What Christmas Is, As We Grow Older. By Charles Dickens.

Time was, with most of us, when Christmas-day encircling all our limited world like a magic ring, left nothing out for us to miss or seek; bound together all our home enjoyments, affections, and hopes; grouped every thing and every one around the Christmas fire; and made the little picture shining in our bright young eyes, complete.

Time came, perhaps, all so soon! when our thoughts overleaped that narrow boundary; when there was some one (very dear, we thought then, very beautiful, and absolutely perfect) wanting to the fullness of our happiness; when we were wanting too (or we thought so, which did just as well) at the Christmas hearth by which that some one sat; and when we intertwined with every wreath and garland of our life that some one's name.

That was the time for the bright visionary Christmases which have long arisen from us to show faintly, after summer rain, in the palest edges of the rainbow! That was the time for the beatified enjoyment of the things that were to be, and never were, and yet the things that were so real in our resolute hope that it would be hard to say, now, what realities achieved since, have been stronger!

What! Did that Christmas never really come when we and the priceless pearl who was our young choice were received, after the happiest of totally impossible marriages, by the two united families previously at daggers-drawn on our account? When brothers and sisters in law who had always been rather cool to us before our relationship was effected, perfectly doted on us, and when fathers and mothers overwhelmed us with unlimited incomes? Was that Christmas dinner never really eaten, after which we arose, and generously and eloquently rendered honor to our late rival, present in the company, then and there exchanging friendship and forgiveness, and founding an attachment, not to be surpassed in Greek or Roman story, which subsisted until death? Has that same rival long ceased to care for that same priceless pearl, and married for money, and become usurious? Above all, do we really know, now, that we should probably have been miserable if we had won and worn the pearl, and that we are better without her?

That Christmas when we had recently achieved so much fame; when we had been carried in triumph somewhere, for doing something great and good; when we had won an honored and ennobled name, and arrived and were received at home in a shower of tears of joy; is it possible that that Christmas has not come yet?

And is our life here, at the best, so constituted that, pausing as we advance at such a noticeable mile-stone in the track as this great birthday, we look back on the things that never were, as naturally and full as gravely as on the things that have been and are gone, or have been and still are? If it be so, and so it seems to be, must we come to the conclusion, that life is little better than a dream, and little worth the loves and strivings that we crowd into it?

No! Far be such miscalled philosophy from us, dear Reader, on Christmas-day! Nearer and closer to our hearts be the Christmas spirit, which is the spirit of active usefulness, perseverance, cheerful discharge of duty, kindness, and forbearance! It is in the last virtues especially, that we are, or should be, strengthened by the unaccomplished visions of our youth; for who shall say that they are not our teachers to deal gently even with the impalpable nothings of the earth!

Therefore, as we grow older, let us be more thankful that the circle of our Christmas associations and of the lessons that they bring, expands! Let us welcome every one of them, and summon them to take their places by the Christmas hearth.

Welcome, old aspirations, glittering creatures of an ardent fancy, to your shelter underneath the holly! We know you, and have not outlived you yet. Welcome, old projects and old loves, however fleeting, to your nooks among the steadier lights that burn around us. Welcome, all that was ever real to our hearts; and for the earnestness that made you real, thanks to Heaven! Do we build no Christmas castles in the clouds now? Let our thoughts, fluttering like butterflies among these flowers of children, bear witness! Before [pg 391] this boy, there stretches out a Future, brighter than we ever looked on in our old romantic time, but bright with honor and with truth. Around this little head on which the sunny curls lie heaped, the graces sport, as prettily, as airily, as when there was no scythe within the reach of Time to shear away the curls of our first-love. Upon another girl's face near it—placider but smiling bright—a quiet and contented little face, we see Home fairly written. Shining from the word, as rays shine from a star, we see how, when our graves are old, other hopes than ours are young, other hearts than ours are moved; how other ways are smoothed; how other happiness blooms, ripens, and decays—no, not decays, for other homes and other bands of children, not yet in being nor for ages yet to be, arise, and bloom, and ripen to the end of all!

Welcome, every thing! Welcome, alike what has been, and what never was, and what we hope may be, to your shelter underneath the holly, to your places round the Christmas fire, where what is sits open-hearted! In yonder shadow, do we see obtruding furtively upon the blaze, an enemy's face? By Christmas-day we do forgive him! If the injury he has done us may admit of such companionship, let him come here and take his place. If otherwise, unhappily, let him go hence, assured that we will never injure nor accuse him.

On this day, we shut out nothing!

“Pause,” says a low voice. “Nothing? Think!”

“On Christmas-day, we will shut out from our fireside, nothing.”

“Not the shadow of a vast city where the withered leaves are lying deep?” the voice replies. “Not the shadow that darkens the whole globe? Not the shadow of the City of the Dead?”

Not even that. Of all days in the year, we will turn our faces toward that city upon Christmas-day, and from its silent hosts bring those we loved, among us. City of the Dead, in the blessed name wherein we are gathered together at this time, and in the Presence that is here among us according to the promise, we will receive, and not dismiss, thy people who are dear to us!

Yes. We can look upon these children-angels that alight, so solemnly, so beautifully, among the living children by the fire, and can bear to think how they departed from us. Entertaining angels unawares, as the Patriarchs did, the playful children are unconscious of their guests; but we can see them—can see a radiant arm around one favorite neck, as if there were a tempting of that child away. Among the celestial figures there is one, a poor mis-shapen boy on earth, of a glorious beauty now, of whom his dying mother said it grieved her much to leave him here, alone, for so many years as it was likely would elapse before he came to her—being such a little child. But he went quickly, and was laid upon her breast, and in her hand she leads him.

There was a gallant boy, who fell, far away, upon a burning sand beneath a burning sun, and said, “Tell them at home, with my last love, how much I could have wished to kiss them once, but that I died contented and had done my duty!” Or there was another, over whom they read the words, “Therefore we commit his body to the dark!” and so consigned him to the lonely ocean, and sailed on. Or there was another who lay down to his rest in the dark shadow of great forests, and, on earth, awoke no more. O shall they not, from sand and sea and forest, be brought home at such a time!

There was a dear girl—almost a woman—never to be one—who made a mourning Christmas in a house of joy, and went her trackless way to the silent City. Do we recollect her, worn out, faintly whispering what could not be heard, and falling into that last sleep for weariness? O look upon her now! O look upon her beauty, her serenity, her changeless youth, her happiness! The daughter of Jairus was recalled to life, to die; but she, more blest, has heard the same voice, saying unto her, “Arise forever!”

