Yellow puts into the
+mouth of his opponents, was ever
+entertained or promulgated by any
+rational being, at least in the broad
+sense which he wishes to imply. The
+true protective theory has reference to
+the State burdens, which, in so far as
+they are exacted from the produce of
+native industry, or, in other words,
+from labour, we wish to see counterbalanced
+by a fair import-duty, which
+shall reduce the foreign and the native
+producer to an equality in the home
+market. When the reviewer talks of
+the non-interference of Government
+with regard to the productive industry
+of the country, he altogether omits
+mention of that most stringent interference
+which is the direct result of
+taxation. If the farmer were allowed
+to till the ground, to sow the seed,
+and to reap the harvest, without any
+interference from Government, then I
+admit at once that a demand for protection
+would be preposterous. But
+when Government requires him to pay
+income-tax, assessed taxes, church and
+poor-rates, besides other direct burdens,
+out of the fruit of his industry&mdash;when
+it prevents him from growing on
+his own land several kinds of crop,
+in order that the customs revenue
+may be maintained&mdash;when it taxes
+indirectly his tea, coffee, wines, spirits,
+tobacco, soap, and spiceries&mdash;then I
+say that Government <em>does</em> interfere,
+and that most unmercifully, with the
+productive industry of the country.
+Just suppose that, by recurring to a
+primitive method of taxation, the
+Government should lay claim to one-third
+of the proceeds of every crop,
+and instruct its emissaries to remove
+it from the ground before another acre
+should be reaped&mdash;would <em>that</em> not
+constitute interference in the eyes of
+the sapient reviewer? Well, then,
+since all taxes must ultimately be paid
+out of produce, what difference does
+the mere method of levying the burden
+make with regard to the burden
+itself? I call your attention to this
+point, because the Free-Traders invariably,
+but I fear wilfully, omit all
+mention of artificial taxation when
+they talk of artificial restrictions.
+They want you to believe that we,
+who maintain the opposite view, seek
+to establish an entire monopoly in
+Great Britain of all kinds of possible
+produce; and they are in the habit of
+putting asinine queries as to the propriety
+of raising the duties on foreign
+wine, so as to encourage the establishment
+of vineyards in Kent and Sussex,
+and also as to the proper protective
+duty which should be levied on
+pine-apples, in order that a due stimulus
+may be given to the cultivation of
+that luscious fruit. But these funny fellows
+take especial care never to hint to
+you that protection is and was demanded
+simply on account of the enormous<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[307]</a></span>
+nature of our imposts, which have the
+effect of raising the rates of labour.
+It is in this way, and no other, that
+agriculture, deprived of protection,
+but still subjected to taxation, has
+become an unremunerative branch of
+industry; and you observe how calmly
+the disciple of Ricardo condemns it to
+destruction. "The mischief," quoth
+he, "which follows upon legislation
+in affairs of trade, in any given
+country, is then most noxious when
+it tends to foster branches of industry
+for which other countries have a
+greater aptitude." So, then, having
+taxed agriculture to that point when
+it can no longer bear the burden, we
+are, for the future, to draw our supplies
+from "other countries which
+have a greater aptitude" for growing
+corn; that aptitude consisting in their
+comparative immunity from taxation,
+and in the degraded moral and social
+condition of the serfs who constitute
+the tillers of the soil! We are to
+give up cultivation, and apply ourselves
+to the task "of enlarging to
+the uttermost those other branches,
+for the prosecution of which our
+countrymen possess the greatest aptitude"&mdash;by
+which, I presume, is meant
+the manufacture of cotton-twist!</p>
+
+<p>Now, then, consider for a moment
+what is the natural, nay, the inevitable
+effect of this narrowing of the
+range of employment. I shall not
+start the important point whether the
+concentration of labour does not tend
+to lower wages&mdash;I shall merely assume,
+what is indeed already abundantly established
+by facts, that the depression
+of agriculture in any district leads almost
+immediately to a large increase
+in the population of the greater towns.
+Places like Dreepdaily may remain stationary,
+but they do not receive any
+material increment to their population.
+You have, I believe, no export trade,
+at least very little, beyond the manufacture
+of an ingenious description of
+snuff-box, justly prized by those who
+are in the habit of stimulating their
+nostrils. The displaced stream of
+labour passes through you, but does
+not tarry with you&mdash;it rolls on towards
+Paisley and Glasgow, where it is
+absorbed in the living ocean. Year
+after year the same process is carried
+on. The older people, probably because
+it is not worth while at their
+years to attempt a change, tarry in
+their little villages and cots, and gradually
+acquire that appearance of
+utter apathy, which is perhaps the
+saddest aspect of humanity. The
+younger people, finding no employment
+at home, repair to the towns,
+marry or do worse, and propagate
+children for the service of the
+factories which are dedicated to the
+export trade. Of education they receive
+little or nothing; for they must
+be in attendance on their gaunt iron
+master during the whole of their
+waking hours; and religion seeks after
+them in vain. What wonder, then,
+if the condition of our operatives
+should be such as to suggest to
+thinking minds very serious doubts
+whether our boasted civilisation can
+be regarded in the light of a blessing?
+Certain it is that the bulk of these
+classes are neither better nor happier
+than their forefathers. Nay, if there
+be any truth in evidence&mdash;any reality
+in the appalling accounts which reach
+us from the heart of the towns, there
+exists an amount of crime, misery,
+drunkenness, and profligacy, which is
+unknown even among savages and
+heathen nations. Were we to recall
+from the four ends of the earth all
+the missionaries who have been despatched
+from the various churches,
+they would find more than sufficient
+work ready for them at home. Well-meaning
+men project sanitary improvements,
+as if these could avail to
+counteract the moral poison. New
+churches are built; new schools are
+founded; public baths are subscribed
+for, and public washing-houses are
+opened; the old rookeries are pulled
+down, and light and air admitted to
+the heart of the cities&mdash;but the heart
+of the people is not changed; and
+neither air nor water, nor religious
+warning, has the effect of checking
+crime, eradicating intemperance, or
+teaching man the duty which he owes
+to himself, his brethren, and his God!
+This is an awful picture, but it is a
+true one; and it well becomes us to
+consider why these things should be.
+There is no lukewarmness on the subject
+exhibited in any quarter. The
+evil is universally acknowledged, and
+every one would be ready to contribute
+to alleviate it, could a proper
+remedy be suggested. It is not my<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[308]</a></span>
+province to suggest remedies; but it
+does appear to me that the original
+fault is to be found in the system
+which has caused this unnatural pressure
+of our population into the towns.
+I am aware that in saying this, I am
+impugning the leading doctrines of
+modern political economy. I am
+aware that I am uttering what will
+be considered by many as a rank
+political heresy; still, not having the
+fear of fire and fagot before my eyes,
+I shall use the liberty of speech. It
+appears to me that the system which
+has been more or less adopted since
+the days of Mr Huskisson, of suppressing
+small trades for the encouragement
+of foreign importation, and of
+stimulating export manufactures to
+the uttermost, has proved very pernicious
+to the morals and the social
+condition of the people. The termination
+of the war found us with a
+large population, and with an enormous
+debt. If, on the one hand, it
+was for the advantage of the country
+that commerce should progress
+with rapid strides, and that our
+foreign trade should be augmented,
+it was, on the other, no less necessary
+that due regard should be had for the
+former occupations of the people, and
+that no great and violent displacements
+of labour should be occasioned,
+by fiscal relaxations which might
+have the effect of supplanting home
+industry by foreign produce in the
+British market. The mistake of the
+political economists lies in their obstinate
+determination to enforce a
+principle, which in the abstract is
+not only unobjectionable but unchallenged,
+without any regard whatever
+to the peculiar and pecuniary circumstances
+of the country. They will
+not look at what has gone before, in
+order to determine their line of conduct
+in any particular case. They
+admit of no exceptions. They start
+with their axiom that trade ought to
+be free, and they will not listen to
+any argument founded upon special
+circumstances in opposition to that
+doctrine. Now, this is not the way
+in which men have been, or ever can
+be, governed. They must be dealt
+with as rational beings, not regarded
+as mere senseless machinery, which
+may be treated as lumber, and cast
+aside to make way for some new
+improvement. Look at the case of
+our own Highlanders. We know
+very well that, from the commencement
+of the American war, it was
+considered by the British Government
+an important object to maintain
+the population of the Highlands, as
+the source from which they drew
+their hardiest and most serviceable
+recruits. So long as the manufacture
+of kelp existed, and the breeding of
+cattle was profitable, there was little
+difficulty in doing this; now, under
+this new commercial system, we are
+told that the population is infinitely
+too large for the natural resources of
+the country; we are shocked by
+accounts of periodical famine, and of
+deaths occurring from starvation;
+and our economists declare that there
+is no remedy except a general emigration
+of the inhabitants. This is
+the extreme case in Great Britain;
+but extreme cases often furnish us
+with the best tests of the operation
+of a particular system. Here you
+have a population fostered for an
+especial purpose, and abandoned so
+soon as that special purpose has been
+served. Without maintaining that
+the Gael is the most industrious of
+mankind, it strikes me forcibly that
+it would be a better national policy
+to give every reasonable encouragement
+to the development of the
+natural resources of that portion of
+the British islands, than to pursue the
+opposite system, and to reduce the
+Highlands to a wilderness. Not so
+think the political economists. They
+can derive their supplies cheaper
+from elsewhere, at the hands of
+strangers who contribute no share
+whatever to the national revenue;
+and for the sake of that cheapness
+they are content to reduce thousands
+of their countrymen to beggary.
+But emigration cannot, and will not,
+be carried out to an extent at all
+equal to the necessity which is engendered
+by the cessation of employment.
+The towns become the great
+centre-points and recipients of the
+displaced population; and so centralisation
+goes on, and, as a matter of
+course, pauperism and crime increase.</p>
+
+<p>To render this system perpetual,
+without any regard to ultimate consequences,
+is the leading object of the
+Free-Traders. Not converted, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[309]</a></span>
+on the contrary rendered more inveterate
+by the failure of their schemes,
+they are determined to allow no consideration
+whatever to stand in the
+way of their purpose; and of this you
+have a splendid instance in their late
+denunciation of the boroughs. They
+think&mdash;whether rightfully or wrongfully,
+it is not now necessary to
+inquire&mdash;that, by altering the proportions
+of Parliamentary power as
+established by the Reform Act&mdash;by
+taking away from the smaller
+boroughs, and by adding to the
+urban constituencies, they will still
+be able to command a majority in
+the House of Commons. In the present
+temper of the nation, and so
+long as its voice is expressed as heretofore,
+they know, feel, and admit
+that their policy is not secure. And
+why is it not secure? Simply because
+it has undergone the test of experience&mdash;because
+it has had a fair trial
+in the sight of the nation&mdash;and because
+it has not succeeded in realising
+the expectations of its founders.</p>
+
+<p>I have ventured to throw together
+these few crude remarks for your consideration
+during the recess, being
+quite satisfied that you will not feel
+indifferent upon any subject which
+touches the dignity, status, or privileges
+of the boroughs. Whether Lord
+John Russell agrees with the <cite>Times</cite> as
+to the mode of effecting the threatened
+Parliamentary change, or whether
+he has some separate scheme of his
+own, is a question which I cannot
+solve. Possibly he has not yet made
+up his mind as to the course which it
+may be most advisable to pursue;
+for, in the absence of anything like
+general excitement or agitation, it is
+not easy to predict in what manner
+the proposal for any sweeping or
+organic change may be received by
+the constituencies of the Empire.
+There is far too much truth in the
+observations which I have already
+quoted from the great leading journal,
+relative to the dangers which must
+attend an increase of constituencies
+already too large, or a further extension
+of their power, to permit of our
+considering this as a light and unimportant
+matter. I view it as a very
+serious one indeed; and I cannot help
+thinking that Lord John Russell has
+committed an act of gross and unjustifiable
+rashness, in pledging himself,
+at the present time, to undertake a remodelment
+of the constitution. But
+whatever he does, I hope, for his own
+sake, and for the credit of the Liberal
+party, that he will be able to assign
+some better and more constitutional
+reason for the change, than the refusal
+of the English boroughs to bear arms
+in the crusade which is directed
+against the interests of Native Industry.</p>
+
+<hr class="chap" />
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[310]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<h2><small>PARIS IN 1851.</small>&mdash;(<em>Continued.</em>)</h2>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">The Opera.</span>&mdash;In the evening I
+went to the French Opera, which is
+still one of the lions of Paris. It was
+once in the Rue Richelieu; but the
+atrocious assassination of the Duc de
+Berri, who was stabbed in its porch,
+threw a kind of horror over the spot:
+the theatre was closed, and the performance
+moved to its present site in
+the Rue Lepelletier, a street diverging
+from the Boulevard.</p>
+
+<p>Fond as the French are of decoration,
+the architecture of this building
+possesses no peculiar beauty, and
+would answer equally well for a substantial
+public hospital, a workhouse,
+or a barrack, if the latter were not the
+more readily suggested by the gendarmerie
+loitering about the doors,
+and the mounted dragoons at either
+end of the street.</p>
+
+<p>The passages of the interior are of
+the same character&mdash;spacious and
+substantial; but the door of the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">salle</i>
+opens, and the stranger, at a single
+step, enters from those murky passages
+into all the magic of a crowded
+theatre. The French have, within
+these few years, borrowed from us the
+art of lighting theatres. I recollect
+the French theatre lighted only by
+a few lamps scattered round the
+house, or a chandelier in the middle,
+which might have figured in the crypt
+of a cathedral. This they excused,
+as giving greater effect to the stage;
+but it threw the audience into utter
+gloom. They have now made the
+audience a part of the picture, and
+an indispensable part. The opera-house
+now shows the audience; and
+if not very dressy, or rather as dowdy,
+odd, and dishevelled a crowd as I ever
+recollect to have seen within theatrical
+walls, yet they are evidently
+human beings, which is much more
+picturesque than masses of spectres,
+seen only by an occasional flash from
+the stage.</p>
+
+<p>The French architects certainly
+have not made this national edifice
+grand; but they have made it a much
+better thing,&mdash;lively, showy, and rich.
+Neither majestic and monotonous,
+nor grand and Gothic, they have
+made it <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">riant</i> and racy, like a place
+where men and women come to be
+happy, where beautiful dancers are
+to be seen, and where sweet songs are
+to be heard, and where the mind is
+for three or four hours to forget all
+its cares, and to carry away pleasant
+recollections for the time being. From
+pit to ceiling it is covered with paintings&mdash;all
+sorts of cupids, nymphs, and
+flower-garlands, and Greek urns&mdash;none
+of them wonders of the pencil,
+but all exhibiting that showy mediocrity
+of which every Frenchman
+is capable, and with which every
+Frenchman is in raptures. All looks
+rich, warm, and <em>operatic</em>.</p>
+
+<p>One characteristic change has
+struck me everywhere in Paris&mdash;the
+men dress better, and the women
+worse. When I was last here, the
+men dressed half bandit and half Hottentot.
+The revolutionary mystery
+was at work, and the hatred of the
+Bourbons was emblematised in a conical
+hat, a loose neckcloth, tremendous
+trousers, and the scowl of a stage
+conspirator. The Parisian men have
+since learned the decencies of <em>dress</em>.</p>
+
+<p>As I entered the house before the
+rising of the curtain, I had leisure to
+look about me, and I found even in
+the audience a strong contrast to
+those of London. By that kind of
+contradiction to everything rational
+and English which governs the Parisian,
+the women seem to choose <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">dishabille</i>
+for the Opera.</p>
+
+<p>As the house was crowded, and the
+boxes are let high, and the performance
+of the night was popular, I
+might presume that some of the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">élite</i>
+were present, yet I never saw so
+many <em>ill-dressed</em> women under one
+roof. Bonnets, shawls, muffles of all
+kinds, were the <em>costume</em>. How different
+from the finish, the splendour,
+and the <em>fashion</em> of the English opera-box.
+I saw hundreds of women who
+appeared, by their dress, scarcely
+above the rank of shopkeepers, yet,
+who probably were among the Parisian
+leaders of fashion, if in republican
+Paris there are <em>any</em> leaders of
+fashion.</p>
+
+<p>But I came to be interested, to enjoy,
+to indulge in a feast of music and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[311]</a></span>
+acting; with no fastidiousness of criticism,
+and with every inclination to
+be gratified. In the opera itself I was
+utterly disappointed. The Opera was
+<em>Zerline</em>, or, <em>The Basket of Oranges</em>.
+The composer was the first living
+musician of France, Auber; the writer
+was the most popular dramatist of his
+day, Scribe; the Prima Donna was
+Alboni, to whom the manager of the
+Opera in London had not thought it
+too much to give £4000 for a single
+season. I never paid my francs with
+more willing expectation: and I never
+saw a performance of which I so soon
+got weary.</p>
+
+<p>The plot is singularly trifling. Zerline,
+an orange-girl of Palermo, has
+had a daughter by Boccanera, a man
+of rank, who afterwards becomes
+Viceroy of Sicily. Zerline is captured
+by pirates, and carried to Algiers.
+The opera opens with her return to
+Palermo, after so many years that
+her daughter is grown up to womanhood;
+and Boccanera is emerged into
+public life, and has gradually became
+an officer of state.</p>
+
+<p>The commencing scene has all the
+animation of the French picturesque.
+The Port of Palermo is before the
+spectator; the location is the Fruit
+Market. Masses of fruits, with smart
+peasantry to take care of them, cover
+the front of the stage. The background
+is filled up with Lazzaroni
+lying on the ground, sleeping, or eating
+macaroni. The Prince Boccanera
+comes from the palace; the crowd
+observe 'Son air sombre;' the Prince
+sings&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"On a most unlucky day,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Satan threw her in my way;<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">I the princess took to wife,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Now the torture of my life," &amp;c.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>After this matrimonial confession,
+which extends to details, the prime
+minister tells us of his love still existing
+for Zerline, whose daughter he
+has educated under the name of niece,
+and who is now the Princess Gemma,
+and about to be married to a court
+noble.</p>
+
+<p>A ship approaches the harbour;
+Boccanera disappears; the Lazzaroni
+hasten to discharge the cargo. Zerline
+lands from the vessel, and sings a
+cavatina in praise of Palermo:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"O Palerme! O Sicile!<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Beau ciel, plaine fertile!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Zerline is a dealer in oranges, and
+she lands her cargo, placing it in the
+market. The original tenants of the
+place dispute her right to come among
+them, and are about to expel her by
+force, when a marine officer, Rodolf,
+takes her part, and, drawing his
+sword, puts the whole crowd to flight.
+Zerline, moved by this instance of heroism,
+tells him her story, that she
+was coming "un beau matin" to the
+city to sell oranges, when a pitiless
+corsair captured her, and carried her
+to Africa, separating her from her
+child, whom she had not seen for fifteen
+years; that she escaped to
+Malta, laid in a stock of oranges there;&mdash;and
+thus the events of the day occurred.
+Rodolf, this young hero, is costumed
+in a tie-wig with powder, stiff
+skirts, and the dress of a century ago.
+What tempted the author to put not
+merely his hero, but all his court characters,
+into the costume of Queen
+Anne, is not easily conceivable, as
+there is nothing in the story which
+limits it in point of time.</p>
+
+<p>Zerline looks after him with sudden
+sympathy, says that she heard him
+sigh, that he must be unhappy, and
+that, if her daughter lives, he is just
+the <em>husband</em> for her,&mdash;Zerline not having
+been particular as to marriage
+herself. She then rambles about the
+streets, singing,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Achetez mes belles oranges,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Des fruits divins, des fruits exquis;<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Des oranges comme les anges<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">N'en <em>goutent pas en Paradis</em>."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>After this "hommage aux oranges!"
+to the discredit of Paradise, on which
+turns the plot of the play, a succession
+of maids of honour appear, clad
+in the same unfortunate livery of fardingales,
+enormous flat hats, powdered
+wigs, and stomachers. The
+Princess follows them, apparently
+armed by her costume against all the
+assaults of Cupid. But she, too, has an
+"affaire du c&oelig;ur" upon her hands. In
+fact, from the Orangewoman up to
+the Throne, Cupid is the Lord of Palermo,
+with its "beau ciel, plaine fertile."
+The object of the Princess's
+love is the Marquis de Buttura, the
+suitor of her husband's supposed
+niece. Here is a complication! The
+enamoured wife receives a billet-doux
+from the suitor, proposing a meeting
+on his return from hunting. She tears<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[312]</a></span>
+the billet for the purpose of concealment,
+and in her emotion drops the fragments
+on the floor. That billet performs
+all important part in the end. The
+enamoured lady buys an orange, and
+gives a gold piece for it. Zerline, not
+accustomed to be so well paid for her
+fruit, begins to suspect this outrageous
+liberality; and having had experience
+in these matters, picks up the fragments
+of the letter, and gets into the
+whole secret.</p>
+
+<p>The plot proceeds: the daughter
+of the orangewoman now appears.
+She is clad in the same preposterous
+habiliments. As the niece of the minister,
+she is created a princess, (those
+things are cheap in Italy,) and she,
+too, is in love with the officer in the
+tie-wig. She recognises the song of
+Zerline, "Achetez mes belles oranges,"
+and sings the half of it. On this, the
+mother and daughter now recognise
+each other. It is impossible to go
+further in such a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">denouement</i>. If
+Italian operas are proverbially silly,
+we are to recollect that this is not an
+Italian, but a French one; and that
+it is by the most popular comic writer
+of France.</p>
+
+<p>The marriage of Gemma and Rodolf
+is forbidden by the pride of the
+King's sister, the wife of Boccanera,
+but Zerline interposes, reminds her of
+the orange <em>affair</em>, threatens her with
+the discovery of the billet-doux, and
+finally makes her give her consent:
+and thus the curtain drops. I grew
+tired of all this insipidity, and left
+the theatre before the catastrophe.
+The music seemed to me fitting for
+the plot&mdash;neither better nor worse;
+and I made my escape with right
+good-will from the clamour and crash
+of the orchestra, and from the loves
+and <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">faux pas</i> of the belles of Palermo.</p>
+
+<p><em>The Obelisk.</em>&mdash;I strayed into the
+Place de la Concorde, beyond comparison
+the finest <em>space</em> in Paris.
+I cannot call it a square, nor does
+it equal in animation the Boulevard;
+but in the <em>profusion</em> of noble architecture
+it has no rival in Paris, nor
+in Europe. <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Vive la Despotisme!</i>
+every inch of it is owing to Monarchy.
+Republics build nothing, if we except
+prisons and workhouses. They are proverbially
+squalid, bitter, and beggarly.
+What has America, with all her boasting,
+ever built, but a warehouse or a
+conventicle? The Roman Republic,
+after seven hundred years' existence,
+remained a collection hovels till an
+Emperor faced them with marble. If
+Athens exhibited her universal talents
+in the splendour of her architecture,
+we must recollect that Pericles was
+her <em>master</em> through life&mdash;as substantially
+<em>despotic</em>, by the aid of the
+populace, as an Asiatic king by
+his guards; and recollect, also, that
+an action of damages was brought
+against him for "wasting the public
+money on the Parthenon," the glory
+of Athens in every succeeding age.
+Louis Quatorze, Napoleon, and Louis
+Philippe&mdash;two openly, and the third
+secretly, as despotic as the Sultan&mdash;were
+the true builders of Paris.</p>
+
+<p>As I stood in the centre of this
+vast enclosure, I was fully struck
+with the effect of <em>scene</em>. The sun
+was sinking into a bed of gold and
+crimson clouds, that threw their hue
+over the long line of the Champs
+Elysées. Before me were the two
+great fountains, and the Obelisk of
+Luxor. The fountains had ceased to
+play, from the lateness of the hour,
+but still looked massive and gigantic;
+the obelisk looked shapely and superb.
+The gardens of the Tuilleries were on
+my left&mdash;deep dense masses of foliage,
+surmounted in the distance by the tall
+roofs of the old Palace; on my right,
+the verdure of the Champs Elysées,
+with the Arc de l'Etoile rising above
+it, at the end of its long and noble
+avenue; in my front the Palace of
+the Legislature, a chaste and elegant
+structure; and behind me, glowing
+in the sunbeams, the Madeleine, the
+noblest church&mdash;I think the noblest
+edifice, in Paris, and perhaps not surpassed
+in beauty and grandeur, for
+its size, by any place of worship in
+Europe. The air cool and sweet from
+the foliage, the vast <em>place</em> almost
+solitary, and undisturbed by the cries
+which are incessant in this babel
+during the day, yet with that gentle
+confusion of sounds which makes
+the murmur and the music of a great
+city. All was calm, noble, and
+soothing.</p>
+
+<p>The obelisk of Luxor which stands
+in the centre of the "Place," is one
+of two Monoliths, or pillars of a
+single stone, which, with Cleopatra's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[313]</a></span>
+Needle, were given by Mehemet Ali
+to the French, at the time when, by
+their alliance, he expected to have
+made himself independent. All the
+dates of Egyptian antiquities are uncertain&mdash;notwithstanding
+Young and
+his imitator Champollion&mdash;but the
+date <em>assigned</em> to this pillar is 1550
+years before the Christian era. The
+two obelisks stood in front of the
+great temple of Thebes, now named
+Luxor, and the hieroglyphics which
+cover this one, from top to bottom, are
+supposed to relate the exploits and
+incidents of the reign of Sesostris.</p>
+
+<p>It is of red Syenite; but, from time
+and weather, it is almost the colour of
+limestone. It has an original flaw up
+a third of its height, for which the
+Egyptian masons provided a remedy
+by wedges, and the summit is slightly
+broken. The height of the monolith
+is seventy-two feet three inches,
+which would look insignificant, fixed
+as it is in the centre of lofty buildings,
+but for its being raised on a
+plinth of granite, and that again
+raised on a pedestal of immense
+blocks of granite&mdash;the height of the
+plinth and the pedestal together being
+twenty-seven feet, making the entire
+height nearly one hundred. The weight
+of the monolith is five hundred thousand
+pounds; the weight of the pedestal
+is half that amount, and the weight of
+the blocks probably makes the whole
+amount to nine hundred thousand,
+which is the weight of the obelisk at
+Rome. It was erected in 1836, by
+drawing it up an inclined plane of masonry,
+and then raising it by cables and
+capstans to the perpendicular. The
+operation was tedious, difficult, and
+expensive; but it was worth the
+labour; and the monolith now forms
+a remarkable monument of the zeal
+of the king, and of the liberality of
+his government.</p>
+
+<p>There is, I understand, an obelisk
+remaining in Egypt, which was given
+by the Turkish government to the
+British army, on the expulsion of the
+French from Egypt, but which has
+been unclaimed, from the difficulty of
+carrying it to England.</p>
+
+<p>That difficulty, it must be acknowledged,
+is considerable. In transporting
+and erecting the obelisk of Luxor
+six years were employed. I have not
+heard the expense, but it must have
+been large. A vessel was especially
+constructed at Toulon, for its conveyance
+down the Nile. A long
+road was to be made from the Nile to
+the Temple. Then the obelisk required
+to be protected from the accidents
+of carriage, which was done by
+enclosing it in a wooden case. It was
+then drawn by manual force to
+the river&mdash;and this employed three
+months. Then came the trouble of
+embarking it, for which the vessel
+had to be nearly sawn through; then
+came the crossing of the bar at
+Rosetta&mdash;a most difficult operation at
+the season of the year; then the
+voyage down the Mediterranean, the
+vessel being towed by a steamer; then
+the landing at Cherbourg, in 1833;
+and, lastly, the passage up the Seine,
+which occupied nearly four months,
+reaching Paris in December; thenceforth
+its finishing and erection, which
+was completed only in three years
+after.</p>
+
+<p>This detail may have some interest,
+as we have a similar project before
+us. But the whole question is,
+whether the transport of the obelisk
+which remains in Egypt for us is
+worth the expense. We, without
+hesitation, say that it <em>is</em>. The French
+have shown that it is <em>practicable</em>, and
+it is a matter of <em>rational</em> desire to
+show that we are not behind the
+French either in power, in ability, or
+in zeal, to adorn our cities. The
+obelisk transported to England would
+be a proud monument, without being
+an offensive one, of a great achievement
+of our armies; it would present
+to our eyes, and those of our children,
+a relic of the most civilised kingdom of
+the early ages; it would sustain the
+recollections of the scholar by its
+record, and might kindle the energy
+of the people by the sight of what
+had been accomplished by the prowess
+of Englishmen.</p>
+
+<p>If it be replied that such views are
+Utopian, may we not ask, what is
+the use of all antiquity, since we can
+eat and drink as well without it?
+But we cannot <em>feel</em> as loftily without
+it; many a lesson of vigour, liberality,
+and virtue would be lost to us without
+it; we should lose the noblest examples
+of the arts, some of the finest
+displays of human genius in architecture,
+a large portion of the teaching of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[314]</a></span>
+the public mind in all things great, and
+an equally large portion of the incentives
+to public virtue in all things
+self-denying. The labour, it is true,
+of conveying the obelisk would be
+serious, the expense considerable, and
+we might not see it erected before the
+gate of Buckingham Palace these ten
+years. But it would be erected at
+<em>last</em>. It would be a trophy&mdash;it would
+be an abiding memorial of the extraordinary
+country from which civilisation
+spread to the whole world.</p>
+
+<p>But the two grand fountains ought
+especially to stimulate our emulation.
+Those we can have without a voyage
+from Alexandria to Portsmouth, or a
+six years' delay.</p>
+
+<p>The fountains of the Place de la
+Concorde would deserve praise if it
+were only for their beauty. At a
+distance sufficient for the picturesque,
+and with the sun shining on them,
+they actually look like domes and
+cataracts of molten silver; and a
+nearer view does not diminish their
+right to admiration. They are both
+lofty, perhaps, fifty feet high, both
+consisting of three basins, lessening
+in size in proportion to their height,
+and all pouring out sheets of water
+from the trumpets of Tritons, from
+the mouths of dolphins, and from
+allegorical figures. One of those
+fountains is in honour of Maritime
+Navigation, and the other of the
+Navigation of Rivers. In the former
+the figures represent the Ocean and
+the Mediterranean, with the Genii
+of the fisheries; and in the upper
+basin are Commerce, Astronomy,
+Navigation, &amp;c., all capital bronzes,
+and all spouting out floods of water.
+The fountain of River Navigation is
+not behind its rival in bronze or
+water. It exhibits the Rhine and the
+Rhone, with the Genii of fruits and
+flowers, of the vintage and the harvest,
+with the usual attendance of
+Tritons. Why the artist had no room
+for the Seine and the Garonne, while
+he introduced the Rhine, which is not
+a French river in any part of its
+course, must be left for his explanation;
+but the whole constitutes a
+beautiful and magnificent object, and,
+with the sister fountain, perhaps
+forms the finest display of the kind in
+Europe. I did not venture, while
+looking at those stately monuments
+of French art, to turn my thoughts to
+our own unhappy performances in
+Trafalgar Square&mdash;the rival of a
+soda-water bottle, yet the work of a
+people of boundless wealth, and the
+first machinists in the world.</p>
+
+<p><i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">The Jardin des Plantes.</i>&mdash;I found
+this fine establishment crowded with
+the lower orders&mdash;fathers and mothers,
+nurses, old women, and soldiers. As
+it includes the popular attractions of a
+zoological garden, as well as a botanical,
+every day sees its visitants, and
+every holiday its crowds. The plants
+are for science, and for that I had no
+time, even had I possessed other
+qualifications; but the zoological collection
+were for curiosity, and of that
+the spectators had abundance. Yet
+the animals of pasture appeared to be
+languid, possibly tired of the perpetual
+bustle round them&mdash;for all animals
+love quiet at certain times, and escape
+from the eye of man, when escape is
+in their power. Possibly the heat of
+the weather, for the day was remarkably
+sultry, might have contributed
+to their exhaustion. But if they have
+memory&mdash;and why should they not?&mdash;they
+must have strangely felt the
+contrast of their free pastures, shady
+woods, and fresh streams, with the
+little patch of ground, the parched
+soil, and the clamour of ten thousand
+tongues round them. I could imagine
+the antelope's intelligent eye, as he
+lay panting before us on his brown
+patch of soil, comparing it with the
+ravines of the Cape, or the eternal
+forests clothing the hills of his native
+Abyssinia.</p>
+
+<p>But the object of all popular interest
+was the pit of the bears;
+there the crowd was incessant and
+delighted. But the bears, three or
+four huge brown beasts, by no means
+<em>reciprocated</em> the popular feeling. They
+sat quietly on their hind-quarters,
+gazing grimly at the groups which
+lined their rails, and tossed cakes and
+apples to them from above. They
+had probably been saturated with
+sweets, for they scarcely noticed anything
+but by a growl. They were
+insensible to apples&mdash;even oranges
+could not make them move, and cakes
+they seemed to treat with scorn. It
+was difficult to conceive that those
+heavy and unwieldy-looking animals
+could be ferocious; but the Alpine<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[315]</a></span>
+hunter knows that they are as fierce
+as the tiger, and nearly as quick and
+dangerous in their spring.</p>
+
+<p>The carnivorous beasts were few,
+and, except in the instance of one
+lion, of no remarkable size or beauty.
+As they naturally doze during the
+day, their languor was no proof of
+their weariness; but I have never
+seen an exhibition of this kind without
+some degree of regret. The plea
+of the promotion of science is nothing.
+Even if it were important to science
+to be acquainted with the habits of
+the lion and tiger, which it is not,
+their native habits are not to be
+learned from the animal shut up in a
+cage. The chief exertion of their
+sagacity and their strength in the
+native state is in the pursuit of prey;
+yet what of these can be learned from
+the condition in which the animal
+dines as regularly as his keeper, and
+divides his time between feeding and
+sleep? Half-a-dozen lions let loose in
+the Bois de Boulogne would let the
+naturalist into more knowledge of their
+nature than a menagerie for fifty years.</p>
+
+<p>The present system is merely
+cruel; and the animals, without exercise,
+without air, without the common
+excitement of free motion, which all
+animals enjoy so highly&mdash;perhaps
+much more highly than the human
+race&mdash;fall into disease and die, no
+doubt miserably, though they cannot
+draw up a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">rationale</i> of their sufferings.
+I have been told that the lions
+in confinement die chiefly of consumption&mdash;a
+singularly sentimental disease
+for this proud ravager of the desert.
+But the whole purpose of display
+would be answered as effectually by
+exhibiting half-a-dozen lions' <em>skins</em>
+stuffed, in the different attitudes of
+seizing their prey, or ranging the
+forest, or feeding. At present nothing
+is seen but a great beast asleep,
+or restlessly moving in a space of
+half-a-dozen square feet, and pining
+away in his confinement. An eagle
+on his perch and with a chain on his
+leg, in a menagerie, always appears
+to me like a dethroned monarch; and
+I have never seen him thus cast down
+from his "high estate" without longing
+to break his chain, and let him
+spread his wing, and delight his
+splendid eye with the full view of his
+kingdom of the Air.</p>
+
+<p>The Jardin dates its origin as far
+back as Louis XIII., when the king's
+physician recommended its foundation
+for science. The French are
+fond of gardening, and are good gardeners;
+and the climate is peculiarly
+favourable to flowers, as is evident
+from the market held every morning
+in summer by the side of the Madeleine,
+where the greatest abundance
+of the richest flowers I ever saw is
+laid out for the luxury of the Parisians.</p>
+
+<p>The Jardin, patronised by kings
+and nobles, flourished through successive
+reigns; but the appointment
+of Buffon, about the middle of the
+eighteenth century, suddenly raised it
+to the pinnacle of European celebrity.
+The most eloquent writer of his time,
+(in the style which the French call
+eloquence,) a man of family, and a
+man of opulence, he made Natural
+History the <em>fashion</em>, and in France
+that word is magic. It accomplishes
+everything&mdash;it includes everything.
+All France was frantic with the study
+of plants, animals, poultry-yards, and
+projects for driving tigers in cabriolets,
+and harnessing lions <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">à la Cybele</i>.</p>
+
+<p>But Buffon mixed good sense with
+his inevitable <em>charlatanrie</em>&mdash;he selected
+the ablest men whom he could
+find for his professors; and in France
+there is an extraordinary quantity of
+"ordinary" cleverness&mdash;they gave
+amusing lectures, and they won the
+hearts of the nation.</p>
+
+<p>But the Revolution came, and
+crushed all institutions alike. Buffon,
+fortunate in every way, had died in
+the year before, in 1788, and was thus
+spared the sight of the general ruin.
+The Jardin escaped, through some
+plea of its being national property;
+but the professors had fled, and were
+starving, or starved.</p>
+
+<p>The Consulate, and still more the
+Empire, restored the establishment.
+Napoleon was ambitious of the character
+of a man of science, he was a
+member of the Institute, he knew the
+French character, and he flattered the
+national vanity, by indulging it with
+the prospect of being at the head of
+human knowledge.</p>
+
+<p>The institution had by this time
+been so long regarded as a public
+show that it was beginning to be
+regarded as nothing else. Gratuitous<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[316]</a></span>
+lectures, which are always good for
+nothing, and to which all kinds of
+people crowd with corresponding profit,
+were gradually reducing the character
+of the Jardin; when Cuvier,
+a man of talent, was appointed to one
+of the departments of the institution,
+and he instantly revived its popularity;
+and, what was of more importance,
+its public use.</p>
+
+<p>Cuvier devoted himself to comparative
+anatomy and geology. The
+former was a study within human
+means, of which he had the materials
+round him, and which, being intended
+for the instruction of man, is evidently
+intended for his investigation.
+The latter, in attempting to fix the
+age of the world, to decide on the
+process of creation, and to contradict
+Scripture by the ignorance of man,
+is merely an instance of the presumption
+of <em>Sciolism</em>. Cuvier exhibited
+remarkable dexterity in discovering
+the species of the fossil fishes, reptiles,
+and animals. The science was
+not new, but he threw it into a new
+form&mdash;he made it interesting, and he
+made it probable. If a large proportion
+of his supposed discoveries were
+merely ingenious guesses, they were
+at least guesses which there was nobody
+to refute, and they <em>were ingenious</em>&mdash;that
+was enough. Fame followed
+him, and the lectures of the
+ingenious theorist were a popular
+novelty. The "Cabinet of Comparative
+Anatomy" in the Jardin is the
+monument of his diligence, and it
+does honour to the sagacity of his
+investigation.</p>
+
+<p>One remark, however, must be
+made. On a former visit to the
+Cabinet of Comparative Anatomy,
+among the collection of skeletons, I
+was surprised and disgusted with the
+sight of the skeleton of the Arab who
+killed General Kleber in Egypt. The
+Arab was impaled, and the iron spike
+was shown <em>still sticking in the</em> spine!
+I do not know whether this hideous
+object is still to be seen, for I have not
+lately visited the apartment; but, if
+existing still, it ought to remain no
+longer in a museum of science. Of
+course, the assassin deserved death;
+but, in all probability, the murder
+which made him guilty, was of the
+same order as that which made Charlotte
+Corday famous. How many of his
+countrymen had died by the soldiery
+of France! In the eye of Christianity,
+this is no palliation; though in the
+eye of Mahometanism it might constitute
+a patriot and a hero. At all
+events, so frightful a spectacle ought
+<em>not</em> to meet the public eye.</p>
+
+<p><i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Hôtel des Invalides.</i>&mdash;The depository
+of all that remains of Napoleon,
+the monument of almost two hundred
+years of war, and the burial-place
+of a whole host of celebrated
+names, is well worth the visit of
+strangers; and I entered the esplanade
+of the famous <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">hôtel</i> with due veneration,
+and some slight curiosity to see
+the changes of time. I had visited
+this noble pile immediately after the
+fall of Napoleon, and while it still
+retained the honours of an imperial
+edifice. Its courts now appeared to
+me comparatively desolate; this, however,
+may be accounted for by the
+cessation of those wars which peopled
+them with military mutilation. The
+establishment was calculated to provide
+for five thousand men; and, at
+that period, probably, it was always
+full. At present, scarcely more than
+half the number are under its roof; and,
+as even the Algerine war is reduced
+to skirmishes with the mountaineers
+of the Atlas, that number must be
+further diminishing from year to year.</p>
+
+<p>The Cupola then shone with gilding.
+This was the work of Napoleon, who
+had a stately eye for the ornament of
+his imperial city. The cupola of the
+Invalides thus glittered above all the
+roofs of Paris, and was seen glittering
+to an immense distance. It might
+be taken for the dedication of the
+French capital to the genius of War.
+This gilding is now worn off practically,
+as well as metaphorically, and
+the <em>prestige</em> is lost.</p>
+
+<p>The celebrated Edmund Burke, all
+whose ideas were grand, is said to
+have proposed gilding the cupola of
+St Paul's, which certainly would have
+been a splendid sight, and would
+have thrown a look of stateliness over
+that city to which the ends of the
+earth turn their eyes. But the civic
+spirit was not equal to the idea, and
+it has since gone on lavishing ten
+times the money on the embellishment
+of <em>lanes</em>.</p>
+
+<p>The Chapel of the Invalides looked
+gloomy, and even neglected; the great<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[317]</a></span>
+Magician was gone. Some service was
+performing, as it is in the Romish
+chapels at most hours of the day:
+some poor people were kneeling in
+different parts of the area; and some
+strangers were, like myself, wandering
+along the nave, looking at the
+monuments to the fallen military
+names of France. On the pillars in
+the nave are inscriptions to the
+memory of Jourdan, Lobau, and
+Oudinot. There is a bronze tablet to
+the memory of Marshal Mortier, who
+was killed by Fieschi's infernal machine,
+beside Louis Philippe; and to
+Damremont, who fell in Algiers.</p>
+
+<p>But the chapel is destined to exhibit
+a more superb instance of national
+recollection&mdash;the tomb of Napoleon,
+which is to be finished in 1852. A
+large circular crypt, dug in the centre
+of the second chapel (which is to be
+united with the first,) is the site of the
+sarcophagus in which the remains of
+Napoleon lie. Coryatides, columns,
+and bas-reliefs, commemorative of his
+battles, are to surround the sarcophagus.
+The coryatides are to represent
+War, Legislation, Art, and
+Science; and in front is to be raised
+an altar of black marble. The architect
+is Visconti, and the best statuaries
+in Paris are to contribute the decorations.
+The expense will be enormous.
+In the time of Louis Philippe
+it had already amounted to nearly
+four millions of francs. About three
+millions more are now demanded for
+the completion, including an equestrian
+statue. On the whole, the
+expense will be not much less than
+seven millions of francs!</p>
+
+<p>The original folly of the nation, and
+of Napoleon, in plundering the Continent
+of statues and pictures, inevitably
+led to retribution, on the first
+reverse of fortune. The plunder of
+money, or of arms, or of anything
+consumable, would have been exempt
+from this mortification; but pictures
+and statues are permanent things,
+and always capable of being re-demanded.
+Their plunder was an
+extension of the law of spoil unknown
+in European hostilities, or in history,
+except perhaps in the old Roman
+ravage of Greece. Napoleon, in
+adopting the practice of heathenism
+for his model, and the French nation&mdash;in
+their assumed love of the arts
+violating the sanctities of art, by
+removing the noblest works from the
+edifices for which they were created,
+and from the lights and positions for
+which the great artists of Italy designed
+them&mdash;fully deserved the vexation
+of seeing them thus carried back
+to their original cities. The moral will,
+it is to be presumed, be learned from
+this signal example, that the works
+of genius are <em>naturally</em> exempt from
+the sweep of plunder; that even the
+violences of war must not be extended
+beyond the necessities of conquest;
+and that an act of injustice is <em>sure</em> to
+bring down its punishment in the
+most painful form of retribution.</p>
+
+<p><em>The Artesian Well.</em>&mdash;Near the Hôtel
+des Invalides is the celebrated well
+which has given the name to all the
+modern experiments of boring to great
+depths for water. The name of
+Artesian is said to be taken from the
+province of Artois, in which the practice
+has been long known. The want
+of water in Paris induced a M. Mulot
+to commence the work in 1834.</p>
+
+<p>The history of the process is instructive.
+For six years there was no prospect
+of success; yet M. Mulot gallantly
+persevered. All was inexorable chalk;
+the boring instrument had broken
+several times, and the difficulty thus
+occasioned may be imagined from its
+requiring a length of thirteen hundred
+feet! even in an early period of
+the operation. However, early in
+1841 the chalk gave signs of change,
+and a greenish sand was drawn up.
+On the 26th of February this was
+followed by a slight effusion of water,
+and before night the stream burst up
+to the mouth of the excavation,
+which was now eighteen hundred feet
+in depth. Yet the water rapidly rose
+to a height of one hundred and twelve
+feet above the mouth of the well by a
+pipe, which is now supported by scaffolding,
+giving about six hundred gallons
+of water a minute.</p>
+
+<p>Even the memorable experiment
+confutes, so far as it goes, the geological
+notion of strata laid under each
+other in their proportions of gravity.
+The section of the boring shows chalk,
+sand, gravel, shells, &amp;c., and this
+order sometimes reversed, in the most
+casual manner, down to a depth five
+times the height of the cupola of the
+Invalides.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[318]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The heat of the water was 83° of
+Fahrenheit. In the theories with
+which the philosophers of the Continent
+have to feed their imaginations
+is that of a <em>central fire</em>, which is felt
+through all the strata, and which
+warms everything in proportion to its
+nearness to the centre. Thus, it was
+proposed to dig an Artesian well of
+three thousand feet, for the supply of
+hot water to the Jardin des Plantes
+and the neighbouring hospitals. It
+was supposed that, at this depth, the
+heat would range to upwards of 100°
+of Fahrenheit. But nothing has been
+done. Even the Well of Grenelle
+has rather disappointed the public
+expectation; of late the supply has
+been less constant, and the boring is
+to be renewed to a depth of two thousand
+feet.</p>
+
+<p><em>The Napoleon Column.</em>&mdash;This is the
+grand feature of the Place de Vendôme,
+once the site of the Hôtel Vendôme,
+built by the son of Henry IV.
+and Gabrielle d'Estrées; afterwards
+pulled down by Louis XIV., afterwards
+abandoned to the citizens, and
+afterwards surrounded, as it is at this
+day, with the formal and heavy architecture
+of Mansard. The "Place"
+has, like everything in Paris, changed
+its name from time to time. It was
+once the "Place des Conquêtes;"
+then it changed to "Louis le Grand;"
+and then it returned to the name of its
+original proprietor. An old figure of
+the "Great King," in all the glories
+of wig and feathers, stood in the
+centre, till justice and the rabble of
+the Revolution broke it down, in the
+first "energies" of Republicanism.
+But the German campaign of 1805
+put all the nation in good humour,
+and the Napoleon Column was raised
+on the site of the dilapidated <em>monarch</em>.</p>
+
+<p>The design of the column is not
+original, for it is taken from the
+Trajan Column at Rome; but it is
+enlarged, and makes a very handsome
+object. When I first saw it, its decorations
+were in peril; for the Austrian
+soldiery were loud for its demolition,
+or at least for stripping off
+its bronze bas-reliefs, they representing
+their successive defeats in that
+ignominious campaign which, in three
+months from Boulogne, finished by
+the capture of Vienna. The Austrian
+troops, however, stoutly retrieved
+their disasters, and, as the proof, were
+then masters of Paris. It was possibly
+this effective feeling that prevailed
+at last to spare the column,
+which the practice of the French
+armies would have entitled them to
+strip without mercy.</p>
+
+<p>In the first instance, a statue of
+Napoleon, as emperor, stood on the
+summit of the pillar. This statue
+had its revolutions too, for it was
+melted down at the restoration of the
+Bourbons, to make a part of the
+equestrian statue of Henry IV. erected
+on the Pont Neuf. A <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">fleur-de-lis</i> and
+flagstaff then took its place. The
+Revolution of 1830, which elevated
+Louis Philippe to a temporary throne,
+raised the statue of Napoleon to an
+elevation perhaps as temporary.</p>
+
+<p>It was the shortsighted policy of
+the new monarch to mingle royal
+power with "republican institutions."
+He thus introduced the tricolor once
+more, sent for Napoleon's remains to
+St Helena by permission of England,
+and erected his statue in the old
+"chapeau et redingote gris," the
+characteristics of his soldiership. The
+statue was inaugurated on one of the
+"three glorious days," in July 1833,
+in all the pomp of royalty,&mdash;princes,
+ministers, and troops. So much for
+the consistency of a brother of the
+Bourbon. The pageant passed away,
+and the sacrifice to popularity was
+made without obtaining the fruits.
+Louis Philippe disappeared from the
+scene before the fall of the curtain;
+and, as if to render his catastrophe
+more complete, he not merely left a
+republic behind him, but he lived to
+see the "prisoner of Ham" the president
+of that republic.</p>
+
+<p>How does it happen that an Englishman
+in France cannot stir a single
+step, hear a single word, or see a
+single face, without the conviction
+that he has landed among a people as
+far from him in all their feelings,
+habits, and nature, as if they were
+engendered in the moon? The feelings
+with which the Briton looks on the
+statue of Buonaparte may be mixed
+enough: he may acknowledge him for
+a great soldier, as well as a great
+knave&mdash;a great monarch, as well as a
+little intriguer&mdash;a mighty ruler of
+men, who would have made an adroit<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[319]</a></span>
+waiter at a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">table d'hôte</i> in the Palais
+Royal. But he never would have
+imagined him into a sentimentalist, a
+shepherd, a Corydon, to be hung
+round with pastoral garlands; an
+opera hero, to delight in the sixpenny
+tribute of bouquets from the
+galleries.</p>
+
+<p>Yet I found the image of this man
+of terror and mystery&mdash;this ravager
+of Europe&mdash;this stern, fierce, and
+subtle master of havoc, decorated like
+a milliner's shop, or the tombs of the
+citizen shopkeepers in the cemeteries,
+with garlands of all sizes!&mdash;the large
+to express copious sorrow, the smaller
+to express diminished anguish, and
+the smallest, like a visiting card, for
+simply leaving their compliments;
+and all this in the face of the people
+who once feared to look in his face,
+and followed his car as if it bore the
+Thunder!</p>
+
+<p>To this spot came the people to offer
+up their sixpenny homage&mdash;to this
+spot came processions of all kinds, to
+declare their republican love for the
+darkest despot of European memory,
+to sing a stave, to walk heroically
+round the railing, hang up their garlands,
+and then, having done their
+duty in the presence of their own
+grisettes, in the face of Paris, and to
+the admiration of Europe, march
+home, and ponder upon the glories of
+the day!</p>
+
+<p>As a work of imperial magnificence,
+the column is worthy of its founder,
+and of the only redeeming point of
+his character&mdash;his zeal for the ornament
+of Paris. It is a monument to
+the military successes of the Empire;
+a trophy one hundred and thirty-five
+feet high, covered with the representations
+of French victory over the
+Austrians and Russians in the campaign
+of 1805. The bas-reliefs are in
+bronze, rising in a continued spiral
+round the column. Yet this is an
+unfortunate sacrifice to the imitation
+of the Roman column. The spiral,
+a few feet above the head of the
+spectator, offers nothing to the eye
+but a roll of rough bronze; the
+figures are wholly and necessarily
+undistinguishable. The only portion
+of those castings which directly meets
+the eye is unfortunately given up to
+the mere uniforms, caps, and arms of
+the combatants. This is the pedestal,
+and it would make a showy decoration
+for a tailor's window. It is a
+clever work of the furnace, but a
+miserable one of invention.</p>
+
+<p>The bronze is said to have been the
+captured cannon of the enemy. On
+the massive bronze door is the inscription
+in Latin:&mdash;"Napoleon, Emperor,
+Augustus, dedicated to the glory of
+the Grand Army this memorial of the
+German War, finished in three months,
+in the year 1805, under his command."</p>
+
+<p>On the summit stands the statue of
+Napoleon, to which, and its changes, I
+have adverted already. But the question
+has arisen, whether there is not
+an error in taste in placing the statue
+of an individual at a height which
+precludes the view of his <em>features</em>.
+This has been made an objection to
+the handsome Nelson Pillar in Trafalgar
+Square. But the obvious answer
+in both instances is, that the
+object is not merely the sight of the
+features, but the perfection of the
+memorial; that the pillar is the true
+<em>monument</em>, and the statue only an
+accessory, though the most <em>suitable</em>
+accessory. But even then the statue
+is not altogether inexpressive. We
+can see the figure and the costume of
+Napoleon nearly as well as they could
+be seen from the balcony of the Tuilleries,
+where all Paris assembled in
+the Carousel to worship him on Sundays,
+at the parade of "La Garde."
+In the spirited statue of Nelson we
+can recognise the figure as well as if
+we were gazing at him within a hundred
+yards in any other direction. It
+is true that pillars are not painters'
+easels, nor is Trafalgar Square a
+sculptor's yard; but the real question
+turns on the effect of the whole. If
+the pillar makes the monument, we
+will not quarrel with the sculptor for
+its not making a <em>miniature</em>. It answers
+its purpose&mdash;it is a noble one;
+it gives a national record of great
+events, and it realises, invigorates,
+and consecrates them by the images
+of the men by whom they were
+achieved.</p>
+
+<p><i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile.</i>&mdash;It is
+no small adventure, in a burning day
+of a French summer, to walk the
+length of the Champs Elysées, even
+to see the arch of the Star, (Napoleon's
+<em>Star</em>,) and climb to its summit. Yet<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[320]</a></span>
+this labour I accomplished with the
+fervour and the fatigue of a pilgrimage.</p>
+
+<p>Why should the name of Republic
+be ever heard in the mouth of a
+Frenchman? All the objects of his
+glory in the Capital of which he
+<em>glories</em>, everything that he can show
+to the stranger&mdash;everything that he
+recounts, standing on tip-toe, and
+looking down on the whole world
+besides&mdash;is the work of monarchy!
+The grand Republic left nothing behind
+but the guillotine. The Bourbons
+and Buonapartes were the creators
+of all to which he points, with an
+exaltation that throws earth into the
+shade from the Alps to the Andes.
+The Louvre, the Madeleine, the Tuilleries,
+the Hôtel de Ville, (now magnified
+and renovated into the most
+stately of town-houses,) the Hôtel
+des Invalides, Nôtre Dame, &amp;c. &amp;c.
+are all the work of Kings. If Napoleon
+had lived half a century longer,
+he would have made Paris a second
+Babylon. If the very clever President,
+who has hitherto managed
+France so dexterously, and whose
+name so curiously combines the monarchy
+and the despotism,&mdash;if Louis
+<em>Napoleon</em> (a name which an old
+Roman would have pronounced an
+omen) should manage it into a Monarchy,
+we shall probably see Paris
+crowded with superb public edifices.</p>
+
+<p>The kings of France were peculiarly
+magnificent in the decoration of the
+entrances to their city. As no power
+on earth can prevent the French from
+crowding into hovels, from living ten
+families in one house, and from appending
+to their cities the most
+miserable, ragged, and forlorn-looking
+suburbs on the globe, the
+monarchs wisely let the national
+habits alone; and resolved, if the
+suburbs must be abandoned to the
+popular fondness for the wigwam, to
+impress strangers with the stateliness
+of their gates. The <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Arc de St Denis</i>,
+once conducting from the most dismal
+of suburbs, is one of the finest
+portals in Paris, or in any European
+city; it is worthy of the Boulevard,
+and that is panegyric at once. Every
+one knows <em>that it was</em> erected in
+honour of the short-lived inroad of
+Louis XIV. into Holland in 1672,
+and the taking of whole muster-rolls
+of forts and villages, left at his mercy,
+ungarrisoned and unprovisioned, by
+the Republican parsimony of the
+Dutch, till a princely defender arose,
+and the young Stadtholder sent back
+the coxcomb monarch faster than he
+came. But the Arc is a noble work,
+and its architecture might well set a
+redeeming example to the London
+<em>improvers</em>. Why not erect an arch in
+Southwark? Why not at all the
+great avenues to the capital? Why
+not, instead of leaving this task to
+the caprices, or even to the bad taste
+of the railway companies, make it a
+branch of the operations of the
+Woods and Forests, and ennoble
+all the entrances of the mightiest
+capital of earthly empire?</p>
+
+<p>The Arch of St Denis is now shining
+in all the novelty of reparation,
+for it was restored so lately as last
+year. In this quarter, which has
+been always of a stormy temperature,
+the insurrection of 1848 raged with
+especial fury; and if the spirits of the
+great ever hover about their monuments,
+Louis XIV. may have seen
+from its summit a more desperate
+conflict than ever figured on its bas-reliefs.</p>
+
+<p>On the Arch of the Porte St Martin
+is a minor monument to minor triumphs,
+but a handsome one. Louis
+XIV. is still the hero. The "Grand
+Monarque" is exhibited as Hercules
+with his club; but as even a monarch
+in those days was nothing without
+his wig, Hercules exhibits a huge
+mass of curls of the most courtly
+dimensions&mdash;he might pass for the
+presiding deity of <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">perruquiers</i>.</p>
+
+<p>The <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Arc de Triomphe du Carousel</i>,
+erected in honour of the German
+campaign in 1805, is a costly performance,
+yet poor-looking, from its
+position in the centre of lofty buildings.
+What effect can an isolated arch, of
+but five-and-forty feet high, have
+in the immediate vicinity of masses
+of building, perhaps a hundred feet
+high? Its aspect is consequently
+meagre; and its being placed in the
+centre of a court makes it look useless,
+and, of course, ridiculous. On the
+summit is a figure of War, or Victory,
+in a chariot, with four bronze horses&mdash;the
+horses modelled from the four
+Constantinopolitan horses brought
+by the French from Venice, as part<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[321]</a></span>
+of the plunder of that luckless city, but
+sent back to Venice by the Allies in
+1815. The design of the arch was from
+that of Severus, in Rome: this secured,
+at least, elegance in its construction;
+but the position is fatal to dignity.</p>
+
+<p>The <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Arc de l'Etoile</i> is the finest
+work of the kind in Paris. It has
+the advantage of being built on an
+elevation, from which it overlooks the
+whole city, with no building of any
+magnitude in its vicinity; and is seen
+from a considerable distance on all the
+roads leading to the capital. Its cost
+was excessive for a work of mere ornament,
+and is said to have amounted
+to nearly half a million sterling!</p>
+
+<p>As I stood glancing over the groups
+on the friezes and faces of this great
+monument, which exhibit war in
+every form of conflict, havoc, and
+victory, the homely thought of "<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">cui
+bono</i>?" struck me irresistibly. Who
+was the better for all this havoc?&mdash;Napoleon,
+whom it sent to a dungeon!
+or the miserable thousands and tens
+of thousands whom it crushed in the
+field?&mdash;or the perhaps more unfortunate
+hundreds of thousands whom
+it sent to the hospital, to die the
+slow death of exhaustion and pain,
+or to live the protracted life of mutilation?
+I have no affectation of
+sentiment at the sight of the soldier's
+grave; he has but taken his share
+of the common lot, with perhaps the
+advantage, which so few men possess,
+of having "done the state some
+service." But, to see this vast monument
+covered with the emblems of
+hostilities, continued through almost
+a quarter of a century, (for the groups
+commence with 1792;) to think of the
+devastation of the fairest countries of
+Europe, of which these hostilities
+were the cause; and to know the utter
+fruitlessness and failure of the result,
+the short-lived nature of the triumph,
+and the frightful depth of the defeat&mdash;-Napoleon
+in ignominious bondage and
+hopeless banishment&mdash;Napoleon, after
+having lorded it over Europe, sent to
+linger out life on a rock in the centre
+of the ocean&mdash;the leader of military
+millions kept under the eye of a British
+sentinel, and no more suffered to
+stray beyond his bounds than a caged
+tiger&mdash;I felt as if the object before me
+was less a trophy than a tomb, less a
+monument of glory than of retribution,
+less the record of national triumph
+than of national frenzy.</p>
+
+<p>I had full liberty for reflection, for
+there was scarcely a human being to
+interrupt me. The bustle of the capital
+did not reach so far, the promenaders
+in the Champs Elysées did
+not venture here; the showy equipages
+of the Parisian "<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">nouveaux
+riches</i>" remained where the crowd
+was to be seen; and except a few
+peasants going on their avocations,
+and a bench full of soldiers, sleeping
+or smoking away the weariness of the
+hour, the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Arc de Triomphe</i>, which
+had cost so much treasure, and was
+the record of so much blood, seemed
+to be totally forgotten. I question, if
+there had been a decree of the Legislature
+to sell the stones, whether it
+would have occasioned more than a
+paragraph in the <cite>Journal des Debats</cite>.</p>
+
+<p>The ascent to the summit is by a
+long succession of dark and winding
+steps, for which a lamp is lighted by
+the porter; but the view from the
+parapet repays the trouble of the
+ascent. The whole basin in which
+Paris lies is spread out before the
+eye. The city is seen in the centre
+of a valley, surrounded on every side
+by a circle of low hills, sheeted with
+dark masses of wood. It was probably
+once the bed of a lake, in which
+the site of the city was an island.
+All the suburb villages came within
+the view, with the fortifications, which
+to a more scientific eye might appear
+formidable, but which to mine appeared
+mere dots in the vast landscape.</p>
+
+<p>This parapet is unhappily sometimes
+used for other purposes than the indulgence
+of the spectacle. A short time
+since, a determined suicide sprang from
+it, after making a speech to the soldiery
+below, assigning his reason for this
+tremendous act&mdash;if reason has anything
+to do in such a desperate determination
+to defy common sense. He
+acted with the quietest appearance of
+deliberation: let himself down on the
+coping of the battlement, from this
+made his speech, as if he had been in the
+tribune; and, having finished it, flung
+himself down a height of ninety feet,
+and was in an instant a crushed and
+lifeless heap on the pavement below.</p>
+
+<p>It is remarkable that, even in these
+crimes, there exists the distinction
+which seems to divide France from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[322]</a></span>
+England in every better thing. In
+England, a wretch undone by poverty,
+broken down by incurable pain, afflicted
+by the stings of a conscience
+which she neither knows how to heal
+nor cares how to cure, woman, helpless,
+wretched, and desolate, takes her
+walk under cover of night by the
+nearest river, and, without a witness,
+plunges in. But, in France, the last
+dreadful scene is imperfect without its
+publicity; the suicide must exhibit
+before the people. There must be
+the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">valete et plaudite</i>. The curtain
+must fall with dramatic effect, and
+the actor must make his exit with the
+cries of the audience, in admiration or
+terror, ringing in the ear.</p>
+
+<p>In other cases, however varied, the
+passion for publicity is still the same.
+No man can bear to perish in silence.
+If the atheist resolves on self-destruction,
+he writes a treatise for his publisher,
+or a letter to the journals. If he
+is a man of science, he takes his laudanum
+after supper, and, pen in hand,
+notes the gradual effects of the poison
+for the benefit of science; or he prepares
+a fire of charcoal, quietly inhales
+the vapour, and from his sofa continues
+to scribble the symptoms of
+dissolution, until the pen grows unsteady,
+the brain wanders, and half-a-dozen
+blots close the scene; the
+writing, however, being dedicated to
+posterity, and circulated next day in
+every journal of Paris, till it finally
+permeates through the provinces, and
+from thence through the European
+world.</p>
+
+<p>The number of suicides in Paris
+annually, of late years, has been about
+three hundred,&mdash;out of a population
+of a million, notwithstanding the suppression
+of the gaming-houses, which
+unquestionably had a large share in
+the temptation to this horrible and
+unatonable crime.</p>
+
+<p>The sculptures on the Arc are in
+the best style. They form a history
+of the Consulate and of the Empire.
+Napoleon, of course, is a prominent
+figure; but in the fine bas-relief
+which is peculiarly devoted to himself,
+in which he stands of colossal
+size, with Fame flying over his head,
+History writing the record of his exploits,
+and Victory crowning him,
+the artist has left his work liable to
+the sly sarcasm of a spectator of a
+similar design for the statue of Louis
+XIV. Victory was there holding
+the laurel at a slight distance from
+his head. An Englishman asked
+"whether she was putting it on <em>or
+taking it off</em>?" But another of the
+sculptures is still more unfortunate,
+for it has the unintentional effect of
+commemorating the Allied conquest
+of France in 1814. A young Frenchman
+is seen defending his family; and
+a soldier behind him is seen falling
+from his horse, and the Genius of
+the <em>future</em> flutters over them all. We
+know what that future was.</p>
+
+<p>The building of this noble memorial
+occupied, at intervals, no less than
+thirty years, beginning in 1806, when
+Napoleon issued a decree for its erection.
+The invasion in 1814 put a stop
+to everything in France, and the building
+was suspended. The fruitless and
+foolish campaign of the Duc d'Angoulême,
+in Spain, was regarded by
+the Bourbons as a title to national
+glories, and the building was resumed
+as a trophy to the renown of the Duc.
+It was again interrupted by the expulsion
+of the Bourbons in 1830; but
+was resumed under Louis Philippe,
+and finished in 1836. It is altogether
+a very stately and very handsome
+tribute to the French armies.</p>
+
+<p>But, without affecting unnecessary
+severity of remark, may not the
+wisdom of such a tribute be justly
+doubted? The Romans, though the
+principle of their power was conquest,
+and though their security was almost
+incompatible with peace, yet are said
+to have never repaired a triumphal
+arch. It is true that they built those
+arches (in the latter period of the
+Empire) so solidly as to want no
+repairs. But we have no triumphal
+monuments of the Republic surviving.
+Why should it be the constant policy
+of Continental governments to pamper
+their people with the food of that most
+dangerous and diseased of all vanities,
+the passion for war? And this is not
+said in the declamatory spirit of the
+"Peace Congress," which seems to
+be nothing more than a pretext for
+a Continental ramble, an expedient
+for a little vulgar notoriety among
+foreigners, and an opportunity of getting
+rid of the greatest quantity of
+common-place in the shortest time.
+But, why should not France learn<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[323]</a></span>
+common sense from the experience of
+England? It is calculated that, of the
+last five hundred years of French history,
+two hundred and fifty have been
+spent in hostilities. In consequence,
+France has been invaded, trampled,
+and impoverished by war; while England,
+during the last three hundred
+years, has never seen the foot of a
+foreign invader.</p>
+
+<p>Let the people of France abolish
+the <em>Conscription</em>, and they will have
+made one advance to liberty. Till
+cabinets are deprived of that material
+of <em>aggressive</em> war, they will
+leave war at the caprice of a weak
+monarch, an ambitious minister, or a
+vainglorious people. It is remarkable
+that, among all the attempts at reforming
+the constitution of France,
+her reformers have never touched upon
+the ulcer of the land, the Conscription,
+the legacy of a frantic Republic,
+taking the children of the country
+from their industry, to plunge them
+into the vices of idleness or the havoc
+of war, and at all times to furnish
+the means, as well as afford the
+temptation, to aggressive war. There
+is not at this hour a soldier of England
+who has been <em>forced</em> into the
+service! Let the French, let all the
+Continental nations, abolish the Conscription,
+thus depriving their governments
+of the means of making war
+upon each other; and what an infinite
+security would not this illustrious
+abolition give to the whole of Europe!&mdash;what
+an infinite saving in the taxes
+which are now wrung from nations by
+the fear of each other!&mdash;and what an
+infinite triumph to the spirit of peace,
+industry, and mutual good-will!</p>
+
+<p><em>The Theatres.</em>&mdash;In the evening I
+wandered along the Boulevard, the
+great centre of the theatres, and was
+surprised at the crowds which, in a
+hot summer night, could venture to
+be stewed alive, amid the smell of
+lamps, the effluvia of orange-peel, the
+glare of lights, and the breathing of
+hundreds or thousands of human
+beings. I preferred the fresh air, the
+lively movement of the Boulevard,
+the glitter of the Cafés, and the
+glow, then tempered, of the declining
+sun&mdash;one of the prettiest moving
+panoramas of Paris.</p>
+
+<p>The French Government take a
+great interest in the popularity of the
+theatres, and exert that species of
+superintendence which is implied in
+a considerable supply of the theatrical
+expenditure. The French Opera
+receives annually from the National
+Treasury no less than 750,000 francs,
+besides 130,000 for retiring pensions.
+To the Théâtre Français, the allowance
+from the Treasury is 240,000
+francs a-year. To the Italian Opera
+the sum granted was formerly 70,000,
+but is now 50,000. Allowances are
+made to the Opera Comique, a most
+amusing theatre, to the Odeon, and
+perhaps to some others&mdash;the whole
+demanding of the budget a sum of
+more than a million of francs.</p>
+
+<p>It is curious that the drama in
+France began with the clergy. In
+the time of Charles VI., a company,
+named "Confrères de la Passion,"
+performed plays founded on the events
+of Scripture, though grossly disfigured
+by the traditions of Monachism. The
+originals were probably the "<em>Mysteries</em>,"
+or plays in the Convents, a
+species of absurd and fantastic representation
+common in all Popish countries.
+At length the life of Manners
+was added to the life of Superstition,
+and singers and grimacers
+were added to the "Confrères."</p>
+
+<p>In the sixteenth century an Italian
+company appeared in Paris, and
+brought with them their opera, the
+invention of the Florentines fifty
+years before. The cessation of the
+civil wars allowed France for a while
+to cultivate the arts of peace; and
+Richelieu, a man who, if it could be
+said of any statesman that he formed
+the mind of the nation, impressed his
+image and superscription upon his
+country, gave the highest encouragement
+to the drama by making it the
+fashion. He even wrote, or assisted
+in writing, popular dramas. Corneille
+now began to flourish, and French
+Tragedy was established.</p>
+
+<p>Mazarin, when minister, and, like
+Richelieu, master of the nation, invited
+or admitted the Italian Opera
+once more into France; and Molière,
+at the head of a new company, obtained
+leave to perform before Louis
+XIV., who thenceforth patronised the
+great comic writer, and gave his company
+a theatre. The Tragedy, Comedy,
+and Opera of France now led
+the way in Europe.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[324]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>In France, the Great Revolution,
+while it multiplied the theatres with
+the natural extravagance of the time,
+yet, by a consequence equally inevitable,
+degraded the taste of the nation.
+For a long period the legitimate
+drama was almost extinguished:
+it was unexciting to a people trained
+day by day to revolutionary convulsion;
+the pageants on the stage were
+tame to the processions in the streets;
+and the struggles of kings and nobles
+were ridiculous to the men who had
+been employed in destroying a
+dynasty.</p>
+
+<p>Napoleon at once perceived the
+evil, and adopted the only remedy.
+He found no less than <em>thirty</em> theatres
+in Paris. He was not a man to
+pause where he saw his way clearly
+before him; he closed twenty-two of
+those theatres, leaving but eight, and
+those chiefly of the old establishments,
+making a species of compensation to
+the closed houses.</p>
+
+<p>On the return of the Bourbons the
+civil list, as in the old times, assisted
+in the support of the theatres. On
+the accession of Louis Philippe, the
+popular triumph infused its extravagance
+even into the system of the
+drama. The number of the theatres
+increased, and a succession of writers
+of the "New School" filled the
+theatres with abomination. Gallantry
+became the <em>spirit</em> of the drama&mdash;everything
+before the scene was intrigue;
+married life was the perpetual burlesque.
+Wives were the habitual
+heroines of the intrigue, and husbands
+the habitual dupes! To keep faith
+with a husband was a standing jest
+on the stage, to keep it with a seducer
+was the height of human character.
+The former was always described as
+brutal, gross, dull, and born to be
+duped; the latter was captivating,
+generous, and irresistible by any
+matron alive. In fact, wives and
+widows were made for nothing else
+but to give way to the fascinations of
+this class of professors of the arts of
+"good society." The captivator was
+substantially described as a scoundrel,
+a gambler, and a vagabond of the
+basest kind, but withal so honourable,
+so tender, and so susceptible, that his
+atrocities disappeared, or rather were
+transmuted into virtues, by the brilliancy
+of his qualifications for seducing
+the wife of his friend. Perjury, profligacy,
+and the betrayal of confidence
+in the most essential tie of human
+nature, were supreme in popularity in
+the Novel and on the Stage.</p>
+
+<p>The direct consequence is, that
+the crime of adultery is lightly considered
+in France; even the pure speak
+of it without the abhorrence which,
+for every reason, it deserves. Its
+notoriety is rather thought of as an
+anecdote of the day, or the gossiping
+of the soirée; and the most acknowledged
+licentiousness does not exclude
+a man of a certain rank from general
+reception in good society.</p>
+
+<p>One thing may be observed on the
+most casual intercourse with Frenchmen&mdash;that
+the vices which, in our
+country, create disgust and offence in
+grave society, and laughter and levity
+in the more careless, seldom produce
+either the one or the other in France.
+The topic is alluded to with neither a
+frown nor a smile; it is treated, in
+general, as a matter of course, either
+too natural to deserve censure, or too
+common to excite ridicule. It is seldom
+peculiarly alluded to, for the general
+conversation of "Good Society" is
+decorous; but to denounce it would be
+unmannered. The result is an extent
+of illegitimacy enough to corrupt the
+whole rising population. By the registers
+of 1848, of 30,000 children
+born in Paris in that year, there were
+10,000 illegitimate, of which but
+1700 were acknowledged by their
+parents!</p>
+
+<p>The theatrical profession forms an
+important element in the population.
+The actors and actresses amount to
+about 5000. In England they are
+probably not as many hundreds.
+And though the French population is
+35,000,000, while Great Britain has
+little more than twenty, yet the disproportion
+is enormous, and forms a
+characteristic difference of the two
+countries. The persons occupied in
+the "working" of the theatrical system
+amount perhaps to 10,000, and
+the families dependent on the whole
+form a very large and very influential
+class among the general orders of
+society.</p>
+
+<p>But if the Treasury assists in their
+general support, it compels them to
+pay eight per cent of their receipts
+as a contribution to the hospitals.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[325]</a></span>
+This sum averages annually a million
+of francs, or £40,000 sterling.</p>
+
+<p>In England we might learn something
+from the theatrical regulations
+of France. The trampling of our
+crowds at the doors of theatres, the
+occasional losses of life and limb, and
+the general inconvenience and confusion
+of the entrance on crowded nights,
+might be avoided by the were adoption
+of French <em>order</em>.</p>
+
+<p>But why should not higher objects
+be held in view? The drama is a
+public <em>necessity</em>; the people will have
+it, whether good or bad. Why should
+not Government offer prizes to the
+best drama, tragic or comic? Why
+should the most distinguished work
+of poetic genius find no encouragement
+from the Government of a nation
+boasting of its love of letters? Why
+shall that encouragement be left to
+the caprice of managers, to the
+finances of struggling establishments,
+or to the tastes of theatres, forced by
+their poverty to pander to the rabble.
+Why should not the mischievous performances
+of those theatres be put
+down, and dramas, founded on the
+higher principles of our nature, be the
+instruments of putting them down?
+Why should not heroism, honour, and
+patriotism, be taught on the national
+stage, as well as the triumphs of the
+highroad, laxity among the higher
+ranks, and vice among all? The
+drama has been charged with corruption.
+Is that corruption essential? It
+has been charged with being a <em>nucleus</em>
+of the loose principles, as its places of
+representation have been haunted by
+the loose characters, of society. But
+what are these but excrescences, generated
+by the carelessness of society,
+by the indolence of magistracy, and
+by the general misconception of the
+real purposes and possible power of
+the stage? That power is magnificent.
+It takes human nature in her
+most <em>impressible</em> form, in the time of
+the glowing heart and the ready tear,
+of the senses animated by scenery,
+melted by music, and spelled by the
+living realities of representation.
+Why should not impressions be
+made in that hour which the man
+would carry with him through all the
+contingencies of life, and which would
+throw a light on every period of his
+being?</p>
+
+<p>The conditions of recompense to
+authors in France make <em>some</em> advance
+to justice. The author of a Drama is
+entitled to a profit on its performance
+in every theatre of France during his
+life, with a continuance for ten years
+after to his heirs. For a piece of
+three or five acts, the remuneration is
+<em>one twelfth part</em> of the gross receipts,
+and for a piece in one act, one twenty-fourth.
+A similar compensation has
+been adopted in the English theatre,
+but seems to have become completely
+nugatory, from the managers' purchasing
+the author's rights&mdash;the transaction
+here being made a private one,
+and the remuneration being at the
+mercy of the manager. But in France
+it is a public matter, an affair of law,
+and looked to by an agent in Paris,
+who registers the performance of the
+piece at all the theatres in the city,
+and in the provinces.</p>
+
+<p>Still, this is injustice. Why should
+the labour of the intellect be less
+permanent than the labour of the
+hands? Why should not the author
+be entitled to make his full demand
+instead of this pittance? If his play
+is worth acting, why is it not worth
+paying for?&mdash;and why should he be
+prohibited from having the fruit of his
+brain as an inheritance to his family,
+as well as the fruit of any other toll?</p>
+
+<p>If, instead of being a man of genius,
+delighting and elevating the mind of
+a nation, he were a blacksmith, he
+might leave his tools and his trade to
+his children without any limit; or if,
+with the produce of his play, he purchased
+a cow, or a cabin, no man
+could lay a claim upon either. But
+he must be taxed for being a man of
+talent; and men of no talent must be
+entitled, by an absurd law and a palpable
+injustice, to tear the fruit of his
+intellectual supremacy from his children
+after ten short years of possession.</p>
+
+<p>No man leaves Paris without regret,
+and without a wish for the
+liberty and peace of its people.</p>
+
+<hr class="chap" />
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[326]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<h2>MR RUSKIN'S WORKS.</h2>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p><em>Modern Painters</em>, vol. i. Second edition.&mdash;&mdash;<cite>Modern Painters</cite>, vol. ii.&mdash;&mdash;<cite>The
+Seven Lamps of Architecture.</cite>&mdash;&mdash;<cite>The Stones of Venice.</cite>&mdash;&mdash;<cite>Notes on the Construction
+of Sheepfolds.</cite> By <span class="smcap">John Ruskin</span>, M.A.</p></blockquote>
+
+
+<p>On the publication of the first
+volume of Mr Ruskin's work on
+Modern Painters, a notice appeared
+of it in this Magazine. Since that
+time a second volume has been published
+of the same work, with two
+other works on architecture. It is
+the second volume of his <cite>Modern
+Painters</cite> which will at present chiefly
+engage our attention. His architectural
+works can only receive a slight
+and casual notice; on some future
+occasion they may tempt us into a
+fuller examination.</p>
+
+<p>Although the second volume of the
+<cite>Modern Painters</cite> will be the immediate
+subject of our review, we must
+permit ourselves to glance back upon
+the first, in order to connect together
+the topics treated by the two, and to
+prevent our paper from wearing quite
+the aspect of a metaphysical essay;
+for it is the nature of the sentiment
+of the beautiful, and its sources in
+the human mind, which is the main
+subject of this second volume. In
+the first, he had entered at once into
+the arena of criticism, elevating the
+modern artists, and one amongst them
+in particular, at the expense of the old
+masters, who, with some few exceptions,
+find themselves very rudely
+handled.</p>
+
+<p>As we have already intimated, we
+do not hold Mr Ruskin to be a safe
+guide in matters of art, and the present
+volume demonstrates that he is
+no safe guide in matters of philosophy.
+He is a man of undoubted power and
+vigour of mind; he feels strongly,
+and he thinks independently: but he
+is hasty and impetuous; can very
+rarely, on any subject, deliver a calm
+and temperate judgment; and, when
+he enters on the discussion of general
+principles, shows an utter inability to
+seize on, or to appreciate, the wide
+generalisations of philosophy. He is
+not, therefore, one of those men who
+can ever become an authority to be
+appealed to by the less instructed in
+any of the fine arts, or on any topic
+whatever; and this we say with the
+utmost confidence, because, although
+we may be unable in many cases to
+dispute his judgment&mdash;as where he
+speaks of paintings we have not seen,
+or technicalities of art we do not
+affect to understand&mdash;yet he so frequently
+stands forth on the broad
+arena where general and familiar
+principles are discussed, that it is
+utterly impossible <em>to be mistaken in
+the man</em>. On all these occasions he
+displays a very marked and rather
+peculiar combination of power and
+weakness&mdash;of power, the result of
+natural strength of mind; of weakness,
+the inevitable consequence of a
+passionate haste, and an overweening
+confidence. When we hear a person
+of this intellectual character throwing
+all but unmitigated abuse upon works
+which men have long consented to
+admire, and lavishing upon some other
+works encomiums which no conceivable
+perfection of human art could
+justify, it is utterly impossible to
+attach any weight to his opinion, on
+the ground that he has made an especial
+study of any one branch of art.
+Such a man we cannot trust out of
+our sight a moment; we cannot give
+him one inch of ground more than his
+reasoning covers, or our own experience
+would grant to him.</p>
+
+<p>We shall not here revive the controversy
+on the comparative merits of
+the ancient and modern landscape-painters,
+nor on the later productions
+of Mr Turner, whether they are the
+eccentricities of genius or its fullest
+development; we have said enough
+on these subjects before. It is Mr
+Ruskin's book, and not the pictures of
+Claude or Turner, that we have to
+criticise; it is his style, and his manner
+of thinking, that we have to pass
+judgment on.</p>
+
+<p>In all Mr Ruskin's works, and in
+almost every page of them, whether
+on painting, or architecture, or philosophy,
+or ecclesiastical controversy,
+two characteristics invariably prevail:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[327]</a></span>
+an extreme dogmatism, and a passion
+for singularity. Every man who
+thinks earnestly would convert all the
+world to his own opinions; but while
+Mr Ruskin would convert all the
+world to his own tastes as well as
+opinions, he manifests the greatest
+repugnance to think for a moment
+like any one else. He has a mortal
+aversion to mingle with a crowd. It
+is quite enough for an opinion to be
+commonplace to insure it his contempt:
+if it has passed out of fashion,
+he may revive it; but to think with
+the existing multitude would be impossible.
+Yet that multitude are to
+think with him. He is as bent on
+unity in matters of taste as others
+are on unity in matters of religion;
+and he sets the example by diverging,
+wherever he can, from the tastes of
+others.</p>
+
+<p>Between these two characteristics
+there is no real contradiction; or
+rather the contradiction is quite familiar.
+The man who most affects
+singularity is generally the most
+dogmatic: he is the very man who
+expresses most surprise that others
+should differ from him. No one is so
+impatient of contradiction as he who
+is perpetually contradicting others;
+and on the gravest matters of religion
+those are often found to be most
+zealous for unity of belief who have
+some pet heresy of their own, for
+which they are battling all their lives.
+The same overweening confidence lies,
+in fact, at the basis of both these
+characteristics. In Mr Ruskin they
+are both seen in great force. No
+matter what the subject he discusses,&mdash;taste
+or ecclesiastical government&mdash;we
+always find the same combination
+of singularity, with a dogmatism approaching
+to intolerance. Thus, the
+Ionic pillar is universally admired.
+Mr Ruskin finds that the fluted shaft
+gives an appearance of weakness.
+No one ever felt this, so long as the
+fluted column is manifestly of sufficient
+diameter to sustain the weight
+imposed on it. But this objection of
+apparent insecurity has been very
+commonly made to the spiral or
+twisted column. Here, therefore, Mr
+Ruskin abruptly dismisses the objection.
+He was at liberty to defend
+the spiral column: we should say
+here, also, that if the weight imposed
+was evidently not too great for even a
+spiral column to support, <em>this</em> objection
+has no place; but why cast the
+same objection, (which perhaps in all
+cases was a mere after-thought)
+against the Ionic shaft, when it had
+never been felt at all? It has been a
+general remark, that, amongst other
+results of the railway, it has given a
+new field to the architect, as well as
+to the engineer. Therefore Mr
+Ruskin resolves that our railroad
+stations ought to have no architecture
+at all. Of course, if he limited his
+objections to inappropriate ornament,
+he would be agreeing with all the
+world: he decides there should be no
+architecture whatever; merely buildings
+more or less spacious, to protect
+men and goods from the weather.
+He has never been so unfortunate, we
+suppose, as to come an hour too soon,
+or the unlucky five minutes too late,
+to a railway station, or he would
+have been glad enough to find himself
+in something better than the large
+shed he proposes. On the grave subject
+of ecclesiastical government he
+has stepped forward into controversy;
+and here he shows both his usual
+propensities in <em>high relief</em>. He has
+some quite peculiar projects of his
+own; the appointment of some hundreds
+of bishops&mdash;we know not what&mdash;and
+a Church discipline to be carried
+out by trial by jury. Desirable or
+not, they are manifestly as impracticable
+as the revival of chivalry.
+But let that pass. Let every man
+think and propose his best. But his
+dogmatism amounts to a disease,
+when, turning from his own novelties,
+he can speak in the flippant intolerant
+manner that he does of the national
+and now time-honoured Church of
+Scotland.</p>
+
+<p>It will be worth while to make, in
+passing, a single quotation from this
+pamphlet, <cite>Notes on the Construction
+of Sheepfolds</cite>. He tells us, in one
+place, that in the New Testament the
+ministers of the Church "are called,
+and call themselves, with absolute
+indifference, Deacons, Bishops, Elders,
+Evangelists, according to what they
+are doing at the time of speaking."
+With such a writer one might, at all
+events, have hoped to live in peace.
+But no. He discovers, nevertheless,
+that Episcopacy is the Scriptural form<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[328]</a></span>
+of Church government; and, having
+satisfied his own mind of this, no
+opposition or diversity of opinion is
+for a moment to be tolerated.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"But how," he says, "unite the two
+great sects of paralysed Protestants?
+By keeping simply to Scripture. <em>The
+members of the Scottish Church have not a
+shadow of excuse for refusing Episcopacy</em>:
+it has indeed been abused among them,
+grievously abused; but it is in the Bible,
+and that is all they have a right to ask.</p>
+
+<p>"<em>They have also no shadow of excuse
+for refusing to employ a written form of
+prayer.</em> It may not be to their taste&mdash;it
+may not be the way in which they like
+to pray; but it is no question, at present,
+of likes or dislikes, but of duties; and
+the acceptance of such a form on their
+part would go half way to reconcile them
+with their brethren. Let them allege
+such objections as they can reasonably
+advance against the English form, and
+let these be carefully and humbly weighed
+by the pastors of both Churches: some of
+them ought to be at once forestalled.
+For the English Church, on the other
+hand, <em>must</em>," &amp;c.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Into Mr Ruskin's own religious
+tenets, further than he has chosen to
+reveal them in his works, we have no
+wish to pry. But he must cease
+to be Mr Ruskin if they do not exhibit
+some salient peculiarity, coupled
+with a confidence, unusual even
+amongst zealots, that his peculiar
+views will speedily triumph. If he
+can be presumed to belong to any
+sect, it must be the last and smallest
+one amongst us&mdash;some sect as exclusive
+as German mysticism, with pretensions
+as great as those of the
+Church of Rome.</p>
+
+<p>One word on the style of Mr
+Ruskin: it will save the trouble of
+alluding to it on particular occasions.
+It is very unequal. In both his
+architectural works he writes generally
+with great ease, spirit, and
+clearness. There is a racy vigour in
+the page. But when he would be
+very eloquent, as he is disposed to be
+in the <cite>Modern Painters</cite>, he becomes
+very verbose, tedious, obscure, extravagant.
+There is no discipline in his
+style, no moderation, no repose.
+Those qualities which he has known
+how to praise in art he has not aimed
+at in his own writing. A rank luxuriance
+of a semi-poetical diction lies
+about, perfectly unrestrained; metaphorical
+language comes before us in
+every species of disorder; and hyperbolical
+expressions are used till they
+become commonplace. Verbal criticism,
+he would probably look upon
+a very puerile business: he need fear
+nothing of the kind from us; we
+should as soon think of criticising or
+pruning a jungle. To add to the confusion,
+he appears at times to have
+proposed to himself the imitation of
+some of our older writers: pages are
+written in the rhythm of Jeremy
+Taylor; sometimes it is the venerable
+Hooker who seems to be his type;
+and he has even succeeded in combining
+whatever is most tedious and
+prolix in both these great writers. If
+the reader wishes a specimen of this
+sort of <em>modern antique</em>, he may turn
+to the fifteenth chapter of the second
+volume of the <cite>Modern Painters</cite>.</p>
+
+<p>Coupled with this matter of style,
+and almost inseparable from it, is the
+violence of his manner on subjects
+which cannot possibly justify so vehement
+a zeal. We like a generous
+enthusiasm on any art&mdash;we delight in
+it; but who can travel in sympathy
+with a writer who exhausts on so
+much paint and canvass every term
+of rapture that the Alps themselves
+could have called forth? One need
+not be a utilitarian philosopher&mdash;or
+what Mr Ruskin describes as such&mdash;to
+smile at the lofty position on which
+he puts the landscape-painter, and
+the egregious and impossible demands
+he makes upon the art itself. And the
+condemnation and opprobrium with
+which he overwhelms the luckless
+artist who has offended him is quite
+as violent. The bough of a tree, "in
+the left hand upper corner" of a landscape
+of Poussin's, calls forth this
+terrible denunciation:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"This latter is a representation of an
+ornamental group of elephants' tusks,
+with feathers tied to the ends of them.
+Not the wildest imagination could ever
+conjure up in it the remotest resemblance
+to the bough of a tree. It might be the
+claws of a witch&mdash;the talons of an eagle&mdash;the
+horns of a fiend; but it is a full
+assemblage of every conceivable falsehood
+which can be told respecting foliage&mdash;a
+piece of work so barbarous in every way
+<em>that one glance at it ought to prove the
+complete charlatanism and trickery of the
+whole system of the old landscape-painters</em>.... I
+will say here at once, that such<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[329]</a></span>
+drawing as this is as ugly as it is childish,
+and as painful as it is false; and that the
+man who could tolerate, much more, who
+could deliberately set down such a thing
+on his canvass, <em>had neither eye nor feeling
+for one single attribute or excellence of
+God's works</em>. He might have drawn <em>the
+other stem</em> in excusable ignorance, or under
+some false impression of being able to
+improve upon nature, but this is conclusive
+and unpardonable."&mdash;(P. 382.)</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The great redeeming quality of Mr
+Ruskin&mdash;and we wish to give it conspicuous
+and honourable mention&mdash;is
+his love of nature. Here lies the
+charm of his works; to this may be
+traced whatever virtue is in them, or
+whatever utility they may possess.
+They will send the painter more than
+ever to the study of nature, and perhaps
+they will have a still more beneficial
+effect on the art, by sending the
+critic of painting to the same school.
+It would be almost an insult to the
+landscape-painter to suppose that he
+needed this lesson; the very love of
+his art must lead him perpetually, one
+would think, to his great and delightful
+study amongst the fields, under the
+open skies, before the rivers and the
+hills. But the critic of the picture-gallery
+is often one who goes from
+picture to picture, and very little from
+nature to the painting. Consequently,
+where an artist succeeds in imitating
+some effect in nature which had not
+been before represented on the canvass,
+such a critic is more likely to be
+displeased than gratified; and the
+artist, having to paint for a conventional
+taste, is in danger of sacrificing
+to it his own higher aspirations. Now
+it is most true that no man should
+pretend to be a critic upon pictures
+unless he understands the art itself of
+painting; he ought, we suspect, to
+have handled the pencil or the brush
+himself; at all events, he ought in
+some way to have been initiated into
+the mysteries of the pallet and the
+easel. Otherwise, not knowing the
+difficulties to be overcome, nor the
+means at hand for encountering them,
+he cannot possibly estimate the degree
+of merit due to the artist for the production
+of this or that effect. He may
+be loud in applause where nothing has
+been displayed but the old traditions
+of the art. But still this is only one-half
+the knowledge he ought to possess.
+He ought to have studied
+nature, and to have loved the study,
+or he can never estimate, and never
+feel, that <em>truth</em> of effect which is the
+great aim of the artist. Mr Ruskin's
+works will help to shame out of the
+field all such half-informed and conventional
+criticism, the mere connoisseurship
+of the picture gallery. On
+the other hand, they will train men
+who have always been delighted spectators
+of nature to be also attentive
+observers. Our critics will learn how
+to admire, and mere admirers will learn
+how to criticise. Thus a public will
+be educated; and here, if anywhere,
+we may confidently assert that the
+art will prosper in proportion as there
+is an intelligent public to reward it.</p>
+
+<p>We like that bold enterprise of Mr
+Ruskin's which distinguishes the first
+volume, that daring enumeration of
+the great palpable facts of nature&mdash;the
+sky, the sea, the earth, the foliage&mdash;which
+the painter has to represent.
+His descriptions are often made indistinct
+by a multitude of words; but
+there is light in the haze&mdash;there is a
+genuine love of nature felt through
+them. This is almost the only point
+of sympathy we feel with Mr Ruskin;
+it is the only hold his volumes have
+had over us whilst perusing them; we
+may be, therefore, excused if we present
+here to our readers a specimen or
+two of his happier descriptions of
+nature. We will give them <em>the Cloud</em>
+and <em>the Torrent</em>. They will confess that,
+after reading Mr Ruskin's description
+of the clouds, their first feeling will be
+an irresistible impulse to throw open
+the window, and look upon them again
+as they roll through the sky. The
+torrent may not be so near at hand,
+to make renewed acquaintance with.
+We must premise that he has been
+enforcing his favourite precept, the
+minute, and faithful, and perpetual
+study of nature. He very justly scouts
+the absurd idea that trees and rocks
+and clouds are, under any circumstances,
+to be <em>generalised</em>&mdash;so that a
+tree is not to stand for an oak or a
+poplar, a birch or an elm, but for a
+<em>general tree</em>. If a tree is at so great
+a distance that you cannot distinguish
+what it is, as you cannot paint more
+than you see, you must paint it indistinctly.
+But to make a purposed
+indistinctness where the kind of tree<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[330]</a></span>
+would be very plainly seen is a manifest
+absurdity. So, too, the forms of
+clouds should be studied, and as much
+as possible taken from nature, and not
+certain <em>general clouds</em> substituted at
+the artist's pleasure.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"But it is not the outline only which
+is thus systematically false. The drawing
+of the solid form is worse still; for it
+is to be remembered that, although clouds
+of course arrange themselves more or less
+into broad masses, with a light side and
+a dark side, both their light and shade are
+invariably composed of a series of divided
+masses, each of which has in its outline
+as much variety and character as the
+great outline of the cloud; presenting,
+therefore, a thousand times repeated, all
+that I have described as the general form.
