CHAPTER I.

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BLACKWOOD'S EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.

NO. CCCLXIV. FEBRUARY, 1846. VOL. LIX.

CONTENTS.

SERVIA AND THE "SERVIAN QUESTION," 129

THE STUDENT OF SALAMANCA. PART IV., 149

SOMETHING MORE ABOUT MUSIC, 169

MARTHA BROWN, 184

MARLBOROUGH. NO. III., 195

RECOLLECTIONS OF A LOVER OF SOCIETY, 215

IT'S ALL FOR THE BEST, 231

A PEEP INTO THE WHIG PENNY POST-BAG, 247

EAST AND WEST, 248

AN APOLOGY FOR A REVIEW, 249

EDINBURGH:

WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, 45, GEORGE STREET;

AND 37, PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON.

_To whom all Communications (post paid) must be addressed._

SOLD BY ALL THE BOOKSELLERS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM.

* * * * *

PRINTED BY BALLANTYNE AND HUGHES, EDINBURGH.

BLACKWOOD'S

EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.

NO. CCCLXIV. FEBRUARY, 1846. VOL. LIX.

SERVIA AND THE "SERVIAN QUESTION."

The principality of Servia was, a few years since, scarcely known to the

English public except as an obscure province of the Ottoman empire, into

which few travellers had penetrated; and of the population, internal

resources, &c., of which, little information existed, and little

curiosity was felt. But the singular political drama of which it has

lately been the theatre, and the patriotic resolution by which its

people, though deprived of support from their legitimate suzerain, the

Sultan, menaced by the power of Russia, and abandoned to their fate by

the other great powers of Europe, have yet succeeded in establishing

their independence, and maintaining in his place the ruler whom they had

chosen, has invested Servia with a degree of interest in the eyes of

Europe, which gives value to whatever tends to dispel our ignorance of a

country, which, by the new position it has assumed, has shown good title

to take rank as "the youngest member of the European family." A work,

therefore, which should give the same clear insight, even to a limited

extent, into the present condition and future prospects of Servia, as

was given some years since in regard to Hungary and Transylvania, by the

well-known volumes of Mr Paget, would at this time be a valuable

addition to our literature; but we are compelled to say, that this

desideratum is far from being adequately supplied by the publication now

before us. The author's descriptive powers are by no means of a high

order;--mountain and valley, castle and river, pass before us, in his

pages, without any definite impression being produced of their features

or scenery; and while page after page is filled with criticisms of the

accommodations and _cuisine_ at his different halting-places, and

verbatim reports of dialogues, on trivial subjects, between _Author_, on

the one part, and _Renegade_, _Cadi_, _Dervish_, _President_, and other

_dramatis personae_, on the other, we look in vain for that extent and

accuracy of information which we might have expected from a traveller

who has enjoyed more than ordinary opportunities of mixing familiarly

with Servians of all ranks and degrees, from the prince to the peasant

and making himself acquainted with their feelings and national

character. The deficiency of political information would appear even

more remarkable. Though the author was personally acquainted with M.

Petronevich, one of the leaders of the National party, whom he visited

in his exile at Widdin; and though he was subsequently resident at

Belgrade for some time after the restoration of this able minister and

his colleague, M. Wucicz, to their country, scarcely an allusion escapes

him throughout, to the political movements which led either to their

banishment or their recall. As various circumstances and expressions,

however, lead us to suppose that Mr Paton's tour may have had reference

to objects which do not appear on the surface of the narrative, this

mysterious silence may not be without good reasons; and we shall deal

with him, accordingly, simply as a traveller in a hitherto untrodden

track, which we hope, erelong, to see more fully explored. Mr Paget, we

believe, is now a naturalized denizen of Transylvania: cannot he find

leisure for an excursion across the Save?

Mr Paton announces himself, in the title-page, as the author of a work

entitled "The Modern Syrians," with which it has not been our good

fortune to meet; but from the conclusion of which we presume the thread

of the present narrative is to be taken up, as he presents himself,

_sans ceremonie_, on the pier of Beyrout, preparing to embark on board

an Austrian steamer for Constantinople:--"I have been four years in the

East, and feel that I have had quite enough of it for the present." On

the third day they touched at Rhodes, "a perfectly preserved city and

fortress of the middle ages, with every variety of mediaeval

battlement--so perfect is the illusion, that one wonders the warder's

horn should be mute, and the walls devoid of bowman, knight, and

squire." Though these ancient bulwarks of Christendom, within which the

White-Cross chivalry, under d'Aubusson and L'Isle-Adam, so long

withstood the might of the Osmanli, are thus briefly dismissed, Mr Paton

immediately after devotes five pages to some choice flowers of

Transatlantic rhetoric, culled from the small-talk of one of his

fellow-passengers, whom he calls "an American Presbyterian

_clergyman_"--though we grievously suspect him to have been a boatswain,

who had jumped from the forecastle to the pulpit by one of those

free-and-easy transitions not unusual in the "free and enlightened

republic." At Smyrna, he signalized his return to the "land of the

Franks," (which we had always imagined to be Europe,) by ordering a

beefsteak and a bottle of porter, and bespeaking the paper of a

Manchester traveller in drab leggings--and we at last find him safe in

Constantinople. For all that concerns the city of the Sultan, he

contents himself with referring his readers to the volumes of Mr

White--and certainly they could not have been left in better hands; and

so, "after a week of delightful repose," during which he was greatly

indebted to the hospitality of the embassy, "I embarked on board a

steamer, skirted the western coast of the Black Sea, and landed on the

following morning in Varna."

We may pass over the "delightfully keen impressions" which Mr Paton

records as produced by the contrast between the shores of Bulgaria and

the Syrian climes he had lately left; the practical result of which was,

that "a rattling blast from the Black Sea, more welcome than all the

balmy spices of Arabia," made it advisable to don a pea-jacket! The

fortifications of Varna, we are informed, were thoroughly repaired in

1843; "and from Varna to Roustchouk is three days' journey--the latter

half of the road being agreeably diversified with wood, corn, and

pasture, and many of the fields enclosed." A reference to the map will

show that this "agreeably diversified" road passes under the famous

lines of Shumla, and through many fields of fierce and stubborn fight

between Turk and Russ, in the days before the Sultan was delivered over

by his allies to his enemy, on the faith of a _military_ report from a

man who had never seen a regiment of regular troops under arms![1]--but

Mr Paton appears to consider such matters as exclusively the province

of _militaires_, and passes on at once to Roustchouk, which he found "a

fortress of vast extent; but, as it is commanded by the heights from

which I was descending, it appeared to want strength if approached from

the south. The ramparts were built with great solidity; but rusty old

dismounted cannon, obliterated embrasures, and palisades rotten from

exposure to the weather, showed that to stand a siege it must undergo a

considerable repair." Several days were devoted to a general

reconnoissance of the place; but the result was not satisfactory--"I

must say that Roustchouk pleased me less than any town of its size I had

seen in the East. The streets are dirty and badly paved, without a

single good bazar or cafe to kill time in, or a single respectable

edifice of any description to look at." A dinner with a Bulgarian family

led us to expect some details of domestic economy; but, in place of

this, we are regaled with the bad French of a hybrid Frank, who assured

_Author_ that Bukarest was equal to Paris or London; and when forced to

admit that he had never seen either of those capitals, covered his

retreat by maintaining that it was at least far superior to Galate and

Braila! Hearing, however, that the Defterdar, an Egyptian Turk, had

resided many years in England, and spole English fluently, Mr Paton

sought an interview; and after "taking a series of short and rapid

whiffs from my pipe," while considering the best way of breaking the

ice, opened his battery by telling the Defterdar, "that few Orientals

could draw a distinction between politics and geography; but that with a

man of his calibre and experience I was safe from misconstruction--that

I was collecting materials for a work on the Danubian provinces, and

that for any information which he might give me, consistently with his

official position, I should feel much indebted, as I thought I was least

likely to be misunderstood by stating clearly the object of ny journey,

while information derived from the fountain-head was most valuable. The

Defterdar, after commending my openness, said, 'I suspect that you will

find very little to remark in the pashalik of Silistria. It is an

agricultural country, and the majority of the inhabitants are Turks. The

Rayahs are very peaceable, and pay few taxes, considering the

agricultural wealth of the country. You may rest assured that there is

not a province of the empire better governed than the pashalik of

Silistria. We have no malcontents within the province; but there are a

few Hetarist scoundrels at Braila, who wish to disturb the tranquillity

of Bulgaria; but the Walachian government has taken measures to prevent

them from carrying their projects into execution.'"

Having thus put his readers in possession of this full, true, and

particular account, derived from exclusive official sources, of all that

is to be learned of the pashalik of Silistria, we next find Mr Paton,

after two days steaming on the Danube, at Widdin, where the exiled

Servian minister, M. Petronovich, was then resident, under the

protection of the Pasha, whose name is known to all the world as the

destroyer of the Janissaries and the defender of Shumla, the once

formidable Hussein. To this redoubted personage, now apparently verging

on eighty, Mr Paton was introduced by M. Petronevich at an evening

audience, it being contrary to etiquette to receive visits by day during

the Ramadan--and found him "sitting in the corner of the divan at his

ease, being afflicted with gout, in the old ample Turkish costume. The

white beard, the dress of the Pasha, the rich but faded carpet, the roof

of elaborate but dingy wooden arabesque, were all in perfect keeping;

and the dubious light of two thick wax candles rising two or three feet

from the floor, but seemed to bring out the picture, which carried me a

generation back to the pashas of the old school." Hussein has since

retired from his government, to enjoy the immense fortune which he has

accumulated by commercial speculations--the last specimen of the

"malignant and turbaned Turk" of former days, whose war shout was heard

under the walls of Vienna; and who will now be replaced by a

smooth-faced hybrid in fez and frock-coat, waging a paper war with the

ambassadors of the _protecting_ powers in defence of the few sovereign

rights still permitted to the Porte--such is the Pasha of the present

day! The town of Widdin found even less favour in our traveller's eyes

than Roustchouk. "Lying so nicely on the bank of the Danube, which here

makes such beautiful curves, and marked on the map with capital letters,

it ought (such was my notion) to be a place having at least one

well-built and well-stocked bazar, a handsome seraglio, and some

good-looking mosques. Nothing of the sort;"--and thus, sorely

disappointed in his reasonable expectations, he proceeded on his way in

a car drawn by two horses, which in six hours brought him to the banks

of the Timok, the river which separates Servia from Bulgaria. The

Servian population, among whom he now first found himself, struck him as

a superior race, both physically and morally, compared with those whom

he had just left, possessing a manliness of address and demeanour

unknown to the serfs of Bulgaria; and, instead of the woolly caps and

frieze clothes of the latter, the peasants wore the red fez, and were

generally dressed in blue cloth. The plough cultivation of Bulgaria was

now exchanged for the innumerable herds of swine, which form the staple

commodity of Servia, fed in the immense oak woods which cover the

country. "They form" (as Mr Paget informs us in his work on Hungary) "a

very important article of trade between Servia and Vienna; and I doubt

if Smithfield could show better shapes or better feeding than the market

of a Servian village." Continuing his route along the banks of the

Danube to New Orsova, where he crossed to the Hungarian bank, he again

posted, with "an enormously stout Wallachian matron" for a travelling

companion, to Drenkova, whence another steamer conveyed him to Semlin,

and half an hour's pull down the Danube and up the Save (the line of the

two rivers being distinctly marked at the confluence by the muddy colour

of the former, and the clearness of the latter) landed him safe at

Belgrade.

We may here mention an amusing anecdote, related in another part of the

volume, in connexion with the town of Panczova below Semlin, where "the

town-major, after swallowing countless boxes of Morison's pills died in

the belief that he had not begun to take them soon enough. The

consumption of these drugs at that time almost surpassed belief. There

was scarcely a sickly or hypochondriac person, from the Hill of Presburg

to the Iron Gates, who had not taken large quantities of them." _Mais

voila le mot d'enigme._ "'The Anglomania,"' was the answer to a query of

the author, "'is nowhere stronger than in this part of the world.

Whatever comes from England, be it Congreve rockets or vegetable pills,

must needs be perfect. Dr Morison is indebted to his high office (!) for

the enormous consumption of his drugs. It is clear that the President of

the British College must be a man in the enjoyment of the esteem of the

government and the faculty of medicine; and his title is a passport to

his pills in foreign countries.' I laughed heartily, and explained that

the British College of Health, and the College of Physicians, were not

identical." We well remember a statement some years since among the

innumerable puffs of the arch-quack, (now gone, we believe, to that

bourn whither so many of his patients had preceded him,) that in

gratitude for the countless cures of incurable diseases by the

"Universal Vegetable Medicine," a statute of the Hygeist had been

erected in Bukarest, not in his native brass, but 'in his habit as he

lived;' and a woodcut was appended of the _ipsissimus_ Morison, with his

mustached phiz and tight frock-coat. As Bukarest is a long way off, we

held this at the time for a pious fraud; but Mr Paton's anecdote gives

it at least probability. _Vive la charlatanerie!_

The hospitality of Mr Consul-general Fonblanque, and the attentions of

the numerous friends of M. Petronevich, soon made Mr Paton quite at home

at Belgrade, where he remained till the end of the year 1843, having

arrived some time in the autumn, since the re-election of Prince

Alexander, and the exile of Petronevich, and his colleague Wucziz, took

place in July of that year. He found Belgrade much Europeanized since a

previous visit which he had paid it in 1839,--"It was then quite an

Oriental town; but now the haughty _parvenu_ spire of the cathedral, a

new and large, but tasteless structure, with a profusely gilt bell-tower

in the Russian manner, throws into the shade the minarets of the

mosques, graceful even in decay. Many of the bazar shops have been

fronted and glazed; the Oriental dress has become much rarer; and

houses, several stories high, in the German fashion, are springing up

every where." The Turkish governor was at this time Hafiz Pasha, the

unsuccessful commander at Nezib, lately appointed in the room of Kiamil,

who had been displaced at the mandate of Russia for the share he had

taken in the first election of Prince Alexander; but his jurisdiction is

now confined to the fortress and the Turkish quarter, which lies along

the Danube; the remainder of the town, lying piled street upon street up

the steep bank of the Save, being under the Servian authorities. During

his stay, Mr Paton paid frequent visits to the Pasha, whom he generally

found in an audience room overlooking the precipitous descent to the

Danube, "studying _at_ the maps: he seemed to think that nothing would

be so useful to Turkey as good roads, made to run from the principal

ports of Asia Minor, up to the depots of the interior, so as to connect

Sivas, Tokat, Angora, Koniah, Kaiserieh, &c., with Samsoon, Tersoos, and

other ports." The ramparts of the fortress are said to be in good

condition, though "very unlike the magnificent towers it the last scene

of the _Siege of Belgrade_ at Drury-Lane,"--a piece of useful

information for play-going Cockneys--and the _Lange Gasse_, or main

street, with the palace of Prince Eugene, built during the Austrian

occupation of Servia from 1717 to 1789, is still standing, though half

choked up with bazar shops and Turkish houses. The Prince holds no

formal levees; but Mr Paton was present at a dinner given to the _corps

diplomatique_ in the palace, and was received in a saloon "with inlaid

and polished parquet; the chairs and sofas covered with crimson and

white satin damask, which is an unusual luxury in these regions; the

roof admirably painted in subdued colours, in the best Vienna style.

High white porcelain urn-like stoves heated the suite of rooms. The

Prince, a muscular, middle-sized, dark-complexioned man, with a serious

composed air, wore a plain blue military uniform;[2] the Princess, and

her _dames de compagnie_, wore the graceful native Servian costume; the

Pasha the Nizam dress, and the _Nishan Iftihar_, (diamond decoration of

his rank;) Baron Lieven, the Russian Commissioner, in the uniform of a

general, glittered with innumerable orders;[3] Colonel Philippovich, a

man of distinguished talents, represented Austria; the Archbishop, in

his black velvet cap, a large enamelled cross hanging by a massive gold

chain from his neck, sat in stately isolation; and the six feet four

inches high Garashanin, minister of the interior, conversed with Stojan

Simitch, the president of the senate, one of the few Servians in high

office who retains his old Turkish costume, and has a frame that reminds

one of the Farnese Hercules. Then what a medley of languages--Servian,

German, Russian, Turkish, and French, all in full buzz! We proceeded to

the dining-room, where the _cuisine_ was in every respect in the German

manner. When the dessert appeared, the Prince rose with a creaming glass

of champagne in his hand, and proposed the health of the Sultan,

acknowledged by the Pasha; and then, after a short pause, the health of

Czar Nicolay Paulovich, acknowledged by Baron Lieven; then came the

health of other crowned heads. Baron Lieven now rose, and proposed the

health of the Prince. The Pasha and the Princess were toasted in turn;

and then Mr Wastchenko, the Russian Consul-general, rose, and in

animated terms drank to the prosperity of Servia. The entertainment,

which commenced at one o'clock, was prolonged to an advanced period of

the afternoon, and closed with coffee, liqueurs, and chibouques, in the

drawing-room: the Princess and the ladies having previously withdrawn to

the private apartments."

At the end of the year, Mr Paton returned to England; and after an

absence of six months, returned in August 1844 to the banks of the Save,

reaching Belgrade at the moment when preparations were being made for

the triumphal reception of the patriot ministers Wuczicz and

Petronevich, who had at length been restored to their country by the

tardy intervention of England. The day of their arrival was celebrated

by a universal jubilee. Surrounded by an immense cavalcade, the exiles

paraded the streets, amid the rapturous acclamations of the multitude,

to the great portal of the cathedral, where they were received by the

Archbishop and clergy:--"They kissed the cross and the gospels, which

the Archbishop presented to them, and, kneeling down, returned thanks

for their safe restoration. The Archbishop then advanced to the edge of

the platform and began a discourse, describing the grief the nation had

experienced at their departure, the universal joy for their return, and

the hope that they would ever keep peace and union in view in all

matters of state, and that in their duties to the state they must never

forget their responsibility to the Most High. Wuczicz, dressed in the

coarse frieze jacket and boots of a Servian peasant, heard, with a

reverential inclination of the head, the discourse of the prelate, but

nought relaxed one muscle of that adamantine visage: the finer but more

luminous features of Petronevich were under the control of a less

powerful will. At certain passages his intelligent eye was moistened

with tears. Two deacons then prayed successively for the Sultan, the

Emperor of Russia, and the Prince,--and now uprose from every tongue,

and every heart, a hymn for the longevity of Wuczicz and Petronevich.

'The Solemn Song for Many Days' is the title of this sublime chant,

which is so old that its origin is lost in the obscure dawn of

Christianity in the East, and so massive, so nobly simple, as to be

beyond the ravages of time, and the caprices of convention." The town

was illuminated in the evening; and a ball was given at the new Konak or

palace, built by the exiled Prince Michael, which was attended "by all

the rank and fashion of Belgrade--senators of the old school, in their

benishes and shalwars, and senators of the new school, in pantaloons and

stiff cravats," which we agree with Mr Paton in considering as no

improvement on the graceful costume of the East. The Servian ladies,

however, have in general the good taste to retain the old national

costume; and "no head-dress that I have seen in the Levant is better

calculated to set off beauty. From a small Greek fez they suspend a gold

tassel, which contrasts with the black and glossy hair, which is laid

smooth and flat down the temple. The sister of the Princess, who was

admitted to be the handsomest woman in the room, with her tunic of

crimson velvet, embroidered in gold, and faced with sable, would have

been, in her strictly indigenous costume, the queen of any fancy ball in

old Europe."

While occupied by his preparations for a tour into the interior, Mr

Paton one day encountered "a strange figure, with a long white beard,

and a Spanish cap, mounted on a sorry horse"--this was no other than

Holman, the well-known blind traveller, whom he had last seen at Aleppo,

and who, having passed in safety, under the safeguard of his infirmity,

through the most dangerous parts of Bosnia, was now on his way to

Walachia. He instantly recognised Mr Paton's voice, and mentioned his

name on being told where he had last seen him; and after a walk on the

esplanade, in which the objects in view were described to him, while

turning his face to the different points of the compass, he appeared to

have acquired a tolerably clear idea of Belgrade. Another visitor of Mr

Paton, Milutinovich, the best living poet of Servia, on hearing the name

of Holman, (of whose wanderings in the four quarters of the globe he had

read in the _Augsburg Gazette_,) was so awe-struck at finding himself in

the presence of even a greater traveller than Robinson Crusoe, (whose

adventures Mr Paton found regarded as an authentic narrative by the

monks of Manasia,) that he reverentially kissed his beard, praying aloud

that he might return home in safety. When the day of departure

approached, "orders were sent by the minister of the interior to all

governors and employes, enjoining them to furnish me with every

assistance, and with whatever information I might require;" and all

preparations being completed, Mr Paton and his man Paul set off

horseback, like Dr Syntax and Patrick, for the highlands and woodlands

of Servia.

Shabatz (more correctly Czabacz,) a town on the Save, between forty and

fifty miles above Belgrade, and one of the few garrisons still retained

by the Turks, was the first point of destination; and reaching it on the

second day, he was hospitably received by _Gospody_ (Monsieur) Ninitch,

the government collector, to whom he had an introductory letter from the

minister Garashanin. Before the revolution, Shabatz numbered 20,000

Osmanlis, the sites of whose kiosks and gardens are still pointed out on

the _Polje_, or open space between the town and the fortress,--at

present the only Moslems are the garrison of Bosniak _Redif_ or militia,

occupying the dilapidated fortifications. It is the episcopal seat of

one of the Archbishop's three suffragans; and the author, accompanied by

his friend the collector, paid his respects to the Bishop, whom he had

previously met at Belgrade. The conversation turned principally on the

system of national education, by which, in a few years, reading and

writing will be universal among the peasantry, while the sons of the

better classes are prepared, by instruction in German, &c., for a

further course of study in the Gymnasium of Belgrade, the germ of a

future university. A proof of the taste now spreading for general

literature was afforded by the library of the Archpriest, "Jowan

Paulovich, a self-taught ecclesiastic: the room in which he received us

was filled with books, mostly Servian, but among them I perceived German

translations of Shakspeare, Young's _Night Thoughts_, and a novel of

Bulwer's." The son of this priest was studying mining engineering at the

expense of government, at Schemnitz in Hungary, a capacity in which he

may one day do good service to his country, as the great mineral riches

believed to exist in Servia are hitherto wholly unexplored. Having

completed the circuit of all the notables in Shabatz, including Luka

Lasaravich, a once redoubted lieutenant of Kara-George, and now an

octagenarian merchant, with thirteen wounds on his body, Mr Paton

prepared for a fresh start, drinking health and long life to his kind

host and hostess in a glass of _slivovitsa_, or plum brandy, the

national liqueur. But his good wishes were not destined to be fulfilled;

for within a month an abortive attempt at a rising was made by the

partisans of the exiled Obrenovich family, a troop of whom, disguised as

Austrian hussars, entered Shabatz, and shot the good collector dead as

he issued from his house to enquire the cause of the disturbance. The

attempt, however, was futile, and the whole party were taken and

executed.

The road to Losnitza, whither our traveller was now bending his way, lay

through the Banat of Matchva, a rich tract of land, with a "charmingly

accidented" chain of mountains, the Gutchevo range, in the distance.

"Even the brutes bespoke the harmony of creation; for, singular to say,

we saw several crows perched on the backs of swine!" Towards evening we

entered a region of cottages among gardens inclosed by bushes, trees,

and verdant fences, with the rural quiet and cleanliness of an English

village in the last century lighted by an Italian sunset. "In this

sylvan paradise he was encountered by a pandour, who conducted him to

the house of the _Natchalnik_, or governor of the province, a gaunt,

greyheaded follower of Kara-George, who had been selected for this post

from his courage and military experience, since the hostile

neighbourhood of the Bosniaks, on the other side the Drina, between whom

and the Servians a deadly religious and national hatred exists, rendered

it necessary to be always on the alert." But before pursuing his route

to Sokol,[4] a sky-threatening fortress, respecting which his curiosity

had been excited by the account given of it by M. Ninitch, he was

persuaded by the Natchalnik to attend a peasant festival held at the

monastery of Tronosha, to celebrate the anniversary of its consecration.

The next day, accordingly, he set off with the Natchalnik and his

companions, all gallantly armed and mounted, and in gala dresses covered

with gold embroidery; and, dashing up hill and down dale, through the

majestic forests which covered the ascent of the mountains, they arrived

in due time at Tronosha, "an edifice with strong walls, towers, and

posterns, more like a secluded and fortified manor-house in the

seventeenth century than a convent; for such establishments, in former

times, were often subject to the unwelcome visits of minor marauders."

After returning thanks for their safe arrival, according to custom, in a

chapel with paintings in the old Byzantine style, "crimson-faced saints

looking up to a golden sky," they proceeded to inspect the preparations

for the approaching fete, in a green glade running up to the foot of the

hill on which stood the monastery, and dined with the Igoumen, ([Greek:

Egoumenoz],) or Superior, and the monks, in the refectory. The healths

of the Prince, and of Wuczicz and Petronevich, were given after dinner

as toasts--a laudable custom, which appears to be in orthodox observance

in Servia--after which a song was sung in their honour by one of the

monks, to whom Mr Paton (whose special aversion he seems to have

incurred, for some reason not exactly apparent) applies the epithet of a

"clerical Lumpacivagabundus," which we quote for the benefit of such of

our friends as may chance to be skilled in the unknown tongue. Meanwhile

the assembled peasantry outside were in the full tide of merriment; and,

on the following morning, Mr Paton was roused from slumbers, in which "I

dreamed I know not what absurdities," by a chorus of countless voices,

and, hurrying out, found the peasants he had seen the evening before,

with a large accession to their numbers, on their knees in the avenue

leading to the church, and following "the chant of a noble old hymn. The

whole pit of this theatre of verdure appeared covered with a carpet of

crimson and white; for such were the prevailing colours of the costumes.

The upper tunic of the women was a species of surtout of undyed cloth,

bordered with a design of red cloth of a finer description. The

stockings, in colour and texture, resembled those of Persia (?), but

were generally embroidered at the ankle with gold and silver thread.

When I thought of the trackless solitude of the sylvan ridges around me,

I seemed to witness one of the early communions of Christianity, in

those ages when incense ascended to the Olympic deities in gorgeous

temples, while praise to the true God rose from the haunts of the wolf,

the lonely cavern, or the subterranean vault."

After witnessing this interesting reunion of a regenerated and Christian

nation, Mr Paton took leave of the Superior, who parted from him with

the words--"God be praised that Servia has at length seen the day when

strangers come from afar to see and know the people!" and, passing

through the double ranks of the peasantry, who took leave of him with

the valediction of _Srentnj poot!_ (a good journey,) repeated by a

thousand voices, he rode on through the never-ceasing oak-forests,

broken here and there by plantations of every variety of tree, to

Krupena. Here he was received by the captain of the district at the

head of a small troop of irregular cavalry, and hospitably entertained

for the night. On the following day he started, "toiling upwards through

woods and wilds of a more rocky character than on the previous day," to

the ridge of the Gutchevo range, whence he looked down on Sokol, a

fortress still held by the Turks, and which, on its inaccessible

position, "built" (as described by M. Ninitch) "on the capital of a

column of rock," was the only one never taken by the Servians; while the

background was formed by the mountains of Bosnia, rising range over

range in the distance. They reached the valley by a narrow winding path

on the face of a precipitous descent, and entered the town; but their

visit was ill-timed. It was Ramadan; the Disdar Aga was, or was said to

be, asleep, and the castle could not be seen in his absence; and Mr

Paton's enquiries from the Mutsellim, who acted as their cicerone, as to

the height of the rock on which the citadel was built above the valley,

only made him suspected of being an engineer surveying the stronghold

with a view to its capture. After climbing up a pinnacle of rock which

overlooked the abyss, he was compelled to return _re infecta_; "and when

we got a little way along the valley, I looked back; Sokol looked like a

little castle of Edinburgh placed in the clouds; and a precipice on the

other side of the valley presented a perpendicular stature of not less

than five hundred feet."

A few hours travelling from Sokol brought Mr Paton to Liuhovia on the

Drina, the precipitous banks of which, covered with wood, present

numerous points of picturesque beauty; but at a short distance above

this town, which is the quarantine station on the road between Belgrade

and Seraievo it ceases to form the boundary of Servia and Bosnia, being

entirely within the latter frontier. Thence ascending the valley of the

Rogaschitza, a small stream tributary to the Drina, and crossing a ridge

which parts the waters flowing into the Drina and into the Morava, he

descended into the tract watered by the Morava, the national river of

Servia; the first town in which was Ushitza, one of the fortresses still

garrisoned by the Turks, and the scene of desperate conflicts during the

war of independence. In past times it was a place of great importance,

and contained sixty thousand inhabitants, being the entrepot of the

trade between Servia and Bosnia; but this commerce has been almost

ruined by the establishment of the quarantine; and most of the Servian

inhabitants, in consequence of a bloody affray with the Turks, have

transferred themselves to Poshega, a town at two hours' distance, and

formerly a Roman colony, of which Mr. Paton found a relic in a fragment

of a Latin inscription built into the wall of the church. From Poshega

Mr P. continued his route down the rich valley of the Morava, here

several miles wide, to Csatsak, the residence of a bishop and a

_Natchalnik_; where the old Turkish town is in process of being

superseded by a new foundation, which, "like Poshega and all these new

places, consists of a circular or square market-place, with bazar shops

in the Turkish manner, and straight streets diverging from it." Mr Paton

waited on the bishop, "a fine specimen of the church-militant; a stout

fiery man of sixty, in full furred robes, and black velvet cap," who had

been, during the rule of Milosh, an energetic denouncer of his

extortions and monopolies, and was consequently in high favour since the

change of dynasty. The cathedral (we are informed) was "a most ancient

edifice of Byzantine architecture," of which we should have been glad to

have had some particulars; but Mr Paton's remarks are confined to

complaints of the wearisome length of the mass, at which the bishop

presided, "dressed in crimson velvet and white satin, embroidered with

gold, which had cost L300 at Vienna; and as he sat in his chair, with

mitre on head and crosier in hand, looked, with his bushy white beard,

an imposing representative of spiritual authority." Taking leave of this

formidable prelate, Mr Paton proceeded to Karanovatz, in the rich plain

round which, surrounded by hills which are compared to the last

picturesque undulations of the Alps near Vicenz or Verona, the river

Ybar falls into the Morava, not far fron the ancient convent of

Zhitchka Jicha, where seven Servian kings of the Neman dynasty were

crowned, a door being broken in the wall for the entrance of each

monarch, and built up again on his departure: and here our traveller,

turning to the right, and ascending the course of the Ybar, struck

southwards into the highlands

The character of the mountains among which he now found himself, was

widely different from the picturesque oak forests of the Gutchevo range,

which he had traversed in the early part of his tour. "Tall cedars

replaced the oak and beech; the scanty herbage was covered with

hoar-frost; the clear brooks murmured chillingly down the unshaded

gullies; and a grand line of sterile peaks to the south showed me that I

was approaching the backbone of the Balkan. There is a total want of

arable land in this part of Servia, and the pasture is neither good nor

abundant; but the Ybar is the most celebrated stream in Servia for large

quantities of trout." Still ascending the steep mountain-paths, while

the scenery became wilder and wilder, they at length reached the convent

of Studenitza, one of the most ancient foundations in Servia, having

been built by Neman, the first monarch of the dynasty bearing his name,

who died in 1195. Like most monastic edifices in Servia, it is a

castellated building, with walls whose massive strength is well

calculated to resist an attack not supported by artillery; and, on

entering the wicket, Mr Paton was received "by a fat, feeble-voiced,

lymphatic-faced superior, leaning on a long staff"--from whom he could

get no other reply to all his inquiries than "_Blagodarim_, (I thank

you.") The magnificent church of white marble, one of the finest

specimens now existing of Byzantine architecture, was built in 1314 (as

an inscription imports) by Stephen Vrosh; but it had suffered severely

at different times from the bigotry of the Turks. "The curiously twisted

pillars of the outer door were sadly chipped, while noseless angels, and

fearfully mutilated lions, guarded the inner portal. Passing through a

vestibule, we saw the remains of the font, which must have been

magnificent; and, covered with a cupola, the stumps of the white marble

columns which support it are still visible. Entering the church, I saw

on the right the tomb of St Simeon, the sainted king of Servia; beside

it hung his banner with the half-moon on it, the insigni_um_(!) of the

South Slavonic nation from the dawn of heraldry; and near the altar was

the body of his son, St Stephen, the patron saint of Servia." Another

day's journey through the same rugged and sterile scenery, in a

direction due south, during which they passed the Demir-kapu, on Iron

Gate, on the bank of the Ybar, where there is only room for a single led

horse in a passage cut through the rock, brought them to the quarantine

station on the river Raska, two hours' distance from Novibazar in

Bosnia, which it was Mr Paton's intention to visit, attended by a

Servian quarantine officer.

The conversion of the Bosniaks to Islam was effected by force, on the

conquest of the country in 1463, by Mohammed II., the only instance in

the career of Turkish conquest in which the injunction of the Prophet

against compulsory proselytism has been violated; but they have always

held the faith, thus forced on them, with the zeal of renegades, and are

now the most fanatic and bigoted Moslems in the empire. The Christians

resident in their territory are subject to every species of tyranny and

maltreatment, several instances of which, related by refugees in Servia,

are given in the work before us. A Frank traveller is a sight scarcely

known; and Mr Paton soon had abundant evidence, on his approach to

Novibazar, which lies in a fertile plain about a mile and a half in

diameter, surrounded by low hills, that his visit here would be even

less favourably received than at Sokol. The gipsies, whose tents covered

the plain, and who here profess Islamism, cried furiously after them,

"See, how the Royal Servians now-a-days have the audacity to enter

Novibazar on horseback!" Youssouf Bey, the governor, was said to be

asleep in his harem, (the usual Not-at-home of an Oriental,) but, as

they afterwards ascertained, was actually afraid to receive them; and

while they were sauntering round the town, a savage-looking Bosniak

starting up, exclaimed, "Giaours, kafirs, spies! I know what you come

for!--Do you expect to see your cross one day planted on the castle?"

The threat of a complaint to the Bey only provoked fresh insolence; and,

warned by a Christian bystander that the whole town would soon be in

commotion, they prudently beat a retreat, and reached the Servian

frontier in safety.

After this narrow escape from Bosniak hospitality, Mr Paton's next

object was the Kopaunik mountain, lying a little to the south, and from

the top of which (as he had been informed at Csatsak) a panoramic view

of all Servia might be obtained; and having prevailed on the captain of

the district to accompany him, they crossed the Ybar, and reached the

summit with little difficulty, if (as seems to be implied) the whole

ascent was accomplished on horseback. "The Kopaunik is not much above

6000 English feet above the level of the sea. But it is so placed in the

Servian basin, that the eye embraces the whole breadth from Bosnia to

Bulgaria, and very nearly the whole length from Macedonia to Hungary.

When at length I stood on the highest peak, the prospect was literally

gorgeous. Servia lay rolled out at my feet. There lay the field of

Kossovo, where Amurath defeated Lasar, and entombed the ancient empire

of Servia. I mused an instant on this great landmark of European

history, and following the finger of an old peasant who accompanied us,

I looked eastwards, and saw Deligrad, the scene of one of the bloodiest

fights that preceded the resurrection of Servia as a principality. The

Morava glistened in its wide valley like a silver thread in a carpet of

green, beyond which the dark mountains of Rudnik rose to the north;

while the frontiers of Bosnia, Albania, Macedonia, and Bulgaria, walled

in the prospect."

After luxuriating to his heart's content in the contemplation of this

magnificent panorama, and taking leave of his companion, Mr Paton

descended the north-eastern slope of the mountain; and lodging for the

night in a shepherd's hut, where he found an officer sent by the

Natchalnik of Krushevatz to meet him, arrived next day at Zhupa. "Here

the aspect of the country changed--the verdant hills became chalky, and

covered with vineyards, which, before the fall of the empire, were

celebrated;" and after partaking of a repast, in which choice grapes and

clotted cream (a national dish in Turkey) formed the dessert, they

pushed on in all haste, and reached Krushevatz (often marked in the maps

by its Turkish name of Aladja-Hissar) late at night. He was hospitably

received by the Natchalnik, whose wife kissed the visitor's hand on his

arrival, in compliance with the old Servian customs, now fast wearing

out, which assign to woman a social position intermediate between the

seclusion of eastern manners and the graceful precedence which she

enjoys in the west. The next morning, they walked out to inspect the

town, which was the metropolis of the Servian kingdom immediately before

its overthrow by the Turks; and which, lying as it does in the midst of

the rich vale of the Morava, which here expands into a wide and fertile

plain, extending from the foot of the mountains by which it is flanked

to the river, occupies a site well adapted for all inland capital. The

author here introduces a dissertation on the history, laws, and customs

of the ancient monarchy; but as our own business is rather with Servia

as it is, than Servia as it was, we shall pass unnoticed the glories of

the house of Neman--the warlike trophies of Stephan Dushan the Powerful,

at whose approach the Greek Emperor trembled within the walls of

Constantinople--and the tragical fate of Knes Lasar, with whom Servian

independence fell on the fatal plain of Kossovo, June 15, 1389. Of the

palace of Lasar in Krushevatz, only the gateway and the ruined walls are

now remaining; but the chapel, having been converted by the Turks into

an arsenal, is still in perfect preservation. "It is a curious monument

of the period, in a Byzantine sort of style, but not for a moment to be

compared in beauty to the church of Studenitza. Above one of the doors

is carved the double eagle, the insigni_um_ (!!) of empire; but instead

of having body to body, and wings and beaks pointed outwards, as in the

arms of Austria and Russia, the bodies are separated, and beak looks

inward to beak. The late governor had the Vandalism to whitewash the

exterior; but the Natchalnik told me, that under the whitewash fine

bricks were disposed in diamond figures between the stones. This antique

principle of tessellation, applied by the Byzantines to perpendicular

walls, and occasionally adopted and varied _ad infinitum_ by the

Saracens, is magnificently illustrated in the upper exterior of the

ducal palace of Venice."

A grand field-day against the bears and boars in the forest, with a

couple of hundred peasants as beaters, had been arranged by the

Natchalnik for his guest's amusement; but their plans were frustrated by

the unpropitious state of the weather; and as soon as it became

favourable, we find Mr Paton again in motion, ascending the eastern

branch of the Morava to Alexinate, the quarantine station on the

Bulgarian frontier, where the British govermnent has established a

_konak_ or residence for the Queen's messengers, who here await, on the

extreme verge of the sanatory system, the return of the Tartars with

despatches from Constantinople. He found it tenanted by Captain W----,

whose guest he became for several days, to his infinite

satisfaction:--"It seemed so odd, and yet was so very comfortable, to

have roast-beef, plum-pudding, sherry, brown stout, Stilton cheese, and

other insular groceries, at the foot of the Balkan. There was, moreover,

a small library, with which the temporary occupants of the konak killed

the month's interval between arrival and departure." He was compelled,

however, to tear himself from the delights of an English cuisine; and on

arriving at Tiupria, (more properly Kiupri-Ravenatz,) where he first

heard tidings of the emeute at Shabatz, and the murder of his friend the

collector Ninitch, he diverged from his route to visit the monasteries

of Ravanitza and Manasia, the former of which was the burial-place of

Lasar. But as his reminiscences of these saintly retreats are rather

convivial than antiquarian, we shall pass on at once to Svilainitza,

(the place of silk,) where he was entertained in the chateau of M.

Ressavatz, the richest man in Servia; the only chateau-residence as he

tells us, which he saw in the country. This part of Servia appears

indeed to be, as Mr Paton says--"Ressavatz qua, Ressavatz la"--since to

the patriotism and command of capital of this enlightened family, it

owes not only the introduction of the growth of silk as above-mentioned,

but the construction of an excellent macadamized road, by which Mr Paton

travelled on the following day, through a country richly cultivated and

interspersed with lofty oaks, to Posharevatz, (commonly written

Passarowitz,) where he was welcomed on his arrival by another of the

name of Ressavatz, the Natchalnik of the place. Posharevatz is

celebrated in history for the treaty there concluded in 1718, by which,

in consequence of the victories of Prince Eugene, Bosnia and Servia

passed under the dominion of Austria for twenty years, till restored to

the Porte at the peace of Belgrade in 1739: in the present day it is a

place of considerable importance, both as the capital of a province of

ninety thousand inhabitants, and the seat of a court of judicial appeal

for Eastern Servia. By the president of this court Mr Paton was

entertained at dinner, where he met all the elite of Posharevatz; "and

the president having made some punch, which showed profound acquaintance

eith the jurisprudence of conviviality, the best amateurs of Posharevatz

sung their best songs, which pleased me somewhat, for my ears had

gradually been broken into the habits of the Servian muse. Being pressed

myself to sing an English national song, I gratified their curiosity

with 'God save the Queen,' and 'Rule Britannia,' explaining that these

two songs contained the essence of English nationality; the one

expressive of our unbounded loyalty, the other of our equally unbounded

dominion." And now having extracted, to the best of our ability, the

plums from the pudding of Mr Paton's _gastronomic_ circuit of Servia, in

which, (as he cordially admits,) "by inter-_larding_ my discourse with

sundry apophthegms of _Bacon_, and stale paradoxes of Rochefaucault, I

passed current considerably above my real value," we shall here leave

him to find his way by the beaten track through Semendria, Belgrade, and

Vienna, to England. But before proceeding to the consideration of the

"Servian Question," a point scarcely touched on in the volume before us,

it will not be amiss to give a brief summary of the social condition and

internal organization of the Servian nation, on which Mr Paton gives

some valuable information in his concluding chapters.

The Servian territory extends about one hundred and seventy miles from

east to west, along the Danube and Save, the boundaries being the rivers

Timok and Drina; and one hundred miles in extreme breadth from Belgrade

to the frontier of Albania. The population, after the expulsion of the

Turks, was roughly estimated, under Milosh, as somewhat exceeding half a

million; but, from the internal peace which the country has since

enjoyed, and the plenty and prosperity which prevails among the

peasantry, there can be little doubt that it has since greatly

increased. As not more than one-sixth of the soil is supposed to be in

cultivation, there is abundance of excellent land undisposed of; as

every man, therefore, with ordinary industry can support himself and his

family, abject want and pauperism are almost unknown. The innumerable

herds of swine, which form the staple commodity of the country, both for

home consumption and export, rove freely through the oak and beech

forests which cover great part of Servia, and in which every one is at

liberty to cut as much timber as he pleases, only an inconsiderable

portion being reserved as state property for the public service. There

are no indirect taxes; and as the _poresa_, or capitation tax, paid by

each head of a family, the maximum of which is six dollars a-year, is

the only impost (except a trifling quit-rent for the land) levied by the

government, "it must be admitted," (as Mr Paton observes,) "that the

peasantry of Servia have drawn a high prize in the lottery of

existence." The harvest is a period of general festivity; all labour in

common in getting in the corn, the proprietor providing entertainment

for his industrious guests; "but in the vale of the lower Morava, where

there is less pasture and more corn, this is not sufficient, and hired

Bulgarians assist." Though in a comparatively southern latitude, the

vegetable productions are those of a more northern climate; Mr Paton

never saw an olive-tree, and the grapes and melons, though abundant, are

inferior to those of Hungary; but the plum, from which the national

liqueur, _slivovitsa_, is made, every where abounds, almost every

village having its plum-orchard. With all these means and appliances for

good living close at hand, it is evident that there is not much prospect

of a famine in Servia, till the productions of the soil fall short of

the demands of the population--a consummation which cannot happen for

many generations to come.

The national character of the Servian is compared by Mr Paton to that of

the Scotch Highlander; and it is not without strong points of

resemblance. "He is brave in battle, highly hospitable; delights in

simple and plaintive music and poetry, his favourite instruments being

the bagpipe and fiddle; unlike the Greek, he shows little aptitude for

trade; and, unlike the Bulgarian, he is very lazy in agricultural

pursuits."

