Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846

by Various

PART THE LAST.

Chapter VI.

It was a lovely morning, notwithstanding it was November—the rain had wholly ceased, and the clear and almost cloudless sky showed every indication of a fine day; so that Frank had an excellent opportunity of witnessing the view of the sea to which the squire had alluded, and with which he was very much gratified. But, for all this, our little hero was looking forward to a far more interesting sight, in the persons of the fair ladies he had fully made up his mind to meet that morning at breakfast; though the altered tones of their voices still exceedingly puzzled him. Wishing, however, to appear to the greatest possible advantage, he no sooner got back to the house, than, under the pretext of just seeing Vernon for a minute, he took the opportunity of brushing up his hair, and all that sort of thing. Having so done, and being by no means dissatisfied with the result, he again descended the stairs, and, with a throbbing heart, entered the breakfast room. Here he found the master of the house, with his amiable little wife, and three young ladies, already seated around the table—yes, three young ladies—actually one more in number than he had anticipated; but, alas! how different from those he had hoped to see. Instead of the lovely forms he and Vernon had been so forcibly struck with the day before, he perceived three very indifferent-looking young women—one, a thin little crooked creature, with sharp contracted features, which put him in mind of the head of a skinned rabbit—another with an immense flat unmeaning face; and the third, though better-looking than her two companions, was a silly little flippant miss in her teens, rejoicing in a crop of luxuriant curls which swept over her shoulders as she returned Frank's polite bow—when the squire introduced him to the assembled company—as much as to say, "I'm not for you, sir, at any price; so, pray don't for a moment fancy such a thing." The other two spinsters returned his salutation less rudely; but he set down the whole trio as the most uninteresting specimens of womankind he had ever met.

"Come," said the squire addressing himself to Frank, who, surprised as well as disappointed, was looking a little as if he couldn't help it, "Come, come Mr Trevelyan, here we are all assembled at last; so make the best use of your time, and then for waging war against the partridges."

Frank did make the best use of his time, and a most excellent breakfast, though he puzzled his brains exceedingly during the whole time he was so occupied with turning it over in his mind, how it was possible that such a delightful couple as the founders of the feast, could have produced so unprepossessing a progeny; whilst Timothy—who, though it was no part of his duty to wait at table, which was performed by a well-dressed man-servant out of livery—managed, on some pretext or other, to be continually coming in and out of the room, and every time contrived to catch Frank's eye, and, by a knowing grin, to let him know that he both understood the cause, and was exceedingly amused at his perplexity.

No sooner had Frank eaten and drank to his heart's content, than he declared his readiness to attend the squire to the field. Here they fell in with several coveys of partridges, and the squire, being an excellent shot, brought down his birds in fine style; added to which he knocked over a woodcock and several snipes; but it was otherwise with Frank, whose shooting experience being rather limited, after missing several easy shots, terminated the day by wounding a cow slightly, and killing a guinea-hen that flew out of a hedge adjoining a farm-yard the sportsmen were passing, which, mistaking for some wild gallinaceous animal or other, he blazed away at, without inquiring as to the particular species to which it might possibly belong. But so far from being cast down with his ill success, or the laughter his more effective shots had raised at his expense, he enjoyed the day amazingly, fully resolved to have another bout at it on the morrow; and so he and the worthy squire returned homewards together in the best possible humour with each other; the latter delighted with Frank, and Frank equally well pleased with the squire.

But Frank felt very sheepish about what his friend Vernon Wycherley would say as to the result of the predictions he had that morning made, and how he should manage to put a bold front upon the matter, so as to have the laugh all on his own side; a sort of thing he couldn't arrange any how; but still he would not pass so near his friend's bedroom, without looking in to ask him how he was getting on, when, to his great surprise, he found not only the bed, but even the apartment unoccupied.

"Ah, well!" said Frank, "I'm rejoiced, poor fellow, he's so much better than I expected; and it's all for the best that I find the bird flown, which spares me the vexation of confessing to him the blunder I made in my calculations this morning, which he must have found out long before this."

Having relieved his mind by these observations, he repaired to his own room, and having shifted his attire, and made the best of himself his limited wardrobe would admit, was again in the act of descending the stairs, when he encountered Timothy, who, with a grin that distended his mouth wellnigh from ear to ear, begged to direct him to the drawing-room, which was on the same floor with the bed chambers, where, he informed him, "the gen'lman was a-laying up top o' the sofer, and a-telkin' away brave with the young ladies—I say," observed Timothy, winking his eye to give greater expression to his words—"I say—he's a ben there for hours, bless'ee; for no sooner did mun[12] hear their sweet voices a-passing long the passage, than ha ups a-ringing away to the bell, which I takes care to answer; so ha tips me yef-a-crown to help mun on we us cloaz, which I did ready and wullin'; and then, guessing what mun 'ud like to be yefter, I ups with my gen'lman pick-a-back, and puts[13] mun with ma right into drawing-room, an drops mun flump down all vittey[14] amongst the ladies a-top of the sofer; and if you wants to see a body look plazed, just step in yer"—added he, laying his hand on the lock of the door, which they had then reached—"only just step in yer, and look to mun."

"Then most heartily do I pity his taste," thought Frank; but he didn't say so, and passed through the door Timothy had opened for him, who duly announced him to the party within. But how shall we attempt to describe Frank's amazement, when he discovered of whom the party consisted? He had indeed been surprised at meeting persons so totally different from what he had expected that morning at breakfast, but he was now perfectly thunderstruck at the sight which burst upon his astonished vision.

There was Mr Vernon Wycherley reclining at his ease on an elegant sofa, his head comfortably propped up with pillows, and as far, at any rate, as face was concerned, appearing not a bit the worse for his late accident, and making himself quite at home; and there, too, seated near him, were those lovely creatures who had excited the admiration of our two young heroes on the preceding day: there they were, both of them, dressed most becomingly, and looking most bewitchingly lady-like, employed about some of those little matters of needlework, which afford no impediment to conversation, chatting away with their new acquaintance in the most friendly and agreeable manner possible.

Chapter VII.

Frank Trevelyan was so much taken aback by a sight so totally unexpected, that his confident assurance for the moment forsook him, and with a countenance suffused with blushes, and a perfect consciousness all the time that he was looking like a fool, he stood stock-still within a few paces from the door, as if uncertain whether to pluck up sufficient courage to advance, or to turn tail and make a run of it; his comfort all this time in nowise enhanced, by detecting the air of triumphant satisfaction with which Mr Vernon Wycherley was witnessing and enjoying his confusion. Fortunately, however, for Frank, the ladies had more compassion, and by their pleasing affability of manner, speedily relieved him from his embarrassment—so speedily indeed, that in the course of five minutes he had not only conquered every bashful feeling, but had acquired so great a degree of easy self-possession, that Vernon Wycherley actually began to wonder at what he was pleased in his own mind to style, "the little rascal's cool impudence"——But he only thought so whilst Frank was devoting his sole attentions to the darker beauty, with whom the young poet had already chosen to fancy himself in love; for when, at the expiration of this five minutes, his friend transferred his civilities to her fair sister, Mr Wycherley returned to his original opinion, formed upon a close intimacy of several years, which was, that friend Frank was one of the best-hearted, good-humoured, and entertaining little fellows that ever existed.

And now, how shall we attempt to describe these lovely young creatures, whose charms were, by this time, playing sad havoc with the hearts of Mr Vernon Wycherley, and his friend Mr Francis Trevelyan. First, then, the elder sister, Miss Mary.—Her features were regular, with the true Madonna cast of countenance, beautiful when in a state of repose, but still more lovely when lighted up by animation. Her cheek, though pale, indicated no symptom of ill health, and her complexion was remarkably clear, which was beautifully contrasted with her raven hair, dark eyes, and long silken eyelashes. Her sister, who was but a year younger, owed more of her beauty to a certain sweetness of expression it is impossible to describe, than to perfect regularity of feature. Her eyes were dark-blue, and her hair of a dark-golden brown; her complexion fair and clear, and her mouth and lips the most perfect that can be conceived. Both sisters had excellent teeth, but in other respects their features were totally dissimilar. They were about the middle height—and their figures faultless, which, added to a lady-like carriage and engaging manners, untainted with affectation, rendered them perfectly fascinating. Such was, at any rate, the opinion each of our two heroes had formed of her to whom he had been pleased to devote his thoughts—Frank of the gentle Bessie, and Vernon of the lovely Mary—for none but the squire before her face, and Timothy behind her back, ever dared to call her Miss Molly; so that before Squire Potts, or his good lady, joined the young folks, which they did ere one delightful half hour had passed away, both our young men were deeply in for it—the poet resigned to pine away the rest of his days in solitary grief, and to write sonnets on his sorrows; and Frank resolved to try all he could do to win the lady over to be of the same mind with himself, and then to do every thing in his power, with the respective governors on both sides, to bring things to a happy conclusion as speedily as possible.

Oh! they were nice people were the Potts's—father, mother, and daughters; and how delighted Frank was when he sate down to the dinner-table with them—never were such nice people, thought Frank—and he wasn't far wide of the mark either. And how disconsolate poor Vernon felt in being compelled to rough it all alone, for that day at least, upon water-gruel above stairs! But the ladies, taking compassion upon his forlorn condition, and sympathizing with him for the dangers he had past, left the table very early, and favoured him with their company, leaving the squire below to amuse friend Frank.

But the squire and Frank were not left long alone together, for the village doctor dropped in just as the ladies had departed to inquire how Vernon was getting on, and was easily prevailed upon to help the squire and his guest out with their wine; and then came the clergyman of the parish, and his three or four private pupils, who had come to finish letting off the fireworks, which they had favoured the squire with partially exhibiting on the previous evening; but which the news of Vernon's misadventure had prematurely cut short—and so the remainder of the exhibition was postponed to the following evening—and that time having then arrived, all the rest of the combustibles went off, one after another, with very great eclat.

But where are those three uninteresting young damsels all this time?—What has become of them? some of our readers may be inclined to ask. For their satisfaction we beg to inform them, that these three unprepossessing personages were merely acquaintances, who had dropped in unexpectedly the evening before, and made use of the squire's residence as a kind of inn or half-way house, on the way to visit some friends some ten miles further on, to which place they had betaken themselves soon after breakfast. And by way of clearing up as we go—The Misses Potts, (for Potts they were called, there's no disguising that fact,) the Misses Potts, we say, were at the time our two heroes first met them returning homewards from a long ride; shortly after which, being overtaken by a heavy shower, they betook themselves to a friend's house not very far distant, where, owing to the unfavourable appearance of the weather, they were induced to remain for the night, and Timothy was accordingly sent home with a message to that effect.

They were very nice people indeed were the Potts's; and not only did their two guests think so, but the whole country, far and wide around, entertained precisely the same opinion. It is not, therefore, surprising that two young men like Frank and Vernon should be well pleased with their quarters, or that, having so early gotten into the slough of love, they should daily continue to sink deeper into the mire. The young poet's lame leg, though not a very serious affair, was still sufficient to keep him for several days a close prisoner to the house; but if any one had asked him—no, we don't go so far as to say that, for if any one had so asked him he would not have answered truly; but if he had seriously proposed the question to himself, his heart would have told him, that notwithstanding all the pain and inconvenience attendant on his then crippled state, he wouldn't have changed with his friend Frank, to have been compelled to ramble abroad with the father, instead of remaining at home to enjoy the society of his daughters.

As for Frank, he was equally well pleased to let matters be as they were; he shot with the squire, accompanied him on his walks about his farm; and occasionally, when the weather permitted, attended the young ladies in their rides; and then, and then only, did Vernon envy him, or repine at his own lame and helpless condition. But whatever the opinion of the latter might have been, never in all his born days did Mr Frank Trevelyan spend his time so much to his satisfaction.

Now we must not suppose that Squire Potts had, like an old blockhead, admitted these two young men into such close terms of intimacy with his family, upon no further acquaintance than was furnished him by his having helped the one out of a lead shaft, and the other to a dry rig-out after the duckings he had encountered in seeking the necessary aid—quite the contrary; for though the nature of the accident, and the forlorn condition of our pedestrians, would have insured them both food and shelter till the patient could have been safely removed elsewhere; yet the squire would never have admitted any one to the society of the female part of his family, whose respectability and station in society he was at all doubtful about. He had therefore, during supper-time on the night of his arrival, but in polite manner, put several pumping questions to Frank, who very readily answered them; from which he discovered that Frank's father, though personally unacquainted with, he knew by reputation to be a highly respectable person and a county magistrate; nor was even Frank's name wholly unknown to him, and the little he had heard was highly in his favour. He, therefore, passed muster very well; and, during the course of the shooting expedition on the following morning, the squire had also contrived to elicit from his young companion, that Vernon Wycherley's father, who had died some years before, had been both an intimate and valued friend of his own early years.

By this means a great portion of the reserve, often attendant upon an acquaintance recently formed, wore off; so that our two heroes felt themselves, in the course of a few days, as much at home with their newly-made friends, as if they had been on terms of intimacy with them from their childhood. There was, however, one serious drawback to the poet's felicity. The comedy upon which he had designed to establish his future fame, was nowhere to be found; and there was every reason to believe, that it was reposing in the shaft from which its author had been so providentially rescued, where no one would venture down to seek it on account of the foul air that was known to prevail near the bottom.

"Well, never mind," said Vernon, who, when informed of his probable loss, was reclining very comfortably on the drawing-room sofa, taking tea with his kind entertainers,—"Well, never mind," he said, "I must be thankful to Heaven for my own preservation, and, practising a little of friend Frank's philosophy, try to believe that what has happened is all for the best."

"And so I've no doubt it is," interposed Frank; "for you must either have been doomed to disappointment by your failure, or, if you had succeeded in being the fortunate competitor out of the hundred candidates who are striving for the prize, you would, as a matter of course, have incurred the everlasting enmity of the disappointed ninety-nine, to say nothing of their numerous friends and allies; why, you would be cut up to minced meat amongst them all; and nine-tenths of the reviews and newspapers would be ringing their changes of abuse upon your name, as one of the most blundering blockheads that ever spoilt paper."

"Enough, Frank, enough—I give in," interrupted Mr Wycherley; "quite enough said on the subject, and perhaps you may be right too in this instance; but I verily believe, that if the direst misfortune were to happen to one, you would strive to convince him, or at any rate set it down in our own mind, that it was all for the best."

"And if he did so," said the squire, "he might be less distant from the truth than you imagine. I myself indeed could mention an instance, where a man at last happily discovered that a circumstance he had set down in his own mind as the ruling cause of every subsequent misfortune, eventually proved the instrument of producing him a greater degree of happiness than often falls to the lot of the most fortunate of mankind."

Frank and Vernon both expressed a wish to hear the tale, which the squire, who was a rare hand at telling a story, proceeded forthwith to recount; but as, for reasons we forbear mentioning at present, he glossed over some important parts, and touched but lightly on others equally material, we purpose, instead of recording the tale in his own words, to state the facts precisely as they occurred, the subject of which will form the contents of the two next following chapters.

Chapter VIII.—The Squire's Tale.

In a town that shall be nameless, but which was situate somewhere or other in the West of England, there lived some years since—no matter how many—a young man, called Job Vivian, who practised as a surgeon, apothecary, and so forth. He was about two or three and twenty years of age when he first commenced his professional career in this place, and very shortly afterwards he married the girl of his affections, to whom he had been sincerely attached from his very boyhood; and as they were both exceedingly good-looking—in fact, she was beautiful—they of course made what the world terms an imprudent marriage. But Job himself thought very differently, and amidst all the cares and vicissitudes that attended several years of his wedded life, he never passed a day without breathing a prayer of thankfulness to Heaven for having blessed him with so excellent a helpmate. But though rich in domestic comforts, all the rest of Job's affairs, for a long time, went on unprosperously. He certainly acquired sufficient practice in the course of a few years to occupy a great portion of his time, by night as well as by day, but then it was not what is termed a paying practice. In fact, nearly the whole of his business was either amongst the poorer classes, who couldn't pay, the dishonest, who wouldn't, or the thoughtless and dilatory, who, if they did so, took a very long time about it. In spite, therefore, of all his labour and assiduity, the actual amount he received from his practice fell short of his yearly expenditure, which obliged him to dip into his small independent property, consisting of a few houses in an obscure part of the town; which, as he became every year more heavily involved, he was erelong compelled to mortgage so deeply, that what between some of his tenants running away without paying their rent, the costs of repairs, and money to be paid for interest, a very small portion of the annual proceeds ever reached Job's pockets; and at last, to complete the whole, a virulent fever broke out in the very midst of this precious property, of so obstinate and dangerous a kind, as for some months to defy the skill of all the medical men of the place, nearly depopulating the whole neighbourhood, which in consequence became all but deserted.

Just at this critical time poor Job Vivian received a notice from his mortgagee—a rich old timber merchant, who lived and carried on his business in the same town with him—to pay off his mortgage; which he being unable to do, or to obtain any body to advance the required amount on the security of property which had then become so depreciated in value, the sordid worshipper of mammon, though rolling in wealth, and not spending one-tenth part of his income, and with neither wife nor children to provide for, nor a soul on earth he cared a straw for, was resolved, as he was technically pleased to term it, to sell up the doctor forthwith; to accomplish which he commenced an action of ejectment to recover the possession of the premises, though Job had voluntarily offered to give them up to him, and also an action of covenant for non-payment of the mortgage money, whilst at the same time he filed his bill in Chancery to foreclose the mortgage; which combined forces, legal and equitable, proved so awful a floorer to a sinking man, that, in order to get clear of them, he was glad at the very outset, not only to give up all claim to the property, but even to consent to pay £100 out of his own pocket for the costs said to have been incurred in thus depriving him of his possessions.

These costs proved an unceasing millstone about the unfortunate doctor's neck. In order to pay them, he had been obliged to leave more just demands undischarged; and thus he became involved in difficulties he strove in vain to extricate himself from. Yet in spite of all this, Job and his good little wife were a far happier couple than most of their richer neighbours. The constant hope that things would soon begin to take a more prosperous turn, reconciled them to their present perplexities; there was but one drawback they considered to render their bliss complete; and Job used to say, that he had never met with an instance of a man who hadn't a drawback to perfect happiness in some shape or other and that, take it for all in all, they had, thank God, a pretty fair allowance of the world's comforts.

"So we have, my dear Job," said his pretty little wife Jessie, in reply to a remark of this kind he had been just then making—"and only think how far happier we are than most of the people around us. Only think of Mr Belasco, who, with all his money and fine estates, is so unhappy, that his family are in constant dread of his destroying himself."