+Nor are these multitudinous divisions a
+truth of slight importance in the character
+of sky, for they are dependent on, and
+illustrative of, a quality which is usually
+in a great degree overlooked&mdash;the enormous
+retiring spaces of solid clouds. Between
+the illumined edge of a heaped
+cloud and that part of its body which
+turns into shadow, there will generally be
+a clear distance of several miles&mdash;more or
+less, of course, according to the general
+size of the cloud; but in such large masses
+as Poussin and others of the old masters,
+which occupy the fourth or fifth of the
+visible sky, the clear illumined breadth of
+vapour, from the edge to the shadow,
+involves at least a distance of five or six
+miles. We are little apt, in watching
+the changes of a mountainous range of
+cloud, to reflect that the masses of vapour
+which compose it are linger and higher
+than any mountain-range of the earth;
+and the distances between mass and mass
+are not yards of air, traversed in an
+instant by the flying form, but valleys of
+changing atmosphere leagues over; that
+the slow motion of ascending curves,
+which we can scarcely trace, is a boiling
+energy of exulting vapour rushing into the
+heaven a thousand feet in a minute; and
+that the topling angle, whose sharp edge
+almost escapes notice in the multitudinous
+forms around it, is a nodding precipice of
+storms, three thousand feet from base to
+summit. It is not until we have actually
+compared the forms of the sky with the
+hill-ranges of the earth, and seen the
+soaring alp overtopped and buried in one
+surge of the sky, that we begin to conceive
+or appreciate the colossal scale of
+the phenomena of the latter. But of this
+there can be no doubt in the mind of any
+one accustomed to trace the forms of
+cloud among hill-ranges&mdash;as it is there a
+demonstrable and evident fact&mdash;that the
+space of vapour visibly extended over an
+ordinarily clouded sky is not less, from
+the point nearest to the observer to the
+horizon, than twenty leagues; that the
+size of every mass of separate form, if it
+be at all largely divided, is to be expressed
+in terms of <em>miles</em>; and that every boiling
+heap of illuminated mist in the nearer
+sky is an enormous mountain, fifteen or
+twenty thousand feet in height, six or
+seven miles over in illuminated surface,
+furrowed by a thousand colossal ravines,
+torn by local tempests into peaks and
+promontories, and changing its features
+with the majestic velocity of a volcano."&mdash;(Vol.
+i. p. 228.)</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The forms of clouds, it seems, are
+worth studying: after reading this,
+no landscape-painter will be disposed,
+with hasty slight invention, to sketch
+in these "<em>mountains</em>" of the sky. Here
+is his description, or part of it, first of
+falling, then of running water. With
+the incidental criticism upon painters
+we are not at present concerned:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"A little crumbling white or lightly-rubbed
+paper will soon give the effect of
+indiscriminate foam; but nature gives
+more than foam&mdash;she shows beneath it,
+and through it, a peculiar character of
+exquisitely studied form, bestowed on
+every wave and line of fall; and it is this
+variety of definite character which Turner
+always aims at, rejecting as much as possible
+everything that conceals or overwhelms
+it. Thus, in the Upper Fall of
+the Tees, though the whole basin of the
+fall is blue, and dim with the rising
+vapour, yet the attention of the spectator
+is chiefly directed to the concentric zones
+and delicate curves of the falling water
+itself; and it is impossible to express
+with what exquisite accuracy these are
+given. They are the characteristic of a
+powerful stream descending without impediment
+or break, but from a narrow
+channel, so as to expand as it falls. They
+are the constant form which such a stream
+assumes as it descends; and yet I think
+it would be difficult to point to another
+instance of their being rendered in art.
+You will find nothing in the waterfalls,
+even of our best painters, but springing
+lines of parabolic descent, and splashing
+and shapeless foam; and, in consequence,
+though they may make you understand
+the swiftness of the water, they never let
+you feel the weight of it: the stream, in
+their hands, looks <em>active</em>, not <em>supine</em>, as if
+it leaped, not as if it fell. Now, water
+will leap a little way&mdash;it will leap down
+a weir or over a stone&mdash;but it <em>tumbles</em>
+over a high fall like this; and it is when<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[331]</a></span>
+we have lost the parabolic line, and arrived
+at the catenary&mdash;when we have
+lost the spring of the fall, and arrived at
+the <em>plunge</em> of it&mdash;that we begin really to
+feel its weight and wildness. Where
+water takes its first leap from the top, it
+is cool and collected, and uninteresting
+and mathematical; but it is when it finds
+that it has got into a scrape, and has
+farther to go than it thought for, that its
+character comes out; it is then that it
+begins to writhe and twist, and sweep
+out, zone after zone, in wilder stretching
+as it falls, and to send down the rocket-like,
+lance-pointed, whizzing shafts at its
+sides sounding for the bottom. And it is
+this prostration, the hopeless abandonment
+of its ponderous power to the air,
+which is always peculiarly expressed by
+Turner....</p>
+
+<p>"When water, not in very great body,
+runs in a rocky bed much interrupted by
+hollows, so that it can rest every now and
+then in a pool as it goes long, it does
+not acquire a continuous velocity of motion.
+It pauses after every leap, and
+curdles about, and rests a little, and then
+goes on again; and if, in this comparatively
+tranquil and rational state of mind,
+it meets with any obstacle, as a rock or
+stone, it parts on each side of it with a
+little bubbling foam, and goes round: if it
+comes to a step in its bed, it leaps it
+lightly, and then, after a little splashing
+at the bottom, stops again to take breath.
+But if its bed be on a continuous slope,
+not much interrupted by hollows, so that
+it cannot rest&mdash;or if its own mass be so
+increased by flood that its usual resting-places
+are not sufficient for it, but that it
+is perpetually pushed out of them by the
+following current before it has had time
+to tranquillise itself&mdash;it of course gains
+velocity with every yard that it runs;
+the impetus got at one leap is carried to
+the credit of the next, until the whole
+stream becomes one mass of unchecked
+accelerating motion. Now, when water
+in this state comes to an obstacle, it does
+not part at it, but clears it like a racehorse;
+and when it comes to a hollow, it
+does not fill it up, and run out leisurely at
+the other side, but it rushes down into it,
+and comes up again on the other side, as
+a ship into the hollow of the sea. Hence
+the whole appearance of the bed of the
+stream is changed, and all the lines of the
+water altered in their nature. The quiet
+stream is a succession of leaps and pools;
+the leaps are light and springy and parabolic,
+and make a great deal of splashing
+when they tumble into the pool; then we
+have a space of quiet curdling water, and
+another similar leap below. But the
+stream, when it has gained an impetus,
+takes the shape of its bed, never stops, is
+equally deep and equally swift everywhere,
+goes down into every hollow, not
+with a leap, but with a swing&mdash;not foaming
+nor splashing, but in the bending
+line of a strong sea-wave, and comes up
+again on the other side, over rock and
+ridge, with the ease of a bounding leopard.
+If it meet a rock three or four
+feet above the level of its bed, it will
+neither part nor foam, nor express any
+concern about the matter, but clear it in
+a smooth dome of water without apparent
+exertion, coming down again as smoothly
+on the other side, the whole surface of
+the surge being drawn into parallel lines
+by its extreme velocity, but foamless,
+except in places where the form of the
+bed opposes itself at some direct angle to
+such a line of fall, and causes a breaker;
+so that the whole river has the appearance
+of a deep and raging sea, with this
+only difference, that the torrent waves
+always break backwards, and sea-waves
+forwards. Thus, then, in the water which
+has gained an impetus, we have the most
+exquisite arrangement of curved lines,
+perpetually changing from convex to concave,
+following every swell and hollow of
+the bed with their modulating grace, and
+all in unison of motion, presenting perhaps
+the most beautiful series of inorganic
+forms which nature can possibly
+produce."&mdash;(Vol. i. p. 363.)</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>It is the object of Mr Ruskin, in his
+first volume of <cite>Modern Painters</cite>, to
+show what the artist has to do in his
+imitation of nature. We have no
+material controversy to raise with him
+on this subject; but we cannot help
+expressing our surprise that he should
+have thought it necessary to combat,
+with so much energy, so very primitive
+a notion that the imitation of the
+artist partakes of the nature of a <em>deception</em>,
+and that the highest excellence
+is obtained when the representation
+of any object is taken for the
+object itself. We thought this matter
+had been long ago settled. In a page
+or two of Quatremère de Quincy's
+treatise on <cite>Imitation in the Fine Arts</cite>,
+the reader, if he has still to seek on this
+subject, will find it very briefly and
+lucidly treated. The aim of the artist
+is not to produce such a representation
+as shall be taken, even for a moment,
+for a real object. His aim is, by
+imitating certain qualities or attributes
+of the object, to reproduce for
+us those pleasing or elevating impressions
+which it is the nature of such<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[332]</a></span>
+qualities or attributes to excite. We
+have stated very briefly the accepted
+doctrine on this subject&mdash;so generally
+accepted and understood that Mr
+Ruskin was under no necessity to
+avoid the use of the word imitation,
+as he appears to have done, under the
+apprehension that it was incurably
+infected with this notion of an attempted
+deception. Hardly any reader
+of his book, even without a word of
+explanation, would have attached any
+other meaning to it than what he himself
+expresses by representation of
+certain "truths" of nature.</p>
+
+<p>With respect to the imitations of
+the landscape-painter, the notion of a
+deception cannot occur. His trees
+and rivers cannot be mistaken, for an
+instant, for real trees and rivers, and
+certainly not while they stand there
+in the gilt frame, and the gilt frame
+itself against the papered wall. His
+only chance of deception is to get rid
+of the frame, convert his picture into
+a transparency, and place it in the
+space which a window should occupy.
+In almost all cases, deception is obtained,
+not by painting well, but by
+those artifices which disguise that
+what we see <em>is</em> a painting. At the
+same time, we are not satisfied with an
+expression which several writers, we
+remark, have lately used, and which
+Mr Ruskin very explicitly adopts. The
+imitations of the landscape-painter are
+not a "language" which he uses; they
+are not mere "signs," analogous to
+those which the poet or the orator
+employs. There is no analogy between
+them. Let us analyse our impressions
+as we stand before the artist's landscape,
+not thinking of the artist, or
+his dexterity, but simply absorbed in
+the pleasure which he procures us&mdash;we
+do not find ourselves reverting, in
+imagination, to <em>other</em> trees or other
+rivers than those he has depicted.
+We certainly do not believe them to
+be real trees, but neither are they
+mere signs, or a language to recall such
+objects; but <em>what there is of tree there</em>
+we enjoy. There is the coolness and
+the quiet of the shaded avenue, and
+we feel them; there is the sunlight on
+that bank, and we feel its cheerfulness;
+we feel the serenity of his river.
+He has brought the spirit of the trees
+around us; the imagination rests in
+the picture. In other departments of
+art the effect is the same. If we
+stand before a head of Rembrandt or
+Vandyke, we do not think that it
+lives; but neither do we think of some
+other head, of which that is the type.
+But there is majesty, there is thought,
+there is calm repose, there is some
+phase of humanity expressed before
+us, and we are occupied with so much
+of human life, or human character, as
+is then and there given us.</p>
+
+<p>Imitate as many qualities of the
+real object as you please, but always
+the highest, never sacrificing a truth
+of the mind, or the heart, for one only
+of the sense. Truth, as Mr Ruskin
+most justly says&mdash;truth always. When
+it is said that truth should not be
+always expressed, the maxim, if properly
+understood, resolves into this&mdash;that
+the higher truth is not to be
+sacrificed to the lower. In a landscape,
+the gradation of light and shade
+is a more important truth than the
+exact brilliancy (supposing it to be
+attainable,) of any individual object.
+The painter must calculate what
+means he has at his disposal for representing
+this gradation of light, and
+he must pitch his tone accordingly.
+Say he pitches it far below reality, he
+is still in search of truth&mdash;of contrast
+and degree.</p>
+
+<p>Sometimes it may happen that, by
+rendering one detail faithfully, an
+artist may give a false impression,
+simply because he cannot render other
+details or facts by which it is accompanied
+in nature. Here, too, he would
+only sacrifice truth <em>in the cause of
+truth</em>. The admirers of Constable
+will perhaps dispute the aptness of our
+illustration. Nevertheless his works
+appear to us to afford a curious example
+of a scrupulous accuracy or
+detail producing a false impression.
+Constable, looking at foliage under
+the sunlight, and noting that the leaf,
+especially after a shower, will reflect
+so much light that the tree will seem
+more white than green, determined to
+paint all the white he saw. Constable
+could paint white leaves. So far so
+well. But then these leaves in nature
+are almost always in motion: they
+are white at one moment and green
+the next. We never have the impression
+of a white leaf; for it is seen
+playing with the light&mdash;its mirror, for
+one instant, and glancing from it the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[333]</a></span>
+next. Constable could not paint
+motion. He could not imitate this
+shower of light in the living tree. He
+must leave his white paint where he
+has once put it. Other artists before
+him had seen the same light, but,
+knowing that they could not bring
+the breeze into their canvass, they
+wisely concluded that less white paint
+than Constable uses would produce a
+more truthful impression.</p>
+
+<p>But we must no longer be detained
+from the more immediate task before
+us. We must now follow Mr Ruskin
+to his second volume of <cite>Modern
+Painters</cite>, where he explains his theory
+of the beautiful; and although this
+will not be to readers in general the
+most attractive portion of his writings,
+and we ourselves have to practise
+some sort of self-denial in fixing
+our attention upon it, yet manifestly
+it is here that we must look for the
+basis or fundamental principles of all
+his criticisms in art. The order in
+which his works have been published
+was apparently deranged by a generous
+zeal, which could brook no delay,
+to defend Mr Turner from the censures
+of the undiscerning public. If the
+natural or systematic order had been
+preserved, the materials of this second
+volume would have formed the first
+preliminary treatise, determining
+those broad principles of taste, or
+that philosophical theory of the beautiful,
+on which the whole of the subsequent
+works were to be modelled.
+Perhaps this broken and reversed order
+of publication has not been unfortunate
+for the success of the author&mdash;perhaps
+it was dimly foreseen to be
+not altogether impolitic; for the popular
+ear was gained by the bold and
+enthusiastic defence of a great painter;
+and the ear of the public, once caught,
+may be detained by matter which, in
+the first instance, would have appealed
+to it in vain. Whether the effect of
+chance or design, we may certainly
+congratulate Mr Ruskin on the fortunate
+succession, and the fortunate
+rapidity with which his publications
+have struck on the public ear. The
+popular feeling, won by the zeal and
+intrepidity of the first volume of
+<cite>Modern Painters</cite>, was no doubt a little
+tried by the graver discussions of the
+second. It was soon, however, to be
+again caught, and pleased by a bold
+and agreeable miscellany under the
+magical name of "The Seven Lamps;"
+and these Seven Lamps could hardly
+fail to throw some portion of their
+pleasant and bewildering light over a
+certain rudimentary treatise upon
+building, which was to appear under
+the title of "The Stones of Venice."</p>
+
+<p>We cannot, however, congratulate
+Mr Ruskin on the manner in which he
+has acquitted himself in this arena of
+philosophical inquiry, nor on the sort
+of theory of the Beautiful which he
+has contrived to construct. The least
+metaphysical of our readers is aware
+that there is a controversy of long
+standing upon this subject, between
+two different schools of philosophy.
+With the one the beautiful is described
+as a great "idea" of the reason, or an
+intellectual intuition, or a simple intuitive
+perception; different expressions
+are made use of, but all imply
+that it is a great primary feeling, or
+sentiment, or idea of the human mind,
+and as incapable of further analysis
+as the idea of space, or the simplest
+of our sensations. The rival school
+of theorists maintain, on the contrary,
+that no sentiment yields more readily
+to analysis; and that the beautiful, except
+in those rare cases where the
+whole charm lies in one sensation, as in
+that of colour, is a complex sentiment.
+They describe it as a pleasure resulting
+from the presence of the visible
+object, but of which the visible object
+is only in part the immediate cause.
+Of a great portion of the pleasure it
+is merely the vehicle; and they say
+that blended reminiscences, gathered
+from every sense, and every human
+affection, from the softness of touch
+of an infant's finger to the highest
+contemplations of a devotional spirit,
+have contributed, in their turn, to this
+delightful sentiment.</p>
+
+<p>Mr Ruskin was not bound to belong
+to either of these schools of philosophy;
+he was at liberty to construct
+an eclectic system of his own;&mdash;and
+he has done so. We shall take the
+precaution, in so delicate a matter, of
+quoting Mr Ruskin's own words for
+the exposition of his own theory.
+Meanwhile, as some clue to the reader,
+we may venture to say that he agrees
+with the first of these schools in
+adopting a primary intuitive sentiment
+of the beautiful; but then this<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[334]</a></span>
+primary intuition is only of a sensational
+or "animal" nature&mdash;a subordinate
+species of the beautiful, which
+is chiefly valuable as the necessary
+condition of the higher and truly
+beautiful; and this last he agrees
+with the opposite school in regarding
+as a derived sentiment&mdash;derived by
+contemplating the objects of external
+nature as types of the Divine attributes.
+This is a brief summary of the
+theory; for a fuller exposition we
+shall have recourse to his own words.</p>
+
+<p>The term <em>Æsthetic</em>, which has been
+applied to this branch of philosophy,
+Mr Ruskin discards; he offers as a
+substitute <em>Theoria</em>, or <em>The Theoretic
+Faculty</em>, the meaning of which he
+thus explains:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"I proceed, therefore, first to examine
+the nature of what I have called the
+theoretic faculty, and to justify my substitution
+of the term 'Theoretic' for
+'Æsthetic,' which is the one commonly
+employed with reference to it.</p>
+
+<p>"Now the term 'æsthesis' properly
+signifies mere sensual perception of the
+outward qualities and necessary effects
+of bodies; in which sense only, if we
+would arrive at any accurate conclusions
+on this difficult subject, it should always
+be used. But I wholly deny that the
+impressions of beauty <em>are in any way sensual</em>;&mdash;they
+are neither sensual nor intellectual,
+<em>but moral</em>; and for the faculty
+receiving them, whose difference from
+mere perception I shall immediately endeavour
+to explain, no terms can be more
+accurate or convenient than that employed
+by the Greeks, 'Theoretic,' which
+I pray permission, therefore, always to
+use, and to call the operation of the
+faculty itself, Theoria."&mdash;(P. 11.)</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>We are introduced to a new faculty
+of the human mind; let us see what
+new or especial sphere of operation is
+assigned to it. After some remarks
+on the superiority of the mere sensual
+pleasures of the eye and the ear, but
+particularly of the eye, to those derived
+from other organs of sense, he
+continues:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"Herein, then, we find very sufficient
+ground for the higher estimation of these
+delights: first, in their being eternal and
+inexhaustible; and, secondly, in their being
+evidently no meaner instrument of life,
+but an object of life. Now, in whatever
+is an object of life, in whatever may be
+infinitely and for itself desired, we may
+be sure there is something of divine: for
+God will not make anything an object of
+life to his creatures which does not point
+to, or partake of himself,"&mdash;[a bold assertion.]
+"And so, though we were to regard
+the pleasures of sight merely as the
+highest of sensual pleasures, and though
+they were of rare occurrence&mdash;and, when
+occurring, isolated and imperfect&mdash;there
+would still be supernatural character
+about them, owing to their self-sufficiency.
+But when, instead of being scattered,
+interrupted, or chance-distributed,
+they are gathered together and so arranged
+to enhance each other, as by
+chance they could not be, there is caused
+by them, not only a feeling of strong
+affection towards the object in which
+they exist, but a perception of purpose
+and adaptation of it to our desires; a
+perception, therefore, of the immediate
+operation of the Intelligence which so
+formed us and so feeds us.</p>
+
+<p>"Out of what perception arise Joy,
+Admiration, and Gratitude?</p>
+
+<p>"Now, the mere animal consciousness
+of the pleasantness I call Æsthesis; but
+the exulting, reverent, and grateful perception
+of it I call Theoria. For this,
+and this only, is the full comprehension
+and contemplation of the beautiful as a
+gift of God; a gift not necessary to our
+being, but adding to and elevating it,
+and twofold&mdash;first, of the desire; and,
+secondly, of the thing desired."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>We find, then, that in the production
+of the full sentiment of the beautiful
+<em>two</em> faculties are employed, or
+two distinct operations denoted. First,
+there is the "animal pleasantness
+which we call Æsthesis,"&mdash;which
+sometimes appears confounded with
+the mere pleasures of sense, but which
+the whole current of his speculations
+obliges us to conclude is some separate
+intuition of a sensational character;
+and, secondly, there is "the exulting,
+reverent, and grateful perception of
+it, which we call Theoria," which
+alone is the truly beautiful, and which
+it is the function of the Theoretic Faculty
+to reveal to us. But this new
+Theoretic Faculty&mdash;what can it be but
+the old faculty of Human Reason,
+exercised upon the great subject of
+Divine beneficence?</p>
+
+<p>Mr Ruskin, as we shall see, discovers
+that external objects are beautiful
+because they are types of Divine
+attributes; but he admits, and is solicitous
+to impress upon our minds,
+that the "meaning" of these types is
+"learnt." When, in a subsequent<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[335]</a></span>
+part of his work, he feels himself
+pressed by the objection that many
+celebrated artists, who have shown a
+vivid appreciation and a great passion
+for the beautiful, have manifested
+no peculiar piety, have been rather
+deficient in spiritual-mindedness, he
+gives them over to that instinctive
+sense he has called Æsthesis, and
+says&mdash;"It will be remembered that I
+have, throughout the examination of
+typical beauty, asserted our instinctive
+sense of it; the moral <em>meaning</em> of it
+being only discoverable by reflection,"
+(p. 127.) Now, there is no other conceivable
+manner in which the meaning
+of the type can be learnt than by
+the usual exercise of the human reason,
+detecting traces of the Divine
+power, and wisdom, and benevolence,
+in the external world, and then associating
+with the various objects of the
+external world the ideas we have thus
+acquired of the Divine wisdom and
+goodness. The rapid and habitual
+regard of certain facts or appearances
+in the visible world, as types of the
+attributes of God, <em>can</em> be nothing else
+but one great instance (or class of
+instances) of that law of association
+of ideas on which the second school
+of philosophy we have alluded to so
+largely insist. And thus, whether
+Mr Ruskin chooses to acquiesce in it
+or not, his "Theoria" resolves itself
+into a portion, or fragment, of that
+theory of association of ideas, to which
+he declares, and perhaps believes,
+himself to be violently opposed.</p>
+
+<p>In a very curious manner, therefore,
+has Mr Ruskin selected his materials
+from the two rival schools of
+metaphysics. His <em>Æsthesis</em> is an intuitive
+perception, but of a mere sensual
+or animal nature&mdash;sometimes almost
+confounded with the mere pleasure
+of sense, at other times advanced
+into considerable importance, as where
+he has to explain the fact that men
+of very little piety have a very acute
+perception of beauty. His <em>Theoria</em> is,
+and can be, nothing more than the
+results of human reason in its highest
+and noblest exercise, rapidly brought
+before the mind by a habitual association
+of ideas. For the lowest element
+of the beautiful he runs to the
+school of intuitions;&mdash;they will not
+thank him for the compliment;&mdash;for
+the higher to that analytic school,
+and that theory of association of ideas,
+to which throughout he is ostensibly
+opposed.</p>
+
+<p>This <em>Theoria</em> divides itself into two
+parts. We shall quote Mr Ruskin's
+own words and take care to quote
+from them passages where he seems
+most solicitous to be accurate and
+explanatory:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"The first thing, then, we have to do,"
+he says, "is accurately to discriminate
+and define those appearances from which
+we are about to reason as belonging to
+beauty, properly so called, and to clear
+the ground of all the confused ideas and
+erroneous theories with which the misapprehension
+or metaphorical use of the
+term has encumbered it.</p>
+
+<p>"By the term Beauty, then, properly
+are signified two things: first, that external
+quality of bodies, already so often
+spoken of, and which, whether it occur
+in a stone, flower, beast, or in man, is
+absolutely identical&mdash;which, as I have
+already asserted, may be shown to be in
+some sort typical of the Divine attributes,
+and which, therefore, I shall, for distinction's
+sake, call Typical Beauty; and,
+secondarily, the appearance of felicitous
+fulfilment of functions in living things,
+more especially of the joyful and right
+exertion of perfect life in man&mdash;and this
+kind of beauty I shall call Vital Beauty."&mdash;(P.
+26.)</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The Vital Beauty, as well as the
+Typical, partakes essentially, as far
+as we can understand our author, of
+a religious character. On turning to
+that part of the volume where it is
+treated of at length, we find a universal
+sympathy and spirit of kindliness
+very properly insisted on, as one great
+element of the sentiment of beauty; but
+we are not permitted to dwell upon this
+element, or rest upon it a moment,
+without some reference to our relation
+to God. Even the animals themselves
+seem to be turned into types for us
+of our moral feelings or duties. We
+are expressly told that we cannot
+have this sympathy with life and
+enjoyment in other creatures, unless
+it takes the form of, or comes accompanied
+with, a sentiment of piety. In
+all cases where the beautiful is anything
+higher than a certain "animal
+pleasantness," we are to understand
+that it has a religious character.
+"In all cases," he says, summing up
+the functions of the Theoretic Faculty,
+"<em>it is something Divine</em>; either the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[336]</a></span>
+approving voice of God, the glorious
+symbol of Him, the evidence of His
+kind presence, or the obedience to His
+will by Him induced and supported,"&mdash;(p.
+126.) Now it is a delicate task,
+when a man errs by the exaggeration
+of a great truth or a noble sentiment,
+to combat his error; and yet as much
+mischief may ultimately arise from
+an error of this description as from
+any other. The thoughts and feelings
+which Mr Ruskin has described, form
+the noblest part of our sentiment of
+the beautiful, as they form the noblest
+phase of the human reason. But they
+are not the whole of it. The visible
+object, to adopt his phraseology, does
+become a type to the contemplative
+and pious mind of the attribute of
+God, and is thus exalted to our apprehension.
+But it is not beautiful
+solely or originally on this account.
+To assert this, is simply to falsify our
+human nature.</p>
+
+<p>Before, however, we enter into these
+<em>types</em>, or this typical beauty, it will be
+well to notice how Mr Ruskin deals
+with previous and opposing theories.
+It will be well also to remind our
+readers of the outline of that theory
+of association of ideas which is here
+presented to us in so very confused a
+manner. We shall then be better
+able to understand the very curious
+position our author has taken up in
+this domain of speculative philosophy.</p>
+
+<p>Mr Ruskin gives us the following
+summary of the "errors" which he
+thinks it necessary in the first place
+to clear from his path:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"Those erring or inconsistent positions
+which I would at once dismiss are, the
+first, that the beautiful is the true; the
+second, that the beautiful is the useful;
+the third, that it is dependent on custom;
+and the fourth, that it is dependent on
+the association of ideas."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The first of these theories, that the
+beautiful is the true, we leave entirely
+to the tender mercies of Mr Ruskin;
+we cannot gather from his refutation
+to what class of theorists he is alluding.
+The remaining three are, as we
+understand the matter, substantially
+one and the same theory. We believe
+that no one, in these days, would define
+beauty as solely resulting either from
+the apprehension of Utility, (that is,
+the adjustment of parts to a whole, or
+the application of the object to an
+ulterior purpose,) or to Familiarity
+and the affection which custom engenders;
+but they would regard both
+Utility and Familiarity as amongst the
+sources of those agreeable ideas or
+impressions, which, by the great law
+of association, became intimately connected
+with the visible object. We
+must listen, however, to Mr Ruskin's
+refutation of them:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"That the beautiful is the <em>useful</em> is an
+assertion evidently based on that limited
+and false sense of the latter term which I
+have already deprecated. As it is the
+most degrading and dangerous supposition
+which can be advanced on the subject,
+so, fortunately, it is the most palpably
+absurd. It is to confound admiration
+with hunger, love with lust, and life
+with sensation; it is to assert that the
+human creature has no ideas and no feelings,
+except those ultimately referable to
+its brutal appetites. It has not a single
+fact, nor appearance of fact, to support it,
+and needs no combating&mdash;at least until its
+advocates have obtained the consent of
+the majority of mankind that the most
+beautiful productions of nature are seeds
+and roots; and of art, spades and millstones.</p>
+
+<p>"Somewhat more rational grounds
+appear for the assertion that the sense of
+the beautiful arises from <em>familiarity</em> with
+the object, though even this could not
+long be maintained by a thinking person.
+For all that can be alleged in defence of
+such a supposition is, that familiarity
+deprives some objects which at first appeared
+ugly of much of their repulsiveness;
+whence it is as rational to conclude
+that familiarity is the cause of beauty, as
+it would be to argue that, because it is
+possible to acquire a taste for olives,
+therefore custom is the cause of lusciousness
+in grapes....</p>
+
+<p>"I pass to the last and most weighty
+theory, that the agreeableness in objects
+which we call beauty is the result of the
+association with them of agreeable or
+interesting ideas.</p>
+
+<p>"Frequent has been the support and
+wide the acceptance of this supposition,
+and yet I suppose that no two consecutive
+sentences were ever written in
+defence of it, without involving either a
+contradiction or a confusion of terms.
+Thus Alison, 'There are scenes undoubtedly
+more beautiful than Runnymede,
+yet, to those who recollect the great
+event that passed there, there is no scene
+perhaps which so strongly seizes on the
+imagination,'&mdash;where we are wonder-struck
+at the bold obtuseness which
+would prove the power of imagination by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[337]</a></span>
+its overcoming that very other power (of
+inherent beauty) whose existence the
+arguer desires; for the only logical conclusion
+which can possibly be drawn
+from the above sentence is, that imagination
+is <em>not</em> the source of beauty&mdash;for,
+although no scene seizes so strongly on
+the imagination, yet there are scenes
+'more beautiful than Runnymede.' And
+though instances of self-contradiction as
+laconic and complete as this are rare, yet,
+if the arguments on the subject be fairly
+sifted from the mass of confused language
+with which they are always encumbered,
+they will be found invariably to fall into
+one of these two forms: either association
+gives pleasure, and beauty gives
+pleasure, therefore association is beauty;
+or the power of association is stronger
+than the power of beauty, therefore the
+power of association <em>is</em> the power of
+beauty."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Now this last sentence is sheer
+nonsense, and only proves that the
+author had never given himself the
+trouble to understand the theory he
+so flippantly discards. No one ever
+said that "association gives pleasure;"
+but very many, and Mr Ruskin
+amongst the rest, have said that
+associated thought adds its pleasure
+to an object pleasing in itself, and
+thus increases the complex sentiment
+of beauty. That it is a complex
+sentiment in all its higher forms, Mr
+Ruskin himself will tell us. As to
+the manner in which he deals with
+Alison, it is in the worst possible
+spirit of controversy. Alison was
+an elegant, but not a very precise
+writer; it was the easiest thing in
+the world to select an unfortunate
+illustration, and to convict <em>that</em> of
+absurdity. Yet he might with equal
+ease have selected many other illustrations
+from Alison, which would
+have done justice to the theory he
+expounds. A hundred such will
+immediately occur to the reader. If,
+instead of a historical recollection of
+this kind, which could hardly make
+the stream itself of Runnymede look
+more beautiful, Alison had confined
+himself to those impressions which
+the generality of mankind receive
+from river scenery, he would have
+had no difficulty in showing (as we
+believe he has elsewhere done) how,
+in this case, ideas gathered from
+different sources flow into one harmonious
+and apparently simple feeling.
+That sentiment of beauty which
+arises as we look upon a river will be
+acknowledged by most persons to be
+composed of many associated thoughts,
+combining with the object before them.
+Its form and colour, its bright surface
+and its green banks, are all that the
+eye immediately gives us; but with
+these are combined the remembered
+coolness of the fluent stream, and of
+the breeze above it, and of the
+pleasant shade of its banks; and
+beside all this&mdash;as there are few persons
+who have not escaped with
+delight from town or village, to
+wander by the quiet banks of some
+neighbouring stream, so there are
+few persons who do not associate
+with river scenery ideas of peace and
+serenity. Now many of these
+thoughts or facts are such as the eye
+does not take cognisance of, yet they
+present themselves as instantaneously
+as the visible form, and so blended as
+to seem, for the moment, to belong to it.</p>
+
+<p>Why not have selected some such
+illustration as this, instead of the unfortunate
+Runnymede, from a work
+where so many abound as apt as they
+are elegantly expressed? As to Mr
+Ruskin's utilitarian philosopher, it is a
+fabulous creature&mdash;no such being exists.
+Nor need we detain ourselves
+with the quite departmental subject of
+Familiarity. But let us endeavour&mdash;without
+desiring to pledge ourselves
+or our readers to its final adoption&mdash;to
+relieve the theory of association of
+ideas from the obscurity our author
+has thrown around it. Our readers
+will not find that this is altogether a
+wasted labour.</p>
+
+<p>With Mr Ruskin we are of opinion
+that, in a discussion of this kind, the
+term Beauty ought to be limited to
+the impression derived, mediately or
+immediately, from the visible object.
+It would be useless affectation to
+attempt to restrict the use of the word,
+in general, to this application. We
+can have no objection to the term
+Beautiful being applied to a piece of
+music, or to an eloquent composition,
+prose or verse, or even to our moral
+feelings and heroic actions; the word
+has received this general application,
+and there is, at basis, a great deal in
+common between all these and the
+sentiment of beauty attendant on the
+visible object. For music, or sweet<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[338]</a></span>
+sounds, and poetry, and our moral
+feelings, have much to do (through the
+law of association) with our sentiment
+of the Beautiful. It is quite
+enough if, speaking of the subject of
+our analysis, we limit it to those impressions,
+however originated, which
+attend upon the visible object.</p>
+
+<p>One preliminary word on this association
+of ideas. It is from its very
+nature, and the nature of human life,
+of all degrees of intimacy&mdash;from the
+casual suggestion, or the case where
+the two ideas are at all times felt to
+be distinct, to those close combinations
+where the two ideas have apparently
+coalesced into one, or require
+an attentive analysis to separate
+them. You see a mass of iron; you
+may be said <em>to see its weight</em>, the impression
+of its weight is so intimately
+combined with its form. The <em>light</em>
+of the sun, and the <em>heat</em> of the sun
+are learnt from different senses, yet
+we never see the one without thinking
+of the other, and the reflection of the
+sunbeam seen upon a bank immediately
+suggests the idea of <em>warmth</em>.
+But it is not necessary that the combination
+should be always so perfect
+as in this instance, in order to produce
+the effect we speak of under the
+name of Association of Ideas. It is
+hardly possible for us to abstract the
+<em>glow</em> of the sunbeam from its light;
+but the fertility which follows upon
+the presence of the sun, though a
+suggestion which habitually occurs to
+reflective minds, is an association of a
+far less intimate nature. It is sufficiently
+intimate, however, to blend
+with that feeling of admiration we
+have when we speak of the beauty of
+the sun. There is the golden harvest
+in its summer beams. Again, the
+contemplative spirit in all ages has
+formed an association between the
+sun and the Deity, whether as the
+fittest symbol of God, or as being His
+greatest gift to man. Here we have
+an association still more refined, and
+of a somewhat less frequent character,
+but one which will be found to enter,
+in a very subtle manner, into that impression
+we receive from the great
+luminary.</p>
+
+<p>And thus it is that, in different
+minds, the same materials of thought
+may be combined in a closer or laxer
+relationship. This should be borne in
+mind by the candid inquirer. That
+in many instances ideas from different
+sources do coalesce, in the manner
+we have been describing, he cannot
+for an instant doubt. He seems <em>to
+see</em> the coolness of that river; he seems
+<em>to see</em> the warmth on that sunny bank.
+In many instances, however, he must
+make allowance for the different habitudes
+of life. The same illustration
+will not always have the same force
+to all men. Those who have cultivated
+their minds by different pursuits,
+or lived amongst scenery of a different
+character, cannot have formed
+exactly the same moral association
+with external nature.</p>
+
+<p>These preliminaries being adjusted,
+what, we ask, is that first original
+charm of the <em>visible object</em> which serves
+as the foundation for this wonderful
+superstructure of the Beautiful, to
+which almost every department of
+feeling and of thought will be found
+to bring its contribution? What is
+it so pleasurable that the eye at once
+receives from the external world, that
+round <em>it</em> should have gathered all
+these tributary pleasures? Light&mdash;colour&mdash;form;
+but, in reference to our
+discussion, pre-eminently the exquisite
+pleasure derived from the sense
+of light, pure or coloured. Colour,
+from infancy to old age, is one original,
+universal, perpetual source of
+delight, the first and constant element
+of the Beautiful.</p>
+
+<p>We are far from thinking that the
+eye does not at once take cognisance
+of form as well as colour. Some
+ingenious analysts have supposed that
+the sensation of colour is, in its origin,
+a mere mental affection, having no
+reference to space or external objects,
+and that it obtains this reference
+through the contemporaneous acquisition
+of the sense of touch. But there
+can be no more reason for supposing
+that the sense of touch informs us immediately
+of an external world than
+that the sense of colour does. If we do
+not allow to all the senses an intuitive
+reference to the external world, we
+shall get it from none of them. Dr
+Brown, who paid particular attention
+to this subject, and who was desirous
+to limit the first intimation of the
+sense of sight to an abstract sensation
+of unlocalised colour, failed entirely
+in his attempt to obtain from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[339]</a></span>
+any other source the idea of space or
+<em>outness</em>; Kant would have given him
+certain subjective <em>forms of the sensitive
+faculty</em>, space and time. These he
+did not like: he saw that, if he denied
+to the eye an immediate perception of
+the external world, he must also deny
+it to the touch; he therefore prayed
+in aid certain muscular sensations
+from which the idea of <em>resistance</em> would
+be obtained. But it seems to us evident
+that not till <em>after</em> we have
+acquired a knowledge of the external
+world can we connect <em>volition</em> with
+muscular movement, and that, until
+that connection is made, the muscular
+sensations stand in the same predicament
+as other sensations, and could
+give him no aid in solving his problem.
+We cannot go further into this
+matter at present.<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> The mere flash
+of light which follows the touch upon
+the optic nerve represents itself as
+something <em>without</em>; nor was colour,
+we imagine, ever felt, but under some
+<em>form</em> more or less distinct; although
+in the human being the eye seems to
+depend on the touch far more than in
+other animals, for its further instruction.</p>
+
+<p>But although the eye is cognisant
+of form as well as colour, it is in the
+sensation of colour that we must seek
+the primitive pleasure derived from
+this organ. And probably the first
+reason why form pleases is this, that
+the boundaries of form are also the
+lines of contrast of colour. It is a
+general law of all sensation that, if it
+be continued, our susceptibility to it
+declines. It was necessary that the eye
+should be always open. Its susceptibility
+is sustained by the perpetual
+contrast of colours. Whether the
+contrast is sudden, or whether one
+hue shades gradually into another,
+we see here an original and primary
+source of pleasure. A constant
+variety, in some way produced, is
+essential to the maintenance of the
+pleasure derived from colour.</p>
+
+<p>It is not incumbent on us to inquire
+how far the beauty of form may be
+traceable to the sensation of touch;&mdash;a
+very small portion of it we suspect.
+In the human countenance, and in
+sculpture, the beauty of form is almost
+resolvable into expression; though
+possibly the soft and rounded outline
+may in some measure be associated
+with the sense of smoothness to the
+touch. All that we are concerned to
+show is, that there is here in colour,
+diffused as it is over the whole world,
+and perpetually varied, a <em>beauty</em> at
+once showered upon the visible object.
+We hear it said, if you resolve all into
+association, where will you begin?
+You have but a circle of feelings. If
+moral sentiment, for instance, be not
+itself the beautiful, why should it become
+so by association. There must
+be something else that is <em>the beautiful</em>,
+by association with which it passes
+for such. We answer, that we do not
+resolve <em>all</em> into association; that we
+have in this one gift of colour, shed
+so bountifully over the whole world,
+an original beauty, a delight which
+makes the external object pleasant
+and beloved; for how can we fail, in
+some sort, to love what produces so
+much pleasure?</p>
+
+<p>We are at a loss to understand how
+any one can speak with disparagement
+of colour as a source of the
+beautiful. The sculptor may, perhaps,
+by his peculiar education, grow comparatively
+indifferent to it: we know
+not how this may be; but let any
+man, of the most refined taste imaginable,
+think what he owes to this<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[340]</a></span>
+source, when he walks out at evening,
+and sees the sun set amongst the
+hills. The same concave sky, the same
+scene, so far as its form is concerned,
+was there a few hours before, and saddened
+him with its gloom; one leaden
+hue prevailed over all; and now in a
+clear sky the sun is setting, and the
+hills are purple, and the clouds are
+radiant with every colour that can be
+extracted from the sunbeam. He
+can hardly believe that it is the same
+scene, or he the same man. Here
+the grown-up man and the child stand
+always on the same level. As to the
+infant, note how its eye feeds upon a
+brilliant colour, or the living flame.
+If it had wings, it would assuredly do
+as the moth does. And take the
+most untutored rustic, let him be old,
+and dull, and stupid, yet, as long as
+the eye has vitality in it, will he look
+up with long untiring gaze at this
+blue vault of the sky, traversed by its
+glittering clouds, and pierced by the
+tall green trees around him.</p>
+
+<p>Is it any marvel now that round
+the <em>visible object</em> should associate
+tributary feelings of pleasure? How
+many pleasing and tender sentiments
+gather round the rose! Yet the rose
+is beautiful in itself. It was beautiful
+to the child by its colour, its texture,
+its softly-shaded leaf, and the contrast
+between the flower and the foliage.
+Love, and poetry, and the tender regrets
+of advanced life, have contributed
+a second dower of beauty.
+The rose is more to the youth and to
+the old man than it was to the child;
+but still to the last they both feel the
+pleasure of the child.</p>
+
+<p>The more commonplace the illustration,
+the more suited it is to our
+purpose. If any one will reflect on
+the many ideas that cluster round this
+beautiful flower, he will not fail to
+see how numerous and subtle may be
+the association formed with the visible
+object. Even an idea painful in
+itself may, by way of contrast, serve
+to heighten the pleasure of others with
+which it is associated. Here the
+thought of decay and fragility, like a
+discord amongst harmonies, increases
+our sentiment of tenderness. We
+express, we believe, the prevailing
+taste when we say that there is nothing,
+in the shape of art, so disagreeable
+and repulsive as artificial
+flowers. The waxen flower may be
+an admirable imitation, but it is a
+detestable thing. This partly results
+from the nature of the imitation; a
+vulgar deception is often practised
+upon us: what is not a flower is intended
+to pass for one. But it is
+owing still more, we think, to the
+contradiction that is immediately
+afterwards felt between this preserved
+and imperishable waxen flower, and
+the transitory and perishable rose.
+It is the nature of the rose to bud, and
+blossom, and decay; it gives its
+beauty to the breeze and to the
+shower; it is mortal; it is <em>ours</em>; it
+bears our hopes, our loves, our regrets.
+This waxen substitute, that
+cannot change or decay, is a contradiction
+and a disgust.</p>
+
+<p>Amongst objects of man's contrivance,
+the sail seen upon the calm
+waters of a lake or a river is universally
+felt to be beautiful. The form
+is graceful, and the movement gentle,
+and its colour contrasts well either
+with the shore or the water. But
+perhaps the chief element of our pleasure
+is all association with human life,
+with peaceful enjoyment&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">To waft me from distraction."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Or take one of the noblest objects
+in nature&mdash;the mountain. There is
+no object except the sea and the sky
+that reflects to the sight colours so
+beautiful, and in such masses. But
+colour, and form, and magnitude,
+constitute but a part of the beauty or
+the sublimity of the mountain. Not
+only do the clouds encircle or rest
+upon it, but men have laid on it their
+grandest thoughts: we have associated
+with it our moral fortitude, and
+all we understand of greatness or
+elevation of mind; our phraseology
+seems half reflected from the mountain.
+Still more, we have made it
+holy ground. Has not God himself descended
+on the mountain? Are not
+the hills, once and for ever, "the
+unwalled temples of our earth?"
+And still there is another circumstance
+attendant upon mountain scenery,
+which adds a solemnity of its own,
+and is a condition of the enjoyment of
+other sources of the sublime&mdash;solitude.
+It seems to us that the feeling of solitude
+almost always associates itself
+with mountain scenery. Mrs Somerville,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[341]</a></span>
+in the description which she
+gives or quotes, in her <cite>Physical Geography</cite>,
+of the Himalayas, says&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"The loftiest peaks being bare of snow
+gives great variety of colour and beauty
+to the scenery, which in these passes is
+at all times magnificent. During the
+day, the stupendous size of the mountains,
+their interminable extent, the variety and
+the sharpness of their forms, and, above
+all, the tender clearness of their distant
+outline melting into the pale blue sky,
+contrasted with the deep azure above, is
+described as a scene of wild and wonderful
+beauty. At midnight, when myriads
+of stars sparkle in the black sky, and
+the pure blue of the mountains looks
+deeper still below the pale white gleam
+of the earth and snow-light, the effect is
+of unparalleled sublimity, and no language
+can describe the splendour of the
+sunbeams at daybreak, streaming between
+the high peaks, and throwing their
+gigantic shadows on the mountains below.
+There, far above the habitation of
+man, no living thing exists, no sound is
+heard; the very echo of the traveller's
+footsteps startles him in the awful <em>solitude
+and silence</em> that reigns in those
+august dwellings of everlasting snow."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>No one can fail to recognise the
+effect of the last circumstance mentioned.
+Let those mountains be the
+scene of a gathering of any human
+multitude, and they would be more
+desecrated than if their peaks had
+been levelled to the ground. We
+have also quoted this description to
+show how large a share <em>colour</em> takes
+in beautifying such a scene. Colour,
+either in large fields of it, or in sharp
+contrasts, or in gradual shading&mdash;the
+play of light, in short, upon this world&mdash;is
+the first element of beauty.</p>
+
+<p>Here would be the place, were we
+writing a formal treatise upon this
+subject, after showing that there is
+in the sense of sight itself a sufficient
+elementary beauty, whereto other
+pleasurable reminiscences may attach
+themselves, to point out some of these
+tributaries. Each sense&mdash;the touch,
+the ear, the smell, the taste&mdash;blend
+their several remembered pleasures
+with the object of vision. Even taste,
+we say, although Mr Ruskin will
+scorn the gross alliance. And we
+would allude to the fact to show the
+extreme subtilty of these mental processes.
+The fruit which you think of
+eating has lost its beauty from that
+moment&mdash;it assumes to you a quite
+different relation; but the reminiscence
+that there is sweetness in the
+peach or the grape, whilst it remains
+quite subordinate to the pleasure derived
+from the sense of sight, mingles
+with and increases that pleasure.
+Whilst the cluster of ripe grapes is
+looked at only for its beauty, the idea
+that they are pleasant to the taste as
+well steals in unobserved, and adds
+to the complex sentiment. If this
+idea grow distinct and prominent,
+the beauty of the grape is gone&mdash;you
+eat it. Here, too, would be the place
+to take notice of such sources of pleasure
+as are derived from adaptation
+of parts, or the adaptation of the
+whole to ulterior purposes; but here
+especially should we insist on human
+affections, human loves, human sympathies.
+Here, in the heart of man,
+his hopes, his regrets, his affections,
+do we find the great source of the
+beautiful&mdash;tributaries which take their
+name from the stream they join,
+but which often form the main current.
+On that sympathy with which
+nature has so wonderfully endowed
+us, which makes the pain and pleasure
+of all other living things our own
+pain and pleasure, which binds us
+not only to our fellow-men, but to
+every moving creature on the face of
+the earth, we should have much to
+say. How much, for instance, does
+its <em>life</em> add to the beauty of the swan!&mdash;how
+much more its calm and placid
+life! Here, and on what would follow
+on the still more exalted mood of
+pious contemplation&mdash;when all nature
+seems as a hymn or song of praise to
+the Creator&mdash;we should be happy to
+borrow aid from Mr Ruskin; his
+essay supplying admirable materials
+for certain <em>chapters</em> in a treatise on
+the beautiful which should embrace
+the whole subject.</p>
+
+<p>No such treatise, however, is it our
+object to compose. We have said
+enough to show the true nature of
+that theory of association, as a branch
+of which alone is it possible to take
+any intelligible view of Mr Ruskin's
+<em>Theoria</em>, or "Theoretic Faculty."
+His flagrant error is, that he will represent
+a part for the whole, and will
+distort and confuse everything for the
+sake of this representation. Viewed
+in their proper limitation, his remarks<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[342]</a></span>
+are often such as every wise and good
+man will approve of. Here and there
+too, there are shrewd intimations
+which the psychological student may
+profit by. He has pointed out several
+instances where the associations
+insisted upon by writers of the school
+of Alison have nothing whatever to
+do with the sentiment of beauty; and
+neither harmonise with, nor exalt it.
+Not all that may, in any way, <em>interest</em>
+us in an object, adds to its beauty.
+"Thus," as Mr Ruskin we think very
+justly says, "where we are told
+that the leaves of a plant are occupied
+in decomposing carbonic acid,
+and preparing oxygen for us, we
+begin to look upon it with some such
+indifference as upon a gasometer. It
+has become a machine; some of our
+sense of its happiness is gone; its
+emanation of inherent life is no longer
+pure." The knowledge of the anatomical
+structure of the limb is very
+interesting, but it adds nothing to the
+beauty of its outline. Scientific associations,
+however, of this kind, will
+have a different æsthetic effect, according
+to the degree or the enthusiasm
+with which the science has
+been studied.</p>
+
+<p>It is not our business to advocate
+this theory of association of ideas, but
+briefly to expound it. But we may
+remark that those who adopt (as Mr
+Ruskin has done in one branch of his
+subject&mdash;his <em>Æsthesis</em>) the rival theory
+of an intuitive perception of the
+beautiful, must find a difficulty where
+to <em>insert</em> this intuitive perception.
+The beauty of any one object is generally
+composed of several qualities
+and accessories&mdash;to which of these
+are we to connect this intuition?
+And if to the whole assemblage of
+them, then, as each of these qualities
+has been shown by its own virtue to
+administer to the general effect, we
+shall be explaining again by this new
+perception what has been already
+explained. Select any notorious
+instance of the beautiful&mdash;say the
+swan. How many qualities and accessories
+immediately occur to us as
+intimately blended in our minds with
+the form and white plumage of the
+bird! What were its arched neck and
+mantling wings if it were not <em>living</em>?
+And how the calm and inoffensive,
+and somewhat majestic life it leads,
+carries away our sympathies! Added
+to which, the snow-white form of the
+swan is imaged in clear waters, and
+is relieved by green foliage; and if
+the bird makes the river more beautiful,
+the river, in return, reflects its
+serenity and peacefulness upon the
+bird. Now all this we seem to see
+as we look upon the swan. To which
+of these facts separately will you
+attach this new intuition? And if
+you wait till all are assembled, the
+bird is already beautiful.</p>
+
+<p>We are all in the habit of <em>reasoning</em>
+on the beautiful, of defending our
+own tastes, and this just in proportion
+as the beauty in question is of a
+high order. And why do we do this?
+Because, just in proportion as the
+beauty is of an elevated character,
+does it depend on some moral association.
+Every argument of this kind
+will be found to consist of an analysis
+of the sentiment. Nor is there anything
+derogatory, as some have supposed,
+in this analysis of the sentiment;
+for we learn from it, at every
+step, that in the same degree as men
+become more refined, more humane,
+more kind, equitable, and pious, will
+the visible world become more richly
+clad with beauty. We see here an
+admirable arrangement, whereby the
+external world grows in beauty, as
+men grow in goodness.</p>
+
+<p>We must now follow Mr Ruskin a
+step farther into the development of
+his <em>Theoria</em>. All beauty, he tell us,
+<em>is such</em>, in its high and only true character,
+because it is a type of one or
+more of God's attributes. This, as
+we have shown, is to represent one
+class of associated thought as absorbing
+and displacing all the rest. We
+protest against this egregious exaggeration
+of a great and sacred source of
+our emotions. With Mr Ruskin's
+own piety we can have no quarrel;
+but we enter a firm and calm protest
+against a falsification of our human
+nature, in obedience to one sentiment,
+however sublime. No good can come
+of it&mdash;no good, we mean, to religion
+itself. It is substantially the same
+error, though assuming a very different
+garb, which the Puritans committed.
+They disgusted men with
+religion, by introducing it into every
+law and custom, and detail of human
+life. Mr Ruskin would commit the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[343]</a></span>
+same error in the department of taste,
+over which he would rule so despotically:
+he is not content that the
+highest beauty shall be religious; he
+will permit nothing to be beautiful,
+except as it partakes of a religious
+character. But there is a vast region
+lying between the "animal pleasantness"
+of his Æsthesis and the pious
+contemplation of his Theoria. There
+is much between the human animal
+and the saint; there are the domestic
+affections and the love they spring
+from, and hopes, and regrets, and
+aspirations, and the hour of peace and
+the hour of repose&mdash;in short, there is
+human life. From all human life, as
+we have seen, come contributions to
+the sentiment of the beautiful, quite
+as distinctly traced as the peculiar
+class on which Mr Ruskin insists.</p>
+
+<p>If any one descanting upon music
+should affirm, that, in the first place,
+there was a certain animal pleasantness
+in harmony or melody, or both,
+but that the real essence of music,
+that by which it truly becomes music,
+was the perception in harmony or
+melody of types of the Divine attributes,
+he would reason exactly in
+the same manner on music as Mr
+Ruskin does on beauty. Nevertheless,
+although sacred music is the
+highest, it is very plain that there is
+other music than the sacred, and that
+all songs are not hymns.</p>
+
+<p>Chapter v. of the present volume
+bears this title&mdash;<em>Of Typical Beauty.
+First, of Infinity, or the type of the
+Divine Incomprehensibility.</em>&mdash;A boundless
+space will occur directly to the
+reader as a type of the infinite; perhaps
+it should be rather described as
+itself the infinite under one form.
+But Mr Ruskin finds the infinite in
+everything. That idea which he
+justly describes as the incomprehensible,
+and which is so profound and
+baffling a mystery to the finite being,
+is supposed to be thrust upon the
+mind on every occasion. Every instance
+of variety is made the type of
+the infinite, as well as every indication
+of space. We remember that, in
+the first volume of the <cite>Modern Painters</cite>,
+we were not a little startled at being
+told that the distinguishing character
+of every good artist was, that "he
+painted the infinite." Good or bad,
+we now see that he could scarcely
+fail to paint the infinite: it must be
+by some curious chance that the feat
+is not accomplished.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"Now, not only," writes Mr Ruskin,
+"is this expression of infinity in distance
+most precious wherever we find it, however
+solitary it may be, and however unassisted
+by other forms and kinds of
+beauty; but it is of such value that no
+such other forms will altogether recompense
+us for its loss; and much as I dread
+the enunciation of anything that may
+seem like a conventional rule, I have no
+hesitation in asserting that no work of
+any art, in which this expression of infinity
+is possible, can be perfect or supremely
+elevated without it; and that, in proportion
+to its presence, <em>it will exalt and render
+impressive even the most tame and trivial
+themes</em>. And I think if there be any
+one grand division, by which it is at all
+possible to set the productions of painting,
+so far as their mere plan or system
+is concerned, on our right and left hands,
+it is this of light and dark background,
+of heaven-light and of object-light....
+There is a spectral etching of Rembrandt,
+a presentation of Christ in the Temple,
+where the figure of a robed priest stands
+glaring by its gems out of the gloom,
+holding a crosier. Behind it there is a
+subdued window-light seen in the opening,
+between two columns, without which
+the impressiveness of the whole subject
+would, I think, be incalculably diminished.
+I cannot tell whether I am at
+present allowing too much weight to my
+own fancies and predilections; but, without
+so much escape into the outer air and
+open heaven as this, I can take permanent
+pleasure in no picture.</p>
+
+<p>"And I think I am supported in this
+feeling by the unanimous practice, if not
+the confessed opinion, of all artists. The
+painter of portrait <em>is unhappy without his
+conventional white stroke under the sleeve</em>,
+or beside the arm-chair; the painter of
+interiors feels like a caged bird unless he
+can throw a window open, or set the door
+ajar; the landscapist dares not lose himself
+in forest without a gleam of light
+under its farthest branches, nor ventures
+out in rain unless he may somewhere
+pierce to a better promise in the distance,
+or cling to some closing gap of variable
+blue above."&mdash;(P. 39.)</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>But if an open window, or "that
+conventional white stroke under the
+sleeve," is sufficient to indicate the
+Infinite, how few pictures there must
+be in which it is not indicated! and
+how many "a tame and trivial
+theme" must have been, by this indication,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[344]</a></span>
+exalted and rendered impressive!
+And yet it seems that some
+very celebrated paintings want this
+open-window or conventional white
+stroke. The Madonna della Sediola
+of Raphael is known over all Europe;
+some print of it may be seen in every
+village; that virgin-mother, in her
+antique chair, embracing her child
+with so sweet and maternal an embrace,
+has found its way to the heart
+of every woman, Catholic or Protestant.
+But unfortunately it has a
+dark background, and there is no
+open window&mdash;nothing to typify infinity.
+To us it seemed that there was
+"heaven's light" over the whole picture.
+Though there is the chamber
+wall seen behind the chair, there is
+nothing to intimate that the door or
+the window is closed. One might in
+charity have imagined that the light
+came directly through an open door
+or window. However, Mr Ruskin is
+inexorable. "Raphael," he says,
+"<em>in his full</em>, betrayed the faith he had
+received from his father and his master,
+and substituted for the radiant
+sky of the Madonna del Cardellino
+the chamber wall of the Madonna
+della Sediola, and the brown wainscot
+of the Baldacchino."</p>
+
+<p>Of other modes in which the Infinite
+is represented, we have an instance in
+"The Beauty of Curvature."</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"The first of these is the curvature of
+lines and surfaces, wherein it at first appears
+futile to insist upon any resemblance
+or suggestion of infinity, since
+there is certainly, in our ordinary contemplation
+of it, no sensation of the kind.
+But I have repeated again and again that
+the ideas of beauty are instinctive, and
+that it is only upon consideration, and
+even then in doubtful and disputable
+way, that they appear in their typical
+character; neither do I intend at all to
+insist upon the particular meaning which
+they appear to myself to bear, but merely
+on their actual and demonstrable agreeableness;
+so that in the present case,
+which I assert positively, and have no
+fear of being able to prove&mdash;that a curve
+of any kind is more beautiful than a right
+line&mdash;I leave it to the reader to accept or
+not, as he pleases, <em>that reason of its agreeableness
+which is the only one that I can at
+all trace: namely, that every curve divides
+itself infinitely by its changes of direction</em>."&mdash;(P.
+63.)</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Our old friend Jacob Boehmen
+would have been delighted with this
+Theoria. But we must pass on to
+other types. Chapter vi. treats <em>of
+Unity, or the Type of the Divine Comprehensiveness</em>.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"Of the appearances of Unity, or of
+Unity itself, there are several kinds, which
+it will be found hereafter convenient to
+consider separately. Thus there is the
+unity of different and separate things,
+subjected to one and the same influence,
+which may be called Subjectional Unity;
+and this is the unity of the clouds, as they
+are driven by the parallel winds, or as
+they are ordered by the electric currents;
+this is the unity of the sea waves; this, of
+the bending and undulation of the forest
+masses; and in creatures capable of Will
+it is the Unity of Will, or of Impulse.
+And there is Unity of Origin, which we
+may call Original Unity, which is of
+things arising from one spring or source,
+and speaking always of this their brotherhood;
+and this in matter is the unity of
+the branches of the trees, and of the petals
+and starry rays of flowers, and of the
+beams of light; and in spiritual creatures
+it is their filial relation to Him from whom
+they have their being. And there is
+Unity of Sequence," &amp;c.&mdash;</p></blockquote>
+
+<p class="noind">down another half page. Very little
+to be got here, we think. Let us advance
+to the next chapter. This is
+entitled, <em>Of Repose, or the Type of
+Divine Permanence</em>.</p>
+
+<p>It will be admitted on all hands
+that nothing adds more frequently to
+the charms of the visible object than
+the associated feeling of repose. The
+hour of sunset is the hour of repose.
+Most beautiful things are enhanced
+by some reflected feeling of this kind.
+But surely one need not go farther
+than to human labour, and human
+restlessness, anxiety, and passion, to
+understand the charm of repose. Mr
+Ruskin carries us at once into the
+third heaven:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"As opposed to passion, changefulness,
+or laborious exertion, Repose is the especial
+and separating characteristic of the
+eternal mind and power; it is the 'I am'
+of the Creator, opposed to the 'I become'
+of all creatures; it is the sign alike of the
+supreme knowledge which is incapable of
+surprise, the supreme power which is incapable
+of labour, the supreme volition
+which is incapable of change; it is the
+stillness of the beams of the eternal
+chambers laid upon the variable waters
+of ministering creatures."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[345]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>We must proceed. Chapter viii.
+treats <em>Of Symmetry, or the Type of
+Divine Justice</em>. Perhaps the nature of
+this chapter will be sufficiently indicated
+to the reader, now somewhat informed
+of Mr Ruskin's mode of thinking,
+by the title itself. At all events,
+we shall pass on to the next chapter,
+ix.&mdash;<em>Of Purity, or the Type of Divine
+Energy</em>. Here, the reader will perhaps
+expect to find himself somewhat
+more at home. One type, at all
+events, of Divine Purity has often
+been presented to his mind. Light
+has generally been considered as the
+fittest emblem or manifestation of the
+Divine Presence,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"That never but in unapproachëd light<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Dwelt from eternity."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="noind">But if the reader has formed any such
+agreeable expectation he will be disappointed.
+Mr Ruskin travels on no
+beaten track. He finds some reasons,
+partly theological, partly gathered
+from his own theory of the Beautiful,
+for discarding this ancient association
+of Light with Purity. As the <em>Divine</em>
+attributes are those which the visible
+object typifies, and by no means the
+<em>human</em>, and as Purity, which is "sinlessness,"
+cannot, he thinks, be predicted
+of the Divine nature, it follows
+that he cannot admit Light to be a
+type of Purity. We quote the passage,
+as it will display the working
+of his theory:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"It may seem strange to many readers
+that I have not spoken of purity in that
+sense in which it is most frequently used,
+as a type of sinlessness. I do not deny
+that the frequent metaphorical use of it
+in Scripture may have, and ought to have,
+much influence on the sympathies with
+which we regard it; and that probably
+the immediate agreeableness of it to most
+minds arises far more from this source
+than from that to which I have chosen to
+attribute it. But, in the first place, <em>if it
+be indeed in the signs of Divine and not of
+human attributes that beauty consists</em>, I see
+not how the idea of sin can be formed
+with respect to the Deity; for it is the
+idea of a relation borne by us to Him,
+and not in any way to be attached to His
+abstract nature; while the Love, Mercifulness,
+and Justice of God I have supposed
+to be symbolised by other qualities
+of beauty: and I cannot trace any rational
+connection between them and the idea of
+Spotlessness in matter, nor between this
+idea nor any of the virtues which make
+up the righteousness of man, except perhaps
+those of truth and openness, which
+have been above spoken of as more expressed
+by the transparency than the
+mere purity of matter. So that I conceive
+the use of the terms purity, spotlessness,
+&amp;c., on moral subjects, to be merely
+metaphorical; and that it is rather that
+we illustrate these virtues by the desirableness
+of material purity, than that we
+desire material purity because it is illustrative
+of those virtues. I repeat, then,
+that the only idea which I think can be
+legitimately connected with purity of
+matter is this of vital and energetic connection
+among its particles."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>We have been compelled to quote
+some strange passages, of most difficult
+and laborious perusal; but our
+task is drawing to an end. The last
+of these types we have to mention is
+that <em>Of Moderation, or the Type of
+Government by Law</em>. We suspect
+there are many persons who have
+rapidly perused Mr Ruskin's works
+(probably <em>skipping</em> where the obscurity
+grew very thick) who would be
+very much surprised, if they gave a
+closer attention to them, at the strange
+conceits and absurdities which they
+had passed over without examination.
+Indeed, his very loose and declamatory
+style, and the habit of saying extravagant
+things, set all examination
+at defiance. But let any one pause a
+moment on the last title we have
+quoted from Mr Ruskin&mdash;let him read
+the chapter itself&mdash;let him reflect that
+he has been told in it that "what we
+express by the terms chasteness, refinement,
+and elegance," in any work
+of art, and more particularly "that
+finish" so dear to the intelligent critic,
+owe their attractiveness to being types
+of God's government by law!&mdash;we
+think he will confess that never in any
+book, ancient or modern, did he meet
+with an absurdity to outrival it.</p>
+
+<p>We have seen why the curve in
+general is beautiful; we have here
+the reason given us why one curve is
+more beautiful than another:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"And herein we at last find the reason
+of that which has been so often noted
+respecting the subtilty and almost invisibility
+of natural curves and colours, and
+why it is that we look on those lines as
+least beautiful which fall into wide and
+far license of curvature, and as most
+beautiful which approach nearest (so that
+the curvilinear character be distinctly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[346]</a></span>
+asserted) to the government of the right
+line, as in the pure and severe curves
+of the draperies of the religious
+painters."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>There is still the subject of "vital
+beauty" before us, but we shall probably
+be excused from entering
+further into the development of
+"Theoria." It must be quite clear
+by this time to our readers, that,
+whatever there is in it really wise
+and intelligible, resolves itself into
+one branch of that general theory
+of association of ideas, of which
+Alison and others have treated.
+But we are now in a condition to
+understand more clearly that peculiar
+style of language which startled us so
+much in the first volume of the <cite>Modern
+Painters</cite>. There we frequently
+heard of the Divine mission of the
+artist, of the religious office of the
+painter, and how Mr Turner was
+delivering God's message to man.
+What seemed an oratorical climax,
+much too frequently repeated, proves
+to be a logical sequence of his theoretical
+principles. All true beauty is
+religious; therefore all true art, which
+is the reproduction of the beautiful,
+must be religious also. Every picture
+gallery is a sort of temple, every
+great painter a sort of prophet. If
+Mr Ruskin is conscious that he never
+admires anything beautiful in nature
+or art, without a reference to some
+attribute of God, or some sentiment
+of piety, he may be a very exalted
+person, but he is no type of humanity.
+If he asserts this, we must be sufficiently
+courteous to believe him; we
+must not suspect that he is hardly
+candid with us, or with himself; but
+we shall certainly not accept him as
+a representative of the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">genus homo</i>.
+He finds "sermons in stones," and
+sermons always; "books in the running
+brooks," and always books of
+divinity. Other men not deficient in
+reflection or piety do not find it thus.
+Let us hear the poet who, more than
+any other, has made a religion of the
+beauty of nature. Wordsworth, in a
+passage familiar to every one of his
+readers, runs his hand, as it were,
+over all the chords of the lyre. He
+finds other sources of the beautiful
+not unworthy his song, besides that
+high contemplative piety which he
+introduces as a noble and fit climax.
+He recalls the first ardours of his
+youth, when the beautiful object
+itself of nature seemed to him all,
+in all:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i12">"I cannot paint<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">What then I was. The sounding cataract<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Haunted me like a passion; the tall rock,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Their colours and their forms were thus to me<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">An appetite; a feeling and a love<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That had no need of a remoter charm<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">By thought supplied, nor any interest<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Unborrowed from the eye. That time is past,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And all its aching joys are now no more,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Faint I, nor mourn, nor murmur; other gifts<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Have followed. I have learned<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To look on nature not as in the hour<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><em>The still sad music of humanity,</em><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><em>Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power</em><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><em>To chasten and subdue.</em> And I have felt<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A presence that disturbs me with the joy<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of something far more deeply interfused,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And the round ocean and the living air,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And the blue sky, and in the mind of man."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Our poet sounds all the chords.
+He does not muffle any; he honours
+Nature in her own simple loveliness,
+and in the beauty she wins from the
+human heart, as well as when she is
+informed with that sublime spirit</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i18">"that impels<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">All thinking things, all objects of all thought,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And rolls through all things."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Sit down, by all means, amongst
+the fern and the wild-flowers, and
+look out upon the blue hills, or near
+you at the flowing brook, and thank
+God, the giver of all this beauty.
+But what manner of good will you do
+by endeavouring to persuade yourself
+that these objects <em>are</em> only beautiful
+because you give thanks for them?&mdash;for
+to this strange logical inversion
+will you find yourself reduced. And
+surely you learned to esteem and love
+this benevolence itself, first as a
+human attribute, before you became
+cognisant of it as a Divine attribute.
+What other course can the mind take
+but to travel through humanity up to
+God?</p>
+
+<p>There is much more of metaphysics
+in the volume before us; there is, in
+particular, an elaborate investigation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[347]</a></span>
+of the faculty of imagination; but we
+have no inducement to proceed further
+with Mr Ruskin in these psychological
+inquiries. We have given some
+attention to his theory of the Beautiful,
+because it lay at the basis of a
+series of critical works which, partly
+from their boldness, and partly from
+the talent of a certain kind which is
+manifestly displayed in them, have
+attained to considerable popularity.
+But we have not the same object for
+prolonging our examination into his
+theory of the Imaginative Faculty.
+"We say it advisedly," (as Mr Ruskin
+always adds when he is asserting
+anything particularly rash,) we say it
+advisedly, and with no rashness whatever,
+that though our author is a man
+of great natural ability, and enunciates
+boldly many an independent isolated
+truth, yet of the spirit of philosophy
+he is utterly destitute. The calm,
+patient, prolonged thinking, which
+Dugald Stewart somewhere describes
+as the one essential characteristic of
+the successful student of philosophy,
+he knows nothing of. He wastes his
+ingenuity in making knots where
+others had long since untied them.
+He rushes at a definition, makes a
+parade of classification; but for any
+great and wide generalisation he has
+no appreciation whatever. He appears
+to have no taste, but rather an antipathy
+for it; when it lies in his way
+he avoids it. On this subject of the
+Imaginative Faculty he writes and he
+raves, defines and poetises by turns;
+makes laborious distinctions where
+there is no essential difference; has
+his "Imagination Associative," and
+his "Imagination Penetrative;" and
+will not, or cannot, see those broad
+general principles which with most
+educated men have become familiar
+truths, or truisms. But what clear
+thinking can we expect of a writer
+who thus describes his "Imagination
+Penetrative?"&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"It may seem to the reader that I am
+incorrect in calling this penetrating possession-taking
+faculty Imagination. Be
+it so: the name is of little consequence;
+the Faculty itself, called by what name
+it will, I insist upon as the highest
+intellectual power of man. <em>There is no
+reasoning in it</em>; it works not by algebra,
+nor by integral calculus; it is a piercing
+Pholas-like mind's tongue, that works
+and tastes into the very rock-heart. No
+matter what be the subject submitted to
+it, substance or spirit&mdash;all is alike
+divided asunder, joint and marrow, whatever
+utmost truth, life, principle, it has
+laid bare; and that which has no truth,
+life, nor principle, dissipated into its
+original smoke at a touch. The whispers
+at men's ears it lifts into visible angels.
+Vials that have lain sealed in the deep
+sea a thousand years it unseals, and
+brings out of them Genii."&mdash;(P. 156.)</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>With such a wonder-working
+faculty man ought to do much. Indeed,
+unless it has been asleep all
+this time, it is difficult to understand
+why there should remain anything
+for him to do.</p>
+
+<p>Surveying Mr Ruskin's works on
+art, with the knowledge we have here
+acquired of his intellectual character
+and philosophical theory, we are at no
+loss to comprehend that mixture of
+shrewd and penetrating remark, of
+bold and well-placed censure, and of
+utter nonsense in the shape of general
+principles, with which they abound.
+In his <cite>Seven Lamps of Architecture</cite>,
+which is a very entertaining book,
+and in his <cite>Stones of Venice</cite>, the reader
+will find many single observations
+which will delight him, as well by
+their justice, as by the zeal and
+vigour with which they are expressed.
+But from neither work will he derive
+any satisfaction if he wishes to carry
+away with him broad general views
+on architecture.</p>
+
+<p>There is no subject Mr Ruskin has
+treated more largely than that of
+architectural ornament; there is none
+on which he has said more good things,
+or delivered juster criticisms; and
+there is none on which he has uttered
+more indisputable nonsense. Every
+reader of taste will be grateful to Mr
+Ruskin if he can pull down from St
+Paul's Cathedral, or wherever else
+they are to be found, those wreaths or
+festoons of carved flowers&mdash;"that
+mass of all manner of fruit and flowers
+tied heavily into a long bunch, thickest
+in the middle, and pinned up by
+both ends against a dead wall."
+Urns with pocket-handkerchiefs upon
+them, or a sturdy thick flame for
+ever issuing from the top, he will
+receive our thanks for utterly demolishing.
+But when Mr Ruskin expounds
+his principles&mdash;and he always<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[348]</a></span>
+has principles to expound&mdash;when he
+lays down rules for the government of
+our taste in this matter, he soon involves
+us in hopeless bewilderment.
+Our ornaments, he tells us, are to be
+taken from the works of nature, not
+of man; and, from some passages of
+his writings, we should infer that Mr
+Ruskin would cover the walls of our
+public buildings with representations
+botanical and geological. But in this
+we must be mistaken. At all events,
+nothing is to be admitted that is taken
+from the works of man.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"I conclude, then, with the reader's
+leave, that all ornament is base which
+takes for its subject human work; that it
+is utterly base&mdash;painful to every rightly
+toned mind, without, perhaps, immediate
+sense of the reason, but for a reason palpable
+enough when we do think of it.
+For to carve our own work, and set it up
+for admiration, is a miserable self-complacency,
+a contentment in our wretched
+doings, when we might have been looking
+at God's doings."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>After this, can we venture to admire
+the building itself, which is, of necessity,
+man's own "wretched doing?"</p>
+
+<p>Perplexed by his own rules, he will
+sometimes break loose from the entanglement
+in some such strange manner
+as this:&mdash;"I believe the right
+question to ask, with respect to all
+ornament, is simply this: Was it done
+with enjoyment&mdash;<em>was the carver happy
+while he was about it</em>?" Happy art!
+where the workman is sure to give
+happiness if he is but happy at his
+work. Would that the same could be
+said of literature!</p>
+
+<p>How far <em>colour</em> should be introduced
+into architecture is a question with
+men of taste, and a question which of
+late has been more than usually discussed.
+Mr Ruskin leans to the introduction
+of colour. His taste may
+be correct; but the fanciful reasoning
+which he brings to bear upon the subject
+will assist no one else in forming
+his own taste. Because there is no
+connection "between the spots of an
+animal's skin and its anatomical
+system," he lays it down as the first
+great principle which is to guide us
+in the use of colour in architecture&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"That it be <em>visibly independent of
+form</em>. Never paint a column with vertical
+lines, but always cross it. Never
+give separate mouldings separate colours,"
+&amp;c. "In certain places," he continues,
+"you may run your two systems closer,
+and here and there let them be parallel
+for a note or two, but see that the colours
+and the forms coincide only as two
+orders of mouldings do; the same for an
+instant, but each holding its own course.
+So single members may sometimes have
+single colours; <em>as a bird's head is sometimes
+of one colour, and its shoulders
+another, you may make your capital one
+colour, and your shaft another</em>; but, in
+general, the best place for colour is on
+broad surfaces, not on the points of interest
+in form. <em>An animal is mottled on
+its breast and back, and rarely on its paws
+and about its eyes</em>; so put your variegation
+boldly on the flat wall and broad shaft,
+but be shy of it on the capital and moulding."&mdash;(<cite>Lamps
+of Architecture</cite>, p. 127.)</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>We do not quite see what we have
+to do at all with the "anatomical
+system" of the animal, which is kept
+out of sight; but, in general, we
+apprehend there is, both in the animal
+and vegetable kingdom, considerable
+harmony betwixt colour and external
+form. Such fantastic reasoning as
+this, it is evident, will do little towards
+establishing that one standard
+of taste, or that "one school of architecture,"
+which Mr Ruskin so strenuously
+insists upon. All architects are
+to resign their individual tastes and
+predilections, and enrol themselves in
+one school, which shall adopt one style.
+We need not say that the very first
+question&mdash;what that style should be,
+Greek or Gothic&mdash;would never be
+decided. Mr Ruskin decides it in
+favour of the "earliest English decorated
+Gothic;" but seems, in this
+case, to suspect that his decision will
+not carry us far towards unanimity.
+The scheme is utterly impossible;
+but he does his duty, he tells us, by
+proposing the impossibility.</p>
+
+<p>As a climax to his inconsistency
+and his abnormal ways of thinking,
+he concludes his <cite>Seven Lamps of
+Architecture</cite> with a most ominous
+paragraph, implying that the time is
+at hand when no architecture of any
+kind will be wanted: man and his
+works will be both swept away from
+the face of the earth. How, with this
+impression on his mind, could he have
+the heart to tell us to build for posterity?
+Will it be a commentary
+on the Apocalypse that we shall next
+receive from the pen of Mr Ruskin?</p>
+
+<hr class="chap" />
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">[349]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<h2>PORTUGUESE POLITICS.</h2>
+
+
+<p>The dramatic and singular revolution
+of which Portugal has recently
+been the theatre, the strange fluctuations
+and ultimate success of Marshal
+Saldanha's insurrection, the narrow
+escape of Donna Maria from at least
+a temporary expulsion from her dominions,
+have attracted in this country
+more attention than is usually bestowed
+upon the oft-recurring convulsions of
+the Peninsula. Busy as the present
+year has been, and abounding in
+events of exciting interest nearer
+home, the English public has yet
+found time to deplore the anarchy
+to which Portugal is a prey, and to
+marvel once more, as it many times
+before has marvelled, at the tardy
+realisation of those brilliant promises
+of order, prosperity, and good government,
+so long held out to the two
+Peninsular nations by the promoters
+of the Quadruple Alliance. The
+statesmen who, for nearly a score of
+years, have assiduously guided Portugal
+and Spain in the seductive paths
+of modern Liberalism, can hardly feel
+much gratification at the results of
+their well-intended but most unprosperous
+endeavours. It is difficult
+to imagine them contemplating with
+pride and exultation, or even without
+a certain degree of self-reproach, the
+fruits of their officious exertions.
+Repudiating partisan views of Peninsular
+politics, putting persons entirely
+out of the question, declaring our absolute
+indifference as to who occupies
+the thrones of Spain and Portugal, so
+long as those countries are well-governed,
+casting no imputations
+upon the motives of those foreign
+governments and statesmen who
+were chiefly instrumental in bringing
+about the present state of things
+south of the Pyrenees, we would look
+only to facts, and crave an honest
+answer to a plain question. The
+question is this: After the lapse of
+seventeen years, what is the condition
+of the two nations upon which
+have been conferred, at grievous expense
+of blood and treasure, the much
+vaunted blessings of rulers nominally
+Liberal, and professedly patriotic?
+For the present we will confine this
+inquiry to Portugal, for the reason
+that the War of Succession terminated
+in that country when it was but beginning
+in the neighbouring kingdom,
+since which time the vanquished party,
+unlike the Carlists in Spain, have
+uniformly abstained&mdash;with the single
+exception of the rising in 1846-7&mdash;from
+armed aggression, and have observed
+a patient and peaceful policy.
+So that the Portuguese Liberals have
+had seventeen years' fair trial of their
+governing capacity, and cannot allege
+that their efforts for their country's
+welfare have been impeded or retarded
+by the acts of that party whom they
+denounced as incapable of achieving
+it,&mdash;however they may have been
+neutralised by dissensions and anarchy
+in their own ranks.</p>
+
+<p>At this particular juncture of Portuguese
+affairs, and as no inappropriate
+preface to the only reply that can
+veraciously be given to the question
+we have proposed, it will not be amiss
+to take a brief retrospective glance at
+some of the events that preceded and
+led to the reign of Donna Maria. It
+will be remembered that from the year
+1828 to 1834, the Liberals in both
+houses of the British Parliament, supported
+by an overwhelming majority
+of the British press, fiercely and pertinaciously
+assailed the government
+and person of Don Miguel, then <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">de
+facto</i> King of Portugal, king <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">de jure</i>
+in the eyes of the Portuguese Legitimists
+and by the vote of the Legitimate
+Cortes of 1828, and recognised
+(in 1829) by Spain, by the United
+States, and by various inferior powers.
+Twenty years ago political passions
+ran high in this country: public men
+were, perhaps, less guarded in their
+language; newspapers were certainly
+far more intemperate in theirs; and
+we may safely say, that upon no
+foreign prince, potentate, or politician,
+has virulent abuse&mdash;proceeding
+from such respectable sources&mdash;ever
+since been showered in England, in
+one half the quantity in which it then
+descended upon the head of the unlucky
+Miguel. Unquestionably Don
+Miguel had acted, in many respects,
+neither well nor wisely: his early<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">[350]</a></span>
+education had been ill-adapted to the
+high position he was one day to fill&mdash;at
+a later period of his life he was
+destined to take lessons of wisdom
+and moderation in the stern but
+wholesome school of adversity. But
+it is also beyond a doubt, now that
+time has cleared up much which then
+was purposely garbled and distorted,
+that the object of all this invective
+was by no means so black as he was
+painted, and that his character suffered
+in England from the malicious
+calumnies of Pedroite refugees, and
+from the exaggerated and easily-accepted
+statements of the Portuguese
+correspondents of English newspapers.
+The Portuguese nation, removed from
+such influence, formed its own opinions
+from what it saw and observed; and
+the respect and affection testified, even
+at the present day, to their dethroned
+sovereign, by a large number of its
+most distinguished and respectable
+members, are the best refutation of
+the more odious of the charges so
+abundantly brought against him, and
+so lightly credited in those days of
+rampant revolution. It is unnecessary,
+therefore, to argue that point,
+even were personal vindication or
+attack the objects of this article,
+instead of being entirely without its
+scope. Against the insupportable
+oppression exercised by the monster
+in human form, as which Don Miguel
+was then commonly depicted in England
+and France, innumerable engines
+were directed by the governments and
+press of those two countries. Insurrections
+were stirred up in Portugal,
+volunteers were recruited abroad,
+irregular military expeditions were
+encouraged, loans were fomented;
+money-lenders and stock-jobbers were
+all agog for Pedro, patriotism, and
+profit. Orators and newspapers foretold,
+in glowing speeches and enthusiastic
+paragraphs, unbounded prosperity
+to Portugal as the sure consequence
+of the triumph of the revolutionary
+party. Rapid progress of
+civilisation, impartial and economical
+administration, increase of commerce,
+development of the country's resources,
+a perfect avalanche of social
+and political blessings, were to descend,
+like manna from heaven, upon
+the fortunate nation, so soon as the
+Liberals obtained the sway of its
+destinies. It were beside our purpose
+here to investigate how it was
+that, with such alluring prospects
+held out to them, the people of Portugal
+were so blind to their interests
+as to supply Don Miguel with men
+and money, wherewith to defend himself
+for five years against the assaults
+and intrigues of foreign and domestic
+enemies. Deprived of support and
+encouragement from without, he still
+held his ground; and the formation of
+a quadruple alliance, including the
+two most powerful countries in Europe,
+the enlistment of foreign mercenaries
+of a dozen different nations, the
+entrance of a numerous Spanish army,
+were requisite finally to dispossess
+him of his crown. The anomaly of
+the abhorred persecutor and tyrant
+receiving so much support from his
+ill-used subjects, even then struck
+certain men in this country whose
+names stand pretty high upon the list
+of clear-headed and experienced politicians,
+and the Duke of Wellington,
+Lord Aberdeen, Sir Robert Peel,
+Lord Lyndhurst, and others, defended
+Miguel; but their arguments, however
+cogent, were of little avail against the
+fierce tide of popular prejudice, unremittingly
+stimulated by the declamations
+of the press. To be brief,
+in 1834 Don Miguel was driven
+from Portugal; and his enemies, put
+in possession of the kingdom and
+all its resources, were at full liberty
+to realise the salutary reforms they
+had announced and promised, and for
+which they had professed to fight.
+On taking the reins of government,
+they had everything in their favour;
+their position was advantageous and
+brilliant in the highest degree. They
+enjoyed the prestige of a triumph,
+undisputed authority, powerful foreign
+protection and influence. At their
+disposal was an immense mass of
+property taken from the church, as
+well as the produce of large foreign
+loans. Their credit, too, was <em>then</em> unlimited.
+Lastly&mdash;and this was far
+from the least of their advantages&mdash;they
+had in their favour the great
+discouragement and discontent engendered
+amongst the partisans of the
+Miguelite government, by the numerous
+and gross blunders which that
+government had committed&mdash;blunders
+which contributed even more to its<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">[351]</a></span>
+downfall than did the attacks of its
+foes, or the effects of foreign hostility.
+In short, the Liberals were complete
+and undisputed masters of the situation.
+But, notwithstanding all the
+facilities and advantages they enjoyed,
+what has been the condition of Portugal
+since they assumed the reins?
+What <em>is</em> its condition at the present
+day? We need not go far to ascertain
+it. The wretched plight of that
+once prosperous little kingdom is deposed
+to by every traveller who visits
+it, and by every English journal that
+has a correspondent there; it is to be
+traced in the columns of every Portuguese
+newspaper, and is admitted
+and deplored by thousands who once
+were strenuous and influential supporters
+of the party who promised so
+much, and who have performed so
+little that is good. The reign of that
+party whose battle-cry is, or was,
+Donna Maria and the Constitution,
+has been an unbroken series of revolutions,
+illegalities, peculations, corruptions,
+and dilapidations. The
+immense amount of misnamed "national
+property" (the <em>Infantado</em> and
+church estates,) which was part of
+their capital on their accession to
+power, has disappeared without benefit
+either to the country or to its
+creditors. The treasury is empty;
+the public revenues are eaten up by
+anticipation; civil and military officers,
+the court itself, are all in constant and
+considerable arrears of salaries and
+pay. The discipline of the troops is
+destroyed, the soldiers being demoralised
+by the bad example of
+their chiefs, including that of Marshal
+Saldanha himself; for it is one of the
+great misfortunes of the Peninsula,
+that there most officers of a certain
+rank consider their political predilections
+before their military duty. The
+"Liberal" party, divided and subdivided,
+and split into fractions, whose
+numbers fluctuate at the dictates of
+interest or caprice, presents a lamentable
+spectacle of anarchy and inconsistency;
+whilst the Queen herself,
+whose good intentions we by no means
+impugn, has completely forfeited, as
+a necessary consequence of the misconduct
+of her counsellors, and of the
+sufferings the country has endured
+under her reign, whatever amount of
+respect, affection, and influence the
+Portuguese nation may once have
+been disposed to accord her. Such is
+the sad picture now presented by
+Portugal; and none whose acquaintance
+with facts renders them competent
+to judge, will say that it is overcharged
+or highly coloured.</p>
+
+<p>The party in Portugal who advocate
+a return to the ancient constitution,<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a>
+under which the country
+flourished&mdash;which fell into abeyance
+towards the close of the seventeenth
+century, but which it is now proposed
+to revive, as preferable to, and practically
+more liberal than, the present
+system&mdash;and who adopt as a banner,
+and couple with this scheme, the
+name of Don Miguel de Bragança,
+have not unnaturally derived great
+accession of strength, both moral and
+numerical, from the faults and dissensions
+of their adversaries. At the
+present day there are few things
+which the European public, and especially
+that of this country, sooner
+becomes indifferent to, and loses
+sight of, than the person and pretensions
+of a dethroned king; and
+owing to the lapse of years, to
+his unobtrusive manner of life, and
+to the storm of accusations amidst
+which he made his exit from power,
+Don Miguel would probably be considered,
+by those persons in this
+country who remember his existence,
+as the least likely member of the
+royal triumvirate, now assembled in
+Germany, to exchange his exile for a
+crown. But if we would take a fair
+and impartial view of the condition of
+Portugal, and calculate, as far as is
+possible in the case of either of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">[352]</a></span>
+two Peninsular nations, the probabilities
+and chances of the future, we
+must not suffer ourselves to be run
+away with by preconceived prejudices,
+or to be influenced by the popular
+odium attached to a name. After
+beholding the most insignificant and
+unpromising of modern pretenders
+suddenly elevated to the virtual
+sovereignty&mdash;however transitory it
+may prove&mdash;of one of the most powerful
+and civilised of European nations,
+it were rash to denounce as impossible
+any restoration or enthronement.
+And it were especially rash so to do
+when with the person of the aspirant
+to the throne a nation is able to connect
+a reasonable hope of improvement
+in its condition. Of the principle
+of legitimacy we here say nothing,
+for it were vain to deny that in
+Europe it is daily less regarded,
+whilst it sinks into insignificance
+when put in competition with the
+rights and wellbeing of the people.</p>
+
+<p>As far back as the period of its
+emigration, the Pedroite or Liberal
+party split into two fractions. One
+of these believed in the possible realisation
+of those ultra-liberal theories so
+abundantly promulgated in the proclamations,
+manifestoes, preambles of
+laws, &amp;c., which Don Pedro issued
+from the Brazils, from England and
+France, and afterwards from Terceira
+and Oporto. The other fraction of
+the party had sanctioned the promulgation
+of these utopian theories as a
+means of delusion, and as leading to
+their own triumph; but they deemed
+their realisation impossible, and were
+quite decided, when the revolutionary
+tide should have borne them into
+power, to oppose to the unruly flood
+the barrier of a gradual but steady
+reaction. At a later period these
+divisions of the Liberal party became
+more distinctly defined, and resulted,
+in 1836, in their nominal classification
+as Septembrists and Chartists&mdash;the
+latter of whom (numerically very
+weak, but comprising Costa Cabral,
+and other men of talent and energy)
+may be compared to the Moderados
+of Spain&mdash;the former to the Progresistas,
+but with tendencies more
+decidedly republican. It is the ambitious
+pretensions, the struggles for
+power and constant dissensions of
+these two sets of men, and of the
+minor fractions into which they have
+subdivided themselves, that have kept
+Portugal for seventeen years in a
+state of anarchy, and have ended by
+reducing her to her present pitiable
+condition. So numerous are the divisions,
+so violent the quarrels of the
+two parties, that their utter dissolution
+appears inevitable; and it is in
+view of this that the National party,
+as it styles itself, which inscribes
+upon its flag the name of Don Miguel&mdash;not
+as an absolute sovereign, but
+with powers limited by legitimate
+constitutional forms, to whose strict
+observance they bind him as a condition
+of their support, and of his
+continuance upon the throne upon
+which they hope to place him&mdash;uplifts
+its head, reorganises its hosts, and
+more clearly defines its political principles.
+Whilst Chartists and Septembrists
+tear each other to pieces, the
+Miguelites not only maintain their
+numerical importance, but, closing
+their ranks and acting in strict
+unity, they give constant proofs of
+adhesion to Don Miguel as personifying
+a national principle, and at the
+same time give evidence of political
+vitality by the activity and progress
+of their ideas, which are adapting
+themselves to the Liberal sentiments
+and theories of the times.<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> And it
+were flying in the face of facts to deny
+that this party comprehends a very
+important portion of the intelligence
+and respectability of the nation. It
+ascribes to itself an overwhelming
+majority in the country, and asserts
+that five-sixths of the population of
+Portugal would joyfully hail its advent
+to power. This of course must be
+viewed as an <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">ex-parte</i> statement, difficult
+for foreigners to verify or refute.
+But of late there have been no lack of
+proofs that a large proportion of the
+higher orders of Portuguese are steadfast<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">[353]</a></span>
+in their aversion to the government
+of the "Liberals," and in their
+adherence to him whom they still,
+after his seventeen years' dethronement,
+persist in calling their king, and
+whom they have supported, during
+his long exile, by their willing contributions.
+It is fresh in every one's
+memory that, only the other day,
+twenty five peers, or successors of
+peers, who had been excluded by Don
+Pedro from the peerage for having
+sworn allegiance to his brother, having
+been reinstated and invited to
+take their seats in the Chamber, signed
+and published a document utterly rejecting
+the boon. Some hundreds of
+officers of the old army of Don Miguel,
+who are living for the most part in
+penury and privation, were invited to
+demand from Saldanha the restitution
+of their grades, which would have
+entitled them to the corresponding
+pay. To a man they refused, and
+protested their devotion to their
+former sovereign. A new law of
+elections, with a very extended franchise&mdash;nearly
+amounting, it is said, to
+universal suffrage&mdash;having been the
+other day arbitrarily decreed by the
+Saldanha cabinet (certainly a most
+unconstitutional proceeding,) and the
+government having expressed a wish
+that all parties in the kingdom should
+exercise the electoral right, and
+give their votes for representatives
+in the new parliament, a numerous
+and highly respectable meeting of the
+Miguelites was convened at Lisbon.
+This meeting voted, with but two
+dissentient voices, a resolution of
+abstaining from all share in the
+elections, declaring their determination
+not to sanction, by coming forward
+either as voters or candidates, a system
+and an order of things which they
+utterly repudiated as illegal, oppressive,
+and forced upon the nation by
+foreign interference. The same resolution
+was adopted by large assemblages
+in every province of the kingdom.
+At various periods, during the
+last seventeen years, the Portuguese
+government has endeavoured to inveigle
+the Miguelites into the representative
+assembly, doubtless hoping
+that upon its benches they would be
+more accessible to seduction, or easier
+to intimidate. It is a remarkable
+and significant circumstance, that only
+in one instance (in the year 1842)
+have their efforts been successful, and
+that the person who was then induced
+so to deviate from the policy of his
+party, speedily gave unmistakable
+signs of shame and regret. Bearing
+in mind the undoubted and easily
+proved fact that the Miguelites, whether
+their numerical strength be or be
+not as great as they assert, comprise
+a large majority of the clergy, of the
+old nobility, and of the most highly
+educated classes of the nation, their
+steady and consistent refusal to sanction
+the present order of things, by
+their presence in its legislative assembly,
+shows a unity of purpose and
+action, and a staunch and dogged
+conviction, which cannot but be disquieting
+to their adversaries, and
+over which it is impossible lightly to
+pass in an impartial review of the
+condition and prospects of Portugal.</p>
+
+<p>We have already declared our determination
+here to attach importance
+to the persons of none of the four
+princes and princesses who claim or
+occupy the thrones of Spain and Portugal,
+except in so far as they may
+respectively unite the greatest amount
+of the national suffrage and adhesion.
