toiling impulse of the moment, whether in love or hate, and, what is of
extreme disadvantage to him as respects the career he is about to enter
upon, suffering from a deficient education. We have now to see how he
overcame all the obstacles arising from his natural character, and from
a youth wasted in idleness and dissipation; and how he gradually won his
way from victory to victory, until he at length attained the noble and
enviable eminence which is assigned to him by universal consent as the
greatest, we had almost said the only, modern Italian poet.

He describes the capital with which he commenced his undertaking as
consisting in a resolute, indomitable, and extremely obstinate mind, and
a heart full to overflowing with every species of emotion, particularly
love, with all its furies, and a profound and ferocious hatred of
tyranny. To this was added a faint recollection of various French
tragedies. On the other hand, he was almost entirely ignorant of the
rules of tragic art, and understood his own language most imperfectly.
The whole was enveloped in a thick covering of presumption, or rather
petulance, and a violence of character so great as to render it most
difficult for him to appreciate truth. He considers these elements
better adapted for forming a bad monarch than a good author.

He began by studying grammar vigorously; and his first attempt was to
put into Italian two tragedies, entitled _Filippo_ and _Polinice_, which
he had some time before written in French prose. At the same time he
read Tasso, Ariosto, Dante, and Petrarch, making notes as he proceeded,
and occupying a year in the task. He then commenced reading Latin with a
tutor; and shortly afterwards went to Tuscany in order to acquire a
really good Italian idiom. He returned to Turin in October, 1776, and
there composed several sonnets, having in the meantime made considerable
progress with several of his tragedies. The next year he again went to
Tuscany, and on reaching Florence in October, intending to remain there
a month, an event occurred which--to use his own words--"fixed and
enchained me there for many years; an event which, happily for me,
determined me to expatriate myself for ever, and which by fastening upon
me new, self-sought, and golden chains, enabled me to acquire that real
literary freedom, without which I should never have done any good, if so
be that I _have_ done good."

Charles Edward, the Young Pretender, was at that time residing in
Florence, in company with his wife, the Countess of Albany, whose maiden
name was Louisa Stolberg, of the princely house of that name. The
following is Alfieri's description of her:--

"The sweet fire of her very dark eyes, added (a thing of rare
occurrence) to a very white skin and fair hair, gave an irresistible
brilliancy to her beauty. She was twenty-five years of age, was much
attached to literature and the fine arts, had an angelic temper, and, in
spite of her wealth, was in the most painful domestic circumstances, so
that she could not be as happy as she deserved. How many reasons for
loving her!"

Her husband appears to have been of a most violent and ungovernable
temper, and to have always treated her in the harshest manner.--No
wonder, then, that an impassioned and susceptible nature like Alfieri's
should have been attracted by such charms! A friendship of the closest
and most enduring description ensued between them; and although a
certain air of mystery always surrounded the story of their mutual
attachment, there is no reason whatever to suppose that it partook in
the slightest degree of a dishonorable character.

Instead of finding his passion for the Countess an obstacle to literary
glory and useful occupations, as had always been the case previously
with him, when under the influence of similar emotions, he found that it
incited and spurred him on to every good work, and accordingly he
abandoned himself, without restraint, to its indulgence. That he might
have no inducement to return to his own country, he determined to
dissolve every tie that united him to it, and with that intent made an
absolute donation for life of the whole of his estates, both in fee and
freehold, to his natural heir, his sister Giulia, wife of the Count di
Cumiana. He merely stipulated for an annual pension, and a certain sum
in ready money, the whole amounting to about one-half of the value of
his property. The negotiations were finally brought to a conclusion in
November, 1778. He also sold his furniture and plate which he had left
in Turin; and, unfortunately for himself, invested almost the whole of
the money he now found himself possessed of in French life annuities. At
one period of the negotiations he was in great fear lest he should lose
every thing, and revolved in his mind what profession he should adopt in
case he should be left penniless.

"The art that presented itself to me as the best for gaining a living
by, was that of a horse-breaker, in which I consider myself a
proficient. It is certainly one of the least servile, and it appeared to
me to be more compatible than any other with that of a poet, for it is
much easier to write tragedies in a stable than in a court."

He now commenced living in the simplest style, dismissed all his
servants, save one; sold or gave away all his horses, and wore the
plainest clothing. He continued his studies without intermission, and by
the beginning of 1782 had nearly finished the whole of the twelve
tragedies which he had from the first made up his mind to write, and not
to exceed. These were entitled respectively _Filippo_, _Polinice_,
_Antigone_, _Agamennone_, _Oreste_, _Don Garzia_, _Virginia_, _La
Congiura de' Pazzi_, _Maria Stuarda_, _Ottavia_, _Timoleone_ and
_Rosmunda_.--Happening, however, to read the _Merope_ of Maffei, then
considered the best Italian tragedy, he felt so indignant, that he set
to work, and very shortly produced his tragedy of that name, which was
soon followed by the _Saul_, which is incomparably the finest of his
works.

The Countess had obtained permission at the end of 1780 to leave her
husband, in consequence of the brutal treatment she experienced at his
hands, and to retire to Rome. It was not long before Alfieri followed
her, and took up his habitation there also. At the end of 1782, his
_Antigone_ was performed by a company of amateurs--he himself being
one--before an audience consisting of all the rank and fashion of Rome.
Its success was unequivocal, and he felt so proud of his triumph, that
he determined to send four of his tragedies to press, getting his friend
Gori, at Siena, to superintend the printing; and they were accordingly
published.

The intimacy between Alfieri and the Countess now inflamed the anger of
Charles Edward and his brother, Cardinal York, to such a pitch, that
Alfieri found it prudent to leave Rome, which he did in May, 1783, in a
state of bitter anguish. He first made pilgrimages to the tombs of
Dante, Petrarch, and Ariosto, at Ravenna, Arquà, and Ferrara; at each of
which he spent some time in dreaming, praying, and weeping, at the same
time pouring forth a perfect stream of impassioned poetry. On getting to
Siena, he superintended personally the printing of six more of his
tragedies, and for the first time felt all the cares of authorship,
being driven nearly distracted by the sad realities of censors, both
spiritual and temporal, correctors of the press, compositors, pressmen,
&c., and the worry he experienced brought on a sharp attack of gout. On
recovering, he determined to start off once more on his travels, making
as a plea his desire to purchase a stud of horses in England, his
equestrian propensities having returned with violence. He accordingly
left his tragedies, both published and unpublished, to shift for
themselves, and proceeded to England, where, in a few weeks, he bought
no less than fourteen horses. That being the exact number of the
tragedies he had written, he used to amuse himself by saying, "For each
tragedy you have got a horse," in reference to the punishment inflicted
on naughty schoolboys in Italy, where the culprit is mounted on the
shoulders of another boy, while the master lays on the cane.

He experienced almost endless trouble and difficulty in conveying his
acquisitions safely back to Italy. The account he gives of the passage
of the Alps by Mount Cenis, from Lanslebourg to the Novalese, is really
quite romantic; and he compares himself to Hannibal on the occasion, but
says that if the passage of the latter cost him a great deal of vinegar,
it cost him (Alfieri) no small quantity of wine, as the whole party
concerned in conveying the horses over the mountain, guides, farriers,
grooms, and adjutants, drank like fishes.

On reaching Turin, he was present at a performance of his _Virginia_ at
the same theatre where, nine years before, his early play of _Cleopatra_
had been acted. He shortly received intelligence that the Countess had
been permitted to leave Rome and to go to Switzerland. He could not
refrain from following her, and accordingly rejoined her at Colmar, a
city of Alsace, after a separation of sixteen months. The sight of her
whom he loved so dearly again awakened his poetic genius, and gave
birth, at almost one and the same moment, to his three tragedies of
_Agide_, _Sofonisba_, and _Mirra_, despite his previous resolve to write
no more. When obliged to leave the Countess, he returned to Italy, but
the following year again visited her, remaining in Alsace when she
proceeded to Paris. She happened to mention in a letter that she had
been much pleased with seeing Voltaire's _Brutus_ performed on the
stage. This excited his emulation. "What!" he exclaimed, "_Brutuses_
written by a Voltaire? I'll write _Brutuses_, and two at once, moreover,
time will show whether such subjects for tragedy are better adapted for
me or for a plebeian-born Frenchman, who for more than sixty years
subscribed himself _Voltaire, Gentleman in Ordinary to the King_."
Accordingly he set to work, and planned on the spot his _Bruto Primo_
and _Bruto Secondo_; after which he once more renewed his vow to Apollo
to write no more tragedies. About this period he also sketched his
_Abel_, which he called by the whimsical title of a _Tramelogedy_. He
next went to Paris, and made arrangements with the celebrated Didot for
printing the whole of his tragedies in six volumes. On returning to
Alsace, in company with the Countess, he was joined by his old friend
the Abate di Caluso, who brought with him a letter from his mother,
containing proposals for his marriage with a rich young lady of Asti,
whose name was not mentioned. Alfieri told the Abate, smilingly, that he
must decline the proffered match, and had not even the curiosity to
inquire who the lady was. Shortly afterwards he was attacked by a
dangerous illness, which reduced him to the point of death. On
recovering, he went with his friends to Kehl, and was so much pleased
with the printing establishment of the well-known Beaumarchais, that he
resolved to have the whole of his works, with the exception of his
tragedies, which were in Didot's hands, printed there; and accordingly,
by August, 1789, all his writings, both in prose and poetry, were
printed.

In the mean time, the Countess of Albany had heard of the death of her
husband, which took place at Rome, on the 31st January, 1788. This event
set her entirely free, and it is generally believed that she was shortly
afterwards united in marriage to Alfieri; but the fact was never known,
and to the last the poet preserved the greatest mystery on the subject.

Paris now became their regular residence, and it was not long before the
revolutionary troubles commenced. In April, 1791, they determined to pay
a visit to England, where the Countess had never been. They remained
here some months, and on their embarking at Dover on their return,
Alfieri chanced to notice among the people collected on the beach to see
the vessel off, the very lady, his intrigue with whom twenty years
before had excited so great a sensation. He did not speak to her, but
saw that she recognized him. Accordingly, on reaching Calais, he wrote
to her to inquire into her present situation. He gives her reply at full
length in his _Memoirs_. It is in French; and we regret that its length
precludes us from giving it here, as it is a very remarkable production.
It indicates a decisive and inflexible firmness of character, very
unlike what is usually met with in her sex.

After visiting Holland and Belgium, Alfieri and the Countess returned to
Paris. In March, 1792, he received intelligence of his mother's death.
In the mean time the war with the emperor commenced, and matters
gradually got worse and worse. Alfieri witnessed the events of the
terrible 10th of August, when the Tuileries was taken by the mob after a
bloody conflict, and Louis XVI. virtually ceased to reign. Seeing the
great danger to which they would be exposed if they remained longer in
Paris, they determined on a hasty flight; and after procuring the
necessary passports, started on the 18th of the same month. They had a
narrow escape on passing the barriers. A mob of the lowest order
insisted on their carriage being stopped, and on their being conducted
back to Paris, exclaiming that all the rich were flying away, taking
their treasures with them, and leaving the poor behind in want and
misery. The few soldiers on the spot would have been soon overpowered;
and nothing saved the travellers except Alfieri's courage. He at length
succeeded in forcing a passage; but there is little doubt that if they
had been obliged to return, they would have been thrown into prison, in
which case they would have been among the unhappy victims who were so
barbarously murdered by the populace on the 2d September.

They reached Calais in two days and a half, having had to show their
passports more than forty times. They afterwards learned that they were
the first foreigners who had escaped from Paris and from France after
the catastrophe of the 10th August. After stopping some time at
Brussels, they proceeded to Italy, and reached Florence in November.
That city remained Alfieri's dwelling-place, nearly uninterruptedly,
from this moment to the period of his death.

In 1795, when he was forty-six years old, a feeling of shame came over
him at his ignorance of Greek, and he determined to master that
language. He applied himself with such industry to the task, that before
very long he could read almost any Greek author. There are few instances
on record of such an effort being made at so advanced a period of life.
Yet, perhaps, a still more remarkable case than that of our poet is that
of Mehemet Ali, who did not learn to read or write till more than forty
years of age. His son, Ibrahim, never did even that. At the same time
that he was learning Greek, Alfieri amused himself by writing satires,
of which he had completed seventeen by the end of 1797. The fruit of his
Greek studies appeared in his tragedies of _Alceste Prima_ and _Alceste
Seconda_, which he composed after reading Euripides' fine play of that
name. He calls these essays his final perjuries to Apollo. We have
certainly seen him break his vow sufficiently often. The twelve
tragedies he pledged himself not to exceed had now grown to their
present number of twenty-one, besides the tramelogedy of _Abel_.

He remained quietly and happily at Florence till the French invasion in
March, 1799, when he and the Countess retired to a villa in the country.
He marked his hatred of the French nation by writing his _Misogallo_, a
miscellaneous collection in prose and verse of the most violent and
indiscriminate abuse of France, and every thing connected with it, as
its name imports. On the evacuation of Florence by the French in July,
they returned to the city, but again left it on the second invasion in
October, 1800. The French commander-in-chief wrote to Alfieri,
requesting the honor of the acquaintance of a man who had rendered such
distinguished services to literature: but he told him in reply, that if
he wrote in his quality as Commandant of Florence, he would yield to his
superior authority; but that if it was merely as an individual curious
to see him, he must beg to be excused.

