Chapter 4

This must be a chapter of rapid action, comprising in its brief space the events of many months--events which might not much interest the reader in minute detail, but which produced important results to all the persons concerned, and drew on the coming catastrophe.

The news that Mr. Marlow was about to be married to Emily, the beautiful heiress of Sir Philip Hastings, spread far and wide over the country; and if joy and satisfaction reigned in the breasts of three persons in Emily's dwelling, discontent and annoyance were felt more and more strongly every hour by Lady Hastings. A Duke, she thought, would not have been too high a match for her daughter, with all the large estates she was to inherit; and the idea of her marrying a simple commoner was in itself very bitter. She was not a woman to bear a disappointment gracefully; and Emily soon had the pain of discovering that her engagement to Marlow was much disapproved by her mother. She consoled herself, however, by the full approval of her father, who was somewhat more than satisfied.

Sir Philip for his part, considering his daughter's youth, required that the marriage should be delayed at least two years, and, in his theoretical way, he soon built up a scheme, which was not quite so successful as he could have wished. Marlow's character was, in most respects, one after his own heart; but as I have shown, he had thought from the first, that there were weak points in it,--or rather points rendered weak by faults of education and much mingling with the world. He wanted, in short, some of that firmness--may I not say hardness of the old Roman, which Sir Philip so peculiarly admired; and the scheme now was, to re-educate Marlow, if I may use the term, during the next two years, to mould him in short after Sir Philip's own idea of perfection. How this succeeded, or failed, we shall have occasion hereafter to show.

Tidings of Emily's engagement were communicated to Mrs. Hazleton, first by rumor, and immediately after by more certain information in a letter from Lady Hastings. I will not dwell upon the effect produced in her. I will not lift up the curtain with which she covered her own breast, and show all the dark and terrible war of passions within. For three days Mrs. Hazleton was really ill, remained shut up in her room, had the windows darkened, admitted no one but the maid and the physician; and well for her was it, perhaps, that the bitter anguish she endured overpowered her corporeal powers, and forced seclusion upon her. During those three days she could not have concealed her feelings from all eyes had she been forced to mingle with society; but in her sickness she had time for thought--space to fight the battle in, and she came forth triumphant.

When she at length appeared in her own drawing-room no one could have imagined that the illness was of the heart. She was a little paler than before, there was a soft and pleasing languor about her carriage, but she was, to all appearance, as calm and cheerful as ever.

Nevertheless she thought it better to go to London for a short time. She did not yet dare to meet Emily Hastings. She feared _herself_.

Yet the letter of Lady Hastings was a treasure to her, for it gave her hopes of vengeance. In it the mother showed but too strongly her dislike of her daughter's choice, and Mrs. Hazleton resolved to cultivate the friendship of Lady Hastings, whom she had always despised, and to use her weakness for her own purposes.

She was destined, moreover, to have other sources of consolation, and that more rapidly than she expected. It was shortly before her return to the country that the trial of Tom Cutter took place; and not long after she came back that he was executed. Many persons at the trial had remarked the effect which some parts of the evidence had produced on Sir Philip Hastings. He was not skilful in concealing the emotions that he felt, and although it was sometimes difficult, from the peculiarities of his character, to discover what was their precise nature, they always left some trace by which it might be seen that he was greatly moved.

Information of the facts was given to Mrs. Hazleton by Shanks the attorney, and young John Ayliffe, who dwelt with pleasure upon the pain his successful artifice had inflicted; and Mrs. Hazleton was well pleased too.

But the wound was deeper than they thought. It was like that produced by the bite of a snake--insignificant in itself, but carrying poison into every vein.

Could his child deceive him? Sir Philip Hastings asked himself. Could Emily have long known this vulgar youth--gone secretly down to see him at a distant cottage--conferred with him unknown to either father or mother? It seemed monstrous to suppose such a thing; and yet what could he believe? She had never named John Ayliffe since her return from Mrs. Hazleton's; and yet it was certain from Marlow's own account, that she had seen him there. Did not that show that she was desirous of concealing the acquaintance from her parents?

Sir Philip had asked no questions, leaving her to speak if she thought fit. He was now sorry for it, and resolved to inquire; as the fact of her having seen the young man, for whom he felt an inexpressible dislike, had been openly mentioned in a court of justice. But as he rode home he began to argue on the other side of the question. The man who had made the assertion was a notorious liar--a convicted felon. Besides, he knew him to be malicious; he had twice before thrown out insinuations which Sir Philip believed to be baseless, and could only be intended to produce uneasiness. Might not these last words of his be traced to the same motive? He would inquire in the first place, he thought, what was the connection between the convict and John Ayliffe, and stopping on the way for that purpose, he soon satisfied himself that the two were boon companions.

When he reached his own dwelling, he found Emily seated by Marlow in one of her brightest, happiest moods. There was frank candor, graceful innocence, bright open-hearted truth in every look and every word. It was impossible to doubt her; and Sir Philip cast the suspicion from him, but, alas! not for ever. They would return from time to time to grieve and perplex him; and he would often brood for hours over his daughter's character, puzzling himself more and more. Yet he would not say a word--he blamed himself for even thinking of the matter; and he would not show a suspicion. Yet he continued to think and to doubt, while poor unconscious Emily would have been ready, if asked, to solve the whole mystery in a moment. She had been silent from an unwillingness to begin a painful subject herself; and though she had yielded no assent to Mrs. Hazleton's arguments, they had made her doubt whether she ought to mention, unquestioned, John Ayliffe's proposal and conduct. She had made up her mind to tell all, if her father showed the slightest desire to know any thing regarding her late visit; but there was something in the effects which that visit had produced on her mind, which she could not explain to herself.

Why did she love Mrs. Hazleton less? Why had she lost so greatly her esteem for her? What had that lady done or said which justified so great a change of feeling towards her? Emily could not tell. She could fix upon no word, no act, she could entirely blame--but yet there had been a general tone in her whole demeanor which had opened the poor girl's eyes too much. She puzzled herself sadly with her own thoughts; and probably would have fallen into more than one of her deep self-absorbed reveries, had not sweet new feelings, Marlow's frequent presence, kept her awake to a brighter, happier world of thought.

She was indeed very happy; and, could she have seen her mother look brighter and smile upon her, she would have been perfectly so. Her father's occasional moodiness she did not heed; for he often seemed gloomy merely from intense thought. Emily had got a key to such dark reveries in her own heart, and she knew well that they were no true indications either of discontent or grief, for very often when to the eyes of others she seemed the most dull and melancholy, she was enjoying intense delight in the activity of her own mind. She judged her father from herself, and held not the slightest idea that any word, deed or thought of hers had given him the slightest uneasiness.

Notwithstanding the various contending feelings and passions which were going on in the little circle on which our eyes are fixed, the course of life had gone on with tolerable smoothness as far as Emily and Marlow were concerned, for about two months, when, one morning, Sir Philip Hastings received a letter in a hand which he did not know. It reached him at the breakfast table, and evidently affected him considerably with some sort of emotion. His daughters instantly caught the change of his countenance, but Sir Philip did not choose that any one should know he could be moved by any thing on earth, and he instantly repressed all agitation, quietly folded up the letter again, concluded his breakfast, and then retired to his own study.

Emily was not deceived, however. There were moments in Sir Philip's life when he was unable to conceal altogether the strong feelings of his heart under the veil of stoicism--or as he would have termed it--to curb and restrain them by the power of philosophy. Emily had seen such moments, and knew, that whatever were the emotions produced by that letter, whether of anger or grief or apprehension--her father was greatly moved.

In his own study, Sir Philip Hastings seated himself, spread the letter before him, and read it over attentively. But now it did not seem to affect him in the least. He was, in fact, ashamed of the feelings he had experienced and partly shown. "How completely," said he to himself, "does a false and fictitious system of society render us the mere slaves of passion, infecting even those who tutor themselves from early years to resist its influence. Here an insolent young man lays claim to my name, and my inheritance, and coolly assumes not only that he has a title to do so, but that I know it; and this instead of producing calm contempt, makes my heart beat and my blood boil, as if I were the veriest schoolboy."

The letter was all that Sir Philip stated; but it was something more. It was a very artful epistle, drawn up by the joint shrewdness of Mr. Shanks, Mr. John Ayliffe, and Mrs. Hazleton. It concisely stated the claims of the young man who signed it, to all the property of the late Sir John Hastings and to the baronetcy. It made no parade of proofs, but assumed that those in the writer's possession were indisputable, and also that Sir Philip Hastings was well aware that John Ayliffe was his elder brother's legitimate son. The annuity which had been bought for himself and his mother was broadly stated to have been the purchase-money of her silence, negotiated by her father, who had no means to carry on a suit at law. As long as his mother lived, the writer said, he had been silent out of deference to her wishes, but now that she was dead in France, he did not feel himself bound to abide by an arrangement which deprived him at once of fortune and station, and which had been entered into without his knowledge or consent. He then went on to call upon Sir Philip Hastings in the coolest terms to give up possession and acknowledge his right without what the writer called "the painful ceremony of a lawsuit;" and in two parts of the letter allusion was made to secret information which the writer had obtained by the kind confidence of a friend whom he would not name.

It was probably intended to give point to this insinuation at an after period, but if it was aimed at poor Emily, it fell harmless for the time, as no one knew better than Sir Philip that she had never been informed of any thing which could affect the case in question.

Indeed, the subject of the annuity was one which he had never mentioned to any one since the transaction had been completed many years before; and the name of John Ayliffe had never passed his lips till Marlow mentioned having seen that young man at Mrs. Hazleton's house.

When he had read the letter, and as soon as he thought he had mastered the last struggle of passion, he dipped the pen in the ink and wrote the few following words:

"Sir Philip Hastings has received the letter signed John Ayliffe Hastings. He knows no person of that name, but has heard of a young man of the name of John Ayliffe. If that person thinks he has any just claim on Sir Philip Hastings, or his estate, he had better pursue it in the legal and ordinary course, as Sir Philip Hastings begs to disclaim all private communication with him."

He addressed the letter to "Mr. John Ayliffe," and sent it to the post. This done, he rejoined Marlow and Emily, and to all appearance was more cheerful and conversable than he had been for many a previous day. Perhaps it cost him an effort to be cheerful at all, and the effort went a little beyond its mark. Emily was not altogether satisfied, but Lady Hastings, when she came down, which, as usual, was rather late in the day, remarked how gay her husband was.

Sir Philip said nothing to any one at the time regarding the contents of the letter he had received. He consulted no lawyer even, and tried to treat the subject with contemptuous forgetfulness; but his was a brooding and tenacious mind, and he often thought of the epistle, and the menaces it implied, against his own will. Nor could he or any one connected with him long remain unattentive or ignorant of the matter, for in a few weeks the first steps were taken in a suit against him, and, spreading from attorneys' offices in every direction, the news of such proceedings travelled far and wide, till the great Hastings case became the talk of the whole country round.

In the mean time, Sir Philip's reply was very speedily shown to Mrs. Hazleton, and that lady triumphed a good deal. Sir Philip was now in the same position with John Ayliffe, she thought, that she had been in some time before with Mr. Marlow; and already he began to show, in her opinion, a disposition to treat the case very differently in his own instance and in hers.

There he had strongly supported private negotiation; here he rejected it altogether; and she chose to forget that circumstances, though broadly the same, were in detail very different.

"We shall see," she said to herself, "we shall see whether, when the proofs are brought forward, he will act with that rigid sense of justice, which he assumed here."

When the first processes had been issued, however, and common rumor justified a knowledge of the transaction, without private information, Mrs. Hazleton set out at once to visit "poor dear Lady Hastings," and condole with her on the probable loss of fortune. How pleasant it is to condole with friends on such occasions. What an accession of importance we get in our own eyes, especially if the poor people we comfort have been a little bit above us in the world.

But Mrs. Hazleton had higher objects in view; she wanted no accession of importance. She was quite satisfied with her own position in society. She sought to see and prompt Lady Hastings--to sow dissension where she knew there must already be trouble; and she found Sir Philip's wife just in the fit frame of mind for her purpose. Sir Philip himself and Emily had ridden out together; and though Mrs. Hazleton would willingly have found an opportunity of giving Sir Philip a sly friendly kick, and of just reminding him of his doctrines announced in the case between herself and Mr. Marlow, she was not sorry to have Lady Hastings alone for an hour or two. They remained long in conference, and I need not detail all that passed. Lady Hastings poured forth all her grief and indignation at Emily's engagement to Mr. Marlow, and Mrs. Hazleton did nothing to diminish either. She agreed that it was a very unequal match, that Emily with her beauty and talents, and even with her mother's fortune alone, might well marry into the highest family of the land. Nay, she said, could the match be broken off, she might still take her rank among the peeresses. She did not advise, indeed, actual resistance on the part of her friend; she feared Lady Hastings' discretion; but she insinuated that a mother and a wife by unwavering and constant opposition, often obtained her own way, even in very difficult circumstances.

From that hour Mrs. Hazleton was Lady Hastings' best friend.

NATURAL REVELATION.

WRITTEN FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MONTHLY MAGAZINE

BY ALFRED B. STREET.

Does not the heart alone a God proclaim! Blot revelation from the mind of man! Yea, let him not e'en Nature's features scan; There is within him a low voice, the same Throughout the varied scenes of being's span, That whispers, God. And doth not conscience speak Though sin its wildest force upon it wreak! Born with us--never dying--ever preaching Of right and wrong, with reference aye to Him-- And doth not Hope, on toward the future reaching-- The aspirations struggling from the Dim Up toward the Bright--a ceaseless unrepose Of something unattained--a ceaseless teaching Of unfulfilled desire--the eternal truth disclose!

HEART-WHISPERS.

WRITTEN FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MONTHLY MAGAZINE

BY MARY E. HEWITT.

What if he loved me!--How the unwhispered thought Comes o'er me, with a thrill of ecstacy! And yet, when constant eve his step hath brought, I timid shrink as he approaches me. Last night, when greeting words were on his lips, My ears grew deaf between my faint replies; And when he pressed my trembling finger tips, I felt me turn to marble 'neath his eyes. What if he loved me! If 'twere mine to share His thought! to be of his proud being part! Hush! lest the tell-tale wind should idly bear To him this wild, wild beating of my heart For should he guess--who in my soul hath name-- That I, unsought, love him, ah! I should die of shame.

THE SNOWDROP IN THE SNOW.

BY SYDNEY YENDYS.

O full of Faith! The Earth is rock,--the Heaven The dome of a great palace all of ice, Russ-built. Dull light distils through frozen skies Thickened and gross. Cold Fancy droops her wing, And cannot range. In winding-sheets of snow Lies every thought of any pleasant thing. I have forgotten the green earth; my soul Deflowered, and lost to every summer hope, Sad sitteth on an iceberg at the Pole; My heart assumes the landscape of mine eyes Moveless and white, chill blanched with hoarest rime; The Sun himself is heavy and lacks cheer Or on the eastern hill or western slope; The world without seems far and long ago; To silent woods stark famished winds have driven The last lean robin--gibbering winds of fear! Thou only darest to believe in spring, Thou only smilest, Lady of the Time!

Even as the stars come up out of the sea Thou risest from the Earth. How is it down In the dark depths? Should I delve there, O Flower, For beauty? Shall I find the Summer there Met manifold, as in an ark of peace? And Thou, a lone white Dove art thou sent forth Upon the winter deluge? It shall cease, But not for thee--pierced by the ruthless North And spent with the Evangel. In what hour The flood abates thou wilt have closed thy wings For ever. When the happy living things Of the old world come forth upon the new I know my heart shall miss thee; and the dew Of summer twilights shall shed tears for me --Tears liker thee, ah, purest! than mine own-- Upon thy vestal grave, O vainly fair!

Thou shouldst have noble destiny, who, like A Prophet, art shut out from kind and kin! Who on the winter silence comest in A still small voice. Pale Hermit of the Year, Flower of the Wilderness! oh, not for thee The jocund playmates of the maiden spring. For when the danceth forth with cymballed feet, Waking a-sudden with great welcoming, Each calling each, they burst from hill to dell In answering music. But thou art a bell. A passing bell, snow-muffled, dim and sweet.

As is the Poet to his fellow-men, So mid thy drifting snows, O Snowdrop, Thou. Gifted, in sooth, beyond them, but no less A snowdrop. And thou shalt complete his lot And bloom as fair as now when they are not. Thou art the wonder of the seasons, O First-born of Beauty. As the Angel near Gazed on that first of living things which, when The blast that ruled since Chaos o'er the sere Leaves of primeval Palms did sweep the plain, Clung to the new-made sod and would not drive, So gaze I upon thee amid the reign Of Winter. And because thou livest, I live. And art thou happy in thy loneliness? Oh couldst thou hear the shouting of the floods, Oh couldst thou know the star among the trees When--as the herald-voice of breeze on breeze Proclaims the marriage pageant of the Spring Advancing from the South--each hurries on His wedding-garment, and the love-chimes ring Thro' nuptial valleys! No, serene and lone, I will not flush thy cheek with joys like these. Songs for the rosy morning; at gray prime To hang the head and pray. Thou doest well. I will not tell thee of the bridal train. No; let thy Moonlight die before their day A Nun among the Maidens, thou and they. Each hath some fond sweet office that doth strike One of our trembling heartstrings musical. Is not the hawthorn for the Queen of May? And cuckoo-flowers for whom the cuckoo's voice Hails, like an answering sister, to the woods? Is not the maiden blushing in the rose? Shall not the babe and buttercup rejoice, Twins in one meadow? Are not violets all By name or nature for the breast of Dames! For them the primrose, pale as star of prime, For them the wind-flower, trembling to a sigh, For them the dew stands in the eyes of day That blink in April on the daisied lea? Like them they flourish and like them they fade And live beloved and loving. But for thee-- For such a bevy how art thou arrayed Flower of the Tempests? What hast thou with them? Thou shalt be pearl unto a diadem Which the Heavens jewel. _They_ shall deck the brows Of joy and wither there. But _thou_ shalt be A Martyr's garland. Thou who, undismayed, To thy spring dreams art true amid the snows As he to better dreams amid the flames.--_Athenæum._

THE COUNT MONTE-LEONE: OR, THE SPY IN SOCIETY.[H]

TRANSLATED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MONTHLY MAGAZINE FROM THE FRENCH OF H. DE ST. GEORGES.

_Continued from page 70._

V.--THE ENTERTAINMENT.

The name of Count Monte-Leone produced great sensation in the numerous assemblage. The adventures of the Count and the report of his trial had been published in all the Parisian papers, and in the eyes of some he was a lucky criminal, and of others a victim and a martyr to his opinions, whom God alone had preserved. The women especially were interested in the hero of this judicial drama, on account of the exaggerated representations of his personal attractions. Received with general curiosity, which, however, he did not seem to notice, and crossing the rooms with his usual dignified air, Monte-Leone approached the Duchess of Palma and expressed his gratitude for her kindness in including him among her guests. The Duchess recognized the Count politely, and replied to him with a few meaningless phrases. She then left him to meet the young Marquise de Maulear, who came in leaning on the arm of her father, the old Prince. The Prince knew the Neapolitan Ambassador, whom he had often seen with the Duchess. He had been one of the first to visit the Duchess of Palma. A man of intelligence and devotion to pleasure, he thought he did not at all derogate from his dignity by civility to a young and beautiful woman, who bore so nobly the name which was conferred on her by love and hymen.

"Duchess," said the Prince, presenting Aminta, "you have often questioned me about my daughter-in-law, and know what I told you. I am, I confess, proud for you to be able now to judge for yourself." In the _interim_ La Felina had taken in the whole person of Aminta at a single glance, and the result of this rapid examination exerted a strange influence on her. She grew pale, and her voice trembled, as she told the Prince that the praises he had bestowed on the Marquise were far less than the truth.

"The Marquis de Maulear," added she, "is an old acquaintance," and bowing kindly to him, she offered Aminta a seat and then left her, under the influence of an emotion which, actress as she was, she could repress with great difficulty.

The Prince sat by his daughter-in-law, and passing in review before her the distinguished personages of the room, described them with that skeptical wit, that courteous irony, of which the nobles of other days were so completely the masters. He spoke like the Duke d'Ayer of old, that caustic wit, of whom a lady of the court said that she was amazed that his tongue was not torn out twenty times a day, so full of pointed needles was all he said. Aminta smiled at the pencil sketches of the Prince, or rather at his dagger blow. Had the old man, however, been twenty times as bitter, she would not have found fault with her father-in-law, for she knew he was kind and she was grateful to him--one day we shall know whence these sentiments originated in his mind. The Marquis de Maulear had left his young wife to speak to his numerous acquaintances: and while the Prince for Aminta's amusement flayed alive the various personages who were led before him by their evil fate, Count Monte-Leone, who had seen the Ambassador, sought in vain to pierce the crowd which surrounded him. The Duke was not in the room when Monte-Leone was announced. It was then with surprise and almost with terror that he saw the Count approach him.

"I have not had the honor," said he, "to approach your Excellency since the visit paid me at the Castle _Del Uovo_. And I am doubly gratified at being able to return it in your hotel amid so splendid a festival."

"Count," said the Duke, seeking to conquer the emotion caused by the unexpected presence of Monte-Leone, "I dared not hope that you would honor me by accepting my invitation; for you cannot be ignorant that an Ambassador represents his king. It is then, in some degree, as if we meet to-day in the palace of his Majesty Fernando King of Naples: and I think I may venture to tell you, in the name of my Sovereign, that if your conduct is a token of reconciliation offered by you to his cause, Fernando IV will acknowledge it as cheerfully as I do now."

Count Monte-Leone appreciated the graceful perfidy of the language of the Duke, and was ready to curse the secret motive which had led him to the Embassy. His eyes, however, turned, almost contrary to his wishes, to the other side of the room, and there he seemed to find something to sustain him. He replied to the Duke as naturally as possible, that in coming to his house, he had remembered only the urbanity of his host and his frankness, being aware that the Duke would never convert a mere visit of pleasure into a political question.

The Duke bit his lips when he heard this evasive answer, and saw that he had met his equal in diplomacy. A young man then approached and passed his arm into that of Monte-Leone's, thus putting an end to this annoying interview. This young man had an eloquent and _distingué_ air, and handsome features, though they were delicate and betokened but feeble health.

"Do you know, my dear Duke," said the new comer to the Ambassador, "that one must have a very perfect character, and be invited to a very charming ball, to come as I do to your house, after the manner we parted eighteen months ago at Naples. Listen!--one goes for health-sake to Naples to pass the winter, to enjoy the Carnival in peace. After one or two intrigues with beautiful women having dark eyes, not, however, comparable with those of the Duchess of Palma, one fine night in the middle of a Pulcinello supper, you send us in place of a dessert a company of black-looking _sbirri_, who rush like vultures upon us, and rust with dirty hands our Venetian daggers which they wrest from us. Twelve to three, they then separate Taddeo, Von Apsbury and myself, and placing us in rickety carriages, take one of us to prison, another to the frontier, and hurry me on board a miserable little vessel, from which they tumble me like a package of damaged goods on the _quai_ of Marseilles. I had expected to make the tour of Italy."

"Vicompte," said the Duke, with a smile, "the air of Italy was not healthy for you. Very excellent physicians told me your life was unsafe in that country, and that you should leave it as soon as possible. So complain to the faculty, but thank me for having followed their directions."

"Now what mistakes," said the young man, "people make. I have always heard that the climate of Naples was excellent for the chest."

"True," said the Duke, "but it is bad for the head."

"Of that I know something," said Monte-Leone, bowing to the Duke.

"Well, then, suppose it is," continued d'Harcourt, who wished at any price to avenge himself on the _sbirri_ of his Excellency, in the person of the Duke himself. "It may be the climate exaggerates and sometimes destroys the head, but it is excellent for the heart--a suffering heart--a heart which is attacked is easily cured in Naples. True, the remedies are sometimes priceless, but patients in desperate cases do not hesitate on that account."

"I hope, Count," said the Duke, who would not understand the allusion of the young man to his marriage, "that the climate of Paris suits you better than that of Naples. Besides, the Duc d'Harcourt, your father, that most influential nobleman, will prevent you henceforth from endangering an existence you held too cheaply in Italy."

"Luckily," said D'Harcourt, with a smile, "your Excellency watched over me, and it is no slight honor to have as a physician the minister of police of a kingdom. Excuse me, however," added he to the Duke, "I hear the prelude of Collinet's orchestra, and I have a family duty to fulfil: my sister Mary has promised to dance this contradance with me, and I must humor the whim of a spoiled child."

The wild young man hurried to take his sister's arm, and to get into place with her. Marie d'Harcourt, René's sister, was a charming girl, with blonde hair and a rosy complexion, fair and lithe as a northern elf. The blue veins were visible beneath her transparent skin, so fair that one might often have fancied the blood was about to come gushing through it. The Duke d'Harcourt had lost two of his sons of that terrible pulmonary disease against which medicine, alas, is powerless. The distress of the father was intense, for two of the scions of this family had been cut off by death; and of the five offshoots from the family tree, but two remained. All his love was therefore centred in René, now his only son, and in Marie, the young girl of whom we have just spoken. From a sentiment of tender respect, the Duke had not permitted his last son to assume the title of those he had lost, and René continued to be called the Vicompte d'Harcourt. There were already apparent sad indications that René would become a prey to the monster which had devoured his two brothers: Marie, a few years younger, gave her father great uneasiness, on account of the excessive delicacy of her constitution and organization. All Paris had participated in the grief of the Duke d'Harcourt; for all Paris respected him. Rich, kind, and benevolent, in an enlightened manner, and within the bounds of reason, rejecting all social Utopias, popular as they might make all who sustained them, the Duke d'Harcourt was a Christian philanthropist, that is to say, a charitable man. Charity is the holiest and purest of earthly virtues, and that in which this patriarch indulged shunned noise and renown. He did not wait until misfortune came to him to soothe it, but sought it out. When this second providence was known to those whom he aided, the Duke imposed secrecy on them as a reward for all he had done. He was, so to say, an impersonation of French honor, and the arbiter of all the differences which arose between the members of the great aristocratic families of France. His word was law, and his decisions sovereign.

The Prince de Maulear had determined to marry his son to the daughter of this noble old man, and had been forced by the Marquis's marriage to abandon the plan. The Duke still remained the friend of the Prince, though he had not unfrequently blamed his somewhat lax principles. Whenever he discovered the Prince in any peccadillo, he used to say, "Well, we must be lenient to youth." Now, the Prince de Maulear was a young man of seventy. The beauty of Aminta, her extreme paleness alone, would have sufficed to fix attention, and created a very revolution in the saloons of the Embassy. The Duchess of Palma did not produce her ordinary effect. The animation she experienced in the beginning of the evening gradually left her, and the sadness under which she had previously suffered, but which she had thrown off during the early hours of the entertainment, began again to take possession of her features and person. One man alone remarked the Duchess, for he had never lost sight of her. Leaning against the door of the boudoir, his eye followed her wherever she went, and appeared to sympathize with all the constraint inflicted on her as mistress of the house. When, however, the Duchess thought she had paid sufficient personal attention, and was satisfied that the pleasures of the evening would be sustained without her, the man who examined her with such care, saw her come towards the boudoir where he was. He went in without being seen by her, and yielding to one of those promptings which a man in his cooler moments would resist, went behind a drapery which covered a door leading into a gallery of pictures, and waited motionless. The Duchess of Palma entered the boudoir, and assuring herself by a glance that she was alone, fell rather than sat on a divan, and suffered two streams of tears to flow from her eyes. "I was strangling," said she. "I would die a thousand deaths. My cruel experiment has succeeded. _He loves her yet_--I am sure of it. For her sake he came to this entertainment, to which he would not have come for mine. He would have made an excuse of his old difficulties with the Duke, of his political position. I would have believed him, and have sacrificed my wish to see him to propriety and his honor. He never ceases to look at her. He thinks of her alone. He is busied with her alone, yet he has no look, no thought for me." The Duchess began to weep again. Steps were heard in the gallery--the drapery at the door was agitated. "Oh, my God!" said the Duchess, "if met with here, and in this condition, what shall I do and say!" The steps approached. Hurrying then to one of the outlets of the boudoir, she opened it hastily, and went into the garden. The steps the Duchess had heard were those of two persons, who, after having been the rounds of the room, were about to go into the picture-gallery. The two persons were René d'Harcourt and Count Monte-Leone.

"Ah ha!" said the Count, "what the devil is Taddeo doing there against the drapery, there like a jealous Spaniard at a corner of Seville, listening to a serenade given by his rival?"

"True! true!" replied d'Harcourt, "but I think the serenade has been given, for his features express the most malevolent expression."

The emotion of Taddeo was so violent when he heard the words of the Duchess, that he had not strength to leave. He, however, restrained himself, and listened to the raillery of his friends.

"Like yourselves," said he, with a quivering voice, "I was in search of fresh air, for it is fearfully warm."

"Do not get sick here," said d'Harcourt, "for Doctor Matheus is not here to cure you."

"Silence," said Taddeo, changing his expression at once, "how imprudent you are to pronounce his name."

All three of them entered the boudoir.

"True," said d'Harcourt, "my tongue is always quicker than my mind. I will however try and make them keep time."

"When will there be a consultation?" asked Taddeo, trying to be calm.

"Eight days hence!"

"At what hour?"

"Midnight!"

"Are there many patients?"

"More than ever," said the Count, "and the poor devils are anxious as possible to be cured!"

"Then," said d'Harcourt, "the practice of the Doctor increases."

"Every day. He will soon be unable to turn around."

"That does not make me uneasy," said d'Harcourt, "our Doctor is a skilful man, a great philosopher, and fully acquainted with the new medicine."

"Yes, very new;--he treats the mind, rather than the body."

"Ah, that is its very essence," replied the Vicompte, "and I know some wonderful cures of his--so wonderful, indeed, that on the other day I presented him to my father."

"To the Duke?" said Monte-Leone,--"introduce Doctor Matheus to the Duke d'Harcourt?" Then in a low voice he continued, "Why did you present him to the Doctor?"

"For a reason which was important and very dear to my heart. My young sister was suffering; my father, who consulted in behalf of my brothers the most eminent practitioners of Paris, lost all confidence in the faculty when he lost his sons. He did not know whom to consult about his daughter; I spoke to him of Matheus, and told him several wonderful cures he had effected, and the Duke became very anxious to see him."

"And did the stern Matheus consent to go to your father's house?"

"He was anxious to do so, and as his house is not far from ours, I in a few minutes was able to introduce him into the patient's room; and would you believe it, a few of the simplest remedies possible exerted a great effect. The agitation of my sister was calmed--her cough arrested--and this evening you see her dancing and waltzing, pretty and gay as possible."

The conversation of the three friends was soon interrupted by the entrance of two other of the personages of our story. The Prince de Maulear entered with the _Marquise_ on his arm, seeking in this retired spot some repose from the fatigues of the ball, and a less heated air than that of the ball-rooms. Aminta leaned heavily on the arm of the Prince when she saw Monte-Leone thus unexpectedly. She had observed him during the evening, and in the course of the winter they had more than once met together. The Count, however, had never referred to their parting at Sorrento. Far from seeking her out, Monte-Leone seemed to avoid her. Satisfied with saluting her respectfully as often as they met, the Count used always to leave her. This reserved and proper conduct was sufficiently explained by the old rivalry of the Marquis de Maulear and the Count. Recollection of this rivalry, without doubt, caused in Aminta's mind the great emotion she always felt when in the presence of Monte-Leone.

"What," said the Prince, when he saw the Count, "are you here, my dear colleague? This chance delights me. My daughter," said he to the young Marquise, "let me introduce to you the Count Monte-Leone, a great traveller, to whom I am indebted for the best chapter of my Italian voyages; all action, I will read it to you one of these days! Ah! but for the Count, I would never have perfected it."

"Monsieur," said Monte-Leone, with a low bow, "I have the honor of the _Marquise_'s acquaintance; and Signora Rovero, her mother, deigned sometimes to receive me at her house before the marriage of the Marquis de Maulear and Madame--"

The Count as he spoke felt as if his heart would burst. The Prince, however, did not perceive it.

"You know my daughter," said the Count, "yes, you have not called on her, you did not seek to see me, who am so glad to see you. This is bad, Count--you will not, however, remain away any longer, and I will not quit you until you promise me a speedy visit."

"I do not know if I should," said the Count, with a hesitation which was not natural to him--and looking timidly at Aminta.

"We shall be happy to receive the Count; but you know, Monsieur, I receive no one without the consent of the Marquis--"

"But the Marquis," said the Prince, "will be delighted to receive so charming a gentleman and erudite a traveller as Count Monte-Leone."

