CHAMBERS' EDINBURGH JOURNAL

 CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, EDITORS OF 'CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE, ' 'CHAMBERS'S EDUCATIONAL COURSE, ' &c. 

 No. 439. NEW SERIES. SATURDAY, MAY 29, 1852. PRICE 1-1/2_d. _

THEREFORE AND BECAUSE. 

A distinguished general-officer being appointed to a command in whichhe would be called on to discharge judicial as well as militaryduties, expressed to Lord Mansfield his apprehensions, that he wouldexecute his office but ill in the former respect, and that hisinexperience and ignorance of technical jurisprudence would prove aserious impediment to his efficient administration of justice. 'Makeyour mind perfectly easy, ' said the great judge; 'trust to your nativegood sense in forming your opinions, but beware of attempting to statethe grounds of your judgments. The judgment will probably beright--the argument infallibly wrong. '

This is a common case, especially with practical men, who rarely haveeither leisure or inclination to recall the workings of their ownminds, or observe the intellectual process by which they have beenconducted to any conclusion. By what they are prone to consider as akind of instinct--if by chance they are philosophers, and delight inwhat old Wilson, the essayist, calls 'inkhorn terms, ' they designateit 'intuition'--they arrive at a truth, but have no recollectionwhatever of the road they travelled to reach it, and are able neitherto retrace their own steps nor indicate to another the way they came. The poet, in describing and contrasting the intellectualcharacteristics of the two sexes, attributes to the softer somethingof this instinct as a distinguishing mental peculiarity, and seems toconsider it as somewhat analogous in its constitution to those animalsenses by means of which the mind becomes cognisant of externalobjects, of their existence, their qualities, and their relations. Inhis view, the reasoning process is vitally and essentially distinct, as it is exercised by men and by women--

 'Her rapid mind decides while his debates; She _feels_ a truth which he but calculates. '

And certainly this is a very pretty, very poetical, and veryconvenient way of accounting for a phenomenon that, if examined withcommon care, suggests a solution more accurate and complete, if notexactly so complimentary. In sober truth, a positive incapacityclearly to point out the precise manner in which a conviction has beenformed, is one of the commonest of logical deficiencies, and no moreto be ascribed exclusively to the softer sex, than it is an attributeof intellectual excellency in either. 

When, in Euripides's beautiful play, the untranslatable _Hippolylus_, Phædra's nurse is made to conclude that certain men she refers tocannot be otherwise than lax in their morals, _because_ they havefinished the roofs of their houses in a very imperfect manner, herreasoning is inconsequential enough; but not more so than that of therenowned French chancellor, Michael L'Hôpital, who, when employed innegotiating a treaty between Charles IX. And our Elizabeth, insistedon the well-known line of the Latin poet--

 'Et penitus toto divisos orbe Britannos, '

as a _reason_ that Calais should not be returned to the English. Theconnection between the premises and the conclusion was not more realin one case than in the other. A learned member of the medicalprofession, in an elaborate work on the climate and the people ofMalta, enjoins on the invalid a participation in the amusements ofcheerful society; and the propriety of his injunction few will bedisposed to dispute: they may well, however, marvel at the _reason_ heassigns for such sensible advice--that, so far as invalids areconcerned, society has a direct tendency to promote cutaneousperspiration!

Cardinal de Retz severely reprehends the historians of his time fortheir pedantic affectation of explaining and accounting for everyevent they record--the motives that actuated this statesman, thereasons which prompted that policy, the wherefore it was thisenterprise miscarried, or that undertaking brought to a successfulissue. It would not be difficult to furnish a lengthy catalogue of theblunders historical writers have perpetrated through their overweeningaddiction to this folly. Let two instances here suffice: When theRoman Church, about the middle of the eleventh century, wasendeavouring to insure the celibacy of its priesthood, the marriedclergy, who braved its censures and contemned its authority, becameknown as _Nicolaites_; which name, grave writers assure us, was giventhem in consequence of the active share Pope Nicholas II. Had taken inpunishing their contumacy and effecting their suppression. The notionthat any sect or class of religionists should have borrowed its namefrom that of its most zealous opponent and indefatigable persecutor, is worthy only of those critics, so severely reprehended byQuintilian, who professed to discover the etymon of the Latin word_lucus_, a grove, in the substantive _lux_, light; and vindicated thederivation on the ground, that in groves darkness usually prevailed. The familiar expression of _lucus à non lucendo_, owes its birth tothis striking manifestation of critical sagacity. 

Again: a certain portion of the eastern and southern coast of Englandwas, in early times, denominated 'the Saxon Shore'--LittusSaxonicum--and was, during the days of Roman supremacy, under thegovernment of a military court enjoying the appellative of _ComesLittoris Saxonici_. Acute historical critics inform us, that thistract was so denominated in consequence of its being open to theaggressions of the Saxons; that, in short, it received its name fromits occasional invaders, and not from its permanent inhabitants. Theabsurdity of this explanation is the greater, inasmuch as, on theother side of the Channel, there was a large district bearingprecisely the same name, and settled entirely by adventurers, Saxon inbirth or by descent. This, one would have thought, would havesuggested to our English antiquaries a more probable explanation ofthe name than that they adopted. The people of Genoa have, or had, inspeaking, a peculiar way of clipping or cutting short their syllables. Their Italian has never been considered pure. You must not go tomaritime towns for purity of language, especially to such as have beenlong and extensively engaged in commercial pursuits. Labat, however, gives a special and peculiar reason for the fashion of mutilatedspeech in which, he declares, the Genoese indulge, telling us theycall their superb city _Gena_, and not _Genoa_. He refers their'chopping' pronunciation to their habitual economy--an economydistinctly traceable to their mercantile habits. 'Telle est leuréconomie, ' he says, 'ils rognent tout jusqu'aux paroles. '

The old English law-writer, Bracton, desiring to account for theancient doctrine of English law, that inheritances shall lineallydescend, and never lineally ascend, finds a reason in the fact, that abowl being trundled, runs down a hill and never up a hill; andLittleton, the first great writer on English real property-law, tracesthe origin of the phrase 'hotchpot'--a familiar legal term--to thearchaic denomination of a pudding, in our English tongue. 'Itseemeth, 'he says, 'that this word, hotchpot, is in English a pudding;for in this pudding is not commonly put one thing alone, and_therefore_ it behoveth, in this case, to put the lands given infrank-marriage, ' &c. Erasmus used to say of lawyers, that of ignorantpeople, they were the most learned. Questionless they are not alwayssound logicians. When the clown in Hamlet disserts so learnedly on'crowner's quest-law, ' he is only parodying, and that closely, ascarcely less ludicrous judgment which had actually been pronounced, not long before, in the Court of Queen's Bench. Dr Clarke, thetraveller, tells an amusing story to the purpose. According to him, the Turkish lawyers recognise as an offence what they style 'homicideby an intermediate cause'--an instance of which offence our travellerdetails in these words: 'A young man, desperately in love with a girlof Stanchio--the ancient Cos, the birthplace of Hippocratesand Apelles, the lovely isle renowned for its lettuces andturpentine--eagerly sought to marry her. But his proposals wererejected. In consequence, he destroyed himself by poison. The Turkishpolice arrested the father of the obdurate fairy, and tried him forculpable homicide. "If the accused, " they argued, with becominggravity, "had not had a daughter, the deceased would not have fallenin love; consequently, he would not have been disappointed;consequently, he would not have died: but he (the accused) had adaughter, and the deceased had fallen in love, " &c. &c. Upon all thesecounts he was called upon to pay the price of the young man's life;and this, being eighty piastres, was accordingly exacted. ' When theamiable and gentle John Evelyn was in the Netherlands, a woman waspointed out to him who had had twenty-five husbands, and was then awidow; 'yet it could not be proved, ' he says, that 'she had made anyof her husbands away, though the suspicion had brought her severaltimes to trouble. ' However, the Dutch logicians made no difficulty ofthe matter; and arguing, from the number of the woman's husbands, thatshe could not be wholly innocent of their death, prohibited her frommarrying again--which, her addiction to matrimony being considered, was perhaps, of all the 'troubles' she had undergone, by no means theleast. 

The logical faculty, which not only consists with the poetical, but isinvariably and necessarily associated with it, whenever the latterexists in an advanced stage of development, is in no writer moreconspicuous as an intellectual characteristic than in Schiller. Inthis respect he is not excelled even by Wordsworth himself; but Homersometimes snoozes, and Schiller's reasoning is not alwaysconsequential: as, for instance, when he denies two compositions ofOvid--the _Tristia_ and _Ex Ponto_--to be genuine poetry, on theground that they were the results not of inspiration, but ofnecessity; just as if poetry were not a thing to be judged of byitself; and as if one could not determine whether it were present orabsent in a composition, without knowing to what influences the authorwas subjected at the time the composition was produced!

Rousseau, in one of his moods of bilious cynicism, falls foul of humanreason altogether. No man despised it more in action; no one couldmore consistently decry it in speculation. In his opinion, theexercise of the reasoning powers is absolutely sinful--_l'homme quiraisonne est l'homme qui péche_. Franklin, on the other hand, in afamiliar tone of playful banter, vindicates its utility, alleging thatit is mightily 'convenient to be a rational animal, who knows how tofind or invent a plausible pretext for whatever it has an inclinationto do. ' Examples of this convenience abound. The Barbary Jews wererich and industrious, and, accordingly, their wealth provoke thecupidity of the indolent and avaricious Mussulmans. These latter, whenever a long drought had destroyed vegetation, and the strenuousprayers offered up in the mosques had proved unavailing for itsremoval, were accustomed to argue--and a mighty convenient argument itwas--that it was the foul breath of the Jews that had offended Heaven, and rendered the pious petitions of the faithful of none effect. Theremedy for the drought, then, who could doubt? The true believersdrove the Jews out of their cities, and quietly confiscated theirgoods. Dryden, anxious to congratulate Charles II. On his 'happyrestoration, ' amidst a thousand fulsome compliments--all tending toshew that that prince was the author of blessings, not only to his ownkingdoms, but to universal humanity--declares, that it was to Charles, and to him only, Spain was indebted for her magnificent colonialpossessions in either hemisphere. Addressing the sovereign, his wordsare--

 'Spain to your gift _alone_ her Indies owes, _For what the powerful takes not, he bestows_. '

A convenient fashion of reasoning truly: as convenient every whit asthat of Daniel Burgess, a witty Presbyterian minister, devoted to theHouse of Brunswick and the principles of the Revolution, who was wontto affirm, as the reason the descendants of Jacob were calledIsraelites, and did not receive the original name of their progenitor, that Heaven was unwilling they should bear a name in every way soodious as that of Jacobites. 

Once more: it appears from Dr Tschudi's valuable and interesting workon South America, that in Peru rice is cheap, and servants both lazyand dirty. Now, the servants in Lima have a theory about rice. Theyconsider it possesses certain qualities antagonistic to water, sothat, after eating, to touch water would be seriously injurious tohealth; and thus does their frequent consumption of rice supply themwith a most convenient reason or excuse for their habitual abstinencefrom an operation they detest--that of washing their hands. 

Verily, they are mighty fine and convenient words, THEREFORE andBECAUSE. 

DAVID'S LAST PICTURE. 

The whole population of the good city of Brussels was in a state ofexcitement. Talma, the great French tragedian, was that evening toclose his engagement by appearing in his favourite character ofLeonidas; and from an early hour in the morning, the doors of thetheatre were beset with waiting crowds, extending to the very end ofthe large square in which it stood. It was evident that the building, spacious as it was, could not contain one-half of the eager expectantsalready assembled, and yet every moment brought a fresh accession tothe number destined to be disappointed. The hero of this ovation, andthe object of all this unusual excitement to the worthy and naturallyphlegmatic beer-drinkers of old Brabant, was standing near a window inthe White Cross Hotel, engaged most prosaically in shaving himself;and, from time to time, casting on the crowd, to which he was themagnet of attraction, the careless glance of a monarch become fromhabit almost insensible to the loyal enthusiasm of his subjects. 

