Walpole's description of the ministry adds strikingly to the

contemptuous feeling, naturally generated by their singular ill

success. We must also observe, as much to the discredit of the past

age as to the honour of the present; that the leading men of the day

exhibited or affected a depravity of morals, which would be the ruin

of any public character at the present time. Many of the scenes in

high life would have been fitter for the court of Charles II., and

many of the actors in those scenes ought to have been cashiered from

public employment. Personal profligacy seems actually to have been

regarded as a species of ornamental appendage to public character;

and, except where its exposure sharpened the sting of an epigram, or

gave an additional flourish to the periods of a political writer, no

one seems to have conceived that the grossest offences against

morality were of the nature of crime. Another scandal seems to have

been frequent--intemperance in wine. Hard drinking was common in

England at that period, and was even regarded as the sign of a

generous spirit; but nearly all the leading politicians who died

early, are described as owing their deaths to excess. Those are

fortunate distinctions for the days which have followed; and the

country may justly congratulate itself on the abandonment of habits,

which, deeply tending to corrupt private character, render political

baseness the almost inevitable result among public men.

Walpole promptly declares, that half the success of Wilkes was owing

to the supineness of the ministers. He might have gone further, and

fixed his charge on higher grounds. He ought to have said, that the

whole was owing to the mingled treachery and profligacy which made the

nation loathe the characters of public parties and public men. Walpole

says, in support of his assertion--"that Lord Chatham would take no

part in business; that the Duke of Grafton neglected every thing, and

whenever pressed to be active threatened to resign; that the

Chancellor Camden, placed between two such intractable friends, with

whom he was equally discontented, avoided dipping himself further;

that Conway, no longer in the Duke's confidence, and more hurt with

neglect than pleased with power, stood in the same predicament; that

Lord Gower thought of nothing but ingratiating himself at St James's;

and though what little business was done was executed by Lord

Weymouth, it required all Wood's, the secretary's, animosity to

Wilkes, to stir him up to any activity. Wood even said, "that if the

King should pardon Wilkes, Lord Weymouth would not sign the pardon."

The chief magistrate of the city, consulting the chancellor on what he

should do if Wilkes should stand for the city, and being answered that

he "must consult the recorder," Harley sharply replied, "I consulted

your lordship as a minister, I don't want to be told my duty."

Some of the most interesting portions of these volumes are the notes,

giving brief biographical sketches of the leading men. The politics

have comparatively passed away, but the characters remain; and no

slight instruction is still to be derived from the progressive steps

by which the individuals rose from private life to public distinction.

The editor, Sir Denis la Marchant, deserves no slight credit for his

efforts to give authenticity to those notices. He seems to have

collected his authorities from every available source; and what he has

compiled with the diligence of an editor, he has expressed with the

good taste of a gentleman.

The commencement of a parliament is always looked to with curiosity,

as the debut of new members. All the expectations which have been

formed by favouritism, family, or faction, are then brought to the

test. Parliament is an unerring tribunal, and no charlatanry can cheat

its searching eye. College reputations are extinguished in a moment,

the common-places of the hustings can avail no more, and the

pamperings of party only hurry its favourites to more rapid decay.

Mr Phipps, the son of Lord Mulgrave, now commenced his career. By an

extraordinary taste, though bred a seaman, he was so fond of quoting

law, that he got the sobriquet of the "marine lawyer." His knowledge

of the science (as the annotator observes) could not have been very

deep, for he was then but twenty-two. But he was an evidence of the

effect of indefatigable exertion. Though a dull debater, he took a

share in every debate, and he appears to have taken the pains of

revising his speeches for the press. Yet even under his nursing, they

exhibit no traces of eloquence. His manner was inanimate, and his

large and heavy figure gained him the luckless appellation of Ursa

Major, (to distinguish him from his brother, who was also a member.)

As if to complete the amount of his deficiencies, his voice was

particularly inharmonious, or rather it was two distinct voices, the

one strong and hoarse, the other weak and querulous; both of which he

frequently used. On this was constructed the waggish story--that one

night, having fallen into a ditch, and calling out in his shrill

voice, a countryman was coming up to assist him; when Phipps calling

out again in his hoarse tone, the man exclaimed--"If there are two of

you in the ditch, you may help each other out!"

One of his qualities seems to have been a total insensibility to his

own defects; which therefore suffered him to encounter any man, and

every man, whatever might be their superiority. Thus, in his early

day, his dulness constantly encountered Lord North, the most dexterous

wit of his time. Thus, too, in his maturer age, he constantly thrust

himself forward to meet the indignant eloquence of Fox; and seems to

have been equally unconscious that he was ridiculed by the sarcastic

pleasantry of the one, or blasted by the lofty contempt of the other.

Yet, such is the value of perseverance, that this man was gradually

regarded as important in the debates, that he wrought out for himself

an influence in the House, and obtained finally the office of joint

paymaster, one of the most lucrative under government, and a British

peerage. And all this toil was undertaken by a man who had no

children.

At his death, he was succeeded in his Irish title by his brother

Henry, who became first lord of the admiralty, and also obtained an

English peerage. The present Marquis of Normandy is his eldest son.

Parliamentary history sometimes gives valuable lessons, in exhibiting

the infinite folly of parliamentary prediction. It will scarcely be

believed in a day like ours, which has seen and survived the French

Revolution, that the chief theme of the period, and especial terror of

the opposition, was the conquest of Corsica by the French! Ministers

seem to have been deterred from a war with the French monarchy, solely

by the dislocated state of the cabinet; while the opposition declared,

that the possession of Corsica by the French, would be "the death-blow

to our influence in the Mediterranean." With Corsica in French hands,

it was boldly pronounced that "France would receive an accession of

power which nothing could shake; and they scarcely hesitated to say,

that upon the independence of Corsica rested not merely the supremacy

but the safety of England." Yet the French conquered Corsica (at a

waste of money ten times worth its value to their nation, and at a

criminal waste of life, both French and Corsican) without producing

the slightest addition to the power of the monarchy, and with no

slight disgrace to the honour of its arms. For, the Corsicans, the

most savage race of the Italian blood, and accustomed to the use of

weapons from their childhood, fought with the boldness of all men

fighting for their property, and routed the troops of France in many a

successive and desperate encounter. Still, the combat was too unequal;

the whole force of a great monarchy was obviously too strong for the

hope of successful resistance, and Corsica, after many a severe

struggle, became a French territory. But, beyond this barren honour

the war produced no fruit, except a deeper consciousness of the

unsparing ambition of the monarchy, and of the recklessness with which

it sacrificed all considerations of humanity and justice, to the

tinsel of a military name. One fatal gift, however, Corsica made, in

return to France. From it came, within a few years, the man who sealed

the banishment of the Bourbons! and, tempting France by the ambition

of military success, inflicted upon her the heaviest mortality, and

the deepest shame known in any kingdom, since the fall of the Roman

empire. Whether this were that direct retribution for innocent blood,

which Providence has so often inflicted upon guilty nations; or

whether it were merely one of those extraordinary casualties which

circumstances make so impressive; there can be no question, that the

man came from Corsica who inflicted on France the heaviest calamities

that she had ever known; who, after leading her armies over Europe, to

conquests which only aroused the hatred of all nations, and after

wasting the blood of hundreds of thousands of her people in victories

totally unproductive but of havoc; saw France twice invaded, and

brought the nation under the ban of the civilized world!

France is at this moment pursuing the same course in Algiers, which

was the pride of her politicians in Corsica. She is pouring out her

gigantic force, to overwhelm the resistance of peasants who have no

defence but their naked bravery. She will probably subdue the

resistance; for what can be done by a peasantry against the

disciplined force and vast resources of a great European power,

applied to this single object of success? But, barbarian as the Moor

and the Arab are, and comparatively helpless in the struggle, the

avenger may yet come, to teach the throne of France, that there is a

power higher than all thrones; a tribunal to which the blood cries out

of the ground.

The death of Secker, Archbishop of Canterbury, excites a few touches

of Walpole's sarcastic pen. He says, "that his early life had shown

his versatility, his latter his ambition. But hypocrisy not being

parts, he rose in the church without ever making a figure in the

state." So much for antithesis. There is no reason why a clergyman

should make a figure in the state under any circumstances; and the

less figure he made in the state, as it was then constituted, the more

likely he was to be fitted for the church. But the true censure on

Secker would have been, that he rose, without making a figure in any

thing; that he had never produced any work worthy of notice as a

divine; that he had neither eloquence in the pulpit, nor vigour with

the pen; that he seems to have been at all times a man of extreme

mediocrity; that his qualifications with the ministry were, his being

a neutral on all the great questions of the day; and his merits with

posterity were, that he possessed power without giving offence. A

hundred such men might have held the highest positions of the church,

without producing the slightest effect on the public mind; or might

have been left in the lowest, without being entitled to accuse the

injustice of fortune. His successor was Cornwallis, Bishop of

Lichfield, raised to the primacy by the Duke of Grafton, who, as

Walpole says, "had a friendship for the bishop's nephew, Earl

Cornwallis." This seems not altogether the most sufficient reason for

placing a man at the head of the Church of England, but we must take

the reason such as we find it. Walpole adds, that the nomination had,

however, the merit of disappointing a more unsuitable candidate,

Ternet of London, whom he describes as "the most time-serving of the

clergy, and sorely chagrined at missing the archiepiscopal mitre."

It was rather unlucky for the public estimate of royalty, that, at

this moment of popular irritation, the young King of Denmark should

have arrived in England. He had married the King's youngest sister,

and making a sort of tour of Europe, he determined to visit the family

of his wife. His proposal was waived by the King, who excused himself

by the national confusions. But the young Dane, scarcely more than a

giddy boy, and singularly self-willed, was not to be repelled; and he

came. Nothing could be colder than his reception; not a royal

carriage, not an officer of the court, was sent to meet him. He

arrived at St James's even in a hired carriage. Neither King nor Queen

was there. The only mark of attention paid to him was giving him an

apartment, and supplying him and his suite with a table. Walpole

observes, that this sullen treatment was as impolitic as it was

inhospitable; that the Dane was then actually a pensioner of France,

and, of course, it would have been wise to win him out of its hands.

But the Danish king seems to have been little better than a fool; and

between his frolics and his follies, he finally produced a species of

revolution in his own country. All power fell into the hands of his

queen, who, though of a bolder nature, seems to have been scarcely

less frantic than himself. On the visit of her mother, the Princess of

Wales, to Denmark, the Queen met her, at the head of a regiment,

dressed in full uniform, and wearing buckskin breeches. She must have

been an extraordinary figure altogether, for she had grown immensely

corpulent. Court favouritism was the fashion in Denmark, and the King

and Queen were equally ruled by favourites. But, in a short period, a

young physician of the household managed both, obtaining peculiarly

the confidence of the Queen. Scandal was not idle on this occasion,

and Germany and England rang with stories of the court of Denmark. The

physician was soon created a noble, and figured for a while as the

prime minister, or rather sovereign of the kingdom, by the well-known

title of Count Struensee. A party was formed against him by the

Queen-mother, at the head of some of the nobility. The Queen was made

prisoner, and died in prison. Struensee was tried as traitor, and

beheaded. The King was finally incapacitated from reigning, and his

son was raised to the regency. This melancholy transaction formed one

of the tragedies of Europe; but it had the additional misfortune of

occurring at a time when royalty had begun to sink under the incessant

attacks of the revolutionists, and France, the leader of public

opinion on the Continent, was filled with opinions contemptuous of all

thrones.

