conquered city a flame for ensign, and fire for a garrison.

6

"The consciousness of his high birth and two-fold origin, now kept Tard*** in a state of sombre preoccupation. As soon as our intimacy warranted every kind of confidence, he constantly talked to me of his mad projects in the East. The East is mine,' he would say, 'as the West belonged to my father Napoleon. I will state my descent, my name, and my projects; I will place myself at the head, not of the Turks, but of the Arabs. The former have run their race. With the Arabs I will restore the civilization of the Ptolemies. I speak their language; I belong to their race; I am of their blood; and they will listen to me. I will call each city, each town, each hamlet, each man, and each child by their several names. All will come to me; and the Nile, and the sands of the desert, and the winds shall roll towards Cairo and Alexandria as did the armies of Cambyses. The cross of the Cophts, and the three colours shall operate new prodigies. I will do for Egypt that which my father had not the generosity to do. He wanted it only as a road to India, instead of making it independent. Egypt shall with me and by me, be free; free by my sword, by the cross, and by the three colours. No more beys, nor pachas, nor slaves. Freedom, as in the time of the Caliphs, will I establish.-See you this casquette?' he continued; I will place it upon the pinnacle of Mecca. Until that time, it shall never quit my possession; then shall civilization revolve round it. Then shall we open our libraries ;-then shall we call to us science now enslaved in old Europe. It shall come to us from Germany, and Italy, and Spain. The Arabic of the Caliphs, the Greek of Plato, and the Latin of Tacitus, shall run through the streets of Alexandria. Then shall the light again come from the East, and the prophecies be accomplished!'

"And I have seen him, full of these strange ideas, full of projects of conquests, gallop halfnaked upon the sand along the sea-shore, calling with his strong and sonorous voice upon the nations who dwell upon the banks of the Nile, the borders of the desert, and skirt the mountains of Ethiopia, waving his hand in the wind as if balancing the scimitar, and shouting in Arabic, Ye people and nations! behold the son of Kebir!"

"Then stopping on a sudden, he would resume the mild and constant smile which I have already noticed, whilst the upper part of his face assumed the most perfect immobility. Insensibly the colour which his enthusiasm and violent excitement had raised upon his cheeks would fade and merge into the hue of sadness, which like a cloud descended from his brow. Here again was to be seen the deep thought of Napoleon, so admirably represented in the picture of the battle of Eylau.

son,

fatal extravagance of belief may have proceeded from an accident which readily admits of an explanation, but which made a lasting impression upon his mind. During his childhood, and on the occasion perhaps of some insurrection in favour of his claim to the throne of the Pharoahs, he had stabbed a camel-driver at Cairo. Some years after this murder, or rather this duel, he met, or thought he met, the same man at Aleppo. Now, whether the camel-driver was the victim of the application of his system, or the first cause of his error, I am not prepared to say; for I never knew. Be that as it may, Tard*** positively denied the mortality of the body.

ternal war, and the public executioner at home); | passport to other climes. I believe that this -let us suppose this, and who knows if Providence would not have placed face to face, two principles sprung like Oromasis and Arimanes, from the same origin, and have revived for us incredulous people those mythic beings, who at first, under real human forms, lead men in herds to some act of regeneration, whether of blood or of fire, and who, after they disappear, become moral truths like Typhon, Isis, and Osiris? Why should not this young prince, this legitimate son of Napoleon, have promoted that eternal tendency of Europe to obtain possession of Egypt, for the purpose of making an easy road to India, the cradle of human civilization? And why should not the young Egyptian, the illegitimate son of Napoleon, have represented that want, already felt by Africa under its Mameloucs and its Pachas, of shaking off the besotted yoke of the Sultans? It would have been a wonderful spectacle for mankind to see two men sprung from the same father-one pale as Europe, the other bronzed like Africameeting under the curve of their sabres in their first march towards each other, asking each other's name, and each replying, 'Napoleon!'

