Here, too, as every where in Syria, Ibrahim Pacha has been our ally. He

permitted infidels to ride horses through the streets. "O, Allah!"

exclaimed the religious Damascenes, who are termed by the Turks

_Shami-Shoumi_, cursed rascals. "Your Highness suffers Christians to sit

as high as the faithful."

"No, my friends," responded Ibrahim, "you shall ride dromedaries, which

will put you much above them."

We went into the bazaars to encounter these enemies of the black hat,

and _ex-officio_ riders of dromedaries. We had a glimpse of their beauty

as we entered the city. But Eastern life is delightful in detail. It is

a mosaic to be closely studied.

You enter, and the murmurous silence blends pleasantly with the luminous

dimness of the place. The matting overhead, torn and hanging in strips

along which, gilding them in passing, the sun slides into the interior,

is a heavy tapestry. The scene is a perpetual fair, not precisely like

Greenwich Fair, or that of the American Institute, but such as you

frequent in Arabian stories.

Bedoueen glide spectrally along, with wild, roving eyes, like startled

deer. Insane Dervishes and Santons meditate the propriety of braining

the infidel Howadji. Shekhs from distant Asia, pompous Effendi from

Constantinople, Bagdad traders, cunning-eyed Armenian merchants meet and

mingle, and many of our old friends, the grizzly-bearded, red-eyed

fire-worshipers, somnolently curled among their goods, eye us, through

the smoke they emit, as perfect specimens of the proper sacrifice they

owe their Deity. All strange forms jostle and crowd in passing, except

those which are familiar; and children more beautiful than any in the

East, play in the living mazes of the crowd.

Shopping goes actively on. The merchant without uncrossing his legs,

exhibits his silks and coarse cottons to the long draped and vailed

figures that group picturesquely about his niche. Your eye seizes the

bright effect of all the gay goods as you saunter on. Here a merchant

lays by his chibouque and drinks, from a carved glass, sweet liquorice

water, cooled with snow from Lebanon. Here one closes his niche and

shuffles off to the mosque, followed by his boy-slave with the

chibouque. Here another rises, and bows, and falls, kissing the floor,

and muttering the noon prayer. Every where there is intense but languid

life.

The bazaars are separated into kinds. That of the jewelers is inclosed,

and you see the Jews, swarthy and keen-eyed servants of Mammon, busily

at work. Precious stones miserably set, and handfuls of pearls, opals,

and turquoises are quietly presented to your inspection. There is no

eagerness of traffic. A boy tranquilly hands you a ring, and another,

when you have looked at the first. You say "_la_," no, and he retires.

Or you pause over a clumsy silver ring, with an Arabic inscription upon

the flint set in it. Golden Sleeve ascertains that it is the cipher of

Hafiz. You reflect that it is silver, which is the orthodox metal, the

Prophet having forbidden gold. You place it upon your finger, with the

stone upon the inside, for so the Prophet wore his upon the fore-finger,

that he might avoid ostentation. It is a quaint, characteristic,

oriental signet-ring. Hafiz is a common name, it is probably that of the

jeweler who owns the ring. But you have other associations with the

name, and as you remember the Persian poet, you suffer it to remain upon

your finger, and pay the jeweler a few piastres. You do not dream that

it is enchanted. You do not know that you have bought Ala-ed-deen's

lamp, and as a rub of that evoked omnipotent spirits, so a glance at

your ring, when Damascus has become a dream, will restore you again to

the dim bazaar, and the soft eyes of the children that watch you

curiously as you hesitate, and to the sweet inspiration of Syria.

You pass on into the quarter where the pattens are made, inlaid with

pearl, such as you remarked upon the feet of the kohl-eyebrowed houris.

Into the shoemakers, where the brilliant leathers justify better poetry

than Hans Sach's interminable rhymes, though here is only their music,

not their moral. You climb crumbling steps, and emerge from darkness

upon the top of the bazaar, on a ledge of a Roman ruin, and look down

into the sunny greenness of the great mosque, which you can not more

nearly approach. Then down, and by all the beautiful fabrics of the

land, hung with the tin-foiled letters that surround pieces of English

prints, and which the color-loving eye of the Oriental seizes as an

ornament for his own wares, you pass into the region of drugs and

apothecaries, and feel that you are about visiting that Persian Doctor

in Mecca who dealt in nothing but miraculous balsams and infallible

elixirs, whose potions were all sweet and agreeable, and the musk and

aloe wood which he burned, diffused a delicious odor through the shop.

Surely he was court-physician to Zobeide.

Golden Sleeve pauses before an old figure curled among the bottles and

lost in reverie, saturated, it seems, with opium, and dreaming its

dreams. This is Zobeide's doctor. He had evidently the elixir of life

among those sweet potions, and has deeply drunk. Life he has preserved;

but little else that is human remains, except the love that is stronger

than life. For as he opens his vague eyes and beholds us, they kindle

with an inward fire, as if they looked upon the Philosopher's Stone.

That stone is in our purses; the old magician knows it, and he knows the

charm to educe it. He opens a jar, and a dreamy odor penetrates our

brains. It is distilled of flowers culled from the gardens of the

Ganges: or is this delicate perfume preferable--this zatta, loved of

poets and houris, which came to the doctor's grandfather from Bagdad?

Attar of roses did Golden Sleeve suggest? Here is the essence of that

divinest distillation of the very heart of summer. But, O opulent

Howadji! no thin, pale, Constantinople perfume is this, but the viscous

richness of Indian roses. As many wide acres of bloom went to this jar

as to any lyric of Hafiz. It lies as molten gold in the quaint glass

vase. The magician holds it toward the Syrian sun, and the shadow of a

smile darkens over his withered features. Then, drop by drop, as if he

poured the last honey that should ever be hived from Hymettus, he

suffers it to exude into the little vials. They are closely stopped, and

sealed, and wrapped in cotton. And some wintry Christmas in the West the

Howadji shall offer to a fairer than Zobeide those more than drops of

diamond.

Nor this alone--but the cunning of Arabian art has sucked the secret of

their sweetness from tea and coffee, from all the wild herbs of Syria,

and from amber. In those small jars is stored the rich result of endless

series of that summer luxuriance you saw in the vale of Zabulon.

Sandal-wood to burn upon your nargileh, mystic bits to lay upon your

tongue, so that the startled Bedoueen, as you pass into the bazaar, and

breathe upon him in passing, dreams that you came from Paradise, and

have been kissed by houris.

Was it not the magic to draw from your purse the Philosopher's Stone?

The court-physician of Zobeide, relapsing into reverie, smiles vaguely

as he says salaam; as if the advantage were his--as if you were not

bearing away with you in those odors the triumphs of the rarest alchemy.

Breathing fragrance, you enter a khan opening upon the bazaar, that of

Assad Pacha, a stately and beautiful building, consisting of a lofty

domed court, the dome supported by piers, with a gallery running quite

around it. Private rooms for the choicest goods open out of the gallery.

The court is full of various merchandise, and merchants from every

region sit by their goods, and smoke placidly as they negotiate.

But we have received visits in our hotel from an Armenian merchant,

young and comely--why not Khadra's cousin?--and he brought with him

silks and stuffs at which all that was feminine in our nature swelled

with delight. Tempted by his odors, we have come to his garden. The room

is small and square, and rough-plastered. Upon the floor are strewn long

deep boxes, and the comely young Armenian, in a flowing dark dress,

reveals his treasures.

Scarfs, shawls, stuffs for dresses, morning gowns and vests,

handkerchiefs, sashes, purses, and tobacco-bags are heaped in rich

profusion. They are of the true Eastern richness, and in the true

Eastern manner they rely upon that richness for their effect, and not

upon their intrinsic tastefulness. The figures of the embroideries, for

instance, are not gracefully designed, but the superb material suffices.

They imply that there are none but beautiful women in the world, and

that all women are brunettes. As the quiet merchant unfolds them, they

have the mysterious charm of recalling all the beautiful brunettes who

have reigned Zenobias, and Queens of Sheba, and Cleopatras, in the

ruined realm of your past life.

But, Northerners and Westerners, we remember another beauty. We remember

Palma Vecchio's golden-haired daughter, and the Venetian pictures, and

the stories of angels with sunny locks, and the radiant Preziosa. The

astute Armenian knows our thoughts. From the beginning was not the

Oriental merchant a magician?

For while we sit smoking and delighted, the merchant, no less wily than

the court-physician of Zobeide, opens the last box of all, and gradually

unfolds the most beautiful garment the Howadji have ever seen. The

coronation robes of emperors and kings, the most sumptuous costumes at

court-festivals, all the elaboration of Western genius in the material

and in the making of dresses, pale and disappear before the simple

magnificence of this robe.

It is a bournouse or Oriental cloak, made of camel's hair and cloth of

gold. The material secures that rich stiffness essential in a superb

mantle, and the color is an azure turquoise, exquisite beyond words. The

sleeves are cloth of gold, and the edges are wrought in gold, but with

the most regal taste. It is the only object purely tasteful that we have

seen. Nor is it of that negative safety of taste, which loves dark

carriages and neutral tints in dress; but magnificent and imperial, like

that of Rachel when she plays Thisbe, and nets her head with Venetian

sequins. If the rest imply that all women are beautiful and brunettes,

this proclaims the one superb Blonde, Queen of them all.

"Take that, Leisurlie, it was intended from the beginning of the world

for an English beauty."

"Oh! _Kooltooluk!_ there is not a woman in England who could wear it."

Through the dewy distances of memory, as you muse in the dim chamber

upon all who might worthily wear the garment, passes a figure perfect as

morning, crowned with youth, and robed in grace, for whose image Alpine

snows were purer and Italian skies more soft. But even while you muse,

it passes slowly away out of the golden gates of possibility into the

wide impossible.

As we stroll leisurely homeward, it is early afternoon. But the shops

are closed--strange silence and desertion reign in the Bazaars--a few

dark turbaned Christians and Jews yet linger, and a few children play.

"They are gone to the cafés and gardens," says Golden Sleeve.

--And we follow them.

TIGER ROCHE.--AN IRISH CHARACTER.

Among the characters distinguished for unbridled indulgence and fierce

passions, who were, unfortunately, too frequently to be met with in

Ireland in the last century, was one whose name attained so much

celebrity as to become a proverb. "Tiger Roche," as he was called, was a

native of Dublin, where he was born in the year 1729. He received the

best education the metropolis could afford, and was instructed in all

the accomplishments then deemed essential to the rank and character of a

gentleman. So expert was he in the various acquirements of polite life,

that at the age of sixteen he recommended himself to Lord Chesterfield,

then Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, who offered him, gratuitously, a

commission in the army; but his friends having other views for him, they

declined it. This seems to have been a serious misfortune to the young

man, whose disposition and education strongly inclined him to a military

life. His hopes were raised, and his vanity flattered, by the notice and

offer of the viceroy; and in sullen resentment he absolutely refused to

embark in any other profession his friends designed for him. He

continued, therefore, for several years among the dissipated idlers of

the metropolis, having no laudable pursuit to occupy his time, and led

into all the outrages and excesses which then disgraced Dublin.