We had a friend who was our friend from early days, with whom we often pictured the changes that were to come upon our lives, and merrily imagined how we would speak, and walk, and think, and talk, when we came to be old. His destined habitation in the City of the Dead received him in his prime. Shall he be shut out from our Christmas remembrance? Would his love have so excluded us? Lost friend, lost child, lost parent, sister, brother, husband, wife, we will not so discard you! You shall hold your cherished places in our Christmas hearts, and by our Christmas fires; and in the season of immortal hope, and on the birthday of immortal mercy, we will shut out nothing!

The winter sun goes down over town and village; on the sea it makes a rosy path, as if the Sacred tread were fresh upon the water. A few more moments, and it sinks, and night comes on, and lights begin to sparkle in the prospect. On the hill-side beyond the shapelessly diffused town, and in the quiet keeping of the trees that gird the village-steeple, remembrances are cut in stone, planted in common flowers, growing in grass, entwined with lowly brambles around many a mound of earth. In town and village, there are doors and windows closed against the weather, there are flaming logs heaped high, there are joyful faces, there is healthy music of voices. Be all ungentleness and harm excluded from the temples of the Household Gods, but be those remembrances admitted with tender encouragement! They are of the time and all its comforting and peaceful reassurances; and of the history that reunited even upon earth the living and the dead; and of the broad beneficence and goodness that too many men have tried to tear to narrow shreds.

The Good Old Times In Paris.

The world, since it was a world at all, has ever been fond of singing the praises of the good old times. It would seem a general rule, that so soon as we get beyond a certain age, whatever that may be, we acquire a high opinion of the past, and grumble at every thing new under the sun. One cause of this may be, that distance lends enchantment to the view, and that the history of the past, like a landscape traveled over, loses in review all the rugged and wearisome annoyances that rendered it scarcely bearable in the journey. But it is hardly worth while to speculate upon the causes of an absurdity which a little candid retrospection will do more to dissipate than whole folios of philosophy. We can easily understand a man who sighs that he was not born a thousand years hence instead of twenty or thirty years ago, but that any one should encourage a regret that his lot in life was not cast a few centuries back, seems inexplicable on any rational grounds. The utter folly of praising the good old times may be illustrated by a reference to the wretched condition of most European cities; but we shall confine ourselves to the single case of Paris, now one of the most beautiful capitals in the world.

In the thirteenth century the streets of Paris were not paved; they were muddy and filthy to a very horrible degree, and swine constantly loitered about and fed in them. At night there were no public lights, and assassinations and robberies were far from infrequent. At the beginning of the fourteenth century public lighting was begun on a limited scale; and at best only a few tallow candles were put up in prominent situations. The improvement, accordingly, did little good, and the numerous bands of thieves had it still pretty much their own way. Severity of punishment seldom compensates the want of precautionary measures. It was the general custom at this period to cut off the ears of a condemned thief after the term of his imprisonment had elapsed. This was done that offenders might be readily recognized should they dare again to enter the city, banishment from which was a part of the sentence of such as were destined to be cropped. But they often found it easier to fabricate false ears than to gain a livelihood away from the arena of their exploits; and this measure, severe and cruel as it was, was found inefficient to rid the capital of their presence.

Among the various adventures with thieves, detailed by an author contemporaneous with Louis XIII., the following affords a rich example of the organization of the domestic brigands of the time, and of the wretched security which the capital afforded to its inhabitants:

A celebrated advocate named Polidamor had by his reputation for riches aroused the covetousness of some chiefs of a band of brigands, who flattered themselves that could they catch him they would obtain possession of an important sum. They placed upon his track three bold fellows, who, after many fruitless endeavors, encountered him one evening accompanied only by a single lackey. Seizing fast hold of himself and attendant, they rifled him in a twinkling; and as he had accidentally left his purse at home, they took his rich cloak of Spanish cloth and silk, which was quite new, and of great value. Polidamor, who at first resisted, found himself compelled to yield to force, but asked as a favor to be allowed to redeem his mantle. This was agreed to at the price of thirty pistoles; and the rogues appointed a rendezvous the next day, at six in the evening, on the same spot, for the purpose of effecting the exchange. They recommended him to come alone, assuring him that his life would be endangered should he appear accompanied with an escort. Polidamor repaired to the place at the appointed hour, and after a few moments of expectation he saw a carriage approaching in which were seated four persons in the garb of gentlemen. They descended from the vehicle, and one of them, advancing toward the advocate, asked him in a low voice if he were not in search of a cloak of Spanish cloth and silk. The victim replied in the affirmative, and declared himself prepared to redeem it at the sum at which it had been taxed. The thieves having assured themselves that he was alone, seized him, and made him get into the carriage; and one of them presenting a pistol to his breast, bade him hold his tongue under pain of instant death, while another blindfolded him. As the advocate trembled with fear, they assured him that no harm was intended, and bade the coachman drive on.

After a rapid flight, which was yet long enough to inspire the prisoner with deadly terror, the carriage stopped in front of a large mansion, the gate of which opened to receive them, and closed again as soon as they had passed the threshold. The robbers alighted with their captive, from whose eyes they now removed the bandage. He was led into an immense saloon, where were a number of tables, upon which the choicest viands were profusely spread, and seated at which was a company of gentlemanly-looking personages, who chatted familiarly together without the slightest demonstration of confusion or alarm. His guardians again enjoined him to lay aside all fear, informed him that he was in good society, and that they had brought him there solely that they might enjoy the pleasure of his company at supper. In the mean while water was served to the guests, that they might wash their hands before sitting at table. Every man took his place, and a seat was assigned to Polidamor at the upper and privileged end of the board. Astonished, or rather stupefied at the strange circumstances of his adventure, he would willingly [pg 396] have abstained from taking any part in the repast; but he was compelled to make a show of eating, in order to dissemble his mistrust and agitation. When the supper was ended and the tables were removed, one of the gentlemen who had assisted in his capture accosted him with polite expressions of regret at his want of appetite. During the interchange of courtesies which ensued, one of the bandits took a lute, another a viol, and the party began to amuse themselves with music. The advocate was then invited to walk into a neighboring room, where he perceived a considerable number of mantles ranged in order. He was desired to select his own, and to count out the thirty pistoles agreed upon, together with one for coach-hire, and one more for his share of the reckoning at supper. Polidamor, who had been apprehensive that the drama of which his mantle had been the occasion might have a very different dÉnouement, was but too well pleased to be quit at such a cost, and he took leave of the assembly with unfeigned expressions of gratitude. The carriage was called, and before entering it he was again blindfolded; his former conductors returned with him to the spot where he had been seized, where, removing the bandage from his eyes, they allowed him to alight, presenting him at the same moment with a ticket sealed with green wax, and having these words inscribed in large letters, “Freed by the Great Band.” This ticket was a passport securing his mantle, purse, and person against all further assaults. Hastening to regain his residence with all speed, he was assailed at a narrow turning by three other rascals, who demanded his purse or his life. The advocate drew his ticket from his pocket, though he had no great faith in it as a preservative, and presented it to the thieves. One of them, provided with a dark lantern, read it, returned it, and recommended him to make haste home, where he at last arrived in safety.