"Yes! I believe in the existence of an ener

getic and divine power, produced by the meeting of certain syllables and of certain numbers. Without unfolding the mysteries of the Cabal, I believe that these two names, forming but one, would have aroused from their sleep of stone, Alexandria, and its pharos, and its bazaars, and its arsenals, and its towers, and its nine hundred thousand inhabitants. I believe that the powerful breath of this double apparition would have dispersed the fine sand which now wears away so many noble monuments of granite; that in lieu of this dust, would have sprung up columns and capitals hewed out of the petrified date-tree, and all that population of statues formed from the natural productions of Egypt.

Egypt only produces statues made from its sand,--and sand which is made solely from its statues. Nothingness and form come and go alternately; to-day there is a pyramid, to-morrow a few heaps of sand. The Great Desert is but a collection of pounded cities.

"But let us quit the field of hypothesis, and return to the reality of my narrative.

"Tard*** added to his powerful energy of character, the most simple pursuits, and much innocence in his amusements. He was passionately fond of flowers. A sunset in the bosom of our Mediterranean, threw him into extasy. His oriental life always swam upon the surface of the habits he had acquired in Europe. He used the bath and perfumes to excess, and when the heat of the weather was great, the veil of drowsiness threw over his eyes that languor peculiar to the women of the East, as well as to lions and tigers.

Before we proceed further, I must state that Tard*** was mad, but his madness was nothing more than a philosophical monomania. It was so whimsical that it would not be worth recording, did it not unravel the dénouement of his life. I know not from what course of read

believed neither in the mortality of the soul, nor in the mortality of the body. Death, so far as he could define it to me, he seemed to consider a mere change of country, a forced journey from one place to another. The man murdered or presumed dead at Paris, would be found at Berlin or London. He positively denied a total disappearance. Thus, he said he had met somewhere walking together, Rousseau and Raynal, Buffon and Linnæus; and according to him, grave-diggers were sinecurists, and cemeteries a farce. With such a system of belief, aided by the officious resources of logic, murder was in his eyes only a forcible expulsion from one country, and a sentence of death only a

He had attained to that age when the contrast of a precarious condition, with gigantic views and hopes in after years, cease to be in equilibrium. The poetry, which had kept his mind within bounds, was fast disappearing.

"Tired of the delays caused by the refusal of his two uncles-respectable merchants, one of whom had been several times elected member of the national representation-to advance him money for his intended voyage to Egypt, Tard*** complained of their parsimony. He could not understand their refusing him the money necessary to take possession of the throne of the Caliphs. These worthy merchants, without denying the august descent of their nephew, would have preferred adding him to their establishment as a book-keeper, to seeing him a Pharoah I., an Aroun, or an Abasside. They therefore declined to supply him with funds for such a purpose.

"One day, as I was walking with him on the port of Marseilles, he began to play with a small knife, about two inches long, which he held between his fingers; he then begged me to wait for him a moment. Returning in a short time, he said, shutting his knife, I have just dispatched my two uncles for America - which means, in your language, that I have just killed them.'

"At the same instant, two gendarmes increased my astonishment and stupefaction, by arresting, with these words, the expeditive nephew: In the name of the law! Napoleon Tard** , you are our prisoner:-you have murdered your two uncles!'

"On his trial at the Assize Court of Aix, Napoleon Tard*** swerved not from his character. But his metaphysical monomania on the subject of death did not save him.

"He proceeded to the scaffold without fear, and without a murmur, deeply impressed with the idea that he could not die, because his body was immortal as well as his soul. He displayed only that smile, half sinister and half lovely, which I before mentioned.

"He must, moreover, have been well pleased at seeing such an abundance of fruit and flowers as were collected at the place to which he was taken. For the place of execution at Aix is embalmed twice a week, with all the vegetable wonders of Provence-the Delta of Southern France. The Nile is not more lavish of its gifts than the Rhone and the Durance. He thought, no doubt, that these perfumes were for him. Without a cravat, his neck free, and his eyes brilliant and sparkling, he walked through the crowd as if he were taking a stroll in the country. He would have been content had he been allowed a carnation in his button-hole, and a switch in his hand.