+As regards Don Miguel, we
+are far from exaggerating his personal
+claims&mdash;the question of legitimacy
+being here waived. His prestige <em>out</em>
+of Portugal is of the smallest, and
+certainly he has never given proofs of
+great talents, although he is not altogether
+without kingly qualities, nor
+wanting in resolution and energy;
+whilst his friends assert, and it is fair
+to admit as probable, that he has long
+since repented and abjured the follies
+and errors of his youth. But we
+cannot be blind to the fact of the
+strong sympathy and regard entertained
+for him by a very large number
+of Portuguese. His presence in
+London during some weeks of the
+present summer was the signal for a
+pilgrimage of Portuguese noblemen
+and gentlemen of the best and most
+influential families in the country,
+many of whom openly declared the
+sole object of their journey to be
+to pay their respects to their exiled
+sovereign; whilst others, the chief
+motive of whose visit was the attraction
+of the Industrial Exhibition,
+gladly seized the opportunity to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">[354]</a></span>
+reiterate the assurances of their
+fidelity and allegiance. Strangely
+enough, the person who opened the
+procession was a nephew of Marshal
+Saldanha, Don Antonio C. de Seabra,
+a staunch and intelligent royalist,
+whose visit to London coincided, as
+nearly as might be, with his uncle's
+flight into Galicia, and with his triumphant
+return to Oporto after the
+victory gained for him as he was
+decamping. Senhor Seabra was followed
+by two of the Freires, nephew
+and grand-nephew of the Freire who
+was minister-plenipotentiary in London
+some thirty years ago; by the
+Marquis and Marchioness of Vianna,
+and the Countess of Lapa&mdash;all of the
+first nobility of Portugal; by the
+Marquis of Abrantes, a relative of
+the royal family of Portugal; by a
+host of gentlemen of the first families
+in the provinces of Beira, Minho,
+Tras-os-Montes, &amp;c.&mdash;Albuquerques,
+Mellos, Taveiras, Pachecos, Albergarias,
+Cunhas, Correa-de-Sas, Beduidos,
+San Martinhos, Pereiras, and
+scores of other names, which persons
+acquainted with Portugal will
+recognise as comprehending much
+of the best blood and highest intelligence
+in the country. Such
+demonstrations are not to be overlooked,
+or regarded as trivial and
+unimportant. Men like the Marquis
+of Abrantes, for instance, not less distinguished
+for mental accomplishment
+and elevation of character than for
+illustrious descent,<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> men of large possessions
+and extensive influence, cannot
+be assumed to represent only
+their individual opinions. The remarkable
+step lately taken by a number
+of Portuguese of this class, must be
+regarded as an indication of the state
+of feeling of a large portion of the
+nation; as an indication, too, of something
+grievously faulty in the conduct
+or constitution of a government
+which, after seventeen years' sway,
+has been unable to rally, reconcile, or
+even to appease the animosity of any
+portion of its original opponents.</p>
+
+<p>Between the state of Portugal and
+that of Spain there are, at the present
+moment, points of strong contrast,
+and others of striking similarity. The
+similarity is in the actual condition of
+the two countries&mdash;in their sufferings,
+misgovernment, and degradation; the
+contrast is in the state and prospects
+of the political parties they contain.
+What we have said of the wretched
+plight of Portugal applies, with few
+and unimportant differences, to the
+condition of Spain. If there has lately
+been somewhat less of open anarchy in
+the latter country than in the dominions
+of Donna Maria, there has not been one
+iota less of tyrannical government and
+scandalous malversation. The public
+revenue is still squandered and robbed,
+the heavy taxes extorted from the
+millions still flow into the pockets of
+a few thousand corrupt officials, ministers
+are still stock-jobbers, the liberty
+of the press is still a farce,<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> and the
+national representation an obscene
+comedy. A change of ministry in
+Spain is undoubtedly a most interesting
+event to those who go out and
+those who come in&mdash;far more so in
+Spain than in any other country, since
+in no other country does the possession
+of office enable a beggar so speedily to
+transform himself into a <em>millionaire</em>.
+In Portugal the will is not wanting, but
+the means are less ample. More may
+be safely pilfered out of a sack of corn
+than out of a sieveful, and poor
+little Portugal's revenue does not
+afford such scope to the itching palms
+of Liberal statesmen as does the more
+ample one of Spain, which of late
+years has materially increased&mdash;without,
+however, the tax-payer and public
+creditor experiencing one crumb of
+the benefit they might fairly expect in
+the shape of reduced imposts and
+augmented dividends. But, however
+interesting to the governing fraction,
+a change of administration in Spain
+is contemplated by the governed
+masses with supreme apathy and
+indifference. They used once to be
+excited by such changes; but they
+have long ago got over that weakness,
+and suffer their pockets to be picked<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">[355]</a></span>
+and their bodies to be trampled
+with a placidity bordering on the
+sublime. As long as things do not
+get <em>worse</em>, they remain quiet; they
+have little hope of their getting <em>better</em>.
+Here, again, in this fertile and beautiful
+and once rich and powerful country
+of Spain, a most gratifying picture is
+presented to the instigators of the
+Quadruple Alliance, to the upholders
+of the virtuous Christina and the innocent
+Isabel! Pity that it is painted
+with so ensanguined a brush, and that
+strife and discord should be the main
+features of the composition! Upon
+the first panel is exhibited a civil
+war of seven years' duration, vying,
+for cold-blooded barbarity and gratuitous
+slaughter, with the fiercest and
+most fanatical contests that modern
+<cite>Times</cite> have witnessed. Terminated
+by a strange act of treachery, even
+yet imperfectly understood, the war
+was succeeded by a brief period of
+well-meaning but inefficient government.
+By the daring and unscrupulous
+man&oelig;uvres of Louis Philippe
+and Christina this was upset&mdash;by
+means so extraordinary and so disgraceful
+to all concerned that scandalised
+Europe stood aghast, and almost
+refused to credit the proofs
+(which history will record) of the
+social degradation of Spaniards. For
+a moment Spain again stood divided
+and in arms, and on the brink of civil
+war. This danger over, the blood
+that had not been shed in the field
+flowed upon the scaffold: an iron
+hand and a pampered army crushed
+and silenced the disaffection and
+murmurs of the great body of the
+nation; and thus commenced a system
+of despotic and unscrupulous misrule
+and corruption, which still endures
+without symptom of improvement.
+As for the observance of the constitution,
+it is a mockery to speak of it,
+and has been so any time these eight
+years. In June 1850, Lord Palmerston,
+in the course of his celebrated
+defence of his foreign policy, declared
+himself happy to state that the
+government of Spain was at that
+time carried on more in accordance
+with the constitution than it had been
+two years previously. As ear-witnesses
+upon the occasion, we can do
+his lordship the justice to say that the
+assurance was less confidently and
+unhesitatingly spoken than were most
+other parts of his eloquent oration.
+It was duly cheered, however, by the
+Commons House&mdash;or at least by
+those Hispanophilists and philanthropists
+upon its benches who accepted
+the Foreign Secretary's assurance in
+lieu of any positive knowledge of their
+own. The grounds for applause and
+gratulation were really of the slenderest.
+In 1848, the <em>un</em>-constitutional
+period referred to by Lord Palmerston,
+the Narvaez and Christina government
+were in the full vigour of their
+repressive measures, shooting the disaffected
+by the dozen, and exporting
+hundreds to the Philippines or immuring
+them in dungeons. This, of course,
+could not go on for ever; the power
+was theirs, the malcontents were compelled
+to succumb; the paternal and
+constitutional government made a
+desert, and called it peace. Short
+time was necessary, when such violent
+means were employed, to crush Spain
+into obedience, and in 1850 she lay
+supine, still bleeding from many an
+inward wound, at her tyrants' feet.
+This morbid tranquillity might possibly
+be mistaken for an indication of an
+improved mode of government. As
+for any other sign of constitutional
+rule, we are utterly unable to discern
+it in either the past or the present
+year. The admirable observance of
+the constitution was certainly in process
+of proof, at the very time of
+Lord Palmerston's speech, by the
+almost daily violation of the liberty
+of the press, by the seizure of journals
+whose offending articles the authorities
+rarely condescended to designate,
+and whose incriminated editors were
+seldom allowed opportunity of exculpation
+before a fair tribunal. It was
+further testified to, less than four
+months later, by a general election,
+at which such effectual use was made
+of those means of intimidation and
+corruption which are manifold in
+Spain, that, when the popular Chamber
+assembled, the government was
+actually alarmed at the smallness of
+the opposition&mdash;limited, as it was, to
+about a dozen stray Progresistas,
+who, like the sleeping beauty in the
+fairy tale, rubbed their eyes in wonderment
+at finding themselves there.
+Nor were the ministerial forebodings
+groundless in the case of the unscrupulous<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">[356]</a></span>
+and tyrannical Narvaez, who,
+within a few months, when seemingly
+more puissant than ever, and with an
+overwhelming majority in the Chamber
+obedient to his nod, was cast
+down by the wily hand that had set
+him up, and driven to seek safety in
+France from the vengeance of his innumerable
+enemies. The causes of
+this sudden and singular downfall are
+still a puzzle and a mystery to the
+world; but persons there are, claiming
+to see further than their neighbours
+into political millstones, who
+pretend that a distinguished diplomatist,
+of no very long standing at
+Madrid, had more to do than was
+patent to the world with the disgrace
+of the Spanish dictator, whom the
+wags of the Puerta del Sol declare to
+have exclaimed, as his carriage whirled
+him northwards through the gates
+of Madrid, "<em>Comme Henri Bulwer!</em>"</p>
+
+<p>Passing from the misgovernment
+and sufferings of Spain to its political
+state, we experience some difficulty in
+clearly defining and exhibiting this,
+inasmuch as the various parties that
+have hitherto acted under distinct
+names are gradually blending and
+disappearing like the figures in dissolving
+views. In Portugal, as we
+have already shown, whilst Chartists
+and Septembrists distract the country,
+and damage themselves by constant
+quarrels and collisions, a
+third party, unanimous and determined
+in its opposition to those two,
+grows in strength, influence, and
+prestige. In Spain, <em>no</em> party shows
+signs of healthy condition. In all
+three&mdash;Moderados, Progresistas, and
+Carlists&mdash;symptoms of dissolution are
+manifest. In the two countries,
+Chartists and Septembrists, Moderados
+and Progresistas, have alike split
+into two or more factions hostile to
+each other; but whilst, in Portugal,
+the Miguelites improve their position,
+in Spain the Carlist party is reduced
+to a mere shadow of its former self.
+Without recognised chiefs or able
+leaders, without political theory of
+government, it bases its pretensions
+solely upon the hereditary right of its
+head. For whilst Don Miguel, on
+several occasions,<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> has declared his
+adhesion to the liberal programme
+advocated by his party for the security
+of the national liberties, the Count de
+Montemolin, either from indecision of
+character, or influenced by evil counsels,
+has hitherto made no precise,
+public, and satisfactory declaration of
+his views in this particular,<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> and by
+such injudicious reserve has lost the
+suffrages of many whom a distinct
+pledge would have gathered round his
+banner. Thus has he partially neutralised
+the object of his father's abdication
+in his favour. Don Carlos was
+too completely identified with the old
+absolutist party, composed of intolerant
+bigots both in temporal and spiritual
+matters, ever to have reconciled
+himself with the progressive spirit of
+the century, or to have become acceptable
+to the present generation of
+Spaniards. Discerning or advised of
+this, he transferred his claims to his
+son, thus placing in his hands an
+excellent card, which the young prince
+has not known how to play. If, instead
+of encouraging a sullen and
+unprofitable emigration, fomenting
+useless insurrections, draining his adherents'
+purses, and squandering their
+blood, he had husbanded the resources
+of the party, clearly and publicly defined
+his plan of government&mdash;if ever
+seated upon the throne he claims&mdash;and
+awaited in dignified retirement the progress
+of events, he would not have supplied
+the present rulers of Spain with
+pretexts, eagerly taken advantage of,
+for shameful tyranny and persecution;
+and he would have spared himself
+the mortification of seeing his party<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">[357]</a></span>
+dwindle, and his oldest and most
+trusted friends and adherents, with few
+exceptions, accept pardon and place
+from the enemies against whom they
+had long and bravely contended. But
+vacillation, incapacity, and treachery
+presided at his counsels. He had none
+to point out to him&mdash;or if any did,
+they were unheeded or overruled&mdash;the
+fact, of which experience and repeated
+disappointments have probably
+at last convinced him, that it is not
+by the armed hand alone&mdash;not by the
+sword of Cabrera, or by Catalonian
+guerilla risings&mdash;that he can reasonably
+hope ever to reach Madrid, but
+by aid of the moral force of public
+opinion, as a result of the misgovernment
+of Spain's present rulers, of an
+increasing confidence in his own merits
+and good intentions, and perhaps of
+such possible contingencies as a
+Bourbon restoration in France, or
+the triumph of the Miguelites in
+Portugal. This last-named event
+will very likely be considered, by that
+numerous class of persons who base
+their opinions of foreign politics upon
+hearsay and general impressions
+rather than upon accurate knowledge
+and investigation of facts, as
+one of the most improbable of possibilities.
+A careful and dispassionate
+examination of the present
+state of the Peninsula does not enable
+us to regard it as a case of such utter
+improbability. But for the intimate
+and intricate connection between the
+Spanish and Portuguese questions, it
+would by no means surprise us&mdash;bearing
+in mind all that Portugal has
+suffered and still suffers under her
+present rulers&mdash;to see the Miguelite
+party openly assume the preponderance
+in the country. England would
+not allow it, will be the reply. Let us
+try the exact value of this assertion.
+England has two reasons for hostility
+to Don Miguel&mdash;one founded on certain
+considerations connected with his
+conduct when formerly on the throne
+of Portugal, the other on the dynastic
+alliance between the two countries.
+The government of Donna Maria may
+reckon upon the sympathy, advice,
+and even upon the direct naval assistance
+of England&mdash;up to a certain
+point. That is to say, that the English
+government will do what it <em>conveniently</em>
+and <em>suitably</em> can, in favour
+of the Portuguese queen and her
+husband; but there is room for a
+strong doubt that it would <em>seriously</em>
+compromise itself to maintain
+them upon the throne. Setting aside
+Donna Maria's matrimonial connection,
+Don Miguel, as a constitutional
+king, and with certain mercantile and
+financial arrangements, would suit
+English interests every bit as well.
+But the case is very different as regards
+Spain. The restoration of Don
+Miguel would be a terrible if not a
+fatal shock to the throne of Isabella II.
+and to the Moderado party, to whom
+the revival of the legitimist principle
+in Portugal would be so much the
+more dangerous if experience proved
+it to be compatible with the interests
+created by the Revolution. For the
+Spanish government, therefore, intervention
+against Don Miguel is an
+absolute necessity&mdash;we might perhaps
+say a condition of its existence;
+and thus is Spain the great stumbling-block
+in the way of his restoration,
+whereas England's objections
+might be found less invincible. So,
+in the civil war in Portugal, this
+country only co-operated indirectly
+against Don Miguel, and it is by no
+means certain he would have been
+overcome, but for the entrance of
+Rodil's Spaniards, which was the decisive
+blow to his cause. And so, the
+other day, the English government
+was seen patiently looking on at the
+progress of events, when it is well
+known that the question of immediate
+intervention was warmly debated
+in the Madrid cabinet, and
+might possibly have been carried, but
+for the moderating influence of English
+counsels.</p>
+
+<p>If we consider the critical and
+hazardous position of Marshal Saldanha,
+wavering as he is between
+Chartists and Septembrists&mdash;threatened
+to-day with a Cabralist insurrection,
+to-morrow with a Septembrist
+pronunciamiento&mdash;it is easy to foresee
+that the Miguelite party may soon
+find tempting opportunities of an
+active demonstration in the field.
+Such a movement, however, would be
+decidedly premature. Their game
+manifestly is to await with patience
+the development of the ultimate consequences
+of Saldanha's insurrection.
+It requires no great amount of judgment<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">[358]</a></span>
+and experience in political matters judgment
+to foresee that he will be the
+victim of his own ill-considered movement,
+and that no long period will
+elapse before some new event&mdash;be it
+a Cabralist reaction or a Septembrist
+revolt&mdash;will prove the instability of
+the present order of things. With
+this certainty in view, the Miguelites
+are playing upon velvet. They have
+only to hold themselves in readiness
+to profit by the struggle between
+the two great divisions of the
+Liberal party. From this struggle
+they are not unlikely to derive an
+important accession of strength, if, as
+is by no means improbable, the
+Chartists should be routed and the
+Septembrists remain temporary masters
+of the field. To understand the
+possible coalition of a portion of the
+Chartists with the adherents of Don
+Miguel, it suffices to bear in mind
+that the former are supporters of constitutional
+monarchy, which principle
+would be endangered by the triumph
+of the Septembrists, whose republican
+tendencies are notorious, as is also&mdash;notwithstanding
+the momentary truce
+they have made with her&mdash;their hatred
+to Donna Maria.</p>
+
+<p>The first consequences of a Septembrist
+pronunciamiento would probably
+be the deposition of the Queen and
+the scattering of the Chartists; and in
+this case it is easy to conceive the
+latter beholding in an alliance with
+the Miguelite party their sole chance
+of escape from democracy, and from a
+destruction of the numerous interests
+they have acquired during their many
+years of power. It is no unfair inference
+that Costa Cabral, when he
+caused himself, shortly after his arrival
+in London, to be presented to Don
+Miguel in a particularly public place,
+anticipated the probability of some
+such events as we have just sketched,
+and thus indicated, to his friends and
+enemies, the new service to which he
+might one day be disposed to devote
+his political talents.</p>
+
+<p>The intricate and suggestive complications
+of Peninsular politics offer a
+wide field for speculation; but of this
+we are not at present disposed further
+to avail ourselves, our object being to
+elucidate facts rather than to theorise
+or indulge in predictions with respect to
+two countries by whose political eccentricities
+more competent prophets
+than ourselves have, upon so many
+occasions during the last twenty
+years, been puzzled and led astray.
+We sincerely wish that the governments
+of Spain and Portugal were
+now in the hands of men capable of
+conciliating all parties, and of averting
+future convulsions&mdash;of men sufficiently
+able and patriotic to conceive
+and carry out measures adapted to the
+character, temper, and wants of the
+two nations. If, by what we should
+be compelled to look upon almost as a
+miracle, such a state of things came
+about in the Peninsula, we should be
+far indeed from desiring to see it disturbed,
+and discord again introduced
+into the land, for the vindication of
+the principle of legitimacy, respectable
+though we hold that to be. But if
+Spain and Portugal are to continue a
+byword among the nations, the focus
+of administrative abuses and oligarchical
+tyranny; if the lower classes of
+society in those countries, by nature
+brave and generous, are to remain
+degraded into the playthings of egotistical
+adventurers, whilst the more
+respectable and intelligent portion of
+the higher orders stands aloof in disgust
+from the orgies of misgovernment;
+if this state of things is to
+endure, without prospect of amendment,
+until the masses throw themselves
+into the arms of the apostles of
+democracy&mdash;who, it were vain to deny,
+gain ground in the Peninsula&mdash;then, we
+ask, before it comes to that, would it
+not be well to give a chance to parties
+and to men whose character and
+principles at least unite some elements
+of stability, and who, whatever reliance
+may be placed on their promises
+for the future, candidly admit their
+past faults and errors? Assuredly
+those nations incur a heavy responsibility,
+and but poorly prove their
+attachment to the cause of constitutional
+freedom, who avail themselves
+of superior force to detain feeble allies
+beneath the yoke of intolerable abuses.</p>
+
+<hr class="chap" />
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">[359]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<h2>THE CONGRESS AND THE AGAPEDOME.</h2>
+
+<h3>A TALE OF PEACE AND LOVE.</h3>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER I.</h4>
+
+<p>If I were to commence my story
+by stating, in the manner of the military
+biographers, that Jack Wilkinson
+was as brave a man as ever pushed a
+bayonet into the brisket of a Frenchman,
+I should be telling a confounded
+lie, seeing that, to the best of my knowledge,
+Jack never had the opportunity
+of attempting practical phlebotomy.
+I shall content myself with describing
+him as one of the finest and best-hearted
+fellows that ever held her
+Majesty's commission; and no one
+who is acquainted with the general
+character of the officers of the British
+army, will require a higher eulogium.</p>
+
+<p>Jack and I were early cronies at
+school; but we soon separated, having
+been born under the influence of
+different planets. Mars, who had
+the charge of Jack, of course devoted
+him to the army; Jupiter, who was
+bound to look after my interests,
+could find nothing better for me than
+a situation in the Woods and Forests,
+with a faint chance of becoming in
+time a subordinate Commissioner&mdash;that
+is, provided the wrongs of Ann
+Hicks do not precipitate the abolition
+of the whole department. Ten years
+elapsed before we met; and I regret
+to say that, during that interval,
+neither of us had ascended many
+rounds of the ladder of promotion.
+As was most natural, I considered
+my own case as peculiarly hard, and
+yet Jack's was perhaps harder. He
+had visited with his regiment, in the
+course of duty, the Cape, the Ionian
+Islands, Gibraltar, and the West
+Indies. He had caught an ague in
+Canada, and had been transplanted
+to the north of Ireland by way of a
+cure; and yet he had not gained a
+higher rank in the service than that
+of Lieutenant. The fact is, that Jack
+was poor, and his brother officers as
+tough as though they had been made of
+caoutchouc. Despite the varieties of
+climate to which they were exposed,
+not one of them would give up the
+ghost; even the old colonel, who had
+been twice despaired of, recovered
+from the yellow fever, and within a
+week after was lapping his claret at
+the mess-table as jollily as if nothing
+had happened. The regiment had a
+bad name in the service: they called
+it, I believe, "the Immortals."</p>
+
+<p>Jack Wilkinson, as I have said,
+was poor, but he had an uncle who
+was enormously rich. This uncle,
+Mr Peter Pettigrew by name, was
+an old bachelor and retired merchant,
+not likely, according to the ordinary
+calculation of chances, to marry; and
+as he had no other near relative save
+Jack, to whom, moreover, he was
+sincerely attached, my friend was
+generally regarded in the light of a
+prospective proprietor, and might
+doubtless, had he been so inclined,
+have negotiated a loan, at or under
+seventy per cent, with one of those
+respectable gentlemen who are making
+such violent efforts to abolish
+Christian legislation. But Pettigrew
+also was tough as one of "the Immortals,"
+and Jack was too prudent a
+fellow to intrust himself to hands so
+eminently accomplished in the art of
+wringing the last drop of moisture
+from a sponge. His uncle, he said,
+had always behaved handsomely to
+him, and he would see the whole tribe
+of Issachar drowned in the Dardanelles
+rather than abuse his kindness
+by raising money on a post-obit.
+Pettigrew, indeed, had paid for his
+commission, and, moreover, given him
+a fair allowance whilst he was quartered
+abroad&mdash;circumstances which
+rendered it extremely probable that
+he would come forward to assist his
+nephew so soon as the latter had any
+prospect of purchasing his company.</p>
+
+<p>Happening by accident to be in
+Hull, where the regiment was quartered,
+I encountered Wilkinson, whom
+I found not a whit altered for the
+worse, either in mind or body, since the
+days when we were at school together;
+and at his instance I agreed to prolong
+my stay, and partake of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">[360]</a></span>
+hospitality of the Immortals. A
+merry set they were! The major told
+a capital story, the senior captain
+sung like Incledon, the <em>cuisine</em> was
+beyond reproach, and the liquor only
+too alluring. But all things must
+have an end. It is wise to quit even
+the most delightful society before it
+palls upon you, and before it is accurately
+ascertained that you, clever
+fellow as you are, can be, on occasion,
+quite as prosy and ridiculous as your
+neighbours; therefore on the third
+day I declined a renewal of the ambrosial
+banquet, and succeeded in persuading
+Wilkinson to take a quiet
+dinner with me at my own hotel.
+He assented&mdash;the more readily, perhaps,
+that he appeared slightly depressed
+in spirits, a phenomenon not
+altogether unknown under similar circumstances.</p>
+
+<p>After the cloth was removed, we
+began to discourse upon our respective
+fortunes, not omitting the usual
+complimentary remarks which, in
+such moments of confidence, are applied
+to one's superiors, who may be
+very thankful that they do not possess
+a preternatural power of hearing. Jack
+informed me that at length a vacancy
+had occurred in his regiment, and that
+he had now an opportunity, could he
+deposit the money, of getting his captaincy.
+But there was evidently a
+screw loose somewhere.</p>
+
+<p>"I must own," said Jack, "that it
+<em>is</em> hard, after having waited so long,
+to lose a chance which may not occur
+again for years; but what can I do?
+You see I haven't got the money; so
+I suppose I must just bend to my
+luck, and wait in patience for my
+company until my head is as bare as
+a billiard-ball!"</p>
+
+<p>"But, Jack," said I, "excuse me
+for making the remark&mdash;but won't
+your uncle, Mr Pettigrew, assist
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not the slightest chance of it."</p>
+
+<p>"You surprise me," said I; "I am
+very sorry to hear you say so. I
+always understood that you were a
+prime favourite of his."</p>
+
+<p>"So I was; and so, perhaps, I am,"
+replied Wilkinson; "but that don't
+alter the matter."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, surely," said I, "if he is
+inclined to help you at all, he will not
+be backward at a time like this. I
+am afraid, Jack, you allow your modesty
+to wrong you."</p>
+
+<p>"I shall permit my modesty," said
+Jack, "to take no such impertinent
+liberty. But I see you don't know my
+uncle Peter."</p>
+
+<p>"I have not that pleasure, certainly;
+but he bears the character
+of a good honest fellow, and everybody
+believes that you are to be his
+heir."</p>
+
+<p>"That may be, or may not, according
+to circumstances," said Wilkinson.
+"You are quite right as to his
+character, which I would advise no
+one to challenge in my presence; for,
+though I should never get another
+stiver from him, or see a farthing of
+his property, I am bound to acknowledge
+that he has acted towards me in
+the most generous manner. But I
+repeat that you don't understand my
+uncle."</p>
+
+<p>"Nor ever shall," said I, "unless
+you condescend to enlighten me."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then, listen. Old Peter
+would be a regular trump, but for one
+besetting foible. He cannot resist a
+crotchet. The more palpably absurd
+and idiotical any scheme may be, the
+more eagerly he adopts it; nay, unless
+it <em>is</em> absurd and idiotical, such as
+no man of common sense would listen
+to for a moment, he will have nothing
+to say to it. He is quite shrewd
+enough with regard to commercial
+matters. During the railway mania,
+he is supposed to have doubled his
+capital. Never having had any faith
+in the stability of the system, he sold
+out just at the right moment, alleging
+that it was full time to do so, when
+Sir Robert Peel introduced a bill
+giving the Government the right of
+purchasing any line when its dividends
+amounted to ten per cent. The result
+proved that he was correct."</p>
+
+<p>"It did, undoubtedly. But surely
+that is no evidence of his extreme
+tendency to be led astray by
+crotchets?"</p>
+
+<p>"Quite the reverse: the scheme
+was not sufficiently absurd for him.
+Besides, I must tell you, that in pure
+commercial matters it would be very
+difficult to overreach or deceive my
+uncle. He has a clear eye for pounds,
+shillings, and pence&mdash;principal and
+interest&mdash;and can look very well after
+himself when his purse is directly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">[361]</a></span>
+assailed. His real weakness lies in
+sentiment."</p>
+
+<p>"Not, I trust, towards the feminine
+gender? That might be awkward for
+you in a gentleman of his years!"</p>
+
+<p>"Not precisely&mdash;though I would
+not like to trust him in the hands of
+a designing female. His besetting
+weakness turns on the point of the
+regeneration of mankind. Forty or
+fifty years ago he would have been a
+follower of Johanna Southcote. He
+subscribed liberally to Owen's schemes,
+and was within an ace of turning out
+with Thom of Canterbury. Incredible
+as it may appear, he actually
+was for a time a regular and accepted
+Mormonite."</p>
+
+<p>"You don't mean to say so?"</p>
+
+<p>"Fact, I assure you, upon my
+honour! But for a swindle that Joe
+Smith tried to perpetrate about the
+discounting of a bill, Peter Pettigrew
+might at this moment have been a
+leading saint in the temple of Nauvoo,
+or whatever else they call the capital
+of that polygamous and promiscuous
+persuasion."</p>
+
+<p>"You amaze me. How any man
+of common sense&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"That's just the point. Where
+common sense ends, Uncle Pettigrew
+begins. Give him a mere thread of
+practicability, and he will arrive at a
+sound conclusion. Envelope him in
+the mist of theory, and he will walk
+headlong over a precipice."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, Jack," said I, "you seem
+to have improved in your figures of
+speech since you joined the army.
+That last sentence was worth preservation.
+But I don't clearly understand
+you yet. What is his present
+phase, which seems to stand in the
+way of your prospects?"</p>
+
+<p>"Can't you guess? What is the
+most absurd feature of the present
+time?"</p>
+
+<p>"That," said I, "is a very difficult
+question. There's Free Trade, and
+the proposed Exhibition&mdash;both of
+them absurd enough, if you look to
+their ultimate tendency. Then there
+are Sir Charles Wood's Budget, and
+the new Reform Bill, and the Encumbered
+Estates Act, and the whole
+rubbish of the Cabinet, which they
+have neither sense to suppress nor
+courage to carry through. Upon my
+word, Jack, it would be impossible
+for me to answer your question satisfactorily."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you think of the Peace
+Congress?" asked Wilkinson.</p>
+
+<p>"As Palmerston does," said I;
+"remarkably meanly. But why do
+you put that point? Surely Mr Pettigrew
+has not become a disciple of the
+blatant blacksmith?"</p>
+
+<p>"Read that, and judge for yourself,"
+said Wilkinson, handing me over
+a letter.</p>
+
+<p>I read as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+
+<p>"<span class="smcap">My dear Nephew</span>,&mdash;I have your
+letter of the 15th, apprising me of
+your wish to obtain what you term a
+step in the service. I am aware that
+I am not entitled to blame you for a
+misguided and lamentably mistaken
+zeal, which, to my shame be it
+said, I was the means of originally
+kindling; still, you must excuse me if,
+with the new lights which have been
+vouchsafed to me, I decline to assist
+your progress towards wholesale homicide,
+or lend any farther countenance
+to a profession which is subversive of
+that universal brotherhood and entire
+fraternity which ought to prevail
+among the nations. The fact is, Jack,
+that, up to the present time, I have
+entertained ideas which were totally
+false regarding the greatness of my
+country. I used to think that England
+was quite as glorious from her renown
+in arms as from her skill in arts&mdash;that
+she had reason to plume herself upon
+her ancient and modern victories, and
+that patriotism was a virtue which it
+was incumbent upon freemen to view
+with respect and veneration. Led
+astray by these wretched prejudices,
+I gave my consent to your enrolling
+yourself in the ranks of the British
+army, little thinking that, by such a
+step, I was doing a material injury to
+the cause of general pacification, and,
+in fact, retarding the advent of that
+millennium which will commence so
+soon as the military profession is entirely
+suppressed throughout Europe.
+I am now also painfully aware that,
+towards you individually, I have failed
+in performing my duty. I have been
+the means of inoculating you with a
+thirst for human blood, and of depriving
+you of that opportunity of
+adding to the resources of your country,
+which you might have enjoyed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">[362]</a></span>
+had I placed you early in one of those
+establishments which, by sending exports
+to the uttermost parts of the
+earth, have contributed so magnificently
+to the diffusion of British patterns,
+and the growth of American
+cotton under a mild system of servitude,
+which none, save the minions
+of royalty, dare denominate as actual
+slavery.</p>
+
+<p>"In short, Jack, I have wronged
+you; but I should wrong you still
+more were I to furnish you with the
+means of advancing one other step in
+your bloody and inhuman profession.
+It is full time that we should discard
+all national recollections. We have
+already given a glorious example to
+Europe and the world, by throwing
+open our ports to their produce
+without requiring the assurance of
+reciprocity&mdash;let us take another step
+in the same direction, and, by a
+complete disarmament, convince them
+that for the future we rely upon
+moral reason, instead of physical force,
+as the means of deciding differences.
+I shall be glad, my dear boy, to
+repair the injury which I have unfortunately
+done you, by contributing
+a sum, equal to three times the
+amount required for the purchase of
+a company, towards your establishment
+as a partner in an exporting
+house, if you can hear of an eligible
+offer. Pray keep an eye on the advertising
+columns of the <cite>Economist</cite>.
+That journal is in every way trustworthy,
+except, perhaps, when it
+deals in quotation. I must now conclude,
+as I have to attend a meeting
+for the purpose of denouncing the
+policy of Russia, and of warning
+the misguided capitalists of London
+against the perils of an Austrian loan.
+You cannot, I am sure, doubt my
+affection, but you must not expect me
+to advance my money towards keeping
+up a herd of locusts, without
+which there would be a general conversion
+of swords and bayonets into
+machinery&mdash;ploughshares, spades, and
+pruning-hooks being, for the present,
+rather at a discount.&mdash;I remain always
+your affectionate uncle,</p>
+
+<p class="sig">
+"<span class="smcap">Peter Pettigrew</span>.
+</p>
+
+<p>"<em>P. S.</em>&mdash;Address to me at Hesse
+Homberg, whither I am going as a
+delegate to the Peace Congress."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>"Well, what do you think of
+that?" said Wilkinson, when I had
+finished this comfortable epistle. "I
+presume you agree with me, that I
+have no chance whatever of receiving
+assistance from that quarter."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, not much I should say,
+unless you can succeed in convincing
+Mr Pettigrew of the error of his ways.
+It seems to me a regular case of monomania."</p>
+
+<p>"Would you not suppose, after
+reading that letter, that I was a sort
+of sucking tiger, or at best an ogre,
+who never could sleep comfortably
+unless he had finished off the evening
+with a cup of gore?" said Wilkinson.
+"I like that coming from old Uncle
+Peter, who used to sing Rule Britannia
+till he was hoarse, and always dedicated
+his second glass of port to the
+health of the Duke of Wellington!"</p>
+
+<p>"But what do you intend to do?"
+said I. "Will you accept his offer,
+and become a fabricator of calicoes?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'd as soon become a field preacher,
+and hold forth on an inverted tub!
+But the matter is really very serious.
+In his present mood of mind, Uncle
+Peter will disinherit me to a certainty
+if I remain in the army."</p>
+
+<p>"Does he usually adhere long to
+any particular crotchet?" said I.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, no; and therein lies my
+hope. Judging from past experience,
+I should say that this fit is not likely
+to last above a month or two; still
+you see there may be danger in treating
+the matter too lightly: besides,
+there is no saying when such another
+opportunity of getting a step may
+occur. What would you advise under
+the circumstances?"</p>
+
+<p>"If I were in your place," said I,
+"I think I should go over to Hesse
+Homberg at once. You need not
+identify yourself entirely with the
+Peace gentry; you will be near your
+uncle, and ready to act as circumstances
+may suggest."</p>
+
+<p>"That is just my own notion; and
+I think I can obtain leave of absence.
+I say&mdash;could you not manage to go
+along with me? It would be a real
+act of friendship; for, to say the
+truth, I don't think I could trust any
+of our fellows in the company of the
+Quakers."</p>
+
+<p>"Well&mdash;I believe they can spare
+me for a little longer from my official<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363">[363]</a></span>
+duties; and as the weather is fine, I
+don't mind if I go."</p>
+
+<p>"That's a good fellow! I shall
+make my arrangements this evening;
+for the sooner we are off the better."</p>
+
+<p>Two days afterwards we were
+steaming up the Rhine, a river which,
+I trust, may persevere in its attempt
+to redeem its ancient character. In
+1848, when I visited Germany last,
+you might just as well have navigated
+the Phlegethon in so far as pleasure
+was concerned. Those were the days
+of barricades and of Frankfort murders&mdash;of
+the obscene German Parliament,
+as the junta of rogues, fanatics, and
+imbeciles, who were assembled in St
+Paul's Church, denominated themselves;
+and of every phase and form
+of political quackery and insurrection.
+Now, however, matters were somewhat
+mended. The star of Gagern
+had waned. The popularity of the
+Archduke John had exhaled like the
+fume of a farthing candle. Hecker
+and Struve were hanged, shot, or
+expatriated; and the peaceably disposed
+traveller could once more retire
+to rest in his hotel, without being
+haunted by a horrid suspicion that
+ere morning some truculent waiter
+might experiment upon the toughness
+of his larynx. I was glad to
+observe that the Frankforters appeared
+a good deal humbled. They were
+always a pestilent set; but during
+the revolutionary year their insolence
+rose to such a pitch that it was
+hardly safe for a man of warm temperament
+to enter a shop, lest he
+should be provoked by the airs and
+impertinence of the owner to commit
+an assault upon Freedom in the person
+of her democratic votary. I suspect
+the Frankforters are now tolerably
+aware that revolutions are the
+reverse of profitable. They escaped
+sack and pillage by a sheer miracle,
+and probably they will not again
+exert themselves, at least for a considerable
+number of years, to hasten
+the approach of a similar crisis.</p>
+
+<p>Everybody knows Homberg. On
+one pretext or another&mdash;whether the
+mineral springs, the baths, the gaiety,
+or the gambling&mdash;the integral portions
+of that tide of voyagers which
+annually fluctuates through the Rheingau,
+find their way to that pleasant
+little pandemonium, and contribute,
+I have no doubt, very largely to the
+revenues of that high and puissant
+monarch who rules over a population
+not quite so large as that comprehended
+within the boundaries of
+Clackmannan. But various as its
+visitors always are, and diverse in
+language, habits, and morals, I
+question whether Homberg ever exhibited
+on any previous occasion so
+queer and incongruous a mixture.
+Doubtful counts, apocryphal barons,
+and chevaliers of the extremest industry,
+mingled with sleek Quakers,
+Manchester reformers, and clerical
+agitators of every imaginable species
+of dissent. Then there were women,
+for the most part of a middle age,
+who, although their complexions
+would certainly have been improved
+by a course of the medicinal waters,
+had evidently come to Homberg on a
+higher and holier mission. There was
+also a sprinkling of French deputies&mdash;Red
+Republicans by principle, who,
+if not the most ardent friends of pacification,
+are at least the loudest in
+their denunciation of standing armies&mdash;a
+fair proportion of political exiles,
+who found their own countries too
+hot to hold them in consequence of
+the caloric which they had been
+the means of evoking&mdash;and one or two
+of those unhappy personages, whose
+itch for notoriety is greater than
+their modicum of sense. We were
+not long in finding Mr Peter Pettigrew.
+He was solacing himself
+in the gardens, previous to the table-d'hôte,
+by listening to the exhilarating
+strains of the brass band which
+was performing a military march;
+and by his side was a lady attired, not
+in the usual costume of her sex, but in
+a polka jacket and wide trousers,
+which gave her all the appearance of
+a veteran duenna of a seraglio. Uncle
+Peter, however, beamed upon her as
+tenderly as though she were a Circassian
+captive. To this lady, by name
+Miss Lavinia Latchley, an American
+authoress of much renown, and a
+decided champion of the rights of
+woman, we were presented in due
+form. After the first greetings were
+over, Mr Pettigrew opened the
+trenches.</p>
+
+<p>"So Jack, my boy, you have come
+to Homberg to see how we carry on
+the war, eh? No&mdash;Lord forgive me&mdash;that's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_364" id="Page_364">[364]</a></span>
+not what I mean. We don't
+intend to carry on any kind of war:
+we mean to put it down&mdash;clap the
+extinguisher upon it, you know; and
+have done with all kinds of cannons.
+Bad thing, gunpowder! I once sustained
+a heavy loss by sending out a
+cargo of it to Sierra Leone."</p>
+
+<p>"I should have thought that a
+paying speculation," observed Jack.</p>
+
+<p>"Not a whit of it! The cruisers
+spoiled the trade; and the missionaries&mdash;confound
+them for meddling
+with matters which they did not
+understand!&mdash;had patched up a peace
+among the chiefs of the cannibals;
+so that for two years there was
+not a slave to be had for love or
+money, and powder went down a
+hundred and seventy per cent."</p>
+
+<p>"Such are the effects," remarked
+Miss Latchley with a sarcastic smile,
+which disclosed a row of teeth as
+yellow as the buds of the crocus&mdash;"such
+are the effects of an ill regulated
+and unphilosophical yearning after
+the visionary theories of an unopportune
+emancipation! Oh that men,
+instead of squandering their sympathies
+upon the lower grades of creation,
+would emancipate themselves
+from that network of error and prejudice
+which reticulates over the whole
+surface of society, and by acknowledging
+the divine mission and hereditary
+claims of woman, construct a
+new, a fairer Eden than any which
+was fabled to exist within the confines
+of the primitive Chaldæa!"</p>
+
+<p>"Very true, indeed, ma'am!"
+replied Mr Pettigrew; "there is a
+great deal of sound sense and observation
+in what you say. But Jack&mdash;I
+hope you intend to become a member
+of Congress at once. I shall
+be glad to present you at our afternoon
+meeting in the character of a
+converted officer."</p>
+
+<p>"You are very good, uncle, I am
+sure," said Wilkinson, "but I would
+rather wait a little. I am certain
+you would not wish me to take so
+serious a step without mature deliberation;
+and I hope that my
+attendance here, in answer to your
+summons, will convince you that I am
+at least open to conviction. In fact,
+I wish to hear the argument of your
+friends before I come to a definite
+decision."</p>
+
+<p>"Very right, Jack; very right!"
+said Mr Pettigrew. "I don't like
+converts at a minute's notice, as I
+remarked to a certain M.P. when he
+followed in the wake of Peel. Take
+your time, and form your own judgment;
+I cannot doubt of the result, if
+you only listen to the arguments of
+the leading men of Europe."</p>
+
+<p>"And do you reckon America as
+nothing, dear Mr Pettigrew?" said
+Miss Latchley. "Columbia may not
+be able to contribute to the task so
+practical and masculine an intellect as
+yours, yet still within many a Transatlantic
+bosom burns a hate of tyranny
+not less intense, though perhaps less
+corruscating, than your own."</p>
+
+<p>"I know it, I know it, dear Miss
+Latchley!" replied the infatuated
+Peter. "A word from you is at any
+time worth a lecture, at least if I may
+judge from the effects which your
+magnificent eloquence has produced
+on my own mind. Jack, I suppose
+you have never had the privilege of
+listening to the lectures of Miss
+Latchley?"</p>
+
+<p>Jack modestly acknowledged the
+gap which had been left in his education;
+stating, at the same time, his
+intense desire to have it filled up
+at the first convenient opportunity.
+Miss Latchley heaved a sigh.</p>
+
+<p>"I hope you do not flatter me," she
+said, "as is too much the case with
+men whose thoughts have been led
+habitually to deviate from sincerity.
+The worst symptom of the present
+age lies in its acquiescence with axioms.
+Free us from that, and we are free
+indeed; perpetuate its thraldom, and
+Truth, which is the daughter of Innocence
+and Liberty, imps its wings
+in vain, and cannot emancipate itself
+from the pressure of that raiment
+which was devised to impede its
+glorious walk among the nations."</p>
+
+<p>Jack made no reply beyond a glance
+at the terminations of the lady, which
+showed that she at all events was resolved
+that no extra raiment should
+trammel her onward progress.</p>
+
+<p>As the customary hour of the table-d'hôte
+was approaching, we separated,
+Jack and I pledging ourselves to
+attend the afternoon meeting of the
+Peace Congress, for the purpose of
+receiving our first lesson in the
+mysteries of pacification.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_365" id="Page_365">[365]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Well, what do you think of that?"
+said Jack, as Mr Pettigrew and the
+Latchley walked off together. "Hang
+me if I don't suspect that old harpy
+in the breeches has a design on Uncle
+Peter!"</p>
+
+<p>"Small doubt of that," said I; "and
+you will find it rather a difficult job
+to get him out of her clutches. Your
+female philosopher adheres to her victim
+with all the tenacity of a polecat."</p>
+
+<p>"Here is a pretty business!" groaned
+Jack. "I'll tell you what it is&mdash;I
+have more than half a mind to put an
+end to it, by telling my uncle what I
+think of his conduct, and then leaving
+him to marry this harridan, and make
+a further fool of himself in any way he
+pleases!"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't be silly, Jack!" said I;
+"It will be time enough to do that
+after everything else has failed; and,
+for my own part, I see no reason to
+despair. In the mean time, if you
+please, let us secure places at the
+dinner-table."</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER II.</h4>
+
+<p>"Dear friends and well-beloved
+brothers! I wish from the bottom of
+my heart that there was but one
+universal language, so that the general
+sentiments of love, equality, and fraternity,
+which animate the bosoms of
+all the pacificators and detesters of
+tyranny throughout the world, might
+find a simultaneous echo in your ears,
+by the medium of a common speech.
+The diversity of dialects, which now
+unfortunately prevails, was originally
+invented under cover of the feudal
+system, by the minions of despotism,
+who thought, by such despicable means,
+for ever to perpetuate their power.
+It is part of the same system which
+decrees that in different countries
+alien to each other in speech, those
+unhappy persons who have sold themselves
+to do the bidding of tyrants
+shall be distinguished by different
+uniforms. O my brothers! see what
+a hellish and deep-laid system is here!
+English and French&mdash;scarlet against
+blue&mdash;different tongues invented, and
+different garments prescribed, to inflame
+the passions of mankind against
+each other, and to stifle their common
+fraternity!</p>
+
+<p>"Take down, I say, from your halls
+and churches those wretched tatters
+of silk which you designate as national
+colours! Bring hither, from all parts
+of the earth, the butt of the gun and
+the shaft of the spear, and all combustible
+implements of destruction&mdash;your
+fascines, your scaling-ladders,
+and your terrible pontoons, that have
+made so many mothers childless!
+Heap them into one enormous pile&mdash;yea,
+heap them to the very stars&mdash;and
+on that blazing altar let there be
+thrown the Union Jack of Britain,
+the tricolor of France, the eagles of
+Russia, Austria, and Prussia, the
+American stripes and stars, and every
+other banner and emblem of that accursed
+nationality, through which alone
+mankind is defrauded of his birthright.
+Then let all men join hands together,
+and as they dance around the reeking
+pile, let them in one common speech
+chaunt a simultaneous hymn in honour
+of their universal deliverance, and in
+commemoration of their cosmopolitan
+triumph!</p>
+
+<p>"O my brothers, O my brothers!
+what shall I say further? Ha! I
+will not address myself to you whose
+hearts are already kindled within you
+by the purest of spiritual flames. I
+will uplift my voice, and in words of
+thunder exhort the debased minions of
+tyranny to arouse themselves ere it
+be too late, and to shake off those
+fetters which they wear for the purpose
+of enslaving others. Hear me,
+then, ye soldiers!&mdash;hear me, ye
+degraded serfs!&mdash;hear me, ye monsters
+of iniquity! Oh, if the earth could
+speak, what a voice would arise out
+of its desolate battle-fields, to testify
+against you and yours! Tell us not
+that you have fought for freedom.
+Was freedom ever won by the sword?
+Tell us not that you have defended
+your country's rights, for in the eye
+of the true philosopher there is no
+country save one, and that is the
+universal earth, to which all have an
+equal claim. Shelter not yourselves,
+night-prowling hyenas as you are,
+under such miserable pretexts as
+these! Hie ye to the charnel-houses,
+ye bats, ye vampires, ye ravens, ye
+birds of the foulest omen! Strive, if
+you can, in their dark recesses, to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_366" id="Page_366">[366]</a></span>
+hide yourselves from the glare of that
+light which is now permeating the
+world. O the dawn! O the glory! O
+the universal illumination! See, my
+brothers, how they shrink, how they
+flee from its cheering influence!
+Tremble, minions of despotism! Your
+race is run, your very empires are
+tottering around you. See&mdash;with one
+grasp I crush them all, as I crush
+this flimsy scroll!"</p>
+
+<p>Here the eloquent gentleman, having
+made a paper ball of the last
+number of the <i lang="de" xml:lang="de">Allgemeine Zeitung</i>,
+sate down amidst the vociferous
+applause of the assembly. He was
+the first orator who had spoken, and
+I believe had been selected to lead
+the van on account of his platform
+experience, which was very great. I
+cannot say, however, that his arguments
+produced entire conviction upon
+my mind, or that of my companion,
+judging from certain muttered adjurations
+which fell from Wilkinson, to
+the effect that on the first convenient
+opportunity he would take means to
+make the crumpler-up of nations
+atone for his scurrilous abuse of the
+army. We were next favoured with
+addresses in Sclavonian, German, and
+French; and then another British
+orator came forward to enlighten the
+public. This last was a fellow of
+some fancy. Avoiding all stale
+topics about despotism, aristocracies,
+and standing armies, he went to the
+root of the matter, by asserting that
+in Vegetarianism alone lay the true
+escape from the horrors and miseries
+of war. Mr Belcher&mdash;for such was
+the name of this distinguished philanthropist&mdash;opined
+that without beef and
+mutton there never could be a battle.</p>
+
+<p>"Had Napoleon," said he, "been
+dieted from his youth upwards upon
+turnips, the world would have been
+spared those scenes of butchery,
+which must ever remain a blot upon
+the history of the present century.
+One of our oldest English annalists
+assures us that Jack Cade, than whom,
+perhaps, there never breathed a more
+uncompromising enemy of tyranny,
+subsisted entirely upon spinach. This
+fact has been beautifully treated by
+Shakspeare, whose passion for onions
+was proverbial, in his play of Henry
+VI., wherein he represents Cade, immediately
+before his death, as engaged
+in the preparation of a salad. I myself,"
+continued Mr Belcher in a
+slightly flatulent tone, "can assure
+this honourable company, that for more
+than six months I have cautiously
+abstained from using any other kind
+of food, except broccoli, which I find
+at once refreshing and laxative, light,
+airy, and digestible!"</p>
+
+<p>Mr Belcher having ended, a bearded
+gentleman, who enjoyed the reputation
+of being the most notorious duellist in
+Europe, rose up for the purpose of
+addressing the audience; but by this
+time the afternoon was considerably
+advanced, and a large number of the
+Congress had silently seceded to
+the <em>roulette</em> and <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">rouge-et-noir</i> tables.
+Among these, to my great surprise,
+were Miss Latchley and Mr Pettigrew:
+it being, as I afterwards understood,
+the invariable practice of this
+gifted lady, whenever she could secure
+a victim, to avail herself of his pecuniary
+resources; so that if fortune
+declared against her, the gentleman
+stood the loss, whilst, in the opposite
+event, she retained possession of the
+spoil. I daresay some of my readers
+may have been witnesses to a similar
+arrangement.</p>
+
+<p>As it was no use remaining after
+the departure of Mr Pettigrew, Wilkinson
+and I sallied forth for a stroll,
+not, as you may well conceive, in a
+high state of enthusiasm or rapture.</p>
+
+<p>"I would not have believed," said
+Wilkinson, "unless I had seen it with
+my own eyes, that it was possible to
+collect in one room so many samples
+of absolute idiocy. What a pleasant
+companion that Belcher fellow, who
+eats nothing but broccoli, must be!"</p>
+
+<p>"A little variety in the way of
+peas would probably render him perfect.
+But what do you say to the
+first orator?"</p>
+
+<p>"I shall reserve the expression of
+my opinion," replied Jack, "until I
+have the satisfaction of meeting that
+gentleman in private. But how are
+we to proceed? With this woman in
+the way, it entirely baffles my comprehension."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know, Jack, I was thinking
+of that during the whole time of
+the meeting; and it does appear to
+me that there is a way open by which
+we may precipitate the crisis. Mind&mdash;I
+don't answer for the success of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_367" id="Page_367">[367]</a></span>
+my scheme, but it has at least the
+merit of simplicity."</p>
+
+<p>"Out with it, my dear fellow! I
+am all impatience," cried Jack.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then," said I, "did you
+remark the queer and heterogeneous
+nature of the company? I don't
+think, if you except the Quakers, who
+have the generic similarity of eels,
+that you could have picked out any
+two individuals with a tolerable resemblance
+to each other."</p>
+
+<p>"That's likely enough, for they
+are a most seedy set. But what of
+it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, simply this: I suspect the
+majority of them are political refugees.
+No person, who is not an
+absurd fanatic or a designing demagogue,
+can have any sympathy
+with the nonsense which is talked
+against governments and standing
+armies. The Red Republicans, of
+whom I can assure you there are plenty
+in every state in Europe, are naturally
+most desirous to get rid of the latter,
+by whom they are held in check; and
+if that were once accomplished, no
+kind of government could stand for
+a single day. They are now appealing,
+as they call it, to public opinion,
+by means of these congresses and
+gatherings; and they have contrived,
+under cover of a zeal for universal
+peace, to induce a considerable number
+of weak and foolish people to join with
+them in a cry which is simply the
+forerunner of revolution."</p>
+
+<p>"All that I understand; but I
+don't quite see your drift."</p>
+
+<p>"Every one of these bearded
+vagabonds hates the other like poison.
+Talk of fraternity, indeed! They want
+to have revolution first; and if they
+could get it, you would see them
+flying at each other's throats like a
+pack of wild dogs that have pulled
+down a deer. Now, my plan is this:
+Let us have a supper-party, and
+invite a deputy from each nation.
+My life upon it, that before they have
+been half-an-hour together, there will
+be such a row among the fraternisers
+as will frighten your uncle Peter out
+of his senses, or, still better, out of
+his present crotchet."</p>
+
+<p>"A capital idea! But how shall
+we get hold of the fellows?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's not very difficult. They
+are at this moment hard at work at
+roulette, and they will come readily
+enough to the call if you promise them
+lots of Niersteiner."</p>
+
+<p>"By George! they shall have it
+in bucketfuls, if that can produce the
+desired effect. I say&mdash;we must positively
+have that chap who abused
+the army."</p>
+
+<p>"I think it would be advisable to
+let him alone. I would rather stick
+to the foreigners."</p>
+
+<p>"O, by Jove, we must have him.
+I have a slight score to settle, for
+the credit of the service!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, but be cautious. Recollect
+the great matter is to leave our guests
+to themselves."</p>
+
+<p>"Never fear me. I shall take care
+to keep within due bounds. Now
+let us look after Uncle Peter."</p>
+
+<p>We found that respected individual
+in a state of high glee. His own
+run of luck had not been extraordinary;
+but the Latchley, who
+appeared to possess a sort of second-sight
+in fixing on the fortunate
+numbers, had contrived to accumulate
+a perfect mountain of dollars, to the
+manifest disgust of a profane Quaker
+opposite, who, judging from the
+violence of his language, had been
+thoroughly cleaned out. Mr Pettigrew
+agreed at once to the proposal for a
+supper-party, which Jack excused
+himself for making, on the ground
+that he had a strong wish to cultivate
+the personal acquaintance of the
+gentlemen, who, in the event of his
+joining the Peace Society, would
+become his brethren. After some
+pressing, Mr Pettigrew agreed to take
+the chair, his nephew officiating as
+croupier. Miss Lavinia Latchley, so
+soon as she learned what was in contemplation,
+made a strong effort to
+be allowed to join the party; but,
+notwithstanding her assertion of the
+unalienable rights of woman to be
+present on all occasions of social
+hilarity, Jack would not yield; and
+even Pettigrew seemed to think that
+there were times and seasons when
+the female countenance might be withheld
+with advantage. We found no
+difficulty whatever in furnishing the
+complement of the guests. There
+were seventeen of us in all&mdash;four
+Britons, two Frenchmen, a Hungarian,
+a Lombard, a Piedmontese, a
+Sicilian, a Neapolitan, a Roman, an<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_368" id="Page_368">[368]</a></span>
+Austrian, a Prussian, a Dane, a
+Dutchman, and a Yankee. The majority
+exhibited beards of startling
+dimension, and few of them appeared
+to regard soap in the light of a justifiable
+luxury.</p>
+
+<p>Pettigrew made an admirable chairman.
+Although not conversant with
+any language save his own, he contrived,
+by means of altering the terminations
+of his words, to carry on a
+very animated conversation with all
+his neighbours. His Italian was
+superb, his Danish above par, and
+his Sclavonic, to say the least of it,
+passable. The viands were good,
+and the wine abundant; so that, by
+the time pipes were produced, we
+were all tolerably hilarious. The
+conversation, which at first was general,
+now took a political turn; and
+very grievous it was to listen to the
+tales of the outrages which some of
+the company had sustained at the
+hands of tyrannical governments.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll tell you what it is, gentlemen,"
+said one of the Frenchmen,
+"republics are not a whit better than
+monarchies, in so far as the liberty of
+the people is concerned. Here am I
+obliged to leave France, because I was
+a friend of that gallant fellow, Ledru
+Rollin, whom I hope one day to see
+at the head of a real Socialist government.
+Ah, won't we set the guillotine
+once more in motion then!"</p>
+
+<p>"Property is theft," remarked the
+Neapolitan, sententiously.</p>
+
+<p>"I calculate, my fine chap, that
+you han't many dollars of your own,
+if you're of that way of thinking!"
+said the Yankee, considerably scandalised
+at this indifference to the rule
+of <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">meum</i> and <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">tuum</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"O Roma!" sighed the gentleman
+from the eternal city, who was rather
+intoxicated.</p>
+
+<p>"<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Peste!</i> What is the matter with
+it?" asked one of the Frenchmen.
+"I presume it stands where it always
+did. <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Garçon&mdash;un petit verre de rhom!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>"How can Rome be what it was,
+when it is profaned by the foot of the
+stranger?" replied he of the Papal
+States.</p>
+
+<p>"<em>Ah, bah!</em> You never were better
+off than under the rule of Oudinot."</p>
+
+<p>"You are a German," said the
+Hungarian to the Austrian; "what
+think you of our brave Kossuth?"</p>
+
+<p>"I consider him a pragmatical ass,"
+replied the Austrian curtly.</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps in that case," interposed
+the Lombard, with a sneer that might
+have done credit to Mephistopheles,
+"the gentleman may feel inclined to
+palliate the conduct of that satrap of
+tyranny, Radetski?"</p>
+
+<p>"What!&mdash;old father Radetski! the
+victor in a hundred fights!" cried the
+Austrian. "That will I; and spit in
+the face of any cowardly Italian who
+dares to breathe a word against his
+honour!"</p>
+
+<p>The Italian clutched his knife.</p>
+
+<p>"Hold there!" cried the Piedmontese,
+who seemed really a decent
+sort of fellow. "None of your stiletto
+work here! Had you Lombards
+trusted more to the bayonet and less
+to the knife, we might have given
+another account of the Austrian in
+that campaign, which cost Piedmont
+its king!"</p>
+
+<p>"<em>Carlo Alberto!</em>" hissed the Lombard,
+"<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">sceleratissimo traditore!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>The reply of the Piedmontese was
+a pie-dish, which prostrated the Lombard
+on the floor.</p>
+
+<p>"Gentlemen! gentlemen! for
+Heaven's sake be calm!" screamed
+Pettigrew; "remember we are all
+brothers!"</p>
+
+<p>"Brothers!" roared the Dane,
+"do ye think I would fraternise with
+a Prussian? Remember Schleswig
+Holstein!"</p>
+
+<p>"I am perfectly calm," said the
+Prussian, with the stiff formality of
+his nation; "I never quarrel over the
+generous vintage of my fatherland.
+Come&mdash;let me give you a song&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">'Sie sollen ihm nicht haben<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Den Deutschen freien Rhein.'"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"You never were more mistaken
+in your life, <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">mon cher</i>," said one of
+the Frenchmen, brusquely. "Before
+twelve months are over we shall see
+who has right to the Rhine!"</p>
+
+<p>"Ay, that is true!" remarked the
+Dutchman; "confound these Germans&mdash;they
+wanted to annex Luxembourg."</p>
+
+<p>"What says the frog?" asked the
+Prussian contemptuously.</p>
+
+<p>The frog said nothing, but he hit
+the Prussian on the teeth.</p>
+
+<p>I despair of giving even a feeble
+impression of the scene which took<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_369" id="Page_369">[369]</a></span>
+place. No single pair of ears was
+sufficient to catch one fourth of the
+general discord. There was first an
+interchange of angry words; then an
+interchange of blows; and immediately
+after, the guests were rolling,
+in groups of twos and threes, as
+suited their fancy, or the adjustment
+of national animosities, on the ground.
+The Lombard rose not again; the
+pie-dish had quieted him for the
+night. But the Sicilian and Neapolitan
+lay locked in deadly combat,
+each attempting with intense animosity
+to bite off the other's nose.
+The Austrian caught the Hungarian
+by the throat, and held him till he
+was black in the face. The Dane
+pommelled the Prussian. One of the
+Frenchmen broke a bottle over the
+head of the subject of the Pope;
+whilst his friend, thirsting for the
+combat, attempted in vain to insult
+the remaining non-belligerents. The
+Dutchman having done all that honour
+required, smoked in mute tranquillity.
+Meanwhile the cries of
+Uncle Peter were heard above the
+din of battle, entreating a cessation
+of hostilities. He might as well have
+preached to the storm&mdash;the row grew
+fiercer every moment.</p>
+
+<p>"This is a disgusting spectacle!"
+said the orator from Manchester.
+"These men cannot be true pacificators&mdash;they
+must have served in the
+army."</p>
+
+<p>"That reminds me, old fellow!"
+said Jack, turning up the cuffs of his
+coat with a very ominous expression
+of countenance, "that you were
+pleased this morning to use some
+impertinent expressions with regard
+to the British army. Do you adhere
+to what you said then?"</p>
+
+<p>"I do."</p>
+
+<p>"Then up with your mauleys;
+for, by the Lord Harry! I intend to
+have satisfaction out of your carcase!"</p>
+
+<p>And in less than a minute the
+Manchester apostle dropped with
+both his eyes bunged up, and did not
+come to time.</p>
+
+<p>"Stranger!" said the Yankee to
+the Piedmontese, "are you inclined
+for a turn at gouging? This child
+feels wolfish to raise hair!" But, to
+his credit be it said, the Piedmontese
+declined the proposal with a
+polite bow. Meanwhile the uproar
+had attracted the attention of the
+neighbourhood. Six or seven men in
+uniform, whom I strongly suspect
+to have been members of the brass
+band, entered the apartment armed
+with bayonets, and carried off the
+more obstreperous of the party to the
+guard-house. The others immediately
+retired, and at last Jack and
+I were left alone with Mr Pettigrew.</p>
+
+<p>"And this," said he, after a considerable
+pause, "is fraternity and
+peace! These are the men who
+intended to commence the reign of the
+millennium in Europe! Giver me your
+hand, Jack, my dear boy&mdash;you shan't
+leave the army&mdash;nay, if you do, rely
+upon it I shall cut you off with a
+shilling, and mortify my fortune to
+the Woolwich hospital. I begin to
+see that I am an old fool. Stop a
+moment. Here is a bottle of wine
+that has fortunately escaped the devastation&mdash;fill
+your glasses, and let
+us dedicate a full bumper to the
+health of the Duke of Wellington."</p>
+
+<p>I need hardly say that the toast
+was responded to with enthusiasm.
+We finished not only that bottle, but
+another; and I had the satisfaction
+of hearing Mr Pettigrew announce to
+my friend Wilkinson that the purchase-money
+for his company would
+be forthcoming at Coutts's before he
+was a fortnight older.</p>
+
+<p>"I won't affect to deny," said
+Uncle Peter, "that this is a great disappointment
+to me. I had hoped
+better things of human nature; but I
+now perceive that I was wrong.
+Good night, my dear boys! I am a
+good deal agitated, as you may see;
+and perhaps this sour wine has not
+altogether agreed with me&mdash;I had
+better have taken brandy and water.
+I shall seek refuge on my pillow, and
+I trust we may soon meet again!"</p>
+
+<p>"What did the venerable Peter
+mean by that impressive farewell?"
+said I, after the excellent old man
+had departed, shaking his head
+mournfully as he went.</p>
+
+<p>"O, nothing at all," said Jack;
+"only the Niersteiner has been
+rather too potent for him. Have you
+any sticking-plaster about you? I
+have damaged my knuckles a little
+on the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">os frontis</i> of that eloquent
+pacificator."</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_370" id="Page_370">[370]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Next morning I was awoke about
+ten o'clock by Jack, who came rushing
+into my room.</p>
+
+<p>"He's off!" he cried.</p>
+
+<p>"Who's off?" said I.</p>
+
+<p>"Uncle Peter; and, what is far
+worse, he has taken Miss Latchley
+with him!"</p>
+
+<p>"Impossible!"</p>
+
+<p>However, it was perfectly true. On
+inquiry we found that the enamored
+pair had left at six in the morning.</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER III.</h4>
+
+<p>"Well, Jack," said I, "any tidings
+of Uncle Peter?" as Wilkinson entered
+my official apartment in London, six
+weeks after the dissolution of the
+Congress.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, yes&mdash;and the case is rather
+worse than I supposed," replied Jack
+despondingly.</p>
+
+<p>"You don't mean to say that he
+has married that infernal woman in
+pantaloons?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not quite so bad as that, but very
+nearly. She has carried him off to
+her den; and what she may make of
+him there, it is quite impossible to
+predict."</p>
+
+<p>"Her den? Has she actually inveigled
+him to America?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all. These kind of women
+have stations established over the
+whole face of the earth."</p>
+
+<p>"Where, then, is he located?"</p>
+
+<p>"I shall tell you. In the course of
+my inquiries, which, you are aware,
+were rather extensive, I chanced to
+fall in with a Yarmouth Bloater."</p>
+
+<p>"A what?"</p>
+
+<p>"I beg your pardon&mdash;I meant to
+say a Plymouth Brother. Now, these
+fellows are a sort of regular kidnappers,
+who lie in wait to catch up any
+person of means and substance: they
+don't meddle with paupers, for, as
+you are aware, they share their property
+in common: and it occurred to
+me rather forcibly, that by means of
+my friend, who was a regular trapping
+missionary, I might learn something
+about my uncle. It cost me an immensity
+of brandy to elicit the information;
+but at last I succeeded in
+bringing out the fact, that my uncle
+is at this moment the inmate of an
+Agapedome in the neighbourhood of
+Southampton, and that the Latchley
+is his appointed keeper."</p>
+
+<p>"An Agapedome!&mdash;what the mischief
+is that?"</p>
+
+<p>"You may well ask," said Jack;
+"but I won't give it a coarser name.
+However, from all I can learn, it is
+as bad as a Mormonite institution."</p>
+
+<p>"And what the deuce may they
+intend to do with him, now they have
+him in their power?"</p>
+
+<p>"Fleece him out of every sixpence
+of property which he possesses in the
+world," replied Jack.</p>
+
+<p>"That won't do, Jack! We must
+get him out by some means or other."</p>
+
+<p>"I suspect it would be an easier
+job to scale a nunnery. So far as I
+can learn, they admit no one into
+their premises, unless they have hopes
+of catching him as a convert; and I
+am afraid that neither you nor I have
+the look of likely pupils. Besides,
+the Latchley could not fail to recognise
+me in a moment."</p>
+
+<p>"That's true enough," said I. "I
+think, however, that I might escape
+detection by a slight alteration of
+attire. The lady did not honour me
+with much notice during the half-hour
+we spent in her company. I must
+own, however, that I should not like
+to go alone."</p>
+
+<p>"My dear friend!" cried Jack, "if
+you will really be kind enough to
+oblige me in this matter, I know the
+very man to accompany you. Rogers
+of ours is in town just now. He is
+a famous follow&mdash;rather fast, perhaps,
+and given to larking&mdash;but as true as
+steel. You shall meet him to-day at
+dinner, and then we can arrange our
+plans."</p>
+
+<p>I must own that I did not feel very
+sanguine of success this time. Your
+genuine rogue is the most suspicious
+character on the face of the earth,
+wide awake to a thousand little discrepancies
+which would escape the
+observation of the honest; and I felt
+perfectly convinced that the superintendent
+of the Agapedome was
+likely to prove a rogue of the first
+water. Then I did not see my way
+clearly to the characters which we
+ought to assume. Of course it was
+no use for me to present myself as a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_371" id="Page_371">[371]</a></span>
+scion of the Woods and Forests; I
+should be treated as a Government
+spy, and have the door slapped in
+my face. To appear as an emissary
+of the Jesuits would be dangerous;
+that body being well known for their
+skill in annexing property. In
+short, I came to the conclusion, that
+unless I could work upon the cupidity
+of the head Agapedomian, there was
+no chance whatever of effecting Mr
+Pettigrew's release. To this point,
+therefore, I resolved to turn my attention.</p>
+
+<p>At dinner, according to agreement,
+I met Rogers of ours. Rogers was not
+gifted with any powerful inventive
+faculties; but he was a fine specimen of
+the British breed, ready to take a hand
+at anything which offered a prospect
+of fun. You would not probably
+have selected him as a leading conspirator;
+but, though no Macchiavelli,
+he appeared most valuable as an
+accomplice.</p>
+
+<p>Our great difficulty was to pitch
+upon proper characters. After much
+discussion, it was resolved that Rogers
+of ours should appear as a young
+nobleman of immense wealth, but
+exceedingly eccentric habits, and that
+I should act as bear-leader, with an
+eye to my own interest. What we
+were to do when we should succeed
+in getting admission to the establishment,
+was not very clear to the perception
+of any of us. We resolved
+to be regulated entirely by circumstances,
+the great point being the
+rescue of Mr Peter Pettigrew.</p>
+
+<p>Accordingly, we all started for
+Southampton on the following morning.
+On arriving there, we were informed
+that the Agapedome was situated
+some three miles from the town, and
+that the most extraordinary legends
+of the habits and pursuits of its inmates
+were current in the neighbourhood.
+Nobody seemed to know exactly
+what the Agapedomians were.
+They seemed to constitute a tolerably
+large society of persons, both male
+and female; but whether they were
+Christians, Turks, Jews, or Mahometans,
+was matter of exceeding disputation.
+They were known, however
+to be rich, and occasionally went
+out airing in carriages-and-four&mdash;the
+women all wearing pantaloons, to
+the infinite scandal of the peasantry.
+So far as we could learn, no gentleman
+answering to the description of Mr
+Pettigrew had been seen among them.</p>
+
+<p>After agreeing to open communications
+with Jack as speedily as possible,
+and emptying a bottle of champagne
+towards the success of our
+expedition, Rogers and I started in
+a postchaise for the Agapedome.
+Rogers was curiously arrayed in garments
+of chequered plaid, a mere
+glance at which would have gone far
+to impress any spectator with a strong
+notion of his eccentricity; whilst, for
+my part, I had donned a suit of black,
+and assumed a massive pair of gold
+spectacles, and a beaver with a portentous
+rim.</p>
+
+<p>This Agapedome was a large building
+surrounded by a high wall, and
+looked, upon the whole, like a convent.
+Deeming it prudent to ascertain
+how the land lay before introducing
+the eccentric Rogers, I requested that
+gallant individual to remain in the
+postchaise, whilst I solicited an interview
+with Mr Aaron B. Hyams, the
+reputed chief of the establishment.
+The card I sent in was inscribed with
+the name of Dr Hiram Smith, which
+appeared to me a sufficiently innocuous
+appellation. After some delay,
+I was admitted through a very
+strong gateway into the courtyard;
+and was then conducted by a servant
+in a handsome livery to a library,
+where I was received by Mr Hyams.</p>
+
+<p>As the Agapedome has since been
+broken up, and its members dispersed,
+it may not be uninteresting to put on
+record a slight sketch of its founder.
+Judging from his countenance, the progenitors
+of Mr Aaron B. Hyams must
+have been educated in the Jewish
+persuasion. His nose and lip possessed
+that graceful curve which is so characteristic
+of the Hebrew race; and
+his eye, if not altogether of that kind
+which the poets designate as "eagle,"
+might not unaptly be compared to
+that of the turkey-buzzard. In certain
+circles of society Mr Hyams
+would have been esteemed a handsome
+man. In the doorway of a warehouse
+in Holywell Street he would
+have committed large havoc on the
+hearts of the passing Leahs and
+Dalilahs&mdash;for he was a square-built
+powerful man, with broad shoulders
+and bandy legs, and displayed on his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_372" id="Page_372">[372]</a></span>
+person as much ostentatious jewellery
+as though he had been concerned in
+a new spoiling of the Egyptians.
+Apparently he was in a cheerful
+mood; for before him stood a half-emptied
+decanter of wine, and an
+odour as of recently extinguished
+Cubas was agreeably disseminated
+through the apartment.</p>
+
+<p>"Dr Hiram Smith, I presume?"
+said he. "Well, Dr Hiram Smith,
+to what fortunate circumstance am
+I indebted for the honour of this
+visit?"</p>
+
+<p>"Simply, sir, to this," said I, "that
+I want to know you, and know about
+you. Nobody without can tell me
+precisely what your Agapedome is,
+so I have come for information to
+headquarters. I have formed my
+own conclusion. If I am wrong, there
+is no harm done; if I am right, we
+may be able to make a bargain."</p>
+
+<p>"Hallo!" cried Hyams, taken
+rather aback by this curt style of
+exordium, "you are a rum customer,
+I reckon. So you want to deal, do
+ye? Well then, tell us what sort of
+doctor you may be? No use standing
+on ceremony with a chap like you.
+Is it M.D. or LL.D. or D.D., or a
+mere walking-stick title?"</p>
+
+<p>"The title," said I, "is conventional;
+so you may attribute it to any
+origin you please. In brief, I want
+to know if I can board a pupil here?"</p>
+
+<p>"That depends entirely upon circumstances,"
+replied Hyams. "Who
+and what is the subject?"</p>
+
+<p>"A young nobleman of the highest
+distinction, but of slightly eccentric
+habits." Here Hyams pricked up his
+ears. "I am not authorised to tell
+his name; but otherwise, you shall
+have the most satisfactory references."</p>
+
+<p>"There is only one kind of reference
+I care about," interrupted
+Hyams, imitating at the same time
+the counting out of imaginary sovereigns
+into his palm.</p>
+
+<p>"So much the better&mdash;there will
+be trouble saved," said I. "I perceive,
+Mr Hyams, you are a thorough
+man of business. In a word, then,
+my pupil has been going it too fast."</p>
+
+<p>"Flying kites and post-obits?"</p>
+
+<p>"And all the rest of it," said I;
+"black-legs innumerable, and no end
+of scrapes in the green-room. Things
+have come to such a pass that his
+father, the Duke, insists on his being
+kept out of the way at present; and,
+as taking him to Paris would only
+make matters worse, it occurred to
+me that I might locate him for a
+time in some quiet but cheerful establishment,
+where he could have his
+reasonable swing, and no questions
+asked."</p>
+
+<p>"Dr Hiram Smith!" cried Hyams
+with enthusiasm, "you're a regular
+trump! I wish all the noblemen
+in England would look out for tutors
+like you."</p>
+
+<p>"You are exceedingly complimentary,
+Mr Hyams. And now that you
+know my errand, may I ask what the
+Agapedome is?"</p>
+
+<p>"The Home of Love," replied
+Hyams; "at least so I was told by
+the Oxford gent, to whom I gave
+half-a-guinea for the title."</p>
+
+<p>"And your object?"</p>
+
+<p>"A pleasant retreat&mdash;comfortable
+home&mdash;no sort of bother of ceremony&mdash;innocent
+attachments encouraged&mdash;and,
+in the general case, community
+of goods."</p>
+
+<p>"Of which latter, I presume, Mr
+Hyams is the sole administrator?"</p>
+
+<p>"Right again, Doctor!" said
+Hyams with a leer of intelligence;
+"no use beating about the bush with
+you, I perceive. A single cashier for
+the whole concern saves a world of
+unnecessary trouble. Then, you see,
+we have our little matrimonial arrangements.
+A young lady in search
+of an eligible domicile comes here
+and deposits her fortune. We provide
+her by-and-by with a husband of
+suitable tastes, so that all matters are
+arranged comfortably. No luxury or
+enjoyment is denied to the inmates of
+the establishment, which may be
+compared, in short, to a perfect
+aviary, in which you hear nothing
+from morning to evening save one
+continuous sound of billing and cooing."</p>
+
+<p>"You draw a fascinating picture,
+Mr Hyams," said I: "too fascinating,
+in fact; for, after what you have
+said, I doubt whether I should be fulfilling
+my duty to my noble patron
+the Duke, were I to expose his heir
+to the influence of such powerful
+temptations."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't be in the least degree<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_373" id="Page_373">[373]</a></span>
+alarmed about that," said Hyams.
+"I shall take care that in this case
+there is no chance of marriage.
+Harkye, Doctor, it is rather against
+our rules to admit parlour boarders;
+but I don't mind doing it in this case,
+if you agree to my terms, which are
+one hundred and twenty guineas per
+month."</p>
+
+<p>"On the part of the Duke," said I,
+"I anticipate no objection; nor shall
+I refuse your stamped receipts at that
+rate. But as I happen to be paymaster,
+I shall certainly not give you
+in exchange for each of them more
+than seventy guineas, which will leave
+you a very pretty profit over and
+above your expenses."</p>
+
+<p>"What a screw you are, Doctor!"
+cried Hyams. "Would you have the
+conscience to pocket fifty for nothing?
+Come, come&mdash;make it eighty and it's
+a bargain."</p>
+
+<p>"Seventy is my last word. Beard
+of Mordecai, man! do you think I am
+going to surrender this pigeon to your
+hands gratis? Have I not told you
+already that he has a natural turn for
+<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">ecarté</i>!"</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, Doctor, Doctor! you must
+be one of our people&mdash;you must indeed!"
+said Hyams. "Well, is it a
+bargain?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not yet," said I. "In common
+decency, and for the sake of appearances,
+I must stay for a couple of
+days in the house, in order that I may
+be able to give a satisfactory report
+to the Duke. By the way, I hope
+everything is quite orthodox here&mdash;nothing
+contrary to the tenets of the
+church?"</p>
+
+<p>"O quite," replied Hyams; "it is
+a beautiful establishment in point of
+order. The bell rings every day
+punctually at four o'clock."</p>
+
+<p>"For prayers?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir&mdash;for hockey. We find
+that a little lively exercise gives a
+cheerful tone to the mind, and promotes
+those animal spirits which are
+the peculiar boast of the Agapedome."</p>
+
+<p>"I am quite satisfied," said I.
+"So now, if you please, I shall introduce
+my pupil."</p>
+
+<p>I need not dwell minutely upon the
+particulars of the interview which
+took place between Rogers of ours
+and the superintendent of the Agapedome.
+Indeed there is little to
+record. Rogers received the intimation
+that this was to be his residence
+for a season with the utmost nonchalance,
+simply remarking that he
+thought it would be rather slow; and
+then, by way of keeping up his character,
+filled himself a bumper of
+sherry. Mr Hyams regarded him as
+a spider might do when some unknown
+but rather powerful insect
+comes within the precincts of his net.</p>
+
+<p>"Well," said Rogers, "since it
+seems I am to be quartered here,
+what sort of fun is to be had? Any
+racket-court, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am sorry to say, my Lord, ours
+is not built as yet. But at four
+o'clock we shall have hockey&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Hang hockey! I have no fancy
+for getting my shins bruised. Any
+body in the house except myself?"</p>
+
+<p>"If your Lordship would like to
+visit the ladies&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Say no more!" cried Rogers impetuously.
+"I shall manage to kill
+time now! 'Hallo, you follow with
+the shoulder-knot! show me the way
+to the drawing-room;" and Rogers
+straightway disappeared.</p>
+
+<p>"Doctor Hiram Smith!" said
+Hyams, looking rather discomposed,
+"this is most extraordinary conduct
+on the part of your pupil."</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all extraordinary, I assure
+you," I replied; "I told you he was
+rather eccentric, but at present he is
+in a peculiarly quiet mood. Wait
+till you see his animal spirits up!"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, he'll be the ruin of the
+Agapedome!" cried Hyams; "I cannot
+possibly permit this."</p>
+
+<p>"It will rather puzzle you to stop
+it," said I.</p>
+
+<p>Here a faint squall, followed by a
+sound of suppressed giggling, was
+heard in the passage without.</p>
+
+<p>"Holy Moses!" cried the Agapedomian,
+starting up, "if Mrs Hyams
+should happen to be there!"</p>
+
+<p>"You may rely upon it she will
+very soon become accustomed to his
+Lordship's eccentricities. Why, you
+told me you admitted of no sort of
+bother or ceremony."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;but a joke maybe carried
+too far. As I live, he is pursuing one
+of the ladies down stairs into the
+courtyard!"</p>
+
+<p>"Is he?" said I; "then you may<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_374" id="Page_374">[374]</a></span>
+be tolerably certain he will overtake
+her."</p>
+
+<p>"Surely some of the servants will
+stop him!" cried Hyams, rushing to
+the window. "Yes&mdash;here comes one
+of them. Father Abraham! is it possible?
+He has knocked Adoniram
+down!"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing more likely," said I;
+"his Lordship had lessons from Mendoza."</p>
+
+<p>"I must look to this myself," cried
+Hyams.</p>
+
+<p>"Then I'll follow and see fair
+play," said I.</p>
+
+<p>We rushed into the court; but by
+this time it was empty. The pursued
+and the pursuer&mdash;Daphne and Apollo&mdash;had
+taken flight into the garden.
+Thither we followed them, Hyams
+red with ire; but no trace was seen
+of the fugitives. At last in an acacia
+bower we heard murmurs. Hyams
+dashed on; I followed; and there, to
+my unutterable surprise, I beheld
+Rogers of ours kneeling at the feet of
+the Latchley!</p>
+
+<p>"Beautiful Lavinia!" he was saying,
+just as we turned the corner.</p>
+
+<p>"Sister Latchley!" cried Hyams,
+"what is the meaning of all this?"</p>
+
+<p>"Rather let me ask, brother Hyams,"
+said the Latchley in unabashed
+serenity, "what means this intrusion,
+so foreign to the time, and so subversive
+of the laws of our society?"</p>
+
+<p>"Shall I pound him, Lavinia?" said
+Rogers, evidently anxious to discharge
+a slight modicum of the debt which he
+owed to the Jewish fraternity.</p>
+
+<p>"I command&mdash;I beseech you, no!
+Speak, brother Hyams! I again require
+of you to state why and wherefore
+you have chosen to violate the
+fundamental rules of the Agapedome?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sister Latchley, you will drive me
+mad! This young man has not been
+ten minutes in the house, and yet I
+find him scampering after you like a
+tom-cat, and knocking down Adoniram
+because he came in his way, and
+you are apparently quite pleased!"</p>
+
+<p>"Is the influence of love measured
+by hours?" asked the Latchley in a
+tone of deep sentiment. "Count we
+electricity by time&mdash;do we mete out
+sympathy by the dial? Brother
+Hyams, were not your intellectual
+vision obscured by a dull and earthly
+film, you would know that the passage
+of the lightning is not more rapid
+than the flash of kindled love."</p>
+
+<p>"That sounds all very fine," said
+Hyams, "but I shall allow no such
+doings here; and you, in particular,
+Sister Latchley, considering how you
+are situated, ought to be ashamed of
+yourself!"</p>
+
+<p>"Aaron, my man," said Rogers of
+ours, "will you be good enough to
+explain what you mean by making
+such insinuations?"</p>
+
+<p>"Stay, my Lord," said I; "I really
+must interpose. Mr Hyams is about
+to explain."</p>
+
+<p>"May I never discount bill again,"
+cried the Jew, "if this is not enough
+to make a man forswear the faith of
+his fathers! Look you here, Miss
+Latchley; you are part of the establishment,
+and I expect you to obey
+orders."</p>
+
+<p>"I was not aware, sir, until this
+moment," said Miss Latchley, loftily,
+"that I was subject to the orders of
+any one."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, don't be a fool; there's a
+dear!" said Hyams. "You know
+well enough what I mean. Haven't
+you enough on hand with Pettigrew,
+without encumbering yourself&mdash;?"
+and he stopped short.</p>
+
+<p>"It is a pity, sir," said Miss
+Latchley, still more magnificently,
+"it is a vast pity, that since you have
+the meanness to invent falsehoods,
+you cannot at the same time command
+the courage to utter them.
+Why am I thus insulted? Who is
+this Pettigrew you speak of?"</p>
+
+<p>"Pettigrew&mdash;Pettigrew?" remarked
+Rogers; "I say, Dr Smith, was
+not that the name of the man who is
+gone amissing, and for whose discovery
+his friends are offering a reward?"</p>
+
+<p>Hyams started as if stung by an
+adder. "Sister Latchley," he said,
+"I fear I was in the wrong."</p>
+
+<p>"You have made the discovery
+rather too late, Mr Hyams," replied
+the irate Lavinia. "After the insults
+you have heaped upon me, it is full
+time we should part. Perhaps these
+gentlemen will be kind enough to
+conduct an unprotected female to a
+temporary home."</p>
+
+<p>"If you will go, you go alone,
+madam," said Hyams; "his Lordship
+intends to remain here."</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_375" id="Page_375">[375]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"His Lordship intends to do nothing
+of the sort, you rascal," said
+Rogers. "Hockey don't agree with
+my constitution."</p>
+
+<p>"Before I depart, Mr Hyams,"
+said Miss Latchley, "let me remark
+that you are indebted to me in the
+sum of two thousand pounds as my
+share of the profits of the establishment.
+Will you pay it now, or would
+you prefer to wait till you hear from
+my solicitor?"</p>
+
+<p>"Anything more?" asked the
+Agapedomian.</p>
+
+<p>"Merely this," said I: "I am
+now fully aware that Mr Peter Pettigrew
+is detained within these walls.
+Surrender him instantly, or prepare
+yourself for the worst penalties of the
+law."</p>
+
+<p>I made a fearful blunder in betraying
+my secret before I was clear of
+the premises, and the words had
+scarcely passed my lips before I was
+aware of my mistake. With the look
+of a detected demon Hyams confronted
+us.</p>
+
+<p>"Ho, ho! this is a conspiracy, is
+it? But you have reckoned without
+your host. Ho, there! Jonathan&mdash;Asahel!
+close the doors, ring the
+great bell, and let no man pass on
+your lives! And now let's see what
+stuff you are made of!"</p>
+
+<p>So saying, the ruffian drew a life-preserver
+from his pocket, and struck
+furiously at my head before I had
+time to guard myself. But quick as
+he was, Rogers of ours was quicker.
+With his left hand he caught the arm
+of Hyams as the blow descended,
+whilst with the right he dealt him a
+fearful blow on the temple, which
+made the Hebrew stagger. But
+Hyams, amongst his other accomplishments,
+had practised in the ring. He
+recovered himself almost immediately,
+and rushed upon Rogers. Several
+heavy hits were interchanged; and
+there is no saying how the combat
+might have terminated, but for the
+presence of mind of the Latchley.
+That gifted female, superior to the
+weakness of her sex, caught up the
+life-preserver from the ground, and
+applied it so effectually to the back of
+Hyams' skull, that he dropped like an
+ox in the slaughter-house.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile the alarum bell was
+ringing&mdash;women were screaming at
+the windows, from which also several
+crazy-looking gentlemen were gesticulating;
+and three or four truculent
+Israelites were rushing through the
+courtyard. The whole Agapedome
+was in an uproar.</p>
+
+<p>"Keep together and fear nothing!"
+cried Rogers. "I never stir on these
+kind of expeditions without my
+pistols. Smith&mdash;give your arm to
+Miss Latchley, who has behaved like
+the heroine of Saragossa; and now
+let us see if any of these scoundrels
+will venture to dispute our way!"</p>
+
+<p>But for the firearms which Rogers
+carried, I suspect our egress would
+have been disputed. Jonathan and
+Asahel, red-headed ruffians both,
+stood ready with iron bars in their
+hands to oppose our exit; but a
+glimpse of the bright glittering
+barrel caused them to change their
+purpose. Rogers commanded them,
+on pain of instant death, to open the
+door. They obeyed; and we emerged
+from the Agapedome as joyfully as
+the Ithacans from the cave of Polyphemus.
+Fortunately the chaise was
+still in waiting: we assisted Miss
+Latchley in, and drove off, as fast as
+the horses could gallop, to Southampton.</p>
+
+
+<h4>CHAPTER IV.</h4>
+
+<p>"Is it possible they can have
+murdered him?" said Jack.</p>
+
+<p>"That, I think," said I, "is highly
+improbable. I rather imagine that
+he has refused to conform to some of
+the rules of the association, and has
+been committed to the custody of
+Messrs Jonathan and Asahel."</p>
+
+<p>"Shall I ask Lavinia?" said
+Rogers. "I daresay she would tell
+me all about it."</p>
+
+<p>"Better not," said I, "in the
+mean time. Poor thing! her nerves
+must be shaken."</p>
+
+<p>"Not a whit of them," replied
+Rogers. "I saw no symptom of
+nerves about her. She was as cool
+as a cucumber when she floored that
+infernal Jew; and if she should be a
+little agitated or so, she is calming
+herself at this moment with a glass
+of brandy and water. I mixed it for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_376" id="Page_376">[376]</a></span>
+her. Do you know she's a capital fellow,
+only 'tis a pity she's so very plain."</p>
+
+<p>"I wish the police would arrive!"
+said Jack. "We have really not
+a minute to lose. Poor Uncle Peter!
+I devoutly trust this may be the
+last of his freaks."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope so too, Jack, for your
+sake: it is no joke rummaging him
+out of such company. But for Rogers
+there, we should all of us have been
+as dead as pickled herrings."</p>
+
+<p>"I bear a charmed life," said
+Rogers. "Remember I belong to
+'the Immortals.' But there come the
+blue-coats in a couple of carriages.
+'Gad, Wilkinson, I wish it were our
+luck to storm the Agapedome with a
+score of our own fellows!"</p>
+
+<p>During our drive, Rogers enlightened
+us as to his encounter with the
+Latchley. It appeared that he had
+bestowed considerable attention to
+our conversation in London; and
+that, when he hurried to the drawing-room
+in the Agapedome, as
+already related, he thought he recognised
+the Latchley at once, in the
+midst of half-a-dozen more juvenile
+and blooming sisters.</p>
+
+<p>"Of course, I never read a word
+of the woman's works," said Rogers,
+"and I hope I never shall; but I know
+that female vanity will stand any
+amount of butter. So I bolted into
+the room, without caring for the rest&mdash;though,
+by the way, there was
+one little girl with fair hair and blue
+eyes, who, I hope, has not left the
+Agapedome&mdash;threw myself at the feet
+of Lavinia; declared that I was a
+young nobleman, enamoured of her
+writings, who was resolved to force
+my way through iron bars to gain a
+glimpse of the bright original: and,
+upon the whole, I think you must
+allow that I managed matters rather
+successfully."</p>
+
+<p>There could be but one opinion as
+to that. In fact, without Rogers,
+the whole scheme must have miscarried.
+It was Kellermann's charge,
+unexpected and unauthorised&mdash;but
+altogether triumphant.</p>
+
+<p>On arriving at the Agapedome we
+found the door open, and three or
+four peasants loitering round the
+gateway.</p>
+
+<p>"Are they here still?" cried Jack,
+springing from the chaise.</p>
+
+<p>"Noa, measter," replied one of the
+bystanders; "they be gone an hour
+past in four carrutches, wi' all their
+goods and chuckles."</p>
+
+<p>"Did they carry any one with
+them by force?"</p>
+
+<p>"Noa, not by force, as I seed; but
+there wore one chap among them
+woundily raddled on the sconce."</p>
+
+<p>"Hyams to wit, I suppose. Come,
+gentlemen; as we have a search-warrant,
+let us in and examine the
+premises thoroughly."</p>
+
+<p>Short as was the interval which had
+elapsed between our exit and return,
+Messrs Jonathan, Asahel, and Co.
+had availed themselves of it to the
+utmost. Every portable article of
+any value had been removed. Drawers
+were open, and papers scattered
+over the floors, along with a good
+many pairs of bloomers rather the
+worse for the wear: in short, every
+thing seemed to indicate that the
+nest was finally abandoned. What
+curious discoveries we made during
+the course of our researches, as to the
+social habits and domestic economy
+of this happy family, I shall not venture
+to recount; we came there not
+to gratify either private or public
+curiosity, but to perform a sacred duty
+by emancipating Mr Peter Pettigrew.</p>
+
+<p>Neither in the cellars nor the
+closets, nor even in the garrets, could
+we find any trace of the lost one.
+The contents of one bedroom, indeed,
+showed that it had been formerly
+tenanted by Mr Pettigrew, for there
+were his portmanteaus with his name
+engraved upon them; his razors, and
+his wearing apparel, all seemingly untouched:
+but there were no marks of
+any recent occupancy; the dust was
+gathering on the table, and the ewer
+perfectly dry. It was the opinion of
+the detective officer that at least ten
+days had elapsed since any one had
+slept in the room. Jack became
+greatly alarmed.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," said he, "there is
+nothing for it but to proceed immediately
+in pursuit of Hyams: do you
+think you will be able to apprehend
+him?"</p>
+
+<p>"I doubt it very much, sir,"
+replied the detective officer. "These
+sort of fellows are wide awake, and
+are always prepared for accidents. I
+expect that, by this time, he is on his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_377" id="Page_377">[377]</a></span>
+way to France. But hush!&mdash;what
+was that?"</p>
+
+<p>A dull sound as of the clapper of a
+large bell boomed overhead. There
+was silence for about a minute, and
+again it was repeated.</p>
+
+<p>"Here is a clue, at all events!"
+cried the officer. "My life on it,
+there is some one in the belfry."</p>
+
+<p>We hastened up the narrow stairs
+which led to the tower. Half way
+up, the passage was barred by a stout
+door, double locked, which the officers
+had some difficulty in forcing with the
+aid of a crow-bar. This obstacle removed,
+we reached the lofty room
+where the bell was suspended; and
+there, right under the clapper, on a
+miserable truckle bed, lay the emaciated
+form of Mr Pettigrew.</p>
+
+<p>"My poor uncle!" said Jack,
+stooping tenderly to embrace his
+relative, "what can have brought you
+here?"</p>
+
+<p>"Speak louder, Jack!" said Mr
+Pettigrew; "I can't hear you. For
+twelve long days that infernal bell
+has been tolling just above my head
+for hockey and other villanous purposes.
+I am as deaf as a doornail!"</p>
+
+<p>"And so thin, dear uncle! You
+must have been most shamefully
+abused."</p>
+
+<p>"Simply starved; that's all."</p>
+
+<p>"What! starved? The monsters!
