The contrast between her past calamities and her present splendour, powerfully heightened the illusion. France loves illusion; she has always rejoiced in glittering deceptions, even with the perfect knowledge that they were deceptions; and here stood the most dazzling of political charlatans, the great wonder-worker, raising phantoms of national glory even out of the charnel. The wrecks of faction, the remnants of the monarchy, and the corpses lying headless in the shadow of the guillotine, gave all semblance to the conception—France was a charnel. Her people, by nature rushing into extremes, wild and fierce, yet gallant and generous, had become at length conscious of the national fall in the eyes of Europe. They had been scandalized by the rudeness, the baseness, and the brutishness, of rabble supremacy. They gazed upon their own crimsoned hands and tarnished weapons with intolerable disgust; and it was in this moment of depression that they saw a sudden beam of military renown shot across the national darkness. After so long defeat that it had extinguished all but the memory of her old triumphs, France was a conqueror; after a century of helpless exhaustion, she had risen into almost supernatural vigour; after a hundred years, scarcely marked by a single victory, her capital rang with the daily sound of successful battles against the veterans of Frederick and Maria Theresa; after lingering for generations in the obscurity so bitter to the popular heart, France had been suddenly thrown into the broadest lustre of European sovereignty. The world was changed; and the limits of that change offered only a more resistless lure to the popular passion, for their being still indistinct to the keenest eye of man.

But our chief struggle was at home, and the reaction of our foreign disasters came with terrible weight upon a cabinet already tottering. We saw its fate. Days and nights of the most anxious consultation, could not relieve us from the hourly increasing evidence, that the Continent was on the verge of ruin. The voice of Opposition, reinforced by the roar of the multitude, could no longer be shut out by the curtains of the council-chamber. Fox, always formidable, was never more confident and more popular, than when he made the House ring with prophecies of national downfall. His attacks were now incessant. He flung his hand-grenades night after night into our camp, and constantly with still greater damage. We still fought, but it was the fight of despair. Pitt was imperturbable; but there was not one among his colleagues who did not feel the hopelessness of calling for public reliance, when, in every successive debate, we heard the leader of Opposition contemptuously asking, what answer we had to the Gazette crowded with bankruptcy? to the resolutions of great bodies of the people denouncing the war? or to the deadly evidence of its effects in the bulletin which he held in his hand, announcing some new defeat of our allies; some new treaty of submission; some new barter of provinces for the precarious existence of foreign thrones?

In all my recollections of public life, this was the period of the deepest perplexity. The name of the great minister has been humiliated by those who judge of the past only by the present. But then all was new. The general eye of statesmanship had been deceived by the formal grandeur of the continential sovereignties. They had lain untouched, like the bodies of their kings, with all their armour on, and with every feature unchanged; and such they might have remained for ages to come, had not a new force broken open their gilded and sculptured shrines, torn off their cerements, and exposed them to the light and air. Then a touch extinguished them; the armour dropped into dust; the royal robes dissolved; the royal features disappeared; and the whole illusion left nothing but its moral behind.

It can be no dishonour to the memory of the first of statesmen, to acknowledge that he had not the gift of prophecy. Europe had never before seen a war of the people. The burning passions, rude vigour, and remorseless daring of the multitude, were phenomena of which man knows no more than he knows of the materials of destruction which lie hid in the central caverns of the globe, and which some new era may be suffered to develope, for the new havoc of posterity. Even to this hour, I think that the true source of revolutionary triumph has been mistaken. It was not in the furious energy of its factions, nor in the wild revenge of the people, nor even in the dazzling view of national conquest. These were but gusts of the popular tempest, currents of the great popular tide. But the mighty mover of all was the sudden change from the disgusts and depressions of serfdom, into a sense that all the world of possession lay before the bold heart and the ruthless hand. Every form of wealth and enjoyment was offered to the man who had begun life in the condition of one chained to the ground, and who could never have hoped to change his toil but for the grave. But the barrier was now cast down, and all were free to rush in. The treasury of national honours was suddenly flung open, and all might share the spoil. This was the true secret of the astonishing power of the Revolution. The man who was nothing to-day, might be everything to-morrow. The conscript might be a captain, a colonel, a general, before the Austrian or Prussian soldier could be a corporal. Who can wonder at the march of France, or the flight of her enemies?

Although every night now produced a debate, and the demand on the activity and vigilance of ministers was incessant and exhausting, the real debates in both Houses were few in comparison with those of later times. In those pitched battles of the great parties, their whole strength was mustered from every quarter; the question was long announced; and its decision was regarded as giving the most complete measure of the strength of the Cabinet and Opposition. One of these nights came, unfortunately for ministers, on the very day in which the bulletin arrived, announcing the signature of the first Austrian armistice. The passage of the Tyrol had stripped Austria of its mountain barrier. Terror had done the rest; and the armistice was signed within three marches of Vienna! The courier who had been sent to the Austrian ambassador, and had been permitted to pass through France, reported the whole nation to be in a frenzy of triumph. He had every where seen civic processions, military displays, and illuminations in the cities. The exultation of the people had risen to the utmost height of national enthusiasm; and Europe was pronounced, by every Frenchman, from the Directory to the postilion, to be at their feet.

This intelligence was all but fatal. If a shower of cannon-balls had been poured in upon the ministerial benches, it could scarcely have produced a more sweeping effect. It was clear that the sagacity of the "independent members"—only another name for the most flexible portion of the House—was fully awake to the contingency; the "waiters upon Providence," as they were called, with no very reverent allusion, were evidently on the point of deciding for themselves; and the "King's friends"—a party unknown to the constitution, but perfectly knowing, and known by, the treasury—began to move away by small sections; and, crowded as the clubs were during the day, I never saw the minister rise with so few of his customary troops behind him. But the Opposition bench was crowded to repletion; and their leader sat looking round with good-humoured astonishment, and sometimes with equally good-humoured burlesque, on the sudden increase of his recruits. The motion was in answer to a royal message on continental subsidies. Nothing could have been more difficult than the topic at that juncture. But I never listened to Pitt with more genuine admiration. Fox, in his declamatory bursts, was superior to every speaker whom I have ever heard. His appearance of feeling was irresistible. It seemed that, if one could have stripped his heart, it could scarcely have shown its pulsations more vividly to the eye, than they transpired from his fluent and most eloquent tongue. But if Fox was the most powerful of declaimers, Pitt was the mightiest master of the language of national council. He, too, could be occasionally glowing and imaginative. He could even launch the lighter weapons of sarcasm with singular dexterity; but his true rank was as the ruler of Empire, and his true talent was never developed but when he spoke for the interests of Empire.

On this night he was more earnest and more impressive than ever; the true description would have been, more imperial. He spoke, less like a debater, than like one who held the sceptre in his hand; and one who also felt that he was transmitting his wisdom as a parting legacy to a great people.

A portion of that speech, which ought never to be forgotten by the leaders of public affairs in England, was singularly full and powerful. Referring to the calumniated Revolution of 1688—"We now stand," said he, "almost in the same position with respect to France and Europe, in which the government of William III. stood a century ago. We have only to substitute the democracy of France for the monarchy; and Europe enfeebled by the shocks of war, as it is now, for Europe untouched and intrepid, awake to the ambition of the French king, and determined to meet him sword in hand. But the King of England was even then the guiding mind of Europe. I now demand, what was the redeeming policy of that pre-eminent sovereign? It was, never to despair of the triumph of principle; never to doubt of the ultimate fortunes of good in a contest with evil; and never to hesitate in calling upon a great and free people for the defence of that constitution which had made them great and free."

Those high-toned sentiments were received with loud cheers. Even Opposition felt the natural force of the appeal, and the cheering was universal; party was forgotten for the time, and the name of England, and the revived glory of those illustrious days, bowed the whole House at the will of the great orator. In the midst of their enthusiasm, he took from the table a volume of the records, and read the final address of William to his Parliament; the bequest of a dying king to the people whom he had rescued from slavery. This royal speech had evidently formed his manual of government, and, certainly, a nobler declaration never came from the throne.

"My Lords and Gentlemen—I promise myself that you are met together with that just sense of the common danger of Europe, and that resentment of the late proceedings of the French king, which have been so fully and universally expressed in the loyal and seasonable addresses of my people." In allusion to the French plan of universal monarchy in the reign of Louis XIV., the speech pronounced that the alliance of Spain was the commencement of a system for subjugating Europe. "It is fit," said the King, "that I should tell you that the eyes of all Europe are upon this Parliament—all matters are at a stand until your resolutions are known; and therefore no time ought to be lost.