'So he will not come?' said the tragedian to an old friend who waswith him. 'He is a cynical old fool; and yet, I assure you, my dear M. Lesec, that I had _Leonidas_ got up expressly for him, thinking totickle his old republican fancies, for to my mind it is as stupid aplay as _Germanicus_, though I contrive to produce an effect with someof its high-sounding patriotic passages; and I thought the worthyDavid would have recognised his own picture vivified. But he will notcome: he positively refused, you tell me. I might have known it. Age, exile, the memory of the past--all this has cut him up terribly: he isthe David of the Consulate no longer. '

'I am just come from him, ' answered Collector Lesec: 'he received mealmost as Hermione receives Orestes in the fourth act of _Andromache_. To say the least of it, he was somewhat tart. "I never go to thetheatre, " he answered abruptly. "Tell my friend Talma, that I thankhim for his kindness; but I always go to bed at nine. I should be veryglad if he would come, before he left Brussels, and have a tankard anda smoke with me. "'

'I see, ' said Talma with a half-ironical smile, 'he is turned quiteFlemish. Poor fellow! to what has he come?--to smoking tobacco, andlosing all faith in art. Persecution does more harm than theguillotine, ' added the tragedian in a tone of bitterness. 'There is aliving death. David's exile has deprived us of many a _chef-d'oeuvre_. I can forgive the Restoration for surrounding itself with nobodies, but it need not banish our men of talent: they are not to be foundnow-a-days in every corner. But enough. Another word, and we should betalking politics. '

Leonidas finished shaving like any other man; and then turned suddenlyto his friend: 'I bet you ten napoleons, ' said he, 'that David wouldhave come to the play had I gone myself to him with the invitation! Iintended it, but I had not time; these rehearsals kill me--I might aswell be a galley-slave. However, I have about three-quarters of anhour to myself now, and I will go beard the old Roman in hisstronghold. What say you to going with me?'

It would have been difficult to name a place to which M. Lesec wouldnot have gone, to have the honour of being seen arm-in-arm with thegreat Talma; and in another half hour they were on their way acrossthe Place de la Monnaie into the Rue Pierre Plate. 

'Now for a storm!' said Lesec. 'We are in for it: so be prepared. Ileave it all on your shoulders, noble sir, for I must keep clear ofhim. '

'Is he, then, so entirely changed?' exclaimed Talma, quickening hispace. 'Poor exile! unhappy genius! torn from thy native soil, tolanguish and die!'

The visitors soon reached the large, though somewhat dilapidatedmansion of the celebrated artist; and after they had been reconnoitredthrough a small grating by an old female servant, they were usheredinto a rather gloomy apartment, presenting a singular discrepancybetween its antique decorations and modern furniture. 

The illustrious exile came out of an adjoining apartment in hisdressing-gown, and advanced towards them with a quick yet almostmajestic step, though his form was slightly bent, apparently by age. To Talma's great surprise, David received him most cordially, eventhrowing away his usually inseparable companion, a long pipe, to graspboth his hands. 'Welcome, welcome, my old friend!' he said; 'you couldnot have come at a better time. I have not for many a day felt sohappy, and the sight of you is a great addition. ' And the old painterkept rubbing his hands, a token with him of exuberant satisfaction. 

Talma looked at Lesec as much as to say: 'The devil is not quite soblack as he is painted;' while the worthy collector only shrugged hisshoulders, and lifted his eyebrows in pantomimic expression of hisinability to comprehend such a sudden change in the atmosphere. 

'You must promise to come and dine with me to-morrow, ' continued thepainter, accompanying his invitation with a smile, or rather a grin, for David's face was very much disfigured by a wen on his cheek, whichalso, by causing a twitching of the jaw, rendered his articulationindistinct. 

'To my great regret, I am obliged to decline your invitation, my dearfriend, ' said Talma. 'This is my last night here, and I must set offfor Paris to-morrow. '

'Set off to-morrow!'

'Positively. Michelet and Dumas have the whole management on theirshoulders, and are pressing my return; and Lemercier is only waitingfor me to read to us a sort of _Richard the Third_. '

'Nevertheless, you dine with me to-morrow. One day longer will notmatter to them, and is a great matter to me. I suspect Lemercier's_Richard the Third_ is cold enough to keep a little longer. I am tohave my friend Girodet with me; so dine with us you must. It will makeme grow young again, man, and bring back the happy meetings atMoliker's, near the gate of the Louvre. '

The illustrious exile accompanied this sentence with another of hisgrim smiles. The actor was deeply moved by it, for in that bittersmile he read how the artist pined for his country. 'I will stay withyou, I will stay with you, dear David!' now eagerly cried Talma. 'Foryour sake, I will desert my post, and steal a holiday from my Parisfriends; but it can only be on condition that you, too, will make alittle sacrifice for me, and come this evening to see me in Leonidas. '

'Well, I don't care if I do, ' answered the painter, whom the sight ofone friend, and the expectation of seeing another, had made quite adifferent being from the David of the morning. 'Here goes forLeonidas; but, remember, I give you fair warning--I shall go to sleep. I have scarcely ever been in a theatre that I did not take a soundnap. '

'But when Talma plays, plaudits will keep you awake, M. David, ' saidthe courtly M. Lesec; and this seasonable compliment obtained for hima smile, and an invitation for the next day, so flattering to hisvanity that, even at the risk of compromising himself with the Princeof Orange, he unhesitatingly accepted. 

That evening, between six and seven o'clock, the old French painter, a Baron of the Empire, entered the theatre in full dress, and with anew red ribbon in his button-hole; but, as if shrinking from notice, he took his seat at the back of the stage-box, reserved for him by hisfriend Talma, with M. Lesec by his side, prouder, more elated, more frizzled and befrilled, than if he had been appointedfirst-commissioner of finance. But notwithstanding all the care of themodest artist to preserve his incognito, it was soon whispered throughthe theatre that he was one of the audience; and it was not longbefore he was pointed out, when instantly the whole house stood uprespectfully, and repeated cheers echoed from pit to vaulted roof. Theprince himself was among the first to offer this tribute to theillustrious exile, who, confused, agitated, and scarcely able torestrain his tears, bowed to the audience rather awkwardly, as hewhispered to M. Lesec: 'So, then, I am still remembered. I thought noone at Brussels cared whether I was dead or alive. '

Soon Talma appeared as Leonidas; and in his turn engrossed every eye, every thought of that vast assembly. A triple round of applause hailedevery speech uttered by the generous Spartan. The painter of theSabines, of Brutus, of the Horatii, of the Coronation, seemed to heedneither the noisy acclamations nor the deep silence that succeededeach other. Mute, motionless, transfixed, he heard not the plaudits:it was not Talma he saw, not Talma he was listening to. He was atThermopylæ by the side of Leonidas himself; ready to die with him andhis three hundred heroes. Never had he been so deeply moved. He hadtalked of sleep, but he was as much alive, as eager, as animated, asif he were an actual sharer in the heroic devotedness that was thesubject of the drama. For some moments after the curtain fell, heseemed equally absorbed; it was not till he was out of the theatre, and in the street, that he recovered sufficiently to speak; and thenit was only to repeat every five minutes: 'What a noble talent it is!What a power he has had over me!'

A night of tranquil sleep, and dreams of bright happy days, closed anevening of such agreeable excitement to the poor exile; and socheering was its effect upon him, that he was up the next morningbefore day, and his old servant, to her surprise, saw her usuallygloomy and taciturn master looking almost gay while charging her tohave breakfast ready, and to be sure that dinner was in every waybefitting the honoured guests he expected. 

'And are you going out, sir, and so early?' exclaimed the old woman;now, for the first time, perceiving that her master had his hat on andhis cane in his hand. 

'Yes, Dame Rebecca, ' answered David, as he gained the outer gate. 'Ihave grown a great boy, and may be trusted to go alone. '

'But it is scarcely daylight yet. None of the shops are open. '

'I do not want to make any purchases. '

'Then, where in the world can you be going, sir, at this hour?'

'_Sacre bleu!_' returned the painter, losing all patience: 'could younot guess, you old fool, that I am going as far as the Flanders-gateto meet my old friend Girodet?'

'O that, indeed! But are you sure he will come that way? And did hetell you the exact time?'

'What matter, you old torment? Suppose I have to wait a few minutesfor him, I can walk up and down, and it will be exercise for me, which, you know, Dr Fanchet has desired me to take. Go along in, anddon't let the dinner be spoiled. ' And the old man went on his way withan almost elastic step. Once more was he young, gay, happy. Was he notsoon to see the friend dearer to him than all the world? But hiseagerness had made him anticipate by two hours the usual time for thearrival of the diligence, and he was not made aware of hismiscalculation till after he had been a good while pacing up and downthe suburb leading to the Flanders-gate. The constant companion alikeof his studio and his exile, his pipe, he had left behind him, forgotten in his hurry; so that he had no resource but to continue hissolitary walk, the current of his happy thoughts flowing on, meanwhile, uninterrupted, save by an occasional greeting fromlabourers going to their work, or the countrywomen hastening, as muchas their Flemish _embonpoint_ would allow, to the city markets. Whensauntering about alone, especially when waiting, we, like children, make the most of everything that can while away the time, or give eventhe semblance of being occupied: a flower-pot in a window, a parrot ina cage, nay, even an insect flying past, is an absolute gain to us. David felt it quite a fortunate chance when he suddenly caught sightof a sign-painter carrying on his work in the open air. Thoughevidently more of a whitewasher than a painter, yet, from the top ofhis ladder, he was flourishing his brush in a masterly style, and attimes pausing and contemplating his work with as much complacency asGros could have done his wonderful cupola of Sainte-Geneviève. 

The painter of Napoleon passed the self-satisfied dauber twice, notwithout some admiring glances at the way in which he was plasteringthe background of his landscape with indigo, by way of making a sky. At top of the sign, now nearly finished, was traced, in largecharacters, 'Break of Day;' a precaution as indispensable to point outthe artist's design, as the inscription, 'Dutch and Flemish Beer, ' wasto announce the articles dealt in by the owner of the house upon whichthis masterpiece was to figure. 

'Here's a pretty fellow!' said the artist to himself; 'with as muchknowledge of perspective as a carthorse; and yet, I doubt not, thinking himself a second Rubens. He brushes away as if he werepolishing a pair of boots. And what matter? Why should he not enjoyhimself in his own way?' But when he passed the ladder for the thirdtime, and saw a fresh layer of indigo putting over the first, hispatience could hold out no longer, and he exclaimed, without stoppingor even looking at the offender: 'There is too much blue!'

'Eh! Do you want anything, sir?' said the sign-painter; but he who hadventured the criticism was already at a distance. 

Again, David passed by. Another glance at the 'Break of Day, ' andanother exclamation: 'Too much blue, you blockhead!' The insultedplasterer turned round to reconnoitre the speaker, and as ifconcluding, from his appearance, that he could be no very greatconnoisseur, he quietly set to work again, shrugging his shoulders inwonder how it could possibly be any business of his whether the skywas red, green, or blue. For the fourth time the unknown loungerrepeated his unwelcome criticism: 'Too much blue!'

The Brussels Wouvermans coloured, but said, in the subdued tone of aman wishing to conceal anger he cannot help feeling: 'The gentlemanmay not be aware that I am painting a sky. ' By this time he had comedown from the ladder, and was standing surveying his work with one eyeclosed, and at the proper distance from it to judge of its effect; andhis look of evident exultation shewed that nothing could be moreill-timed than any depreciation of his labours. 

'It is because I suppose you do want to paint a sky, that for thatvery reason I wished to give you this little piece of advice, and totell you that there is too much blue in it. '

'And pray, Mr Amateur, when was there ever a sky seen without blue?'

'I am no amateur; but I tell you once more, that there is too muchblue. And now do as you like; and if you do not think you have enough, you can put more. '

'This is entirely too bad!' cried the now exasperated sign-painter. 'You are an old fool, and know nothing of painting. I should like tosee you make a sky without blue. '

'I do not say I am a good hand at a sky; but if I did set about it, there should be no blue. '

'A pretty job it would be!'

'It would look like something, at all events. '

'That is as much as to say mine is like nothing at all. '

'No indeed, for it is very like a dish of spinach, and very like avile daub, or like anything else you please. '

'A dish of spinach! a vile daub!' cried the artist of Brabant in arage. 'I, the pupil of Ruysdael--I, fourth cousin to Gerard Dow! andyou pretend to know more of my art than I do--an art I have practisedwith such credit at Antwerp, Louvain, and Liege! A dish of spinach, indeed!' And by this time the fury of the insulted painter hadincreased to such a degree, that he seized David by the arm, andshaking him violently, added: 'Do you know, you old dotard, that mycharacter has been long established? I have a red horse at Mechlin, astag at Namur, and a Charlemagne at Aix-la-Chapelle, that no one hasever seen without admiring!'

'This is beyond all patience, ' said David; and suddenly extricatinghimself from the man's grasp, and snatching his palette from him, hewas up the ladder in an instant, shouting: 'Wait awhile, and you shallhave yourself to admire, with your fool's pate and your ass's ears!'