The year 1768 exhibited France in her most humiliating position before

Europe. The Duc de Choiseul was the minister--a man of wit, elegance,

and accomplishment; but too frivolous to follow, if he had not been

too ignorant to discover, the true sources of national greatness. His

foreign policy was intrigue, and his domestic policy the favouritism

of the court by administering to its vices. He raised a war between

the Russians and Turks, and had the mortification of seeing his

_protege_ the Turk trampled by the armies of his rival the Czarina.

Even the Corsicans had degraded the military name of France. But he

had a new peril at home. Old Marshal Richelieu--who, as Walpole

sarcastically observes, "had retained none of his faculties, but that

last talent of a decayed Frenchman, a spirit of back-stairs

intrigue"--had provided old Louis XV. with a new mistress. Of all the

persons of this character who had made French royal life scandalous in

the eyes of Europe, this connexion was the most scandalous. It

scandalized even France. This mistress was the famous Countess du

Barri--a wretched creature, originally of the very lowest condition;

whose vices would have stained the very highest; and who, in the

convulsions of the reign that followed, was butchered by the

guillotine.

In November of this year died the Duke of Newcastle, at the age of

seventy-five. He had been struck with palsy some months before, and

then for the first time withdrew from public life. Walpole observes,

that his life had been a proof that, "even in a free country, great

abilities are not necessary to govern it." Industry, perseverance, and

intrigue, gave him that duration of power "which shining talents, and

the favour of the crown, could not secure to Lord Granville, nor the

first rank in eloquence, or the most brilliant services, to Lord

Chatham. Rashness overset Lord Granville's parts, and presumptuous

impracticability Lord Chatham; while adventitious cunning repaired

Newcastle's folly." Such is the explanation of one of the most curious

phenomena of the time, by one of its most ingenious lookers-on. But

the explanation is not sufficient. It is impossible to conceive, how

mere cunning could have sustained any man for a quarter of a century

in the highest ministerial rank; while that rank was contested from

day to day by men of every order of ability. Since the days of

Bolingbroke, there have been no examples of ministerial talent, equal

to those exhibited, in both Houses, in the day of the Duke of

Newcastle. Chatham was as ambitious as any man that ever lived, and

full of the faculties that make ambition successful. The Butes, the

Bedfords, the Hollands, the Shelburnes, exhibited every shape and

shade of cabinet dexterity, of court cabal, of popular influence, and

of political knowledge and reckless intrigue. Yet the Duke of

Newcastle, with remarkable personal disadvantages--a ridiculous

manner, an ungainly address, speech without the slightest pretension

to eloquence, and the character of extreme ignorance on general

subjects--preserved his power almost to the extreme verge of life; and

to the last was regarded as playing a most important part in the

counsels of the country. Unless we believe in magic, we must believe

that this man, with all his oddity of manner, possessed some

remarkable faculty, by which he saw his way clearly through

difficulties impervious to more showy minds. He must have deeply

discovered the means of attaching the monarch, of acting upon the

legislature, and of controlling the captiousness of the people. He

must have had practical qualities of a remarkable kind; and his is not

the first instance, in which such qualities, in the struggles of

government, bear away the prize. Thus, in later times, we have seen

Lord Liverpool minister for eleven years, and holding power with a

firm, yet quiet grasp to the last; with the whole strength of Lord

Grey and the Whigs struggling for it in front, and George Canning, a

still more dangerous enemy, watching for it in the rear.

In one of the Notes referring to the appointment of Earl Cornwallis to

the vice-treasuryship of Ireland, the editor makes a remark which

ought not to pass without strong reprehension. Earl Cornwallis,

towards the close of the Irish rebellion in 1798, had been made chief

governor of Ireland, at the head of a large army, for the purpose of

extinguishing the remnants of the rebellion, and restoring the country

to the habits of peace. The task was no longer difficult, but he

performed his part with dignity and moderation. He had been sent

expressly for the purpose of pacifying the country, an object which

would have been altogether inconsistent with measures of violence; but

the editor, in telling us that his conduct exhibited sagacity and

benevolence, hazards the extraordinary assertion, that "he was one of

the few statesmen who inculcated the necessity of forbearance and

concession in the misgoverned country!" Nothing can be more erroneous

than this statement in point of principle, or more ignorant in point

of fact. For the last hundred years and upwards, dating from the

cessation of the war with James II., Ireland had been the object of

perpetual concessions, and, if misgoverned at all, it has been such by

the excess of those concessions. It is to be remembered, that in the

reign of William I. the Roman Catholics were in actual alliance with

France, and in actual arms against England. They were next beaten in

the field, and it was the business of the conquerors to prevent their

taking arms again. From this arose the penal laws. To those laws we

are not friendly; because we are not friendly to any attempt at the

suppression even of religious error by the force of the state. It was

a political blunder, and an offence to Christian principle, at the

same time; but the Papist is the last man in the world who has a right

to object to penal laws; for he is the very man who would have enacted

them himself against the Protestant--who always enacts them where he

has the power--and, from the spirit of whose laws, the British

legislature were in fact only borrowing at the moment. Yet from the

time when James II. and his family began to sink into insignificance,

the legislature began to relax the penal laws. Within the course of

half a century, they had wholly disappeared; and thus the editor's

flippant assertion, that Earl Cornwallis was one of the few statesmen

who inculcated the necessity of forbearance and concession, exhibits

nothing but his Whiggish ignorance on the subject. The misgovernment

of Ireland, if such existed, was to be laid to the charge of neither

the English minister nor the English people. The editor probably

forgets, that during that whole period she was governed by her own

parliament; while her progress during the second half of the 18th

century was memorably rapid, and prosperous in the highest degree,

through the bounties, privileges, and encouragements of every kind,

which were constantly held out to her by the _British_ government. And

that so early as the year 1780, she was rich enough to raise, equip,

and support a volunteer army of nearly a hundred thousand men--a

measure unexampled in Europe, and which would probably task the

strength of some of the most powerful kingdoms even at this day. And

all this was previous to the existence of what is called the "patriot

constitution."

Walpole has the art of painting historic characters to the life; but

he sadly extinguishes the romance with which our fancy so often

enrobes them. We have been in the habit of hearing Pascal Paoli, the

chief of the Corsicans, described as the model of a republican hero;

and there can be no question, that the early resistance of the

Corsicans cost the French a serious expenditure of men and money. But

Walpole charges Paoli with want of military skill, and even with want

of that personal intrepidity so essential to a national leader. At

length, Corsican resistance being overpowered by the constant

accumulation of French force, Paoli gave way, and, as Walpole

classically observes, "not having fallen like Leonidas, did not

despair like Cato." Paoli had been so panegyrized by Boswell's work,

that he was received with almost romantic applause. The Opposition

adopted him for the sake of popularity, but ministers took him out of

their hands by a pension of L1000 a-year. "I saw him," says Walpole,

"soon after his arrival, dangling at court. He was a man of decent

deportment, and so void of any thing remarkable in his aspect, that,

being asked if I knew who he was, I judged him a Scotch officer--for

he was sandy complexioned and in regimentals--who was cautiously

awaiting the moment of promotion." All this is in Walpole's style of

fashionable impertinence; but there can be no doubt that Paoli was a

brave man, and an able commander. He gave the French several severe

defeats, but the contest was soon too unequal, and Paoli withdrew to

this country; which was so soon after to be a shelter to the

aristocracy of the country which had stained his mountains with blood.

By a singular fate, on his return to France in an early period of the

Revolution, he was received with a sort of national triumph, and

actually appointed lieutenant-general of Corsica by the nation which

had driven him into exile. In the war which followed, Paoli, disgusted

by the tyranny of French republicanism, and alarmed by the violence of

the native factions, proposed to put his country under the protection

of the English government. A naval and military force was sent to

Corsica, and the island was annexed to the British crown. But the

possession was not maintained with rational vigour. The feeble

armament was found unequal to resist the popular passion for

republicanism. And, from this expenditure of troops, and probably

still more from the discovery that the island would be wholly useless,

the force was altogether withdrawn. Paoli returned to England, where

he died, having attained the advanced age of eighty. His red hair and

sandy complexion are probably fatal to his character as an Italian

chieftain. But if his locks were not black, his heart was bold; and if

his lip wanted mustaches, his mind wanted neither sagacity nor

determination.

Walpole was born for a cynic philosopher. He treats men of all ranks

with equal scorn. From Wilkes to George III., he brands them all.

Ministers meet no mercy at his hands. He ranges them, as the Sultan

used to range heads on the spikes of the seraglio, for marks for his

arrows. His history is a species of moveable panorama; the scene

constantly shifting, and every scene a burlesque of the one that went

before; or perhaps the more faithful similitude would be found in a

volume of HB.'s ingenious caricatures, where all the likenesses are

preserved, though perverted, and all the dexterity of an accomplished

pencil is employed only in making its subjects ridiculous. He thus

tells us:--"The Duke of Grafton was the fourth prime minister in seven

years, who fell by his own fault. Lord Bute was seized with a panic,

and ran away from his own victory. Grenville was undone by his

insolence, by joining in the insult on the princess, and by his

persecution of Lord Bute and Mackenzie. Lord Rockingham's incapacity

overturned _him_; and now the Duke of Grafton destroyed a power which

it had depended on himself to make as permanent as he could desire."

But rash and rapid as those changes were, what were the grave

intrigues of the English cabinet to the _boudoir_ ministries of

France? Walpole is never so much in his element, as when he is

sporting in the fussy frivolities of the Faubourg St Germain. He was

much more a Frenchman than an Englishman; his love of gossip, his

passion for haunting the society of talkative old women, and his

delight at finding himself revelling in a region of _petite soupers_,

court gallantries, and the faded indiscretions of court beauties in

the wane, would have made him a rival to the courtiers of Louis XIV.

Perhaps, the world never saw, since the days of Sardanapalus, a court

so corrupt, wealth so profligate, and a state of society so utterly

contemptuous of even the decent affectation of virtue, as the closing

years of the reign of Louis XV. A succession of profligate women ruled

the king, a similar succession ruled the cabinet; lower life was a

sink of corruption; the whole a romance of the most scandalous order.