"And poor Sir Charles Deacon," interposed Job, "a man so devotedly fond of good eating and drinking as he is, and yet to be compelled to live on less than even workhouse allowance for fear of the gout—and then that silly Lord Muddeford, who's fretting himself to death because ministers wouldn't make him an earl—Mrs Bundy, with her two thousand a-year, making herself miserable because the Grandisons, and my Lord and Lady Muddeford, and one or two others of the grand folks, every one of whom she dislikes, won't visit her. Then the squire at Mortland is troubled with a son that no gentleman will be seen speaking to; and the rich rector of"——Job nodded his head, but didn't say where—"has a tipsy-getting wife—and poor Squire Taylor's wife stark mad—Mr Gribbs also, with his fine unencumbered property, has two idiot children, and another deaf and dumb, and the other—the only sane child he has, is little better than a fool. Then the Hoblers are rendered miserable by the disobedience and misconduct of their worthless children; and the Dobsons are making themselves wretched because they've no such creatures to trouble themselves about. The only man of property I can name in the whole country round who seems free from care, is our fox-hunting squire at Abbot's Beacon, who really does enter into the life of the sport, has plenty of money to carry it on with, and has besides one of the nicest places I think I ever saw."

"But then," interposed Job's better half, "his wife, every body says, doesn't care a fig for him."

"Then a fig for all his happiness," said Job; "I wouldn't change places with him for ten thousand times ten thousand his wealth and possessions, and a dukedom thrown into the bargain;" and Job told the truth too, and kissed his wife by way of confirmation; for he couldn't help it for the very life of him, Job couldn't.

"And then only to consider," said Mrs Job Vivian, as she smilingly adjusted her hair—and very nice hair she had, and kept it very nicely too, though her goodman had just then tumbled it pretty considerably—"only think what two lovely children we have; every one who sees them is struck with their remarkable beauty." This was perfectly true, by the way, notwithstanding the observation proceeded from a mother's lips.

"And so good, too, my dear Jessie," continued Job; "I wonder," he proudly said, "if any father in the land, besides myself, can truly boast of children who have had the use of their tongues so long, and who yet, amidst all their chattering and prattling, have never told a falsehood—so that, amidst all the cares that Providence has been pleased to allot us, we never can be thankful enough for the actual blessings we enjoy."

"We never can, indeed," said Jessie. And thus, in thankfulness for the actual comforts they possessed, they forgot all the troubles that surrounded them, and, happily, were ignorant of how heavily they would soon begin to press upon them.

And now, we must state here, that, although generally unfortunate in his worldly undertakings, a young colt, which the young doctor had himself reared, seemed to form an exception to the almost general rule, for he turned out a most splendid horse; and as his owner's patients were distributed far and wide over a country in which an excellent pack of hounds was kept; and Job himself, not only fond of the sport, but also a good rider, who could get with skill and judgment across a country, his colt, even at four years' old, became the first-rate hunter of the neighbourhood; so much so, indeed, that a rich country squire one day—and that at the very close of the hunting season—witnessing his gallant exploits in the field, was so pleased with the horse, that he offered Job £150 for him.

Now, Job thought his limited circumstances would never justify his riding a horse worth £150; yet he was so much attached to the animal he had reared, that, greatly as he then wanted money, he felt grieved at the idea of parting with him, and, at the instant of the offer, he could not in fact make up his mind to do. Promising, therefore, to give an answer in the course of a day or two, he returned home, by no means a happier man in the consciousness of the increased value of his steed; nor could he muster sufficient courage to tell his wife, who was almost as fond of the horse as he himself was, of the liberal price that had been offered for him. But the comfortable way in which Jessie had gotten every thing ready for him against his return, dispelled a great portion of his sadness; and her cheerful looks and conversation, added to the pleasing pranks of his little children, had all but chased away the remainder, when he received a summons to attend a sick patient, living at least three miles away, in the country.

"This really is very provoking," said Job; "and the worst part of the business is, that I can do no good whatever—the poor creature is too far gone in consumption for the skill of the whole faculty put together to save her life; and, bless me, my poor Selim has not only carried me miles and miles over the road to-day, but, like an inconsiderate blockhead, I must gallop him after the hounds, across the country. But there, I suppose, I must go; I ought not to stay away from doing an act of charity, because I am certain not to be paid, or perhaps even thanked for my pains. Had it been a rich patient, I should have started readily enough, and so I will now for my poor one. But as Selim has had something more than a fair day's work of it, I must even make a walk of it, and be thankful I've such a good pair of legs to carry me."

Job had a very good pair of legs, and the consciousness of this gave him very great satisfaction; and so, having talked himself into a good humour, and into the mind for his work, and fearing lest pondering too long over the matter might induce him to change his resolution, he caught up his hat, and at once prepared to make a start of it; but, in his haste, he tripped over two or three steps of the stair, and falling down the remainder, sprained his ankle so badly, as to render his walking impracticable. Determined, however, not to abandon a duty he had made up his mind to perform, and having no other horse at his command, Selim was again saddled, who, even with only an hour's rest and grooming, looked nearly as fresh as if he had not been out of his stable for the day. Never was a man more pleased with a horse than Job was with the noble animal he then bestrode, and deeply did he regret the urgent necessity which compelled him to part with him. "Had it not been for that old miserly fellow in there, I might still have kept my poor Selim," said Job to himself, as he rode by a large mansion at the verge of the town; "that £100," continued Job, "he obliged me to pay him or his attorney, for taking away the remnant of my little property, is the cause of those very embarrassments which compel me to sell this dear good horse of mine."

Just as he had so said, an incident occurred which stopped his further remarks; but, before we mention what this incident was, we must state what was occurring within this said house at the time Job was in the act of riding past it.

The proprietor and occupant of this mansion—one of the best in the place—was, as our readers may have already suspected, the selfsame old timber merchant who had dealt so hardly with our friend Job, by taking advantage of a temporary depreciation in the value of his mortgaged property to acquire the absolute ownership—well knowing, that, in a very short time, the premises would fetch at least three times the amount of what he had advanced upon them; in fact, he sold them for more than four times that sum in less than six months afterwards: but that is not the matter we have now to deal with. We must therefore introduce our readers into one of the front rooms of this mansion, in which its master, (an elderly person, with the love of money—Satan's sure mark—deeply stamped upon his ungainly countenance,) was closeted with his attorney; the latter of whom was in the act of taking the necessary instructions for making the rich man's will—a kind of job the intended testator by no means relished, and which no power on earth, save the intense hatred he bore to the persons upon whom his property would otherwise devolve, could have forced him to take in hand.

"'Tis a bitter thing, Mr Grapple," said the monied man, addressing himself to the attorney, "a bitter thing to give away what one's been the best part of one's life trying to get together; and not only to receive nothing in return, but even to have to pay a lawyer for taking it away."

"But I'm sure, my good friend, you'll hardly begrudge my two guineas for this," observed the lawyer—"only think what a capital business I made in getting you into all Job Vivian's property."

"Well, but you got a hundred pounds for your trouble, didn't you?" observed the timber-merchant impatiently.

"Yes, my dear sir; but none of that came out of your own pocket," interposed the attorney.

"And didn't you promise nothing ever should?" rejoined the old man; "but never mind—business is business—and, when upon business, stick to the business you're on, that's my rule; so now to proceed—but mind, I say, them two guineas includes the paper."

"Oh yes, paper of course!" replied the man of law, "and nothing to pay for stamps; and this will enable you to dispose of every penny of your money; and, my dear sir, consider—only for one moment consider your charities—how they'll make all the folks stare some day or other!"

"Ay, ay, you're right," said the client, a faint smile for the first time that day enlivening his iron features. "Folks will stare indeed; and, besides, 'tis well know'd—indeed the Scripturs says, that charity do cover a multitude of sins."

"To be sure they do; and then only think of the name you'll leave behind to be handed down to posterity. Such munificent bequests nobody hereabouts ever heard of before."

"There's a satisfaction in all you say, I confess," observed the intended donor of all these good gifts; "and who can then say I wasn't the man to consider the wants of the poor? I always did consider the poor." So he did, an old scoundrel, and much misery the unhappy creatures endured in consequence.

"And then," resumed Mr Grapple, "only consider again the tablets in which all your pious bequests will be stuck up in letters of gold, just under the church organ, where they will be read and wondered at, not only by all the townsfolk for hundreds of years to come, but also by all the strangers that pass through and come to look at the church."

"Very satisfactory that—very!" said the intended testator; "but are you still sure I can't give my land as well as my money in charities?"

"Only by deed indented, and enrolled within six months after execution, and to take effect immediately," replied the attorney.

"By which you mean, I suppose, that I must give it out and out, slap bang all at once, and pass it right away in the same way as if I sold it outright?"

Lawyer Grapple replied in the affirmative; at which information his client got very red in the face, and exclaimed, with considerable warmth—"Before I do that, I'd see all the charities in ——" he didn't say where; and, checking himself suddenly, continued, in a milder tone—"That is, I could hardly be expected to make so great a sacrifice as that in my lifetime; so, as I can't dispose of my lands in the way I wish, I'll tie 'em up from being made away with as long as I can: for having neither wife, chick, nor child, nor any one living soul as I care a single farthing about, it's no pleasure to me to leave it to any body; but howsomever, as relations is in some shape, as the saying is, after a manner a part of one's own self, I suppose I'd better leave it to one of they."

"Your nephew who resides in Mortimer Street, is, I believe, your heir-at-law?" suggested Mr Grapple.

"He be blowed!" retorted the timber-merchant, petulantly; "he gave me the cut t'other day in Lunnun streets, for which I cuts he off with a shilling. Me make he my heir!—see he doubly hanged first, and wouldn't do it then."

The attorney next mentioned another nephew, who had been a major in the East India Company's service, and was then resident at Southampton.

"He!" vociferated the uncle, "a proud blockhead; I heerd of his goings on. He, the son of a hack writer in a lawyer's office! he to be the one, of all others, to be proposing that all the lawyers and doctors should be excluded from the public balls! I've a-heerd of his goings on. He have my property! Why, he'd blush to own who gid it to him. He have it! No; I'd rather an earthquake swallowed up every acre of it, before a shovel-full should come to his share."

"Then your other nephew at Exeter?" observed the attorney.

"Dead and buried, and so purvided for," said the timber-merchant.

"I beg your pardon, sir—I had for the moment forgotten that circumstance; but there's his brother, Mr Montague Potts Beverley, of Burton Crescent?"

"Wuss and wuss," interrupted the testy old man. "Me give any thing to an ungrateful dog like that? Why, I actelly lent he money on nothing but personal security, to set him up in business; and the devil of a ha-penny could I ever screw out of him beyond principal and legal interest at five per cent; and, now he's made his forten, he's ashamed of the name that made it for him—a mean-spirited, henpecked booby, that cast his name to the dogs to please a silly wife's vanity. He have my property! I rather calculate not! And so, having disposed of all they, I think I'll leave my estates to some of brother Thomas's sons. Now, Grapple, mind me; this is how I'll have it go. In the first place, intail it on my nephew Thomas, that's the tailor in Regent Street, who, they says, is worth some thousands already; so what I intends to give him, will come in nicely;—failing he and his issue, then intail it on Bill—you knows Bill—he comes here sometimes—travels for a house in the button line;—failing he and his issue, then upon Bob the letenant in the navy; he's at sea now, though I be hanged if I know the name of the ship he belongs to."

Mr Grapple observed that this was unimportant, and then asked if he should insert the names of any other persons.

"I don't know, really, or very much care whether you does or not," replied the timber-merchant. "My late brother Charles," he continued, "left three sons; but what's become of they all, or whether they be dead or alive, any of them, I can hardly tell, nor does it very much signify; for they were a set of extravagant, low-lived, drunken fellows, every one of them, and not very likely to mend either."

"Then, perhaps you'd rather your heirs at-law should take?" remarked the attorney.

"No, I'll be hanged if I should!" answered the vender of deals and mahogany; "so put in all brother Charles's sons, one after t'other, in the same manner as they before—let me see, what's their names? Oh, George first, then Robert, and then Richard, and that's the whole of they."

"I believe, sir," said the attorney, "before I can do so, I must beg the favour of a candle, for it's growing so dark I am unable to see what I write."

"Then come nigher to the winder," said the testator, pushing forward the table in that direction—"Hallo!" he exclaimed, "what can all this yer row and bustle be about outside?"—and, looking into the street, he discovered poor Selim lying prostrate in the middle of the road, from whence some persons were raising up Job himself, who was stunned and bleeding from the violence of his fall. A young lad had accidentally driven his hoop between the horse's legs, which threw the unlucky animal with such violence to the ground as to fracture one of its fore-legs, and inflict several other dreadful injuries, far beyond all power or hope of cure. But the man of wealth contemplated the passing scene with that species of complacent satisfaction, with which men like-minded with himself are ever found to regard the misfortunes of others, when they themselves can by no possibility be prejudiced thereby. This selfish old villain, therefore, instead of evincing any sympathy, was highly amused at what was going on, and every now and then passed some remark or other indicative of those feelings, of which the following, amongst others, afford a pretty fair specimen:—

"Well," he said, "pride they say must have a fall, and a fine fall we've had here to be sure. Well, who'd a-thought it? But what I say is, that for a man that can't pay his way as he goes—and his twenty shillings in the pound whenever he's called upon for it—what I mean to say is, if a fellow like he will ride so fine a horse, why, it serves him parfectly right if he gets his neck broke. Oh, then, I see your neck ar'n't broke this time, after all! Getting better, b'aint you?—pity, isn't it? Oh dear! what can the matter be? I'll be hanged if he isn't a-crying like a babbey that's broke his pretty toy. Ay, my master, cry your eyes out, stamp and whop your head—'twont mend matters, I promise ye. Clear case of total loss, and no insurance to look to, eh! And that's the chap as had the himpudence but t'other day to call me a hard-hearted old blackguard, and that before our whole board of guardians, too—just because I proposed doctoring the paupers by tender, and that the lowest tender should carry the day—a plan that would hactelly have saved the parish pounds and pounds; and he—that blubbering fellow there—hactelly, as I was a-saying, called me a hard-hearted old blackguard for proposing it. Oh! I see; here comes Timson the butcher, what next then? Oh! just as I expected—it's a done job with my nag, I see. Steady, John Donnithorne, and hold down his head. Come, Timson, my good man—come, bear a hand, and whip the knife into the throat of un—skilfully done, wasn't it, doctor? Oh dear! can't bear the sight; too much for the doctor's nerves. Ay—well, that's a good one—that's right; turn away your head and pipe your eye, my dear, I dare say it will do ye good. It does me, I know—he! he! he! Hallo! what have we here—is it a horse or is it a jackass? Well, I'm sure here's a come-down with a vengeance—a broken-knee'd, spavined jade of a pony, that's hardly fit for carrion. Oh! it's yours, Master Sweep, I s'pose. Ay, that's the kind of nag the doctor ought to ride; clap on the saddle, my boys—that's your sort; just as it should be. No, you can't look that way, can't ye? Well, then, mount and be off with ye—that's right; off you goes, and if you gets back again without a shy-off, it's a pity." And the hard-hearted old sinner laughed to that degree, that the tears ran down in streams over his deeply-furrowed countenance.

Chapter IX.

The two years that followed Job's untoward accident, instead of mending his fortunes, had only added to his embarrassments—all owing to his being just a hundred pounds behind the mark, which, as he often said, the price he could have obtained for poor Selim would have effectually prevented. His circumstances daily grew worse and worse, and at last became so desperate, that this patient and amiable couple were almost driven to their wits' end. Creditors, becoming impatient, at last resorted to legal remedies to recover their demands, until all his furniture was taken possession of under judicial process, which, being insufficient to discharge one half the debts for which judgments had been signed against him, he had no better prospect before his eyes than exchanging the bare walls of his present abode for the still more gloomy confines of a debtor's prison.

He had striven hard, but in vain, to bear all these trials with fortitude; and even poor Jessie—she who had hitherto never repined at the hardness of her lot, and who, to cheer her husband's drooping spirits, had worn a cheerful smile upon her countenance, whilst a load of sorrow pressed heavily upon her heart—even she now looked pale and sad, as with an anxious eye she stood by and watched poor Job, leaning with his back against the wall in an up-stairs room, now devoid of every article of furniture. And there he had been for hours, completely overcome by the accumulation of woes he saw no loophole to escape from; whilst his two little girls, terrified at the desolate appearance of every thing around them, and at the unusual agitation of their parents, were crouched together in a corner, fast grasped together, as if for mutual protection, in each other's arms.

Not a morsel of food had that day passed the lips of any member of that unhappy family, and every moveable belonging to the house had been taken away at an early hour in the morning; so that nothing but the bare walls were left for shelter, and hard boards for them to lie upon. Often had poor Jessie essayed to speak some words of comfort to her husband's ear; but even these, which had never before failed, were no longer at her command; for when some cheering thought suggested itself, a choking sensation in her throat deprived her of the power of uttering it. At length a loud single rap at the street door caused Job to start, whilst a hectic flush passed over his pale cheek, and a violent tremor shook his frame, as the dread thought of a prison occurred to him.

"Don't be alarmed, my dearest," said his wife, "it's only some people with something or other to sell; I dare say they'll go away again when they find that no one answers the door."

"It's a beggar," said one of the children, who, hearing the sound, had looked out of the window; "poor man, he looks miserably cold! I wish we'd something to give him."

"Beggar, did the child say?" demanded Job, gazing wildly round the room. "Beggar!" he repeated. "And what are we all but beggars? Are we not stripped of every thing? Are we not actually starving for want of the daily bread that I have toiled so hard for, and prayed unceasingly to heaven to afford us; whilst those who never use their Maker's name except in terms of blasphemy, have loads of affluence heaped into their laps. Oh! it's enough to make one doubt"——

"Oh, no, no, no! don't, for the love you bear me—don't utter those awful words!" cried out Jessie, rushing upon her husband, and throwing her arms around his neck. "As you love me, don't repine at the will of heaven, however hard our trials may seem now to bear on us. I can endure all but this. Let us hope still. We have all of us health and strength; and we have many friends who, if they were only aware of the extent of our distress, would be sure to relieve us. There's your good friend Mr Smith, he most probably will return from London to-morrow; and you know, in his letter, he told you to keep up your spirits, for that there was yet good-luck in store for you; and I am sure you must have thought so then, or you never would have returned him the money he so kindly remitted us. So, don't be cast down in almost your first hour of trial; we shall be happy yet—I know we shall; let us then still put our trust in God. Don't answer me, my dear Job—don't answer me; I know how much you are excited, and that you are not now yourself; for my sake, for our dear children's sake, try to be tranquil but for to-night; and let us yet hope that there is some comfort yet in store for us on the morrow."

"I will strive to, my dearest Jessie," he replied. "I'll not add another drop of bitterness to your cup of sorrow, because I am unable to relieve you from it.—But hark! what's this coming, and stopping here too?—what can be the meaning of this?"

Just as he uttered these last words the sound of carriage-wheels was heard rapidly approaching, and a post-chaise drew up in front of the house. Job trembled violently, and leant upon his wife for support, whilst a thundering rap was heard at the door; the children both rushed to the window; and one of them, to the great relief of their parents, exclaimed, "Oh! my dear papa! Mr Smith's come, and he's looking up here smiling so good-naturedly; he looks as if he was just come off a journey, and he's beckoning me to come down and let him in."