"You have yet an opportunity, by God's blessing, to secure to yourselves and your posterity the quiet enjoyment of your religion and liberties, if you are not wanting to yourselves, but will exert the utmost vigour of the English nation. But I tell you plainly, that if you do not lay hold of this occasion, you have no reason to hope for another." One of the measures proposed was, for the maintenance of the public good faith. "I cannot but press upon you," said the King, "to take care of the public credit, which cannot be preserved but by keeping sacred the maxim, that they shall never be losers who trust to parliamentary security.

"Let me conjure you to disappoint the only hopes of your enemies by your unanimity. I have shown, and will always show, how desirous I am to be the common father of all my people: do you, in like manner, lay aside parties and divisions; let there be no other distinction heard of amongst us, but of those who are for the Protestant religion and the present establishment; and of those who mean a Popish prince and a French government.

"I shall only add this; that if you do, in good earnest, desire to see England hold the balance of Europe, and to be indeed at the head of the Protestant interest, it will appear by the present opportunity."

Daylight shone on the windows of St Stephen's before the debate closed. The minister had retired immediately after his exhausting speech, and left his friends to sustain the combat. It was long and fierce; but Opposition was again baffled, and the division gave us a lingering majority. It was now too late, or too early, to go to rest; and I had returned to my official apartments, to look over some returns required for the next council, when, my friend the secretary tapped at my door. His countenance looked care-worn; and for a few moments after he had sat down, he remained in total silence, with his forehead resting on his hands. This was so unlike the cheerful spirit of former times—times in which he had seemed to defy, or almost to enjoy, the struggles of public life—that I began to express alarm for his health. But he interrupted me by a look of the deepest distress, and the words "Pitt is dying." No words could be fuller of ill omen, and my anxiety was equal to his own. "My meaning," said he, "is not, that he must die to-day, or to-morrow, nor in six months, nor perhaps in a year, but that the statesman is dead. He must speak no more, act no more, and even think no more, or he must go to his grave. This night has finished the long supremacy of the noblest mind that ever ruled the councils of this country. William Pitt may live, but the minister has finished his days."

"Yet," I remarked, "I never heard him more animated or more impressive than on this night. He absolutely broke down all resistance. His mind seemed richer than ever, and his combination of facts and reasoning appeared to me unequalled by even his greatest previous efforts. I should have almost pronounced him to be inspired by the increased difficulties of the time."

"True—yet I conveyed him from the House, fainting;—I have sate, along with his physician, at his bedside ever since, applying restoratives to him, with scarcely a hope of recovery. It is plain that another night of such effort would be too much for his frame; and the question on which I have now come to summon an immediate meeting of our friends, turns on the means of calming public opinion until he shall be able to appear in his place once more. His career is unquestionably at an end, but his name is powerful still; and though another trial of his powers in Parliament would cost him his life, still, as the head of the cabinet, he might effect, for a while, all the principal purposes of an administration."

I doubted the possibility of encountering the present strength of Opposition, reinforced, as it was, by calamity abroad, and asked, "Whether any expedient was contemplated, to restore the public fortunes on the Continent?"

"Every point of that kind has been long since considered," was the answer. "Our alliances have all failed; and we are now reproached, not simply with the folly of paying for inefficient help, but with the cruelty of dragging the states of Europe into a contest, where to be crushed was inevitable."

I still urged an enquiry into the strength of states which had never been sharers in the war. "If the minor German powers have been absorbed; if Prussia has abandoned the cause; if Austria has fought in vain—is the world included in Germany?" I threw the map of Europe on the table. "See what a narrow circle comprehends the whole space to which we have hitherto limited the defence of society against the enemy of all social order. Our cause is broader than Austria and Prussia; it is broader than Europe; it is the cause of civilization itself; and why not summon all civilization to its defence? Russia alone has an army of half a million, yet she has never fired a shot." Still, I found it difficult to convince my fellow minister.

"Russia—jealous, ambitious, and Asiatic; Russia, with the Eastern world for her natural field—what object can she have in relieving the broken powers of the Continent? Must she not rather rejoice in the defeats and convulsions which leave them at her mercy?" I still continued to urge him.

"Rely upon it; it is in the North that we must look for the reinforcement. If the councils of Catharine were crafty, the councils of her successor may be sincere. Catharine thought only of the seizure of Turkey; Paul may think only of the profits of commerce. Yet, is it altogether justifiable to suppose that monarchs may not feel the same sympathies, the same principles of honour—nay, the same abhorrence of a sanguinary republicanism—which a private individual might feel in any other instance of oppression?"

"Still, Marston, I am at a loss to know by what influence a British government could urge a Russian despotism into a contest, a thousand miles from its frontier; in which it can gain no accession of territory, and but little accession of military fame; and all this, while it is itself perfectly secure from all aggression."

"All true; but remember the striking commencement of Voltaire's Memoir of Peter—'Who could have pretended to say, in the year 1700, that a magnificent and polished court would be formed at the extremity of the Gulf of Finland; that the inhabitants of Cazan and the banks of the Wolga would be ranked among disciplined warriors, and, after beating the Turk and the Swede, gain victories in Germany? That a desert of two thousand leagues in length, should, in the space of fifty years, extend its influence to all the European courts; and that, in 1759, the most zealous patron of literature in Europe should be a Russian sovereign? The man who had said this would have been regarded as the most chimerical mortal on earth.' But all this has been done, and the career is not closed. More will be done still. It may even be our most essential policy to bring Russia into full collision with France. She is now the only rival: and I shall scarcely regret the fall of the German sovereignties, if it clears the field, to bring face to face the two great powers which hold at their sword's point the fate of the Continent."

A month passed, of perpetual difficulty in the cabinet, of ill news from abroad, and of violent discontents among the people. A deficient harvest had come, to increase the national murmurs; a season of peculiar inclemency had added its share to the public vexations; and I fully experienced the insufficiency of office, and of the showy honours of courts, to constitute happiness. But a new scene was reserved for me. Casual as my conversation with the secretary of state had been, it was not forgotten: it had been related to the minister; and it had so far coincided with the conceptions of a mind, which seemed to comprehend every chance of human things, that I was shortly sent for, to enter into the necessary explanations. The result was, the offer of a mission to St Petersburg. The proposal was so unexpected, that I required time for my answer. I must abandon high employment at home for a temporary distinction abroad; my knowledge of Russia was slight; the character of the Czar was eccentric; and the success of an embassy, dependent on the most capricious of mankind, was so uncertain, that the result might strip me of whatever credit I already possessed.

But, there was one authority, to which I always appealed. I placed the proposal in the hands of Clotilde; and she settled all my doubts at once, by declaring, "that it was the appointment which, if she had been suffered to choose, she would have selected, in preference to all others, for its honour and its services." I had no power to resist such pleadings—seconded as they were by the rosiest smiles, and the most beaming eyes. But Clotilde was still the woman, and I only valued her the more for it.—Her sincerity had not a thought to hide; and she acknowledged her delight at the prospect of once more treading on the soil of the Continent; at gazing even on the borders of her native land, excluded as she might be from its entrance; at the enjoyment of seeing continental life in the brilliant animation of its greatest court; and at mingling with the scene in a rank which entitled her to its first distinctions.

"But, Clotilde, how will you reconcile your tastes to the wild habits of Russia, and even to the solemn formalities of a northern court?"

"They both present themselves to me," was her answer, "with the charm at once of novelty and recollection. From my nursery days, the names of Peter, Catharine, and their marvellous city, rang in the ears of all Paris. Romance had taken refuge at the pole; Voltaire, Buffon, D'Alembert—all the wit, and all the philosophy of France—satirized the French court under the disguise of Russian panegyric; and St Petersburg was to us the modern Babylon—a something compounded of the wildness of a Scythian desert, and the lustre of a Turkish tale."