In the cleanliness of their persons and houses, they present a

favourable contrast to most of the other Slavic populations; and their

personal appearance is also advantageous. "They are a remarkably tall

and robust race of men; in form and feature they bespeak strength of

body and energy of mind; but one seldom sees that thoroughbred look, so

frequently found in the poorest peasants of Italy and Greece. The women

I think very pretty. They are not so well-shaped as the Greeks; but

their complexions are fine, their hair generally black and glossy, and

their head-dress particularly graceful; and not being addicted to the

bath, like other eastern women, they prolong their beauty beyond the

average period." The spirit of nationality, and zeal for national

improvement, which pervades the population almost as one man, is

strongly marked by many incidents related in Mr Paton's pages, and one

is so remarkable that we cannot forbear quoting it. An idiot boy, to

whom he had given a glass of _slivovitza_, "taking off his greasy fez,

said, 'I drink to our prince Kara-Georgovich, and the progress and

enlightenment of the nation.' He was too stupid to entertain these

sentiments himself; but if the determination to rise were not in the

minds of the people, it would not be on the lips of an oaf in an

insignificant hamlet." Nor is the progress of intellectual development

behind this patriotic zeal for national independence in the march of

regeneration. "In the whole range of the Slavic family, no nation

possesses so extensive a collection of excellent popular poetry," with

which the British public has been in some measure made acquainted by the

translations of Dr Bowring. "The romantic beauty of their country--the

relics of a wild mythology, which has some resemblance to that of Greece

and Scandinavia--the adventurous character of the population--the

vicissitudes of guerilla warfare--are all given in a dialect which for

musical sweetness is to other Slavonic tongues what the Italian is to

the languages of Western Europe." The Servian Anthology has been

collected by Dr Wuk Stephanovich, the author of several works on

national topics; and there are several living poets, among whom,

Milutinovich, already mentioned, is reputed _facile princeps_. The only

newspaper now printed at Belgrade is the _State Gazette_, which

prudently avoids all remarks on Austrian or Russian policy; and the only

annual is the _Golubitza_, (Dove,) a miscellany in prose and verse,

neatly got up in imitation of the German Taschenbuecher, and edited by M.

Hadschitch, the framer of the code of laws. In the Lyceum, lectures on

law are delivered by M. Simonovich, bred an Hungarian advocate, and

formerly editor of the _Courier_, a newspaper now discontinued; but the

study of law, as well as its practitioners, is said to be unpopular in

Servia at present; and Professor John Shafarik is an able and popular

lecturer on Slavic history, literature, and antiquities; of the latter,

there is a collection in the museum of the institution, as well as a

rich mineralogical cabinet collected by Baron Herder, and including

specimens of silver, lead, and copper ore, as well as marble, white as

that of Carrara. A Literary Society has also been formed for the

encouragement of popular literature, and the formation of a complete

dictionary of the language--the seal of which represents an uncultivated

field, with the rising sun shining on a monument bearing the arms of

Servia.

The administrative senate consists of twenty-one members, named by the

Prince for life; four of whom are ministers. Stojan Simitch, who has

been before mentioned, the present vice-president (the presidency being

an imaginary office,) is a Servian of the old school, in whom talent and

shrewdness have supplied the place of education; but the most remarkable

member of the cabinet is M. Petronevich, now minister for foreign

affairs. He was at one time in a commercial house at Trieste, and

subsequently for nine years a hostage for Servia at Constantinople--"he

is astute by nature and education, but has a good heart and a capacious

intellect; and, in the course of a very tortuous political career, has

kept the advancement of Servia constantly in view. He is one of the very

few public men in Servia, in whom the Christian and Western love of

_community_ has triumphed over the Oriental allegiance to _self_; and

this disinterestedness, in spite of his defects, is the secret of his

popularity." His partner in exile, M. Wuczicz, is now commander of the

military force and minister of the interior, in which latter office he

succeeded Garashanin; the standing army is a mere skeleton force; but

every Servian is a soldier, and bound to provide himself with arms, thus

forming a national militia, of which the effective strength is estimated

at little less than 100,000 men. The military command of each of the

seventeen provinces is vested in the Natchalnik, under whom are the

captains of the several cantons, usually three in each province; these

officers superintend the police, and report to the minister at war. As

minister of the interior, he is charged also with the superintendence of

ecclesiastical affairs, the spiritual head of which, the Archbishop of

Belgrade, though acknowledging the supremacy of the Greek Patriarch, is

virtually independent within the province; his salary, as well as that

of the three bishops and the inferior clergy, is paid by the state, that

of the primate being about L800 a-year, and of his suffragans half as

much. The administration of justice (as settled by the Sultan's _hatti

shereef_ of 1838, which may be regarded as the Servian constitution) is

vested in local courts in each province, consisting of a president and

three members, from which an appeal lies to the supreme courts of

Belgrade and Posharevatz; but reference is always made in the first

instance, in minor cases, to the _Courts of Peace_ (as they are called,)

consisting of the village magnates, with whose patriarchal arbitration

the litigants are usually satisfied, law and lawyers not being held in

high estimation. "The courts of law have something of the promptitude of

Oriental justice, without its flagrant venality;" but the salaries of

the judges are small, that of the president of the appeal court at

Belgrade not exceeding L300 a-year. But it is the financial department

that presents the most striking contrast to other European states, in

the unheard-of phenomenon of a national debt due not _from_ but _to_ the

government; the revenue so much exceeding the expenditure, that a sum of

a hundred thousand ducats has been lent to the people at six per cent,

and forms an item on the credit side of the budget! The total annual

outlay, according to the financial returns, including the tribute to the

Porte and the civil list of the Prince, (the latter equivalent to about

L20,000 English,) is 830,000 dollars; while the income reaches 887,000,

principally derived from the _poresa_, or capitation-tax paid by heads

of families, a separate tax being levied on bachelors. Such is at

present the flourishing state of the principality of Servia, "the

youngest member of the European family," the views of Russia on which,

somewhat prematurely developed by the famous "Servian question," will be

more clearly understood by a preliminary sketch of its previous history.

The political existence of modern Servia may be considered to date from

1804, in February of which year a general rising took place of the

Christian population against the Moslems, provoked by the massacres and

atrocities committed by the spahis, who held lands in the province by

military tenure, and whose chiefs had thrown off the authority of the

Pasha of Belgrade, and embraced the party of the famous Paswan-Oghlu,

Pasha of Widdin, who was then in open revolt against Selim III., as the

champion of the janissaries and the _ancien regime_, against the civil

and military reforms which the Sultan was striving to introduce. The

principal leaders of the Servians were Slavatz, (or as Mr Paton calls

him, if the same person is intended, Glavash,) and George Petrovich,

surnamed _Kara_ or _Czerni_, (black,) the son of a peasant in the

district of Kragejewatz, who afterwards migrated to Topola, which has

therefore been held by the Servians as the place whence sprung their

liberator,[5] and where an annual festival is held in his honour. He was

in his youth a _Hayduk_ or klepht; and having been forced to fly from

Servia for taking part in an unsuccessful insurrection, had served

several years in the Austrian army. His successes were at first viewed

with satisfaction by the Porte; and the obnoxious chiefs, driven to take

refuge in Belgrade, were there seized and put to death by the Pasha; but

it soon became evident that the Servians, once in arms and victorious,

would not be satisfied without complete independence. Semendria and

other fortresses fell into their hands; and Kara George, by the

unanimous voice of his countrymen, was declared _hospodar_ or prince.

The Porte now directed an invasion of Servia by a mingled force of forty

thousand Turks and Bosniaks; but the Moslem army was totally overthrown

near Shabatz, Aug. 8, 1806, by seven thousand foot and two thousand

horse under Kara George, and driven across the Drina with the loss of

their commander and many other chiefs. It was now apparent that Servia

was not to be reduced by force of arms; and conferences were opened, by

which the Sultan engaged to grant them a local and national government,

with free exercise of their religion. But the negotiation failed, from

the demands of the Porte that they should surrender their arms, and

leave the fortresses in the hands of the Turks; and while it was yet

pending, Kara George carried Belgrade with great slaughter, by a

_coup-de-main_, on the night of Dec. 13, 1806, thus completing the

expulsion of the Turks from Servia, with the exception of Szoko, (Mr

Paton's Sokol,) and a few other strongholds which still remained in

their hands.

The war which broke out in the following year between Russia and the

Porte, secured Servia against any further attacks from the Turks; and

Kara George, thus freed from apprehensions of invasion, endeavoured to

introduce some degree of order and civil organization into the country.

A sort of federal senate, to which each of the twelve districts into

which the principality was then divided sent a member, met annually at

Belgrade to regulate the finances and internal affairs of the country;

and though the freedom of their deliberations was impeded by the

presence of the _wayvodes_ or military governors, at the head of their

armed retainers, whom even the authority of Kara George was unable to

coerce, the success of their efforts to establish schools and promote

the interests of civilization, indicated a degree of enlightened policy

little to have been expected from a people but half emancipated from

Turkish bondage. Kara George, meanwhile, who had received from the

Emperor Alexander the rank of lieutenant-general, did good service to

his Russian allies; and though signally defeated in an invasion of

Bosnia, repulsed with triumphant success every attempt of the Turks to

enter Servia. But his energies were paralysed by the disaffection of the

subordinate chiefs; and when Russia, pressed by the advance of Napoleon,

concluded in 1812 the peace of Bukarest, there was only a nugatory

stipulation, in the eighth clause of the treaty, that the internal

administration should be left with the Servians, "as to the subjects of

the Sublime Porte in the islands of the Archipelago;" the fortresses to

remain in the hands of the Turks. But no sooner was the Porte relieved

from the presence of the enemy, than an overwhelming force was poured

into Servia; and Kara George, unable to resist, fled into Hungary, and

afterwards took refuge in Russia.

The character of this remarkable man is well portrayed in a despatch,

quoted by Mr Paton, of the afterwards well-known Diebitsch, who was the

confidential agent of Russia in Servia, in 1810-11:--"His countenance

shows a greatness of mind not to be mistaken; and when we consider times

and circumstances, and his want of education, we must admit that his

mind is of a masculine and commanding order. The imputation of cruelty

appears to be unjust. When the country was without the shadow of a

constitution, and when he commanded an unorganized and uncultivated

nation, he was compelled to be severe; he dared not relax his

discipline; but now that there are courts of law and legal forms, he

hands every thing over to the tribunals. He has very little to say for

himself, and is rude in his manners; but his judgments in civil affairs

are promptly and soundly formed, and to great talents he joins unwearied

industry. As a soldier, there is but one opinion of his talents,

bravery, and enduring firmness." The portrait prefixed to the present

volume, from a painting in the possession of the reigning Prince, the

duplicate of one executed for the Emperor Alexander, bears out the

character thus given of the Servian hero:--"The countenance expressed

not only intelligence, but a certain refinement, which one would

scarcely expect in a warrior peasant; but all his contemporaries agree

in representing him to have possessed an inherent superiority and

nobility of nature, which, in any station, would have raised him above

his equals."

At this juncture, when Servia lay at the mercy of the Turks, Milosh

Obrenovich appeared on the scene. He had originally been a swineherd,

and afterwards an officer of Kara George; but he now sided with the

Turks, to whom he rendered efficient aid in cutting off the other

popular leaders who still continued in arms. But the execution of

Slavatz, and other chiefs who had also made their submission, by order

of Soliman Pasha of Belgrade, showed him that his own fate was only

deferred; and, escaping into his native district of Rudnik, he once more

raised the standard of freedom. The peasantry rose _en masse_, and the

campaign was generally to the advantage of Milosh, who displayed great

bravery and military skill; but Soliman Pasha was at length recalled,

and an accommodation effected, by which Milosh became hospodar, under

the suzerainte of the Sultan, Belgrade and a few fortresses only

remaining in the hands of the Turks. As the resident Turkish population

had almost wholly disappeared during the war, Milosh was now absolute

master of the country, and was delivered from all fears of a rival, by

the death of Kara George, who, in 1817, misled by false representations,

had returned from Petersburg to Servia; but was betrayed by Milosh, and

put to death by the Turks.[6] Though unable to read or write, his rule

was marked by ability and vigour. He repressed robberies and offences

against property with merciless severity, frequently causing malefactors

to be hung to the next tree, without form of trial;--and improved the

internal communications by the formation of an excellent road through

the forests, from the Turkish frontier at Nissa to Belgrade. In his

political relations with Russia and the Porte, he steered a middle

course with consummate dexterity, constantly maintaining a good

understanding with the cabinet of St Petersburg; while, in 1830, he

succeeded in obtaining from the Sultan a firman, by which the dignity of

prince was declared hereditary in his family; and it was further

provided, that such Turks as still retained land in Servia should

dispose of their estates within a limited period, and quit the province.

Another firman, in 1833, released the Servians from the payment of

_kharaj_ (the capitation tax paid by rayahs) and all other dues and

imposts, in consideration of an annual tribute of 2,300,000 piastres

(L23,000) to be paid to the Porte; the right of levying taxes was

conceded to the Servian government, and all fortresses erected by the

Turks, since the commencement of the war in 1804, were to be rased.[7]

These concessions, which rendered the dependence of Servia on the Porte

little more than nominal, were doubtless granted through the secret

influence of Russia, whose obvious interest it was to weaken the

connexion between her destined prey and its titular suzerain; but the

despotic power thus placed in the hands of Milosh, was exercised with a

degree of arrogance and contempt of vested rights, which soon rendered

him highly unpopular. No carriage but his was allowed to appear in the

streets of Belgrade; and, while all political rights were withheld from

the people, he amassed immense wealth by arbitrary confiscations, by

levying heavy taxes and import duties, and by establishing oppressive

monopolies of articles of necessary consumption, particularly salt,

veins of which, discovered by Baron Herder near the Kopaunik mountain,

he forbade to be worked under severe penalties, in order to keep in his

own hands the importation from Walachia. The discontent of the national

party, headed by the _primates_ (as they are called) of the

municipalities, at length broke out into flame--fomented (as it was then

believed) by Russia, who was jealous of the influence acquired over

Milosh by Colonel Hodges, appointed in 1836 consul-general for England,

and with whom he was on the point of concluding a commercial treaty. A

_hatti-shereef_ at this juncture (December 1838) arrived from the Porte,

obtained (as it is said) through the advice of Colonel Hodges, and

containing a form of constitution for Servia, regulating the legal

tribunals, the functions of the ministry, &c., and ordaining the

formation of a legislative council of seventeen members, as a check on

the despotism of the Prince. But the crisis had already arrived. The

senate took the initiative, by charging Milosh with embezzlement of the

public property, and calling him to account; and, after a vain attempt

to make a stand against the popular indignation, he fled with his

treasures into Hungary. An attempt to recover his power having proved

ineffectual, he at length abdicated in favour of his son, Milan; who,

dying soon after, was succeeded by his brother, Michael, under the

guardianship of his mother, Liubitza. But the same system still

continued; and all efforts to procure any redress of grievances proving

fruitless, a general outbreak took place in September 1842, the prime

movers in which were Wucicz and Petronevich, who for several years had

been the recognised heads of the popular party. As it was found that the

few troops round the Prince were not to be depended upon, he quitted

Belgrade, accompanied by his mother and the French and English consuls,

and repaired to Semlin; and after some fruitless negotiation, the

sovereignty was declared vacant by the representatives of the nation,

with the concurrence of the Turkish governor, Kiamil Pasha.

As it was well known that the Obrenovich family had been for some time

in bad odour at Petersburg, this movement was at first universally

attributed to Russian influence; but it soon became apparent that its

only motive was the spontaneous assertion by the Servians of the rights

and liberties withheld from them; and the steps for a fresh election, in

pursuance of the provisions of the _hatti-shereefs_ were taken with

perfect order and unanimity. A firman was issued by the Sultan, in right

of his suzerainte; and the unanimous and enthusiastic choice of the

nation fell on Alexander, son of the well-remembered Kara George, who

was forthwith inaugurated in the cathedral of Belgrade, by the

Archbishop, and received from the Porte the _berat_ or patent, necessary

for his confirmation in his new dignity. His accession was officially

notified by the Ottoman ministers, to the Russian envoy at

Constantinople but this evidence of good understanding and unity of

interest between the Porte and her vassal, was a formidable and

unexpected obstacle to the sinister designs of Russia which was to be

counteracted at all hazards; and the course adopted for this purpose,

unparalleled perhaps in the annals of diplomacy, cannot be better

understood than from the able and lucid statement of Lord Beaumont in

his place in parliament, on the 5th of May following. [It must first be

well remembered that neither in the treaty of Bukarest, nor in any

subsequent convention, was a shadow of a right of _veto_, or

interference in any way in the election of a prince of Servia, conveyed

to Russia, (as in the joint nomination with the Porte of the hospodars

of the Trans-Danubian principalities,) and the only ground on which such

interference could rest, was that enunciated by Baron Lieven, with

somewhat remarkable frankness in a Russ diplomatist, to Mr Paton, that

"Servia owed her political existence solely to Russia, which gave the

latter a moral right of intervention over and above the stipulations of

treaties, to which no other power could pretend"--a statement false both

in fact and inference, since it was by their own good swords, unaided by

Russia or any other European power with either men or money,[8] that the

Servians won their freedom; and the nugatory stipulation in the treaty

of Bukarest, had been all along left a dead letter.] "Russia, neglecting

all international law, sent an agent of her own into Servia, to

investigate the internal proceedings of an independent state, and, on

receiving his report, directed that agent to state his complaints,

without consulting any other power, to the Divan. Now, he would venture

to say, that a greater or more direct insult than this, was never

offered to an independent state, and he could not conceive any act that

could be a more gross and positive violation of the treaties of

Bukarest, Akerman, and Adrianople, under which alone she could set up a

right to be informed of what passed in Servia. Though Georgevich was

elected by the people, according to the constitution of the province,

and though the validity of his election was acknowledged by the Divan,

and confirmed by the Porte, Russia demanded that the election should be

set aside; and this demand was made by that power in such an overbearing

manner, as to show to the world that Turkey was under the control of

Russia, and must act in conformity with the dictates of the Czar."

In this extremity, the Porte appealed for support to Great Britain and

Austria, two of the powers who were parties to the quintuple treaty

signed at London, July 15, 1840, for the express object of ensuring the

integrity and independence of the Ottoman Empire; and the appeal was

backed by strong representations from Sir Stratford Canning, the British

ambassador at Constantinople, to his home government. But the British

government was (as Lord Palmerston observed, with much sarcastic truth,

in the House of Commons on August 15) "in the same condition in which

they had too often of late been found in foreign affairs, without any

opinion of their own on the subject, (hear;) and determined to act with

Austria, thereby risking the sacrifice of our own interests for a remote

Austrian interest in which we had no concern. Austria at first

determined to support Servia; but there came an _urgent appeal_ from

Russia; and Austria recommended Servia to yield." The nature of this

"urgent appeal" will be well understood by those who are aware of the

morbid fear entertained by Austria of Russian extension among the Slavic

populations in Hungary; and of which Russia availing herself, (as

remarked by Mr Paget,) "by exerting the influence which similarity of

language, and, in some parts, of religion, gives her over them, has

hitherto frightened Austria into doing almost any thing she likes." "The

Sultan" (continued Lord Palmerston) "was now forced to submit. He

annulled the election of Prince Georgevich; he consented to a popular

election; he recalled the two popular leaders, Wucicz and Petronevich,

to Constantinople; and even appointed a Russian general, Baron Lieven,

his commissioner, in conjunction with a Turkish officer, to go into

Servia to see his orders carried into execution."

So far Lord Palmerston; and the accuracy of the information possessed by

the British Cabinet to combat these strong facts, may be estimated, from

Sir Robert Peel's calling Prince Alexander, a man of thirty-five, and

the worthy inheritor of his father's great qualities, "an infatuated

youth"--on the authority (it is said) of a letter from Mr Fonblanque!

But we must return from the English debates to the progress of the drama

in Servia, where the commissioners found the Servians, in defiance of

the great powers, and in spite of the hopelessness of aid from

Constantinople, preparing for national resistance. The Prince refused to

abdicate, alleging that the firman by which he had been appointed had

never been revoked, and that universal anarchy would result from his

resigning the reins of government, since no _kaimakams_, or regents _pro

tempore_, had been named by the Porte--an omission which is supposed not

to have been altogether unintentional; and the whole nation rose in

commotion at the bare mention of the recall of Wucicz and Petronevich;

the crowd exclaiming, when Wucicz told them that 'the Servian forests

would not be less green were two old trees cut down, "No! a thousand

times no!" and rushing with arms in their hands to the presence of

Hafiz-Pasha, (who had been appointed on Kiamil's recall on the mandate

of Russia for his share in the revolution,) announced their

determination to maintain their prince and his counsellors; to which

Hafiz assented, no doubt, with secret gratification. While the

proceedings were thus stayed by the unexpected resolution shown by the

Servians, Russian emissaries were traversing the country in all

directions, striving in vain to stir up a revolt in favour of the

Obrenovich family, whose former partisans, it was found, were now their

strongest opponents; and inciting the Christians in Bosnia and Bulgaria

to rise against the Moslems, by the hope of obtaining independent

governments under hospodars of their own, like the other principalities.

On the other hand, the Servian population was ready to rise _en masse_

in defence of its liberties, and was further cheered by the report that

thirty thousand of the Slavic races under Austrian dominion were ready

to join them in the struggle for national freedom; while the Porte,

roused to unexpected energy by the accumulation of wrong heaped upon it,

reinforced the garrison of Belgrade with three thousand fresh troops,

and formed encampments to the amount of near one hundred thousand men at

Constantinople and Adrianople, for the ostensible purpose of overawing

the spirit of revolt among the Bulgarians. The National Assembly, which

had in the mean time met at Belgrade, declared the election of Prince

Alexander legal and valid, and refused to abrogate it; and as the agents

of Russia found that their original object could only be effected by an

invasion, an act which (even had the season left time to march an army

to the Danube) might have exceeded even the long-suffering of the other

powers who were parties to the treaty of 1840, it was resolved, for the

sake of appearances, to repair the false step as far as possible by a

show of moderation. It was accordingly announced that the principal

objections of Russia to the late election arose from the informality

with which the proceedings had been conducted; that Prince Alexander

would be admitted as a candidate, (a concession very distasteful to

Austria, who apprehended that the talent and popularity of the prince

might attract her own Slavic subjects under his rule;) and that the late

prince, Michael, should be excluded from competition. This could only

lead to one result; and Alexander, having _pro forma_ resigned his

authority, a _hatti-shereef_ was sent from the Porte, and he was again

elected with even greater enthusiasm than before.

But Russia, though foiled in her main object, had still another move in

reserve. The _berat_, or letter-patent of the Sultan, was still

necessary for the confirmation of the new prince; and July 27, M. Titoff

(who had succeeded M. Boutenieff as Russian envoy to the Porte)

announced to the Divan the will of his master, that this important

document should be withheld till Wucicz and Petronevich, "the authors of

the late disturbances," had left the country. The ministers of the

Porte, unsupported by the ambassadors of France and England, who

remained passive, had no alternative but to yield to this audacious act

of intervention, which was communicated by Baron Lieven to the Servian

kaimakams appointed during the interregnum. "As soon as the intelligence

was spread among the people, the universal exclamation was--'We will not

suffer them to be taken from us--they are our protectors, our

benefactors;'" but submission was inevitable, and, in the middle of

August, the two ministers repaired to Widdin, where they were received

with high distinction by Hussein Pasha. They remained in exile a year,

when the interdict was withdrawn by Russia, as it is said in consequence

of British intervention, but more probably from finding, that,

notwithstanding their absence, it was impossible to stir up faction

against Prince Alexander. The circumstances of their return have been

already given from Mr Paton's account; and we can little doubt, that on

his next interview with the Prince, after his faithful counsellors had

been restored to him, "he showed no trace of that reserve and timidity

which foreigners had remarked in him a year before."

Such is the plain unvarnished account of the late transactions in

Servia, in which the true character of Russian policy, and the means by

which it is carried out, have been unveiled before the eyes of Europe in

a manner sufficient to enlighten those which are not closed in wilful

blindness. "Europe has been apprised, if she wishes to be so," (says the

_Journal des Debats_,) "that there is in the East, independent of

Turkey, a point of resistance against the encroachments of Russia;" and

this _great fact_ derives double value from that point being found in

one of those Slavic populations which it is the grand object and aim of

Russia to unite under her iron sceptre. But (in the eloquent language of

Mr Paget) "we knew that if Europe did awake, the progress of Russia was

stopped; we knew that her gigantic power would crumble away, and nothing

remain but the hatred of the world, of the injustice and cruelty by

which it had been raised."

F. H.

_Servia, the Youngest Member of the European Family; or, a

Residence in Belgrade, and Travels in the Highlands and Woodlands

of the Interior, during the Years 1843 and 1844._ By ANDREW

ARCHIBALD PATON, Esq., Author of the "Modern Syrians."

FOOTNOTES:

[1] This was the explanation actually given by Develuz, our consul at

Adrianople, of his exaggerated account of the strength of Diebitsch's

army, at the moment when Diebitsch's best hope was, that he might effect

his retreat across the Balkan with the shattered and debilitated remnant

of his troops! Yet on this authority the Sultan was recommended to yield

at discretion, and the treaty of Adrianople was signed!

[2] The present Prince, on public occasions, always wears the fez with

an aigrette of diamonds, as a recognition of the suzerainte of the

Porte; his predecessor, Michel Obrenovich, gave great offence by wearing

a cocked hat.

[3] The old Emperor, Francis of Austria, when a Russian general was to

be presented, would say, "Now bring in the northern firmament, and all

its stars."

[4] Sokol must here be a slip of the pen for Szoko. Sokol, the

birth-place of the famous Mohammed Sokolli, vizier of Soliman the

Magnificent and his two successors, is in the heart of Bosnia, near

Gradachatz.

[5] In the supplement to the _Biographie Universelle_, vol. lxi., a

strange tale is told, that Czerni George was a native of Nanci, who fled

in his youth to Servia--but this is a mere romance.

[6] Lamartine (_Voyage en Orient_) and other writers represent Kara

George as having died in confinement in an Austrian fortress, soon after

his flight in 1813-an error which has probably arisen from a confusion

between his fate and that of Alexander Hypsilantis, who headed the

insurrection in Walachia in 1821, and died in Mongatz, after three

years' imprisonment.

[7] These firmans, with the _hatti-shereef_ of 1838, &c., were printed

and laid before the House of Commons in May 1843.

[8] The contrast in this respect, between the progress and results of

the Servian and Greek revolutions, is forcibly stated in an extract from

a MS. document by Wuk Stephanovich, author of the Servian Anthology, in

Parish's _Diplomatic History of the Monarchy of Greece_.--Pp. 387-90.

THE STUDENT OF SALAMANCA.

PART IV.

"Y asi entre otras razones le dijo que no tuviese pena del suceso

de Camila, porque sin duda la herida era ligera."--CERVANTES. _El

Curioso Impertinente._

The unexpected and opportune appearance of Mariano Torres, at the moment

of Herrera's escape, requires a few words of explanation. When Rodil, on

the morrow of the skirmish with Zumalacarregui in the Lower Amezcoa,

evacuated that valley, he proceeded to distribute a portion of his army

amongst various garrisons; and then, with the remainder, marched to

Biscay in pursuit of Don Carlos, who, having as yet no place of security

from his enemies, was wandering about attended by a handful of

followers. Amongst the troops left in Navarre by the Christino general,

was the cavalry regiment to which Herrera and Torres belonged, and this

was ordered to the plains of the Ebro. The day after its arrival at the

town of Viana, a battalion marched in from Pampeluna, and with it came

Sergeant Velasquez, who, after his escape from the Carlists, had taken

refuge in that fortress. Great was the consternation of Torres on

learning the surprise of the escort and capture of his friend, and his

grief was warmly sympathized in by the other officers of the regiment,

with whom Herrera was a universal favourite. But Torres was not the man

to content himself with idle regrets and unavailing lamentations, and he

resolved to rescue Herrera, if it were possible, even at the hazard of

his own life. He confided his project to the colonel of his regiment,

who, with some difficulty, was induced to acquiesce in it, and to grant

him leave of absence. This obtained, he disguised himself as a private

soldier, and boldly plunged into the centre of Navarre in quest of

Zumalacarregui and his army. He had little difficulty in finding them:

he announced himself as a deserter from the Christinos, and, without

attracting unusual notice or suspicion, was enrolled in a Navarrese

battaline, which, a day or two afterwards, marched to the village where

Herrera was kept prisoner. Although by the interference of Count

Villabuena, and the dexterity of Paco and the gipsy, Mariano's daring

self-devotion was rendered superfluous, it had its uses, inasmuch as his

disappearance with Herrera prevented the slightest suspicion from

falling upon those who had really contrived and effected the escape. The

gipsy, after guiding the two friends to Salvatierra, and receiving an

ample reward from Herrera, performed the secret service with which

Zumalacarregui had charged him, returned to that general with a ready

framed excuse for the slight delay in its execution, and pocketed the

ten additional onzas promised him by Paco. The muleteer, still weak from

his wound, was the last man to be suspected; and of the Count's

participation in the affair, no one, excepting Major Villabuena, for a

moment dreamed. Don Baltasar, remembering his cousin's anxiety

concerning Herrera, certainly entertained a notion that he had in some

way or other facilitated his escape; but of this he could obtain no

proof, nor, had he been able to do so, would it have been for his own

interest to expose the Count, whom he was desirous, on the contrary, to

conciliate. It was a vague and undefined apprehension of some attempt at

a rescue, that had led him, at so late an hour on the night of the

escape, to prowl in the vicinity of Herrera's prison.

The autumn and winter of 1834 passed away without any material change in

the position of the personages of our narrative. The war continued with

constantly increasing spirit and ferocity, and each month was marked by

new and important successes on the part of the Carlists. The plains of

Vittoria, the banks of the Ebro, the mountains of central and northern

Navarre, were alternately the scene of encounters, in which the skill of

Zumalacarregui, and the zeal and intrepidity of his troops, proved an

overmatch for the superior numbers of the Christinos. In vain did the

government of the Queen Regent, persevering in spite of its many

reverses, send its best troops and most experienced generals to that

corner of the peninsula where civil strife raged: it was only that the

troops might be decimated, and the generals forfeit their former

reputation in repeated and disastrous defeats. Although the country and

climate were such as to render temporary repose in winter quarters most

desirable for the contending armies, the idea of such an indulgence was

scarcely for a moment entertained, and the winter campaign proved as

active as the summer one. The arrival of Mina to take the chief command

of the Queen's forces, and the severity of the measures he adopted,

rendered the character of the war more sanguinary and cruel than it had

been since its commencement; and although, in numerous instances, the

nearest relatives and dearest friends were fighting on contrary sides,

it became impossible for them to obtain intelligence of each other's

welfare. It was by no means surprising, therefore, that eight months

elapsed, and the spring arrived, without Herrera hearing any thing of

Count Villabuena or his daughter; and that the Count, on the other hand,

remained ignorant of the proceedings of the young man whose life he had

saved, and in whose fate he could not but feel interested, save through

the occasional rumour of some dashing exploit, by which Herrera

maintained and increased the high reputation he had early acquired in

the ranks of the Christinos. His gallantry did not go unrewarded, and

the opening of the spring campaign found him in command of a squadron,

and on the high-road to further promotion.

Whilst Herrera was thus gaining fame and honour, his rival, Major

Villabuena, had no reason to complain of his services being overlooked.

His courage was undoubted, his military skill by no means contemptible,

and these qualities had procured him a colonel's commission and a staff

appointment. But, in spite of these advantages, Don Baltasar was

dissatisfied and unhappy. His object in joining the Carlists had not

been promotion, still less a zeal for the cause, but the appropriation

to himself of the fair hand and broad lands of Rita de Villabuena. His

prospect of obtaining these, however, seemed each day to diminish. The

favour with which the Count regarded him had lasted but during the first

days of their acquaintance, and had since been materially impaired by

the discovery of various unpleasing traits in Don Baltasar's character,

and particularly by his endeavours to urge the death of Herrera in

opposition to the wishes of his kinsman. Moreover, there could be little

sympathy or durable friendship between men of such opposite qualities

and dispositions. Count Villabuena had the feelings and instincts of a

nobleman, in the real, not the conventional sense of the term: he was

proud to a fault, stern, and unyielding, but frank, generous, and

upright. Don Baltasar was treacherous, selfish, and unscrupulous. He

felt himself cowed and humbled by the superiority of the Count, whom he

began secretly to detest; and who, whilst still keeping on good, or at

least courteous, terms with his cousin, became daily more averse to his

alliance, and more decided to support Rita in her rejection of his suit.

As a natural consequence of Zumalacarregui's successes, they of the

absolutist party in Spain who had openly declared for Don Carlos, and

who, during the first year of the war, had been hunted from post to

pillar, and frequently compelled to seek concealment in caves and

forests from the pursuit of the foe, found themselves, in the spring of

1835, in possession of a considerable tract of country, including a few

fortified places. _El Lobo Cano_, the Grey-haired Wolf, as his followers

had styled Don Carlos, in allusion to his hair having become bleached on

the mountain and in the bivouac, began to collect around him the

semblance of a court; and various ladies, the wives and daughters of his

partisans, who had been in temporary exile in France, recrossed the

frontier and hazarded themselves in the immediate vicinity of the scene

of war. Amongst others, Rita de Villabuena, who had been residing with

some friends at the French town of Pau, implored, and with difficulty

obtained, her father's permission to rejoin him. A house was prepared

for her reception in the small town of Segura in Guipuzcoa, whence, in

case of need, a speedy retreat might be made to the adjacent sierras of

Mutiloa and Aralar, and here she arrived, under her father's escort,

towards the commencement of the month of May.

One of the first who hastened to pay court to the young and beautiful

heiress, was, as might be expected, Colonel Baltasar de Villabuena. But

his reception was in the highest degree discouraging, and he was able to

assure himself, that if any variation had taken place in Rita's

sentiments, it was by no means in his favour. His only remaining hope,

therefore, was in an appeal to the Count, whom he still believed to be,

for the family reasons already adverted to, desirous of a union between

Rita and himself. This appeal he resolved to take an early opportunity

of making. A valuable estate, which Rita had inherited from her mother,

lay within the tract of country already conquered by the Carlists; and

although the revenue it yielded was greatly diminished by the disturbed

state of Navarre, and the contributions levied for the carrying on of

the war, it was still sufficiently important to excite the cupidity of

Don Baltasar, and to render him doubly anxious to obtain, on any terms,

the hand of his cousin.

It was on a bright May morning, three days subsequently to Rita's

arrival at Segura, that a small train of horsemen was seen winding along

the declivitous paths that lead across the sierra of Elgua, a part of

the northern boundary of the province of Alava. The snows with which,

during the long winter, the upper portion of these mountains had been

covered, had disappeared in the warm rays of the spring sun, and

disclosed peaks of grey rock, and patches of table-land strewn with

flints, producing little besides a few Alpine plants, which, in defiance

of the scanty nourishment they found, and of the keen air that blew over

those elevated summits, boldly expanded their blossoms in the pleasant

sunshine. Lower down, and on that part of the southern side of the

mountain over which the cavalcade now proceeded, masses of forest-trees

sprang out of the more plentiful soil, and overshadowed the rocky path

that rang under the horses' feet; the dusky foliage of the fir-tree, the

brighter green of the oak, and the broad angular leaves of the sycamore,

mingling in rich variety. Now the path lay through some dried-up

water-course, half filled with loose stones, whose elevated sides, over

the edges of which the tendrils of innumerable creeping plants dangled

and swung, bounded the view on either hand; whilst overhead the

interwoven branches afforded, through their thick leafage, but scanty

glimpses of the bright blue sky. Presently, emerging from the ravine,

the road, if such it might be called, ran along the shelf of a

precipice, below which successive ranges of luxuriant foliage, varied

here and there by a projecting crag, or enlivened by the dash and

sparkle of a waterfall, continued to the level below. From the foot of

the mountains, an extensive plain stretched out to a distance of several

leagues, its smiling and fertile fields thickly sprinkled with villages

and farm-houses. To the left front rose the old Moorish castle of

Guevara; and at a greater distance, more to the westward, and near the

centre of the plain, were seen the imperfect fortifications and lofty

church-towers of the city of Vittoria.

The foremost of the horsemen, who, on the day referred to, were thus

scrambling, to the great discomfort of their steeds, down the steep and

rugged sides of the sierra, avoiding, for reasons of safety, the

high-road from Salinas to Vittoria, which lay at a league or two on

their right, was a man of middle age and tawny complexion, mounted on a

lean and uncomely, but surefooted horse, whose long tail, which, if

allowed to flow at will, would have swept the ground, was doubled up

into a sort of club, about a foot long, and tightly bound with worsted

ribands of bright and varied colours. The thick and abundant mane had

been carefully plaited, with the exception of the foremost tuft, left

hanging down between the ears, and from beneath which the wild eyes of

the animal glanced shyly at the different objects he passed, pretty much

as did those of the rider from under his bushy and projecting eye-brows.

The horseman was dressed in a loose jacket of black sheep-skin, the wool

rubbed off in many places, fastened down the front by copper clasps and

chains that had once boasted a gilding, and bound at edges with coarse

crimson velvet, which, from time and dirt, had become as dark as the

principal material of the garment. Between the loose short trousers and

the clumsy half-boots, replacing the sandals that were the customary

wear of the person described, several inches of lean and sinewy leg were

visible. A coloured handkerchief, tied round the head, and from beneath

which a quantity of shaggy black hair escaped, rusty iron spurs, with

huge jingling rowels, and a well-stuffed leathern wallet slung across

his body, completed the equipment of the horseman, in whom the reader

will perhaps already have recognised Jaime, the gipsy esquilador, now

acting as guide to the persons who followed. These consisted of Count

Villabuena and his cousin, Don Baltasar, both well mounted on powerful

chargers, and cloaked from chin to heel; for they had been early in the

saddle, and, although now in the month of May, the morning air upon the

mountains was keen and searching. They were followed, at a short

distance, by an escort of forty Carlist cavalry, strange, wild-looking

figures, whose scanty equipment, and the little uniformity of their

clothing, might have excited the derision of better provided troops; but

whose muscular forms and hardy aspect, as well as the serviceable state

of their carbines and lances, gave promise of their proving efficient

defenders and formidable foes.

Not having been bred to the profession of arms, Count Villabuena was, in

a strictly military point of view, of little use to his party; but his

intimate acquaintance with Navarre and the Basque provinces, with the

customs, feelings, and prejudices of their inhabitants, rendered him

invaluable in all administrative arrangements and combinations, and in

these he cheerfully and actively exerted himself. It was on a mission of

this nature that he was now proceeding, having left Onate early that

morning, to attend a meeting of influential Alavese Carlists, which was

to take place at the village of Gamboa, on the north side of the plain

of Vittoria. Although the country he had to pass through was not then

occupied, and only occasionally visited, by the Christinos, an escort

was necessary; and, besides this escort, Colonel Villabuena had

volunteered to accompany his cousin. His object in so doing was to

obtain an opportunity for an uninterrupted conversation with the Count,

on the subject of his pretensions to the hand of Rita.

This conversation had taken place, and its result had been most

unsatisfactory to Don Baltasar. The Count plainly told him that it was

not his intention to force the inclinations of his daughter; and that,

as she was averse to the proposed alliance, he himself had abandoned the

idea of its taking place. A long and stormy discussion ensued, and

Baltasar accused the Count of having deceived him, and induced him to

join a cause, the ultimate triumph of which was impossible, by holding

out hopes that he never intended to realize. The Count replied by

reminding Don Baltasar, that when he had urged him to serve his rightful

monarch, and not under the banner of a usurper, the only arguments he

had used were those of loyalty and duty; and that the proposed marriage

was a private arrangement entirely contingent upon his daughter's

acquiescence. Sharp retorts and angry words followed, until the

conversation was brought to a close by the Count's checking his horse,

and allowing the escort, which had previously been at some distance

behind, to come up with them. The cousins then rode on, still side by

side, but silent, and as far apart as the narrow path would allow, the

Count haughty and indignant, Don Baltasar sullen and dogged.

Whilst this occurred in the mountains, the persons whom Count Villabuena

came to meet were assembling at the place of rendezvous in the village

of Gamboa. From various country lanes and roads, substantial-looking

men, wrapped in heavy brown cloaks, and riding punchy mountain horses,

were seen to emerge, for the most part singly, and at the careless,

deliberate pace least calculated to excite suspicion of their going to

other than their ordinary avocations. Some of these were alcaldes and

regidores from the neighbouring villages, others landed proprietors in

the vicinity. Now and then a lean, anxious priest, perched upon a high

saddle, his feet encased in clumsy wooden stirrups, his head covered

with an enormous hat, of which the brim, curled up at the sides over the

crown, projected half a yard before and behind him, came ambling into

the village, distributing his _benedicites_ amongst the peasant women

and children, who stood at the doors of the houses bowing reverently to

the _padre cura_. One man, dressed in the coarsest and commonest garb of

a labourer, came up upon an ill-looking mule, and received a loud and

joyful welcome from the persons already assembled. He was a wealthy

proprietor, whose estates lay within the Christino lines, and had been

compelled to adopt this disguise to avoid notice. The arrival of another

person, to all appearance a charcoal-burner, with grimy face and hands,

riding a ragged pony, across which a couple of sacks, black from the

charcoal they had contained, were thrown by way of saddle, was hailed

with similar demonstrations of joy. He was a rich merchant and national

guardsman from Vittoria, secretly well affected to Don Carlos.

The place where the Carlists first assembled was not in a house, but on

a paved platform, extending along one side of the large church, by which

it was masked from the view of persons approaching from the direction of

Vittoria. A sort of cloister, with stone benches beneath it, ran along

the wall of the church, and in front of the platform was a broad

greensward, used as a playground by the village children. Whilst the

Carlists grouped themselves in the cloisters, talking eagerly together,

and waiting the coming of Count Villabuena, their horses and ponies

stood saddled and bridled upon the green, held by peasant boys, and in

readiness for their owners to mount and ride away at a moment's notice,

or on the first signal of alarm. Of the mountain path by which the Count

was expected to arrive, only about a mile was visible from the platform,

after which it disappeared over the brow of a low wood-crowned eminence

that rose to the north, partially intercepting the view of the sierra.

On this eminence a peasant was stationed to watch for the Count; whilst

on the other side of the village, at a short distance upon the road to

Vittoria, another vedette was posted, to give notice of the appearance

of any of the foraging or reconnoitring parties which the Christinos not

unfrequently sent out in this direction.

It was considerably past noon, and the members of the Junta, for such

did the assembly style itself, were beginning to wax impatient for the

arrival of the Count, without whom the business for which they had met

could not be proceeded with, when the watcher upon the hill gave the

concerted signal by waving his cap in the air, uttering at the same time

one of those far-sounding cries, peculiar to the inhabitants of

mountainous regions. Upon this announcement, the Carlists descended from

the platform into the road that ran past one of its extremities, and

took their way, with grave and dignified demeanour, to the dwelling of

the priest, in which the meeting was to be held. This house, according

to custom one of the most spacious and comfortable in the village, was

situated at about musket-shot from the church, and a little detached

from the other buildings. Annexed to it was a long garden, bordering the

road, and divided from it by a low hedge; beyond the garden was a vast

and level field, and, on the eastern side of that, a tract of marshy

ground, thickly covered with a lofty growth of willow and alder trees,

extended to a considerable distance. The Carlists had traversed nearly

the whole length of the garden hedge, and the foremost of them were

close to the door of the house, when they were startled by the loud

blast of a horn, with which the peasant sentry upon the Vittoria road

had been furnished, to give the alarm if needful. They simultaneously

paused, and anxiously listened for a repetition of the sound. It came; a

third and a fourth blast were sounded, and with such hurried vehemence

of tone as denoted pressing danger. Yet the peril could scarcely be so

imminent as the quick repetition of the signal would seem to denote;

for, from the place where the vedette was posted, he would command a

view of any advancing troops nearly half an hour before they could reach

the village, and those who had aught to fear from them would have ample

time to effect their escape. But the horn continued sounding, ever

louder and louder,--the Carlists gazed at each other in dismay, and some

few made a movement towards their horses, as if to mount and fly.

Suddenly a fat and joyous-looking alcalde, whose protuberant paunch and

ruby nose were evidence of his love for the wine-skin, although the

chalky tint that had overspread his features at the first sound of

alarm, did not say much for his intrepidity, burst out into a loud

laugh, which caused his companions to stare at him in some wonder and

displeasure.

"By the blessed St. Jago!" exclaimed he, "the idiot has mistaken our

friends for our enemies. He has been looking over his shoulder instead

of before him, and has caught a sight of the Senor Conde and his escort.

See yonder."

The Carlists looked in the direction pointed out, and on the top of the

hill over which Count Villabuena was expected to approach, they saw

three horsemen standing, one of whom was sweeping the village and the

adjacent country with a field-glass, apparently seeking the cause and

meaning of the violent fanfare that had so much alarmed the respectable

Junta. Behind these three men, who were no others than the Count, his

cousin, and their guide, the lance-flags of the escort were visible,

although the soldiers themselves were still out of sight, having halted

just here arriving on the crest of the hill. The countenances of the

Carlists, which for a moment had contracted with alarm, were beginning

again to expand, as the plausibility of their companion's explanation

occurred to them, when suddenly they saw the Count and his companions

turn their horses in all haste, and disappear behind the hill. At the

same moment, and before they could guess at the meaning of this

manoeuvre, a shout was heard, a troop of Christino dragoons debouched

from behind the willow wood, deployed upon the field, and charged across

it in open order, their lances levelled,[9] and the pennons fluttering

above their horses' ears. In less time than it takes to write it, they

had crossed the field, dashed into the garden, and, breaking through the

hedge, clattered over the rough streets of the village in pursuit, of

the unfortunate priests and alcaldes, who, taken entirely by surprise,

knew not which way to run to avoid the danger that menaced them. Some

few who had time to get on horseback, scampered off, but were pursued

and overtaken by the better-mounted dragoons; others crept into houses

and stables, or flung themselves into ditches; and the majority, seeing

no possibility of escape, threw themselves on their knees, and, in

piteous accents, implored mercy. This was not refused.

