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Editor: William Chambers Robert Chambers

CHAMBERS' EDINBURGH JOURNAL

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

BOOK-WORSHIP.

A book belongs in a peculiar manner to the age and nation that produce it. It is an emanation of the thought of the time; and if it survive to an after-time, it remains as a landmark of the progress of the imagination or the intellect. Some books do even more than this: they press forward to the future age, and make appeals to its maturer genius; but in so doing they still belong to their own--they still wear the garb which stamps them as appertaining to a particular epoch. Of that epoch, it is true, they are, intellectually, the flower and chief; they are the expression of its finer spirit, and serve as a link between the two generations of the past and the future; but of that future--so much changed in habits, and feelings, and knowledge--they can never, even when acting as guides and teachers, form an essential part: there is always some bond of sympathy wanting.

In the present century, the French and German critics have begun to place this reverential feeling for the 'classics' of a language upon a more rational basis. In estimating an author, they throw themselves back into the times in which he wrote; they determine his place among the spirits of his own age; and ascertain the practical influence his works have exercised over those of succeeding generations. In short, they judge him relatively, not absolutely; and thus convert an unreasoning superstition into a sober faith. We do not require to be told that in every book destined to survive its author, there are here and there gleams of nature that belong to all time; but the body of the work is after the fashion of the age that produced it; and he who is unacquainted with the thought of that age, will always judge amiss. In England, we are still in the bonds of the last century, and it is surprising what an amount of affectation mingles with criticism even of the highest pretensions. It is no wonder, then, that common readers should be mistaken in their book-worship. To such persons, for all their blind reverence, Dante must in reality be a wild beast--a fine animal, it is true, but still a wild beast--and our own Milton a polemical pedant arguing by the light of poetry. To such readers, the spectacle of Ugolino devouring the head of Ruggieri, and wiping his jaws with the hair that he might tell his story, cannot fail to give a feeling of horror and disgust, which even the glorious wings of Dante's angels--the most sublime of all such creations--would fail to chase away. The poetry of the Divine Comedy belongs to nature; its superstition, intolerance, and fanaticism, to the thirteenth century. These last have either passed away from the modern world or they exist in new forms, and with the first alone can we have any real healthy sympathy.

One of our literary idols is Shakspeare--perhaps the greatest of them all; but although the most universal of poets, his works, taken in the mass, belong to the age of Queen Elizabeth, not to ours. A critic has well said, that if Shakspeare were now living, he would manifest the same dramatic power, but under different forms; and his taste, his knowledge, and his beliefs would all be different. This, however, is not the opinion of the book-worshippers: it is not the poetry alone of Shakspeare, but the work bodily, which is preeminent with them; not that which is universal in his genius, but that likewise which is restricted by the fetters of time and country. The commentators, in the same way, find it their business to bring up his shortcomings to his ideal character, not to account for their existence by the manners and prejudices of his age, or the literary models on which his taste was formed. It would be easy to run over, in this way, the list of all our great authors, and to shew that book-worship, as contradistinguished from a wise and discriminating respect, is nothing more than a vulgar superstition.

And the general reader, be it remembered, is virtually the age. It is for him the studious think, the imaginative invent, the tuneful sing: beyond him there is no appeal but to the future. He is superstitious, as we have seen, but his gods are few and traditional. He determines to make a stand somewhere; and it is necessary for him to do so, if he would not encumber his literary Olympus with a Hindoo-like pantheon of millions. But how voracious is this general reader in regard to the effusions of his own day! What will become of the myriads of books that have passed through our own unworthy hands? How many of them will survive to the next generation? How many will continue to float still further down the stream of time? How many will attain the honour of the apotheosis? And will they coexist in this exalted state with the old objects of worship? This last is a pregnant question; for each generation will in all probability furnish its quota of the great books of the language, and, if so, a reform in the superstition we have exposed is no longer a matter of mere expedience, but of necessity. We are aware that all this will be pronounced rank heresy by those who assume the style of critics, who usually make a prodigious outcry when a great author is mutilated, even by expunging a word which modern decency excludes from the vocabulary of social and family intercourse. This word, however--supposing it to represent the mortal and perishing part of an author's productions--belongs not to him, but to his age; not to the intellectual man, but to the external and fleeting manners of his day and generation. Such critics usually take credit to themselves for a peculiarly large and liberal spirit; but there seems to us, on the contrary, to be something mean and restricted in views that regard the man as an individual, not as a portion of the genius which belongs to the world. Yet, even as an individual, the man is safe in his entirety, for there is no project of cancelling the printed works extant in our libraries, public and private. The true question simply is: Are great authors to be allowed to become practically obsolete--and many of them have become so already--while we stand upon the delicacies and ceremonies of Book-worship?

OUR TERRACE.

London has been often compared to a wilderness--a wilderness of brick, and so in one sense it is; because you may live in London all the days of your life if you choose--and, indeed, if you don't choose, if you happen to be very poor--without exciting observation, or provoking any further questioning than is comprised in a demand for accurate guidance from one place to another, a demand which might be made upon you in an Arabian desert, if there you chanced to meet a stranger. But London is something else besides a wilderness--indeed it is everything else. It is a great world, containing a thousand little worlds in its bosom; and pop yourself down in it in any quarter you will, you are sure to find yourself in the centre of some peculiar microcosm distinguished from all others by features more or less characteristic.