'Stop, stop, you villain!' roared the luckless artist, pale withconsternation. 'My splendid sign! A painting worth thirty-five francs!I am ruined and undone!' And he continued shaking the ladder, andpouring out a torrent of abuse upon David, who, caring neither for thereproaches of his victim, nor for the crowd that the sudden clamourhad attracted, went on pitilessly effacing the 'Break of Day, ' andmingling in one confused mass sky and sun, and trees and figures; orwhat was intended, at least, to represent them. And now--not lessrapid in creating than in destroying--and with the lightest possibletouch of his brush, the new sign-painter sketched and finished, withmagic rapidity, a sky with the gray tints of early dawn, and a groupof three men, glass in hand, watching the rising sun; one of thesefigures being a striking likeness of the whitewasher, shewn at once byhis bushy eyebrows and snub-nose. 

The crowd, that had at first shewn every inclination to take the partof their countryman against a stranger unfairly interfering with him, now stood quietly watching the outlines as they shone through thefirst layers of colour, and shouts of applause burst from them as thefigures grew beneath the creative hand of the artist. Thetavern-keeper himself now swelled the number of admirers, having comeout to ascertain the cause of the tumult; and even the fourth-cousinof Gerard Dow felt his fury fast changing into admiration. 

'I see it all now, ' he said to those nearest him in the crowd. 'He isa French or Dutch sign-painter, one of ourselves, and he only wantedto have a joke against me. It is but fair to own that he has the realknack, and paints even better than I do. '

The artist to whom this equivocal compliment was paid, was now comingdown from the ladder amid the cheers of the spectators, when a newadmirer was added to them in the person of a man who, mounted on afine English horse, seemed inclined to ride over the crowd in hiseagerness to get a good view of the painting. 

'That picture is mine!' he exclaimed; 'I will have it. I will buy it, even if I have to cover it with guineas!'

'What do you mean?' asked the tavern-keeper. 

'I mean, that I will give any price you choose to name for that sign, 'answered the stranger. 

'The picture is not to be sold, young man; I could not think ofparting with it, ' said the whitewasher with as much paternal pride asif it had been indeed his workmanship. 

'Certainly not, ' said the vender of beer; 'for it has been alreadysold, and partly paid for in advance. The picture is mine; and, thoughnot very anxious to dispose of it, yet, perhaps, we may come to someunderstanding, and make a bargain. '

'Not so fast, ' said the dauber; 'the sign belongs to me, and mybrother-artist was only kindly giving me a helping-hand. It is mylawful property; and if this gentleman wants to buy it, he must dealwith me for it. '

'I tell you, ' replied the tavern-keeper, 'that the "Break of Day" ismy property, as sure as it is now hanging in front of my house. '

The dispute was waxing louder and louder, when David broke in: 'And amI to go for nothing in the matter? Methinks I might be allowed a voicein it. '

'And a good right you have, brother, ' said the sign-painter; 'and I amsure you and I shall have no difference about it. But the open streetis no place for all this. We had better go into the house, and settlethe matter over a pot of beer. '

David, wishing to escape the continually increasing crowd, consentedto the adjournment, which, however, had no effect upon the disputants, and the contest waged more fiercely than ever; nor did theEnglishman's reiterated offers to give for the picture its weight ingold tend to allay it. 

'But what will you say, if I won't let it be sold?' cried David, atlength losing all patience. 

'Ah, good sir, ' said the tavern-keeper, 'you would not deprive a poor, struggling man like me of this opening for getting a little readymoney to enable me to lay in a stock of beer. As for thatsign-painter, he is a drunken sot, who has left himself without asmuch as a stiver to give his daughter, who ought to have been marrieda year ago. '

'Do not believe him, sir, ' cried David's brother-artist. 'Every oneknows there is not a fonder father in the whole town; and more shameto me if I were not, for never was there such a good daughter as mydear, pretty Lizette. I have no money to give her, to be sure, but sheis betrothed to an honest fellow, who is glad to get her, poor as sheis. He is a young Frenchman, a cabinet-maker, and no better workman inthe whole city; and they are to be married whenever he has anythingsaved. '

'A good child, and a good workman, and only waiting for wherewithal tolive! This alters the matter entirely, ' said David; 'and the youngcouple shall have the picture. We leave it to this gentleman'sliberality to name the price he is willing to give for it. '

'Illustrious artist, ' said the Englishman, 'I rejoice in the decisionyou have come to: Solomon himself could not have given a wiser one. Asfor me, I have already offered a hundred guineas for the sign as itstands; but I will give two hundred, if you will consent to inscribeon it the two words "Pierre David. "'

The name was no sooner pronounced, than a cry of astonishment anddelight burst from all present; and the poor sign-painter, with tearsin his eyes, implored pardon for all his rudeness and presumption, andpoured out grateful thanks for the Master's kind intentions in favourof the young couple. 

By this time the news had reached the crowd without, and was receivedwith repeated shouts, and cries of 'Long live David!' 'Long live theprince of artists!' But the cheers became almost deafening, when thepretty Lizette, having heard the wonderful story of a sign having beenpainted that was to hasten her marriage, and give her a dowry of 200guineas, made her appearance, and, without a moment's hesitation, threw her arms about the neck of her benefactor, who returned hercaresses most cordially; declaring that, all things considered, he didnot know any one who had a better right to a kiss from the bride. 

At this instant Talma, followed by Girodet and the collector, hurriedly entered the tavern. Not finding David at his house, andbeing told of his having left home very early, they became uneasy lestsome accident had befallen him, and set off in search of him. 

'Thank Heaven, we have found him!' said Girodet. 

'And very well employed, too, I declare, ' cried Talma. 'If I could besure of meeting such a kind welcome from a pretty girl, I should notmind getting up early myself!'

'Bravo, bravo, my old friend!' said Girodet, as, after a warm embracefrom him, he turned to examine the picture: 'I never expected to hearof your changing your style, and turning Flemish sign-painter. But itis no shame for David to end as Rembrandt began. '

ADMIRAL BLAKE. [1]

A good biography is ever welcome; and if it be the biography of a goodand a great man, the cordiality of the _bienvenu_ is doubled. MrPrescott remarks, [2] that there is no kind of writing, having truthand instruction for its main object, which, on the whole, is sointeresting and popular as biography: its superiority, in this pointof view, to history, consisting in the fact, that the latter has todeal with masses--with nations, which, like corporate societies, seemto have no soul, and whose chequered vicissitudes may be contemplatedrather with curiosity for the lessons they convey, than with personalsympathy. Among contemporary biographers, Mr Hepworth Dixon hasalready established for himself a name of some distinction by hispopular lives of William Penn and John Howard; nor will his creditsuffer a decline in the instance of the memoir now before us--that ofthe gallant and single-minded patriot, Robert Blake. Of this fine oldEnglish worthy, republican as he was, the Tory Hume freely affirms, that never man, so zealous for a faction, was so much respected andeven esteemed by his opponents. 'Disinterested, generous, liberal;ambitious only of true glory, dreadful only to his avowed enemies; heforms one of the most perfect characters of the age, and theleast stained with those errors and vices which were then sopredominant. '[3] Yet hitherto the records of this remarkable man havebeen scanty in matter, and scattered in form--the most notable beingDr Johnson's sketch in the _Gentleman's Magazine_, and another in the_Encyclopædia Britannica_. Mr Dixon has consulted several scarceworks, of genuine though obsolete authority, and a large mass oforiginal documents and family papers, in preparing the present ableand attractive memoir; not omitting a careful examination of thesquibs, satires, and broadsides of that time, in his endeavour totrace, in forgotten nooks and corners, the anecdotes and detailsrequisite, as he says, to complete a character thus far chiefly knownby a few heroic outlines. We propose taking a brief survey of hislife-history of the great admiral and general at sea--the 'PuritanSea-King, ' as Mr Dixon more characteristically than accurately callshis hero. A sea-king he was, every inch of him; but to dub himPuritan, is like giving up to party what was meant for Britishmankind. To many, the term suggests primarily a habit of speakingthrough the nose; and Blake had thundered commands through too many apiping gale and battle blast for _that_. 

Robert Blake was born at Bridgewater, in August 1599. His father, Humphrey Blake, was a merchant trading with Spain--a man whose temperseems to have been too sanguine and adventurous for the ordinaryaction of trade, finally involving him in difficulties which cloudedhis latter days, and left his family in straitened circumstances: hisname, however, was held in general respect; and we find that he livedin one of the best houses in Bridgewater, and twice filled the chairof its chief magistrate. The perils to which mercantile enterprise wasthen liable--the chance escapes and valorous deeds which thesuccessful adventurer had to tell his friends and children on the darkwinter nights--doubtless formed a part of the food on which theimagination of young Blake, 'silent and thoughtful from hischildhood, ' was fed in the 'old house at home. ' At the Bridgewatergrammar-school, Robert received his early education, making tolerableacquaintance with Latin and Greek, and acquiring a strong bias towardsa literary life. This _penchant_ was confirmed by his subsequentcareer at Oxford, where he matriculated at sixteen, and where hestrove hard but fruitlessly for scholarships and fellowships atdifferent colleges. His failure to obtain a Merton fellowship has beenattributed to a crotchet of the warden's, Sir Henry Savile, in favourof tall men: 'The young Somersetshire student, thick-set, faircomplexioned, and only five feet six, fell below his standard of manlybeauty;' and thus the Cavalier warden, in denying this aspirant themeans of cultivating literature on a little university oatmeal, wasturning back on the world one who was fated to become a republicanpower of the age. This shining light, instead of comfortably andobscurely merging in a petty constellation of Alma Mater, was tobecome a bright particular star, and dwell apart. The avowedliberalism of Robert may, however, have done more in reality to shockSir Henry, than his inability to add a cubit to his stature. It ispleasant to know, that the 'admiral and general at sea' never outgrewa tenderness for literature--his first-love, despite the rebuff of hisadvances. Even in the busiest turmoil of a life teeming with accidentsby flood and field, he made it a point of pride not to forget hisfavourite classics. Nor was it till after nine years' experience ofcollege-life, and when his father was no longer able to manage his_res angusta vitæ_, that Robert finally abandoned his long-cherishedplans, and retired with a sigh and last adieu from the banks of theIsis. 

When he returned to Bridgewater, in time to close his father's eyes, and superintend the arrangements of the family, he was alreadyremarkable for that 'iron will, that grave demeanour, that free anddauntless spirit, ' which so distinguished his after-course. His tasteswere simple, his manners somewhat bluntly austere; a refined dignityof countenance, and a picturesque vigour of conversation, invested himwith a social interest, to which his indignant invectives againstcourt corruptions gave distinctive character. To the Short Parliamenthe was sent as member for his native town; and in 1645, was returnedby Taunton to the Long Parliament. At the dissolution of the former, which he regarded as a signal for action, he began to prepare armsagainst the king; his being one of the first troops in the field, andengaged in almost every action of importance in the western counties. His superiority to the men about him lay in the 'marvellous fertility, energy, and comprehensiveness of his military genius. ' Prince Rupertalone, in the Royalist camp, could rival him as a 'partisan soldier. 'His first distinguished exploit was his defence of Prior's Hill fort, at the siege of Bristol--which contrasts so remarkably with thepusillanimity of his chief, Colonel Fiennes. Next comes his yet morebrilliant defence of Lyme--then a little fishing-town, with some 900inhabitants, of which the defences were a dry ditch, a fewhastily-formed earth-works, and three small batteries, but which theCavalier host of Prince Maurice, trying storm, stratagem, blockade, day after day, and week after week, failed to reduce or dishearten. 'At Oxford, where Charles then was, the affair was an inexplicablemarvel and mystery: every hour the court expected to hear that the"little vile fishing-town, " as Clarendon contemptuously calls it, hadfallen, and that Maurice had marched away to enterprises of greatermoment; but every post brought word to the wondering council, thatColonel Blake still held out, and that his spirited defence wasrousing and rallying the dispersed adherents of Parliament in thoseparts. ' After the siege was raised, the Royalists found that more menof gentle blood had fallen under Blake's fire at Lyme, than in all theother sieges and skirmishes in the western counties since the openingof the war. The details of the siege are given with graphic effect byMr Dixon, and are only surpassed in interest by those connected withBlake's subsequent and yet more celebrated defence of Taunton, towhich the third chapter of this biography is devoted. 