+Did they give you nothing to eat?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;broccoli. I wish you would
+try it for a week: it is a rare thing to
+bring out the bones."</p>
+
+<p>"And why did they commit this
+outrage upon you?"</p>
+
+<p>"For two especial reasons, I suppose&mdash;first,
+because I would not surrender
+my whole property; and,
+secondly, because I would not marry
+Miss Latchley."</p>
+
+<p>"My dear uncle! when I saw you
+last, it appeared to me that you would
+have had no objections to perform the
+latter ceremony."</p>
+
+<p>"Not on compulsion, Jack&mdash;not on
+compulsion!" said Mr Pettigrew, with
+a touch of his old humour. "I won't
+deny that I was humbugged by her at
+first, but this was over long ago."</p>
+
+<p>"Indeed! Pray, may I venture
+to ask what changed your opinion of
+the lady?"</p>
+
+<p>"Her works, Jack&mdash;her own works!"
+replied Uncle Peter. "She gave me
+them to read as soon as I was fairly
+trapped into the Agapedome, and
+such an awful collection of impiety
+and presumption I never saw before.
+She is ten thousand times worse than
+the deceased Thomas Paine."</p>
+
+<p>"Was she, then, party to your
+incarceration?"</p>
+
+<p>"I won't say that. I hardly think
+she would have consented to let them
+harm me, or that she knew exactly
+how I was used; but that fellow
+Hyams is wicked enough to have been
+an officer under King Herod. Now,
+pray help me up, and lift me down
+stairs, for my legs are so cramped
+that I can't walk, and my head is as
+dizzy as a wheel. That confounded
+broccoli, too, has disagreed with my
+constitution, and I shall feel particularly
+obliged to any one who can
+assist me to a drop of brandy."</p>
+
+<p>After having ministered to the immediate
+wants of Mr Pettigrew, and
+secured his effects, we returned to
+Southampton, leaving the deserted
+Agapedome in the charge of a couple
+of police. In spite of every entreaty
+Mr Pettigrew would not hear of entering
+a prosecution against Hyams.</p>
+
+<p>"I feel," said he, "that I have
+made a thorough ass of myself; and
+I should not be able to stand the ridicule
+that must follow a disclosure of
+the consequences. In fact, I begin to
+think that I am not fit to look after
+my own affairs. The man who has
+spent twelve days, as I have, under
+the clapper of a bell, without any
+other sustenance than broccoli&mdash;is
+there any more brandy in the flask?
+I should like the merest drop&mdash;the
+man, I say, who has undergone these
+trials, has ample time for meditation
+upon the past. I see my weakness,
+and I acknowledge it. So Jack, my
+dear boy, as you have always behaved
+to me more like a son than a nephew,
+I intend, immediately on my return
+to London, to settle my whole property
+upon you, merely reserving an
+annuity. Don't say a word on the
+subject. My mind is made up, and
+nothing can alter my resolution."</p>
+
+<p>On arriving at Southampton we
+considered it our duty to communicate
+immediately with Miss Latchley,
+for the purpose of ascertaining if we
+could render her any temporary assistance.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_378" id="Page_378">[378]</a></span>
+Perhaps it was more than she
+deserved; but we could not forget her
+sex, though she had done everything
+in her power to disguise it; and,
+besides, the lucky blow with the life-preserver,
+which she administered to
+Hyams, was a service for which we
+could not be otherwise than grateful.
+Jack Wilkinson was selected as the
+medium of communication. He found
+the strong Lavinia alone, and perfectly
+composed.</p>
+
+<p>"I wish never more," said she, "to
+hear the name of Pettigrew. It is
+associated in my mind with weakness,
+fanaticism, and vacillation; and I
+shall ever feel humbled at the reflection
+that I bowed my woman's pride
+to gaze on the surface of so shallow
+and opaque a pool! And yet, why
+regret? The image of the sun is reflected
+equally from the B&oelig;otian
+marsh and the mirror of the clear
+Ontario! Tell your uncle," continued
+she, after a pause, "that as he is nothing
+to me, so I wish to be nothing
+to him. Let us mutually extinguish
+memory. Ha, ha, ha!&mdash;so they fed
+him, you say, upon broccoli?</p>
+
+<p>"But I have one message to give,
+though not to him. The youth who,
+in the nobility of his soul, declared
+his passion for my intellect&mdash;where is
+he? I tarry beneath this roof but for
+him. Do my message fairly, and say
+to him that if he seeks a communion
+of soul&mdash;no! that is the common
+phrase of the slaves of antiquated
+superstition&mdash;if he yearns for a grand
+amalgamation of essential passion
+and power, let him hasten hither, and
+Lavinia Latchley is ready to accompany
+him to the prairie or the forest,
+to the torrid zone, or to the confines
+of the arctic seas!"</p>
+
+<p>"I shall deliver your message,
+ma'am," said Jack, "as accurately as
+my abilities will allow." And he
+did so.</p>
+
+<p>Rogers of ours writhed uneasily in
+his seat.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll tell you what it is, my fine
+fellows," said he, "I don't look upon
+this quite as a laughing matter. I
+am really sorry to have taken in the
+old woman, though I don't see how
+we could well have helped it; and I
+would far rather, Jack, that she had
+fixed her affections upon you than
+on me. I shall get infernally roasted
+at the mess if this story should
+transpire. However, I suppose
+there's only one answer to be given.
+Pray, present my most humble respects,
+and say how exceedingly distressed
+I feel that my professional
+engagements will not permit me to
+accompany her in her proposed expedition."</p>
+
+<p>Jack reported the answer in due
+form.</p>
+
+<p>"Then," said Lavinia, drawing
+herself up to her full height, and
+shrouding her visage in a black veil,
+"tell him that for his sake I am resolved
+to die a virgin!"</p>
+
+<p>I presume she will keep her word;
+at least I have not yet heard that any
+one has been courageous enough to
+request her to change her situation.
+She has since returned to America,
+and is now, I believe, the president
+of a female college, the students of
+which may be distinguished from the
+rest of their sex, by their uniform
+adoption of bloomers.</p>
+
+
+<p class="center space-above"><em>Printed by William Blackwood &amp; Sons, Edinburgh.</em></p>
+
+
+<hr class="chap" />
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> <cite>Blackwood's Magazine</cite>, No. CCCXCIX., for January 1849.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> "The word <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">chasua</i> signifies an expedition along the frontier, or rather <em>across</em>
+the frontier, for the capture of men and beasts. These slave-hunts are said to have
+been first introduced here by the Turks, and the word chasua is not believed to be
+indigenous, since for war and battle are otherwise used <i>harba</i> (properly a lance)
+and <i>schàmmata</i>. <i>Chasua</i> and <i>razzia</i> appear to be synonymous, corrupted from the
+Italian <i lang="it" xml:lang="it">cazzia</i>, in French <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">chasse</i>."&mdash;<cite>Feldzug von Sennaar</cite>, &amp;c., p. 17.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> These Kammarabs possess a tract on the left or south bank of the Atbara.
+The distribution of the different tribes, as well as the line of march and other particulars,
+are very clearly displayed in the appropriate little map accompanying Mr
+Werne's volume. Opposite to the Kammarabs, "on the right bank of the Atbara,
+are the Anafidabs, of the race or family of the Bischari. They form a Kabyle (band
+or community) under a Schech of their own. How it is that the French in Algiers
+persist in using <em>Kabyle</em> as the proper name of a nation and a country, I cannot understand."&mdash;<cite>Feldzug
+von Sennaar</cite>, p. 32.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> <cite>Blackwood's Magazine</cite>, No. CCCCIV., for June 1849.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Fact. In a work by <span class="smcap">M. Gibert</span>, a celebrated French physician, on diseases of
+the skin, he states that that minute troublesome kind of rash, known by the name
+of <i>prurigo</i>, though not dangerous in itself, has often driven the individual afflicted
+by it to&mdash;suicide. I believe that our more varying climate, and our more heating
+drinks and aliments, render this skin complaint more common in England than in
+France, yet I doubt if any English physician could state that it had ever driven one
+of his <em>English</em> patients to suicide.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> It is seldom any action of a limb is performed without the concurrence of several
+muscles; and, if the action is at all energetic, a number of muscles are brought into
+play as an equipoise or balance; the infant, therefore, would be sadly puzzled
+amongst its muscular sensations, supposing that it had them. Besides, it seems clear
+that those movements we see an infant make with its arms and legs are, in the first
+instance, as little <em>voluntary</em> as the muscular movements it makes for the purpose of
+respiration. There is an animal life within us, dependent on its own laws of irritability.
+Over a portion of this the developed thought or reason gains dominion;
+over a large portion the will never has any hold; over another portion, as in the
+organs of respiration, it has an intermittent and divided empire. We learn voluntary
+movement by doing that instinctively and spontaneously which we afterwards do
+from forethought. We have moved our arm; we wish to do the like again, (and to
+our wonder, if we then had intelligence enough to wonder,) we do it.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> It is desirable here to explain that the old constitution of Portugal, whose
+restoration is the main feature of the scheme of the National or Royalist party, (it
+assumes both names,) gave the right of voting at the election of members of the
+popular assembly to every man who had a hearth of his own&mdash;whether he occupied
+a whole house or a single room&mdash;in fact, to all heads of families and self-supporting
+persons. Such extent of suffrage ought surely to content the most democratic, and
+certainly presents a strong contrast to the farce of national representation which has
+been so long enacting in the Peninsula.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> The principal Miguelite papers, <cite>A Nação</cite> (Lisbon,) and <cite>O Portugal</cite> (Oporto,)
+both of them highly respectable journals, conducted with much ability and moderation,
+unceasingly reiterate, whilst exposing the vices and corruption of the present system,
+their aversion to despotism, and their desire for a truly liberal and constitutional
+government.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> The Marquis of Abrantes is descended from the Dukes of Lancaster, through
+Philippa of Lancaster, Queen of John I., one of the greatest kings Portugal ever
+possessed.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> This remark, (regarding the press,) literally true in Spain, does not apply to
+Portugal.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> Particularly by his "declaration" of the 24th June 1843, by his autograph
+letter of instructions of the 15th August of the same year, and by his "royal letter"
+of the 6th April 1847, which was widely circulated in Portugal.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> We cannot attach value to the vague and most unsatisfactory manifesto signed
+"Carlos Luis," and issued from Bourges in May 1845, or consider it as in the
+slightest degree disproving what we have advanced. It contains no distinct pledge or
+guarantee of constitutional government, but deals in frothy generalities and magniloquent
+protestations, binding to nothing the prince who signed it, and bearing more
+traces of the pen of a Jesuit priest than of that of a competent and statesmanlike
+adviser of a youthful aspirant to a throne.</p></div></div>
+
+<hr class="chap" />
+
+<div class="tn"><h3>Transcriber's note:</h3>
+<p>Mismatched quotes are not fixed if it's not sufficiently clear where the missing quote should be placed.</p>
+
+<p>The cover for the eBook version of this book was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.</p>
+
+<p>Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note. Irregularities and inconsistencies in the text have been retained as printed, ecept for the following:</p>
+
+<p>The transcriber has made accents consistent for "Schaïgië" and "Schaïgië's".</p>
+
+<p>Page 328: "But he must cease to be Mr Ruskin if they ..." The transcriber has inserted "be".</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol.
+70, No. 431, September 1851, by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE, SEPT 1851 ***
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+</pre>
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+</body>
+</html>
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 70,
+No. 431, September 1851, by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 70, No. 431, September 1851
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: December 5, 2013 [EBook #44361]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE, SEPT 1851 ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Brendan OConnor, Jonathan Ingram and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Library of Early Journals.)
+
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
+
+Text enclosed in plus signs is transliterated Greek
+(+Io, io, io, io+).
+
+Small capital text has been replaced with all capitals.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+  BLACKWOOD'S
+
+  EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.
+
+  NO. CCCCXXXI.       SEPTEMBER, 1851.       VOL. LXX.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+  A CAMPAIGN IN TAKA,                                      251
+
+  MY NOVEL; OR, VARIETIES IN ENGLISH LIFE. PART XIII,      275
+
+  DISFRANCHISEMENT OF THE BOROUGHS,                        296
+
+  PARIS IN 1851.--(_Continued_,)                           310
+
+  MR RUSKIN'S WORKS,                                       326
+
+  PORTUGUESE POLITICS,                                     349
+
+  THE CONGRESS AND THE AGAPEDOME.--A TALE OF PEACE
+  AND LOVE,                                                359
+
+
+  EDINBURGH:
+
+  WILLIAM BLACKWOOD & SONS, 45 GEORGE STREET;
+  AND 37 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON.
+
+  _To whom all communications (post paid) must be addressed._
+
+  SOLD BY ALL THE BOOKSELLERS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM.
+
+  PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, EDINBURGH.
+
+
+
+
+BLACKWOOD'S
+
+EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.
+
+  NO. CCCCXXXI.      September, 1851.       VOL. LXX.
+
+
+
+
+A CAMPAIGN IN TAKA.
+
+     _Feldzug von Sennaar nach Taka, Basa, und Beni-Amer, mit
+     besonderem Hinblick auf die Voelker von Bellad-Sudan._--[Campaign
+     from Sennaar to Taka, Basa, and Beni-Amer; with a particular
+     Glance at the Nations of Bellad-Sudan.]--VON FERDINAND WERNE.
+     Stuttgart: Koenigl. Hofbuchdruckerei. London: Williams and
+     Norgate. 1851.
+
+
+Africa, the least explored division of the globe's surface, and the
+best field for travellers of bold and enterprising character, has
+been the scene of three of the most remarkable books of their class
+that have appeared within the last ten years. We refer to Major
+Harris's narrative of his Ethiopian expedition--to the marvellous
+adventures of that modern Nimrod, Mr Gordon Cumming--to Mr Ferdinand
+Werne's strange and exciting account of his voyage up the White
+Nile. In our review of the last-named interesting and valuable
+work,[1] we mentioned that Mr Werne, previously to his expedition up
+the Nile, had been for several months in the Taka country, a region
+previously untrodden by Europeans, with an army commanded by Achmet
+Bascha, governor-general of the Egyptian province of Bellad-Sudan,
+who was operating against refractory tributaries. He has just
+published an account of this campaign, which afforded him, however,
+little opportunity of expatiating on well-contested battles,
+signal victories, or feats of heroic valour. On the other hand,
+his narrative abounds in striking incidents, in curious details of
+tribes and localities that have never before been described, and
+in perils and hardships not the less real and painful that they
+proceeded from no efforts of a resolute and formidable foe, but from
+the effects of a pernicious climate, and the caprice and negligence
+of a wilful and indolent commander.
+
+  [1] _Blackwood's Magazine_, No. CCCXCIX., for January 1849.
+
+It was early in 1840, and Mr Werne and his youngest brother Joseph
+had been resident for a whole year at Chartum, chief town of the
+province of Sudan, in the country of Sennaar. Chartum, it will be
+remembered by the readers of the "Expedition for the Discovery of
+the Sources of the White Nile," is situated at the confluence of
+the White and Blue streams, which, there uniting, flow northwards
+through Nubia and Egypt Proper to Cairo and the Mediterranean; and
+at Chartum it was that the two Wernes had beheld, in the previous
+November, the departure of the first expedition up Nile, which they
+were forbidden to join, and which met with little success. The
+elder Werne, whose portrait--that of a very determined-looking
+man, bearded, and in Oriental costume--is appended to the present
+volume, appears to have been adventurous and a rambler from his
+youth upwards. In 1822 he had served in Greece, and had now been
+for many years in Eastern lands. Joseph Werne, his youngest and
+favourite brother, had come to Egypt at his instigation, after
+taking at Berlin his degree as Doctor of Medicine, to study, before
+commencing practice, some of the extraordinary diseases indigenous
+in that noxious climate. Unfortunately, as recorded in Mr Werne's
+former work, this promising young man, who seems to have possessed
+in no small degree the enterprise, perseverance, and fortitude so
+remarkable in his brother, ultimately fell a victim to one of those
+fatal maladies whose investigation was the principal motive of his
+visit to Africa. The first meeting in Egypt of the two brothers was
+at Cairo; and of it a characteristic account is given by the elder,
+an impetuous, we might almost say a pugnacious man, tolerably prompt
+to take offence, and upon whom, as he himself says at page 67, the
+Egyptian climate had a violently irritating effect.
+
+"Our meeting, at Guerra's tavern in Cairo, was so far remarkable,
+that my brother knew me immediately, whilst I took him for some
+impertinent Frenchman, disposed to make game of me, inasmuch as he,
+in the petulance of his joy, fixed his eyes upon me, measuring me
+from top to toe, and then laughed at the fury with which I rushed
+upon him, to call him to an account, and, if necessary, to have him
+out. We had not seen each other for eight years, during which he
+had grown into a man, and, moreover, his countenance had undergone
+a change, for, by a terrible cut, received in a duel, the muscle of
+risibility had been divided on one side, and the poor fellow could
+laugh only with half his face. In the first overpowering joy of our
+meeting in this distant quarter of the globe, we could not get the
+wine over our tongues, often as my Swiss friend De Salis (over whose
+cheeks the tears were chasing each other) and other acquaintances
+struck their glasses against ours, encouraging us to drink.... I now
+abandoned the hamlet of Tura--situated in the desert, but near the
+Nile, about three leagues above Cairo, and whither I had retreated
+to do penance and to work at my travels--as well as my good friend
+Dr Schledehaus of Osnabruck, (then holding an appointment at the
+military school, now director of the marine hospital of Alexandria,)
+with whom my brother had studied at Bonn, and I hired a little house
+in the Esbekie Square in Cairo. After half an hour's examination,
+Joseph was appointed surgeon-major, with the rank of a Sakulagassi
+or captain, in the central hospital of Kasr-el-Ain, with a thousand
+piastres a month, and rations for a horse and four servants. Our
+views constantly directed to the interior of Africa, we suffered
+a few months to glide by in the old city of the Khalifs, dwelling
+together in delightful brotherly harmony. But our thirst for
+travelling was unslaked; to it I had sacrificed my appointment as
+chancellor of the Prussian Consulate at Alexandria; Joseph received
+his nomination as regimental surgeon to the 1st regiment in Sennaar,
+including that of physician to the central hospital at Chartum. Our
+friends were concerned for us on account of the dangerous climate,
+but, nevertheless, we sailed with good courage up the Nile, happy
+to escape from the noise of the city, and to be on our way to new
+scenes."
+
+A stroke of the sun, received near the cataract of Ariman in
+Upper Nubia, and followed by ten days' delirium, soon convinced
+the younger Werne that his friends' anxiety on his behalf was
+not groundless. During the whole of their twelvemonth's stay at
+Chartum, they were mercilessly persecuted by intermittent fever,
+there most malignant, and under whose torturing and lowering attacks
+their sole consolation was that, as they never chanced both to be
+ill together, they were able alternately to nurse each other. At
+last, fearing that body or mind would succumb to these reiterated
+fever-fits, and the first expedition up the White Nile having, to
+their great disgust and disappointment, sailed without them, they
+made up their minds to quit for ever the pestiferous Chartum and the
+burning steppes of Bellad-Sudan. Whilst preparing for departure,
+they received a visit from the chief Cadi, who told them, over a
+glass of cardinal--administered by Dr Werne as medicine, to evade
+his Mahomedan scruples--that Effendina (Excellency) Achmet Bascha
+was well pleased with the brotherly love they manifested, taking
+care of each other in sickness, and that they would do well to pay
+their respects occasionally at the Divan. This communication was
+almost immediately followed by the arrival at Chartum of Dr Gand,
+physician to Abbas Bascha. This gentleman had been a comrade of
+Ferdinand Werne's in Greece, and he recommended the two brothers to
+Achmet, with whom he was intimate, in true Oriental style, as men
+of universal genius and perfect integrity, to whom he might intrust
+both his body and his soul. The consequence of this liberal encomium
+was, that Achmet fixed his eyes upon them to accompany him, in
+the capacity of confidential advisers, upon a projected campaign.
+Informed of this plan and of the advantages it included, the Wernes
+joyfully abandoned their proposed departure. Joseph was to be
+made house-physician to Achmet and his harem, as well as medical
+inspector of the whole province, in place of Soliman Effendi, (the
+renegade Baron di Pasquali of Palermo,) a notorious poisoner, in
+whose hands the Bascha did not consider himself safe. Ferdinand
+Werne, who had held the rank of captain in Greece, was made
+_bimbaschi_ or major, and was attached, as engineer, to Achmet's
+person, with good pay and many privileges. "At a later period he
+would have made me bey, if I--not on his account, for he was an
+enlightened Circassian, but on that of the Turkish jackasses--would
+have turned Mussulman. I laughed at this, and he said no more about
+it." Delighted to have secured the services of the two Germans,
+Achmet ordered it to be reported to his father-in-law, Mehemet Ali,
+for his approval, and took counsel with his new officers concerning
+the approaching campaign. Turk-like, he proposed commencing it in
+the rainy season. Mr Werne opposed this as likely to cost him half
+his army, the soldiers being exceedingly susceptible to rain, and
+advised the erection of blockhouses at certain points along the
+line of march where springs were to be found, to secure water for
+the troops. The Bascha thought this rather a roundabout mode of
+proceeding, held his men's lives very cheap, and boasted of his
+seven hundred dromedaries, every one of which, in case of need,
+could carry three soldiers. His counsellors were dismissed, with
+injunctions to secresy, and on their return home they found at their
+door, as a present from the Bascha, two beautiful dromedaries,
+tall, powerful, ready saddled for a march, and particularly adapted
+for a campaign, inasmuch as they started not when muskets were
+fired between their ears. A few days later, Mr Werne was sent
+for by Achmet, who, when the customary coffee had been taken,
+dismissed his attendants by a sign, and informed him, with a gloomy
+countenance, that the people of Taka refused to pay their _tulba_,
+or tribute. His predecessor, Churdschid Bascha, having marched into
+that country, had been totally defeated in a _chaaba_, or tract of
+forest. Since that time, Achmet mournfully declared, the tribes had
+not paid a single piastre, and he found himself grievously in want
+of money. So, instead of marching south-westward to Darfour, as he
+had intended, he would move north-eastward to Taka, chastise the
+stubborn insolvents, and replenish the coffers of the state. "Come
+with me," said he, to Mr Werne; "upon the march we shall all recover
+our health," (he also suffered from frequent and violent attacks of
+fever;) "yonder are water and forests, as in Germany and Circassia,
+and very high mountains." It mattered little to so restless and
+rambling a spirit as Mr Ferdinand Werne whether his route lay inland
+towards the Mountains of the Moon, or coastwards to the Red Sea. His
+brother was again sick, and spoke of leaving the country; but Mr
+Werne cheered him up, pointed out to him upon the map an imaginary
+duchy which he was to conquer in the approaching war, and revived
+an old plan of going to settle at Bagdad, there to practise as
+physician and apothecary. "We resolved, therefore, to take our
+passports with us, so that, if we chose, we might embark on the Red
+Sea. By this time I had seen through the Bascha, and I resolved to
+communicate to him an idea which I often, in the interest of these
+oppressed tribes, had revolved in my mind, namely, that he should
+place himself at their head, and renounce obedience to the Egyptian
+vampire. I did subsequently speak to him of the plan, and it might
+have been well and permanently carried out, had he not, instead of
+striving to win the confidence of the chiefs, tyrannised over them
+in every possible manner. Gold and regiments! was his motto."
+
+Meanwhile the influential Dr Gand had fallen seriously ill, and
+was so afflicted with the irritability already referred to as a
+consequence of the climate, that no one could go near him but the
+two Wernes. He neglected Joseph's good advice to quit Chartum at
+once, put it off till it was too late, and died on his journey
+northwards. His body lay buried for a whole year in the sand of the
+desert; then his family, who were going to France, dug it up to take
+with them. Always a very thin man, little more than skin and bone,
+the burning sand had preserved him like a mummy. There was no change
+in his appearance; not a hair gone from his mustaches. Strange is
+the confusion and alternation of life and death in that ardent
+and unwholesome land of Nubia. To-day in full health, to-morrow
+prostrate with fever, from which you recover only to be again
+attacked. Dead, in twenty-four hours or less corruption is busy on
+the corpse; bury it promptly in the sand, and in twelve months you
+may disinter it, perfect as if embalmed. At Chartum, the very focus
+of disease, death, it might be thought, is sufficiently supplied by
+fever to need no other purveyors. Nevertheless poisoning seems a
+pretty common practice there. Life in Chartum is altogether, by Mr
+Werne's account, a most curious thing. During the preparations for
+the campaign, a Wurtemberg prince, Duke Paul William of Mergentheim,
+arrived in the place, and was received with much pomp. "For the
+first time I saw the Bascha sit upon a chair; he was in full
+uniform, a red jacket adorned with gold, a great diamond crescent,
+and three brilliant stars upon his left breast, his sabre by his
+side." The prince, a fat good-humoured German, was considerably
+impressed by the state displayed, and left the presence with many
+obeisances. The next day he dined with the Bascha, whom he and the
+Wernes hoped to see squatted on the ground, and feeding with his
+fingers. They were disappointed; the table was arranged in European
+fashion; wine of various kinds was there, especially champagne,
+(which the servants, notwithstanding Werne's remonstrances, insisted
+on shaking before opening, and which consequently flew about the
+room in foaming fountains;) bumper-toasts were drunk; and the
+whole party, Franks and Turks, seem to have gradually risen into
+a glorious state of intoxication, during which they vowed eternal
+friendship to each other in all imaginable tongues; and the German
+prince declared he would make the campaign to Taka with the Bascha,
+draw out the plan, and overwhelm the enemy. This jovial meeting
+was followed by a quieter entertainment given by the Wernes to the
+prince, who declared he was travelling as a private gentleman, and
+wished to be treated accordingly; and then Soliman Effendi, the
+Sicilian renegade, made a respectful application for permission to
+invite the "_Altezza Tedesca_," for whom he had conceived a great
+liking. A passage from Mr Werne is here worth quoting, as showing
+the state of society at Chartum. "I communicated the invitation,
+with the remark that the Sicilian was notorious for his poisonings,
+but that I had less fear on his highness' account than on that of
+my brother, who was already designated to replace him in his post.
+The prince did not heed the danger; moreover, I had put myself on a
+peculiar footing with Soliman Effendi, and now told him plainly that
+he had better keep his vindictive manoeuvres for others than us,
+for that my brother and I should go to dinner with loaded pistols
+in our pockets, and would shoot him through the head (_brucciare
+il cervello_) if one of us three felt as much as a belly-ache at
+his table. The dinner was served in the German fashion; all the
+guests came, except Vaissiere (formerly a French captain, now a
+slave-dealer, with the cross of the legion of honour.) He would
+not trust Soliman, who was believed to have poisoned a favourite
+female-slave of his after a dispute they had about money matters.
+The dinner went off merrily and well. The duke changed his mind
+about going to Taka, but promised to join in the campaign on his
+return from Faszogl, and bade me promise the Bascha in his name a
+crocodile-rifle and a hundred bottles of champagne."
+
+Long and costly were the preparations for the march; the more so
+that Mr Werne and his brother, who saw gleaming in the distance the
+golden cupolas of Bagdad, desired to take all their baggage with
+them, and also sufficient stores for the campaign--not implicitly
+trusting to the Bascha's promise that his kitchen and table should
+be always at their service. Ten camels were needed to carry the
+brothers' baggage. One of their greatest troubles was to know how
+to dispose of their collection of beasts and birds. "The young
+maneless lion, our greatest joy, was dead--Soliman Effendi, who
+was afraid of him, having dared to poison him, as I learned, after
+the renegade's death, from one of our own people." But of birds
+there were a host; eagles, vultures, king-cranes, (_grus pavonina_,
+Linn.;) a snake-killing secretary, with his beautiful eagle head,
+long tail, and heron legs; strange varieties of water-fowl, many
+of which had been shot, but had had the pellets extracted and the
+wounds healed by the skill of Dr Werne; and last, but most beloved,
+"a pet black horn-bird, (_buceros abyss._ L.,) who hopped up to us
+when we called out 'Jack!'--who picked up with his long curved beak
+the pieces of meat that were thrown to him, tossed them into the air
+and caught them again, (whereat the Prince of Wurtemberg laughed
+till he held his sides,) because nature has provided him with too
+short a tongue; but who did not despise frogs and lizards, and who
+called us at daybreak with his persevering '_Hum, hum_,' until we
+roused ourselves and answered 'Jack.'" Their anxiety on account of
+their aviary was relieved by the Bascha's wife, who condescendingly
+offered to take charge of it during their absence. Mehemet Ali's
+daughter suffered dreadfully from ennui in dull, unwholesome
+Chartum, and reckoned on the birds and beasts as pastime and
+diversion. Thus, little by little, difficulties were overcome, and
+all was made ready for the march. A Bolognese doctor of medicine,
+named Bellotti, and Dumont, a French apothecary, arrived at Chartum.
+They belonged to an Egyptian regiment, and must accompany it on the
+_chasua_.[2] Troops assembled in and around Chartum, the greater
+part of whose garrison, destined also to share in the campaign, were
+boated over to the right bank of the Blue Nile. Thence they were
+to march northwards to Damer--once a town, now a village amidst
+ruins--situated about three leagues above the place where the
+Atbara, a river that rises in Abyssinia, and flows north-westward
+through Sennaar, falls into the Nile. There the line of march
+changed its direction to the right, and took a tolerably straight
+route, but inclining a little to the south, in the direction of the
+Red Sea. The Bascha went by water down the Nile the greater part of
+the way to Damer, and was of course attended by his physician. Mr
+Werne, finding himself unwell, followed his example, sending their
+twelve camels by land, and accompanied by Bellotti, Dumont, and a
+Savoyard merchant from Chartum, Bruno Rollet by name. There was
+great difficulty in getting a vessel, all having been taken for the
+transport of provisions and military stores; but at last one was
+discovered, sunk by its owner to save it from the commissariat, and
+after eleven days of sickness, suffering, and peril--during which Mr
+Werne, when burning with fever, had been compelled to jump overboard
+to push the heavy laden boat off the reef on which the stupid Reis
+had run it--the party rejoined headquarters. There Mr Werne was
+kindly received by Achmet, and most joyfully by his brother. Long
+and dolorous was the tale Dr Joseph had to tell of his sufferings
+with the wild-riding Bascha. Three days before reaching Damer, that
+impatient chieftain left his ship and ordered out the dromedaries.
+The Berlin doctor of medicine felt his heart sink within him; he had
+never yet ascended a dromedary's saddle, and the desperate riding
+of the Bascha made his own Turkish retinue fear to follow him. His
+forebodings were well-founded. Two hours' rough trot shook up his
+interior to such an extent, and so stripped his exterior of skin,
+that he was compelled to dismount and lie down upon some brushwood
+near the Nile, exposed to the burning sun, and with a compassionate
+Bedouin for sole attendant, until the servants and baggage came up.
+Headache, vomiting, terrible heat and parching thirst--for he had
+no drinking vessel, and the Bedouin would not leave him--were his
+portion the whole day, followed by fever and delirium during the
+night. At two o'clock the next day (the hottest time) the Bascha was
+again in the saddle, as if desirous to try to the utmost his own
+endurance and that of his suite. By this time the doctor had come
+up with him, (having felt himself better in the morning,) after a
+six hours' ride, and terrible loss of leather, the blood running
+down into his stockings. Partly on his dromedary, partly on foot,
+he managed to follow his leader through this second day's march,
+at the cost of another night's fever, but in the morning he was
+so weak that he was obliged to take boat and complete his journey
+to Damer by water. Of more slender frame and delicate complexion
+than his brother, the poor doctor was evidently ill-adapted for
+roughing it in African deserts, although his pluck and fortitude
+went far towards supplying his physical deficiencies. Most painful
+are the accounts of his constantly recurring sufferings during
+that arduous expedition; and one cannot but admire and wonder at
+the zeal for science, or ardent thirst for novelty, that supported
+him, and induced him to persevere in the teeth of such hardship and
+ill-health. At Damer he purchased a small dromedary of easy paces,
+and left the Bascha's rough-trotting gift for his brother's riding.
+
+  [2] "The word _chasua_ signifies an expedition along the frontier,
+  or rather _across_ the frontier, for the capture of men and beasts.
+  These slave-hunts are said to have been first introduced here by the
+  Turks, and the word chasua is not believed to be indigenous, since
+  for war and battle are otherwise used _harba_ (properly a lance)
+  and _schammata_. _Chasua_ and _razzia_ appear to be synonymous,
+  corrupted from the Italian _cazzia_, in French _chasse_."--_Feldzug
+  von Sennaar_, &c., p. 17.
+
+At three in the afternoon of the 20th March, a cannon-shot gave the
+signal for departure. The Wernes' water-skins were already filled
+and their baggage packed; in an instant their tents were struck and
+camels loaded; with baggage and servants they took their place at
+the head of the column and rode up to the Bascha, who was halted
+to the east of Damer, with his beautiful horses and dromedaries
+standing saddled behind him. He complained of the great disorder
+in the camp, but consoled himself with the reflection that things
+would go better by-and-by. "It was truly a motley scene," says
+Mr Werne. "The Turkish cavalry in their national costume of many
+colours, with yellow and green banners and small kettle-drums; the
+Schaigie and Mograbin horsemen; Bedouins on horseback, on camels,
+and on foot; the Schechs and Moluks (little king) with their
+armour-bearers behind them on the dromedaries, carrying pikes and
+lances, straight swords and leather shields; the countless donkeys
+and camels--the former led by a great portion of the infantry, to
+ride in turn--drums and an ear-splitting band of music, The Chabir
+(caravan-leader) was seen in the distance mounted on his dromedary,
+and armed with a lance and round shield; the Bascha bestrode his
+horse, and we accompanied him in that direction, whilst gradually,
+and in picturesque disorder, the detachments emerged from the
+monstrous confusion and followed us. The artillery consisted of two
+field-pieces, drawn by camels, which the Bascha had had broken to
+the work, that in the desert they might relieve the customary team
+of mules.
+
+"Abd-el-Kader, the jovial Topschi Baschi, (chief of the artillery,)
+commanded them, and rode a mule. The Turks, (that is to say, chiefly
+Circassians, Kurds, and Arnauts or Albanians,) who shortly before
+could hardly put one leg before the other, seemed transformed
+into new men, as they once more found themselves at home in their
+saddles. They galloped round the Bascha like madmen, riding their
+horses as mercilessly as if they had been drunk with opium. This
+was a sort of honorary demonstration, intended to indicate to their
+chief their untameable valour. The road led through the desert, and
+was tolerably well beaten. Towards evening the Bascha rode forwards
+with the Chabir. We did not follow, for I felt myself unwell. It was
+dark night when we reached the left bank of the Atbara, where we
+threw ourselves down amongst the bushes, and went to sleep, without
+taking supper."
+
+The campaign might now be said to be beginning; at least the army
+was close upon tribes whose disposition, if not avowedly hostile,
+was very equivocal, and the Bascha placed a picket of forty men at
+the only ford over the Atbara, a clear stream of tolerable depth,
+and with lofty banks, covered with rich grass, with mimosas and
+lofty fruit-laden palm-trees. The next day's march was a severe
+one--ten hours without a halt--and was attended, after nightfall,
+with some danger, arising partly from the route lying through
+trees with barbed thorns, strong enough to tear the clothes off
+men's bodies and the eyes out of their heads, and partly from the
+crowding and pressure in the disorderly column during its progress
+amongst holes and chasms occasioned by the overflowing of the river.
+Upon halting, at midnight, a fire was lighted for the Bascha, and
+one of his attendants brought coffee to Mr Werne; but he, sick
+and weary, rejected it, and would have preferred, he says, so
+thoroughly exhausted did he feel, a nap under a bush to a supper
+upon a roasted angel. They were still ascending the bank of the
+Atbara, a winding stream, with wildly beautiful tree-fringed banks,
+containing few fish, but giving shelter, in its deep places, to
+the crocodile and hippopotamus. From the clefts of its sandstone
+bed, then partially exposed by the decline of the waters, sprang a
+lovely species of willow, with beautiful green foliage and white
+umbelliferous flowers, having a perfume surpassing that of jasmine.
+The Wernes would gladly, have explored the neighbourhood; but the
+tremendous heat, and a warm wind which played round their temples
+with a sickening effect, drove them into camp. Gunfire was at noon
+upon that day; but it was Mr Werne's turn to be on the sick-list.
+Suddenly he felt himself so ill, that it was with a sort of
+despairing horror he saw the tent struck from over him, loaded upon
+a camel, and driven off. In vain he endeavoured to rise; the sun
+seemed to dart coals of fire upon his head. His brother and servant
+carried him into the shadow of a neighbouring palm-tree, and he sank
+half-dead upon the glowing sand. It would suffice to abide there
+during the heat of the day, as they thought, but instead of that,
+they were compelled to remain till next morning, Werne suffering
+terribly from dysentery. "Never in my life," he says, "did I more
+ardently long for the setting of the sun than on that day; even
+its last rays exercised the same painful power on my hair, which
+seemed to be in a sort of electric connection with just as many
+sunbeams, and to bristle up upon my head. And no sooner had the
+luminary which inspired me with such horror sunk below the horizon,
+than I felt myself better, and was able to get on my legs and crawl
+slowly about. Some good-natured Arab shepherd-lads approached our
+fire, pitied me, and brought me milk and durra-bread. It was a
+lovely evening; the full moon was reflected in the Atbara, as were
+also the dark crowns of the palm-trees, wild geese shrieked around
+us; otherwise the stillness was unbroken, save at intervals by the
+cooing of doves. There is something beautiful in sleeping in the
+open air, when weather and climate are suitable. We awoke before
+sunrise, comforted, and got upon our dromedaries; but after a couple
+of hours' ride we mistrusted the sun, and halted with some wandering
+Arabs belonging to the Kabyle of the Kammarabs. We were hospitably
+received, and regaled with milk and bread."[3]
+
+  [3] These Kammarabs possess a tract on the left or south bank of
+  the Atbara. The distribution of the different tribes, as well as
+  the line of march and other particulars, are very clearly displayed
+  in the appropriate little map accompanying Mr Werne's volume.
+  Opposite to the Kammarabs, "on the right bank of the Atbara, are the
+  Anafidabs, of the race or family of the Bischari. They form a Kabyle
+  (band or community) under a Schech of their own. How it is that the
+  French in Algiers persist in using _Kabyle_ as the proper name of a
+  nation and a country, I cannot understand."--_Feldzug von Sennaar_,
+  p. 32.
+
+When our two Germans rejoined headquarters, after four days'
+absence, they found Achmet Bascha seated in the shade upon the
+ground in front of his tent, much burned by the sun, and looking
+fagged and suffering--as well he might be after the heat and
+exposure he had voluntarily undergone. Nothing could cure him,
+however, at least as yet, of his fancy for marching in the heat of
+the day. Although obstinate and despotic, the Bascha was evidently
+a dashing sort of fellow, well calculated to win the respect and
+admiration of his wild and heterogeneous army. Weary as were the
+two Wernes, (they reached the camp at noon,) at two o'clock they
+had to be again in the saddle. "A number of gazelles were started;
+the Bascha seized a gun and dashed after them upon his Arabian
+stallion, almost the whole of the cavalry scouring after him like
+a wild mob, and we ourselves riding a sharp trot to witness the
+chase. We thought he had fallen from his horse, so suddenly did he
+swing himself from saddle to ground, killing three gazelles with
+three shots, of which animals we consumed a considerable portion
+roasted for that night's supper." The river here widened, and
+crocodiles showed themselves upon the opposite shore. The day was
+terribly warm; the poor medico was ill again, suffering grievously
+from his head, and complaining of _his hair being so hot_; and as
+the Salamander Bascha persisted in marching under a sun which,
+through the canvass of the tents, heated sabres and musket-barrels
+till it was scarcely possible to grasp them, the brothers again
+lingered behind and followed in the cool of the evening, Joseph
+being mounted upon an easy-going mule lent him by Topschi Baschi,
+the good-humoured but dissolute captain of the guns. They were now
+divided but by the river's breadth from the hostile tribe of the
+Haddenda, and might at any moment be assailed; so two hours after
+sunset a halt was called and numerous camp-fires were lighted,
+producing a most picturesque effect amongst the trees, and by their
+illumination of the diversified costumes of the soldiery, and
+attracting a whole regiment of scorpions, "some of them remarkably
+fine specimens," says Mr Werne, who looks upon these unpleasant
+fireside companions with a scientific eye, "a finger and a half
+long, of a light colour, half of the tail of a brown black and
+covered with hair." It is a thousand pities that the adventurous Mrs
+Ida Pfeiffer did not accompany Mr Werne upon this expedition. She
+would have had the finest possible opportunities of curing herself
+of the prejudice which it will be remembered she was so weak as to
+entertain against the scorpion tribe. These pleasant reptiles were
+as plentiful all along Mr Werne's line of march as are cockchafers
+on a summer evening in an English oak-copse. Their visitations were
+pleasantly varied by those of snakes of all sizes, and of various
+degrees of venom. "At last," says Mr Werne, "one gets somewhat
+indifferent about scorpions and other wild animals." He had greater
+difficulty in accustoming himself to the sociable habits of the
+snakes, who used to glide about amongst tents and baggage, and by
+whom, in the course of the expedition, a great number of persons
+were bitten. On the 12th April "Mohammed Ladham sent us a remarkable
+scorpion--pity that it is so much injured--almost two fingers long,
+black-brown, tail and feet covered with prickly hair, claws as large
+as those of a small crab.... We had laid us down under a green tree
+beside a cotton plantation, whilst our servants unloaded the camels
+and pitched the tents, when a snake, six feet long, darted from
+under our carpet, passed over my leg, and close before my brother's
+face. But we were so exhausted that we lay still, and some time
+afterwards the snake was brought to us, one of Schech Defalla's
+people having killed it." About noon next day a similar snake sprang
+out of the said Defalla's own tent; it was killed also, and found to
+measure six feet two inches. The soldiers perceiving that the German
+physician and his brother were curious in the matter of reptiles,
+brought them masses of serpents; but they had got a notion that the
+flesh was the part coveted (not the skin) to make medicine, and most
+of the specimens were so defaced as to be valueless. Early in May
+"some soldiers assured us they had seen in the thicket a serpent
+twenty feet long, and as thick as a man's leg; probably a species
+of boa--a pity that they could not kill it. The great number of
+serpents with dangerous bites makes our bivouac very unsafe, and we
+cannot encamp with any feeling of security near bushes or amongst
+brushwood; the prick of a blade of straw, the sting of the smallest
+insect, causes a hasty movement, for one immediately fancies it
+is a snake or scorpion; and when out shooting, one's _second_
+glance is for the game, one's _first_ on the ground at his feet,
+for fear of trampling and irritating some venomous reptile." As
+we proceed through the volume we shall come to other accounts of
+beasts and reptiles, so remarkable as really almost to reconcile
+us to the possibility of some of the zoological marvels narrated
+by the Yankee Doctor Mayo in his rhapsody of Kaloolah.[4] For the
+present we must revert to the business of this curiously-conducted
+campaign. As the army advanced, various chiefs presented themselves,
+with retinues more or less numerous. The first of these was the
+Grand-Shech Mohammed Defalla, already named, who came up, with a
+great following, on the 28th March. He was a man of herculean frame;
+and assuredly such was very necessary to enable him to endure in
+that climate the weight of his defensive arms. He wore a double
+shirt of mail over a quilted doublet, arm-plates and beautifully
+wrought steel gauntlets; his casque fitted like a shell to the upper
+part of his head, and had in front, in lieu of a visor, an iron
+bar coming down over the nose--behind, for the protection of the
+nape, a fringe composed of small rings. His straight-bladed sword
+had a golden hilt. The whole equipment, which seems to correspond
+very closely with that of some of the Sikhs or other warlike Indian
+tribes, proceeded from India, and Defalla had forty or fifty such
+suits of arms. About the same time with him, arrived two Schechs
+from the refractory land of Taka, tall handsome men; whilst, from
+the environs of the neighbouring town of Gos-Rajeb, a number of
+people rode out on dromedaries to meet the Bascha, their hair quite
+white with camel-fat, which melted in the sun and streamed over
+their backs. Gos-Rajeb, situated at about a quarter of a mile from
+the left bank of the Atbara, consists of some two hundred _tokul_
+(huts) and clay-built houses, and in those parts is considered
+an important commercial depot, Indian goods being transported
+thither on camels from the port of Souakim, on the Red Sea. The
+inhabitants are of various tribes, more of them red than black
+or brown; but few were visible, many having fled at the approach
+of Achmet's army, which passed the town in imposing array--the
+infantry in double column in the centre, the Turkish cavalry on the
+right, the Schaigies and Mograbins on the left, the artillery, with
+kettledrums, cymbals, and other music, in the van--marched through
+the Atbara, there very shallow, and encamped on the right bank, in
+a stony and almost treeless plain, at the foot of two rocky hills.
+The Bascha ordered the Shech of Gos-Rajeb to act as guide to the
+Wernes in their examination of the vicinity, and to afford them all
+the information in his power. The most remarkable spot to which
+he conducted them was to the site of an ancient city, which once,
+according to tradition, had been as large as Cairo, and inhabited
+by Christians. The date of its existence must be very remote, for
+the ground was smooth, and the sole trace of buildings consisted in
+a few heaps of broken bricks. There were indications of a terrible
+conflagration, the bricks in one place being melted together into a
+black glazed mass. Mr Werne could trace nothing satisfactory with
+respect to former Christian occupants, and seems disposed to think
+that Burckhardt, who speaks of Christian monuments at that spot, (in
+the neighbourhood of the hill of Herrerem,) may have been misled by
+certain peculiarly formed rocks.
+
+  [4] _Blackwood's Magazine_, No. CCCCIV., for June 1849.
+
+The most renowned chief of the mutinous tribes of Taka, the
+conqueror of the Turks under Churdschid Bascha, was Mohammed Din,
+Grand-Schech of the Haddenda. This personage, awed by the approach
+of Achmet's formidable force, sent his son to the advancing
+Bascha, as a hostage for his loyalty and submission. Achmet sent
+the young man back to his father as bearer of his commands. The
+next day the army crossed the frontier of Taka, which is not
+very exactly defined, left the Atbara in their rear, and, moving
+still eastwards, beheld before them, in the far distance, the
+blue mountains of Abyssinia. The Bascha's suite was now swelled
+by the arrival of numerous Schechs, great and small, with their
+esquires and attendants. The route lay through a thick forest,
+interwoven with creeping plants and underwood, and with thorny
+mimosas, which grew to a great height. The path was narrow, the
+confusion of the march inconceivably great and perilous, and if
+the enemy had made a vigorous attack with their javelins, which
+they are skilled in throwing, the army must have endured great
+loss, with scarcely a possibility of inflicting any. At last the
+scattered column reached an open space, covered with grass, and
+intersected with deep narrow rills of water. The Bascha, who had
+outstripped his troops, was comfortably encamped, heedless of their
+fate, whilst they continued for a long time to emerge in broken
+parties from the wood. Mr Werne's good opinion of his generalship
+had been already much impaired, and this example of true Turkish
+indolence, and of the absence of any sort of military dispositions
+under such critical circumstances, completely destroyed it. The
+next day there was some appearance of establishing camp-guards,
+and of taking due precautions against the fierce and numerous
+foe, who on former occasions had thrice defeated Turkish armies,
+and from whom an attack might at any moment be expected. In the
+afternoon an alarm was given; the Bascha, a good soldier, although
+a bad general, was in the saddle in an instant, and gallopping
+to the spot, followed by all his cavalry, whilst the infantry
+rushed confusedly in the same direction. The uproar had arisen,
+however, not from Arab assailants, but from some soldiers who had
+discovered extensive corn magazines--_silos_, as they are called
+in Algeria--holes in the ground, filled with grain, and carefully
+covered over. By the Bascha's permission, the soldiers helped
+themselves from these abundant granaries, and thus the army found
+itself provided with corn for the next two months. In the course of
+the disorderly distribution, or rather scramble, occurred a little
+fight between the Schaigie, a quarrelsome set of irregulars, and
+some of the Turks. Nothing could be worse than the discipline of
+Achmet's host. The Schaigies were active and daring horsemen, and
+were the first to draw blood in the campaign, in a skirmish upon
+the following day with some ambushed Arabs. The neighbouring woods
+swarmed with these javelin-bearing gentry, although they lay close,
+and rarely showed themselves, save when they could inflict injury
+at small risk. Mr Werne began to doubt the possibility of any
+extensive or effectual operations against these wild and wandering
+tribes, who, on the approach of the army, loaded their goods on
+camels, and fled into the _Chaaba_, or forest district, whither
+it was impossible to follow them. Where was the Bascha to find
+money and food for the support of his numerous army?--where was
+he to quarter it during the dangerous _Chariff_, or rainy season?
+He was very reserved as to his plans; probably, according to Mr
+Werne, because he had none. The Schechs who had joined and marched
+with him could hardly be depended upon, when it was borne in mind
+that they, formerly the independent rulers of a free people, had
+been despoiled of their power and privileges, and were now the
+ill-used vassals of the haughty and stupid Turks, who overwhelmed
+them with imposts, treated them contemptuously, and even subjected
+them to the bastinado. "Mohammed Din, seeing the hard lot of these
+gentlemen, seems disposed to preserve his freedom as long as
+possible, or to sell it as dearly as may be. Should it come to a
+war, there is, upon our side, a total want of efficient leaders, at
+any rate if we except the Bascha. Abdin Aga, chief of the Turkish
+cavalry, a bloated Arnaut; Sorop Effendi, a model of stupidity and
+covetousness; Hassan Effendi Bimbaschi, a quiet sot; Soliman Aga,
+greedy, and without the slightest education of any kind; Hassan
+Effendi of Sennaar, a Turk in the true sense of the word (these
+four are infantry commanders); Mohammed Ladjam, a good-natured but
+inexperienced fellow, chief of the Mograbin cavalry: amongst all
+these officers, the only difference is, that each is more ignorant
+than his neighbour. With such leaders, what can be expected from an
+army that, for the most part, knows no discipline--the Schaigies,
+for instance, doing just what they please, and being in a fair way
+to corrupt all the rest--and that is encumbered with an endless
+train of dangerous rabble, idlers, slaves, and women of pleasure,
+serving as a burthen and hindrance? Let us console ourselves with
+the _Allah kerim!_ (God is merciful.)" Mr Werne had not long to
+wait for a specimen of Turkish military skill. On the night of the
+7th April he was watching in his tent beside his grievously sick
+brother, when there suddenly arose an uproar in the camp, followed
+by firing. "I remained by our tent, for my brother was scarcely able
+to stir, and the infantry also remained quiet, trusting to their
+mounted comrades. But when I saw Bimbaschi Hassan Effendi lead a
+company past us, and madly begin to fire over the powder-waggons,
+as if these were meant to serve as barricades against the hostile
+lances, I ran up to him with my sabre drawn, and threatened him
+with the Bascha, as well as with the weapon, whereupon he came to
+his senses, and begged me not to betray him. The whole proved to
+be mere noise, but the harassed Bascha was again up and active.
+He seemed to make no use of his aides-de-camp, and only his own
+presence could inspire his troops with courage. Some of the enemy
+were killed, and there were many tracks of blood leading into the
+wood, although the firing had been at random in the darkness. As
+a specimen of the tactics of our Napoleon-worshipping Bascha, he
+allowed the wells, which were at two hundred yards from camp, to
+remain unguarded at night, so that they might easily have been
+filled up by the enemy. Truly fortunate was it that there were no
+great stones in the neighbourhood to choke them up, for we were
+totally without implements wherewith to have cleared them out
+again." Luckily for this most careless general and helpless army,
+the Arabs neglected to profit by their shortcomings, and on the 14th
+April, after many negotiations, the renowned Mohammed Din himself,
+awed, we must suppose, by the numerical strength of Achmet's troops,
+and over-estimating their real value, committed the fatal blunder
+of presenting himself in the Turkish camp. Great was the curiosity
+to see this redoubted chief, who alighted at Schech Defalla's
+tent, into which the soldiers impudently crowded, to get a view of
+the man before whom many of them had formerly trembled and fled.
+"Mohammed Din is of middle stature, and of a black-brown colour,
+like all his people; his countenance at first says little, but,
+on longer inspection, its expression is one of great cunning; his
+bald head is bare; his dress Arabian, with drawers of a fiery red
+colour. His retinue consists, without exception, of most ill-looking
+fellows, on whose countenances Nature seems to have done her best
+to express the faithless character attributed to the Haddenda.
+They are all above the middle height, and armed with shields and
+lances, or swords." Next morning Mr Werne saw the Bascha seated
+on his _angareb_, (a sort of bedstead, composed of plaited strips
+of camel-hide, which, upon the march, served as a throne,) with a
+number of Shechs squatted upon the ground on either side of him,
+amongst them Mohammed Din, looking humbled, and as if half-repentant
+of his rash step. The Bascha appeared disposed to let him feel that
+he was now no better than a caged lion, whose claws the captor can
+cut at will. He showed him, however, marks of favour, gave him a red
+shawl for a turban, and a purple mantle with gold tassels, but no
+sabre, which Mr Werne thought a bad omen. The Schech was suffered to
+go to and fro between the camp and his own people, but under certain
+control--now with an escort of Schaigies, then leaving his son as
+hostage. He sent in some cattle and sheep as a present, and promised
+to bring the tribute due; this he failed to do, and a time was
+fixed to him and the other Shechs within which to pay up arrears.
+Notwithstanding the subjection of their chief, the Arabs continued
+their predatory practices, stealing camels from the camp, or taking
+them by force from the grooms who drove them out to pasture.
+
+Mr Werne's book is a journal, written daily during the campaign but,
+owing to the long interval between its writing and publication, he
+has found it necessary to make frequent parenthetical additions,
+corrective or explanatory. Towards the end of April, during great
+sickness in camp, he writes as follows:--"My brother's medical
+observations and experiments begin to excite in me a strong
+interest. He has promised me that he will keep a medical journal;
+but he must first get into better health, for now it is always with
+sickening disgust that he returns from visiting his patients; he
+complains of the insupportable effluvia from these people, sinks
+upon his _angareb_ with depression depicted in his features, and
+falls asleep with open eyes, so that I often feel quite uneasy."
+Then comes the parenthesis of ten years' later date. "Subsequently,
+when I had joined the expedition for the navigation of the White
+Nile, he wrote to me from the camp of Kassela-el-Lus to Chartum,
+that, with great diligence and industry, he had written some
+valuable papers on African diseases, and was inconsolable at having
+lost them. He had been for ten days dangerously ill, had missed me
+sadly, and, in a fit of delirium, when his servant asked him for
+paper to light the fire, had handed him his manuscript, which the
+stupid fellow had forthwith burned. At the same time, he lamented
+that, during his illness, our little menagerie had been starved to
+death. The Bascha had been to see him, and by his order Topschi
+Baschi had taken charge of his money, that he might not be robbed,
+giving the servants what was needful for their keep, and for the
+purchase of flesh for the animals. The servants had drunk the money
+intended for the beasts' food. When my brother recovered his health,
+he had the _fagged_, (a sort of lynx,) which had held out longest,
+and was only just dead, cut open, and so convinced himself that
+it had died of hunger. The annoyance one has to endure from these
+people is beyond conception, and the very mildest-tempered man--as,
+for instance, my late brother--is compelled at times to make use of
+the whip."
+
+Whilst Mohammed Din and the other Shechs, accompanied by detachments
+of Turkish troops, intended partly to support them in their demands,
+and partly to reconnoitre the country, endeavoured to get together
+the stipulated tribute, the army remained stationary. But repose
+did not entail monotony; strange incidents were of daily occurrence
+in this singular camp. The Wernes, always anxious for the increase
+of their cabinet of stuffed birds and beasts, sent their huntsman
+Abdallah with one of the detachments, remaining themselves, for the
+present at least, at headquarters, to collect whatever might come
+in their way. The commander of the Mograbins sent them an antelope
+as big as a donkey, having legs like a cow, and black twisted
+horns. From the natives little was to be obtained. They were very
+shy and ill-disposed, and could not be prevailed upon, even by
+tenfold payment, to supply the things most abundant with them, as
+for instance milk and honey. In hopes of alluring and conciliating
+them, the Bascha ordered those traders who had accompanied the army
+to establish a bazaar outside the fence enclosing the camp. The
+little mirrors that were there sold proved a great attraction. The
+Arabs would sit for whole days looking in them, and pulling faces.
+But no amount of reflection could render them amicable or honest:
+they continued to steal camels and asses whenever they could, and
+one of them caught a Schaigie's horse, led him up to the camp,
+and stabbed him to death. So great was the hatred of these tribes
+to their oppressors--a hatred which would have shown itself by
+graver aggressions, but for Achmet's large force, and above all,
+for their dread of firearms. Within the camp there was wild work
+enough at times. The good-hearted, hot-headed Werne was horribly
+scandalised by the ill-treatment of the slaves. Dumont, the French
+apothecary, had a poor lad named Amber, a mere boy, willing and
+industrious, whom he continually beat and kicked, until at last Mr
+Werne challenged him to a duel with sabres, and threatened to take
+away the slave, which he, as a Frenchman, had no legal right to
+possess. But this was nothing compared to the cruelties practised
+by other Europeans, and especially at Chartum by one Vigoureux, (a
+French corporal who had served under Napoleon, and was now adjutant
+of an Egyptian battalion,) and his wife, upon a poor black girl,
+only ten years of age, whom they first barbarously flogged, and
+then tied to a post, with her bleeding back exposed to the broiling
+sun. Informed of this atrocity by his brother, who had witnessed
+it, Mr Werne sprang from his sickbed, and flew to the rescue, armed
+with his sabre, and with a well-known iron stick, ten pounds in
+weight, which had earned him the nickname of Abu-Nabut, or Father
+of the Stick. A distant view of his incensed countenance sufficed,
+and the Frenchman, cowardly as cruel, hastened to release his
+victim, and to humble himself before her humane champion. Concerning
+this corporal and his dame, whom he had been to France to fetch,
+and who was brought to bed on camel-back, under a burning sun,
+in the midst of the desert, some curious reminiscences are set
+down in the _Feldzug_, as are also some diverting details of the
+improprieties of the dissipated gunner Topschi Baschi, who, on the
+1st May, brought dancing-girls into the hut occupied by the two
+Germans, and assembled a mob round it by the indecorous nature of
+his proceedings. Regulations for the internal order and security of
+the camp were unheard of. After a time, tents were pitched over the
+ammunition; a ditch was dug around it, and strict orders were given
+to light no fire in its vicinity. All fires, too, by command of the
+Bascha, were to be extinguished when the evening gun was fired.
+For a short time the orders were obeyed; then they were forgotten;
+fires were seen blazing late at night, and within fifteen paces of
+the powder. Nothing but the bastinado could give memory to these
+reckless fatalists. "I have often met ships upon the Nile, so laden
+with straw that there was scarcely room for the sailors to work
+the vessel. No matter for that; in the midst of the straw a mighty
+kitchen-fire was merrily blazing."
+
+On the 6th of May, the two Wernes mounted their dromedaries and set
+off, attended by one servant, and with a guide provided by Mohammed
+Defalla, for the village of El Soffra, at a distance of two and a
+half leagues, where they expected to find Mohammed Din and a large
+assemblage of his tribe. It was rather a daring thing to advance
+thus unescorted into the land of the treacherous Haddendas, and
+the Bascha gave his consent unwillingly; but Mussa, (Moses,) the
+Din's only son, was hostage in the camp, and they deemed themselves
+safer alone than with the half company of soldiers Achmet wanted
+to send with them. Their route lay due east, at first through
+fields of _durra_, (a sort of grain,) afterwards through forests of
+saplings. The natives they met greeted them courteously, and they
+reached El Soffra without molestation, but there learned, to their
+considerable annoyance, that Mohammed Din had gone two leagues and
+a half farther, to the camp of his nephew Shech Mussa, at Mitkenab.
+So, after a short pause, they again mounted their camels, and rode
+off, loaded with maledictions by the Arabs, because they would
+not remain and supply them with medicine, although the same Arabs
+refused to requite the drugs with so much as a cup of milk. They
+rode for more than half an hour before emerging from the straggling
+village, which was composed of wretched huts made of palm-mats,
+having an earthen cooking-vessel, a leathern water-bottle, and two
+stones for bruising corn, for sole furniture. The scanty dress of
+the people--some of the men had nothing but a leathern apron round
+their hips, and a sheep-skin, with the wool inwards, over their
+shoulders--their long hair and wild countenances, gave them the
+appearance of thorough savages. In the middle of every village
+was an open place, where the children played stark naked in the
+burning sun, their colour and their extraordinarily nimble movements
+combining, says Mr Werne, to give them the appearance of a troop
+of young imps. Infants, which in Europe would lie helpless in the
+cradle, are there seen rolling in the sand, with none to mind them,
+and playing with the young goats and other domestic animals. In that
+torrid climate, the development of the human frame is wonderfully
+rapid. Those women of whom the travellers caught a sight in this
+large village, which consisted of upwards of two thousand huts and
+tents, were nearly all old and ugly. The young ones, when they by
+chance encountered the strangers, covered their faces, and ran away.
+On the road to Mitkenab, however, some young and rather handsome
+girls showed themselves. "They all looked at us with great wonder,"
+says Mr Werne, "and took us for Turks, for we are the first Franks
+who have come into this country."
+
+Mitkenab, pleasantly situated amongst lofty trees, seemed to
+invite the wanderers to cool shelter from the mid-day sun. They
+were parched with thirst when they entered it, but not one of the
+inquisitive Arabs who crowded around them would attend to their
+request for a draught of milk or water. Here, however, was Mohammed
+Din, and with him a party of Schaigies under Melek Mahmud, whom
+they found encamped under a great old tree, with his fifty horsemen
+around him. After they had taken some refreshment, the Din came to
+pay them a visit. He refused to take the place offered him on an
+_angareb_, but sat down upon the ground, giving them to understand,
+with a sneering smile, that _that_ was now the proper place for
+him. "We had excellent opportunity to examine the physiognomy of
+this Schech, who is venerated like a demigod by all the Arabs
+between the Atbara and the Red Sea. 'He is a brave man,' they say,
+'full of courage; there is no other like him!' His face is fat and
+round, with small grey-brown, piercing, treacherous-looking eyes,
+expressing both the cunning and the obstinacy of his character;
+his nose is well-proportioned and slightly flattened; his small
+mouth constantly wears a satirical scornful smile. But for this
+expression and his thievish glance, his bald crown and well-fed
+middle-sized person would become a monk's hood. He goes with his
+head bare, wears a white cotton shirt and _ferda_, and sandals on
+his feet.... We told him that he was well known to the Franks as
+a great hero; he shook his head and said that on the salt lake,
+at Souakim, he had seen great ships with cannon, but that he did
+not wish the help of the Ingleb (English;) then he said something
+else, which was not translated to us. I incautiously asked him, how
+numerous his nation was. 'Count the trees,' he replied, glancing
+ironically around him; (a poll-tax constituted a portion of the
+tribute.) Conversation through an interpreter was so wearisome that
+we soon took our leave." At Mitkenab they were upon the borders
+of the great forest (Chaaba) that extends from the banks of the
+Atbara to the shores of the Red Sea. It contains comparatively few
+lofty trees--most of these getting uprooted by hurricanes, when the
+rainy season has softened the ground round their roots--but a vast
+deal of thicket and dense brushwood, affording shelter to legions
+of wild beasts; innumerable herds of elephants, rhinoceroses,
+lions, tigers, giraffes, various inferior beasts, and multitudes
+of serpents of the most venomous description. For fear of these
+unpleasant neighbours, no Arab at Mitkenab quits his dwelling after
+nightfall. "When we returned to the wells, a little before sundown,
+we found all the Schaigies on the move, to take up their quarters in
+an enclosure outside the village, partly on account of the beasts
+of prey, especially the lions, which come down to drink of a night,
+partly for safety from the unfriendly Arabs. We went with them
+and encamped with Mammud in the middle of the enclosure. We slept
+soundly the night through, only once aroused by the hoarse cries of
+the hyenas, which were sneaking about the village, setting all the
+dogs barking. To insure our safety, Mohammed Din himself slept at
+our door--so well-disposed were his people towards us." A rumour had
+gained credit amongst the Arabs, that the two mysterious strangers
+were, sent by Achmet to reconnoitre the country for the Bascha's own
+advance; and so incensed were they at this, that, although their
+beloved chief's son was a hostage in the Turkish camp, it was only
+by taking bypaths, under guidance of a young relative of Schech
+Mussa's, that the Wernes were able to regain their camp in safety.
+A few days after their return they were both attacked by bad fever,
+which for some time prevented them from writing. They lost their
+reckoning, and thenceforward the journal is continued without dates.
+
+The Bascha grew weary of life in camp, and pined after action. In
+vain did the Schaigies toss the djereed, and go through irregular
+tournaments and sham fights for his diversion; in vain did he
+rattle the dice with Topschi Baschi; vain were the blandishments
+of an Abyssinian beauty whom he had quartered in a hut surrounded
+with a high fence, and for whose amusement he not unfrequently had
+nocturnal serenades performed by the band of the 8th regiment; to
+which brassy and inharmonious challenge the six thousand donkeys
+assembled in camp never failed to respond by an ear-splitting bray,
+whilst the numerous camels bellowed a bass: despite all these
+amusements, the Bascha suffered from ennui. He was furious when
+he saw how slowly and scantily came in the tribute for which he
+had made this long halt. Some three hundred cows were all that had
+yet been delivered; a ridiculously small number contrasted with
+the vast herds possessed by those tribes. Achmet foamed with rage
+at this ungrateful return for his patience and consideration. He
+reproached the Schechs who were with him, and sent for Mohammed Din,
+Shech Mussa, and the two Shechs of Mitkenab. Although their people,
+foreboding evil, endeavoured to dissuade them from obedience, they
+all four came and were forthwith put in irons and chained together.
+With all his cunning Mohammed Din had fallen into the snare. His
+plan had been, so Mr Werne believes, to cajole and detain the Turks
+by fair words and promises until the rainy season, when hunger
+and sickness would have proved his best allies. The Bascha had
+been beforehand with him, and the old marauder might now repent
+at leisure that he had not trusted to his impenetrable forests
+and to the javelins of his people, rather than to the word of a
+Turk. On the day of his arrest the usual evening gun was loaded
+with canister, and fired into the woods in the direction of the
+Haddendas, the sound of cannon inspiring the Arab and negro tribes
+with a panic fear. Firearms--to them incomprehensible weapons--have
+served more than anything else to daunt their courage. "When the
+Turks attacked a large and populous mountain near Faszogl, the
+blacks sent out spies to see how strong was the foe, and how armed.
+The spies came back laughing, and reported that there was no great
+number of men; that their sole arms were shining sticks upon their
+shoulders, and that they had neither swords, lances, nor shields.
+The poor fellows soon found how terrible an effect had the sticks
+they deemed so harmless. As they could not understand how it was
+that small pieces of lead should wound and kill, a belief got abroad
+amongst them, that the Afrite, Scheitan, (the devil or evil spirit,)
+dwelt in the musket-barrels. With this conviction, a negro, grasping
+a soldier's musket, put his hand over the mouth of the barrel, that
+the afrite might not get out. The soldier pulled the trigger, and
+the leaden devil pierced the poor black's hand and breast. After
+an action, a negro collected the muskets of six or seven slain
+soldiers, and joyfully carried them home, there to forge them into
+lances in the presence of a party of his friends. But it happened
+that some of them were loaded, and soon getting heated in the fire,
+they went off, scattering death and destruction around them." Most
+of the people in Taka run from the mere report of a musket, but the
+Arabs of Hedjas, a mountainous district near the Red Sea, possess
+firearms, and are slow but very good shots.
+
+In the way of tribute, nothing was gained by the imprisonment of
+Mahommed Din and his companions. No more contributions came in, and
+not an Arab showed himself upon the market-place outside the camp.
+Mohammed Din asked why his captors did not kill rather than confine
+him; he preferred death to captivity, and keeping him prisoner would
+lead, he said, to no result. The Arab chiefs in camp did not conceal
+their disgust at the Bascha's treatment of their Grand-Shech, and
+taxed Achmet with having broken his word, since he had given him the
+Amahn--promise of pardon. Any possibility of conciliating the Arabs
+was destroyed by the step that had been taken. At night they swarmed
+round the camp, shrieking their war-cry. The utmost vigilance was
+necessary; a third of the infantry was under arms all night, the
+consequent fatigue increasing the amount of sickness. The general
+aspect of things was anything but cheering. The Wernes had their
+private causes of annoyance. Six of their camels, including the two
+excellent dromedaries given to them by the Bascha before quitting
+Chartum, were stolen whilst their camel-driver slept, and could
+not be recovered. They were compelled to buy others, and Mr Werne
+complains bitterly of the heavy expenses of the campaign--expenses
+greatly augmented by the sloth and dishonesty of their servants.
+The camel-driver, fearing to face his justly-incensed employers,
+disappeared and was no more heard of. Upon this and other occasions,
+Mr Werne was struck by the extraordinary skill of the Turks in
+tracing animals and men by their footsteps. In this manner his
+servants tracked his camels to an Arab village, although the road
+had been trampled by hundreds of beasts of the same sort. "If
+these people have once seen the footprint of a man, camel, horse,
+or ass, they are sure to recognise it amongst thousands of such
+impressions, and will follow the trail any distance, so long as the
+ground is tolerably favourable, and wind or rain has not obliterated
+the marks. In cases of loss, people send for a man who makes this
+kind of search his profession; they show him a footprint of the
+lost animal, and immediately, without asking any other indication,
+he follows the track through the streets of a town, daily trodden
+by thousands, and seldom falls to hunt out the game. He does not
+proceed slowly, or stoop to examine the ground, but his sharp eye
+follows the trail at a run. We ourselves saw the footstep of a
+runaway slave shown to one of these men, who caught the fugitive at
+the distance of three days' journey from that spot. My brother once
+went out of the Bascha's house at Chartum, to visit a patient who
+lived far off in the town. He had been gone an hour when the Bascha
+desired to see him, and the tschansch (orderly) traced him at once
+by his footmarks on the unpaved streets in which crowds had left
+similar signs. When, in consequence of my sickness, we lingered for
+some days on the Atbara, and then marched to overtake the army, the
+Schaigies who escorted us detected, amidst the hoof-marks of the
+seven or eight thousand donkeys accompanying the troops, those of a
+particular jackass belonging to one of their friends, and the event
+proved that they were right." Mr Werne fills his journal, during
+his long sojourn in camp, with a great deal of curious information
+concerning the habits and peculiarities of both Turks and Arabs,
+as well as with the interesting results of his observations on the
+brute creation. The soldiers continued to bring to him and his
+brother all manner of animals and reptiles--frogs, whole coils of
+snakes, and chameleons, which there abound, but whose changes of
+colour Mr Werne found to be much less numerous than is commonly
+believed. For two months he watched the variations of hue of these
+curious lizards, and found them limited to different shades of grey
+and green, with yellow stripes and spots. He made a great pet of
+a young wild cat, which was perfectly tame, and extraordinarily
+handsome. Its colour was grey, beautifully spotted with black,
+like a panther; its head was smaller and more pointed than that of
+European cats; its ears, of unusual size, were black, with white
+stripes. Many of the people in camp took it to be a young tiger, but
+the natives called it a _fagged_, and said it was a sort of cat, in
+which Mr Werne agreed with them. "Its companion and playfellow is a
+rat, about the size of a squirrel, with a long silvery tail, which,
+when angry, it swells out, and sets up over its back. This poor
+little beast was brought to us with two broken legs, and we gave it
+to the cat, thinking it was near death. But the cat, not recognising
+her natural prey--and moreover feeling the want of a companion--and
+the rat, tamed by pain and cured by splints, became inseparable
+friends, ate together, and slept arm in arm. The rat, which was not
+ugly like our house rats, but was rather to be considered handsome,
+by reason of its long frizzled tail, never made use of its liberty
+to escape." Notwithstanding the numerous devices put in practice
+by the Wernes to pass their time, it at last began to hang heavy,
+and their pipes were almost their sole resource and consolation.
+Smoking is little customary in Egypt, except amongst the Turks and
+Arabs. The Mograbins prefer chewing. The blacks of the Gesira make a
+concentrated infusion of this weed, which they call _bucca_; take a
+mouthful of it, and roll the savoury liquor round their teeth for a
+quarter of an hour before ejecting it. They are so addicted to this
+practice, that they invite their friends to "bucca" as Europeans do
+to dinner. The vessel containing the tobacco juice makes the round
+of the party, and a profound silence ensues, broken only by the
+harmonious gurgle of the delectable fluid. Conversation is carried
+on by signs.
+
+"We shall march to-morrow," had long been the daily assurance of
+those wiseacres, to be found in every army, who always know what
+the general means to do better than the general himself. At last
+the much-desired order was issued--of course when everybody least
+expected it--and, after a night of bustle and confusion, the army
+got into motion, in its usual disorderly array. Its destination was
+a mountain called Kassela-el-Lus, in the heart of the Taka country,
+whither the Bascha had sent stores of grain, and where he proposed
+passing the rainy season and founding a new town. The distance was
+about fourteen hours' march. The route led south-eastwards, at
+first through a level country, covered with boundless fields of
+tall _durra_. At the horizon, like a great blue cloud, rose the
+mountain of Kassela, a blessed sight to eyes that had long been
+weary of the monotonous level country. After a while the army got
+out of the durra-fields, and proceeded over a large plain scantily
+overgrown with grass, observing a certain degree of military
+order and discipline, in anticipation of an attempt, on the part
+of the angry Arabs, to rescue Mohammed Din and his companions in
+captivity. Numerous hares and jackals were started and ridden
+down. Even gazelles, swift as they are, were sometimes overtaken
+by the excellent Turkish horses. Presently the grass grew thicker
+and tall enough to conceal a small donkey, and they came to wooded
+tracts and jungles, and upon marks of elephants and other wild
+beasts. The foot-prints of the elephants, in places where the ground
+had been slightly softened by the rain, were often a foot deep,
+and from a foot and a half to two feet in length and breadth. Mr
+Werne regrets not obtaining a view of one of these giant brutes.
+The two-horned rhinoceros is also common in that region, and is
+said to be of extraordinary ferocity in its attacks upon men and
+beasts, and not unfrequently to come off conqueror in single combat
+with the elephant. "Suddenly the little Schaigies cavalry set up
+a great shouting, and every one handled his arms, anticipating an
+attack from the Arabs. But soon the cry of 'Asset! Asset!' (lion)
+was heard, and we gazed eagerly on every side, curious for the
+lion's appearance. The Bascha had already warned his chase-loving
+cavalry, under penalty of a thousand blows, not to quit their ranks
+on the appearance of wild beasts, for in that broken ground he
+feared disorder in the army and an attack from the enemy. I and
+my brother were at that moment with Melek Mahmud at the outward
+extremity of the left wing; suddenly a tolerably large lioness
+trotted out of a thicket beside us, not a hundred paces off. She
+seemed quite fearless, for she did not quicken her pace at sight
+of the army. The next minute a monstrous lion showed himself at
+the same spot, roaring frightfully, and apparently in great fury;
+his motions were still slower than those of his female; now and
+then he stood still to look at us, and after coming to within sixty
+or seventy paces--we all standing with our guns cocked, ready to
+receive him--he gave us a parting scowl, and darted away, with great
+bounds, in the track of his wife. In a moment both had disappeared."
+Soon after this encounter, which startled and delighted Dr Werne,
+and made his brother's little dromedary dance with alarm, they
+reached the banks of the great _gohr_, (the bed of a river, filled
+only in the rainy season,) known as El Gasch, which intersects
+the countries of Taka and Basa. With very little daring and still
+less risk, the Haddendas, who are said to muster eighty thousand
+fighting men, might have annihilated the Bascha's army, as it wound
+its toilsome way for nearly a league along the dry water-course,
+(whose high banks were crowned with trees and thick bushes,) the
+camels stumbling and occasionally breaking their legs in the deep
+holes left by the feet of the elephants, where the cavalry could
+not have acted, and where every javelin must have told upon the
+disorderly groups of weary infantry. The Arabs either feared the
+firearms, or dreaded lest their attack should be the signal for
+the instant slaughter of their Grand-Shech, who rode, in the midst
+of the infantry, upon a donkey, which had been given him out of
+consideration for his age, whilst the three other prisoners were
+cruelly forced to perform the whole march on foot, with heavy chains
+on their necks and feet, and exposed to the jibes of the pitiless
+soldiery. On quitting the Gohr, the march was through trees and
+brushwood, and then through a sort of labyrinthine swamp, where
+horses and camels stumbled at every step, and where the Arabs again
+had a glorious opportunity, which they again neglected, of giving
+Achmet such a lesson as they had given to his predecessor in the
+Baschalik. The army now entered the country of the Hallengas, and a
+six days' halt succeeded to their long and painful march.
+
+It would be of very little interest to trace the military operations
+of Achmet Bascha, which were altogether of the most contemptible
+description--consisting in the _chasuas_, or razzias already
+noticed, sudden and secret expeditions of bodies of armed men
+against defenceless tribes, whom they despoiled of their cattle
+and women. From his camp at the foot of Kassela-el-Lus, the Bascha
+directed many of these marauding parties, remaining himself safely
+in a large hut, which Mr Werne had had constructed for him, and
+usually cheating the men and officers, who had borne the fatigue and
+run the risk, out of their promised share of the booty. Sometimes
+the unfortunate natives, driven to the wall and rendered desperate
+by the cruelties of their oppressors, found courage for a stout
+resistance.
+
+"An expedition took place to the mountains of Basa, and the troops
+brought back a large number of prisoners of both sexes. The men
+were almost all wounded, and showed great fortitude under the
+painful operation of extracting the balls. Even the Turks confessed
+that these mountaineers had made a gallant defence with lances and
+stones. Of our soldiers several had musket-shot wounds, inflicted
+by their comrades' disorderly fire. The Turks asserted that the
+Mograbins and Schaigies sometimes fired intentionally at the
+soldiers, to drive them from their booty. It was a piteous sight to
+see the prisoners--especially the women and children--brought into
+camp bound upon camels, and with despair in their countenances.
+Before they were sold or allotted, they were taken near the tent of
+Topschi Baschi, where a fire was kept burning, and were all, even
+to the smallest children, branded on the shoulder with a red-hot
+iron in the form of a star. When their moans and lamentations
+reached our hut, we took our guns and hastened away out shooting
+with three servants. These, notwithstanding our exhortations, would
+ramble from us, and we had got exceedingly angry with them for so
+doing, when suddenly we heard three shots, and proceeded in that
+direction, thinking it was they who had fired. Instead of them, we
+found three soldiers, lying upon the ground, bathed in their blood
+and terribly torn. Two were already dead, and the third, whose whole
+belly was ripped up, told us they had been attacked by a lion.
+The three shots brought up our servants, whom we made carry the
+survivor into camp, although my brother entertained slight hopes
+of saving him. The Bascha no sooner heard of the incident than he
+got on horseback with Soliman Kaschef and his people, to hunt the
+lion, and I accompanied him with my huntsman Sale, a bold fellow,
+who afterwards went with me up the White Nile. On reaching the spot
+where the lion had been, the Turks galloped off to seek him, and I
+and Sale alone remained behind. Suddenly I heard a heavy trampling,
+and a crashing amongst the bushes, and I saw close beside me an
+elephant with its calf. Sale, who was at some distance, and had just
+shot a parrot, called out to know if he should fire at the elephant,
+which I loudly forbade him to do. The beast broke its way through
+the brushwood just at hand. I saw its high back, and took up a safe
+position amongst several palm-trees, which all grew from one root,
+and were so close together that the elephant could not get at me.
+Sale was already up a tree, and told me the elephant had turned
+round, and was going back into the chaaba. The brute seemed angry
+or anxious about its young one, for we found the ground dug up for
+a long distance by its tusk as by a plough. Some shots were fired,
+and we thought the Bascha and his horsemen were on the track of the
+lion, but they had seen the elephant, and formed a circle round
+it. A messenger galloped into camp, and in a twinkling the Arnaut
+Abdin Bey came up with part of his people. The elephant, assailed
+on all sides by a rain of bullets, charged first one horseman, then
+another; they delivered their fire and galloped off. The eyes were
+the point chiefly aimed at, and it soon was evident that he was
+blinded by the bullets, for when pursuing his foes he ran against
+the trees, the shock of his unwieldy mass shaking the fruit from
+the palms. The horsemen dismounted and formed a smaller circle
+around him. He must already have received some hundred bullets, and
+the ground over which he staggered was dyed red, when the Bascha
+crept quite near him, knelt down and sent a shot into his left eye,
+whereupon the colossus sank down upon his hinder end and died.
+Nothing was to be seen of the calf or of the lion, but a few days
+later a large male lion was killed by Soliman Kaschef's men, close
+to camp, where we often in the night-time heard the roaring of those
+brutes."
+
+Just about this time bad news reached the Wernes. Their huntsman
+Abdallah, to whom they were much attached by reason of his gallantry
+and fidelity, had gone a long time before to the country of the
+Beni-Amers, eastward from Taka, in company of a Schaigie chief,
+mounted on one of their best camels, armed with a double-barrelled
+gun, and provided with a considerable sum of money for the
+purchase of giraffes. On his way back to his employers, with a
+valuable collection of stuffed birds and other curiosities, he was
+barbarously murdered, when travelling, unescorted, through the
+Hallenga country, and plundered of all his baggage. Sale, who went
+to identify his friend's mutilated corpse, attributed the crime
+to the Hallengas. Mr Werne was disposed to suspect Mohammed Ehle,
+a great villain, whom the Bascha at times employed as a secret
+stabber and assassin. This Ehle had been appointed Schech of the
+Hallengas by the Divan, in lieu of the rightful Schech, who had
+refused submission to the Turks. Three nephews of Mohammed Din (one
+of them the same youth who had escorted the Wernes safely back
+to camp when they were in peril of their lives in the Haddenda
+country) came to visit their unfortunate relative, who was still a
+prisoner, cruelly treated, lying upon the damp earth, chained to two
+posts, and awaiting with fortitude the cruel death by impalement
+with which the Bascha threatened him. Achmet received the young men
+very coldly, and towards evening they set out, greatly depressed
+by their uncle's sad condition, upon their return homewards. Early
+next morning the Wernes, when out shooting, found the dead bodies
+of their three friends. They had been set upon and slain after a
+gallant defence, as was testified by their bloody lances, and by
+other signs of a severe struggle. The birds of prey had already
+picked out their eyes, and their corpses presented a frightful
+spectacle. The Wernes, convinced that this assassination had taken
+place by the Bascha's order, loaded the bodies on a camel, took
+them to Achmet, and preferred an accusation against the Hallengas
+for this shameful breach of hospitality. The Bascha's indifference
+confirmed their suspicions. He testified no indignation, but there
+was great excitement amongst his officers; and when they left the
+Divan, Mr Werne violently reproached Mohammed Ehle, whom he was well
+assured was the murderer, and who endured his anger in silence. "The
+Albanian Abdin Bey was so enraged that he was only withheld by the
+united persuasions of the other officers from mounting his horse
+and charging Mohammed Ehle with his wild Albanians, the consequence
+of which would inevitably have been a general mutiny against the
+Bascha, for the soldiers had long been murmuring at their bad food
+and ill treatment." The last hundred pages of Mr Werne's very
+closely printed and compendious volume abound in instances of the
+Bascha's treachery and cruelty, and of the retaliation exercised
+by the Arabs. On one occasion a party of fifty Turkish cavalry
+were murdered by the Haddendas, who had invited them to a feast.
+The town of Gos-Rajeb was burned, twenty of the merchants there
+resident were killed, and the corn, stored there for the use of
+the army on its homeward march, was plundered. The Bascha had a
+long-cherished plan of cutting off the supply of water from the
+country of the Haddendas. This was to be done by damming up the
+Gohr-el-Gasch, and diverting the abundant stream which, in the rainy
+season, rushed along its deep gully, overflowing the tall banks
+and fertilising fields and forests. As the Bascha's engineer and
+confidential adviser, Mr Werne was compelled to direct this work.
+By the labour of thousands of men, extensive embankments were made,
+and the Haddendas began to feel the want of water, which had come
+down from the Abyssinian mountains, and already stood eight feet
+deep in the Gohr. Mr Werne repented his share in the cruel work,
+and purposely abstained from pressing the formation of a canal
+which was to carry off the superfluous water to the Atbara, there
+about three leagues distant from the Gohr. And one morning he was
+awakened by a great uproar in the camp, and by the shouts of the
+Bascha, who was on horseback before his hut, and he found that a
+party of Haddendas had thrashed a picket and made an opening in the
+dykes, which was the deathblow to Achmet's magnificent project of
+extracting an exorbitant tribute from Mohammed Din's tribe as the
+price of the supply of water essential to their very existence.
+The sole results of the cruel attempt were a fever to the Bascha,
+who had got wet, and the sickness of half the army, who had been
+compelled to work like galley-slaves under a burning sun and upon
+bad rations. The vicinity of Kassela is rich in curious birds
+and beasts. The mountain itself swarms with apes, and Mr Werne
+frequently saw groups of two or three hundred of them seated upon
+the cliffs. They are about the size of a large dog, with dark brown
+hair and hideous countenances. Awful was the screaming and howling
+they set up of a night, when they received the unwelcome visit of
+some hungry leopard or prowling panther. Once the Wernes went out
+with their guns for a day's sport amongst the monkeys, but were soon
+glad to beat a retreat under a tremendous shower of stones. Hassan,
+a Turk, who purveyed the brothers with hares, gazelles, and other
+savoury morsels, and who was a very good shot, promised to bring
+in--of course for good payment--not only a male and female monkey,
+but a whole camel-load if desired. He started off with this object,
+but did not again show himself for some days, and tried to sneak
+out of the Wernes' way when they at last met him in the bazaar. He
+had a hole in his head, and his shoulder badly hurt, and declared
+he would have nothing more to say to those _transformed men_ upon
+the mountain. Mr Werne was very desirous to catch a monkey alive,
+but was unsuccessful, and Mohammed Ehle refused to sell a tame one
+which he owned, and which usually sat upon his hut. Mr Werne thinks
+them a variety of the Chimpanzee. They fight amongst themselves
+with sticks, and defend themselves fiercely with stones against the
+attacks of men. Upon the whole the Wernes were highly fortunate in
+collecting zoological and ornithological specimens, of which they
+subsequently sent a large number, stuffed, to the Berlin museum.
+They also secured several birds and animals alive; amongst these
+a young lion and a civet cat. Regarding reptiles they were very
+curious, and nothing of that kind was too long or too large for
+them. As Ferdinand Werne was sitting one day upon his dromedary,
+in company with the Bascha, on the left bank of the Gasch, the
+animals shied at a large serpent which suddenly darted by. The
+Bascha ordered the men who were working at the dykes to capture it,
+which they at once proceeded to do, as unconcernedly as an English
+haymaker would assail a hedge snake. "Pursued by several men, the
+serpent plunged into the water, out of which it then boldly reared
+its head, and confronted an Arab who had jumped in after it, armed
+with a _hassaie_. With extraordinary skill and daring the Arab
+approached it, his club uplifted, and struck it over the head, so
+that the serpent fell down stunned and writhing mightily; whereupon
+another Arab came up with a cord; the club-bearer, without further
+ceremony, griped the reptile by the throat, just below the head;
+the noose was made fast, and the pair of them dragged their prize
+on shore. There it lay for a moment motionless, and we contemplated
+the terribly beautiful creature, which was more than eleven feet
+long and half-a-foot in diameter. But when they began to drag it
+away, by which the skin would of course be completely spoiled,
+orders were given to _carry_ it to camp. A jacket was tied over its
+head, and three men set to work to get it upon their shoulders;
+but the serpent made such violent convulsive movements that all
+three fell to the ground with it, and the same thing occurred again
+when several others had gone to their assistance. I accompanied
+them into camp, drove a big nail into the foremost great beam of
+our _recuba_, (hut,) and had the monster suspended from it. He
+hung down quite limp, as did also several other snakes, which were
+still alive, and which our servants had suspended inside our hut,
+intending to skin them the next morning, as it was now nearly
+dark. In the night I felt a most uncomfortable sensation. One of
+the snakes, which was hung up at the head of my bed, had smeared
+his cold tail over my face. But I sprang to my feet in real alarm,
+and thought I had been struck over the shin with a club, when the
+big serpent, now in the death agony, gave me a wipe with its tail
+through the open door, in front of which our servants were squatted,
+telling each other ghost stories of snake-kings and the like....
+They called this serpent _assala_, which, however, is a name they
+give to all large serpents. Soon afterwards we caught another, as
+thick, but only nine feet long, and with a short tail, like the
+_Vipera cerastes_; and this was said to be of that breed of short,
+thick snakes which can devour a man." In the mountains of Basa,
+two days' journey from the Gohr-el-Gasch, and on the road thither,
+snakes are said to exist, of no great length, but as thick as a
+crocodile, and which can conveniently swallow a man; and instances
+were related to Mr Werne of these monsters having swallowed persons
+when they lay sleeping on their angarebs. Sometimes the victims had
+been rescued _when only half gorged_! Of course travellers hear
+strange stories, and some of those related by Mr Werne are tolerably
+astounding; but these are derived from his Turkish, Egyptian, or
+Arabian acquaintances, and there is no appearance of exaggeration
+or romancing in anything which he narrates as having occurred to
+or been witnessed by himself. A wild tradition was told him of a
+country called Bellad-el-Kelb, which signifies the Country of Dogs,
+where the women were in all respects human, but where the men had
+faces like dogs, claws on their feet, and tails like monkeys. They
+could not speak, but carried on conversation by wagging their tails.
+This ludicrous account appeared explicable by the fact, that the men
+of Bellad-el-Kelb are great robbers, living by plunder, and, like
+fierce and hungry dogs, never relinquishing their prey.
+
+The Hallengas, amongst whom the expedition now found itself, were
+far more frank and friendly, and much less wild, than the Haddendas
+and some other tribes, and they might probably have been converted
+into useful allies by a less cruel and capricious invader than the
+Bascha. But conciliation was no part of his scheme; if he one day
+caressed a tribe or a chief, it was only to betray them the next.
+Mr Werne was on good terms with some of the Hallenga sheiks, and
+went to visit the village of Hauathi, about three miles from camp,
+to see the birds of paradise which abounded there. On his road he
+saw from afar a great tree covered with those beautiful birds,
+and which glistened in the sunshine with all the colours of the
+rainbow. Some days later he and his brother went to drink _merissa_,
+a slightly intoxicating liquor, with one of the Fakis or priests
+of the country. The two Germans got very jovial, drinking to each
+other, student-fashion; and the faki, attempting to keep pace with
+them, got crying-drunk, and disclosed a well-matured plan for
+blowing up their powder-magazine. The ammunition had been stored in
+the village of Kadmin, which was a holy village, entirely inhabited
+by fakis. The Bascha had made sure that none of the natives would
+risk blowing up these holy men, even for the sake of destroying his
+ammunition, and he was unwilling to keep so large a quantity of
+powder amidst his numerous camp-fires and reckless soldiery. But
+the fakis had made their arrangements. On a certain night they were
+to depart, carrying away all their property into the great caverns
+of Mount Kassela, and fire was to be applied to the house that
+held the powder. Had the plot succeeded, the whole army was lost,
+isolated as it was in the midst of unfriendly tribes, embittered by
+its excesses, and by the aggressions and treachery of its chief,
+and who, stimulated by their priests, would in all probability have
+exterminated it to the last man, when it no longer had cartridges
+for its defence. The drunken faki's indiscretion saved Achmet and
+his troops; the village was forthwith surrounded, and the next day
+the ammunition was transferred to camp. Not to rouse the whole
+population against him, the Bascha abstained for the moment from
+punishing the conspirators, but he was not the man to let them
+escape altogether; and some time afterwards, Mr Werne, who had
+returned to Chartum, received a letter from his brother, informing
+him that nine fakis had been hung on palm-trees just outside the
+camp, and that the magnanimous Achmet proposed treating forty more
+in the same way.
+
+A mighty liar was Effendina Achmet Bascha, as ever ensnared a
+foe or broke faith with a friend. Greedy and cruel was he also,
+as only a Turkish despot can be. One of his most active and
+unscrupulous agents was a bloodsucker named Hassan Effendi, whom
+he sent to the country of the Beni-Amers to collect three thousand
+five hundred cows and thirteen hundred camels, the complement of
+their tribute. Although this tribe had upon the whole behaved
+very peaceably, Hassan's first act was to shoot down a couple of
+hundred of them like wild beasts. Then he seized a large number of
+camels belonging to the Haddendas, although the tribe was at that
+very time in friendly negotiation with the Bascha. The Haddendas
+revenged themselves by burning Gos-Rajeb. In proof of their valour,
+Hassan's men cut off the ears of the murdered Beni-Amers, and took
+them to Achmet, who gave them money for the trophies. "They had
+forced a slave to cut off the ears; yonder now lies the man--raving
+mad, and bound with cords. Camel-thieves, too--no matter to what
+tribe they belong--if caught _in flagranti_, lose their ears,
+for which the Bascha gives a reward. That many a man who never
+dreamed of committing a theft loses his ears in this way, is easy
+to understand, for the operation is performed on the spot." Dawson
+Borrer, in his _Campaign in the Kabylie_, mentions a very similar
+practice as prevailing in Marshal Bugeaud's camp, where ten francs
+was the fixed price for the head of a horse-stealer, it being
+left to the soldiers who severed the heads and received the money
+to discriminate between horse-stealers and honest men. Whether
+Bugeaud took a hint from the Bascha, or the Bascha was an admiring
+imitator of Bugeaud, remains a matter of doubt. "Besides many
+handsome women and children, Hassan Effendi brought in two thousand
+nine hundred cows, and seven thousand sheep." He might have been a
+French prince returning from a razzia. "For himself he kept eighty
+camels, _which he said he had bought_." A droll dog, this Hassan
+Effendi, but withal rather covetous--given to sell his soldier's
+rations, and to starve his servants, a single piastre--about
+twopence halfpenny--being his whole daily outlay for meat for his
+entire household, who lived for the most part upon durra and water.
