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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75215 ***
+
+
+
+
+
+                    BLACKWOOD’S EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.
+           NO. CCCXCV.      SEPTEMBER, 1848.      VOL. LXIV.
+
+
+
+
+                               CONTENTS.
+
+
+             A REVIEW OF THE LAST SESSION,             261
+             TO A CAGED SKYLARK. BY B. SIMMONS,        290
+             SONNET.—TO DENMARK,                       292
+             LIFE IN THE “FAR WEST.” PART IV.,         293
+             THE CAXTONS. PART VI.,                    315
+             LIFE AND TIMES OF GEORGE II.,             327
+             THE GREAT TRAGEDIAN,                      345
+             THE MOSCOW RETREAT,                       359
+             WHAT WOULD REVOLUTIONISING GERMANY BE AT? 373
+
+                                EDINBURGH:
+
+ WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND 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. CCCXCV.      SEPTEMBER, 1848.      VOL. LXIV.
+
+
+
+
+                     A REVIEW OF THE LAST SESSION.
+
+
+There is perhaps no body of men confederated in her Majesty’s dominions
+who are less properly the subjects of envy than the members of the
+present Cabinet. A session, begun under circumstances of unexampled
+commercial pressure, continued amidst insurrection abroad and turbulence
+at home, and ending with an Irish rebellion, ought surely to have
+exhibited some specimens of extraordinary and judicious legislation.
+Slovenliness in high places, at no time decorous, is most undecent,
+dangerous, and unendurable, at a period when the whole world is drunk
+with the revolutionary elixir. France, that old irreclaimable bacchante,
+is staggering to and fro, madly bellicose, and threatening incendiarism
+in her cups. Germany, once thought too stolid to be roused, is hiccuping
+for national unity, and on the fair way of contributing largely to the
+overthrow of the equilibrium of power in Europe. The Irish symptoms have
+by no means surprised us. The insurrection there is the inevitable fruit
+of the measures and policy against which, for the last twenty years, we
+have entered our strong and unflinching protest. The shameful truckling
+of the Whigs to O’Connell and his scandalous followers; the
+unconstitutional fostering of the Roman Catholic Church; and the
+conciliation system, which, while it did gross injustice to the people
+of England and Scotland, contributed to confirm the spirit of
+improvidence and pauperism among the Irish, without in any way securing
+their gratitude,—have resulted in a rebellion, imbecile, indeed, and
+almost ludicrous in its issue, but not, on that account, less afflicting
+to the supporters of order and the crown.
+
+More than once, too, we have been threatened at home by manifestations
+of the insurrectionary spirit. In so densely populated a country as
+this, it is impossible that commercial distress and slackness can
+exist for any length of time, without trying sorely the patience and
+the fortitude of the working classes. Such distress undoubtedly did
+prevail, towards the close of last year, in a most alarming degree;
+and throughout the whole spring there was a vast want of employment in
+the manufacturing districts. The completion of some of the great lines
+of railway, and in others the partial abandonment or suspension of the
+works, caused by the extreme tightness of the money market, also threw
+a great deal of unemployed labour on the public; and this evil was
+increased by the heterogeneous character of the masses. Irish
+immigration has increased to such an extent, that not only in all the
+towns of Britain, but almost in every village, especially on the
+western coast, there exists a Hibernian colony; unreclaimed by
+civilisation—uneducated as the brutes that perish—knowing nothing of
+religion, save as an idolatrous form, and professing rebellion as a
+principle. This class have always formed a nucleus for disaffection,
+and, but for the extreme reluctance of the native labourers to
+fraternise with those children of Esau, the results might ere now have
+been more serious than we altogether care to contemplate. As it was,
+the British demagogue was always sure of finding a ready partisan,
+confederate, and coadjutor in the western Celt; and we need hardly say
+that the Chartist leaders availed themselves to the full of that
+sympathy. We shall presently see how far this state of matters
+received the attention of the men in power.
+
+In this critical position we were entitled to expect that the government
+would have shown itself fully adequate to the crisis—that the causes of
+distress, which lie at the root of turbulence and disaffection, would be
+probed with a firm and prudent hand—that every possible relief and
+assistance would be given to the home market—and that, above all,
+nothing should be done which might tend, in the remotest degree, to
+endanger the integrity of the empire. The welfare of Great Britain is a
+terrible trust in times like these, and the responsibility of those who
+have professed themselves ready to govern, and who, in fact, have rather
+claimed the government than received it, is proportionally great.
+
+Let us then take a candid and impartial review of the proceedings which
+have characterised this session of Parliament, extending over a period
+more fertile in insurrection than any which the world has known. Let us
+examine how Lord John Russell and his colleagues have acquitted
+themselves in the discharge of their important functions. We shall be
+sparing neither of praise nor blame: glad, indeed, if we can find an
+opportunity of being lavish of the former, or, in case of neglect, of
+stumbling upon an honest excuse.
+
+Our readers cannot have forgotten the circumstances under which this
+last session of Parliament commenced. The commercial world has not, for
+very many years, felt any thing like a corresponding crisis; and the
+change is most remarkable, when we reflect that the depression followed
+immediately upon a period of almost unexampled prosperity. Our opinion
+is still unchanged, as to the causes which led to this. We pointed out,
+in former articles, long before the pressure began, what must be the
+inevitable result of a wholesale departure from our older system, of the
+adoption of the free-trading economical views, and of the arbitrary
+contraction of the currency, as devised by Sir Robert Peel. Every word
+we then said has been verified to the letter; and, as we expected, the
+very contingencies which we suggested as likely to operate in producing
+this unfavourable state of matters, and which actually did subsequently
+occur, have been paraded, by the free-traders and extreme bullionists,
+as the causes of the whole disaster. It is of great importance that the
+public should understand this subject clearly; and, therefore, without
+repeating what we have elaborately attempted to demonstrate before, let
+us merely remark that the tendency of free trade, and of fettered
+currency combined, was to prostrate the whole commercial world, on the
+first occurrence of a bad season and a scarcity of food, by stimulating
+the exportation of gold, and at the same time by withdrawing its
+representative. In fact, Sir Robert Peel constructed his machinery so,
+that the result, in the event which we have instanced, could be
+calculated on with mathematical certainty. The realised wealth of
+Britain was rendered of no avail in this emergency, for the counters
+which represented it were amissing, and nothing else would be received
+in exchange. Hence arose that total prostration of credit, and
+consequent lack of employment, which was so lamentably felt towards the
+close of the year 1847.
+
+So intolerable was the pressure that, after much delay and repeated
+refusals to interfere, the Whig ministers were compelled to bestir
+themselves, and to suspend the operation of the Banking Act, in order to
+save the country from actual convulsion. Parliament was summoned about
+the middle of November, more, perhaps, for the sake of obtaining a bill
+of indemnity for the suspension—a measure which, after all, did not lead
+to any infringement of the Act—than with the view of boldly facing the
+increasing difficulties of the country. Notwithstanding annual
+disappointment, every one waited for the speech from the throne with the
+most intense anxiety, trusting that at such a time some comforting
+glimpses for the future, some earnest ministerial schemes would be
+announced, likely to retrieve the commercial world from its
+embarrassment. These expectations were destined to receive an immediate
+check. The financial prose of the author of “Don Carlos” was as vague
+and unsatisfactory as his halting tragic verse. There was, of course, a
+decent show of regret for public calamity, but no vestige of an
+intention to interpose any remedial measure. In point of finance, the
+only intelligible topic contained in the speech was ominous of the
+repeal of the Navigation Laws. Sanitary improvements, the great Whig
+hobby, which they are constantly thrusting forward beneath the public
+nose, were also recommended. Ireland, then testifying the humane and
+Christian disposition of its inhabitants, by a series of the most
+cold-blooded and revolting murders, was recommended to the benevolence
+of the state. A treaty with the Republic of the Equator, touching the
+suppression of the slave-trade, was announced; and the Whigs looked
+forward “with confidence to the maintenance of the general peace of
+Europe.” A more paltry programme was never yet submitted to the public
+eye.
+
+The ministerial move in November, and the suspension of the Banking Act,
+for however short a period, was in truth a remarkable circumstance. If
+the suspension was right, it must necessarily imply that Sir Robert Peel
+was utterly wrong in framing the measure as he did. We know that the Act
+is useless for control in times of prosperity, and that it pinches us by
+becoming operative under adverse seasons; and it was precisely when the
+pinch was felt that the Whigs were forced to suspend it. True—a great
+deal of the mischief had by that time been accomplished. Men, every whit
+as respectable as the late Premier, had been driven into the Gazette for
+the sheer want of temporary accommodation, and property sank in value as
+rapidly as the mercury before a storm. But the true nature of the Act
+had been felt and condemned by the public; and in no one instance do we
+ever recollect to have witnessed a greater unanimity of opinion, hostile
+to its endurance and principle, than prevailed, at least beyond the
+walls of the House of Commons. If the public were wrong in this
+impression, then it followed as a matter of course that the ministry
+were highly blameable for the suspension; that Peel’s machine, being a
+sound and salutary one, should have been left to do its work, and to
+crush down as many victims as it could possibly entangle in its wheels.
+But in truth, very few could be found to support such a proposition. If
+credit is to be altogether annihilated in this country, whether by
+Banking Acts like this, framed and forced upon us contrary to the
+experience and in face of the remonstrance of the mercantile classes, or
+by anarchy and mob rule, as has been the case in France, we must prepare
+to bid an everlasting farewell to our greatness. Credit, it is in vain
+to deny, has made the British nation. Credit may, like every thing else,
+be pushed too far; but even over-trading is a far less calamity than a
+restrictive system, which in a day can destroy the accumulated profits
+of years, for the first carries with it its own antidote and cure.
+Peel’s banking legislation, we do not hesitate to say, has been
+productive of more harm to this country in three years, than has ever
+occurred from any known cause within the same period of time; and the
+obstinacy with which he has clung to his delusion, the sophistry which
+he has invariably employed to shift the responsibility from his
+shoulders, and the manœuvring style of his defence, may be consistent
+with the character of the man, but are not worthy of the dignity of a
+British statesman.
+
+In suspending the operation of the Banking Act, the Whigs tacitly
+admitted that, in their opinion, whether lately adopted or not, there
+was something fundamentally injurious and wrong with the measure. The
+subject was a very serious one. You may bungle sanitary bills, pass
+coercive laws, or tamper with the jurisprudence of the country, without
+doing more than a limited amount of evil. But the subject of the
+currency is so intimately and vitally connected with our whole
+commercial greatness, that it must be handled with the utmost
+precaution. A leak in a ship is not more dangerous than a flaw in a
+monetary statute; and, when once discovered, not a moment should be lost
+in repairing it.
+
+Not one member of the present Cabinet was in any way competent for the
+task. It is most extraordinary, that the Whigs, after all their official
+experience, should exhibit such a singular incapacity in every matter
+which has the slightest connexion with finance. They do not seem to
+comprehend the subject at all; and if their private affairs were
+conducted in the same slovenly fashion as are those of the public when
+unfortunately committed to their guidance, we should very soon see the
+Gazette adorned with some elegant extracts from the Court Guide. The
+only respectable Chancellor of the Exchequer whom they ever produced was
+Mr Baring; and he, it is rumoured, was considered too scrupulous to be
+admitted to that post again. Besides this, his views upon the currency
+were known to be diametrically opposite to those entertained by Sir
+Robert Peel. Sir Charles Wood, the worst financier that ever disgraced
+the memory of Cocker, had committed himself before the suspension of the
+Act, in an especially ridiculous manner. At one time, this gentleman was
+quite jocund and hopeful, a firm believer in the existence of a
+plethora, and smiled at the idea of a crisis with a happy air of mingled
+indifference and satisfaction. Shortly afterwards, however, he took the
+alarm, attempted to eat in his own words—an operation which he performed
+with most indifferent grace,—and possibly became dimly conscious that a
+Chancellor of the Exchequer has more duties to perform than to sign the
+receipt for his salary. Sir Charles evidently was not the man to grapple
+with the difficulty; and besides this, he could not afford to offend Sir
+Robert Peel, or give a triumph to his political opponents, who had all
+along denounced the Banking Act as an experiment of a perilous nature.
+In this position, the Whigs adopted the safest course for themselves, if
+not for the country. They asked for a committee, both in the Lords and
+Commons, to consider the question of the currency, taking care, of
+course, to nominate members whose opinions were already known. We
+thoroughly agree with Mr Herries, that the inquiry was a work of
+supererogation. The subject has been already investigated in every
+possible way. Blue books have been issued from time to time, containing
+an enormous mass of deliberate evidence; and that evidence has been
+repeatedly analysed and dissected by writers of great ability and
+statistical knowledge on either side. The public mind was perfectly ripe
+for decision—indeed, for months the currency had formed almost the sole
+topic discussed by the press; and it was peculiarly desirable that we
+should no longer be left in a state of uncertainty, or exposed to the
+operation of another panic. But such an arrangement did not suit the
+Whigs. They were not prepared to come forward with an intelligible plan
+for remedying the evil which they had already admitted to exist.—Not
+secretly displeased, perhaps, at the general impression that the
+Tamworth Baronet had committed a gross and unpardonable blunder, they
+were unable to dispense with his support, and extremely unwilling to
+give him umbrage—and therefore they took refuge in the convenient scheme
+of committees. In vain did Mr Herries, in an able and statesmanlike
+speech, point out the danger of delay, and exhibit the true causes of
+the distress which had lately prevailed, and which was still weighing
+upon the country. In vain did he implore ministers to face the question
+manfully. His proposal that the House should proceed at once to the
+consideration of the Banking Act, with the view of suspending
+permanently its limitations, subject to a wholesome control, was lost by
+a majority of forty-one. After a most lengthened examination, the
+committees have issued their reports; and the result is another
+difference of opinion, which leaves the whole matter open to renewed
+discussion. The session has rolled away, and the Banking Act is left
+untouched.
+
+We presume that the most confirmed free-trader within the four seas of
+Britain will at all events admit this fact, that not one of the glorious
+promises held out to us by the political economists and gentlemen of the
+Manchester school has as yet been realised. We can hardly expect that
+they will be candid enough to confess the fallacy of the views which
+they then so enthusiastically maintained; and we doubt not that, in any
+discussion, we should still hear some very ingenious explanations to
+account for the non-advent of the anticipated blessings. But the boldest
+of them will not deny that, in the mean time, all the fiscal changes
+have been followed by a decline in our prosperity, a falling-off in
+trade, and a consequent defalcation of the revenue. We have certainly
+not gained in employment, we have lost money; and the best proof of it
+is, the low ebb of the national revenue. Such being the case, it is no
+wonder if the budget or financial statement of the minister was expected
+with the most intense anxiety, and if, for the time, every other topic
+was merged in the consideration of this. Political history does not
+contain many episodes equal to that famous discussion—many instances of
+utter helplessness like that exhibited by the Premier.
+
+We have already analysed the budget fully in another article,[1] and it
+is not worth while now to recur to it for the purposes of exposure. The
+deficit was estimated at no less than three millions for the year; and
+this large sum was to be made up by the imposition of an augmented
+income-tax. Considering what had taken place on the occasion when Sir
+Robert Peel first proposed that discreditable and decidedly odious
+impost, the assurances that it was to be merely temporary in its
+endurance, and the specious pleas of necessity with which it was then
+fortified,—it is no matter of surprise that the ministerial plan should
+have been received with symptoms of marked disgust, even by those who
+usually accord their support to the measures of the present government.
+Mr Hume opined that the ministry were mad. Mr Osborne declared his
+belief that, had there been a regularly organised Opposition, such a
+financial statement would have been the death-warrant of any
+administration. Even the Manchester section of the free-traders held
+aloof from ministers, just as cowards might do from the support of a
+drowning man. For however vexatious the admission might be, they were
+bound in common gratitude to have recollected that the change from
+indirect to direct taxation was effected mainly at their instance, and
+to gratify their everlasting clamour. That change had resulted in a huge
+deficit of the revenue; and, it being admitted on all sides that a
+revenue must be raised—for we have not yet got the length of talking
+openly of the sponge—they, at all events, might have been expected to
+say something in favour of their friends, at a crisis of their own
+producing. But there is no creature on earth so utterly selfish and
+devoid of compunction, as your thorough-paced economical free-trader.
+Point merely in the direction of his pocket, and he instantly howls with
+terror. Five per cent income-tax was as obnoxious in the eyes of Cobden
+and Bright as in those of other men who acted upon sounder principles;
+and it is not uninstructive to remark the course which on this occasion
+the ex-members of the League thought fit to pursue. It had been long
+apparent to them, as it was to every man in the country, that the
+revenue of the year must prove insufficient to meet the expenditure.
+They knew that the unpalatable fact, when announced in Parliament, would
+inevitably lead to a discussion regarding the policy of past measures,
+and the wisdom of persisting in a course which hitherto had met with no
+reciprocity from foreign countries, but, on the contrary, had been used
+to increase the burden of our embarrassments. Such discussion was to be
+deprecated and avoided by every possible means; and the readiest way of
+effecting this seemed to be the suggestion of a plan whereby the
+expenditure might be lessened and brought down to the level of the
+revenue. This very desirable result was not so easy of accomplishment;
+but nevertheless Mr Cobden undertook the task. The product was worthy of
+the author. The wise, politic, and sagacious principle of the
+calico-printer was to effect a saving by the material reduction of our
+military and naval establishments, and the weakening of the national
+arm. We hope our readers have not forgotten, were it merely from the
+disgust they must have excited, the silly and egotistic remarks of this
+complacent personage touching his travels, his observations, and his
+mission as a peaceful regenerator. Free trade, which ought long ago to
+have made Great Britain rich, had, according to his experiences, already
+pacified the world. There was to be no more war—the French were the most
+affectionate and domesticated men upon the face of the earth—and he,
+Cobden, and his friend Cremieux, were interchanging congratulatory
+letters on the advent of the new millennium. In our March Number for the
+present year, we had the satisfaction of bestowing a slight castigation
+upon Cobden, to which we beg now to refer those gentlemen who were so
+wroth with us for presuming to question the _dicta_ of the oracle of the
+West Riding. Within a few days after that article was penned, Europe was
+wrapped in insurrection, and Cobden’s correspondent a member of a
+revolutionary government! The French free-trader, Cremieux, was a
+consenting party to the decree which drove forth the British labourers
+from France, without warning and without compensation! The barricades of
+June have demonstrated the affectionate and domesticated character of
+the race whom Cobden delighteth to honour. If to cut, in cold blood, the
+throats of prisoners, to shoot down the messengers of peace in spite of
+their sacred calling, to mangle the bodies of the wounded, and these
+brothers and countrymen, under circumstances unheard-of, save perhaps in
+the tales of African atrocity—if these things constitute domestication,
+then by all means let us fall back upon a more erratic and natural state
+of society. How would we have stood at this moment, with regard to
+Ireland, save for the fact of our being able to overawe rebellion by the
+presence of an overwhelming military force? Did ever a man, professing
+to be an apostle and a prophet, find himself landed in such a ridiculous
+and ignominious posture?
+
+It is strange that the reception which he met with in the House of
+Commons, upon the occasion of his first attack upon the army, did not
+induce Cobden to pause before committing himself to a second absurdity.
+But there are some men whose conceit is of such extravagant a
+development, that no experience, no failure, no argument, will induce
+them to part with one iota of a preconceived opinion. Such a person is
+Cobden. Unabashed by the result of his previous exhibitions, callous to
+shame, and impenetrable to ridicule, he again addressed the House on the
+subject of the navy estimates, for the purpose of demonstrating the
+propriety of an immediate reduction of the fleet. This was too much even
+for Lord John Russell, who for once took heart of grace, and
+administered a fair allowance of punishment to the arrogant and ignorant
+free-trader. But the truth is, Mr Cobden’s career is ended. The _Times_,
+once a warm admirer of this confident gentleman, has ceased to vouchsafe
+him its protection, as will be seen from the following extract of 11th
+August last:—
+
+
+  “What has he done? What have been his tactics? What is the sum and
+  substance of the statesmanship to which all the world looked forward
+  so anxiously? Simply this—a depreciation of our military and naval
+  establishments, and an emulation of America. The first constitutes the
+  whole gist and pith of the honourable member’s speeches; the latter,
+  of his policy. England is to disband her fleets and armies, to give up
+  her colonies, and to enter boldly on a course of Yankee statesmanship.
+  We would not wrong the hon. gentleman. We refer to his speeches on
+  Tuesday and Wednesday nights, as well as those delivered at the close
+  of the last year. What do they amount to? ‘Retrench your expenditure;
+  give up your ships; abolish the ordnance; send round embassies to
+  every country and court of Europe; tell them you have disarmed; ask
+  them to do the same; and then set to work, and tinker up your
+  constitution on the model of the United States. Do away with open
+  voting. Destroy the _privilege_ of the suffrage; abolish the virtue of
+  patriotic courage; give every man a vote, and _make_ every man vote in
+  secret. Then you will be rich and prosperous; your expenditure will at
+  once be curtailed, and your commerce will be diffused by the amity of
+  nations.’ This is the policy which is to save us from ruin, to pay our
+  debt and confirm our strength. All that we can say is, that one part
+  of it is well matched to the other; that both equally demonstrate the
+  ability of the counsellor to advise, as his vaticinations last winter
+  proved his ability to prophesy.”
+
+
+And yet this is the person whom the Whigs lauded, and whom Sir Robert
+Peel elaborately eulogised for his sagacity!
+
+By a somewhat curious coincidence, the budget was brought forward on the
+very week when the French revolution broke out. Mr Cobden’s proposal,
+therefore, met with no support; and it must have become evident, even to
+the free-traders, that under such a threatening aspect as the Continent
+presented, no sane man would agree to a reduction in our military force.
+Still that party continued inflexibly opposed to the ministerial measure
+for raising an adequate revenue, and, by doing so, we maintain that they
+were guilty of an act of political ingratitude. In this situation,
+ministers were fain to withdraw their proposal, and to continue the
+income-tax as formerly, for a period of three years, without any
+definite scheme of making up for the deficiency in the revenue.
+
+In fact, the session has passed away without a budget at all. That which
+Lord John Russell tabled, has crumbled away like a thing of gossamer;
+and, so far as financial matters are concerned, we are left in the
+pleasant impression that we are getting into further debt, and have no
+distinct means of paying it. To exhibit the recklessness with which the
+Whigs regard all matters connected with revenue, it is sufficient to
+remark, that with three millions of deficit admitted, our rulers think
+this an advantageous and a proper time to sacrifice about fifty thousand
+pounds annually, the produce of duties upon imported copper ore.
+
+Mr Osborne was right. No ministry, had there been a decent Opposition,
+could have stood such an exposure. We even go further; for we believe
+that—but for the French revolution, and the universal turbulence abroad,
+which rendered it absolutely necessary that this country should maintain
+a firm front, and exhibit no symptoms of internal weakness or
+discord—the present ministry could not have existed for another
+fortnight. As it is, we are in some respects glad that they have
+continued in office; because, though late, they have been called upon to
+act under circumstances which, in future, may give a new and improved
+tone to Whig political opinions.
+
+Before quitting the budget, let us say a word or two regarding future
+financial prospects. It is no doubt possible that trade may
+revive—though, from the present aspect of European affairs, we are not
+inclined to be at all sanguine in our expectations. We cannot, it is
+quite clear, reduce our effective establishments; for no one can say
+what emergency may arise to make us, not mere spectators, but active
+partisans in a contest which we shall deeply and long deplore. Economy
+we may practise at home, and for once we are of Joseph’s mind. There are
+items in our civil and pension list clearly superfluous and
+undefensible, and we wish to see these removed, though with a just
+regard to vested interests and claims. We are no admirers of such
+antiquated offices as that of Hereditary Grand Falconer; and we think
+that Mr MacGregor’s inquiry, as to the heirs of the Duke of Schomberg,
+who for a century and a half have been billeted upon the country to the
+tune of three thousand a-year, deserved at least a courteous reply from
+so very determined an economist as the Premier formerly proclaimed
+himself. A doorkeeper may surely be maintained at a less annual expense
+than the income of a country gentleman; and in many departments even of
+government, we have certainly been over lavish of remuneration. But
+these retrenchments, though they may give satisfaction to the nation,
+can never free it from its embarrassments. The revenue has clearly sunk
+to a point when it must be augmented by some decided and effective
+measure; and it will well become us all to consider, even without
+reference to past disputes, from what quarter the supply is to come. If
+the decision, or at all events the expressed feeling, of the House of
+Commons can be taken as an index of the popular wish, the nation will
+not submit to an augmentation of the income-tax. No increased duties
+upon excise can be levied,—indeed the cry is general for the removal of
+those which exist. The window-tax—though it might be materially improved
+by a more equitable arrangement, and by rating great houses without any
+graduated scale—is decidedly unpopular. In fact, all direct taxation is
+of an obnoxious character—it is the fertile source of murmur and of
+discontent, and it never can be adjusted so as to render it palatable to
+the payer.
+
+From what quarter, then, is it possible for us to recruit our revenue?
+How are we to provide for casualties, and for a possibly increased
+expenditure? That question must be solved in one way or the other, and
+that without lack of time. It will not do to go on from year to year
+with a continually increasing deficit, the arrears of which shall be
+passed to the capital of our national debt—we must raise money, and the
+only question is, how to do it.
+
+Within the last six years, says Sir Charles Wood, the nation has
+remitted _seven and a half_ millions of annual taxation: since the
+peace, says Lord John Russell, more than _thirty-nine millions_ of
+annual taxes have been removed. Highly satisfactory this, no doubt—but
+what does it prove? Simply that we have pushed the abolition of indirect
+taxation too far. We have gone on, year after year, lowering tariffs,
+for the purpose of stimulating foreign trade. We have thereby
+unquestionably increased our imports, but we have failed in giving any
+thing like a corresponding buoyancy to our exports. _Why_ we did this is
+not very difficult of comprehension, if we look attentively to the state
+of party which has subsisted for the last few years in this country.
+
+Free-trade, in so far as it lessens the cost of production, is clearly
+the interest of the master-manufacturer who exports for the foreign
+market; but, we repeat, it is the interest of no one else in the
+community. Free-trade in certain articles,—that is, in raw material
+introduced to this country for the purpose of being manufactured, sold
+at home, or exported—is just and commendable. Free-trade in what are
+called the necessaries of life, such as corn and cattle, does not tend
+to the wealth of the country; but, for the present, we shall leave that
+subject in abeyance. Free-trade in luxuries and in manufactured goods,
+whenever these latter displace the home labourer in the home market, we
+hold to be utterly injurious, and we shall presently state our reasons.
+
+The Manchester school have adopted, preached, and insisted upon free
+trade in _all_ these branches. It was their interest to push the cotton
+trade to its utmost possible limits, and to undersell all competitors in
+every accessible market. Hence their favourite doctrine of cheapness,
+which in appearance is so plausible, but which actually is so
+fallacious, and the pertinacity with which they have continued to preach
+it up. Hence the League, in the formation of which they displayed such
+undoubted energy, and the immense sums which they lavished for the
+popular promulgation of their creed. To conciliate these men, swollen to
+a formidable number, and maintaining their opinions with extreme
+plausibility, and no ordinary share of talent, became an important
+object to the leaders who were then at the head of the two great parties
+of the state. It is in vain to deny that a large body of the middle
+classes were concerned in this movement, and, to gain their votes and
+support, the unholy race for power began.
+
+Hence our legislation, whether under Peel or Russell, has been directed
+for the last six or seven years invariably to one point. The man who
+could boast of having removed the greatest amount of taxation was sure
+to be the popular favourite; and we all know in what manner, and by what
+means, Sir Robert Peel accomplished his share of the work. He first, on
+the assurance that it was to be merely temporary, obtained an
+income-tax, amply sufficient to redeem the financial deficit which was
+the legacy of his predecessors. He next proceeded to make that
+income-tax permanent, by paring at, and reducing the tariffs; and
+finally, in order that his rival might not have the start of him in
+popularity, he threw his party overboard, and consented to the abolition
+of the corn-laws.
+
+But there is a point beyond which taxation cannot possibly be remitted;
+and that point Sir Robert Peel had reached before he retired from
+office. True, the effect of his measures had not yet become apparent,
+but they were foreseen by many, and perhaps not unsuspected by himself
+towards the close of his tenure of office. Further than as being
+consenting parties to those reckless sacrifices of revenue, it would be
+unfair to charge the Whigs with having brought us into our present
+perplexity. Sir Robert Peel is the real author of this, and he cannot
+escape the responsibility.
+
+Now upon two points—viz., the introduction of raw material for
+manufacture, and of articles of food—we shall for the present forbear
+joining issue with the free-traders. But the third one, that of the
+admission of foreign manufactured goods at nearly nominal rates of duty,
+is far too important to be passed over, even at the risk of repetition.
+
+The industry of this country is not confined to a few, but flows through
+a thousand channels. There are, however, about four great trades in
+which Britain can at present, owing to her mineral wealth, machinery,
+and capital, compete with decided advantage against any other country in
+the world. These are the cotton, the linen, the woollen, and the iron
+trade, the exports of which articles amount to rather more than
+TWO-THIRDS of the whole exports of the United Kingdom, or in round
+numbers from thirty-three to thirty-five millions annually. It is to the
+unceasing agitation of men connected with _these_ trades that we owe the
+erection of the League, and the progress of free trade which has brought
+us to so low a condition.
+
+It is no matter of surprise that the corn-laws were obnoxious to such
+persons. With the agricultural interest they had no natural sympathy;
+and being always able to command the monopoly of the home market, their
+invariable effort has been to stimulate trade abroad to the very utmost
+of their power. High wages interfered with their profits; and in order
+to command the labour market, they formed their famous scheme for
+reducing the price of food, by dealing a blow to agriculture at home,
+and opening the ports to the admission of foreign corn. This cry was to
+a certain degree popular, especially amongst those who were not
+connected with their works; for the more intelligent of the operatives,
+to their credit be it said, very early detected the selfishness of the
+whole manœuvre, and saw, that with the price of food wages also would
+inevitably decline. Foreign corn, however, was not enough for the
+appetite of those grasping monopolists. They looked with envy on the
+smaller non-exporting trades, who constituted a great portion of the
+population, and who were defended in the home market, their only field,
+by a reasonable scale of duties. It presently occurred to them, that if,
+by any means this scale could be broken down, and the market inundated
+with foreign manufactures, they might be enabled to export a larger
+quantity of their own fabrics, reduce the price of articles which they
+were personally inclined to consume, and finally reap another benefit by
+cheapening labour—that is, by forcing a new class, through want of
+employment, to compete with their former operatives. These we know to
+have been the secret views of the League, and to these ends, for several
+years past, they have bent the whole of their energies. How they have
+succeeded, let the present state of the labour market tell. The tariffs
+of 1846 were expressly framed in their favour. They have done half of
+the anticipated work; for by the admission of foreign manufactures into
+this country at a reduced rate of duty, they have thrown many thousands
+of industrious handicraftsmen into the streets. The small shopkeeper has
+been reduced from an employer into a mere retailer, and disaffection has
+been engendered through the pressure of absolute misery.
+
+This may seem a highly-coloured picture; but if any man of intelligence
+will take the trouble to make himself acquainted with the feelings, and
+to listen to the individual histories of persons of the working-class,
+he will find it to be strictly true. Four-fifths of the men who were in
+attendance at the late Chartist meetings belonged in 1845 to the
+non-exporting trades, were then in full employment, and probably as
+loyal as any subjects in the kingdom. So, indeed, we believe they are
+still, in so far as loyalty to the crown is concerned; for, thank God!
+Republicanism has not taken any root in the empire. But they are utterly
+discontented with the government, and furious at the apathy with which,
+they think, their sufferings are regarded. They find that the repeal of
+the corn-laws has done absolutely nothing in their favour. They find
+that the lowered tariffs have opened a sluice-gate through which
+articles of foreign manufacture have rushed in to swamp them; and they
+gloomily, and even savagely, assert, that this state of things is the
+result of a combination of the rich against the poor. So it is: but from
+that combination the aristocracy and gentlemen of England stand apart.
+The headquarters of the grinding-society are at Manchester, Liverpool,
+and Sheffield; the machinery it uses are the arms of the League; the
+master-spirits of the confederacy are Cobden, Wilson, and Bright.
+
+A very pregnant instance of the sympathy which is felt by the
+free-traders and political economists for the suffering of the lower
+orders, occurred during a debate towards the beginning of May last. We
+specially notice the fact, because it proves that, however two
+successive ministers may have forgot their duty to the people, there
+exists, in a higher quarter still, the deepest commiseration for their
+distress, and an earnest desire to alleviate it in every possible
+manner. It appears from official documents that, during the first three
+months of the present year, there were entered for home consumption, at
+the port of London alone, foreign silk goods worth £400,000, equal to
+the employment of 31,000 weavers; lace and needlework worth £40,000, or
+sufficient to displace the produce of 4000 workwomen and sempstresses;
+and 7000 dozen of boot and shoe fronts, enough to keep 1200 cordwainers
+in full employment. So near as we can calculate, the duty payable upon
+those articles, under the tariff of 1845, would have amounted to
+£88,150: at present it is not more than £65,575, thus entailing a
+primary loss of £22,575 to the revenue. Such an influx of goods, at a
+peculiarly unprofitable season, was tantamount to displacing the labour
+of 36,200 persons, who were to be thrown upon the public charity,
+without any other resource. A short time after these facts became known,
+an order was issued from the Lord Chamberlain’s office, containing her
+Majesty’s commands to the ladies of England, that in attending court
+they should appear attired in dresses exclusively the production of
+native industry. Yes! our gracious Queen, whose heart is unchilled by
+the cold dogmas of political economy, felt like a woman and a sovereign,
+and resolved, on her part at least, to rescue from famine and misery so
+many thousands of her poorer subjects. It is most gratifying to know
+that this exercise of the royal care and benevolence has met with its
+best reward, for in the midst of all the distress which has
+unfortunately prevailed, the class for whose benefit those timely orders
+were issued have been kept in employment and food: the example set from
+the throne has been widely and generously followed. But will it be
+believed, that this act of mercy gave huge umbrage to the free-traders,
+and was fiercely commented on in their journals as a gross infringement
+of the principles of enlightened government? Therefore, in the eyes of
+the Leaguers, it seems a crime to interfere for the support of the
+British workman,—and unjustifiable interference with Providence to give
+work to the labouring poor!
+
+But this is not all. Lord John Russell, on being asked in the House of
+Commons whether he had any share in suggesting this philanthropic
+action, or whether the sole credit of it appertained to his royal
+mistress, was not slow in uttering his disclaimer. “_He_ had not advised
+the crown in the matter,—he could only say that the order had issued
+from the Chamberlain’s office.” After a vain attempt to show that no
+extra quantity of goods had been imported, but that the apparent
+increase arose solely from the cessation of smuggling, he proceeded to
+remark:—“But if more goods _are_ now entered, and thereby a particular
+class do suffer inconvenience or distress, _yet these entries must
+stimulate the production and exportation of the classes of goods for
+which the imports are exchanged_.” There spoke the convert to the
+League—the truckler to Cobden and Co.! There, from the lips of a British
+minister, fell the most un-British, the most unpatriotic doctrine that
+ever yet was enunciated! Said we not truly that the whole object of free
+trade is to put down and exterminate the non-exporting trades, for the
+exclusive benefit of the few monster monopolies? The Premier concluded
+an ungracious, halting, and discreditable speech with the somewhat
+unnecessary announcement that, under all circumstances, he thought he
+should be the last person to advise her Majesty to make an alteration in
+the commercial policy which of late years had been pursued.
+
+We need hardly remark that, in the present instance, the importation of
+these foreign goods could in no way “stimulate the production or
+exportation” of any kind of British manufacture whatever. The articles
+in question were sent from France, at a time when every thing was
+unsaleable, and were sold in London for hard cash, at a heavy discount.
+Even Cobden need not have grudged this little encouragement to
+Spitalfields and Bethnal Green. He did not sell a yard of calico the
+less. Gold, and not shirting, was what the French wanted, what they
+bargained for, and what they received. But let us see a little more of
+the sympathy of the Leaguers for the poor, and respect for the
+sovereign, who surely might be left, in matters of this kind, to
+exercise some discretion of her own.
+
+Colonel Thompson, representing _an exporting constituency_, was furious
+at the alleged interference. “He would ask whether there was any
+charity, any humanity, any justice, any policy, any common-sense in
+representing hostility to one portion of the manufacturing classes of
+the country, to come from a quarter of which he was sure no one in that
+House wished to speak otherwise than with feelings of the utmost
+affection and reverence?” We are not sure that we quite understand this
+outburst of the gallant Colonel, which we copy verbatim from the columns
+of the _Spectator_, but, as he talks about charity and humanity with
+reference to his waistcoat and pantaloon exporting constituency of
+Bradford, we take him to mean that that favoured place should flourish,
+and Spitalfields utterly disappear. This is pure Leaguer’s doctrine,
+distinctly redolent of the Bastile!
+
+Mr John Bright was also true to his order. The partisan of peace opined
+that “there was no difference between driving out workmen, and keeping
+out their work: though no order had been issued to exclude foreign work,
+yet the effect of the order really given is, that French silks, which
+would have been consumed, will not be used, _and English taken instead_.
+It should be known, that from the late convulsions, the contingent
+depression of trade, and the low price of French silks in France, very
+large quantities of them have been purchased and brought to this
+country. The announcement in question might therefore entail _great loss
+on large capitalists_, and ruin on many of smaller means. The kindness
+to the Spitalfields weavers would then be done only at a cost of loss
+and injury to other classes.” Quite right, Friend Bright! the first
+persons to be guarded are _your_ speculators and _your_ capitalists. The
+poor operative, who is not in your line, may starve for any thing you
+care. There is a protective spirit about this, which absolutely charms
+us. We wonder that Mr Bright did not on a former occasion foresee that
+the repeal of the corn-laws might entail great loss on large
+proprietors, and ruin on many of smaller means!
+
+Sir William Molesworth considered that “it was _a silly and foolish_
+order; and he was informed, on the best authority, that there was not
+the slightest chance of its being obeyed.” We leave this remark of
+Molesworth without any comment, merely asking his authority for holding
+that, to assist in feeding the hungry, and maintaining our poorer
+countrymen by the exercise of their own industry, is a silly and a
+foolish act; and requesting him to consider how far his chivalrous title
+is consistent with such language, when applied to an order emanating
+directly from his sovereign.
+
+This little episode is very instructive, as elucidating the views of the
+free-traders. The great exporting trades have combined to crush and
+annihilate the small handicrafts, and this they are rapidly doing
+through the operation of these lowered tariffs. If direct taxation were
+to be introduced, and the custom-house virtually abolished, in so far as
+regards articles of foreign manufacture, the thing would be done at
+once—for no one would wear clumsy English boots when he could get French
+ones at a lower price; or British instead of Parisian gloves; or silk
+from Spitalfields rather than the less costly fabric of Lyons. The more
+honest of the free-traders make no scruple of announcing their views.
+They admit that the realisation of their maxim, to sell in the dearest
+and buy in the cheapest market, implies the ruin of every non-exporting
+trade, and they seem absolutely resolved to push their theory to the
+utmost. At present Sir Robert Peel has managed it so, that, without
+being absolutely annihilated, the poorer classes are ground down to the
+lowest point. We ask the shopkeepers, artisans, and smaller
+manufacturers, who have no connexion with the foreign market, whether
+this is not truly the case,—and if so, whether they are inclined to
+allow this cruel, selfish, and inhuman system to be carried any
+further—nay, whether they will not at once resolve to make determined
+head against it? But for the obstinate blindness of the political
+economists, we would appeal to that dearest of all considerations, their
+own safety. Do they really think it possible, even were it politic, to
+drive the whole operative industry of Britain into the compass of a few
+exporting trades. Can they make millions of men change their habits of a
+sudden, and walk from the country towns and villages,—wherein, before
+Sir Robert Peel introduced the foreigner to swamp them, they had
+supported themselves by the exercise of their craft,—to the factory or
+the mine, or the furnace, or the printing work, there to spend the
+remainder of their existence in twisting, digging, smelting, and
+stamping, for the benefit of Cobden and his confederates? The idea is
+absolute madness. Already we see the effects of false and unpatriotic
+legislation, in Chartist meetings and processions, in agitations for
+universal suffrage, in crime three-fold increased, and in augmented
+poor-rates. What are considerations of sanatory reform or of public
+instruction compared to these? Will men thank you for soap and tracts,
+even should these articles be gratuitous, if you take their labour away
+from them, and legislate for one class alone, as has been the case of
+late years? Can you expect to make them loyal and peaceable, whilst you
+deny them the means of obtaining a fair day’s wage for a fair day’s
+labour—whilst you not only encourage, but convert into an actual fact
+the idea that a large portion of the poor are oppressed, and drive them
+to seek a remedy in attempts to procure a more popular representation?
+Free trade has been the great incentive to Chartism, and, unless men
+return speedily to their senses, it may chance to be the terrible
+promoter of revolution.
+
+But what is to be the real amount of the deficit? No man living can
+tell. Lord John Russell estimated it at about three millions, and
+subsequently Sir Charles Wood announced that, by sundry savings and
+sales of old stores—which latter source of revenue very much resembles
+the case of a gentleman parting with his body clothes to make up for his
+annual expenditure—it might be reduced to a million and a half. Since
+then we have received the official accounts of the trade of the kingdom
+for the six months ending 5th July 1848; and we very much fear, from a
+perusal of these, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has understated
+his difficulties. Our exports, for the sake of which every other
+interest has been sacrificed, have fallen off to an alarming extent.
+During the corresponding six months of last year the declared value of
+our exports was £25,395,243: the whole amount for this period is
+£21,571,939, or very nearly FOUR MILLIONS less on the half year! Here is
+another staggering instance of the utter futility of free trade. The
+decrease of export for the year 1846, as compared with 1845, was about
+two millions—and now it is going on at the rate of four millions for
+half the time! Was there ever a more pregnant proof of the impossibility
+of forcing markets?
+
+Looking to the imports, we find some very curious results. Lord John
+Russell took great credit for the increased consumption of sugar
+consequent on his West Indian experiments, which we shall presently have
+occasion to notice more minutely; and predicted a still further
+consumption and increase to the revenue. Let us see how that matter
+stands. The following is the total of sugar imported to this country for
+the first six months of the last three years respectively.
+
+                                   1846.     1847.     1848.
+         Sugar unrefined, cwts., 2,956,986 3,967,686 2,960,430
+         Sugar Refined,             54,249    39,344    50,863
+         Sugar Candy,                    1     1,025       507
+         Sugar Molasses,           202,264   411,263   191,531
+                                 ————————— ————————— —————————
+                                 3,213,500 4,419,318 3,203,331
+                                 ————————— ————————— —————————
+
+So that we are absolutely importing _less sugar_ in 1848 than we did in
+1846, before Lord John Russell and his sapient colleagues chose to give
+the _coup de grace_ to the colonists! So much for increased revenue from
+that source.
+
+In the articles of raw material for manufacture there is a considerable
+increase; and, should money be obtainable at easy rates throughout the
+coming winter, this may be a source of real congratulation. But from
+recent symptoms, and the insanity of ministers in refusing to face the
+difficulties of the Bank Restriction Acts, we very much dread another
+recurrence of tightness, in which case industry must inevitably be
+paralysed as before. It is, however, comforting to know that we have a
+stock of raw material in hand, and that our condition in that respect
+has improved since last year, when the warehouses were nearly drained.
+The aggregate amount of cotton, wool, flax, hemp, and silk which have
+been imported for the last six months is in the ratio of 28,811,825, to
+27,372,502 for the same period in 1847.
+
+But the influx of foreign manufactures is the most singular feature of
+all; and we do entreat the most serious consideration of our readers to
+this very pressing point. What we have already said regarding the
+annihilation of the small trades in this country, by the total
+withdrawal of protection, receives the amplest confirmation from these
+official tables; and, if we are wise, something must be done, with the
+least possible delay, to remedy the evils which have been entailed upon
+us, through our blind submission to the pernicious doctrines of the
+free-traders. Do honourable members really believe, that by agitating
+the ballot, or bringing forward schemes for extended suffrage, they will
+give work to the unemployed, or put bread in the mouths of the starving?
+If, instead of attempting to gain a little transient popularity by
+advocating organic changes, they would seriously address themselves to
+the task of revising the tariffs, and so encouraging the home market,
+they would be of real use to the country at this momentous time. For
+momentous it is most certainly. The discovery of a deliberate plan for
+general incendiarism in Liverpool, the mobs in Glasgow, and the
+disturbances at Bradford, are all symptoms of disaffection, and all
+proceed from one cause—from the sacrifice of native industry at the
+shrine of the Moloch of free trade. Even now, while we are writing,
+intelligence has arrived of the arrest of armed Chartists in London and
+in Manchester; assassination has begun at Ashton, and every post brings
+in tidings of some new commotion. Is this a time for Parliament to
+separate without any remedial measure? Is this a time to allow our
+markets to be inundated with foreign produce; each fresh cargo
+displacing our own industry, and further adding to our embarrassment, by
+hastening on another monetary crisis by the exportation of bullion in
+exchange? This is the work commenced by Peel, and consummated by the
+incapable Whigs. God knows how it will end, if wiser, more unselfish,
+and more patriotic men are not speedily summoned to take the lead in her
+Majesty’s councils.
+
+No account is given, as in former years, of the amount of foreign linen
+and woollen manufactures imported, or of several other important
+branches of trade upon which Sir Robert Peel abolished the duty. Why
+this omission has taken place we do not know, unless it be for the worst
+of all reasons, that the results were too startling for disclosure. But
+we shall take the statistics of the silk manufactured trade alone, from
+which it will be seen that, in two years after the relaxation of the
+duties, we have _doubled our imports_, thereby throwing immense numbers
+of our own operatives out of employment.
+
+       FOREIGN SILK MANUFACTURES, ENTERED UNDER TARIFF OF 1846.
+                                  1846.        1847.        1848.
+  Silk or satin broad stuffs,   64,269 lbs.  85,589 lbs. 141,179 lbs.
+  Silk ribbons,                 79,541       95,906       95,881
+  Gauze or crape broad stuffs,   4,383        4,053        5,127
+  Gauze ribbons,                11,268       26,166       26,312
+  Gauze, mixed,                     18            8           39
+  Mixed ribbons,                   687        1,650        1,244
+  Velvet broad stuffs,           2,935        4,822        6,558
+  Velvet embossed ribbons,       4,183        3,141       10,530
+                               ———————      ———————      ———————
+                               167,284 lbs. 221,335 lbs. 286,870 lbs.
+
+Now if, as it is fair to suppose, the same increase, or even half of it,
+has taken place in the importation of other articles upon which the
+duties were removed, but which have been quietly withdrawn from the
+official tables; these statistics are enough to condemn free trade
+before any tribunal in the world. Mark how the matter stands. Here is a
+_doubled importation_ of foreign manufactured goods. One half at least
+of these goods have come in to displace your home manufacture. The other
+half would have come in as formerly to supply the rich, who would have
+had to pay a high duty for the gratification of their fancy. That duty,
+where reduced, is now lost to the revenue. Who is the gainer, then? No
+one, save the rich consumer; whilst, on the other hand, the revenue has
+suffered, and home industry has received a prostrating blow. But—say men
+of the Cobden school—though the silk weaver, and embroiderer, and
+milliner, and plaiter, and shoemaker, and tailor, may have suffered, the
+country is no loser, because WE export goods in return for the articles
+of import. Do you, gentlemen? Let us turn to the export tables, and see
+how your account stands. Recollect, you have undertaken to show us a
+corresponding export of your goods to meet the influx of foreign
+manufactures. Unless you can do this, your case is utterly worthless,
+and you stand as detected impostors.
+
+            EXPORT OF PRINCIPAL MANUFACTURES FROM THE UNITED
+                                KINGDOM.
+                                1846.       1847.       1848.
+        Cotton manufactures,  £8,899,272  £9,248,835  £8,023,825
+        Ditto yarn,            3,523,793   2,628,616   2,214,431
+        Linen manufactures,    1,389,520   1,502,770   1,413,819
+        Ditto yarn,              410,277     315,196     236,076
+        Silk manufactures,       421,910     494,806     263,798
+        Woollen yarn,            377,160     444,797     291,985
+        Ditto manufactures,    3,143,550   3,564,754   2,578,470
+                             ——————————— ——————————— ———————————
+                             £18,165,482 £18,199,774 £15,022,404
+
+The result is a loss on these articles alone of THREE MILLIONS in six
+months, and we are to set that against doubled imports, free of duty,
+and displacing British employment! Here are the glorious effects of Sir
+Robert’s commercial legislation!
+
+What, then, _has_ gone out to meet the import which is rapidly promoting
+Chartism among us, by impoverishing the poorer classes? Just what we
+predicted long ago—GOLD; the idol without which men must starve, but
+which free trade periodically sweeps from out our grasp. The lowered
+tariffs have operated peculiarly unfavourably at the present crisis—not
+perhaps so much in the branch of silk manufactures as in others; for it
+is remarkable that the increase of import in 1847, over that of 1846, is
+quite as large as the increase of the present over the former year; and
+had Lord John Russell been alive to the duties of his situation, or
+capable of comprehending the effects which a glut of foreign goods must
+produce on the home market, he ought instantly to have brought in a bill
+augmenting the customs duties, and hurried it through Parliament without
+a moment’s unnecessary delay. The madness of encouraging increased
+imports, whilst exports are falling, is utterly inconceivable to any who
+have not eaten and drunk with Cobden; and it is quite possible that some
+who have been admitted to that precious privilege, may agree with us if
+they will take the trouble to consider the foregoing tables. We are not
+the only sufferers. America is beginning to understand that increased
+imports are by no means decisive symptoms of a healthy commercial state;
+and the following extract from Transatlantic correspondence, which we
+copy from the money article in the _Sun_ newspaper of 16th August last,
+is pregnant with meaning in the present posture of affairs.
+
+
+  “The whole of Europe is in a terrible condition, and our only hope is,
+  that Great Britain may escape the blast which has swept from one end
+  of the Continent to the other with such devastating effect. If England
+  escape, we shall continue to find extensive markets for our products,
+  and our prosperity will be partially preserved. Our markets on the
+  Continent have almost become extinct, so that the worst in that
+  particular has already been realised; but, every week or month,
+  consumption in that section of the world is restricted or limited—so
+  much the more injurious must be the revolution causing such a state of
+  things. With the exception of Great Britain, our European export trade
+  has been literally annihilated; but _unfortunately, our import trade
+  with these countries_ has not met with a similar fate, but on the
+  contrary, has rather increased than otherwise. Importers and
+  speculators in this country have taken advantage of the financial
+  embarrassments growing out of the Revolution, which the manufacturers
+  of France and Europe generally have laboured under, and have purchased
+  of them for cash, goods at one half their cost, and have filled our
+  markets. _A portion of the specie which has been shipped from this
+  port within the last four months went abroad for this purpose_; and
+  while our exports had become reduced to the lowest limit, and exchange
+  drawn upon previous shipments of produce was coming back protested,
+  millions of dollars of gold and silver were going forward to purchase
+  goods which could not be obtained on the usual credit. In this way,
+  our whole foreign trade has become deranged, and we have thus far
+  borne the brunt of the commercial revulsions and political revolutions
+  in Europe.”
+
+
+What is to be said of a system which swamps our home market, whilst at
+the same time it promotes a drain of gold? What is to be said of the
+system which makes a drain of gold almost tantamount to national
+bankruptcy?
+
+Having hitherto dealt with the subjects of the currency and finance, let
+us now glance for a moment at the new legislation for our colonies. We
+need not repeat the tale of the disasters into which the West Indies
+have been plunged, or the ruin which has befallen many of our own most
+respectable citizens, who, to their misfortune, had embarked their
+capital and fortunes in sugar-growing estates, trusting to British faith
+and protection for at least an adequate return. The veriest zealot could
+not have wished to have seen the crime of slavery more bitterly avenged;
+but in what a manner! Great Britain, after having made a sacrifice of
+twenty millions to emancipate the slave population in her own
+colonies,—a sacrifice to her, though not an adequate compensation to the
+planters,—after having declared to the whole world her determination no
+longer to participate in the profits of forced labour,—after having made
+treaties, and equipped armaments for the suppression of the
+slave-trade,—suddenly changed her policy, admitted slave-grown sugar
+from foreign states, first, at a high, and, latterly, at so low a duty,
+that her own colonies, already impoverished, could no longer afford to
+defray the cost of production. Here, again, the principle of free trade
+has been triumphant and ruinous; here, again, the exporting trades have
+carried their point, not only against the interests of the colonists,
+but against those of benevolence and Christianity. The cause of the
+Blacks has been abandoned for the tempting bribe of cheap sugars, of an
+augmented demand for cottons and blankets to supply the gangs of Cuba,
+and of machinery for Brazil, to enable the planter more utterly to
+prostrate Jamaica.
+
+In February last we reviewed with great care all the evidence which we
+could collect regarding the West Indian interest. The conclusion to
+which we arrived was contained in the following paragraph:—“And what is
+it that our colonists ask? What is the extravagant proposal which we are
+prepared to reject at the cost of the loss of our most fertile
+possessions, and of nearly two hundred millions of British capital?
+Simply this, that in the meantime such a distinctive duty should be
+enforced as will allow them to compete on terms of equality with the
+slave-growing states. Let this alone be granted, and they have no wish
+to interfere with any other fiscal regulation. And what would be the
+amount of differential duty required? _Not more, as we apprehend, than
+ten shillings the hundredweight._” Having hazarded this statement so
+early, it was certainly gratifying to find that an impartial committee
+of the House of Commons, reporting four months later, had, after a full
+investigation of the whole case,—and of course with official documents
+before them, the correctness of which could not admit of a
+doubt,—arrived at precisely the same result. The proposition for a
+differential duty of ten shillings, which was finally agreed to by the
+committee, was actually made by a member whose general opinions are
+understood to lean towards the side of free trade,—we mean Sir Thomas B.
+Birch, one of the representatives for Liverpool.
+
+This resolution of course implied a direct condemnation of the Whig Act
+of 1846, which the West Indians bitterly complained of as a flagrant
+breach of faith, and as having put the coping-stone on their
+misfortunes. It was the resolution of an independent and intelligent
+parliamentary committee, founded upon a mass of evidence derived from
+every quarter; and in a matter of this sort, wherein so vast an interest
+as that of our most valuable colonies was concerned, it might have been
+expected that the report would be treated with deference, even though it
+might in some degree impugn the sagacity of a prime minister, by
+exposing the results of his former reckless legislation. Such was not
+the case. Had the seven wise men of Greece sate upon that committee,
+their report would have been utterly indifferent to Lord John, who
+immediately came forward with a counter-scheme, which had not even the
+merit of consistency to give it colour. He proposed a new sliding-scale
+of duties, the result of which will be, that next year the colonists
+will have a protection against the slave-owners of seven shillings in
+the article of clayed, and five-and-sixpence in that of muscovado
+sugar,—the boon to taper away annually, until, in 1854, the protective
+duty will be reduced to three shillings on the one article, and two
+shillings upon the other. This is the doom of the West Indies,—and we
+expect nothing less than an immediate stoppage of the supplies for the
+maintenance of the colonial governments. Robbed as they have been,
+ruined as they are, and all through a course of most reckless and
+unprovoked legislation, it is in vain to hope that any further capital
+will be embarked in the cultivation of these islands. For the benefit of
+economists at home, and the clamourers for cheap sugar, it may be as
+well to record that this new sliding-scale is to be accompanied with a
+_loan_ of £500,000, in addition to £160,000 already guaranteed this
+session, for the purposes of promoting immigration, and that at a period
+when the annual deficit was originally calculated at _three_ millions!
+The amendment of Sir John Pakington, founded upon the resolutions of the
+committee, was negatived in a full house by the small majority of
+fifteen.