"God be praised!" exclaimed Jessie; "I told you, my dear Job, that relief was near at hand, and here it comes in the person of your excellent friend;" and she darted out of the room, and hurried down the stairs to admit the welcome visitor. Jessie soon returned with Mr Smith, a handsome gentlemanly-looking man, who ran forward with extended hands to his disconsolate friend, whom he greeted in so kind a manner, and with a countenance so merry and happy, that the very look of it seemed enough to impart some spirit of consolation even to a breaking heart—at any rate it did to Job's. "My dear fellow!" exclaimed the welcome visitor, "how on earth did you allow things to come to this pass without even hinting any thing of the kind to me? I never heard it till the day I left town. How could you return me the remittance I sent you, which should have been ten times as much had I known the full extent of your wants? But enough of this now; we won't waste time in regrets for the past, and as for the future, leave that to me. I'll soon set things all straight and smooth again for you. And now, my dear Mrs Vivian," added he, addressing himself to Jessie, "do you go and do as you promised."

Jessie smiled assent, and, looking quite happy again, she took her two daughters by the hand and led them out of the room.

"But, my dear Smith," said Job, as soon as the two friends were alone, "you can have no idea how deeply I am involved. I can tax your generosity no further—even what you have already done for me, I can never repay."

"Nor do I intend you ever shall," rejoined the worthy attorney—for such was Mr Smith—"particularly," he added, "as there's a certain debt I owe you, which I neither can nor will repay, and that I candidly tell you."

"Indeed! what do you mean?" asked Job, looking very puzzled; "I'm rather dull of apprehension to-day." And verily he was so, for his troubles had wellnigh driven him mad.

"My life, Job, that's all," replied the attorney; "that I owe to you, and can't repay you—and won't either, that's more. Had it not been for your skill," he added in a graver tone, "and the firmness you displayed in resolutely opposing the treatment those two blackguards, Dunderhead and Quackem, wished to adopt in my case, I must have died a most distressing and painful death, and my poor wife and children would have been left perfectly destitute."

The consciousness of the truth of this grateful remark infused a cheering glow to Job's broken spirit, and even raised a faint smile upon his care-worn countenance; which his visitor perceiving, went on to say, "And now, my good doctor, owing you so deep a debt of gratitude as I do, make your mind easy about the past; what you've had from me is a mere trifle. Why, my good fellow, I'm not the poor unhappy dog I was when you told me never to mind when I paid you. I'm now getting on in the world, and shall fancy by and by that I'm getting rich; and, what's more, I expect soon to see my friend Job Vivian in circumstances so much more thriving than my own, that if I didn't know him to be one of the sincerest fellows in the world, and one whom no prosperity could spoil, I should begin to fear he might be ashamed to acknowledge his old acquaintance."

The good-natured attorney had proved more of a Job's comforter in the literal sense of the term, than he had intended; in fact he had overdone it—the picture was too highly coloured to appear natural, and at once threw back poor Job upon a full view of all his troubles, which Mr Smith perceiving, mildly resumed, "I'm not surprised, my good fellow, at your being excited, from the violent shock your feelings must have sustained; but you may rest assured—mind I speak confidently, and will vouch for the truth of what I'm going to say—when I tell you that the worst of your troubles are past, and that, before the week is out, you will be going on all right again; but really you are so much depressed now, that I'm afraid to encourage you too much; for I believe you doctors consider that too sudden a transition from grief to joy often produces dangerous, and sometimes even fatal, consequences?"

"It's a death I stand in no dread of dying," said Job with a melancholy smile.

"You don't know your danger perhaps," interposed the attorney; "but at the same time you sha'n't die through my means; so, if I had even a berth in store for you that I thought might better your condition, I wouldn't now venture to name it to you."

"It might be almost dangerous," said Job; "any thing that would procure the humblest fare, clothing, and shelter, for myself and family, would confer a degree of happiness far beyond my expectation."

"Why, if you are so easily satisfied," rejoined the attorney, "I think I can venture to say, that these, at least, may be obtained for you forthwith; but come, here's the chaise returned again, which has just taken your good little wife and children to my house, where they're all now expecting us. In fact, I haven't yet crossed my own threshold, for I picked up my old woman as I came along, and she has taken your folks back with her; so come along, Job, we'll talk matters over after dinner—come along, my dear fellow—come along, come along."

Job suffered himself to be led away, hardly knowing what he was about, or what was going on, until he found himself seated in the post-chaise; which, almost before he had time to collect his scattered ideas, drew up at the attorney's door. Here he met his Jessie, her handsome and expressive countenance again radiant with smiles; for in that short interval she had heard enough to satisfy her mind that better times were approaching, and her only remaining anxiety was on poor Job's account, who seemed so stunned by the heavy blow of misfortune, as to appear more like one wandering in a dream than a man in his right senses. But a change of scene, and that the pleasing one of a comfortable family dinner, with sincere friends, effected a wonderful alteration; and the ladies withdrawing early, in order that the gentlemen might talk over their business together, Mr Smith at once entered into the subject, by telling Job that he thought he could, as he had before hinted, put him into a way of bettering his condition.

"I trust you may be able to do so," replied Job; "I'm sure there's no labour I would shrink from, could I attain so desirable an object."

"But you mistake me there," interrupted the attorney; "I don't mean to better your condition by making you work yourself to death—far from it; your labours shall be but light, and your time pretty much at your command; but you'll want, perhaps, a little money to begin with."

"And where, in the world, am I to procure it?" asked Job.

"You might raise it upon the interest you take in the landed property under the old timber-merchant's will," observed the attorney.

"You can hardly be serious, my dear Smith," replied Job; "why, the old fellow—God forgive him as freely as I do—merely put in my name with a bequest of a shilling, to bring me better luck, as a poor insult upon my misfortunes. And as to his mentioning my name in connexion with his landed property, which I was to take after the failure of issue of at least half a dozen other people—you yourself told me was only put in to show his nearest heirs, that rather than his property should descend upon them, they should go to the person—Heaven help the man!—he was pleased to call his greatest enemy, and that my chance of ever succeeding to the property wasn't worth twopence."

"Whatever his motive was is immaterial now," interposed Mr Smith; "and since I expressed the opinion you allude to, so many of the previous takers have died off, that I have no hesitation in saying that your interest is worth money now, and that, if you wished it, I could insure you a purchaser."

"Oh, then, sell it by all means!" exclaimed Job.

"Not quite so fast, my friend," answered the attorney; "before you think of selling, would it not be prudent to ascertain the value, which depends in a great measure on the number of preceding estates that have determined since the testator's decease."

"Of course it must," rejoined Job; "but any thing I could obtain from that quarter I should esteem a gain. I've lost enough from it in all conscience; in fact, the old man's harsh proceedings towards me were the foundation of all my subsequent difficulties. The old fellow did, indeed, boast to the clergyman who visited him in his last illness, that he had made me ample amends in his will for any injustice he might have done me in his lifetime, and that his mind was quite easy upon that score; and I'm sure mine will be, when I find that I actually can gain something by him."

"Then listen to me patiently, and I'll tell you just what you'll gain; but first help yourself, and pass me the wine. You'll gain a larger amount than you would guess at, if you were to try for a week. Much more than sufficient to pay every one of your creditors their full twenty shillings in the pound."

"Will it indeed?" exclaimed Job; "then may God forgive me as one of the most ungrateful of sinners, who had almost begun to think that the Almighty had deserted him."

"Forgive you, to be sure," said the kind-hearted lawyer; "why, even your holy namesake, the very pattern of patient resignation, would grumble a bit now and then, when his troubles pinched him in a particularly sore place. So take another glass whilst I proceed with our subject: and so you see, doctor, your debts are paid—that's settled. Hold your tongue, Job; don't interrupt me, and drink your wine; that's good port, isn't it? the best thing in the world for your complaint. Well, then, all this may be done without selling your chance outright; and in case you should want to do so, lest you should part with it too cheaply, we'll just see how many of the preceding estates have already determined. First, the testator himself must be disposed of; he died, as we all know, and nobody sorry, within six weeks after he had made his will. Then the tailor in Regent Street, he had scarcely succeeded to the property when he suddenly dropped down dead in his own shop. His son and heir, and only child, before he had enjoyed the property six months, wishing to acquire some fashionable notoriety, purposely got into a quarrel with a profligate young nobleman well known about town, who killed him in a duel the next morning. The traveller in the button line, on whom the property next devolved, was in a bad state of health when he succeeded to it, and died a bachelor about three months since; and his brother, the lieutenant, who was also unmarried, had died of a fever on the coast of Africa some time before; so that you see your chance seems to be bettered at least one half, in the course of little more than a couple of twelvemonths."

"So it has, indeed," said Job; "but who, with the other three remainder men, as you call them, and their issue in the way, would give any thing for my poor chance?"

"But suppose," resumed Mr Smith, "the other three should happen to die, and leave no issue."

"That's a species of luck not very likely to fall to my lot," replied Job.

"Then I must at once convince you of your error," rejoined Mr Smith; "and, so to cut short what I've been making a very long story of—the remaining three of the testator's nephews, upon whom the property was settled, not one of whom was ever married, got drunk together at a white-bait dinner at Greenwich, which their elder brother gave to celebrate his accession to the property, and, returning towards town in that state in a wherry, they managed between them to upset the boat, and were all drowned. That I've ascertained—such, in fact, being my sole business in town; and now, my dear Job, let me congratulate you on being the proprietor of at least five thousand a-year."

And so he was!

"And thus you see," said the squire, in whose own words we conclude the tale—"the being dispossessed of his houses, and the loss of his valuable horse, to which he attributed all his misfortunes, in the end proved the source of his greatest gain; and now, throughout the whole length and breadth of the land, I don't think you'll find two persons better satisfied with their lot than Job and his little wife Jessie, notwithstanding the timber-merchant made it a condition, that if Job Vivian should ever succeed to his property, he should take the testator's surname of Potts—not a pretty one, I confess—and thus Job Vivian, surgeon, apothecary, &c., has become metamorphosed into the Job Vivian Potts, Esquire, who has now the honour to address you. His worthy friend, Smith—now, alas! no more—who, like my self, was induced to change his name, was Mr Vernon Wycherley's father. I told you, my dear sir, before, how valued a friend your late father was of mine, and how much I stood indebted to him; but this is the first time I have made you acquainted with any of the particulars, and now I fear I've tired you with my tedious narration."

"Indeed you have not!" exclaimed both the young men, whilst Vernon added, that he only regretted not knowing who the parties were during the progress of the tale, which, had he done, he should have listened to it with redoubled interest; for who amongst the thousands of Smiths dispersed about the land, though he had once a father of the name, could be expected to recognise him as part hero of a tale he had never heard him allude to; "but pray tell me," he added, "about the poor girl you went to see at the time the accident occurred to your horse? Did she ever recover?"

"No," replied the squire, "she died within a few days afterwards. In fact, as I believe I before stated, I knew she was past all hope of recovery at the time I set off to visit her."

"And the little broken-knee'd and spavined pony you were compelled to borrow—do pray tell us how he carried you?" interposed Frank, looking as demure and innocent as possible.

"Badly, very badly, indeed!" replied the squire; "for the sorry brute stumbled at nearly every third step, and at last tumbling down in real earnest, threw me sprawling headlong into the mud; and then favoured me with a sight of his heels, with the prospect of a couple of miles before me to hobble home through the rain."

Chapter X.

Frank Trevelyan, one morning on opening his eyes, was surprised to discover his friend, Mr Vernon Wycherley, (whose lameness was by this time sufficiently amended to permit him to move about with the aid of a stick,) sitting half dressed by his bedside—a very cool attire for so chill a morning, and looking very cold and miserable.

"Hallo! old fellow, what on earth brought you here at this time of day?" asked Frank. "The first morning visit, I believe, you've honoured me with since we took up our quarters in this neighbourhood."

"I'm very wretched," said the poet in a faltering tone—"very unhappy."

"Unhappy!" reiterated Frank; "why, what on earth have you to make you so, unless it be the apprehension that you may jump out of your skin for joy at your splendid prospects! Unhappy indeed!—the notion's too absurd to obtain a moment's credit."

"Can a man suffering under a hopeless attachment for an object too pure almost to tread the earth—can a man, whose affections are set upon an unattainable object, be otherwise than unhappy?" asked Vernon in a solemn tone, no bad imitation of Macready; indeed the speaker, whilst uttering these sentiments, thought it sounded very like it; for he had often seen that eminent tragedian, and greatly admired his style of acting.

"But how have you ascertained that the object is so unattainable?" demanded Frank. "Come now—have you ever yet asked the young lady the question?"

"Asked her!" repeated Vernon, perfectly amazed that his friend could have supposed such a thing possible—"How could I presume that so angelic a creature would love such a fellow as me—or, even supposing such a thing were possible, what would our good friend the squire say to my ingratitude for his great kindness; and to my presumption—a mere younger son without a profession, and scarcely a hundred pounds a-year to call his own, to think of proposing to one of his daughters, who would be an honour to the noblest and richest peer of the realm?"

"Well, well, Vernon—one thing first—and you shall have my answers to all. First, then, as to the fair lady liking you—that I must say, judging from your looks, is what no one would have thought a very probable circumstance; but then your poetical talents must be taken into calculation."

"Oh, don't mention them!" said Vernon. "Worse than good-for-nothing. She esteems such talents very lightly, and I shall even lose the small solace to my sorrows I had hoped they would have afforded me. Even this sad consolation is denied me. My Mary is indifferent to poetry—she holds sonnets upon hopeless love in utter contempt—entertains no higher opinion of the writers of them—and considers publishing any thing of the kind as a downright ungentlemanly act; bringing, as she says it does, a lady's name before the public in the most indelicate and unwarrantable manner."

"But is she really serious in these sentiments?" asked Frank. Oh, Frank, Frank, you're a sad fellow to pump and roast your friend in this way!

"Serious," repeated Vernon, and looking very so himself, "serious—ah! indeed she is—and expressed herself with more warmth upon the subject than I could have supposed a being so mild and amiable was capable of."

"But how came all this?" asked Frank—"what were you talking about that could have caused her to make these remarks?" and this he said in a very grave and quiet tone of voice, trying to entrap his poetic friend into telling him much more than the latter was inclined to do, who, therefore, declined entering more fully into the subject.

"Then, if you won't tell me, I have still the privilege of guessing," rejoined Frank; "and now I've found you out, Master Vernon; you've been attempting acrostics after the Petrarch style[15]—a style in which she didn't approve of being held forth to the admiring notice of the present and future generations. Vernon blushed to the very tips of his fingers, and averted his head that his friend might not perceive how very foolish he was looking, whilst the latter continued—"Very pretty stanzas, I've no doubt. How nice they would have come out in a neat little 12mo, price 2s. 6d., boards. Let me see—M—O—L, Mol—that's three; L—Y, ly—two more, makes Molly; and three and two make five. P—O double T—S, Potts—that's five more, and five and five make ten. But then that's a couple of letters too many. Petrarch's Lauretta, you know, only made eight. Yet, after all, if you liked it, you might leave out the Y and the S at the end of each name, without at all exceeding the usual poetical license. Let me see, M—O double L, Moll; P—O double T, Pott—Moll Pott; or you might retain the Y and leave out the last T—S—or you might"—

Vernon could bear no more; and having risen abruptly with the intention of making a bolt of it, was in the act of hobbling out of the room as fast as his lameness would allow him, when Frank entreated him to stay but one minute; promising to spare his jokes, for that he really wished to speak seriously with him; and, having succeeded in pacifying the enraged poet, proceeded to ask him what he actually intended doing.

"To leave this either to-day or to-morrow," replied Vernon in a tremulous voice, and with a quivering lip.

"But not without breaking your mind to your lady love?"

"Why, alas! should I do so—why pain her by confessing to her my unhappy attachment, which I know it is hopeless to expect her to return."

"I'll be hanged," said Frank, "if I think you know any thing at all about the matter."

"Not know, indeed! How, alas! could any one suppose that an angelic creature like her could love me?"

"Not many, I grant; but then, as old Captain Growler used to say—never be astonished at any thing a woman does in that way—

'Pan may win where Phœbus woos in vain.'

And so the lovely Miss Moll—I beg your pardon, Mary, I mean—may in like manner, do so differently from what any one could have suspected, as to be induced at last to listen to her Vernon's tale of love."

The lover here alluded to hardly knew whether to treat the matter as a joke or to get very angry; and so he did neither, whilst Frank went on—"I'm sure you needn't despair either, as far as looks go. There's pretty, smiling, little Bessie—in my opinion the prettiest girl of the two"—Vernon shook his head with mournful impatience—"Well, you think yours prettiest, and I'll think mine," continued Frank; "that's just as it should be; and as I was about to say, if the lovely Bessie can smile upon your humble servant when he talked of love, I don't see why her sister might not be induced to smile upon his companion if he did the like."

"How! what? Why, you surely don't mean to say that you've told Miss Bessie that you love her?"

"Yes, I do," replied Frank. "I told her so yesterday afternoon as we walked home from church, behind the rest of the party, across the fields. Thought I wouldn't do it then either, as there were so many people about—never said a word about the matter over two fields—helped her over the stiles, too, and talked—no, I be hanged if I think we said a word, either of us—till as I was helping her to jump down the third, out it bounced, all of a sudden."

"And what did you say?" asked Wycherley.

"Catch a weasel asleep, Mr Vernon," was Frank's reply.

"But the squire, how will you manage with him, do you suppose?"

"Managed with him already," replied Frank; "settled every thing last night over a glass of port, after you'd bundled your lazy carcass off to bed. That is, one glass didn't quite complete the business, for it took two or three to get my courage up to concert pitch. Then another or two to discuss the matter—and then a bumper to drink success—and then another glass"—

"Another!" interrupted Vernon; "why, you little drunken rascal, what pretext could you have for that?"

"I've a great mind not to tell you for your rude question," resumed Frank laughing; "but never mind, old fellow, you've borne a great deal from me before now, and there's probably more in store for you yet; so without further preamble I'll at once answer your question, by informing you that the pretext for my last glass was to wet a dry discourse about the affairs of one Mr Vernon Wycherley. Now, hold your tongue, and don't interrupt me, or swallow me either, which you appear to be meditating. And so the squire asked me if I had known him long, and about his principles, religious and moral; his worldly prospects, and so forth. To all of which I replied by stating, that, with the exception of being addicted to flirting a little with the Muses, which old women might consider as only one step removed from absolute profligacy, he was a well-disposed young man, and would doubtless grow wiser as he increased in years; but that his fortune was very limited, and that all his expectations in that way wouldn't fill a nutshell."

"Ah, there's the rub!" interposed Vernon; "how can a poor fellow with my small pittance pretend to aspire to the hand of one with such splendid expectations? My poverty, as I've long foreseen, must mar my every hope, even if every other obstacle could be removed."