About half-past nine, or from that to a quarter to ten, comes the postman with his first delivery of letters for the day. Our Terrace is the most toilsome part of his beat, for having to serve both sides of the way, his progress is very like that of a ship at sea sailing against the wind. R'tat he goes on our side, then down he jumps into the road--B'bang on the other side--tacks about again, and serves the terrace--off again, and serves the villas, and so on till he has fairly epistolised both sides of the way, and vanished round the corner. The vision of his gold band and red collar is anxiously looked for in the morning by many a fair face, which a watchful observer may see furtively peering through the drawing-room window-curtains. After he has departed, and the well-to-do merchants and employers who reside in the villas opposite have had time to look over their correspondence, come sundry neat turn-outs from the stables and coach-houses in the rear of the villas: a light, high gig, drawn by a frisky grey, into which leaps young Oversea the shipbroker--a comfortable, cushioned four-wheel drawn by a pair of bay ponies, into which old Discount climbs heavily, followed perhaps by his two daughters, bound on a shopping-visit to the city--and a spicy-looking, rattling trap, with a pawing horse, which has a decided objection to standing still, for Mr Goadall, the wealthy cattle-drover. These, with other vehicles of less note, all roll off the ground by a quarter after ten o'clock or so; and the ladies and their servants, with some few exceptions, are left in undisputed possession of home, while not a footfall of man or beast is heard in the sunshiny quiet of the street.

The quiet, however, is broken before long by a peculiar and suggestive cry. We do not hear it yet ourselves, but Stalker, our black cat and familiar, has caught the well-known accents, and with a characteristic crooning noise, and a stiff, perpendicular erection of tail, he sidles towards the door, demanding, as plainly as possible, to be let out. Yes, it is the cats-meat man. 'Ca' me-e-et--me-yet--me-e-yet!' fills the morning air, and arouses exactly thirty responsive feline voices--for there is a cat to every house--and points thirty aspiring tails to the zenith. As many hungry tabbies, sables, and tortoise-shells as can get out of doors, are trooping together with arched backs upon the pavement, following the little pony-cart, the cats' commissariat equipage, and each one, anxious for his daily allowance, contributing most musically his quota to the general concert. We do not know how it is, but the cats-meat man is the most unerring and punctual of all those peripatetic functionaries who undertake to cater for the consumption of the public. The baker, the butcher, the grocer, the butterman, the fishmonger, and the coster, occasionally forget your necessities, or omit to call for your orders--the cats-meat man never. Other traders, too, dispense their stock by a sliding-scale, and are sometimes out of stock altogether: Pussy's provider, on the contrary, sticks to one price from year's end to year's end, and never, in the memory of the oldest Grimalkin, was known to disappoint a customer. A half-penny for a cat's breakfast has been the regulation-price ever since the horses of the metropolis began to submit to the boiling process for the benefit of the feline race.

First comes an ingenious lass of two or three-and-twenty, with a flaming red shawl, pink ribbons in her bonnet, and the hue of health on a rather saucy face. She carries a large basket on her left arm, and in her right hand she displays to general admiration a gorgeous group of flowers, fashioned twice the size of life, from tissue-paper of various colours. She lifts up her voice occasionally as she marches slowly along, singing, in a clear accent: 'Flowers--ornamental papers for the stove--flowers! paper-flowers!' She is the accredited herald of summer--a phenomenon, this year, of very late appearance. We should have seen her six weeks ago, if the summer had not declined to appear at the usual season. She is the gaudy, party-coloured ephemera of street commerce, and will disappear from view in a fortnight's time, to be seen no more until the opening summer of '53. Her wares, which are manufactured with much taste, and with an eye to the harmony of colours, are in much request among the genteel housewives of the suburbs. They are exceedingly cheap, considering the skill which must be applied in their construction. They are all the work of her own hands, and have occupied her time and swallowed up her capital for some months past. She enjoys almost a monopoly in her art, and is not to be beaten down in the price of her goods. She knows their value, and is more independent than an artist dares to be in the presence of a patron. Her productions are a pleasant summer substitute for the cheerful fire of winter; and it is perhaps well for her that, before the close of autumn, the faded hues of the flowers, and the harbour they afford to dust, will convert them into waste paper, in spite of all the care that may be taken to preserve them.

Paper Poll, as the servants call her, is hardly out of sight, and not out of hearing, when a young fellow and his wife come clattering along the pavement, appealing to all who may require their good offices in the matter of chair-mending. The man is built up in a sort of cage-work of chairs stuck about his head and shoulders, and his dirty phiz is only half visible through a kind of grill of legs and cross-bars. These are partly commissions which, having executed at home, he is carrying to their several owners. But as everybody does not choose to trust him away with property, he is ready to execute orders on the spot; and to this end his wife accompanies him on his rounds. She is loaded with a small bag of tools suspended at her waist, and a plentiful stock of split-cane under one arm. He will weave a new cane-seat to an old chair for 9d., and he will set down his load and do it before your eyes in your own garden, if you prefer that to intrusting him with it; that is, he will make the bargain, and his wife will weave the seat under his supervision, unless there happen to be two to be repaired, when husband and wife will work together. We have noticed that it is a very silent operation, that of weaving chair-bottoms; and that though the couple may be seated for an hour and more together rapidly plying the flexible canes, they never exchange a word with each other till the task is accomplished. Sometimes the wife is left at a customer's door working alone, while the husband wanders further on in search of other employment, returning by the time she has finished her task. But there are no chairs to mend this morning on Our Terrace, and our bamboo friends may jog on their way.