We now find him irresistibly impelled to try his hand at comedy, and he
accordingly wrote the six which are published with his other works. They
are entitled respectively, _L'Uno_, _I Pochi_, _Il Troppo_, _Tre Velene
rimesta avrai l'Antido_, _La Finestrina_, and _Il Divorzio_. The first
four are political in their character, and written in iambics, like his
tragedies. The last is the only one that can be ranked with modern
comedies. Sismondi truly remarks, that in these dramas he exhibits the
powers of a great satirist, not of a successful dramatist.

His health was by this time seriously impaired, and he felt it necessary
to cease entirely from his labors. On the 8th December, 1802, he put the
finishing stroke to his works, and amused himself for the short
remainder of his life in writing the conclusion of his _Memoirs_.
Feeling extremely proud at having overcome the difficulties of the Greek
language in his later years, he invented a collar, on which were
engraved the names of twenty-three ancient and modern poets, and to
which was attached a cameo representing Homer. On the back of it he
wrote the following distich:

[Greek:

    Auton poiêsas Alphêrios hippe Homêron
    Koiranikês timên êlphane zeioteran,]

which may be thus Englished:

    "Perchance Alfieri made no great misnomer
    When he dubb'd himself Knight of the Order of Homer."

With the account of this amusing little incident, Alfieri terminates the
history of his life. The date it bears is the 14th of May, 1803, and on
the 8th October of the same year he breathed his last, in the
fifty-fifth year of his age. The particulars of his death are given in a
letter addressed by the Abate di Caluso to the Countess of Albany. An
attack of gout in the stomach was the immediate cause of it. The
delicate state of his health greatly accelerated the progress of the
disease, which was still further promoted by his insisting on proceeding
with the correction of his works almost to the very last. He was so
little aware of his impending dissolution, that he took a drive in a
carriage on the 3d October, and tried to the last moment to starve his
gout into submission. He refused to allow leeches to be applied to his
legs, as the physicians recommended, because they would have prevented
him from walking. At this period, all his studies and labors of the last
thirty years rushed through his mind; and he told the Countess, who was
attending him, that a considerable number of Greek verses from the
beginning of Hesiod, which he had only read once in his life, recurred
most distinctly to his memory. His mortal agony came on so suddenly,
that there was not time to administer to him the last consolations of
religion. He was buried in the church of Santa Croce at Florence, where
already reposed the remains of Machiavelli, of Michael Angelo, and of
Galileo. A monument to his memory, the work of the great Canova, was
raised over his ashes by direction of the Countess of Albany.

Such then was Alfieri! And may we not draw a moral from the story of his
life as faintly and imperfectly shadowed forth in the preceding sketch?
Does it not show us how we may overcome obstacles deemed by us
insuperable, and how we may seek to become something better than what we
are? The poet's name will go down to future ages as the idol of his
countrymen; may the beneficial effect produced by a mind like his upon
the character and aspirations of the world be enduring!

From the Dublin University Magazine

ANECDOTES OF PAGANINI.

Paganini was in all respects a very singular being, and an interesting
subject to study. His talents were by no means confined to his wonderful
powers as a musician. On other subjects he was well informed, acute, and
conversible, of bland and gentle manners, and in society, perfectly well
bred. All this contrasted strangely with the dark, mysterious stories
which were bruited abroad, touching some passages in his early life. But
outward semblance and external deportment are treacherous as quicksands,
when taken as guides by which to sound the real depths of human
character. Lord Byron remarks, that his pocket was once picked by the
civilest gentleman he ever conversed with, and that by far the mildest
individual of his acquaintance was the remorseless Ali Pacha of Yanina.
The expressive lineaments of Paganini told a powerful tale of passions
which had been fearfully excited, which might be roused again from
temporary slumber, or were exhausted by indulgence and premature decay,
leaving deep furrows to mark their intensity. Like the generality of his
countrymen, he looked much older than he was. With them, the elastic
vigor of youth and manhood rapidly subside into an interminable and
joyless old age, numbering as many years but with far less both of
physical and mental faculty, to render them endurable, than the more
equally poised gradations of our northern clime. It is by no means
unusual to encounter a well-developed Italian, whiskered to the
eyebrows, and "bearded like the pard," who tells you, to your utter
astonishment, that he is scarcely seventeen, when you have set him down
from his appearance as, at least, five-and-thirty.

The following extract from Colonel Montgomery Maxwell's book of Military
Reminiscences, entitled, "My Adventures," dated Genoa, February 22nd,
1815, supplies the earliest record which has been given to the public
respecting Paganini, and affords authentic evidence that some of the
mysterious tales which heralded his coming were not without foundation.
He could scarcely have been at this time thirty years old. "Talking of
music, I have become acquainted with the most _outré_, most extravagant,
and strangest character I ever beheld, or heard, in the musical line. He
has just been emancipated from durance vile, where he has been for a
long time incarcerated on suspicion of murder. His long figure, long
neck, long face, and long forehead; his hollow and deadly pale cheek,
large black eye, hooked nose, and jet black hair, which is long, and
more than half hiding his expressive, Jewish face; all these rendered
him the most extraordinary person I ever beheld. There is something
scriptural in the _tout ensemble_ of the strange physiognomy of this
uncouth and unearthly figure. Not that, as in times of old, he plays, as
Holy Writ tells us, on a ten-stringed instrument; on the contrary, he
brings the most powerful, the most wonderful, and the most heart-rending
tones from one string. His name is Paganini; he is very improvident and
very poor. The D----s, and the Impressario of the theatre got up a
concert for him the other night, which was well attended, and on which
occasion he electrified the audience. He is a native of Genoa, and if I
were a judge of violin playing, I would pronounce him the most
surprising performer in the world!"

That Paganini was either innocent of the charge for which he suffered
the incarceration Colonel Maxwell mentions, or that it could not be
proved against him, may be reasonably inferred from the fact that he
escaped the gallies of the executioner. In Italy, there was then, _par
excellence_ (whatever there may be now), a law for the rich, and another
for the poor. As he was without money, and unable to buy immunity, it is
charitable to suppose he was entitled to it from innocence. A nobleman,
with a few _zecchini_, was in little danger of the law, which confined
its practice entirely to the lower orders. I knew a Sicilian prince, who
most wantonly blew a vassal's brains out, merely because he put him in a
passion. The case was not even inquired into. He sent half a dollar to
the widow of the defunct (which, by the way, he borrowed from me, and
never repaid), and there the matter ended. Lord Nelson once suggested to
Ferdinand IV. of Naples, to try and check the daily increase of
assassination, by a few salutary executions. "No, no," replied old
Nasone, who was far from being as great a fool as he looked, "that is
impossible. If I once began that system, my kingdom would soon be
depopulated. One half my subjects would be continually employed in
hanging the remainder."

Among other peculiarities, Paganini was an incarnation of avarice and
parsimony, with a most contradictory passion for gambling. He would
haggle with you for sixpence, and stake a rouleau on a single turn at
_rouge et noir_. He screwed you down in a bargain as tightly as if you
were compressed in a vice; yet he had intervals of liberality, and
sometimes did a generous action. In this he bore some resemblance to the
celebrated John Elwes, of miserly notoriety, who deprived himself of the
common necessaries of life, and lived on a potato skin, but sometimes
gave a check for £100 to a public charity, and contributed largely to
private subscriptions. I never heard that Paganini actually did this,
but once or twice he played for nothing, and sent a donation to the
Mendicity, when he was in Dublin.

When he made his engagement with me, we mutually agreed to write no
orders, expecting the house to be quite full every night, and both being
aware that the "sons of freedom," while they add nothing to the
exchequer, seldom assist the effect of the performance. They are not
given to applaud vehemently; or, as Richelieu observes, "in the right
places." What we can get for nothing we are inclined to think much less
of than that which we must purchase. He who invests a shilling will not
do it rashly, or without feeling convinced that value received will
accrue from the risk. The man who pays is the real enthusiast; he comes
with a pre-determination to be amused, and his spirit is exalted
accordingly. Paganini's valet surprised me one morning, by walking into
my room, and with many "_eccellenzas_" and gesticulations of respect,
asking me to give him an order. I said, "Why do you come to me? Apply to
your master--won't he give you one?" "Oh, yes; but I don't like to ask
him." "Why not?" "Because he'll stop the amount out of my wages!" My
heart relented; I gave him the order, and paid Paganini the dividend. I
told him what it was, thinking, as a matter of course, he would return
it. He seemed uncertain for a moment, paused, smiled sardonically,
looked at the three and sixpence, and with a spasmodic twitch, deposited
it in his own waistcoat pocket instead of mine. Voltaire says, "no man
is a hero to his valet de chambre," meaning, thereby, as I suppose, that
being behind the scenes of every-day life, he finds out that Marshal
Saxe, or Frederick the Great, is as subject to the common infirmities of
our nature, as John Nokes or Peter Styles. Whether Paganini's squire of
the body looked on his master as a hero in the vulgar acceptation of the
word, I cannot say, but in spite of his stinginess, which he writhed
under, he regarded him with mingled reverence and terror. "A strange
person, your master," observed I. "_Signor_," replied the faithful
Sancho Panza, "_e veramente grand uomo, ma da non potersi comprendere_."
"He is truly a great man, but quite incomprehensible." It was edifying
to observe the awful importance with which Antonio bore the instrument
nightly intrusted to his charge to carry to and from the theatre. He
considered it an animated something, whether demon or angel he was
unable to determine, but this he firmly believed, that it could speak in
actual dialogue when his master pleased, or become a dumb familiar by
the same controlling volition. This especial violin was Paganini's
inseparable companion. It lay on his table before him as he sat
meditating in his solitary chamber; it was placed by his side at dinner,
and on a chair within his reach when in bed. If he woke, as he
constantly did, in the dead of night, and the sudden _estro_ of
inspiration seized him, he grasped his instrument, started up, and on
the instant perpetuated the conception which otherwise he would have
lost for ever. This marvellous Cremona, valued at four hundred guineas,
Paganini, on his death-bed, gave to De Kontski, his nephew and only
pupil, himself an eminent performer, and in his possession it now
remains.

When Paganini was in Dublin, at the musical festival of 1830, the
Marquis of Anglesea, then Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, came every night
to the concerts at the theatre, and was greatly pleased with his
performance. On the first evening, between the acts, his Excellency
desired that he might be brought round to his box, to be introduced, and
paid him many compliments. Lord Anglesea was at that time residing in
perfect privacy with his family at Sir Harcourt Lee's country house,
near Blackrock, and expressed a wish to get an evening from the great
violinist, to gratify his domestic circle. The negotiation was rather a
difficult one, as Paganini was, of all others, the man who did nothing
in the way of business without an explicit understanding, and a
clearly-defined con-si-de-ra-tion. He was alive to the advantages of
honor, but he loved money with a paramount affection. I knew that he had
received enormous terms, such as £150 and £200 for fiddling at private
parties in London, and I trembled for the vice-regal purse; but I
undertook to manage the affair, and went to work accordingly. The
aid-de-camp in waiting called with me on Paganini, was introduced in due
form, and handed him a card of invitation to dinner, which, of course,
he received and accepted with ceremonious politeness. Soon after the
officer had departed, he said suddenly, "This is a great honor, but am I
expected to bring my instrument?" "Oh, yes," I replied, "as a matter of
course--the Lord Lieutenant's family wish to hear you in private."
"_Caro amico_," rejoined he, with petrifying composure, "_Paganini con
violino e Paganini senza violino,--ecco due animali distinti_."
"Paganini with his fiddle and Paganini without it are two very different
persons." I knew perfectly what he meant, and said, "The Lord Lieutenant
is a nobleman of exalted rank and character, liberal in the extreme, but
he is not Croesus; nor do I think you could with any consistency
receive such an honor as dining at his table, and afterwards send in a
bill for playing two or three tunes in the evening." He was staggered,
and asked, "What do you advise?" I said, "Don't you think a present, in
the shape of a ring, or a snuff-box, or something of that sort, with a
short inscription, would be a more agreeable mode of settlement?" He
seemed tickled by this suggestion, and closed with it at once. I
dispatched the intelligence through the proper channel, that the violin
and the _grand maestro_ would both be in attendance. He went in his very
choicest mood, made himself extremely agreeable, played away,
unsolicited, throughout the evening, to the delight of the whole party,
and on the following morning a gold snuff-box was duly presented to him,
with a few complimentary words engraved on the lid.

A year or two after this, when Paganini was again in England, I thought
another engagement might be productive, as his extraordinary attraction
appeared still to increase. I wrote to him on the subject, and soon
received a very courteous communication, to the effect, that although he
had not contemplated including Ireland in his tour, yet he had been so
impressed by the urbanity of the Dublin public, and had moreover
conceived such a personal esteem for my individual character, that he
might be induced to alter his plans, at some inconvenience, provided
always I could make him a more enticing proposal than the former one. I
was here completely puzzled, as on that occasion I gave him a clear
two-thirds of each receipt, with a bonus of twenty-five pounds per night
in addition, for two useless coadjutors. I replied, that having duly
deliberated on his suggestion, and considered the terms of our last
compact, I saw no possible means of placing the new one in a more
alluring shape, except by offering him the entire produce of the
engagement. After I had dispatched my letter, I repented bitterly, and
was terrified lest he should think me serious, and hold me to the
bargain; but he deigned no answer, and this time I escaped for the
fright I had given myself. When in London, I called to see him, and met
with a cordial reception; but he soon alluded to the late
correspondence, and half seriously said, "That was a curious letter you
wrote to me, and the joke with which you concluded it by no means a good
one." "Oh," said I, laughing, "it would have been much worse if you had
taken me at my word." He then laughed too, and we parted excellent
friends. I never saw him again. He returned to the Continent, and died,
having purchased the title of Baron, with a patent of nobility, from
some foreign potentate, which, with his accumulated earnings, somewhat
dilapidated by gambling, he bequeathed to his only son. Paganini was the
founder of his school, and the original inventor of those extraordinary
_tours de force_ with which all his successors and imitators are
accustomed to astonish the uninitiated. But he still stands at the head
of the list, although eminent names are included in it, and is not
likely to be pushed from his pedestal.

