CHAPTER XXV.

But Frank had arrived in Curzon Street--leapt from the

cabriolet--knocked at the door, which was opened by a strange-looking

man in a buff waistcoat and corduroy smalls. Frank gave a glance at this

personage--pushed him aside--and rushed up stairs. He burst into the

drawing-room--no Beatrice was there. A thin elderly man, with a

manuscript book in his hands, appeared engaged in examining the

furniture and making an inventory, with the aid of Madame di Negra's

upper servant. The thin man stared at Frank, and touched the hat which

was on his head. The servant, who was a foreigner, approached Frank,

and said, in broken English, that his lady did not receive--that she was

unwell, and kept her room. Frank thrust a sovereign into the servant's

hand, and begged him to tell Madame di Negra that Mr Hazeldean entreated

the honour of an interview. As soon as the servant vanished on this

errand, Frank seized the thin man by the arm--"What is this?--an

execution?"

"Yes, sir."

"For what sum?"

"Fifteen hundred and forty-seven pounds. We are the first in

possession."

"There are others, then?"

"Or else, sir, we should never have taken this step. Most painful to our

feelings, sir; but these foreigners are here to-day, and gone to-morrow.

And--"

The servant re-entered. Madame di Negra would see Mr Hazeldean. Would he

walk up stairs? Frank hastened to obey this summons.

Madame di Negra was in a small room which was fitted up as a boudoir.

Her eyes showed the traces of recent tears, but her face was composed,

and even rigid, in its haughty though mournful expression. Frank,

however, did not pause to notice her countenance--to hear her dignified

salutation. All his timidity was gone. He saw but the woman whom he

loved, in distress and humiliation. As the door closed on him, he flung

himself at her feet. He caught at her hand--the skirt of her robe.

"Oh! Madame di Negra!--Beatrice!" he exclaimed, tears in his eyes, and

his voice half-broken by generous emotion; "forgive me--forgive me;

don't see in me a mere acquaintance. By accident I learned, or, rather,

guessed--this--this strange insult to which you are so unworthily

exposed. I am here. Think of me--but as a friend--the truest friend. Oh!

Beatrice"--and he bent his head over the hand he held--"I never dared

say so before--it seems presuming to say it now--but I cannot help it. I

love you--I love you with my whole heart and soul--to serve you--if only

but to serve you!--I ask nothing else." And a sob went from his warm,

young, foolish heart.

The Italian was deeply moved. Nor was her nature that of the mere sordid

adventuress. So much love and so much confidence! She was not prepared

to betray the one, and entrap the other.

"Rise--rise," she said, softly; "I thank you gratefully. But do not

suppose that I--"

"Hush--hush!--you must not refuse me. Hush!--don't let your pride

speak."

"No--it is not my pride. You exaggerate what is occurring here. You

forget that I have a brother. I have sent for him. He is the only one I

can apply to. Ah! that is his knock! But I shall never, never forget

that I have found one generous noble heart in this hollow world."

Frank would have replied, but he heard the Count's voice on the stairs,

and had only time to rise and withdraw to the window, trying hard to

repress his agitation and compose his countenance. Count di Peschiera

entered--entered as a very personation of the beauty and magnificence of

careless, luxurious, pampered, egotistical wealth. His surtout, trimmed

with the costliest sables, flung back from his splendid chest. Amidst

the folds of the glossy satin that enveloped his throat, gleamed a

turquoise, of such value as a jeweller might have kept for fifty years

before he could find a customer rich and frivolous enough to buy it. The

very head of his cane was a masterpiece of art, and the man himself, so

elegant despite his strength, and so fresh despite his years!--It is

astonishing how well men wear when they think of no one but themselves!

"Pr-rr!" said the Count, not observing Frank behind the draperies of the

window; "P-rr--. It seems to me that you must have passed a very

unpleasant quarter of an hour. And now--_Dieu me damne_--_quoi faire!_"

Beatrice pointed to the window, and felt as if she could have sunk into

the earth for shame. But as the Count spoke in French, and Frank did not

very readily comprehend that language, the words escaped him; though his

ear was shocked by a certain satirical levity of tone.

Frank came forward. The Count held out his hand, and, with a rapid

change of voice and manner, said, "One whom my sister admits at such a

moment must be a friend to me."

"Mr Hazeldean," said Beatrice, with meaning, "would indeed have nobly

pressed on me the offer of an aid which I need no more, since you, my

brother, are here."

"Certainly," said the Count, with his superb air of _grand seigneur_; "I

will go down and clear your house of this impertinent _canaille_. But I

thought your affairs were with Baron Levy. He should be here."

"I expect him every moment. Adieu! Mr Hazeldean." Beatrice extended her

hand to her young lover with a frankness which was not without a certain

pathetic and cordial dignity. Restrained from farther words by the

Count's presence, Frank bowed over the fair hand in silence, and

retired. He was on the stairs, when he was joined by Peschiera.

"Mr Hazeldean," said the latter, in a low tone, "will you come into the

drawing-room?"

Frank obeyed. The man employed in his examination of the furniture was

still at his task; but at a short whisper from the Count he withdrew.

"My dear sir," said Peschiera, "I am so unacquainted with your English

laws, and your mode of settling embarrassments of this degrading nature,

and you have evidently showed so kind a sympathy in my sister's

distress, that I venture to ask you to stay here, and aid me in

consulting with Baron Levy."

Frank was just expressing his unfeigned pleasure to be of the slightest

use, when Levy's knock resounded at the street-door, and in another

moment the Baron entered.

"Ouf!" said Levy, wiping his brows and sinking into a chair as if he had

been engaged in toils the most exhausting--"Ouf! this is a very sad

business--very; and nothing, my dear Count, nothing but ready money can

save us here."

"You know my affairs, Levy," replied Peschiera, mournfully shaking his

head, "and that though in a few months, or it may be weeks, I could

discharge with ease my sister's debts, whatever their amount, yet at

this moment, and in a strange land, I have not the power to do so. The

money I brought with me is nearly exhausted. Can you not advance the

requisite sum?"

"Impossible!--Mr Hazeldean is aware of the distress under which I labour

myself."

"In that case," said the Count, "all we can do to-day is to remove my

sister, and let the execution proceed. Meanwhile I will go among my

friends, and see what I can borrow from them."

"Alas!" said Levy, rising and looking out of the window--"alas! we

cannot remove the Marchesa--the worst is to come. Look!--you see those

three men; they have a writ against her person: the moment she sets her

foot out of these doors she will be arrested."[M]

"Arrested!" exclaimed Peschiera and Frank in a breath.

"I have done my best to prevent this disgrace, but in vain," said the

Baron, looking very wretched. "You see, these English tradespeople fancy

they have no hold upon foreigners. But we can get bail; she must not go

to prison--"

"Prison!" echoed Frank. He hastened to Levy and drew him aside. The

Count seemed paralysed by shame and grief. Throwing himself back on the

sofa, he covered his face with his hands.

"My sister!" groaned the Count--"daughter to a Peschiera, widow to di

Negra!" There was something affecting in the proud woe of this grand

patrician.

"What is the sum?" whispered Frank, anxious that the poor Count should

not overhear him; and indeed the Count seemed too stunned and

overwhelmed to hear anything less loud than a clap of thunder!

"We may settle all liabilities for £5000. Nothing to Peschiera, who is

enormously rich. _Entre nous_, I doubt his assurance that he is without

ready money. It may be so, but--"

"£5000! How can I raise such a sum!"

[M] At that date the law of _mesne process_ existed still.

"You, my dear Hazeldean? What are you talking about? To be sure, you

could raise twice as much with a stroke of your pen, and throw your own

debts into the bargain. But--to be so generous to an acquaintance!"

"Acquaintance--Madame di Negra!--the height of my ambition is to claim

her as my wife!"

"And these debts don't startle you?"

"If a man loves," answered Frank simply, "he feels it most when the

woman he loves is in affliction. And," he added, after a pause, "though

these debts are faults, kindness at this moment may give me the power to

cure for ever both her faults and my own. I can raise this money by a

stroke of the pen! How?"

"On the Casino property."

Frank drew back.

"No other way?"

"Of course not. But I know your scruples; let us see if they can be

conciliated. You would marry Madame di Negra; she will have £20,000 on

her wedding-day. Why not arrange that, out of this sum, your

anticipative charge on the Casino property be paid at once? Thus, in

truth, it will be but for a few weeks that the charge will exist. The

bond will remain locked in my desk--it can never come to your father's

knowledge, nor wound his feelings. And when you marry, (if you will but

be prudent in the meanwhile,) you will not owe a debt in the world."

Here the Count suddenly started up.

"Mr Hazeldean, I asked you to stay and aid us by your counsel; I see now

that counsel is unavailing. This blow on our house must fall! I thank

you, sir--I thank you. Farewell. Levy, come with me to my poor sister,

and prepare her for the worst."

"Count," said Frank, "hear me. My acquaintance with you is but slight,

but I have long known and--and esteemed your sister. Baron Levy has

suggested a mode in which I can have the honour and the happiness of

removing this temporary but painful embarrassment. I can advance the

money."

"No--no!" exclaimed Peschiera. "How can you suppose that I will hear of

such a proposition? Your youth and benevolence mislead and blind you.

Impossible, sir--impossible! Why, even if I had no pride, no delicacy of

my own, my sister's fair fame--"

"Would suffer indeed," interrupted Levy, "if she were under such

obligation to any one but her affianced husband. Nor, whatever my regard

for you, Count, could I suffer my client, Mr Hazeldean, to make this

advance upon any less valid security than that of the fortune to which

Madame di Negra is entitled."

"Ha!--is this indeed so? You are a suitor for my sister's hand, Mr

Hazeldean?"

"But not at this moment--not to owe her hand to the compulsion of

gratitude," answered gentleman Frank.

"Gratitude! And you do not know her heart, then? Do not know--" the

Count interrupted himself, and went on after a pause. "Mr Hazeldean, I

need not say, that we rank among the first houses in Europe. My pride

led me formerly into the error of disposing of my sister's hand to one

whom she did not love--merely because in rank he was her equal. I will

not again commit such an error, nor would Beatrice again obey me if I

sought to constrain her. Where she marries, there she will love. If,

indeed, she accept you, as I believe she will, it will be from affection

solely. If she does, I cannot scruple to accept this loan--a loan from a

brother-in-law--loan to me, and not charged against her fortune! _That_,

sir, (turning to Levy, with his grand air,) you will take care to

arrange. If she do not accept you, Mr Hazeldean, the loan, I repeat, is

not to be thought of. Pardon me, if I leave you. This, one way or other,

must be decided at once." The Count inclined his head with much

stateliness, and then quitted the room. His step was heard ascending the

stairs.