Now resounds from a distance the cry of 'All a-growin' an' a-blowin'--all a-blowin', a-blowin' here!' and in a few minutes the travelling florist makes his appearance, driving before him a broad-surfaced handcart, loaded in profusion with exquisite flowers of all hues, in full bloom, and, to all appearance, thriving famously. It may happen, however, as it has happened to us, that the blossoms now so vigorous and blooming, may all drop off on the second or third day; and the naked plant, after making a sprawling and almost successful attempt to reach the ceiling for a week or so, shall become suddenly sapless and withered, the emblem of a broken-down and emaciated sot--and, what is more, ruined from the self-same cause, an overdose of stimulating fluid. It may happen, on the other hand, that the plant shall have suffered no trick of the gardener's trade, and shall bloom fairly to the end of its natural term. The commerce in blossoming flowers is one of the most uncertain and dangerous speculations in which the small street-traders of London can engage. When carried on under favourable circumstances, it is one of the most profitable, the demand for flowers being constant and increasing; but the whole stock-in-trade of a small perambulating capitalist may be ruined by a shower of rain, which will spoil their appearance for the market, and prevent his selling them before they are overblown. Further, as few of these dealers have any means of housing this kind of stock safely during the night, they are often compelled to part with them, after an unfavourable day, at less than prime cost, to prevent a total loss. Still, there are never wanting men of a speculative turn of mind, and the cry of 'All a-blowin' an' a-growin'' resounds through the streets as long as the season supplies flowers to grow and to blow.

While the graveller is patting down the pathway round Robinson's flower-bed, we hear the well-known cry of a countryman whom we have known any time these ten years, and who, with his wife by his side, has perambulated the suburbs for the best part of his life. He has taken upon himself the patronage of the laundry department, and he shoulders a fagot of clothes-poles, ten feet long, with forked extremities, all freshly cut from the forest. Coils of new rope for drying are hanging upon his arm, and his wife carries a basket well stocked with clothes-pins of a superior description, manufactured by themselves. The cry of 'Clo'-pole-line-pins' is one long familiar to the neighbourhood; and as this honest couple have earned a good reputation by a long course of civility and probity, they enjoy the advantage of a pretty extensive connection. Their perambulations are confined to the suburbs, and it is a question if they ever enter London proper from one year's end to another. It is of no use to carry clothes-poles and drying-lines where there are no conveniences for washing and drying.

Next comes a travelling umbrella-mender, fagoted on the back like the man in the moon of the nursery rhyme-book. He is followed at a short distance by a travelling tinker, swinging his live-coals in a sort of tin censer, and giving utterance to a hoarse and horrible cry, intelligible only to the cook who has a leaky sauce-pan. Then comes the chamois-leather woman, bundled about with damaged skins, in request for the polishing of plate and plated wares. She is one of that persevering class who will hardly take 'No' for an answer. It takes her a full hour to get through the terrace, for she enters every garden, and knocks at every door from No. 1 to No. 30. In the winter-time, she pursues an analogous trade, dealing in what may strictly be termed the raw material, inasmuch as she then buys and cries hare-skins and rabbit-skins. She has, unfortunately, a notoriously bad character, and is accused of being addicted to the practice of taking tenpence and a hare-skin in exchange for a counterfeit shilling.

It is by this time nearly half-past nine o'clock, and now comes the regular nightly 'tramp, tramp' of the police, marching in Indian file, and heavily clad in their night-gear. They come to replace the guardians of the day by those of the night. One of the number falls out of the line on the terrace, where he commences his nocturnal wanderings, and guarantees the peace and safety of the inhabitants for the succeeding eight hours: the rest tramp onwards to their distant stations. The echoes of their iron heels have hardly died away, when there is a sudden and almost simultaneous eruption from every garden-gate on the terrace of clean-faced, neat-aproned, red-elbowed servant-girls, each and all armed with a jug or a brace of jugs, with a sprinkling of black bottles among them, and all bound to one or other of the public-houses which guard the terrace at either end. It is the hour of supper; and the supper-beer, and the after-supper nightcaps, for those who indulge in them, have to be procured from the publican. This is an occasion upon which Betty scorns to hurry; but she takes time by the forelock, starting for the beer as soon as the cloth is laid, and before master has finished his pipe, or his game of chess, or Miss Clementina her song, in order that she may have leisure for a little gossip with No. 7 on the one hand, or No. 9 on the other. She goes out without beat of drum, and lets herself in with the street-door key without noise, bringing home, besides the desiderated beverage, the news of the day, and the projects of next-door for the morrow, with, it may be, a plan for the enjoyment of her next monthly holiday.