Julius Cornet of Hamburgh understands thirty-eight different languages,
not in the superficial manner of Elihu Burritt, but so well that he is
able to write them with correctness, and to make translations from one
into the other. He has issued a circular to the German public, offering
his services as a universal translator, and refers to some of the most
prominent publishers of Leipsic, whom he has many years served in that
capacity.

BIOGRAPHY OF FRENCH JOURNALISTS.

Fraser's magazine contains a reviewal of Texier's new book on the Paris
journals and editors, from which we copy the following paragraphs:

THE DÉBATS.

The _Débats_ is chiefly read by wealthy landed proprietors, public
functionaries, the higher classes of the magistracy, the higher classes
of merchants and manufacturers, by the agents de change, barristers,
notaries, and what we in England would call country gentlemen. Its
circulation we should think 10,000. If it circulate 12,000 now, it
certainly must have considerably risen since 1849.

The chief editor of the _Débats_ is Armand Bertin. He was brought up in
the school of his father, and is now about fifty years of age, or
probably a little more. M. Bertin is a man of _esprit_, and of literary
tastes, with the habits, feelings, and demeanor of a well-bred
gentleman. Of an agreeable and facile commerce, the editor of the
_Débats_ is a man of elegant and Epicurean habits; but does not allow
his luxurious tastes to interfere with the business of this nether
world. According to M. Texier, he reads with his own proprietary and
editorial eyes all the voluminous correspondence of the office on his
return from the _salon_ in which he has been spending the evening. If in
the forenoon there is any thing of importance to learn in any quarter of
Paris, M. Bertin is on the scent, and seldom fails to run down his game.
At a certain hour in the day he appears in the Rue des Prêtres, in which
the office of the _Débats_ is situate, and there assigns to his
collaborators their daily task. The compiler of the volume before us,
who, as we stated, is himself connected with the Parisian press, writing
in the _Siècle_, and who, it may therefore be supposed, has had good
opportunities for information, states that, previous to the passing of
the Tinguy law, M. Bertin never wrote in his own journal, but contented
himself with giving to the products of so many pens the necessary
homogeneity. But be this as it may, it is certain he has often written
since the law requires the _signature obligatoire_.

Under the Monarchy of the Barricades the influence of M. Bertin was most
considerable, yet he only used this influence to obtain orders and
decorations for his contributors. As to himself, to his honor and glory
be it stated, that he never stuck the smallest bit of riband to his own
buttonhole, or, during the seventeen years of the monarchy of July, ever
once put his feet inside the Tuileries. At the Italian Opera or the
Variétés, sometimes at the Café de Paris, the Maison Dorée, or the Trois
Frères, M. Bertin may be seen enjoying the music, or his dinner and
wine, but never was he a servile courtier or trencher-follower of the
Monarch of the Barricades. It is after these enjoyments, or after his
_petit souper_, that M. Bertin proceeds for the last time for the day,
or rather the night, to the office of the paper. There shutting himself
up in his cabinet, he calls for proofs, reads them, and when he has seen
every thing, and corrected every thing, he then gives the final and
authoritative order to go to press, and towards two o'clock in the
morning turns his steps homeward. M. Bertin, says our author with some
malice, belongs to that class of corpulent men so liked by Cæsar and
Louis Phillippe. Personally, M. Bertin has no reverence for what is
called nobility, either ancient or modern. He is of the school of
Chaussée d'Antin, which would set the rich and intelligent middle
classes in the places formerly occupied by _Messieurs les Grands
Seigneurs_.

The ablest man, connected with the _Débats_, or indeed, at this moment,
with the press of France, is M. DE SACY. De Sacy is an advocate by
profession, and pleaded in his youth some causes with considerable
success. At a very early period of his professional existence he allied
himself with the _Débats_. His articles are distinguished by ease and
flow, yet by a certain gravity and weight, which is divested, however,
of the disgusting doctoral tone. He is, in truth, a solid and serious
writer, without being in the least degree heavy. Political men of the
old school read his papers with pleasure, and most foreigners may read
them with profit and instruction. M. de Sacy is a simple, modest, and
retiring gentleman, of great learning, and a taste and tact very
uncommon for a man of so much learning. Though he has been for more than
a quarter of a century influentially connected with the _Débats_, and
has, during eighteen or twenty years of the period, had access to men in
the very highest positions--to ministers, ambassadors, to the sons of a
king, and even to the late king himself, it is much to his credit that
he has contented himself with a paltry riband and a modest place, as
Conservateur de la Bibliothèque Mazarine. M. de Sacy belongs to a
Jansenist family. _Apropos_ of this, M. Texier tells a pleasant story
concerning him. A Roman Catholic writer addressing him one day in the
small gallery reserved for the journalist at the Chamber of Deputies,
said, "You are a man, M. de Sacy, of too much cleverness, and of too
much honesty, not to be one of us, sooner or later." "Not a bit of it,"
replied promptly M. de Sacy; "_je veux vivre et mourir avec un pied dans
le doute et l'autre dans la foi_."

SAINT-MARC GIRARDIN is certainly, next to De Sacy, the most
distinguished writer connected with the _Débats_. He was originally a
_maître d'étude_ at the College of Henry IV., and sent one fine morning
an article to the _Débats_, which produced a wonderful sensation. The
article was without name or address; but old Bertin so relished and
appreciated it, that he was not to be foiled in finding out the author.
An advertisement was inserted on the following day, requesting the
writer to call at the editor's study, when M. Saint-Marc Girardin was
attached as a regular _soldat de plume_ to the establishment--a
profitable engagement, which left him at liberty to leave his miserable
_métier_ of _maître d'étude_. The articles written in 1834 against the
Emperor of Russia and the Russian system were from the pen of M.
Girardin.--The _maître d'étude_ of former days became professor at the
College of France--became deputy, and exhibited himself, able writer and
dialectician as he was and is, as a mediocre speaker, and ultimately
became academician and _un des quarante_.

Another distinguished writer in the _Débats_ is Michel Chevalier.
Chevalier is an _élève_ of the Polytechnic School, who originally wrote
in the _Globe_. When editor and _gérant_ of the _Globe_, he was
condemned to six months' imprisonment for having developed in that
journal the principles of St. Simonianism. Before the expiration of his
sentence he was appointed by the Government to a sort of travelling
commission to America; and from that country he addressed a series of
memorable letters to the _Débats_, which produced at the time immense
effect. Since that period, Chevalier was appointed Professor of
Political Economy at the College of France, a berth from whence he was
removed by Carnot, Minister of Public Instruction, but afterwards
reinstated by subsequent ministers. Chevalier, though an able man, is
yet more of an economic writer than a political disquisitionist. His
brother Augustus is Secretary-general of the Elysée.

Among the other contributors are PHILARETE CHASLES, an excellent
classical scholar, and a man well acquainted with English literature;
Cuvillier Fleury, unquestionably a man of taste and talent; and the
celebrated Jules Janin. The productions of the latter as a
_feuilletoniste_ are so well known that we do not stop to dwell upon
them. Janin is not without merit, and he is highly popular with a
certain class of writers: but his articles after all, apart from the
circumstances of the day, are but a _rechauffé_ of the style of
Marivaux.

THE CONSTITUTIONNEL.

The history of the _Constitutionnel_ follows that of the _Débats_. The
_Débats_, says M. Texier, is ingenious, has tact without enthusiasm,
banters with taste, and scuds before the wind with a grace which only
belongs to a _fin voilier_--to a fast sailing clipper. But, on the other
hand, none of these qualities are found in the _Constitutionnel_, which,
though often hot, and not seldom vehement and vulgar, is almost
uniformly heavy. For three-and-thirty years--that is to say, from 1815
to 1848--the _Constitutionnel_ traded in Voltairien principles, in
vehement denunciations of the _Parti Prêtre_ and of the Jesuits, and in
the intrigues of the emigrants and royalist party _quand même_. For many
years the literary giant of this Titanic warfare was Etienne, who had
been in early life secretary to Maret, duke of Bassano, himself a
mediocre journalist, though an excellent reporter and stenographer.
Etienne was a man of _esprit_ and talent, who had commenced his career
as a writer in the _Minerve Française_. In this miscellany, his letters
on Paris acquired as much vogue as his comedies. About 1818, Etienne
acquired a single share in the _Constitutionnel_, and after a year's
service became impregnated with the air of the Rue Montmartre--with the
spirit of the _genius loci_. When one has been some time writing for a
daily newspaper, this result is sure to follow. One gets habituated to
set phrases--to pet ideas--to the traditions of the locality--to the
prejudices of the readers, political or religious, as the case may be.
Independently of this, the daily toil of newspaper writing is such, and
so exhausting, that a man obliged to undergo it for any length of time
is glad occasionally to find refuge in words without ideas, which have
occasionally much significancy with the million, or in topics on which
the public love to dwell fondly. Under the reign of Louis XVIII. and
Charles X. it lost no opportunity, by indirection and innuendo, of
hinting at the "Petit Caporal," and this circumstance during the life of
the emperor, and long after his death, caused the journal to be
adored--that is really the word--by the old army, by the _vieux de
vieille_, and by the _durs à cuirs_. In these good old bygone times the
writers in the _Constitutionel_ wore a blue frock closely buttoned up to
the chin, to the end that they might pass for officers of the old army
on half-pay. In 1830 the fortunes of the _Constitutionnel_ had reached
the culminant point. It then counted 23,000 subscribers, at 80 francs a
year. At that period a single share in the property was a fortune. But
the avatar of the Citizen King spoiled in a couple of years the sale of
the citizen journal. The truth is, that the heat of the Revolution of
July had engendered and incubated a multitude of journals, great and
little, bounding with young blood and health--journals whose editors and
writers did not desire better sport than to attack the _Constitutionnel_
at right and at left, and to tumble the dear, fat, rubicund, old
gentleman, head over heels. Among these was the _Charivari_, which
incontinently laughed at the whole system of the establishment, from the
crapulous, corpulent, and Voltairien Etienne, down to the lowest
printer's devil. The metaphors, the puffs, _canards_, the _réclames_,
&c. of the _Constitutionnel_ were treated mercilessly and as
nothing--not even Religion itself can stand the test of ridicule among
so mocking a people as the French; the result was, that the
_Constitutionnel_ diminished wonderfully in point of circulation. Yet
the old man wrote and spoke well, and had, from 1824 to 1829, as an ally
the sharp and clever Thiers, and the better read, the better informed,
and the more judicious Mignet. It was during the Vitelle administration
that the _Constitutionnel_ attained the very highest acme of its fame.
It was then said to have had 30,000 subscribers, and to have maintained
them with the cry of "Down with the Jesuits!" In 1827-28, during its
palmiest days, the _Constitutionnel_ had no _Roman feuilleton_. It
depended then on its leading articles, nor was it till its circulation
declined, in 1843, to about 3500, that the proprietors determined to
reduce the price one-half. They then, too, adopted the _Roman
feuilleton_, giving as much as 500 francs for an article of this kind to
Dumas or Sue. From 1845 or 1846 to 1848, the _Consitutionnel_ had most
able contributors of leading articles; Thiers, De Remusat, and Duvergier
d'Hauranne, having constantly written in its columns. The circulation of
the journal was then said to amount to 24,000. When the
_Constitutionnel_ entered into the hands of its present proprietor,
Docteur Louis Veron, it was said to be reduced to 3000 subscribers. How
many subscribers it has now we have no very accurate means of knowing,
but we should say, at a rough guess, it may have 9000 or 10,000. It
should be remembered, that from being an anti-sacerdotal journal it has
become a priests' paper and the organ of priests; from being an opponent
of the executive, it has become the organ and the apologist of the
executive in the person of M. L. N. Buonaparte, and the useful
instrument, it is said, of M. Achille Fould. Every body knows, says M.
Texier, with abundant malice prepense, that Dr. Veron, the chief editor
of the _Constitutionnel_, has declared that France may henceforth place
her head on the pillow and go quietly to sleep, for the doctor
confidently answers for the good faith and wisdom of the president.

