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Pisistratus.—"Miss Austin; Mrs. Gore in her masterpiece of Mrs. Armytage; Mrs. Marsh, too; and then (for Scottish manners) Miss Ferrier!"
Mr. Caxton, growing cross.—"Oh, if you cannot treat on bucolics but what you must hear some Virgil or other cry 'Stop thief,' you deserve to be tossed by one of your own 'short-horns.'—(Still more contemptuously)—I am sure I don't know why we spend so much money on sending our sons to school to learn Latin, when that Anchronism of yours, Mrs. Caxton, can't even construe a line and a half of Phaedrus. Phaedrus, Mrs. Caxton—a book which is in Latin what Goody Two Shoes is in the vernacular!"
Mrs. Caxton, alarmed and indignant.—"Fie, Austin! I am sure you can construe Phaedrus, dear!"
Pisistratus prudently preserves silence.
Mr. Caxton.—"I'll try him—
"'Sua cuique quum sit animi cogitatio Colorque proprius.'
"What does that mean?"
Pisistratus, smiling.—"That every man has some coloring matter within him, to give his own tinge to—"
"His own novel," interrupted my father! "Contentus peragis."
During the latter part of this dialogue, Blanche had sewn together three quires of the best Bath paper, and she now placed them on a little table before me, with her own inkstand and steel pen.
My mother put her finger to her lip, and said, "Hush!" my father returned to the cradle of the AEsar; Captain Roland leant his cheek on his hand, and gazed abstractedly on the fire; Mr. Squills felt into a placid doze; and, after three sighs that would have melted a heart of stone, I rushed into—MY NOVEL.
* * * * *
CHAPTER II.
"There has never been occasion to use them since I have been in the Parish," said Parson Dale.
"What does that prove?" quoth the Squire sharply, and looking the Parson full in the face.
"Prove!" repeated Mr. Dale—with a smile of benign, yet too conscious superiority—"What does experience prove?"
"That your forefathers were great blockheads, and that their descendant is not a whit the wiser."
"Squire," replied the Parson, "although that is a melancholy conclusion, yet if you mean it to apply universally, and not to the family of the Dales in particular, it is not one which my candor as a reasoner, and my Humility as a mortal, will permit me to challenge."
"I defy you," said Mr. Hazledean triumphantly. "But to stick to the subject, which it is monstrous hard to do when one talks with a parson, I only just ask you to look yonder, and tell me on your conscience—I don't even say as a parson, but as a parishioner—whether you ever saw a more disreputable spectacle?"
While he spoke, the Squire, leaning heavily on the Parson's left shoulder, extended his cane in a line parallel with the right of that disputatious ecclesiastic, so that he might guide the organ of sight to the object he had thus flatteringly described.
"I confess," said the Parson, "that, regarded by the eye of the senses, it is a thing that in its best day had small pretensions to beauty, and is not elevated into the Picturesque even by neglect and decay. But, my friend, regarded by the eye of the inner man—of the rural philosopher and parochial legislator—I say it is by neglect and decay that it is rendered a very pleasing feature in what I may call 'the moral topography of a parish.'"
The Squire looked at the Parson as if be could have beaten him; and indeed, regarding the object in dispute not only with the eye of the outer man, but the eye of law and order, the eye of a country gentleman and a justice of the peace, the spectacle was scandalously disreputable. It was moss-grown; it was worm-eaten; it was broken right in the middle; through its four socketless eyes, neighbored by the nettle, peered the thistle:—the thistle!—a forest of thistles!—and, to complete the degradation of the whole, those thistles had attracted the donkey of an itinerant tinker; and the irreverent animal was in the very act of taking his luncheon out of the eyes and jaws of—THE PARISH STOCKS.
The Squire looked as if he could have beaten the Parson; but as he was not without some slight command of temper, and a substitute was luckily at hand, he gulped down, his resentment and made a rush—at the donkey!
Now the donkey was hampered by a rope to its fore feet, to the which was attached a billet of wood called technically "a clog," so that it had no fair chance of escape from the assault its sacrilegious luncheon had justly provoked. But, the ass turned round with unusual nimbleness at the first stroke of the cane, the Squire caught his foot in the rope, and went head over heels among the thistles. The donkey gravely bent down, and thrice smelt or sniffed its prostrate foe; then, having convinced itself that it had nothing farther to apprehend for the present, and very willing to make the best of the reprieve, according to the poetical admonition, "Gather your rosebuds while you may," it cropped a thistle in full bloom, close to the ear of the Squire; so close indeed, that the Parson thought the ear was gone; and with the more probability, inasmuch as the Squire, feeling the warm breath of the creature, bellowed out with all the force of lungs accustomed to give a view-hallo!
"Bless me, is it gone?" said the Parson, thrusting his person between the ass and the Squire.
"Zounds and the devil!" cried the Squire, rubbing himself as be rose to his feet.
"Hush!" said the Parson gently. "What a horrible oath!"
"Horrible oath! If you had my nankeens on," said the Squire, still rubbing himself, "and had fallen into a thicket of thistles with a donkey's teeth within an inch of your ear!"
"It is not gone—then?" interrupted the Parson.
"No—that is, I think not," interrupted the Squire dubiously; and he clapped his hand to the organ in question. "No, it is not gone."
"Thank heaven!" said the good clergyman kindly.
"Hum," growled the Squire, who was now once more engaged in rubbing himself. "Thank heaven indeed, when I am as full of thorns as a porcupine! I should just like to know what use thistles are in the world."
"For donkeys to eat, if you will let them, Squire," answered the Parson.
"Ugh, you beast!" cried Mr. Hazeldean, all his wrath reawakened, whether by the reference to the donkey species, or his inability to reply to the Parson, or perhaps by some sudden prick too sharp for humanity—especially humanity in nankeens—to endure without kicking; "Ugh, you beast!" he exclaimed, shaking his cane at the donkey, who, at the interposition of the Parson, had respectfully recoiled a few paces, and now stood switching his thin tail, and trying vainly to lift one of its fore legs—for the flies teased it.
"Poor thing!" said the Parson pityingly. "See, it has a raw place on the shoulder, and the flies have found out the sore."
"I am devilish glad to hear it," said the Squire vindictively.
"Fie, fie!"
"It is very well to say 'Fie, fie.' It was not you who fell among the thistles. What's the man about now, I wonder?"
The Parson had walked toward a chestnut tree that stood on the village green—he broke off a bough—returned to the donkey, whisked off the flies, and then tenderly placed the broad leaves over the sore, as a protection from the swarms. The donkey turned round its head, and looked at him with mild wonder.
"I would bet a shilling," said the Parson, softly, "that this is the first act of kindness thou hast met with this many a day. And slight enough it is, Heaven knows."
With that the Parson put his hand into his pocket, and drew out an apple. It was a fine large rose-cheeked apple: one of the last winter's store, from the celebrated tree in the parsonage garden, and he was taking it as a present to a little boy in the village who had notably distinguished himself in the Sunday-school. "Nay, in common justice, Lenny Fairfield should have the preference," muttered the Parson. The ass pricked up one of his ears, and advanced its head timidly. "But Lenny Fairfield would be as much pleased with twopence: and what could twopence do to thee?" The ass's nose now touched the apple. "Take it in the flame of charity," quoth the Parson, "Justice is accustomed to be served last:" And the ass took the apple. "How had you the heart?" said the Parson, pointing to the Squire's cane.
The ass stopped munching, and looked askant at the Squire.
"Pooh! eat on; he'll not beat thee now!"
"No," said the Squire apologetically. "But, after all, he is not an ass of the parish; he is a vagrant, and he ought to be pounded. But the pound is in as bad a state as the stocks, thanks to your new-fashioned doctrines."
"New-fashioned!" cried the Parson almost indignantly, for he had a great disdain of new fashions. "They are as old as Christianity; nay, as old as Paradise, which you will observe is derived from a Greek, or rather a Persian word, and means something more than a 'garden,' corresponding (pursued the Parson rather pedantically) with the Latin vivarium—viz. grove or park full of innocent dumb creatures. Depend on it, donkeys were allowed to eat thistles there."
"Very possibly," said the Squire drily. "But Hazeldean, though a very pretty village, is not Paradise. The stocks shall be mended to-morrow day, and the pound too—and the next donkey found trespassing shall go into it, as sure as my name is Hazeldean."
"Then," said the Parson gravely, "I can only hope that the next parish may not follow your example; or that you and I may never be caught straying!"
* * * * *
CHAPTER III.
Parson Dale and Squire Hazeldean parted company; the latter to inspect his sheep, the former to visit some of his parishioners, including Lenny Fairfield, whom the donkey had defrauded of his apple.
Lenny Fairfield was sure to be in the way, for his mother rented a few acres of grass land from the Squire, and it was now hay-time. And Leonard, commonly called Lenny, was an only son, and his mother a widow. The cottage stood apart, and somewhat remote, in one of the many nooks of the long green village lane. And a thoroughly English cottage it was—three centuries old at least; with walls of rubble let into oak frames, and duly whitewashed every summer, a thatched roof, small panes of glass, and an old doorway raised from the ground by two steps. There was about this little dwelling all the homely rustic elegance which peasant life admits of: a honeysuckle was trained over the door; a few flower-pots were placed on the window-sills; the small plot of ground in front of the house was kept with great neatness, and even taste; some large rough stones on either side the little path having been formed into a sort of rock-work, with creepers that were now in flower; and the potatoe ground was screened from the eye by sweet peas and lupine. Simple elegance all this, it is true; but how well it speaks for peasant and landlord, when you see that the peasant is fond of his home, and has some spare time and heart to bestow upon mere embellishment. Such a peasant is sure to be a bad customer to the ale-house, and a safe neighbor to the Squire's preserves. All honor and praise to him, except a small tax upon both, which is due to the landlord!