+
+This has been by far the most important debate of the session; and at
+one time it was confidently expected that ministers would have been
+defeated. Sir Robert Peel, however, came to their rescue at the last
+stage. Oleaginous and plausible as ever, the wily baronet began his
+speech by deploring the misfortunes of the West Indians, repudiating
+mere pecuniary considerations, and calling to mind old struggles, in
+which these colonies had stood by the side of the mother country. This
+sympathetic introduction boded little mercy for the parties it seemed to
+favour. Sir Robert had acquiesced in the Act of 1846, and it was now
+rather difficult to back out from that position. But soothing measures
+might be adopted, the salaries of governors defrayed by the mother
+country, and _perhaps_, if, after due consideration, it should be found
+expedient to remove the blockading squadron from the coast of Africa,
+part of the sums so saved might be devoted to colonial purposes. Then
+came a discourse upon the merits of irrigation, which would have done
+credit to a lecturer in an agricultural society. Finally, Sir Robert
+rested his future hopes for the Indies upon other, and what appear to us
+peculiarly objectionable considerations. He has no confidence in the
+tranquillity of Cuba and Brazil, and he hints at an insurrection of the
+slaves being probable, if emancipation is not granted. We shall not
+comment more than lightly upon the decency of such a hint. Desirable as
+emancipation may be, it is, to say the least, questionable whether it
+would be cheaply bought by so terrible a catastrophe as a general rising
+of the black barbarian population against the whites; and in the event
+of such a misfortune occurring either in the above slave colonies or in
+the United States, it is extremely problematical whether our own dearly
+bought emancipation would effectually prevent the contagion from
+spreading to the free colonies. But we will tell Sir Robert a fact of
+which he ought to be fully cognisant. The greatest enemies and obstacles
+to emancipation, in the Spanish and South American States, have been
+himself and his free-trading allies. It is well known to many here, and
+notorious in the West Indies, that at the very time when the ill-advised
+Act permitting slave-grown sugar to be introduced into this country was
+produced, negotiations were actually pending in Cuba for the immediate
+emancipation of the slaves. The results of that Act were the instant
+abandonment of such an idea, the withdrawal of the slaves from the
+coffee plantations to the sugar-fields, double work rigorously enforced,
+and an enormously increased importation of human beings from the coast
+of Africa. With such a bonus held out to the Cuban planter, such a huge
+increase of consumption in this country as Lord John Russell gloatingly
+contemplates, it would be utter insanity to expect that emancipation can
+take place through any other means than blood, rapine, plunder, and
+incendiarism. Sir Robert and the free-traders have effectually precluded
+any milder method. Had they been true to the principles professed by
+this country at the time of our own emancipation, there is every human
+reason to believe that by this time Cuba would have been a free colony.
+Had that event taken place, slavery, and of course the slave-trade,
+would have received its death-blow. But now when we have given, and
+continue to give, a direct premium to the abhorred system, when we have
+shown that we love its produce so much, as to hold the welfare of our
+own colonies as nothing in comparison, it is mere Jesuitry to cant about
+the probability of voluntary freedom. This is the worst and most
+indefensible argument, if, indeed, it can be brought within the category
+of arguments, which has yet been advanced from any quarter in support of
+the false legislation and determined opposition of ministers to the just
+claims of the colonists.
+
+In the course of the debate a singular discussion arose, which tends to
+throw some light upon the management of the Colonial Office. A most
+important despatch upon the state of Jamaica had been received from
+Governor Grey, and this was withheld from the select committee then
+sitting, although Mr Hawes, the Under-secretary for the Colonies, was
+directly questioned as to its existence. We do not wish to enter into
+the details of this matter, or to cast any imputation upon the probity
+of Mr Hawes, who, in explanation, was fain to take shelter under the
+plea of a mistake. But the circumstance certainly did look awkward, and
+the doubts, not only of the House but of the country, were far from
+being removed by the extreme acrimony displayed by the Premier, in his
+injudicious defence of his subordinate. Never in our recollection has a
+Prime Minister shown so remarkable a want of temper and of courtesy to a
+political opponent, as was exhibited by Lord John Russell in his reply
+to Lord George Bentinck. We should be glad, for the sake of the utterer,
+that the speech could be erased from the pages of Hansard, even were we
+to lose, at the same time, the brilliant and withering reply which it
+elicited from Mr D’Israeli. A suppression certainly had occurred,
+whether through mistake or otherwise; and the matter was thought so
+serious that Earl Grey volunteered an explanation in the Upper House. He
+had better have let it alone. New charges of suppression were preferred;
+and finally Earl Grey admitted that, on one occasion at least, he had
+quoted passages from a Jamaica memorial in support of his argument,
+totally and purposely omitting to read other sentences, which gave a
+different construction to the meaning intended to be conveyed! This is
+popularly said to be the method adopted by a certain personage, who
+shall be nameless, whenever he has occasion to quote Scripture, and yet
+it is practised and defended by a high official functionary! We copy the
+remarks of our contemporary the _Spectator_, as very apposite on this
+occasion.
+
+
+  “The personal dispute about the conduct of Lord Grey and Mr Hawes, and
+  the strictures of Lord George Bentinck, which began on Friday last,
+  have usurped a large share of the week’s debates; not altogether to so
+  little purpose as most personal squabbles, since it throws
+  considerable light on the administration of colonial affairs. The
+  general impression, when all sides have had their say, is, that Mr
+  Hawes and Lord Grey did not intend to cheat Lord George Bentinck’s
+  committee by the deliberate suppression of evidence; but the very
+  statements made by ministers, in defence, unveil reprehensible
+  practices. It seems that the routine of the Colonial Office is such as
+  to preclude any security against ‘mistakes’ so grave as the
+  withholding of most important despatches. And Lord Grey claims, as an
+  admitted official privilege, to pick out bits of evidence in his
+  exclusive possession, that make for a particular view, although those
+  bits may be torn from a context that should perfectly refute that
+  particular view! In effect, he upholds the doctrine that a government
+  is not bound to lay before parliament all the information that reaches
+  the departments, even though that information be not of a secret kind,
+  but may select such parts as go to bolster up the preconceived
+  crotchets of the minister for the time being. In this case, Lord Grey
+  had preconceived crotchets hostile to the West Indian colonies, whom
+  he treated as if he were the Attorney-General prosecuting a state
+  criminal. He has carried beyond its usual bounds the spirit of the
+  _Anti_-Colonial Office, in Downing Street. With this spirit of
+  animosity the Secretary for the Colonies coupled the most singular
+  exhibition of personal trifling, and self-worship. He appealed to the
+  name of his father, as a reason for not accusing himself! and pointed
+  to the ‘awful warning across the Channel,’ as a reason for not
+  preferring charges calculated to weaken English statesmen. ‘Don’t talk
+  of inefficiency or dishonesty,’ cries he—‘it is dangerous; for such
+  talk has upset governments abroad.’ Yes, shaky and dishonest
+  governments; but what is Lord Grey afraid of?”
+
+
+As for the sugar duties, we do not by any means believe that this is a
+final settlement of the question. If free trade, indeed, should continue
+to progress, there is not much hope for the colonists; but, to the
+observant eye, there are unmistakeable symptoms of reaction apparent in
+this country, and a very general sympathy for the case of the West
+Indians. Our greatest fear is, that irretrievable mischief will be
+wrought before there is an opportunity of applying a remedy. It seems
+cruel mockery, after all that has happened, to exhort the planters to
+persevere, and to prevent those valuable islands from lapsing into a
+state of wilderness: and yet there seems no alternative between such
+perseverance and abandonment. This only we can say, that should the
+commercial principles, which we have advocated throughout, be again
+recognised and adopted—should true and not hollow Conservatism once more
+triumph over Whig effrontery and weakness, this mighty grievance will
+assuredly be the earliest redressed.
+
+Referring again to the speech from the throne as the text for the
+parliamentary campaign, we find the Navigation Laws specially marked out
+either for modification or repeal. This subject having been fully dealt
+with in our July Number, we offer no further remarks upon the policy
+which dictated such a plan; indeed, no remarks are necessary, for since
+then the measure has been postponed. This is a sorry result for
+ministers; for although they plead, in justification, that other
+important business had prevented them from forcing on the consideration
+of this very serious question, their protestations do not seem to
+satisfy the gentlemen who are most clamorous against the shipping
+interest of Britain. It has been more than hinted in certain quarters,
+that this postponement is a small stroke of Whig policy or prudence, for
+the purpose of keeping alive as long as possible a theme of dissension
+among the Conservatives. We offer no opinion as to this conjecture,
+which may be substantially true or not. Certain it is that the proposal
+for the repeal of those laws has been encountered, outside of the House
+of Commons, with a storm of disapprobation; and that, if the feeling of
+the public, as opposed to the interests of the exporters, has any weight
+with the legislature, the ministerial bill will be strangled before it
+can receive the royal assent. So great was the anxiety displayed, that
+on the day after it became known in Glasgow that the bill was not to be
+pushed forward this session, every vessel in the Clyde was decorated
+with flags, in token of thankfulness for the respite. We hope that every
+advantage will be taken in the interval to force upon the attention of
+parliament the resolution of the well-affected people of this country,
+to maintain intact that law which has been the source of our naval
+supremacy, and which was declared, by no less an authority than Adam
+Smith, to be as wise as if it had been dictated by the most deliberate
+wisdom.
+
+A considerable number of minor bills have been quietly allowed to drop.
+This is not matter of lamentation, for, as far as we could comprehend
+the principle of most of them, they were utterly worthless and uncalled
+for. The Bill for the Removal of the Jewish Disabilities was, we rejoice
+to say, thrown out in the House of Lords, the peers being of opinion
+that the British Legislature should continue a Christian assembly. Lord
+John, in the plenitude of his zeal for the Sanhedrim, gave notice of a
+motion for altering the form of the oaths required to be taken by each
+member of Parliament at his admission, and so introducing the Jew by a
+convenient little postern. But somehow or other, as the session
+progressed, the ardour of the Premier cooled, and Baron Rothschild is at
+present left with as little chance of adorning the benches of St
+Stephens as ever. Mr Joseph Hume and his party have got up a radical
+alliance, for the extension of the suffrage and various other organic
+schemes, and it was understood that Sir Joshua Walmsley was to have the
+honour of leading the movement. Unfortunately, however, before the day
+of debate had arrived, Sir Joshua had been unseated in consequence of
+certain acts of bribery which had taken place in connexion with the
+borough of Leicester, so that the purists had to march to battle under
+the chieftainship of the veteran of Montrose. They were beaten hollow:
+but at a later period of the session, the carelessness of ministers gave
+a temporary triumph to the same parties, resolutions in favour of the
+ballot having been passed by a small majority. This vote is of no
+importance whatever, save in so far as it demonstrates the utter
+helplessness of the Whigs when left to their own resources.
+
+Whilst upon the subject of shelving, let us remark that the Scottish
+Registration and Marriage Bills have shared a similar fate. Of this we
+are devoutly glad. Not a single petition has been presented in their
+favour; and though no doubt the registration of births, and a stricter
+law of marriage, may be desirable, we think it might be quite possible
+to accomplish both objects, without creating a new and expensive staff
+of functionaries, or holding forth a prospect of entire immunity to
+seduction. Possibly at a later period we may take an opportunity of
+examining these postponed measures in detail.
+
+Two more questions remain, and then the history of the session is ended.
+They are of vast importance—Ireland, and our foreign policy.
+
+The opening of the session found Ireland in a state of agrarian outrage.
+Agitation was doing its work, and murder was rife on every hand.
+Foremost in stirring up the people, most determined in hounding them on,
+were the Roman Catholic priesthood; and we trust that this fact will not
+be forgotten by those who are now meditating to buy their silence.
+Individuals were openly denounced from the altar, and next day shot down
+by the assassin. The most seditious language was used by these cassocked
+traitors towards the British government; and even the higher dignitaries
+of their church sought to stimulate the passions of the populace by the
+most barefaced and impudent misrepresentation. Hear Archdeacon Laffan at
+Cashel, upon a Sunday, surrounded by some fifteen thousand of the
+peasantry, and backed by that notable worthy, Mr John O’Connell, and
+three other members of Parliament—“The Saxon scoundrel, with his
+bellyful of Irish meat, could very well afford to call his poor, honest,
+starving fellow-countrymen savages and assassins; but if in the
+victualling department John Bull suffered one-fifth of the privations to
+which the Tipperary men were subject, if he had courage enough, he would
+stand upon one side, _and shoot the first man he could meet with a
+decent coat on his back_—(Cheers.) But the Saxon had not courage to do
+any thing like a man; he growls out like a hungry tiger!” At the time
+when this expositor of the Christian doctrine was raving to his
+miserable flock, the following was the condition of the Established
+clergy. One of them, writing from King’s County, described his
+position—“For nearly twenty years I have been a minister of the
+Established Church; and during that time I have had nothing whatever to
+do with tithes, for my benefice is a chapelry of £90 a-year, and is paid
+partly out of land set apart for the purpose, and partly by the
+ecclesiastical commissioners of Ireland, from a fund bequeathed to small
+livings by Primate Boulter.” He had devoted much attention to the
+employment of the poor; had never shown favour or partiality to any one
+sect; had lived simply, and attended to his duties; had never brought an
+ejectment, or taken any other law proceedings, against a tenant. “What,
+then,” continued he, “was my surprise and horror to find an assassin
+lying in wait for me for three successive days; and—for this is still
+more horrifying—that most of the people of the neighbourhood where I
+live have been so far from expressing joy at the escape I have made,
+that they show evident disappointment at my not being shot!”
+
+We have often marvelled what must be the impression of foreigners after
+reading such speeches as are usually delivered at an Irish assembly, by
+men who cannot plead utter ignorance in extenuation of the language they
+employ. They must, we presume, imagine that “the Saxon” has taken
+forcible possession of the whole of Ireland; that the natives are no
+better than serfs—unprotected by any laws, and liable to be beaten,
+plundered, and massacred at the pleasure of the invaders; that, on the
+approach of each harvest, hordes of the Saxons repair to the fertile
+fields of the Celt, reap them with a sickle in the one hand and a musket
+in the other, and then carry off the produce, without leaving a single
+doit in reparation. He would imagine that the women are forced, the men
+defrauded, and the houses pillaged at pleasure; that the Roman Catholics
+are hunted down like wild beasts, by armies of bloodthirsty Protestants;
+that the exercise of their faith is denied them; and that they are
+allowed no voice whatever in the national representation. Some such
+conception as this he must form from the harangues which have
+constituted the staple of Conciliation Hall for more years than we care
+to reckon. But what would be his amazement were he told that Ireland is
+governed by precisely the same laws as the sister country; that property
+is equally protected, and life endangered only by the brutality of the
+Celtic assassin; that Ireland is specially exempted from several of the
+taxes which press most heavily upon the industrious classes of Great
+Britain; that on the last occasion of famine, upwards of nine millions
+of public, and a vast amount of private money, was given for the support
+of her poor; that Roman Catholic colleges have been munificently
+endowed; that Ireland has her full share of representation in the
+imperial Parliament, and that upwards of one half of the time of the
+House of Commons is occupied with measures tending to the amelioration
+of the Irish people! If he were told all this—and it is no more than the
+naked truth—what would be his astonishment? And yet so it is. Ireland
+has persisted, and is persisting, in her course of sedition without a
+grievance, of murder without provocation, of black and brutal
+ingratitude without even the shadow of an excuse!
+
+It is impossible to find language too strong to characterise the guilt
+of the individuals, lay or clerical, who have spent the better part of
+their mean and mischievous existence in misleading their rude and
+ignorant fellow-countrymen. They are the moral nuisances who have always
+stood in the way of Ireland’s progression and happiness. But for them,
+there would have been no absenteeism, no heart-burning between the
+landlord and the tenant. The people would gradually have learned habits
+of industry and providence, and instead of whooping through the country
+like maniacs, shouting and yelling for repeal, which if granted, would
+make an utter hell of Ireland, they would be tilling the ground, or
+usefully employed in the development of that capital which no one dare
+hazard at present in their mad and turbulent districts. For all these
+things we do not blame, but execrate O’Connell and his tribe. The
+grasping selfishness of that family has for the last few years been the
+greatest curse to Ireland; and the crimes of other and inferior
+agitators shrink into insignificance, compared with the moral turpitude
+of the men who have deliberately fattened upon their country’s ruin.
+
+Mr John O’Connell, having previously declared his intention of dying on
+the floor of the House of Commons rather than permit the passing of a
+Coercion Bill to restrain his countrymen from murder, did in effect make
+his appearance in St Stephens, but by no means with a suicidal
+intention. One of his earliest speeches is worth preserving, as it
+exhibits, in a most extraordinary degree, the hereditary power of
+mendicancy. “If they had a reverence for human life, let them extend it
+to the people of Ireland. Give money. He asked for money. He heard the
+laughter of honourable gentlemen; but he could tell them that they ought
+to give money, and that it was their duty to do so. Charge them for the
+money if they liked, but at all events let them save the lives of the
+people. He did not expect to be met otherwise than with laughter; and he
+was bound to say that he never saw in that House one single real thought
+for the interest of Ireland. (_Great laughter._) He begged to say, that
+he had made that remark hastily and hotly, but now he repeated it
+deliberately and coolly. Whenever the interests of Ireland came into
+competition with those of England, they were invariably sacrificed. And
+if he did ask money, had he not a right to do so? In a few nights a
+motion would come on, and then he would prove that they owed it!” No man
+certainly ever did more credit to his profession. Brought up under the
+most able instructor of his age in the art of begging, John O’Connell
+exhibited on this occasion talents of the highest order, which would
+have made his fortune on the highway, unless some stray traveller should
+have mistaken the intentions of the suppliant, and been over ready with
+his pistol to prevent an anticipated robbery. The vile ingratitude of
+this man is almost equal to his audacity. Great Britain, without the
+slightest hope of any return, had impoverished herself for the support
+of the Irish, and yet here was the whole acknowledgment! Even on the
+score of policy it would have been wiser for Mr O’Connell to have
+mitigated his tone.
+
+The Irish Crime and Outrage Bill was introduced by ministers at an early
+stage of the session, with the general concurrence of all parties. No
+one could doubt that it was especially needed, but few were sanguine
+that it would suffice to cure the spirit of disaffection which was
+abroad. In fact, Irish agitation has been allowed to proceed to such a
+point, that the evil is utterly incurable. What chance is there of
+putting a stop to physical force demonstrations, or, in other words, to
+open rebellion, whilst another gang of demagogues is permitted to preach
+sedition under the guise of moral force, and to fill the minds of their
+deluded victims with every species of misrepresentation and wild
+hostility to Great Britain? Our system of government towards Ireland has
+been timid and weak, and we are now paying the penalty. Our charities
+have been given with far too liberal a hand. Ireland has but had to ask,
+in order to be relieved by the public money: and this process has been
+so often repeated, that what at first was an extraordinary boon, is now
+considered in the light of an indefeasible claim. The Irish peasant will
+not work, will do nothing to better his own position, because he
+believes that, in his hour of need, he will be supported by British
+alms. We wish we could believe that this scandalous and sordid spirit
+was confined to the peasantry alone. It is not so. A general scramble
+takes place on each fresh issue of bounty, and rich and poor, high and
+low, among the repealers, press clamorously forward for their share.
+Never was money more absurdly, more mischievously misapplied, than the
+great government grants on occasion of the famine. Had the proposals of
+Lord George Bentinck been agreed to, and the money given by way of loan
+for construction of the Irish railroads, not only would the government
+have held some security for repayment, or, at all events, a vested
+interest in the works, but a useful improvement would have been effected
+in the heart of the country, and a new element of civilisation
+introduced. But the scheme was rejected, for no other reason, we
+believe, than because it was suggested by a political opponent, and the
+millions granted by Britain have been squandered in making good roads
+bad, in trenching mosses, draining waste lands, and what not. The
+expenditure has been lost to this country, and has not had the effect of
+awakening the slightest spark of gratitude or respect for the quarter
+whence it came. Ireland must be disabused on one point. These grants are
+not annual, and cannot be continued. The time has come when Ireland must
+be put upon precisely the same footing of taxation with the sister
+kingdoms—she must be forced to forego pauperism, and in future to rely
+on her industry, and on her own resources. Ireland is at least four
+times as fertile in soil as Scotland, and there can be no reason
+whatever why she should be exempt from burdens which apply to the
+latter, and moreover, like a sturdy beggar, be for ever vociferous for
+relief.
+
+The Crime and Outrage Bill in some degree fulfilled its purpose; for
+open murder and assassination, if not extinguished, were somewhat
+diminished throughout the winter. Still the work of sedition progressed.
+Old and Young Ireland, ruffians both, were at loggerheads—the older
+section finding a profit in the shape of the weekly rent, the younger
+and more conscientious one thirsting for the hour when the dogs of
+rebellion might be let loose. The French revolution found Ireland in
+this state, and no doubt aided to precipitate the crisis. The visions of
+mere repeal gradually faded before the more brilliant and daring
+aspiration of an Irish republic! France would probably sympathise with
+Erin; and a deputation was sent over to wait upon Lamartine, then in the
+zenith of his popularity, for the double purpose of ascertaining the
+chances of assistance, and of taking a flying lesson in the art of
+constructing barricades. But the members of the French Provisional
+Government showed no alacrity in recognising the Irish patriots, and
+distinctly refused to interfere. Then it became apparent, that if the
+Irish party were determined to rebel, they must do so without foreign
+aid and intervention; and on their own ground, and with their own
+weapons, be prepared to cope with the Saxon.
+
+It is but fair, in justice to the unfortunate men who, since that time,
+have suffered for their almost incredible folly, to state that others,
+too crafty or pusillanimous to approach within grasp of the law, were at
+least equally guilty in promoting agitation after revolution had been
+triumphant in France. John O’Connell thus wrote from Paris a few days
+after Louis Philippe had been driven from his throne:—“Speak out, people
+of Ireland! Speak from every city—every valley—every hill—every plain!
+THE TIME IS COME! The hour has arrived when it is our instant right!
+when it is England’s directest and most imperative interest that we
+should manage our own affairs in our own Parliament at home!” It matters
+not, in a moral point of view, though it might be convenient for
+sheltering purposes, that this note of sedition was accompanied with
+advice to abstain from crime and bloodshed. Such advice goes for nothing
+with the million, as O’Connell well knows; and, furthermore, he knows
+this, that of all the phantoms ever conjured up by designing rogues and
+mountebanks, this one of Irish repeal is the most unlikely of
+realisation. What, then, did the man mean by these words, “_The time is
+come!_” save to stir up the people to some demonstration, the issue of
+which must have been massacre and bloodshed?
+
+We need hardly allude to the effect of those appeals upon the more
+hot-headed and determined of the confederates. They no longer preserved
+even the semblance of loyalty, but, with a daring wholly unexampled,
+gloried in the name of traitors. At public meetings they recommended the
+immediate arming of the people—descanted, in terms of gloating fondness,
+upon that “queen of weapons” the pike—and the only point of hesitation
+was the precise period of the rising—whether it ought to take place
+immediately, or be postponed “until French steamers were letting off
+their steam in Falmouth and Portsmouth.” John Mitchell, in the _United
+Irishman_, and his coadjutors in the _Nation_, seconded these views in a
+series of the most inflammatory and villanous articles. They propounded
+deliberate plans for barricading the streets of Dublin; displayed the
+most hellish ingenuity in devising implements to be used against the
+troops; attempted to persuade their dupes, that, in the event of a
+rising, the army would be found on their side; and, in short, set every
+law, human and divine, at defiance. At this crisis, ministers failed to
+act with that decision which was clearly their duty. They should at once
+have suspended the _Habeas Corpus_ Act, and arrested the whole of the
+leading agitators. Such a course would have struck terror into the
+insurgents, before, emboldened by impunity, and relying upon the want of
+unanimity almost sure to prevail among Irish juries, they had dragged
+other misled individuals into a participation of their guilt.
+
+March, and a portion of April, passed away before ministers took courage
+to introduce the Crown and Government Security Bill, under which
+Mitchell was ultimately convicted. In the discussions which took place,
+Lord John Russell was evidently sorely hampered by the opinions which he
+had expressed when in opposition, and the manifest discrepancy of his
+measures with the principles of the Whiggish creed. He showed a
+disposition to truckle, when he came to that portion of the bill which
+declared that open and advised speaking, of treasonable nature, should
+henceforward be treated as felony, and took it merely as a temporary
+provision. A bolder front, at such a time, would better have become a
+British statesman.
+
+Smith O’Brien and Meagher, two of the most daring leaders of the
+faction, were tried at Dublin in the month of May, and escaped, the jury
+being in neither case unanimous. These trials may be memorable in the
+history of the jurisprudence of Ireland, for they distinctly prove that
+the present system of trial is utterly unsuited for that country.
+Nothing could be clearer than the evidence against both parties. O’Brien
+had recommended the formation of an Irish brigade in the United States.
+Meagher’s recommendation was “up with the barricades, and invoke the god
+of battles.” Yet in the face of this, the jury could not agree upon
+their verdict. Mitchell was the first person convicted under the new
+Act. On the 27th of May, he was found guilty, and sentenced to fourteen
+years’ transportation.
+
+No effort whatever was made, on the part of the populace, to rescue this
+misguided man. He had proclaimed himself a felon, and he was sent forth
+to undergo the punishment of his crime. But this example, stringent as
+it was, had no effect whatever in repressing the spirit of treason. The
+arming went on rapidly as before, or rather in an augmented ratio.
+Cargoes of muskets, and other fire-arms, were openly shipped for Dublin,
+and exposed for sale; their destination and use were openly admitted,
+and yet ministers did not seem to consider it their duty to interfere!
+The newspaper war continued. Fresh journals sprang up to replace the
+_United Irishman_, and the favourite doctrines of Mitchell were enforced
+with a ferocity and earnestness almost equal to his own. Clubs, after
+the fashion of those in Paris, were organised throughout the country:
+drilling began, and at length rebellion assumed a tangible shape, the
+confederate forces having been reviewed by Smith O’Brien at Cork. On the
+21st of July, Dublin was proclaimed by the Lord Lieutenant; and
+immediately thereafter, and not a moment too soon, ministry were
+compelled to suspend the _Habeas Corpus_ Act in Ireland.
+
+As we are not writing a history of this most abortive rebellion, we need
+not follow its leaders throughout their ignominious, and even cowardly
+career. That a bubble, deemed so gigantic, should have burst with so
+miraculously small an explosion, may hereafter be a source of wonder to
+the chronicler; at present our only feeling should be gratitude to the
+Almighty that this affair has as yet been accompanied with so little
+loss of human life. So far, it is well; but it would be absolute madness
+to suppose that the spirit of rebellion has been extinguished. The Irish
+people have been guilty of a great crime. A large portion of them are,
+without any doubt, rebels in their hearts; and they must submit to be
+treated as such, until we are satisfied that their stubborn disposition
+is removed. Great credit, it seems, is now given in certain quarters to
+the Roman Catholic clergy, for the part they took in suppressing the
+late disturbances; and we anticipate an immediate burst of laudation,
+and perhaps a promise of reward, in return for their disinterested
+exertions. If to foster rebellion in every possible manner, whilst there
+is the least chance of its success, and to preach it down from the very
+moment when the cause appears obviously desperate, be an acceptable
+course, we freely admit the claims of the priesthood to the heartfelt
+gratitude of Britain: upon no other ground whatever can we see a reason
+for their recognition. Let any man consider seriously and impartially
+the history and proceedings in Ireland for the last six months, and he
+cannot fail, we think, to arrive at the conclusion, that clerical
+connivance is visible in every scene of the drama. Smith O’Brien and
+Mitchell, being both of them Protestants, may have raised the banner too
+early, and may have been sacrificed with little scruple; but we repeat,
+that we have no faith in that interference which comes so very late, and
+which, without any hyperbole, may be said to have been forced at the
+point of the bayonet.
+
+As regards ministers, we think their later measures have been taken with
+a fair regard for the interests of the imperial crown. Much they might
+have done earlier; but, on the whole, we are not inclined to quarrel
+with their conduct. Lord John Russell, in the course of late events, has
+received a more wholesome lesson in the practical science of legislation
+than was ever vouchsafed him before. His Lordship’s eyes are now, we
+hope, opened to the fallacy of some of the cherished Whig propositions.
+He has learned that there are times when a government must have recourse
+to extraordinary measures, if it is sincere in its wish to maintain the
+integrity of the crown and the constitution: and that although the
+liberty of the subject, and the freedom of the press, are undoubtedly
+most excellent things, and capital toasts at Whig propaganda banquets,
+neither of them can be allowed to go so far as to achieve a violent
+revolution. If some slight tinge should be apparent on the cheek of the
+Premier as he reviews his past career, and reflects on the inconsistency
+of his former speeches with his present more energetic conduct, we are
+willing to attribute the blush to the most amiable, and certainly the
+most honourable of possible motives—the acknowledgment of a cherished
+error.
+
+But while we accord with satisfaction this meed of praise to ministers,
+it is impossible to forget that the Whig party, by playing into the
+hands of O’Connell and his followers, have given a pernicious incentive
+to the agitation which has ended in the late revolt. There has been far
+too much coquetting and trafficking with the repealers,—far too little
+consideration shown for the really loyal and peaceable portion of the
+Irish people. Is it possible to expect that any credence will be given
+to the idea that the Whigs are sincere and determined in their
+opposition to the repeal doctrines, when a high official functionary
+like Sir William Somerville, Chief Secretary of State for Ireland, is
+found subscribing to the fund raised for defending the return of Mr
+Reynolds, the member for Dublin? Is it, we say, decent that a man in the
+position of the honourable baronet should be allowed to identify not
+only himself, but the government to which he belongs, with a party so
+diametrically opposed to the best interests of the British empire? If
+the Whigs are determined to put down agitation in Ireland—and put down
+it must be, at whatever cost—let them show their sincerity by dropping
+all connexion with the agitators. These are not times for
+truckling—least of all for party purposes and pretension.
+
+If there is an immediate return to the old system of conciliation—if
+that unhappy country is to be left under the impression that Britain is
+bound to support her, we may look for another projected rebellion at no
+very distant period. Ireland must be taught to depend thoroughly upon
+herself. The wages of idleness must no longer be given her under any
+circumstances whatever. We are satisfied that the social misery of
+Ireland proceeds mainly from the injudicious system of eleemosynary
+support, to which she has been so long accustomed; for nowhere else in
+the known world is there a land so rich in resources, with a population
+so utterly improvident. An end also must be put, by the strong arm of
+power, to agitation of every kind. Jury trial requires remodelment; and
+we hope that the very first Irish measure which is introduced, will be
+one for assimilating the system of jury trial in criminal cases there
+with that which has worked so well and satisfactorily in Scotland. Let
+fifteen men be impanelled, and let the opinion of the majority be the
+verdict. This would effectually prevent those allegations about packing,
+which do certainly detract from the moral weight of such convictions as
+that of Mitchell: it would strengthen the hands of justice, and be
+especially useful as a further preventive of crime. The weal or the
+continued misery of Ireland will depend very much upon the character and
+complexion of the measures which may be introduced during the next
+session of Parliament.
+
+The progress of the revolutions abroad has been any thing but peaceful.
+On the Continent, the treaty of Vienna has become a dead letter—a mere
+antiquated sheet of parchment, hardly to be appealed to by any of the
+conflicting powers. War has broken out in more than one point; and
+though, during the last month, there has been some prospect of
+compromise, it is in vain to hope that Europe will immediately subside
+into its former tranquillity. Hitherto, whatever may be said regarding
+the internal economy of France, that country has manifested no
+aggressive spirit. Paris, the centre-point of the volcanic eruption, has
+kept, and may keep for some time, the soldiery in full employment; and
+we are sincerely of opinion that General Cavaignac, now at the head of
+affairs in France, has no personal disposition to undertake a war of
+conquest. But the position of Germany is very peculiar, and her affairs
+so complicated, that we may justly feel alarm as to the issue.
+
+We shall say little of the experiment, so rashly undertaken by a number
+of untried constitution craftsmen, for welding together into one
+indissoluble mass the political existence of the different Teutonic
+tribes. It is a project which, at first sight, may appear sufficiently
+imposing; but when we examine it more closely, it seems fraught with
+insuperable difficulties. To constitute a Regent for all Germany, in
+whose hands is to be lodged the sovereign administration of affairs, is
+in fact to dethrone and mediatise the whole of the reigning potentates.
+It may be freely conceded that a number of the smaller states might be
+absorbed, and their names removed from the map of Europe, without
+causing any disturbance of the balance of power; but, with regard to the
+larger ones, the case is very different. Will Austria, Prussia, Bavaria,
+and Saxony, submit to surrender their independence? Will the kings allow
+themselves to be stripped of their authority—of the power to make laws,
+to proclaim war and peace, and to levy and command their own armies? We
+do not believe it. Austria may not object at this peculiar juncture,
+both because she is deeply engaged in war for the recovery of Lombardy,
+and because the present Regent is a prince of her imperial family.
+Prussia can hardly be the first to dissent, because her monarch had the
+credit of originating the idea of German unity, under the illusion that
+he would be nominated as the head. But unity is not popular in Prussia,
+any more than it is in Bavaria, and the moment is fast approaching when
+this bubble also must explode. We might look upon the whole experiment
+with feelings of pure curiosity, were it not that incipient unity has
+been signalised by an act of the most flagrant aggression. We allude to
+the occupation of Schleswig-Holstein by the Germans.
+
+Denmark is one of those small states in which the nationality is of the
+most invincible kind. Circumscribed in territorial space, the Danish
+people are possessed of a courage and energy which for centuries has
+continued undiminished; and the more powerful northern states are bound,
+if not by treaty, at least by the strongest ties of policy and
+relationship, to assist their gallant neighbours in maintaining their
+original position. Russia and Sweden have already declared themselves
+open allies of Denmark, and resolute to maintain her against the forces
+of Germany. The disposition of England, and, we are glad to say, of
+France also, tends towards the same point; and such being the case, we
+have great hopes that the Germans will not be mad enough to persevere in
+their unjustifiable course. A war in the north of Europe, in which so
+many great nations would be engaged, must be a hideous calamity; and
+Germany, if wise, should be the last country to provoke it. But, as if
+to complicate matters, the parliament at Frankfort have manifested an
+intention of embroiling themselves with Holland for one of the ceded
+duchies.
+
+It is no purpose of ours to speculate upon events, and therefore we
+leave the Danish question without further comment. It will be extremely
+gratifying if, after all the demonstration which has been made, and the
+actual collision between the Danes and the Germans, peace can be
+re-established without having recourse to the armed interference of a
+northern confederation; and it would be still more gratifying if this
+desirable result should be the effect of British mediation. But, looking
+to the south of Europe, we cannot approve of the policy which Great
+Britain has since pursued, or the attitude which Lord Palmerston has
+chosen to assume towards a friendly foreign power.
+
+Our readers will not have forgotten the surprise and suspicion which was
+excited, about a year ago, by the absence of a cabinet minister, who was
+understood to be perambulating Italy with a sort of roving commission.
+The intention may have been friendly, but the fact was both unusual and
+degrading, and gave rise at the time to a multitude of unpleasant
+suspicions. Whether Lord Minto travelled in the capacity of
+constitution-maker for Italy we know not; but if so, as has more than
+once been broadly alleged, his attempts have been utter failures. We
+hope it was not by his advice that Charles Albert has done his best to
+light up the flames of general war by that ungenerous attack upon
+Austria, which has ended so disastrously for himself. Baffled on every
+hand—after having sacrificed his army, and squandered his treasure—the
+King of Sardinia has been driven back into his own country, amidst the
+execrations of those whom he professedly came to emancipate, and without
+a hope left of gaining the diadem for which he had perilled so much. The
+papal constitution at Rome has by no means fulfilled the hopes of the
+liberal advocates. Pius, lately so popular, is trembling in the Vatican,
+and the inhabitants of the Eternal City are in as much terror as if
+Attila were again at its gates. We repeat that we do not know how much
+share British councils may have had in promoting these untoward events;
+but this we know, that it would have been far better if Lord Minto had
+remained at home. For, in the matter of Naples at least, we have chosen
+to take a direct part, which throws suspicion upon the tendency of our
+whole negotiations with the Peninsula.
+
+Sicily has chosen to cast off its allegiance to the crown of Naples, and
+to elect a sovereign of its own. This is strictly a domestic contest,
+and one in which we had no title whatever to interfere. But mark what
+has taken place. No sooner was Naples—a country which has also felt the
+revolutionary shock—quieted by the granting of a constitution, than King
+Ferdinand, desirous of quelling rebellion in Sicily, is intimidated from
+sending his squadron for that purpose, by the appearance of a British
+fleet off his own territory. Against this unjustifiable demonstration
+the King of Naples has protested, declaring that he will hold any armed
+interference between himself and his subjects as tantamount to a
+declaration of war on the part of the British government. Lord
+Stanley—whose conduct throughout the session, on all questions connected
+with foreign or colonial affairs, has been pre-eminently distinguished
+for temperance, rectitude, and ability, and who has exhibited, in a
+remarkable degree, every qualification requisite for the leader of a
+great and national party—brought the whole subject before the
+consideration of the House of Lords: but the explanations given by Lord
+Lansdowne are not calculated to improve our character for good faith,
+whilst they may afford a ready apology to other states for any act of
+aggression whatever. Also, at a later period of the session, Mr
+D’Israeli, in one of those brilliant speeches for which he is
+unrivalled, again demanded explanation from the Foreign Secretary, and
+took occasion to comment, with sarcastic felicity, on the Minto
+pilgrimage to Rome. We shall presently allude to the reply which Lord
+Palmerston thought proper to make.
+
+The facts of the case, as admitted by Lord Lansdowne, are shortly
+these:—Britain was never asked to mediate formally between the
+conflicting parties. The Sicilians stood in the position of rebels,
+victorious perhaps on their own soil, but not, on that account, released
+from an allegiance which had been formally recognised by Europe. They
+proceeded, as all insurgents do, to debate upon some form of government;
+and at this point, it seems, the Foreign Office thought fit to use its
+influence. Lord Palmerston became a party to the discussions of the
+revolted Sicilians, to the extent at least of advising them to select a
+monarchical instead of a republican form of government; with an
+assurance that, in that event, Britain would recognise the prince who
+might be elected by the people.
+
+This is neither more nor less than a recognition of the right of revolt;
+and we should like to know upon what principle of the law of nations it
+can be defended. It is one thing to acknowledge the right of a nation to
+change the character of its institutions,—as for example, in the case of
+France, which from a monarchy has become a republic. Were we to undergo
+the same organic change, France, doubtless, would recognise us, and
+continue the same relations with us under the altered form of
+government. But what if France had chosen to espouse the cause of the
+Irish confederates? What if—supposing our troops had been defeated by a
+general rising, and Smith O’Brien had been proclaimed not only King of
+Munster, but of Ireland—General Cavaignac should have assured the
+rebels, that he would recognise the descendant of Brian Boru as the
+prince elected by the people? Would not that negotiation, that
+assurance, be treated by England as an open declaration of hostility,—an
+interference which no circumstances could palliate, and for which no
+explanation could suffice? We apprehend there can be no difficulty in
+answering the question, and yet our position with regard to Naples was
+precisely similar.
+
+No official recognition of the independence of Sicily has as yet taken
+place. Her Britannic Majesty has accredited no ambassador to that court,
+nor does she know any thing more of the King of Sicily than her royal
+predecessor did of Theodore King of Corsica. In all Sicilian matters, as
+yet, this country nominally recognises the supremacy of King Ferdinand,
+who has in no way incurred a forfeiture. Yet at the very moment when
+that potentate has completed his preparations for coercing his rebel
+subjects, a British fleet appears off his shores, and no explanation has
+been vouchsafed of the reasons which have brought it there.
+
+In answer to Lord Malmesbury, who reiterated the question originally put
+by Lord Stanley, “Is the fleet of Admiral Parker to interfere with any
+expedition which his Neapolitan Majesty may send against his subjects in
+Sicily?” Lord Lansdowne distinctly refused explanation. So did Lord
+Palmerston in answer to Mr D’Israeli; and he further added, “that it is
+not the practice of the government of this country to announce to
+parliament what the intentions of the government are.” All that we shall
+say upon that point is, that, even during the present session of
+parliament, ministers have more than once been particularly eager to
+parade their intentions, without even the formality of a question. Such
+answers are very apt to make distrustful people recollect that Naples is
+but a small state, and not so formidable as some others which have led
+the van of revolution. But even supposing that the Whig government are
+not prepared to go the length of violating treaties, and breaking
+alliances by a direct and forcible interference, this concealment is
+peculiarly unwise at a moment when neutrality is of the last importance.
+Apart from this question of Sicilian interference, no one wants to know
+why Admiral Parker’s fleet is there. It is not alone Lord Stanley or Mr
+D’Israeli whose curiosity requires to be gratified. The King of Naples
+believes this armament is sent with intentions hostile to him, and he
+has a right to know whether Britain proposes to throw an impediment
+betwixt him and his revolted dominions. Are ministers aware of the
+effect which such ambiguous answers may have upon the future policy of
+France? General Oudinot, we know, is at the head of a large army on the
+southern frontier of France, and Charles Albert has notoriously
+solicited assistance from that quarter. What if the French, drawing
+their own deduction from the fact of the fleet being there, and all
+explanation refused, should choose to assume that we have exceeded the
+bounds of neutrality, and are now coercing the King of Naples?—what if
+they should march an army to the support of the Piedmontese, again make
+Lombardy a field of battle, and throw all Europe into irretrievable
+confusion, by engaging in hostilities with Austria? Is that contingency
+so remote that we can afford to indulge in mysteries, and peril the fair
+fame of England’s open dealing for a paltry Palmerston intrigue?
+
+If we contemplate seriously the whole course of our foreign policy, in
+so far as regards Italy, we cannot fail to be impressed with the idea
+that the Whigs have given undue countenance to the late insurrectionary
+movements. Great Britain might have come forward honourably at the
+commencement of the Lombardy campaign to stop the effusion of blood and
+the horrors of war, by the offer of a timely mediation; but no such step
+was taken. On the contrary, our Cabinet remained quiescent and looked on
+approvingly, so long as success appeared to favour the Sardinian arms:
+it is only after the invader has been beaten back, and driven within the
+frontiers of his own kingdom—after Austria has redeemed by force all her
+Lombard territory, that Lord Palmerston, and his new ally Cavaignac,
+have thought fit to tender their good offices. We may safely ask—what
+good purpose can be achieved by this very late intervention? Who are the
+parties whose quarrel is to be taken up? Mr D’Israeli put the matter
+well when he asked,—First, what was to be the principle of this
+mediation; secondly, what was to be the motive of the mediation; and
+thirdly, what was the end proposed to be attained by the mediation? The
+motive, we are assured, is the preservation of peace, and we fully
+subscribe to its importance; but on all other matters we are left as
+thoroughly in the dark as ever. Really this mystery is, to say the least
+of it, tantalising; and we would fain know whether Austria is the party
+who has taken the initiative, in securing the advice of two peace-makers
+like Palmerston and Cavaignac. Austria has recovered the possessions
+guaranteed her by the faith of the leading states of Europe, has put
+down insurrection, and driven back in rout and terror the invading
+Sardinian over his own frontier. There remains no body of her revolted
+subjects in a position to ask for mediation. As for Charles Albert, he
+is not, we presume, either King of Italy or Lord of Lombardy, neither
+have we heard of any other claim, save that of sympathy, which could
+entitle him to enter into the contest. Personally he had no wrong to
+avenge; but having chosen to espouse the cause of the rebels, and to
+encounter the risks of war, he is surely not entitled, especially after
+defeat, to insist upon any conditions. If Austria shall choose, of her
+own free will and accord, to cede possession of Lombardy, it will be a
+mere act of grace, which cannot be demanded from her by any state in
+Europe. But she is clearly entitled to dictate, and not to receive
+conditions; and any interference with her guaranteed and fully recovered
+rights, either on the part of England or of France, would be tantamount
+to a declaration of war.
+
+From first to last, therefore, we condemn the course which has been
+pursued by the British foreign minister with reference to the affairs of
+Italy, as undignified, unconstitutional, and mischievous. It has
+naturally lowered the estimate of our character in the eyes of the
+Italian people, whose own fondness for intrigue does not prevent them
+from despising that system, when pursued on the part of a strong and
+powerful nation. Minto jobbing has proved an utter failure. It may not
+indeed have been unproductive in results, for it has materially
+stimulated sedition, but certainly it has not tended to the preservation
+of peace, or the consolidation of government in Italy.
+
+Lord Palmerston has not been happy for the present year in his foreign
+relations. Some gratuitous advice to Spain, which he no doubt tendered
+with the best possible intentions, was ignominiously returned upon his
+hand; and this affront was followed up by another still more serious,
+for our ambassador at Madrid was dismissed. Such are the results of
+constant meddling with the institutions of foreign states, or prying
+into their domestic arrangements, and of everlastingly tendering
+unsolicited and unpalatable advice. We do Lord Palmerston the justice to
+believe, that he is the last man in the world who would brook such
+conduct at the hands of others. Why then will he persist in acting the
+part of Mentor to all the states of Europe, at the risk of attracting
+insult to himself, and of materially endangering the character and
+position of his country?
+
+Whether we regard the conduct of the present ministry at home or abroad,
+in domestic or in foreign relations, we find little to praise, and much
+which we must conscientiously condemn. Late events do not seem to have
+conveyed to them any important lesson. Diminished exports, want of
+reciprocity, and the disorganisation of affairs on the Continent, have
+effected as yet no change in their commercial policy. They are still
+determined to persevere in the course which they have unfortunately
+adopted, and to neglect the home and colonial markets for the desperate
+chance of pushing exportation further. By delaying to make any provision
+for the relaxation of the odious Bank Restriction Acts—by placing upon
+the committee of the House of Commons men whose financial reputation
+depended upon the maintenance of these measures—they have again exposed
+the country to a recurrence of that crisis which, in November last, was
+so near a fatal termination. Who shall answer for it that a fresh drain
+of bullion will not take place this autumn? If the harvest shall prove
+deficient, such undoubtedly may be the case, and the mercantile world
+will be left without the means of accommodation at the moment of its
+utmost need.
+
+When we look at the long period of tranquillity which this country has
+enjoyed since the peace—when we reflect upon the extension of trade, the
+increase of our colonies, the apparent accumulation of wealth at home,
+the development of industry, and the enormous social improvements which
+have resulted from the progress of science—it seems almost miraculous
+that any combination of circumstances should so rapidly have involved us
+in financial embarrassments. Those embarrassments are marked by the
+price of money and its fluctuations, by the difficulty of accommodation,
+by the unprecedented decline in the value of every kind of property, by
+the amount of unemployed labour in the market, and by the long list of
+bankruptcies. We ask for an explanation of these phenomena, and we are
+referred to a failure of the potato crop! The political economists will
+not acknowledge the share they have had in the production of such
+lamentable results—but, fortunately, they cannot alter dates; and one
+thing at least is incontestible, that the commencement of the period of
+decline corresponds exactly with that of Sir Robert Peel’s fiscal and
+currency measures. It may have been that we were previously in danger
+from the want of these, but the country neither knew nor felt it. The
+change was made, and since then our prospects have been dark and gloomy.
+
+Parliament has utterly failed, during last session, to suggest any
+remedy for the general distress. It must fail so to do, until it is
+called together under the auspices of a Cabinet imbued with patriotic
+principles, aware of the responsibility of their situation, and
+thoroughly resolved to release themselves from the trammels of a system
+which has fraud and selfishness for its foundation, and which seeks to
+aggrandise a few at the sacrifice of the industrious many. May Heaven
+grant that such men may speedily be called to the supreme councils of
+the nation, and that this may be the last session, the futilities of
+which it is our duty to record, under the imbecile and slovenly
+administration of the Whigs!
+
+
+
+
+            TO A CAGED SKYLARK, REGENT’S CIRCUS, PICCADILLY.
+
+                             BY B. SIMMONS.
+
+
+         The city’s stony roar around!
+           The city’s stifling air!
+         The London May’s distracting sound,
+           And dust, and heat, and glare!
+         She sings to-night who puts to shame
+         Her fabled sisters’ syren-fame;
+         And, swarming through one mighty street,
+         From all opposing points they meet;
+         And hurrying, whirling, madd’ning on,
+           The crashing wheels and battling crowd
+         Are coming still, and still are gone—
+           The Thunder and the Cloud.
+             But the gush of faint odours
+               From apple-tree blooms—
+             The dew-fall by starlight
+               In green mossy glooms—
+             The sob of low breezes
+               Through hill-lifted pines
+             Looking miles o’er lone moorlands
+               While evening declines—
+             The dying away
+               Of far bleats at the shealing,
+             The hum of the night-fly
+               Where streamlets are stealing—
+             All are floating, this moment, or mournfully heard,
+ (Distinct as lutes mid trumpets) round thy cage, heart-breaking Bird!
+         They heed, nor hear—that seething mass—
+           But storm and brawl and burst along,
+         Porter and Peer—the City class—
+         And high-born Beauty shrined in glass—
+         The pale Mechanic and his lass—
+         Thick as the scythe-awaiting grass,
+           In one discordant throng.
+         While, loud with many a clanging bell,
+         Some annual joy the steeples tell,
+         And waggons’ groan and drivers’ yell
+         The loud hubbub and riot swell;
+ Yet still the stunn’d ear drinks, through all, that liquid song.
+
+             And far sinks the tumult,
+               And takes the soft moan
+             Of billows that shoreward
+               Are lapsingly thrown,
+             When the stars o’er the light-house
+               Set faintly and few,
+             And the waves’ level blackness
+               Is trembling to blue.
+             Wing’d Darling of Sunrise!
+               How oft at that hour,
+             Where the grassy lea lovingly
+               Tufted thy bower,
+             Thy friends the meek cowslips
+               Still folded in sleep,
+             Didst thou burst, and meet Morning
+               Half way from the deep,
+             And circle and soar
+               Till thy small rosy wing
+             Seem’d a sparkle the far-coming
+               Splendour might fling!
+             How lavishly then
+               On the night-hidden hill
+             Didst thou rain down thy carol
+               Deliciously shrill—
+             Still mounting to Heaven,
+               As thou didst rejoice
+             To be nearer the Angels,
+               Since nearest in voice!
+             And thy wild liquid warbling,
+               Sweet Thing! after all,
+             Leaves thee thus aching-breasted,
+               A captive and thrall.
+         For the thymy dell’s freshness and free dewy cloud
+     A barr’d nook in this furnace-heat and suffocating crowd.
+     No pause even here to list thy lay;
+       The human ferment working
+     Must on with unresisted sway
+     In bubbling thousands swept away,
+ Nor near thy cage be left ONE HERMIT-HEARER lurking.
+         Twin minstrels were ye
+           Once in sunshine and shade
+         With _thy_ hymns to the Love-star,
+           _His_ rhymes to the Maid.
+         How sweet was it then,
+           As he linger’d at noon
+         Beneath trees dropping diamonds
+           In shower-freshen’d June,
+         Beloved of the Rainbow!
+           To mark thee on high,
+         Where violet and amber
+           Were arching the sky;
+         And to deem thou wert singing
+           Of comfort to him—
+         Of some Bow yet to brighten
+           His destiny dim!
+         From _thy_ Cloud and _his_ Dream
+           Long the glory is gone,
+         And the dungeon remains
+           To each desolate one:
+     And as vainly as thine would his spirit up-spring,
+ Beating against his prison-bar with faint and baffled wing.
+
+
+
+
+                          SONNET.—TO DENMARK.
+
+
+                Again the trumpet-blast of war is blown:
+                Again the cannon booms along the sea.
+                Now, may the God of Battles stand by thee,
+                True-hearted Denmark! struggling for thine own,
+                For right, and loyalty, and King, and throne,
+                Against the weight of frantic Germany!
+                Old Honour is not dead whilst thou art free—
+                Oh be thou faithful to thy past renown!
+                May the great spirit of thy heroes dead
+                Be as a bulwark to thine ancient shore:
+                And, midst the surge of battle rolling red,
+                Still be thy banner foremost as of yore;
+                Prouder than when it waved, to winds outspread,
+                On the broad bastion-keep of Elsinore!
+
+
+
+
+                        LIFE IN THE “FAR WEST.”
+
+
+                                PART IV.
+
+We have said that La Bonté was a philosopher: he took the streaks of ill
+luck which checkered his mountain life in a vein of perfect
+carelessness, if not of stoical indifference. Nothing ruffled his
+danger-steeled equanimity of temper; no sudden emotion disturbed his
+mind. We have seen how wives were torn from him without eliciting a
+groan or grumble, (but such _contretemps_, it may be said, can scarcely
+find a place in the category of ills;) how the loss of mules and
+mustangs, harried by horse-stealing Indians, left him in the
+_ne-plus-ultra_ of mountain misery—“afoot;” how packs and peltries, the
+hard-earned “beaver” of his perilous hunts, were “raised” at one fell
+swoop by freebooting bands of savages. Hunger and thirst, we know, were
+commonplace sensations to the mountaineer. His storm-hardened flesh
+scarce felt the pinging wounds of arrow-point or bullet; and when in the
+midst of Indian fight, it is not probable that any tender qualms of
+feeling would allay the itching of his fingers for his enemy’s
+scalp-lock, nor would any remains of civilised fastidiousness prevent
+his burying his knife again and again in the life-blood of an Indian
+savage.
+
+Still, in one dark corner of his heart, there shone at intervals a faint
+spark of what was once a fiercely-burning fire. Neither time, that
+corroder of all things, nor change, that ready abettor of oblivion, nor
+scenes of peril and excitement, which act as dampers to more quiet
+memory, could smother this little smouldering spark, which now and
+again—when rarely-coming calm succeeded some stirring passage in the
+hunter’s life, and left him, for a brief time, devoid of care and victim
+to his thoughts—would flicker suddenly, and light up all the nooks and
+corners of his rugged breast, and discover to his mind’s eye that one
+deep-rooted memory clung there still, though long neglected; proving
+that, spite of time and change, of life and fortune,
+
+              “On revient toujours à ses premiers amours.”
+
+Often and often, as La Bonté sat cross-legged before his solitary
+camp-fire, and, pipe in mouth, watched the blue smoke curling upwards in
+the clear cold sky, a well-remembered form appeared to gaze upon him
+from the vapoury wreaths. Then would old recollections crowd before him,
+and old emotions, long a stranger to his breast, shape themselves, as it
+were, into long-forgotten but now familiar pulsations. Again he felt the
+soft subduing influence which once, in days gone by, a certain passion
+exercised over his mind and body; and often a trembling seized him, the
+same he used to experience at the sudden sight of one Mary Brand, whose
+dim and dreamy apparition so often watched his lonely bed, or,
+unconsciously conjured up, cheered him in the dreary watches of the long
+and stormy winter nights.
+
+At first he only knew that one face haunted his dreams by night, and the
+few moments by day when he thought of any thing, and this face smiled
+lovingly upon him, and cheered him mightily. Name he had quite
+forgotten, or recalled it vaguely, and, setting small store by it, had
+thought of it no more.
+
+For many years after he had deserted his home, La Bonté had cherished
+the idea of again returning to his country. During this period he had
+never forgotten his old flame, and many a choice fur he had carefully
+laid by, intended as a present for Mary Brand; and many a _gâge d’amour_
+of cunning shape and device, worked in stained quills of porcupine and
+bright-coloured beads—the handiwork of nimble-fingered squaws—he had
+packed in his possible sack for the same destination, hoping a time
+would come when he might lay them at her feet.