Madame de Pompadour, a woman whose vice had long survived her beauty,

and who ruled the decrepit heart of a debauched king, had made

Choiseul minister. Choiseul was the beau-ideal of a French noble of

the old _regime_. His ambition was boundless, his insolence

ungoverned, his caprice unrestrained, and his love of pleasure

predominant even over his love of power. "He was an open enemy, but a

generous one; and had more pleasure in attaching an enemy, than in

punishing him. Whether from gaiety or presumption, he was never

dismayed; his vanity made him always depend on the success of his

plans, and his spirits made him soon forget the miscarriage of them."

At length appeared on the tapis the memorable Madame du Barri! For

three months, all the faculties of the court were absorbed in the

question of her public presentation. Indulgent as the courtiers were

to the habits of royal life, the notoriety of Madame du Barri's early

career, startled even their flexible sense of etiquette. The ladies of

the court, most of whom would have been proud to have taken her place,

determined "that they would not appear at court if she should be

received there." The King's daughters (who had borne the ascendant of

Madame du Pompadour in their mother's life) grew outrageous at the new

favourite; and the relatives of Choiseul insisted upon it, that he

should resign rather than consent to the presentation. Choiseul

resisted, yielded, was insulted for his resistance, and was scoffed at

for his submission. He finally retired, and was ridiculed for his

retirement. Du Barri triumphed. Epigrams and _calembours_ blazed

through Paris. Every one was a wit for the time, and every wit was a

rebel. The infidel faction looked on at the general dissolution of

morals with delight, as the omen of general overthrow. The Jesuits

rejoiced in the hope of getting the old King into their hands, and

terrifying him, if not into a proselyte, at least into a tool. Even Du

Barri herself was probably not beyond their hopes; for the established

career of a King's mistress was, to turn _devote_ on the decay of her

personal attractions.

Among Choiseul's intentions was that of making war on England. There

was not the slightest ground for a war. But it is a part of the

etiquette of a Frenchman's life, that he must be a warrior, or must

promote a war, or must dream of a war. M. Guizot is the solitary

exception in our age, as M. Fleury was the solitary exception in the

last; but Fleury was an ecclesiastic, and was eighty years old

besides--two strong disqualifications for a conqueror. But the King

was then growing old, too; his belligerent propensities were absorbed

in quarrels with his provincial parliaments; his administrative

faculties found sufficient employment in managing the morals of his

mistresses; his private hours were occupied in pelting Du Barri with

sugar-plums; and thus his days wore away without that supreme glory of

the old _regime_--a general war in Europe.

The calamities of the French noblesse at the period of the Revolution,

excited universal regret; and the sight of so many persons, of

graceful manners and high birth, flung into the very depths of

destitution in foreign lands, or destroyed by the guillotine at home,

justified the sympathy of mankind. But, the secret history of that

noblesse was a fearful stigma, not only on France, but on human

nature. Vice may have existed to a high degree of criminality in other

lands; but in no other country of Europe, or the earth, ever was vice

so public, so ostentatiously forced upon the eyes of man, so

completely formed into an established and essential portion of

fashionable and courtly life. It was even the _etiquette_, that the

King of France should have a _mistress_. She was as much a part of the

royal establishment as a prime minister was of the royal councils;

and, as if for the purpose of offering a still more contemptuous

defiance to the common decencies of life, the etiquette was, that this

mistress should be a _married woman_! Yet in that country the whole

ritual of Popery was performed with scrupulous exactness. A vast and

powerful clergy filled France; and the ceremonials of the national

religion were performed continually before the court, with the most

rigid formality. The King had his confessor, and, so far as we can

discover, the mistress had her confessor too; the nobles attended the

royal chapel, and also had their confessors. The confessional was

never without royal and noble solicitors of monthly, or, at the

furthest, quarterly absolution. Still, from the whole body of

ecclesiastics, France heard no remonstrance against those public

abominations. Their sermons, few and feeble, sometimes declaimed on

the vices of the beggars of Paris, or the riots among the peasantry;

but no sense of scriptural responsibility, and no natural feeling of

duty, ever ventured to deprecate the vices of the nobles and the

scandals of the throne.

We must give but a fragment, from Walpole's _catalogue raisonne_, of

this Court of Paphos. It had been the King's object to make some women

of rank introduce Madame du Barri at court; and he had found

considerable difficulty in this matter, not from her being a woman of

no character, but on her being a woman of no birth, and whose earlier

life had been spent in the lowest condition of vice. The King at last

succeeded--and these are the _chaperons_. "There was Madame de

l'Hopital, an ancient mistress of the Prince de Soubize! The Comtesse

Valentinois, of the highest birth, very rich, but very foolish; and as

far from a Lucretia as Madame du Barri herself! Madame de Flavacourt

was another, a suitable companion to both in virtue and understanding.

She was sister to _three_ of _the King's earliest mistresses_, and had

aimed at succeeding them! The Marechale Duchesse de Mirpoix was the

last, and a very important acquisition." Of her, Walpole simply

mentions that all her talents were "drowned in such an overwhelming

passion for play, that though she had long and singular credit with

the King, she reduced her favour to an endless solicitation for money

to pay her debts." He adds, in his keen and amusing style--"That, to

obtain the post of _dame d'honneur_ to the Queen, she had left off

_red_ (wearing rouge,) and acted _devotion_; and the very next day was

seen riding with Madame de Pompadour (the King's mistress) in the

latter's coach!" The editor settles the question of _her_ morality,

too.--"She was a woman of extraordinary wit and cleverness, but

totally _without character_." She had her morals by inheritance; for

she was the daughter of the _mistress_ of the Duke of Lorraine, who

married her to Monsieur de Beauvan, a poor noble, and whom the duke

got made a prince of the empire, by the title of De Craon. Now, all

those were females of the highest rank in France, ladies of fashion,

the stars of court life, and the models of national manners. Can we

wonder at the retribution which cast them out into the highways of

Europe? Can we wonder at the ruin of the corrupted nobility? Can we

wonder at the massacre of the worldly church, which stood looking on

at those vilenesses, and yet never uttered a syllable against them, if

it did not even share in their excesses? The true cause for

astonishment is, not in the depth of their fall, but in its delay; not

in the severity of the national judgment, but in that long-suffering

which held back the thunderbolt for a hundred years, and even then did

not extinguish the generation at a blow!

[Footnote 33: _Memoirs of the Reign of King George the Third, by

Horace Walpole. From the MSS. Edited, with Notes, by_ SIR D. LA

MARCHANT, BART. London: Bentley.]

A FEW PASSAGES CONCERNING OMENS, DREAMS, APPEARANCES, &c.

IN A LETTER TO EUSEBIUS.

No. II.

It is somewhat late, my dear, Eusebius, to refer me to my letter of

August 1840, and to enquire, in your bantering way, if I have shaken

hands with a ghost recently, or dreamed a dream worth telling. You

have evidently been thinking upon this subject ever since I wrote to

you; and I suspect you are more of a convert than you will admit. You

only wish to provoke me to further evidence; but I see--through the

flimsy veil of your seeming denials, and through your put-on

audacity--the nervous workings of your countenance, when your

imagination is kindled by the mysterious subject. Your wit and your

banter are but the whistle of the clown in the dark, to keep down his

rising fears. However good your story[34] may be, there have been

dreams even of the numbers of lottery-tickets that have been verified.

We call things coincidences and chances, because we have no name to

give them, whereas they are phenomena that want a better settlement.

You speak, too, of the "doctrine of chances." If chance have a

doctrine, it is subject to a rule, is under calculation, arithmetic,

and loses all trace at once of our idea of absolute chance. If there

be chance, there is also a power over chance. The very hairs of our

head, which seem to be but a chance-confusion, are yet, we are

assured, all numbered--and is it less credible that their every

movement is noted also? One age is the type of another; and every age,

from the beginning of the world, hath had its own symbols; and not

poetically only, but literally true is it, that "coming events cast

their shadows before." If the "vox populi" be the "vox Dei," it has

pronounced continually, in a space of above five thousand years, that

there is communication between the material and immaterial worlds. So

rare are the exceptions, that, speaking of mankind, we may assert that

there is a universal belief amongst them of that connexion by signs,

omens, dreams, visions, or ghostly presences. Many professed sceptics,

who have been sceptics only in the pride of understanding, have in

secret bowed down to one form or other of the superstition. Take not

the word in a bad sense. It is at least the germ, the natural germ,

of religion in the human mind. It is the consciousness of a

superiority not his own, of some power so immeasurably above man, that

his mind cannot take it in, but accepts, as inconsiderable glimpses of

it, the phenomena of nature, and the fears and misgivings of his own

mind, spreading out from himself into the infinite and invisible. I am

not certain, Eusebius, if it be not the spiritual part of conscience,

and is to it what life is to organized matter--the mystery which gives

it all its motion and beauty.

It is not my intention to repeat the substance of my former letter--I

therefore pass on. You ask me if the mesmeric phenomena--which you

ridicule, yet of which I believe you covet a closer investigation--are

not part and parcel of the same incomprehensible farrago? I cannot

answer you. It would be easy to do so were I a disciple. If the

mesmerists _can_ establish _clairvoyance_, it will certainly be upon a

par with the ancient oracles. But what the philosopher La Place says,

in his _Essay on Probabilities_, may be worth your consideration--that

"any case, however apparently incredible, if it is a recurrent case,

is as much entitled to a fair valuation under the laws of induction,

as if it had been more probable beforehand." If the mesmerized can

project, and that apparently without effort, their minds into the

minds of others--read their thoughts; if they can see and tell what is

going on hundreds of miles off, on the sea and on distant lands alike;

if they can at remote distances _influence_ others with a sense of

their presence--they possess a power so very similar to that ascribed,

in some extraordinary cases, to persons who, in a dying state, have

declared that they have been absent and conversed with individuals

dear to them in distant countries, and whose presence has been

recognised at those very times by the persons so said to be visited,

that I do not see how they can be referable to different original

phenomena. Yet with this fact before them, supposing the facts of

mesmerism, of the mind's separation from, and independence of its

organic frame, is it not extraordinary that so many of this new school

are, or profess themselves by their writings, materialists? I would,

however, use the argument of mesmerism thus:--Mesmerism, if true,

confirms the ghost and vision power, though I cannot admit that

dreams, ghosts, and visions are any confirmation of mesmerism; for if

mesmerism be a delusion and cheat, it may have arisen from speculating

upon the other known power--as true miracles have been known to give

rise to false. In cases of mesmerism, however, this shock is felt--the

facts, as facts in the ordinary sense, are incredible; but then I see

persons who have examined the matter very nicely, whom I have known,

some intimately, for many years, of whose good sense, judgement, and

_veracity_ I will not allow myself to doubt--indeed to doubt whose

veracity would be more incredible to me than the mesmeric facts

themselves. Here is a conflict--a shock. Two contradictory

impossibilities come together. I do not weigh in the scale at all the

discovery of some cheats and pretenders; this was from the first to

have been expected. In truth, the discoveries of trick and collusion

are, after all, few. Not only has mesmerism been examined into by

persons I respect, but practised likewise; and by one, a physician,

whom I have known intimately many years, who, to his own detriment,

has pursued it, and whom I have ever considered one of the most

truthful persons living, and incapable of collusion, or knowingly in

any way deceiving. Now, Eusebius, we cannot go into society, and

pronounce persons whom we have ever respected all at once to be cheats

and liars. Yet there may be some among them who will tell you that

they themselves were entirely sceptical until they tried mesmerism,

and found they had the power in themselves. We must then, in fairness,

either acknowledge mesmerism as a power, or believe that these persons

whom we respect and esteem are practised upon and deluded by others.