"But I also know M. de Maulear," said the Count.

"Indeed! then you know every one," said the old man. "Why then be so ceremonious? People of our rank easily understand each other. Besides, if the invitation of my son is all you need, here he comes to speak for himself."

D'Harcourt and Taddeo, especially the latter, who knew how devotedly Monte-Leone had loved Aminta, participated in the embarrassment of the scene. Aminta trembled. "Ah! you here at last, Monsieur," said the Prince to his son, as he appeared at the door of the boudoir. "You are a lucky fellow to have your father as your wife's _cavalier servente_, for you have not been near her during the whole evening." The Marquis turned pale, and said with agitation, "Excuse me, sir, but I met some old friends who kept possession of me all the evening."

"Ah!" said the Prince, "_apropo_ of old friends--or old acquaintances, if you will, here is one of yours--the Count Monte-Leone, who wants only for a word from your mouth to renew his acquaintance and visit me."

Henri looked at Monte-Leone, whom he had not seen before.

Without trouble, without agitation, or any apparent effort, he said, "Count Monte-Leone will always be welcome whenever he pleases to visit me."

Aminta cast a glance full of surprise, grief, and reproach on the Marquis, and a secret voice repeated in her very heart:--"He is no longer jealous, and therefore does not love me."

"Very well," said the Prince to his son, and turning to Monte-Leone, and giving him his hand, he said, "We shall meet again, my dear colleague." He continued, "We will talk of our travels, and especially of the chapter of Ceprano."

Then taking the arm of Aminta, who could scarcely support herself, he returned to the ball-room.

VI.--JOURNAL OF A HEART.

The entertainment continued, and the joyous sounds of the orchestra reached the very extremity of the garden of the Hotel, where the Duchess of Palma had taken refuge to conceal her tears from all observers. She heard a faint noise beneath a neighboring hedge, and looking towards it, saw Taddeo gazing at her with an expression of great grief.

"Taddeo," said she.

"Yes," said the young man, "Taddeo, who pities and suffers with you because he knows all and suffers all that unappreciated love can inflict on the heart--"

This was said with an expression of deep pity.

"Who has told you," said the Duchess proudly, "that I suffered as you say?"

"Your tears," said Taddeo, "and the memory of the past. Better still, yourself. The words you uttered not long ago in the boudoir, and which by chance I heard."

"Signor," replied the Duchess with indignation, "do not attribute to chance what you owe to ignoble curiosity. To watch a woman--to surprise the secrets of her heart, is infamous, and betrays the hospitality extended to you. It shows a want of respect for me, and absence of honor in yourself."

"Signora, my only excuse is my ardent passion, which has lasted in spite of time and contempt. I have no motive for my fault but my sad interest in your suffering, the cruel progress of which I have read on your features since the commencement of the entertainment;--that is all----"

"But, Signor, what have I said? What words have I uttered?" said the Duchess, every feature being instinct with terror.

"Nothing, alas! that my heart has not long been aware of. He that you loved, you love still, and his coldness and insensibility for your devotion, makes you lament his ingratitude and indifference."

The Duchess seemed, as it were, relieved of an enormous burden which oppressed her. She breathed more freely and murmured these words with a burst of gratitude to God who had preserved her--"He knows nothing."

"Taddeo," said she, giving him her hand, "I pardon you, for I am myself guilty, very guilty in still preserving my old sentiments in the face of my new obligations, voluntarily contracted. I have, I am certain, lost the right to reproach you with a fault, which passion induced you to commit, while I commit one far greater. For pity's sake forget what you have heard, and to ask me to explain it would be an offence. Pity me in your heart. Ah! pity me, for I am most unfortunate." Then drying her eyes, she continued, "No more of this--be a friend to me as you promised six months ago, when we came to Paris. On this condition alone you know that I permitted you to see me. Now give me your arm, and let us return to the ball-room, whence, probably, our absence has been remarked." They walked in silence down the alley which led to the ball-room.

Two hours after, all was calm and silent where every thing had been gay and brilliant. The lights were out, and the darkness of night replaced the thousand lamps which a few minutes before were seen to glitter within the palace windows. But one person in all the Hotel of the Duke of Palma was awake. A woman sat alone, in a room of rare elegance, still wearing her ball attire, but with her hair dishevelled and her heart crushed. Her eyes were fixed and dry, and yet red with the tears she had shed. She was in all the brilliancy of youth and beauty, but which was already defaced somewhat, by the iron claws of sorrow, which by sleepless nights and the ravages of jealousy seemed resolved yet more to lacerate her. With her head resting on her hands, beautiful and touching as Canova's Magdalen, she looked with sorrow over the papers which lay strewn on a rich ebony desk before her. A lamp, the upper portion of which was shrouded in blue tulle, cast a pale and sad light over her brow. Her fine white hand rested on the papers which she seemed afraid to touch. "No," said she, "it is impossible; all that these contain are but falsehoods. No, this journal of my heart, written by myself, day by day, cannot be a romance created by the imagination in its delirium. No! all I wrote there was true. I felt the joys and bitternesses, yet it now seems to me a dream. A dream! can it be a dream?"

Taking up the papers convulsively she read as follows:--"It is he. I have seen him again and free. I thought that he, like myself, had contracted a life-long obligation. Is this joy or grief? The ties he was about to form, the ties the mere thought of which caused me a terrible anguish, were imposed on me by myself. Oh my God! what have I done? What perfidious demon inspired me when I yielded to another than to him the _right_ to love me? When I promised a love I knew could be given to no other than to him? Why on the day of that fatal marriage did I see him only when I was about to leave the church? I would have broken off had I stood at the foot of the altar--I would have told him who was about to give me his name--ask me not to perjure myself! do not ask me to pledge you a faith I cannot keep! my heart, my soul, my love are his. I thought, alas! because he was not free that I too might cease to be. I fancied my agony to be power, my spite to be courage. When, however, I saw him pale and sombre, leaning against the door of the temple, I felt the coldness of death take possession of me, and I doubted long after that sad day, if I had seen a shadow, if some hallucinations of my senses had not evoked a phantom of my vanished love, to inspire me with eternal regret. Yet HE it was! HE it was! and when at the risk of my very life I would have flown towards that man, I was forced to follow another." The poor woman paused; for a mist obscured her sight, a distillation of burning tears. She resumed her task:--"I am a Duchess but of what value is that vain title which I sought, as an ægis against memory, to me? Have I found it such? For a long time, I thought so. I should, however, never have seen him again. I should have passed no happy days near him, and have been ignorant of the delirium and intoxication of his presence, which I never can forget. I had been the wife of the Duke of Palma six months, when a mission of the King of Naples forced him to leave me at a villa on the _Lago di Como_, while he went in a foreign country to discharge the duties his monarch had imposed on him. I scarcely dared to confess to myself, in spite of the kindness of the Duke, how I was delighted during his absence, for it gave me a liberty of mind and thought which was absolutely necessary to my heart. Resolved to discharge all my duties, I lived, or rather vegetated, in this existence, so unoccupied and objectless as all marriages contracted without love must be. Amid, however, the dead calm of a marriage contracted without love, there glittered sometimes a burst of passion repressed, but alas! not stifled. Dark passions filled my bosom, and I felt the poison of regret. I found myself often longing for my independence, which, however, would not have contributed to my happiness, but would at least have permitted me to indulge in my secret sorrow. My temporary solitude, therefore, became precious to me, for I was about to abandon myself to sadness without annoying any one, and without exciting a curiosity which it was impossible for me to satisfy. When one evening I had been wandering alone on the banks of the lake, I was terrified by a terrible scene on the water. At a great distance a man made every effort to approach the shore--for his boat was evidently sinking beneath him. Some opening, beyond doubt, permitted the water to penetrate, and his danger became every moment more imminent. I was too far from the villa to send him any assistance, and as a secret presentiment was joined to the horror and pity caused by the spectacle, I felt the greatest anxiety about the stranger. The night was near, and the sky became darker every moment. By the flashes of lights here and there, I saw the bark almost sinking, and ere long, it was entirely gone--and the tranquil waves of the lake, calm as they are wont to be, rolled over it. My strength deserted me, and almost in a fainting condition, I fell on the strand. I did not absolutely lose consciousness; for far in the distance I heard the sound of sudden blows on the water, for which at the time I could not account. The noise approached, and grew every moment more distinct. I then heard the sound, as it were, of a body falling on the sand, accompanied by a painful cry. I heard no more. Soon I saw the light of the torches of my servants, who being uneasy, had come to look for me. They found me, and also a half inanimate body, dripping with water. It was doubtless the person whose boat had foundered in the water, and I ordered him to be taken to the villa and carefully attended to. It was late, and I returned. A few hours had passed since the event, and I was sitting alone at the piano. Fancy bore me back to my last appearance at San-Carlo, where a mad and infatuated public had bade me so enthusiastic an adieu. While all that crowd had eyes, for him alone I wished to be beautiful--for him alone to be worthy of the admiration I excited. Dreaming this, my fingers run over the keys, and joining my voice to the instrument, I sang almost unconsciously that touching air in which I had been so much applauded. My song was at first low and half-whispered, but gradually increased in power. I thought I spoke to him, and that his eyes were fixed on mine. At last I paused, pale with surprise, joy and terror. In the glass before me I saw Count Monte-Leone."

The memory of this event was so distinct and exciting, that the Duchess paused and looked around for the apparition which had caused her such keen emotion. Then, as if she delighted to place the knife in the wound, she took up the manuscript, and continued:--

"'Excuse me, Madame,' said the Count, 'for having thus introduced myself into your house; but I am come to thank you for the cares I have received in your name.'

"'You--you here?' said I, yet doubting my eyes. 'Is it a dream or vision? Speak, speak once more, that, I may be sure I do not dream.'

"'Felina,' said he, in a tone full of melancholy, 'I know not why our fate should thus constantly bring us together. But one might think, that still faithful to your old oath, you continue the providence you used to be to me. When a few months since, after the wreck of all my hopes of happiness, after having been misconceived by those for whom I had done so much, when sad and desperate, I cursed my egotistical and cold career, you appeared to me in the Church of Ferentino and cast on me, in the face of your marriage vows, one of those deep-loving looks which cheer the heart and attach it to life. And when on the lake, exhausted with fatigue and ready to yield under the struggle necessary to avert my threatened fate, you again came to my relief. You see, then,' continued he, smiling sadly, 'that in becoming the good angel of the Duke of Palma, you do not cease to be mine.'

"Never had the Count spoken thus to me. He had always been cold, and seemed most unwillingly to acknowledge the services I had rendered him. I had never received an affectionate word from his mouth before. He saw the trouble he gave me, and taking my hand, said, with a voice full of sensibility, 'Are you happy?' At this question, it seemed as if my heart would break, and I burst into tears.

"'Felina,' said he, 'why do you weep? what is the meaning of this?'

"'Do not question me,' said I. 'Let me keep the cause of those tears a secret, for you can neither dry up nor understand them. Tell me though about yourself, said I. Tell me of your marriage.'

"Monte-Leone grew pale, and said, 'I am not married, I am free.'

"I could not repress a feeling of joy.

"'Ah!' said he, bitterly, 'Do you enjoy my misfortune?'

"This word restored me to my _sang-froid_. I became more calm, and questioned him. The Count told me all.

"For many months, he had travelled and returned to Europe to arrange some pecuniary matters previous to his return to France, where he purposed to remain. Passing by _la Tremezzina_, he learned, indirectly, that certain malevolent reports had been circulated in relation to him by the brothers of the powerful association, of which he had been the chief. A venta was to meet on the opposite shore of Lake Como. Taking a rude costume--he had gone thither, for the purpose of protesting against the perfidious insinuations of his enemies. Afraid, however, of being watched by some agent of his enemies, he resolved to cross the lake alone and at night. Thus he became so near being lost. The Count wished to leave me that night, for he was aware of the absence of the Duke of Palma, and was afraid of compromising me. I, however, retained him for several days in the villa, for the purpose of throwing off the vigilance of his enemies. Alas! how have I regretted those days, the only happy ones of my life. How rapidly they passed away! The Count knew the mystery I wished to hide from him. He read it in my soul, the only thought of which he long had been. He knew why I had married, what tears and sorrow I had known, and what anguish it had caused me. Touched by this vast sacrifice, understanding the extent of my love, I saw the ice of his heart gradually begin to melt. But as his heart warmed to mine, a secret terror took possession of me. Tasting all the joy of seeing arise in the heart of the Count, sentiments which, when I was free I could not have heard without pride and satisfaction, I trembled at the idea of being able to listen to them only with crime. Soon it was I who besought the Count to fly--to leave me--to see me no more. Strange, however, is the human heart; the passion of Monte-Leone seemed to feed on my opposition. He forgot the past, he could not realize it to have existed.

"Sitting by my side during the long days, beneath the flowery bowers of the villa, the Count, as he said, saw through the darkness in which he had been enveloped--his eyes recovered their vision, and at last I appeared to him, for the first time, the most charming, the most adorable of women. Never was there a more eloquent tenderness than his--and to me who lived for him alone--whose image was ever before me, who had loved him in spite of his coldness and indifference, almost his contempt, to me he used this language of entreaty.... Yet he did so to a woman who loved him. A month passed in this cruel contest of love and duty. The contest was not equal, and passion triumphed. The Count had left the villa, but was concealed in the vicinity, and I saw him every day become more tender and affectionate. One must have suffered as I have to understand the intoxication of my happiness. To be loved by him had never seemed possible; and to possess this life-dream, to read in his looks a passion I alone had experienced hitherto, was a veil, thin indeed, but this prevented me from discerning how great was my fault. If it did become known to me, I loved it; for in my delirium I thought that I gave to this man a heart which belonged to him, and a person of which, in defiance of his rights, another was possessed. The other though, whom I doubly injured by this thought, had given me truly, loyally, and nobly, his heart, his rank, his name. So completely, however, was I led astray, that I censured the Duke for this very generosity. Sometimes, however, my life of love had its sorrows. The Count would be sad, and in his moments of melancholy, forgot my presence, and spoke slightingly on the volatility of women and of their caprices. I used to look at him with surprise, and seek to discover his secret thoughts. One day it was revealed to me.

"'When women are young,' said he, 'they suffer themselves to be led away by brilliant exterior, and by that studied gallantry of which the French make such a display.' A few words full of venom escaped him involuntarily in relation to a rival that she whom he _had_ loved preferred to him. So shocked was I, that I asked him, if ill-humor at his repulse alone had led him to my feet. Without knowing how he had done so, the Count saw he had wounded me, and by increased care and tenderness lulled a suspicion which ultimately was to rise in all its power and agony.

"One day, we were to separate. The Count was obliged to go to Naples, where he was impatiently waited for. My despair at this intelligence was terrible. How could I leave this sweet happiness which had grown around me in two months! It seemed above my power and ability. Nothing seemed to influence the Count. I knew him well, and was aware that he never yielded. I soon ceased to contend, and he left me--not, however, without the tenderest oaths of constancy. 'We will soon meet again,' he remarked, 'and in Paris: in that vast city where mystery is so easy, and where secret love finds an impenetrable shelter, we will reside--you still as beautiful, I devoted as ever.'"

This was the end of the manuscript.

"Vain promises," said La Felina, crushing the papers in her hands. "I wished to read these pages once more. I wrote them after he had gone, and they are the history of my fleeting happiness. I wished to be satisfied that I had been happy. I doubt it sometimes, for during the three months the Count has been here, I see him every day resume more and more his old coldness to me. Formerly, I could reproach myself with nothing. I had betrayed no one; and he, in his disdain, had violated no promise. Now, though, he has created eternal remorse and regret. He has revived in my heart a flame which was nearly out--yet has nothing but indifference and contempt for me. He forgets, though, how dangerous it is to offend an Italian woman. He has forgotten what he read in my letter to his friend: 'Had I been to the Count but an ordinary woman, the charms of whom would have fixed him for a time, but whom he would repudiate as he has his other conquests, _I would have killed him_.'"

VII.--DOCTOR MATHEUS.

At the time we write of, there was in _la rue Babylonne_, near the faubourg Saint-Germain, an old house, the owner of which was really to be pitied. In consequence of a kind of fate which overhung this house, no room had been occupied for many years, and the persons who went thither in search of room, terrified at their sombre air, heard, subsequently, such stories of what had happened within its walls, took good care not to take up their abode there, even if they had given the _denier-à-Dieu_, an important matter in Paris, and a kind of bargain between the lodger and landlord, made in the presence of the porter, who is the notary, witness, and depository of the contract. If, however, any quiet family, led astray by the retirement of the house, established themselves in it, the servants soon heard such stories from their neighbors in No. 15, that they lived in perpetual terror--madame grew pale, and as often as monsieur sang louder than usual, or came in without noise, had nervous attacks. The unfortunate lodgers, menaced by jaundice or some other bilious complaint, in consequence of the repeated emotions to which they were subjected, were anxious always to go, even under the penalty of indemnifying the landlord. The latter saw himself again forced to submit to the reign of solitude in the old halls, which were gilt and painted _à la Louis XV._, and saw the mildew and dust again rest on the windows and cells, as soon as the fires ceased to burn; not even the presence of a trunk, belonging to a chance sojourner in this desert isle, relieved the landlord from apprehensions of the recurrence of his old calamity. The Crusoe of this desert island had declared that he had rather pay the lodging three, six, or nine-fold, than live in such proximity with the miserable ideas which the house suggested. True, the Crusoe was an Englishman, predisposed to the _spleen_, and the sadness of his abode would soon have led him to augment by a new scene the dramas which had already happened in this house. The landlord, afraid that he would do so, hurried to conclude matters as soon as possible with the islander.

The following was the reason of the bad repute of No. 13:

A man had hung himself there for love. This was a horrid story, but it was not the whole drama. Three years after, two very old men, who were very rich, and said to be retired merchants, were found stifled beneath their mattress, and the criminal was never found out. The people of the quartier, however, knew all about it, and said who was the murderer. They maintained it was the old suicide, the shadow of whom was ill at ease, and had a mortal aversion to any one who disagreed with him about a suitable and pleasant residence.

Yet for some time No. 13 had looked like all the other houses in the vicinity. People went in and came out, just as if it had been the domicile of no ghost. The knocker on the door was often heard, and when the porter opened his door, a little flower-garden was seen, with various horticultural treasures, expanding beneath the spring sun.

At length a lodger was found, a very godsend to No. 13, whose lofty reason was superior to all the fables told of the house, and, by his presence defended it from the calumny which had been circulated about it; not by words but deeds, for he lived there, and was neither hung nor stifled, like the old merchants, who had several very evil disposed nephews, and who, to say the least, assisted the man that was hung in procuring the rich inheritance for them. This house had a large ground-floor, and many handsome rooms on the first story. The second story was very expensive, having previously been the _studio_ of a painter, but which had been appropriated by the new lodger to an object which we will describe by and by. We will not attempt a description of this new lodger, but will introduce to our readers one more competent to do it. This person is Mlle. Celestine Crepineau, an old maid between thirty-seven and forty-nine years of age. She was tall and thin, and had all her life rejoiced at this, for she had a form three fingers in diameter. True, a broomstick can be grasped between the thumb and index finger, and yet is not very graceful. Let not any one think, though, in spite of this infantine vanity, that Mlle. Crepineau was of those virgins whom the Bible condemns _as foolish about their beauty_. She was a prudent honest-minded girl, the heart of whom if it ever spoke, did so in such low terms, that no one ever heard it. Mademoiselle Celestine's virtue was a proverb. Mothers in all that part of the town spoke of her as a model of prudence, and fathers pointed her out to their sons as a warning against the passions of youth. Without father or mother, from her very childhood Mlle. Crepeneau had no protector but her god-father, an old lawyer, who owned No. 13 of Babylonne-street. The worthy lawyer had provided for the youth of Mlle. Celestine, and had long intrusted her with the control of his kitchen: discovering, however, how little talent his god-daughter had for the art of _Cussy_ and _Brillot-Savarin_, and wishing to provide an honorable and comfortable home for her, he removed her from the charge of her personal to that of his real property. We will see how fully Mlle. Celestine justified the esteem of her god-father: with what martial courage she took possession of this kingdom of shadows; and how, after sprinkling the whole house with holy water and hung a bough of a blessed tree, she had declared that this asylum, thus purified, henceforth would be unapproachable to the man who had been hung.

The fact is, for three years, neither the suicide nor any one else had violated this sanctuary of virtue. But Mlle. Celestine was not only a virtuous and sensible woman, but a woman of eloquence. Nothing could be more attractive than the harangues she made use of to induce lodgers to occupy her rooms. Honey flowed from her mouth, and many persons were led away by the siren's song. But generally they soon became terrified and fled from the terrors which besieged them. Mlle. Celestine Crepeneau therefore could not praise her new lodger too highly. "What a charming man," said she to her neighbors in 11 and 51, the porters of which looked on her as an oracle. "Doctor Matheus is an angel, pure as those of Paradise. God forgive me for saying so, for I think he is handsomer than they, with his magnificent whiskers and moustache. I do not see why angels do not wear them! I am sure they are very becoming. Besides, he is so kind to other people. Only the other day he wished to set _Tamburin's_ leg, which some Jacobin had broken." In Mlle. Crepeneau's mind, a Jacobin was capable of any thing. "And what a magnificent room he has! how beautiful: all full of noble skeletons, Jacobins' heads, and books enough to fill all the Place Louis XV. He has also a fine practice, and patients of every kind coming on horseback, in carriages, on foot, and in wooden shoes. He refuses no one, and cures every body--even _Tamburin_. The poor animal is very fond of him, never barking when he passes, but wagging his tail as if he knew his physician. I alone attend to Doctor Matheus," continued Mlle. Crepeneau, "and I flatter myself he is well waited on. He has a great deal of trouble, too, especially on his consultation days. One would think then all Paris met at his house. He is a brave man, and is not afraid of ghosts! Yet he said the other day, 'I have killed so many people that one more would run me mad.'"

Yet while Mlle. Crepineau was thus prodigal of her praises, in front of No. 13, her lodger, as she called him, was in the third story of the house, and was shut up in his room engaged in the strangest manner. The studio had preserved nothing of its original destination but its name. Instead of pictures, plaster casts, statuettes, and manikins, the table was covered with manuscripts, books, pamphlets, and loose papers; on this battle-field, where science, art and politics seemed to contend together, stood a noble Japan vase from which arose a noble bouquet of white camelias--above this hung the portrait of a protestant preacher.

Doctor Matheus, as Mlle. Celestine had said, was young and handsome. He had luxuriant fair hair, hanging in clusters around his face and falling on his shoulders, so as to give a seraphic air to his face, very well calculated to touch the heart of pious Celestine. In his mild blue eyes, however, there was an expression of will, decision and daring which strangely contrasted with the rest of his face. The Doctor was tall and elegantly formed, and wore at home the costume yet popular at Leipsig, Gottingen and Heidelberg, a doublet of velvet and a kind of cap surmounted by a plume. He had suppressed the plume. This is exactly the costume of Karl de Moor in Schiller's robber; and in 1847 we saw the pupils of those venerable universities strolling through the streets of the German capitals in this very theatrical costume, precisely that of Wilhelm Meister's actors when they met Mignon on the Ingolstadt road just after their unfortunate representation of Hamlet. The Doctor, we have said, was strangely engaged. He leaned over a vast chart of Europe, extended before him like a body waiting for the knife of the anatomist. His eyes were expanded, his brow flushed, and from time to time he stuck black pins into this chart, and whenever he did so consulted the manuscripts which he held in his hand. When he had inserted the last pin, he arose, and with a cry of joy looked around like a conqueror; as great men are wont to survey their fields of triumphs. "Europe is ours," said he, "and the world is Europe's." The vaccine of _Carbonarism_ has taken, and courses from vein to vein, to the very noblest portion of the social body. It has reached and taken possession of the heart. The old man is dead and a new being is about to be born. Better still, Lazarus, regenerated, is about to burst from the tomb.

Afraid to yield to a false hope, trembling lest he should be deceived in his calculations, the Doctor leaned again over his chart, and began to compute the black pins which, like a mourning cloak, covered the map of Europe. And indeed the terrible monster he had named was a pall thrown over the happiness of the people of the world. The idealists and ambitious men who sought to extend it were the murderers of all prosperity. A Gothic clock which leaned against the wall struck eleven. The features of the Doctor at once changed their expression, and infinite grief replaced the enthusiasm which pervaded them. He hurried to a low window of his cabinet, and pushing aside the curtain, looked anxiously into a garden which was behind the house he dwelt in, and from which he was separated only by the _parterre_ of which we have spoken before. This garden belonged to a magnificent hotel in the street of Verennes. A large portal decked with flower vases led to rooms on the ground-floor. This door was just then opened and a beautiful girl hurried past, when the Doctor went to the window of his cabinet. The young girl walked down an alley well lighted; she seemed to seek for the generous heat of the sun, and turned toward it like a true Heliotrope. She seemed to take no care of her complexion, for her head was scarcely covered by a straw-hat which could not avert the heat. A thin dress of embroidered muslin with short sleeves displayed her arms, and a blue sash surrounded her thin and delicate form. She gathered a few flowers, and cut away a few bad branches of the rose-trees with an elegant English pruning-knife. Then after having passed two or three times up and down the alley in front of the portal, she put her hand to her brow as if to make a visor to shield her eyes from the burning rays of the sun. Just in front of her was the window--the curtain of which Doctor Matheus had drawn aside, and there he stood more beautiful and radiant than ever. The young girl blushed slightly and looked hastily away, for the sun probably appeared too bright just then. The Doctor seemed fascinated by what he had seen, and we cannot say how long his ecstasy continued. At last a well-known voice exclaimed on the other side of the door, which was closed even to Mlle. Celestine Crepineau, "Doctor--you are wanted in the parlor. A gentleman--a patient. He has given me his card to bring you."

"Very well," said the Doctor, "I am coming."

"But, sir, if you will open the door I will give you his card."

"Keep it," said the Doctor, "as I am coming down and do not need it."

"Yet," said the inquisitive porteress.--"Monsieur may wish to know the name in advance."

"I do not," said the Doctor, "and hope Mlle. Crepineau that you will go away."

"My God!" said Mlle. Celestine, terrified at the Doctor's manner. "What is the matter with my new lodger? Why will he not let me enter his cabinet? Perhaps though he is cutting up some human body, and has respect for my sex."

The Doctor left his room, and locked the door carefully; putting the key in his pocket, he went down. When he entered the room he was amazed to see who was waiting for him.

"The Duke d'Harcourt here!" said he, bowing respectfully to his visitor.

The Duke said, "My visit should not surprise you, for I came, after all, only to thank you for your services to my dear Marie."

"Duke," said Doctor Matheus, "your benevolent reception, when I had the honor to be presented to you, has converted a duty into a pleasure. The natural interest," added he, with profound emotion, "with which your daughter inspires all who see her, would make me most proud of her cure."

"Doctor," said the Duke, looking most earnestly at the physician, "you inspire me with a confidence I have had in none of your brethren. Your reply, therefore, to my question, I shall look on as a sentence. Do not fear to be frank, Doctor, for I am prepared for every misfortune; already crushed by my sufferings, my heart looks forward to no earthly happiness. The lives of my two surviving children are the objects of my own life, but uncertainty is too much for me. Reply therefore, I beg you, sincerely to me whether the life of my child is in danger."

"Duke," said Doctor Matheus, "the hand of God is more powerful than that of science.--HE often strikes down the strong, and preserves the weak, so that none here can tell when to expect his blows. I can, however, assure you on my honor, that your daughter, delicate as she is, at this time has not even a germ of the terrible malady which has ravaged your hearth. This germ is always in the blood of members of the same family. Art establishes this, though it can provide no remedy.--This secret enemy, however," said the physician, with a kind of pride, "before which all known remedies are powerless, I can perhaps oppose and conquer."

"Tell me, Doctor, tell me!" said the Duke, clasping the Doctor's hands, "save my child, grant her life, and my fortune is yours."

"Duke," said Matheus, "if I had the honor of a better acquaintance with you, I would not listen to such language as you have used.--Gold has little value in my eyes, and reputation no more, for I do not place my hopes for the future in my profession. Since, however, study has revealed to me the art of assisting those who suffer, and of saving those who are in danger, I would esteem it a crime not to do so; and I promise this art shall be employed in the cure of Mlle. d'Harcourt.

"And," said the Duke, "will this be a secret to me?"

"No, Duke; I will use it in your presence. I will also own that I have already made use of it, though but slightly, in the case of Mlle. d'Harcourt; what I have done, satisfies me that I may hope to see her completely restored."

"It is true;" said the Duke. "The interview and the simple remedies you prescribed, have sufficed to soothe the sufferings of my daughter. Ah! Monsieur," added he, clasping the Doctor's hand kindly, "how can I discharge my obligations towards you?"

"By granting me a boon, invaluable to me, and which all Paris will envy, and of which I know you are prodigal indeed, your esteem--the respect of the Duke d'Harcourt--the most honorable and virtuous of men. You see, Monsieur, I place a great value on my consultations; and few persons have received so noble a recompense from you."

"Doctor," said the Duke d'Harcourt, with a smile, "in that case you are already paid; for I know all that you do in Paris, and especially in this neighborhood. I know that want meets here with a better reception than opulence, and that you look on all sufferers as having an equal claim on your attention. You must be aware, that knowing this I have already given you all you ask."

"Well, then," said the Doctor, "let me continue to have your respect, and we shall be equal."

Just then Mlle. Celestine Crepineau knocked at the door.

"Come in," said Doctor Matheus.

"Sir, there are in the reception-room an English Milord, and two miserable creatures waiting to see you."

"Who are the latter?"

"One is an Auvergnat, very badly dressed, with a bandage over his eye, who has already been here once or twice."

Doctor Matheus seemed annoyed, and turned away lest the Duke should observe it.

"The other is a peasant from the environs, who has a handkerchief over his face as if he _enjoyed a fluxion_."

"I will go," said the Duke, "for your visitors are impatient, and sorrow should not wait. I will give place to Milord."

"Mademoiselle," said the Doctor, "show in the poor wretches."

"Very well," said the Duke, "the poor before the rich, I expected that." Bowing kindly to the Doctor, the old nobleman left.

As he passed through the reception room, he saw the Doctor's visitors, each of whom looked towards him. The _Milord_ rushed towards a window, which luckily was closed. The other two were introduced to the Doctor's room. No sooner were they there, than the one threw off his handkerchief, and the Auvergnat his bandage. The Doctor gave them his hand and exclaimed, "MONTE-LEONE! Taddeo."

"And here, too, am I," said the Milord, entering the room and throwing aside his red wig and burning whiskers.

"D'Harcourt, too"--said the Doctor, hurrying to meet the new comer--and then closing the curtains, "Here we all are," said he.

"Yes, dear Von Apsbury," said the Count, embracing him. "_The Pulcinelli of the Etruscan villa are again united._"

* * * * *

Dr. Franklin's father had seventeen children. He was the fifteenth. He says in his autobiography, that his father died at the age of eighty-nine, and his mother at the age of eighty-five, and that neither were ever known to have any sickness except that of which they died.

FOOTNOTES:

[H] Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1850, by Stringer & Townsend, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New-York.

From Fraser's Magazine.

LIFE AT A WATERING PLACE.

THE DOG OF ALCIBIADES.

BY C. ASTOR BRISTED.

We left Tom Edwards mysteriously swallowed up, like a stage ghost down a trap-door. And do you know, reader, I am very near leaving him so for good and all, and suspending these sketches indefinitely,--yea, even to the time of the Mississippi dividends, or any other period beyond the Greek Calends that your imagination can conjure up. For the wise men--and the wise women, too--of Gotham are wroth with me, and one says that I am writing on purpose to libel this man or puff that woman, and another charges me with sketching my own life in _Fraser_, for self-glorification, and a third holds up the last number of _Pendennis_ at me and says, "If you could write like _that_, there would be some excuse for you, but you won't as long as you live." "Alas, no!" said I, and was just going to burn my unfinished papers, and vow that I would never again turn aside from my old craft of reviewing. But then came reflection in the shape of a bottle of true Dutch courage--genuine Knickerbocker Madeira--and said, "Why should you be responsible for resemblances you never meant, if people will insist on finding them? Consider how prone readers, and still more hearers who take their reading at second-hand, are to suppose that the author, be he great or small, must have represented himself in some one of his personages." True enough, Mr. Bottle; for instance, any one of our fashionables will tell you that "our _spirituel_ and accomplished friend" (as Slingsby calls him), M. Le Vicomte Vincent Le Roi, is the hero of his thrilling romance, _Le Chevalier Bazalion_--why they should, or what possible resemblance they can find between the real man in New-York, and the ideal one in the novel, it passeth my poor understanding to discover. Bazalion is a stalwart six-footer, who goes about knocking people's brains out, scaling inaccessible precipices, defending castles single-handed against a regiment or two, and, by way of relaxation after this hard work, victimizing all the fair dames and blooming damsels that come in his way--breaking the hearts of all the women when he has broken the heads of all the men. Le Roi is a nice gentlemanly man, of the ordinary size, who sings prettily and talks well, and makes himself generally agreeable, and not at all dangerous in society--much the more Christian and laudable occupation, it seems to me. If ever he does bore you, it is with his long stories, not with a long pike as Bazalion used to do. Be the absurdity, then, on the head of him who makes it; _Qui vult decipi decipiatur_: if any one chooses to think that I am bodied forth under the character of Harry Benson, and am, in consequence, a handsome young man, who can do a little of every thing instead of----but never mind what; your actor has not yet sufficient standing to come down before the footlights, and have his little bit of private chaff with the audience. Only this will I say, so help me N. P. Willis, I mean to go on with these sketches till they are finished, provided always that _Fraser_ will take them so long and that you continue to read them, or fall into a sweet and soothing slumber over them, as the case may be. For if we are all to shut up shop until we can write as well as Mr. Titmarsh, there will be too extensive a bankruptcy of literary establishments.