The hero's fame had become a spell in the west: it was seen that herivalled Rupert in rapid and brilliant execution, and excelled him inthe caution and sagacity of his plans. He took Taunton--a place soimportant at that juncture, as standing on and controlling the greatwestern highway--in July 1644, within a week of Cromwell's defeat ofRupert at Marston Moor. All the vigour of the Royalists was broughtto bear on the captured town; Blake's defence of which isjustly characterised as abounding with deeds of individualheroism--exhibiting in its master-mind a rare combination of civil andmilitary genius. The spectacle of an unwalled town, in an inlanddistrict, with no single advantage of site, surrounded by powerfulcastles and garrisons, and invested by an enemy brave, watchful, numerous, and well provided with artillery, successfully resistingstorm, strait, and blockade for several months, thus paralysing theking's power, and affording Cromwell time to remodel the army, naturally arrested the attention of military writers at that time; andFrench authors of this class bestowed on Taunton the name of themodern Saguntum. The rage of the Royalists at this prolongedresistance was extreme. Reckoning from the date when Blake firstseized the town, to that of Goring's final retreat, the defence lastedexactly a year, and under circumstances of almost overwhelmingdifficulty to the besieged party, who, in addition to the fatigue ofnightly watches, and the destruction of daily conflicts, suffered fromterrible scarcity of provisions. 'Not a day passed without a fire;sometimes eight or ten houses were burning at the same moment; and inthe midst of all the fear, horror, and confusion incident to suchdisasters, Blake and his little garrison had to meet thestorming-parties of an enemy brave, exasperated, and ten times theirown strength. But every inch of ground was gallantly defended. A broadbelt of ruined cottages and gardens was gradually formed between thebesiegers and the besieged; and on the heaps of broken walls and burntrafters, the obstinate contest was renewed from day to day. ' At lastrelief arrived from London; and Goring, in savage dudgeon, beat aretreat, notwithstanding the wild oath he had registered, either toreduce that haughty town, or to lay his bones in its trenches. 

Blake was now the observed of all observers; but, unlike most of hiscompeers, he abstained from using his advantages for purposes ofselfish or personal aggrandisement. He kept aloof from the 'centre ofintrigues, ' and remained at his post, 'doing his duty humbly andfaithfully at a distance from Westminster; while other men, with lessthan half his claims, were asking and obtaining the highest honoursand rewards from a grateful and lavish country. ' Nor, indeed, did heat any time side with the ultras of his party, but loudly disapprovedof the policy of the regicides. This, coupled with his influence, sogreatly deserved and so deservedly great, made him an object ofjealousy with Cromwell and his party; and it was owing, perhaps, totheir anxiety to keep him removed from the home-sphere of action, thatthe hero of Taunton was now appointed to the chief naval command. 

Hitherto, and for years afterwards, no state, ancient or modern, asMacaulay points out, had made a separation between the military andthe naval service. Cimon and Lysander, Pompey and Agrippa, had foughtby sea as well as by land: at Flodden, the right wing of the Englishwas led by her admiral, and the French admiral led the Huguenots atJarnac, &c. Accordingly, Blake was summoned from his pacificgovernment at Taunton, to assume the post of 'General and Admiral atSea;' a title afterwards changed to 'General of the Fleet. ' Two otherswere associated with him in the command; but Blake seems at _least_ tohave been recognised as _primus inter pares_. The navy system was indeplorable need of reform; and a reformer it found in Robert Blake, from the very day he became an admiral. His care for the well-being ofhis men made him an object of their almost adoring attachment. Fromfirst to last, he stood alone as England's model-seaman. 'Envy, hatred, and jealousy dogged the steps of every other officer in thefleet; but of him, both then and afterwards, every man spoke well. 'The 'tremendous powers' intrusted to him by the Council of State, heexercised with off-handed and masterly success--startling politiciansand officials of the _ancien régime_ by his bold and open tactics, andhis contempt for tortuous bypaths in diplomacy. His wondrous exploitswere performed with extreme poverty of means. He was the first torepudiate and disprove the supposed fundamental maxim in marinewarfare, that no ship could attack a castle, or other strongfortification, with any hope of success. The early part of his navalcareer was occupied in opposing and defeating the piraticalperformances of Prince Rupert, which then constituted the support ofthe exiled Stuarts, and which Mr Dixon refuses to interpret in suchmild colours as Warburton and others. Blake's utmost vigilance andactivity were required to put down this extraordinary system offreebooting; and by the time that he had successively overcome Rupert, and the minor but stubborn adventurers, Grenville and Carteret, he wasin request to conduct the formidable war with Holland, and to copewith such veterans as Tromp, De Witt, De Ruyter, &c. Of the variousencounters in which he thus signalised himself, his biographer givesmost spirited descriptions, such as their length alone deters us fromquoting. On one occasion only did Blake suffer a defeat; and this oneis easily explained by--first, Tromp's overwhelming superiority offorce; secondly, the extreme deficiency of men in the English fleet;and thirdly, the cowardice or disaffection of several of Blake'scaptains at a critical moment in the battle. Notwithstanding thisdisaster, not a whisper was heard against the admiral either in theCouncil of State or in the city; his offer to resign was flatteringlyrejected; and he soon found, that the 'misfortune which might haveruined another man, had given him strength and influence in thecountry. ' This disaster, in fact, gave him power to effect reforms inthe service, and to root out abuses which had defied all his effortsin the day of his success. He followed it up by the great battle ofPortland, and other triumphant engagements. 

Then came his sweeping _tours de force_ in the Mediterranean; in sixmonths he established himself, as Mr Dixon says, as a power in thatgreat midland sea, from which his countrymen had been politicallyexcluded since the age of the Crusades--teaching nations, to whichEngland's very name was a strange sound, to respect its honours andits rights; chastising the pirates of Barbary with unprecedentedseverity; making Italy's petty princes feel the power of the northernProtestants; causing the pope himself to tremble on his seven hills;and startling the council-chambers of Venice and Constantinople withthe distant echoes of our guns. And be it remembered, that England hadthen no Malta, Corfu, and Gibraltar as the bases of naval operationsin the Mediterranean: on the contrary, Blake found that in almostevery gulf and island of that sea--in Malta, Venice, Genoa, Leghorn, Algiers, Tunis, and Marseilles--there existed a rival and an enemy;nor were there more than three or four harbours in which he couldobtain even bread for love or money. 

After this memorable cruise, he had to conduct the Spanish war--abusiness quite to his mind; for though his highest renown had beengained in his conflicts with the Dutch, he had secretly disliked suchencounters between two Protestant states; whereas, in thecase of Popish Spain, his soul leaped at the anticipation ofbattle--sympathising as he did with the Puritan conviction, that Spainwas the devil's stronghold in Europe. At this period, Blake wassuffering from illness, and was sadly crippled in his navalequipments, having to complain constantly of the neglect at home toremedy the exigencies of the service. 'Our ships, ' he writes, 'extremely foul, winter drawing on, our victuals expiring, all storesfailing, our men falling sick through the badness of drink, and eatingtheir victuals boiled in salt water for two months' space' (1655. ) Hisown constitution was thoroughly undermined. For nearly a year, remarkshis biographer, 'he had never quitted the "foul and defective"flag-ship. Want of exercise and sweet food, beer, wine, water, bread, and vegetables, had helped to develop scurvy and dropsy; and hissufferings from these diseases were now acute and continuous. ' But hisservices were indispensable, and Blake was not the man to shrink fromdying in harness. His sun set gloriously at Santa Cruz--thatmiraculous and unparalleled action, as Clarendon calls it, whichexcited such grateful enthusiasm at home. At home! words offascination to the maimed and enfeebled veteran, [4] who now turned histhoughts so anxiously towards the green hills of his native land. Cromwell's letter of thanks, the plaudits of parliament, and thejewelled ring sent to him by his loving countrymen, reached him whilehomeward bound. But he was not again to tread the shores he haddefended so well. 

As the ships rolled through the Bay of Biscay, his sickness increased, and affectionate adherents saw with dismay that he was drawing near tothe gates of the grave. 'Some gleams of the old spirit broke forth asthey approached the latitude of England. He inquired often andanxiously if the white cliffs were yet in sight. He longed to beholdonce more the swelling downs, the free cities, the goodly churches ofhis native land. . . . At last, the Lizard was announced. Shortlyafterwards, the bold cliffs and bare hills of Cornwall loomed outgrandly in the distance. But it was too late for the dying hero. Hehad sent for the captains and other great officers of his fleet, tobid them farewell; and while they were yet in his cabin, theundulating hills of Devonshire, glowing with the tints of earlyautumn, came full in view. . . . But the eyes which had so yearned tobehold this scene once more were at that very instant closing indeath. Foremost of the victorious squadron, the _St George_ rode withits precious burden into the Sound; and just as it came into full viewof the eager thousands crowding the beach, the pier-heads, the wallsof the citadel, &c. Ready to catch the first glimpse of the hero ofSanta Cruz, and salute him with a true English welcome--he, in hissilent cabin, in the midst of his lion-hearted comrades, now sobbinglike little children, yielded up his soul to God. '

The corpse was embalmed, and conveyed to Greenwich, where it lay instate for some days. On the 4th of September 1657, the Thames bore asolemn funeral procession, which moved slowly, amid salvos ofartillery, to Westminster, where a new vault had been prepared in thenoble abbey. The tears of a nation made it hallowed ground. A prince, of whom the epigram declares that, if he never said a foolish thing, he never did a wise one--saw fit to disturb the hero's grave, drag outthe embalmed body, and cast it into a pit in the abbey-yard. One ofCharles Stuart's most witless performances! For Blake is not to beconfounded--though the Merry Monarch thought otherwise--with theIretons and Bradshaws who were similarly exhumed. The admiral was amoderate in the closest, a patriot in the widest sense. 

In the chivalric disposition of the man, there was true affinity tothe best qualities of the Cavalier, mingled sometimes with a certaingrim humour, all his own. Many are the illustrations we might adduceof this high-minded and generous temperament. For instance: meeting aFrench frigate of forty guns in the Straits, and signaling for thecaptain to come on board his flag-ship, the latter, considering thevisit one of friendship and ceremony, there being no _declared_ warbetween the two nations--though the French conduct at Toulon haddetermined England on measures of retaliation--readily complied withBlake's summons; but was astounded, on entering the admiral's cabin, at being told he was a prisoner, and requested to give up his sword. No! was the surprised but resolute Frenchman's reply. Blake felt thatan advantage had been gained by a misconception, and scorning to makea brave officer its victim, he told his guest he might go back to hisship, if he wished, and fight it out as long as he was able. Thecaptain, we are told, thanked him for his handsome offer, and retired. After two hours' hard fighting, he struck his flag; like a true Frenchknight, he made a low bow, kissed his sword affectionately, anddelivered it to his conqueror. Again: when Blake captured the Dutchherring-fleet off Bochness, consisting of 600 boats, instead ofdestroying or appropriating them, he merely took a tithe of the wholefreight, in merciful consideration towards the poor families whoseentire capital and means of life it constituted. This 'characteristicact of clemency' was censured by many as Quixotic, and worse. But, asMr Dixon happily says: 'Blake took no trouble to justify his nobleinstincts against such critics. His was indeed a happy fate: the onlyfault ever advanced by friend or foe against his public life, was anexcess of generosity towards his vanquished enemies!' His sense of thecomic is amusingly evidenced by the story of his _ruse_ during adearth in the same siege. Tradition reports, that only one animal, ahog, was left alive in the town, and that more than half starved. Inthe afternoon, Blake, feeling that in their depression a laugh woulddo the defenders as much good as a dinner, had the hog carried to allthe posts and whipped, so that its screams, heard in many places, might make the enemy suppose that fresh supplies had somehow beenobtained. According to his biographer, never man had finer sense ofsarcasm, or used that weapon with greater effect--loving to findexpression for its scorn and merriment in the satires of Horace andJuvenal; and thus in some degree relieving the stern fervour ofPuritan piety with the more easy graces of ancient scholarship. 