Early in the seventeenth century the Parisian rogues availed themselves of the regulations against the use of snuff to pillage the snuff-takers. As the sale of this article was forbidden by law to any but grocers and apothecaries, and as even they could only retail it to persons provided with the certificate of a medical man, the annoyance of such restrictions was loudly complained of. The rogues, ever ready to profit by circumstances, opened houses for gaming—at that period almost a universal vice—where “snuff at discretion” was a tempting bait to those long accustomed to a gratification all the more agreeable because it was forbidden. Here the snuff-takers were diligently plied with wine, and then cheated of their money; or, if too temperate or suspicious to drink to excess, they were unceremoniously plundered in a sham quarrel. To such a length was this practice carried, that an ordinance was at length issued in 1629, strictly forbidding all snuff-takers from assembling in public places or elsewhere, “pour satisfaire leur goÚt!”

The thieves of the good old times were not only more numerous in proportion to the population than they are at present, but were also distinguished by greater audacity and cruelty.—They had recourse to the most diabolical ingenuity to subdue the resistance and to prevent the outcries of their victims. Under the rule of Henry IV. a band of brigands arose, who, in the garb, and with the manners of gentlemen, introduced themselves into the best houses under the pretext of private business, and when alone with the master, demanded his money at the dagger's point. Some of them made use of a gag—a contrivance designated at the period the poire d'angoisse. This instrument was of a spherical shape, and pierced all over with small holes; it was forced into the mouth of the person intended to be robbed, and upon touching a spring sharp points protruded from every hole, at once inflicting the most horrible anguish, and preventing the sufferer from uttering a single cry. It could not be withdrawn but by the use of the proper key, which contracted the spring. This device was adopted universally by one savage band, and occasioned immense misery not only in Paris, but throughout France.

An Italian thief, an enterprising and ingenious rogue, adopted a singular expedient for robbing women at their devotions in church. He placed himself on his knees by the side of his intended prey, holding in a pair of artificial hands a book of devotion, to which he made a show of the most devout attention, while with his natural hands he cut the watch or purse-string of his unsuspecting neighbor. This stratagem, favored by the fashion, then general, of wearing mantles, met with great success, and of course soon produced a host of clumsy imitators, and excited the vigilance of the police, who at length made so many seizures of solemn-faced devotees provided with wooden kid-gloved hands, that it fell into complete discredit, and was at last abandoned by the profession.

Cunning as were the rogues of a past age, they were liable to capture like their modern successors. A gentleman having resorted to Paris on business, was hustled one day in the precincts of the palace, and robbed of his well-filled purse. Furious at the loss of a considerable sum, he swore to be avenged. He procured a clever mechanic, who, under his directions, contrived a kind of hand-trap for the pocket, managed in such a manner as to preclude the possibility of an attempt at purse-stealing without detection. Having fixed the instrument in its place, impatient for the revenge he had promised himself, he sallied forth to promenade the public walks, mingled with every group, and stopped from time to time gazing about him with the air of a greenhorn. Several days passed before any thing resulted from his plan; but one morning, while he was gaping at the portraits of the kings of France in one of the public galleries, he finds himself surrounded and pushed about, precisely as in the former instance; he feels a hand insinuating itself gently into the open snare, and hears immediately the click of the instrument, which assures him that the delinquent is safely [pg 397] caught. Taking no notice, he walks on as if nothing had happened, and resumes his promenade, drawing after him the thief, whom pain and shame prevented from making the least effort to disengage his hand. Occasionally the gentleman would turn round, and rebuke his unwilling follower for his importunity, and thus drew the eyes of the whole crowd upon his awkward position. At last, pretending to observe for the first time the stranger's hand in his pocket, he flies into a violent passion, accuses him of being a cut-purse, and demands the sum he had previously lost, without which he declares the villain shall be hanged. It would seem that compounding a felony was nothing in those days; for it is upon record that the thief, though caught in the act, was permitted to send a messenger to his comrades, who advanced the money, and therewith purchased his liberty.

The people were forbidden to employ particular materials in the fabrication of their clothing, to ride in a coach, to decorate their apartments as they chose, to purchase certain articles of furniture, and even to give a dinner-party when and in what style they chose. Under the Valois rÉgime strict limits were assigned to the expenses of the table, determining the number of courses of which a banquet should consist, and that of the dishes of which each course was to be composed. Any guest who should fail to denounce an infraction of the law of which he had been a witness, was liable to a fine of forty livres; and officers of justice, who might be present, were strictly enjoined to quit the tables of their hosts, and institute immediate proceedings against them. The rigor of these regulations extended even to the kitchen, and the police had the power of entry at all hours, to enforce compliance with the statutes.

But it was during the prevalence of an epidemic that it was least agreeable to live in France in the good old times. No sooner did a contagious malady, or one that was supposed to be so, make its appearance, than the inhabitants of Paris were all forbidden to remove from one residence to another, although their term of tenancy had expired, until the judge of police had received satisfactory evidence that the house they desired to leave had not been affected by the contagion. When a house was infected, a bundle of straw fastened to one of the windows warned the public to avoid all intercourse with the inmates. At a later period two wooden crosses were substituted for the straw, one of which was attached to the front door, and the other to one of the windows in an upper story. In 1596 the provost of Paris having learned that the tenants of some houses infected by an epidemic which was then making great ravages, had removed these badges, issued an ordinance commanding that those who transgressed in a similar manner again should suffer the loss of the right hand—a threat which was found perfectly efficient.

By an ordinance of 1533, persons recovering from a contagious malady, together with their domestics, and all the members of their families, were forbidden to appear in the streets for a given period without a white wand in their hands, to warn the public of the danger of contact.—Three years after, the authorities were yet more severe against the convalescents, who were ordered to remain shut up at home for forty days after their cure; and even when the quarantine had expired, they were not allowed to appear in the streets until they had presented to a magistrate a certificate from the commissary of their district, attested by a declaration of six house-holders, that the forty days had elapsed. In the preceding century (in 1498) an ordinance still more extraordinary had been issued. It was at the coronation of Louis XII., when a great number of the nobles came to Paris to take part in the ceremony. The provost, desiring to guard them from the danger of infection, published an order that all persons of both sexes, suffering under certain specified maladies, should quit the capital in twenty-four hours, under the penalty of being thrown into the river!

Vision Of Charles XI.