One night, in patrolling the city with his drunken associates, they

attacked and killed a watch-man, who, with others, had attempted to

quell a riot they had excited. He was, therefore, compelled to fly from

Dublin. He made his way to Cork, where he lay concealed for some time,

and from thence escaped to the plantations in North America. When the

war broke out between France and England, he entered as a volunteer in

one of the provincial regiments, and distinguished himself in several

engagements with the Indians in the interest of the French, during which

he seems to have acquired those fierce and cruel qualities by which

those tribes are distinguished.

He was now particularly noticed by his officers for the intrepidity and

spirit he displayed, and was high in favor with Colonel Massy, his

commander; but an accident occurred of so humiliating and degrading a

nature, as to extinguish at once all his hopes of advancement. An

officer of Massy's regiment was possessed of a very valuable

fowling-piece which he highly prized. He missed it from his tent, and

made diligent inquiry after it, but it was nowhere to be found. It was,

however, reported that it was seen in the possession of Roche, and an

order was made to examine his baggage. On searching among it the lost

article was found. Roche declared that he had bought it from one Bourke,

a countryman of his own, and a corporal in his regiment. Bourke was sent

for and examined. He solemnly declared on oath that the statement of

Roche was altogether false, and that he himself knew nothing at all of

the transaction. Roche was now brought to a court-martial, and little

appearing in his favor, he was convicted of the theft, and, as a lenient

punishment, ordered to quit the service with every mark of disgrace and

ignominy. Irritated with this treatment, Roche immediately challenged

the officer who had prosecuted him. He refused, however, to meet him, on

the pretext that he was a degraded man, and no longer entitled to the

rank and consideration of a gentleman. Stung to madness, and no longer

master of himself, he rushed to the parade, insulted the officer in the

grossest terms, and then flew to the picket-guard, where he attacked the

corporal with his naked sword, declaring his intention to kill him on

the spot. The man with difficulty defended his life, till his companions

sprung upon Roche and disarmed him. Though deprived of his weapon, he

did not desist from his intention; crouching down like an Indian foe, he

suddenly sprung, like Roderick Dhu, at his antagonist, and fastened on

his throat with his teeth, and before he could be disengaged nearly

strangled him, dragging away a mouthful of flesh, which, in the true

Indian spirit, he afterward said was "the sweetest morsel he had ever

tasted." From the fierce and savage character he displayed on this

occasion, he obtained the appellation of "Tiger," an affix which was

ever after joined to his name.

A few days after, the English army advanced to force the lines of

Ticonderoga. Unfortunate Roche was left desolate and alone in the

wilderness, an outcast from society, apparently abandoned by all the

world. His resolution and fidelity to his cause, however, did not desert

him. He pursued his way through the woods till he fell in with a party

of friendly Indians, and by extraordinary exertions and forced marches,

arrived at the fortress with his Indians, to join in the attack. He gave

distinguished proofs of his courage and military abilities during that

unfortunate affair, and received four dangerous wounds. He attracted the

notice of General Abercrombie, the leader of the expedition; but the

stain of robbery was upon him, and no services, however brilliant, could

obliterate it.

From hence he made his way to New York, after suffering incredible

afflictions from pain, poverty, and sickness. One man alone, Governor

Rogers, pitied his case, and was not satisfied of his guilt. In the year

1785, Roche received from his friends in Ireland a reluctant supply of

money, which enabled him to obtain a passage on board a vessel bound for

England, where he arrived shortly afterward. He reserved part of his

supply of money for the purchase of a commission, and hoped once more to

ascend to that rank from which he had been, as he thought, unjustly

degraded; but just as the purchase was about to be completed, a report

of his theft in America reached the regiment, and the officers refused

to serve with him. With great perseverance and determined resolution, he

traced the origin of the report to a Captain Campbell, then residing at

the British Coffee-house, in Charing-cross. He met him in the public

room, taxed him with what he called a gross and false calumny, which the

other retorted with great spirit. A duel immediately ensued, in which

both were desperately wounded.

Roche now declared in all public places, and caused it to be every where

known, that, as he could not obtain justice on the miscreant who had

traduced his character in America, he would personally chastise every

man in England who presumed to propagate the report. With this

determination, he met one day, in the Green Park, his former colonel,

Massy, and another officer, who had just returned home. He addressed

them, and anxiously requested they would, as they might, remove the

stain from his character. They treated his appeal with contempt, when he

fiercely attacked them both. They immediately drew their swords, and

disarmed him. A crowd of spectators assembled round, and being two to

one they inflicted severe chastisement on Roche. Foiled in his attempt,

he immediately determined to seek another occasion, and finding that one

of them had departed for Chester, Roche set out after him with the

indefatigable perseverance and pursuit of a bloodhound. Here Roche again

sought him, and meeting him in the streets, again attacked him. Roche

was, however, again defeated, and received a severe wound in the

sword-arm, which long disabled him.

But that redress to his character now came accidentally and

unexpectedly, which all his activity and perseverance could not obtain.

Bourke, the corporal, was mortally wounded by a scalping party of

Indians, and on his death-bed made a solemn confession that he himself

had actually stolen the fowling-piece, and sold it to Roche, without

informing him by what means he had procured it, and that Roche had

really purchased it without any suspicion of the theft. This declaration

of the dying man was properly attested, and universally received, and

restored the injured Roche at once to character and countenance. His

former calumniators now vied with each other in friendly offers to serve

him; and as a remuneration for the injustice and injury he had suffered,

a lieutenancy in a newly-raised regiment was conferred upon him

gratuitously. He soon returned to Dublin with considerable eclat; the

reputation of the injuries he had sustained, the gallant part he had

acted, and the romantic adventures he had encountered among the Indians,

in the woods of America, were the subject of every conversation.

Convivial parties were every where made for him. Wherever he appeared,

he was the lion of the night. A handsome person, made still more

attractive by the wounds he had received, a graceful form in the dance,

in which he excelled, and the narrative of "his hair-breadth 'scapes,"

with which he was never too diffident to indulge the company, made him

at this time "the observed of all observers" in the metropolis of

Ireland.

But a service which he rendered the public in Dublin deservedly placed

him very high in their esteem and good-will. It was at this time

infested with those miscreants who were known by the names of

"sweaters," or "pinkindindies," and every night some outrage was

perpetrated on the peaceable and unoffending inhabitants. One evening

late, an old gentleman with his son and daughter, were returning home

from a friend's house, when they were attacked on Ormond-quay by a party

of them. Roche, who was accidentally going the same way at the same

time, heard the shrieks of a woman crying for assistance, and instantly

rushed to the place. Here he did not hesitate singly to meet the whole

party. He first rescued the young woman from the ruffian who held her,

and then attacking the band, he desperately wounded some, and put the

rest to flight. His spirited conduct on this occasion gained him a high

and deserved reputation, and inspired others with resolution to follow

his example. He formed a body, consisting of officers and others of his

acquaintance, to patrol the dangerous streets of Dublin at night, and so

gave that protection to the citizens which the miserable and decrepit

watch were not able to afford.

But he was not fated long to preserve the high character he had

acquired. His physical temperament, impossible to manage, and his moral

perceptions, hard to regulate, were the sport of every contingency and

vicissitude of fortune. The peace concluded in 1763 reduced the army,

and he retired in indigent circumstances to London, where he soon lived

beyond his income. In order to repair it, he paid his addresses to a

Miss Pitt, who had a fortune of £4000. On the anticipation of this, he

engaged in a career of extravagance that soon accumulated debts to a

greater amount, and the marriage portion was insufficient to satisfy his

creditors. He was arrested and cast into the prison of the King's

Bench, where various detainers were laid upon him, and he was doomed to

a confinement of hopeless termination. Here his mind appears to have

been completely broken down, and the intrepid and daring courage, which

had sustained him in so remarkable a manner through all the vicissitudes

of his former life, seemed to be totally exhausted. He submitted to

insults and indignities with patience, and seemed deprived not only of

the capability to resent, but of the sensibility to feel them.

On one occasion he had a trifling dispute with a fellow-prisoner, who

kicked him, and struck him a blow in the face. There was a time when his

fiery spirit would not have been satisfied but with the blood of the

offender. He now only turned aside and cried like a child. It happened

that his countryman, Buck English, a personage of some notoriety, was

confined at the same time in the Bench; with him also he had some

dispute, and English, seizing a stick, flogged him in a savage manner.

Roche made no attempt to retaliate or resist, but crouched under the

punishment. But while he shrunk thus under the chastisement of men, he

turned upon his wife, whom he treated with such cruelty, that she was

compelled to separate from him, and abandon him to his fate.

At length, however, an act of grace liberated him from a confinement

under which all his powers were fast sinking; and a small legacy, left

him by a relation, enabled him once more to appear in the gay world.

With his change of fortune a change of disposition came over him; and in

proportion as he had shown an abject spirit in confinement, he now

exhibited even a still more arrogant and irritable temper than he had

ever before displayed. He was a constant frequenter of billiard tables,

where he indulged in insufferable assumption, with sometimes a shrewd

and keen remark. He was one day driving the balls about with the cue,

and on some one expostulating with him that he was not playing himself,

but hindering other gentlemen from their amusement; "Gentlemen!" said

Roche, "why, sir, except you and I, and one or two more, there is not a

gentleman in the room." His friend afterwards remarked that he had

grossly offended a large company, and wondered some of them had not

resented the affront. "Oh!" said Roche, "there was no fear of that.

There was not a thief in the room that did not consider himself _one_ of

the _two_ or _three_ gentlemen I excepted!"

Again his fortune seemed in the ascendant, and the miserable,

spiritless, flogged and degraded prisoner of the King's Bench, was

called on to stand as candidate to represent Middlesex in Parliament. So

high an opinion was entertained of his daring spirit, that it was

thought by some of the popular party he might be of use in intimidating

Colonel Luttrell, who was the declared opponent of Wilkes at that

election. In April, 1769, he was put into nomination at Brentford by Mr.

Jones, and seconded by Mr. Martin, two highly popular electors. He,

however, disappointed his friends, and declined the poll, induced, it

was said, by promises of Luttrell's friends to provide for him. On this

occasion he fought another duel with a Captain Flood, who had offended

him in a coffee-house. He showed no deficiency of courage, but on the

contrary even a larger proportion of spirit and generosity than had

distinguished him at former periods.