The moral aspects of his character appear in this memoir in anadmirable light. If he did not stand so high as some others in publicnotoriety, it was mainly because, to stand higher than he did, he mustplant his feet on a _bad_ eminence. His patriotism was as pure asCromwell's was selfish. Mr Dixon alludes to the strong points ofcontrast, as well as of resemblance, between the two men. Both, hesays, were sincerely religious, undauntedly brave, fertile inexpedients, irresistible in action. Born in the same year, they beganand almost closed their lives at the same time. Both were countrygentlemen of moderate fortune; both were of middle age when therevolution came. Without previous knowledge or professional training, both attained to the highest honours of the respective services. Butthere the parallel ends. Anxious only for the glory and interest ofhis country, Blake took little or no care of his personalaggrandisement. His contempt for money, his impatience with the merevanities of power, were supreme. Bribery he abhorred in all itsshapes. He was frank and open to a fault; his heart was ever in hishand, and his mind ever on his lips. His honesty, modesty, generosity, sincerity, and magnanimity, were unimpeached. Cromwell's inferiormoral qualities made him distrust the great seaman; yet now and then, as in the case of the street tumult at Malaga, he was fain to expresshis admiration of Robert Blake. The latter was wholly unversed in thescience of nepotism, and 'happy family' compacts; for althoughdesirous of aiding his relatives, he was jealous of the least offenceon their part, and never overlooked it. Several instances of thisdisposition are on record. When his brother Samuel, in rash zeal forthe Commonwealth, ventured to exceed his duty, and was killed in afray which ensued, Blake was terribly shocked, but only said: 'Sam hadno business there. ' Afterwards, however, he shut himself up in hisroom, and bewailed his loss in the words of Scripture: 'Died Abner asa fool dieth!' His brother Benjamin, again, to whom he was stronglyattached, falling under suspicion of neglect of duty, was instantlybroken, and sent on shore. 'This rigid measure of justice against hisown flesh and blood, silenced every complaint, and the service gainedimmeasurably in spirit, discipline, and confidence. ' Yet more touchingwas the great admiral's inexorable treatment of his favourite brotherHumphrey, who, in a moment of extreme agitation, had failed in hisduty. The captains went to Blake in a body, and argued that Humphrey'sfault was a neglect rather than a breach of orders, and suggested hisbeing sent away to England till it was forgotten. But Blake wasoutwardly unmoved, though inwardly his bowels did yearn over hisbrother, and sternly said: 'If none of you will accuse him, I must behis accuser. ' Humphrey was dismissed from the service. It is affectingto know how painfully Blake missed his familiar presence during hissick and lonely passage homewards, when the hand of death was uponthat noble heart. To Humphrey he bequeathed the greater part of hisproperty. 

In the rare intervals of private life which he enjoyed on shore, Blakealso compels our sincere regard. When released for awhile frompolitical and professional duties, he loved to run down to Bridgewaterfor a few days or weeks, and, as his biographer says, with his chosenbooks, and one or two devout and abstemious friends, to indulge in allthe luxuries of seclusion. 'He was by nature self-absorbed andtaciturn. His morning was usually occupied with a long walk, duringwhich he appeared to his simple neighbours to be lost in profoundthought, as if working out in his own mind the details of one of hisgreat battles, or busy with some abstruse point of Puritan theology. If accompanied by one of his brothers, or by some other intimatefriend, he was still for the most part silent. Always good-humoured, and enjoying sarcasm when of a grave, high class, he yet never talkedfrom the loquacious instinct, or encouraged others so to employ theirtime and talents in his presence. Even his lively and rattling brotherHumphrey, his almost constant companion when on shore, caught, fromlong habit, the great man's contemplative and self-communing gait andmanner; and when his friends rallied him on the subject inafter-years, he used to say, that he had caught the trick of silencewhile walking by the admiral's side in his long morning musings onKnoll Hill. A plain dinner satisfied his wants. Religiousconversation, reading, and the details of business, generally filledup the evening until supper-time; after family prayers--alwayspronounced by the general himself--he would invariably call for hiscup of sack and a dry crust of bread, and while he drank two or threehorns of Canary, would smile and chat in his own dry manner with hisfriends and domestics, asking minute questions about their neighboursand acquaintance; or when scholars or clergymen shared his simplerepast, affecting a droll anxiety--rich and pleasant in the conquerorof Tromp--to prove, by the aptness and abundance of his quotations, that, in becoming an admiral, he had not forfeited his claim to beconsidered a good classic. '

The care and interest with which he looked to the well-being of hishumblest followers, made him eminently popular in the fleet. He wasalways ready to hear complaints and to rectify grievances. Whenwounded at the battle of Portland, and exhorted to go on shore forrepose and proper medical treatment, he refused to seek for himselfthe relief which he had put in the way of his meanest comrade. Even atthe early period of his cruise against the Cavalier corsairs ofKinsale, such was Blake's popularity, that numbers of men werecontinually joining him from the enemy's fleet, although he offeredthem less pay, and none of that licence which they had enjoyed underPrince Rupert's flag. They gloried in following a leader _sans peur etsans reproche_--one with whose renown the whole country speedilyrang--the renown of a man who had revived the traditional glories ofthe English navy, and proved that its meteor flag could 'yet terrificburn. '

FOOTNOTES:

[1] _Robert Blake: Admiral and General at Sea. _ By Hepworth Dixon. London: Chapman and Hall. 1852. 

[2] _Biographical and Critical Miscellanies. _

[3] _History of Great Britain_, c. Lxi. 

[4] He had been lamed for life, by a wound in the thigh, at the battleof Portland, 1653. 

SUMMER LODGINGS. 

In the dominions of the Czar, the backs of the serfs suffer a weeklytitillation as insufferable, although not so deadly, as the lessfrequent knout. When it comes to Wednesday, they begin to imagine thatthey are not exactly comfortable; on Thursday, the natural moisture oftheir skin seems fast drying up, and they are in an incipient fit ofthe fidgets; on Friday, the epidermis cracks all over, ormakes-believe to do so; and on Saturday, the whole population, with ashout of impatient joy, rush to the bath-house of the village, like aherd of bullocks in the dog-days to the river, and boil themselves insteam. When thoroughly done, they come out, beautifully plumped, asthe cooks say, and feeling fresh and vigorous, and as fit as ever theywere in their lives to encounter a new week of serfdom. 

An annual process analogous to this takes place in our own country. Inspring, we begin to look wistfully at the garden, to watch the openingof the lettuces, and count the colours of the pansies. As the seasonadvances, we wander into the fields, examine curiously the thin grass, and turn an admiring eye towards the green hills in the distance. AsMay breaks upon us in sunlight, though the east wind is still chill, we half persuade ourselves that this really _is_ the season of loveand sentiment; and when the month ripens into June, when the grassbeneath our feet actually deserves the name of a carpet, when thetrees are rich and umbrageous, when the birds are in full song, andthe roses in full blow--then the hitherto indefinite longing of ourheart acquires strength and purpose. The dry streets look unnatural;the formal lines of houses offend the taste; the air is close and hot;the younger children look pale, and their elder sisters languish. Themonth is at length out, and we wonder how we have survived it. Thething can no longer be borne: the town looks and breathes like apest-house; while hill-sides glimmer in our waking dreams, broad seasstretch away till they are lost in the golden light--

 'And dying winds and waters near Make music to the lonely ear:'

still worse--everybody that is anybody is off to the country and thesea, and we rush madly after. 

But the country? Where is the country? That is the puzzle. In ouryouth, we knew many a quiet village, many a fine beach, many asheltered bay, where one might wander, or swim, or muse, or rusticatein any way he chose. The village has grown into a town; the beach islined with villas; the bay swarms with vessels, and its shores withpopulation. Every eligible spot on the coast becomes the resort ofcountry-goers, till it is no longer the country. All local advantagesare taken advantage of, till they disappear. The citizen, charmed withthe countryness of the spot, builds his box by the water-side; thespeculator runs up lines of houses; a handsome inn rises in the midst;and benevolent individuals hasten to the new centre of attraction, loaded with every kind of commodity men stand in need of, and arelikely to buy. Here, in Scotland, on the Clyde, which is the grandsanatorium of the east as well as the west country, this process ofchange is remarkable. The once wildly beautiful shores, wherever thereis not a town or a village, are dotted with trim white villas, glimmering here and there among the trees. The angles of the lochs, where these diverge from the parent stream, are covered with houses. The Gair Loch, which we remember as one of the sweetest mysteries of amountain lake whose banks ever echoed to the songs of poetry and love, is a snug suburban retreat. The entrance of the Holy Loch, and of thedark and awful Loch Long, are fortified against the spirit of natureby groups of streets. At the heretofore quiet village of Dunoon, slumbering at the foot of its almost obliterated castle, you mightlose yourself in the wilderness of new habitations. Gourock, on theopposite side, where in our boyhood the fairies disported round theKempuck Stane, is a bustling town, with a suburb stretching along theClyde, nearly as long as the long town of Kirkaldy, on the Forth; andat Largs, the barrows of the ancient Danes have become the cellars ofthe sons of little men, who confine spirits in them, as the prophetSolomon used to do, with a sealed cork. The once solitary island ofCumbrae is the town of Milport; the hoary ruins of Rothsay Castle arealmost buried in a congeries of seaport streets and lanes; and, smoking, sputtering, and flapping their water-wings, scores ofsteamers ply in endless succession among these and a multitude ofother places of renown. 

All this, we may be told, is as it should be; a house is better than ahut, and the conveniences of civilised life better than roughing it inthe desert: but we will not be comforted. Roughing it! that is justwhat the smoke-dried citizen wants occasionally, to prevent his bloodfrom stagnating, and keep his faculties in working order. Physically, at least, we are not half the men we were when we used to rumble, andsometimes tumble, in stage-coaches, exposed to all the excitement andadventures of a journey; or to get as sick as forty dogs, tossingabout whole days and nights in a sailing vessel. Then, when we landed, how delightful were the miseries of a cottage; the makeshifts, thesqueezing, the dirt, the hunger--that veal-pie was _always_ leftbehind!--the hunting of the neighbourhood for eggs for the children, the compulsory abstinence for three days out of four frombutcher-meat, and the helpless dependence upon the chapter ofaccidents for everything else!

Now, we get into a railway carriage, or the cabin of a steamer, andafter taking a book or a nap for an hour or two, raise our heads, andfind ourselves, somehow or other, fifty miles off--in the country. Thecountry is a genteel house in a genteel street, or a nice villa in arow of nice villas, where we are surrounded with all the convenienceswe enjoy at home. The very society is the same; for our friends, Thomson and Smith, and the whole of that set, have brought theirfamilies to the same place for summer lodgings--it is so agreeable tobe among one's acquaintances. Then we begin to enjoy ourselves: wehave conversation-parties, and dancing-parties, and balls, all thesame as at home. We enjoy our newspaper, as usual, in our comfortablereading-room. In the morning, we take a stroll or a dip, or drinkwater at the Wells, which, although undoubtedly nasty, is undeniablywholesome. Then there is a steamer in sight, and we all hasten to thepier, to ascertain if we know anybody on board. Then we dine early, for one _must_ dine early in the country. Then we take a nap; thenanother stroll; then there is another steamer to watch; then we drinktea; then to the pier again. This time, the vessel's head is pointedhomewards; and as she breaks away from the land, we follow her withour eyes till she is swallowed up in the distance. Then we turn awaywith a sigh; go back to our lodgings; lounge into bed; and fall asleepin the midst of the delightful sensation of having nothing to do, andbeing in the country. 

All this _is_ delightful, no doubt; every bit as good as being athome. Our aim, in fact, is to carry home with us--to feel as if we hadnever left No. 24. The closer the resemblance between our countrylodgings and our town-house, the better we are off; for we then getwhat we have come for--change of air--without any sacrifice ofcomfort. 

But we doubt whether 'change of air' has so limited a meaning. Hygienically speaking, it includes, we suspect, change of habits, change of diet, change of company, change of thought. The miseries ofthe old country lodgings were better for the health than the comfortsof the new. The very grumbling they gave rise to was a wholesomeexercise. The short allowance was worth a whole pharmacopoeia. Theravenous appetite that fastened upon things common and unclean was aglorious symptom. We came back strengthened in mind as well as body. Our country sojourn had the effect of foreign travel in opening theheart and expanding the intellect; it smoothed away prejudices andupset conventionalities; and the ruddy glow of our sunburnt cheeks wasthe external token of the healthy natural tone of the feelings within. No; this passion for comfort and gentility in the wilderness, is a badsign of the generation: it bespeaks effeminacy of character, and avanity which, however graceful it may be thought in the town, shewsmean and ridiculous among the hills, and woods, and waters of thecountry. 

Among our neighbours on the continent, the summer move is not souniversal as with us. In Paris, for instance, everything is consideredthe country that is outside the barriers; and in the fine season, every bourgeois family is outside the barriers at least once aweek--eating, drinking, dancing, and singing. Then there are the walksin the Bois de Boulogne, and the picnics at St Cloud, and theexcursions to Versailles: wherever there is green turf and shadytrees, you hear the sounds of mirth and music rising in the clearest, brightest atmosphere in the world. Thus a sojourn out of town is not anecessity. They take change of air by instalments, and pass the summerin a state of chronic excitement. 