"He was in the market-place of Aix, and on a market day.

"In the glowing beams of a sun-shine in Provence, the imperial head of the victim fell by the knife of the guillotine, and the blood of Napoleon stained the pavement.

"One day, when the executioner came to Marseilles, to purchase a better blade, and two

stronger planks, a certain young man whom I may be allowed not to name, received a casquette, as the dying bequest of Tard***.

"It was the one which was to have crowned the minaret at Mecca, and rallied the civilization of the East."

Otterbourne: a Story of the English Marches. By the Author of Derwentwater.' 3 vols. London: Bentley.

Ir has been the taste, or the pleasure, of the author of 'Otterbourne' to write his story in a sort of stilted style, to the manifest injury of the talent and truth of some of his delineations. He might have imitated the clear and easy flow of the Rede, or the Coquet, or of the Tyne itself; but he has tried to rival the swollen turbulence of less musical streams. He seems well acquainted with the days when Douglas and Percy held rule on the borders; and he is also intimate with the manners and with the scenery. There is a sort of Northumberland air about the whole which is far from unpleasing, and frequent touches of heroic feeling worthy of the days of border chivalry. But his strange style spoils all he makes his heroes utter a language as stiff and inflexible as their corselets; and even his heroines express their anger or their love in a way starched and padded. There is little that is easy or simple: all is a sort of gladiator contest in language, where strange words and out-of-the-way expressions fly about as thick as cloth-yard shafts on the field of Chevy Chace itself. There are many fine situations, many noble actions, and much that is amusing and interesting, nevertheless, in the narrative. The story is connected with the battle of Otterbourne, fought in 1388, between Douglas and Percy a tall column marks the spot where the former fell; and the castle of Penoon, in Ayrshire, still stands to attest that the ransom of the latter was not small. The banner or pennon which Hotspur lost in the single combat at the gates of Newcastle, is in the keeping of the Montgomeries of Églinton. The fortunes of a Northumbrian knight of the name of Coupland, and his niece and daughter, are interwoven with the Scottish expedition: there are love passages with leaders of both countries, and skirmishes

and combats good store;—at last, truth and constancy, by the aid of prudence and valour, prevail, and the daughters of England are wedded in their own land and according to their own heart; and the Scots retreat in a state something between victors and vanquished.

Of the two ladies, who occasioned all this strife, our author draws the following por

traits:¡

"Amisia de Coupland, the younger of the pair, as the banneret's heiress, takes precedence. She was one of those 'witching beings whose charms peculiarly baffle description. Angel, Houri, and Grace, were terms in use before the deluge, and probably at these times, tabooed even in Owhyhee, but had they been available, would fail to raise the true idea. She was too much a woman to be an angel-too retiring for a houri-and too unstudied in attitudes for a grace. Yet her form and face, actions and speech, were, together, overcharged with a spell, which her clear blue eye served to launch

forth and fix. She was of middle stature, luxu

Her hair was a glossy auburn-not of the sorrel cast, usually so denominated by partial mothers, but the rich sunny brown veritably implied,

Warm

"Thus beautiful, and with such expectancies, Amisia, young as she was, might have made more than one high alliance; but the goldenheaded dart had never been fairly planted in her bosom, and she entertained certain romantic notions which a wound of that kind could alone realize. These, she was self-willed enough to tinue some time longer the queen of love and stand upon, and, therefore, was likely to conbeauty,' at the northern tournaments. in fancy, sanguine in disposition, and unfettered by worldly opinions, her heart once engaged, she was not constituted to bend its aspirations to conventional shadows. She was, however, essentially of the gentlest disposition: a sweet smile ever played around her mouth-a mouth that a miser's heir would have sacrificed his patrimony to kiss, and wished the caress to endure, like that invoked by the Athenian, for thrice ten years!