Before Ashburner could form any conjecture to account for the evanishment of Edwards--indeed before he could altogether realize it to himself--the little man's head reappeared above the ground, though there were no signs of his horse; and at the same time Benson began to ride round the scene of the catastrophe, at an easy canter, laughing immoderately. The Englishman shook up his brute into the best gallop he could get out of him, and a few more strides brought him near enough to see the true state of things. There was a marsh at no great distance, which rendered the grass in the immediate vicinity moist and sloppy, and just in this particular spot the action of the water had caved away a hole precisely large enough to receive a horse and rider--it could hardly have made a more accurate grave had they been measured for it--and so marked by a slight elevation in front, that it was ten to one any person riding over the ground at such a rate, and unacquainted with the position of this trap, but must fall headlong into it, as Edwards had done. There was some reason to suspect that our friend Harry, who was an habitual rider, and knew all the environs of Oldport pretty well, and was fonder of short cuts and going over grass than most American horsemen are, had not been altogether ignorant of the existence of the pitfall; it looked very much as if he had led Edwards, who was no particular friend of his, purposely into it: but if such was the case, he kept his own counsel. When the fallen man and mare had scrambled out of the hole, which they did before Benson had offered to help them, or Ashburner had time to be of any assistance, it appeared that she had sprained her off foreankle, and he his nigh wrist. But they were close to the main road; by good luck a boy was found to conduct the animal home, and by a still greater piece of good luck the Robinsons' carriage happened to be coming along just then, so the little man, who did not take up much room, was popped into it, and as much pitied and mourned over by the lady occupants as was _père Guilleri_ in the French song. And, to do him justice, even without this consolation, he had taken his mishap very quietly from the first, as soon as he found himself not injured in any vital, _i. e._ dancing part.

Having finished their road at a more leisurely pace, our two horsemen arrived at the glen after most of the company were assembled there. And as the place was one of general resort, they noticed traces of other parties, people of the Simpson class, hail-fellow-well-met men, who didn't dance but took it out in drinking, and who in their intercourse with the other sex, betrayed more vulgar familiarity and less refined indecency than characterized the men and boys of White, Edwards, Robinson, and Co.'s set. But of these it may be supposed that the set took no heed. There was some really pretty scenery about the glen, but they took no heed of that either--to be sure, most of them had seen it at least once before. They had gone straight to the largest parlor of the house, and led, as usual, by the indefatigable Edwards, had begun their tricks with the chairs. Booted and spurred as he was, and with his arm in a sling, the ever-ready youth had already arranged the German cotillion, taking the head himself, and constituting Sumner his second in command. Benson was left out of this dance for coming too late, one of the ladies told him; but he did not find the punishment very severe, as he rather preferred walking with Ashburner, and showing him the adjacent woods. As they passed out through several specimens of the Simpson species, who were smoking and lounging around the door, Ashburner nearly ran over a very pretty young woman who was coming up the steps. She was rather rustically, but not unbecomingly dressed, and altogether so fresh and rosy that it was a treat to see her after the fine town ladies, even the youngest of whom were beginning to look faded and jaded from the dissipation of the season. But when she opened her mouth in reply to Benson's affable salutation, it was like the girl in the fairy tale dropping toads and adders, so nasal, harsh, and inharmonious was the tone in which she spoke.

"That's Mrs. Simpson," said Harry, as they went on, "the Bird's wife. Pretty little woman: what a pity she has that vulgar accent! She belongs to New England originally; one finds many such girls here, every way charming until they begin to talk. But I suppose you saw no difference between her and any of us. In your ears we all speak with a barbarous accent--at least you feel bound to think so."

"What do you think yourself? You have known a good many of my countrymen, and heard them talk, and are able to make the comparison. Do you, or do you not, find a difference?"

"To say the truth, I do; it is a thing I never think seriously of denying, for it seems to me neither singular nor to be ashamed of. You can tell an Irishman from a Londoner by his accent; so you can a Scotchman; or a Yorkshireman for that matter: why should you not be able to tell an American? The error of your countrymen consists in attributing to all our people the nasal twang, which is almost peculiar to one section of the country. If I were asked the peculiar characteristic of a New-Yorker's speech, I should say _monotone_. Notice any one of our young men--you will find his conversational voice pitched in the same key. Sumner goes on at the same uniform growl, Edwards in an unvaried buzz. When I first landed in England, I was struck with the much greater variety of tone one hears in ordinary conversation. Your women, especially, seemed to me always just going to sing. And I fancied the address of the men affected--just as, very likely, this monotone of ours seems affected to you."

"What I remark most is a hardness and dryness of voice, as if the extremes of climate here had an injurious effect on the vocal organs."

"Perhaps they do; and yet I think you will find a better average of singers, male and female, in our society than in yours, notwithstanding our fashionables are so engrossed by dancing. Holla! here's Harrison. How are you, old fellow? and how are the Texas Inconvertibles?"

It was indeed the broker, wandering moodily alone. What had he in common with the rest of the company--the fops and flirts, the dancing men and dancing women? The males all snubbed and despised him, from tall White down to little Robinson; the women were hardly conscious of his existence. He knew, too, that he could thrash any man there in a fair stand-up fight, or buy out any three of them, ay, or talk any of them down in the society of sensible and learned people; and this very consciousness of superiority only served to embitter his position the more. There were other sets, doubtless, who would have welcomed him gladly, but either they were not sufficiently to his taste to attract him, or he was in no mood to receive consolation from their sympathy. So he had wandered alone, untouched by the charming scenery about him--a man whom nobody cared for; and when Benson addressed him genially, and in an exuberance of spirits threw his arm over the other's neck as they walked side by side, the broker's heart seemed to expand towards the man who had shown him even this slight profession of kindness, his intelligent eyes lighted up, and he began to talk out cheerfully and unassumingly all that was in him.

Harrison's own narrative of his personal prowess, as well as the qualified panegyric pronounced upon him by Benson, had led Ashburner to expect to find in him a manly person with some turn for athletic sports and good living, but no particular intellectual endowments beyond such as his business demanded. He was, therefore, not a little astonished at (inasmuch as he was altogether unprepared for) the variety of knowledge and the extent of mental cultivation which the broker displayed as their conversation went on. They talked of the hills and valleys, and ravines and water-courses around them, and Harrison compared this place with others in a way that showed a ready observer of the beauties of nature. They talked of Italy, and Harrison had at his fingers' ends the principal palaces in every city, and the best pictures in every palace. They talked of Greece, and Harrison quoted Plato. They talked of England and France, and Harrison displayed a familiar acquaintance, not merely with the statistics of the two countries, but also with the habits and characteristics of their people. Finally, they talked on the puzzling topic of American society--puzzling in its transition state and its singular contrasts--and, whether the broker's views were correct or not, they were any thing but commonplace or conventional.

"Our fashionable society has been all a mistake hitherto," said Harry (Ashburner could not well make out whether there was a spice of irony in his observation); "Mrs. Benson and some others are going to reform it indifferently. The women thus far have been lost sight of after marriage, and have left the field to the young girls. Now they are beginning to wake up to their rights and privileges."

"They will not remedy any of the present evils in that way," answered Harrison, apparently addressing himself to Ashburner, but he seemed to be talking at Benson and through him at Benson's wife, or his own, or both of them. "Our theory and practice was that a young girl should enjoy herself in all freedom; that her age and condition were those of pleasure and frolic--of dissipation, if you will--that after her marriage she, comparatively speaking, retired from the world, not through any conventional rule or imaginary standard of propriety, but of her own free will, and in the natural course of things; because the cares of maternity and her household gave her sufficient employment at home. A woman who takes a proper interest in her family gives them the first place in her thoughts, and is always ready to talk about them. Now these domestic details are the greatest possible bore to a mere fashionable casual drawing-room acquaintance. Hence you see that the French, whose chief aim is to talk well in a drawing-room or an opera box, utterly detest and unmercifully ridicule every thing connected with domesticity or home life. On the other hand, if a married woman never talks of these things or lets you think of them, she does not take a proper interest in her family. No, the fault of youth is with the other sex. There are too few men about, and too many boys. And the more married belles there are the more will the boys be encouraged. For your married belles like to have men about them younger than themselves--it makes them appear younger, or at least they think so; and besides, such youths are more easily managed and more subservient. But, still worse, the more these boys usurp the place of men in society, the more boyish and retrograde will the few men become who continue to divide the honors of society with them. When Plato enumerated among the signs of a republic in the last stage of decadence, that the youth imitate and rival old men, and the old men let themselves down to a level with the youth, he anticipated exactly the state of things that has come to pass among us. Look at that little friend of yours with the beard--I don't mean Edwards, but an older man about his size."

"Dicky Bleecker, I suppose you mean," growled Benson: "he's as much your friend--or your wife's--as he is mine."

"Well, he is my contemporary, I may say; perhaps five years at most my junior. What perceptible sign of mature age or manliness is there about him? In what is he superior to or distinguishable from young Snelling, who but this season rejoices in his first white tie and first horse, and in the fruits of his first course of dancing lessons?"

"Well, but consider," said Benson, who was always ready to take up any side of an argument--it was one of the first criticisms Ashburner made on American conversation, that the men seemed to talk for victory rather than for truth--"it stands to reason, that an intelligent married woman must be better able than a girl to converse with a mature man, and her conversation must have more attraction for him. As to our boys coming out too soon, doubtless they do, but that depends not on the persons ready to receive them, but on the general social system of the country which pushes them into the world so early. For instance, I was left my own master at twenty-one. So, too, with the want of proper progress and growth in knowledge of the men. It is and must be so with the man of fashion every where, for he is not occupied in learning things that have a tendency to develop or improve his mind, but the contrary. I myself have seen Frenchmen of fifty as easily amused and as eager after trifles as boys."

"Frenchmen?" sneered the other; "yes, but they _are_ boys all their lives, except in innocence."

"Very amusing and pleasant, at any rate; the best people for travelling acquaintances that I know."

"Exactly--very pleasant to know for a little while. I have met with a great many Frenchmen who impressed me favorably, and I used to think as you say, what amusing people they were, but I never had occasion to live with one for any length of time without finding him a bore and a nuisance. A Frenchman turns himself inside out, as it were, at once. He shows off all that there is to show on first acquaintance. You see the best of him immediately, and afterwards there is nothing left but repetitions of the same things, and eternal dissertations on himself and his own affairs. He is like a wide, shallow house, with a splendid front externally, and scanty furniture inside."

"Very true, and an Englishman (don't blush Ashburner) is like a suite of college-rooms in one of his own university towns--a rusty exterior, a dark, narrow passage along which you find your way with difficulty; and when you do get in, jolly and comfortable apartments open suddenly upon you; and as you come to examine them more carefully, you discover all sorts of snug, little, out-of-the-way closets and recesses, full of old books and old wine, and all things rich and curious. But the entrance is uninviting to a casual acquaintance. Now, when you find an American of the right stamp (here Benson's hands were accidentally employed in adjusting his cravat), he hits the proper medium, and is accessible as a Frenchman and as true as an Englishman."

Ashburner was going to express a doubt as to the compatibility of the two qualities, when Harrison struck in again.

"On that account I never could see why Frenchmen should be dreaded as dangerous in society. They fling out all their graces at once, exhaust all their powers of fascination, and soon begin to be tiresome. How many cases I have seen where a Frenchman fancied he was making glorious headway in a lady's affections, and that she was just ready to fall into his arms, when she was only ready to fall asleep in his face, and was civil to him only from a great sacrifice of inclination to politeness!"

"Very pleasant it must be to a lady," said Ashburner, "that a man should be at the same time wearying her to death with his company, and perilling her reputation out of doors by his language."

"By Jove, it's dinner time!" exclaimed Benson, pulling out a microscopic Geneva watch. "I thought the clock of my inner man said as much." And back they hurried through the woods to the Glen House, but were as late for the dinner as they had been for the dance. Harrison and Benson found seats at the lower end of the table, where they established themselves together and began, _à propos_ of Edwards's misadventure, to talk horse, either because they had exhausted all other subjects, or because they did not think the company worthy a better one. Mrs. Benson beckoned Ashburner up to a place by her, but, somehow, he found himself opposite Mrs. Harrison's eyes, and though he could not remember any thing she said ten minutes after, her conversation, or looks, or both, had the effect of transferring to her all the interest he was beginning to feel for her husband--of whom, by the way, she took no more notice than if he had not belonged to her.

"Poor Harrison!" said Benson, as he and Ashburner were walking their horses leisurely homeward that evening (they both had too much sense to ride fast after dinner), "he is twice thrown away! He might have been a literary gentleman and a lover of art, living quietly on a respectable fortune; but his father would make him go into business. He might be a model family man, and at the same time a very entertaining member of society; but his wife has snubbed and suppressed him for her own exaltation. If, instead of treating him thus, she would only show him a little gratitude as the source of all her luxury and magnificence, her dresses and her jewelry, her carriage and horses (what a pair of iron-grays she does drive!), and all her other splendors--if she would only be proud of him as the great broker--not to speak of his varied knowledge, of which she might also well be proud--if she would take some little pains to interest herself in his pleasures and to bring him forward in society--how easily she could correct and soften his little uncouthnesses of person and dress, if she would take the trouble! Why should she be ashamed of him? He is older than she--how much? ten years perhaps, or twelve at most. He is not a beauty; but in a man, I should say, mind, comes before good looks; and how infinitely superior he is in mind and soul to any of the frivolous little beaux, native or foreign, whom she delights to draw about her!"

"I fear I shall never be able to regard Mr. Harrison with as much respect as you do. It may be ignorance, but I never could see much difference between a speculator in stocks and a gambler."

"When a man is in his predicament domestically there are three things, to one, two, or all of which he is pretty sure to take--drink, gambling, and horses. Harrison is too purely intellectual a man to be led away by the vulgar animal temptation of liquor, though he has a good cellar, and sometimes consoles himself with a snug bachelor dinner. Stock-jobbing is, as you say, only another sort of gambling, and this is his vice: at the same time you will consider that it is his business, to which he was brought up. Then, for absolute relaxation, he has his 'fast crab.' Put him behind his 2' 45" stepper and he is happy for an hour or two, and forgets his miseries--that is to say, his wife."

"But you talk as if his marriage was the cause of his speculations, whereas you told me the other day that his speculations were the indirect cause of his marriage."

"You are right: I believe the beginning of that bad habit must be set down to his father's account; but the continuance of it is still chargeable on his wife. I have heard him say myself that he would have retired from business long ago but for Mrs. Harrison--that is to say, he had to go on making money to supply her extravagance."

One fine morning there was a great bustle and flurry; moving of trunks, and paying of bills, and preparations for departure. The fashionables were fairly starved out, and had gone off in a body. The brilliant equipages of Ludlow and Löwenberg, the superfine millinery of the Robinsons, the song and story of the Vicomte, the indefatigable revolutions of Edwards, were all henceforth to be lost to the sojourners at Oldport. Mr. Grabster heeded not this practical protest against the error of his ways. He had no difficulty in filling the vacant rooms, for a crowd of people from all parts of the Union constantly thronged Oldport, attracted by its reputation for coolness and salubrity; and he rather preferred people from the West and South, as they knew less about civilized life, and were more easily imposed upon. To be sure, even they would find out in time the deficiencies of his establishment, and report them at home; but meanwhile he hoped to fill his pockets for two or three seasons under cover of _The Sewer's_ puffs, and then, when business fell off, to impose on his landlord with some plausible story, and obtain a lowering of his rent.

Some few--a very few--of "our set" were left. Our friend Harry stayed, because the air of the place agreed remarkably with the infant hope of the Bensons; and a few of the beaux remained--among them Sumner, White, and Sedley--either out of friendship for Benson, or retained by the attractions of Mrs. Benson, or those of Mrs. Harrison; for the _lionne_ stayed of course, it being her line to do just whatever the exclusives did not do. But though Benson remained, he was not disposed to suffer in silence. All this while _The Sewer_ had been filled with letters lauding every thing about the Bath Hotel; and communications equally disinterested, and couched in the same tone, had found their way into some more respectable prints. Benson undertook the thankless task of undeceiving the public. He sat down one evening and wrote off a spicy epistle to _The Blunder and Bluster_, setting forth how things really were at Oldport. Two days after, when the New-York mail arrived, great was the wrath of Mr. Grabster. He called into council the old gentleman with the melodious daughter, _The Sewer_ reporters, and some other boarders who were in his confidence; and made magnificent, but rather vague promises, of what he would do for the man who should discover the daring individual who had thus bearded him in his very den; simultaneously he wrote to _The Blunder and Bluster_, demanding the name of the offender. With most American editors such a demand (especially if followed up with a good dinner or skilfully-applied tip to the reporter or correspondent) would have been perfectly successful. But he of _The Blunder and Bluster_ was a much higher style of man. As Benson once said of him, he had, in his capacity of the first political journalist in the country, associated so much with gentlemen, that he had learned to be something of a gentleman himself. Accordingly he replied to Mr. Grabster, in a note more curt than courteous, that it was impossible to comply with his request. So the indignant host was obliged to content himself for the time with ordering _The Sewer_ to abuse the incognito. Before many days, however, he obtained the desired information through another source, in this wise.

Oldport had its newspaper, of course. Every American village of more than ten houses has its newspaper. Mr. Cranberry Fuster, who presided over the destinies of _The Oldport Daily Twaddler_, added to this honorable and amiable occupation the equally honorable and amiable one of village attorney. Though his paper was in every sense a small one, he felt and talked as big as if it had been _The Times_, or _The Moniteur_, or _The Blunder and Bluster_. He held the President of the United States as something almost beneath his notice, and was in the habit of lecturing the Czar of Russia, the Emperor of Austria, and other foreign powers, in true Little Pedlington style. Emboldened by the impunity which attended these assaults, he undertook to try his hand on matters nearer home, and boldly essayed one season to write down the polka and redowa as indecent and immoral. But here he found, as Alexander, Napoleon, and other great men, had done before him, that there is a limit to all human power. He might better have tried to write off the roof of the Bath Hotel, which was rather a fragile piece of work, and might have been carried away by much less wind than usually served to distend the columns of _The Twaddler_. The doughty Tom Edwards snapped his heels, so to speak, in the face of the mighty editor, and the exclusives continued to polk more frantically than ever in the teeth of his direst fulminations. One practical effect, however, these home diatribes had, which his luminous sallies on foreign affairs altogether failed to effect--they put money into his pocket. The next thing Americans like to hearing themselves well praised, is to hear somebody, even if it be themselves, well abused; and accordingly, on the mornings when Mr. Fuster let out an anti-polka article, the usually small circulation of his small sheet was multiplied by a very large factor--almost every stranger bought a copy, the million to see the abuse of the fashionables, the fashionables to see the abuse of themselves.

Benson, in the course of his almost annual visits to Oldport Springs, had been frequently amused by the antics of this formidable gentleman, and had laudably contributed to make them generally known. Once, when Mr. Fuster had politely denominated the Austrian emperor "a scoundrel," Harry moved _The Blunder and Bluster_ to say, that it was very sorry for that potentate, who would undoubtedly be overwhelmed with mortification when he learned that _The Twaddler_ entertained such an opinion of him. Whereupon Fuster, who was of a literal dulness absolutely joke-proof, struck off a flaming article on "the aristocratic sympathies" of _The Blunder and Bluster_, which, like a British Whig and Federal journal as it was, always came to the rescue of tyrants and despots, &c. &c. On another occasion--the very morning of a State election--_The Twaddler_ had announced, with a great flourish, "that before its next sheet was issued Mr. Brown would be invested with the highest honors that the State could confer upon him." But even American editors are not always infallible; Mr. Brown came out sadly in the minority, and the day after _The Blunder and Bluster_ had a little corner paragraph to this effect:--

"_We sincerely regret to see that our amusing little contemporary, THE OLDPORT DAILY TWADDLER, has suspended publication_."

At this Mr. Fuster flared up fearfully, and threatened to sue _The Blunder and Bluster_ for libel.

Now this magniloquent editor, who professed to be a great moral reformer at home, and to regulate the destinies of nations abroad, was in truth the mere creature and toady of Mr. Grabster, the greater part of the revenue of his small establishment being derived from printing the bills and advertisements of the Bath Hotel. As in duty bound, therefore, he set to work to abuse the anonymous assailant of that atrociously-kept house, calling him a quantity of heterogeneous names, and more than insinuating that he was a person who had never been in good society, and did not know what good living was, _because_ he found fault with the living at the Bath Hotel. The leader wound up with a more than ever exaggerated eulogy of Mr. Grabster and his "able and gentlemanly assistants." Benson happened to get hold of this number of _The Twaddler_ one evening when he had nothing to do, and those dangerous implements, pen, ink, and paper, were within his reach. Beginning to note down the absurdities and _non sequiturs_ in Mr. Fuster's article, he found himself writing a very chaffy letter to _The Twaddler_. He had an unfortunate talent for correspondence had Benson, like most of his countrymen; so, giving the reins to his whim, he finished the epistle, making it very spicy and satirical, with a garnish of similes and classical quotations--altogether rather a neat piece of work, only it might have been objected to as a waste of cleverness, and building a large wheel to break a very small bug upon. Then he dropped it into the post-office himself, never dreaming that Cranberry would publish it, but merely anticipating the wrath of the little-great man on receiving such a communication. It chanced, however, not long before, that Benson, in the course of some legal proceedings, had been to sign papers, and "take fifty cents' worth of affidavit," as he himself phrased it, before Mr. Fuster in his legal capacity. The latter gentleman had thus the means of identifying by comparison, the handwriting of the pseudonymous letter. In a vast fit of indignation, not unmingled with satisfaction, he brought out next day Harry's letter at full length, to the great peril of the Latin quotations, and then followed it up with a rejoinder of his own, in which he endeavored to take an attitude of sublime dignity, backed up by classical quotations also, to show that he understood Latin as well as Benson. But the attempt was as unsuccessful as it was elaborate, for his anger broke through in every other sentence, making the intended "smasher" an extraordinary compound of superfine writing and vulgar abuse.

When in the course of human events (he began) it becomes necessary for men holding our lofty and responsible position to stoop to the chastisement of pretentious ignorance and imbecility, we shall not be found to shrink from the task. The writer of the above letter is Mr. Henry Benson, a young man of property, and a Federal Whig. He insinuates that we are very stupid. It's no such thing; we are not stupid a bit, and we mean to show Mr. B. as much before we have done with him. Mr. Benson is a pompous young aristocrat, and Mr. Grabster is more of a gentleman than he is--and so are we too for that matter. He says the Bath Hotel is a badly kept house. We say it isn't, and we know a great deal better than he does. We have dined there very often, and found the fare and attendance excellent: and so did the Honorable Theophilus Q. Smith, of Arkansas, last summer, when he came to enjoy the invigorating breezes of this healthful locality. That distinguished and remarkable man expressed himself struck with the arrangements of the Bath Hotel, which left him no cause, he said, to regret the comforts of his western home. But this establishment cannot please the fastidious Mr. Benson! _O tempora, O Moses!_ as Cicero said to Catiline, _quousque tandem_?

And so on for three columns.

Likewise, _The Sewer_, which had begun to blackguard _The Blunder and Bluster's_ correspondent while he remained under the shelter of his pseudonym, now that his name was known, came out with double virulence, and filled half a sheet with filthy abuse of Harry, including collateral assaults on his brother, grandmother, and second cousins, and most of the surviving members of his wife's family. But as Benson never read _The Sewer_, this part of the attack was an utter waste of Billingsgate so far as he was concerned. What did surprise and annoy him was to find that _The Inexpressible_, which, though well-known to be a stupid, was generally considered a decent paper, had taken the enemy's side, and published some very impertinent paragraphs about him. Afterwards he discovered that he had been the victim of a principle. _The Inexpressible_ and _Blunder and Bluster_ had a little private quarrel of their own, and the former felt bound to attack every thing in any way connected with the latter.

Nevertheless Benson was not very much distressed even at this occurrence, for a reason which we shall now give at length, and which will at the same time explain the propriety of the heading we have given to this number. While every body was reading _The Sewer_ and _The Twaddler_, and the more benevolent were pitying Harry for having started such a nest of editorial and other blackguards about his ears, and the more curious were wondering whether he would leave the hotel and resign the field of battle to the enemy, our friend really cared very little about the matter, except so far as he could use it for a blind to divert attention from another affair which he had on hand, and which it was of the greatest importance to keep secret, lest it should draw down the interference of the local authorities: in short, he had a defiance to mortal combat impending over him, which dangerous probability he had brought upon himself in this wise.

Among the beaux who remained after the Hegira of the fashionables was a Mr. Storey Hunter, who had arrived at Oldport only just before that great event, for he professed to be a traveller and travelling man, and, to keep up the character never came to a place when other people did, but always popped up unexpectedly in the middle, or at the end, of a season, as if he had just dropped from the moon, or arrived from the antipodes. He had an affectation of being foreign--not English, or French, or German, or like any particular European nation, but foreign in a general sort of way, something not American; and always, on whichever side of the Atlantic he was, hailed from some locality; at one time describing himself in hotel books as from England, at another as from Paris, at another from Baden--from anywhere, in short, except his own native village in Connecticut. In accordance with this principle, moreover, he carefully eschewed the indigenous habits of dress; and while all the other men appeared at the balls in dress coats, and black or white cravats, he usually displayed a flaming scarlet or blue tie, a short frock coat, and yellow or brown trousers. A man six feet high, and nearly as many round, is a tolerably conspicuous object in most places, even without any marked peculiarities of dress; and when to this it is added, that Mr. Hunter exhibited on his shirt-front and watch-chain trinkets enough to stock a jeweller's shop, and that he was always redolent of the most fashionable perfumes, it may be supposed that he was not likely to escape notice at Oldport. His age no one knew exactly; some of the old stagers gave him forty years and more, but he was in a state of wonderful preservation, had a miraculous dye for his whiskers, and a perpetually fresh color in his cheeks. Sedley used to say he rouged, and that you might see the marks of it inside his collar; but this may have been only an accident in shaving. He rather preferred French to English in conversation; and with good reason, for when he used the former language, you might suppose (with your eyes shut) that you were talking to a very refined gentleman, whereas, so soon as he opened his mouth in the vernacular, the provincial Yankee stood revealed before you. As to his other qualities and merits, he appeared to have plenty of money, and was an excellent and indefatigable dancer. Ashburner, when he saw him spin round morning after morning, and night after night, till he all but melted away himself, and threatened to drown his partner, thought he must have the laudable motive of wishing to reduce his bulk, which, however, continued undiminished. Notwithstanding his travels and accomplishments, which, especially the dancing, were sufficient to give him a passport to the best society, there were some who regarded him with very unfavorable eyes, more particularly Sumner and Benson. Supposing this to be merely another of the frivolous feuds that existed in the place, and among "our set," Ashburner was not over-anxious or curious to know the cause of it. Nor, if he had been, did the parties seem disposed to afford him much information. Benson had, indeed, observed one day, that _that_ Storey Hunter was the greatest blackguard in Oldport, except _The Sewer_ reporters; but as he had already said the same thing of half-a-dozen men, his friend was not deterred thereby from making Hunter's acquaintance--or rather, from accepting it; the difficulty at Oldport being, _not_ to make the acquaintance of any man in society. And he found the fat dandy, to all appearance, an innocent and good-natured person, rather childish for his years, and well illustrating Harrison's assertion, that the men in fashionable life rather retrograded than developed from twenty to forty; but in no apparent respect formidable, save for a more than American tendency to gossip. He had some story to the prejudice of every one, but seemed to tell all these stories just as an _enfant terrible_ might, without fully understanding them, or at all heeding the possible consequences of repeating them.

The glory of the balls had departed with Edwards and the Robinsons, but the remaining fashionables kept up their amusement with much vigor; and the absence of the others, though detracting much from the brilliancy of the place, was in some respects the gain of a loss. White came out in all his glory now that most of the young men were gone. With his graceful figure, neat dress, and ever-ready smile and compliment, he looked the very ideal of the well-drilled man of fashion. Sumner, though he could not have talked less if he had been an English heavy dragoon-officer, or an Hungarian refugee, understanding no language but his own, was very useful for a quiet way he had of arranging every thing beforehand without fuss or delay, and, moreover, had the peculiar merit (difficult to explain, but which we have all observed in some person at some period of our lives) of _being good company without talking_. Benson, with less pretence and display than he had before exhibited, showed an energy and indefatigableness almost equal to Le Roi's; whatever he undertook, he "kept the pot a-boiling." In short, the people of "our set," who were left, went on among themselves much better than before, because the men's capabilities were not limited to dancing, and the women had less temptation to be perpetually dressing. Besides, the removal of most of the fashionables had encouraged the other portions of the transient population to come more forward, and exhibit various primitive specimens of dancing, and other traits worth observing. One evening there was a "hop" at the Bellevue. Ashburner made a point of always looking in at these assemblies for an hour or so, and scrutinizing the company with the coolness and complacency which an Englishman usually assumes in such places, as if all the people there were made merely for his amusement. Benson, who had literally polked the heel off one of his boots, and thereby temporarily disabled himself, was lounging about with him, making observations on men, women, and things generally.

"You wouldn't think that was only a girl of seventeen," said Harry, as a languishing brunette, with large, liquid black eyes, and a voluptuous figure, glided by them in the waltz. "How soon these Southerners develope into women! They beat the Italians even."

"I wonder the young lady has time to grow, she dances so much. I have watched her two or three evenings, and she has never rested a moment except when the music stopped.--Something must suffer, it seems to me. Does her mind develope uniformly with her person? She is a great centre of attraction, I observe; is it only for her beauty and dancing?"

"I suppose a beautiful young woman, with fifty or sixty thousand a year, may consider mental accomplishments as superfluous. She knows, perhaps, as much as a Russian woman of five-and-twenty. How much that is, you, who have been on the Continent, know."

"Ah, an heiress; acres of cotton-fields, thousands of negroes, and so on."

"Exactly. I put the income down at half of what popular report makes it; these southern fortunes are so uncertain: the white part of the property (that is to say, the cotton) varies with the seasons; and the black part takes to itself legs, and runs off occasionally. But, at any rate, there is quite enough to make her a great prize, and an object of admiration and attention to all the little men--not to the old hands, like White and Sumner; they are built up in their own conceit, and wouldn't marry Sam Weller's 'female marchioness,' unless she made love to them first, like one of Knowles's heroines. But the juveniles are crazy about her. Robinson went off more ostentatiously love-sick than a man of his size I ever saw; and Sedley is always chanting her praises--the only man, woman, or child, he was ever known to speak well of. I don't think any of them will catch her. Edwards might dance into her heart, perhaps, if he were a little bigger; but as it is, she will, probably, make happy and rich some one in her own part of the world. She says the young men there suit her better, because they are 'more gentlemanly' than we Northerners."

"I have heard many strangers say the same thing," said Ashburner, prudently refraining from expressing any opinion of his own for he knew Benson's anti-southern feelings.

"If education has any thing to do with being a gentleman, then, whether you take _education_ in the highest sense, as the best discipline and expansion of the mind by classical and scientific study; or in the utilitarian sense, as the acquisition of useful knowledge, and a practical acquaintance with men and things; or in the fine lady sense, as the mastery of airs, and graces, and drawing-room accomplishments; or in the moralist's sense, as the curbing of our mischievous propensities, and the energizing of our good ones--in every case, we are more of gentlemen than the Southerners. If the mere possession of wealth, and progress in the grosser and more material arts of civilization, have any thing to do with it, then, too, we are more of gentlemen. Their claims rest on two grounds: first, they live on the unpaid labor of others, while we all work, more or less, for ourselves, holding idleness as disgraceful as they do labor; secondly, they are all the time fighting duels."