But who is DOCTOR VERON, the editor-in-chief, when one finds his
excellency _chezelle_? The ingenuous son of Esculapius tells us himself
that he has known the _coulisses_ (the phrase is a queer one) of
science, of the arts, of politics, and even of the opera. It appears,
however, that the dear doctor is the son of a stationer of the Rue du
Bac, who began his career by studying medicine. If we are to believe
himself, his career was a most remarkable one. In 1821 he was received
what is called an _interne_ of the Hôtel Dieu. After having walked the
hospitals, he enrolled himself in the Catholic and Apostolic Society of
'_bonnes lettres_,' collaborated with the writers in the _Quotidienne_,
and, thanks to Royalist patronage, was named physician-in-chief of the
Royal Museums. Whether any of the groups in the pictures of Rubens,
Salvator Rosa, Teniers, Claude, or Poussin--whether any of the Torsos of
Praxiteles, or even of a more modern school, required the assiduous care
or attention of a skilful physician, we do not pretend to state. But we
repeat that the practice of Dr. Veron, according to M. Texier, was
confined to these dumb yet not inexpressive personages. In feeling the
pulse of the Venus de Medici, or looking at the tongue of the Laocoon,
or the Apollo Belvidere, it is said the chief, if not the only practice
of Dr. Louis Veron consisted. True, the doctor invented a _pâte
pectorale_, approved by all the emperors and kings in Europe, and very
renowned, too, among the commonalty; but so did Dr. Solomon, of Gilead
House, near Liverpool, invent a balm of Gilead, and Mrs. Cockle invent
anti-bilious pills, taken by many of the judges, a majority of the
bench of bishops, and some admirals of the blue, and general officers
without number, yet we have never heard that Moses Solomon or Tabitha
Cockle were renowned in the practice of physic, notwithstanding the said
Gilead and the before-mentioned pills. Be this, however, as it may,
Veron, after having doctored the pictures and statues, and
patepectoraled the Emperor, the Pope, the Grand Turk, the Imaum of
Muscat, the Shah of Persia, and the Great Mogul himself, next
established the _Review of Paris_, which in its turn he abandoned to
become the director of the Opera. Tired of the Opera after four or five
years' service, the doctor became a candidate of the dynastic opposition
at Brest. This was the "artful dodge" before the Revolution of July
1848, if we may thus translate an untranslateable phrase of the
doctor's. At Brest the professor of the healing art failed, and the
consequence was, that instead of being a deputy he became the proprietor
of the _Constitutionnel_. Fortunate man that he is! In _Robert le
Diable_ at the Opera, which he would not at first have at any price, the
son of Esculapius found the principal source of his fortune, and by the
_Juif Errant_ of Eugène Sue, for which he gave 100,000 francs, he saved
the _Constitutionnel_ from perdition. _Apropos_ of this matter, there is
a pleasant story abroad. When Veron purchased the _Constitutionnel_,
Thiers was writing his _Histoire du Consulat_, for which the booksellers
had agreed to give 500,000 francs. Veron wished to have the credit of
publishing the book in the _Constitutionnel_, and with this view waited
on Thiers, offering to pay down, _argent comptant_, one-half the money.
Thiers, though pleased with the proposition, yet entrenched himself
behind his engagement with the booksellers. To one of the leading
booksellers Veron trotted off post-haste, and opened the business. "Oh!"
said the sensible publisher, "you have mistaken your _coup_ altogether."
"How so?" said the doctor. "Don't you see," said the Libraire Editeur,
"that the rage is Eugène Sue, and that the _Débats_ and the _Presse_ are
at fistycuffs to obtain the next novelty of the author of the _Mystères
de Paris_? Go you and offer as much again for this novel, whatever it
may be, as either the one or other of them, and the fortune of the
_Constitutionnel_ is made." The doctor took the advice, and purchased
the next novelty of Sue at 100,000 francs. This turned out to be the
_Juif Errant_, which raised the circulation of the _Constitutionnel_ to
24,000.

Veron is a puffy-faced little man, with an overgrown body, and midriff
sustained upon an attenuated pair of legs; his visage is buried in an
immense shirt collar, stiff and starched as a Norman cap. Dr. Veron
believes himself the key-stone of the Elyséan arch, and that the weight
of the government is on his shoulders. Look at him as he enters the Café
de Paris to eat his _purée à la Condé_, and his _suprême de volaille_,
and his _filet de chevreuil piqué aux truffes_, and you would say that
he is not only the prime, but the favorite minister of Louis Napoleon,
_par la grace de Dieu et Monsieur le Docteur Président de la
République_. "_Après tout c'est un mauvais drôle, que ce pharmacien_,"
to use the term applied to the doctor by General Changarnier.

A short man of the name of Boilay washes the dirty linen of Dr. Veron,
and corrects his faults of grammar, of history, &c. Boilay is a small,
sharp, stout, little man, self-possessed, self-satisfied, with great
readiness and tact. Give him but the heads of a subject and he can make
out a very readable and plausible article. Boilay is the real working
editor of the _Constitutionnel_, and is supported by a M. Clarigny, a M.
Malitourne, and others not more known or more respected. Garnier de
Cassagnac, of the _Pouvoir_, a man of very considerable talent, though
not of very fixed principle, writes occasionally in the
_Constitutionnel_, and more ably than any of the other contributors. M.
St. Beuve is the literary critic, and he performs his task with eminent
ability.

THE NATIONAL.

We now come to the _National_, founded by Carrel, Mignet, and Thiers. It
was agreed between the triad that each should take the place of
_rédacteur en chef_ for a year. Thiers, as the oldest and most
experienced, was the first installed, and conducted the paper with zest
and spirit till the Revolution of 1830 broke out. The _National_ set out
with the idea of changing the incorrigible dynasty, and instituting
Orléanism in the place of it. The refusal to pay taxes and to contribute
to a budget was a proposition of the _National_, and it is not going too
far to say, that the crisis of 1830 was hastened by this journal. It was
at the office of the _National_ that the famous protest, proclaiming the
right of resistance, was composed and signed by Thiers, De Remusat, and
Canchois Lemaire. On the following day the office of the journal was
bombarded by the police and an armed force, when the presses were
broken. Against this illegal violence the editors protested. After the
Revolution, Carrel assumed the conduct of the journal, and became the
firmest as well as the ablest organ of democracy. To the arbitrary and
arrogant Perier, he opposed a firm and uncompromising resistance. Every
one acquainted with French politics at that epoch is aware of the
strenuous and stand-up fight he made for five years for his principles.
He it was who opposed a bold front to military bullies, and who invented
the epithet _traîneurs de sabre_. This is not the place to speak of the
talent of Carrel. He was shot in a miserable quarrel in 1836, by Emile
Girardin, then, as now, the editor of the _Presse_. On the death of
Carrel, the shareholders of the paper assembled together to name a
successor. M. Trelat, subsequently minister, was fixed upon. But as he
was then a _détenu_ at Clairvaux, Bastide and Littré filled the
editorial chair during the interregnum. On the release of Trelat, it was
soon discovered that he had not the peculiar talent necessary. The
sceptre of authority passed into the hands of M. Bastide, named
Minister of Foreign Affairs in the ending of 1848, or the beginning of
1849. M. Bastide, then a _marchand de bois_, divided his editorial
empire with M. Armand Marrast, who had been a political prisoner and a
refugee in England, and who returned to France on the amnesty granted on
the marriage of the Duke of Orleans. M. Marrast, though a disagreeable,
self-sufficient, and underbred person, was unquestionably a writer of
point, brilliancy, and vigor. From 1837 to the Revolution of 1848 he was
connected with the _National_, and was the author of a series of
articles which have not been equalled since. Like all low, vulgar-bred,
and reptile-minded persons, Marrast forgot himself completely when
raised to the position of President of the Chamber of Deputies. In this
position he made irreconcileable enemies of all his old colleagues, and
of most persons who came into contact with him. The fact is, that your
schoolmaster and pedagogue can rarely become a gentleman, or any thing
like a gentleman. The writers in the _National_ at the present moment
are, M. Léopold Duras, M. Alexandre Rey, Caylus, Cochut, Forques,
Littré, Paul de Musset, Colonel Charras, and several others whose names
it is not necessary to mention here.

THE SIÈCLE.

We come now to the _Siècle_, a journal which, though only established in
1836, has, we believe, a greater sale than any journal in Paris--at
least, had a greater sale previous to the Revolution of February 1848.
The _Siècle_ was the first journal that started at the low price of 40
francs a-year, when almost every other newspaper was purchased at a cost
of 70 or 80 francs. It should also be recollected, that it was published
under the auspices of the deputies of the constitutional opposition. The
_Siècle_ was said, in 1846, to have had 42,000 subscribers. Its then
editor was M. Chambolle, who abandoned the concern in February or March
1849, not being able to agree with M. Louis Perrée, the _directeur_ of
the journal. Since Chambolle left a journal which he had conducted for
thirteen years, M. Perrée has died in the flower of his age, mourned by
those connected with the paper, and regretted by the public at large.
Previous to the Revolution of 1848, Odillon Barrot and Gustave de
Beaumont took great interest and an active part in the management of the
_Siècle_. That positive, dogmatical, self-opinioned, and indifferent
newspaper writer, Léon Faucher, was then one of the principal
contributors to this journal. The _Siècle_ of 1851 is somewhat what the
_Constitutionnel_ was in 1825, 6, and 7. It is eminently City-like and
of the _bourgeoisie_, "earth, earthy," as a good, reforming, economic
National Guard ought to be. The success of the journal is due to this
spirit, and to the eminently fair, practical, and business-like manner
in which it has been conducted. Perrée, the late editor and manager of
the journal, who died at the early age of 34, was member for the Manche.
The writers in the journal are Louis Jourdan, formerly a St. Simonian;
Pierre Bernard, who was secretary to Armand Carrel; Hippolite Lamarche,
an ex-cavalry captain; Auguste Jullien (son of Jullien de Paris, one of
the commissaries of Robespierre); and others whom it is needless to
mention.

THE PRESSE.

The _Presse_ was founded in 1836, about the same time as the _Siècle_,
by Emile de Girardin, a son of General de Girardin, it is said, by an
English mother. Till that epoch of fifteen years ago, people in Paris or
in France had no idea of a journal exceeding in circulation 25,000
copies, the circulation of the _Constitutionnel_, or of a newspaper
costing less than seventy or eighty francs per annum. Many journals had
contrived to live on respectably enough on a modest number of 4000 or
5000 _abonnés_. But the conductors of the _Presse_ and of the _Siècle_
were born to operate a revolution in this routine and jog-trot of
newspaper life. They reduced the subscription to newspapers from eighty
to forty francs per annum, producing as good if not a better article.
This was a great advantage to the million, and it induced parties to
subscribe for, and read a newspaper, more especially in the country, who
never thought of reading a newspaper before. In constituting his new
press, M. Girardin entirely upset and rooted out all the old notions
theretofore prevailing as to the conduct of a journal. The great feature
in the new journal was not its leading articles, but its _Roman
feuilleton_, by Dumas, Sue, &c. This it was that first brought Socialism
into extreme vogue among the working classes. True the _Presse_ was not
the first to publish Socialist _feuilletons_, but the _Débats_ and the
_Constitutionnel_. But the _Presse_ was the first to make the leading
article subsidiary to the _feuilleton_. It was, even when not a
professed Socialist, a great promoter of Socialism, by the thorough
support which it lent to all the slimy, jesuitical corruptions of
Guizoism, and all the turpitudes and chicanery of Louis Philippism. When
the _Presse_ was not a year old it had 15,000 subscribers, and before it
was twelve years old the product of its advertisements amounted to
150,000 francs a-year. Indeed this journal has the rare merit of being
the first to teach the French the use, and we must add the abuse, of
advertisements. We fear the _Presse_, during these early days of the
gentle Emile and Granier Cassagnac, was neither a model of virtue,
disinterestedness, nor self-denial. Nor do we know that it is so now,
even under the best of Republics. There are strange tales abroad, even
allowing for the exaggeration of Rumor with her hundred tongues. One
thing, however, is clear; that the _Presse_ was a liberal paymaster to
its _feuilletonistes_. To Dumas, Sand, De Balzac, Théophile Gautier, and
Jules Sandeau, it four years ago paid 300 francs per day for
contributions. The _Presse_, as M. Texier says, is now less the
collective reason of a set of writers laboring to a common intent, than
the expression of the individual activity, energy, and wonderful
mobility of M. Girardin himself. The _Presse_ is Emile de Girardin, with
his boldness, his audacity, his rampant agility, his Jim Crowism, his
inexhaustible cleverness, wonderful fecundity, and indisputable talent.
The _Presse_ is bold and daring; but no man can tell the color of its
politics to-day, much less three days, or three months hence. On the
25th of July, 1848, it was as audacious, as unabashed, and as little
disconcerted as two days before. When the workmen arrived in crowds to
break its presses, the ingenious Emile threw open the doors of the
press-room, talked and reasoned with the greasy rogues, and sent them
contented away.

The number of journals in Paris is greater--much greater,
relatively--than the number existing in London. The people of Paris love
and study a newspaper more than the people of London, and take a greater
interest in public affairs, and more especially in questions of foreign
policy. Previous to the Revolution of February 1848, it cannot, we
think, be denied that newspaper writers in France held a much higher
rank than contributors to the daily press in England, and even still
they continue to hold a higher and more influential position, though
there can be no good reason why they should have done so at either time.
For the last fifteen years there cannot be any doubt or question that
the leading articles in the four principal daily London morning papers
exhibit an amount of talent, energy, information, readiness, and
compression, which are not found in such perfect and wonderful
combination in the French press.

For the last three years, however, the press of France has wonderfully
deteriorated. It is no longer what it was antecedent to the Revolution.
There is not the literary skill, the artistical ability, the energy, the
learning, and the eloquence which theretofore existed. The class of
writers in newspapers now are an inferior class in attainments, in
scholarship, and in general ability. There can be little doubt, we
conceive, that the press greatly increased and abused its power, for
some years previous to 1848. This led to the decline of its
influence--an influence still daily diminishing; but withal, even still
the press in France has more influence, and enjoys more social and
literary consideration, than the press in England. We believe that
newspaper writers in France are not now so generally well paid as they
were twenty or thirty years ago. Two or three eminent writers can always
command in Paris what would be called a sporting price, but the great
mass of leading-article writers receive considerably less in money than
a similar class in London, though they exercise a much greater influence
on public opinion, and enjoy from the peculiar constitution of French
society a higher place in the social scale.

--We see by the last papers from Paris that Veron and the President have
quarreled.

From the Cincinnati Commercial Advertiser.

PROPHECY.