+
+Year after year wore on, however, and still found him, with traps and
+rifle, following his perilous avocation; and each succeeding one saw him
+more and more wedded to the wild mountain life. He was conscious how
+unfitted he had become again to enter the galling harness of
+conventionality and civilisation. He thought, too, how changed in
+manners and appearance he now must be, and could not believe that he
+would again find favour in the eyes of his quondam love, who, he judged,
+had long since forgotten him; and inexperienced as he was in such
+matters, yet he knew enough of womankind to feel assured that time and
+absence had long since done the work, if even the natural fickleness of
+woman’s nature had lain dormant. Thus it was that he came to forget Mary
+Brand, but still remembered the all-absorbing feeling she had once
+created in his breast, the shadow of which still remained, and often
+took form and feature in the smoke-wreaths of his solitary camp-fire.
+
+If truth be told, La Bonté had his failings as a mountaineer, and—sin
+unpardonable in hunter law—still possessed, in holes and corners of his
+breast seldom explored by his inward eye, much of the leaven of kindly
+human nature, which now and again involuntarily peeped out, as greatly
+to the contempt of his comrade trappers as it was blushingly repressed
+by the mountaineer himself. Thus, in his various matrimonial episodes,
+he treated his dusky _sposas_ with all the consideration the sex could
+possibly demand from hand of man. No squaw of his ever humped shoulder
+to receive a castigatory and marital “lodge-poling” for offence
+domestic; but often has his helpmate blushed to see her pale-face lord
+and master devote himself to the feminine labour of packing huge piles
+of fire-wood on his back, felling trees, butchering unwieldy buffalo—all
+which are included in the Indian category of female duties. Thus he was
+esteemed an excellent _parti_ by all the marriageable young squaws of
+Blackfoot, Crow, and Shoshone, of Yutah, Shian, and Arapaho; but after
+his last connubial catastrophe, he steeled his heart against all the
+charms and coquetry of Indian belles, and persevered in unblessed
+widowhood for many a long day.
+
+From the point where we left him on his way to the waters of the
+Columbia, we must jump with him over a space of nearly two years, during
+which time he had a most uninterrupted run of good luck; trapping with
+great success on the head streams of the Columbia and Yellow Stone—the
+most dangerous of trapping ground—and finding good market for his
+peltries at the “North-west” posts—beaver fetching as high a price as
+five and six dollars a “plew”—the “golden age” of trappers, now, alas,
+never to return, and existing only in the fond memory of the
+mountaineers. This glorious time, however, was too good to last. In
+mountain language, “such heap of fat meat was not going to ‘shine’ much
+longer.”
+
+La Bonté was at this time one of a band of eight trappers, whose hunting
+ground was about the head waters of the Yellow Stone, which we have
+before said is in the country of the Blackfeet. With him were Killbuck,
+Meek, Marcelline, and three others; and the leader of the party was Bill
+Williams, that old “hard case” who had spent forty years and more in the
+mountains, until he had become as tough as the parflêche soles of his
+mocassins. They were all good men and true, expert hunters, and
+well-trained mountaineers. After having trapped all the streams they
+were acquainted with, it was determined to strike into the mountains, at
+a point where old Williams affirmed, from the “run” of the hills, there
+must be plenty of water, although not one of the party had before
+explored the country, or knew any thing of its nature, or of the
+likelihood of its affording game for themselves or pasture for their
+animals. However, they packed their peltry, and put out for the land in
+view—a lofty peak, dimly seen above the more regular summit of the
+chain, being their landmark.
+
+For the first day or two their route lay between two ridges of
+mountains, and by following the little valley which skirted a creek,
+they kept on level ground, and saved their animals considerable labour
+and fatigue. Williams always rode ahead, his body bent over his
+saddle-horn, across which rested a long heavy rifle, his keen gray eyes
+peering from under the slouched brim of a flexible felt-hat, black and
+shining with grease. His buckskin hunting-shirt, bedaubed until it had
+the appearance of polished leather, hung in folds over his bony carcass;
+his nether extremities being clothed in pantaloons of the same material,
+(with scattered fringes down the outside of the leg—which ornaments,
+however, had been pretty well thinned to supply “whangs” for mending
+mocassins or pack-saddles,) which, shrunk with wet, clung tightly to his
+long, spare, sinewy legs. His feet were thrust into a pair of Mexican
+stirrups, made of wood, and as big as coal-scuttles; and iron spurs of
+incredible proportions, with tinkling drops attached to the rowels, were
+fastened to his heel—a bead-worked strap, four inches broad, securing
+them over the instep. In the shoulder-belt which sustained his
+powder-horn and bullet-pouch, were fastened the various instruments
+essential to one pursuing his mode of life. An awl, with deer-horn
+handle, and the point defended by a case of cherry-wood carved by his
+own hand, hung at the back of the belt, side by side with a worm for
+cleaning the rifle; and under this was a squat and quaint-looking
+bullet-mould, the handles guarded by strips of buckskin to save his
+fingers from burning when running balls, having for its companion a
+little bottle made from the point of an antelope’s horn, scraped
+transparent, which contained the “medicine” used in baiting the traps.
+The old coon’s face was sharp and thin, a long nose and chin hob-nobbing
+each other; and his head was always bent forward, giving him the
+appearance of being hump-backed. He _appeared_ to look neither to the
+right nor left, but, in fact, his little twinkling eye was everywhere.
+He looked at no one he was addressing, always seeming to be thinking of
+something else than the subject of his discourse, speaking in a whining,
+thin, cracked voice, and in a tone that left the hearer in doubt whether
+he was laughing or crying. On the present occasion he had joined this
+band, and naturally assumed the leadership, (for Bill ever refused to go
+in harness,) in opposition to his usual practice, which was to hunt
+alone. His character was well known. Acquainted with every inch of the
+Far West, and with all the Indian tribes who inhabited it, he never
+failed to outwit his Red enemies, and generally made his appearance at
+the rendezvous, from his solitary expeditions, with galore of beaver,
+when numerous bands of trappers dropped in on foot, having been
+despoiled of their packs and animals by the very Indians through the
+midst of whom old Williams had contrived to pass unseen and unmolested.
+On occasions when he had been in company with others, and attacked by
+Indians, Bill invariably fought manfully, and with all the coolness that
+perfect indifference to death or danger could give, but always “on his
+own hook.” His rifle cracked away merrily, and never spoke in vain; and
+in a charge—if ever it came to that—his keen-edged butcherknife tickled
+the fleece of many a Blackfoot. But at the same time, if he saw that
+discretion was the better part of valour, and affairs wore so cloudy an
+aspect as to render retreat advisable, he would first express his
+opinion in curt terms, and decisively, and, charging up his rifle, would
+take himself off, and “cache”[2] so effectually that to search for him
+was utterly useless. Thus, when with a large party of trappers, when any
+thing occurred which gave him a hint that trouble was coming, or more
+Indians were about than he considered good for his animals, Bill was
+wont to exclaim—
+
+“Do ’ee hyar now, boys, thar’s sign about? this hos feels like caching;”
+and, without more words, and stoically deaf to all remonstrances, he
+would forthwith proceed to pack his animals, talking the while to an
+old, crop-eared, raw-boned Nez-percé pony, his own particular
+saddle-horse, who, in dogged temper and iron hardiness, was a worthy
+companion of his self-willed master. This beast, as Bill seized his
+apishamore to lay upon its galled back, would express displeasure by
+humping its back and shaking its withers with a wincing motion, that
+always excited the ire of the old trapper; and no sooner had he laid the
+apishamore smoothly on the chafed skin, than a wriggle of the animal
+shook it off.
+
+“Do ’ee hyar now, you darned crittur!” he would whine out, “can’t’ee
+keep quiet your old fleece now? Isn’t this old coon putting out to save
+’ee from the darned Injuns now, do ’ee hyar?” And then, continuing his
+work, and taking no notice of his comrades, who stood by bantering the
+eccentric trapper, he would soliloquise—“Do ’ee hyar, now? This niggur
+sees sign ahead—he does; he’ll be afoot afore long, if he don’t keep his
+eye skinned,—_he_ will. _Injuns_ is all about, they ar’: Blackfoot at
+that. Can’t come round this child—they can’t, wagh!” And at last, his
+pack animals securely tied to the tail of his horse, he would mount, and
+throwing the rifle across the horn of his saddle, and without noticing
+his companions, would drive the jingling spurs into his horse’s gaunt
+sides, and muttering, “Can’t come round this child—they can’t!” would
+ride away; and nothing more would be seen or heard of him perhaps for
+months, when they would not unfrequently, themselves bereft of animals
+in the scrape he had foreseen, find him located in some solitary valley,
+in his lonely camp, with his animals securely picketed around, and his
+peltries safe.
+
+However, if he took it into his head to keep company with a party, all
+felt perfectly secure under his charge. His iron frame defied fatigue,
+and, at night, his love for himself and his own animals was sufficient
+guarantee that the camp would be well guarded. As he rode ahead, his
+spurs jingling, and thumping the sides of his old horse at every step,
+he managed, with admirable dexterity, to take advantage of the best line
+of country to follow—avoiding the gullies and cañons and broken ground,
+which would otherwise have impeded his advance. This tact appeared
+instinctive, for he looked neither right nor left, whilst continuing a
+course as straight as possible at the foot of the mountains. In
+selecting a camping site, he displayed equal skill: wood, water, and
+grass began to fill his thoughts towards sundown, and when these three
+requisites for a camping ground presented themselves, old Bill sprang
+from his saddle, unpacked his animals in a twinkling, and hobbled them,
+struck fire and ignited a few chips, (leaving the rest to pack in the
+wood,) lit his pipe, and enjoyed himself. On one occasion, when passing
+through the valley, they had come upon a band of fine buffalo cows, and,
+shortly after camping, two of the party rode in with a good supply of
+fat fleece. One of the party was a “greenhorn” on his first hunt, and,
+fresh from a fort on Platte, was as yet uninitiated in the mysteries of
+mountain cooking. Bill, lazily smoking his pipe, called to him, as he
+happened to be nearest, to butcher off a piece of meat and put it in his
+pot. Markhead seized the fleece, and commenced innocently carving off a
+huge ration, when a gasping roar from the old trapper caused him to drop
+his knife.
+
+“Ti-yah,” growled Bill, “do ’ee hyar, now, you darned greenhorn, do ’ee
+spile fat cow like that whar you was raised? Them doin’s won’t shine in
+this crowd, boy, do ’ee hyar, darn you? What! butcher meat across the
+grain! why, whar’ll the blood be goin’ to, you precious Spaniard? Down
+the grain I say,” he continued in a severe tone of rebuke, “and let your
+flaps be long, or out the juice’ll run slick—do ’ee hyar, now?” But this
+heretical error nearly cost the old trapper his appetite, and all night
+long he grumbled his horror at seeing “fat cow spiled in that fashion.”
+
+When two or three days’ journey brought them to the end of the valley,
+and they commenced the passage of the mountain, their march was
+obstructed by all kinds of obstacles; although they had chosen what
+appeared to be a gap in the chain, and what was in fact the only
+practicable passage in that vicinity. They followed the cañon of a
+branch of the Yellow Stone, where it entered the mountain; but from this
+point it became a torrent, and it was only by dint of incredible
+exertions that they reached the summit of the ridge. Game was
+exceedingly scarce in the vicinity, and they suffered extremely from
+hunger, having, on more than one occasion, recourse to the parflêche
+soles of their mocassins to allay its pangs. Old Bill, however, never
+grumbled; he chewed away at his shoes with relish even, and as long as
+he had a pipeful of tobacco in his pouch, was a happy man. Starvation
+was as yet far off, for all their animals were in existence; but as they
+were in a country where it was difficult to procure a remount, each
+trapper hesitated to sacrifice one of his horses to his appetite.
+
+From the summit of the ridge, Bill recognised the country on the
+opposite side to that whence they had just ascended as familiar to him,
+and pronounced it to be full of beaver, as well as abounding in the less
+desirable commodity of Indians. This was the valley lying about the
+lakes now called Eustis and Biddle, in which are many thermal and
+mineral springs, well known to the trappers by the names of the Soda,
+Beer, and Brimstone Springs, and regarded by them with no little awe and
+curiosity, as being the breathing places of his Satanic
+majesty—considered, moreover, to be the “biggest kind” of “medicine” to
+be found in the mountains. If truth be told, old Bill hardly relished
+the idea of entering this country, which he pronounced to be of “bad
+medicine” notoriety, but nevertheless agreed to guide them to the best
+trapping ground.
+
+One day they reached a creek full of beaver sign, and determined to halt
+here and establish their headquarters, while they trapped in the
+neighbourhood. We must here observe, that at this period—which was one
+of considerable rivalry amongst the various trading companies in the
+Indian country—the Indians, having become possessed of arms and
+ammunition in great quantities, had grown unusually daring and
+persevering in their attacks on the white hunters who passed through
+their country, and consequently the trappers were compelled to roam
+about in larger bands for mutual protection, which, although it made
+them less liable to open attack, yet rendered it more difficult for them
+to pursue their calling without being discovered; for, where one or two
+men might pass unseen, the broad trail of a large party, with its
+animals, was not likely to escape the sharp eyes of the cunning savages.
+
+They had scarcely encamped when the old leader, who had sallied out a
+short distance from camp to reconnoitre the neighbourhood, returned with
+an Indian mocassin in his hand, and informed his companions that its
+late owner and others were about.
+
+“Do ’ee hyar now, boys, thar’s _Injuns_ knocking round, and Blackfoot at
+that; but thar’s plenty of beaver too, and this child means trapping any
+how.”
+
+His companions were anxious to leave such dangerous vicinity; but the
+old fellow, contrary to his usual caution, determined to remain where he
+was—saying that there were Indians all over the country for that matter;
+and as they had determined to hunt here, he had made up his mind
+too—which was conclusive, and all agreed to stop where they were, in
+spite of the Indians. La Bonté killed a couple of mountain sheep close
+to camp, and they feasted rarely on the fat mutton that night, and were
+unmolested by marauding Blackfeet.
+
+The next morning, leaving two of their number in camp, they started in
+parties of two, to hunt for beaver sign and set their traps. Markhead
+paired with one Batiste, Killbuck and La Bonté formed another couple,
+Meek and Marcelline another; two Canadians trapped together, and Bill
+Williams and another remained to guard the camp: but this last, leaving
+Bill mending his mocassins, started off to kill a mountain sheep, a band
+of which animals was visible.
+
+Markhead and his companion, the first couple on the list, followed a
+creek, which entered that on which they had encamped, about ten miles
+distant. Beaver sign was abundant, and they had set eight traps, when
+Markhead came suddenly upon fresh Indian sign, where squaws had passed
+through the shrubbery on the banks of the stream to procure water, as he
+knew from observing a large stone placed by them in the stream, on which
+to stand to enable them to dip their kettles in the deepest water.
+Beckoning to his companion to follow, and cocking his rifle, he
+carefully pushed aside the bushes, and noiselessly proceeded up the
+bank, when, creeping on hands and knees, he gained the top, and, looking
+from his hiding-place, descried three Indian huts standing on a little
+plateau near the creek. Smoke curled from the roofs of branches, but the
+skin doors were carefully closed, so that he was unable to distinguish
+the number of the inmates. At a little distance, however, he observed
+two or three squaws gathering wood, with the usual attendance of curs,
+whose acuteness in detecting the scent of strangers was much to be
+dreaded.
+
+Markhead was a rash and daring young fellow, caring no more for Indians
+than he did for prairie dogs, and acting ever on the spur of the moment,
+and as his inclination dictated, regardless of consequences. He at once
+determined to enter the lodges, and attack the enemy, should any be
+there; and the other trapper was fain to join him in the enterprise. The
+lodges proved empty, but the fires were still burning and meat cooking
+upon them, to which the hungry hunters did ample justice, besides
+helping themselves to whatever goods and chattels, in the shape of
+leather and mocassins, took their fancy.
+
+Gathering their spoil into a bundle, they sought their horses, which
+they had left tied under cover of the timber on the banks of the creek;
+and, mounting, took the back trail, to pick up their traps and remove
+from so dangerous a neighbourhood. They were approaching the spot where
+the first trap was set, a thick growth of ash and quaking-ash concealing
+the stream, when Markhead, who was riding ahead, observed the bushes
+agitated, as if some animal was making its way through them. He
+instantly stopped his horse, and his companion rode to his side, to
+inquire the cause of this abrupt halt. They were within a few yards of
+the belt of shrubs which skirted the stream; and before Markhead had
+time to reply, a dozen swarthy heads and shoulders suddenly protruded
+from the leafy screen, and as many rifle barrels and arrows were
+pointing at their breasts. Before the trappers had time to turn their
+horses and fly, a cloud of smoke burst from the thicket almost in their
+faces. Batiste, pierced with several balls, fell dead from his horse,
+and Markhead felt himself severely wounded. However, he struck the spurs
+into his horse; and as some half-score Blackfeet jumped with loud cries
+from their cover, he discharged his rifle amongst them, and galloped
+off, a volley of balls and arrows whistling after him. He drew no bit
+until he reined up at the camp-fire, where he found Bill quietly
+dressing a deer-skin. That worthy looked up from his work; and seeing
+Markhead’s face streaming with blood, and the very unequivocal evidence
+of an Indian rencontre in the shape of an arrow sticking in his back, he
+asked,—“Do’ee feel bad now, boy? Whar away you see them darned
+Blackfoot?”
+
+“Well, pull this arrow out of my back, and may be I’ll feel like
+telling,” answered Markhead.
+
+“Do ’ee hyar now! hold on till I’ve grained this cussed skin, will ’ee!
+Did ’ee ever see sich a darned pelt, now? it won’t take the smoke any
+how I fix it.” And Markhead was fain to wait the leisure of the
+imperturbable old trapper, before he was eased of his annoying
+companion.
+
+Old Bill expressed no surprise or grief when informed of the fate of
+poor Batiste. He said it was “just like greenhorns, runnin’ into them
+cussed Blackfoot;” and observed that the defunct trapper, being only a
+Vide-pôche, was “no account anyhow.” Presently Killbuck and La Bonté
+galloped into camp, with another alarm of Indians. They had also been
+attacked suddenly by a band of Blackfeet, but, being in a more open
+country, had got clear off, after killing two of their assailants, whose
+scalps hung at the horns of their saddles. They had been in a different
+direction to that where Markhead and his companion had proceeded, and,
+from the signs they had observed, expressed their belief that the
+country was alive with Indians. Neither of these men had been wounded.
+Presently the two Canadians made their appearance on the bluff,
+galloping with might and main to camp, and shouting “Indians, Indians,”
+as they came. All being assembled, and a council held, it was determined
+to abandon the camp and neighbourhood immediately. Old Bill was already
+packing his animals, and as he pounded the saddle down on the withers of
+his old Rosinante, he muttered,—“Do ’ee hyar, now! this coon ’ull câche,
+_he_ will.” So mounting his horse, and leading his pack mule by a
+lariat, he bent over his saddle-horn, dug his ponderous rowels into the
+lank sides of his beast, and, without a word, struck up the bluff and
+disappeared.
+
+The others, hastily gathering up their packs, and most of them having
+lost their traps, quickly followed his example, and “put out.” On
+cresting the high ground which rose from the creek, they observed thin
+columns of smoke mounting into the air from many different points, the
+meaning of which they were at no loss to guess. However, they were
+careful not to show themselves on elevated ground, keeping as much as
+possible under the banks of the creek, when such a course was
+practicable; but, the bluffs sometimes rising precipitously from the
+water, they were more than once compelled to ascend the banks, and
+continue their course along the uplands, whence they might easily be
+discovered by the Indians. It was nearly sundown when they left their
+camp, but they proceeded during the greater part of the night at as
+rapid a rate as possible; their progress, however, being greatly
+retarded as they advanced into the mountain, their route lying up
+stream. Towards morning they halted for a brief space, but started again
+as soon as daylight permitted them to see their way over the broken
+ground.
+
+The creek now forced its way through a narrow cañon, the banks being
+thickly clothed with a shrubbery of cottonwood and quaking-ash. The
+mountain rose on each side, but not abruptly, being here and there
+broken into plateaus and shelving prairies. In a very thick bottom,
+sprinkled with coarse grass, they halted about noon, and removed the
+saddles and packs from their wearied animals, piqueting them in the best
+spots of grass.
+
+La Bonté and Killbuck, after securing their animals, left the camp to
+hunt, for they had no provisions of any kind; and a short distance
+beyond it, the former came suddenly upon a recent mocassin track in the
+timber. After examining it for a moment, he raised his head with a broad
+grin, and, turning to his companion, pointed into the cover, where, in
+the thickest part, they discerned the well-known figure of old Bill’s
+horse, browsing upon the cherry bushes. Pushing through the thicket in
+search of the brute’s master, La Bonté suddenly stopped short as the
+muzzle of a rifle-barrel gaped before his eyes at the distance of a few
+inches, whilst the thin voice of Bill muttered—
+
+“Do ’ee hyar now, I was nigh giving ’ee h——: I _was_ now. If I didn’t
+think ’ee was Blackfoot, I’m dogged now.” And not a little indignant was
+the old fellow that his câche had been so easily, though accidentally,
+discovered. However, he presently made his appearance in camp, leading
+his animals, and once more joined his late companions, not deigning to
+give any explanation as to why or wherefore he had deserted them the day
+before, merely muttering, “do ’ee hyar now, thar’s trouble comin’.”
+
+The two hunters returned after sundown with a black-tailed deer; and
+after eating the better part of the meat, and setting a guard, the party
+were glad to roll in their blankets and enjoy the rest they so much
+needed. They were undisturbed during the night; but at dawn of day the
+sleepers were roused by a hundred fierce yells, from the mountains
+enclosing the creek on which they had encamped. The yells were instantly
+followed by a ringing volley, the bullets thudding into the trees, and
+cutting the branches near them, but without causing any mischief. Old
+Bill rose from his blanket and shook himself, and exclaimed “Wagh!” as
+at that moment a ball plumped into the fire over which he was standing,
+and knocked the ashes about in a cloud. All the mountaineers seized
+their rifles and sprang to cover; but as yet it was not sufficiently
+light to show them their enemy, the bright flashes from the guns alone
+indicating their position. As morning dawned, however, they saw that
+both sides of the cañon were occupied by the Indians; and, from the
+firing, judged there must be at least a hundred warriors engaged in the
+attack. Not a shot had yet been fired by the trappers, but as the light
+increased, they eagerly watched for an Indian to expose himself, and
+offer a mark to their trusty rifles. La Bonté, Killbuck, and old Bill,
+lay a few yards distant from each other, flat on their faces, near the
+edge of the thicket, their rifles raised before them, and the barrels
+resting in the forks of convenient bushes. From their place of
+concealment to the position of the Indians—who, however, were scattered
+here and there, wherever a rock afforded them cover—was a distance of
+about a hundred and fifty yards, or within fair rifle-shot. The trappers
+were obliged to divide their force, since both sides of the creek were
+occupied; but such was the nature of the ground, and the excellent cover
+afforded by the rocks and boulders, and clumps of dwarf pine and
+hemlock, that not a hand’s-breadth of an Indian’s body had yet been
+seen. Nearly opposite La Bonté, a shelving glade in the mountain side
+ended in an abrupt precipice, and at the very edge, and almost toppling
+over it, were several boulders, just of sufficient size to afford cover
+to a man’s body. As this bluff overlooked the trapper’s position, it was
+occupied by the Indians, and every rock covered an assailant. At one
+point, just over where La Bonté and Killbuck were lying, two boulders
+lay together, with just sufficient interval to admit a rifle-barrel
+between them, and from this breastwork an Indian kept up a most annoying
+fire. All his shots fell in dangerous propinquity to one or other of the
+trappers, and already Killbuck had been grazed by one better directed
+than the others. La Bonté watched for some time in vain for a chance to
+answer this persevering marksman, and at length an opportunity offered,
+by which he was not long in profiting.
+
+The Indian, as the light increased, was better able to discern his mark,
+and fired, and yelled every time he did so, with redoubled vigour. In
+his eagerness, and probably whilst in the act of taking aim, he leaned
+too heavily against the rock which covered him, and, detaching it from
+its position, down it rolled into the cañon, exposing his body by its
+fall. At the same instant, a wreath of smoke puffed from the bushes
+which concealed the trappers, and the crack of La Bonté’s rifle spoke
+the first word of reply to the Indian challenge. But a few feet behind
+the rock, fell the dead body of the Indian, rolling down the steep sides
+of the cañon, and only stopped by a bush at the very bottom, within a
+few yards of the spot where Markhead lay concealed in some high grass.
+
+That daring fellow instantly jumped from his cover, and, drawing his
+knife, rushed to the body, and in another moment held aloft the Indian’s
+scalp, giving, at the same time, a triumphant whoop. A score of rifles
+were levelled and discharged at the intrepid mountaineer; but in the act
+many Indians incautiously exposed themselves, every rifle in the timber
+cracked simultaneously, and for each report an Indian bit the dust.
+
+But now they changed their tactics. Finding they were unable to drive
+the trappers from their position, they retired from the mountain, and
+the firing suddenly ceased. In their retreat, however, they were forced
+to expose themselves, and again the whites dealt destruction amongst
+them. As the Indians retired, yelling loudly, the hunters thought they
+had given up the contest; but presently a cloud of smoke rising from the
+bottom immediately below them, at once discovered the nature of their
+plans. A brisk wind was blowing up the cañon, and, favoured by it, they
+fired the brush on the banks of the stream, knowing that before this the
+hunters must speedily retreat.
+
+Against such a result, but for the gale of wind which drove the fire
+roaring before it, they could have provided—for your mountaineer never
+fails to find resources on a pinch. They would have fired the brush to
+leeward of their position, and also carefully ignited that to windward,
+or between them and the advancing flame, extinguishing it immediately
+when a sufficient space had thus been cleared, and over which the
+fire-flame could not leap, and thus cutting themselves off from it both
+above and below their position. In the present instance, they could not
+profit by such a course, as the wind was so strong that, if once the
+bottom caught fire, they would not be able to extinguish it; besides
+which, in the attempt, they would so expose themselves that they would
+be picked off by the Indians without difficulty. As it was, the fire
+came roaring before the wind with the speed of a race-horse, and,
+spreading from the bottom, licked the mountain sides, the dry grass
+burning like tinder. Huge volumes of stifling smoke rolled before it,
+and, in a very few minutes, the trappers were hastily mounting their
+animals, driving the packed ones before them. The dense clouds of smoke
+concealed every thing from their view, and, to avoid this, they broke
+from the creek and galloped up the sides of the cañon on to the more
+level plateau. As they attained this, a band of mounted Indians charged
+them. One, waving a red blanket, dashed through the cavallada, and was
+instantly followed by all the loose animals of the trappers, the rest of
+the Indians following with loud shouts. So sudden was the charge, that
+the whites had not power to prevent the stampede. Old Bill, as usual,
+led his pack mules by the lariat; but the animals, mad with terror at
+the shouts of the Indians, broke from him, nearly pulling him out of his
+seat at the same time.
+
+To cover the retreat of the others with their prey, a band of mounted
+Indians now appeared, threatening an attack in front, whilst their first
+assailants, rushing from the bottom, at least a hundred strong,
+assaulted in rear. “Do ’ee hyar, boys!” shouted old Bill, “break, or
+you’ll go under. This child’s goin’ to câche!” and saying the word, off
+he went. _Sauve-qui-peut_ was the order of the day, and not a moment too
+soon, for overwhelming numbers were charging upon them, and the mountain
+resounded with savage yells. La Bonté and Killbuck stuck together: they
+saw old Bill, bending over his saddle, dive right into the cloud of
+smoke, and apparently make for the creek bottom—their other companions
+scattering each on his own hook, and saw no more of them for many a
+month; and thus was one of the most daring and successful bands broken
+up that ever trapped in the mountains of the Far West.
+
+It is painful to follow the steps of the poor fellows who, thus
+despoiled of the hardly-earned produce of their hunt, saw all their
+wealth torn from them at one swoop. The two Canadians were killed upon
+the night succeeding that of the attack. Worn with fatigue, hungry and
+cold, they had built a fire in what they thought was a secure retreat,
+and, rolled in their blankets, were soon buried in a sleep from which
+they never awoke. An Indian boy tracked them, and watched their camp.
+Burning with the idea of signalising himself thus early, he awaited his
+opportunity, and noiselessly approaching their resting-place, shot them
+both with arrows, and returned in triumph to his people with their
+horses and scalps.
+
+La Bonté and Killbuck sought a passage in the mountain by which to cross
+over to the head waters of the Columbia, and there fall in with some of
+the traders or trappers of the North-west. They became involved in the
+mountains, in a part where was no game of any description, and no
+pasture for their miserable animals. One of these they killed for food;
+the other, a bag of bones, died from sheer starvation. They had very
+little ammunition, their mocassins were worn out, and they were unable
+to procure skins to supply themselves with fresh ones. Winter was fast
+approaching, the snow already covered the mountains, and storms of sleet
+and hail poured incessantly through the valleys, benumbing their
+exhausted limbs, hardly protected by scanty and ragged covering. To add
+to their miseries, poor Killbuck was taken ill. He had been wounded in
+the groin by a bullet some time before, and the ball still remained. The
+wound, aggravated by walking and the excessive cold, assumed an ugly
+appearance, and soon rendered him incapable of sustained exertion, all
+motion even being attended with intolerable pain. La Bonté had made a
+shanty for his suffering companion, and spread a soft bed of pine
+branches for him, by the side of a small creek at the point where it
+came out of the mountain and followed its course through a little
+prairie. They had been three days without other food than a piece of
+parflêche, which had formed the back of La Bonté’s bullet-pouch, and
+which, after soaking in the creek, they eagerly devoured. Killbuck was
+unable to move, and sinking fast from exhaustion. His companion had
+hunted from morning till night, as well as his failing strength would
+allow him, but had not seen the traces of any kind of game, with the
+exception of some old buffalo tracks, made apparently months before by a
+band of bulls crossing the mountain.
+
+The morning of the fourth day La Bonté, as usual, rose at daybreak from
+his blanket, and was proceeding to collect wood for the fire during his
+absence while hunting, when Killbuck called to him, and in an almost
+inarticulate voice desired him to seat himself by his side.
+
+“Boy,” he said, “this old hos feels like goin’ under, and that afore
+long. You’re stout yet, and if thar was meat handy, you’d come round
+slick. Now, boy, I’ll be under, as I said, afore many hours, and if you
+don’t raise meat you’ll be in the same fix. I never eat dead meat[3]
+myself, and wouldn’t ask no one to do it neither; but meat fair killed
+is meat any way; so, boy, put your knife in this old niggur’s lights,
+and help yourself. It’s ‘poor bull,’ I know, but maybe it’ll do to keep
+life in; and along the fleece thar’s meat yet, and maybe my old hump
+ribs has picking on ’em.”
+
+“You’re a good old hos,” answered La Bonté, “but this child ain’t turned
+niggur yet.”
+
+Killbuck then begged his companion to leave him to his fate, and strive
+himself to reach game; but this alternative La Bonté likewise generously
+refused, and faintly endeavouring to cheer the sick man, left him once
+again to look for game. He was so weak that he felt difficulty in
+supporting himself, and knowing how futile would be his attempts to
+hunt, he sallied from the camp convinced that a few hours more would see
+the last of him.
+
+He had scarcely raised his eyes, when, hardly crediting his senses, he
+saw within a few hundred yards of him an old bull, worn with age, lying
+on the prairie. Two wolves were seated on their haunches before him,
+their tongues lolling from their mouths, whilst the buffalo was
+impotently rolling his ponderous head from side to side, his bloodshot
+eyes glaring fiercely at his tormentors, and flakes of foam, mixed with
+blood, dropping from his mouth over his long shaggy beard. La Bonté was
+transfixed; he dared scarcely to breathe lest the animal should be
+alarmed and escape. Weak as it was, he could hardly have followed it,
+and, knowing that his own and companion’s life hung upon the success of
+his shot, he scarcely had strength to raise his rifle. By dint of
+extraordinary exertions and precautions, which were totally unnecessary,
+for the poor old bull had not a move in him, the hunter approached
+within shot. Lying upon the ground, he took a long steady aim, and
+fired. The buffalo raised its matted head, tossed it wildly for an
+instant, and, stretching out its limbs convulsively, turned over on its
+side and was dead.
+
+Killbuck heard the shot, and crawling from under the little shanty which
+covered his bed, saw, to his astonishment, La Bonté in the act of
+butchering a buffalo within two hundred yards of camp. “Hurraw for you!”
+he faintly exclaimed; and exhausted by the exertion he had used, and
+perhaps by the excitement of an anticipated feast, fell back and
+fainted.
+
+However, the killing was the easiest matter, for when the huge carcass
+lay dead upon the ground, our hunter had hardly strength to drive the
+blade of his knife through the tough hide of the old patriarch. Then
+having cut off as much of the meat as he could carry, eating the while
+sundry portions of the liver, which he dipped in the gall-bladder by way
+of relish, La Bonté cast a wistful look upon the half-starved wolves,
+who now loped round and round, licking their chops, only waiting until
+his back was turned to fall to with appetite equal to his own, and
+capabilities of swallowing and digesting far superior. La Bonté looked
+at the buffalo, and then at the wolves, levelled his rifle and shot one
+dead, at which the survivor scampered off without delay.
+
+Arrived at camp, packing in a tolerable load of the best part of the
+animal—for hunger lent him strength—he found poor Killbuck lying on his
+back, deaf to time, and to all appearance gone under. Having no
+sal-volatile or vinaigrette at hand, La Bonté flapped a lump of raw
+fleece into his patient’s face, and this instantly revived him. Then
+taking the sick man’s shoulder, he raised him tenderly into a sitting
+posture, and invited, in kindly accents, “the old hos to feed,”
+thrusting at the same time a tolerable slice of liver into his hand,
+which the patient looked at wistfully and vaguely for a few short
+moments, and then greedily devoured. It was nightfall by the time that
+La Bonté, assisted by many intervals of hard eating, packed in the last
+of the meat, which formed a goodly pile around the fire.
+
+“Poor bull” it was in all conscience: the labour of chewing a mouthful
+of the “tender loin” was equal to a hard day’s hunt; but to them, poor
+starved fellows, it appeared the richest of meat. They still preserved a
+small tin pot, and in this, by stress of eternal boiling, La Bonté
+contrived to make some strong soup, which soon restored his sick
+companion to marching order. For himself, as soon as a good meal had
+filled him, he was strong as ever, and employed himself in drying the
+remainder of the meat for future use. Even the wolf, bony as he was, was
+converted into meat, and rationed them several days. Winter, however,
+had set in with such severity, and Killbuck was still so weak, that La
+Bonté determined to remain in his present position until spring, as he
+now found that buffalo frequently visited the valley, as it was more
+bare of snow than the lowlands, and afforded them better pasture; and
+one morning he had the satisfaction of seeing a band of seventeen bulls
+within long rifle-shot of the camp, out of which four of the fattest
+were soon laid low by his rifle.
+
+They still had hard times before them, for towards spring the buffalo
+again disappeared; the greater part of their meat had been spoiled,
+owing to there not being sufficient sun to dry it thoroughly; and when
+they resumed their journey they had nothing to carry with them, and had
+a desert before them without game of any kind. We pass over what they
+suffered. Hunger, thirst, and Indians assaulted them at times, and many
+miraculous and hairbreadth escapes they had from such enemies.
+
+The trail to Oregon, followed by traders and emigrants, crosses the
+Rocky Mountains at a point known as the South Pass, where a break in the
+chain occurs of such moderate and gradual elevation as to permit the
+passage of waggons with tolerable facility. The Sweet Water Valley runs
+nearly to the point where the dividing ridge of the Pacific and Atlantic
+waters throws off its streams to their respective oceans. At one end of
+this valley, and situated on the right bank of the Sweet Water, a huge
+isolated mass of granitic rock rises to the height of three hundred
+feet, abruptly from the plain. On the smooth and scarped surface
+presented by one of its sides, are rudely carved the names and initials
+of traders, trappers, travellers and emigrants, who have here recorded
+the memorial of their sojourn in the remote wilderness of the Far West.
+The face of the rock is covered with names familiar to the mountaineers
+as those of the most renowned of their hardy brotherhood; while others
+again occur, better known to the science and literature of the Old World
+than to the unlearned trappers of the Rocky Mountains. The huge mass is
+a well-known landmark to the Indians and mountaineers; and travellers
+and emigrants hail it as the half-way beacon between the frontiers of
+the United States and the still distant goal of their long and perilous
+journey.
+
+It was a hot sultry day in July. Not a breath of air relieved the
+intense and oppressive heat of the atmosphere, unusual here where
+pleasant summer breezes, and sometimes stronger gales, blow over the
+elevated plains with the regularity of trade-winds. The sun, at its
+meridian height, struck the dry sandy plain and parched the drooping
+buffalo-grass on its surface, and its rays, refracted and reverberating
+from the heated ground, distorted every object seen through its lurid
+medium. Straggling antelope, leisurely crossing the adjoining prairie,
+appeared to be gracefully moving in mid-air; whilst a scattered band of
+buffalo bulls loomed huge and indistinct in the vapoury distance. In the
+timbered valley of the river deer and elk were standing motionless in
+the water, under the shade of the overhanging cottonwoods, seeking a
+respite from the persevering attacks of swarms of horseflies and
+mosquitos; and now and then the heavy splash was heard, as they tossed
+their antlered heads into the stream, to free them from the venomous
+insects that buzzed incessantly about them. But in the sandy prairie,
+beetles of an enormous size were rolling in every direction huge balls
+of earth, pushing them with their hind legs with comical perseverance;
+cameleons darted about, assimilating the hue of their grotesque bodies
+with the colour of the sand: groups of prairie-dog houses were seen,
+each with its inmate barking lustily on the roof; whilst under cover of
+nearly every bush of sage or cactus a rattlesnake lay glittering in lazy
+coil. Tantalising the parched sight, the neighbouring peaks of the lofty
+Wind River Mountains glittered in a mantle of sparkling snow, whilst
+Sweet Water Mountain, capped in cloud, looked gray and cool, in striking
+contrast to the burned up plains which lay basking at its foot.
+
+Resting their backs against the rock, (on which, we have said, are _now_
+carved the names of many travellers,) and defended from the powerful
+rays of the sun by its precipitous sides, two white men quietly slept.
+They were gaunt and lantern-jawed, and clothed in tattered buckskin.
+Each held a rifle across his knees, but—strange sight in this
+country—one had its pan thrown open, which was rust-eaten and contained
+no priming; the other’s hammer was without a flint. Their faces were as
+if covered with mahogany-coloured parchment; their eyes were sunken; and
+as their jaws fell listlessly on their breasts, their cheeks were
+hollow, with the bones nearly protruding from the skin. One was in the
+prime of manhood, with handsome features; the other, considerably past
+the middle age, was stark and stern. Months of dire privation had
+brought them to this pass. The elder of the two was Killbuck, of
+mountain fame; the other hight La Bonté.
+
+The former opened his eyes, and saw the buffalo feeding on the plain.
+“Ho, boy,” he said, touching his companion, “thar’s meat a-runnin.”
+
+La Bonté looked in the direction the other pointed, stood up, and
+hitching round his pouch and powder-horn, drew the stopper from the
+latter with his teeth, and placing the mouth in the palm of his left
+hand, turned the horn up and shook it.
+
+“Not a grain,” he said—“not a grain, old hos.”
+
+“Wagh!” exclaimed the other, “we’ll have to eat afore long,” and rising,
+walked into the prairie. He had hardly stepped two paces, when, passing
+close to a sage bush, a rattlesnake whizzed a note of warning with its
+tail. Killbuck grinned, and taking the wiping-stick from his
+rifle-barrel, tapped the snake on the head, and, taking it by the tail,
+threw it to La Bonté, saying, “hyar’s meat, any how.” The old fellow
+followed up his success by slaying half a dozen more, and brought them
+in skewered through the head on his wiping-stick. A fire was soon
+kindled, and the snakes as soon roasting before it; when La Bonté, who
+sat looking at the buffalo which fed close to the rock, suddenly saw
+them raise their heads, snuff the air, and scamper towards him. A few
+minutes afterwards a huge shapeless body loomed in the refracted air,
+approaching the spot where the buffalo had been grazing. The hunters
+looked at it and then at each other, and ejaculated “Wagh!” Presently a
+long white mass showed more distinctly, followed by another, and before
+each was a string of animals.
+
+“Waggons, by hos and beaver! Hurrah for Conostoga!” exclaimed the
+trappers in a breath, as they now observed two white-tilted waggons,
+drawn by several pairs of mules, approaching the very spot where they
+sat. Several mounted men were riding about the waggons, and two on
+horseback, in advance of all, were approaching the rock, when they
+observed the smoke curling from the hunters’ fire. They halted at sight
+of this, and one of the two, drawing a long instrument from a case,
+which Killbuck voted a rifle, directed it towards them for a moment, and
+then, lowering it, again moved forward.
+
+As they drew near, the two poor trappers, although half-dead with joy,
+still retained their seats with Indian gravity and immobility of
+feature, turning now and then the crackling snakes which lay on the
+embers of the fire. The two strangers approached. One, a man of some
+fifty years of age, of middle height and stoutly built, was clad in a
+white shooting-jacket, of cut unknown in mountain tailoring, and a pair
+of trousers of the well-known material called “shepherd’s plaid;” a
+broad-brimmed Panama shaded his face, which was ruddy with health and
+exercise; a belt round the waist supported a handsome bowie-knife, and a
+double-barrelled fowling-piece was _slung_ across his shoulder.
+
+His companion was likewise dressed in a light shooting-jacket, of many
+pockets and dandy cut, rode on an English saddle and in _boots_, and was
+armed with a superb double rifle, glossy from the case, and bearing few
+marks of use or service. He was a tall, fine-looking fellow of thirty,
+with light hair and complexion; a scrupulous beard and mustache; a
+wide-awake hat, with a short pipe stuck in the band, but not very black
+with smoke; an elaborate powder-horn over his shoulder, with a Cairngorm
+in the butt as large as a plate; a blue handkerchief tied round his
+throat in a sailor’s knot, and the collar of his shirt turned carefully
+over it. He had, moreover, a tolerable idea of his very correct
+appearance, and wore Woodstock gloves.
+
+The trappers looked at them from head to foot, and the more they looked
+the less could they make them out.
+
+“H—!” exclaimed La Bonté emphatically.
+
+“This beats grainin’ bull-hide slick,” broke from Killbuck as the
+strangers reined up at the fire, the younger dismounting, and staring
+with wonder at the weather-beaten trappers.
+
+“Well, my men, how are you?” he rattled out. “Any game here? By Jove!”
+he suddenly exclaimed, seizing his rifle, as at that moment a large
+buzzard, the most unclean of birds, flew into the topmost branch of a
+cottonwood, and sat, a tempting shot. “By Jove, there’s a chance!” cried
+the mighty hunter; and, bending low, started off to approach the unwary
+bird in the most approved fashion of northern deer-stalkers. The buzzard
+sat quietly, and now and then stretched its neck to gaze upon the
+advancing sportsman, who on such occasions threw himself flat on the
+ground, and remained motionless, in dread of alarming the bird. It was
+worth while to look at the countenance of old Killbuck, as he watched
+the antics of the “bourgeois” hunter. He thought at first that the dandy
+rifleman had really discovered game in the bottom, and was nothing loth
+that there was a chance of his seeing meat; but when he understood the
+object of such manœuvres, and saw the quarry the hunter was so carefully
+approaching, his mouth grinned from ear to ear, and, turning to La
+Bonté, he said, “Wagh! _he’s_ some—_he_ is!”
+
+Nothing doubting, however, the stranger approached the tree on which the
+bird was sitting, and, getting well under it, raised his rifle and
+fired. Down tumbled the bird; and the successful hunter, with a loud
+shout, rushed frantically towards it, and bore it in triumph to the
+camp, earning the most sovereign contempt from the two trappers by the
+achievement.
+
+The other stranger was a quieter character. He, too, smiled as he
+witnessed the exultation of his younger companion, (whose horse, by the
+way, was scampering about the plain,) and spoke kindly to the
+mountaineers, whose appearance was clear evidence of the sufferings they
+had endured. The snakes by this time were cooked, and the trappers gave
+their new acquaintances the never-failing invitation to “sit and eat.”
+When the latter, however, understood what the viands were, their looks
+expressed the horror and disgust they felt.
+
+“Good God!” exclaimed the elder, “you surely cannot eat such disgusting
+food?”
+
+“This niggur doesn’t savy what disgustin’ is,” gruffly answered
+Killbuck; “but them as carries empty paunch three days an’ more, is glad
+to get ‘snake-meat,’ I’m thinkin.”
+
+“What! you’ve no ammunition, then?”
+
+“_Well_, we haven’t.”
+
+“Wait till the waggons come up, and throw away that abominable stuff,
+and you shall have something better, I promise,” said the elder of the
+strangers.
+
+“Yes,” continued the younger, “some hot preserved soup, hotchpotch, and
+a glass of porter, will do you good.”
+
+The trappers looked at the speaker, who was talking Greek (to them.)
+They thought the bourgeois were making fun, and did not half like it, so
+answered simply, “Wagh! h—’s full of hosh-posh and porter.”
+
+Two large waggons presently came up, escorted by some eight or ten stout
+Missourians. Sublette was amongst the number, well known as a mountain
+trader, and under whose guidance the present party, which formed a
+pleasure expedition at the expense of a Scotch sportsman, was leisurely
+making its way across the mountains to the Columbia. As several
+mountaineers were in company, Killbuck and La Bonté recognised more than
+one friend, and the former and Sublette were old compañeros. As soon as
+the animals were unhitched, and camp formed on the banks of the creek, a
+black cook set about preparing a meal. Our two trapping friends looked
+on with astonishment as the sable functionary drew from the waggon the
+different articles he required to furnish forth a feed. Hams, tongues,
+tins of preserved meats, bottles of pickles, of porter, brandy, coffee,
+sugar, flour, were tumbled promiscuously on the prairie; whilst pots and
+pans, knives, forks, spoons, plates, &c. &c. displayed their unfamiliar
+faces to the mountaineers. “Hosh-posh and porter” did not now appear
+such Utopian articles as they had first imagined; but no one can
+understand the relish, but those who have fared for years on simple meat
+and water, with which they accepted the invitation of the Capen (as they
+called the Scotchman,) to “take a horn of liquor.” Killbuck and La Bonté
+sat in the same position as when we first surprised them asleep under
+the shadow of Independence Rock, regarding the profuse display of
+comestibles with scarce-believing eyes, and childishly helpless by the
+novelty of the scene. Each took the proffered half-pint cup, filled to
+the brim with excellent brandy—(no tee-totallers they!)—looked once at
+the amber-coloured surface, and with the usual mountain pledge of
+“here’s luck!” tossed off the grateful liquor at a breath. This prepared
+them in some measure for what was yet in store for them. The Scotchman
+bestirred the cook in his work, and soon sundry steaming pots were
+lifted from the fire, and the skillets emptied of their bread—the
+contents of the former poured in large flat pans, while pannikins were
+filled with smoking coffee. The two trappers needed no second
+invitation, but, seizing each a panful of steaming stew, drew the
+butcher knives from their belts, and fell to lustily—the hospitable
+Scotchman plying them with more and more, and administering corrective
+noggins of brandy the while; until at last they were fain to cry enough,
+wiped their knives on the grass, and placed them in their sheaths—a sign
+that human nature could no more. How can pen describe the luxury of the
+smoke that followed, to lips which had not kissed pipe for many months,
+and how the fragrant honey-dew from Old Virginia was relishingly puffed!
+
+But the Scotchman’s bounty did not stop here. He soon elicited from the
+lips of the hunters the narrative of their losses and privations, and
+learned that they now, without ammunition and scarcely clothed, were on
+their way to Platte Fort, to hire themselves to the Indian traders in
+order to earn another outfit, wherewith once more to betake themselves
+to their perilous employment of trapping. What was their astonishment to
+see their entertainer presently lay out upon the ground two piles of
+goods, each consisting of a four-point Mackinaw, two tin canisters of
+powder, with corresponding lead and flints, a pair of mocassins, a
+shirt, and sufficient buckskin to make a pair of pantaloons; and how
+much the more was the wonder increased when two excellent Indian horses
+were presently lassoed from the cavallada, and with mountain saddle,
+bridle, and lariats complete, together with the two piles of goods
+described, presented to them “on the prairie” or “gift-free,” by the
+kindhearted stranger, who would not even listen to thanks for the most
+timely and invaluable present.
+
+Once more equipped, our two hunters, filled with good brandy and fat
+buffalo meat, again wended on their way; their late entertainers
+continuing their pleasure trip across the gap of the South Pass,
+intending to visit the Great Salt Lake, or Timponogos, of the West. The
+former were bound for the North Fork of the Platte, with the intention
+of joining one of the numerous trapping parties which rendezvous at the
+American Fur Company’s post on that branch of the river. On a fork of
+Sweet Water, however, not two days after the meeting with the
+Scotchman’s waggons, they encountered a band of a dozen mountaineers,
+mounted on fine horses, and well armed and equipped, travelling along
+without the usual accompaniment of a mulada of pack-animals, two or
+three mules alone being packed with meat and spare ammunition. The band
+was proceeding at a smart rate, the horses moving with the gait peculiar
+to American animals, known as “_pacing_” or “_racking_,” in Indian
+file—each of the mountaineers with a long heavy rifle resting across the
+horn of his saddle. Amongst them our two friends recognised Markhead,
+who had been of the party dispersed months before by the Blackfeet on
+one of the head streams of the Yellow Stone, which event had been the
+origin of the dire sufferings of Killbuck and La Bonté. Markhead, after
+running the gauntlet of numerous Indians, through the midst of whose
+country he passed with his usual temerity and utter disregard to danger,
+suffering hunger, thirst, and cold—those every-day experiences of
+mountain life—riddled with balls, but with three scalps hanging from his
+belt, made his way to a rendezvous on Bear River, whence he struck out
+for the Platte in early spring, in time to join the band he now
+accompanied, who were on a horse-stealing expedition to the Missions of
+Upper California. Little persuasion did either Killbuck or La Bonté
+require to join the sturdy freebooters. In five minutes they had gone
+“files-about,” and at sundown were camping on the well-timbered bottom
+of “Little Sandy,” feasting once more on delicate hump-rib and tender
+loin.
+
+For California, ho!
+
+Fourteen good rifles in the hands of fourteen mountain men, stout and
+true, on fourteen strong horses, of true Indian blood and
+training—fourteen cool heads, with fourteen pairs of keen eyes in them,
+each head crafty as an Indian’s, directing a right arm strong as steel,
+and a heart as brave as grizzly bear’s. Before them a thousand miles of
+dreary desert or wilderness, overrun by hostile savages, thirsting for
+the white man’s blood; famine and drought, the arrows of wily hordes of
+Indians—and, these dangers past, the invasion of the civilised
+settlements of whites, the least numerous of which contained ten times
+their number of armed and bitter enemies,—the sudden swoop upon their
+countless herds of mules and horses, the fierce attack and bloody
+slaughter;—such were the consequences of the expedition these bold
+mountaineers were now engaged in. Fourteen lives of any fourteen enemies
+who would be rash enough to stay them, were, any day you will, carried
+in the rifle barrels of these stout fellows; who, in all the proud
+consciousness of their physical qualities, neither thought, nor cared to
+think, of future perils; and rode merrily on their way, rejoicing in the
+dangers they must necessarily meet. Never a more daring band crossed the
+mountains; a more than ordinary want of caution characterised their
+march, and dangers were recklessly and needlessly invited, which even
+the older and more cold-blooded mountaineers seemed not to care to
+avoid. They had, each and all, many a debt to pay the marauding Indians.
+Grudges for many privations, for wounds and loss of comrades, rankled in
+their breasts; and not one but had suffered more or less in property and
+person at the hands of the savages, within a few short months. Threats
+of vengeance on every Redskin they met were loud and deep; and the wild
+war-songs round their nightly camp-fires, and grotesque scalp-dances,
+borrowed from the Indians, proved to the initiated that they were, one
+and all, “half-froze for hair.” Soon after Killbuck and La Bonté joined
+them, they one day suddenly surprised a band of twenty Sioux, scattered
+on a small prairie and butchering some buffalo they had just killed.
+Before they could escape, the whites were upon them with loud shouts,
+and in three minutes the scalps of eleven were dangling from their
+saddle-horns.
+
+Struggling up mountains, slipping down precipices, dashing over prairies
+which resounded with their Indian songs, charging the Indians wherever
+they met them, and without regard to their numbers; frightening with
+their lusty war-whoops the miserable Diggers, who were not unfrequently
+surprised while gathering roots in the mountain plains, and who,
+scrambling up the rocks and concealing themselves, like sage rabbits, in
+holes and corners, peered, chattering with fear, as the wild and noisy
+troop rode by. Scarce drawing rein, they passed rapidly the heads of
+Green and Grand Rivers, through a country abounding in game and in
+excellent pasture; encountering in the upland valleys, through which
+meandered the well-timbered creeks on which they made their daily camps,
+many a band of Yutahs, through whom they dashed at random, caring not
+whether they were friends or foes. Passing many other heads of streams,
+they struck at last the edge of the desert, lying along the
+south-eastern base of the Great Salt Lake, and which extends in almost
+unbroken sterility to the foot of the range of the Sierra Nevada—a
+mountain chain, capped with perpetual snow, that bounds the northern
+extremity of a singular tract of country, walled by mountains and
+utterly desert, whose salt lagoons and lakes, although fed by many
+streams, find no outlet to the ocean, but are absorbed in the spongy
+soil or thirsty sand, which characterise the different portions of this
+deserted tract. In the “Grand Basin,” it is reported, neither human nor
+animal life can be supported. No oases cheer the wanderer in the
+unbroken solitude of the vast wilderness. More than once the lone
+trapper has penetrated, with hardy enterprise, into the salt plains of
+the basin; but no signs of beaver or fur-bearing animal rewarded the
+attempt. The ground is scantily covered with coarse unwholesome grass
+that mules and horses refuse to eat; and the water of the springs,
+impregnated with the impurities of the soil through which it percolates,
+affords but nauseating draughts to the thirsty traveller.
+
+In passing from the more fertile uplands to the lower plains, as they
+descended the streams, the timber on their banks became scarcer, and the
+groves more scattered. The rich buffalo or _grama_ grass was exchanged
+for a coarser species, on which the hard-worked animals soon grew poor
+and weak. The thickets of plum and cherry, of box-alder and quaking-ash,
+which had hitherto fringed the creeks, and where the deer and bear loved
+to resort—the former to browse on the leaves and tender shoots, the
+latter to devour the fruit—now entirely disappeared, and the only shrub
+seen was the eternal sage bush, which flourishes every where in the
+western regions in uncongenial soils where other vegetation refuses to
+grow. The visible change in the scenery had also a sensible effect on
+the spirits of the mountaineers. They travelled on in silence through
+the deserted plains; the hi-hi-hiya of their Indian chants was no longer
+heard enlivening the line of march. More than once a Digger of the
+Pi-yutah tribe took himself and hair, in safety, from their path, and
+almost unnoticed; but as they advanced they became more cautious in
+their movements, and testified, by the vigilant watch they kept, that
+they anticipated hostile attacks even in these arid wastes. They had
+passed without molestation through the country infested by the bolder
+Indians. The mountain Yutes, not relishing the appearance of the
+hunters, had left them unmolested; but they were now entering a country
+inhabited by the most degraded and abject of the western tribes; who,
+nevertheless, ever suffering from the extremities of hunger, have their
+brutish wits sharpened by the necessity of procuring food, and rarely
+fail to levy a contribution of rations, of horse or mule flesh, on the
+passenger in their inhospitable country. The brutish cunning and animal
+instinct of these wretches is such, that although arrant cowards, their
+attacks are more feared than those of bolder Indians. These
+people—called the Yamparicas or Root-Diggers—are, nevertheless, the
+degenerate descendants of those tribes which once overran that portion
+of the continent of North America now comprehended within the boundaries
+of Mexico, and who have left such startling evidences in their track of
+a comparatively superior state of civilisation. They now form an outcast
+tribe of the great nation of the Apache, which extends under various
+names from the Great Salt Lake along the table-lands on each side the
+Sierra Madre to the tropic of Cancer, where they merge into what are
+called the Mexican Indians. The whole of this nation is characterised by
+most abject cowardice; and they even refuse to meet the helpless
+Mexicans in open fight—unlike the Yutah or Camanche, who carry bold and
+open warfare into the territories of their civilised enemy, and never
+shrink from hand to hand encounter. The Apaches and the degenerate
+Diggers pursue a cowardly warfare, hiding in ambush, and shooting the
+passer-by with arrows; or, dashing upon him at night when steeped in
+sleep, they bury their arrow to the feather in his heaving breast. As
+the Mexicans say, “_Sin ventaja, no salen_;” they never attack without
+odds. But they are not the less dangerous enemies on this account; and
+by the small bands of trappers who visit their country, they are the
+more dreaded by reason of this coward and wolfish system of warfare.