In other parts of the world, the move is as entire as with us; and inat least one instance, all classes of the population desert the citiesat the same time, and flock to the same sea-side. To be sure, thissea-side is somewhat extensive, and there need be no more crowdingthan is social and comfortable. An amusing account of the migration, and of the summer lodgings of Central America is given in Mr Squier's_Nicaragua_, recently published. The state of Nicaragua occupies thatpart of the Isthmus lying between the lake of the same name and thePacific, the distance between being in some places only about fifteenmiles. In this narrow tract there are several large towns, such asGrenada and Leon, which, in spite of the breath of the two oceans, getsmoke-dried by the time the dry season advances into March. Then comeson the 'Paseo al mar, ' or bathing-season, when a great portion of thepopulation, taken not merely from the upper classes, but from thebourgeoisie and Indian peasantry, rush down to the shores of thePacific. 'At that time, ' says Mr Squier, 'a general movement of cartsand servants takes place in the direction of the sea, and thegovernment despatches an officer and a guard, to superintend thepitching of the annual camp upon the beach, or rather upon theforest-covered sand-ridge which fringes the shore. Each family buildsa temporary cane-hut, lightly thatched with palm-leaves, and flooredwith petates or mats. The whole is wickered together with vines, orwoven together basketwise, and partitioned in the same way, by meansof coloured curtains of cotton cloth. This constitutes the penetralia, and is sacred to the _bello sexo_ and the babies. The more luxuriousladies bring down their neatly-curtained beds, and make no mean showof elegance in the interior arrangements of their impromptu dwellings. Outside, and something after the fashion of their permanentresidences, is a kind of broad and open shed, which bears a verydistant relation to the corridor. Here hammocks are swung, thefamilies dine, the ladies receive visitors, and the men sleep. . . . Theestablishments here described pertain only to the wealthier visitors, the representatives of the upper classes. There is every intermediatevariety, down to those of the _mozo_ and his wife, who spread theirblankets at the foot of a tree, and weave a little bower of branchesabove them--an affair of ten or a dozen minutes. And there are yetothers who disdain even this exertion, and nestle in the dry sand. '

This kind of gipsying expedition to the sea in summer would hardlysuit the form of European, or at least British civilisation; but we donot see why, in the one continent more than in the other, one'scountry lodgings should be required to resemble a town-house. In theClyde, which we have mentioned as a resort for summer loiterers, thereis one exceptional place--the island of Arran. Here the Marquis ofDouglas has determined, with much good taste, that his property shallnot be vulgarised by the new style of country lodgings, and so farfrom feuing the ground, he will not permit even a pier to be built forthe accommodation of visitors. The village, accordingly, is simply aline of thatched cottages, which, in the fine season, are filled tooverflowing. A few houses of more pretension stand on the other sideof the bay; but, in general, no one sets his foot in Brodick who hasnot made up his mind to rough it pretty much in the fashion of thelast generation. Sometimes, on the occasion of a holiday in Glasgow, which is six hours' steaming distant, the village is flooded with amoving population that can neither find house-room on the island normeans of quitting it the same day. Then comes a scene of somethingmore than Mexican roughness. Shawls, cloaks, plaids, are the onlysubstitute for tents, and a bush or a tree the only shelter from thesummer wind. Such wandering companies are rarely short of provisions, for they have a wholesome dread of Highland hunger; and hearty is thefeast and loud the merriment, as they sit thus, houseless and homelessoutcasts of the Clyde. The night comes on, neither dark norunpleasantly cold, and the trooping stars assemble in the heavens, andlook down on the slumbrous waters, as bright and new as they were seenof old from the hill-tops of Chaldea. Higher swell the hearts of thespectators for a time, till, yielding to the influence of the hour, lower and lower sink their pulses of emotion, like the tide of thelately panting deep. Their voices fall; their words are few andwhispered, then heard no more; the lights of the village disappear oneby one; the last door is heard to shut; there is silence on the earth. 

We never heard of anybody being the worse of this adventure, althoughit is a kind of roughing we would not positively recommend to MissLaura Matilda, or any of her fair sisters. We would give _them_ athatched roof over their heads, a weather-tight room for theirslumbers, and a substantial wall between them and the couple of cowsthat yield their warm milk in the morning. We would afford them ahomely sitting-room, with no temptation to keep them within doors fora single moment, except during their brief and humble meals. We wouldplant their tabernacle in some lonely place on a hillside, or on theshores of a romantic loch, an hour's smart walk from any society theyare accustomed to at home. We would have them make acquaintances ofthe said two cows; of both the dogs, even the surly one, which cannotfor some time understand who or what they are, or what business theyhave there; of the hens, that present them with newly-laid eggs tobreakfast; of the five or six sheep, to whom they are evidentlyobjects of curiosity and admiration; of that sociable goat, whichaccompanies the sheep to the hill like one of themselves; and moreespecially of the little boy, who is proud of being called the herd;and of the cotter and his old mother, and his wife and two youngdaughters. We would insist upon their feeling a kindly interest inthese new friends, one and all; on their taking leave of themindividually when coming away; and on their carrying home with them animpression which would sometimes, in the crowded street, or the hotroom, well suddenly up in their hearts like a fresh stream, or passacross their cheeks like a breath of mountain air. 

Depend upon it, we lose much humanising feeling, much true refinement, much of the poetry of life, in parting with the roughness of ourSummer Lodgings. 

PAPER-MONEY AND BANKING IN CHINA. 

The origin or prototype of so many of our European arts and customshas been found in the 'central flowery land, ' that it is notsurprising to hear of the Chinese having begun to use paper-money ascurrency in the second century preceding the Christian era. At thattime, the coinage of the Celestials was of a more bulky and ponderousnature than it is at the present day; and we may easily believe that apeople so cunning and ingenious, would contrive not a few schemes toavoid the burden of carrying it about; as the man did, who scratchedthe figure of an ox on a piece of leather, and went from door to doorwith that until he had found a customer, leaving the animal, meantime, at home in the stall. There was a deficiency, too, in the ways andmeans of the government: money was never plentiful enough in theimperial coffers. At last, to get out of the difficulty, it wasdetermined to try the effect of a paper-currency, and an issue wasmade of assignats or treasury-warrants, which, being based on thecredit of the highest authorities, were regarded as secure; whichfact, with their facility of transfer, soon brought them intocirculation. Of course, a good deal of legislation was expended on themeasure, before it could be got to work satisfactorily, and itunderwent many fluctuations in its progress towards permanence. Theintestine wars to which China was exposed at that period, byoverturning dynasty after dynasty, led one government to disavow theobligations of its predecessor, and the natural consequences of badfaith followed. After circulating with more or less success for fivehundred years, the government paper-money disappeared. 

This happened under the Ming dynasty: the Manchus, who succeeded, gave themselves no trouble to restore the paper-currency; on which thetrading portion of the community took the matter into their own hands, and by the time that their Tatar conquerors were quietly settled intheir usurped authority, the merchants had revived the use of paper. They were too sensible of its great utility not to make the attempt;and since that time, they have gone on without any aid from the state, developing their plans as experience suggested, and so cautiously asto insure success. This result is, however, far below what has beenobtained by Europeans. In comparison with ours, the banking-system ofChina is in a very primitive condition; theirs is extremely limited inits application, each city restricting itself to its own method; andwhile the means of intercommunication are imperfect, there is littleprospect of improvement. 

One example may be taken as an illustration of the whole; and we availourselves of a communication made by Mr Parkes to the Royal AsiaticSociety on the paper-currency of Fuhchowfoo, for the substance of thepresent article. As in other places, the system was started in thecity of Fuhchow by private individuals, who began by circulating amongeach other notes payable on demand. As the convenience of such amedium became apparent, the circulation was extended, and ultimatelyoffices were opened for the special purpose of issuing notes; but asthe only guarantee for their security was the character of those whoput them forth, the circulation remained comparatively trifling, untiltheir credit was recognised and established. Not till the firstquarter of the present century did the use of paper become extensiveor permanent; and now, everybody in Fuhchowfoo prefers notes to coin. 

As no licence is required, any one may commence the banking business, and at first considerable mischief resulted from this liberty. Speculators who forced their notes largely into circulation, notunfrequently met with a reverse, with the usual consequences ofdistress and embarrassment to their connection. Although this for atime brought paper into disfavour, it has now recovered, and the greatcompetition is found to have the effect of mitigating the evils offailure. Where so many are concerned, individual suffering must becomparatively slight. The banks, moreover, are not banks of deposit;the proprietors prefer not to receive deposits, so that privateparties run no risk of a great and sudden loss, beyond that of suchnotes as they may hold at the time of a stoppage. On the other hand, the usefulness of a bank is limited by this arrangement; there can beno paying of cheques; but very few of the banking establishments cantransact business beyond the city or the department in which they maybe located, and seldom or never beyond the limits of the province. Hence the convenience and safety of making payments at places remotefrom each other, through the medium of a banker, is almost unknown inChina. 

Within certain limits, the large bankers undertake mercantileexchanges; they also refine the sycee, or silver, for the receivers oftaxes. The government will take no silver under a standard quality;the collector delivers his sycee to the banker, who weighs, refines, and casts it into ingots, for a consideration, giving a receipt, whichis handed to the treasurer of the department, who calls for the amountwhen required. 

The small banks transact their business on an extremely petty scale. On first starting in business, their notes are seldom in circulationabove a few hours, and they have always to be watchful to avoid a'run. ' It is among this class that failures most frequently occur, thetime of the crash being the end of the year, owing to the demand forspecie which then arises. As a precautionary measure, some of themmostly circulate the notes of the large banks, which do not return tothem as their own would. Their own are sure to come back once at leastin the twenty-four hours, as the large banks make a rule of sendingall petty bank-notes to their issuers every day, and exchanging themfor specie or larger notes. The petty establishments resort to variousexpedients for the sake of profit; one is, to locate themselves in agood situation: if far from a large bank, they charge a higher rate ofdiscount on notes presented for payment, than is charged by their morepowerful competitor; and the people who live in the neighbourhoodsubmit to this charge, rather than take the trouble of going to thelarge bank. On the contrary, if the great and the small are neartogether, the latter charge lower, and make their profit by placingbase coin among the strings of copper _cash_ which they pay to theircustomers in exchange for notes. The inferior cash is manufactured forthe purpose, in the same way as Birmingham halfpence used to be fordistribution by the keepers of toll-gates. 

'Such petty chicanery is not viewed, as with us, in the light of anoffence, since, from the exceeding low value of the Chinesecash--twenty-seven being only equivalent to a penny--those must be badindeed which will not pass current with the rest; and, accordingly, the inferior sorts, when used in moderation, are accepted along withthe better in all the ordinary transactions of life. The profits ofthese establishments must, therefore, be but slender--proportioned, however, to the extent of their dealings; and some of the smallestfirms may not make more than half a dollar in the course of a day. '

'The banking establishments in the city and suburbs of Fuhchow, ' saysMr Parkes, 'may be enumerated by hundreds. Most of them are naturallyvery insignificant, and the circulation of their notes exceedinglylimited. Many of the outside notes will not pass current inside; andare only convertible at the place of issue. Such branches as thesemust be entirely superfluous, and might seriously inconvenience ortrammel the transactions of the higher ones; but, in order to guardagainst encroachment from this direction, and as a self-protectivemeasure, several of the leading banks of known stability co-operatewith each other to keep up the value of their notes; and thus, byholding a strong check on the issues of those minor parties, effectually continue to regulate the whole system. There are thirty ofthese establishments inside and outside the city, all reported to bepossessed of capital to the amount of from 500, 000 to upwards of1, 000, 000 dollars. 