The ministerial note had been headed "most secret and confidential," and as such I had regarded it. But I soon saw the difficulty of keeping "a state secret." I had scarcely sent in my acceptance of the appointment, when I found a letter on my table from my old Israelite friend, Mordecai, congratulating me on "my decision." It was in his usual abrupt style:—

"I was aware of the minister's offer to you within twelve hours after it was made. I should have written to you, urging its acceptance; but I preferred leaving your own judgment to settle the question. Still, I can give you some personal knowledge on the subject of Russia. I have been there for the last six months. My daughter—for what purpose I have never been able to ascertain—took a sudden whim of hating Switzerland, and loving the snows and deserts of the North. But I have known the sex too long, ever to think of combating their wills by argument.—The only chance of success is to give way to them. Mariamne, sick of hills and valleys, and unable to breathe in the purest air of the globe, determined to try the exhalations from the marshes of the Neva. But, she is my child, after all—the only being for whom I live—and I was peculiarly grateful that she had not fixed on Siberia, or taken a resolution to live and die at Pekin. I do not regret my journey. It has thrown a new light on me. I must acknowledge to you, that I was astonished at Russia. I had known it in early life, and thought that I knew it well. But it is singularly changed. The spirit of the people—the country—the throne itself—have undergone the most remarkable of silent revolutions, and the most effective of all. Russia is now Russia no longer; she is Greece, Germany, France—and she will yet be England. Her politics and her faculties, alike, embrace the civilized world. She is Greece in her subtlety, Germany in her intelligence, and France in her ambition. St Petersburg is less the capital of her empire, though of all capitals the most magnificent, than an emblem of her mind. I often stood on the banks of the Neva, and, looking round me on their mass of palaces, involuntarily asked myself—Could all this have been the work of a single mind? Other capitals have been the work of necessity, of chance, of national defence, of the mere happiness of location. But this was founded in ambition alone—founded by the sovereign will of one who felt, that in it he was erecting an empire of conquest; and that from this spot, in after ages, was to pour forth the force that was to absorb every other dominion of the world. Peter fixed on the site of his city to tell this to the world. I see in its framer, and in its site, the living words—'I fix my future capital in a wilderness—in a swamp—in a region of tempests—on the shores of an inhospitable sea—in a climate of nine months' winter—to show that I am able to conquer all the obstacles of nature. I might have fixed it on the shores of the Euxine—in the most fertile regions of Asia—in the superb plains of central Russia—or on the banks of the Danube; but I preferred fixing it in the extremity of the North, to show that the mind and power of Russia dreaded no impediments, of either man or nature.'

"I am now in London for a week. You will find me in my den."

I visited him "in his den;" and it deserved the name as much as ever. Not a pane had been cleared of its dinginess; not a cobweb had been swept from its ceiling; nothing had been removed, except the pair of living skeletons who once acted as his attendants. They had been removed by the Remover of all things; and were succeeded by a pair, so similar in meagreness and oddity of appearance, that I could not have known the change, except for its mention by their master, congratulating himself on being so "fortunate" in finding substitutes. I found Mordecai immersed in day-books and ledgers, and calculating the exchanges with as much anxiety as if he were not worth a shilling. But his look was more languid than before, and his powerful eye seemed to have sunk deeper beneath his brow.

"You are probably surprised at seeing me here;" said he, "but I have more reason than ever to be here. There is a time for all things, but not if we throw it away. My last excursion to Poland has revived my zeal in behalf of my nation; and as years advance on me, like the rest of the world, I find that I must only exert myself the more."

"But, Mordecai, you are opulent; you can have no necessity for abandoning the natural indulgences of life. You will only shorten your days by this toil. At least why do you linger in this dungeon?"

He smiled grimly. "It is a dungeon, and I only value it the more. To this dungeon, as you call it, come, day by day, some of the haughtiest names of the land. If I lived in some west-end Square, with my drawing-room filled with Louis Quatorze gew-gaws, and half-a-dozen idle fellows in livery to announce my visitors, I should not feel the hundredth part of the sense of superiority, the contemptuous triumph, the cool consciousness of the tyranny of gold, which I feel when I see my shrinking supplicants sitting down among my dusty boxes and everlasting cobwebs. I shall not suffer a grain of dust to be cleared away. It is my pride—it is my power—it is my revenge."

His visage assumed so completely the expression which I had always imagined for Shylock, that I should scarcely have been surprised if I had seen him produce the knife and the scales.

"You are surprised at all this," said he after a pause, in which he fixed his searching eyes on me. "I see by your countenance, that you think me a Goth, a monster, a savage.—I think myself none of those things. I am a man; and, if I am not much deceived, I am also a philosopher. My life has been a perpetual struggle through a world where every one worships self. My nation are scorned, and they struggle too. The Jew has been injured, not by the individual alone, but by all mankind; and has he not a right to his revenge? He has at last found the means. He is now absorbing the wealth of all nations. With the wealth he will have the power; and another half century will not elapse, before all the grand questions of public council—nay, of national existence—must depend on the will of the persecuted sons of Abraham. Who shall rise, or who shall fall; who shall make war, or who shall obtain peace; what republic shall be created, or what monarchy shall be rent in pieces—will henceforth be the questions, not of cabinets, but of the 'Change. There are correspondences within this escritoire, worth all the wisdom of all the ministers of earth. There are commands at the point of this pen, which the proudest statesmanship dares not controvert. There is in the chests round you a ruler more powerful than ever before held the sceptre—the dictator of the globe; the true Despot is Gold."

After this wild burst, he sank into silence; until, to change the fever of his thoughts, I enquired for the health of his daughter. The father's heart overcame him again.

"My world threatens to be a lonely one, Mr Marston," said he in a feeble voice. "You see a heartbroken man. Forgive the bitterness with which I have spoken. Mariamne, I fear, is dying; and what is wealth now to me? I have left her in Poland among my people. She seemed to feel some slight enjoyment in wandering from place to place; but her last letter tells me that she is wearied of travelling, and has made up her mind to live and die where she may be surrounded by her unhappy nation. I remain here only to wind up my affairs, and in a week I quit England—and for ever."

But a new object caught my glance. Mordecai—who, while he was thus speaking in paroxysms of alternate indignation and sorrow, had never for a moment ceased to turn over his books and boxes—had accidentally shaken a pile of tin cases from its pinnacle, and the whole rolled down at my feet. On one of them I saw, with no very strong surprise, the words—"Mortgage—Mortimer Castle." The eyes of both glanced in the same direction.

"There," said the Israelite, "you have your paternal acres in your hand—your Plantagenet forests, and your Tudor castle, all in a cubic foot. On the chair where you are now sitting, your lordly brother sat yesterday, gathering up his skirts from the touch of every thing round him, and evidently suffering all the torture of a man of fashion, forced to smile on the holder of his last mortgage. He is ruined—not worth a sixpence; Melton and Newmarket have settled that question for him. But do you recognise that hand?" He drew a letter from his portfolio. I knew the writing: it was from my mother—on whom, now old and feeble, this accomplished roue had been urging the sale of her jointure. Helpless and alone, she had consented to this fatal measure; and my noble brother's visit to the Israelite had been for the purpose of inducing him to make the purchase.

I started up in indignation; declared that the result must reduce my unfortunate parent to beggary; and demanded by what means I could possibly prevent what was "neither more nor less than an act of plunder."

"I see no means," said Mordecai coolly, "except your making the purchase yourself, and thus securing the jointure to her ladyship. It is only ten thousand pounds."

"I make the purchase! I have not the tenth part of the money upon earth. I ask you, what is to be done?"

"Your brother has here the power of selling—and will sell, if the starvation of fifty mothers stood in his way. Newmarket suffers no qualms of that kind; and, when his matters there are settled, his coachmaker's bill for landaulets and britchskas will make him a pedestrian for the rest of his life. But I have refused the purchase; and it was chiefly on this subject that I was induced to invite you to my 'dungeon,' as you not unjustly term it."

The picture of a mother, of whom I had always thought with the tenderness of a child, cast out in her old age to poverty, with the added bitterness of being thus cast out by her reliance on the honour of a cruel and treacherous son, rose before my eyes with such pain, that I absolutely lost all power of speech, and could only look the distress which I felt. Mordecai gazed on me with an enquiring countenance.

"You love this mother, Mr Marston. You are a good son. We Israelites, with all our faults, respect the feelings which 'honour the father and the mother.' It is a holy love, and well earned by the cares and sorrows of parentage." He paused, and covered his forehead with his gigantic hands. I could hear him murmur the name of his daughter. The striking of a neighbouring church clock startled him from his reverie.

Suddenly again bustling among his papers, he said—"Within this half hour, your brother is to call again for my definitive answer. Now, listen to me. The jointure shall be purchased." I bit my lip; but he did not leave me long in suspense—"And you shall be the purchaser." He wrote a cheque for the amount, and placed it in my hand.

"Mordecai, you are a noble fellow! But how am I to act upon this? I am worth nothing. I might as well attempt to repay millions."

"Well, so be it, Mr Marston. You are a man of honor, and a good son. You will repay it when you can. I exact but one condition: that you will come and visit Mariamne and me in Poland."

A loud knock at the hall-door put an end to our interview.