Supper is the last great business of the day upon Our Terrace, which, by eleven at night, is lapped in profound repose. The moon rides high in mid-sky, and the black shadows of the trees lie motionless on the white pavement. Not a footfall is heard abroad; the only sound that is audible as you put your head out of the window, to look up at the glimmering stars and radiant moon, is the distant and monotonous murmur of the great metropolis, varied now and then by the shrill scream of a far-off railway-whistle, or the 'cough, cough, cough' of the engine of some late train. We are sober folks on the terrace, and are generally all snug abed before twelve o'clock. The last sound that readies our ears ere we doze off into forgetfulness, is the slow, lumbering, earthquaky advance of a huge outward-bound wagon. We hear it at the distance of half a mile, and note distinctly the crushing and pulverising of every small stone which the broad wheels roll over as they sluggishly proceed on their way. It rocks us in our beds as it passes the house; and for twenty minutes afterwards, if we are awake so long, we are aware that it is groaning heavily onwards, and shaking the solid earth in its progress--till it sinks away in silence, or we into the land of dreams.

SLAVES IN BRITAIN.

It has sometimes been predicted, not without plausibility, that if this great empire should sink before the rising genius of some new state, when all it has accomplished in arts and arms, and its wealth, its literature, its machinery, are forgotten, its struggles for humanity in the abolition of negro slavery will stand forth in undiminished lustre. All the steps of this mighty operation are interesting. It is a peculiarity of England and its institutions, that many of the most momentous constitutional conflicts have taken place in the courts of law. In despotic countries, this seldom occurs, because the rulers can bend the courts of law to their pleasure; but here, even under the worst governments, whatever degree of freedom was really warranted by law, could be secured by the courts of justice. When it was said that the air of Britain was too pure for a slave to breathe in--that his shackles fell off whenever he reached her happy shore--the sentiment was noble; but the question depended entirely on the law and its technical details. The trials resulting in a decision against slavery, have thus much interest from the influence they exercised on human progress.

'Inquire of Mr Owen, at the Angel Inn, behind St Clement's Church in the Strand.'

Mr Sharp's early conflicts in the law-courts are more romantic than the last and decisive one. He and his brother had found a poor mendicant negro, called Jonathan Strong, in rags on the streets of London. They took him into their service, and after he had become plump, strong, and acquainted with his business, the man who had brought him from the colonies, an attorney, seeing him behind a carriage, set covetous eyes on him. The lad was waylaid on a false message to a public-house, seized, and committed to the Compter, where, however, he managed to make Mr Sharp acquainted with his position. The indefatigable philanthropist had him brought before the lord mayor as sitting magistrate. After hearing the case stated, his lordship said: 'The lad had not stolen anything, and was not guilty of any offence, and was therefore at liberty to go away.' A captain of a vessel, saying he had been employed by a person who had just bought the youth, to convey him to Jamaica, seized him by the arm as his employer's property. A lawyer standing behind Mr Sharp, who seems to have been puzzled how to proceed, whispered, 'Charge him.' Sharp charged the captain with an assault, and as he would have been immediately committed by the lord mayor if he persisted, he let go his hold. The philanthropist was threatened with a prosecution for abstraction of property, but it was abandoned.

This occurred in 1767. The next important case was that of a negro named Lewis. He 'had formerly,' says Mr Sharp's biographer, 'been a slave in possession of a Mr Stapylton, who now resided at Chelsea. Stapylton, with the aid of two watermen, whom he had hired for that purpose, in a dark night seized the person of Lewis, and, after a struggle, dragged him on his back into the water, and thence into a boat lying in the Thames, where, having first tied his legs, they endeavoured to gag him by running a stick into his mouth; and then rowing down to a ship bound for Jamaica, whose commander was previously engaged in the wicked conspiracy, they put him on board, to be sold as a slave on his arrival in the island.' The negro's cries, however, were heard; the struggle was witnessed; and information given in the quarter whence aid was most likely to come. Mr Sharp lost no time in obtaining a writ of habeas corpus. The ship in the meantime had sailed from Gravesend, but the officer with the writ was able to board her in the Downs. There he saw the negro chained to the mast. The captain was at first furious, and determined to resist; but he knew the danger of deforcing an officer with, such a writ as a habeas corpus, and found it necessary to yield. The writ came up before Lord Mansfield. He did not go into the general question of slavery, for there was an incidental point on which the case could be decided on the side of humanity--the captain and the persons employing him could not prove their property in the slave, supposing such property lawful. He was not only liberated, but his captors were convicted of assault.

The pleadings upon the legality of this proceeding were solemn and full. The question was, Whether it was to be held a just inference, from the fact of the slave, being undoubtedly by the law of the day property in the colonies, that, while his colonial master made a temporary stay in Britain, he should be property there also, without any direct law to that effect. Had it been a question of inanimate goods, there would be no reason why the property should not continue in the colonial owner. It would be all one to the inanimate object what hands it was in, and regularity and justice would decree that the person who was owner of it in one country should be so in another. But in these cases there was a separate adverse interest of a very strong character. Was the uniformity of this right of possession sufficient to overrule another right--that which every man, black or white, had to the freedom of his own person, unless there was special law to restrain it? The counsel for the negro not only pleaded strongly on this his personal right, but on the consequence to the moral condition of the British Empire, if the inhabitants of slave countries could bring their slaves hither. From the strictness of the laws, and the uniformity of the course of justice, if slaves were permitted in England, it was the very place where property in them would be most secure. Thus the country might become a resort of slaveholders, and its boasted purity and freedom would be sadly contaminated. 'If that right,' said Mr Hargrave, 'is here recognised, domestic slavery, with its horrid train of evils, may be lawfully imported into this country, at the discretion of every individual, foreign and native. It will come not only from our own colonies, and those of other European nations, but from Poland, Russia, Spain, and Turkey--from the coast of Barbary, from the western and eastern coasts of Africa--from every part of the world where it still continues to torment and dishonour the human species.'