"Two pretty women in consecutive pages is somewhat too much; and ladies may incline to think, that the traits of the second, like the madness of Tilburina's confidante, should be kept modestly in the background. But to act on this would be to cast a derogation far from admissible. Brevity affords a medium.

"Hester Arnecliffe was the daughter of Sir John de Coupland's only sister, and an orphan. Her father had been an esquire of approved descent, but no estate; consequently his child was left entirely dependent on her uncle, who had fostered her with kindly affection. She was now in the full bloom of womanhood. Majestic in person;

'He appealed to boiling blood. At the words, the English chivalry dashed on amain, and ere a fresh breath could be drawn the rival hosts closed with a shock awfully tremendous. In a few moments more every arm, of horse and foot,

on either side, was engaged in the strife.

and prolonged, which the history of ages, rife A fight, the most inveterate, sanguinary, in such events, has handed down to us, ensued. Order or arrangement of action there was none.

Sometimes, the murderous iron-wave surged tumultuously one way, then rolled heavily back the other, marking at each flow rather the indomitable spirit of the struggle, than any change in its fortune. The war-cries, at the beginning frequent and piercing, gradually became less

often iterated, and then, in tones hoarse and indistinct. Several, which erst had waked the

echoes, sunk altogether, leaving the unhappy fate of their owners to be sadly inferred. But increased rather than diminished, and yells, the rain of blows-the clash and clang of steel not of defiance but of suffering, began more to afflict the ear. The bright moon, now high in the heavens, threw a pale radiance over the fearful scene, rendering the horrible flashings

of bill, brand, and battle-axe, but too distinct,

as they swung and circled above the eddying throng. The whole contrasted strongly and strangely with the hour, and the wild stillness of the neighbouring hills.

"The slogan of the Douglas, a sound which

this eventful evening. Need we say that the foremost of these, and he who hacked and clove a path for his fellow-braves, was the invincible Hotspur? The planet of his house literally and figuratively ascendant, eventfully rewarded efforts memorialised in gouts of Scottish blood: for, gaining a temporary vantage-ground, he saw its beams kissing the white outline of the Brabant-lion-his captured insignia-streaming in the wind above the heads of a knot of Scots. To behold, and to make his destrier bound, through all intervention towards it, was one act. Doughty indeed must that enemy have been who could have withstood the more than mortal power that nerved him.

"Raimond Farneley and De Neville were both in his rear, and simultaneously saw his ob ject; saw him lop away, as a woodman clears a copse, the weak branches of resistance offered to his career, with mingled sensations. The first could not help feeling pride in the prowess of his lord, even though forestalled by it in a darling desire: the last, looked on with envy indeed, but also with a sort of satisfaction that the prize was about to be won by a competitor so pre-eminent, and one he did not, in a certain sense, regard as an obnoxious rival.

"It was won. The hapless esquire, Glendonwin, to whom the unlucky honour of bearing the trophy had been committed, gave up life and trust together.

"Ha-hah! a rescue! a rescue!' shouted Hotspur exultingly waving his recovered banner in the air. The Percy, for himself!-What Scot dares the Percy?'

"I-the Douglas!' rose in answer from a little distance, and with the defiance, the furions utterer could be seen working through the press to back it.

"The parties here being in the very centre of the mêlée, a dire confusion reigned around, and blows were dealing so fast and indiscrimi nately, that each man's constant care was necessarily that of his own head. Farneley, desperately tasked at the moment by a huge Lothian man-at-arms, found exclusive employ ment most unpropitiously for the juncture."

These passages support, in every line, the opinion which we have delivered upon the uneasy and ungraceful style of the author. It is in vain that several of the characters are well conceived and well drawn; and that there is much animation and incident

throughout the narrative: we cannot for our language is not that of nature, nor yet of any hearts get on as we would wish, for the fiction which we are acquainted with. We would advise the author, when he next makes a venture in romance, to give his own feelings fair play, and imagine that he is describing the scenes of his story in a letter to some friend: this will bring him down into the familiar language of life, and enable him to speak like a man of this world.