"That is your brother," said he. "You must not see him, as I choose to keep the name of the purchaser to myself. Take your mother's letter with you; and give her my best advice to write no more—at least to such correspondents as his lordship."

I rose to take my leave. He followed me hastily; and, taking me by the hand, said—"Another condition I have to make. It is, that not a syllable of all that has passed between us on this subject shall be suffered to transpire. I should make but a bad figure on 'Change, if I were suspected of transactions in that style. Remember, it must be a profound secret to all the world."

"Even to my wife?" I asked. "Is she included?"

"No, no," he replied, with a faint laugh; "I look upon you as a mere mortal still. All vows are void in their nature, which require impossibilities in their execution." We parted.

I told my little city tale to Clotilde. She wept and smiled alternately, as I told it. Mordecai received all his due praise; and we pledged ourselves to find out his Mariamne, in whatever corner of the Lithuanian wilderness she might have hidden her fantastic heart and head. But I had now another duty. Within a few hours, we were on our way to the jointure-house. It was a picturesque old building, the residence of the Father Abbot, in the times before the insatiable hand of Somerset had fallen upon the monasteries. We reached it in the twilight of a gentle day, when all its shrubs and flowers were filling the air with freshness and fragrance. I found my mother less enfeebled than I had expected; and still affectionate and tender, as she had always been to her long-absent son. She was still fully susceptible of the honours which had now opened before me. Clotilde almost knelt before her noble air and venerable beauty. My mother could not grow weary with gazing on the expressive countenance of my beautiful wife. I had secured my parent's comfort for life; and I, too, was happy.

* * * * *

My embassy, like all other embassies, had its vexations; but on the whole I had reason to congratulate myself on its acceptance. My reception at St Petersburg was most distinguished; I had arrived at a fortunate period. The French expedition to Egypt had alarmed the Russian councils for Constantinople; a possession to which every Russian looks, in due time, as naturally as to the right of his copecks and caftan. But the victory of Aboukir, which had destroyed the French fleet, again raised the popular exultation, and English heroism was the topic of every tongue. The incomparable campaign of the Russian army in Italy; the recovery, in three months, of all which it had cost the power of France, and the genius of her greatest general, in two years of pitched battles, sanguinary sieges, artful negotiation, and incessant intrigue, to obtain, excited the nation to the highest degree of enthusiasm, and the embassy basked in the broadest sunshine of popularity. Fete now succeeded fete; the standards taken in Suwarrow's battles, the proudest trophies ever won by Russian arms, were carried in procession to the cathedral; illuminations of the capital, balls in the palaces, and public sports on the waters and banks of the Neva, kept St Petersburg in a perpetual tumult of joy.

But all was not sunshine: the character of the sovereign in a despotism demands perpetual study; and Paul was freakish and headstrong beyond all human calculation. No man was more misunderstood at a distance, nor less capable of being understood near. He had some striking qualities. He was generous, bold, and high-principled; but the simplest accident would turn all those qualities into their reverse. To-day he was ready to devote himself to the cause of Europe; every soldier of Russia must march: but, when the morrow came, he revoked the order for his troops, and cashiered the secretaries who had been rash enough to take him at his word. The secret was in his brain; disease was gathering on his intellect, and he was daily becoming dangerous to those nearest him. The result was long foreseen. In Spain, Gil Blas recommends that no man who wishes for long life should quarrel with his cook. In Russia, let no Czar rouse the suspicions of his courtiers. As the Pagans hung chaplets on the statues of their gods in victory, and flogged them in defeat, the Russians, in every casualty of their arms, turned a scowling eye upon their liege lord: and the retreat of Suwarrow, the greatest of Russian soldiers, from Switzerland, at once stripped the Emperor of all his popularity.

My position now became doubly anxious. Even despots love popularity, and the Czar was alternately furious and frightened at its loss. Guards were planted in every part of the city, with orders to disperse all groups. Every man who looked at the Imperial equipage as it passed through the streets, was in danger of being arrested as an assassin. Nobles were suddenly exiled—none knew why, or where. The cloud was thickening round the palace. It is a perilous thing to be the one object on which every eye involuntary turns, as the cause of public evil. Rumours of conspiracy rose and died, and were heard again. In free governments public discontents have room to escape, and they escape. In despotisms they have no room to evaporate, and they condense until they explode. St Petersburg at length became a place of silence and solitude by day, and of murmurs and meetings by night. It reminded one of Rome in the days of Nero; and I looked with perpetual alarm for the catastrophe of Nero.

The Russian is a submissive man, and even capable of strong attachment to the throne: but there is no spot of the earth where national injury is more deeply resented; and Paul had been regarded as tarnishing the fame of Russia. His abandonment of Suwarrow—a warrior, of whom the annals of the Russian army will bear record to the end of time—had stung all classes. More than a soldier, Suwarrow was a great military genius. He gained battles without tactics, and in defiance of them. He had astonished the Austrian generals by the fierce rapidity of his movements; he had annihilated the French armies in Italy by the desperate daring of his attacks. Wherever Suwarrow came, he was conqueror. In his whole career he had never been beaten. The soldiery told numberless tales of his eccentricity—laughed at, mimicked, and adored him. The nation honoured him as the national warrior. But the failure of some of his detached corps in Switzerland had embarrassed the campaign; and Paul, capricious as the winds, hastily recalled him. The popular indignation now burst out in every form of anger. Placards fixed at night on the palace walls; gipsy ballads sung in the streets; maskers, at the countless balls of the nobles; satires in quaint verse, and national proverbs, showed the public resentment to be universal. Every incident furnished some contemptuous comment. The Czar had built a wing to one of the palaces of Catharine. The addition wanted the stateliness of the original fabric. This epigram was posted on the building, in angry Slavonic:—

"One built a palace, one a stall. One marble; one a plaster wall. One sure to stand; one sure to fall. So much for Catharine—and for Paul!"

In the midst of this growing perplexity, the English messenger arrived. His tidings had been long anticipated, yet they came with the effect of a thunderclap. The cabinet had resigned! I of course now waited only for my order to return. But, in the mean time, this event formidably increased the difficulties of my position. Foreigners will never allow themselves to comprehend the nature of any English transaction whatever. They deal with them all as if they were scenes on a stage. In the incorrigible absurdity of their theatrical souls, they imagine a parliamentary defeat to be a revolution, and the change of a ministry the fall of an empire. Paul instantly cast off all his old partialities. He pronounced England undone. The star of France was to be the light of the west; he himself to be the luminary of the east. The bold ambition of Catharine was to be realized; however, without the system or the sagacity of her imperial genius. But Paul was to learn the terrible lesson of a despotic government. The throne separated from the people, is the more in peril the more widely it is separated. The people would not be carried along with their master to the feet of his new political idol. The substantial virtues of the national character resisted that French alliance, which must be begun at once by prostration and ingratitude. France was their new taunter. England was their old ally. They hated France for its republican insolence; they honoured England for its resolute determination to fight out the battle, not for its own sake alone, but for the cause of all nations. Paul, in the attempt to partition the globe, was narrowing his supremacy to his own sepulchre.

Yet, this time of national gloom was the most splendid period of the court. With the double purpose of recovering his popularity, and concealing his negotiations, Paul plunged into the most extraordinary festivity. Balls, masquerades, and fetes succeeded each other with restless extravagance. But the contrast of the saturnine Emperor with the sudden change of his court was too powerful. It bore the look of desperation; though for what purpose, was still a mystery to the million. I heard many a whisper among the diplomatic circle, that this whirl of life, this hot and fierce dissipation, was, in all Russian reigns, the sure precursor of a catastrophe; though none could yet venture to predict its nature. It was like the furious and frenzied indulgence of a crew in a condemned ship, breaking up the chests and drinking the liquors, in the conviction that none would survive the voyage. Even I, with all my English disregard of the speculative frivolities which to the foreigner are substance and facts, was startled by the increasing glare of those hurried and feverish festivities. More than once, as I entered the imperial saloon, crowded with the civil and military uniforms of every court of Europe, and exhibiting at once European taste and Asiatic magnificence, I could scarcely suppress the feeling that I was only entering the most stately of theatres; where, with all the temporary glitter of the stage, the sounds of the orchestra, and the passion and poetry of the characters—the fifth act was preparing, and the curtain was to fall on the death of nobles and kings.

The impression that evil was to come, already seemed to be universal. Rumours of popular conspiracy, fresh discoveries by the police, and new tales of imperial eccentricity, kept the public mind in constant fitfulness. At length, I received the formal communication of a "challenge" from the Czar to my sovereign, along with all the other crowned heads of Europe, to meet him in a champ-clos, and, sword in hand, decide the quarrels of nations. With this despatch came an invitation for the whole diplomatic body to a masquerade! in which all were commanded to appear as knights in armour—the Czar, as grand-master of the Order of Malta, exhibiting himself in the panoply in which he was to settle the disputes of mankind.