And such would, I confess, be the solution of the difficulty, were it

not that there are cases where this is next to an impossibility.

But I do not mean now, Eusebius, to discuss mesmerism,[35] further

than as it does seem "a part and parcel" of that mysterious power

which has been manifested in omens, dreams, and appearances. I say

_seem_--for if it be proved altogether false, the other mystery stands

untouched by the failure--for in fact it was, thousands of years

before either the discovery or practice--at least as far as we know;

for some will not quite admit this, but, in their mesmeric dreaming,

attribute to it the ancient oracles, and other wonders. And there are

who somewhat inconsistently do this, having ridiculed and contemned as

utterly false those phenomena, until they have found them hitch on to,

and give a credit to, their new Mesmeric science.

But to return to the immediate subject. It has been objected against

dreams, omens, and visions, that they often occur without an object;

that there is either no consequence, or a very trifling one; the knot

is not "dignus vindice." Now, I am not at all staggered by this; on

the contrary, it rather tends to show that there is some _natural_

link by which the material and immaterial within and without ourselves

may be connected; and very probably many more intimations of that

connexion are given than noted. Those of thought, mental suggestions,

may most commonly escape us. It is thus what we would not do of

ourselves we may do in spite of ourselves. Nor do we always observe

closely objects and ends. We might, were we to scrutinize, often find

the completion of a dream or omen which we had considered a failure,

because we looked too immediately for its fulfilment. But even where

there is evidently no purpose attained, there is the less reason to

suspect fabrication, which would surely commence with an object. Some

very curious cases are well attested, where the persons under the

impression act upon the impulse blindly, not knowing why; and

suddenly, in conclusion, the whole purpose bursts upon their

understandings. But I think the objection as to purpose is answered by

one undoubted fact, the dream of Pilate's wife--"Have thou nothing to

do with that just man; for I have suffered many things this day in a

dream because of him." There is here no apparent purpose--the warning

was unheeded. Yet the dream, recorded as it is and where it is, was

unquestionably a dream upon the event to happen; and is not to be

considered as a mere coincidence, which would have been unworthy the

sacred historian, who wrote the account of it under inspiration. And

this is a strong--the strongest confirmation of the inspiration of

dreams, or rather, perhaps, of their significance, natural or

otherwise, and with or without a purpose. So the dream of Caesar's wife

did not save Caesar's life. And what are we to think of the whole

narrative, beginning with the warning of the Ides of March? Now,

Joseph's dream and Pharaoh's dream were dreams of purpose; they were

prophetic, and disclosed to the understanding of Joseph. So that, with

this authority of Scripture, I do not see how dreams can be set aside

as of no significance. And we have the like authority for omens, and

symbols, and visions--so that we must conclude the things themselves

to be possible; and this many do, yet say that, with other miracles,

they have long ceased to be.

Then, again, in things that by their agreement, falling in with other

facts and events, move our wonder, we escape from the difficulty, as

we imagine, by calling them coincidences; as if we knew what

coincidences are. I do not believe they are without a purpose, any

more than that seeming fatality by which little circumstances produce

great events, and in ordinary life occur frequently to an apparent

detriment, yet turn out to be the very hinge upon which the fortune

and happiness of life depend and are established. I remember a

remarkable instance of this--though it may not strictly belong to

omens or coincidences; but it shows the purpose of an accident. Many

years ago, a lady sent her servant--a young man about twenty years of

age, and a native of that part of the country where his mistress

resided--to the neighbouring town with a ring which required some

alteration, to be delivered into the hands of a jeweller. The young

man went the shortest way, across the fields; and coming to a little

wooden bridge that crossed a small stream, he leaned against the rail,

and took the ring out of its case to look at it. While doing so, it

slipped out of his hand, and fell into the water. In vain he searched

for it, even till it grew dark. He thought it fell into the hollow of

a stump of a tree under water; but he could not find it. The time

taken in the search was so long, that he feared to return and tell his

story--thinking it incredible, and that he should even be suspected of

having gone into evil company, and gamed it away or sold it. In this

fear, he determined never to return--left wages and clothes, and

fairly ran away. This seemingly great misfortune was the making of

him. His intermediate history I know not; but this--that after many

years' absence, either in the East or West Indies, he returned with a

very considerable fortune. He now wished to clear himself with his old

mistress; ascertained that she was living, purchased a diamond ring of

considerable value, which he determined to present in person, and

clear his character, by telling his tale, which the credit of his

present condition might testify. He took the coach to the town of ----,

and from thence set out to walk the distance of a few miles. He found,

I should tell you, on alighting, a gentleman who resided in the

neighbourhood, who was bound for the adjacent village. They walked

together; and, in conversation, this former servant, now a gentleman,

with graceful manners and agreeable address, communicated the

circumstance that made him leave the country abruptly, many years

before. As he was telling this, they came to the very wooden bridge.

"There," said he--"it was just here that I dropped the ring; and there

is the very bit of old tree, into a hole of which it fell--just

there." At the same time, he put down the point of his umbrella into

the hole of a knot in the tree--and, drawing it up, to the

astonishment of both, found _the_ very ring on the ferrule of the

umbrella. I need not tell the rest. But make this reflection--why was

it that he did not as easily find it immediately after it had fallen

in? It was an incident like one of those in Parnell's "Hermit," which,

though a seeming chance, was of purpose, and most important.

Now, here is an extraordinary coincidence between a fact and a dream,

or a vision, whatever it may be, which yet was of no result--I know it

to be true. And you know, Eusebius, my excellent, truth-telling,

worthy Mrs H----, who formerly kept a large school at ----. One morning

early, the whole house was awakened by the screams of one of the

pupils. She was in hysterics; and, from time to time, fainting away in

an agony of distress. She said she had seen her grandfather--that he

was dead, and they would bury him alive. In due time, the post brought

a letter--the grandfather _was dead_. Letters were written to the

friends to announce the dream or vision, and the burial was delayed in

consequence. Nothing could be more natural than the fear of burying

him alive in the mind of the young girl, unacquainted with death, and

averse to persuade herself that the person she had seen could be

really dead. Now, my dear Eusebius, you know Mrs H----, and cannot

doubt the fact.

Cases of this kind are so many, and well authenticated, that one knows

not where to choose.

----"Tam multa loquacem

Delassare valent Fabium."

I think you knew the worthy and amiable Mr ----, who had the charge of

the valuable museum at ----. I well remember hearing this narrated of

him, long _before_ his death. He stated, that one day opening a case,

he heard a voice issue from it, which said--"In three days you shall

die." He became ill, and sent for Dr P----, the very celebrated

physician. It was in vain to reason with him. The third day arrived.

The kind physician sat with him till the hour was past. He did not

then die! Did he, however, mistake or miscalculate the meaning of the

voice? He died _that very day three years_!! Nothing can be more

authentic than this.

When I was in town in the summer, Eusebius, I spent an agreeable day

with my friends, the C----s. Now, I do not know a human being more

incapable of letting an idea, a falsehood of imagination, run away

with his sober judgment. He has a habit, I should say, more than most

men, of tying himself down to matters of fact. I copy for you an

extract from a diary; it was taken down that night. "Mr C---- has just

told me the following very curious circumstance:--Some years ago, Mrs

C---- being not in good health, they determined to spend some weeks in

the country. His father was then in his house. They separated--the

father, to his own home in the neighbourhood of London, and Mr and Mrs

C---- to visit the brother of Mrs C----, a clergyman, and resident

upon his living, in Suffolk. Soon after their arrival, there was a

large assembly of friends, in consequence of some church business.

There was church service--in the midst of which Mr C---- suddenly

felt an irresistible desire to return to his house in town. He knew

not why. It was in vain he reasoned with himself--go he must, forced

by an impulse for which he could in no way account. It would distress

his friends--particularly on such an occasion. He could not help it.

He communicated his intention to Mrs C----; begged her to tell no one,

lest he should give trouble by having the carriage;--his resolution

was instantly taken, to quit the church at once, to walk about six

miles to meet the coach if possible; if not, determining to walk all

night, a distance of thirty-two miles. He did quit the church, walked

the six miles, was in time to take the coach, reached London, and his

own home. The intelligence he found there was, that his father was

dangerously ill. He went to him--found him dying--and learned that he

had told those about him that he knew he should see his son. That wish

was gratified, which could not have been but for this sudden impulse

and resolution. His father expired in his arms."

It is curious that his father had told him a dream which he had had

some years before--that he was in the midst of some convulsion of

nature, where death was inevitable, and that then the only one of his

children who came to him was my friend Mr C----, which was thus in

manner accomplished on the day of his death.

I know not if some persons are naturally more under these and suchlike

mysterious influences. There was another occurrence which much

affected Mr C----. He went into Gloucestershire to visit a brother. I

do not think the brother was ill. All the way that he went in the

coach, he had, to use his own words, a death-smell which very much

annoyed him. Leaving the coach, he walked towards his brother's house

greatly depressed; so much so, that, for a considerable time, he sat

on a stone by the way, deeply agitated, and could not account for the

feeling. He arrived in time only to see his brother expire. I do not

know, Eusebius, how you can wish for better evidence of facts so

extraordinary. Mr C----'s character is sufficient voucher.

Here is another of these extraordinary coincidences which I have been

told by my friend Mrs S----, niece to the Rev. W. Carr, whom she has

very frequently heard narrate the following:--A farmer's wife at

Bolton Abbey, came to him, the Rev. W. Carr, in great agitation, and

told him she had passed a dreadful night, having dreamed that she saw

Mr Richard, (brother to Rev. W. Carr;) that she saw him in great

distress, struggling in the water, with his portmanteau on his

shoulders, escaping from a burning ship; and she begged the family to

write to know if Mr Richard was safe. It was exactly according to the

dream; he had, at the very time, so escaped from the burning of (I

believe) the Boyne. How like is this to some of the mesmeric visions!

I am assured of the truth of the following, by one who knew the

circumstance. One morning, as Mrs F---- was sitting in her room, a

person came in and told her he had had a very singular dream; that he

had been sitting with her sister, Mrs B----k, when some one came into

the room with distressing intelligence about her husband. Though it

could not have been there known at the time, Mr B----k had been

thrown from his horse and killed.