"If," said Levy, in the tone of a mere man of business--"if the Count

pay the debts, and the lady's fortune be only charged with your

own--after all it will not be a bad marriage in the world's eye, nor

ought it to be in a father's. Trust me, we shall get Mr Hazeldean's

consent, and cheerfully too."

Frank did not listen; he could only listen to his love, to his heart

beating loud with hope and with fear.

Levy sate down before the table, and drew up a long list of figures in a

very neat hand--a list of figures on _two_ accounts, which the

_post-obit_ on the Casino was destined to efface.

After a lapse of time, which to Frank seemed interminable, the Count

reappeared. He took Frank aside, with a gesture to Levy, who rose, and

retired into the drawing-room.

"My dear young friend," said Peschiera, "as I suspected, my sister's

heart is wholly yours. Stop; hear me out. But unluckily, I informed her

of your generous proposal; it was most unguarded, most ill-judged in me,

and that has wellnigh spoiled all; she has so much pride and spirit; so

great a fear that you may think yourself betrayed into an imprudence you

may hereafter regret, that I am sure she will tell you she does not love

you, she cannot accept you, and so forth. Lovers like you are not easily

deceived. Don't go by her words; but you shall see her yourself and

judge. Come."

Followed mechanically by Frank, the Count ascended the stairs and threw

open the door of Beatrice's room. The Marchesa's back was turned; but

Frank could see that she was weeping.

"I have brought my friend to plead for himself," said the Count in

French; "and take my advice, sister, and do not throw away all prospect

of real and solid happiness for a vain scruple. _Heed me!_" He retired

and left Frank alone with Beatrice.

Then the Marchesa, as if by a violent effort, so sudden was her

movement, and so wild her look, turned her face to her wooer, and came

up to him, where he stood.

"Oh!" she said, clasping her hands, "is this true? You would save me

from disgrace, from a prison--and what can I give you in return? My

love! No, no. I will not deceive you. Young, fair, noble, as you

are, I do not love you, as you should be loved. Go; leave this house;

you do not know my brother. Go, go--while I have still strength,

still virtue enough to reject whatever may protect me from him!

whatever--may-- Oh--go, go."

"You do not love me," said Frank. "Well, I don't wonder at it; you are

so brilliant, so superior to me. I will abandon hope--I will leave you

as you command me. But at least I will not part with my privilege to

serve you. As for the rest--shame on me if I could be mean enough to

boast of love, and enforce a suit, at such a moment."

Frank turned his face and stole away softly. He did not arrest his steps

at the drawing-room; he went into the parlour, wrote a brief line to

Levy charging him quietly to dismiss the execution, and to come to

Frank's rooms with the necessary deeds; and, above all, to say nothing

to the Count. Then he went out of the house and walked back to his

lodgings.

That evening Levy came to him, and accounts were gone into, and papers

signed; and the next morning Madame di Negra was free from debt; and

there was a great claim on the reversion of the Casino estates; and at

the noon of that next day Randal was closeted with Beatrice; and before

the night, came a note from Madame di Negra, hurried, blurred with

tears, summoning Frank to Curzon Street. And when he entered the

Marchesa's drawing-room, Peschiera was seated beside his sister; and

rising at Frank's entrance, said, "My dear brother-in-law!" and placed

Frank's hand in Beatrice's.

"You accept me--you accept me--and of your own free will and choice?"

And Beatrice answered, "Bear with me a little, and I will try to repay

you with all my--all my--" She stopped short, and sobbed aloud.

"I never thought her capable of such acute feeling, such strong

attachment," whispered the Count.

Frank heard, and his face was radiant. By degrees Madame di Negra

recovered composure, and she listened with what her young lover deemed a

tender interest, but what, in fact, was mournful and humbled

resignation, to his joyous talk of the future. To him the hours passed

by, brief and bright, like a flash of sunlight. And his dreams, when he

retired to rest, were so golden! But, when he awoke the next morning,

he said to himself, "What--what will they say at the Hall?"

At that same hour Beatrice, burying her face on her pillow, turned from

the loathsome day, and could have prayed for death. At that same hour,

Giulio Franzini, Count di Peschiera, dismissing some gaunt, haggard

Italians, with whom he had been in close conference, sallied forth to

reconnoitre the house that contained Violante. At that same hour, Baron

Levy was seated before his desk casting up a deadly array of figures,

headed "Account with the Right Hon. Audley Egerton, M.P., _Dr._ and

_Cr._"--title-deeds strewed around him, and Frank Hazeldean's post-obit

peeping out fresh from the elder parchments. At that same hour, Audley

Egerton had just concluded a letter from the chairman of his committee

in the city he represented, which letter informed him he had not a

chance of being re-elected. And the lines of his face were as composed

as usual, and his foot rested as firm on the grim iron box; but his hand

was pressed to his heart, and his eye was on the clock; and his voice

muttered--"Dr F---- should be here!" And at that hour Harley L'Estrange,

who the previous night had charmed courtly crowds with his gay humour,

was pacing to and fro the room in his hotel with restless strides and

many a heavy sigh;--and Leonard was standing by the fountain in his

garden, and watching the wintry sunbeams that sparkled athwart the

spray;--and Violante was leaning on Helen's shoulder, and trying archly,

yet innocently, to lead Helen to talk of Leonard;--and Helen was gazing

steadfastly on the floor, and answering but by monosyllables;--and

Randal Leslie was walking down to his office for the last time, and

reading, as he passed across the Green Park, a letter from _home_, from

his sister; and then, suddenly crumpling the letter in his thin pale

hand, he looked up, beheld in the distance the spires of the great

national Abbey; and recalling the words of our hero Nelson, he

muttered--"Victory _and_ Westminster, but _not_ the abbey!" And Randal

Leslie felt that, within the last few days, he had made a vast stride in

his ambition;--his grasp on the old Leslie lands--Frank Hazeldean

betrothed, and possibly disinherited;--and Dick Avenel, in the back

ground, opening, against the hated Lansmere interest, that same seat in

Parliament which had first welcomed into public life Randal's ruined

patron.

"But some must laugh, and some must weep;

Thus runs the world away!"

AMERICAN MILITARY RECONNOISSANCES.

_Notes of a Military Reconnoissance from Fort Leavenworth, in

Missouri, to San Diego in California, including parts of the Arkansas,

Del Norte, and Gila rivers._ By W. H. EMORY, Brevet-major, Corps

Topographical Engineers. New York, 1848. London, Delf.

_Reconnoissances in New Mexico, Texas_, &c. (Reports of the American

Secretary at War.) Washington, 1850.

Military works are not exactly the kind of literature we look for from

the United States. The gigantic European wars which ensanguined the

early years of the century, make us apt to depreciate all contests that

have since occurred. With Austerlitz and Jena, Leipzig and Toulouse,

Salamanca and Waterloo, fresh in our memory, we scarcely heed the

gallant actions of which Hungary and Northern Italy have recently been

the scene. Still less do we regard, otherwise than with a smile, the

easy triumphs obtained by Anglo-Americans over Indians and Mexicans.

And, therefore, we were glad to find, on examining these two bulky

volumes of _Military Reconnoissances_, that they had other claims to

interest besides the narration of unequal combats between the stalwart

and intrepid children of the Union and the degenerate descendants of the

Spanish Conquistadores. Their military portions are quite subordinate,

and they may be read as books of travel, written by highly intelligent

and scientific men. They comprise the notes and reports of several

American staff and engineer officers sent at different times to explore

New Mexico, Texas, the country of the Navajos Indians, and other wild

and little known districts south and west of the States--to which much

of the territory thus travelled over has since been annexed. The most

copious and interesting of the reports is that of Major (then

Lieutenant) Emory, who, in June 1846, received orders to repair to Fort

Leavenworth, with three junior officers, and to report himself and party

to Colonel Kearney, as field and topographical engineers to his command.

Colonel Kearney's column, rather magniloquently styled "The Army of the

West," was destined to strike a blow at the northern provinces of

Mexico, particularly at New Mexico and California. This "Army of the

West" was on a very diminutive scale, consisting of two batteries of

six-pounders, three squadrons of dragoons, a regiment of Missouri

cavalry, and two companies of infantry. It was part of Lieutenant

Emory's instructions that, when military duties permitted, he and his

subalterns should give their time and attention to the observation of

the regions they were to traverse. The calls upon their military

services proving extremely limited, they diligently pursued their

peaceable and scientific researches, to which we are now indebted for a

closely printed volume of notes, a large number of drawings of scenery,

plants, antiquities, Indians, &c., and a map, as large as a table-cloth,

of the route of the expedition. The other and more lately printed

volume, more miscellaneous, and perhaps less generally interesting in

its printed contents, surpasses its companion in the merits of its

pictorial portion, consisting of seventy-five plates, many of them very

curious, and some of them remarkably good specimens of the new art of

printing in colours.

Any common map of North America will show in an instant the route

followed by Lieutenant Emory. Starting from Fort Leavenworth, which is

situated a little north of the junction of the Kanzas with the Missouri,

he marched in a south-westerly direction to Santa Fé, then nearly due

south through the country of the Navajos and Apaches Indians, and then

west to San Diego on the Pacific. A great portion of this route was

through regions previously little explored. The contrary was the case

with its earliest portion, namely, from Fort Leavenworth to Bent's Fort,

which has been much visited. It is not till he quits the latter place

that Lieutenant Emory commences his miscellaneous notes, previously

confining himself to scientific, and especially astronomical,

observations. From Bent's Fort to Santa Fé was little more than a

fortnight's march. At Santa Fé the Mexican general, Armijo, was in

command, and there might probably be fighting. But on the approach of

the invaders, Armijo's heart failed him: he abandoned, without a shot,

his advantageous and very defensible position, and fled southwards.