"Give quarter, and make prisoners," was the command uttered in the

clear, sonorous tones of Luis Herrera, who led the party; "they are

unarmed--spare their lives."

The order was obeyed, and only one or two of the more desperate, who

produced concealed weapons, and endeavoured to defend themselves,

received trifling sabre-cuts from the exasperated dragoons.

But although Don Baltasar, on first obtaining a view of the Queen's

cavalry, and before he knew what force was approaching the village, had

retired behind the brow of the hill. It was by no means his intention to

make a precipitate retreat without ascertaining the strength of the

enemy, and endeavouring, if possible, to rescue the captive Junta.

Whilst the Count and the escort retraced their steps down the hill, and

halted in the fields upon its north side, whence they had the option of

returning to the mountains by the way they had come, or of striking off

into the high-road to Salinas and Onate, which ran at a short distance

to their right, Colonel Villabuena and the gipsy, concealed amongst the

trees that clothed the summit of the eminence, noted what passed in the

village. They at once saw how the surprise had occurred. The Junta had

not expected an enemy to approach by any other road than that from

Vittoria, and had consequently stationed sentries in no other direction.

That such would be the case, had been foreseen by the Christinos, who

having received, through their spies, information of the intended

meeting had sent out troops upon the Pampeluna road, with orders, after

proceeding a certain distance, to strike off to the left, and, availing

themselves of the cover afforded by a large tract of wood and swamp, to

take Gamboa in rear or flank. The manoeuvre had been rapidly and

skilfully executed; and Luis Herrera, who, with his squadron, had been

sent upon this duty, arrived with one half of his men within a few

hundred yards of the village before he was perceived by the Carlist

vedette. His other troop he had detached to his right, in order that, by

making a wider sweep, they might get in rear of Gamboa, and prevent the

possible escape of any of the rebels. This detachment, ignorant of the

country, and puzzled by the numerous lanes and paths which crossed each

other in every direction, had lost its way, and was still at some

distance from the village when Herrera charged into it.

When Colonel Villabuena had made his observations, and ascertained that

the number of the enemy but little exceeded that of his own men, he rode

out of the wood and rejoined the escort, resolved to take advantage of

the Christinos being dispersed, and, unexpectant of an attack, to make a

dash at them, which, he doubted not, would be fully successful.

Previously, however, and although the Count had no military rank, it was

a matter of common courtesy, not to say of duty, to communicate with

him, and ask his consent to dispose of an escort which had been sent for

his protection. But here the sullen temper of Don Baltasar, and the

rankling irritation left by his recent altercation with his kinsman,

showed themselves. Followed by the gipsy, he rode to the front of the

lancers, who were drawn up in line, and, without addressing a syllable

to the Count, or appearing to notice his presence, gave, in a sharp

abrupt tone, the necessary words of command. The men moved off to the

left. The Count, highly sensitive on matters of etiquette, and indignant

at being treated by Don Baltasar as a person of no importance, unworthy

of being consulted, allowed the troop to march away without giving any

indication of an intention to follow or accompany it. Don Baltasar

looked round, hesitated for a moment, and then seeing that the Count

remained motionless, and took no notice of the departure of his escort,

he rode back to him.

"The enemy are few," said he, abruptly; "I shall attack them."

Count Villabuena bowed his head coldly.

"Scant measure of courtesy, colonel," said he. "Angry feelings should

not make you forget the conduct of a _caballero_."

On hearing himself thus rebuked, an expression of anger and deadly hate

overspread the sombre countenance of Don Baltasar, and he scowled at the

Count as though about to deal him a stab. But his eye sank beneath the

calm, cold, contemptuous gaze of Count Villabuena. He said nothing: and

again wheeling his charger, galloped furiously back to the head of his

men, followed, at a more deliberate pace, by his cousin. Passing swiftly

over a few fields, the little troop swept round the base of the hill,

dashed across the level, and appeared upon the road at half a mile from

the village. On obtaining a view of the latter, Don Baltasar at once saw

that he was not likely to have so cheap a bargain of the Christinos as

he had anticipated. Herrera had too much experience in this description

of warfare to be easily caught; and although, upon first entering

Gamboa, the dragoons had unavoidably dispersed in pursuit of the

fugitives, he had lost no time in reassembling them; and, whilst a few

men kept the prisoners already made, and searched the houses for others,

he himself had formed upon the road a party fully equal in number to

that commanded by Don Baltasar. Nothing daunted, however, at finding the

enemy on his guard, the Carlist colonel drew his sabre and turned to his

men.

"_A ellos!_" he cried. "At them, boys, for Spain and the King!"

The lancers replied to his words by a loud hurra, and the little party

advanced, at first at a moderate pace, in order not to blow the horses

before the decisive moment should arrive. The Count, forgetting private

animosity in the excitement and exhilaration of the moment, rode

cheerfully at the side of his cousin, and drew the sword which, although

a civilian, the perilous and adventurous life he led induced him

invariably to carry. At the same moment Herrera's trumpeter sounded the

assembly, and those of the dragoons who had dismounted hurried to their

horses. Before, however, the distance between the opposite parties had

been diminished by many yards, the blast of the Christino trumpets was

replied to by another, and, upon looking back, Don Baltasar saw a fresh

party of dragoons just appearing upon the road, about a mile in his

rear. It was the second troop of Herrera's squadron coming to the

support of their leader.

"Curse and confound them!" cried Baltasar, his face darkening with rage

and disappointment. "Halt--files about! And now, boys, legs must do it,

for they are three to one."

And he led the way back into the fields, followed by his men at a rapid

pace, but in good order.

Without a moment's delay, Herrera, leaving a few dragoons to guard the

prisoners, dashed across the country in pursuit of the Carlists. His

example was followed by Torres, who commanded the other detachment. The

fugitives had a good start, and were soon behind the hill; but the

Christino horses were fresher, and although less accustomed to climb the

mountains, in the plain they were swifter of foot. Don Baltasar, now

riding in rear of his men, cast a glance over his shoulder.

"They gain on us," said he, in a low tone, and as if to himself. "It is

impossible to reach the sierra. If we could, we should be safe. There

are positions that we could hold on foot with our carbines, where they

would not dare attack us."

"We shall never reach them," said the Count. "Let us turn and fight

whilst yet there is time."

"The bridge! the bridge!" cried the gipsy, who, notwithstanding the

gaunt appearance of his steed, had kept well up with the soldiers. "If

we gain that, we are safe. A child could pull it down."

"Right, by God!" cried Baltasar glancing in some surprise at the adviser

of an expedient which he had himself overlooked. "Spur, men, spur; but

keep together."

Every rowel was struck into the flanks of the straining, panting horses

and the Carlists rapidly neared a small river, which, rising in some of

the adjacent mountains, flowed in rear of the little hill already

referred to, and parallel to the sierra whence Count Villabuena and his

companions had recently descended. The land, for some distance on either

side of the stream, was uncultivated, covered with furze and yellow

broom, and sprinkled with trees and clumps of high bushes. Across the

river, only a few months previously, a rude but solid stone bridge had

afforded a passage; but the bridge had been broken down soon after the

commencement of the war, and the stream, which, although not more than

seven or eight yards broad, was deep, and had steep high banks was now

traversed by means of four planks, laid side by side, but not fastened

together, and barely wide enough to give passage to a bullock cart. Over

this imperfect and rickety causeway, the retreating Carlists galloped,

the boards bending and creaking beneath their horses' feet. When all had

passed, Don Baltasar flung himself from his saddle, and aided by the

gipsy and by several of his men who had also dismounted, seized the

planks, and strove, by main strength, to tear their extremities from the

clay in which they were embedded. The Christinos, who were within a

couple of hundred yards of the river, set up a shout of fury when they

perceived the intention of their enemies. By the sinewy hands of

Baltasar and his soldiers, three of the boards were torn from the earth

and flung into the stream. The fourth gave way as Herrera came up, the

first man of his party, and, regardless of the narrow footing it

afforded, was about to risk the perilous voyage. Violently curbing his

horse, he but just escaped falling headlong into the stream. A shout of

exultation from the Carlists, and the discharge of several carbines

greeted the disappointed Christinos, who promptly returned the fire;

whilst, as was usual when they came within earshot, the complimentary

epithets of "Sons of Priests," and "_Soldados de la Puta_," accompanied

by volleys of imprecations, were bandied between the soldiers on either

side of the stream.

"Is there any bridge or ford at hand?" said Baltasar hastily to the

gipsy.

"None within a quarter of a league," was the reply.

"Then we will have a shot at them."

Herrera and Count Villabuena were again opposed to each other, and each

acknowledged the other's presence by a brief smile of recognition.

A smart skirmish now began. All was smoke, noise, and confusion. The

Count rode up to his cousin, who was on the right of his men.

"Let us retire," said he. "No advantage is to be gained by this idle

skirmishing. Infantry may be at hand, and delay will endanger our

retreat."

"Not so fast," replied Baltasar; "we will empty a few saddles before we

go."

"The escort was sent for my safety," said the Count, haughtily. "You are

not doing your duty in thus risking it."

"I have not been twenty years a soldier to learn my duty from you, sir,"

said Baltasar, fiercely. "Aim at the officers, men. A doubloon for him

who picks off the captain."

Stimulated by the promised reward, several of the Carlists directed

their fire at Herrera, who was on the left of the dragoons, exactly

opposite to, and within sixty paces of, Don Baltasar. The bullets flew

thick around Luis, but none touched him, and Baltasar himself drew a

pistol from his holster to take aim at his opponent. Disgusted at his

cousin's intemperate speech and imprudent conduct, the Count

contemptuously turned his back upon him and approached the stream,

regardless that by so doing he brought himself into a cross fire of

friends and foes.

"This is useless, Herrera," said he, "draw off your men."

The words had scarcely left his lips, when his hand relinquished its

hold of the bridle, by a convulsive movement he threw himself back in

the saddle, and fell heavily to the ground, struck by a ball. A cry of

horror from Luis was echoed by one of consternation from the Carlists,

on witnessing the fall of a man whom they all loved and respected.

"Where can we cross the stream?" demanded Herrera of one of his men, who

knew the country.

"To our left there is a ford, but at some distance."

"Cease firing," cried Herrera. The trumpet sounded the necessary call,

the Christinos hastily formed up and started at a gallop in the

direction of the ford. Don Baltasar advanced to the spot where his

cousin lay prostrate. Count Villabuena was lying on his back, his teeth

set, his eyes wide open and fixed, his clenched hands full of earth and

grass. Baltasar turned away with a slight shudder.

"He is dead," said he to the subaltern of the escort. "To take the body

with us would but impede our retreat, already difficult enough. The

living must not be endangered for the sake of the dead. Forward, men!"

And, without further delay, the Carlists set off at a brisk pace towards

the mountains, which they reached before the Christinos had found and

passed the distant ford. When the dragoons arrived at the foot of the

sierra, Don Baltasar and his men were already out of sight amongst its

steep and dangerous paths; and Herrera, compelled to abandon the

pursuit, returned mournfully to the river bank, to seek, and, if it

could be found, to convey to Vittoria the body of Count Villabuena.

Leaving Herrera to his mournful duty, let us conduct our readers to an

apartment in a house on the outskirts of the town of Segura. The

interior, which was plainly but commodiously furnished, indicated

feminine tastes and occupations, breathing that perfume of elegance

which the presence of woman ever communicates. Vases of flowers decked

the sideboards; a few books, the works of the best Spanish poets, lay

upon the table; and a guitar, unstrung, it is true, was suspended

against the wall. Two persons occupied the apartment. One of them, who

was seated on a low stool at its inner extremity, near to the folding

doors that separated it from an antichamber, was a robust, ruddy-cheeked

Navarrese girl, whose abundant hair, of which the jet blackness atoned

for the coarse texture, hung in a thick plait down her back, and whose

large red fingers were busily engaged in knitting. At the other end of

the apartment, close to the open window, through which she intently

gazed, was a being of very different mould. On a high-backed elbow-chair

of ancient oak sat Rita de Villabuena, pensive and anxious, her fair

face and golden tresses seeming fairer and brighter from the contrast

with the dark quaint carving against which they reposed. Her cheek was

perhaps paler than when first we made her acquaintance; anxiety for her

lover, and, latterly, for her father, was the cause; but her beauty had

lost nothing by the change, for the shade of melancholy upon her

features seemed, by adding to the interest her expressive countenance

inspired, rather to enhance than diminish its charm. She was now

watching for her father, who had led her to expect his return at about

this time. Over the stone balustrade of her balcony, she commanded a

view of the road along which he was to approach; and upon the farthest

visible point of it, where a bend round a group of trees concealed its

continuation, her gaze was riveted. Although the Count had assured her,

before his departure, that his journey was unattended with risk, Rita's

arrival upon the scene of war was too recent for her to escape

uneasiness during his absence. Some hours before the time at which his

return could reasonably be looked for, she had taken her post at the

window, and although, at the persuasion of her attendant, a simple

country girl, recently installed as her _doncella_, she had more than

once endeavoured to fix her attention on a book, or to distract it by

some of her usual occupations, the effort had each time been made in

vain, and she had again resumed her anxious watch. In every horseman, or

muleteer, who turned the angle of the road, she thought she recognised

the guide, who, two days previously, had accompanied her father from

Segura, and her heart throbbed with a feeling of joyful relief till a

nearer approach convinced her of her error.

Could the vision of Rita de Villabuena have penetrated the copse that

bounded her view in that direction, she would have perceived, towards

four of the afternoon, not her father, alas! but another horseman,

attended by the gipsy guide, riding at a rapid pace along the road. On

reaching the trees aforesaid, however, they deviated from the track into

a lane inclosed between hedges, which led round the town, and again

joined the road on its further side. To explain this manoeuvre, it is

necessary to retrace our steps, and to follow the movements of Colonel

Villabuena after his return to Onate on the preceding evening.

When the first excitement of the skirmish and subsequent flight had

subsided, and the detachment of Carlists, after giving their horses a

moment's breathing-time upon one of the higher levels of the sierra,

resumed their march at a more leisurely pace, the thoughts of Don

Baltasar became concentrated on the one grand object of deriving the

utmost possible advantage from the death of his cousin. By that event

the estates of the Villabuena family were now his own, those, at least,

that lay within the Carlist territory. These, however, were

comparatively of little value; and although the far more extensive ones,

that had been confiscated by the Queen's government, might possibly be

redeemed by a prompt abjuration of the cause of Don Carlos, a measure at

the adoption of which Don Baltasar was by no means so scrupulous as to

hesitate, yet even that would not fully satisfy him. He had other views

and wishes. As far as his selfish nature would admit of the existence of

such a feeling, he was deeply in love with Rita; the coldness with which

she treated him had only served to stimulate his passion; and he was

bent upon making her his at any price, and by any means. He was

sufficiently acquainted with her character to be convinced that his

prospect of obtaining her hand was any thing but improved by her

father's death and that to her the wealthy possessor of her family's

estates would be as unwelcome a wooer as the needy soldier of fortune.

He did not doubt that, after the first violence of her grief should

subside, she would return to France, where some of her mother's

relatives were resident; and that, when next he heard of her, it would

be as the bride of his fortunate rival. The picture thus conjured up

caused him to grind his teeth with fury; and he swore to himself a deep

oath that she should be his at any risk, and if, by the boldest and most

unscrupulous measures, that consummation could be brought about. A plan

occurred to him which he thought could not fail of success, and by which

the obstinacy of the self-willed girl must, he believed, be overcome. It

was a hazardous scheme, even in that unsettled and war-ridden country,

where men were too much occupied in party strife to attend to the strict

administration of justice; but Baltasar did not lack resolution, and the

prize was worth the peril. One thing he wanted; a bold and quick-witted

confederate, and him it was not so easy to find. No man had fewer

friends in his own class than Don Baltasar, and by his inferiors he was

generally detested on account of his harsh and overbearing demeanour. Of

this he was aware; and he vainly racked his brain to find a man in whom

he could confide. The details of his nefarious project were already

arranged in his mind, and only this one difficulty had yet to be

overcome; when, at two hours after dark, he entered the streets of

Onate. Hopeless of being served for affection's sake, he was meditating

whom he could make his own by bribery, when a light from an open window

flashed across the street, and illuminated the unprepossessing profile

of Jaime the gipsy, who, in his capacity of guide, was riding in front,

and a little on one side of Colonel Villabuena. The sight of those

sinister features, on which rapacity and cunning had set their stamp,

was as a sudden revelation to Don Baltasar, to whom it instantly

occurred that the gitano was the very man he sought. The circumstance of

his belonging to a race despised, and almost persecuted, by the people

amongst whom they dwelt, was an additional guarantee against any

compunctious scruples on his part; his occupation of a spy bespoke him

at once daring and venal, and Colonel Villabuena doubted not that he

should find him a willing and useful instrument.

The soldiers filed off to their quarters; and Baltasar, after desiring

the gipsy to come to him in an hour's time, betook himself to the

posada. When Jaime had given his horse an ample feed, and groomed him

with a care that showed the value he set upon his services, he made a

hasty meal in a neighbouring taberna, and repaired to the Colonel's

quarters. His stealthy tap at the door was replied to by an impatient

"_adelante_," and he entered the room.

A scarcely tasted supper was upon the table, and Don Baltasar was pacing

the apartment, his brow knit and apparently deep in thought. On

beholding the gipsy, he arranged his features into their most amiable

expression, and advanced towards him with an assumed air of frank

good-humour.

"I have to thank you, Jaime," said he, "for your promptness and presence

of mind this morning. Had you not thought of what we all forgot, and

suggested the pulling down of the bridge, few, if any of us, would have

seen Onate to-night. I shall report your conduct most favourably to the

General, who will doubtless reward it."

The esquilador slightly bowed his head, but, with the exception of that

movement, made no reply; nor did any expression of satisfaction at the

praise bestowed upon him light up his dark countenance.

"Meanwhile," continued Don Baltasar, "I will discharge my personal

obligation to you in a more solid manner than by mere thanks."

And he held out a handful of dollars, which, the next instant,

disappeared in one of Jaime's capacious pockets. This time a muttered

word or two of thanks escaped the lips of the taciturn esquilador.

"Whither do you now proceed?" enquired Baltasar. "Are you to rejoin the

General? What are your orders?"

"I am no man's servant," replied the gipsy, "and have no orders to

obey. When your General requires my services, we make a bargain, I to

act, he to pay. I risk my life for his gold, and if I deceive him I know

the penalty. But the service once rendered, I am my own man again."

"So then," said Baltasar, "you are not bound to Zumalacarregui; and

should any other offer you better pay for lighter service, you are free

to take it?"

"That's it," replied the gipsy.

There was a short pause, during which Colonel Villabuena attentively

scanned the countenance of Jaime, who remained impassive, and with eyes

fixed upon the ground, as though to prevent their expression from being

read. Baltasar resumed--

"Say then that I were to ensure you a large reward for the performance

of services far less dangerous than those you daily render at a less

price, would you accept or refuse the offer?"

"I must know what I am to do, and what to get," said the gipsy, this

time raising his eyes to Don Baltasar's face.

"Can you be silent?" said Baltasar.

"When I am paid for it--as the grave," was the reply.

"In short, if I understand you rightly," said the Colonel with an easy

smile, "you will do any thing at a price."

"Any thing," returned the unabashed gipsy. "It is not a small risk that

will frighten me, if the reward is proportionate."

"We shall suit one another charmingly," said Baltasar; "for what I

require will expose you to little danger, and your reward shall be of

your own fixing."

And, without further preamble, he proceeded to unfold to the gipsy the

outline of a scheme requiring his cooperation, the nature of which will

best be made known to the reader by the march of subsequent events.

The sinking sun and rapidly lengthening shadows proclaimed the approach

of evening, and Rita de Villabuena, still seated at her window, watched

for her father's arrival, when the trot of a horse, which stopped at the

door of the house, caused her to start from her seat, and hurry to the

balcony. Her anxiety was converted into the most lively alarm when she

saw the Count's gipsy guide alighting alone from his horse; a

presentiment of evil came over her, she staggered back into the room,

and sank almost fainting upon a chair. Recovering herself, however, she

was hurrying to the door of the apartment, when it opened, and Paco the

muleteer, who had lately been attached to her father as orderly, and

whom the Count had left as a protection to his daughter, made his

appearance.

"The gipsy is here, Senora," said he; "he brings news of his Excellency

the Conde."

"Admit him instantly," cried Rita, impatiently. "Where did you leave my

father?" she enquired, as the esquilador entered the room. "Is he well?

Why does he not return?"

"I left the Senor Conde at a convent near Lecumberri," replied the

gipsy.

"Near Lecumberri?" repeated Rita; "it was not in that direction he went.

He left this for the plains of Vittoria."

"He did so, Senora," answered the gipsy; "but before we were half-way to

Onate, we were met by a courier with despatches for the Senor Conde, who

immediately turned bridle, and ordered the escort to do the same. It was

past midnight when we again reached Segura; and, not to cause alarm, we

marched round the town, and continued our route without stopping.

"And your errand now?" exclaimed Rita. The gipsy seemed to hesitate

before replying.

"The Senor Conde is wounded," said he, at last.

"Wounded!" repeated Rita, in the shrill accents of alarm. "You are not

telling truth--they have killed him! Oh, tell me all! Say, is my father

still alive?"

And, clasping her hands together, she seemed about to throw herself at

the feet of Jaime, whilst her anxious glance strove to read the truth

upon his countenance. It was a strange contrast presented by that lovely

and elegant creature and the squalid, tawny gipsy; an angel

supplicating some evil spirit, into whose power she had temporarily

fallen, might so have looked.

"The Senor Conde's wound is severe," said Jaime. "On his way yesterday

afternoon to attend a meeting of the Navarrese Junta in the valley of

Lanz, he fell in with a party of Christino cavalry, and, although his

escort repulsed them, he himself received a hurt in the skirmish."

"My father wounded and suffering!" exclaimed Rita in extreme agitation,

passing her hand over her forehead in the manner of one bewildered by

some stunning and terrible intelligence. "I will go to him instantly.

Quick, Paco, the mules! Micaela, my mantilla! We must set out at once."

The servants hurried away to obey the orders of their mistress, and

prepare for instant departure, and the gipsy was about to follow, when

Rita detained him, and overwhelmed him with questions concerning her

father's state, to all of which Jaime replied in a manner that somewhat

tranquillized her alarm, although it produced no change in her

resolution to set off immediately to join him. This, indeed, the

esquilador informed her, was her father's wish, as he found that he

should be detained some time in his present quarters by the consequences

of his wound.

Although all haste was used in the necessary preparations, the sun was

close to the horizon before Rita and her attendants left Segura, and

took the road to Lecumberri, at about two leagues from which, as Jaime

told them, and in the heart of the sierra, was situated the convent that

was their destination. The distance was not great; but, owing to the

mountains, the travellers could hardly expect to reach the end of their

journey much before daybreak. Paco, who viewed this hasty departure with

any thing but a well-pleased countenance, urged Rita to postpone setting

off till the following morning, alleging the difficult nature of the

roads they must traverse, and which led for a considerable part of the

way over a steep and almost trackless sierra. But Rita's anxiety would

brook no delay, and the little cavalcade set out. It consisted of Rita

and her waiting-maid, mounted upon mules, and of the gipsy and Paco upon

their horses; Paco leading a third mule, upon which, by the care of

Micaela, a hastily packed portmanteau had been strapped. The gipsy rode

in front; thirty paces behind him came the women, and the muleteer

brought up the rear. Jaime had betrayed some surprise, and even

discomposure, when he found that Paco was to accompany them; but he did

not venture to make any objection to so natural an arrangement.

Taking advantage of the goodness of the road, which for the first league

or two was tolerably smooth and level, the travellers pushed on for

nearly two hours at a steady amble, which, had the nature of the ground

allowed them to sustain it, would have brought them to their journey's

end much sooner than was really to be the case. The sun had set, the

moon had not yet risen, and the night was very dark. Jaime, who

continued to maintain a short interval between his horse and the mules

of Rita and her attendant, kept shifting his restless glances from one

side of the road to the other, as though he would fain have penetrated

the surrounding gloom. He was passing a thicket that skirted the road,

when a cautious "Hist!" inaudible to his companions, arrested his

attention. He immediately pulled up his horse, and, dismounting,

unstrapped the surcingle of his saddle. On perceiving this, Rita stopped

to enquire the cause of the delay, but the gipsy requested her to

proceed.

"My horse's girths are loose, Senora," said he in explanation. "Be good

enough to ride on, and I will overtake you immediately."

Rita rode on, and Paco followed, without paying any attention to so

common an occurrence as the slackening of a girth. Scarcely, however,

had he passed the gipsy some fifty paces, when the latter left his

horse, who remained standing motionless in the middle of the road, and

approached the thicket. Just within the shadow of the foremost trees, a

man on horseback, muffled in a cloak, was waiting. It was Colonel

Villabuena.

"All is well," said the gipsy; "and you have only to ride forward and

prepare for our reception."

"Who is with you?" said Don Baltasar, in a dissatisfied tone.

"The lady and her doncella, and Paco, her father's orderly."

"Fool!" cried Baltasar; "why did you let him come? His presence may ruin

my plan."

"How could I help it?" retorted Jaime. "If I had objected he would have

suspected me. He's as cunning as a fox, and did not swallow the story

half as well as his mistress. But her impatience decided it. Nothing

would serve her but setting out immediately."

"He must be disposed of," said Baltasar. "There's many a mountain

precipice between this and our destination," he added meaningly.

Jaime shook his head.

"I might do it," said he; "but if I failed, and he is a wary and active

fellow, the chances are that he would do the same kind office for me,

and return with the lady."

"Humph!" said Baltasar. "Well, he shall be cared for. And now ride on. I

shall be at the convent an hour before you. Remember to take the longest

road."

The gipsy nodded, returned to his horse, and, springing lightly into the

saddle, galloped after his companions. Don Baltasar remained a short

time longer in the thicket, and then emerging upon the road, followed

Rita and her party at a deliberate pace. From time to time he stopped,

and listened for the sound of their horses' footsteps. If he could hear

it, he halted till it became inaudible, and then again moved on. His

object evidently was to keep as near to the travellers as he could

without allowing his proximity to be suspected.

It was nearly midnight, and Rita and her companions had been for some

time amongst the mountains, when they reached a place where the road, or

rather track, they followed, split and branched off in two different

directions. Jaime, who, since they had entered the sierra, had abridged

the distance between himself and his companions, and now rode just in

front of Rita's mule, was taking the right hand path, when Paco called

out to him that the left was the shortest and best.

"You are mistaken," said Jaime abruptly, continuing in the direction he

had first taken.

But Paco would not be put off in so unceremonious a manner, and he rode

up to the gipsy. "I tell you," said he, "that I know this country well,

and the left hand road is the one to take."

"How long is it since you travelled it?" inquired Jaime.

"Only last autumn," was the reply, "and then for the twentieth time."

"Well," said the esquilador, "it may be the shortest; but if you had

ridden along it this morning, as I did, you would hardly call it the

best. The winter rains have washed away the path, and left the bare

rocks so slippery and uneven, that I could scarcely get my horse over

them in daylight, and by night I should make sure of breaking his legs

and my own neck."

"I know nothing of this convent you are taking us to," said Paco, in a

sulky tone; "but if it stands, as you tell me, to the north of

Lecumberri, this road will lengthen our journey an hour or more."

"Scarcely so much," said Jaime. "At any rate," added he doggedly, "it is

I who answer to the Count for the Senora's safety, and I shall therefore

take the road I think best."

Paco was about to make an angry reply, but Rita interfered, and the

discussion terminated in the gipsy having his own way. Three minutes

later Don Baltasar arrived at the division of the roads, paused,

listened, and heard the faint echo of the horses' hoofs upon the right

hand path. With an exclamation of satisfaction, he struck his spurs into

the flanks of his steed, and at as rapid a pace as the uneven ground

would permit, ascended the contrary road, the shortest, and, as Paco had

truly asserted, by far the best to the convent whither Rita de

Villabuena was proceeding.

Over rocks and through ravines, and along the margin of precipices, Don

Baltasar rode, threading, in spite of the darkness, the difficult and

often dangerous mountain-paths, with all the confidence of one well

acquainted with their intricacies. At last, after a long descent, he

entered a narrow valley, or rather a mountain-gorge, which extended in

the form of nearly a semicircle, and for a distance of about three

miles, between two steep and rugged lines of hill. Upon finding himself

on level ground, he spurred his horse, and passing rapidly over the

dew-steeped grass of a few fields, entered a beaten track that ran along

the centre of the valley. The moon was now up, silvering the summits of

the groups of trees with which the narrow plain was sprinkled, and

defining the gloomy peaks of the sierra against the star-spangled sky.

By its light Don Baltasar rode swiftly along, until, arriving near the

further end of the valley, he came in sight of an extensive edifice,

beautifully situated on the platform of a low hill, and sheltered to the

north and east by lofty mountains. The building was of grey stone, and

formed three sides of a square; the side that was at right angles with

the two others being considerably the longest, and the wings connected

by a wall of solid masonry, in the centre of which was an arched portal.

In front, and on one side of the convent, for such, as a single glance

was sufficient to determine, was the purpose to which the roomy

structure was appropriated, the ground was bare and open, until the

platform began to sink towards the plain; and then the sunny southern

slope had been turned to the best account. Luxuriant vineyards, a

plantation of olive-trees, and a large and well-stocked orchard covered

it, whilst the level at its foot was laid out in pasture and

corn-fields. The space between the back of the convent and the mountains

was filled up by a thick wood, affording materials for the blazing fires

which, in the winter months, the keen airs from the hills would render

highly acceptable. The forest also extended round and close up to the

walls of the right wing of the building. From the roof of the left wing

rose a lofty open tower, where was seen hanging the ponderous mass of

bronze by whose sonorous peal the pious inmates were summoned to their

devotions.

Urging his horse up the steep and winding path that led to the front of

the convent, Don Baltasar seized and pulled a chain that hung beside the

gate. The clank of a bell immediately followed, and Baltasar, receding a

little from the door, looked up at the windows. No light was visible at

any of them, and the most profound stillness reigned. After waiting for

about a minute, the Carlist colonel again rang, and he was about to

repeat the summons for a third time, when a faint gleam of light in the

court warned him that some one was afoot. Presently a small wicket in

the centre of the gate was opened, and the pinched and crabbed features

of the lay-sister who acted as portress showed themselves at the

aperture. In a voice rendered unusually shrill and querulous by vexation

at having her rest broken, she demanded who it was thus disturbing the

slumbers of the sisterhood.

"I come," said Baltasar, "to speak with your lady abbess, Dona Carmen de

Forcadell, upon matters of the utmost importance. Admit me instantly,

for my business presses."

"The lady abbess," peevishly returned the portress, "cannot be disturbed

before matins. If you choose to wait till then, I will tell her you are

here, and she will perhaps see you."

"I must see her at once," replied Baltasar, waxing wroth at this delay,

when every moment was of importance to his projects. "Tell her that Don

Baltasar is here, and she will give orders to admit me."

Whilst he spoke, the lay sister raised her glimmering lantern to the

wicket, in order to take a survey of this peremptory applicant for

admission. The view thus obtained of his features apparently did not

greatly impress her in his favour, or at any rate did not render her

more disposed to open the solid barrier between them.

"Baltasar or Benito," cried she, "it is all one to Mariquita. You may

wait till the matin bell rings. Fine times, indeed, when every thieving

guerilla thinks he may find free quarters where he pleases! No, no,

senor, stay where you are; the fresh air will cool your impatience. It

will be daybreak in an hour, and that will be time enough for your

errand, whatever it is."

It was with no small difficulty that Don Baltasar restrained his spleen

during the old woman's harangue. When it came to a close, however, and

he saw that she persisted in leaving him on the outside of the gate till

the usual hour for opening it, he lost all patience. Before the portress

could shut the wicket, close to which she was standing, he thrust his

hand and arm through it, and grasped her by her skinny throat. The lay

sister set up a yell of alarm and pain.

"Jesus Maria! _Al socorro!_ Help, help!" screamed she; the last words

dying away in a gurgling sound, as Don Baltasar tightened his hold upon

her windpipe.

"Silence, you old jade!" cried the fierce soldier in a suppressed tone,

"you will alarm the whole convent. You have the keys in your hand--I

heard them clank. Open the gate instantly, or by all the saints in

heaven, I throttle you where you stand."

The increased pressure of his fingers warned the old woman that he would

keep his word; and, yielding to so novel and convincing a mode of

argument, she made use of the keys whose jingle she had imprudently

allowed to be heard. Two heavy locks shot back, and a massive bar was

withdrawn; and when, by pushing against it, Don Baltasar had convinced

himself that the gate was open, he released the gullet of the trembling

sister, and entered the paved court. In grievous trepidation the

portress was retreating to her lodge, which stood just within the gate,

when an upper window of the convent opened, and a female voice enquired,

in commanding tones, the cause of the uproar. Don Baltasar seemed to

recognise the voice, and he rode up beneath the window whence it

proceeded.

"Carmen," said he, "is it you?"

"Who is that?" was the rejoinder, in accents which surprise or alarm

rendered slightly tremulous.

"Baltasar," replied the officer. "I must see you instantly, on a matter

of life or death."

There was a moment's pause. "Remain where you are," said the person at

the window; "I will come down to you."

The portress, finding that the intruder was known to the lady abbess,

for she it was whom Baltasar had addressed as Carmen, now refastened the

gate, and crept grumbling to her cell. Don Baltasar waited. Presently a

door in the right wing of the convent was opened, a tall female form,

clothed in flowing drapery, and carrying a taper in her hand, appeared

at it and beckoned him to enter. Tying his horse to a ring in the wall,

he obeyed the signal.

The room into which, after passing through a corridor, Colonel

Villabuena was now introduced, was one of those appropriated to the

reception of guests and visitors to the convent. The apartment was

plainly furnished with a table and a few wooden chairs; and in a recess

hung a large ebony crucifix, before which was placed a hassock, its

cloth envelope worn threadbare by the knees of the devout. But if the

room of itself offered little worthy of note, the case was far different

with the person who now ushered Don Baltasar into it. This was a woman

about forty years old, possessed of one of those marked and

characteristic physiognomies which painters are fond of attributing to

the inhabitants of southern Europe. Her age was scarcely to be read upon

her face, whose slight furrows seemed traced by violent passions rather

than by the hand of time: she had the remains of great beauty, although

wanting in the intellectual; and the expression of her face, her

compressed lips, and the fixed look of her eyes, went far to neutralize

the charm which her regular features, and the classical oval of her

physiognomy, would otherwise have possessed. The outline of her tall

figure was veiled, but not concealed, by her monastic robe, from the

loose sleeves of which protruded her long thin white hands. After

closing the door, she seated herself beside a table, upon which she

reposed her elbow, and motioned her visiter to a chair. A slight degree

of agitation was perceptible in her manner, as she waited in silence for

Don Baltasar to communicate the motive of his unseasonable arrival. This

he speedily did.

"You must do me a service, Carmen," said he. "My cousin Rita is now

within an hour's ride of this place. She comes hither expecting to find

her father. She must be detained captive."

"What!" exclaimed the abbess, "is your suit so hopeless as to render

such hazardous measures adviseable? What is to be gained by such an act

of violence? Her father will inevitably seek and discover her, and

disgrace and disappointment will be the sole result of your mad scheme."

"Her father," replied Baltasar gloomily, "will give us no trouble."

"How?--no trouble! If all be true that I have heard of Count Villabuena,

and of his affection for his only surviving child, he is capable of

devoting his life to the search for her."

"Count Villabuena," said Baltasar, "now stands before you. The father of

Rita is dead."

"Dead!" exclaimed the abbess with a start. "How and when did he die?"

"He was shot in a skirmish."

"In a skirmish!" repeated Dona Carmen. "He held no military command."

"I was escorting him with a few men to attend a junta. We were attacked

by a superior force, from which we escaped, thanks to an intervening

river. A few shots were exchanged, the Count thrust himself into the

fire, and fell."

The abbess seemed to reflect a moment, and then fixed a keen and

searching look upon the countenance of Baltasar.

"Was your loss in men severe?" said she abruptly.

"No--yes--" replied Baltasar, slightly confused. "I believe there were

several wounded. Why do you ask?"

"And the Count's death gives you the Villabuena estates?"

"It does so," answered Baltasar.

The dark penetrating eyes of the abbess still remained fixed, with a

peculiar expression of enquiry and suspicion, upon the countenance of

Colonel Villabuena. He tried at first to sustain their gaze, but was

unable to do so. He looked down, and a slight paleness came over his

features.

"I have no time to answer questions," said he, with a rough brutality of

manner which seemed assumed to veil embarrassment. "My plan is arranged,

but promptness of execution is essential to its success. Rita must be

detained here, where none will think of seeking her, till she becomes my

wife. Your power in this place is unlimited, and your word law; you will

have no difficulty in secluding her in some corner where none shall see

her but those in whom you can fully confide. Make the necessary

preparations. Each moment she may arrive."

Whilst Baltasar was speaking, Dona Carmen remained with her brow

supported on her hand, silent and sunk in reflection. She now sprang

impetuously from her chair.

"I will have naught to do with it," cried she; "you would entangle me in

a labyrinth of crime, whence the only issue would be ignominy and

punishment. You must find others to aid you in your machinations."

In his turn Baltasar rose from his seat, and, approaching the abbess,

led her back to her chair.

"Carmen," said he, in a suppressed voice, and from between his set

teeth, "is it to me that you say 'I will not?'--Carmen," he continued,

speaking low, and with his face very near to hers, "there was a time

when, for love of you and to do your bidding, I feared no punishment

here or hereafter. Have you already forgotten it? 'I hate him,' were

your words, as I sat at your feet in yon sunny Andalusian bower--'I hate

him, and in proportion to my hatred should be my gratitude to him who

rid me of his odious presence.' That night the _serenos_ found the body

of Don Fernando de Forcadell stiff and cold upon the steps of his villa.

He had had a dispute at the _monte_ table, and two men were sent to

Ceuta on suspicion of the deed. Only two persons knew who had really

done it. Ha! Carmen, only two persons!"

During this terrible recapitulation, the abbess sat motionless as a

statue, for which indeed, in her white robe and with her marble pale

complexion, she might almost have been taken. She covered her face with

her hands, and her bosom heaved so violently, that the loose folds of

drapery which shrouded it rose and fell like the waves of a troubled

ocean. When Baltasar ceased speaking she removed her hands, and

exhibited a countenance livid as that of a corpse. Her almost

preternatural paleness, the dark furrows under her eyes, and the tension

of every feature, added ten years to her apparent age.

"Is that all?" she said, in a hollow voice, to her tormentor.

"And one of those persons," resumed the pitiless Baltasar, without

replying to her question, "swore by earth and by heaven, and by the

God who made them both, never to forget the service that I--that

the other person, I would say--had rendered her, and to be ready to

requite it whenever he should point out the way. Years have flown

by since that day, and the feelings that united those two persons

have long since changed; but a promise made as that one was--a

promise sealed with blood--can never pass away till it has been

redeemed. Carmen, I claim its fulfilment."

Baltasar paused. "Fiend!" exclaimed the abbess, "what would you of me?"

"I have already told you," said Villabuena. "It is no crime, nothing

that need alarm your conscience, recently grown so tender; but a good

deed, rather, since it will prevent the daughter of a noble house from

throwing herself away on an adventurer and a rebel, and give her hand to

him for whom her father destined it. She is as yet unaware of the

Count's death. She will learn it here, and no place fitter. Your pious

consolations will soothe her grief. I shall leave her in your

guardianship, and, when the first violence of her sorrow is over,

return, to find means of overcoming her puerile objections to my suit.

But I am a fool," exclaimed he, interrupting himself, "to lose in idle

talk time that is so precious! They must already be in sight of the

convent. Lead me to a window whence we may observe their approach, and

whilst watching for it we can make our final arrangements."

He took the hand of the abbess, and she led the way, mechanically, to

the door of an inner room. Passing through two other apartments, they

reached one at the extremity of the wing, from the window of which a

view was obtained for a considerable distance down the valley. The

prospect that presented itself to them on pausing before this window,

was so enchantingly beautiful, that it seemed to produce an effect, and

to exercise a softening influence, even upon the depraved and vicious

nature of Don Baltasar. At any rate, a full minute elapsed during which

he stood in silence and contemplation.

The view afforded by the valley in question, upon that pleasant May

morning, was indeed of almost unparalleled loveliness. The sun, which

had already risen behind the eastern hills, but not yet surmounted them,

threw its first rays across their summits, and illuminated the opposite

mountains, bathing their pinnacles in a golden glow, whilst their lower

steeps remained in comparative darkness. In the depths of the valley the

last shades of twilight still seemed to linger, and masses of thin grey

vapour rolled in billows over the rich vegetation and vivid verdure of

the fields. The most fantastic variety of form was exhibited by the

surrounding mountain wall; here it rose in turrets and towers, there

spread out into crags, then again fell in blank abrupt precipices, their

edges fringed with shrubs, the recesses of their sides sheltering

wild-flowers of the most varied hues, whose sprays and blossoms waved in

the sweet breath of morning. Equally varied, and as delicately

beautiful, were the ethereal tints of the mountain tops, to which the

cloudless sky seemed to impart a tinge of its azure. On the edge of a

ravine, midway up a mountain, were seen a few crumbling walls, and a

fragment of a broken tower, sole remains of some ancient stronghold,

which, centuries before, had frowned over the vale. The hut of a

goatherd or charcoal-burner, here and there dotted the hill-side; and at

the southern limit of the valley, just before its change of direction

took it out of sight of the convent, were visible the houses of a small

hamlet, surrounded by plantations, and half buried amidst blossoms of

the tenderest rose-colour and most dazzling white. Masses of beech and

ilex clothed the lower slopes of the mountains, and from out of their

dark setting of foliage the grey walls of the Dominican convent arose

like a pale and shadowy spectre. The fresh brightness of spring was the

characteristic of the whole scene; the year seemed rejoicing in its

youthful vigour, and to express its delight by millions of mute voices,

which spoke out of each leaf and twig that danced in the breeze. Nor

were other and audible voices wanting. The lark was singing in the sky,

the grasshopper had begun its chirp, the rills and rivulets that

splashed or trickled from the hills, gave out their indistinct murmur;

whilst, heard far above these voices of nature, the toll of the matin

bell resounded through the valley, calling the devoutly disposed to

their morning thanksgiving.

The angelus had ceased to ring when Rita and her party came in sight of

the Dominican convent, their horses and mules giving evidence, by their

jaded appearance, of having been ridden far, and over rough and painful

roads. The gipsy rode in front, vigilant and unfatigued--although he had

now been in the saddle, with little intermission, for a whole day and

night--and was followed by Rita, to whose delicate frame the long ride

had been an exertion as unusual as it was trying. But a resolute spirit

had compensated for physical weakness, and, uncomplaining, she had borne

up against the hardships of the preceding ten hours. She was pale and

harassed; her hair, uncurled by the night fogs, hung in dank masses

round her face, and her fragile form was unable to maintain its upright

position. Micaela, the waiting-maid, yawned incessantly, and audibly

groaned at each rough stumble or uncomfortable movement of her mule.

Several times during the drowsy morning hours, she had nearly fallen

from her saddle, and had to thank Paco, who had taken his station beside

her, for saving her from more than one tumble. Paco, either out of

respect to the presence of Rita, or concern for the Count's misfortune,

rode along, contrary to his custom, in profound silence, and without

indulging in any of those snatches of muleteers' songs with which it was

his wont to beguile the tedium of a march.

Upon nearing the place where she expected to find her father, Rita's

impatience to behold him, and to ascertain for herself the exact extent

of the injury he had received, increased to a feverish degree, and on

reaching the convent gate, already open for her reception, she sprang

from her mule without assistance. But she had over-rated her strength;

her limbs, stiffened by the long ride and the cold night air, refused

their service, and she would have fallen to the ground had not Paco, who

was already off his horse, given her the support of his arm. The

portress and another old lay sister were the only persons visible in the

court, and the last of these invited Rita to accompany her into the

convent. Paco held out his horse's bridle and those of the mules to

Jaime, intending to follow his young mistress, but the gipsy hesitated

to take them, and the lay sister, perceiving Paco's intention,

interposed to prevent its execution.