+
+To provide against surprise, therefore, as the hunters rode along,
+flankers were extended _en guerilla_ on each side, mounting the high
+points to reconnoitre the country, and keeping a sharp look-out for the
+Indian sign. At night the animals were securely hobbled, and a
+horse-guard posted round them—a service of great danger, as the stealthy
+cat-like Diggers are often known to steal up silently, under cover of
+the darkness, towards the sentinel, shoot him with their arrows, and,
+approaching the animals, cut the hobbles and drive them away unseen.
+
+One night they encamped on a creek where was but little of the coarsest
+pasture, and that little scattered here and there; so that they were
+compelled to allow their animals to roam farther than usual from camp in
+search of food. Four of the hunters, however, accompanied them to guard
+against surprise; whilst but half of those in camp laid down to sleep,
+the others, with rifles in their hands, remaining prepared for any
+emergencies. This day they had killed one of their two pack mules for
+food, game not having been met with for several days; but the animal was
+so poor, that it scarcely afforded more than one tolerable meal to the
+whole party.
+
+A short time before the dawn of day an alarm was given; the animals were
+heard to snort violently; a loud shout was heard, followed by the sharp
+crack of a rifle, and the tramp of galloping horses plainly showed that
+a stampede had been effected. The whites instantly sprang to their arms,
+and rushed in the direction of the sounds. The body of the cavallada,
+however, had luckily turned, and, being headed by the mountaineers, were
+surrounded and secured, with the loss of only three, which had probably
+been mounted by the Indians.
+
+Day breaking soon after, one of their band was discovered to be missing;
+and it was then found that a man who had been standing horse-guard at
+the time of the attack, had not come into camp with his companions. At
+that moment a thin spiral column of smoke was seen to rise from the
+banks of the creek, telling but too surely the fate of the missing
+mountaineer. It was the signal of the Indians to their people that a
+“_coup_” had been struck, and that an enemy’s scalp remained in their
+triumphant hands.
+
+“H——!” exclaimed the trappers in a breath; and soon imprecations and
+threats of revenge, loud and deep, were showered upon the heads of the
+treacherous Indians. Some of the party rushed to the spot where the
+guard had stood, and there lay the body of their comrade, pierced with
+lance and arrow, the scalp gone, and the body otherwise mutilated in a
+barbarous manner. Five were quickly in the saddle, mounted upon the
+strongest horses, and flying along the track of the Indians, who had
+made off towards the mountains with their prize and booty. We will not
+follow them in their work of bloody vengeance, save by saying that they
+followed the savages to their village, into which they charged headlong,
+recovered their stolen horses, and returned to camp at sundown with
+thirteen scalps dangling from their rifles, in payment for the loss of
+their unfortunate companion.[4]
+
+In their further advance, hunger and thirst were their daily companions;
+they were compelled to kill several of their animals for food, but were
+fortunate enough to replace them by a stroke of good luck in meeting a
+party of Indians returning from an excursion against one of the
+Californian settlements with a tolerably large band of horses. Our
+hunters met this band one fine morning, and dashed into the midst at
+once; half a dozen Indians bit the dust, and twenty horses were turned
+over from red to white masters in as many seconds, which remounted those
+whose animals had been eaten, and enabled the others to exchange their
+worn-out steeds for fresh ones. This fortunate event was considered a
+_coup_, and the event was celebrated by the slaughter of a fat young
+horse, which furnished an excellent supper that night—a memorable event
+in these starveling regions.
+
+They were now devouring their horses and mules at the rate of one every
+alternate day; for, so poor were the animals, that one scarcely
+furnished an ample meal for the thirteen hungry hunters. They were once
+more reduced to the animals they rode on; and after a fast of
+twenty-four hours’ duration, were debating on the propriety of drawing
+lots as to whose Rosinante should fill the kettle, when some Indians
+suddenly appeared making signs of peace upon the bluff, and indicating a
+disposition to enter the camp for the purpose of trading. Being invited
+to approach, they offered to trade a few dressed elk-skins; but being
+asked for meat, they said that their village was a long way off, and
+they had nothing with them but a small portion of some game they had
+lately killed. When requested to produce this, they hesitated, but the
+trappers looking hungry and angry at the same moment, an old Indian drew
+from under his blanket several flaps of portable dried meat which he
+declared was bear’s. It was but a small ration amongst so many; but,
+being divided, was quickly laid upon the fire to broil. The meat was
+stringy, and of whitish colour, altogether unlike any flesh the trappers
+had before eaten. Killbuck was the first to discover this. He had been
+quietly masticating the last mouthful of his portion, the stringiness of
+which required more than usual dental exertion, when the novelty of the
+flavour struck him as something singular. Suddenly his jaws ceased their
+work, he thought a moment, took the morsel from his mouth, looked at it
+intently, and dashed it into the fire.
+
+“Man-meat, by G—!” he cried out; and at the words every jaw stopped
+work: the trappers looked at the meat and each other.
+
+“I’m dog-gone if it ain’t!” cried old Walker, looking at his piece, “and
+white meat at that, wagh!” (and report said it was not the first time he
+had tasted such viands;) and the conviction seizing each mind, every
+mouthful was quickly spat into the fire, and the ire of the deceived
+whites was instantly turned upon the luckless providers of the feast.
+They saw the storm that was brewing, and without more ado turned tail
+from the camp, and scuttled up the bluffs, where, turning round, they
+fired a volley of arrows at the tricked mountaineers, and instantly
+disappeared.
+
+However, the desert and its nomade pilferers were at length passed; the
+sandy plains became grass-covered prairies; the monstrous cottonwood on
+the creeks was replaced by oak and ash; the surface of the country grew
+more undulating, and less broken up into cañons and ravines; elk and
+deer leaped in the bottoms, and bands of antelope dotted the plains,
+with occasional troops of wild horses, too wary to allow the approach of
+man. On the banks of a picturesque stream called the San Joaquim, the
+party halted a few days to recruit themselves and animals, feasting the
+while on the fattest of venison and other game. They then struck to the
+south-east for two days, until they reached a branch of the “Las
+Animas,” a clear stream running through a pretty valley, well timbered
+and abounding in game. Here, as they wound along the river-banks, a
+horseman suddenly appeared upon the bluff above them, galloping at a
+furious rate along the edge. His dress approached in some degree to
+civilised attire. A broad-brimmed sombrero surmounted his swarthy face;
+a coloured blanket, through a slit in which his head was thrust, floated
+in the air from his shoulders; leathern leggings encased his lower
+limbs; and huge spurs jingled on his heels. He rode in a high-peaked
+Mexican saddle, his feet thrust in ponderous stirrups, and in his hand
+swung a coil of ready lasso, his only offensive arm. One of the trappers
+knew a little Spanish, and instantly hailed him.
+
+“_Compadre_,” he shouted, “_por onde va?_” The Californian reined in
+suddenly, throwing the horse he rode on its very haunches, and darting
+down the bluff, galloped unhesitatingly into the midst of the hunters.
+
+“_Americanos!_” he exclaimed glancing at them; and continued,
+smiling—“_Y caballos quieren, por eso vienen tan lejitos. Jesus, que
+mala gente!_” “It’s horses you want, and for this you come all this way.
+Ah, what rogues you are!”
+
+He was an Indian, employed at the Mission of San Fernando, distant three
+days’ journey from their present position, and was now searching for a
+band of horses and mules which had strayed. San Fernando, it appeared,
+had once before been visited by a party of mountain free-traders, and
+the Indian therefore divined the object of the present one. He was, he
+told them, “_un Indio, pero mansito_:” an Indian, but a tame one;[5]
+“_de mas, Christiano_;” a Christian moreover, (exhibiting a small cross
+which hung round his neck.) There were many people about the mission, he
+said, who knew how to fight, and had plenty of arms; and there were
+enough to “eat up” the “_Americanos, sin frijoles_,” without beans, as
+he facetiously observed. For his part, however, he was very friendly to
+the _Americanos_; he had once met a man of that nation who was a good
+sort of fellow, and had made him a present of tobacco, of which he was
+particularly fond. Finding this hint did not take, he said that the
+horses and mules belonging to the mission were innumerable—“like that,”
+he added, sweeping his hand to all points of the compass over the plain,
+to intimate that they would cover that extent; and he could point out a
+large herd grazing nearer at hand than the mission, and guarded but by
+three _vaqueros_. Regaled with venison, and with a smoke of his coveted
+tobacco, he rode off, and made his way to the mission without delay;
+conveying the startling intelligence that a thousand Americans were upon
+them.
+
+The next morning the thirteen doughty mountaineers quietly resumed their
+journey, moving leisurely along towards the object of their expedition.
+
+It will not be out of place here to digress a little, in order to
+describe the singular features of the establishments formed in those
+remote regions by the Catholic church, as nuclei round which to
+concentrate the wandering tribes that inhabit the country, with a view
+to give them the benefit of civilised example, and to wean them from
+their restless nomadic habits.
+
+The establishment of missions in Upper California is coeval with the
+first settlement of Southern Mexico. No sooner had Spanish rule taken a
+firm foothold in the Aztec empire, than the avowed primary object of the
+military expedition began to be carried into effect. “To save the souls”
+of the savage and barbarous subjects of their most Catholic majesties
+was ever inculcated upon the governors of the conquered country as the
+grand object to be sought after, as soon as tranquillity was partially
+restored by the submission of the Mexicans; and the cross, the sacred
+emblem of the Catholic faith, was to be upraised in the remotest corners
+of the country, and the natives instructed and compelled to worship it,
+in lieu of the grotesque images of their own idolatrous religion.
+
+To carry into effect these orthodox instructions, troops of pious
+priests, of friars and monks of every order, and even of saintly nuns,
+followed in the wake of the victorious armies of Cortez; and girding up
+their loins with zealous fervour and enthusiasm, and with an enterprise
+and hardihood worthy of buccaneers, they pushed their adventurous way
+far into the bowels of the land, preaching devoutly and with commendable
+perseverance to savages who did not understand a syllable of what they
+so eloquently discoursed; and returning, after the lapse of many months
+passed in this first attempt, with glowing accounts of the “_muy buen
+indole_,” the very ductile disposition of the savages, and of the
+thousands they had converted to “_la santa fé catolica_.”
+
+Ferdinand and Isabel, of glorious memory, at once beat up for
+volunteers. Crowds of Franciscan monks, greasy Capuchinos, and nuns of
+orthodox odour, joined the band; and saints even of the feminine gender,
+long since canonised and up aloft amongst the goodly muster of saints
+and martyrs, put foot once more on _terra firma_, and, rosary in hand,
+crossed the seas to participate in the good work. As proof of this
+latter fact, one Venabides, a Franciscan, whose veracity is beyond
+impeachment, declared that, while preaching in the regions now known as
+New Mexico, one million Indians from the “rumbo” known as Cibolo, a
+mighty nation, approached his temporary pulpit on the Rio Grande, and
+requested in a body the favour of being baptised. Struck with the
+singularity of this request from Indians with whom he had as yet held no
+communication, and with conscientious scruple as to whether he would be
+justified in performing such ceremony without their having received
+previous instruction, he hesitated a few moments before making an
+answer. At this juncture, the Indians espied a medallion which hung
+around his neck, bearing the effigy of a certain saint of extraordinary
+virtue. At sight of this they fell on their knees before it; and it was
+some time before they found words (in what language does not appear) to
+explain to the holy father that the original of that effigy, which hung
+pendant from his neck, had been long amongst them instructing them in
+the elements of the Christian religion, and had only lately disappeared;
+informing them that certain reverend men would shortly appear in the
+land, who would finish the good work she had devoutly commenced, and
+clench the business by baptising the one million miserable sinners who
+now knelt before El Padre Venabides.
+
+“Valgame Dios!” reverently exclaimed that worthy man, “qui milagro es
+este;” [what a miracle is this I hear;] and casting up his eyes, and
+speaking slowly, as if he weighed every word, and taxing his memory of
+the historical calendar of saints, continued,—
+
+“_Se murió—aquella—santissima—muger—en el ano 175—es decir—ya
+hacen—mil—quatro—cientos—anos._” [That most holy woman died in the year
+175, that is to say, one thousand four hundred years ago.]
+
+“Oh, what a strange thing is this!” the padre continues devoutly. “After
+so many ages spent in heaven in company of the angels, of most holy men,
+and of virgins the most pure; and, perhaps, also in the company of my
+worthy and esteemed friend and patron Don Vincente Carvajal y Calvo, who
+died a few years ago in San Lucar of Xeres, (bequeathing me certain
+arrobas of dry wine, of a class I greatly esteem,—for which act he
+deserved to be canonised, and, I have no doubt, is,) the said Don
+Vincente Carvajal y Calvo being, moreover, a man of the purest and
+holiest thoughts, (Dios mio! what a puchero that man always had on his
+table!) this holy woman comes here—to these wild and remote regions;
+this holy woman, (who died fifteen hundred years ago,) abandoning the
+company of angels, of holy men, and sanctified women and virgins, and
+also of Don Vincente Carvajal y Calvo, (that worthy man!)—comes here, I
+say, where there are neither pucheros, nor garbanzos, nor dry wine, nor
+sweet wine, neither of Xeres, nor of Val de Peñas, nor of Peralta;
+where” (sobbed the padre, and bellowed the last word) “there is—nothing
+either to eat or to drink. Valgame Purissima Maria! And what is the name
+of this holy woman? the world will ask,” continues Venabides. “Santa
+Clara of Carmona is her name, one well known in my native country, who
+leaves heaven and all its joys, wends her way to the distant wilds of
+New Spain, and spends years in inducting the savage people to the holy
+faith. Truly a pious work, and pleasing to God!”[6]
+
+Thus spoke Venabides the Franciscan, and no doubt he believed what he
+said; and many others in Old Spain were fools enough to believe it too,
+for the shaven heads flocked over in greater numbers, and the cry was
+ever “still they come.”
+
+Along the whole extent of the table-lands, not an Indian tribe but was
+speedily visited by the preaching friars and monks; and, in less than a
+century after the conquest of Mexico by the Spaniards, these hardy and
+enthusiastic frayles had pushed their way into the inhospitable regions
+of New Mexico, nearly two thousand miles distant from the valley of
+Anahuac. How they succeeded in surmounting the natural obstacles
+presented by the wild and barren deserts they traversed; how they
+escaped the infinite peril they encountered at every step, at the hands
+of the savage inhabitants of the country, with whose language they were
+totally unacquainted, is sufficient puzzle to those who, in the present
+day, have attempted a journey in the same regions.
+
+However, it is impossible not to admire the hardihood of these holy
+pioneers of civilisation, who, totally unfitted by their former mode of
+life for undergoing such hardships as they must have anticipated, threw
+themselves into the wilderness with fearless and stubborn zeal.
+
+For the most part, however, they found the Indians exceedingly
+hospitable and well disposed; and it was not until some time after—when,
+receiving from the missionary monks glowing, and not always very
+truthful accounts of the riches of the country in which they had located
+themselves, the governors of Mexico despatched armed expeditions under
+adventurous desperadoes to take and retain possession of the said
+country, with orders to compel the submission of the native tribes, and
+enforce their obedience to the authority of the whites—that the simple
+and confiding Indians began to see the folly they had committed in
+permitting the residence amongst them of these superior beings, whom
+they had first looked upon as more than mortal, but who, when strong
+enough to do so, were not long in throwing off the mask, and proving to
+the simple savages that they were much “more human than divine.”
+
+Thus, in the province of New Mexico, Fray Augustin Ruiz, with his
+co-preachers Marcos and Venabides, were kindly received by the native
+inhabitants, and we have seen how one million (?) Indians came from the
+“rumbo” of the Cibolo, ready and willing to receive the baptismal
+sacrament. This Cibolo, or Sivulo, as it is written in some old MSS.,
+is, by the way, mysteriously alluded to by the monkish historians who
+have written on this region, as being a kingdom inhabited by a very
+superior class of Indians to any met with between Anahuac and the Vale
+of Taos—in the enjoyment of a high state of civilisation, inhabiting a
+well-built city, the houses of which were three stories high, and having
+attained considerable perfection in the domestic arts. This,
+notwithstanding the authority of Don Francisco Vasquez Coronado, who
+visited Cibolo, and of Solis and Venegas, who have guaranteed the
+assertion, must be received _cum grano salis_; but, at all events, the
+civilisation of the mysterious Cibolo may be compared to that of the
+Aztec empire, under Montezuma, at the time of the Spanish Conquest, both
+being egregiously exaggerated by the historians of the day. Cibolo was
+situated on a river called Tegue. At this day, neither name is known to
+the inhabitants of New Mexico. If pate-shaven Venabides had held his
+tongue, New Mexico might now be in the peaceful possession of the
+Catholic Missions, and the property of the Church of Mexico pretty
+considerably enhanced by the valuable _placeres_, or gold washings,
+which abound in that province. Full, however, of the wonderful miracle
+of Santa Clara of Carmona, which had been brought to light through the
+agency of the medallion at the end of his rosario, Fray Venabides must
+needs return to Spain, and humbug poor old Fernando, and even the more
+sensible Isabel, with wonderful accounts of the riches of the country he
+had been instrumental in exploring, and of the excellent disposition of
+the natives to receive the word of God. Don Juan Oñate was, therefore,
+quickly despatched to take possession; and in his train followed twelve
+Castilian families of _sangre azul_, to colonise the newly-acquired
+territory. The names of these still remain, disgraced by the degenerate
+wretches who now bear them, but in whom scarce a drop of blood remains
+which ever filtered from the veins of the paladins of Old Castile.
+
+Then commenced the troublous times. The missions were upheld by dint of
+steel alone; and, on every occasion, the Indians rose, and often
+massacred their white persecutors. The colonists were more than once
+driven bodily from New Mexico, and were only reinstated by the aid of
+large bodies of armed men.
+
+In California, however, they managed these things better. The wily monks
+took care to keep all interlopers from the country, established
+themselves in snug quarters, instructed the Indians in agriculture, and
+soon gained such an ascendency over them, that no difficulty was
+experienced in keeping them under proper and wholesome restraint. Strong
+and commodious missions were built and fortified, well stored with arms
+and ammunition, and containing sufficient defenders to defy attack.
+Luxuriant gardens and thriving vineyards soon surrounded these isolated
+stations: the plains waved with golden corn; whilst domestic cattle,
+thriving on the rich pasture, and roaming far and near, multiplied and
+increased a hundred-fold.
+
+Nothing can be more beautiful than the appearance of one of these
+missions, to the traveller who has lately passed the arid and barren
+wilderness of the North-west. The _adobe_ walls of the convent-looking
+building, surmounted by cross and belfry, are generally hidden in a mass
+of luxuriant vegetation. Fig-trees, bananas, cherry, and apple,
+leaf-spreading platanos, and groves of olives, form umbrageous vistas,
+under which the sleek monks delight to wander; gardens, cultivated by
+their own hands, testify to the horticultural skill of the worthy
+padres; whilst vineyards yield their grateful produce to gladden the
+hearts of the holy exiles in these western solitudes. Vast herds of
+cattle roam half-wild on the plains, and bands of mules and horses,
+whose fame has even reached the distant table-lands of the Rocky
+Mountains, and excited the covetousness of the hunters—and thousands of
+which, from the day they are foaled to that of their death, never feel a
+saddle on their backs—cover the country. Indians (Mansitos) idle round
+the skirts of these vast herds, (whose very numbers keep them together,)
+living, at their own choice, upon the flesh of mule, or ox, or horse.
+
+
+
+
+                         THE CAXTONS.—PART VI.
+
+
+                             CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+“I don’t know that,” said my father.
+
+“What is it my father does not know? My father does not know that
+happiness is our being’s end and aim.”
+
+And pertinent to what does my father reply, by words so sceptical, to an
+assertion so little disputed?
+
+Reader, Mr Trevanion has been half-an-hour seated in our little
+drawing-room. He has received two cups of tea from my mother’s fair
+hand; he has made himself at home. With Mr Trevanion has come another
+old friend of my father’s, whom he has not seen since he left
+college—Sir Sedley Beaudesert.
+
+Now, you must understand that it is a warm night, a little after nine
+o’clock—a night between departing summer and approaching autumn—the
+windows are open—we have a balcony, which my mother has taken care to
+fill with flowers—the air, though we are in London, is sweet and
+fresh—the street quiet, except that an occasional carriage or hackney
+cabriolet rolls rapidly by—a few stealthy passengers pass to and fro
+noiselessly on their way homeward. We are on classic ground—near that
+old and venerable Museum, the dark monastic pile, with its learned
+treasures, which the taste of the age had spared then—and the quiet of
+the temple seems to hallow the precincts; Captain Roland is seated by
+the fireplace, and though there is no fire, he is shading his face with
+a handscreen; my father and Mr Trevanion have drawn their chairs close
+to each other in the middle of the room; Sir Sedley Beaudesert leans
+against the wall near the window, and behind my mother, who looks
+prettier and more pleased than usual, since her Austin has his old
+friends about him; and I, leaning my elbow on the table, and my chin
+upon my hand, am gazing with great admiration on Sir Sedley Beaudesert.
+
+O rare specimen of a race fast decaying!—specimen of the true fine
+gentleman, ere the word dandy was known, and before exquisite became a
+noun substantive—let me here pause to describe thee! Sir Sedley
+Beaudesert was the contemporary of Trevanion and my father; but, without
+affecting to be young, he still seemed so. Dress, tone, look, manner—all
+were young—yet all had a certain dignity which does not belong to youth.
+At the age of five-and-twenty, he had won what would have been fame to a
+French marquis of the old regime, viz.—he was “the most charming man of
+his day”—the most popular with our sex—the most favoured, my dear lady
+reader, with yours. It is a mistake, I believe, to suppose that it does
+not require talent to become the fashion; at all events, Sir Sedley was
+the fashion, and he had talent. He had travelled much, he had read
+much—especially in memoirs, history, and belles-lettres—he made verses
+with grace and a certain originality of easy wit and courtly
+sentiment—he conversed delightfully—he was polished and urbane in
+manner—he was brave and honourable in conduct; in words he could
+flatter—in deeds he was sincere.
+
+Sir Sedley Beaudesert had never married. Whatever his years, he was
+still young enough in looks to be married for love. He was high-born, he
+was rich; he was, as I have said, popular; yet on his fair features
+there was an expression of melancholy; and on that forehead—pure from
+the lines of ambition, and free from the weight of study—there was the
+shadow of unmistakeable regret.
+
+“I don’t know that,” said my father; “I have never yet found in life one
+man who made happiness his end and aim. One wants to gain a fortune,
+another to spend it—one to get a place, another to build a name; but
+they all know very well that it is not happiness they search for. No
+Utilitarian was ever actuated by self-interest, poor man, when he sate
+down to scribble his unpopular crochets to prove self-interest
+universal. And as to that notable distinction—between self-interest
+vulgar and self-interest enlightened—the more the self-interest is
+enlightened, the less we are influenced by it. If you tell the young man
+who has just written a fine book or made a fine speech, that he will not
+be any happier if he attains to the fame of Milton, or the power of
+Pitt, and that, for the sake of his own happiness, he had much better
+cultivate a farm, live in the country, and postpone to the last the days
+of dyspepsia and gout, he will answer you fairly,—‘I am quite as
+sensible of that as you are. But I am not thinking whether or not I
+shall be happy. I have made up my mind to be, if I can, a great author
+or a prime minister.’ So it is with all the active sons of the world. To
+push on is the law of nature. And you can no more say to men and to
+nations than to children,—‘Sit still, and don’t wear out your shoes!’”
+
+“Then,” said Trevanion, “if I tell you I am not happy, your only answer
+is, that I obey an inevitable law.”
+
+“No! I don’t say that it is an inevitable law that man should not be
+happy; but it is an inevitable law that a man, in spite of himself,
+should live for something higher than his own happiness. He cannot live
+in himself or for himself, however egotistical he may try to be. Every
+desire he has links him with others. Man is not a machine—he is a part
+of one.”
+
+“True, brother, he is a soldier, not an army,” said Captain Roland.
+
+“Life is a drama, not a monologue,” pursued my father. “Drama is derived
+from a Greek verb, signifying _to do_. Every actor in the drama has
+something to do, which helps on the progress of the whole: that is the
+object for which the Author created him. Do your part, and let the Great
+Play get on.”
+
+“Ah!” said Trevanion briskly, “but to do the part is the difficulty!
+Every actor helps to the catastrophe, and yet must do his part without
+knowing how all is to end. Shall he help the curtain to fall on a
+tragedy or a comedy? Come, I will tell you the one secret of my public
+life—that which explains all its failure (for, in spite of my position,
+I have failed) and its regrets—_I want conviction!_”
+
+“Exactly,” said my father; “because to every question there are two
+sides, and you look at them both.”
+
+“You have said it,” answered Trevanion, smiling also. “For public life a
+man should be one-sided; he must act with a party; and a party insists
+that the shield is silver, when, if it will take the trouble to turn the
+corner, it will see that the reverse of the shield is gold. Wo to the
+man who makes that discovery alone, while his party are still swearing
+the shield is silver, and that not once in his life, but every night!”
+
+“You have said quite enough to convince me that you ought not to belong
+to a party, but not enough to convince me why you should not be happy,”
+said my father.
+
+“Do you remember,” said Sir Sedley Beaudesert, “an anecdote of the first
+Duke of Portland? He had a gallery in the great stable of his villa in
+Holland, where a concert was given once a-week, to _cheer and amuse_ his
+horses! I have no doubt the horses thrived all the better for it. What
+Trevanion wants is a concert once a-week. With him it is always saddle
+and spur. Yet, after all, who would not envy him? If life be a drama,
+his name stands high in the playbill, and is printed in capitals on the
+walls.”
+
+“Envy ME!” cried Trevanion—“ME!—no, you are the enviable man—you who
+have only one grief in the world, and that so absurd a one, that I will
+make you blush by disclosing it. Hear, O sage Austin!—O sturdy
+Roland!—Olivares was haunted by a spectre, and Sedley Beaudesert by the
+dread of old age!”
+
+“Well,” said my mother seriously, “I do think it requires a great sense
+of religion, or, at all events, children of one’s own, in whom one is
+young again, to reconcile one’s-self to becoming old.”
+
+“My dear ma’am,” said Sir Sedley, who had slightly coloured at
+Trevanion’s charge, but had now recovered his easy self-possession, “you
+have spoken so admirably that you give me courage to confess my
+weakness. I do dread to be old. All the joys of my life have been the
+joys of youth. I have had so exquisite a pleasure in the mere sense of
+living, that old age, as it comes near, terrifies me by its dull eyes
+and gray hairs. I have lived the life of the butterfly. Summer is over,
+and I see my flowers withering; and my wings are chilled by the first
+airs of winter. Yes, I envy Trevanion; for, in public life, no man is
+ever young; and while he can work he is never old.”
+
+“My dear Beaudesert,” said my father, “when St Amable, patron saint of
+Riom, in Auvergne, went to Rome, the sun waited upon him as a servant,
+carried his cloak and gloves for him in the heat, and kept off the rain,
+if the weather changed, like an umbrella. You want to put the sun to the
+same use; you are quite right; but then, you see, you must first be a
+saint before you can be sure of the sun as a servant.”
+
+Sir Sedley smiled charmingly; but the smile changed to a sigh as he
+added, “I don’t think I should much mind being a saint if the sun would
+be my sentinel instead of my courier. I want nothing of him but to stand
+still. You see he moved even for St Amable. My dear madam, you and I
+understand each other; and it is a very hard thing to grow old, do what
+one will to keep young.”
+
+“What say you, Roland, of these two malcontents?” asked my father. The
+Captain turned uneasily in his chair, for the rheumatism was gnawing his
+shoulder, and sharp pains were shooting through his mutilated limb.
+
+“I say,” answered Roland, “that these men are wearied with marching from
+Brentford to Windsor—that they have never known the bivouac and the
+battle.”
+
+Both the grumblers turned their eyes to the veteran: the eyes rested
+first on the furrowed, care-worn lines on his eagle face—then they fell
+on the stiff, outstretched cork limb—and then they turned away.
+
+Meanwhile my mother had softly risen, and, under pretence of looking for
+her work on the table near him, bent over the old soldier, and pressed
+his hand.
+
+“Gentlemen,” said my father, “I don’t think my brother ever heard of
+Nichocorus, the Greek comic writer; yet he has illustrated him very
+ably. Saith Nichocorus, ‘the best cure for drunkenness is a sudden
+calamity.’ For chronic drunkenness, a continued course of real
+misfortune must be very salutary!”
+
+No answer came from the two complainants; and my father took up a great
+book.
+
+
+                              CHAPTER XIX.
+
+“My friends,” said my father, looking up from his book, and addressing
+himself to his two visitors, “I know of one thing, milder than calamity,
+that would do you both a great deal of good.”
+
+“What is that?” asked Sir Sedley.
+
+“A saffron bag, worn at the pit of the stomach!”
+
+“Austin, my dear!” said my mother reprovingly.
+
+My father did not heed the interruption, but continued gravely,—“Nothing
+is better for the spirits! Roland is in no want of saffron, because he
+is a warrior; and the desire of fighting, and the hope of victory,
+infuse such a heat into the spirits as is profitable for long life, and
+keeps up the system.”
+
+“Tut!” said Trevanion.
+
+“But gentlemen in your predicament must have recourse to artificial
+means. Nitre in broth, for instance—about three grains to ten—(cattle
+fed upon nitre grow fat); or earthy odours—such as exist in cucumbers
+and cabbage. A certain great lord had a clod of fresh earth, laid in a
+napkin, put under his nose every morning after sleep. Light anointing of
+the head with oil, mixed with roses and salt, is not bad; but, upon the
+whole, I prescribe the saffron bag at the”—
+
+“Sisty, my dear, will you look for my scissors?” said my mother.
+
+“What nonsense are you talking! Question, question!” cried Mr Trevanion.
+
+“Nonsense!” exclaimed my father, opening his eyes; “I am giving you the
+advice of Lord Bacon.—You want conviction—conviction comes from
+passion—passion from the spirits—spirits from a saffron bag. You,
+Beaudesert, on the other hand, want to keep youth. He keeps youth
+longest who lives longest. Nothing more conduces to longevity than a
+saffron bag, provided always it is worn at the”—
+
+“Sisty, my thimble!” said my mother.
+
+“You laugh at us justly,” said Beaudesert, smiling; “and the same
+remedy, I dare say, would cure us both!”
+
+“Yes,” said my father, “there is no doubt of that. In the pit of the
+stomach is that great central web of nerves called the ganglions; thence
+they affect the head and the heart. Mr Squills proved that to us,
+Sisty.”
+
+“Yes,” said I; “but I never heard Mr Squills talk of a saffron bag.”
+
+“Oh, foolish boy! it is not the saffron bag—it is the belief in the
+saffron bag. Apply BELIEF to the centre of the nerves, and all will go
+well,” said my father.
+
+
+                              CHAPTER XX.
+
+“But it is a devil of a thing to have too nice a conscience!” quoth the
+member of Parliament.
+
+“And it is not an angel of a thing to lose one’s front teeth!” sighed
+the fine gentleman.
+
+Therewith my father rose, and, putting his hand into his waistcoat,
+_more suo_, delivered his famous
+
+          SERMON UPON THE CONNEXION BETWEEN FAITH AND PURPOSE.
+
+Famous it was in our domestic circle. But as yet, it has not gone
+beyond. And since the reader, I am sure, does not turn to the Caxton
+memoirs with the expectation of finding sermons, so to that circle let
+its fame be circumscribed. All I shall say about it is, that it was a
+very fine sermon, and that it proved indisputably, to me at least, the
+salubrious effects of a saffron bag applied to the great centre of the
+nervous system. But the wise Ali saith, that “a fool doth not know what
+maketh him look little, neither will he hearken to him that adviseth
+him.” I cannot assert that my father’s friends were fools, but they
+certainly came under this definition of Folly.
+
+
+                              CHAPTER XXI.
+
+For therewith arose not conviction but discussion; Trevanion was
+logical, Beaudesert sentimental. My father held firm to the saffron bag.
+When James the First dedicated to the Duke of Buckingham his Meditation
+on the Lord’s Prayer, he gave a very sensible reason for selecting his
+grace for that honour,—“For,” (saith the king) “it is made upon a very
+short and plaine prayer, and, therefore, the fitter for a courtier, for
+courtiers are for the most part thought neither to have lust nor leisure
+to say long prayers; liking best _courte messe et long disner_.” I
+suppose it was for a similar reason that my father persisted in
+dedicating to the member of parliament and the fine gentleman, this
+“short and plaine” morality of his—to wit, the saffron bag. He was
+evidently persuaded, if he could once get them to apply that, it was all
+that was needful; that they had neither lust nor leisure for longer
+instructions. And this saffron bag,—it came down with such a whack, at
+every round in the argument! You would have thought my father one of the
+old plebeian combatants in the popular ordeal, who, forbidden to use
+sword and lance, fought with a sand-bag tied to a flail: a very stunning
+weapon it was when filled only with sand; but a bag filled with
+saffron,—it was irresistible! Though my father had two to one against
+him, they could not stand such a deuce of a weapon. And after tuts and
+pishes innumerable from Mr Trevanion, and sundry bland grimaces from Sir
+Sedley Beaudesert, they fairly gave in, though they would not own they
+were beaten.
+
+“Enough,” said the member, “I see that you don’t comprehend me; I must
+continue to move by my own impulse.”
+
+My father’s pet book was the Colloquies of Erasmus; he was wont to say
+that those Colloquies furnished life with illustrations in every page.
+Out of the Colloquies of Erasmus he now answered the member:—
+
+“Rabirius, wanting his servant Syrus to get up,” quoth my father, “cried
+out to him to move. ‘I do move,’ said Syrus. ‘I see you move,’ replied
+Rabirius, ‘but you _move nothing_.’ To return to the saffron bag,—”
+
+“Confound the saffron bag!” cried Trevanion in a rage; and then,
+softening his look as he drew on his gloves, he turned to my mother, and
+said, with more politeness than was natural to, or at least customary
+with him:—
+
+“By the way, my dear Mrs Caxton, I should tell you that Lady Ellinor
+comes to town to-morrow, on purpose to call on you. We shall be here
+some little time, Austin; and though London is so empty, there are still
+some persons of note to whom I should like to introduce you, and yours—”
+
+“Nay,” said my father, “your world and my world are not the same. Books
+for me, and men for you. Neither Kitty nor I can change our habits, even
+for friendship; she has a great piece of work to finish, and so have I.
+Mountains cannot stir, especially when in labour; but Mahomet can come
+to the mountain as often as he likes.”
+
+Mr Trevanion insisted, and Sir Sedley Beaudesert mildly put in his own
+claims; both boasted acquaintance with literary men, whom my father
+would, at all events, be pleased to meet. My father doubted whether he
+could meet any literary men more eloquent than Cicero, or more amusing
+than Aristophanes; and observed, that if such did exist, he would rather
+meet them in their books than in a drawing-room. In fine, he was
+immovable; and so also, with less argument, was Captain Roland.
+
+Then Mr Trevanion turned to me.
+
+“Your son, at all events, should see something of the world.”
+
+My mother’s soft eyes sparkled.
+
+“My dear friend, I thank you,” said my father, touched; “and Pisistratus
+and I will talk it over.”
+
+Our guests had departed. All four of us gathered to the open window, and
+enjoyed in silence the cool air and the moonlight.
+
+“Austin,” said my mother at last, “I fear it is for my sake that you
+refuse going amongst your old friends: you knew I should be frightened
+by such fine people, and—”
+
+“And we have been happy for more than eighteen years without them,
+Kitty! My poor friends are not happy, and we are. To leave well alone is
+a golden rule worth all in Pythagoras. The ladies of Bubastis, my dear,
+a place in Egypt where the cat was worshipped, always kept rigidly aloof
+from the gentlemen in Athribis, who adored the shrewmice. Cats are
+domestic animals,—your shrewmice are sad gadabouts: you can’t find a
+better model, my Kitty, than the ladies of Bubastis!”
+
+“How Trevanion is altered!” said Roland, musingly—“he who was so lively
+and ardent!”
+
+“He ran too fast up-hill at first, and has been out of breath ever
+since,” said my father.
+
+“And Lady Ellinor;” said Roland, hesitatingly, “shall you see her
+to-morrow?”
+
+“Yes!” said my father, calmly.
+
+As Captain Roland spoke, something in the tone of his question seemed to
+flash a conviction on my mother’s heart,—the woman there was quick; she
+drew back, turning pale, even in the moonlight, and fixed her eyes on my
+father, while I felt her hand which had clasped mine tremble
+convulsively.
+
+I understood her. Yes, this Lady Ellinor was the early rival whose name
+till then she had not known. She fixed her eyes on my father, and at his
+tranquil tone and quiet look she breathed more freely, and sliding her
+hand from mine rested it fondly on his shoulder. A few moments
+afterwards, I and Captain Roland found ourselves standing alone by the
+window.
+
+“You are young, nephew,” said the Captain; “and you have the name of a
+fallen family to raise. Your father does well not to reject for you that
+opening into the great world which Trevanion offers. As for me, my
+business in London seems over: I cannot find what I came to seek. I have
+sent for my daughter; when she arrives I shall return to my old tower;
+and the man and the ruin will crumble away together.”
+
+“Tush, uncle! I must work hard and get money; and then we will repair
+the old tower, and buy back the old estate. My father shall sell the red
+brick house; we will fit him up a library in the keep; and we will all
+live united, in peace, and in state, as grand as our ancestors before
+us.”
+
+While I thus spoke, my uncle’s eyes were fixed upon a corner of the
+street, where a figure, half in shade half in moonlight, stood
+motionless. “Ah!” said I following his eye, “I have observed that man,
+two or three times, pass up and down the street on the other side of the
+way, and turn his head towards our window. Our guests were with us then,
+and my father in full discourse, or I should have—”
+
+Before I could finish the sentence, my uncle, stifling an exclamation,
+broke away, hurried out of the room, stumped down the stairs, and was in
+the street, while I was yet rooted to the spot with surprise. I remained
+at the window, and my eye rested on the figure. I saw the Captain, with
+his bare head and his gray hair, cross the street; the figure started,
+turned the corner, and fled.
+
+Then I followed my uncle, and arrived in time to save him from falling:
+he leant his head on my breast, and I heard him murmur,—“It is he—it is
+he! He has watched us!—he repents!”
+
+
+                             CHAPTER XXII.
+
+The next day Lady Ellinor called; but to my great disappointment without
+Fanny.
+
+Whether or not some joy at the incident of the previous night had served
+to make my uncle more youthful than usual, I know not, but he looked to
+me ten years younger when Lady Ellinor entered. How carefully the
+buttoned up coat was brushed! how new and glossy was the black stock!
+The poor Captain was restored to his pride, and mighty proud he looked!
+With a glow on his cheek, and a fire in his eye; his head thrown back,
+and his whole air composed, severe, Mavortian and majestic, as if
+awaiting the charge of the French cuirassiers at the head of his
+detachment.
+
+My father, on the contrary, was as usual (till dinner, when he always
+dressed punctiliously, out of respect to his Kitty) in his easy morning
+gown and slippers; and nothing but a certain compression in his lips
+which had lasted all the morning, evinced his anticipation of the visit,
+or the emotion it caused him.
+
+Lady Ellinor behaved beautifully. She could not conceal a certain
+nervous trepidation, when she first took the hand my father extended;
+and, in touching rebuke of the Captain’s stately bow, she held out to
+him the hand left disengaged, with a look which brought Roland at once
+to her side. It was a desertion of his colours to which nothing, short
+of Ney’s shameful conduct at Napoleon’s return from Elba, affords a
+parallel in history. Then, without waiting for introduction, and before
+a word indeed was said, Lady Ellinor came to my mother so cordially, so
+caressingly—she threw into her smile, voice, manner, such winning
+sweetness, that I, intimately learned in my poor mother’s simple loving
+heart, wondered how she refrained from throwing her arms round Lady
+Ellinor’s neck, and kissing her outright. It must have been a great
+conquest over herself not to do it! My turn came next; and talking to
+me, and about me, soon set all parties at their ease—at least
+apparently.
+
+What was said I cannot remember: I do not think one of us could. But an
+hour slipped away, and there was no gap in the conversation.
+
+With curious interest, and a survey I strove to make impartial, I
+compared Lady Ellinor with my mother. And I comprehended the fascination
+the high-born lady must, in their earlier youth, have exercised over
+both brothers, so dissimilar to each other. For _charm_ was the
+characteristic of Lady Ellinor—a charm indefinable. It was not the mere
+grace of refined breeding, though that went a great way; it was a charm
+that seemed to spring from natural sympathy. Whomsoever she addressed,
+that person appeared for the moment to engage all her attention, to
+interest her whole mind. She had a gift of conversation very peculiar.
+She made what she said like a continuation of what was said to her. She
+seemed as if she had entered into your thoughts, and talked them aloud.
+Her mind was evidently cultivated with great care, but she was perfectly
+void of pedantry. A hint, an allusion, sufficed to show how much she
+knew, to one well instructed, without mortifying or perplexing the
+ignorant. Yes, there probably was the only woman my father had ever met
+who could be the companion to his mind, walk through the garden of
+knowledge by his side, and trim the flowers while he cleared the vistas.
+On the other hand, there was an inborn nobility in Lady Ellinor’s
+sentiments that must have struck the most susceptible chord in Roland’s
+nature, and the sentiments took eloquence from the look, the mien, the
+sweet dignity of the very turn of the head. Yes, she must have been a
+fitting Orinda to a young Amadis. It was not hard to see that Lady
+Ellinor was ambitious—that she had a love of fame, for fame itself—that
+she was proud—that she set value (and that morbidly) on the world’s
+opinion. This was perceptible when she spoke of her husband, even of her
+daughter. It seemed to me as if she valued the intellect of the one, the
+beauty of the other, by the gauge of the social distinction or the
+fashionable _éclat_. She took measure of the gift, as I was taught at Dr
+Herman’s to take measure of the height of a tower—by the length of the
+shadow it cast upon the ground.
+
+My dear father, with such a wife you would never have lived eighteen
+years, shivering on the edge of a great book!
+
+My dear uncle, with such a wife you would never have been contented with
+a cork leg and a Waterloo medal! And I understand why Mr Trevanion,
+“eager and ardent” as ye say he was in youth, with a heart bent on the
+practical success of life, won the hand of the heiress. Well, you see Mr
+Trevanion has contrived not to be happy! By the side of my listening,
+admiring mother, with her blue eyes moist, and her coral lips apart,
+Lady Ellinor looks faded. Was she ever as pretty as my mother is now?
+Never. But she was much handsomer. What delicacy in the outline, and yet
+how decided in spite of the delicacy! The eyebrow so defined—the profile
+slightly aquiline, so clearly cut—with the curved nostril, which, if
+physiognomists are right, shows sensibility so keen; and the classic lip
+that, but for that dimple, would be so haughty. But wear and tear are in
+that face. The nervous excitable temper has helped the fret and cark of
+ambitious life. My dear uncle, I know not yet your private life. But as
+for my father, I am sure that, though he might have done more on earth,
+he would have been less fit for heaven, if he had married Lady Ellinor.
+
+At last this visit—dreaded, I am sure, by three of the party, was over,
+but not before I had promised to dine at the Trevanions’ that day.
+
+When we were again alone, my father threw off a long breath, and looking
+round him cheerfully, said, “Since Pisistratus deserts us, let us
+console ourselves for his absence—send for brother Jack, and all four go
+down to Richmond to drink tea.”
+
+“Thank you, Austin,” said Roland. “But I don’t want it, I assure you!”
+
+“Upon your honour?” said my father in a half whisper.
+
+“Upon my honour.”
+
+“Nor I either! So Kitty, Roland, and I will take a walk, and be back in
+time to see if that young Anachronism looks as handsome as his new
+London-made clothes will allow him. Properly speaking, he ought to go
+with an apple in his hand, and a dove in his bosom. But now I think of
+it, that was luckily not the fashion with the Athenians till the time of
+Alcibiades!”
+
+
+                             CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+You may judge of the effect that my dinner at Mr Trevanion’s, with a
+long conversation after it with Lady Ellinor, made upon my mind, when,
+on my return home, after having satisfied all questions of parental
+curiosity, I said nervously, and looking down,—“My dear father,—I should
+like very much, if you have no objection,—to—to—”
+
+“What, my dear?” asked my father kindly.
+
+“Accept an offer Lady Ellinor has made me, on the part of Mr Trevanion.
+He wants a secretary. He is kind enough to excuse my inexperience, and
+declares I shall do very well, and can soon get into his ways. Lady
+Ellinor says (I continued with dignity) that it will be a great opening
+in public life for me; and at all events, my dear father, I shall see
+much of the world, and learn what I really think will be more useful to
+me than any thing they will teach me at college.”
+
+My mother looked anxiously at my father. “It will indeed be a great
+thing for Sisty,” said she timidly; and then taking courage she
+added—“And that is just the sort of life he is formed for—”
+
+“Hem!” said my uncle.
+
+My father rubbed his spectacles thoughtfully, and replied, after a long
+pause,—
+
+“You may be right, Kitty: I don’t think Pisistratus is meant for study;
+action will suit him better. But what does this office lead to?”
+
+“Public employment, sir,” said I boldly; “the service of my country.”
+
+“If that be the case,” quoth Roland, “I have not a word to say. But I
+should have thought that for a lad of spirit, a descendant of the old De
+Caxtons, the army would have—”
+
+“The army!” exclaimed my mother, clasping her hands, and looking
+involuntarily at my uncle’s cork leg.
+
+“The army!” repeated my father peevishly. “Bless my soul, Roland, you
+seem to think man is made for nothing else but to be shot at! You would
+not like the army, Pisistratus?”
+
+“Why, sir, not if it pained you and my dear mother; otherwise, indeed—”
+
+“Papæ!” said my father interrupting me. “This all comes of your giving
+the boy that ambitious, uncomfortable name, Mrs Caxton; what could a
+Pisistratus be but the plague of one’s life? That idea of serving his
+country is Pisistratus ipsissimus all over. If ever I have another son,
+(_Dii meliora!_) he has only got to be called Eratostratus, and then he
+will be burning down St Paul’s; which I believe was, by the way, first
+made out of the stones of the temple of Diana! Of the two, certainly,
+you had better serve your country with a goose-quill than by poking a
+bayonet into the ribs of some unfortunate Indian;—I don’t think there
+are any other people whom the service of one’s country makes it
+necessary to kill just at present,—eh, Roland?”
+
+“It is a very fine field, India,” said my uncle, sententiously. “It is
+the nursery of captains.”
+
+“Is it? Those plants take up a great deal of ground, then, that might be
+more profitably cultivated. And, indeed, considering that the tallest
+captains in the world will be ultimately set into a box not above seven
+feet at the longest, it is astonishing what a quantity of room that
+species of _arbor mortis_ takes in the growing! However, Pisistratus, to
+return to your request, I will think it over, and talk to Trevanion.”
+
+“Or rather to Lady Ellinor,” said I imprudently: my mother slightly
+shivered, and took her hand from mine. I felt cut to the heart by the
+slip of my own tongue.
+
+“That, I think, your mother could do best,” said my father, drily, “if
+she wants to be quite convinced that somebody will see that your shirts
+are aired. For I suppose they mean you to lodge at Trevanion’s.”
+
+“Oh, no!” cried my mother. “He might as well go to college then. I
+thought he was to stay with us; only go in the morning, but, of course,
+sleep here.”
+
+“If I know any thing of Trevanion,” said my father, “his secretary will
+be expected to do without sleep. Poor boy, you don’t know what it is you
+desire. And yet, at your age, I—” my father stopped short. “No!” he
+renewed abruptly, after a long silence, and as if soliloquising. “No,
+man is never wrong while he lives for others. The philosopher who
+contemplates from the rock, is a less noble image than the sailor who
+struggles with the storm. Why should there be two of us? And _could_ he
+be an _alter ego_, even if I wished it? impossible!” My father turned on
+his chair, and, laying the left leg on the right knee, said smilingly,
+as he bent down to look me full in the face; “But, Pisistratus, will you
+promise me always to wear the saffron bag?”
+
+
+                             CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+I now make a long stride in my narrative. I am domesticated with the
+Trevanions. A very short conversation with the statesman sufficed to
+decide my father; and the pith of it lay in this single sentence uttered
+by Trevanion—“I promise you one thing—he shall never be idle!”
+
+Looking back, I am convinced that my father was right, and that he
+understood my character, and the temptations to which I was most prone,
+when he consented to let me resign college and enter thus prematurely on
+the world of men. I was naturally so joyous, that I should have made
+college life a holiday, and then, in repentance, worked myself into a
+phthisis.
+
+And my father, too, was right, that, though I could study, I was not
+meant for a student.
+
+After all, the thing was an experiment. I had time to spare: if the
+experiment failed, a year’s delay would not necessarily be a year’s
+loss.
+
+I am ensconced, then, at Mr Trevanion’s. I have been there some
+months—it is late in the winter—parliament and the season have
+commenced. I work hard—Heaven knows, harder than I should have worked at
+college. Take a day for a sample.
+
+Trevanion gets up at eight o’clock, and in all weathers rides an hour
+before breakfast; at nine he takes that meal in his wife’s
+dressing-room; at half-past nine he comes into his study. By that time
+he expects to find done by his secretary the work I am about to
+describe.
+
+On coming home, or rather before going to bed, which is usually after
+three o’clock, it is Mr Trevanion’s habit to leave on the table of the
+said study a list of directions for the secretary. The following, which
+I take at random from many I have preserved, may show their multifarious
+nature:—
+
+   1. Look out in the Reports—Committee House of Lords for the last
+        seven years—all that is said about the growth of flax—mark the
+        passages for me.
+
+   2. Do. do—“Irish Emigration.”
+
+   3. Hunt out second volume of Kames’s History of Man, passage
+        containing “Reid’s Logic”—don’t know where the book is!
+
+   4. How does the line beginning “Lumina conjurent, inter” something,
+        end? Is it in Gray? See!
+
+   5. Fracastorius writes—“Quantum hoc _infecit_ vitium, quot adiverit
+        urbes.” Query, Ought it not to be—_infecerit_ instead of
+        _infecit_?—if you don’t know, write to father.
+
+   6. Write the four letters in full from the notes I leave, _i.e._
+        about the Ecclesiastical Courts.
+
+   7. Look out Population Returns—strike average of last five years
+        (between mortality and births), in Devonshire and Lancashire.
+
+   8. Answer these six begging-letters; “No”—civilly.
+
+   9. The other six, to constituents—“that I have no interest with
+        Government.”
+
+  10. See, if you have time, whether any of the new books on the round
+        table are not trash.
+
+  11. I want to know ALL about Indian corn!
+
+  12. Longinus says something, somewhere, in regret for uncongenial
+        pursuits, (public life, I suppose)—what is it? N.B. Longinus is
+        not in my London Catalogue, but is here I know—I think in a box
+        in the lumber-room.
+
+  13. Set right the calculation I leave on the poor-rates. I have made a
+        blunder somewhere. &c. &c.
+
+Certainly my father knew Mr Trevanion; he never expected a secretary to
+sleep! To have all the above ready by half-past nine, I get up by
+candle-light. At half-past nine I am still hunting for Longinus, when Mr
+Trevanion comes in with a bundle of letters.
+
+Answers to half the said letters fall to my share. Directions verbal—in
+a species of short-hand talk. While I write, Mr Trevanion reads the
+newspapers—examines what I have done—makes notes therefrom, some for
+Parliament, some for conversation, some for correspondence—skims over
+the Parliamentary papers of the morning—and jots down directions for
+extracting, abridging, and comparing them, with others, perhaps twenty
+years old. At eleven he walks down to a Committee of the House of
+Commons—leaving me plenty to do—till half-past three, when he returns.
+At four, Fanny puts her head into the room—and I lose mine. Four days in
+the week Mr Trevanion then disappears for the rest of the day,—dines at
+Bellamy’s or a club—expects me at the House at eight o’clock, in case he
+thinks of something, wants a fact or a quotation. He then releases
+me—generally with a fresh list of instructions. But I have my holidays,
+nevertheless. On Wednesdays and Saturdays Mr Trevanion gives dinners,
+and I meet the most eminent men of the day—on both sides. For Trevanion
+is on both sides himself—or on no side at all, which comes to the same
+thing. On Tuesdays, Lady Ellinor gives me a ticket for the Opera, and I
+get there at least in time for the ballet. I have already invitations
+enough to balls and soirées, for I am regarded as an only son of great
+expectations. I am treated as becomes a Caxton who has the right, if he
+pleases, to put a De before his name. I have grown very smart. I have
+taken a passion for dress—natural to eighteen. I like every thing I do,
+and every one about me. I am over head and ears in love with Fanny
+Trevanion—who breaks my heart, nevertheless; for she flirts with two
+peers, a life-guardsman, three old members of parliament, Sir Sedley
+Beaudesert, one ambassador, and all his attachés, and, positively, (the
+audacious minx!) with a bishop, in full wig and apron, who, people say,
+means to marry again.
+
+Pisistratus has lost colour and flesh. His mother says he is very much
+improved,—_that_ he takes to be the natural effect produced by Stultz
+and varnished boots. Uncle Jack says he is “fined down.”
+
+His father looks at him, and writes to Trevanion,—
+
+“Dear T.—I refused a salary for my son. Give him a horse, and two hours
+a day to ride it. Yours, A. C.”
+
+The next day I am master of a pretty bay mare, and riding by the side of
+Fanny Trevanion. Alas! alas!
+
+
+                              CHAPTER XXV.
+
+I have not mentioned my Uncle Roland. He is gone—abroad—to fetch his
+daughter. He has stayed longer than was expected. Does he seek his son
+still—there as here? My father has finished the first portion of his
+work, in two great volumes. Uncle Jack, who for some time has been
+looking melancholy, and who now seldom stirs out, except on Sundays, (on
+which days we all meet at my father’s and dine together)—Uncle Jack, I
+say, has undertaken to sell it.
+
+“Don’t be over sanguine,” says Uncle Jack, as he locks up the MS. in two
+red boxes with a slit in the lids, which belonged to one of the defunct
+companies. “Don’t be over sanguine as to the price. These publishers
+never venture much on a first experiment. They must be talked even into
+looking at the book.”
+
+“Oh!” said my father, “if they will publish it at all, and at their own
+risk, I should not stand out for any other terms. ‘Nothing great,’ said
+Dryden, ‘ever came from a venal pen!’”
+
+“An uncommonly foolish observation of Dryden’s,” returned Uncle Jack:
+“he ought to have known better.”
+
+“So he did,” said I, “for he used his pen to fill his pockets—poor man!”
+
+“But the pen was not venal, master Anachronism,” said my father. “A
+baker is not to be called venal if he sells his loaves—he is venal if he
+sells himself: Dryden only sold his loaves.”