A party of gentlemen had met at Newcastle; the nature of the meeting

is stated to have been of a profane character. One of them suddenly

started, and cried, "What's that?"--and saw a coffin. The others saw

it; and one said--"It is mine: I see myself in it!" In twenty-four

hours he was a corpse.

I think I mentioned to you, Eusebius, that when I dined with Miss

A----, in town, she told me a curious story about a black boy. I have

been since favoured with the particulars, and copy part of the letter;

weigh it well, and tell me what you think of such coincidences--if you

are satisfied that there is nothing but chance in the matter.

"Now for the little black boy. In the year 1813, I was at the house of

Sir J. W. S----th of D---- House, near Bl----d, who then resided in

Portman Square, and a Mr L----r of Norfolk, a great friend of Sir

John's, was of the party. On coming into the room, he said--'I have

just been calling on our old Cambridge friend, H----n, who returned

the other day from India; and he has been telling me a very curious

thing which happened in his family. He had to go up the country to a

very remote part, on some law business, and he left Mrs H----n at

home, under the protection of her sister and that lady's husband. The

night after Mr H----n went away, the brother-in-law was awakened by

the screams of his own wife in her sleep; she had dreamed that a

little black boy, Mr H----n's servant, who had attended him, was

murdering him. He woke her, and while he was endeavouring to quiet

her, and convince her that her fears were the effects of a bad dream,

produced probably by indigestion, he was roused by the alarming

shrieks of Mrs H----n, who slept in an adjoining room. On going to

her, he found her, too, just awakening after a horrid dream--the

little Indian boy was murdering her husband. He used the same

arguments with her that he had already found answer in quieting his

own wife; but, in his own mind, he felt very anxious for tidings from

Mr H----n. To their great surprise, that gentleman made his

appearance the next evening, though he had expected to be absent above

a week. He looked ill and dejected. They anxiously asked him what was

the matter. Nothing, but that he was angry with himself for acting in

a weak, foolish manner. He had dreamed that his attendant, the little

black boy, intended to murder him; and the dream made such an

impression on his nerves that he could not bear the sight of the boy,

but dismissed him at once without any explanation. Finding he could

not go on without an attendant, he had returned home to procure one;

but as he had no reason whatever to suspect the boy of any ill

intention, he felt very angry with himself for minding a dream. Dear

Mrs H----n was much struck with this story; but she used to

say--unless it were proved that the boy really had the intention of

murdering his master, the dreams were for nothing.'"

In this instance a murder may have been prevented by these dreams; for

if merely coincidences, and without an object, the wonder of

coincidences is great indeed; for it is not one dream, but three, and

of three persons.

Things apparently of little consequence are yet curious for

observation. Our friend K----n, and two or three other friends, some

months ago went on an excursion together. Their first point was Bath,

where they meant to remain some time. K----n dreamed on Friday they

were to start on Saturday; that there was a great confusion at the

railway station; and that there would be no reaching Bath for them.

They went, however, on Saturday morning, and he told his dream when in

the carriage. One of the party immediately repeated the old saying--

"A Friday's dream on Saturday told

Will be sure to come true ere the day is old."

There was no accident to the train; but, instead of finding themselves

at Bath, they found themselves at Bristol--having, in their

conversation, neglected to notice that they had passed Bath. They were

put to great inconvenience, and confusion, and difficulty in getting

their luggage. I know you too well, Eusebius, not to hear, by

anticipation, your laughter at this trifling affair, and the wit with

which for a few moments you will throw off your ridicule. You may ask,

if the shooting of your corns are not as sure and as serious

prognostications? Be it so; and why not, Eusebius? You can tell by

them what weather to expect; and, after all, you know little more of

the material world, less of the immaterial, and nothing of their

mystical union. Nothing now, past, present, and future, may be but

terms for we know not what, and cannot comprehend how they can be lost

in an eternity. There they become submerged. So take the thing

represented, not the paltry, perhaps ridiculous, one through which it

is represented. It is the picture, the attitude, the position, the

undignified familiarity of yourself with the defects of your own

person, that make the ridiculous; but there is grave philosophy,

nevertheless, to be drawn from every atom of your own person, if you

view it aright. I have heard you eloquent against the "hypocrite

Cicero," as you called him, for his saying, that one Augur meeting

another could scarcely help laughing. If mankind chose augury as a

sign, it might have been permitted them to find a sign in it. But this

is plunging into deeper matter, and one which you will think a

quagmire, wherein wiser thoughts may flounder and be lost. When the

officers of Hannibal's army were heard to laugh by the soldiery on the

morning of the battle of Cannae, they took it as a good omen. It was

generally received, and the day was fatal to the Romans. "Possunt quia

posse videntur," you will say; but whence comes the "videntur?" There,

Eusebius, you beg the whole question. The wonders and omens, gravely

related by Livy, at least portray a general feeling--an impression

before events. In the absence of a better religion, I would not have

quarrelled with the superstition, and very much join you in your

condemnation of the passage in Cicero.

The fatal necessity of event upon event, of omen, dream, and vision,

is the great characteristic of the wondrous Greek drama. So awfully

portrayed is the _OEdipus_--and with more grand and prophetic

mystery pervading the _Agamemnon_. Had it not been congenial with

popular belief, it could never have been so received; nor, indeed,

could somewhat similar (though degraded from their high authority, as

standing less alone by their amalgamation with a purer creed)

characteristics in some of the plays of our own Shakspeare have

touched the mind to wonderment, had there been no innate feeling to

which they might, and without effort, unite. The progress, however, of

the omen and vision, clearer and clearer, pointing to the very deed,

and even while its enactment has commenced, and that fatality by which

(prophetic, too) the plainest prophecy is unheeded, contemned, and the

Prophetess herself doomed, and knowing herself doomed, may be

considered as an epitome of the Grecian creeds upon the subject. It

was no vulgar punning spirit that designated the very _name_ of Helen

as a cursing omen.

[Greek:

"Tis pot' honomazen hod

Es to pan etetumos--

Me tis onton ouch oro--

Men pronoaisi tou pepromeuou

Glossan en tucha nemon."]

Helen, the destroyer--yes, that was her significant name. The present

King of the French was not allowed to assume the title of Valois,

which was, strictly speaking, his, and instead assumed that of Duc de

Chartres, on account of an evil omen attached to the former name; and

that evil omen originating in a curious fact, the seeing of a spectre

by that German princess who succeeded the poisoned sister of our

second Charles. But there is nothing in modern history more analogous

to the fatalities of the Grecian drama than those singular passages

relating to the death of Henry the Fourth of France. We have the

gravest authority of the gravest historians, that prophecies,

warnings, and omens so prepared Henry for his death, that he waited

for it with a calm resignation, as to an irresistible fatality. "In

fact," (says an eloquent writer in Maga of April 1840,) "it is to this

attitude of listening expectation in the king, and breathless waiting

for the blow, that Schiller alludes in that fine speech of Wallenstein

to his sister, where he notices the funeral knells that sounded

continually in Henry's ears; and, above all, his prophetic instinct,

that caught the sound from a far distance of his murderer's motions,

that could distinguish, amidst all the tumult of a mighty Capital,

those stealthy steps."

And does it seem so strange to you, Eusebius, if the ear and the eye,

those outposts, as it were, of the ever watchful, spiritual, and

intellectual sentinels within man, convey the secret intelligences

that most concern him? What is there, Eusebius, so marvellous to your

conception, if there be sympathy more than electric between those two

worlds, outer Nature and Man himself? If earth, that with him and for

him partook of one curse, with all its accompanying chain and

interchange of elements, be still one with him, in utterance and

signification, whether of his weal or woe. The sunshine and the gloom

enter into him, and are his; they reflect his feelings, or rather they

are his feelings, almost become his flesh--they are his bodily

sensations. The winds and the waters, in their gentler breathings and

their sullen roar, are but the music of his mind, echo his joys, his

passions, or funereally rehearse the dirge of his fate.

Reject not, my Eusebius, any fact, because it seems little and

trifling; a mite is a wonder in creation, from which deep, hidden

truths present themselves. It was a heathen thought, an imperfect

conception of the wide sympathy of all nature, and of that meaning

which every particle of it can convey, and more significantly as we

calculate our knowledge;--it was a heathen thought, that the poet

should lament the unlikeliness of the flowers of the field to man in

their fall and reappearance. It was not the blessing given to his

times to see the perfectness of the truth--the "non omnis moriar"

indicated even in his own lament.[36]

I had written thus far, when our friend H---l---r looked in upon me,

and enquired what I was about; I told him I was writing to you, and

the subject of my letter. He is this moment gone, and has left with me

these two incidents. They came within his own experience. He

remembers, that when he was a boy, he was in a room with several of

his brothers, some of whom were unwell, yet not seriously ill. On a

sudden, there was a great noise, so great, that it could be compared

to nothing but the firing of a pistol--a pane in the window was

broken; not, he said, to _pieces_, but literally to a _powder_ of

glass. All in the house heard it, with the exception of one of his

brothers, which struck them as very strange. The servants from below,

and their mother from above, rushed into the room, fearing one of them

might have been shot. The mother, when she saw how it was, told

H---l---r that his brother, who did not hear the noise, she knew it well,

would die. At that same hour next day that brother did die.

The other story is more singular. His family were very intimate with

another, consisting of father, mother, and an only daughter--a child.

Of her the father was so fond, that he was never happy but when she

was with him. It happened that he lost his health, and during his long

illness, continually prayed that, when he was gone, his child too

should be shortly taken from this world, and that he might be with her

in a better. He died--when, a short time after his death, the child,

who was in perfect health, came rushing into the presence of her

mother, from a little room which looked out upon a court, but from

which there was no entrance to the room--she came rushing to her

mother, calling out--"Oh, papa, papa! I have seen papa in the court,

and he called me to him. I must go--open the door for me--do, mamma! I

must go, for he called me." Within twenty-four hours that child was

dead. Now, said H--l--r, I knew this to be a fact, as well as I ever

knew any act, for our families were like one family. Sweet image of

infant and of parental love!--let us excuse the prayer, by that of the

ancient mother, who, when her sons dragged her chariot to the temple,

prayed that they might receive from the gods what was best for

them--and they were found dead in the temple. How beautiful is the

smile of the sleeping infant! "Holds it not converse with angels?" the

thought is natural--ministering spirits may be unseen around us, and

in all space, and love the whispering speech in the ear of sleeping

innocence; there is visible joy in the face, yet how little can it

know of pleasurable sensations, communicable through this world's

objects? How know we but the sense must be deteriorated, to make it

serviceable for the lower purposes for which in part the child is

born?--as the air we breathe must have something of poison, or it

would be too pure for mortal beings. Look down some lengthening valley

from a height, Eusebius, at the hour of twilight, when all lands,

their marks and boundaries, grow dim, and only here and there the

scant light indicates lowly dwellings, shelters of humanity in earth's

sombre bosom, and mark the vast space of vapour that fills all

between, and touches all, broods over all--can you think this little

world of life that you know by having walked its path, and now see so

indistinguishable, to be the all of existence before you? Lone indeed

would be the world were there nothing better than ourselves in it. No

beings to watch for us, to warn us, to defend us from "the Power of

the Air:" ministering spirits--and why not of the departed?--may be

there. If there be those that in darkness persuade to evil--and in

winter nights, the winds that shake the casement seem to denote to the

guilty conscience the presence of avenging fiends--take we not peace

and wholesome suggestion from milder influences of air and sunshine?