"I don't see that exactly," rejoined Frank; "for, when I told the squire what your circumstances actually were, and that you had managed to live creditably upon your small income without getting into debt, he said, if your head wasn't crammed so confoundedly full of poetical nonsense, which set you always hunting after shadows, instead of grasping substances, he should be exceedingly rejoiced to have you for a son-in-law. So, if you could make up your mind to relinquish your love for writing poetry"—

"The poetry be hanged!" interrupted Vernon with considerable vehemence. "I'll cast it to the dogs—the winds—send it to Halifax, Jericho, any where. Oh! my dear Frank, what a happy fellow you've made me!"

"Which just finished the bottle," continued Frank; "and I find that somehow or other I've got a precious headach this morning. I wonder how the squire feels to-day. Will you Vernon, that's a good fellow, give me a glass of water?"

"There's nothing on earth I wouldn't give you now, my dear Frank, except my dear Mary; but do you think she will ever consent?"

"Yes, to be sure she will," answered Frank. "I know she will, and that she is by no means best pleased at your hanging fire so long. I know this to be the fact, though I mustn't tell you how, why, or wherefore; but if you don't propose soon she'll consider you are acting neither fairly nor honourably to her."

"I'll do the deed to-day," said Vernon resolutely.

And so he did.

---

A very few months more had passed away, before our two heroes were on the same day united to the fair objects of their choice; and the generous old squire settled a handsome sum upon them both, sufficient to supply them with all the essential comforts of life.

"And now, friend Frank," said Vernon Wycherley, "I believe, after all, you will make a convert of me; for I find that the attachment I had indulged in, until despair of obtaining the loved object made me fancy myself the most miserable wretch alive, and that I had incurred the worst evil that could have befallen me, has made me the happiest of mankind, and has indeed turned out to be ALL FOR THE BEST; nor can I think of my blundering fall into the lead shaft in any other light; as, but for that accident, I should probably never have formed the acquaintance to which I owe all my good fortune."

"Then, for the future," said the worthy squire, "let us put all our trust in Heaven, and rest assured that whatever may be the will of Providence, IT'S ALL FOR THE BEST."

---

THE ROMAN CAMPAGNA.

There is no district in Europe which is more remarkable, or has more strongly impressed the minds of men in modern times, than the Roman Campagna. Independent of the indelible associations with which it is connected, and the glorious deeds of which it has been the theatre, its appearance produces an extraordinary impression on the mind of the beholder. All is silent; the earth seems struck with sterility—desolation reigns in every direction. A space extending from Otricoli to Terracina, above sixty miles in length, and on an average twenty in breadth, between the Apennines and the sea, containing nearly four thousand square miles, in the finest part of Italy, does not maintain a single peasant.[16] A few tombs lining the great roads which issued from the forum of Rome to penetrate to the remotest parts of their immense empire; the gigantic remains of aqueducts striding across the plain, which once brought, and some of which still bring, the pellucid fountains of the Apennines to the Eternal City, alone attest the former presence of man. Nothing bespeaks his present existence. Not a field is ploughed, not a blade of corn grows, hardly a house is to be seen, in this immense and dreary expanse. On entering it, you feel as if you were suddenly transported from the garden of Europe to the wilds of Tartary. Shepherds armed with long lances, as on the steppes of the Don, and mounted on small and hardy horses, alone are occasionally seen following, or searching in the wilds for the herds of savage buffaloes and cattle which pasture the district. The few living beings to be met with at the post-houses, have the squalid melancholy look which attests permanent wretchedness, and the ravages of an unhealthy atmosphere.

But though the curse of Providence seems to have fallen on the land, so far as the human race is concerned, it is otherwise with the power of physical nature. Vegetation yearly springs up with undiminished vigour. It is undecayed since the days of Cincinnatus and the Sabine farm. Every spring the expanse is covered with a carpet of flowers, which enamel the turf and conceal the earth with a profusion of varied beauty. So rich is the herbage which springs up with the alternate heats and rains of summer, that it becomes in most places rank, and the enormous herds which wander over the expanse are unable to keep it down. In autumn this rich grass becomes russet-brown, and a melancholy hue clothes the slopes which environ the Eternal City. The Alban Mount, when seen from a distance, clothed as it is with forests, vineyards, and villas, resembles a green island rising out of a sombre waste of waters. In the Pontine marshes, where the air is so poisonous in the warm months that it is dangerous, and felt as oppressive even by the passing traveller, the prolific powers of nature are still more remarkable. Vegetation there springs up with the rapidity, and flourishes with the luxuriance, of tropical climates. Tall reeds, in which the buffaloes are hid, in which a rhinoceros might lie concealed, spring up in the numerous pools or deep ditches with which the dreary flat surface is sprinkled. Wild grapes of extraordinary fecundity grow in the woods, and ascend in luxuriant clusters to the tops of the tallest trees. Nearer the sea, a band of noble chestnuts and evergreen oaks attests the riches of the soil, which is capable of producing such magnificent specimens of vegetable life; and over the whole plain the extraordinary richness of the herbage, and luxuriance of the aquatic plants, bespeaks a region which, if subjected to a proper culture and improvement, would, like the Delta of Egypt, reward eighty and an hundred fold the labours of the husbandman.

It was not thus in former times. The Campagna now so desolate, the Pontine marshes now so lonely, were then covered with inhabitants. Veiæ, long the rival of Rome, and which was only taken after a siege as protracted as that of Troy by Camillus at the head of fifty thousand men, stood only ten miles from the Capitol. The Pontine marshes were inhabited by thirty nations. The freehold of Cincinnatus, the Sabine farm, stood in the now desolate plain at the foot of the Alban Mount. So rich were the harvests, so great the agricultural booty to be gathered in the plains around Rome, that for two hundred years after the foundation of the city, it was the great object of their foreign wars to gain possession of it, and on that account they were generally begun in autumn. Montesquieu has observed, that it was the long and desperate wars which the Romans carried on for three centuries with the Sabines, Latines, Veientes, and other people in their neighbourhood, which by slow degrees gave them the hardihood and discipline which enabled them afterwards to subdue the world. The East was an easy conquest, the Gauls themselves could be repelled, Hannibal in the end overcome, after the tribes of Latium had been vanquished. But the district in which the hardy races dwelt, who so long repelled, and maintained a doubtful conflict with the future masters of the world, is now a desert. It could not in its whole extent furnish men to fill a Roman cohort. Rome has emerged from its long decay after the fall of the Western Empire; the terrors of the Vatican, the shrine of St Peter, have again attracted the world to the Eternal City; and the most august edifice ever raised by the hands of man to the purposes of religion, has been reared within its walls. But the desolate Campagna is still unchanged.

Novelists and romance-writers have for centuries exhausted their imaginative and descriptive powers in developing the feelings which this extraordinary phenomenon, in the midst of the classic land of Italy, awakens. They have spoken of desolation as the fitting shroud of departed greatness; of the mournful feelings which arise on approaching the seat of lost empire; of the shades of the dead alone tenanting the scene of so much glory. Such reflections arise unbidden in the mind; the most unlettered traveller is struck with the melancholy impression. An eloquent Italian has described this striking spectacle:—"A vast solitude, stretching for miles, as far as the eye can reach. No shelter, no resting-place, no defence for the wearied traveller; a dead silence, interrupted only by the sound of the wind which sweeps over the plain, or the trickling of a natural fountain by the wayside; not a cottage nor the curling of smoke to be seen; only here and there a cross on a projecting eminence to mark the spot of a murder; and all this in gentle slopes, dry and fertile plains, and up to the gates of great city."[17] The sight of the long lines of ruined aqueducts traversing the deserted Campagna, of the tombs scattered along the lines of the ancient chaussées across its dreary expanse, of the dome of St Peter's alone rising in solitary majesty over its lonely hills, forcibly impress the mind, and produce an impression which no subsequent events or lapse of time are able to efface. At this moment the features of the scene, the impression it produces, are as present to the mind of the writer as when they were first seen thirty years ago.

But striking as these impressions are, the Roman Campagna is fraught with instruction of a more valuable kind. It stands there, not only a monument of the past, but a beacon for the future. It is fraught with instruction, not only to the ancient but the modern world. The most valuable lessons of political wisdom which antiquity has bequeathed to modern times, are to be gathered amidst its solitary ruins.

In investigating the causes of this extraordinary desolation of a district, in ancient times the theatre of such busy industry, and which, for centuries, maintained so great and flourishing a rural population, there are several observations to be made on the principle, as logicians call it, of exclusion, in order to clear the ground before the real cause is arrived at.

The first of these is, that the causes, whatever they are, which produced the desolation of the Campagna, had begun to operate, and their blasting effect was felt, in ancient times, and long before a single squadron of the barbarians had crossed the Alps. In fact, the Campagna was a scene of active agricultural industry only so long as Rome was contending with its redoubtable Italian neighbours—the Latins, the Etruscans, the Samnites, and the Cisalpine Gauls. From the time that, by the conquest of Carthage, they obtained the mastery of the shore of the Mediterranean, agriculture in the neighbourhood of Rome began to decline. Pasturage was found to be a more profitable employment of estates; and the vast supplies of grain, required for the support of the citizens of Rome, were obtained by importation from Lybia and Egypt, where they could be raised at a less expense. "At, Hercule," says Tacitus, "olim ex Italia legionibus longinquas in provincias commeatus portabantur; nec nunc infecunditate laboratur: sed Africam potius et Egyptum exercemus, navibusque et casibus vita populi Romani permissa est."[18] The expense of cultivating grain in a district where provisions and wages were high because money was plentiful, speedily led to the abandonment of tillage in the central parts of Italy, when the unrestrained importation of grain from Egypt and Lybia, where it could be raised at less expense in consequence of the extension of the Roman dominions over those regions, took place. "More lately," says Sismondi, "the gratuitous distributions of grain made to the Roman people, rendered the cultivation of grain in Italy still more unprofitable: it then became absolutely impossible for the little proprietors to maintain themselves in the neighbourhood of Rome; they became insolvent, and their patrimonies were sold to the rich. Gradually the abandonment of agriculture extended from one district to another. The true country of the Romans—central Italy—had scarcely achieved the conquest of the globe, when it found itself without an agricultural population. In the provinces peasants were no longer to be found to recruit the legions; as few corn-fields to nourish them. Vast tracts of pasturage, where a few slave shepherds conducted herds of thousands of horned cattle, had supplanted the nations who had brought their greatest triumphs to the Roman people."[19] These great herds of cattle were then, as now, in the hands of a few great proprietors. This was loudly complained of, and signalized as the cancer which would ruin the Roman empire, even so early as the time of Pliny. "Verumque confitentibus," says he, "latifunda perdidêre Italiam; imo ac provincias."[20]

All the historians of the decline and fall of the Roman empire, have concurred in ascribing to these two causes—viz. the decay of agriculture and ruin of the agricultural population in Italy, and consequent engrossing of estates in the hands of the rich—the ruin of its mighty dominion. But it is not generally known how wide-spread had been the desolation thus produced; how deep and incurable the wounds inflicted on the vitals of the state—by the simple consequences of its extension, which enabled the grain growers of the distant provinces of the empire to supplant the cultivators of its heart by the unrestricted admission of foreign corn, before the invasion of the northern nations commenced. In fact, however, the evil was done before they appeared on the passes of the Alps; it was the weakness thus brought on the central provinces which rendered them unable to contend with enemies whom they had often, in former times, repelled and subdued. A few quotations from historians of authority, will at once establish this important proposition.

"Since the age of Tiberius," says Gibbon, "the decay of agriculture had been felt in Italy; and it was a just subject of complaint, that the laws of the Roman people depended on the accidents of the winds and the waves. In the division and decline of the empire, the tributary harvests of Egypt and Africa were withdrawn; the numbers of the inhabitants continually diminished with the means of subsistence; and the country was exhausted by the irretrievable losses of war, pestilence and famine. Pope Gelasius was a subject of Odoacer, and he affirms, with strong exaggeration, that in Emilia, Tuscany, and the adjacent provinces, the human species was almost extirpated."[21] Again the same accurate author observes in another place—"Under the emperors the agriculture of the Roman provinces was insensibly ruined; and the government was obliged to make a merit of remitting tributes which their subjects were utterly unable to pay. Within sixty years of the death of Constantine, and on the evidence of an actual survey, an exemption was granted in favour of three hundred and thirty thousand English acres of desert and uncultivated land in the fertile and happy Campania, which amounted to an eighth of the whole province. As the footsteps of the barbarians had not yet been seen in Italy, the cause of this amazing desolation, which is recorded in the laws,[22] can be ascribed only to the administration of the Roman emperors."[23]

The two things which, beyond all question, occasioned this extraordinary decline of domestic agriculture in Italy before the invasion of the barbarians commenced, were the weight of direct taxation, and the decreasing value of agricultural produce, owing to the constant importation of grain from Egypt and Lybia, where, owing to the cheapness of labour and the fertility of the soil in those remote provinces, so burdensome did the first become, that Gibbon tells us that, in the time of Constantine, in Gaul it amounted to nine pounds sterling of gold on every freeman.[24] The periodical distribution of grain to the populace of Rome, all of which, from its greater cheapness, was brought by the government from Egypt and Africa, utterly extinguished the market for corn to the Italian farmers, though Rome, at its capture by Alaric, still contained 1,200,000 inhabitants. "All the efforts of the Christian emperors," says Michelet, "to arrest the depopulation of the country, were as nugatory as those of their heathen predecessors had been. Sometimes alarmed at the depopulation, they tried to mitigate the lot of the farmer, to shield him against the landlord; upon this the proprietor exclaimed, he could no longer pay the taxes. At other times they strove to chain the cultivators to the soil; but they became bankrupts or fled, and the land became deserted. Pertinax granted an immunity of taxes to such cultivators from distant provinces as would occupy the deserted lands of Italy. Aurelian did the same. Probus, Maximian, and Constantine, were obliged to transport men and oxen from Germany to cultivate Gaul. But all was in vain. The desert extended daily. The people in the fields surrendered themselves in despair, as a beast of burden lies down beneath his load and refuses to rise."[25]

Gibbon has told us what it was which occasioned this constant depopulation of the country, and ruin of agriculture in the Italian provinces. "The Campagna of Rome," says he, "about the close of the sixth century, was reduced to a state of dreary wilderness, in which the air was infectious, the land barren, and the waters impure. Yet the number of citizens still exceeded the measure of subsistence; their precarious food was supplied from the harvests of Lybia and Egypt; and the frequent recurrence of famine, betrayed the inattention of the emperor at Constantinople to the wants of a distant province."[26] Nor was Italy the only province in the heart of the empire which was ruined by those foreign importations. Greece suffered not less severely under it. "In the latter stages of the empire," says Michelet, "Greece was supported almost entirely by corn raised in the plains of Poland."[27]

These passages, to which, did our limits permit, innumerable others to the same purpose might be added, explain the causes of the decay and ultimate ruin of agriculture in the central provinces of the Roman empire, as clearly as if one had arisen from the dead to unfold it. It was the weight of direct taxation, and the want of remunerating prices to the grain cultivators, which occasioned the evil. The first arose from the experienced impossibility of raising additional taxes on industry by indirect taxation: the unavoidable consequence of the contraction of the currency, owing to the habits of hoarding which the frequent incursions of the barbarians produced; and of the free importation of African grain, which the extension of the empire over its northern provinces, and the clamours of the Roman populace for cheap bread, occasioned. The second arose directly from that importation itself. The Italian cultivator, oppressed with direct taxes, and tilling a comparatively churlish soil, found himself utterly unable to compete with the African cultivators, with whom the process of production was so much cheaper owing to the superior fertility of the soil under the sun of Lybia, or the fertilizing floods of the Nile. Thence the increasing weight of direct taxation, the augmented importation of foreign grain, the disappearance of free cultivators in the central provinces, the impossibility of recruiting the legions with freemen, and the ruin of the empire.

And that it was something pressing upon the cultivation of grain, not of agriculture generally, which occasioned these disastrous results, is decisively proved by the fact, that, down to the fall of the empire, the cultivation of land in pasturage continued to be a highly profitable employment in Italy. It is recorded by Ammianus Marcellinus, that when Rome was taken by Alaric, it was inhabited by 1,200,000 persons, who were maintained almost entirely by the expenditure of 1780 patrician families holding estates in Italy and Africa, many of whom had above £160,000 yearly of rent from land. Their estates were almost entirely managed in pasturage, and conducted by slaves.[28] Here, then, is decisive evidence, that down to the very close of the empire, the managing of estates in pasturage was not only profitable, but eminently so in Italy—though all attempts at raising grain were hopeless. It is not an unprofitable cultivation which can yield £160,000 a-year, equivalent to above £300,000 annually of our money, to a single proprietor, and maintain 1700 of them in such affluence that they maintained, in ease and luxury, a city not then the capital of the empire, containing 1,200,000 inhabitants, or considerably more than Paris at this time. It was not slavery, therefore, which ruined Italian cultivation; for the whole pasture cultivation which yielded such immense profits was conducted by slaves. It was the Lybian and Egyptian harvests, freely imported into the Tiber, which occasioned the ruin of agriculture in the Latian plains; and, with the consequent destruction of the race of rural freemen, brought on the ruin of the empire. But this importation could not injure pasturage; for cattle Africa had none, and therefore estates in grass still continued to yield great returns.

The second circumstance worthy of notice in this inquiry is, that the cause of the present desolation of the Campagna, whatever it is, is something which is peculiar to that district, and has continued to act with as great force in modern as in ancient times. It is historically known, indeed, that the sanguinary contests of the rival houses of Orsini and Colonna, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, produced the most dreadful ravages in the Campagna, and extinguished, for the time at least, any attempts to reclaim or restore to cultivation this desolate region. But many centuries have elapsed since this desolating warfare has entirely ceased; and under the shelter of peace and tranquillity, agricultural industry in other parts of Italy has flourished to such a degree as to render it the garden of the world: witness the rich plain of Lombardy, the incomparable terrace cultivation of the Tuscan hills, the triple harvests of the Terra di Lavoro, near Naples. The desolation of the Campagna, therefore, must have been owing to some causes peculiar to the Roman States, or rather to that part of those states which adjoins the city of Rome; for in other parts of the ecclesiastical territories, particularly in the vicinity of Ancona, and the slope of the Apennines towards Bologna, agriculture is in the most flourishing state. The hills and declivities are there cut out into terraces, and cultivated with garden husbandry in as perfect style as in the mountains of Tuscany. The marches of Ancona contain 426,222 inhabitants, spread over 2111 square miles, which is about 200 to the square mile; but, considering how large a part of the territory is barren rock, the proportion on the fertile parts is about 300 to the square mile, while the average of England is only 260. The soil is cultivated to the depth of two and three feet.[29] It is in vain, therefore, to say, that it is the oppression of the Papal government, the indolence of the cardinals, and the evils of an elective monarchy, which have been the causes of the ruin of agricultural industry in the vicinity of Rome. These causes operate just as strongly in the other parts of the Papal States, where cultivation, instead of being in a languishing, is in the most flourishing condition. In truth, so far from having neglected agriculture in this blasted district, the Papal government, for the last two centuries, has made greater efforts to encourage it than all the other powers of Italy put together. Every successive Pope has laboured at the Pontine marshes, but in vain. Nothing can be more clear, than that the causes which have destroyed agriculture in the Campagna, are some which were known in the days of the Roman Republic; gradually came into operation with the extension of the empire; and have continued in modern times to press upon this particular district of the Papal States, in a much greater degree than among other provinces of a similar extent in Italy.

