Chapter 4

"Como un pobre condenado Agui vivo entre cadenas, A mi xabega amarrado, Tendido en esta carena."

_Cancion Andatuza._

In one of the wildest and most secluded of the valleys formed by the sierra of Urbasa and its contiguous ranges, stands a small cluster of houses, differing in few respects from the nine or ten hundred villages and hamlets scattered over the fertile vales and rugged hills of Navarre, but of which, nevertheless, a brief description may not be without interest. The village in question is composed of some five-score houses, for the most part the habitations of peasants, who earn their living by labour in the fields of the neighbouring proprietors, or, many of them, by the cultivation of small portions of land belonging to themselves. Nothing can be more uniform than the arrangement and construction of Navarrese houses of this class, which are well adapted to the wants and tastes of the race of men who inhabit them, and to the extremes of heat and cold for which the climate of that part of Spain is remarkable. The walls are generally of stone, of which the neighbouring mountains yield an abundant supply; glass windows are rare, and replaced by wooden shutters; the door, usually of oak, and of great solidity, is hung in a low archway of granite blocks. The entrance is into a small clay-floored room or vestibule, answering a variety of purposes. Here are seen implements of agriculture--sometimes a plough, or the heavy iron prongs with which the Basques and Navarrese are accustomed laboriously to turn up the ground in places too steep for the use of oxen; mules or ponies stand tethered here, waiting their turn of duty in the fields, or on the road; and here sacks of vegetables and piles of straw or maize-ears are temporarily deposited, till they can be placed in the granary, usually in the upper part of the house. At the further end, or on one side of this vestibule, a door opens into the stable or cowshed, and on the other side is the kitchen, which the family habitually occupy. An immense arched chimney projects far into the last-named apartment, and under it is a stone hearth, slightly raised above the tiled floor. Around, and upon this tiled hearth, during the long winter evenings, the peasant and his family establish themselves; the room is lighted by a glimmering oil-lamp, and, more effectually, by the bright wood-fire, which crackles and sparkles as the rain-drops or snow-flakes occasionally fall through the aperture of the chimney. The men smoke and talk, and repose themselves after the fatigues of the day; the women spin and attend to the pots of coarse red earth, in which various preparations of pork, eggs, or salt-fish, with beans and _garbanzos_, (a sort of large pea of excellent flavour,) the whole plentifully seasoned with oil and red pepper, stew and simmer upon the embers. Above stairs are the sleeping and store rooms, the divisions between which often consist of slight walls of reeds, plastered over and whitewashed.

Besides the humble dwellings above described, many of these mountain villages contain two or three houses of larger size and greater pretension, belonging to hidalgos or country gentlemen, who own estates in the neighbourhood. Independently of their superior dimensions, glass in the windows, painted doors and shutters, and the arms of the family carved in stone above the entrance, perhaps a few valuable pictures by the old Spanish masters, decorating the walls of the apartments, distinguish these more aristocratic mansions, which, although spacious, and of dignified aspect, frequently afford little more real comfort than the cottages above which they tower.

It was early on an August morning, about a fortnight subsequently to the rescue of Count Villabuena, that a man in an officer's uniform, and who, to judge from the stripe of gold-lace on his coat cuff, held the rank of major, knocked at the door of a house of the description last referred to. The applicant for admission was about forty years of age, of middle stature, broad-shouldered and powerful, and his countenance, the features of which were regular, might have been called handsome but for a peculiarly lowering and sullen expression. Apparently he had just come off a journey; his boots and dress were covered with dust, his face was unshaven, and he had the heated, jaded look of a man who has passed in the saddle the hours usually allotted to repose.

"Is Count Villabuena quartered here?" said he to the servant who opened the door.

"He is, Senor Comandante," replied the man.

The stranger entered the house, and was ushered into a large apartment on the first floor. He had waited there but a few minutes, when the door of an adjoining chamber opened, and Count Villabuena, wrapped in a morning-gown, and seemingly just out of bed, made his appearance.

"Don Baltasar!" exclaimed the Count, in a tone of some surprise, on beholding his early visitor.

"As you see, cousin," replied the new-comer; "and glad enough, I assure you, to be at the end of his ride, although the bearer of no very welcome news."

"Whence come you?" said the Count, "and what are the news you bring?"

"From Pampeluna, or at least from as near to it as I could venture. The news I bring are bad enough. Yesterday morning, at this hour, Juan Orrio, and the four other officers who were taken in the skirmish near Echauri, were shot to death on the glacis of Pampeluna."

"Bad news indeed!" said the Count, starting, in visible perturbation, from the chair on which he had seated himself. "Most unfortunate, just at this time."

"At this or at any other time it would hardly be welcome intelligence to the general," observed Don Baltasar. "Orrio was one of the first who joined him after he took command of the king's army, and he greatly valued him both as a friend and an officer."

"True," replied Villabuena; "but at this moment I have especial reasons for regretting his death. Have you communicated it to Zumalacarregui?"

"Not yet. I have been to his quarters; he rode out at daybreak, and has not returned. My horse is dead beat, and as the direction the general took is not exactly known, I think it better to wait his coming than to follow him. Meanwhile, cousin, a cup of chocolate will be no unwelcome refreshment after the night's march."

Villabuena rang a hand-bell that lay upon the table, and gave his orders to the servant who answered the summons. Some smoking chocolate and other refreshments, and a small brazen cup containing embers for lighting cigars, were brought in, and the Major applied himself vigorously to the discussion of his breakfast.

Major Baltasar de Villabuena, that distant relative of the Count to whom reference has been already made as the intended husband of his daughter, was a soldier of fortune who had entered the army at an early age, and at the outbreak of the Carlist insurrection was captain in a regiment of the line. He might have risen higher during his twenty years' service, but for his dogged and unpleasant temper, which ever stood in the way of his advancement. The death of the Count's sons, although it constituted him heir to the Villabuena property, made but little real difference in his prospects. The Count was only twelve or fifteen years older than himself, and likely to live nearly as long. The cousins had not met for many years, and had never been on intimate or even friendly terms; and it was therefore with joyful surprise, that, a few days after the commencement of the war, Don Baltasar received a letter from the Count, expressing a wish to see and know more of the man who was to inherit his title and estates. The letter informed him of what he already knew, that the Count had espoused the cause of Charles V.; and it further urged him to throw up his commission in the army of the usurping government, and to hasten to join his kinsman, who would receive him with open arms. Some vague hints concerning a nearer alliance between them, were more than was wanting to raise Don Baltasar's hopes to the highest pitch, and to induce him instantly to accept the Count's propositions. He at once resigned his commission and joined the Carlists, by whom he was made heartily welcome; for men of military experience were then scarce amongst them. Don Baltasar was a bold and efficient officer, and the opportunity was favourable for exhibiting his qualities. The Count was at first much pleased with him; and soon afterwards, when the Carlists were temporarily dispersed, and the insurrection was seemingly at an end, Major Villabuena accompanied his cousin to France, and was presented to Rita as her intended husband. But his unpolished manners and brutal abruptness made a most unfavourable impression upon the lady, who did not attempt to conceal her repugnance to her new suitor. The Count himself, who, amidst the bustle and activity of the life he had recently led, had overlooked or not discovered many of his kinsman's bad qualities, was now not slow in finding them out; and although the proposed marriage was of his own planning, he began almost to congratulate himself on his prudence in having made the promise of his daughter's hand contingent on her encouragement of her cousin's addresses. That encouragement there appeared little probability of Baltasar's obtaining. The gallant major, however, who entertained an abundantly good opinion of his own merits, instead of attributing the young lady's dislike to any faults or deficiencies of his own, laid it at the door of her attachment to Herrera, of which he had heard something from the Count; and he vowed to himself, that if ever he had the opportunity, he would remove that obstacle from his path, and make short work of it with the beardless boy who stood between him and the accomplishment of his wishes.

Whilst the Major satisfied the keen appetite which his night-ride had given him, Count Villabuena restlessly paced the room, his features wearing an expression of anxiety and annoyance.

"You take this news much to heart, Count," said Baltasar. "I knew not that Orrio or any other of the sufferers was your friend."

"None of them were particularly my friends," replied the Count; "nor does my regret for their fate exceed that which I should feel for any other brave and unfortunate men who might lose their lives in the service of his majesty. But their death at this precise conjuncture is most unfortunate. You have heard me speak of Luis Herrera?"

"Herrera!" repeated Baltasar, with affected unconcern; "is not that the name of your former protege, the love-stricken swain who ventured to aspire to the hand of your fair daughter?"

"The same," replied the Count, gravely.

"He is with the enemy," said Baltasar; "holds a commission in a cavalry regiment now in our front. I trust to fall in with him some day, and to exchange a sabre-cut in honour of the bright eyes of my charming cousin."

"He would find you employment if you did," replied the Count. "He is a brave lad and a skilful soldier. But at present there is small chance of your meeting him, at least with a sword in his hand. He was taken prisoner a few days ago, and is now in this village."

"Ha!" exclaimed Baltasar, his dark deep-set eyes emitting a gleam of satisfaction. "And what does Zumalacarregui propose to do with him?"

"Up to yesterday, I trusted to procure his release. The general seemed half inclined to grant it, as well as that of the other captive officers, if they would take an oath not to bear arms against the king. A few of them had agreed to give the required pledge; and although the others, including Herrera, obstinately refused, I was not without hopes of overcoming their repugnance. But last evening news came of the excesses that Rodil's division has been committing in Biscay, burning houses, ill-treating the peasantry, and refusing quarter to prisoners. This greatly exasperated the general, and he talked of recommencing the system of reprisals, which, since the removal of Quesada from the command of the Christino forces, has been in some degree abandoned."

"You are particularly interested, then, in the fate of this Herrera?" said Baltasar, with a searching glance at the Count.

"I am so for various reasons. His father and myself, although of different political creeds, were old friends; the son was long an inmate of my house, and I at one time thought of him as my future son-in-law. If he has taken up arms against his rightful sovereign, it is from a mistaken sense of duty, and not, as many have done, with a view to personal gain and advantage. Moreover, during my recent short captivity, of which you have probably heard, he twice saved my life; once at great risk and with positive detriment to himself."

"Numerous and sufficing motives," said Baltasar, with a slight sneer.

"Undoubtedly they are," replied the Count; "and you now see why I regret your arrival and the intelligence you bring. The general's indignation at the slaughter of Orrio and his companions will place the lives of Herrera and the other prisoners in great jeopardy."

"I am sorry," said Baltasar, in a tone which belied his professed concern, "that my arrival should interfere with your plans, and endanger the life of your friend."

"I can scarcely believe in your regrets, cousin," replied the Count, "or that you will grieve for the death of one whom you regard as rival. But again I tell you that Herrera can never be the husband of my daughter; and although you have the impression that he is now one of the chief obstacles to your success with Rita, time cannot fail to obliterate her childish attachment. Be sure that you will do more towards winning her favour by acting generously in the present circumstances, than if you were to take this opportunity of compassing Herrera's death."

"I do not understand you, Count," said Baltasar. "You talk as if the young man's life or death were in my hands. I bring intelligence which it is my duty to convey to the general as speedily as possible, and I am no way responsible for the consequences. I cannot believe that you would have me forget my duty, and suppress news of this importance."

"Certainly not," answered the Count; "but much depends on the way in which such things are told. Moreover, the general talked yesterday of calling a council of war, to deliberate and decide on the fate of these prisoners. Should he do so, you will be a member of it; and if you wish to serve me, you will give your vote on the side of mercy."

What reply Don Baltasar would have made to this request, must remain unknown; for, before he had time to speak, the conversation was interrupted by a knock at the door of the apartment, and one of Zumalacarregui's aides-de-camp entered the room.

"The general has returned from his ride, Major Villabuena," said the officer; "he has heard of your arrival, and is impatient to see you."

"I am ready to accompany you to him," said Baltasar, by no means sorry to break off his dialogue with the Count.

"General Zumalacarregui also requests your presence, Senor Conde," said the aide-de-camp.

"I will shortly wait upon him," replied Villabuena.

The two officers left the house, and the Count re-entered his sleeping apartment to complete his toilet.

On reaching Zumalacarregui's quarters, Major Villabuena found the Carlist chief seated at a table, upon which were writing-materials, two or three maps, and some open letters. Several aides-de-camp, superior officers, and influential partisans of Don Carlos, stood near him, walked up and down the room, or lounged at the windows that looked out upon the winding, irregular street of the village. In the court-yard of the house, a picket of lancers sat or stood near their horses, which were saddled and bridled, and ready to turn out at a moment's notice; a sentry paced up and down in front of the door, and on the highest points of some hills which rose behind the village, videttes were seen stationed. Although there were more than a dozen persons assembled in the apartment, scarcely a word was uttered; or if a remark was interchanged, it was in a low whisper. Zumalacarregui himself sat silent and thoughtful, his brow knit, his eyes fixed upon the papers before him. The substance of the intelligence brought by Don Baltasar had already reached him through some officers, to whom the Major had communicated it on his first arrival at the general's quarters; and Zumalacarregui waited in a state of painful anxiety to hear its confirmation and further details. He foresaw that extreme measures would be necessary to put an end to the system adopted by the Christinos, of treating the prisoners they made as rebels and malefactors, instead of granting them the quarter and fair usage commonly enjoyed by prisoners of war; but although Zumalacarregui had been compelled, by the necessities of his position, to many acts of severity and apparent cruelty, his nature was in reality humane, and the shedding of human blood abhorrent to him. It was, therefore, with some difficulty that he resolved upon a course, the adoption of which he felt to be indispensable to the advancement of the cause he defended.

Don Baltasar made his report. Two days previously, he said, whilst reconnoitring with a handful of men in the neighbourhood of Pampeluna, and observing the movements of the garrison, he was informed that an execution of Carlist prisoners was to take place in that city on the following morning. He sent a peasant to ascertain the truth of this rumour. By some accident the man was detained all night in the fortress, and in the morning he had the opportunity of witnessing the death of Captain Orrio and four other officers, who were shot upon the glacis, in presence of the assembled garrison. This was the substance of the Major's report, to which Zumalacarregui listened with the fixed and profound attention that he was accustomed to give to all who addressed him. But not contented with relating the bare facts of the case, Don Baltasar, either unmindful of his cousin's wishes, or desirous, for reasons of his own, to produce an effect as unfavourable as possible to the Christino prisoners, did all he could to place the cruelties exercised on the unfortunate Carlists in the strongest possible light.

"Your Excellency will doubtless grieve for the loss of these brave and devoted officers," said he, as he concluded his report; "but to them their death was a boon and a release. The information brought by our spies concerning the cruelty with which they were treated, exceeds belief. Crowded into loathsome dungeons, deprived of the commonest necessaries of life, fed on mouldy bread and putrid water, and overwhelmed with blows if they ventured to expostulate--such were the tender mercies shown by the agents of Christina to the unhappy Orrio and his gallant companions. Although their imprisonment was but of three weeks' duration, I am informed that they were so weakened and emaciated as scarcely to be able to walk to the place of execution, which they reached amidst the jeers and insults of their escort."

There was a movement of horror and indignation amongst the listeners.

"The savages!" muttered Zumalacarregui. "And how did they meet their death?"

"Like heroes. Their last look was a defiance to their enemies, their last words a _viva_ for the king. It is said that the Christinos offered them their lives if they would renounce Charles V. and take up arms for Isabel, but to a man they refused the offer."

"Truly," said Zumalacarregui, "the cause must be good and righteous that finds such noble defenders. Have you heard aught of the prisoners at Tafalla, Major Villabuena?"

"They are still detained there," said the Major, "but it is said that orders for their execution are daily expected."

"By whom is it said, or is it merely a supposition of your own?" said a voice behind Don Baltasar.

The Major turned, and met the stern gaze of the Count, who had entered the room unobserved by him. Baltasar looked confused, and faltered in his reply. He had heard it--it was generally believed, he said.

"Such reports are easily circulated, or invented by those who find an interest in their fabrication," said the Count. "I trust that General Zumalacarregui will not place implicit faith in them, or allow them to influence his decision with regard to the unfortunate Christino officers."

"Certainly not," returned Zumalacarregui; "but the undoubted facts that have yesterday and to-day come to my knowledge, render any additional atrocity on the part of our enemies unnecessary. The volley that they fired yesterday on the glacis of Pampeluna, was the death-knell of their own friends. Count Villabuena, the prisoners must die."

A hum of approbation ran through the assembly.

"With such opponents as ours," said Zumalacarregui, "humanity becomes weakness. Captain Solano, let the prisoners be placed in capilla, and order a firing-party for to-morrow noon."

The officer addressed left the room to fulfil the commands he had received; and Zumalacarregui, as if desirous to get rid of a painful subject, called Count Villabuena and some of his officers around him, and began discussing with them a proposed plan of operations against the division of one of the generals whom Rodil had left to follow up the Carlist chief during his own absence in Biscay.

In the apartment in which the interview between the Conde de Villabuena and his cousin had taken place, and within a few hours after the scene in Zumalacarregui's quarters, the Count was seated alone, revolving in his mind various schemes for the rescue of Luis Herrera from his imminent peril. To rescue him, even at risk or sacrifice to himself, the Count was fully resolved; but the difficulty was, to devise a plan offering a reasonable chance of success. An appeal to Zumalacarregui would, he well knew, be worse than useless. The general had decided on the death of the prisoners from a conviction of its justice and utility; and, had his own brother been amongst them, no exception would have been made in his favour. The Count, therefore, found reason to rejoice at having said nothing to Zumalacarregui of the interest he felt in Herrera personally, and at having based his intercession in behalf of the prisoners on the general ground of humanity. A contrary course would greatly have increased the danger of the plans he was now forming. Since there was no hope of obtaining Herrera's pardon, he was determined to accomplish his escape. How to do this was a difficulty, out of which he did not yet clearly see his way. The village was small, and crowded with Carlist soldiers; the prisoners were strictly guarded; and even should he succeed in setting Herrera at liberty, it would be no easy matter to get him conveyed in safety to any post or garrison of the Christinos, the nearest of which was several leagues distant, whilst the road to it lay through a wild and difficult country, entirely unknown to Luis, and containing a population devoted to Don Carlos.