Brighter may be, perhaps, the child's vision than ours; as it grows

for the toil and work for which it is destined, there comes another

picture of a stern and new reality, and that which brought the smile

of joy upon the face, is but as a dissolving view; and then he becomes

fully fitted for humanity, of which he was before but the embryo. And

even in his progress, if he keep charge of his mind, in purity and in

love, seem there not ministering spirits, that spread before him, in

the mirage of the mind, scenes that look like a new creation? and

pedants, in their kind, call this the poet's fancy, his imagination.

Lately I have spent a month by the sea: the silent rocks seemed

significant in their overhanging look, and silence, as listening to

the incessant sea. It would be painful to think every thing insensible

about us, but ourselves. I wonder not that the rocks, the woods, and

wilds, were peopled by ancient Mythologists; and with beings, too,

with whom humanity could sympathize. I would not think that the

greater part of the earth's islands and continents were given up to

hearts insensate; that there were nothing better than wildernesses of

chattering apes--no sounds more rational than

"The wolf's wild howl on Ulalaski's shore."

I would rather think that there are myriads of beings of higher nature

than ourselves, whose passage is [Greek: hoste noema], and whose home

is ubiquity; and such as these may have their missions to us, and may

sometimes take the dying breath of father or of brother in far-off

seas, and instinct with, and maintaining in themselves, made visible,

that poor remnant of life, stand at a moment at the bedside of beloved

relatives, even in most distant lands, and give to each a blessed

interchange and intelligence. In every sense, indeed, we "see but in

part." In the dulness of the day, we see not a tenth part of the

living things that people the ground; a gleam of sunshine instantly

discovers to us in leaf and flower a little world; and could we but

remove this outward fog, this impure atmosphere of our mortal senses,

that which may be occasionally granted at dying hour, we might behold

all space peopled with the glory of created beings. There is a

beautiful truth of best feeling hidden in the superstition, that at

one particular moment on Christmas Eve, all the beasts of the field go

down on their knees amidst the darkness, seen alone by their Creator's

eye, and by that angelic host that sing again the first divine hymn of

Palestine.

I do not wonder that sailors are, what we choose to call, more

superstitious than landsmen; with but a plank between them and

death--unfathomable seas around them, whose depths are continual

wonder, from whose unseen treasure-house, the

----"billows roll ashore

The beryl and the golden ore."

Seas and skies with the great attribute of life, motion--their very

ship a personification, as it were a living creature--cut off,

separated as they are for the most part, from cities, and the

mind-lowering ways of cities, which they see recede from them and melt

into utter insignificance, leaving for companionship but the winds and

the waters. Can it be a matter of wonder, if, with warm wishes and

affections in their breasts, their imaginations shape the clouds and

mists into being, messengers between them and the world they have all

but lost? The stars, those "watches of the night," to them are not the

same, changing yet ever significant. Even the waters about them, which

by day are apparently without a living thing beyond the life of their

own motion, in the darkness glittering with animated fire; can we

wonder, then, if their thoughts rise from these myriad, invisible,

lucent worms of the sea, to a faith in the more magnificent beings who

"clothe themselves with light;" and if they believe that such are

present, unseen, commissioned to guard and guide them in ways perilous

and obscure? Seamen, accustomed to observe signs in their great

solitude, unattracted by the innumerable sights and businesses of

other life, are ever open and ready to receive signs and

significations even of omen and vision; whereas he that is engaged in

crowded street and market, heeds no sign, though it were offered, but

that which his little and engrossing interests make for him; he,

indeed, may receive "angels' visits unaware." Omens, dreams, and

visions are to seamen more real, more frequent, as more congenial with

their wants; and some extraordinary cases have even been registered in

ships' logs, not resting on the credibility of one but of a crew, and

such logs, if I mistake not, have been admitted evidence in courts of

judicature. Am I led away by the subject, Eusebius? You will say I am;

yet I could go on--the wonder increases--the common earth is not their

sure grave--

"Nothing of them that doth fade,

But doth suffer a sea-change

Into something rich and strange."

But I must not pursue this, lest, in your wit, you find reason to

compare me to that great philosopher, who gravely asserted that he had

discovered how to make a mermaid, but abstained from using the

receipt; and I am quite sure you are not likely to resemble the

learned Dr Farmer, who folded down the page for future experiment.[37]

It is not very long ago that I was discussing subjects of this kind

with our acute friend S---- V----. I send you a letter received from

him, written, I presume, more for you than myself; for I told him I

was on the point of answering yours, which he read. His attempt to

account for any of his stories by common coincidences, is rather

indicative of his naturally inquisitive mind than of his real belief;

and I suspect he has been led into that train of argument by his

hostility to mesmerism, which he pronounces to be a cheat from

beginning to end; and he cannot but see that, granting mesmerism, the

step in belief beyond is easy. He would, therefore, have no such

stepping stone; and lest confidence in dreams, omens, &c., should make

mesmerism more credible, he has been a little disposed to trim his own

opinions on the subject. You will judge for yourself--here is his

letter:--

"My dear --------,--You desire me to give you a written account

of the dreams which I related to you when we lately met, and

amused ourselves with speculations on these mysterious phenomena.

"_Dream I._--Mrs X----, when a child, was attached to Captain

T----, R.N. She had been brought up from infancy by her uncle and

aunt, with whom she resided, and with whom Captain T---- had long

been on terms of the most intimate friendship and regard. At the

time to which I now refer, Captain T---- commanded a frigate in

the West Indies, where he had been stationed for some months;

letters had been occasionally received from him; his health had

not suffered from the climate, nor had any of his friends in

England the least reason to apprehend that a man of his age, good

constitution, and temperate habits, by whom also the service in

which he was engaged had been eagerly desired, would be likely to

suffer from the diseases of these latitudes. One morning Mrs

X----, (then Miss X----,) appeared at the breakfast table with an

expression of grief on her countenance, that at once induced her

uncle and aunt to ask the cause. She said, that she had dreamed

that Captain T---- had died of fever in the West Indies, and that

the intelligence had been sent in a large letter to her uncle. The

young lady's uncle and aunt both represented to her the weakness

of yielding to the impression of a dream, and she appeared to

acquiesce in the good sense of their remonstrances--when, shortly

after, the servant brought in the letter-case from the

Post-office, and when her uncle had unlocked it, and was taking

out the letters, (there were several,) Miss X---- instantly

exclaimed, pointing to one of them--'That's the letter! I saw it

in my dream!' It was the letter--a large letter, of an official

size, addressed to her uncle, and conveying precisely the event

which Miss X---- had announced.

"_Dream II._--General D----, R.M., was one morning conversing with

me on the subject of dreams, and gave me the following

relation:--'I had the command of the marines on board a frigate,

and in company with another frigate, (giving names and date,) was

proceeding to America, when, on joining the breakfast table, I

told my brother officers that I had had a very vivid and singular

dream. That I had dreamed that the day was calm, as it now was,

and bright, but with some haziness in the distance; and that

whilst we were at breakfast, as we now are, the master-at-arms

came in and announced two sail in the distance. I thought we all

immediately ran on deck--saw the two ships--made them out to be

French frigates, and immediately gave chase to them. The wind

being light, it was long before we could approach the enemy near

enough to engage them; and when, in the evening, a distant fire

was commenced, a shot from the frigate which we attacked, carried

away our foretopmast, and, consequently, we were unable to

continue the chase. Our companion, also, had kept up a distant

fire with the other French frigate, but in consequence of our

damage, shortened sail to keep company with us during the night.

On the following morning the French frigates had made their

escape--no person had been killed or wounded on board our own

ship; but in the morning we were hailed by our companion, and told

that she had lost two men. Shortly after, whilst my brother

officers were making comments on my dream--and before the

breakfast table was cleared, the master-at-arms made his

appearance, announcing, to the great surprise of all present, two

sail in the distance; (and General D---- assured me that on

reaching the deck they appeared to him precisely the same in place

and distance as in his dream)--'the chase--the distant action--the

loss of the topmast--the escape of the enemy during the night--and

the announcement from the companion frigate that she had lost two

men--all took place precisely as represented in my dream.' The

General had but just concluded his narration, when a coincidence

took place, little less extraordinary than that of the dream and

its attendant circumstances.--The door opened, and a gentleman

rushed into the room with all that eagerness which characterizes

the unexpected meeting of warm friends after a long absence--and

immediately after the first cordial greetings, General D----

said--'My dear F----, it is most singular, that although we have

not met during the last fifteen years, and I had not the most

distant expectation of seeing or hearing from you, yet you were in

my thoughts not five minutes ago--I was relating to my friend my

extraordinary dream when on board the ----; you were present, and

cannot have forgotten it.' Major F---- replied, that he remembered

it most accurately, and, at his friend's request, related it to

me, in every particular correspondent with the General's account.

"What I now relate to you cannot be called a dream, but it bears a

close affinity to 'those shadowy tribes of mind' which constitute

our sleeping phantasmagoria. Calling one morning on my friend, Mrs

D----m, who had for some time resided in my neighbourhood, I

found her greatly distressed at the contents of a letter which she

had just received. The letter was from her sister, Mrs B----, who

was on her return to England, on board the ----, East Indiaman,

accompanied by her two youngest children, and their nurse; Mr

B----, her husband, remaining in India. One morning, shortly after

breakfast, Mrs B---- was sitting in the cabin, with many other

passengers present, but not herself at that moment engaged in

conversation with them; when she suddenly turned her head, and

exclaimed aloud, and with extreme surprise, 'Good God! B----, is

that you?' At the same moment the children, who were with their

nurse at a distant part of the ship, too far off, it is stated, to

have heard their mother's exclamation, both cried out, 'Papa!

papa!' Mrs B---- declared, that the moment she spoke, she saw her

husband most distinctly, but the vision instantly vanished. All

the persons present noted the precise time of this singular

occurrence, lat. and long., &c., and Mrs B----'s letter to her

sister was written immediately after it; it was forwarded to

England by a vessel that was expected to reach home before the

East Indiaman, and which did precede her by some weeks. No

reasonings that I could offer were sufficient to relieve my

friend's mind from the conviction that her sister had lost her

husband, and that his decease had been thus mysteriously announced

to her, until letters arrived from Mr B----, attesting his perfect

health, which he enjoyed for some years after--and I believe he is

still living.

"To arrive at any reasonable conclusion respecting the phenomena

of dreams, we require data most difficult to be obtained; we

should compare authentic dreams, faithfully related, with their

equally well-attested attendant and _precedent_ circumstances. But

who can feel certain that he correctly relates even his own dream?