Perplexities like those form a large share of the trials of the foreign ambassador. To attend the fete was embarrassing; but to decline the invitation, would have been equivalent to demanding my passports. And I must acknowledge, that if the eye was to be gratified by the most superb and the most curious of all displays, never was there an occasion more fitted for its indulgence. All the armouries of Europe, and of Asia, seemed to have been searched for the arms and ornaments of this assemblage. The Kremlin had given up its barbaric shields and caps of bronze; the plate-mail of the Crusader; the gold-inlaid morions and cuirasses of France; the silver chain-mail of the Circassian; the steel corslet of the German chivalry; and a whole host of the various and rich equipments of the Greek, the Hungarian, the Moresco, and the Turkoman, made the Winter palace a blaze of knighthood.

Yet, to me, after the first excitement, the whole conveyed a deep impression of melancholy. It irresistibly reminded me of the last ceremonial of dead sovereigns, the "Chapelle Ardente." Even the curtains which fell round the throne, fringed with jewels as they were, to me looked funereal. The immense golden candelabra were to me the lights round a bier. I almost imagined that I could see the sword and sceptre laid across the coffin, and all of the Lord of Empire that remained, a corpse within.

I was roused from my reluctant reverie by the approach of a group of masks, who came dancing towards the recess where I had retired, wearied with the general noise, and the exhaustion of the fete. One of the casements opened into the famous Conservatory; and I was enjoying the scents of the thousand flowers and shrubs, of, perhaps, the finest collection in the world. But, in the shade, the group had evidently overlooked me; for they began to speak of matters which they could not have designed for a stranger's ear. The conduct of the Czar, the wrongs of Russia, and the "necessity of coming to a decision," were the topics. Suddenly, as if to avert suspicion, one of the group struck up a popular air on the little three-stringed guitar which throws the Russian crowd into such ecstasies; and they began a dance, accompanying it by a murmuring chorus, which soon convinced me of the dangerous neighbourhood into which I had fallen. The words became well known afterwards. No language excels the Russian in energy; but I must give them in the weakness of a translation.

The Neva may rush To its fountain again; The bill of a bird Lake Ladoga may drain; The blast from the Pole May be held in a chain; But the cry of a Nation Was never in vain!

When the bones of our chiefs Feed the wolf and the kite; When the spurs of our squadrons Are bloody with flight; When the Black Eagle's banner Is torn from its height; Then, dark-hearted dreamer! Beware of the night!

I hear in the darkness The tread of the bold; They stop not for iron, They stop not for gold; But the Sword has an edge, And the Scarf has a fold. Proud master of millions, Thy tale has been told!

Now the chambers are hush'd, And the strangers are gone, And the sire is no sire, And the son is no son, And the mightiest of Earth Sleeps for ever alone, The worm for his brother, The clay for his throne!

My conviction was complete, when, in the whirl of the dance, a small roll of paper dropped from the robe of one of the maskers, and fell at my feet. In taking it up to return it to him, I saw that it was a list of names, and, at the head, a name which, from private information, I knew to be involved in dark political purposes. The thought flashed across me, in connexion with the chorus which I had just heard, that the paper was of too much importance to be suffered to leave my possession.—The life of the sovereign might be involved. The group, who had been evidently startled by my sudden appearance among them, now surrounded me, and the loser of the paper insisted on its instant surrender. The violence of his demand only confirmed my resolution. He grew more agitated still, and the group seized me. I laid my hand upon my sword. This measure stopped them for the moment. But in the next, I saw a knife brandished in the air, and felt myself wounded in the arm. My attempt to grasp the weapon had alone saved me from its being buried in my heart. But the fracas now attracted notice; a crowd rushed towards us, and the group suddenly scattered away, leaving me still in possession of the paper. My wound bled, and I felt faint, and desired to be led into the open air. My mask was taken off; and this was scarcely done when I heard my name pronounced, and saw the welcome countenance of my friend Guiscard by my side. He had arrived but on that day, on a mission from his court; had, with his usual eagerness of friendship, gone to enquire for me at the hotel of the embassy; and thus followed me to the fete at the critical time. As he supported me to my equipage, I communicated the circumstances of the rencontre to his clear head and generous heart; and he fully agreed with me on the duty of instantly apprising the Czar of his probable danger. As I was unable to move through pain and feebleness, he offered to take the roll with him, and demand an interview with the sovereign himself, if possible; or, if not, with the governor of the palace. The paper contained not only names of individuals, all, long before, objects of public suspicion, but a sketch of the imperial apartments, and, at the bottom, the words—"three hours after midnight." I looked at my watch, it was already half-past two. This might, or might not be, the appointed night for this dreadful business; but, if it were, there was but one half hour between the throne and the grave. Guiscard hurried off, leaving me in the deepest anxiety, but promising to return as speedily as in his power. But he came not. My anxiety grew intolerable; hour after hour passed away, while I reckoned minute after minute, as if they were so much drained from my own existence. Even, if I had been able to move, it was impossible to know where to follow him. His steps might have been watched. Doubtless the conspirators were on the alert to prevent any approach to the palace. He might have fallen by the pistol of some of those men, who had not scrupled to conspire against their monarch. The most miserable of nights at length wore away; but it was only to be succeeded by the most fearful of mornings. The career of Paul was closed! On the entrance of the chamberlains into his sleeping apartment, the unhappy Czar was found dead. There could be no doubt that he had perished by treason. He was strangled. The intelligence no sooner spread through the capital, than it produced a burst of national sorrow. All his errors were forgotten. All his good qualities were remembered.

But where was my gallant and excellent friend—Guiscard?—Of him I heard nothing.

Another week of suspense, and he appeared. His history was of the most singular kind. On the night when I had last seen him, he had made his way through all obstacles into the palace, and been promised a private interview with the Czar. But, while he urged that no time should be lost, he had sufficient proof that there could be no chance of an interview. A succession of apologies was made: the 'Czar was at supper'—'he was engaged with the minister'—'he had gone to rest.' In total hopelessness of communicating his pressing intelligence in person, he at length consented to seal the roll, and place it in the hands of one of the officers of rank in the household. But that officer himself was in the conspiracy. The paper was immediately destroyed; and the bearer of it was considered to be too dangerous to be sent back. He was put under arrest in an apartment of the palace, and told that his life depended on his silence. He urged his diplomatic character in vain. The only answer was the sword of the conspirator turned to his throat. But within the week the revolution was complete, and he was set at liberty. A new monarch, a new government, a new feeling followed this dangerous act. But the character of the young monarch was made to be popular; the reign of caprice was at an end. The empire felt relieved; and Russia began the most glorious period of her national history.

My mission was now accomplished, for I refused to hold the embassy under a rival cabinet; but I carried with me from St Petersburg two trophies:—the former was the treaty concluded by Paul with France for the march of an army, in conjunction with a French column of 300,000 men, to invade India—a document which had hitherto baffled all diplomatic research; the other was the pathetic and noble letter of Alexander to the British sovereign, proposing a restoration of the national friendship.

I took my leave of the Russian court with a most gracious audience of its new monarch. I saw him long afterwards, under different circumstances, struggling with a tremendous war, pressed by every difficulty which could beset the throne, and throwing the last melancholy and doubtful cast for the independence of Europe. But, both now and then, I saw him, what nature had made him—a noble being. His stature was tall and commanding; and he was one of the most striking figures of his court when in the uniform of his guards. But his manner was still superior—it was at once affable and dignified; he spoke of European interests with intelligence, of his own intentions with candour, and of England with a rational respect for its spirit and institutions. Of his own country, he expressed himself with candour. "I feel," said he, "that I have a great trust laid on me, and I am determined to fulfil it. I shall not make the throne a bed of roses. There is still much to be done, and I shall do what I can. I have the advantage of a fine material in the people. No being is at once more susceptible of improvement, and more grateful for it, than the Russian. He has quick faculties and an honest heart. If the common hazards of empire should come, I know that he will not desert me. In the last extremity of human fortunes, I shall not desert him."

Those generous declarations were gallantly realized on both sides within a few years. I was not then aware that the Imperial prediction would be soon brought to the test. But it was gloriously fulfilled at Moscow, and proudly registered in the fragments of the throne of Napoleon.