The last circumstance which forces itself upon the mind, in the outset of this inquiry, is, that the desolation of the Campagna is owing to moral or political, not physical causes. Naturalists and physicians have exhausted all their energies for centuries in investigating the causes of the malaria, which is now felt with such severity in Rome in the autumnal months, and renders health so precarious there at that period; and the soil has been analyzed by the most skillful chemists, to see whether there is any peculiarity in the earth, from its volcanic character, which either induces sterility in the crops, or proves fatal to the cultivators. But nothing has been discovered that in the slightest degree explains the phenomena. There is no doubt that the Campagna is extremely unhealthy in the autumnal months, and the Pontine marshes still more so; but that is no more than is the case with every low plain on the shores of the Mediterranean: it obtains in Lombardy, Greece, Sicily, Asia Minor, and Spain, as well as in the Agro Romano. If any one doubt it, let him lie down to sleep in his cloak in any of these places in a night of September, and see what state he is in in the morning. Clarke relates, that intermittent fevers are universal in the Grecian plains in the autumnal months: in Estremadura, in September 1811, on the banks of the Guadiana, nine thousand men fell sick in Wellington's army in three days. The savannas of America, where "death bestrides the evening gale," when first ploughed up, produce intermittent fevers far more deadly than the malaria of the Roman Campagna. But the energy of man overcomes the difficulty, and, ere a few years have passed away, health and salubrity prevail in the regions of former pestilence. It was the same with the Roman Campagna in the early days of the Republic; it is the same now with the Campagna of Naples, and the marshy plains around Parma and Lodi, to the full as unhealthy in a desert state as the environs of Rome. It would be the same with the Agro Romano, if moral causes did not step in to prevent the efforts and industry of man, from here, as elsewhere, correcting the insalubrity of uncultivated nature.

And for decisive evidence that this desolation of the Campagna is owing to moral or political, not physical causes, and that, under a different system of administration, it might be rendered as salubrious and populous as it was in the early days of the Roman Republic, reference may be made to the fact, that in many parts of Italy, equally unhealthy and in this desert state, cultivation has taken place, a dense population has arisen, and the dangerous qualities of the atmosphere have disappeared. Within the last twenty years, the district called Grosseté has been reclaimed, in the most pestilential part of the Maremma of Tuscany, by an industrious population, which has succeeded in introducing agriculture and banishing the malaria; and the ruins of the Roman villas on the banks of the Tiber, near the sea, prove that the Romans went to seek salubrity and the healthful breezes of the sea, where now they could meet with nothing but pestilence and death. The rocky and dry slopes of the Campagna are admirably adapted for raising olives and vines; while the difference of the soil and exposure in different places, promises a similar variety in their wines. The Pontine marshes themselves, and the vast plain which extends from them to the foot of the cluster of hills called the Alban Mount, are not more oppressed by water, or lower in point of level, than the plains of Pisa; and yet there the earth yields magnificent crops of grain and succulent herbs, while the poplars, by which the fields are intersected, support to their very summits the most luxuriant vines. The Campagna of Naples is more volcanic and level than that of Rome; the hills and valleys of Baiæ are nothing but the cones and craters of extinguished volcanoes; and if we would see what such a district becomes when left in a desert state, we have only to go to the Maremma of Pestum, now as desolate and unhealthy as the Pontine marshes themselves. But in the Campagna of Naples an industrious population has overcome all these obstacles, and rendered the land, tenanted only by wild boars and buffaloes in the fourth century, the garden of Europe, known over all the world, from its riches, by the name of the Campagna Felice.

Nay, the Agro Romano itself affords equally decisive proof, that where circumstances will permit the work of cultivation to be commenced so as to be carried on at a profit, the malaria and desolation speedily disappear before the persevering efforts of human industry. In many parts of the district, the custom of granting perpetual leases at a fixed rate prevails, the Emphyteutis of the Roman law, the sources of the prosperity of the cultivators in Upper and Lower Austria, and well known in Scotland under the name of feus. Sismondi has given the following account of the effect of the establishment of a permanent interest in the soil in arresting the effects of the malaria, and spreading cultivation over the land:—"The Emphyteutic cultivator has a permanent interest in the soil: he labours, therefore, unceasingly for the good of his family. He cuts out his slope into terraces, covers it with trees, fruits, and garden-stuffs: he takes advantage of every leisure moment, either in himself, his wife, or children, to advance the common cultivation. Industry and abundance reign around. Whenever you ascend the volcanic hills of Latium, or visit those ravishing slopes which so many painters have illustrated, around the lakes of Castel Gandolfo or Nemi, at L'Aricia, Rocca di Papa, Marino, and Frescati; whenever you meet with a smiling cultivation, healthy air, and the marks of general abundance, you may rest assured the cultivator is proprietor of the fruits of the soil. The bare right of property, or superiority, as the lawyers term it, belongs to some neighbouring lord; but the real property, "il miglioramento," belongs to the cultivator. In this way, in these happy districts, the great estates, the latifundia of Pliny, have been practically distributed among the peasantry; and, whenever this is the case, you hear no more of the malaria. Agriculture has caused to arise in those localities a numerous population, which multiplies with singular rapidity, and for ages has furnished cultivators not only for the mountains where it has arisen, but bands of adventurers, who in every age have filled the ranks of the Italian armies."[30]

But while those examples, to which, did our limits permit, many others might be added, decisively demonstrate that human industry can effectually overcome the physical difficulties or dangers of the Roman Campagna; yet it is clear that some great and overwhelming cause is at work, which prevents agriculture flourishing, by means of tenants or métayers, in the plains of the Campagna. The plains, it is true, are in the hands of a few great proprietors, but their tenants are extremely rich, often more so, Sismondi tells us, than their landlords. What is it, then, which for so long a period has chained the Campagna to pasturage, and rendered all attempts to restore it to the plough abortive? The answer is plain: It is the same cause now which binds it to pasturage, which did so under the Romans from the time of Tiberius—it is more profitable to devote the land to grass than to raise grain. And it is so, not because the land will not bear grain crops, for it would do now even better than it did in the days of the Etruscans and the Sabines; since so many centuries of intervening pasturage have added so much to its fertility. It is so, because the weakness of the Papal government, yielding, like the Imperial in ancient days, to the cry for cheap bread among the Roman populace, has fed the people, from time immemorial, with foreign grain, instead of that of its own territory. The evidence on this subject is as clear and more detailed in modern, than it was in ancient times; and both throw a broad and steady light on the final results of that system of policy, which purchases the present support of the inhabitants of cities, by sacrificing the only lasting and perennial sources of strength derived from the industry and population of the country.

During the confusion and disasters consequent on the fall of the Empire, after the capture of Rome by the Goths, the Campagna remained entirely a desert; but it continued in the hands of the successors of the great senatorial families who held it in the last days of the Empire. "The Agro Romano," says Sismondi, "almost a desert, had been long exposed to the ravages of the barbarians, who in 846 pillaged the Vatican, which led Pope Leo IV., in the following year, to enclose that building within the walls of Rome. For an hundred years almost all the hills which border the horizon from Rome were crowned with forts; the ancient walls of the Etruscans were restored, or rebuilt from their ruins; the old hill strengths, where the Sabines, the Hernici, the Volscians, the Coriolani, had formerly defended their independence, again offered asylums to the inhabitants of the plains. But the great estates, the bequest of ancient Rome, remained undivided. With the first dawn of history in the middle ages, we see the great house of the Colonna master of the towns of Palestrina, Genazzano, Zagorole; that of Orsini, of the territories of the republics of Veiæ and Ceres, and holding the fortresses of Bracciano, Anguetta, and Ceri. The Monte-Savili, near Albano, still indicates the possessions of the Savili, which comprehended the whole ancient kingdom of Turnus; the Frangipani were masters of Antium, Astura, and the sea-coast; the Gaetani, the Annibaldeschi of the Castles which overlook the Pontine marshes; while Latium was in the hands of a smaller number of feudal families than it had formerly numbered republics within its bounds."[31]

But while divided among these great proprietors, the Roman Campagna was still visited, as in the days of the emperor, with the curse of cheap grain, imported from the other states bordering on the Mediterranean, and was in consequence exclusively devoted to the purposes of pasturage. An authentic document proves that this was the case so far down as the fifteenth century. In the year 1471, Pope Sextus IV. issued a bull, which was again enforced by Clement VII. in 1523, and which bore these remarkable words:—"Considering the frequent famines to which Rome has been exposed in late years, arising chiefly from the small amount of lands which have been sown or laid down in tillage, and that their owners prefer allowing them to remain uncultivated, and pastured only by cattle, than to cultivate for the use of men, on the ground that the latter mode of management is more profitable than the former."[32] The decree ordered the cultivation of a large portion of the Campagna in grain under heavy penalties.

And that this superior profit of pasturage to tillage has continued to the present time, and is the real cause of the long-continued and otherwise inexplicable desolation of this noble region, has been clearly demonstrated by a series of important and highly interesting official decrees and investigations, which, within this half century, have taken place by order of the Papal government. Struck with the continued desolation of so large and important a portion of their territory, the popes have both issued innumerable edicts to enforce tillage, and set on foot the most minute inquiries to ascertain the causes of their failure. It is only necessary to mention one. Pius VI., in 1783, took a new and most accurate survey or cadastre of the Agro Romano, and ordained the proprietors to sow annually 17,000 rubbi (85,000 acres) with grain.[33] This decree, however, like those which had preceded it, was not carried into execution. "The proprietors and farmers," says Nicolai, "equally opposed themselves to its execution; the former declaring that they must have a higher rent for the land if laid down in tillage, than the latter professed themselves able to pay."[34]

To ascertain the cause of this universal and insurmountable resistance of all concerned to the cultivation of the Campagna, the Papal government in 1790 issued a commission to inquire into the matter, and the proprietors prescribe to two memoirs on the subject, which at once explained the whole difficulty. The one set forth the cost and returns of 100 rubbi (500 acres) in grain tillage in the Roman Campagna; the other, the cost and returns of a flock of 2500 sheep in the same circumstances. The result of the whole was, that while the grain cultivation would with difficulty, on an expenditure of 8000 crowns (£2000,) bring in a clear profit of thirty crowns (£7, 10s.) to the farmer, and nothing at all to the landlord, the other would yield between them a profit of 1972 crowns, (£496.)[35] Well may Sismondi exclaim:—"These two reports are of the very highest importance. They explain the constant invincible resistance which the proprietors and farmers of the Roman Campagna have opposed to the extension of grain cultivation; they put in a clear light the opposite interest of great capitalists and the interest of the state; they give in authentic details, which I have personally verified, and found to be still entirely applicable and correct, on the causes which have reduced the noble district of the Roman Campagna to its desolate state, and still retain it in that condition. Incredible as the statements may appear, they are amply borne out by everyday experience. In effect, all the farmers whom I have consulted, affirm, that they invariably lose by grain cultivation, and that they never resort to it, but to prevent the land from being overgrown by brushwood or forests, and rendered unfit for profitable pasturage."[36]

Extraordinary as these facts are, as to the difference between the profits of pasturage and tillage in the Agro Romano, it is only by the most rigid economy, and reducing the shepherds to the lowest amount of subsistence consistent with the support of life, that the former yields any profits at all. The wages of the shepherds are only fifty-three francs (£2) for the winter season, and as much for the summer; the proprietors, in addition, furnishing them with twenty ounces of bread a-day, a half-pound of salt meat, a little oil and salt a-week. As to wine, vinegar, or fermented liquors, they never taste any of them from one year's end to another. Such as it is, their food is all brought to them from Rome; for in the whole Campagna there is not an oven, a kitchen, or a kitchen-garden, to furnish an ounce of vegetables or fruits. The clothing of these shepherds is as wretched as their fare. It consists of sheep-skin, with the wool outside; a few rags on their legs and thighs, complete their vesture. Lodging or houses they have none; they sleep in the open air, or nestle into some sheltered nook among the ruined tombs or aqueducts which are to be met with in the wilderness, in some of the caverns, which are so common in that volcanic region, or beneath the arches of the ancient catacombs. A few spoons and coarse jars form their whole furniture; the cost of that belonging to twenty-nine shepherds, required for the 2500 sheep, is only 159 francs (£7.) The sum total of the expense of the whole twenty-nine persons, including wages, food, and every thing, is only 1038 crowns, or £250 a-year; being about £8, 10s. a-head annually. The produce of the flock is estimated at 7122 crowns (£1780) annually, and the annual profit 1972 crowns, or £493.[37]

The other table given by Nicolai, exhibits, on a similar expenditure of capital, the profit of tillage; and it is so inconsiderable, as rarely, and that only in the most favourable situations, to cover the expense of cultivation. The labourers, who almost all come from the neighbouring hills, above the level of the malaria, are obliged to be brought from a distance at high wages for the time of their employment; sometimes in harvest wages are as high as five francs, or four shillings a-day. The wages paid to the labourers on a grain farm on which £2000 has been expended on 500 acres, amount to no less than 4320 crowns, or £1080 sterling, annually; being above four times the cost of the shepherds for a similar expenditure of capital, though they wander over ten times the surface of ground. The labourers never remain in the fields; they set off to the hills when their grain is sown, and only return in autumn to cut it down. They do not work above twenty or thirty days in the year; and therefore, though their wages for that period are so high, they are in misery all the rest of the season. But though so little is done for the land, the price received for the produce is so low, that cultivation in grain brings no profit, and is usually carried on at a loss. The peasants who conduct it never go to Rome—have often never seen it; they make no purchases there; and the most profitable of all trades in a nation, that between the town and the country, is unknown in the Roman States.[38]

Here, then, the real cause of the desolation of the Campagna stands revealed in the clearest light, and on the most irrefragable evidence. It is not cultivated for grain crops, because remunerating prices for that species of produce cannot be obtained. It is exclusively kept in pasturage, because it is in that way only that a profit can be obtained from the land. And that it is this cause, and not any deficiency of capital or skill on the part of the tenantry, which occasions the phenomenon, is further rendered apparent by the wealth, enterprize, and information on agricultural subjects, of the great farmers in whose lands the land is vested. "The conductors," says Sismondi, "of rural labour in the Roman States, called Mercanti di Tenute or di Campagne, are men possessed of great capital, and who have received the very best education. Such, indeed, is their opulence, that it is probable they will, erelong, acquire the property of the land of which at present they are tenants. Their number, however, does not exceed eighty. They are acquainted with the most approved methods of agriculture in Italy and other countries; they have at their disposal all the resources of science, art, and immense capital; have availed themselves of all the boasted advantages of centralization, of a thorough division of labour, of a most accurate system of accounts, and checking of inferior functionaries. The system of great farms has been carried to perfection in their hands. But, with all these advantages, they cannot in the Agro Romano, once so populous, still so fertile, raise grain to a profit. The labourers cost more than they are worth, more than their produce is worth; while on a soil not richer, and under the same climate and government, in the marches of Ancona, agriculture maintains two hundred souls the square mile, in comfort and opulence."[39]

What, then, is the explanation which is to be given of this extraordinary impossibility of raising grain with a profit in the Roman Campagna; while in a similar climate, and under greater physical disadvantages, it is in the neighbouring plains of Pisa, and the Campagna Felice of Naples, the most profitable of all species of cultivation, and therefore universally resorted to? The answer is obvious—It is the cry for cheap bread in Rome, the fatal bequest of the strength of the Imperial, to the weakness of the Papal government, which is the cause. It is the necessity under which the ecclesiastical government felt itself, of yielding every thing to the clamour for a constant supply of cheap bread for the people of the town which has done the whole. It is the ceaseless importation of foreign grain into the Tiber by government, to provide cheap food for the people, which has reduced the Campagna to a wilderness, and rendered Rome in modern, not less than Tadmor in ancient times, a city in the desert.

It has been already noticed, that in the middle of the fifteenth century Sextus IV. issued a decree, ordaining the proprietors of lands in the Campana to lay down a third of their estates yearly in tillage. But the Papal government, not resting on the proprietors of the soil, but mainly, in so far as temporal power went, on the populace of Rome, was under the necessity of making at the same time extraordinary efforts to obtain supplies of foreign grain. A free trade in grain was permitted to the Tiber, or rather the government purchased foreign grain wherever they could find it cheapest, as the emperors had from a similar apprehension done in ancient times, and retailed it at a moderate price to the people. They became themselves the great corn-merchant. This system, of course, prevented the cultivation of the Campagna, and rendered the decree of Sextus IV. nugatory; for no human laws can make men continue a course of labour at a loss to themselves. Thence the citizens of Rome came to depend entirely on foreign supplies of grain for their daily food; and the consumption of the capital had no more influence on the agriculture of the adjoining provinces, than it had on that of Hindostan or China. Again, as in the days of Tacitus, the lives of the Roman people were exposed to the chances of the winds and the waves. As this proved a fluctuating and precarious source of supply, a special board, styled the Casa Annonaria, was constituted by government for the regular importation of foreign grain, and retailing of it at a fixed and low price to the people. This board has been in operation for nearly two hundred and fifty years; and it is the system it has pursued which has prevented all attempts to cultivate the Campagna, by rendering it impossible to do so at a profit. The details of the proceedings of this board—this "chamber of commerce" of Rome, are so extremely curious and instructive, that we must give them in the authentic words of Sismondi.

"Having failed in all their attempts to bring about the cultivation of the Campagna, the popes of the 17th and 18th centuries endeavoured to secure abundance in the markets by other means. The motive was legitimate and praiseworthy; but the means taken failed in producing the desired effect, because they sacrificed the future to the present, and, in the anxiety to secure the subsistence of the people, compromised those who raised food for them. Pope Pius VI., who reigned from 1600 to 1621, instituted the Casa Annonaria of the apostolic chamber, which was charged with the duty of providing subsistence for the inhabitants of Rome. This board being desirous, above all things, of avoiding seditions and discontent, established it as a principle, that whatever the cost of production was, or the price in a particular year, bread should be sold at certain public bake-houses at a certain price. This price was fixed at a Roman baiocco, a tenth more than the sous of France, (1/2 d. English,) for eight ounces of bread. This price has now been maintained constantly the same for two hundred years; and it is still kept at the same level, with the difference only of a slight diminution in the weight of the bread sold for the baiocco in years of scarcity.