BY ALICE CAREY.

    I think thou lovest me--yet a prophet said
      To-day, Elhadra, if thou laidest dead,
    From thy white forehead would he fold the shroud,
      And thereon lay his sorrow, like a crown.
    The drenching rain from out the chilly cloud,
      In the gray ashes beats the red flame down!
    And when the crimson folds the kiss away
      No longer, and blank dulness fills the eyes,
    Lifting its beauty from the crumbling clay,
      Back to the light of earth life's angel flies.

    So, with my large faith unto gloom allied,
      Sprang up a shadow sunshine could not quell,
    And the voice said, Would'st haste to go outside
      This continent of being, it were well:
    Where finite, growing toward the Infinite,
      Gathers its robe of glory out of dust,
    And looking down the radiances white,
      Sees all God's purposes about us, just.
    Canst thou, Elhadra, reach out of the grave,
      And draw the golden waters of love's well?
    _His_ years are chrisms of brightness in time's wave--
      Thine are as dewdrops in the nightshade's bell!

    Then straightening in my hands the rippled length
      Of all my tresses, slowly one by one,
    I took the flowers out.--Dear one, in thy strength
      Pray for my weakness. Thou hast seen the sun
    Large in the setting, drive a column of light
      Down through the darkness: so, within death's night,
    O my beloved, when I shall have gone,
    If it might be so, would my love burn on.

From Household Words

THE MODERN HAROUN-AL-RASCHID.

In the district of Ferdj' Onah (which signifies _Fine Country_),
Algeria, lives a Scheik named Bou-Akas-ben-Achour. He is also
distinguished by the surname of _Bou-Djenoni_ (the Man of the Knife),
and may be regarded as a type of the eastern Arab. His ancestors
conquered Ferdj' Onah, but he has been forced to acknowledge the
supremacy of France, by paying a yearly tribute of 80,000 francs. His
dominion extends from Milah to Rabouah, and from the southern point of
Babour to within two leagues of Gigelli. He is forty-nine years old, and
wears the Rahyle costume; that is to say, a woollen _gandoura_, confined
by a leathern belt. He carries a pair of pistols in his girdle, by his
side the Rahyle _flissa_, and suspended from his neck a small black
knife.

Before him walks a negro carrying his gun, and a huge greyhound bounds
along by his side. He holds despotic sway over twelve tribes; and should
any neighboring people venture to make an incursion on his territory,
Bou-Akas seldom condescends to march against them in person, but sends
his negro into the principal village. This envoy just displays the gun
of Bou-Akas, and the injury is instantly repaired.

He keeps in pay two or three hundred Tolbas to read the Koran to the
people; every pilgrim going to Mecca, and passing through Ferdj' Onah,
receives three francs, and may remain as long as he pleases to enjoy the
hospitality of Bou-Akas. But whenever the Scheik discovers that he has
been deceived by a pretended pilgrim, he immediately dispatches
emissaries after the impostor; who, wherever he is, find him, throw him
down, and give him fifty blows on the soles of his feet.

Bou-Akas sometimes entertains three hundred persons at dinner; but
instead of sharing their repast, he walks round the tables with a baton
in his hand, seeing that the servants attend properly to his guests.
Afterwards, if any thing is left, he eats; but not until the others have
finished.

When the governor of Constantinople, the only man whose power he
recognizes, sends him a traveller; according to the rank of the latter,
or the nature of the recommendation Bou-Akas gives him his gun, his dog,
or his knife. If the gun, the traveller takes it on his shoulder; if the
dog, he leads it in a leash; or if the knife, he hangs it round his
neck: and with any one of these potent talismans, of which each bears
its own degree of honor, the stranger passes through the region of the
twelve tribes, not only unscathed, but as the guest of Bou-Akas, treated
with the utmost hospitality. When the traveller is about to leave Ferdj'
Onah, he consigns the knife, the dog, or the gun to the care of the
first Arab he meets. If the Arab is hunting, he leaves the chase; if
laboring in the field, he leaves his plough; and, taking the precious
deposit, hastens to restore it to the Bou-Akas.

The black-handled knife is so well known, that it has given the surname
of "Bou-Djenoni, _the man of the knife_," to its owner. With this
implement he is accustomed to cut off heads, whenever he takes a fancy
to perform that agreeable office with his own hand.

When first Bou-Akas assumed the government, the country was infested
with robbers, but he speedily found means to extirpate them. He
disguised himself as a poor merchant; walked out, and dropped a _douro_
(a gold coin) on the ground, taking care not to lose sight of it. If the
person who happened to pick up the _douro_, put it into his pocket and
passed on, Bou-Akas made a sign to his _chinaux_ (who followed him, also
in disguise, and knew the Scheik's will) rushed forward immediately, and
decapitated the offender. In consequence of this summary method of
administering justice, it is a saying amongst the Arabs that a child
might traverse the regions which own Bou-Akas's sway, wearing a golden
crown on his head, without a single hand being stretched out to take it.

The Scheik has great respect for women, and has ordered that when the
females of Ferdj' Onah go out to draw water, every man who meets them
shall turn away his head. Wishing one day to ascertain whether his
commands were attended to, he went out in disguise: and, meeting a
beautiful Arab maiden on her way to the well, approached and saluted
her. The girl looked at him with amazement, and said: "Pass on,
stranger; thou knowest not the risk them hast run." And when Bou-Akas
persisted in speaking to her, she added: "Foolish man, and reckless of
thy life; knowest thou not that we are in the country of Bou-Djenoni,
who causes all women to be held in respect?"

Bou-Akas is very strict in his religious observances; he never omits his
prayers and ablutions, and has four wives, the number permitted by the
Koran. Having heard that the Cadi of one of his twelve tribes
administered justice in an admirable manner, and pronounced decisions in
a style worthy of King Solomon himself, Bou-Akas, like a second
Haroun-Al-Raschid, determined to judge for himself as to the truth of
the report. Accordingly, dressed like a private individual, without arms
or attendants, he set out for the Cadi's towns, mounted on a docile
Arabian steed. He arrived there, and was just entering the gate, when a
cripple seizing the border of his burnous, asked him for alms in the
name of the prophet. Bou-Akas gave him money, but the cripple still
maintained his hold. "What dost thou want?" asked the Scheik; "I have
already given thee alms."

"Yes," replied the beggar, "but the law says, not only--'Thou shalt give
alms to thy brother,' but also, 'Thou shalt do for thy brother
whatsoever thou canst.'"

"Well! and what can I do for thee?"

"Thou canst save me,--poor crawling creature that I am!--from being
trodden under the feet of men, horses, mules and camels, which would
certainly happen to me in passing through the crowded square, in which a
fair is now going on."

"And how can I save thee?"

"By letting me ride behind you, and putting me down safely in the
market-place, where I have business."

"Be it so," replied Bou-Akas. And stooping down, he helped the cripple
to get up behind him; a business which was not accomplished without much
difficulty. The strangely assorted riders attracted many eyes as they
passed through the crowded streets; and at length they reached the
market-place. "Is this where you wish to stop?" asked Bou-Akas.

"Yes."

"Then get down."

"Get down yourself."

"What for?"

"To leave me the horse."

"To leave you my horse! What mean you by that?"

"I mean that he belongs to me. Know you not that we are now in the town
of the just Cadi, and that if we bring the case before him, he will
certainly decide in my favor?"

"Why should he do so, when the animal belongs to me?"

"Don't you think that when he sees us two,--you with your strong
straight limbs, which Allah has given you for the purpose of walking,
and I with my weak legs and distorted feet,--he will decree that the
horse shall belong to him who has most need of him?"

"Should, he do so, he would not be the _just_ Cadi," said Bou-Akas.

"Oh! as to that," replied the cripple, laughing, "although he is just,
he is not infallible."

"So!" thought the Scheik to himself, "this will be a capital opportunity
of judging the judge." He said aloud, "I am content--we will go before
the Cadi."

Arrived at the tribunal, where the judge, according to the eastern
custom, was publicly administering justice, they found that two trials
were about to go on, and would of course take precedence of theirs. The
first was between a _taleb_ or learned man, and a peasant. The point in
dispute was the _taleb's_ wife, whom the peasant had carried off, and
whom he asserted to be his own better half, in the face of the
philosopher who demanded her restoration. The woman, strange
circumstance! remained obstinately silent, and would not declare for
either; a feature in the case which rendered its decision excessively
difficult. The judge heard both sides attentively, reflected for a
moment, and then said, "Leave the woman here, and return to-morrow." The
_savant_ and the laborer each bowed and retired; and the next cause was
called. This was a difference between a butcher and an oil-seller. The
latter appeared covered with oil, and the former was sprinkled with
blood.

The butcher spoke first:--"I went to buy some oil from this man, and in
order to pay him for it, I drew a handful of money from my purse. The
sight of the money tempted him. He seized me by the wrist. I cried out,
but he would not let me go; and here we are, having come before your
worship, I holding my money in my hand, and he still grasping my wrist.
Now, I swear by the Prophet, that this man is a liar, when he says that
I stole his money, for the money is truly mine own."

Then spoke the oil-merchant:--"This man came to purchase oil from me.
When his bottle was filled, he said, 'Have you change for a piece of
gold?' I searched my pocket, and drew out my hand full of money, which I
laid on a bench in my shop. He seized it, and was walking off with my
money and my oil, when I caught him by the wrist, and cried out
'Robber!' In spite of my cries, however, he would not surrender the
money, so I brought him here, that your worship might decide the case.
Now, I swear by the Prophet that this man is a liar, when he says that I
want to steal his money, for it is truly mine own."

The Cadi caused each plaintiff to repeat his story, but neither varied
one jot from his original statement. He reflected for a moment, and then
said, "Leave the money with me, and return to-morrow." The butcher
placed the coins, which he had never let go, on the edge of the Cadi's
mantle. After which he and his opponent bowed to the tribunal, and
departed.

It was now the turn of Bou-Akas and the cripple. "My lord Cadi," said
the former, "I came hither from a distant country, with the intention of
purchasing merchandise. At the city gate I met this cripple, who first
asked for alms, and then prayed me to allow him to ride behind me
through the streets, lest he should be trodden down in the crowd. I
consented, but when we reached the market-place, he refused to get down,
asserting that my horse belonged to him, and that your worship would
surely adjudge it to him, who wanted it most. That, my lord Cadi, is
precisely the state of the case--I swear it by Mahomet!"

"My lord," said the cripple, "as I was coming on business to the market,
and riding this horse, which belongs to me, I saw this man seated by the
roadside, apparently half dead from fatigue. I good naturedly offered to
take him on the crupper, and let him ride as far as the market-place,
and he eagerly thanked me. But what was my astonishment, when, on our
arrival, he refused to get down, and said that my horse was his. I
immediately required him to appear before your worship, in order that
you might decide between us. That is the true state of the case--I swear
it by Mahomet!"

Having made each repeat his deposition, and having reflected for a
moment, the Cadi said, "Leave the horse here, and return to-morrow."

It was done, and Bou-Akas and the cripple withdrew in different
directions. On the morrow, a number of persons besides those immediately
interested in the trials assembled to hear the judge's decisions. The
_taleb_ and the peasant were called first.

"Take away thy wife," said the Cadi to the former, "and keep her, I
advise thee, in good order." Then turning towards his _chinaux_, he
added, pointing to the peasant, "Give this man fifty blows." He was
instantly obeyed, and the _taleb_ carried off his wife.

Then came forward the oil-merchant and the butcher. "Here," said the
Cadi to the butcher, "is thy money; it is truly thine, and not his."
Then pointing to the oil-merchant, he said to his _chinaux_, "Give this
man fifty blows." It was done, and the butcher went away in triumph with
his money.

The third cause was called, and Bou-Akas and the cripple came forward.
"Would'st thou recognize thy horse amongst twenty others?" said the
judge to Bou-Akas.

"Yes, my lord."

"And thou?"

"Certainly, my lord," replied the cripple.

"Follow me," said the Cadi to Bou-Akas.

They entered a large stable, and Bou-Akas pointed out his horse amongst
twenty which were standing side by side.

"'Tis well," said the judge. "Return now to the tribunal, and send me
thine adversary hither."

The disguised Scheik obeyed, delivered his message, and the cripple
hastened to the stable, as quickly as his distorted limbs allowed. He
possessed quick eyes and a good memory, so that he was able, without the
slightest hesitation, to place his hand on the right animal.

"'Tis well," said the Cadi; "return to the tribunal."

His worship resumed his place, and when the cripple arrived, judgment
was pronounced. "The horse is thine," said the Cadi to Bou-Akas. "Go to
the stable, and take him." Then to the _chinaux_, "Give this cripple
fifty blows." It was done; and Bou-Akas went to take his horse.

When the Cadi, after concluding the business of the day, was retiring
to his house, he found Bou-Akas waiting for him. "Art thou discontented
with my award?" asked the judge.

"No, quite the contrary," replied the Scheik. "But I want to ask by what
inspiration thou hast rendered justice; for I doubt not that the other
two cases were decided as equitably as mine. I am not a merchant; I am
Bou-Akas, Scheik of Ferdj' Onah, and I wanted to judge for myself of thy
reputed wisdom."

The Cadi bowed to the ground, and kissed his master's hand.

"I am anxious," said Bou-Akas, "to know the reasons which determined
your three decisions."

"Nothing, my lord, can be more simple. Your highness saw that I detained
for a night the three things in dispute?"

"I did."