Returning at this time one night to his apartments at Chelsea, he was

attacked by two ruffians, who presented pistols to his breast. He sprang

back, and drew his sword, when one of them fired at him, and the ball

grazed his temple. He then attacked them both, pinned one to the wall,

and the other fled. Roche secured his prisoner, and the other was

apprehended next day. They were tried at the Old Bailey, and capitally

convicted; but at the humane and earnest intercession of Roche, their

punishment was mitigated to transportation.

All the fluctuations of this strange man's character seemed at length to

settle into one unhappy state, from which he was unable ever again to

raise himself. He met with a young person, walking with her mother in

St. James's Park, and was struck with her appearance. He insinuated

himself into their acquaintance, and the young lady formed for him a

strong and uncontrollable attachment. She possessed a considerable

fortune, of which Roche became the manager. His daily profusion and

dissipation soon exhausted her property, and the mother and daughter

were compelled to leave London, reduced to indigence and distress, in

consequence of the debts in which he had involved them.

He was soon after appointed captain of a company of foot in the East

India service, and embarked in the Vansittart, for India, in May, 1773.

He had not been many days on board, when such was his impracticable

temper that he fell out with all the passengers, and among the rest with

a Captain Ferguson, who called him out as soon as they arrived at

Madeira. Roche was again seized with a sudden and unaccountable fit of

terror, and made submission. The arrogance and cowardice he displayed

revolted the whole body of the passengers, and they unanimously made it

a point that the captain should expel him from the table. He was driven,

therefore, to the society of the common sailors and soldiers on board

the ship. With them he endeavored to ingratiate himself, by mixing

freely with them, and denouncing vengeance against every gentleman and

officer on board the ship; but his threats were particularly directed

against Ferguson, whom he considered the origin of the disgrace he

suffered. On the arrival of the ship at the Cape, after all the

passengers were disembarked, Roche came ashore, in the dusk of the

evening, and was seen about the door of the house where Ferguson lodged.

A message was conveyed to Ferguson, who went out, and was found soon

afterward round the corner of the house, weltering in his blood, with

_nine_ deep wounds, all on his left side; and it was supposed they must

have been there inflicted, because it was the unprotected side, and the

attack was made when he was off his guard.

Suspicion immediately fixed on Roche as the murderer; he fled during the

night, and took refuge among the Caffres. It was supposed that he ended

his strange and eventful life soon after. The Cape was at that time a

colony of the Dutch, who, vigilant and suspicious of strangers, suffered

none to enter there, but merely to touch for provisions and pass on. The

proceedings, therefore, of their colonial government were shut up in

mystery. It was reported at the time, that Roche was demanded and given

up to the authorities at the Cape, who caused him to be broken alive

upon the wheel, according to the then Dutch criminal law of the Cape,

which inflicted that punishment on the more atrocious murderers, and the

uncertainty that hung about the circumstance assorted strangely with the

wild character of the man.

It appears, however, he was tried by the Dutch authorities at the Cape,

and acquitted. He then took a passage in a French vessel to Bombay; but

the Vansittart, in which he had come from England to the Cape, had

arrived in India before him; information had been given to the British

authorities, charging Roche with Ferguson's murder; and Roche was

arrested as soon as he landed. He urged his right to be discharged, or

at least bailed, on the grounds that there was not sufficient evidence

against him; that he had been already acquitted; and that as the

offense, if any, was committed out of the British dominions, he could

only be tried by special commission, and it was uncertain whether the

Crown would issue one or not, or, if the Crown did grant a commission,

when or where it would sit. He argued his own case with the skill of a

practiced lawyer. The authorities, however, declined either to bail or

discharge him, and he was kept in custody until he was sent a prisoner

to England, to stand his trial.

An appeal of murder was brought against him, and a commission issued to

try it. The case came on at the Old Bailey, in London, before Baron

Burland, on the 11th December, 1775. The counsel for Roche declined in

any way relying on the former acquittal at the Cape of Good Hope; and

the case was again gone through. The fact of the killing was undisputed,

but from the peculiar nature of the proceedings, there could not be, as

in a common indictment for murder, a conviction for manslaughter; and

the judge directed the jury, if they did not believe the killing to be

malicious and deliberate, absolutely to acquit the prisoner. The jury

brought in a verdict of acquittal.

The doubt about Roche's guilt arose on the following state of facts. On

the evening of their arrival at the Cape, Ferguson and his friends were

sitting at tea, at their lodgings, when a message was brought into the

room; on hearing which Ferguson rose, went to his apartment, and, having

put on his sword and taken a loaded cane in his hand, went out. A friend

named Grant followed him, and found Roche and him at the side of the

house, round a corner, and heard the clash of swords, but refused to

interfere. It was too dark to see what was occurring; but in a few

moments he heard Roche going away, and Ferguson falling. Ferguson was

carried in, and died immediately. All his wounds were on the _left_

side. The most violent vindictive feelings had existed between them; and

there was proof of Roche's having threatened "to shorten the race of the

Fergusons." The message, in answer to which Ferguson went out, was

differently stated, being, according to one account, "Mr. Mathews wants

Mr. Ferguson," and to the other, "a gentleman wants Mr. Mathews." The

case for the prosecution was, that this message was a trap to draw

Ferguson out of the house, and that, on his going out, Roche attacked

him; and this was confirmed by the improbability of Roche's going out

for an innocent purpose, in a strange place, on the night of his

landing, in the dark, and in the neighborhood of Ferguson's lodgings;

and particularly by the wounds being on the left side, which they could

not be if given in a fair fight with small swords. Roche's account was,

that on the evening of his arrival he went out to see the town,

accompanied by a boy, a slave of his host; that they were watched by

some person till they came near Ferguson's, when that person

disappeared, and immediately afterward, Roche was struck with a loaded

stick on the head, knocked down, and his arm disabled; that afterward he

succeeded in rising, and; perceiving Ferguson, drew his sword, and,

after a struggle, in which he wished to avoid bloodshed, killed his

assailant in self-defense. This was, to some extent, corroborated by the

boy at the Dutch trial, and by a sailor in England, but both these

witnesses were shaken a little in their testimony. According to this

account, the message was a concerted signal to Ferguson, who had set a

watch on Roche, intending to assassinate him. The locality of Ferguson's

wounds was accounted for by his fighting both with cane and sword, using

the former to parry. If the second version of the message was correct,

it would strongly confirm this account. There was no proof that Ferguson

knew any one named Mathews.

A writer of the last century, in speaking of the Irish character,

concludes with the remark: "In short, if they are good, you will

scarcely meet a better: if bad, you will seldom find a worse." These

extremes were frequently mixed in the same person. Roche, at different

periods, displayed them. At one time, an admirable spirit, great

humanity, and unbounded generosity; at another, abject cowardice,

ferocity, treachery, and brutal selfishness. The vicissitudes of his

fortune were as variable as his character: at times he was exposed to

the foulest charges, and narrowly escaped ignominious punishment; at

others, he was the object of universal esteem and admiration.

WIVES OF GREAT LAWYERS.

Lawyers do not marry with the impulsiveness of poets. For they are a

prudent class--mostly shrewd, practical men--any thing but dreamers; and

though they may admire a handsome figure, and like a pretty face as

other men do, they have not usually allowed those adventitious gifts of

nature to divert their attention from the "main chance" in choosing a

wife. Lawyers are, take them as a whole, a marrying class, and they not

unfrequently enjoy that "lawyer's blessing," a large family. Take the

Lord Chancellors, for instance. Lord Clarendon, Lords-Keeper Coventry,

Lyttleton, Bridgeman, Judge Jeffries, Lord York, Lord Bathurst, Lord

Loughborough, and Lord Erskine, were twice married; Lord Shaftesbury,

Lord Maynard, and Lord Harcourt, were three times married. The wives

whom they chose were usually heiresses, or rich widows; those who

remained bachelors, or who married "for love," seem to have formed the

exceptions. And yet, on the whole, the married life of the Lord

Chancellors, judging from Lord Campbell's Lives, seems to have been

comfortable and happy.

The great Lord Bacon, when a young man plodding at the bar, but with a

very small practice, cast about his eyes among the desirable matches of

the day, and selected the handsome widow of Sir William Hutton (nephew

and heir of Lord Chancellor Hutton), who had a large fortune at her own

disposal. But another legal gentleman had been beforehand with him; and

when he proposed he was rejected. His favored rival was Sir Edward Coke,

a crabbed widower, but attorney-general, rich and of large estate, as

well as of large family. The widow who valued wealth as much as Bacon

did, married the old man, running off with him, and entering into an

irregular marriage, for which they were both prosecuted in the

Ecclesiastical Court. Bacon had reason to rejoice at his escape, for the

widow was of capricious and violent temper, and led Coke a most wretched

life, refusing to take his name, separating from him, doing every thing

to vex and annoy him, and teaching his child to rebel against him. Bacon

was however shortly after consoled by a rich and handsome wife, in the

daughter of Alderman Barnham, whom he married. But the marriage seems at

best to have been one of convenience on his part. They did not live

happily together; she never was a companion to him; and not long before

his death, a final separation took place, and the great Lord Chancellor

died without the consolations of female tenderness in his last moments.

When the separation took place, "for great and just causes," as he

expresses it in his will, he "utterly revoked" all testamentary

dispositions in her favor. But she lost nothing by this, for his costly

style of living during his official career left him without a penny, and

he died insolvent.

Sir Thomas More, when twenty-one, married the eldest daughter of one

"Maister Coult, a gentleman of Essex," a country girl, very

ill-educated, but fair and well-formed. Erasmus says of the

marriage--"He wedded a young girl of respectable family, but who had

hitherto lived in the country with her parents and sisters; and was so

uneducated, that he could mould her to his own tastes and manners. He

caused her to be instructed in letters; and she became a very skillful

musician, which peculiarly pleased him." The union was a happy one, but

short, the wife dying, and leaving behind her a son and three daughters;

shortly after which, however, More married again, this time a widow

named Alice Middleton, seven years older than himself, and not by any

means handsome. Indeed, More indulged himself in a jest on her want of

youth and beauty--"_nec bella nec puella_." He had first wooed her, it

seems, for a friend, but ended by marrying her himself. Erasmus, who was

often an inmate of the family, speaks of her as "a keen and watchful

manager." "No husband," continues Erasmus, "ever gained so much

obedience from a wife by authority and severity, as More won by

gentleness and pleasantry. Though verging on old age, and not of a

yielding temper, he prevailed on her to take lessons on the lute, the

viol, the monochord, and the flute, which she daily practiced to him."