"As a necessary consequence of this regulation, the apostolic chamber soon found itself under the necessity of taking entire possession of the commerce of grain. It not only bought up the whole which was to be obtained in the country, but provided for the public wants by large importation. Regulations for the import and export of grain were made by it; sometimes, it was said, through the influence of those who solicited exemptions. Whether this was the case or not is uncertain, and not very material. What is certain is, that the rule by which the chamber was invariably regulated, viz. that of consulting no other interest but that of the poor consumer, is as vicious and ruinous as the one so much approved of now-a-days, of attending only to the interest of the proprietors and producers. Government, doubtless, should attend to the vital matter of the subsistence of the people; but it should do so with a view to the interest of all, not a single section of society.

"At what price soever bread was bought by them, the Casa Annonaria sold it to the bakers at seven Roman crowns (30 f.) the rubbio, which weighs 640 kilograms, (1540 lbs.) That price was not much different from the average one; and the apostolic chamber sustained no great loss till 1763, by its extensive operations in the purchase and sale of grain. But at that period the price of wheat began to rise, and it went on continually advancing to the end of the century. Notwithstanding its annual losses, however, the apostolic chamber was too much afraid of public clamour to raise the price of bread. It went on constantly retailing it at the same price to the people; and the consequence was, that its losses in 1797, when the pontifical government was overturned, had accumulated to no less than 17,457,485 francs, or £685,000."[40]

It might naturally have been imagined, that after so long an experience of the effects of a forcible reduction of the price of grain below the level at which it could be raised at a profit by home cultivators, the ecclesiastical government would have seen what was the root of the evil, and applied themselves to remedy it, by giving some protection to native industry. But though the evil of the desolation of the Campagna was felt in its full extent by government in subsequent times; yet as the first step in the right course, viz. protecting native industry by stopping the sales of bread by government at lower prices than it could be raised at home, was likely to occasion great discontent, it was never attempted. Such a step, dangerous in the firmest and best established, was impossible in an elective monarchy of old Popes, feeble cardinals, and a despicable soldiery. They went on deploring the evil, but never once ventured to face the remedy. In 1802, Pius VII., a most public-spirited and active pontiff, issued an edict, in which he declared, "We are firmly persuaded that if we cannot succeed in applying a remedy the abandonment and depopulation of the Campagna will go on increasing, till the country becomes a fearful desert. Fatal experience leaves no doubt on that point. We see around us, above all in the Campagna, a number of estates entirely depopulated and abandoned to grass, which, in the memory of man, were rich in agricultural productions, and crowded with inhabitants, as is clearly established by the seignorial rights attached to them. Population had been introduced into these domains by agriculture, which employed a multitude of hands, being in a flourishing state. But now the obstacles opposed to the interior commerce of grain, and the forced prices fixed by government, have caused agriculture to perish. Pasturage has come every where to supplant it; and the great proprietors and farmers living in Rome, have abandoned all thought of dividing their possessions among cultivators, and sought only to diminish the cost of the flocks to which they have devoted their estates. But if that system has proved profitable to them, it has been fatal to the state, which it has deprived of its true riches, the produce of agriculture, and of the industry of the rural population."[41] But it was all in vain. The measures adopted by Pius VII. to resuscitate agriculture in the Campagna, have proved all nugatory like those of all his predecessors; the importation of foreign grain into the Tiber, the forced prices at which it was sold by the government at Rome, rendered it impossible to prosecute agriculture to a profit; and the Campagna has become, and still continues, a desert.[42]

Here, then, the real cause of the long-continued desolation of the Agro Romano, both in ancient and modern times, becomes perfectly apparent. It is the cry for cheap bread in Rome which has done the whole. To stifle this cry in the dreaded populace of the Eternal City, the emperors imported grain largely from Egypt and Lybia, and distributed it at an elusory price, or gratuitously, to the people. The unrestricted importation of foreign grain, in consequence of those provinces becoming parts of the empire, enabled the cultivators and merchants of Africa to deluge the Italian harbours with corn at a far cheaper rate than it could be raised in Italy itself, where labour bore a much higher price, in consequence of money being more plentiful in the centre than the extremities of the empire. Thus the market of its towns was lost to the Italian cultivators, and gained to those of Egypt and Lybia, where a vertical sun, or the floods of the Nile, almost superseded the expense of cultivation. Pasturage became the only way in which land could be managed to advantage in the Italian fields; because live animals and dairy produce do not admit of being transported from a distance by sea, with a profit to the importer, and the sunburnt shores of Africa yielded no herbage for their support. Agriculture disappeared in Italy, and with it the free and robust arms which conducted it; pasturage succeeded, and yielded large rentals to the great proprietors, into whose hands, on the ruin of the little freeholders by foreign importation, the land had fallen. But pasturage could not nourish a bold peasantry to defend the state; it could only produce the riches which might attract its enemies. Hence the constant complaint, that Italy had ceased to be able to furnish soldiers to the legionary armies; hence the entrusting the defence of the frontier to mercenary barbarians, and the ruin of the empire.

In modern times the same ruinous system has been continued, and hence the continued desolation of the Campagna, so pregnant with weakness and evil to the Roman states. The people never forgot the distribution of grain by government in the time of the emperors; the Papal authorities never had strength sufficient to withstand the menacing cry for cheap bread. Anxious to keep the peace in Rome, and depending little on the barons of the country, the ecclesiastical government saw no resource but to import grain themselves from any countries where they could get it cheapest, and sell it at a fixed price to the people. This price, down to 1763, was just the price at which it could be imported with a fair profit; as is proved by the fact, that down to that period the Casa Annonaria sustained no loss. But it was lower than the rate at which it could be raised even in the fertile plains of the Campagna, where labour was dearer and taxes heavier than in Egypt and the Ukraine, from whence the grain was imported by government; and consequently cultivation could not be carried on in the Agro Romano but at a loss. It of course ceased altogether; and the land, as in ancient times, has been entirely devoted to pasturage, to the extinction of the rural population, and the infinite injury of the state.

And this explains how it has happened, that in other parts of the Papal states, particularly in the marches on the other side of the Apennines, between Bologna and Ancona, agriculture is not only noways depressed, but flourishing; and the same is the case with the slopes of the Alban Mount, even in the Agro Romano. In the first situation, the necessity of bending to the cry for cheap bread in the urban population was not felt, as the marches contained no great towns, and the weight of influence was in the rural inhabitants. There was no Casa Annonaria, or fixed price of bread there; and therefore agriculture flourished as it did in Lombardy, the Campagna Felice of Naples, the plain of Pisa, or any other prosperous part of Italy. In the latter, it was in garden cultivation that the little proprietors, as in nearly the whole slopes of the Apennines, were engaged. The enchanting shores of the lakes of Gandolfo and Nemi, the hills around L'Aricia and Marino, are all laid out in the cultivation of grapes, olives, fruits, vegetables, and chestnuts. No competition from without was to be dreaded by them, as at least, until the introduction of steam, it was impossible to bring such productions by distant sea voyages, so as to compete with those raised in equally favourable situations within a few miles of the market at home. In these places, therefore, the peculiar evil which blasted all attempts at grain cultivation in the Campagna was not felt; and hence, though in the Roman states, and subject, in other respects, to precisely the same government as the Agro Romano, they exhibit not merely a good, but the most admirable cultivation.

If any doubt could exist on the subject, it would be removed by two other facts connected with agriculture on the shores of the Mediterranean; one in ancient and one in modern times.

The first of these is that while agriculture declined in Italy, as has been shown from the time of Tiberius, until at length nearly the whole plains of that peninsula were turned into grass, it, from the same date, took an extraordinary start in Spain and Lybia. And to such a length had the improvement of Africa, under the fostering influence of the market of Rome and Italy gone, that it contained, at the time of its invasion by the Vandals under Genseric, in the year 430 of the Christian era, twenty millions of inhabitants, and had come to be regarded with reason as the garden of the human race. "The long and narrow tract," says Gibbon, "of the African coast was filled, when the Vandals approached its shores, with frequent monuments of Roman art and magnificence; and the respective degrees of improvement might be accurately measured by the distance from Carthage and the Mediterranean. A simple reflection will impress every thinking mind with the clearest idea of its fertility and cultivation. The country was extremely populous; the inhabitants reserved a liberal supply for their own use; and the annual exportation, PARTICULARLY OF WHEAT, was so regular and plentiful, that Africa deserved the name of the common granary of Rome and of mankind."[43] Nor had Spain flourished less during the long tranquillity and protection of the legions. In the year 409 after Christ, when it was first invaded by the barbarians, its situation is thus described by the great historian of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. "The situation of Spain, separated on all sides from the enemies of Rome by the sea, by the mountains, and by intermediate provinces, had secured the long tranquillity of that remote and sequestered country; and we may observe, as a sure symptom of domestic happiness, that in a period of 400 years, Spain furnished very few materials to the history of the Roman empire. The cities of Merida, Cordova, Seville, and Tarragona, were numbered with the most illustrious of the Roman world. The various plenty of the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms was improved and manufactured by the skill of an industrious people, and the peculiar advantages of naval stores contributed to support an extensive and profitable trade." And he adds, in a note, many particulars relative to the fertility and trade of Spain, may be found in Huet's Commerce des Anciens, c. 40, p. 228.[44]

These facts are very remarkable, and worthy of the most profound attention; for they point in a decisive manner, they afford the experimentum crucis as to the real cause of the long-continued and frightful decay of Italian agriculture during the reign of the emperors. For here, it appears, that during the four hundred years that the Western Empire endured, while the cultivation of grain in Italy was constantly declining, and at last wholly ceased, insomuch that the country relapsed entirely into a state of nature, or was devoted to the mere raising of grass for sheep and cattle, agriculture was flourishing in the highest degree in the remoter provinces of the Empire; and the exportation of grain from Africa had become so great and regular, that it had come to be regarded as the granaries of Rome and of the world! The government was the same, the slavery was the same, in Africa as in Italy. Yet in the one country agriculture rose, during four centuries, to the highest point of elevation; while in the other, during the same period, it sunk to the lowest depression, until it became wellnigh extinct, so far as the raising of grain was concerned. How did this come to pass? It could not have been that the labour of slaves was too costly to raise grain; for it was raised at a great profit, and to a prodigious extent, almost entirely by slaves, in Egypt and Lybia. What was it, then, which destroyed agriculture in Italy and Greece, while, under circumstances precisely similar in all respects but one, it was, at the very same time, rising to the very highest prosperity in Egypt, Lybia, and Spain? Evidently that one circumstance, and that was—that Italy and Greece were the heart of the empire, the theatre of long-established civilization, the abode of opulence, the seat of wealth, the centre to which riches flowed from the extremities of the empire. Pounds were plentiful there, and, consequently, labour was dear; in the provinces pence were few, and, therefore, it was cheap. It was impossible, under a free trade in grain, for the one to compete with the other. It is for the same reason that agricultural labour is now sixpence a-day in Poland, tenpence in Ireland, and two shillings in Great Britain.

The peculiar conformation of the Roman empire, while it facilitated in many respects its growth and final settlement under the dominion of the Capitol, led by a process not less certain, and still more rapid, to its ruin, when that empire was fully extended. If any one will look at the map, he will see that the Roman empire spread outwards from the shores of the Mediterranean. It embraced all the monarchies and republics which, in the preceding ages of the world, had grown up around that inland sea. Water, therefore, afforded the regular, certain, and cheap means of conveying goods and troops from one part of the empire to the other. Nature had spread out a vast system of internal navigation, which brought foreign trade in a manner to every man's door. The legions combated alternately on the plains of Germany, in the Caledonian woods, on the banks of the Euphrates, and at the foot of Mount Atlas. But much as this singular and apparently providential circumstance aided the growth, and for a season increased the strength of the empire, it secretly but certainly undermined its resources, and in the end proved its ruin. The free trade in grain which it necessarily brought with it, when the same dominion stretched over all Spain and Africa, and long-continued peace had brought their crops to compete with the Italian in the supply of the Roman, or the Grecian in that of the Constantinopolitan markets, destroyed the fabric the legions had reared. Italy could not compete with Lybia, Greece with Poland. Rome was supplied by the former, Constantinople by the latter. If the Mediterranean wafted the legions out in the rise of the empire, it wafted foreign grain in in its later stages, and the last undid all that the former had done. The race of agricultural freemen in Italy, the bone and muscle of the legions which had conquered the world, became extinct; the rabble of towns were unfit for the labours, and averse to the dangers of war; mercenaries became the only resource.

The fact in modern times, which illustrates and confirms the same view of the chief cause of the ruin of the Roman empire, is, that a similar effect has taken place, and is at this moment in full operation in Romelia, and all the environs of Constantinople. Every traveller in the East knows that desolation as complete as that of the Campagna of Rome pervades the whole environs of Constantinople; that the moment you emerge from the gates of that noble city, you find yourself in a wilderness, and that the grass comes up to our horse's girths all the way to Adrianople. "Romelia," says Slade, "if cultivated, would become the granary of the East;" whereas Constantinople depends on Odessa for daily bread. The burial-grounds, choked with weeds and underwood, constantly occurring in every traveller's route, far remote from habitations, are eloquent testimonials of continued depopulation. The living, too, are far apart; a town about every fifty miles; a village every ten miles, is deemed close; and horsemen meeting on the highway regard each other as objects of curiosity.[45] This is the Agro Romano over again. Nor will it do to say, that it is the oppression of the Turkish government which occasions this desolation and destruction of the rural population; for many parts of Turkey are not only well cultivated but most densely peopled; as, for example, the broad tract of Mount Hœmus, where agriculture is in as admirable a state as in the mountains of Tuscany or Switzerland. "No peasantry in the world," says Slade, "are so well off as those of Bulgaria; the lowest of them has abundance of every thing—meat, poultry, eggs, milk, rice, cheese, wine, bread, good clothing, a warm dwelling, and a horse to ride; where is the tyranny under which the Christian subjects of the Porte are generally supposed to dwell? Among the Bulgarians certainly. I wish that, in every country, a traveller could pass from one end to the other, and find a good supper and warm fire in every cottage, as he can in this part of European Turkey."[46] Clarke gives the same account of the peasantry of Parnassus and Olympia; and it is true generally of almost all the mountain districts of Turkey. How, then, does it happen that the rich and level plains of Romelia, at the gates of Constantinople, and thence over a breadth of an hundred and twenty miles to Adrianople, is a desert? Slade has explained it in a word. "Constantinople depends on Odessa for its daily bread." The cry for cheap bread in Constantinople, its noble harbour, and ready communication by water with Egypt on the one hand, and the Ukraine on the other, have done the whole. Romelia, like the Campagna of Rome, is a desert, because the market of Constantinople is lost to the Turkish cultivators; because grain can be brought cheaper from the Nile and the Wolga than raised at home, in consequence of the cheapness of labour in those remote provinces; and because the Turkish government, dreading an insurrection in the capital, have done nothing to protect native industry.

There are many countries to whom the most unlimited freedom in the importation of corn can do no injury. There are, in the first place, the great grain countries, such as Poland and the Ukraine: they have no more reason to dread the importation of grain than Newcastle that of coals, or the Scotch Highlands that of moor-game. In the next place, countries which are poor need never fear the importation of corn from abroad; for they have no money to pay for it; and, if they had, it would not be brought in at a profit, because currency being scarce, of course the price will be low. Lastly, Countries which have vast inland tracts, like Russia, Austria, France, and America, especially if no extensive system of water communication exists in their interior, have little reason to apprehend injury from the most unrestricted commerce in grain; because the cost of inland carriage on so bulky and heavy an article as corn is so considerable, that the produce of foreign harvests can never penetrate far into the interior, or come to supply a large portion of the population with food.

The countries which have reason to apprehend injury, and in the end destruction, to their native agriculture, from the unrestricted admission of foreign corn, are those which, though they may possess a territory in many places well adapted for the raising of grain crops, are yet rich, far advanced in civilization, with a narrow territory, and their principal towns on the sea-coast. They have every thing to dread from foreign importation; because both the plenty of currency, which opulence brings in its train, and the heavy public burdens with which it is invariably attended, render labour dear at home, by lowering the value of money, and raising the weight of taxation. If long continued, an unrestricted foreign importation cannot fail to ruin agriculture, and destroy domestic strength in such a state. Italy and Greece stood eminently in such a situation; for all their great towns were upon the sea-coast, their territory was narrow, and being successively the seats of empire, and the centres of long-continued opulence, money was more plentiful, and therefore production dearer than in those remote and poorer states from which grain might be brought to their great towns by sea carriage. In the present circumstances of this country, we would do well to bear in mind the following reflections of Sismondi, "It is not to no purpose that we have entered into the foregoing details concerning the state of agriculture in the neighbourhood of Rome; for we are persuaded that a universal tendency in Europe menaces us with the same calamities, even in those countries which at present seem to adopt an entirely opposite system; only the Romans have gone through the career, while we are only entering upon it."[47]

The times are past, indeed, when gratuitous distributions of grain will be made to an idle population, as under the Roman emperors, or bread be sold for centuries by government at a fixed and low price, as under their papal successors. But the same causes which produced these effects are still in full operation. The cry for cheap bread in a popular state, is as menacing as it was to the emperors or popes of Rome. The only difference is, the sacrifice of domestic industry is now more disguised. The thing is done, but it is done not openly by public deliveries of the foreign grain at low prices, but indirectly under the specious guise of free trade. Government does not say, "We will import Polish grain, and sell it permanently at thirty-six or forty shillings a quarter;" but it says, "we will open our harbours to the Polish farmers who can do so. We will admit grain duty free from a country where wages are sixpence a-day, and rents half-a-crown an acre." They thus force down the price of grain to the foreign level, augmented only by the cost and profit of importations, as effectually as ever did the emperors or Casa Annonariaof Rome.

And what has Rome—the urban population of Rome—for whose supposed interests, and in obedience to whose menacing cry, the Roman market has for eighteen centuries been supplied with foreign bread—what have they gained by this long continuation of government to their wishes? Sismondi has told us in one word—"In Rome there is no commerce between the town and the country." They would have foreign grain with its consequences, and they have had foreign grain with its consequences. And what have been these consequences? Why, that the Eternal City, which, even when taken by the Goths, had 1,200,000 inhabitants within its walls, can now scarcely number 170,000, and they almost entirely in poverty, and mainly supported by the influx and expenditure of foreigners. The Campagna, once so fruitful and so peopled, has become a desert. No inhabitant of the Roman states buys any thing in Rome. Their glory is departed—it has gone to other people and other lands. And what would have been the result if this wretched concession to the blind and unforeseeing popular clamour had not taken place? Why, that Rome would have been what Naples—where domestic industry is protected—has become; it would have numbered 400,000 busy and active citizens within its walls. The Campagna would have been what the marches of Ancona now are. Between Rome and the Campagna, a million of happy and industrious human beings would have existed in the Agro Romano, independent of all the world, mutually nourishing and supporting each other; instead of an hundred and seventy thousand indolent and inactive citizens of a town, painfully dependent on foreign supplies for bread, and on foreign gold for the means of purchasing it.