+If his servants asked for wages, they received the bastinado. "The
+Bascha had given the poor camel-drivers sixteen cows. The vampire
+(Hassan) took upon himself to appropriate thirteen of them." Mr
+Werne reported this robbery to the Bascha, but Achmet merely replied
+"_malluch_"--signifying, "it matters not." When inferior officers
+received horses as their share of booty, Hassan bought them of them,
+but always forgot to pay, and the poor subalterns feared to complain
+to the Bascha, who favoured the rogue, and recommended him to the
+authorities at Cairo for promotion to the rank of Bey, because, as
+he told Mr Werne with an ironical smile, Hassan was getting very
+old and infirm, and when he died the Divan would bring charges
+against him, and inherit his wealth. Thus are things managed in
+Egypt. No wonder that, where such injustice and rascality prevail,
+many are found to rejoice at the prospect of a change of rulers.
+"News from Souakim (on the Red Sea) of the probable landing of the
+English, excite great interest in camp; from all sides they come
+to ask questions of us, thinking that we, as Franks, must know
+the intentions of the invaders. Upon the whole, they would not be
+displeased at such a change of government, particularly when we tell
+them of the good pay and treatment customary amongst the English;
+and that with them no officer has to endure indignities from his
+superiors in rank."
+
+"I have now," says Mr Werne, (page 256,) "been more than half a
+year away from Chartum, continually in the field, and not once
+have I enjoyed the great comfort of reposing, undressed, between
+clean white sheets, but have invariably slept in my clothes, on
+the ground, or on the short but practical angareb. All clean linen
+disappears, for the constant perspiration and chalky dust burns
+everything; and the servants do not understand washing, inasmuch as,
+contrasted with their black hides, everything appears white to them,
+and for the last three months no soap has been obtainable. And in
+the midst of this dirty existence, which drags itself along like a
+slow fever, suddenly 'Julla!' is the word, and one hangs for four or
+five days, eighty or a hundred leagues, upon the camel's back, every
+bone bruised by the rough motion,--the broiling sun, thirst, hunger,
+and cold, for constant companions. Man can endure much: I have gone
+through far more than I ever thought I could,--vomiting and in a
+raging fever on the back of a dromedary, under a midday sun, more
+dead than alive, held upon my saddle by others, and yet I recovered.
+To have remained behind would have been to encounter certain death
+from the enemy, or from wild beasts. We have seen what a man can
+bear, under the pressure of necessity; in my present uniform and
+monotonous life I compare myself to the camels tied before my tent,
+which sometimes stand up, sometimes slowly stretch themselves on
+the ground, careless whether crows or ravens walk over their backs,
+constantly moving their jaws, looking up at the sun, and then, by
+way of a change, taking a mouthful of grass, but giving no signs of
+joy or curiosity."
+
+From this state of languid indifference Mr Werne was suddenly and
+pleasurably roused by intelligence that a second expedition was
+fitting out for the White Nile. He and his brother immediately
+petitioned the Bascha for leave to accompany it. The desired
+permission was granted to him, but refused to his brother. There
+was too much sickness in the camp, the Bascha said; he could not
+spare his doctor, and lacked confidence in the Italian, Bellotti.
+The fondly-attached brothers were thus placed in a painful dilemma:
+they had hoped to pursue their wanderings hand in hand, and to pass
+their lives together, and loth indeed were they to sunder in those
+sickly and perilous regions. At last they made up their minds to the
+parting. It has been already recorded in Mr Werne's former work,
+how, within ten days of their next meeting, his beloved brother's
+eyes were closed in death.
+
+In various respects, Mr Werne's _Feldzug_ is one of the most
+curious books of travel and adventure that, for a very long time,
+has appeared. It has three points of particular attraction and
+originality. In the first place, the author wanders in a region
+previously unexplored by Christian and educated travellers, and
+amongst tribes whose bare names have reached the ears of but few
+Europeans. Secondly, he campaigns as officer in such an army as we
+can hardly realise in these days of high civilisation and strict
+military discipline,--so wild, motley, and grotesque are its
+customs, composition, and equipment,--an army whose savage warriors,
+strange practices, and barbarous cruelties, make us fancy ourselves
+in presence of some fierce Moslem horde of the middle ages, marching
+to the assault of Italy or Hungary. Thirdly, during his long sojourn
+in camp he had opportunities such as few ordinary travellers enjoy,
+and of which he diligently profited, to study and note down the
+characteristics and social habits of many of the races of men that
+make up the heterogeneous population of the Ottoman empire. Some
+of the physiological and medical details with which he favours us,
+would certainly have been more in their place in his brother's
+professional journal, than in a book intended for the public at
+large; and passages are not wanting at which the squeamish will be
+apt to lay down the volume in disgust. For such persons Mr Werne
+does not write; and his occasional indelicacy and too crude details
+are compensated, to our thinking, by his manly honest tone, and by
+the extraordinary amount of useful and curious information he has
+managed to pack into two hundred and seventy pages. As a whole,
+the _Expedition to the White Nile_, which contains a vast deal
+of dry meteorological and geographical detail, is decidedly far
+less attractive than the present book, which is as amusing as any
+romance. We have read it with absorbing interest, well pleased with
+the hint its author throws out at its close, that the records of his
+African wanderings are not yet all exhausted.
+
+
+
+
+MY NOVEL; OR, VARIETIES IN ENGLISH LIFE.
+
+BY PISISTRATUS CAXTON.
+
+
+BOOK VII.--INITIAL CHAPTER.
+
+"What is courage?" said my uncle Roland, rousing himself from a
+reverie into which he had fallen after the Sixth Book in this
+history had been read to our family circle.
+
+"What is courage?" he repeated more earnestly. "Is it insensibility
+to fear? _That_ may be the mere accident of constitution; and, if
+so, there is no more merit in being courageous than in being this
+table."
+
+"I am very glad to hear you speak thus," observed Mr Caxton, "for I
+should not like to consider myself a coward; yet I am very sensible
+to fear in all dangers, bodily and moral."
+
+"La, Austin, how can you say so?" cried my mother, firing up; "was
+it not only last week that you faced the great bull that was rushing
+after Blanche and the children?"
+
+Blanche at that recollection stole to my father's chair, and,
+hanging over his shoulder, kissed his forehead.
+
+MR CAXTON, (sublimely unmoved by these flatteries.)--"I don't deny
+that I faced the bull, but I assert that I was horribly frightened."
+
+ROLAND.--"The sense of honour which conquers fear is the true
+courage of chivalry: you could not run away when others were looking
+on--no gentleman could."
+
+MR CAXTON.--"Fiddledee! It was not on my gentility that I stood,
+Captain. I should have run fast enough, if it had done any good. I
+stood upon my understanding. As the bull could run faster than I
+could, the only chance of escape was to make the brute as frightened
+as myself."
+
+BLANCHE.--"Ah, you did not think of that; your only thought was to
+save me and the children."
+
+MR CAXTON.--"Possibly, my dear--very possibly I might have been
+afraid for you too;--but I was very much afraid for myself. However,
+luckily I had the umbrella, and I sprang it up and spread it forth
+in the animal's stupid eyes, hurling at him simultaneously the
+biggest lines I could think of in the First Chorus of the 'Seven
+against Thebes.' I began with ELEDEMNAS PEDIOPLOKTUPOS; and when I
+came to the grand howl of +Io, io, io, io+--the beast stood
+appalled as at the roar of a lion. I shall never forget his amazed
+snort at the Greek. Then he kicked up his hind legs, and went bolt
+through the gap in the hedge. Thus, armed with AEschylus and the
+umbrella, I remained master of the field; but (continued Mr Caxton,
+ingenuously,) I should not like to go through that half minute
+again."
+
+"No man would," said the Captain kindly. "I should be very sorry to
+face a bull myself, even with a bigger umbrella than yours, and even
+though I had AEschylus, and Homer to boot, at my fingers' ends."
+
+MR CAXTON.--"You would not have minded if it had been a Frenchman
+with a sword in his hand?"
+
+CAPTAIN.--"Of course not. Rather liked it than otherwise," he added
+grimly.
+
+MR CAXTON.--"Yet many a Spanish matador, who doesn't care a button
+for a bull, would take to his heels at the first lunge _en carte_
+from a Frenchman. Therefore, in fact, if courage be a matter of
+constitution, it is also a matter of custom. We face calmly the
+dangers we are habituated to, and recoil from those of which we have
+no familiar experience. I doubt if Marshal Turenne himself would
+have been quite at his ease on the tight-rope; and a rope-dancer,
+who seems disposed to scale the heavens with Titanic temerity, might
+possibly object to charge on a cannon."
+
+CAPTAIN ROLAND.--"Still, either this is not the courage I mean,
+or there is another kind of it. I mean by courage that which is
+the especial force and dignity of the human character, without
+which there is no reliance on principle, no constancy in virtue--a
+something," continued my uncle gallantly, and with a half bow
+towards my mother, "which your sex shares with our own. When the
+lover, for instance, clasps the hand of his betrothed, and says,
+'Wilt thou be true to me, in spite of absence and time, in spite of
+hazard and fortune, though my foes malign me, though thy friends may
+dissuade thee, and our lot in life may be rough and rude?' and when
+the betrothed answers, 'I will be true,' does not the lover trust to
+her courage as well as her love?"
+
+"Admirably put, Roland," said my father. "But _apropos_ of what do
+you puzzle us with these queries on courage?"
+
+CAPTAIN ROLAND, (with a slight blush.)--"I was led to the inquiry
+(though, perhaps, it may be frivolous to take so much thought of
+what, no doubt, costs Pisistratus so little) by the last chapters
+in my nephew's story. I see this poor boy, Leonard, alone with his
+fallen hopes, (though very irrational they were,) and his sense of
+shame. And I read his heart, I dare say, better than Pisistratus
+does, for I could feel like that boy if I had been in the same
+position; and, conjecturing what he and thousands like him must go
+through, I asked myself, 'What can save him and them?' I answered,
+as a soldier would answer, 'Courage!' Very well. But pray, Austin,
+what is courage?"
+
+MR CAXTON, (prudently backing out of a reply.)--"_Papae!_ Brother,
+since you have just complimented the ladies on that quality, you had
+better address your question to them."
+
+Blanche here leant both hands on my father's chair, and said,
+looking down at first bashfully, but afterwards warming with the
+subject, "Do you not think, sir, that little Helen has already
+suggested, if not what is courage, what at least is the real essence
+of all courage that endures and conquers, that ennobles, and
+hallows, and redeems? Is it not PATIENCE, father?--and that is why
+we women have a courage of our own. Patience does not affect to be
+superior to fear, but at least it never admits despair."
+
+PISISTRATUS.--"Kiss me, my Blanche, for you have come near to the
+truth which perplexed the soldier and puzzled the sage."
+
+MR CAXTON, (tartly.)--"If you mean me by the sage, I was not puzzled
+at all. Heaven knows you do right to inculcate patience--it is a
+virtue very much required in your readers. Nevertheless," added my
+father, softening with the enjoyment of his joke--"nevertheless
+Blanche and Helen are quite right. Patience is the courage
+of the conqueror; it is the virtue, _par excellence_, of Man
+against Destiny--of the One against the World, and of the Soul
+against Matter. Therefore this is the courage of the Gospel; and
+its importance, in a social view--its importance to races and
+institutions--cannot be too earnestly inculcated. What is it that
+distinguishes the Anglo-Saxon from all other branches of the human
+family, peoples deserts with his children, and consigns to them
+the heritage of rising worlds? What but his faculty to brave, to
+suffer, to endure--the patience that resists firmly, and innovates
+slowly. Compare him with the Frenchman. The Frenchman has plenty of
+valour--that there is no denying; but as for fortitude, he has not
+enough to cover the point of a pin. He is ready to rush out of the
+world if he is bit by a flea."
+
+CAPTAIN ROLAND.--"There was a case in the papers the other day,
+Austin, of a Frenchman who actually did destroy himself because he
+was so teased by the little creatures you speak of. He left a paper
+on his table, saying that 'life was not worth having at the price of
+such torments.'"[5]
+
+[5] Fact. In a work by M. GIBERT, a celebrated French physician, on
+diseases of the skin, he states that that minute troublesome kind
+of rash, known by the name of _prurigo_, though not dangerous in
+itself, has often driven the individual afflicted by it to--suicide.
+I believe that our more varying climate, and our more heating drinks
+and aliments, render this skin complaint more common in England than
+in France, yet I doubt if any English physician could state that it
+had ever driven one of his _English_ patients to suicide.
+
+MR CAXTON, (solemnly.)--"Sir, their whole political history, since
+the great meeting of the Tiers Etat, has been the history of men
+who would rather go to the devil than be bit by a flea. It is
+the record of human impatience, that seeks to force time, and
+expects to grow forests from the spawn of a mushroom. Wherefore,
+running through all extremes of constitutional experiment, when
+they are nearest to democracy they are next door to a despot; and
+all they have really done is to destroy whatever constitutes the
+foundation of every tolerable government. A constitutional monarchy
+cannot exist without aristocracy, nor a healthful republic endure
+with corruption of manners. The cry of Equality is incompatible
+with Civilisation, which, of necessity, contrasts poverty with
+wealth--and, in short, whether it be an emperor or a mob that is to
+rule, Force is the sole hope of order, and the government is but an
+army.
+
+"Impress, O Pisistratus! impress the value of patience as regards
+man and men. You touch there on the kernel of the social system--the
+secret that fortifies the individual and disciplines the million.
+I care not, for my part, if you are tedious so long as you are
+earnest. Be minute and detailed. Let the real human life, in its war
+with Circumstance, stand out. Never mind if one can read you but
+slowly--better chance of being less quickly forgotten. Patience,
+patience! By the soul of Epictetus, your readers shall set you an
+example!"
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+Leonard had written twice to Mrs Fairfield, twice to Riccabocca, and
+once to Mr Dale; and the poor proud boy could not bear to betray
+his humiliation. He wrote as with cheerful spirits--as if perfectly
+satisfied with his prospects. He said that he was well employed,
+in the midst of books, and that he had found kind friends. Then he
+turned from himself to write about those whom he addressed, and the
+affairs and interests of the quiet world wherein they lived. He did
+not give his own address, nor that of Mr Prickett. He dated his
+letters from a small coffeehouse near the bookseller, to which he
+occasionally went for his simple meals. He had a motive in this. He
+did not desire to be found out. Mr Dale replied for himself and for
+Mrs Fairfield, to the epistles addressed to these two. Riccabocca
+wrote also. Nothing could be more kind than the replies of both.
+They came to Leonard in a very dark period in his life, and they
+strengthened him in the noiseless battle with despair.
+
+If there be a good in the world that we do without knowing it,
+without conjecturing the effect it may have upon a human soul, it is
+when we show kindness to the young in the first barren footpath up
+the mountain of life.
+
+Leonard's face resumed its serenity in his intercourse with his
+employer; but he did not recover his boyish ingenuous frankness.
+The under-currents flowed again pure from the turbid soil and the
+splintered fragments uptorn from the deep; but they were still too
+strong and too rapid to allow transparency to the surface. And now
+he stood in the sublime world of books, still and earnest as a seer
+who invokes the dead. And thus, face to face with knowledge, hourly
+he discovered how little he knew. Mr Prickett lent him such works as
+he selected and asked to take home with him. He spent whole nights
+in reading; and no longer desultorily. He read no more poetry, no
+more Lives of Poets. He read what poets must read if they desire
+to be great--_Sapere principium et fons_--strict reasonings on the
+human mind; the relations between motive and conduct, thought and
+action; the grave and solemn truths of the past world; antiquities,
+history, philosophy. He was taken out of himself. He was carried
+along the ocean of the universe. In that ocean, O seeker, study
+the law of the tides; and seeing Chance nowhere--Thought presiding
+over all--Fate, that dread phantom, shall vanish from creation, and
+Providence alone be visible in heaven and on earth!
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+There was to be a considerable book-sale at a country house one
+day's journey from London. Mr Prickett meant to have attended it
+on his own behalf, and that of several gentlemen who had given
+him commissions for purchase; but, on the morning fixed for his
+departure, he was seized with a severe return of his old foe the
+rheumatism. He requested Leonard to attend instead of himself.
+Leonard went, and was absent for the three days during which the
+sale lasted. He returned late in the evening, and went at once to
+Mr Prickett's house. The shop was closed; he knocked at the private
+entrance; a strange person opened the door to him, and, in reply
+to his question if Mr Prickett was at home, said with a long and
+funereal face--"Young man, Mr Prickett senior is gone to his long
+home, but Mr Richard Prickett will see you."
+
+At this moment a very grave-looking man, with lank hair, looked
+forth from the side-door communicating between the shop and the
+passage, land then, stepped forward--"Come in, sir; you are my late
+uncle's assistant, Mr Fairfield, I suppose?"
+
+"Your late uncle! Heavens, sir, do I understand aright--can Mr
+Prickett be dead since I left London?"
+
+"Died, sir, suddenly last night. It was an affection of the heart;
+the Doctor thinks the rheumatism attacked that organ. He had small
+time to provide for his departure, and his account-books seem in sad
+disorder: I am his nephew and executor."
+
+Leonard had now followed the nephew into the shop. There, still
+burned the gas-lamp. The place seemed more dingy and cavernous than
+before. Death always makes its presence felt in the house it visits.
+
+Leonard was greatly affected--and yet more, perhaps, by the utter
+want of feeling which the nephew exhibited. In fact, the deceased
+had not been on friendly terms with this person, his nearest
+relative and heir-at-law, who was also a bookseller.
+
+"You were engaged but by the week I find, young man, on reference
+to my late uncle's papers. He gave you L1 a week--a monstrous
+sum! I shall not require your services any further. I shall move
+these books to my own house. You will be good enough to send
+me a list of those you bought at the sale, and your account of
+travelling-expenses, &c. What may be due to you shall be sent to
+your address. Good evening."
+
+Leonard went home, shocked and saddened at the sudden death of his
+kind employer. He did not think much of himself that night; but,
+when he rose the next day, he suddenly felt that the world of London
+lay before him, without a friend, without a calling, without an
+occupation for bread.
+
+This time it was no fancied sorrow, no poetic dream disappointed.
+Before him, gaunt and palpable, stood Famine.
+
+Escape!--yes. Back to the village; his mother's cottage; the exile's
+garden; the radishes and the fount. Why could he not escape? Ask why
+civilisation cannot escape its ills, and fly back to the wild and
+the wigwam?
+
+Leonard could not have returned to the cottage, even if the Famine
+that faced had already seized him with her skeleton hand. London
+releases not so readily her fated stepsons.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+One day three persons were standing before an old book-stall in a
+passage leading from Oxford Street into Tottenham Court Road. Two
+were gentlemen; the third, of the class and appearance of those who
+more habitually halt at old book-stalls.
+
+"Look," said one of the gentlemen to the other, "I have discovered
+here what I have searched for in vain the last ten years--the Horace
+of 1580, the Horace of the Forty Commentators--a perfect treasury of
+learning, and marked only fourteen shillings!"
+
+"Hush, Norreys," said the other, "and observe what is yet more worth
+your study;" and he pointed to the third bystander, whose face,
+sharp and attenuated, was bent with an absorbed, and, as it were,
+with a hungering attention over an old worm-eaten volume.
+
+"What is the book, my lord?" whispered Mr Norreys.
+
+His companion smiled, and replied by another question, "What is the
+man who reads the book?"
+
+Mr Norreys moved a few paces, and looked over the student's
+shoulder "Preston's translation of BOETHIUS, _The Consolations of
+Philosophy_," he said, coming back to his friend.
+
+"He looks as if he wanted all the consolations Philosophy can give
+him, poor boy."
+
+At this moment a fourth passenger paused at the book-stall, and,
+recognising the pale student, placed his hand on his shoulder and
+said, "Aha, young sir, we meet again. So poor Prickett is dead. But
+you are still haunted by associations. Books--books--magnets to
+which all iron minds move insensibly. What is this? BOETHIUS! Ah,
+a book written in prison, but a little time before the advent of
+the only philosopher who solves to the simplest understanding every
+mystery of life--"
+
+"And that philosopher?"
+
+"Is Death!" said Mr Burley. "How can you be dull enough to ask? Poor
+Boethius, rich, nobly born, a consul, his sons consuls--the world
+one smile to the Last Philosopher of Rome. Then suddenly, against
+this type of the old world's departing WISDOM, stands frowning the
+new world's grim genius, FORCE--Theodoric the Ostrogoth condemning
+Boethius the Schoolman; and Boethius, in his Pavian dungeon, holding
+a dialogue with the shade of Athenian Philosophy. It is the finest
+picture upon which lingers the glimmering of the Western golden day,
+before night rushes over time."
+
+"And," said Mr Norreys abruptly, "Boethius comes back to us with the
+faint gleam of returning light, translated by Alfred the Great. And,
+again, as the sun of knowledge bursts forth in all its splendour, by
+Queen Elizabeth. Boethius influences us as we stand in this passage;
+and that is the best of all the Consolations of Philosophy--eh, Mr
+Burley?"
+
+Mr Burley turned and bowed.
+
+The two men looked at each other; you could not see a greater
+contrast. Mr Burley, his gay green dress already shabby and soiled,
+with a rent in the skirts, and his face speaking of habitual
+night-cups. Mr Norreys, neat and somewhat precise in dress, with
+firm lean figure, and quiet, collected, vigorous energy in his eye
+and aspect.
+
+"If," replied Mr Burley, "a poor devil like me may argue with a
+gentleman who may command his own price with the booksellers, I
+should say it is no consolation at all, Mr Norreys. And I should
+like to see any man of sense accept the condition of Boethius in his
+prison, with some strangler or headsman waiting behind the door,
+upon the promised proviso that he should be translated, centuries
+afterwards, by Kings and Queens, and help indirectly to influence
+the minds of Northern barbarians, babbling about him in an alley,
+jostled by passers-by who never heard the name of Boethius, and who
+don't care a fig for philosophy. Your servant, sir--young man, come
+and talk."
+
+Burley hooked his arm within Leonard's, and led the boy passively
+away.
+
+"That is a clever man," said Harley L'Estrange. "But I am sorry to
+see yon young student, with his bright earnest eyes, and his lip
+that has the quiver of passion and enthusiasm, leaning on the arm of
+a guide who seems disenchanted of all that gives purpose to learning
+and links philosophy with use to the world. Who, and what is this
+clever man whom you call Burley?"
+
+"A man who might have been famous, if he had condescended to be
+respectable! The boy listening to us both so attentively interested
+_me_ too--I should like to have the making of him. But I must buy
+this Horace."
+
+The shopman, lurking within his hole like a spider for flies, was
+now called out. And when Mr Norreys had bought the Horace, and given
+an address where to send it, Harley asked the shopman if he knew the
+young man who had been reading Boethius.
+
+"Only by sight. He has come here every day the last week, and spends
+hours at the stall. When once he fastens on a book, he reads it
+through."
+
+"And never buys?" said Mr Norreys.
+
+"Sir," said the shopman with a good-natured smile, "they who buy
+seldom read. The poor boy pays me twopence a-day to read as long as
+he pleases. I would not take it, but he is proud."
+
+"I have known men amass great learning in that way," said Mr
+Norreys. "Yes, I should like to have that boy in my hands. And now,
+my lord, I am at your service, and we will go to the studio of your
+artist."
+
+The two gentlemen walked on towards one of the streets out of
+Fitzroy Square.
+
+In a few minutes more Harley L'Estrange was in his element, seated
+carelessly on a deal table, smoking his cigar, and discussing art
+with the gusto of a man who honestly loved, and the taste of a man
+who thoroughly understood it. The young artist, in his dressing
+robe, adding slow touch upon touch, paused often to listen the
+better. And Henry Norreys, enjoying the brief respite from a life of
+great labour, was gladly reminded of idle hours under rosy skies;
+for these three men had formed their friendship in Italy, where the
+bands of friendship are woven by the hands of the Graces.
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+Leonard and Mr Burley walked on into the suburbs round the north
+road from London, and Mr Burley offered to find literary employment
+for Leonard--an offer eagerly accepted.
+
+Then they went into a public house by the wayside. Burley demanded
+a private room, called for pen, ink, and paper; and, placing these
+implements before Leonard, said, "Write what you please in prose,
+five sheets of letter paper, twenty-two lines to a page--neither
+more nor less."
+
+"I cannot write so."
+
+"Tut, 'tis for bread."
+
+The boy's face crimsoned.
+
+"I must forget that," said he.
+
+"There is an arbour in the garden under a weeping ash," returned
+Burley. "Go there, and fancy yourself in Arcadia."
+
+Leonard was too pleased to obey. He found out the little arbour at
+one end of a deserted bowling-green. All was still--the hedgerow
+shut out the sight of the inn. The sun lay warm on the grass, and
+glinted pleasantly through the leaves of the ash. And Leonard there
+wrote the first essay from his hand as Author by profession. What
+was it that he wrote? His dreamy impressions of London? an anathema
+on its streets, and its hearts of stone? murmurs against poverty?
+dark elegies on fate?
+
+Oh, no! little knowest thou true genius, if thou askest such
+questions, or thinkest that there, under the weeping ash, the
+taskwork for bread was remembered; or that the sunbeam glinted but
+over the practical world, which, vulgar and sordid, lay around.
+Leonard wrote a fairy tale--one of the loveliest you can conceive,
+with a delicate touch of playful humour--in a style all flowered
+over with happy fancies. He smiled as he wrote the last word--he was
+happy. In rather more than an hour Mr Burley came to him, and found
+him with that smile on his lips.
+
+Mr Burley had a glass of brandy and water in his hand; it was
+his third. He too smiled--he too looked happy. He read the paper
+aloud, and well. He was very complimentary. "You will do!" said he,
+clapping Leonard on the back. "Perhaps some day you will catch my
+one-eyed perch." Then he folded up the MS., scribbled off a note,
+put the whole in one envelope--and they returned to London.
+
+Mr Burley disappeared within a dingy office near Fleet Street,
+on which was inscribed--"Office of the _Beehive_," and soon came
+forth with a golden sovereign in his hand--Leonard's first-fruits.
+Leonard thought Peru lay before him. He accompanied Mr Burley to
+that gentleman's lodging in Maida Hill. The walk had been very long;
+Leonard was not fatigued. He listened with a livelier attention
+than before to Burley's talk. And when they reached the apartments
+of the latter, and Mr Burley sent to the cookshop, and their joint
+supper was taken out of the golden sovereign, Leonard felt proud,
+and for the first time for weeks he laughed the heart's laugh. The
+two writers grew more and more intimate and cordial. And there was a
+vast deal in Burley by which any young man might be made the wiser.
+There was no apparent evidence of poverty in the apartments--clean,
+new, well furnished; but all things in the most horrible litter--all
+speaking of the huge literary sloven.
+
+For several days Leonard almost lived in those rooms. He wrote
+continuously--save when Burley's conversation fascinated him into
+idleness. Nay, it was not idleness--his knowledge grew larger as
+he listened; but the cynicism of the talker began slowly to work
+its way. That cynicism in which there was no faith, no hope, no
+vivifying breath from Glory--from Religion. The cynicism of the
+Epicurean, more degraded in his stye than ever was Diogenes in his
+tub; and yet presented with such ease and such eloquence--with such
+art and such mirth--so adorned with illustration and anecdote, so
+unconscious of debasement.
+
+Strange and dread philosophy--that made it a maxim to squander
+the gifts of mind on the mere care for matter, and fit the soul
+to live but as from day to day, with its scornful cry, "A fig
+for immortality and laurels!" An author for bread! Oh, miserable
+calling! was there something grand and holy, after all, even in
+Chatterton's despair!
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+The villanous _Beehive_! Bread was worked out of it, certainly; but
+fame, but hope for the future--certainly not. Milton's _Paradise
+Lost_ would have perished without a sound, had it appeared in the
+_Beehive_.
+
+Fine things were there in a fragmentary crude state, composed
+by Burley himself. At the end of a week they were dead and
+forgotten--never read by one man of education and taste; taken
+simultaneously and indifferently with shallow politics and wretched
+essays, yet selling, perhaps, twenty or thirty thousand copies--an
+immense sale;--and nothing got out of them but bread and brandy!
+
+"What more would you have?" cried John Burley. "Did not stern old
+Sam Johnson say he could never write but from want?"
+
+"He might say it," answered Leonard; "but he never meant posterity
+to believe him. And he would have died of want, I suspect, rather
+than have written _Rasselas_ for the _Beehive_! Want is a grand
+thing," continued the boy, thoughtfully. "A parent of grand things.
+Necessity is strong, and should give us its own strength; but Want
+should shatter asunder, with its very writhings, the walls of our
+prison-house, and not sit contented with the allowance the jail
+gives us in exchange for our work."
+
+"There is no prison-house to a man who calls upon Bacchus--stay--I
+will translate to you Schiller's Dithyramb. 'Then see I
+Bacchus--then up come Cupid and Phoebus, and all the Celestials are
+filling my dwelling.'"
+
+Breaking into impromptu careless rhymes, Burley threw off a rude but
+spirited translation of that divine lyric.
+
+"O materialist!" cried the boy, with his bright eyes suffused.
+"Schiller calls on the gods to take him to their heaven with him;
+and you would debase the gods to a gin palace."
+
+"Ho, ho!" cried Burley, with his giant laugh. "Drink, and you will
+understand the Dithyramb."
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+Suddenly one morning, as Leonard sate with Barley, a fashionable
+cabriolet, with a very handsome horse, stopped at the door--a loud
+knock--a quick step on the stairs, and Randal Leslie entered.
+Leonard recognised him, and started. Randal glanced at him in
+surprise, and then, with a tact that showed he had already learned
+to profit by London life, after shaking hands with Burley,
+approached, and said with some successful attempt at ease, "Unless
+I am not mistaken, sir, we have met before. If you remember me, I
+hope all boyish quarrels are forgotten?"
+
+Leonard bowed, and his heart was still good enough to be softened.
+
+"Where could you two ever have met?" asked Burley.
+
+"In a village green, and in single combat," answered Randal,
+smiling; and he told the story of the Battle of the Stocks, with
+a well-bred jest on himself. Burley laughed at the story. "But,"
+said he, when this laugh was over, "my young friend had better have
+remained guardian of the village stocks, than come to London in
+search of such fortune as lies at the bottom of an inkhorn."
+
+"Ah," said Randal, with the secret contempt which men elaborately
+cultivated are apt to feel for those who seek to educate
+themselves--"ah, you make literature your calling, sir? At what
+school did you conceive a taste for letters?--not very common at our
+great public schools."
+
+"I am at school now for the first time," answered Leonard, drily.
+
+"Experience is the best schoolmistress," said Burley; "and that
+was the maxim of Goethe, who had book-learning enough, in all
+conscience."
+
+Randal slightly shrugged his shoulders, and, without wasting another
+thought on Leonard, peasant-born and self-taught, took his seat, and
+began to talk to Burley upon a political question, which made then
+the war-cry between the two great Parliamentary parties. It was a
+subject in which Burley showed much general knowledge; and Randal,
+seeming to differ from him, drew forth alike his information and his
+argumentative powers. The conversation lasted more than an hour.
+
+"I can't quite agree with you," said Randal, taking his leave; "but
+you must allow me to call again--will the same hour to-morrow suit
+you?"
+
+"Yes," said Burley.
+
+Away went the young man in his cabriolet. Leonard watched him from
+the window.
+
+For five days, consecutively, did Randal call and discuss the
+question in all its bearings; and Burley, after the second day, got
+interested in the matter, looked up his authorities--refreshed his
+memory--and even spent an hour or two in the Library of the British
+Museum.
+
+By the fifth day, Burley had really exhausted all that could well be
+said on his side of the question.
+
+Leonard, during these colloquies, had sate apart, seemingly
+absorbed in reading, and secretly stung by Randal's disregard of
+his presence. For indeed that young man, in his superb self-esteem,
+and in the absorption of his ambitious projects, scarce felt even
+curiosity as to Leonard's rise above his earlier station, and looked
+on him as a mere journeyman of Burley's. But the self-taught are
+keen and quick observers. And Leonard had remarked, that Randal
+seemed more as one playing a part for some private purpose, than
+arguing in earnest; and that, when he rose and said, "Mr Burley,
+you have convinced me," it was not with the modesty of a sincere
+reasoner, but the triumph of one who has gained his end. But so
+struck, meanwhile, was our unheeded and silent listener, with
+Burley's power of generalisation, and the wide surface over which
+his information extended, that when Randal left the room the boy
+looked at the slovenly purposeless man, and said aloud--"True;
+knowledge is _not_ power."
+
+"Certainly not," said Burley, drily--"the weakest thing, in the
+world."
+
+"Knowledge is power," muttered Randal Leslie, as, with a smile on
+his lip, he drove from the door.
+
+Not many days after this last interview there appeared a short
+pamphlet; anonymous, but one which made a great impression on the
+town. It was on the subject discussed between Randal and Burley. It
+was quoted at great length in the newspapers. And Burley started
+to his feet one morning, and exclaimed, "My own thoughts! my very
+words! Who the devil is this pamphleteer?"
+
+Leonard took the newspaper from Burley's hand. The most flattering
+encomiums preceded the extracts, and the extracts were as
+stereotypes of Burley's talk.
+
+"Can you doubt the author?" cried Leonard, in deep disgust and
+ingenuous scorn. "The young man who came to steal your brains, and
+turn your knowledge--"
+
+"Into power," interrupted Burley, with a laugh, but it was a laugh
+of pain. "Well, this was very mean; I shall tell him so when he
+comes."
+
+"He will come no more," said Leonard. Nor did Randal come again. But
+he sent Mr Burley a copy of the pamphlet with a polite note, saying,
+with candid but careless acknowledgment, that "he had profited much
+by Mr Burley's hints and remarks."
+
+And now it was in all the papers, that the pamphlet which had made
+so great a noise was by a very young man, Mr Audley Egerton's
+relation. And high hopes were expressed of the future career of Mr
+Randal Leslie.
+
+Burley still attempted to laugh, and still his pain was visible.
+Leonard most cordially despised and hated Randal Leslie, and his
+heart moved to Burley with noble but perilous compassion. In his
+desire to soothe and comfort the man whom he deemed cheated out of
+fame, he forgot the caution he had hitherto imposed on himself,
+and yielded more and more to the charm of that wasted intellect.
+He accompanied Burley now where he went to spent his evenings,
+and more and more--though gradually, and with many a recoil and
+self-rebuke--there crept over him the cynic's contempt for glory,
+and miserable philosophy of debased content.
+
+Randal had risen into grave repute upon the strength of Burley's
+knowledge. But, had Burley written the pamphlet, would the same
+repute have attended _him_? Certainly not. Randal Leslie brought to
+that knowledge qualities all his own--a style simple, strong, and
+logical; a certain tone of good society, and allusions to men and
+to parties that showed his connection with a cabinet minister, and
+proved that he had profited no less by Egerton's talk than Burley's.
+
+Had Burley written the pamphlet, it would have showed more genius,
+it would have had humour and wit, but have been so full of whims and
+quips, sins against taste, and defects in earnestness, that it would
+have failed to create any serious sensation. Here, then, there was
+something else besides knowledge, by which knowledge became power.
+Knowledge must not smell of the brandy bottle.
+
+Randal Leslie might be mean in his plagiarism, but he turned the
+useless into use. And so far he was original.
+
+But one's admiration, after all, rests where Leonard's rested--with
+the poor, shabby, riotous, lawless, big fallen man.
+
+Burley took himself off to the Brent, and fished again for the
+one-eyed perch. Leonard accompanied him. His feelings were indeed
+different from what they had been when he had reclined under the
+old tree, and talked with Helen of the future. But it was almost
+pathetic to see how Burley's nature seemed to alter, as he strayed
+along the banks of the rivulet, and talked of his own boyhood.
+The man then seemed restored to something of the innocence of the
+child. He cared, in truth, little for the perch, which continued
+intractable, but he enjoyed the air and the sky, the rustling grass
+and the murmuring waters. These excursions to the haunts of youth
+seemed to rebaptise him, and then his eloquence took a pastoral
+character, and Isaac Walton himself would have loved to hear him.
+But as he got back into the smoke of the metropolis, and the gas
+lamps made him forget the ruddy sunset, and the soft evening star,
+the gross habits reassumed their sway; and on he went with his
+swaggering reckless step to the orgies in which his abused intellect
+flamed forth, and then sank into the socket quenched and rayless.
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+Helen was seized with profound and anxious sadness. Leonard had been
+three or four times to see her, and each time she saw a change in
+him that excited all her fears. He seemed, it is true, more shrewd,
+more worldly-wise, more fitted, it might be, for coarse daily life;
+but, on the other hand, the freshness and glory of his youth
+were waning slowly. His aspirings drooped earthward. He had not
+mastered the Practical, and moulded its uses with the strong hand
+of the Spiritual Architect, of the Ideal Builder: the Practical was
+overpowering himself. She grew pale when he talked of Burley, and
+shuddered, poor little Helen! when she found he was daily and almost
+nightly in a companionship which, with her native honest prudence,
+she saw so unsuited to strengthen him in his struggles, and aid him
+against temptation. She almost groaned when, pressing him as to his
+pecuniary means, she found his old terror of debt seemed fading
+away, and the solid healthful principles he had taken from his
+village were loosening fast. Under all, it is true, there was what a
+wiser and older person than Helen would have hailed as the redeeming
+promise. But that something was _grief_--a sublime grief in his
+own sense of falling--in his own impotence against the Fate he had
+provoked and coveted. The sublimity of that grief Helen could not
+detect: she saw only that it _was_ grief, and she grieved with it,
+letting it excuse every fault--making her more anxious to comfort,
+in order that she might save. Even from the first, when Leonard had
+exclaimed, "Ah, Helen, why did you ever leave me?" she had revolved
+the idea of return to him; and when in the boy's last visit he told
+her that Burley, persecuted by duns, was about to fly from his
+present lodgings, and take his abode with Leonard in the room she
+had left vacant, all doubt was over. She resolved to sacrifice the
+safety and shelter of the home assured her. She resolved to come
+back and share Leonard's penury and struggles, and save the old
+room, wherein she had prayed for him, from the tempter's dangerous
+presence. Should she burden him? No; she had assisted her father by
+many little female arts in needle and fancy work. She had improved
+herself in these during her sojourn with Miss Starke. She could
+bring her share to the common stock. Possessed with this idea, she
+determined to realise it before the day on which Leonard had told
+her Burley was to move his quarters. Accordingly she rose very
+early one morning; she wrote a pretty and grateful note to Miss
+Starke, who was fast asleep, left it on the table, and, before
+any one was astir, stole from the house, her little bundle on her
+arm. She lingered an instant at the garden-gate, with a remorseful
+sentiment--a feeling that she had ill-repaid the cold and prim
+protection that Miss Starke had shown her. But sisterly love carried
+all before it. She closed the gate with a sigh, and went on.
+
+She arrived at the lodging-house before Leonard was up, took
+possession of her old chamber, and, presenting herself to Leonard as
+he was about to go forth, said, (story-teller that she was,)--"I am
+sent away, brother, and I have, come to you to take care of me. Do
+not let us part again. But you must be very cheerful and very happy,
+or I shall think that I am sadly in your way."
+
+Leonard at first did look cheerful, and even happy; but then he
+thought of Burley, and then of his own means of supporting her, and
+was embarrassed, and began questioning Helen as to the possibility
+of reconciliation with Miss Starke. And Helen said gravely,
+"Impossible--do not ask it, and do not go near her."
+
+Then Leonard thought she had been humbled and insulted, and
+remembered that she was a gentleman's child, and felt for her
+wounded pride--he was so proud himself. Yet still he was embarrassed.
+
+"Shall I keep the purse again, Leonard?" said Helen coaxingly.
+
+"Alas!" replied Leonard, "the purse is empty."
+
+"That is very naughty in the purse," said Helen, "since you put so
+much into it."
+
+"I?"
+
+"Did not you say that you made, at least, a guinea a-week?"
+
+"Yes; but Burley takes the money; and then, poor fellow! as I owe
+all to him, I have not the heart to prevent his spending it as he
+likes."
+
+"Please, I wish you could settle the month's rent," said the
+landlady, suddenly showing herself. She said it civilly, but with
+firmness.
+
+Leonard coloured. "It shall be paid to-day."
+
+Then he pressed his hat on his head, and, putting Helen gently
+aside, went forth.
+
+"Speak to _me_ in future, kind Mrs Smedley," said Helen with the air
+of a housewife. "_He_ is always in study, and must not be disturbed."
+
+The landlady--a good woman, though she liked her rent--smiled
+benignly. She was fond of Helen, whom she had known of old.
+
+"I am so glad you are come back; and perhaps now the young man will
+not keep such late hours. I meant to give him warning, but--"
+
+"But he will be a great man one of these days, and you must bear
+with him now." And Helen kissed Mrs Smedley, and sent her away half
+inclined to cry.
+
+Then Helen busied herself in the rooms. She found her father's box,
+which had been duly forwarded. She re-examined its contents, and
+wept as she touched each humble and pious relic. But her father's
+memory itself thus seemed to give this home a sanction which the
+former had not; and she rose quietly and began mechanically to put
+things in order, sighing as she, saw all so neglected, till she
+came to the rose-tree, and that alone showed heed and care. "Dear
+Leonard!" she murmured, and the smile resettled on her lips.
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+Nothing, perhaps, could have severed Leonard from Burley but Helen's
+return to his care. It was impossible for him, even had there been
+another room in the house vacant, (which there was not,) to install
+this noisy riotous son of the Muse by Bacchus, talking at random,
+and smelling of spirits, in the same dwelling with an innocent,
+delicate, timid, female child. And Leonard could not leave her alone
+all the twenty-four hours. She restored a home to him, and imposed
+its duties. He therefore told Mr Burley that in future he should
+write and study in his own room, and hinted with many a blush, and
+as delicately as he could, that it seemed to him that whatever he
+obtained from his pen ought to be halved with Burley, to whose
+interest he owed the employment, and from whose books or whose
+knowledge he took what helped to maintain it; but that the other
+half, if his, he could no longer afford to spend upon feasts or
+libations. He had another to provide for.
+
+Burley pooh-poohed the notion of taking half his coadjutor's
+earning, with much grandeur, but spoke very fretfully of Leonard's
+sober appropriation of the other half; and, though a good-natured
+warm-hearted man, felt extremely indignant against the sudden
+interposition of poor Helen. However, Leonard was firm; and then
+Burley grew sullen, and so they parted. But the rent was still to
+be paid. How? Leonard for the first time thought of the pawnbroker.
+He had clothes to spare, and Riccabocca's watch. No; that last he
+shrank from applying to such base uses.
+
+He went home at noon, and met Helen at the street door. She too had
+been out, and her soft cheek was rosy red with unwonted exercise and
+the sense of joy. She had still preserved the few gold pieces which
+Leonard had taken back to her on his first visit to Miss Starke's.
+She had now gone out and bought wools and implements for work; and
+meanwhile she had paid the rent.
+
+Leonard did not object to the work, but he blushed deeply when he
+knew about the rent, and was very angry. He payed back to her that
+night what she had advanced; and Helen wept silently at his pride,
+and wept more when she saw the next day a woeful hiatus in his
+wardrobe.
+
+But Leonard now worked at home, and worked resolutely; and Helen
+sate by his side, working too; so that next day, and the next,
+slipped peacefully away, and in the evening of the second he
+asked her to walk out in the fields. She sprang up joyously at
+the invitation, when bang went the door, and in reeled John
+Burley--drunk:--And so drunk!
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+And with Burley there reeled in another man--a friend of his--a
+man who had been a wealthy trader and once well to do, but who,
+unluckily, had literary tastes, and was fond of hearing Burley talk.
+So, since he had known the wit, his business had fallen from him,
+and he had passed through the Bankrupt Court. A very shabby-looking
+dog he was, indeed, and his nose was redder than Burley's.
+
+John made a drunken dash at poor Helen. "So you are the Pentheus in
+petticoats who defies Bacchus," cried he; and therewith he roared
+out a verse from Euripides. Helen ran away, and Leonard interposed.
+
+"For shame, Burley!"
+
+"He's drunk," said Mr Douce the bankrupt trader--"very drunk--don't
+mind--him. I say, sir, I hope we don't intrude. Sit still, Burley,
+sit still, and talk, do--that's a good man. You should hear
+him--ta--ta--talk, sir."
+
+Leonard meanwhile had got Helen out of the room, into her own,
+and begged her not to be alarmed, and keep the door locked. He
+then returned to Burley, who had seated himself on the bed, trying
+wondrous hard to keep himself upright; while Mr Douce was striving
+to light a short pipe that he carried in his buttonhole--without
+having filled it--and, naturally failing in that attempt, was now
+beginning to weep.
+
+Leonard was deeply shocked and revolted for Helen's sake; but it was
+hopeless to make Burley listen to reason. And how could the boy turn
+out of his room the man to whom he was under obligations?
+
+Meanwhile there smote upon Helen's shrinking, ears loud jarring talk
+and maudlin laughter, and cracked attempts at jovial songs. Then she
+heard Mrs Smedley in Leonard's room, remonstrating, and Burley's
+laugh was louder than before, and Mrs Smedley, who was a meek woman,
+evidently got frightened, and was heard in precipitate retreat.
+Long and loud talk recommenced, Burley's great voice predominant,
+Mr Douce chiming in with hiccupy broken treble. Hour after hour
+this lasted, for want of the drink that would have brought it to a
+premature close. And Burley gradually began to talk himself somewhat
+sober. Then Mr Douce was heard descending the stairs, and silence
+followed. At dawn, Leonard knocked at Helen's door. She opened it at
+once, for she had not gone to bed.
+
+"Helen," said he very sadly, "you cannot continue here. I must find
+out some proper home for you. This man has served me when all London
+was friendless, and he tells me that he has nowhere else to go--that
+the bailiffs are after him. He has now fallen asleep. I will go and
+find you some lodging close at hand--for I cannot expel him who has
+protected me; and yet you cannot be under the same roof with him. My
+own good angel, I must lose you."
+
+He did not wait for her answer, but hurried down the stairs.
+
+The morning looked through the shutterless panes in Leonard's
+garret, and the birds began to chirp from the elm-tree, when Burley
+rose and shook himself, and stared round. He could not quite make
+out where he was. He got hold of the water-jug which he emptied
+at three draughts, and felt greatly refreshed. He then began to
+reconnoitre the chamber--looked at Leonard's MSS.--peeped into the
+drawers--wondered where the devil Leonard himself had gone to--and
+finally amused himself by throwing down the fire-irons, ringing the
+bell, and making all the noise he could, in the hopes of attracting
+the attention of somebody or other, and procuring himself his
+morning dram.
+
+In the midst of this _charivari_ the door opened softly, but as if
+with a resolute hand, and the small quiet form of Helen stood before
+the threshold. BURLEY turned round, and the two looked at each other
+for some moments with silent scrutiny.
+
+BURLEY, (composing his features into their most friendly
+expression.)--"Come hither, my dear. So you are the little girl whom
+I saw with Leonard on the banks of the Brent, and you have come
+back to live with him--and I have come to live with him too. You
+shall be our little housekeeper, and I will tell you the story of
+Prince Prettyman, and a great many others not to be found in _Mother
+Goose_. Meanwhile, my dear little girl, here's sixpence--just run
+out and change this for its worth in rum."
+
+HELEN, (coming slowly up to Mr Burley, and still gazing earnestly
+into his face.)--"Ah, sir, Leonard says you have a kind heart, and
+that you have served him--he cannot ask you to leave the house; and
+so I, who have never served him, am to go hence and live alone."
+
+BURLEY, (moved.)--"You go, my little lady?--and why? Can we not all
+live together?"
+
+HELEN.--"No, sir. I left everything to come to Leonard, for we had
+met first at my father's grave. But you rob me of him, and I have no
+other friend on earth."
+
+BURLEY, (discomposed.)--"Explain yourself. Why must you leave him
+because I come?"
+
+Helen looks at Mr Burley again, long and wistfully, but makes no
+answer.
+
+BURLEY, (with a gulp.)--"Is it because he thinks I am not fit
+company for you?"
+
+Helen bowed her head.
+
+Burley winced, and after a moment's pause said,--"He is right."
+
+HELEN, (obeying the impulse at her heart, springs forward and takes
+Burley's hand.)--"Ah, sir," she cried, "before he knew you he was
+so different--then he was cheerful--then, even when his first
+disappointment came, I grieved and wept; but I felt he would conquer
+still--for his heart was so good and pure. Oh, sir, don't think I
+reproach you; but what is to become of him if--if--No, it is not for
+myself I speak. I know that if I was here, that if he had me to care
+for, he would come home early--and work patiently--and--and--that
+I might save him. But now when I am gone, and you with him--you
+to whom he is grateful, you whom he would follow against his own
+conscience, (you must see that, sir)--what is to become of him?"
+
+Helen's voice died in sobs.
+
+Burley took three or four long strides through the room--he was
+greatly agitated. "I am a demon," he murmured. "I never saw it
+before--but it is true--I should be this boy's ruin." Tears stood in
+his eyes, he paused abruptly, made a clutch at his hat, and turned
+to the door.
+
+Helen stopped the way, and, taking him gently by the arm,
+said,--"Oh, sir, forgive me--I have pained you;" and looked up at
+him with a compassionate expression, that indeed made the child's
+sweet face as that of an angel.
+
+Burley bent down as if to kiss her, and then drew back--perhaps with
+a sentiment that his lips were not worthy to touch that innocent
+brow.
+
+"If I had had a sister--a child like you, little one," he muttered,
+"perhaps I too might have been saved in time. Now--"
+
+"Ah, now you may stay, sir; I don't fear you any more."
+
+"No, no; you would fear me again ere night-time, and I might not be
+always in the right mood to listen to a voice like yours, child.
+Your Leonard has a noble heart and rare gifts. He should rise yet,
+and he shall. I will not drag him into the mire. Good-bye--you will
+see me no more." He broke from Helen, cleared the stairs with a
+bound, and was out of the house.
+
+When Leonard returned he was surprised to hear his unwelcome
+guest was gone--but Helen did not venture to tell him of her
+interposition. She knew instinctively how such officiousness would
+mortify and offend the pride of man--but she never again spoke
+harshly of poor Burley. Leonard supposed that he should either see
+or hear of the humourist in the course of the day. Finding he did
+not, he went in search of him at his old haunts; but no trace. He
+inquired at the _Beehive_ if they knew there of his new address, but
+no tidings of Burley could be obtained.
+
+As he came home disappointed and anxious, for he felt uneasy as to
+the disappearance of his wild friend, Mrs Smedley met him at the
+door.
+
+"Please, sir, suit yourself with another lodging," said she. "I can
+have no such singings and shoutings going on at night in my house.
+And that poor little girl, too!--you should be ashamed of yourself."
+
+Leonard frowned, and passed by.
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+Meanwhile, on leaving Helen, Burley strode on; and, as if by some
+better instinct, for he was unconscious of his own steps, he took
+the way towards the still green haunts of his youth. When he paused
+at length, he was already before the door of a rural cottage,
+standing alone in the midst of fields, with a little farm-yard at
+the back; and far through the trees in front was caught a glimpse of
+the winding Brent.
+
+With this cottage Burley was familiar; it was inhabited by a good
+old couple who had known him from a boy. There he habitually
+left his rods and fishing-tackle; there, for intervals in his
+turbid riotous life, he had sojourned for two or three days
+together--fancying the first day that the country was a heaven, and
+convinced before the third that it was a purgatory.
+
+An old woman, of neat and tidy exterior, came forth to greet him.
+
+"Ah, Master John," said she clasping his nerveless hand--"well,
+the fields be pleasant now--I hope you are come to stay a bit? Do;
+it will freshen you: you lose all the fine colour you had once, in
+Lunnon town."
+
+"I will stay with you, my kind friend," said Burley with unusual
+meekness--"I can have the old room, then?"
+
+"Oh yes, come and look at it. I never let it now to any one but
+you--never have let it since the dear beautiful lady with the
+angel's face went away. Poor thing, what could have become of her?"
+
+Thus speaking, while Burley listened not, the old woman drew him
+within the cottage, and led him up the stairs into a room that might
+have well become a better house, for it was furnished with taste,
+and even elegance. A small cabinet pianoforte stood opposite the
+fireplace, and the window looked upon pleasant meads and tangled
+hedgerows, and the narrow windings of the blue rivulet. Burley sank
+down exhausted, and gazed wistfully from the casement.
+
+"You have not breakfasted?" said the hostess anxiously.
+
+"No."
+
+"Well, the eggs are fresh laid, and you would like a rasher of
+bacon, Master John? And if you _will_ have brandy in your tea, I
+have some that you left long ago in your own bottle."
+
+Burley shook his head. "No brandy, Mrs Goodyer; only fresh milk. I
+will see whether I can yet coax Nature."
+
+Mrs Goodyer did not know what was meant by coaxing Nature, but she
+said, "Pray do, Master John," and vanished.
+
+That day Burley went out with his rod, and he fished hard for the
+one-eyed perch: but in vain. Then he roved along the stream with
+his hands in his pockets, whistling. He returned to the cottage at
+sunset, partook of the fare provided for him, abstained from the
+brandy, and felt dreadfully low. He called for pen, ink, and paper,
+and sought to write, but could not achieve two lines. He summoned
+Mrs Goodyer, "Tell your husband to come and sit and talk."
+
+Up came old Jacob Goodyer, and the great wit bade him tell him all
+the news of the village. Jacob obeyed willingly, and Burley at last
+fell asleep. The next day it was much the same, only at dinner he
+had up the brandy bottle, and finished it; and he did _not_ have up
+Jacob, but he contrived to write.
+
+The third day it rained incessantly. "Have you no books, Mrs
+Goodyer?" asked poor John Burley.
+
+"Oh, yes, some that the dear lady left behind her; and perhaps you
+would like to look at some papers in her own writing?"
+
+"No, not the papers--all women scribble, and all scribble the same
+things. Get me the books."
+
+The books were brought up--poetry and essays--John knew them by
+heart. He looked out on the rain, and at evening the rain had
+ceased. He rushed to his hat and fled.
+
+"Nature, Nature!" he exclaimed when he was out in the air and
+hurrying by the dripping hedgerows, "you are not to be coaxed by
+me! I have jilted you shamefully, I own it; you are a female and
+unforgiving. I don't complain. You may be very pretty, but you are
+the stupidest and most tiresome companion that ever I met with.
+Thank heaven, I am not married to you!"
+
+Thus John Burley made his way into town, and paused at the first
+public house. Out of that house he came with a jovial air, and
+on he strode towards the heart of London. Now he is in Leicester
+Square, and he gazes on the foreigners who stalk that region, and
+hums a tune; and now from yonder alley two forms emerge, and dog
+his careless footsteps; now through the maze of passages towards St
+Martin's he threads his path, and, anticipating an orgy as he nears
+his favourite haunts, jingles the silver in his pockets; and now the
+two forms are at his heels.
+
+"Hail to thee, O Freedom!" muttered John Burley, "thy dwelling is in
+cities, and thy palace is the tavern."
+
+"In the king's name," quoth a gruff voice; and John Burley feels the
+horrid and familiar tap on the shoulder.
+
+The two bailiffs who dogged have seized their prey.
+
+"At whose suit?" asked John Burley falteringly.
+
+"Mr Cox, the wine-merchant."
+
+"Cox! A man to whom I gave a cheque on my bankers, not three months
+ago!"
+
+"But it warn't cashed."
+
+"What does that signify?--the intention was the same. A good heart
+takes the will for the deed. Cox is a monster of ingratitude; and I
+withdraw my custom."
+
+"Sarve him right. Would your honour like a jarvey?"
+
+"I would rather spend the money on something else," said John
+Burley. "Give me your arm, I am not proud. After all, thank heaven,
+I shall not sleep in the country."
+
+And John Burley made a night of it in the Fleet.
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+Miss Starke was one of those ladies who pass their lives in the
+direst of all civil strife--war with their servants. She looked upon
+the members of that class as the unrelenting and sleepless enemies
+of the unfortunate householders condemned to employ them. She
+thought they ate and drank to their villanous utmost, in order to
+ruin their benefactors--that they lived in one constant conspiracy
+with one another and the tradesmen, the object of which was to
+cheat and pilfer. Miss Starke was a miserable woman. As she had no
+relations or friends who cared enough for her to share her solitary
+struggle against her domestic foes; and her income, though easy,
+was an annuity that died with herself, thereby reducing various
+nephews, nieces, or cousins, to the strict bounds of a natural
+affection--that did not exist; and as she felt the want of some
+friendly face amidst this world of distrust and hate, so she had
+tried the resource of venal companions. But the venal companions
+had never staid long--either they disliked Miss Starke, or Miss
+Starke disliked them. Therefore the poor woman had resolved upon
+bringing up some little girl whose heart, as she said to herself,
+would be fresh and uncorrupted, and from whom she might expect
+gratitude. She had been contented, on the whole, with Helen, and
+had meant to keep that child in her house as long as she (Miss
+Starke) remained upon the earth--perhaps some thirty years longer;
+and then, having carefully secluded her from marriage, and other
+friendship, to leave her nothing but the regret of having lost so
+kind a benefactress. Agreeably with this notion, and in order to
+secure the affections of the child, Miss Starke had relaxed the
+frigid austerity natural to her manner and mode of thought, and been
+kind to Helen in an iron way. She had neither slapped nor pinched
+her, neither had she starved. She had allowed her to see Leonard,
+according to the agreement made with Dr Morgan, and had laid out
+tenpence on cakes, besides contributing fruit from her garden for
+the first interview--a hospitality she did not think it fit to renew
+on subsequent occasions. In return for this, she conceived she had
+purchased the right to Helen bodily and spiritually, and nothing
+could exceed her indignation when she rose one morning and found the
+child had gone. As it never had occurred to her to ask Leonard's
+address, though she suspected Helen had gone to him, she was at a
+loss what to do, and remained for twenty-four hours in a state of
+inane depression. But then she began to miss the child so much that
+her energies woke, and she persuaded herself that she was actuated
+by the purest benevolence in trying to reclaim this poor creature
+from the world into which Helen had thus rashly plunged.
+
+Accordingly, she put an advertisement into the _Times_, to the
+following effect, liberally imitated from one by which, in former
+years, she had recovered a favourite Blenheim.
+
+     TWO GUINEAS REWARD.
+
+     Strayed, from Ivy Cottage, Highgate, a Little Girl, answers to
+     the name of Helen; with blue eyes and brown hair; white muslin
+     frock, and straw hat with blue ribbons. Whoever will bring the
+     same to Ivy Cottage, shall receive the above Reward.
+
+     _N.B._--Nothing more will be offered.
+
+Now, it so happened that Mrs Smedley had put an advertisement in
+the _Times_ on her own account, relative to a niece of hers who
+was coming from the country, and for whom she desired to find
+a situation. So, contrary to her usual habit, she sent for the
+newspaper, and, close by her own advertisement, she saw Miss
+Starke's.
+
+It was impossible that she could mistake the description of Helen;
+and, as this advertisement caught her eye the very day after the
+whole house had been disturbed and scandalised by Burley's noisy
+visit, and on which she had resolved to get rid of a lodger who
+received such visitors, the goodhearted woman was delighted to think
+that she could restore Helen to some safe home. While thus thinking,
+Helen herself entered the kitchen where Mrs Smedley sate, and the
+landlady had the imprudence to point out the advertisement, and
+talk, as she called it, "seriously" to the little girl.
+
+Helen in vain and with tears entreated her to take no step in reply
+to the advertisement. Mrs Smedley felt it was an affair of duty,
+and was obdurate, and shortly afterwards put on her bonnet and
+left the house. Helen conjectured that she was on her way to Miss
+Starke's, and her whole soul was bent on flight. Leonard had gone
+to the office of the _Beehive_ with his MSS.; but she packed up all
+their joint effects, and, just as she had done so, he returned. She
+communicated the news of the advertisement, and said she should be
+so miserable if compelled to go back to Miss Starke's, and implored
+him so pathetically to save her from such sorrow that he at once
+assented to her proposal of flight. Luckily, little was owing to the
+landlady--that little was left with the maid-servant; and, profiting
+by Mrs Smedley's absence, they escaped without scene or conflict.
+Their effects were taken by Leonard to a stand of hackney vehicles,
+and then left at a coach-office, while they went in search of
+lodgings. It was wise to choose an entirely new and remote district;
+and before night they were settled in an attic in Lambeth.
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+As the reader will expect, no trace of Burley could Leonard find:
+the humourist had ceased to communicate with the _Beehive_. But
+Leonard grieved for Burley's sake; and indeed, he missed the
+intercourse of the large wrong mind. But he settled down by
+degrees to the simple loving society of his child companion, and
+in that presence grew more tranquil. The hours in the daytime
+that he did not pass at work he spent as before, picking up
+knowledge at bookstalls; and at dusk he and Helen would stroll
+out--sometimes striving to escape from the long suburb into fresh
+rural air; more often wandering to and fro the bridge that led
+to glorious Westminster--London's classic land--and watching the
+vague lamps reflected on the river. This haunt suited the musing
+melancholy boy. He would stand long and with wistful silence by the
+balustrade--seating Helen thereon, that she too might look along the
+dark mournful waters which, dark though they be, still have their
+charm of mysterious repose.
+
+As the river flowed between the world of roofs, and the roar of
+human passions on either side, so in those two hearts flowed
+Thought--and all they knew of London was its shadow.
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+There appeared in the _Beehive_ certain very truculent political
+papers--papers very like the tracts in the Tinker's bag. Leonard
+did not heed them much, but they made far more sensation in the
+public that read the _Beehive_ than Leonard's papers, full of rare
+promise though the last were. They greatly increased the sale of the
+periodical in the manufacturing towns, and began to awake the drowsy
+vigilance of the Home Office. Suddenly a descent was made upon the
+_Beehive_, and all its papers and plant. The editor saw himself
+threatened with a criminal prosecution, and the certainty of two
+years' imprisonment: he did not like the prospect, and disappeared.
+One evening, when Leonard, unconscious of these mischances, arrived
+at the door of the office, he found it closed. An agitated mob was
+before it, and a voice that was not new to his ear was haranguing
+the bystanders, with many imprecations against "tyrans." He looked,
+and, to his amaze, recognised in the orator Mr Sprott the Tinker.
+
+The police came in numbers to disperse the crowd, and Mr Sprott
+prudently vanished. Leonard learned then what had befallen, and
+again saw himself without employment and the means of bread.
+
+Slowly he walked back. "O, knowledge, knowledge!--powerless indeed!"
+he murmured.
+
+As he thus spoke, a handbill in large capitals met his eyes on a
+dead wall--"Wanted, a few smart young men for India."
+
+A crimp accosted him--"You would make a fine soldier, my man. You
+have stout limbs of your own." Leonard moved on.
+
+"It has come back, then, to this. Brute physical force after all! O
+Mind, despair! O Peasant, be a machine again."
+
+He entered his attic noiselessly, and gazed upon Helen as she sate
+at work, straining her eyes by the open window--with tender and deep
+compassion. She had not heard him enter, nor was she aware of his
+presence. Patient and still she sate, and the small fingers plied
+busily. He gazed, and saw that her cheek was pale and hollow, and
+the hands looked so thin! His heart was deeply touched, and at that
+moment he had not one memory of the baffled Poet, one thought that
+proclaimed the Egotist.
+
+He approached her gently, laid his hand on her shoulder--"Helen, put
+on your shawl and bonnet, and walk out--I have much to say."
+
+In a few moments she was ready, and they took their way to their
+favourite haunt upon the bridge. Pausing in one of the recesses or
+nooks, Leonard then began,--"Helen, we must part."
+
+"Part?--Oh, brother!"
+
+"Listen. All work that depends on mind is over for me; nothing
+remains but the labour of thews and sinews. I cannot go back to
+my village and say to all, 'My hopes were self-conceit, and my
+intellect a delusion!' I cannot. Neither in this sordid city can
+I turn menial or porter. I might be born to that drudgery, but my
+mind has, it may be unhappily, raised me above my birth. What, then,
+shall I do? I know not yet--serve as a soldier, or push my way to
+some wilderness afar, as an emigrant, perhaps. But whatever my
+choice, I must henceforth be alone; I have a home no more. But there
+is a home for you, Helen, a very humble one, (for you, too, so well
+born,) but very safe--the roof of--of--my peasant mother. She will
+love you for my sake, and--and--"
+
+Helen clung to him trembling, and sobbed out, "Anything, anything
+you will. But I can work; I can make money, Leonard. I do, indeed,
+make money--you do not know how much--but enough for us both till
+better times come to you. Do not let us part."
+
+"And I--a man, and born to labour, to be maintained by the work of
+an infant! No, Helen, do not so degrade me."
+
+She drew back as she looked on his flushed brow, bowed her head
+submissively, and murmured, "Pardon."
+
+"Ah," said Helen, after a pause, "if now we could but find my poor
+father's friend! I never so much cared for it before."
+
+"Yes, he would surely provide for you."
+
+"For _me_!" repeated Helen, in a tone of soft deep reproach, and she
+turned away her head to conceal her tears.
+
+"You are sure you would remember him, if we met him by chance?"
+
+"Oh yes. He was so different from all we see in this terrible city,
+and his eyes were like yonder stars, so clear and so bright; yet the
+light seemed to come from afar off, as the light does in yours, when
+your thoughts are away from all things round you. And then, too, his
+dog whom he called Nero--I could not forget that."
+
+"But his dog may not be always with him."
+
+"But the bright clear eyes are! Ah, now you look up to heaven, and
+yours seem to dream like his."
+
+Leonard did not answer, for his thoughts were indeed less on earth
+than struggling to pierce into that remote and mysterious heaven.
+
+Both were silent long; the crowd passed them by unheedingly. Night
+deepened over the river, but the reflection of the lamplights on
+its waves was more visible than that of the stars. The beams showed
+the darkness of the strong current, and the craft that lay eastward
+on the tide, with sail-less spectral masts and black dismal hulks,
+looked deathlike in their stillness.
+
+Leonard looked down, and the thought of Chatterton's grim suicide
+came back to his soul, and a pale scornful face with luminous
+haunting eyes seemed to look up from the stream, and murmur from
+livid lips,--"Struggle no more against the tides on the surface--all
+is calm and rest within the deep."
+
+Starting in terror from the gloom of his reverie, the boy began to
+talk fast to Helen, and tried to soothe her with descriptions of the
+lowly home which he had offered.
+
+He spoke of the light cares which she would participate with his
+mother--for by that name he still called the widow--and dwelt,
+with an eloquence that the contrast round him made sincere and
+strong, on the happy rural life, the shadowy woodlands, the rippling
+cornfields, the solemn lone church-spire soaring from the tranquil
+landscape. Flatteringly he painted the flowery terraces of the
+Italian exile, and the playful fountain that, even as he spoke, was
+flinging up its spray to the stars, through serene air untroubled
+by the smoke of cities, and untainted by the sinful sighs of men.
+He promised her the love and protection of natures akin to the
+happy scene: the simple affectionate mother--the gentle pastor--the
+exile wise and kind--Violante, with dark eyes full of the mystic
+thoughts that solitude calls from childhood,--Violante should be her
+companion.
+
+"And oh!" cried Helen, "if life be thus happy there, return with me,
+return--return!"
+
+"Alas!" murmured the boy, "if the hammer once strike the spark from
+the anvil, the spark must fly upward; it cannot fall back to earth
+until light has left it. Upward still, Helen--let me go upward
+still!"
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+The next morning Helen was very ill--so ill that, shortly after
+rising, she was forced to creep back to bed. Her frame shivered--her
+eyes were heavy--her hand burned like fire. Fever had set in.
+Perhaps she might have caught cold on the bridge--perhaps her
+emotions had proved too much for her frame. Leonard, in great
+alarm, called on the nearest apothecary. The apothecary looked
+grave, and said there was danger. And danger soon declared
+itself--Helen became delirious. For several days she lay in this
+state, between life and death. Leonard then felt that all the
+sorrows of earth are light, compared with the fear of losing what we
+love. How valueless the envied laurel seemed beside the dying rose.
+
+Thanks, perhaps, more to his heed and tending than to medical
+skill, she recovered sense at last--immediate peril was over.
+But she was very weak and reduced--her ultimate recovery
+doubtful--convalescence, at best, likely to be very slow.
+
+But when she learned how long she had been thus ill, she looked
+anxiously at Leonard's face as he bent over her, and faltered
+forth--"Give me my work; I am strong enough for that now--it would
+amuse me."
+
+Leonard burst into tears.
+
+Alas! he had no work himself; all their joint money had melted away;
+the apothecary was not like good Dr Morgan: the medicines were to
+be paid for, and the rent. Two days before, Leonard had pawned
+Riccabocca's watch; and when the last shilling thus raised was gone,
+how should he support Helen? Nevertheless he conquered his tears,
+and assured her that he had employment; and that so earnestly that
+she believed him, and sank into soft sleep. He listened to her
+breathing, kissed her forehead, and left the room. He turned into
+his own neigbouring garret, and, leaning his face on his hands,
+collected all his thoughts.
+
+He must be a beggar at last. He must write to Mr Dale for money--Mr
+Dale, too, who knew the secret of his birth. He would rather have
+begged of a stranger--it seemed to add a new dishonour to his
+mother's memory for the child to beg of one who was acquainted with
+her shame. Had he himself been the only one to want and to starve,
+he would have sunk inch by inch into the grave of famine, before he
+would have so subdued his pride. But Helen, there on that bed--Helen
+needing, for weeks perhaps, all support, and illness making luxuries
+themselves like necessaries! Beg he must. And when he so resolved,
+had you but seen the proud bitter soul he conquered, you would
+have said--"This which he thinks is degradation--this is heroism.
+Oh strange human heart!--no epic ever written achieves the Sublime
+and the Beautiful which are graven, unread by human eye, in thy
+secret leaves." Of whom else should he beg? His mother had nothing,
+Riccabocca was poor, and the stately Violante, who had exclaimed,
+"Would that I were a man!"--he could not endure the thought that she
+should pity him, and despise. The Avenels! No--thrice No. He drew
+towards him hastily ink and paper, and wrote rapid lines, that were
+wrung from him as from the bleeding strings of life.
+
+But the hour for the post had passed--the letter must wait till
+the next day; and three days at least would elapse before he
+could receive an answer. He left the letter on the table, and,
+stifling as for air, went forth. He crossed the bridge--he passed
+on mechanically--and was borne along by a crowd pressing towards
+the doors of Parliament. A debate that excited popular interest
+was fixed for that evening, and many bystanders collected in the
+street to see the members pass to and fro, or hear what speakers had
+yet risen to take part in the debate, or try to get orders for the
+gallery.
+
+He halted amidst these loiterers, with no interest, indeed, in
+common with them, but looking over their heads abstractedly towards
+the tall Funeral Abbey--Imperial Golgotha of Poets, and Chiefs, and
+Kings.
+
+Suddenly his attention was diverted to those around by the sound of
+a name--displeasingly known to him. "How are you, Randal Leslie?
+coming to hear the debate?" said a member who was passing through
+the street.
+
+"Yes; Mr Egerton promised to get me under the gallery. He is to
+speak himself to-night, and I have never heard him. As you are going
+into the House, will you remind him?"
+
+"I can't now, for he is speaking already--and well too. I hurried
+from the Athenaeum, where I was dining, on purpose to be in time, as
+I heard that his speech was making a great effect."
+
+"This is very unlucky," said Randal. "I had no idea he would speak
+so early."
+
+"M---- brought him up by a direct personal attack. But follow me;
+perhaps I can get you into the House; and a man like you, Leslie,
+of whom we expect great things some day, I can tell you, should not
+miss any such opportunity of knowing what this House of ours is on a
+field night. Come on!"
+
+The member hurried towards the door; and as Randal followed him,
+a bystander cried--"That is the young man who wrote the famous
+pamphlet--Egerton's relation."
+
+"Oh, indeed!" said another. "Clever man, Egerton--I am waiting for
+him."
+
+"So am I."
+
+"Why, you are not a constituent, as I am."
+
+"No; but he has been very kind to my nephew, and I must thank him.
+You are a constituent--he is an honour to your town."
+
+"So he is: Enlightened man!"
+
+"And so generous!"
+
+"Brings forward really good measures," quoth the politician.
+
+"And clever young men," said the uncle.
+
+Therewith one or two others joined in the praise of Audley Egerton,
+and many anecdotes of his liberality were told.
+
+Leonard listened at first listlessly, at last with thoughtful
+attention. He had heard Burley, too, speak highly of this generous
+statesman, who, without pretending to genius himself, appreciated
+it in others. He suddenly remembered, too, that Egerton was
+half-brother to the Squire. Vague notions of some appeal to this
+eminent person, not for charity, but employ to his mind, gleamed
+across him--inexperienced boy that he yet was! And, while thus
+meditating, the door of the House opened, and out came Audley
+Egerton himself. A partial cheering, followed by a general murmur,
+apprised Leonard of the presence of the popular statesman. Egerton
+was caught hold of by some five or six persons in succession; a
+shake of the hand, a nod, a brief whispered word or two, sufficed
+the practised member for graceful escape; and soon, free from the
+crowd, his tall erect figure passed on, and turned towards the
+bridge. He paused at the angle and took out his watch, looking at it
+by the lamp-light.
+
+"Harley will be here soon," he muttered--"he is always punctual; and
+now that I have spoken, I can give him an hour or so. That is well."
+
+As he replaced his watch in his pocket, and re-buttoned his coat
+over his firm broad chest, he lifted his eyes, and saw a young man
+standing before him.
+
+"Do you want me?" asked the statesman, with the direct brevity of
+his practical character.
+
+"Mr Egerton," said the young man, with a voice that slightly
+trembled, and yet was manly amidst emotion, "you have a great name,
+and great power--I stand here in these streets of London without
+a friend, and without employ. I believe that I have it in me to
+do some nobler work than that of bodily labour, had I but one
+friend--one opening for my thoughts. And now I have said this, I
+scarcely know how, or why, but from despair, and the sudden impulse
+which that despair took from the praise that follows your success, I
+have nothing more to add."
+
+Audley Egerton was silent for a moment, struck by the tone and
+address of the stranger; but the consummate and wary man of the
+world, accustomed to all manner of strange applications, and all
+varieties of imposture, quickly recovered from a passing and slight
+effect.
+
+"Are you a native of ----?" (naming the town he represented as
+member.)
+
+"No, sir."
+
+"Well, young man, I am very sorry for you; but the good sense
+you must possess (for I judge of that by the education you have
+evidently received) must tell you that a public man, whatever be his
+patronage, has it too fully absorbed by claimants who have a right
+to demand it, to be able to listen to strangers."
+
+He paused a moment, and, as Leonard stood silent, added, with more
+kindness than most public men so accosted would have showed--
+
+"You say you are friendless--poor fellow. In early life that happens
+to many of us, who find friends enough before the close. Be honest,
+and well-conducted; lean on yourself, not on strangers; work with
+the body if you can't with the mind; and, believe me, that advice is
+all I can give you, unless this trifle,"--and the minister held out
+a crown piece.
+
+Leonard bowed, shook his head sadly, and walked away. Egerton looked
+after him with a slight pang.
+
+"Pooh!" said he to himself, "there must be thousands in the same
+state in these streets of London. I cannot redress the necessities
+of civilisation. Well educated! It is not from ignorance henceforth
+that society will suffer--it is from over-educating the hungry
+thousands who, thus unfitted for manual toil, and with no career for
+mental, will some day or other stand like that boy in our streets,
+and puzzle wiser ministers than I am."
+
+As Egerton thus mused, and passed on to the bridge, a bugle-horn
+rang merrily from the box of a gay four-in-hand. A drag-coach with
+superb blood-horses rattled over the causeway, and in the driver
+Egerton recognised his nephew--Frank Hazeldean.
+
+The young Guardsman was returning, with a lively party of men, from
+dining at Greenwich; and the careless laughter of these children of
+pleasure floated far over the still river.
+
+It vexed the ear of the careworn statesman--sad, perhaps, with all
+his greatness, lonely amidst all his crowd of friends. It reminded
+him, perhaps, of his own youth, when such parties and companionships
+were familiar to him, though through them all he bore an ambitious
+aspiring soul--"_Le jeu, vaut-il la chandelle?_" said he, shrugging
+his shoulders.
+
+The coach rolled rapidly past Leonard, as he stood leaning against
+the corner of the bridge, and the mire of the kennel splashed over
+him from the hoofs of the fiery horses. The laughter smote on his
+ear more discordantly than on the minister's, but it begot no envy.
+
+"Life is a dark riddle," said he, smiting his breast.
+
+And he walked slowly on, gained the recess where he had stood
+several nights before with Helen; and dizzy with want of food, and
+worn out for want of sleep, he sank down into the dark corner; while
+the river that rolled under the arch of stone muttered dirge-like
+in his ear;--as under the social key-stone wails and rolls on for
+ever the mystery of Human Discontent. Take comfort, O Thinker by the
+stream! 'Tis the river that founded and gave pomp to the city; and
+without the discontent, where were progress--what were Man? Take
+comfort, O THINKER! where ever the stream over which thou bendest,
+or beside which thou sinkest, weary and desolate, frets the arch
+that supports thee;--never dream that, by destroying the bridge,
+thou canst silence the moan of the wave!
+
+
+
+
+DISFRANCHISEMENT OF THE BOROUGHS.
+
+TO WALTER BINKIE, ESQ., PROVOST OF DREEPDAILY.
+
+
+MY DEAR PROVOST,--In the course of your communings with nature on
+the uplands of Dreepdaily, you must doubtless have observed that
+the advent of a storm is usually preceded by the appearance of a
+flight of seamaws, who, by their discordant screams, give notice of
+the approaching change of weather. For some time past it has been
+the opinion of those who are in the habit of watching the political
+horizon, that we should do well to prepare ourselves for a squall,
+and already the premonitory symptoms are distinctly audible. The
+Liberal press, headed by the _Times_, is clamorous for some sweeping
+change in the method of Parliamentary representation; and Lord John
+Russell, as you are well aware, proposes in the course of next
+Session to take up the subject. This is no mere _brutum fulmen_,
+or dodge to secure a little temporary popularity--it is a distinct
+party move for a very intelligible purpose; and is fraught, I
+think, with much danger and injustice to many of the constituencies
+which are now intrusted with the right of franchise. As you, my
+dear Provost, are a Liberal both by principle and profession,
+and moreover chief magistrate of a very old Scottish burgh, your
+opinion upon this matter must have great weight in determining the
+judgment of others; and, therefore, you will not, I trust, consider
+it too great a liberty, if, at this dull season of the year, I call
+your attention to one or two points which appear well worthy of
+consideration.
+
+In the first place, I think you will admit that extensive organic
+changes in the Constitution ought never to be attempted except in
+cases of strong necessity. The real interests of the country are
+never promoted by internal political agitation, which unsettles
+men's minds, is injurious to regular industry, and too often leaves
+behind it the seeds of jealousy and discord between different
+classes of the community, ready on some future occasion to burst
+into noxious existence. You would not, I think, wish to see annually
+renewed that sort of strife which characterised the era of the
+Reform Bill. I venture to pass no opinion whatever on the abstract
+merits of that measure. I accept it as a fact, just as I accept
+other changes in the Constitution of this country which took place
+before I was born; and I hope I shall ever comport myself as a loyal
+and independent elector. But I am sure you have far too lively
+a recollection of the ferment which that event created, to wish
+to see it renewed, without at least some urgent cause. You were
+consistently anxious for the suppression of rotten boroughs, and for
+the enlargement of the constituency upon a broad and popular basis;
+and you considered that the advantages to be gained by the adoption
+of the new system, justified the social risks which were incurred in
+the endeavour to supersede the old one. I do not say that you were
+wrong in this. The agitation for Parliamentary Reform had been going
+on for a great number of years; the voice of the majority of the
+country was undeniably in your favour, and you finally carried your
+point. Still, in consequence of that struggle, years elapsed before
+the heart-burnings and jealousies which were occasioned by it were
+allayed. Even now it is not uncommon to hear the reminiscences of
+the Reform Bill appealed to on the hustings by candidates who have
+little else to say for themselves by way of personal recommendation.
+A most ludicrous instance of this occurred very lately in the case
+of a young gentleman, who, being desirous of Parliamentary honours,
+actually requested the support of the electors on the ground that
+his father or grandfather--I forget which--had voted for the Reform
+Bill; a ceremony which he could not very well have performed in
+his own person, as at that time he had not been released from
+the bondage of swaddling-clothes! I need hardly add that he was
+rejected; but the anecdote is curious and instructive.
+
+In a country such as this, changes must be looked for in the course
+of years. One system dies out, or becomes unpopular, and is replaced
+by a new one. But I cannot charge my memory with any historical
+instance where a great change was attempted without some powerful
+or cogent reason. Still less can I recollect any great change being
+proposed, unless a large and powerful section of the community had
+unequivocally declared in its favour. The reason of this is quite
+obvious. The middle classes of Great Britain, however liberal they
+may be in their sentiments, have a just horror of revolutions. They
+know very well that organic changes are never effected without
+enormous loss and individual deprivation, and they will not move
+unless they are assured that the value of the object to be gained is
+commensurate with the extent of the sacrifice. In defence of their
+liberties, when these are attacked, the British people are ever
+ready to stand forward; but I mistake them much, if they will at any
+time allow themselves to be made the tools of a faction. The attempt
+to get up organic changes for the sole purpose of perpetuating the
+existence of a particular Ministry, or of maintaining the supremacy
+of a particular party, is a new feature in our history. It is an
+experiment which the nation ought not to tolerate for a single
+moment; and which I am satisfied it will not tolerate, when the
+schemes of its authors are laid bare.
+
+I believe, Provost, I am right in assuming that there has been no
+decided movement in favour of a New Parliamentary Reform Bill,
+either in Dreepdaily or in any of the other burghs with which you
+are connected. The electors are well satisfied with the operation of
+the ten-pound clause, which excludes from the franchise no man of
+decent ability and industry, whilst it secures property from those
+direct inroads which would be the inevitable result of a system of
+universal suffrage. Also, I suppose, you are reasonably indifferent
+on the subjects of Vote by Ballot and Triennial Parliaments, and
+that you view the idea of annual ones with undisguised reprobation.
+Difference of opinion undoubtedly may exist on some of these points:
+an eight-pound qualification may have its advocates, and the right
+of secret voting may be convenient for members of the clique; but,
+on the whole, you are satisfied with matters as they are; and,
+certainly, I do not see that you have any grievance to complain of.
+If I were a member of the Liberal party, I should be very sorry to
+see any change of the representation made in Scotland. Just observe
+how the matter stands. At the commencement of the present year the
+whole representation of the Scottish burghs was in the hands of the
+Liberal party. Since then, it is true, Falkirk has changed sides;
+but you are still remarkably well off; and I think that out of
+thirty county members, eighteen may be set down as supporters of
+the Free-trade policy. Remember, I do not guarantee the continuance
+of these proportions: I wish you simply to observe how you stand at
+present, under the working of your own Reform Bill; and really it
+appears to me that nothing could be more satisfactory. The Liberal
+who wishes to have more men of his own kidney from Scotland must
+indeed be an unconscionable glutton; and if, in the face of these
+facts, he asks for a reform in the representation, I cannot set him
+down as other than a consummate ass. He must needs admit that the
+system has worked well. Scotland sends to the support of the Whig
+Ministry, and the maintenance of progressive opinions, a brilliant
+phalanx of senators; amongst whom we point, with justifiable pride,
+to the distinguished names of Anderson, Bouverie, Ewart, Hume,
+Smith, M'Taggart, and M'Gregor. Are these gentlemen not liberal
+enough for the wants of the present age? Why, unless I am most
+egregiously mistaken--and not I only, but the whole of the Liberal
+press in Scotland--they are generally regarded as decidedly ahead
+even of my Lord John Russell. Why, then, should your representation
+be reformed, while it bears such admirable fruit? With such a
+growth of golden pippins on its boughs, would it not be madness
+to cut down the tree, on the mere chance of another arising from
+the stump, more especially when you cannot hope to gather from it
+a more abundant harvest? I am quite sure, Provost, that you agree
+with me in this. You have nothing to gain, but possibly a good deal
+to lose, by any alteration which may be made; and therefore it is,
+I presume, that in this part of the world not the slightest wish
+has been manifested for a radical change of the system. That very
+conceited and shallow individual, Sir Joshua Walmsley, made not
+long ago a kind of agitating tour through Scotland, for the purpose
+of getting up the steam; but except from a few unhappy Chartists,
+whose sentiments on the subject of property are identically the same
+with those professed by the gentlemen who plundered the Glasgow
+tradesmen's shops in 1848, he met with no manner of encouragement.
+The electors laughed in the face of this ridiculous caricature of
+Peter the Hermit, and advised him, instead of exposing his ignorance
+in the north, to go back to Bolton and occupy himself with his own
+affairs.
+
+This much I have said touching the necessity or call for a
+new Reform Bill, which is likely enough to involve us, for a
+considerable period at least, in unfortunate political strife. I
+have put it to you as a Liberal, but at the same time as a man of
+common sense and honesty, whether there are any circumstances,
+under your knowledge, which can justify such an attempt; and in
+the absence of these, you cannot but admit that such an experiment
+is eminently dangerous at the present time, and ought to be
+strongly discountenanced by all men, whatever may be their kind
+of political opinions. I speak now without any reference whatever
+to the details. It may certainly be possible to discover a better
+system of representation than that which at present exists. I never
+regarded Lord John Russell as the living incarnation of Minerva,
+nor can I consider any measure originated by him as conveying an
+assurance that the highest amount of human wisdom has been exhausted
+in its preparation. But what I do say is this, that in the absence
+of anything like general demand, and failing the allegation of
+any marked grievance to be redressed, no Ministry is entitled to
+propose an extensive or organic change in the representation of the
+country; and the men who shall venture upon such a step must render
+themselves liable to the imputation of being actuated by other
+motives than regard to the public welfare.
+
+You will, however, be slow to believe that Lord John Russell is
+moving in this matter without some special reason. In this you
+are perfectly right. He has a reason, and a very cogent one, but
+not such a reason as you, if you are truly a Liberal, and not a
+mere partisan, can accept. I presume it is the wish of the Liberal
+party--at least it used to be their watchword--that public opinion
+in this country is not to be slighted or suppressed. With the view
+of giving full effect to that public opinion, not of securing the
+supremacy of this or that political alliance, the Reform Act was
+framed; it being the declared object and intention of its founders
+that a full, fair, and free representation should be secured to the
+people of this country. The property qualification was fixed at a
+low rate; the balance of power as between counties and boroughs
+was carefully adjusted; and every precaution was taken--at least
+so we were told at the time--that no one great interest of the
+State should be allowed unduly to predominate over another. Many,
+however, were of opinion at the time, and have since seen no reason
+to alter it, that the adjustment then made, as between counties and
+boroughs, was by no means equitable, and that an undue share in the
+representation was given to the latter, more especially in England.
+That, you will observe, was a Conservative, not a Liberal objection;
+and it was over-ruled. Well, then, did the Representation, as fixed
+by the Reform Bill, fulfil its primary condition? You thought so;
+and so did my Lord John Russell, until some twelve months ago, when
+a new light dawned upon him. That light has since increased in
+intensity, and he now sees his way, clearly enough, to a new organic
+measure. Why is this? Simply, my dear Provost, because the English
+boroughs will no longer support him in his bungling legislation, or
+countenance his unnational policy!
+
+Public opinion, as represented through the operation of the Reform
+Act, is no longer favourable to Lord John Russell. The result of
+recent elections, in places which were formerly considered as
+the strongholds of Whiggery, have demonstrated to him that the
+Free-trade policy, to which he is irretrievably pledged, has become
+obnoxious to the bulk of the electors, and that they will no longer
+accord their support to any Ministry which is bent upon depressing
+British labour and sapping the foundations of national prosperity.
+So Lord John Russell, finding himself in this position, that he must
+either get rid of public opinion or resign his place, sets about
+the concoction of a new Reform Bill, by means of which he hopes to
+swamp the present electoral body! This is Whig liberty in its pure
+and original form. It implies, of course, that the Reform Bill did
+not give a full, fair, and free representation to the country, else
+there can be no excuse for altering its provisions. If we really
+have a fair representation; and if, notwithstanding, the majority of
+the electors are convinced that Free Trade is not for their benefit,
+it does appear to me a most monstrous thing that they are to be
+coerced into receiving it by the infusion of a new element into
+the Constitution, or a forcible change in the distribution of the
+electoral power, to suit the commercial views which are in favour
+with the Whig party. It is, in short, a most circuitous method of
+exercising despotic power; and I, for one, having the interests of
+the country at heart, would much prefer the institution at once of a
+pure despotism, and submit to be ruled and taxed henceforward at the
+sweet will of the scion of the house of Russell.
+
+I do not know what your individual sentiments may be on the subject
+of Free Trade; but whether you are for it or against it, my argument
+remains the same. It is essentially a question for the solution of
+the electoral body; and if the Whigs are right in their averment
+that its operation hitherto has been attended with marked success,
+and has even transcended the expectation of its promoters, you may
+rely upon it that there is no power in the British Empire which
+can overthrow it. No Protectionist ravings can damage a system
+which has been productive of real advantage to the great bulk of
+the people. But if, on the contrary, it is a bad system, is it to
+be endured that any man or body of men shall attempt to perpetuate
+it against the will of the majority of the electors, by a change
+in the representation of the country? I ask you this as a Liberal.
+Without having any undue diffidence in the soundness of your own
+judgment, I presume you do not, like his Holiness the Pope, consider
+yourself infallible, or entitled to coerce others who may differ
+from you in opinion. Yet this is precisely what Lord John Russell is
+now attempting to do; and I warn you and others who are similarly
+situated, to be wise in time, and to take care lest, under the
+operation of this new Reform Bill, you are not stripped of that
+political power and those political privileges which at present you
+enjoy.
+
+Don't suppose that I am speaking rashly or without consideration.
+All I know touching this new Reform Bill, is derived from the
+arguments and proposals which have been advanced and made by the
+Liberal press in consequence of the late indications of public
+feeling, as manifested by the result of recent elections. It
+is rather remarkable that we heard few or no proposals for an
+alteration in the electoral system, until it became apparent
+that the voice of the boroughs could no longer be depended on
+for the maintenance of the present commercial policy. You may
+recollect that the earliest of the victories which were achieved
+by the Protectionists, with respect to vacant seats in the House
+of Commons, were treated lightly by their opponents as mere
+casualties; but when borough after borough deliberately renounced
+its adherence to the cause of the League, and, not unfrequently
+under circumstances of very marked significance, declared openly in
+favour of Protection, the matter became serious. It was _then_, and
+then only, that we heard the necessity for some new and sweeping
+change in the representation of this country broadly asserted;
+and, singularly enough, the advocates of that change do not
+attempt to disguise their motives. They do not venture to say that
+the intelligence of the country is not adequately represented at
+present--what they complain of is, that the intelligence of the
+country is becoming every day more hostile to their commercial
+theories. In short, they want to get rid of that intelligence, and
+must get rid of it speedily, unless their system is to crumble to
+pieces. Such is their aim and declared object; and if you entertain
+any doubts on the matter, I beg leave to refer you to the recorded
+sentiments of the leading Ministerial and Free-trade organ--the
+_Times_. It is always instructive to notice the hints of the
+Thunderer. The writers in that journal are fully alive to the nature
+of the coming crisis. They have been long aware of the reaction
+which has taken place throughout the country on the subject of
+Free Trade, and they recognise distinctly the peril in which their
+favourite principle is placed, if some violent means are not used to
+counteract the conviction of the electoral body. They see that, in
+the event of a general election, the constituencies of the Empire
+are not likely to return a verdict hostile to the domestic interests
+of the country. They have watched with careful and anxious eyes the
+turning tide of opinion; and they can devise no means of arresting
+it, without having recourse to that peculiar mode of manipulation,
+which is dignified by the name of Burking. Let us hear what they say
+so late as the 21st of July last.
+
+     "With such a prospect before us, with unknown struggles and
+     unprecedented collisions within the bounds of possibility,
+     there is only one resource, and we must say that Her Majesty's
+     present advisers will be answerable for the consequences if they
+     do not adopt it. They must lay the foundation of an appeal to
+     the people with a large and liberal measure of Parliamentary
+     reform. It is high time that this great country should cease to
+     quake and to quail at the decisions of stupid and corrupt little
+     constituencies, of whom, as in the case before us, it would take
+     thirty to make one metropolitan borough. The great question
+     always before the nation in one shape or another is--whether
+     _the people_ are as happy as laws can make them? To what sort of
+     constituencies shall we appeal for the answer to this question?
+     To Harwich with its population of 3370; to St Albans with its
+     population of 6246; to Scarborough with its population of 9953;
+     to Knaresborough with its population of 5382; and to a score
+     other places still more insignificant? Or shall we insist on the
+     appeal being made to much larger bodies? The average population
+     of boroughs and counties is more than 60,000. Is it not high
+     time to require that no single borough shall fall below half or
+     a third of that number?"
+
+The meaning of this is clear enough. It points, if not to the
+absolute annihilation, most certainly to the concretion of the
+smaller boroughs throughout England--to an entire remarshalling of
+the electoral ranks--and, above all, to an enormous increase in the
+representation of the larger cities. In this way, you see, local
+interests will be made almost entirely to disappear; and London
+alone will secure almost as many representatives in Parliament
+as are at the present time returned for the whole kingdom of
+Scotland. Now, I confess to you, Provost, that I do not feel greatly
+exhilarated at the prospect of any such change. I believe that the
+prosperity of Great Britain depends upon the maintenance of many
+interests, and I cannot see how that can be secured if we are to
+deliver over the whole political power to the masses congregated
+within the towns. Moreover, I would very humbly remark, that past
+experience is little calculated to increase the measure of our
+faith in the wisdom or judgment of large constituencies. I may be
+wrong in my estimate of the talent and abilities of the several
+honourable members who at present sit for London and the adjacent
+districts; but, if so, I am only one out of many who labour under a
+similar delusion. We are told by the _Times_ to look to Marylebone
+as an example of a large and enlightened constituency. I obey
+the mandate; and on referring to the Parliamentary Companion, I
+find that Marylebone is represented by Lord Dudley Stuart and Sir
+Benjamin Hall. That fact does not, in my humble opinion, furnish a
+conclusive argument in favour of large constituencies. As I wish to
+avoid the Jew question, I shall say nothing about Baron Rothschild;
+but passing over to the Tower Hamlets, I find them in possession of
+Thomson and Clay; Lambeth rejoicing in d'Eyncourt and Williams; and
+Southwark in Humphrey and Molesworth. Capable senators though these
+may be, I should not like to see a Parliament composed entirely
+of men of their kidney; nor do I think that they afford undoubted
+materials for the construction of a new Cabinet.