It was three in the afternoon. Count Villabuena leaned over the balcony of his apartment, and gazed musingly into the street of the little village. The scene that offered itself to him was one that at any other moment might have fixed his attention, although he was now too much pre-occupied to notice its picturesque details. The rays of the August sun fell in a broad flood of light upon the scattered houses of the hamlet, making the flint and granite of their walls to glitter again; the glare being only here and there relieved by a scanty patch of shadow, thrown by some projecting wall, or by the thick foliage of a tree. The presence of the Carlist troops caused an unusual degree of bustle and animation in the village. Many of the houses had for the time been converted into shops and taverns; in the former, tobacco, fruit, sardines, and other soldier's luxuries, were exposed for sale on a board in front of the window; whilst in the latter, huge pig-skins, of black and greasy exterior, poured forth a dark stream of wine, having at least as much flavour of the tar with which the interior of its leathern receptacle was besmeared, as of the grape from which the generous liquid had been originally pressed. Through the open windows of various houses, glimpses were to be caught of the blue caps, strongly marked countenances, and fierce mustaches of the Carlist soldiers; their strangely-sounding Basque oaths and ejaculations mingling with the clack of the castanets and monotonous thrum of the tambourine, as they followed the sunburnt peasant girls through the mazes of the Zorcico, and other national dances. Hanging over the window-sills, or suspended from nails in the wall, were the belts, which the soldiers had profited by the day's halt--no very frequent occurrence with them--to clean and pipeclay, and then had hung to dry in the sun. Here, just within the open door of a stable, were men polishing their musket-barrels, or repairing their accoutrements; in another place a group, more idly disposed, had collected in some shady nook, and were playing at cards or morra; whilst others, wrapped in their grey capotes, their heads resting upon a knapsack or doorstep, indulged in the sound and unbroken slumber which their usually restless and dangerous existence allowed them but scanty opportunity of enjoying.

The house occupied by Count Villabuena was nearly in the centre of one of the irregular lines of detached buildings that formed the village. About eighty yards further off, on the opposite side of the road, from which they receded, and were partially screened by some barns and a plantation of fruit-trees, there stood two houses united under one roof. They were of the description usually inhabited by peasants of the richer sort, and consisted of a ground floor, an upper story, and above that a sort of garret under the tiles, which might serve as the abode of pigeons, or perhaps, in case of need, afford sleeping quarters for a farm-servant. In one of these houses, in which a number of soldiers were billeted, a guard-room had been established, and in the other, before the door and beneath the side-windows of which sentries were stationed, the prisoners were confined. They had been brought to this village immediately after their capture, as to a place of security, and one little likely to be visited by any Christino column. Zumalacarregui had accompanied them thither, but had marched away on the following day, leaving only a few wounded men and a company behind him. He had now again returned, to give his troops a day or two's repose, after some harassing marches and rapid movements. Count Villabuena had accompanied the general upon this last expedition, but not without previously ascertaining that Herrera was well cared for, and that the wound in his arm, which was by no means a severe one, was attended to by a competent surgeon. The prisoners were lodged in a room upon the upper floor, with the exception of Herrera, to whom, in consideration of his suffering state, was allotted a small chamber near the apartment of his comrades, the side window of which overlooked the open country. This casement, which was about fifteen feet from the ground, was guarded by a sentry, who had orders to fire upon the prisoners at the first indication of an attempt to escape.

Whilst the Conde de Villabuena gazed on the temporary prison, of which he commanded a view from his balcony, and meditated how he should overcome the almost insuperable difficulties that opposed themselves to Herrera's rescue, there emerged from the door of the guard-room a man, whose gait and figure the Count thought he knew, although he was too far distant to discern his features. This man was in a sort of half-uniform; a blue jacket decorated with three rows of metal buttons, coarse linen trousers, and on his head the customary woollen boina. From underneath the latter appeared a white linen bandage, none of the cleanest, and considerably stained with blood. His face was pale and thin, and the Count conjectured him to be a wounded man, recently out of hospital. The person who had thus attracted Villabuena's notice, turned into the street, and keeping on the shady side, either from disliking the heat, or out of regard to his recently bleached complexion, walked slowly along till he arrived near the Count's window; then looking up, he brought his hand to his cap, and saluted. As he did so, the Count recognised the well-known features of Paco the muleteer.

The surprise felt by the Count at the reappearance of this man, whom he fully believed to have been killed when he himself was rescued from the Christinos by Zumalacarregui, was succeeded by a joyful foreboding. By the aid of Paco, with whose sagacity and courage he was well acquainted, who had been at a former period in his service, and whom he knew to be entirely devoted to him, he felt at once that he should be able to accomplish the escape of Herrera. Giving but one glance around to see that he was not observed, he made a sign to the muleteer to come up to him. Paco obeyed, and in another moment entered the apartment.

"I thought you were in your grave, Paco," said Villabuena, "and so did we all. I myself saw you lying in the dust of the road, with a sabre-cut on your head that would have killed an ox."

"It was not so bad as it looked," replied the Navarrese. "Nothing like a close-woven boina for turning a sabre edge. Pepe Velasquez is a hard hitter, and if I had worn one of their pasteboard shakos, my head would have been split in two like a ripe tomata. But as it was, the blow glanced sideways, and only shaved off a bit of the scalp, though it left me senseless, and as like dead as night be. After the troops and your senoria had marched away, and just as life was returning, some peasants found me. They took me home and doctored me, and three days ago I was well enough to crawl hither. I am getting strong and hearty, and shall soon be in the saddle again."

"So much the better," replied the Count. "We want all the men we can muster, and especially brave fellows like yourself. Meanwhile, what are you doing, and where are you quartered?"

"In the house of Jose Urriola, here the guard-room is. My duty is to take the prisoners their rations, and clean out their room. Poor Don Luis, as your senoria doubtlessly knows, is amongst them."

"I do know it, and it is concerning him that I wish to speak to you. Paco, I know I can depend on you."

"You can, your senoria," replied the muleteer. "Do you think I have forgotten all your honour's kindness, how you got me out of the scrape about the smuggling?"

"Or the one about thrashing the alguazils," returned the Count, with a smile.

"Ah, your senoria was always very good to me," said Paco; "and I am not the man to forget it."

"You have an opportunity of showing your gratitude," said the Count. "Have you heard that the prisoners are to be shot to-morrow?"

Paco started.

"And Don Luis with them?"

The Count nodded affirmatively.

"It will be the death of Dona Rita," exclaimed Paco with blunt passion. "Speak to the general--you can do it. He will not refuse Senor Herrera's life, if you ask it."

"You are mistaken," said Villabuena; "in that quarter there is no hope. The only chance for Don Luis is his escape, before to-morrow morning."

Paco shook his head, and remained for a moment silent. The Count observed him attentively.

"It is difficult," said the muleteer, "and dangerous."

"Difficulties may be overcome; for the danger, you shall be amply recompensed," said the Count, anxiously.

"I want no recompense, senor," cried the Navarrese, with one of those bursts of free and manly independence that characterise his countrymen. "I will do it for you if it cost me my life.

"But how is the escape to be accomplished?" said the Count. "Does any plan occur to you?"

"I could do it," said Paco, "had I been ten days longer off the doctor's list. But I am still weak; and even if I got Don Luis out of his prison, I should be unable to accompany him till he is out of danger. I take it he will want a guide. I must have some one to help me, Senor Conde."

"That increases the danger to all of us," said the Count. "Whom can we trust?"

"I can find some one," said Paco, after a moment's reflection, "who will be safe and silent, if well paid."

The Count opened a writing-desk, and produced several gold ounces.

"A dozen of those will be sufficient," said Paco; "perhaps fewer. I will do it as cheap as it can be done; for I suppose the _pesetas_ are not more plentiful with your senoria than with most of Charles V.'s followers. But it will not do to bargain too closely for a man's life."

"Nor do I mean to do so," said the Count. "Here is the sum you name, and something over. Who is your man?"

"Your senoria has heard of Romany Jaime, the gipsy _esquilador?_"

The Count made a movement of surprise.

"He is one of our spies; devoted to the general. You cannot think of trusting him?"

"He is devoted to any body who pays him," returned Paco. "I knew him well in former days, when I went to buy mules in the mountains of Arragon. An arch rogue is Master Jaime, who will do any thing for gold. I daresay he serves the general honestly, being well paid; but he will look upon our job as a godsend, and jump at the chance."

"I doubt the plan," said the Count. "I am bent upon saving Herrera, and have made up my mind to some risk; but this appears too great."

"And what need your senoria know about the matter at all?" said the ready-witted Paco. "No one has seen me here; or, if any one has, nothing will be thought of it. The money was given me by the prisoner--I arrange the matter with Jaime, and to-morrow morning, when the escape is discovered, who is to tax you with a share in it?"

"'Tis well," said the Count--"I leave all to you; and the more willingly, as my further interference might rather excite suspicion than prove of service. If you want money or advice, come to me. I shall remain here the whole evening."

Upon leaving the Count's quarters, Paco lounged carelessly down the street, with that listless think-of-nothing sort of air, which is one of the characteristics of the Spanish soldier, till he arrived opposite to a narrow passage between two houses, at the extremity of which was a stile, and beyond it a green field, and the foliage of trees. Turning down this lane, he entered the field, and crossed it in a diagonal direction, till he reached its further corner. Here, on the skirt of a coppice, and under the shade of some large chestnut-trees, a group was assembled, and a scene presented itself, that might be sought for in vain in any country but Spain. Above a wood-fire, which burned black and smouldering in the strong daylight, a large iron kettle was suspended, emitting an odour that would infallibly have turned the stomachs of more squeamish or less hungry persons than those for whom its contents were destined. It would have required an expert chemist to analyse the ingredients of this caldron, of which the attendant Hecate was a barefooted, grimy-visaged drummer-boy, who, having been temporarily promoted to the office of cook, hung with watering lips, and eyes blinking from the effect of the wood smoke, over the precious stew entrusted to his care. This he occasionally stirred with a drumstick, the end of which he immediately afterwards transferred to his mouth, provoking a catalogue of grimaces that the heat of the boiling mess and its savoury flavour had probably an equal share in producing. Another juvenile performer on the sheepskin was squatted upon his haunches on the opposite side of the fire, acting as a check upon any excess of voracity on the part of his comrade, whilst he diligently employed his dirty digits and a rusty knife in peeling and slicing a large pumpkin, of which the fragments, so soon as they were in a fitting state, were plunged into the pot. A quantity of onion skins and tomata stalks, some rusty bacon rind, the skin of a lean rabbit, and some feathers that might have belonged either to a crow or a chicken, bestrewed the ground, affording intelligible hints as to a few of the heterogeneous materials already committed to the huge bowels of the kettle.

At a short distance from the fire, and so placed as to be out of the current of smoke, a score of soldiers sprawled upon the grass, intent upon the proceedings of a person who sat in the centre of the circle they formed. This was a man whose complexion, dark as that of a Moor, caused even the sunburnt countenance of his neighbours to appear fair by the comparison. His eyes were deep-set and of a dead coal-black; and around them, as well as at the corners of his large mouth, which, at times, displayed a double row of sharp teeth of ivory whiteness, were certain lines and wrinkles that gave to his physiognomy an expression in the highest degree repulsive. Deceit, low cunning, and greed of gain, were legibly written upon this unprepossessing countenance; whose wild character was completed by a profusion of coarse dark hair, that hung or rather stuck out in black elf-locks around the receding forehead and tawny sunken cheeks. The dress of this man was in unison with his aspect. He wore a greasy velveteen jacket, loose trousers of the same stuff, and his feet were shod with _abarcas_--a kind of sandal in common use in some parts of Navarre and Biscay, composed of a flat piece of tanned pig's hide, secured across the instep by thongs. A leathern wallet lay upon the ground beside him, and near it were scattered sundry pairs of shears and scissors, used to clip mules and other animals. The _esquilador_, or shearer--for such was the profession of the individual just described--had found a subject for the exercise of his art in a large white dog of the poodle species, who, with a most exemplary patience, the result probably of a frequent repetition of the same process, lay upon his back between the operator's knees, all four legs in the air, exposing his ribs and belly to the scissors that were rapidly divesting them of their thick fleece. The operation seemed to excite intense interest amongst the surrounding soldiers, who followed with their eyes each clip of the shears and movement of the esquilador's agile fingers, and occasionally encouraged the patient, their constant companion and playmate both in quarters and the field, by expressions of sympathy and affection. The arrival of Paco, who established himself behind the esquilador, in a gap of the circle, was insufficient to distract their attention from the important and all-absorbing interest of the dog-shearing.

"_Pobre Granuka!_" cried one of the lookers-on, patting the dog's head, which lay back over the esquilador's knee; "how quiet he is! what a sensible animal! How fares it, Granuka?--how is it with you?"

The dog replied by a blinking of his eyes, and by passing his tongue over his black snout, to this kind inquiry concerning his state of personal comfort.

"_Mira! que entendido!_" cried the gratified soldier; "he understands every word. Come, gitano--have you nearly done? The poor dog's weary of lying on his back."

The last trimming was given to the patient, and the liberated animal jumped up and raced round the circle, as if anxious to show his friends how greatly he was improved by the process he had undergone. His face and the hinder half of his body were closely clipped, his shoulders and forelegs remaining covered with a fell of woolly hair; whilst at the end of his tail, the cunning artist had left, by express desire of the soldiers, a large tuft, not unlike a miniature mop, which Granuka brandished in triumph above his clean-shaven flanks.

"_Que hermoso!_" screamed one of the delighted soldiers, catching Granuka in his arms, kissing his muzzle, and then pitching him down with a violence that would have broken the bones of any but a regimental dog.

"Attention, Granuka!" cried another of the quadruped's numerous masters, dropping on his knees before the dog, and uplifting his finger to give force to the command. At the word, Granuka bounced down upon his hinder end, and assumed an aspect of profound gravity.

"A _viva_ for the _nina_ Isabel," said his instructor.

Granuka stretched out his paws before him, laid his nose upon them, and winked with his eyes as if he were composing himself to sleep.

"Won't you?" said the soldier. "Well, then, a _viva_ for the _puta_ Christina."

This time the eyes were closed entirely, and the animal gave a dissatisfied growl.

"A _viva_ for the king!" was the next command.

The dog jumped briskly up, gave a little spring into the air, and uttered three short, quick barks, which were echoed by shouts of laughter from the soldiers. Having done this, he again sat down, grave and composed.

"Once more," said his instructor, "and a good one, Granuka. _Viva el Tio Zumalacarregui!_"

This time the dog seemed to have lost his senses, or to have been bitten by a tarantula. He jumped off the ground half-a-dozen times to thrice his own height, giving a succession of little joyous yelps that resembled a human cachinnation far more than any sounds of canine origin or utterance. Then, as if delighted at his own performances, he dashed out of the circle, and began tearing about the field, his tail in the air, yelling like mad. The soldiers doubled themselves up, and rolled upon the grass in convulsions of merriment. As ill-luck would have it, however, Granuka, in one of his frolicsome gyrations, in the performance of which the curve described was larger than in the preceding ones, came within sight and scent of the _al fresco_ kitchen, and that at the precise moment when the cook, either conceiving his olla to be sufficiently stewed, or desirous to ascertain its progress by actual inspection, had fished out by the claw one of the anomalous-looking bipeds whose feathers bestrewed the ground, and had placed it upon the reversed lid of the camp-kettle. Granuka, either unusually hungry, or imagining that the savoury morsel had been prepared expressly as a reward for his patience and docility under his recent trials, made a dart at the bird, caught it up in his mouth, and with lowered tail, but redoubled speed, scampered towards the houses.

"_Maldito perro! Ladron!_" roared the cook, hurling his drumstick after the thief, abandoning his kitchen, and starting off in pursuit, followed by the soldiers, who had witnessed the nefarious transaction, and whose shouts of laughter were suddenly changed into cries of indignation. The stolen bird was of itself hot enough to have made any common dog glad to drop it; but Granuka was an uncommon dog, an old campaigner, whose gums were fire-proof; and the idea of relinquishing his prize never entered his head. Presently he reached the stile at the end of the field, darted under it and disappeared, followed by cooks and soldiers, swearing and laughing, abusing the dog, and tripping up one an other. In less than a half minute from the commission of the theft, Paco and the esquilador were the only persons remaining in the field.

So soon as this was the case, Paco abandoned his position in rear of the gipsy, and came round to his front. The dog-shearer had slung his wallet over his shoulder, and was replacing in it his scissors and the other implements of his craft.

"Good-day, Jaime," said Paco.

The gipsy glanced at the muleteer from under his projecting eyebrows, and nodded a surly recognition.

"Will you come with me to clip a mule?" said Paco.

"I have no time," replied the esquilador. "The heat of the day is past, and I must be moving. I have ten leagues to do between this and morning."

"A quartillo of wine will be no bad preparation for the journey," said the muleteer; "and I will readily bestow one in memory of the spavined mule which you tried to palm upon me, but could not, now some three years past."

The gipsy gave another of his furtive and peculiar glances, accompanied by a slight grin.

"Thanks for your offer," said he, "but I tell you again I have no time either to drink or shear. I must be gone before those mad fellows return, and detain me by some new prank."