Impatient as I was to reach England, I left St Petersburg with regret. Clotilde left it with those feelings which belong to the finer fancy of woman. She remembered it as the scene where she had enjoyed the most dazzling portion of her life; where every countenance had met her with smiles, and every tongue was prodigal of praise; where the day rose on the promise of new enjoyments, and the night descended in royal festivity. As we drove along the banks of the Neva, she more than once stopped the carriage, to give herself a parting glance at the long vista of stately buildings, which she was then to look upon, perhaps, for the last time. The scene was certainly of the most striking order; for we had commenced our journey on the evening of one of the national festivals; and we thus had the whole population, in all their holiday dresses, to give animation to the general aspect of the massive and gigantic architecture. The Neva was covered with barges of the most graceful form; the fronts of the citizens' houses were hung with decorations; music sounded from a vast orchestra in front of the palace; and the air re-echoed with the voices of thousands and tens of thousands, all evidently determined to be happy for the time. We both gazed in silence and admiration. The carriage had accidentally drawn up in view of the little hut which is preserved in the Neva as the dwelling of Peter. I saw a tear glistening on the long eyelash of my lovely fellow traveller.

"If I wanted a proof," said she, "of the intellectual greatness of man, I should find it in this spot. I may see in that hut the emblem of his mind. That a Russian, two centuries ago—almost before the name of Russia was known in Europe—while its court had scarcely emerged from the feuds of barbarous factions, and its throne had been but just rescued from the hands of the Tartar—should have conceived the design of such an empire, and should have crowned his design with such a capital, is to me the most memorable effort of a ruling mind, within all human recollection."

"Clotilde, I was not aware that you were inclined to give the great Czar so tender a tribute," I said laughingly, at her embarrassment in the discovery of a tear stealing down her cheek.

Truth was in her reply. "I agree in the common censure of the darker portions of his course. But I can now judge of him only by what I see. Who is to know the truth of his private history? What can be more unsafe than to judge of the secret actions of princes, from the interested or ignorant narratives of a giddy court, or foreign enemies? But the evidence round us allows of no deception. These piles of marble are unanswerable;—these are the vindications of kings. The man who, sitting in that hut, in the midst of the howling wilderness, imagined the existence of such a city rising round him and his line—at once bringing his country into contact with Europe, and erecting a monument of national greatness, to which Europe itself, in its thousand years of progress, has no equal—must have had a nature made for the highest tasks of human advancement. Of all the panegyrics of an Imperial life, St Petersburg is the most Imperial."

* * * * *

We passed rapidly through the Russian provinces, and, intending to embark in one of our frigates cruising the Baltic, felt all the delight of having at length left the damp and dreary forests of Livonia far down in the horizon, and again feeling the breezes blowing from that ocean which the Englishman instinctively regards as a portion of his home. But, as we drove along the smooth sands which line so many leagues of the Baltic, and enjoyed with the full sense of novelty the various contrast of sea and shore, we were startled by the roar of guns from the ramparts of Riga, followed by the peal of bells. What victory, what defeat, what great event, did those announce? The intelligence at length broke on us at the gates; and it was well worth all our interest. "Peace with France." The English ambassador had arrived in Paris. "War was at end, and the world was to be at rest once more." I changed my route immediately, and flew on the road to Paris.

My life was destined to be a succession of scenes. It had been thrown into a whirl of memorable incidents, any one of which would have served for the tumult of fifty years, and for the meditation of the fifty after. But this was the period of powerful, sometimes of terrible, vicissitudes. All ranks of men were reached by them. Kings and statesmen only felt them first: they penetrated to the peasant; and the Continent underwent a moral convulsion—an outpouring of the general elements of society—like that of some vast inundation, sweeping away the landmarks, and uprooting the produce of the soil; until it subsided, leaving the soil in some places irreparably stripped—in others, filled with a new fertility.

I found France in a state of the highest exultation. The national cry was, "that she had covered herself with glory;" and to earn that cry, probably, no Frenchman who ever existed would hesitate to march to Timbuctoo, or swim across the Atlantic. The name of "conquest" is a spell which no brain, from Calais to Bayonne, has ever thought of resisting. The same spell lives, masters, domineers over the national mind, to this hour; and will last, long after Paris has dropped into the depths of its own catacombs, and its fifteen fortresses are calcined under the cannon of some Austrian or Russian invader. It will be impossible to tell future ages the scene which France then presented to the mind. If objects are capable of record, impressions are beyond the power of the pen. No image can be conveyed to posterity by the sensations which crowded on Europe in the course of the French Revolution—the rapidity, the startling lustre, and the deep despair; as it went forth crushing all that the earth had of solid or sacred. It was now only in its midway. The pause had come; but it was only the pause in the hurricane—the still heavier trial was at hand. Even as a stranger, I could see that it was but a lull. Every thing that met the eye in Paris was a preparative for war. The soldier was every thing, and every where. I looked in vain for the Republican costumes which I so fearfully remembered. They had been flung aside for the uniform of the Imperial Guard; or were to be seen only on a few haggard and desolate men, who came out in the twilight, and sat in silence, and gloomy dreams of revenge, in some suburb cafe. Where were the deadly tribunals, with their drunken judges, their half-naked assassins, and the eternal clank of the guillotines?—all vanished; the whole sullen furniture of the Republican drama flung behind the scenes, and the stage filled with the song and the dance—the pageant and the feast—with all France gazing and delighted at the spectacle. But, my still stronger curiosity was fixed on the one man who had been the soul of the transformation. I have before my eye at this moment his slender and spirituel figure; his calm, but most subtle glance; and the incomparable expression of his smile. His face was classic—the ideal of thought; and, when Canova afterwards transferred it to marble, he could not have made it less like flesh and blood. It was intensely pale—pure, profound, Italian.



A LETTER FROM LONDON.

BY A RAILWAY WITNESS.

MY DEAR BOGLE,—It is ten thousand pities that you are not here. Why the deuce can't you make yourself useful to the commonwealth, by calculating a gradient, laying down a curve, or preparing a table of traffic, in order to obtain the proper qualification for a railway witness? Nothing in this world is easier. You have only to sit at your window for a given amount of hours once a-week, and note down the number of the cabs and carts which jolt and jingle to the Broomielaw; or, if you like that better, to ascertain the quality of the soil three feet beneath your own wine-cellar; and you are booked for a month's residence in London, free quarters in a first-rate hotel, five guineas a-day, and all expenses paid. I confess that this regimen seems to me both profitable and pleasant. I have been here for six weeks feeding on the fat of the land, drinking claret which even a Leith man would scarcely venture to anathematize, white-baiting at Blackwall, and varying these sensual qualifications with an occasional trip to Richmond and Ascot races. I have, moreover, mark you, a bunch of as pretty bank paper in my pocket as ever was paid into the Exchequer; and the whole equivalent I have given for this kind and liberal treatment was certain evidence touching the iron-trade of Ayrshire, which I poured into the drowsy ears of five worthy gentlemen, about as familiar with that subject as you are with the mythology of the Chinese. Long life to the railway mania, say I! It has been treasure-trove to some of us. The only thing I regret is my inability to carry the war into the enemy's country, and make my fortune out of the English companies. I have the appetite but not the power; and, after all, it would hardly make up for Flodden.

I like this sort of life much better than assorting cargoes and superintending the arrival of sugar casks. There is no want of society, for I find myself here surrounded by the old familiar faces. I do not think there is a soul in this hotel except townsmen of our own. You meet in the committee rooms the same excellent fellows whom you have daily encountered for the last ten years on the Exchange, and they are all getting fatter upon their work. Edinburgh, too, has furnished her quota. We have Writers to the Signet by the score, and a sprinkling of the young Advocates whom we are accustomed to meet upon circuit. Poor lads! it does one good to see them thriving. This must be a very different sort of business from the weariful Parliament House, and the two square yards of processes, with a fee of three guineas for many an interminable condescendence. I believe they would have no objection if the Session of Parliament were declared perpetual; and for that matter no more would I.