Such sights were as pleasant to the Parson as the most beautiful landscapes of Italy can be to the dilettante. He paused a moment at the wicket to look around him, and distended his nostrils voluptuously to inhale the smell of the sweet peas, mixed with that of the new-mown hay in the fields behind, which a slight breeze bore to him. He then moved on, carefully scraped his shoes, clean and well polished as they were—for Mr. Dale was rather a beau in his own clerical way—on the scraper without the door, and lifted the latch.
Your virtuoso looks with artistical delight on the figure of some nymph painted on an Etruscan vase, engaged in pouring out the juice of the grape from her classic urn. And the Parson felt as harmless, if not as elegant a pleasure in contemplating Widow Fairfield brimming high a glittering can, which she designed for the refreshment of the thirsty hay-makers.
Mrs. Fairfield was a middle-aged tidy woman, with that alert precision of movement which seems to come from an active orderly mind; and as she now turned her head briskly at the sound of the Parson's footsteps, she showed a countenance prepossessing, though not handsome,—a countenance from which a pleasant hearty smile, breaking forth at that moment, effaced some lines that, in repose, spoke "of sorrows, but of sorrows past;" and her cheek, paler than is common to the complexions even of the fair sex, when born and bred amidst a rural population, might have favored the guess that the earlier part of her life had been spent in the languid air and "within doors" occupation of a town.
"Never mind me," said the Parson, as Mrs. Fairfield dropped her quick courtesy, and smoothed her apron; "if you are going into the hayfield, I will go with you; I have something to say to Lenny—an excellent boy."
Widow.—"Well, sir, and you are kind to say it—but so he is."
Parson.-"He reads uncommonly well, he writes tolerably; he is the best lad in the whole school at his catechism and in the Bible lessons; and I assure you, when I see his face at church, looking up so attentively, I fancy that I shall read my sermon all the better for such a listener!"
Widow, wiping her eyes with the corner of her apron.—"Deed, sir, when my poor Mark died, I never thought I could have lived on as I have done. But that boy is so kind and good, that when I look at him sitting there in dear Mark's chair, and remember how Mark loved him, and all he used to say to me about him, I feel somehow or other as if my goodman smiled on me, and would rather I was not with him yet, till the lad had grown up, and did not want me any more."
Parson, looking away, and after a pause.—"You never hear anything of the old folks at Lansmere?"
"'Deed, sir, sin' poor Mark died, they han't noticed me, nor the boy; but," added the widow, with all a peasant's pride, "it isn't that I wants their money; only it's hard to feel strange like to one's own father and mother!"
Parson.—"You must excuse them. Your father, Mr. Avenel, was never quite the same man after that sad event,—but you are weeping, my friend, pardon me:—your mother is a little proud; but so are you, though in another way."
Widow.—"I proud! Lord love ye, sir, I have not a bit of pride in me! and that's the reason they always looked down on me."
Parson.—"Your parents must be well off; and I shall apply to them in a year or two in behalf of Lenny, for they promised me to provide for him when he grew up, as they ought."
Widow, with flashing eyes.—"I am sure, sir, I hope you will do no such thing; for I would not have Lenny beholden to them as has never given him a kind word sin' he was born!"
The Parson smiled gravely and shook his head at poor Mrs. Fairfield's hasty confutation of her own self-acquittal from the charge of pride; but he saw that it was not the time or moment for effectual peace-making in the most irritable of all rancors, viz., that nourished against one's nearest relations. He therefore dropped the subject, and said,—"Well, time enough to think of Lenny's future prospects; meanwhile we are forgetting the haymakers. Come."
The widow opened the back door, which led across a little apple orchard into the fields.
Parson.—"You have a pleasant place here; and I see that my friend Lenny should be in no want of apples. I had brought him one, but I have given it away on the road."
Widow.—"Oh, sir, it is not the deed—it is the will; as I felt when the Squire, God bless him! took two pounds off the rent the year he-that is, Mark—died."
Parson.—"If Lenny continues to be such a help to you, it will not be long before the Squire may put the two pounds on again."
"Yes, sir," said the widow simply; "I hope he will."
"Silly woman!" muttered the Parson. "That's not exactly what the schoolmistress would have said. You don't read nor write, Mrs. Fairfield; yet you express yourself with great propriety."
"You know Mark was a schollard, sir, like my poor, poor, sister; and though I was a sad stupid girl afore I married, I tried to take after him when we came together."
* * * * *
CHAPTER IV.
They were now in the hayfield, and a boy of about sixteen, but, like most country lads, to appearance much younger than he was, looked up from his rake, with lively blue eyes, beaming forth under a profusion of brown curly hair.
Leonard Fairfield was indeed a very handsome boy—not so stout nor so ruddy as one would choose for the ideal of rustic beauty; nor yet so delicate in limb and keen in expression as are those children of cities, in whom the mind is cultivated at the expense of the body; but still he had the health of the country in his cheeks, and was not without the grace of the city in his compact figure and easy movements. There was in his physiognomy something interesting from its peculiar character of innocence and simplicity. You could see that he had been brought up by a woman, and much apart from familiar contact with other children; and such intelligence as was yet developed in him, was not ripened by the jokes and cuffs of his coevals, but fostered by decorous lecturings from his elders, and good little boy maxims in good little boy books.
Parson.—"Come hither, Lenny. You know the benefit of school, I see: it can teach you nothing better than to be a support to your mother."
Lenny, looking down sheepishly, and with a heightened glow over his face.—"Please, sir, that may come one of these days."
Parson.—"That's right, Lenny. Let me see! why you must be nearly a man. How old are you?"
Lenny looks up inquiringly at his mother.
Parson.—"You ought to know, Lenny, speak for yourself. Hold your tongue, Mrs. Fairfield."
Lenny, twirling his hat, and in great perplexity.—"Well, and there is Flop, neighbor Dutton's old sheep-dog. He be very old now."
Parson.—"I am not asking Flop's age, but your own."
Lenny.-"'Deed, sir, I have heard say as how Flop and I were pups together. That is, I—I—"
For the Parson is laughing, and so is Mrs. Fairfield; and the haymakers who have stood still to listen, are laughing too. And poor Lenny has quite lost his head, and looks as if he would like to cry.
Parson, patting the curly locks, encouragingly.—"Never mind; it is not so badly answered after all. And how old is Flop?"
Lenny.—"Why, he must be fifteen year and more."
Parson.—"How old, then, are you?"
Lenny, looking up with a beam of intelligence.—"Fifteen year and more!"
Widow sighs and nods her head.
"That's what we call putting two and two together," said the Parson. "Or, in other words," and here be raised his eyes majestically toward the haymakers—"in other words—thanks to his love for his book—simple as he stands here, Lenny Fairfield has shown himself capable of INDUCTIVE RATIOCINATION."
At those words, delivered ore rotundo, the haymakers ceased laughing. For even in lay matters they held the Parson to be an oracle, and words so long must have a great deal in them.
Lenny drew tip his head proudly.
"You are very fond of Flop, I suppose?"
"'Deed he is," said the Widow, "and of all poor dumb creatures."
"Very good. Suppose, my lad, that you had a fine apple, and you met a friend who wanted it more than you; what would you do with it?"
"Please you, sir, I would give him half of it."
The Parson's face fell.—"Not the whole, Lenny?"
Lenny considered.—"If he was a friend, sir, he would not like me to give him all!"
"Upon my word, Master Leonard, you speak so well, that I must e'en tell the truth. I brought you an apple, as a prize for good conduct in school. But I met by the way a poor donkey, and some one beat him for eating a thistle; so I thought I would make it up by giving him the apple. Ought I only to have given him the half?"
Lenny's innocent face became all smile; his interest was aroused. "And did the donkey like the apple?"
"Very much," said the Parson, fumbling in his pocket, but thinking of Leonard Fairield's years and understanding; and moreover, observing, in the pride of his heart, that here were many spectators to his deed, he thought the meditated twopence not sufficient, and he generously produced a silver sixpence.
"There, my man, that will pay for the half apple which you would have kept for yourself." The Parson again patted the curly locks, and, after a hearty word or two with the other haymakers, and a friendly "Good day" to Mrs. Fairfield, struck into a path that led toward his own glebe.
He had just crossed the stile, when, he heard hasty but timorous feet behind him. He turned and saw his friend Lenny.
Lenny, half crying and holding out the sixpence.—"Indeed, sir, I would rather not. I would have given all to the Neddy."
Parson.—"Why, then, my man, you have a still greater right to the sixpence."
Lenny.—"No, sir; 'cause you only gave it to make up for the half apple. And if I had given the whole, as I ought to have done, why, I should have had no right to the sixpence. Please, sir, don't be offended; do take it back, will you?"
The Parson hesitated. And the boy thrust the sixpence into his hand, as the ass had poked his nose there before in quest of the apple.
"I see," said Parson Dale, soliloquizing, "that if one don't give Justice the first place at the table, all the other Virtues eat up her share."