The counsel on the other side was the celebrated Mr Dunning, afterwards Lord Ashburton, a friend of freedom, who seems to have undertaken the cause on notions of professional duty, and without any great inclination for it. His first words were: 'It is incumbent on me to justify Captain Knowles's detainer of the negro.' He was careful to shew, that he did not in the meantime maintain that there was an absolute property in Somerset--it was sufficient to shew, that there was a sufficient presumption of property to authorise the shipmaster in detaining him until the absolute question of right was solemnly settled. He proceeded to say: 'It is my misfortune to address an audience, the greater part of which I fear are prejudiced the other way. But wishes, I am well convinced, will never be allowed by your lordships to enter into the determination of the point. This cause must be what in fact and law it is. Its fate, I trust, therefore, depends on fixed and variable rules, resulting by law from the nature of the case. For myself, I would not be understood to intimate a wish in favour of slavery by any means; nor, on the other side, to be supposed the maintainer of an opinion contrary to my own judgment. I am bound in duty to maintain those arguments which are most useful to Captain Knowles, as far as is consistent with truth; and if his conduct has been agreeable to the laws throughout, I am under a further indispensable duty to support it.'

A few years afterwards--in 1778--a case occurred in Scotland, where the question of a master's rights over a negro slave in Britain was at issue. The right claimed in this case, however, was not of so offensive a nature. The master did not claim the power of seizing the negro as his property. He maintained, however, that their mutual position gave him a right to claim the negro's services, as if he had engaged himself as a servant for life. Mr Wedderburn had bought in Jamaica a negro named Knight, about twelve years old. He came to Scotland as Mr Wedderburn's personal servant, married in the country, and for some years seemed contented with his position. Probably at the suggestion of some one who wished to try the question, as it had been tried in England, Knight went off, avowing his intention of being free. Mr Wedderburn applied to a justice of peace, who at once issued a warrant for the negro's apprehension. The matter, however, came before the sheriff, a professional judge, who decided that the colonial laws of slavery do not extend to Scotland, and that personal service for life is just another term for slavery. After a tedious litigation, this view was affirmed by the Court of Session, and the negro was declared free. The case acquired notice from the interest taken in it by Dr Johnson, and the frequent mention of it in Boswell's well-known work.

THE OLD HOUSEKEEPER'S TALE.

After my good and excellent mistress, Mrs Dacre, departed this life for a better, it seemed as if nothing ever prospered in the family, whom I had the honour of serving in the capacity of confidential housekeeper. Mr Dacre became morose and careless of his affairs; his sons were a source of great misery to him, pursuing a course of reckless extravagance and heartless dissipation; while the five young ladies--the youngest of whom, however, had attained the age of twenty-four--cared for little else than dress, and visiting, and empty show. These five young ladies had not amiable dispositions or gentle manners; but they were first-rate horsewomen, laughed and talked very loud, and were pronounced fine dashing women. There was another member of the family, an orphan niece of my master's, who had greatly profited by my lamented lady's teaching and companionship. Miss Marion had devoted herself to the sick-room with even more than a daughter's love; and for two years she had watched beside the patient sufferer, when her more volatile and thoughtless cousins refused to credit the approach of death. Miss Marion had just entered her twentieth year; life had not been all summer with her; for she remembered scenes of privation and distress, ere the decease of her parents left her, their only child, to the care of affluent relatives. She was a serious and meek, but affectionate creature; of a most goodly countenance and graceful carriage; and I used sometimes to think that the Misses Dacre were jealous of the admiration she excited, and kept her in the background as much as possible. It was not difficult to do this, for Miss Marion sought and loved retirement. After Mrs Dacre's decease, she had expressed an urgent wish to earn her bread by filling the situation of a governess. But the pride of the Dacres revolted at this; besides, Miss Marion was a comfort to her uncle, when his daughters were absent or occupied. So the dear young lady gave up her own wishes, and strove to do all she could for her generous benefactor, as she was wont to call my master.

In less than six months after I had quitted the family, a climax, which I had long anticipated with dread, actually arrived. Mr Dacre, suddenly called to his account, was found to have left his temporal affairs involved in inextricable and hopeless ruin; and amid the general crash and desolation, who was to shield or befriend the poor dependent, the orphan niece, Miss Marion? She was rudely cast adrift on the cold world; her proffered sympathy and services tauntingly rejected by those who had now a hard battle to fight on their own account. Broken down in health and spirits, the poor young lady flew to me, her humble, early friend, gratefully and eagerly availing herself of Thomas Wesley's cordial invitation, to make his house her home for the present.

'Dame, dame, don't let that tongue of thine wag so fast,' interrupted Thomas, for he never liked to hear people ill spoken of behind their backs, though he would speak out plainly enough to everybody's face.