We are in the habit of laughing incredulously at stories of visions and supernatural apparitions, yet some are so well authenticated, that if we refuse to believe them, we should, in consistency, reject all historical evidence. The fact I am about to relate is guaranteed by a declaration signed by four credible witnesses; I will only add, that the prediction contained in this declaration was well known, and generally spoken of, long before the occurrence of the events which have apparently fulfilled it.

Charles XI. father of the celebrated Charles XII. was one of the most despotic, but, at the same time, wisest monarchs, who ever reigned in Sweden. He curtailed the enormous privileges of the nobility, abolished the power of the Senate, made laws on his own authority; in a word, he changed the constitution of the country, hitherto an oligarchy, and forced the States to invest him with absolute power. He was a man of an enlightened and strong mind, firmly attached to the Lutheran religion; his disposition was cold, unfeeling, and phlegmatic, utterly destitute of imagination. He had just lost his queen, Ulrica Eleonora, and he appeared to feel her death more than could have been expected from a man of his character. He became even more gloomy and silent than before, and his incessant application to business proved his anxiety to banish painful reflections.

Toward the close of an autumn evening, he was sitting in his dressing-gown and slippers, before a large fire, in his private apartment. His chamberlain, Count Brahe, and his physician, Baumgarten, were with him. The evening wore away, and his Majesty did not dismiss them as usual; with his head down and his eyes fixed on the fire, he maintained a profound silence, weary of his guests, and fearing, half unconsciously, to remain alone. The count and his companion tried various subjects of conversation, but could interest him in nothing. At length Brahe, who [pg 398] supposed that sorrow for the queen was the cause of his depression, said with a deep sigh, and pointing to her portrait, which hung in the room,

“What a likeness that is! How truly it gives the expression, at once so gentle and so dignified!”

“Nonsense!” said the king, angrily, “the portrait is far too flattering; the queen was decidedly plain.”

Then, vexed at his unkind words, he rose and walked up and down the room, to hide an emotion at which he blushed. After a few minutes he stopped before the window looking into the court; the night was black, and the moon in her first quarter.

The palace where the kings of Sweden now reside was not completed, and Charles XI. who commenced it, inhabited the old palace, situated on the Ritzholm, facing Lake Modu. It is a large building in the form of a horseshoe: the king's private apartments were in one of the extremities; opposite was the great hall where the States assembled to receive communications from the crown. The windows of that hall suddenly appeared illuminated. The king was startled, but at first supposed that a servant with a light was passing through; but then, that hall was never opened except on state occasions, and the light was too brilliant to be caused by a single lamp. It then occurred to him that it must be a conflagration; but there was no smoke, and the glass was not broken; it had rather the appearance of an illumination. Brahe's attention being called to it, he proposed sending one of the pages to ascertain the cause of the light, but the king stopped him, saying, he would go himself to the hall. He left the room, followed by the count and doctor, with lighted torches. Baumgarten called the man who had charge of the keys, and ordered him, in the king's name, to open the doors of the great hall. Great was his surprise at this unexpected command. He dressed himself quickly, and came to the king with his bunch of keys. He opened the first door of a gallery which served as an ante-chamber to the hall. The king entered, and what was his amazement at finding the walls hung with black.

“What is the meaning of this?” asked he.

The man replied, that he did not know what to make of it, adding, “When the gallery was last opened, there was certainly no hanging over the oak paneling.”

The king walked on to the door of the hall.

“Go no further, for heaven's sake,” exclaimed the man; “surely there is sorcery going on inside. At this hour, since the queen's death, they say she walks up and down here. May God protect us!”

“Stop, sire,” cried the count and Baumgarten together, “don't you hear that noise? Who knows to what dangers you are exposing yourself! At all events, allow me to summon the guards.”

“I will go in,” said the king, firmly; “open the door at once.”

The man's hand trembled so that he could not turn the key.

“A fine thing to see an old soldier frightened,” said the king, shrugging his shoulders; “come count, will you open the door?”

“Sire,” replied Brahe, “let your Majesty command me to march to the mouth of a Danish or German cannon, and I will obey unhesitatingly, but I can not defy hell itself.”

“Well,” said the king, in a tone of contempt, “I can do it myself.”

He took the key, opened the massive oak door, and entered the hall, pronouncing the words “With the help of God.” His three attendants, whose curiosity overcame their fears, or who, perhaps, were ashamed to desert their sovereign, followed him. The hall was lighted by an innumerable number of torches. A black hanging had replaced the old tapestry. The benches round the hall were occupied by a multitude, all dressed in black; their faces were so dazzlingly bright that the four spectators of this scene were unable to distinguish one among them. On an elevated throne, from which the king was accustomed to address the assembly, sat a bloody corpse, as if wounded in several parts, and covered with the ensigns of royalty; on his right stood a child, a crown on his head, and a sceptre in his hand; at his left an old man leant on the throne; he was dressed in the mantle formerly worn by the administrators of Sweden, before it became a kingdom under Gustavus Vasa. Before the throne were seated several grave, austere looking personages, in long black robes. Between the throne and the benches of the assembly was a block covered with black crape; an ax lay beside it. No one in the vast assembly appeared conscious of the presence of Charles and his companions. On their entrance they heard nothing but a confused murmur, in which they could distinguish no words. Then the most venerable of the judges in the black robes, he who seemed to be their president, rose, and struck his hand five times on a folio volume which lay open before him. Immediately there was a profound silence, and some young men, richly dressed, their hands tied behind their backs, entered the hall by a door opposite to that which Charles had opened. He who walked first, and who appeared the most important of the prisoners, stopped in the middle of the hall, before the block, which he looked at with supreme contempt. At the same time the corpse on the throne trembled convulsively, and a crimson stream flowed from his wounds. The young man knelt down, laid his head on the block, the ax glittered in the air for a moment, descended on the block, the head rolled over the marble pavement, and reached the feet of the king, and stained his slipper with blood. Until this moment surprise had kept Charles silent, but this horrible spectacle roused him, and advancing two or three steps toward the throne, he boldly addressed the figure on its left in the well-known formulary, “If thou art of God, speak; if of the other, leave us in peace.”

The phantom answered slowly and solemnly, “King Charles, this blood will not flow in thy time, but five reigns after.” Here the voice became [pg 399] less distinct, “Woe, woe, woe to the blood of Vasa!” The forms of all the assembly now became less clear, and seemed but colored shades: soon they entirely disappeared; the lights were extinguished; still they heard a melodious noise, which one of the witnesses compared to the murmuring of the wind among the trees, another to the sound a harp string gives in breaking. All agreed as to the duration of the apparition, which they said lasted ten minutes. The hangings, the head, the waves of blood, all had disappeared with the phantoms, but Charles's slipper still retained a crimson stain, which alone would have served to remind him of the scenes of this night, if indeed they had not been but too well engraven on his memory.