Indeed, the case was perplexing. Charity, like a forward impudent baggage as she is, always thrusting herself in the way, and taking other people's apples to make her own little pie, had defrauded Lenny of his due; and now Susceptibility, who looks like a shy, blush-faced, awkward Virtue in her teens—but who, nevertheless, is always engaged in picking the pockets of her sisters, tried to filch from him his lawful recompense. The case was perplexing; for the Parson held Susceptibility in great honor, despite her hypocritical tricks, and did not like to give her a slap in the face, which might frighten her away forever. So Mr. Dale stood irresolute, glancing from the sixpence to Lenny, and from Lenny to the sixpence.
"Buon giorno—good day to you," said a voice behind, in an accent slightly but unmistakably foreign, and a strange-looking figure presented itself at the stile.
Imagine a tall and exceedingly meager man, dressed in a rusty suit of black—the pantaloons tight at the calf and ancle, and there forming a loose gaiter over thick shoes buckled high at the instep; an old cloak, lined with red, was thrown over one shoulder, though the day was sultry; a quaint, red, outlandish umbrella, with a carved brass handle, was thrust under one arm, though the sky was cloudless; a profusion of raven hair, in waving curls that seemed as fine as silk, escaped from the sides of a straw-hat of prodigious brim; a complexion sallow and swarthy, and features which, though not without considerable beauty to the eye of the artist, were not only unlike what we fair, well-fed, neat-faced Englishmen are wont to consider comely, but exceedingly like what we are disposed to regard as awful and Satanic—to wit, a long hooked nose, sunken cheeks, black eyes, whose piercing brilliancy took something wizard-like and mystical from the large spectacles through which they shone; a mouth round which played an ironical smile, and in which a physiognomist would have remarked singular shrewdness and some closeness, complete the picture: Imagine this figure, grotesque, peregrinate; and to the eye of a peasant certainly diabolical, then perch it on the stile in the midst of those green English fields, and in sight of that primitive English village; there let it sit straddling, its long legs dangling down, a short German pipe emitting clouds from one corner of those sardonic lips, its dark eyes glaring through the spectacles full upon the Parson, yet askant upon Lenny Fairfield. Lenny Fairfield looked exceedingly frightened.
"Upon my word, Dr. Riccabocca." said Mr. Dale, smiling, "you come in good time to solve a very nice question in casuistry;" and herewith the Parson explained the case, and put the question—"Ought Lenny Fairfield to have the sixpence, or ought he not?"
"Cospetto!" said the Doctor. "If the hen would but hold her tongue, nobody would know that she had laid an egg."
* * * * *
CHAPTER V.
"Granted," said the Parson; "but what follows? The saying is good, but I don't see the application."
"A thousand pardons!" replied Dr. Riccabocca, with all the urbanity of an Italian; "but it seems to me, that if you had given the sixpence to the fanciullo—that is, to this good little boy—without telling him the story about the donkey, you would never have put him and yourself into this awkward dilemma."
"But, my dear sir," whispered the Parson, mildly, as he inclined his lips to the Doctors ear, "I should then have lost the opportunity of inculcating a moral lesson—you understand."
Dr. Riccabocca shrugged his shoulders, restored his pipe to his mouth, and took a long whiff. It was a whiff eloquent, though cynical—a whiff peculiar to your philosophical smoker—a whiff that implied the most absolute but the most placid incredulity as to the effect of the Parson's moral lesson.
"Still you have not given us your decision," said the Parson, after a pause.
The Doctor withdrew the pipe. "Cospetto!" said he. "He who scrubs the head of an ass wastes his soap."
"If you scrubbed mine fifty times over with those enigmatical proverbs of yours," said the Parson testily, "you would not make it any the wiser."
"My good sir," said the Doctor, bowing low from his perch on the stile, "I never presumed to say that there were more asses than in the story; but I thought I could not better explain my meaning, which is simply this—you scrubbed the ass's head, and therefore you must lose the soap. Let the fanciullo have the sixpence; and a great sum it is, too, for a little boy, who may spend it all upon pocket-money!"
"There, Lenny—you hear?" said the Parson, stretching out the sixpence. But Lenny retreated, and cast on the umpire a look of great aversion and disgust.
"Please, Master Dale," said he, obstinately, "I'd rather not."
"It is a matter of feeling, you see," said the Parson, turning to the umpire; "and I believe the boy is right."
"If it is a matter of feeling," replied Dr. Riccabocca, "there is no more to be said on it. When Feeling comes in at the door, Reason has nothing to do but to jump out of the window."
"Go, my good boy," said the Parson, pocketing the coin; "but stop! Give me your hand first. There—I understand you—good-by!"
Lenny's eyes glistened as the Parson shook him by the hand, and, not trusting himself to speak, he walked off sturdily. The Parson wiped his forehead, and sat himself down on the stile beside the Italian. The view before them was lovely, and both enjoyed it (though not equally) enough to be silent for some moments. On the other side the lane, seen between gaps in the old oaks and chestnuts that hung over the moss-grown pales of Hazeldean Park, rose gentle verdant slopes, dotted with sheep and herds of deer; a stately avenue stretched far away to the left, and ended at the right hand, within a few yards of a ha-ha that divided the park from a level sward of table-land gay with shrubs and flower-pots, relieved by the shade of two mighty cedars. And on this platform, only seen in part, stood the Squire's old-fashioned house, red brick, with stone mullions, gable-ends, and quaint chimney-pots. On this side the road, immediately facing the two gentlemen, cottage after cottage whitely emerged from the curves in the lane, while, beyond, the ground declining gave an extensive prospect of woods and cornfields, spires and farms. Behind, from a belt of lilacs and evergreens, you caught a peep of the parsonage-house, backed by woodlands, and a little noisy rill running in front. The birds were still in the hedgerows, only, as if from the very heart of the most distant woods, there came now and then the mellow note of the cuckoo.
"Verily," said Mr. Dale softly, "my lot has fallen on a goodly heritage."
The Italian twitched his cloak over him, and sighed almost inaudibly. Perhaps he thought of his own Summer Land, and felt that amidst all that fresh verdure of the North, there was no heritage for the stranger.
However, before the Parson could notice the sigh or conjecture the cause, Dr. Riccabocca's thin lips took an expression almost malignant.
"Per Bacco!" said he; "in every country I find that the rooks settle where the trees are the finest. I am sure that, when Noah first landed on Ararat, he must have found some gentleman in black already settled in the pleasantest part of the mountain, and waiting for his tenth of the cattle as they came out of the Ark."
The Parson turned his meek eyes to the philosopher, and there was in them something so deprecating rather than reproachful, that Dr. Riccabocca turned away his face and refilled his pipe. Dr. Riccabocca abhorred priests; but though Parson Dale was emphatically a parson, he seemed at that moment so little of what Dr. Riccabocca understood by a priest, that the Italian's heart smote him for his irreverent jest on the cloth. Luckily at this moment there was a diversion to that untoward commencement of conversation, in the appearance of no less a personage than the donkey himself—I mean the donkey who ate the apple.
* * * * *
Chapter VI.
The Tinker was a stout swarthy fellow, jovial and musical withal, for he was singing a stave as he flourished his staff, and at the end of each refrain down came the staff on the quarters of the donkey. The Tinker went behind and sung, the donkey went before and was thwacked.
"Yours is a droll country," quoth Dr. Riccabocca; "in mine it is not the ass that walks first in the procession, who gets the blows."
The Parson jumped from the stile, and, looking over the hedge that divided the field from the road-"Gently, gently," said he; "the sound of the stick spoils the singing! O Mr. Sprott, Mr. Sprott! a good man is merciful to his beast."
The donkey seemed to recognize the voice of its friend, for it stopped short, pricked one ear wistfully, and looked up.
The Tinker touched his hat, and looked up too. "Lord bless your reverence! he does not mind it, he likes it. I would not hurt thee; would I, Neddy?"
The donkey shook his head and shivered; perhaps a fly had settled on the sore, which the chestnut leaves no longer protected.
"I am sure you did not mean to hurt him, Sprott," said the Parson, more politely I fear than honestly—for he had seen enough of that cross-grained thing called the human heart, even in the little world of a country parish, to know that it requires management, and coaxing, and flattering, to interfere successfully between a man and his own donkey—"I am sure you did not mean to hurt him; but he has already got a sore on his shoulder as big as my hand, poor thing!"
"Lord love 'un! yes; that vas done a playing with the manger, the day I gave 'un oats!" said the Tinker.
Dr. Riccabocca adjusted his spectacles, and surveyed the ass. The ass pricked up his other ear, and surveyed Dr. Riccabocca. In that mutual survey of physical qualifications, each being regarded according to the average symmetry of its species, it may be doubted whether the advantage was on the side of the philosopher.
The Parson had a great notion of the wisdom of his friend, in all matters not immediately ecclesiastical.
"Say a good word for the donkey!" whispered he.
"Sir," said the Doctor, addressing Mr. Sprott, with a respectful salutation, "there's a great kettle at my house—the Casino—which wants soldering: can you recommend me a tinker?"
"Why, that's all in my line," said Sprott, "and there ben't a tinker in the country that I would recommend like myself, thof I say it."
"You jest, good sir." said the Doctor, smiling pleasantly. "A man who can't mend a hole in his own donkey, can never demean himself by patching up my great kettle."
"Lord, sir," said the Tinker, archly, "if I had known that poor Neddy had two sitch friends in court, I'd have seen he was a gintleman, and treated him as sitch."
"Corpo di Bacco!" quoth the Doctor, "though that jest's not new, I think the Tinker comes very well out of it."
"True; but the donkey!" said the Parson, "I've a great mind to buy it."
"Permit me to tell you an anecdote in point," said Dr. Riccabocca.
"Well!" said the Parson, interrogatively.