The Year of Liberation, a Journal of the Defence of Hamburgh in 1813. 2 vols. London: Duncan, THE writer of The Year of Liberation is answerable for the extraordinary offence of hiding his light under a bushel; for twenty years has he been treasuring up in secret his nied that some of their interest has been lost very pleasant volumes, and it cannot be deby this long suppression. We have been, both last week and this, so perplexed to find room for notices of new works and for forthcoming

than improved

- a waist,

Indeed, sized to love's wish.

of ordinary adversaries, was the breath of attraction to at least three desperate warriors on

been kindly favoured, that we cannot make extracts; but we are so well pleased with the

'Life of Sir Walter Scott, Bart., with critical notices of his writings. Part I.'-This is an Edinburgh work: the first part contains ninetysix pages,-price two shillings,-and the whole life will extend to twelve numbers, embellished with engravings. The materials are said to be gathered from authentic sources, and the publisher states that a gentleman of eminent and acknowledged talents is engaged to reduce them to order, and extract from them a

clear and satisfactory narrative. We had hoped that the slight and hurried sketches of the poet already published, would have sufficed till Mr. Lockhart's Memoir made its appearance; we scarcely imagine that a work without the stamp of authenticity upon it, can be acceptable to the world, when one, in which all credence may be placed, is even now in preparation. Looking at the present undertaking as materials collected more for the use of the future biographer, than the edification of the world, we cannot withhold our praise from the industry of the author, who has related some curious traits of early character, and some school-boy adventures, in all of which, we recognize not a little of the illustrious poet. We have, however, more about his kindred and acquaintances than was necessary to be told, and a dissertation on moral philosophy which might be spared. There are a number of sensible remarks and judicious observations scattered about. The portrait is a sad failure; it is a miserable copy of Leslie's Sir Walter; the eyes are stony, and the whole figure seems rather to have been cast at Carron, than engraved on copper by a man desirous of producing a natural and easy copy of a clever original.

'LADIES' FAMILY LIBRARY, VOL. II.-The Biographies of Lady Russell and Madame Guyon, by Mrs. Child.'-The memoir of Lady Russell is so judiciously interspersed with her own admirable letters, that it cannot fail to be read with great interest; but we think it an error to have introduced into such a work the life of the mystical fanatic Madame Guyon-what possible good purpose could it answer?

'Lives of the Twelve; or, the Modern Cæsars, by H. W. Montagu.'-This first part contains the Life of Napoleon'-who are to be the other eleven, the reader is left to conjecture. The work is a brief chronicle, in which important events are marked by a short comment.

'Grier's Mechanics' Calculator.'—This is truly an excellent work, far better calculated for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, than any or all of the treatises yet published by the Society that assumes the monopoly of intelligence. The introduction is replete with the practical wisdom of common sense; the scientific part of the work is equally distinguished for accuracy and simplicity; a profound mathematician may read it with pleasure, and a beginner can read it with profit. From the modest title-page, few persons can learn the great value of the book; it is, in fact, a complete introduction to the mathematical and mechanical sciences, and one of the very best in our language.

'The Panorama of Torquay.'-This is a descriptive and historical sketch of the district lying between the Dart and the Teign, and it has been

so well received, as to reach a second edition.

The historian, the geologist, the florist, the antiquary, and the biographer, may all find some

'Tales and Conversations, by Emily Cooper.'These stories want power, though they have much simplicity. From this remark, we, however, exempt the little conversation called Genius and Industry; there we have the line drawn between the productions of mechanical labour and natural talent, and we would advise all those to read it, who have children that set up for geniuses.

'Representation of England and Wales, by M. H. Rankin.'-In these times of change or im

provement, this will be found a useful book. It is neither more nor less than an account of all the counties, cities, and boroughs sending members to parliament: with an Appendix containing a summary of the representation in England and Wales, the Reform and Boundary Acts-the whole alphabetically arranged.