"As we approached the ruins of the ancient town of Pecos, a large

fat fellow, mounted on a mule, came towards us at full speed, and

extending his hand to the general, congratulated him on the arrival

of himself and army. He said, with a roar of laughter, 'Armijo and

his troops have gone to h--, and the Cañon is all clear.' This was

the Alcalde of the settlement, two miles up the Pecos from the ruins

where we encamped. Pecos, once a fortified town, is built on a

promontory or rock, somewhat in the shape of a foot. Here burned,

until within seven years, the eternal fires of Montezuma, and the

remains of the architecture exhibit, in a prominent manner, the

engraftment of the Catholic church upon the ancient religion of the

country. At one end of the short spur forming the terminus of the

promontory, are the remains of the _estufa_, (stove or furnace for

the preservation of the eternal fire,) with all its parts distinct;

at the other are the remains of the Catholic church, both showing

the distinctive marks and emblems of the two religions. The fires

from the _estufa_ burned and sent their incense through the same

altars from which was preached the doctrine of Christ. Two religions

so utterly different in theory were here, as in all Mexico, blended

in harmonious practice until about a century since, when the town

was sacked by a band of Indians. Amidst the havoc of plunder, the

faithful Indian managed to keep his fire burning in the _estufa_,

and it was continued till a few years since, when the tribe became

almost extinct. Their devotions rapidly diminished their numbers,

until they became so few as to be unable to keep their immense

_estufa_ (forty feet in diameter) replenished, when they abandoned

the place and joined a tribe of the original race over the

mountains, about sixty miles south. There, it is said, to this day

they keep up their fire, which has never yet been extinguished. The

labour, watchfulness, and exposure to heat, consequent on this

practice of their faith, is fast reducing this remnant of the

Montezuma race; and a few years will, in all probability, see the

last of this interesting people."

The Indians in general, Mr Emory states, were delighted to exchange

Mexican for American masters. The day after his arrival at Santa Fé, the

chiefs of the large and formidable tribe of the Pueblo Indians came to

give in their joyful adhesion to the invaders. These Indians are some of

the best and most peaceable inhabitants of New Mexico. Very soon after

the Spanish conquest they embraced the religion, manners, and customs of

their masters. A tradition was long current amongst them, they told the

American officers, that the white man would come from the far east and

release them from Spanish bondage. From Taos and other places

deputations arrived to give in their allegiance, and to ask protection

from hostile Indians; and a band of Navajos, naked savage-looking

fellows, also dropped in and took up their quarters with the interpreter

to the expedition, just opposite Mr Emory's lodging. "They ate, drank,

and slept all the time, noticing nothing but a little cinnamon-coloured

naked brat that was playing in the court, which they gazed at with the

eyes of gastronomes." The Navajos are a robber tribe, dwelling in holes

and caverns in lofty mountains, difficult of access, westward from Santa

Fé and the Rio del Norte, and descending at night into the valleys to

carry off the fruit, cattle, women, and children of the Mexicans. To

assail and subdue them in their strongholds is an enterprise which the

Mexicans never dreamed of attempting, and which Mr Emory believed would

be no easy task even for his own countrymen. Armijo, during his

government of New Mexico, would not allow the inhabitants to make war on

these banditti, whom he took advantage of as a means of intimidation and

extortion, as a thief might avail of a savage dog. Any who offended him

were pretty sure to have a visit from the Navajos. Three years after Mr

Emory's expedition, a military reconnoissance was made from Santa Fé to

the Navajo country, under command of Colonel Washington, governor of New

Mexico. Lieutenant Simpson, of the Topographical Engineers, accompanied

it, and we turn to his report (included in the second volume under

notice) for some particulars of this predatory tribe and its district.

The object of the expedition was to enforce compliance with a treaty

made with the Navajos by a United States officer, by which they had

pledged themselves to give up all Mexican captives, all murderers of

Mexicans, who might be secreted amongst them, and all the Mexican stock

they had driven off since the establishment of the government of the

United States in that province. Several head-men of the Navajos came

into camp for a talk with Colonel Washington and Mr Calhoun, (the Indian

agent,) and it was agreed that on the following day the chiefs of the

tribe should hold a conference with the American officers. Accordingly,

at noon the next day, which was the 31st August, Narbona, the head chief

of the Navajos, a man of eighty, whose portrait (that of a handsome old

man, with a straight nose, a high forehead, and little or nothing of the

savage in his aspect,) is given by Lieutenant Simpson, came into camp,

accompanied by two other chiefs, and a colloquy was held with them

through Sandoval, Navajo guide and interpreter to the expedition. The

Indians agreed to the demands of the white men, who promised them

protection and presents, and it was settled that another council should

shortly be held at Chelly, for the arrangement of further details.

"The council breaking up, Sandoval harangued some two or three

hundred Navajos, ranged before him on horseback; the object, as it

occurred to me, being to explain to them the views and purposes of

the government of the United States. Sandoval himself, habited in

his gorgeous dress, [we could give no idea of its richness and

brilliant colouring without here presenting Mr Simpson's 52d plate,

a coloured print of a Navajo in full costume,] and all the Navajos

as gorgeously decked in red, blue, and white, with rifle erect in

hand; the spectacle was very imposing. But soon I perceived there

was likely to be some more serious work than mere talking. It

appears that it was ascertained very satisfactorily that there was

then amongst the horses, in the possession of the Navajos present,

one which belonged to a Mexican, a member of Colonel Washington's

command. The colonel, particularly as the possessor of it

acknowledged it to be stolen, demanded its immediate restoration.

The Navajos demurred. He then told them that, unless they restored

it immediately, they would be fired into. They replied that the man

in whose possession the horse was had fled. Colonel Washington then

directed Lieutenant Tores to seize one in reprisal. The Navajos

scampered off at the top of their speed. The guard present was then

ordered to fire upon them--the result of which was that their head

chief, Narbona, was shot dead on the spot; and six others, as the

Navajos subsequently told us, were mortally wounded. Major Peck also

threw amongst them, very handsomely, much to their terror, when they

were afar off and thought they could with safety relax their flight,

a couple of round shot. These people evidently gave signs of being

tricky and unreliable, and probably never will be chastened into

perfect subjection _until troops are stationed immediately amongst

them_."

This wholesale shooting, for so trifling a thing as a stolen horse,

seems rather sharp practice; but perhaps it was judicious to intimidate

the Navajos at first starting. They certainly showed no such formidable

resistance as had been anticipated, three years previously, by

Lieutenant Emory. The expedition continued its march, preceded by forty

Pueblo Indians as an advanced guard, through a most formidable defile,

which received the name of Washington Pass. The Pueblos were commanded

by a chief of their own election, Owtewa by name, whose portrait, given

by Mr Simpson, is more like that of some old weather-beaten Spanish

guerilla-leader than of an Indian. Indeed, most of the portraits

contained in these two volumes have much of the Spanish character of

physiognomy, easily explicable by three centuries of license and

oppression. Mariano Martinez, another Navajo chief, has the very

features and expression of a Castilian or Biscayan peasant. He came into

camp a few days after Narbona's death, embraced Colonel Washington, and

declared his wish for peace, and his willingness to comply with the

conditions of the treaty. Then, again embracing the American officers,

"very impressively and with much endearment," he departed to seek and

restore the captives and plunder claimed from his tribe. Fear had

probably something to do with his humility and submission, for by this

time the expedition was in the very heart of the Navajo country, close

to the renowned _cañon_ of Chelly. The word _cañon_, sometimes applied

to a shallow valley, more commonly means a very deep and narrow one, or

rather a ravine, enclosed between lofty escarpments. The _cañon_ of

Chelly is of the latter description, and of most remarkable

configuration. It has long been celebrated in Mexico for its great depth

and for the impregnable positions it affords, as well as for a strong

fort it was said to contain, and which, according to Caravajal, Mr

Simpson's Mexican guide, was so high as to require fifteen ladders to

scale it, seven of which the said Caravajal affirmed that he, on one

occasion, ascended, but was not permitted to go higher. From their camp,

within five miles of Chelly, a large party of the American officers

visited the _cañon_, which more than fulfilled their anticipations--so

great was its depth, so precipitous its rocks, so beautiful and regular

its stratification. Plate 48, "View of the cañon of Chelly near its

head," although only a rough lithograph on a minute scale, gives an

imposing idea of the gloomy depths of this natural wonder. At that spot

Mr Simpson estimated it to be about eight hundred feet deep.

"At its bottom," he says, "a stream of water could be seen winding

its way along it, the great depth causing it to appear like a mere

riband. As far as time would permit an examination, for a depth of

about three hundred feet--I could descend no further, on account of

the wall becoming vertical--the formation appeared to be sandstone,

horizontally stratified with drift conglomerate. At this depth I

found, protruding horizontally from the wall, its end only sticking

out, a petrified tree of about a foot in diameter, a fragment of

which I broke off as a specimen. How did this tree get there? I also

picked up at this point, upon the shelf on which I was standing, a

species of iron ore, probably red hematite. The colonel commanding

returning to camp, after a cursory look at the _cañon_, in order to

put the troops in motion for the day's march, I had not the time

necessary to make the full examination which I would have liked. I

saw, however, enough to assure me that this _cañon_ is not more

worthy the attention of the lover of nature than it is of the

mineralogist and geologist."

Three days later, Lieutenant Simpson, attended by his assistant

engineers and draughtsmen, and escorted by sixty men and several

officers, went to reconnoitre the cañon. The account he gives of it is

most curious and interesting. At its mouth the walls were low; but as he

proceeded, their altitude increased, until, at about three miles from

the entrance, they assumed a stupendous appearance. The floor of the

ravine, which in some places was no more than one hundred and fifty feet

wide--although generally more than double that width--is a heavy sand.

"The escarpment walls, which are a red amorphous sandstone, are rather

friable, and show imperfect seams of stratification--the dip being

slight, and towards the west. Almost perfectly vertical, they look as if

they had been chiselled by the hand of art; and occasionally cizous

marks, apparently the effect of the rotary attrition of contiguous

masses, could be seen on their faces." Having proceeded about three

miles, the party turned into a left-hand branch of the cañon. This

branch was one hundred and fifty to two hundred yards wide, and its

walls of the same towering height as those of the main line of ravine.

Two or three patches of corn, with melons and pumpkins growing amongst

it, were met with on the way; and then, after following this left-hand

branch for half a mile, Mr Simpson turned to his right up a narrow

secondary branch, enclosed between vertical walls three hundred feet

high, which in some places are without a seam in their surface from top

to bottom.

"About half a mile up this branch," continues Mr Simpson, "in the

right-hand escarpment wall, is a hemispherical cave, canopied by

some stupendous rocks, a small, cool, acceptable spring being

sheltered by it. A few yards further, this branch terminates in an

almost vertical wall, affording no pathway for the ascent or

descent of troops. At the head of this branch I noticed two or three

hackberry trees, and also the _stramonium_, the first plant of the

kind we have seen. Retracing our steps to the primary branch we had

left, we followed it up to its head, which we found but two or three

hundred yards above the fork--the side walls still continuing

stupendous, and some fine caves being visible here and there within

them. I also noticed here some small habitations, made up of natural

overhanging rock, and artificial walls, laid in stone and

mortar--the latter forming the front portion of the dwelling."