"Well, early in the morning I caused the woman to be called, and I said
to her suddenly--'Put fresh ink in my inkstand.' Like a person who had
done the same thing a hundred times before, she took the bottle, removed
the cotton, washed them both, put in the cotton again, and poured in
fresh ink, doing it all with the utmost neatness and dexterity. So I
said to myself, 'A peasant's wife would known nothing about
inkstands--she must belong to the _taleb_."

"Good," said Bou-Akas, nodding his head. "And the money?"

"Did your highness remark that the merchant had his clothes and hands
covered with oil?"

"Certainly, I did."

"Well; I took the money, and placed it in a vessel filled with water.
This morning I looked at it, and not a particle of oil was to be seen on
the surface of the water. So I said to myself, 'If this money belonged
to the oil-merchant it would be greasy from the touch of his hands; as
it is not so, the butcher's story must be true.'"

Bou-Akas nodded in token of approval.

"Good," said he. "And my horse?"

"Ah! that was a different business; and, until this morning, I was
greatly puzzled."

"The cripple, I suppose, did not recognize the animal?"

"On the contrary, he pointed him out immediately."

"How then did you discover that he was not the owner?"

"My object in bringing you separately to the stable, was not to see
whether you would know the horse, but whether the horse would
acknowledge you. Now, when you approached him, the creature turned
towards you, laid back his ears, and neighed with delight; but when the
cripple touched him, he kicked. Then I knew that you were truly his
master."

Bou-Akas thought for a moment, and then said: "Allah has given thee
great wisdom. Thou oughtest to be in my place, and I in thine. And yet,
I know not; thou art certainly worthy to be Scheik, but I fear that I
should but badly fill thy place as Cadi!"

From the Manchester Examiner.

LOVE.--A SONNET.

BY J. C. PRINCE.

    Love is an odor from the heavenly bowers,
      Which stirs our senses tenderly, and brings
      Dreams which are shadows of diviner things
    Beyond this grosser atmosphere of ours.
    An oasis of verdure and of flowers,
      Love smiteth on the Pilgrim's weary way;
      There fresher air, there sweeter waters play,
    There purer solace charms the quiet hours.
    This glorious passion, unalloyed, endowers
      With moral beauty all who feel its fire;
      Maid, wife, and offspring, brother, mother, sire,
    Are names and symbols of its hallowed powers.
      Love is immortal. From our head may fly
      Earth's other blessings; Love can never die!

    _Ashton, 5th March._

From the Spectator.

THE HISTORY OF SORCERY AND MAGIC.[I]

The rationale of magic, when a combination of skill and fraud imposed
upon the vulgar, is easily settled. The priests of the ancient
mythology, the adepts of the middle ages, turned their knowledge of
chemistry and mechanics and their proficiency in legerdemain to account;
and before we denounce the latter as impostors, we should bear in mind
the ignorance of the times in which they lived. People would not have
believed any natural explanation, though they might have felt inclined
to persecute the man when stripped of his magical character: we should
also consider how far the general belief might influence even the man
himself; how far he could in his inmost mind draw the distinction
between what we call natural philosophy and what the age considered
magic--a lawful if a riskful power over nature and spirits, by means of
occult knowledge. An allowance is further to be made for the stories as
they have come down to us; a distinction is to be drawn between the
actual facts and the fancy of the narrator, between the reality and the
romance of magic.

Sorcery and witchcraft (to which, notwithstanding its title, Mr.
Wright's book chiefly relates) was a more vulgar pursuit, and is a more
difficult matter to determine. The true magician was a master over both
the seen and the unseen world. His art could _compel_ spirits or demons
to obey him, however much against their will. It seems a question
whether a spell of sufficient potency could not control Satan himself.
The witch or wizard was a vulgar being, a mere slave of the Evil One,
with no original power, very limited in derived power, and, it would
appear, with no means of acting directly except upon the elements. The
facts relating to witchcraft, being often matter of legal record, are
more numerous and more correctly narrated than those relating to magic.
The difficulty of fixing the exact boundary between truth and falsehood,
guilt and innocence, in the case of witchcraft, is not so easily settled
as the sciolist in liberal philosophy imagines. Of course we all know
that men and women could not travel through the air on broomsticks, or
cause storms, or afflict cattle. Their innocence of the intention is
not always so certain: their power over a nervous or weakly person,
especially in bad health, might really, through the influence of
imagination, produce the death threatened, and the miserable patient
might pine away as his real or supposed waxen image slowly melted before
the fire. At a time when the belief in witchcraft was entertained by
society in general, as well as by the majority of educated men, it is
not likely that the persons who were generally accused of it were
skeptical on the subject. Their innocence would lie, not in their
disbelief of its power, but in their rejection of the practice. That an
accusation of witchcraft was sometimes made from political, religious,
or personal motives, is true; and numbers of innocent victims were
sacrificed in times of public mania on the subject. The question is,
whether many did not attempt unlawful arts in full belief of their
efficacy; and whether some, a compound of the self-dupe and the
impostor, did not make use of their reputed power to indulge in the
grossest license and to perpetrate abominable crimes.

The great difficulty, however, is the confessions. In many cases, no
doubt, the victims, worn down by terror and torture, said whatever their
examiners seemed to wish them to say; in other cases, their statements
were exaggerated by the reporters. Yet enough remains, after every
deduction, to render witches' confessions a very curious mental problem.
Was it vision, or monomania, or nervous delusion, all influenced by
foregone conclusion? or was it, as the mesmerists seem to hold, an
instance of clairvoyance in a high degree? The case of Gaufridi is of
this puzzling nature. Gaufridi was a French priest of licentious
character, who succeeded by the opportunities which his priestly
influence gave him, or by some pretended supernatural arts. His crimes
were discovered through the confession of one of his victims, a nun whom
he had abused before profession. After a time, she appeared to be
possessed; and, under treatment by a celebrated exorcist, (an inferior
hand having failed,) she, or the demon in possession, among other things
accused Gaufridi. _Her_ revelations may be resolved into an imposture
instigated by revenge, or a pious fraud caused by remorse, or hysterical
fits, with utterance shaped by memory; but what can be said of
Gaufridi's, made with a full knowledge of consequences?

     "The priests who conducted this affair seem almost to have lost
     sight of Louis Gaufridi, in their anxiety to collect these
     important evidences of the true faith. It was not till towards
     the close of winter that the reputed wizard was again thought
     of. A warrant was then obtained against him, and he was taken
     into custody, and confined in the prison of the conciergerie at
     Marseilles. On the fifth of March he was for the first time
     confronted with sister Magdalen, but without producing the
     result anticipated by his persecutors. Little information is
     given as to the subsequent proceedings against him; but he
     appears to have been treated with great severity, and to have
     persevered in asserting his innocence. Sister Magdalen, or
     rather the demon within her, gave information of certain marks
     on his body which had been placed there by the Evil One; and on
     search they were found exactly as described. It is not to be
     wondered at, if, after the intercourse which had existed
     between them, sister Magdalen were able to give such
     information. Still Gaufridi continued unshaken, and he made no
     confession; until at length, on Easter Eve, the twenty-sixth of
     March, 1611, a full avowal of his guilt was drawn from him, we
     are not told through what means, by two Capuchins of the
     Convent of Aix, to which place he had been transferred for his
     trial. At the beginning of April, another witness, the
     Demoiselle Victoire de Courbier, came forward to depose that
     she had been bewitched by the renegade priest, who had obtained
     her love by his charms; and he made no objection to their
     adding this new incident to his confession.

     "Gaufridi acknowledged the truth of all that had been said by
     sister Magdalen or by her demon. He said that an uncle, who had
     died many years ago, had left him his books, and that one day,
     about five or six years before his arrest on this accusation,
     he was looking them over, when he found amongst them a volume
     of magic, in which were some writings in French verse,
     accompanied with strange characters. His curiosity was excited,
     and he began to read it; when, to his great astonishment and
     consternation, the demon appeared in a human form, and said to
     him, 'What do you desire of me, for it is you who have called
     me?' Gaufridi was young, and easily tempted; and when he had
     recovered from his surprise and was reassured by the manner and
     conversation of his visitor, he replied to his offer, 'If you
     have power to give me what I desire, I ask for two things:
     first, that I shall prevail with all the women I like;
     secondly, that I shall be esteemed and honored above all the
     priests of this country, and enjoy the respect of men of wealth
     and honor.' We may see, perhaps, through these wishes, the
     reason why Gaufridi was persecuted by the rest of the clergy.
     The demon promised to grant him his desires, on condition that
     he would give up to him entirely his 'body, soul, and works;'
     to which Gaufridi agreed, excepting only from the latter the
     administration of the holy sacrament, to which he was bound by
     his vocation as a priest of the church.

     "From this time Louis Gaufridi felt an extreme pleasure in
     reading the magical book, and it always had the effect of
     bringing the demon to attend upon him. At the end of two or
     three days the agreement was arranged and completed, and, it
     having been fairly written on parchment, the priest signed it
     with his blood. The tempter then told him, that whenever he
     breathed on maid or woman, provided his breath reached their
     nostrils, they would immediately become desperately in love
     with him. He soon made a trial of the demon's gift, and used it
     so copiously that, he became in a short time a general object
     of attraction to the women of the district. He said that he
     often amused himself with exciting their passions when he had
     no intention of requiting them, and he declared that he had
     already made more than a thousand victims.

     "At length he took an extraordinary fancy to the young Magdalen
     de la Palude; but he found her difficult of approach, on
     account of the watchfulness of her mother, and he only overcame
     the difficulty by breathing on the mother before he seduced the
     daughter. He thus gained his purpose; took the girl to the cave
     in the manner she had already described, and became so much
     attached to her that he often repeated his charm on her, to
     make her more devoted in her love. Three days after their first
     visit to the cave, he gave her a familiar named Esmodes.
     Finding her now perfectly devoted to his will, he determined to
     marry her to Beelzebub, the prince of the demons; and she
     readily agreed to his proposal. He immediately called the demon
     prince, who appeared in the form of a handsome gentleman; and
     she then renounced her baptism and Christianity, signed the
     agreement with her blood, and received the demon's mark....

     "The priest gave an account of the Sabbaths, at which he was a
     regular attendant. When he was ready to go--it was usually at
     night--he either went to the open window of his chamber, or
     left the chamber, locking the door, and proceeded into the open
     air. There Lucifer made his appearance, and took him in an
     instant to their place of meeting, where the orgies of the
     witches and sorcerers lasted usually from three to four hours.
     Gaufridi divided the victims of the Evil One into three
     classes: the masqués, (perhaps the novices,) the sorcerers, and
     the magicians. On arriving at the meeting, they all worshipped
     the demon according to their several ranks; the masqués falling
     flat on their faces, the sorcerers kneeling with their heads
     and bodies humbly bowed down, and the magicians, who stood
     highest in importance, only kneeling. After this they all went
     through the formality of denying God and the Saints. Then they
     had a diabolical service in burlesque of that of the church, at
     which the Evil One served as priest in a violet chasuble; the
     elevation of the demon host was announced by a wooden bell, and
     the sacrament itself was made of unleavened bread. The scenes
     which followed resembled those of other witch-meetings.
     Gaufridi acknowledged that he took Magdalen thither, and that
     he made her swallow magical 'characters' that were to increase
     her love to him; yet he proved unfaithful to her at these
     Sabbaths with a multitude of persons, and among the rest with
     'a princess of Friesland.' The unhappy sorcerer confessed,
     among other things, that his demon was his constant companion,
     though generally invisible to all but himself; and that he only
     left him when he entered the church of the Capuchins to perform
     his religious duties, and then he waited for him outside the
     church door.

     "Gaufridi was tried before the Court of Parliament of Provence
     at Aix. His confession, the declaration of the demons, the
     marks on his body, and other circumstances, left him no hope of
     mercy. Judgment was given against him on the last day of April,
     and the same day it was put in execution. He was burnt alive."

_Narratives of Sorcery and Magic_ is a skilful and popular selection of
stories or narratives relating to the subject, not a philosophic
treatise. We are carried to France, Germany, England, Ireland, Scotland,
Spain, and America, by turns. We have the most remarkable trials for
witchcraft in these countries, as well as cases in which supernatural
agency was only an incidental part,--as that of the Earl and Countess of
Somerset, for the murder of Overbury.

By way of showing that Mr. Wright is by no means an indifferent
story-teller, we may refer to the following legend:

     "The demons whom the sorcerer served seem rarely to have given
     any assistance to their victims when the latter fell into the
     hands of the judicial authorities; but if they escaped
     punishment by the agency of the law, they were only reserved
     for a more terrible end. We have already seen the fate of the
     woman of Berkeley. A writer of the thirteenth century has
     preserved a story of a man who, by his compact with the Evil
     One, had collected together great riches. One day, while he was
     absent in the fields, a stranger of suspicious appearance came
     to his house and asked for him. His wife replied that he was
     not at home. The stranger said, 'Tell him when he returns, that
     to-night he must pay me my debt.' The wife replied that she was
     not aware that he owed any thing to him. 'Tell, him,' said the
     stranger, with a ferocious look, 'that I will have my debt
     to-night.' The husband returned, and when informed of what had
     taken place, merely remarked that the demand was just. He then
     ordered his bed to be made that night in an outhouse, where he
     had never slept before, and he shut himself in it with a
     lighted candle. The family were astonished, and could not
     resist the impulse to gratify their curiosity by looking
     through the holes in the door. They beheld the same stranger,
     who had entered without opening the door, seated beside his
     victim, and they appeared to be counting large sums of money.
     Soon they began to quarrel about their accounts, and were
     proceeding from threats to blows, when the servants, who were
     looking through the door, burst it open, that they might help
     their master. The light was instantly extinguished; and when
     another was brought, no traces could be found of either of the
     disputants, nor were they ever afterwards heard of. The
     suspicious-looking stranger was the demon himself, who had
     carried away his victim."