Her ordinary and rather vulgar apprehension could not fathom the

conscientious scruples of her husband in his refusal to take the oath

dictated to him by Henry VIII.; and when he was at length cast by that

bad monarch into the Tower, then the grave of so many royal victims, his

wife strongly expostulated with him on his squeamishness. "How can a

man," she said to him on one occasion, "taken for wise, like you, play

the fool in this close filthy prison, when you might be abroad at your

liberty, if you would but do as the bishops have done?" She dilated upon

his fine house at Chelsea, his library, gallery, garden, and orchard,

together with the company of his wife and children. But to all he

opposed the mild force of his conscience and religious feelings. "Is not

this house," he asked, "as nigh heaven as my own?" to which her

contemptuous ejaculation was--"_Tilly vally, tilly vally!_" He persisted

in his course, and was executed, after which we hear no more of his

wife.

Among the few great lawyers who have married "for love," Hyde, Lord

Clarendon, deserves a place. While yet a young man, he became

desperately enamored of the daughter of Sir George Aycliffe, a Wiltshire

gentleman of good family, though of small fortune. A marriage was the

result, but the beautiful young wife died only six months after, of the

malignant small-pox (then a frightful scourge in this country), and Hyde

was for some time so inconsolable, that he could scarcely be restrained

from throwing up his profession and going abroad. Two years after,

however, he married again into a good family, his second wife being the

daughter of Sir Thomas Aylesbury, Master of the Mint; and the marriage

proved highly auspicious. This worthy lady was his companion in all his

vicissitudes of fortune--lived with him for many years in exile--shared

all his dangers and privations, when at times the parents could with

difficulty provide food and raiment for their children; but the wife was

yet preserved to see her husband Earl of Clarendon, Lord Chancellor and

Prime Minister of England. As an instance of the straits to which the

family was occasionally reduced, we may quote the following extract from

a letter written by Hyde to a friend, when at Madrid in 1650, in which

he says: "All our money is gone, and let me never prosper, if I know or

can imagine how we can get bread a month longer;" and again, "Greater

necessities are hardly felt by any men than we for the present undergo,

such as have almost made me foolish. I have not for my life been able to

supply the miserable distress of my poor wife."

Francis North, afterward Lord-Keeper Guildford, went about marrying in a

business-like way. He was a reader at Lincoln's Inn, but much desired to

wed, because he had "grown tired of dining in the hall, and eating a

costelet and salad at Chateline's in the evening with a friend."

Besides, he wished to mend his fortune in the most summary way. He first

tried a rich, coquettish young widow, but she jilted him. Then he found

out an alderman who was reputed to be rich, and had three marriageable

daughters with a fortune of £6000 each. He made his approaches, was

favorably received, and proceeded to broach the money question to the

alderman. The sum named as the young lady's portion was £5000; but as

North had set his heart on the £6000, he was disappointed, and at once

took his leave. The alderman, running after him (at least so relates

Lord Campbell), offered him to boot £500 on the birth of the first

child. But North would not take a penny under the sum he had fixed upon,

and the match fell through. At last he found a lady with £14,000, one of

the daughters of the Earl of Devon, whom he courted in a business style,

and ultimately married.

Judge Jeffries, when a dissolute youth, courted an heiress, and in spite

of her father's interdict, the young lady encouraged Jeffries, and

corresponded with him. The father fell upon a heap of love-letters which

had passed between Jeffries and his daughter, and in a savage manner

turned the young lady from his doors. She was suffering great distress

in some house in Holborn, in which she had taken shelter, and where

Jeffries sought her out. Perhaps his marrying her under such

circumstances was the one generous act of that infamous man's life. She

made him an excellent wife while she lived, but before she died,

Jeffries was already courting another wife, and married her three months

after; and in about three months after that, his new wife presented him

with certain marital fruits rather prematurely. This woman caused much

scandal during her life, and seems to have been as great a disgrace to

the domestic conditions of life, as her husband was to the bench he

occupied.

Neither Lord Somers nor Lord Thurlow were married--both having been

disappointed in attachments in their younger years. The latter proposed

to a young Lincolnshire lady, a Miss Gouch, but she protested "she would

not have him--she was positively afraid of him;" so he forswore

matrimony thenceforward. We do not remember any other of the Lord

Chancellors who have led a single life.

Strange that Lord Chancellor Eldon--a man of so much caution and worldly

providence, should have been one of the few great lawyers who married

"for love;" but it was so. His choice was nearly a penniless beauty, and

he had nothing; she was only eighteen, and he twenty-one. Scott induced

the fair damsel to elope with him; she stole away from her father's home

by night, descending from her window by a ladder planted there by her

impatient lover; they fled across the border, and got married at

Blackshiels. The step was an important one for Scott--fraught with great

consequences; for it diverted him from the church, for which he had been

studying, and forced him to the bar, thus compelling him to enter upon a

career which ended in the highest honors. William Scott, his elder

brother, afterward Lord Stowell, helped the young couple on, and the

young lawyer worked with a will. "I have married rashly," said he, in a

letter to a friend, "and I have neither house nor home to offer to my

wife; but it is my determination to _work hard_ to provide for the woman

I love, as soon as I can find the means of so doing." He was shortly

after engaged by Sir Robert Chambers, as his deputy, to read lectures on

law at Oxford; and in after years he used to relate the following story

respecting his first appearance in the character of a lecturer. "The

most awkward thing that ever occurred to me was this: immediately after

I was married, I was appointed Deputy Professor of Law, at Oxford; and

the law professor sent me the first lecture, which I had to read

_immediately_ to the students, and which I began without knowing a word

that was in it. It was upon the statute of _young men running away with

maidens_. Fancy me reading, with about one hundred and forty boys and

young men giggling at the professor! Such a tittering audience no one

ever had."

It remains for us to notice the wives of two other great lawyers, who,

though not equal in rank to those we have named, were equal to any of

them in professional merit, and in true nobility of character. We allude

to the late Sir Samuel Romilly and Sir James Mackintosh, both of whom

were blessed in their married state, and have left behind them memorials

of the most touching kind in memory of their wives.

"For fifteen years," says Sir Samuel Romilly, writing in 1813, "my

happiness has been the constant study of the most excellent of wives; a

woman in whom a strong understanding, the noblest and most elevated

sentiments, and the most courageous virtue, are united to the warmest

affection, and to the utmost delicacy of mind and tenderness of heart;

and all these intellectual perfections are graced and adorned by the

most splendid beauty that human eyes ever beheld. She has borne to me

seven children, who are living, and in all of whom I persuade myself

that I discover the promise of them, one day, proving themselves not

unworthy of such a mother."

The noble woman here referred to was Anne, the eldest daughter of

Francis Garbett, Esq., of Knill Court, Herefordshire, whom Romilly

married in January, 1798. He first accidentally met the young lady when

on a visit to the Marquis of Lansdowne, at Bowood. He gives the

following charming account of the circumstance in his diary: "The

amiable disposition of Lord and Lady Lansdowne always renders the place

delightful to their guests. To me, besides the enjoyment of the present

moment, there is always added, when I am at Bowood, a thousand pleasing

recollections of past times; of the happy days I have spent, of the

various society of distinguished persons I have enjoyed, of the

friendships I have formed here; and above all, that it was here that I

first saw and became known to my dearest Anne. If I had not chanced to

meet with her here, there is no probability that I should ever have seen

her; for she had never been, nor was likely, unmarried, to have been in

London. To what accidental causes are the most important occurrences of

our lives sometimes to be traced! Some miles from Bowood is the form of

a white horse, grotesquely cut out upon the downs, and forming a

landmark to wide extent of country. To that object it is that I owe all

the real happiness of my life. In the year 1796 I made a visit to

Bowood. My dear Anne, who had been staying there some weeks, with her

father and her sisters, was about to leave it. The day fixed for their

departure was the eve of that on which I arrived; and if nothing had

occurred to disappoint their purpose, I never should have seen her. But

it happened that, on the preceding day, she was one of an equestrian

party which was made to visit this curious object; she overheated

herself by her ride; a violent cold and pain in her face was the

consequence. Her father found it indispensably necessary to defer his

and her journey for several days, and in the mean time I arrived. I saw

in her the most beautiful and accomplished creature that ever blessed

the sight and understanding of man--a most intelligent mind, an

uncommonly correct judgment, a lively imagination, a cheerful

disposition, a noble and generous way of thinking, an elevation and

heroism of character, and a warmth and tenderness of affection, such as

is rarely found even in her sex, were among her extraordinary

endowments. I was captivated alike by the beauties of her person, and

the charms of her mind. A mutual attachment was formed between us,

which, at the end of a little more than a year, was consecrated by

marriage. All the happiness I have known in her beloved society, all the

many and exquisite enjoyments which my dear children have afforded me,

even my extraordinary success in my profession, the labors of which, if

my life had not been so cheered and exhilarated, I never could have

undergone--all are to be traced to this trivial cause."

Lady Romilly died on the 29th of October, 1818, and the bereaved husband

was unable to bear up under this terrible loss. The shock occasioned by

her death deprived him of his senses, and in his despair he committed

the fatal act which laid him in the same grave with his devoted wife. In

life they were united, and in death they would not be separated.

Mackintosh married when only a young man in great pecuniary straits. He

was living in the family of Dr. Fraser, London, where Miss Catherine

Stuart, a young Scotch lady, was a frequent visitor. She was

distinguished by a rich fund of good sense, and an affectionate heart,

rather than for her personal attractions. An affection sprang up between

them, and they got privately married at Marylebone Church, on February

18th, 1789, greatly to the offense of the relatives of both parties.