When the king returned to his apartment, he wrote an account of what he had seen, and he and his companions signed it. In spite of all the precautions taken to keep these circumstances private, they were well known, even during the lifetime of Charles, and no one hitherto has thought fit to raise doubts as to their authenticity.

What Becomes Of The Rind?

Of all the occupations that exercise the ordinary energies of human beings, the most abstracting is that of sucking an orange. It seems to employ the whole faculties for the time being. There is an earnestness of purpose in the individual so employed—an impassioned determination to accomplish what he has undertaken—that creates a kindred excitement in the bystanders. His air is thoughtful; his eye severe, not to say relentless; and although his mouth is full of inarticulate sounds, conversation is out of the question. But the mind is busy although the tongue is silent; and when the deed is accomplished, the collapsed spheroid seems to swell anew with the ideas to which the exercise had given birth. One of these ideas we shall catch and fix, for occurring as it did to ourselves, it is our own property: it was contained in the question that rose suddenly in our mind as we looked at the ruin we had made—What becomes of the rind?

And this is no light question; no unimportant or merely curious pastime for a vacant moment. In our case it became more and more serious; it clung and grappled, till it hung upon our meditations like the albatross round the neck of the Ancient Mariner. Only consider what a subject it embraces. The orange, it is true, and its congener the lemon, are Celestial fruits, owing their origin to the central flowery land; but, thanks to the Portuguese, they are now domesticated in Europe, and placed within the reach of such northern countries as ours, where the cold prohibits their growth. Some of us no doubt force them in an artificial climate, at the expense of perhaps half a guinea apiece; but the bulk of the nation are content to receive them from other regions at little more than the cost of apples. Now the quantity we (the English) thus import every year from the Azores, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Malta, and other places, is about 300,000 chests, and each of these chests contains about 650 oranges, all wrapped separately in paper. But beside these we are in the habit of purchasing a [pg 403] large quantity, entered at the custom-house by number, and several thousand pounds' worth, entered at value; so that the whole number of oranges and lemons we consume in this country may be reckoned modestly at 220,000,000! Surely, then, it is not surprising that while engaged in the meditative employment alluded to, we should demand with a feeling of strong interest—What becomes of the rind?

Every body knows that Scotch marmalade uses up the rinds of a great many Seville oranges, as well as an unknown quantity of turnip skins and stalks of the bore-cole, the latter known to the Caledonian manipulators of the preserve as “kail-custocks.” Every body understands also, that not a few of the rinds of edible oranges take up a position on the pavement, where their mission is to bring about the downfall of sundry passers-by thus accomplishing the fracture of a not inconsiderable number—taking one month with another throughout the season—of arms, legs, and occiputs. It is likewise sufficiently public that a variety of drinks are assisted by the hot, pungent rinds of oranges and lemons as well as by the juice; but notwithstanding all these deductions, together with that of the great quantity thrown away as absolute refuse, we shall find a number of rinds unaccounted for large enough to puzzle by its magnitude the Statistical Society. This mystery, however, we have succeeded in penetrating, and although hardly hoping to carry the faith of the reader along with us, we proceed to unfold it: it is contained in the single monosyllable, peel.

Orange-peel, lemon-peel, citron-peel—these are the explanation: the last-mentioned fruit—imported from Sicily, Madeira, and the Canary Islands—being hardly distinguishable from a lemon except by its somewhat less acid pulp and more pungent rind. Even a very careless observer can hardly fail to be struck at this season by the heaps of those candied rinds displayed in the grocers' windows; but the wildest imagination could not guess at any thing so extravagant as the quantity of the fruit thus used; and even when we learn that upward of 600 tons of peel are manufactured in the year, it is a hopeless task to attempt to separate that prodigious bulk into its constituent parts. Six hundred tons of candied peel! of a condiment employed chiefly if not wholly, in small quantities in the composition of puddings and cakes. Six hundred tons—12,000 hundredweights—1,344,000 pounds—21,504,000 ounces! But having once got possession of the fact, see how suggestive it is. Let us lump the puddings and cakes in one; let us call them all puddings—plum-puddings of four pounds' weight. We find, on consulting the best authorities—for we would not presume to dogmatize on such a subject—that the quantity of peel used in the composition of such a work is two ounces; and thus we are led to the conclusion that we Britishers devour in the course of a year 10,752,000 full-sized, respectable plum-puddings, irrespective of all such articles as are not adorned and enriched with candied peel.

Citrons intended for peel are imported in brine, but oranges and lemons in boxes. All are ripe in December, January, and February; but as it would be inconvenient to preserve so vast a quantity at the same time, the juice is squeezed out, and the collapsed fruit packed in pipes, with salt and water, till wanted. When the time for preserving comes, it is taken from the pipes, and boiled till soft enough to admit of the pulp being scooped out; then the rind is laid in tubs or cisterns, and melted sugar poured over it. Here it lies for three or four weeks; and then the sugar is drained away, and the rind placed on trays in a room constructed for the purpose. It now assumes the name of “dried peel,” and is stored away in the original orange and lemon boxes, till wanted for candying.

Mazzini, The Italian Liberal.

Giuseppe Mazzini is descended from a highly honorable family, and of talented and respectable parentage; his father was an esteemed physician, and also professor of anatomy at the University in Genoa, his native city. His mother is still living, an excellent and dignified lady, as proud of her Giuseppe, as Madame Letitia was of her Napoleon.

When young, Mazzini was remarkably handsome, and will be deemed so now in his mature years, by all who, in the expression of his countenance, his dark intelligent eye, and expansive intellectual forehead, can overlook the deep, we may say premature furrows, traced in that forehead by the never resting labors of a mind of indomitable activity, the constantly renewing anxieties of a generous heart for the welfare of the human race; and above all for that oppressed portion of it which claimed his earliest sympathies, as his compatriots, his brothers, alike in the wrongs they labored under, and their determined resolution to combat with them in every shape, and to win in the contest, either a glorious victory, or an honorable death. The youth of Mazzini was spent in witnessing the struggles of his country for liberty. The fruitlessness of all these struggles, the conviction they carried with them in their repeated defeats, that there was something radically wrong in their organization, or in the manner in which they were carried out, only excited ardent desires in him to trace the evil to its root, and point out the remedy accordingly: his genius naturally bent toward studies,

concentrated all its energies upon the situation of Italy, and on the means of rescuing her from the despotism that preyed upon her very vitals, and rendered even the choicest gifts of nature, with which she is so abundantly endowed, not merely nugatory, but an absolute disadvantage and a curse.