"Are there no duels ever fought in this part of the country?"

"Scarcely any since Burr shot Hamilton. Alexander Hamilton was one of our greatest men, and his death excited a feeling throughout the Northern States which put down the practice almost entirely; and I certainly think it a step forward in real civilization."

"Do you mean to say that it is with you as with us, where, if a man becomes so involved in a quarrel that he is challenged, it is against him and almost ruin to him whether he fights or does not fight? Or is public opinion decidedly in favor of the man who does not fight, and against the man who does? For instance, suppose you were challenged yourself?"

"A man can't say beforehand what he would do in an emergency of the kind; but my impression is that I should not fight, and that the opinion of society would bear me out."

"But suppose a man insulted your wife or sister?"

"It is next door to impossible that an American gentleman should do such a thing; but if he did, I should consider that he had reduced himself to the level of a snob, and should treat him as I would any snob in the streets,--knock him down, if I was able; and if I wasn't, take the law of him: and if a man had wronged me irreparably, I fancy I should do as these uncivilized Southerners themselves do in such a case,--shoot him down in the street, wherever I could catch him. What sense or justice is there in a duel? It is as if a man stole your coat, and instead of having him put into prison, you drew lots with him whether you or he should go."

"But suppose a man was spreading false reports about you; suppose he said you were no gentleman, or that you had cheated somebody?"

"Bah!" replied Benson, dexterously evading the most important part of the question, "if I were to fight all the people that spread false reports about me, I should have my hands full. There is a man in this room that slandered me as grossly as he could four years ago, and was very near breaking off my marriage. That fat man there, with all the jewelry--Storey Hunter."

"Indeed!" exclaimed the other, really surprised, for he had just seen Mrs. Benson conversing with the ponderous exquisite, apparently on most amicable terms.

"Yes, and it was entirely gratuitous. I never gave the scamp any provocation. By Jupiter!" Benson turned very white and then very red, "if he isn't dancing with my wife! His impudence is too much, and----. I believe one of our women would put up with any thing from a man here if he can only dance well. They have no self-respect."

Benson appeared to have very little himself at that moment, and not to care much what he said or did. He trembled all over with rage, and his friend expected to see an immediate outbreak; but, as if recollecting himself, he suddenly stammered out something about the necessity of changing his boots, and limped off accordingly for that purpose. He was not gone more than five minutes, but in that time had contrived not only to supply his pedal deficiency, but also to take a drink by way of calming himself; and after the drink he took a turn with Miss Friskin, and whirled her about the room, till he knocked over two or three innocent bystanders, all of which tended very much to compose his feelings. Ashburner had a presentiment that something would happen, and stayed longer that night than his wont; indeed, till the end of the ball, which, as there was now no German cotillion, lasted till only one in the morning.

But the universal panacea of the polka had its mollifying effect on Benson, and every thing might have passed off quietly but for an unlucky accident. Some of the young Southerners had ordered up sundry bottles of champagne, and were drinking the same in a corner. Hunter, who was much given to toadying Southerners (another reason for Benson's dislike of him), mingled among them, and partook of the inspiring beverage. _In vino veritas_ is true as gospel, if you understand it rightly as meaning that wine develops a man's real nature. Hunter, being by nature gossipy and mendacious, waxed more and more so with every glass of Heidseck he took down. Ashburner chancing to pass near the group, had his attention arrested by hearing Benson's name. He stopped, and listened: Hunter was going on with a prolix and somewhat confused story of some horse that Benson had sold to somebody, in which transaction Sumner was somehow mixed up, and the horse hadn't turned out well, and the purchaser wasn't satisfied, and so on.

"If Benson hear this!" thought Ashburner.

And Benson did hear it very promptly, for Sedley was within ear-shot, and, delighted at having a piece of mischief to communicate, he tracked Harry out at the further extremity of the room, to inform him of the liberties Storey Hunter was taking with his name. Whereupon the slandered one, with all his wrath reawakened, traversed the apartment in time to hear the emphatic peroration that, "bad as Sumner was, Benson was a thousand times worse."

"I can't stand this," exclaimed he. "Where is Frank Sumner?" Sumner was not visible. "Ashburner, will you stand by me if there's a row?"

By this time the ball was breaking up, and Benson, on going back to look for his party, found that Mrs. B., like a true watering-place _belle_, had gone off without waiting for him. This was exactly what he wanted. Keeping his eye on Hunter, he followed him out to the head of the staircase, where he had just been bidding good night to some ladies. No one was in sight but Ashburner, who happened to be standing just outside the door-way. The fat man nodded to Harry as if they had been the best friends in the world.

"Curse his impudence!" exclaimed Benson, now fairly boiling over. "Holloa, you Hunter! did you know you were an infernal scoundrel? Because you are."

"What for?" quoth the individual in question, half sobered and half disconcerted by this unceremonious address.

"And a contemptible blackguard," continued Benson, following up his verbal attack.

"You're another," retorted Hunter.

Ashburner wondered if the two men were going to stand slanging each other all night.

"I ought to have pulled your nose three years ago, and now take that!" and Benson, who had been working at his glove ever since the parley began, twitched it off and slapped Hunter in the face with it.

When an Irishman sees two people fighting, or going to fight, his natural impulse is to urge them on. A Scotchman or an American tries to part them. A Frenchman runs after the armed force. An Englishman does nothing but look quietly on, unless one side meets with foul play. Thus it was with Ashburner in the present instance. He took Benson's request "to stand by him in case of a row," _au pied de la lettre_. He stood by him, and that was all.

As soon as Hunter felt the glove in his face he struck out at Benson, who stopped the blow very neatly, and seemed about to return it with a left-hander; then suddenly changing his style of attack, he rushed within the other's guard, and catching him by the throat with both hands, did his best to strangle him. Hunter, unable to call for help or to loosen the throttling grasp of his assailant, threw himself bodily upon him. As he was about twice Benson's size and weight, the experiment succeeded. Harry was thrown off his feet and precipitated against the banisters, which being of slight material, gave way like so much paper, and both men tumbled over into the landing-place below amid a great scattering of splinters. Lighting on their feet, they began to pummel each other without doing more damage than a couple of children, for they were at such close quarters and so blinded by rage that they hit wild; but Benson had caught his man by the throat again and was just getting him into chancery, when White, Sedley, and some of the Southerners, attracted by the noise, ran down stairs, calling on the "gentlemen" to "behave as such," and words proving ineffectual, endeavoring to pull them apart; which was no easy matter, for Benson hung on like grim death, and when his hand was removed from Hunter's collar, caught him again by the nose, nor would he give up till Mr. Simson, who was one of the stoutest and most active men in the place, caught him up from behind and fairly carried him off to the hall below. Then he seemed to come to himself all at once, and recollected that he had invited the remains of "our set" to supper that night. And accordingly, after taking a rapid survey of himself in a glass, and finding that his face bore no mark of the conflict, and that his dress was not more disordered than a man's usually is when he has been polkaing all the evening, he went off to meet his company, and a very merry time they had of it. Ashburner was surprised to find that the spectators of the fray were able to ignore it so completely. If they had been old men and old soldiers, they could not have acted with more discretion, and it was impossible to suspect from their conversation or manner that any thing unpleasant had occurred. "These people do know how to hold their tongues sometimes," thought he.

Next morning while strolling about before breakfast (he was the earliest riser of the young men in the place, as he did not dance or gamble), he heard firing in the pistol-gallery. He thought of his conversation with Benson and the occurrences of last night, and then recollected that he was out of practice himself, and that there would be no harm in trying a few shots. So he strode over to the gallery, and there, to his astonishment, found on one side of the door the keeper, on the other Frank Sumner (who had given a most devoted proof of friendship by getting up two hours earlier in the morning than he had ever been known to do before); and between them Benson, blazing away at the figure, and swearing at himself for not making better shots.

"Take time by the forelock, you see," said he as he recognized Ashburner. "_Nunquam non paratus_. The fellow will send me a challenge this morning, I suppose, and I want to be ready for him."

"But do you know," said the Englishman, "if after this you should kill your man, we in our country would call it something very like murder?"

"That may be," answered Harry, as he let fly again, this time ringing the bell; "but we only call it practice."

* * * * *

John Adams, in his Diary, states, that out of eight prominent members of the Boston bar in 1763, with whom he was one evening discussing the encroachments of England upon the colonies, only one, Adams himself, lived through the Revolution, as an advocate of American independence. Five adhered to Great Britain: Gridley, Auchmuty, Fitch, Kent, and Hutchinson. Thatcher died in 1765, and Otis became incapacitated in 1771.

From Colburn's New Monthly Magazine

THE TWIN SISTERS.

A TRUE STORY.

BY W. WILKIE COLLINS, AUTHOR OF "ANTONINA."

Among those who attended the first of the King's _levées_, during the London season of 18--, was an unmarried gentleman of large fortune, named Streatfield. While his carriage was proceeding slowly down St. James's Street, he naturally sought such amusement and occupation as he could find in looking on the brilliant scene around him. The day was unusually fine; crowds of spectators thronged the street and the balconies of the houses on either side, all gazing at the different equipages with as eager a curiosity and interest, as if fine vehicles and fine people inside them were the rarest objects of contemplation in the whole metropolis. Proceeding at a slower and slower pace, Mr. Streatfield's carriage had just arrived at the middle of the street, when a longer stoppage than usual occurred. He looked carelessly up at the nearest balcony; and there among some eight or ten ladies, all strangers to him, he saw one face that riveted his attention immediately.

He had never beheld any thing so beautiful, any thing which struck him with such strange, mingled, and sudden sensations, as this face. He gazed and gazed on it, hardly knowing where he was, or what he was doing, until the line of vehicles began again to move on. Then--after first ascertaining the number of the house--he flung himself back in the carriage, and tried to examine his own feelings, to reason himself into self-possession; but it was all in vain. He was seized with that amiable form of social monomania, called "love at first sight."

He entered the palace, greeted his friends, and performed all the necessary Court ceremonies, feeling the whole time like a man in a trance. He spoke mechanically, and moved mechanically--the lovely face in the balcony occupied his thoughts, to the exclusion of every thing else. On his return home, he had engagements for the afternoon and the evening--he forgot and broke them all; and walked back to St. James's Street as soon as he had changed his dress.

The balcony was empty; the sight-seers, who had filled it but a few hours before, had departed--but obstacles of all sorts now tended only to stimulate Mr. Streatfield; he was determined to ascertain the parentage of the young lady, determined to look on the lovely face again--the thermometer of his heart had risen already to Fever Heat! Without loss of time, the shopkeeper to whom the house belonged was bribed to loquacity by a purchase. All that he could tell, in answer to inquiries, was that he had let his lodgings to an elderly gentleman and his wife, from the country, who had asked some friends into their balcony to see the carriages go to the _levée_. Nothing daunted, Mr. Streatfield questioned and questioned again. What was the old gentleman's name?--Dimsdale.--Could he see Mr. Dimsdale's servant?--The obsequious shopkeeper had no doubt that he could: Mr. Dimsdale's servant should be sent for immediately.

In a few minutes the servant, the all-important link in the chain of Love's evidence, made his appearance. He was a pompous, portly man, who listened with solemn attention, with a stern judicial calmness, to Mr. Streatfield's rapid and somewhat confused inquiries, which were accompanied by a minute description of the young lady, and by several explanatory statements, all very fictitious, and all very plausible. Stupid as the servant was, and suspicious as all stupid people are, he had nevertheless sense enough to perceive that he was addressed by a gentleman, and gratitude enough to feel considerably mollified by the handsome _douceur_ which was slipped into his hand. After much pondering and doubting, he at last arrived at the conclusion that the fair object of Mr. Streatfield's inquiries was a Miss Langley, who had joined the party in the balcony that morning, with her sister; and who was the daughter of Mr. Langley, of Langley Hall, in ----shire. The family were now staying in London, at ---- Street. More information than this, the servant stated that he could not afford--he was certain that he had made no mistake, for the Miss Langleys were the only very young ladies in the house that morning--however, if Mr. Streatfield wished to speak to his master, he was ready to carry any message with which he might be charged.

But Mr. Streatfield had already heard enough for his purpose, and departed at once for his club, determined to discover some means of being introduced in due form to Miss Langley, before he slept that night--though he should travel round the whole circle of his acquaintance--high and low, rich and poor--in making the attempt. Arrived at the club, he began to inquire resolutely, in all directions, for a friend who knew Mr. Langley, of Langley Hall. He disturbed gastronomic gentlemen at their dinner; he interrupted agricultural gentlemen who were moaning over the prospects of the harvest; he startled literary gentlemen who were deep in the critical mysteries of the last Review; he invaded billiard-room, dressing-room, smoking-room; he was more like a frantic ministerial whipper-in, hunting up stray members for a division, than an ordinary man; and the oftener he was defeated in his object, the more determined he was to succeed. At last, just as he had vainly inquired of every body that he knew, just as he was standing in the hall of the clubhouse thinking where he should go next, a friend entered, who at once relieved him of all his difficulties--a precious, an estimable man, who was on intimate terms with Mr. Langley, and had been lately staying at Langley Hall. To this friend all the lover's cares and anxieties were at once confided; and a fitter depositary for such secrets of the heart could hardly have been found. He made no jokes--for he was not a bachelor; he abstained from shaking his head and recommending prudence--for he was not a seasoned husband, or an experienced widower; what he really did was to enter heart and soul into his friend's projects--for he was precisely in that position, the only position, in which the male sex generally take a proper interest in match-making: he was a newly married man.

Two days after, Mr. Streatfield was the happiest of mortals--he was introduced to the lady of his love--to Miss Jane Langley. He really enjoyed the priceless privilege of looking again on the face in the balcony, and looking on it almost as often as he wished. It was perfect Elysium. Mr. and Mrs. Langley saw little or no company--Miss Jane was always accessible, never monopolized--the light of her beauty shone, day after day, for her adorer alone; and his love blossomed in it, fast as flowers in a hot-house. Passing quickly by all the minor details of the wooing to arrive the sooner at the grand fact of the winning, let us simply relate that Mr. Streatfield's object in seeking an introduction to Mr. Langley was soon explained, and was indeed visible enough long before the explanation. He was a handsome man, an accomplished man, and a rich man. His two first qualifications conquered the daughter, and his third the father. In six weeks Mr. Streatfield was the accepted suitor of Miss Jane Langley.

The wedding-day was fixed--it was arranged that the marriage should take place at Langley Hall, whither the family proceeded, leaving the unwilling lover in London, a prey to all the inexorable business formalities of the occasion. For ten days did the ruthless lawyers--those dead weights that burden the back of Hymen--keep their victim imprisoned in the metropolis, occupied over settlements that never seemed likely to be settled. But even the long march of the law has its end like other mortal things: at the expiration of the ten days all was completed, and Mr. Streatfield found himself at liberty to start for Langley Hall.

A large party was assembled at the house to grace the approaching nuptials. There were to be _tableaux_, charades, boating-trips, riding-excursions, amusements of all sorts--the whole to conclude (in the play-bill phrase) with the grand climax of the wedding. Mr. Streatfield arrived late; dinner was ready: he had barely time to dress, and then bustle into the drawing-room, just as the guests were leaving it, to offer his arm to Miss Jane--all greetings with friends and introductions to strangers being postponed till the party met round the dining-table.

Grace had been said; the covers were taken off; the loud, cheerful hum of conversation was just beginning, when Mr. Streatfield's eyes met the eyes of a young lady who was seated opposite, at the table. The guests near him, observing at the same moment, that he continued standing after every one else had been placed, glanced at him inquiringly. To their astonishment and alarm, they observed that his face had suddenly become deadly pale--his rigid features looked struck by paralysis. Several of his friends spoke to him; but for the first few moments he returned no answer. Then, still fixing his eyes upon the young lady opposite, he abruptly exclaimed, in a voice, the altered tones of which startled every one who heard him:--"_That_ is the face I saw in the balcony!--_that_ woman is the only woman I can ever marry!" The next instant, without a word more of either explanation or apology, he hurried from the room.

One or two of the guests mechanically started up, as if to follow him; the rest remained at the table, looking on each other in speechless surprise. But before any one could either act or speak, almost at the moment when the door closed on Mr. Streatfield, the attention of all was painfully directed to Jane Langley. She had fainted. Her mother and sisters removed her from the room immediately, aided by the servants. As they disappeared, a dead silence again sank down over the company--they all looked around with one accord to the master of the house.

Mr. Langley's face and manner sufficiently revealed the suffering and suspense that he was secretly enduring. But he was a man of the world--neither by word nor action did he betray what was passing within him. He resumed his place at the table, and begged his guests to do the same. He affected to make light of what had happened; entreated every one to forget it, or, if they remembered it at all, to remember it only as a mere accident which would no doubt be satisfactorily explained. Perhaps it was only a jest on Mr. Streatfield's part--rather too serious a one, he must own. At any rate, whatever was the cause of the interruption to the dinner which had just happened, it was not important enough to require every body to fast around the table of the feast. He asked it as a favor to himself, that no further notice might be taken of what had occurred. While Mr. Langley was speaking thus, he hastily wrote a few lines on a piece of paper, and gave it to one of the servants. The note was directed to Mr. Streatfield; the lines contained only these words:--"Two hours hence, I shall expect to see you alone in the library."

The dinner proceeded; the places occupied by the female members of the Langley family, and by the young lady who had attracted Mr. Streatfield's notice in so extraordinary a manner, being left vacant. Every one present endeavored to follow Mr. Langley's advice, and go through the business of the dinner, as if nothing had occurred; but the attempt failed miserably. Long, blank pauses occurred in the conversation; general topics were started, but never pursued; it was more like an assembly of strangers, than a meeting of friends; people neither ate nor drank, as they were accustomed to eat and drink; they talked in altered voices, and sat with unusual stillness, even in the same positions. Relatives, friends, and acquaintances, all alike perceived that some great domestic catastrophe had happened; all foreboded that some serious, if not fatal, explanation of Mr. Streatfield's conduct would ensue: and it was vain and hopeless--a very mockery of self-possession--to attempt to shake off the sinister and chilling influences that recent events had left behind them, and resume at will the thoughtlessness and hilarity of ordinary life.

Still, however, Mr. Langley persisted in doing the honors of his table, in proceeding doggedly through all the festive ceremonies of the hour, until the ladies rose and retired. Then, after looking at his watch, he beckoned to one of his sons to take his place; and quietly left the room. He only stopped once, as he crossed the hall, to ask news of his daughter from one of the servants. The reply was, that she had had a hysterical fit; that the medical attendant of the family had been sent for; and that since his arrival she had become more composed. When the man had spoken, Mr. Langley made no remark, but proceeded at once to the library. He locked the door behind him, as soon as he entered the room.

Mr. Streatfield was already waiting there--he was seated at the table, endeavoring to maintain an appearance of composure, by mechanically turning over the leaves of the books before him. Mr. Langley drew a chair near him; and in low, but very firm tones, began the conversation thus:--

"I have given you two hours, sir, to collect yourself, to consider your position fully--I presume, therefore, that you are now prepared to favor me with an explanation of your conduct at my table, to-day."

"What explanation can I make?--what can I say, or think of this most terrible of fatalities?" exclaimed Mr. Streatfield, speaking faintly and confusedly; and still not looking up--"There has been an unexampled error committed!--a fatal mistake, which I could never have anticipated, and over which I had no control!"

"Enough, sir, of the language of romance," interrupted Mr. Langley, coldly; "I am neither of an age nor a disposition to appreciate it. I come here to ask plain questions honestly, and I insist, as my right, on receiving answers in the same spirit. _You_, Mr. Streatfield, sought an introduction to _me_--you professed yourself attached to my daughter Jane--your proposals were (I fear unhappily for _us_) accepted--your wedding-day was fixed--and now, after all this, when you happen to observe my daughter's twin-sister sitting opposite to you--"

"Her twin-sister!" exclaimed Mr. Streatfield; and his trembling hand crumpled the leaves of the book, which he still held while he spoke. "Why is it, intimate as I have been with your family, that I now know for the first time that Miss Jane Langley has a twin-sister?"

"Do you descend, sir, to a subterfuge, when I ask you for an explanation?" returned Mr. Langley, angrily. "You must have heard, over and over again, that my children, Jane and Clara, were twins."

"On my word and honor, I declare that--"

"Spare me all appeals to your word or your honor, sir; I am beginning to doubt both."

"I will not make the unhappy situation in which we are all placed, still worse, by answering your last words, as I might, at other times, feel inclined to answer them," said Mr. Streatfield, assuming a calmer demeanor than he had hitherto displayed. "I tell you the truth, when I tell you that, before to-day, I never knew that any of your children were twins. Your daughter Jane has frequently spoken to me of her absent sister Clara, but never spoke to me of her as her twin-sister. Until to-day, I have had no opportunity of discovering the truth; for until to-day, I have never met Miss Clara Langley since I saw her in the balcony of the house in St. James's street. The only one of your children who was never present during my intercourse with your family in London, was your daughter Clara--the daughter whom I now know, for the first time, as the young lady who really arrested my attention on my way to the _levée_--whose affections it was really my object to win in seeking an introduction to you. To _me_, the resemblance between the twin-sisters has been a fatal resemblance; the long absence of one, a fatal absence."

There was a momentary pause, as Mr. Streatfield sadly and calmly pronounced the last words. Mr. Langley appeared to be absorbed in thought. At length he proceeded, speaking to himself:--

"It _is_ strange! I remember that Clara left London on the day of the _levée_, to set out on a visit to her aunt; and only returned here two days since, to be present at her sister's marriage. Well, sir," he continued, addressing Mr. Streatfield, "granting what you say, granting that we all mentioned my absent daughter to you, as we are accustomed to mention her among ourselves, simply as 'Clara,' you have still not excused your conduct in my eyes. Remarkable as the resemblance is between the sisters, more remarkable even, I am willing to admit, than the resemblance usually is between twins, there is yet a difference, which, slight, indescribable though it may be, is nevertheless discernible to all their relations and to all their friends. How is it that you, who represent yourself as so vividly impressed by your first sight of my daughter Clara, did not discover the error when you were introduced to her sister Jane, as the lady who had so much attracted you."

"You forget, sir," rejoined Mr. Streatfield, "that I have never beheld the sisters together until to-day. Though both were in the balcony when I first looked up at it, it was Miss Clara Langley alone who attracted my attention. Had I only received the smallest hint that the absent sister of Miss Jane Langley was her _twin-sister_, I would have seen her, at any sacrifice, before making my proposals. For it is my duty to confess to you, Mr. Langley (with the candor which is your undoubted due), that when I was first introduced to your daughter Jane, I felt an unaccountable impression that she was the same as, and yet different from, the lady whom I had seen in the balcony. Soon, however, this impression wore off. Under the circumstances, could I regard it as any thing but a mere caprice, a lover's wayward fancy? I dismissed it from my mind; it ceased to affect me, until to-day, when I first discovered that it was a warning which I had most unhappily disregarded; that a terrible error had been committed, for which no one of us was to blame, but which was fraught with misery, undeserved misery, to us all!"

"These, Mr. Streatfield, are explanations which may satisfy _you_," said Mr. Langley, in a milder tone, "but they cannot satisfy _me_; they will not satisfy the world. You have repudiated, in the most public and most abrupt manner, an engagement, in the fulfilment of which the honor and the happiness of my family are concerned. You have given me reasons for your conduct, it is true; but will those reasons restore to my daughter the tranquillity which she has lost, perhaps for ever? Will they stop the whisperings of calumny? Will they carry conviction to those strangers to me, or enemies of mine, whose pleasure it may be to disbelieve them? You have placed both yourself and me, sir, in a position of embarrassment--nay, a position of danger and disgrace, from which the strongest reasons and the best excuses cannot extricate us."

"I entreat you to believe," replied Mr. Streatfield, "that I deplore from my heart the error--the fault, if you will--of which I have been unconsciously guilty. I implore your pardon, both for what I said and did at your table to-day; but I cannot do more. I cannot and I dare not pronounce the marriage vows to your daughter, with my lips, when I know that neither my conscience nor my heart can ratify them. The commonest justice, and the commonest respect towards a young lady who deserves both, and more than both, from every one who approaches her, strengthen me to persevere in the only course which it is consistent with honor and integrity for me to take."

"You appear to forget," said Mr. Langley, "that it is not merely your own honor, but the honor of others, that is to be considered in the course of conduct which you are now to pursue."

"I have by no means forgotten what is due to _you_," continued Mr. Streatfield, "or what responsibilities I have incurred from the nature of my intercourse with your family. Do I put too much trust in your forbearance, if I now assure you, candidly and unreservedly, that I still place all my hopes of happiness in the prospect of becoming connected by marriage with a daughter of yours? Miss Clara Langley--"

Here the speaker paused. His position was becoming a delicate and a dangerous one; but he made no effort to withdraw from it. Almost bewildered by the pressing and perilous emergency of the moment, harassed by such a tumult of conflicting emotions within him as he had never known before, he risked the worst, with all the blindfold desperation of love. The angry flush was rising on Mr. Langley's cheek; it was evidently costing him a severe struggle to retain his assumed self-possession; but he did not speak. After an interval, Mr. Streatfield proceeded thus:--

"However unfortunately I may express myself, I am sure you will do me the justice to believe that I am now speaking from my heart on a subject (to _me_) of the most vital importance. Place yourself in my situation, consider all that has happened, consider that this may be, for aught I know to the contrary, the last opportunity I may have of pleading my cause; and then say whether it is possible for me to conceal from you that I can only look to your forbearance and sympathy for permission to retrieve my error, to--to--Mr. Langley! I cannot choose expressions at such a moment as this. I can only tell you that the feeling with which I regarded your daughter Clara, when I first saw her, still remains what it was. I cannot analyze it; I cannot reconcile its apparent inconsistencies and contradictions; I cannot explain how, while I may seem to you and to every one to have varied and vacillated with insolent caprice, I have really remained, in my own heart and to my own conscience, true to my first sensations and my first convictions. I can only implore you not to condemn me to a life of disappointment and misery, by judging me with hasty irritation. Favor me, so far at least, as to relate the conversation which has passed between us to your two daughters. Let me hear how it affects each of them towards me. Let me know what they are willing to think and ready to do under such unparalleled circumstances as have now occurred. I will wait _your_ time, and _their_ time; I will abide by _your_ decision and _their_ decision, pronounced after the first poignant distress and irritation of this day's events have passed over."

Still Mr. Langley remained silent; the angry word was on his tongue; the contemptuous rejection of what he regarded for the moment as a proposition equally ill-timed and insolent, seemed bursting to his lips; but once more he restrained himself. He rose from his seat, and walked slowly backwards and forwards, deep in thought. Mr. Streatfield was too much overcome by his own agitation to plead his cause further by another word. There was a silence in the room now, which lasted for some time.

We have said that Mr. Langley was a man of the world. He was strongly attached to his children; but he had a little of the selfishness and much of the reverence for wealth of a man of the world. As he now endeavored to determine mentally on his proper course of action--to disentangle the whole case from all its mysterious intricacies--to view it, extraordinary as it was, in its proper bearings, his thoughts began gradually to assume what is called, "a practical turn." He reflected that he had another daughter, besides the twin-sisters, to provide for; and that he had two sons to settle in life. He was not rich enough to portion three daughters; and he had not interest enough to start his sons favorably in a career of eminence. Mr. Streatfield, on the contrary, was a man of great wealth, and of great "connections" among people in power. Was such a son-in-law to be rejected, even after all that had happened, without at least consulting his wife and daughters first? He thought not. Had not Mr. Streatfield, in truth, been the victim of a remarkable fatality, of an incredible accident, and were no allowances, under such circumstances, to be made for him? He began to think there were. Reflecting thus, he determined at length to proceed with moderation and caution at all hazards; and regained composure enough to continue the conversation in a cold, but still in a polite tone.

"I will commit myself, sir, to no agreement or promise whatever," he began, "nor will I consider this interview in any respect as a conclusive one, either on your side or mine; but if I think, on consideration, that it is desirable that our conversation should be repeated to my wife and daughters, I will make them acquainted with it, and will let you know the result. In the mean time, I think you will agree with me, that it is most fit that the next communications between us should take place by letter alone."

Mr. Streatfield was not slow in taking the hint conveyed by Mr. Langley'a last words. After what had occurred, and until something was definitely settled, he felt that the suffering and suspense which he was already enduring would be increased tenfold if he remained longer in the same house with the twin sisters--the betrothed of one, the lover of the other! Murmuring a few inaudible words of acquiescence in the arrangement which had just been proposed to him, he left the room. The same evening he quitted Langley Hall.

The next morning the remainder of the guests departed, their curiosity to know all the particulars of what had happened remaining ungratified. They were simply informed that an extraordinary and unexpected obstacle had arisen to delay the wedding; that no blame attached to any one in the matter; and that as soon as every thing had been finally determined, every thing would be explained. Until then, it was not considered necessary to enter in any way into particulars. By the middle of the day every visitor had left the house; and a strange and melancholy spectacle it presented when they were all gone. Rooms were now empty and silent, which the day before had been filled with animated groups, and had echoed with merry laughter. In one apartment, the fittings for the series of "Tableaux" which had been proposed, remained half completed: the dresses that were to have been worn, lay scattered on the floor; the carpenter who had come to proceed with his work, gathered up his tools in ominous silence, and departed as quickly as he could. Here lay books still open at the last page read; there was an album, with the drawing of the day before unfinished, and the color-box unclosed by its side. On the deserted billiard-table, the positions of the "cues" and balls showed traces of an interrupted game. Flowers were scattered on the rustic tables in the garden, half made into nosegays, and beginning to wither already. The very dogs wandered in a moody, unsettled way about the house, missing the friendly hands that had fondled and fed them for so many days past, and whining impatiently in the deserted drawing-rooms. The social desolation of the scene was miserably complete in all its aspects.

Immediately after the departure of his guests, Mr. Langley had a long interview with his wife. He repeated to her the conversation which had taken place between Mr. Streatfield and himself, and received from her in return such an account of the conduct of his daughter, under the trial that had befallen her, as filled him with equal astonishment and admiration. It was a new revelation to him of the character of his own child.

"As soon as the violent symptoms had subsided," said Mrs. Langley, in answer to her husband's first inquiries, "as soon as the hysterical fit was subdued, Jane seemed suddenly to assume a new character, to become another person. She begged that the Doctor might be released from his attendance, and that she might be left alone with me and with her sister Clara. When every one else had quitted the room, she continued to sit in the easy-chair where we had at first placed her, covering her face with her hands. She entreated us not to speak to her for a short time, and, except that she shuddered occasionally, sat quite still and silent. When she at last looked up, we were shocked to see the deadly paleness of her face, and the strange alteration that had come over her expression; but she spoke to us so coherently, so solemnly even, that we were amazed; we knew not what to think or what to do; it hardly seemed to be _our_ Jane who was now speaking to us."

"What did she say?" asked Mr. Langley, eagerly.

"She said that the first feeling of her heart, at that moment, was gratitude on her own account. She thanked God that the terrible discovery had not been made too late, when her married life might have been a life of estrangement and misery. Up to the moment when Mr. Streatfield had uttered that one fatal exclamation, she had loved him, she told us, fondly and fervently; _now_, no explanation, no repentance (if either were tendered), no earthly persuasion or command (in case Mr. Streatfield should think himself bound, as a matter of atonement, to hold to his rash engagement), could ever induce her to become his wife."