When composing his _Vindiciæ Gallicæ_ at Little Ealing, his wife sat by

him in the room; he could tolerate no one else, and he required her to

be perfectly quiet--not even to write or work--as the slightest movement

disturbed him. In the evening, by way of recreation, he walked out with

his wife, reading to her as he went along. This amiable wife died in

1797, when slowly recovering from the birth of a child, and she left

three daughters behind her. Mackintosh thus spoke of his departed wife,

in a letter to Dr. Parr, written shortly after his sad bereavement, and

we do not remember ever to have met with a more beautiful testimony to a

deceased wife than this is:

"In the state of deep, but quiet melancholy, which has succeeded to the

first violent agitations of my sorrow, my greatest pleasure is to look

back with gratitude and pious affection on the memory of my beloved

wife; and my chief consolation is the soothing recollection of her

virtues. Allow me, in justice to her memory, to tell you what she was,

and what I owed her. I was guided in my choice only by the blind

affection of my youth. I found an intelligent companion and a tender

friend, a prudent monitress, the most faithful of wives, and a mother as

tender as children ever had the misfortune to lose. I met a woman who,

by the tender management of my weaknesses, gradually corrected the most

pernicious of them. She became prudent from affection; and though of the

most generous nature, she was taught frugality and economy by her love

for me. During the most critical period of my life, she preserved order

in my affairs, from the care of which she relieved me. She gently

reclaimed me from dissipation; she propped my weak and irresolute

nature; she urged my indolence to all the exertions that have been

useful and creditable to me; and she was perpetually at hand to admonish

my heedlessness or improvidence. To her I owe whatever I am; to her,

whatever I shall be. In her solicitude for my interest, she never for a

moment forgot my feelings, or my character. Even in her occasional

resentment, for which I but too often gave her cause (would to God I

could recall those moments), she had no sullenness nor acrimony. Her

feelings were warm and impetuous, but she was placable, tender, and

constant. Such was she whom I have lost; and I have lost her when her

excellent natural sense was rapidly improving, after eight years of

struggle and distress had bound us fast together, and moulded our

tempers to each other,--when a knowledge of her worth had refined my

youthful love into friendship, before age had deprived it of much of its

original ardor. I lost her, alas! (the choice of my youth, the partner

of my misfortunes) at a moment when I had the prospect of her sharing my

better days. If I had lost the giddy and thoughtless companion of

prosperity, the world could easily repair the loss; but I have lost the

faithful and tender partner of my misfortunes, and my only consolation

is in that Being, under whose severe, but paternal chastisement, I am

bent down to the ground."

Mackintosh married, about a year after the death of his first wife,

Catherine, the second daughter of John Allen, of Cresselly, Co.

Pembroke. She was an amiable and accomplished woman, and greatly

contributed to his happiness in after life. She died in 1830, at Chêne,

near Geneva, after a short illness; and her husband, speaking of her

afterward, "in the deep sincerity of deliberate conviction," calls her

"an upright and pious woman, formed for devoted affection, who employed

a strong understanding and resolute spirit in unwearied attempts to

relieve every suffering under her view."

CRIME DETECTED.--AN ANECDOTE OF THE PARIS POLICE.

Previously to the year 1789, but at what precise date can not say, the

city of Paris possessed as guardian of its safety, and chief minister of

police, a man of rare talent and integrity. At the same period, the

parish of St. Germais, in the quarter of the Rue St. Antoine, had for

its curé a kind venerable old man, whose whole life was spent in doing

good to both the souls and bodies of his fellow-creatures, and whose

holy consistency and dignified courage caused him to be loved by the

good, and respected by even the most abandoned characters. One cold dark

winter's night, the bell at the old curé's door was rung loudly, and he,

although in bed, immediately arose and opened the door, anticipating a

summons to some sick or dying bed.

A personage, richly dressed, with his features partly concealed by a

large false beard, stood outside. Addressing the curé in a courteous and

graceful manner, he apologized for his unseasonable visit, which, as he

said, the high reputation of monsieur had induced him to make.

"A great and terrible, but necessary and inevitable deed," he continued,

"is to be done. Time presses; a soul about to pass into eternity

implores your ministry. If you come you must allow your eyes to be

bandaged, ask no questions, and consent to act simply as spiritual

consoler of a dying woman. If you refuse to accompany me, no other

priest can be admitted, and her spirit must pass alone."

After a moment of secret prayer, the curé answered, "I will go with

you." Without asking any further explanation, he allowed his eyes to be

bandaged, and leaned on the arm of his suspicious visitor. They both got

into a coach, whose windows were immediately covered by wooden shutters,

and then they drove off rapidly. They seemed to go a long way, and make

many doublings and turnings ere the coach drove under a wide archway and

stopped.

During this time, not a single word had been exchanged between the

travelers, and ere they got out the stranger assured himself that the

bandage over his companion's eyes had not been displaced, and then

taking the old man respectfully by the hand, he assisted him to alight

and to ascend the wide steps of a staircase as far as the second story.

A great door opened, as if of itself, and several thickly-carpeted rooms

were traversed in silence. At length, another door was opened by the

guide, and the curé felt his bandage removed. They were in a

solemn-looking bed-chamber; near a bed, half-vailed by thick damask

curtains, was a small table, supporting two wax lights, which feebly

illuminated the cold death-like apartment. The stranger (he was the Duke

de ----), then bowing to the curé, led him toward the bed, drew back the

curtains, and said in a solemn tone:

"Minister of God, before you is a woman who has betrayed the blood of

her ancestors, and whose doom is irrevocably fixed. She knows on what

conditions an interview with you has been granted her; she knows too

that all supplication would be useless. You know your duty, M. le Curé;

I leave you to fulfill it, and will return to seek you in half an hour."

So saying he departed, and the agitated priest saw lying on the bed a

young and beautiful girl, bathed in tears, battling with despair, and

calling in her bitter agony for the comforts of religion. No

investigation possible! for the unhappy creature declared herself bound

by a terrible oath to conceal her name; besides, she knew not in what

place she was.

"I am," she said, "the victim of a secret family tribunal, whose

sentence is irrevocable! More, I can not tell. I forgive mine enemies,

as I trust that God will forgive me. Pray for me!"

The minister of religion invoked the sublime promises of the gospel to

soothe her troubled soul, and he succeeded. Her countenance, after a

time, became composed, she clasped her hands in fervent prayer, and then

extended them toward her consoler.

As she did so, the curé perceived that the sleeve of her robe was

stained with blood.

"My child," said he, with a trembling voice, "what is this?"

"Father, it is the vein which they have already opened, and the bandage,

no doubt, was carelessly put on."

At these words, a sudden thought struck the priest. He unrolled the

dressing, allowed the blood to flow, steeped his handkerchief in it,

then replaced the bandage, concealed the stained handkerchief within his

vest, and whispered:

"Farewell, my daughter, take courage, and have confidence in God!"

The half-hour had expired, and the step of his terrible conductor was

heard approaching.

"I am ready," said the curé, and having allowed his eyes to be covered,

he took the arm of the Duke de ----, and left the awful room, praying

meanwhile with secret fervor.

Arrived at the foot of the staircase, the old man, succeeded, without

his guide's knowledge, in slightly displacing the thick bandage so as to

admit a partial ray of lamp light. Finding himself in the carriage

gateway, he managed to stumble and fall, with both hands forward toward

a dark corner. The duke hastened to raise him, both resumed their places

in the carriage, and, after repassing through the same tortuous route,

the curé was set down in safety at his own door.

Without one moment's delay, he called his servant.

"Pierre," he said, "arm yourself with a stick, and give me your support;

I must instantly go to the minister of police."

Soon afterward the official gate was opened to admit the well-known

venerable pastor.

"Monseigneur," he said, addressing the minister, "a terrible deed will

speedily be accomplished, if you are not in time to prevent it. Let your

agents visit, before daybreak, every carriage gateway in Paris; in the

inner angle of one of them will be found a blood-stained handkerchief.

The blood is that of a young female, whose murder, already begun, has

been miraculously suspended. Her family have condemned their victim to

have her veins opened one by one, and thus to perish slowly in expiation

of a fault, already more than punished by her mortal agony. Courage, my

friend, you have already some hours. May God assist you--I can only

pray."

That same morning, at eight o'clock, the minister of police entered the

curé's room.

"My friend," said he, "I confess my inferiority, you are able to

instruct me in expedients."

"Saved!" cried the old man, bursting into tears.

"Saved," said the minister, "and rescued from the power of her cruel

relations. But the next time, dear abbé, that you want my assistance in

a benevolent enterprise, I wish you would give me a little more time to

accomplish it."

Within the next twenty-four hours, by an express order from the king,

the Duke de ---- and his accomplices were secretly removed from Paris,

and conveyed out of the kingdom.

The young woman received all the care which her precarious state

required; and when sufficiently recovered, retired to a quiet country

village where the royal protection assured her safety. It is scarcely

needful to say, that next to her Maker, the curé of St. Germais was the

object of her deepest gratitude and filial love. During fifteen years,

the holy man received from time to time the expression of her grateful

affection; and at length, when himself, from extreme old age, on the

brink of the grave, he received the intelligence that she had departed

in peace.

Never until then, had a word of this mysterious adventure passed the

good curé's lips. On his deathbed, however, he confided the recital to a

bishop, one of his particular friends; and from a relation of the

latter, I myself heard it. This is the exact truth.

ZOOLOGICAL STORIES.

Travelers' tales have a peculiar reputation for the marvelous, and many

travelers have been accused of fiction. Whether zoologists' tales are in

all cases to be trusted, we have, now and then, a doubt. They are true

in the main; but sometimes, possibly, the first narrator of an unusually

good story has judiciously abstained from sifting it; and once in the

Zoological Story-book, the pleasant tale has stood on its own merits,

and been handled tenderly, as is the way with ornaments; no man too

roughly scratching at them to find out of what materials they are

composed.

Of course we accept legends _as_ legends. It was once believed of

crocodiles, that, after they had eaten a man comfortably, and left only

his skull, at the sweet kernel of which--the brain--they could not get,

their tears were shed over the bone until they softened it, and so the

skull was opened, and the brain devoured. When that is told us as a

legend, we say, certainly, it was a very quaint thing to believe of the

tears of crocodiles. Then, travelers' tales of the proverbial kind are

next of kin to legends. Here is a very marvelous one, and yet, let us be

bold and say that we believe it. It is this. An Indian, having tamed a

rattlesnake, carried it about in a box with him, and called it his great

father. M. Pinnisance met with him as he was starting for his winter

hunt, and saw him open the box-door and give the snake his liberty,

telling it to be sure and come back to meet him, when he returned to the

same spot next May. It was then October. M. Pinnisance laughed at the

man, who immediately saw his way clearly to a speculation in rum, and

betted two gallons that his snake would keep the appointment. The wager

was made; the second week in May arrived; the Indian and the Frenchman

were on the appointed spot. The great father was absent, and the Indian,

having lost his wager, offered to repeat it, doubled, if the snake did

not return within the next two days. That wager the Frenchman took and

lost. The snake, who (had he speech) might have apologized for being

rather behind his time, appeared, and crawled into his box. We believe

this. Rattlesnakes are teachable; and, in this instance, the keeping of

the appointment seems to us only an apparent wonder. Snakes are not

given to travel in the winter, and the Indian's father, turned out of

the box, made himself snug at no great distance from the place of his

ejectment. Winter over, the Indian came back. His great father may have

been dining heartily, and indisposed to stir; but, as he grew more

brisk, the accustomed invocation of his little son became effectual, and

brought the tame snake to the box as usual.