"You must remain here," said she; "I have no orders to admit men into

the convent, nor can I, without express orders from the lady abbess."

Paco obeyed the injunction, and the three women disappeared through a

door of the right wing of the building. They had been gone less than a

minute, when the lay sister again came forth, and, approaching the

gipsy, desired him to follow her. He did so, and Paco remained alone

with the horses.

With eager step, and a heart palpitating with anxiety, Rita followed her

guide into the convent, making, as she went, anxious enquiries

concerning her father's health. To her first question the old woman

replied by an inarticulate mumble; and upon its repetition, a brief "I

do not know; the lady abbess will see you,"--checked any further attempt

upon a person who either could not or would not give the much wished-for

information. Passing through a corridor and up a staircase, the lay

sister ushered Rita into an apartment of comfortable appearance.

"I will inform the abbess of your arrival," said she, as she went out

and closed the door.

Five minutes elapsed, and Rita, to whom this delay was as inexplicable

as her impatience to see her father was great, was about to leave the

room and seek or enquire the way to his apartment, when the abbess made

her appearance.

"Holy mother!" exclaimed Rita, advancing to meet her with clasped hands

and tearful eyes, "is my father doing well? Conduct me to him, I beseech

you."

Struck by the beauty of the fair creature who thus implored her, and

touched, perhaps, by the painful anxiety expressed in her trembling

voice, and pale and interesting countenance, Dona Carmen almost

hesitated to communicate her fatal tidings.

"I have painful intelligence for you, Senora," said she. "The Count,

your father"--

"He is wounded; I know it," interrupted Rita. "Is he worse? Oh, let me

see him!--This instant see him!"

"It is impossible," said the abbess. "The bullet that struck him was too

surely aimed. Your father is dead!"

For an instant Rita gazed at the speaker as though unable fully to

comprehend the terrible announcement, and then, with one shriek of

heartfelt agony, she sank senseless to the ground.

The shrill and thrilling scream uttered by the bereaved daughter, rang

through the chambers and corridors of the convent, and reached the ears

of Paco, who had remained in the court, waiting with some impatience for

the return of the gipsy, and for intelligence concerning the health of

the Count. Abandoning his horse, he rushed instinctively to the door by

which Rita had entered the building. It was closed, but not fastened,

and passing through it he found himself in a long corridor, traversed by

two shorter ones, and at whose extremity, through a grated window, was

visible the foliage of the forest surrounding that side of the convent.

Not a living creature was to be seen; and Paco paused, uncertain in what

direction to proceed. He listened for a repetition of the cry, but none

came. Suddenly a door, close to which he stood, was opened, and before

he could turn his head to ascertain by whom, he was seized from behind,

and thrown violently upon the paved floor of the corridor. The attack

had been so vigorous and unexpected, that Paco had no time for

resistance before he found himself stretched upon his back; but then he

struggled furiously against his assailants, who were no others than Don

Baltasar and the gipsy. So violent were his efforts, that he got the

gipsy under him, and was on the point of regaining his feet, when

Colonel Villabuena drew a pistol from the breast of his coat, and with

its but-end dealt him a severe blow on the head. The unlucky muleteer

again fell stunned upon the ground. In another minute his hands were

tightly bound, and Don Baltasar and his companion carried him swiftly

down one of the transversal corridors. Descending a flight of stone

steps, the two men with their burthen entered a range of subterranean

cloisters, at whose extremity was a low and massive door, which Don

Baltasar opened, and they entered a narrow cell, having a straw pallet

and earthen water-jug for sole furniture. Close to the roof of this

dismal dungeon was an aperture in the wall, through which a strong iron

grating, and the rank grass that grew close up to it, allowed but a

faint glimmer of daylight to enter. Placing their prisoner upon the

straw bed, Don Baltasar and Jaime took away his sabre and the large

knife habitually carried by Spaniards of his class. They then unbound

his hands, and, carefully securing the door behind them, left him to the

gloom and solitude of his dungeon.

FOOTNOTES:

[9] From an early period of the war, the Spanish dragoon regiments, both

light and heavy, were armed with the lance, that weapon being considered

the most efficient for the mountain warfare in which they were

frequently engaged.

SOMETHING MORE ABOUT MUSIC.

We mused on music some while ago; and as the subject still haunts

us--very much after the manner of an obstinate ghost that refuses to be

laid, even by the choicest Latin--we are strongly disposed to try the

effect of giving it full swing for once; and in idle mood, too idle to

oppose ourselves to its tyranny, letting it carry us whither it will, in

the hope that, in return for our complacence, it may in future suffer us

to conduct our meditations according to our own pleasure, and give that

sad and serious thought, which their merits demand, to the gravities of

this life--to corn-laws and _poor_-laws, (of all sorts!) and the Irish

question, and the debates to which all these give occasion, in reading

which we have already worn out we know not how many pairs of spectacles,

and one pair of excellent eyes; and last, not least, to the marchings

and counter-marchings of the House of Commons, in which we are deeply

interested.

With such a course of study before us, we are disposed to make the most

of our holiday; and should we chance to be a little too frisky, it must

be borne in mind that retribution is at hand, and that we shall speedily

become as solemn as ever a fool in the land, as dull as an owl bathing

its eyes in the morning sunshine, which--having overslept itself--it

takes for the full moon, and dismal enough to satisfy the most ardent

advocate of the religious duty of being miserable,--eschewing laughter

as we would the tax-gatherer, and refreshing our oppressed spirits alone

with serious jokes, and such merriment as may be presented to us under

the sanction and recommendation of a college of dissenting divines!

But our harp will be a mingled one, for so is our theme; having a

sympathy alike for our mirthful and sorrowful moments, which it alike

spiritualizes; striking the light, gleesome chord to the one, and

attuning the soul to more ethereal joy; while by its soft influence it

tones down the harshness of bitter, _unavailing_ sorrow, and woos the

heart, misanthropizing under the pangs of grief or unrequited love--pent

up in its own solitude, unpitied and uncared for--and filled with dark

thoughts, and sad sounds, and tones of plaintive winds, sighing through

the cypress and doleful yew with mournful melody around the

resting-place of the loved and lost, to submissive lamentings, and slow

stealing tears that assuage its aching anguish and tranquillize the

spirit, leading it to the hope of a brighter future, in whose dawning

beams it will, ere-long, show like "the tender grass, clear-shining

after rain"--more glistening and beautiful for the invigorating dews of

the cloud which had overhung it, and beneath whose gloom its beauty

faded away--for very trouble!

How often have we found that hard, _bitter_ mood into which the mind

under the pressure of suffering which is irremediable, and which has to

be borne alone, is so apt to decline--feeling the harder and the

bitterer for the careless, galling gaiety of all around--softened,

subdued, yea, utterly broken up by the sweet notes of "some old familiar

strain," that steal on the willing ear, freshening and exhilarating the

spirit like a breezy morning in June, when it seems a sin to be

wretched; the twittering birds on dancing boughs crying shame on us, for

what is not only wrong, but, as we begin to feel, needless--not to say

foolish; and we return from our stroll, wondering what in the world we

have done with that load on our chest with which we began our

walk--ending in a regular ramble--and which it then seemed incumbent on

us, nay, a sacred duty, to pant under for the term of our natural lives;

relieving ourselves by such sighs and groans as appeared to us the

appropriate forms of expression for all human beings under the sun--made

on purpose to be unhappy; we especially, fulfilling the end of our

creation. And as we mark the change that has passed upon us--the

bounding circulation in place of flagging energies--full, calm

breathing, instead of the slow, short respiration of sadness--with

reverent heart we bless nature, and, may we say also, nature's great

Architect, all-merciful, all-loving!

Such on us is frequently the effect of music; the heaviness of heart,

caused by the weary rubs of this rough world, or the result of a

temperament that has a constitutionally jarring string in it, is as it

were _drawn out_, and sweetness and calm-breathing tranquillity infused

in its stead; while our nerves become as the harmonious strings of a

harp, that respond in sympathy with the master chords of one with which

it is in unison, and whereon the fresh breeze of morning lightly plays,

calling forth sounds of joy and gladness. Therefore do we _love_ it,

with a warmth of affection that may perchance appear extravagant to

those whose robust, well-balanced minds, clothed with strong, healthy,

unsusceptible bodies--people who are always in good spirits, unless

there be a reason for the contrary--may render them independent of such

external influences, for we must acknowledge, that we do at times

express this our affection in somewhat unmeasured phrase, as one who

stays not accurately to calculate, and weigh with cool precision, the

virtues of a friend, thus laying ourselves open to the unmitigated

condemnation of those who soar above, (or sink below!) such sympathies.

Be it so! We are not about to enter into any vindication of ourselves;

we shall not even attempt to convince these dull souls, that it is

possible for elevated feeling, and repose and tenderness of mind, to be

indebted for their origin to such insignificant and material sources as

catgut and brass wire--and that they are not therefore to be

undervalued; though by way of illustration of the influence of matter

over spirit, we would remind them of their own humane and charitable

feelings _after_ dinner, compared with the fierce, nay, atrocious

sentiments, which their consciences convict them of having entertained,

before the pangs of their raging hunger had been appeased by that

inestimable mollifier of men's hearts and tempers. For the cause of

their insensibility to such impressions--a natural incapacity for

receiving them--it is vain to seek a remedy, however willing we might be

to apply one; but where cure is impracticable, palliatives are

frequently admissible, and we would suggest that one may be found in

this case, in the patients' treating the unhappy privation under which

they labour with greater tenderness than has been their wont, throwing

over it that veil of oblivion and charity with which they so gracefully

conceal their other defects, instead of obtruding it on public

observation, under the singular misconception of its being an admirable

feature in their character, a something of which a man ought to be

proud. Conduct like this, they may rest assured, will not fail of being

appreciated and rewarded by the corresponding delicacy with which all,

who are not utterly barbarous, invariably treat him who, by the

deprecating humility with which he seeks to conceal his deficiencies,

betrays his painful cognisance of their existence.

We are aware that this is a turning of the tables upon them which they

may not be disposed to admire--to be placed at the bar, when they

expected a seat on the Bench, and were just smoothing down their ermine,

and adjusting their wigs, in order to enter on their duties with the

greater impressiveness and dignity; but they must believe us when we

tell them, that we, too, have an opinion on this subject, to which we

must be permitted to attribute as high authority as they possibly can to

their own; and that, tried by this standard, they, being found wanting,

would inevitably have been brought up for judgment, but for a merciful

leaning, (sanctioned by legal precedent,) which prompts us rather to try

the salutary effect of admonition and good counsel, than to proceed at

once to inflict extreme penalties on the offenders--in short, that we

are not in a hanging humour, or they should swing for it!

Grim, rough Luther, laying about him with his ponderous mace, and making

giant Pope tremble in the deepest recesses of his stronghold, lest he

should grow utterly savage with his perpetual warfare--albeit a "Holy

war"--humanized and spiritualized himself with his lute--(who does not

sympathize with his unfailing "Deus noster refugium," that divine stay

of his stout heart that trembled not at men or devils!) Ken, undaunted

opponent of the tyranny of a king--meek sufferer for that monarch's

lawful rights, rose at day-dawn, or so soon as the first brief slumber

had recruited his exhausted frame, to give thanks unto the King of kings

in strains that, handed down to us, yet thrill the heart by their

fervent piety, and plain, vigorous verse, and animate it to a stricter

more manly rectitude. Herbert--saintliest of men and priests--after his

sacred toils, refreshed his spirit with "divine music;" the more

melodious to his ear, that his heart was teeming with the harmony of

that "good-will towards man," which seeks and finds its due expression

in active exertions on their behalf--disdaining not the lowliest

occasion of serving with hearty zeal the lowliest of his neighbours.

Rest assured, then, O reader! whosoever thou art, that it is not for

_thee_ to pretend to despise it!

Ponder the rather on the _power_ of that art, that could soothe the

perturbed soul of Israel's wrath-sent king--mad and moody--and even

expel the evil spirit that goaded him; and on its _dignity_--for

prophets of old, when the Divine inspiration came upon them, revealing

to their purified eyes the "vision of the Almighty," uttered their "dark

sayings upon the harp."

What a plague it sometimes is to be hag-ridden by a tune, racing through

one's head, with a never-ending always-beginningness, as though a

thousand imps were singing it in one's ears. Wherever you may be,

whomsoever with, whatsoever doing, still ring on those incessant tones

of perchance the merriest of all jigs, till--it is Sunday morning, and

you are preparing for church--you leave your house with the entire and

miserable conviction, that, seated in your pew in the very face of the

congregation-genteel sinners in silks, and satins, and feathers--you

will betray your long-concealed suffering by giving vent to that

interminable "Rory O'More," the moment you open your lips for the

emission of "All people that on earth do dwell;" so ensuring your rapid

transfer to the street, under the escort of the man with the

parti-coloured coat and black wand, whose Sabbath duties of jerking the

Sunday scholars, and rapping their heads with that authoritative cane,

are unceremoniously interfered with on your behalf. Misery and disgrace

stare you in the face, and all through an undue titillation of that part

of your sensorium that takes cognisance of musical sounds; a titillation

not to be subdued by endeavouring to direct your attention from it to

the very gravest of all subjects; nor propitiated even by audibly

chanting the offending strain, previously retiring into the furthest

corner of your coal-cellar, to prevent your unwilling profanity on

shocking the strictly conscientious ears of your household. This is

bad--and yet it is but a mild form of this morbid affection, which, in

its most intense degree, torments the sufferer from fever, (or one

stunned by some sudden and violent grief,) when certain sounds, words,

or tunes, accidentally determined, thrill through the head with the

steadiness and vehement action of the piston of a steam-engine--beat,

beat, beat!--every note seeming to fall on the excited brain like the

blow of a hammer; while, as the fever and pain increase, the more

rapidly and heavily do those torturing notes pursue their furious chase.

We well remember, under an attack of disorder in the neighbourhood of

the brain, causing severe suffering, lying--we know not how long, it

might be a thousand years for any thing we knew--singing over and over

again _in our mind_, for we were speechless with pain, the 148th psalm,

which we had just chanced to hear sung, in Brady and Tate's version, to

a new and somewhat peculiar tune. Oh, how those "dreadful whales" and

"glittering scales" did quaver and quiver in our poor head! Lying like a

log--for pain neither permitted us to stir nor groan--still rattled on,

hard and quick, the rumbling bass and shrill tenor of that most

inappropriately jubilant composition--"cherubim and seraphim," "fire,

hail, and snow," succeeding each other with a railway velocity that

there was no resisting; no sooner had we got to "stands ever fast," than

round again we went to the "boundless realms of joy," and so on, on,

on, through each dreary minute of those dreary hours, an infinity, or

perchance but twenty-four, according as time is computed by clocks or by

agonised human beings. It made a capital Purgatory; one which we have

even deemed every way adequate to those slight delinquencies of which we

may have been guilty, and which are appointed, as it is understood, to

be expiated in this way.

At times some simple air, or even a single chord of unusual, but

apparently obvious harmony, will haunt us with a peculiar sweetness,

producing a soothing, gentle sadness, as though we listened to distant

bells, whose music is borne in surges on the breeze that sways the

golden corn on a sunny Sabbath, when our pathway lies through the

undulating fields, already "white unto the harvest;" where the pleasant

rustling of the ripened grain, as it is stirred by the soft wind, is

sweet and soothing; and the gay poppy, and other less obtrusive, though

not less beautiful wild-flowers, bloom at our loitering feet. In the

power of exciting such feeling, what can equal our old English ballads?

There is an inexpressible charm in these, and we would almost give our

fingers to be able to describe that indescribable _something_, which

constitutes their peculiar fascination and power over the imagination.

Most plain, most artless, does their composition appear; like the

natural out-breathing of the heart in its sunny moments; and yet--as

with all earthly brightness--with a trace of cloud on that sunshine.

They are redolent of the "olden time;" and as they fall softly on the

ear, the antique hall, with its groined roof, and mullioned window,

glowing with rich heraldic devices, through which the many-tinted lights

fall tenderly on arch and pillar, and elaborately fretted walls, studded

with ancestral armour, rises up before us; and with the melting tones of

the lute, mingles the low, clear voice of a gentle maiden, whose small

foot and brocaded train are just seen from behind yonder deeply

sculptured oaken screen. What innocence is in that voice! and how

expressive are the chords that accompany it--less elaborate and

fantastic, perchance, than might win favour in our vitiated ears; but

natural, harmonious, full, and in exquisite subordination to the air,

which they fill up and enrich, instead of overpowering with misplaced

beauty.

And now a movement of the singer reveals still more of the quaint,

beautiful costume, with its heavy, yet graceful folds, while--aha! what

else do we see?--a plumed hat thrown carelessly on the ground; the armed

heel, glittering rapier, and slashed sleeve, just visible, betokening

that its owner is not far off, and that the lady fair has not, as we had

thought, been wasting her sweetness, either of voice or countenance, on

that comfortable-looking pet dog or caged linnet. Sing on, pretty one!

for well do gallant knights love to hear their stern deeds sung by

innocent lips; and _right well_, to listen to the strain that tells how

the heart of "lady-bright" is won by noble daring. But what means that

sudden break in the song, and the confused sweep of the strings, as

though the lute had slipped from its owner's grasp; while the masculine

paraphernalia which we had just discovered disappears altogether behind

that most impervious and curiosity-mocking screen? No great harm done,

or that light laugh had not escaped the lips so suddenly silenced; and

the offending cavalier is doubtless forgiven on the spot, as they

amicably retreat to that deep oriel, framed apparently for the express

purpose of excluding _intrusionists_ like ourselves, who would fain

follow, where, it is evident, we are marvellously little wanted! Well,

well!--maidens will be maidens, we trow, and lovemaking in the olden

time is, we suppose, after all, vastly like the same performance by more

modern actors. Leave we them to their light-heartedness:--and yet we

could linger long in this ancient chamber,

"With quaint oak-carving lined and ceiled;"

so calm, so cool, so repose-breathing,--the shrill twitter of the

swallow the only sound now heard amid its silence; the fleecy clouds,

throwing that rich interior into alternate light and shade, as they sail

lazily along the deep blue sky--the only moving objects, save the long

wreaths of ivy, that, green as the tender buds of spring, tap lightly

against the casement, as they are swayed by the impulses of the summer

breeze. Beyond, is an old-fashioned garden--a _pleasance_, as it would

be called--and truly is it one; with its trim walks, its terraces, and

moss-grown urns, around which luxuriant creepers are entwined--its

impervious hedges--its close-shorn lawn, decked with appropriate

statues, and its yew-trees, clipped into fantastic shapes; while the

ivy-covered walls that bound it, afford a shelter from the blasts that

too often allay the sunshine of our northern climate, and render it a

spot where 'tis sweet to saunter, in idle or quiet contemplative mood,

at glowing sunset; or chaster beauty of summer evening, when the pure,

cold moon mingles her passionless lustre with the gorgeous hues that

still linger around the portals of the west--bright train of the

departing monarch that has passed to the sway of a new hemisphere!

Here could we linger in genial meditation, while from the dark pannelled

walls look down upon us lovely countenances of those who, centuries ago,

have called this _home_--portraits whose calm, meek dignity so far

transcends the more active style in which it too often pleases us

moderns to glare from our gilt frames, "looking delightfully with all

our might, and staring violently at nothing;" costume and truth being

utterly outraged,--the _roturier's_ wife mapped in the ermine of the

duchess, and perchance dandling on her maternal lap what appears to be a

dancing dog in its professional finery, but which, on closer inspection,

turns out to be an imp of a child, made a fool of by its mother and

milliner; and my lady--in inadequate garments, and a pair of wings,

flourishing as some heathen divinity or abstract virtue! Look at those

girlish features, just mantling into fairest womanhood, with their sweet

serious look, exhibiting all the self-possession of simplicity; the

drapery and other accessories natural, and in perfect keeping with the

unpretending character of the whole; and then turn to some recent

"portrait of a lady," with what toleration you may. Contrast for one

moment that fine ancestral face, dignified and unmoved as the mighty

ocean slumbering in his strength, with the eager visage of one of the

latest "batch," (cooked, without much regard to the materials, for some

ministerial exigency,) who would appear to be standing in rampant

defence of his own brand-new coronet, emulative of the well-gilt lion

which supports that miracle of ingenuity rather than research, his

brightly emblazoned coat-of-arms; whose infinitude of charges and

quarterings do honour to the inventive genius of the Herald's Office,

and are enough to make the Rouge Dragon of three centuries ago claw out

the eyes of the modern functionary.

But, oh dear, dear! where are our ballads all this while? Drifted sadly

to leeward, we fear, according to a bad habit of ours, of letting any

breeze, from whatever point of the compass it may chance to blow, fill

our sails, and float us away before it, utterly unmindful of our

original purpose and destination. Thus have we, to the tune of an old

Hall and its garniture, sailed away from that which we were

aiming--trying to find out, and describe the peculiar fascination of our

loved old ballads; flattering ourselves, perhaps, that we were escaping

a difficulty which we feared to meet.

There is a quaint cheerfulness in them, toned down with a shade--the

shadow of a shade--of the most touching melancholy, effected, we can

scarcely tell how, by an exquisitely felicitous, though but slight

introduction of the minor key, perchance but a single note or chord. But

that suffices, and it is as a sudden vision of our home, far off among

the mountains, or in the "happy valley" of our fathers, passing before

us in the gay crowded city, bringing plaintive thoughts of remembered

joys, and quietude, and childish innocence. Old ballads are like April

skies, all smiles and tears, sunshine and swift-flitting clouds, that

serve but to heighten the loveliness they concealed for a while. They

are like,--nay, we despair; none but our own Shakspeare can express what

we should vainly puzzle ourselves to describe, the essence of the "old

and antique song."

"Mark it, Cesario; it is old and plain;

The spinsters and the knitters in the sun

And the free maids that weave their thread with bones,

Do use to chaunt it; it is silly sooth,

And dallies with the innocence of love,

Like the old age."

Ay! like gray eld fondling sunny childhood, gazing on the wavy hair, and

pure brow, and calm yet kindling eye, with a fond sad pleasure; for in

that young exulting spirit he sees the sure inheritor of his own fading

honours, the usurper of his strength, and influence, and worship,

rapidly passing away from his feeble grasp; and as he gazes, though his

lips pour willing benedictions on the unconscious supplanter, there

lingers in his heart the sorrowful, "He shall increase, but I shall

decrease."

Something akin in their sad soothing effect, are the _waits_, (dear

reader, you do not need to be told what these are? Wordsworth has

immortalized them;) simple, rude, and inharmonious as they would be in

the clear, truth-telling daylight, but strange, witching, and half

unearthly, when heard between the pauses of some fantastic dream in the

deep midnight; when,

"All around,

The stars are watching with their thousand eyes;"

those same stars that peered down on this earth, in "earnest gaze," on

the first act of that most awful drama, when, in "the winter wild, the

heaven-born child"--Him in whom all nations of the world were

blessed--was placed in his rude cradle at Bethlehem: in commemoration of

whose advent--and _this_ is one secret of their pathos, waking high

thoughts in the soul, too long brooding over and degrading itself with

the mean cares and hopes of this life--the humble musicians make night

tuneful, "scraping the chords with strenuous hand."

A blessing on them as they go, softening our hard, unloving hearts! In

our childhood it was one of our most cherished pleasures to

lie--half-sleeping, half-waking--listening to them, as the sounds, at

times discordant enough, though of that we recked not, rose and fell in

pleasing cadence, as the winter wind rose and fell, wafting the notes

that, faint and fainter still, at last died away in the distance.

We and our room-companion were under a solemn engagement, each to other,

to waken the little sleepy thing beside him, when the more watchful

became aware of the approach of the itinerant minstrels; and woe to the

one who had forgotten this duty! It would have required no little

"music" to soothe the "savage breast" of the aggrieved one; for--as we

are pathetically reminded by the old song--"Christmas comes but once

a-year," and so often, but no more, did we know that our chance of

hearing this seductive harmony occurred. Hence our wrath, if through the

neglect, the "breach of promise" of another, so solemnly pledged, we

missed it. And even now, dear as is the oblivion of night and dreamless

sleep to the spirit, harassed and world-worn, that in outgrowing its

child-like feelings and happiness, has, alas! also out-grown what its

increase of worldly wisdom can hardly make amends for--the child-like

purity, and intense enjoyment of simple pleasures, which marked its

earlier years--even now, weary and dull-hearted as we are become, we

would not willingly lose this delight of our happier days, although it

fall on the still darkness like wail for a departed friend, unsealing

the fount of mournful memories, whose bitter waters gush from their

stricken rock; sad as are its associations, they are of that sadness

whereby the "heart is made better."

What think ye of the drum as a musical instrument? Is there not

something magnificent in it, albeit suggestive of a distant wheelbarrow

on rough paving-stones, or heavily laden cart in the distance? This

latter, by the way,--we appeal with confidence to any musical soul

present for confirmation of our assertion--being decidedly its equal, in

effect, any day; as in our _happy_ infancy we found out to our sorrow,

from being frequently deceived by its dull booming, which our vivid

imagination at once pronounced to be its parchment representative; as we

writhed and wriggled with agony on our unhonoured bench (selected, and

adhered to, for constancy was our _forte_, chiefly on account of its

being out of the reach of the cane, and commanding a good view of the

street) in a perfect fever, poor little soul, to squirl away books and

slates, and scamper after the soldiers. Scarlet has been said to be like

the sound of a trumpet; surely then a drum must be taken as the exponent

of that ferocious mixture yclept thunder and lightning, erst dear to

country bumpkins, and rendered classical by Master Moses Primrose's

coat. It can scarcely be described as _music_, but rather as sound with

an idea in it--the connecting link between mere noise and musical

expression. Kettle-drums,

"Whose sullen dub,

Is like the hooping of a tub,"

we hate; and never see them in a concert-room without heartily wishing

they and their tatooer might tumble, helter-skelter, from their topmost

perch into the very lowest depth, if there be one lower than another, of

the orchestra; and thereby sustain such a compound fracture, attended by

loss of substance, as should put it out of their power, for that night

at least, to torture our fastidious ears. Being of a melancholy

temperament, we are unfortunately, at times, subject to most ludicrous

fancies; and as these ungainly instruments loom on our disgusted eye, we

cannot, for the life of us, help imagining them moulds for a couple of

enormous gooseberry puddings; and we verily pant at the idea of the sea

of melted butter, or yellow cream, requisite to mollify their

acidity--and then we laugh like a hyena at the nightmareish vision, and

so are disgraced, for it is at a "serious opera:" therefore, we repeat

it, do we hate them, cordially and perseveringly. They are horrid

things, and ought to be excommunicated. And when employed in military

bands--why, a horse looks a complete fool between a couple of these

gigantic basins, each with its long tag-rag of unmeaning velvet,

beplastered and bedizened with lace and gold, streaming from it; and the

unlucky performer perched between them, exactly like an old

market-woman, bolstered up between a brace of paniers or

milk-pails;--any thing but a fierce dragoon, or most chivalrous hussar.

But peace be to the kettle-drums,--ay, _peace be to them_, say we! and

may our ears never again be subjected to the torture of hearing Handel's

massive chorus, or Beethoven's fearfully dramatic harmony, disfigured by

their most abominable bangs, or villanous rumble-grumble.

Now all this is rank nonsense--we are fully aware of it; and it is a

most foolish, unjust prejudice of ours against drums--kettle or

otherwise, as it may please Apollo--which are most respectable members

of musical society, and good--very good--in their way; were it only as a

foil to the enchanting, inspiriting, maddening strains of the horn, the

shrill pipe, the regal trumpet, and the various other instruments of our

military music, of which we are more passionate admirers, almost ready

to follow the drum ourselves. Oh, the supreme delight of having one's

arms and legs shot off to such soul-elevating sounds, to the tune of

Rule Britannia, and somebody or other's march! "Britons strike home"

thrills through the air, and you scarcely feel that you are spitted by a

Polish lancer; a flourish of trumpets, and enter a troop of horse, that

trot briskly over you as you lie smashed by a round-shot, but heedless

of the exhibition of their unceremonious heels to your injuries, for are

you not sustained by that "point of war"--mercilessly beaten at your

elbow, without the slightest regard to the effect it may have on your

cracked head, for which you are indebted to the last trooper who spurred

his charger over you: who would care for his vulgar limbs under such

excitement? But if this part of our military economy be intended to

inspire cowards with courage, and string them up to a disregard of all

the chances of warfare, in the way of bullet and sabre, why--_why_ is

not so valuable an idea carried out to the full extent of its

requirement, and a military band instituted for the comfort and

encouragement of the patients (every whit as nervous as if they were

under arms) of Guy's Hospital? Why should not the case of poor bedfast

wretches in cap and gown, and pale faces, meet with as much

consideration as that of your clodpole in scarlet and an 'Albert hat?'

(Heaven forgive the prince for making such simpletons of our handsome

Englishmen!) Look to it, ye governors of such institutions, and look to

it, ye charitable and humane, who empty your purses into the blandly

presented plate to buy shoes and stockings for the kangaroos. Consider

the case of your afflicted countrymen, and relieve the plethora of your

coffers by providing them music, every way equal to that enjoyed by

troops going into action; music so entrancing that an arm or leg whipped

off shall, under its influence, be no object to them; and let them drink

down their odious physic to such masterly compositions of the first

artists as shall sweeten the bitterest potion, and elicit a chorus of

blessings on the taste and liberality of their munificent benefactors.

But we fear that our pleading will be vain--Englishmen, poor, sick, and

suffering, are intolerably uninteresting; not to be named on the same

day with the happy possessors of woolly locks, flat noses, and

copper-coloured skins; these being personal qualifications calculated to

excite the intense sympathies of the many whose charity neither begins

nor ends "at home." Yet, in the spirit of the little girl, who, on the

denial of her request that she might be married, substituted the more

modest one of a piece of bread and butter; if unsuccessful in this

particular, we will be content to lower our tone, and, in place of the

luxury we have recommended, simply require all whom it may concern to

give the poor--their own!--honest wages for their honest labour.

We may perhaps be accused of having a Turkish taste in music (after the

pattern of that Sultan's, who was chiefly fascinated with the jarring

process of tuning the instruments, a thing abhorred by "gods and men")

if we venture to own the strange, thrilling effect once produced on us

by the discordant, yet withal imposing clangour of some half dozen

regimental bands (all of them, mark you, playing different tunes!) which

struck up simultaneously as my Lord ----, the then commander-in-chief,

(whose spirit has since mingled with the shades of the heroes who had

preceded him, not to the hall of Odin, but we trust to a more Christian

place,) made his appearance, with his brilliant staff, on ---- Moor;

whither he came down ostensibly for the purpose of reviewing the

troops--really, to marry his nephew and heir to the grand-daughter of a

manufacturing millionnaire. (Commercial gold, or heraldic _or_, is a

good modern "tricking;" though we query whether our ancestors would have

countenanced such bad heraldry, or been content with such abatements of

honour on their old shields!)

The wild sounds streamed on the crisp morning air--'twas one of those

September days whose mature beauty rivals the budding grace of

spring--with a strange wayward beauty, a barbaric grandeur, that carried

away both our heart and ears; and we enjoyed it to the full as much as

did the steed of a military lady present, that verily danced with the

tingling delight. We had a fellow feeling with the brute, and could

ourselves, grave and sensible as we are, have pranced about in an

ecstasy of admiration, which was by no means allayed when the deep-toned

sullen music--for such it is to us--of the artillery uttered its

majestic bass to the sharp ringing fire of musketry. While, as wreath

after wreath of the light morning mist floated away before the breeze,

the glittering files and compact bristling squares, the centaur-like

cavalry, and stealthy riflemen gliding along the windings of the copse,

became apparent, stretching far into the distance; now hidden for a

moment by the rolling vapour from a discharge of firearms, then, as it

curled above them, dimming the clear sky, glancing bright in the sun,

which blithely kissed sabre and epaulet, and dancing plume, and the

knightly-looking pennoned weapon of the picturesque lancer. Truly the

scene was beautiful, and one to breathe a warlike spirit into the most

unexcitable. And we gazed in a paroxysm of admiration at the exquisite

evolutions and fierce charges that seemed as though they must bear all

before them, till this perfection of discipline came to an end, and the

long files of troops had taken their slow dusty departure; when, hot and

fagged, and with bright colours still dancing before our eyes, we

returned to our home. There, as each "pleasure has its pain," we found

that one was superinduced on ours, in the shape of a robbery of our

plate committed while we were staring ourselves out of countenance at

the gay spectacle; our faithless domestics having taken that opportunity

of indulging their own taste for the "sublime and beautiful." 'Tis to be

hoped they got enough of the "beautiful" at the show, as we indulged

them with a touch of the "sublime" (which has one of its sources in

_terror_) when we discovered our loss. But we enjoyed the review

thoroughly for all that, and are ready for another to-morrow, first

taking the precaution to "lock up all our treasure," warned by a

catastrophe which nearly reduced us to wooden spoons and hay-makers.

Military music! But to feel its power fully, let it be heard when the

exulting strains that are wont to fill the air with exuberant harmony

are saddened into the sweet, mournful, heart-breaking notes that steal

on the ear at a soldier's funeral, and the gaudy splendour of military

array has passed into the drear pomp of that most touching, most

monitory sight. Faint mournful bugle-notes are wafted fitfully on the

wind, plumes and glittering weapons glance and disappear as the

procession advances, now hidden by the hedge-rows, now flashing on the

sight, in the autumnal sun, as it winds slowly along the devious road;

louder and louder swell those short abrupt trumpet-notes as it draws

near, till the whole sad array, in its affecting beauty, is presented to

the eye. The _life in death_ that pervades the melancholy

ceremonial!--"Our brother is not dead, but sleepeth," seems written on

the impressive pageant; and we almost expect, while we gaze, to see the

deep slumber chased from the closed eyelids, and the recumbent form

start up again to claim the warlike weapons with which it was wont to be

girt, and that now lie, as if awaiting their master's grasp, in

unavailing display on the funereal pall. But a mightier than he has for

ever wrenched them from his hold, and vain the sword, the helm, the

spear, in that unequal conflict. The last contest is over, and "he is in

peace."

"Brother, wrapp'd in quiet sleep,

Thou hast ceased to watch and weep;

Wipe the toil-drops from thy brow,

War and strife are over now;

Bow the head, and bend the knee,

For the crown of victory."

But suppose not pathos confined to the "bugle's wailing sound," and the

sad subdued bursts of well-modulated military music--to the long files

of slow-pacing troops with reversed arms, and the riderless steed,

vainly caparisoned for the battle, that proclaim the obsequies of a

chief. We are not ashamed to confess that the tear has been wrung from

our eye by the plaintive notes of the few rude instruments that alone

lament over the poor private's simple bier--the inharmonious fife, and

the measured beats of the muffled drum; while the dull tramp of the

appointed mourners following a comrade to his obscure resting-place

falls chilly on the heart. Though even he, lowly in death as in life,

shares with his leader in the brief wild honours of a soldier's

grave--the sharp volleys of musketry pealing over his narrow home, a

strange farewell to its passionless inhabitant, on whom the sanctity of

the tomb has already passed; the unholy sound falls voiceless on his

dull ear, fast closed until

"The last loud trumpet-notes on high

Peal through the echoing sky,

And cleave the quivering ground"--

breaking, with dreadful summons, "the eternal calm wherewith the grave

is bound."

"Facilis descensus!" We cannot say that we admire the hurdy-gurdy, that

synthesis of a grindstone and a Jew's-harp, yea, of all that is

detestable, musically speaking, which must have owed its origin to a

desire on the part of Jupiter _Musicus_, in a bad temper, to invent a

suitable purgatory for expiating the sins of delinquent musicians;

affording, on this supposition, an exquisite illustration of the perfect

adaptation of means to an end--one well worthy the attention of all

future writers on that subject. Independently of the nuisance of its

inexpressibly harsh-jingling tones, (as, if you were being hissed by a

quantity of rusty iron wire,) it always gives us the fidget to hear it

for the sake of poor Abel, (surely its only admirer,) grinding away for

dear life, to the extreme exacerbation of the bears growling beneath,

under the combined irritation of no supper and his abominable tinkling.

How they must have longed to gobble him up, were it only for the sake

of popping an extinguisher on the "zit zan zounds" overhead! It was the

reverse of the old tale, "no song no supper;" for they got the song,

instead of a supper on the nice plump artist, which they would have

liked much better. We wish he had stuck to his text, and persisted in

his refusal to play; for then the fate that awaited him would but have

been poetical justice for his utter and criminal want of taste--an

adequate retribution on a wretch patronising an instrument whose

demerits transcend every adjective that occurs to us at this present

moment.

But as we cannot, even in the wildest freaks of our imagination,

conceive of any one really liking the hurdy-gurdy--nay, we are prepared

to demonstrate much affection absolutely impossible--we incline to think

there must have been some corruption of this tradition in the course of

its being handed down to us, so far at least as concerns the name of the

instrument played at such a price; and on the antiquarian principle that

consonants are changeable at pleasure, and vowels go for nothing, we

take leave for hurdy-gurdy (what a vulgar sound it has!) to read flute,

violin, lute, or, in short, any other presentable musical instrument

that may chance to find the greatest favour in our eyes. A change which

has the twofold merit of saving Abel's character for taste, and

preserving so excellent a story from carrying a lie on the face of it;

and for this service of ours, we desire alike the thanks of musicians

and moralists, to whom we most respectfully present our improved

version, as suitable for circulation by the most fastidious artist, or

rigid precisian.

Mercy on us! What a rattling and clattering of doors and windows! The

windows will certainly be blown in at last, for they strain and creak

like a ship at sea; and how the wind roars and bellows in the chimney,

as if AEolus and all his noisy crew were met on a tipsy revel!

There--that last gust shook the house! It is to be hoped the chimneys

stand with their feather-edge to it, or we shall have a stack or two

about our ears in a trice. We wonder whether the cellars would be the

safest place, or, indeed, whether there is a safe place about the house

at all! We have often heard of the music of the wind, but never felt

less disposed to admire it in our life--for the gale has been howling in

our ears all day; and this last hour or two, there has been, as the

sailors say, a fresh hand at the bellows; so that we are in no humour to

sentimentalize on what is, within a few yards of us, curling the dark

waves, that, since the day in which their fluctuation was first decreed,

have swallowed up so much of what is goodly and beloved of this earth,

and that now roar as if for their prey! of which may the great God that

ruleth over the sea, as well as the dry land, disappoint their ravening

jaws! We shrink and are half appalled at their clamour, while we are on

the point of uttering a hasty vow never again to locate ourselves at the

sea-side, though it were prescribed by fifty physicians; or, at all

events, not so very near that dun mass of troubled waters, blending on

the horizon in strange confusion with the lowering, tempestuous sky. Who

could believe, as he views them in their milder mood, as we did

yesterday--lying placid as a clear lake among the mountains, wherein the

bright face of heaven is mirrored, reflecting each light cloud that

floats in the deep azure, or the many-tinted hues of evening--that anon,

lashed into foaming wrath, they should devour "rich fruit of earth, and

human kind," the gold, and the gems, and the priceless treasures wrung

from both hemispheres; and the young, the brave, the loved--the bright

locks, and the manly beauty, and the hoary head; crushing their diverse

hopes into one watery ruin, surging a wild tumultuous dirge over their

one fathomless tomb! And then, sated with destruction, smile and glisten

beneath the morning sunbeams with all the sportiveness of child-like

innocence.

No, no--speak not to us of the "music of the wind." For to us, in our

gloomy moods, it breathes but of desolation, sorrow, and suffering;

while, as the blast rises higher, its sentimental mournfulness is

mingled with painful thoughts, which press on our spirit, of the peril

in which it places so many of our fellow-creatures; and, "God help the

poor souls at sea!" rises earnestly in our heart, and even

unconsciously passes the barrier of our lips, as we retire, utterly

unsympathizing with the selfish enjoyment of those who delight to wrap

up themselves, warm and cozy, in their curtained and downy repose,

lulled to deeper slumber by the blustering cold in which others are

shivering, or, haply, contending with the winds and waves so soon to

overwhelm them. And in our more ordinary everyday humour--if it chance

to rise above what in our humble opinion ought to be its maximum, a

gentle refreshing breeze, just enough to waft sweet woodland sounds, or

ripple the quiet stream--why, it discomposes and discomforts us,

whistling, howling, and rattling among slates and chimney-tops, and

making whirligigs of the dust, in the town; and in the country,

_soughing_ among the boughs, as though the trees had got some horrible

secret which they were whispering to each other, while their long arms

lash each other as if for a wager; the whole exciting in us a most

uneasy and undefinable sensation, as though we had done something wrong,

and were every minute expecting to be found out! A sensation which might

fairly be deemed punishment sufficient for all the minor offences of

this offensive world, and which we most decidedly object to having

inflicted on us for nothing.

"The music of the wind!" Why, what can be more detestable than the wind

whistling through a key-hole? or singing its shrill melancholy song

among the straining cordage of the storm-threatened ship? Then,

uninteresting accidents happen during squally weather: hats are blown

off; coat-tails, and eke the flowing garments of the gentler sex, flap,

as if waging war with their distressed wearers; grave dignified persons

are compelled to scud along before the gale, shorn of all the

impressiveness of their wonted solemn gait, holding, perchance, their

shovel-hat firmly on with both hands; and finally, there is neither

pathos nor glory in having your head broken by a chimney-pot, or volant

weathercock. No, the wide sea is an emblem of all that is deceitful and

false, smiling most blandly when preparing to devour you; and the wind

is only one shade more respectable--nay, perchance the worse of the two;

for the waters, in the self-justifying, neighbour-condemning spirit,

apparently inherent in human nature--and for which Father Adam be

thanked--may very possibly lay the blame of their fickleness upon it,

and bring a host of witnesses into court to testify to their general

good behaviour--their calmness, and amenity, and inoffensiveness, till

exposed to the evil influence of AEolus's unruly troop--the most

wholesale agitators going, and never so happy as when raising a riot.

N.B.--The whole tribe of zephyrs, gentle airs, and evening and morning

breezes, will please to consider themselves as _not_ included under the

term _wind_; to which alone, in its common-place hectoring style, this

tirade is meant to apply.

(We hate any thing important being popped within a parenthesis, but as

the literary sin pinches us less than the immorality, we must here state

what truth requires us to say--that the above, being written during a

fit of the spleen, induced by the hubbub of winds and waters adverted

to, must be received by the candid reader with considerable allowance.)

So much for the wind, which has blown _music_ completely out of our head

for a while. What a pity we did not bethink us of placing our AEolian

harp in the window, before it had sunk into those short angry gusts

which are now alone heard--the mere dregs of the gale; and so have drawn

our inspiration from that which puffed it out! But, somehow or other,

our bright thoughts generally present themselves too late to be of any

use; and this is one in that predicament!

Some people profess to be never tired of music, but to enjoy it _a

l'outrance_, at all times and in all places. With such, we must own, we

have no sympathy. With all our _love_--not mere liking--for the art, we

still hold that it is indebted for its charm to the categories of time

and place, at least as much as its neighbours; for (but this confession

should be made in the smallest, most modest-looking type in the world)

there are both times and places when we hate it cordially, and fervently

wish that neither harmony, nor its ancestor, melody, had ever been

invented. In some such mood as made the very heavens themselves odious

and pestilential to Hamlet, does music appear to us as unlike itself, as

they really were to his crazed imagination of them; and we look forward

with malicious pleasure to the time when, if Dryden is to be

believed--but your poets are not always prophets--"music shall untune

the sky," as a period when all the miseries it has inflicted on us shall

be amply revenged by its perpetrating, or assisting at, this gigantic

mischief. 'Tis then that your first-fiddle is but impertinent

catgut--your fluent organ a vile box of whistles, fit representative of

its _Tube_-al inventor--and the sweetest pipe ever resonant with the

clear, music-breathing air of Italy, or bravely struggling against the

damper atmosphere of our humid isle, sounds harsh and shrilly in our

ears, instead of soothing our "savage breast," which seems to marshal

all its powers the more emphatically to give the poet the lie. This--now

that we are in the confessional--we are free to own--yea, it is

incumbent on us to do ourselves this justice--is only when we are in one

of our unamiable moods, luckily about as rare as snow at mid-summer, but

correspondingly chilling and shocking to the genial ones around

us,--ourselves usually most so, like quiet sunshine in November. We are,

by nature, the meekest of individuals--a "falcon-hearted dove," or

anything else, pretty and poetical, that might give the idea of our

possessing a brave heart under a most gentle exterior; but when roused,

then indeed are we a very dragon; or rather, to keep up our former

simile, (which we think a taking one, though, alas! it is not our own,)

and delineate, by one expressive phrase, a mouldering, rage kept in

check; by the constitutional cowardice on which it is superinduced--then

are we a pigeon-hearted hawk, wanting only the courage to be desperately

cross! (An impertinent friend, who has been looking over our shoulder,

suggests that ourselves, under the two above-named phrases, would be

better adumbrated by the figure of a dish of skimmed milk, and that same

milk curdled! A plague on friends, say we! the most impertinent

impertinencies that fall to our lot in this cross-cornered world are

sure to emanate from them.)