+
+But perhaps I am undervaluing the abilities of these gentlemen;
+perhaps I am doing injustice to the discretion and wisdom of the
+metropolitan constituencies. Anxious to avoid any such imputation,
+I shall again invoke the assistance of the _Times_, whom I now cite
+as a witness, and a very powerful one, upon my side of the question.
+Let us hear the Thunderer on the subject of these same metropolitan
+constituencies, just twelve months ago, before Scarborough and
+Knaresborough had disgraced themselves by returning Protectionists
+to Parliament. I quote from a leader in the _Times_ of 8th August
+1850, referring to the Lambeth election, when Mr Williams was
+returned.
+
+     "When it was proposed some twenty years ago to extend the
+     franchise to the metropolitan boroughs, the presumption was,
+     that the quality of the representatives would bear something
+     like a proportion to the importance of the constituencies
+     called into play. In other words, if the political axioms from
+     which the principle of an extended representation is deduced
+     have any foundation in reality, it should follow that the most
+     numerous and most intelligent bodies of electors would return
+     to Parliament members of the highest mark for character and
+     capacity. Now, looking at the condition of the metropolitan
+     representation as it stands at present, or as it has stood any
+     time since the passing of the Reform Bill, has this expectation
+     been fulfilled? Lord John Russell, the First Minister of the
+     Crown, sits, indeed, as member for the city of London, and so
+     far it is well. Whatever difference of opinion may exist as to
+     the noble lord's capacity for government, or whatever may be the
+     views of this or that political party, it is beyond all dispute
+     that, in such a case as this, there is dignity and fitness in
+     the relation between the member and the constituency. But,
+     setting aside this one solitary instance, with what metropolitan
+     borough is the name of any very eminent Englishman associated at
+     the present time? It is of course as contrary to our inclination
+     as it would be unnecessary for the purposes of the argument, to
+     quote this or that man's name as an actual illustration of the
+     failure of a system, or of the decadence of a constituency. We
+     would, however, without any invidious or offensive personality,
+     invite attention to the present list of metropolitan members,
+     and ask what name is to be found among them, with the single
+     exception we have named, which is borne by a man with a shadow
+     of a pretension to be reckoned as among the leading Englishmen
+     of the age?"
+
+You see, Provost, I am by no means singular in my estimate of the
+quality of the metropolitan representatives. The _Times_ is with
+me, or was with me twelve months ago; and I suppose it will hardly
+be averred that, since that time, any enormous increase of wisdom
+or of ability has been manifested by the gentlemen referred to.
+But there is rather more than this. In the article from which I am
+quoting, the writer does not confine his strictures simply to the
+metropolitan boroughs. He goes a great deal further, for he attacks
+large constituencies in the mass, and points out very well and
+forcibly the evils which must inevitably follow should these obtain
+an accession to their power. Read, mark, and perpend the following
+paragraphs, and then reconcile their tenor--if you can--with the
+later proposals from the same quarter for the general suppression of
+small constituencies, and the establishment of larger tribunals of
+public opinion.
+
+     "Lambeth, then, on the occasion of the present election, is
+     likely to become another illustration of the downward tendencies
+     of the metropolitan constituencies. We use the word 'tendency'
+     advisedly, for matters are worse than they have been, and we
+     can perceive no symptom of a turning tide. Let us leave the
+     names of individuals aside, and simply consider the metropolitan
+     members as a body, and what is their main employment in the
+     House of Commons? _Is it not mainly to represent the selfish
+     interests and blind prejudices of the less patriotic or less
+     enlightened portion of their constituents whenever any change
+     is proposed manifestly for the public benefit?_ Looking at
+     their votes, one would suppose a metropolitan member to be
+     rather a Parliamentary agent of the drovers, and sextons, and
+     undertakers, than a representative of one of the most important
+     constituencies in the kingdom. Is this downward progress of
+     the metropolitan representation to remain unchanged? Will it
+     be extended to other constituencies as soon as they shall be
+     brought under conditions analogous to those under which the
+     metropolitan electors exercise the franchise? The question is of
+     no small interest. Whether the fault be with the electors, or
+     with those who should have the nerve to come forward and demand
+     their suffrages, matters not for the purposes of the argument.
+     The fact remains unaltered. Supposing England throughout its
+     area were represented as the various boroughs of the metropolis
+     are represented at the present time, what would be the effect?
+     That is the point for consideration. It may well be that men
+     of higher character, and of more distinguished intellectual
+     qualifications, would readily attract the sympathies and secure
+     the votes of these constituencies; but what does their absence
+     prove? _Simply that the same feeling of unwillingness to face
+     large electoral bodies, which is said to prevail in the United
+     States, is gradually rising up in this country._ On the other
+     side of the Atlantic, we are told by all who know the country
+     best, that the most distinguished citizens shrink from stepping
+     forward on the arena of public life, lest they be made the mark
+     for calumny and abuse. It would require more space than we can
+     devote to the subject to point out the correlative shortcomings
+     of the constituencies and the candidates; but, leaving these
+     aside, _we cannot but arrive at the conclusion that there is
+     something in the constitution of these great electoral masses
+     which renders a peaceful majority little better than a passive
+     instrument in the hands of a turbulent minority_, and affords an
+     explanation of the fact that such a person as Mr Williams should
+     aspire to represent the borough of Lambeth."
+
+What do you think of that, Provost, by way of an argument in favour
+of large constituencies? I agree with every word of it. I believe,
+in common with the eloquent writer, that matters are growing worse
+instead of better, and that there is something radically wrong in
+the constitution of these great electoral masses. I believe that
+they do not represent the real intelligence of the electors, and
+that they are liable to all those objections which are here so well
+and forcibly urged. It is not necessary to travel quite so far
+as London for an illustration. Look at Glasgow. Have the twelve
+thousand and odd electors of that great commercial and manufacturing
+city covered themselves with undying glory by their choice of their
+present representatives? Is the intelligence of the first commercial
+city in Scotland really embodied in the person of Mr M'Gregor? I
+should be very loth to think so. Far be it from me to impugn the
+propriety of any particular choice, or to speculate upon coming
+events; but I cannot help wondering whether, in the event of the
+suppression of some of the smaller burghs, and the transference of
+their power to the larger cities, it may come to pass that the city
+of St Mungo shall be represented by the wisdom of six M'Gregors? I
+repeat, that I wish to say nothing in disparagement of large urban
+constituencies, or of their choice in any one particular case--I
+simply desire to draw your attention to the fact, that we are not
+indebted to such constituencies for returning the men who, by common
+consent, are admitted to be the most valuable members, in point of
+talent, ability, and business habits, in the House of Commons. How
+far we should improve the character of our legislative assembly,
+by disfranchising smaller constituencies, and transferring their
+privileges to the larger ones,--open to such serious objections as
+have been urged against them by the _Times_, a journal not likely
+to err on the side of undervaluing popular opinion--appears to me a
+question decidedly open to discussion; and I hope that it will be
+discussed, pretty broadly and extensively, before any active steps
+are taken for suppressing boroughs which are not open to the charge
+of rank venality and corruption.
+
+The _Times_, you observe, talks in its more recent article, in which
+totally opposite views are advocated, of "stupid and corrupt little
+constituencies." This is a clever way of mixing up two distinct and
+separate matters. We all know what is meant by corruption, and I
+hope none of us are in favour of it. It means the purchase, either
+by money or promises, of the suffrages of those who are intrusted
+with the electoral franchise; and I am quite ready to join with the
+_Times_ in the most hearty denunciation of such villanous practices,
+whether used by Jew or Gentile. It may be, and probably is,
+impossible to prevent bribery altogether, for there are scoundrels
+in all constituencies; and if a candidate with a long purse is
+so lax in his morals as to hint at the purchase of votes, he is
+tolerably certain to find a market in which these commodities are
+sold. But if, in any case, general corruption can be proved against
+a borough, it ought to be forthwith disfranchised, and declared
+unworthy of exercising so important a public privilege. But of the
+"stupidity" of constituencies, who are to be the judges? Not, I
+hope, the Areopagites of the _Times_, else we may expect to see
+every constituency which does not pronounce in favour of Free Trade,
+placed under the general extinguisher! Scarborough, with some seven
+or eight hundred electors--a good many more, by the way, than are
+on the roll for the Dreepdaily burghs--has, in the opinion of the
+_Times_, stultified itself for ever by returning Mr George F. Young
+to Parliament, instead of a Whig lordling, who possessed great local
+influence. Therefore Scarborough is put down in the black list,
+not because it is "corrupt," but because it is "stupid," in having
+elected a gentleman of the highest political celebrity, who is at
+the same time one of the most extensive shipowners of Great Britain!
+I put it to you, Provost, whether this is not as cool an instance
+of audacity as you ever heard of. What would you think if it were
+openly proposed, upon our side, to disfranchise Greenwich, because
+the tea-and-shrimp population of that virtuous town has committed
+the stupid act of returning a Jew to Parliament? If stupidity is to
+go for anything in the way of cancelling privileges, I think I could
+name to you some half-dozen places on this side of the border which
+are in evident danger, at least if we are to accept the attainments
+of the representatives as any test of the mental acquirements of the
+electors; but perhaps it is better to avoid particulars in a matter
+so personal and delicate.
+
+I am not in the least degree surprised to find the Free-Traders
+turning round against the boroughs. Four years ago, you would
+certainly have laughed in the face of any one who might have
+prophesied such a result; but since then, times have altered. The
+grand experiment upon native industry has been made, and allowed
+to go on without check or impediment. The Free-Traders have had it
+all their own way; and if there had been one iota of truth in their
+statements, or if their calculations had been based upon secure and
+rational data, they must long ago have achieved a complete moral
+triumph. Pray, remember what they told us. They said that Free Trade
+in corn and in cattle would not permanently _lower_ the value of
+agricultural produce in Britain--it would only steady prices, and
+prevent extreme fluctuations. Then, again, we were assured that
+large imports from any part of the world could not by possibility be
+obtained; and those consummate blockheads, the statists, offered to
+prove by figures, that a deluge of foreign grain was as impossible
+as an overflow of the Mediterranean. I need not tell you that the
+results have entirely falsified such predictions, and that the
+agricultural interest has ever since been suffering under the
+effects of unexampled depression. No man denies that. The stiffest
+stickler for the cheap loaf does not venture now to assert that
+agriculture is a profitable profession in Britain; all he can do is
+to recommend economy, and to utter a hypocritical prayer, that the
+prosperity which he assumes to exist in other quarters may, at no
+distant date, and through some mysterious process which he cannot
+specify, extend itself to the suffering millions who depend for
+their subsistence on the produce of the soil of Britain, and who pay
+by far the largest share of the taxes and burdens of the kingdom.
+
+Now, it is perfectly obvious that agricultural distress, by which
+I mean the continuance of a range of unremunerative prices, cannot
+long prevail in any district, without affecting the traffic of the
+towns. You, who are an extensive retail merchant in Dreepdaily,
+know well that the business of your own trade depends in a great
+degree upon the state of the produce markets. So long as the farmer
+is thriving, he buys from you and your neighbours liberally, and you
+find him, I have no doubt, your best and steadiest customer. But if
+you reverse his circumstances, you must look for a corresponding
+change in his dealings. He cannot afford to purchase silks for his
+wife and daughters, as formerly; he grows penurious in his own
+personal expenditure, and denies himself every unnecessary luxury;
+he does nothing for the good of trade, and is impassable to all the
+temptations which you endeavour to throw in his way. To post your
+ledger is now no very difficult task. You find last year's stock
+remaining steadily on your hands; and when the season for the annual
+visit of the bagmen comes round, you dismiss them from your premises
+without gratifying their avidity by an order. This is a faithful
+picture of what has been going on for two years, at least, in the
+smaller inland boroughs. No doubt you are getting your bread cheap;
+but those whose importations have brought about that cheapness,
+never were, and never can be, customers of yours. Even supposing
+that they were to take goods in exchange for their imported grain,
+no profit or custom could accrue to the retail shopkeeper, who must
+necessarily look to the people around him for the consumption of
+his wares. In this way trade has been made to stagnate, and profits
+have of course declined, until the tradesmen, weary of awaiting
+the advent of a prosperity which never arrives, have come to the
+conclusion, that they will best consult their interest by giving
+their support to a policy the reverse of that which has crippled the
+great body of their customers.
+
+Watering-places, and towns of fashionable resort, have suffered in
+a like degree. The gentry, whose rents have been most seriously
+affected by the unnatural diminution of prices, are compelled to
+curtail their expenditure, and to deny themselves many things which
+formerly would have been esteemed legitimate indulgences. Economy is
+the order Of the day: equipages are given up, servants dismissed,
+and old furniture made to last beyond its appointed time. These
+things, I most freely admit, are no great hardships to the gentry;
+nor do I intend to awaken your compassion in behalf of the squire,
+who, by reason of his contracted rent-roll, has been compelled
+to part with his carriage and a couple of footmen, and to refuse
+his wife and daughters the pleasure of a trip to Cheltenham. The
+hardship lies elsewhere. I pity the footmen, the coach-builder, the
+upholsterer, the house proprietor in Cheltenham, and all the other
+people to whom the surplus of the squire's revenue found its way,
+much more than the old gentleman himself. I daresay he is quite
+as happy at home--perhaps far happier--than if he were compelled
+to racket elsewhere; and sure I am that he will not consume his
+dinner with less appetite because he lacks the attendance of a
+couple of knaves, with heads like full-blown cauliflowers. But is
+it consistent with the workings of human nature to expect that the
+people to whom he formerly gave employment and custom, let us say
+to the extent of a couple of thousand pounds, can be gratified by
+the cessation of that expenditure?--or is it possible to suppose
+that they will remain enamoured of a system which has caused them
+so heavy a loss? View the subject in this light, and you can have
+no difficulty in understanding why this formidable reaction has
+taken place in the English boroughs. It is simply a question of
+the pocket; and the electors now see, that unless the boroughs are
+to be left to rapid decay, something must be done to protect and
+foster that industry upon which they all depend. Such facts, which
+are open and patent to every man's experience, and tell upon his
+income and expenditure, are worth whole cargoes of theory. What
+reason has the trader, whose stock is remaining unsold upon his
+hands, to plume himself, because he is assured by Mr Porter, or
+some other similar authority, that some hundred thousand additional
+yards of flimsy calico have been shipped from the British shores
+in the course of the last twelve months? So far as the shopkeeper
+is concerned, the author of the _Progress of the Nation_ might as
+well have been reporting upon the traffic-tables of Tyre and Sidon.
+He is not even assured that all this export has been accompanied
+with a profit to the manufacturer. If he reads the _Economist_, he
+will find that exhilarating print filled with complaints of general
+distress and want of demand; he will be startled from time to time
+by the announcement that in some places, such as Dundee, trade
+has experienced a most decided check; or that in others, such as
+Nottingham and Leicester, the operatives are applying by hundreds
+for admission to the workhouse! Comfortable intelligence this,
+alongside of increasing exports! But he has been taught, to borrow
+a phrase from the writings of the late John Galt, to look upon your
+political arithmetician as "a mystery shrouded by a halo;" and he
+supposes that, somehow or other, somebody must be the gainer by all
+these exports, though it seems clearly impossible to specify the
+fortunate individual. However, this he knows, to his cost any time
+these three years back, that _he_ has not been the gainer; and, as
+he opines very justly that charity begins at home, and that the
+man who neglects the interest of his own family is rather worse
+than a heathen, he has made up his mind to support such candidates
+only as will stand by British industry, and protect him by means
+of protecting others. As for the men of the maritime boroughs--a
+large and influential class--I need not touch upon their feelings
+or sentiments with regard to Free Trade. I observe that the Liberal
+press, with peculiar taste and felicity of expression, designates
+them by the generic term of "crimps," just as it used to compliment
+the whole agriculturists of Britain by the comprehensive appellation
+of "chawbacons." I trust they feel the compliment so delicately
+conveyed; but, after all, it matters little. Hard words break no
+bones; and, in the mean time at least, the vote of a "crimp" is
+quite as good as that of the concocter of a paragraph.
+
+Perhaps now you understand why the Free-Traders are so wroth against
+the boroughs. They expected to play off the latter against the
+county constituencies; and, being disappointed in that, they want to
+swamp them altogether. This, I must own, strikes me as particularly
+unfair. Let it be granted that a large number of the smaller
+boroughs did, at the last general election, manifest a decided
+wish that the Free Trade experiment, then begun, should be allowed
+a fair trial; are they to be held so pledged to that commercial
+system, that, however disastrous may have been its results, they
+are not entitled to alter their minds? Are all the representations,
+promises, and prophecies of the leading advocates of Free Trade,
+to be set aside as if these were never uttered or written? Who
+were the cozeners in this case? Clearly the men who boasted of the
+enormous advantages which were immediately to arise from their
+policy--advantages whereof, up to the present moment, not a single
+glimpse has been vouchsafed. Free Trade, we were distinctly told,
+was to benefit the boroughs. Free Trade has done nothing of the
+kind; on the contrary, it has reduced their business and lowered
+their importance. And now, when this effect has become so plain and
+undeniable that the very men who subscribed to the funds of the
+League, and who were foremost in defending the conduct of the late
+Sir Robert Peel, are sending Protectionists to Parliament, it is
+calmly proposed to neutralise their conversion by depriving them of
+political power!
+
+Under the circumstances, I do not know that the Free-Traders could
+have hit upon a happier scheme. The grand tendency of their system
+is centralisation. They want to drive everything--paupers alone
+excepted, if they could by possibility compass that fortunate
+immunity--into the larger towns, which are the seats of export
+manufacture, and to leave the rest of the population to take care
+of themselves. You see how they have succeeded in Ireland, by
+the reports of the last census. They are doing the same thing in
+Scotland, as we shall ere long discover to our cost; and, indeed,
+the process is going on slowly, but surely, throughout the whole of
+the British islands. I chanced the other day to light upon a passage
+in a very dreary article in the last number of the _Edinburgh
+Review_, which seems to me to embody the chief economical doctrines
+of the gentlemen to whom we are indebted for the present posture of
+affairs. It is as follows:--
+
+     "The common watchword, or cuckoo-note of the advocates of
+     restriction in affairs of trade is, 'Protection to Native
+     Industry.' In the principle fairly involved in this motto we
+     cordially agree. We are as anxious as the most vehement advocate
+     for high import duties on foreign products can be, that the
+     industry of our fellow-countrymen should be protected(!) We only
+     differ as to the means. Their theory of protection is to guard
+     against competition those branches of industry which, without
+     such extraneous help, could never be successfully pursued:
+     ours, is that of enlarging, to the uttermost, those other
+     branches for the prosecution of which our countrymen possess the
+     greatest aptitude, and of thereby securing for their skill and
+     capital the greatest return. This protection is best afforded
+     by governments when they leave, without interference, the
+     productive industry of the country to find its true level; for
+     we may be certain that the interest of individuals will always
+     lead them to prefer those pursuits which they find most gainful.
+     There is, in fact, no mode of interference with entire freedom
+     of action which must not be, in some degree, hurtful; but _the
+     mischief which follows upon legislation in affairs of trade, in
+     any given country, is then most noxious when it tends to foster
+     branches of industry for which other countries have a greater
+     aptitude_."
+
+You will, I think, find some difficulty in discovering the
+protective principle enunciated by this sagacious scribe, who,
+like many others of his limited calibre, is fain to take refuge
+in nonsense when he cannot extricate his meaning. You may also,
+very reasonably, entertain doubts whether the protective theory,
+which our friend of the Blue and Yellow puts into the mouth of his
+opponents, was ever entertained or promulgated by any rational
+being, at least in the broad sense which he wishes to imply. The
+true protective theory has reference to the State burdens, which,
+in so far as they are exacted from the produce of native industry,
+or, in other words, from labour, we wish to see counterbalanced by
+a fair import-duty, which shall reduce the foreign and the native
+producer to an equality in the home market. When the reviewer talks
+of the non-interference of Government with regard to the productive
+industry of the country, he altogether omits mention of that most
+stringent interference which is the direct result of taxation. If
+the farmer were allowed to till the ground, to sow the seed, and to
+reap the harvest, without any interference from Government, then I
+admit at once that a demand for protection would be preposterous.
+But when Government requires him to pay income-tax, assessed taxes,
+church and poor-rates, besides other direct burdens, out of the
+fruit of his industry--when it prevents him from growing on his own
+land several kinds of crop, in order that the customs revenue may
+be maintained--when it taxes indirectly his tea, coffee, wines,
+spirits, tobacco, soap, and spiceries--then I say that Government
+_does_ interfere, and that most unmercifully, with the productive
+industry of the country. Just suppose that, by recurring to a
+primitive method of taxation, the Government should lay claim
+to one-third of the proceeds of every crop, and instruct its
+emissaries to remove it from the ground before another acre should
+be reaped--would _that_ not constitute interference in the eyes of
+the sapient reviewer? Well, then, since all taxes must ultimately be
+paid out of produce, what difference does the mere method of levying
+the burden make with regard to the burden itself? I call your
+attention to this point, because the Free-Traders invariably, but
+I fear wilfully, omit all mention of artificial taxation when they
+talk of artificial restrictions. They want you to believe that we,
+who maintain the opposite view, seek to establish an entire monopoly
+in Great Britain of all kinds of possible produce; and they are in
+the habit of putting asinine queries as to the propriety of raising
+the duties on foreign wine, so as to encourage the establishment of
+vineyards in Kent and Sussex, and also as to the proper protective
+duty which should be levied on pine-apples, in order that a due
+stimulus may be given to the cultivation of that luscious fruit. But
+these funny fellows take especial care never to hint to you that
+protection is and was demanded simply on account of the enormous
+nature of our imposts, which have the effect of raising the rates
+of labour. It is in this way, and no other, that agriculture,
+deprived of protection, but still subjected to taxation, has become
+an unremunerative branch of industry; and you observe how calmly
+the disciple of Ricardo condemns it to destruction. "The mischief,"
+quoth he, "which follows upon legislation in affairs of trade, in
+any given country, is then most noxious when it tends to foster
+branches of industry for which other countries have a greater
+aptitude." So, then, having taxed agriculture to that point when it
+can no longer bear the burden, we are, for the future, to draw our
+supplies from "other countries which have a greater aptitude" for
+growing corn; that aptitude consisting in their comparative immunity
+from taxation, and in the degraded moral and social condition of
+the serfs who constitute the tillers of the soil! We are to give up
+cultivation, and apply ourselves to the task "of enlarging to the
+uttermost those other branches, for the prosecution of which our
+countrymen possess the greatest aptitude"--by which, I presume, is
+meant the manufacture of cotton-twist!
+
+Now, then, consider for a moment what is the natural, nay, the
+inevitable effect of this narrowing of the range of employment.
+I shall not start the important point whether the concentration
+of labour does not tend to lower wages--I shall merely assume,
+what is indeed already abundantly established by facts, that the
+depression of agriculture in any district leads almost immediately
+to a large increase in the population of the greater towns. Places
+like Dreepdaily may remain stationary, but they do not receive any
+material increment to their population. You have, I believe, no
+export trade, at least very little, beyond the manufacture of an
+ingenious description of snuff-box, justly prized by those who are
+in the habit of stimulating their nostrils. The displaced stream of
+labour passes through you, but does not tarry with you--it rolls
+on towards Paisley and Glasgow, where it is absorbed in the living
+ocean. Year after year the same process is carried on. The older
+people, probably because it is not worth while at their years to
+attempt a change, tarry in their little villages and cots, and
+gradually acquire that appearance of utter apathy, which is perhaps
+the saddest aspect of humanity. The younger people, finding no
+employment at home, repair to the towns, marry or do worse, and
+propagate children for the service of the factories which are
+dedicated to the export trade. Of education they receive little or
+nothing; for they must be in attendance on their gaunt iron master
+during the whole of their waking hours; and religion seeks after
+them in vain. What wonder, then, if the condition of our operatives
+should be such as to suggest to thinking minds very serious doubts
+whether our boasted civilisation can be regarded in the light of a
+blessing? Certain it is that the bulk of these classes are neither
+better nor happier than their forefathers. Nay, if there be any
+truth in evidence--any reality in the appalling accounts which reach
+us from the heart of the towns, there exists an amount of crime,
+misery, drunkenness, and profligacy, which is unknown even among
+savages and heathen nations. Were we to recall from the four ends
+of the earth all the missionaries who have been despatched from the
+various churches, they would find more than sufficient work ready
+for them at home. Well-meaning men project sanitary improvements, as
+if these could avail to counteract the moral poison. New churches
+are built; new schools are founded; public baths are subscribed for,
+and public washing-houses are opened; the old rookeries are pulled
+down, and light and air admitted to the heart of the cities--but the
+heart of the people is not changed; and neither air nor water, nor
+religious warning, has the effect of checking crime, eradicating
+intemperance, or teaching man the duty which he owes to himself, his
+brethren, and his God! This is an awful picture, but it is a true
+one; and it well becomes us to consider why these things should be.
+There is no lukewarmness on the subject exhibited in any quarter.
+The evil is universally acknowledged, and every one would be ready
+to contribute to alleviate it, could a proper remedy be suggested.
+It is not my province to suggest remedies; but it does appear to
+me that the original fault is to be found in the system which has
+caused this unnatural pressure of our population into the towns. I
+am aware that in saying this, I am impugning the leading doctrines
+of modern political economy. I am aware that I am uttering what
+will be considered by many as a rank political heresy; still, not
+having the fear of fire and fagot before my eyes, I shall use the
+liberty of speech. It appears to me that the system which has been
+more or less adopted since the days of Mr Huskisson, of suppressing
+small trades for the encouragement of foreign importation, and of
+stimulating export manufactures to the uttermost, has proved very
+pernicious to the morals and the social condition of the people. The
+termination of the war found us with a large population, and with an
+enormous debt. If, on the one hand, it was for the advantage of the
+country that commerce should progress with rapid strides, and that
+our foreign trade should be augmented, it was, on the other, no less
+necessary that due regard should be had for the former occupations
+of the people, and that no great and violent displacements of
+labour should be occasioned, by fiscal relaxations which might have
+the effect of supplanting home industry by foreign produce in the
+British market. The mistake of the political economists lies in
+their obstinate determination to enforce a principle, which in the
+abstract is not only unobjectionable but unchallenged, without any
+regard whatever to the peculiar and pecuniary circumstances of the
+country. They will not look at what has gone before, in order to
+determine their line of conduct in any particular case. They admit
+of no exceptions. They start with their axiom that trade ought to
+be free, and they will not listen to any argument founded upon
+special circumstances in opposition to that doctrine. Now, this
+is not the way in which men have been, or ever can be, governed.
+They must be dealt with as rational beings, not regarded as mere
+senseless machinery, which may be treated as lumber, and cast aside
+to make way for some new improvement. Look at the case of our own
+Highlanders. We know very well that, from the commencement of
+the American war, it was considered by the British Government an
+important object to maintain the population of the Highlands, as
+the source from which they drew their hardiest and most serviceable
+recruits. So long as the manufacture of kelp existed, and the
+breeding of cattle was profitable, there was little difficulty in
+doing this; now, under this new commercial system, we are told that
+the population is infinitely too large for the natural resources of
+the country; we are shocked by accounts of periodical famine, and of
+deaths occurring from starvation; and our economists declare that
+there is no remedy except a general emigration of the inhabitants.
+This is the extreme case in Great Britain; but extreme cases often
+furnish us with the best tests of the operation of a particular
+system. Here you have a population fostered for an especial purpose,
+and abandoned so soon as that special purpose has been served.
+Without maintaining that the Gael is the most industrious of
+mankind, it strikes me forcibly that it would be a better national
+policy to give every reasonable encouragement to the development of
+the natural resources of that portion of the British islands, than
+to pursue the opposite system, and to reduce the Highlands to a
+wilderness. Not so think the political economists. They can derive
+their supplies cheaper from elsewhere, at the hands of strangers
+who contribute no share whatever to the national revenue; and for
+the sake of that cheapness they are content to reduce thousands of
+their countrymen to beggary. But emigration cannot, and will not,
+be carried out to an extent at all equal to the necessity which is
+engendered by the cessation of employment. The towns become the
+great centre-points and recipients of the displaced population; and
+so centralisation goes on, and, as a matter of course, pauperism and
+crime increase.
+
+To render this system perpetual, without any regard to ultimate
+consequences, is the leading object of the Free-Traders. Not
+converted, but on the contrary rendered more inveterate by
+the failure of their schemes, they are determined to allow no
+consideration whatever to stand in the way of their purpose; and
+of this you have a splendid instance in their late denunciation of
+the boroughs. They think--whether rightfully or wrongfully, it is
+not now necessary to inquire--that, by altering the proportions
+of Parliamentary power as established by the Reform Act--by
+taking away from the smaller boroughs, and by adding to the urban
+constituencies, they will still be able to command a majority in the
+House of Commons. In the present temper of the nation, and so long
+as its voice is expressed as heretofore, they know, feel, and admit
+that their policy is not secure. And why is it not secure? Simply
+because it has undergone the test of experience--because it has had
+a fair trial in the sight of the nation--and because it has not
+succeeded in realising the expectations of its founders.
+
+I have ventured to throw together these few crude remarks for your
+consideration during the recess, being quite satisfied that you will
+not feel indifferent upon any subject which touches the dignity,
+status, or privileges of the boroughs. Whether Lord John Russell
+agrees with the _Times_ as to the mode of effecting the threatened
+Parliamentary change, or whether he has some separate scheme of his
+own, is a question which I cannot solve. Possibly he has not yet
+made up his mind as to the course which it may be most advisable to
+pursue; for, in the absence of anything like general excitement or
+agitation, it is not easy to predict in what manner the proposal for
+any sweeping or organic change may be received by the constituencies
+of the Empire. There is far too much truth in the observations which
+I have already quoted from the great leading journal, relative to
+the dangers which must attend an increase of constituencies already
+too large, or a further extension of their power, to permit of our
+considering this as a light and unimportant matter. I view it as a
+very serious one indeed; and I cannot help thinking that Lord John
+Russell has committed an act of gross and unjustifiable rashness, in
+pledging himself, at the present time, to undertake a remodelment of
+the constitution. But whatever he does, I hope, for his own sake,
+and for the credit of the Liberal party, that he will be able to
+assign some better and more constitutional reason for the change,
+than the refusal of the English boroughs to bear arms in the crusade
+which is directed against the interests of Native Industry.
+
+
+
+
+PARIS IN 1851.--(_Continued._)
+
+
+THE OPERA.--In the evening I went to the French Opera, which is
+still one of the lions of Paris. It was once in the Rue Richelieu;
+but the atrocious assassination of the Duc de Berri, who was stabbed
+in its porch, threw a kind of horror over the spot: the theatre was
+closed, and the performance moved to its present site in the Rue
+Lepelletier, a street diverging from the Boulevard.
+
+Fond as the French are of decoration, the architecture of this
+building possesses no peculiar beauty, and would answer equally well
+for a substantial public hospital, a workhouse, or a barrack, if
+the latter were not the more readily suggested by the gendarmerie
+loitering about the doors, and the mounted dragoons at either end of
+the street.
+
+The passages of the interior are of the same character--spacious and
+substantial; but the door of the _salle_ opens, and the stranger,
+at a single step, enters from those murky passages into all the
+magic of a crowded theatre. The French have, within these few
+years, borrowed from us the art of lighting theatres. I recollect
+the French theatre lighted only by a few lamps scattered round the
+house, or a chandelier in the middle, which might have figured in
+the crypt of a cathedral. This they excused, as giving greater
+effect to the stage; but it threw the audience into utter gloom.
+They have now made the audience a part of the picture, and an
+indispensable part. The opera-house now shows the audience; and if
+not very dressy, or rather as dowdy, odd, and dishevelled a crowd as
+I ever recollect to have seen within theatrical walls, yet they are
+evidently human beings, which is much more picturesque than masses
+of spectres, seen only by an occasional flash from the stage.
+
+The French architects certainly have not made this national edifice
+grand; but they have made it a much better thing,--lively, showy,
+and rich. Neither majestic and monotonous, nor grand and Gothic,
+they have made it _riant_ and racy, like a place where men and
+women come to be happy, where beautiful dancers are to be seen,
+and where sweet songs are to be heard, and where the mind is for
+three or four hours to forget all its cares, and to carry away
+pleasant recollections for the time being. From pit to ceiling
+it is covered with paintings--all sorts of cupids, nymphs, and
+flower-garlands, and Greek urns--none of them wonders of the pencil,
+but all exhibiting that showy mediocrity of which every Frenchman is
+capable, and with which every Frenchman is in raptures. All looks
+rich, warm, and _operatic_.
+
+One characteristic change has struck me everywhere in Paris--the men
+dress better, and the women worse. When I was last here, the men
+dressed half bandit and half Hottentot. The revolutionary mystery
+was at work, and the hatred of the Bourbons was emblematised in a
+conical hat, a loose neckcloth, tremendous trousers, and the scowl
+of a stage conspirator. The Parisian men have since learned the
+decencies of _dress_.
+
+As I entered the house before the rising of the curtain, I had
+leisure to look about me, and I found even in the audience a strong
+contrast to those of London. By that kind of contradiction to
+everything rational and English which governs the Parisian, the
+women seem to choose _dishabille_ for the Opera.
+
+As the house was crowded, and the boxes are let high, and the
+performance of the night was popular, I might presume that some of
+the _elite_ were present, yet I never saw so many _ill-dressed_
+women under one roof. Bonnets, shawls, muffles of all kinds, were
+the _costume_. How different from the finish, the splendour, and
+the _fashion_ of the English opera-box. I saw hundreds of women who
+appeared, by their dress, scarcely above the rank of shopkeepers,
+yet, who probably were among the Parisian leaders of fashion, if in
+republican Paris there are _any_ leaders of fashion.
+
+But I came to be interested, to enjoy, to indulge in a feast of
+music and acting; with no fastidiousness of criticism, and with
+every inclination to be gratified. In the opera itself I was utterly
+disappointed. The Opera was _Zerline_, or, _The Basket of Oranges_.
+The composer was the first living musician of France, Auber; the
+writer was the most popular dramatist of his day, Scribe; the Prima
+Donna was Alboni, to whom the manager of the Opera in London had
+not thought it too much to give L4000 for a single season. I never
+paid my francs with more willing expectation: and I never saw a
+performance of which I so soon got weary.
+
+The plot is singularly trifling. Zerline, an orange-girl of Palermo,
+has had a daughter by Boccanera, a man of rank, who afterwards
+becomes Viceroy of Sicily. Zerline is captured by pirates, and
+carried to Algiers. The opera opens with her return to Palermo,
+after so many years that her daughter is grown up to womanhood; and
+Boccanera is emerged into public life, and has gradually became an
+officer of state.
+
+The commencing scene has all the animation of the French
+picturesque. The Port of Palermo is before the spectator; the
+location is the Fruit Market. Masses of fruits, with smart peasantry
+to take care of them, cover the front of the stage. The background
+is filled up with Lazzaroni lying on the ground, sleeping, or eating
+macaroni. The Prince Boccanera comes from the palace; the crowd
+observe 'Son air sombre;' the Prince sings--
+
+    "On a most unlucky day,
+     Satan threw her in my way;
+     I the princess took to wife,
+     Now the torture of my life," &c.
+
+After this matrimonial confession, which extends to details, the
+prime minister tells us of his love still existing for Zerline,
+whose daughter he has educated under the name of niece, and who is
+now the Princess Gemma, and about to be married to a court noble.
+
+A ship approaches the harbour; Boccanera disappears; the Lazzaroni
+hasten to discharge the cargo. Zerline lands from the vessel, and
+sings a cavatina in praise of Palermo:--
+
+    "O Palerme! O Sicile!
+     Beau ciel, plaine fertile!"
+
+Zerline is a dealer in oranges, and she lands her cargo, placing
+it in the market. The original tenants of the place dispute her
+right to come among them, and are about to expel her by force, when
+a marine officer, Rodolf, takes her part, and, drawing his sword,
+puts the whole crowd to flight. Zerline, moved by this instance of
+heroism, tells him her story, that she was coming "un beau matin"
+to the city to sell oranges, when a pitiless corsair captured her,
+and carried her to Africa, separating her from her child, whom she
+had not seen for fifteen years; that she escaped to Malta, laid in
+a stock of oranges there;--and thus the events of the day occurred.
+Rodolf, this young hero, is costumed in a tie-wig with powder, stiff
+skirts, and the dress of a century ago. What tempted the author
+to put not merely his hero, but all his court characters, into
+the costume of Queen Anne, is not easily conceivable, as there is
+nothing in the story which limits it in point of time.
+
+Zerline looks after him with sudden sympathy, says that she heard
+him sigh, that he must be unhappy, and that, if her daughter
+lives, he is just the _husband_ for her,--Zerline not having been
+particular as to marriage herself. She then rambles about the
+streets, singing,
+
+    "Achetez mes belles oranges,
+     Des fruits divins, des fruits exquis;
+     Des oranges comme les anges
+     N'en _goutent pas en Paradis_."
+
+After this "hommage aux oranges!" to the discredit of Paradise, on
+which turns the plot of the play, a succession of maids of honour
+appear, clad in the same unfortunate livery of fardingales, enormous
+flat hats, powdered wigs, and stomachers. The Princess follows them,
+apparently armed by her costume against all the assaults of Cupid.
+But she, too, has an "affaire du coeur" upon her hands. In fact,
+from the Orangewoman up to the Throne, Cupid is the Lord of Palermo,
+with its "beau ciel, plaine fertile." The object of the Princess's
+love is the Marquis de Buttura, the suitor of her husband's
+supposed niece. Here is a complication! The enamoured wife receives
+a billet-doux from the suitor, proposing a meeting on his return
+from hunting. She tears the billet for the purpose of concealment,
+and in her emotion drops the fragments on the floor. That billet
+performs all important part in the end. The enamoured lady buys an
+orange, and gives a gold piece for it. Zerline, not accustomed to
+be so well paid for her fruit, begins to suspect this outrageous
+liberality; and having had experience in these matters, picks up the
+fragments of the letter, and gets into the whole secret.
+
+The plot proceeds: the daughter of the orangewoman now appears. She
+is clad in the same preposterous habiliments. As the niece of the
+minister, she is created a princess, (those things are cheap in
+Italy,) and she, too, is in love with the officer in the tie-wig.
+She recognises the song of Zerline, "Achetez mes belles oranges,"
+and sings the half of it. On this, the mother and daughter now
+recognise each other. It is impossible to go further in such a
+_denouement_. If Italian operas are proverbially silly, we are to
+recollect that this is not an Italian, but a French one; and that it
+is by the most popular comic writer of France.
+
+The marriage of Gemma and Rodolf is forbidden by the pride of the
+King's sister, the wife of Boccanera, but Zerline interposes,
+reminds her of the orange _affair_, threatens her with the discovery
+of the billet-doux, and finally makes her give her consent: and thus
+the curtain drops. I grew tired of all this insipidity, and left the
+theatre before the catastrophe. The music seemed to me fitting for
+the plot--neither better nor worse; and I made my escape with right
+good-will from the clamour and crash of the orchestra, and from the
+loves and _faux pas_ of the belles of Palermo.
+
+_The Obelisk._--I strayed into the Place de la Concorde, beyond
+comparison the finest _space_ in Paris. I cannot call it a square,
+nor does it equal in animation the Boulevard; but in the _profusion_
+of noble architecture it has no rival in Paris, nor in Europe. _Vive
+la Despotisme!_ every inch of it is owing to Monarchy. Republics
+build nothing, if we except prisons and workhouses. They are
+proverbially squalid, bitter, and beggarly. What has America, with
+all her boasting, ever built, but a warehouse or a conventicle?
+The Roman Republic, after seven hundred years' existence, remained
+a collection hovels till an Emperor faced them with marble. If
+Athens exhibited her universal talents in the splendour of her
+architecture, we must recollect that Pericles was her _master_
+through life--as substantially _despotic_, by the aid of the
+populace, as an Asiatic king by his guards; and recollect, also,
+that an action of damages was brought against him for "wasting
+the public money on the Parthenon," the glory of Athens in every
+succeeding age. Louis Quatorze, Napoleon, and Louis Philippe--two
+openly, and the third secretly, as despotic as the Sultan--were the
+true builders of Paris.
+
+As I stood in the centre of this vast enclosure, I was fully struck
+with the effect of _scene_. The sun was sinking into a bed of gold
+and crimson clouds, that threw their hue over the long line of
+the Champs Elysees. Before me were the two great fountains, and
+the Obelisk of Luxor. The fountains had ceased to play, from the
+lateness of the hour, but still looked massive and gigantic; the
+obelisk looked shapely and superb. The gardens of the Tuilleries
+were on my left--deep dense masses of foliage, surmounted in the
+distance by the tall roofs of the old Palace; on my right, the
+verdure of the Champs Elysees, with the Arc de l'Etoile rising above
+it, at the end of its long and noble avenue; in my front the Palace
+of the Legislature, a chaste and elegant structure; and behind me,
+glowing in the sunbeams, the Madeleine, the noblest church--I think
+the noblest edifice, in Paris, and perhaps not surpassed in beauty
+and grandeur, for its size, by any place of worship in Europe.
+The air cool and sweet from the foliage, the vast _place_ almost
+solitary, and undisturbed by the cries which are incessant in this
+babel during the day, yet with that gentle confusion of sounds which
+makes the murmur and the music of a great city. All was calm, noble,
+and soothing.
+
+The obelisk of Luxor which stands in the centre of the "Place," is
+one of two Monoliths, or pillars of a single stone, which, with
+Cleopatra's Needle, were given by Mehemet Ali to the French,
+at the time when, by their alliance, he expected to have made
+himself independent. All the dates of Egyptian antiquities are
+uncertain--notwithstanding Young and his imitator Champollion--but
+the date _assigned_ to this pillar is 1550 years before the
+Christian era. The two obelisks stood in front of the great temple
+of Thebes, now named Luxor, and the hieroglyphics which cover this
+one, from top to bottom, are supposed to relate the exploits and
+incidents of the reign of Sesostris.
+
+It is of red Syenite; but, from time and weather, it is almost the
+colour of limestone. It has an original flaw up a third of its
+height, for which the Egyptian masons provided a remedy by wedges,
+and the summit is slightly broken. The height of the monolith is
+seventy-two feet three inches, which would look insignificant,
+fixed as it is in the centre of lofty buildings, but for its being
+raised on a plinth of granite, and that again raised on a pedestal
+of immense blocks of granite--the height of the plinth and the
+pedestal together being twenty-seven feet, making the entire height
+nearly one hundred. The weight of the monolith is five hundred
+thousand pounds; the weight of the pedestal is half that amount, and
+the weight of the blocks probably makes the whole amount to nine
+hundred thousand, which is the weight of the obelisk at Rome. It was
+erected in 1836, by drawing it up an inclined plane of masonry, and
+then raising it by cables and capstans to the perpendicular. The
+operation was tedious, difficult, and expensive; but it was worth
+the labour; and the monolith now forms a remarkable monument of the
+zeal of the king, and of the liberality of his government.
+
+There is, I understand, an obelisk remaining in Egypt, which
+was given by the Turkish government to the British army, on the
+expulsion of the French from Egypt, but which has been unclaimed,
+from the difficulty of carrying it to England.
+
+That difficulty, it must be acknowledged, is considerable. In
+transporting and erecting the obelisk of Luxor six years were
+employed. I have not heard the expense, but it must have been large.
+A vessel was especially constructed at Toulon, for its conveyance
+down the Nile. A long road was to be made from the Nile to the
+Temple. Then the obelisk required to be protected from the accidents
+of carriage, which was done by enclosing it in a wooden case. It was
+then drawn by manual force to the river--and this employed three
+months. Then came the trouble of embarking it, for which the vessel
+had to be nearly sawn through; then came the crossing of the bar
+at Rosetta--a most difficult operation at the season of the year;
+then the voyage down the Mediterranean, the vessel being towed by a
+steamer; then the landing at Cherbourg, in 1833; and, lastly, the
+passage up the Seine, which occupied nearly four months, reaching
+Paris in December; thenceforth its finishing and erection, which was
+completed only in three years after.
+
+This detail may have some interest, as we have a similar project
+before us. But the whole question is, whether the transport of the
+obelisk which remains in Egypt for us is worth the expense. We,
+without hesitation, say that it _is_. The French have shown that it
+is _practicable_, and it is a matter of _rational_ desire to show
+that we are not behind the French either in power, in ability, or
+in zeal, to adorn our cities. The obelisk transported to England
+would be a proud monument, without being an offensive one, of a
+great achievement of our armies; it would present to our eyes, and
+those of our children, a relic of the most civilised kingdom of the
+early ages; it would sustain the recollections of the scholar by its
+record, and might kindle the energy of the people by the sight of
+what had been accomplished by the prowess of Englishmen.
+
+If it be replied that such views are Utopian, may we not ask,
+what is the use of all antiquity, since we can eat and drink as
+well without it? But we cannot _feel_ as loftily without it; many
+a lesson of vigour, liberality, and virtue would be lost to us
+without it; we should lose the noblest examples of the arts, some
+of the finest displays of human genius in architecture, a large
+portion of the teaching of the public mind in all things great,
+and an equally large portion of the incentives to public virtue in
+all things self-denying. The labour, it is true, of conveying the
+obelisk would be serious, the expense considerable, and we might
+not see it erected before the gate of Buckingham Palace these ten
+years. But it would be erected at _last_. It would be a trophy--it
+would be an abiding memorial of the extraordinary country from which
+civilisation spread to the whole world.
+
+But the two grand fountains ought especially to stimulate our
+emulation. Those we can have without a voyage from Alexandria to
+Portsmouth, or a six years' delay.
+
+The fountains of the Place de la Concorde would deserve praise
+if it were only for their beauty. At a distance sufficient for
+the picturesque, and with the sun shining on them, they actually
+look like domes and cataracts of molten silver; and a nearer view
+does not diminish their right to admiration. They are both lofty,
+perhaps, fifty feet high, both consisting of three basins, lessening
+in size in proportion to their height, and all pouring out sheets
+of water from the trumpets of Tritons, from the mouths of dolphins,
+and from allegorical figures. One of those fountains is in honour of
+Maritime Navigation, and the other of the Navigation of Rivers. In
+the former the figures represent the Ocean and the Mediterranean,
+with the Genii of the fisheries; and in the upper basin are
+Commerce, Astronomy, Navigation, &c., all capital bronzes, and all
+spouting out floods of water. The fountain of River Navigation is
+not behind its rival in bronze or water. It exhibits the Rhine and
+the Rhone, with the Genii of fruits and flowers, of the vintage and
+the harvest, with the usual attendance of Tritons. Why the artist
+had no room for the Seine and the Garonne, while he introduced the
+Rhine, which is not a French river in any part of its course, must
+be left for his explanation; but the whole constitutes a beautiful
+and magnificent object, and, with the sister fountain, perhaps
+forms the finest display of the kind in Europe. I did not venture,
+while looking at those stately monuments of French art, to turn my
+thoughts to our own unhappy performances in Trafalgar Square--the
+rival of a soda-water bottle, yet the work of a people of boundless
+wealth, and the first machinists in the world.
+
+_The Jardin des Plantes._--I found this fine establishment crowded
+with the lower orders--fathers and mothers, nurses, old women, and
+soldiers. As it includes the popular attractions of a zoological
+garden, as well as a botanical, every day sees its visitants, and
+every holiday its crowds. The plants are for science, and for that
+I had no time, even had I possessed other qualifications; but the
+zoological collection were for curiosity, and of that the spectators
+had abundance. Yet the animals of pasture appeared to be languid,
+possibly tired of the perpetual bustle round them--for all animals
+love quiet at certain times, and escape from the eye of man, when
+escape is in their power. Possibly the heat of the weather, for
+the day was remarkably sultry, might have contributed to their
+exhaustion. But if they have memory--and why should they not?--they
+must have strangely felt the contrast of their free pastures, shady
+woods, and fresh streams, with the little patch of ground, the
+parched soil, and the clamour of ten thousand tongues round them.
+I could imagine the antelope's intelligent eye, as he lay panting
+before us on his brown patch of soil, comparing it with the ravines
+of the Cape, or the eternal forests clothing the hills of his native
+Abyssinia.
+
+But the object of all popular interest was the pit of the bears;
+there the crowd was incessant and delighted. But the bears, three
+or four huge brown beasts, by no means _reciprocated_ the popular
+feeling. They sat quietly on their hind-quarters, gazing grimly at
+the groups which lined their rails, and tossed cakes and apples to
+them from above. They had probably been saturated with sweets, for
+they scarcely noticed anything but by a growl. They were insensible
+to apples--even oranges could not make them move, and cakes they
+seemed to treat with scorn. It was difficult to conceive that
+those heavy and unwieldy-looking animals could be ferocious; but
+the Alpine hunter knows that they are as fierce as the tiger, and
+nearly as quick and dangerous in their spring.
+
+The carnivorous beasts were few, and, except in the instance of
+one lion, of no remarkable size or beauty. As they naturally doze
+during the day, their languor was no proof of their weariness; but
+I have never seen an exhibition of this kind without some degree of
+regret. The plea of the promotion of science is nothing. Even if
+it were important to science to be acquainted with the habits of
+the lion and tiger, which it is not, their native habits are not to
+be learned from the animal shut up in a cage. The chief exertion
+of their sagacity and their strength in the native state is in the
+pursuit of prey; yet what of these can be learned from the condition
+in which the animal dines as regularly as his keeper, and divides
+his time between feeding and sleep? Half-a-dozen lions let loose in
+the Bois de Boulogne would let the naturalist into more knowledge of
+their nature than a menagerie for fifty years.
+
+The present system is merely cruel; and the animals, without
+exercise, without air, without the common excitement of free motion,
+which all animals enjoy so highly--perhaps much more highly than the
+human race--fall into disease and die, no doubt miserably, though
+they cannot draw up a _rationale_ of their sufferings. I have been
+told that the lions in confinement die chiefly of consumption--a
+singularly sentimental disease for this proud ravager of the desert.
+But the whole purpose of display would be answered as effectually
+by exhibiting half-a-dozen lions' _skins_ stuffed, in the different
+attitudes of seizing their prey, or ranging the forest, or feeding.
+At present nothing is seen but a great beast asleep, or restlessly
+moving in a space of half-a-dozen square feet, and pining away in
+his confinement. An eagle on his perch and with a chain on his leg,
+in a menagerie, always appears to me like a dethroned monarch; and
+I have never seen him thus cast down from his "high estate" without
+longing to break his chain, and let him spread his wing, and delight
+his splendid eye with the full view of his kingdom of the Air.
+
+The Jardin dates its origin as far back as Louis XIII., when the
+king's physician recommended its foundation for science. The French
+are fond of gardening, and are good gardeners; and the climate is
+peculiarly favourable to flowers, as is evident from the market held
+every morning in summer by the side of the Madeleine, where the
+greatest abundance of the richest flowers I ever saw is laid out for
+the luxury of the Parisians.
+
+The Jardin, patronised by kings and nobles, flourished through
+successive reigns; but the appointment of Buffon, about the middle
+of the eighteenth century, suddenly raised it to the pinnacle of
+European celebrity. The most eloquent writer of his time, (in
+the style which the French call eloquence,) a man of family, and
+a man of opulence, he made Natural History the _fashion_, and
+in France that word is magic. It accomplishes everything--it
+includes everything. All France was frantic with the study of
+plants, animals, poultry-yards, and projects for driving tigers in
+cabriolets, and harnessing lions _a la Cybele_.
+
+But Buffon mixed good sense with his inevitable _charlatanrie_--he
+selected the ablest men whom he could find for his professors;
+and in France there is an extraordinary quantity of "ordinary"
+cleverness--they gave amusing lectures, and they won the hearts of
+the nation.
+
+But the Revolution came, and crushed all institutions alike. Buffon,
+fortunate in every way, had died in the year before, in 1788, and
+was thus spared the sight of the general ruin. The Jardin escaped,
+through some plea of its being national property; but the professors
+had fled, and were starving, or starved.
+
+The Consulate, and still more the Empire, restored the
+establishment. Napoleon was ambitious of the character of a man
+of science, he was a member of the Institute, he knew the French
+character, and he flattered the national vanity, by indulging it
+with the prospect of being at the head of human knowledge.
+
+The institution had by this time been so long regarded as a
+public show that it was beginning to be regarded as nothing else.
+Gratuitous lectures, which are always good for nothing, and to
+which all kinds of people crowd with corresponding profit, were
+gradually reducing the character of the Jardin; when Cuvier, a
+man of talent, was appointed to one of the departments of the
+institution, and he instantly revived its popularity; and, what was
+of more importance, its public use.
+
+Cuvier devoted himself to comparative anatomy and geology. The
+former was a study within human means, of which he had the materials
+round him, and which, being intended for the instruction of man, is
+evidently intended for his investigation. The latter, in attempting
+to fix the age of the world, to decide on the process of creation,
+and to contradict Scripture by the ignorance of man, is merely
+an instance of the presumption of _Sciolism_. Cuvier exhibited
+remarkable dexterity in discovering the species of the fossil
+fishes, reptiles, and animals. The science was not new, but he threw
+it into a new form--he made it interesting, and he made it probable.
+If a large proportion of his supposed discoveries were merely
+ingenious guesses, they were at least guesses which there was nobody
+to refute, and they _were ingenious_--that was enough. Fame followed
+him, and the lectures of the ingenious theorist were a popular
+novelty. The "Cabinet of Comparative Anatomy" in the Jardin is the
+monument of his diligence, and it does honour to the sagacity of his
+investigation.
+
+One remark, however, must be made. On a former visit to the Cabinet
+of Comparative Anatomy, among the collection of skeletons, I was
+surprised and disgusted with the sight of the skeleton of the Arab
+who killed General Kleber in Egypt. The Arab was impaled, and the
+iron spike was shown _still sticking in the_ spine! I do not know
+whether this hideous object is still to be seen, for I have not
+lately visited the apartment; but, if existing still, it ought to
+remain no longer in a museum of science. Of course, the assassin
+deserved death; but, in all probability, the murder which made him
+guilty, was of the same order as that which made Charlotte Corday
+famous. How many of his countrymen had died by the soldiery of
+France! In the eye of Christianity, this is no palliation; though in
+the eye of Mahometanism it might constitute a patriot and a hero. At
+all events, so frightful a spectacle ought _not_ to meet the public
+eye.
+
+_Hotel des Invalides._--The depository of all that remains of
+Napoleon, the monument of almost two hundred years of war, and the
+burial-place of a whole host of celebrated names, is well worth
+the visit of strangers; and I entered the esplanade of the famous
+_hotel_ with due veneration, and some slight curiosity to see the
+changes of time. I had visited this noble pile immediately after
+the fall of Napoleon, and while it still retained the honours of
+an imperial edifice. Its courts now appeared to me comparatively
+desolate; this, however, may be accounted for by the cessation
+of those wars which peopled them with military mutilation. The
+establishment was calculated to provide for five thousand men; and,
+at that period, probably, it was always full. At present, scarcely
+more than half the number are under its roof; and, as even the
+Algerine war is reduced to skirmishes with the mountaineers of the
+Atlas, that number must be further diminishing from year to year.
+
+The Cupola then shone with gilding. This was the work of Napoleon,
+who had a stately eye for the ornament of his imperial city. The
+cupola of the Invalides thus glittered above all the roofs of Paris,
+and was seen glittering to an immense distance. It might be taken
+for the dedication of the French capital to the genius of War. This
+gilding is now worn off practically, as well as metaphorically, and
+the _prestige_ is lost.
+
+The celebrated Edmund Burke, all whose ideas were grand, is said
+to have proposed gilding the cupola of St Paul's, which certainly
+would have been a splendid sight, and would have thrown a look of
+stateliness over that city to which the ends of the earth turn their
+eyes. But the civic spirit was not equal to the idea, and it has
+since gone on lavishing ten times the money on the embellishment of
+_lanes_.
+
+The Chapel of the Invalides looked gloomy, and even neglected; the
+great Magician was gone. Some service was performing, as it is in
+the Romish chapels at most hours of the day: some poor people were
+kneeling in different parts of the area; and some strangers were,
+like myself, wandering along the nave, looking at the monuments to
+the fallen military names of France. On the pillars in the nave are
+inscriptions to the memory of Jourdan, Lobau, and Oudinot. There is
+a bronze tablet to the memory of Marshal Mortier, who was killed by
+Fieschi's infernal machine, beside Louis Philippe; and to Damremont,
+who fell in Algiers.
+
+But the chapel is destined to exhibit a more superb instance of
+national recollection--the tomb of Napoleon, which is to be finished
+in 1852. A large circular crypt, dug in the centre of the second
+chapel (which is to be united with the first,) is the site of the
+sarcophagus in which the remains of Napoleon lie. Coryatides,
+columns, and bas-reliefs, commemorative of his battles, are to
+surround the sarcophagus. The coryatides are to represent War,
+Legislation, Art, and Science; and in front is to be raised an altar
+of black marble. The architect is Visconti, and the best statuaries
+in Paris are to contribute the decorations. The expense will be
+enormous. In the time of Louis Philippe it had already amounted to
+nearly four millions of francs. About three millions more are now
+demanded for the completion, including an equestrian statue. On the
+whole, the expense will be not much less than seven millions of
+francs!
+
+The original folly of the nation, and of Napoleon, in plundering the
+Continent of statues and pictures, inevitably led to retribution,
+on the first reverse of fortune. The plunder of money, or of
+arms, or of anything consumable, would have been exempt from this
+mortification; but pictures and statues are permanent things, and
+always capable of being re-demanded. Their plunder was an extension
+of the law of spoil unknown in European hostilities, or in history,
+except perhaps in the old Roman ravage of Greece. Napoleon, in
+adopting the practice of heathenism for his model, and the French
+nation--in their assumed love of the arts violating the sanctities
+of art, by removing the noblest works from the edifices for which
+they were created, and from the lights and positions for which the
+great artists of Italy designed them--fully deserved the vexation of
+seeing them thus carried back to their original cities. The moral
+will, it is to be presumed, be learned from this signal example,
+that the works of genius are _naturally_ exempt from the sweep of
+plunder; that even the violences of war must not be extended beyond
+the necessities of conquest; and that an act of injustice is _sure_
+to bring down its punishment in the most painful form of retribution.
+
+_The Artesian Well._--Near the Hotel des Invalides is the celebrated
+well which has given the name to all the modern experiments of
+boring to great depths for water. The name of Artesian is said to
+be taken from the province of Artois, in which the practice has
+been long known. The want of water in Paris induced a M. Mulot to
+commence the work in 1834.
+
+The history of the process is instructive. For six years there was
+no prospect of success; yet M. Mulot gallantly persevered. All
+was inexorable chalk; the boring instrument had broken several
+times, and the difficulty thus occasioned may be imagined from its
+requiring a length of thirteen hundred feet! even in an early period
+of the operation. However, early in 1841 the chalk gave signs of
+change, and a greenish sand was drawn up. On the 26th of February
+this was followed by a slight effusion of water, and before night
+the stream burst up to the mouth of the excavation, which was now
+eighteen hundred feet in depth. Yet the water rapidly rose to a
+height of one hundred and twelve feet above the mouth of the well
+by a pipe, which is now supported by scaffolding, giving about six
+hundred gallons of water a minute.
+
+Even the memorable experiment confutes, so far as it goes, the
+geological notion of strata laid under each other in their
+proportions of gravity. The section of the boring shows chalk, sand,
+gravel, shells, &c., and this order sometimes reversed, in the most
+casual manner, down to a depth five times the height of the cupola
+of the Invalides.
+
+The heat of the water was 83 deg. of Fahrenheit. In the theories
+with which the philosophers of the Continent have to feed their
+imaginations is that of a _central fire_, which is felt through all
+the strata, and which warms everything in proportion to its nearness
+to the centre. Thus, it was proposed to dig an Artesian well of
+three thousand feet, for the supply of hot water to the Jardin des
+Plantes and the neighbouring hospitals. It was supposed that, at
+this depth, the heat would range to upwards of 100 deg. of Fahrenheit.
+But nothing has been done. Even the Well of Grenelle has rather
+disappointed the public expectation; of late the supply has been
+less constant, and the boring is to be renewed to a depth of two
+thousand feet.
+
+_The Napoleon Column._--This is the grand feature of the Place
+de Vendome, once the site of the Hotel Vendome, built by the son
+of Henry IV. and Gabrielle d'Estrees; afterwards pulled down by
+Louis XIV., afterwards abandoned to the citizens, and afterwards
+surrounded, as it is at this day, with the formal and heavy
+architecture of Mansard. The "Place" has, like everything in
+Paris, changed its name from time to time. It was once the "Place
+des Conquetes;" then it changed to "Louis le Grand;" and then it
+returned to the name of its original proprietor. An old figure of
+the "Great King," in all the glories of wig and feathers, stood in
+the centre, till justice and the rabble of the Revolution broke
+it down, in the first "energies" of Republicanism. But the German
+campaign of 1805 put all the nation in good humour, and the Napoleon
+Column was raised on the site of the dilapidated _monarch_.
+
+The design of the column is not original, for it is taken from
+the Trajan Column at Rome; but it is enlarged, and makes a very
+handsome object. When I first saw it, its decorations were in peril;
+for the Austrian soldiery were loud for its demolition, or at
+least for stripping off its bronze bas-reliefs, they representing
+their successive defeats in that ignominious campaign which, in
+three months from Boulogne, finished by the capture of Vienna. The
+Austrian troops, however, stoutly retrieved their disasters, and,
+as the proof, were then masters of Paris. It was possibly this
+effective feeling that prevailed at last to spare the column, which
+the practice of the French armies would have entitled them to strip
+without mercy.
+
+In the first instance, a statue of Napoleon, as emperor, stood on
+the summit of the pillar. This statue had its revolutions too, for
+it was melted down at the restoration of the Bourbons, to make a
+part of the equestrian statue of Henry IV. erected on the Pont Neuf.
+A _fleur-de-lis_ and flagstaff then took its place. The Revolution
+of 1830, which elevated Louis Philippe to a temporary throne, raised
+the statue of Napoleon to an elevation perhaps as temporary.
+
+It was the shortsighted policy of the new monarch to mingle royal
+power with "republican institutions." He thus introduced the
+tricolor once more, sent for Napoleon's remains to St Helena by
+permission of England, and erected his statue in the old "chapeau et
+redingote gris," the characteristics of his soldiership. The statue
+was inaugurated on one of the "three glorious days," in July 1833,
+in all the pomp of royalty,--princes, ministers, and troops. So much
+for the consistency of a brother of the Bourbon. The pageant passed
+away, and the sacrifice to popularity was made without obtaining the
+fruits. Louis Philippe disappeared from the scene before the fall
+of the curtain; and, as if to render his catastrophe more complete,
+he not merely left a republic behind him, but he lived to see the
+"prisoner of Ham" the president of that republic.
+
+How does it happen that an Englishman in France cannot stir a
+single step, hear a single word, or see a single face, without the
+conviction that he has landed among a people as far from him in all
+their feelings, habits, and nature, as if they were engendered in
+the moon? The feelings with which the Briton looks on the statue
+of Buonaparte may be mixed enough: he may acknowledge him for a
+great soldier, as well as a great knave--a great monarch, as well
+as a little intriguer--a mighty ruler of men, who would have made
+an adroit waiter at a _table d'hote_ in the Palais Royal. But he
+never would have imagined him into a sentimentalist, a shepherd, a
+Corydon, to be hung round with pastoral garlands; an opera hero, to
+delight in the sixpenny tribute of bouquets from the galleries.
+
+Yet I found the image of this man of terror and mystery--this
+ravager of Europe--this stern, fierce, and subtle master of havoc,
+decorated like a milliner's shop, or the tombs of the citizen
+shopkeepers in the cemeteries, with garlands of all sizes!--the
+large to express copious sorrow, the smaller to express diminished
+anguish, and the smallest, like a visiting card, for simply leaving
+their compliments; and all this in the face of the people who once
+feared to look in his face, and followed his car as if it bore the
+Thunder!
+
+To this spot came the people to offer up their sixpenny homage--to
+this spot came processions of all kinds, to declare their republican
+love for the darkest despot of European memory, to sing a stave, to
+walk heroically round the railing, hang up their garlands, and then,
+having done their duty in the presence of their own grisettes, in
+the face of Paris, and to the admiration of Europe, march home, and
+ponder upon the glories of the day!
+
+As a work of imperial magnificence, the column is worthy of its
+founder, and of the only redeeming point of his character--his
+zeal for the ornament of Paris. It is a monument to the military
+successes of the Empire; a trophy one hundred and thirty-five feet
+high, covered with the representations of French victory over the
+Austrians and Russians in the campaign of 1805. The bas-reliefs
+are in bronze, rising in a continued spiral round the column. Yet
+this is an unfortunate sacrifice to the imitation of the Roman
+column. The spiral, a few feet above the head of the spectator,
+offers nothing to the eye but a roll of rough bronze; the figures
+are wholly and necessarily undistinguishable. The only portion of
+those castings which directly meets the eye is unfortunately given
+up to the mere uniforms, caps, and arms of the combatants. This is
+the pedestal, and it would make a showy decoration for a tailor's
+window. It is a clever work of the furnace, but a miserable one of
+invention.
+
+The bronze is said to have been the captured cannon of the enemy.
+On the massive bronze door is the inscription in Latin:--"Napoleon,
+Emperor, Augustus, dedicated to the glory of the Grand Army this
+memorial of the German War, finished in three months, in the year
+1805, under his command."
+
+On the summit stands the statue of Napoleon, to which, and its
+changes, I have adverted already. But the question has arisen,
+whether there is not an error in taste in placing the statue of an
+individual at a height which precludes the view of his _features_.
+This has been made an objection to the handsome Nelson Pillar in
+Trafalgar Square. But the obvious answer in both instances is,
+that the object is not merely the sight of the features, but the
+perfection of the memorial; that the pillar is the true _monument_,
+and the statue only an accessory, though the most _suitable_
+accessory. But even then the statue is not altogether inexpressive.
+We can see the figure and the costume of Napoleon nearly as well
+as they could be seen from the balcony of the Tuilleries, where
+all Paris assembled in the Carousel to worship him on Sundays, at
+the parade of "La Garde." In the spirited statue of Nelson we can
+recognise the figure as well as if we were gazing at him within a
+hundred yards in any other direction. It is true that pillars are
+not painters' easels, nor is Trafalgar Square a sculptor's yard; but
+the real question turns on the effect of the whole. If the pillar
+makes the monument, we will not quarrel with the sculptor for its
+not making a _miniature_. It answers its purpose--it is a noble
+one; it gives a national record of great events, and it realises,
+invigorates, and consecrates them by the images of the men by whom
+they were achieved.
+
+_Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile._--It is no small adventure, in a
+burning day of a French summer, to walk the length of the Champs
+Elysees, even to see the arch of the Star, (Napoleon's _Star_,)
+and climb to its summit. Yet this labour I accomplished with the
+fervour and the fatigue of a pilgrimage.
+
+Why should the name of Republic be ever heard in the mouth of a
+Frenchman? All the objects of his glory in the Capital of which he
+_glories_, everything that he can show to the stranger--everything
+that he recounts, standing on tip-toe, and looking down on the whole
+world besides--is the work of monarchy! The grand Republic left
+nothing behind but the guillotine. The Bourbons and Buonapartes were
+the creators of all to which he points, with an exaltation that
+throws earth into the shade from the Alps to the Andes. The Louvre,
+the Madeleine, the Tuilleries, the Hotel de Ville, (now magnified
+and renovated into the most stately of town-houses,) the Hotel
+des Invalides, Notre Dame, &c. &c. are all the work of Kings. If
+Napoleon had lived half a century longer, he would have made Paris
+a second Babylon. If the very clever President, who has hitherto
+managed France so dexterously, and whose name so curiously combines
+the monarchy and the despotism,--if Louis _Napoleon_ (a name which
+an old Roman would have pronounced an omen) should manage it into
+a Monarchy, we shall probably see Paris crowded with superb public
+edifices.
+
+The kings of France were peculiarly magnificent in the decoration
+of the entrances to their city. As no power on earth can prevent
+the French from crowding into hovels, from living ten families in
+one house, and from appending to their cities the most miserable,
+ragged, and forlorn-looking suburbs on the globe, the monarchs
+wisely let the national habits alone; and resolved, if the suburbs
+must be abandoned to the popular fondness for the wigwam, to
+impress strangers with the stateliness of their gates. The _Arc
+de St Denis_, once conducting from the most dismal of suburbs, is
+one of the finest portals in Paris, or in any European city; it
+is worthy of the Boulevard, and that is panegyric at once. Every
+one knows _that it was_ erected in honour of the short-lived
+inroad of Louis XIV. into Holland in 1672, and the taking of whole
+muster-rolls of forts and villages, left at his mercy, ungarrisoned
+and unprovisioned, by the Republican parsimony of the Dutch, till
+a princely defender arose, and the young Stadtholder sent back the
+coxcomb monarch faster than he came. But the Arc is a noble work,
+and its architecture might well set a redeeming example to the
+London _improvers_. Why not erect an arch in Southwark? Why not at
+all the great avenues to the capital? Why not, instead of leaving
+this task to the caprices, or even to the bad taste of the railway
+companies, make it a branch of the operations of the Woods and
+Forests, and ennoble all the entrances of the mightiest capital of
+earthly empire?
+
+The Arch of St Denis is now shining in all the novelty of
+reparation, for it was restored so lately as last year. In this
+quarter, which has been always of a stormy temperature, the
+insurrection of 1848 raged with especial fury; and if the spirits of
+the great ever hover about their monuments, Louis XIV. may have seen
+from its summit a more desperate conflict than ever figured on its
+bas-reliefs.
+
+On the Arch of the Porte St Martin is a minor monument to minor
+triumphs, but a handsome one. Louis XIV. is still the hero. The
+"Grand Monarque" is exhibited as Hercules with his club; but as
+even a monarch in those days was nothing without his wig, Hercules
+exhibits a huge mass of curls of the most courtly dimensions--he
+might pass for the presiding deity of _perruquiers_.
+
+The _Arc de Triomphe du Carousel_, erected in honour of the German
+campaign in 1805, is a costly performance, yet poor-looking, from
+its position in the centre of lofty buildings. What effect can
+an isolated arch, of but five-and-forty feet high, have in the
+immediate vicinity of masses of building, perhaps a hundred feet
+high? Its aspect is consequently meagre; and its being placed
+in the centre of a court makes it look useless, and, of course,
+ridiculous. On the summit is a figure of War, or Victory, in a
+chariot, with four bronze horses--the horses modelled from the
+four Constantinopolitan horses brought by the French from Venice,
+as part of the plunder of that luckless city, but sent back to
+Venice by the Allies in 1815. The design of the arch was from
+that of Severus, in Rome: this secured, at least, elegance in its
+construction; but the position is fatal to dignity.
+
+The _Arc de l'Etoile_ is the finest work of the kind in Paris. It
+has the advantage of being built on an elevation, from which it
+overlooks the whole city, with no building of any magnitude in its
+vicinity; and is seen from a considerable distance on all the roads
+leading to the capital. Its cost was excessive for a work of mere
+ornament, and is said to have amounted to nearly half a million
+sterling!
+
+As I stood glancing over the groups on the friezes and faces of
+this great monument, which exhibit war in every form of conflict,
+havoc, and victory, the homely thought of "_cui bono_?" struck me
+irresistibly. Who was the better for all this havoc?--Napoleon,
+whom it sent to a dungeon! or the miserable thousands and tens
+of thousands whom it crushed in the field?--or the perhaps more
+unfortunate hundreds of thousands whom it sent to the hospital, to
+die the slow death of exhaustion and pain, or to live the protracted
+life of mutilation? I have no affectation of sentiment at the
+sight of the soldier's grave; he has but taken his share of the
+common lot, with perhaps the advantage, which so few men possess,
+of having "done the state some service." But, to see this vast
+monument covered with the emblems of hostilities, continued through
+almost a quarter of a century, (for the groups commence with 1792;)
+to think of the devastation of the fairest countries of Europe,
+of which these hostilities were the cause; and to know the utter
+fruitlessness and failure of the result, the short-lived nature of
+the triumph, and the frightful depth of the defeat---Napoleon in
+ignominious bondage and hopeless banishment--Napoleon, after having
+lorded it over Europe, sent to linger out life on a rock in the
+centre of the ocean--the leader of military millions kept under the
+eye of a British sentinel, and no more suffered to stray beyond
+his bounds than a caged tiger--I felt as if the object before me
+was less a trophy than a tomb, less a monument of glory than of
+retribution, less the record of national triumph than of national
+frenzy.
+
+I had full liberty for reflection, for there was scarcely a human
+being to interrupt me. The bustle of the capital did not reach so
+far, the promenaders in the Champs Elysees did not venture here; the
+showy equipages of the Parisian "_nouveaux riches_" remained where
+the crowd was to be seen; and except a few peasants going on their
+avocations, and a bench full of soldiers, sleeping or smoking away
+the weariness of the hour, the _Arc de Triomphe_, which had cost so
+much treasure, and was the record of so much blood, seemed to be
+totally forgotten. I question, if there had been a decree of the
+Legislature to sell the stones, whether it would have occasioned
+more than a paragraph in the _Journal des Debats_.
+
+The ascent to the summit is by a long succession of dark and winding
+steps, for which a lamp is lighted by the porter; but the view from
+the parapet repays the trouble of the ascent. The whole basin in
+which Paris lies is spread out before the eye. The city is seen in
+the centre of a valley, surrounded on every side by a circle of low
+hills, sheeted with dark masses of wood. It was probably once the
+bed of a lake, in which the site of the city was an island. All the
+suburb villages came within the view, with the fortifications, which
+to a more scientific eye might appear formidable, but which to mine
+appeared mere dots in the vast landscape.
+
+This parapet is unhappily sometimes used for other purposes than
+the indulgence of the spectacle. A short time since, a determined
+suicide sprang from it, after making a speech to the soldiery below,
+assigning his reason for this tremendous act--if reason has anything
+to do in such a desperate determination to defy common sense. He
+acted with the quietest appearance of deliberation: let himself down
+on the coping of the battlement, from this made his speech, as if
+he had been in the tribune; and, having finished it, flung himself
+down a height of ninety feet, and was in an instant a crushed and
+lifeless heap on the pavement below.
+
+It is remarkable that, even in these crimes, there exists the
+distinction which seems to divide France from England in every
+better thing. In England, a wretch undone by poverty, broken down by
+incurable pain, afflicted by the stings of a conscience which she
+neither knows how to heal nor cares how to cure, woman, helpless,
+wretched, and desolate, takes her walk under cover of night by the
+nearest river, and, without a witness, plunges in. But, in France,
+the last dreadful scene is imperfect without its publicity; the
+suicide must exhibit before the people. There must be the _valete et
+plaudite_. The curtain must fall with dramatic effect, and the actor
+must make his exit with the cries of the audience, in admiration or
+terror, ringing in the ear.
+
+In other cases, however varied, the passion for publicity is
+still the same. No man can bear to perish in silence. If the
+atheist resolves on self-destruction, he writes a treatise for his
+publisher, or a letter to the journals. If he is a man of science,
+he takes his laudanum after supper, and, pen in hand, notes the
+gradual effects of the poison for the benefit of science; or he
+prepares a fire of charcoal, quietly inhales the vapour, and from
+his sofa continues to scribble the symptoms of dissolution, until
+the pen grows unsteady, the brain wanders, and half-a-dozen blots
+close the scene; the writing, however, being dedicated to posterity,
+and circulated next day in every journal of Paris, till it finally
+permeates through the provinces, and from thence through the
+European world.
+
+The number of suicides in Paris annually, of late years, has
+been about three hundred,--out of a population of a million,
+notwithstanding the suppression of the gaming-houses, which
+unquestionably had a large share in the temptation to this horrible
+and unatonable crime.
+
+The sculptures on the Arc are in the best style. They form a history
+of the Consulate and of the Empire. Napoleon, of course, is a
+prominent figure; but in the fine bas-relief which is peculiarly
+devoted to himself, in which he stands of colossal size, with Fame
+flying over his head, History writing the record of his exploits,
+and Victory crowning him, the artist has left his work liable to the
+sly sarcasm of a spectator of a similar design for the statue of
+Louis XIV. Victory was there holding the laurel at a slight distance
+from his head. An Englishman asked "whether she was putting it on
+_or taking it off_?" But another of the sculptures is still more
+unfortunate, for it has the unintentional effect of commemorating
+the Allied conquest of France in 1814. A young Frenchman is seen
+defending his family; and a soldier behind him is seen falling from
+his horse, and the Genius of the _future_ flutters over them all. We
+know what that future was.
+
+The building of this noble memorial occupied, at intervals, no
+less than thirty years, beginning in 1806, when Napoleon issued
+a decree for its erection. The invasion in 1814 put a stop to
+everything in France, and the building was suspended. The fruitless
+and foolish campaign of the Duc d'Angouleme, in Spain, was regarded
+by the Bourbons as a title to national glories, and the building
+was resumed as a trophy to the renown of the Duc. It was again
+interrupted by the expulsion of the Bourbons in 1830; but was
+resumed under Louis Philippe, and finished in 1836. It is altogether
+a very stately and very handsome tribute to the French armies.
+
+But, without affecting unnecessary severity of remark, may not the
+wisdom of such a tribute be justly doubted? The Romans, though the
+principle of their power was conquest, and though their security was
+almost incompatible with peace, yet are said to have never repaired
+a triumphal arch. It is true that they built those arches (in the
+latter period of the Empire) so solidly as to want no repairs. But
+we have no triumphal monuments of the Republic surviving. Why should
+it be the constant policy of Continental governments to pamper
+their people with the food of that most dangerous and diseased of
+all vanities, the passion for war? And this is not said in the
+declamatory spirit of the "Peace Congress," which seems to be
+nothing more than a pretext for a Continental ramble, an expedient
+for a little vulgar notoriety among foreigners, and an opportunity
+of getting rid of the greatest quantity of common-place in the
+shortest time. But, why should not France learn common sense from
+the experience of England? It is calculated that, of the last five
+hundred years of French history, two hundred and fifty have been
+spent in hostilities. In consequence, France has been invaded,
+trampled, and impoverished by war; while England, during the last
+three hundred years, has never seen the foot of a foreign invader.
+
+Let the people of France abolish the _Conscription_, and they
+will have made one advance to liberty. Till cabinets are deprived
+of that material of _aggressive_ war, they will leave war at the
+caprice of a weak monarch, an ambitious minister, or a vainglorious
+people. It is remarkable that, among all the attempts at reforming
+the constitution of France, her reformers have never touched upon
+the ulcer of the land, the Conscription, the legacy of a frantic
+Republic, taking the children of the country from their industry, to
+plunge them into the vices of idleness or the havoc of war, and at
+all times to furnish the means, as well as afford the temptation,
+to aggressive war. There is not at this hour a soldier of England
+who has been _forced_ into the service! Let the French, let all the
+Continental nations, abolish the Conscription, thus depriving their
+governments of the means of making war upon each other; and what an
+infinite security would not this illustrious abolition give to the
+whole of Europe!--what an infinite saving in the taxes which are now
+wrung from nations by the fear of each other!--and what an infinite
+triumph to the spirit of peace, industry, and mutual good-will!
+
+_The Theatres._--In the evening I wandered along the Boulevard,
+the great centre of the theatres, and was surprised at the crowds
+which, in a hot summer night, could venture to be stewed alive,
+amid the smell of lamps, the effluvia of orange-peel, the glare of
+lights, and the breathing of hundreds or thousands of human beings.
+I preferred the fresh air, the lively movement of the Boulevard, the
+glitter of the Cafes, and the glow, then tempered, of the declining
+sun--one of the prettiest moving panoramas of Paris.
+
+The French Government take a great interest in the popularity of
+the theatres, and exert that species of superintendence which is
+implied in a considerable supply of the theatrical expenditure. The
+French Opera receives annually from the National Treasury no less
+than 750,000 francs, besides 130,000 for retiring pensions. To the
+Theatre Francais, the allowance from the Treasury is 240,000 francs
+a-year. To the Italian Opera the sum granted was formerly 70,000,
+but is now 50,000. Allowances are made to the Opera Comique, a most
+amusing theatre, to the Odeon, and perhaps to some others--the whole
+demanding of the budget a sum of more than a million of francs.
+
+It is curious that the drama in France began with the clergy. In the
+time of Charles VI., a company, named "Confreres de la Passion,"
+performed plays founded on the events of Scripture, though grossly
+disfigured by the traditions of Monachism. The originals were
+probably the "_Mysteries_," or plays in the Convents, a species of
+absurd and fantastic representation common in all Popish countries.
+At length the life of Manners was added to the life of Superstition,
+and singers and grimacers were added to the "Confreres."
+
+In the sixteenth century an Italian company appeared in Paris, and
+brought with them their opera, the invention of the Florentines
+fifty years before. The cessation of the civil wars allowed France
+for a while to cultivate the arts of peace; and Richelieu, a man
+who, if it could be said of any statesman that he formed the mind
+of the nation, impressed his image and superscription upon his
+country, gave the highest encouragement to the drama by making it
+the fashion. He even wrote, or assisted in writing, popular dramas.
+Corneille now began to flourish, and French Tragedy was established.
+
+Mazarin, when minister, and, like Richelieu, master of the nation,
+invited or admitted the Italian Opera once more into France; and
+Moliere, at the head of a new company, obtained leave to perform
+before Louis XIV., who thenceforth patronised the great comic
+writer, and gave his company a theatre. The Tragedy, Comedy, and
+Opera of France now led the way in Europe.
+
+In France, the Great Revolution, while it multiplied the theatres
+with the natural extravagance of the time, yet, by a consequence
+equally inevitable, degraded the taste of the nation. For a
+long period the legitimate drama was almost extinguished: it
+was unexciting to a people trained day by day to revolutionary
+convulsion; the pageants on the stage were tame to the processions
+in the streets; and the struggles of kings and nobles were
+ridiculous to the men who had been employed in destroying a dynasty.
+
+Napoleon at once perceived the evil, and adopted the only remedy. He
+found no less than _thirty_ theatres in Paris. He was not a man to
+pause where he saw his way clearly before him; he closed twenty-two
+of those theatres, leaving but eight, and those chiefly of the old
+establishments, making a species of compensation to the closed
+houses.
+
+On the return of the Bourbons the civil list, as in the old
+times, assisted in the support of the theatres. On the accession
+of Louis Philippe, the popular triumph infused its extravagance
+even into the system of the drama. The number of the theatres
+increased, and a succession of writers of the "New School" filled
+the theatres with abomination. Gallantry became the _spirit_ of
+the drama--everything before the scene was intrigue; married life
+was the perpetual burlesque. Wives were the habitual heroines of
+the intrigue, and husbands the habitual dupes! To keep faith with
+a husband was a standing jest on the stage, to keep it with a
+seducer was the height of human character. The former was always
+described as brutal, gross, dull, and born to be duped; the latter
+was captivating, generous, and irresistible by any matron alive.
+In fact, wives and widows were made for nothing else but to give
+way to the fascinations of this class of professors of the arts
+of "good society." The captivator was substantially described as
+a scoundrel, a gambler, and a vagabond of the basest kind, but
+withal so honourable, so tender, and so susceptible, that his
+atrocities disappeared, or rather were transmuted into virtues, by
+the brilliancy of his qualifications for seducing the wife of his
+friend. Perjury, profligacy, and the betrayal of confidence in the
+most essential tie of human nature, were supreme in popularity in
+the Novel and on the Stage.
+
+The direct consequence is, that the crime of adultery is lightly
+considered in France; even the pure speak of it without the
+abhorrence which, for every reason, it deserves. Its notoriety is
+rather thought of as an anecdote of the day, or the gossiping of the
+soiree; and the most acknowledged licentiousness does not exclude a
+man of a certain rank from general reception in good society.
+
+One thing may be observed on the most casual intercourse with
+Frenchmen--that the vices which, in our country, create disgust
+and offence in grave society, and laughter and levity in the more
+careless, seldom produce either the one or the other in France.
+The topic is alluded to with neither a frown nor a smile; it is
+treated, in general, as a matter of course, either too natural to
+deserve censure, or too common to excite ridicule. It is seldom
+peculiarly alluded to, for the general conversation of "Good
+Society" is decorous; but to denounce it would be unmannered. The
+result is an extent of illegitimacy enough to corrupt the whole
+rising population. By the registers of 1848, of 30,000 children born
+in Paris in that year, there were 10,000 illegitimate, of which but
+1700 were acknowledged by their parents!
+
+The theatrical profession forms an important element in the
+population. The actors and actresses amount to about 5000. In
+England they are probably not as many hundreds. And though the
+French population is 35,000,000, while Great Britain has little
+more than twenty, yet the disproportion is enormous, and forms a
+characteristic difference of the two countries. The persons occupied
+in the "working" of the theatrical system amount perhaps to 10,000,
+and the families dependent on the whole form a very large and very
+influential class among the general orders of society.
+
+But if the Treasury assists in their general support, it compels
+them to pay eight per cent of their receipts as a contribution to
+the hospitals. This sum averages annually a million of francs, or
+L40,000 sterling.
+
+In England we might learn something from the theatrical regulations
+of France. The trampling of our crowds at the doors of theatres, the
+occasional losses of life and limb, and the general inconvenience
+and confusion of the entrance on crowded nights, might be avoided by
+the were adoption of French _order_.
+
+But why should not higher objects be held in view? The drama is a
+public _necessity_; the people will have it, whether good or bad.
+Why should not Government offer prizes to the best drama, tragic or
+comic? Why should the most distinguished work of poetic genius find
+no encouragement from the Government of a nation boasting of its
+love of letters? Why shall that encouragement be left to the caprice
+of managers, to the finances of struggling establishments, or to the
+tastes of theatres, forced by their poverty to pander to the rabble.
+Why should not the mischievous performances of those theatres be put
+down, and dramas, founded on the higher principles of our nature,
+be the instruments of putting them down? Why should not heroism,
+honour, and patriotism, be taught on the national stage, as well as
+the triumphs of the highroad, laxity among the higher ranks, and
+vice among all? The drama has been charged with corruption. Is that
+corruption essential? It has been charged with being a _nucleus_
+of the loose principles, as its places of representation have been
+haunted by the loose characters, of society. But what are these
+but excrescences, generated by the carelessness of society, by
+the indolence of magistracy, and by the general misconception of
+the real purposes and possible power of the stage? That power is
+magnificent. It takes human nature in her most _impressible_ form,
+in the time of the glowing heart and the ready tear, of the senses
+animated by scenery, melted by music, and spelled by the living
+realities of representation. Why should not impressions be made
+in that hour which the man would carry with him through all the
+contingencies of life, and which would throw a light on every period
+of his being?
+
+The conditions of recompense to authors in France make _some_
+advance to justice. The author of a Drama is entitled to a profit on
+its performance in every theatre of France during his life, with a
+continuance for ten years after to his heirs. For a piece of three
+or five acts, the remuneration is _one twelfth part_ of the gross
+receipts, and for a piece in one act, one twenty-fourth. A similar
+compensation has been adopted in the English theatre, but seems to
+have become completely nugatory, from the managers' purchasing the
+author's rights--the transaction here being made a private one, and
+the remuneration being at the mercy of the manager. But in France
+it is a public matter, an affair of law, and looked to by an agent
+in Paris, who registers the performance of the piece at all the
+theatres in the city, and in the provinces.
+
+Still, this is injustice. Why should the labour of the intellect
+be less permanent than the labour of the hands? Why should not the
+author be entitled to make his full demand instead of this pittance?
+If his play is worth acting, why is it not worth paying for?--and
+why should he be prohibited from having the fruit of his brain as an
+inheritance to his family, as well as the fruit of any other toll?
+
+If, instead of being a man of genius, delighting and elevating the
+mind of a nation, he were a blacksmith, he might leave his tools and
+his trade to his children without any limit; or if, with the produce
+of his play, he purchased a cow, or a cabin, no man could lay a
+claim upon either. But he must be taxed for being a man of talent;
+and men of no talent must be entitled, by an absurd law and a
+palpable injustice, to tear the fruit of his intellectual supremacy
+from his children after ten short years of possession.
+
+No man leaves Paris without regret, and without a wish for the
+liberty and peace of its people.
+
+
+
+
+MR RUSKIN'S WORKS.
+
+     _Modern Painters_, vol. i. Second edition.----_Modern Painters_,
+     vol. ii.----_The Seven Lamps of Architecture._----_The Stones of
+     Venice._----_Notes on the Construction of Sheepfolds._ By JOHN
+     RUSKIN, M.A.
+
+
+On the publication of the first volume of Mr Ruskin's work on Modern
+Painters, a notice appeared of it in this Magazine. Since that
+time a second volume has been published of the same work, with two
+other works on architecture. It is the second volume of his _Modern
+Painters_ which will at present chiefly engage our attention. His
+architectural works can only receive a slight and casual notice; on
+some future occasion they may tempt us into a fuller examination.
+
+Although the second volume of the _Modern Painters_ will be the
+immediate subject of our review, we must permit ourselves to glance
+back upon the first, in order to connect together the topics treated
+by the two, and to prevent our paper from wearing quite the aspect
+of a metaphysical essay; for it is the nature of the sentiment of
+the beautiful, and its sources in the human mind, which is the main
+subject of this second volume. In the first, he had entered at once
+into the arena of criticism, elevating the modern artists, and one
+amongst them in particular, at the expense of the old masters, who,
+with some few exceptions, find themselves very rudely handled.
+
+As we have already intimated, we do not hold Mr Ruskin to be a
+safe guide in matters of art, and the present volume demonstrates
+that he is no safe guide in matters of philosophy. He is a man of
+undoubted power and vigour of mind; he feels strongly, and he thinks
+independently: but he is hasty and impetuous; can very rarely, on
+any subject, deliver a calm and temperate judgment; and, when he
+enters on the discussion of general principles, shows an utter
+inability to seize on, or to appreciate, the wide generalisations
+of philosophy. He is not, therefore, one of those men who can ever
+become an authority to be appealed to by the less instructed in any
+of the fine arts, or on any topic whatever; and this we say with the
+utmost confidence, because, although we may be unable in many cases
+to dispute his judgment--as where he speaks of paintings we have not
+seen, or technicalities of art we do not affect to understand--yet
+he so frequently stands forth on the broad arena where general and
+familiar principles are discussed, that it is utterly impossible _to
+be mistaken in the man_. On all these occasions he displays a very
+marked and rather peculiar combination of power and weakness--of
+power, the result of natural strength of mind; of weakness, the
+inevitable consequence of a passionate haste, and an overweening
+confidence. When we hear a person of this intellectual character
+throwing all but unmitigated abuse upon works which men have long
+consented to admire, and lavishing upon some other works encomiums
+which no conceivable perfection of human art could justify, it is
+utterly impossible to attach any weight to his opinion, on the
+ground that he has made an especial study of any one branch of art.
+Such a man we cannot trust out of our sight a moment; we cannot give
+him one inch of ground more than his reasoning covers, or our own
+experience would grant to him.
+
+We shall not here revive the controversy on the comparative merits
+of the ancient and modern landscape-painters, nor on the later
+productions of Mr Turner, whether they are the eccentricities of
+genius or its fullest development; we have said enough on these
+subjects before. It is Mr Ruskin's book, and not the pictures of
+Claude or Turner, that we have to criticise; it is his style, and
+his manner of thinking, that we have to pass judgment on.
+
+In all Mr Ruskin's works, and in almost every page of them, whether
+on painting, or architecture, or philosophy, or ecclesiastical
+controversy, two characteristics invariably prevail: an extreme
+dogmatism, and a passion for singularity. Every man who thinks
+earnestly would convert all the world to his own opinions; but while
+Mr Ruskin would convert all the world to his own tastes as well as
+opinions, he manifests the greatest repugnance to think for a moment
+like any one else. He has a mortal aversion to mingle with a crowd.
+It is quite enough for an opinion to be commonplace to insure it his
+contempt: if it has passed out of fashion, he may revive it; but
+to think with the existing multitude would be impossible. Yet that
+multitude are to think with him. He is as bent on unity in matters
+of taste as others are on unity in matters of religion; and he sets
+the example by diverging, wherever he can, from the tastes of others.
+
+Between these two characteristics there is no real contradiction;
+or rather the contradiction is quite familiar. The man who most
+affects singularity is generally the most dogmatic: he is the very
+man who expresses most surprise that others should differ from him.
+No one is so impatient of contradiction as he who is perpetually
+contradicting others; and on the gravest matters of religion those
+are often found to be most zealous for unity of belief who have
+some pet heresy of their own, for which they are battling all their
+lives. The same overweening confidence lies, in fact, at the basis
+of both these characteristics. In Mr Ruskin they are both seen in
+great force. No matter what the subject he discusses,--taste or
+ecclesiastical government--we always find the same combination of
+singularity, with a dogmatism approaching to intolerance. Thus, the
+Ionic pillar is universally admired. Mr Ruskin finds that the fluted
+shaft gives an appearance of weakness. No one ever felt this, so
+long as the fluted column is manifestly of sufficient diameter to
+sustain the weight imposed on it. But this objection of apparent
+insecurity has been very commonly made to the spiral or twisted
+column. Here, therefore, Mr Ruskin abruptly dismisses the objection.