FOOTNOTES:

[I] Narratives of Sorcery and Magic, from the most Authentic Sources. By
Thomas Wright, Esq., M.A., F.S.A., &c., &c. In two volumes. Published by
Bentley.

From the Examiner.

HARTLEY COLERIDGE AND HIS GENIUS.

Hartley Coleridge was a poet whose life was so deplorable a
contradiction to the strength and subtlety of his genius, and the
capability and range of his intellect, that perhaps no such sad example
has ever found similar record.[J] Indeed we are obliged with sincere
grief to doubt, whether, as written here, the memoir should have been
written at all. With much respect for Mr. Derwent Coleridge, who is
himself no unworthy inheritor of a great name, his white neckcloth is
somewhat too prominently seen in the matter. There are too many labored
explainings, starched apologies, and painful accountings for this and
that. The writer was probably not conscious of the effort he was making,
yet the effort is but too manifest, A simple statement of facts, a
kindly allowance for circumstances, a mindful recollection of what his
father was in physical as well as mental organization, extracts from
Hartley's own letters, recollections of those among whom his latter life
was passed--this, as it seems to us, should have sufficed. Mr. Derwent
Coleridge brings too many church-bred and town-bred notions to the grave
design of moralizing and philosophizing his brother's simple life and
wayward self-indulgences. His motives will be respected, and his real
kindness not misunderstood; but it will be felt that a quiet and
unaffected little memoir of that strange and sorry career, and of those
noble nor wholly wasted powers, remains still to be written.

Meanwhile we gratefully accept the volumes before us, which in their
contents are quite as decisive of Hartley Coleridge's genius as of what
it might have achieved in happier circumstances. A more beautiful or
more sorrowful book has not been published in our day.

    "Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight,
    And burned is Apollo's laurel-bough,
    That sometime grew within this learned man."

Hartley Coleridge was the eldest son of the poet, and with much of his
father's genius (which in him, however, took a more simple and practical
shape than consisted with the wider and more mystical expanse of his
father's mind), inherited also the defects of his organization and
temperament. What would have become of the elder Coleridge but for the
friends in whose home his later years found a refuge, no one can say.
With no such friends or home, poor Hartley became a cast-away. After a
childhood of singular genius, manifested in many modes and forms, and
described with charming effect by his brother in the best passages and
anecdotes of the memoir, he was launched without due discipline or
preparation into the University of Oxford, where the catastrophe of his
life befell. He had first fairly shown his powers when the hard doom
went forth which condemned them to waste and idleness. He obtained a
fellowship-elect at Oriel, was dismissed on the ground of intemperance
before his probationary year had passed, and wandered for the rest of
his days by the scenes with which his father most wished to surround his
childhood--

    ("But thou, my babe, shall wander like a breeze
    By lakes and sandy shores, beneath the crags
    Of ancient mountains, and beneath the clouds
    Which image in their bulk both lakes and shores
    And mountain crags")

--listening with hardly less than his father's delight to the sounds and
voices of nature, in homely intimacy with all homely folk, uttering now
and then piercing words of wisdom or regret, teaching little children in
village schools, and----.

Well, it would be perhaps too much to say that he continued to justify
the rejection of the Oriel fellows. Who knows how largely that event may
itself have contributed to what it too hastily anticipated and too
finally condemned? It appears certain that the weakness had not thus
early made itself known to Hartley's general acquaintance at the
University. Mr. Dyce had nothing painful to remember of him, but
describes him as a young man possessing an intellect of the highest
order, with great simplicity of character and considerable oddity of
manner; and he hints that the college authorities had probably resented,
in the step they took, certain attacks more declamatory than serious
which Hartley had got into the habit of indulging against all
established institutions. Mr. Derwent Coleridge touches this part of the
subject very daintily. "My brother was, however, _I am afraid_, more
sincere in his invectives against establishments, as they appeared to
his eyes at Oxford, and elsewhere, _than Mr. Dyce kindly supposes_." How
poor Hartley would have laughed at that!

One thing to the last he continued. The simplicity of character which
Mr. Dyce attributes to his youth remained with him till long after his
hair was prematurely white. As Wordsworth hoped for him in his
childhood, he kept

    "A young lamb's heart among the full-grown flock;"

--and some delightful recollections of his ordinary existence from day
to day among the lakes and mountains, and in the service of the village
schools, are contributed to his brother's Memoir. Here is one, from one
of the scholars he taught:

     "I first saw Hartley in the beginning, I think, of 1837, when I
     was at Sedbergh, and he heard us our lesson in Mr. Green's
     parlor. My impression of him was what I conceived Shakespeare's
     idea of a gentleman to be, something which we like to have in a
     picture. He was dressed in black, his hair, just touched with
     gray, fell in thick waves down his back, and he had a frilled
     shirt on; and there was a sort of autumnal ripeness and
     brightness about him. His shrill voice, and his quick,
     authoritative 'right! right!' and the chuckle with which he
     translated 'rerum repetundarum' as 'peculation, a very common
     vice in governors of all ages,' after which he took a turn
     round the sofa--all struck me amazingly; his readiness
     astonished us all, and even himself, as he afterwards told me;
     for, during the time he was at the school, he never had to use
     a dictionary once, though we read Dalzell's selections from
     Aristotle and Longinus, and several plays of Sophocles. He took
     his idea, so he said, from what De Quincy says of one of the
     Eton masters fagging the lesson, to the great amusement of the
     class, and, while waiting for the lesson, he used to read a
     newspaper. While acting as second master he seldom occupied the
     master's desk, but sat among the boys on one of the school
     benches. He very seldom came to school in a morning, never till
     about eleven, and in the afternoon about an hour after we had
     begun. I never knew the least liberty taken with him, though he
     was kinder and more familiar than was then the fashion with
     masters. His translations were remarkably vivid; of [Greek:
     mogera mogerôs] 'toiling and moiling;' and of some ship or
     other in the Philoctetes, which he pronounced to be 'scudding
     under main-top sails,' our conceptions became intelligible.
     Many of his translations were written down with his initials,
     and I saw some, not a long while ago, in the Sophocles of a
     late Tutor at Queen's College, Oxford, who had them from
     tradition. He gave most attention to our themes; out of those
     sent in he selected two or three, which he then read aloud and
     criticised; and once, when they happened to agree, remarked
     there was always a coincidence of thought amongst great men.
     Out of school he never mixed with the boys, but was sometimes
     seen, to their astonishment, running along the fields with his
     arms outstretched, and talking to himself. He had no pet
     scholars except one, a little fair-haired boy, who he said
     ought to have been a girl. He told me that was the only boy he
     ever loved, though he always loved little girls. He was
     remarkably fond of the travelling shows that occasionally
     visited the village. I have seen him clap his hands with
     delight; indeed, in most of the simple delights of country
     life, he was like a child. This is what occurs to me at present
     of what he was when I first knew him; and, indeed, my after
     recollections are of a similarly fragmentary kind, consisting
     only of those little, numerous, noiseless, every-day acts of
     kindness, the sum of which makes a Christian life. His love of
     little children, his sympathy with the poor and suffering, his
     hatred of oppression, the beauty and the grace of his
     politeness before women, and his high manliness,--these are the
     features which I shall never forget while I have any thing to
     remember."

The same writer afterwards tells us:

     "On his way to one of these parties he called on me, and I
     could not help saying, 'How well you look in a white
     neckcloth!' 'I wish you could see me sometimes,' he replied;
     'if I had only black-silk stockings and shoe-buckles I should
     be quite a gentleman.' Those who had only seen him in the
     careless dress that he chose to adopt in the lanes--his
     trowsers, which were generally too long, doubled half way up
     the leg, unbrushed, and often splashed; his hat brushed the
     wrong way, for he never used an umbrella; and his wild,
     unshaven, weather-beaten look--were amazed at his metamorphose
     into such a faultless gentleman as he appeared when he was
     dressed for the evening. 'I hate silver forks with fish,' he
     said; 'I can't manage them.' So did Dr. Arnold, I told him.
     'That's capital; I am glad of such an authority. Do you know I
     never understood the gladiator's excellence till the other day.
     The way in which my brother eats fish with a silver fork made
     the thing quite clear.'

     "He often referred to his boyish days, when he told me he
     nearly poisoned half the house with his chemical infusions, and
     spoiled the pans, with great delight. The 'Pilgrim's Progress'
     was an early favorite with him. 'It was strange,' he said, 'how
     it had been overlooked. Children are often misunderstood. When
     I was a baby I have often been in the greatest terror, when, to
     all appearance, I was quite still;--so frightened that I could
     not make a noise. Crying, I believe, is oftener a sign of
     happiness than the reverse. I was looked upon as a remarkable
     child. My mother told me, when I was born she thought me an
     ugly red thing; but my father took me up and said, 'There's no
     sweeter baby any where than this.' He always thought too much
     of me. I was very dull at school, and hated arithmetic; I
     always had to count on my fingers.

     "He once took me to the little cottage where he lived by the
     Brathey, when Charles Lloyd and he were school-companions. Mrs.
     Nicholson, of Ambleside, told me of a donkey-race which they
     had from the market-cross to the end of the village and back,
     and how Hartley came in last, and minus his white straw hat."

Those who remember the ordinary (and most extraordinary) dress that hung
about his small eager person, will smile at this entry in his journal of
a visit to Rydal chapel, and the reflections awakened therein:

     "17th.--Sunday.--At Rydal chapel. Alas! I have been _Parcus
     Deorum cultor et infrequens_ of late. Would I could say with
     assurance, _Nunc interare cursus cogor relictos_. I never saw
     Axiologus (Wordsworth) look so venerable. His cape cloak has
     such a gravity about it. Old gentlemen should never wear light
     great coats unless they be military; and even then Uncle Toby's
     Roquelaure would be more becoming than all the frogs in Styx.
     On the other hand, loose trowsers should never invest the
     nether limbs of led. It looks as if the Septuagenarian were
     ashamed of a diminished calf. The sable silk is good and
     clerical, so are the gray pearl and the partridge. I revere
     gray worsted and ridge and furrow for [Greek: Omak rites] his
     sake, but perhaps the bright white lamb's wool doth most set
     off the leg of an elderly man. The hose should be drawn over
     the knees, unless the rank and fortune require diamond buckles.
     Paste or Bristol stones should never approach a gentleman of
     any age. Roomy shoes, not of varnished leather. Broad
     shoe-buckles, well polished. Cleanliness is an ornament to
     youth, but an indispensable necessity to old age. Breeches,
     velvet or velveteen, or some other solid stuff. There may be
     serious objections to reviving the trunk breeches of our
     ancestors. I am afraid that hoops would follow in their train.
     But the flapped waistcoat, the deep cuffs, and guarded
     pocket-holes, the low collar, I should hail with pleasure; that
     is, for grandfathers and men of grandfatherly years. I was
     about to add the point-lace ruffles, cravat, and frill, but I
     pause in consideration of the miseries and degraded state of
     the lace makers."

Occasional passages in his letters are very beautiful, and very sad.
Here is one--adverting to some attack made upon him:

     "'This jargon,' said my orthodox reviewer, 'might be excused in
     an alderman of London, but not in a Fellow elect of Oriel,' or
     something to the same purpose, evidently designing to recall to
     memory the most painful passage of a life not over happy. But
     perhaps it is as well to let it alone. The writer might be some
     one in whom my kindred are interested; for I am as much alone
     in my revolt as Abdiel in his constancy."

We are glad to see valuable testimony borne by Mr. James Spedding as to
his habits having left unimpaired his moral and spiritual sensibility:

     "Of his general character and way of life I might have been
     able to say something to the purpose, if I had seen more of
     him. But though he was a person so interesting to me in
     himself, and with so many subjects of interest in common with
     me, that a little intercourse went a great way; so that I feel
     as if I knew him much better than many persons of whom I have
     seen much more; yet I have in fact been very seldom in his
     company. If I should say ten times altogether, I should not be
     understating the number; and this is not enough to qualify me
     for a reporter, when there must be so many competent observers
     living, who really knew him well. One very strong impression,
     however, with which I always came away from him, may be worth
     mentioning; I mean, that his moral and spiritual sensibilities
     seemed to be absolutely untouched by the life he was leading.
     The error of his life sprung, I suppose, from moral incapacity
     of some kind--his way of life seemed in some things destructive
     of self-respect; and was certainly regarded by himself with a
     feeling of shame, which in his seasons of self-communion became
     passionate; and yet it did not at all degrade his mind. It
     left, not his understanding only, but also his imagination and
     feelings, perfectly healthy,--free, fresh, and pure. His
     language might be sometimes what some people would call gross,
     but that I think was not from any want of true delicacy, but
     from a masculine disdain of false delicacy; and his opinions,
     and judgment, and speculations, were in the highest degree
     refined and elevated--full of chivalrous generosity, and
     purity, and manly tenderness. Such, at least, was my invariable
     impression. It always surprised me, but fresh observations
     always confirmed it."

When Wordsworth heard of his death, he was much affected, and gave the
touching direction to his brother:--"Let him lie by us: he would have
wished it." It was accordingly so arranged.

     "The day following he walked over with me to Grasmere--to the
     churchyard, a plain enclosure of the olden time, surrounding
     the old village church, in which lay the remains of his wife's
     sister, his nephew, and his beloved daughter. Here, having
     desired the sexton to measure out the ground for his own and
     for Mrs. Wordsworth's grave, he bade him measure out the space
     of a third grave for my brother, immediately beyond.