A few days after Miss Marion's arrival at Fairdown , a pedestrian was seen advancing leisurely up the valley, coming in a direction from the neighbouring town--a distance, however, of some miles, and the nearest point where the coach stopped. The stranger, aided in his walk by a stout stick, was a short, thickset, elderly man, clad in brown habiliments from head to foot: a brown, broad-brimmed beaver, an antiquated brown spencer , brown gaiters, and brown cloth boots, completed his attire. His linen was spotless and fine, his countenance rubicund and benevolent; and when he took off his green spectacles, a pair of the clearest and honestest brown eyes ever set in mortal's head looked you full in the face. He was a nice, comfortable-looking old gentleman; and so Thomas and I both thought at the same moment--for Martha was out of the way, and I shewed the apartments for her; the stranger, who gave his name as Mr Budge, having been directed to our house by the people of the inn where the coach stopped, who were kin to Martha, and well-disposed, obliging persons.

Mr Budge said he wanted quietness for some weeks, and the recreation of fishing; he had come from the turmoil of the great city to relax and enjoy himself, and if Thomas Wesley would kindly consent to receive him as a lodger, he would feel very much obliged. Never did we listen to so pleasant and obliging a mode of speaking; and when Mr Budge praised the apartments, and admired the country, the conquest of Thomas's heart was complete. 'Besides,' as Martha sagaciously remarked, 'it was so much better to have a steady old gentleman like this for a lodger, when pretty Miss Marion honoured them as a guest.' I thought so too; my dear young lady being so lone and unprotected by relatives, we all took double care of her.

So Mr Budge engaged the rooms, and speedily arrived to take possession, bringing with him a spick-and-span new fishing-rod and basket. He did not know much about fishing, but he enjoyed himself just as thoroughly as if he did; and he laughed so good-humouredly at his own Cockney blunders, as he called them, that Thomas would have been quite angry had any one else presumed to indulge a smile at Mr Budge's expense. A pattern lodger in all respects was Mr Budge--deferential towards Martha and myself, and from the first moment he beheld Miss Marion, regarding her as a superior being, yet one to be loved by a mortal for all that. Mr Budge was not a particularly communicative individual himself, though we opined from various observations, that, although not rich, he was comfortably off: but somehow or other, without appearing in the least inquisitive, he managed to obtain the minutest information he required. In this way, he learned all the particulars respecting Miss Marion; and gathered also from me, my own desire of obtaining a situation, such as I had held at Mr Dacre's, but in a small and well-regulated household. As to Miss Marion, the kind old gentleman could never shew kindness enough to her; and he watched the returning roses on her fair cheeks with a solicitude scarcely exceeded by mine. I never wondered at anybody admiring and loving the sweet, patient girl; but Mr Budge's admiration and apparent affection so far exceeded the bounds of mere conventional kindness in a stranger, that sometimes I even smilingly conjectured he had the idea of asking her to become Mrs Budge, for he was a widower, as he told us, and childless.

Such an idea, however, had never entered Miss Marion's innocent heart; and she, always so grateful for any little attention, was not likely to receive with coldness those so cordially lavished on her by her new friend, whom she valued as a truly good man, and not for a polished exterior, in which Mr Budge was deficient. Nay, so cordial was their intimacy, and so much had Miss Marion regained health and cheerfulness, that with unwonted sportiveness, on more than one occasion she actually hid the ponderous brown snuff-box, usually reposing in Mr Budge's capacious pocket, and only produced it when his distress became real; whereupon he chuckled and laughed, as if she had performed a mighty clever feat, indulging at the same time, however, in a double pinch.

I do not know which I felt most grateful or delighted for--my own prospects, or my dear Miss Marion's; though certainly hers were more vague and undefined than mine, for the remuneration offered for my services was far beyond my expectation, and from Mr Budge's description of Sorel Park, it seemed to be altogether a place beyond my most sanguine hopes. I said something about Miss Marion, and my hope that she might be as fortunate as myself; and Mr Budge, I was happy to see, was quite fervent in his response. 'My friend,' said he, at the close of the interview, 'will not arrive to take possession of Sorel Park until you, Mrs Deborah, have got all things in order; and as I know that he is anxious for the time to arrive, the sooner you can set out on your journey thither the better. I also must depart shortly, but I hope to return hither again.' Important business required Mr Budge's personal attention, and with hurried adieus to us all, he departed from Fairdown; and in compliance with his request, I set off for Sorel Park, leaving my beloved Miss Marion to the care of Thomas and Martha for the present.

The owner of this fine place was not as yet known there; for Mr Budge, being a managing man, had taken everything upon himself, and issued orders with as lordly an air as if there was nobody in the kingdom above the little brown man. The head-gardener, and some of the other domestics, informed me they had been engaged by Mr Budge himself, who, I apprehended, made very free and busy with the concerns of his friend. Sorel Park was a princely domain, and there was an air of substantial comfort about the dwelling and its appointments, which spoke volumes of promise as to domestic arrangements in general. I soon found time to write a description of the place to Miss Marion, for I knew how interested she was in all that concerned her faithful Deborah; and I anxiously awaited the tidings she had promised to convey--of Mr Budge having provided as comfortably for her as he had for me. I at length received formal notification of the day and hour the owner of Sorel Park expected to arrive, accompanied by his female relative. This was rather earlier than I had been led to expect; but all things being in order for their reception, I felt glad at their near approach, for I was strangely troubled and nervous to get this introduction over. I was very anxious, too, about my dear Miss Marion; for I knew that some weighty reason alone prevented her from answering my letter, though what that reason could be, it was impossible for me to conjecture.