"Once in a time," pursued Riccabocca, "the Emperor Adrian, going to the public baths, saw an old soldier, who had served under him, rubbing his back against the marble wall. The Emperor, who was a wise, and therefore a curious, inquisitive man, sent for the soldier, and asked him why he resorted to that kind of friction. 'Because,' answered the veteran, 'I am too poor to have slaves to rub me down.' The Emperor was touched, and gave him slaves and money. The next day, when Adrian went to the oaths, all the old men in the city were to be seen rubbing themselves against the marble as hard as they could. The Emperor sent for them, and asked them the same question which he had put to the soldier; the cunning old rogues, of course, made the same answer. 'Friends,' said Adrian, 'since there are so many of you, you will just rub one another!' Mr. Dale, if you don't want to have all the donkeys in the county with holes in their shoulders, you had better not buy the Tinker's!"
"It is the hardest thing in the world to do the least bit of good," groaned the Parson, as he broke a twig off the hedge nervously, snapped it in two, and flung the fragments on the road-one of them hit the donkey on the nose. If the ass could have spoken Latin, he would have said, "Et tu, Brute!" As it was, he hung down his ears, and walked on.
"Gee hup," said the Tinker, and he followed the ass. Then stopping, he looked over his shoulder, and seeing that the Parson's eyes were gazing mournfully on his protege, "Never fear, your reverence," cried the Tinker kindly; "I'll not spite 'un."
* * * * *
CHAPTER VII.
"Four o'clock," cried the Parson, looking at his watch; "half-an-hour after dinnertime, and Mrs. Dale particularly begged me to be punctual, because of the fine trout the Squire sent us. Will you venture on what our homely language calls 'pot luck,' Doctor?"
Now Riccabocca, like most wise men, especially if Italians, was by no means inclined to the credulous view of human nature. Indeed, he was in the habit of detecting self-interest in the simplest actions of his fellow-creatures. And when the Parson thus invited him to pot luck, he smiled with a kind of lofty complacency; for Mrs. Dale enjoyed the reputation of having what her friends styled "her little tempers." And, as well-bred ladies rarely indulge in "little tempers" in the presence of a third person, not of the family, so Dr. Riccabocca instantly concluded that he was invited to stand between the pot and the luck! Nevertheless—as he was fond of trout, and a much more good-natured man than he ought to have been according to his principles-he accepted the hospitality; but he did so with a sly look from over his spectacles, which brought a blush into the guilty cheeks of the Parson. Certainly Riccabocca had for once guessed right in his estimate of human motives.
The two walked on, crossed a little bridge that spanned the rill, and entered the parsonage lawn. Two dogs, that seemed to have sat on watch for their master, sprang toward him barking; and the sound drew the notice of Mrs. Dale, who, with parasol in hand, sallied out from the sash window which opened on the lawn. Now, O reader! I know that in thy secret heart, thou art chuckling over the want of knowledge in the sacred arcana of the domestic hearth, betrayed by the author; thou art saying to thyself, "A pretty way to conciliate little tempers, indeed, to add to the offense of spoiling the fish, the crime of bringing an unexpected friend to eat it. Pot luck, quotha, when the pot's boiled over this half hour!"
But, to thy utter shame and confusion, O reader, learn that both the author and Parson Dale knew very well what they were about.
Dr. Riccabocca was the special favorite of Mrs. Dale, and the only person in the whole county who never put her out by dropping in. In fact, strange though it may seem at first glance, Dr. Riccabocca had that mysterious something about him which we of his own sex can so little comprehend, but which always propitiates the other. He owed this, in part, to his own profound but hypocritical policy; for he looked upon woman as the natural enemy to man—against whom it was necessary to be always on the guard: whom it was prudent to disarm by every species of fawning, servility, and abject complaisance. He owed it also, in part, to the compassionate and heavenly nature of the angels whom his thoughts thus villanously traduced—for women like one whom they can pity without despising; and there was something in Signer Riccabocca's poverty, in his loneliness, in his exile, whether voluntary or compelled, that excited pity; while, despite the threadbare coat, the red umbrella, and the wild hair, he had, especially when addressing ladies, that air of gentleman and cavalier, which is or was more innate in an educated Italian, of whatever rank, than perhaps in the highest aristocracy of any other country in Europe. For, though I grant that nothing is more exquisite than the politeness of your French marquis of the old regime—nothing more frankly gracious than the cordial address of a high-bred English gentleman—nothing more kindly prepossessing than the genial good-nature of some patriarchal German, who will condescend to forget his sixteen quarterings in the pleasure of doing you a favor—yet these specimens of the suavity of their several nations are rare; whereas blandness and polish are common attributes with your Italian. They seem to have been immemorially handed down to him from ancestors emulating the urbanity of Caesar, and refined by the grace of Horace.
"Dr. Riccabocca consents to dine with us," cried the Parson hastily.
"If Madame permit!" said the Italian, bowing over the hand extended to him, which however he forebore to take, seeing it was already full of the watch.
"I am only sorry that the trout must be quite spoiled," began Mrs. Dale, plaintively.
"It is not the trout one thinks of when one dines with Mrs. Dale," said the infamous dissimulator.
"But I see James coming to say that dinner is ready?" observed the Parson.
"He said that three-quarters of an hour ago, Charles dear," retorted Mrs. Dale, taking the arm of Dr. Riccabocca.
* * * * *
CHAPTER VIII.
While the Parson and his wife are entertaining their guest, I propose to regale the reader with a small treatise apropos of that "Charles dear," murmured by Mrs. Dale;—a treatise expressly written for the benefit of THE DOMESTIC CIRCLE.
It is an old jest that there is not a word in the language that conveys so little endearment as the word "dear." But though the saying itself, like most truths, be trite and hackneyed, no little novelty remains to the search of the inquirer into the varieties of inimical import comprehended in that malign monosyllable. For instance, I submit to the experienced that the degree of hostility it betrays is in much proportioned to its collocation in the sentence. When, gliding indirectly through the rest of the period, it takes its stand at the close, as in that "Charles dear" of Mrs. Dale—it has spilt so much of Its natural bitterness by the way that it assumes even a smile, "amara lento temperet risu." Sometimes the smile is plaintive, sometimes arch. Ex. gr.
(Plaintive.)
"I know very well that whatever I do is wrong, Charles dear."
"Nay, I am only glad you amused yourself so much without me, Charles dear."
"Not quite so loud! If you had but my poor head, Charles dear," &c.
Arch.
"If you could spill the ink anywhere but on the best table-cloth, Charles dear!"
"But though you must always have your own way, you are not quite faultless, own, Charles dear," &c.
In this collocation occur many dears, parental as well as conjugal; as—"Hold up your head, and don't look quite so cross, dear."
"Be a good boy for once in your life—that's a dear," &c.
When the enemy stops in the middle of a sentence, its venom is naturally less exhausted. Ex. gr.
"Really I must say, Charles dear, that you are the most fidgety person," &c.
"And if the house bills were so high last week, Charles dear, I should just like to know whose fault it was—that's all."
"Do you think, Charles dear, that you could put your feet anywhere but on the chintz sofa?"
"But you know, Charles dear, that you care no more for me and the children than," &c.
But if the fatal word spring up, in its primitive freshness, at the head of the sentence, bow your head to the storm. It then assumes the majesty of "my" before it; is generally more than simple objurgation—it prefaces a sermon. My candor obliges me to confess that this is the mode in which the hateful monosyllable is more usually employed by the marital part of the one flesh; and has something about it of the odious assumption of the Petruchian pater familias—the head of the family—boding, not perhaps "peace, and love, and quiet life," but certainly "awful rule and right supremacy." Ex. gr.
"My dear Jane—I wish you would just put by that everlasting tent-stitch, and listen to me for a few moments," &c.
"My dear Jane—I wish you would understand me for once—don't think I am angry-no, but I am hurt. You must consider," &c.
"My dear Jane—I don't know if it is your intention to ruin me; but I only wish you would do as all other women do who care three straws for their husbands' property," &c.
"My dear Jane—I wish you to understand that I am the last person in the world to be jealous; but I'll be d——d if that puppy, Capt. Prettyman," &c.
Now, if that same "dear" could be thoroughly raked and hoed out of the connubial garden, I don't think that the remaining nettles would signify a button. But even as it was, Parson Dale, good man, would have prized his garden beyond all the bowers which Spenser and Tasso have sung so musically, though there had not been a single specimen of "dear," whether the dear humilis, or the dear superba; the dear pallida, rubra, or nigra; the dear umbrosa, florens, spicata; the dear savis, or the dear horrida;—no, not a single dear in the whole horticulture of matrimony which Mrs. Dale had not brought to perfection. But this, fortunately, was far from being the case—the dears of Mrs. Dale were only wild flowers after all!
* * * * *
CHAPTER IX.
In the cool of the evening Dr. Riccabocca walked home across the fields. Mr. and Mrs. Dale had accompanied him half way; and as they now turned back to the parsonage, they looked behind, to catch a glimpse of the tall, outlandish figure, winding slowly through the path amidst the waves of the green corn.
"Poor man!" said Mrs. Dale, feelingly; "and the button was off his wristband! What a pity he has nobody to take care of him! He seems very domestic. Don't you think, Charles, it would be a great blessing if we could get him a good wife?"
"Um," said the Parson; "I doubt if he values the married state as he ought."
"What do you mean, Charles? I never saw a man more polite to ladies in my life."
"Yes, but—"
"But what? You are always so mysterious, Charles dear."
"Mysterious! No, Carry; but if you could hear what the Doctor says of the ladies sometimes."