+
+“And we must sell yours,” said Uncle Jack emphatically. “A thousand
+pounds a volume will be about the mark, eh?”
+
+“A thousand pounds a volume?” cried my father. “Gibbon, I fancy, did not
+receive more.”
+
+“Very likely; Gibbon had not an Uncle Jack to look after his interests,”
+said Mr Tibbets, laughing, and rubbing those smooth hands of his. “No!
+two thousand pounds the two volumes!—a sacrifice, but still I recommend
+moderation.”
+
+“I should be happy, indeed, if the book brought in any thing,” said my
+father, evidently fascinated—“for that young gentleman is rather
+expensive; and you, my dear Jack;—perhaps half the sum may be of use to
+you!”
+
+“To me! my dear brother,” cried Uncle Jack—“to me! why, when my new
+speculation has succeeded, I shall be a millionnaire!”
+
+“Have you a new speculation, Uncle?” said I anxiously. “What is it?”
+
+“Mum!” said my uncle, putting his finger to his lip, and looking all
+round the room—“Mum!! Mum!!!”
+
+PISISTRATUS.—“A Grand National Company for blowing up both Houses of
+Parliament!”
+
+MR CAXTON.—“Upon my life, I hope something newer than that; for they, to
+judge by the newspapers, don’t want brother Jack’s assistance to blow up
+each other!”
+
+UNCLE JACK, mysteriously.—“Newspapers! you don’t often read a newspaper,
+Austin Caxton!”
+
+MR CAXTON.—“Granted, John Tibbets!”
+
+UNCLE JACK.—“But if my speculation made you read a newspaper every day?”
+
+MR CAXTON, astounded.—“Made me read a newspaper every day!”
+
+UNCLE JACK, warming, and expanding his hands to the fire.—“As big as the
+Times!”
+
+MR CAXTON, uneasily.—“Jack, you alarm me!”
+
+UNCLE JACK.—“And make you write in it, too,—a leader!”
+
+MR CAXTON, pushing back his chair, seizes the only weapon at his
+command, and hurls at Uncle Jack a great sentence of Greek.—“Τους μεν
+γαρ ειναι χαλεπους, ὁσε λαι ανθροποφαγειν!”[7]
+
+UNCLE JACK, nothing daunted.—“Ay, and put as much Greek as you like into
+it!”
+
+MR CAXTON, relieved, and softening.—“My dear Jack, you are a great
+man,—let us hear you!”
+
+Then Uncle Jack began. Now, perhaps my readers may have remarked that
+this illustrious speculator was really fortunate in his ideas. His
+speculations in themselves always had something sound in the kernel,
+considering how barren they were in the fruit; and this it was that made
+him so dangerous. The idea Uncle Jack had now got hold of will, I am
+convinced, make a man’s fortune one of these days; and I relate it with
+a sigh, in thinking how much has gone out of the family. Know, then, it
+was nothing less than setting up a daily paper on the plan of the Times,
+but devoted entirely to Art, Literature, and Science—_Mental_ Progress
+in short; I say on the plan of the Times, for it was to imitate the
+mighty machinery of that diurnal illuminator. It was to be the Literary
+Salmoneus of the political Jupiter: and rattle its thunder over the
+bridge of knowledge. It was to have correspondents in all parts of the
+globe; every thing that related to the chronicle of the mind, from the
+labour of a missionary in the South Sea islands, or the research of a
+traveller in pursuit of that mirage called Timbuctoo, to the last new
+novel at Paris, or the last great emendation of a Greek particle at a
+German university, was to find a place in this focus of light. It was to
+amuse, to instruct, to interest—there was nothing it was not to do. Not
+a man in the whole reading public, not only of the three kingdoms, not
+only of the British empire, but under the cope of heaven, that it was
+not to touch somewhere, in head, in heart, or in pocket. The most
+crotchety member of the intellectual community might find his own hobby
+in those stables.
+
+“Think,” cried Uncle Jack—“think of the march of mind—think of the
+passion for cheap knowledge—think how little quarterly, monthly, weekly
+journals can keep pace with the main wants of the age. As well have a
+weekly journal on politics, as a-weekly journal on all the matters still
+more interesting than politics to the mass of the public. My Literary
+Times once started, people will wonder how they had ever lived without
+it! Sir, they have not lived without it—they have vegetated—they have
+lived in holes and caves like the Troggledikes.”
+
+“Troglodytes,” said my father mildly—“from _trogle_, a cave—and _dumi_,
+to go under. They lived in Ethiopia, and had their wives in common.”
+
+“As to the last point, I don’t say that the Public, poor creatures, are
+as bad as that,” said Uncle Jack candidly; “but no simile holds good in
+all its points. And the public are not less Troggledummies, or whatever
+you call them, compared with what they will be when living under the
+full light of my Literary Times. Sir, it will be a revolution in the
+world. It will bring literature out of the clouds into the parlour, the
+cottage, the kitchen. The idlest dandy, the finest fine lady, will find
+something to her taste; the busiest man of the mart and counter will
+find some acquisition to his practical knowledge. The practical man will
+see the progress of divinity, medicine, nay, even law. Sir, the Indian
+will read me under the banyan; I shall be in the seraglios of the East;
+and over my sheets the American Indian will smoke the calumet of peace.
+We shall reduce politics to its proper level in the affairs of
+life—raise literature to its due place in the thoughts and business of
+men. It is a grand thought; and my heart swells with pride while I
+contemplate it!”
+
+“My dear Jack,” said my father, seriously, and rising with emotion, “it
+_is_ a grand thought, and I honour you for it! You are quite right—it
+would be a revolution! It would educate mankind insensibly. Upon my
+life, I should be proud to write a leader, or a paragraph. Jack, you
+will immortalise yourself!”
+
+“I believe I shall,” said Uncle Jack, modestly; “but I have not said a
+word yet on the greatest attraction of all—”
+
+“Ah! and that—”
+
+“THE ADVERTISEMENTS!” cried my uncle, spreading his hands, with all the
+fingers at angles, like the threads of a spider’s web. “The
+advertisements—oh, think of them!—a perfect _El Dorado_. The
+advertisements, sir, on the most moderate calculation, will bring us in
+£50,000 a-year. My dear Pisistratus, I shall never marry, you are my
+heir. Embrace me!”
+
+So saying, my Uncle Jack threw himself upon me, and squeezed out of
+breath the prudential demur that was rising to my lips.
+
+My poor mother, between laughing and sobbing, faltered out—“And it is
+_my_ brother who will pay back to _his_ son all, all he gave up for me!”
+
+While my father walked to and fro’ the room, more excited than ever I
+saw him before, muttering,—“A sad useless dog I have been hitherto! I
+should like to serve the world! I should indeed!”
+
+Uncle Jack had fairly done it this time! He had found out the only bait
+in the world to catch so shy a carp as my father—“_hæret lethalis
+arundo_.” I saw that the deadly hook was within an inch of my father’s
+nose, and that he was gazing at it with a fixed determination to
+swallow.
+
+But if it amused my father? Boy that I was, I saw no further. I must own
+I myself was dazzled, and perhaps, with childlike malice, delighted at
+the perturbation of my betters. The young carp was pleased to see the
+waters so playfully in movement, when the old carp waved his tail, and
+swayed himself on his fins.
+
+“Mum!” said Uncle Jack, releasing me: “not a word to Mr Trevanion, to
+any one.”
+
+“But why?”
+
+“Why? God bless my soul. Why? If my scheme gets wind, do you suppose
+some one will not clap on sail to be before me? You frighten me out of
+my senses. Promise me faithfully to be silent as the grave—”
+
+“I should like to hear Trevanion’s opinion too—”
+
+“As well hear the town-crier! Sir, I have trusted to your honour. Sir,
+at the domestic hearth all secrets are sacred. Sir, I—”
+
+“My dear Uncle Jack, you have said quite enough. Not a word will I
+breathe!”
+
+“I’m sure you may trust him, Jack,” said my mother.
+
+“And I do trust him—with wealth untold,” replied my uncle. “May I ask
+you for a little water—with a trifle of brandy in it—and a biscuit, or
+indeed a sandwich. This talking makes me quite hungry.”
+
+My eye fell upon Uncle Jack as he spoke. Poor Uncle Jack, he had grown
+thin!
+
+
+
+
+                    LIFE AND TIMES OF GEORGE II.[8]
+
+
+It has been the fortune of England to have undergone more revolutions
+than any other kingdom of Europe. Later periods have made Revolution
+synonymous with popular violence; but the more effectual revolution is
+that which, being required by the necessities of a people, is directed
+by the national judgment. It is not the convulsion of a tempest, which,
+if it purifies the air, strips the soil; it is a change, not of
+temperature but of the seasons, gradual but irresistible; it is a great
+operation of moral Nature, in every change preparing for the more
+abundant provision of public prosperity.
+
+It is an equally remarkable contrast to the condition of other kingdoms,
+that while their popular revolutions have almost always plunged the
+country into confusion, and been ultimately rectified only by the
+salutary despotism of some powerful master, the hazards of our
+revolutions have chiefly originated in personal ambition, and have been
+reduced to order by popular sentiment.
+
+The Reformation was the first _great_ revolution of England: it formed
+the national circle of light and darkness. All beyond it was civil war,
+arbitrary power, and popular wretchedness—all within it has been
+progress, growing vigour, increasing illumination, and more systematic
+liberty. Like the day, it had its clouds; but the sun was still above,
+ready to shine through their first opening. That sun has not yet stooped
+from its meridian, and will go down, only when we forget to honour the
+Beneficence and the power which commanded it to shine.
+
+The accession of the Hanoverian line was one of those peaceful
+revolutions—it closed the era of Jacobitism. The reign of Anne had
+vibrated between the principles of the constitution and the principles
+of Charles II. Never was a balance more evenly poised, than the fate of
+freedom against the return to arbitrary power. Anne herself was a
+Jacobite—she had all the superstition of “Divine right.” By her nature
+she had the infirmities of the convent. She was evidently fitter to be
+an abbess than a queen: a character of frigidness and formality
+designated her for the cloister; and if the Hanoverian succession had
+not been palpably prepared before the national eye, to ascend the throne
+at the moment when the royal coffin sank into the vault, England might
+have seen the profligate son of James dealing out vengeance through a
+corrupted or terrified legislature; the Reformation extinguished by the
+Inquisitor; the jesuit at the royal ear, mass in Westminster Abbey, and
+the scaffold the instrument of conversion to the supremacy of Rome.
+
+The expulsion of the Stuarts had left the throne to the disposal of the
+nation. By the Bill of Rights, it was determined that the succession
+should go to the heirs of William and Mary; and, in their default, to
+Anne, daughter of James. But the deaths of Mary, and of the Duke of
+Gloucester, awoke the hopes of Popery and the cabals of Jacobitism once
+more. The danger was imminent. William became deeply anxious for the
+Protestant succession, and a bill was brought into the House of Commons,
+declaring that the crown should devolve on the Electress Sophia,
+Duchess-dowager of Hanover, and her heirs,—the Electress of Hanover (or
+more correctly, of Brunswick and Luneburg) being the tenth child of
+Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia, daughter of James I., the only Protestant
+princess among the foreign relations of the line. The next in succession
+to Anne in the Roman Catholic line would have been the houses of Savoy,
+France, and Spain, through Henrietta, daughter of Charles I. This order
+of succession was made law by the 12th of William III., and confirmed in
+the next session by the Abjuration Act, (13th William,) so named from
+the oath _abjuring_ the Pretender.
+
+It is striking to observe how many high matters of legislation have
+seemed the work of casualty. The Habeas Corpus Act, confessedly the
+noblest achievement of British liberty since Magna Charta, was said to
+have been carried by a mistake in counting the votes of the House; the
+limitation to the Electress was proposed by a half-lunatic; the oath of
+abjuration was carried but by a majority of one; and the Reform Bill,
+which, though a measure as doubtful in its principles as disappointing
+in its promises, has yet exercised an extraordinary power over the
+constitution, was carried in its second reading by a majority of only
+one.
+
+It is more important to observe how large a share of legislation, in the
+reign of Anne, was devoted to the security of the Protestant succession.
+The 4th, 6th, and 10th of Anne are occupied in devising clauses to give
+it force. It was guaranteed in all the great diplomatic transactions of
+the reign,—in the Dutch Treaty of 1706, in the Barrier Treaty of 1709,
+in the Guarantee Treaty of 1713, and in the Treaty of Utrecht of the
+same year, between England and France, and England and Spain.
+
+This diligence and determination seem wholly due to the spirit of the
+people. The Queen was almost a Jacobite; her ministers carried on
+correspondences with the family of James; there was scarcely a man of
+influence in public life who had not an agent at St Germains. Honest
+scruples, too, had been long entertained among individuals of high rank.
+Six of the seven bishops who had so boldly resisted the arrogance of
+James, shrank from repudiating the claims of his son. It is true, that
+nothing could be feebler than their reasons; for nothing could be more
+evident than the treason of James to the oath which he had sworn at his
+coronation. Its violation was his virtual dethronement—his abdication
+was his actual dethronement; and the principles of his family, all
+Papists like himself, rendered it impossible to possess freedom of
+conscience, while any one of a race of bigots and tyrants retained the
+power to oppress. Thus the nation only vindicated itself, and used only
+the common rights of selfdefence; and used them only in the calm and
+deliberate forms of self-preservation.
+
+This strong abhorrence of the exiled family arose alike from a sense of
+religion, and a sense of fear. The people had seen with disgust and
+disdain the persecution of Protestantism by the French King. They had
+seen the scandalous treachery which had broken all compacts, the
+ostentatious falsehood which had trafficked in promises, and the
+remorseless cruelty which had strewed the Protestant provinces with
+dead. The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes gave a sanguinary and
+perpetual caution “not to put their trust in princes;” and the generous
+spirit of the people, doubly excited by scorn for the persecutor, and
+pity for his victims, was thenceforth armed in panoply alike against the
+arts and the menaces of Jacobitism and Popery. So it has been, and so
+may it ever be. The Stuarts have passed away—they mouldered from the
+sight of men; they have no more place or name on earth; they have been
+sunk in the mire of their monkism; their “drowned honour” is incapable
+of being plucked up even “by the locks;” but their principles survive,
+and against their corruption we must guard the very air we breathe.
+
+The Electress, a woman of remarkable intelligence, died in 1714, in her
+84th year. The Queen died in the August following. George I., Elector of
+Brunswick, son of Sophia, arrived in England in September, and was King
+of the fairest empire in the world. He was then fifty-four years old.
+
+The habits of George I. were Continental—a phrase which implies all of
+laxity that is consistent with the etiquette of a court. His personal
+reign was anxious, troubled, and toilsome; but the nation prospered, and
+the era had evidently arrived when the character of the sitter on the
+throne had ceased to attract the interest, or influence the conduct of
+the nation. The King had no taste for the fine arts: he had no knowledge
+of literature. He had served in the army, like all the German princes,
+but had served without distinction. He loved Hanoverian life, and he was
+incapable of enjoying the life of England. He lived long enough to be
+easily forgotten, and died of apoplexy on his _way to Hanover_!
+
+George II., the chief object of these Memoirs, only son of George I. and
+Sophia Dorothea, was forty-four at his accession. In 1705 he had married
+Caroline, daughter of the Margrave of Brandenburg Anspach.
+
+The reign of George II. was the era of another revolution—the supremacy
+of ministers. A succession of ambitious and able men governed the
+country by parties. The King was intelligent and active, yet they
+controlled him, until he found his chief task to be limited to
+obedience. He was singularly fond of power, and openly jealous of
+authority, but his successive ministers were the virtual masters of the
+crown. His chief vexations arose from their struggles for office; and
+his only compensation to his injured feelings was, in dismissing one
+cabinet, to find himself shackled by another. He seems to have lived in
+a state of constant ebullition with the world—speaking sarcastically of
+every leading person of his own society, and on harsh terms with his
+family. His personal habits were incapable of being praised, even by
+flattery, and the names of the Walmodens, the Deloraines, and the
+Howards, still startle the graver sensibilities of our time.
+
+But his public conduct forms a striking contrast to those painful
+scenes. He was bold in conception and diligent in business. He felt the
+honour of being an English king; and though he wasted time and
+popularity in his childish habit of making his escape to Hanover
+whenever he could, he offered no wilful offence to the feelings of the
+people. His letters on public affairs exhibit strong sense, and he had
+the wisdom to leave his finance in the hands of Walpole, and the
+manliness to suffer himself to be afterwards eclipsed by the lustre of
+Chatham. His reign, which had begun in difficulties, and was carried on
+in perils, closed in triumph.—The French navy was swept from the ocean;
+the battle of the Heights of Abraham gave him Canada; the battle of
+Plassy gave him India; and at his death, in 1760, at the age of
+seventy-seven, he left England in a blaze of glory.
+
+The death of George I. had brought Walpole forward as the minister of
+his son. The story of Sir Spencer Compton has been often told, but never
+so well as in these Memoirs. The King died on the 11th of June 1727 at
+Osnaburg. The news reached Walpole on the 14th, at his villa in Chelsea.
+He immediately went to Richmond to acquaint the Prince of Wales with
+this momentous intelligence. The Prince was asleep after dinner,
+according to his custom; but he was awakened for the intelligence, which
+he appeared to receive with surprise. Yet, neither the sense of his
+being raised to a throne, nor the natural feelings of such an occasion,
+prevented the exhibition of his dislike to Walpole. On being asked, when
+it was his pleasure that the Council should be summoned, the King’s
+abrupt answer was, “Go to Chiswick, and take your directions from Sir
+Spencer Compton.” Sir Robert bore this ill-usage with his habitual
+philosophy, and went to Compton at once. There he acted with his usual
+address; told him that he was minister, and requested his protection;
+declaring that he had no desire for power or business, but wished to
+have one of the “white sticks,” as a mark that he was still under the
+shelter of the crown.
+
+Lord Hervey delights in portraiture, and his portraits generally have a
+bitter reality, which at once proves the truth of the likeness and the
+severity of the artist. He daguerreotypes all his generation. He thus
+describes Sir Spencer: “He was a plodding, heavy fellow, with great
+application but no talents; with vast complaisance for a court; always
+more concerned for the manner of the thing than for the thing itself;
+fitter for a clerk to a minister than for a minister to a prince. His
+only pleasures were money and eating; his only knowledge forms and
+precedents; and his only insinuation bows and smiles.” Walpole and he
+went together to the Duke of Devonshire, President of the Council, but
+laid up with the gout. Lord Hervey’s sketch of him is certainly not
+flattering—but such is the price paid by personal feebleness for public
+station—“He was more able as a virtuoso than a statesman, and a much
+better jockey than a politician.”
+
+At the council Sir Spencer took Walpole aside, and begged of him, as a
+speech would be necessary for the King in Council, that, as Sir Robert
+was more accustomed to that sort of composition than himself, he should
+go into another room, and make a draft of the speech. Sir Robert retired
+to draw up his paper, and Sir Spencer went to Leicester Fields, where
+the King and Queen were already, followed by all who had any thing to
+ask, or any thing to hope—a definition which seems to have included the
+whole of what, in later parlance, are called the fashionable world.
+Whether the present sincerity of court life is purer than of old may be
+doubtful, but the older manners were certainly the more barefaced. When
+the new premier was returning to his coach he walked through a lane of
+“bowers,” all shouldering each other to pay adoration to the new idol.
+
+During the four days of the King’s remaining in town, Leicester House,
+which used to be a desert, was “thronged from morning till night, like
+the ‘Change at noon.’” But Walpole walked through those rooms “as if
+they had been empty.” The same people who were officiously, a-week
+before, crowding the way to flatter his prosperity, were now getting out
+of it to avoid sharing his disgrace. Horace Walpole says, that his
+mother could not make her way to pay her respects to the King and Queen
+between the scornful backs and elbows of her late devotees, nor could
+approach nearer to the Queen than the third or fourth row, until the
+Queen cried out,—“There, I am sure I see a friend.” The torrent then
+divided, and shrank to either side. In short, Walpole, with his brother
+Horace, ambassador to France, the Duke of Newcastle and Lord Townshend,
+the two Secretaries of State, were all conceived to be as much undone,
+as a pasha on the arrival of the janizary with the bowstring.
+
+The evidences, it must be owned, seemed remarkably strong. The King had
+openly, and more than once, called Walpole “rogue and rascal;” he had
+called the ambassador “a scoundrel and a fool;” he had declared his
+utter contempt for the Duke, and his determination never to forgive him.
+Townshend fared still worse. The King looked on him to be no more an
+honest man than an able minister, and attributed all the confusion in
+foreign affairs to the heat of his temper and his scanty genius, to the
+strength of his passions and the weakness of his understanding. There
+can be no doubt that a minister of foreign affairs, with those
+qualities, might become a very mischievous animal.
+
+On Compton’s receiving the speech drawn up by Walpole, he carried it, in
+his own handwriting, to the King. The King objected to a paragraph,
+which Sir Spencer Compton was either unwilling or unable to amend; and
+not being satisfied of his own powers of persuasion, he actually
+solicited Walpole to go to the King, and persuade him to leave it as it
+was! The Queen, who was the friend of Walpole, instantly took advantage
+of this singular acknowledgment of inferiority, and advised the King to
+retain the man whom his intended successor so clearly acknowledged to be
+his superior.
+
+Nothing can be more evident than that Sir Spencer played the fool
+egregiously. To place a rival in immediate communication with the King
+was, at least, an unusual way of supplanting him; while, to give him the
+advantage of his authorship, by sending him to explain it to the King,
+would have been ridiculous under any circumstances. But there are no
+miracles in politics; and he was evidently so far convinced of his own
+security, that the idea of a rival was out of the question. Compton had
+been all his life a political personage. He had been Paymaster; he had
+been Speaker in three Parliaments; he was _au fait_ in the routine of
+office; and he had evidently received the King’s order to make a
+ministry. But we have had such sufficient proof in our own time that
+princes and kings are different persons according to circumstances, that
+we can perfectly comprehend the cessation of the royal favouritism on
+one side, and of the royal aversion on the other. The civil list was
+still to be voted—the subject dearest to the royal heart. Walpole was
+noted for financial management, and Compton’s awkwardness in the
+preceding transaction might well have startled the monarch. The general
+result was, that Walpole remained minister, Compton was quietly put out
+of the way with a peerage, as Lord Wilmington, and an enormous civil
+list was carried, with but a single vote, that of Mr William Shippen,
+against it. The civil list was little less than £900,000 a-year, an
+immense revenue, when we consider that the value of money at that time
+probably made it equal to double the sum now. The present civil list
+would be practically not much more than a fourth of the amount in 1777.
+The Queen’s jointure was equally exorbitant; it was £100,000 a-year,
+besides Somerset House and Richmond Lodge, a sum amounting to double
+what any Queen of England had before.
+
+Walpole was now paramount; he had purchased his supremacy by his
+official prodigality. Lord Hervey thinks that he was still hurt by two
+mortifications—the displacement of his son-in-law, Lord Malpas, and of
+Sir William Yonge, a Lord of the Treasury, and his notorious tool. But,
+contrasting those trifling changes with the plenitude of Walpole’s
+power, and recollecting the extraordinary wiliness of his nature, it
+seems not improbable that he either counselled or countenanced those
+dismissals, to escape the invidiousness of absolute power; for both
+Malpas and Yonge clung to the court, and, after a decent interval, were
+replaced in office. Walpole was, perhaps, one of the most singular
+instances of personal dexterity in the annals of statesmanship. Without
+eloquence in the House, or character out of it; without manners in the
+court, or virtue any where, he continued to hold supreme ministerial
+power for nearly a quarter of a century, under the most jealous of
+kings, with the weakest of cabinets, against the most powerful
+Opposition, and in the midst of the most contemptuous people. His power
+seems even to have grown out of those sinister elements. By constantly
+balancing them against each other, by at once awaking fears and exciting
+hopes, he deluded all the fools, and enlisted all the knaves of public
+life in his cause. The permanency of his office, however, wholly rested
+upon the Queen; and he had the dexterity to discover, from the moment of
+the Royal accession, that, insulted as she was by the King’s conduct,
+she was the true source of ministerial power. He accordingly adhered to
+her, in all the fluctuations of the court, appeared to consult her on
+all occasions, studied her opinions, and provided for her expenses. The
+want of money, or its possession, seem to have exerted an extraordinary
+influence on the higher ranks in those days; and one of the first acts
+of Walpole was to offer the Queen £60,000 a-year. Sir Spencer Compton
+had been impolitic enough to propose but £40,000, on the ground that
+this sum had been sufficient for Charles II.’s queen. The sum was at
+last settled at £50,000, and the donor was not forgotten.
+
+But it seems impossible to doubt, that Walpole’s character was
+essentially corrupt; that he regarded corruption as a legitimate source
+of power; that he bribed every man whom he had the opportunity to bribe:
+that he laughed at political integrity, and did his best to extinguish
+the little that existed; that no minister ever went further to degrade
+the character of public life; and that the period of his supremacy is a
+general blot upon the reign, the time, and the people.
+
+The celebrated Burke, in that magnanimous partiality which disposed him
+to overlook the vices of individuals in the effect of their measures,
+has given a high-flown panegyric on the administration of Walpole; but
+the whole is a brilliant paradox. He looked only to the strength of the
+Brunswick succession, and, taking his stand upon that height, from which
+he surveyed grand results alone, neglected or disdained to examine into
+the repulsive detail. Seeing before him a national harvest of peace and
+plenty, he never condescended to look to the gross and offensive
+material by which the furrow was fertilised. Nothing is more certain,
+than that the daily acts of Walpole would now stamp a ministry with
+shame—that no man would dare now to express the sentiments which form
+the maxims of the minister; and that any one of the acts which, though
+they passed with many a sneer, yet passed with practical impunity, in
+the days of George II., would have ruined the proudest individual, and
+extinguished the most powerful cabinet, of the last fifty years.
+
+The arguments which Lord Hervey puts into the lips of the Queen are
+scarcely less corrupt in another style. She tells the King not merely
+that Walpole’s long experience and known abilities would make him the
+best minister, but that his simply being in power would make him the
+most submissive—that his having made a vast fortune already would make
+him less solicitous about his own interest—that _new_ leeches would be
+more hungry, and that, Walpole’s fortune being made, he would have
+nothing in view but serving the King, and securing the government, to
+keep what he had got—closing all this grave advice with that maxim of
+consummate craft, that in royal breasts both enmity and friendship alike
+should always give way to policy. If such were to be regarded as the
+habitual rules of the highest rank, well might we remonstrate against
+their baseness. The bigotry of James, or the morals of Charles II.,
+would be preferable to this scandalous selfishness. But those maxims
+have never found tolerance among the people of England. We are to
+recollect that they came from a despotic soil, that they were the wisdom
+of courts where the great corrective of state-craft, public opinion, was
+unknown; that they were the courage of the timid, and the integrity of
+the intriguing; and that the maxims, the manners, and the system, have
+alike been long since consigned to a deserved and contemptuous oblivion.
+
+By much the best part of Lord Hervey’s authorship consists in his
+characters of public personages. No rank is suffered to shield any man.
+He exercises a sort of Egyptian judgment even upon kings, and pronounces
+sentence upon their faults with all the indignation of posthumous
+virtue. The King of France at that period had begun to exercise a
+powerful influence over Europe. France, always liable to great changes,
+had been for half a century almost prostrated before the great powers of
+Europe. The triumphs of Marlborough in the earliest years of the century
+had swept her armies from the field, as the close of the preceding
+century had desolated the industry of her southern provinces by
+persecution. The supremacy of the Regent had subsequently dissolved
+almost the whole remaining force of public character in a flood of
+profligacy, and the reigning King was perhaps the most profligate man in
+the most licentious nation of the world. The description of him in these
+volumes is equally disdainful and true. “I cannot,” says Lord Hervey,
+“by the best accounts I have had, and by what I have myself seen of this
+insensible piece of royalty, venture absolutely to say that he was of a
+good or bad disposition, for, more properly speaking, he was of no
+disposition at all. He was neither merciful nor cruel, without affection
+or enmity, without gratitude or resentment, and, to all appearance,
+without pleasure or pain.” His actions are described as resembling more
+the mechanical movements of an automaton, than the effects of will and
+reason. The state of his mind seemed to be a complete apathy, neither
+acting nor acted on. If he had any passion, it was avarice; and if he
+took pleasure in any amusement, it was in gaming. It is observed that he
+had not any share in the “epidemical gaiety that runs through the French
+nation.” He appeared to take as little pleasure as he gave, to live to
+as little purpose to himself as to any body else, and to have no more
+joy in being King, than his people had advantage in being his subjects.
+
+It was the good fortune of France to be governed at this period by
+Cardinal Fleury, a man of no distinction for talents, yet possessing a
+plain, practical understanding, habitual prudence, and personal honesty.
+But his most important qualification was a remarkable absence of the
+passion for disturbing the world, which seems to have made him an
+exception to all Frenchmen since the days of Julius Cæsar. Fleury loved
+peace, and was so far an illustrious anomaly in French nature. Something
+of this singular contradiction to his countrymen may have arisen from
+his being eighty years old, from his habits as an ecclesiastic, and from
+his being fully acquainted with the fact, that France had not the power
+to go to war. The result of this policy was not merely tranquillising to
+Europe, but fortunate for France. Her task was to recover from the
+wasteful wars of Louis XIV., from the general corruption of the Regency,
+from the financial follies of the Mississippi scheme, and from the weak
+and rapacious ministry of the Duke of Bourbon. The administration of
+Cardinal Fleury met all her evils, and met them with patience, and thus
+with success. France has been always the great disturber of Europe, and
+will be so whenever she has the power to disturb; but the old Cardinal,
+conscious of her helplessness, applied himself to restrain her ambition,
+and taught her that the indulgence of vanity was no compensation for
+defeat, and that war was folly, at least until success was possible.
+Under this rational course of government, the public mind was turned to
+intellectual advancement and national industry. Paris, instead of being
+the centre of European profligacy, rapidly became the centre of European
+science. A succession of extraordinary men threw light upon every
+kingdom of nature and knowledge. The Continent actually basked in the
+beams of France; her language became universal, her literature the
+general model, her taste the leader of European refinement, her manners
+the standard of fashion to the world; and, at the accession of the
+unfortunate Louis XVI., Paris, the court, and the people, possessed an
+acknowledged supremacy over the opinions, the habits, and the
+accomplishments of Europe, to which no kingdom of the modern world has
+ever exhibited a parallel.
+
+The closing period of the eighteenth century has already been given to
+the world by a historian equal to the magnitude of his subject. The
+“History of the French Revolution,” by Alison, will never be superseded.
+The extent of its information, the clearness of its details, the
+freshness and fidelity of its descriptions, and the force and vividness
+of its language, place it at the head of all contemporary annals. But we
+should wish also to see a History of the whole preceding portion of the
+century. The French Revolution was a result: we should desire to see the
+origin. It was a burst of gigantic violence, and gigantic strength: we
+should desire to have the primal _myth_ of this assault of the Titans;
+the narrative of their growth, their passions, and their powers, until
+the moment when they moved against the battlements of all that was
+lofty, magnificent, and glittering in the land. There is nothing without
+a cause on earth,—accident is a name which has no place in the
+Providential supremacy of things. To investigate the sources of even the
+common events of nature, is a subject worthy of the philosopher. But
+there never was a time when it was more important to connect its
+mightier changes with the mystery in which they find their birth; to
+ascertain the laws of national convulsion; to fix the theory of moral
+storms and inundations. Such would be among the highest services, as
+they might administer to the most effective security of the social
+system.
+
+It strikes us, that our chief historians have hitherto limited their
+view too much to England: a broader view would have been more
+productive. The combinations of this great country with the Continental
+kingdoms; the contrasts furnished by them all; the variety in their
+means of working out the same object of national power; their
+comparative tardiness; even their failures, would have supplied new
+conceptions of history, and have added alike to the illustration and the
+interest of that political science which is among the noblest bequests
+of a great nation to posterity. We are fully convinced that politics,
+rightly examined, will be found to constitute a _system_, as much as
+astronomy, and that a _solitary_ kingdom would be as much a
+contradiction to nature as a solitary star.
+
+
+We now glance over the pages of these volumes: they are very amusing. If
+they do not give the court _costumes_ of a hundred years ago, they give
+the mental costumes. The witty and the wise, the great and the little,
+pass before the eye with the rapidity and the oddity of the figures in a
+show-box. Kings, queens, and courtiers are exhibited to the life; and,
+harsh as their physiognomies may sometimes seem, the exhibition is
+always amusing.
+
+The King was generally regarded as being governed by his wife, and the
+opinion was not the less general because the King constantly boasted of
+his own independence. One day, alluding to this subject, he said,
+“Charles I. was governed by his wife, Charles II. by his mistresses,
+James by his priests, William by his men-favourites, and Anne by her
+women-favourites.” He then turned with a significant and satisfied air,
+and asked, “Who do they say governs now?” The political squibs of the
+time were, however, of a different opinion from the King. For example—
+
+       “You may strut, dapper George, but ‘twill all be in vain,
+       We know ’tis Queen Caroline, not you, that reign—
+       You govern no more than Don Philip of Spain.
+       Then, if you would have us fall down and adore you,
+       Lock up your fat spouse, as your dad did before you.”
+
+The “dapper” was an allusion to the King’s figure, which was much under
+size. The locking up was an allusion to the imprisonment of the wife of
+George I., whom, by an atrocious act of cruelty, he had shut up in one
+of his castles for thirty-two years. It argues something in favour of
+the progress of public opinion, that in our day the most despotic or
+powerful sovereign of Europe would not dare to commit an act, which was
+then committed with perfect impunity by a little German Elector. Another
+of those squibs began—
+
+            “Since England was England there never was seen
+            So strutting a King, and so prating a Queen.”
+
+The first of those brought Lord Scarborough into a formidable scrape;
+for, being taxed by the King with having seen it, evidently in private,
+the King demanded to know who had shown it to him. Scarborough declared
+that he was on his honour, not to reveal it. On this the King became
+furious, and said to him, “Had I been Lord Scarborough in this
+situation, and you king, the man should have shot me, or I him, who had
+dared to affront me in the person of my master, by showing me such
+insolent nonsense!” His Lordship replied, that he never told his Majesty
+it was a man from whom he had it. He consequently left the King, (who
+never spoke to him for three months after,) almost as much irritated
+against him as the author.
+
+Lord Hervey’s portrait of the celebrated Chesterfield is a work of
+elaborate peevishness. It has all the marks of an angry rival, and all
+the caricature of a pen dipped in personal mortification. He allows him
+wit, but with an utter “mismanagement in its use;” talent without
+common-sense, and a ridiculous propensity to love-making, with an
+ungainly face and a repulsive figure. This character is new to those who
+have been so long accustomed to regard Chesterfield even on the more
+unfavourable side of his character. To his admirers the portrait is of
+course intolerable; but we must leave some future biographer to settle
+those matters with the ghost of his libeller.
+
+An anecdote is given illustrative of the violence of Lord Townshend’s
+temper, and the cutting calmness of Walpole’s. Townshend was a man of
+considerable powers, but singularly irritable. He had been from an early
+period engaged in office, and was a constant debater in the House. His
+temper, however, made him so publicly disliked, and his selfishness so
+much alienated public men, that when he left office he did not leave a
+regret behind. He was followed only by epigrams, of which one is given—
+
+                 “With such a head, and such a heart,
+                 If fortune fails to take thy part,
+                 And long continues thus unkind,
+                 She must be deaf as well as blind,
+                 And, quite reversing every rule,
+                 Nor see the knave, nor hear the fool.”
+
+Lord Townshend had been Foreign Secretary, and Walpole had to defend his
+blunders in the Commons. This made the latter anxious, and the former
+jealous. Another source of discontent was added, probably with still
+greater effect. Walpole, who had begun as a subordinate to Townshend,
+had risen above him. He had begun poor, and now exceeded him in fortune;
+and, as the last offence, he had built Houghton, a much handsomer
+mansion than Lord Townshend’s house at Raynham, which his lordship had
+once considered as the boast of Norfolk. Thus both were in a condition
+for perpetual squabble. The anecdote to which we have alluded was
+this:—One evening, at Windsor, on the Queen’s asking Walpole and
+Townshend where they had dined that day, the latter said that he had
+dined at home with Lord and Lady Trevor; on which Walpole said to her
+Majesty, smiling, “My lord, Madam, I think, is grown _coquet_ from a
+long widowhood, and has some design upon my Lady Trevor; for his
+assiduity of late, in that family, is grown so much beyond common
+civility, that without this solution I know not how to account for it.”
+The burlesque of this not very decorous observation was obvious, for
+Lady Trevor was nearly seventy years old, and, besides being a woman of
+character, was of the “most forbidding countenance that natural
+ugliness, age, and small-pox, ever compounded.”
+
+But Townshend, affecting to take the remark literally, replied with
+great warmth—“No, sir, I am not one of those fine gentlemen who find no
+time of life, nor any station in the world, preservatives against
+follies and immoralities that are hardly excusable when youth and
+idleness make us most liable,” &c., &c. In short, his lordship made a
+speech in which his voice trembled, and every limb shook with passion.
+But Walpole, always master of his temper, made him no other answer than
+asking him with a smile, and in a very mild tone of voice, “What, my
+lord, all this for Lady Trevor!”
+
+The Queen grew uneasy, and, to avoid Townshend’s replying, only laughed,
+and turned the conversation.
+
+An anecdote is told of the Duchess of Queensberry’s being forbid the
+court; which belongs to the literary history of the cleverest opera in
+our own or any other language—Gay’s famous production. Walpole, justly
+regarding himself as caricatured in the “Beggar’s Opera,” obtained the
+Duke of Grafton’s authority as Lord Chamberlain to suppress the
+representation of his next opera, “Polly.” Gay resolved to publish it by
+subscription, and his patroness, the Duchess of Queensberry, put herself
+at the head of the undertaking, and solicited every person she met, to
+subscribe. As the Duchess was handsome, a wit, and of the first fashion,
+she obtained guineas in all directions, even from those who dreaded to
+encourage this act of defiance. The Duchess’s zeal, however, increased
+with her success; and she even came to the drawing-room, and under the
+very eye of majesty solicited subscriptions for a play which the monarch
+had forbidden to be acted. When the King came into the drawing-room,
+seeing the Duchess very busy in a corner with three or four persons, he
+asked her what she was doing. She answered, “What must be agreeable, she
+was sure, to any body so humane as his Majesty, for it was an act of
+charity; and a charity to which she did not despair of bringing his
+Majesty to contribute.” This proceeding was so much resented, that Mr
+Stanhope, vice-chamberlain to the King, was sent in form to the Duchess
+to forbid her coming to court. The message was verbal; but she desired
+to send a written answer—wrote it on the spot—and thus furnished a
+document, whose style certainly exhibited more sincerity than
+courtiership.
+
+“That the Duchess of Queensberry is surprised and well pleased that the
+King has given her so agreeable a command as to stay from court, where
+she never came for diversion, but to bestow a great civility on the King
+and Queen. She hopes that, by such an unprecedented order as this, the
+King will see as few as he wishes at his court, particularly such as
+dare to think or speak truth. I dare not do otherwise, and ought not,
+nor could have imagined that it would not have been the very highest
+compliment I could possibly pay the King, to endeavour to support truth
+and innocence in his house—particularly when the King and Queen both
+told me that they had not read Mr Gay’s play. I have certainly done
+right, then, to stand by my own words rather than his Grace of
+Grafton’s, who hath neither made use of truth, judgment, nor honour,
+through this whole affair, either for himself or his friends.
+
+                                                       “C. QUEENSBERRY.”
+
+When her Grace had finished this paper, drawn up, as Lord Hervey
+observes, “with more spirit than accuracy,” Stanhope requested of her to
+think again, and give him a more courtly message to deliver. The Duchess
+took her pen and wrote another, but it was so much more disrespectful,
+that he asked for the former one and delivered it.
+
+There was, of course, a prodigious quantity of court gossip on this
+occasion: and, doubtless, though some pretended to be shocked, many were
+pleased at the sting of royalty, and many more were amused at the
+dashing oddity of the Duchess. But public opinion, on the whole, blamed
+the court. It certainly was infinitely childish in the King, to have
+inquired into what the Duchess was doing among her acquaintances in the
+drawing-room; it was equally beneath the natural notions of royal
+dignity that the King should put himself in a state of hostility with a
+subject, and in so trifling a matter as the subscription to an
+unpublished play; and it was equally impolitic, for the world was sure
+to range itself on the side of the woman, especially when that woman was
+handsome, eccentric, and rich. It produced some inconvenience, however,
+to the lady’s husband, as he, in consequence, gave up the office of
+Admiral of Scotland.
+
+The history of the “Beggar’s Opera” is still one of those mysticisms
+which perplex the chroniclers of the stage. It has been attributed to
+the joint conception of Swift, Pope, and Gay. The original idea probably
+belonged to Swift, who, in that fondness for contrasts, and contempt of
+romance, which belonged to him in every thing, had observed, “What a
+pretty thing a Newgate pastoral would make!” Pope may have given hints
+for the epigrammatic pungency of the dialogue; while the general
+workmanship may have been left to Gay. It is scarcely possible to doubt
+the sharp and worldly hand of Swift in some of the scenes and songs.
+Pope may have polished the dialogue, or nerved some of the songs,
+otherwise it is difficult to account for the total failure of all those
+characters of sternness, sharpness, and knowledge of the world, in Gay’s
+subsequent and unassisted drama, “Polly.” For, as the note on the
+subject observes, nothing can be more dull and less sarcastic, or, in
+fact, less applicable to either public characters or public events than
+the latter opera, against which a prime minister levelled the
+hostilities of the Lord Chamberlain, and engaged the indignation of the
+King.
+
+Gay had been a dependant on Mrs Howard,—a matter which, in the
+scandalous laxity of the time, was by no means disgraceful. He had been
+solicitor for some place under the court, and had been disappointed. But
+the “Beggar’s Opera” had been written before his disappointment. Of
+course, it is unlikely that he should have then thought of burlesquing
+the minister. His disappointment, however, may have given him new
+intentions, and a few touches from Swift’s powerful hand might have
+transformed Macheath, Peachum, and Lockit into the fac-similes of the
+premier and his cabinet. It is remarkable that Gay had never attempted
+any thing of the kind before, nor after. His solitary muse was the very
+emblem of feebleness, his ambition never soared beyond a salary, and his
+best authorship was fables.
+
+As ours is the day when rioting is popular, and rebels in every country
+are modellers of government, it may be amusing to remember how those
+matters were managed in the last century. The history of the famous
+Excise scheme, which in its day convulsed England, and finally shook the
+most powerful of all ministers out of the most powerful of all cabinets,
+is amongst the curious anecdotes of a time full of eccentricity. Walpole
+was no more superior to the effects of prosperity than honester men.
+Long success had confirmed him in a belief of its perpetual power; and
+the idea that, with a court wholly at his disposal, with a Queen for his
+agent, a King almost for his subject, the peerage waiting his nod, and
+the commons in his pay, he could be cast down and shattered like a
+plaster image, seems never to have entered into his dreams. But in this
+plenitude of power, whether to exercise his supremacy, or for the mere
+want of something to do, it occurred to him to relieve the country
+gentlemen by reducing the land-tax to a shilling in the pound, turning
+the duty on tobacco and wine, then payable on importation, into inland
+duties,—that is, changing customs on those two commodities into excise.
+By which scheme, and the continuation of the salt-duty, he proposed to
+improve the revenue half a million a-year, so as to supply the abatement
+of the shilling in the pound. The plan seemed feasible, and it also
+appeared likely to attract popularity among the country gentlemen, who
+had frequently complained of the pressure of the land-tax—two shillings
+in the pound.
+
+The result, however, showed that a man may govern a court who is unequal
+to govern a people. The very mention of excise raised a universal
+storm,—all kinds of exaggerations flew through the land. The subject, at
+no time popular, was converted into a source of frantic indignation. The
+orators alleged, that if excise was once to be made a substitute for the
+land-tax, it might be made a substitute for every tax; that if it was
+laid on wine and tobacco, it would soon be laid on corn and clothing;
+that every man’s house would be at the mercy of excise-officers, whose
+numbers would amount to a standing army, and of the most obnoxious kind,
+an army of tax-gatherers; that liberty must perish; Magna Charta be not
+worth its own parchment; parliament be voted useless; and the monarch,
+who could extract every shilling from the pockets of his subjects under
+the pretext of an excise, might soon ride roughshod over the liberties
+of England. Petition on petition, of course, showered into parliament;
+the boroughs angrily advised their representatives to vote against the
+measure; and the towns and cities haughtily commanded their
+parliamentary delegates to resist all extension of the excise, however
+qualified, corrected, or modelled by the minister.
+
+Walpole was thunderstruck; but he still relied upon his fortune. His
+friends crowded round him with entreaties that he would abandon the
+measure. But his argument was the argument of infatuation—the old
+absurdity of exposing himself to immediate ruin, through fear of being
+ruined at some future time, which might never arrive. In fact, his
+flexibility, which often saves a minister, was suddenly exchanged for
+the stubbornness which is the ministerial road to ruin. At last the
+memorable day came, March 14, 1743, when the bill was to be presented to
+parliament. It was reported that thousands of the people would block up
+the House, and there was a general order for constables, peace-officers,
+and the Guards to be in readiness. The mob, however, were neither so
+numerous nor so unruly as was expected. The debate was long, and the
+question was carried for the excise scheme by a majority of 61—the
+numbers being 204 and 265. The King was so anxious on the subject, that
+he made Lord Hervey write to him from the House at five o’clock; and,
+when the debate broke up at one in the morning, and Lord Hervey came to
+St James’s to mention the result, the King carried him into the Queen’s
+bedchamber, and kept him there till three in the morning, (without
+having dined;) asking him ten thousand questions, not merely about the
+speeches, but the very looks of the speakers.
+
+The memoirs of persons in high life have a certain use for those who
+will draw the true moral from them; which is, that the highest rank is
+by no means the happiest. The exterior glitters to the eye, and
+doubtless there are few pedestrians who would not rejoice to drive in a
+gilt coach, with a squadron of hussars prancing round them. But the
+Memoirs of George II. and his Queen, altogether independently of private
+character, give formidable evidence of the cares which haunt even
+thrones. Yet, perhaps, there was no more palmy state of public affairs
+than that which saw George and Caroline on the throne. The country was
+in profound peace, commerce was flourishing, there was no impediment to
+the wheels of society—neither famine nor pestilence, nor rebellion; and
+yet distress, vexation, and perplexity seem to be as frequent inmates of
+the palace as they could have been of the workhouse. Even the great
+minister himself, though the head and front of the whole immediate
+disturbance, and likely to suffer more severely than all the rest, bore
+the crisis with more equanimity than either of their majesties.
+
+“This evening,” says Lord Hervey, “Sir Robert Walpole saw the King in
+the Queen’s apartment, and the final resolution was then taken to drop
+the bill; but as there was a petition to come from the city of London
+against it the next day, it was resolved that the bill should not be
+dropped till that petition was rejected, lest it should be thought to be
+done by the weight and power of the city.” Walpole, on coming from this
+conference, called on Lord Hervey to let him know what had passed. Sir
+Robert was extremely disconcerted. Lord Hervey told him that he had been
+twice that afternoon sent for by the King; but, not knowing in what
+strain to talk to him, as he was ignorant whether Sir Robert intended to
+go forward or retreat, and expecting that he should be asked millions of
+questions relating to what he saw, and what he heard, and what he
+thought; to avoid the difficulties which this catechism would lay him
+under, he kept out of the way.
+
+In the mean time, Sir Robert had gone to the Queen, and told her, that
+the clamour had grown so great, that there were but two ways of trying
+to appease it, one by dropping the project, and the other by dropping
+the projector. The Queen chid him extremely “for thinking it possible
+she could act so cowardly a part.” When Lord Hervey went up to the
+drawing-room, he saw that her Majesty had been weeping very plentifully,
+and found her so little able to disguise what she felt, that she was
+forced to pretend headach and vapours, and break up her quadrille party
+sooner than the usual hour. When the drawing-room was over, the King
+called Lord Hervey into the Queen’s bedchamber, and began with great
+eagerness to ask him where he had been all day, whom he had seen, what
+he had heard, and how both friends and foes looked? To some of the
+replies, referring to the Opposition, the King said with great warmth,
+“It is a lie; those rascals in the Opposition are the greatest liars
+that ever spoke.” The city petition was presented the next morning, and
+attended by a train of coaches reaching from Temple Bar to Westminster.
+The prayer of the petition was, that they might be heard by counsel
+against the bill. After a debate till midnight the petition was
+rejected, but only by a majority of seventeen—214 to 197. Walpole was
+never more deeply smitten than by this defeat, for so small a majority
+was a virtual defeat. He stood for some time after the House was up,
+leaning against the table, with his hat pulled over his eyes, and some
+few friends, with melancholy countenances, round him. As soon as the
+whole was over, Pelham went to the King, and Hervey to the Queen, to
+acquaint them with what had passed. When Hervey, at his first coming
+into the room, shook his head and told her the numbers, the tears ran
+down her cheeks, and for some time she could not utter a word. At last
+she said, “It is over—we must give way; but pray tell me a little how it
+passed.”
+
+On the next day, Walpole proposed the postponement of the tobacco bill
+for two months. On coming out of the House, the mob, who had increased
+in numbers, continued to insult the members. Walpole, though warned of
+the reception which he was likely to get, determined to face the mob, as
+he boldly said, “there was no end of flying from their menaces, and that
+meeting dangers of this kind was the only way to put an end to them.”
+With some friends, and to a certain degree protected by the constables,
+who made a passage for the members to go out, he at last worked his way
+through the mob; though there was a great deal of jostling, and the
+constables were obliged to make large use of their staves. Three of his
+friends (among whom was Lord Hervey) were hurt. The city had been filled
+with illuminations and bonfires the night before, when Sir Robert
+Walpole, with a fat woman, (meant for the Queen,) was burnt in effigy.
+It is singular that this triumph was carried as far as Oxford, where for
+three nights together, round the bonfires in the streets, the healths of
+Ormond, Bolingbroke, and James III. were publicly drunk!
+
+Lord Hervey’s sketches of character are among the best specimens of his
+writing, and the most interesting portions of his book. They are always
+acute and forcible, natural though epigrammatic, and remorseless though
+polished. As the lives of Chancellors have been, of late, so frequently
+brought before the public, we give his sketch of Lord Chancellor King.
+Speaking of King as having risen from obscurity to the woolsack, without
+an obstruction in his career, and with the general approbation of all
+judges of legal merit, he observes that, from the moment of his
+presiding in Chancery, his reputation began to sink. But this is
+explained, not by any newly discovered deficiency of talent, but by
+deficiency of decision. “Expedition,” says Lord Hervey, “was never
+reckoned among the merits of the Court of Chancery; but while Lord King
+presided there, its delays became insupportable. He had such a
+diffidence of himself, that he dared not do right for fear of doing
+wrong. Decrees were always extorted from him; and, had he been left
+alone, he would never have given any suitor his due, for fear of giving
+him what was not so; never reflecting that the suspension of justice was
+almost as bad as the total privation of it. His understanding was of
+that balancing irregular kind, which gives people just light enough to
+see difficulties and form doubts, yet not enough to surmount the one, or
+remove the other. This sort of understanding, which was of use to him as
+a pleader, was a trouble to him as a judge, and made him make a great
+figure at the bar, but an indifferent one upon the bench. The Queen once
+said of him, very truly, as well as agreeably, that ‘he was just in the
+law, what he had formerly been in the gospel—making creeds of the one,
+without any steady belief, and judgments in the other, without any
+settled opinion. But the misfortune,’ said she, ‘for the public is, that
+though they can reject his silly creeds, they are forced to submit to
+his silly judgments.’” (Lord King had dabbled in divinity, and published
+a history of the Apostles’ Creed.) Complaints soon arose, that all the
+equity of the nation was at a stand. He afterwards nearly lost his
+senses by repeated attacks of apoplexy. He was at last induced to retire
+on a pension of £3000. He died in the next year, “little regretted by
+any body, but least of all by his Majesty, who saved £3000 a-year by
+it.”
+
+The condition of the court seems to have been perpetual conflict. The
+King’s personal conduct was inexcusable; the Queen’s great object was
+the possession of power; and the Prince was an object of suspicion to
+both, as both were objects of vexation to the Prince. His case in short
+was this: “He had a father that abhorred him, a mother that despised
+him, sisters that betrayed him, a brother set up against him, and a set
+of servants that neglected him, and were neither of use to him, nor
+capable of being of use, nor desirous of being of use.”
+
+The Opposition were in pretty much the same condition: they, too, were
+in a state of civil war. Lord Carteret and Bolingbroke had no
+correspondence at all; Pulteney and Bolingbroke hated each other;
+Carteret and Pulteney were jealous of each other; Sir William Wyndham
+and Pulteney the same; while Chesterfield had a little correspondence
+with them all, but was confided in by none.
+
+The Princess’s marriage to the Prince of Orange had long engrossed the
+consideration of the court. The Princess was not ill-looking, but her
+figure was short, and inclined to be fat. She seems to have resembled
+both the King and the Queen in their better, and in their worst,
+qualities. She was quick, intelligent, and passionate; yet could be
+cool, callous, and ready to sacrifice every thing to power. The Prince
+of Orange was poor, having but £12,000 a-year, and he was deformed,
+having a humpback, and altogether exhibiting the least attractive object
+possible in the eyes of a princess as haughty as any in Christendom. The
+marriage was solemnised at seven in the evening: the chapel was
+splendidly fitted up; but the Queen and the Princesses exhibited so much
+undisguised concern, that the procession to the chapel, and the aspect
+of matters there, looked more like a sacrifice than a marriage. We
+cannot go any further into details which, however suitable to foreign
+manners, can only disgust the fortunate delicacy of the English mind.
+But Lord Hervey’s manner of consoling the philosophic Queen in her
+disdain and disgust, is capital, as a specimen at once of the man of the
+world and of the courtier.
+
+His answer was, “Madam, in half a year all persons are alike; and the
+figure one is married to, like the prospect of the place one lives at,
+grows so familiar to one’s eyes, that we look at it mechanically,
+without regarding either the beauties or deformities that strike a
+stranger.” The Queen’s answer was clever: “One may, and I believe one
+does, grow blind at last; but you must allow, my dear Lord Hervey, that
+there is a great difference, as long as one sees, in the _manner_ of
+one’s growing blind.” The sisters spoke much in the same style as the
+mother, with horror at his figure, and commiseration for his wife. The
+Princess Emily said, “nothing on earth should have induced her to marry
+the monster.” The Princess Caroline, in her soft sensible way, spoke
+truth and said, “She must own it was very bad, but that, in her sister’s
+situation, all things considered, she believed she should have come to
+the same resolution.”
+
+From time to time, some traits of men and history oddly remind us of
+foreign courts in our own day. The Emperor of Germany, a personage in
+whom ambition and imbecility seem to have contended for the mastery, had
+commenced a war, which transferred hostilities into Italy. France,
+Sardinia, and Spain attacked him there, and pushed his army to the walls
+of Mantua. The position of Radetsky, while he continued constrained by a
+court which gave him little more than orders and counter-orders, was
+evidently the _fac-simile_ of Austrian affairs in 1733. “Those affairs,”
+says Lord Hervey, “were so _well managed_, that with thirteen thousand
+men in Lombardy, and provisions for double the number, and ammunition in
+proportion, those essentials of war were so dispersed and scattered,
+that, wherever there were provisions there was no ammunition, and where
+there was ammunition there were no provisions, and where there were men
+there was neither ammunition nor provisions.”