     "'When I lifted up my eyes from my daughter's grave,' he
     exclaimed, 'he was standing there!' pointing to the spot where
     my brother had stood on the sorrowful occasion to which he
     alluded. Then turning to the sexton, he said, 'Keep the ground
     for us,--we are old people, and it cannot be for long.'"

     "In the grave thus marked out, my brother's remains were laid
     on the following Thursday, and in little more than a
     twelvemonth his venerable and venerated friend was brought to
     occupy his own. They lie in the south-east angle of the
     churchyard, not far from a group of trees, with the little
     beck, that feeds the lake with its clear waters, murmuring by
     their side. Around them are the quiet mountains."

We have often expressed a high opinion of Hartley Coleridge's poetical
genius. It was a part of the sadness of his life that he could not
concentrate his powers, in this or any other department of his
intellect, to high and continuous aims--but we were not prepared for
such rich proof of its exercise, within the limited field assigned to
it, as these volumes offer. They largely and lastingly contribute to the
rare stores of true poetry. In the sonnet Hartley Coleridge was a master
unsurpassed by the greatest. To its "narrow plot of ground" his habits,
when applied in the cultivation of the muse, most naturally led him--and
here he may claim no undeserved companionship even with Shakespeare,
Milton, and Wordsworth. We take a few--with affecting personal reference
in all of them.

    Hast thou not seen an aged rifted tower,
    Meet habitation for the Ghost of Time,
    Where fearful ravage makes decay sublime,
    And destitution wears the face of power?
    Yet is the fabric deck'd with many a flower
    Of fragrance wild, and many-dappled hues,
    Gold streak'd with iron-brown and nodding blue,
    Making each ruinous chink a fairy bower.
    E'en such a thing methinks I fain would be,
    Should Heaven appoint me to a lengthen'd age;
    So old in look, that Young and Old may see
    The record of my closing pilgrimage:
    Yet, to the last, a rugged wrinkled thing
    To which young sweetness may delight to cling!

    Pains I have known, that cannot be again,
    And pleasures too that never can be more:
    For loss of pleasure I was never sore,
    But worse, far worse is to feel no pain.
    The throes and agonies of a heart explain
    Its very depth of want at inmost core;
    Prove that it does believe, and would adore,
    And doth with ill for ever strive and strain.
    I not lament for happy childish years,
    For loves departed, that have had their day,
    Or hopes that faded when my head was gray;
    For death hath left me last of my compeers:
    But for the pain I felt, the gushing tears
    I used to shed when I had gone astray.

    A lonely wanderer upon the earth am I,
    The waif of nature--like uprooted weed
    Borne by the stream, or like a shaken reed,
    A frail dependent of the fickle sky.
    Far, far away, are all my natural kin;
    The mother that erewhile hath hush'd my cry,
    Almost hath grown a mere fond memory.
    Where is my sister's smile? my brother's boisterous din?
    Ah! nowhere now. A matron grave and sage,
    A holy mother is that sister sweet.
    And that bold brother is a pastor meet
    To guide, instruct, reprove a sinful age,
    Almost I fear, and yet I fain would greet;
    So far astray hath been my pilgrimage.

    How shall a man fore-doom'd to lone estate,
    Untimely old, irreverently gray,
    Much like a patch of dusky snow in May,
    Dead sleeping in a hollow--all too late--
    How shall so poor a thing congratulate
    The blest completion of a patient wooing,
    Or how commend a younger man for doing
    What ne'er to do hath been his fault or fate?
    There is a fable, that I once did read.
    Of a bad angel that was someway good,
    And therefore on the brink of Heaven he stood,
    Looking each way, and no way could proceed;
    Till at the last he purged away his sin
    By loving all the joy he saw within.

Here is another poem of very touching reference to his personal story:

    "When I received this volume small,
      My years were barely seventeen;
    When it was hoped I should be all
      Which once, alas! I might have been.

    "And now my years are thirty-five,
      And every mother hopes her lamb,
    And every happy child alive,
      May never be what now I am.

    "But yet should any chance to look
      On the strange medley scribbled here.
    I charge thee, tell them, little book,
      I am not vile as I appear.

    "Oh! tell them though thy purpose lame
      In fortune's race, was still behind,--
    Though earthly blots my name defiled,
      They ne'er abused my better mind.

    "Of what men are, and why they are
      So weak, so wofully beguiled,
    Much I have learned, but better far,
      I know my soul is reconciled."

Before we shut the volumes--which will often and often be re-opened by
their readers--we may instance, in proof of the variety of his verse,
some masterly heroic couplets on the character of Dryden, which will be
seen in a series of admirable "sketches of English poets" found written
on the fly-leaves and covers of his copy of _Anderson's British Poets_.
The successors of Dryden are not less admirably handled, and there are
some sketches of Wilkie, Dodsley, Langhorne, and rhymers of that class,
inimitable for their truth and spirit.

FOOTNOTES:

[J] Poems by Hartley Coleridge. With a Memoir of his Life. By his
Brother. Two vols. Moxon.

From the Cincinnati Commercial Advertiser.

LYRA.--A LAMENT.

BY ALICE CAREY.

    Maidens, whose tresses shine,
    Crowned with daffodil and eglantine,
    Or, from their stringed buds of brier-roses,
    Bright as the vermeil closes
    Of April twilights, after sobbing rains,
    Fall down in rippled skeins
    And golden tangles, low
    About your bosoms, dainty as new snow;
    While the warm shadows blow in softest gales
      Fair hawthorn flowers and cherry blossoms white
    Against your kirtles, like the froth from pails
      O'er brimmed with milk at night,
    When lowing heifers bury their sleek flanks
    In winrows of sweet hay, or clover banks--
    Come near and hear, I pray,
    My plained roundelay:
      Where creeping vines o'errun the sunny leas,
    Sadly, sweet souls, I watch your shining bands
    Filling with stained hands
      Your leafy cups with lush red strawberries;
    Or deep in murmurous glooms,
    In yellow mosses full of starry blooms,
    Sunken at ease--each busied as she likes,
      Or stripping from the grass the beaded dews,
    Or picking jagged leaves from the slim spikes
      Of tender pinks--with warbled interfuse
    Of poesy divine,
      That haply long ago
      Some wretched borderer of the realm of wo
    Wrought to a dulcet line:
    If in your lovely years
    There be a sorrow that may touch with tears
    The eyelids piteously, they must be shed
    FOR LYRA, DEAD.
    The mantle of the May
      Was blown almost within summer's reach,
    And all the orchard trees,
      Apple, and pear, and peach,
    Were full of yellow bees,
      Flown from their hives away.
    The callow dove upon the dusty beam
      Fluttered its little wings in streaks of light,
      And the gray swallow twittered full in sight--
    Harmless the unyoked team
      Browsed from the budding elms, and thrilling lays
      Made musical prophecies of brighter days;
    And all went jocundly; I could but say.
    Ah! well-a-day!
    What time spring thaws the wold,
    And in the dead leaves come up sprouts of gold,
    And green and ribby blue, that after hours
    Encrown with flowers;
    Heavily lies my heart
    From all delights apart,
    Even as an echo hungry for the wind,
    When fail the silver-kissing waves to unbind
    The music bedded in the drowsy strings
      Of the sea's golden shells--
    That, sometimes, with their honeyed murmurings
      Fill all its underswells:
    For o'er the sunshine fell a shadow wide
    When Lyra died.
    When sober Autumn, with his mist-bound brows,
    Sits drearily beneath the fading boughs,
    And the rain, chilly cold,
    Wrings from his beard of gold,
    And as some comfort for his lonesome hours,
    Hides in his bosom stalks of withered flowers,
    I think about what leaves are drooping round
    A smoothly shapen mound;
    And if the wild wind cries
    Where Lyra lies,
    Sweet shepherds, softly blow
    Ditties most sad and low--
    Piping on hollow reeds to your pent sheep--
    Calm be my Lyra's sleep.
    Unvexed with dream of the rough briers that pull
    From his strayed lambs the wool!
    O, star, that tremblest dim
    Upon the welkin's rim,
    Send with thy milky shadows from above
    Tidings about my love;
    If that some envious wave
    Made his untimely grave,
    Or if, so softening half my wild regrets,
    Some coverlid of bluest violets
    Was softly put aside,
    What time he died!
    Nay, come not, piteous maids,
    Out of the murmurous shades;
    But keep your tresses crowned as you may
    With eglantine and daffodillies gay,
    And with the dews of myrtles wash your cheek,
    When flamy streaks,
    Uprunning the gray orient, tell of morn--
    While I, forlorn,
    Pour all my heart in tears and plaints, instead,
    FOR LYRA, DEAD.

From Fraser's Magazine.

MY NOVEL:

OR, VARIETIES IN ENGLISH LIFE.

BY PISISTRATUS CAXTON.

_Continued from page 126._

PART VIII.--CHAPTER XIII.

Mr. Dale had been more than a quarter of an hour conversing with Mrs.
Avenel, and had seemingly made little progress in the object of his
diplomatic mission, for now, slowly drawing on his gloves, he said,--

"I grieve to think, Mrs. Avenel, that you should have so hardened your
heart--yes--you must pardon me--it is my vocation to speak stern truths.
You cannot say that I have not kept faith with you, but I must now
invite you to remember that I specially reserved to myself the right of
exercising a discretion to act as I judged best, for the child's
interests, on any future occasion; and it was upon this understanding
that you gave me the promise, which you would now evade, of providing
for him when he came into manhood."

"I say I will provide for him. I say that you may 'prentice him in any
distant town, and by-and-by we will stock a shop for him. What would you
have more, sir, from folks like us, who have kept shop ourselves? It
ain't reasonable what you ask, sir!"

"My dear friend," said the Parson, "what I ask of you at present is but
to see him--to receive him kindly--to listen to his conversation--to
judge for yourselves. We can have but a common object--that your
grandson should succeed in life, and do you credit. Now, I doubt very
much whether we can effect this by making him a small shopkeeper."

"And has Jane Fairfield, who married a common carpenter, brought him up
to despise small shopkeepers?" exclaimed Mrs. Avenel, angrily.

"Heaven forbid! Some of the first men in England have been the sons of
small shopkeepers. But is it a crime in them, or their parents, if their
talents have lifted them into such rank or renown as the haughtiest duke
might envy? England were not England if a man must rest where his father
began."

"Good!" said, or rather grunted, an approving voice, but neither Mrs.
Avenel nor the Parson heard it.

"All very fine," said Mrs. Avenel, bluntly. "But to send a boy like that
to the university--where's the money to come from?"

"My dear Mrs. Avenel," said the Parson, coaxingly, "the cost need not be
great at a small college at Cambridge; and if you will pay half the
expense, I will pay the other half. I have no children of my own, and
can afford it."

"That's very handsome in you, sir," said Mrs. Avenel, somewhat touched,
yet still not graciously, "But the money is not the only point."

"Once at Cambridge," continued Mr. Dale, speaking rapidly, "at
Cambridge, where the studies are mathematical--that is, of a nature for
which he has shown so great an aptitude--and I have no doubt he will
distinguish himself; if he does, he will obtain, on leaving, what is
called a fellowship--that is a collegiate dignity accompanied by an
income on which he could maintain himself until he made his way in life.
Come, Mrs. Avenel, you are well off; you have no relations nearer to you
in want of your aid. Your son, I hear, has been very fortunate."

"Sir," said Mrs. Avenel, interrupting the Parson, "it is not because my
son Richard is an honor to us, and is a good son, and has made his
fortin, that we are to rob him of what we have to leave, and give it to
a boy whom we know nothing about, and who, in spite of what you say,
can't bring upon us any credit at all."

"Why? I don't see that."

"Why?" exclaimed Mrs. Avenel, fiercely--"why? you know why. No, I don't
want him to rise in life; I don't want folks to be speiring and asking
about him. I think it is a very wicked thing to have put fine notions in
his head, and I am sure my daughter Fairfield could not have done it
herself. And now, to ask me to rob Richard, and bring out a great
boy--who's been a gardener, or ploughman, or such like--to disgrace a
gentleman who keeps his carriage, as my son Richard does--I would have
you to know, sir, no! I won't do it, and there's an end to the matter."

During the last two or three minutes, and just before that approving
"good" had responded to the Parson's popular sentiment, a door
communicating with an inner room had been gently opened, and stood ajar;
but this incident neither party had even noticed. But now the door was
thrown boldly open, and the traveller whom the Parson had met at the inn
walked up to Mr. Dale, and said, "No! that's not the end of the matter.
You say the boy's a cute, clever lad?"

"Richard, have you been listening?" exclaimed Mrs. Avenel.

"Well, I guess, yes--the last few minutes."

"And what have you heard?"

"Why, that this reverend gentleman thinks so highly of my sister
Fairfield's boy that he offers to pay half of his keep at college. Sir,
I'm very much obliged to you, and there's my hand, if you'll take it."

The Parson jumped up, overjoyed, and, with a triumphant glance towards
Mrs. Avenel, shook hands heartily with Mr. Richard.

"Now," said the latter, "just put on your hat, sir, and take a stroll
with me, and we'll discuss the thing business-like. Women don't
understand business; never talk to women on business."

With these words, Mr. Richard drew out a cigar-case, selected a cigar,
which he applied to the candle, and walked into the hall.

Mrs. Avenel caught hold of the Parson. "Sir, you'll be on your guard
with Richard. Remember your promise."

"He does not know all, then?"

"He? No! And you see he did not overhear more than what he says. I'm