The noisy chatter and laughter of the soldiers was heard as he spoke. The dog had got clear off, and they were returning to the kettle to devour what was left there. The gipsy turned to go, when Paco put his hand into his pocket, and on again drawing it forth, a comely golden ounce, with the coarse features of Ferdinand VII. stamped in strong relief on its bright yellow surface, lay upon the palm. The eyes of the esquilador sparkled at the sight, and he extended his hand as if to clutch the coin. Paco closed his fingers.

"Gently, friend Jaime," said he; "nothing for nothing is a good motto to grow rich upon. This shining _onca_, and more of the same sort, may be yours when you have done service for them."

"And what do you require of me?" said the gipsy, with a quick eagerness that contrasted strongly with his previous apathetic indifference.

"I will tell you," said Paco, "but in some more private place than this."

"Let us be gone," said the gipsy.

And as the first of the soldiers re-entered the field, the two men passed through a gap in the hedge that bounded it, and were lost to view in the adjacent thicket.

It was about an hour after sunset, and contrary to what is usual at that season and in that country, the night was dark and cloudy. A slight mist rose from the fields surrounding the village, and a fine rain began to fall. In the guard-room adjoining the house in which Luis Herrera was prisoner, the soldiers on duty were assembled round a rickety table, on which a large coarse tallow candle, stuck in a bottle, flared and guttered, and emitted an odour even more powerful than that of the tobacco smoke with which the room was filled. The air was heavy, the heat oppressive, and both the house-door and that of the guard-room, which was at right angles to it, just within the passage, were left open. Whilst some few of the men, their arms crossed upon the table, and their heads laid upon them, dozed away the time till their turn for going on sentry should arrive, the sergeant and the remainder of the guard, including a young recruit who had only two days before deserted from the Christinos and been incorporated in a Carlist battalion, consumed successive measures of wine, to be paid for by those who were least successful in a trial of skill that was going on amongst them. This consisted in drinking _de alto_, as it is called--literally, from a height, and was accomplished by holding a small narrow-necked bottle at arm's length above the head, and allowing the wine to flow in a thin stream into the mouth. In this feat of address the new recruit, whose name was Perrico, was so successful as to excite the envy of his less dexterous rivals.

"Pshaw!" said the sergeant, who, in a clumsily executed attempt, had inundated his chin and mustache with the purple liquid--"Pshaw!" said he, on seeing the deserter raise his bottle in the air and allow its contents to trickle steadily and noiselessly down his expanded gullet; "Perrico beats us all."

"No wonder," said a soldier, "he is from the country where Grenache and Tinto are more plentiful than water, and where nobody drinks in any other way, or ever puts a glass to his lips. He is a Catalan."

"An Arragonese," hastily interrupted Perrico, eager to vindicate himself from belonging to a province which the rough manners and harsh dialect of its inhabitants cause generally to be held in small estimation throughout the rest of Spain. "An Arragonese, from the _siempre heroica_ Sarragossa."

"It's all one," said the sergeant, with a horse-laugh, "all of the _corona de Aragon_, as the Catalans say when they are ashamed of their country. But what induced you, Don Perrico, being from Sarragossa, where they are all as revolutionary as Riego, to leave the service of the Neapolitan woman and come over to Charles V.?"

"Many things," answered the deserter. "In the first place, I am of a thirsty family. My father kept a wine-shop and my mother was a cantiniera, and both drank as much as they sold. I inherited an unfortunate addiction to the wine-skin, which upon several occasions has brought me into trouble and the black-hole. The latter did not please me, and I resolved to try whether I should not find better treatment in the service of King Charles."

"Not if you have brought your thirst with you," answered the sergeant. "Zumalacarregui does not joke in matters of discipline; so, if your thirst troubles you here, I advise you to quench it at the pump. But that will be the easier, as neither wine nor money are likely to be over-abundant with us."

At this moment, and before Perrico could reply to the sergeant's warning, the sentry in front of the house suspended his walk and uttered a sharp "Quien vive?"

"Carlos Quinto," was the reply.

Another password was exchanged, and then a step was audible in the passage, and the bandaged head and pale face of Paco appeared at the door of the guard-room. The muleteer was received with a cry of welcome from the soldiers.

"Hurra!" cried the sergeant, "here is your match, Perrico. No Catalan or Arragonese, but jolly Navarro. A week's pay to a wet cartridge, he empties this bottle _de alto_ without spilling a drop."

And he held out one of the small bottles before mentioned, which contained something like an English pint. Paco took it, raised it as high as he could in the air, and gradually depressing the neck, the wine poured out in a slender and continuous stream, which the muleteer, his head thrown back, caught in his mouth. The bottle was emptied without a single drop being spilt, or a stain appearing on the face of the drinker.

"Bravo, Paco!" cried the soldiers.

"Could not be better," said Perrico.

"You are making a jolly guard of it," said Paco. "Wine seems as common as ditch-water amongst you. Who pays the shot?"

"I!" cried the sergeant, clapping his hand on his pocket, which gave forth a sound most harmoniously metallic. "I have inherited, friend Paco; and, if you like to sit down with us, you shall drink yourself blind without its costing on an _ochavo_."

"'Twould hardly suit my broken head," returned the muleteer. "But from whom have you inherited? From the dead or the living?"

"The living to be sure," replied the sergeant, laughing. "From a fat Christino alcalde, with whom I fell in the other morning upon the Salvatierra road. His saddle-bags were worth the rummaging."

"I can't drink myself," said Paco; "but let me take out a glass to poor Blas, who is walking up and down, listening to the jingle of the bottles, as tantalized as a mule at the door of a corn-store."

"Against the regulations," said the sergeant. "Wait till he comes off sentry, and he shall have a skin-full."

"Pooh!" said Paco, "cup of wine will break no bones, on sentry or off."

And taking advantage of the excellent humour in which his potations had put the non-commissioned officer, he filled a large earthen mug with wine, and left the room.

The sentinel was leaning against the house-wall, his coat-skirt wrapped round the lock of his musket to protect it from the drizzling rain, and looking as if he would gladly have exchanged his solitary guard for a share in the revels of his comrades, when Paco came out, the cup of wine in his hand, and whistling in a loud key a popular Basque melody. The soldier took the welcome beverage from the muleteer, unsuspicious of any other than a friendly motive on the part of Paco, raised it to his lips, and drank it slowly off, as if to make the pleasure of the draught as long as possible. Thus engaged, he did not observe a man lurking in the shadow of an opposite barn, and who, taking advantage of the sentinel's momentary inattention, and of the position of Paco, who stood so as to mask his movements from the soldier, glided across the street, darted into the house, and, passing unseen and unheard before the open door of the guard-room, nimbly and noiselessly ascended the stairs.

The sentinel drained the cup to the last drop, returned it to Paco, gave a deep sigh of satisfaction, and began marching briskly up and down. Paco re-entered the guard room, and placed the cup upon the table.

The wine was beginning to make visible inroads on the sobriety of some of the soldiers, and the propriety of putting an end to the debauch occurred to the non-commissioned officer.

"Come, boys," cried he, "knock off from drinking, or you'll hardly go through your facings, if required."

"Only one glass more, sergeant," cried Perrico. "There is still a pleasant tinkle in the _borracha_."

And he shook the large leathern bottle which held the supply of wine.

"Only one more, then," said the sergeant, unable to resist the temptation, and holding out his glass. Perrico filled it to the brim, and afterwards did the same for three soldiers who still kept their places at the table, the others having composed themselves to sleep upon the benches round the room. For himself, however, as Paco, who stood behind him, had opportunity of observing, the deserter poured out little or nothing, though he kept the cup at his lips as long as if he were drinking an equal share with his comrades.

"Now," said the sergeant, thumping his glass upon the table, "not another drop. And you, Master Perrico, though your father did keep a wine-shop, and your mother carry the brandy-keg, let me advise you to put your head under the fountain, and then lie down and sleep till your turn for sentry. It will come in an hour or two."

"And where shall I be posted?" hiccuped Perrico, who, to all appearance, began to feel the effects of the strong Navarrese wine.

"Under the prisoners' window," was the reply, "where you will need to keep a bright look-out. I would not be in your jacket for a colonel's commission if they were to escape during your guard. To-morrow's firing-party would make a target of you."

"No fear," replied the young man. "I could drink another _azumbre_ and be none the worse for it."

"_Fanfarron!_" said the sergeant; "you talk big enough for an Andalusian, instead of an Arragonese."

And so saying, the worthy sergeant walked to the door of the house to cool his own temples, which he felt were somewhat of the hottest, in the night air. Paco wished him good-night; and lighting a long thin taper, composed of tow dipped in rosin, at the guard-room candle, ascended the stairs to his own dormitory.

The room, or rather kennel, appropriated to the lodging of the muleteer, was a triangular garret already described, formed by the ceiling of the upper story and the roof of the house, which rose in an obtuse angle above it. Its greatest elevation was about six feet, and that only in the centre, whence the tiles slanted downwards on either side to the beams by which the floor was supported. The entrance was by a step-ladder, and through a trap-door, against which, when he reached it, Paco gave two very slight but peculiar taps. Thereupon a bolt was cautiously withdrawn, and the trap raised; the muleteer completed the ascent of the steps, entered the loft, and found himself face to face with Jaime the gipsy.

"Did no one see you?" said Paco, in a cautious whisper.

"No one," replied the esquilador, reseating himself upon Paco's bed, from which he had risen to give admittance to the muleteer. The bed consisted of a wooden _catre_, or frame, supporting a large square bag of the coarsest sackcloth, half full of dried maize-leaves, and having a rent in the centre, through which to introduce the arm, and shake up the contents. The only other furniture of the room was a chair with a broken back. On the floor lay the gipsy's wallet, and his abarcas, which he had taken off to avoid noise during his clandestine entrance into the house. The gipsy himself was busy tying slip-knot at the end of a stout rope about seven or eight yards long. Another piece of cord, of similar length and thickness, lay beside him, having much the appearance of a halter, owing to the noose already made at one of its extremities. The tiles and rafters covering the room were green with damp, and, through various small apertures, allowed the wind and even the rain to enter with a facility which would have rendered the abode untenable for a human inhabitant during any but the summer season. In one of the slopes of the roof was an opening in the tiles, at about four feet from the floor, closed by a wooden door, and large enough to give egress to a man. To this opening Paco now pointed.

"Through there," said he.

The gipsy nodded.

"The roof is strong," continued Paco, "and will bear us well. We creep along the top till we get to the chimney at the further end, just above the window of the prisoner's room. I have explained to you what is then to be done."

"It is hazardous," said the gipsy. "If a tile slips under our feet, or the sentries catch sight of us, we shall be picked off the house-top like sparrows."

"Perfectly true," said Paco; "but the tiles will not slip, and the night is too dark for the sentries to see us. Besides, friend Jaime, ten ounces are not to be earned by saying paternosters, or without risk."

"Risk enough already," grumbled the gipsy. "At this hour I ought to be five leagues away, and if he, on whose service I was bound, finds out that I have tarried, no tree in the sierra will be too high to hang me on."

"You must hope that he will not find it out," said Paco, coolly.

"Did you give the prisoner a hint of our plan?" enquired the gitano.

"I was unable. I visit him but once a-day, to take him his rations, and that at noon. Since I arranged this plan, I endeavoured to get admittance to him, but was repulsed by the sentry. To have insisted would have excited suspicion. He knows, however, that he is to be shot to-morrow, and is not likely to be asleep."

Just then the deep sonorous bell of the neighbouring church-clock struck the hour. The two men listened, and counted ten strokes.

"Is it time?" said the gipsy, who had completed the noose upon the second rope.

"Not yet," replied Paco; "let another hour strike. Till then, not another word."

The muleteer extinguished the light and seated himself down upon the broken chair; the gipsy stretched himself upon the bed, and all was silent and dark in the garret. Gradually, the slight murmuring sounds which still issued from various houses of the little village became hushed, as the inmates betook themselves to rest; and Paco, who waited with anxious impatience till the moment for action should arrive, heard nothing but the heavy breathing of the esquilador, who had sunk into a restless slumber. Half-past ten was tolled; the challenging of the sentries was heard as they were visited by the rounds; and then soon afterwards came the long-drawn admonition of "_Sentinela alerta!_" from the main guard, replied to in sharp quick tones by the "_Aleria esta_" of the sentries. At length eleven struck, and when the reverberation of the last stroke had died away, Paco rose from his chair, and shook his companion from his sleep.

"It is time," said he.

The gipsy started up.

"The money?" was his first question.

Paco placed a small bag in the esquilador's hand, which closed eagerly upon it.

"I promised you ten ounces," said the muleteer, "and you have them there. When you bring me a line in the handwriting of the prisoner, dated from a Christino town, you shall receive a like sum. But beware of playing false, gitano. Others, more powerful than myself, are concerned in this affair, and will know how to punish treachery."

The gipsy made no reply, but feeling for his wallet, put his sandals and one of the ropes into it, and fastened it on his shoulders. Paco slipped off his shoes, twisted the other rope round his body, and opening the door in the tiles, in an instant was on the top of the house. The esquilador followed. Upon their hands and feet the two men ascended the gradual slope of the roof till they reached the ridge in its centre, upon which they got astride, and worked themselves slowly and silently along towards that end of the building in which Herrera was confined. Owing to the profound darkness, and to the extreme caution with which Paco, who led the way, proceeded, their progress was very gradual, and at last an actual stop was put to it by a small but solidly-built stone chimney which rose out of the summit, and within a foot of the extremity of the house. Paco untwisted the rope from round his body and handed it to the gipsy, retaining one end in his hand. The esquilador fixed the noose about his middle, and altering his position, passed Paco, scrambled round the chimney, and seated himself on the verge of the roof, his legs dangling over. Paco gave a turn of the rope round the chimney, and then leaning forward from behind it, put his mouth to the gipsy's ear, and spoke in one of those suppressed whispers which seem scarcely to pass the lips of the speaker.

"Remember," said he, "ten ounces, or"----

A significant motion of his hand round his throat, completed the sentence in a manner doubtless comprehensible enough to the esquilador. The latter now turned himself about, and supported himself with his breast and arms upon the roof, his legs and the lower part of his body hanging against the side wall of the house. Paco kept his seat behind the chimney, astride as before, and gathering up the rope, held it firmly. Gradually the gipsy slid down; his breast was off the roof, then his arms, and he merely hung on by his hands. His hold was then transferred to the rope above his head, of which one end was round his waist and the other in the hands of Paco. All this was effected with a caution and absence of noise truly extraordinary, and proving wonderful coolness and habit of danger on the part of the two actors in the strange scene. As the gipsy hung suspended in the air, Paco began gradually paying out the rope, inch by inch. This process, owing to the light weight of the gipsy, and to the check given to the running of the cord by the chimney round which it was turned, he was enabled without difficulty to accomplish and regulate. In a brief space of time a sensible diminution of the strain warned him that the gitano had found some additional means of support. For the space of about three minutes Paco sat still, holding the rope firmly, but giving out no more of it; then pulling towards him, he found it come to his hand without opposition. He drew it all in, again twisted it about his body, and lying down upon his belly, put his head over the edge of the tiles to see what was passing beneath. All was quiet; no light was visible from the window of Herrera's room, which was at about a dozen feet below him. The mist and thick darkness prevented any view of the sentry; but he could hear the sound of his footsteps, and the burden of the royalist ditty which he was churming between his teeth.

Whilst all this took place, Luis Herrera, unsuspicious of the efforts that were making for his rescue, sat alone in his room, which was dimly lighted by an ill-trimmed lamp. Twelve hours had elapsed since he had been informed of the fate that awaited him; in twelve more his race would be run, and he should bid adieu to life, with its hopes and cares, its many deceptions and scanty joys. A priest, who had come to give him spiritual consolation in his last hours, had left him at sundown, promising to return the next morning; and since his departure Herrera had remained sitting in one place, nearly in one posture, thoughtful and pre-occupied, but neither grieving at nor flinching from the death which was to snatch him from a world whereof he had short but sad experience. Alone, and almost friendless, his affections blighted and hopes ruined, and his country in a state of civil war--all concurred to make Herrera regard his approaching death with indifference. Life, which, by a strange contradiction, seems prized the more as its value diminishes, and clung to with far greater eagerness by the old than the young had for him few attractions remaining. Once, and only once, a shade of sadness crept over his features, and he gave utterance to a deep sigh, almost a sob, of regret, as he drew from his breast a small locket containing a tress of golden hair. It was a gift of Rita's in their happy days, before they knew sorrow or foresaw the possibility of a separation; and from this token, even when Herrera voluntarily renounced his claim to her hand, and bade her farewell for ever, he had not had courage to part. By a strong effort, he now repressed the emotion which its sight, and the recollections it called up, had occasioned him, and he became calm and collected as before. Drawing a table towards him, he made use of writing-materials, which he had asked for and obtained, to commence a long letter to Mariano Torres. This his confessor had promised should be conveyed to his friend.

He had written but a few lines, when a slight sound at the room window roused his attention. The noise was too trifling to be much heeded; it might have been a passing owl or bat flapping its wing against the wooden shutter. Herrera resumed his writing. A few moments elapsed, and the noise was again heard. This time it was a distinct tapping upon the shutter, very low and cautious, but repeated with a degree of regularity that argued, on the part of the person making it, a desire of attracting his attention. Herrera rose from his seat, and obeying a sort of instinct or impulse, for which he would himself have had trouble to account, masked the lamp behind a piece of furniture, and hastening to the window, which opened inwards, cautiously unlatched it. A man, whose features were unknown to him, was supporting himself on the ledge outside, his legs gathered under him, and nearly the whole of his thin flexible body coiled up within the deep embrasure of the window. Putting his finger to his lips, to enjoin silence, he severed, by one blow of a keen knife, a cord that encircled his waist, and then springing lightly and actively into the room, closed the shutter, since the opening of which, so rapid had been his movements, not ten seconds had elapsed.