+
+The German war engaged a good deal of the public attention at this time;
+but much less in the nation than at the court. Prince Eugene, on the
+Rhine, marched to the relief of Philipsburg, while Marshal Berwick, with
+one hundred thousand men, carried on the siege. The high reputation of
+Prince Eugene had excited the King’s hope that Philipsburg would be
+relieved. It was, however, taken. This gave rise to a smart saying of
+the Princess Royal. She observed to Lord Hervey, after the drawing-room,
+shrugging up her shoulders, “Was there ever any thing so unaccountable
+as the temper of papa! He has been snapping and snubbing every mortal
+for this week, because he began to think that Philipsburg would be
+taken; and this very day, that he hears it is actually taken, he is in
+as good humour as ever I saw him in my life. But all this seems so odd,
+that I am more angry at his good humour than I was at his bad.” Lord
+Hervey said, with that sort of wit which was fashionable at the time,
+“that this was like David, who, when his child lived wore sackcloth, but
+when it was dead, shaved and drank wine.”—“It may be like David,” said
+the Princess, “but I am sure it is not like Solomon.”
+
+The King had a foolish habit of talking of war, of imagining his genius
+made for renown, and of pronouncing himself infinitely unlucky in not
+being permitted by his minister to gain laurels in Germany. Walpole
+exhibited his power in nothing more effectually than in preventing the
+operation of this thirst for “glory.”—“He could not bear,” said the
+monarch, “that while he was engaged only in treaties, letters, and
+despatches, his booby brother, the brutal King of Prussia, should pass
+his time in camps and in the midst of arms,” neither desirous of the
+glory, nor fit for the employment.
+
+Walpole, who saw the danger of involving England in this war, and
+probably the absurdity of going to war for the sake of any foreigners,
+reminded the King of the existence of the Pretender, and of the
+probability “that his crown would yet have to be fought for on British
+ground.” As to the Queen, Lord Hervey said, “the _shadow_ of the
+Pretender would beat the whole German body.”
+
+His lordship’s knowledge of the world appears to have extinguished all
+his ideas of its generosity: for he finds a personal motive in every
+thing. Thus, he assigns three reasons for Walpole’s pacific advice. One
+was, to avoid new clamour against his administration; the next was, to
+avoid the unpopularity of new taxes; and the third was, that military
+business might not throw his power into the hands of military men.
+
+The Memoir then proceeds “to toss and gore” all the prominent public men
+in succession. It tells us “that the Duke of Newcastle, who always
+talked as his master talked,” echoed all the King’s “big words,” and
+expatiated for ever on regaining Italy for the Emperor, chastising
+Spain, and humbling the pride of France. Next comes the Duke of Grafton;
+of whom it is said, that loving to make his court as well as the Duke of
+Newcastle, he talked in the same strain, and for the same reason; but
+“could never make any great compliment to the King and Queen of
+embracing their opinions, as he never understood things enough to have
+one of his own.” Next comes Lord Grantham. “He was a degree still lower,
+and had the gift of reasoning in so small a proportion, that his
+existence was barely distinguished from a vegetable.” Then follows Lord
+Harrington. Of him it is said that, “with all his seeming phlegm, he was
+as tenacious of an opinion, when his indolence suffered him to form one,
+as any man living. His parts were of the common run of mankind. He was
+well bred, a man of honour, and fortunate, loved pleasure, and was
+infinitely lazy.” The Queen once in speaking of him said, “There is a
+heavy insipid sloth about that man, that puts me out of all patience: he
+must have six hours to dress, six more to dine, six more for his
+intrigues, and six more to sleep; and there, for a minister, are the
+four-and-twenty admirably disposed of; and if, now and then, he borrows
+six of those hours, to do any thing relating to his office, it is for
+something that might be done in six minutes, and ought to have been done
+six days before.”
+
+We have then another instance of the discomforts of Royalty in those
+times. The day before the birthday, October 29, 1734, the court removed
+from Kensington to London, and the Queen, “who had long been out of
+order with a cough and a little lurking fever, notwithstanding she had
+been twice blooded, grew every hour worse and worse. However, the King
+forced her, the night she came from Kensington—the first of Farinelli’s
+performances—to the Opera, and made her the next day go through all the
+tiresome ceremonies of drawing-rooms and balls, the fatigues of heats
+and crowds, and every other disagreeable appurtenance to the celebration
+of a birthday.”
+
+His lordship observes that “there was a strange affectation of an
+incapacity of being sick, that ran through the whole royal family. I
+have known the King to get out of his bed, choking with a sore throat,
+and in a high fever, only to dress and have a levee, and, in five
+minutes after it, undress and return to his bed, till the same
+ridiculous farce of health was to be presented the next day at the same
+hour. He used to make the Queen, in like circumstances, commit the same
+extravagances; but never with more danger than at this time. In the
+morning drawing-room, she found herself so near swooning, that she was
+forced to send Lord Grantham to the King, to beg he would retire, for
+that she was unable to stand any longer; notwithstanding which, at
+night, he brought her into a still greater crowd at the ball, and there
+kept her till eleven o’clock.”
+
+The recollections of those times constantly bring the name of Lady
+Suffolk before the eye. We have no wish to advert to the grossnesses
+connected with the name; but the waning of her power gave a singular
+pungency to opinion in the palace. The Princesses were peculiarly candid
+upon the occasion. The Princess Emily “wished Lady Suffolk’s disgrace,
+because she wished misfortune to most people. The Princess Caroline,
+because she thought it would please her mother. The Princess Royal was
+for having her crushed; and, when Lord Hervey made some remonstrance,
+she replied, that Lady Suffolk’s conduct, with regard to politics, had
+been so impertinent, that she cannot be too ill used.” It must seem
+strange to us that such topics should have been in the lips of any
+women, especially women of such rank—but they seem to have been
+discussed with the most perfect familiarity; and a name and conduct
+which ought to have been suppressed through mere delicacy, appear to
+have furnished the principal conversation of the court.
+
+The next affair was the quarrel with the Princess of Orange, from her
+reluctance to return to Holland. As she was about to be confined, her
+husband was desirous that his child should be born in Holland. To this
+the Princess demurred. However, they at length contrived to send her on
+board, and she sailed from Harwich; but after she had been some time at
+sea, she either grew so ill, or pretended to be so ill, that she either
+was, or pretended to be, in convulsions: we give his lordship’s rather
+ungallant surmise. On this, and the wind not being quite fair, she
+obliged the captain of the yacht to put back to Harwich. She then
+despatched a courier to London with letters, written, as it was
+supposed, by her own absolute command, from her physician, her
+accoucheur, and her nurse, to say that she was disordered with her
+expedition, and that she could not be stirred for ten days from her bed,
+nor put to sea again, without the hazard of her child’s life and her
+own. The King and Queen declined giving any orders. The Prince of Orange
+was written to, and he desired that his wife might go by France to
+Holland. The King, hating the bustle of a new parting, directed that she
+should cross the country from Harwich to Dover; but his Majesty, after
+having been informed that the roads were impassable at this time of the
+year in a coach, (how strangely this sounds in our day of universal
+locomotion!) permitted her to come to London and go over the bridge; but
+it was a positive command that she should not lie in in London, nor even
+come to St James’s. Accordingly, “after all her tricks and schemes, to
+avoid going to Holland, and to get back to London, she was obliged to
+comply with those orders; and had the mortification and disgrace to go,
+without seeing any of her family, over London Bridge to Dover.”
+
+A note conjectures, that the Princess Royal might have had some
+expectation of ascending the throne of England, neither of her brothers
+being then married; a circumstance, which may account for the Princess’s
+anxiety to have her child born in this country.
+
+The next scene is laid among the bishops. The bishopric of Winchester
+had been promised to Hoadly. Willis, the Bishop of Winchester, was
+seized with an apoplectic fit, and Lord Hervey instantly wrote to
+Hoadly, who was then Bishop of Salisbury, to come up to town and enforce
+his claim. The bishop wrote to the Queen and Sir Robert letters, which
+were to be delivered as soon as Willis was dead. The Queen, on
+presenting those letters, asked Lord Hervey if he did not blush for the
+conduct of his friend in this early and pressing application for a thing
+not yet vacant. While he was speaking, the King came in, and both King
+and Queen talked of Hoadly, in such a manner as plainly showed that they
+neither esteemed nor loved him. Potter, Bishop of Oxford, a great
+favourite of the Queen, strongly solicited Winchester, and would have
+obtained it, but for Walpole’s suggestion, that the engagements to
+Hoadly could not be broken without scandal. Hoadly at last obtained
+Winchester; and, as the Memoir observes, one of the best preferments in
+the church was conferred upon a man hated by the King, disliked by the
+Queen, and long estranged from the friendship of Walpole. Then all
+followed in the way which might have been anticipated; the King not
+speaking a word to the new bishop, either when he kissed his hand or did
+homage; the Queen, when she found it could not be helped, making the
+most of promoting him,—and Sir Robert taking the whole merit of the
+promotion to himself.
+
+Another source of contention now arose. The Chancellor Talbot had
+recommended Rundle, a chaplain of his father, the late Bishop of Durham,
+for the see of Gloucester, which had been vacant a twelvemonth. Gibson,
+Bishop of London, objected to him, that fourteen or fifteen years before
+he had been heard to speak disrespectfully of some portions of
+Scripture, and Rundle was suspected of Arianism. This reason was
+certainly sufficient to justify inquiry.
+
+Sir Robert, in his usual style, tried to mediate; begged of the
+Chancellor to give up his support of Rundle, offering him at the same
+time a deanery, or to give him the Bishopric of Derry in Ireland, then
+possessed by Henry Downes; of whom the Memoir speaks as a crazy old
+fellow with three thousand a-year. This affair ended in Benson’s being
+made Bishop of Gloucester, and Secker Bishop of Bristol, both formerly
+chaplains to the Chancellor’s father. Rundle was subsequently made
+Bishop of Derry, where he died, nine years after, in his sixtieth year,
+much regretted.
+
+Walpole was now visibly approaching decline. He had become negligent of
+the claims of his friends, and solicitous only to conciliate his
+enemies. Of course, where he bought over one opponent, there were fifty
+others ready to fill up his place. This policy failed, and ought always
+to fail. At the close of the session, say the Memoirs, “the harvest of
+court favour was small, though the labourers were many.” The only things
+to give away were the Privy Seal, by the retirement of Lord Lonsdale,
+and the Secretaryship at War, by the dismissal of Sir William
+Strickland, “who was become so weak in mind and body, that his head was
+as much in its second infancy as his limbs.”
+
+A new source of ministerial vexation was added to the _mêlée_, by the
+King’s sudden determination to run over to Hanover, in spite of all
+remonstrance—the royal answer being always “Pooh, stuff! You think to
+get the better of me, but you shall not.”
+
+Walpole, who dreaded that the King, once in Hanover, would plunge the
+country into a war, tried to set the Queen against this untoward
+journey; but her Majesty, though she gave the minister fair words, was
+in favour of the freak. The reasons assigned by the Memoir for her
+conduct being those rather irreverent ones, on the part of his
+lordship—pride in the _éclat_ of the regency; the ease of being mistress
+of her hours, which was not the case for two hours together, when the
+King was in England; and, “besides these _agrémens_, she had the
+certainty of being, for six months at least, not only free from the
+fatigue of being obliged to entertain him for twenty hours in the
+twenty-four, but also from the more irksome office of being set up to
+receive the _quotidian_ sallies of a temper that, let it be charged by
+what hand it would, used always to discharge its hottest fire, on some
+pretence or other, upon her.”
+
+But “one trouble arose from the King’s going to Hanover, which her
+Majesty did not at all foresee;” and which was his becoming, soon after
+his arrival, so much attached to a Madame Walmoden, “a married woman of
+the first fashion in Hanover,” that nobody in England talked of any
+thing but the declining power of the Queen.
+
+They might justly have talked much more of the insult of this conduct to
+public morals; but we shall not go further into those details. They
+absolutely repel the common-sense of propriety, to a degree which, we
+hope, will never be endurable in England. The King, however, gave her
+Majesty, in the long succession of his correspondence, the complete
+history of his passion, its progress, and his final purchase of the lady
+for 1000 ducats! A proof, as Lord Hervey says, more of his economy than
+his passion.
+
+The life of courts is stripped of its glitter a good deal by the
+indefatigable courtier who has here left us his reminiscences; but it
+requires strong evidence, to believe that the persons who constitute the
+officials of royal households _can_ submit to the humiliations described
+in these volumes.
+
+The Queen narrates a sort of quarrel which she had with Lady Suffolk, a
+woman so notoriously scandalous, that the wife of George II. ought not
+to have suffered her to approach her person. The quarrel was, as a note
+conceives it, not about holding a basin for the Queen to wash in, but
+about holding it on her knees. (What person of any degree of
+self-respect can discover the difference?) But Lady Suffolk, on this
+nice distinction, consulted the well-known Lady Masham, bedchamber woman
+to Queen Anne, as to the point of etiquette. This authority delivered
+her judgment of chambermaid duties, in the following style:—“When the
+Queen washed her hands, a page of the backstairs brought and set down
+upon a side-table the basin and ewer. Then the bedchamber _woman_ set it
+before the Queen, and _knelt_ on the other side of the table over
+against the Queen, the bedchamber _lady_ only looking on. The bedchamber
+_woman_ brought in the chocolate, and gave it _kneeling_.” Lady Suffolk,
+formerly Mrs Howard, had been bedchamber _woman_, and of course had
+performed this menialism! “We shall see by-and-by,” adds the note,
+“that, the _lady_ of the bedchamber, though a countess, presented the
+basin for the Queen’s washing, _on her knees_.”
+
+If such things were done, we must own that it wholly exceeds our
+comprehension how they could be exacted on the one side, or submitted to
+on the other. We are sure that there is not a scullion in England who
+would stoop to hold a basin for her mistress’s ablutions on her knees.
+Yet, however we may be surprised at the existence of such practices, it
+is impossible to feel the slightest sympathy for the persons whom their
+salaries tempt to the sufferance.
+
+We have left ourselves but little room for the biography of Lord Hervey
+himself. He was born in 1696, the second son of the first Lord Bristol.
+He travelled; returned to solicit a commission; failed in his
+solicitation; became, of course, “a virtuous opponent of the court,” and
+attached himself to the Prince and Princess, who held a sort of
+Opposition court at Richmond. Hervey, young, handsome, and polished,
+became a general favourite. He won the most accomplished woman of her
+time; married; and, in 1723, became Lord Hervey by the death of his
+elder brother, a man of ability, but of habits remarkably profligate.
+
+On the death of George I., Hervey changed his politics; abandoned
+Pulteney; leveed Walpole; obtained a pension of £1000 a-year; received
+another gilded fetter, in the office of vice-chamberlain, and became a
+courtier for life.
+
+Whether to console himself for this showy slavery, or to indulge a
+natural taste for the sarcasm which is forbidden in the atmosphere of
+high life, he wrote the Memoirs, of which we have given a sketch. The
+prudence of his son, the third earl, kept them in secret. The marquis,
+nephew of that earl, probably regarding the time as past when they could
+provoke private resentment, has suffered them to emerge, and Mr Croker
+has edited them, for the benefit of the rising generation.
+
+Whether the editor has done credit to himself or service to the public,
+by this employment of his hours of retirement, has been the subject of
+considerable question. That the volumes are amusing there can be no
+doubt; that they are flippant and frivolous there can be no question
+whatever; that they disclose conceptions of the interior of courts which
+may “make the rabble laugh and the judicious grieve,” that, though
+filtered through three generations of correctors, they yet remain miry
+enough still, requires no further proof than their perusal.
+
+We say this in no favouritism for either the King or the Queen: the
+truth was probably told of both. Their foreign habits evidently clung to
+them; and the purer feelings of England, as evidently, had not the power
+to purify the practices of their foreign descent. But if Lord Hervey’s
+mind was exercised in giving the secret life of courts to the world, we
+think that a much more contemptuous subject for the pencil might be
+found, in the man who, earning his daily bread by his courtiership,
+pretended to independence of opinion; who, listening to every expression
+of royalty with a bow, and receiving every command with the submission
+of a slave, threw off the sycophant only to assume the satirist, and
+revenged his sense of servitude only by privately registering the errors
+of those, the dust of whose shoes he licked for twelve hours in every
+twenty-four.
+
+But we must hope that the Memoirs of Lord Hervey will be the last with
+which the national curiosity is to be stimulated. We must have no
+further ill-natured overflowing on the absurdities of high life. If this
+fashion shall invade the shelves and _scrinia_ of noble families, there
+is probably not a household of the higher ranks which may not furnish
+its tribute. We shall be overrun with feeble gossiping and obsolete
+scandal. No rational purpose can be held in view by indulging the
+posthumous malice of a discontented slave. No manly curiosity can be
+gratified by breaking up the tomb, showing us only the decay so long
+hidden by its marbles and escutcheons from the eye.—_Requiescat._
+
+
+
+
+                          THE GREAT TRAGEDIAN.
+
+
+                               CHAPTER I.
+
+Amidst a storm of applause the curtain fell. The applause continued, and
+the curtain rose once more; and the favourite actor, worn out with
+emotion and fatigue, reappeared to receive the homage which an
+enthusiastic multitude paid to his genius.
+
+I saw a proud flush of triumph steal over his wan face, which lighted it
+for a moment with almost supernatural expression. As he passed behind
+the scenes, amidst the rustling dresses of the rouged and spangled
+crowd, I observed his face contracted by a pang, which struck me the
+more forcibly from its so quickly succeeding the look of triumph. He
+passed on to his room without uttering a word—there to disrobe himself
+of the kingly garments in which he had “strutted his brief hour on the
+stage;” and in a little while again passed me (as I was hammering out
+compliments, in voluble but questionable German, to the pretty
+little * * *) in his sober-suited black, and, stepping into his
+carriage, drove to the Behren Strasse.
+
+I knew he was going there, as I had been earnestly pressed to meet him
+that very evening; so, collecting all my forces, I uttered the happiest
+thing my German would permit me, and accompanying it with my most
+killing glance, raised the tiny hand of * * * to my lips and withdrew,
+perfectly charmed with her, and perfectly satisfied with myself.
+
+There was a brilliant circle that night at Madame Röckel’s. To use the
+received phrase, “all Berlin was there.” I found Herr Schoenlein, the
+great actor, surrounded by admirers, more profuse than delicate in their
+adulation. He was pale; looked wearied. He seemed to heed that
+admiration so little—and yet, in truth, he needed it so much! Not a
+muscle moved—not a smile answered their compliments; he received them as
+if he had been a statue which a senseless crowd adored. Yet, fulsome as
+the compliments were, they were never too fulsome for his greed. He had
+the fever-thirst of praise upon him now more than ever—now more than at
+any period of his long career, during which his heart had always
+throbbed at every sound of applause, did he crave more and more
+applause. That man, seemingly so indifferent, was sick at heart, and
+applause alone could cure him! Had he not applause enough? Did not all
+Germany acknowledge his greatness? Did not Berlin worship him? True; but
+that was not enough: he hungered for more.
+
+I was taken up to him by Madame Röckel, and introduced as an “English
+admirer.” Now, for the first time, he manifested some pleasure. It was
+not assuredly _what_ I said—(for although, _of course_, I am always
+“mistaken for a German,” so pure is my accent, so correct my
+diction!)—it was the fact of my being a foreigner—an Englishman—which
+made my praise so acceptable. I was a countryman of Shakspeare’s, and,
+of course, a discerning critic of Shakspearian acting. We rapidly passed
+over the commonplace bridges of conversation, and were soon engaged in a
+discussion respecting the stage.
+
+With nervous energy, and a sort of feverish irritability, he questioned
+me about our great actors—our Young, Kean, Kemble, and Macready—which
+gave me an opportunity for displaying that nice critical discrimination
+which my friends are kind enough to believe I possess—with what reason
+it is not for me to say.
+
+When I told him that, on the whole, I was more gratified with the
+performances of Shakspeare in Germany, he turned upon me with sudden
+quickness and asked—
+
+“In what towns?”
+
+“At Berlin and Dresden,” I answered.
+
+“You have seen Franz, then?”
+
+“I have.”
+
+His lip quivered. I saw that I had made a mistake. I am not generally an
+ass—nay, I am believed to possess some little tact; but what demon could
+have possessed me to talk of an actor _to_ an actor?
+
+“Do you think Franz greater than any of your English actors?” he asked,
+fretfully.
+
+“Why, I cannot say that exactly. But I was amazingly struck with his
+performance. My observation, however, principally applied to the general
+‘getting-up.’”
+
+“But Franz—Franz. I wish to hear your opinion of him.”
+
+“He is young,” I replied; “has a fine figure, a noble voice, a grand
+carriage, and, although new to the stage, and consequently deficient in
+some technical matters, yet he has that undefinable something which men
+call genius.”
+
+“Hm!” was the significant answer.
+
+I then saw whither my stupidity had led me. This, however, I will say
+for myself, if ever I do get into a dilemma, I have generally readiness
+of mind enough to extricate myself. I do not say this out of conceit,
+for I am not at all conceited—I merely mention it as a fact. This is how
+I turned my blunder to account.
+
+“Although,” said I, “he has not _your_ mastery, yet he reminded me a
+great deal of you. I cannot pay _him_ a higher compliment.”
+
+To my surprise he did not see the flattery of this, but moved to another
+part of the room; and I did not speak with him again till supper.
+
+This little incident excited my attention. I puzzled my brain for an
+explanation of the riddle which his conduct presented, and spoke to
+several of my friends about it, who could only tell me that Schoenlein
+was jealous of this new actor Franz.
+
+Did you ever sup in Berlin, reader? If not, let me inform you that
+supper there is a most substantial affair. I had not read Miss Bremer’s
+novels when first I went there; so, not being prepared for the infinite
+amount of eating and drinking which is transacted in the north, I
+confess my astonishment was a little mingled with disgust to find a
+supper begin with white-beer soup, (capital soup, by the way,) followed
+by various kinds of fish, amongst them, of course, that eternal hideous
+carp—roast veal, poultry, pastry, and dessert. To see the worthy
+Berliners sup, you would fancy they had not dined, and to see them dine
+next day, you would fancy they had not supped, and breakfasted _twice_.
+
+Eating is an art. It is also—and this fact we are prone to overlook—a
+habit. As a habit it may be enlarged to an indefinite extent; and
+lisping _fraüleins_ have demonstrated the capacity of the human stomach
+to be such as would make our beauties stare.
+
+It must not be supposed that I am a coxcomb, since nothing can be
+farther from the truth; nor must I be held to share with Lord Byron his
+horror at seeing women eat. In fact I like to see the darlings enjoy
+themselves: but—and I care not who knows it—to see German women eat, is
+more than I can patiently endure.
+
+Let me cease this digression to remark that, except myself, the great
+tragedian was the only person at table who was not voracious—and that
+because he was unhappy. While knives and forks were playing with
+reckless energy he talked to me, but there was a coldness and constraint
+in his manner which plainly told me that my praises of Franz had deeply
+mortified him.
+
+Poor Schoenlein! Unhappy he came to Madame Röckel’s; for, amidst the
+storm of applause which saluted him at the theatre, he heard the
+applause which was saluting his rival at Dresden; and he had left the
+theatre for a friendly circle of admirers only to hear his rival praised
+by an Englishman. All the applause of all Berlin weighed as nothing
+against one compliment paid to Franz!
+
+It was nearly twelve, and the company had gradually departed. I was left
+alone with Madame Röckel; and, as usual, I stayed half-an-hour later
+than the others, to have a quiet chat with her. I wanted to ask her for
+an explanation of Schoenlein’s conduct. Much as I had seen of the vanity
+of actors—well as I knew their petty jealousy of each other—I was not
+prepared for what I had seen that night.
+
+Madame Röckel had resumed her knitting—the never-failing accompaniment
+of a German lady—and I drew a chair close to the sofa, and told her what
+had passed.
+
+“His story is a strange one,” she said; “and to understand him you must
+know it.”
+
+“Can you not tell it me?”
+
+“Willingly. Schoenlein is a man well born and well bred, who feels his
+profession is a disgrace.”
+
+“A disgrace!”
+
+“Very absurd, is it not? but that _is_ his feeling. At the same time,
+just as the opium-eater, knowing the degradation of his vice, cannot
+resist its fascination—so this actor, with an intense feeling of what he
+regards as the sinfulness of the stage, cannot resist its fascination.”
+
+“You astonish me!”
+
+“He is an austere man—what you English would call a puritan—who looks
+upon the stage as the theatre of vice, and yet cannot quit it because it
+is the theatre of his triumphs!”
+
+“But how came he to be an actor!”
+
+“Why, thrown upon the stage when the stage seemed the only means of
+livelihood open to him—forced on it by necessity, success has chained
+him there. I have heard him say that every time he performs it is with
+the conviction that he is performing for the last time. But the
+fascination still continues—his heart is still greedy of applause—his
+mind still eager for its accustomed emotions. He goes on the stage sad,
+struggling, and repentant; to leave it with throbbing pulses and a
+wild-beating heart. He accepts no engagement, he only plays by the
+night. He has from time to time made vigorous efforts to quit the stage,
+but at the end of a fortnight he invariably returns. He once set out for
+Italy, thinking that if away from Germany he should be able to wean
+himself from the theatre; but he got no farther than Vienna, and there
+played for twenty nights.”
+
+“But don’t you think there must be a great deal of humbug in all this?”
+
+“Not a bit.”
+
+“Do you really believe in his scruples?”
+
+“I know him too well to doubt them. There are many men quite as
+inconsistent. He deludes himself with all sorts of sophistry. He
+persuades himself that he acts only to realise an independence for his
+son, and to secure his own old age. But the truth is, he acts because he
+has an irresistible impulse to act. It is a sort of intellectual
+dram-drinking which he cannot forego.”
+
+“To be sure, men are strange bundles of contradictions; and I suppose
+one must give Schoenlein credit for being sincere.”
+
+“He is his own dupe, for to no one but very intimate friends has he ever
+disclosed his real opinions.”
+
+“Then his life must be a constant struggle?”
+
+“It is. This it is which has made him prematurely old: the struggle of
+his conscience with his passions. But this it is also which gives such
+touching pathos to his acting—which makes his voice so mournful that it
+vibrates through your whole being. As the poet’s sufferings are sublimed
+into song, and become the delight of mankind, so from the ground of this
+tragedian’s despair springs the well of his inspiration, which makes him
+truly great.”
+
+We were both silent for a few moments.
+
+“I have said enough,” added Madame Röckel, “to explain how such a man
+must necessarily be, above all others, envious—how the success of
+another must be torture to him. Nothing but intense vanity could keep
+him on the stage. Hitherto he has really had no rival—he has stood
+alone; other tragedians have not been named beside him. But now, within
+the last few weeks, there has arisen this young Franz, who has only
+played at Leipsic and Dresden, yet whose fame has spread all over
+Germany.”
+
+“But I have seen Franz, and I assure you he is not so great an actor as
+Schoenlein. To be sure, he has youth on his side.”
+
+“It is not his success alone which is so exasperating; it is because the
+critics, as usual, will do nothing but compare the young Franz with the
+old Schoenlein; while the public, with its natural inconstancy, begins
+to discover that Schoenlein is no longer young. It is a sad thing,” she
+pursued, with a faint smile, “for those who have reigned supreme over
+audiences to feel their dynasty is drawing to a close—sad for those who
+have swayed all hearts, to feel that another is now to usurp their
+place. We women know what it is, in a slight degree, when we grow old.
+Do we ever grow old, and _know_ it? When our glass still tells us we are
+young, that the bloom is still upon our cheeks, the lustre in our eyes,
+the witchery in our smiles, now as of yore—and yet what the glass tells
+us, what our feelings confirm, we do _not_ see mirrored in the
+admiration of those around us! We also know what it is when we see our
+former adorers pass to newer beauties, and we perhaps overhear such a
+phrase spoken of us as, ‘Yes, she has been handsome!’ But even we cannot
+know the actor’s triumph or the actor’s humiliation. To feel that our
+presence is the signal for applause, that every word we utter is
+listened to with eager interest, that every part we play is an image
+which we engrave upon the minds of thousands, there to abide as a thing
+of beauty and of wonder—this is beyond us.”
+
+“But, my dear Madame Röckel, I see no diminution of admiration for
+Schoenlein in Berlin. Surely no audience can be more enthusiastic. Why
+should he fear a rival?”
+
+“You might as well ask a beauty,” she replied, “why she is jealous of a
+woman less pretty than herself. The _why_ is not to be explained by
+logic, for envy does not _calculate_—it _feels_.”
+
+“Yet, when Franz comes to Berlin, which will be next month, there will
+then be no possible doubt as to which is the finer actor.”
+
+“Perhaps not. But the public will nevertheless applaud Franz; and
+however slightly they do so, to the envious ears of Schoenlein it will
+sound like thunder.”
+
+The clock striking twelve warned me to depart, for in Berlin they keep
+early hours; and I went away thinking of what I had just heard, and
+feeling no small contempt for Schoenlein’s preposterous jealousy: “What
+a contemptible feeling is envy!—as if only one person in the world had a
+right to admiration!”
+
+At that moment I stepped into a droschke, and was driving to my rooms,
+when I passed that miserable puppy Fürstenberg, whom, I am sorry to say,
+little * * * admires so much; though, for the life of me, I never could
+see wherefore. Yet this uncouth German, aping the dandy, usurps all her
+conversation, even when I am by!
+
+It is not that I am jealous, for that is not my character; but I
+_cannot_ bear to see so charming a girl so miserably deceived in any one
+as she is in Fürstenberg!
+
+
+                              CHAPTER II.
+
+Schoenlein did not play for a fortnight, and, as the time of Franz’s
+engagement was drawing near, I imagined he was sulking. I communicated
+my suspicions to Madame Röckel.
+
+“I would wager fifty thalers,” she replied, “that he has gone to Dresden
+to see his dreaded rival, and judge for himself.”
+
+It was as Madame Röckel said: goaded by irresistible jealousy,
+Schoenlein had set off for Dresden to see his rival play.
+
+Arrived there, he was three days before he could summon resolution to
+enter the theatre. Franz’s name met him every where. At the
+_table-d’hôte_ he heard nothing but praises of Franz: in the newspapers
+he read nothing but invidious comparisons between Franz and himself, in
+which the palm was awarded to his rival. “Franz,” it was said, “had all
+the energy of Schoenlein, with youth, and grace, and beauty in his
+favour. The same power of distinct conception and unexaggerated
+execution, without Schoenlein’s tendency to conventional ‘points.’”
+Strangers asked him if he had seen Franz. The very waiters at the hotel
+recommended him to go and see Franz!
+
+Schoenlein never hated his profession so much as at that moment. Yet,
+such was his exasperation, that he was constantly tempted to appear on
+the stage at Dresden, and crush his rival by acting in the same theatre
+with him—constantly tempted to show the fickle public the genius of the
+actor they were fast forgetting.
+
+It was the fourth day of his presence at Dresden. Hamlet was to be
+performed that evening, and Schoenlein had resolved to be there. As the
+hour drew near, he was seated at a table on that beautiful terrace,
+which no one who has visited Dresden can ever forget, and which the
+Hahn-Hahn has so graphically set before us in her _Faustine_. He was
+smoking a meditative cigar, gazing abstractedly at the promenaders, who,
+in their gay dresses, passed to and fro in light happy talk, while the
+sounds of a good orchestra in the Café came mellowed by the distance,
+and lent another charm to the exhilarating scene. His thoughts were not
+at all in harmony with that happy scene—they were fixed mournfully on
+his own condition. He felt the sadness of a fallen favourite.
+
+There he sat, and saw the sun go down over the antique bridge—saw its
+last rays shimmering on the placid bosom of the Elbe, which winds its
+undulating course beneath the terrace—saw the groups of promenaders
+gradually disappear, and the tables all deserted. The calls for ices,
+for cigars, for “light,” were becoming rarer and rarer. The music had
+ceased—night had shut in. Still he sat there in the same mournful mood,
+tempted to go to the theatre, so close at hand, but repelled by the idea
+of hearing Franz applauded.
+
+At the conclusion of the third act, several playgoers reappeared upon
+the terrace, to cool themselves in the evening air, and to take an ice.
+Their conversation, of course, turned but upon one man, and that man was
+Franz. They spoke of his Hamlet as the finest part he had yet played.
+
+Three men seated themselves at Schoenlein’s table. In the midst of their
+enthusiastic criticism one of them remarked—
+
+“Well, Franz is certainly very fine; but it is absurd to compare him
+with Schoenlein.”
+
+“I think him better,” said another.
+
+“Nonsense!—you would not say so if you could see them together. You will
+find that in a little while the public will come round to my opinion.
+Let them once get over the novelty, and they will judge correctly.”
+
+A thrill ran through the actor’s frame as he heard this. He called the
+waiter; paid; rose; departed. In another instant he was in the
+_parterre_ of the theatre, feverishly impatient for the curtain to rise.
+
+The brief scene between the King and Queen, which opens the fourth act,
+seemed to that impatient man as if it never would end; and when
+Rosenkranz was heard within calling, “Hamlet, Lord Hamlet!” the
+perspiration burst from every pore, and he trembled like a leaf as
+Hamlet appeared, uttering the “Soft—what news? Who calls on Hamlet?”
+
+Schoenlein heard no more. The tones of that voice raised a mist before
+his brain—stung and perplexed him with rage and astonishment. He heard
+nothing, saw nothing—his brain was in a whirl.
+
+The Hamlet before him—Franz, the dreaded rival—was his son!
+
+
+                              CHAPTER III.
+
+It is necessary here to take a retrospective glance into Schoenlein’s
+history, that we may understand the horror which possessed him at the
+discovery of his son upon the stage.
+
+We may readily conceive how his dislike to his profession made him very
+sedulous of keeping his child from all contact with it, lest its
+fascination should mislead him also. He had never permitted him to see a
+play. He brought him up strictly, religiously, austerely. He had no
+friends among actors: acting was never spoken of in his presence. Yet,
+by an inconsistency easily enough explained, the works most constantly
+read and talked about by him were those of Shakspeare, Molière, Göthe,
+and Schiller. These were his household gods. Young Franz was early
+initiated into their beauties, and would declaim, (in private,) with
+great gusto, all the long speeches.
+
+Franz was sent to the university of Leipsic, where it was his father’s
+fond hope he would distinguish himself as a student of theology. For the
+first year he was assiduous enough; but theology grew inexpressibly
+wearisome, while poetry became irresistibly alluring to him. Göthe’s
+_Wilhelm Meister_ fell into his hands, and was read with rapture. He
+fell in love with the actor’s life, and felt secret yearnings to quit
+the university, and throw himself upon the world in quest of
+adventure—especially in quest of a Marianne, a Philina, and a Mignon! He
+had not as yet dared to disobey his father’s strict commands—he had
+never ventured inside a theatre; but he had imbibed the dangerous
+poison—he had learned to look upon an actor’s life as a life of poetry.
+The seed was sown!
+
+About this time my cousin William went to the Leipsic university, and
+became the fellow-student and companion of Franz. From him I learned
+most of these details. William was by no means a model of select
+virtue—in fact, was what, in the jargon of the day, is called “rather a
+fast man;” and he led Franz into many a debauch which would have driven
+Schoenlein wild, had he known it; but he could not persuade him to go to
+the theatre.
+
+Franz was ready enough at a duel, and had spoiled the beauty of some
+half-dozen faces by the dexterous sword-cut which draws a line over the
+nose, and lays open the cheek. He was ready enough, too, with his
+beer—few youths of his age had more promising talents that way: and as
+to patriotic songs, energetically demanding of the universe where the
+German’s fatherland might be, or the probability of tyrants long
+crushing free hearts beneath their heels, together with frantic calls
+upon the sword, responded to by the clatter of beer-jugs—in these Franz
+was distinguished.
+
+At last he did brush away his scruples, and accompanied William to the
+theatre. They played Schiller’s _Don Carlos_. Conceive his rapture at
+this first taste of the long-coveted forbidden fruit! He thought the
+Marquis of Posa a demigod. But words cannot express his adoration of the
+Princess Eboli, that night played by Madame Clara Kritisch. She was to
+him the “vision of loveliness and light,” which an actress always is to
+an impassioned youth, the first time he sees one. Her large voluptuous
+eyes, her open brow, her delicate nostrils, her full and not ungraceful
+figure, together with the dazzling beauty of her (theatrical)
+complexion, made a powerful impression on him. Her acting seemed to him
+the acting of an angel.
+
+He left the theatre madly in love with her.
+
+We all know what it is to be in love with an actress. We have all of us,
+in the halcyon days of boyhood, offered up the incense of our young
+hearts to some painted, plain, conventional, and perfectly stupid
+actress, round whose head we have thrown the halo and the splendour of
+our imaginations. We have had our Juliets, our Desdemonas, our Imogens,
+our Rosalinds, our Violas, our Cordelias, who, though in the
+flesh-and-blood reality they were good, honest, middle-aged women,
+mothers of families or disreputable demireps, to us were impersonations
+of the ideal—fairy visions, to whom we have written verses, whose
+portraits have hung over our beds!
+
+Therefore, having known a touch of this “exquisite fooling,” we can
+sympathise with Franz. Never having seen an actress before, any hag
+painted for the heroine of the night would have charmed him. But Clara
+was by no means a hag: in fact, his passion was excusable, for on the
+stage she was charming.
+
+Franz went again and again, only to return home more in love than
+before. He fancied she had remarked him in the pit; he fancied the smile
+on her ruddy lips was a smile of encouragement addressed to him. He
+wrote her a burning love-letter, which she quietly burned. He waited
+impatiently for an answer, and went to the theatre expecting to read it
+in her looks. He could read nothing there but her loveliness.
+
+He wrote again; he wrote daily. He sent her quires of verses, and reams
+of “transcripts of his heart,” in the form of letters. He lived a
+blissful life of intense emotion. Fatherland was forgotten; the sword
+was no longer called upon; all tyrants were merged in the cruel one whom
+he adored.
+
+At length he gained admittance behind the scenes; nay, more—he was
+introduced to Clara.
+
+Alas! the shock his sense of loveliness received, when he beheld before
+him the fat, rouged, spangled woman, whom he had regarded as the
+incarnation of beauty! Her complexion—was this its red and white? were
+its roses and lilies gathered by the hare’s foot and the powder-puff?
+
+He could not speak; the springs of his eloquence were frozen; the
+delicate compliments he had so laboriously prepared, faded away in an
+unmeaning stammer. The first illusion of his life was gone.
+
+Perhaps there is nothing more striking to a young man than his first
+experience of the stage behind the scenes. That which, seen from the
+boxes, looks health and beauty, behind the scenes is weariness and
+paint; that which in the house is poetic, behind the scenes is horrible
+mechanism. What scene-painting is when looked at closely, that are
+actresses seen in the green-room.
+
+Franz was staggered, but not cured. He could not divest his heart of her
+image, and began to see her again as he had always seen her. Growing
+accustomed to the reality, he again beheld it in its ideal light; and as
+on the stage Clara was always enchanting, she carried with her some of
+the enchantment when she left it. Poor fellow! how patiently he stood
+there, hungering for the merest word—the simplest look! He saw others—a
+privileged few—speaking to her boldly; jesting with her; admiring her;
+giving their opinions respecting her costume, as if she were an ordinary
+woman, while he could only stammer out some meaningless remark. What
+would he have given to feel himself at ease with her, to be familiar, so
+that he might be seen to advantage!
+
+At last he thought of a plan for making himself better known to her. He
+wrote a play, in which the heroine was destined for her; and as hers was
+the only character in the piece which was effective, she pronounced it
+the finest thing which had been written since Schiller. Franz was in
+ecstasies. She read the play herself to the manager, and exerted all her
+eloquence in its behalf. But the manager saw well enough her
+motive,—knew that she was so delighted with the play merely because her
+part was the important one, and declined to produce it. The play gained
+its author’s end however. It had established him among Clara’s friends.
+She began to notice his love for her, began to recognise its
+seriousness. She knew how to distinguish between the real homage of a
+heart, and the lip-homage which others offered her.
+
+There is something inexpressibly charming in knowing yourself possessed
+of a heart’s first love; and women—especially those who have passed the
+first flush of youth—are more gratified by the love of a boy, than by
+that of twenty men. A boy’s love has something in it so intense, so
+absorbing, so self-forgetting! It is love, and love only, unmixed with
+any thoughts of responsibilities; looking forward to no future,
+reflected by no past. There is a bloom on first love. Its very
+awkwardness is better than grace; its silence or imperfect stammerings
+more eloquent than eloquence; there is a mute appeal in its eyes, which
+is worth all the protestations in the world.
+
+Clara, who had been accustomed to the admiration of _roués_, felt the
+exquisite charm of this boy’s love. In a few weeks he became her
+acknowledged lover; and excited no little envy among the _habitués_ of
+the theatre, who could not for the life of them comprehend “what the
+devil she could see in that bumpkin.”
+
+But if boys love intensely, they love like tyrants, and Clara was made a
+slave. Jealous of every one who approached her, he forced her to give up
+all her friends; she gave way to every caprice; she began to idolise
+him.
+
+This connexion with an actress, as may easily be foreseen, led to
+Franz’s adopting the profession of the stage. Clara taught him in a few
+months that which ordinary actors take years to acquire; but this was
+owing to his hereditary dramatic talent more than to her instruction.
+His appearance on the stage, which would, he knew, profoundly hurt his
+father, was not the mere theatrical ambition which possesses most young
+men: it was stern necessity; it was the only profession open to him, for
+he had married Clara!
+
+Yes! he, the boy of one-and-twenty, had married a woman of
+five-and-thirty! It was a mad act—the recklessness or delirium of a boy:
+but it was an act which has too many precedents for us to wonder at it.
+He had by this act separated himself, he feared, from his father for
+ever. His only hope of pardon was, as he fondly thought, dramatic
+success. Could his father but see him successfully following in his
+footsteps, he would surely forgive him. It was a proud moment—that boy’s
+triumphant debut; proud because he had succeeded, proud because his
+pardon was purchased—as he thought!
+
+Franz had only played a few weeks, and Germany was ringing with his
+praises. So great was his success, that when a few critics and actors
+whose judgments were all _traditional_, objected that he could not be a
+good actor because he had not gradually worked his way upwards, they
+were speedily silenced by the incontestible fact that he _was_ a great
+actor. A brilliant engagement had been offered him at Berlin; and he was
+about to appear on the same stage with his father, before that father
+had the faintest suspicion of his son’s ever having entered a theatre.
+
+
+                              CHAPTER IV.
+
+The curtain fell. Franz had reappeared to receive the enthusiastic
+homage of the audience, and was now in his room undressing, when the
+door opened, and his father stood before him.
+
+Instead of rushing into his arms, Franz stood confused, blushing,
+trembling. The haggard sternness of his father’s face told but too
+plainly with what feelings he was regarded.
+
+It was a moment of cruel silence.
+
+The position was humiliating. With his clothes scattered about the room;
+with the paint still unwashed from his face; with his room in
+disorder;—swords, playbills, theatrical dresses, a wig, a rouge-pot, and
+washing-stand, lying about; himself in the undignified attitude of
+drawing on his stockings;—all combined to present the miserable and
+prosaic side of his profession to the angry glance of an incensed
+parent.
+
+“So!” said the old man, “these are your theological studies! This is the
+end of all my care! you have disobeyed me. You have destroyed all my
+hopes, and gone upon the stage, for which you well know my detestation.
+I find you _thus_!”
+
+Franz could make no answer.
+
+“While I fondly believed you still at the university, pursuing an
+honourable career—a career useful to mankind and honourable to
+yourself—you were like a runaway apprentice taking to this odious life.”
+
+“But, sir,—I have succeeded!”
+
+“So much the worse!”
+
+“Is not that my excuse?”
+
+“No; it is your condemnation.”
+
+“Surely, father, it proves that I have chosen right. It proves I have a
+vocation for the stage?”
+
+“It only proves your disobedience. Vocation, indeed! Any man has a
+vocation for the stage: any man who has brains, and is not physically
+too weak to utter the thoughts of an author. Vocation! You might as well
+tell me you had a vocation for the highway—and if you had robbed a man,
+by placing a pistol to his head, and bidding him stand and deliver, that
+your success was your excuse!
+
+“Is it not enough,” pursued Schoenlein, after a pause, “that there
+should be _one_ actor in the family: one whose necessities have driven
+him on the stage, and who, once there, is forced to remain there?”
+
+“But I, for my part, see nothing reprehensible in the life of an actor.”
+
+“I do.”
+
+Franz saw there was no appeal from such a decision, so he dressed
+himself in silence.
+
+He was hurt, angry. He expected that his father would have been
+delighted with his performance, would have rejoiced in his success. To
+be treated like a schoolboy, to hear such tones and see such looks,
+irritated him.
+
+“Come with me to my hotel,” said Schoenlein, as Franz completed his
+dressing.
+
+They had not taken many steps before a stout middle-aged woman,
+enveloped in a fur cloak, said to Franz:
+
+“_Lieber Franz_, the carriage is waiting.”
+
+Schoenlein did not hear the whispered reply, but strode hastily onwards:
+his son followed.
+
+“Who was that,” he inquired, as they came out into the street, “who
+called you _Lieber Franz_?”
+
+“Oh! that—an actress—one of our company—Madame Kritisch.”
+
+“Hm!” growled the old man; but he did not speak again till they reached
+the hotel. Arrived there, they went up into his room.
+
+“Franz, my dear boy,” said Schoenlein, with great tenderness, “you must
+promise me to quit this life, and I will forget that you have ever
+disobeyed me. Let us look on it as a boyish freak, now over.”
+
+Franz was silent.
+
+“It is your father who speaks. Remember he is your best friend; and he
+earnestly implores you to quit a career which even success can only make
+a gilded disgrace. Will you promise me this?”
+
+He felt very uncomfortable, and knew not what answer to make.
+
+“You are young,” pursued his father; “young and hopeful. You look as yet
+only to the bright side of life, and see only the pleasures of the
+stage. You think it glorious to be applauded, to have your name in the
+mouths of men, your portrait in shop windows. In a little while all this
+applause will pall upon your ear; all these portraits will look like so
+many signs of your disgrace, and caricatures of yourself. The charm will
+pass away, and you will feel yourself to be a mountebank, painted to
+amuse a gaping crowd! Then the wear and tear of the profession, its
+thousand petty irritations and miserable anxieties, will be as stings of
+wretchedness, and you will curse the day you first trod upon a stage.
+
+“Look at me!” he said, suddenly pausing in the angry walk which he was
+taking up and down the room. “Have _I_ not been successful? have _I_ not
+been flattered, envied? have _I_ not known what it is to be a great
+tragedian, to dictate terms to managers, to sway audiences? Have _I_ not
+known all this? And yet, since you can remember me, have you ever seen
+me happy? Is not my life an example? Does not my whole life cry out to
+you, Beware! Will you not profit by the bitter lessons of my
+experience?”
+
+“But, my dear father, you forget one thing: you have always looked upon
+the profession with disgust. I do not.”
+
+“You will learn to do so.”
+
+“I cannot believe it. You are the only actor in Germany who thinks so.
+Besides, I have, as it seems to me, a real vocation.—You may sneer, but
+a vocation is necessary in this as in all other professions. It is quite
+clear that I have none for theology. I must get my bread somehow.”
+
+“Your bread? Franz, listen to me. So fixed is my opinion, that if you
+will obey me, from this time forward you shall have the whole of my
+earnings. I have already saved enough to satisfy my own humble wants. I
+will devote every shilling to furthering and maintaining you in any
+profession you choose to select. You shall not say that necessity made
+you—as it has made _me_—an actor.”
+
+“I cannot accept such a sacrifice.”
+
+“It is none. I would sacrifice every thing rather than see you on the
+stage! Besides, in another year or two you may make a rich marriage. I
+have already agreed with our old friend Schmidt, that you should be
+united to his daughter Bertha, and her dowry will be very large.”
+
+A deep, deep blush overspread Franz’s face, which was succeeded by a
+deathlike paleness, as his father mentioned marriage.
+
+“How can I ever break my marriage to him!” was his mental exclamation.
+
+“Will you promise me?”
+
+“I cannot. Believe me, it distresses me thus to disobey you, but I
+cannot quit the stage.”
+
+“I have failed to convince you then? You misapprehend my motives. You
+think, perhaps”—and here an affected laugh of irony gave tenfold force
+to the words—“that I am jealous of you?”
+
+“Oh, father!” exclaimed Franz.
+
+But his father’s words and tone had, as in a flash of light, suddenly
+revealed the real feeling in his heart: he _was_ jealous, and his son
+perceived it.
+
+Do not, however, suppose that the old man was aware of this feeling; he
+would have shuddered at the accusation. Blinding himself with all sorts
+of sophistications, he attributed his horror at Franz’s adoption of the
+stage to his very sincere disgust to that profession; and because he
+really did in his own person feel an actor’s life was disgraceful, even
+sinful, he fancied his objection to Franz’s being an actor was wholly
+derived from that feeling. But in the depths of his heart he was
+horribly jealous. He had learned to hate Franz as a rival, before he
+knew him to be his son. Critics had maddened him by their comparisons.
+Franz had been pointed out as the actor who was to eclipse him. And now
+that he found Franz was his son, instead of rejoicing in his success,
+instead of feeling proud that at any rate his rival was his son, and
+that the genius which dethroned him was derived from himself—instead of
+the consolation which another father would have received, he was
+assailed by the bitterest thoughts at the idea of his son being an
+actor! He was incensed at such disobedience, at such violation of all
+his wishes; and attributed to his anger all he really felt of jealousy.
+
+There is something so painful in the idea of a father being jealous of
+his son, that many will be tempted to pronounce it impossible. Rare it
+fortunately is, but not impossible. Who has not known women jealous of
+their daughters: women preserving their beauty, and followed by homage,
+till their girls are old enough to dispute and bear away the palm from
+them? If this is not uncommon—and more than one instance must occur
+within every reader’s experience—what is to prevent the same principle
+applying in a man’s case? You have only to imagine the vanity pampered
+by flattery into an unhealthy condition, and then bring in a rival—no
+matter whom—and the thing is done. Either the father’s vanity will be
+caressed by the reflection of the child’s success, (and this, happily,
+is the commoner case,) or it will be irritated at the child’s
+interference with its claims.
+
+In Schoenlein’s case must be added the strange but intense dislike with
+which he regarded the profession of an actor. Had there been no rivalry
+in the case, had Franz been only a tolerable actor, he would still have
+been excessively irritated. But for his son to be an actor, and for the
+public to prefer him as an actor to his father—this was agonising!
+
+He grew eloquent in his exhortations. Finding it was in vain to make
+Franz share his religious opinions, he endeavoured to dissuade him by
+painting all the dangers of the profession—its pangs, its weariness, its
+disappointments—painted the disagreeable ordeal he himself had been
+forced to undergo; and speaking, as he thought, to accomplish his son’s
+welfare, he was eloquent.
+
+This much is to be said for fathers who object to their sons following
+their own careers: the struggles by which they have won their way, the
+sorrows which have been forced upon them, the dangers they have
+escaped—these are all so vividly present to their minds, that they
+believe them inseparable from the career. Who shall say that another
+will escape these perils? All the delight, all the rapture of hope and
+of success are forgotten, or else weigh but as a feather in the scale
+against these perils. A father says:—
+
+“It is true I escaped; but I was fortunate. Besides, I had genius,—I had
+rectitude,—I had strength of will. My poor boy, (and fathers are apt to
+look with a sort of compassion on their children: is it because the
+children have, from infancy upwards, looked to them for pity and
+protection?)—my poor boy will not be able to buffet with the world as I
+did! He will be led away by temptations; he will succumb beneath
+adversity!”
+
+In proportion to the precariousness of the profession is the reluctance
+of the parent. Poets never wish their sons to be poets; certainly not to
+trust to poetry for their livelihood. Nor do artists desire their sons
+to be artists. Actors almost universally shudder at the idea of their
+children becoming actors.
+
+So that Schoenlein’s remonstrances would have been vehement, even had he
+not been tormented with jealousy. But, from the moment Franz perceived
+the real state of his father’s mind, all compunction vanished. No
+arguments could have made him quit the stage; but now he felt his
+father’s arguments to be insults.
+
+“I hope you do not misunderstand me,” said the old man. “You must know
+me well enough to believe that no one would more rejoice in your
+success—that to no one should I be so proud to transmit my laurel crown,
+if it were not lined with iron, which brands the forehead with disgrace.
+I am growing old, and am soon about to leave the stage for ever: to whom
+could I so fitly leave the inheritance of my renown, did I not perceive
+that it would entail lasting misery upon him, as it has entailed it upon
+me? No, no, you must relinquish this boyish notion,—you shall marry
+Bertha Schmidt, and quit the stage for ever.”
+
+“Oh, do not ask it!”
+
+“I do more than ask it—I command!”
+
+“Do not—dear father—do not force me to disobey you.”
+
+“You—you will _not_ leave the stage?”
+
+“I—I cannot! It would be hypocrisy in me to pretend it. I have a passion
+for the stage; and whether that passion lead me to happiness or to ruin,
+I _must_ gratify it.”
+
+“And think you Bertha will marry an actor?”
+
+“Perhaps not.”
+
+“Are you indifferent to that?”
+
+“Why—the truth is—I cannot marry her.”
+
+“You cannot? You shall!”
+
+“I love another!”
+
+“You love another!” angrily exclaimed his father; and then adding, with
+a sneer—
+
+“Some _actress_, I presume!”
+
+Franz coloured.
+
+“It _is_ so,” said his father. “Old Clara Kritisch, I shouldn’t wonder!”
+
+A deeper blush overspread Franz’s face, and a look of anger shot from
+his eyes, as his father contemptuously let fall those words.
+
+Franz loved his wife; but he knew the disparity between them. She was
+not old to him, for he loved her,—was happy with her; but although to
+him she was as young as a bride, he knew what others said of her—what
+others thought of her. For himself he felt that
+
+                “Age could not wither, nor custom stale
+                Her infinite variety;”
+
+yet he trembled at his father’s knowing she was his wife.
+
+Schoenlein, who had observed the blush on Franz’s countenance, walked up
+to him and, placing one hand upon his shoulder, said—
+
+“Franz, Franz, beware! You are on the edge of an abyss: the worst
+temptations of our miserable profession beset you. Beware of that artful
+old woman:—do not frown, she is artful,—I have heard of her! She has
+ruined more young men than any woman now upon the stage. She has
+ensnared you;—do not attempt to deny it,—I see it in your countenance.
+She has flattered and cajoled you. She has lured you with languishing
+looks and sweet low words. You are already her dupe;—beware lest you
+become her victim!”
+
+“I cannot,” said Franz, rising wrathfully, “I must not, I will not, hear
+this language of her.”
+
+“You must and shall hear it. Why should I hesitate to utter the contempt
+I feel for that _refuse_ of a hundred libertines!”
+
+Franz was purple with suppressed passion, and, with terrible calmness,
+said:—
+
+“You are speaking, sir, of MY WIFE!”
+
+Schoenlein’s lower jaw fell; his eyes became glazed, and, slowly sinking
+on the sofa, he waved his hand for his son to withdraw.
+
+
+                               CHAPTER V.
+
+The following week Schoenlein was again in Berlin, and playing three
+nights a-week—a thing quite unprecedented with him. All his repertory
+was brought forward. A sort of rage possessed him. He was tormented with
+the idea of producing such an effect upon the public as should perfectly
+eclipse his rival and son.
+
+With true actor’s ingenuity in such matters, he gave the preference to
+his son’s favourite parts. He hoped, by repeatedly performing them ere
+Franz arrived, he should weary the public of those plays, and so prevent
+large audiences welcoming the new actor. He hoped, also, that by this
+means the public would better appreciate the difference between his
+finished style and the crude energy of his rival. The consequence of
+this procedure he expected to be,—small audiences and unfavourable
+criticisms. By these he hoped to disgust his son, and so wean him from
+the stage.