Disjonval knew a spider (such a spider was a person to know) who

regularly placed himself upon the ceiling over a young lady's head

whenever she played the harp, and followed her if she changed her

position. The celebrated violinist, Berthome (it is our shame never to

have heard of him), when a boy, saw a spider habitually come out to hear

when he was practicing: this creature at last became familiar, and took

a seat upon the desk. Lenz tells of a goose who followed a harp-player

wherever he performed, probably to hiss him out of self-respect. Bingley

tells of a pigeon in the neighborhood of a young lady who played

brilliantly on the harpsichord; the pigeon did not greatly care about

her playing, except when she played the song of "Speri si," from

Handel's opera, Admetus: then it would come and sit by the window,

testifying pleasure; when the song was over, it would fly back to its

dovecote, for it had not learnt the art of clapping wings for an encore.

In the matter of experience, we can believe the story of a dog who

either was _not_ blessed with a love of music, or had a master given to

the perpetration of atrocities against his canine ear; the dog whose

peace was broken by his master's practice on the violin, took every

opportunity to hide the stick. Plutarch's story of the mule we are at

liberty, we hope, to set down in the list of pleasant fables. The mule

laden with salt blundered, by chance, into a stream; on coming out it

found its load to be so agreeably lightened, that it afterward made a

point of taking a bath upon its travels. To cure it of this trick, the

panniers were filled with sponge, and then when the mule came out of the

water with the sponges saturated, it felt a load that it had reason to

remember.

Dr. Pelican saw a party of rats around the bunghole of a cask of wine

dipping their tails in and then licking them. Mr. Jesse tells of rats

who performed a similar feat with an oil-bottle. But this is nothing in

comparison with the acuteness of Degrandpre's monkey. Left with an open

bottle of aniseed brandy, he sucked what he could from it with tongue

and fingers, and then poured sand into the bottle till the rest ran

over. Le Vaillant, the African traveler, had with him dogs and a monkey.

When the monkey was weary he leapt on a dog's back for a ride. One dog

on such occasions quietly stood still. The monkey, fearing to be left

behind, would presently jump off and hasten to the caravan: the dog,

with studious politeness, took good care to give him precedence. An

elephant--we must at once append one tale about the elephant, whose

great sagacity makes him the hero of a thousand and one--an elephant

belonging to an officer in the Bengal army, was left during the long

absence of his master to a keeper; who, as even elephant-ostlers will

do, cheated him of his rations. When the master came back, the poor

half-starved elephant testified the greatest joy, the keeper, in his

master's presence, put, of course, the full allowance of food before the

elephant, who immediately divided it into two parts, one representing

his short commons, which he devoured greedily; the other representing

the amount to which he had been defrauded in his dinners, he left. The

officer of course understood the hint, and the man confessed his breach

of trust.

We must get rid of another story of an elephant; like the last,

perfectly credible. Elephants have more sagacity than dogs, and of dogs

few tales that are current are doubtful. This is the tale of an elephant

in the Jardin des Plantes. A painter used to study from the animals in

the garden, and was minded once to paint the elephant. But of course he

must paint him in an attitude; and even the sagacity of an elephant

failed to understand that the artist wished him to keep his mouth open,

and hold up his trunk. The artist therefore got a little boy, and

intrusted to his care a bag of apples, which he was to throw into the

elephant's mouth one by one, obliging him in this way to keep his trunk

uplifted. "The apples," says Mr. Broderip, "were numerous, but the

painter was not a Landseer, and as he had not the faculty of seizing and

transferring character with Edwin's magical power and rapidity, the task

was tedious. By the master's directions, the boy occasionally deceived

the elephant by a simulated chuck, and thus eked out the supply.

Notwithstanding the just indignation of the balked expectant, his

_gourmandise_ checked his irritable impatience; and, keeping his eye on

the still well-filled bag, he bore the repeated disappointment,

crunching an apple, when it chanced to come, with apparent glee. At

length the last apple was thrown and crunched, the empty bag was laid

aside, and the elephant applied himself to his water-tank as if for the

purpose of washing down his repast. A few more touches would have

completed the picture, when an overwhelming _douche_ from his

well-adjusted trunk obliterated the design, and drenched the discomfited

painter. Having, by this practical application of retributive justice,

executed judgment on the instigator, the elephant, disdaining the boy,

whom he regarded as the mere instrument of wrong, marched proudly round

his inclosure, loudly trumpeting forth his triumph."

We have left that story in the pleasant words of its accomplished

narrator. Mr. Thomson now shall tell us one in his way, which

illustrates the faculty of imitation: "An oran-otan, brought up by Père

Carbasson, became so fond of him, that wherever he went, it always

seemed desirous of accompanying him; whenever, therefore, he had to

perform the service of his church, he was under the necessity of

shutting him up in a room. Once, however, the animal escaped, and

followed the father to the church, where, silently mounting the

sounding-board above the pulpit, he lay perfectly still till the sermon

commenced. He then crept to the edge, and overlooking the preacher,

imitated all his gestures in so grotesque a manner, that the whole

congregation were unavoidably urged to laugh. The father, surprised and

confounded at this ill-timed levity, severely rebuked their inattention.

The reproof failed in its effect; the congregation still laughed, and

the preacher, in the warmth of his zeal, redoubled his vociferations and

actions; these the ape imitated so exactly, that the congregation could

no longer restrain themselves, but burst out into a loud and continued

laughter." Of course a friend stepped up to acquaint the preacher with

the existence of a second person above the sounding-board, co-operating

with him zealously. And of course the culprit was taken out by the

servants of the church with a face expressive of insulted innocence.

There was a dog trained to run on errands for his master, who was

trotting home one evening along a by-road, with a basket containing hot

pies for his master's supper, when two highwaymen dogs burst out upon

him, and while he dogfully fought one, the other burglariously broke

into his basket. The dog who was waylaid saw instantly that fighting

would not save the pies; the pies must go, and it resolved itself into a

question who should eat them. He at once gave up his contest with the

adversary; if the pies were to be eaten--among dogs, at least--his right

was the best, so he immediately darted on the basket and devoured all

that remained.

A story of an elephant again comes to the surface. At Macassar, an

elephant-driver had a cocoa-nut given him, which he wantonly struck

twice against the elephant's forehead to break it. The next day, they

were passing by some cocoa-nuts in the street exposed for sale. The

elephant took up one, and began to knock it on the driver's head; the

result, unhappily, was fatal. Elephants commonly discriminate so well,

as to apportion punishment to the offense against them: they are

considerate, merciful, and magnanimous. Another story of an elephant, we

think, occurs in one of Mr. Broderip's books. A visitor to an elephant

at a fair, having given to him one by one a number of good ginger-bread

nuts, thought it a good joke to end by giving him at once a bag full of

the hottest kind. The elephant, distressed with pain, took bucket-full

after bucket-full of water, and the joker, warned of his danger, had

barely escaped over the threshold before the bucket was flung violently

after his departing figure. A year afterward, the foolish fellow came

again, with gingerbread in one pocket and hot spice in the other. He

began with his donations of gingerbread, and then modestly substituted

one hot nut. The moment it was tasted by the elephant, the offender was

remembered, and caught up into the air by his clothes; his weight tore

them, and he fell, leaving the elephant his tails and some part of his

trousers. The animal putting them on the floor set his foot upon them,

and having deliberately picked out of the pockets and eaten all the

gingerbread that he considered orthodox, he trod upon the rest, and

threw the tails away.

The Cape baboons appear to have a tact for battle, like the Caffres.

Lieutenant Shipp headed twenty men, to recapture sundry coats and

trowsers stolen by a Cape baboon. He made a circuit, to cut off the

marauders from their caverns; they observed him, and detaching a small

troop, to guard the entrance, kept their posts. They could be seen

collecting large stones, under the active superintendence of an old

gray-headed baboon, who appeared to be issuing his orders as a general.

The soldiers rushed to the attack, when down came an avalanche of

enormous stones, and Britons left baboons the masters of the situation.

Of monkey-tricks, the Indians have an amusing fable. A man went on a

journey with a monkey and a goat, and he took with him, for his

refreshment, rice and curds. Arrived at a tank, the man resolved to

bathe and dine. While he was in his bath, the monkey ate his dinner,

and, having wiped his mouth and paws on the goat's beard, he left the

goat to settle his account. When the man came out of the bath, and found

his dinner gone, it was quite easy to see, by the goat's beard, who had

stolen it.

The monkey was no ass. The sense of asses is not rated very high; but

that is a mistake about them. They are shrewder people than we take them

for, and kind-hearted as well. A poor higgler, living near Hawick, had

an ass for his only companion and partner in the business. The higgler

being palsied, was accustomed to assist himself often upon the road, by

holding to the ass's tail. Once, on their travels, during a severe

winter, man and ass were plunged into a snow-wreath, near Rule Water.

After a hard struggle, the ass got out; but, knowing that his helpless

master was still buried, he made his way to him, and placed himself so

that his tail lay ready to his partner's hand. The higgler grasped it,

and was dragged out to a place of safety. Zoologically speaking, it

ought not to be thought disrespectful in a man to call his friend "an

ass."

Elephants, again. They show their good taste, and are very fond of

children. Dr. Darwin says: The keeper of an elephant, in his journey in

India, sometimes leaves him fixed to the ground by a length of chain,

while he goes into the woods to collect food for him; and, by way of

reciprocal attention, asks the elephant to mind his child--a child

unable to walk--while he is gone. The animal defends it; lets it creep

about his legs; and, when it creeps to the extremity of the chain, he

gently wraps his trunk about the infant's body, and brings it again into

the middle of the circle.

And now we can not clear our minds of elephants without unburthening a

story, which we have from a tale-teller with Indian experience, and

which we imagine to be now first told in print. It causes us to feel

that in a Parliament of animals, elephants would have divided in favor

of a ten-hours' bill. There was a large ship's rudder to be floated; men

were busy about it one evening, when a file of elephants were passing,

on the way home from work, and it was proposed and carried that an

elephant might as well save them their pains, and push the thing into

the water for them. So an elephant was brought, and put his head down,

and appeared to push with might, but not a beam stirred. Another was

brought to help him, with the same result; and finally, as many

elephants as the rudder would allow, seemed to be busy and did nothing.

So the elephants went home. They had struck, and declined working but of

business hours: Next morning, on the way to work, one elephant was again

brought, and pushed the rudder down into the water, almost as a man

might push a walking-stick.

Stories illustrative of the kindness, gratitude, and kindred feelings of

which animals are capable, have no end; one follows on another; for in

fact, the animals, bird, beast, and fish, are all good fellows, if you

come to know them properly. A rat tamed by a prisoner at Genf slept in

his bosom. Punished for some fault, it ran away, but its anger or its

fear died and its love lived on: in a month it returned. The prisoner

was released, and in the joy of liberty it did not come into his mind to

take his old companion with him. The rat coiled itself up in some old

clothes left by his friend, all that was left of him, abstained from

food, and died in three days.