'The Maxima Charta of 1832.'-This is a work comprising the various acts lately passed for amending the representation of the people in the Commons House of Parliament, as also the statutes which settle the boundaries; the reader will find in it all that he wishes to know

regarding the operation of the Reform Bills in England, Ireland, and Scotland.

A Companion to every Almanack for 1833.'This little work is a kind of Diary of the Year, exhibiting the botanical and natural characteristics of each month, with the operations in the field, garden, and orchard; it also contains the curious customs, games, and other amusements of the people. All this is related with much brevity and considerable knowledge of the matter in hand.

'The Peasant's Posy; consisting of Poems, Sonnets, and Songs, by Robert M'Burnie.'-Poetry is a thriftless pursuit, but it must be pleasant to many, for many are its followers. It is seldom, indeed, that a poet of such original merit arises as to command attention by the vigour, and the melody of his strains; nor does it always happen that he meets with the approbation which his genius deserves: the truth is, that the land overflows with song: the gods, in their wrath, have made too many poetical. The bard before us seems of Scottish growth, and his song is sometimes of Nith and the Solway: he has some nature, but little elevation or vigour: he has affection in his love, but no passion. We could write smooth words of sympathy and encouragement to Mr. M'Burnie, who is, we hear, a respectable man, residing at Worksop, in Nottinghamshire, where he cheers the hours of labour with song and ballad. But we should only mislead him if we held out hopes of future distinction in the province of inspiration.

Crooning to a body's sel', does weel enoughwas the consolation which Burns drew from his immortal strains: we do not mean that the poet before us should be quite so limited, but we fear he is not born to charm that wide circle called

the world.

ORIGINAL PAPERS

LINES

pave

Thy path to the grave.

Hearest thou the festal din

Of Death, and Destruction, and Sin, And Wealth crying Havock! within? 'Tis the Bacchanal triumph which makes truth dumb

Thine Epithalamium!

Aye, marry thy ghastly wife!

Let Fear, and Disgust, and Strife, Spread thy couch in the chamber of Life: Marry Ruin, thou Tyrant! and God be thy guide To the bed of thy bride!

VICTOR HUGO'S NEW TRAGEDY.

Paris, Nov. 24.

I must give you an account of Victor Hugo's new tragedy-a singular and a shameful one, full of genius and abomination.

'Le Roi s'amuse,'-the King amuses himself,-such is the name of the drama. The king in question is no other than Francis the First, a chivalric hero for a drama. Let us see what M. Hugo makes of him. The first act represents the Court of Francis, himself, his courtiers, and his fool. The latter, not Francis, is the hero of the drama. The said fool is an historic character, by name Triboulet, celebrated by Rabelais and Marot. The latter has even left his portrait, as having

Petit front et gros yeux, nes grant taillé a voste,
Estomac plat et long, hault dos à porter hcte.

Triboulet is represented by M. Hugo, as the

confidant, the minister of Francis-the minister, that is, of his pleasures. He grimaces, puns, plays tricks, and fires epigrams, all to amuse the monarch, who is in love, it seems, with some unknown and undiscoverable damsel. Triboulet gives him the commonplace advice, to divert himself en attendant with Madame Cosse. The monarch freely follows it, and with a frankness of conduct calculated to put all the female portion of the audience to the blush. Lest, however, this should not be broad enough, Triboulet takes care to make it significant by a world of coarse jests upon Monsieur de Cosse and his

"horned front."

In the second act, the trifling and extravagant fool, Triboulet, appears alone, as a senmodo, in Notre-Dame de Paris. He is like timental character, the counterpart of Quasigusted with his profession, with his kind, with, Liston off the stage, sad and sentimental, dishimself. He has a daughter, named Blanche, the loveliest and purest of secluded flowers; for

Francis succeeds, despite of the fool's vigi

lance, in getting possession of Blanche, whom he woos, before the audience, like an Italian Bandit, and carries off by force into an adjoining cabinet, whilst Triboulet enters, and thunders at the door in vain to rescue his daughter.