Although the motive of this strange intrusion was entirely unknown to him, Herrera at once inferred that it boded good rather than evil. He was not long left in doubt. The esquilador pointed to Herrera's wounded arm, the sleeve of which was still cut open, although the wound was healed, and the limb had regained its strength.

"Have you full use of that?" said he.

"I have," replied Herrera. "But what is your errand here?"

"To save you," answered the gipsy. "There is no time for words. We must be doing."

And making a sign to Herrera to assist him, he caught hold of one end of the heavy old-fashioned bedstead, which had been allotted to the use of the wounded prisoner, and with the utmost caution to avoid noise, lifted it from the ground and brought it close to the window. Then, taking a rope from his wallet, he fastened it to one of the bed-posts. Herrera began to understand.

"And my companions," said he. "They also must be saved. My room door is locked, but the next window is that of their apartment."

"It is impossible," said the gipsy. "_You_ may be saved, perhaps; but to attempt the rescue of more would be destruction. Look here."

The gipsy extinguished the lamp and, stepping upon the bed, reopened the shutter, and drew Herrera towards him.

"Listen," said he, in a low whisper.

The tread of the sentry was heard, and at that moment, the glare of a lantern fell upon the trees, bordering a field opposite the window. Beyond that field the ground was broken and uneven, covered with tall bushes, fern, and masses of rock, and sloping upwards towards the neighbouring hills. The light drew nearer; the sentry challenged. It was the relief. Their heads in the embrasure of the window, Herrera and the gipsy could hear every word that passed. The man going off sentry gave over his instructions to his successor. They were few and short. The principal was, to fire upon any one of the prisoners who should so much as show himself at a window.

By the light of the lantern which the corporal carried, Paco, who was still peering over the edge of the roof, distinguished the features of the new sentry. They were those of Perrico the Christino deserter. The relief marched away, the sentinel shouldered his musket, and walked slowly up to the further end of his post.

"Now then," said the gipsy to Herrera, "fix the rope round your waist. We will let him pass once more, and when he again turns his back, I will lower you. I shall be on the ground nearly as quickly as yourself, and then keep close to me. Take this, it may be useful."

And he handed him a formidable clasp-knife, of which the curved and sharp-pointed blade was fitted into a strong horn handle. With some repugnance, but aware of the possible necessity he might find for it, Herrera took the weapon. The rope was round his waist, and, with his hands upon the embrasure of the window, he only waited to spring out for a signal from the gipsy, who was watching, as well as the obscurity would permit, the movements of the soldier. The night was growing lighter, the wind had risen and swept away the mist from the fields, overhead the clouds had broken, and stars were visible, sparkling in their setting of dark blue enamel.

"Now!" said the gipsy, who held the slack of the rope gathered up in his hands. "No, stop!" cried he, in a sharp whisper, checking Herrera, who was about to jump out, and drawing hastily back. "Hell and the devil! What is he about?"

The window of the room was nearly at the extremity of the sentinel's post, so that, during one period of his walk, the soldier's back, owing to the slow pace at which he marched up and down, was turned for a full minute. It was upon this brief space of time that the gipsy had calculated for accomplishing his own descent and that of his companion. He had allowed the soldier to proceed twice along the whole length of his post, meaning to avail himself of the third turn he should take. But to his surprise and perplexity, when the man passed for the third time, he left his usual track, moved some twenty paces backwards from the house, and gazed up at Herrera's window. Apparently he could distinguish nothing; for, after remaining a few moments stationary, he again approached the wall of the house, looked cautiously around him, and, giving three low distinct coughs, continued his walk. Without pausing to consider the meaning of this strange proceeding, the esquilador caught Herrera's arm.

"Out with you," said he, "and quickly!"

Herrera darted through the window, hung on for one instant by the edge, and let himself go--the gipsy, with a degree of strength that could hardly have been anticipated in one so slightly built, holding the rope firmly, and lowering him steadily and rapidly. The moment that his feet touched the ground, the gipsy sprang out of the window, and, grasping the rope, began descending by the aid of his hands and feet, with the agility of a monkey or a sailor boy. Before he was half-way down, however, the sentinel, who had reached the end of his walk, began retracing his steps. Hererra's heart beat quick. Hastily cutting the noose from round his waist, he pressed himself against the wall and stood motionless, scarcely venturing to breathe. The sentinel approached. Dark though it was, it seemed impossible that he did not already perceive what was passing. Gliding along close to the wall, Herrera prepared to spring upon him at the first sound uttered, or dangerous movement made by him. The soldier drew nearer, paused, let the but of his musket fall gently to the ground, and clasped his hands over the muzzle. Herrera made a bound forward, and clutching his throat, placed the point of his knife against his breast.

"One word," said he, "and I strike!"

"At the heart of your best friend," replied the soldier, in a voice of which the well-known accents thrilled Hererra's blood.

"Mariano!" he exclaimed.

"Himself," replied Mariano Torres.

Just then the gipsy, who had reached the ground, sprang upon the disguised Christino, and made a furious blow at him with his knife. Torres raised his arm, and the blade passed through the loose sleeve of his capote. Herrera hastened to interfere.

"'Tis a friend," said he.

The gipsy made a step backwards, in distrust and uncertainty.

"I tell you it is a friend," repeated Herrera--"a comrade of my own, who has come to aid my escape. And now that you have rescued me, act as our guide to the nearest Christino post, and your reward shall be ample."

The mention of reward seemed at once to remove the doubts and suspicions of the esquilador. Returning to the rope which dangled from the window, he cut it as high up as he could reach.

"They may perhaps miss the sentry and not the prisoner," said he.

At that moment a dark form turned the corner of the house.

"Who goes there?" exclaimed a voice.

"This way," cried the gipsy, and springing across the road, he dashed down a bank, and with long and rapid strides hurried across the fields.

"Who goes there?" repeated the deep hoarse tones of Major Villabuena "Sentry, where are you? Guard, turn out!"

The flash and report of Mariano's musket, which he had left leaning against the wall, and which Don Baltasar found and fired, followed the words of alarm. The bullet whistled over the heads of the fugitives. In another instant all was noise and confusion in the village. The rattle of the drum was heard, lights appeared at the windows, and the clatter of arms and tramp of man and horse reached the ears of Herrera and his companions. Soon they heard a small party of cavalry gallop down a road which ran parallel to the course they were taking. But in the darkness, and in that wild and mountainous region, pursuit was vain, especially when one so well skilled as the gipsy in the various paths and passes directed the flight. In less than half an hour, the three fugitives were out of sight and sound of the village and their pursuers.

After six hours' march, kept up without a moment's halt, over hill and dale, through forest and ravine, the intricacies of which were threaded by their experienced guide with as much facility as if it had been noonday instead of dark night, Herrera and Torres paused at sunrise upon the crest of a small eminence, whence they commanded a view of an extensive plain. On their right front, and at the distance of a mile, lay a town, composed of dark buildings of quaint and ancient architecture, surrounded by walls and a moat, and on the battlements of which sentries were stationed; whilst from the church tower the Spanish colours, the gaudy red and gold, flaunted their folds in the morning breeze.

"What place is that?" said Torres to the guide.

"It is the Christino town of Salvatierra," replied the gipsy, turning into a path that led directly to the gate of the fortress.

SICILIAN SKETCHES.

SYRACUSIANA.

FOUNTAIN OF ARETHUSA.

After three hours' steaming from Catania, we were in the harbour of Syracuse; but it was at two in the morning, and we could not go ashore. A little scuttling takes place overhead while the Mongibello litters her two hundred and forty horses for the night; and, when this is accomplished, all is silent, and we sleep in the moonlit mirror. In two hours more the last star had dropped out of its place; and in another, rosy morn found us all in activity, and on deck, examining a most unprepossessing _paysage_, and contemplating, for many a league, the wretched coast road which must have been our doom if we had _not_ come by sea--so, for once, we had chosen well! Our alternative would have consisted in two days' swinging in a _lettiga_, in facing malaria in the fields, with nothing but famine and fever-stricken hamlets to halt at, and even these at long intervals. There were, to be sure, places enough of ancient _name_, in D'Anville's Geography, along the coast, but nothing _beyond_ the name itself. This is so exactly the case, that even with the beautiful and authentic money of _Leontium_ before us, we did not land at _Lentini_! There is nothing so utterly confounding as the contemplation of _money_, every piece of which is a _gem_, on spots where no imagination can conceive the city that coined it. We are not long before we begin to cater for new disappointment, in the desire to be conducted without delay to the fountain of _Arethusa_. Accordingly, a quarter of a mile's distance from our locanda, under the rampart of the old _Ortygia_, and in the most uncleanly suburb of modern Syracuse, the far-famed spring is pointed out to our incredulity; and we are at once booked with the many who, having got up a suitable provision of enthusiasm to be exploded on the spot, are obliged to carry it away with them. A vile, _soapy washing-tank_ is Arethusa, occupied by half-naked, noisy laundresses, thumping away with wooden bats at brown-looking linen, or depositing the wet load that had been belaboured and rinsed on the bank, gabbling, as they work, like the very _Adonizousoe_ of Theocritus, (himself, as he informs us, a native of Syracuse.) A man lay sleeping with his dog beside him; a number of mahogany-coloured children, quite naked, were sprawling on the parapet-wall, covered with flies, but fast asleep! A poor bird, a descendant of the [Greek: Adones Sikelikai], a nightingale of the soil, _with his eyes put out, that he might not know day from night, and so sing unconsciously, sang to us as we passed_! But the affair was destined, in a single moment, to become ludicrous as well as disappointing. Our guide, Jack Robertson, (so named by an English man-of-war's crew that had, as he said, kidnapped him during the war,) quite mistaking the _nature_ of our disappointment, said, consolingly, "You come _dis_ way, sir; down here I show you _more gals' feet, wash more clothes_;" on which intimation we certainly followed him down a few steps, when, pushing back a wooden door, we entered at once into a large roofed washing-house, along the floor of which still ran the sadly humiliated Arethusa! We praised the beauty of the young washerwomen, and departed--Jack Robertson having considerably more to say on the subject than would interest the reader to know; and which, in fact, we could not tell, without violating what was evidently imparted in confidence.

JACK ROBERTSON AND THE PROFESSOR OF ELOQUENCE.

Under the guidance of the aforesaid Jack Robertson, we had visited two rival collections of coins, the property of two priests, and certainly the finest we had seen in Sicily. Those of _Syracuse_ in silver, of the _first_ or largest module, (_medaglioni_ as they are technically called,) are for size and finish deservedly reputed the most beautiful of ancient coins; and of these we saw a full score in each collection. We might indeed have purchased, as well as admired, but were deterred by the price asked, which, for one perfect specimen, was from 45 to 50 crowns, (L7 or L8 sterling.) These coins are among the largest extant. On one side, the head of Arethusa is a perfect gem in silver, (the _hair_ especially, treated in a way that we have never seen elsewhere;) on the other, is a _quadriga_. One of these ecclesiastics dealt like any other dealer. The other consulted the dignity of the church, and employed a lay brother to impose upon strangers who buy in haste to repent at leisure; for even among the picked, select, and _winnowed_ coins of the man who knows what he is about, there are always false ones. Having shown that we are _au fait_ both as to the _thing_ and the market-price--that we had read Myounet, and were acquainted with the sharp eyes of _de Dominicis_ at Rome, we pass immediately for an English _dealer_; and suspicion becomes conviction, when, taking up a gold Philip, we remark that "all trades must live," and that our price must depend upon his "_quanto per il Filippo_?" "You will not scruple, I suppose, to pay forty-seven dollars!" "Thirty-seven is plenty."--"_Pocket Philip._" "Sir," said we to our employe as we went home, "you are a _rogue_ to have brought us to that cheating priest." "Not so, sir," said the Siculo-Inglese Jack Robertson, "they tell here priest _not_ cheat, always deal _square_--have that character indeed, sir;" and he proceeded to conduct us to another priest-collector, who, in this instance, had gone out to dine with a friend. Jack, however, said he would soon bring him back, dined or undined; and in ten minutes he returned in high spirits at his success. "Always trust _me_, sir! Me no fool, sir! As soon as I see him, sir, I say, you got _coins?_ He say '_yes_.' Den you show what you got _directly_ to English gentlemen. 'No, I won't,' he tell me--'I take my dinner here wid my friends, and after dat I come see English gentlemen.'" Rather a cool thing we thought for a _dealer_ to keep his customers waiting; but, whenever one wants any thing, one can always afford to wait a little, and Jack informed us that he had learned from the padre's servant that his master always dines in a quarter of an hour. The quarter of an hour up, we send again, but our messenger comes back empty-handed. "Well, where is your friend?" "He no friend of mine, sir! He very angry! Not my fault, sir," "Angry? what is he angry about?" "Because I say to him only this, sir--'_Other_ priest ask gentleman _too much_--hope you not _very dear too_, sir;' to which he say, '_You damn fool_, I don't sell coins!' _Den_ I beg his pardon, and he ask me sharply, '_Who_ say I sell coins?' 'Sir,' I say, 'all the whole world say so.' Den he say, '_D--n all the whole world_; and when any body tell you this again, say Abate _Rizzi_ call him a d----d fool, and say he may go to h-ll!!!'" "Abate Rizzi!! why, that is the _Professor of Eloquence_ to whom we were to be introduced yesterday." "Yes, sir," says Jack, "and here he comes," glancing up the street. We now see a personage, whose staid deportment and gait declare him to be much beyond the age when it may be thought allowable to swear. "You rascal, you have been telling us a lie; that gentleman could never have said, damn the whole world." "He did not speak it in _English, sir_." "Not speak it in English? why, what did he say?" "Sir, he say, '_Cazzo! questa e una minchioneria!_' that means 'damn fool,' sir,--'_dettia tutti d' andare al diavolo_,' that be the same as tell every body go to h-ll!!" (the translation in this case we thought not _so_ bad;) we had not, however, time to discuss the matter, for the Professor of Eloquence, who had indulged our servant _pro re nata_ with so very unusual a specimen of his art, was at our elbow. We saluted him courteously, but offended dignity was apparent in a grave face of considerable _church_ power; we therefore subjoined to the ordinary salutation much regret at the awkwardness of our guide, and apologised for intruding on his repose; which apologies, and further explanations, immediately changed the current in our favour. Jack, too, regretted he had been so indiscreet as to be misled by _current reports_; but _this_ was to rouse the calmed resentment into a new explosion. "_Who_," he demanded, in very Demosthenic accents--"_who_ had dared to affirm that he had ever sold a coin?" We went in, saw his very beautiful collection, the Professor himself doing the honours with so much obligingness, that we left him convinced that he neither sold coin nor dispensed anathemas.

EAR OF DIONYSIUS.

"Lautumias Syracusanas omnes audistis; plerique nostis. Opus est ingens magnificum regumac tyrannorum. Totum est ex saxo in mirandam altitudenem depresso, et multorum operis penitus exciso. Nihil tam clausum ad exitus, nihil tam septum undique, nihil tam tutum ad custodias, nec fieri nec cogitari potest."

Half an hour's shaking in a _lettiga_ brings us without a stumble, by the old forum of Syracuse, to the Ear of Dionysius, and those other stone quarries so well described in the above passage from Cicero _in Verrem_. We alight at the embouchure of these most striking excavations, and, descending a very steep short hill, wind through a small garden of exquisite vegetation, and are in the first _lautumia_ of the series. Here, deeply embayed in a colossal cave, we behold the marks of the ancient pick-axe, and the niches, as it were, in which the labourers sat while they chiselled out the extraordinary work, fresh as if they had been done yesterday! Shapeless and half-fashioned masses, _ebauches_ of columns for temples which never came into the possession of capitals, or the support of entablatures--unborn Dorics of the Greek portfolios are here. The sun striking obliquely from the mouth into the interior of the cavern, made the green vegetation all hoary in the slanting light. Fires in dark caverns are favourite subjects with some painters. We admire them not, but we would have liked to take a sketch of one here for the sake of poor Nicias and his fellow captives. A party of men is collected round a caldron with a fire blazing beneath it; another group is seated at a long table eating; some feed the immense boiler with new supplies from a heap of dirty-looking earth-stained _salt_. Others test the quality from time to time of that which has been purged and crystallized. It was the native nitre of the country on which they were occupied, and the test was its deflagration. In passing out of the _first_ of the line of quarried caverns to go to the _Ear_, which is the last, we are struck with the beauty of the garden into which it opens, which is found in possession of many unfrequent flowers and plants, such as had not prospered even here, but for the singularly sheltered disposition of the spot. Against the wall there grew a magnificent _Smilax sarsaparilla_ in full maturity. A decoction of the twigs of that tree cured the gardener, as he assured us, of an obstinate pain in both shoulders that no other medicine would touch; which testimony in its favour made us look with an added interest on the cordate leaf, and small white verbena-looking flower, of certainly the first, and in all probability the last, _Smilax sarsa_ we should ever see _growing_. We cut off from the main stem an arm about the thickness of an ordinary-sized bamboo, and, like it, knotted, for a souvenir of the place and the plant. In this same garden the tea-plant thrived; the proprietor, Count S----, makes an annual _racolte_ of its leaves, which he keeps for his own teapot. Another curiosity is the _Celtis australis_ or _favaragio_, a tree that bears fruit of the size of a pea, with a stone kernel; a trumpet-flower of spotless white, belonging to the _Datura arborea_, measured a whole foot and a half from lip to stalk! But it were vain to dwell on the novelties of a garden which is _all_ novelty to an English eye, and full of variety to the Italian himself; a garden equally unique in its position and productions. The _Ear_ is probably the most wonderful acoustic contrivance in existence; and that it was the work of studious design, is proved by a _second_ one _commenced_ in a neighbouring quarry--commenced, but not further prosecuted, evidently because it would not answer, from the soft, chalky material of the wall on one side. Its _external_ shape of the conch is that of the ass's ear. The aperture, through which the light now enters from its further end, and from a height of one hundred and twenty feet, was till lately not known to exist; it not being supposed that the _Ear_ had any _meatus internus_ corresponding with the _external one_. The accidental removal of a quantity of loose stones from above, revealed a narrow passage of from twenty to thirty feet in length, and opening directly into the cave. This internal opening is situated almost immediately over the amphitheatre, one hundred and twenty feet above the _floor_ of the cavern, and (measuring in a plane) is one hundred and eighty feet from the external opening.