Disastrous as have been the consequences of a free trade in grain to the Roman States, alike in ancient and modern times, it was introduced by its rulers in antiquity under the influence of noble and enlightened principles. The whole civilized world was then one state; the banks of the Nile and the plains of Lybia acknowledged the sway of the emperors, as much as the shores of the Tiber or the fields of the Campagna. When the Roman government, ruling so mighty a dominion, permitted the harvests of Africa and the Ukraine to supplant those of Italy and Greece, they did no more than justice to their varied subjects. Magnanimously overlooking local interests and desires, they extended their vision over the whole civilized world, and

"View'd with equal eyes, as lords of all,"

their subjects, whether in Italy, Spain, Egypt, or Lybia. Though the seat of government was locally on the Tiber, they administered for the interest of the whole civilized world, alike far and near. If the Campagna was ruined, the Delta of Egypt flourished! If the plains of Umbria were desolate, those of Lybia and Spain, equally parts of the empire, were waving with grain. But can the same be said of England, now proclaiming a free trade in grain, not merely with her colonies or distant provinces, but with her rivals or her enemies? Not merely with Canada and Hindostan, but with Russia and America? With countries jealous of her power, envious of her fame, covetous of her riches. What should we have said of the wisdom of the Romans, if they had sacrificed Italian to African agriculture in the days of Hannibal? If they had put it into the power of the Carthaginian Senate to have said, "We will not arm our galleys; we will not levy armies; we will prohibit the importation of African grain, and starve you into submission?" How is England to maintain her independence, if the autocrat of Russia, by issuing his orders from St Petersburg, can at any moment stop the importation of ten millions of quarters of foreign grain, that is, a sixth of our whole annual consumption? And are we to render penniless our home customers, not in order to promote the interest of the distant parts of our empire, but in order to enrich and vivify our enemies?

It is said public opinion runs in favour of such a change; that the manufacturing has become the dominant interest in the state; that wages must at all hazards be beat down to the continental level; and that, right or wrong, the thing must be done. Whether this is the case or not, time, and possibly a general election, will show. Sometimes those who are the most noisy, are not the most numerous. Certain it is, that in 1841 a vast majority both of the electors and the people were unanimous in favour of protection. But, be the present opinion of the majority what it may, that will not alter the nature of things—It will not render that wise which is unwise. Public opinion in Athens, in the time of Demosthenes, was nearly unanimous to apply the public funds to the support of the theatres instead of the army, and they got the battle of Chæronea, and subjection by Philip, for their reward. Public opinion in Europe was unanimous in favour of the Crusades, and millions of brave men left their bones in Asia in consequence. The Senate of Carthage, yielding to the wishes of the majority of their democratic community, refused to send succours to Hannibal in Italy; and they brought, in consequence, the legions of Scipio Africanus round their walls. Public opinion in France was unanimous in favour of the expedition to Moscow. "They regarded it," says Segur, "as a mere hunting party of six months;" but that did not hinder it from bringing the Cossacks to Paris. The old Romans were unanimous in their cry for cheap bread, and they brought the Gothic trumpet to their gates from its effects. A vast majority of the electors of Great Britain in 1831, were in favour of Reform: out of 101, 98 county members were returned in the liberal interest; and now they have got their reward, in seeing the Reformed Parliament preparing to abolish all protection to native industry. All the greatest and most destructive calamities recorded in history have been brought about, not only with the concurrence, but in obedience to the fierce demand of the majority. Protection to domestic industry, at home or colonial, is the unseen but strongly felt bond which unites together the far distant provinces of the British empire by the firm bond of mutual interest.

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MR BROOKE OF BORNEO.

[48]On the 19th of August last, some twenty boats belonging to her Majesty's ships, Agincourt, Vestal, Dædalus, Wolverine, Cruiser, and Vixen, and containing about five hundred men, attacked and destroyed in the Malladu, a river of the Eastern Archipelago, the forts of Seriff Housman, a notorious and daring pirate, whose crimes had paralysed the commerce of the seas of Borneo, and finally rendered British interference absolutely necessary for the security of British life and property. The action was one of the many that the suppression of piracy in these regions has demanded—was gallantly fought, and full reported in the journals of the time;—a narrow river, with two forts mounting eleven or twelve heavy guns, (and defended by from five hundred to one thousand fighting men,) protected by a strong and well-contrived boom, was the position of the enemy. The English boats took the bull by the horns—cut away part of the boom under a heavy fire; advanced and carried the place in a fight protracted for fifty minutes. The enemy fought well, and stood manfully to their guns. The mate of the Wolverine fell mortally wounded whilst working at the boom, axe in hand; but his death was avenged by a wholesale slaughter of the pirates. At two minutes to nine, those who had remained on board the Vixen heard the report of the first heavy gun, and the first column of black smoke proclaimed that the village was fired. On the evening of the 19th, a detachment of ten boats, with fresh men and officers, quitted the Vixen, and arrived at the forts shortly after daylight. The work of destruction was complete. The boom, above spoken of, was ingeniously fastened with the chain-cable of a vessel of three hundred or four hundred tons; other chains, for darker purposes, were discovered in the town; a ship's long-boat; two ship's bells, one ornamented with grapes and vine leaves, and marked "Wilhelm Ludwig, Bremen," and every other description of ship's furniture. Some piratical boats were burned, twenty-four brass guns captured; the other guns spiked or otherwise destroyed. Malladu ceased to exist; the power of Seriff Housman was extinguished in a day.

Small wars, as well as great, have their episodes of touching tenderness. Twenty-four hours after the action, a poor woman, with her child of two years of age, was discovered in a small canoe; her arm was shattered at the elbow by a grape-shot, and the poor creature lay dying for want of water, in an agony of pain, with her child playing around her, and endeavouring to derive the sustenance which the mother could no longer give. The unfortunate woman was taken on board the Vixen, and in the evening her arm was amputated. On board the Vixen she met with one who offered to convey her to the Borneon town of Sarāwak, where she would find protection. To have left her where she was, would have been to leave her to die. To the stranger's kind offers she had but one answer to give. "If you please to take me, I shall go. I am a woman, and not a man; I am a slave, and not a free woman—do as you like." The woman recovered, was grateful for the kindness shown her, and was deposited faithfully and well in the town already named, by the stranger already introduced.

Let us state at once that the object of this article is to bring to public notice, as shortly as we may, the history of this stranger, and to demand for it the reader's warmest sympathy. Full accounts of the doings of her Majesty's ship Dido will no doubt be reported elsewhere, with the several engagements which Mr Keppel's book so graphically describes. Let them receive the attention that they merit. We cannot afford to meddle with them now. "Metal more attractive" lies in the adventures of a man who has devoted his fortune and energies to the cause of humanity, and has purchased with both the amelioration of a large portion of his suffering fellow-creatures.

We know not when, since our boyhood, we have met with an adventurer more ardent and daring, a companion more fascinating and agreeable, than Mr Brooke, the Rajah or Governor of Sarāwak. Essentially British, in as much as he practises our national virtues when circumstances call them into action, he reminds us at all times of those Eastern men, famous in their generation, who delighted us many years ago, and secured our wonder by their devoted love of enterprise, and the moral ascendency that waited on their efforts. In truth, Mr Brooke belongs not to the present generation. His energy, his perseverance, which nothing can subdue, his courage which no dangers can appal, his simplicity which no possession of power and authority can taint, his integrity and honest mind, all belong to a more masculine and primitive age, and constitute a rare exception for our respect and gratitude in this. We take the earliest opportunity afforded us to pay our humble tribute to worth that cannot be questioned, to heroic virtue that cannot be surpassed.

Whatsoever humanity and civilisation may gain in the extermination of odious crimes upon the shores of Borneo, whatsoever advantages England may hereafter obtain from British settlements in the island, and from a peaceful trade carried on around it, to Mr Brooke, and to that gentleman alone, will belong the glory and the honour of such acquisitions. Inspired by his vigorous nature, but more by the dictates of true benevolence, unaided and unprotected, save by his own active spirit and the blessing of Providence, he undertook a mission on behalf of mankind, with perils before him which the stoutest could not but feel, and achieved a success which the most sanguine could hardly have anticipated.

Mr Brooke was born on the 29th of April 1803, and is therefore now in his 43d year. He is the second son of the late Thomas Brooke, Esq., who held an appointment in the civil service of the East India Company. At an early age he went out to India as a cadet, served with distinction in the Burmese war, was wounded, and returned to England for the recovery of his health. In the year 1830, Mr Brooke relinquished the service altogether, and quitted Calcutta for China, again in search of health. During his voyage, he saw, for the first time, the islands of the Asiatic Archipelago; almost unknown, even at that recent period, to Europeans generally. Such information as was before the world he obtained, and carefully considered; and the result of his reflections was a determination to carry to Borneo, an island of some magnitude, and terribly afflicted in more respects than one, such knowledge and instruction as might help to elevate its people from the depravity in which they lived, and the horrors to which they were hourly subjected. This was in 1830. In the year 1838, he quitted England to fulfil his purpose. For eight years he had patiently and steadily worked towards his object, and gathered about him all that was necessary for its accomplishment. Nothing had been omitted to insure success. A man of fortune, he had been prodigal of his wealth; free from professional and other ties, he had given up his time wholly to the cause. One year was passed in the Mediterranean, that his vessel, The Royalist, might be put to the severest tests. Three years were spent in educating a crew worthy of an undertaking that promised so little sudden prosperity, that exacted so much immediate self-denial, threatened so many hardships. The men were happy and contented, cheerful and willing. The vessel belonged to the royal yacht squadron, was a fast sailer, armed with six six-pounders, a number of swivels and small arms, carried four boats, and provisions for as many months. On the 27th of October 1838, the adventurous company left the river. A fortunate passage carried them in safety to Rio Janeiro, and on the 29th of March 1839, they were sailing from the Cape of Good Hope. A six weeks' passage brought them to Java Head, and on the 1st of June they reached that "pivot of the liberal system in the Archipelago," the island of Singapore. It was not until the 27th of July that Mr Brooke quitted Singapore. Five days afterwards, the Royalist was anchored off the coast of Borneo!

At the period of Mr Brooke's arrival, Borneo Proper,[49] once the seat of piracy, which few vessels could approach with safety, was under the government of the rajah Muda Hassim. Report spoke favourably of this rajah's character. A vessel had been wrecked on his coast, and the crew, who had been saved with difficulty, had taken shelter in the jungle. Muda Hassim, hearing of their fate, caused them to be brought to his town of Sarāwak, collected as much as could be saved from the wreck, clothed the sufferers, fed them, and sent then free of expense to Singapore. Moreover, for reasons known to himself, the rajah was well disposed towards the English. These important circumstances were borne in mind by Mr Brooke. The rajah was now at Sarāwak, and the adventurer determined to enter the river of that name, and to proceed as far as the town. He was well supplied with presents; gaudy silks of Surat, scarlet cloth, stamped velvet, gunpowder, confectionery, sweets, ginger, jams, dates, and syrups for the governor, and a huge box of China toys for the governor's children. From Mr Brooke's own diary, we extract the following account of his position and feelings at this interesting moment of his still doubtful undertaking:—

"August 1st.—I am, then, at length, anchored off the coast of Borneo! not under very pleasant circumstances, for the night is pitchy dark, with thunder, lightning, rain, and squalls of wind.

"2d.—Squally bad night. This morning, the clouds clearing away, was delightful, and offered for our view the majestic scenery of Borneo. At nine got under weigh, and ran in on an east-by-south course four and a half or five miles towards Tanjong Api. Came to an anchor about five miles from the land, and dispatched the boat to take sights ashore, in order to form a base line for triangulation. The scenery may really be called majestic. The low and wooded coast about Tanjong Api is backed by a mountain called Gunong Palo, some 2000 feet in height, which slopes down behind the point, and terminates in a number of hummocks, showing from a distance like islands.

"The coast, unknown, and represented to abound in shoals and reefs, is the harbour for pirates of every description. Here every man's hand is raised against his brother man; and here sometimes the climate wars upon the excitable European, and lays many a white face and gallant heart low on the distant strand.

"3d.—Beating between Points Api and Datu. The bay, as far as we have seen, is free from danger; the beach is lined by a feathery row of beautiful casuarinas, and behind is a tangled jungle, without fine timber; game is plentiful, from the traces we saw on the sand; hogs in great numbers; troops of monkeys, and the print of an animal with cleft hoofs, either a large deer, tapir, or cow. We saw no game save a tribe of monkeys, one of which, a female, I shot, and another quite young, which we managed to capture alive. The captive, though the young of the black monkey, is greyish, with the exception of the extremities, and a stripe of black down his back and tail.

"We witnessed, at the same time, an extraordinary and fatal leap made by one of these monkeys. Alarmed by our approach, he sprang from the summit of a high tree at the branch of one lower, and at some distance. He leaped short, and came clattering down sixty or seventy feet amid the jungle. We were unable to penetrate to the spot, on account of a deep swamp, to ascertain his fate.

"A river flows into the sea not far from where we landed—the water is sweet, and of that clear brown colour so common in Ireland. This coast is evidently the haunt of native prahns, whether piratical or other. Print of men's feet were numerous and fresh, and traces of huts, fires, and parts of boots, some of them ornamented after their rude fashion. A long pull of five miles closed the day.

"Sunday, 4th.—Performed divine service myself! manfully overcoming that horror which I have to the sound of my own voice before an audience. In the evening landed again more to the westward. Shore skirted by rocks; timber noble, and the forest clear of brushwood, enabling us to penetrate with ease as far as caution permitted. Traces of wild beasts numerous and recent, but none discovered. Fresh-water streams coloured as yesterday, and the trail of an alligator from one of them to the sea. This dark forest, where the trees shoot up straight and tall, and are succeeded by generation after generation varying in stature, but struggling upward, strikes the imagination with pictures trite yet true. It was thus I meditated in my walk. The foot of European, I said, has never touched where my foot now presses—seldom the native wanders here. Here, I, indeed, behold nature fresh from the bosom of creation, unchanged by man, and stamped with the same impress she originally bore! Here I behold God's design when He formed this tropical land, and left its culture and improvement to the agency of man! The Creator's gift as yet neglected by the creature; and yet the time may be confidently looked for when the axe shall level the forest, and the plough turn the ground."

Upon the 5th of August, a boat was sent to the island of Tulang-Talang, where some Malays were seen; they were civil, and offered their assistance. On the following morning the bandar (or chief steward) of the place came off in his canoe, and welcomed the new-comers. He assured them of a happy reception from the Rajah, and took his leave, after having been sumptuously entertained with sweetmeats and syrups, and handsomely provided with three yards of red cloth, some tea, and a little gunpowder. The great man himself, Muda Hassim, was, visited in his town of Sarāwak on the morning of the 15th. He received his visitors in state, seated in his hall of audience, a large shed, erected on piles. Sarāwak is only the occasional residence of the Rajah, and at the time of the ship's arrival he was detained there by a rebellion in the interior. The town was found to be a mere collection of mud-huts, containing about 1500 persons, and inhabited for the most part by the Rajah, his family, and their attendants. The remaining population were poor and squalid. "We sat," says Mr Brooke, "in easy and unreserved converse, out of hearing of the rest of the circle. He expressed great kindness to the English nation; and begged me to tell him really, which was the most powerful nation, England or Holland; or, as he significantly expressed, which is the 'cat and which is the rat?' I assured him that England was the mouser, though in this country Holland had most territory. We took our leave after he had intimated his intention of visiting us to-morrow morning."

The visit was duly paid, and as duly returned. Tea, cigars, scissors, knives, and biscuits, were distributed amongst the rajah and his suite, and the friendliest understanding was maintained. Mr Brooke, however, had come to Borneo for more serious business. Ceremonies being over, he dispatched his interpreter, an Englishman, (Mr. Williamson by name,) to the rajah, intimating his desire to travel to some of the Malay towns, and especially into the country of the Dyaks. The request, it was fully believed, would be refused; but, to the surprise of the asker, leave was given, with the accompanying assurance, however, that the Rajah was powerless amongst many Dyak tribes, and could not answer for the adventurer's safety. Mr Brooke availed himself of the license, and undertook to provide in other respects for himself. The Dyaks are the aborigines of Borneo, and share the country with the Malays and Chinese who have made their homes in it. "There be land rats, and there be water rats." There be also land Dyaks and water Dyaks; or, to use the language of the country, Dyak Darrat and Dyak Laut. Those of the sea vary in their character and prospects, but, for the most part, they are powerful communities, and desperate pirates, ravaging the coasts in immense fleets, and robbing and murdering without discrimination. Their language is similar to the Malay. The name of God amongst them is Battara (the Avatara of the Hindoos.) They bury their dead, and in the graves deposit a large portion of the property of the deceased, consisting of gold ornaments, brass guns, jars, and arms. "Their marriage ceremony consists in two fowls being killed, and the forehead and breast of the young couple being touched with the blood; after which the chief, or an old man, knocks their heads together several times, and the ceremony is completed with mirth and feasting." The Dyak Darrats inhabit an inconsiderable portion of the island, and are composed of numerous tribes, all agreeing in their customs, and speaking the same dialect. They are regarded as slaves by the Malays, and treated and disposed of like beasts of burden. "We do not live," said one, "like men; we are like monkeys; we are hunted from place to place; we have no houses; and when we light a fire, we fear the smoke will draw our enemies upon us." The appearance of these Dyaks, we are told, is very prepossessing. They are of middle height, active, and good-natured in their expression; the women not so good-looking, but as cheerful tempered. "The dress of the men consists of a piece of cloth, about fifteen feet long, passed between the legs, and fastened round the loins, with the ends hanging before and behind; the head-dress is composed of bark cloth, dyed bright yellow, and stuck up in front, so as to resemble a tuft of feathers. The arms and legs are often ornamented with rings of silver, brass, or shell; and necklaces are worn, made of human teeth, or those of bears or dogs, or of white beads, in such numberless strings as to conceal the throat. A sword on one side, a knife and small betel-basket on the other, completes the ordinary equipment of the males; but when they travel, they carry a basket slung from the forehead, on which is a palm mat, to protect the owner and his property from the weather. The women wear a short and scanty petticoat, reaching from the loins to the knees, and a pair of black bamboo stays, which are never removed except the wearer be enceinte. They have rings of brass and red bamboo about the loins, and sometimes ornaments on the arms; the hair is worn long; the ears of both sexes are pierced, and ear-rings of brass inserted occasionally; the teeth of the young people are sometimes filed to a point and discoloured, as they say that 'dogs have white teeth.' They frequently dye their feet and hands of a bright red or yellow colour; and the young people, like those of other countries, affect a degree of finery and foppishness, whilst the elders invariably lay aside all ornaments as unfit for a wise person, or one advanced in years." The character given of these Dyaks is highly favourable. They are pronounced grateful for kindness, industrious, honest, simple, mild, tractable and hospitable, when well used. The word of one may be taken before the oath of half a dozen Borneons. Their ideas are limited enough; they reckon with their fingers and toes, and few are arithmeticians beyond counting up to twenty. They can repeat the operation, but they must record each twenty by making a knot in a string.