Another of our sins which--to make "a clean breast"--we must confess, is

that of fickleness in our loves; an occasional flirting with other arts

and sciences, in their turn--for we protest against the profligacy of

making love to more than one at once! We string together fearful and

unreadable lengths of iambics, and dactyles, and trochaics, and write

sonnets to the bright queen of night, beginning "O thou!" and stick fast

in the middle of sorely-laboured and at length baffling extempores to

this, that, and t'other; and, wickeder still, then we din them into the

ears of a wretched friend, who having once, in the extremity of his

courtesy, unhappily proved himself a good listener, is, for his sins,

fated to continue so to the end of the chapter--_i.e._, our interminable

rhymes; til, tired of exchanging our bad prose for worse poetry, (and

having the fear of his maledictions before our eyes,) we throw it aside

in a pet. Then comes a change over our spirit; and we dabble in

paint-pots, and flourish a palette, and are great on canvass, and in

chalks, and there is a mingled perfume of oil and turpentine in our

_studio_ (whilome study) that is to us highly refreshing, and good

against fainting; and we make tours in search of the picturesque,

climbing over stone walls, and what not, to gain some hill-top whence we

may see the sun set or the moon rise, haply getting soused in a

peat-drain for our pains--and we pencil sketches from nature, really

very like; and the blue mountains, the solemn sunsets, and purple

shadows among the woods, or falling on the tawny sands, girdling the

sea, whose blue-gray melts into the horizon, throw us into quick

ecstasies of delight that almost paralyse the adventurous hand as it

seeks, often vainly, to transfer the quick-changing loveliness to the

enduring canvass. And then we fling away our pencils in despair, and

worship, with all the devotion of which ignorance is the mother, (for we

never handled the chisel,) the serene beauty of sculpture; most

passionless, most intellectual art, breathing the repose of divinity,

the grand inaction of the All-powerful; shadowing forth in this its

perfection, sublime truth, with its faint, troubled, yet still sublime

reflection, error;--the "without passions" of Divine revelation, and its

perversion, its undue development, the unconsciousness, issuing in the

final perfection of annihilation, of Braminical deity. So are the

extremes of truth and error linked--the error depending for its

existence on its antagonist truth. Painting is objective, sculpture

subjective, throwing the mind more upon itself, to seek there the hidden

forms of grace and beauty yet unmanifested by pencil or chisel. The one

appeals more to the senses, the other to the imagination and the mind;

exciting ideas rather than presenting them. Painting, sublimate it as

you will, is still of the earth; albeit a purer one than this desolated

habitation in which the sons of Adam mourn their exile--even the

unviolated Eden; of which it is one of the fairest, tenderest

emanations, reaching forward to the angelic, yet still a child of earth

with mortality on its brow. Sculpture is of the gods, with its Titanic

majesty, and calm, celestial grace.

But next succeeds one of our hard, stern, misanthropical fits, in which

verjuice and aloes might be taken as the type of our condition, and we

propound strange heresies concerning the affections, social and

domestic; the leading one being that they are greater inlets to misery

than happiness, and that mankind would have been less wretched had they

grown up, like blades of grass, alone and separate; a cheerless

doctrine, but one which misanthropical logic legitimately deduces from

the more comprehensive one, that in this world evil is more potential

than good--more active and influential in its own nature. And we

bitterly call to mind all the treachery with which our trustfulness has

been met--our leaning on that broken reed, friendship--the placing our

whole hope and stay on some loved one who has failed us in our

extremity;--we call up (and how they throng at that call!) these gloomy

recollections, clad in all the terrors of the dark and indistinct past,

to build ourselves up in our gloomy creed. And in our utter weariness of

soul, the thought of an uninterrupted sentient existence is oppressive:

and we passionately wish that the rest of the grave might not be

vouchsafed to our body alone, but that our spirit also might sleep a

deep, tranquil sleep, until the great day of awakening. 'Tis a dreary

mood--like clouded moonlight on troubled, turbid waters! And we could

roast Love with his own torch--and we see every thing through crape

spectacles, and have no clarity for the softer, more refined emotions

and contemplations; so we plunge our head and ears into a chaos of most

musty, dusty metaphysics; and by the time we are nearly choked with

them, and have reasoned ourselves, first, out of all intercourse with an

external world, secondly, out of its existence, thirdly, out of our own,

we are right glad to be brought back to our senses, and our old love,

whom we embrace with all the ardour of reconciliation after a lover's

quarrel, and willingly yield ourselves to the humanizing effect of

music--grave or gay, as our mood may dictate, either perfect after its

kind.

Reader, should you haply be of the extreme North, has it ever chanced to

you to be present at our glorious English cathedral service? If not,

congratulate yourself on this enjoyment in reserve for you; and when you

next visit our end of the little island, pass not, we beseech you, those

Gothic towers, massive and rich, or taper spires rising majestically

above the cloistered arches, buttresses, and pinnacles, of these

monuments of the piety, consummate skill, and humility of our ancestors;

for no modern black board, with gilt letters, proclaims the name of

their founders, who have sought a simple, perchance a nameless, tomb

within the sacred walls they have reared. Pass within that lofty

doorway; and the silence, the stillness, the vastness within, awe the

heart! From the care and turmoil without, one step has placed us lonely

as in a desert;--from the surges of life to the presence of the dead,

who sleep around as if under the more immediate keeping of the Mighty

One in His holy temple! And if, entering, a solitary memorial of the

more clouded faith which they inherited from their fathers--the jewel,

dimmed by its frail setting--should meet the eye, start not, with the

pride of knowledge, from the meek petition, "Ora pro me," enscrolled

beneath that mitred effigy, worn by the thoughtless feet of the

generations passed away; but believe, and fear not to do so, that "it is

accepted according to that a man hath," and that the sincere devotion of

the heart, even when erroneously expressed, through _involuntary_

ignorance, shall not be rejected by that just Being who seeks not to

reap where He hath not sowed; but that it may come up as holy incense

before Him, when our cold, unloving, orthodox prayers, backed by our

heathenish lives, and meaner offerings on the altar of our God, shall

return, blighted and blighting, into our own bosoms. Or should you be

too petrified with pious horror at this--Popery, as with your longest,

dismalest face, you will style it--to think with any charity of those

who dwelt but in the twilight of your open day--the very verger, sleek,

round, and smiling, as he stands by you in his sake-robes, shall, in his

honest zeal, supply an antidote for the evil, moralizing on the vanity

of such supplications, and winding up his simple homily with the

significant--"Where the tree falleth, there it shall lie!" Think on

that, rigid critic, and take heed how _you_ fall!--nor, if you have the

capacity for finding "good in every thing," will you disdain to learn

the lesson of instruction, which your own heart had failed to supply,

from so lowly a source.

But you still curl your sanctimonious lip, and shrug your pious

shoulders, in intimation of your knowing vastly better than your poor,

ignorant forefathers! Ah, well--then _live_ better; that is all we have

got to say to you!

Our very parish churches are now emulating the impressive ceremonial and

exquisite musical service of the cathedral. Enter, then, with us one

that has seemed, in some degree, to revive the glory of the olden time,

when men, as they received, gave lavishly for the service of the altar;

nor meted out their offerings with the niggard hand that is moved by the

heart of this generation; unmoved, unwarmed, but boastful of its

_light_--the light of a moonbeam playing on an iceberg! There is the

long sweep of the nave, with the open chancel (not separated from the

former by the richly carved and fretted screen, which, however beautiful

in itself, mars the grand effect of the whole) leading to the altar--we

are old-fashioned people, and fear not to offend by this old-fashioned

term--whose sacred garniture glows beneath the many tints of the fine

eastern window, with its monograms and emblems, and flowing-robed

apostles, through which the mellowed summer sun shines obliquely,

throwing strange, grotesque, many-coloured shadows on the walls and

pavement; while on either side tall lancet-shaped windows, thickly

covered with heraldic devices, bear modest record to the willing service

of those whose munificence has reared the pile, and give increased light

and richness to the scene. The great western window, also covered with

armorial bearings, throws a dim, yet kindling, tint on the stone font

aptly placed beneath it, as figurative of its character--initial to that

further sacrament, meetly celebrated where the star of Him who first

blessed it proclaimed His advent to the expectant world. While

throughout the holy building, high-springing arch, and sombre aisle, and

vaulted ceiling, and curiously-wrought oaken roof; all combine to

impress the mind with awe and admiration, with thoughts of the past and

hopes for the future.

But this is not all: these are but the glories of art, worthily

employed, indeed, in the service of the temple; 'tis but the body

without the life, the soul that animates it. Return at the decline of

day, when "man, who goeth forth unto his labour even unto the evening,"

has received a respite from his ordained toil, and seeks to refresh and

elevate his spirit, wearied and worn down with the low, inevitable cares

of the day, with the mingled prayer and chant, "rising and falling as on

angels' wings," that duly, at each appointed eve, swell through the

consecrated structure, filling its concave with solemn melody. The last

flush of evening has died in the west, and the scattered worshippers are

indistinctly seen by the dim lights, which, bringing out into strong

relief the parts immediately adjacent to the massive yet graceful

pillars to which they are attached, throw the rest of the interior into

deeper gloom, brought into sharp contrast with the illuminated

portions, by intersecting arch, clustered shaft, and all the endless

intricacies of Gothic architecture; exuberant with profusely decorated

spandrils, sculptured bosses, light flying buttresses, and delicate

fan-like tracery. How beautiful and hushed is all around! Now the

stillness is broken by approaching footsteps, and the white-robed train

of priests and choristers is seen advancing along the aisle, the organ

uttering its impressive modulations to soothe the heart, and still its

tumult of worldly care and feelings, that these may not, "like birds of

evil wing," mar the sacrifice about to be offered on its unworthy altar.

And then, amid the succeeding silence, fall on the ear--ay, on the very

soul!--the words of Holy Writ, deprecating the wrath of an offended

Creator, announcing pardon to the repentant, and cleansing from the

pollution of guilt to the heart, vexed with the defilement of this evil

world, and yearning after the purity of that higher existence for which,

erst designed, the inherited frailty of its nature, and the threefold

temptations that unweariedly beset it, have rendered it unfit and

unworthy.

How clear, simple, yet most thrilling, is the enunciation of those

words! and mark the superb harmony with which, proceeding in the sacred

service, the single plaintively modulated voice of the officiating

minister is answered by the choral supplications of the assembled

worshippers--swelling out in joyous exulting tones, and dying away in

sorrowful minor cadence, as though the shadow of sin and suffering fell

on those pathways to the highest heaven, clouding the radiance unmeet

for mortal eye! And if rude tremulous notes, from some of the lowly ones

who, still habited in their garb of daily toil, kneel by our side--for,

in that house, distinctions are there none--mingle with the harmony,

they mingle not harshly, for there is melody in the heart, and it is the

voice of a brother; not the less "bone of our bone, and flesh of our

flesh," that the blessings of this life have been more sparingly

bestowed on him--perchance to crown him more abundantly with glory and

honour in that which is to come. Succeeding each other, the antiphonal

chant--venerable with the port of near eighteen centuries; yea, with the

hoar of Jewish, as well as Christian antiquity--the exuberant anthem

with its ponderous chorus, and again, the joyous, melancholy, choral

response, wherein blend the voices of childish innocence, strong

manhood, and plaintive age, hear us on to the close;--that threefold

blessing which none may hear unmoved, and whose magnitude seems to

transcend our poor belief, as we reverently bow, in awed silence, musing

on its unfathomable import; while the deep, mellow voice that pronounced

it still lingers on the ear.

How imposing is the sight! One kneeling throng around--the indistinct

light, that clothes with mysterious grace the beautiful lineaments of

the Gothic structure--the bright gleam on the white and flowing

vestments;--and the _stillness!_ broken at length by a low, sad melody,

in accordance with the subdued tone resting on all, gradually rising

into the more swelling chords of the solemn organ, that, earthly strains

though they be, seen not unmeet to mingle with those exalted ones that

have gone before--rousing the heart from its more celestial

contemplations, and by gentle transition--like a descending

dove--bringing it down from its heavenward flight to that earth with

which its present daily and active duties are concerned, the more fitly

and cheerfully performed when thus hallowed; for, be it remembered, the

preparation for that unseen world to which we are tending, is the best

preparation for our continuance in this.

But the last wave of harmony has died away in the sounding aisles; one

by one the lights are extinguished, throwing the varied beauty of arch,

and niche, and pillar, into indistinguishable and fast deepening shade;

and, last of the train, we, with heart tranquillized and elevated by the

service of that evening hour, slowly follow the departing worshippers

into the still, clear night.

M. J.

MARTHA BROWN.

BY AN ANCIENT CONTRIBUTOR.

TO THE EDITOR OF BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE.

Sir,--It is twenty years since I first contributed to your Magazine;--it

was rather a brief article, and was not inserted in the early part of

the work. In short, it consisted of a few lines in the Obituary at the

end of the Number, and was as follows:--"Died at Bunderjumm, in the East

Indies, Thomas Sneezum, Esq., much and justly regretted by a numerous

circle of friends and acquaintances." He was my uncle, sir, and I was

his heir,--a highly respectable man, and a remarkable judge of bullocks.

He was in the Commissariat, and died worth forty thousand pounds. If you

saw his monument, on the wall of our parish church, and read his

character, you would know what a beautiful sympathy exists between a

dead uncle and a grateful nephew. I took the name of Sneezum in addition

to my own--bought an estate, and an immense number of books--and

cultivated my land and literature with the greatest care. I planted

trees--I drained meadows--and wrote books. The trees grew--the meadows

flourished--but the books never came to an end. Something always

interfered. I never could get the people in my novels disposed of. When

they began talking, they talked for ever; when they fought duels, they

were always killed; and, by the time I had got them into the middle of a

scrape, I always forgot how I had intended to get them out of it. In

history, it was very nearly the same. Centuries jostled against each

other like a railway collision. I confused Charlemagne with Frederick

Barbarossa, and the Cardinal Richelieu with M. Thiers. So, with the

exception of the article I alluded to, in your Magazine, and a few

letters on the present potato disease in the Gardener's Guide, I am a

Great Unpublished--in the same way as I understand there are a number of

extraordinary geniuses in the dramatic line, who have called themselves

the Great Unacted. I can only hope that advancing civilization will

bring better days to us both--types for me--actors for them.

At the time of the lamented death of my uncle, I was about thirty years

of age, and for ten years before that, had been sleeping partner in a

house in Liverpool; and I can honestly say I did my part of the duty to

the perfect satisfaction of all concerned. I slept incessantly--not

exactly in a house in Liverpool but in a very comfortable one--the

drawing-room floor, near the Regent's Park. Twice a-year a balance-sheet

came in, and a little ready money. I put the money carefully away in a

drawer, and threw the balance-sheet in the fire. It was a very happy

life, for I subscribed to a circulating library, and wrote the

beginnings of books continually.

One day, about six months after I was in possession of the fortune, I

heard a ring at the bell. There was something in the ring different from

any I had ever heard before--a sort of sweet, modest tingling kind of a

ring. I felt as if somebody was shaking my hand all the time; and, on

looking back on the event, I think there must be something in mesmerism

and every thing else--homoeopathy and the water cure included; for it

was certainly quite unaccountable on ordinary principles--but so it was.

The maid was very slow in answering the bell. There was another pull.

The same mysterious effects--a sort of jump--a tremor as it were, not at

all unpleasant, but very odd--so I went to the door myself; and there

fixed on me, in the most extraordinary manner, were two of the blackest

eyes I ever saw--illuminating cheeks of a dark yellow colour, and

increasing the whiteness of the most snowy teeth--the brightest,

glistenest, shiningest, teeth that can possibly be imagined. She

wore--for I may as well tell you it was a woman--she wore a flowing

white veil upon her head, the queerest petticoats, and funniest

shoes--at that time I had not seen the Chinese Collection and thought it

was Desdemona (whom I had seen Mr Kean put to death a few nights before)

"walking" in some of Othello's clothes. What she said, or if she said

any thing, I was too much astonished to make out; but she walked into my

room, smiling with her wonderful teeth, and curtsying with the

extraordinary petticoats down to the very floor--and calling me "Massa

Sib."

"My good woman," I said, "I am afraid you make a mistake. I don't know

any one of the name of Sib;" but I checked myself, for I thought she

perhaps mistook me--I wore prodigious whiskers at that time--for a

gallant colonel, whose name begins with that euphonious syllable.

"No, no--no colonel," she said; "me wants _you_--me no care for

colonels." What could she possibly want with me? I had never seen the

woman before, or any body like her, except a picture of the Queen of

Sheba when she was on a visit to Solomon. Could this woman come from

Sheba? Could she take me for--no, no--she couldn't possibly take me for

Solomon. So I was quite non-plussed.

"You no get no letter, Massa Sib, to tell you we was to come--eh?"

A letter? a letter?--I had had a hundred and fifty letters, but put them

all into a box. How was it possible for me to read such a number? and

who did she mean by _us_? How many more of then were coming?

"Massa Sib vill be so fond of him's babba--him vill"----

A dreadful thought came into my head--a conspiracy to extort money--a

declaration at Bow Street--a weekly allowance. "Woman!" I said, "what,

in heaven's name, do you mean by babba?"

"Dee little babb; it is so pretty--so like him papa."

"And whose baby is it? for I suppose it's a baby you mean, by your

chatter about a babb."

"Your's. Oh! you will so lubb it."

"Mine? you detestable impostor, I never had such a thing in all my

life."

"And here it is--oh, dee pretty dear!"

And at that moment, another woman, dressed in the same outlandish style

as herself, brought up a little round parcel, that looked like a bundle

of clothes, and, before I had time to say a word, or shut the door, or

fly, placed it in my arms; and then both the women showed their

glistening teeth, stretching from ear to ear, and screamed out in

chorus, "You vill so lubb dee babba--it is such a pretty dear!"

I stood in a state of stupefaction for some time, but the dark-visaged

visitors by no means shared my inactivity; they ran, and screamed, and

bustled; trotted down stairs, jumped up again, and filled the whole

passage; then the drawing-room; then the little bedroom behind it, with

trunks, and bags, and band-boxes, and bird-cages full of parrots, and

cloaks, and shawls; till at last, when I started from my trance--in

doing which, nearly let the baby fall--I found my whole house taken

possession of, and the two women apparently as much at home as if they

had lived with me twenty years.

I unrolled the shawls and things from the baby's face. It was an infant

about a year old, and opened its eyes as I was looking at it, and looked

so wisely and sagaciously at me in return, that I could almost believe

it knew as much of the proceeding as I did--and this it might very

easily have done, without being a miracle of premature information, for

I had not the remotest conception of what the whole thing was about. So

I laid the child on the sofa, and went to the bell to ring for a

policeman.

"Oh, don't ring him bell, ve are so comfitable here!" said one of the

women. "Yesha vill go home 'gain, and I vill habb little bed in t'oder

room, and vill sleep vid dee babb--so nice!"

"Oh, you will--will you? We'll see about that," I answered, astonished

at the woman's impudence. "I will get you and your little lump of

Newcastle"--this was an allusion to her colour--"turned out into the

street."

"Oh, Massa Moggan vill soon be here! Him wrote letter a veek since; but

him vill come to-day."

"Oh!"----

So I did not pull the bell, but looked at the two intruders just as

Macready looks at the witches in _Macbeth_; for Mr Morgan was my legal

adviser, and had been my uncle's agent, and transacted all the business

connected with the succession; and I had such confidence in him that I

never opened his letters, and had of course thrown the note they talked

of into the great wooden box that was the receptacle of all my

correspondence.

In the mean time, the baby began to squall.

"Take the brat away, and I'll tell a little bit of my mind to Mr

Morgan," I said, grinding my teeth in a horrible passion; and, in a

moment, the two women disappeared with the child, roaring and screaming,

as if they had stuck pins into it on purpose to drive me mad.

If I had been a man of a tragic turn of mind, and fond of giving vent to

the passion of a scene, I would have walked up and down the room,

striking myself on the brow or breast, and shouting, "Confusion!

distraction!" and other powerful words which Mr Kean used to deliver

with astonishing emphasis; but I had no talent for the intense, and

threw myself on the sofa, exclaiming, "Here's a pretty go!"

And a pretty go it undoubtedly was--two black women and a

saffron-coloured baby established with me, as if I had been married to a

Hottentot; and my sister-in-law, as is very often the case, had come to

attend to her nieces' morals and education.

"So! Mr Morgan, what is the meaning of all this?"

But before I had time for further exclamations, my friend Mr Morgan, who

had come quietly into the room, interrupted me----

"Hush, my dear Sneezum--you are delighted, I'm sure. A most interesting

incident--eh, Sneezum?"

"Oh! these things do all very well in a book," I began; "but, by jingo,

sir, it's a very different thing in real life; and I tell you very

fairly, I'd sooner be married at once than have all the troubles of

bringing up a set of children that I have nothing to do with."

"Children! my dear Sneezum?"

"To be sure; how do I know that some more black women mayn't come--with

some more children--till my house grows like a gallery of bronzed

figures; but I'll sell them--see if I don't; I'll pack them all on an

Italian boy's head-board, and sell them to the doctors--every one."

"You labour under a mistake, my dear Sneezum. You've got my letter?"

"Yes--I got it--but"----

"Oh, then, of course you are too happy to show such respect to the

wishes of the defunct."

"What defunct?"

"Your uncle."

"What! uncle Sneezum?" and a wonderful light seemed to break in upon my

mind.--"He sent this baby here?"

Mr Morgan nodded his head; and, being a man of great caution, he only

put his finger in a mysterious manner alongside of his nose, and said--

"Secrets in all families, Sneezum."

"Oho! well--but the women--they're ugly customers, both of them; uncle

Sneezum was no judge of beauty."

"The women! what do you mean?" said Mr Morgan.

"Ay, which of them is it? but you need hardly tell, for I should never

know which of them you meant; they're a great deal liker each other than

any two peas _I_ ever saw. Are we to call her Mrs Sneezum?"

Here Mr Morgan burst into a great laugh.

"My dear Sneezum, you are always trying to find out some wonderful scene

or other to put into one of your books. No, no--these are two nurses;

one will remain in charge of the child, the other returns immediately to

Calcutta."

"And where will the one that is to remain--where will she live?" I asked

with a fearful presentiment of something shockingly unpleasant. But

before he had time to answer, the black visage of the nurse herself

appeared at the door, smiling with more blindingly white teeth than

ever.

"We have took dee room below dis--dee babb is in dee beautiful bed, and

ve vill never leave Massa Sib--never no more--so nice!"

So I was booked, and felt it useless to complain.

CHAPTER II.

Fifteen years passed on most happily. I established myself, or rather

old Morgan established me, in my present house; he paid L25,000 for the

estate; and I have gone on, as I told you at the beginning of this

letter, cultivating my farm and my talents with the utmost care. The

little girl grew and grew till I thought she would never stop; and by

the time she was sixteen she was at least an inch taller than I was.

Many people like those prodigious women of five feet six--I'm only five

feet five myself, which I believe was the exact measurement of Napoleon;

and I must confess that when I looked on Martha Brown--that was her

name--a sort of compliment I always thought to the complexion of her

Hindoo mother--I could not imagine how she could be the child of such a

curious old-fashioned looking individual as I had heard my uncle Sneezum

was. Well, she grew tall--and grew stout--and grew clever; and if old

Morgan had been her father himself, he could not have taken more care of

her. He was always down at Goslingbury, (that's the name of my place--I

sometimes put "Park" after it; but the lawn is now in turnips, and not

the least like Blenheim,) and his wife, and his two daughters, and his

little boy--in fact, the whole family; and though, I confess, they were

always most friendly and attentive to _me_, their principal cares were

bestowed on Martha Brown. I never push myself where I perceive my

company is not greatly desired; so I went out to see the planting, or

thin the copses, or make new fences, or superintend the ploughing, or

betook myself to my study, and gave full way to the wildest flights of

fancy in my everlasting first chapters of a novel or romance.

Sir,--It was at that time--now nearly four years ago--that I began a

work which I don't believe the most hostile criticism--but I will not

boast; it will be enough to say that I consider it equal to any two

introductory chapters I ever read. The whole of the first consists in a

description of my own house--the name of course changed, and the

locality removed to another county. I give the number of the rooms, the

width of the passages, the height of ceilings, and a description of the

new lifting-hinges to the dining-room door, that raise it over the

turkey carpet, without sacrificing, as is usual, an inch of the lower

part, and leaving a great interval at the sill. The fields are also very

particularly described, and in some instances the exact measurement

given; it gives such an appearance of reality, as may be seen in

Ainsworth and others; and the second chapter is devoted, or meant to be

devoted, to the living interests of the story--the _dramatis personae_,

as it were--with hopes, fears, griefs, and the other passions alluded to

in Collins's ode.

Mystery has an indescribable charm, which is the thing that makes me so

fond of riddles; and so I determined to have a hero or a heroine, I did

not care which, of a most unexampled kind. But how to invent an

unexampled hero, I could not imagine. Some disgusting fellow had always

done it before: even a blackamoor had been taken up--for there was that

horrid Othello; a Jew--there was Sheva; a puppy--there was Pelham; a

pickpocket--there was Jack Sheppard; and at last, as the sweet source of

mystery, and the pleasantest one to unravel, I thought I would take

myself. Yes, I would be the hero of my own book; and as to a heroine,

why, one of the Misses Morgan, or Martha Brown, or old Mrs Morgan, or

the Indian nurse, (whose name was Ayah, which is Sanscrit or Cherokee

for her situation,) any body would do. I was not at all particular; so I

began my own description.

It is amazing how little difference there is between man and man. A very

few touches judiciously applied, would make Roebuck into Wellington,

especially if Roebuck held the brush himself. Involuntarily I found my

height increasing, my _embonpoint_ diminishing, my eyes brightening, my

hair disporting in wavy ringlets over a majestic brow, till at the end

of the second page I was Theodore Fitzhedingham, twenty-five years of

age, with several grandfathers and grandmothers distinguished in history

before the Norman conquest, and a clear rent-roll of forty thousand

a-year. And yet, after all, it was my own individual self, Thomas Smith

Sneezum--not, perhaps, exactly as I was at that moment--but as I had

often and often fancied myself when I had gone through a course of

Thaddeus of Warsaws, and other chronicles of the brave and beautiful.

For, I confess, I was no wiser than other people, and it is well known

they have an amazing tendency to identify themselves with the characters

of the books they read, which perhaps accounts for the contempt that

Doctors' or Clergymen's wives in country villages entertain for any body

of the name of Snookes; and gives them so prodigious an opinion of their

own importance, that they wouldn't visit a stockbroker or flannel

manufacturer for the world. But there I was, stuck in the third page of

the second chapter--Theodore Fitzhedingham--blessed with all that

handsomeness, and rolling in all that money, and not able to move hand

or foot, or in short make the least progress towards the _denouement_ of

the story. For, with all my study, I could not manufacture a heroine out

of any of the girls around me. Miss Letitia Morgan had false teeth--I

found it quite impossible to make a heroine of _her_; and besides, I was

not even sure of the genuineness of the long curls at the side of her

face. For, you will observe, that the beautifying process I have

mentioned above; seems strictly confined to one's own particular case.

No lying and swopping, and altering and amending, would make those long

brown artificial incisors--you saw a roll of the gold wire every time

she laughed--into a row of pearls encased in a casket of ruby. That is

my description of white teeth in red lips, and I think it is far from

bad. Then Miss Sophia was immensely tall, and immensely thin; and in the

mornings when she appeared _en negligee_, as they say in the _Morning

Post_, her clothes hung straight down in perpendicular descent, so that

she looked exactly like the canvass air funnels that you see in a

steam-boat: and there were no outs and ins, or ups and downs, about her

figure from top to toe; and I found it impossible, for a particular

reason, to supply these deficiencies by the exercise of my ingenuity in

description And that particular reason was this,--that she did it

herself. Lord! what a change took place on Miss Sophia as you saw her

gliding about the room like a half emptied pillow-case in the morning,

and the grand and _distinguee_ (_Morning Post_ again) individual that

choked up all the doorways, and occupied whole sofas, when you met her

at a party at night. Then there were such flounces and tucks, and

furbelows,--she sailed through the room enveloped in such awful

circumgyrations of muslin--so pulled in at the waist, and so inflated

every where else, that she looked--as you saw only her neck and

shoulders emerging from the enormous circle in which the rest of her was

buried--like an intrepid aeronaut who has fallen by some accident through

a hole in the balloon, and you were lost in calculations of the length

of darning-needle that would be needed to reach to the _vera

superficies_. Now if I invent, I like to have the honour of the

invention entirely to myself; and I found it impracticable to extract a

heroine from seven or eight spring gauze petticoats, and a roll of

millinery below the waist, that looked like a military cloak rolled up

on the crupper of a life-guardsman's saddle. Then poor Martha Brown was

too young, and at that time too bashful, for a heroine; and besides,

there was no getting over the blot on her birth. Theodore Fitzhedingham

could never think of paying attention to the daughter of a Hindoo woman

and old Sneezum, the bullock contractor of Bunderjumm. One day I had

been at work in one of the plantations, and just as I was marking with

my hand-axe a birch tree to be felled, a thought came into my head. I

left the cross half executed, and threw the axe on the bank, hurried

home, and locked myself in the study. Pen and paper were lying before

me, and in a moment I had got deep into the introduction of my heroine.

She was an orphan thrown on Fitzhedingham's care--young, beautiful,

accomplished, but of unknown mysterious parentage--and the _denouement_

to consist in the discovery that her father was----but I won't mention

it just now, for half the value of these things consists in the

surprise. I will give you a page or two of it, only begging you to

remark how entirely a man's style alters when he gets into a serious

work. Here I go gabbling on and on to you, without much regard to style,

or perhaps to grammar--(if there are any slips in it, have the kindness

to correct them before you show this to any one)--but the instant I take

up my pen to write a portion of my novel, I get dignified and heroic,

perhaps you will say a little stiff, but I assure you I have formed

myself on the best models. The passage I alluded to was this:--

"To all the graces of external beauty Maria Valentine de Courcy united

all the captivations of the intellect--all the attractions of the

understanding,--all the enchantments of the soul. Cast in the finest

mould of earthly loveliness--radiant in all the charms of youth, of

innocence, and of integrity--she was the loved of all approachers--the

idol of all observers--the appropriator of all affections. A little more

ethereal, she would have been a goddess--a little less celestial, she

would have been a more ordinary woman than she was. For her nature was

of too lofty a kind--her spirit of too sublimated a character--her

disposition of too beatified a placidity, to allow her to be classed

with the other individuals constituting the female sex. A period of many

years had elapsed since she first took up her residence among the proud

halls--the baronial corridors--the heraldic passages of Fitzhedingham

Castle. Winter had found her wandering in the snowy lanes--Spring had

noticed her careering in the budding meadows--Summer had beheld her

perambulating through the flowery grove--and Autumn had kept his eye on

her as she galloped her managed palfrey through the umbrageous orchard,

or skimmed in her light bark over the pellucid bosom of the silver lake.

For many years such had been her unvarying course; and if loveliness has

a charm--if innocence has an attraction--if youth has a

witchery--all--all--were concentrated in the noble figure and

exquisitely-chiselled countenance of the subject of our sketch. The

colouring of a Titian, the elasticity of a Rubens, the magnificence of a

Michael Angelo Buonaparte."--

"Sneezum, Sneezum!" cried old Morgan, kicking with all his might at the

study-door; and interrupting me before I could exactly settle how the

sentence was to be properly ended--"Come and bid poor Billy good-bye."

"Billy? who's Billy?" I thought--a little perplexed, perhaps, with the

labours of composition.

"Come; he's off this minute for Dublin, where he joins the

Trigonometrical Survey--a great honour for a fellow not six months in

the Engineers."

The old fool was talking about his son William Morgan, who had been at

Goslingbury (Park, when I get the turnips up and the grass sown) for a

month--a nice merry young man; and so clever at mathematics, and

hydraulics, and other scientific pursuits, that he had won all the

prizes at Addiscombe; and, though only a second lieutenant, was chosen

to conduct a great survey of Ireland.

"I'm coming," I said; and bundled away my description of Maria Valentine

de Courcy; and away old Morgan and I went to the lawn, where we expected

to find the soldier. But no soldier, nor any body else, was to be seen.

"His mother and sisters are making fools of themselves, I daresay," said

I, "blubbering and crying over the boy, as if he was going out to settle

in New Zealand."

"I suspect there's a good deal of crying going on," replied old Morgan;

"let us look into the summer-house at the top of the garden." So we

hurried up the grass walk; and just as we got to the door, I was in the

very act of stepping into the bower, and old Morgan close on my heels,

when a man, with a handkerchief held to his eyes, rushed distractedly

upon us, and rolled us both down the steps, as if we had been pushed by

a bull; and in a minute or so, when I came to myself; I found my heels

in a gooseberry bush, and my head tight-jammed into a flower-pot; old

Morgan had rolled over into the next bed, which was prepared for celery,

and he lay in one of the long troughs, with his hands folded across his

breast, and evidently persuaded that he was his own effigy on the top of

his own tomb. And this was all the leave-taking we had with the

engineer; for, in an agony of grief at parting from his mother, and

perhaps to hide his crying, he had hurried out blindfolded, and took no

more notice of his host and his father than if we had been a couple of

old cabbage-stalks. However, I got up as soon as I was able, and

assisted Morgan once more upon his feet. This time we proceeded more

cautiously into the summer-house; and on the bench we saw Martha Brown

sitting and sobbing with all her might, with her head on Mrs Morgan's

shoulder, and Miss Sophia holding a bottle of salts to her nose; while a

tear, every now and then, rolled slowly over the tip of her own; and

Miss Letitia chafing the sufferer's hands, and occasionally giving them

a thump, as if to guard against a fit of hysterics.

Those Hindoos are certainly beautifully made. I never saw any thing more

graceful than the recumbent figure of Martha Brown; and I think that was

the first time I remarked that she was no longer a child. Up to that

moment I had scarcely observed her size; but there she was--a regular

full-grown woman--though, I must say, she was behaving rather like an

infant, to keep whimpering and sobbing in such a ridiculous way, merely

because I had fallen down-stairs.

"What is all this?" I said; "has any body hurt the child?"

"No, no, Mr Sneezum!" exclaimed Mrs Morgan, without looking at me;

"leave her alone for a minute or two; it will soon be over."

"How do feel, dear?" enquired Miss Letitia.

"Are you any better, love?" asked Miss Sophia.

And it was very evident they gave themselves no concern about the nearly

fatal accident we had met with, which had affected poor Martha so

deeply; so I became a little warm.

"Very pretty--very pretty this--upon my word! What in heaven's name is

the matter with you all? Here has been that blundering booby William,

pushed his father and me down-stairs, and Martha seems the only one that

would care a farthing if we had both been killed."

Upon this the girl made a great effort, and lifted up her head; but the

moment her eyes rested on me she gave a great scream--wild laughter

mixed with the most dreadful sobs; and she was fairly off in an

hysterical attack.

"Why, she's worse than she was," I said; but old Morgan took me aside.

"Don't you see," he said, "that she's of a most affectionate, gentle

nature, and that William's rushing off in the way he did"--

"Ay, to be sure, and upsetting me in such a dangerous manner. Poor

thing! is it all for my sake do you think she's crying?" So I went and

took her hand, and said--"Don't cry, Martha, don't cry--I'm not a bit

hurt--so be a good girl, and don't vex yourself any more."

Upon this, Mrs Morgan looked at me as if she thought me deranged--so did

Miss Letitia--and so did Miss Sophia; and even Martha, when she looked

at me again, fell back in fresh fit, holloing "His head! his head"--and

this time it was more laughter than sobs.

"Come away--come away," said old Morgan at last; "no wonder you frighten

them all to death. What the deuce is that you've got on your head?"

And there stood I with my brows enveloped by the flower-pot.

CHAPTER III.

I saw the Morgans were making a dead set to take me in. Sometimes it was

Miss Letitia, and sometimes Miss Sophia--and always the mother. To hear

that woman talk of her daughters, you would swear that two such were

never known on earth before. Their sweetness--their temper--their

beauty--the numbers of people that were in love with them--the hosts of

rich and handsome fellows they had rejected, and the decided turn both

of them had for a quiet country life, and the society of a

well-educated, intellectual man of a certain age. She was a wonderful

woman Mrs Morgan, and I really believe she thought she was speaking the

simple truth all the time. But it wouldn't do--I judged for myself, and

never took the least notice of all her hints and boastings. I tried to

have them less about the house than they used to be; but nothing would

keep them away--they always pretended it was for the sake of Martha

Brown--a very likely story that they should trouble their heads about my

uncle's anonymous contribution to the population returns, when his

veritable nephew and heir was to be had by hook or crook. But I don't

mean any disparagement by that to the poor little girl herself--far from

it--she was the nicest creature in the world, and really not so black as

I had thought; and she was now nearly twenty-one, and played and

sung--and such an excellent critic, too! I always read my writings to

her the moment they were finished, and she never found the slightest

fault in any of them. I had left my description of Maria Valentine de

Courcy incompleted for several years--for it is a long time now since

the foolish adventure of the flower-pot first showed me that she took a

tenderer interest in me than merely that of a cousin--and I now

determined to give my second chapter the finishing touch, and consult

her on the farther conduct of the story.

"Martha," I said, "I wish you would listen for a minute or two to what

I've written."

So she sat down in my study, and worked a flower in an Ottoman square,

and was evidently prepared to listen with the utmost attention.

"It is the rest of the second chapter."

"Oh, are you only there yet? I was in hopes you had come to the end of

the story."

To the end of the story! Could the girl be hinting that I ought to tell

her my mind; for I must tell you, I had so completely got over all

prejudice about her birth, that I was strongly tempted to give an

additional proof of my veneration for my uncle's memory, by giving his

poor little orphan my name. Can she mean any thing by wishing me to come

to the end of the story?

"How do you mean to wind up?" she asked.

"Oh! in a most mysterious and surprising manner; but we haven't got near

the _denouement_ yet. There must be a duel, of course--a

misunderstanding--and a rival."

"Oh! Theodore Fitzhedingham has no occasion to fear a rival," said

Martha, pretending to have lost the stitch.

"No! 'Pon my word that's very good of you. Do you really think that

Maria Valentine de Courcy will prefer him to every one else?"

"She will be a very foolish, a very ungrateful girl, if she doesn't--for

hasn't he loved her ever since she was a child?"

"Well, Martha, you are certainly a very nice, a very affectionate girl;

and I may as well put your mind at rest at once by telling you"--

"Sneezum! Sneezum!"

There was old Morgan again kicking at the study door, and holloing

Sneezum with all his might. I had taken Martha's hand, and was just

going to tell her to make preparations to become Mrs Sneezum in a week

or two. I let go her hand, and rushed to the door.

"What the mischief do you want?"

"Why, here's Billy come back again," he said; "won't you come and give a

welcome to poor Billy?"

"No; I be hang'd if I do. He has never apologized for pushing me down

the steps; tell him to get out of my house; I have not forgot what alarm

my accident caused to poor Martha. Don't you remember it, my dear?"

But there sat Martha--sometimes red and sometimes white--with tears in

her eyes, and her lips half open, like the picture of St Cecilia.

"There! the very recollection of it frightens her to death. Go to your

room, my dear, and I'll send this blustering fellow out of the house."

She glided out of the study without speaking a word, and I hurried to

the drawing-room, but no Billy was there. His mother and sisters were

luckily in London, so I turned angrily round on the father.

"A pretty fellow this son of yours--never one word of apology, either to

me or Martha--I won't have him roystering here at all hours, frightening

affectionate little girls with his violence."

"Who is it he has frightened?" enquired old Morgan; "who are the

affectionate girls you mean? I'm sure he has never caused the least

alarm to his sisters in his life."

"Perhaps not--perhaps not, Mr Morgan; but there is another girl that I

wouldn't have any injury done to on any account. In fact, I may as well

tell you at once, that Martha evidently expects me to provide for her

happiness, and I am going to do it."

"Well, nothing can be fairer--but how?"

"Why, as to any little blot on her birth, I don't care much about it.

Uncle was a kind friend to me, and I really think I can't do better than

give a good steady husband to his child."

"Bravo! bravo! when you have found her."

"What do you mean by--when I have found her?"

"Why, have you never read the letters?"

"No; I never read letters. They're all in the wooden box."

"Then where, when, or how, have you encountered a daughter of your

uncle?"

"Why, Martha Brown. I tell you I don't dislike a little dash of Hindoo

blood; it's like curry, and gives a flavour."

"And who is the husband you have chosen for her?"

"Myself."

Old Morgan burst into a prodigious laugh, but I was in no humour to

stand such nonsense. I got into a furious passion--he answered in an

insulting manner--and so I ordered him to get out of my house, him and

his son, and all his baggage.

"Certainly, certainly, Mr Sneezum, but you'll repent of it; and, as to

your marrying Martha, you'll just as soon marry the Princess-Royal."

When he was gone, I went in search of Martha to settle the matter at

once. There was a circular basin among the shrubs upon the lawn, with a

nymph cowering under a waterfall that fell all round her like a veil--a

very pretty ornament to the grounds--and at one side of it was a little

arbour, where I used often to sit and see the sun make rainbows out of

the spray that rose round the head of the nymph. To get to it, it was

necessary to walk on the ledge of the wall that rose a little above the

water in the basin, and this I was induced to do; for, as I was

searching for Martha, I thought I heard a voice in the arbour, and I

hurried on to tell her what I had done to old Morgan. I stept steadily

on tiptoe along the coping-stone--for I wished to surprise her--but on

getting to the opening of the arbour, a sight met my eyes that made me

lose my balance all of a sudden; and with a start of rage and

indignation, I stept backward into the pond, and was forced to battle

among the water-lilies for my life. Martha rushed from the arbour and

held out her hands in vain; but the person with her--a tall young man,

with bushy whiskers and an enormous pair of mustaches--leapt into the

basin and lifted me on to the bank, just as I had found it useless to

try any longer to rise above the broad leaves that floated on the top,

and made up my mind to give it up as a bad job. When I came to myself my

preserver was gone, but Martha was supporting my head.

"Oh, you double-faced, deceitful gipsy!" I began. "Who would have

thought you would be sitting, hand locked in hand, with a horrid fellow

like the ruffian that was with you in the bower?"

"The ruffian! My dear guardian, don't you know him?"

"How should I? I never saw the vagabond's ugly face before."

"Why, it's William Morgan--how strange you shouldn't recognise him!"

"Well, if it were twenty William Morgans, that's no reason you should

sit with your hand in his like the sign of the fire-office over our

stable-door."

"Oh, he's such an old friend! Recollect, sir, we grew up together, and

now how can you keep your anger against him? He has saved your life."

"After first startling me into the water. No, no; I'll have none of the

Morgans here. I'll go and get changed, and then I'll finish what I was

going to tell you when Morgan came to the door."

I was inflexible; I wouldn't let one of the Morgans into my house. Miss

Letitia wrote a letter of four pages, and Miss Sophia enclosed a sonnet.

Nothing would do. I resolved to keep Martha all to myself; and, for fear

of other adventures in the bower, I gave her positive orders not to

leave the house. I set people to watch her. I threatened to hang her

Ayah with my own hands, and showed her the very bough of the tree I

would do it on, if Martha was allowed to speak to any body but myself. I

resolved to marry her in a week; and, merely to prevent her being

harassed by the Morgans in the interval, I took all these precautions.

After that, I determined to pardon the whole family, and had even

prepared a letter asking them all to dinner on our wedding-day. Martha

did not seem inconsolable. Day after day passed away; and, to show how

easy I was in my mind, I went on with the last chapter of my novel,

leaving all the middle part to be filled up at my leisure.

One morning--it was last Wednesday--I went into the study, and had just

taken pen in hand, when I recollected that that was the very day I had

summoned all the labourers on the estate to resist the approach of the

levellers and engineers of a disgusting railway that was determined to

force itself right through my garden and close under the dining-room

windows. I went out to the barn--all the men were there. I gave orders

to them to warn the intruders off; if they resisted, to knock them down

without ceremony and keep them in custody till I could get them before a

magistrate. Having satisfied my mind on these points, I felt so sure of

my object being gained in both respects--that is, Martha and the

railway--that I dispatched my letter to old Morgan, inviting the whole

family to dine with me on Friday, the day I had fixed on for the

marriage. Martha sat by my side in the study, and went on with the

everlasting Ottoman square. I read to her--

"'Is it in the circle of possible events--is it a contingency to be

calculated on in the decrees of fate,' exclaimed Theodore

Fitzhedingham--(this was the finest bit out of my last chapter)--'that

the girl I have loved--the paragon I have worshipped--the angel I have

adored, is, indeed no longer the humbly born maid I thought her but the

descendant of princes--the kinswoman of emperors--the inheritrix of

kings?'

