Part 3

France, "with all thy faults I love thee still!" No man should travel from his cradle to his grave without paying thee a visit by the way: with a disposition prone to enjoyment, it lightens the journey amazingly. The French are a kind people, and it must be his fault who cannot live happily with them. Pity it is, possessing, as they do, whatever can contribute to the felicity of a people in a state of peace, that war should be indispensable in order to render their idea of happiness complete. _La gloire_ and _la guerre_ form the eternal burden of their song--as if the chief business of life were to destroy life. They would fight to-morrow with any nation on earth, for no better an object than the chance of achieving a victory. Laugh at me, if you please, for uttering what you may consider a foolish opinion, but I look upon it as a serious misfortune to them that the two words _Gloire_ and _Victoire_ rhyme together: they so constantly occur in that portion of their poetry which is the most popular, and the best calculated to excite them in a high degree--their _vaudeville_ songs--that the two ideas they express have become identical in their minds; and he will deserve well of his country who shall discover the means of making _glory_ rhyme to _peace_.--_Ibid._

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"HELP YOURSELF."

The custom of HELPING ONESELF has its sanction in the remotest antiquity, and has been continued down to the present day in the highest places, and by those whom it especially behoves to set example to the world. It was clearly never designed that man should regulate his conduct for the good of others, for the first lesson taught to the first of men, was to take care of himself; had it been intended that men should study the good of each other, a number would surely have been simultaneously created for the exercise of the principle, instead of one, who, being alone, was essentially selfish. Adam was all the world to himself. With the addition of Eve, human society commenced; and the fault of our first mother furnishes a grand and terrible example of the mischief of thinking of the benefit of another. Satan suggested to her that Adam should partake of the fruit--an idea, having in it the taint of benevolence, so generally mistaken--whence sin and death came into the world. Had Eve been strictly selfish, she would wisely have kept the apples to herself, and the evil would have been avoided. Had Adam helped himself, he would have had no stomach for the helping of another--and so, on his part, the evil temptation had been obviated.

The HELP YOURSELF principle has at no time been extinct in society, while it is seen to be a universal law of Nature. The wolf _helps himself_ to the lamb, and the lamb to the grass. No animal assists another, excepting when in the relation of parent to young, when Nature could not dispense with the caprice of benevolence, which in this instance, be it observed, distresses the parties susceptible of the sentiment; for suckling creatures are always in poor condition. Appropriation is the great business of the universe. The institution of property is, on the other hand, artificial.--_Ibid._

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BALLET OF KENILWORTH, AT THE KING'S THEATRE.

There is a very curious and ingenious, though not original, exhibition in this ballet. Among the festivities at Kenilworth Castle, in honour of the royal guests, a pantomimic "masque" of the gods and goddesses of Olympus is introduced. The divinities, instead of appearing in genuine Grecian attire, present themselves in the mongrel costume visual on such occasions in the time of Queen Elizabeth. This is droll enough, but more whimsical still is the style of their dancing. This, too, is meant as an imitation of the limited choregraphic _savoir faire_ of the age. It is as if Mons. Deshayes had triumphantly intended to portray the first dawn of an art which he considers to have now reached the summit of perfection. But who knows but the Monsieur _Un tel_ of 1931 may, with equal boldness, parody the pirouettes of Monsieur Deshayes? Even the music to this mythological interlude is borrowed from ancient scores; a happy thought, which deserves commendation.--_Ibid._

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SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

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THE NEW MAGAZINE.

Mr. Campbell, the Poet, has seceded from the _New Monthly Magazine_, and commenced a magazine of his own--_The Metropolitan_. Without prejudice to the first-mentioned work, he has our best wishes for his new undertaking. The New Monthly Magazine has, however, supplied the _Mirror_ with brighter columns than any of its contemporaries, and we are mindful of the obligation, especially for that gay and lively description of writing which is really the _patter_ of literature. It will soon be seen whether Mr. Campbell and his forces succeed. The Number before us is, for a first, excellent. The Editor's Paper on Ancient Geography, with which it opens, is worth the price of the whole magazine: nay, it is worth more than many a modern quarto. Other papers are attractive; and there is much of the spirit of the times throughout the Number.--Poland, the Political Times, and the Lord Chancellor's Levee--are vividly written. The last is a good specimen of the "keep moving" style of a Magazine. We intend to quote largely from the

_Memoirs of the Macaw of a Lady of Quality_,

BY LADY MORGAN:

I am a native of one of the most splendid regions of the earth, where nature dispenses all her bounties with a liberal hand; and where man and bird are released from half the penalties to which, in other climes, their flesh is heir. I was born in one of those superb forests of fruit and flowers so peculiar to the Brazils, which stood at no great distance from an Indian village, and was not far removed from an European settlement. This forest was impervious to human footsteps. A nation of apes occupied the interior; and the dynasty of the Psittacus Severus, or Brazilian queen macaw, inhabited the upper regions.--Several subject-states of green and yellow parrots constituted our colonial neighbours. My family held the highest rank in the privileged classes of our oligarchy; for our pride would not admit of a king, and our selfishness (so I must call it) would allow of no rights. We talked nevertheless in our legislative assemblies of our happy constitution, which by tacit agreement we understood to mean "happy for ourselves;" but the green and yellow parrots too plainly showed a strong disposition to put another interpretation on the phraseology. My paternal nest was situated in the hollow of one of the most ancient and lofty trees in the forest. It had once been rich in fruit and flowers, gums and odours, and all in the same season; and though it was now scathed at the top, hollow in the trunk, and was threatened with total ruin from the first hurricane, we still preferred it, because it _was_ the oldest. I owed all my early impressions, and much of my acquired superiority, to my great grandfather, who lived to an extreme old age, and attained a celebrity, of which we were ourselves at that time unaware. He was the identical bird which was brought from Marignan to Prince Maurice, governor of the Brazils, and whose pertinent answers to many silly questions are recorded in the pages of the greatest of English philosophers. My great grandfather was soon disgusted with the folly and cruelty of what is called civilized life; and having seen an Indian roasted alive for a false religion's sake, he thought that some day they might take it into their heads to do as much by a macaw, for the same reason. So he availed himself of an early opportunity of retiring without leave from the service, and returned to his native forest, where his genius and learning at once raised him to the highest honours of the Psittacan aristocracy. Influenced by his example, I early felt the desire of visiting foreign countries. My mother too (who, though fond and indulgent, like all the mothers of our race, was as vain and foolish as any that I have since met with in human society) worked powerfully on my ambition, by her constant endeavours to "push me up the tree," as she called it, in her way. I was already a first-rate orator, and a member of the great congress of macaws; while in our social re-unions I left all the young birds of fashion far behind me: and as I not only articulated some human sounds picked up from the Indians, but could speak a few words of Portuguese and Dutch, learned by rote from my great grandfather, I was considered a genius of high order. With the conceit, therefore, of all my noble family, I was prompted to go forth and visit other and better worlds, and to seek a sphere better adapted to the display of my presumed abilities, than that afforded by our domestic senate and home-spun society. On one of those celestial nights, known only in the tropical regions, I set forth on my travels, directing my course to the Portuguese settlement, which the youthful vigour of my wing enabled me to reach by the break of morning. Having refreshed myself with a breakfast of fruit, after the exhaustion of my nocturnal flight, I ascended a spacious palm tree, which afforded an admirable view of the adjacent country, and a desirable shelter from the ardours of the rising sun. My first impulse was to take a bird's-eye view of the novel scene which lay before me, and I gazed around for some minutes with intense delight; but fatigue gradually obtained the mastery over curiosity, and, putting my head unconsciously beneath my wing, I fell into a profound sleep. How long this continued, I know not; but I was suddenly awakened by a strange muttering of unknown voices. I looked, and beheld two creatures whose appearance greatly surprised me. They had nothing of the noble form and aspect of our Indian neighbours. One of them considerably resembled the preacher-monkey in countenance and deportment; his head was denuded of hair, and his person was covered by a black substance, which left no limb visible except his ancles and feet, which were very much like those of an ape. The other had all the air of a gigantic parrot: he had a hooked bill, a sharp look, a yellow head; and all the rest of his strange figure was party-coloured, blue, green, red, and black. I classed him at once as a specimen of the Psittacus Ochropterus. The ape and the parrot seemed to have taken shelter beneath the palm tree, like myself, for the purposes of shade and repose. They had beside them a basket filled with dead game, fruit, and honey; and the parrot had a long instrument near him on the ground, which I afterwards learned was a fowling-piece. They talked a strange jargon of different intonation, like that of the respective chatter of the grey and the green parrots. Both seemed to complain, and, by the expression of their ugly and roguish faces, to interrogate each other. As soon as they went away, I endeavoured to mutter to myself the sounds they had uttered, but could retain only two phrases. The one had been spoken by the ape, and ran thus--"Shure it was for my sweet sowl's sake, jewel;" the other was--"Eh, sirs, it was aw' for the love of the siller." I was extremely amused by my acquisition; and, being convinced that I was now qualified to present myself at the settlement, was about to descend from my altitude, when the two strangers returned: they had come back for the gun, which they had left behind them. As they picked it up, it went off, and I was startled into one of my loudest screams. The strangers looked at me with great delight, he whom I likened to the parrot exclaiming--"Weel, mon, what brought you here?" I answered in his own words, for want of better--"Eh, sirs, it was aw' for the love of the siller." He dropped his piece, and fled in consternation, calling lustily--"Its auld clooty himsen, mon, its auld Horny, I tell ye; come awa, come awa." His friend, who seemed more acquainted with our species, encouraged him to return; and offering me some fruit from his basket, said--"Why, Poll, you cratur, what brought you so far from home?" I endeavoured to imitate his peculiar tone, and replied--"Why thin it was for my sweet sowl's sake, jewel."--"Why then," said my interlocutor, coolly (for I never forgot his words) "that bird bates cockfighting." They now both endeavoured to catch me. It was all I wanted, and I perched on the preaching-monkey's wrist, while he took up the basket in his left hand, and in this easy and commodious style of travelling, we proceeded. On approaching the settlement, a fierce dispute arose between the friends; of which, by each tearing me from the other, I was evidently the object; and I am quite sure that I should have been torn to pieces between them, but for the timely approach of a person who issued from a lofty and handsome edifice on the road side, attended by a train of preacher-monkeys, of which he was the chief. He was quite a superior looking being to either of my first acquaintance, who cowered and shrunk beneath his eagle look. They seemed humbly to lay their cases before him; when, after looking contemptuously on both, he took me to himself, caressed me, and giving me to an attendant, said--"This bird belongs to neither, it is the property of mother church:" and the property of mother church I remained for some years. Of my two friends of the palm-tree, one, the preacher-monkey, turned out to be a poor Irish lay brother, of the convent of which my new master (an Irishman too) was the superior. My yellow parrot was a Scotch adventurer, who came out to give lectures on _poleetical economy_ to the Brazilians: and who, finding that they had no taste for moral science, had become a servant of all-work to the brotherhood. My dwelling was a missionary house of the Propaganda, established for the purpose of converting (i.e. burning) the poor Indians. The Superior, Father Flynn, had recently arrived from Lisbon with unlimited powers. He was clever, eloquent, witty, and humorous; but panting for a bishopric in his native country, he was principally employed in theological writings, which might bring him into notice and hasten his recall to Europe.