A surgeon at Dover saw in the streets a wounded terrier, and like a true

man took it home with him, cured it in two days, and let it go. The

terrier ran home, resolved to pay the doctor by installments. For many

succeeding weeks he paid a daily visit to the surgery, wagged his tail

violently for some minutes and departed. Tailwagging is dog's money, and

when this dog thought that he had paid in his own coin a proper doctor's

bill, the daily visit to the surgery was discontinued.

AN EPISODE OF THE ITALIAN REVOLUTION.

During my residence at London in the early part of 1848, I became

acquainted with Count ---- and his friend Del Uomo, both Italians. They

had settled at London about two years previously, and were remarkable

for the strength of attachment subsisting between them. I believe it was

four years since they had left Lombardy, and they had clung together in

exile closer than brothers. Del Uomo was several years the senior. His

age might be about thirty; and a nobler looking Italian I never met

with. There was a majesty in his fine manly form, and a dignity in his

bearing, that impressed every body at first sight. His countenance was

peculiarly handsome, yet shaded with an expression of habitual

melancholy. His piercing black eyes, and long black hair, and flowing

beard, added to the interest of his aspect. His influence over his young

companion was most extraordinary. Count ---- regarded him as friend,

brother, father. Whatever Del Uomo did or said was right in his eyes;

and yet on the vital subject of religion the two were diametrically

opposed.

At the time in question, Italy was in a flame of war, and refugee

Italians were hurrying from all parts of the world to fight in what they

deemed a righteous cause. For reasons not necessary to be named, Count

---- could not himself join his fellow-patriots; but his pen and his

purse were devoted to the cause. Del Uomo, however, at once prepared to

leave for the seat of war. "I have a father, mother, and sisters," said

he, "who are exposed to all the horrors of war, and for them, as well as

for my poor bleeding country, my sword must be drawn." His friend was

almost heartbroken to part with him, but there was no alternative. Well

do I remember the morning when Del Uomo left London. Numbers of Italians

assembled to bid him farewell, and the parting scene was deeply

affecting. When I myself wrung his hand, and bade God speed him, I felt

the subtle involuntary presentiment that he would be shot, and mentioned

it to my friends at the time. Little, however, did I think in what

manner he would meet his end.

Many months rolled on, with varying success to the arms of Italy. I

frequently heard tidings of Del Uomo from his friend. The gallant fellow

had obtained a commission in a regiment of cavalry, and was said to have

distinguished himself in every action. Ere the close of the campaign,

his regiment was almost annihilated, but he himself escaped, I believe,

without a wound. Austria triumphed, and Italy was bound in chains

heavier than ever.

One morning, Count ---- received a parcel of letters from Italy, the

perusal of which threw him into a state of distraction. It was two or

three days ere I learned their full import--detailing the following

intelligence of the betrayal of Del Uomo to his enemies, and his cruel

death.

The parents and family of Del Uomo remained in Lombardy--he himself

being in security in some other part of Italy. He was seized with an

intense desire to see them once more, and at all hazards determined to

indulge in this natural yearning. He had fought openly and manfully

against the Austrians, and, however merciless they might be, he did not

think they would have sufficient colorable excuse to put him to death,

even if he were recognized and seized. Probably he was correct in this,

but he had not reckoned on the depths of perfidy to which they would

descend.

Hardly had he set foot in the Lombard territory, ere he was recognized

by a creature of Austria, who instantly planned his destruction.

Accosting Del Uomo, this spy inquired whether he were not about to visit

such a town? (I believe, the very town where his parents dwelt.) The

unsuspicious fellow replied in the affirmative. "Then," said the other,

"would you do me the favor to deliver this letter to a friend of mine,

there resident? I have no other opportunity to send it, and shall be

infinitely obliged." Del Uomo, with his usual kindliness of disposition,

instantly consented, and put the letter into his pocket, without even

looking at the superscription. From that moment his doom was sealed, and

he went as a victim to the slaughter.

No sooner had he embraced his family than the bloodhounds of Austria

were on his track, and to his amazement, he was seized, and accused of

being engaged in a traitorous design. He indignantly denied it. "I

fought in open battle against you, man to man, sword to sword," replied

he; "but the war is over, and never since have I done aught against

Austria." He was searched, and the letter given him to deliver found in

his pocket. It was opened, and proved to be a treasonable correspondence

addressed to one known as a conspirator. Vain all explanation of the

manner in which it came into his possession--vain all the frantic

prayers for mercy by his agonized family. The ruthless Austrians only

required a fair-seeming pretext to put so distinguished an enemy to

death, and here it was. Whether the general in command did or did not

believe Del Uomo guilty, admits of some doubt; but that mattered not, so

far as his doom was concerned. Little respite--no mercy. He was

condemned to be shot on the spot. The priest, his confessor, was so

satisfied of his innocency, that he even knelt to the Austrian general,

imploring pardon, or at least a respite till the truth could be

investigated; but the general only answered, "He dies!"

Del Uomo behaved like a Christian and a hero. He prayed fervently to God

to receive his soul. Death he feared not in itself, but the bitterness

of such a death as this to his poor family was indeed an awful trial. He

was led out to the fatal spot, and there he embraced his relatives for

the last time. He gave his watch to his father, his handkerchief to a

sister, and bequeathed other little mementoes to his friends. His poor

mother swooned away, but his father and one or two sisters stood by him

till all was over. They offered to bind his eyes, but he refused. "No,"

said he, "I am not afraid to look upon death. I will enter eternity with

open eyes." And he looked his farewell at his friends, at the glorious

orb of day, at the landscape, at the soil of Italy, so soon to be

watered with his blood; then he drew himself to his full height, bared

his breast, and, with flashing eyes, cried, "Fire, soldiers! Long live

Italy!" Nine balls pierced him, and he ceased to breathe. Peace to the

memory of Del Uomo!

THE MIGHTY MAGICIAN.

He stood upon the summit of a mount,

Waving a wand above his head uplifted;

And smote the ground, whence gushed, as from a fount,

A sparkling stream, with magic virtues gifted.

It fill'd the air with music as it leapt,

Merrily bounding over hill and hollow;

And swiftly to the distant plain it swept,

Gurgling a challenge to the birds to follow.

Onward and onward, parting as it ran

A thousand streamlets from the parent river,

It roll'd among the farthest haunts of man,

Wooing the sunlight on its breast to quiver

Where'er it flow'd, it fed the desert earth

With wholesome aliment, its seeds to nourish;

Quickening its treasures into rapid birth,

And bidding golden harvests spring and flourish.

Fair thriving cities rising on its banks,

Gather'd the noble, and enrich'd the humble;

Throng'd with the happy in their various ranks,

They rear'd proud domes that ages scarce could crumble

The Great Magician from his lofty height

Beheld the world, with boundless plenty teeming,

And his eye kindled with a sense of might,

Proudly, yet softly, at the prospect gleaming.

"I've wrought," he cried, "rich blessings for mankind

I've thrill'd with happiness the hearts of mourners;

And Fame will waft upon her wings of wind

The deeds of PEACE to earth's remotest corners!"

TWO KINDS OF HONESTY.

Some few years ago, there resided in Long Acre an eccentric old Jew,

named Jacob Benjamin: he kept a seed shop, in which he likewise carried

on--not a common thing, we believe, in London--the sale of meal, and had

risen from the lowest dregs of poverty, by industry and self-denial,

till he grew to be an affluent tradesman. He was, indeed, a rich man;

for as he had neither wife nor child to spend his money, nor kith nor

kin to borrow it of him, he had a great deal more than he knew what to

do with. Lavish it on himself he could not, for his early habits stuck

to him, and his wants were few. He was always clean and decent in his

dress, but he had no taste for elegance or splendor in any form, nor had

even the pleasures of the table any charms for him; so that, though he

was no miser, his money kept on accumulating, while it occurred to him

now and then to wonder what he should do with it hereafter. One would

think he need not have wondered long, when there were so many people

suffering from the want of what he abounded in; but Mr. Benjamin, honest

man, had his crotchets like other folks. In the first place, he had less

sympathy with poverty than might have been expected, considering how

poor he had once been himself; but he had a theory, just in the main,

though by no means without its exceptions--that the indigent have

generally themselves to thank for their privations. Judging from his own

experience, he believed that there was bread for every body that would

take the trouble of earning it; and as he had had little difficulty in

resisting temptation himself, and was not philosopher enough to allow

for the varieties of human character, he had small compassion for those

who injured their prospects by yielding to it. Then he had found, on

more than one occasion, that even to the apparently well-doing,

assistance was not always serviceable. Endeavor was relaxed, and

gratuities, once received, were looked for again. Doubtless, part of

this evil result was to be sought in Mr. Benjamin's own defective mode

of proceeding; but I repeat, he was no philosopher, and in matters of

this sort he did not see much farther than his nose, which was, however,

a very long one.

To public charities he sometimes subscribed liberally; but his hand was

frequently withheld by a doubt regarding the judicious expenditure of

the funds, and this doubt was especially fortified after chancing to see

one day, as he was passing the Crown and Anchor Tavern, a concourse of

gentlemen turn out, with very flushed faces, who had been dining

together for the benefit of some savages in the Southern Pacific Ocean,

accused of devouring human flesh--a practice so abhorrent to Mr.

Benjamin, that he had subscribed for their conversion. But failing to

perceive the connection betwixt the dinner and that desirable

consummation, his name appeared henceforth less frequently in printed

lists, and he felt more uncertain than before as to what branch of

unknown posterity he should bequeath his fortune.

In the mean time, he kept on the even tenor of his way, standing behind

his counter, and serving his customers, assisted by a young woman called

Leah Leet, who acted as his shop-woman, and in whom, on the whole, he

felt more interest than in any body else in the world, insomuch that it

even sometimes glanced across his mind, whether he should not make her

the heiress of all his wealth. He never, however, gave her the least

reason to expect such a thing, being himself incapable of conceiving

that, if he entertained the notion, he ought to prepare her by education

for the good fortune that awaited her. But he neither perceived this

necessity, nor, if he had, would he have liked to lose the services of a

person he had been so long accustomed to.

At length, one day a new idea struck him. He had been reading the story

of his namesake, Benjamin, in the Old Testament, and the question

occurred to him, how many among his purchasers of the poorer class--and

all who came to his shop personally were of that class--would bring back

a piece of money they might find among their meal, and he thought he

should like to try a few of them that were his regular customers. The

experiment would amuse his mind, and the money he might lose by it he

did not care for. So he began with shillings, slipping one among the

flour before he handed it to the purchaser. But the shillings never came

back--perhaps people did not think so small a sum worth returning; so he

went on to half-crowns and crowns, and now and then, in very particular

cases, he even ventured a guinea; but it was always with the same luck,

and the longer he tried, the more he distrusted there being any honesty

in the world, and the more disposed he felt to leave all his money to

Leah Leet, who had lived with him so long, and to his belief, had never

wronged him of a penny.