I have many times made the attempt, but cannot be perfectly sure

that in the act of recording a dream, I have not given more of

order to the succession of the events than the dream itself

presented. In the case of the first dream, the mere delivery of a

letter, there is no succession of events, and therefore no ground

to suppose that any invention could have been added to give it

form and consistency. The young lady knew that her friend was in

the West Indies; she knew, too, the danger of that climate, and

had often seen the Admiral, her uncle, receive official letters.

Some transient thoughts on these subjects, although too transient

to be remembered, unquestionably formed her dream. That the letter

really arrived and confirmed the event predicted, can only be

referable to those coincidences which are not of very uncommon

occurrence in daily life. To similar causes I attribute the second

dream; and even its external fulfilment in so many particulars can

hardly be deemed more extraordinary than the coincidence of the

sudden and wholly unexpected arrival of Major F----, just at the

very moment after General D---- had related to me his dream. The

third narrative admits of an easy solution. Mrs B---- was not in

good health. Thinking of her husband, in a state of reverie, a

morbid spectrum might be the result--distinct enough to cause her

sudden alarm and exclamation which, if the children heard, (and

children distinguish their mother's voice at a considerable

distance--the cabin door, too, might have been open, and the

children much nearer than they were supposed to have been,) would

account at once for their calling out 'Papa! papa!' During our

waking hours, we are never conscious of any complete suspension of

thought, even for a moment; if fatigued by any long and laborious

mental exertion, such as the solution of a complicated

mathematical problem, how is the weariness relieved? Not by

listless rest like the tired body, but by a change of subject--a

change of action--a new train of thoughts and expressions. Are we,

then, always dreaming when asleep? We certainly are not conscious

that we are; but it may be that in our sleep we do not remember

our dreams, and that it is only in imperfect sleep, or in the act

of waking, that the memory records them. That dreams occupy an

exceedingly short period of time, I know from my own experience;

for I once had, when a boy, a very long dream about a bird, which

was placed in an insecure place in my bedroom, being attacked by a

cat. The fall of the cage on the floor awoke me, and I sprang out

of bed in time to save the bird. The dream must, I think, have

been suggested by the fall of the cage; and, if so, my seemingly

long dream could only have occupied a mere point of time. I have

also experienced other instances nearly similar. It seems

reasonable, too, to suppose that this is generally the case; for

our dreams present themselves to us as pictures, with the subjects

of which we are intimately acquainted. I now glance my eye at the

fine landscape hanging in my room. You may say of it, as Falstaff

said of Prince Henry, 'By the Lord, I know you as well as he that

made you.' Well, it is full of subject, full of varied beauty and

grand conception--a 'paulo majora' eclogue. When I first saw it, I

could barely read it through in an hour. For pictures that are

what pictures ought to be, Poems to the eye, demand and repay this

investigating attention--those that do not demand and suggest

thoughts are not worth a thought; but this picture, now its every

part, tint, and sentiment, have long been intimately known to me.

I see, at a glance, its entire subject--ay, at a glance, too, see

the effect which a casual gleam of light has just thrown over it.

Is it not probable, then, that our dreams may be equally

suggestive, in as short a space of time? Dreams that have not some

connexion, something of a continuity of events, however wild, are

not retained by the memory. Most persons would find it much more

difficult to learn to repeat the words in a dictionary, than a

page of poetry of equal length; and many dreams are probably

framed of very unconnected materials. In falling asleep, I have

often been conscious of the dissevering of my thoughts--like a

regiment dismissed from parade, they seemed to straggle away "in

most admired disorder;" but these scattered bands muster together

again in our sleep; and, as these have all been levied from the

impressions, cogitations, hopes, fears, and affections, of our

waking hours, however strangely they may re-combine, if they do

combine with sufficient continuity to be remembered, the form

presented, however wild, will always be found, on a fair analysis,

to be characteristic of the dreamer. They are his own thoughts

oddly joined, like freshwater Polyps, which may be divided, and

then stuck again together, so as to form chains, or any other

strange forms, across the globe of water in which they may be

exhibited. In Devonshire, the peasantry have a good term to

express that wandering of thought, and imperfect dreaming, which

is common in some states of disease.--"Oh, sir, he has been lying

pretty still; but he has been _roading_ all night." By this, they

mean, that the patient, in imperfect sleep, has been muttering

half-connected sentences; and the word, _roading_, is taken from

the mode in which they catch woodcocks. At the last gleam of

evening, the woodcocks rise from their shelter in the woods, and

wind their way to the open vistas, which lead to the adjacent

meadows, where they go to feed during the night; and they return

to their covert, through the same vistas, with the first beam of

morning. At the end of these vistas, which they call 'cock-roads,'

the woodcock catchers suspend nets to intercept the birds in their

evening and morning flights, and great numbers are taken in this

manner; the time when they suspend the nets, is called

roading-time; and thus, by applying the term, roading, to

disturbed and muttered sleep, they compare the dim, loose thoughts

of the half-dreaming patient, to the flight of the woodcocks,

wheeling their way through the gloomy and darkling woods. It has

been asserted that we never feel _surprise_ in our dreams; and

that we do not _reason_ on the subjects which they present to us.

This, from my own experience, I know to be a mistake. I once

dreamed, whilst residing with a friend in London, that on entering

his breakfast-room, the morning was uncommonly dark; but not very

much more so than sometimes occurs in a November fog, when, as

some one has said, the thick yellow air makes you think you are

walking through pease-soup, and the sun, when seen at all, looks

like the yolk of a poached egg floating on it. My friend was

seated alone by the table, resting his head thoughtfully on his

hand, when, looking towards me, with a very serious countenance,

he said--'Can you account for this darkness? There is no eclipse

stated in the almanack. Some change is taking place in our system.

Go to N----, (a philosophical neighbour, who lived within three

doors of our house,) and ask if he can explain it.' I certainly

felt much surprised at my friend's observations. I went to N----

's house--or, rather, I found myself in his room. He was walking

up and down the room in evident perplexity; and, turning to me,

said, 'This is very extraordinary! A change is taking place in our

system!--look at the barometer.'--I looked at the barometer, which

appeared to be hanging in its usual place in the room, and saw,

with great surprise, that the tube was without quicksilver; it had

fallen almost entirely down to the bulb. Certainly in this dream I

felt great _surprise_, and that the faculty of reason was not

suspended is apparent, nay, perhaps, it was quickened in this

instance, for I doubt, if I had really seen the praeternatural

darkness, whether I should so readily have thought of consulting

an almanack, or referring to a barometer; I should certainly have

gone to my friend N----, for I was in the frequent habit of

appealing to him on any subject of natural philosophy on which I

might be desirous to be fully instructed. It is clear that the

fabricator of the Ephesian Diana could not pay real adoration to

his own work; and as we must be the artificers of our own dreams,

and furnish all the materials, it seems difficult to discover by

what process the mind can present subjects of surprise to itself;

but surprise is that state of mind which occurs when an object or

idea is presented to it, which our previous train of thought would

not lead us to expect or account for. In dreams the catenation of

our ideas is very imperfect and perplexed; and the mind, by

forgetting its own faint and confused links of association, may

generate subjects of surprise to itself. There are some dreams

which we dream over again many times in our lives, but these

dreams are generally mere scenes, with little or no action or

dialogue. I formerly often dreamed that I was standing on a broad

road by the side of a piece of water, (in which geese were

swimming,) surrounding the base of a green hill, on the summit of

which were the ruins of a castle: the sun shining brightly, and

the blue sky throwing out the yellow stone-work of the ruin in

strong relief. This dream always gave me an indefinite sense of

pleasure. I fancied I had formed it from some picture that I might

at some time have casually seen and forgotten; but a few years ago

I visited the village in which I was born, and from which I had

been removed when about three and a half years old. I found that I

well remembered many things which might have engaged the attention

of a child. The house in which my parents resided was little

changed; and I remembered every room, and the pictures on the

Dutch tiles surrounding the fireplace of that which had been our

nursery. I pointed out the house where sugar-candy had formerly

been sold, and went to the very spot in the churchyard where I had

been led, when a child, to call out my name and hear the echo from

the tower. I then went by a pathway, through some fields, which

led to a neighbouring town. In these fields I recognised a

remarkable stone stile, and a bank on which I had gathered

daisies; then, extending my route, that I might return to the

village by a different course, suddenly the prototype of my often

dreamed dream stood before me. The day was bright. There was the

blue sky--the green hill--the geese in the surrounding water. 'In

every form of the thing _my dream_ made true and good.' The

distance of this spot from the house of my birth was rather a long

walk for a child so young; and, therefore, I suppose I might only

once or twice have seen it, and then only in the summer, or in

bright weather. I have said that that dream, whenever it recurred,

always impressed me with an indefinite sense of pleasure; was not

this feeling an echo, a redolence, of the happy, lively sensations

with which, as a child, I had first witnessed the scene? It is

singular that, remembering so many objects much less likely to

have fixed themselves on the memory, I should have so utterly

forgotten, in my waking hours, the real existence of that of which

my dream had so faithfully Daguerreotyped; and it is not less

remarkable that I have never had the dream since I recognised its

original. I think I can account for this, but will not now attempt

it, as the length of my epistle may probably have put you in a

fair way of having dreams of your own.--Ever faithfully yours.

"C. S."

This last dream of our friend exhibits one of the phenomena of memory,

which may not be unconnected with another, curious, and I suppose

common. Did you never feel a sense of a reduplication of any passing

occurrence, act, or scene--something which you were saying or doing,

or in which you were actor or spectator? Did you never, while the

occurrence was taking place, suddenly feel a consciousness of its

pre-existence and pre-acting; that the whole had passed before, just

as it was then passing, even to the details of place, persons, words,

and circumstances, and this not in events of importance, but mostly in

those of no importance whatever; as if life and all its phenomena were

a duplicate in itself, and that that which is acting here, were at the

same time acting also elsewhere, and the fact were suddenly revealed

to you? I call this one of the phenomena of memory, because it may

possibly be accounted for by the repercussion of a nerve, an organ,

which, like the string of an instrument unequally struck, will double

the sound. Vibrations of memory--vibrations of imagination are curious

things upon which to speculate; but not now, Eusebius--you must work

this out yourself.

What a curious story is that of Pan.[38] "Pan is dead,"--great Pan is

dead--as told by Plutarch. Was not one commissioned by dream or vision

to go to a particular place to proclaim it there; and is it not added

that the cry "great Pan is dead," was re-echoed from shore to shore,

and that this happened at the time of the ceasing of oracles?