Next to the servant's hall of a great English family, the first place in the world for completing the education of a macaw of genius, is a convent. Its idleness and ennui render a monkey, or a parrot, a valuable resource; and between what I picked up, and what I was taught by the monks of the Propaganda, my acquirements soon became stupendous. Always following my kind master from the refectory to the church, assisting at mess or at mass, being near him in the seclusion of the oratory, and in the festivities, he frequently held with his more confidential friends; I had loaded my astonishing memory with scraps of theology and of fun. I could sing a French drinking song, taught me by the sub-prior Frere Jacques, and intonate a "Gloria in Excelsis" with a true nasal twang. I had actually learned the Creed in English;[3] and could call all the brothers by their name. I had even learned the Savoyard's dance from my friend Frère Jacques, and sung "Gai Coco" at the same time, like Scaliger's parrot, from whose history Frère Jacques took the idea of teaching me. I did this, it must be acknowledged, with great awkwardness, turning in my toes, and often tumbling backwards in a clumsy and ludicrous way. But this amused my religious friends more than all the rest; for, like the great, they loved a ridicule as well as a talent; and, provided they were amused, were not nice as to the means. My fame soon began to spread on all sides, and the anecdotes told of the macaw of the Propaganda soon reached the circles of the Governor of the Brazils, who wrote to request the pleasure of my company for a few weeks at the palace. This was a compliment which he had never paid to the learned superior of the order, and my master was evidently hurt. He declined therefore the invitation for me, on the plea that he would soon visit Rio Janeiro himself, when I should accompany him into the vice-regal presence.