It would be necessary to transcribe the whole of Mr Simpson's minute

account of his visit to the cañon and its branches, in order to convey

to the reader a just idea of that most extraordinary and gigantic

fissure. Even then the idea obtained might be incommensurate with the

grandeur of the subject, if the description were unaided by the three

plates, dashed off with a bold, rough pencil, in which Simpson's

draughtsman has given us a better notion of the grim aspect and huge

proportions of the ravine than words could well supply. Having explored

the lateral branches, without seeing any sign of the celebrated fort,

the party then continued their progress up the main channel, passing

some ruined villages, perched on shelves of the rock wall. Near one of

these, about five miles from the entrance, they observed, in the bed of

the cañon, the ordinary Navajo hut, (a common Indian lodge of conical

form, constructed of poles united at the apex, and covered with bark,

bushes, and mud,) and, hard by it, a peach orchard.

"A mile further, observing several Navajos, high above us, on the

verge of the north wall, shouting and gesticulating as if they were

very glad to see us, what was our astonishment when they commenced

tripping down the almost vertical wall before them as nimbly and

dexterously as minuet-dancers! Indeed, the force of gravity, and

their descent upon a steep inclined plane, made such a kind of

performance absolutely necessary to insure their equilibrium. All

seemed to allow that this was one of the most wonderful feats they

had ever witnessed."

After this meeting, the party passed more ruins of considerable

villages, mostly built on shelves, and accessible only by ladders.

Fragments of curiously-marked pottery were picked up, of which drawings

are given. The walls, still of red sandstone, increased in the

magnificence of their proportions, at intervals presenting _façades_

hundreds of feet in length, and three or four hundred in height,

beautifully smooth and vertical. About eight miles up the cañon, a small

rill, previously lost in the deep sand, reappeared above ground. At

last, at nine and a half miles from the entrance, the horses of the

Pueblo Indians who accompanied him not being strong enough to go

farther, and the much talked-of _presidio_ or fort not appearing, Mr

Simpson resolved to return to camp. The height of the walls, at the

point where he turned back, he ascertained to be five hundred and two

feet, and still increasing. The length of the cañon he conjectures--he

does not mention on what grounds--to be about twenty-five miles. Its

average width, as far as he ascended it, was two hundred yards.

"Both in going up and returning through the cañon, groups of Navajos

and single persons were seen by us, high above our heads, gazing

upon us from its walls. A fellow upon horseback, relieved as he was

sharply against the sky, and scanning us from his elevation,

appeared particularly picturesque. Whenever we met them in the

cañon, they were very friendly--the principal chief, Martinez,

joining and accompanying us in our exploration, and the proprietors

of the peach orchards bringing out blanket-loads of the fruit (at

best but of ordinary quality) for distribution among the troops. I

noticed the cross, the usual emblem of the Roman Catholic faith,

stuck up but in one instance in the cañon, and this is the only one

I have seen in the Navajo country."

Mr Simpson was assured by Martinez that he and his companions were the

first American troops that had visited Chelly. His visit, he considers,

has solved the mystery of the wonderful cañon, and dissipated the notion

previously entertained that upon a plateau, near its mouth, stood a high

insulated fort, to which the Navajos repaired when danger approached.

The report was very likely to be originated by the elevated position of

some of the old Mexican villages, and also, perhaps, by the lofty

shelves of the rock walls, to which the sure-footed Navajos may have

fled when enemies were at hand, and to scale some of which would have

taken more than the "fifteen ladders" spoken of by Caravajal. We cannot

but regret that Mr Simpson did not prosecute his researches till he

reached the extremity of the main cañon. However unnecessary in a

military point of view, the results of such an expedition could not have

been otherwise than highly interesting to science, and especially to the

geologist. We can hardly doubt that the perusal of his report will

stimulate adventurous travellers to an early exploration of the

wonderful cañon. It offers, indeed, a wide field for speculation, and

abounds in points of the strongest interest. Its origin--whether a

natural fissure or from aqueous agents (Mr Simpson seems to incline to

the former hypothesis)--its ruins, broken pottery, and other

antiquities--its minerals and plants, are all fresh and fascinating

subjects for investigation. The Navajos, too, are a people well worth

making acquaintance with; presenting, as they do, a singular mixture of

barbarism with ingenuity and civilisation. From what Mr Simpson had seen

of them, he fully expected, on ascending the cañon, to find they had

better habitations than the wretched wigwams we have already described.

But no others did he discover, save ruined houses and villages, of whose

origin the Navajos could give no account; and he was struck by the

anomaly, that dwellers in miserable mud lodges should be the best

blanket manufacturers in the world. "The _sarape_ Navajo," says Gregg,

in his _Commerce of the Prairies_, "is of so close and dense a texture,

that it will frequently hold water almost as well as gum-elastic cloth.

It is, therefore, highly prized for protection against the rains. Some

of the finer qualities are often sold among the Mexicans as high as

fifty or sixty dollars each." Gregg also speaks of the Navajos producing

"some exquisite styles of cotton textures," and of their ingenuity in

feather embroidery; but Mr Simpson could discover amongst them no traces

of either of these two arts, although they are fond of decorating their

persons with plumage of birds, and display much taste in its selection

and arrangement. Mr Simpson particularly noticed their wickerwork bowls

and vases, which, like the blankets, held water, and were superior to

anything of the kind he had seen in the States. The credit of making

these was attributed, not to the Navajos, but to the Coystero Indians.

After quitting the neighbourhood of the Navajos, Lieutenant Emory and

"The Army of the West" marched due south, following the course of the

Del Norte for a distance of more than two hundred miles from Santa Fé.

Turning off from the river, after parting with their waggons by reason

of the badness of the road, their progress continued, without anything

of particular interest occurring, until they reached the neighbourhood

of the river Gila, when a number of Apache Indians, a tribe celebrated

for their thievish propensities, came into camp, headed by their chief,

Red Sleeve, swore eternal friendship to the Americans, and everlasting

hatred to the Mexicans. Henceforward, they protested, the white man

might pass alone and unharmed through their country: if on foot, he

should be mounted--if hungry, they would give him food. Carson, the

guide, only twinkled his keen eye, and declared he would not trust one

of them. They were eager to trade.

"They had seen some trumpery about my camp which pleased them, and

many of them collected there. My packs were made. One of my gentlest

mules at that moment took fright, and went off like a rocket on the

back trail, scattering to the right and left all who opposed him. A

large, elegant-looking woman, mounted a straddle, more valiant than

the rest, faced the brute, and charged upon him at full speed. This

turned his course back to the camp; and I rewarded her by

half-a-dozen biscuits, and through her intervention, succeeded in

trading two broken-down mules for two good ones, giving two yards of

scarlet cloth in the bargain. By this time, a great number of

Indians had collected about us, all differently dressed, and some in

the most fantastical style. The Mexican dress and saddles

predominated, showing where they had chiefly made up their wardrobe.

One had a jacket made of a Henry Clay flag, which aroused unpleasant

sensations; for the acquisition, no doubt, cost one of my countrymen

his life. Several wore beautiful helmets, decked with black

feathers, which, with the short shirt, waist-belt, bare legs, and

buskins, gave them the look of antique Grecian warriors. Most were

furnished with the Mexican cartridge-box, which consists of a strap

round the waist, with cylinders inserted for the cartridges."

The Apaches are a nomadic tribe, living in huts of twigs, easily

constructed, and abandoned with indifference. In the saddle from

infancy, they are perfect horsemen, and usually well mounted--their

horses being kept in excellent condition by the abundant pasture that

clothes the pleasant hills between the Del Norte and the Gila. Round the

skirts of these they hover, overlooking the plains of Chihuahua and

Sonora, and watching for those caravans whose slender escort encourages

an attack. They are inveterate thieves, faithless and treacherous; but

their treatment by the Mexicans was ill calculated to improve their

character, or to turn them from their evil courses. The Mexicans slew

them unmercifully whenever they could catch them, and used every species

of stratagem to decoy them into their power.

"The former governor of Sonora," Mr Emory informs us, "employed a

bold and intrepid Irishman, named Kirker, to hunt the Apaches. He

had in his employment whites and Delaware Indians, and was allowed,

besides a per diem, 100 dollars per scalp, and 25 dollars for a

prisoner. A story is also told of one Johnson, an Englishman, an

Apache trader, who, allured by the reward, induced a number of these

people to come to his camp, and placed a barrel of flour for them to

help themselves. When the crowd of men, women, and children was

thickest, he fired a six-pounder amongst them from a concealed

place, and killed great numbers."

What wonder if tribes which have met such perfidious and cruel treatment

are eminently distrustful of the white men! Two poor wretches, with whom

the head of the American column fell in, could not believe their senses

when suffered to ride away unmolested. They spoke no Spanish, but a

language described by Mr Emory as resembling the bark of a mastiff; and

it was thought they belonged to the tribe of Tremblers, so called from

the emotion they display at meeting white men. Some distance down the

Gila, a second band of Apaches was met. They were anxious to have "a

talk," and the Americans wished to trade; but it was difficult to dispel

Indian mistrust. Alone and unarmed, Mr Emory went to meet them at the

top of a hill, where their chief, although well mounted, and surrounded

by six or eight of his armed followers, showed great trepidation on

receiving the weaponless white man. Mr Emory remained as a hostage,

whilst a young Indian, bolder than his fellows, went into camp. The ice

thus broken, intercourse followed. Amongst others, a middle-aged and

particularly garrulous Apache lady visited the American bivouac.

"She had on a gauze-like dress, trimmed with the richest and most

costly Brussels lace, pillaged, no doubt, from some fandango-going

belle of Sonora. She straddled a fine grey horse; and whenever her

blanket dropped from her shoulders, her tawny form could be seen

through the transparent gauze. After she had sold her mule, she was

anxious to sell her horse, and careered about to show his qualities.

Charging at full speed up a steep hill, the fastenings of her dress

broke, and her bare back was exposed to the crowd, who ungallantly

raised a shout of laughter. Nothing daunted, she wheeled short round

with surprising dexterity, and seeing the mischief done, coolly

slipped the dress from her arms, and tucked it between the seat and

the saddle. In this state of nudity she rode through camp, from fire

to fire, until, at last, attaining the object of her ambition, a

soldier's red flannel shirt, she made her adieu in that new

costume."