"Mr. Streatfield will not test her resolution," said Mr. Langley, bitterly; "he deliberately repeated his repudiation of his engagement in this room; nay, more, he--"

"I have something important to say to you from Jane on this point," interrupted Mrs. Langley. "After she had spoken the first few words which I have already repeated to you, she told us that she had been thinking--thinking more calmly perhaps than we could imagine--on all that had happened; on what Mr. Streatfield had said at the dinner-table; on the momentary glance of recognition which she had seen pass between him and her sister Clara, whose accidental absence, during the whole period of Mr. Streatfield's intercourse with us in London, she now remembered and reminded me of. The cause of the fatal error, and the manner in which it had occurred, seemed to be already known to her, as if by intuition. We entreated her to refrain from speaking on the subject for the present; but she answered that it was her duty to speak on it--her duty to propose something which should alleviate the suspense and distress we were all enduring on her account. No words can describe to you her fortitude, her noble endurance--." Mrs. Langley's voice faltered as she pronounced the last words. It was some minutes ere she became sufficiently composed to proceed thus:

"I am charged with a message to you from Jane--I should say, charged with her entreaties, that you will not suspend our intercourse with Mr. Streatfield, or view his conduct in any other than a merciful light--as conduct for which accident and circumstances are alone to blame. After she had given me this message to you, she turned to Clara, who sat weeping by her side, completely overcome; and said that _they_ were to blame, if any one was to be blamed in the matter, for being so much alike as to make all who saw them apart doubt which was Clara and which was Jane. She said this with a faint smile, and an effort to speak playfully, which touched us to the heart. Then, in a tone and manner which I can never forget, she asked her sister--charging her, on their mutual affection and mutual confidence, to answer sincerely--if _she_ had noticed Mr. Streatfield on the day of the _levée_, and had afterwards remembered him at the dinner-table, as _he_ had noticed and remembered _her_? It was only after Jane had repeated this appeal, still more earnestly and affectionately, that Clara summoned courage and composure enough to confess that she _had_ noticed Mr. Streatfield on the day of the _levée_, had thought of him afterwards during his absence from London, and had recognized him at our table, as he had recognized her.

"Is it possible! I own I had not anticipated--not thought for one moment of that," said Mr. Langley.

"Perhaps," continued his wife, "it is best that you should see Jane now, and judge for yourself. For _my_ part, her noble resignation under this great trial, has so astonished and impressed me, that I only feel competent to advise, as she advises, to act as she thinks fit. I begin to think that it is not _we_ who are to guide _her_, but _she_ who is to guide _us_."

Mr. Langley lingered irresolute for a few minutes; then quitted the room, and proceeded along to Jane Langley's apartment.

When he knocked at the door, it was opened by Clara. There was an expression partly of confusion, partly of sorrow on her face; and when her father stopped as if to speak to her, she merely pointed into the room, and hurried away without uttering a word.

Mr. Langley had been prepared by his wife for the change that had taken place in his daughter since the day before; but he felt startled, almost overwhelmed, as he now looked on her. One of the poor girl's most prominent personal attractions, from her earliest years, had been the beauty of her complexion; and now, the freshness and the bloom had entirely departed from her face; it seemed absolutely colorless. Her expression, too, appeared to Mr. Langley's eye, to have undergone a melancholy alteration; to have lost its youthfulness suddenly; to have assumed a strange character of firmness and thoughtfulness, which he had never observed in it before. She was sitting by an open window, commanding a lovely view of wide, sunny landscape; a Bible which her mother had given her, lay open on her knees; she was reading in it as her father entered. For the first time in his life, he paused, speechless, as he approached to speak to one of his own children.

"I am afraid I look very ill," she said, holding out her hand to him; "but I am better than I look; I shall be quite well in a day or two. Have you heard my message, father? have you been told?"--

"My love, we will not speak of it yet; we will wait a few days," said Mr. Langley.

"You have always been so kind to me," she continued, in less steady tones, "that I am sure you will let me go on. I have very little to say, but that little must be said now, and then we need never recur to it again. Will you consider all that has happened, as something forgotten? You have heard already what it is that I entreat you to do; will you let _him_--Mr. Streatfield--" (She stopped, her voice failed for a moment, but she recovered herself again almost immediately.) "Will you let Mr. Streatfield remain here, or recall him if he is gone, and give him an opportunity of explaining himself to my sister? If poor Clara should refuse to see him for my sake, pray do not listen to her. I am sure this is what ought to be done; I have been thinking of it very calmly, and I feel that it is right. And there is something more I have to beg of you, father; it is, that, while Mr. Streatfield is here, you will allow me to go and stay with my aunt.--You know how fond she is of me. Her house is not a day's journey from home. It is best for every body (much the best for _me_) that I should not remain here at present; and--and--dear father! I have always been your spoiled child; and I know you will indulge me still. If you will do what I ask you, I shall soon get over this heavy trial. I shall be well again if I am away at my aunt's--if--"

She paused; and putting one trembling arm round her father's neck, hid her face on his breast. For some minutes, Mr. Langley could not trust himself to answer her. There was something, not deeply touching only, but impressive and sublime, about the moral heroism of this young girl, whose heart and mind--hitherto wholly inexperienced in the harder and darker emergencies of life--now rose in the strength of their native purity superior to the bitterest, cruellest trial that either could undergo; whose patience and resignation, called forth for the first time by a calamity which suddenly thwarted the purposes and paralyzed the affections that had been destined to endure for a life, could thus appear at once in the fullest maturity of virtue and beauty. As the father thought on these things; as he vaguely and imperfectly estimated the extent of the daughter's sacrifice; as he reflected on the nature of the affliction that had befallen her--which combined in itself a fatality that none could have foreseen, a fault that could neither be repaired nor resented, a judgment against which there was no appeal--and then remembered how this affliction had been borne, with what words and what actions it had been met, he felt that it would be almost a profanation to judge the touching petition just addressed to him, by the criterion of _his_ worldly doubts and _his_ worldly wisdom. His eye fell on the Bible, still open beneath it; he remembered the little child who was set in the midst of the disciples, as teacher and example to all; and when at length he spoke in answer to his daughter, it was not to direct or to advise, but to comfort and comply.

They delayed her removal for a few days, to see if she faltered in her resolution, if her bodily weakness increased; but she never wavered; nothing in her appearance changed, either for better or for worse. A week after the startling scene at the dinner-table, she was living in the strictest retirement in the house of her aunt.

About the period of her departure, a letter was received from Mr. Streatfield. It was little more than a recapitulation of what he had already said to Mr. Langley--expressed, however, on this occasion, in stronger and, at the same time, in more respectful terms. The letter was answered briefly: he was informed that nothing had, as yet, been determined on, but that the next communication would bring him a final reply.

Two months passed. During that time, Jane Langley was frequently visited at her aunt's house, by her father and mother. She still remained calm and resolved; still looked pale and thoughtful, as at first. Doctors were consulted: they talked of a shock to the nervous system; of great hope from time, and their patient's strength of mind; and of the necessity of acceding to her wishes in all things. Then, the advice of the aunt was sought. She was a woman of an eccentric, masculine character, who had herself experienced a love-disappointment in early life, and had never married. She gave her opinion unreservedly and abruptly, as she always gave it. "Do as Jane tells you!" said the old lady, severely; "that poor child has more moral courage and determination than all the rest of you put together! I know better than any body what a sacrifice she has had to make; but she has made it, and made it nobly--like a heroine, as some people would say; like a good, high-minded, courageous girl, as _I_ say! Do as she tells you! Let that poor, selfish fool of a man have his way, and marry her sister--he has made one mistake already about a face--see if he doesn't find out, some day, that he has made another, about a wife! Let him!--Jane is too good for _him_, or for any man! Leave her to me; let her stop here; she shan't lose by what happened! You know this place is mine--I mean it is to be hers, when I'm dead. You know I've got some money--I shall leave it to her. I've made my will: it's all done and settled! Go back home; send for the man, and tell Clara to marry him without any more fuss! You wanted my opinion--There it is for you!"

At last Mr. Langley decided. The important letter was written, which recalled Mr. Streatfield to Langley Hall. As Jane had foreseen, Clara at first refused to hold any communication with him; but a letter from her sister, and the remonstrances of her father, soon changed her resolution. There was nothing in common between the twin-sisters but their personal resemblance. Clara had been guided all her life by the opinions of others, and she was guided by them now.

Once permitted the opportunity of pleading his cause, Mr. Streatfield did not neglect his own interests. It would be little to our purpose to describe the doubts and difficulties which delayed at first the progress of his second courtship--pursued as it was under circumstances, not only extraordinary, but unprecedented. It is no longer with him, or with Clara Langley, that the interest of our story is connected. Suffice it to say, that he ultimately overcame all the young lady's scruples; and that, a few months afterwards, some of Mr. Langley's intimate friends found themselves again assembled round his table as wedding-guests, and congratulating Mr. Streatfield on his approaching union with Clara, as they had already congratulated him, scarcely a year back, on his approaching union with Jane!

The social ceremonies of the wedding-day were performed soberly--almost sadly. Some of the guests (especially the unmarried ladies) thought that Miss Clara had allowed herself to be won too easily--others were picturing to themselves the situation of the poor girl who was absent; and contributed little toward the gayety of the party. On this occasion, however, nothing occurred to interrupt the proceedings; the marriage took place; and, immediately after it, Mr. Streatfield and his bride started for a tour on the Continent.

On their departure, Jane Langley returned home. She made no reference whatever to her sister's marriage; and no one mentioned it in her presence. Still the color did not return to her cheek, or the old gayety to her manner. The shock that she had suffered had left its traces on her for life. But there was no evidence that she was sinking under the remembrances which neither time nor resolution could banish. The strong, pure heart had undergone a change, but not a deterioration. All that had been brilliant in her character was gone; but all that was noble in it remained. Never had her intercourse with her family and her friends been so affectionate and so kindly as it was now.

When, after a long absence, Mr. Streatfield and his wife returned to England, it was observed, at her first meeting with them, that the momentary confusion and embarrassment were on _their_ side, not on _hers_. During their stay at Langley Hall, she showed not the slightest disposition to avoid them. No member of the family welcomed them more cordially, entered into all their plans and projects more readily, or bade them farewell with a kinder or better grace, when they departed for their own home.

Our tale is nearly ended: what remains of it, must comprise the history of many years in a few words.

Time passed on; and Death and Change told of its lapse among the family at Langley Hall. Five years after the events above related, Mr. Langley died; and was followed to the grave, shortly afterwards, by his wife. Of their two sons, the eldest was rising into good practice at the bar; the youngest had become _attaché_ to a foreign embassy. Their third daughter was married, and living at the family seat of her husband, in Scotland. Mr. and Mrs. Streatfield had children of their own, now, to occupy their time and absorb their care. The career of life was over for some--the purposes of life had altered for others--Jane Langley alone, still remained unchanged.

She now lived entirely with her aunt. At intervals--as their worldly duties and avocations permitted them--the other members of her family, or one or two intimate friends, came to the house. Offers of marriage were made to her, but were all declined. The first, last love of her girlish days--abandoned as a hope, and crushed as a passion; living only as a quiet grief, as a pure remembrance--still kept its watch, as guardian and defender, over her heart. Years passed on and worked no change in the sad uniformity of her life, until the death of her aunt left her mistress of the house in which she had hitherto been a guest. Then it was observed that she made fewer and fewer efforts to vary the tenor of her existence, to forget her old remembrances for awhile in the society of others. Such invitations as reached her from relations and friends were more frequently declined than accepted. She was growing old herself now; and, with each advancing year, the busy pageant of the outer world presented less and less that could attract her eye.

So she began to surround herself, in her solitude, with the favorite books that she had studied, with the favorite music that she had played, in the days of her hopes and her happiness. Every thing that was associated, however slightly, with that past period, now acquired a character of inestimable value in her eyes, as aiding her mind to seclude itself more and more strictly in the sanctuary of its early recollections. Was it weakness in her to live thus; to abandon the world and the world's interests, as one who had no hope, or part in either? Had she earned the right, by the magnitude and resolution of her sacrifice, thus to indulge in the sad luxury of fruitless remembrance? Who shall say!--who shall presume to decide that cannot think with _her_ thoughts, and look back with _her_ recollections!

Thus she lived--alone, and yet not lonely; without hope, but with no despair; separate and apart from the world around her, except when she approached it by her charities to the poor, and her succor to the afflicted; by her occasional interviews with the surviving members of her family and a few old friends, when they sought her in her calm retreat; and by the little presents which she constantly sent to brothers' and sisters' children, who worshipped, as their invisible good genius, "the kind lady" whom most of them had never seen. Such was her existence throughout the closing years of her life: such did it continue--calm and blameless--to the last.

* * * * *

Reader, when you are told, that what is impressive and pathetic in the Drama of Human Life has passed with a past age of Chivalry and Romance, remember Jane Langley, and quote in contradiction the story of the TWIN SISTERS!

* * * * *

When about nine years old, Southey attended a school at Bristol, kept by one Williams, a Welshman, the one, he says, of all his schoolmasters, whom he remembered with the kindliest feelings. This Williams used sometimes to infuse more passion into his discipline than was becoming, of which Southey records a most ridiculous illustration. One of his schoolmates--a Creole, with a shade of African color and negro features--was remarkable for his stupidity. Williams, after flogging him one day, made him pay a half-penny for the use of the rod, because he required it so much oftener than any other boy in school.

From Fraser's Magazine.

ALFIERI.

Vittorio Alfieri was born at Asti, a city of Piedmont, on the 17th of January, 1749,--the year in which his great contemporary, Goëthe, first saw the light. His father, Antonio Alfieri, was a nobleman of high rank in his own country; his mother, whose name was Monica Maillard di Tournon, was of Savoyard descent. At the time of Vittorio's birth his father was sixty years of age; and as until then he had had no son, the entrance of the future poet into the world was to him a subject of unspeakable delight: but his happiness was of short duration, for he overheated himself one day by going to see the child at a neighboring village where he was at nurse, and died of the illness that ensued, his son being at the time less than a year old. The countess, his widow, did not long remain so, as she very shortly married again, her third husband (she was a widow when the count married her) being the Cavalier Giacinto Alfieri, a distant member of the same family.

When about six years old, Alfieri was placed under the care of a priest called Don Ivaldi, who taught him writing, arithmetic, Cornelius Nepos, and Phædrus. He soon discovered, however, that the worthy priest was an ignoramus, and congratulates himself on having escaped from his hands at the age of nine, otherwise he believes that he should have been an absolute and irreclaimable dunce. His mother and father-in-law were constantly repeating the maxim then so popular among the Italian nobility, that it was not necessary that a gentleman should be a doctor. It was at this early age that he was first attacked by that melancholy which gradually assumed entire dominion over him, and throughout life remained a most prominent feature in his character. When only seven years of age, he made an attempt to poison himself by eating some noxious herbs, being impelled to this strange action by an undefined desire to die. He was well punished for his silliness by being made very unwell, and by being, moreover, shut up in his room for some days. No punishment for his youthful transgressions was, however, so effectual as being sent in a nightcap to a neighboring church. "Who knows," says he, "whether I am not indebted to that blessed nightcap for having turned out one of the most truthful men I ever knew?"

In 1758, his paternal uncle and guardian, seeing what little progress he was making, determined to send him to the Turin Academy, and accordingly he started in the month of July.

"I cried (he says, in his autobiography) during the whole of the first stage. On arriving at the post-house, I got out of the carriage while the horses were being changed, and feeling thirsty, instead of asking for a glass, or requesting any body to fetch me some water, I marched up to the horse-trough, dipped the corner of my cap in the water, and drank to my heart's content. The postilions, seeing this, told my attendant, who ran up and began rating me soundly; but I told him that travellers ought to accustom themselves to such things, and that no good soldier would drink in any other manner. Where I fished up these Achilles-like ideas I know not, as my mother had always educated me with the greatest tenderness, and with really ludicrous care for my health."

He describes his character at this period, where he ends what he calls the epoch of childhood, and begins that of adolescence, as having been as follows:

"I was taciturn and placid for the most part, but occasionally very talkative and lively; in fact, I generally ran from one extreme to another. I was obstinate and restive when force was exerted, most docile under kind treatment; restrained more by fear of being scolded than by any thing else; susceptible of shame even to excess, and inflexible when rubbed against the grain."

He entered the Academy on the 1st of August. It was a magnificent quadrangular building, of which two of the sides were occupied by the King's Theatre and the Royal Archives; another side was appropriated to the younger students, who composed what were called the second and third apartments, while the fourth contained the first apartment, or the older students, who were mostly foreigners, besides the king's pages, to the number of twenty or twenty-five. Alfieri was at first placed in the third apartment, and the fourth class, from which he was promoted to the third at the end of three months. The master of this class was a certain Don Degiovanni, a priest even more ignorant than his good friend Ivaldi. It may be supposed that under such auspices he did not make much progress in his studies. Let us hear his own account:

"Being thus an ass, in the midst of asses, and under an ass, I translated Cornelius Nepos, some of Virgil's _Eclogues_, and such-like; we wrote stupid, nonsensical themes, so that in any well-directed school we should have been a wretched fourth class. I was never at the bottom; emulation spurred me on until I surpassed or equalled the head boy; but as soon as I reached the top, I fell back into a state of torpor. I was perhaps to be excused, as nothing could equal the dryness and insipidity of our studies. It is true that we translated Cornelius Nepos; but none of us, probably not even the master himself, knew who the men were whose lives we were translating, nor their countries, nor the times in which they lived, nor the governments under which they flourished, nor even what a government was. All our ideas were contracted, false, or confused; the master had no object in view; his pupils took not the slightest interest in what they learned. In short, all were as bad as bad could be; no one looked after us, or if they did, knew what they were about."

In November, 1759, he was promoted to the humanity class, the master of which was a man of some learning. His emulation was excited in this class by his meeting a boy who could repeat 600 lines of the _Georgics_ without a single mistake, while he could never get beyond 400. These defeats almost suffocated him with anger, and he often burst out crying, and occasionally abused his rival most violently. He found some consolation, however, for his inferior memory, in always writing the best themes. About this time he obtained possession of a copy of Ariosto in four volumes, which he rather believes he purchased, a volume at a time, with certain half-fowls that were given the students on Sundays, his first Ariosto thus costing him two fowls in the space of four weeks. He much regrets that he is not certain on the point, feeling anxious to know whether he imbibed his first draughts of poetry at the expense of his stomach. Notwithstanding that he was at the head of the humanity class, and could translate the _Georgics_ into Italian prose, he found great difficulty in understanding the easiest of Italian poets. The master, however, soon perceived him reading the book by stealth, and confiscated it, leaving the future poet deprived for the present of all poetical guidance.

During this period he was in a wretched state of health, being constantly attacked by various extraordinary diseases. He describes himself as not growing at all, and as resembling a very delicate and pale wax taper. In 1760 he passed in the class of rhetoric, and succeeded, moreover, in recovering his Ariosto, but read very little of it, partly from the difficulty he found in understanding it, and partly because the continued breaks in the story disgusted him. As to Tasso, he had never even heard his name. He obtained a few of Metastasio's plays as _libretti_ of the Opera at carnival time, and was much pleased with them, and also with some of Goldoni's comedies that were lent to him.

"But the dramatic genius, of which the germs perhaps existed in me, was soon buried or extinguished for want of food, of encouragement, and every thing else. In short, my ignorance and that of my instructors, and the carelessness of every body in every thing exceeded all conception."

The following year he was promoted into the class of philosophy, which met in the adjoining university. The following is his description of the course:

"This school of peripatetic philosophy was held after dinner. During the first half-hour we wrote out the lecture at the dictation of the professor, and in the subsequent three-quarters of an hour, when he commented upon it, Heaven knows how, in Latin, we scholars wrapped ourselves up comfortably in our mantles, and went fast asleep; and among the assembled philosophers, not a sound was heard except the drawling voice of the professor himself, half asleep, and the various notes of the snorers, who formed a most delightful concert in every possible key."

During his holidays this year, his uncle took him to the Opera for the first time, where he heard the _Mercato di Malmantile_. The music produced a most extraordinary effect upon him, and for several weeks afterwards he remained immersed in a strange but not unpleasing melancholy, followed by an absolute loathing of his usual studies. Music all through life affected him most powerfully, and he states that his tragedies were almost invariably planned by him when under its influence. It was about this time that he composed his first sonnet, which was made up of whole or mutilated verses of Metastasio and Ariosto, the only two Italian poets of whom he knew any thing. It was in praise of a certain lady to whom his uncle was paying his addresses, and whom he himself admired. Several persons, including the lady herself, praised it, so that he already fancied himself a poet. His uncle, however, a military man, and no votary of the Muses, laughed at him so much, that his poetical vein was soon dried up, and he did not renew his attempts in the line till he was more than twenty-five years old. "How many good or bad verses did my uncle suffocate, together with my first-born sonnet!"

He next studied physics and ethics--the former under the celebrated Beccaria, but not a single definition remained in his head. These studies, however, as well as those in civil and canon law, which he had commenced, were interrupted by a violent illness, which rendered it necessary for him to have his head shaved, and to wear a wig. His companions, at first, tormented him greatly about this wig, and used to tear it from his head; but he soon succeeded in appeasing the public indignation, by being always the first to throw the unhappy ornament in question up in the air, calling it by every opprobrious epithet. From that time he remained the least persecuted wig-wearer among the two or three who were in this predicament.

He now took lessons on the piano, and in geography, fencing, and dancing. He imbibed the most invincible dislike to the latter, which he attributed to the grimaces and extraordinary contortions of the master, a Frenchman just arrived from Paris. He dates from this period that extreme hatred of the French nation which remained with him through life, and which was one of the strangest features in his character. His uncle died this year (1763), and as he was now fourteen, the age at which, by the laws of Piedmont, minors are freed from the care of their guardians, and are placed under curators, who leave them masters of their income, and can only prevent the alienation of their real estates, he found himself possessed of considerable property, which was still farther increased by his uncle's fortune. Having obtained the degree of master of arts, by passing a public examination in logic, physics, and geometry, he was rewarded by being allowed to attend the riding-school, a thing he had always ardently desired. He became an expert horseman, and attributes to this exercise the recovery of his health, which now rapidly improved.

"Having buried my uncle, changed my guardian into a curator, obtained my master's degree, got rid of my attendant Andrea, and mounted a steed, it is incredible how proud I became. I told the authorities plainly that I was sick of studying law, and that I would not go on with it. After a consultation, they determined to remove me into the first apartment, which I entered on the 8th May, 1763."

He now led an extremely idle life, being little looked after. A crowd of flatterers, the usual attendants upon wealth, sprung up around him, and he indulged in amusements and dissipations of every kind. A temporary fit of industry, which lasted for two or three months, came over him, and he plunged deeply into the thirty-six volumes of Fleury's _Ecclesiastical History_. Soon, however, he resumed his old course, and conducted himself so badly that the authorities found it necessary to place him under arrest, and he remained for some months a prisoner in his own apartment, obstinately refusing to make any apology, and leading the life of a wild beast, never putting on his clothes, and spending most of his time in sleep. He was at length released, on the occasion of his sister Giulia's marriage to the Count Giacinto di Cumiana, in May, 1764.

On regaining his former position he bought his first horse, and soon afterwards another, on the pretence of its being delicate. He next purchased two carriage horses, and went on thus till in less than a year he had eight in his possession. He also had an elegant carriage built for him, but used it very seldom, because his friends were obliged to walk, and he shrunk from offending them by a display of ostentation. His horses, however, were at the service of all, and as his love for them could not excite any feelings of envy, he took the greatest delight in them.

It was now that he first felt the symptoms of love, excited by a lady who was the wife of an elder brother of some intimate friends of his, to whom he was on a visit. His transient passion, however, soon passed away, without leaving any trace behind it. The period had now arrived for his leaving the academy, and in May, 1766, he was nominated ensign in the provincial regiment of Asti, which met only twice a-year for a few days, thus allowing ample opportunity for doing nothing; the only thing, he says, he had made up his mind to do. But he soon got tired of even this slight restraint. "I could not adapt myself to that chain of graduated dependence which is called subordination, and which although the soul of military discipline, could never be the soul of a future tragic poet." He therefore obtained permission, though with great difficulty, to accompany an English Catholic tutor, who was about to visit Rome and Naples with two of his fellow-students. He chooses this moment for commencing the epoch of youth, which he describes as embracing ten years of travel and dissipation.

On reaching Milan, the travellers visited the Ambrosian library.

"Here the librarian placed in my hands a manuscript of Petrarch, but, like a true Goth, I threw it aside, saying it was nothing to me. The fact was, I had a certain spite against the aforesaid Petrarch; for having met with a copy of his works some years before, when I was a philosopher, I found on opening it at various places by chance that I could not understand the meaning in the least; accordingly I joined with the French and other ignorant pretenders in condemning him, and as I considered him a dull and prosy writer, I treated his invaluable manuscript in the manner above described."

At this time he always spoke and wrote in French, and read nothing but French books.

"As I knew still less of Italian, I gathered the necessary fruit of my birth in an amphibious country, and of the precious education I had received."

They proceeded afterwards to Florence, Rome, and Naples. At the latter place he obtained permission from his own court, through the intercession of the Sardinian minister, to leave the tutor, and travel for the future alone. Attended only by his faithful servant Elia, who had taken the place of the worthless Andrea, and for whom he felt a great affection, he returned to Rome, and had the honor of kissing the Pope's toe. The pontiff's manner pleased him so much, that he felt no repugnance to going through the ceremony, although he had read Fleury, and knew the real value of the aforesaid toe.

Having obtained leave to travel for another year, he determined to visit France, England, and Holland. He went first to Venice, and there was assailed by that melancholy, _ennui_, and restlessness, peculiar to his character.

"I spent many days without leaving the house, my chief employment being to stand at the window, and make signs, and hold brief dialogues with a young lady opposite; the rest of the day I spent in sleeping, in thinking of I know not what, and generally crying, I knew not why."

All through life he was subject to these periodical fits, which came on every spring, and materially influenced his powers of composition.

He proceeded afterwards to France, expecting to be delighted with Paris; but on arriving there he found it so unlike what he had anticipated, that he burst into a violent fit of passion at having made so much haste, undergone so much fatigue, and had his fancy excited to such a pitch of frenzy, only to plunge into that filthy sewer, as he calls it! His anger is quite ludicrous; but he, notwithstanding, remained there five months, during which time he was presented to Louis XV. at Versailles, but the cold reception he met with greatly annoyed him.

"Although I had been told that the king did not speak to ordinary foreigners, and although I did not care much for his notice, yet I could not swallow the Jove-like superciliousness of the monarch, who surveyed from head to foot the people presented to him, without appearing to receive the slightest impression. It was as if somebody said to a giant, 'I beg to present an ant to you;' and he were either to stare or to smile, or to say, it may be, 'Oh, what a little creature!'"

He was as much delighted with England as he had been disgusted with France. He falls into perfect raptures when speaking of our national character and our national institutions, and regrets that it was not in his power to remain here for ever. In June, 1768, he went to Holland, and at the Hague fell violently in love with the wife of a rich gentleman whom he knew. When the lady was obliged to go into Switzerland, he was thrown into such a state of frenzy that he attempted to commit suicide, by tearing off the bandages from the place where he had had himself bled, under pretence of illness. His servant, however, suspected his intentions, and prevented him from carrying his resolution into effect. He gradually recovered his spirits, and determined to return to Italy. On reaching Turin, he was seized by a desire to study. The book in which he took most delight was Plutarch's Lives:

"Some of these, such as Timoleon, Cæsar, Brutus, Pelopidas, and Cato, I read four or five times over, with such transports of shouting, crying, and fury, that any person in the next room must have thought me mad. On reading any particular anecdotes of those great men, I used often to spring to my feet in the greatest agitation, and quite beside myself, shedding tears of grief and rage at seeing myself born in Piedmont, and in an age and under a government where nothing noble could be said or done, and where it was almost useless to think or to feel."

His brother-in-law now strongly urged him to marry, and he consented, although unwillingly, that negotiations should be entered into on his behalf with the family of a young, noble, and rich heiress, whose beautiful black eyes would, doubtless, soon have driven Plutarch out of his head. The end, however, was that she married somebody else, to Alfieri's internal satisfaction. "Had I been tied down by a wife and children, the Muses would certainly have bid me good bye."

The moment he felt himself free he determined to start again on his travels. On reaching Vienna, the Sardinian minister offered to introduce him to Metastasio; but he cared nothing at that time for any Italian author, and, moreover, had taken a great dislike to the poet, from having seen him make a servile genuflexion to the Empress Maria Theresa in the Imperial Gardens at Schönbrunn. On entering the dominions of Frederick the Great, he was made extremely indignant by the military despotism that reigned there. When presented to the king he did not appear in uniform.

"The minister asked me the reason of this, seeing that I was in the service of my own sovereign. I replied, 'Because there are already enough uniforms here.' The king said to me his usual four words; I watched him attentively, fixing my eyes respectfully on his, and thanked Heaven that I was not born his slave."

Denmark, Sweden, and Russia, were then successively visited by him. He had heard so much of the latter country, that when he reached St. Petersburgh his expectations were wrought up to a great pitch.

"But, alas! no sooner did I set foot in this Asiatic encampment of tents, than I called to mind Rome, Genoa, Venice, and Florence, and began to laugh. The longer I remained in the country, the more were my first impressions confirmed, and I left it with the precious conviction that it was not worth seeing."

He refused to be presented to the celebrated female autocrat, Catherine II., whom he stigmatizes as "a philosophical Clytemnestra."

He next visited England for the second time, arriving at the end of 1770. During his stay in London, which lasted for seven months, he became involved in an affair which excited an extraordinary sensation at the time, and which is even remembered by the scandal-mongers of the present day. He formed the acquaintance of the wife of an officer of high rank in the Guards, and this intimacy soon assumed a criminal character. Her husband, a man of a very jealous temperament, suspected his wife's infidelity, and had them watched. On finding his suspicions confirmed, he challenged Alfieri, and they fought a duel with swords in the Green Park, in which the future poet was wounded in the arm. The husband pressed for a divorce, and Alfieri announced his intention of marrying the lady as soon as she was free; but, to his horror, she confessed to him one day, what was already known to the public through the newspapers, although he was ignorant of it, that before she knew him she had been engaged in an intrigue with a groom of her husband! Despite this discovery, it was some time before his affection for her abated; but at length, on her announcing her determination to enter a convent in France, he quitted her at Rochester, and left this country himself almost immediately afterwards. He went to Paris, and there bought a collection of the principal Italian poets and prose-writers in thirty-six volumes, which from that time became his inseparable companions, although he did not make much use of them for two or three years. However, he now learned to know at least something of the six great luminaries, Dante, Petrarch, Ariosto, Tasso, Boccaccio, and Machiavelli.

He next proceeded to Spain and Portugal. At Lisbon he formed the acquaintance of the Abate Tommaso di Caluso, younger brother of the Sardinian minister. The society of this distinguished man produced the most beneficial effect on him. One evening, when the Abate was reading to him the fine _Ode to Fortune_ of Alessandro Guidi, a poet whose name he had never even heard, some of the stanzas produced such extraordinary transports in him, that the former told him that he was born to write verses. This sudden impulse of Apollo, as he calls it, was however only a momentary flush, which was soon extinguished, and remained buried for a long time to come.

He now bent his steps homewards, and reached Turin in May, 1772, after an absence of three years. He took a magnificent house in the Piazza di San Carlo, furnished it sumptuously, and commenced leading a merry life with about a dozen friends, who formed a society, which met at his house every week. This Society was governed by strict rules, one of which was that all should contribute something in writing for their reciprocal amusement; these contributions being placed in a chest, of which the president for the time being kept the key, and read aloud by him at their meetings. They were all written in French, and Alfieri mentions one of his which was very successful. It described the Deity at the last judgment demanding from every soul an account of itself, and the characters he drew were all those of well-known individuals, both male and female, in Turin.

It was not long before he fell in love for the third time, the object of his passion now being a lady some years older than himself, and of somewhat doubtful reputation. For the space of nearly two years she exercised unbounded dominion over him. Feeling that he could not support the fetters of Venus and of Mars at one and the same time, he with some little difficulty obtained permission to throw up his commission in the army.

While attending at his mistress's bedside, during an illness by which she was attacked in January, 1744, the idea first struck him of writing a dramatic sketch. He wrote it without the slightest plan, in the form of a dialogue between three persons, called respectively, Photinus, Lachesis, and Cleopatra. He gives a specimen of it in a note, and it is certainly not of the very highest order of merit. On the recovery of the lady he placed it under the cushion of her couch, where it remained forgotten for a year, and thus were the first fruits of his tragic genius brooded over, as it were, by the lady and all who chanced to sit upon the couch.

At length he threw off the chains which had so long bound him. The exertion was, however, so great that he was actually obliged to get his servant Elia to tie him to his chair, that he might not quit the house. When his friends came to see him, he dropped his dressing gown over the bandages, so that his forced imprisonment was not perceived. His first appearance in public was at the carnival of 1775, where he dressed himself up as Apollo, and recited at the public ball at the theatre a masquerade he had composed on the subject of love, twanging a guitar vigorously all the time. He was afterwards heartily ashamed of this freak, which he wonders he could ever have been guilty of. An ardent desire for glory now seized him, and after some months spent in constant poetical studies, and in fingering grammars and dictionaries, he succeeded in producing his first tragedy; which, like the sketch already mentioned, he entitled _Cleopatra_. It was performed at Turin, on the 16th June, 1775, at the Carignan Theatre, and was followed by a comic after-piece, also written by him, called _The Poets_, in which he introduced himself under the name of Giusippus, and was the first to ridicule his own tragedy; which, he says, differed from those of his poetical rivals, inasmuch as their productions were the mature offspring of an erudite incapacity, whilst his was the premature child of a not unpromising ignorance. These two pieces were performed with considerable success for two successive evenings, when he withdrew them from the stage, ashamed at having so rashly exposed himself to the public. He never considered this _Cleopatra_ worthy of preservation, and it is not published with his other works. From this moment, however, he felt every vein swollen with the most burning thirst for real theatrical laurels, and here terminates the epoch of Youth and commences that of Manhood.