+He was at liberty to defend the spiral column: we should say here,
+also, that if the weight imposed was evidently not too great for
+even a spiral column to support, _this_ objection has no place;
+but why cast the same objection, (which perhaps in all cases was
+a mere after-thought) against the Ionic shaft, when it had never
+been felt at all? It has been a general remark, that, amongst other
+results of the railway, it has given a new field to the architect,
+as well as to the engineer. Therefore Mr Ruskin resolves that our
+railroad stations ought to have no architecture at all. Of course,
+if he limited his objections to inappropriate ornament, he would
+be agreeing with all the world: he decides there should be no
+architecture whatever; merely buildings more or less spacious,
+to protect men and goods from the weather. He has never been so
+unfortunate, we suppose, as to come an hour too soon, or the unlucky
+five minutes too late, to a railway station, or he would have been
+glad enough to find himself in something better than the large shed
+he proposes. On the grave subject of ecclesiastical government he
+has stepped forward into controversy; and here he shows both his
+usual propensities in _high relief_. He has some quite peculiar
+projects of his own; the appointment of some hundreds of bishops--we
+know not what--and a Church discipline to be carried out by trial
+by jury. Desirable or not, they are manifestly as impracticable as
+the revival of chivalry. But let that pass. Let every man think
+and propose his best. But his dogmatism amounts to a disease,
+when, turning from his own novelties, he can speak in the flippant
+intolerant manner that he does of the national and now time-honoured
+Church of Scotland.
+
+It will be worth while to make, in passing, a single quotation
+from this pamphlet, _Notes on the Construction of Sheepfolds_. He
+tells us, in one place, that in the New Testament the ministers
+of the Church "are called, and call themselves, with absolute
+indifference, Deacons, Bishops, Elders, Evangelists, according to
+what they are doing at the time of speaking." With such a writer
+one might, at all events, have hoped to live in peace. But no. He
+discovers, nevertheless, that Episcopacy is the Scriptural form of
+Church government; and, having satisfied his own mind of this, no
+opposition or diversity of opinion is for a moment to be tolerated.
+
+     "But how," he says, "unite the two great sects of paralysed
+     Protestants? By keeping simply to Scripture. _The members of
+     the Scottish Church have not a shadow of excuse for refusing
+     Episcopacy_: it has indeed been abused among them, grievously
+     abused; but it is in the Bible, and that is all they have a
+     right to ask.
+
+     "_They have also no shadow of excuse for refusing to employ
+     a written form of prayer._ It may not be to their taste--it
+     may not be the way in which they like to pray; but it is no
+     question, at present, of likes or dislikes, but of duties; and
+     the acceptance of such a form on their part would go half way
+     to reconcile them with their brethren. Let them allege such
+     objections as they can reasonably advance against the English
+     form, and let these be carefully and humbly weighed by the
+     pastors of both Churches: some of them ought to be at once
+     forestalled. For the English Church, on the other hand, _must_,"
+     &c.
+
+Into Mr Ruskin's own religious tenets, further than he has chosen to
+reveal them in his works, we have no wish to pry. But he must cease
+to be Mr Ruskin if they do not exhibit some salient peculiarity,
+coupled with a confidence, unusual even amongst zealots, that his
+peculiar views will speedily triumph. If he can be presumed to
+belong to any sect, it must be the last and smallest one amongst
+us--some sect as exclusive as German mysticism, with pretensions as
+great as those of the Church of Rome.
+
+One word on the style of Mr Ruskin: it will save the trouble of
+alluding to it on particular occasions. It is very unequal. In
+both his architectural works he writes generally with great ease,
+spirit, and clearness. There is a racy vigour in the page. But when
+he would be very eloquent, as he is disposed to be in the _Modern
+Painters_, he becomes very verbose, tedious, obscure, extravagant.
+There is no discipline in his style, no moderation, no repose. Those
+qualities which he has known how to praise in art he has not aimed
+at in his own writing. A rank luxuriance of a semi-poetical diction
+lies about, perfectly unrestrained; metaphorical language comes
+before us in every species of disorder; and hyperbolical expressions
+are used till they become commonplace. Verbal criticism, he would
+probably look upon a very puerile business: he need fear nothing
+of the kind from us; we should as soon think of criticising or
+pruning a jungle. To add to the confusion, he appears at times to
+have proposed to himself the imitation of some of our older writers:
+pages are written in the rhythm of Jeremy Taylor; sometimes it is
+the venerable Hooker who seems to be his type; and he has even
+succeeded in combining whatever is most tedious and prolix in both
+these great writers. If the reader wishes a specimen of this sort of
+_modern antique_, he may turn to the fifteenth chapter of the second
+volume of the _Modern Painters_.
+
+Coupled with this matter of style, and almost inseparable from it,
+is the violence of his manner on subjects which cannot possibly
+justify so vehement a zeal. We like a generous enthusiasm on any
+art--we delight in it; but who can travel in sympathy with a writer
+who exhausts on so much paint and canvass every term of rapture
+that the Alps themselves could have called forth? One need not be
+a utilitarian philosopher--or what Mr Ruskin describes as such--to
+smile at the lofty position on which he puts the landscape-painter,
+and the egregious and impossible demands he makes upon the art
+itself. And the condemnation and opprobrium with which he overwhelms
+the luckless artist who has offended him is quite as violent. The
+bough of a tree, "in the left hand upper corner" of a landscape of
+Poussin's, calls forth this terrible denunciation:--
+
+     "This latter is a representation of an ornamental group of
+     elephants' tusks, with feathers tied to the ends of them.
+     Not the wildest imagination could ever conjure up in it the
+     remotest resemblance to the bough of a tree. It might be the
+     claws of a witch--the talons of an eagle--the horns of a fiend;
+     but it is a full assemblage of every conceivable falsehood
+     which can be told respecting foliage--a piece of work so
+     barbarous in every way _that one glance at it ought to prove
+     the complete charlatanism and trickery of the whole system of
+     the old landscape-painters_.... I will say here at once, that
+     such drawing as this is as ugly as it is childish, and as
+     painful as it is false; and that the man who could tolerate,
+     much more, who could deliberately set down such a thing on his
+     canvass, _had neither eye nor feeling for one single attribute
+     or excellence of God's works_. He might have drawn _the other
+     stem_ in excusable ignorance, or under some false impression of
+     being able to improve upon nature, but this is conclusive and
+     unpardonable."--(P. 382.)
+
+The great redeeming quality of Mr Ruskin--and we wish to give it
+conspicuous and honourable mention--is his love of nature. Here
+lies the charm of his works; to this may be traced whatever virtue
+is in them, or whatever utility they may possess. They will send
+the painter more than ever to the study of nature, and perhaps they
+will have a still more beneficial effect on the art, by sending the
+critic of painting to the same school. It would be almost an insult
+to the landscape-painter to suppose that he needed this lesson; the
+very love of his art must lead him perpetually, one would think,
+to his great and delightful study amongst the fields, under the
+open skies, before the rivers and the hills. But the critic of the
+picture-gallery is often one who goes from picture to picture, and
+very little from nature to the painting. Consequently, where an
+artist succeeds in imitating some effect in nature which had not
+been before represented on the canvass, such a critic is more likely
+to be displeased than gratified; and the artist, having to paint
+for a conventional taste, is in danger of sacrificing to it his own
+higher aspirations. Now it is most true that no man should pretend
+to be a critic upon pictures unless he understands the art itself
+of painting; he ought, we suspect, to have handled the pencil or
+the brush himself; at all events, he ought in some way to have been
+initiated into the mysteries of the pallet and the easel. Otherwise,
+not knowing the difficulties to be overcome, nor the means at hand
+for encountering them, he cannot possibly estimate the degree of
+merit due to the artist for the production of this or that effect.
+He may be loud in applause where nothing has been displayed but
+the old traditions of the art. But still this is only one-half the
+knowledge he ought to possess. He ought to have studied nature,
+and to have loved the study, or he can never estimate, and never
+feel, that _truth_ of effect which is the great aim of the artist.
+Mr Ruskin's works will help to shame out of the field all such
+half-informed and conventional criticism, the mere connoisseurship
+of the picture gallery. On the other hand, they will train men who
+have always been delighted spectators of nature to be also attentive
+observers. Our critics will learn how to admire, and mere admirers
+will learn how to criticise. Thus a public will be educated; and
+here, if anywhere, we may confidently assert that the art will
+prosper in proportion as there is an intelligent public to reward it.
+
+We like that bold enterprise of Mr Ruskin's which distinguishes the
+first volume, that daring enumeration of the great palpable facts
+of nature--the sky, the sea, the earth, the foliage--which the
+painter has to represent. His descriptions are often made indistinct
+by a multitude of words; but there is light in the haze--there is
+a genuine love of nature felt through them. This is almost the
+only point of sympathy we feel with Mr Ruskin; it is the only hold
+his volumes have had over us whilst perusing them; we may be,
+therefore, excused if we present here to our readers a specimen or
+two of his happier descriptions of nature. We will give them _the
+Cloud_ and _the Torrent_. They will confess that, after reading Mr
+Ruskin's description of the clouds, their first feeling will be an
+irresistible impulse to throw open the window, and look upon them
+again as they roll through the sky. The torrent may not be so near
+at hand, to make renewed acquaintance with. We must premise that he
+has been enforcing his favourite precept, the minute, and faithful,
+and perpetual study of nature. He very justly scouts the absurd
+idea that trees and rocks and clouds are, under any circumstances,
+to be _generalised_--so that a tree is not to stand for an oak or a
+poplar, a birch or an elm, but for a _general tree_. If a tree is
+at so great a distance that you cannot distinguish what it is, as
+you cannot paint more than you see, you must paint it indistinctly.
+But to make a purposed indistinctness where the kind of tree would
+be very plainly seen is a manifest absurdity. So, too, the forms
+of clouds should be studied, and as much as possible taken from
+nature, and not certain _general clouds_ substituted at the artist's
+pleasure.
+
+     "But it is not the outline only which is thus systematically
+     false. The drawing of the solid form is worse still; for it
+     is to be remembered that, although clouds of course arrange
+     themselves more or less into broad masses, with a light side
+     and a dark side, both their light and shade are invariably
+     composed of a series of divided masses, each of which has in
+     its outline as much variety and character as the great outline
+     of the cloud; presenting, therefore, a thousand times repeated,
+     all that I have described as the general form. Nor are these
+     multitudinous divisions a truth of slight importance in the
+     character of sky, for they are dependent on, and illustrative
+     of, a quality which is usually in a great degree overlooked--the
+     enormous retiring spaces of solid clouds. Between the illumined
+     edge of a heaped cloud and that part of its body which turns
+     into shadow, there will generally be a clear distance of several
+     miles--more or less, of course, according to the general size
+     of the cloud; but in such large masses as Poussin and others of
+     the old masters, which occupy the fourth or fifth of the visible
+     sky, the clear illumined breadth of vapour, from the edge to
+     the shadow, involves at least a distance of five or six miles.
+     We are little apt, in watching the changes of a mountainous
+     range of cloud, to reflect that the masses of vapour which
+     compose it are linger and higher than any mountain-range of the
+     earth; and the distances between mass and mass are not yards of
+     air, traversed in an instant by the flying form, but valleys
+     of changing atmosphere leagues over; that the slow motion of
+     ascending curves, which we can scarcely trace, is a boiling
+     energy of exulting vapour rushing into the heaven a thousand
+     feet in a minute; and that the topling angle, whose sharp edge
+     almost escapes notice in the multitudinous forms around it, is
+     a nodding precipice of storms, three thousand feet from base to
+     summit. It is not until we have actually compared the forms of
+     the sky with the hill-ranges of the earth, and seen the soaring
+     alp overtopped and buried in one surge of the sky, that we begin
+     to conceive or appreciate the colossal scale of the phenomena of
+     the latter. But of this there can be no doubt in the mind of any
+     one accustomed to trace the forms of cloud among hill-ranges--as
+     it is there a demonstrable and evident fact--that the space of
+     vapour visibly extended over an ordinarily clouded sky is not
+     less, from the point nearest to the observer to the horizon,
+     than twenty leagues; that the size of every mass of separate
+     form, if it be at all largely divided, is to be expressed in
+     terms of _miles_; and that every boiling heap of illuminated
+     mist in the nearer sky is an enormous mountain, fifteen or
+     twenty thousand feet in height, six or seven miles over in
+     illuminated surface, furrowed by a thousand colossal ravines,
+     torn by local tempests into peaks and promontories, and changing
+     its features with the majestic velocity of a volcano."--(Vol. i.
+     p. 228.)
+
+The forms of clouds, it seems, are worth studying: after reading
+this, no landscape-painter will be disposed, with hasty slight
+invention, to sketch in these "_mountains_" of the sky. Here is his
+description, or part of it, first of falling, then of running water.
+With the incidental criticism upon painters we are not at present
+concerned:--
+
+     "A little crumbling white or lightly-rubbed paper will soon give
+     the effect of indiscriminate foam; but nature gives more than
+     foam--she shows beneath it, and through it, a peculiar character
+     of exquisitely studied form, bestowed on every wave and line of
+     fall; and it is this variety of definite character which Turner
+     always aims at, rejecting as much as possible everything that
+     conceals or overwhelms it. Thus, in the Upper Fall of the Tees,
+     though the whole basin of the fall is blue, and dim with the
+     rising vapour, yet the attention of the spectator is chiefly
+     directed to the concentric zones and delicate curves of the
+     falling water itself; and it is impossible to express with what
+     exquisite accuracy these are given. They are the characteristic
+     of a powerful stream descending without impediment or break, but
+     from a narrow channel, so as to expand as it falls. They are the
+     constant form which such a stream assumes as it descends; and
+     yet I think it would be difficult to point to another instance
+     of their being rendered in art. You will find nothing in the
+     waterfalls, even of our best painters, but springing lines of
+     parabolic descent, and splashing and shapeless foam; and, in
+     consequence, though they may make you understand the swiftness
+     of the water, they never let you feel the weight of it: the
+     stream, in their hands, looks _active_, not _supine_, as if
+     it leaped, not as if it fell. Now, water will leap a little
+     way--it will leap down a weir or over a stone--but it _tumbles_
+     over a high fall like this; and it is when we have lost the
+     parabolic line, and arrived at the catenary--when we have lost
+     the spring of the fall, and arrived at the _plunge_ of it--that
+     we begin really to feel its weight and wildness. Where water
+     takes its first leap from the top, it is cool and collected,
+     and uninteresting and mathematical; but it is when it finds
+     that it has got into a scrape, and has farther to go than it
+     thought for, that its character comes out; it is then that it
+     begins to writhe and twist, and sweep out, zone after zone, in
+     wilder stretching as it falls, and to send down the rocket-like,
+     lance-pointed, whizzing shafts at its sides sounding for the
+     bottom. And it is this prostration, the hopeless abandonment
+     of its ponderous power to the air, which is always peculiarly
+     expressed by Turner....
+
+     "When water, not in very great body, runs in a rocky bed much
+     interrupted by hollows, so that it can rest every now and then
+     in a pool as it goes long, it does not acquire a continuous
+     velocity of motion. It pauses after every leap, and curdles
+     about, and rests a little, and then goes on again; and if, in
+     this comparatively tranquil and rational state of mind, it meets
+     with any obstacle, as a rock or stone, it parts on each side of
+     it with a little bubbling foam, and goes round: if it comes to a
+     step in its bed, it leaps it lightly, and then, after a little
+     splashing at the bottom, stops again to take breath. But if its
+     bed be on a continuous slope, not much interrupted by hollows,
+     so that it cannot rest--or if its own mass be so increased by
+     flood that its usual resting-places are not sufficient for it,
+     but that it is perpetually pushed out of them by the following
+     current before it has had time to tranquillise itself--it of
+     course gains velocity with every yard that it runs; the impetus
+     got at one leap is carried to the credit of the next, until the
+     whole stream becomes one mass of unchecked accelerating motion.
+     Now, when water in this state comes to an obstacle, it does not
+     part at it, but clears it like a racehorse; and when it comes
+     to a hollow, it does not fill it up, and run out leisurely at
+     the other side, but it rushes down into it, and comes up again
+     on the other side, as a ship into the hollow of the sea. Hence
+     the whole appearance of the bed of the stream is changed, and
+     all the lines of the water altered in their nature. The quiet
+     stream is a succession of leaps and pools; the leaps are light
+     and springy and parabolic, and make a great deal of splashing
+     when they tumble into the pool; then we have a space of quiet
+     curdling water, and another similar leap below. But the stream,
+     when it has gained an impetus, takes the shape of its bed,
+     never stops, is equally deep and equally swift everywhere, goes
+     down into every hollow, not with a leap, but with a swing--not
+     foaming nor splashing, but in the bending line of a strong
+     sea-wave, and comes up again on the other side, over rock and
+     ridge, with the ease of a bounding leopard. If it meet a rock
+     three or four feet above the level of its bed, it will neither
+     part nor foam, nor express any concern about the matter, but
+     clear it in a smooth dome of water without apparent exertion,
+     coming down again as smoothly on the other side, the whole
+     surface of the surge being drawn into parallel lines by its
+     extreme velocity, but foamless, except in places where the
+     form of the bed opposes itself at some direct angle to such a
+     line of fall, and causes a breaker; so that the whole river
+     has the appearance of a deep and raging sea, with this only
+     difference, that the torrent waves always break backwards, and
+     sea-waves forwards. Thus, then, in the water which has gained
+     an impetus, we have the most exquisite arrangement of curved
+     lines, perpetually changing from convex to concave, following
+     every swell and hollow of the bed with their modulating grace,
+     and all in unison of motion, presenting perhaps the most
+     beautiful series of inorganic forms which nature can possibly
+     produce."--(Vol. i. p. 363.)
+
+It is the object of Mr Ruskin, in his first volume of _Modern
+Painters_, to show what the artist has to do in his imitation of
+nature. We have no material controversy to raise with him on this
+subject; but we cannot help expressing our surprise that he should
+have thought it necessary to combat, with so much energy, so very
+primitive a notion that the imitation of the artist partakes of
+the nature of a _deception_, and that the highest excellence is
+obtained when the representation of any object is taken for the
+object itself. We thought this matter had been long ago settled. In
+a page or two of Quatremere de Quincy's treatise on _Imitation in
+the Fine Arts_, the reader, if he has still to seek on this subject,
+will find it very briefly and lucidly treated. The aim of the artist
+is not to produce such a representation as shall be taken, even
+for a moment, for a real object. His aim is, by imitating certain
+qualities or attributes of the object, to reproduce for us those
+pleasing or elevating impressions which it is the nature of such
+qualities or attributes to excite. We have stated very briefly
+the accepted doctrine on this subject--so generally accepted and
+understood that Mr Ruskin was under no necessity to avoid the
+use of the word imitation, as he appears to have done, under the
+apprehension that it was incurably infected with this notion of an
+attempted deception. Hardly any reader of his book, even without a
+word of explanation, would have attached any other meaning to it
+than what he himself expresses by representation of certain "truths"
+of nature.
+
+With respect to the imitations of the landscape-painter, the
+notion of a deception cannot occur. His trees and rivers cannot be
+mistaken, for an instant, for real trees and rivers, and certainly
+not while they stand there in the gilt frame, and the gilt frame
+itself against the papered wall. His only chance of deception is to
+get rid of the frame, convert his picture into a transparency, and
+place it in the space which a window should occupy. In almost all
+cases, deception is obtained, not by painting well, but by those
+artifices which disguise that what we see _is_ a painting. At the
+same time, we are not satisfied with an expression which several
+writers, we remark, have lately used, and which Mr Ruskin very
+explicitly adopts. The imitations of the landscape-painter are not
+a "language" which he uses; they are not mere "signs," analogous
+to those which the poet or the orator employs. There is no analogy
+between them. Let us analyse our impressions as we stand before the
+artist's landscape, not thinking of the artist, or his dexterity,
+but simply absorbed in the pleasure which he procures us--we do not
+find ourselves reverting, in imagination, to _other_ trees or other
+rivers than those he has depicted. We certainly do not believe them
+to be real trees, but neither are they mere signs, or a language to
+recall such objects; but _what there is of tree there_ we enjoy.
+There is the coolness and the quiet of the shaded avenue, and we
+feel them; there is the sunlight on that bank, and we feel its
+cheerfulness; we feel the serenity of his river. He has brought
+the spirit of the trees around us; the imagination rests in the
+picture. In other departments of art the effect is the same. If we
+stand before a head of Rembrandt or Vandyke, we do not think that
+it lives; but neither do we think of some other head, of which that
+is the type. But there is majesty, there is thought, there is calm
+repose, there is some phase of humanity expressed before us, and we
+are occupied with so much of human life, or human character, as is
+then and there given us.
+
+Imitate as many qualities of the real object as you please, but
+always the highest, never sacrificing a truth of the mind, or the
+heart, for one only of the sense. Truth, as Mr Ruskin most justly
+says--truth always. When it is said that truth should not be
+always expressed, the maxim, if properly understood, resolves into
+this--that the higher truth is not to be sacrificed to the lower. In
+a landscape, the gradation of light and shade is a more important
+truth than the exact brilliancy (supposing it to be attainable,)
+of any individual object. The painter must calculate what means he
+has at his disposal for representing this gradation of light, and
+he must pitch his tone accordingly. Say he pitches it far below
+reality, he is still in search of truth--of contrast and degree.
+
+Sometimes it may happen that, by rendering one detail faithfully,
+an artist may give a false impression, simply because he cannot
+render other details or facts by which it is accompanied in nature.
+Here, too, he would only sacrifice truth _in the cause of truth_.
+The admirers of Constable will perhaps dispute the aptness of our
+illustration. Nevertheless his works appear to us to afford a
+curious example of a scrupulous accuracy or detail producing a false
+impression. Constable, looking at foliage under the sunlight, and
+noting that the leaf, especially after a shower, will reflect so
+much light that the tree will seem more white than green, determined
+to paint all the white he saw. Constable could paint white leaves.
+So far so well. But then these leaves in nature are almost always in
+motion: they are white at one moment and green the next. We never
+have the impression of a white leaf; for it is seen playing with
+the light--its mirror, for one instant, and glancing from it the
+next. Constable could not paint motion. He could not imitate this
+shower of light in the living tree. He must leave his white paint
+where he has once put it. Other artists before him had seen the same
+light, but, knowing that they could not bring the breeze into their
+canvass, they wisely concluded that less white paint than Constable
+uses would produce a more truthful impression.
+
+But we must no longer be detained from the more immediate task
+before us. We must now follow Mr Ruskin to his second volume of
+_Modern Painters_, where he explains his theory of the beautiful;
+and although this will not be to readers in general the most
+attractive portion of his writings, and we ourselves have to
+practise some sort of self-denial in fixing our attention upon
+it, yet manifestly it is here that we must look for the basis or
+fundamental principles of all his criticisms in art. The order in
+which his works have been published was apparently deranged by a
+generous zeal, which could brook no delay, to defend Mr Turner
+from the censures of the undiscerning public. If the natural or
+systematic order had been preserved, the materials of this second
+volume would have formed the first preliminary treatise, determining
+those broad principles of taste, or that philosophical theory of
+the beautiful, on which the whole of the subsequent works were to
+be modelled. Perhaps this broken and reversed order of publication
+has not been unfortunate for the success of the author--perhaps it
+was dimly foreseen to be not altogether impolitic; for the popular
+ear was gained by the bold and enthusiastic defence of a great
+painter; and the ear of the public, once caught, may be detained
+by matter which, in the first instance, would have appealed to it
+in vain. Whether the effect of chance or design, we may certainly
+congratulate Mr Ruskin on the fortunate succession, and the
+fortunate rapidity with which his publications have struck on the
+public ear. The popular feeling, won by the zeal and intrepidity of
+the first volume of _Modern Painters_, was no doubt a little tried
+by the graver discussions of the second. It was soon, however, to be
+again caught, and pleased by a bold and agreeable miscellany under
+the magical name of "The Seven Lamps;" and these Seven Lamps could
+hardly fail to throw some portion of their pleasant and bewildering
+light over a certain rudimentary treatise upon building, which was
+to appear under the title of "The Stones of Venice."
+
+We cannot, however, congratulate Mr Ruskin on the manner in which
+he has acquitted himself in this arena of philosophical inquiry,
+nor on the sort of theory of the Beautiful which he has contrived
+to construct. The least metaphysical of our readers is aware that
+there is a controversy of long standing upon this subject, between
+two different schools of philosophy. With the one the beautiful
+is described as a great "idea" of the reason, or an intellectual
+intuition, or a simple intuitive perception; different expressions
+are made use of, but all imply that it is a great primary feeling,
+or sentiment, or idea of the human mind, and as incapable of
+further analysis as the idea of space, or the simplest of our
+sensations. The rival school of theorists maintain, on the contrary,
+that no sentiment yields more readily to analysis; and that the
+beautiful, except in those rare cases where the whole charm lies
+in one sensation, as in that of colour, is a complex sentiment.
+They describe it as a pleasure resulting from the presence of the
+visible object, but of which the visible object is only in part the
+immediate cause. Of a great portion of the pleasure it is merely
+the vehicle; and they say that blended reminiscences, gathered from
+every sense, and every human affection, from the softness of touch
+of an infant's finger to the highest contemplations of a devotional
+spirit, have contributed, in their turn, to this delightful
+sentiment.
+
+Mr Ruskin was not bound to belong to either of these schools of
+philosophy; he was at liberty to construct an eclectic system
+of his own;--and he has done so. We shall take the precaution,
+in so delicate a matter, of quoting Mr Ruskin's own words for
+the exposition of his own theory. Meanwhile, as some clue to the
+reader, we may venture to say that he agrees with the first of
+these schools in adopting a primary intuitive sentiment of the
+beautiful; but then this primary intuition is only of a sensational
+or "animal" nature--a subordinate species of the beautiful, which
+is chiefly valuable as the necessary condition of the higher and
+truly beautiful; and this last he agrees with the opposite school
+in regarding as a derived sentiment--derived by contemplating the
+objects of external nature as types of the Divine attributes. This
+is a brief summary of the theory; for a fuller exposition we shall
+have recourse to his own words.
+
+The term _AEsthetic_, which has been applied to this branch of
+philosophy, Mr Ruskin discards; he offers as a substitute _Theoria_,
+or _The Theoretic Faculty_, the meaning of which he thus explains:--
+
+     "I proceed, therefore, first to examine the nature of what
+     I have called the theoretic faculty, and to justify my
+     substitution of the term 'Theoretic' for 'AEsthetic,' which is
+     the one commonly employed with reference to it.
+
+     "Now the term 'aesthesis' properly signifies mere sensual
+     perception of the outward qualities and necessary effects of
+     bodies; in which sense only, if we would arrive at any accurate
+     conclusions on this difficult subject, it should always be used.
+     But I wholly deny that the impressions of beauty _are in any
+     way sensual_;--they are neither sensual nor intellectual, _but
+     moral_; and for the faculty receiving them, whose difference
+     from mere perception I shall immediately endeavour to explain,
+     no terms can be more accurate or convenient than that employed
+     by the Greeks, 'Theoretic,' which I pray permission, therefore,
+     always to use, and to call the operation of the faculty itself,
+     Theoria."--(P. 11.)
+
+We are introduced to a new faculty of the human mind; let us see
+what new or especial sphere of operation is assigned to it. After
+some remarks on the superiority of the mere sensual pleasures of the
+eye and the ear, but particularly of the eye, to those derived from
+other organs of sense, he continues:--
+
+     "Herein, then, we find very sufficient ground for the higher
+     estimation of these delights: first, in their being eternal
+     and inexhaustible; and, secondly, in their being evidently
+     no meaner instrument of life, but an object of life. Now, in
+     whatever is an object of life, in whatever may be infinitely
+     and for itself desired, we may be sure there is something of
+     divine: for God will not make anything an object of life to his
+     creatures which does not point to, or partake of himself,"--[a
+     bold assertion.] "And so, though we were to regard the pleasures
+     of sight merely as the highest of sensual pleasures, and though
+     they were of rare occurrence--and, when occurring, isolated and
+     imperfect--there would still be supernatural character about
+     them, owing to their self-sufficiency. But when, instead of
+     being scattered, interrupted, or chance-distributed, they are
+     gathered together and so arranged to enhance each other, as by
+     chance they could not be, there is caused by them, not only a
+     feeling of strong affection towards the object in which they
+     exist, but a perception of purpose and adaptation of it to our
+     desires; a perception, therefore, of the immediate operation of
+     the Intelligence which so formed us and so feeds us.
+
+     "Out of what perception arise Joy, Admiration, and Gratitude?
+
+     "Now, the mere animal consciousness of the pleasantness I call
+     AEsthesis; but the exulting, reverent, and grateful perception
+     of it I call Theoria. For this, and this only, is the full
+     comprehension and contemplation of the beautiful as a gift
+     of God; a gift not necessary to our being, but adding to and
+     elevating it, and twofold--first, of the desire; and, secondly,
+     of the thing desired."
+
+We find, then, that in the production of the full sentiment of the
+beautiful _two_ faculties are employed, or two distinct operations
+denoted. First, there is the "animal pleasantness which we call
+AEsthesis,"--which sometimes appears confounded with the mere
+pleasures of sense, but which the whole current of his speculations
+obliges us to conclude is some separate intuition of a sensational
+character; and, secondly, there is "the exulting, reverent, and
+grateful perception of it, which we call Theoria," which alone is
+the truly beautiful, and which it is the function of the Theoretic
+Faculty to reveal to us. But this new Theoretic Faculty--what can
+it be but the old faculty of Human Reason, exercised upon the great
+subject of Divine beneficence?
+
+Mr Ruskin, as we shall see, discovers that external objects are
+beautiful because they are types of Divine attributes; but he
+admits, and is solicitous to impress upon our minds, that the
+"meaning" of these types is "learnt." When, in a subsequent part
+of his work, he feels himself pressed by the objection that many
+celebrated artists, who have shown a vivid appreciation and a great
+passion for the beautiful, have manifested no peculiar piety, have
+been rather deficient in spiritual-mindedness, he gives them over to
+that instinctive sense he has called AEsthesis, and says--"It will
+be remembered that I have, throughout the examination of typical
+beauty, asserted our instinctive sense of it; the moral _meaning_
+of it being only discoverable by reflection," (p. 127.) Now, there
+is no other conceivable manner in which the meaning of the type can
+be learnt than by the usual exercise of the human reason, detecting
+traces of the Divine power, and wisdom, and benevolence, in the
+external world, and then associating with the various objects of the
+external world the ideas we have thus acquired of the Divine wisdom
+and goodness. The rapid and habitual regard of certain facts or
+appearances in the visible world, as types of the attributes of God,
+_can_ be nothing else but one great instance (or class of instances)
+of that law of association of ideas on which the second school of
+philosophy we have alluded to so largely insist. And thus, whether
+Mr Ruskin chooses to acquiesce in it or not, his "Theoria" resolves
+itself into a portion, or fragment, of that theory of association
+of ideas, to which he declares, and perhaps believes, himself to be
+violently opposed.
+
+In a very curious manner, therefore, has Mr Ruskin selected his
+materials from the two rival schools of metaphysics. His _AEsthesis_
+is an intuitive perception, but of a mere sensual or animal
+nature--sometimes almost confounded with the mere pleasure of
+sense, at other times advanced into considerable importance, as
+where he has to explain the fact that men of very little piety have
+a very acute perception of beauty. His _Theoria_ is, and can be,
+nothing more than the results of human reason in its highest and
+noblest exercise, rapidly brought before the mind by a habitual
+association of ideas. For the lowest element of the beautiful he
+runs to the school of intuitions;--they will not thank him for
+the compliment;--for the higher to that analytic school, and that
+theory of association of ideas, to which throughout he is ostensibly
+opposed.
+
+This _Theoria_ divides itself into two parts. We shall quote Mr
+Ruskin's own words and take care to quote from them passages where
+he seems most solicitous to be accurate and explanatory:--
+
+     "The first thing, then, we have to do," he says, "is accurately
+     to discriminate and define those appearances from which we are
+     about to reason as belonging to beauty, properly so called, and
+     to clear the ground of all the confused ideas and erroneous
+     theories with which the misapprehension or metaphorical use of
+     the term has encumbered it.
+
+     "By the term Beauty, then, properly are signified two things:
+     first, that external quality of bodies, already so often spoken
+     of, and which, whether it occur in a stone, flower, beast,
+     or in man, is absolutely identical--which, as I have already
+     asserted, may be shown to be in some sort typical of the Divine
+     attributes, and which, therefore, I shall, for distinction's
+     sake, call Typical Beauty; and, secondarily, the appearance
+     of felicitous fulfilment of functions in living things, more
+     especially of the joyful and right exertion of perfect life in
+     man--and this kind of beauty I shall call Vital Beauty."--(P.
+     26.)
+
+The Vital Beauty, as well as the Typical, partakes essentially, as
+far as we can understand our author, of a religious character. On
+turning to that part of the volume where it is treated of at length,
+we find a universal sympathy and spirit of kindliness very properly
+insisted on, as one great element of the sentiment of beauty; but
+we are not permitted to dwell upon this element, or rest upon it
+a moment, without some reference to our relation to God. Even the
+animals themselves seem to be turned into types for us of our moral
+feelings or duties. We are expressly told that we cannot have this
+sympathy with life and enjoyment in other creatures, unless it takes
+the form of, or comes accompanied with, a sentiment of piety. In
+all cases where the beautiful is anything higher than a certain
+"animal pleasantness," we are to understand that it has a religious
+character. "In all cases," he says, summing up the functions of
+the Theoretic Faculty, "_it is something Divine_; either the
+approving voice of God, the glorious symbol of Him, the evidence
+of His kind presence, or the obedience to His will by Him induced
+and supported,"--(p. 126.) Now it is a delicate task, when a man
+errs by the exaggeration of a great truth or a noble sentiment, to
+combat his error; and yet as much mischief may ultimately arise from
+an error of this description as from any other. The thoughts and
+feelings which Mr Ruskin has described, form the noblest part of our
+sentiment of the beautiful, as they form the noblest phase of the
+human reason. But they are not the whole of it. The visible object,
+to adopt his phraseology, does become a type to the contemplative
+and pious mind of the attribute of God, and is thus exalted to our
+apprehension. But it is not beautiful solely or originally on this
+account. To assert this, is simply to falsify our human nature.
+
+Before, however, we enter into these _types_, or this typical
+beauty, it will be well to notice how Mr Ruskin deals with previous
+and opposing theories. It will be well also to remind our readers
+of the outline of that theory of association of ideas which is here
+presented to us in so very confused a manner. We shall then be
+better able to understand the very curious position our author has
+taken up in this domain of speculative philosophy.
+
+Mr Ruskin gives us the following summary of the "errors" which he
+thinks it necessary in the first place to clear from his path:--
+
+     "Those erring or inconsistent positions which I would at once
+     dismiss are, the first, that the beautiful is the true; the
+     second, that the beautiful is the useful; the third, that it is
+     dependent on custom; and the fourth, that it is dependent on the
+     association of ideas."
+
+The first of these theories, that the beautiful is the true, we
+leave entirely to the tender mercies of Mr Ruskin; we cannot gather
+from his refutation to what class of theorists he is alluding. The
+remaining three are, as we understand the matter, substantially one
+and the same theory. We believe that no one, in these days, would
+define beauty as solely resulting either from the apprehension
+of Utility, (that is, the adjustment of parts to a whole, or the
+application of the object to an ulterior purpose,) or to Familiarity
+and the affection which custom engenders; but they would regard both
+Utility and Familiarity as amongst the sources of those agreeable
+ideas or impressions, which, by the great law of association, became
+intimately connected with the visible object. We must listen,
+however, to Mr Ruskin's refutation of them:--
+
+     "That the beautiful is the _useful_ is an assertion evidently
+     based on that limited and false sense of the latter term which
+     I have already deprecated. As it is the most degrading and
+     dangerous supposition which can be advanced on the subject, so,
+     fortunately, it is the most palpably absurd. It is to confound
+     admiration with hunger, love with lust, and life with sensation;
+     it is to assert that the human creature has no ideas and no
+     feelings, except those ultimately referable to its brutal
+     appetites. It has not a single fact, nor appearance of fact, to
+     support it, and needs no combating--at least until its advocates
+     have obtained the consent of the majority of mankind that the
+     most beautiful productions of nature are seeds and roots; and of
+     art, spades and millstones.
+
+     "Somewhat more rational grounds appear for the assertion that
+     the sense of the beautiful arises from _familiarity_ with the
+     object, though even this could not long be maintained by a
+     thinking person. For all that can be alleged in defence of such
+     a supposition is, that familiarity deprives some objects which
+     at first appeared ugly of much of their repulsiveness; whence
+     it is as rational to conclude that familiarity is the cause of
+     beauty, as it would be to argue that, because it is possible to
+     acquire a taste for olives, therefore custom is the cause of
+     lusciousness in grapes....
+
+     "I pass to the last and most weighty theory, that the
+     agreeableness in objects which we call beauty is the result of
+     the association with them of agreeable or interesting ideas.
+
+     "Frequent has been the support and wide the acceptance of
+     this supposition, and yet I suppose that no two consecutive
+     sentences were ever written in defence of it, without involving
+     either a contradiction or a confusion of terms. Thus Alison,
+     'There are scenes undoubtedly more beautiful than Runnymede,
+     yet, to those who recollect the great event that passed
+     there, there is no scene perhaps which so strongly seizes on
+     the imagination,'--where we are wonder-struck at the bold
+     obtuseness which would prove the power of imagination by its
+     overcoming that very other power (of inherent beauty) whose
+     existence the arguer desires; for the only logical conclusion
+     which can possibly be drawn from the above sentence is, that
+     imagination is _not_ the source of beauty--for, although no
+     scene seizes so strongly on the imagination, yet there are
+     scenes 'more beautiful than Runnymede.' And though instances
+     of self-contradiction as laconic and complete as this are
+     rare, yet, if the arguments on the subject be fairly sifted
+     from the mass of confused language with which they are always
+     encumbered, they will be found invariably to fall into one of
+     these two forms: either association gives pleasure, and beauty
+     gives pleasure, therefore association is beauty; or the power of
+     association is stronger than the power of beauty, therefore the
+     power of association _is_ the power of beauty."
+
+Now this last sentence is sheer nonsense, and only proves that the
+author had never given himself the trouble to understand the theory
+he so flippantly discards. No one ever said that "association gives
+pleasure;" but very many, and Mr Ruskin amongst the rest, have said
+that associated thought adds its pleasure to an object pleasing in
+itself, and thus increases the complex sentiment of beauty. That it
+is a complex sentiment in all its higher forms, Mr Ruskin himself
+will tell us. As to the manner in which he deals with Alison, it
+is in the worst possible spirit of controversy. Alison was an
+elegant, but not a very precise writer; it was the easiest thing
+in the world to select an unfortunate illustration, and to convict
+_that_ of absurdity. Yet he might with equal ease have selected many
+other illustrations from Alison, which would have done justice to
+the theory he expounds. A hundred such will immediately occur to
+the reader. If, instead of a historical recollection of this kind,
+which could hardly make the stream itself of Runnymede look more
+beautiful, Alison had confined himself to those impressions which
+the generality of mankind receive from river scenery, he would have
+had no difficulty in showing (as we believe he has elsewhere done)
+how, in this case, ideas gathered from different sources flow into
+one harmonious and apparently simple feeling. That sentiment of
+beauty which arises as we look upon a river will be acknowledged by
+most persons to be composed of many associated thoughts, combining
+with the object before them. Its form and colour, its bright surface
+and its green banks, are all that the eye immediately gives us;
+but with these are combined the remembered coolness of the fluent
+stream, and of the breeze above it, and of the pleasant shade of its
+banks; and beside all this--as there are few persons who have not
+escaped with delight from town or village, to wander by the quiet
+banks of some neighbouring stream, so there are few persons who do
+not associate with river scenery ideas of peace and serenity. Now
+many of these thoughts or facts are such as the eye does not take
+cognisance of, yet they present themselves as instantaneously as the
+visible form, and so blended as to seem, for the moment, to belong
+to it.
+
+Why not have selected some such illustration as this, instead of
+the unfortunate Runnymede, from a work where so many abound as apt
+as they are elegantly expressed? As to Mr Ruskin's utilitarian
+philosopher, it is a fabulous creature--no such being exists.
+Nor need we detain ourselves with the quite departmental subject
+of Familiarity. But let us endeavour--without desiring to pledge
+ourselves or our readers to its final adoption--to relieve the
+theory of association of ideas from the obscurity our author has
+thrown around it. Our readers will not find that this is altogether
+a wasted labour.
+
+With Mr Ruskin we are of opinion that, in a discussion of this kind,
+the term Beauty ought to be limited to the impression derived,
+mediately or immediately, from the visible object. It would be
+useless affectation to attempt to restrict the use of the word,
+in general, to this application. We can have no objection to the
+term Beautiful being applied to a piece of music, or to an eloquent
+composition, prose or verse, or even to our moral feelings and
+heroic actions; the word has received this general application,
+and there is, at basis, a great deal in common between all these
+and the sentiment of beauty attendant on the visible object. For
+music, or sweet sounds, and poetry, and our moral feelings, have
+much to do (through the law of association) with our sentiment of
+the Beautiful. It is quite enough if, speaking of the subject of
+our analysis, we limit it to those impressions, however originated,
+which attend upon the visible object.
+
+One preliminary word on this association of ideas. It is from
+its very nature, and the nature of human life, of all degrees
+of intimacy--from the casual suggestion, or the case where the
+two ideas are at all times felt to be distinct, to those close
+combinations where the two ideas have apparently coalesced into
+one, or require an attentive analysis to separate them. You see a
+mass of iron; you may be said _to see its weight_, the impression
+of its weight is so intimately combined with its form. The _light_
+of the sun, and the _heat_ of the sun are learnt from different
+senses, yet we never see the one without thinking of the other, and
+the reflection of the sunbeam seen upon a bank immediately suggests
+the idea of _warmth_. But it is not necessary that the combination
+should be always so perfect as in this instance, in order to
+produce the effect we speak of under the name of Association of
+Ideas. It is hardly possible for us to abstract the _glow_ of the
+sunbeam from its light; but the fertility which follows upon the
+presence of the sun, though a suggestion which habitually occurs
+to reflective minds, is an association of a far less intimate
+nature. It is sufficiently intimate, however, to blend with that
+feeling of admiration we have when we speak of the beauty of the
+sun. There is the golden harvest in its summer beams. Again, the
+contemplative spirit in all ages has formed an association between
+the sun and the Deity, whether as the fittest symbol of God, or as
+being His greatest gift to man. Here we have an association still
+more refined, and of a somewhat less frequent character, but one
+which will be found to enter, in a very subtle manner, into that
+impression we receive from the great luminary.
+
+And thus it is that, in different minds, the same materials of
+thought may be combined in a closer or laxer relationship. This
+should be borne in mind by the candid inquirer. That in many
+instances ideas from different sources do coalesce, in the manner
+we have been describing, he cannot for an instant doubt. He seems
+_to see_ the coolness of that river; he seems _to see_ the warmth on
+that sunny bank. In many instances, however, he must make allowance
+for the different habitudes of life. The same illustration will not
+always have the same force to all men. Those who have cultivated
+their minds by different pursuits, or lived amongst scenery of a
+different character, cannot have formed exactly the same moral
+association with external nature.
+
+These preliminaries being adjusted, what, we ask, is that first
+original charm of the _visible object_ which serves as the
+foundation for this wonderful superstructure of the Beautiful, to
+which almost every department of feeling and of thought will be
+found to bring its contribution? What is it so pleasurable that the
+eye at once receives from the external world, that round _it_ should
+have gathered all these tributary pleasures? Light--colour--form;
+but, in reference to our discussion, pre-eminently the exquisite
+pleasure derived from the sense of light, pure or coloured. Colour,
+from infancy to old age, is one original, universal, perpetual
+source of delight, the first and constant element of the Beautiful.
+
+We are far from thinking that the eye does not at once take
+cognisance of form as well as colour. Some ingenious analysts have
+supposed that the sensation of colour is, in its origin, a mere
+mental affection, having no reference to space or external objects,
+and that it obtains this reference through the contemporaneous
+acquisition of the sense of touch. But there can be no more reason
+for supposing that the sense of touch informs us immediately of an
+external world than that the sense of colour does. If we do not
+allow to all the senses an intuitive reference to the external
+world, we shall get it from none of them. Dr Brown, who paid
+particular attention to this subject, and who was desirous to limit
+the first intimation of the sense of sight to an abstract sensation
+of unlocalised colour, failed entirely in his attempt to obtain
+from any other source the idea of space or _outness_; Kant would
+have given him certain subjective _forms of the sensitive faculty_,
+space and time. These he did not like: he saw that, if he denied
+to the eye an immediate perception of the external world, he must
+also deny it to the touch; he therefore prayed in aid certain
+muscular sensations from which the idea of _resistance_ would be
+obtained. But it seems to us evident that not till _after_ we have
+acquired a knowledge of the external world can we connect _volition_
+with muscular movement, and that, until that connection is made,
+the muscular sensations stand in the same predicament as other
+sensations, and could give him no aid in solving his problem. We
+cannot go further into this matter at present.[6] The mere flash of
+light which follows the touch upon the optic nerve represents itself
+as something _without_; nor was colour, we imagine, ever felt, but
+under some _form_ more or less distinct; although in the human being
+the eye seems to depend on the touch far more than in other animals,
+for its further instruction.
+
+[6] It is seldom any action of a limb is performed without the
+concurrence of several muscles; and, if the action is at all
+energetic, a number of muscles are brought into play as an equipoise
+or balance; the infant, therefore, would be sadly puzzled amongst
+its muscular sensations, supposing that it had them. Besides, it
+seems clear that those movements we see an infant make with its
+arms and legs are, in the first instance, as little _voluntary_ as
+the muscular movements it makes for the purpose of respiration.
+There is an animal life within us, dependent on its own laws of
+irritability. Over a portion of this the developed thought or reason
+gains dominion; over a large portion the will never has any hold;
+over another portion, as in the organs of respiration, it has an
+intermittent and divided empire. We learn voluntary movement by
+doing that instinctively and spontaneously which we afterwards do
+from forethought. We have moved our arm; we wish to do the like
+again, (and to our wonder, if we then had intelligence enough to
+wonder,) we do it.
+
+But although the eye is cognisant of form as well as colour, it is
+in the sensation of colour that we must seek the primitive pleasure
+derived from this organ. And probably the first reason why form
+pleases is this, that the boundaries of form are also the lines
+of contrast of colour. It is a general law of all sensation that,
+if it be continued, our susceptibility to it declines. It was
+necessary that the eye should be always open. Its susceptibility is
+sustained by the perpetual contrast of colours. Whether the contrast
+is sudden, or whether one hue shades gradually into another, we
+see here an original and primary source of pleasure. A constant
+variety, in some way produced, is essential to the maintenance of
+the pleasure derived from colour.
+
+It is not incumbent on us to inquire how far the beauty of form
+may be traceable to the sensation of touch;--a very small portion
+of it we suspect. In the human countenance, and in sculpture,
+the beauty of form is almost resolvable into expression; though
+possibly the soft and rounded outline may in some measure be
+associated with the sense of smoothness to the touch. All that we
+are concerned to show is, that there is here in colour, diffused
+as it is over the whole world, and perpetually varied, a _beauty_
+at once showered upon the visible object. We hear it said, if you
+resolve all into association, where will you begin? You have but a
+circle of feelings. If moral sentiment, for instance, be not itself
+the beautiful, why should it become so by association. There must
+be something else that is _the beautiful_, by association with
+which it passes for such. We answer, that we do not resolve _all_
+into association; that we have in this one gift of colour, shed so
+bountifully over the whole world, an original beauty, a delight
+which makes the external object pleasant and beloved; for how can we
+fail, in some sort, to love what produces so much pleasure?
+
+We are at a loss to understand how any one can speak with
+disparagement of colour as a source of the beautiful. The sculptor
+may, perhaps, by his peculiar education, grow comparatively
+indifferent to it: we know not how this may be; but let any man,
+of the most refined taste imaginable, think what he owes to this
+source, when he walks out at evening, and sees the sun set amongst
+the hills. The same concave sky, the same scene, so far as its form
+is concerned, was there a few hours before, and saddened him with
+its gloom; one leaden hue prevailed over all; and now in a clear sky
+the sun is setting, and the hills are purple, and the clouds are
+radiant with every colour that can be extracted from the sunbeam. He
+can hardly believe that it is the same scene, or he the same man.
+Here the grown-up man and the child stand always on the same level.
+As to the infant, note how its eye feeds upon a brilliant colour, or
+the living flame. If it had wings, it would assuredly do as the moth
+does. And take the most untutored rustic, let him be old, and dull,
+and stupid, yet, as long as the eye has vitality in it, will he look
+up with long untiring gaze at this blue vault of the sky, traversed
+by its glittering clouds, and pierced by the tall green trees around
+him.
+
+Is it any marvel now that round the _visible object_ should
+associate tributary feelings of pleasure? How many pleasing and
+tender sentiments gather round the rose! Yet the rose is beautiful
+in itself. It was beautiful to the child by its colour, its texture,
+its softly-shaded leaf, and the contrast between the flower and the
+foliage. Love, and poetry, and the tender regrets of advanced life,
+have contributed a second dower of beauty. The rose is more to the
+youth and to the old man than it was to the child; but still to the
+last they both feel the pleasure of the child.
+
+The more commonplace the illustration, the more suited it is to our
+purpose. If any one will reflect on the many ideas that cluster
+round this beautiful flower, he will not fail to see how numerous
+and subtle may be the association formed with the visible object.
+Even an idea painful in itself may, by way of contrast, serve
+to heighten the pleasure of others with which it is associated.
+Here the thought of decay and fragility, like a discord amongst
+harmonies, increases our sentiment of tenderness. We express, we
+believe, the prevailing taste when we say that there is nothing,
+in the shape of art, so disagreeable and repulsive as artificial
+flowers. The waxen flower may be an admirable imitation, but it
+is a detestable thing. This partly results from the nature of the
+imitation; a vulgar deception is often practised upon us: what is
+not a flower is intended to pass for one. But it is owing still
+more, we think, to the contradiction that is immediately afterwards
+felt between this preserved and imperishable waxen flower, and the
+transitory and perishable rose. It is the nature of the rose to bud,
+and blossom, and decay; it gives its beauty to the breeze and to the
+shower; it is mortal; it is _ours_; it bears our hopes, our loves,
+our regrets. This waxen substitute, that cannot change or decay, is
+a contradiction and a disgust.
+
+Amongst objects of man's contrivance, the sail seen upon the calm
+waters of a lake or a river is universally felt to be beautiful. The
+form is graceful, and the movement gentle, and its colour contrasts
+well either with the shore or the water. But perhaps the chief
+element of our pleasure is all association with human life, with
+peaceful enjoyment--
+
+    "This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing,
+     To waft me from distraction."
+
+Or take one of the noblest objects in nature--the mountain. There
+is no object except the sea and the sky that reflects to the sight
+colours so beautiful, and in such masses. But colour, and form, and
+magnitude, constitute but a part of the beauty or the sublimity of
+the mountain. Not only do the clouds encircle or rest upon it, but
+men have laid on it their grandest thoughts: we have associated
+with it our moral fortitude, and all we understand of greatness
+or elevation of mind; our phraseology seems half reflected from
+the mountain. Still more, we have made it holy ground. Has not God
+himself descended on the mountain? Are not the hills, once and
+for ever, "the unwalled temples of our earth?" And still there is
+another circumstance attendant upon mountain scenery, which adds a
+solemnity of its own, and is a condition of the enjoyment of other
+sources of the sublime--solitude. It seems to us that the feeling of
+solitude almost always associates itself with mountain scenery. Mrs
+Somerville, in the description which she gives or quotes, in her
+_Physical Geography_, of the Himalayas, says--
+
+     "The loftiest peaks being bare of snow gives great variety of
+     colour and beauty to the scenery, which in these passes is at
+     all times magnificent. During the day, the stupendous size of
+     the mountains, their interminable extent, the variety and the
+     sharpness of their forms, and, above all, the tender clearness
+     of their distant outline melting into the pale blue sky,
+     contrasted with the deep azure above, is described as a scene of
+     wild and wonderful beauty. At midnight, when myriads of stars
+     sparkle in the black sky, and the pure blue of the mountains
+     looks deeper still below the pale white gleam of the earth and
+     snow-light, the effect is of unparalleled sublimity, and no
+     language can describe the splendour of the sunbeams at daybreak,
+     streaming between the high peaks, and throwing their gigantic
+     shadows on the mountains below. There, far above the habitation
+     of man, no living thing exists, no sound is heard; the very
+     echo of the traveller's footsteps startles him in the awful
+     _solitude and silence_ that reigns in those august dwellings of
+     everlasting snow."
+
+No one can fail to recognise the effect of the last circumstance
+mentioned. Let those mountains be the scene of a gathering of any
+human multitude, and they would be more desecrated than if their
+peaks had been levelled to the ground. We have also quoted this
+description to show how large a share _colour_ takes in beautifying
+such a scene. Colour, either in large fields of it, or in sharp
+contrasts, or in gradual shading--the play of light, in short, upon
+this world--is the first element of beauty.
+
+Here would be the place, were we writing a formal treatise upon
+this subject, after showing that there is in the sense of sight
+itself a sufficient elementary beauty, whereto other pleasurable
+reminiscences may attach themselves, to point out some of these
+tributaries. Each sense--the touch, the ear, the smell, the
+taste--blend their several remembered pleasures with the object
+of vision. Even taste, we say, although Mr Ruskin will scorn
+the gross alliance. And we would allude to the fact to show the
+extreme subtilty of these mental processes. The fruit which you
+think of eating has lost its beauty from that moment--it assumes
+to you a quite different relation; but the reminiscence that there
+is sweetness in the peach or the grape, whilst it remains quite
+subordinate to the pleasure derived from the sense of sight, mingles
+with and increases that pleasure. Whilst the cluster of ripe grapes
+is looked at only for its beauty, the idea that they are pleasant
+to the taste as well steals in unobserved, and adds to the complex
+sentiment. If this idea grow distinct and prominent, the beauty of
+the grape is gone--you eat it. Here, too, would be the place to take
+notice of such sources of pleasure as are derived from adaptation
+of parts, or the adaptation of the whole to ulterior purposes;
+but here especially should we insist on human affections, human
+loves, human sympathies. Here, in the heart of man, his hopes,
+his regrets, his affections, do we find the great source of the
+beautiful--tributaries which take their name from the stream they
+join, but which often form the main current. On that sympathy with
+which nature has so wonderfully endowed us, which makes the pain and
+pleasure of all other living things our own pain and pleasure, which
+binds us not only to our fellow-men, but to every moving creature
+on the face of the earth, we should have much to say. How much, for
+instance, does its _life_ add to the beauty of the swan!--how much
+more its calm and placid life! Here, and on what would follow on
+the still more exalted mood of pious contemplation--when all nature
+seems as a hymn or song of praise to the Creator--we should be
+happy to borrow aid from Mr Ruskin; his essay supplying admirable
+materials for certain _chapters_ in a treatise on the beautiful
+which should embrace the whole subject.
+
+No such treatise, however, is it our object to compose. We have said
+enough to show the true nature of that theory of association, as a
+branch of which alone is it possible to take any intelligible view
+of Mr Ruskin's _Theoria_, or "Theoretic Faculty." His flagrant error
+is, that he will represent a part for the whole, and will distort
+and confuse everything for the sake of this representation. Viewed
+in their proper limitation, his remarks are often such as every
+wise and good man will approve of. Here and there too, there are
+shrewd intimations which the psychological student may profit by. He
+has pointed out several instances where the associations insisted
+upon by writers of the school of Alison have nothing whatever to
+do with the sentiment of beauty; and neither harmonise with, nor
+exalt it. Not all that may, in any way, _interest_ us in an object,
+adds to its beauty. "Thus," as Mr Ruskin we think very justly says,
+"where we are told that the leaves of a plant are occupied in
+decomposing carbonic acid, and preparing oxygen for us, we begin to
+look upon it with some such indifference as upon a gasometer. It
+has become a machine; some of our sense of its happiness is gone;
+its emanation of inherent life is no longer pure." The knowledge of
+the anatomical structure of the limb is very interesting, but it
+adds nothing to the beauty of its outline. Scientific associations,
+however, of this kind, will have a different aesthetic effect,
+according to the degree or the enthusiasm with which the science has
+been studied.
+
+It is not our business to advocate this theory of association of
+ideas, but briefly to expound it. But we may remark that those who
+adopt (as Mr Ruskin has done in one branch of his subject--his
+_AEsthesis_) the rival theory of an intuitive perception of the
+beautiful, must find a difficulty where to _insert_ this intuitive
+perception. The beauty of any one object is generally composed
+of several qualities and accessories--to which of these are we
+to connect this intuition? And if to the whole assemblage of
+them, then, as each of these qualities has been shown by its own
+virtue to administer to the general effect, we shall be explaining
+again by this new perception what has been already explained.
+Select any notorious instance of the beautiful--say the swan.
+How many qualities and accessories immediately occur to us as
+intimately blended in our minds with the form and white plumage
+of the bird! What were its arched neck and mantling wings if it
+were not _living_? And how the calm and inoffensive, and somewhat
+majestic life it leads, carries away our sympathies! Added to
+which, the snow-white form of the swan is imaged in clear waters,
+and is relieved by green foliage; and if the bird makes the river
+more beautiful, the river, in return, reflects its serenity and
+peacefulness upon the bird. Now all this we seem to see as we look
+upon the swan. To which of these facts separately will you attach
+this new intuition? And if you wait till all are assembled, the bird
+is already beautiful.
+
+We are all in the habit of _reasoning_ on the beautiful, of
+defending our own tastes, and this just in proportion as the beauty
+in question is of a high order. And why do we do this? Because,
+just in proportion as the beauty is of an elevated character, does
+it depend on some moral association. Every argument of this kind
+will be found to consist of an analysis of the sentiment. Nor is
+there anything derogatory, as some have supposed, in this analysis
+of the sentiment; for we learn from it, at every step, that in the
+same degree as men become more refined, more humane, more kind,
+equitable, and pious, will the visible world become more richly
+clad with beauty. We see here an admirable arrangement, whereby the
+external world grows in beauty, as men grow in goodness.
+
+We must now follow Mr Ruskin a step farther into the development
+of his _Theoria_. All beauty, he tell us, _is such_, in its high
+and only true character, because it is a type of one or more of
+God's attributes. This, as we have shown, is to represent one class
+of associated thought as absorbing and displacing all the rest.
+We protest against this egregious exaggeration of a great and
+sacred source of our emotions. With Mr Ruskin's own piety we can
+have no quarrel; but we enter a firm and calm protest against a
+falsification of our human nature, in obedience to one sentiment,
+however sublime. No good can come of it--no good, we mean, to
+religion itself. It is substantially the same error, though assuming
+a very different garb, which the Puritans committed. They disgusted
+men with religion, by introducing it into every law and custom, and
+detail of human life. Mr Ruskin would commit the same error in
+the department of taste, over which he would rule so despotically:
+he is not content that the highest beauty shall be religious; he
+will permit nothing to be beautiful, except as it partakes of a
+religious character. But there is a vast region lying between the
+"animal pleasantness" of his AEsthesis and the pious contemplation of
+his Theoria. There is much between the human animal and the saint;
+there are the domestic affections and the love they spring from,
+and hopes, and regrets, and aspirations, and the hour of peace and
+the hour of repose--in short, there is human life. From all human
+life, as we have seen, come contributions to the sentiment of the
+beautiful, quite as distinctly traced as the peculiar class on which
+Mr Ruskin insists.
+
+If any one descanting upon music should affirm, that, in the first
+place, there was a certain animal pleasantness in harmony or melody,
+or both, but that the real essence of music, that by which it truly
+becomes music, was the perception in harmony or melody of types of
+the Divine attributes, he would reason exactly in the same manner
+on music as Mr Ruskin does on beauty. Nevertheless, although sacred
+music is the highest, it is very plain that there is other music
+than the sacred, and that all songs are not hymns.
+
+Chapter v. of the present volume bears this title--_Of
+Typical Beauty. First, of Infinity, or the type of the Divine
+Incomprehensibility._--A boundless space will occur directly to
+the reader as a type of the infinite; perhaps it should be rather
+described as itself the infinite under one form. But Mr Ruskin finds
+the infinite in everything. That idea which he justly describes
+as the incomprehensible, and which is so profound and baffling a
+mystery to the finite being, is supposed to be thrust upon the mind
+on every occasion. Every instance of variety is made the type of the
+infinite, as well as every indication of space. We remember that,
+in the first volume of the _Modern Painters_, we were not a little
+startled at being told that the distinguishing character of every
+good artist was, that "he painted the infinite." Good or bad, we now
+see that he could scarcely fail to paint the infinite: it must be by
+some curious chance that the feat is not accomplished.
+
+     "Now, not only," writes Mr Ruskin, "is this expression of
+     infinity in distance most precious wherever we find it, however
+     solitary it may be, and however unassisted by other forms and
+     kinds of beauty; but it is of such value that no such other
+     forms will altogether recompense us for its loss; and much
+     as I dread the enunciation of anything that may seem like a
+     conventional rule, I have no hesitation in asserting that
+     no work of any art, in which this expression of infinity is
+     possible, can be perfect or supremely elevated without it; and
+     that, in proportion to its presence, _it will exalt and render
+     impressive even the most tame and trivial themes_. And I think
+     if there be any one grand division, by which it is at all
+     possible to set the productions of painting, so far as their
+     mere plan or system is concerned, on our right and left hands,
+     it is this of light and dark background, of heaven-light and
+     of object-light.... There is a spectral etching of Rembrandt,
+     a presentation of Christ in the Temple, where the figure of
+     a robed priest stands glaring by its gems out of the gloom,
+     holding a crosier. Behind it there is a subdued window-light
+     seen in the opening, between two columns, without which
+     the impressiveness of the whole subject would, I think, be
+     incalculably diminished. I cannot tell whether I am at present
+     allowing too much weight to my own fancies and predilections;
+     but, without so much escape into the outer air and open heaven
+     as this, I can take permanent pleasure in no picture.
+
+     "And I think I am supported in this feeling by the unanimous
+     practice, if not the confessed opinion, of all artists. The
+     painter of portrait _is unhappy without his conventional white
+     stroke under the sleeve_, or beside the arm-chair; the painter
+     of interiors feels like a caged bird unless he can throw a
+     window open, or set the door ajar; the landscapist dares not
+     lose himself in forest without a gleam of light under its
+     farthest branches, nor ventures out in rain unless he may
+     somewhere pierce to a better promise in the distance, or cling
+     to some closing gap of variable blue above."--(P. 39.)
+
+But if an open window, or "that conventional white stroke under the
+sleeve," is sufficient to indicate the Infinite, how few pictures
+there must be in which it is not indicated! and how many "a tame
+and trivial theme" must have been, by this indication, exalted and
+rendered impressive! And yet it seems that some very celebrated
+paintings want this open-window or conventional white stroke. The
+Madonna della Sediola of Raphael is known over all Europe; some
+print of it may be seen in every village; that virgin-mother, in her
+antique chair, embracing her child with so sweet and maternal an
+embrace, has found its way to the heart of every woman, Catholic or
+Protestant. But unfortunately it has a dark background, and there
+is no open window--nothing to typify infinity. To us it seemed that
+there was "heaven's light" over the whole picture. Though there
+is the chamber wall seen behind the chair, there is nothing to
+intimate that the door or the window is closed. One might in charity
+have imagined that the light came directly through an open door or
+window. However, Mr Ruskin is inexorable. "Raphael," he says, "_in
+his full_, betrayed the faith he had received from his father and
+his master, and substituted for the radiant sky of the Madonna del
+Cardellino the chamber wall of the Madonna della Sediola, and the
+brown wainscot of the Baldacchino."
+
+Of other modes in which the Infinite is represented, we have an
+instance in "The Beauty of Curvature."
+
+     "The first of these is the curvature of lines and surfaces,
+     wherein it at first appears futile to insist upon any
+     resemblance or suggestion of infinity, since there is certainly,
+     in our ordinary contemplation of it, no sensation of the kind.
+     But I have repeated again and again that the ideas of beauty
+     are instinctive, and that it is only upon consideration, and
+     even then in doubtful and disputable way, that they appear in
+     their typical character; neither do I intend at all to insist
+     upon the particular meaning which they appear to myself to bear,
+     but merely on their actual and demonstrable agreeableness; so
+     that in the present case, which I assert positively, and have
+     no fear of being able to prove--that a curve of any kind is
+     more beautiful than a right line--I leave it to the reader to
+     accept or not, as he pleases, _that reason of its agreeableness
+     which is the only one that I can at all trace: namely, that
+     every curve divides itself infinitely by its changes of
+     direction_."--(P. 63.)
+
+Our old friend Jacob Boehmen would have been delighted with this
+Theoria. But we must pass on to other types. Chapter vi. treats _of
+Unity, or the Type of the Divine Comprehensiveness_.
+
+     "Of the appearances of Unity, or of Unity itself, there are
+     several kinds, which it will be found hereafter convenient to
+     consider separately. Thus there is the unity of different and
+     separate things, subjected to one and the same influence, which
+     may be called Subjectional Unity; and this is the unity of the
+     clouds, as they are driven by the parallel winds, or as they
+     are ordered by the electric currents; this is the unity of the
+     sea waves; this, of the bending and undulation of the forest
+     masses; and in creatures capable of Will it is the Unity of
+     Will, or of Impulse. And there is Unity of Origin, which we may
+     call Original Unity, which is of things arising from one spring
+     or source, and speaking always of this their brotherhood; and
+     this in matter is the unity of the branches of the trees, and
+     of the petals and starry rays of flowers, and of the beams of
+     light; and in spiritual creatures it is their filial relation
+     to Him from whom they have their being. And there is Unity of
+     Sequence," &c.--
+
+down another half page. Very little to be got here, we think. Let
+us advance to the next chapter. This is entitled, _Of Repose, or the
+Type of Divine Permanence_.
+
+It will be admitted on all hands that nothing adds more frequently
+to the charms of the visible object than the associated feeling of
+repose. The hour of sunset is the hour of repose. Most beautiful
+things are enhanced by some reflected feeling of this kind. But
+surely one need not go farther than to human labour, and human
+restlessness, anxiety, and passion, to understand the charm of
+repose. Mr Ruskin carries us at once into the third heaven:--
+
+     "As opposed to passion, changefulness, or laborious exertion,
+     Repose is the especial and separating characteristic of the
+     eternal mind and power; it is the 'I am' of the Creator, opposed
+     to the 'I become' of all creatures; it is the sign alike of the
+     supreme knowledge which is incapable of surprise, the supreme
+     power which is incapable of labour, the supreme volition which
+     is incapable of change; it is the stillness of the beams of the
+     eternal chambers laid upon the variable waters of ministering
+     creatures."
+
+We must proceed. Chapter viii. treats _Of Symmetry, or the Type
+of Divine Justice_. Perhaps the nature of this chapter will be
+sufficiently indicated to the reader, now somewhat informed of Mr
+Ruskin's mode of thinking, by the title itself. At all events, we
+shall pass on to the next chapter, ix.--_Of Purity, or the Type
+of Divine Energy_. Here, the reader will perhaps expect to find
+himself somewhat more at home. One type, at all events, of Divine
+Purity has often been presented to his mind. Light has generally
+been considered as the fittest emblem or manifestation of the Divine
+Presence,
+
+    "That never but in unapproached light
+     Dwelt from eternity."
+
+But if the reader has formed any such agreeable expectation he
+will be disappointed. Mr Ruskin travels on no beaten track. He finds
+some reasons, partly theological, partly gathered from his own
+theory of the Beautiful, for discarding this ancient association of
+Light with Purity. As the _Divine_ attributes are those which the
+visible object typifies, and by no means the _human_, and as Purity,
+which is "sinlessness," cannot, he thinks, be predicted of the
+Divine nature, it follows that he cannot admit Light to be a type of
+Purity. We quote the passage, as it will display the working of his
+theory:--
+
+     "It may seem strange to many readers that I have not spoken
+     of purity in that sense in which it is most frequently used,
+     as a type of sinlessness. I do not deny that the frequent
+     metaphorical use of it in Scripture may have, and ought to have,
+     much influence on the sympathies with which we regard it; and
+     that probably the immediate agreeableness of it to most minds
+     arises far more from this source than from that to which I have
+     chosen to attribute it. But, in the first place, _if it be
+     indeed in the signs of Divine and not of human attributes that
+     beauty consists_, I see not how the idea of sin can be formed
+     with respect to the Deity; for it is the idea of a relation
+     borne by us to Him, and not in any way to be attached to His
+     abstract nature; while the Love, Mercifulness, and Justice of
+     God I have supposed to be symbolised by other qualities of
+     beauty: and I cannot trace any rational connection between them
+     and the idea of Spotlessness in matter, nor between this idea
+     nor any of the virtues which make up the righteousness of man,
+     except perhaps those of truth and openness, which have been
+     above spoken of as more expressed by the transparency than the
+     mere purity of matter. So that I conceive the use of the terms
+     purity, spotlessness, &c., on moral subjects, to be merely
+     metaphorical; and that it is rather that we illustrate these
+     virtues by the desirableness of material purity, than that we
+     desire material purity because it is illustrative of those
+     virtues. I repeat, then, that the only idea which I think can be
+     legitimately connected with purity of matter is this of vital
+     and energetic connection among its particles."
+
+We have been compelled to quote some strange passages, of most
+difficult and laborious perusal; but our task is drawing to an
+end. The last of these types we have to mention is that _Of
+Moderation, or the Type of Government by Law_. We suspect there are
+many persons who have rapidly perused Mr Ruskin's works (probably
+_skipping_ where the obscurity grew very thick) who would be very
+much surprised, if they gave a closer attention to them, at the
+strange conceits and absurdities which they had passed over without
+examination. Indeed, his very loose and declamatory style, and the
+habit of saying extravagant things, set all examination at defiance.
+But let any one pause a moment on the last title we have quoted
+from Mr Ruskin--let him read the chapter itself--let him reflect
+that he has been told in it that "what we express by the terms
+chasteness, refinement, and elegance," in any work of art, and more
+particularly "that finish" so dear to the intelligent critic, owe
+their attractiveness to being types of God's government by law!--we
+think he will confess that never in any book, ancient or modern, did
+he meet with an absurdity to outrival it.
+
+We have seen why the curve in general is beautiful; we have here the
+reason given us why one curve is more beautiful than another:--
+
+     "And herein we at last find the reason of that which has been so
+     often noted respecting the subtilty and almost invisibility of
+     natural curves and colours, and why it is that we look on those
+     lines as least beautiful which fall into wide and far license
+     of curvature, and as most beautiful which approach nearest (so
+     that the curvilinear character be distinctly asserted) to the
+     government of the right line, as in the pure and severe curves
+     of the draperies of the religious painters."
+
+There is still the subject of "vital beauty" before us, but we shall
+probably be excused from entering further into the development of
+"Theoria." It must be quite clear by this time to our readers, that,
+whatever there is in it really wise and intelligible, resolves
+itself into one branch of that general theory of association of
+ideas, of which Alison and others have treated. But we are now
+in a condition to understand more clearly that peculiar style of
+language which startled us so much in the first volume of the
+_Modern Painters_. There we frequently heard of the Divine mission
+of the artist, of the religious office of the painter, and how
+Mr Turner was delivering God's message to man. What seemed an
+oratorical climax, much too frequently repeated, proves to be a
+logical sequence of his theoretical principles. All true beauty is
+religious; therefore all true art, which is the reproduction of the
+beautiful, must be religious also. Every picture gallery is a sort
+of temple, every great painter a sort of prophet. If Mr Ruskin is
+conscious that he never admires anything beautiful in nature or art,
+without a reference to some attribute of God, or some sentiment
+of piety, he may be a very exalted person, but he is no type of
+humanity. If he asserts this, we must be sufficiently courteous
+to believe him; we must not suspect that he is hardly candid with
+us, or with himself; but we shall certainly not accept him as a
+representative of the _genus homo_. He finds "sermons in stones,"
+and sermons always; "books in the running brooks," and always books
+of divinity. Other men not deficient in reflection or piety do not
+find it thus. Let us hear the poet who, more than any other, has
+made a religion of the beauty of nature. Wordsworth, in a passage
+familiar to every one of his readers, runs his hand, as it were,
+over all the chords of the lyre. He finds other sources of the
+beautiful not unworthy his song, besides that high contemplative
+piety which he introduces as a noble and fit climax. He recalls the
+first ardours of his youth, when the beautiful object itself of
+nature seemed to him all, in all:--
+
+                "I cannot paint
+    What then I was. The sounding cataract
+    Haunted me like a passion; the tall rock,
+    The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood.
+    Their colours and their forms were thus to me
+    An appetite; a feeling and a love
+    That had no need of a remoter charm
+    By thought supplied, nor any interest
+    Unborrowed from the eye. That time is past,
+    And all its aching joys are now no more,
+    And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this
+    Faint I, nor mourn, nor murmur; other gifts
+    Have followed. I have learned
+    To look on nature not as in the hour
+    Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes
+    _The still sad music of humanity,
+    Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
+    To chasten and subdue_. And I have felt
+    A presence that disturbs me with the joy
+    Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
+    Of something far more deeply interfused,
+    Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
+    And the round ocean and the living air,
+    And the blue sky, and in the mind of man."
+
+Our poet sounds all the chords. He does not muffle any; he honours
+Nature in her own simple loveliness, and in the beauty she wins from
+the human heart, as well as when she is informed with that sublime
+spirit
+
+                      "that impels
+    All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
+    And rolls through all things."
+
+Sit down, by all means, amongst the fern and the wild-flowers, and
+look out upon the blue hills, or near you at the flowing brook, and
+thank God, the giver of all this beauty. But what manner of good
+will you do by endeavouring to persuade yourself that these objects
+_are_ only beautiful because you give thanks for them?--for to this
+strange logical inversion will you find yourself reduced. And surely
+you learned to esteem and love this benevolence itself, first as
+a human attribute, before you became cognisant of it as a Divine
+attribute. What other course can the mind take but to travel through
+humanity up to God?
+
+There is much more of metaphysics in the volume before us; there
+is, in particular, an elaborate investigation of the faculty of
+imagination; but we have no inducement to proceed further with
+Mr Ruskin in these psychological inquiries. We have given some
+attention to his theory of the Beautiful, because it lay at the
+basis of a series of critical works which, partly from their
+boldness, and partly from the talent of a certain kind which
+is manifestly displayed in them, have attained to considerable
+popularity. But we have not the same object for prolonging our
+examination into his theory of the Imaginative Faculty. "We say
+it advisedly," (as Mr Ruskin always adds when he is asserting
+anything particularly rash,) we say it advisedly, and with no
+rashness whatever, that though our author is a man of great natural
+ability, and enunciates boldly many an independent isolated truth,
+yet of the spirit of philosophy he is utterly destitute. The
+calm, patient, prolonged thinking, which Dugald Stewart somewhere
+describes as the one essential characteristic of the successful
+student of philosophy, he knows nothing of. He wastes his ingenuity
+in making knots where others had long since untied them. He rushes
+at a definition, makes a parade of classification; but for any
+great and wide generalisation he has no appreciation whatever. He
+appears to have no taste, but rather an antipathy for it; when it
+lies in his way he avoids it. On this subject of the Imaginative
+Faculty he writes and he raves, defines and poetises by turns; makes
+laborious distinctions where there is no essential difference; has
+his "Imagination Associative," and his "Imagination Penetrative;"
+and will not, or cannot, see those broad general principles which
+with most educated men have become familiar truths, or truisms. But
+what clear thinking can we expect of a writer who thus describes his
+"Imagination Penetrative?"--
+
+     "It may seem to the reader that I am incorrect in calling this
+     penetrating possession-taking faculty Imagination. Be it so:
+     the name is of little consequence; the Faculty itself, called
+     by what name it will, I insist upon as the highest intellectual
+     power of man. _There is no reasoning in it_; it works not by
+     algebra, nor by integral calculus; it is a piercing Pholas-like
+     mind's tongue, that works and tastes into the very rock-heart.
+     No matter what be the subject submitted to it, substance or
+     spirit--all is alike divided asunder, joint and marrow, whatever
+     utmost truth, life, principle, it has laid bare; and that which
+     has no truth, life, nor principle, dissipated into its original
+     smoke at a touch. The whispers at men's ears it lifts into
+     visible angels. Vials that have lain sealed in the deep sea a
+     thousand years it unseals, and brings out of them Genii."--(P.
+     156.)
+
+With such a wonder-working faculty man ought to do much. Indeed,
+unless it has been asleep all this time, it is difficult to
+understand why there should remain anything for him to do.
+
+Surveying Mr Ruskin's works on art, with the knowledge we have here
+acquired of his intellectual character and philosophical theory, we
+are at no loss to comprehend that mixture of shrewd and penetrating
+remark, of bold and well-placed censure, and of utter nonsense in
+the shape of general principles, with which they abound. In his
+_Seven Lamps of Architecture_, which is a very entertaining book,
+and in his _Stones of Venice_, the reader will find many single
+observations which will delight him, as well by their justice, as by
+the zeal and vigour with which they are expressed. But from neither
+work will he derive any satisfaction if he wishes to carry away with
+him broad general views on architecture.
+
+There is no subject Mr Ruskin has treated more largely than that
+of architectural ornament; there is none on which he has said more
+good things, or delivered juster criticisms; and there is none on
+which he has uttered more indisputable nonsense. Every reader of
+taste will be grateful to Mr Ruskin if he can pull down from St
+Paul's Cathedral, or wherever else they are to be found, those
+wreaths or festoons of carved flowers--"that mass of all manner
+of fruit and flowers tied heavily into a long bunch, thickest in
+the middle, and pinned up by both ends against a dead wall." Urns
+with pocket-handkerchiefs upon them, or a sturdy thick flame for
+ever issuing from the top, he will receive our thanks for utterly
+demolishing. But when Mr Ruskin expounds his principles--and he
+always has principles to expound--when he lays down rules for the
+government of our taste in this matter, he soon involves us in
+hopeless bewilderment. Our ornaments, he tells us, are to be taken
+from the works of nature, not of man; and, from some passages of his
+writings, we should infer that Mr Ruskin would cover the walls of
+our public buildings with representations botanical and geological.
+But in this we must be mistaken. At all events, nothing is to be
+admitted that is taken from the works of man.
+
+     "I conclude, then, with the reader's leave, that all ornament is
+     base which takes for its subject human work; that it is utterly
+     base--painful to every rightly toned mind, without, perhaps,
+     immediate sense of the reason, but for a reason palpable enough
+     when we do think of it. For to carve our own work, and set it up
+     for admiration, is a miserable self-complacency, a contentment
+     in our wretched doings, when we might have been looking at God's
+     doings."
+
+After this, can we venture to admire the building itself, which is,
+of necessity, man's own "wretched doing?"
+
+Perplexed by his own rules, he will sometimes break loose from the
+entanglement in some such strange manner as this:--"I believe the
+right question to ask, with respect to all ornament, is simply this:
+Was it done with enjoyment--_was the carver happy while he was about
+it_?" Happy art! where the workman is sure to give happiness if
+he is but happy at his work. Would that the same could be said of
+literature!
+
+How far _colour_ should be introduced into architecture is a
+question with men of taste, and a question which of late has been
+more than usually discussed. Mr Ruskin leans to the introduction
+of colour. His taste may be correct; but the fanciful reasoning
+which he brings to bear upon the subject will assist no one else in
+forming his own taste. Because there is no connection "between the
+spots of an animal's skin and its anatomical system," he lays it
+down as the first great principle which is to guide us in the use of
+colour in architecture--
+
+     "That it be _visibly independent of form_. Never paint a column
+     with vertical lines, but always cross it. Never give separate
+     mouldings separate colours," &c. "In certain places," he
+     continues, "you may run your two systems closer, and here and
+     there let them be parallel for a note or two, but see that the
+     colours and the forms coincide only as two orders of mouldings
+     do; the same for an instant, but each holding its own course. So
+     single members may sometimes have single colours; _as a bird's
+     head is sometimes of one colour, and its shoulders another, you
+     may make your capital one colour, and your shaft another_; but,
+     in general, the best place for colour is on broad surfaces, not
+     on the points of interest in form. _An animal is mottled on its
+     breast and back, and rarely on its paws and about its eyes_; so
+     put your variegation boldly on the flat wall and broad shaft,
+     but be shy of it on the capital and moulding."--(_Lamps of
+     Architecture_, p. 127.)
+
+We do not quite see what we have to do at all with the "anatomical
+system" of the animal, which is kept out of sight; but, in general,
+we apprehend there is, both in the animal and vegetable kingdom,
+considerable harmony betwixt colour and external form. Such
+fantastic reasoning as this, it is evident, will do little towards
+establishing that one standard of taste, or that "one school of
+architecture," which Mr Ruskin so strenuously insists upon. All
+architects are to resign their individual tastes and predilections,
+and enrol themselves in one school, which shall adopt one style. We
+need not say that the very first question--what that style should
+be, Greek or Gothic--would never be decided. Mr Ruskin decides it
+in favour of the "earliest English decorated Gothic;" but seems,
+in this case, to suspect that his decision will not carry us far
+towards unanimity. The scheme is utterly impossible; but he does his
+duty, he tells us, by proposing the impossibility.
+
+As a climax to his inconsistency and his abnormal ways of thinking,
+he concludes his _Seven Lamps of Architecture_ with a most ominous
+paragraph, implying that the time is at hand when no architecture of
+any kind will be wanted: man and his works will be both swept away
+from the face of the earth. How, with this impression on his mind,
+could he have the heart to tell us to build for posterity? Will it
+be a commentary on the Apocalypse that we shall next receive from
+the pen of Mr Ruskin?
+
+
+
+
+PORTUGUESE POLITICS.
+
+
+The dramatic and singular revolution of which Portugal has recently
+been the theatre, the strange fluctuations and ultimate success
+of Marshal Saldanha's insurrection, the narrow escape of Donna
+Maria from at least a temporary expulsion from her dominions, have
+attracted in this country more attention than is usually bestowed
+upon the oft-recurring convulsions of the Peninsula. Busy as the
+present year has been, and abounding in events of exciting interest
+nearer home, the English public has yet found time to deplore the
+anarchy to which Portugal is a prey, and to marvel once more, as it
+many times before has marvelled, at the tardy realisation of those
+brilliant promises of order, prosperity, and good government, so
+long held out to the two Peninsular nations by the promoters of the
+Quadruple Alliance. The statesmen who, for nearly a score of years,
+have assiduously guided Portugal and Spain in the seductive paths
+of modern Liberalism, can hardly feel much gratification at the
+results of their well-intended but most unprosperous endeavours.
+It is difficult to imagine them contemplating with pride and
+exultation, or even without a certain degree of self-reproach, the
+fruits of their officious exertions. Repudiating partisan views of
+Peninsular politics, putting persons entirely out of the question,
+declaring our absolute indifference as to who occupies the thrones
+of Spain and Portugal, so long as those countries are well-governed,
+casting no imputations upon the motives of those foreign governments
+and statesmen who were chiefly instrumental in bringing about the
+present state of things south of the Pyrenees, we would look only to
+facts, and crave an honest answer to a plain question. The question
+is this: After the lapse of seventeen years, what is the condition
+of the two nations upon which have been conferred, at grievous
+expense of blood and treasure, the much vaunted blessings of rulers
+nominally Liberal, and professedly patriotic? For the present we
+will confine this inquiry to Portugal, for the reason that the War
+of Succession terminated in that country when it was but beginning
+in the neighbouring kingdom, since which time the vanquished party,
+unlike the Carlists in Spain, have uniformly abstained--with the
+single exception of the rising in 1846-7--from armed aggression, and
+have observed a patient and peaceful policy. So that the Portuguese
+Liberals have had seventeen years' fair trial of their governing
+capacity, and cannot allege that their efforts for their country's
+welfare have been impeded or retarded by the acts of that party whom
+they denounced as incapable of achieving it,--however they may have
+been neutralised by dissensions and anarchy in their own ranks.
+
+At this particular juncture of Portuguese affairs, and as no
+inappropriate preface to the only reply that can veraciously be
+given to the question we have proposed, it will not be amiss to take
+a brief retrospective glance at some of the events that preceded
+and led to the reign of Donna Maria. It will be remembered that
+from the year 1828 to 1834, the Liberals in both houses of the
+British Parliament, supported by an overwhelming majority of the
+British press, fiercely and pertinaciously assailed the government
+and person of Don Miguel, then _de facto_ King of Portugal, king
+_de jure_ in the eyes of the Portuguese Legitimists and by the
+vote of the Legitimate Cortes of 1828, and recognised (in 1829) by
+Spain, by the United States, and by various inferior powers. Twenty
+years ago political passions ran high in this country: public men
+were, perhaps, less guarded in their language; newspapers were
+certainly far more intemperate in theirs; and we may safely say,
+that upon no foreign prince, potentate, or politician, has virulent
+abuse--proceeding from such respectable sources--ever since been
+showered in England, in one half the quantity in which it then
+descended upon the head of the unlucky Miguel. Unquestionably Don
+Miguel had acted, in many respects, neither well nor wisely: his
+early education had been ill-adapted to the high position he was
+one day to fill--at a later period of his life he was destined to
+take lessons of wisdom and moderation in the stern but wholesome
+school of adversity. But it is also beyond a doubt, now that time
+has cleared up much which then was purposely garbled and distorted,
+that the object of all this invective was by no means so black as
+he was painted, and that his character suffered in England from the
+malicious calumnies of Pedroite refugees, and from the exaggerated
+and easily-accepted statements of the Portuguese correspondents
+of English newspapers. The Portuguese nation, removed from such
+influence, formed its own opinions from what it saw and observed;
+and the respect and affection testified, even at the present
+day, to their dethroned sovereign, by a large number of its most
+distinguished and respectable members, are the best refutation of
+the more odious of the charges so abundantly brought against him,
+and so lightly credited in those days of rampant revolution. It is
+unnecessary, therefore, to argue that point, even were personal
+vindication or attack the objects of this article, instead of being
+entirely without its scope. Against the insupportable oppression
+exercised by the monster in human form, as which Don Miguel was
+then commonly depicted in England and France, innumerable engines
+were directed by the governments and press of those two countries.
+Insurrections were stirred up in Portugal, volunteers were recruited
+abroad, irregular military expeditions were encouraged, loans were
+fomented; money-lenders and stock-jobbers were all agog for Pedro,
+patriotism, and profit. Orators and newspapers foretold, in glowing
+speeches and enthusiastic paragraphs, unbounded prosperity to
+Portugal as the sure consequence of the triumph of the revolutionary
+party. Rapid progress of civilisation, impartial and economical
+administration, increase of commerce, development of the country's
+resources, a perfect avalanche of social and political blessings,
+were to descend, like manna from heaven, upon the fortunate nation,
+so soon as the Liberals obtained the sway of its destinies. It were
+beside our purpose here to investigate how it was that, with such
+alluring prospects held out to them, the people of Portugal were so
+blind to their interests as to supply Don Miguel with men and money,
+wherewith to defend himself for five years against the assaults
+and intrigues of foreign and domestic enemies. Deprived of support
+and encouragement from without, he still held his ground; and the
+formation of a quadruple alliance, including the two most powerful
+countries in Europe, the enlistment of foreign mercenaries of a
+dozen different nations, the entrance of a numerous Spanish army,
+were requisite finally to dispossess him of his crown. The anomaly
+of the abhorred persecutor and tyrant receiving so much support from
+his ill-used subjects, even then struck certain men in this country
+whose names stand pretty high upon the list of clear-headed and
+experienced politicians, and the Duke of Wellington, Lord Aberdeen,
+Sir Robert Peel, Lord Lyndhurst, and others, defended Miguel; but
+their arguments, however cogent, were of little avail against the
+fierce tide of popular prejudice, unremittingly stimulated by the
+declamations of the press. To be brief, in 1834 Don Miguel was
+driven from Portugal; and his enemies, put in possession of the
+kingdom and all its resources, were at full liberty to realise the
+salutary reforms they had announced and promised, and for which they
+had professed to fight. On taking the reins of government, they
+had everything in their favour; their position was advantageous
+and brilliant in the highest degree. They enjoyed the prestige of
+a triumph, undisputed authority, powerful foreign protection and
+influence. At their disposal was an immense mass of property taken
+from the church, as well as the produce of large foreign loans.
+Their credit, too, was _then_ unlimited. Lastly--and this was far
+from the least of their advantages--they had in their favour the
+great discouragement and discontent engendered amongst the partisans
+of the Miguelite government, by the numerous and gross blunders
+which that government had committed--blunders which contributed
+even more to its downfall than did the attacks of its foes, or the
+effects of foreign hostility. In short, the Liberals were complete
+and undisputed masters of the situation. But, notwithstanding all
+the facilities and advantages they enjoyed, what has been the
+condition of Portugal since they assumed the reins? What _is_ its
+condition at the present day? We need not go far to ascertain it.
+The wretched plight of that once prosperous little kingdom is
+deposed to by every traveller who visits it, and by every English
+journal that has a correspondent there; it is to be traced in the
+columns of every Portuguese newspaper, and is admitted and deplored
+by thousands who once were strenuous and influential supporters
+of the party who promised so much, and who have performed so
+little that is good. The reign of that party whose battle-cry is,
+or was, Donna Maria and the Constitution, has been an unbroken
+series of revolutions, illegalities, peculations, corruptions, and
+dilapidations. The immense amount of misnamed "national property"
+(the _Infantado_ and church estates,) which was part of their
+capital on their accession to power, has disappeared without benefit
+either to the country or to its creditors. The treasury is empty;
+the public revenues are eaten up by anticipation; civil and military
+officers, the court itself, are all in constant and considerable
+arrears of salaries and pay. The discipline of the troops is
+destroyed, the soldiers being demoralised by the bad example of
+their chiefs, including that of Marshal Saldanha himself; for it
+is one of the great misfortunes of the Peninsula, that there most
+officers of a certain rank consider their political predilections
+before their military duty. The "Liberal" party, divided and
+subdivided, and split into fractions, whose numbers fluctuate at the
+dictates of interest or caprice, presents a lamentable spectacle
+of anarchy and inconsistency; whilst the Queen herself, whose good
+intentions we by no means impugn, has completely forfeited, as a
+necessary consequence of the misconduct of her counsellors, and of
+the sufferings the country has endured under her reign, whatever
+amount of respect, affection, and influence the Portuguese nation
+may once have been disposed to accord her. Such is the sad picture
+now presented by Portugal; and none whose acquaintance with facts
+renders them competent to judge, will say that it is overcharged or
+highly coloured.
+
+The party in Portugal who advocate a return to the ancient
+constitution,[7] under which the country flourished--which fell into
+abeyance towards the close of the seventeenth century, but which it
+is now proposed to revive, as preferable to, and practically more
+liberal than, the present system--and who adopt as a banner, and
+couple with this scheme, the name of Don Miguel de Braganca, have
+not unnaturally derived great accession of strength, both moral and
+numerical, from the faults and dissensions of their adversaries. At
+the present day there are few things which the European public, and
+especially that of this country, sooner becomes indifferent to, and
+loses sight of, than the person and pretensions of a dethroned king;
+and owing to the lapse of years, to his unobtrusive manner of life,
+and to the storm of accusations amidst which he made his exit from
+power, Don Miguel would probably be considered, by those persons in
+this country who remember his existence, as the least likely member
+of the royal triumvirate, now assembled in Germany, to exchange his
+exile for a crown. But if we would take a fair and impartial view of
+the condition of Portugal, and calculate, as far as is possible in
+the case of either of the two Peninsular nations, the probabilities
+and chances of the future, we must not suffer ourselves to be
+run away with by preconceived prejudices, or to be influenced by
+the popular odium attached to a name. After beholding the most
+insignificant and unpromising of modern pretenders suddenly elevated
+to the virtual sovereignty--however transitory it may prove--of one
+of the most powerful and civilised of European nations, it were
+rash to denounce as impossible any restoration or enthronement.
+And it were especially rash so to do when with the person of the
+aspirant to the throne a nation is able to connect a reasonable hope
+of improvement in its condition. Of the principle of legitimacy we
+here say nothing, for it were vain to deny that in Europe it is
+daily less regarded, whilst it sinks into insignificance when put in
+competition with the rights and wellbeing of the people.
+
+[7] It is desirable here to explain that the old constitution of
+Portugal, whose restoration is the main feature of the scheme of
+the National or Royalist party, (it assumes both names,) gave the
+right of voting at the election of members of the popular assembly
+to every man who had a hearth of his own--whether he occupied a
+whole house or a single room--in fact, to all heads of families
+and self-supporting persons. Such extent of suffrage ought surely
+to content the most democratic, and certainly presents a strong
+contrast to the farce of national representation which has been so
+long enacting in the Peninsula.
+
+As far back as the period of its emigration, the Pedroite or
+Liberal party split into two fractions. One of these believed
+in the possible realisation of those ultra-liberal theories so
+abundantly promulgated in the proclamations, manifestoes, preambles
+of laws, &c., which Don Pedro issued from the Brazils, from England
+and France, and afterwards from Terceira and Oporto. The other
+fraction of the party had sanctioned the promulgation of these
+utopian theories as a means of delusion, and as leading to their
+own triumph; but they deemed their realisation impossible, and were
+quite decided, when the revolutionary tide should have borne them
+into power, to oppose to the unruly flood the barrier of a gradual
+but steady reaction. At a later period these divisions of the
+Liberal party became more distinctly defined, and resulted, in 1836,
+in their nominal classification as Septembrists and Chartists--the
+latter of whom (numerically very weak, but comprising Costa Cabral,
+and other men of talent and energy) may be compared to the Moderados
+of Spain--the former to the Progresistas, but with tendencies more
+decidedly republican. It is the ambitious pretensions, the struggles
+for power and constant dissensions of these two sets of men, and
+of the minor fractions into which they have subdivided themselves,
+that have kept Portugal for seventeen years in a state of anarchy,
+and have ended by reducing her to her present pitiable condition.