Scattered through Mr Emory's journal, and especially after passing Santa

Fé, and whilst following, with occasional deviations, the course of the

Gila, are many notes and observations of much interest to the

naturalist. Traversing the plains near the little town of Socoro on the

Del Norte, Mr Emory noticed, as the chief growth of the sandy soil, the

iodeodonda, or _Larrea Mexicana_--a new plant, which, when crushed,

gives out a most offensive smell of creosote. It grows to about the

height of a man on horseback, and is the only bush which mules, even

when extremely hungry, refuse to eat. On the 8th October, shortly before

attaining one of the southernmost points of his journey, Mr Emory found

himself surrounded by a vegetable world totally different from that of

the United States. The variety of enormous cacti was so great that it

was impossible, with his slender means of transport, to carry away a

complete collection of them. Just after turning off from the Del Norte,

he passed through a valley where grew a new variety of the evergreen

oak, with leaves like the holly, and which was covered with round red

balls, the size and colour of apricots, the effects of disease, or of

the sting of an insect. Three days later he fell in with the famous

mezcal, (an agave,) "about three feet in diameter, having broad leaves,

armed with shark-like teeth, and arranged in concentric circles, which

terminate in the middle of the plant in a perfect cone. Of this the

Apaches make molasses, and cook it with horse meat." In the districts

where this plant flourishes, artificial craters are found, into which

the Indians throw the fruit, with heated stones, to remove the sharp

thorns and reduce it to its saccharine state. In the course of one of

his botanical rambles, during a day's halt, rendered necessary by severe

marches, Mr Emory came upon a settlement of tarantulas, which, on his

approach, rushed fearlessly to the front of their little caves and

assumed an attitude of defence. He threw a peeble at them, and it would

be hard to imagine, he says, concentrated in so small a space, so much

expression of defiance, fury, and ability to do mischief, as the

pleasant little colony presented.

From the 1st to the 9th of November, we find frequent mention in the

"Notes" of an extraordinary species of cactus, to which Dr Engelmann of

St Louis, in an interesting botanical letter appended to Mr Emory's

work, proposes to give the name of _Cereus Giganteus_. Under this name

we find it depicted at page 96, in a plate where a mounted Indian,

halted at its base, gives, by comparison, an imposing idea of its

height. It also forms a most singular and striking feature of several of

the landscapes scattered through this volume--of one particularly, on

the Gila, where it has the effect of a chain of artificial columns or

signal-posts. One of its most curious characteristics appears to be its

invariable perpendicularity both of stem and branches; the latter, as

soon as they bud out from the main trunk or from each other, hastening

to turn their heads heavenwards, and to spring up in an exactly parallel

direction to the parent stem. "The stem," says Dr Engelmann, "is tall,

25 to 60 feet high, and 2 to 6 feet in circumference--erect, simple, or

with a few erect branches." Mr Emory's first mention of this pillar-like

plant is as follows:--

"At the point where we left the Gila, there stands a cereus six feet

in circumference, and so high that I could not reach half way to the

top of it with the point of my sabre by many feet; and a short

distance up the ravine is a grove of these plants, much larger than

the one I measured, and with large branches. These plants bear a

saccharine fruit much prized by the Indians and Mexicans. They are

without leaves, the fruit growing to the boughs. The fruit resembles

the burr of a chesnut, and is full of prickles; but the pulp

resembles that of the fig, only more soft and luscious. In some it

is white, in some red, and in others yellow, but always of exquisite

taste."

The name of _pitahaya_ is given to this cactus by the Californians; but

that, according to Dr Engelmann, is a general name applied in Mexico and

South America to all the large columnar cacti which bear an edible

fruit. "We encamped in a grove of cacti of all kinds," writes Mr Emory

on the 4th November; "amongst them the huge pitahaya, one of which was

fifty feet high." The next day "we followed the Gila for six miles. The

pitahaya and every other variety of cactus flourished in great

luxuriance. The pitahaya, tall, erect, and columnar in its appearance,

grew in every crevice from the base to the tops of the mountains, and

in one place I saw it growing nearly to its full dimensions from a

crevice not much broader than the back of my sabre. These

extraordinary-looking plants seem to seek the wildest and most

unfrequented places." Although the course of the Gila is nine degrees to

the north of the tropics, the vegetation, as exhibited in a plate at

page 112, has something very tropical in its gigantic luxuriance and

strange character. The geological features of the country are of

corresponding peculiarity. On the 8th November, the course of the

expedition was traversed by "a seam of yellowish-coloured igneous rock,

shooting up into irregular spires and turrets, one or two thousand feet

in height. It ran at right angles to the river, and extended to the

north and to the south, in a chain of mountains as far as the eye could

reach. One of these towers was capped with a substance many hundred feet

thick, disposed in horizontal strata of different colours, from deep red

to light yellow." A sketch of this singular chain of natural spires and

towers is annexed to Mr Emory's description by one of his companions. At

this part of the journey, although beaver "sign" and tracks of game were

seen, few animals made their appearance. On the 6th November, the only

creatures observed were lizards, scorpions, and tarantulas. Five days

after, however, Mr Emory secured a long-sought bird, an inhabitant of

the mezquite tree, having indigo-blue plumage, with top knot and a long

tail, and whose wings, when spread, exhibit a white ellipse. "Strolling

over the hills alone," says Mr Emory, "in pursuit of seeds and

geological specimens, my thoughts went back to the States; and when I

turned from my momentary aberrations, I was struck most forcibly with

the fact that not one object in the whole view, animal, vegetable, or

mineral, had anything in common with the products of any State in the

Union, with the single exception of the cotton-wood, which is found in

the Western States, and seems to grow wherever water flows from the

vertebral range of mountains of North America."

On the 9th November, the expedition, which had long been struggling over

precipitous mountains and through deep _cañones_, emerged upon the

plain, and for a moment all considered the difficulties of the journey

at an end. The real gain was confined to the howitzers, which, dragged

by main force of men and mules over a terribly rugged country, had by

this time had every part of their running gear repeatedly broken and

replaced. The artillerymen rejoiced at the level which lightened their

labour. It was, however, but an exchange of one set of difficulties for

another. Grass ceased when the mountains were left behind, and the mules

were fain to feed on willow and cotton-wood. And soon there were short

commons for men as well as for beasts. Their first day's march over the

plain brought them into the vicinity of two Indian tribes of a very

different stamp from the predatory Navajos and perfidious Apaches. The

Maricopas and Pimos almost realise those virtuous and heroic savages

whom we had hitherto thought to exist nowhere but in Fenimore Cooper's

novels. They gallopped into the American camp in a frank confident

style, delighted to find they had to do with white men instead of with

their enemies the Apaches, of whose approach a report had been spread.

There was a Pimo village nine miles off, and in three hours its

inhabitants crowded into the camp, laden with corn, beans, honey, and

water-melons, and opened a brisk trade. It was Mr Emory's observing

night, but the throng, and, the perpetual galloping to and fro,

interfered greatly with the correctness of his observations. He was

struck by the unsuspicious character of these people, who would leave

their packs in the camp and absent themselves for hours. Theft was

apparently unknown amongst them. With the mounted party, which first

came in, was a man on foot, who appeared able to keep pace with the

fleetest horse, and who, on recovering his breath, announced himself as

interpreter to Juan Antonio Llunas, chief of the Pimos. With him for a

guide, Mr Emory and other officers visited some neighbouring ruined

buildings, concerning whose origin he could give them no information

except a wild tradition in which he himself did not believe. They then

proceeded to the Pimos village, the interpreter going a pace which kept

their mules at a long trot.

"We were much impressed with the beauty, order, and disposition of

the arrangements for irrigating and draining the land. Corn, wheat,

and cotton are the crops of this peaceful and intelligent race of

people. All the crops have been gathered in, and the stubbles show

they have been luxuriant. The cotton has been picked, and stacked

for drying on the top of sheds. The fields are subdivided by ridges

of earth into rectangles of about 200 x 100 feet, for the

convenience of irrigating. The fences are of sticks wattled with

willow and mezquite and, in this particular, set an example of

economy in agriculture worthy to be followed by the Mexicans, who

never use fences at all. The houses of the people are mere sheds,

thatched with willow and corn stalks."

This is rather a surprising account of the agricultural accomplishments

of a tribe of North American Indians. It is to be remarked, however, of

all these tribes, that their progress is generally confined to one of

the arts of civilised life. We have seen the Navajos, whose costume is

brilliant and complete, dwelling in wretched wigwams, and scarcely

cultivating a few scanty patches of corn. The Pimos, who, as tillers of

the ground, are superior in some respects to the Mexicans, go naked,

save a breech cloth and a cotton blanket, whilst their women wear the

blanket only, pinned around their loins. And beads and red cloth are as

much prized by them as by any savages on the face of the earth. For

these coveted articles, for blankets, and for cotton cloth, the

Americans obtained a supply of corn and beans, and two or three

bullocks, but no horses or mules. These were not plentiful amongst the

Pimos, who extravagantly prized the few they had. One dashing young

fellow, with ivory teeth and flowing hair, dashed full speed into camp

on a wild unruly horse, which flew from side to side as he approached,

alarmed at the unusual appearance of the white men.

"The Maricopa--for he was of that tribe--was without saddle or

stirrups, and balanced himself to the right and left with such ease

and grace, as to appear part of his horse. He succeeded in bringing

his fiery nag into the heart of the camp, and was immediately

offered a very advantageous trade by a young officer. Stretching

himself on his horse's neck, he caressed it tenderly, at the same

time shutting his eyes--meaning thereby that no offer could tempt

him to part with his charger.... To us it was a rare sight, to be

thrown in the midst of a large nation of what are termed wild

Indians, surpassing many of the Christian nations in agriculture,

little behind them in the useful arts, and immeasurably before them

in honesty and virtue. During the whole of yesterday, our camp was

full of men, women, and children, who sauntered amongst our packs

unwatched, and not a single instance of theft was reported. This

peaceful and industrious race are in possession of a beautiful and

fertile basin. Living remote from the civilised world, they are

seldom visited by whites, and then only by those in distress, to

whom they generously furnish horses and food. Aguardiente (brandy)

is known among their chief men only, and its abuse and the vices it

entails are yet unknown. They are without other religion than a

belief in one great and overruling spirit. Their peaceful

disposition is not the result of incapacity for war, for they are at

all times enabled to meet and vanquish the Apaches in battle; and

when we passed, they had just returned from an expedition into the

Apache country to revenge some thefts and other outrages, with

eleven scalps and thirteen prisoners. The prisoners are sold as

slaves to the Mexicans."