"What's this you have put into the gruel, Mary?" said a pale,

sickly-looking man, one evening, taking something out of his mouth,

which he held toward the feeble gleams emitted by a farthing rush-light

standing on the mantle-piece.

"What is it, father?" inquired a young girl, approaching him. "Isn't the

gruel good?"

"It's good enough," replied the man; "but here's something in it: it's a

shilling, I believe."

"It's a guinea, I declare!" exclaimed the girl, as she took the coin

from him and examined it nearer the light.

"A guinea!" repeated the man; "well, that's the first bit of luck I've

had these seven years or more. It never could have come when we wanted

it worse. Show it us here, Mary."

"But it's not ours, father," said Mary. "I paid away the last shilling

we had for the meal, and here's the change."

"God has sent it us, girl! He saw our distress, and He sent it us in His

mercy!" said the man, grasping the piece of gold with his thin, bony

fingers.

"It must be Mr. Benjamin's," returned she. "He must have dropped it

into the meal-tub that stands by the counter."

"How do you know that?" inquired the man with an impatient tone and a

half-angry glance. "How can you tell how it came into the gruel? Perhaps

it was lying at the bottom of the basin, or at the bottom of the

sauce-pan. Most likely it was."

"Oh, no, father," said Mary: "it is long since we had a guinea."

"A guinea that we knew of; but I've had plenty in my time, and how do

you know this is not one we had overlooked?"

"We've wanted a guinea too much to overlook one," answered she. "But

never mind, father; eat your gruel, and don't think of it: your cheeks

are getting quite red with talking so, and you won't be able to sleep

when you go to bed."

"I don't expect to sleep," said the man, peevishly; "I never do sleep."

"I think you will, after that nice gruel!" said Mary, throwing her arms

round his neck, and tenderly kissing his cheek.

"And a guinea in it to give it a relish, too!" returned the father, with

a faint smile and an expression of archness, betokening an inner nature

very different from the exterior which sorrow and poverty had encrusted

on it.

His daughter then proposed that he should go to bed; and having assisted

him to undress, and arranged her little household matters, she retired

behind a tattered, drab-colored curtain which shaded her own mattress,

and laid herself down to rest.

The apartment in which this little scene occurred, was in the attic

story of a mean house, situated in one of the narrow courts or alleys

betwixt the Strand and Drury-lane. The furniture it contained was of the

poorest description; the cracked window-panes were coated with dust; and

the scanty fire in the grate, although the evening was cold enough to

make a large one desirable--all combined to testify to the poverty of

the inhabitants. It was a sorry retreat for declining years and

sickness, and a sad and cheerless home for the fresh cheek and glad

hopes of youth; and all the worse, that neither father nor daughter was

"to the manner born;" for poor John Glegg had, as he said, had plenty of

guineas in his time; at least, what should have been plenty, had they

been wisely husbanded. But John, to describe the thing as he saw it

himself, had always "had luck against him." It did not signify what he

undertook, his undertakings invariably turned out ill.

He was born in Scotland, and had passed a great portion of his life

there; but, unfortunately for him, he had no Scotch blood in his veins,

or he might have been blessed with some small modicum of the caution for

which that nation is said to be distinguished. His father had been a

cooper, and when quite a young man, John had succeeded to a

well-established business in Aberdeen. His principal commerce consisted

in furnishing the retail-dealers with casks, wherein to pack their dried

fish; but partly from good-nature, and partly from indolence, he

allowed them to run such long accounts, that they were apt to overlook

the debt altogether in their calculations, and to take refuge in

bankruptcy when the demand was pressed and the supply of goods

withheld--his negligence thus proving, in its results, as injurious to

them as to himself. Five hundred pounds embarked in a scheme projected

by a too sanguine friend, for establishing a local newspaper, which

"died ere it was born;" and a fire, occurring at a time that John had

omitted to renew his insurance, had seriously damaged his resources,

when some matter of business having taken him to the Isle of Man, he was

agreeably surprised to find that his branch of trade, which had of late

years been alarmingly declining in Aberdeen, was there in the most

flourishing condition. Delighted with the prospect this state of affairs

opened, and eager to quit the spot where misfortune had so unrelentingly

pursued him, John, having first secured a house at Ramsay, returned to

fetch his wife, children, and merchandise, to this new home. Having

freighted a small vessel for their conveyance, he expected to be

deposited at his own door; but he had unhappily forgotten to ascertain

the character of the captain, who, under pretense that, if he entered

the harbor, he should probably be wind-bound for several weeks,

persuaded them to go ashore in a small boat, promising to lie-to till

they had landed their goods; but the boat had no sooner returned to the

ship, than, spreading his sails to the wind, he was soon out of sight,

leaving John and his family on the beach, with--to recur to his own

phraseology--"nothing but what they stood up in."

Having with some difficulty found shelter for the night, they proceeded

on the following morning in a boat to Ramsay; but here it was found

that, owing to some informality, the people who had possession of the

house refused to give it up, and the wanderers were obliged to take

refuge in an inn. The next thing was to pursue, and recover the lost

goods; but some weeks elapsed before an opportunity of doing so could be

found; and at length, when John did reach Liverpool, the captain had

left it, carrying away with him a considerable share of the property.

With the remainder, John, after many expenses and delays, returned to

the island, and resumed his business. But he soon discovered to his

cost, that the calculations he had made were quite fallacious, owing to

his having neglected to inquire whether the late prosperous season had

been a normal or an exceptional one. Unfortunately, it was the latter;

and several very unfavorable ones that succeeded reduced the family to

great distress, and finally to utter ruin.

Relinquishing his shop and his goods to his creditors, John Glegg,

heart-sick and weary, sought a refuge in London--a proceeding to which

he was urged by no prudential motives, but rather by the desire to fly

as far as possible from the scenes of his vexations and disappointments,

and because he had heard that the metropolis was a place in which a man

might conceal his poverty, and suffer and starve at his ease,

untroubled by impertinent curiosity or officious benevolence; and, above

all, believing it to be the spot where he was least likely to fall in

with any of his former acquaintance.

But here a new calamity awaited him, worse than all the rest. A fever

broke out in the closely-populated neighborhood in which they had fixed

their abode, and first two of his three children took it, and died; and

then himself and his wife--rendered meet subjects for infection by

anxiety of mind and poor living--were attacked with the disease. He

recovered; at least he survived, though with an enfeebled constitution,

but he lost his wife, a wise and patient woman, who had been his

comforter and sustainer through all his misfortunes--misfortunes which,

after vainly endeavoring to avert, she supported with heroic and

uncomplaining fortitude; but dying, she left him a precious legacy in

Mary, who, with a fine nature, and the benefit of her mother's precept

and example, had been to him ever since a treasure of filial duty and

tenderness.

A faint light dawned through the dirty window on the morning succeeding

the little event with which we opened our story, when Mary rose softly

from her humble couch, and stepping lightly to where her father's

clothes lay on a chair, at the foot of his bed, she put her hand into

his waistcoat-pocket, and, extracting therefrom the guinea which had

been found in the gruel the preceding evening, she transferred it to her

own. She then dressed herself, and having ascertained that her father

still slept, she quietly left the room. The hour was yet so early, and

the streets so deserted, that Mary almost trembled to find herself in

them alone; but she was anxious to do what she considered her duty

without the pain of contention. John Glegg was naturally an honest and

well-intentioned man, but the weakness that had blasted his life adhered

to him still. They were doubtless in terrible need of the guinea, and

since it was not by any means certain that the real owner would be

found, he saw no great harm in appropriating it; but Mary wasted no

casuistry on the matter. That the money was not legitimately theirs, and

that they had no right to retain it, was all she saw; and so seeing, she

acted unhesitatingly on her convictions.

She had bought the meal at Mr. Benjamin's, because her father complained

of the quality of that she procured in the smaller shops, and on this

occasion he had served her himself. From the earliness of the hour,

however, though the shop was open, he was not in it when she arrived on

her errand of restitution; but addressing Leah Leet, who was dusting the

counter, she mentioned the circumstance, and tendered the guinea; which

the other took and dropped into the till, without acknowledgment or

remark. Now Mary had not restored the money with any view to praise or

reward: the thought of either had not occurred to her; but she was,

nevertheless, pained by the dry, cold, thankless manner with which the

restitution was accepted, and she felt that a little civility would not

have been out of place on such an occasion.

She was thinking of this on her way back, when she observed Mr. Benjamin

on the opposite side of the street. The fact was, that he did not sleep

at the shop, but in one of the suburbs of the metropolis, and he was now

proceeding from his residence to Long Acre. When he caught her eye, he

was standing still on the pavement, and looking, as it appeared, at her,

so she dropped him a courtesy, and walked forward; while the old man

said to himself: "That's the girl that got the guinea in her meal

yesterday. I wonder if she has been to return it!"

It was Mary's pure, innocent, but dejected countenance, that had induced

him to make her the subject of one of his most costly experiments. He

thought if there was such a thing as honesty in the world, that it would

find a fit refuge in that young bosom; and the early hour, and the

direction in which she was coming, led him to hope that he might sing

_Eureka_ at last. When he entered the shop, Leah stood behind the

counter, as usual, looking very staid and demure; but all she said was,

"Good-morning;" and when he inquired if any body had been there, she

quietly answered: "No; nobody."

Mr. Benjamin was confirmed in his axiom; but he consoled himself with

the idea, that as the girl was doubtless very poor, the guinea might be

of some use to her. In the mean time, Mary was boiling the gruel for her

father's breakfast, the only food she could afford him, till she got a

few shillings that were owing to her for needle-work.

"Well, father, dear, how are you this morning?"

"I scarce know, Mary. I've been dreaming, and it was so like reality,

that I can hardly believe yet it was a dream;" and his eyes wandered

over the room, as if looking for something.

"What is it, father? Do you want your breakfast? It will be ready in

five minutes."

"I've been dreaming of a roast fowl and a glass of Scotch ale, Mary. I

thought you came in with the fowl, and a bottle in your hand, and said:

'See, father, this is what I've bought with the guinea we found in the

meal!'"

"But I couldn't do that, father, you know. It wouldn't have been honest

to spend other people's money."

"Nonsense!" answered John. "Whose money is it, I should like to know?

What belongs to no one, we may as well claim as any body else."

"But it must belong to somebody; and, as I knew it was not ours, I've

carried it back to Mr. Benjamin."

"You have?" said Glegg, sitting up in bed.

"Yes, I have, father. Don't be angry. I'm sure you won't when you think

better of it."