"Ay, when you men get together, my dear, I know what that means-pretty things you say of us. But you are all alike; you know you are, love!"
"I am sure," said the Parson, simply, "that I have good cause to speak well of the sex—when I think of you, and my poor mother."
Mrs. Dale, who, with all her "tempers," was an excellent woman, and loved her husband with the whole of her quick little heart, was touched. She pressed his hand, and did not call him dear all the way home.
Meanwhile the Italian passed the fields, and came upon the high-road about two miles from Hazeldean. On one side stood an old-fashioned solitary inn, such as English inns used to be before they became railway hotels—square, solid, old-fashioned, looking so hospitable and comfortable, with their great signs swinging from some elm tree in front, and the long row of stables standing a little back, with a chaise or two in the yard, and the jolly landlord talking of the crops to some stout farmer, who has stopped his rough pony at the well-known door. Opposite this inn, on the other side the road, stood the habitation of Dr. Riccabocca.
A few years before the date of these annals, the stage coach, on its way to London from a seaport town, stopped at the inn, as was its wont, for a good hour, that its passengers might dine like Christian Englishmen—not gulp down a basin of scalding soup, like everlasting heathen Yankees, with that cursed railway whistle shrieking like a fiend in their ears! It was the best dining-place on the whole road, for the trout in the neighboring rill were famous, and so was the mutton which came from Hazeldean Park.
From the outside of the coach had descended two passengers who, alone insensible to the attractions of mutton and trout, refused to dine—two melancholy-looking foreigners, of whom one was Signor Riccabocca, much the same as we see him now, only that the black suit was less threadbare, the tall form less meager, and he did not then wear spectacles; and the other was his servant. "They would walk about while the coach stopped." Now the Italian's eye had been caught by a mouldering dismantled house on the other side of the road, which nevertheless was well situated; half-way up a green hill, with its aspect due south, a little cascade falling down artificial rock-work, and a terrace with a balustrade, and a few broken urns and statues before its Ionic portico; while on the roadside stood a board, with characters already half effaced, implying that the house was to be "Let unfurnished, with or without land."
The abode that looked so cheerless, and which had so evidently hung long on hand, was the property of Squire Hazeldean. It had been built by his grandfather on the female side—a country gentleman who had actually been in Italy (a journey rare enough to boast of in those days), and who, on his return home, had attempted a miniature imitation of an Italian villa. He left an only daughter and sole heiress, who married Squire Hazeldean's father: and since that time, the house, abandoned by its proprietors for the larger residence of the Hazeldeans, had been uninhabited and neglected. Several tenants, indeed, had offered themselves; but your squire is slow in admitting upon his own property a rival neighbor. Some wanted shooting. "That," said the Hazeldeans, who were great sportsmen and strict preservers, "was quite out of the question." Others were fine folks from London. "London servants," said the Hazeldeans, who were moral and prudent people, "would corrupt their own, and bring London prices." Others, again, were retired manufacturers, at whom the Hazeldeans turned up their agricultural noses. In short, some were too grand, and others too vulgar. Some were refused because they were known so well: "Friends are best at a distance," said the Hazeldeans. Others because they were not known at all: "No good comes of strangers," said the Hazeldeans. And finally, as the house fell more and more into decay, no one would take it unless it was put into thorough repair: "As if one was made of money!" said the Hazeldeans. In short, there stood the house unoccupied and ruinous; and there, on its terrace, stood the two forlorn Italians, surveying it with a smile at each other, as, for the first time since they set foot in England, they recognized, in dilapidated pilasters and broken statues, in a weed-grown terrace and the remains of an orangery, something that reminded them of the land they had left behind.
On returning to the inn, Dr. Riccabocca took the occasion of learning from the innkeeper (who was indeed a tenant of the Squire's) such particulars as he could collect; and a few days afterward Mr. Hazeldean received a letter from a solicitor of repute in London, stating that a very respectable foreign gentleman had commissioned him to treat for Clump Lodge, otherwise called the "Casino;" that the said gentleman did not shoot—lived in great seclusion—and, having no family, did not care about the repairs of the place, provided only it were made weather-proof—if the omission of more expensive reparations could render the rent suitable to his finances, which were very limited. The offer came at a fortunate moment—when the steward had just been representing to the Squire the necessity of doing something to keep the Casino from falling into positive ruin, and the Squire was cursing the fates which had put the Casino into an entail—so that he could not pull it down for the building materials. Mr. Hazeldean therefore, caught at the proposal even as a fair lady, who has refused the best offers in the kingdom, catches at last at some battered old Captain on half-pay, and replied that, as for rent, if the solicitors client was a quiet respectable man, he did not care for that. But that the gentleman might have it for the first year rent free, on condition of paying the taxes and putting the place a little in order. If they suited each other, they could then come to terms. Ten days subsequently to this gracious reply, Signer Riccabocca and his servant arrived; and, before the years end, the Squire was so contented with his tenant that he gave him a running lease of seven, fourteen, or twenty-one years, at a rent nearly nominal, on condition that Signer Riccabocca would put and maintain the place in repair, barring the roof and fences, which the Squire generously renewed at his own expense. It was astonishing, by little and little, what a pretty place the Italian had made of it, and what is more astonishing, how little it had cost him. He had indeed painted the walls of the hall, staircase, and the rooms appropriated to himself, with his own hands. His servant had done the greater part of the upholstery. The two between them had got the garden into order. The Italians seemed to have taken a joint love to the place, and to deck it as they would have done some favorite chapel to their Madonna.
It was long before the natives reconciled themselves to the odd ways of the foreign settlers. The first thing that offended them was the exceeding smallness of the household bills. Three days out of the seven, indeed, both man and master dined on nothing else but the vegetables in the garden, and the fishes in the neighboring rill; when no trout could be caught they fried the minnows, (and certainly, even in the best streams, minnows are more frequently caught than trouts.) The next thing which angered the natives quite as much, especially the female part of the neighborhood, was the very sparing employment the two he creatures gave to the sex usually deemed so indispensable in household matters. At first indeed, they had no woman servant at all. But this created such horror that Parson Dale ventured a hint upon the matter, which Riccabocca took in very good part, and an old woman was forthwith engaged, after some bargaining—at three shillings a week—to wash and scrub as much as she liked during the daytime. She always returned to her own cottage to sleep. The man servant, who was styled in the neighborhood "Jackeymo," did all else for his master—smoothed his room, dusted his papers, prepared his coffee, cooked his dinner, brushed his clothes, and cleaned his pipes, of which Riccabocca had a large collection. But however close a man's character, it generally creeps out in driblets; and on many little occasions the Italian had shown acts of kindness, and, on some more rare occasions, even of generosity, which had served to silence his calumniators, and by degrees he had established a very fair reputation—suspected, it is true, of being a little inclined to the Black Art, and of a strange inclination to starve Jackeymo and himself,—in other respects harmless enough.
Signor Riccabocca had become very intimate, as we have seen, at the Parsonage. But not so at the Hall. For though the Squire was inclined to be very friendly to all his neighbors—he was, like most country gentlemen, rather easily huffed. Riccabocca had, if with great politeness, still with great obstinacy, refused Mr. Hazeldean's earlier invitations to dinner; and when the Squire found that the Italian rarely declined to dine at the Parsonage, he was offended in one of his weak points—viz., his regard for the honor of the hospitality of Hazeldean Hall—and he ceased altogether invitations so churlishly rejected. Nevertheless, as it was impossible for the Squire, however huffed, to bear malice, he now and then reminded Riccabocca of his existence by presents of game, and would have called on him more often than he did, but that Riccabocca received him with such excessive politeness that the blunt country gentleman felt shy and put out, and used to say, that "to call on Riccabocca was as bad as going to court."
But I left Dr. Riccabocca on the high-road. By this time he has ascended a narrow path that winds by the side of the cascade, he has passed a trellis-work covered with vines, from the which Jacheymo has positively succeeded in making what he calls wine—a liquid, indeed, that, if the cholera had been popularly known in those days, would have soured the mildest member of the Board of Health; for Squire Hazeldean, though a robust man, who daily carried off his bottle of port with impunity, having once rashly tasted it, did not recover the effect till he had had a bill from the apothecary as long as his own arm. Passing this trellis, Dr. Riccabocca entered upon the terrace, with its stone pavement smoothed and trim as hands could make it. Here, on neat stands, all his favorite flowers were arranged. Here four orange-trees were in full blossom; here a kind of summer-house or Belvidere, built by Jackeymo and himself, made his chosen morning-room from May till October; and from this Belvidere there was as beautiful an expanse of prospect as if our English Nature had hospitably spread on her green board all that she had to offer as a banquet to the exile.
A man without his coat, which was thrown over the balustrade, was employed in watering the flowers: a man with movements so mechanical—with a face so rigidly grave in its tawny hues—that he seemed like an automaton made out of mahogany.
"Giacomo," said Dr. Riccabocca, softly.
The automaton stopped its hand, and turned its head.
"Put by the watering-pot, and come here," continued Riccabocca in Italian; and moving toward the balustrade, he leaned over it. Mr. Mitford, the historian, calls Jean Jacques John James. Following that illustrious example, Giacomo shall be Anglified into Jackeymo. Jackeymo came to the balustrade also, and stood a little behind his master.
"Friend," said Riccabocca, "enterprises have not always succeeded with us. Don't you think, after all, it is tempting our evil star to rent those fields from the landlord?" Jackeymo crossed himself, and made some strange movement with a little coral charm which he wore set in a ring on his finger.