It was to these people that Mr Brooke made more than one excursion during his first visit to Sarāwak. He met with no disaster, but he stored up useful information for future conduct. Great morality and the practice of many virtues distinguished the tribes he encountered, although degraded as low as oppression and utter ignorance could bring them. The men, he found, married but one wife, and concubinage was unknown in their societies; cases of seduction and adultery were very rare, and the chastity of the Dyak women was proverbial even amongst their Malay rulers. Miserable as was the lot of these people, Mr Brooke gathered from their morality and simplicity, hopes of their future elevation. They have no forms of worship, no idea of future responsibility; but they are likewise free from prejudice of every kind, and therefore open, under skilful hands and tender applications, to the conviction of truth, and to religious impressions. One tribe, the Sibnowans, particularly struck Mr Brooke by their gentleness and sweetness of disposition. But,

"Like the rest of the Dyaks," he informs us, "the Sibnowans adorn their houses with the heads of their enemies; yet with them this custom exists in a modified form. Some thirty skulls," he adds, "were hanging from the roof of one apartment; and I was informed that they had many more in their possession; all however, the heads of enemies, chiefly of the tribe of Sazebus. On enquiring, I was told that it is indispensably necessary a young man should procure a skull before he gets married. On my urging that the custom would be more honoured in the breach than in the observance, they replied, that it was established from time immemorial, and could not be dispensed with. Subsequently, however, Sejugali allowed that heads were very difficult to obtain now, and a young man might sometimes get married by giving presents to his ladye-love's parents; at all times they denied warmly ever obtaining any heads but those of their enemies; adding, they were bad people, and deserved to die.

"I asked a young unmarried man whether he would be obliged to get a head before he could obtain a wife. He replied, 'Yes.' 'When would he get one?' 'Soon.' 'Where would he go to get one?' 'To the Sazebus river.' I mention these particulars in detail, as I think, had their practice extended to taking the head of any defenceless traveller, or any Malay surprised in his dwelling or boat, I should have wormed the secret out of them."

The Dyaks, generally, are celebrated for the manufacture of iron. Their forge is the simplest possible, and is formed by two hollow trees, each about seven feet high, placed upright, side by side, in the ground. From the lower extremity of these, two pipes of bamboo are conducted through a clay bank three inches thick, into a charcoal fire; a man is perched at the top of the trees, and pumps with two pistons, the suckers of which are made with cocks' feathers, which, being raised and depressed alternately, blow a regular stream of air into the fire. The soil cultivated by these people was found to be excellent. In the course of his wanderings, Mr Brooke lighted upon a Chinese colony, who, as is customary with our new allies, were making the most of their advantages. The settlement consisted of thirty men, genuine Chinese, and five women of the mixed breed of Sambas. They had been but four or five months in the country, and many acres were already cleared and under cultivation. The head of the settlement, a Chinese of Canton, spoke of gold mines which were abundant in the Sarāwak mountains, and of antimony ore and diamonds; the former, he said, might be had in any quantities.

Upon his return to Sarāwak, Mr Brooke opened to the rajah the business which had chiefly conducted him to his shores. He informed his highness that, being a private gentleman, he had no interest in the communication he was about to make; and that, being in no way connected with government, his words came with no authority. At the same time, he was, anxious for the interests of mankind, and more especially for the wellbeing of the inhabitants of Borneo, which was the last Malay state possessing any power, that the resources of a country so favoured by Providence should be brought into the fullest play. To this end, he suggested the opening of a trade with individual European merchants. Sarāwak was rich, and the territory around it produced many articles well adapted for commercial intercourse—such as bees' wax, birds' nests, rattans, antimony ore, and sago, which constituted the staple produce of the country. And, in return for such commodities, merchants of Singapore would gladly send from Europe such articles as would be highly serviceable to the people of Borneo—gunpowder, muskets, and cloths. Both parties would be benefited, and the comfort and happiness of the Borneons greatly enhanced. There was much discussion on the proposal, timidity and apprehension characterizing the questions and answers of the Rajah.

The important interview at an end, Mr Brooke prepares for a return to Singapore. "Never," says that gentleman, "was such a blazing as when we left Sarāwak; twenty-one guns I fired to the Rajah, and he fired forty-two to me—at least we counted twenty-four, and they went on firing afterwards, as long as ever we were in sight. The last words the Rajah, Muda Hassim, said, as I took my leave, were—'Tuan Brooke, do not forget me.'"

In August 1840, Mr Brooke arrived in Sarāwak for the second time. He had passed many months in cruising about the Archipelago, obtaining valuable information respecting the language, habits, and history of the race for whom he was concerned, and in collecting specimens of natural history, which are said to be interesting in the highest degree. The position of the Rajah had altered during his absence. The civil war or rebellion which had, in the first instance, forced the governor to reside in Sarāwak, was not yet quelled. The rebels, indeed, were within thirty miles of the rajah, and threatening an immediate attack. Nothing could be more opportune than the return of Mr Brooke at this critical moment. Muda Hassim begged his ancient friend not to desert him in his extremity, and appealed to his honour, as a gentleman from England, whether it would be fair to suffer him to be vanquished by the traitorous revolt of his people. Mr Brooke felt that it would not, and resolved to stand by the governor.

"A grand council of war," writes Mr Brooke in his journal, "was held, at which were present Macota, Subtu, Abong Mia, and Datu Naraja, two Chinese leaders, and myself—certainly a most incongruous mixture, and one rarely to be met with. After much discussion, a move close to the enemy was determined on for to-morrow; and on the following day to take up a position near the defences. To judge by the sample of the council, I should form very unfavourable expectations of their conduct in action. Macota is lively and active; but, whether from indecision or want of authority, undecided. The Capitan China is lazy and silent; Subtu indolent and self-indulgent; Abong Mia and Datu Maraja stupid."

The army set off, and Mr Brooke availed himself of a friendly hill to obtain a view of the country, and of the enemy's forts. The fort of Balidah was the strongest of their defences, and a moment's observation convinced him that a company of military might put an end to the war in a few hours. This fort was situated at the water edge, on a slight eminence on the right bank of a river; a few swivels and a gun or two were in it, and around it a breast-work of wood, six or seven feet high. The remaining defences were even more insignificant; and the enemy's artillery was reported to consist of three six-pounders, and numerous swivels. The number of fighting men amounted to about five hundred, about half of whom were armed with muskets, while the rest carried swords and spears. Ranjows were stuck in every direction. "These ranjows are made of bamboo, pointed fine, and stuck in the ground; and there are, besides, holes of about three feet deep filled with these spikes, and afterwards lightly covered, which are called patobong." The army of the rajah was scarcely more formidable than that of the enemy. It consisted of two hundred Chinese, excellent workmen and bad soldiers, two hundred and fifty Malays, and some two hundred friendly Dyaks; a few brass guns composed the artillery; and the boats were furnished with swivels. Mr Brooke suggested an attack of the detached defences—a proposition that was treated as that of a madman, the Rajah's army having no notion of fighting except from behind a wall. A council of war decided that advances should be made from the hill behind the rajah's fort to Balidah by a chain of posts, the distance being a short mile, in which space the enemy would probably erect four or five forts; "and then," says Mr Brooke, "would come a bombardment, noisy, but harmless."

Insignificant as the account may read, the difficulties of Mr Brooke, as commander-in-chief, were formidable enough, surrounded as he was by perils threatening not only from the enemy, but from the rank cowardice of his supporters, and the envy, spite, hatred, and machinations of his allies, the Rajah's ministers. The operations are admirably described in Mr Brooke's journal. Let it suffice to say, that the energy and bravery of the English leader brought them to a satisfactory issue, and, finally, the war to a happy close. At his intercession the lives of many of the offenders were spared, and the rebels suffered to deliver up their arms, and to return in peace to Sarāwak.

It is now necessary to state, that at the commencement of the war, Muda Hassim, unsolicited by Mr Brooke, had undertaken to confer upon the latter the governorship of Sarāwak, in the event of success crowning the efforts of his "friend from England." Mr Brooke had not demanded from the unfortunate Rajah a written agreement to this effect; nor at the time even desired a recompense, which was likely to bring with it much more of difficulty and vexation than profit and power. He respectfully declined an honour which he informed the Rajah it did not become him to accept whilst his highness was in his hands. The war being over, and Muda Hassim reinstated, the negotiation recommenced. No sooner was it discussed, however, than Mr Brooke informed the rajah that Malay institutions were so faulty, the high being allowed by them so much license, and the poor so oppressed, that any attempt to govern without a removal of abuses, was, on his part at least, impossible; and as a condition of his acceptance, he insisted that the Rajah should use all his exertions to establish the principle, that one man must not take from another, and that all men were free to enjoy the produce of their labour, save and except when they were working for the revenue. This revenue, too, he submitted, it was necessary to fix at a certain amount for three years, as well as the salaries of the government officers. The same rights should be conceded to the Dyak and Malay, and the property of the former must be protected, their taxes fixed, and labour free. The rajah acquiesced in the propriety of these measures, and bargained only for the maintenance of the national faith and customs. Mr Brooke remained in Sarāwak, but the office which had been offered with so much eagerness and pressing love, was after all slow in being conferred. Bad advisers, envious ministers, and weakness in Muda Hassim himself, all prevented the conclusion of a business upon which Mr Brooke had never entered of his own accord; but which, having entered upon it, had rendered him liable for many engagements which his anticipated new position had made essential.

"I found myself," writes Mr Brooke, "clipped like Samson, while delay was heaped upon delay, excuse piled upon excuse. It was provoking beyond sufferance. I remonstrated firmly but mildly on the waste of my money, and on the impossibility of any good to the country whilst the rajah conducted himself as he had done. I might as well have whistled to the winds, or have talked reason to stones. I had trusted—my eyes gradually opened—I feared I was betrayed and robbed, and had at length determined to be observant and watchful." Upon the faith of the Rajah, Mr Brooke had purchased in Singapore a schooner of ninety tons, called The Swift, which he had laden with a suitable cargo. Upon its arrival at Sarāwak, the rajah petitioned to have the cargo ashore, assuring Mr Brooke of a good and quick return: part of such return being immediately promised in the shape of antimony ore. Three months elapsed, and the rajah's share in this mercantile transaction had yet to be fulfilled. Disgusted with his treatment, and hopeless of justice, Mr Brooke dispatched the Swift to Singapore; and hearing that the crew of a shipwrecked vessel were detained in Borneo Proper, sent his only remaining vessel, the Royalist, to the city of Borneo, in order to obtain such information as might lead to the rescue of his countrymen. "I resolved," the journal informs us, "to remain here, to endeavour, if I could, to obtain my own. Each vessel was to return as quickly as possible from her place of destination; and I then determined to give two additional months to the rajah, and to urge him in every way in my power to do what he was bound to do as an act of common honesty. Should these means fail, after making the strongest representations, and giving amplest time, I considered myself free to extort by force what I could not gain by fair means."

"I need hardly remark," writes Captain Keppel, "on the singular courage and disregard of personal safety, and life itself, evinced by my friend on this occasion. At issue with the rajah on points of great temptation to him, beset by intrigues, and surrounded by a fierce and lawless people, Mr Brooke did not hesitate to dispatch his vessels and protectors,—the one on a mission of pure humanity, and the other in calm pursuance of the objects he had proposed to himself to accomplish; and, with three companions, place himself at the mercy of such circumstances, regardless of the danger, and relying on the overruling Providence in which he trusted, to bring him safely through all his difficulties and perils."

On the 16th of August 1841, the Royalist returned, and three days afterwards it was followed by the Swift. The former reported that the prisoners had been heard of in Borneo, but, unfortunately, not released. The Swift was accompanied by the Diana steamer. The formidable squadron alarmed the rajah and his ministers. Mr Brooke learned that the difficulties of the rajah's situation were increased, and his conduct towards himself, in a manner, excused, by the intrigues and evil doings of the latter. Macota, of whom mention has been made, was the most vindictive and unscrupulous amongst them. He had attempted to poison the interpreter of Mr Brooke, and had been discovered as the abettor of even more fearful crimes. Mr Brooke, strengthened by his late arrivals, resolved to bring matters to a crisis, and to test at once the strength of the respective parties. He landed a party of men fully armed, and loaded the ship's guns with grape and canister; he then proceeded to Muda Hassim, protested that he was well disposed towards the rajah, but assured him, at the same time, that neither he nor himself was safe against the practices of the artful and desperate Macota. Muda Hassim was frightened. One of the Dyak tribes took part with Mr Brooke, two hundred of them, with their chiefs, placing themselves unreservedly at his disposal, whilst Macota was deserted by all but his immediate slaves. The Chinese and the rest of the inhabitants looked on. The upshot may be anticipated. The rajah became suddenly active and eager for an arrangement. The old agreement was drawn out, sealed, and signed; guns fired, flags waved, and on the 24th of September 1841 Mr Brooke became Rajah of Sarāwak.

The first acts of Mr Brooke, after his accession to power, were suggested by humanity, and a tender consideration for the savage people whom he so singularly and unexpectedly had been called upon to govern. He inquired into the state of the Dyaks, endeavoured to gain their confidence, and to protect them from the brutal onslaught of the Malays and of each other, and at once relieved them of the burdens of taxation which weighed so cruelly upon them. He opened a court for the administration of justice, at which he presided with the late rajah's brothers, and maintained strict equity amongst the highest and lowest of his people. He decreed that murder, robbery, and other heinous crimes, should, for the future, be punished according to the written law of Borneo; that all men, irrespectively of race, should be permitted to trade and labour according to their pleasure, and to enjoy their gains; that all roads should be open, and that all boats coming to the river should be free to enter and depart without let or hindrance; that trade should be free; that the Dyaks should be suffered to live unmolested; together with other salutary measures for the general welfare. Difficulty and vexation met the governor at every step; but he persevered in his schemes of amelioration, and with a success which is not yet complete, and for years cannot be fairly estimated.

Muda Hassim, the former rajah of Sarāwak, was also presumptive heir to the throne of Borneo; but, unfortunately for him, under the displeasure of his nephew, the reigning sultan. The confirmation of Mr Brooke's appointment, it was absolutely necessary to receive from the latter; and Mr Brooke accordingly resolved to pay a visit to the prince, in the first place, to obtain a reconciliation, if possible, with the offending Muda, and secondly, to consolidate his own infant government. There was another object, too. The sultan had power to release the prisoners who had been spared in the wreck already mentioned; and this power Mr Brooke hoped, by discretion, to prevail upon his majesty to exercise. The picture of this potentate is thus drawn by Mr Brooke:

"The sultan is a man past fifty years of age, short and puffy in person, with a countenance which expresses, very obviously, the imbecility of his mind. His right hand is garnished with an extra diminutive thumb—the natural member being crooked and distorted. His mind, indeed, by his face, seems to be a chaos of confusion—without acuteness, without dignity, and without good sense. He can neither read nor write; is guided by the last speaker; and his advisers, as might be expected, are of the lower order, and mischievous from their ignorance and greediness. He is always talking, and generally joking; and the most serious subjects never meet with five minutes' consecutive attention. The favourable side of his character is, that he is good-tempered and good-natured—by no means cruel—and, in a certain way, generous, though rapacious to as high a degree. His rapacity, indeed, is carried to such an excess as to astonish a European, and is evinced in a thousand mean ways. The presents I made him were unquestionably handsome; but he was not content without begging from me the share I had reserved for the other Pangerans; and afterwards, through Mr Williamson, solicited more trifles—such as sugar, penknives, and the like. I may note one other feature that marks the man. He requested as the greatest favour—he urged with the earnestness of a child—that I would send back the schooner before the month Ramban, (Ramadan of the Turks,) remarking, 'What shall I do during the fast without soft sugar and dates?'"

The delivery of the prisoners, and the forgiveness of Muda Hassim, were quickly obtained; the more personal matter found opposition with the advisers of the Crown, but was ultimately conceded. On the 1st of August 1842, the letters to Muda Hassim were sealed and signed; and at the same council the contract, which gave Mr Brooke the government of Sarāwak, was fully discussed; and by ten o'clock at night was signed, sealed and witnessed. Mr Brooke returned to his government and people on the following day.

On the 1st of January 1843, the following entry appears in the diary so often quoted:—"Another year passed and gone!—a year with all its anxieties, its troubles, its dangers, upon which I can look back with satisfaction—a year in which I have been usefully employed in doing good to others. Since I last wrote, the Dyaks have been quiet, settled, and improving; the Chinese advancing towards prosperity; and the Sarāwak people wonderfully contented and industrious, relieved from oppression, and fields of labour allowed them. Justice I have executed with an unflinching hand."

It was in the month of March 1843, at the conclusion of the Chinese war, that Captain Keppel was ordered in the Dido to the Malacca Straits and the island of Borneo. Daring acts of piracy had been committed, and were still committing, on the Borneon coast; and, becoming engaged in the suppression of these crimes, he fell in with the English rajah of Sarāwak, and obtained from him the information which he has recently given to the world, and enabled us to place succinctly before our readers.

The piracy of the Eastern Archipelago is very different to that of the western world. The former obtains an importance unknown to the latter. The hordes who conduct it issue from their islands and coasts in fleets, rove from place to place, intercept the native trade, enslave whole towns at the entrance of rivers, and attack ill-armed or stranded European vessels. The native governments, if they are not participators in the crime, are made its victims, and in many cases, we are told, they are both—purchasing from one set of pirates, and plundered and enslaved by another. Captain Keppel has well related more than one engagement in which he was concerned with the ferocious marauders of these eastern seas—scenes of blood and horror, justified only by the enormity of the offence, and the ultimate advantages likely to be obtained from an extirpation of the deeply-rooted evil. As we have hinted at the commencement of this article, our present object is not so much to draw attention to the battle-scenes described by Mr Keppel, and which may be read with peculiar though painful interest in his book, as to obtain for Mr Brooke, the peaceful and unselfish disposer of so many blessings amongst a benighted and neglected people, that admiration and regard which he has so nobly earned. He has done much, but our government may enable him to do more. He has shown the capabilities of his distant home, and called upon his mother-country to improve them to the uttermost. We hear that her Majesty's government have not been deaf to his appeal, and that aid will be given for the development of his plans, equal to his warmest expectations. We trust it may be so. Nothing is wanting but the assistance which a government alone can afford, to render Borneo a friendly and valuable ally, and to constitute Mr Brooke one of the most useful benefactors of modern times; a benefactor in the best sense of the term—an improver of his species—an intelligent messenger and expounder of God's purpose to man.

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THE SMUGGLER'S LEAP.