Soon after quitting the country of the friendly Pimos and Maricopas, the

Army of the West came upon the trail of an enemy, and at night fires

were seen upon the opposite side of the Gila, which were thought to be

those of the Mexican general, Castro. Mr Emory took a few dragoons and

went to reconnoitre. It was not Castro, but a party of Mexicans

conveying five hundred horses to Sonora for his use. This was a precious

capture, for long marches and scanty forage, besides frequent want of

water, had dismounted most of the American cavalry. Unfortunately, the

prize horses were unbroken, and ill adapted for immediate service. They

were good for meat, however, for by this time the expedition was on

horseflesh rations. On the 28th November, "Major Swords found in a

concealed place one of the best pack-mules slaughtered, and the choice

bits cut from his shoulders and flanks--stealthily done by some mess

less provident than others." The next day, it is recorded by Mr Emory

that a horse was killed for food, which was eaten with great appetite,

and all of it consumed; and when the expedition reached the beautiful

valley of the Agua Caliente, all waving with yellow grass, and halted at

the farm of an American named Warner, so sharp set were they that Mr

Emory assures us that seven of his men ate, at one single meal, a fat

full-grown sheep. Near Warner's _rancheria_ is the fountain whence the

valley derives its name. From the fissure of a granite rock, there

gushes forth a magnificent hot spring, of the temperature of 137°

Fahrenheit. The volume of water is very large, and for a long distance

the air is loaded with the fumes of sulphuretted hydrogen. Flowing down

the same valley is a cold spring, of the temperature of 45°; and,

without the aid of machinery, the cold and warm water may be mingled to

the required temperature.

"The Indians have made pools for bathing. They huddle round the

basin of the spring to catch the genial warmth of its vapours; and

in cold nights immerse themselves in the pools to keep warm. A day

will come, no doubt, when the invalid and pleasure-seeking portion

of the white race will assemble here to drink and bathe in these

waters, to ramble over the hills which surround them on all sides,

and to sit under the shade of the great live oaks that grow in the

valley."

This remarkable spring, destined, perhaps, at no remote period, to

become the Saratoga of the Pacific States, rises in the heart of

California; and, after marching away from it, the American troops might

daily expect an encounter with the enemy. This occurred two days later.

The Americans were victorious over greatly superior numbers, but with

the loss of several officers killed and badly wounded. Mr Emory refers

his readers to General Kearny's despatch for the account of the affair,

but himself furnishes an elaborate topographical sketch of the positions

and movements of the contending parties, in what he calls the "action"

at San Pasqual, which seems to have been a smart but very brief combat.

The next day the Californians were driven with the utmost ease from a

hill which they occupied, abandoning it on the approach of only six or

eight Americans. By this time the Army of the West was, without

exception, "the most tattered and ill-fed body of men that ever the

United States mustered under her colours." The dragoons were diminished

to a single squadron, provisions were exhausted, horses dead, mules on

their last legs, men emaciated and reduced to a third of their numbers.

For want of proper conveyances, it would have taken half the fighting

men to transport the wounded; so it was held expedient to wait till

these could ride. After dark on the 8th December, a naval lieutenant,

Kit Carson the guide, and an Indian, set out for San Diego, thence

twenty-nine miles distant, to ask reinforcements. There was but slender

hope of their passing the enemy's pickets, which occupied all the passes

to the town. Nevertheless they succeeded; and, during the night of the

10th, two hundred sailors and marines came into camp. Next morning the

Californians, panic-struck at this accession to their enemies, fled

precipitately, leaving most of their cattle behind them; and, on the

12th, the way-worn expedition entered San Diego.

English readers will find little to interest them in Mr Emory's

narrative of some subsequent military operations in California, of

sundry skirmishes, and of the capture of Pueblo de los Angeles. This,

however, fills but a few pages. In the volume there is much to reward

perusal, whether by the antiquarian, the geologist, the botanist, or the

reader for mere amusement's sake. The same must be said of Lieutenant

Simpson's report, to which we are indebted for the curious account of

the cañon of Chelly and the Navajos Indians; and also of the report of

Captain Marcy, who, during the summer of 1849, marched, with an escort

of thirty dragoons and fifty infantry, from Fort Smith, in Arkansas

territory, to Santa Fé, and back again. The objects of the movement

were to afford protection to the American citizens then emigrating to

the newly-acquired provinces of New Mexico and California, to ascertain

and establish the best route from the old to the new states, and to

conciliate, as far as possible, the various Indian tribes inhabiting the

extensive region through which lay his road. The whole distance gone

over was about two thousand miles; and Captain Marcy's notes and

observations are valuable to travellers and emigrants in that direction.

The Comanches and Kioways (famous horse-stealers both of them) were the

principal Indian tribes he met with; and, of the degree of civilisation

prevailing amongst them, we may form some notion by an extract from his

journal of the 19th June:--

"The Comanche women are, as in many other wild tribes, the slaves of

their lords; and it is a common practice for their husbands to lend

or sell them to a visitor for one, two, or three days at a time.

There is no alternative for the women but to submit, as their

husbands do not hesitate, in case of disobedience, to punish them by

cutting off an ear or a nose. I should not imagine, however, that

they would often be subjected to this degradation; for, if we may

judge of them by the specimens before us, they are the most

repulsive-looking objects of the female kind on earth--covered with

dirt, their hair cut close to their heads, and with features ugly in

the extreme. The men who visited us this morning were armed with the

bow, quiver, and shield; and they gave us an opportunity of

witnessing the force with which they can throw the arrow. As we were

about to slaughter an ox, one of the Indians requested to use his

bow for that purpose; and, approaching to within about twenty yards

of the animal, strained his bow to the full extent, and let fly an

arrow, which buried itself in the vitals of the ox, passing through

and breaking two ribs in its course. It is thus that they kill the

buffalo, upon which these Indians, who are called the Upper

Comanches, or 'buffalo-eaters,' mainly depend for a subsistence."

This description contrasts strongly with that given of the gentle,

intelligent, and highly moral Pimos and Maricopas, amongst whom polygamy

is unknown, and the crime of adultery entails universal contempt and

detestation upon the criminals. These two tribes, apparently, form the

only exception to the general character for treacherous and marauding

propensities attributed to the Indians of Western Texas, New Mexico, and

California. Lieutenant Whiting, in his report of a reconnoissance on the

Texan frontier, denounces the Comanches as the fiercest and most

formidable of all--the very pest of the western route; but gives

scarcely a better character to Lipans, Wacos, and the other tribes

inhabiting that region. Their speedy extermination will probably be an

indirect result of Californian discoveries, and of the prodigious growth

of the Anglo-Saxon race on the northern continent of America.

OUR LONDON COMMISSIONER.

On presenting our credentials from _Maga_, we have been received in all

quarters with the greatest possible respect. We have had private boxes

presented to us at both the Italian Operas, and a free ticket, entitling

the bearer to a glass of gin and water, at the Yorkshire Stingo. Museums

are thrown open to us on the mere announcement of our name; Kew Gardens

burst into bloom on our approach; and with regard to levee and

drawing-room, we content ourselves with a distant and respectful

allusion to the obliging behaviour of some of the loftiest personages in

this realm; we will only say that the Lord Chamberlain and the Lord

Steward have behaved in a manner to secure our highest approbation and

esteem. May it be long--in the figurative language of the

Coal-hole--before they cut their sticks! Nor is it only with regard to

the existent objects of art or elegance that we are called upon to

express our acknowledgments. Artists have already waited on us to

express their anxiety to do honour to our employer by attentions

showered upon ourselves. To three of the most venerated members of the

Royal Academy we were reluctantly compelled to refuse our consent, when

they proposed a peristrephic panorama--eight miles in length--to be

called The Commissioner's Voyage to London. We declined the glory of

being the central figure in a linked sweetness so very long drawn out,

more especially as we are conscious of not being in our best looks if

represented at the rougher periods of our experience as passenger in a

Leith smack. We omit an enumeration of the tributary offerings from

Truman, Hanbury & Co., as also from Sir Felix Booth. A blush of pleasure

settles on our countenance when we reflect on these friendly gifts, as

you may observe, perhaps, on our return, by a close inspection of our

nose. Churches and chapels, no less than distilleries and museums, have

vied with each other in the warmth of their reception. From gentlemanly

High-Church, as from puritanical Dissent, we have received the most

pressing invitations, particularly on occasion of a charity sermon.

Country or colour no object, we have been equally addressed by the

United-Negro-Mental-Cultivation-Society, and the Red-Republican-topsy-turvy

Association, under the presidency of Louis Blanc. With such an "open

sesame" in our possession as is supplied by the appointment we now hold,

it will be our own fault if a single object worthy of observation is

omitted from our report; and we have only to say, before we proceed to

the serious business of our commission, that we shall discharge the

duties of our office with a high and fearless disregard of all

consequences whatsoever. If we are a little too severe on the vanity or

other bad feelings of any of the thin-skinned subjects of our remarks,

we will observe that we are of an Irish family, in which the shortest of

our three brothers is six feet two; and that we are still in the

possession of the hair-triggers, with which our grandfather fought his

way to the head of the Bar at the expense of twelve meetings with the

various leading counsel on the opposite side. For the satisfaction of

less belligerent but equally sensitive opponents, we will mention that

one of our cousins is an attorney in very little practice, and that his

address will be forthcoming on the slightest hint of legal proceedings.

After this flourish of trumpets, we toss our hat into the ring, shake

hands all round with all the world, and proceed to work.

The objects which we take into our charge in the present communication,

are the places of amusement. First in the rank of these are, of course,

the theatres; but whether from their now existing merits, or from

ancient prescription, it is useless at the present time to inquire. To

many the word itself has still a magical charm; and, in spite of what is

called the decadence of the stage, the inferiority of actors, and the

general change of taste, to them the theatre has still unequalled

attractions: the poorest side-scenes are superior to Stanfield's finest

landscapes; orange-peel is sweeter than Sabæan odours from the spicy

shores of Araby the blest; and something, a sentiment, a regret, a

recollection, rises to them from the seediest of dresses, and dirtiest

of boards, and,

"Like the memory of the just,

Smells sweet, and blossoms from the dust."