Certainly, of all tribunals ever invented by the ingenuity of man, a Parliamentary Committee is the most extraordinary. It is a court of enquiry consisting of five members, whose principal qualification is absolute previous ignorance of the localities and conflicting interests with regard to which they must decide. Of their impartiality, therefore, there can be no doubt. You or I might just as well sit down at a moment's notice, and adjudicate upon the merits of three competing lines between Pekin and Canton, with an equal chance of arriving at a satisfactory conclusion. Of course they must be guided entirely by evidence, and have plenty of materials laid before them from which they may pick and choose. It is the richest thing in the world to see two crack engineers pitted against each other. The first, who appears on behalf of the line, does not know and cannot conceive the slightest engineering difficulty. If a mountain stands in his way, he plunges fearlessly into its bowels, finds in the interior strata of surpassing mineral wealth, yet marvellously adapted for the purposes of a four-mile tunnel, and brings you out sound and safe at the opposite side, as though he had been perforating a gigantic cheese instead of hammering his path through whinstone coeval with the creation. If a lake stands in the way, he will undertake to drain it, with immense advantage to the neighbouring proprietors. If a valley intervenes, he will bridge it with a viaduct, which shall put to shame the grandest relics of antiquity. He has no knowledge of such bugbears as steep gradients or dangerous curves; a little hocus-pocus with the compasses transforms all these into gentle undulations, and sweeps of the most graceful description. He will run you his rails right through the heart of the most populous city,—yea, even Glasgow herself,—and across the streets, without the slightest interruption to the traffic. He will contrive so, that the hissing of the locomotive shall be as graceful a sound as the plashing of a fountain in the midst of our bisected squares; and he is indignant at the supposition that any human being can be besotted enough to prefer the prospect of a budding garden, to a clean double pair of rails beneath his bedroom window, with a jolly train steaming it along at the rate of some fifty miles per hour.

The opposing engineer has a contrary story to tell. He has the utmost confidence in the general ability of his scientific friend, but on this occasion he has the misfortune to differ in opinion. Very carefully has he gone over the whole of the line surveyed. He is sorry to say that the gradients are utterly impossible, and the curves approaching to a circle. Tunnelling is out of the question. How are two miles of quicksand and two of basaltic rock to be gone through? The first is deeper than the Serbonian bog, and would swallow up the whole British army. The second could not be pierced in a shorter time than Pharaoh took to construct the pyramids of Egypt. He considers a railway in the heart of a town to be an absolute and intolerable nuisance; and, on the whole, looking at the plan before him, he has come to the conclusion, that a more dangerous and impracticable line was never yet laid before a committee of the United Parliament of Great Britain.

So much for the engineering Hector and Achilles. Out of these two opinions, of necessity, must the five respectable members on the bench form their judgment; for of themselves they know nothing, having been purposely selected on account of their superior ignorance. Cross-examination makes the matter still worse. A cantankerous waspish counsel, with the voice of an exasperated cockatoo, endeavours to make the opposing engineer contradict himself. He might as well try to overturn Ailsa Crag. He of the impossible gradients is the hero of a hundred committees, quite accustomed to legal artifice, cool, wary, and self-collected. He receives every thrust with a pleasant smile, and sometimes returns them with damaging effect. If close pressed, he is conscious that behind him is a thicket of algebra, into which neither counsel nor judges will dare to follow; and so fortified by the mysteries of his calling, he is ready to defy the universe. Then come the hordes of subordinate witnesses, the gentlemen who are to give evidence for and against the bill. One side represents the country as abounding in mineral produce and agricultural wealth: the other likens it unto Patmos, or the stony Arabia. Tims swears that the people of his district are mad, insane, rabid in favour of the line. Jenkins, his next-door neighbour, on the contrary, protests that if the rails were laid down to-morrow, they would be torn up by an insurrection of the populace en masse. John thinks the Dreep-daily Extension is the only one at all suited to supply the wants of the country; Sandy opines that the Powhead's Junction is the true and genuine potato; and both John and Sandy, Tims and Jenkins, are backed by a host of corroborators. Then come the speeches of the counsel, and rare specimens they are of unadulterated oratory. I swear to you, Bogle, that, no later than a week ago, I listened to such a picture of Glasgow and the Clyde, from the lips of a gentleman eminent alike in law and letters, as would have thrown a diorama of Damascus into the shade. He had it all, sir, from the orchards of Clydesdale to the banks of Bothwell, the pastoral slopes of Ruglen, and the emerald solitudes of the Green. The river flowed down towards the sea in translucent waves of crystal. From the parapets of the bridge you watched the salmon cleaving their way upwards in vivid lines of light. Never did Phoebus beam upon a lovelier object than the fair suburb of the Gorbals, as seen from the Broomielaw, reposing upon its shadow in perfect stillness. Then came the forest of masts, the activity of the dockyards, and

"The impress of shipwrights, whose hard toil Doth scarce divide the Sunday from the week."

Further down, the villas of the merchant princes burst upon your view, each of them a perfect Sirmio—then Port-Glasgow, half spanned by the arch of a dissolving rainbow—Dumbarton, grand and solemn as became the death-place of the Bruce—Ben Lomond, with its hoary head swathed in impenetrable clouds—and lo! the ocean and the isles. Not a Glasgow man in the committee-room but yearned with love and admiration towards the gifted speaker, who certainly did make out a case for the Queen of the West such as no matter-of-fact person could possibly have believed. And all this was done by merely substituting a Claude Lorraine glass for our ordinary dingy atmosphere. The outline was most correct and graphic, but the secret lay in the handling and distribution of the colours. I shall not wonder if the whole committee, clerk included come down this autumn to catch a glimpse of that terrestrial paradise.

Such is a brief and unexaggerated abstract of the transactions of these railway committees; and you may judge for yourself how far the members are likely to understand the true circumstances of the case from evidence so singularly conflicting. Sometimes three or four days are wasted before they can even comprehend the precise position of the lines which they are required to consider, and, after all, these impressions must be of the haziest description. For my own part, I think the legislature has made a most palpable mistake in not intrusting such important functions to parties who possess competent local knowledge; and I am satisfied that the result of the present session has proved the insufficiency of the system. I demur altogether to the propriety of devolving upon Members of Parliament the duties of a civil jury. They have surely enough to do in weighing and determining the larger questions of policy, without entering into the minute details necessarily involved in the consideration of railways, roads, bridges, and canals. These should be transferred to parties conversant with such subjects, and responsible to the public for their decisions. Besides this, the direct pecuniary loss to Scotland by the present system of sending witnesses to London—though personally I have no reason to complain—is quite enormous, and demands attention in a national point of view. It is calculated that not less than a million and a half sterling, has been expended in the course of last year in carrying the Scottish bills through Parliament, and by far the greater part of this sum has been absorbed by plethoric London, and cannot by possibility return. Now, the whole annual value of the lands and houses in Scotland does not exceed ten millions, (in 1843, it was little more than nine)—an amount which is totally inadequate to afford so prodigious a deduction as this, for the mere purpose of procuring authority to carry our own schemes into execution. That the seventh part of the rental of a country should be drawn away from it, and expended beyond its boundaries, in the course of simple preliminary investigations, is not only an exorbitant abuse, but, to my mind, a clear demonstration of the total falsity of the system. It may have worked tolerably when there was less work to do; but the amazing increase of private bills during the last few years must render a new arrangement necessary. I wish our countrymen would be a little more alive to the vast benefit of local institutions in a pecuniary point of view. Can there be any doubt, that, if the details connected with all the private bills applicable to Scotland, were referred to a paid board of commissioners sitting permanently in Edinburgh, whose judgment of course would be subject to the review of Parliament, the business would be got through, not only more cheaply, but with greater satisfaction and dispatch? I cannot see why London should be entitled to this exclusive monopoly, or the principle of centralization pushed so far as to injure the extremities of the empire. The private committee business has already become an absolute nuisance to the whole bulk of the members. It is a function for which few of them have been educated, which is in itself highly distasteful, and, moreover, interferes most materially with their public duties. Let them, then, be freed from this thraldom, and Scotland will have no reason to complain. We don't ask for any power of legislation; we only require that within and among ourselves the necessary investigations shall be made. This can be done in Edinburgh quite as well as in London; and very sorely does our poor Metropolis stand in need of such indigenous support. Dublin has its viceregal court, and therefore can make some stand against centralization. Edinburgh has nothing left her except the courts of law, which have been pared down by ignorant experimentalists to the smallest possible substance. All that could be taken from her has been transferred to London. Her local boards, her officers of state, have vanished one by one; and scarce any remonstrance has been made against these useless and unjustifiable aggressions.

I find myself getting into the Malagrowther vein, so I had better pull up in time, without hinting at the existence of claymores. Only this, should there ever be a decent agitation in Scotland, you will find the old Tories at the head of it, demanding the restitution of certain ancient rights, which Whiggery has subverted, and Conservatism trodden under foot. Undoubtedly, at no very distant period, the great questions of centralization and uniformity will be gravely and considerately discussed, both within and without the walls of the British Parliament. Next year it is probable that the transit between Edinburgh and London will be effected in fourteen hours. That of itself will go far to bring matters to a crisis. If we are to be centralized, let the work be thoroughly done; if not, let us get back at least a reasonable portion of our own.