Having rent paper, which made an incredible noise, and let off a Waterloo cracker, which reverberated along the walls like thunder, and done other deeds of the same kind below, we ascended, and walking over the _back_ of the cavern, presently came upon the passage which leads to its _inner_ opening; and there, leaning over a parapet wall, (in doing which we almost exclude the feeble light that penetrates into the cavern from behind,) we are startled by a very audible but faint whisper, which comes from our friend below, asking us to declare our present sensations. We reply in the same faint whisper; and are immediately apprised of its safe arrival by _another_. One hundred and eighty feet separate the parties. In the stillness of that half-lit cavern, not only were our faintest whisperings conveyed, but we could hear each other breathe! This was a place to come and see!

SANTA LUCIA AND THE CAPUCIN CONVENT, &c.

Some Franciscans told us that Saint Lucia was stabbed close to a granite column, in a subterranean chapel in their church, in the _fourth century_, and _under Nero_!--so ignorant are these men even about what it concerns them to know. They show a silver image, which a dozen men can, they assure us, scarcely lift. The body of the saint is not, however, here, but at Venice. "No; we have but one rib and a thumb," said the padre! "but we have two very handsome _dresses_ which she wore--one red, the other blue." Cast-off clothes, then, will do for relics! In returning to the church, they tell us of a blind old general who came hither on purpose to obtain the intercession of: Santa Lucia, (who had her own eyes put out,) to remove this calamity; with success of course, for they never record failures in church _clinique_. "Do you believe the cure?" we ventured to ask. "Why not? il miracolo e _autenticato_." "No!" said his companion, "_autorizzato_! The distinction is, that the church _authorizes_ the declaration of some lies as miraculous, but declines to make herself responsible for the reality of others!" Round the Capucian church certain stanzas are written, under what are called the fourteen _stazioni_ or stations of the cross, (places where our Saviour is supposed to have halted, or fainted under his load, on his way to Calvary.) Stanzas we were at first profane enough to attribute to Metastasio, but afterwards found that it was only the _metastasis_ of his metre adapted to the use of the church. They are much better than most of our sacred poetry, as it is strangely miscalled, which is frequently neither poetry nor common sense:--

"Il sol si oscura, E in fin la terra Il sen disserra Per grand dolor; Morto e il Signore! O Peccatore, Se tu non piangi, Sei senza cuor!

"Deh, madre mia, Con quant' afflitto, Piangendo, al Petto, Stringi Gesu! Io, l'ho fer ito, Ma son pentito-- Non piu peccati, Non piu, non piu!

"Dal tuo sepolcro, Non vo partire, Senza morire, Ma qui staro; Finche 'l dolore M'uccida il core, L'alma piangendo Qui spirero!" &c. &c.

The Capucins live on a hill in the only good air in the vicinity of Syracuse; in their precincts we found ourselves fairly attacked on _Luther's_ quarrel, and expected to take up cudgels ecclesiastic on that worn-out controversy--one of our Capucins vaunting himself ready and able to bleed for the _truth_. Liberal ideas are not common in the cloister. "You aver," said he, "that Roman Catholics may be in a way of salvation; we by no means return the compliment--but as both Lutherans and Calvinists agree in believing thus charitably of _us_, and not of one another, it seems a pretty strong argument in our favour." With such high subjects did our apparently very much in earnest friends entertain us, in a garden planted amidst those quarried prisons of the captive Athenians. A man attempted to-day to put off some bad coins upon us, which we recollected to have had offered to us by another hand--still we only hinted that they were forgeries, and declined purchasing. While this was in progress, another person came up properly introduced, with an _enlarged spleen_, which was _certainly_ authentic. We tell him that such indurations of viscera require a _very long time_ indeed for removal: and that malaria is their origin This convent possesses one of those revolting vaults, which dry up and preserve the corpse in the form of mummy; a huge trap-door flapped its wooden wings, and gave us admission into a large subterranean apartment, wherein we presently stood in the midst of defunct brethren arranged along the walls, as if they stood in chapel at their devotions! On the floor thirty or forty light boxes looked like orange chests, with custom-house hieroglyphics on their lids; but they were marked with proper and even high-sounding names, and were in fact the coffins of barons, counts, and prelates, transported here to have the _benefit of the air_, and there accordingly they lay unburied, to profit by the antiseptic qualities of the soil. We looked at a baron or two, and saw something like a huge caterpillar beginning to change into a chrysalis; a grub mummy dressed out in old Catanian silk, and so enveloped in cobwebs, that you could with difficulty make out the central nucleus of shrivelled humanity. "_Questo_," said our cowled conductor, "e il Barone Avellina, morto di cholera, anno aetatis fifty-six; he loved our order! here is another equally good-looking personage," said he, exposing a corrugated face and dark hair, frightfully at variance with a blue silk handkerchief, and all the funeral gear of twenty years ago. This was another victim to that awful visitation; his feet and hands were covered with faded herbs, rosemary, and lavender; first placed in the coffin at the time of his decease, and renewed every year by friends, when the cobwebs of the year preceding are brushed away. One elder, the pride of the collection, had lain in his court-suit for nearly a hundred years, the aforesaid aromatics having kept off the moths all this time. The room felt dry, and, except for the _company_, what one calls _comfortable_. Knee-buckles and shoe-buckles, and steel-hilted swords, do not rust here, and white cravats and embroidered waistcoats might almost return to the world! The Capucins themselves are disposed in niches, and each has a text from Scripture over his cowl. "Do you _prepare_ these mummies?" we enquire "_Nienti preparati, signor!_ We only lay them to dry in yonder room over a sink, and when they have lain four months, we take them out and complete the process in another room, where the sun comes; after which we dress them and place them here." These Capucins, they tell us, are the strictest of all sects of Franciscans. From the sights of the mummy chamber, we see at least that they are not idle, and must always have a job on hand. Females, if _not_ Catholic, are here admitted to see the grounds, and they offer wine and bread for our refreshment, which we, thinking of their _wallets_, decline on the plea of _anorexia_. Near the Capucins is the Church of _San Giovanni_, a singularly wild spot, in the midst of bad air, and within reach of the Ear of Dionysius. We descend with a fellow filthier than the filthiest Capucin, calling himself a hermit, to guide us in the vast catacombs over which the hermitage stands. It was a trial to follow him--the rank woollen dress, uncleansed till it falls to pieces, diffuses an odour which, in such confined passages, is particularly unpleasant. Cleanliness, says an English proverb, is next to godliness; but, in cowled society, it assuredly forms no part of it. Catacombs, in general, are called interesting--we never saw one in which we did not pay heavy penalty for gratifying curiosity. Those of Syracuse are vast indeed; spacious arcaded streets intersect each other in all directions, and your walk throughout lies between lengthening files of niches, cut into the walls for coffins, tier above tier, like berths in a steamboat, conducting here and there into a circular apartment, with a cupola and a central aperture, looking out upon the wild moor above.

SHARKS, FIREFLIES, &c.

We form to-day the acquaintance of an intelligent medical practitioner and collector in natural history, from whom we learn that there are eight different species of dog-fish (_Squalus_) along the Syracusan coast. This animal, to the popular fame of whose injurious exploits we had hitherto yielded unabated confidence, appears fully to justify his West Indian character. An "ancient mariner" told us, that full forty miles from Syracuse, a shark, which had been following him for a long time, thrust his head suddenly out of the water, and made a snap at him; and if the boat had not been a _thunny_ boat, high in the sides, there is no saying how much of him might have been extant! A pair of trousers drying in the sun over the side of the boat should have small attraction for a shark, but he _took_ them on _speculation_. At one of the principal thunny fisheries near Catania, the fishermen have fixed upon poles, like English kites on a barn-door, _pour encourager les autres_, two immense sharks' heads as trophies--the jaws at full gape, exhibiting four sets of teeth as sharp as harrows, and as white and polished as ivory. They always wish to decline any dealings with this formidable foe, though his flesh is in repute in the market, and he weighs from two thousand five hundred to four thousand pounds. But Syracuse has no reason to complain of scarcity, or to eat shark's flesh from necessity; most of the _Scomber_ family,--the _alatorya_, the _palamida_, and a fine gray-coloured fellow which the fishermen call _serra_, frequent her coast; then there is the _Cefalo_--the ancient _mugilis_, our gray mullet--and the sea-pike, _Lucedimare_, whose teeth and size might well constitute him lieutenant to the dog-fish,--all these came to table during our stay; but we did not meet with one very superior fish known to the ancients as the _Lupus_, (_labrax_ of the Greeks,) which abounds when in season, and is known in every comfortable _menage_ along the Sicilian coast; his Linnaean name is _sparus_. On the shore are to be picked up occasionally two small kinds of shells _peculiar_ to Sicily, of which our intelligent acquaintance is so obliging as to give us specimens. We never saw or heard of a firefly in Sicily. Professor Costa of Naples, though he doubted the fact of there being none, had never seen any in his frequent entomological trips to that island. This beautiful insect, so common about Florence and Rome, and in central Italy, is extremely rare about Naples; nor does this seem to be from their disliking the sea, for we never saw so _many_ as at _Pesaro_, on the Adriatic;--no insect, then, is more _volage_, or uncertain as to place, than the firefly. The only poisonous _reptile_ of Sicily is the _viper_, of which there seem to be several varieties. A beautiful blue thrush (_Turdus cyaneus_), a great _talker_, much prized, and _high-priced_ too, when he has been taught to speak, is found in the rocky clefts about Syracuse. The heat and brilliancy of the sunshine render it extremely difficult, we are told, to preserve collections in natural history. All the water drunk here is _rain water_. The butter, fruit, and vegetables of Syracuse are, in the month of May at least, bad, very bad; but its _Muscat_ wine, its _Hybla_ honey, and its fish, are all of superior quality.

The honey of that hill needs not our praise,

----"quae nectareis vocat ad certamen Hymetton, Audax Hybla, favis."

For ourselves, after tasting the confection of the Attic as well as of the Sicilian bee, we know not which is the greater artist, or which operates on the finer material; but the _best_ honey in Europe, in our opinion, comes from the apiaries of Narbonne.

A CONSULTATION.

We had given advice, and were preparing to go, when another candidate comes forward, and, with suitable gesticulation, _so_ placed his hands that we could not help saying, "Liver, eh?" "_Eccelenza_, si!" "Dopo una febbre?" "_Illustrissimo_, si!"--Folk now beginning to wink approvingly at our sagacity, we were looking exceeding grave, when a pair of Sicilian eyes set in a female head put us quite out by evidently taking us for a conjurer, and so setting at once our ethics, our pathology, and our Italian dictionary at fault. Still the surgeon congratulates the room on the "_lumi_" brought to it by the strange doctor, approves of the prescription, and corroborates our opinion that the "Signore _Don Jacomo_" _Somebody_ was the incontestable possessor of a "_flogose chronica del fegato!_" We now said we must go; and _two_ children ran for our hat, the man with the liver kisses our hand, others seize our coat-skirts, and the guide, Jack Robertson, carries the mace and leads the way, and puts himself at the head of the procession homewards; and glad were we to escape the embarrassment of curtsies and courtesies, to which we are unused, and far too extravagant ones to admit of reply. Come! the best of fees is a poor man's gratitude; but from poor or rich, at home or abroad, it is seldom that medical men walk off so magnificently.

EXCURSION TO EPIPOLAE.

The country about Syracuse is neither grand nor beautiful; but the ground is _classic ground_, and Sicily has not been brought within the reach of an intercourse which, while it polishes and confers substantial benefits, removes the sacred rust of antiquity. The Hybla hills, as hills, are not equal to the Surrey hills as one sees then from one's window at Kensington; but Hybla is Hybla, and here we eat the honey and sip the wine of the soil. Yonder plain before our breakfast-table is plain enough, and promises little; but that small insignificant stream is the _Anapus_, those columns belonged to a temple of Jupiter, that white tower, five miles off, marks _Epipolae_, the snow-capped Etna is the background of the picture, and the bay at our feet once bore that Athenian navy which left the Piraeus to make as great a mistake as we did in our American war. We rowed across that bay to the mouth of the Anapus, and penetrated up the stream to the paper manufactory, from real papyrus, on its banks. The vestiges of a temple of Diana, converted into a monastery, and the nearly perfect remains of that amphitheatre which Cicero pronounced the largest in the world, are not to be seen in every morning's walk! Of Archimedes, without being able to fix his proper tomb among so many, the _name_ here is enough. One ought to be able to conjure with it; the genius that concentrated the sun of Syracuse on the hostile anchorage, was of no common measure. We spent our day on a visit of the deepest interest, up at _Epipolae_ (_i.e._, the position _on or over the city_, as Thucydides expresses it,) the acropolis, in fact, of Syracuse, and at about the same distance from the town itself as Athens is from Piraeus. In order to do this commodiously, we allowed ourselves to be suspended between two mules in a very narrow watchman's box, _lettiga_, (the ancient _lectiga_, you will say--no: here there is nothing for it but an erect spine.) The see-saw motion is unpleasant as well as unusual; the mules, though docile, have not the _savoir faire_ of a couple of Dublin or Edinburgh chairmen. You must sit _quite_ in the middle, or run the perpetual chance of capsizing. A little alarming, also, is it to look out on the stone-strewn furrow, over which the mules carry you safely enough; and when you have become reconciled to the oscillation, and have learned to trim the boat in which you have embarked, it is long before your ear becomes accustomed to the stunning sound of a hundred little bells fastened to the mules' heads. "_Do_ take them off," said we, after half an hour's impatience; "do, pray, remove these infernal bells!" "And does the signor imagine that _any_ mule would go without falling asleep, or lying down, were it not for the bells?" We arrived safe and stunned, in about an hour and a half, at the foot of a tower of no Roman or Sicilian growth, but a bastard construction upon the ancient foundations of Epipolae. We saw, however, some fine remains of a wall, which might have been called Cyclopian, but that the blocks which composed it were of _one_ size. Our guide, a mason, and, of course, an amateur of walls, insists upon our calling this a _capo d'opera_, as, no doubt, it is. On the spot itself there is nothing antique to see; but the drive or ride is one of the most remarkable in all the world! It takes you over from four to five miles of a rocky table-land, by a very gradual ascent, abounding with indelible traces of human frequentation, else long forgotten. The deep channelling of those wheels is still extant that had transported million tons of stone out of those interminable lines of quarries, to raise buildings of such grandeur as to give occasion to Cicero to say, that he had "seen nothing so imposing as the ancient port and walls of Syracuse!" The scene is altogether wild and peculiar; you pass for miles amidst excavated rock, and on the flagstones of ancient pavement, between the _commissures_ of which wild-flowers, principally of the _thistle_ kind, spring up into vigorous life, and look as if they grew out of the very stone itself. The small conduit-pipe of an underground aqueduct still serves to carry from the same sources the same water; but the people who used it are gone. In the wildest parts of the way, the large flat stones, that formed a continuous road, serve for _barn-floors_--or rather _threshing_-floors that require _no barns_--on which long-horned cattle tread out, without any chance of bad weather to injure, the golden grain of the Sicilian harvest. Here lives the blue-breasted _hermit bird_ in unmolested solitude; and, careless of solitude, the _Passer solitarius_ utters her small twitter in the hollows--a few goats browse amongst the scanty thistles, and one or two dogs protect them. Snakes, hatched in vast number under the warm stones, show you their progress, by the motion they impart to the thin light grass; and an endless variety of new lizards present themselves in a soil not untenanted, though barren. From a plain, justly called Bel Veduta, we see _Catania_ and _Lentini_, (Leontium,) famous once for its coinage, infamous now for its malaria. A little bay bears the great name of _Thapsus_; and, opposite, a small mass of nearly undistinguishable houses, the ambitious distinction of _Port Augusta_.

We have seen our sights, and are returned, and waiting to go on shore. Our paddle-wheels are once more at rest in the harbour of Messina! They have let down the windows of the long room on deck, in which we had taken shelter from the vermin below, and wake we must, though it is not five o'clock. The sun breaks cover to-day, magnificently, behind Messina; but the Health-office having no inducement to open its eyes prematurely, will not, for some time, send its delegates on board, to announce our liberty to land. We have nothing for it but to look over the boat, or study haggard faces reflected in the unflattering mirror of a beautiful sea. The hauling about of things on deck is always pleasant, as a signal of voyage over! The sun still shines full upon the long row of houses on the quay--fishing boats are entering with abundance of fresh fish for our dinner, and shoals of silvery sardines, untaken, are leaping out of the water near our prow, to escape from a large body of mackerel which is pursuing them. The authorities are coming! We don't want any cards to hotels, but cram a dozen into our pockets, and ask if there are any more here? We are sorry to take a new guide. Jack Robertson has spoiled us for some time. When he pocketed our supplementary piece, as we were coming off, he told us, "haud sine lacrymis," it should buy a linen shirt for his youngest child. "I good Christian, sir, I no tell you lie, sir! I love my children, upon my word! When they go to bed, my wife not able to attend them, sir! They cry, father. I say, yes! _Bread_, says little Bill--I get up; give him some bread. Mary say, _water_, and I get up for water six times every night!--no story, sir!" "How many hours do you work?" "When sun get up, sir, till it be mid-day; I go see childer till three, den work hard at BUILD WALL till sun go down; den I go home. I wish I could speak English better; but you understand me, sir." We rowed off with many _vivas_, and this poor mason's "hopes" that we "might _find all square at home_." At home! Oh, that we had a home!!--an unassuming wife--placens et tacens uxor; an unpretending house, with a comfortable guest-chamber; and no noiseless nursery, _unfendered_ and uncared for! But the bells of Messina, all let loose together, interrupt our pleasing reverie, and our friends, who have been hovering round us in a boat, are now permitted to approach, and to land with us at our hotel. 'Tis our last day!--in the evening, we go to hear Sicilian vespers for the last time; and the next day we are off for Naples!