Up to this point we have seen Alfieri's character as formed by nature, and before it was influenced by study, or softened down by intercourse with the world. We have seen him ardent, restless beyond all belief, passionate, oppressed by unaccountable melancholy, acting under the toiling impulse of the moment, whether in love or hate, and, what is of extreme disadvantage to him as respects the career he is about to enter upon, suffering from a deficient education. We have now to see how he overcame all the obstacles arising from his natural character, and from a youth wasted in idleness and dissipation; and how he gradually won his way from victory to victory, until he at length attained the noble and enviable eminence which is assigned to him by universal consent as the greatest, we had almost said the only, modern Italian poet.

He describes the capital with which he commenced his undertaking as consisting in a resolute, indomitable, and extremely obstinate mind, and a heart full to overflowing with every species of emotion, particularly love, with all its furies, and a profound and ferocious hatred of tyranny. To this was added a faint recollection of various French tragedies. On the other hand, he was almost entirely ignorant of the rules of tragic art, and understood his own language most imperfectly. The whole was enveloped in a thick covering of presumption, or rather petulance, and a violence of character so great as to render it most difficult for him to appreciate truth. He considers these elements better adapted for forming a bad monarch than a good author.

He began by studying grammar vigorously; and his first attempt was to put into Italian two tragedies, entitled _Filippo_ and _Polinice_, which he had some time before written in French prose. At the same time he read Tasso, Ariosto, Dante, and Petrarch, making notes as he proceeded, and occupying a year in the task. He then commenced reading Latin with a tutor; and shortly afterwards went to Tuscany in order to acquire a really good Italian idiom. He returned to Turin in October, 1776, and there composed several sonnets, having in the meantime made considerable progress with several of his tragedies. The next year he again went to Tuscany, and on reaching Florence in October, intending to remain there a month, an event occurred which--to use his own words--"fixed and enchained me there for many years; an event which, happily for me, determined me to expatriate myself for ever, and which by fastening upon me new, self-sought, and golden chains, enabled me to acquire that real literary freedom, without which I should never have done any good, if so be that I _have_ done good."

Charles Edward, the Young Pretender, was at that time residing in Florence, in company with his wife, the Countess of Albany, whose maiden name was Louisa Stolberg, of the princely house of that name. The following is Alfieri's description of her:--

"The sweet fire of her very dark eyes, added (a thing of rare occurrence) to a very white skin and fair hair, gave an irresistible brilliancy to her beauty. She was twenty-five years of age, was much attached to literature and the fine arts, had an angelic temper, and, in spite of her wealth, was in the most painful domestic circumstances, so that she could not be as happy as she deserved. How many reasons for loving her!"

Her husband appears to have been of a most violent and ungovernable temper, and to have always treated her in the harshest manner.--No wonder, then, that an impassioned and susceptible nature like Alfieri's should have been attracted by such charms! A friendship of the closest and most enduring description ensued between them; and although a certain air of mystery always surrounded the story of their mutual attachment, there is no reason whatever to suppose that it partook in the slightest degree of a dishonorable character.

Instead of finding his passion for the Countess an obstacle to literary glory and useful occupations, as had always been the case previously with him, when under the influence of similar emotions, he found that it incited and spurred him on to every good work, and accordingly he abandoned himself, without restraint, to its indulgence. That he might have no inducement to return to his own country, he determined to dissolve every tie that united him to it, and with that intent made an absolute donation for life of the whole of his estates, both in fee and freehold, to his natural heir, his sister Giulia, wife of the Count di Cumiana. He merely stipulated for an annual pension, and a certain sum in ready money, the whole amounting to about one-half of the value of his property. The negotiations were finally brought to a conclusion in November, 1778. He also sold his furniture and plate which he had left in Turin; and, unfortunately for himself, invested almost the whole of the money he now found himself possessed of in French life annuities. At one period of the negotiations he was in great fear lest he should lose every thing, and revolved in his mind what profession he should adopt in case he should be left penniless.

"The art that presented itself to me as the best for gaining a living by, was that of a horse-breaker, in which I consider myself a proficient. It is certainly one of the least servile, and it appeared to me to be more compatible than any other with that of a poet, for it is much easier to write tragedies in a stable than in a court."

He now commenced living in the simplest style, dismissed all his servants, save one; sold or gave away all his horses, and wore the plainest clothing. He continued his studies without intermission, and by the beginning of 1782 had nearly finished the whole of the twelve tragedies which he had from the first made up his mind to write, and not to exceed. These were entitled respectively _Filippo_, _Polinice_, _Antigone_, _Agamennone_, _Oreste_, _Don Garzia_, _Virginia_, _La Congiura de' Pazzi_, _Maria Stuarda_, _Ottavia_, _Timoleone_ and _Rosmunda_.--Happening, however, to read the _Merope_ of Maffei, then considered the best Italian tragedy, he felt so indignant, that he set to work, and very shortly produced his tragedy of that name, which was soon followed by the _Saul_, which is incomparably the finest of his works.

The Countess had obtained permission at the end of 1780 to leave her husband, in consequence of the brutal treatment she experienced at his hands, and to retire to Rome. It was not long before Alfieri followed her, and took up his habitation there also. At the end of 1782, his _Antigone_ was performed by a company of amateurs--he himself being one--before an audience consisting of all the rank and fashion of Rome. Its success was unequivocal, and he felt so proud of his triumph, that he determined to send four of his tragedies to press, getting his friend Gori, at Siena, to superintend the printing; and they were accordingly published.

The intimacy between Alfieri and the Countess now inflamed the anger of Charles Edward and his brother, Cardinal York, to such a pitch, that Alfieri found it prudent to leave Rome, which he did in May, 1783, in a state of bitter anguish. He first made pilgrimages to the tombs of Dante, Petrarch, and Ariosto, at Ravenna, Arquà, and Ferrara; at each of which he spent some time in dreaming, praying, and weeping, at the same time pouring forth a perfect stream of impassioned poetry. On getting to Siena, he superintended personally the printing of six more of his tragedies, and for the first time felt all the cares of authorship, being driven nearly distracted by the sad realities of censors, both spiritual and temporal, correctors of the press, compositors, pressmen, &c., and the worry he experienced brought on a sharp attack of gout. On recovering, he determined to start off once more on his travels, making as a plea his desire to purchase a stud of horses in England, his equestrian propensities having returned with violence. He accordingly left his tragedies, both published and unpublished, to shift for themselves, and proceeded to England, where, in a few weeks, he bought no less than fourteen horses. That being the exact number of the tragedies he had written, he used to amuse himself by saying, "For each tragedy you have got a horse," in reference to the punishment inflicted on naughty schoolboys in Italy, where the culprit is mounted on the shoulders of another boy, while the master lays on the cane.

He experienced almost endless trouble and difficulty in conveying his acquisitions safely back to Italy. The account he gives of the passage of the Alps by Mount Cenis, from Lanslebourg to the Novalese, is really quite romantic; and he compares himself to Hannibal on the occasion, but says that if the passage of the latter cost him a great deal of vinegar, it cost him (Alfieri) no small quantity of wine, as the whole party concerned in conveying the horses over the mountain, guides, farriers, grooms, and adjutants, drank like fishes.

On reaching Turin, he was present at a performance of his _Virginia_ at the same theatre where, nine years before, his early play of _Cleopatra_ had been acted. He shortly received intelligence that the Countess had been permitted to leave Rome and to go to Switzerland. He could not refrain from following her, and accordingly rejoined her at Colmar, a city of Alsace, after a separation of sixteen months. The sight of her whom he loved so dearly again awakened his poetic genius, and gave birth, at almost one and the same moment, to his three tragedies of _Agide_, _Sofonisba_, and _Mirra_, despite his previous resolve to write no more. When obliged to leave the Countess, he returned to Italy, but the following year again visited her, remaining in Alsace when she proceeded to Paris. She happened to mention in a letter that she had been much pleased with seeing Voltaire's _Brutus_ performed on the stage. This excited his emulation. "What!" he exclaimed, "_Brutuses_ written by a Voltaire? I'll write _Brutuses_, and two at once, moreover, time will show whether such subjects for tragedy are better adapted for me or for a plebeian-born Frenchman, who for more than sixty years subscribed himself _Voltaire, Gentleman in Ordinary to the King_." Accordingly he set to work, and planned on the spot his _Bruto Primo_ and _Bruto Secondo_; after which he once more renewed his vow to Apollo to write no more tragedies. About this period he also sketched his _Abel_, which he called by the whimsical title of a _Tramelogedy_. He next went to Paris, and made arrangements with the celebrated Didot for printing the whole of his tragedies in six volumes. On returning to Alsace, in company with the Countess, he was joined by his old friend the Abate di Caluso, who brought with him a letter from his mother, containing proposals for his marriage with a rich young lady of Asti, whose name was not mentioned. Alfieri told the Abate, smilingly, that he must decline the proffered match, and had not even the curiosity to inquire who the lady was. Shortly afterwards he was attacked by a dangerous illness, which reduced him to the point of death. On recovering, he went with his friends to Kehl, and was so much pleased with the printing establishment of the well-known Beaumarchais, that he resolved to have the whole of his works, with the exception of his tragedies, which were in Didot's hands, printed there; and accordingly, by August, 1789, all his writings, both in prose and poetry, were printed.

In the mean time, the Countess of Albany had heard of the death of her husband, which took place at Rome, on the 31st January, 1788. This event set her entirely free, and it is generally believed that she was shortly afterwards united in marriage to Alfieri; but the fact was never known, and to the last the poet preserved the greatest mystery on the subject.

Paris now became their regular residence, and it was not long before the revolutionary troubles commenced. In April, 1791, they determined to pay a visit to England, where the Countess had never been. They remained here some months, and on their embarking at Dover on their return, Alfieri chanced to notice among the people collected on the beach to see the vessel off, the very lady, his intrigue with whom twenty years before had excited so great a sensation. He did not speak to her, but saw that she recognized him. Accordingly, on reaching Calais, he wrote to her to inquire into her present situation. He gives her reply at full length in his _Memoirs_. It is in French; and we regret that its length precludes us from giving it here, as it is a very remarkable production. It indicates a decisive and inflexible firmness of character, very unlike what is usually met with in her sex.

After visiting Holland and Belgium, Alfieri and the Countess returned to Paris. In March, 1792, he received intelligence of his mother's death. In the mean time the war with the emperor commenced, and matters gradually got worse and worse. Alfieri witnessed the events of the terrible 10th of August, when the Tuileries was taken by the mob after a bloody conflict, and Louis XVI. virtually ceased to reign. Seeing the great danger to which they would be exposed if they remained longer in Paris, they determined on a hasty flight; and after procuring the necessary passports, started on the 18th of the same month. They had a narrow escape on passing the barriers. A mob of the lowest order insisted on their carriage being stopped, and on their being conducted back to Paris, exclaiming that all the rich were flying away, taking their treasures with them, and leaving the poor behind in want and misery. The few soldiers on the spot would have been soon overpowered; and nothing saved the travellers except Alfieri's courage. He at length succeeded in forcing a passage; but there is little doubt that if they had been obliged to return, they would have been thrown into prison, in which case they would have been among the unhappy victims who were so barbarously murdered by the populace on the 2d September.

They reached Calais in two days and a half, having had to show their passports more than forty times. They afterwards learned that they were the first foreigners who had escaped from Paris and from France after the catastrophe of the 10th August. After stopping some time at Brussels, they proceeded to Italy, and reached Florence in November. That city remained Alfieri's dwelling-place, nearly uninterruptedly, from this moment to the period of his death.

In 1795, when he was forty-six years old, a feeling of shame came over him at his ignorance of Greek, and he determined to master that language. He applied himself with such industry to the task, that before very long he could read almost any Greek author. There are few instances on record of such an effort being made at so advanced a period of life. Yet, perhaps, a still more remarkable case than that of our poet is that of Mehemet Ali, who did not learn to read or write till more than forty years of age. His son, Ibrahim, never did even that. At the same time that he was learning Greek, Alfieri amused himself by writing satires, of which he had completed seventeen by the end of 1797. The fruit of his Greek studies appeared in his tragedies of _Alceste Prima_ and _Alceste Seconda_, which he composed after reading Euripides' fine play of that name. He calls these essays his final perjuries to Apollo. We have certainly seen him break his vow sufficiently often. The twelve tragedies he pledged himself not to exceed had now grown to their present number of twenty-one, besides the tramelogedy of _Abel_.

He remained quietly and happily at Florence till the French invasion in March, 1799, when he and the Countess retired to a villa in the country. He marked his hatred of the French nation by writing his _Misogallo_, a miscellaneous collection in prose and verse of the most violent and indiscriminate abuse of France, and every thing connected with it, as its name imports. On the evacuation of Florence by the French in July, they returned to the city, but again left it on the second invasion in October, 1800. The French commander-in-chief wrote to Alfieri, requesting the honor of the acquaintance of a man who had rendered such distinguished services to literature: but he told him in reply, that if he wrote in his quality as Commandant of Florence, he would yield to his superior authority; but that if it was merely as an individual curious to see him, he must beg to be excused.

We now find him irresistibly impelled to try his hand at comedy, and he accordingly wrote the six which are published with his other works. They are entitled respectively, _L'Uno_, _I Pochi_, _Il Troppo_, _Tre Velene rimesta avrai l'Antido_, _La Finestrina_, and _Il Divorzio_. The first four are political in their character, and written in iambics, like his tragedies. The last is the only one that can be ranked with modern comedies. Sismondi truly remarks, that in these dramas he exhibits the powers of a great satirist, not of a successful dramatist.

His health was by this time seriously impaired, and he felt it necessary to cease entirely from his labors. On the 8th December, 1802, he put the finishing stroke to his works, and amused himself for the short remainder of his life in writing the conclusion of his _Memoirs_. Feeling extremely proud at having overcome the difficulties of the Greek language in his later years, he invented a collar, on which were engraved the names of twenty-three ancient and modern poets, and to which was attached a cameo representing Homer. On the back of it he wrote the following distich:

[Greek:

Auton poiêsas Alphêrios hippe Homêron Koiranikês timên êlphane zeioteran,]

which may be thus Englished:

"Perchance Alfieri made no great misnomer When he dubb'd himself Knight of the Order of Homer."

With the account of this amusing little incident, Alfieri terminates the history of his life. The date it bears is the 14th of May, 1803, and on the 8th October of the same year he breathed his last, in the fifty-fifth year of his age. The particulars of his death are given in a letter addressed by the Abate di Caluso to the Countess of Albany. An attack of gout in the stomach was the immediate cause of it. The delicate state of his health greatly accelerated the progress of the disease, which was still further promoted by his insisting on proceeding with the correction of his works almost to the very last. He was so little aware of his impending dissolution, that he took a drive in a carriage on the 3d October, and tried to the last moment to starve his gout into submission. He refused to allow leeches to be applied to his legs, as the physicians recommended, because they would have prevented him from walking. At this period, all his studies and labors of the last thirty years rushed through his mind; and he told the Countess, who was attending him, that a considerable number of Greek verses from the beginning of Hesiod, which he had only read once in his life, recurred most distinctly to his memory. His mortal agony came on so suddenly, that there was not time to administer to him the last consolations of religion. He was buried in the church of Santa Croce at Florence, where already reposed the remains of Machiavelli, of Michael Angelo, and of Galileo. A monument to his memory, the work of the great Canova, was raised over his ashes by direction of the Countess of Albany.

Such then was Alfieri! And may we not draw a moral from the story of his life as faintly and imperfectly shadowed forth in the preceding sketch? Does it not show us how we may overcome obstacles deemed by us insuperable, and how we may seek to become something better than what we are? The poet's name will go down to future ages as the idol of his countrymen; may the beneficial effect produced by a mind like his upon the character and aspirations of the world be enduring!

From the Dublin University Magazine

ANECDOTES OF PAGANINI.

Paganini was in all respects a very singular being, and an interesting subject to study. His talents were by no means confined to his wonderful powers as a musician. On other subjects he was well informed, acute, and conversible, of bland and gentle manners, and in society, perfectly well bred. All this contrasted strangely with the dark, mysterious stories which were bruited abroad, touching some passages in his early life. But outward semblance and external deportment are treacherous as quicksands, when taken as guides by which to sound the real depths of human character. Lord Byron remarks, that his pocket was once picked by the civilest gentleman he ever conversed with, and that by far the mildest individual of his acquaintance was the remorseless Ali Pacha of Yanina. The expressive lineaments of Paganini told a powerful tale of passions which had been fearfully excited, which might be roused again from temporary slumber, or were exhausted by indulgence and premature decay, leaving deep furrows to mark their intensity. Like the generality of his countrymen, he looked much older than he was. With them, the elastic vigor of youth and manhood rapidly subside into an interminable and joyless old age, numbering as many years but with far less both of physical and mental faculty, to render them endurable, than the more equally poised gradations of our northern clime. It is by no means unusual to encounter a well-developed Italian, whiskered to the eyebrows, and "bearded like the pard," who tells you, to your utter astonishment, that he is scarcely seventeen, when you have set him down from his appearance as, at least, five-and-thirty.

The following extract from Colonel Montgomery Maxwell's book of Military Reminiscences, entitled, "My Adventures," dated Genoa, February 22nd, 1815, supplies the earliest record which has been given to the public respecting Paganini, and affords authentic evidence that some of the mysterious tales which heralded his coming were not without foundation. He could scarcely have been at this time thirty years old. "Talking of music, I have become acquainted with the most _outré_, most extravagant, and strangest character I ever beheld, or heard, in the musical line. He has just been emancipated from durance vile, where he has been for a long time incarcerated on suspicion of murder. His long figure, long neck, long face, and long forehead; his hollow and deadly pale cheek, large black eye, hooked nose, and jet black hair, which is long, and more than half hiding his expressive, Jewish face; all these rendered him the most extraordinary person I ever beheld. There is something scriptural in the _tout ensemble_ of the strange physiognomy of this uncouth and unearthly figure. Not that, as in times of old, he plays, as Holy Writ tells us, on a ten-stringed instrument; on the contrary, he brings the most powerful, the most wonderful, and the most heart-rending tones from one string. His name is Paganini; he is very improvident and very poor. The D----s, and the Impressario of the theatre got up a concert for him the other night, which was well attended, and on which occasion he electrified the audience. He is a native of Genoa, and if I were a judge of violin playing, I would pronounce him the most surprising performer in the world!"

That Paganini was either innocent of the charge for which he suffered the incarceration Colonel Maxwell mentions, or that it could not be proved against him, may be reasonably inferred from the fact that he escaped the gallies of the executioner. In Italy, there was then, _par excellence_ (whatever there may be now), a law for the rich, and another for the poor. As he was without money, and unable to buy immunity, it is charitable to suppose he was entitled to it from innocence. A nobleman, with a few _zecchini_, was in little danger of the law, which confined its practice entirely to the lower orders. I knew a Sicilian prince, who most wantonly blew a vassal's brains out, merely because he put him in a passion. The case was not even inquired into. He sent half a dollar to the widow of the defunct (which, by the way, he borrowed from me, and never repaid), and there the matter ended. Lord Nelson once suggested to Ferdinand IV. of Naples, to try and check the daily increase of assassination, by a few salutary executions. "No, no," replied old Nasone, who was far from being as great a fool as he looked, "that is impossible. If I once began that system, my kingdom would soon be depopulated. One half my subjects would be continually employed in hanging the remainder."

Among other peculiarities, Paganini was an incarnation of avarice and parsimony, with a most contradictory passion for gambling. He would haggle with you for sixpence, and stake a rouleau on a single turn at _rouge et noir_. He screwed you down in a bargain as tightly as if you were compressed in a vice; yet he had intervals of liberality, and sometimes did a generous action. In this he bore some resemblance to the celebrated John Elwes, of miserly notoriety, who deprived himself of the common necessaries of life, and lived on a potato skin, but sometimes gave a check for £100 to a public charity, and contributed largely to private subscriptions. I never heard that Paganini actually did this, but once or twice he played for nothing, and sent a donation to the Mendicity, when he was in Dublin.

When he made his engagement with me, we mutually agreed to write no orders, expecting the house to be quite full every night, and both being aware that the "sons of freedom," while they add nothing to the exchequer, seldom assist the effect of the performance. They are not given to applaud vehemently; or, as Richelieu observes, "in the right places." What we can get for nothing we are inclined to think much less of than that which we must purchase. He who invests a shilling will not do it rashly, or without feeling convinced that value received will accrue from the risk. The man who pays is the real enthusiast; he comes with a pre-determination to be amused, and his spirit is exalted accordingly. Paganini's valet surprised me one morning, by walking into my room, and with many "_eccellenzas_" and gesticulations of respect, asking me to give him an order. I said, "Why do you come to me? Apply to your master--won't he give you one?" "Oh, yes; but I don't like to ask him." "Why not?" "Because he'll stop the amount out of my wages!" My heart relented; I gave him the order, and paid Paganini the dividend. I told him what it was, thinking, as a matter of course, he would return it. He seemed uncertain for a moment, paused, smiled sardonically, looked at the three and sixpence, and with a spasmodic twitch, deposited it in his own waistcoat pocket instead of mine. Voltaire says, "no man is a hero to his valet de chambre," meaning, thereby, as I suppose, that being behind the scenes of every-day life, he finds out that Marshal Saxe, or Frederick the Great, is as subject to the common infirmities of our nature, as John Nokes or Peter Styles. Whether Paganini's squire of the body looked on his master as a hero in the vulgar acceptation of the word, I cannot say, but in spite of his stinginess, which he writhed under, he regarded him with mingled reverence and terror. "A strange person, your master," observed I. "_Signor_," replied the faithful Sancho Panza, "_e veramente grand uomo, ma da non potersi comprendere_." "He is truly a great man, but quite incomprehensible." It was edifying to observe the awful importance with which Antonio bore the instrument nightly intrusted to his charge to carry to and from the theatre. He considered it an animated something, whether demon or angel he was unable to determine, but this he firmly believed, that it could speak in actual dialogue when his master pleased, or become a dumb familiar by the same controlling volition. This especial violin was Paganini's inseparable companion. It lay on his table before him as he sat meditating in his solitary chamber; it was placed by his side at dinner, and on a chair within his reach when in bed. If he woke, as he constantly did, in the dead of night, and the sudden _estro_ of inspiration seized him, he grasped his instrument, started up, and on the instant perpetuated the conception which otherwise he would have lost for ever. This marvellous Cremona, valued at four hundred guineas, Paganini, on his death-bed, gave to De Kontski, his nephew and only pupil, himself an eminent performer, and in his possession it now remains.

When Paganini was in Dublin, at the musical festival of 1830, the Marquis of Anglesea, then Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, came every night to the concerts at the theatre, and was greatly pleased with his performance. On the first evening, between the acts, his Excellency desired that he might be brought round to his box, to be introduced, and paid him many compliments. Lord Anglesea was at that time residing in perfect privacy with his family at Sir Harcourt Lee's country house, near Blackrock, and expressed a wish to get an evening from the great violinist, to gratify his domestic circle. The negotiation was rather a difficult one, as Paganini was, of all others, the man who did nothing in the way of business without an explicit understanding, and a clearly-defined con-si-de-ra-tion. He was alive to the advantages of honor, but he loved money with a paramount affection. I knew that he had received enormous terms, such as £150 and £200 for fiddling at private parties in London, and I trembled for the vice-regal purse; but I undertook to manage the affair, and went to work accordingly. The aid-de-camp in waiting called with me on Paganini, was introduced in due form, and handed him a card of invitation to dinner, which, of course, he received and accepted with ceremonious politeness. Soon after the officer had departed, he said suddenly, "This is a great honor, but am I expected to bring my instrument?" "Oh, yes," I replied, "as a matter of course--the Lord Lieutenant's family wish to hear you in private." "_Caro amico_," rejoined he, with petrifying composure, "_Paganini con violino e Paganini senza violino,--ecco due animali distinti_." "Paganini with his fiddle and Paganini without it are two very different persons." I knew perfectly what he meant, and said, "The Lord Lieutenant is a nobleman of exalted rank and character, liberal in the extreme, but he is not Croesus; nor do I think you could with any consistency receive such an honor as dining at his table, and afterwards send in a bill for playing two or three tunes in the evening." He was staggered, and asked, "What do you advise?" I said, "Don't you think a present, in the shape of a ring, or a snuff-box, or something of that sort, with a short inscription, would be a more agreeable mode of settlement?" He seemed tickled by this suggestion, and closed with it at once. I dispatched the intelligence through the proper channel, that the violin and the _grand maestro_ would both be in attendance. He went in his very choicest mood, made himself extremely agreeable, played away, unsolicited, throughout the evening, to the delight of the whole party, and on the following morning a gold snuff-box was duly presented to him, with a few complimentary words engraved on the lid.

A year or two after this, when Paganini was again in England, I thought another engagement might be productive, as his extraordinary attraction appeared still to increase. I wrote to him on the subject, and soon received a very courteous communication, to the effect, that although he had not contemplated including Ireland in his tour, yet he had been so impressed by the urbanity of the Dublin public, and had moreover conceived such a personal esteem for my individual character, that he might be induced to alter his plans, at some inconvenience, provided always I could make him a more enticing proposal than the former one. I was here completely puzzled, as on that occasion I gave him a clear two-thirds of each receipt, with a bonus of twenty-five pounds per night in addition, for two useless coadjutors. I replied, that having duly deliberated on his suggestion, and considered the terms of our last compact, I saw no possible means of placing the new one in a more alluring shape, except by offering him the entire produce of the engagement. After I had dispatched my letter, I repented bitterly, and was terrified lest he should think me serious, and hold me to the bargain; but he deigned no answer, and this time I escaped for the fright I had given myself. When in London, I called to see him, and met with a cordial reception; but he soon alluded to the late correspondence, and half seriously said, "That was a curious letter you wrote to me, and the joke with which you concluded it by no means a good one." "Oh," said I, laughing, "it would have been much worse if you had taken me at my word." He then laughed too, and we parted excellent friends. I never saw him again. He returned to the Continent, and died, having purchased the title of Baron, with a patent of nobility, from some foreign potentate, which, with his accumulated earnings, somewhat dilapidated by gambling, he bequeathed to his only son. Paganini was the founder of his school, and the original inventor of those extraordinary _tours de force_ with which all his successors and imitators are accustomed to astonish the uninitiated. But he still stands at the head of the list, although eminent names are included in it, and is not likely to be pushed from his pedestal.

* * * * *

Julius Cornet of Hamburgh understands thirty-eight different languages, not in the superficial manner of Elihu Burritt, but so well that he is able to write them with correctness, and to make translations from one into the other. He has issued a circular to the German public, offering his services as a universal translator, and refers to some of the most prominent publishers of Leipsic, whom he has many years served in that capacity.

BIOGRAPHY OF FRENCH JOURNALISTS.

Fraser's magazine contains a reviewal of Texier's new book on the Paris journals and editors, from which we copy the following paragraphs:

THE DÉBATS.

The _Débats_ is chiefly read by wealthy landed proprietors, public functionaries, the higher classes of the magistracy, the higher classes of merchants and manufacturers, by the agents de change, barristers, notaries, and what we in England would call country gentlemen. Its circulation we should think 10,000. If it circulate 12,000 now, it certainly must have considerably risen since 1849.

The chief editor of the _Débats_ is Armand Bertin. He was brought up in the school of his father, and is now about fifty years of age, or probably a little more. M. Bertin is a man of _esprit_, and of literary tastes, with the habits, feelings, and demeanor of a well-bred gentleman. Of an agreeable and facile commerce, the editor of the _Débats_ is a man of elegant and Epicurean habits; but does not allow his luxurious tastes to interfere with the business of this nether world. According to M. Texier, he reads with his own proprietary and editorial eyes all the voluminous correspondence of the office on his return from the _salon_ in which he has been spending the evening. If in the forenoon there is any thing of importance to learn in any quarter of Paris, M. Bertin is on the scent, and seldom fails to run down his game. At a certain hour in the day he appears in the Rue des Prêtres, in which the office of the _Débats_ is situate, and there assigns to his collaborators their daily task. The compiler of the volume before us, who, as we stated, is himself connected with the Parisian press, writing in the _Siècle_, and who, it may therefore be supposed, has had good opportunities for information, states that, previous to the passing of the Tinguy law, M. Bertin never wrote in his own journal, but contented himself with giving to the products of so many pens the necessary homogeneity. But be this as it may, it is certain he has often written since the law requires the _signature obligatoire_.

Under the Monarchy of the Barricades the influence of M. Bertin was most considerable, yet he only used this influence to obtain orders and decorations for his contributors. As to himself, to his honor and glory be it stated, that he never stuck the smallest bit of riband to his own buttonhole, or, during the seventeen years of the monarchy of July, ever once put his feet inside the Tuileries. At the Italian Opera or the Variétés, sometimes at the Café de Paris, the Maison Dorée, or the Trois Frères, M. Bertin may be seen enjoying the music, or his dinner and wine, but never was he a servile courtier or trencher-follower of the Monarch of the Barricades. It is after these enjoyments, or after his _petit souper_, that M. Bertin proceeds for the last time for the day, or rather the night, to the office of the paper. There shutting himself up in his cabinet, he calls for proofs, reads them, and when he has seen every thing, and corrected every thing, he then gives the final and authoritative order to go to press, and towards two o'clock in the morning turns his steps homeward. M. Bertin, says our author with some malice, belongs to that class of corpulent men so liked by Cæsar and Louis Phillippe. Personally, M. Bertin has no reverence for what is called nobility, either ancient or modern. He is of the school of Chaussée d'Antin, which would set the rich and intelligent middle classes in the places formerly occupied by _Messieurs les Grands Seigneurs_.

The ablest man, connected with the _Débats_, or indeed, at this moment, with the press of France, is M. DE SACY. De Sacy is an advocate by profession, and pleaded in his youth some causes with considerable success. At a very early period of his professional existence he allied himself with the _Débats_. His articles are distinguished by ease and flow, yet by a certain gravity and weight, which is divested, however, of the disgusting doctoral tone. He is, in truth, a solid and serious writer, without being in the least degree heavy. Political men of the old school read his papers with pleasure, and most foreigners may read them with profit and instruction. M. de Sacy is a simple, modest, and retiring gentleman, of great learning, and a taste and tact very uncommon for a man of so much learning. Though he has been for more than a quarter of a century influentially connected with the _Débats_, and has, during eighteen or twenty years of the period, had access to men in the very highest positions--to ministers, ambassadors, to the sons of a king, and even to the late king himself, it is much to his credit that he has contented himself with a paltry riband and a modest place, as Conservateur de la Bibliothèque Mazarine. M. de Sacy belongs to a Jansenist family. _Apropos_ of this, M. Texier tells a pleasant story concerning him. A Roman Catholic writer addressing him one day in the small gallery reserved for the journalist at the Chamber of Deputies, said, "You are a man, M. de Sacy, of too much cleverness, and of too much honesty, not to be one of us, sooner or later." "Not a bit of it," replied promptly M. de Sacy; "_je veux vivre et mourir avec un pied dans le doute et l'autre dans la foi_."

SAINT-MARC GIRARDIN is certainly, next to De Sacy, the most distinguished writer connected with the _Débats_. He was originally a _maître d'étude_ at the College of Henry IV., and sent one fine morning an article to the _Débats_, which produced a wonderful sensation. The article was without name or address; but old Bertin so relished and appreciated it, that he was not to be foiled in finding out the author. An advertisement was inserted on the following day, requesting the writer to call at the editor's study, when M. Saint-Marc Girardin was attached as a regular _soldat de plume_ to the establishment--a profitable engagement, which left him at liberty to leave his miserable _métier_ of _maître d'étude_. The articles written in 1834 against the Emperor of Russia and the Russian system were from the pen of M. Girardin.--The _maître d'étude_ of former days became professor at the College of France--became deputy, and exhibited himself, able writer and dialectician as he was and is, as a mediocre speaker, and ultimately became academician and _un des quarante_.