The revolution in France of July, 1830, communicated an electric flame throughout Italy, which in the ensuing year kindled insurrections in Modena, Parma, and other departments: the light of victory hovered over them for a moment, but for a moment only. Aid had been hoped for from the Citizen King, but in his very outset Louis Philippe evinced the political caution which marked his reign. Austria, reassured by the conviction she felt of his determination to remain neuter in the struggles of others for the same freedom which had placed himself upon a throne, again advanced upon the cities she had evacuated; the insurgents disappointed, bewildered, paralyzed, offered no further resistance, and again all was wrapped in the gloom of despotism. Then came its invariable attendant denunciations, imprisonments, exile, to all who were suspected of a love of liberty, whether it had impelled them to deeds, or only influenced their words.

Mazzini, though a very young man at this period, was already known in Italy as an author. He had published a weekly literary Gazette, at Genoa, in 1828, called the “Indicatore Genovese,” but this journal being strangled, ere the year was out, under the double supervision of a civil and an ecclesiastical censorship, he began another at Leghorn under the title of the “Indicatore Livornese” [pg 405] which in a few months succumbed under the same fate. He then beguiled his forced inactivity with furnishing an admirable essay on European literature, and other contributions, to the “Antologia di Firenze,” but the review was made the subject of a prosecution, soon after its commencement, at the instigation of the Austrian government, and was finally suppressed. Under these circumstances it was not likely that Mazzini would escape the fate of his party. He was put under arrest, along with many others, though it should seem that the strongest accusation which could be brought against him was that he indulged in habits of thinking; for when his father went to the governor of the city to inquire what offense his son had committed, that could authorize his arrest, the worthy functionary, who appears himself to have belonged to the Dogberry faction, could only allege that the young man was “in the habit of walking every evening in the fields and gardens of the suburbs, alone, and wrapped in meditation;” wisely adding, as his own comment on the matter, “What on earth can he have at his age to think about? we do not like so much thinking on the part of young people, without knowing the subject of their thoughts.”

Mazzini and his companions were tried at Turin by a commission of Senators, embodied for the purpose; they were all acquitted for want of any evidence against them, of evil acts or intentions: nevertheless Mazzini, notwithstanding this virtual acknowledgment of his innocence, was treated with the severity due only to convicted guilt, and detained five months in solitary imprisonment, in the fortress of Savona; a tyrannical act of injustice, not likely to turn the current of his thoughts, or to cure him of his meditative propensities. At length his prison doors were reluctantly opened to him—he was free to depart, but not to remain in Italy; accordingly he took refuge in France, along with a crowd of exiles under similar circumstances, and it was there, in June 1831, that the fruits of his long-nursed musings burst forth, in his address to Charles Albert of Savoy, “A Carlo Alberto di Savoia un Italiano,” on the accession of that prince to the throne of Sardinia. This address has been justly termed by Mariotti, “a flash of divine eloquence, such as never before shone over Italy. His companions in misfortune gathered in adoration, and bent before his powerful genius. Ere the year had elapsed, he became the heart and soul of the Italian movement. He was the ruler of a state of his own creation—the king of Young Italy.”

Eager to turn his popularity, alike with his abilities, to the best account for his country, Mazzini now established himself at Marseilles, as the editor of a journal to which he gave the name of “La Giovine Italia,” as the expression of his favorite theory of intrusting the great cause of Italian liberty to the young, the ardent, the hopeful; and moreover the unpledged and therefore unfettered; rather than to those who, grown old under a timid, temporizing policy, endeavored in vain to disentangle themselves from the net of foreign diplomacy; and who, while they flattered themselves they were endeavoring to rescue their country from slavery, were in fact still themselves the slaves of high-sounding names, and veered round with all the changing views of those who bore them.

Anxious to enlist in his cause the finest talents of the day, Mazzini invited many persons of acknowledged reputation and ability to contribute to his journal; among them the venerable and justly celebrated Sismondi, author of the “History of the Italian Republics,” and many other works of importance. Sismondi willingly complied, for he loved the high-minded character of the young Italian, and was glad to share in his literary labors, in order that he might be able occasionally to rein in, with a gentle yet judicious hand, the too impetuous spirit which, in fearlessly endeavoring to overleap every obstacle that stood before it, overlooked the destruction that might await an error of calculation: he therefore immediately replied, “If by my name, my example, I can be useful to that Italy which I love as if it were my own country, which I shall never cease to serve, to the very utmost of my ability, and for which I shall never cease to hope, then most willingly do I promise you my co-operation.”

The generous ardor of the Genevese Economiste was not more pleasing to behold than the filial deference of the young republican; for Sismondi spared neither remonstrance nor advice, where he thought the interests of his young colleague, or of the sacred cause in which he was embarked, likely to be endangered by his precipitancy. But neither arguments nor advice had any power over the fixed idea in Mazzini's mind that Italian liberty was to spring forth from the Italian people, and that Italy, formerly free in her numerous republics, would, after five hundred years of slavery, become free again in one, alone and indivisible. Meanwhile his journal extended its circulation and its influence: supplied through the channel of an active correspondence with abundant information of all that was going on in the peninsula, he astonished and excited the public more and more every day, by the facts he laid before them; he unvailed the cruelties of the tribunals in Romagna, of the government in Modena, of the police in Naples; he brought forth the unhappy prisoners from their cells, and portrayed them in every varied attitude of their sufferings, with a vividness that thrilled the compassionate with horror, and worked the ardent up to rage. It would be difficult for us in our own present state of press and post, to imagine the possibility of our counties remaining days and weeks in ignorance of what was passing among each other. Yet so it was in the Italian provinces: under the lynx-eyed vigilance of government officials and spies, the public journals contained little more than details of church ceremonies, or the local affairs of petty municipalities: pamphlets were unknown, and news of a political kind traveled slowly and uncertainly from mouth to mouth, always in dread of some listening ear being ready to catch the words as they floated in the air. [pg 406] Hence the transactions in Romagna and Naples were long unknown to upper Italy; the excitement therefore that the appearance of Mazzini's journal must have occasioned, revealing as it did facts upon facts calculated to inspire even the most indifferent with a thirst for vengeance, may easily be imagined, but the modes by which it found circulation under every obstacle are more difficult to comprehend. It is scarcely necessary to say how strictly it was prohibited throughout Italy; the possession of it was denounced as a crime, to be punished with three years of the galleys, besides the possessor being subjected for the remainder of his days to the suspicion of being connected with revolutionary factions. The smugglers, albeit accustomed to danger and little susceptible of fear, refused to have any thing to do with it; nevertheless its distribution was effected far and wide; copies were dispatched from Marseilles, by merchant vessels, in parcels directed to persons at places fixed upon for the purpose of receiving them; they thus reached the Committees of “Young Italy” in each city, and were by them transmitted to the subscribers, that is to say, to every one conjoined to the cause; thus the Society itself remained in the shade, while the journal, passed from hand to hand, was every where eagerly perused. In many places it was left, in the obscurity of evening, upon the thresholds of the shops, and at the doors of the theatres, cafÉs, and other frequented places. Never was a periodical paper edited with such marvelous activity, or circulated with such unshaken courage. The leaders risked their heads in its service, and not one of them hesitated so to do. In the same manner has the clandestine press at Rome, since the reinstatement of the priestly government, fearlessly pursued its task of exposing the cruelties, injustice, and meanness of that government in its every act—and the cardinals have not unfrequently had to go to breakfast, with what appetite they might, after finding on their tables a sheet, of which the ink had not had time to dry, wherein their unworthy deeds were set forth and commented upon, in the accents of all others strangest to “ears polite”—that is to say, of truth.