ADDIO! SICILIA!

On deck!--off!--Stromboli is already veiling himself in the rapidly encroaching shades of darkness, and it is time to say good-night to this fair night, and to go to our cabin. Beautiful Sicily! may this _not_ be our final leave-taking! We found no poetry below, and in a short time are driven back from the cabin by its complicated nuisances, to moonlight contemplation, and catching cold. An hour elapses--a town not to be forgotten by the Neapolitans is just ahead. The moon shines brightly on its high-perched castle, and we have scarce stopped the paddles, when our deck is invaded by a new freightage of passengers, already far too many. Twenty boats full of noise and animation, with all the exaggeration that attends both in these latitudes; every pair of oars fighting for a fare, and knocking one another over board in contention for passenger or parcel destined to land at Pizzo. They ship about with the wildness and alacrity of South-Sea islanders; some are all but naked, and every quarrel is conducted in such a Calabrian brogue, that the very men of Messina profess not to understand them, and to treat them as savages rather than as countrymen. The small fort in front was disgraced by the nocturnal trial and prompt execution of the unfortunate Murat. It is long ago; but of these noisy disputants for the things to be landed, some probably had been eyewitnesses of the last bloody act of a blood-stained throne. A poor sick horse, confined in his narrow crib on deck, blinks at the moonlight, and can neither sleep nor eat his corn; he drops his lower lip, and presents an appearance of more physical suffering than we should have thought could have been recognized in face of quadruped; but pain traces stronger lines, and understands the anatomy of expression better than pleasure. We wished to land for half an hour, but this being impossible, _addio Pizzo!_ Our vessel is quickly off, and our Cyclopean stokers are already mopping off their black sweat in the dreadful glare of the engine-room. Some cages, full of canaries and parrots, just become our fellow-passengers, are all in a fluster at the screaming and bustle to which they are unused, and a large cargo of turkeys, with fettered legs, and fowls that can only flap their wings, do so in despair at the treatment threatened them by the dogs on deck--second and third class passengers are fighting for prerogatives in misery, amidst the clatter of unclean plates, and the remains of the supper of the fore-cabin. The space for walking, is encumbered with coils of cordage, and the empty water-barrels are all taken possession of for seats. Bad tobacco, even among the _elite_, and garlic every where, drive us to the fore-deck, or to the neutral ground between it and ours. A passage, which promised fair when we started, begins, now that we are half over, to look suspicious; and a preliminary lurch or two, as the breeze freshens, converts many from an opinion they had begun to _promulgate_, that the steamer on the Mediterranean afforded, _on the whole_, the most eligible mode of traversing space. We looked at each other piteously enough, on seeing that we were fast going to face a magnificent specimen of a wave, of which our piston was determined to try the valour, and if possible abate the confidence. When Greek meets Greek, said we, as we dashed through it, and gave a warning to old Neptune to take care of his interests below! Other huge parcels of water hit us obliquely, or come down upon us with a swoop like a falchion; steam hisses, and chimney gets red-hot; but though the vessel yields not, there be those on board who _do_: an Anglo-Sicilian pleasure party is quenched in twenty blanched faces at once; conversation is over, women retire, and the deck is deserted. Against such _ups and downs as these_, the very philosophy of the Stoics were powerless!--even thou, O moon! seemest a _little_ disconcerted, and hast withdrawn thy _pale_ face from thy whilom plate-glass, _the Mediterranean_, so often, for weeks together, like the inland lake of the north,

"Thy _mirror_! to inform Thee, if the dark and arrowy storm The forest boughs that brake, Require thy slender silvery hand, to still Thy ruffled wreath of _lily_ and jonquil!"

_Pindemonte._

Whew!--wind gets up, and takes part with wave, and all against us--never mind!--

"Hurrah! for the marvels of steam, As thus through the waters we roam; For pistons that smite, oh! for funnels that gleam, And to carry us safe through the _foam_."

Whew, whew!--but greater divinities than Neptune are abroad to-night!--What! expect our _black_ chimney to show the _white_ feather! Pooh! pooh! old _Eunosigaeus_, what are thy _white horses_ to the invisible hoofs of two hundred and forty coal-black steeds stamping in the hold? We had, however, a sharp seven-hours' tussle for it; at the end of which, the buffeted Mongibello came bounding into the harbour, and swirled round in the face of Vesuvius, who was smoking his cigar as quietly as ever!

We have tried several Mediterranean steamers, and our report of all is much the same--bad is the best! A sea passage any where, to be comfortable, depends _solely_ on the smoothness of the water; if this be rough, what care you for mahogany, rosewood, and plate-glass? Whether the cabin where you are to be sick, and to hear others groan, has its Scotts, its Byrons, and its Moores, under a convex mirror; its rows of curtained births, and horse-hair sofas, and its long line of polished, well articulated tables? Whether the smell of empyreumatised grease be wafted to the nostrils by a _Maudsley_ or a _Bell_? Whether the captain have his _ears bored_, or be an Englishman? Your brass nails and varnished _buffets_ are very well _in dock_, when the vessel has _stank_ off her last voyage, and lies clean washed, like that other _syren_ of the opposite coast, who coaxed Ulysses and his men, some years ago--not, indeed, to _come on board_, but the contrary. But when her deck is all soot and nastiness, when she has quartered her vermin on her passengers, and goes gurgling along, as if _she had an Empyema under her pleura costalis_; when she _pitches into_ the waves, as if to _punish_ them, and tramples on their crests, as if to crush them under her keel, why all the brass you want is "AES TRIPLEX;" and there is no _varnish_ in the world that will enable _you_ to put _a good face on it_. A few heaves more, such as those of our present imagining, and brandy and water, bottled porter, and _bottled philosophy_, are uncorked in vain!

As to particular steamers, the Castor since he lost his twin-brother, who was run down off _Capo D'Anzo_ (he forgot, we suppose, to invoke Fortune "_gratum quae regit Antium_"), has become quite negligent of toilette, and incredulous about the powers of soap and sand. The bugs in only _one_ of her beds would defy _Bonnycastle!_ Fast enough, however, goes the Castor! Orestes, pursued by the furies, never rushed more impetuously on than does this child of Leda, with all his vermin in the locker. Of Virgil in the water, we have no experience, but they say his _prosody_ is perfect, and his _quantity_ (of accommodation) blameless. The Dante under paddles is unknown to us; but the poem which his customers read oftenest on board is doubtless the _Purgatory_. The captain of the Palermo, an obliging man, _with ear-rings_, and speaking Siculo-English, does his job in nineteen hours; and giving you one execrable meal, gives you more than enough. This vessel (blessed privilege!) carries some of the Teffin family (Mr Teffin, our readers know, was _bug-destroyer to the king_), and _is said_ to have no bugs. As to the two floating volcanoes, Vesuvius and Mongibello, we had heard much against the Neapolitan _crater_ (_cabin they_ call it), and, after due preparation, we precipitated ourselves into the latter, which placards her two hundred and fifty horse-power. The engineer, however, if you acquire his confidence, reduces the team considerably, taking off at least one-fifth. Horse-power is, after all, we fear, an appeal to the imagination! How do you measure horse-power? and what horses? Calabrian nags? Arab stallions? Dutch mares? or English drays? or perhaps you mean _sea-horses?_ That every vessel has a great _rocking-horse power_ we know by sad experience, and are come to read one hundred and fifty, two hundred, &c., with great tranquillity, being convinced that when the translation from horse-power into paddle-power is effected, you obtain no corresponding result.

AESTHETICS OF DRESS.

MILITARY COSTUME.

Military dress is almost as difficult and dangerous a thing to deal with as ladies' attire; as various in its hues and forms, as fanciful in its conceits, as changeable in its fashions, and as touchy in the temper of its wearers. To pull a guardsman by his coat-tail would be as unpardonable an offence as to tread on a lady's skirt; and to offer an opinion upon a lancer's cap might be considered as impertinent as to criticise a lady's bonnet. Having, however, been bold enough to commit offences of the latter description, we will now venture to brave the wrath of the whole of Her Majesty's forces, horse, foot, and artillery, while we read those gallant gentlemen a lecture on their costume; and we will even add into the bargain that other most honourable and equally useful branch of the public force "the mariners of England;"--as for "the force," the police, truly we eschew them and their deeds. They are a perverse, stiff-necked race, who wear two abominations, round hats and short coats, and they have a villanous propensity of following you home from your club of an evening, and inveigling you every now and then to Bow Street, thrusting a broken knocker or two into your pocket as you go along, and then pestering your bewildered memory with all sorts of nocturnal misdemeanors; truly they are a race of noxious vermin; pretty well, perhaps, for the protection of the swinish multitude; but for us gentlemen, why, they "come betwixt the wind and our nobility," and their remembrance stinks in our nostrils! One thing only we know in their favour,--they dress all in one colour; their blueness alone makes them sufferable in this nineteenth century of ours, and whenever they depart from this great principle of aesthetic unity, we will bring in a bill for their suppression.

Now, if there be any thing more self-evident than the ante-Noachian problem that "two and two make four," it is this axiom, the verity of which was demonstrated long before Achilles behaved in so ungentlemanlike a manner to Hector, when he took him that dirty drive round Troy, viz., that utility for purposes of service is the very essence and spirit of military costume. The finest dressed army in the world had better be in plain clothes, if the excellence of their clothing depends only upon its ornament; while, on the contrary, the plainest and most rudely equipped corps will come out of campaign with excellent military effect and appearance, provided only that their clothing has been suited to their service. "My dear fellow," said an old moustache to us one day on the Place du Carrousel, "give me 20,000 men who have served in nothing but blouses and blue caps, and I'll make you ten times as fine a line as all that mob of national guards there in their new uniforms." And he was right; in military matters it is the man that produces the real effect, as to appearance, upon the long run; and the practised eye of the old campaigner would prefer a Waterloo man in a smock-frock to any flunkey you could pick out, even though he were dressed up as fine as Lady L----'s favourite chasseur. We assert, then, that a scrupulous attention to the nature of the service should form the basis and the starting point of all discussions as to military costume; but we will not go so far as to say that ornament is inadmissible or unnecessary for military men. On the contrary, we know that the adornment of the person has been attended to by the bravest men in all ages and in all armies; and we know further, that it does produce a powerful effect on the _morale_ of a corps. We intend to advocate the use of frequent but consistent ornament for our soldiers, but we do not wish to turn then into mere paraders. Use first and before every thing, in this case at least--ornament next and entirely subsidiary to it; keep to this rule, and you shall see an army turned out into the field better than most that pass muster now-a-days.

It is of no use going into that diffuse subject--that _vexatissima quaestio_--of how far the military dress of ancient days accorded with the wants and uses of the service; the reader may go and look into that dusty little volume of _Vegetius de Re Militari_, if he is fond of dabbling in military antiquities; or he may consult our learned old friend, Captain Grose of facetious memory; or still better, let him be off to Goderich Court, and ask the porter to admit him to a sight of the finest collection of armour in the world. We are not going to dive into these matters; we will rather say roundly, that ever since armour came to be disused, we think military men have gone clean daft in equipping themselves. Only look at the uniforms of the campaigns of the Grand Monarque or William of Orange; see what inconvenient coats those glorious fellows that won Blenheim and Ramilies wore; recollect the absurd turn-out of Charles XII., and even of Frederick the Great. Convenience and comfort seem to have been totally out of the question in those days--not that they made the men worse soldiers--they all fought admirably--but we question whether their fatigues would not have been less, and their health sounder, had they been clad and equipped in a sensible manner. Oh, the powder, and the pigtails, and the broad cuffs, and the Ramilies cock, and the sword tucked through the coat-tail! Glories of glorious times, ye are gone for ever! But so, too, are the tactics of your wearers; all is changed; another Caesar has swept you all off the field; and even the famous uniforms of the French empire, so brilliant,--but at times so absurd,--even they have been altered. They have had their day, and most of them are fit now only for fancy-balls and old-clothes' shops. Nothing is so short-lived as a good uniform; it varies with the taste of a commander-in-chief, or a commander-in-chief's toady; or the fancy of some royal favourite. It's like the wind in the Mediterranean; you never know what is coming upon you till you are in the midst of it; and so it is with your uniform. Get a new one, and the probability is that you will not show it on parade half-a-dozen times before a new regulation is out, and then more work for the tailors. Be it so, then; military costume, like all other kinds, is doomed to change; let us aim only at keeping its vagaries within something like the limits of common sense.

The infantry of our own army--the successors of those noble fellows that walked across Spain--have no better covering for their backs than the scanty and useless coatee; in this they parade, and in this they are supposed to fight. Behind, two little timid-looking skirts descend any thing but gracefully; they are too small to have any grace in them; and a pair of sham cotton epaulettes, or large unmeaning wings, are supposed, by a pleasing fiction of the military tailors, to adorn their shoulders. Now, this garment, we contend, is neither ornamental nor graceful: were it cut down into the common jacket, it would be better; were the excrescences at the shoulders removed, it would be more seemly; it has no warmth in it, and offers little or no protection against the rain. No soldier, who has been reduced to his coatee in a campaign, but must have sighed after his original smock-frock, or any other outer covering that had at least some pretensions to being useful. Since, however, the idea of defending the body of the foot-soldier by steel or leather is given up, the two things requisite in a serviceable coat are warmth and convenience. No coatee nor jacket can be warm enough for the British service, exposed as the men are to all varieties of climate; and infinitely more to cold and wet than to sunshine. In India, and in some of the colonies, a lighter kind of clothing may be indeed necessary; but for the common use of the army, a coat is wanted that shall be a protection against wet and cold, and yet not inconvenient to the wearer--making him comfortable, in fact, while it allows him free use of all his limbs and muscles. For the heavy infantry, therefore, we would propose such a coat as we have before recommended for all civilians; nothing more nor less than a frock-coat, coming down half way along the thighs, and close buttoned above to the chin. Every body knows that this is the most comfortable thing he can put on for all kinds of wear; and the evolutions of a good infantry soldier can be perfectly well gone through by whoever wears it. The shoulders, if they require external ornament, should have something that is really useful at the same time; not merely tinsel or cotton lace; and, therefore, it should be the adaptation of a thick woollen pad, ornamented with metal or coloured lace, calculated to take off the pressure of the musket and of the knapsack-straps from the bones of the neck and arm. Whoever has carried a musket twelve or fourteen hours continuously, and has had his pack on at the same time, well knows how comfortable and how really useful such an addition to his dress would have been. The coat should be furnished with two small pockets in front, just to hold a knife, some money, and things of that kind; and they should be close to the circle of pressure at the waist.

The appearance of a close-buttoned coat of this kind, not caricatured about the shoulders, is manly and dignified; it proclaims its usefulness at the first glance; and, whatever be its colour, will form a handsome uniform. The cross-belts should be done away with--being at once ugly, expensive, and inconvenient--a plain broad strap, white or black, as you please, should gird the waist up well; and the cartouche-box, which could be made to slide upon it, might be worn, while out of battle, behind; but, in actual engagement, in front. The bayonet (which might advantageously be lengthened, and made to approximate rather more to the nature of a sword, or a long knife, than it does now) should always have its sheath fixed to the belt, at the left side.

The soldier would in this way have his habiliments warmer, his equipments tighter and more simple, and his appearance in line or on guard, highly improved. Only think of how you would dress yourself if you were going out deer-stalking, and you will come to something of this kind--barring the pockets of your shooting-coat, which are certainly inadmissible, from motives of military neatness and discipline; and barring, too, the buttoning up to the chin, which, on the mountain's side, you had perhaps rather dispense with; but which the soldier must adhere to, if he would keep up the essential degree of stiffness and smartness of dress. Coats of this kind, and equipments of this nature, are worn by the Prussian and French infantry--two good authorities in military matters; they have been tried on our police force; something of the sort has been used for clothing the pensioners; and we venture to predict, that, in a few years, a dress upon these principles will become universal in the British service.

Should a man have a cloak or a great-coat?--It should be a compound of both--a small cloak with sleeves; and it might be worn either rolled up, as at present, on the top of the kit; or else, as some of the French troops wear it--both conveniently and gracefully--made up into a long thin roll, going over the left shoulder, and with the ends strapped together upon the right hip. The Scotch regiments would wear their plaids most effectively in this fashion; and it is a good guise to adopt, whether you are on the rough lands of Spain, or in the thick woods of America. A warm coat and a blanket are two of the soldier's dearest friends in winter and have kept many a man out of hospital.

The light-infantry man--and there ought to be more distinction made in the uniforms than there is--might wear a long jacket, descending below the hips, instead of a frock-coat: his cloak, too, should be lighter: and, in fact, his whole equipments constructed for quick and active service. So should be the rifleman's clothing and arms; everything should be designed to serve the one end had in view--the real use and intent of that particular arm, whatever it might be; and, if so, then let the officers of the rifles leave off their long trailing sabres--fitter for a light dragoon than for one who is supposed to be hopping about, like a Will o' the Wisp, in swampy brakes; or creeping, like a serpent, through rushes and long grass. Their present swords are good for nothing but to trip them up in their movements, or to give them the pleasure of holding the sheath in one hand, and the blade in the other.