This is enough to show how the object and aim of the tragic art is changed. It was wont to excite the emotions of sympathy and pity. M. Hugo excites emotions to a high degree, but they are those of disgust and shame. Female spectators are driven, as of old, to use their handkerchiefs-but 'tis to hide crimson blushes, rather than to dry up tears.

But I am not yet arrived at the acme of enormity. The fourth act, I believe it is, opens -where? In a brothel, of which the master is a bravo, and the mistress a crony of Francis the First. The King is there, over a pot of wine, behaving in a manner befitting the scene. Triboulet has bribed mine host to kill Francis, whom mine host knows not. But the lady

of the mansion intercedes in behalf of Francis's good looks, and persuades her companion to earn Triboulet's fee, by stabbing the first comer, putting the body into a sack, and palming it on the fool for that of Francis. The assassin follows the advice, and does stab the first comer, who proves to be no other than Blanche.

The dead body of Blanche is then handed in a sack to Triboulet, who receives it as the corpse of Francis. He places it on the stage, and gloats in poetic and indignant soliloquy on the honour of his daughter avenged, and the consequences of the monarch of France being slain by his fool. His soliloquy is interrupted by the entrance of Francis himself, somewhat sobered. Triboulet, amazed, opens the sack, and finds to his horror the body of his daughter.

This is the dénouement of the piece, which took place, I am happy to say, for the credit of the French, amidst a volley of hisses. It was, notwithstanding, announced for another evening, with corrections. But the authorities interposed, and the repetition of 'Le Roi s'amuse' has been prohibited.

OUR WEEKLY GOSSIP ON LITERATURE
AND ART.

THE Abbotsford subscription succeeds well in London: five thousand pounds and upwards have already been obtained, and we have no doubt that ten times that sum will, in process of time, be subscribed. The idea of the Committee to endow Abbotsford as an heir-loom to the family, has been well received by the country; to preserve the noble edifice which Scott built, the rare and valuable books which he collected, and the old armour and old weapons, and other interesting relics of past ages, which came to him from all quarters of the world, is, at least, as wise an undertaking as that of rearing pillars on the hills, with inscriptions in his honour. The people of Aberdeen, however, seem resolved to have a monument to his memory of their own: the people of Glasgow incline the same way, while those of Edinburgh have commenced debating, not only about the design, but respecting the site on which their monument shall be raised. has been for some time fashionable in Scotland to raise architectural monuments, and of these Edinburgh has its full allowance.

It

We see that Lady Dacre announces-or the booksellers for her a work in three vo

Dec. 6.-William George Maton, M.D., Vice President, in the chair.-No paper was read, in consequence of the reading of the minutes of the anniversary meeting, which occupied the evening.

ROYAL SOCIETY OF LITERATURE.

Dec. 5.-Rev. Dr. Richards in the chair.The reading of Col. Gunter's narrative of Charles the Second's escape from England, after the battle of Worcester, was concluded.

The details of the fugitive monarch's dangers and embarrassments, while in the charge of the loyal narrator, possess a lively interest. In passing near Arundel, the party fell in with the Governor of the Castle, Capt. Morley; at Bramber, they found themselves on a sudden in the midst of a large body of cavalry, that, unknown to them, were quartered in the neighbourhood; and at Brighton, they were thrown into a further alarm, in consequence of the King's being recognized by the landlord of the inn where they put up. The master of the vessel which the Colonel had engaged, likewise proved of a temper to occasion some apprehensions of delay or discovery. These distresses, however, were relieved by a ludicrous adventure, at a house near Chichester, which afforded them hospitality for a night; and the proprietor of which, a staunch cavalier, related to the Colonel, but not entrusted with his secret, mistook the King for a Roundhead, and occasioned Charles and his company much diversion, by the perplexity into which he was thrown, on finding his loyal but hospitable hearth unexpectedly invaded by one, as he thought, of that canting fraternity.