+
+Unhappily, he was so goaded by the desire to produce a greater effect
+than heretofore, as to act much worse than heretofore. He overdid every
+thing. He was too violent; his contrasts were too marked; the
+elaboration was painful. People lamented his exaggeration, and began to
+whisper that his day was gone.
+
+Franz appeared. Young, handsome, ambitious, full of hope and
+energy—around him the charm which always belongs to novelty, and within
+him the inappreciable wealth of genius—how could he fail to produce a
+deep impression? The calculation of his rival turned out a mistake: so
+far from the public keeping away because they had so recently seen the
+pieces performed, they flocked to the house because they wished to
+compare the two rivals in the same parts. As in the case of all
+well-known plays, the attraction was in the actor, not in the piece.
+
+Berlin never witnessed such a debut. Franz was called sixteen times
+before the curtain to receive their boisterous homage. The whole town
+was in a state of excitement. Every body talked about him; every body
+compared him with Schoenlein—to the general disadvantage of the latter;
+and the secret of the relationship soon transpired, which led to endless
+discussion. The actors mostly stood by Schoenlein: they do not like new
+favourites. But the public, undisguisedly, unequivocally preferred
+Franz.
+
+Exasperated by what he called the fickleness of the public, Schoenlein
+went to Dresden, there to eclipse the remembrance of his son. He played
+to crowded houses. But if at Berlin he overacted, at Dresden he “tore
+the passion to tatters.” Instead of crushing Franz’s reputation he
+nearly ruined his own. One paper had the malice to recommend him to
+retire from the stage.
+
+He did retire; but not till after a fearful struggle with himself, and
+many a bitter reflection on the world’s ingratitude, and the
+worthlessness of his efforts. He was deeply hurt. He secluded himself
+from every one. In the practices of devotion, and in brooding solitude,
+he endeavoured to forget the world and its frivolities. He tried to find
+occupation in study, and solace in religion. But to the one he did not
+bring a studious mind; to the other he did not bring a religious heart.
+Lacerated with envy and humiliation, his soul found no comfort in books.
+He could not forget the past; he could not shut the world from his
+heart. The solemn organ strains, which stirred his soul when in church,
+recalled to him the stage; still more so did the inflections of the
+preacher’s voice recall it to him; he could not refrain from criticising
+the preacher’s declamation.
+
+He ceased to go to church, and tried the efficacy of lonely prayer. In
+vain! The stage was for ever present before his mind. He tried to
+renounce the world, but the world held possession of his heart. His
+renunciation was not prompted by weariness, but by rage: the world
+weighed not too heavily and sorely upon his spirit, making him weary,
+making him yearn “for the wings of the dove, to flee away and be at
+rest;” on the contrary, he was only angry at his unjust appreciation.
+His retreat was not misanthropy but sulking. He could not forget his
+defeat.
+
+Months passed away in this unavailing struggle.
+
+Suddenly he reappeared upon the stage. His reappearance created intense
+interest, and the theatre trembled with applause. The public was so glad
+to see its old favourite again! Schoenlein’s heart bounded, as of old,
+responsive to that thunder of applause; but the joy was transient: his
+pride was soon once more to be laid low. That very public, which had
+welcomed him so enthusiastically, grew indifferent by the end of the
+week. In truth his acting had lost its former grandeur. Flashes of the
+old genius there still were, from time to time, but they only served to
+make more obvious the indifference of the whole performance. People
+shook their heads, and said, “He was certainly grown too old for the
+stage.”
+
+He never reappeared.
+
+Meanwhile Franz continued his triumphant career. He played at almost
+every town in Germany; and even the old men thought him superior to the
+actors of “their day.” The greatest triumph an actor can achieve is to
+make the “laudator temporis acti” forget for a moment the illusions of
+his youth, and confess that, even seen through the magnifying mist which
+envelops and aggrandises the past, this living actor is as great as
+those who are no more.
+
+But Franz, amidst his brilliant success, was far from happy. The stage
+was the scene of his triumphs, but home was the scene of his despair. He
+was in a false, a very false position. Petted and idolised by the
+loveliest women in Germany, he had learned to look upon his wife as what
+she was—a woman past her prime, faded in beauty, insignificant in mind.
+He began to blush for her! This is perhaps the cruellest torture a
+husband can know, because it affects his self-love as keenly as his
+love. It is a torture which generally results from such ill-assorted
+unions. Slowly had the conviction dawned upon him—but it had come. He
+struggled against it, but it would not be set aside; it pressed on and
+on, till at last it fairly gained admittance into his mind, and made him
+wretched.
+
+For observe, it was not her faded beauty which made him blush—it was not
+that she was so much older—it was because this faded insignificant woman
+was fretful, jealous, ungenerous, and unprincipled. The perception of
+these faults of disposition opened his eyes to the perception of her
+faults of person; they raised the question in his mind—_who_ is this
+whose jealousy irritates, whose fretfulness distresses me? He began to
+scrutinise her, and the scales fell from his eyes!
+
+“My dear Clara,” he said to her one day, “what in heaven’s name has
+changed you so? You used to be cheerful—now you are unbearably peevish.”
+
+“And what has changed _you_ so, Franz?”
+
+“I am not aware of any change!”
+
+“No!” she said ironically.
+
+“In what, pray?”
+
+“You used to be fond and attentive, and now you are cold and
+neglectful.”
+
+“If I am so, whose fault is it?”
+
+“Lieschen Flemming’s. Oh, yes! pretend astonishment; but I see clearly
+enough. Your tenderness _on_ the stage with her is so well acted,
+because you have so often rehearsed it in private.”
+
+“Clara! Clara! this jealousy is insupportable!”
+
+“Yes, yes—that is the answer I always receive; but it is no answer to my
+accusation.”
+
+“Why, Lieschen is betrothed to Fechter!”
+
+“What matters that? Are _you_ not married to me—and does that interfere
+with your making love to her?”
+
+“This is perfectly ridiculous! Last week you were jealous of Rosa Behr,
+because she played Juliet; now it is Lieschen Flemming, because she
+plays Gretchen. I presume every actress whom I have to make love to on
+the stage will come under your suspicions?”
+
+“Every one to whom I see you making evident love. I know I am old. I
+have lost the charm I once had in your eyes.”
+
+“This is not the way to regain it,” he said, as he put on his hat and
+angrily left the room.
+
+He that day confessed to himself that she was old, that she had lost the
+charm which once had captivated him! But Franz was a man of honour; and
+although he found himself in this false position, he resolved to support
+his lot with courage. He was wedded to a woman too old for him, unsuited
+to him; but the wedding had been his act and desire. It had been the
+crown upon his hopes. He had loved her—been happy with her. He could not
+forget that. And although divorces are easily obtained in Germany, he
+could not bring himself to abandon her, to separate from her, now she
+was past her prime. He had offered her an independence if she wished to
+part from him; but she did not wish to part—she still clung to the idea
+of regaining his lost affection—and made home miserable as a means of
+regaining it!
+
+For five years did Franz drag about with him this load of wretchedness.
+
+To render his situation still more pitiable, he became conscious that he
+loved another. Madame Röckel’s youngest daughter—a sweet innocent girl
+of eighteen—had conceived a passion for the young tragedian, which her
+artless nature had but ill concealed. Franz read it in her eyes, in her
+tones, in her confusion; and reading it, he also read in his own heart
+that her passion was returned.
+
+He left Berlin in two days after the discovery, with bitter curses on
+his youthful error, which had yoked him to a woman he could no longer
+love, and which had shut him for ever from the love of another.
+
+Then, indeed, the thought of a divorce rose constantly before him; but
+he wrestled with the temptation, and subdued it. He resolved to bear his
+fate. His only hope was that death might interpose to set him free!
+
+
+                              CHAPTER VI.
+
+If in these brief sentences I have indicated the misery of Franz’s
+condition—the depth of the shadows which accompanied the lustre of his
+success—if I have truly presented the main outlines of his domestic
+history, the reader will imagine Franz’s feelings when a hand as
+friendly as that of death did interfere to set him free.
+
+Clara ran away with the low comedian of the troop!
+
+She had worn away in tears and fretfulness all the affection she once
+had felt for Franz, and having inspired a sort of passion in the breast
+of this comedian, lent a willing ear to his romantic proposal of an
+elopement. To a woman of her age an elopement was irresistible!
+
+She fled, and left Franz at liberty.
+
+The very day on which Franz received this intelligence he had to perform
+in Kotzebue’s _Menschenhass und Reue_ (our “Stranger.”) He went to the
+theatre extremely agitated. Great as was his delight at being released
+from his wife, and released by no act of his own—he could not think
+without a shudder upon the probable fate which awaited her; and a
+remembrance of his former love and happiness with her returned to make
+him sad.
+
+It happened that old Schoenlein had that night been seized with a sudden
+impulse to see his son act, and had gone privately into the _parterre_.
+It was the first time he saw his son acting—for on that Dresden night he
+_saw_ nothing—a mist was before his eyes. He was now sufficiently calm
+to be critical.
+
+Franz played the wronged husband with such intense feeling, such depth
+of passion, such thrilling intonation of voice, that the old man shared
+the rapture of the audience, and wept tears of joy and of pride as he
+confessed that his son was really a great actor.
+
+The curtain had no sooner descended than Schoenlein, hurrying out of the
+house, went round to the stage-door, knocked at his son’s dressing-room,
+and in another instant had fallen on his shoulders, sobbing—“My boy! my
+dear, dear Franz! you have conquered me!”
+
+“My dear father!” exclaimed Franz, pressing him convulsively to his
+heart.
+
+“Franz, I retract all that I have said. I forgive you. You have a real
+vocation for the stage!”
+
+This happy reconciliation was soon followed by the betrothal of Franz
+Schoenlein to Matilda Röckel; and the old man had not only the delight
+of seeing his son wedded to a woman worthy of him, but also to hear him
+announce his intention of retiring for ever from the stage. He had
+realised an independence, and the stage was connected with too many
+disagreeable associations for him not to quit it on this opening of a
+new era in his life.
+
+
+
+
+                          THE MOSCOW RETREAT.
+
+
+“It is scarcely necessary,” says Mr Rellstab, in the preface to an early
+edition of his romance of “1812,” “for the author to confess how largely
+he has availed himself of Ségur’s narrative of the Russian campaign. It
+will be evident to all readers that he has followed, at times almost
+word for word, the descriptions of that skilful historian.” Without
+taxing Mr Rellstab with exceeding the romance-writer’s legitimate
+privilege in thus largely helping himself from the pages of General
+Count Ségur, we may congratulate him on having had as a guide, in the
+historical portions of his book, so admirable a work as the _Histoire de
+Napoleon et de la Grande Armée_. As interesting as any romance, it at
+the same time conveys the conviction that the author has determined to
+merit the character of historian, and to avoid that of the retailer of
+campaigning gossip and anecdotes. Indeed one often feels disappointed
+and almost vexed at the extreme brevity with which the Count refers to
+all matters not strictly essential to the history of the grand army and
+great chief whose history, during the brief existence of the former and
+the first reverses of the latter, he undertakes to portray. He dismisses
+in three lines many an incident of strange romance or thrilling horror,
+whose details one would gladly see extended over as many pages. Mr
+Rellstab has cleverly availed himself of this dignified and military
+conciseness, improving upon hints, and filling up blanks. With a few
+bold dashes of his graphic pen, Count Ségur furnishes the rough sketch;
+this his German follower seizes, adds figures, tints, and names, and
+expands it into a picture. The account in “1812” of the retreat from
+Moscow to Wilna is, in fact, a poetical paraphrase of that given in
+Ségur’s history; and this paraphrase Mr Rellstab, seduced by the
+excellence of his text, allows somewhat to impede the progress of his
+plot; or rather it protracts the book after the plot has, in all
+essential respects, been wound up. Nevertheless, as we have already
+said, this paraphrase, which may be considered in some degree
+supplementary or parenthetical, is the best part of the work; and Mr
+Rellstab displays great power of pen, and artistical skill, in his
+handling and adaptation of the materials furnished by his French leader.
+The last strictly original chapters of the romance are those composing
+the eleventh book, commencing immediately after Ludwig is rescued by
+hostile peasants from death at the hands of his own friends. Here for a
+while we lose sight of the fugitive army, and abide amongst the
+Russians.
+
+The chief ground of apprehension with the Russian nobles, upon
+Napoleon’s invasion of their country, was lest he should proclaim the
+emancipation of the serfs, and thus enlist in his behalf millions of
+oppressed peasants. The plan occurred, and was suggested to the French
+Emperor, but various considerations deterred him from attempting its
+realisation. He apprehended a frightful amount of license and excess
+amongst a barbarous people thus suddenly released from bondage.
+Tremendous destruction of property, and frightful massacres of the
+higher classes, were the almost certain results. He might succeed in
+raising the storm, but he could never hope to guide it. Moreover,
+although the child of revolution, his sympathies were not with the
+masses. The Russian landholders, however, did not reckon upon his
+forbearance, and took every means in their power to counteract any
+propagandist projects he might have in view. “In the first place,” says
+Ségur, “they worked upon the minds of their unfortunate serfs,
+brutalised by every kind of servitude. Their priests, in whom they are
+accustomed to confide, misled them by deceitful discourse, persuading
+these peasants that we were legions of demons, commanded by
+Antichrist,—infernal spirits, whose aspect excited horror, and whose
+contact polluted. Our prisoners perceived that when they had used a dish
+or vessel, their captors would not touch it again, but kept it for the
+most unclean animals. As we advanced into the country, however, it was
+natural that the clumsy fables of the priests should lose credit with
+their dupes. But, on our approach, the nobles recede with their serfs
+into the interior of the land, as from the advance of some mighty
+contagion. Riches, habitations, all that could delay them or serve us,
+are sacrificed. They place hunger, fire, the desert, between us and
+them; for it is as much against their serfs as against Napoleon that
+this great resolution is executed. It is not a mere war of kings, but a
+war of classes and of parties, a religious war, a national war, every
+kind of war united in one.” Stimulated to hatred of the intruding
+foreigners by those they most feared and respected—by their owners,
+namely, and their priests—the peasant-slaves of Russia perpetrated
+frightful cruelties upon those unfortunate Frenchmen who fell into their
+hands; cruelties admitted and abundantly illustrated by Mr Rellstab,
+although his predilections are upon the whole rather Russian than
+French. It is only justice to say, however, that in all the historical
+portions of his romance he displays great impartiality, and puts himself
+above national antipathies, taking a cosmopolitan view of the causes,
+conduct, and progress of the great struggle.
+
+Led away by his captors to a bivouac of armed peasants in the glades of
+a vast forest, Ludwig at first almost regrets having escaped the volley
+of the French firing-party. A colossal Russian stretches out his hand to
+appropriate his prisoner’s foraging-cap, and, upon the imprudent
+resistance of the latter, raises a club to dash out his brains. Ludwig
+deems himself no better than a dead man, when suddenly a woman’s scream
+is heard, and a figure clad in costly furs rescues him from the fierce
+savage. A veil is thrown back, and Ludwig beholds Bianca, who possesses
+a castle in the neighbourhood, the same which the Polish lancers had
+surprised upon her wedding-night. It is not quite clear what has brought
+her into the forest among beastly Cossacks and bloodthirsty peasants,
+unless it were to meet Ludwig. The sights she there meets are not all of
+the most agreeable kind. Whilst the enraptured Ludwig kneels before her,
+kissing her hand and weeping, a horseman, whose noble steed and rich
+dress bespeaks the man of rank, dashes into the circle, and sternly
+inquires the reason of this strange scene between the lady and the
+captive dragoon. It is Count Dolgorow, who interrupts Bianca’s
+explanation by suddenly springing from his horse, and seizing the
+scoundrel Beaucaire, his former secretary, whom his quick eye has
+distinguished in the group of prisoners. By a strange fatality, his
+betrayer and his rescuer are together delivered into his hands. He
+gratifies revenge before showing gratitude, and has the traitor
+precipitated into one of the huge bivouac fires that blaze around.
+Before this we have met with a French grenadier impaled alive in a wood,
+and with a party of Russians setting up their captives as targets. There
+is no scarcity of the horrible in Mr Rellstab’s pages, but without it
+the retreat from Moscow could not be faithfully described. After
+Beaucaire has been roasted, Bianca recovered from her swoon, and Ludwig
+presented to the Count—who admits, but with no very good grace, his
+claims to gratitude and consideration—the other prisoners are sorted.
+The able-bodied are sent to the Count’s hunting-seat, thence to be
+forwarded to the mines. To those unfit to work, Russia, says Dolgorow,
+can afford no other nourishment than two ounces of lead. One man only is
+put aside as too old for labour. This is St Luces, Beaucaire’s employer
+and Ludwig’s persecutor.
+
+“St Luces, not having understood the Count’s words, fancied that, from
+his appearance and fine linen, and from his clothes (of which, however,
+he was by this time pretty well stripped,) his captors had discovered
+him to belong to the higher classes. The pallid horror which had spread
+over his features since the terrible fate of Beaucaire, was replaced by
+a faint gleam of hope. He ventured to address the Count in French.
+
+“‘I trust, sir,’ he said, ‘I shall be treated in conformity with those
+laws of war which all civilised nations respect. I am not a military
+man, but belong to the civil service; my rank—’
+
+“‘You are a Frenchman,’ sternly interrupted Dolgorow—‘one of those
+vampires who have sucked the blood and marrow out of half the nations of
+Europe; more contemptible and odious than the soldier, for he, at least,
+fights with fair and open weapons.’
+
+“‘They would willingly,’ persisted St Luces, again trembling with
+apprehension, ‘exchange me against Russian prisoners!’
+
+“‘Prisoners! what prisoners have you?’ cried Dolgorow with bitter scorn.
+‘Thousands, certainly are set down in your bulletins, but where can you
+show them? You do wrong to remind me of that. Think you we know not how
+your ruthless assassin bands have treated the few who fell into their
+hands? Think you we have not found them, lying with shattered skulls
+upon the roads in rear of your flying columns? Did we not meet with them
+shut up in churches, barns, and stables, dead in the pangs of famine?
+Away with ye! We shall find enough to exchange, when exchange we
+_will_.’”[9]
+
+Discoveries and surprises now tread rapidly on each other’s heels. A
+German in the service of Count Dolgorow recognises Ludwig as the son,
+and St Luces as the murderer of his former master; whereupon Ludwig
+generously intercedes for the Frenchman’s life, but is sternly repulsed
+by the Count, and St Luces is forthwith shot. Then, upon their way to
+Bianca’s castle, Ludwig and his mistress stumble upon Bernard, lying
+senseless in the road. They pick him up and take him with them, in spite
+of danger from wolves and of the anger of Countess Dolgorow, impatient
+to proceed. At the castle Bernard and Bianca discover, by the somewhat
+hackneyed contrivance of identical rings, that they are brother and
+sister, and soon afterwards the Count becomes aware of the good
+understanding between them, and that Bianca knows she is not his
+daughter. These meetings and recognitions thwarting certain deep-laid
+plans, he resolves to forward Ludwig and Bernard to Siberia; but before
+he can do so, the two young men, with Bianca and Willhofen the German
+servant, make their escape by the aid of some French prisoners, and take
+the road to Smolensko, with the intention of joining the French army and
+seeking refuge in Germany.
+
+Meanwhile Rasinski, with the shattered remnant of his gallant regiment,
+now reduced to a feeble squadron of sixty horses, forms part of the
+rear-guard under the hero Ney. We will give a specimen of Mr Rellstab’s
+adaptation of Ségur.
+
+“‘Rasinski!’ suddenly exclaimed Jaromir, ‘do you see yonder on the
+rising ground?’
+
+“‘Cossacks! And I wager my head they are not alone!’ replied Rasinski.
+
+“Upon the heights appeared three horsemen, seemingly thrown forward to
+reconnoitre. They were soon remarked by all; and there occurred in the
+French ranks that restless stir and low murmur, betokening the
+expectation of an important event.
+
+“‘Jump on your horse, Jaromir,’ said Rasinski, ‘and ride to the corner
+of the forest; thence you will see far over the country.’
+
+“Jaromir, now the best mounted in the regiment, sped swiftly across the
+snow, in obedience to the order. But he returned even more rapidly, to
+announce that the entire heights were covered with Cossacks, and that
+infantry columns were debouching from the depths of the forest.
+
+“Just then Colonel Regnard, who by the marshal’s order had also been out
+to reconnoitre, rode by. ‘This looks like work, Rasinski,’ he cried in
+passing; ‘the ball opens just like the day before yesterday. The wood is
+as full of Russians as an anthill of ants.’ The drums beat. The troops
+stood to their arms. The disorderly groups of weaponless stragglers and
+invalids formed themselves into a dense mass.
+
+“‘For us the fight is a pleasure,’ exclaimed Rasinski; ‘but it is hard
+upon Boleslaw and the other wounded. We must do our best to shield them
+from harm. But who comes here?’
+
+“A Russian officer was seen descending the hill, waving a white
+handkerchief.
+
+“‘Useless trouble, sir,’ said Rasinski proudly to himself, as he
+distinguished the Russian’s object. ‘We shall not treat for peace so
+long as we can handle our arms.’
+
+“The marshal was busy placing and ordering his troops. He galloped
+through the ranks, showing himself every where, directing and
+encouraging all. Rasinski sent an orderly to report to him the approach
+of a flag of truce. But before the message reached him, the Russian
+officer reached the outposts, and, on distinguishing the Polish uniform,
+summoned them in their own language to surrender to overpowering forces.
+Rasinski sprang forward like an incensed lion. ‘What!’ he shouted, ‘you
+would seduce our men, incite them to desert! That is not the duty of a
+flag of truce. You are my prisoner!’
+
+“The alarmed officer would have turned his horse, but Rasinski already
+held the bridle, and his soldiers surrounded the Russian so quickly that
+resistance and flight were alike impossible.
+
+“‘You will surely respect the sacred rights of a flag of truce!’ cried
+the Russian.
+
+“‘You should have waited at proper distance, till you knew if it pleased
+us to receive you,’ replied Rasinski. ‘It is against all usage of war to
+approach an enemy’s army as you have done.’
+
+“‘Take me to your commander,’ said the officer, ‘he will listen to my
+well-intended offers. The bravest must yield to impossibility. You have
+no alternative but capitulation.’
+
+“‘We shall see that,’ answered Rasinski, well assured beforehand of the
+marshal’s decision. ‘Here comes our commander, Marshal Ney. That name
+may suffice to convince you that you will waste your words.’
+
+“The marshal came; Rasinski rode to meet him and reported what had
+passed.
+
+“‘You have done your duty as an officer and man of honour,’ replied Ney;
+‘I should take shame to myself did I hesitate to confirm your words.’
+And he rode forward and inquired the Russian’s pleasure.
+
+“‘Marshal Kutusow sends me,’ began the officer. ‘He would not offend so
+renowned a warrior and general by asking him to lay down his arms, if
+any alternative remained open. Upon the surrounding heights stand eighty
+thousand men, and one hundred pieces of cannon. If you doubt my words,
+you are at liberty to send an officer, whom I will conduct through our
+ranks that he may count our strength.’
+
+“‘I hope to get near enough to your army to count them myself,’ replied
+the marshal with flashing eyes. ‘Tell Prince Kutusow that Marshal Ney
+has never yet surrendered, and that the world’s history shall never
+record his having done so. Yonder is the goal which duty and honour
+assign me; I will break a road through your ranks, though your forests
+became armies.’
+
+“‘They _will_ do so,’ replied the Russian. The words had scarce left his
+lips, when the thunder of artillery echoed from the heights in front and
+on the left flank, and an iron hail crashed and rattled upon the icy
+surface of the plain.
+
+“‘This is treachery!’ cried the marshal sternly, as he looked up and
+beheld the hills crowned on all sides with levelled guns, and dark
+masses of troops. ‘There is no parleying under fire! You are my
+prisoner!’
+
+“The officer, confounded at being thus sacrificed by the imprudence or
+recklessness of his friends, gave up his sword.
+
+“‘Take him to the rear!’ commanded the marshal. ‘General Ricard,
+forward! Attack the enemy with the bayonet. You shall have the honour of
+opening the road.’
+
+“The general, at the head of fifteen hundred men, pressed resolutely
+forward.”
+
+Everybody who has read Ségur, and those who have not had better begin
+immediately, knows how these fifteen hundred men were swept away by
+Kutusow’s artillery; how Ney in person headed the next charge; and how,
+after losing more than half his division, he retreated towards
+Smolensko, made a flank movement, again returned southwards, and at last
+struck the Dnieper, and crossed it with the remnant of his force,
+without a bridge, and on blocks of floating ice, to find, upon the
+further bank, Platoff and his Cossacks, with their Scythian tactics and
+sledge-mounted artillery, to which he had no cannon to oppose,—the six
+guns wherewith he had audaciously returned the fire of Kutusow’s
+tremendous batteries having been left, of course, on the north bank of
+the river. But, after braving and escaping from the whole Russian army,
+Ney was not to be intimidated by a horde of ill-disciplined savages; and
+he forced his way, fighting incessantly, to the neighbourhood of Orcha,
+where Eugene received him with open arms. There are only five short
+days’ marches from Smolensko to Orcha; but in that little section of the
+long and terrible retreat, Ney, whilst losing thousands of men daily,
+gathered enough laurels to shade the brows of half a dozen heroes. We do
+not envy the feelings of those, be they Russians, English, or of what
+country they may, who can read, without profound emotion and admiration,
+the history of Marshal Ney during the Russian campaign, and especially
+during its latter and most disastrous portion. When those who previously
+ranked as the bravest gave in—when pride and thirst for glory were
+obliterated by extremity of suffering, and by the instinct of
+self-preservation—when the soldier’s most powerful incentives,
+discipline, honour, and gain, were forgotten and lost sight of, and even
+the iron veterans of the Old Guard, no longer sustained by their
+Emperor’s presence, renounced the contest and lay down to die—when his
+fellow-marshals, with rare exceptions, showed weariness and
+discouragement, and even the stern Davoust complained that the limits of
+human suffering were exceeded,—where was Ney, what was his aspect, what
+his words and actions? In rear of the army, a musket in his hand, a
+smile of confidence on his lips, the fire of his great soul and of his
+own glory flashing from his eyes, he exposed his life each minute in the
+day, as freely as ever he had done when he had but life to lose, before
+his valour had given him riches and rank, family and fame. Surely, so
+long as valour is appreciated, the name of NEY will be borne in glorious
+remembrance. And surely those men who subsequently pronounced his
+sentence of death, must since have sometimes felt remorse at their share
+in the untimely fate of so great a warrior. “I have saved my eagles!”
+joyously exclaimed Napoleon, when he learned, at two leagues from Orcha,
+that Ney was safe, although he brought with him but the ghost of his
+fine division. “I would have given three hundred millions to avoid the
+loss of such a man.” Although Napoleon, in some things the most
+magnificent charlatan upon record, dealt largely in speeches of this
+sort, we may believe that in this instance the cry came from the heart.
+What would the Emperor have said, had he then been told that three years
+later, on the 7th December 1815, the anniversary of one of those days
+when Ney so bravely breasted the Muscovite torrent, an execution would
+take place in an alley of the Luxemburg gardens, and that there, by
+sentence of a French chamber and the bullets of French soldiers, a
+premature end would be put to the glorious career of him he had surnamed
+the Bravest of the Brave!
+
+Previously to the junction of Ney and Eugene, Colonel Rasinski, whilst
+reconnoitring in the gray of the morning, falls in with a sledge
+containing three persons muffled in furs, whom he at first takes for
+Russians, but who prove to be Ludwig and his two companions. Upon the
+occasion of so happy a meeting, M. Rellstab is of course profuse in
+tears and embraces; Jaromir and Boleslaw are summoned to assist at the
+jubilee, and thenceforward the three Poles, the two Germans, Bianca, her
+waiting-maid Jeannette, and the faithful Willhofen, keep together as far
+as Wilna, save and except those amongst them whom death snatches by the
+way. The party is soon increased by an infant, the daughter of Colonel
+Regnard, and of a French actress, of which Bianca takes charge. Here
+again the author of “1812” has made good and effective use of an
+incident thus briefly recorded by Ségur.
+
+“At the gates of the town (Smolensko) an infamous act struck all
+witnesses with a horror that still survives. A mother abandoned her son,
+a child of five years old; in spite of his cries and tears she repulsed
+him from her overloaded sledge, wildly exclaiming that ‘he had not seen
+France! he would not regret it! But as to her, she knew France! she must
+see her country again!’ Twice did Ney have the poor child replaced in
+its mother’s arms, thrice she threw it upon the frozen snow. But amongst
+a thousand instances of sublime and tender devotedness, this solitary
+crime was not left unpunished. This unnatural parent was herself
+abandoned upon the snow, whence her victim was raised and confided to
+another mother. At the Beresina, at Wilna, and Kowno, the orphan was
+seen, and he finally escaped all the horrors of the retreat.”
+
+In the romance the child is first fostered by a wounded veteran, and a
+compassionate canteen woman, but is separated from them when traversing
+the Dnieper, and receives the tenderest care from Bianca. On the
+northern bank of the Beresina we find the principal personages of the
+tale assembled, at the moment when the Russian cannon pour their
+murderous contents into the dense mass of fugitives, and these, crowding
+to the bridge, fall by hundreds into the water. A round-shot suddenly
+shatters the front of the vehicle in which Bianca, her maid, and the
+child are seated. The scene that ensues is spiritedly and naturally
+told.
+
+“The frightened horses reared furiously, and would have upset the
+carriage had not the pole and fore-axle been in splinters. Willhofen
+sprang forward to hold them; Ludwig and Bernard hurried to his
+assistance. With streaming hair, Jeannette had already leaped from the
+cart, and Bianca, unconscious of what she did, followed her example,
+still closely clasping the infant.
+
+“‘Is it alive?’ cried a voice, and at the same moment she felt herself
+seized from behind. She turned, and Regnard stood before her, his right
+arm in a sling: he had just made his way through the crowd of carts.
+‘Oh! I have you then at last,’ he tenderly exclaimed, kissing and
+caressing his child as she lay in the arms of Bianca, who, stunned with
+terror and the recent shock, scarce thought of wondering at his
+unexpected appearance.
+
+“‘You here, colonel?’ cried Bernard. ‘How and whence came you?’
+
+“‘From the fight up yonder,’ replied Regnard. ‘’Tis awful work; our
+fellows stand like the walls of Troy, but all must soon be overthrown,
+for the Russians bury us under their bullets.’
+
+“‘Did you see Rasinski? Is he alive? And Boleslaw and Jaromir?’
+
+“‘They fight like lions, like devils, those Poles; but it’s all in vain,
+we cannot hold out another hour. And this defile over the bridge looks
+about as tempting as the jaws of hell.’
+
+“‘You are wounded, colonel?’
+
+“‘My right arm shattered. My horse was knocked over by a shell; I
+dragged myself as far as Studianka to seek a doctor, and found ashes and
+corpses, no longer of use in the fight. I thought I would have a trial
+to cross the bridge. I saw these carriages from above; I knew you had
+driven up here yesterday. If I could only find you, I thought, and get a
+last look at my little daughter! Laugh at me, if you like, but the
+thought came like a whisper from heaven. ‘Perhaps it is the last wish
+you will see fulfilled,’ said I to myself. And as if some invisible
+guide had led me, I made my way to your very carriage, just as the
+twelve-pounder played you the trick. Only see now how hearty the child
+is; it grows like its mother! Ah! if I only had something for you, poor
+darling! Were we but in Paris, that I might give you a pocketful of
+bonbons!’
+
+“And in fondling and chattering with the infant, he forgot both his
+crushed arm and the destruction that raged so actively around. The storm
+of shot had no terrors for him; twenty battles had accustomed him to it.
+But the sweet emotions of paternal love were new to him, and a secret
+voice seemed to warn him that he would not long enjoy them.
+
+“Ludwig now came up and greeted the colonel. Bianca gave the child to
+Jeannette, for Regnard, with only one arm, could not hold it, and she
+felt that her strength was giving way amidst this complication of
+horrors. She leaned against the wheel of the carriage. Bernard observed
+her faltering, and encircling her tenderly with his arm, he kissed her
+pale cheek.
+
+“‘See yonder woman,’ he said; ‘take pattern by her; see, dearest sister!
+how calm she is amidst the ravages of death.’
+
+About twenty paces off, a tall female figure sat upon a horse, a child
+of three years old in her arms, and gazed steadily at the tumult. A
+black veil was twined round her head, but left her noble and striking
+countenance exposed. She could but just have arrived, otherwise her
+appearance was too remarkable not to have attracted attention, even in
+that hour of confusion when few thought of any thing but their danger.
+
+“‘Calm?’ said Bianca, after a long look, ‘calm, say you? Petrified, you
+_should_ say. See you not the tears that roll over her rigid
+countenance, and the despairing gaze she directs to heaven? Alas, poor
+woman!’
+
+“‘She is the widow of Colonel Lavagnac,’ said Regnard; ‘her husband fell
+three weeks ago at Wiazma; the child in her lap is her daughter.’
+
+“All eyes were fixed in pity on the mourning figure, when a cannon-ball
+boomed through the air, and struck her and her horse to the ground. A
+cry of horror escaped the bystanders. The unhappy woman had disappeared.
+One could not see her for the throng. Bernard, Ludwig, and Regnard
+forced a passage through the mob of men and horses, but with all their
+efforts their progress was slow. Bianca followed them, led partly by
+pity and partly by fear of separation from her protectors.
+
+“Silent and uncomplaining, the lady sat upon the ensanguined snow, her
+tall, dignified form supported against an overturned cart, her child
+clasped in her arms. The shot had shattered both her feet, but her
+infant appeared unhurt, and anxiously clasped its mother’s neck with its
+little hands. None thought of succouring the poor creatures; all were
+too engrossed with their own selfish misery, and few vouchsafed her more
+than a passing glance as they struggled onwards. She would hardly have
+escaped being trampled under foot, had not her wounded horse, lashing
+out convulsively in the agonies of death, cleared a space around her.
+Whilst Bernard supported his trembling sister, Ludwig and Regnard
+attempted to climb over the cart which intervened between them and the
+wounded lady. But at that moment the noble sufferer took a strong
+hair-chain from her neck, twisted it, before any could stay her hand,
+around her infant’s throat, and with a sudden exertion of strength drew
+it tight. The little creature drooped its head and fell strangled on its
+mother’s knees. In a last frantic convulsion, the unhappy parent clasped
+her child to her bosom, gave an agonised sigh, a glance to heaven, and
+fell back, dead. At that moment Ludwig and Regnard reached her, but it
+was too late. Bianca hid her face in her brother’s bosom.”
+
+A fragment of a shell knocks over the faithful Willhofen. The fire from
+the Russian batteries becomes more terrible than ever, the crowd more
+agitated and frantic.
+
+“‘Let us keep together!’ cried Regnard—‘once separated, we shall never
+meet again.’ And he stretched out his hand to grasp that of Ludwig, when
+a ball passed between them, overthrowing the colonel.
+
+“‘Regnard!’ cried Ludwig, springing to his assistance, ‘are you badly
+hit?’
+
+“Bernard raised the wounded man by the shoulders, and bent over him.
+
+“‘I have got my allowance,’ said Regnard, faintly. ‘Where is my little
+daughter?’
+
+“Shuddering, but with resolute step, Bianca came forward, the child in
+her arms. She kneeled beside the dying soldier and held it out to him.
+Regnard looked mournfully at the little creature so soon to be an
+orphan.
+
+“‘Farewell!’ he said, kissing it for the last time. ‘You have no longer
+a father—but a mother—has she not?’ added he, imploringly to Bianca.
+‘Greetings to Rasinski, if he still lives to receive them. Long live the
+Emperor!’
+
+“Upon this last exclamation, uttered in a hoarse soldier-like tone, the
+final breath of the dying man was expended. The next instant his soul
+had fled.”
+
+From the heights of Studianka the beaten French now pour down, and
+Bianca loses her female attendant, who perishes miserably, crushed by a
+gun-carriage. It will be seen that there is a considerable accumulation
+of horrors at this part of the romance; but tender-hearted persons, whom
+narratives of human suffering too painfully affect, will naturally avoid
+a book founded on such a campaign as that of 1812. The passage of the
+Beresina has been too often described to be worth dwelling upon here;
+and the more so as Mr Rellstab very judiciously has not attempted to
+alter or improve upon the reality, of itself sufficiently extraordinary
+and harrowing. He makes Rasinski execute the famous feat of Jacqueminot,
+Oudinot’s aide-de-camp, who, after swimming the Beresina in spite of the
+piercing cold and of the floating blocks of ice that bruised and cut his
+horse’s chest and flanks, galloped after the stragglers from Tchaplitz’s
+retreating column, caught one, disarmed him, put him before him on his
+horse and swam back with him to Napoleon, who had expressed a wish for a
+prisoner from whom to get information.
+
+Hopeless of crossing the crowded bridge, where a fearful struggle for
+precedence now goes on amongst the mob of desperate fugitives, Bianca
+and her two companions take their course up stream, still bearing with
+them Regnard’s orphan daughter, and hoping to find rest and shelter by
+passing themselves off as Russians. At last, seeing no signs of house or
+village, they sit down in despair upon the snow and await their fate;
+when, in accordance with Mr Rellstab’s practice of bringing about
+opportune meetings, Rasinski and his handful of lancers ride up to them,
+and after the due amount of kisses and tears, a Lithuanian peasant
+guides them to a ford, and they get through the river in safety. At
+Zembin they procure a small sledge, and Bernard and Ludwig urge Bianca
+to hurry forward to Wilna. Neither of them offer to accompany her, which
+they might with great propriety have done, seeing that they are
+dismounted and useless, but propose confiding her to a wounded dragoon,
+a proposal which she naturally enough declines, and declares she will
+stick to the ship—in other words to the regiment—and rough it with the
+rest. After which plucky decision there is no more talk of parting
+company till they reach Wilna. Before getting there, however, there is
+much to be gone through. For winter sets in, and the tortures of cutting
+cold are added to those previously endured, slaying the sick and wounded
+by hundreds of a night. Overpowered by the fatigues of the day, they lie
+down to sleep beside their watchfires, and in the morning are stiff and
+cold. The north-west wind suddenly surrounds the harassed Frenchmen with
+the terrible atmosphere of the north pole, the air is filled with an icy
+dust, lips and cheeks crack and blister, the eyes are inflamed by the
+glittering whiteness of the snow. The horses die from extreme cold, and
+it is just as well for their riders, who would otherwise be frozen in
+their saddles. Thus Rasinski and his comrades find themselves
+dismounted, and Bianca’s sledge becomes useless. They pursue their way
+on foot, amidst scenes of inconceivable suffering and woe. Few of those
+around them show fortitude in this extremity of misery. In some
+instances despair and madness lead to violence and shameful excesses.
+Bianca, whose courage rises with the necessity for exertion, is walking
+supported by Ludwig’s arm, and Bernard follows at a short distance,
+carrying the infant, who, unconscious of the danger, smiles cheerily in
+his face, when the following incident occurs.
+
+“At this moment a hoarse firm voice was heard in rear of Bernard.
+
+“‘Stop, dog!’ it exclaimed. ‘Your cloak, or I shoot you dead!’
+
+“Bernard stopped and looked round. A soldier, scantily attired in
+wretched rags, his features distorted, his beard long and tangled, his
+face black with earth and smoke, his eyes, frightfully inflamed, rolling
+wildly in their orbits, stood before him and covered him with his
+musket.
+
+“‘What would you, wretched man?’ cried Bernard, horror-struck and
+stepping backwards. The child screamed with terror, clasped its arms
+around him, and hid its little head in his breast.
+
+“‘Your warm cloak, or I shoot you down!’ shouted the frantic soldier.
+‘No more comrades here; I’ve as good a right to save myself as you.’
+
+“Bernard saw himself almost alone with the assassin; although thousands
+were within hail, the bullet would be quicker than their aid, supposing
+even that one amongst them had sufficient pity for another’s peril to
+turn aside for a moment, and thus lengthen his journey and sufferings by
+a few painful paces. There was nothing for it but to yield to the menace
+and give up his warm wrapper, although he well knew that with it he gave
+up his life.
+
+“‘You would murder a comrade to prolong your own life?’ said Bernard, in
+a tone of dignified determination; ‘be it so, but you will profit little
+by the deed. Your hour will overtake you the sooner.’
+
+“‘Quick, death gripes me already!’ cried the madman, his musket still
+levelled and his bloodshot eyes wildly rolling.
+
+“Bernard stooped to put down the child, which impeded him in pulling off
+his coat; as he did so, he heard a loud cry, and turning, he beheld
+Bianca, who threw herself weeping at the feet of the furious soldier.
+
+“‘Take this gold, these jewels!’ she exclaimed; ‘this warm cloak is
+yours, but let my brother live!’ And, with the quickness of thought, she
+tore the rich chain from her neck and the furs from her shoulders,
+leaving her arms and delicate frame exposed with slight covering to the
+rigour of that horrible climate. The soldier gazed at her for a moment
+with fixed and straining eyes, then his arms slowly sank; letting the
+musket fall to the ground, he pressed both hands to his face, and broke
+out in loud weeping and whimpering. By this time Ludwig came up, and he
+and Bernard lifted up Bianca, who was still kneeling on the frozen
+ground, and extending her arms with the proffered gifts.
+
+“‘Wild beast that I am!’ suddenly exclaimed the stranger; ‘no, I cannot
+survive this shame. Forgive me; you knew me once a better man, before
+suffering drove me mad! But no matter; I know my duty.’
+
+“He stooped to pick up his musket. Bernard kept his eyes fixed upon him,
+and racked his memory for the features, which, wild and distorted though
+they now were, still seemed familiar to him.
+
+“‘Where have I known you?’ he asked, as the man resumed his erect
+position.
+
+“‘I don’t wonder you’ve forgotten me,’ was the gloomy reply; ‘I have
+forgotten myself. Alive, I am no longer worthy of the Order!’ cried he
+wildly, tearing from his rags the ribbon of the Legion of Honour and
+throwing it upon the snow. ‘I will try to earn it again, that you may
+lay it upon my body. I am my own judge, and I show no favour.’
+
+“Setting the butt of his musket firmly on the earth, he pressed his
+breast against the muzzle and touched the trigger with his foot. The
+piece went off, and its unfortunate owner fell heavily to the ground.
+
+“‘Gracious God!’ exclaimed Bianca, sinking senseless into Ludwig’s arms.
+
+“Bernard was at the side of the fallen man, supporting his head. A last
+spark of life still remained. ‘If you get to France,’ gasped the
+suicide, ‘a word to my wife and children—Sergeant Ferrand—of Laon,’ and
+the spirit departed. As he closed his eyes, Bernard remembered him. It
+was the same Sergeant Ferrand whose humanity saved him and Ludwig from
+perishing during their imprisonment at Smolensko. Military honour was
+the condition of the veteran’s existence; he thought himself degraded
+beyond redemption by the murderous aggression to which misery, pain, and
+despair, had driven him; a woman had surpassed him in courage, and that
+was more than he could bear. A rigorous judge, he had pronounced his own
+doom, and executed it with his own hand.
+
+“Deeply moved, Bernard knelt beside the body; he gathered up the scrap
+of tarnished ribbon which the departed soldier had prized above all
+earthly goods, and laid it upon the breast of the corpse.
+
+“‘Who shall deprive you of it?’ he said. ‘May it adorn you beyond the
+grave, amidst the throng of the valiant who have preceded you!’
+
+“And they continued their journey, for the times admitted not of delay.”
+
+That night they have to fight for their quarters in the village of
+Malodeczno, and use their artillery for the last time, being compelled
+to abandon it for the want of horses. Boleslaw is killed in the action.
+Soon afterwards, the Emperor leaves the army, and his departure
+dispirits even those who admit its propriety. Things get worse and
+worse. Often, after a fatiguing day’s march, no shelter is obtainable,
+and Bianca and her tender charge are fain to brave the inclemency of the
+bivouac, whilst the men watch by turns to keep off wolves and marauders.
+One night, when performing this duty, Jaromir is startled by a loud
+laugh, sounding strangely horrible in that scene of misery and
+desolation.
+
+“From out of the surrounding darkness a grim figure stalked into the
+circle of fire-light. It was a gigantic cuirassier, wrapped in a
+tattered cloak, a bloody cloth bound round his head beneath his helmet.
+In his hand he carried a young fir tree, as a staff to support his
+steps.
+
+“‘Good evening,’ he said, in a hollow voice to Jaromir. ‘Good evening,
+comrade. You seem merry here.’
+
+“‘What seek you?’ demanded Jaromir, amazed at this hideous apparition!
+‘There is no place for you here. Begone!’
+
+“The cuirassier stared at him with his hollow eyes, twisted his mouth
+into a frightful grin, and gnashed his teeth like some infuriated beast.
+
+“‘Ha, ha, ha!’ he laughed, or rather yelled; ‘Sleep you then so sound,
+ye idlers?’ And as he spoke he stamped with his foot on a frozen corpse
+upon which he stood. ‘Awake, awake!’ he cried, ‘and come with me!’
+
+“For a moment he stood as if listening to some distant sound, then
+tottered painfully forward to the fire.
+
+“‘Back!’ cried Jaromir, ‘Back, or I shoot you on the spot!’ And he drew
+a pistol; but his hand, trembling with fever, had not strength to level
+it.
+
+“The lunatic stared at him with stupified indifference, his sunken
+features varying in their expression from a ghastly smile to the deepest
+misery. Jaromir gazed at him in silent horror. The huge figure stretched
+its lean arms out from under the cloak, and made strange and
+unintelligible gestures.
+
+“‘Ho! I am frozen!’ howled the human spectre at last, and shook himself.
+Then he clutched at the flames with his fingers, like an infant, and
+staggered nearer and nearer till he stood close to the circle of
+sleepers, far within which he extended his arms. For the first time he
+now seemed to feel the warmth of the fire. A low whining noise escaped
+him, then he suddenly exclaimed, in tones between laughing and crying,
+‘To bed! to my warm bed!’ tossed his fir-tree staff far from him,
+stumbled forwards over the sleeping soldiers, and threw himself, in his
+raging madness, into the centre of the glowing pile.
+
+“‘Help, help!’ cried Jaromir, his hair erect with horror, and seizing
+Rasinski, he shook him with all his remaining strength.
+
+“‘What is it?’ cried Rasinski, raising himself.
+
+“‘There, there!’ stammered his friend, pointing to the flames, in which
+the unhappy cuirassier lay writhing and bellowing with agony. Rather
+conjecturing than comprehending what had occurred, Rasinski started up
+to rescue the sufferer. But it was too late. The heat had already
+stifled him; he lay motionless, the flame licking greedily round his
+limbs, and a thick nauseous smoke ascending in clouds from his funeral
+faggots. Rasinski stepped shudderingly backward, and turned away his
+face to conceal his emotion; then he observed that all around him lay
+buried in a deathlike sleep. Not one had been aroused by the terrible
+catastrophe that had occurred in the midst of so many living men.”
+
+After those long days of hunger and fatigue, the bonds of slumber were
+of iron strength, and difficult to loosen. And it was even more
+dangerous than difficult to rob the survivors of the Grand Army of that
+brief repose, often their sole solace and refreshment during the
+twenty-four hours. In his turn overtaken by delirium, Jaromir’s cries
+and complaints at last awoke the whole party round the fire. A low
+murmur arose amongst the soldiers, and rapidly increased. Soon they cast
+ominous and threatening glances at the young Pole, and at last their
+discontent found a voice.
+
+“‘Who is the madman, and what ails him?’ savagely exclaimed a bearded
+grenadier. ‘He robs us of our precious sleep! Thrust him from the
+fire—let him freeze if he cannot be still!’
+
+“‘Ay, thrust him out!’ was the universal cry; and several sprang to
+accomplish the barbarous deed. Bianca uttered a cry of terror; Ludwig
+caught her in his right arm, and with his left kept off the assailants.
+Rasinski, who at once saw the greatness of the peril, left Jaromir in
+Bernard’s care, and leaped with flashing eyes into the midst of the
+circle. Ever prompt and decided, he snatched a half consumed branch from
+the fire, waved it above his head, and shouted with that lion’s voice so
+often heard above the thunder of the battle, ‘Back, knaves! The first
+step forward costs one of you his life.’
+
+“The angry soldiers hesitated and hung back, yielding to Rasinski’s
+moral ascendency as much as to his threat of punishment. But then the
+grenadier drew his sabre and furiously exclaimed:—
+
+“‘What, dastards, are ye all afraid of one man? Forward! Down with the
+Polish dogs!’
+
+“‘Down thyself, inhuman ruffian!’ thundered Rasinski, and sprang to meet
+his foe. Adroitly seizing the soldier by the wrist of his uplifted arm,
+so that he could not use his weapon, he struck him over the head with
+the burning branch so violently, that the charred wood shivered, and a
+cloud of sparks flew out. But the blow, heavy as it was, was deadened by
+the thick bearskin cap, and served only to convert the angry
+determination of the grenadier into foaming fury. Of herculean build,
+and at least half the head taller than his opponent, he let his sabre
+fall, and grappled Rasinski with the intention of throwing him into the
+flames. The struggle lasted but for a moment before Rasinski tottered
+and fell upon his knees. To all appearance his doom was sealed, the hero
+succumbed before the overpowering strength of the brute, when Ludwig
+flew to his assistance, dragged the soldier backwards, and fell with him
+to the ground. Rasinski picked up the sabre, with his left hand dashed
+the bearskin from the head of the fallen grenadier, and with the right
+dealt him a blow that clove his skull in twain. Then, erecting his
+princely form, he advanced, with the calm dignity that characterised
+him, into the midst of the astounded bystanders. ‘Throw the corpse into
+the snow,’ commanded he: ‘lie down again and sleep. It matters no more
+than if I knocked a wolf upon the head.’
+
+“As if he had no longer occasion for it, he threw the sabre
+contemptuously from him. None dared to murmur, but two soldiers
+obediently raised the bloody corpse of the fallen man, carried it a few
+paces, and threw it upon the snow-covered ground.”
+
+The following evening the little band of friends reached Wilna, but
+without Jaromir, who had expired on the road. Wilna, the first inhabited
+town the French army had seen since their entrance into Russia, had been
+looked forward to by the fugitives who escaped from the terrible passage
+of the Beresina, as a refuge and a resting-place. There they fondly
+expected shelter from the cold, food for the famishing, bandages and
+medicine for the wounded and the sick. But their arrival took the
+Lithuanian capital by surprise. The inhabitants were still without any
+certain accounts of the disasters of the French, when suddenly they
+beheld their streets invaded by forty thousand ragged wretches, in whom
+it was impossible to recognise the remains of those magnificent troops
+which had passed through with Napoleon in the previous month of July.
+The very impatience of the men to get into the comfortable quarters they
+had promised themselves (but which few of them found, for the
+inhabitants shut their doors, and the commissaries, although their
+stores were crammed with bread and meat, refused to serve out those much
+needed provisions without a host of formalities rendered impossible by
+the general disorganisation) was the destruction of thousands. They all
+rushed in at one entrance,—the narrow suburb became blocked up with men,
+horses, and vehicles, and numbers perished of cold and of suffocation.
+When the survivors got through, their despair was terrible on finding
+themselves every where repulsed, from hospital and barracks, from the
+provision-store and the private dwelling. The hospitals and barracks,
+where there were neither beds or straw, were converted into
+charnel-houses, heaped with human bodies. “At last,” says Ségur, “the
+exertions of certain chiefs, such as Eugene and Davoust, the pity of the
+Lithuanians and the avarice of the Jews, opened places of refuge. Then
+it was strange to behold the astonishment of these unfortunates on
+finding themselves at last in inhabited houses. What delicious food a
+loaf of bread appeared, what inexpressible pleasure did they find in
+eating it seated, and with what admiration were they struck by the sight
+of a single weak battalion, still armed and uniformly clothed. They
+seemed to return from the extremity of the world, so completely had the
+violence and duration of their sufferings detached them from all their
+former habits.”
+
+Bianca, her brother and friends, skirt the town to avoid the throng, and
+get in by an unencumbered entrance. In the streets, however, Rasinski is
+separated from his three companions, who find shelter in the house of a
+former servant of Bianca, and there meet with Ludwig’s sister Marie, and
+the Countess Micielska, a widowed sister of Rasinski, whom we have not
+had occasion previously to mention, although she is a fine enthusiastic
+character, and plays no unimportant part in the earlier scenes of the
+book. On learning, by letters from their brothers, the burning of Moscow
+and probability of retreat, the two ladies braved the severity of a
+Lithuanian winter, and left Warsaw for Wilna, where their arrival
+coincides with that of Napoleon’s disordered cohorts. Their joy at
+meeting Ludwig and Bernard is greatly overcast by the loss of Jaromir
+and Boleslaw, and by the absence of Rasinski, whom the two young Germans
+vainly seek in the crowded town, until at last, overcome with weariness,
+they retire to rest, dissembling, for his sister’s sake, their
+uneasiness touching his fate. Scarcely in bed, however, they are aroused
+by Paul, their host, who calls their attention to groans and
+lamentations in the street without. Arming themselves, they hurry forth
+to investigate the cause.
+
+“Paul, bearing a lantern, preceded them to the spot whence the piteous
+sounds proceeded. It was a narrow lane, running parallel to the city
+wall, and inhabited entirely by Jews. Just as they turned into it they
+were challenged by a manly and well-known voice in their rear. ‘Who goes
+there? What is this disturbance?’
+
+“‘Rasinski!’ exclaimed Ludwig. Paul turned, and, as the light fell upon
+the face of the new comer, the features of the noble Pole were revealed
+to his friends.
+
+“‘Rasinski! you here, and alive!’ cried Ludwig, throwing himself into
+the Count’s arms.”
+
+Here follows, of course, _more Rellstab_, half a page of tender embraces
+and gratulations. Then, the groans and lamentations continuing, the
+friends again move forward.
+
+“The lane was narrow and crooked, so that they could not see far before
+them. On passing an abrupt bend, they distinguished several figures,
+which fled noiselessly before them, like night-birds frightened by the
+sudden light, keeping close in the shadow of the wall.
+
+“‘Who goes there?’ cried Rasinski in Russian. ‘Stand, or I fire!’
+
+“But the shadows flew onwards, grazing the wall, and gliding over the
+snow. Rasinski rushed after them, stumbled over an object in his path,
+fell, and, in his fall, his pistol went off. Ludwig and Bernard, close
+at his heels, would have stopped to help him up—
+
+“‘Forward, forward!’ he cried: ‘follow and catch them.’
+
+“They hurried on, but only one figure was now visible. They called to
+him to stop; he heeded them not. A shot fired by Bernard missed its
+mark, but the whistle of the bullet discomposed the fugitive, who, in
+stooping his head, slipped and fell. Ludwig was upon him in an instant,
+inquiring who he was, and why he fled. The stranger, who wore a sort of
+long black caftan, replied in piteous and terrified tones.
+
+“‘God of my fathers!’ he cried: ‘have compassion, gracious sir! Why
+persecute the poor Jew, who does harm to no one?’
+
+“‘Paul, a light!’ cried Bernard, who just then came up. ‘Let us see who
+it is that is in such haste to crave mercy. His conscience seems none of
+the best.’
+
+“Paul lifted the lantern, casting the light full on the Jew’s visage.
+
+“‘The devil!’ cried Bernard. ‘I should know that face. Where have I seen
+the accursed mask? To be sure, those red-bearded Lithuanians are all as
+like each other as bullets. But I greatly err, Jew, or you are the spy
+with whom we have an account to settle, that has stood over for the last
+five months.’
+
+“A shout from Rasinski interrupted the speaker.
+
+“‘Hither, friends!’ he cried; ‘your help here!’ The three hastily obeyed
+the summons, dragging the Jew with them in spite of his struggles and
+cries.
+
+“‘Here has been the most villanous crime the world ever witnessed!’