For the leg-clothing of our men, give us the trouser, and let us keep to it; we do not indeed seem likely to change it; yet, who can tell? Just as the civilian seems to have decided upon this happy invention, as the most useful and comfortable thing he ever donned, so will all military men agree in its praises. It is not so good for parade purposes, as the light pantaloon and gaiter, in as much as it conceals defects of limbs; but, on the long run, it is far to be preferred; it lasts better, keeps cleaner, and does more comfortable service to its wearer, than any thing else. One point not sufficiently attended to by our military authorities, and yet which affects the health of the men, is, that their trousers, whether in parade or for service, whether for winter or for summer use, should be made of such a woollen fabric as will allow of frequent washing. It is impossible for the cleanliness of the soldier to be sufficiently kept up without this; and the material now used for plaids of various kinds, or the common blanketing for sailors' clothes, might be easily modified, so as to be suitable for this purpose. Linen trousers are indispensable for foreign service of some kinds; but for summer clothing at home, a light white blanketing, which has the curious faults of being cool in warm weather, and warm in cold, is the proper substitute; our men often get sudden chills in summer evenings, which send then to the fever ward, and the cause is mainly attributable to undue exposure in insufficient clothing. To complete the lower portions of the soldier's dress, let him wear either the shoe and gaiter, or the low boot; either is good, there is hardly a choice--comfort preponderates in favour of the gaiters--ornament in that of the boot.

And now for the head-gear of the British Achilles: a touching and a troublesome subject, which has bothered all heads, from those of the humble wearer up to the field-marshal, who is content under the shadow--not of his laurels--but his plumes--to design any kind of uncomfortable and ugly thing that strikes his imagination, and to clap it on the cranium of steady veteran and raw recruit. Truly we have been most unfortunate, aesthetically speaking, in our military caps; and, to go no further back than Peninsular recollections,--from the conico-cylindrical cap of Vimiera to the funny little thing with a flap up in front of Vittoria and Waterloo, down through the inverted cone-shaped shako of recent days--until we have come to the very bathos of all chapellerie that now disgraces the heads of too many among our infantry regiments--all has been bad. Never, since the day when men first armed their heads for the fight, has there been seen such a paltry, ugly, useless, bastard kind of a thing as the last cap turned out for the British army. With its poke before and behind, its conical top and low elevation, it is a degraded cross between a Germano-Tyrolese cap and a policeman's hat--a bad mixture of both. May it be sent back to Germany, where the idea came from, and may it be stuffed into a barrel of sour-crout, not to come out till it is thoroughly rotted.

There is only this choice for the useful and graceful covering of the foot-soldier's head; either the small slouched hat of the old Spanish infantry--a hat very liable to be turned into something slovenly and dirty--or the foraging cap of our undress--a covering most comfortable, but not quite strong enough for campaigning use, as well as for parade; or the helmet of antique form, shaped, that is to say, in some conformity with the make of the head, and more or less ornamented with crest and plume. We incline on the whole to the latter, and for two reasons: it is not so liable to get altered in shape by service as the others; it will wear well for a longer time; it is more useful in melees and against cavalry; and it is the most becoming of any. In Prussia it has lately been adopted with great success; and the appearance of the infantry there is now warlike and graceful in the highest degree. The helmet need not be made of metal; boiled leather is the proper material--ventilation and lightness can be easily provided for in it, and any degree of ornament may be superadded--crest or feathers, each is becoming.

For Eastern service something lighter than this is of course necessary--a cap or a broad hat might easily be adopted there; and for American service another description of covering is also most essential to the health and comfort of the soldier. We mean the close-fitting and well-formed fur cap, which can protect the head, neck, and cheeks of the wearer from the extraordinary rigour of a Canadian winter. The cap worn by our guards when last on service in these regions, was at once comfortable, useful, and handsome.

For the cavalry, where ornament seems to be required much more than amongst the infantry--for they fancy themselves, if indeed they are not, the top sawyers in all matters of service--the head-dress must be not only useful, but can hardly be made too ornamental, within the limits of good taste. And here allow us to say that the infantry shako and the great grenadier's cap are perfectly absurd and misplaced; the one will never give a man any chance against a sabre-cut, and the other is fit only to tumble off within the first two minutes of a charge. In heavy cavalry nothing but the helmet, richly plumed and crested, should be allowed; constructed either of leather or metal, yellow brass or silvery steel, and adorned sometimes with skins, sometimes with graven plates. The handsomest helmet worn by any regiment in Europe, is that of the old _gardes du corps_ of Charles X., the same as that now worn by the _gardes municipaux a cheval_ in Paris; a metal helm with leopard-skin visir; a lofty crest, with a horse-tail streaming down the back, and a high red and white feather rising from the left side. Beauty of natural form, the sharp contrast of flowing lines between the feather and the tailed crest, and the general brilliancy of colour, render this by far the most effective head-dress for cavalry which we have ever seen. Our helmets in England, for the dragoon guards, are too heavy, too theatrical; there is no life and spirit in them.

In light cavalry of all kinds, except lancers, the fur cap, lately re-introduced into the British army, is the most useful and most suitable covering; it is at once comfortable and becoming; its form is warlike and harmonious; its colour rich; and it admits of as much or as little ornament as you please to put upon it. Without a feather it is good, with one it is better; guard-bands add to its appearance without troubling the wearer; and it has the merit of lasting to look well longer than any other kind of cap whatever. In the lancers they should always preserve that national cap which tells us of the origin of this arm, and which is an ingenious and elegant adaptation of the strength of the helmet to the lightness of the shako; it is beautiful and graceful as the lance itself; we have nothing to say of it but what is in its favour.

Heavy cavalry, in our opinion, ought to wear the cuirass; this is the only relic of ancient defence which we are advocates for keeping up, and we do so upon the score of utility. It is rather heavy for the men, but only so because they are not accustomed to wear it in a judicious manner; it is of real service to the arm in question, and is the greatest ornament that a soldier can put on. It is true that our heavy cavalry did all their gallant deeds without it, and may do so over again; still it can do no harm, and may be of much use to a brigade of decidedly heavy cavalry; the helmet and the cuirass should always go together, neither without the other, as we see it often now, forming an absurd anomaly. The coat of the cavalry should be long, like the frock-coat for the heavy regiments; short, like the lengthened jacket of the light infantry, for the corresponding branch of the mounted soldiers; and the lancers should all wear the Andalusian or Hungarian jacket. While these may be ornamented with all the fancies of lace, embroidery, and buttons, the dress of the cuirassiers should be severely plain and simple. Epaulettes here, if worn, should be mere enrichments of the top of the sleeve; no weight has to be carried on the horseman's shoulder, and therefore our metal plates now stuck upon them are useless. The belt of the cartouche-box, if needed, can be confined on the shoulder by other means; and this, as well as the waist-belt for the sabre, should be broad and serviceable, fit for the roughest use.

To complete the clothing of our brave cavaliers, we would urge that wherever the helmet and cuirass are used, there the long boot should be adopted, were it only for harmony of purpose, to say nothing of means of defence. They need not be stiff, unwieldy, and so-called sword-proof boots, like those of the Life-guards, but equally high and much more flexible; they would cost a good deal of money at the first mounting of a regiment, but they would last for a long time by merely renewing their feet, and they would be both serviceable and comfortable to the men. Let all other regiments adhere as at present to their trousers--they can hardly do better; though, if any smart hussar corps wanted to show off their well-turned limbs to the ladies on a review day, they might sport tight pantaloons and Hessian boots as of old, _pace nostra_.

One important subject, as connected with military dress, is that of national distinctions of costume; for whatever tends to remind men of their common country, whatever tends to mark them out as a band of brothers in arms, coming from the same homes, and bound to stand by each other in their noble calling--this is worthy of the attention of the skilful leader. In our own country, we have admirable opportunities of turning the strong love of local distinction and ancient glory to good account; for while we consider the brilliant scarlet of our uniforms to be distinctive of English arms, we have the glorious old plaids of Scotland, any one of which is enough to stir up the heart of the hardiest mountaineer, when he meets his brethren in the field. We are of opinion, then, that as a point of military discipline, as well as of aesthetical correctness, all English regiments--properly so called--should adhere to their red uniforms, varied with subsidiary ornaments, or other distinctions, to mark separate regiments and corps. Those from Scotland should all wear the plaids, so as to let them predominate in their habiliments--of course, we would send those stupid plumed caps to the right-about, and adopt the Scotch bonnet; but the plaid of each clan should find its place in the British army; and those noble distinctions of old feudal manners should never be done away with. The Irish regiments ought also to have their distinguishing colours; and as green seems to be the poetical tint of the Emerald Isle, there is no sound objection to the adoption of that hue for the base of the Irish uniform. Irish soldiers will fight like devils in any uniform, or in no uniform at all, as has been seen on many a gory field; but if the use of green can awaken one thought of national glory--one kindly recollection of "dear Erin" in their hearts--then let the gallant spirits from the western isle lead their headlong charges in the tint that haunts their imagination. Do we want them to have some red about their coats?--they are always willing to dye them with their best blood. And even the Taffies--the quiet, sedate Taffies--for "she is good soldier, Got tam, when her blood is up"--why should not they have some national uniform, to remind them of the blue tints of their native mountains and deep vales? Children of the mist and the wild heath, the natural rock, and the lonely lake--the glare of our Saxon red is too brilliant for them; let them wrap their sinewy limbs and fiery hearts in pale blue, and grey, and white--and so let them enter the bloody lists, where they will hold their ground by the side of the three other nations, and bear away their share of military glory.

A few words on the navy, and we have done--and only a few words; for we have nothing to say, but to give unqualified praise. In the habiliments of our jolly tras--God bless 'em!--utility is every thing, ornament nothing. They are clad just as they should be; and yet, on gala days, they know how to make themselves as coquettish as any girl on Portsmouth Downs. There is no greater dandy in the world, in his peculiar way, than your regular man-of-war's man. The short jacket, and the loose trousers, and the neat pumps, and the trim little hat, and the checked shirt, and the black riband round his neck--he is quite irresistible among the fairer portion of the creation. Or in a stormy night, with his pilot coat on, at the lonely helm, and his northwester pulled close over his ears, and his steady, unflinching eye, and his warm, lion-like heart within--the true sailor is one of the noblest specimens of man. He that is fierce as a bull, and yet tender-hearted like a young child--the greatest blasphemer on earth, and yet the most religious, or even the most superstitious, of men--he is not to be tied down by the rules of aesthetics, like a land-crab. His home is on the sea, as somebody has said or sung; he has nobody there to see him but himself, (if we may be excused the bull.) What does he care for dress? Only look at him standing by his gun, when broadside after broadside is pouring into the timbers of some sanguinary Yankee or blustering Frenchman. What is his uniform then? Let them declare who have seen that most awful of human sights, a great battle at sea; but let them not whisper it in ears feminine or polite.

To the officers, we will only add a word--let them eschew all hats and short coats, and keep to their caps and frocks. This is their proper dress. Let them keep themselves warm, comfortable, and ever ready for service. Never let them face their coats with red again. The old blue and white against all the world, say we! And let the soldiers take a leaf out of the sailors' books, and remember that utility, though accompanied by plainness, is far more consonant to the laws of aesthetics than unmeaning ornament or erroneous form.

GOETHE TO HIS ROMAN LOVE.

ATTEMPTED IN THE ORIGINAL METRE.

Lass dich, Geliebte, nicht reu'n dass du mich so schnell dich ergeben! Glaub'es, ich denke nicht frech, denke nicht niedrig von dir. Vielfach wirkten die Pfeile des Amor; einige ritzen, Und vom schleichenden Gift kranket auf Jahre des Herz, Aber machtig befiedert, mit frisch geschliffener Scharfe, Dringen die andern ins Mark, zunden behende das Blut. In der Heroischen Zeit, da Gotten und Gottinnen liebten, Folgte Begierde dem Blick, folgte Genuss der Begier. Glau'bst du er habe sich lange die Gottiun der Liebe besonnen, Als in Idaeischen Hain einst ihr Anchises befiel? Hatte Luna gesaeumt den schonen Schlaefer zu kuessen,-- O, so hatt' ihm geschwind, neidend, Aurora geweckt! Hero erblickte Leander am lauten Fest, und behende Stuerzte der Liebende sich heiss in die nachtliche Fluth. Rhea Sylvia wandelt, die fuerstliche Jungfrau, der Tiber Wasser zu schopfen, hinab--und sie ergreifet der Gott. So erzengte die Sohne sich Mars! Die zwillinge tranket Eine Wolfin, und Rom nennt sich die Fuerstin der Welt.

Rue it not, dear, that so swiftly thy tenderness yielded thee to me-- Dream not again that I think lightly or lowly of thee. Divers the arrows of Love: from some that but graze on the surface, Softly the poison is shed, slowly to sicken the heart; Others, triumphantly feather'd, and pointed with exquisite mischief, Rush to the mark, and the glow quivers at once in the blood. In the heroical time when to Love the Deities yielded, Follow'd desire on a glance, follow'd enjoyment desire. Deem'st thou the parley was long when Anchises had pleased Aphrodite, Catching her eye as she roved deep in the woodlands of Ide? Or that if Luna had paused about wooing her beautiful Sleeper, Jealous Aurora's approach would not have startled the boy? Hero had glanced on Leander but once at the Festival--instant Plunges the passionate youth into the night-mantled wave. Rhea in maidenly glee caroll'd down with her urn to the Tiber-- But in a moment she sank mute on the breast of the God: Hence the illustrious Twins that were nursed in the den of the She-wolf; Worthy of Mars were the boys:--Rome was the Queen of the World.

P.M.

EPIGRAMS.

ANACREON'S GRAVE.

Wo die Rose hier blueht, wo Reben um Lorbeer sich schlingen Wo das Turtelchen lockt, wo sich das Grillchen ergezt, Welch ein grab est hier, das alle Goetter mit Leben Schoen bepflanzt und geziert? Es ist Anacreons Ruh. Fruehling, Sommer und Herbst genoss der glueckliche Dichter, Vor dem Winter hat ihn endlich der huegel geschuetzt.

Here where the Rose is in bloom, the Vine and the Laurel entwining-- Here where the Turtle invites--here where the Grasshopper springs, Whose is this grave in the midst, which the Gods with life and with beauty Thus have circled and decked?--This is Anacreon's Tomb. Spring, and Summer, and Autumn, the joyous spirit had tasted, And from the Winter he hides under this hillock of green.

THE WARNING.

Wecke den Amor nicht auf! Noch schaeft der liebliche Knabe Geh! vollbring dein Geshaeft, wie es der Tag dir gebeut! So der Zeit bedienet sich klug die sorgliche Mutter, Wenn ihr Knaebchen entschlaeft, denn es erwacht nur zu bald.

Waken not Love from his sleep! The boy lies buried in slumber; Go, and, while leisure is left, finish the task of to-day; Even as a diligent mother, who, seizing the hour as it passes, Works while her child is asleep--knowing he'll waken too soon.

THE SWISS ALP.

War doch gestern dein haupt noch so braun wie die Locke der Lieben, Deren holdes Gebild still aus der Ferne mir winkt; Silbergrau bezeichzet dir fruh der Schnee nun die Gipfel, Der sich im sturmender nacht, dir um den Scheitel ergoss. Jugend, ach, ist dem Alter so nah, durch's Leben verbunden Wie ein beweglicher Traum Gestern und Heute verband.

Yesterday's eve were thy peaks still dark as the locks of my loved one, When from a distance she looks fair and serene upon me; But, with a mantle of snow, at morn those summits were silver'd, Which the chill fingers of night sudden had spread on thy brow. Ah! how swiftly in life may youth and old age be united-- Even as the flight of a dream yesterday link'd with to-day.

NORTH AND SOUTH.

Glanzen sah ich das Meer, und blinken die liebliche Welle Frisch mit gunstigem Wind zogen die Segel dahin. Keine sehnsucht fuehlte mein Herz; es wendete rueckwaerts Nach dem Schnee des Gebirgs, bald sich der schmachtende Blick. Suedwaerts liegen der Schaetze wie viel! Doch einer im Norden Zieht, ein grosser Magnet, unwiderstehlich zurueck.

Glitter'd the ocean around, in light the billows were breaking, Freshly, with favouring winds, glided our sails o'er the sea. Yet for the land of beauty I felt no longing; in sadness Backward my glances still turn'd towards the region of snow. Southward how many a treasure invites! but _one_, like the Magnet, Stronger than all, to the North draws me resistlessly back.

CHRISTMAS CAROL, 1845.

TUNE.--"_Packington's Pound._"

I.

"The intrigues of this month shall we e'er comprehend? Will the Dons, when the Parliament meets, give a clue? Will one Tory among them speak out like a friend, On the WHY and BECAUSE of this famous to-do? Is it really the case That the Whigs are in place, Because Peel, when his colleagues assembled, appall'd them By a cool proposition, To toss to perdition, Both the faith and the force that in office install'd them."

II.

Thus groan'd out a grumbler, all sulky and sour, But for Christopher's temper such trash was too much; And it soon made the malecontent quiver and cower, When he saw preparations for handling the Crutch. "Lay your croaking aside," The old gentleman cried, "Or I'll make you eat up each ungenerous word: Not our deadliest foe, Such injustice should know, And far less shall a friend be convicted unheard.

III.

"Come read here their Mottoes extracted from Burke For the Commoners,--here for the Peerage from Lodge; Say, can these be consistent with pitiful work, On a par with some Whiggish O'Connellite dodge? Though at present a cloud May the mystery shroud, Till secrecy's seal from their lips be removed; When the truth shall appear, It will all become clear, And the words here inscribed shall again be approved.