Mr. Hamilton read a passage in a letter from Sir W. Gell, communicating some particulars of an interesting discovery made at Pompeii. Among other novel objects lately met with there by Col. Robinson, are the masts of a number of vessels, which were lying in the port at the time when the devoted town was overwhelmed. A drawing was likewise shown by Mr. Hamilton, copied from a picture lately found at the same place: the original is perhaps the most beautiful specimen of ancient painting known to exist. It is a spirited representation of some event in the war of Alexander with Darius-probably the death of the latter.

A drawing of a very curious relic of antiquity was also exhibited by the Chev. P. O. Bronsted. It is a terra-cotta vase, in the form of a box of a very peculiar shape, and is supposed to have held the aorpayaλot, or bones used in playing at dice. The subject of Prometheus, visited on the rock by the Oceanitida, is elegantly painted on the vase. It was found at gina, and is of Athenian workmanship.

LINNEAN SOCIETY.

Dec. 4.-A. B. Lambert, Esq., in the chair.Several candidates were elected, and others proposed. A notice was read of the occurrence of a beautiful species of Thrush, new to this country as a British bird, and very nearly allied, both in size and plumage, to our well known Missel Thrush. This bird was shot by Lord Malmsbury, in a furze-field, near Heron's Curtis, Esq. The reading a further portion of Court. The communication was made by John Professor Essenbeck's botanical paper, concluded the business of the evening. The meeting was fully attended, and among the members present, Mr. Burchill, and Lieut. Holman, the blind traveller.

HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY.

Dec. 4.A paper was communicated by the author of The Domestic Gardener's Manual,' on the growth and uses in this climate of the Zea Mays, or Indian Corn, and some notes upon Chinese Chrysanthemums, by Mr. Donald Munro, the Society's head gardener. The observations on both these subjects, were interesting, and will be found serviceable by the cultivators of the plants. A very handsome Queen pine-apple was exhibited, from Sir Rowland Hill's extensive gardens at Hawkston, near Shrewsbury; a seedling cactus of great beauty, and a hybrid cineraria, from Sir Herbert Jenner's garden; roses and passifloras from Mrs. Marryatt; seedling chrysanthemums, from Mr. Wheeler, of Oxford, and varieties of stenactis and chimonanthus, from the garden of the Society.

The Rev. T. Ferris was elected a Fellow of the Society.

The cards of the days of meeting, for the ensuing year, were distributed; on the backs of which, we observed a prospectus of Six Lectures on Botany, which are intended to be given in the summer months, according to the plan hitherto adopted.

GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON.

Dec. 5.-Roderick Impey Murchison, Esq., President, in the chair.-The Rev. J. C. Stapleton, of Highclere, John Forbes Royle, Esq., and Robert Hudson, Esq., were elected Fellows of the Society.

A paper by Gideon Mantell, Esq., F.G.S., was read, on the saurian remains found by the author, at various times, in Tilgate Forest, Sussex, but more particularly on a new animal belonging to the same tribe, and lately discovered by him. The paper was illustrated by an extensive series of specimens, including the recently found reptile, and numerous drawings.

ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY.

Dec. 6.-John Hamilton, Esq., Vice President, in the chair.-The minutes of the last monthly meeting were read and confirmed. Nineteen candidates were elected, amongst whom were the Earls of Stair and Yarmouth, Lord Viscount Ranelagh, Sir E. Halliday, N. N. Rothschild, and others. The report of the council, read by the Secretary, stated, among various details, that the balance in hand, on the 30th of Nov., after the monthly receipts and payments, was 5171. 4s. 8d., and the number of visitors to the Gardens, 4424.

It was announced that Dr. Grant, Professor of Zoology at the London University, would give an extended course of lectures to the members of the Society, in Bruton Street, on the structure and classification of animals. These lectures will commence on the 15th of January; the report also stated, that the council, convinced by the experience of the last two years, that the Society contained, among its members, men of high rank in science, both at home and abroad, and referring to the printed