+So numerous are the divisions, so violent the quarrels of the two
+parties, that their utter dissolution appears inevitable; and it is
+in view of this that the National party, as it styles itself, which
+inscribes upon its flag the name of Don Miguel--not as an absolute
+sovereign, but with powers limited by legitimate constitutional
+forms, to whose strict observance they bind him as a condition of
+their support, and of his continuance upon the throne upon which
+they hope to place him--uplifts its head, reorganises its hosts,
+and more clearly defines its political principles. Whilst Chartists
+and Septembrists tear each other to pieces, the Miguelites not only
+maintain their numerical importance, but, closing their ranks and
+acting in strict unity, they give constant proofs of adhesion to Don
+Miguel as personifying a national principle, and at the same time
+give evidence of political vitality by the activity and progress of
+their ideas, which are adapting themselves to the Liberal sentiments
+and theories of the times.[8] And it were flying in the face of
+facts to deny that this party comprehends a very important portion
+of the intelligence and respectability of the nation. It ascribes
+to itself an overwhelming majority in the country, and asserts that
+five-sixths of the population of Portugal would joyfully hail its
+advent to power. This of course must be viewed as an _ex-parte_
+statement, difficult for foreigners to verify or refute. But of
+late there have been no lack of proofs that a large proportion of
+the higher orders of Portuguese are steadfast in their aversion
+to the government of the "Liberals," and in their adherence to him
+whom they still, after his seventeen years' dethronement, persist in
+calling their king, and whom they have supported, during his long
+exile, by their willing contributions. It is fresh in every one's
+memory that, only the other day, twenty five peers, or successors
+of peers, who had been excluded by Don Pedro from the peerage for
+having sworn allegiance to his brother, having been reinstated and
+invited to take their seats in the Chamber, signed and published
+a document utterly rejecting the boon. Some hundreds of officers
+of the old army of Don Miguel, who are living for the most part
+in penury and privation, were invited to demand from Saldanha the
+restitution of their grades, which would have entitled them to
+the corresponding pay. To a man they refused, and protested their
+devotion to their former sovereign. A new law of elections, with a
+very extended franchise--nearly amounting, it is said, to universal
+suffrage--having been the other day arbitrarily decreed by the
+Saldanha cabinet (certainly a most unconstitutional proceeding,)
+and the government having expressed a wish that all parties in the
+kingdom should exercise the electoral right, and give their votes
+for representatives in the new parliament, a numerous and highly
+respectable meeting of the Miguelites was convened at Lisbon.
+This meeting voted, with but two dissentient voices, a resolution
+of abstaining from all share in the elections, declaring their
+determination not to sanction, by coming forward either as voters
+or candidates, a system and an order of things which they utterly
+repudiated as illegal, oppressive, and forced upon the nation by
+foreign interference. The same resolution was adopted by large
+assemblages in every province of the kingdom. At various periods,
+during the last seventeen years, the Portuguese government has
+endeavoured to inveigle the Miguelites into the representative
+assembly, doubtless hoping that upon its benches they would be
+more accessible to seduction, or easier to intimidate. It is a
+remarkable and significant circumstance, that only in one instance
+(in the year 1842) have their efforts been successful, and that
+the person who was then induced so to deviate from the policy of
+his party, speedily gave unmistakable signs of shame and regret.
+Bearing in mind the undoubted and easily proved fact that the
+Miguelites, whether their numerical strength be or be not as great
+as they assert, comprise a large majority of the clergy, of the old
+nobility, and of the most highly educated classes of the nation,
+their steady and consistent refusal to sanction the present order of
+things, by their presence in its legislative assembly, shows a unity
+of purpose and action, and a staunch and dogged conviction, which
+cannot but be disquieting to their adversaries, and over which it is
+impossible lightly to pass in an impartial review of the condition
+and prospects of Portugal.
+
+[8] The principal Miguelite papers, _A Nacao_ (Lisbon,) and _O
+Portugal_ (Oporto,) both of them highly respectable journals,
+conducted with much ability and moderation, unceasingly reiterate,
+whilst exposing the vices and corruption of the present system,
+their aversion to despotism, and their desire for a truly liberal
+and constitutional government.
+
+We have already declared our determination here to attach importance
+to the persons of none of the four princes and princesses who claim
+or occupy the thrones of Spain and Portugal, except in so far as
+they may respectively unite the greatest amount of the national
+suffrage and adhesion. As regards Don Miguel, we are far from
+exaggerating his personal claims--the question of legitimacy being
+here waived. His prestige _out_ of Portugal is of the smallest, and
+certainly he has never given proofs of great talents, although he is
+not altogether without kingly qualities, nor wanting in resolution
+and energy; whilst his friends assert, and it is fair to admit as
+probable, that he has long since repented and abjured the follies
+and errors of his youth. But we cannot be blind to the fact of the
+strong sympathy and regard entertained for him by a very large
+number of Portuguese. His presence in London during some weeks of
+the present summer was the signal for a pilgrimage of Portuguese
+noblemen and gentlemen of the best and most influential families in
+the country, many of whom openly declared the sole object of their
+journey to be to pay their respects to their exiled sovereign;
+whilst others, the chief motive of whose visit was the attraction
+of the Industrial Exhibition, gladly seized the opportunity to
+reiterate the assurances of their fidelity and allegiance. Strangely
+enough, the person who opened the procession was a nephew of Marshal
+Saldanha, Don Antonio C. de Seabra, a staunch and intelligent
+royalist, whose visit to London coincided, as nearly as might be,
+with his uncle's flight into Galicia, and with his triumphant
+return to Oporto after the victory gained for him as he was
+decamping. Senhor Seabra was followed by two of the Freires, nephew
+and grand-nephew of the Freire who was minister-plenipotentiary
+in London some thirty years ago; by the Marquis and Marchioness
+of Vianna, and the Countess of Lapa--all of the first nobility
+of Portugal; by the Marquis of Abrantes, a relative of the royal
+family of Portugal; by a host of gentlemen of the first families in
+the provinces of Beira, Minho, Tras-os-Montes, &c.--Albuquerques,
+Mellos, Taveiras, Pachecos, Albergarias, Cunhas, Correa-de-Sas,
+Beduidos, San Martinhos, Pereiras, and scores of other names, which
+persons acquainted with Portugal will recognise as comprehending
+much of the best blood and highest intelligence in the country. Such
+demonstrations are not to be overlooked, or regarded as trivial
+and unimportant. Men like the Marquis of Abrantes, for instance,
+not less distinguished for mental accomplishment and elevation of
+character than for illustrious descent,[9] men of large possessions
+and extensive influence, cannot be assumed to represent only their
+individual opinions. The remarkable step lately taken by a number of
+Portuguese of this class, must be regarded as an indication of the
+state of feeling of a large portion of the nation; as an indication,
+too, of something grievously faulty in the conduct or constitution
+of a government which, after seventeen years' sway, has been unable
+to rally, reconcile, or even to appease the animosity of any portion
+of its original opponents.
+
+[9] The Marquis of Abrantes is descended from the Dukes of
+Lancaster, through Philippa of Lancaster, Queen of John I., one of
+the greatest kings Portugal ever possessed.
+
+Between the state of Portugal and that of Spain there are, at the
+present moment, points of strong contrast, and others of striking
+similarity. The similarity is in the actual condition of the two
+countries--in their sufferings, misgovernment, and degradation; the
+contrast is in the state and prospects of the political parties
+they contain. What we have said of the wretched plight of Portugal
+applies, with few and unimportant differences, to the condition
+of Spain. If there has lately been somewhat less of open anarchy
+in the latter country than in the dominions of Donna Maria, there
+has not been one iota less of tyrannical government and scandalous
+malversation. The public revenue is still squandered and robbed,
+the heavy taxes extorted from the millions still flow into the
+pockets of a few thousand corrupt officials, ministers are still
+stock-jobbers, the liberty of the press is still a farce,[10]
+and the national representation an obscene comedy. A change of
+ministry in Spain is undoubtedly a most interesting event to those
+who go out and those who come in--far more so in Spain than in
+any other country, since in no other country does the possession
+of office enable a beggar so speedily to transform himself into a
+_millionaire_. In Portugal the will is not wanting, but the means
+are less ample. More may be safely pilfered out of a sack of corn
+than out of a sieveful, and poor little Portugal's revenue does not
+afford such scope to the itching palms of Liberal statesmen as does
+the more ample one of Spain, which of late years has materially
+increased--without, however, the tax-payer and public creditor
+experiencing one crumb of the benefit they might fairly expect in
+the shape of reduced imposts and augmented dividends. But, however
+interesting to the governing fraction, a change of administration in
+Spain is contemplated by the governed masses with supreme apathy and
+indifference. They used once to be excited by such changes; but they
+have long ago got over that weakness, and suffer their pockets to be
+picked and their bodies to be trampled with a placidity bordering
+on the sublime. As long as things do not get _worse_, they remain
+quiet; they have little hope of their getting _better_. Here, again,
+in this fertile and beautiful and once rich and powerful country of
+Spain, a most gratifying picture is presented to the instigators of
+the Quadruple Alliance, to the upholders of the virtuous Christina
+and the innocent Isabel! Pity that it is painted with so ensanguined
+a brush, and that strife and discord should be the main features
+of the composition! Upon the first panel is exhibited a civil war
+of seven years' duration, vying, for cold-blooded barbarity and
+gratuitous slaughter, with the fiercest and most fanatical contests
+that modern _Times_ have witnessed. Terminated by a strange act of
+treachery, even yet imperfectly understood, the war was succeeded by
+a brief period of well-meaning but inefficient government. By the
+daring and unscrupulous manoeuvres of Louis Philippe and Christina
+this was upset--by means so extraordinary and so disgraceful to all
+concerned that scandalised Europe stood aghast, and almost refused
+to credit the proofs (which history will record) of the social
+degradation of Spaniards. For a moment Spain again stood divided and
+in arms, and on the brink of civil war. This danger over, the blood
+that had not been shed in the field flowed upon the scaffold: an
+iron hand and a pampered army crushed and silenced the disaffection
+and murmurs of the great body of the nation; and thus commenced a
+system of despotic and unscrupulous misrule and corruption, which
+still endures without symptom of improvement. As for the observance
+of the constitution, it is a mockery to speak of it, and has been so
+any time these eight years. In June 1850, Lord Palmerston, in the
+course of his celebrated defence of his foreign policy, declared
+himself happy to state that the government of Spain was at that time
+carried on more in accordance with the constitution than it had
+been two years previously. As ear-witnesses upon the occasion, we
+can do his lordship the justice to say that the assurance was less
+confidently and unhesitatingly spoken than were most other parts of
+his eloquent oration. It was duly cheered, however, by the Commons
+House--or at least by those Hispanophilists and philanthropists
+upon its benches who accepted the Foreign Secretary's assurance
+in lieu of any positive knowledge of their own. The grounds for
+applause and gratulation were really of the slenderest. In 1848,
+the _un_-constitutional period referred to by Lord Palmerston,
+the Narvaez and Christina government were in the full vigour of
+their repressive measures, shooting the disaffected by the dozen,
+and exporting hundreds to the Philippines or immuring them in
+dungeons. This, of course, could not go on for ever; the power was
+theirs, the malcontents were compelled to succumb; the paternal and
+constitutional government made a desert, and called it peace. Short
+time was necessary, when such violent means were employed, to crush
+Spain into obedience, and in 1850 she lay supine, still bleeding
+from many an inward wound, at her tyrants' feet. This morbid
+tranquillity might possibly be mistaken for an indication of an
+improved mode of government. As for any other sign of constitutional
+rule, we are utterly unable to discern it in either the past or
+the present year. The admirable observance of the constitution was
+certainly in process of proof, at the very time of Lord Palmerston's
+speech, by the almost daily violation of the liberty of the press,
+by the seizure of journals whose offending articles the authorities
+rarely condescended to designate, and whose incriminated editors
+were seldom allowed opportunity of exculpation before a fair
+tribunal. It was further testified to, less than four months later,
+by a general election, at which such effectual use was made of
+those means of intimidation and corruption which are manifold in
+Spain, that, when the popular Chamber assembled, the government was
+actually alarmed at the smallness of the opposition--limited, as it
+was, to about a dozen stray Progresistas, who, like the sleeping
+beauty in the fairy tale, rubbed their eyes in wonderment at finding
+themselves there. Nor were the ministerial forebodings groundless in
+the case of the unscrupulous and tyrannical Narvaez, who, within
+a few months, when seemingly more puissant than ever, and with
+an overwhelming majority in the Chamber obedient to his nod, was
+cast down by the wily hand that had set him up, and driven to seek
+safety in France from the vengeance of his innumerable enemies. The
+causes of this sudden and singular downfall are still a puzzle and a
+mystery to the world; but persons there are, claiming to see further
+than their neighbours into political millstones, who pretend that a
+distinguished diplomatist, of no very long standing at Madrid, had
+more to do than was patent to the world with the disgrace of the
+Spanish dictator, whom the wags of the Puerta del Sol declare to
+have exclaimed, as his carriage whirled him northwards through the
+gates of Madrid, "_Comme Henri Bulwer!_"
+
+[10] This remark, (regarding the press,) literally true in Spain,
+does not apply to Portugal.
+
+Passing from the misgovernment and sufferings of Spain to its
+political state, we experience some difficulty in clearly defining
+and exhibiting this, inasmuch as the various parties that have
+hitherto acted under distinct names are gradually blending and
+disappearing like the figures in dissolving views. In Portugal,
+as we have already shown, whilst Chartists and Septembrists
+distract the country, and damage themselves by constant quarrels
+and collisions, a third party, unanimous and determined in its
+opposition to those two, grows in strength, influence, and
+prestige. In Spain, _no_ party shows signs of healthy condition.
+In all three--Moderados, Progresistas, and Carlists--symptoms of
+dissolution are manifest. In the two countries, Chartists and
+Septembrists, Moderados and Progresistas, have alike split into two
+or more factions hostile to each other; but whilst, in Portugal,
+the Miguelites improve their position, in Spain the Carlist party
+is reduced to a mere shadow of its former self. Without recognised
+chiefs or able leaders, without political theory of government, it
+bases its pretensions solely upon the hereditary right of its head.
+For whilst Don Miguel, on several occasions,[11] has declared his
+adhesion to the liberal programme advocated by his party for the
+security of the national liberties, the Count de Montemolin, either
+from indecision of character, or influenced by evil counsels, has
+hitherto made no precise, public, and satisfactory declaration of
+his views in this particular,[12] and by such injudicious reserve
+has lost the suffrages of many whom a distinct pledge would have
+gathered round his banner. Thus has he partially neutralised the
+object of his father's abdication in his favour. Don Carlos was too
+completely identified with the old absolutist party, composed of
+intolerant bigots both in temporal and spiritual matters, ever to
+have reconciled himself with the progressive spirit of the century,
+or to have become acceptable to the present generation of Spaniards.
+Discerning or advised of this, he transferred his claims to his son,
+thus placing in his hands an excellent card, which the young prince
+has not known how to play. If, instead of encouraging a sullen and
+unprofitable emigration, fomenting useless insurrections, draining
+his adherents' purses, and squandering their blood, he had husbanded
+the resources of the party, clearly and publicly defined his plan of
+government--if ever seated upon the throne he claims--and awaited
+in dignified retirement the progress of events, he would not have
+supplied the present rulers of Spain with pretexts, eagerly taken
+advantage of, for shameful tyranny and persecution; and he would
+have spared himself the mortification of seeing his party dwindle,
+and his oldest and most trusted friends and adherents, with few
+exceptions, accept pardon and place from the enemies against whom
+they had long and bravely contended. But vacillation, incapacity,
+and treachery presided at his counsels. He had none to point out
+to him--or if any did, they were unheeded or overruled--the fact,
+of which experience and repeated disappointments have probably at
+last convinced him, that it is not by the armed hand alone--not by
+the sword of Cabrera, or by Catalonian guerilla risings--that he
+can reasonably hope ever to reach Madrid, but by aid of the moral
+force of public opinion, as a result of the misgovernment of Spain's
+present rulers, of an increasing confidence in his own merits and
+good intentions, and perhaps of such possible contingencies as a
+Bourbon restoration in France, or the triumph of the Miguelites in
+Portugal. This last-named event will very likely be considered,
+by that numerous class of persons who base their opinions of
+foreign politics upon hearsay and general impressions rather than
+upon accurate knowledge and investigation of facts, as one of the
+most improbable of possibilities. A careful and dispassionate
+examination of the present state of the Peninsula does not enable
+us to regard it as a case of such utter improbability. But for the
+intimate and intricate connection between the Spanish and Portuguese
+questions, it would by no means surprise us--bearing in mind all
+that Portugal has suffered and still suffers under her present
+rulers--to see the Miguelite party openly assume the preponderance
+in the country. England would not allow it, will be the reply. Let
+us try the exact value of this assertion. England has two reasons
+for hostility to Don Miguel--one founded on certain considerations
+connected with his conduct when formerly on the throne of Portugal,
+the other on the dynastic alliance between the two countries. The
+government of Donna Maria may reckon upon the sympathy, advice, and
+even upon the direct naval assistance of England--up to a certain
+point. That is to say, that the English government will do what it
+_conveniently_ and _suitably_ can, in favour of the Portuguese queen
+and her husband; but there is room for a strong doubt that it would
+_seriously_ compromise itself to maintain them upon the throne.
+Setting aside Donna Maria's matrimonial connection, Don Miguel, as
+a constitutional king, and with certain mercantile and financial
+arrangements, would suit English interests every bit as well. But
+the case is very different as regards Spain. The restoration of Don
+Miguel would be a terrible if not a fatal shock to the throne of
+Isabella II. and to the Moderado party, to whom the revival of the
+legitimist principle in Portugal would be so much the more dangerous
+if experience proved it to be compatible with the interests
+created by the Revolution. For the Spanish government, therefore,
+intervention against Don Miguel is an absolute necessity--we
+might perhaps say a condition of its existence; and thus is Spain
+the great stumbling-block in the way of his restoration, whereas
+England's objections might be found less invincible. So, in the
+civil war in Portugal, this country only co-operated indirectly
+against Don Miguel, and it is by no means certain he would have
+been overcome, but for the entrance of Rodil's Spaniards, which was
+the decisive blow to his cause. And so, the other day, the English
+government was seen patiently looking on at the progress of events,
+when it is well known that the question of immediate intervention
+was warmly debated in the Madrid cabinet, and might possibly have
+been carried, but for the moderating influence of English counsels.
+
+[11] Particularly by his "declaration" of the 24th June 1843, by
+his autograph letter of instructions of the 15th August of the same
+year, and by his "royal letter" of the 6th April 1847, which was
+widely circulated in Portugal.
+
+[12] We cannot attach value to the vague and most unsatisfactory
+manifesto signed "Carlos Luis," and issued from Bourges in May
+1845, or consider it as in the slightest degree disproving what
+we have advanced. It contains no distinct pledge or guarantee of
+constitutional government, but deals in frothy generalities and
+magniloquent protestations, binding to nothing the prince who signed
+it, and bearing more traces of the pen of a Jesuit priest than of
+that of a competent and statesmanlike adviser of a youthful aspirant
+to a throne.
+
+If we consider the critical and hazardous position of
+Marshal Saldanha, wavering as he is between Chartists and
+Septembrists--threatened to-day with a Cabralist insurrection,
+to-morrow with a Septembrist pronunciamiento--it is easy to foresee
+that the Miguelite party may soon find tempting opportunities of
+an active demonstration in the field. Such a movement, however,
+would be decidedly premature. Their game manifestly is to await
+with patience the development of the ultimate consequences of
+Saldanha's insurrection. It requires no great amount of judgment
+and experience in political matters judgment to foresee that he
+will be the victim of his own ill-considered movement, and that no
+long period will elapse before some new event--be it a Cabralist
+reaction or a Septembrist revolt--will prove the instability of the
+present order of things. With this certainty in view, the Miguelites
+are playing upon velvet. They have only to hold themselves in
+readiness to profit by the struggle between the two great divisions
+of the Liberal party. From this struggle they are not unlikely to
+derive an important accession of strength, if, as is by no means
+improbable, the Chartists should be routed and the Septembrists
+remain temporary masters of the field. To understand the possible
+coalition of a portion of the Chartists with the adherents of Don
+Miguel, it suffices to bear in mind that the former are supporters
+of constitutional monarchy, which principle would be endangered by
+the triumph of the Septembrists, whose republican tendencies are
+notorious, as is also--notwithstanding the momentary truce they have
+made with her--their hatred to Donna Maria.
+
+The first consequences of a Septembrist pronunciamiento would
+probably be the deposition of the Queen and the scattering of the
+Chartists; and in this case it is easy to conceive the latter
+beholding in an alliance with the Miguelite party their sole chance
+of escape from democracy, and from a destruction of the numerous
+interests they have acquired during their many years of power. It
+is no unfair inference that Costa Cabral, when he caused himself,
+shortly after his arrival in London, to be presented to Don Miguel
+in a particularly public place, anticipated the probability of some
+such events as we have just sketched, and thus indicated, to his
+friends and enemies, the new service to which he might one day be
+disposed to devote his political talents.
+
+The intricate and suggestive complications of Peninsular politics
+offer a wide field for speculation; but of this we are not at
+present disposed further to avail ourselves, our object being to
+elucidate facts rather than to theorise or indulge in predictions
+with respect to two countries by whose political eccentricities
+more competent prophets than ourselves have, upon so many occasions
+during the last twenty years, been puzzled and led astray. We
+sincerely wish that the governments of Spain and Portugal were now
+in the hands of men capable of conciliating all parties, and of
+averting future convulsions--of men sufficiently able and patriotic
+to conceive and carry out measures adapted to the character, temper,
+and wants of the two nations. If, by what we should be compelled
+to look upon almost as a miracle, such a state of things came
+about in the Peninsula, we should be far indeed from desiring to
+see it disturbed, and discord again introduced into the land, for
+the vindication of the principle of legitimacy, respectable though
+we hold that to be. But if Spain and Portugal are to continue a
+byword among the nations, the focus of administrative abuses and
+oligarchical tyranny; if the lower classes of society in those
+countries, by nature brave and generous, are to remain degraded
+into the playthings of egotistical adventurers, whilst the more
+respectable and intelligent portion of the higher orders stands
+aloof in disgust from the orgies of misgovernment; if this state of
+things is to endure, without prospect of amendment, until the masses
+throw themselves into the arms of the apostles of democracy--who,
+it were vain to deny, gain ground in the Peninsula--then, we ask,
+before it comes to that, would it not be well to give a chance to
+parties and to men whose character and principles at least unite
+some elements of stability, and who, whatever reliance may be placed
+on their promises for the future, candidly admit their past faults
+and errors? Assuredly those nations incur a heavy responsibility,
+and but poorly prove their attachment to the cause of constitutional
+freedom, who avail themselves of superior force to detain feeble
+allies beneath the yoke of intolerable abuses.
+
+
+
+
+THE CONGRESS AND THE AGAPEDOME.
+
+A TALE OF PEACE AND LOVE.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+If I were to commence my story by stating, in the manner of the
+military biographers, that Jack Wilkinson was as brave a man as
+ever pushed a bayonet into the brisket of a Frenchman, I should be
+telling a confounded lie, seeing that, to the best of my knowledge,
+Jack never had the opportunity of attempting practical phlebotomy.
+I shall content myself with describing him as one of the finest and
+best-hearted fellows that ever held her Majesty's commission; and no
+one who is acquainted with the general character of the officers of
+the British army, will require a higher eulogium.
+
+Jack and I were early cronies at school; but we soon separated,
+having been born under the influence of different planets. Mars, who
+had the charge of Jack, of course devoted him to the army; Jupiter,
+who was bound to look after my interests, could find nothing better
+for me than a situation in the Woods and Forests, with a faint
+chance of becoming in time a subordinate Commissioner--that is,
+provided the wrongs of Ann Hicks do not precipitate the abolition of
+the whole department. Ten years elapsed before we met; and I regret
+to say that, during that interval, neither of us had ascended many
+rounds of the ladder of promotion. As was most natural, I considered
+my own case as peculiarly hard, and yet Jack's was perhaps harder.
+He had visited with his regiment, in the course of duty, the Cape,
+the Ionian Islands, Gibraltar, and the West Indies. He had caught
+an ague in Canada, and had been transplanted to the north of
+Ireland by way of a cure; and yet he had not gained a higher rank
+in the service than that of Lieutenant. The fact is, that Jack was
+poor, and his brother officers as tough as though they had been
+made of caoutchouc. Despite the varieties of climate to which they
+were exposed, not one of them would give up the ghost; even the
+old colonel, who had been twice despaired of, recovered from the
+yellow fever, and within a week after was lapping his claret at the
+mess-table as jollily as if nothing had happened. The regiment had a
+bad name in the service: they called it, I believe, "the Immortals."
+
+Jack Wilkinson, as I have said, was poor, but he had an uncle
+who was enormously rich. This uncle, Mr Peter Pettigrew by name,
+was an old bachelor and retired merchant, not likely, according
+to the ordinary calculation of chances, to marry; and as he had
+no other near relative save Jack, to whom, moreover, he was
+sincerely attached, my friend was generally regarded in the light
+of a prospective proprietor, and might doubtless, had he been so
+inclined, have negotiated a loan, at or under seventy per cent,
+with one of those respectable gentlemen who are making such violent
+efforts to abolish Christian legislation. But Pettigrew also was
+tough as one of "the Immortals," and Jack was too prudent a fellow
+to intrust himself to hands so eminently accomplished in the art
+of wringing the last drop of moisture from a sponge. His uncle, he
+said, had always behaved handsomely to him, and he would see the
+whole tribe of Issachar drowned in the Dardanelles rather than abuse
+his kindness by raising money on a post-obit. Pettigrew, indeed, had
+paid for his commission, and, moreover, given him a fair allowance
+whilst he was quartered abroad--circumstances which rendered it
+extremely probable that he would come forward to assist his nephew
+so soon as the latter had any prospect of purchasing his company.
+
+Happening by accident to be in Hull, where the regiment was
+quartered, I encountered Wilkinson, whom I found not a whit altered
+for the worse, either in mind or body, since the days when we were
+at school together; and at his instance I agreed to prolong my
+stay, and partake of the hospitality of the Immortals. A merry set
+they were! The major told a capital story, the senior captain sung
+like Incledon, the _cuisine_ was beyond reproach, and the liquor
+only too alluring. But all things must have an end. It is wise to
+quit even the most delightful society before it palls upon you,
+and before it is accurately ascertained that you, clever fellow
+as you are, can be, on occasion, quite as prosy and ridiculous as
+your neighbours; therefore on the third day I declined a renewal
+of the ambrosial banquet, and succeeded in persuading Wilkinson to
+take a quiet dinner with me at my own hotel. He assented--the more
+readily, perhaps, that he appeared slightly depressed in spirits, a
+phenomenon not altogether unknown under similar circumstances.
+
+After the cloth was removed, we began to discourse upon our
+respective fortunes, not omitting the usual complimentary remarks
+which, in such moments of confidence, are applied to one's
+superiors, who may be very thankful that they do not possess a
+preternatural power of hearing. Jack informed me that at length
+a vacancy had occurred in his regiment, and that he had now an
+opportunity, could he deposit the money, of getting his captaincy.
+But there was evidently a screw loose somewhere.
+
+"I must own," said Jack, "that it _is_ hard, after having waited so
+long, to lose a chance which may not occur again for years; but what
+can I do? You see I haven't got the money; so I suppose I must just
+bend to my luck, and wait in patience for my company until my head
+is as bare as a billiard-ball!"
+
+"But, Jack," said I, "excuse me for making the remark--but won't
+your uncle, Mr Pettigrew, assist you?"
+
+"Not the slightest chance of it."
+
+"You surprise me," said I; "I am very sorry to hear you say so. I
+always understood that you were a prime favourite of his."
+
+"So I was; and so, perhaps, I am," replied Wilkinson; "but that
+don't alter the matter."
+
+"Why, surely," said I, "if he is inclined to help you at all, he
+will not be backward at a time like this. I am afraid, Jack, you
+allow your modesty to wrong you."
+
+"I shall permit my modesty," said Jack, "to take no such impertinent
+liberty. But I see you don't know my uncle Peter."
+
+"I have not that pleasure, certainly; but he bears the character of
+a good honest fellow, and everybody believes that you are to be his
+heir."
+
+"That may be, or may not, according to circumstances," said
+Wilkinson. "You are quite right as to his character, which I
+would advise no one to challenge in my presence; for, though I
+should never get another stiver from him, or see a farthing of his
+property, I am bound to acknowledge that he has acted towards me in
+the most generous manner. But I repeat that you don't understand my
+uncle."
+
+"Nor ever shall," said I, "unless you condescend to enlighten me."
+
+"Well, then, listen. Old Peter would be a regular trump, but for one
+besetting foible. He cannot resist a crotchet. The more palpably
+absurd and idiotical any scheme may be, the more eagerly he adopts
+it; nay, unless it _is_ absurd and idiotical, such as no man of
+common sense would listen to for a moment, he will have nothing
+to say to it. He is quite shrewd enough with regard to commercial
+matters. During the railway mania, he is supposed to have doubled
+his capital. Never having had any faith in the stability of the
+system, he sold out just at the right moment, alleging that it was
+full time to do so, when Sir Robert Peel introduced a bill giving
+the Government the right of purchasing any line when its dividends
+amounted to ten per cent. The result proved that he was correct."
+
+"It did, undoubtedly. But surely that is no evidence of his extreme
+tendency to be led astray by crotchets?"
+
+"Quite the reverse: the scheme was not sufficiently absurd for him.
+Besides, I must tell you, that in pure commercial matters it would
+be very difficult to overreach or deceive my uncle. He has a clear
+eye for pounds, shillings, and pence--principal and interest--and
+can look very well after himself when his purse is directly
+assailed. His real weakness lies in sentiment."
+
+"Not, I trust, towards the feminine gender? That might be awkward
+for you in a gentleman of his years!"
+
+"Not precisely--though I would not like to trust him in the hands
+of a designing female. His besetting weakness turns on the point of
+the regeneration of mankind. Forty or fifty years ago he would have
+been a follower of Johanna Southcote. He subscribed liberally to
+Owen's schemes, and was within an ace of turning out with Thom of
+Canterbury. Incredible as it may appear, he actually was for a time
+a regular and accepted Mormonite."
+
+"You don't mean to say so?"
+
+"Fact, I assure you, upon my honour! But for a swindle that Joe
+Smith tried to perpetrate about the discounting of a bill, Peter
+Pettigrew might at this moment have been a leading saint in the
+temple of Nauvoo, or whatever else they call the capital of that
+polygamous and promiscuous persuasion."
+
+"You amaze me. How any man of common sense--"
+
+"That's just the point. Where common sense ends, Uncle Pettigrew
+begins. Give him a mere thread of practicability, and he will arrive
+at a sound conclusion. Envelope him in the mist of theory, and he
+will walk headlong over a precipice."
+
+"Why, Jack," said I, "you seem to have improved in your figures
+of speech since you joined the army. That last sentence was worth
+preservation. But I don't clearly understand you yet. What is his
+present phase, which seems to stand in the way of your prospects?"
+
+"Can't you guess? What is the most absurd feature of the present
+time?"
+
+"That," said I, "is a very difficult question. There's Free Trade,
+and the proposed Exhibition--both of them absurd enough, if you
+look to their ultimate tendency. Then there are Sir Charles Wood's
+Budget, and the new Reform Bill, and the Encumbered Estates Act, and
+the whole rubbish of the Cabinet, which they have neither sense to
+suppress nor courage to carry through. Upon my word, Jack, it would
+be impossible for me to answer your question satisfactorily."
+
+"What do you think of the Peace Congress?" asked Wilkinson.
+
+"As Palmerston does," said I; "remarkably meanly. But why do you put
+that point? Surely Mr Pettigrew has not become a disciple of the
+blatant blacksmith?"
+
+"Read that, and judge for yourself," said Wilkinson, handing me over
+a letter.
+
+I read as follows:--
+
+     "MY DEAR NEPHEW,--I have your letter of the 15th, apprising me
+     of your wish to obtain what you term a step in the service. I
+     am aware that I am not entitled to blame you for a misguided
+     and lamentably mistaken zeal, which, to my shame be it said, I
+     was the means of originally kindling; still, you must excuse
+     me if, with the new lights which have been vouchsafed to me, I
+     decline to assist your progress towards wholesale homicide, or
+     lend any farther countenance to a profession which is subversive
+     of that universal brotherhood and entire fraternity which ought
+     to prevail among the nations. The fact is, Jack, that, up to
+     the present time, I have entertained ideas which were totally
+     false regarding the greatness of my country. I used to think
+     that England was quite as glorious from her renown in arms as
+     from her skill in arts--that she had reason to plume herself
+     upon her ancient and modern victories, and that patriotism
+     was a virtue which it was incumbent upon freemen to view with
+     respect and veneration. Led astray by these wretched prejudices,
+     I gave my consent to your enrolling yourself in the ranks of
+     the British army, little thinking that, by such a step, I was
+     doing a material injury to the cause of general pacification,
+     and, in fact, retarding the advent of that millennium which
+     will commence so soon as the military profession is entirely
+     suppressed throughout Europe. I am now also painfully aware
+     that, towards you individually, I have failed in performing my
+     duty. I have been the means of inoculating you with a thirst
+     for human blood, and of depriving you of that opportunity of
+     adding to the resources of your country, which you might have
+     enjoyed had I placed you early in one of those establishments
+     which, by sending exports to the uttermost parts of the earth,
+     have contributed so magnificently to the diffusion of British
+     patterns, and the growth of American cotton under a mild system
+     of servitude, which none, save the minions of royalty, dare
+     denominate as actual slavery.
+
+     "In short, Jack, I have wronged you; but I should wrong you
+     still more were I to furnish you with the means of advancing one
+     other step in your bloody and inhuman profession. It is full
+     time that we should discard all national recollections. We have
+     already given a glorious example to Europe and the world, by
+     throwing open our ports to their produce without requiring the
+     assurance of reciprocity--let us take another step in the same
+     direction, and, by a complete disarmament, convince them that
+     for the future we rely upon moral reason, instead of physical
+     force, as the means of deciding differences. I shall be glad,
+     my dear boy, to repair the injury which I have unfortunately
+     done you, by contributing a sum, equal to three times the
+     amount required for the purchase of a company, towards your
+     establishment as a partner in an exporting house, if you can
+     hear of an eligible offer. Pray keep an eye on the advertising
+     columns of the _Economist_. That journal is in every way
+     trustworthy, except, perhaps, when it deals in quotation. I must
+     now conclude, as I have to attend a meeting for the purpose of
+     denouncing the policy of Russia, and of warning the misguided
+     capitalists of London against the perils of an Austrian loan.
+     You cannot, I am sure, doubt my affection, but you must not
+     expect me to advance my money towards keeping up a herd of
+     locusts, without which there would be a general conversion of
+     swords and bayonets into machinery--ploughshares, spades, and
+     pruning-hooks being, for the present, rather at a discount.--I
+     remain always your affectionate uncle,
+
+     "PETER PETTIGREW.
+
+     "_P. S._--Address to me at Hesse Homberg, whither I am going as
+     a delegate to the Peace Congress."
+
+"Well, what do you think of that?" said Wilkinson, when I had
+finished this comfortable epistle. "I presume you agree with me,
+that I have no chance whatever of receiving assistance from that
+quarter."
+
+"Why, not much I should say, unless you can succeed in convincing Mr
+Pettigrew of the error of his ways. It seems to me a regular case of
+monomania."
+
+"Would you not suppose, after reading that letter, that I was a
+sort of sucking tiger, or at best an ogre, who never could sleep
+comfortably unless he had finished off the evening with a cup of
+gore?" said Wilkinson. "I like that coming from old Uncle Peter, who
+used to sing Rule Britannia till he was hoarse, and always dedicated
+his second glass of port to the health of the Duke of Wellington!"
+
+"But what do you intend to do?" said I. "Will you accept his offer,
+and become a fabricator of calicoes?"
+
+"I'd as soon become a field preacher, and hold forth on an inverted
+tub! But the matter is really very serious. In his present mood of
+mind, Uncle Peter will disinherit me to a certainty if I remain in
+the army."
+
+"Does he usually adhere long to any particular crotchet?" said I.
+
+"Why, no; and therein lies my hope. Judging from past experience,
+I should say that this fit is not likely to last above a month or
+two; still you see there may be danger in treating the matter too
+lightly: besides, there is no saying when such another opportunity
+of getting a step may occur. What would you advise under the
+circumstances?"
+
+"If I were in your place," said I, "I think I should go over to
+Hesse Homberg at once. You need not identify yourself entirely with
+the Peace gentry; you will be near your uncle, and ready to act as
+circumstances may suggest."
+
+"That is just my own notion; and I think I can obtain leave of
+absence. I say--could you not manage to go along with me? It would
+be a real act of friendship; for, to say the truth, I don't think I
+could trust any of our fellows in the company of the Quakers."
+
+"Well--I believe they can spare me for a little longer from my
+official duties; and as the weather is fine, I don't mind if I go."
+
+"That's a good fellow! I shall make my arrangements this evening;
+for the sooner we are off the better."
+
+Two days afterwards we were steaming up the Rhine, a river which, I
+trust, may persevere in its attempt to redeem its ancient character.
+In 1848, when I visited Germany last, you might just as well have
+navigated the Phlegethon in so far as pleasure was concerned. Those
+were the days of barricades and of Frankfort murders--of the obscene
+German Parliament, as the junta of rogues, fanatics, and imbeciles,
+who were assembled in St Paul's Church, denominated themselves; and
+of every phase and form of political quackery and insurrection.
+Now, however, matters were somewhat mended. The star of Gagern had
+waned. The popularity of the Archduke John had exhaled like the
+fume of a farthing candle. Hecker and Struve were hanged, shot, or
+expatriated; and the peaceably disposed traveller could once more
+retire to rest in his hotel, without being haunted by a horrid
+suspicion that ere morning some truculent waiter might experiment
+upon the toughness of his larynx. I was glad to observe that the
+Frankforters appeared a good deal humbled. They were always a
+pestilent set; but during the revolutionary year their insolence
+rose to such a pitch that it was hardly safe for a man of warm
+temperament to enter a shop, lest he should be provoked by the airs
+and impertinence of the owner to commit an assault upon Freedom in
+the person of her democratic votary. I suspect the Frankforters are
+now tolerably aware that revolutions are the reverse of profitable.
+They escaped sack and pillage by a sheer miracle, and probably they
+will not again exert themselves, at least for a considerable number
+of years, to hasten the approach of a similar crisis.
+
+Everybody knows Homberg. On one pretext or another--whether the
+mineral springs, the baths, the gaiety, or the gambling--the
+integral portions of that tide of voyagers which annually fluctuates
+through the Rheingau, find their way to that pleasant little
+pandemonium, and contribute, I have no doubt, very largely to
+the revenues of that high and puissant monarch who rules over a
+population not quite so large as that comprehended within the
+boundaries of Clackmannan. But various as its visitors always are,
+and diverse in language, habits, and morals, I question whether
+Homberg ever exhibited on any previous occasion so queer and
+incongruous a mixture. Doubtful counts, apocryphal barons, and
+chevaliers of the extremest industry, mingled with sleek Quakers,
+Manchester reformers, and clerical agitators of every imaginable
+species of dissent. Then there were women, for the most part of a
+middle age, who, although their complexions would certainly have
+been improved by a course of the medicinal waters, had evidently
+come to Homberg on a higher and holier mission. There was also a
+sprinkling of French deputies--Red Republicans by principle, who,
+if not the most ardent friends of pacification, are at least the
+loudest in their denunciation of standing armies--a fair proportion
+of political exiles, who found their own countries too hot to hold
+them in consequence of the caloric which they had been the means
+of evoking--and one or two of those unhappy personages, whose itch
+for notoriety is greater than their modicum of sense. We were not
+long in finding Mr Peter Pettigrew. He was solacing himself in
+the gardens, previous to the table-d'hote, by listening to the
+exhilarating strains of the brass band which was performing a
+military march; and by his side was a lady attired, not in the usual
+costume of her sex, but in a polka jacket and wide trousers, which
+gave her all the appearance of a veteran duenna of a seraglio. Uncle
+Peter, however, beamed upon her as tenderly as though she were a
+Circassian captive. To this lady, by name Miss Lavinia Latchley, an
+American authoress of much renown, and a decided champion of the
+rights of woman, we were presented in due form. After the first
+greetings were over, Mr Pettigrew opened the trenches.
+
+"So Jack, my boy, you have come to Homberg to see how we carry on
+the war, eh? No--Lord forgive me--that's not what I mean. We don't
+intend to carry on any kind of war: we mean to put it down--clap
+the extinguisher upon it, you know; and have done with all kinds
+of cannons. Bad thing, gunpowder! I once sustained a heavy loss by
+sending out a cargo of it to Sierra Leone."
+
+"I should have thought that a paying speculation," observed Jack.
+
+"Not a whit of it! The cruisers spoiled the trade; and the
+missionaries--confound them for meddling with matters which they
+did not understand!--had patched up a peace among the chiefs of the
+cannibals; so that for two years there was not a slave to be had for
+love or money, and powder went down a hundred and seventy per cent."
+
+"Such are the effects," remarked Miss Latchley with a sarcastic
+smile, which disclosed a row of teeth as yellow as the buds
+of the crocus--"such are the effects of an ill regulated and
+unphilosophical yearning after the visionary theories of an
+unopportune emancipation! Oh that men, instead of squandering their
+sympathies upon the lower grades of creation, would emancipate
+themselves from that network of error and prejudice which
+reticulates over the whole surface of society, and by acknowledging
+the divine mission and hereditary claims of woman, construct a new,
+a fairer Eden than any which was fabled to exist within the confines
+of the primitive Chaldaea!"
+
+"Very true, indeed, ma'am!" replied Mr Pettigrew; "there is a great
+deal of sound sense and observation in what you say. But Jack--I
+hope you intend to become a member of Congress at once. I shall be
+glad to present you at our afternoon meeting in the character of a
+converted officer."
+
+"You are very good, uncle, I am sure," said Wilkinson, "but I would
+rather wait a little. I am certain you would not wish me to take
+so serious a step without mature deliberation; and I hope that my
+attendance here, in answer to your summons, will convince you that I
+am at least open to conviction. In fact, I wish to hear the argument
+of your friends before I come to a definite decision."
+
+"Very right, Jack; very right!" said Mr Pettigrew. "I don't like
+converts at a minute's notice, as I remarked to a certain M.P. when
+he followed in the wake of Peel. Take your time, and form your own
+judgment; I cannot doubt of the result, if you only listen to the
+arguments of the leading men of Europe."
+
+"And do you reckon America as nothing, dear Mr Pettigrew?" said
+Miss Latchley. "Columbia may not be able to contribute to the task
+so practical and masculine an intellect as yours, yet still within
+many a Transatlantic bosom burns a hate of tyranny not less intense,
+though perhaps less corruscating, than your own."
+
+"I know it, I know it, dear Miss Latchley!" replied the infatuated
+Peter. "A word from you is at any time worth a lecture, at least
+if I may judge from the effects which your magnificent eloquence
+has produced on my own mind. Jack, I suppose you have never had the
+privilege of listening to the lectures of Miss Latchley?"
+
+Jack modestly acknowledged the gap which had been left in his
+education; stating, at the same time, his intense desire to have it
+filled up at the first convenient opportunity. Miss Latchley heaved
+a sigh.
+
+"I hope you do not flatter me," she said, "as is too much the
+case with men whose thoughts have been led habitually to deviate
+from sincerity. The worst symptom of the present age lies in its
+acquiescence with axioms. Free us from that, and we are free indeed;
+perpetuate its thraldom, and Truth, which is the daughter of
+Innocence and Liberty, imps its wings in vain, and cannot emancipate
+itself from the pressure of that raiment which was devised to impede
+its glorious walk among the nations."
+
+Jack made no reply beyond a glance at the terminations of the lady,
+which showed that she at all events was resolved that no extra
+raiment should trammel her onward progress.
+
+As the customary hour of the table-d'hote was approaching, we
+separated, Jack and I pledging ourselves to attend the afternoon
+meeting of the Peace Congress, for the purpose of receiving our
+first lesson in the mysteries of pacification.
+
+"Well, what do you think of that?" said Jack, as Mr Pettigrew and
+the Latchley walked off together. "Hang me if I don't suspect that
+old harpy in the breeches has a design on Uncle Peter!"
+
+"Small doubt of that," said I; "and you will find it rather
+a difficult job to get him out of her clutches. Your female
+philosopher adheres to her victim with all the tenacity of a
+polecat."
+
+"Here is a pretty business!" groaned Jack. "I'll tell you what it
+is--I have more than half a mind to put an end to it, by telling my
+uncle what I think of his conduct, and then leaving him to marry
+this harridan, and make a further fool of himself in any way he
+pleases!"
+
+"Don't be silly, Jack!" said I; "It will be time enough to do that
+after everything else has failed; and, for my own part, I see no
+reason to despair. In the mean time, if you please, let us secure
+places at the dinner-table."
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+"Dear friends and well-beloved brothers! I wish from the bottom
+of my heart that there was but one universal language, so that
+the general sentiments of love, equality, and fraternity, which
+animate the bosoms of all the pacificators and detesters of tyranny
+throughout the world, might find a simultaneous echo in your ears,
+by the medium of a common speech. The diversity of dialects, which
+now unfortunately prevails, was originally invented under cover of
+the feudal system, by the minions of despotism, who thought, by such
+despicable means, for ever to perpetuate their power. It is part of
+the same system which decrees that in different countries alien to
+each other in speech, those unhappy persons who have sold themselves
+to do the bidding of tyrants shall be distinguished by different
+uniforms. O my brothers! see what a hellish and deep-laid system is
+here! English and French--scarlet against blue--different tongues
+invented, and different garments prescribed, to inflame the passions
+of mankind against each other, and to stifle their common fraternity!
+
+"Take down, I say, from your halls and churches those wretched
+tatters of silk which you designate as national colours! Bring
+hither, from all parts of the earth, the butt of the gun and
+the shaft of the spear, and all combustible implements of
+destruction--your fascines, your scaling-ladders, and your terrible
+pontoons, that have made so many mothers childless! Heap them into
+one enormous pile--yea, heap them to the very stars--and on that
+blazing altar let there be thrown the Union Jack of Britain, the
+tricolor of France, the eagles of Russia, Austria, and Prussia, the
+American stripes and stars, and every other banner and emblem of
+that accursed nationality, through which alone mankind is defrauded
+of his birthright. Then let all men join hands together, and as they
+dance around the reeking pile, let them in one common speech chaunt
+a simultaneous hymn in honour of their universal deliverance, and in
+commemoration of their cosmopolitan triumph!
+
+"O my brothers, O my brothers! what shall I say further? Ha! I will
+not address myself to you whose hearts are already kindled within
+you by the purest of spiritual flames. I will uplift my voice, and
+in words of thunder exhort the debased minions of tyranny to arouse
+themselves ere it be too late, and to shake off those fetters which
+they wear for the purpose of enslaving others. Hear me, then, ye
+soldiers!--hear me, ye degraded serfs!--hear me, ye monsters of
+iniquity! Oh, if the earth could speak, what a voice would arise
+out of its desolate battle-fields, to testify against you and
+yours! Tell us not that you have fought for freedom. Was freedom
+ever won by the sword? Tell us not that you have defended your
+country's rights, for in the eye of the true philosopher there is
+no country save one, and that is the universal earth, to which all
+have an equal claim. Shelter not yourselves, night-prowling hyenas
+as you are, under such miserable pretexts as these! Hie ye to the
+charnel-houses, ye bats, ye vampires, ye ravens, ye birds of the
+foulest omen! Strive, if you can, in their dark recesses, to hide
+yourselves from the glare of that light which is now permeating
+the world. O the dawn! O the glory! O the universal illumination!
+See, my brothers, how they shrink, how they flee from its cheering
+influence! Tremble, minions of despotism! Your race is run, your
+very empires are tottering around you. See--with one grasp I crush
+them all, as I crush this flimsy scroll!"
+
+Here the eloquent gentleman, having made a paper ball of the last
+number of the _Allgemeine Zeitung_, sate down amidst the vociferous
+applause of the assembly. He was the first orator who had spoken,
+and I believe had been selected to lead the van on account of his
+platform experience, which was very great. I cannot say, however,
+that his arguments produced entire conviction upon my mind, or that
+of my companion, judging from certain muttered adjurations which
+fell from Wilkinson, to the effect that on the first convenient
+opportunity he would take means to make the crumpler-up of nations
+atone for his scurrilous abuse of the army. We were next favoured
+with addresses in Sclavonian, German, and French; and then another
+British orator came forward to enlighten the public. This last was
+a fellow of some fancy. Avoiding all stale topics about despotism,
+aristocracies, and standing armies, he went to the root of the
+matter, by asserting that in Vegetarianism alone lay the true escape
+from the horrors and miseries of war. Mr Belcher--for such was the
+name of this distinguished philanthropist--opined that without beef
+and mutton there never could be a battle.
+
+"Had Napoleon," said he, "been dieted from his youth upwards upon
+turnips, the world would have been spared those scenes of butchery,
+which must ever remain a blot upon the history of the present
+century. One of our oldest English annalists assures us that Jack
+Cade, than whom, perhaps, there never breathed a more uncompromising
+enemy of tyranny, subsisted entirely upon spinach. This fact has
+been beautifully treated by Shakspeare, whose passion for onions was
+proverbial, in his play of Henry VI., wherein he represents Cade,
+immediately before his death, as engaged in the preparation of a
+salad. I myself," continued Mr Belcher in a slightly flatulent tone,
+"can assure this honourable company, that for more than six months I
+have cautiously abstained from using any other kind of food, except
+broccoli, which I find at once refreshing and laxative, light, airy,
+and digestible!"
+
+Mr Belcher having ended, a bearded gentleman, who enjoyed the
+reputation of being the most notorious duellist in Europe, rose
+up for the purpose of addressing the audience; but by this time
+the afternoon was considerably advanced, and a large number of the
+Congress had silently seceded to the _roulette_ and _rouge-et-noir_
+tables. Among these, to my great surprise, were Miss Latchley and
+Mr Pettigrew: it being, as I afterwards understood, the invariable
+practice of this gifted lady, whenever she could secure a victim,
+to avail herself of his pecuniary resources; so that if fortune
+declared against her, the gentleman stood the loss, whilst, in the
+opposite event, she retained possession of the spoil. I daresay some
+of my readers may have been witnesses to a similar arrangement.
+
+As it was no use remaining after the departure of Mr Pettigrew,
+Wilkinson and I sallied forth for a stroll, not, as you may well
+conceive, in a high state of enthusiasm or rapture.
+
+"I would not have believed," said Wilkinson, "unless I had seen it
+with my own eyes, that it was possible to collect in one room so
+many samples of absolute idiocy. What a pleasant companion that
+Belcher fellow, who eats nothing but broccoli, must be!"
+
+"A little variety in the way of peas would probably render him
+perfect. But what do you say to the first orator?"
+
+"I shall reserve the expression of my opinion," replied Jack, "until
+I have the satisfaction of meeting that gentleman in private. But
+how are we to proceed? With this woman in the way, it entirely
+baffles my comprehension."
+
+"Do you know, Jack, I was thinking of that during the whole time of
+the meeting; and it does appear to me that there is a way open by
+which we may precipitate the crisis. Mind--I don't answer for the
+success of my scheme, but it has at least the merit of simplicity."
+
+"Out with it, my dear fellow! I am all impatience," cried Jack.
+
+"Well, then," said I, "did you remark the queer and heterogeneous
+nature of the company? I don't think, if you except the Quakers, who
+have the generic similarity of eels, that you could have picked out
+any two individuals with a tolerable resemblance to each other."
+
+"That's likely enough, for they are a most seedy set. But what of
+it?"
+
+"Why, simply this: I suspect the majority of them are political
+refugees. No person, who is not an absurd fanatic or a designing
+demagogue, can have any sympathy with the nonsense which is talked
+against governments and standing armies. The Red Republicans, of
+whom I can assure you there are plenty in every state in Europe,
+are naturally most desirous to get rid of the latter, by whom they
+are held in check; and if that were once accomplished, no kind of
+government could stand for a single day. They are now appealing,
+as they call it, to public opinion, by means of these congresses
+and gatherings; and they have contrived, under cover of a zeal for
+universal peace, to induce a considerable number of weak and foolish
+people to join with them in a cry which is simply the forerunner of
+revolution."
+
+"All that I understand; but I don't quite see your drift."
+
+"Every one of these bearded vagabonds hates the other like poison.
+Talk of fraternity, indeed! They want to have revolution first; and
+if they could get it, you would see them flying at each other's
+throats like a pack of wild dogs that have pulled down a deer.
+Now, my plan is this: Let us have a supper-party, and invite a
+deputy from each nation. My life upon it, that before they have
+been half-an-hour together, there will be such a row among the
+fraternisers as will frighten your uncle Peter out of his senses,
+or, still better, out of his present crotchet."
+
+"A capital idea! But how shall we get hold of the fellows?"
+
+"That's not very difficult. They are at this moment hard at work
+at roulette, and they will come readily enough to the call if you
+promise them lots of Niersteiner."
+
+"By George! they shall have it in bucketfuls, if that can produce
+the desired effect. I say--we must positively have that chap who
+abused the army."
+
+"I think it would be advisable to let him alone. I would rather
+stick to the foreigners."
+
+"O, by Jove, we must have him. I have a slight score to settle, for
+the credit of the service!"
+
+"Well, but be cautious. Recollect the great matter is to leave our
+guests to themselves."
+
+"Never fear me. I shall take care to keep within due bounds. Now let
+us look after Uncle Peter."
+
+We found that respected individual in a state of high glee. His
+own run of luck had not been extraordinary; but the Latchley,
+who appeared to possess a sort of second-sight in fixing on the
+fortunate numbers, had contrived to accumulate a perfect mountain
+of dollars, to the manifest disgust of a profane Quaker opposite,
+who, judging from the violence of his language, had been thoroughly
+cleaned out. Mr Pettigrew agreed at once to the proposal for a
+supper-party, which Jack excused himself for making, on the ground
+that he had a strong wish to cultivate the personal acquaintance of
+the gentlemen, who, in the event of his joining the Peace Society,
+would become his brethren. After some pressing, Mr Pettigrew agreed
+to take the chair, his nephew officiating as croupier. Miss Lavinia
+Latchley, so soon as she learned what was in contemplation, made a
+strong effort to be allowed to join the party; but, notwithstanding
+her assertion of the unalienable rights of woman to be present on
+all occasions of social hilarity, Jack would not yield; and even
+Pettigrew seemed to think that there were times and seasons when
+the female countenance might be withheld with advantage. We found
+no difficulty whatever in furnishing the complement of the guests.
+There were seventeen of us in all--four Britons, two Frenchmen, a
+Hungarian, a Lombard, a Piedmontese, a Sicilian, a Neapolitan, a
+Roman, an Austrian, a Prussian, a Dane, a Dutchman, and a Yankee.
+The majority exhibited beards of startling dimension, and few of
+them appeared to regard soap in the light of a justifiable luxury.
+
+Pettigrew made an admirable chairman. Although not conversant with
+any language save his own, he contrived, by means of altering the
+terminations of his words, to carry on a very animated conversation
+with all his neighbours. His Italian was superb, his Danish above
+par, and his Sclavonic, to say the least of it, passable. The viands
+were good, and the wine abundant; so that, by the time pipes were
+produced, we were all tolerably hilarious. The conversation, which
+at first was general, now took a political turn; and very grievous
+it was to listen to the tales of the outrages which some of the
+company had sustained at the hands of tyrannical governments.
+
+"I'll tell you what it is, gentlemen," said one of the Frenchmen,
+"republics are not a whit better than monarchies, in so far as the
+liberty of the people is concerned. Here am I obliged to leave
+France, because I was a friend of that gallant fellow, Ledru
+Rollin, whom I hope one day to see at the head of a real Socialist
+government. Ah, won't we set the guillotine once more in motion
+then!"
+
+"Property is theft," remarked the Neapolitan, sententiously.
+
+"I calculate, my fine chap, that you han't many dollars of your own,
+if you're of that way of thinking!" said the Yankee, considerably
+scandalised at this indifference to the rule of _meum_ and _tuum_.
+
+"O Roma!" sighed the gentleman from the eternal city, who was rather
+intoxicated.
+
+"_Peste!_ What is the matter with it?" asked one of the Frenchmen.
+"I presume it stands where it always did. _Garcon--un petit verre de
+rhom!_"
+
+"How can Rome be what it was, when it is profaned by the foot of the
+stranger?" replied he of the Papal States.
+
+"_Ah, bah!_ You never were better off than under the rule of
+Oudinot."
+
+"You are a German," said the Hungarian to the Austrian; "what think
+you of our brave Kossuth?"
+
+"I consider him a pragmatical ass," replied the Austrian curtly.
+
+"Perhaps in that case," interposed the Lombard, with a sneer that
+might have done credit to Mephistopheles, "the gentleman may
+feel inclined to palliate the conduct of that satrap of tyranny,
+Radetski?"
+
+"What!--old father Radetski! the victor in a hundred fights!" cried
+the Austrian. "That will I; and spit in the face of any cowardly
+Italian who dares to breathe a word against his honour!"
+
+The Italian clutched his knife.
+
+"Hold there!" cried the Piedmontese, who seemed really a decent
+sort of fellow. "None of your stiletto work here! Had you Lombards
+trusted more to the bayonet and less to the knife, we might have
+given another account of the Austrian in that campaign, which cost
+Piedmont its king!"
+
+"_Carlo Alberto!_" hissed the Lombard, "_sceleratissimo traditore!_"
+
+The reply of the Piedmontese was a pie-dish, which prostrated the
+Lombard on the floor.
+
+"Gentlemen! gentlemen! for Heaven's sake be calm!" screamed
+Pettigrew; "remember we are all brothers!"
+
+"Brothers!" roared the Dane, "do ye think I would fraternise with a
+Prussian? Remember Schleswig Holstein!"
+
+"I am perfectly calm," said the Prussian, with the stiff formality
+of his nation; "I never quarrel over the generous vintage of my
+fatherland. Come--let me give you a song--
+
+    'Sie sollen ihm nicht haben
+    Den Deutschen freien Rhein.'"
+
+"You never were more mistaken in your life, _mon cher_," said one of
+the Frenchmen, brusquely. "Before twelve months are over we shall
+see who has right to the Rhine!"
+
+"Ay, that is true!" remarked the Dutchman; "confound these
+Germans--they wanted to annex Luxembourg."
+
+"What says the frog?" asked the Prussian contemptuously.
+
+The frog said nothing, but he hit the Prussian on the teeth.
+
+I despair of giving even a feeble impression of the scene which
+took place. No single pair of ears was sufficient to catch one
+fourth of the general discord. There was first an interchange of
+angry words; then an interchange of blows; and immediately after,
+the guests were rolling, in groups of twos and threes, as suited
+their fancy, or the adjustment of national animosities, on the
+ground. The Lombard rose not again; the pie-dish had quieted him
+for the night. But the Sicilian and Neapolitan lay locked in deadly
+combat, each attempting with intense animosity to bite off the
+other's nose. The Austrian caught the Hungarian by the throat,
+and held him till he was black in the face. The Dane pommelled
+the Prussian. One of the Frenchmen broke a bottle over the head
+of the subject of the Pope; whilst his friend, thirsting for the
+combat, attempted in vain to insult the remaining non-belligerents.
+The Dutchman having done all that honour required, smoked in mute
+tranquillity. Meanwhile the cries of Uncle Peter were heard above
+the din of battle, entreating a cessation of hostilities. He might
+as well have preached to the storm--the row grew fiercer every
+moment.
+
+"This is a disgusting spectacle!" said the orator from Manchester.
+"These men cannot be true pacificators--they must have served in the
+army."
+
+"That reminds me, old fellow!" said Jack, turning up the cuffs of
+his coat with a very ominous expression of countenance, "that you
+were pleased this morning to use some impertinent expressions with
+regard to the British army. Do you adhere to what you said then?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"Then up with your mauleys; for, by the Lord Harry! I intend to have
+satisfaction out of your carcase!"
+
+And in less than a minute the Manchester apostle dropped with both
+his eyes bunged up, and did not come to time.
+
+"Stranger!" said the Yankee to the Piedmontese, "are you inclined
+for a turn at gouging? This child feels wolfish to raise hair!" But,
+to his credit be it said, the Piedmontese declined the proposal
+with a polite bow. Meanwhile the uproar had attracted the attention
+of the neighbourhood. Six or seven men in uniform, whom I strongly
+suspect to have been members of the brass band, entered the
+apartment armed with bayonets, and carried off the more obstreperous
+of the party to the guard-house. The others immediately retired, and
+at last Jack and I were left alone with Mr Pettigrew.
+
+"And this," said he, after a considerable pause, "is fraternity
+and peace! These are the men who intended to commence the reign
+of the millennium in Europe! Giver me your hand, Jack, my dear
+boy--you shan't leave the army--nay, if you do, rely upon it I
+shall cut you off with a shilling, and mortify my fortune to the
+Woolwich hospital. I begin to see that I am an old fool. Stop a
+moment. Here is a bottle of wine that has fortunately escaped the
+devastation--fill your glasses, and let us dedicate a full bumper to
+the health of the Duke of Wellington."
+
+I need hardly say that the toast was responded to with enthusiasm.
+We finished not only that bottle, but another; and I had the
+satisfaction of hearing Mr Pettigrew announce to my friend Wilkinson
+that the purchase-money for his company would be forthcoming at
+Coutts's before he was a fortnight older.
+
+"I won't affect to deny," said Uncle Peter, "that this is a great
+disappointment to me. I had hoped better things of human nature; but
+I now perceive that I was wrong. Good night, my dear boys! I am a
+good deal agitated, as you may see; and perhaps this sour wine has
+not altogether agreed with me--I had better have taken brandy and
+water. I shall seek refuge on my pillow, and I trust we may soon
+meet again!"
+
+"What did the venerable Peter mean by that impressive farewell?"
+said I, after the excellent old man had departed, shaking his head
+mournfully as he went.
+
+"O, nothing at all," said Jack; "only the Niersteiner has been
+rather too potent for him. Have you any sticking-plaster about you?
+I have damaged my knuckles a little on the _os frontis_ of that
+eloquent pacificator."
+
+Next morning I was awoke about ten o'clock by Jack, who came rushing
+into my room.
+
+"He's off!" he cried.
+
+"Who's off?" said I.
+
+"Uncle Peter; and, what is far worse, he has taken Miss Latchley
+with him!"
+
+"Impossible!"
+
+However, it was perfectly true. On inquiry we found that the
+enamored pair had left at six in the morning.
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+"Well, Jack," said I, "any tidings of Uncle Peter?" as Wilkinson
+entered my official apartment in London, six weeks after the
+dissolution of the Congress.
+
+"Why, yes--and the case is rather worse than I supposed," replied
+Jack despondingly.
+
+"You don't mean to say that he has married that infernal woman in
+pantaloons?"
+
+"Not quite so bad as that, but very nearly. She has carried him
+off to her den; and what she may make of him there, it is quite
+impossible to predict."
+
+"Her den? Has she actually inveigled him to America?"
+
+"Not at all. These kind of women have stations established over the
+whole face of the earth."
+
+"Where, then, is he located?"
+
+"I shall tell you. In the course of my inquiries, which, you are
+aware, were rather extensive, I chanced to fall in with a Yarmouth
+Bloater."
+
+"A what?"
+
+"I beg your pardon--I meant to say a Plymouth Brother. Now, these
+fellows are a sort of regular kidnappers, who lie in wait to catch
+up any person of means and substance: they don't meddle with
+paupers, for, as you are aware, they share their property in common:
+and it occurred to me rather forcibly, that by means of my friend,
+who was a regular trapping missionary, I might learn something
+about my uncle. It cost me an immensity of brandy to elicit the
+information; but at last I succeeded in bringing out the fact,
+that my uncle is at this moment the inmate of an Agapedome in the
+neighbourhood of Southampton, and that the Latchley is his appointed
+keeper."
+
+"An Agapedome!--what the mischief is that?"
+
+"You may well ask," said Jack; "but I won't give it a coarser
+name. However, from all I can learn, it is as bad as a Mormonite
+institution."
+
+"And what the deuce may they intend to do with him, now they have
+him in their power?"
+
+"Fleece him out of every sixpence of property which he possesses in
+the world," replied Jack.
+
+"That won't do, Jack! We must get him out by some means or other."
+
+"I suspect it would be an easier job to scale a nunnery. So far as I
+can learn, they admit no one into their premises, unless they have
+hopes of catching him as a convert; and I am afraid that neither you
+nor I have the look of likely pupils. Besides, the Latchley could
+not fail to recognise me in a moment."
+
+"That's true enough," said I. "I think, however, that I might escape
+detection by a slight alteration of attire. The lady did not honour
+me with much notice during the half-hour we spent in her company. I
+must own, however, that I should not like to go alone."
+
+"My dear friend!" cried Jack, "if you will really be kind enough
+to oblige me in this matter, I know the very man to accompany you.
+Rogers of ours is in town just now. He is a famous follow--rather
+fast, perhaps, and given to larking--but as true as steel. You shall
+meet him to-day at dinner, and then we can arrange our plans."
+
+I must own that I did not feel very sanguine of success this time.
+Your genuine rogue is the most suspicious character on the face
+of the earth, wide awake to a thousand little discrepancies which
+would escape the observation of the honest; and I felt perfectly
+convinced that the superintendent of the Agapedome was likely to
+prove a rogue of the first water. Then I did not see my way clearly
+to the characters which we ought to assume. Of course it was no use
+for me to present myself as a scion of the Woods and Forests; I
+should be treated as a Government spy, and have the door slapped in
+my face. To appear as an emissary of the Jesuits would be dangerous;
+that body being well known for their skill in annexing property.
+In short, I came to the conclusion, that unless I could work upon
+the cupidity of the head Agapedomian, there was no chance whatever
+of effecting Mr Pettigrew's release. To this point, therefore, I
+resolved to turn my attention.
+
+At dinner, according to agreement, I met Rogers of ours. Rogers was
+not gifted with any powerful inventive faculties; but he was a fine
+specimen of the British breed, ready to take a hand at anything
+which offered a prospect of fun. You would not probably have
+selected him as a leading conspirator; but, though no Macchiavelli,
+he appeared most valuable as an accomplice.
+
+Our great difficulty was to pitch upon proper characters. After
+much discussion, it was resolved that Rogers of ours should appear
+as a young nobleman of immense wealth, but exceedingly eccentric
+habits, and that I should act as bear-leader, with an eye to my
+own interest. What we were to do when we should succeed in getting
+admission to the establishment, was not very clear to the perception
+of any of us. We resolved to be regulated entirely by circumstances,
+the great point being the rescue of Mr Peter Pettigrew.
+
+Accordingly, we all started for Southampton on the following
+morning. On arriving there, we were informed that the Agapedome
+was situated some three miles from the town, and that the most
+extraordinary legends of the habits and pursuits of its inmates
+were current in the neighbourhood. Nobody seemed to know exactly
+what the Agapedomians were. They seemed to constitute a tolerably
+large society of persons, both male and female; but whether they
+were Christians, Turks, Jews, or Mahometans, was matter of exceeding
+disputation. They were known, however to be rich, and occasionally
+went out airing in carriages-and-four--the women all wearing
+pantaloons, to the infinite scandal of the peasantry. So far as
+we could learn, no gentleman answering to the description of Mr
+Pettigrew had been seen among them.
+
+After agreeing to open communications with Jack as speedily as
+possible, and emptying a bottle of champagne towards the success
+of our expedition, Rogers and I started in a postchaise for the
+Agapedome. Rogers was curiously arrayed in garments of chequered
+plaid, a mere glance at which would have gone far to impress any
+spectator with a strong notion of his eccentricity; whilst, for my
+part, I had donned a suit of black, and assumed a massive pair of
+gold spectacles, and a beaver with a portentous rim.
+
+This Agapedome was a large building surrounded by a high wall,
+and looked, upon the whole, like a convent. Deeming it prudent to
+ascertain how the land lay before introducing the eccentric Rogers,
+I requested that gallant individual to remain in the postchaise,
+whilst I solicited an interview with Mr Aaron B. Hyams, the reputed
+chief of the establishment. The card I sent in was inscribed with
+the name of Dr Hiram Smith, which appeared to me a sufficiently
+innocuous appellation. After some delay, I was admitted through a
+very strong gateway into the courtyard; and was then conducted by a
+servant in a handsome livery to a library, where I was received by
+Mr Hyams.
+
+As the Agapedome has since been broken up, and its members
+dispersed, it may not be uninteresting to put on record a slight
+sketch of its founder. Judging from his countenance, the progenitors
+of Mr Aaron B. Hyams must have been educated in the Jewish
+persuasion. His nose and lip possessed that graceful curve which is
+so characteristic of the Hebrew race; and his eye, if not altogether
+of that kind which the poets designate as "eagle," might not unaptly
+be compared to that of the turkey-buzzard. In certain circles of
+society Mr Hyams would have been esteemed a handsome man. In the
+doorway of a warehouse in Holywell Street he would have committed
+large havoc on the hearts of the passing Leahs and Dalilahs--for
+he was a square-built powerful man, with broad shoulders and
+bandy legs, and displayed on his person as much ostentatious
+jewellery as though he had been concerned in a new spoiling of the
+Egyptians. Apparently he was in a cheerful mood; for before him
+stood a half-emptied decanter of wine, and an odour as of recently
+extinguished Cubas was agreeably disseminated through the apartment.
+
+"Dr Hiram Smith, I presume?" said he. "Well, Dr Hiram Smith, to what
+fortunate circumstance am I indebted for the honour of this visit?"
+
+"Simply, sir, to this," said I, "that I want to know you, and know
+about you. Nobody without can tell me precisely what your Agapedome
+is, so I have come for information to headquarters. I have formed my
+own conclusion. If I am wrong, there is no harm done; if I am right,
+we may be able to make a bargain."
+
+"Hallo!" cried Hyams, taken rather aback by this curt style of
+exordium, "you are a rum customer, I reckon. So you want to deal,
+do ye? Well then, tell us what sort of doctor you may be? No use
+standing on ceremony with a chap like you. Is it M.D. or LL.D. or
+D.D., or a mere walking-stick title?"
+
+"The title," said I, "is conventional; so you may attribute it to
+any origin you please. In brief, I want to know if I can board a
+pupil here?"
+
+"That depends entirely upon circumstances," replied Hyams. "Who and
+what is the subject?"
+
+"A young nobleman of the highest distinction, but of slightly
+eccentric habits." Here Hyams pricked up his ears. "I am not
+authorised to tell his name; but otherwise, you shall have the most
+satisfactory references."
+
+"There is only one kind of reference I care about," interrupted
+Hyams, imitating at the same time the counting out of imaginary
+sovereigns into his palm.
+
+"So much the better--there will be trouble saved," said I. "I
+perceive, Mr Hyams, you are a thorough man of business. In a word,
+then, my pupil has been going it too fast."
+
+"Flying kites and post-obits?"
+
+"And all the rest of it," said I; "black-legs innumerable, and no
+end of scrapes in the green-room. Things have come to such a pass
+that his father, the Duke, insists on his being kept out of the way
+at present; and, as taking him to Paris would only make matters
+worse, it occurred to me that I might locate him for a time in some
+quiet but cheerful establishment, where he could have his reasonable
+swing, and no questions asked."
+
+"Dr Hiram Smith!" cried Hyams with enthusiasm, "you're a regular
+trump! I wish all the noblemen in England would look out for tutors
+like you."
+
+"You are exceedingly complimentary, Mr Hyams. And now that you know
+my errand, may I ask what the Agapedome is?"
+
+"The Home of Love," replied Hyams; "at least so I was told by the
+Oxford gent, to whom I gave half-a-guinea for the title."
+
+"And your object?"
+
+"A pleasant retreat--comfortable home--no sort of bother of
+ceremony--innocent attachments encouraged--and, in the general case,
+community of goods."
+
+"Of which latter, I presume, Mr Hyams is the sole administrator?"
+
+"Right again, Doctor!" said Hyams with a leer of intelligence; "no
+use beating about the bush with you, I perceive. A single cashier
+for the whole concern saves a world of unnecessary trouble. Then,
+you see, we have our little matrimonial arrangements. A young
+lady in search of an eligible domicile comes here and deposits
+her fortune. We provide her by-and-by with a husband of suitable
+tastes, so that all matters are arranged comfortably. No luxury
+or enjoyment is denied to the inmates of the establishment, which
+may be compared, in short, to a perfect aviary, in which you hear
+nothing from morning to evening save one continuous sound of billing
+and cooing."
+
+"You draw a fascinating picture, Mr Hyams," said I: "too
+fascinating, in fact; for, after what you have said, I doubt whether
+I should be fulfilling my duty to my noble patron the Duke, were I
+to expose his heir to the influence of such powerful temptations."
+
+"Don't be in the least degree alarmed about that," said Hyams. "I
+shall take care that in this case there is no chance of marriage.
+Harkye, Doctor, it is rather against our rules to admit parlour
+boarders; but I don't mind doing it in this case, if you agree to my
+terms, which are one hundred and twenty guineas per month."
+
+"On the part of the Duke," said I, "I anticipate no objection; nor
+shall I refuse your stamped receipts at that rate. But as I happen
+to be paymaster, I shall certainly not give you in exchange for
+each of them more than seventy guineas, which will leave you a very
+pretty profit over and above your expenses."
+
+"What a screw you are, Doctor!" cried Hyams. "Would you have the
+conscience to pocket fifty for nothing? Come, come--make it eighty
+and it's a bargain."
+
+"Seventy is my last word. Beard of Mordecai, man! do you think I am
+going to surrender this pigeon to your hands gratis? Have I not told
+you already that he has a natural turn for _ecarte_!"
+
+"Ah, Doctor, Doctor! you must be one of our people--you must
+indeed!" said Hyams. "Well, is it a bargain?"
+
+"Not yet," said I. "In common decency, and for the sake of
+appearances, I must stay for a couple of days in the house, in order
+that I may be able to give a satisfactory report to the Duke. By the
+way, I hope everything is quite orthodox here--nothing contrary to
+the tenets of the church?"
+
+"O quite," replied Hyams; "it is a beautiful establishment in point
+of order. The bell rings every day punctually at four o'clock."
+
+"For prayers?"
+
+"No, sir--for hockey. We find that a little lively exercise gives a
+cheerful tone to the mind, and promotes those animal spirits which
+are the peculiar boast of the Agapedome."
+
+"I am quite satisfied," said I. "So now, if you please, I shall
+introduce my pupil."
+
+I need not dwell minutely upon the particulars of the interview
+which took place between Rogers of ours and the superintendent of
+the Agapedome. Indeed there is little to record. Rogers received the
+intimation that this was to be his residence for a season with the
+utmost nonchalance, simply remarking that he thought it would be
+rather slow; and then, by way of keeping up his character, filled
+himself a bumper of sherry. Mr Hyams regarded him as a spider might
+do when some unknown but rather powerful insect comes within the
+precincts of his net.
+
+"Well," said Rogers, "since it seems I am to be quartered here, what
+sort of fun is to be had? Any racket-court, eh?"
+
+"I am sorry to say, my Lord, ours is not built as yet. But at four
+o'clock we shall have hockey--"
+
+"Hang hockey! I have no fancy for getting my shins bruised. Any body
+in the house except myself?"
+
+"If your Lordship would like to visit the ladies--"
+
+"Say no more!" cried Rogers impetuously. "I shall manage to kill
+time now! 'Hallo, you follow with the shoulder-knot! show me the way
+to the drawing-room;" and Rogers straightway disappeared.
+
+"Doctor Hiram Smith!" said Hyams, looking rather discomposed, "this
+is most extraordinary conduct on the part of your pupil."
+
+"Not at all extraordinary, I assure you," I replied; "I told you he
+was rather eccentric, but at present he is in a peculiarly quiet
+mood. Wait till you see his animal spirits up!"
+
+"Why, he'll be the ruin of the Agapedome!" cried Hyams; "I cannot
+possibly permit this."
+
+"It will rather puzzle you to stop it," said I.
+
+Here a faint squall, followed by a sound of suppressed giggling, was
+heard in the passage without.
+
+"Holy Moses!" cried the Agapedomian, starting up, "if Mrs Hyams
+should happen to be there!"
+
+"You may rely upon it she will very soon become accustomed to his
+Lordship's eccentricities. Why, you told me you admitted of no sort
+of bother or ceremony."
+
+"Yes--but a joke maybe carried too far. As I live, he is pursuing
+one of the ladies down stairs into the courtyard!"
+
+"Is he?" said I; "then you may be tolerably certain he will
+overtake her."
+
+"Surely some of the servants will stop him!" cried Hyams, rushing
+to the window. "Yes--here comes one of them. Father Abraham! is it
+possible? He has knocked Adoniram down!"
+
+"Nothing more likely," said I; "his Lordship had lessons from
+Mendoza."
+
+"I must look to this myself," cried Hyams.
+
+"Then I'll follow and see fair play," said I.
+
+We rushed into the court; but by this time it was empty. The pursued
+and the pursuer--Daphne and Apollo--had taken flight into the
+garden. Thither we followed them, Hyams red with ire; but no trace
+was seen of the fugitives. At last in an acacia bower we heard
+murmurs. Hyams dashed on; I followed; and there, to my unutterable
+surprise, I beheld Rogers of ours kneeling at the feet of the
+Latchley!
+
+"Beautiful Lavinia!" he was saying, just as we turned the corner.
+
+"Sister Latchley!" cried Hyams, "what is the meaning of all this?"
+
+"Rather let me ask, brother Hyams," said the Latchley in unabashed
+serenity, "what means this intrusion, so foreign to the time, and so
+subversive of the laws of our society?"
+
+"Shall I pound him, Lavinia?" said Rogers, evidently anxious to
+discharge a slight modicum of the debt which he owed to the Jewish
+fraternity.
+
+"I command--I beseech you, no! Speak, brother Hyams! I again require
+of you to state why and wherefore you have chosen to violate the
+fundamental rules of the Agapedome?"
+
+"Sister Latchley, you will drive me mad! This young man has not been
+ten minutes in the house, and yet I find him scampering after you
+like a tom-cat, and knocking down Adoniram because he came in his
+way, and you are apparently quite pleased!"
+
+"Is the influence of love measured by hours?" asked the Latchley in
+a tone of deep sentiment. "Count we electricity by time--do we mete
+out sympathy by the dial? Brother Hyams, were not your intellectual
+vision obscured by a dull and earthly film, you would know that the
+passage of the lightning is not more rapid than the flash of kindled
+love."
+
+"That sounds all very fine," said Hyams, "but I shall allow no such
+doings here; and you, in particular, Sister Latchley, considering
+how you are situated, ought to be ashamed of yourself!"
+
+"Aaron, my man," said Rogers of ours, "will you be good enough to
+explain what you mean by making such insinuations?"
+
+"Stay, my Lord," said I; "I really must interpose. Mr Hyams is about
+to explain."
+
+"May I never discount bill again," cried the Jew, "if this is not
+enough to make a man forswear the faith of his fathers! Look you
+here, Miss Latchley; you are part of the establishment, and I expect
+you to obey orders."
+
+"I was not aware, sir, until this moment," said Miss Latchley,
+loftily, "that I was subject to the orders of any one."
+
+"Now, don't be a fool; there's a dear!" said Hyams. "You know well
+enough what I mean. Haven't you enough on hand with Pettigrew,
+without encumbering yourself--?" and he stopped short.
+
+"It is a pity, sir," said Miss Latchley, still more magnificently,
+"it is a vast pity, that since you have the meanness to invent
+falsehoods, you cannot at the same time command the courage to utter
+them. Why am I thus insulted? Who is this Pettigrew you speak of?"
+
+"Pettigrew--Pettigrew?" remarked Rogers; "I say, Dr Smith, was
+not that the name of the man who is gone amissing, and for whose
+discovery his friends are offering a reward?"
+
+Hyams started as if stung by an adder. "Sister Latchley," he said,
+"I fear I was in the wrong."
+
+"You have made the discovery rather too late, Mr Hyams," replied
+the irate Lavinia. "After the insults you have heaped upon me, it
+is full time we should part. Perhaps these gentlemen will be kind
+enough to conduct an unprotected female to a temporary home."
+
+"If you will go, you go alone, madam," said Hyams; "his Lordship
+intends to remain here."
+
+"His Lordship intends to do nothing of the sort, you rascal," said
+Rogers. "Hockey don't agree with my constitution."
+
+"Before I depart, Mr Hyams," said Miss Latchley, "let me remark that
+you are indebted to me in the sum of two thousand pounds as my share
+of the profits of the establishment. Will you pay it now, or would
+you prefer to wait till you hear from my solicitor?"
+
+"Anything more?" asked the Agapedomian.
+
+"Merely this," said I: "I am now fully aware that Mr Peter Pettigrew
+is detained within these walls. Surrender him instantly, or prepare
+yourself for the worst penalties of the law."
+
+I made a fearful blunder in betraying my secret before I was clear
+of the premises, and the words had scarcely passed my lips before
+I was aware of my mistake. With the look of a detected demon Hyams
+confronted us.
+
+"Ho, ho! this is a conspiracy, is it? But you have reckoned without
+your host. Ho, there! Jonathan--Asahel! close the doors, ring the
+great bell, and let no man pass on your lives! And now let's see
+what stuff you are made of!"
+
+So saying, the ruffian drew a life-preserver from his pocket, and
+struck furiously at my head before I had time to guard myself. But
+quick as he was, Rogers of ours was quicker. With his left hand he
+caught the arm of Hyams as the blow descended, whilst with the right
+he dealt him a fearful blow on the temple, which made the Hebrew
+stagger. But Hyams, amongst his other accomplishments, had practised
+in the ring. He recovered himself almost immediately, and rushed
+upon Rogers. Several heavy hits were interchanged; and there is no
+saying how the combat might have terminated, but for the presence
+of mind of the Latchley. That gifted female, superior to the
+weakness of her sex, caught up the life-preserver from the ground,
+and applied it so effectually to the back of Hyams' skull, that he
+dropped like an ox in the slaughter-house.
+
+Meanwhile the alarum bell was ringing--women were screaming at
+the windows, from which also several crazy-looking gentlemen were
+gesticulating; and three or four truculent Israelites were rushing
+through the courtyard. The whole Agapedome was in an uproar.
+
+"Keep together and fear nothing!" cried Rogers. "I never stir on
+these kind of expeditions without my pistols. Smith--give your arm
+to Miss Latchley, who has behaved like the heroine of Saragossa; and
+now let us see if any of these scoundrels will venture to dispute
+our way!"
+
+But for the firearms which Rogers carried, I suspect our egress
+would have been disputed. Jonathan and Asahel, red-headed ruffians
+both, stood ready with iron bars in their hands to oppose our exit;
+but a glimpse of the bright glittering barrel caused them to change
+their purpose. Rogers commanded them, on pain of instant death, to
+open the door. They obeyed; and we emerged from the Agapedome as
+joyfully as the Ithacans from the cave of Polyphemus. Fortunately
+the chaise was still in waiting: we assisted Miss Latchley in, and
+drove off, as fast as the horses could gallop, to Southampton.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+"Is it possible they can have murdered him?" said Jack.
+
+"That, I think," said I, "is highly improbable. I rather imagine
+that he has refused to conform to some of the rules of the
+association, and has been committed to the custody of Messrs
+Jonathan and Asahel."
+
+"Shall I ask Lavinia?" said Rogers. "I daresay she would tell me all
+about it."
+
+"Better not," said I, "in the mean time. Poor thing! her nerves must
+be shaken."
+
+"Not a whit of them," replied Rogers. "I saw no symptom of nerves
+about her. She was as cool as a cucumber when she floored that
+infernal Jew; and if she should be a little agitated or so, she is
+calming herself at this moment with a glass of brandy and water. I
+mixed it for her. Do you know she's a capital fellow, only 'tis a
+pity she's so very plain."
+
+"I wish the police would arrive!" said Jack. "We have really not a
+minute to lose. Poor Uncle Peter! I devoutly trust this may be the
+last of his freaks."
+
+"I hope so too, Jack, for your sake: it is no joke rummaging him out
+of such company. But for Rogers there, we should all of us have been
+as dead as pickled herrings."
+
+"I bear a charmed life," said Rogers. "Remember I belong to 'the
+Immortals.' But there come the blue-coats in a couple of carriages.
+'Gad, Wilkinson, I wish it were our luck to storm the Agapedome with
+a score of our own fellows!"
+
+During our drive, Rogers enlightened us as to his encounter with the
+Latchley. It appeared that he had bestowed considerable attention
+to our conversation in London; and that, when he hurried to the
+drawing-room in the Agapedome, as already related, he thought he
+recognised the Latchley at once, in the midst of half-a-dozen more
+juvenile and blooming sisters.
+
+"Of course, I never read a word of the woman's works," said Rogers,
+"and I hope I never shall; but I know that female vanity will stand
+any amount of butter. So I bolted into the room, without caring for
+the rest--though, by the way, there was one little girl with fair
+hair and blue eyes, who, I hope, has not left the Agapedome--threw
+myself at the feet of Lavinia; declared that I was a young nobleman,
+enamoured of her writings, who was resolved to force my way through
+iron bars to gain a glimpse of the bright original: and, upon
+the whole, I think you must allow that I managed matters rather
+successfully."
+
+There could be but one opinion as to that. In fact, without Rogers,
+the whole scheme must have miscarried. It was Kellermann's charge,
+unexpected and unauthorised--but altogether triumphant.
+
+On arriving at the Agapedome we found the door open, and three or
+four peasants loitering round the gateway.
+
+"Are they here still?" cried Jack, springing from the chaise.
+
+"Noa, measter," replied one of the bystanders; "they be gone an hour
+past in four carrutches, wi' all their goods and chuckles."
+
+"Did they carry any one with them by force?"
+
+"Noa, not by force, as I seed; but there wore one chap among them
+woundily raddled on the sconce."
+
+"Hyams to wit, I suppose. Come, gentlemen; as we have a
+search-warrant, let us in and examine the premises thoroughly."
+
+Short as was the interval which had elapsed between our exit and
+return, Messrs Jonathan, Asahel, and Co. had availed themselves
+of it to the utmost. Every portable article of any value had been
+removed. Drawers were open, and papers scattered over the floors,
+along with a good many pairs of bloomers rather the worse for the
+wear: in short, every thing seemed to indicate that the nest was
+finally abandoned. What curious discoveries we made during the
+course of our researches, as to the social habits and domestic
+economy of this happy family, I shall not venture to recount; we
+came there not to gratify either private or public curiosity, but to
+perform a sacred duty by emancipating Mr Peter Pettigrew.
+
+Neither in the cellars nor the closets, nor even in the garrets,
+could we find any trace of the lost one. The contents of one
+bedroom, indeed, showed that it had been formerly tenanted by Mr
+Pettigrew, for there were his portmanteaus with his name engraved
+upon them; his razors, and his wearing apparel, all seemingly
+untouched: but there were no marks of any recent occupancy; the dust
+was gathering on the table, and the ewer perfectly dry. It was the
+opinion of the detective officer that at least ten days had elapsed
+since any one had slept in the room. Jack became greatly alarmed.
+
+"I suppose," said he, "there is nothing for it but to proceed
+immediately in pursuit of Hyams: do you think you will be able to
+apprehend him?"
+
+"I doubt it very much, sir," replied the detective officer. "These
+sort of fellows are wide awake, and are always prepared for
+accidents. I expect that, by this time, he is on his way to France.
+But hush!--what was that?"
+
+A dull sound as of the clapper of a large bell boomed overhead.
+There was silence for about a minute, and again it was repeated.
+
+"Here is a clue, at all events!" cried the officer. "My life on it,
+there is some one in the belfry."
+
+We hastened up the narrow stairs which led to the tower. Half way
+up, the passage was barred by a stout door, double locked, which the
+officers had some difficulty in forcing with the aid of a crow-bar.
+This obstacle removed, we reached the lofty room where the bell
+was suspended; and there, right under the clapper, on a miserable
+truckle bed, lay the emaciated form of Mr Pettigrew.
+
+"My poor uncle!" said Jack, stooping tenderly to embrace his
+relative, "what can have brought you here?"
+
+"Speak louder, Jack!" said Mr Pettigrew; "I can't hear you. For
+twelve long days that infernal bell has been tolling just above my
+head for hockey and other villanous purposes. I am as deaf as a
+doornail!"
+
+"And so thin, dear uncle! You must have been most shamefully abused."
+
+"Simply starved; that's all."
+
+"What! starved? The monsters! Did they give you nothing to eat?"
+
+"Yes--broccoli. I wish you would try it for a week: it is a rare
+thing to bring out the bones."
+
+"And why did they commit this outrage upon you?"
+
+"For two especial reasons, I suppose--first, because I would not
+surrender my whole property; and, secondly, because I would not
+marry Miss Latchley."
+
+"My dear uncle! when I saw you last, it appeared to me that you
+would have had no objections to perform the latter ceremony."
+
+"Not on compulsion, Jack--not on compulsion!" said Mr Pettigrew,
+with a touch of his old humour. "I won't deny that I was humbugged
+by her at first, but this was over long ago."
+
+"Indeed! Pray, may I venture to ask what changed your opinion of the
+lady?"
+
+"Her works, Jack--her own works!" replied Uncle Peter. "She gave me
+them to read as soon as I was fairly trapped into the Agapedome,
+and such an awful collection of impiety and presumption I never saw
+before. She is ten thousand times worse than the deceased Thomas
+Paine."
+
+"Was she, then, party to your incarceration?"
+
+"I won't say that. I hardly think she would have consented to
+let them harm me, or that she knew exactly how I was used; but
+that fellow Hyams is wicked enough to have been an officer under
+King Herod. Now, pray help me up, and lift me down stairs, for my
+legs are so cramped that I can't walk, and my head is as dizzy
+as a wheel. That confounded broccoli, too, has disagreed with my
+constitution, and I shall feel particularly obliged to any one who
+can assist me to a drop of brandy."
+
+After having ministered to the immediate wants of Mr Pettigrew,
+and secured his effects, we returned to Southampton, leaving the
+deserted Agapedome in the charge of a couple of police. In spite of
+every entreaty Mr Pettigrew would not hear of entering a prosecution
+against Hyams.
+
+"I feel," said he, "that I have made a thorough ass of myself;
+and I should not be able to stand the ridicule that must follow a
+disclosure of the consequences. In fact, I begin to think that I am
+not fit to look after my own affairs. The man who has spent twelve
+days, as I have, under the clapper of a bell, without any other
+sustenance than broccoli--is there any more brandy in the flask?
+I should like the merest drop--the man, I say, who has undergone
+these trials, has ample time for meditation upon the past. I see
+my weakness, and I acknowledge it. So Jack, my dear boy, as you
+have always behaved to me more like a son than a nephew, I intend,
+immediately on my return to London, to settle my whole property upon
+you, merely reserving an annuity. Don't say a word on the subject.
+My mind is made up, and nothing can alter my resolution."
+
+On arriving at Southampton we considered it our duty to communicate
+immediately with Miss Latchley, for the purpose of ascertaining if
+we could render her any temporary assistance. Perhaps it was more
+than she deserved; but we could not forget her sex, though she had
+done everything in her power to disguise it; and, besides, the lucky
+blow with the life-preserver, which she administered to Hyams, was
+a service for which we could not be otherwise than grateful. Jack
+Wilkinson was selected as the medium of communication. He found the
+strong Lavinia alone, and perfectly composed.
+
+"I wish never more," said she, "to hear the name of Pettigrew. It is
+associated in my mind with weakness, fanaticism, and vacillation;
+and I shall ever feel humbled at the reflection that I bowed my
+woman's pride to gaze on the surface of so shallow and opaque a
+pool! And yet, why regret? The image of the sun is reflected equally
+from the Boeotian marsh and the mirror of the clear Ontario! Tell
+your uncle," continued she, after a pause, "that as he is nothing
+to me, so I wish to be nothing to him. Let us mutually extinguish
+memory. Ha, ha, ha!--so they fed him, you say, upon broccoli?
+
+"But I have one message to give, though not to him. The youth
+who, in the nobility of his soul, declared his passion for my
+intellect--where is he? I tarry beneath this roof but for him. Do
+my message fairly, and say to him that if he seeks a communion of
+soul--no! that is the common phrase of the slaves of antiquated
+superstition--if he yearns for a grand amalgamation of essential
+passion and power, let him hasten hither, and Lavinia Latchley is
+ready to accompany him to the prairie or the forest, to the torrid
+zone, or to the confines of the arctic seas!"
+
+"I shall deliver your message, ma'am," said Jack, "as accurately as
+my abilities will allow." And he did so.
+
+Rogers of ours writhed uneasily in his seat.
+
+"I'll tell you what it is, my fine fellows," said he, "I don't look
+upon this quite as a laughing matter. I am really sorry to have
+taken in the old woman, though I don't see how we could well have
+helped it; and I would far rather, Jack, that she had fixed her
+affections upon you than on me. I shall get infernally roasted at
+the mess if this story should transpire. However, I suppose there's
+only one answer to be given. Pray, present my most humble respects,
+and say how exceedingly distressed I feel that my professional
+engagements will not permit me to accompany her in her proposed
+expedition."
+
+Jack reported the answer in due form.
+
+"Then," said Lavinia, drawing herself up to her full height, and
+shrouding her visage in a black veil, "tell him that for his sake I
+am resolved to die a virgin!"
+
+I presume she will keep her word; at least I have not yet heard that
+any one has been courageous enough to request her to change her
+situation. She has since returned to America, and is now, I believe,
+the president of a female college, the students of which may be
+distinguished from the rest of their sex, by their uniform adoption
+of bloomers.
+
+
+_Printed by William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh._
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+Mismatched quotes are not fixed if it's not sufficiently clear where
+the missing quote should be placed.
+
+The cover for the eBook version of this book was created by the
+transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
+
+Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note.
+Irregularities and inconsistencies in the text have been retained as
+printed, ecept for the following:
+
+The transcriber has made accents consistent for "Schaigie" and
+"Schaigie's".
+
+Page 328: "But he must cease to be Mr Ruskin if they ..." The
+transcriber has inserted "be".
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol.
+70, No. 431, September 1851, by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE, SEPT 1851 ***
+
+***** This file should be named 44361.txt or 44361.zip *****
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