"If the Madonna send us luck, and we could hire a lad cheap?" said Jackeymo, doubtfully.
"Piu vale un presente che due futuri," said Riccabocca—"A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush."
"Chi non fa quondo puo, non puo fare quondo vuole"—("He who will not when he may, when he will it shall have nay")—answered Jackeymo, as sententiously as his master. "And the Padrone should think in time that he must lay by for the dower of the poor signorina"—(young lady.)
Riccabocca sighed, and made no reply.
"She must be that high now!" said Jackeymo, putting his band on some imaginary line a little above the balustrade. Riccabocca's eyes, raised over the spectacles, followed the hand.
"If the Padrone could but see her here"—
"I thought I did!" muttered the Italian.
"He would never let her go from his side till she went to a husband's," continued Jackeymo.
"But this climate—she could never stand it," said Riccabocca, drawing his cloak round him, as a north wind took him in the rear.
"The orange-trees blossom even here with care," said Jackeymo, turning back to draw down an awning where the orange-trees faced the north. "See!" he added, as he returned with a sprig in fall bud.
Dr. Riccabocca bent over the blossom, and then placed it in his bosom.
"The other one should be there too." said Jackeymo.
"To die—as this does already!" answered Riccabocca. "Say no more."
Jackeymo shrugged his shoulders; and then, glancing at his master, threw his hand over his eyes.
There was a pause. Jackeymo was the first to break it.
"But, whether here or there, beauty without money is the orange-tree without shelter. If a lad could be got cheap, I would hire the land, and trust for the crop to the Madonna."
"I think I know of such a lad," said Riccabocca, recovering himself, and with his sardonic smile once more lurking about the corner of his mouth—"a lad made for us!"
"Diavolo!"
"No, not the Diavolo! Friend, I have this day seen a boy who-refused sixpence!"
"Cosa stupenda!"—(Stupendous thing!) exclaimed Jackeymo, opening his eyes, and letting fall the watering-pot.
"It is true, my friend."
"Take him, Padrone, in Heaven's name, and the fields will grow gold."
"I will think of it, for it must require management to catch such a boy," said Riccabocca. "Meanwhile, light a candle in the parlor, and bring from my bedroom—that great folio of Machiavelli."
* * * * *
RECENT DEATHS.
LOUIS PHILIPPE, EX-KING OF THE FRENCH.
The vicissitudes of kings form an impressive chapter in the history of Europe; and one of the most striking episodes in the narrative is the checkered life of the last king of France—one week among the mightiest monarchs on the loftiest pinnacle of ambition, he was, the next, an exile in a foreign land—his past supremacy almost forgotten.
Louis Philippe died on the morning of the 26th of August, at Claremont, in the presence of the Queen and several members of his family. He had been made aware of his approaching dissolution early the previous day, and receiving with calmness the melancholy intimation, prepared for the final arrangements he wished to make. After a conversion with the Queen, he dictated, with remarkable clearness, the concluding portion of his Memoirs, and then, having caused to be assembled his chaplain, the Abbe Gaelle, and all his children and grandchildren who were at Claremont, he received, with resignation and firmness, the last rites of the Catholic Church. Toward seven in the evening the debility that had oppressed him appeared to pass off, and fever came on, which continued during the night with much violence, but without disturbing his composure of mind. At eight o'clock in the morning he expired, in the presence of his wife, and of the Duchess of Orleans, the Count of Paris, the Duke de Chartres, the Duke and Duchess de Nemours, the Prince and Princess de Joinville, the Duke and Duchess d'Aureale, and the Duchess Augusta of Saxe-Coburg. Thus ended the closing scene of the life of Louis Philippe of Orleans,—the wise and judicious sovereign of a great people, the soldier of one revolution, the conqueror of a second, and the victim of a third.
Louis Philippe was born in Paris, 6th October, 1773, the eldest son of Philippe Joseph, Duke of Orleans (so well-known under the revolutionary soubriquet of Egalite), by Marie Louise Adelaide de Bourbon his wife, daughter and heir of the wealthy Duke de Penthievre. At his birth he bore the title of Valois; but after the death of his grandfather, in 1785, was styled Duke of Chartres. The care of the young Prince's education was assigned to Madame de Genlis, who ably and admirably performed her important duties. From her guidance Louis Philippe passed at once to the arena of active life. In 1791, the Prince, then Duke of Chartres, having previously received the appointment of Colonel in the 14th Dragoons, assumed the command of that regiment, and shortly after, quitting the garrison of Vendome, proceeded to Valenciennes, where he continued to pursue his military avocations. In the April of the following year, war being declared against Austria, the Duke made his first campaign, fighting with gallantry under Kellerman at Valmy, and with Dumouriez at Jemappes. But the horrors of the Revolution were progressing with giant strides; the unfortunate Louis XVI. was carried to the scaffold, and within a few months after, the Duke of Orleans was seized on a plea of conspiracy against the French nation, and after a mock trial, consigned to the executioner. A short time previously to the death of his father, the Duke de Chartres had effected his escape through Belgium into Switzerland, and there was joined by his sister Adelaide and Madame de Genlis. Our confined space precludes the possibility of our dwelling on the romantic events of this period of Louis Philippe's life, and permits us to glance only at his wanderings through Switzerland, Denmark, Lapland, Finland, America, and England. For one year he held the Appointment of Professor in the College of Reichenau, at a salary of fifty-eight pounds; and for that sum undertook to teach history, mathematics, and English. He bore the name of Chabaud-Latour, and none but the superiors of the institution were aware of his rank. The news of his father's execution reached him while quietly instructing the youth of Reichenau, and he instantly threw up his Professorship, and after a protracted journey through northern Europe, succeeded, by the kind instrumentality of Mr. Gouverneur Morris, the American Ambassador at Paris, in reaching the United States. He landed at Philadelphia on the 24th October, 1796, and was soon after joined by his brothers, Montpensier and Beaujolais. The three brothers passed the winter in that city, and afterward made a journey through the Western States, and visited General Washington at Mount Vernon. Their residence in this country was not however of very long duration. After an inhospitable reception by the Spanish authorities in Cuba, the royal exiles made their way to England, in February, 1800, and thence immediately proceeded to Barcelona, in the hope of meeting their mother. But this object failing, they returned to England, and took up their abode at Twickenham, on the banks of the Thames. In Great Britain they were treated with respect and consideration, and were furnished with ample opportunities for repose after their exciting adventures. Within a few years, however, the Duke of Montpensier and the Count Beaujolais both died—the former in England, the latter at Malta. Louis Philippe had accompanied his last surviving brother to that island, and after his interment sailed for Sicily, on the invitation of the King of Naples. There he gained the affections of the Princess Amelia, and their marriage took place in November, 1809. No event of material importance marks the subsequent life of the Duke, until the year 1814, when, on the abdication of Napoleon, he returned to Paris, and for a short period was in full enjoyment of his honors. In 1815, Napoleon's escape from Elba again called the Duke of Orleans into active employment, and he proceeded, in obedience to the desire of Louis XVIII., to take the command of the Army of the North. In this situation he remained until the 24th of March, hen he surrendered his command to the Duke de Treviso, and retired to Twickenham. After the Hundred Days, the Duke of Orleans obeyed the ordinance authorizing the Princes of the blood to take their seats in the Chamber of Peers; but subsequently incurring the jealousy and displeasure of the Court, he resought his old residence on the Thames, and dwelt there in seclusion until 1817, when he went back to France, and devoted himself to the education of his children, until the Revolution of 1830 broke out, resulting in his elevation to the throne. The subsequent events of his reign, and the memorable outbreak of 1848, that finally overthrew the dynasty that the monarch had strained every nerve to establish, are too fresh on the public mind to require recapitulation here.
* * * * *
JOHN INMAN.
John Inman, a son of William Inman, was born in Utica in 1805. He had two brothers, William, a commander in the Navy, and Henry, so well known as one of the finest artists of this country. John Inman was educated pretty much by chance; he had the usual country schooling; but whatever valuable cultivation he had was in after-life when he was alone in the world, seeking his fortune. In 1823 he went to North Carolina where he taught school for two years. In the spring of 1826, with the profits of his schoolmastership, he went to Europe, and traveled there a little more than a year. On his return, being admitted to the bar, he practiced law about two years, when, in 1829, he became one of the editors of The Standard newspaper, which he left in 1830 to conduct the Mirror. In 1833 he was married to Miss Fisher, a sister of the popular and estimable actress, Clara Fisher, and about this time he devoted the leisure left from the duties of the Mirror office to a paper owned by his brother-in-law and himself, called The Spirit of the Times. In 1833 he accepted an offer from the late Colonel Stone to become one of the editors of the Commercial Advertiser, of which he became the editor in chief upon the death of that gentleman, in 1844. He continued in this post until his failing health last spring compelled him entirely to relinquish the use of the pen; and gradually declining, he died on the 30th of August.
Mr. Inman had edited several books, and for two or three years he conducted the Columbian Magazine. He was for a long time the critical reader of the great house of Harper & Brothers, who learned by a happy experience to confide unhesitatingly in his judgment of books. He wrote many tales and sketches for the annuals and other publications, and a few poems, of which "Byron, a Fragment," was the longest. Of the Columbian Magazine, he wrote with his own hand the whole of one number, partly from an ambition to achieve what seemed an impossible feat, and partly from his habit of close and unremitting labor. He also wrote several literary papers for the New York Review. He was a gentleman of the most honorable nature, and of the finest taste and most refined habits. Perhaps there was not connected with the press in this city a writer of purer English, and very few of our literary men have had a more thorough knowledge of French and English literature.