The momentous day dawned; the hours glided on; and the twilight hour deepened. The superior servants and myself stood ready to receive the travellers, listening to every sound; and startled, nevertheless, when the rapid approach of carriage-wheels betokened their close proximity. With something very like disappointment, for which I accused myself of ingratitude, I beheld Mr Budge, browner than ever, alight from the chariot, carefully assisting a lady, who seemed in delicate health, as she was muffled up like a mummy. Mr Budge returned my respectful salutation most cordially, and said, with a smile, as he bustled forwards to the saloon, where a cheerful fire blazed brightly on the hearth--for it was a chill evening: 'I've brought your new mistress home, you see, Mrs Deborah; but you want to know where your new master is--eigh? Well, come along, and this young lady will tell you all about the old fellow.'

I followed them into the apartment; Mr Budge shut the door; the lady flung aside her veil, and my own dear, sweet Miss Marion clasped me round the neck, and sobbed hysterically in my arms.

'O my dear Miss Marion!' was all I could utter; 'what does this mean? Am I in a dream?' But it was not a happy dream; for when I had a moment to reflect, my very soul was troubled as I thought of the sacrifice of all her youthful aspirations, made by that poor, gentle creature, for the sake of a secure and comfortable home in this stormy world. I could not reconcile myself to the idea of Mr Budge and Marion as man and wife; and as I learned, ere we retired to rest that night, I had no occasion to do so. Mr Budge was Miss Marion's paternal uncle, her mother, Miss Dacre, having married his elder brother. These brothers were of respectable birth, but inferior to the Dacres; and while the elder never prospered in any undertaking, and finally died of a broken heart, the younger, toiling in foreign climes, gradually amassed a competency. On returning to his native land, he found his brother no more, and the orphan girl he had left behind placed with her mother's relatives.

For several years, Mr Budge paid an annual visit to Fairdown, when the trout-fishing season commenced; and many useful and valuable gifts found their way into Thomas's comfortable homestead, presented by dear Miss Marion. In the course of time, she became the wife of one worthy of her in every respect--their lovely children often sportively carrying off the ponderous box of brown rappee, and yet Uncle Budge never frowning.

ADVENTURES IN JAPAN.

For above two hundred years, the unknown millions of Japan have been shut up in their own islands, forbidden, under the severest penalties, either to admit foreigners on their shores, or themselves to visit any other realm in the world. The Dutch are permitted to send two ships in a year to the port of Nangasaki, where they are received with the greatest precaution, and subjected to a surveillance even more degrading than was that formerly endured by the Europeans at Canton. Any other foreigner whom misfortune or inadvertence may land on their shores, is doomed to perpetual imprisonment; and even if one of their own people should pass twelve months out of the country, he is, on his return, kept for life at the capital, and suffered no more to join his family, or mingle at large in the business or social intercourse of life. In pursuance of this policy, it is believed that the Japanese government now holds in captivity several subjects of the United States, and it is expected that an armament will be sent to rescue them by force.

Since this announcement has been made, and the general expectation has been raised that Japan will soon have to submit, like China, to surrender its isolation, and enter into relations with the rest of the civilised world, there has seasonably appeared an English reprint of a work hitherto little known among us--a personal narrative of a Japanese captivity of two years and a half, by an officer in the Russian navy. If we may judge from its details, our transatlantic friends had need to keep all their eyes wide open in dealing with this people.

On the following day, the captain, according to appointment, paid another visit on shore, accompanied by two officers, Alexei, and four seamen carrying the presents intended for the Japanese. On this occasion, the former precautions were dispensed with; the boat was hauled up to the shore, and left with one seaman, while the rest of the party proceeded to the castle. The result was, that after a renewal of the friendly explanations and entertainments of the preceding day, the treacherous Japanese threw off the mask, and made prisoners of the whole party.

'The first thing done, was to tie our hands behind our backs, and conduct us into an extensive but low building, which resembled a barrack, and which was situated opposite to the tent in the direction of the shore. Here we were placed on our knees, and bound in the cruelest manner with cords about the thickness of a finger; and as though this were not enough, another binding of smaller cords followed, which was still more painful. The Japanese are exceedingly expert at this work; and it would appear that they conform to some precise regulation in binding their prisoners, for we were all tied exactly in the same manner. There was the same number of knots and nooses, and all at equal distances, on the cords with which each of us was bound. There were loops round our breasts and necks; our elbows almost touched each other, and our hands were firmly bound together. From these fastenings proceeded a long cord, the end of which was held by a Japanese, and which, on the slightest attempt to escape, required only to be drawn to make the elbows come in contact with the greatest pain, and to tighten the noose about the neck to such a degree as almost to produce strangulation. Besides all this, they tied our legs in two places--above the knees and above the ankles; they then passed ropes from our necks over the cross-beams of the building, and drew them so tight, that we found it impossible to move. Their next operation was searching our pockets, out of which they took everything, and then proceeded very quietly to smoke tobacco. While they were binding us, the lieutenant-governor shewed himself twice, and pointed to his mouth, to intimate, perhaps, that it was intended to feed, not to kill us.'