There are others to whom the theatre is an abomination, who see nothing

in it but the abode of misery and the school of vice, who frown upon the

steadiest of people sitting quietly in the boxes, and look fiercely down

on the humbler tenants of the pit. Let us have a few words, as used

often to be observed by a witty and oleaginous friend of ours, on the

"general question." People _must_ be amused. That is a universal

proposition. It is impossible for all mankind to be for ever bending

over books, or calculating ventures, or studying mathematics, or writing

history or other works of imagination. "All work and no play makes Jack

a dull boy," and Janet an insufferable girl. All metaphysics and no

liveliness, would make them incredibly stupid. All sermons and no

relaxation would make them very wicked. Imagine a world of statists and

geometricians, strong-minded women and intellectual young ladies, a

whole generation of M'Cullochs, and Lardners, and Jellibies, and Miss

Bunions! The thing is impossible. We have too many of that sort of

people already; and if it were the type of the English character, and we

were all condemned by law to the same dreary, useful, honourable, dull,

elevated, worthy-of-an-immortal-being and detestable existence, we can

only say that a French invasion would to us lose all its terrors, and

that we would instantly sell our minié rifle for half price. If people

are to be amused, how are we to amuse them?--Respectably of course;

improvingly by all means; intellectually if possible. Now, in this

united Rome-Babylon-and-Nineveh which rejoices in the name of London,

there are two millions and a half of the most active, energetic,

bustling, sagacious, and exacting human beings who were ever assembled

together before. The variety of tastes must be infinite in the style of

their amusements, as in all other things. Mr Muggleton Stentor derives

the greatest possible gratification from roaring to a dimly-lighted

audience a series of denunciations and forebodings, which excite his

congregation like gin; but it would be very hard if Mr Muggleton Stentor

were the "arbiter of the elegancies" for everybody else, and there was

no way whatever left of getting through an evening unless by listening

to the howls and bellowings that are the delight of his warm and

philanthropic heart. Would we put an end to the eloquence of Stentor? By

no means. Horrible as may be his discord, and bitter as may be his

sentiments, his auditors are better employed there than in swilling beer

or cheering Bronterre O'Brien. There must be a hundred and fifty

thousand people in this city who require relaxation, mental, or bodily,

after the toils of the day; or some healthful stimulant after the

idleness and listlessness of a rich and luxurious existence. What is to

be done for them? You say you can't ask them, or even permit them, to go

to the theatre, for there is nothing there to be heard but ribaldry, and

nothing learned but immorality and vice. The people who tell you this

will tell you in the same breath they have never been in a theatre in

their lives! Oh, no! it is too shocking a place for such holy personages

to visit; and the ninth commandment is rolled firmly up into a sharp and

angular parcel, and sent with all their might against the faces of Henry

Hart Milman, Henry Taylor, and Justice Talfourd.

This squeamish horror of the theatre is the result, we are willing to

believe, of mere ignorance and stupidity. The word theatre itself is

partly to blame for this; for the old meaning has never altogether

eradicated itself from the half-educated mind. The amphitheatre still

rises up with its burning Christians, its murdered gladiators, and

fights of wild beasts. Before another class of objectors, the theatre

rises as the chosen headquarters of the irreverence, iniquity, and

debauchery of the wits of Charles's time. The one class of

entertainments is just as much exploded as the other. It is not more

likely that the lovers of Congreve and Wycherly will be restored to the

stage, than the slaughtering of French prisoners, or the conversion of

oily churchmen into a row of lamps. Depend upon it, in no play of

English manufacture within these twenty years, has there occurred a

line, or a thought, which the most fastidious censor would be inclined

to blot. The force of ancient custom, or the prestige of

long-established fame, may still cause a play to be represented which is

not adapted to the pure taste or morals of the present day--the

spectator may have the pain of seeing equivocal situations received with

applause, or coarse expressions escaping the condemnation they deserve;

but if the lofty in station and mind, the matrons and daughters of

England, the highly-polished gentlemen who keep the drawing-room and

ball-room as pure from the whispers of evil as the inner court of

Diana's temple, were to frequent the theatre, a still farther advance

would be made in the refinement of the drama; vice would be shown its

own image, but stript of all its allurements; and no better school of

truth, or honour, or morality, could possibly be imagined, than a stage

teeming with the poetic fancies of our noblest authors, and subdued and

chastened by the presence and approbation of our best and wisest men.

The faults, then, such as they still exist upon the stage, are caused,

not by the people who patronise the theatre, but by those who desert it.

It is really too bad to hear a stiff-neckclothed individual, who can

spout you off a few hundred lines from the Greek dramatists that would

make the gods in the shilling gallery shudder with horror and

indignation, find fault with the productions of the modern playwrights

as licentious or revolting. A man perhaps has gained his mitre by a

knowledge of the scanning of the lines, and an intimate acquaintance

with the most frightful allusions of Aristophanes, and would disfrock

his chaplain if that worthy dignitary were seen in a box at the

Princess's, laughing at the honest humour of "She Stoops to Conquer."

This is by no means a light question, if you grant our first postulate,

that people must be amused. Not more necessary to village children are

national or parochial schools--not more beneficial to mechanics and

artificers are literary and scientific institutes--not more useful to

the humble classes are lectures on temperance or education, than the

elevation of the theatre to the hundreds of thousands in populous city

pent, who fly to them for information--for a lifting up of their

thoughts into a world of imagination, and run the risk, through the

negligence, the pharisaism, the ignorance, or the pride of those who

should regulate public taste, of finding poison set before them in the

place of wholesome food--of having the melodies and humanities of

Shakspeare supplanted by "Dick Turpin" and "Jack Sheppard." As long as

"Macbeth" and "Hamlet" are looked upon with the same detestation as the

"Fiend of the Hollow," and the "Mysteries of Paris," so long will the

chances be equal that the angel of darkness will expel the angel of

light. Remember, therefore, O ye who indiscriminately abuse the theatre,

and sanctimoniously turn away your eyes from the stage! that you are not

only deserting a strong post, but basely surrendering it to the enemy;

that you are building up the school-room door, and transferring the

possession of it to people who may perhaps convert it into a gin-shop.

Let us therefore hear no more hootings against theatrical performances

in the abstract, but let them stand or fall by their own merits.

These are our wise saws; now for our modern instances. The night is

cold. We have been busy all day, no matter in what occupation, even

if it were writing a few pages in Maga; our chop is done; our lodging

looks "lone and eerie;" of books for the moment we are tired;

besides, our eyes require repose--our spirits need refreshment--the

sight of human faces will be a charm--the sound of human voices will

teach us to answer, as of old, to the "still, sad music of humanity;"

we will wend our way to a theatre, and take an interest in the fates

and fortunes, the loves and sufferings, of some lovely imaginary

beings--and forget our bills, our labours, our disappointments, in

following the strange eventful history that shall be unrolled before

us, without any effort of our own. Muffling ourselves in our paletôt,

and well enwrapt in a belcher fogle, we pursue our way through the

still crowded streets, illuminated by the gorgeous windows, and find

ourselves in the Haymarket. We are in ample time, and find the house

only now beginning to fill. Let us look at the irreligious and

disreputable pagans who occupy the boxes. Did you ever commit a

murder, you old ruffian with the benevolent countenance so tenderly

taking charge of those three blooming grandchildren of yours? You are

a frightful hypocrite, sir, to look so calm and happy when you know

very well that you come very often into this hotbed of iniquity,

where you have constantly been taught to poison your oldest port in

order to hocus and rob your friends. And as to you, you Messalina

Manning! in the black satin, do you think all your graceful manners

and pleasant smiles will conceal your real character from the

Jeremiah Tawells and Doctor Dodds, who saw you bring your own nieces

in your own quiet family coach into this high-school of Satan, where

they will be most powerfully advised to deceive any husband they may

catch, and elope with a captain in the Blues? The pit also is now

nearly full. How we shudder to think of the forgers, swindlers,

housebreakers, horse-stealers, drunkards, and smugglers, who are all

looking so intolerably respectable, many of them accompanied by dowdy

comfortable-looking companions, who pass themselves off for their

wives, but all assembled here for the express purpose of taking

lessons in depravity! Our eye is upon you--you there on the sixth

bench from the orchestra! You are a farmer, sir, fresh from Essex;

and having achieved an unenviable notoriety in Colchester, by perjury

and highway robbery, you come up to perfect your education by

listening to the shameful instruction communicated to you by an

atrocious play. Yes, pig-stealer, our eye is upon you, and we give

you up already, in spite of your expanse of greatcoat, and your shiny

top-boots, your joyous face, and rubicund complexion, as a rascal fit

only for transportation or the gallows. Mr Rush was once seen at a

play! See, there is a quiver of expectation in the house--the curtain

rapidly rises, and the play of "Woman's Heart" is begun. We are in a

sculptor's studio; statues are placed all round the room; on a table

is a block of marble just beginning to feel the breath of genius and

flush into life; and on a sofa reclining in a graceful drapery, and

watched by the intense eyes of the enraptured artist, we see a tall

poetic-looking girl, with fine light hair parted on her majestic

forehead, and an expression on her countenance as if she listened

with her heart as well as with her ears. That is Isolina, a

foster-sister of Angiolo the artist; his model, his all in all, his

bride. Their language is charming, from its purity and affection; her

voice is soft and low, an excellent thing in woman--but her motions

have a strange constraint. She puts out her arms uncertainly; she

stretches forth her feet searchingly; and with a full winning

trustingness, places her hand on Angiolo's shoulder--for she is

blind. But all other senses are sharpened to a painful degree. She

feels his coldness in a single tone of his voice; detects the waning

of the sympathy that once existed between them in the slightest

motion of his form, and inquires with those sightless eyes, and

scarcely in articulate words, what can be the reason of the change?