"'It certainly is far from false, nay, it is absolutely true,' returned

Maria Valentine de Courcy, with a condescending smile, 'that I am not

the person you have taken me for, but oh! beloved Theodore--faithful

Fitzhedingham, need I tell you that my love is unaltered, my affections

are unabated, my heart unchanged'"----

"Sir! sir!" cried voice at the door, "they be come." I hurried out; my

servant was armed with the poker, I seized the hall tongs as I passed

through; and on the lawn, in the coolest possible manner, were about

half a dozen fellows smoking their cigars, and occasionally looking

through a bright brass instrument upon a three-legged stand, and noting

down the result with the greatest nonchalance.

"Oho!" I cried, and rushed at the intruders, "run for the people in the

barn, Thomas. Who are you, you infernal interloping vagabonds?"

"Engineers of the Episcopal and Universal Railway Company, sir, and we

will trouble you to stand out of the way," said a tall blackguard,

scarcely deigning to look at me.

"Oh, you are, are you? Just wait a minute till my men come up, and I'll

have you and your railway ducked in the horsepond."

"Don't interrupt us, old man," replied the scientific ruffian; "if we do

any damage, charge it to the Company--we have seventy-five thousand

shares, and can afford to pay any claims."

"Here!" I cried to the men, "catch that long villain with the dwarf

telescope and take him into the house; if I don't get him six weeks of

the treadmill my name is not Tom Sneezum."

The man made a stout resistance, but at last was overpowered, and

carried into the hall. I helped to repel the others, and as they were

tolerably civil, now that the ringleader was gone, I contented myself

with walking them to the very end of my boundaries, and gave them

notice, that if they ventured to return, I would treat them exactly as I

had done their chief. This whole business did not take up more than an

hour; and before going home, I walked across to Major Slowtops, the

nearest magistrate, and luckily found him at home. He promised to

trounce the fellow handsomely when I brought him; and telling him I

would be back with the culprit and the witnesses in half an hour, I

returned in no little triumph to Goslingbury.

"Where is the vagabond?" I exclaimed, when I got into the house.

"He's been gone this hour, sir," said Thomas, hardly able to keep in a

laugh.

"Gone! who let him go?"

"Why, he ordered the carriage, sir, and him and Miss Martha is off for

London."

"Are you mad, Thomas?--what is it you're speaking of? Where is the

rascally leveller of the railway?"

"Lor', sir--don't you know? It was only Mr William at one of his tricks.

The moment he took off the spectacles we all knew him, and Miss Martha

seemed so pleased"--

"Did she?"

"Oh, yes! and Mr William--but they say he's Captain Morgan now--laughed

so. It was certainly a rare good surprise--wasn't it, sir?"

I rushed into my study. "Let her go!" I said, "the false, deceitful

Hottentot, or Hindoo, or whatever she is; she's as black as my hat, and

a disgrace to my old uncle." So I stood very quietly, brooding over my

misfortune--if a misfortune it was--and revenging myself by tearing into

a million pieces the beginning and the end of my romantic novel.

* * * * *

"Here we are, Sneezum, my boy!" said old Morgan, on the Friday, at about

two o'clock; "I've come on before, to tell you to get into good-humour;

for perhaps you've forgotten the invitations you gave us all for

to-day."

"What has become of the young woman?" I asked, with a very disdainful

look; "my uncle's unowned little girl?"

"Do you mean William's wife?" inquired Mr Morgan; "they were married

this morning, at St George's, Hanover Square, and will take you for an

hour or two on their way to the North."

"I think, sir, as her guardian--not to say her cousin"----

"There, my dear Sneezum, you are altogether wrong; she was no relation

of your uncle. She was the daughter of a Mr Brown of the Commissariat,

and left to your uncle's charge; you, of course, succeeded to the

guardianship as his representative; but she is no more a Hindoo than you

are."

"That makes it worse, sir."

"Come, come, old Sneezum, don't keep up your anger; recollect you are

old enough to be her father, and that she likes you next in the whole

world to William. Shake hands with them, and be friends; and if you ever

had the folly to think of marrying her, keep your own secret, and nobody

will be a bit the wiser."

I thought old Morgan advised very wisely--so, if you show this to any

body, alter the names a little; for I would not have it known for the

world.--Believe me, sir, your obedient servant,

T. S. S.

MARLBOROUGH.

NO. III.

The campaign of 1707 opened under very different auspices to the Allies

from any which had preceded it:--Blenheim had saved Germany, Ramilies

had delivered Brabant. The power of the Grande Monarque no longer made

Europe tremble. The immense advantage which he had gained in the outset

of the contest, by the declaration of the governor of Flanders for the

cause of the Bourbons, and the consequent transference of the Flemish

fortresses into his hands, had been lost. It was more than lost--it had

been won to the enemy. Brussels, Antwerp, Menin, Ath, Ostend, Ghent,

Dendermonde, Louvain, now acknowledged the Archduke Charles for their

sovereign; the states of Brabant had sent in their adhesion to the Grand

Alliance. Italy had been lost as rapidly as it had been won; the stroke

of Marlborough at Ramilies had been re-echoed at Turin; and Eugene had

expelled the French arms from Piedmont as effectually as Marlborough had

from Flanders. Reduced on all sides to his own resources, wakened from

his dream of foreign conquests, Louis XIV. now sought only to defend his

own frontier; and the arms which had formerly been at the gates of

Amsterdam, and recently carried terror into the centre of Germany, were

now reduced to a painful defensive on the Scheldt and the Rhine.

These great advantages would, in all probability, notwithstanding the

usual supineness and divisions of the Allied Powers, have led to their

obtaining signal success in the next campaign, had not their attention

been, early in spring, arrested, and their efforts paralyzed by a new

and formidable actor on the theatre of affairs. This was no less a man

than CHARLES XII. KING OF SWEDEN; who, after having defeated the

coalition of the northern sovereigns formed for his destruction,

dictated peace to Denmark at Copenhagen, dethroned the King of Poland,

and wellnigh overturned the empire of Russia--had now advanced his

victorious standards into the centre of Germany, and at the head of an

army hitherto invincible, fifty thousand strong, stationed himself at

Dresden, where he had become the arbiter of Europe, and threatened

destruction to either of the parties engaged in the contest on the Rhine

against whom he chose to direct his hostility.

This extraordinary man approached closer than any warrior of modern

times to the great men of antiquity. More nearly even than Napoleon, he

realized the heroes of Plutarch--a Stoic in pacific, he was a Caesar in

military life. He had all their virtues, and a considerable share of

their barbarism. Achilles did not surpass him in the thirst for warlike

renown, nor Hannibal in the perseverance of his character and the

fruitfulness of his resources; like Alexander, he would have wept

because a world did not remain to conquer. Indefatigable in fatigue,

resolute in determination, a lion in heart, he knew no fear but that of

his glory being tarnished. Endowed by nature with a constitution of

iron, he was capable of undergoing a greater amount of fatigue than any

of his soldiers: at the siege of Stralsund, when some of his officers

were sinking under the exhaustion of protracted watching, he desired

them to retire to rest, and himself took their place. Outstripping his

followers in speed, at one time he rode across Germany, almost alone, in

an incredibly short space of time: at another, he defended himself for

days together, at the head of a handful of attendants, in a barricaded

house, against ten thousand Turks. Wrapt up in the passion for fame, he

was insensible to the inferior desires which usually rouse or mislead

mankind. Wine had no attractions, women no seductions for him: he was

indifferent to personal comforts or accommodations; his fare was as

simple, his dress as plain, his lodging as rude, as those of the meanest

of his followers. To one end alone his attention was exclusively

directed, on one acquisition alone his heart was set. Glory, military

glory, was the ceaseless object of his ambition; all lesser desires

were concentrated in this ruling passion; for this he lived, for this

he died.

That his military abilities were of the very highest order, may be

judged of by the fact that, with the resources of the poor monarchy of

Sweden, not at that period containing two millions of inhabitants, he

entirely defeated a coalition of Russia, Denmark, and Poland, headed by

the vast capacity and persevering energy of Peter the Great, and

numbering not less than forty millions of subjects under its various

sovereigns. Nor let it be said that these nations were rude in the

military art, and unfit to contend in the field with the descendants of

the followers of Gustavus Adolphus. The Danes are the near neighbours

and old enemies of the Swedes; their equals in population, discipline,

and warlike resources. Thirty years had not elapsed since the Poles had

delivered Europe from Mussulman bondage by the glorious victory of

Vienna, under John Sobieski, over two hundred thousand Turks. Europe has

since had too much reason to know what are the military resources of

Russia, against which all the power of Western Europe, in recent times,

has been so signally shattered; and though the soldiers of Peter the

Great were very different, in point of discipline, from those that

repelled the legions of Napoleon, yet their native courage was the same,

and they were directed by an energy and perseverance, on the part of the

Czar, which never has been exceeded in warlike annals. What then must

have been the capacity of the sovereign, who, with the resources of a

monarchy not equalling those of Scotland at this time, could gain such

extraordinary success over so powerful a coalition, from the mere force

of indefatigable energy, military ability, and heroic determination!

Charles, however, had many faults. He was proud, overbearing, and

opinionative. Like all men of powerful original genius, he was confident

in his own opinion, and took counsel from none; but, unfortunately, he

often forgot also to take counsel from himself. He did not always weigh

the objections against his designs with sufficient calmness to give them

fair play, or allow his heroic followers a practical opportunity of

crowning his enterprises with success. He had so often succeeded against

desperate, and apparently hopeless, odds, that he thought himself

invincible, and rushed headlong into the most dreadful perils, with no

other preparation to ward them off but his own calmness in danger, his

inexhaustible fecundity of resources, and the undaunted courage, as well

as patience of fatigue and privation, with which he had inspired his

followers. It is surprising, however, how often they extricated him from

his difficulties; and even in his last expedition against Russia, which

terminated in the disaster of Pultowa, he would, to all appearance, have

proved successful, if the Tartar chief, Mazeppa, had proved faithful to

his engagement. Like Hannibal, his heroic qualities had inspired a

multifarious army--_colluvies omnium gentium_--with one homogeneous

spirit, rendered them subject to his discipline, faithful to his

standard, obedient to his will. But in some particulars his private

character was still more exceptionable, and stained with the vices as

well as virtues of the savage character. Though not habitually cruel, he

was stern, vindictive, and implacable; and his government has been

stained by some acts of atrocious barbarity at which humanity shudders,

and which must ever leave an indelible stain on his memory.

Louis XIV., in his distress, was naturally anxious to gain the support

of so powerful an ally, who was now at Dresden at the head of

fifty-three thousand veteran soldiers, ready to fall on the rear of

Marlborough's army, that threatened the defensive barrier of France in

the Low Countries. Every effort, accordingly, was made to gain Charles

over to the French interest. The ancient alliance of France with Sweden,

their mutual cause of complaint against the Emperor, the glories of

Gustavus Adolphus and the thirty years' war, in which they had stood

side by side, were held forth to dazzle his imagination or convince his

judgment. The Swedish monarch appeared ready to yield to these efforts.

He brought forward various real or imaginary grounds of complaint

against the German powers, for infractions of the constitution of the

empire, of which he put himself forth as the guarantee, as heir to the

crown and fame of Gustavus Adolphus, as well as for sundry insults

alleged to have been committed against the Swedish crown or subjects.

These various subjects of complaint were sedulously inflamed by the

French agents; and the weight of their arguments was not a little

increased by the knowledge of the fact, that they were authorized to

offer Count Piper, the prime minister of Charles, 300,000 livres

(L.12,000), to quicken his movements in favour of the cabinet of

Versailles, besides bribes in proportion to the subordinate ministers of

the Swedish monarch.[10]

Marlborough, as well he might, was extremely uneasy at this negotiation,

which he soon discovered by secret information, as well as the

undisguised reluctance of the German powers to furnish the contingents

for which they were bound for the ensuing campaign. Indeed, it could

hardly be expected that the Northern powers in Germany should send their

chief disposable forces to swell Marlborough's army beyond the Rhine,

when so warlike a monarch, at the head of fifty thousand men, was in the

centre of the empire, with his intentions as yet undeclared, and exposed

to the influence of every imaginable seduction. He dispatched,

accordingly, General Grumbkow, an adroit and intelligent diplomatist,

who had been sent by the King of Prussia on a mission to the Allied

headquarters, to Dresden, to endeavour to ascertain the real intentions

of the Swedish monarch. He was not long of discovering that Charles had

assumed an angry tone towards the confederates, only in order to extract

favourable terms of accommodation from them, and that Muscovy was the

real object on which his heart was set. His despatches convey a curious

and highly interesting picture of Charles and the Swedish court and army

at this important juncture.[11] The negotiation went on for some time

with varying success; but at length matters were brought to a crisis, by

the King of Sweden declaring that he would treat with none but

Marlborough in person.

This immediately led to the English general repairing to the court of

Charles XII. at Dresden. He left the Hague on the 20th April

accordingly; and after visiting Hanover on the way, where, as usual,

there were some jealousies to appease, arrived at the Swedish camp of

Alt-Ranstadt on the 28th. The Duke drove immediately to the headquarters

of Count Piper, from whom he received the most flattering assurance of

the gratification which the Swedish monarch had felt at his arrival. He

was shortly after introduced to the monarch, to whom he delivered a

letter from the Queen of England, and at the same time addressed him in

the following flattering terms:--"I present to your Majesty a letter,

not from the chancery, but from the heart of the Queen, my mistress, and

written with her own hand. Had not her sex prevented it, she would have

crossed the sea, to see a prince admired by the whole universe. I am in

this particular more happy than the Queen, and I wish I could serve some

campaigns under so great a general as your Majesty, that I might learn

what I yet want to know in the art of war."[12]

This adroit compliment from so great and justly celebrated a commander,

produced an immediate effect on the Swedish monarch, who was

passionately desirous of military glory. His satisfaction was visible in

his countenance, and he returned a gracious answer in these terms:--"The

Queen of Great Britain's letter and your person are both very acceptable

to me, and I shall always have the utmost regard for the interposition

of her Britannic Majesty and the interests of the Grand Alliance. It is

much against my will that I have been obliged to give umbrage to any of

the parties engaged in it. I have had just cause to come into this

country with my troops; but you may assure the Queen, my sister, that my

design is to depart from hence as soon as I have obtained the

satisfaction I demand, but not till then. However, I shall do nothing

that can tend to the prejudice of the common cause in general, or of the

Protestant religion, of which I shall always glory to be a zealous

protector." This favourable answer was immediately followed by an

invitation to dine with the King, by whom he was placed on his right

hand, and honoured with the most flattering attention. In the course of

the evening the conversation turned chiefly on military matters, in

which Marlborough exerted himself with such skill and success, that he

had another long private audience of Charles; and before his departure,

that monarch even exceeded his views, and declared that there could be

no security for the peace of Europe till France was reduced to the rank

she held at the date of the treaty of Westphalia.

Though the address and abilities of Marlborough, however, had thus

removed the chief danger to be apprehended from the presence of the

Swedish monarch at Dresden, yet other matters of great delicacy remained

still for adjustment, which required all his prudence and skill to bring

to a satisfactory issue. Not the least of these difficulties arose from

the zeal of the King of Sweden for the protection of the Protestant

religion, and his desire to revive and secure the privileges granted to

the German Protestants by the treaty of Westphalia. As Marlborough

justly apprehended that the Court of Vienna might take umbrage at these

demands, and so be diverted from the objects of the Grand Alliance, he

exerted himself to the utmost to convince his Majesty that the great

object in the mean time, even as regarded the Protestant faith, was to

humble the French monarch, who had shown himself its inveterate enemy by

the atrocious persecutions consequent on the revocation of the Edict of

Nantes; and that, if this were once done, the Emperor would be unable to

prevent any stipulations being inserted in favour of the Reformed faith

in the general peace which might follow. Charles was convinced by these

arguments, which, in truth, were well-founded, and even went so far as

to propose a secret convention with England for the promotion of the

Protestant interest; a proposal which, so embarrassing at the moment

when Great Britain was in close alliance with the Emperor, Marlborough

contrived to elude with admirable dexterity. Another matter of great

delicacy was the conduct to be observed towards the dethroned King of

Poland, Augustus, who was also at Dresden, and of course viewed with the

utmost jealousy the close intimacy between Marlborough and his

formidable enemy Charles. Here, however, the diplomatic skill of the

English general overcame all difficulties, and by skilfully taking

advantage of his pecuniary embarrassments, after his territories had

been ravaged and exhausted by the Swedish forces, and engaging that the

Emperor should take a large part of his troops into his pay, he

succeeded at once in gaining over the dethroned monarch, and securing a

considerable body of fresh troops for the service of the Allies. By

these means, aided by the judicious bestowing of considerable pensions

on Count Piper and the chief Swedish ministers, paid in advance,

Marlborough succeeded in entirely allaying the storm which had

threatened his rear, and left the Saxon capital, after a residence of

ten days, perfectly secure of the pacific intentions of the Swedish

monarch, and having fully divined the intended direction of his forces

toward Moscow.[13]

The brilliant success with which this delicate and important negotiation

terminated, naturally induced a hope that vigorous operations would be

undertaken by the Allied powers, and that the great successes of the

preceding campaign would be so far improved, as to compel the Court of

France to submit to such terms as the peace of Europe, and the

independence of the adjoining States, required. It was quite the

reverse, and Marlborough had again the indescribable mortification of

seeing month after month of the summer of 1707 glide away, without one

single measure conducive to the common cause, or worthy of the real

strength of the Allied powers, having been attempted. They had all

relapsed into their former and fatal jealousies and procrastination. The

Dutch, notwithstanding the inestimable services which Marlborough had

rendered to their Republic, had again become distrustful, and authorized

their field-deputies to thwart and mar all his operations. They made no

concealment of their opinion, that their interests were now secured, and

that the blood and treasure of the United Provinces should no longer be

wasted in enterprises in which the Emperor or Queen of England alone

were concerned. They never failed accordingly to interfere when any

aggressive movement was in contemplation; and even when the Duke, in the

course of his skilful marches and countermarches, had gained the

opportunity for which he longed, of bringing the enemy to an engagement

on terms approaching to an equality, never failed to interpose with

their fatal negative, and prevent any thing being attempted. They did

this, in particular, under the most vexatious circumstances, on the 27th

May, near Nevilles, where Marlborough had brought his troops into the

presence of the enemy with every prospect of signalizing that place by a

glorious victory. A council of war forbade an engagement despite

Marlborough's most earnest entreaties, and compelled him in consequence

to fall back to Branheim, to protect Louvain and Brussels. The

indignation of the English general at this unworthy treatment, and at

the universal selfishness of the Allied powers, exhaled in bitter terms

in his private correspondence.[14]

The consequence of this determination on the part of the Dutch

field-deputies to prevent any serious operation being undertaken, was,

that the whole summer passed away in a species of armed truce, or a

series of manoeuvres so insignificant, as to be unworthy of the name

of a campaign. Vendome, who commanded the French, though at the head of

a gallant army above eighty thousand strong, had too much respect for

his formidable antagonist to hazard any offensive operation, or run the

risk of a pitched battle, unless in defence of his own territory. On the

other hand, Marlborough, harassed by the incessant opposition of the

Dutch deputies, and yet not strong enough to undertake any operation of

importance without the support of their troops, was reduced to merely

nominal or defensive operations. The secret of this ruinous system,

which was at the time the subject of loud complaints, and appeared

wholly inexplicable, is now fully revealed by the published despatches.

The Dutch were absolutely set on getting an accession of territory, and

a strong line of barrier towns, set apart for them out of the _Austrian_

Netherlands; and as the Emperor, not unnaturally, objected to being

shorn of his territories, as a remuneration for his efforts in favour of

European independence, they resolved to thwart all the measures of the

Allied generals, in the hope that, it the end, they would in this manner

prevail in their demands with the Allied cabinets.[15]

It was not, however, in the Low Countries alone that the selfish views

and jealousies of the Allies prevented any operation of importance from

being undertaken, and blasted all the fair prospects which the brilliant

victories of the preceding campaign had afforded. In Spain, the Allies

had suffered a fearful reverse by the battle of Almanza, which in a

manner ruined the Austrian prospects in the Peninsula, and rendered some

operation indispensable, to relieve the pressure felt by the Allies in

that quarter. Peterborough, whose great military abilities had hitherto

nearly alone sustained their sinking cause in Spain, had been deprived

of his command in Catalonia, from that absurd jealousy of foreigners

which in every age has formed so marked a feature in the Spanish

character. His successor, Lord Galway, was far from possessing his

military abilities, and every thing presaged that, unless a great effort

was immediately made, the crown of Spain, the prize for which all

contended in the war, would be lost to the Allied powers. Nor was the

aspect of affairs more promising on the Rhine. The Margrave of Baden had

there died; and his army, before a successor could be appointed,

sustained a signal defeat at Stodhoffen. This disaster having opened the

gates of Germany, Marshal Villars, at the head of a powerful French

army, burst into the Palatinate, which he ravaged with fire and sword.

To complete the catalogue of disasters, the disputes between the King of

Sweden and the Emperor were again renewed, and conducted with such

acrimony, that it required all the weight and address of Marlborough to

prevent a rupture, threatening fatal consequences, from breaking out

between these powers.

Surrounded by so many difficulties, Marlborough wisely judged that the

most pressing danger was that in Spain, and that the first thing to be

done was to stop the progress of the Bourbon armies in that quarter. As

the forces in the Peninsula afforded no hopes of effecting that object,

he conceived, with reason, that the only way to make an effectual

diversion in that quarter was to take advantage of the superiority of

the Allies in Piedmont, since the decisive victory of Turin in the

preceding year, and threaten Provence with a serious irruption. For this

purpose, Marlborough no sooner heard of the disasters in Spain, than he

urged in the strongest manner upon the Allied courts to push Prince

Eugene with his victorious army across the Maritime Alps, and lay siege

to Toulon. Such an offensive movement, which might be powerfully aided

by the English fleet in the Mediterranean, would at once remove the war

from the Italian plains, fix it in the south of France, and lead to the

recall of a considerable part of the French forces now employed beyond

the Pyrenees. But though the reasons for this expedition were thus

pressing, and it afforded the only feasible prospect of bringing affairs

round in the Peninsula; yet the usual jealousies of the coalesced

powers, the moment it was proposed, opposed insurmountable objections to

its being carried into effect. It was objected to the siege of Toulon,

that it was a maritime operation, of value to England alone: the Emperor

insisted on the Allied forces being exclusively employed in the

reduction of the fortresses yet remaining in the hands of the French in

the Milanese; while Victor Amadeus, Duke of Savoy, between whom and the

Imperialists the most violent jealousy had arisen, threatened to

withdraw altogether from the alliance, unless Eugene's army was directed

to the protection and consolidation of his dominion. The real reason of

these obstacles thrown by the Emperor in the way of these operations,

was, that he had ambitious designs of his own on Naples, and he had, to

facilitate their accomplishment, concluded a secret convention with

Louis for a sort of neutrality or understanding in Italy, which enabled

that monarch to direct the forces employed, or destined to be employed

there, to the Spanish peninsula. Marlborough's energetic

representations, however, at length prevailed over all these

difficulties; and the reduction of the Milanese having been completed,

the Emperor, in the end of June, consented to Prince Eugene invading

Provence at the head of thirty-five thousand men.[16]

The invasion of the territory of the Grande Monarque accordingly took

place, and was supported by a powerful English squadron, which, as

Eugene's army advanced into Provence by the Col di Tende, kept the

sea-coast in a constant state of alarm. No resistance, as Marlborough

had predicted, was attempted; and the Allies, almost without firing a

shot, arrived at the heights of Vilate, in the neighbourhood of Toulon,

on the 27th July. Had Eugene been aware of the real condition of the

defences, and the insubordination which prevailed in the garrison, he

might, without difficulty, have made himself master of this important

fortress. But from ignorance of these propitious circumstances, he

deemed it necessary to commence operations against it in form; and the

time occupied in the necessary preparations for a siege proved fatal to

the enterprise. The French made extraordinary efforts to bring troops to

the menaced point; and, amongst other reinforcements, thirteen

battalions and nine squadrons were detached from Vendome's army in the

Netherlands. No sooner did Marlborough hear of this detachment, than he

concentrated his forces, and made a forward movement to bring Vendome to

battle, to which the Dutch deputies had at length consented; but that

general, after some skilful marches and countermarches, retired to an

intrenched camp under the guns of Lille, of such strength as to bid

defiance to every attack for the remainder of the campaign. Meanwhile

the troops, converging towards Toulon, having formed a respectable array

in his rear, Eugene was under the necessity of raising the siege, and he

retired, as he had entered the country, by the Col di Tende, having

first embarked his heavy artillery and stores on board the English

fleet. But though the expedition thus failed in its ostensible object,

it fully succeeded in its real one, which was to effect a diversion in

the south of France, and relieve the pressure on the Spanish peninsula,

by giving the armies of Louis employment in the defence of their own

territory.

Marlborough led his army into winter quarters in the end of October, and

Vendome did the same; the weather being so thoroughly broken as to

render it impossible to keep the field. He repaired first to Frankfort,

where he met the Elector of Hanover, and then to the Hague, where he

exerted himself to inspire a better feeling in the Dutch government, and

to get Eugene appointed to the supreme command in Spain: a project which

afforded the only feasible prospect of retrieving affairs in the

Peninsula, and which, if adopted, might have changed the fate and

ultimate issue of the war. Neither the Emperor nor the court of Madrid,

however, would consent to this arrangement; the former, because he

feared to lose that great general in Italy, the latter because they

feared to gain him in Spain. Marlborough, meanwhile, embarked for

England on the 7th November, where his presence had now become

indispensably necessary to arrest the progress of court and

parliamentary intrigues, which threatened to prove immediately fatal to

his influence and ascendancy.

The origin of these intrigues was to be found not merely in the asperity

of party feeling which, at that time, owing to the recent Revolution,

prevailed to a degree never before paralleled in English history, and

the peculiar obloquy to which Marlborough was exposed, owing to the part

he had taken in that transaction; but to another cause of a private

nature, but which, in all courts, and especially under a female reign,

is likely to produce important public results. During Marlborough's

absence from court, owing to his commanding the armies in Flanders, his

influence with the Queen had sensibly declined, and that of another

materially increased. Queen Anne had become alienated from her former

favourite, the Duchess of Marlborough, and, what is very remarkable, in

consequence of the growing ascendancy of a person recommended by the

duchess herself. Worn out with the incessant fatigue of attendance on

the royal person, the duchess had recommended a poor relative of her

own, named Abigail Hill, to relieve her of part of her laborious duties.

This young lady, who possessed considerable talents, and a strong desire

for intrigue and elevation, had been educated in High Church and Tory

principles, and she had not been long about the royal person before she

began to acquire an influence over the Queen's mind. Harley, whose

ambition and spirit of intrigue were at least equal to her own, was not

slow in perceiving the new source of influence thus opened up in the

royal household, and a close alliance was soon established between them.

These matters are not beneath the dignity of history; they are the

secret springs on which its most important changes sometimes depend.

Abigail Hill soon after bestowed her hand on Mr Masham, who had also

been placed in the Queen's household by the duchess, and, under the name

of MRS MASHAM, became the principal instrument in Marlborough's fall,

and the main cause of the fruit of the glorious victories of the English

general being lost by the treaty of Utrecht.

Though the ascendancy of Mrs Masham, and the treacherous part she was

playing to her benefactress, had long been evident to others, yet the

Duchess of Marlborough long continued blind to it. Her marriage,

however, opened the eyes of the duchess, and, soon after the promotion

of Davies and Blackhall, both avowed Tories, not free from the

imputation of Jacobitism, to the Episcopal bench, in opposition to the

recommendation of Marlborough and Godolphin, gave convincing proof that

their influence at court in the disposal even of the highest offices,

had been supplanted by that of the new favourite. The consequences were

highly prejudicial to Marlborough. The Whigs, who were not fully aware

of this secret influence, and who had long distrusted him on account of

his former connexion with James II., and envied him on account of his

great services to the country, and lustre at court, now joined the

Tories in bitter enmity against him. He was accused of protracting the

war for his own private purposes; and the man who had refused the

government of the Netherlands, and L60,000 a-year, lest it should breed

jealousies in the alliance, was accused of checking the career of

victory from sordid motives connected with the profits of the war. His

brother Churchill was prosecuted by Halifax and the Whigs on the charge

of neglect of duty; and the intercession of the duke, though made in

humble terms, was not so much as even honoured with a reply. The

consequences of this decline of court favour were soon apparent.

Recruits and supplies were forwarded to the army with a very scanty

hand--the military plans and proposals of the duke were either overruled

or subjected to a rigid and often inimical examination--and that

division of responsibility and weakening of power became apparent, which

is so often in military, as well as political transactions, the

forerunner of disaster.

Matters were in this untoward state, when Marlborough, in the middle of

November, returned from the Hague to London. The failure before Toulon,

the disasters in Spain, the nullity of the campaign in Flanders, were

made the subject of unbounded outcry in the country; and the most

acrimonious debates took place in Parliament, in the course of which

violent reproaches were thrown on Marlborough, and all his great

services to his country seemed to be forgotten. Matters even went so

far, that it was seriously proposed to draft fifteen thousand men from

Flanders to reinforce the armies in Spain, although it might easily be

foreseen that the only effect of this would be to drive the Dutch to a

separate peace, and lose the whole of Brabant, wrested at such an

expense of blood and treasure from the French arms. The Session of

Parliament was one incessant scene of vehement contention; but at length

the secret league of Harley with Mrs Masham and the Tories became so

apparent, that all his colleagues refused to attend a cabinet council to

which he was summoned, and he was obliged to retire. This decisive step

restored confidence between Marlborough and the Whigs, and for a time

re-established his influence in the government; but Mrs Masham's sway

over the Queen was not so easily subverted, and, in the end, proved

fatal both to his fortune and the career of glory he had opened to his

country.

Desirous of retaliating upon England the insult which the Allied armies

had inflicted upon France by the invasion of Provence, Louis XIV. now

made serious preparations for the invasion of Great Britain, with the

avowed object of re-establishing the Chevalier of St George, the heir of

James II., on the throne from which that unhappy monarch had been

expelled. Under Marlborough's able direction, to whom, as

commander-in-chief, the defensive measures were entrusted, every thing

was soon put in a train to avert the threatened danger. Scotland was the

scene where an outbreak was to be apprehended, and all the disposable

forces of the empire, including ten battalions brought over from

Flanders, were quickly sent to that country. The _habeas corpus_ act was

suspended. Edinburgh Castle was strongly garrisoned, and the British

squadron so skilfully disposed in the North Seas, that when the

Chevalier with a French squadron put to sea, he was so closely watched,

that after vainly attempting to land, both in the Firth of Forth and the

neighbourhood of Inverness, he was obliged to return to Dunkirk. This

auspicious event entirely restored Marlborough's credit with the nation,

and dispelled every remnant of suspicion with which the Whigs regarded

him in relation to the exiled family; and though his influence with the

court was secretly undermined, his power, to outward appearance, was

unbounded; and he resumed the command of the army in the beginning of

April 1708, with authority as paramount as he had enjoyed on any former

occasion.

Every thing announced a more important campaign than the preceding had

proved in the Low Countries. Encouraged by the little progress which the

Allies had made in the former campaign, Louis XIV. had been induced to

make the most vigorous efforts to accumulate a preponderating force, and

re-establish his affairs in that quarter. Vendome's army had, by great

exertion, been raised to a hundred thousand men, and at the same time

secret communications were opened with a considerable portion of the

inhabitants in some of the frontier fortresses of Brabant, in order to

induce then on the first favourable opportunity to surrender them to the

French arms. The unpopularity of the Dutch authorities in those towns,

and the open pretensions which they put forth to wrest them from the

Emperor, and deliver them over at a general peace to the hated rule of

Protestant Holland, rendered those advances peculiarly acceptable.

Vendome's instructions were to act on the offensive, though in a

cautious manner; to push forward in order to take advantage of these

favourable dispositions, and endeavour to regain the important ground

which had been lost during the panic which followed the battle of

Ramilies.

On their side the Allies had not been idle; and preparations had been

made for transferring the weight of the contest to the Low Countries.

The war in Italy being in a manner terminated by the entire expulsion of

the French from that peninsula, and their secret convention for a sort

of suspension of active operations with the Emperor in that quarter,

Prince Eugene had been brought to the theatre of real hostilities on the

northern frontier of France. It was agreed that two great armies should

be formed, one in Brabant under Marlborough, and the other on the

Moselle under Eugene; that the Elector of Hanover should act on the

defensive on the Rhine; that Eugene should join the English general, and

that with their united force they should force the French general to a

battle. This well conceived plan met with the usual resistance on the

part of the Allied powers, which compelled Marlborough to repair in

person to Hanover, to smooth over the objections of its Elector.

Meanwhile the dissensions and difficulties of the cabinet in London

increased to such a degree, that he had scarcely quitted England when he

was urged by Godolphin, and the majority of his own party, to return, as

the only means of saving them from shipwreck. Marlborough, however, with

that patriotic spirit which ever distinguished him, and not less than

his splendid abilities formed so honourable a feature in his character,

refused to leave the seat of war, and left his political friends to

shift for themselves as they best could. Having obtained a promise from

Eugene that he would join him before the month expired he joined the

army at Ghent on the 9th May 1708, and on the same day reviewed the

British division stationed in that city.

An event soon occurred which showed how wide-spread were the intrigues

of the French in the Flemish towns, and how insecure was the foundation

on which the authority of the Allies rested there. An accidental

circumstance led to the discovery of a letter put into the post-office

of Ghent, containing the whole particulars of a plan for admitting the

French troops into the citadel of Antwerp. Vendome at the same time made

a forward movement to take advantage of these attempts; but Marlborough

was on his guard, and both frustrated the intended rising in Antwerp,

and barred the way against the attempted advance of the French army.

Disconcerted by the failure of this enterprise, Vendome moved to

Soignies at the head of an hundred thousand men, where he halted at the

distance of three leagues from the Allied armies. A great and decisive

action was confidently expected in both armies; as, although Marlborough

could not muster above eighty thousand combatants, it was well known he

would not decline a battle, although he was not as yet sufficiently

strong to assume the offensive. Vendome, however, declined attacking the

Allies where they stood, and, filing to the right to Braine la Leude,

close to the field of Waterloo, again halted in a position, threatening

at once both Louvain and Brussels. Moving parallel to him, but still

keeping on the defensive, Marlborough retired to Anderleet. No sooner

had he arrived there, than intelligence was received of a farther

movement to the right on the part of the French general, which indicated

an intention to make Louvain the object of attack. Without losing an

instant, Marlborough marched on that very night with the utmost

expedition, amidst torrents of rain, to Parc, where he established

himself in such strong ground, covering Louvain, that Vendome, finding

himself anticipated in his movements, fell back to Braine-le-Leude

without firing a shot.[17]

Though Marlborough, however, had in this manner foiled the movement of

the French general, he was in no condition to undertake offensive

operations until the arrival of Eugene's army from the Moselle raised

his force nearer to an equality with the preponderating masses of the

enemy, headed by so able a general as Vendome. The usual delays,

however, of the German powers, for long prevented this object being

attained. For about a month Marlborough was retained in a state of

forced inactivity from this cause, during which period he bitterly

complained, "that the slowness of the German powers was such as to

threaten the worst consequences." At length, however, the pressing

representations of the English general, seconded by the whole weight of

Prince Eugene, overcame the tardiness of the German Electors, and the

army of the Moselle began its march towards Brabant. But the Prince was

too far distant to bring up his troops to the theatre of active

operations before decisive events had taken place; and fortunately for

the glory of England, to Marlborough alone and to his army belongs the

honour of one of the most decisive victories recorded in its annals.

Encouraged by his superiority of numbers, and the assurances of support

he received from the malecontents in the Flemish towns, Vendome, who was

both an able and enterprising general, put in execution, in the

beginning of July, a design which he had long meditated, for the purpose

of expelling the Allies from Brabant. This was by a sudden irruption to

make himself master of Ghent, with several of the citizens of which he

had established a secret correspondence. This city commands the course

of the Scheldt and the Lys, and lay in the very centre of Marlborough's

water communications; and as the fortifications of Oudenarde were in a

very dilapidated state, it was reasonable to suppose that its reduction

would speedily follow. The capture of these fortresses would at once

break up Marlborough's communications, and sever the connecting link

between Flanders and Brabant, so as to compel the English army to fall

back to Antwerp and the line of the Scheldt, and thus deprive them of

the whole fruits of the victory of Ramilies. Such was the able and

well-conceived design of the French general, which promised the most

brilliant results; and against a general less wary and able than

Marlborough, unquestionably would have obtained them.

Vendome executed the first part of this design with vigour and success.

On the evening of the 4th July he suddenly broke up from

Braine-le-Leude, and marching rapidly all night, advanced towards Hall

and Tubise, dispatching at the same time, parties towards such towns in

that quarter as had maintained a correspondence with him. One of these

parties, by the connivance of the watch, made itself master of Ghent. At

the same time Bruges was surrendered to another party under the Count de

la Motte; the small but important fort of Plassendael was carried by

storm, and a detachment sent to recover Ghent found the gates shut by

the inhabitants, who had now openly joined the enemy, and invested the

Allied garrison in the citadel.

Marlborough no sooner heard of this movement than he followed with his

army; but he arrived in the neighbourhood of Tubise in time only to

witness their passage of the Senne, near that place. Giving orders to

his troops to prepare for battle, he put himself in motion at one next

morning, intending to bring the enemy to an immediate action. The

activity of Vendome, however, baffled his design. He made his men, weary

as they were, march all night and cross the Dender at several points,

breaking down the bridges between Alort and Oerdegun, and the Allies

only arrived in time to make three hundred prisoners from the rearguard.

Scarcely had they recovered from this disappointment, when intelligence

arrived of the surprise of Ghent and Bruges; while, at the same time,

the ferment in Brussels, owing to the near approach of the French to

that capital, became so great, that there was every reason to apprehend

a similar disaster, from the disaffection of some of its inhabitants.

The most serious apprehensions also were entertained for Oudenarde, the

garrison of which was feeble, and its works dilapidated. Marlborough,

therefore, dispatched instant orders to Lord Chandos, who commanded at

Ath, to collect all the detachments he could from the garrisons in the

neighbourhood, and throw himself into that fortress, and with such

diligence were these orders executed that Oudenarde was secured against

a _coup-de-main_, before the French outposts appeared before it.

Vendome, however, felt himself strong enough to undertake its siege in

form. He drew his army round it; the investment was completed on the

evening of the 9th, and a train of heavy artillery ordered from Tournay,

to commence the siege,[18] while he himself with the covering army, took

post in a strong camp at Lessines, on the river Dender.

Such was the chagrin experienced by Marlborough at these untoward

events, that he was thrown into a fever, the result of fatigue,

watching, and anxiety. His physician earnestly counselled him to leave

the camp, and retire to Brussels, as the only means of arresting his

distemper; but nothing could induce him to leave his post at such a

crisis. He continued in his tent accordingly, and the orders were issued

by Marshal Overkirk. He was greatly relieved on the 7th, by the arrival

of Prince Eugene, who, finding his troops could not come up in time, had

left his cavalry at Maestricht, and hastened in person, though without

any followers but his personal suite, to take part in the approaching

conflict. Great was the joy of Marlborough on learning the arrival of so

illustrious a general; not a feeling of jealousy crossed the breast of

either of these great men. His first words to Eugene were--"I am not

without hopes of congratulating your Highness on a great victory; for my

troops will be animated by the presence of so distinguished a

commander." Eugene warmly approved the resolution he had taken of

instantly attacking the enemy: and a council of war having been

summoned, their united opinion prevailed over the objections of the

Dutch deputies, who were now seriously alarmed for their barrier, and it

was resolved to give battle to the enemy in his position in front of

OUDENARDE.[19]

The Allies broke up at two in the morning of the 9th July, and advanced

towards the French frontiers at Lessines in four great columns. So rapid

and well ordered was the march, that before noon the heads of the

columns reached Herfilingen, fourteen miles fron Asche, whence they had

started. Bridges were rapidly thrown over the Dender, and it was crossed

early on the following morning in presence of Eugene and Marlborough,

whom the animation of the great events in progress, had, in a manner,

raised from the bed of sickness.[20] Here the duke halted, and the

troops encamped in their order of march with their right on the Dender

and their front covered by a small stream which falls into that river.

By this bold and rapid movement, Vendome's well-concerted plan was

entirely disconcerted; Marlborough had thrown himself between the French

and their own frontier; he had rendered himself master of their

communications; and instead of seeking merely to cover his own

fortresses, threatened to compel them to fall back, in order to regain

their communications, and abandon the whole enterprise which had

commenced with such prospects of success. Vendome was extremely

disconcerted at this able movement, and he gave immediate orders to fall

back upon Gavre, situated on the Scheldt below Oudenarde, where it was

intended to cross that river.

No sooner was this design made manifest, than Marlborough followed with

all his forces, with the double design of raising the investment of

Oudenarde, and if possible forcing the enemy to give battle, under the

disadvantage of doing so in a retreat. Anxious to improve their

advantage, the Allied generals pushed forward with the utmost

expedition, hoping to come up with the enemy when his columns and

baggage were close upon the Scheldt, or in the very act of crossing that

river. Colonel Cadogan, with a strong advanced guard, was pushed forward

by daybreak on the 11th towards the Scheldt which he reached by eleven,

and immediately threw bridges over, across which the whole cavalry and

twelve battalions of foot were immediately thrown. They advanced to the

summit of the plateau on the left bank of the river, and formed in

battle array, the infantry opposite Eynes, the cavalry extending on the

left towards Schaerken. Advancing slowly on in this regular array down

the course of the river on its left bank, Cadogan was not long of coming

in sight of the French rearguard under Biron, with whom he had some

sharp skirmishing. Meanwhile, Marlborough and Eugene were pressing the

passage at the bridges with all imaginable activity; but the greater

part of their army had not yet got across. The main body was still half

a league from the Scheldt, and the huge clouds of dust which arose from

the passage of the artillery and carriages in that direction, inspired

Vendome with the hope that he might cut off the advanced guard which was

over the Scheldt, before the bulk of the Allied forces could get across

to their relief. With this view he halted his troops, and drew them up

hastily in order of battle. This brought on the great and glorious

action which followed, towards the due understanding of which, a

description of the theatre of combat is indispensable.

"At the distance of a mile north of Oudenarde, is the village of

Eynes. Here the ground rises into a species of low, but spacious

amphitheatre. From thence it sweeps along a small plain, till it

nearly reaches the glacis of Oudenarde, where it terminates in the

village of Bevere. To the west the slope ascends to another broad

hill called the Bosercanter; and at the highest point of the

eminence stands a windmill, shaded by a lofty lime-tree, forming

conspicuous objects from the whole adjacent country. From thence

the ground gradually declines towards Mardlen; and the eye glancing

over the humid valley watered by the Norken, rests on another range

of uplands, which, gently sinking, at length terminates near Asper.