It little matters whether you look to public events or private

histories--you will see signs and omens, and wondrous visitations,

prefiguring and accomplishing their purposes; and if occasionally,

when too they are indisputable, they seem to accomplish no end, it may

be only a seeming non-accomplishment--but suppose it real, it would

then the more follow, that they arise necessarily from the nature of

things, though a nature with which we are not acquainted. There is an

unaccountable sympathy and connexion between all animated

nature--perhaps the invisible, as well as the visible. Did you never

remark, that in a crowded room, if you fix your eyes upon any one

person, he will be sure soon to look at you? Whence is this more than

electric power! Wonderful is that of yawning, that it is

communicable;--it is so common, that the why escapes our observation.

This attractive power, the fascination of the eye, is still more

wonderful. Hence, perhaps, the superstition of the "Evil Eye," and the

vulgarly believed mischief of "being overlooked."

Of private histories--I should like to see the result of a commission

to collect and enquire into the authenticity of anecdotes bearing upon

this subject. I will tell you one, which is traditionary in our

family--of whom one was of the _dramatis personae_. You know the old

popular ballad of "Margaret's Ghost"--

"In glided Margaret's grimly ghost,

And stood at William's feet."

You do not know, perhaps that it is founded on truth. William was Lord

S----, who had jilted Margaret; she died; and after death appeared to

him--and, it is said, gave him the choice of two things--to die within

a week, or to vow constancy, never to marry. He gave the solemn

promise to the ghost. We must transfer the scene to the living world

of pleasure. Lord S---- is at Bath. He is in the rooms; suddenly he

starts--is so overcome as to attract general attention--his eyes are

riveted upon one person, the beautiful Mary T----, whose father

resided in great style and fashion at Bathford. It was her resemblance

to Margaret, her astonishing resemblance, that overcame him. He

thought the ghost had again appeared. He was introduced--and, our

family tradition says, was for a length of time a daily visitor at

Bathford, where his habit was, to say little, but to sit opposite to,

and fix his eyes upon the lovely face of Mary T----. The family not

liking this, for there was no declaration on his part, removed Mary

T---- to the house of some relative in London. There Lord S----

followed her, and pursued his daily habit of profound admiration. At

length the lady spoke, and asked him his intentions with regard to her

guest. Lord S---- was in the greatest agitation, rose, burst into

tears, and left the house. Time passed; and here nothing more is said

of Mary T----; Lord S---- saw her no more. But of him, it is added,

that, being persuaded by his family and friends, he consented to

marry--that the bride and her relatives were at the appointed hour at

the church--that no bridegroom was there--that messengers sent to

enquire for him brought back the frightful intelligence, that he was

no more. He had suddenly expired.

My dear Eusebius, with this story I terminate my long letter. Ruminate

upon the contents. Revolved in your mind, they will yield a rich

harvest of thought. I hope to be at the reaping. Ever yours, &c.

[Footnote 34: The story given by Eusebius is very probably of his own

manufacture. It is this. Some years ago, when all the world were mad

upon lotteries, the cook of a middle-aged gentleman drew from his

hands the savings of some years. Her master, curious to know the

cause, learned that she had repeatedly dreamed that a certain number

was a great prize, and she had bought it. He called her a fool for her

pains, and never omitted an occasion to tease her upon the subject.

One day, however, the master saw in the newspaper, or at his

bookseller's in the country town, that _the_ number was actually the

L.20,000 prize. Cook is called up, a palaver ensues--had known each

other many years, loth to part, &c.--in short, he proposes and is

accepted, but insists on marriage being celebrated next morning.

Married they were; and, as the carriage took them from the church they

enjoy the following dialogue. "Well, Molly--two happy events in one

day. You have married, I trust, a good husband. You have something

else--but first let me ask you where you have locked up your

lottery-ticket." Molly, who thought her master was only bantering her

again on the old point, cried--"Don't ye say no more about it. I

thought how it would be, and that I never should hear the end on't, so

I sold it to the baker of our village for a guinea profit. So you need

never be angry with me again about that."]

[Footnote 35: Supposing mesmerism true in its facts, one knows not to

what power to ascribe it--a good or an evil. It is difficult to

imagine it possible that a good power would allow one human being such

immense influence over others. All are passive in the hands of the

mesmeriser. Let us take the case related by Miss Martineau. She

willed, and the water drunk by the young girl _was_ wine, at another

time it _was_ porter. These were the effects. Now, supposing Miss M.

had willed it to be a poison, if her statement is strictly true, the

girl would have been poisoned. We need no hemlock, if this be so--and

the agent must be quite beyond the reach of justice. A coroner's

inquest here would be of little avail.

It is said that most mischievous consequences have resulted from the

doings of some practitioners--and it must be so, if the means be

granted; and it is admitted not to be a very rare gift. The last

mesmeric exhibition I witnessed, was at Dr Elliotson's. It appeared to

be of so public a nature, that I presume there is no breach of

confidence in describing what took place. There were three persons

mesmerised, all from the lower rank of life. The first was put into

the sleep by, I think, but two passes of the hand, (Lord Morpeth the

performer.) She was in an easy-chair: all her limbs were rendered

rigid--and, as I was quite close to her, I can testify that she

remained above two hours in one position, without moving hand or foot,

and breathing deeply, as in a profound sleep. Her eyes were closed,

and she was finally wakened by Dr Elliotson waving his hand at some

distance from her. As he motioned his hand, I saw her eyelids quiver,

and at last she awoke, but could not move until the rigidity of her

limbs was removed by having the hand slightly passed over them. She

then arose, and walked away, as if unconscious of the state she had

been in. The two others were as easily transferred to a mesmeric

state. They conversed, answered questions, showed the usual

phrenological phenomena, singing, imitating, &c.

But there was one very curious phrenological experiment which deserves

particular notice. They sat close together. Dr W. E---- touched the

organ of Acquisitiveness of the one, (we will call her A.) She

immediately put out her hand, as if to grasp something, and at length

caught hold of the finger of Dr W. E----; she took off his ring and

put it in her pocket. Dr W. E---- then touched the organ of Justice of

the second girl, (B,) and told her that A had stolen his ring. B, or

Justice, began to lecture upon the wickedness of stealing. A denied

she had done any such thing, upon which Dr W. E---- remarked, that

thieving and lying always went together. Then, still keeping his hand

on Acquisitiveness, he touched also that of Pride; then, as Justice

continued her lecture, the thief haughtily justified the act, that she

should steal if she pleased. The mesmeriser then touched also the

organ of Combativeness, so that three organs were in play. Justice

still continued her lecture; upon which A, the thief, told her to hold

her tongue, and not lecture her, and gave her several pretty hard

slaps with her hand. Dr W. E---- then removed his hands, and

transferred the operation, making Justice the thief, and the thief

Justice; when a similar scene took place.

Another curious experiment was, differently affecting the opposite

organs--so that endearment was shown on one side, and aversion on the

other, of the same person. One scene was beautiful, for the very

graceful motion exhibited. One of these young women was attracted to

Dr Elliotson by his beckoning her to him, while by word he told her

not to come. Her movements were slow, very graceful, as if moved by

irresistible power.]

[Footnote 36: You remember the melancholy music of the lines of

Moschus:--

[Greek: "Ai Ai tai malachai men epan kata katon olontai

E tachlora selina, to t' euthales oulon anedon,

Ysteron hauzoonti, kai eis etos allo phyonti.

Ammes d' hoi megaloi kai karteroi he sophoi andres,

Oppote prota thanomes, anakosi en chthoni koila

Eudames eu mala makron atermona negreton hypnon."]

Accept of this attempt:--

Alas! alas! the mallows, though they wither where they lie,

And all the fresh and pleasant herbs within the garden die,

Another year they shall appear, and still fresh bloom supply.

But we, Great men, the strong, the wise, the noble, and the brave,

When once we fall into the earth, our nourriture that gave,

Long silence keep of endless sleep, within the hollow grave.]

[Footnote 37: _Vide_ an amusing little _jeu-d'esprit--A Descant upon

Weather-Wisdom--both Witty and Wise._--ANON. Longmans. 1845.]

[Footnote 38: There is an exquisite little poem, taken from this

passage of Plutarch, at once imaginative and true, for hidden truths

are embodied in the tangible workings of the poet's imagination, by

Miss Barrett.]

A MOTHER TO HER FORSAKEN CHILD.

My child--my first-born! Oh, I weep

To think of thee--thy bitter lot!

The fair fond babe that strives to creep

Unto the breast where _thou art not_,

Awakes a piercing pang within,

And calls to mind thy heavy wrong.

Alas! I weep not for my sin--

To thy dark lot these tears belong.

Thy little arms stretch forth in vain

To meet a mother's fond embrace;

Alas! in weariness or pain,

Thou gazest on a hireling's face.

I left thee in thy rosy sleep--

I dared not then kneel down to bless;

Now--now, albeit thou may'st weep,

Thou canst not to my bosom press.

My child! though beauty tint thy cheek,

A deeper dye its bloom will claim,

When lips all pitiless shall speak

Thy mournful legacy of shame.

Perchance, when love shall gently steal

To thy young breast all pure as snow,

This cruel thought shall wreck thy weal,

_The mother's guilt doth lurk below_.

J. D.

SUMMER NOONTIDE.

Unruffled the pure ether shines,

O'er the blue flood no vapour sails,

Bloom-laden are the clinging vines,

All odour-fraught the vales.

There's not a ripple on the main,

There's not a breath to stir the leaves,

The sunlight falls upon the plain

Beside the silent sheaves.

The drowsy herd forget to crop,

The bee is cradled in the balm:

If but one little leaf should drop,

'Twould break the sacred calm.

From the wide sea leaps up no voice,

Mute is the forest, mute the rill;

Whilst the glad earth sang forth _Rejoice_,

God's whisper said--_Be still_.

Her pulses in a lull of rest,

In hush submissive Nature lies,

With folded palms upon her breast,

Dreaming of yon fair skies.

J. D.

TO CLARA.

I would not we should meet again--

We twain who loved so fond,

Although through years and years afar,

I wish'd for nought beyond.

Yet do I love thee none the less;

And aye to me it seems,

There's not on earth so fair a thing

As thou art in my dreams.

All, all hath darkly changed beside,

Grown old, or stern, or chill--

All, save one hoarded spring-tide gleam,

_Thy smile that haunts me still_!

My brow is but the register

Of youth's and joy's decline;

I would not trace such record too

Deep graven upon thine.

I would not _see_ how rudely Time

Hath dealt with all thy store

Of bloom and promise--'tis enough

To know the harvest's o'er.

I would not that one glance to-day,

One glance through clouds and tears,

Should mar the image in my soul

That love hath shrined for years.

J. D.

SECLUSION.

The heart in sacred peace may dwell,

Apart from convent gloom--

To matins and to vespers rise,

'Mid nature's song and bloom:

Or in the busy haunts of life,

In gay or restless scene,

In sanctuary calm abide,

As vestal saint serene.

It is the pure and holy thought,

The spotless veil within,

That screens pollution from the breast,

And hides a world of sin.

J. D.

THE LAST HOURS OF A REIGN.

A TALE IN TWO PARTS.--PART I.