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ADONIRAM JUDSON, D.D.
The death of this widely-known and eminently devoted missionary is announced in an article of The Tribune, to have taken place on the 12th of April, on board of the French brig Ariotide, bound to the Isle of Bourbon, in which he had taken passage for the benefit of his health. His remains were committed to the deep on the evening of his death. For some time past the health of Dr. Judson, which had been seriously impaired for several years, has been known to be in an alarming state, and the news of his decease accordingly will not come as an unlooked-for blow upon his wide circle of friends. Dr. Judson was the son of Rev. Adoniram Judson, a Congregational clergyman in Plymouth county, Mass. He received his collegiate education at Brown University, with the original intention of pursuing the profession of the law, but experiencing a great change in his religious views soon after his graduation, he entered the Theological Seminary at Andover. During his residence at this institution, a profound interest in Foreign Missions was awakened among the students which resulted in his determination to devote his life to the missionary service. Leaving his native land, among the first missionaries sent forth by the American Board, in company with Samuel Nevill, Luther Rice, and Samuel Nott, he arrived in Calcutta, in 1812. In consequence of studies during the voyage, he was led to change his opinions on the subject of baptism, and a short time after his landing, received the rite of immersion from the hands of one of the English missionaries resident in Calcutta. His sermon on that occasion, which produced a deep impression on the religious world, is a masterpiece of logical argument, Scriptural research and grave eloquence. After connecting himself with the Baptist denomination, he selected the Burman empire as the seat of his future labors—at which post he has remained, with scarcely an interval of relaxation, for nearly forty years. His efforts and sufferings in the prosecution of his mission are well known. He was a man of high and resolute courage, of remarkable self-reliance, of more than common mental ability and of devotion to the performance of his duty, almost without a parallel in modern times. He had all the elements of a hero in his composition, and whoever would look for a rare specimen of a life consecrated to noble, ideal aims, inspired with an elevated and almost romantic self-devotion, and daily exercising a valiant energy more difficult of attainment than that which animates the soldier amid the smoke of battle, must contemplate the strange and beautiful history of the lion-hearted missionary of Burmah.
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HENRY WHITE, D.D.
The REV. HENRY WHITE, D.D., Professor of Theology in the Union Theological Seminary, died in this city on Sunday, August 25th, in the fifty-first year of his age. We obtain the following biographical facts from The Independent: "Professor White was born in Durham, Greene county, in this state. He had nearly reached the age of manhood before commencing a liberal course of education; was graduated at Union College in 1824; studied theology at Princeton, N.J., and after being licensed to preach the Gospel, was employed as an agent of the American Bible Society in Georgia and the Carolinas. In this service he remained during parts of the years 1826 and 1827. In 1827-28 he was engaged as an agent of the same society in New York and the vicinity; and during that period he supplied for some time the pulpit of the second Presbyterian church in Newark, N.J. In March, 1829, he became pastor of the Allen-street Presbyterian church in this city, in which office he remained until after his appointment to the Professorship of Theology in the Union Theological Seminary, then newly formed in this city. He was dismissed from his pastoral charge in March, 1837. The labors of his professorship were begun and carried on for some years in discouragement. The pecuniary basis on which the Seminary rested was inadequate, and there were arrearages in the salaries. In 1843 Professor W. was invited to Auburn, and great anxiety was felt lest he should accept the invitation. But his own attachment to the Seminary and the entreaties of his friends, and an effort which was made to endow his Professorship with a sufficient permanent fund, induced him to remain, and he held the office as long as he lived."
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SIR MARTIN ARCHER SHEE, P.R.A.
SIR MARTIN ARCHER SHEE, long known in art and letters, and for some years the oldest member as well as the President of the Royal Society, died at Brighton, on the 13th of August, in the eighty-first year of his age. He was descended lineally from one of the Kings of Munster, in the third century, and his family in more recent times has been honorably distinguished. He was born in Dublin, on the 23d of December, 1770. He evinced extraordinary precocity in his art, and when but twelve years old obtained of the Irish Academy medals for figures, landscapes and flowers. The author of "Wine and Walnuts," as quoted in the London Athenaeum, gives the following account of his first appearance in the Great Metropolis:
"I well remember this gentleman on his first arrival from Ireland to the British metropolis; he was introduced to the notice of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and to some other distinguished persons by his illustrious Friend and countryman Mr. Edmund Burke. I was at that time making a drawing in the Plaster Academy in Somerset House, and perfectly recollect the first evening Mr. Shee joining the students there. He selected the figure of the Discobolus for his probationary exercises to procure a permanent student's ticket. I need not say that he obtained it,—for it was acknowledged to be one of the best copies that had yet been seen of that fine figure. I further remarked that Mr. Wilton, the then keeper of the Royal Academy, was so pleased with the performance that he expressed a wish to retain it, after Mr. Shee had received his ticket; and Mr. Shee, with that politeness which marked his early career, presented it to the worthy old gentleman."
Mr. Shee became an exhibitor at the Royal Academy for the first time in 1789. He abstained from exhibiting in the following year, wisely husbanding his strength—worked hard at his art—gave his nights and days to Sir Joshua; and in 1791 took handsome apartments, and sent four portraits to the Exhibition. In 1792 he removed to yet better rooms, and sent in all seven works to the Exhibition. In the same year he walked as one of the students of the Royal Academy at the funeral of Sir Joshua Reynolds. In 1793 he reached what is now the full Academical number of eight portraits. The Exhibition of the following year contained his as yet most ambitious efforts:—a portrait of a young lady as Miranda in "The Tempest," and "Jephtha's Daughter" from the Book of Judges. In 1795 he exhibited a portrait of himself,—and a portrait of Mr. Addington, afterward Lord Sidmouth. In 1797 he exhibited in all ten works; including portraits of Pope and Fawcett the actors. He continued equally industrious for many successive years; and was in such favor with his fellow artists that he was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1798, immediately after the election of Flaxman into the same honorary rank. The same year, on Romney's withdrawal from London, he removed to the house which that artist had built for himself in Cavendish Square; and in this he continued as Romney's successor to reside until age and growing infirmities compelled him to withdraw to Brighton, and abandon his pencil. In 1800, he was elected a full Royal Academician:—and of his thirty-nine brethren by whom he was chosen he was the last survivor.
Mr. Shee continued to produce for years with amazing readiness of hand and fertility in posture. People of all ranks in life went to Cavendish Square, and for a time Shee was in greater request than either Beechey or Hoppner, though not so much so as Lawrence, or even as Owen or Phillips somewhat later. Lord Spencer was the first nobleman who sat to him; and his example was followed by the Duke of Clarence, the Duke of Leinster, the Marquis of Exeter, and others. The ladies flocked less readily around him; for Lawrence had then, as he continued to have, the entire artist monopoly of the beauty of Great Britain.
Much to the surprise of his friends, and to the infinite wonder of some of his brethren in the Academy, Mr. Shee made his appearance as a poet by the publication, in 1805, of his "Rhymes on Art, or the Remonstrance of a Painter; in two parts, with Notes and a Preface, including Strictures on the State of the Arts, Criticism, Patronage, and Public Taste": and the wonder had not ceased with Nollekins and Northcote, when, in 1809, he published a second poem, in six cantos, entitled "Elements of Art." It is to these poems that Byron alludes in his "English Bards and Scotch Reviewers":
"And here let Shee and Genius find a place, Whose pen and pencil yield an equal grace; To guide whose hand the sister-arts combine, And trace the poet's or painter's line; Whose magic touch can bid the canvas glow, Or pour the easy rhyme's harmonious flow; While honors, doubly merited, attend The poet's rival, but the painter's friend."
The Quarterly was complimentary, but less kind to the painter than the noble lord.
Mr. Shee appears to have always evinced taste for the theater; and when his gravity of years and his position as a popular portrait-painter forbade his any longer entertaining a wish to appear there, he began to woo the dramatic Muse, and commenced a tragedy called "Alasco," of which the scene was laid in Poland. The play was accepted at Covent Garden, but excluded, it was said, from the stage by Colman, who was then licenser. This is not strictly true. Colman objected to about eighty-five lines, which Shee refused to alter. Colman was equally obstinate; and Shee in 1824 printed his play, and appealed to the public against the licenser in a lengthy and angry preface. "Alasco," notwithstanding, is still on the list of the unacted drama.
On the death of Lawrence in 1830, Shee was elected President of the Royal Academy, and immediately knighted. His election was by a large majority, though Wilkie was a candidate; the members being governed in their votes rather, it is said, by the necessities of their annual dinner than by their sense of the merits of Shee as a painter. He excelled in short, well-timed and well-delivered speeches. He was seldom at a loss; and so highly was his eloquence appreciated within the walls of the Academy, that it had been common with more than one Royal Academician to remark whenever a great speaker was mentioned—"Did you ever hear the President—you should hear the President,"—as if Canning and Stanley had been united in Sir Martin Archer Shee.