+exclaimed Rasinski, pale with horror and indignation, as his friends
+joined him. ‘Behold our comrades, driven out naked in this deadly cold,
+plundered, strangled, hurled from the windows! Inhuman monster!’ he
+cried in a terrible voice to the trembling Jew, ‘if you have shared in
+this work, I will have you torn by dogs. See! here they lie. Horrible,
+horrible!’
+
+“In a nook formed by the recession of a house from the line of street,
+lay eight human bodies, half naked, some with only a shirt or a few
+miserable rags to cover them. Over one of these unfortunates, who was
+still alive, Rasinski had thrown his furred cloak, to protect him from
+the piercing cold. Ludwig and Bernard shuddered at this lamentable
+spectacle.
+
+“‘God of Abraham!’ cried the Jew, ‘to thee I lift up my right hand, and
+swear that I am innocent of this deed. May I be accursed with my
+children and my grandchildren if I know aught of it! May the ravens pick
+out my eyes, and the flesh of my hand wither, if I speak not the truth.’
+
+“‘He was amongst the murderers,’ the wounded man faintly gasped out: ‘he
+was about to cut my throat, when the fall from the window did not kill
+me, and because I called for help. Only your arrival saved me.’
+
+“‘Fiend, inhuman fiend! the unspeakable misery that might draw tears
+from a demon could not touch you.’ Thus spoke Rasinski between his set
+teeth, and raised his sabre to split the skull of the Jew. In
+convulsions of terror the miserable wretch embraced his knees, and
+prayed for pity.
+
+“‘God—Jehovah—mercy, noble Count, mercy!’
+
+“Ludwig held back Rasinski’s arm. ‘Sully not your good blade with the
+monster’s blood,’ he said, earnestly and solemnly. ‘Leave him to the
+justice of an omnipotent Avenger.’
+
+“‘You are right,’ replied Rasinski, quickly resuming his habitual
+composure. ‘Think you I have forgotten?’ said he, with an expression of
+the deepest loathing, to the Jew, who still clasped his feet in agony of
+fear. ‘I know you well for the base and double traitor who once already
+escaped well-merited death. Nothing could save you now, were it not that
+even a villain like yourself may be made useful. Begone, and warn your
+fellow-assassins, that if to-morrow I find a single dead body, a single
+mark of violence in one of their houses, I lay the whole quarter in
+ashes,—men, women, and habitations; and I myself will be the first to
+hurl the sucking-babe into the devouring flames! Away, dog! Yet will I
+mark thee, that thou mayest not escape.’
+
+“And raising his foot, he stamped thrice upon the face of the prostrate
+Jew, who bellowed like a wild beast, whilst his blood reddened the snow.
+Nevertheless, the murderer managed to scramble to his feet, and reach an
+adjacent house door, where he stood knocking and calling upon his fellow
+Israelites for help and compassion.”
+
+Count Ségur tells us, that the Jews enticed the unfortunate wounded into
+their houses to despoil them, and afterwards, in sight of the Russians,
+threw them, naked and dying, out of the doors and windows, leaving them
+to perish of cold.
+
+We approach the final chapters of Mr Rellstab’s romance. Bianca, whose
+quality of a Russian noble suffices to protect her and her attendants,
+remains with Ludwig, Marie, and her brother at Wilna, after the French
+leave it. They then post to Germany without further adventure. Their
+last sight of Rasinski is when, mounted on a Cossack horse, by the side
+of Marshal Ney, he heads a scanty but determined band, covering the
+retreat of the French. He subsequently falls at Leipzig, fighting with
+his wonted gallantry under the orders of his countryman Poniatowski.
+
+From the glimpses of the plot and numerous extracts we have given, the
+reader will have small difficulty in forming his own estimate of the
+faults and merits of “1812.” We have already commented upon both: upon
+the spirit and power often conspicuous in the dialogue and description,
+as well as upon the excess of forced coincidences, and upon the
+occasional long-windedness and super-sentimentality. However the
+interest may here and there, by reason of prolixity, be found to flag,
+the book, when once begun, is not likely to be laid aside unfinished.
+This alone is saying much for a historical romance in four very long
+volumes. There are not many German writers, in that style, of whose
+works we would venture the like prediction. And just at present Mr
+Rellstab need not apprehend fresh rivals. The year 1848 is unfavourable
+to German literature. The country is far too busy revolutionising to
+care about belles-lettres. Fictions are ousted by realities, novels by
+newspapers, trim octavos by uncouth twopenny pamphlets, polemical and
+satirical, attacking and defending, supporting and tearing to pieces,
+the numerous schemes afoot for the regeneration of Fatherland. In due
+time it will be seen whether the literature of the country is to share
+the general improvement so sanguinely anticipated from the recent
+changes in a system, under which Germany undeniably has long enjoyed a
+very large share of tranquillity and happiness.
+
+
+
+
+               WHAT WOULD REVOLUTIONISING GERMANY BE AT?
+
+
+Many a confirmed wanderer upon Continental highways and byways may have
+been long since wearied by the conceitedly-vulgar airs in which old
+Father Rhine has indulged himself in latter years, and heartily tired of
+his bald vineyards, his melodramatic old ruins, and the make-believe
+majesty of his so-called mountains. But still there remained a sort of
+spurious halo about his very name; some kindly reminiscence of the time
+when, as an enthusiastic youth just escaped from the supposed
+commonplace of England, one gazed for the first time upon this famed
+show-stream of the Continent, and wondered, and admired, and poetised in
+spite of one’s-self, may have cast a charm of early memory upon its
+overrated allurements; and, of a surety, there must have been brought a
+comfortable glow of pleasure to the heart of any one, except that
+nearly-exploded animal, the exclusive exquisite, either male or female,
+in witnessing the happy gaping faces of the touristic hordes, who
+paddled up and down the well-known old banks—a feeling of ease, comfort,
+and even homeishness, in the modern luxuries of the hundred
+palace-hotels of the Rhenish towns and villages, in the contented aspect
+of the thriving landlord, welcoming the guests who brought him wealth,
+and in the ready alertness of the active and obsequious waiters. Well,
+Germany has taken into its head to follow in the lead which distracted
+France gave, when it madly beckoned with frantic finger to all the
+Continent to follow in its wild dance. Germany has caught the St Vitus
+of revolution, and danced off, if not as distractedly, at all events in
+less connected step, and less defined figure, than its neighbour: and in
+this revolutionary frenzy Germany has assumed so ungenial an aspect—a
+manner so doubtful, so unpromising, so uncertain, as regards the next
+step it may be inclined to take in the jerkings of its abrupt and
+unregulated dance—that the gentle tourist-seekers of ease and pleasure
+have turned away in disgust from this heavy Meg Merrilees, who has
+forgotten even her scraps of song, and her long-pretended spirit of
+romance, and declined to visit her until she shall have somewhat
+recovered from her drunken fit of revolution, and become more decently
+behaved. The Rhine, then, has lost the last charm of foreign bustle and
+movement, with which he decked his old head, as with a crown of wild
+flowers, not unbecoming his gray hairs. He looks sad, sober,
+discontented, disappointed, mourning his lost old joys, and his lost
+glories, of which young Germany, in its revolutionary excitement, has
+despoiled him. His hotels are empty; landlords, too, have a forlorn air,
+and take to rattling their last _groschen_ in their pockets; and unhappy
+waiters get fat upon their inactivity, but, at the same time, pale with
+ill-humour at their diminished _trinkgelder_, and apprehension of losing
+their places altogether. Travellers’ visits have grown, like those of
+angels, “few and far between;” and as angels do the poor scanty tourists
+appear to be regarded—as munificent beings, in fact, from whom too much
+cannot be demanded and expected; for the Rhenish hotel-keepers, in
+pursuance of the system adopted by Parisian shopkeepers, in these days
+of revolutionary scarcity and destitution, seem determined to make those
+unhappy beings, who fall into their clutches, redeem the debt they
+appear to consider due to them from those absent tourists, who have not
+come to enjoy all the splendours prepared for them. Since Germany, with
+its newborn cry for imperial unity, has appeared inclined to turn back
+again, in new revolutionary spirit, to old feudal times, the Rhenish
+hotel-keepers seem to think that they ought to appear in the characters
+of the old robber-knights. This consideration, perfectly personal to a
+poor tourist, who has lately paid his _löse-geld_ at many a modern
+robber’s stronghold on the Rhine, brings him round, however, to the
+question which he has been putting to himself, at every step he has been
+taking in Germany—“What would revolutionising Germany be at?”
+
+What would revolutionising Germany be at? It is a question easily put,
+but very difficult to answer. The old joke, lately “freshed-up” to be
+applied to the French—namely, that “they don’t know what they want, and
+won’t be easy till they get it,” may, with still deeper truth, be
+applied to the Germans. In spite of much inquiring conversation with all
+men of all ranks, and in all positions of life, it has been quite
+impossible for an unimaginative English understanding to discover
+exactly, in the midst of all the vague rhapsody, florid discourse, and
+poetical politics with which it has been assailed, “what they want.” To
+judge by the fermenting spirit every where prevalent, the bombastic and
+unpractical dreams—for plans they are not—formed as regards the future,
+it would be difficult also not to suppose that “they won’t be easy till
+they get it.”
+
+What would revolutionising Germany be at? In spite of all one sees and
+hears, or rather does not hear, it is impossible not to recur to the
+question again and again; for, after all, in Germany we are among
+thinking men, and, children as they may be in political life, _thinking
+men_ they _are_; and, surely, thinking men must have some definite end
+and aim to which their thoughts, their hopes, their aspirations, and
+their efforts are directed. All the Utopian schemes, all the unpractical
+theories of all parties, who put themselves forward in the revolutionary
+movement, be their tendencies monarchic, constitutional, or republican,
+aspire, then, to the setting up of the ill-defined idol of modern German
+political fancies—“German unity”—“One great and powerful united
+Germany”—“One great united German Empire”—or whatever name, designation,
+or varied shade of name the idol, whose pedestal is “Union,” may bear.
+This was the great fancied panacea for all evils, for which men
+clamoured, when, in imitation of that distracted city of Paris—so worthy
+of imitation, forsooth!—they got up revolutions, and tried their hands
+at building barricades. This has been, in truth, long since the
+watchword of the German student, when, in the recesses of his
+beer-cellar at the university, he collected a set of fellow _fancied_
+enthusiasts around the beer-jugs, imagined this species of club to be a
+wonderful conspiracy, because he designated it by the forbidden name of
+“_Burschenschaft_,” and deemed himself a notable and formidable
+conspirator, because he drank off his _krug_ of beer to the cry of
+“Perish all Princes—_es lebe hoch das Deutsche Vaterland_!” The princes,
+by the way, were highly complimentary to such conspirators, in
+considering them dangerous, and forbidding the existence of the
+_Burschenschaften_, which were pretty safety-valves enough to let off
+the exuberance of studentic steam. Whether the cry for a “United
+Germany” first proceeded again from the mouths of these fantastic
+enthusiasts, who, when they found out, to their surprise, that the parts
+they had been acting in their mimic dramas of the beer-cellars might be
+acted to the life and under the open sky of heaven, became in most parts
+of Germany the leaders of the mobs, or the heroes of the barricades,
+matters but little; nothing is more like a flock of sheep—although the
+term of “a pack of wolves” might often appear more applicable—than the
+general herd of men in moments of revolutionary excitement; whatever
+conclusion, however far-fetched and fantastic, any old revolutionary
+bell-wether may jump at, the flock is sure to follow and jump after him.
+It matters, then, but little how or by whom the cry of “United Germany”
+was first raised—the whole revolutionary flock immediately set up the
+same “baa!” and in each convulsion of each German State, great or small,
+in which a revolution may be said to have taken place, among the
+grievances which mobs, deputations, or delegates laid before German
+princes, as necessary to be forthwith amended and rectified, was the
+immediate and indispensable want of a “United Germany.” A somewhat more
+decided and definite step towards the possible realisation of this
+tolerably vague and indefinite _desideratum_, in the amendment of
+people’s wrongs, was taken by the call for the meeting of one united
+German parliament, for the purpose of considering and regulating the
+affairs of all Germany in this revolutionary crisis; but more especially
+of effecting that union in one empire, under one head, or under one form
+of government, which appeared to be the great desire of those who now
+put themselves forward as the expression of the will of all the German
+nation, either as a whole, or in its parts; and which seemed to be
+considered as the great unknown remedy for all evils, real or imaginary.
+The meeting of the first illegal and self-constituted body, which, in
+its impatience to be ruling the destinies of the nation, assembled at
+Frankfort under the name of a _Vor-Parlement_, or preliminary
+parliament, and, although originally only emanating from a club of
+revolutionary spirits at Heidelberg, contrived to impose itself upon
+Germany and its princes, and sway the destinies of the land, in
+opposition to the old German Diet assembled in the same place—the
+proceedings of the _Ausschuss_, or select committee, which the members
+of this _Vor-Parlement_ left behind them, to follow up their assumed
+authority, when they themselves dispersed,—the constitution of the
+present National Assembly, sanctioned by most of the German princes, and
+acknowledged as fully legal and supreme in its authority, its members
+being elected by universal suffrage,—and its meeting in time to put a
+stop to the wild democratic tendencies and reckless proceedings of the
+_Ausschuss_, are all matters of newspaper history, and need here no
+further detail; they are mentioned only to show what revolutionising
+Germany fancies and pretends it would be at, as far as any idea can be
+formed from its actions—and the means it would employ to arrive at its
+ends. We have got thus far, then, in the solution of our question.
+Revolutionising Germany desires, above all things, one great and
+powerful union of all its several parts,—the how, when, where, &c.,
+being as yet very indefinite and unintelligible; and the General
+National Assembly is there to settle those important preliminaries. Let
+us content ourselves awhile with this very vague and uncertain answer,
+and return to old Father Rhine and his neighbourhood, to have some
+further idea of the physiognomy of the country under the present
+revolutionary auspices, and with the soothing hopes of the realisation
+of the grand desideratum of union before the country’s eyes. After
+taking this superficial survey of the “outward man,” and judging as far
+as we can of his character and temper therefrom, we may then speculate,
+perhaps, a little upon his tendencies in his present course; and even go
+so far as to attempt to take his hand, and try a trick or two of
+palmistry in fortune-telling—not pretending, however, in true gipsy
+spirit, to infallibility in foretelling the future, however knowingly
+and mysteriously we may shake our heads in so doing.
+
+Although the Germans cannot be said to have the capabilities of acting
+any new part, that they may pretend to take upon themselves, to the
+life—and even to the death—with all that reality and energy for which
+the French have such an inborn talent, yet they may be looked up to as a
+still more symbol-loving people than the latter; and although perhaps
+not quite so much “up to” correctness of costume, at least quite as fond
+of parading the dress of the new part upon all occasions. The first
+thing, consequently, that strikes the tourist, on entering the Germany
+of 1848, is the ostentatious display of the new-old imperial, so-called
+national cockade, the red, black, and gold colours of the old German
+empire. It is not only upon the caps of vapouring students, who begin to
+consider themselves more or less the masters of the world, or upon the
+hats of hot-headed, _soi-disant_-enthusiastic, poetico-political young
+men that the new cockade is now to be seen; it stares you in the face
+from the head and breast of almost every man you meet—gray-beard,
+middle-aged, or youngster. It is generally from the centre of the cap or
+hat, and thus just upon the forehead, that it glares upon you, like the
+dark, red, gleaming eye of a new race of Cyclops: almost every male
+individual looks like a political Polyphemus. The soldiers are, one and
+all, adorned with two cockades, the one of the colours of the individual
+country they serve, the other of those of Imperial United Germany. They
+have thus two staring, distorted, and unmatched eyes, one over the
+other, in the centre of their foreheads. With their two eyes they ought,
+one would suppose, to see farther in the mist of the political storm
+than other people. The military, however, influenced perhaps by the
+example of their aristocratic young officers, have shown themselves,
+generally speaking, and markedly so in Prussia, where the revolutionary
+movement has been the most decided, recalcitrant towards the so-called
+progress of the day, anti-popular in their sympathies, attached only to
+the king and individual country they serve, disdainful of the new
+central power, the authority of which they do not and will not
+comprehend, and of its representatives, whom they regard as a herd of
+insolent _schwätzer_, or chatterers—in fact, anti-revolutionary, or, as
+it is called in the pet political phrases of the day, which the Germans
+have, now more than ever, shown themselves so foolishly eager to borrow
+of the French—_retrograd_ and _reactionär_.
+
+This position of the military, which appears, generally speaking, to be
+the same all over the country, is, to say the best, a very ticklish and
+equivocal one, and promises but little for the future internal peace of
+United Germany. Orders, however, have been given by such authorities as
+still are,—and in the first instance by weak, uncertain, vacillating,
+and now disappointed Prussia,—that the military should do their homage
+to the ideas of the day, by wearing the imperial cockade, if not in lieu
+of, at all events in addition to, that which they had heretofore
+considered as their national symbol: and the double Polyphemus eye of
+the soldier is one of the most striking and startling evidences of the
+unsteady and contending spirit of the times, that meet the eye of the
+tourist in Germany of to-day. Even more than the students—who are still,
+however, sufficiently remarkable both in costume and manner in these
+days of unrestricted movement and opinion—you will find a certain set of
+men, whose physiognomy of race is so strongly marked by some
+indescribable peculiarity of type, whatever be their colour or form of
+feature, as to render them unmistakeable, and who make the most flaring
+display of the imperial national colours, now so strangely converted
+into the symbol of a revolutionary spirit, be it in cockade, or band, or
+button-hole decoration. These are the Jews. They are positively lavish
+in their display of ribbon. Ever since the revolution has begun its
+dubious and unsteady course throughout Germany, it has been, invariably
+and everywhere, the Jews who have displayed the strongest revolutionary
+spirit, the most decided republican tendencies, the most acrimonious
+hatred against the “powers that be,” and the most virulent efforts
+towards the subversion of the existing state of things. What may have
+been the cause of the outburst of this spirit in an essentially trading
+and money-getting people, whose commercial advantages, in whatever
+branch they may lie, must be so completely compromised, if not
+altogether ruined, by revolutionary movements and their consequences, it
+would be difficult in a superficial sketch to say: it may be conjectured
+to have arisen simply from a spirit of revenge against the exclusive
+upper classes of Germany, who have so long treated their sect, proud of
+its wealth, and seeking influence from its power, with cutting repulsion
+and contempt. The fact, however, is as stated; the most active
+revolutionary spirits engaged in the task of pulling down and
+destroying, as far as was possible, have been every where the Jews; the
+avowed republicans may chiefly be found among men of their persuasion;
+the clamour, the attack, and the denunciation, chiefly still proceed
+from Jewish mouths and Jewish pens. Those who now march forward, then,
+the most boldly, hand in hand in strange conjunction, along the
+precipitous path of revolutionary movement, are the students and the
+Jews. If you unwisely allow one of the latter to lay hold of an unlucky
+button of your coat in a steamboat, he will be sure to endeavour, with
+his peculiar twang, to insinuate into you all the wildest
+ultra-revolutionary doctrines: the former will keep more apart from you,
+and herd in knots; but, when they get drunk, instead of vapouring vague,
+incomprehensible, _soi-disant_ Kantian philosophy, as of yore, they will
+bellow still more vague and incomprehensible political theories about
+United Germany. It is these two classes of beings, then, who make the
+most ostentatious parade of the national cockades that flash across our
+eyesight.
+
+The fate of this cockade has been a very strange one, by the way, in
+latter years. The red, black, and gold combination was long formally
+proscribed in universities, as deleterious and dangerous, and typical of
+the forbidden _Burschenschaften_: it was worn only in secret and by
+stealth, by recalcitrant would-be revolutionary students. All on a
+sudden it has been raised on high in flag and banner, waving not only in
+revolutionary procession, but from palace walls, and tops of public
+buildings. The cockade has not only been authorised, but enjoined; and
+in a late reactionary movement in Berlin,—when, out of jealousy and
+spite towards a central power, that had chosen its executive head from
+southern and not northern Germany, a considerable public feeling was
+exhibited against the imperial national flag, and in favour of the
+Prussian colours exclusively—the government, or rather the king himself,
+was obliged, for fear of an outbreak of the students, to command the
+resumption of those colours in flag and cockade, which, but a little
+while ago, he himself had proscribed. The pride of the young
+_soi-disant_ heroes at being openly able to parade that symbol which
+they cherished only heretofore as fancied conspirators, may be easily
+conceived: and, now these boy-men find that they can dictate to the
+princes of the earth, not only upon the matter of flags and cockades,
+but upon matters of far graver note, there is no knowing to what height
+of presumption this pride may not still further lead them.
+
+If, now, we look around us to note the general physiognomy of the
+people, we shall find many other little traits, that mark these
+revolutionary times in Germany. The common people, more especially upon
+the Rhine, and in many parts of the duchy of Baden—the common people,
+formerly so smiling, so ready, so civil, perhaps only too obsequious in
+their signs of respect, have grown insolent and rude: ask them a
+question, and they will scarcely deign to bestow upon you an answer: in
+many instances they will shrug their shoulders, laugh in your face, and
+then turn their back upon you. On the contrary the public officials, the
+government _beamten_, have considerably lowered that arrogance of tone
+for which they formerly possessed a not unmerited evil repute, and will
+answer your inquiries with civil words and smiling faces. Such, however,
+is the natural see-saw movement of manners in revolutionary times, in
+the lower and lower-middle classes; and as far as regards the latter
+effect of revolutionary movement, no tourist in Germany will be disposed
+to complain of the change.
+
+Over the middle and upper classes, at the same time, there has fallen a
+very visible gloom. That uncertainty of the future, which is
+proverbially far more difficult for moral strength to bear than any
+certain evil, has had the very evident effect, to the least observant
+eye, of depressing the spirits of “all manner of men.” The _hope_
+appears to exist only in the theoretical fancies of the excited liberal
+politician,—the _enthusiasm_ only in the wild dreams of the declaiming
+student. The prevailing impression is one of all the dulness of doubt
+and the stupor of apprehension. Talk to people of the state of the
+country, and they will either shake their heads with a grunt, or openly
+express their fears about the future: and those fears are none the less
+active because they are so vague—none the less depressing because they
+wear the mysterious, visionary, and consequently awful form which the
+dim distance of complete uncertainty imparts.
+
+Another change, again, in the manners of the people, is in the
+politicising spirit, so uncongenial in times gone by to the Germans,
+which, in most great towns, seems now to have so completely absorbed
+them. It is to be found not only in the low clubs, and in the insensate
+pothouse debates, but in the eagerness to crowd round the revolutionary
+addresses, which are posted by ultra-liberals at street corners, in the
+anxiety to read the last revolutionary disquisition of the new radical
+journal, in all its glory of large sheet and full columns, which has
+taken the place of the innocent and patriarchal little _Volks-blatt_,
+that was before the study and delight of the humble burgher; and in the
+malicious enjoyment with which the political caricature, railing at
+prince or men in power, is studied at the shop window, and the feverish
+importance that is attached to it.
+
+All these characteristic signs and changes will meet the eye of the
+tourist if he even go no farther than the confines of the Rhine, and the
+old city of Cologne. There at once is that depression visible to which
+allusion has already been made. It is visible in the aspect of the
+fallen half-ruined shopkeeper, of the disconsolate master of the hotel,
+and, above all, of the anxious labourer upon the progress of that mighty
+work, the completion of which evil times seem again to render an
+impossible task—the Cologne cathedral. Funds for the further progress of
+the great undertaking already begin to fail; and these are not times to
+seek them from the munificence either of states or private individuals.
+The _Baumeister_, who has spent the greater part of a life upon the
+wonderful task of working out the completion of this miracle of Gothic
+art,—whose whole soul has been concentrated upon this one object,—the
+breath of whose very existence seems to depend upon the growth of this
+foster-child of his fancy, for which alone he has lived,—now shakes his
+head, like the consumptive man whose presentiments tell him that his
+last hour is nigh, and who despairs of escaping his doom. The
+revolutionary wind has blown like the plague-blast over the land: he
+feels that his hand must soon fall powerless before the neglect, or even
+ill-will of the newborn age of revolutionary liberty, and that he must
+disperse abroad that band of artist-workmen whom he has fashioned and
+educated to the noble work, and whom, in their completeness of artistic
+intelligence, none perhaps, in future years, may be able again to
+collect together. The cathedral, however, has proceeded to a certain
+point, at which the whole interior may be enclosed; and there, in all
+probability, the progress of the works will be checked for the present.
+The consecration of the new part of the building, in this state, has
+already taken place; but, even in these ceremonies, the revolutionary
+modern spirit of Germany has not forgotten to assert its influence: the
+deputation sent to them by the Prussian Assembly refused to join to
+itself a Catholic ecclesiastic; and yet it was seriously proposed at the
+same time, by the arrangers of the ceremonial _programme_, that the
+monarchs who were expected to be present upon the occasion should mount
+upon the roof of the cathedral, and there take an oath to preserve the
+unity of Germany, which oath was to be blessed and ratified by the Pope,
+who was to be invited to come over to Cologne for the purpose. The Pope
+has had other deeds and other revolutionary tendencies to bless or to
+ban in his own dominions; but this little trait, culled from the first
+_programme_ of the consecration of the Cologne cathedral, may be taken,
+at the same time, as a slight specimen of the wild poetico-political
+freaks of theoretically revolutionising Germany.
+
+Let us wend our way a little farther. Without attempting to take any
+precise survey of Prussia and Austria, the continued fermenting and
+agitated state of which countries is the topic of every-day newspaper
+notice, and consequently without venturing upon any description of the
+poisonous and ulcerating sores continually breaking out upon the face of
+the fair and once healthy cities of Berlin and Vienna, the ignorant
+tumult of the parliamentary meetings assembled in them, the noisy
+fermentation of the ultra-revolutionary and republican clubs, the
+symbolical but dangerous demonstrations of hot-headed students and other
+unripe and unquiet spirits, the continual struggle and clash of parties
+accusing each other reciprocally of utterly subversive or
+counter-revolutionary and reactionary tendencies, and the constantly
+threatened danger of fresh convulsions, with further ruin to trade, and
+consequently to the well-being of the country at large—without, then,
+painting to ourselves a well-known and notorious picture, let us cast
+our eyes over the outward aspect of some of the smaller states.
+
+Nothing, in the first place, can be more uneasy and disquieting than the
+appearance of the Duchy of Baden. In Heidelberg, ultra-revolutionary
+students have come to a total schism with their moderately and vaguely
+revolutionary professors; and it is at present difficult to see how any
+understanding is to be effected between teacher and scholar, so as to
+render the university a seat of learning of any other kind than that of
+subversive principles. In this part of Germany the revolutionary
+fermentation appears far more active, and is far more visible in the
+manner, attitude, and language of the lower classes, than even in those
+hotbeds of revolutionary movement, Austria and Prussia. To this state of
+things the confinity with agitated France, and consequently a more
+active affinity with its ideas, caught like a fever from a next-door
+neighbour’s house, the agency of the emissaries from the
+ultra-republican Parisian clubs, who find an easier access across the
+frontiers—not without the cognisance, and, it would now seem, as was
+long suspected, with the aid also of certain influential members of the
+Provisional Government of France—and the fact also that the unhappy
+duchy has been, if not the native country, at least the scene of action
+of the republican insurgents Hecker and Struve—have all combined to
+contribute. It is impossible to enter the duchy and converse with the
+peasant population, formerly and proverbially so peacefully disposed in
+patriarchal Germany, without finding the poison of these various
+influences gathering and festering in all their ideas, words, and
+actions. The prostration of spirit, generally speaking, among the middle
+and trading classes, the discouragement, the uncertain fear, are even
+still more apparent here than on the lower Rhine; and the gloom appears
+the greater, from all we see and hear, the higher we mount upon the
+social ladder. The proud and exclusive German nobility, who have so long
+slept cradled in the pride and exclusiveness of their courtly
+prerogatives and privileges, now waken to see an abyss before and behind
+them, a precipice at every step. How far they may have merited the
+terrors of utter ruin to their fortunes as well as their position, by
+their long contemptuous exclusion from their intercourse and society of
+all who had not the magic key to secure admission to them, in the shape
+of the privileged particle denoting nobility, whatever was the talent
+and the worth of the despised unprivileged—and to this state of things,
+even up to the present day, there have been very few exceptions at
+German courts, and much less in German high society—how far they have
+themselves prepared the way for their present position, by their wilful
+blindness to the progress of ideas in the world, are not questions to be
+discussed here. Their present apprehension and consternation are very
+apparent in every word and action, however much the younger generation,
+and especially those of it who may be military men, may bluster and talk
+big, and defy: they fly away to their country houses, if they have them,
+economise, retrench, and pinch, in preparation for that change in
+circumstances and position which seems to be approaching them like a
+spectre. The little capitals of Carlsruhe and Stuttgardt, with their
+small ducal and royal courts, certainly never exhibited any picture of
+great animation or bustle even in their most flourishing times; but the
+gloom that now hangs over them is assuredly very different from the
+peaceful, although somewhat torpid quietude in which they heretofore
+reposed: their dulness has become utter dreariness; their lady-like
+old-maidish decent listlessness a sort of melancholy bordering upon
+despair. Princes and people look askance at one another: people suffer;
+and princes think right to retrench. The theatres of these little
+capitals are about to be closed, because they are considered to be too
+expensive popular luxuries in the present state of things, and onerous
+appendages to court charges. Sovereigns cut down their households and
+their studs; and queens shut themselves close up in their summer
+residences, declaring themselves too poor to visit German
+watering-places, and support the expenses of regal _toilette_. In
+Stuttgardt these symptoms are all peculiarly visible. Spite of the
+long-acquired popularity of the King of Wurtemberg, as a liberal,
+well-judging, and rightly-minded monarch towards his subjects, the wind
+of revolution, that has blown in such heavy gusts in other parts of
+Germany, has not wholly spared that kingdom; and before accomplishing
+the intention attributed to him of retiring, in order to avoid those
+revolutionary demands which, in spite of his best intentions, he
+declares himself unable conscientiously to meet, the present king puts
+in practice those measures of retrenching economy, which add to the
+gloom of his capital and the disconsolate look of the court-attached and
+commercial portion of his subjects. It is scarcely possible, however, to
+suppose that the King of Wurtemberg can seriously think of abdicating in
+favour of a son whose youthful actions have always rendered him highly
+unpopular, all the more so as he is married to a Russian archduchess,
+whose birth must render her _suspecte_ to the liberals of the day.
+Another cause, which contributes to the melancholy and deserted air of
+these capitals of the smaller German courts, is the retirement of the
+ambassadors and diplomatic agents of the other German courts, who, if
+not already recalled from their posts, will probably shortly be so, to
+meet the views of German unity, which needs but one representative in
+common. This unhappy look of the little German capitals is one of the
+most melancholy signs of the times in these smaller states. In Hanover
+and Brunswick the apparent resolution of their present rulers, to resist
+the power of the new Central Government of would-be united Germany,
+occasions agitation, uncertainty, and fear, which make themselves as
+fully apparent in outward symptoms as elsewhere. Bavaria alone appears
+to preserve an exceptional position. Bavaria also has had her
+revolution, to be sure; but, strange to say, the revolution was
+occasioned by the manœuvres of the anti-liberal, or, in that country,
+Jesuitical party, against the liberal tendencies of a wild woman’s
+influence over the mind of the king; and, singular as was the nature and
+cause of this revolution, singular has remained the situation of
+Bavaria, quiet, unagitated, and seemingly contented, in the midst of the
+convulsive hurly-burly passing every where around it.
+
+After this cursory survey of the outward aspect of a great part of
+Germany, let us turn our eyes to Frankfort, the present central point of
+all interest and attention; for there sits the General National
+Assembly; there is to be brewed, by whatever recipe, or in whatever
+manner it may be, that fancied panacea for all evils, the Union of
+Germany: there, then, we may probably best learn what revolutionising
+Germany would be at, or, at all events, best see the means employed to
+arrive at something like a consummation. Let us first look at the cooks
+at their work; and then taste the nature of the brew, as far as their
+political culinary efforts have gone to “make the medley slab and good.”
+
+Let us enter, then, that plain, dry, and harsh-looking circular
+building, which is the Lutheran Church of St Paul; it is there the
+Assembly holds its sittings. The interior arrangement has been fashioned
+entirely upon the plan of the French Chambers. The President’s tribune,
+the lower tribune of the orator before it, the gradually rising and
+diverging amphitheatre of seats for the members, are all entirely French
+in their plan. Completely French also, and with similar designation, is
+the political shading of the members according to their seats; the
+_Droit_, the _Centre_ in its variety of progressing _nuances_, and the
+_Gauche_ and _Extreme Gauche_ have the same signification in the German
+Assembly as in the French. Nor does the resemblance cease here; the
+constitution of the Assembly, in its various elements, has a strong
+affinity to that of the present French National Assembly. The majority
+of the members are evidently concentrated in the different shades of the
+_Centre_. The old conservatives of the right have but little influence,
+except as a make-weight against the ultra-liberals. The centre consists
+chiefly of the old liberals, and opposition leaders in the different
+chambers of such of the German states as possessed constitutions of one
+modification or another—men who have now, in turn, in their position
+towards the ultra-revolutionary spirits, that tendency which may be
+called liberal conservative: they are the men of progress, who, in the
+present hurricane of revolutionary ideas, endeavour to guide the helm so
+as to avoid the very rocks they have had so great a hand in raising, and
+to restrain the very waves which their own breath has so greatly
+contributed to lash into fury! They are the Odillon Barrots, and
+suchlike old liberals of Germany. They find that the task before them is
+one of far ruder difficulty than in their theoretical fancies they had
+first imagined; and many of them there may be, who cannot but
+acknowledge to themselves, however little they may be inclined to
+acknowledge it to the world, that the business of a vast nation is not
+to be conducted by inexperienced heads, however talented, however well
+they may have conducted the business of a counting-house, or taught
+theories from a professor’s chair—in fact, that theory and practice will
+not walk hand in hand without a long process of amalgamating experience.
+The left is occupied by the men of revolutionary utopics and crude
+subversive opinions; and in its extreme by the ardent republicans and
+tribunes of the people, whom the revolution has caused to spring out of
+the political soil like mushrooms. These are the men who complain, in
+speech or in journal, that the Assembly is wasting its time in vain
+vapid disputations—an accusation, by the way, by no means unfounded—and
+yet themselves, when ever they mount into the tribune, indulge, more
+than any others, in declamatory would-be poetical phrases, “full of
+sound and fury, signifying nothing,” and containing not one practical
+idea, or feasible proposal. They seem to think that, by ringing the
+changes upon certain pet words, such as “patriotism” and “nationality,”
+they have said great things and done great deeds for the good of the
+country; and, as far as such clap-trap efforts to gain popular applause
+go, they may fairly be said to obtain their ends. In this again they
+have a strong “cousin-german” resemblance with the French ultras in a
+similar position—and no less so in their endeavours to overawe and
+browbeat the majority of the Assembly by noisy exclamations, and even
+uproarious riot. The German ultras, however, have succeeded, to a great
+extent, in a manœuvre in which their French brethren have failed,
+although supported in it, at first, by a certain reckless member of the
+Provisional Government—that is to say, in packing the public galleries
+with acolytes, said to be paid, who, while they applaud all
+ultra-revolutionary speeches “to the echo,” endeavour to put down the
+conservative orators by tumult, or violent hissings, and are of course
+vaunted forth in the ultra-liberal journals as “the expression of the
+will of the nation.” Be it said, at the same time, _en passant_, that
+this manner of applauding by the clapping of hands, and expressing
+disapproval by hissing, has been borrowed from a habit of the members of
+the Assembly themselves, which has certainly a very unparliamentary
+appearance and sound to English eyes and ears. This use of the public
+galleries, which, in spite of the regulations of the Assembly, it has
+been found impossible altogether to put down, has assuredly a certain
+influence in overawing and intimidating some of the members of the
+majority. Two causes, however, have contributed to preserve the Assembly
+from utter anarchy and confusion. The first of these, a negative one,
+consists in the fact that Frankfort is not a great noisy stirring
+capital of a great country, where a mob is always at hand to be used as
+a tyrannical influence by the leaders of the people, and that there are
+no suburbs filled with a working population, whence, as in Paris, an
+insurgent army may be suddenly recruited to work mischief, when it may
+have no other work to do. The second, a direct and active one, arises
+from the personality of the President of the Assembly; and certainly it
+is in the personal qualities and physical advantages of the Herr von
+Gagern, as much as in his position, and from the esteem in which he is
+held, that his power to dominate, control, and will to order, very
+greatly consists.
+
+The President Gagern, long known as the most talented and leading
+opposition member of the Darmstadt Chamber, has passed his life in his
+energetic attempts to further those constitutional liberties, which he
+would now check with powerful hand, that they may not go too far.
+Disappointed and disgusted with his fruitless efforts to promote what he
+considered the interests of his country, the Herr von Gagern had
+retired, for some time past, into private life, when, upon the breaking
+forth of the revolutionary storm, he was called upon by his prince to
+take the helm of affairs, and, as minister, to steer the bark along the
+current by which he might avoid the Scylla of ultra-democracy as much as
+the Charybdis of resistance to the progress of the age. In this new
+character he again appeared upon the stage of the political world; and
+he has only retired from his post, as he has since refused to accept
+office as minister of the new central executive power of all Germany, in
+order to maintain the position, to which he was raised by acclamation,
+as the controlling head of that Assembly which was to decide the
+destinies of the country, and from the councils of which he himself had
+fondly hoped to see emanate the welfare of united Germany.
+
+Tall and stout, with a face which possesses a decision and firmness of
+character, much aided by a pair of very broad black brows, Herr von
+Gagern has, at the same time, a bold dignity of manner and gesture,
+which is well calculated to rule an Assembly, and a powerful voice,
+which knows how to make itself heard in a storm: a ready and simple
+eloquence, and a clear good sense, which fastens upon the right point at
+the right moment, are combined with these advantages of exterior
+appearance; and as he rises, in cases of emergency, to display a vigour
+of energy, rather than that system of conciliation so fatally used in
+France, and so impracticable amidst all the clashing party opinions of a
+revolutionary Assembly, he shows himself to be the man of the moment,
+and of the place. He may be said to be the saviour of the German
+National Assembly, inasmuch as his personal influence may be considered
+to have rescued it from that state of anarchy and confusion which now
+disgraces the French chamber, and into which the German Assembly, with
+its conflicting elements, and its still greater inexperience, seemed at
+first about to fall.
+
+As it is, the German National Assembly can by no means be looked upon as
+a model of parliamentary order: it is still noisy, ill-regulated, and
+uncertain in its movements. It cannot be denied, at the same time, that
+sufficient individual talent may be found among its members. Among the
+rising men of the day, the orators of Prussia and the smaller northern
+states, (for Southern Germany has as yet produced but little striking
+talent,)—along with those young, ardent, and energetic men who, the
+conspirators and insurgents of a few months ago, have gone over to the
+liberal conservative majority, and the people’s orators, who aim at
+being the O’Connells of Germany, as their phraseology goes, and who, in
+spite of the impracticable nature of their tenets, and the frequently
+vapid nature of their declamation, have a certain, rude ready eloquence,
+that strives to be poetical—there are also a few practised statesmen, a
+few wary old men of action, and several well-known authors and poets,
+such as old Uhland, whose democratic ardour still keeps, him upon the
+benches of the left, and the Count Auersperg, well known under the name
+of Anastatius Grün, whom disappointments in his position, in society are
+supposed also to have driven into the ultra-democratic ranks. But there
+seems to be an utter want of purpose in most of the speeches which
+emanate from the lips of these men of talent. Proverbially vague in
+their philosophical theories, even when they make most pretensions to
+clearness, the Germans show themselves still more so in their political
+views. The speeches not only of the ultra-liberals, but of the would-be
+statesmen of the centre, appear mere compilations of “words, words,
+words,” without any tangible argument or practical proposal: it is
+rarely that it is possible to sift from the readily flowing, but
+generally most muddy stream, a sand of gold, that may be used as one of
+sterling worth in the crown of unity which the hands of the Assembly
+would be forging. In all that emanates from the Assembly, either in
+debate or in decree, there is generally a lamentable want of correctly
+defined purpose: and, in fact, to return to the point from which we have
+started, it is as difficult to discover from the vague, wavering,
+boggling proceedings of the Assembly, as from any other quarter, or from
+any other movement, precisely what revolutionising Germany would be at.
+Up to the present time, like the Provisional Government of France, it
+has rather attempted to rule aristocratically itself, than to prepare
+the way, as was its object, for the future definitive constitution of
+Germany. The only definite step it has yet taken towards that vague
+_desideratum_, a “United Germany,” has been in the appointment of a
+Provisional Executive Head, and of a cabinet of ministers at its
+direction.
+
+Except in as far as regards the jealousy of Prussia, disappointed in its
+hopes of itself giving the head to the Imperial government, and inclined
+in consequence to quarrel with the dictates of that central power, for
+which it clamoured, and which it at least accepted not ungraciously, as
+long as it thought, with true Prussian conceit, that the head must
+necessarily emanate from itself—a jealousy to which reference will be
+made further on—the choice of the Austrian Archduke John, as
+Administrator or Protector of the Government of United Germany, whatever
+his charge may be called, (for the German term “Reichs Verweser”
+expresses in itself both these attributive designations,) cannot be
+looked upon as one of any political weight. As a prince, enjoying for
+many years past a certain popularity, more perhaps from a feeling of
+opposition, because he was considered as living upon ill terms with the
+Imperial court of Austria, than from any personal attachment to himself,
+the Archduke John may be considered to be well selected as a popular and
+generally accepted head of Germany: whether he possesses either the
+talent or the energy to fill so strange and awfully responsible a post
+in the present disturbed state of Germany is another question, which
+only those who have known him in the retirement of private life can
+answer. The political writer who designated him as the Duke of Sussex of
+Austria, made a happy hit in thus classifying him. The Archduke John has
+rendered himself popular by his patronage and furtherance of scientific
+institutions: but he has been too little known, otherwise than as the
+discarded and disgraced of the Imperial family, to be called in any way
+“the man of the people.” The marriage, which was the cause of his
+disgrace, was thus, likewise, the cause of his popularity, such as it
+was: the union of an Imperial prince with a girl of comparatively humble
+birth—a union about the origin of which so many absurdly fabulous tales
+have been told—flattered the instincts of the middle and lower classes.
+The Archduchess, however, who now finds herself elevated still more, to
+a pinnacle to which her wildest dreams could scarcely have led her, and
+who is now flattered, caressed, and done homage to, as she was before
+set aside, is said to reveal nothing of any humble origin, and to be as
+lady-like as sensible in manner. Upon the whole, then, it is not in the
+wholly provisional and most unstable appointment of the Archduke John as
+“Reichs Verweser” that we shall find any solution to the inquiry as to
+the more certain revolutionary tendencies of Germany.
+
+Assuredly more ought to be gathered from the appointment of the new
+central cabinet, and more especially of its Minister for Foreign Affairs
+and leading member, Prince Leiningen: and naturally we look to the
+recent manifesto of the prince as a document from which we may best
+learn “what revolutionising Germany would be at.” Sensible and clear, or
+at all events as little confused as is possible in the present confused
+state of all theories, plans, and reasonings in Germany, the manifesto,
+in doing no more than pointing out two methods towards effecting the
+reconstruction of Germany, leaves every thing as regards the future in
+as vague and uncertain a state as before. It only states a dilemma—it
+does not attempt to resolve it. It puts Germany in a cleft stick, or
+rather, at the division of two paths, the greater merit or
+practicability of either of which it does not attempt to show very
+decisively, by its concluding words, “_Entweder, Oder!_ choose!” In
+fact, it does no more than ask with ourselves, “What would
+revolutionising Germany be at?”
+
+It may be surmised, certainly, from the manifesto of Prince Leiningen,
+that he himself is really inclined towards the going forward in the
+uncertain course of doing _something_ towards the effectuation of the
+desired union, although he by no means pretends to recommend _how_ this
+is to be done. He seems—and his acceptation of office would in itself
+appear to confirm the fact—a partisan of what he defines somewhat
+confusedly as “an actual union of all the component parts of the whole,
+in such a manner as to avert the possibility of any dispute between the
+whole and the parts;” for he adds, “If any other course be pursued, not
+singleness or unity, but discord and separation will be established.”
+But in the alternative which he places before Germany, of either
+returning to the past, or of realising the uncertain and as yet
+undefined desideratum of a great union for the future, it would seem,
+whatever be the prince’s own meaning, or whatever may be supposed to be
+the means used by the Assembly to produce a united whole, that he only
+places before it at the same time the alternative of a civil war, at
+which he himself hints, or a republican constitution, which must appear
+to be the result of the progress in its present sense, of
+revolutionising Germany.
+
+When we hear that “to retrograde to a confederation of states, or to
+establish a weak federal state, by a powerfully impressed independence
+of the individual states, would only be to create a mournful period of
+transition to fresh catastrophes and new revolutions;” that from such a
+course of proceeding would result the danger “of harbouring in Germany
+revolutionary movements, or perchance civil war, for a series of years;”
+that the nation would arrive at “the most undesirable consummation of
+rendering itself ridiculous for ever by trumpeting to the world German
+unity and German power, and presenting in reality a spectacle the very
+reverse”—when we hear that “no dynastic interests can be taken into
+consideration if the nation wills unity;” that “to construct a new
+empire, and at the same time to permit an organisation tending to an
+inevitable contest for the supreme sovereignty between the individual
+states, would be to sow disunion instead of unity, to create weakness
+instead of power;” and that, consequently, “the imperial power must, in
+a degree, absorb in itself the sovereignty of the individual states,
+abolish the diplomatic intercourse of the individual states at home and
+abroad, and concentrate it in its own hands, appropriate to itself the
+unconditional disposal of the national forces, and not allow governments
+or their constituent State Assemblies to occupy themselves with affairs
+appertaining to the National Assembly alone, since a perfectly
+established central state, in which other perfectly established states
+are encased, would be virtually a monstrosity,”—when we hear all these
+things, and weigh the tendency of their views, we can see in them no
+other result than the abasement of the individual sovereigns, an
+absorption of their power, which would leave them no more than useless
+and ridiculous puppets, and, consequently, their inevitable overthrow in
+the course of time, and the establishment of republican institutions,
+whatever the name given to the new form of republic, whatever the title
+bestowed upon its head, be it even Emperor, or _Reichs Verweser_,
+Regent, Protector, Administrator, or President.
+
+On the other hand, when we are told—although “jealousies between
+individual states, and revilings of the northern by the southern parts
+of the empire” are stigmatised as “criminal absurdities”—that, “if the
+many collateral and coexistent interests are too preponderant to be
+sacrificed to German unity, if the old spirit of discord and separation
+is still too powerfully at work, if the jealousy between race and race,
+between north and south, is still too strongly felt, the nation must
+convince itself of the fact, and return to the old federal system,”
+already hinted at as _impossible_ without fresh revolutions or long
+civil wars; and when we know, at the same time, that these jealousies
+between state and state not only _do_ exist, but continue to increase
+and ferment still more in the present state of things,—that in fact, the
+old spirit of discord and separation is still more powerfully at work
+than ever,—what can we look forward to? Only the other alternative to
+which we have alluded—those civil wars which the manifesto of Prince
+Leiningen itself hints at so cautiously.
+
+Since, from the very first commencement of the revolution in Germany,
+the jealous spirit between the northern and southern states broke out in
+a decided form, it has only increased instead of diminishing. When the
+vacillating but ambitious King of Prussia, desirous of coming forward as
+the “man of Germany” of the day, but “infirm of purpose,” attempted to
+direct the revolutionary movement in his own states by accepting the
+call for a United German Empire, and by placing himself, although
+unavowedly, at its head, the Austrian _Official_ Gazette immediately
+fulminated a severe, damning, and, under the circumstances, almost cruel
+manifesto against the ambitious Prussian monarch; in Bavaria, the young
+men of the upper classes burnt his majesty in effigy in the public
+market-place of Munich; at Stuttgardt, the picture of the offending
+sovereign was as publicly hung by the neck to a gallows. Southern
+Germany was indignant at the thought that an upstart King of Prussia
+should attempt to lead the movement for a new United Empire of Germany,
+and presume even to dream of being its future emperor. But when, in the
+course of events, the provisional head of the newly constituted central
+power was chosen by the assembly from among the princes of Southern
+Germany, it was the turn of Prussia to exhibit its spite and anger: its
+jealousy was not to be concealed. The result of the disappointed
+ambition of Prussia was exhibited, as already alluded to, in a
+reactionary feeling against that central power, which it would have
+accepted probably with acclamation, and been the first to applaud and
+support, had it emanated from its own country. The exhibition of this
+feeling in some violent outbreak was so much dreaded upon the occasion
+of the military homage appointed to be shown to the _Reichs Verweser_ at
+Berlin, that the ceremony, as is well known, was obliged to be
+countermanded. The feeling is now still continuing to be shown in a
+constant exhibition of mistrust on the part of Prussia towards the
+National Assembly, and as well as in the counter-accusation of that new
+and vaguely defined political crime “reaction,” laid by the journals of
+the moderate party, as well as by the ultra-liberals, to the charge of
+Prussia. With all these conflicting elements at work between the various
+parts of Germany, and again between these various parts and the central
+power, placed in the hands of the Assembly, it is very difficult to look
+clearly as yet towards any possible constitution of that unity which
+would appear to be the most vague end and aim of the revolution in
+Germany. To those who attempt to look into the mist of the future, and
+see visions, and dream dreams—for, in the present state of the cloudy
+and wavering political horizon, it would seem that all political
+foresight can pretend to no better name than that—the nearer of the two
+alternatives to be deduced from Prince Leiningen’s manifesto, would
+appear to be the disunion, the total rupture, the civil war.
+
+The other alternative, however, seems not without its chances; for,
+although the old liberals of republican tendencies, the suspected and
+imprisoned, have now been brought round, for the most part, into the
+ranks of the moderately progressive party, in the natural course of
+revolutionary changes, or even been called to the councils of the kings
+and princes who rejected and persecuted them; yet, on the other hand,
+the exertions of the moderate party, in spite of the clog that they
+would now put upon the too rapid course of ultra-democracy, appear to
+tend, in the efforts made, and the views entertained respecting the
+unity of Germany, towards the very republican institutions which they
+disavow, and suppose themselves endeavouring to avoid. The real
+republicans, at the same time, although without any present weight among
+the political spirits of the day, are yet composed, as elsewhere, of the
+young, hot-headed, reckless, active, stirring elements of the time, and
+are always ready to make up, by violence and headlong precipitation, for
+what they want in importance and experience. They are aided also in
+their views by a certain party of the liberal press, which is always
+preaching the imitation of French institutions and the conduct of the
+present leading men in France,—as if France and the French did not hold
+up a lesson and a warning instead of models for imitation—and consoling
+Germany with the idea, that although it does not possess such enviable
+men or measures, the men must shortly rise upon the political surface,
+and that the measures will follow behind them. By a great portion of the
+press, even that of the moderate party also, a continual irritation of
+suspicion and mistrust is being kept up against the still reigning
+sovereigns of Germany; and the cry of that very vague accusation
+“reaction,” the name of which alone, however, is considered sufficiently
+damning, is constantly raised upon every movement, of whatever nature it
+may be, which those sovereigns may make. The moderate party may be
+acquitted of republican tendencies in their hearts; but they seem to
+ignore the old proverb, “give a dog a bad name,” and the consequences;
+and they will make “sad dogs” out of the sovereigns, until at last the
+consequences will threaten more and more nearly.
+
+Between these two alternatives, however, Germany seems to think that it
+may find a middle course, and establish its theoretical and vaunted
+unity without exciting civil dissension, or plunging into the depths of
+republicanism. May it prove right in its as yet uncertain hopes; but
+certainly the means by which this desired consummation is to be arrived
+at, are not in the least degree visible: it remains as yet the vaguest
+of vague fancies—the how, the where, the when, and even the why, are as
+yet matters of doubt: not only deeds but principles, not only principles
+but plans, to this intent, are as yet utterly absent. In fact our
+question, after all, remains unanswered; and, beyond the main point of
+“unity,” to be effected somehow or other, revolutionising Germany seems
+utterly unable to tell us, as we vainly endeavour to find out
+definitively, “what it would be at?”
+
+
+          _Printed by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh._
+
+-----
+
+Footnote 1:
+
+  See our No. for March 1848.
+
+Footnote 2:
+
+  Hide—from _cacher_.
+
+Footnote 3:
+
+  Carrion.
+
+Footnote 4:
+
+  In Frémont’s expedition to California, on a somewhat similar occasion,
+  two mountaineers, one the celebrated Kit Carson, the other a St Louis
+  Frenchman named Godey, and both old trappers, performed a feat
+  surpassing the one described above, inasmuch as they were but two, who
+  charged into an Indian village to rescue some stolen horses, and
+  avenge the slaughter of two New Mexicans who had been butchered by the
+  Indians; both which objects they effected, returning to camp with the
+  lost animals and a couple of propitiatory scalps.
+
+Footnote 5:
+
+  The Mexicans call the Indians living near the Missions and engaged in
+  agriculture, _mansos_, or _mansitos_, tame.
+
+Footnote 6:
+
+  From a manuscript obtained in Santa Fé of New Mexico, describing the
+  labours of the missionaries Fray Augustin Ruiz, Venabides, and Macos,
+  in the year 1585.
+
+Footnote 7:
+
+  “Some were so barbarous as to eat their own species.” The sentence
+  refers to the Scythians, and is in Strabo. I mention the authority,
+  for Strabo is not an author that any man engaged on a less work than
+  the History of Human Error is expected to have by heart.
+
+Footnote 8:
+
+  _Memoirs of the Reign of George II., from his Accession to the Death
+  of Queen Caroline._ By JOHN LORD HERVEY. Edited, from the original
+  MSS. at Ickworth, by the Right Hon. J. W. CROKER. 2 vols. Murray,
+  London: 1848.
+
+Footnote 9:
+
+  “Upon the evening of this long day’s march, the imperial column
+  approaching Gjatz was surprised to find upon the road the bodies of
+  Russians quite recently slain, all with their heads cloven in the same
+  manner, and with their brains scattered around. It was known that two
+  thousand prisoners preceded the column, escorted by Spaniards,
+  Portuguese, and Poles. Various opinions were emitted; some were
+  indignant, others approved or remained indifferent, according to the
+  character of each. Around the Emperor these different impressions
+  found no voice, until Caulaincourt burst out and exclaimed, ‘that it
+  was an atrocious cruelty. This, then, is the civilisation we bring to
+  Russia! What effect would this barbarity have upon the enemy? Did we
+  not leave him our wounded and a host of prisoners? Would he lack the
+  opportunity of horrible reprisals?’ Napoleon maintained a gloomy
+  silence, but upon the morrow these murders had ceased. The unfortunate
+  prisoners were allowed to die of hunger in the enclosures into which,
+  at night, they were huddled like cattle. Doubtless it was still a
+  barbarity; but what could be done? Exchange them? The enemy refused.
+  Set them free? They would have hastened to proclaim our destitution,
+  and soon they would have returned with their companions to harass our
+  march. In this unsparing war, to have given them life would have been
+  to sacrifice ourselves. We were cruel from necessity. The fault was,
+  to have ever placed ourselves in so terrible an alternative.
+
+  “On the other hand, during our march into the interior of Russia, our
+  captive soldiers were not treated more humanely, although the Russians
+  had not imperious necessity for an excuse.”—SÉGUR, vol. ii. p. 149.
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+
+
+
+                          TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
+
+
+ Page           Changed from                      Changed to
+
+  298 young follow, caring no more for young fellow, caring no more for
+      Indians                          Indians
+
+ ● Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained.
+ ● Used numbers for footnotes, placing them all at the end of the last
+     chapter.
+ ● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75215 ***