Another distinguished writer in the _Débats_ is Michel Chevalier. Chevalier is an _élève_ of the Polytechnic School, who originally wrote in the _Globe_. When editor and _gérant_ of the _Globe_, he was condemned to six months' imprisonment for having developed in that journal the principles of St. Simonianism. Before the expiration of his sentence he was appointed by the Government to a sort of travelling commission to America; and from that country he addressed a series of memorable letters to the _Débats_, which produced at the time immense effect. Since that period, Chevalier was appointed Professor of Political Economy at the College of France, a berth from whence he was removed by Carnot, Minister of Public Instruction, but afterwards reinstated by subsequent ministers. Chevalier, though an able man, is yet more of an economic writer than a political disquisitionist. His brother Augustus is Secretary-general of the Elysée.

Among the other contributors are PHILARETE CHASLES, an excellent classical scholar, and a man well acquainted with English literature; Cuvillier Fleury, unquestionably a man of taste and talent; and the celebrated Jules Janin. The productions of the latter as a _feuilletoniste_ are so well known that we do not stop to dwell upon them. Janin is not without merit, and he is highly popular with a certain class of writers: but his articles after all, apart from the circumstances of the day, are but a _rechauffé_ of the style of Marivaux.

THE CONSTITUTIONNEL.

The history of the _Constitutionnel_ follows that of the _Débats_. The _Débats_, says M. Texier, is ingenious, has tact without enthusiasm, banters with taste, and scuds before the wind with a grace which only belongs to a _fin voilier_--to a fast sailing clipper. But, on the other hand, none of these qualities are found in the _Constitutionnel_, which, though often hot, and not seldom vehement and vulgar, is almost uniformly heavy. For three-and-thirty years--that is to say, from 1815 to 1848--the _Constitutionnel_ traded in Voltairien principles, in vehement denunciations of the _Parti Prêtre_ and of the Jesuits, and in the intrigues of the emigrants and royalist party _quand même_. For many years the literary giant of this Titanic warfare was Etienne, who had been in early life secretary to Maret, duke of Bassano, himself a mediocre journalist, though an excellent reporter and stenographer. Etienne was a man of _esprit_ and talent, who had commenced his career as a writer in the _Minerve Française_. In this miscellany, his letters on Paris acquired as much vogue as his comedies. About 1818, Etienne acquired a single share in the _Constitutionnel_, and after a year's service became impregnated with the air of the Rue Montmartre--with the spirit of the _genius loci_. When one has been some time writing for a daily newspaper, this result is sure to follow. One gets habituated to set phrases--to pet ideas--to the traditions of the locality--to the prejudices of the readers, political or religious, as the case may be. Independently of this, the daily toil of newspaper writing is such, and so exhausting, that a man obliged to undergo it for any length of time is glad occasionally to find refuge in words without ideas, which have occasionally much significancy with the million, or in topics on which the public love to dwell fondly. Under the reign of Louis XVIII. and Charles X. it lost no opportunity, by indirection and innuendo, of hinting at the "Petit Caporal," and this circumstance during the life of the emperor, and long after his death, caused the journal to be adored--that is really the word--by the old army, by the _vieux de vieille_, and by the _durs à cuirs_. In these good old bygone times the writers in the _Constitutionel_ wore a blue frock closely buttoned up to the chin, to the end that they might pass for officers of the old army on half-pay. In 1830 the fortunes of the _Constitutionnel_ had reached the culminant point. It then counted 23,000 subscribers, at 80 francs a year. At that period a single share in the property was a fortune. But the avatar of the Citizen King spoiled in a couple of years the sale of the citizen journal. The truth is, that the heat of the Revolution of July had engendered and incubated a multitude of journals, great and little, bounding with young blood and health--journals whose editors and writers did not desire better sport than to attack the _Constitutionnel_ at right and at left, and to tumble the dear, fat, rubicund, old gentleman, head over heels. Among these was the _Charivari_, which incontinently laughed at the whole system of the establishment, from the crapulous, corpulent, and Voltairien Etienne, down to the lowest printer's devil. The metaphors, the puffs, _canards_, the _réclames_, &c. of the _Constitutionnel_ were treated mercilessly and as nothing--not even Religion itself can stand the test of ridicule among so mocking a people as the French; the result was, that the _Constitutionnel_ diminished wonderfully in point of circulation. Yet the old man wrote and spoke well, and had, from 1824 to 1829, as an ally the sharp and clever Thiers, and the better read, the better informed, and the more judicious Mignet. It was during the Vitelle administration that the _Constitutionnel_ attained the very highest acme of its fame. It was then said to have had 30,000 subscribers, and to have maintained them with the cry of "Down with the Jesuits!" In 1827-28, during its palmiest days, the _Constitutionnel_ had no _Roman feuilleton_. It depended then on its leading articles, nor was it till its circulation declined, in 1843, to about 3500, that the proprietors determined to reduce the price one-half. They then, too, adopted the _Roman feuilleton_, giving as much as 500 francs for an article of this kind to Dumas or Sue. From 1845 or 1846 to 1848, the _Consitutionnel_ had most able contributors of leading articles; Thiers, De Remusat, and Duvergier d'Hauranne, having constantly written in its columns. The circulation of the journal was then said to amount to 24,000. When the _Constitutionnel_ entered into the hands of its present proprietor, Docteur Louis Veron, it was said to be reduced to 3000 subscribers. How many subscribers it has now we have no very accurate means of knowing, but we should say, at a rough guess, it may have 9000 or 10,000. It should be remembered, that from being an anti-sacerdotal journal it has become a priests' paper and the organ of priests; from being an opponent of the executive, it has become the organ and the apologist of the executive in the person of M. L. N. Buonaparte, and the useful instrument, it is said, of M. Achille Fould. Every body knows, says M. Texier, with abundant malice prepense, that Dr. Veron, the chief editor of the _Constitutionnel_, has declared that France may henceforth place her head on the pillow and go quietly to sleep, for the doctor confidently answers for the good faith and wisdom of the president.

But who is DOCTOR VERON, the editor-in-chief, when one finds his excellency _chezelle_? The ingenuous son of Esculapius tells us himself that he has known the _coulisses_ (the phrase is a queer one) of science, of the arts, of politics, and even of the opera. It appears, however, that the dear doctor is the son of a stationer of the Rue du Bac, who began his career by studying medicine. If we are to believe himself, his career was a most remarkable one. In 1821 he was received what is called an _interne_ of the Hôtel Dieu. After having walked the hospitals, he enrolled himself in the Catholic and Apostolic Society of '_bonnes lettres_,' collaborated with the writers in the _Quotidienne_, and, thanks to Royalist patronage, was named physician-in-chief of the Royal Museums. Whether any of the groups in the pictures of Rubens, Salvator Rosa, Teniers, Claude, or Poussin--whether any of the Torsos of Praxiteles, or even of a more modern school, required the assiduous care or attention of a skilful physician, we do not pretend to state. But we repeat that the practice of Dr. Veron, according to M. Texier, was confined to these dumb yet not inexpressive personages. In feeling the pulse of the Venus de Medici, or looking at the tongue of the Laocoon, or the Apollo Belvidere, it is said the chief, if not the only practice of Dr. Louis Veron consisted. True, the doctor invented a _pâte pectorale_, approved by all the emperors and kings in Europe, and very renowned, too, among the commonalty; but so did Dr. Solomon, of Gilead House, near Liverpool, invent a balm of Gilead, and Mrs. Cockle invent anti-bilious pills, taken by many of the judges, a majority of the bench of bishops, and some admirals of the blue, and general officers without number, yet we have never heard that Moses Solomon or Tabitha Cockle were renowned in the practice of physic, notwithstanding the said Gilead and the before-mentioned pills. Be this, however, as it may, Veron, after having doctored the pictures and statues, and patepectoraled the Emperor, the Pope, the Grand Turk, the Imaum of Muscat, the Shah of Persia, and the Great Mogul himself, next established the _Review of Paris_, which in its turn he abandoned to become the director of the Opera. Tired of the Opera after four or five years' service, the doctor became a candidate of the dynastic opposition at Brest. This was the "artful dodge" before the Revolution of July 1848, if we may thus translate an untranslateable phrase of the doctor's. At Brest the professor of the healing art failed, and the consequence was, that instead of being a deputy he became the proprietor of the _Constitutionnel_. Fortunate man that he is! In _Robert le Diable_ at the Opera, which he would not at first have at any price, the son of Esculapius found the principal source of his fortune, and by the _Juif Errant_ of Eugène Sue, for which he gave 100,000 francs, he saved the _Constitutionnel_ from perdition. _Apropos_ of this matter, there is a pleasant story abroad. When Veron purchased the _Constitutionnel_, Thiers was writing his _Histoire du Consulat_, for which the booksellers had agreed to give 500,000 francs. Veron wished to have the credit of publishing the book in the _Constitutionnel_, and with this view waited on Thiers, offering to pay down, _argent comptant_, one-half the money. Thiers, though pleased with the proposition, yet entrenched himself behind his engagement with the booksellers. To one of the leading booksellers Veron trotted off post-haste, and opened the business. "Oh!" said the sensible publisher, "you have mistaken your _coup_ altogether." "How so?" said the doctor. "Don't you see," said the Libraire Editeur, "that the rage is Eugène Sue, and that the _Débats_ and the _Presse_ are at fistycuffs to obtain the next novelty of the author of the _Mystères de Paris_? Go you and offer as much again for this novel, whatever it may be, as either the one or other of them, and the fortune of the _Constitutionnel_ is made." The doctor took the advice, and purchased the next novelty of Sue at 100,000 francs. This turned out to be the _Juif Errant_, which raised the circulation of the _Constitutionnel_ to 24,000.

Veron is a puffy-faced little man, with an overgrown body, and midriff sustained upon an attenuated pair of legs; his visage is buried in an immense shirt collar, stiff and starched as a Norman cap. Dr. Veron believes himself the key-stone of the Elyséan arch, and that the weight of the government is on his shoulders. Look at him as he enters the Café de Paris to eat his _purée à la Condé_, and his _suprême de volaille_, and his _filet de chevreuil piqué aux truffes_, and you would say that he is not only the prime, but the favorite minister of Louis Napoleon, _par la grace de Dieu et Monsieur le Docteur Président de la République_. "_Après tout c'est un mauvais drôle, que ce pharmacien_," to use the term applied to the doctor by General Changarnier.

A short man of the name of Boilay washes the dirty linen of Dr. Veron, and corrects his faults of grammar, of history, &c. Boilay is a small, sharp, stout, little man, self-possessed, self-satisfied, with great readiness and tact. Give him but the heads of a subject and he can make out a very readable and plausible article. Boilay is the real working editor of the _Constitutionnel_, and is supported by a M. Clarigny, a M. Malitourne, and others not more known or more respected. Garnier de Cassagnac, of the _Pouvoir_, a man of very considerable talent, though not of very fixed principle, writes occasionally in the _Constitutionnel_, and more ably than any of the other contributors. M. St. Beuve is the literary critic, and he performs his task with eminent ability.

THE NATIONAL.

We now come to the _National_, founded by Carrel, Mignet, and Thiers. It was agreed between the triad that each should take the place of _rédacteur en chef_ for a year. Thiers, as the oldest and most experienced, was the first installed, and conducted the paper with zest and spirit till the Revolution of 1830 broke out. The _National_ set out with the idea of changing the incorrigible dynasty, and instituting Orléanism in the place of it. The refusal to pay taxes and to contribute to a budget was a proposition of the _National_, and it is not going too far to say, that the crisis of 1830 was hastened by this journal. It was at the office of the _National_ that the famous protest, proclaiming the right of resistance, was composed and signed by Thiers, De Remusat, and Canchois Lemaire. On the following day the office of the journal was bombarded by the police and an armed force, when the presses were broken. Against this illegal violence the editors protested. After the Revolution, Carrel assumed the conduct of the journal, and became the firmest as well as the ablest organ of democracy. To the arbitrary and arrogant Perier, he opposed a firm and uncompromising resistance. Every one acquainted with French politics at that epoch is aware of the strenuous and stand-up fight he made for five years for his principles. He it was who opposed a bold front to military bullies, and who invented the epithet _traîneurs de sabre_. This is not the place to speak of the talent of Carrel. He was shot in a miserable quarrel in 1836, by Emile Girardin, then, as now, the editor of the _Presse_. On the death of Carrel, the shareholders of the paper assembled together to name a successor. M. Trelat, subsequently minister, was fixed upon. But as he was then a _détenu_ at Clairvaux, Bastide and Littré filled the editorial chair during the interregnum. On the release of Trelat, it was soon discovered that he had not the peculiar talent necessary. The sceptre of authority passed into the hands of M. Bastide, named Minister of Foreign Affairs in the ending of 1848, or the beginning of 1849. M. Bastide, then a _marchand de bois_, divided his editorial empire with M. Armand Marrast, who had been a political prisoner and a refugee in England, and who returned to France on the amnesty granted on the marriage of the Duke of Orleans. M. Marrast, though a disagreeable, self-sufficient, and underbred person, was unquestionably a writer of point, brilliancy, and vigor. From 1837 to the Revolution of 1848 he was connected with the _National_, and was the author of a series of articles which have not been equalled since. Like all low, vulgar-bred, and reptile-minded persons, Marrast forgot himself completely when raised to the position of President of the Chamber of Deputies. In this position he made irreconcileable enemies of all his old colleagues, and of most persons who came into contact with him. The fact is, that your schoolmaster and pedagogue can rarely become a gentleman, or any thing like a gentleman. The writers in the _National_ at the present moment are, M. Léopold Duras, M. Alexandre Rey, Caylus, Cochut, Forques, Littré, Paul de Musset, Colonel Charras, and several others whose names it is not necessary to mention here.

THE SIÈCLE.

We come now to the _Siècle_, a journal which, though only established in 1836, has, we believe, a greater sale than any journal in Paris--at least, had a greater sale previous to the Revolution of February 1848. The _Siècle_ was the first journal that started at the low price of 40 francs a-year, when almost every other newspaper was purchased at a cost of 70 or 80 francs. It should also be recollected, that it was published under the auspices of the deputies of the constitutional opposition. The _Siècle_ was said, in 1846, to have had 42,000 subscribers. Its then editor was M. Chambolle, who abandoned the concern in February or March 1849, not being able to agree with M. Louis Perrée, the _directeur_ of the journal. Since Chambolle left a journal which he had conducted for thirteen years, M. Perrée has died in the flower of his age, mourned by those connected with the paper, and regretted by the public at large. Previous to the Revolution of 1848, Odillon Barrot and Gustave de Beaumont took great interest and an active part in the management of the _Siècle_. That positive, dogmatical, self-opinioned, and indifferent newspaper writer, Léon Faucher, was then one of the principal contributors to this journal. The _Siècle_ of 1851 is somewhat what the _Constitutionnel_ was in 1825, 6, and 7. It is eminently City-like and of the _bourgeoisie_, "earth, earthy," as a good, reforming, economic National Guard ought to be. The success of the journal is due to this spirit, and to the eminently fair, practical, and business-like manner in which it has been conducted. Perrée, the late editor and manager of the journal, who died at the early age of 34, was member for the Manche. The writers in the journal are Louis Jourdan, formerly a St. Simonian; Pierre Bernard, who was secretary to Armand Carrel; Hippolite Lamarche, an ex-cavalry captain; Auguste Jullien (son of Jullien de Paris, one of the commissaries of Robespierre); and others whom it is needless to mention.

THE PRESSE.

The _Presse_ was founded in 1836, about the same time as the _Siècle_, by Emile de Girardin, a son of General de Girardin, it is said, by an English mother. Till that epoch of fifteen years ago, people in Paris or in France had no idea of a journal exceeding in circulation 25,000 copies, the circulation of the _Constitutionnel_, or of a newspaper costing less than seventy or eighty francs per annum. Many journals had contrived to live on respectably enough on a modest number of 4000 or 5000 _abonnés_. But the conductors of the _Presse_ and of the _Siècle_ were born to operate a revolution in this routine and jog-trot of newspaper life. They reduced the subscription to newspapers from eighty to forty francs per annum, producing as good if not a better article. This was a great advantage to the million, and it induced parties to subscribe for, and read a newspaper, more especially in the country, who never thought of reading a newspaper before. In constituting his new press, M. Girardin entirely upset and rooted out all the old notions theretofore prevailing as to the conduct of a journal. The great feature in the new journal was not its leading articles, but its _Roman feuilleton_, by Dumas, Sue, &c. This it was that first brought Socialism into extreme vogue among the working classes. True the _Presse_ was not the first to publish Socialist _feuilletons_, but the _Débats_ and the _Constitutionnel_. But the _Presse_ was the first to make the leading article subsidiary to the _feuilleton_. It was, even when not a professed Socialist, a great promoter of Socialism, by the thorough support which it lent to all the slimy, jesuitical corruptions of Guizoism, and all the turpitudes and chicanery of Louis Philippism. When the _Presse_ was not a year old it had 15,000 subscribers, and before it was twelve years old the product of its advertisements amounted to 150,000 francs a-year. Indeed this journal has the rare merit of being the first to teach the French the use, and we must add the abuse, of advertisements. We fear the _Presse_, during these early days of the gentle Emile and Granier Cassagnac, was neither a model of virtue, disinterestedness, nor self-denial. Nor do we know that it is so now, even under the best of Republics. There are strange tales abroad, even allowing for the exaggeration of Rumor with her hundred tongues. One thing, however, is clear; that the _Presse_ was a liberal paymaster to its _feuilletonistes_. To Dumas, Sand, De Balzac, Théophile Gautier, and Jules Sandeau, it four years ago paid 300 francs per day for contributions. The _Presse_, as M. Texier says, is now less the collective reason of a set of writers laboring to a common intent, than the expression of the individual activity, energy, and wonderful mobility of M. Girardin himself. The _Presse_ is Emile de Girardin, with his boldness, his audacity, his rampant agility, his Jim Crowism, his inexhaustible cleverness, wonderful fecundity, and indisputable talent. The _Presse_ is bold and daring; but no man can tell the color of its politics to-day, much less three days, or three months hence. On the 25th of July, 1848, it was as audacious, as unabashed, and as little disconcerted as two days before. When the workmen arrived in crowds to break its presses, the ingenious Emile threw open the doors of the press-room, talked and reasoned with the greasy rogues, and sent them contented away.

The number of journals in Paris is greater--much greater, relatively--than the number existing in London. The people of Paris love and study a newspaper more than the people of London, and take a greater interest in public affairs, and more especially in questions of foreign policy. Previous to the Revolution of February 1848, it cannot, we think, be denied that newspaper writers in France held a much higher rank than contributors to the daily press in England, and even still they continue to hold a higher and more influential position, though there can be no good reason why they should have done so at either time. For the last fifteen years there cannot be any doubt or question that the leading articles in the four principal daily London morning papers exhibit an amount of talent, energy, information, readiness, and compression, which are not found in such perfect and wonderful combination in the French press.

For the last three years, however, the press of France has wonderfully deteriorated. It is no longer what it was antecedent to the Revolution. There is not the literary skill, the artistical ability, the energy, the learning, and the eloquence which theretofore existed. The class of writers in newspapers now are an inferior class in attainments, in scholarship, and in general ability. There can be little doubt, we conceive, that the press greatly increased and abused its power, for some years previous to 1848. This led to the decline of its influence--an influence still daily diminishing; but withal, even still the press in France has more influence, and enjoys more social and literary consideration, than the press in England. We believe that newspaper writers in France are not now so generally well paid as they were twenty or thirty years ago. Two or three eminent writers can always command in Paris what would be called a sporting price, but the great mass of leading-article writers receive considerably less in money than a similar class in London, though they exercise a much greater influence on public opinion, and enjoy from the peculiar constitution of French society a higher place in the social scale.

--We see by the last papers from Paris that Veron and the President have quarreled.

From the Cincinnati Commercial Advertiser.

PROPHECY.

BY ALICE CAREY.

I think thou lovest me--yet a prophet said To-day, Elhadra, if thou laidest dead, From thy white forehead would he fold the shroud, And thereon lay his sorrow, like a crown. The drenching rain from out the chilly cloud, In the gray ashes beats the red flame down! And when the crimson folds the kiss away No longer, and blank dulness fills the eyes, Lifting its beauty from the crumbling clay, Back to the light of earth life's angel flies.

So, with my large faith unto gloom allied, Sprang up a shadow sunshine could not quell, And the voice said, Would'st haste to go outside This continent of being, it were well: Where finite, growing toward the Infinite, Gathers its robe of glory out of dust, And looking down the radiances white, Sees all God's purposes about us, just. Canst thou, Elhadra, reach out of the grave, And draw the golden waters of love's well? _His_ years are chrisms of brightness in time's wave-- Thine are as dewdrops in the nightshade's bell!

Then straightening in my hands the rippled length Of all my tresses, slowly one by one, I took the flowers out.--Dear one, in thy strength Pray for my weakness. Thou hast seen the sun Large in the setting, drive a column of light Down through the darkness: so, within death's night, O my beloved, when I shall have gone, If it might be so, would my love burn on.

From Household Words

THE MODERN HAROUN-AL-RASCHID.

In the district of Ferdj' Onah (which signifies _Fine Country_), Algeria, lives a Scheik named Bou-Akas-ben-Achour. He is also distinguished by the surname of _Bou-Djenoni_ (the Man of the Knife), and may be regarded as a type of the eastern Arab. His ancestors conquered Ferdj' Onah, but he has been forced to acknowledge the supremacy of France, by paying a yearly tribute of 80,000 francs. His dominion extends from Milah to Rabouah, and from the southern point of Babour to within two leagues of Gigelli. He is forty-nine years old, and wears the Rahyle costume; that is to say, a woollen _gandoura_, confined by a leathern belt. He carries a pair of pistols in his girdle, by his side the Rahyle _flissa_, and suspended from his neck a small black knife.

Before him walks a negro carrying his gun, and a huge greyhound bounds along by his side. He holds despotic sway over twelve tribes; and should any neighboring people venture to make an incursion on his territory, Bou-Akas seldom condescends to march against them in person, but sends his negro into the principal village. This envoy just displays the gun of Bou-Akas, and the injury is instantly repaired.

He keeps in pay two or three hundred Tolbas to read the Koran to the people; every pilgrim going to Mecca, and passing through Ferdj' Onah, receives three francs, and may remain as long as he pleases to enjoy the hospitality of Bou-Akas. But whenever the Scheik discovers that he has been deceived by a pretended pilgrim, he immediately dispatches emissaries after the impostor; who, wherever he is, find him, throw him down, and give him fifty blows on the soles of his feet.

Bou-Akas sometimes entertains three hundred persons at dinner; but instead of sharing their repast, he walks round the tables with a baton in his hand, seeing that the servants attend properly to his guests. Afterwards, if any thing is left, he eats; but not until the others have finished.

When the governor of Constantinople, the only man whose power he recognizes, sends him a traveller; according to the rank of the latter, or the nature of the recommendation Bou-Akas gives him his gun, his dog, or his knife. If the gun, the traveller takes it on his shoulder; if the dog, he leads it in a leash; or if the knife, he hangs it round his neck: and with any one of these potent talismans, of which each bears its own degree of honor, the stranger passes through the region of the twelve tribes, not only unscathed, but as the guest of Bou-Akas, treated with the utmost hospitality. When the traveller is about to leave Ferdj' Onah, he consigns the knife, the dog, or the gun to the care of the first Arab he meets. If the Arab is hunting, he leaves the chase; if laboring in the field, he leaves his plough; and, taking the precious deposit, hastens to restore it to the Bou-Akas.

The black-handled knife is so well known, that it has given the surname of "Bou-Djenoni, _the man of the knife_," to its owner. With this implement he is accustomed to cut off heads, whenever he takes a fancy to perform that agreeable office with his own hand.

When first Bou-Akas assumed the government, the country was infested with robbers, but he speedily found means to extirpate them. He disguised himself as a poor merchant; walked out, and dropped a _douro_ (a gold coin) on the ground, taking care not to lose sight of it. If the person who happened to pick up the _douro_, put it into his pocket and passed on, Bou-Akas made a sign to his _chinaux_ (who followed him, also in disguise, and knew the Scheik's will) rushed forward immediately, and decapitated the offender. In consequence of this summary method of administering justice, it is a saying amongst the Arabs that a child might traverse the regions which own Bou-Akas's sway, wearing a golden crown on his head, without a single hand being stretched out to take it.

The Scheik has great respect for women, and has ordered that when the females of Ferdj' Onah go out to draw water, every man who meets them shall turn away his head. Wishing one day to ascertain whether his commands were attended to, he went out in disguise: and, meeting a beautiful Arab maiden on her way to the well, approached and saluted her. The girl looked at him with amazement, and said: "Pass on, stranger; thou knowest not the risk them hast run." And when Bou-Akas persisted in speaking to her, she added: "Foolish man, and reckless of thy life; knowest thou not that we are in the country of Bou-Djenoni, who causes all women to be held in respect?"

Bou-Akas is very strict in his religious observances; he never omits his prayers and ablutions, and has four wives, the number permitted by the Koran. Having heard that the Cadi of one of his twelve tribes administered justice in an admirable manner, and pronounced decisions in a style worthy of King Solomon himself, Bou-Akas, like a second Haroun-Al-Raschid, determined to judge for himself as to the truth of the report. Accordingly, dressed like a private individual, without arms or attendants, he set out for the Cadi's towns, mounted on a docile Arabian steed. He arrived there, and was just entering the gate, when a cripple seizing the border of his burnous, asked him for alms in the name of the prophet. Bou-Akas gave him money, but the cripple still maintained his hold. "What dost thou want?" asked the Scheik; "I have already given thee alms."

"Yes," replied the beggar, "but the law says, not only--'Thou shalt give alms to thy brother,' but also, 'Thou shalt do for thy brother whatsoever thou canst.'"

"Well! and what can I do for thee?"

"Thou canst save me,--poor crawling creature that I am!--from being trodden under the feet of men, horses, mules and camels, which would certainly happen to me in passing through the crowded square, in which a fair is now going on."

"And how can I save thee?"

"By letting me ride behind you, and putting me down safely in the market-place, where I have business."

"Be it so," replied Bou-Akas. And stooping down, he helped the cripple to get up behind him; a business which was not accomplished without much difficulty. The strangely assorted riders attracted many eyes as they passed through the crowded streets; and at length they reached the market-place. "Is this where you wish to stop?" asked Bou-Akas.

"Yes."

"Then get down."

"Get down yourself."

"What for?"

"To leave me the horse."

"To leave you my horse! What mean you by that?"

"I mean that he belongs to me. Know you not that we are now in the town of the just Cadi, and that if we bring the case before him, he will certainly decide in my favor?"

"Why should he do so, when the animal belongs to me?"

"Don't you think that when he sees us two,--you with your strong straight limbs, which Allah has given you for the purpose of walking, and I with my weak legs and distorted feet,--he will decree that the horse shall belong to him who has most need of him?"

"Should, he do so, he would not be the _just_ Cadi," said Bou-Akas.

"Oh! as to that," replied the cripple, laughing, "although he is just, he is not infallible."

"So!" thought the Scheik to himself, "this will be a capital opportunity of judging the judge." He said aloud, "I am content--we will go before the Cadi."

Arrived at the tribunal, where the judge, according to the eastern custom, was publicly administering justice, they found that two trials were about to go on, and would of course take precedence of theirs. The first was between a _taleb_ or learned man, and a peasant. The point in dispute was the _taleb's_ wife, whom the peasant had carried off, and whom he asserted to be his own better half, in the face of the philosopher who demanded her restoration. The woman, strange circumstance! remained obstinately silent, and would not declare for either; a feature in the case which rendered its decision excessively difficult. The judge heard both sides attentively, reflected for a moment, and then said, "Leave the woman here, and return to-morrow." The _savant_ and the laborer each bowed and retired; and the next cause was called. This was a difference between a butcher and an oil-seller. The latter appeared covered with oil, and the former was sprinkled with blood.

The butcher spoke first:--"I went to buy some oil from this man, and in order to pay him for it, I drew a handful of money from my purse. The sight of the money tempted him. He seized me by the wrist. I cried out, but he would not let me go; and here we are, having come before your worship, I holding my money in my hand, and he still grasping my wrist. Now, I swear by the Prophet, that this man is a liar, when he says that I stole his money, for the money is truly mine own."

Then spoke the oil-merchant:--"This man came to purchase oil from me. When his bottle was filled, he said, 'Have you change for a piece of gold?' I searched my pocket, and drew out my hand full of money, which I laid on a bench in my shop. He seized it, and was walking off with my money and my oil, when I caught him by the wrist, and cried out 'Robber!' In spite of my cries, however, he would not surrender the money, so I brought him here, that your worship might decide the case. Now, I swear by the Prophet that this man is a liar, when he says that I want to steal his money, for it is truly mine own."

The Cadi caused each plaintiff to repeat his story, but neither varied one jot from his original statement. He reflected for a moment, and then said, "Leave the money with me, and return to-morrow." The butcher placed the coins, which he had never let go, on the edge of the Cadi's mantle. After which he and his opponent bowed to the tribunal, and departed.

It was now the turn of Bou-Akas and the cripple. "My lord Cadi," said the former, "I came hither from a distant country, with the intention of purchasing merchandise. At the city gate I met this cripple, who first asked for alms, and then prayed me to allow him to ride behind me through the streets, lest he should be trodden down in the crowd. I consented, but when we reached the market-place, he refused to get down, asserting that my horse belonged to him, and that your worship would surely adjudge it to him, who wanted it most. That, my lord Cadi, is precisely the state of the case--I swear it by Mahomet!"

"My lord," said the cripple, "as I was coming on business to the market, and riding this horse, which belongs to me, I saw this man seated by the roadside, apparently half dead from fatigue. I good naturedly offered to take him on the crupper, and let him ride as far as the market-place, and he eagerly thanked me. But what was my astonishment, when, on our arrival, he refused to get down, and said that my horse was his. I immediately required him to appear before your worship, in order that you might decide between us. That is the true state of the case--I swear it by Mahomet!"

Having made each repeat his deposition, and having reflected for a moment, the Cadi said, "Leave the horse here, and return to-morrow."

It was done, and Bou-Akas and the cripple withdrew in different directions. On the morrow, a number of persons besides those immediately interested in the trials assembled to hear the judge's decisions. The _taleb_ and the peasant were called first.

"Take away thy wife," said the Cadi to the former, "and keep her, I advise thee, in good order." Then turning towards his _chinaux_, he added, pointing to the peasant, "Give this man fifty blows." He was instantly obeyed, and the _taleb_ carried off his wife.

Then came forward the oil-merchant and the butcher. "Here," said the Cadi to the butcher, "is thy money; it is truly thine, and not his." Then pointing to the oil-merchant, he said to his _chinaux_, "Give this man fifty blows." It was done, and the butcher went away in triumph with his money.

The third cause was called, and Bou-Akas and the cripple came forward. "Would'st thou recognize thy horse amongst twenty others?" said the judge to Bou-Akas.

"Yes, my lord."

"And thou?"

"Certainly, my lord," replied the cripple.

"Follow me," said the Cadi to Bou-Akas.

They entered a large stable, and Bou-Akas pointed out his horse amongst twenty which were standing side by side.

"'Tis well," said the judge. "Return now to the tribunal, and send me thine adversary hither."

The disguised Scheik obeyed, delivered his message, and the cripple hastened to the stable, as quickly as his distorted limbs allowed. He possessed quick eyes and a good memory, so that he was able, without the slightest hesitation, to place his hand on the right animal.

"'Tis well," said the Cadi; "return to the tribunal."

His worship resumed his place, and when the cripple arrived, judgment was pronounced. "The horse is thine," said the Cadi to Bou-Akas. "Go to the stable, and take him." Then to the _chinaux_, "Give this cripple fifty blows." It was done; and Bou-Akas went to take his horse.

When the Cadi, after concluding the business of the day, was retiring to his house, he found Bou-Akas waiting for him. "Art thou discontented with my award?" asked the judge.

"No, quite the contrary," replied the Scheik. "But I want to ask by what inspiration thou hast rendered justice; for I doubt not that the other two cases were decided as equitably as mine. I am not a merchant; I am Bou-Akas, Scheik of Ferdj' Onah, and I wanted to judge for myself of thy reputed wisdom."

The Cadi bowed to the ground, and kissed his master's hand.

"I am anxious," said Bou-Akas, "to know the reasons which determined your three decisions."

"Nothing, my lord, can be more simple. Your highness saw that I detained for a night the three things in dispute?"

"I did."

"Well, early in the morning I caused the woman to be called, and I said to her suddenly--'Put fresh ink in my inkstand.' Like a person who had done the same thing a hundred times before, she took the bottle, removed the cotton, washed them both, put in the cotton again, and poured in fresh ink, doing it all with the utmost neatness and dexterity. So I said to myself, 'A peasant's wife would known nothing about inkstands--she must belong to the _taleb_."