He has but little claim to be remembered as a poet. His verse wants vigor, and his examples are deficient in novelty of illustration. The notes to both his poems are, however, valuable, and his poetry is perhaps more frequently read for its prose illustrations than for the beauty of its versification or the value of the truths which it seeks to inculcate. As a portrait-painter he was eclipsed by several or his contemporaries,—by Lawrence and by Hoppner,—by Phillips, Jackson, and Raeburn. He had a fine eye for color; while his leading want was, proportion, more especially in his heads. Compare his head of Chantrey with the portraits of Chantrey by Jackson and Raeburn, and the defect is at once obvious; or compare his head of Mr. Hallam with the head of Mr. Hallam by Phillips, or with the living head—since happily Mr. Hallam is still among us. How, then, it will be asked, is Sir Martin to be remembered: by his poems or by his portraits?—by his speeches or by his annual addresses to the students? The question is not difficult of solution. His pictures in the Vernon Gallery will not preserve his name, nor will his portraits viewed as works of Art. His name will scend in the History of Painting as a clever artist with greater accomplishments than have commonly fallen to the class to which he belongs,—and as the painter who has preserved to us the faces and figures of Sir Thomas Munro, Sir Thomas Picton, Sir Eyre Coote, Sir James Scarlett, and Sir Henry Halford. There was merit, we may add, in his portrait of the poet Moore. Principally, however, he will be remembered as one of the Presidents of the Royal Academy.
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GERARD TROOST, M.D.
Dr. GERARD TROOST, for a long period one of the most eminent naturalists of the United States, died on the 14th of August at Nashville, where he had been for twenty years Professor of Chemistry and Natural History in the University of Tennessee. A native of Holland, and educated in one of her universities, he devoted himself to the natural sciences. For the sake of improvement he visited Paris, and for several years was a pupil of the celebrated Hauy. He removed to the United States about forty years ago, and in due time became an American citizen. In 1824 and 1825 he was with Robert Owen at New Harmony, and he appears always to have been distinguished for eccentricities of opinion and conduct, but to have commanded in every situation respect and affection. His entire life was consecrated to geology and the kindred sciences, with what ability and success, his published writings and his well-earned reputation at home and abroad may eloquently testify. Among the subjects upon which he wrote are, amber of Cape Sable, Maryland; the minerals of Missouri; five reports on the geology of Tennessee; meteoric iron from Tennessee and Alabama; a shower of red matter in Tennessee; meteorites, &c., &c.
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PERCEVAL W. BANKS.
This gentleman—better known as Morgan Rattler of "Fraser's Magazine"—died in London on the 13th of August. Mr. Banks, though only in his forty-fifth year, was the last of the race of writers, who, with Dr. Maginn, Mr. Churchill, and others, gave a sting and pungency (of a vicious and unwholesome kind however), to the early numbers of that journal. He seldom did justice to his own talents, for he wrote too often in haste, always at the last moment, and too rarely with good taste. He was by profession a barrister. The world at large, who admired the sportive fancy, classical eloquence, and kind yet firm criticism of poor Morgan Rattler, in his later years, will regret the early decease of one so gifted.
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ROBERT HUNT.
Mr. ROBERT HUNT, the eldest brother of Mr. Leigh Hunt, often mentioned in the "Autobiography," is dead. He was lately nominated by the Queen to the brotherhood of the Charter house, but has not lived very long to enjoy the royal bounty. He was seventy-six years old when he died.
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JOHN COMLY.
JOHN COMLY, an eminent minister of the Society of Friends, died on the 17th of August at Byberry in Pennsylvania, in the seventy-seventh year of his age. "Comly's Spelling-Book," and "Comly's Grammar," have to thousands now living made his name "familiar as household words."
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BISHOP BASCOMB.
THE REV. DR. BASCOMB, long eminent for various abilities, and most of all for a brilliant and effective elocution, died at Louisville, Ky., on the 9th of August. He was editor of the Southern Methodist Quarterly Review, and one of the Bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
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COUNT PIRE.
GENERAL COUNT PIRE, one of the most distinguished officers of the French Empire, died recently. He fought as a private soldier of the National Guard of Paris, on the barricades, against the insurgents of June, 1848.
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GLEANINGS FROM THE JOURNALS.
The Athenaeum is incredulous upon the subject of the falling of Table Rock, at Niagara, and in reprinting the account of the event, thought it necessary to offer a few remarks upon the credibility of American intelligence:—"Our readers," says the Athenaeum, "know that we have great fears of the American penny-a-liner, and are carefully on our guard against his feats. Our own specimens of the class are commonplace artists compared with their American brethren. The season is at hand when we are looking out for the performances at the former,—but we expect little from beyond the old routine. In their sluggish imaginations, the annual pike is doubtless already growing up to his great dimensions, which, on failure of the accustomed springs of intelligence, we are soon to find floating in the newspaper shallows,—and the preposterous cucumber is probably having an inch added to its stature, which will shortly shoot rankly up where the parliamentary harvest has been cut down. The most daring thing that we can expect from these geniuses is, a trick or two perhaps with the Nelson Column. But the American penny-a-liner, our readers know, does the thing on the vast scale of his country. He takes down Niagara at his pleasure,—and puts it up again in its place, or anywhere else that he will. He transports the great Falls about the soil of his country at halt a crown an adventure,—and for five shillings would probably set them playing in the moon."
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A "MASONIC SWORD" FOR THE EMPEROR OF HAYTI.—A magnificent sword, intended to be presented to the Emperor Soulouque on his installation to the mysteries of the "Grand Masonic Order of Hayti," has been made at Birmingham, thirty-two inches in length. The blade is richly ornamented along its whole length with devices in blue and gold, bearing the inscription in French on the one side, "To the illustrious F. Faustin Soulouque, Emperor of Hayti," and on the other, "Homage of the Grand Order of Hayti." The hilt is surmounted by an imperial crown, and adorned with various masonic emblems. On the shield are richly chased the arms of Hayti, with the motto, "God! my Country, and my Sword," "Liberty and Independence." We perceive, also, from the French papers, that a celebrated goldsmith at Paris, has forwarded to Hayti a crown, a scepter, a wand of justice, and a sword of state, manufactured expressly for his sable Majesty, at a cost of L20,000 sterling. The latter has moreover, commanded, for his coronation, a sky-blue velvet mantle, embroidered with bees and richly bound with gold lace, and a Court dress of scarlet velvet, lined with white satin, and trimmed with the most expensive point lace, "with most valuable ornaments to match."
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TIME WORKS WONDERS.—A correspondent Of the Melbourne Daily News remarks that in June, 1847, he met Prince Louis Napoleon and his cousin Jerome Napoleon at Lady Blessington's. "The president was then living in a very modest house in King-street, St. James's-square, and his very unaffected demeanor led me to form an intimate acquaintance with him. He appeared to me a person more fond of the ordinary amusements of the metropolis, frequenting the theaters, casinos, and other similar places, than an ambitious adventurer. On the following May as I was entering the chambers of my solicitor, in Lincoln's Inn Fields, an old gentleman with an umbrella under his arm passed me as I opened the swing doors, and politely removed his hat as I made way for him. It was Louis Philippe. It is scarce three weeks ago I was ordering a waistcoat of my tailor, when two gentlemen entered the shop, and one of them in broken English gave an order for a paletot; I looked up, It was Ledru Rollin and Etienne Arago; when they had gone, the worthy tradesman, knowing I had lived much in Paris, asked me if I knew his customer (M. Arago,) and if he could safely give him credit!"
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AMERICAN MUMMIES.—A letter from Ratisbon states, that the Museum of the Zoological and Mineralogical Society of that town has made a curious acquisition,—that of two mummies found in the sands of the desert of Atacama in Upper Peru, by Dr. Ried, a Bavarian physician resident at Valparaiso. These mummies, male and female, both of American race, are natural mummies,—that is to say, dried without embalming or any other species of preparation. The man is in a stooping posture, his head sustained on his hands, and his elbows renting on his knees. The face has an expression of pain which seems to indicate a, violent death. The woman is stretched at length, with arms crossed on her breast. Both heads are covered with long hair, dark and silky, and divided into an infinity of small plaits. When Dr. Reid discovered these mummies both had their teeth complete; but during their transport to Europe many of these have fallen out, and were found at the bottom of the cases containing these curious relics of American antiquity.
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THE COMMON SLANDERS AGAINST DANIEL WEBSTER are noted in the English Journals in connection with his acceptance of the Secretaryship of State. "These scandals," observes the Spectator, "cannot, however, hide from us the fact, that of all public men in America, perhaps with one exception, Mr. Webster is he who has evinced the greatest knowledge of public affairs, the greatest acumen in administration, and the greatest common sense in emergency. High intelligence is probably the best of all substitutes for high honor—if, indeed, it does not necessarily include that nobler quality."
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COFFINS OF BAKED CLAY OF THE CHALDEANS.—Mr. Kennet Loftus, the first European who has visited the ancient ruins of Warka in Mesopotamia, and who is attached to the surveying staff of Colonel Williams, appointed to settle the question of the boundary line between Turkey and Persia, writes thus:—"Warka is no doubt the Erech of Scripture, the second city of Nimrod, and it is the Orchoe of the Chaldees. The mounds within the walls afford subjects of high interest to the historian and antiquarian; they are filled, nay, I may say, they are literally composed of coffins, piled upon each other to the height of forty-five feet. It has, evidently, been the great burial-place of generations of Chaldeans, as Meshad Ali and Kerbella at the present day are of the Persians. The coffins are very strange affairs; they are in general form like a slipper-bath, but more depressed and symmetrical, with a large oval aperture to admit the body, which is closed with a lid of earthenware. The coffins themselves are also of baked clay, covered with green glaze, and embossed with figures of warriors, with strange and enormous coiffures, dressed in a short tunic and long under garments, a sword by the side, the arms resting on the hips, the legs apart. Great quantities of pottery and also clay figures, some most delicately modeled, are found around them; and ornaments of gold, silver, iron, copper, glass, &c., within."—Art-Journal. |
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