This visit shortly took place, not for the object supposed by the community, (who parted with me, even for a short time, with great regret,) but for another purpose. The British ambassador, Lord ----, who had recently arrived at Rio, was a countryman of Father Flynn's. He enjoyed eminent literary celebrity, was a delightful poet, and well acquainted with the Portuguese language. The superior had no doubt that his own literary and theological merits were equally known to his excellency, whom he visited with a view to negotiating a passage in the British man of war; for he had been called on a secret mission to Ireland, and wished to depart without notifying his intention to the subaltern of the Propaganda. I was not included in the muster-roll of this expedition; but anxious to lose no opportunity of seeing the world, and desirous of beholding the Governor, who had shown his taste and politeness by inviting me to his court, I contrived to nestle myself in the carriage without the superior's knowledge, and followed his steps to the very ante-room of the embassy. It was too late to send me back; for I was instantly seized by a company of pretty young animals, the very reverse in appearance of the preacher-monkeys of the Propaganda; they all seemed to find in me a kindred soul: my master was ushered into the cabinet, and I was left with my new acquaintance, who were called "_attachés_," but whom I at once classed with the secretary-birds,[4] while here and there, I thought, was mingled among them a specimen of the booby, or Pelicanus Sula. Two of these mischievous creatures seemed to delight in tormenting me from mere idleness and ennui, which I bore for some time with great patience, as I saw the boobies pay them much respect. One was called Lord Charles, and the other the Hon. Mr. Henry. I learned these names with facility, and contrived to repeat them, as they had been taught me, by the frequent iteration of one of the boobies.

[3] "Rhodoginus mentions a parrot which could recite correctly the whole of the Apostle's Creed."--Animal Biography, by the Rev. W. Bingley.

[4] "The Dutch," says Le Vaillant, "give this bird the name of Secretary, on account of the bunch of quills behind its head."--Bingley, Animal Biography.

(_To be continued._)

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THE GATHERER.

A snapper up of unconsidered trifles. SHAKSPEARE.

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PRISONS.

We had formerly in the Tower of London, a straight room or dungeon, called, from the misery the unhappy occupiers of this very confined place endured, the Little-Ease. But this will appear a luxurious habitation, when compared with the inventions of Louis XI. of France, with his iron cages, in which persons of rank lay for whole years; or his oubliettes, dungeons made in the form of reversed cones, with concealed trap-doors, down which dropped the unhappy victims of the tyrant, brought there by Tristam L'Hermite, his companion and executioner in ordinary; sometimes their sides were plain, sometimes set with knives, or sharp-edged wheels; but in either cases they were complete _oubliettes;_ the devoted were certain to fall into the land where all things are forgotten.--(_Pennant's London._)

When the Bastille of France was demolished, three iron cages were discovered, they were made of strong bars of iron, about eight feet high and six feet wide, and such have been used in other prisons in that country. The Bishop of Verdun, according to Mezeray, was the inventer, and was himself the first man confined in them, and remained a prisoner thus for eleven years, so that he could speak practically as to his own invention.

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FEMALE LEANDER.

The Duchess of Chevereux, who was for the first time at the court of England, in 1638, swam across the Thames, in a frolic, near Windsor. On this occasion some verses were composed by a Sir J. M. containing these lines:--

But her chaste breast, cold as the cloyster'd nun, Whose frost to chrystal might congeal the sun, So glar'd the stream, that pilots, there afloat, Thought they might safely land without a boat; July had seen the Thames in ice involv'd, Had it not been by her own beams dissolv'd.

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BIRTHDAY PRAYER.

The observance of a birthday by _prayer_ is not altogether incurious in these days of license; and the following specimen, quoted from the _Diary_ of that truly good man, JOHN EVELYN, may be entertained as the genuine effusion of piety, unmixed with any alloy of fanaticism, or religious enthusiasm:--

_Oct_. 31, 1689.--My birthday, being now 69 years old. Blessed Father who hast prolonged my years to this great age, and given me to see so great and wonderful revolutions, and preserved me amidst them to this moment, accept, I beseech thee, the continuance of my prayers and thankful acknowledgements, and grant me grace to be working out my salvation and redeeming the time, that thou mayest be glorified by me here, and my soul immortal saved, whenever thou shalt call for it to perpetuate thy praises to all eternity, in that heavenly kingdom where there are no more changes or vicissitudes, but rest and peace, and joy and consummate felicity for ever. Grant this, O Heavenly Father, for the sake of Jesus thine only Son and our Saviour. Amen.

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CURIOUS LETTER,

_From a country squire, in the 18th century, to a gentleman in London, who had written to him concerning the character of a Servant._