After some hours, the legs and ankles of the prisoners were partially loosed, and preparations were made for removing them to Matsmai, which seems to be the head-quarters of government for the Kurile dependencies of Japan. The journey, which occupied above a month, was performed partly in boats, which were dragged along the shore, and even for miles over the land; and partly on foot, the captives being marched in file, each led with a cord by a particular conductor, and having an armed soldier abreast of him. It was evident, however, that whatever was rigorous in their treatment, was not prompted by personal feelings of barbarity, but by the stringency of the law, which would have made the guards answerable for their prisoners with their own lives. They were always addressed with the greatest respect; and, as soon as it was deemed safe, their hands, which were in a dreadfully lacerated state, were unbound, and surgically treated; but not till their persons had been again most carefully searched, that no piece of metal might remain about them, lest they might contrive to destroy themselves. Suicide is, in Japan, the fashionable mode of terminating a life which cannot be prolonged but in circumstances of dishonour: to rip up one's own bowels in such a case, wipes away every stain on the character. The guards of the Russian captives not only used every precaution against this, but carefully watched over their health and comfort, carrying them over the shallowest pools and streamlets, lest their feet should be wet, and assiduously beating off the gnats and flies, which would have been annoying. At every village, crowds of both sexes, young and old, turned out to see these unfortunate men; but there was nothing like insult or mockery in the demeanour of any--pity appeared to be the universal feeling: many begged permission from the guards to offer sagi, comfits, fruits, and other delicacies; and these were presented often with tears of compassion, as well as gestures of respect.

The prison to which Golownin and his companions were finally committed had been constructed expressly for their habitation in the town of Matsmai. It was a quadrangular wooden building, 25 paces long, 15 broad, and 12 feet high. Three sides of it were dead-wall, the fourth was formed of strong spars. Within this structure were two apartments, formed likewise of wooden spars, so as to resemble cages: one was appropriated to the officers, the other to the sailors and Alexei. The building was surrounded by a high wall or paling, outside of which were the kitchen, guard-house, &c., enclosed by another paling. This outer enclosure was patrolled by common soldiers; but no one was allowed within, except the physician, who visited daily, and the orderly officers, who looked through the spars every half-hour. Of course, it was rather a cold lodging; but, as winter advanced, a hole was dug a few feet from each cage, built round with freestone, and filled with sand, upon which charcoal was afterwards kept burning. Benches were provided for them to sleep on, and two of the orderlies presented them with bear-skins; but the native fashion is to lie on a thick, wadded quilt, folded together, and laid on the floor, which, even in the poorest dwellings, is covered with soft straw-mats. A large wadded dress, made of silk or cotton, according to the circumstances of the wearer, serves for bed-clothes--which seem to be quite unknown; and while the poorer classes have only a piece of wood for a pillow, the richer fasten a cushion on the neat boxes which contain their razors, scissors, pomatum, tooth-brushes, and other toilet requisites.

But while the comfort of the captives was attended to in many minor matters, there was no relaxation of the vigilance used to preclude the possibility of self-destruction. They were not allowed scissors or knife to cut their nails, but were obliged to thrust their hands through the palisades, to get this office performed for them. When they were indulged with smoking, it was with a very long pipe held between the spars, and furnished with a wooden ball fixed about the middle, to prevent its being drawn wholly within the cage.

For weeks together they were brought daily before the bunyo , bound and harnessed like horses as before. The ostensible object of these examinations, which frequently lasted the whole day, was to ascertain for what purpose they had come near Japan, and what they knew of Resanoff and Chwostoff--for a singularly unfortunate combination of circumstances had arisen to give colour to the suspicion, that some of their party had been connected with that expedition. But for one inquiry connected with the case, there were fifty that were wholly irrelevant, and prompted by mere curiosity. The most trivial questions were put several times and in different forms, and every answer was carefully written down. Golownin was often puzzled, irritated, and quite at the end of his stock of patience; but that of the interrogators appeared interminable. They said, that by writing down everything they were told, whether true or false, and comparing the various statements they received, they were enabled through time to separate truth from fiction, and the practice was very improving. At the close of almost every examination, the bunyo exhorted them not to despair, but to offer up prayers to Heaven, and patiently await the emperor's decision.

Presently new work was found for them. An intelligent young man was brought to their prison, to be taught the Russian language. To this the captain consented, having no confidence in the Kurile Alexei as an interpreter, and being desirous himself to gain some knowledge of Japanese. Teske made rapid progress, and soon became a most useful and kindly companion to the captives. Books, pens, and paper were now allowed them in abundance; and their mode of treatment was every way improved. But by and by, they were threatened with more pupils; a geometrician and astronomer from the capital was introduced to them, and would gladly have been instructed in their mode of taking observations. Other learned men were preparing to follow, and it was now evident that the intention of the Japanese government was to reconcile them to their lot, and retain them for the instruction of the nation. Indeed, this appears to be the great secret of the policy of detaining for life instead of destroying the hapless foreigners that light on these shores; as the avowed motive for tolerating the commercial visits of the Dutch is, that they furnish the only news of public events that ever reach Japan. Fearful of becoming known to other nations for fear of invasion, they are yet greedy of information respecting them, and many were the foolish questions they asked Golownin about the emperor of Russia, his dress, habitation, forces, and territories.

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