"Good," said Bou-Akas, nodding his head. "And the money?"

"Did your highness remark that the merchant had his clothes and hands covered with oil?"

"Certainly, I did."

"Well; I took the money, and placed it in a vessel filled with water. This morning I looked at it, and not a particle of oil was to be seen on the surface of the water. So I said to myself, 'If this money belonged to the oil-merchant it would be greasy from the touch of his hands; as it is not so, the butcher's story must be true.'"

Bou-Akas nodded in token of approval.

"Good," said he. "And my horse?"

"Ah! that was a different business; and, until this morning, I was greatly puzzled."

"The cripple, I suppose, did not recognize the animal?"

"On the contrary, he pointed him out immediately."

"How then did you discover that he was not the owner?"

"My object in bringing you separately to the stable, was not to see whether you would know the horse, but whether the horse would acknowledge you. Now, when you approached him, the creature turned towards you, laid back his ears, and neighed with delight; but when the cripple touched him, he kicked. Then I knew that you were truly his master."

Bou-Akas thought for a moment, and then said: "Allah has given thee great wisdom. Thou oughtest to be in my place, and I in thine. And yet, I know not; thou art certainly worthy to be Scheik, but I fear that I should but badly fill thy place as Cadi!"

From the Manchester Examiner.

LOVE.--A SONNET.

BY J. C. PRINCE.

Love is an odor from the heavenly bowers, Which stirs our senses tenderly, and brings Dreams which are shadows of diviner things Beyond this grosser atmosphere of ours. An oasis of verdure and of flowers, Love smiteth on the Pilgrim's weary way; There fresher air, there sweeter waters play, There purer solace charms the quiet hours. This glorious passion, unalloyed, endowers With moral beauty all who feel its fire; Maid, wife, and offspring, brother, mother, sire, Are names and symbols of its hallowed powers. Love is immortal. From our head may fly Earth's other blessings; Love can never die!

_Ashton, 5th March._

From the Spectator.

THE HISTORY OF SORCERY AND MAGIC.[I]

The rationale of magic, when a combination of skill and fraud imposed upon the vulgar, is easily settled. The priests of the ancient mythology, the adepts of the middle ages, turned their knowledge of chemistry and mechanics and their proficiency in legerdemain to account; and before we denounce the latter as impostors, we should bear in mind the ignorance of the times in which they lived. People would not have believed any natural explanation, though they might have felt inclined to persecute the man when stripped of his magical character: we should also consider how far the general belief might influence even the man himself; how far he could in his inmost mind draw the distinction between what we call natural philosophy and what the age considered magic--a lawful if a riskful power over nature and spirits, by means of occult knowledge. An allowance is further to be made for the stories as they have come down to us; a distinction is to be drawn between the actual facts and the fancy of the narrator, between the reality and the romance of magic.

Sorcery and witchcraft (to which, notwithstanding its title, Mr. Wright's book chiefly relates) was a more vulgar pursuit, and is a more difficult matter to determine. The true magician was a master over both the seen and the unseen world. His art could _compel_ spirits or demons to obey him, however much against their will. It seems a question whether a spell of sufficient potency could not control Satan himself. The witch or wizard was a vulgar being, a mere slave of the Evil One, with no original power, very limited in derived power, and, it would appear, with no means of acting directly except upon the elements. The facts relating to witchcraft, being often matter of legal record, are more numerous and more correctly narrated than those relating to magic. The difficulty of fixing the exact boundary between truth and falsehood, guilt and innocence, in the case of witchcraft, is not so easily settled as the sciolist in liberal philosophy imagines. Of course we all know that men and women could not travel through the air on broomsticks, or cause storms, or afflict cattle. Their innocence of the intention is not always so certain: their power over a nervous or weakly person, especially in bad health, might really, through the influence of imagination, produce the death threatened, and the miserable patient might pine away as his real or supposed waxen image slowly melted before the fire. At a time when the belief in witchcraft was entertained by society in general, as well as by the majority of educated men, it is not likely that the persons who were generally accused of it were skeptical on the subject. Their innocence would lie, not in their disbelief of its power, but in their rejection of the practice. That an accusation of witchcraft was sometimes made from political, religious, or personal motives, is true; and numbers of innocent victims were sacrificed in times of public mania on the subject. The question is, whether many did not attempt unlawful arts in full belief of their efficacy; and whether some, a compound of the self-dupe and the impostor, did not make use of their reputed power to indulge in the grossest license and to perpetrate abominable crimes.

The great difficulty, however, is the confessions. In many cases, no doubt, the victims, worn down by terror and torture, said whatever their examiners seemed to wish them to say; in other cases, their statements were exaggerated by the reporters. Yet enough remains, after every deduction, to render witches' confessions a very curious mental problem. Was it vision, or monomania, or nervous delusion, all influenced by foregone conclusion? or was it, as the mesmerists seem to hold, an instance of clairvoyance in a high degree? The case of Gaufridi is of this puzzling nature. Gaufridi was a French priest of licentious character, who succeeded by the opportunities which his priestly influence gave him, or by some pretended supernatural arts. His crimes were discovered through the confession of one of his victims, a nun whom he had abused before profession. After a time, she appeared to be possessed; and, under treatment by a celebrated exorcist, (an inferior hand having failed,) she, or the demon in possession, among other things accused Gaufridi. _Her_ revelations may be resolved into an imposture instigated by revenge, or a pious fraud caused by remorse, or hysterical fits, with utterance shaped by memory; but what can be said of Gaufridi's, made with a full knowledge of consequences?

"The priests who conducted this affair seem almost to have lost sight of Louis Gaufridi, in their anxiety to collect these important evidences of the true faith. It was not till towards the close of winter that the reputed wizard was again thought of. A warrant was then obtained against him, and he was taken into custody, and confined in the prison of the conciergerie at Marseilles. On the fifth of March he was for the first time confronted with sister Magdalen, but without producing the result anticipated by his persecutors. Little information is given as to the subsequent proceedings against him; but he appears to have been treated with great severity, and to have persevered in asserting his innocence. Sister Magdalen, or rather the demon within her, gave information of certain marks on his body which had been placed there by the Evil One; and on search they were found exactly as described. It is not to be wondered at, if, after the intercourse which had existed between them, sister Magdalen were able to give such information. Still Gaufridi continued unshaken, and he made no confession; until at length, on Easter Eve, the twenty-sixth of March, 1611, a full avowal of his guilt was drawn from him, we are not told through what means, by two Capuchins of the Convent of Aix, to which place he had been transferred for his trial. At the beginning of April, another witness, the Demoiselle Victoire de Courbier, came forward to depose that she had been bewitched by the renegade priest, who had obtained her love by his charms; and he made no objection to their adding this new incident to his confession.

"Gaufridi acknowledged the truth of all that had been said by sister Magdalen or by her demon. He said that an uncle, who had died many years ago, had left him his books, and that one day, about five or six years before his arrest on this accusation, he was looking them over, when he found amongst them a volume of magic, in which were some writings in French verse, accompanied with strange characters. His curiosity was excited, and he began to read it; when, to his great astonishment and consternation, the demon appeared in a human form, and said to him, 'What do you desire of me, for it is you who have called me?' Gaufridi was young, and easily tempted; and when he had recovered from his surprise and was reassured by the manner and conversation of his visitor, he replied to his offer, 'If you have power to give me what I desire, I ask for two things: first, that I shall prevail with all the women I like; secondly, that I shall be esteemed and honored above all the priests of this country, and enjoy the respect of men of wealth and honor.' We may see, perhaps, through these wishes, the reason why Gaufridi was persecuted by the rest of the clergy. The demon promised to grant him his desires, on condition that he would give up to him entirely his 'body, soul, and works;' to which Gaufridi agreed, excepting only from the latter the administration of the holy sacrament, to which he was bound by his vocation as a priest of the church.

"From this time Louis Gaufridi felt an extreme pleasure in reading the magical book, and it always had the effect of bringing the demon to attend upon him. At the end of two or three days the agreement was arranged and completed, and, it having been fairly written on parchment, the priest signed it with his blood. The tempter then told him, that whenever he breathed on maid or woman, provided his breath reached their nostrils, they would immediately become desperately in love with him. He soon made a trial of the demon's gift, and used it so copiously that, he became in a short time a general object of attraction to the women of the district. He said that he often amused himself with exciting their passions when he had no intention of requiting them, and he declared that he had already made more than a thousand victims.

"At length he took an extraordinary fancy to the young Magdalen de la Palude; but he found her difficult of approach, on account of the watchfulness of her mother, and he only overcame the difficulty by breathing on the mother before he seduced the daughter. He thus gained his purpose; took the girl to the cave in the manner she had already described, and became so much attached to her that he often repeated his charm on her, to make her more devoted in her love. Three days after their first visit to the cave, he gave her a familiar named Esmodes. Finding her now perfectly devoted to his will, he determined to marry her to Beelzebub, the prince of the demons; and she readily agreed to his proposal. He immediately called the demon prince, who appeared in the form of a handsome gentleman; and she then renounced her baptism and Christianity, signed the agreement with her blood, and received the demon's mark....

"The priest gave an account of the Sabbaths, at which he was a regular attendant. When he was ready to go--it was usually at night--he either went to the open window of his chamber, or left the chamber, locking the door, and proceeded into the open air. There Lucifer made his appearance, and took him in an instant to their place of meeting, where the orgies of the witches and sorcerers lasted usually from three to four hours. Gaufridi divided the victims of the Evil One into three classes: the masqués, (perhaps the novices,) the sorcerers, and the magicians. On arriving at the meeting, they all worshipped the demon according to their several ranks; the masqués falling flat on their faces, the sorcerers kneeling with their heads and bodies humbly bowed down, and the magicians, who stood highest in importance, only kneeling. After this they all went through the formality of denying God and the Saints. Then they had a diabolical service in burlesque of that of the church, at which the Evil One served as priest in a violet chasuble; the elevation of the demon host was announced by a wooden bell, and the sacrament itself was made of unleavened bread. The scenes which followed resembled those of other witch-meetings. Gaufridi acknowledged that he took Magdalen thither, and that he made her swallow magical 'characters' that were to increase her love to him; yet he proved unfaithful to her at these Sabbaths with a multitude of persons, and among the rest with 'a princess of Friesland.' The unhappy sorcerer confessed, among other things, that his demon was his constant companion, though generally invisible to all but himself; and that he only left him when he entered the church of the Capuchins to perform his religious duties, and then he waited for him outside the church door.

"Gaufridi was tried before the Court of Parliament of Provence at Aix. His confession, the declaration of the demons, the marks on his body, and other circumstances, left him no hope of mercy. Judgment was given against him on the last day of April, and the same day it was put in execution. He was burnt alive."

_Narratives of Sorcery and Magic_ is a skilful and popular selection of stories or narratives relating to the subject, not a philosophic treatise. We are carried to France, Germany, England, Ireland, Scotland, Spain, and America, by turns. We have the most remarkable trials for witchcraft in these countries, as well as cases in which supernatural agency was only an incidental part,--as that of the Earl and Countess of Somerset, for the murder of Overbury.

By way of showing that Mr. Wright is by no means an indifferent story-teller, we may refer to the following legend:

"The demons whom the sorcerer served seem rarely to have given any assistance to their victims when the latter fell into the hands of the judicial authorities; but if they escaped punishment by the agency of the law, they were only reserved for a more terrible end. We have already seen the fate of the woman of Berkeley. A writer of the thirteenth century has preserved a story of a man who, by his compact with the Evil One, had collected together great riches. One day, while he was absent in the fields, a stranger of suspicious appearance came to his house and asked for him. His wife replied that he was not at home. The stranger said, 'Tell him when he returns, that to-night he must pay me my debt.' The wife replied that she was not aware that he owed any thing to him. 'Tell, him,' said the stranger, with a ferocious look, 'that I will have my debt to-night.' The husband returned, and when informed of what had taken place, merely remarked that the demand was just. He then ordered his bed to be made that night in an outhouse, where he had never slept before, and he shut himself in it with a lighted candle. The family were astonished, and could not resist the impulse to gratify their curiosity by looking through the holes in the door. They beheld the same stranger, who had entered without opening the door, seated beside his victim, and they appeared to be counting large sums of money. Soon they began to quarrel about their accounts, and were proceeding from threats to blows, when the servants, who were looking through the door, burst it open, that they might help their master. The light was instantly extinguished; and when another was brought, no traces could be found of either of the disputants, nor were they ever afterwards heard of. The suspicious-looking stranger was the demon himself, who had carried away his victim."

FOOTNOTES:

[I] Narratives of Sorcery and Magic, from the most Authentic Sources. By Thomas Wright, Esq., M.A., F.S.A., &c., &c. In two volumes. Published by Bentley.

From the Examiner.

HARTLEY COLERIDGE AND HIS GENIUS.

Hartley Coleridge was a poet whose life was so deplorable a contradiction to the strength and subtlety of his genius, and the capability and range of his intellect, that perhaps no such sad example has ever found similar record.[J] Indeed we are obliged with sincere grief to doubt, whether, as written here, the memoir should have been written at all. With much respect for Mr. Derwent Coleridge, who is himself no unworthy inheritor of a great name, his white neckcloth is somewhat too prominently seen in the matter. There are too many labored explainings, starched apologies, and painful accountings for this and that. The writer was probably not conscious of the effort he was making, yet the effort is but too manifest, A simple statement of facts, a kindly allowance for circumstances, a mindful recollection of what his father was in physical as well as mental organization, extracts from Hartley's own letters, recollections of those among whom his latter life was passed--this, as it seems to us, should have sufficed. Mr. Derwent Coleridge brings too many church-bred and town-bred notions to the grave design of moralizing and philosophizing his brother's simple life and wayward self-indulgences. His motives will be respected, and his real kindness not misunderstood; but it will be felt that a quiet and unaffected little memoir of that strange and sorry career, and of those noble nor wholly wasted powers, remains still to be written.

Meanwhile we gratefully accept the volumes before us, which in their contents are quite as decisive of Hartley Coleridge's genius as of what it might have achieved in happier circumstances. A more beautiful or more sorrowful book has not been published in our day.

"Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight, And burned is Apollo's laurel-bough, That sometime grew within this learned man."

Hartley Coleridge was the eldest son of the poet, and with much of his father's genius (which in him, however, took a more simple and practical shape than consisted with the wider and more mystical expanse of his father's mind), inherited also the defects of his organization and temperament. What would have become of the elder Coleridge but for the friends in whose home his later years found a refuge, no one can say. With no such friends or home, poor Hartley became a cast-away. After a childhood of singular genius, manifested in many modes and forms, and described with charming effect by his brother in the best passages and anecdotes of the memoir, he was launched without due discipline or preparation into the University of Oxford, where the catastrophe of his life befell. He had first fairly shown his powers when the hard doom went forth which condemned them to waste and idleness. He obtained a fellowship-elect at Oriel, was dismissed on the ground of intemperance before his probationary year had passed, and wandered for the rest of his days by the scenes with which his father most wished to surround his childhood--

("But thou, my babe, shall wander like a breeze By lakes and sandy shores, beneath the crags Of ancient mountains, and beneath the clouds Which image in their bulk both lakes and shores And mountain crags")

--listening with hardly less than his father's delight to the sounds and voices of nature, in homely intimacy with all homely folk, uttering now and then piercing words of wisdom or regret, teaching little children in village schools, and----.

Well, it would be perhaps too much to say that he continued to justify the rejection of the Oriel fellows. Who knows how largely that event may itself have contributed to what it too hastily anticipated and too finally condemned? It appears certain that the weakness had not thus early made itself known to Hartley's general acquaintance at the University. Mr. Dyce had nothing painful to remember of him, but describes him as a young man possessing an intellect of the highest order, with great simplicity of character and considerable oddity of manner; and he hints that the college authorities had probably resented, in the step they took, certain attacks more declamatory than serious which Hartley had got into the habit of indulging against all established institutions. Mr. Derwent Coleridge touches this part of the subject very daintily. "My brother was, however, _I am afraid_, more sincere in his invectives against establishments, as they appeared to his eyes at Oxford, and elsewhere, _than Mr. Dyce kindly supposes_." How poor Hartley would have laughed at that!

One thing to the last he continued. The simplicity of character which Mr. Dyce attributes to his youth remained with him till long after his hair was prematurely white. As Wordsworth hoped for him in his childhood, he kept

"A young lamb's heart among the full-grown flock;"

--and some delightful recollections of his ordinary existence from day to day among the lakes and mountains, and in the service of the village schools, are contributed to his brother's Memoir. Here is one, from one of the scholars he taught:

"I first saw Hartley in the beginning, I think, of 1837, when I was at Sedbergh, and he heard us our lesson in Mr. Green's parlor. My impression of him was what I conceived Shakespeare's idea of a gentleman to be, something which we like to have in a picture. He was dressed in black, his hair, just touched with gray, fell in thick waves down his back, and he had a frilled shirt on; and there was a sort of autumnal ripeness and brightness about him. His shrill voice, and his quick, authoritative 'right! right!' and the chuckle with which he translated 'rerum repetundarum' as 'peculation, a very common vice in governors of all ages,' after which he took a turn round the sofa--all struck me amazingly; his readiness astonished us all, and even himself, as he afterwards told me; for, during the time he was at the school, he never had to use a dictionary once, though we read Dalzell's selections from Aristotle and Longinus, and several plays of Sophocles. He took his idea, so he said, from what De Quincy says of one of the Eton masters fagging the lesson, to the great amusement of the class, and, while waiting for the lesson, he used to read a newspaper. While acting as second master he seldom occupied the master's desk, but sat among the boys on one of the school benches. He very seldom came to school in a morning, never till about eleven, and in the afternoon about an hour after we had begun. I never knew the least liberty taken with him, though he was kinder and more familiar than was then the fashion with masters. His translations were remarkably vivid; of [Greek: mogera mogerôs] 'toiling and moiling;' and of some ship or other in the Philoctetes, which he pronounced to be 'scudding under main-top sails,' our conceptions became intelligible. Many of his translations were written down with his initials, and I saw some, not a long while ago, in the Sophocles of a late Tutor at Queen's College, Oxford, who had them from tradition. He gave most attention to our themes; out of those sent in he selected two or three, which he then read aloud and criticised; and once, when they happened to agree, remarked there was always a coincidence of thought amongst great men. Out of school he never mixed with the boys, but was sometimes seen, to their astonishment, running along the fields with his arms outstretched, and talking to himself. He had no pet scholars except one, a little fair-haired boy, who he said ought to have been a girl. He told me that was the only boy he ever loved, though he always loved little girls. He was remarkably fond of the travelling shows that occasionally visited the village. I have seen him clap his hands with delight; indeed, in most of the simple delights of country life, he was like a child. This is what occurs to me at present of what he was when I first knew him; and, indeed, my after recollections are of a similarly fragmentary kind, consisting only of those little, numerous, noiseless, every-day acts of kindness, the sum of which makes a Christian life. His love of little children, his sympathy with the poor and suffering, his hatred of oppression, the beauty and the grace of his politeness before women, and his high manliness,--these are the features which I shall never forget while I have any thing to remember."

The same writer afterwards tells us:

"On his way to one of these parties he called on me, and I could not help saying, 'How well you look in a white neckcloth!' 'I wish you could see me sometimes,' he replied; 'if I had only black-silk stockings and shoe-buckles I should be quite a gentleman.' Those who had only seen him in the careless dress that he chose to adopt in the lanes--his trowsers, which were generally too long, doubled half way up the leg, unbrushed, and often splashed; his hat brushed the wrong way, for he never used an umbrella; and his wild, unshaven, weather-beaten look--were amazed at his metamorphose into such a faultless gentleman as he appeared when he was dressed for the evening. 'I hate silver forks with fish,' he said; 'I can't manage them.' So did Dr. Arnold, I told him. 'That's capital; I am glad of such an authority. Do you know I never understood the gladiator's excellence till the other day. The way in which my brother eats fish with a silver fork made the thing quite clear.'

"He often referred to his boyish days, when he told me he nearly poisoned half the house with his chemical infusions, and spoiled the pans, with great delight. The 'Pilgrim's Progress' was an early favorite with him. 'It was strange,' he said, 'how it had been overlooked. Children are often misunderstood. When I was a baby I have often been in the greatest terror, when, to all appearance, I was quite still;--so frightened that I could not make a noise. Crying, I believe, is oftener a sign of happiness than the reverse. I was looked upon as a remarkable child. My mother told me, when I was born she thought me an ugly red thing; but my father took me up and said, 'There's no sweeter baby any where than this.' He always thought too much of me. I was very dull at school, and hated arithmetic; I always had to count on my fingers.

"He once took me to the little cottage where he lived by the Brathey, when Charles Lloyd and he were school-companions. Mrs. Nicholson, of Ambleside, told me of a donkey-race which they had from the market-cross to the end of the village and back, and how Hartley came in last, and minus his white straw hat."

Those who remember the ordinary (and most extraordinary) dress that hung about his small eager person, will smile at this entry in his journal of a visit to Rydal chapel, and the reflections awakened therein:

"17th.--Sunday.--At Rydal chapel. Alas! I have been _Parcus Deorum cultor et infrequens_ of late. Would I could say with assurance, _Nunc interare cursus cogor relictos_. I never saw Axiologus (Wordsworth) look so venerable. His cape cloak has such a gravity about it. Old gentlemen should never wear light great coats unless they be military; and even then Uncle Toby's Roquelaure would be more becoming than all the frogs in Styx. On the other hand, loose trowsers should never invest the nether limbs of led. It looks as if the Septuagenarian were ashamed of a diminished calf. The sable silk is good and clerical, so are the gray pearl and the partridge. I revere gray worsted and ridge and furrow for [Greek: Omak rites] his sake, but perhaps the bright white lamb's wool doth most set off the leg of an elderly man. The hose should be drawn over the knees, unless the rank and fortune require diamond buckles. Paste or Bristol stones should never approach a gentleman of any age. Roomy shoes, not of varnished leather. Broad shoe-buckles, well polished. Cleanliness is an ornament to youth, but an indispensable necessity to old age. Breeches, velvet or velveteen, or some other solid stuff. There may be serious objections to reviving the trunk breeches of our ancestors. I am afraid that hoops would follow in their train. But the flapped waistcoat, the deep cuffs, and guarded pocket-holes, the low collar, I should hail with pleasure; that is, for grandfathers and men of grandfatherly years. I was about to add the point-lace ruffles, cravat, and frill, but I pause in consideration of the miseries and degraded state of the lace makers."

Occasional passages in his letters are very beautiful, and very sad. Here is one--adverting to some attack made upon him:

"'This jargon,' said my orthodox reviewer, 'might be excused in an alderman of London, but not in a Fellow elect of Oriel,' or something to the same purpose, evidently designing to recall to memory the most painful passage of a life not over happy. But perhaps it is as well to let it alone. The writer might be some one in whom my kindred are interested; for I am as much alone in my revolt as Abdiel in his constancy."

We are glad to see valuable testimony borne by Mr. James Spedding as to his habits having left unimpaired his moral and spiritual sensibility:

"Of his general character and way of life I might have been able to say something to the purpose, if I had seen more of him. But though he was a person so interesting to me in himself, and with so many subjects of interest in common with me, that a little intercourse went a great way; so that I feel as if I knew him much better than many persons of whom I have seen much more; yet I have in fact been very seldom in his company. If I should say ten times altogether, I should not be understating the number; and this is not enough to qualify me for a reporter, when there must be so many competent observers living, who really knew him well. One very strong impression, however, with which I always came away from him, may be worth mentioning; I mean, that his moral and spiritual sensibilities seemed to be absolutely untouched by the life he was leading. The error of his life sprung, I suppose, from moral incapacity of some kind--his way of life seemed in some things destructive of self-respect; and was certainly regarded by himself with a feeling of shame, which in his seasons of self-communion became passionate; and yet it did not at all degrade his mind. It left, not his understanding only, but also his imagination and feelings, perfectly healthy,--free, fresh, and pure. His language might be sometimes what some people would call gross, but that I think was not from any want of true delicacy, but from a masculine disdain of false delicacy; and his opinions, and judgment, and speculations, were in the highest degree refined and elevated--full of chivalrous generosity, and purity, and manly tenderness. Such, at least, was my invariable impression. It always surprised me, but fresh observations always confirmed it."

When Wordsworth heard of his death, he was much affected, and gave the touching direction to his brother:--"Let him lie by us: he would have wished it." It was accordingly so arranged.

"The day following he walked over with me to Grasmere--to the churchyard, a plain enclosure of the olden time, surrounding the old village church, in which lay the remains of his wife's sister, his nephew, and his beloved daughter. Here, having desired the sexton to measure out the ground for his own and for Mrs. Wordsworth's grave, he bade him measure out the space of a third grave for my brother, immediately beyond.

"'When I lifted up my eyes from my daughter's grave,' he exclaimed, 'he was standing there!' pointing to the spot where my brother had stood on the sorrowful occasion to which he alluded. Then turning to the sexton, he said, 'Keep the ground for us,--we are old people, and it cannot be for long.'"

"In the grave thus marked out, my brother's remains were laid on the following Thursday, and in little more than a twelvemonth his venerable and venerated friend was brought to occupy his own. They lie in the south-east angle of the churchyard, not far from a group of trees, with the little beck, that feeds the lake with its clear waters, murmuring by their side. Around them are the quiet mountains."

We have often expressed a high opinion of Hartley Coleridge's poetical genius. It was a part of the sadness of his life that he could not concentrate his powers, in this or any other department of his intellect, to high and continuous aims--but we were not prepared for such rich proof of its exercise, within the limited field assigned to it, as these volumes offer. They largely and lastingly contribute to the rare stores of true poetry. In the sonnet Hartley Coleridge was a master unsurpassed by the greatest. To its "narrow plot of ground" his habits, when applied in the cultivation of the muse, most naturally led him--and here he may claim no undeserved companionship even with Shakespeare, Milton, and Wordsworth. We take a few--with affecting personal reference in all of them.

Hast thou not seen an aged rifted tower, Meet habitation for the Ghost of Time, Where fearful ravage makes decay sublime, And destitution wears the face of power? Yet is the fabric deck'd with many a flower Of fragrance wild, and many-dappled hues, Gold streak'd with iron-brown and nodding blue, Making each ruinous chink a fairy bower. E'en such a thing methinks I fain would be, Should Heaven appoint me to a lengthen'd age; So old in look, that Young and Old may see The record of my closing pilgrimage: Yet, to the last, a rugged wrinkled thing To which young sweetness may delight to cling!

Pains I have known, that cannot be again, And pleasures too that never can be more: For loss of pleasure I was never sore, But worse, far worse is to feel no pain. The throes and agonies of a heart explain Its very depth of want at inmost core; Prove that it does believe, and would adore, And doth with ill for ever strive and strain. I not lament for happy childish years, For loves departed, that have had their day, Or hopes that faded when my head was gray; For death hath left me last of my compeers: But for the pain I felt, the gushing tears I used to shed when I had gone astray.

A lonely wanderer upon the earth am I, The waif of nature--like uprooted weed Borne by the stream, or like a shaken reed, A frail dependent of the fickle sky. Far, far away, are all my natural kin; The mother that erewhile hath hush'd my cry, Almost hath grown a mere fond memory. Where is my sister's smile? my brother's boisterous din? Ah! nowhere now. A matron grave and sage, A holy mother is that sister sweet. And that bold brother is a pastor meet To guide, instruct, reprove a sinful age, Almost I fear, and yet I fain would greet; So far astray hath been my pilgrimage.

How shall a man fore-doom'd to lone estate, Untimely old, irreverently gray, Much like a patch of dusky snow in May, Dead sleeping in a hollow--all too late-- How shall so poor a thing congratulate The blest completion of a patient wooing, Or how commend a younger man for doing What ne'er to do hath been his fault or fate? There is a fable, that I once did read. Of a bad angel that was someway good, And therefore on the brink of Heaven he stood, Looking each way, and no way could proceed; Till at the last he purged away his sin By loving all the joy he saw within.

Here is another poem of very touching reference to his personal story:

"When I received this volume small, My years were barely seventeen; When it was hoped I should be all Which once, alas! I might have been.

"And now my years are thirty-five, And every mother hopes her lamb, And every happy child alive, May never be what now I am.

"But yet should any chance to look On the strange medley scribbled here. I charge thee, tell them, little book, I am not vile as I appear.

"Oh! tell them though thy purpose lame In fortune's race, was still behind,-- Though earthly blots my name defiled, They ne'er abused my better mind.

"Of what men are, and why they are So weak, so wofully beguiled, Much I have learned, but better far, I know my soul is reconciled."

Before we shut the volumes--which will often and often be re-opened by their readers--we may instance, in proof of the variety of his verse, some masterly heroic couplets on the character of Dryden, which will be seen in a series of admirable "sketches of English poets" found written on the fly-leaves and covers of his copy of _Anderson's British Poets_. The successors of Dryden are not less admirably handled, and there are some sketches of Wilkie, Dodsley, Langhorne, and rhymers of that class, inimitable for their truth and spirit.

FOOTNOTES:

[J] Poems by Hartley Coleridge. With a Memoir of his Life. By his Brother. Two vols. Moxon.

From the Cincinnati Commercial Advertiser.

LYRA.--A LAMENT.

BY ALICE CAREY.

Maidens, whose tresses shine, Crowned with daffodil and eglantine, Or, from their stringed buds of brier-roses, Bright as the vermeil closes Of April twilights, after sobbing rains, Fall down in rippled skeins And golden tangles, low About your bosoms, dainty as new snow; While the warm shadows blow in softest gales Fair hawthorn flowers and cherry blossoms white Against your kirtles, like the froth from pails O'er brimmed with milk at night, When lowing heifers bury their sleek flanks In winrows of sweet hay, or clover banks-- Come near and hear, I pray, My plained roundelay: Where creeping vines o'errun the sunny leas, Sadly, sweet souls, I watch your shining bands Filling with stained hands Your leafy cups with lush red strawberries; Or deep in murmurous glooms, In yellow mosses full of starry blooms, Sunken at ease--each busied as she likes, Or stripping from the grass the beaded dews, Or picking jagged leaves from the slim spikes Of tender pinks--with warbled interfuse Of poesy divine, That haply long ago Some wretched borderer of the realm of wo Wrought to a dulcet line: If in your lovely years There be a sorrow that may touch with tears The eyelids piteously, they must be shed FOR LYRA, DEAD. The mantle of the May Was blown almost within summer's reach, And all the orchard trees, Apple, and pear, and peach, Were full of yellow bees, Flown from their hives away. The callow dove upon the dusty beam Fluttered its little wings in streaks of light, And the gray swallow twittered full in sight-- Harmless the unyoked team Browsed from the budding elms, and thrilling lays Made musical prophecies of brighter days; And all went jocundly; I could but say. Ah! well-a-day! What time spring thaws the wold, And in the dead leaves come up sprouts of gold, And green and ribby blue, that after hours Encrown with flowers; Heavily lies my heart From all delights apart, Even as an echo hungry for the wind, When fail the silver-kissing waves to unbind The music bedded in the drowsy strings Of the sea's golden shells-- That, sometimes, with their honeyed murmurings Fill all its underswells: For o'er the sunshine fell a shadow wide When Lyra died. When sober Autumn, with his mist-bound brows, Sits drearily beneath the fading boughs, And the rain, chilly cold, Wrings from his beard of gold, And as some comfort for his lonesome hours, Hides in his bosom stalks of withered flowers, I think about what leaves are drooping round A smoothly shapen mound; And if the wild wind cries Where Lyra lies, Sweet shepherds, softly blow Ditties most sad and low-- Piping on hollow reeds to your pent sheep-- Calm be my Lyra's sleep. Unvexed with dream of the rough briers that pull From his strayed lambs the wool! O, star, that tremblest dim Upon the welkin's rim, Send with thy milky shadows from above Tidings about my love; If that some envious wave Made his untimely grave, Or if, so softening half my wild regrets, Some coverlid of bluest violets Was softly put aside, What time he died! Nay, come not, piteous maids, Out of the murmurous shades; But keep your tresses crowned as you may With eglantine and daffodillies gay, And with the dews of myrtles wash your cheek, When flamy streaks, Uprunning the gray orient, tell of morn-- While I, forlorn, Pour all my heart in tears and plaints, instead, FOR LYRA, DEAD.

From Fraser's Magazine.

MY NOVEL:

OR, VARIETIES IN ENGLISH LIFE.

BY PISISTRATUS CAXTON.

_Continued from page 126._