'These latter establishments command the utmost confidence, and theirnotes pass current everywhere and with everybody. They contributemutual support by constantly exchanging and continually cashing eachother's notes, which they severally seem to value as highly as theirown particular issues. This reciprocal and implicit trust must addgreatly to their solidity, and tend to prevent the possibility offailure. The chief banker gained his high reputation by a voluntarysubscription, about thirty years ago, of no less than 100, 000 dollarsto the government toward the repairs of the city walls and otherpublic works, for which he was rewarded with honorary officialinsignia, and the extensive patronage or business of all theauthorities. These large banks are complete rulers of themoney-market; they regulate the rates of exchange, which areincessantly fluctuating, and are known to alter several times in thecourse of the day. The arrival or withdrawal from the place of specieto the amount of a few thousands, has an immediate effect in eitherraising or lowering the exchange. The bankers are kept most accuratelyinformed on the subject by some twenty men in their general employ, whose sole business it is to be in constant attendance in the market, and to acquaint the banks with everything that is going on, when they, guided by the transactions of the day, determine and fix upon, betweenthemselves, the various prices of notes, sycee, and dollars. Theirunanimity on those points is very remarkable; and they are all deeplyimpressed with the salutary conviction, that their chief strengthconsists in the degree of mutual harmony that they preserve, and theconfidence they place in one another. These reporters are also veryuseful to new arrivals, in affording them guidance on matters ofexchange, or in introducing them to the best bankers; and theallowances that the stranger makes to them for their assistance, andthe banker for procuring him custom, constitute the gains of theircalling. They have also to report the prices of silver every morningat the Magistracy, which, from its daily increasing value, has becomean object of especial attention. ' Twenty years ago, much discontentwas expressed that silver, which had been worth 1000 cash per ounce, rose to 1500; now it is over 2000, owing to the continuous drain ofthe metal from the country. 

Still, with all this, failures are rare. The petty banks are mostliable to this reverse; and on such occasions, they generally contriveto arrange the matter quietly among themselves; but the whole propertyor lands belonging to the defaulters may be seized and sold to satisfythe claims of the creditors: the dividend is usually from 10s. To 12s. In the pound. Wilful fraud is seldom practised; the heaviest instanceknown, was for 70, 000 dollars; from the year 1843 to 1848, there werebut four bankruptcies, and three of these were for less than 6000dollars. The defaulters frequently escape punishment owing to the highcost of prosecution. The large banks are safe; but at times, fromfalse or malicious reports, are exposed to a sudden 'run;' a greatcrowd besets the doors when least expected, and numbers of vagabondsseize the opportunity for mischief and plunder. These outbreaks grewto such a pitch, that the magistrates now, whenever possible, hastento the threatened establishment, to repress violence by their presenceand authority. The rush, however, is so sudden, that before they canarrive on the spot, the mob has improved its opportunity fordestruction, and disappeared. 

Forgery is not often attempted, probably because it does not pay, owing to the fact of its being extremely difficult to circulate anybut notes of small value. The penalty for this offence istransportation to a distance of three thousand _le_--about a thousandmiles; or imprisonment or flogging, according to circumstances. Wequestion if such an instance as the following ever occurred out ofChina:--'A forger of some notoriety having been several timesprosecuted by the bankers, and with but little success, for he stillcontinued to carry on his malpractices, they conferred together, andagreed _to take him into their pay_, making him responsible for anyfuture frauds of the kind. He continues to receive a stipend from themat the present time, and is one of their most effective safeguardsagainst further imposition, as it devolves upon him to detect andapprehend any other offender. '

Most of the bank-notes are printed from copperplates, but some of thepetty dealers still use wooden blocks. They are longer and narrowerthan ours, and have a handsomely engraved border, within which areparagraphs laudatory of the ability or reputation of the firm. Thenotes are of three kinds: for cash, dollars, and sycee. The first arefrom 400 cash (1s. 3d. Sterling), to hundreds of thousands, and arelargely circulated in all the smaller business transactions. Thedollar-notes, varying from a unit to 500, and, in some instances, to1000, circulate among the merchants, their value continuallyfluctuating with that of the price of the silver which they represent. The sycee-notes are from one to several hundred _taels_ (ounces), andare chiefly confined to the government offices, to avoid the troubleand inconvenience of making payments in silver by weight. Whatever bethe value or denomination of the notes, the holder is at liberty todemand payment of the whole whenever he pleases, and receives itwithout abatement, as the banker makes his profit at the time of theirissue. When notes are lost, payment is stopped, as here, and they arespeedily traced, as it is the practice not to take notes of a highvalue--say, 100 dollars--without first inquiring at the bank as totheir genuineness. But no indemnification is made for notes lost ordestroyed by accident. Promissory-notes are the chief medium ofinterchange among merchants, who take ten days' grace on all bills, except those on which is written the word 'immediate. '

The rates of interest are, on lands and houses, from 10 to 15 percent. ; on government deposits, which the people are made to take attimes against their will, 8 per cent. ; on insurance of ships andcargoes, owing to the risk from storms and pirates, from 20 to 30 percent. ; on pawnbrokers' loans, 2 per cent. Per month, or 20 per cent. Per annum. Five days' grace is allowed on pledges; and if goods be notredeemed within three years, they are made over to the old clothes'shops at a settled premium of 20 per cent. On the amount lent on them. Pawnbrokers' establishments are numerous, and are frequented by allclasses, who pawn without scruple anything they may possess. Thebanks, we are informed, 'keep up an intimate connection with thepawnbrokers, who make and receive all their payments in notes forcopper cash, and will not take sycee, dollars, or dollar-notes--theformer, lest they should prove counterfeit, and the latter, on accountof the fluctuating value. They are very particular in passing thebank-notes, and will accept only those of the large banks. A notice ishung up in each shop, specifying what notes pass current with them;and when the people go to redeem the articles they have pledged, asthey can present only those notes in payment, they have often torepair previously to the bank where they are issued, to purchase them, and, being at a premium, the banker thus gains his discount upon them. Of such importance is this considered, that, without the support ofthe pawnbrokers' connection, the business of a banker will always belimited. Indeed, many of the banks keep pawnbrokers' shops also; andthe chief banker at Fuhchow is known to have opened no less than fiveof these establishments. This is on account of the high interest paidon pawnbrokers' loans. '

THINGS TALKED OF IN LONDON. 

_May, 1852. _

As May of last year was made memorable by the opening of the GreatExhibition, so will the present month become famous for the pullingdown of the Crystal Palace. Parliament has decreed it, and there is anend of the matter. If the people by and by find reason to complain ofthe proceeding, they will have no one to blame but themselves;because, had they spoken out as only a whole nation can speak, thedecision of the legislature would have been on the other side of thequestion. We are promised, however, that it shall be re-erected onsome other site, and herein must solace ourselves for disappointmentat the removal, while waiting for the National Exhibition to be openedat Cork, or that of the Arts and Manufactures of the Indian Empirepromised by the Society of Arts. Besides this, the present May will benoteworthy in the annals of ocean steam-navigation: the steamers toAustralia are to commence their trips, as also those to Brazil andValparaiso. Who would have dreamed, twenty years ago, that theredoubtable Cape Horn would, before a quarter century had expired, berounded by a steamer from an English port? Captain Denham is about tosail in the _Herald_, to survey the islands of the great ocean, oneobject being to find the best route and coaling-stations among theislands for steamers from the Isthmus to Sydney. The vessel will carryan interpreter, a supply of English seeds and plants, and a number ofarticles, to serve as presents for the natives. Should this survey besuccessful, and the United States' expedition to Japan produce theeffect anticipated, the vast solitudes of the Pacific will be erelongcontinually echoing with the beat of paddle-wheels and the roar ofsteam. Rapid intercommunication will bring about changes, whereatpoliticians and ethnologists shall wonder. The Chinese still keeppouring into California by shiploads of 200 or 300 at a time, wherethey will perhaps learn that a year of Anglo-Saxondom is 'worth cycleof Cathay. ' We may regard as evidence of progress, that Loo-choo hasbeen visited by Captain Shadwell of the _Sphynx_; he was received withgreat favour, and conducted to the royal city of Shooi, three milesinland. Readers of Captain Basil Hall's pleasant account of the sameisland will remember, that he was jealously forbidden to approach theinterior. Do the Loo-chooans want to conciliate an ally? If, as issaid, Japan is to become to the Americans what India is to us, weshall have them for neighbours in the east, as we now have them in thewest. It will be an interesting event should England, America, andRussia some day meet on the Asiatic continent. 

One good effect of railways, as you know, has been to cheapen coal, and excite activity in heretofore dormant mining districts--resultswhich tell upon the trade in sea-borne coals. To meet this emergency, a scheme is on foot for sending coal from the Tyne to the Thames insteam-colliers, which, by their short and regular passages, shallcompete successfully with the railways. The experiment is well worthtrying, and ought to pay, if properly managed: meantime, our railwayswill extend their ramifications. Looking for a moment at what is doingin other parts of the world, it appears that there are at present 2000miles of railway in France, besides as much more which is to becompleted in four years. Portugal is only just beginning to think ofiron routes: a few wakeful people are trying to impress that backwardland with a sense of the advantages of rapid locomotion; and it isshewn that, by a simple system of railways, Lisbon would be placed atsixteen hours' distance from Madrid, forty-three from Paris, fifty-three from Brussels, and fifty-seven from London. Would it notbe a comfort to be able to run away from the north-east monsoon, whichhas so long afflicted us, to the orange groves on the banks of theTagus, in about two days and a half? A telegraph is about tobe carried from the Austrian States over the Splugen intoSwitzerland--the Alps, it would appear, being no bar to thethought-flasher. There is a project, too, for a regular and universaldispatch of telegraph messages from all parts of the world. A mail andtelegraph route from the Mississippi across to San Francisco is talkedabout. The proposer considers that post-houses might be erected atevery twenty miles across the American continent, in which companiesof twenty men of the United States' army might be stationed, toprotect and facilitate the intercommunication; news would then findits way across in six or seven days. Should this scheme fail to berealised, the Americans may content themselves with having nearly11, 000 miles of railway already open, and another 11, 000 in progress. 

A beginning is made towards the abolition of the duty on foreign booksimported. Government have consented that certain learned societies, and a number of scientific individuals, shall receive, duty free, suchscientific publications as may be sent to them from abroad. Considering that the whole amount realised by the present customs'charge is only L. 8000, it is easy to believe that the authorities willshortly have to abolish it altogether. Another question in which booksare concerned, is the dispute that has been going on for some timeamong the fraternity of booksellers, as to whether a retailer shall beallowed to sell books for any price he pleases, or not. Whether'free-trade' or 'monopoly' is to prevail, will depend on the decisionof the arbitrators who have been chosen. Leaving out all the rest ofthe kingdom, there are nearly 1000 booksellers in London; so thesubject is an important one. This number affords a notable datum forcomparison with other countries. In Germany, the number of booksellersis 2651, of which 2200 are retailers, 400 publishers only, while 451combine the two. They are distributed--36 in Frankfort, 56 inStuttgart, 52 in Vienna, 129 in Berlin, 145 in Leipsic. The figuresare suggestive. Another fact may be instanced: in 1851 the number ofvisits to the British Museum for reading was 78, 419--giving an averageof 269 per day, the room having been open during 292 days. The numberof books consulted was 424, 851, or 1455 daily. This is an agreeableview of what one part of society is doing; but there is a reverse tothe picture, as shewn in a recently published parliamentary report, from which it appears that in 1849 the juvenile offenders in Englandnumbered 6849--in Wales, 73--of whom 167 were transported; in 1850, the numbers were respectively 6988, 82, 184, shewing an increase undereach head. Of the whole number in confinement last November, 169 wereunder thirteen years of age, and 568 under sixteen: 205 had been inprison once before, 90 twice, 49 three times, 85 four times andupwards; 329 had lost one parent, 103 both parents; 327 could notread, and 554 had not been brought up to any settled employment. Thesefacts may be taken as demonstrative of the necessity for multiplyingreformatory agricultural schools, such as have been established invarious parts of the continent with the happiest effects. 

Among the prizes just announced by the French Académie, is one for'the best work on the state of pauperism in France, and the means ofremedying it, ' to be adjudged in 1853. It is greatly to be wished thatsome gifted mind would arise capable of taking a proper survey of sograve a question, and bringing it to a practical and satisfactorysolution. Some people are beginning to ask, whether it would not bebetter, with the proceeds of poor-rates, to send paupers to colonieswhich are scant of labourers, rather than to expend the money inkeeping them at home. The Académie of Literature, too, has offered aprize for an essay on the parliamentary eloquence of England--asignificant fact in a country where the legislature is not permittedto be eloquent, and where forty-nine provincial papers have died sincethe 2d of December. Coming again to science: the judicial _savants_have awarded a medal to Mr Hind for his discovery of some two or threeof the minor planets--an acknowledgment of merit which will not failof good results in more ways than one. 