But to the committees. You can have no idea, Bogle, of the excitement caused by any of their decisions. At the close of the evidence, counsel, agents, and spectators are unceremoniously hustled out of the room, to give leisure for the selected senators to make up their minds on the propriety of passing or rejecting the preamble of the bill. In the lobby all is confusion. Near the door stand five-and-twenty speculators, all of them heavy holders of stock, some flushed in the face like peonies, some pale and trembling with excitement. The barristers, for the most part, have a devil-may-care look, as if it mattered little to them, whether the Dreep-daily or Powhead's gentry shall carry the day. And, in truth, it is of little consequence. The sittings of this committee cannot by possibility be prolonged, and as most of the legal gentlemen have other briefs—

"To-morrow to fresh fields and pastures new."

The magistrates of Camlachie, though sorely agitated for the integrity of that important borough, threatened by the Dreep-daily Extension with immediate intersection, yet preserve a becoming decorum of feature. The senior bailie bows a dignified assent to the protestations of the Parliamentary solicitor, that it is quite impossible the bill can pass—such an interference with vested rights never can be sanctioned by a British House of Commons, &c. &c.; and then, with a shrewd eye to future proceedings, the wily Machiavel hints that at all events the House of Lords will be sure to put the matter right. What in the name of torture can make the committee deliberate so long? Two hours have elapsed since we were excluded, and yet there is no indication of a judgment. The chairman of the Powhead's line, which on the whole has had the worst of it in evidence, begins to gain confidence from the delay. Whispers arise and circulate that the committee are two to two, the chairman not being able to make up his mind either way; but as his wife is a third cousin of a Powheads director, there may yet be balm in Gilead. Hark! the tinkling of a bell—there is a buzz as of a hive overturned, the doors are opened, and the whole crowd rush elbowing in. How provokingly calm are the countenances of the five legislators! Not a twinkle in the eye of any of them to betray the nature of their decision—nay, with a refinement of cruelty positively appalling, the chairman is elaborating a quill into a toothpick until order shall be partially restored. Now for the dictum—"The Committee, having heard evidence, are of opinion that the preamble of the Dreep-daily Extension Bill has not been proved, and further, that the preamble of the Powheads Junction Bill has been satisfactorily proved, and they intend to report accordingly." One second's pause, and a triumphant cheer bursts from the dignitaries of Camlachie. The five-and-twenty speculators darting at once to the door, choke up the entrance for a time—divers coat-tails give way, and hats disappear in the scuffle—at last they break out from the Cloisters like so many demoniacs, fling themselves into four-and-twenty cabs, and offer triple fares for immediate transmission to the City. One, more knowing than the rest, sneaks down to Westminster Bridge, finds a steamer just starting, makes his way by water to the Exchange; and five minutes before the earliest cab, obstructed by a covey of coal-carts in the Strand, can fetch its agitated inmate to his broker, his speedier rival has sold several thousand Dreep-dailys to unwitting and unfortunate purchasers, and has become the coveted possessor of every Powhead scrip then negotiable in the London market. If there is any caricature in this sketch I shall submit to do penance in the pillory.

I think I have now bored you sufficiently with railway matters: being a literary character, you may like to know how I otherwise employ my time. Imprimis, I have not attended a single debate in the House of Commons. It is quite enough to spell one's way through the dreary columns of the Times after the matutinal muffin, without exposing the mind to the cruelties of a Maynooth debate, or the body to the tender mercies of the novel mode of ventilation. I find the theatres much more amusing, not from the excellence of the dramatic performances, but from their sheer and gross absurdity, which, without actual experience, is almost too monstrous for belief. The fact is, that a new Cockney school has arisen, ten times more twaddling and impotent than the ancient academy of that name. The old professors, for whom I always had a sneaking kindness, affected a sort of solitary grandeur, deported themselves with the conscious swagger of genius, read Tooke's Pantheon, and prated of the Heathen gods. This was very harmless and innocent pastime; tiresome, to be sure, yet laughable withal; nor did it call for any further rebuke than an occasional tap upon the cranium of some blockhead who forsook his legitimate sphere, thrust himself in your way, and became unsufferably blatant. Now the spirit of the times has changed. The literary youth of London are all in the facetious line. They have regular clubs, at which they meet to collate the gathered slang and pilfered witticisms of the week; periodical compotations to work these materials into something like a readable shape; and hebdomadal journals, by means of which their choice productions are issued to a wondering world. Now, though a single gnat can give you very little annoyance in the course of a summer's night, the evil becomes serious when you are surrounded with whole scores of these diminutive vermin, singing in your ears, buzzing in your hair, and lighting incessantly on your face. In vain you turn aside, in hopes to get rid of the nuisance. Go where you will, a perfect cloud of midges keeps hovering round your head, each tiny bloodsucker sounding his diminutive horn, in the full and perfect belief that he discourses most excellent music. Even so, in London, are you surrounded with these philosophers of the Cider-cellar. Their works stare you every where in the face; the magazines abound with their wit; their songs, consisting for the most part of prurient parodies, are resonant throughout the purlieus of Covent Garden. What is worse than all, they have wriggled themselves into a sort of monopoly of the theatres, persuaded the public to cashier Shakespeare, who is now utterly out of date, and to instal in his place a certain Mr J.R. Planche as the leading swan of the Thames. In giving him this prominent place, I merely echo the opinions of his compeers, who with much modesty, but at the same time with praiseworthy candour, have acknowledged his pre-eminence in the modern walk of the drama, and with him they decline competition. The new Beaumont and Fletcher, J. Taylor and Albert Smith, Esquires, thus bear testimony to his merits in one of their inimitable prologues:

"'Fair One with Golden Locks:' no, you won't do— PLANCHE has taken the shine out of you: Who runs with HIM, it may be safely reckon'd, Whate'er the odds, must come in 'a bad second.'"

Ben Jonson never penned a more delicate or classical compliment, albeit it halteth a little. Let us then submit to the better judgment of our brethren, and bow down promiscuously before any brazen calf which their eager idolatry may rear. Let London promulgate the law of letters, as well as the statutes of the land. Therefore, say I, away with Romeo, and give us Cinderella; banish Hamlet, and welcome Sleeping Beauty; let the Tempest make room for Fortunio; and Venice Preserved for the gentle Graciosa and Percinet! Do you, Bogle, disencumber your study as fast as you can of these absurd busts of the older dramatists, now fit for nothing but targets in a shooting-gallery. Fling the effigies, one and all, into the area; and let us see, in their stead, each on its appropriate pedestal, with some culinary garland round the head, new stucco casts of J. R. Planche, Albert Smith, and Gilbert a-Beckett, Esquires.

After all, is it to be wondered at if the public lacketh novelty? Shakespeare has had possession of the stage for nearly two centuries—quite enough, one would think, to pacify his unconscionable Manes. We have been dosed with his dramas from our youth upwards. Two generations of the race of Kean have, in our own day, perished, after a series of air-stabs, upon Bosworth field. We have seen twenty different Hamlets appear upon the damp chill platform of Elsinore, and fully as many Romeos in the sunny streets of Verona. The nightingale in the pomegranate-tree was beginning to sing hoarsely and out of tune; therefore it was full time that our ears should be dieted with other sounds. Well, no sooner was the wish expressed, than we were presented with "Nina Sforza," the "Legend of Florence," and several other dramas of the highest class. Sheridan Knowles and Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton professed themselves ready to administer any amount of food to the craving appetite of the age—but all in vain. Tragedy was not what we wanted—nor comedy—no, nor even passable melodrama. We sighed for something of a more ethereal sort, and—laud we the gods!—the manna has descended in showers. Go into any of the London theatres now, and the following is your bill of fare. Fairies you have by scores in flesh-coloured tights, spangles, and paucity of petticoats; gnomes of every description, from the gigantic glittering diamond beetle, to the grotesque and dusky tadpole. Epicene princes, whose taper limbs and swelling busts are well worth the scrutiny of the opera-glass—dragons vomiting at once red flames and witticisms about the fountains in Trafalgar Square—Dan O'Connell figuring in the feathers of a Milesian owl—and the Seven Champions of Christendom smoking cigars upon the parapets of Hungerford Bridge! All these things have I seen, Bogle, yea, and cheered them to the echo, in company with some thousand Cockneys, all agape at the glitter of tinselled pasteboard, and the glories of the Catharine-wheel. Such is the intellectual banquet which London, queen of literature, presents to her fastidious children!