Within this space, two small streams, descending from the lower

part of the hill of Oycke, embrace a low tongue of land, the centre

of which rises to a gentle elevation. The borders of these rivulets

are crossed by frequent enclosures, surrounding the farm-yards of

Barwaen, Chobon, and Diepenbeck. Near the source of one of these

streams is a castellated mansion; at that of the other is the

hamlet of Rhetelhouk, embosomed in a wooded nook. These streams

unite at the hamlet of Scharken, and their united current flows in

a marshy bed to the Scheldt, which it reaches near Eynes. The

Norken, another river traversing the field, runs for a considerable

distance parallel to the Scheldt, until, passing by Asper, it

terminates in a stagnant canal, which joins the Scheldt below

Gavre. Its borders, like those of the other streams, are skirted

with coppice-wood thickets; behind are the enclosures surrounding

the little plain. Generally speaking, this part of Flanders is even

not merely of picturesque beauty and high cultivation, but great

military strength; and it is hard to say whether its numerous

streams, hanging banks, and umbrageous woods, add most to its

interest in the eye of a painter, or to its intricacy and defensive

character in warlike operations."[21]

As fast as the Allies got across the Scheldt, Marlborough formed them

along the high grounds stretching from Bevere to Mooreghem Mill, with

their right resting on the Scheldt. Vendome's men stretched across the

plain, from the hill of Asper on the left, to Warreghem on the right. A

considerable body of cavalry and infantry lay in front of their position

in Eynes, of which they had retained possession since they had repulsed

Cadogan's horse. No sooner had the English general got a sufficient

number of troops up, than he ordered that gallant officer to advance and

retake that village. The infantry attacked in front, crossing the

rivulet near Eynes; while the horse made a circuit, and passing higher,

made their appearance in their rear, when the conflict was warmly going

on in front. The consequence was, that the village was carried with

great loss to the enemy, three entire battalions were cut off and made

prisoners, and eight squadrons cut to pieces in striving to make their

way across the steep and tangled banks of the Norken. This sharp blow

convinced the French leaders that a general action was unavoidable; and

though, from the vigour with which it had been struck, their remained

little hope of overpowering the Allied advanced guard before the main

body came up, yet they resolved, contrary to the opinion of Vendome, who

had become seriously alarmed, to persist in the attack, and risk all on

the issue of a general engagement.[22]

It was four in the afternoon when the French commenced the action in

good earnest. The Duke of Burgundy ordered General Grimaldi to lead

Sistern's squadron across the Norken, apparently with the view of

feeling his way preparatory to a general attack; but when he arrived on

the margin of the stream, and saw the Prussian cavalry already formed on

the other side, he fell back to the small plain near the Mill of

Royeghorn. Vendome, meanwhile, directed his left to advance, deeming

that the most favourable side to attack, but the Duke of Burgundy, who

nominally had the supreme command, and who was jealous of Vendome's

reputation, countermanded this order; alleging that an impassable morass

separated the two armies in that quarter. Those contradictory orders

produced indecision in the French lines, and Marlborough, divining its

cause, instantly took advantage of it. Judging with reason that the real

attack of the enemy would be made on his left by their right, in front

of the castle of Bevere, he drew the twelve battalions of foot under

Cadogan from Heurne and Eynes, which they occupied, and reinforced the

left with them; while the bridges of the Norken were strongly occupied,

and musketeers disposed in the woods on their sides. Marlborough

himself, at the head of the Prussian horse, advanced by Heurne, and took

post on the flank of the little plain of Diepenbeck, where it was

evident the heat of the action would ensue. A reserve of twenty British

battalions, with a few guns, took post near Schaerken, and proved of the

most essential service in the struggle which ensued. Few pieces of

artillery were brought up on either side; the rapidity of the movements

on both having outstripped the slow pace at which those ponderous

implements of destruction were then conveyed.[23]

Hardly were these defensive arrangements completed, when the tempest was

upon them. The whole French right wing, consisting of thirty battalions,

embracing the French and Swiss guards, and the flower of their army,

debouched from the woods and hedges near Groemvelde, and attacking four

battalions stationed there, quickly compelled them to retreat. Advancing

then in the open plain, they completely outflanked the Allied left, and

made themselves masters of the hamlets of Barwaen and Banlaney. This

success exposed the Allies to imminent danger; for in their rear was

the Scheldt, flowing lazily in a deep and impassable current, through

marshy meadows, crossed only by a few bridges, over which retreat would

be impossible in presence of a victorious enemy; and the success against

the Allied left exposed to be cut off from their only resource in such a

case, the friendly ramparts of Oudenarde.

Anxiously observing the rapid progress of the French on his left,

Marlborough successively drew brigade after brigade from his right, and

moved them to the quarter which was now severely pressed. The hostile

lines fought with the most determined resolution. Every bridge, every

ditch, every wood, every hamlet, every inclosure, was obstinately

contested; and so incessant was the roll of musketry, that, seen from a

distance, the horizon seemed an unbroken line of fire. Hitherto

Marlborough and Eugene had remained together; but now, as matters had

reached the crisis, they separated. The English general bestowed on

Prince Eugene the command of his right, where the British battalions,

whose valour he had often praised, were placed. He himself, with the

Prussian horse on the banks of the Norken, kept the enemy's left in

check; while with his own left he endeavoured to outflank the enemy, and

retaliate upon then the manoeuvre which they had attempted against

him. This bold movement was attended with severe loss, but it proved

completely successful. Eugene was soon warmly engaged, and at first

wellnigh overpowered by the superior numbers and vehement onset of the

enemy. But Marlborough, whose eye was every where, no sooner observed

this, than he dispatched Cadogan with his twelve English battalions to

his support. Encouraged by this aid, Eugene moved forward General

Natzmer, at the head of the Prussian heavy horse and cuirassiers, to

charge the enemy's second lines near the Mill of Royeghem; while he

himself renewed the attack on their infantry near Herlehorn. Both

attacks proved successful. The enemy were expelled on the right from the

enclosure of Avelchens, and the battle restored in that quarter; while,

at the same time, their second line was drivers back into the enclosures

of Royeghem. But this last success was not achieved without a very heavy

loss; for the Prussian horse were received by so terrible a fire of

musketry from the hedges near Royeghem, into which they had pushed the

enemy's second line, that half of then were stretched on the plain, and

the remainder recoiled in disorderly flight.

Meanwhile, Marlborough himself was not less actively engaged on the

Allied left. At the head of the Hanoverian and Dutch battalions, he

there pressed forward against the hitherto victorious French right. The

vigour inspired by his presence quickly altered the state of affairs in

that quarter. Barlaney and Barwaen were soon regained, but not without

the most desperate resistance; for not only did the enemy obstinately

contest every field and enclosure, but, in their fury, set fire to such

of the houses as could no longer be maintained. Despite all these

obstacles, hovever, the English general fairly drove them back, at the

musket's point, fron one enclosure to another, till he reached the

hamlet of Diepenbeck, where the resistance proved so violent that he was

compelled to pause. His vigilant eye, however, erelong observed, that

the hill of Oycke, which flanked the enemy's extreme right, was

unoccupied. Conceiving that their right might be turned by this

eminence, he directed Overkirk, with the reserve cavalry, and twenty

Dutch and Danish battalions, to occupy it. The veteran marshal executed

this important, and, as it proved, decisive movement, with his wonted

alacrity and spirit. The wooded dells round the castle of Bevere soon

rung with musketry; the enemy, forced out of them, was driven over the

shoulder of the Bosercanter; soon it was passed, and the mill of Oycke,

and the plateau behind it, occupied by the Danish and Dutch battalions.

Arrived on the summit, Overkirk made his men bring up their left

shoulders, so as to wheel inwards, and form a vast semicircle round the

right wing of the French, which, far advanced beyond the centre, was now

thrown back, and grouped into the little plain of Diepenbeck. Observing

the effect of this movement, Marlborough directed Overkirk to press

forward his left still farther, so as to seize the passes of Mullem and

mill of Royeghem, by which the communication between the enemy's right

and centre was maintained. This order was executed with vigour and

success by the Prince of Orange and General Oxenstiern. The progress of

the extreme Allied left round the rear of the French right, was observed

by the frequent flashes of their musketry on the heights above Mullem,

down to which they descended, driving the enemy with loud cheers, which

re-echoed over the whole field of battle, before them. The victory was

now gained. Refluent from all quarters, enveloped on every side, the

whole French right was hurled together, in wild confusion, into the

plain of Diepenbeck; where seven regiments of horse, which made a noble

effort to stem the flood of disaster, was all cut to pieces or taken.

Seeing his right wing on the verge of destruction, Vendome made a

gallant effort to rescue it. Dismounting from his horse, he led the

infantry of his left near Mullem, to the aid of their devoted comrades.

But the thick and frequent enclosures broke their array; the soldiers

were dismayed by the loud shouts of victory from their right; and when

they emerged from the enclosures; and approached the plain of

Diepenbeck, the firm countenance of the British horse, drawn up on its

edge, and the sturdy array of their infantry under Eugene, which

advanced to meet them, rendered the effort abortive. Meanwhile darkness

set in, but the battle still raged on all sides; and the frequent

flashes of the musketry on the heights around, intermingled with the

shouts of the victors, showed but too clearly how nearly the extremity

of danger was approaching to the whole French army. So completely were

they enveloped, that the advanced guard of the right under Eugene, and

the left under the Prince of Orange, met on the heights in the French

rear, and several volleys were exchanged between there, before the error

was discovered, and, by great exertions of their respective commanders,

the useless butchery was stopped. To prevent a repetition of such

disasters orders were given to the whole troops to halt where they

stood, and to this precaution many owed their safety as it was

impossible in the darkness to distinguish friend from foe. But it

enabled great part of the centre and left of the French to escape

unobserved, which, had daylight continued for two hours longer, would

have been all taken or destroyed. Their gallant right was left to its

fate; while Eugene, by directing the drums of his regiments to beat the

French _assemblee_, made great numbers of their left and centre

prisoners. Some thousands of the right slipped unobserved to the

westward near the castle of Bevere, and made their way in a confused

body toward France, but the greater part of that wing were killed or

taken. Vendome with charateristic presence of mind formed a rearguard of

a few battalions and twenty-five squadrons, with which he covered the

retreat of the centre and left; but the remainder of those parts of the

army fell into total confusion, and fled headlong in wild disorder

towards Ghent.[24]

We have the authority of Marborough for the assertion, that "if he had

had two hours more of daylight the French army would have been

irretrievably routed, great part of it killed or taken, and the war

terminated on that day."[25] As it was, the blow struck was prodigious,

and entirely altered the character and issue of the campaign. The French

lost six thousand men in killed and wounded, besides nine thousand

prisoners and one hundred standards wrested from them in fair fight. The

Allied were weakened by five thousand men for the French were superior

in number and fought well, having been defeated solely by the superior

generalship of the Allied commanders.[26]

No sooner did daylight appear, than forty squadrons were detached

towards Ghent in pursuit of the enemy; while Marlborough himself, with

characteristic humanity, visited the field of battle, doing his utmost

to assuage the sufferings, and provide for the cure of the numerous

wounded--alike friend and foe--who encumbered its bloody expanse. Count

Lottnow was sent with thirty battalions and fifty squadrons, to possess

himself of the lines which the enemy had constructed between Ipres and

Warneton, which that officer did with vigour and success, making five

hundred prisoners. This was the more fortunate, as, at the moment they

were taken, the Duke of Berwick, with the French army from the Moselle,

was hastening up, and had exhorted the garrison to defend the lines to

the last extremity. At the same time, the corresponding Allied army,

commanded by Eugene, arrived at Brussels, so that both sides were

largely reinforced. Berwick's corps, which consisted of thirty-four

battalions and fifty-five squadrons, was so considerable, that it raised

Vendome's army again to an hundred thousand men. With this imposing

mass, that able general took post in a camp behind the canal of Bruges,

and near Ghent, which he soon strongly fortified, and which commanded

the navigation both of the Scheldt and the Lys. He rightly judged, that

as long as he was there at the head of such a force, the Allies would

not venture to advance into France; though it lay entirely open to their

incursions, as Marlborough was between him and Paris.[27]

Encouraged by this singular posture of the armies, Marlborough strongly

urged upon the Allied council of war the propriety of relinquishing all

lesser objects, passing the whole fortified towns on the frontier, and

advancing straight towards the French capital.[28] This bold counsel,

however--which, if acted on, would have been precisely what Wellington

and Blucher did a century after, in advancing from the same country, and

perhaps attended with similar success--was rejected. Eugene, and the

remainder of the council, considered the design too hazardous, while

Vendome with so great an army lay intrenched in their rear, threatening

their communications. It was resolved, therefore, to commence the

invasion of the territory of the Grande Monarque, by the siege of the

great frontier fortress of LILLE, the strongest and most important place

in French Flanders, and the possession of which would give the Allies a

solid footing in the enemy's territory. This, however, was a most

formidable undertaking; for not only was the place itself of great

strength, and with a citadel within its walls still stronger, but it was

garrisoned by Marshal Boufflers, one of the ablest officers in the

French service, with fifteen thousand choice troops, and every requisite

for a vigorous defence. On the other hand, Vendome, at the head of an

hundred thousand men, lay in an impregnable camp between Ghent and

Bruges, ready to interrupt or raise the siege; and his position there

extremely hampered Marlborough in bringing forward the requisite

equipage for so great an undertaking, as it interrupted the whole water

navigation of the country, by which it could best be effected. The

dragging it up by land, would require sixteen thousand horses.

Nevertheless it was resolved to undertake the enterprise, sanguine hopes

being entertained, that, rather than see so important a fortress fall,

Vendome would leave his intrenched camp, and give the Allies an

opportunity of bringing him again to battle on equal terms.[29]

No sooner was the undertaking resolved on, than the most vigorous

measures were adopted to carry it into execution. The obstacles which

presented themselves, however, were great indeed, and proved even more

formidable than had been at first anticipated. Every gun, every waggon,

every round of ammunition, required to be transported from Holland; and

even the nearest depot for ordinary and military stores for the Allies,

was Brussels, situated twenty-five leagues off. Sixteen thousand horses

were requisite to transport the train which brought these stores, partly

from Maestricht, partly from Holland; and when in a line of march, it

stretched over fifteen miles. Prince Eugene, with fifty-three battalions

and ninety squadrons, covered the vast moving mass--Marlborough himself

being ready, at a moment's notice, in his camp near Menin, to support

him, if necessary. Between these two great men there existed then, as

ever, the most entire cordiality.[30] Their measures were all taken in

concord, and with such ability, that though Vendome lay on the flank of

the line of march, which extended over above seventy miles, not a gun

was taken, nor a carriage lost; and the whole reached the camp at

Helchin in safety, on the 12th August, whither Marlborough had gone to

meet it. So marvellous were the arrangements made for the safe conduct

of this important convoy, and so entire their success, that they excited

the admiration of the French, and in no slight degree augmented the

alarm of their generals, who had hitherto treated the idea of Lille

being besieged, with perfect derision. "Posterity," says the French

annalist, Feuqueres, "will scarcely believe the fact, though it is an

undoubted truth. Never was a great enterprise conducted with more skill

and circumspection."[31]

Prince Eugene was entrusted with the conduct of the siege, while

Marlborough commanded the covering army. The former commenced the

investment of the place on the 13th August, while Marlborough remained

at Helchin, taking measures for the protection of the convoys, which

were incessantly coming up from Brussels. At length the whole were

passed, and arrived in safety in the camp before Lille, amounting to one

hundred and twenty heavy guns, forty mortars, twenty howitzers, and four

hundred ammunition waggons. Eugene's army for the siege consisted of

fifty-three battalions and ninety squadrons, in all about forty thousand

men. Marlborough's covering force was sixty-nine battalions and one

hundred and forty squadrons, numbering nearly sixty thousand men. But

the force of the French was still more considerable in the field.

Vendome and Berwick united on the 30th, on the plain between Grammont

and Lessines, and on the 2d September advanced towards Lille with one

hundred and forty battalions and two hundred and fifty squadrons,

mustering one hundred thousand combatants, besides twenty thousand left,

under Count de la Motte, to cover Ghent and Bruges. But Marlborough had

no fears for the result, and ardently longed for a general action, which

he hoped would one way or other conclude the war. "If we have a second

action," says he, "and God blesses our just cause, this, in all

likelihood, will be our last campaign; for I think they would not

venture a battle, but are resolved to submit to any condition, if the

success be on our side; and if they get the better, they will think

themselves masters; so that, if there should be an action, it is like to

be the last this war. If God continues on our side, we have nothing to

fear, our troops being good, though not so numerous as theirs. I dare

say, before half the troops have fought, success will declare, I trust

in God, on our side; and then I may have what I earnestly wish for

quick."[32]

No sooner was Marlborough informed of the junction of Vendome and

Berwick, than, anticipating the direction they would follow, and the

point at which they would endeavour to penetrate through, and raise the

siege, he marched parallel to the enemy, and arrived on the 4th

September at a position previously selected, having his right at

Noyelle, and his left at Peronne. So correctly had he divined the

designs of the able generals to whom he was opposed, that, within two

hours after he had taken up his ground, the united French army appeared

in his front. Notwithstanding their great superiority of forces, the

enemy, however, did not venture to attack, and the two armies remained

watching each other for the next fortnight, without any movement being

attempted on either side.[33]

Meanwhile, Eugene was actively prosecuting the siege of Lille. Trenches

were opened on the 22d, and a heavy fire was opened from eighty pieces

of cannon. On the following night, an outwork, called the Chapel of St

Magdalene, was stormed and taken. The second parallel was soon

completed, and some farther outworks carried; and the whole battering

guns having at length been mounted, a breach was effected in the salient

angle of one of the horn-works, and on the same night a lodgement was

effected. A vigorous sortie, on the 10th September, hardly retarded the

progress of the operations, and a sap was made under the covered way.

Marlborough, who visited the besiegers' lines on the 18th, however,

expressed some displeasure at the slow progress of the siege; and in

consequence, on the 20th, another assault was hazarded. It was most

obstinately resisted, but at length the assailants overcame all

opposition and bursting in, carried a demi-bastion and several adjoining

works, though with a loss of two thousand men. Great as this loss was,

it was not so severe as that of one officer who fell; for Eugene

himself, transported with ardour, had taken part in the assault, and was

seriously wounded. This grievous casualty not only gave the utmost

distress to Marlborough, but immensely augmented his labours; for it

threw upon him at once the direction of the siege, and the command of

the covering army. Every morning at break of day he was on horseback to

observe Vendome's army; and if all was quiet in front, he rode to the

lines and directed the siege in person till evening, when he again

returned to the camp of the covering force. By thus in a manner doubling

himself, this great man succeeded in preventing any serious

inconvenience being experienced even from so great a catastrophe as

Eugene's wound, and he infused such vigour into the operations of the

siege, that, on the 23d September, great part of the tenaillons were

broken, with a large portion of the covered way. At the same time the

ammunition of the garrison began to fail so much in consequence of the

constant fire they had kept up for above a month, that Marshal Boufflers

sent intimation to Vendome, that unless a supply of that necessary

article was speedily obtained, he should be obliged to surrender.[34]

The French generals, aware how much the fortress was straitened, were

meanwhile straining every nerve to raise the siege; but such was the

terror inspired by Marlborough's presence, and the skill with which his

defensive measures were taken, that they did not venture to hazard an

attack on the covering army. But a well-conceived project of Vendome's,

for throwing a supply of powder into the fortress, in part succeeded;

although many of the horsemen who carried it were cut off, some

succeeded in making their way in through the Allied lines, and

considerably raised the spirits of the garrison, as well as prolonged

their means of defence. But meanwhile the ammunition of the besiegers

was falling short, as well as that of the besieged; and as the enemy

were completely masters of the communication with Brussels, no resource

remained but to get it up from Ostend. A convoy was formed there

accordingly by General Erle, and set out on the 27th September,

consisting of seven hundred waggons, escorted by General Webb with ten

thousand men. Count de la Motte instantly set out with the troops under

his command from the vicinity of Ghent, and came up with the convoy in

the defile of Wynandals. A sharp action ensued, and the French advanced

to the attack with their wonted impetuosity. But Webb's defensive

arrangements were so skilful, and the fire kept up by his troops so

vigorous, that the enemy were utterly routed; and the convoy forcing its

way, reached Menin on the following day, and entered the Allied camp,

amidst the acclamations of the whole army, on the 30th September.[35]

The safe arrival of this convoy gave new energy to the operations of the

siege; while the recovery of Eugene relieved Marlborough of half the

labour under which, to use his own words, he had been for a fortnight

"rather dead than alive." Three days after the whole tenaillon was

carried, and the troops established directly opposite the breaches of

the ramparts. Meanwhile Vendome opened the sluices, and inundated the

country to the very borders of the dyke, so as to intercept

Marlborough's communication with Ostend, and prevent the arrival of

stores from it. But the English general defeated this device by bringing

the stores up in flat-bottomed boats from Ostend to Leffinghen, and

thence conveying them in carriages, mounted on very high wheels, to the

camp. Cadogan greatly distinguished himself in this difficult service.

Overkirk died at this critical juncture, to the great regret of

Marlborough, who could then ill spare his ardent and patriotic spirit.

Meanwhile, however, the siege continued to advance, and fifty-five heavy

guns thundered from the counterscarp on the breaches, while thirty-six

mortars swept all the works which commanded them. Finding himself unable

to withstand the assault which was now hourly expected, Boufflers, on

the 22d October, beat a parley, and capitulated; having sustained, with

unparalleled resolution, a siege of sixty days, of which thirty were

with open trenches. Penetrated with admiration at his gallant defence,

Eugene granted the French general and his brave garrison the most

honourable terms. The gates were surrendered on the 23d, and the

remainder of the garrison, still five thousand strong, retired into the

citadel,[36] where they prolonged their defence for six weeks more.

Thus had Marlborough the glory, in one campaign, of defeating, in

pitched battle, the best general and most powerful army possessed by

France, and capturing its strongest frontier fortress, the masterpiece

of Vauban, under the eyes of one hundred and twenty thousand assembled

from all quarters for its relief. He put the keystone at the same time

into this arch of glory, by again declining the magnificent offer of the

government of the Low Countries, with its appointment of sixty thousand

a-year for life, a second time pressed upon him by King Charles, from an

apprehension that such an offer might give umbrage to the government of

Holland, or excite jealousy in the Queen's government at home.[37]

FOOTNOTES:

[10] _Coxe_, III. 156. _Instructions pour le Sieur Recoux. Cardonell

Papers_.

[11] "Count Piper said, 'We made war on Poland only to subsist; our

design in Saxony is only to terminate the war; but for the Muscovite he

shall pay _les pots cassees_, and we will treat the Czar in a manner

which posterity will hardly believe.' I secretly wished that already he

was in the heart of Muscovy. After dinner he conveyed me to

headquarters, and introduced me to his Majesty. He asked me whence I

came, and where I had served. I replied, and mentioned my good fortune

in having served three campaigns under your Highness. He questioned me

much, particularly concerning your Highness and the English troops; and

you may readily believe that I delineated my hero in the most lively and

natural colours. Among other particulars, he asked me if your Highness

yourself led the troops to the charge. I replied, that as all the troops

were animated with the same ardour for fighting, that was not necessary;

but that you were every where, and always in the hottest of the action,

and gave your orders with that coolness which excites general

admiration. I then related to him that you had been thrown from your

horse, the death of your aide-de-camp Borafield, and many other things.

He took great pleasure in this recital, and made me repeat the same

thing twice. I also said that your Highness always spoke of his Majesty

with esteem and admiration, and ardently desired to pay you his

respects. He observed, 'That is not likely, but I should be delighted to

see a general of whom I have heard so much.' They intend vigorously to

attack the Muscovites, and expect to dethrone the Czar, compelling him

to discharge all his foreign officers, and pay several millions as an

indemnity. Should he refuse such conditions, the King is resolved to

exterminate the Muscovites, and make their country a desert. God grant

he may persist in this decision, rather than demand the restitution, as

some assert, of the Protestant churches in Silesia! The Swedes in

general are modest, but do not scruple to declare themselves invincible

when the King is at their head."--_General Grumbkow to Marlborough, Jan.

11 and_ 31, 1707. _Coxe_, III. 159-161.

[12] _Coxe_, III. 167-169. The authenticity of this speech is placed

beyond doubt by Lediard, who was then in Saxony, and gives it

_verbatim_.

[13] _Coxe_, III. 174-182.

[14] "I cannot venture unless I am certain of success; for the

inclinations in Holland are so strong for peace, that, if we had the

least disadvantage, it would make them act very extravagant. I must own

every country we have to do with, acts, in my opinion, so contrary to

the general good, that it makes me quite weary of serving. The Emperor

is in the wrong in almost every thing he does."--_Marlborough to

Godolphin, June 27, 1707_; _Coxe_, III. 261.

[15] _Despatches_, III. 142-207.--So much were the Dutch alienated from

the common cause at this time, and set on acquisitions of their own,

that they beheld with undisguised satisfaction the battle of Almanza,

and disasters in Spain, as likely to render the Emperor more tractable

in considering their proceedings in Flanders. "The States," says

Marlborough, "received the news of this fatal stroke with less concern

than I expected. This blow has made so little impression in the great

towns in this country, that the _generality of the people have shown

satisfaction at it rather then otherwise_, which I attribute mainly to

the aversion to the present government."--_Marlborough to Godolphin,

May_ 13, 1707. _Coxe_, III. 204.

[16] _Coxe_, III. 196-205.

[17] _Marlborough's Despatches_, IV. 49.

[18] _Desp._ IV. 95-101. _Coxe_, IV. 128-131.

[19] _Desp._ IV. 79-102. _Coxe_, IV. 130-132.

[20] "The treachery of Ghent, continual marching, and some letters I

have received from England, (from the Queen and the Duchess,) have so

vexed me, that I was yesterday in so great a fever, that the doctor

would have persuaded me to have gone to Brussels; but I thank God I am

now better, and by the next post I hope to answer your letters. The

States have used this country so ill, that I noways doubt but all the

towns in it will play us the same trick as Ghent if they have the

power."--_Marlborough to Godolphin, July 9, 1708._ _Coxe_, IV. 38.

[21] The above description of the field of Oudenarde is mainly taken

from _Coxe_, IV. 134-135; but the author, from personal inspection of

the field, can attest its accuracy.

[22] _Coxe_, IV. 140-143.

[23] _Marlborough to Count Piper, 15th July 1708.--Desp._ IV. 115.

_Coxe_, IV. 144-145.

[24] _Coxe_, IV. 146-151. _Marlborouqh to Count Piper, 16th July

1708.--Desp._ IV. 115. _Duke of Berwck's Mem._ II. 12.

[25] _Marlborough a M. De Themgue, 15th July 1708.--Desp._ IV. 111.

[26] _Desp._ IV. 111. Berwick himself states the prisoners at

9000.--_Marlborough_, II. 12. _Marlborough to the Duchess_, _July_ 16,

1708.--_Coxe_, IV. 157.

[27] _Marlborough to Lord Godolphin, July 16 and 19, 1708._--_Coxe_, IV.

158, 159.

[28] Conscious of the panic which prevailed in France, and aware that

some brilliant enterprise was requisite to prevent the Dutch from

listening to separate overtures for peace, Marlborough proposed to meet

at Lille, and penetrate by the northern frontier into the heart of

France. An expedition fitted out in England was to co-operate on the

coast. But the design of penetrating direct into France seemed too bold

even to Eugene, and, of course, encouraged strong opposition from a

government so timid and vacillating as that of Holland.--_Coxe_, IV.

165.

[29] _Marlborough to Godolphin, July 23, 1708._--_Coxe_, IV. 165.

[30] "I need not tell you how much I desire the nation may be at last

eased of a burdensome war, by an honourable peace; and no one can judge

better than yourself of the sincerity of my wishes to enjoy a little

retirement at a place you have contributed in a great measure to make so

desirable. I thank you for your good wishes to myself on this occasion.

_I dare say, Prince Eugene and I shall never differ about our

laurels._"--_Marlborough to Mr Travers_, July 30, 1708.

[31] _Coxe_, IV. 216-219.

[32] _Marlborough to Godolphin, August 30, 1708._--_Coxe_, IV. 222.

[33] _Desp_. IV. 241-260.

[34] _Desp_. IV. 260-271. _Marlborough to Godolphin, September 24,

1708._--_Coxe_, IV. 243.

[35] _Marlborough to Godolphin, October 1, 1708._--_Coxe_, IV. 254.

[36] _Desp._ IV. 271, _Marlborough to Godolphin, October 24,

1708._--_Coxe_, IV. 263, 264.

[37] "You will find me, my Prince, always ready to renew the patent for

the government of the Low Countries, formerly sent to you, and to extend

_it for your life_."--_King Charles to Marlborough, August 8, 1708._

_Coxe_, IV. 245.

RECOLLECTIONS OF A LOVER OF SOCIETY.

Many years ago, I was struck with the remark--that if any one would

write down, from week to week, the prominent events which occurred in

his time, he must make a book which many would like to read.

I took the hint; and here I give a portion of my Recollections. Not that

I have ever kept a regular Journal, a matter which I now regret; but I

have mingled a good deal in general life, I have seen nearly all the

remarkable characters of Europe in the most stirring period of the

world, and I have seen the beginning as well as the end of that most

extraordinary of all national catastrophes, the French Revolution.

At all times fond of associating with my fellow men, taking a strong

interest in public opinions, having strong opinions of my own, and

witnessing the most singular changes in almost every form of public, of

personal, and of national impressions, I have had my full share of

experience in the ways of men. And I now offer it to those who would

refresh their remembrances of memorable men, things, and times.

For the purpose of dealing in the fairest possible manner with my

readers, I have looked into the various records of those events which

might have escaped my memory. But I have not suffered them to bias

opinions conceived long since, and conceived in the spirit of sincerity.

Such is my design. It is given to the public with a perfect freedom from

all party influence; with a total avoidance of all personality; with

that calmness of retrospect which best becomes one who has no desire to

share in the passions of the world; and with that wish of the French

almanack-maker, which lies at the bottom of many a bulkier enterprise

than mine--

"Je veux infiniment qu'on me lise."

1800.

_January 1._--The nineteenth century has commenced with one of those

events, which deserve to mark epochs. On this day the UNION Of Ireland

with England has begun. The church bells are ringing, at this moment, in

all quarters. Flags are flying on the various government establishments.

A new Imperial flag is hoisted at the Tower, and I now hear the guns

saluting it with their roar.

The last century was the era of Intrigue in politics, in war, in courts,

in every thing. In England, the Revolution at the close of the Century

before had extinguished the power of Despotism. Popery had perished

under the heel of Protestantism. The Jacobite had fled from the face of

the Williamite. The sword was seen no longer. But the strifes of party

succeeded the struggles of Religion; and Parliament became the scene of

those conflicts, which, in the century before, would have been fought in

the field.

I strongly doubt which age exhibits the national character in a more

elevated point of view. The war of Charles I. was a period of proud

feeling. It was the last burst of Chivalry. Men of rank and fortune

periled both from a sense of honour, and some of the noblest who fell on

the royal side, were as fully convinced of the royal errors as the

orators of Parliament; but their sense of honour urged them to the

sacrifice, and they freely shed their blood for a King, whose

faithlessness and folly were to be redeemed only by his martyrdom.

From the period of the Revolution, the character of the country had

changed. Still bold, sensitive, and capable of sacrifice, it had grown

more contemptuous of political romance, more clear-sighted as to public

merits, and more fixed on substantial claims. The latter part of the

seventeenth century had seen the worthless and treacherous Charles II.

brought back by the nobles and gentry of the land in a national triumph.

The middle of the eighteenth century saw the expulsion of the Pretender,

a gallant and adventurous prince, whose only adherents were the Scottish

chiefs, and whose most determined opponents were the whole multitude of

England.

France had lost her Chivalric spirit nearly a hundred years before. It

had died with Francis I. The wars of the League were wars of Chicane;

Artifice in arms, Subtlety in steel coats. The profligacy of the courts

of Louis Quatorze, and his successors, dissolved at once the morals and

the mind of France. That great country exhibited, to the eye of Europe,

the aspect of the most extravagant license, and the most rapid decay.

There lay the great voluptuary, under the general gaze; like one of its

feudal lords dying of his own debauch--lying helpless from infirmity,

surrounded with useless pomp, and in the sight of luxuries which he

could taste no more--until death came, and he was swept away from his

place among men.

Germany was unknown even in Europe, but by the military struggles of

Prussia and Austria. But the objects were trifling, and the result was

more trifling still. Prussia gained Silesia, and Austria scarcely felt

the loss, in an Empire extending from the Rhine to the Euxine. Then came

peace, lassitude, and oblivion once more. But this languid century was

to close with a tremendous explosion. A Belgian revolt was followed by a

French Revolution. The wearisome continuance of the calm was broken up

by a tornado, and when the surges subsided again, they exhibited many a

wreck of thrones flung upon the shore.

What is to be the next great change? What inscription shall be written

by the historian on the sepulchre of the coming hundred years? Will they

exhibit the recovery of the power of opinion by Kings, or the mastery of

its power by the People? Will Europe be a theatre of State intrigue, as

of old, or a scene of Republican violence? It would require a prophet to

pronounce the reality.

But I can already see symptoms of change; stern demands on the higher

classes; sullen discontents in every country; an outcry for

representative government throughout Europe. The example of France has

not been lost upon the populace; the millions of Europe, who have seen

the mob of the capital tear down the throne, will not forget the lesson.

They may forget the purchase, or they may disregard the miseries of the

purchase, in the pride of the possession. But we shall not have another

French Revolution. We shall have no more deifications of the axe, no

more baptisms in blood, no more display of that horrid and fearful

ceremonial with which France, like the ancient idolators, offered her

children to Moloch, and drowned the shrieks and groans of the dying in

the clangour of trumpets and the acclamations of the multitude. Those

scenes were too terrible to be renewed. The heart of man shrinks from

liberty obtained by this dreadful violation of all its feelings. Like

the legendary compacts with the Evil One, the fear of the Bond would

embitter the whole intermediate indulgence; and even the populace would

be startled at a supremacy, to be obtained only by means of such utter

darkness, and followed by such awful retribution.

31.--A piece of intelligence has arrived to-day, which has set all the

World of London in commotion. It is no less than a direct challenge to

our good King. Chivalry is not yet dead, as I supposed. After expulsion

from the sunny plains of Italy and Spain, it has revived among the polar

snows.

The Russian Emperor has actually published this defiance to the world,

in the St Petersburg _Gazette_. "It is said that his majesty the

Emperor, perceiving that the European powers cannot come to an

accommodation, and wishing to put an end to a war which has raged eleven

years, has conceived the idea of appointing a place, to which he will

invite the other potentates to engage together with himself in single

combat, in Lists which shall be marked out. For which purpose they shall

bring with them, to act as their esquires, umpires, and heralds, their

most enlightened ministers and able generals, as Thugut, Pitt, and

Bernstorff. He will bring, on his part, Counts Pahlen and Kutusoff."

The first impression on the appearance of this singular document was

surprise; the next, of course, was ridicule. The man must have utterly

lost his senses. He has been for some months playing the most fantastic

tricks in his capital: cutting off people's beards if they happen to

displease his taste as a barber, cutting off coat-skirts if they offend

his taste as a tailor, ordering the passers-by to pay him a kind of

Oriental homage, and threatening to send every body to Siberia. Under

such circumstances, the air of Russia is supposed to be unfavourable to

royal longevity.

The death of a singular character occurred a few days since, a

_protegee_ of Hannah More, and, as might be expected from that lady's

publishing habits, rendered sufficiently conspicuous by her pen. She was

a total stranger, apparently a German by her pronunciation of English,

yet carefully avoiding to speak any foreign language. She was first

found taking refuge under a haystack, apparently in a state of insanity,

and determined to die there. The peasantry, who occasionally brought her

food, of course soon gave her a name, and, as she was evidently a

gentlewoman, they called her the lady of the haystack. Hannah More, who

had unquestionably some humanity, though she was rather too fond of its

public exhibition, made her the heroine of a tale, and thus drew upon

her considerable notice. She was prevailed on, though with some

difficulty, to leave the haystack; and after a residence of a

considerable period in the country, supported by subscriptions, she was

removed, on its being ascertained that she was incurably insane, to an

hospital in London, where, after continuing several years, she died.

Her case excited great curiosity for the time, and every effort was made

in Germany to ascertain her family, and give some notice of her

condition. One of the most remarkable circumstances in her insanity, was

her guarded silence on the subject of her relatives. Though she rambled

into all conceivable topics, she could not be induced to give the

slightest clue to their names. The moment any attempt at their discovery

was made, all her feelings seemed to be startled; she shrank at once,

looked distressed, and became silent. Hannah More's "Tale of Woe," was

therefore a well-meant effort to attract attention to an unhappy

creature, who was determined to give no knowledge of herself to the

world.

Lord Camelford's eccentricities are well known, but the world has given

him credit for more than he deserves. He was unluckily a duellist almost

by profession, and thus as dangerous to associate with as a mad bull.

Yet I have heard traits of a generosity on his part as lavish as his

manners are eccentric. He is, however, so well known to be alert in the

use of the pistol, and to be of fiery temper, that some curious stories

are told of the alarm inspired by his presence. One of those is now

running the round of the Clubs.

Some days ago, his lordship, walking into a coffee-house, and taking up

the evening paper, began poring over its paragraphs. A coxcomb in an

adjoining box, who had frequently called to the waiter for the paper,

walked over to Lord Camelford's box, and, seeing him lay down the paper

for the moment while he was sipping his coffee, took it up, and walked

off with it without ceremony. His lordship bore the performance without

exhibiting any sign of disturbance, but waited till he saw the intruder

engaged in its paragraphs. He then quietly walked over, and with all the

eyes of the Coffeehouse upon him, snuffed out the fellow's candles, and

walked back to his own seat. The fellow, astonished and furious,

demanded the name of the person who had served him in this contemptuous

manner. His lordship threw him his card. He took it--read "Lord

Camelford" aloud--seemed petrified for a moment, and in the next

snatched up his hat, and made but one step to the door, followed by the

laugh of the whole room.

But his lordship has, like Hamlet, method in his madness. A report was

lately spread that he had resolved, in case of Horne Tooke's rejection

by the House as member for Old Sarum, that he would bring in his own

black footman. This report he resented and denied, sending a letter to

the newspapers, of which this is a fragment:--

"A report, as preposterous as unfounded, has lately found its way

abroad, stating that I meditated a gross and indecent insult upon

the dignity of the legislature, by using an influence which I am

supposed to possess, for the purpose of introducing an improper

character into the formation of its body.

"It becomes me to set the public right, by solemnly assuring them,

that no such idea was ever in contemplation for one moment; and

that I am at a loss to discover how the rumour originated; as, so

far from being capable of harbouring a wish to add to the

embarrassments of an unhappy and dejected people, it would be the

pride and glory of my heart, if I had the power to place such

persons in situations of responsibility, as, by their talents and

integrity, might preserve our Laws and Government and

Constitution."

The eccentricities of the unfortunate Emperor of Russia have come to

even a more rapid end than I had expected. A courier has just arrived

with the startling intelligence, that the Czar was found dead in his

chamber. The whole transaction is for the moment covered with extreme

obscurity; but it is to be feared that what the Frenchman, with equal

cleverness and wickedness, called the Russian trial by Jury, has been

acted on in this instance, and that the Russian annals have been stained

with another Imperial catastrophe.

How natural and magnificent are Shakspeare's reflections on the

anxieties that beset a crown--

"Oh, polished perturbation! golden care,

That keeps the ports of Slumber open wide

To many a watchful night: O Majesty!

When thou cost pinch thy bearer, thou dost sit

Like a rich armour worn in heat of day,

That scalds with safety."

If Voltaire's definition be true, that swindling is the perfection of

civilization, and that the more civilized, the more subtle we become,

England may boast of a swindler that seems to have brought the art to

its highest perfection. She is a female, not at all of the showy order,

which beguiles so many understandings through the eyes--an insignificant

and mean person, with an ordinary face, not at all exhibiting manners

superior to her appearance, yet certainly of the most superb ambition in

the art of tricking the World. Where she began her adventures first,

remains to be developed by future biography. At length she appeared in

the neighbourhood of Greenwich, and, representing herself there as an

heiress, took a handsome house, and contrived, in the usual way, to make

all the tradesmen in the neighbourhood contribute to its furnishing. By

the simplicity and plausibility of her manner, she even obtained loans

to the amount of some thousands, to set her household in motion, until

her affairs were settled. An heiress must, of course, have a carriage;

but this clever person was not content with doing things in an ordinary

way, but set up three. While her house was being prepared,--which she

ordered to be done by the first artists in their way, the walls being

painted in fresco,--she drove down to Brighton in her travelling

carriage, with four horses and two outriders. She gave an order for the

furnishing of her house to the amount of L4000, and commissioned from

Hatchett, the celebrated coachmaker, a first-rate chariot, with all

kinds of expensive mountings and mouldings, to be ready for the Queen's

birthday, when she was to be introduced at court by the wife of one of

the Secretaries of State. In the interval, she drove daily through the

West End, dropping her cards at the houses of persons of public name.

She thus proceeded for a while triumphantly; but having, in the

intoxication of her success, given the names of some persons of rank as

her relatives, inquiry was made amongst them, and the relationship being

of course disowned, suspicion was suddenly excited. Nothing could exceed

her indignation on the subject; but the tradesmen, thus rendered only

more suspicious, attempted to recover their furniture. The caption was

at last made, and bailiffs were put into the house, with the

expectation of apprehending the lady herself. However, she was adroit

enough to discover her danger, and to her house she returned no more.

Search was made after her, and it was said that she was discovered and

thrown into jail. But she suddenly disappeared; and failing her own

legacy, left to the unlucky people who had given her credit, a long

legacy of general quarrel and mutual disappointment.

When Fox was asked whether he had any faith in Political Economy, the

doctrines of which had become fashionable in his day, from the writings

of Turgot and the French school, he answered--"That it was too undefined

for his comprehension; that its views were either too large, or too

indistinct, to give his mind the feeling of certainty."

He well might say this, when no two of the modern Political Economists

agree, and when all the theories of the last age are laughed at by all

the theorists of the present. In the middle of the seventeenth century

Sir William Petty, one of the most acute, and also one of the most

practical men of his time, pronounced that the population of England

would take three hundred and sixty years to double--the fact being, that

it has doubled within about a seventh part of that period. Of London he

predicts, that its growth must finally stop in 1842; and that then its

population must amount to half the population of England. Yet London is

still growing, day by day, and yet its population scarcely exceeds a

twentieth of the whole.

The Emperor Paul, in the beginning of his reign, was a favourite with

the soldiery, whom he indulged in all possible ways, giving them money,

distributing promotion lavishly among them, and always pronouncing them

the bulwark of his throne. But when his brain began to give way, his

first experiments were with the soldiery, and he instantly became

unpopular. The former dress of the Russian soldier was remarkable alike

for its neatness and its convenience. He wore large pantaloons of red

cloth, the ends of which were stuffed into his boots; the boots were of

flexible leather, and an excellent and easy protection for the legs and

feet. He wore a jacket of red and green, with a girdle round the waist;

his head was protected by a light helmet. The whole dress thus

consisting of two garments, light, showy, and looking the true dress for

a soldier.

Paul's evil genius, which induced him to change every thing, began with

that most perilous of all things to tamper with--the army of a great

military power. He ordered the Austrian costume to be adopted. Nothing

could equal the general indignation. The hair must be powdered, curled,

and pomatumed; a practice which the Russian, who washed his locks every

day, naturally abhorred. The long tail made him the laugh of his

countrymen. His boots, to which he had been accustomed from his infancy,

and which form a distinctive part of the national costume, were to be

taken off, and to be substituted by the tight German spatterdash and the

shoe, the one pinching the leg, and the other perpetually falling off

the foot, wherever the march happened to be in the wet. The consequence

was, infinite discontent, and desertion to a great extent--a thing never

heard of in the service before.

It may be conceived with what disdain those frivolous, yet mischievous,

innovations must have been regarded by those Russian officers who had

known the reality of service. Suvaroff was then in Italy with his army.

One morning a large packet was brought to him by an Imperial courier. To

his astonishment, and the amusement of his staff, it was but models of

tails and curls. Suvaroff gave vent to a sneer, a much more fatal thing

than a sarcasm, in some Russian verses, amounting to--

"Hair-powder is not gunpowder;

Curls are not cannon;

Tails are not bayonets."

The general's rough poetry was instantly popular; it spread through the

army, it travelled back to Russia, it reached the Imperial ear; the

Czar was stung by the burlesque, and Suvaroff was recalled.

Few things are more remarkable, than the slowness with which common

sense acts, even in matters which should evidently be wholly under its

guidance. It might appear that the mere necessities of war would dictate

the equipment of the soldier; namely, that it should be light, simple,

and safe, as far as is possible. Yet the equipment of the European

soldier, at the commencement of the French war, seemed to be intended

only to give him trouble, to encumber him, and to expose his personal

safety. The Austrian soldier's dress was an absolute toilette. The

Prussian, even with all the intelligence of the Great Frederic to model

it, was enough to perplex a French milliner, and to occupy the wearer

half the day in putting it off and on. The English uniform was modelled

on the Prussian, and our unlucky soldier was compelled to employ his

hours in tying his queue, powdering his hair, buttoning on his

spatterdashes, and polishing his musket-barrel. The heavy dragoons all

wore cocked hats, of all coverings of the head the most unprotecting and

the most inconvenient. The French light troops, too, all wore cocked

hats. The very colour of the royal French uniform, as well as the

Austrian, was white, of all colours the most unfitted for the rough work

of the bivouack, and also injurious, as shewing the immediate stain of

blood.