Various scientific matters, which are deserving of a passing notice, have come before the same learned body. Matteucci, who has beensteadily pursuing his electro-chemical labours, now states that withcertain liquids and a single metal he can form a pile, theelectro-magnetic and electro-chemical effects of which are muchgreater than those obtained with the old piles of Volta and Wollaston, and come nearer to those of the batteries of Bunsen and Grove. As yet, he withholds the particulars, but they will shortly be forthcoming. M. Dureau de la Malle, in remarks on the breeding of fish, a subjectwhich has of late occupied much attention in France, says, that he hasnow discovered the reason 'why domestic servants in Holland andScotland, when taking a situation, stipulate that they shall not bemade to eat salmon more than three times a week;' it is, the insipidtaste of young salmon. It is safe to say, that however much M. De laMalle may know about fish, he knows but little of the habits of thecountries to which he refers. M. Yvart mentions a fact that may beuseful to graziers--the breed of cattle has been improved in France bythe introduction of the Durham bull; but, as experience has shewn, itis at the expense of certain qualities deemed essential on the otherside of the Channel. Here, we require meat as speedily as possible inyoung animals for consumption in our great towns; there, the greatrural population use milk largely, and keep the animals longer beforethey are killed. The quantity of milk, it appears, is materiallyreduced in the Durham breed, and on this account M. Yvart suggests, that it should not be too much encouraged. Then there is somethingabout dogs by Messrs Gruby and Delafond, who shew that the worms whichhave long been known to exist in the larger blood-vessels of certaindogs, are the parents of the almost innumerable _filaria_ ormicroscopic worms, found circulating also in the veins. The numbergenerally in one dog is estimated at 52, 000, though at times it ismore than 200, 000; and being smaller than the blood-globules, thecreatures penetrate the minutest blood-vessels. They are met with onthe average in one dog in twenty-five, though most frequent in theadult and old, and without distinction of sex or race. The examinationof the phenomenon is to be continued, with a view to ascertain whetherdogs infested with these blood-worms are subject to any peculiardisease. 

More interesting is the account of a successful case of transfusion ofblood in the human subject, performed in presence of the ablestsurgeons of Paris. A woman was taken to the Hôtel Dieu reduced byhemorrhage to the last stage of weakness, unable to speak, to open hereyes, or to draw back her tongue when put out. The basilic vein wasopened, and the point of a syringe, warmed to the proper temperature, was introduced, charged with blood drawn from the same vein in the armof one of the assistants. The quantity, 180 grammes, was injected in2-1/2 minutes, after which the wound was dressed, and the patientplaced in a comfortable position. Gradually, the beatings of the pulserose from 130 to 138, and became firmer; the action of the heartincreased in energy; the eyes opened with a look of intelligence; andthe tongue could be advanced and withdrawn with facility, and regainedits redness. On the following day, there was a little delirium, afterwhich the pulse fell to 90, the signs of vitality acquired strength, and at the end of a week the woman left the hospital restored tohealth. Cases of successful transfusion are so rare, that it is notsurprising the one here recorded should have excited attention amongour physiologists. 

People inclined to corpulence may profit by M. Dancel's observationson the development of fat. He says, that some of his patients, whoseobesity was a constant inconvenience and cause of disease, 'lost verynotably of their _embonpoint_ by a change in their alimentaryregimen--abstaining almost entirely from vegetables, feculentsubstances, diminishing their quantity of drink, and increasing, whennecessary, their portion of meat. ' On another, subject, M. GuérinMéneville believes he has found a new cochineal insect (_Coccus fabæ_)on the common bean, which grows wild in the south of France, and insuch abundance, that a considerable quantity may be collected in ashort time. The yield of colouring matter is of such amount, that aproject is talked of for cultivating the plant extensively. 

A communication has been made to the Geological Society at Paris by M. De Hauslab, on a subject which has from time to time occupied thethoughts of those who study the _physique_ of the planet on which welive--namely, the origin of the present state of our globe, and itscrystal-like cleavage. After a few preliminary remarks aboutmountains, rocks, dikes and their line of direction, he shews that theglobe presents the form approximately of a great octahedron(eight-sided figure); and further, that the three axial planes whichsuch a form necessitates, may be described by existing circles roundthe earth: the first being Himalaya and Chimborazo; starting from CapeFinisterre, passing to India, Borneo, the eastern range of Australia, New Zealand, across to South America, Caracas, the Azores, and soround to Finisterre. The second runs in the opposite direction;includes the Andes, Rocky Mountains, crosses Behring's Strait toSiberia, thence to the Altaï, Hindostan, Madagascar, Cape Colony, andending again at the Andes of Brazil. The third, which cuts the twoformer at right angles, proceeds from the Alps, traverses theMediterranean by Corsica and Sardinia to the mountains of Fezzan, through Central Africa to the Cape, on to Kerguelen's Land, BlueMountains of Australia, Spitzbergen, Scandinavia, and completingitself in the Alps, from whence it started. These circles shew thelimits of the faces of the huge crystal, and may be divided intoothers, comprising forty-eight in the whole. The views thus set forthexhibit much ingenuity; and when we consider that metals crystallisein various forms, and native iron in the octahedral, there is much tobe said in their favour. 

We shall probably not be long before hearing of another gold field, for Dr Barth writes from the interior of Africa, that grains of theprecious metal have been found in two rivers which flow into LakeTchad, and that the mountains in the neighbourhood abound with it. Should the first discovery be verified by further explorations, goldwill be more abundant than it now promises to be, and Africa perhapsthe richest source of supply. Apropos of this continent, a Frenchtraveller is about to prove from the results of a journey from theCape towards the equator, that the Carthaginian discoveries had beenpushed much further towards the south than is commonly supposed. 

Agassiz, who, as you know, has become a citizen of the United States, has had the Cuvierian prize awarded to him for his great work onfossil fishes--an honour approved by every lover of science. Thisdistinguished writer says, in his latest publications on fossilzoology, that the number of fossil fishes distributed over the globeis more than 25, 000 species; of mammifera, over 3000; reptiles, over4000; shells, more than 40, 000; numbers which greatly exceed allformer calculation. Of other American items, there is one worthy thenotice of apiarians: some emigrants who sailed from Boston wished toconvey a hive of bees to the Sandwich Islands, where the industriousinsects have not as yet been introduced; all went well until thevessel reached the tropics, and there the heat was so great as to meltthe wax of the combs, and consequently to destroy the bees. 

Lieutenant Hunt, of the American Coast Survey, states thatcopper-plate engravings may be copied on stone; specimens are toappear in the forthcoming report. To quote his description: 'Acopper-plate being duly engraved, it is inked, and an impression takenon transfer-paper. A good paper, which wetting does not expand, isneeded, and a fatty coating is used in the process. The transfer-paperimpression is laid on the smooth stone, and run through a press. It isthen wetted, heated, and stripped off from the stone, leaving the inkand fat on its face. The heated fat is softly brushed away, leavingonly the ink-lines. From this reversed impression on the stone, theprinting is performed just as in ordinary lithography. A good transferproduces from 3000 to 5000 copies. Thus prints from a singlecopper-plate can be infinitely multiplied, the printing being, moreover, much cheaper than copper-plate. '

IN EXPECTATION OF DEATH. --CONSTANTIA. 

 When I was young, my lover stole One of my ringlets fair: I wept--'Ah no! Those always part, Who having once changed heart for heart, Change also locks of hair. 

 'And wonder-opened eyes have seen The spirits of the dead, Gather like motes in silent bands Round hair once reft by tender hands From some now shrouded head. 

 'If'---- Here he closed my quivering mouth, And where the curl had lain, Laid payment rich for what he stole:-- Could I to one hour crush life's whole, I'd live that hour again!

 My golden curls are silvering o'er-- Who heeds? The seas roll wide; When one I know their bounds shall pass, There'll be no tresses--save long grass-- For _his_ hands to divide;

 While I shall lie, low, deep, a-cold, And never hear him tread: Whether he weep, or sigh, or moan, I shall be passive as a stone, He living, and I--dead!

 And then he will rise up and go, With slow steps, looking back, Still--going: leaving me to keep My frozen and eternal sleep, Beneath the earth so black. 

 Pale brow--oft leant against his brow: Dear hand--where his lips lay; Dim eyes, that knew not they were fair, Till his praise made them half they were-- Must all these pass away?

 Must nought of mine be left for him Save the poor curl he stole? Round which this wildly-loving _me_ Will float unseen continually, A disembodied soul. 

 A soul! Glad thought--that lightning-like Leaps from this cloud of doom: If, living, all its load of clay Keeps not my spirit from him away, Thou canst not, cruel tomb!

 The moment that these earth-chains burst, Like an enfranchised dove, O'er seas and lands to him I fly, Whom only, whether I live or die, I loved, love, and shall love. 

 I'll wreathe around him--he shall breathe My life instead of air; In glowing sunbeams o'er his head My visionary hands I'll spread, And kiss his forehead fair. 

 I'll stand, an angel bold and strong, Between his soul and sin; If Grief lie stone-like on his heart, I'll beat its marble doors apart, To let Peace enter in. 

 He never more shall part from me, Nor I from him abide; Let these poor limbs in earth find rest! I'll live like Love within his breast, Rejoicing that I died. 

WATER. 

Some four-fifths of the weight of the human body are nothing butwater. The blood is just a solution of the body in a vast excess ofwater--as saliva, mucus, milk, gall, urine, sweat, and tears are thelocal and partial infusions effected by that liquid. All the softsolid parts of the frame may be considered as ever temporaryprecipitates or crystallisations (to use the word but loosely) fromthe blood, that mother-liquor of the whole body; always beingprecipitated or suffered to become solid, and always beingredissolved, the forms remaining, but the matter never the same formore than a moment, so that the flesh is only a vanishing solid, asfluent as the blood itself. It has also to be observed, that everypart of the body, melting again into the river of life continually asit does, is also kept perpetually drenched in blood by means of theblood-vessels, and more than nine-tenths of that wonderful current ispure water. Water plays as great a part, indeed, in the economy ofthat little world, the body of man, as it still more evidently does inthe phenomenal life of the world at large. Three-fourths of thesurface of the earth is ocean; the dry ground is dotted with lakes, its mountain-crests are covered with snow and ice, its surface isirrigated by rivers and streams, its edges are eaten by the sea; andaqueous vapour is unceasingly ascending from the ocean and inlandsurfaces through the yielding air, only to descend in portions and atintervals in dews and rains, hails and snows. Water is not only thebasis of the juices of all the plants and animals in the world; it isthe very blood of nature, as is well known to all the terrestrialsciences; and old Thales, the earliest of European speculators, pronounced it the mother-liquid of the universe. In the later systemsof the Greeks, indeed, it was reduced to the inferior dignity of beingonly one of the four parental natures--fire, air, earth, and water;but water was the highest--[Greek: udôr men ariston]--inrank. --_Westminster Review_. 

LOTTERY OF DEATH. 

The Polish and German peasantry have given the authorities at Posenconsiderable trouble by their inquiries respecting a 'Rothschild'sLottery. ' They have been led to believe, that the 'great Rothschild'has been sentenced to be beheaded; but that he has been allowed toprocure a substitute, if he can, by lottery! For this purpose, a sumof many millions is devoted, all the tickets to be prizes of 3000thalers each, except one; that fatal number is a blank; and whoeverdraws it, is to be decapitated instead of the celebrated banker!Notwithstanding the risk, the applicants for shares have beennumerous. [There is nothing surprising in the number of applicationsfor these shares. Every man who enters the army in wartime, takes outa ticket in a similar lottery. In China, human life is of still lessaccount; for there it is easy for a condemned criminal, whose escapethe authorities are willing to connive at, to obtain a substitute, who, for a sum of money, suffers death in his stead. ]

A MAN FOR THE WORLD. 

A successful merchant in New Zealand, a Scotchman, commenced businesswith the following characteristic entry on the first page of hisledger:--'Commenced business this day--with no money--littlecredit--and L. 70 in debt. Faint heart never won fair lady. Set a stoutheart to a stay (steep) brae. God save the Queen!'

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_Just Published_, _Price 6d. Paper Cover_, CHAMBERS'S POCKET MISCELLANY: forming a LITERARY COMPANION for theRAILWAY, the FIRESIDE, or the BUSH. 

VOLUME VI. 

To be continued in Monthly Volumes. 

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Printed and Published by W. And R. CHAMBERS, High Street, Edinburgh. Also sold by W. S. ORR, Amen Corner, London; D. N. CHAMBERS, 55 WestNile Street, Glasgow; and J. M'GLASHAN, 50 Upper Sackville Street, Dublin. --Advertisements for Monthly Parts are requested to be sent toMAXWELL & Co. , 31 Nicholas Lane, Lombard Street, London, to whom allapplications respecting their insertion must be made.