He offers her the affection of a brother--the carefulness of a

guardian; and she feels that she is deserted. Ambition has entered

his heart. Princes invite him to their tables; the sovereign himself

is honoured in the friendship of the artist and man of genius, who

will bestow an immortality on his reign. There is no room for love in

a heart so occupied, and he casts her off; not angrily, not even

unkindly, but selfishly, and at the instigation of his pride. She

throws herself for consolation on the kindness of the old peasant,

the father of Angiolo, and the protector of her infancy; she utters

no word against the deserter, but, as is the nature of woman's heart,

loves him still. One interview she resolves to have, and finds her

way to the magnificent palace in which the sculptor now pursues his

art; fatigued with her walk, and overcome by her emotions, she lies

down upon the sofa concealed in her cloak, and falls asleep. Angiolo

comes in; his great friends visit him--a noble--a prince--and finally

the duke. The beautiful girl is discovered, and makes an impression

on the sovereign; but Angiolo is unyielding--a struggle there

evidently is; but the world comes between him and the tenderness of

his affection, and the blind girl finds that she is hopelessly

forsaken. Two years have passed; her father, the Marquis of Albrizzi,

has recognised her, taken her from the hands of the peasant, educated

her, refined her, and by the touch of science removed the cloud from

her sight, and she is now the noblest heiress in the land, and her

hand is petitioned for by the duke. She rejects his suit, but agrees,

at her father's request, to sit for her portrait to the most

celebrated artist of his time. She has never _seen_ Angiolo; the

Marquis has made it imperative on the painter not to speak; for he

dreads the effect of the recognition on his child, and in dumb show a

very pretty scene takes place. But envy has been at work against the

painter: a seditious picture, imitating his style, and even

containing his forged initials on the canvass, has been exhibited in

the market-place; a warrant has been issued for his arrest, and in

the very midst of Isolina's vague anticipations and involuntary

expectations--mysterious intimations, conveyed to her by magnetic

sympathies, that her lover is before her--all doubts are converted

into certainty, when the emissaries of the police rush into the room,

attaint him of treason, and extract from him the indignant

exclamation of his innocence. The voice has done it all! That sound

has brought back all the past. Angiolo is hurried off to prison; but

the purpose of Isolina is fixed. She follows him to his

dungeon--obtains his pardon from the duke, who magnanimously foregoes

his pretensions to her hand, brings better thoughts to Angiolo, whose

infatuation was only momentary, and who had dearly paid, by two years

of misery, for the heartlessness of his ambition; and even the proud

Marquis is reconciled to the nuptials by the pleadings of his

daughter, and the fame and genius of her lover.

Such is the feeble outline of the story. The language sometimes rises

into exquisite poetry--is at all times smooth and graceful--and conveys

a lesson, we think, that must "mend the manners and improve the heart."

The authoress is the performer of the part of the heroine; and a

charming performer of it she is. Never was anything more pure and

classic than her appearance in the earlier scenes. The same feminine

softness continues through the play, but elevated by occasional force

and dignity when she "shapes her heart with woman's meekness to all

duties of her rank." We will be bound to say, that not one thought unfit

for cloistered nun or vestal pale was awakened throughout that play. The

audience took a touch of decorum from the subdued and melting tenderness

of the story; and even the oranges, soda-water, and ginger-beer, were

announced to a thirsty and pleased audience in quieter tones than usual.

The painter-sculptor was represented by Mr Barry Sullivan, a gentleman

with a most Milesian name, but an unimpeachable English pronunciation.

In this character there was no room for the display of tempestuous

passion or energetic declamation; the flow of his words, as of his

actions, was calm and equable; and if it had not been for the

pleasantness of his look, and the gentlemanly propriety of his

movements, it would have been impossible for him to regain the

sympathies of the audience, after his cold rejection of the blind girl's

affection. We confess _we_ have not forgiven him for it yet; and if

Isolina had been a sister of ours, nothing should have prevented our

having a shot at him at twelve paces. Several of the other characters

were executed in a very remarkable manner; and by the word "executed"

here, we mean that they were fairly put to death. Some men have blank

impassive features--mouths and eyes that have no expression at all; but

compensate for it by the possession of legs of the most marked

individuality, which there is no possibility of mistaking for anybody

else's legs; regular, round, unfeatured sausages, which entirely

destroy the assumption of any part by the unfortunate being who is

perched upon them; but in this unchanging, stiff, unimaginative

stolidity always reduce the Italian prince or Roman senator, or Grecian

hero, to be nothing more nor less than plain Jack Vickers, or whatever

his name may be, with his unimpulsive, unintellectual pins. A sad

misfortune this; and the misery is aggravated by the apparent obtuseness

of the owner of them, to the obvious bar they interpose between him and

success in his profession. Can't those miserable individuals stuff the

sawdust into different shapes, so as not to torment us for ever with

Jack Vickers's legs? Come, let us off to the Adelaide gallery, and take

a look at the Marionettes.

A pretty place this. A long narrow room, with a slight elevation from

the stage, filled with comfortable seats, and closed in at the upper end

with a few private boxes. A snug warm habitable apartment; and the stage

so small, so low, so narrow, that any of the magnates of Baker Street

could find room for it at the end of their drawing-rooms. It doesn't

seem more than about nine feet wide, and the proscenium not more than

eight feet high. But the proportions throughout are excellently kept;

and when the manager walks in, drest in the first style of fashion, and

makes a bow to the audience, it is difficult to believe he is about a

foot and a half in height; and not very easy to remember that he is

merely a stuffed doll. There are some peculiarities, to be sure, about

him, which lead you to perceive that he differs from other men. For

instance, he comes in rolling sideways, and planting his feet upon the

floor in a manner not usual among gentlemen of the present day; nor have

we observed that he is imitated by this generation in having his motions

steadied by a rope of considerable size attached to the top of his head.

But he begins: his attitudes are very good; he suits the action to the

word with unfailing correctness, and passes judgment on the different

actors, who display their skill before him, with a force and acumen

which we look for in vain in the _Edinburgh Review_. Signor Bari Tone is

a singer of extraordinary power, and has a perception of the humorous

yet unattained by Lablache. He expresses his sentiments on the

legitimate drama with an uncompromising truthfulness, which gains our

respect even when we differ from him in opinion; and, for our own parts,

we consider that his annotations and emendations of the Swan of Avon are

worthy of the earliest attention of Mr Charles Knight. A tremendous

drama succeeds these introductory flourishes, and the actors exert

themselves to the utmost in the Bottle Imp. They enter, we are bound to

say, more into the spirit of the author than is usually the case at

larger theatres among larger performers. Here there is no underling

bending his listless eyes towards the pit in the midst of the very agony

of the action, nor any apathetic murderer standing utterly unconcerned

when on the eve of executing the fatal deed. Here all is in excellent

keeping. The dull dead eyes of the puppets are all turned to the proper

part of the stage; their stiff arms are raised in horror, or extended in

surprise, at the fitting moment; and, with the exception of four, or

perhaps five, of the principal actors in the real stage, we consider

that there is less appearance of sawdust and wool in the _dramatis

personæ_ at this theatre than at ---- or ----. Here, in this chosen

temple of originality and genius, there is nothing to tempt the

principal tragedian into tricks of voice or style: the wooden attitude

and timber tones are here natural property of the intelligent puppet; no

sudden contractions of the countenance convulse the features into an

ideal ugliness, such as Fuseli might have envied after his supper of raw

pork; no sudden exclamations distend these leather-covered bosoms, like

alarms of fire and battle, to subside as suddenly into low whispers or

inarticulate groans, like the last agonies of an expiring trombone. No,

charming, natural, and truly business-like Marionettes! if one thrill of

gratified ambition pervades your hearts at the perusal of these lines,

our purpose will have been fully obtained. We pronounce you in your

_tout-ensemble_ the most perfect corps of artistes in London; and though

we are bound to confess that your performance is tiresome after the

first ten minutes, that after the first display of your mechanism you

become positively a nuisance, from your imitating humanity so

abominably, justice compels us to pass the same judgment on the great

majority of your living brethren, larger than you--as merely mechanical,

and not a whit more intelligent.

For, after all, what is the use of our Commissionership if we do not

speak the truth? We say, then, that in few theatres of London can a fair

representation be presented to the public of any dramatic work whatever,

which contains more than one principal part; there is scarcely one

theatre, in short, where a _play_ can be acted. Let us not blame the

unfortunate modern author, therefore, if he accommodates himself to

circumstances, and produces a drama with one strongly developed

character surrounded by nonentities. It is the sad necessity of his

condition, entailed on him by the fact that there exists no power on any

one stage of doing justice to more than one part. Mr Phelps, to whom

every one interested in the British stage owes a deep debt of gratitude,

may illuminate the suburban shades of Islington with flashes of power or

pathos, with Hamlet or Othello--such as awakened the rapture or evoked

the tears of the thousands of Drury Lane--but how is he supported? The

Marionettes would be more natural, the Bateman monstrosities more richly

endowed with the human voice divine! And the same holds good in almost

every other theatre, unless that in some of them even the one redeeming

actor is wanting. But are we less prepared to defend the stage for this?

nay, are we less hopeful of its eventful restoration? By no means. The

very darkness that has settled upon it at present, foretells the near

approach of dawn. It will be found that the free trade in theatres,

which was to fill our land with the highest works of art and noblest

specimens of acting--which has scattered in a thousand small streams,

too shallow to be fertilising, too slow to be sanitary, the majestic

river which (contained within its just banks) was deep enough to bear

the merchandise of Shakspeare and the war-galleys of the ancient

dramatists--it will be found, we repeat, that Dramatic Free Trade has

been a failure, and that we must go back to the grand old days of

Protection, when native talent was supported by applauding millions in

the companies of the larger houses; when the Keans and Kembles were not

surrounded by shades and phantoms, but by the largest "thews of men;"

when Young, Macready, Kemble, Elliston, Dowton, Liston, and Munden, trod

the same boards; where Mrs Jordan's merry laugh had scarcely ceased to

vibrate in our ears, till our eyes and hearts began to pay tribute to

O'Neil.

That theatres as places of amusement should die out we hold to be

impossible. What is, therefore, to be done, is to fit them for the high

uses to which they may be applied, by obtaining for them the support of

a class of people, whose mere presence would be at once a cause and a

guarantee of the improvement both of plays and actors. One noble

personage, whom it is every Englishman's privilege to "love, honour, and

obey," sets a good example in this behalf. In the halls of Windsor,

Shakspeare's voice is heard; surrounded by knights and nobles, by dames

and demoiselles, she disdains not to shudder at the villanies of King

John, or melt at the relentings of Hubert; to glow with patriotic pride

at the denunciation of the Italian priest, or to refresh herself, after

the excitement of "Macbeth," with the sparkling wit and genial humour of

some of our modern dramatists. Who are the audience there? Her sage

cousins and counsellors, her statesmen, warriors, nobles, matrons as

spotless as Cornelia, maidens with their blue veins filled with the

blood of Saxon Thanes and Norman conquerors: nor are there lacking the

representatives of law and learning; the masters of the noble seminary

beyond the walls, the dignitaries of the most tolerant, the most pure,

the most intellectual Church that ever was set up as a guide and

teacher among men: and what is the result? Is there any shock given to

the most sensitive feeling by word or act? Are the young scions of the

house, the future hopes of England and the world, contaminated by what

they see or hear? Not at all. They hear

"The quality of mercy is not strained,

But droppeth like the gentle dew from heaven."

They hear

"The power I have upon you is to pardon."