IV.

"Ne'er believe that Peel's noble INDUSTRIA Plann'd Aught design'd of its honours his fame to despoil, Aught but JUSTICE to INDUSTRY, JUSTICE to Land, To the loom and the ploughshare, the sea and the soil. His hand will still hold Straight, steady, and bold, The scales where our wealth and our welfare are weigh'd: Still though tempests may blow, And cross currents may flow, He will steer our good ship till at anchor she's laid."

V.

"But surely that terrible leader of Walter's Was not utterly void of foundation in fact. Was the Cabinet really not full of defaulters, And resolved for a time on that ruinous act?" "Cease, blockhead, to babble Your ganderlike gable: Could Repeal e'er be REASON CONTENTS ME with Graham, Could the NE NIMIUM Of good Gordon succumb, Or the Stanley's SANS CHANGER be changed into shame?

VI.

"With AVITO HONORE would Wortley turn tail, To his PRAESTO ET PERSTO is Binning untrue? Could the SPERNO TIMERE of Somerset quail, Or a Ripon with treachery blot FOY EST TOUT? Could the princely Buccleuch Stoop the star-spangled blue Of his Bellenden banner when Leaguers came on? Proved the Lion a jest On great Wellington's crest? Did his VIRTUS exude at the shriek of Lord John?

VII.

"Arthur falter'd?--I'll swallow such inpudent flams When the ears of the sow yield us purses of silk; When there's no Devil's Dust in the Cotton Lord's shams, And the truck-master's pail holds unmystified milk. Not a Tory, I swear, Will be forced to declare In the face of the Nation's assembled Senatus. That from duty he shrunk, Or once felt in a funck About Cobden, and Bright, and some rotten potatoes!

VIII.

"We shall see them again, even now or erelong, Upon Wisdom and Equity taking their stand, Calm, able, and upright, harmonious, and strong, In peace and prosperity ruling the land. Firm, faithful, and free? What they say they will do-- No Right unprotected, no Wrong unredress'd; While writers of Letters And all their abettors Stand in swaggering impotence caught and confess'd."

THE CRISIS.

The announcement that the Peel Ministry had resigned was received by us, as we believe it was by the nation at large, with feelings of sincere and solemn regret. We do not know that any Cabinet has existed within our memory whose retirement was wished for by so few, and deprecated by so many among all classes of men. We have doubted the policy of some of its measures, and more than doubted the propriety of others. But we have never ceased to respect the energy, the ability, and the honesty of the great men composing it; and have always felt that in those points on which we could not agree with them, they were entitled to a generous forbearance, due to their responsible and arduous position, as the ministers who have most strenuously and most successfully endeavoured to solve the problem, how the government is to be carried on under the Reform Bill. The disappointment of some expectations among a powerful and prominent part of their supporters had diminished the enthusiasm, and divided the feelings, of the party who mainly contributed to bring them into power. But, on the other hand, it should not be forgotten, that they equally disappointed the adverse expectations, and ultimately gained the confidence of a large, and not unimportant, portion of the country, who for years had been taught to believe, that the accession of Conservatives to power would commence a new era of warfare, oppression, profusion, and corruption. Let us look fairly at some of the practical and palpable facts of the case--at some of the most conspicuous features of public affairs, during their administration. AGRICULTURE has flourished, and agricultural improvement has advanced in an unprecedented degree. COMMERCE has plumed her wings anew, and added other regions to her domain. PUBLIC CREDIT has been supported and advanced, and the revenue raised from an alarming and increasing depression. PEACE has been universally maintained abroad, and agitation rendered powerless and contemptible at home. The POOR have been contented and employed, and not a murmur has been heard against the authority of the Crown, or the principles of the Constitution. These unmistakable results have been felt by all men, and all have confessed, in their hearts, that however they may have been offended with minor blemishes--whether by the short-coming, or by the excess of ministerial liberality,--the great purposes of government have been achieved by the ministry now dissolved, and they will frankly acknowledge with ourselves, that we shall not soon look upon its like again.

We know nothing of the causes that have led to this memorable and momentous event, except that apparently differences of opinion prevailed among the members of the Ministry in reference to the corn-laws. We shall not believe, until we hear it from their own lips, that any portion of the Cabinet have advocated any scheme fraught with danger and injustice to the best interests of the country: nor shall we indulge in any conjecture as to the real nature of the policy that may have been under discussion, where conjecture must be so vague, and where it must so soon give place to authentic information. We shall merely say, that any measure calculated to place agriculture and industry generally, in a disadvantageous and defenceless position, must have met with our unfactious, but firm, opposition. If ever the day should come, when protection, by common consent, were to be withdrawn, truth compels us to declare, that there is no one by whose hand we should desire to see that painful and dangerous operation performed so much as Sir Robert Peel;--not because we should be insensible to all the awkward and painful embarrassments of such a change of course; but simply, because we are bound to say, that there is no other man of whose knowledge, skill, and sagacity we have the same opinion. By none we think could the fall be so much broken, or the transition made so smooth, or so little injurious. Certain it is, that a measure of total and immediate abolition _from the Whigs, incompetent and incapable as they have been proved_, would be a calamity of which the magnitude can scarcely be estimated by the most gloomy imagination. We are far, however, from contemplating the necessity or possibility of such a policy from any Ministry whatever.

We take our stand upon the principle of protection to national agriculture and industry, in the existing and peculiar circumstances of the country. We do not love restrictions for their own sake, or desire any protection by which nothing is to be protected. But we think that protection is demanded by the exigencies of the whole community, and to that extent and on that ground we advocate its preservation for the general good. We shall not enquire at present how far the amount or the form of that protection may be modified. That may no doubt be a varying question, of which the discussion is to be controlled only by the grave consideration that its too frequent agitation is a great evil, as inevitably unsettling important rights and arrangements. But if it be thought that the rapid progress of events in this railway age admits or requires a relaxation or re-construction of existing restrictions, we are prepared candidly to consider any specific plan that may be tabled, and to weigh deliberately the amount and kind of protection that may now be necessary to preserve our _status quo_, having regard to the facilities of transit, the discoveries of science, the progress of improvement, the increase of population, the abundance of money, and any other elements which may be alleged as to a certain extent emerging since the last adjustment of the scale, and having special regard also to _any alteration in the distribution of taxation_ which may accompany the proposal for such change. We do not see our way to such a change. We do not recognise its necessity; but we think it unbecoming the position occupied by those who concur in our principles to offer a blind or bigoted resistance to any discussion of a practical matter, which must always depend greatly on surrounding circumstances and complex calculations. Far less shall we here enquire whether the time is soon or is ever to arrive when all protection is to cease. In politics, as in other things, the absolute words of "always" or "never" are rarely to be spoken. It is sufficient for us to say, that the period when such a revolution ought to take place has not as yet been presented to our minds as an object of present and practical contemplation.

Let us unite, then, in support of these national principles with a calm, candid, and temperate firmness, demanding a just and fair protection, _so far_ and _so long_ as it is needed to keep our soil in cultivation, and to foster those improvements, which cannot be carried on without the prospect of a due return, and by means of which alone, _if ever_, the necessity of protection may be superseded, or its amount diminished. Let us oppose any rash or undue alteration, from whatever quarter it may come; but, above all, let us resist to the uttermost the attempts of selfish Leaguers and the more reckless portion of the Whigs, whose interested or unprincipled policy would overlook all those large and deep-seated considerations, which in every view require so much management, and such nice computation, before any thing can be done in so momentous a matter as the _providing permanently for a nation's food_, and the development of a nation's resources with a due regard to those various interests which seem often to be conflicting, but which, in a just point of perspective, are ultimately identical.

Our pain in contemplating the loss of one ministry, is not alleviated by our anticipation of the ministry that is expected to succeed. The rash and presumptuous man who has been called to take office, does not possess, and his character, so far as hitherto known, is not calculated to command, the confidence of the British nation. We could not look back upon the crude projects and unscrupulous practices by which the last Whig ministry disgraced their office and endangered their country, without a feeling of the deepest alarm--if we believed it possible that a repetition of them would now be tolerated. What is to be the character and course of our new rulers? Independently of the corn-laws, what is to be their policy as to Ireland, as to foreign affairs, as to domestic finance? Is the Popish Church to be endowed in the sister kingdom? or is the Protestant Establishment to be overthrown? Is repeal to be openly patronized, or only covertly connived at? Is Lord Palmerston to be let loose on our relations with other powers, and to embroil us, before six months are over, in a quarrel with France and a war with America? Is our revenue to be supported to the level of our expenditure, or is a growing deficiency to be permitted to accumulate, till our credit is crippled, and our character branded with almost Pensylvanian notoriety? Is the country prepared for such enormities as these, or for the risk of their being attempted? We hope not: we think not. We feel assured that the very contemplation of their possibility, would make the nation rise in a mass, and eject the imbecile impostors who have already been so patiently tried, and so miserably found wanting.

Then, as to the corn-laws, is the new minister to adhere to his last manifesto, or has he used it merely as a lever for opposition purposes, to be laid aside, like some implement of housebreaking, when an entry into the premises has been effected? That attempt will scarcely be tolerated by his own supporters. Then how is he to carry his measure? With the present House of Commons, he cannot hope to do so, nor can he entertain that anticipation from any dissolution, except one carried on under such circumstances of unprincipled agitation, _as would convulse the country, and prove fatal to commercial credit and prosperity_.

But suppose he had the power, how would he use it? Would his measure be such as would immediately throw any considerable portion of land out of cultivation? That seems to be the hinging point of this corn-law question; and it is one on which the "total and immediate" men are more evasive, _in public discussion_, than on any other, though privately such of them as understand the subject, are fully aware of its bearings. If the proposed scheme would _not_ attain or involve the result of throwing inferior soils out of culture, what good would it do to the League and their friends? For, strange to say, when the matter is probed to the bottom, the battle for which the League are truly fighting is directed to _the great national end of laying waste inferior land_. It is only by lowering rents and prices that they expect benefit, yet it is as clear as day that rents are dependent on the comparative value of the highest and lowest grades of the land in tillage; and if prices fall, those lands that barely pay at the present rates must cease to be cultivated. Read any of the more open and outspoken repealers. Take up the little tales of Miss Martineau, one of the most able and honest of her sect, and see how completely the object is to get rid of the expense attending the cultivation of inferior land. If that object is not attained by total and immediate repeal the whole discussion is a delusion. But if Lord John's proposed measures _will_ throw lands out of cultivation, to a large extent, what provision is to be made to avert the inevitable evils that must ensue? How is the surplus population to be supported that will thus be thrown loose on the market of labour? How are the burdens to be provided for that the land thus disabled has hitherto borne? Are the imposts on agriculture to increase while its returns are to diminish? or is the old Whig expedient to be resorted to, of raising that very tax which they have resisted and denounced? Are all customs-duties to be abolished, and is the deficiency to be supplied by having the property-tax aggravated to whatever multiple the account may require? What safeguards or palliatives are to be devised to prevent the PANIC likely to ensue from so vast and so sudden a revolution; in which, under the instant diminution of rents and precariousness of prices, every mortgagee will be driven in desperation to recur upon his debtor, and every landlord upon his tenant; while the whole landed interest, high and low, though chiefly, no doubt, the middle and smaller proprietors and tenants, will be compelled to curtail their expenses to the lowest sum, and those who have already but a narrow margin of surplus, be reduced to beggary and ruin.

But would this confusion and distress affect the landed interest alone? No; the same alarm which involved that interest in ruin, would soon extend to manufactures, by striking at their foundation, CREDIT. Already, from a singular and unhappy combination of causes, a period of restricted circulation and of high interest for money, has begun to follow on one of unlimited accommodation: distrust seems ready to take the place of confidence: gigantic schemes in progress are paralysed or threatened with abandonment: the country appears to be trembling on the brink of one of those commercial crises which from time to time, and unavoidably, arise out of the spirit of speculation. Let but this additional element of confusion--the distress of the agricultural classes, _and all that depend upon them_--be thrown into the already wavering scale, and who can pretend to estimate the amount of ruin which a week may produce? The paradise of free-trade in corn may indeed be obtained, but it will be reached through the purgatory of a general bankruptcy.

But is free-trade to be confined to corn? Are the agriculturists alone to be deprived of protection, the manufacturing interests retaining the advantage of those protecting duties which exclude the competition of foreign markets? That is plainly impracticable. The silk, the wool, the iron, the manufactures of the Continent--the "main articles of _food and clothing_," according to Lord John Russell's letter--are also to be admitted into our markets at rates with which native industry cannot contend. Is this likely to raise wages, or to keep them as they are? Will it better the condition of the working classes? Or is the condition even of the higher classes in the mercantile circles to be made more comfortable by that immediate increase of the income-tax, which must be imposed, to balance the loss of revenue arising from the deficiency of our customs, if national faith is to be preserved, or the government of the country conducted. In every view of the case, and to every interest in the state, we believe that absolute free-trade, such as appears to be contemplated by the late leader of the Whigs, would be fraught with ruin. The letting loose of such a storm upon the State, _with the hand of Lord John Russell to hold the helm_, is a contingency from which we believe the very boldest will draw back.

But we feel no apprehension of such a result. There is now no democracy to be fooled into a new excitement in favour of a Whig ministry, or to be cheated by a cry of cheap bread, counteracted as it must be by the contemplation of lower wages, and an increased competition in the labour-market. The middle classes, again, and all who have any thing to lose, are too wise to hazard the prosperity of the last four years, by supporting the men to whose ejection from office that prosperity is attributable.

We should, at the same time, act with a want of candour and frankness towards our agricultural friends, if we did not direct their attention to another aspect of the case. If it be true, contrary to our own hopes and convictions, that repeal is inevitable, _every thing depends_ on the TIME and MANNER of effecting it. There is a inestimable value attending every year of continued protection that can yet be gained. Even a comparatively short period might be of infinite importance in completing those great improvements now in progress, which will raise the available fertility of so large a portion of our soil, but which must instantly stop, if protection be suddenly withdrawn. It is not in our power to see far into futurity, but every delay is precious, as enabling us better to meet the demands of public necessity, and to stand a competition with foreign soils, if that competition must ultimately be entered upon without legislative aid. How infinite, too, the difference of any change produced WITH A PANIC, and WITHOUT ONE! There may be various arrangements, moreover, which, if boldly and equitably made, might possibly go to place our protection on a footing nearly as firm, and not so likely to be assailed. On all this, however, we suspend our judgment for the present, remarking merely that we are not prepared to quit our present amount and plan of protection without DEMONSTRATION that we cannot fairly or prudently retain it.

In the meantime let us hope and struggle for the best, for the maintenance either of the present law, or of a scale substantially equivalent. If that fails us, let us aim at the _next best_ arrangement; and by a firm and temperate course, we need not at least despair of averting that overwhelming confusion and wide destruction of property that would inevitably follow from the nostrums of desperate and designing men, devised and conducted with an equal absence of wisdom and of honesty.

A single word of earnest admonition in conclusion. The next few months or weeks must decide one important practical question, which we think has been unfolding itself silently before the minds of considerate men for the last few years, and which, whether they will or no, men of all opinions must weigh well, with the deliberation due to their own safety and self-interest, and with that freedom from personal pique or party spirit which the emergency demands. We are far from pinning our faith to individual characters, or thinking that the welfare of the state can be wrapped up in the fortunes or progress of a single mind. But still the question will recur, whether, in the existing state of the country, and when all circumstances are balanced together, Sir Robert Peel is not the statesman of the day, as being at once the _most Conservative_ and the _most Liberal_ minister whom the opposite and conflicting forces in operation in this great country are likely to suffer or submit to. He may not be so tenacious of certain points as some would wish, or so lavish of concession as may be wished by others. But we speak of him on the one hand as witnesses to the fact, that his past measures, though calculated to excite apprehension, have been found, _by experience_, to carry with them no detriment to agriculture, or to any other great interest in the country; and, on the other hand, in the confident anticipation that nothing has recently occurred in his proposed course, that will not, in due time, be fully and satisfactorily explained. With these views of Sir Robert Peel's conduct, we cannot avoid asking, whether when we take him all in all, and appeal to the standard of practical good sense and prudence which wisdom will alone employ in such a momentous discussion, there is any other man now in the field, or likely to appear, to whom all parties can look so confidently, as an equitable and safe arbitrator of our national differences? If there is such a man, let him be pointed out. Sure we are that it is _not_ Lord John Russell.

We had written thus far, in the belief that the Whigs, though after some coy, reluctant, amorous delay, would succeed in forming a sort of government--a task which we were sure Lord John Russell would attempt. That result seems now more than doubtful, and we close this article in the anticipation that a Conservative cabinet may possibly be again in power, before these pages meet the eyes of our readers. We rejoice at the prospect, and the country will rejoice. _Good measures from good men_ is the best consummation of political well-doing, as it is certain that _dangerous measures from dangerous and desperate men_, is the most fearful political evil. In any view our friends have a plain course. It is, to adhere to their principles with a firm, yet prudent, determination of purpose--to hope and believe the best of their leaders and party--and to await patiently, and receive candidly, the elucidation of those things that have hitherto been a mystery; and, as to which, as it was impossible to make any explanations, so it was unjust to pronounce a decision. We earnestly pray that, whether in power or in opposition, the meeting of Parliament will see among our great Conservative statesmen, and their followers throughout the country, including the new adherents whom the rashness and recklessness of our opponents have necessarily gained for us, that solid union of opinion and vigorous co-operation of action, on safe and sound principles of legislation, which can alone terminate the CRISIS and avert its recurrence.

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_Edinburgh: Printed by Ballantyne & Hughes, Paul's Work._