Two hours afterwards, weary cries of "Question, question!" "Divide, divide!" sank into reluctant silence as Audley Egerton rose to conclude the debate—the man of men to speak late at night, and to impatient benches: a man who would be heard; whom a Bedlam broke loose would not have roared down; with a voice clear and sound as a bell, and a form as firmly set on the ground as a church-tower. And while, on the dullest of dull questions, Audley Egerton thus, not too lively himself, enforced attention, where was Harley L'Estrange? Standing alone by the river at Richmond, and murmuring low fantastic thoughts as he gazed on the moonlit tide.
When Audley left him at home, he had joined his parents, made them gay with his careless gayety, seen the old-fashioned folks retire to rest, and then—while they, perhaps, deemed him once more the hero of ball-rooms and the cynosure of clubs—he drove slowly through the soft summer night, amidst the perfumes of many a garden and many a gleaming chestnut grove, with no other aim before him than to reach the loveliest margin of England's loveliest river, at the hour the moon was fullest and the song of the nightingale most sweet. And so eccentric a humorist was this man, that I believe, as he there loitered—no one near to cry "How affected!" or "How romantic!"—he enjoyed himself more than if he had been exchanging the politest "how-d'ye-do's" in the hottest of London drawing-rooms, or betting his hundreds on the odd trick with Lord de R—— for his partner.
FOOTNOTES:
[8] "What was the star I know not, but certainly some star it was that attuned me unto thee."
From the London Examiner.
A GLIMPSE OF THE GREAT EXHIBITION.
There is one country which is not represented at the Great Exhibition, one power which refused to send any specimens of its produce, lest the having done so should be considered as a tribute to the commercial greatness of England, and lest exhibitors and exhibited should incur contamination by contact with specimens of the world's industry. One is not sorry that this should be the case, and that the felon power of Europe should have thus passed judgment on itself, and of its own accord placed itself in Coventry.
The country we allude to is Naples. The horror which the king entertains of any thing constitutional since his Majesty took the oath to his own constitution, and since he hanged those who committed the same crime without afterwards perjuring themselves after the royal example, has induced him to prohibit the sending of any specimens to London. Naples, to be sure, has little to exhibit. Industry in that country, so blessed by nature, has been crushed and annihilated by the hand of tyranny. Sulphur and other volcanic products, wine which science has never enabled to bear exportation, silk in its brut state, with some coarse fabrics of cloth and linen, and hats in imitation of Tuscany, compose all the industry of one of the finest countries in Europe. No marvel, therefore, it should have shrunk upon any pretence from occupying a booth at the Great Exhibition.
A very different place in that great show is held by Piedmont, which has furnished a large assortment of raw materials and manufactured articles. On the other hand, Florence and Venice are far, we fear, from even keeping up a shadow of their old reputation. The country of Benvenuto Cellini has lost the gift of the arts with that of freedom; and the manufactures with which Venice used to pay for the merchandise of the East are no more. Strange to say, however, Milan supplies one of the most interesting and perfect compartments of the Exhibition, that of small sculptures, in which the youth of the region are so skilled as to distance all competition.