It actually took twenty years to teach the general officers of the

European armies, that men could fight without spatterdashes, that

hair-powder was not heroism, and that long tails were only an imitation

of the monkey; that muskets did not fire the worse for having brown

barrels, and that the cuirass was a better defence for the body of the

dragoon than a cloth waistcoat, however covered with embroidery. But why

shall not improvement go a little farther? Why shall not the arm of the

dragoon be a little protected as well as his body? A slight and simple

covering of steel rings would effect the purpose, and it is an important

one; for a slight wound in the arm disables him even more than a wound

in the body, unless the latter wound should be mortal at once. But why,

also, should not the foot soldier wear something equivalent to the

cuirass? The weight might be made trifling, it might be carried at the

back of his knapsack except when in actual engagement, and it would save

thousands of lives; for the most dangerous wounds are in the front, and

a wound in the abdomen is almost incurable. Five shillings' worth of

tin-plate might protect the soldier for his lifetime; and there can be

no doubt, that the consciousness of having such a protection would

render troops more efficient. Of the bravery of the British there can be

no doubt; but there can be just as little doubt, that every increase to

the personal security of troops renders them calmer under fire, and of

course fitter for obedience in the exigiencies of service. Besides, it

is a public duty to the brave men in our service, not to expose them

needlessly on any occasion; and they _are_ exposed needlessly, when they

are sent into the field without every protection which our skill can

give. But are we demanding armour for the foot soldiers? No; the armour

of the old times of Chivalry would be too heavy, and impede the activity

of those movements, of which so much of military success depends. The

defensive arms of the Roman soldier were simply a small light helmet, a

light cuirass, and greaves, or boots bound with brass. Yet with these

his average march was twenty miles a-day, carrying sixty pounds weight

of provisions and baggage on his back. The weight of his sword, his two

lances, and his intrenching tools and palisade, was not reckoned.

Buonaparte has made a Concordat with the Pope. The laughers have

attacked him in the following epigram:--

Politique plus fin que General Eubile,

Bien plus ambitieux que Louis dit le Grand.

Pour etre Roi d'Egypte, il croit a l'Alkoran,

Pour etre Roi de France, il croit a l'Evangile.

Our English epitaphs are often as disgraceful to the national taste, as

their levity is unsuitable to the place of the dead. I am not aware

whether this epitaph, by the most amiable of poets, Cowper, has been

preserved among his works. It is on the tomb of a Mrs Hamilton:--

"Pause here and think--a monitory rhyme

Demands one moment of thy fleeting time.

Consult Life's silent clock. Thy glowing vein

Seems it to say--'Health here has long to reign?'--

Hast thou the vigour of thy youth? an eye

That beams delight: a heart untaught to sigh?

Yet fear. Youth ofttimes, healthful and at ease,

Anticipates a day it never sees.

And many a tomb, like Hamilton's, aloud

Exclaims--Prepare thee for an early shroud!"

In the course of this year died three remarkable men, Lavater, Gilbert

Wakefield, and Heberden, the famous physician. Perhaps no man of his day

excited more general attention throughout Europe than John Gaspar

Lavater; and this is the more remarkable, when we recollect that he was

but a simple Swiss pastor at Zurich--minister of the church of St Peter.

When about thirty years' old, his mind was first turned to the study of

Physiognomy. He shortly after published some parts of a work on the

subject, in which he broached a new theory; viz. that the countenance

gave representative evidences of the powers and comparative vigour of

the understanding. The subject of Physiognomy had been already treated

of by the German writers; but, as Voltaire observes, the business of

German philosophy is to make philosophy inaccessible; and their

treatises had sunk into oblivion. Yet the science itself, if science it

is to be called, is so natural, so universally, however involuntarily,

practised, and frequently so useful in its practice, that its revival

became instantly popular:--a large part of its popularity, however,

being due to the novelty of Lavater's system, the animation of his

language, and that enthusiastic confidence in his discovery, which is

always amongst the most powerful means of convincing the majority of

mankind. Something also is due to the happy idea of illustrating his

conceptions by a great number of portraits, which added amusement to the

general interest of the volumes. Passion possesses great influence in

the world, and Physiognomy became the fashion. His books spread through

every part of the Continent, and nothing can be more striking than the

ardour with which they were received. If Switzerland is proud of his

popularity, the mysticism of Germany was delighted with his mysticism;

and the literary coteries of France, at whose head were all the ladies

of the court, were his most vehement disciples. Nothing was read, for a

considerable period, but the pages of Lavater. It has been said, that

scarcely a domestic would be hired without a physiognomical examination,

and reference to the pages of Lavater.

His personal conduct sustained his public popularity; his gentle

manners, his general benevolence, and his eloquence in the pulpit,

endeared him to the people. He was the most popular preacher in Zurich,

less from his abilities, than on the softness of his voice, and the

tenderness of his manner.

The objections occasionally started to his theories only increased his

hold upon the national affections. For the period he was the

physiognomical apostle of Switzerland. Some of his admirers went so far,

as to lay his quarto on the table beside the Scriptures, and regard it

as a species of Natural Revelation.

Even when the novelty lost its charm, the locality preserved his

reputation. Switzerland, in those days, was the peculiar resort of all

the leading personages of Europe; all travellers of distinction visited

the country, and generally made some stay in its cities; and all visited

Lavater. What has become of his Album, I have not heard; but its

autographs must have made it invaluable to a collector of the signatures

of eminent names.

But, whether tempted by vanity, or betrayed by original feebleness of

intellect, the harmless physiognomist at length suffered himself to

announce doctrines equally hazardous to the Religion, and the Policy, of

the Canton. The habits of the times were latitudinarian in religion, and

revolutionary in politics. Some unlucky opinions, uttered in the folly

of the hour, brought Lavater under the charge of a leaning to Rome in

the one, and to France in the other; he bore up for a while against

both. But the invasion of Switzerland by the French armies, suddenly

made him a vigorous denouncer of Republican ambition, and he was soon to

be its victim. In the storming of Zurich by Moreau, he was severely

wounded in the streets; and though he was rescued, and his wounds were

healed, he never recovered the injury. He languished, though in full

possession of his intellectual powers, until he died.

What his theology was, can scarcely be defined; but if he had not

adopted Physiognomy as the study of his life, his temperament might have

excited him to try the effect of a new Religion. He was said to have

believed in the continuance of the power of working miracles, and to

have equally believed in the modern power of exorcists. Fortunately his

talent was turned to a harmless pursuit; and he amused, without

bewildering, the minds of men.

The grand principle of his physiognomical system is, that human

character is to be looked for, not as is usually supposed, in the

movable features and lines of the face, but in its solid structure. And

he also imagined that the degree of intellectual acuteness is to be

ascertained by the same indications. But his theory in the former

instance is but feebly supported by fact; for it is by the movements of

the features that the passions are most distinctly displayed: and in the

latter, his theory is constantly contradicted by facts, for many of the

most powerful minds that the world has ever seen have been masked under

heavy countenances.

Perhaps the true limit of the Science is to be discovered by the

knowledge of its use. Every man is more or less a physiognomist. It is

of obvious importance for us to have some knowledge of the passions and

propensities of our fellow men; for these constitute the instruments of

human association, and form the dangers or advantages of human

intercourse. Thus, a countenance of ill temper or of habitual guile, of

daring violence or of brutish profligacy, warns the spectator at once.

But the knowledge of intellectual capacity is comparatively unimportant

to us as either a guide or a protection, and it is therefore not given,

but left to be ascertained by its practical operation.

Phrenology has since taken up the challenge which Physiognomy once gave

to mankind:--equally ingenious and equally fantastic, equally offering a

semblance of truth, and equally incapable of leading us beyond the

simple observation which strikes the eye. A well-formed head will

probably contain a well-formed brain; and a well-formed brain will

probably be the fittest for the operations of the intellect. But beyond

this, Phrenology has not gone, and probably will never go. The attempts

to define the faculties by their position in the structure of the bone

or the brain, have been so perpetually contradicted by fact; its

prognostics of capacity have been so perpetually defeated; and its

mistakes of character have been so constantly thrown into burlesque by

the precipitancy and presumption of its advocates--that common sense has

abandoned it altogether; it has by common consent been abandoned to

enthusiasts; and to assert its right to the name of a Science, would now

hazard the title of its advocate to rationality.

The life of Gilbert Wakefield is one among the many instances of

vigorous learning and strong intellect, made a source of misery to their

possessor by a want of common prudence. His whole life might be

characterized in three words--courage, caprice, and misfortune. After

having attained a Cambridge fellowship, acquired distinction in

classical criticism, and entered into the Church, he suddenly began to

entertain notions hostile to the liturgy, and became classical tutor of

the dissenting academy of Warrington. For ten years he laboured in this

obscure vocation, or with private pupils, now chiefly turning his

classical studies to the illustration of the New Testament. At the end

of this period, he became classical tutor of the dissenting College in

Hackney. But even Dissent could not tolerate his opinions; for a volume

which he published, tending to lower the value of public worship, gave

offence, and speedily dissolved the connexion. His classical knowledge

was now brought into more active use, and he published Annotations on

the Greek tragedies, and editions of some of the Roman poets.

Unfortunately, the popular follies on the subject of the French

Revolution tempted him to try his pen as a Pamphleteer; and a letter

written in reply to the Bishop of Llandaff, rendered him liable to a

prosecution: he was found guilty, and sentenced to an imprisonment of

two years in Dorchester jail. This imprisonment was unfortunately fatal;

for whether from his confinement, or the vexation of mind which must be

the natural consequence, his liberation found him exhausted in strength,

though still the same bold and indefatigable being which he had been

through the whole course of his wayward life. Still he had many friends,

and between the spirit of party, and the more honourable spirit of

personal regard, the large subscription of L5000 was raised for his

family. But his career was now rapidly drawing to a close. He had been

but a few months relieved from his prison, when his constitution sank

under an attack of typhus, and he died in his forty-sixth year, at an

age which in other men is scarcely more than the commencement of their

maturity--is actually the most vigorous period of all their powers; and

in an undecayed frame gives the securest promise of longevity. With all

his eccentricities, and he had many, he had the reputation of being an

amiable man.

Heberden was at the head of English Medicine in his day. He was a man of

vigorous understanding and accomplished knowledge. He began life as a

scholar, entering Cambridge, where he obtained a fellowship. Adopting

physic as his profession, he continued in Cambridge for ten years; until

the usual ambition of country practitioners to be known in the

metropolis, urged him to try his fortunes in London.

The example of this able, and ultimately successful man, is not without

its value, as an encouragement to perseverance under the most

discouraging obstacles, when they happen to come in the way of

individuals of sound scholarship and substantial strength of mind.

Heberden lingered in London without success for some years; and at

length, conceiving that his ill-fortune was beyond remedy, had formed

his resolution to return to the country.

At this period some lucky chance changed his purpose. He became known;

rapidly rose into practice, and assumed the rank due to his ability.

Similar circumstances had occurred in the career of the celebrated

Edmund Burke, who was at two different periods on the point of leaving

England for America, in despair of distinction at home. The late Lord

Eldon had even given up his chambers in London, and announced his

intention of commencing as a country practitioner of the law; when, at

the suggestion of a legal friend, he made the experiment of "trying

another term." Business suddenly flowed in upon him, and the

disheartened barrister was soon floated on to the highest dignities of

his profession. Even the illustrious Wellington himself is said, at one

time, to have entertained serious thoughts of directing himself to a

civil career, and to have been prevented only by the difficulty of

finding an immediate employment. The delay gave room for the fortunate

change in his prospects, which soon made him the first officer in

Europe.

Heberden wrote a great variety of Tracts on his own science; suffered no

improvement in medicine, or public topic connected with general health,

to escape him; cultivated his original scholarship to the last; enjoyed

the friendship of the scientific world throughout his career; and

enjoyed life itself to an unusual duration, dying in his ninety-first

year.

The anxieties of Europe are, for a while, at least, at an end. The

preliminaries of peace with France were signed on October the 1st, and

yesterday the 9th, Lauriston, first aide-de-camp to Bonaparte, arrived

in town. The populace were all civility to him so were the ministers.

The French ambassador, Otto, immediately took him to Downing Street,

where he was complimented by Lord Hawkesbury. Lauriston is a general in

the Republican service, with a handsome figure, which, covered with

lace, and the showy decorations of his rank, quite enchanted the

multitude of gazers.

At the peace of 1782, the pleasantry of George Selwyn, on the arrival of

the French ambassador, a remarkably little man, was, "That France had

sent them the preliminaries of peace, by the preliminaries of an

ambassador." Whatever may be the fate of the present preliminaries, the

jest will not apply to the present envoy, who looks the soldier, and

would evidently make a dashing hussar. His progress through the streets

was, from the first, followed by acclamation. But at length it became a

kind of triumph. The zeal of the rabble, (probably under good guidance,

for the French _employes_ comprehend those little arrangements

perfectly,) determined on drawing the carriage. The harness was taken

off, the horses enjoyed a sinecure, the coachman sat in uneasy idleness

on his box, and the crowd tugged away in their best style. The

procession slowly moved through the principal streets of the West End,

till it reached the Foreign Office. After a pause there, for the

delivery of his credentials, Lauriston went to the Admiralty, where St

Vincent, the first lord, (albeit no lover of Frenchmen,) received the

stranger with a good-humoured shake of the hand, and, on parting with

him, made a little speech to the mob, recommending it to them "to take

care and not overset the carriage."

In the evening London was illuminated, and looked as brilliant as lights

and transparencies could make it. An odd incident during the day,

however, showed of what tetchy materials a great populace is made. Otto,

the French resident, in preparing his house for the illumination, had

hung in its front a characteristic motto, in coloured lamps, consisting

of the three words--"France, Concord, England." A party of sailors, who

had rambled through the streets to see the preparations for the night,

could not bring their tongues to relish this juxtaposition; which they

read as if it were, "France _conquered_ England." The mob gathered, and

were of the same opinion. Jack began to talk loud, and to speak of the

motto as a national insult. Fortunately, however, before the matter

could proceed to breaking windows, or perhaps worse, some of the envoy's

servants informed their master of the equivocal nature of his motto. The

obnoxious word was changed accordingly, and the illumination in the

evening (which was most splendid,) displayed the

motto--"France--Peace--England."

The North, too, has not been without its festivities. Alexander of

Russia has been crowned with all the pomp of a successor of Catherine,

and the Lord of an Empire five thousand miles long, and touching almost

the Tropics, and almost the Pole. Moscow, of course, was the scene. All

that barbaric pomp and European luxury could combine, was to be seen in

the displays of the double coronation of the Czar and Czarina.

Alexander, disdaining the royal habit of being drawn in a carriage,

however gilded; or remembering that he was the monarch of a nation of

horsemen, King of the Tartar world, moved in the midst of his great

lords and cavalry, mounted on a fine English charger, and was received

every where with boundless acclamations.

The memory of kings is seldom long-lived in despotic governments. But

Paul's is already extinguished, or survives only in the rejoicing of the

people to have got rid of him. His nature was not ungenerous, but his

caprice had become so intolerable, that his longer life would probably

have seen some desperate outbreak in the Empire.

The Czar is handsome, according to Russian ideas of beauty,--tall, and

well-proportioned. The people are delighted to find themselves under his

authority, and the peculiar affability of his manner to the English at

Moscow, is regarded as a pledge of the reconciliation of Russia to the

system of our politics and our trade.

Russia, more than any other monarchy, requires a powerful, direct, and

vigilant administration. The enormous extent of her territory exposes

her to perpetual abuses in her provincial governments. The barbarism of

a vast portion of her population, demands the whole capacity of an

enlightened Sovereign, to raise it in the rank of human nature.

To this hour the question is doubtful, whether Moscow ought not to have

continued the seat of government. It is true that then Russia would

probably have had no Baltic fleet. But ought she ever to have had a

Baltic fleet? Ought she to have attempted a maritime superiority, with

sea locked up in ice for six months of the year; a territory meant for a

wilderness, and incapable of becoming anything better, in which the

Russian sovereigns have condemned themselves to the life of one of their

own bears, cold, wild, and comfortless? All the stoves on earth cannot

make a St Petersburg winter endurable by any thing but a fish or a

marmozet; while Moscow offered a glorious climate, unlimited space for a

capital city, a fertile country, a fine landscape, a central position

for the head of an empire, with Europe in its front, and Asia at its

back.

The choice of St Petersburg has probably cramped the growth of Russian

power. Even Poland has only given her a desert, a kingdom scantily

cultivated, scantily peopled, discontented serfdom and a broken

frontier. Yet all may be for the best. Moscow, as the head of the

Empire, might have made her too powerful, and Europe might have seen a

Russian Gengis Khan.

The Town is ringing with an extraordinary feat of pedestrianism; the

first exploit of a young Scotchman, Barclay of Ury. He had betted L5000

that he would walk ninety miles in twenty-one and a half hours, and has

won, leaving an hour and seventeen minutes to spare.

Feats of this order have a value, as showing the powers of the human

frame. They would otherwise be merely vulgar gambling. But if it is of

importance to know the extent of the mental powers, those of the body

also have their uses; and an effeminate generation would only have to

prepare themselves by the exercises of this young gentleman, to be able

to dispense with post-chaises and the gout. The walker is but twenty-two

years old; and he has finished his exploit without any injury to his

frame, and, it may be presumed, with a considerable advantage to his

finances. All the "Sporting world," as they are named, were on the

ground, which was a measured mile, on the road between York and Hull;

lamps were erected to light the principal performer during the night. A

cottage at the road-side received him for refreshment, and change of

dress, at intervals. A militia regiment, which happened to be on its

march from Hull, halted and filed on either side of the road, with the

gallantry of sportsmen, to give him free way; and the general interest

taken in this singular performance was surprising. The only drawback was

the evident activity of his frame, and his power of endurance; for after

the first thirty miles the betting began to be wholly in his favour, and

the spirit of speculation shrunk from that period, and long before the

close no bets would be taken. From daylight, multitudes thronged to the

course. All the carriages, of which such numbers pass along this

communication between the two great northern towns, went to the side of

the road; even the mails gave way. The affair seemed national, and if

the gallant pedestrian had failed, it might have been followed by a

general mourning in the Ridings.

One of the great Histrionic Dynasty, Stephen Kemble, has lately amused

the Town by his performance of Falstaff. He exhibited the humours of the

jovial knight with skill enough to make the audiences laugh. But he was

perhaps the first actor who ever played the _fat_ knight to the life.

His remarkable corpulence qualified him to play the character without

stuffing. The good-humour of his visage was fully equalled by the

protuberance of his stomach; and if the "totus in se teres atque

rotundus" of Horace, is the poet's definition of a good man, the actor

rose to the summit of human virtue. The best prologue, since the days of

Garrick, ushered in this singular performance.

"A Falstaff here to-night, by nature made,

Lends to your favourite bard his pond'rous aid;

No man in buckram he, no stuffing gear!

No feather bed, nor e'en a pillow here!

But all good honest flesh, and blood, and bone,

And weighing, more or less--some _thirty_ stone.

Upon the northern coast, by chance, we caught him:

And hither, in a broad-wheel'd waggon, brought him;

For in a chaise the varlet ne'er could enter,

And no mail-coach on such a fare would venture.

Blest with unwieldiness, at least his size

Will favour find in every critic's eyes;

And should his humour, and his mimic art,

Bear due proportion to his outer part,

As once 'twas said of Macklin in the Jew,

'This is the very Falstaff Shakspeare drew.'

To you, with diffidence, he bids me say,

Should you approve, you may command his stay,

To lie and swagger here another day.

If not, to better men he'll leave his sack,

And go as ballast, in a collier, back."

1802.

This French peace will not last. The parties to this unnatural wedlock

are beginning to grumble already; and this, too, when the bans are still

in every body's ears. The French, however, have begun the quarrel, by

sending out a huge fleet, with 30,000 men on board, to St Domingo. This

our minister regards as a daring exploit, which may finish by turning on

Jamaica. The negroes are every where in exultation; for they cannot be

made to believe that France intends any thing but a general

emancipation; and that her expedition, however it be apparently against

Touissaint, is sent for a general overthrow of the whites.

Long discussions have taken place between the two governments, all

ending in the usual way. France protesting her honour, and England

proclaiming her alarms; both amounting to so much paper wasted. But our

West India squadron has been reinforced; and the First Consul has found

employment for a daring soldiery, who cannot live in quiet; found

offices for some hundreds of officials, the most petitioning and

perplexing race of mankind; and found a topic for the Coffeehouses,

which he naturally thinks much better employed in talking about St

Domingo, than in criticising his proceedings at home.

Another source of grumbling between these two ill-assorted parties. At

the very Marriage feast an apple of discord has been thrown in, and that

apple is Switzerland. France will suffer but one republic, and that must

be the World. The presumption of a little pigeon-house of Republics

among the Alps insults her feelings; and all must run under the wing of

the great Republican Eagle, or be grasped by her talons. An army has

been ordered to march to Berne. The Swiss will probably resist, but they

will certainly be beaten. Republics are sometimes powerful in attack;

they are always feeble in defence. They are at best but a mob; and,

while the mob can rush on, they may trample down opposition. But a mob,

forced to the defensive, thinks of nothing but running away. The

strength of a monarchy alone can bind men together for an effectual

resistance. Switzerland will get the fraternal embrace, and be as much

fettered as St Domingo.

Who are to be the heirs of General Claude Martin? The man never knew

that he had a grandfather, and probably was as much in doubt about his

heirs. What he was himself, nobody seems to know. But this man of

obscurity has died worth half a million sterling! So much for India and

her adventurers.

When a boy, he entered into the French service. By some chance or other

he found himself in India; there offered himself to the Nabob of

Lucknow, disciplined his troops, rose to the rank of commandant of the

Rajah's troops, or some similar position, and amassed the half million.

He was a splendid distributor, however, and has given away by his will

six hundred thousand rupees--a sum large enough to buy any thing in

France but the First Consul.

Francis, Duke of Bedford, has just died. The reports vary as to the

cause. The general opinion is, that in playing rackets, or in some other

rough exercise, he overstrained himself, and produced a return of a

disease to which he had been for some years liable. The details of his

death are too painful to be entered into. The first surgical assistance

was brought down to Woburn. An operation was performed, which for some

days gave hope, but it was too late. Mortification ensued, and he died,

to the great regret of a large circle of personal friends; to the great

loss of his party, which was Whig in the highest degree; and to the

general sorrow of the country. He was a handsome man with a showy

figure, and the manners, and, what was better, the spirit of a nobleman.

He was magnificent in his household, and not less magnificent in his

sense of duty as a landlord and country gentleman. He first established

those great Agricultural Meetings by which the breed of British cattle

was so greatly improved; Agriculture took the shape of a science, and

the Agricultural interest, the true strength of a country, took its

place among the pillars of the Empire.

By a sort of fashion, the leading country gentlemen always began public

life as Whigs. And although the Bedford family had gone through every

form of politics, from the days of their founder, Russell, under Henry

the VIII., and especially in the person of the Duke of Bedford's

unpopular, but able, grandfather, the Duke espoused the party of Fox

with the devotion of an enthusiast.

He was thus brought into some unfortunate collisions with the bolder

spirits and more practised talents of the Treasury Bench; and though,

from his position in the House of Lords, secure from direct attack by

the great leaders of Government, he was struck by many a shaft which he

had neither the power to repel nor to return.

An unlucky piece of hardihood, in attacking the royal grant of a pension

of three thousand a year to the greatest writer, philosopher, and

politician of the age, Edmund Burke, provoked a rejoinder, which must

have put any man to the torture. Burke's pamphlet in defence of his

pension, was much less a defence than an assault. He broke into the

enemy's camp at once, and "swept all there with huge two-handed sway."

He traced the history of the Bedford opulence up to its origin, which he

loftily pronounced to be personal sycophancy and public spoil--the

plunder of the Abbeys, obtained by subserviency to a Tyrant. The

eloquence of this terrible castigation unhappily embalmed the scorn. And

so long as the works of this great man are read, and they will be read

so long as the language endures, the honours of Francis Duke of Bedford

will go down dismantled to posterity.

But his private character was amiable, and the closing hours of his

career were manly. On its being announced to him that an operation was

necessary, he asked only for "two hours delay to settle his affairs;"

and he occupied those two hours in writing to his brothers, and to some

friends. He then offered to submit to be bound, if the operators should

think it necessary; but they replied, "that they relied fully on his

Grace's firmness of mind." He bore the trial with remarkable fortitude.

But the disorder took an unfavourable turn, and on the third day he

expired.

The retirement of Pitt from the Ministry, has given his successor,

Addington, the honour of making the peace. But the services of the great

Master are not eclipsed by the fortunes of the follower. Addington is

universally regarded as the shadow of Pitt; moving only as he moves;

existing by his existence; and exhibiting merely in outline his reality.

Every one believes that Pitt must return to power; and those who are

inclined to think sulkily of all ministers, look upon the whole as an

intrigue, to save Pitt's honour to the Irish Roman Catholics, and yet

preserve his power. Those rumours have received additional strength from

a grand dinner given the other day in the city, on his birthday, at

which his friends mustered in great force, and his name was toasted with

the most lavish panegyric. Among the rest, a song, said to be by George

Rose, of whose claims to the laurel no one had ever heard before--was

received with great applause. Some of its stanzas were sufficiently

applicable.

"No Jacobin rites in our fetes shall prevail,

Ours the true feast of reason, the soul's social flow;

Here we cherish the friend, while the patriot we hail,

As true to his country--as stern to her foe.

Impress'd with his worth,

We indulge in our mirth,

And bright shines the planet that ruled at his birth.

Round the orbit of Britain, oh, long may it move,

Like the satellite circling the splendours of Jove!

"To the name of a Pitt, in the day of the past,

Her rank 'mid the nations our country may trace;

Though his statue may moulder, his memory will last,

The great and the good live again in their race;

Ere to time's distant day,

Our marble convey

The fame that now blooms, and will know no decay,

Our fathers' example our breasts shall inspire

And we'll honour the Son as they honour'd the Sire."

The public doubts of the peace are at length settled. A note has been

sent from the Foreign Office to the Lord Mayor, announcing that the

definitive treaty had been finally settled at Amiens, on the 27th of

March, by the plenipotentiaries of England, France, Spain, and the

Batavian Republic. The treaty, as it transpires, is the source of

general cavil. It leaves to France all her conquests, while England

restores every thing except Ceylon and Trinidad; the one a Dutch colony,

and the other a Spanish; both powers having been our Allies at the

commencement of the war. The Cape is to be given back to the Dutch; but

Malta, the principal bone of contention, is to be garrisoned by a

Neapolitan force, until a Maltese garrison can be raised, and the island

is then to be declared independent, under the guarantee of all the great

powers of Europe. The French government affected to display great

reluctance to conclude even this treaty, which has thus taken six months

of negotiation since the exchange of preliminaries. At one time, orders

were sent for the Channel fleet to put to sea. Yet there can be no

question that France desired this Peace, whether as a resting time for a

fresh attack, or from the mere exhaustion of war. She had already gained

every object that she could hope to obtain by arms in her present

condition, and her natural policy was to secure what she had thus

attained. The two grand prizes of her ambition, Egypt and the command of

the Mediterranean, had been boldly aimed at, but she had lost both, and

both were now evidently hopeless. Some of those straws, too, had been

thrown up, which, if they show nothing else, show the direction of the

wind; and there were evident signs in the almost royal pomp of the First

Consul, in the appointments of officers of state for ten years, and the

constituting the Consulate an office for life; in the preparations for

the return of the emigrants, and in the superb receptions at the

Tuilleries--that Bonaparte already contemplated the last days of the

republic. To what new shape of power his ambition looks is yet only in

conjecture. But he is ambitious, daring, and unscrupulous--the idol of

the army, and the wonder of the people. He may shrink, like Caesar, from

the diadem, or he may assume, like Cromwell, the power of a king,

without the name; but the field is open before him, and France can offer

no competition.

Darwin, the author of the "Botanic Garden," has just died at the age of

seventy-one. His death will leave a chasm, though one not incapable of

being filled up, in our didactic poetry. His "Loves of the Plants" was a

new idea, thrown into agreeable verse; and a new idea is always

popular. For a while his poem obtained great celebrity: but Nature alone

is permanent; and after the first surprise wore off, the quaintness of

his inventions, and the minute artifice of his poetic machinery,

repelled the public taste. The Linnaean system, partly indecent, and

partly ridiculous, was felt to be wholly unfitted for the blazonry of

versification; and his poem, the labour of years, sank into obscurity as

rapidly as it had risen into distinction. It is now wholly unread, and

almost wholly forgotten; yet it contains bold passages, and exhibits

from time to time happiness of epithet, and harmony of language. Its

subject degrades the poem; its casual allusions constitute its merit.

Vegetable loves must be an absurdity in any language; but Darwin's mind

was furnished with variety of knowledge, and he lavished it on his

subject with Oriental profusion. He had eloquence, but he wanted

feeling; knowledge, but he wanted taste; and invention, but he wanted

nature. The want of any one of the three would have been dangerous to

his fame as a poet, but his deficiency in the three together left him to

drop into remediless oblivion.

A curious attempt hast just shown the popular opinion of ministerial

honesty. The Attorney-General has prosecuted, and brought to conviction,

a fellow in some low trade, who, hearing that Mr Addington was prime

minister, and thinking of course that a prime minister could do all

things, sent an actual offer of L2000 to him for a place in the Customs,

on which he happened to set his heart. Unluckily for the applicant, he

was a century too late. However those matters might have been managed a

hundred years ago, less tangible means than money now rule the world.

Besides, no man who knew any thing of Addington, ever attached a

suspicion of the kind to him. Erskine made a speech in the defence, the

best that could be made on such a subject, but not the most flattering

to the vanity of his client. It was that he was a blockhead, and had no

idea of the absurdity that he was committing. Among other instances of

his ignorance, he said, that when he saw the subpoena served upon him,

he thought that it was the appointment to his place. But even his

idiotism could not save him, and the affair ended in his being sentenced

to three months' imprisonment, and L100 fine.

Christie, the auctioneer, the other day, gave a happy specimen of the

eloquence of the hammer. He is at the head of his trade, and sells all

the remarkable things. On this occasion the Pigot diamond had come into

his hands. It is a very fine brilliant, but objected to by the

connoisseurs as not having sufficient depth. It was valued at L40,000.

But at this sale the auctioneer could not raise its price above L9500,

or guineas. He then appealed to his audience, a crowd of the fair and

fashionable,--

"How unfortunate," said he, "is it, for the owners of this incomparable

production, that they should have brought it into the market in a

country so famed for female beauty as England! Here the charms of the

sex require no such additions; here the eyes of the ladies sparkle with

brilliancy which outvies all the gems of the East. In other countries

this incomparable stone would be sought as a necessary aid; here it can

be valued only as a splendid superfluity." The room rang with applause.

One of the heroes of Junius has just died; the veteran Wellbore Ellis,

Lord Mendip. This man's whole life was spent in public employments. He

was the son of an Irish bishop, whose brother--such were the curious

qualities of the time--took orders in the Popish Church, followed the

Pretender, and died a Popish bishop. Young Ellis, after an education at

Westminster and Oxford, was brought into parliament under the Pelhams,

who made him a lord of the Admiralty. Under the Newcastle administration

which followed, he was appointed to the lucrative post of Irish

vice-treasurer, which he held undisturbed through all the struggles of

the Cabinet till the Grenville administration, when he was raised still

higher, and became Secretary at War.

The Grenvilles fell; the Marquis of Rockingham brought in his friends

and Ellis was superseded in his Irish office by Colonel Barre. For five

unlucky years he continued in that Limbo of patriots, exclusion from

place. At length, the Premiership of Lord North recalled him. He again

obtained the Vice-treasurership, and in the final distress of that

unpopular administration, was for a short time raised even to the

Colonial Secretaryship. But North was driven from power, and all his

adherents fell along with him. Rockingham, the North and Fox coalition,

and Pitt, exhibited a succession of premierships, which ended in the

exclusion of the whole Whig principle, in all its shapes and shades, for

twenty years. Ellis was now growing old; he was rich; he had been a

public man for upwards of forty years; he had been fiercely abused by

the opposition writers while he continued in office, and fiercely

attacked by the government writers when in opposition. He had thus his

full share of all that public life furnishes to its subjects, and he

seemed inclined to spend the remainder of his days in quiet. But the

French Revolution came. Startled at the ruin with which its progress

threatened all property, he joined that portion of the Whigs which

allied itself with the great Minister. The Duke of Portland entered the

cabinet, and Wellbore Ellis was raised to the peerage. There his career,

not unworthily, closed; and his remaining years were given to private

society, to books, of which he had a celebrated collection, and to the

recollections of the Classics, of which he possessed an early mastery.

He was an acute and accomplished man. The fiery indignation of Junius

rather threw a light than inflicted an injury on his character. That

first of political satirists spared none; and the universal nature of

his attacks made men receive them, as they receive a heavy shower,

falling on all alike, and drenching the whole multitude together.

Bonaparte has taken the first step to a throne: he has established

nobility. The Republic having abolished all titles, a peerage was, for a

while, impossible. But he has formed a military Caste, which, without

hazarding his popularity with the Parisians, increases his popularity

with the troops, and has all the advantages of a noblesse, with all the

dependency of its members on the head of the State. He has named this

Institution the Legion of Honour. It is to consist of several classes,

the first comprehending the great officers of state, generals who have

distinguished themselves, and ancient men of science. It has sixteen

Cohorts, with palaces allotted to them in Paris and the provinces, for

the headquarters of the cohorts. Grants of land are also proposed for

the support of these officers and their residences, with distributions

and pensions for the lower ranks of the soldiery, to whom the "croix

d'honneur" is given.

Thus the old reign of titles, orders, crosses, and an established Class

of society, has begun once more; a large portion of the most influential

personages of France are thus bound to the head of the government, the

hopes of every man, however humble in soldiership or in science, are

pointed to the attainment of this public honour, as well as personal

provision, and the general purchase of power is virtually declared, with

the general consent of this versatile nation.

Ten thousand pounds have just been voted to Jenner, for his discovery of

the vaccine inoculation. The liberality of parliament was never more

rationally employed. The history of the man, and the discovery, have

been long before the public. But the most curious circumstance of the

whole is, that the facts of the disease, and the remedy, should have

remained for any one to discover in the nineteenth century. They were

known to the peasantry of Gloucestershire probably from the first days

of cow milking. That the most disfiguring of all diseases, in every

country of Europe and Asia, and the most pestilential in a large portion

of the globe, could be arrested by a disease from the udders of a cow,

seems never to have entered into human thoughts, though the fact that

those who had the vaccine disease never suffered from the smallpox, was

known to the country physicians.

But Jenner's chief merit was his fortunate conjecture, that the

infection might be propagated from one human subject to another. This

was the greatest medical discovery since that of the Circulation of the

Blood.

IT'S ALL FOR THE BEST.

CHAPTER I.

"It's all for the best, you may depend upon it," said Frank Trevelyan,

addressing his companion, Vernon Wycherley, as those two young men were

pursuing a beaten track across one of those wild wastes that form so

prevalent a feature in most of the mining districts of Cornwall.

"All for the best, indeed?" repeated Vernon interrogatively. "Can it be

all for the best to have a whole batch of poems I've been racking my

brains about for the last year and a half--and which even you yourself,

hard as you are to please, admitted were worthy of praise--to have all

these, not only rejected by every publisher I offered them to, but to be

actually returned with a recommendation to give up all idea of ever

offering them to public notice?"

"But which convinces me still more that matters have turned out for the

best; and that if your poetical effusions had been published, they would

have brought you far more ridicule than praise," thought Frank. But at

the same time, not wishing to hurt his companion's feelings, he

said--"Yet, probably, when you have again revised the manuscripts, and

bestowed some of your masterly finishing touches here and there, you

will, after all, congratulate yourself upon the source of your present

disappointment."

"That's an impossibility--an utter impossibility," returned Vernon

Wycherley--"for were I to look through them a hundred times, I should

never alter a word.----But stay--Look! look!--what is that I see? Two

ladies on horseback, I declare! who could have anticipated meeting with

such an occurrence in so outlandish a place?"

The place was by no means undeserving of the remark, being devoid of any

kind of vegetation, except some straggling heath and a few patches of

stunted gorse, which here and there sprung up amidst the rugged

spar-stones that, intermixed with rude crags of granite, were thickly

scattered over this wide waste, which, throughout its vast extent,

afforded as perfect a picture of sterility as can be well conceived.

With this brief outline of the scenery, we must next attempt to describe

the parties who were wandering over it.

Frank Trevelyan was about two-and-twenty. In figure he was rather below

the middle height, and being slightly made and with the proportions of a

tall man, he looked much less than he actually was. His features were

not handsome, but he possessed what in a man is far more important--a

highly intelligent and intellectual cast of countenance. He wore his

hair, which was light and curly, cut very close, and incipient whiskers

adorned the outline of his lower jaw. He was dressed in a gray tweed

wrapper, with trousers of the Brougham pattern, and he sported a

hat--black, but whether beaver or gossamer we are uninformed--high in

the crown, but very narrow in the brim, bearing altogether no very

remote resemblance to an inverted flower-pot.

His companion was about the same age, but the latter had made so much

better use of his growing years, as to have shot up to something more

than six feet in height; yet his figure, though slender, exhibited no

appearance of weakness. His features were passably good--the nose

perhaps rather too projecting; but his teeth were unexceptionable. He

had a clear complexion, with a good fresh colour in his cheeks, which

were still covered with the down of youth, but without imparting the

slightest appearance of effeminacy. A foraging-cap of gray woven

horse-hair, with a preposterous shade projecting out in front, covered

his head; a loose blouse enveloped the upper, whilst checkered

inexpressibles enclosed the lower man. Unlike his companion, he wore his

hair, which was rather dark, very long, both at the sides and behind;

and the rudiments of mustaches were perceptible upon his upper lip; but

whether they were to be allowed to attain a more luxuriant maturity, or

their brief existence was to be prematurely cut short by the destroying

razor, was, at the time we speak of, involved in doubt, that being a

subject which, though it engrossed much of his thoughts, the proprietor

had hitherto been unable to make up his mind upon. Each of our two

heroes bore a light kind of knapsack upon his back; their general

appearance marked them to be gentlemen, whilst their attire and

accoutrements denoted they were pursuing a pedestrian tour.

But softly! the ladies approach. See how elegantly they canter their

steeds over the only smooth piece of turf our travellers had met with

throughout the whole extent of gloomy commons they had that morning

traversed.

"Ay, that's right! Pull up in time, my lovely ones, ere you get amongst

the rascally mole-hills; and then you'll not only ride the safer, but

afford us at the same time a chance of obtaining a view of your pretty

faces," thought friend Frank; whilst similar thoughts, although perhaps

arranged in more elegant terms, were passing through the mind of his

companion. But if the curiosity of the two pedestrians was great, their

admiration proved far greater when the objects which excited those

feelings, on a nearer approach, proved to be two as lovely young women

as the most fastidious admirer of beauty could wish to gaze upon. One of

them, indeed, displayed such matchless charms to the youthful poet's

eyes, as at the very first glance to form to his excited fancy the

beau-ideal of perfect loveliness.

"What an angel!" he mentally exclaimed; "upon such a form I could

continue to gaze enraptured for"----

How long he never said, for ere he had time to give utterance to the

thought, he stumbled over one of the surrounding mole-hills, and

staggering forward several paces with extended arms, he ultimately fell

prostrate on the ground, close by the side of the innocent yet moving

cause of his misadventure, and with such force, as to bury the whole of

his countenance in the soft heavings of a similar hillock to the one he

had so inadvertently tripped over.

Luckily for him, the place his physiognomy alighted upon was of so soft

and yielding a nature, that though he stamped a perfect model of his

features in the clay, the features themselves were unimpaired, otherwise

than by the earthy colouring communicated to them by so pressing a

contact, which perfectly satisfied the fair equestrians (who had the

kindness to pull up and express their hopes that he was not seriously

hurt) that the actual damage sustained was of a very superficial nature.

"And I suppose you intend to say that this is all for the best?"

observed Vernon in rather a rueful tone, as, the ladies having ridden

on, he was attempting to rub off the dirt from his face with his pocket

handkerchief--the first wipe of which was sufficient to show him how

much the effects of his tumble had changed the natural hue of his

complexion.

"To be sure I do," answered Frank "and any man less unreasonable than

yourself would say so too."

"What! say it was all for the best for him, like an awkward booby, to

fall sprawling in the dirt, thereby making himself a laughing-stock to

that beautiful, angelic creature? Oh! only look, my dear Frank, only

look--see her--see both of them! Why, as I live, they are almost ready

to fall off the very backs of their horses from the laughter my

blundering awkwardness has excited. Oh, it's really dreadful--I must

turn my head another way. I can bear the sight of it no longer!"

"But only think how much worse it would have been if your phiz, instead

of the soft earth, had encountered one of the hard spar-stones that are

so plentifully strewed about here?"

"And supposing it had--wouldn't it have been better, at the cost of

little pain and suffering, to have excited the compassion, instead of

the laughter of that heavenly creature?"

"But hardly at the sacrifice of your nose, I should say," rejoined

Frank, "which, from the deep impression it has made in the clay, must

have been smashed flat as a pancake had it battled out the matter with

the stones."

The young poet had a great regard for his nose, and his companion's

remarks upon the subject were so palpable, that he was not only silenced

but convinced.

"I say here, my man. Here, Jan, Jan, I say," bawled out our friend

Frank, to what he was pleased to style a straw-yard savage in the

disguise of a gentleman's servant on horseback, who, whilst engaged in

the pleasant employment of munching an apple, had allowed the ladies he

was attending to canter off some distance a-head, and was then in the

act of passing, at a very moderate pace, close by our two heroes, but

pulled up his nag at the summons, and, touching his hat, replied, in the

singing accent of the western Cornishmen--" Your sarvant, gen'lmen both;

what 'ud ye plaze to have, sir?--though my name b'aint Jan, plaze yer

honours."

"What is it then?--Bill, Dick, Tom, Harry, Ben, Jim, Nic, Mike, Mathey,

or Peter?"

"Neither, maester, plaze your honour, sir," said the man, with a grin

that denoted he was entering into the humour of the thing, and who, as

well as Frank, was a bit of a wag in his way. "Timothy's my name, at

your sarvice, gen'lmen--what 'ud your honours plaze to have of I?"

"What I would have, Timothy," answered Frank, "is for you to tell me who

those two young ladies are that you are in attendance upon?"

"Maester's two dafters," replied Timothy.

"And who's maester?" asked Frank.

"The squire, to be sure," answered his man.

"And what's squire's name?" inquired Frank.

"Potts--Squire Potts," replied Timothy--at which announcement Vernon

Wycherley lifted up both eyes and hands in unfeigned amazement.

"And the young ladies?" resumed the questioner.

"Lor, sir! I ha'n't a got time to bide and tell'ee no more. See they be

'most out of sight a'ready, and I shall have to ride a brave pace to

catch mun again--and most dead wi' thest, too, I be's a'ready."

Frank, who plainly saw Timothy's drift, dived his hand into the deep

recesses of his trousers' pockets.--Timothy, who witnessed the act, not

altogether an unexpected one, drew nearer and nearer, and when close

alongside of Frank, cramming the remainder of the apple into his mouth,

he dropped the hand that had conveyed it there, as if by the merest

accident in the world, within easy reach of the interrogator's, who,

slipping into it a coin of sufficient importance, small as it was, to

raise a grin of delight in the groom's countenance, again asked him the

names of the two young ladies.

"Heerken, and I'll tell'ee," he answered. "She with the light hair and

eyes, she's Miss Bessie; and she with the dark hair and eyes, she's

called Miss Molly--that's she's name." And having so said, Timothy rode

off at a rapid pace.

"Can it be possible!" exclaimed Vernon Wycherley--"can it be possible

that so lovely a being--one who seems too beautiful to tread the

earth"----

"And so rides on horseback over it; is that what you mean?" interrupted

Frank.

"No, you know very well it is not what I mean," answered Vernon

petulantly. "My wonder is, how one so elegant could be called by such a

name as that knave uttered."

"What! Molly Potts, eh? that I believe was the name he mentioned?"

interposed Frank.

"Pshaw, nonsense!" retorted his companion; "it can't be her name. The

idea's too preposterous to be true. That insolent clown has dared to try

to hoax us; for which I promise him, if I were his master, I'd break

every bone in his good-for-nothing body. Molly Potts! It never can be

so. The thing's quite out of the question--utterly impossible!"

"Impossible or not, I don't see that it's likely to make much difference

either to you or me," observed Frank; "for the chances are, we never set

eyes upon either of them again."

"Then," said Vernon, "I almost wish that I, at least, had never set

eyes upon one of them at all. To know that such an angel moves about on

earth, and to think that I may never see her more, must ever form a

source of deep regret; and yet it seems strange--very strange--that

I--I--who have ever looked upon the fairest of the sex unmoved, should

be so struck as I was here by a mere glance."

"A very hard hit, certainly," said Frank: "I never saw a fellow more

completely floored."

"Better book that to tell again," retorted vernon; "it really is so

seldom you do say a witty thing, that it's a pity it should be lost upon

these dull moors."

"Then, unless we intend to follow the fate of my wit," resumed Frank,

"we must step out a little faster to get out of them; which we sha'n't

do under a couple of miles' walk more, I promise you."