The effect of “La Giovine Italia” upon the public mind became more and more developed every day. Genoa and Alexandria were the first to show its influence. Turin, Chamberry, and Lombardy followed. Central Italy, crushed for the moment, remained passive; but the flag of republicanism was unfurled, it only waited the moment to lift it up, and that moment came, every way, too soon. The government of Charles Albert was the first to take hostile measures against Young Italy. It saw that the influence of the party was beginning to spread in the army; and it immediately pointed its cannons against Genoa; three persons were executed in that city, three at Chamberry, and six at Alexandria; while Austria stocked her favorite fortress of Speilberg with such as were objects of suspicion, but against whom no charge could be substantiated. These rigorous measures struck terror through the peninsula, and instantly stopped the propagandism of the journal; still hundreds of emigrants, fearful of being compromised, poured in from Italy, and the police redoubled its vigilance in watching over their proceedings. But a step backward was what Mazzini never could take; he looked his dangers full in the face, and tempted fate, not only for himself, but, unhappily, for his colleagues also. The sufferings of his party seemed to call upon him for vengeance, and he sought it by joining himself to a Polish committee, and projecting the attempt upon Savoy, in 1833.

It is a singular fact in the moral history of man, that in the course of his life he almost invariably falls into some error, or commits some fault, which he has either condemned, or suffered from, in others. This appears to have been notoriously the case in this ill-planned, ill-organized, ill-conducted expedition. It was planned in a secret society, whereas Mazzini had always advocated open appeals to the people; he had always inculcated distrust of heads of parties, and he intrusted the command of the troops to General Romarino, a Pole, He had insisted upon the necessity of whole provinces rising en masse, if a revolution was to be effected, and he saw General Romarino set out from Geneva, to carry Savoy, with a handful of men. Mazzini himself, with his utmost efforts, scarcely got together five hundred followers, of whom not one half were Italians; and it was with difficulty that they, tracked every where by the police, succeeded in rallying at the small village of Annemasse, to the amount of two hundred; when lo! Romarino, who had always shown himself wavering and undecided, turned his back upon them, even before they had cast eyes upon the enemy—and thus in one single day did Mazzini see vanish at once, the hopes and toils of two years of incessant labor and anxiety. In vain he plied his pen still more vigorously, and called around him “Young Switzerland,” “Young Poland,” “Young France,” and even “Young Europe” at large; few responded to his ardent voice: the Moderates, taking advantage of his discomfiture, and appealing to the selfish prudence of all parties, under the plausible argument of trusting in moral force, turned, for the time, the tide of popular opinion, and Mazzini, banished from France, proscribed in Switzerland, and sentenced to death in Italy, sought an asylum in England, where he betook himself to the literary pursuits which had formed the delight of his younger years, and to the benevolent endeavor of improving the moral state of the humbler classes of his countrymen whom he found scattered about in London; particularly of the poor organ boys, whom, sold by venal parents to sordid masters, or lured from their beautiful native scenes by fallacious representations, he beheld lost in ignorance, enslaved in vice, and suffering under every species of ill-treatment and destitution. His founding an evening school for these unfortunate outcasts was a mortal offense in the eyes of the Roman Catholic priests of every denomination—for a [pg 407] layman to presume to instruct the ignorant, and to hold out a hand to the helpless, was, in their eyes, an unpardonable crime; and they strove to vilify all his acts by connecting them with covert designs of exciting anarchy and rebellion, even in the land that had afforded him a refuge. Nevertheless, the blameless tenor of his domestic life, the magnanimity with which he bore his disappointments and his trials, and the respect in which he was held both for his talents and his private character, which no calumny has ever yet been able to impugn, would have insured him as undisturbed a tranquillity as his anxiety for his country, ever throbbing in his breast, could have permitted him, had he not suddenly been brought forth to public notice, by the English government committing a flagrant act of injustice toward him, which the more it endeavored to explain and vindicate, the more odium it brought upon itself—we allude to the opening of Mazzini's letters at the General Post-Office in 1844, by order of Lord Aberdeen and the Right Honorable Sir James Graham, at the instigation of Austrian jealousies and fears. The disgraceful disclosures that were brought forward on that occasion, will be fresh in the memory of many of our readers.

The stirring events of Italy in 1847, naturally turned all the thoughts and hopes of Mazzini again to his country, and to the heightening, by his presence, the effect of his doctrines, so long, so ardently preached. But we must be brief; we shall, therefore, pass over intervening steps, and behold him in Rome—Rome proclaimed a republic, Rome, at that moment, promising to realize all the most glorious visions of his youth, all the most thoughtfully-revolved theories of his matured powers. He was elected on the 3d of March, 1849, a deputy in the National Assembly, by 8982 votes, being nearly one thousand ahead of seven other candidates elected at the same time, consequently at the top of the poll. On the 31st of the same month, the dissolution of the Executive Committee was decreed by the Constituent Assembly, and the government of the republic appointed to be intrusted to a Triumvirate, “with unlimited powers.” The citizens chosen for this important office were Carlo Armellini, Giuseppe Mazzini, and Aurelio Saffi. How wisely, temperately, and benevolently they acquitted themselves of the task assigned them, under the most complicated and trying circumstances that ever legislators had to struggle with, is known to all. The contrast of their conduct with that of the Cardinal Triumvirate that succeeded them, will live in the page of impartial history, to the honor of the representatives of the People, the disgrace of the representatives of the Church.

It is needless to say that on the entrance of the French into Rome, Mazzini, with his illustrious colleagues, and many other distinguished patriots, prepared to quit it. Again he found an asylum in England, and again he betook himself to the furtherance of the cause to which all his faculties are devoted, to the emancipation of Italy. “Twenty years,” he says, in the preliminary note to his pamphlet recently published, entitled, “The Charge of Terrorism in Rome, during the Government of the Republic, refuted by Facts and Documents”—“Twenty years, attended with the usual amount of cares, woes, and deceptions, have rolled around me since my first step in the career. But my soul is as calm, my hands are as pure, my faith is as unshaken, and bright with hope for my awakened country, as in my young years. With these gifts one may well endure with a smile such little annoyances as may arise from such writers as Mr. Cochrane, and Mr. Macfarlane.” We should think so!

The first publication of Mazzini's that attracted notice after his return to England, was his “Letter to Messrs. De Tocqueville and De Falloux, Ministers of France.” It excited universal interest. The simple truth of its statements, which no sophistry of the parties to whom it was addressed could deny, the justice of its reproaches, the manly sentiments it set forth, gained it the sympathy of all persons of candor and liberal views, and added a deeper tinge of shame on the conduct, if not on the cheek, of the President, by whose command the unjust, inconsistent, and we may add barbarous attack upon Republican Rome was made by Republican France.

From the moment that Mazzini set his foot again upon English ground, as a refugee himself, he turned his thoughts toward the sufferings of his fellow-refugees, who still gathered around him with unshaken devotedness and admiration. By his exertions a committee was formed for “The Italian Refugee Fund.” A touching address was inserted by it in the leading journals, wherein, after briefly setting forth the claims of the Italian refugees upon the compassion of the public, it proceeded: “It is not the only sorrow of the Italian exiles that a noble cause is, for the time being, lost. Proscribed and driven from their watch over the beautiful country of their birth and their affections, they seek a refuge here in England, almost the only free land where they may set foot. Hunted by their and the world's enemies, forlorn and penniless, reduced to indigence, bereft of almost all that makes life dear, and bringing nothing from the wreck beyond the Mediterranean Sea, but hope in the eternal might of the principles they have upheld, the Committee appeals in their behalf to Englishmen, for present help, that they may not die of want, where they have found a home.”

Mazzini's next care was, to found a “Society of the Friends of Italy,” the objects of which are, by public meetings, lectures, and the press, to promote a correct appreciation of the Italian question, and to aid the cause of the political and religious liberty of the Italian people.

Of Mazzini's private character we believe there is, among those who know him, but one opinion, that he is the soul of honor, candid and compassionate in his nature, and of almost woman's tenderness in his friendships and attachments. “I have had the honor,” says Thomas Carlyle, “to know Mr. Mazzini for a series of years, and [pg 408] whatever I may think of his practical insight and skill in worldly affairs, I can with great freedom testify to all men, that he, if I have ever seen one such, is a man of genius and virtue; a man of sterling virtue, humanity, and nobleness of mind; one of those rare men, numerable, unfortunately, but as units in this world, who are worthy to be called Martyr souls.” Equally honorable to him is the testimony of M. Lesseps, the French Envoy to the Roman Republic, in the Memoir of his Mission: “I fear the less making known here the opinion I had of Mazzini, with whom I was already in open strife, namely, that during the whole series of our negotiations, I had but to congratulate myself on his loyalty, and the moderation of his character, which have earned for him all my esteem.... Now that he has fallen from power, and that he seeks, doubtless, an asylum in a foreign land, I ought to render homage to the nobleness of his sentiments, to his conviction of his principles, to his high capacity, and to his courage.”

The man who can win, from the depths of disappointment and adversity, such a tribute from one politically opposed to him, must have something very extraordinary in himself—and such a man is Mazzini. The faults alleged against him are his enthusiasm, which leads him into rash and precipitant measures, and his indomitable will; or, we would rather call it, his unconquerable tenacity of purpose, which is deaf to argument, and spurns control; but it is only his political character that is liable to these charges. His virtues are all his own. When he was in office at Rome he gave the whole of the salary allotted to him to the hospitals, stating that his own private income, though moderate, was sufficient for his wants; and never does distress, in any shape that he may have the power to alleviate, appeal to him in vain. Had he not concentrated all his abilities, all his energies upon the one grand object of his life, the independence of his country, he would have been as eminent in the field of literature, as he is in that of politics. He writes with equal facility and elegance in the French and English languages as in his own, and his beautiful memoir of Ugo Foscolo, his essay upon Art in Italy, in his review of Grossi's “Marco Visconti,” and many other admirable contributions to periodical literature, sufficiently prove that if the peculiar aspect of the times in which he has lived had not impelled him into public life, he would have found abundant resource in more retired pursuits, for his own enjoyment, and the benefit of society.

Sketch Of Suwarow.

The most able military commander that Russia has produced was in person miserably thin, and five feet one inch in height. A large mouth, pug nose, eyes commonly half shut, a few gray side locks, brought over the top of his bald crown, and a small unpowdered queue, the whole surmounted by a three-cornered felt hat ornamented with green fringe, composed the “head and front” of Field-marshal Suwarow; but his eyes, when open, were piercing, and in battle they were said to be terrifically expressive. When any thing said or done displeased him, a wavy play of his deeply-wrinkled forehead betrayed, or rather expressed, his disapproval. He had a philosophical contempt for dress, and might often be seen drilling his men in his shirt sleeves. It was only during the severest weather that he wore cloth his outer garments being usually of white serge turned up with green. These were the most indifferently made, as were his large, coarsely greased slouching boots; one of which he very commonly dispensed with, leaving his kneeband unbuttoned, and his stocking about his heel. A huge sabre and a single order completed his ordinary costume; but on grand occasions his field-marshal's uniform was covered with badges, and he was fond of telling where and how he had won them. He often arose at midnight, and welcomed the first soldier he saw moving with a piercing imitation of the crowing of a cock, in compliment to his early rising. It is said that in the first Polish war, knowing a spy was in the camp, he issued orders for an attack at cock-crow, and the enemy expecting it in the morning, were cut to pieces at nine at night—Suwarow having turned out the troops an hour before by his well-known cry. The evening before the storm of Ismail, he informed his columns—“To-morrow morning, an hour before daybreak, I mean to get up. I shall then dress and wash myself, then say my prayers, and then give one good cock-crow, and capture Ismail.” When SÉgur asked him if he never took off his clothes at night, he replied, “No! when I get lazy, and want to have a comfortable sleep, I generally take off one spur.” Buckets of cold water were thrown over him before he dressed, and his table was served at seven or eight o'clock with sandwiches and various messes which Duboscage describes as “des ragouts Kosaks detestables;” to which men paid “the mouth honor, which they would fain deny, but dare not,” lest Suwarow should consider them effeminate. He had been very sickly in his youth, but by spare diet and cold bathing had strengthened and hardened himself into first-rate condition.

Monthly Record of Current Events.