Behold us, then, landed at the Place of Dolour. The spot chosen for the lazaretto makes it certainly not the most desirable or sana. tory of residences. It stands in a swamp below the ramparts, but separated from them first by the general Campo Santo, or cemetery, and nigh by a deep drain, always full of black-water in a state of putrescence, that washes the side of the prison. In front is the beach, whose accumulated shingles have attained such a height as almost to exclude the sea breeze, and consequently the fetid odours of the ditch have no chance of being neutralized by ventilation.

Owing to the arrival of several vessels from the Barbary coast, the lazaretto was so crowded, that only one room was vacant, or rather, perhaps, our intemperate denunciations against the harbour-master had obtained for us as a penance the infliction of one general ward, like that of an hospital. I will endeavour to describe it. The apartment was about sixty feet long by forty wide. It had originally been white-washed; but time, and the mal-properté of its numerous sets of occupants, tobacco and other stains, not mentionable, made it difficult to guess what had been the original dye of the walls-so that an artist (and there was one among us) might have found any colour that his canvass required. The brick floor had been innocent of water for some generations, and was covered with marks innumerable and indelible, that gave it the appearance of a tortoise's back, or a chessboard, without its regularity. There were three grated windows of ample size, looking out into a narrow yard, bounded by lofty walls rising high above the roof of the building; and in the court was posted a sentinel who paraded in front, in order to remind the détenus of what they were.

You may imagine our despair when we were shown into this barrack. We stared at each other in blank astonishment. But scarcely had we entered when we were visited by an upholsterer, who undertook to fit up our quarters, and soon commenced his operations. By means of wood and canvass he contrived to cut the room unequally in two with a partition eight feet high, and behind it were ranged some iron bedsteads. Here was to be our dormitory. Outside this screen, a salle à manger, as he dignified the place, was furnished with a table and some wooden chairs; whilst one of the corner windows was allotted to the cause of all our woes. Only speaking a few words of Italian, and her French not being very legitimate, Miss Pigou was heard storming at the top of her voice, and in high altercation with the concierge.

"Where is my bed-room, Camera ?" said the antiquated spinster. "Your bed-room!" replied the keeper, with a sneer.

quì," pointing to the corner.

"I am not a signora," said the lady-" a ragazza."

66

"Signora

66

una

Che," said the man, with the most imperturbable effrontery, ragazza-you are all fellow passengers," and, eyeing her with attention, added, "There is no danger."

"What a brute!" exclaimed the lady.

"Sì," muttered the keeper, "é molto bruta."

"I will appeal to the ambassador," menaced Miss Pigou.

"The ambassador has nothing to do with our quarantine laws; I am supreme here," said the man, and immediately turned on his heel.

C'était beau cuir. If circumstances will not yield to you, says Lord Bacon, you must yield to circumstances-so with us.

We soon

became reconciled to our situation :-we had books, a chess.board, and very agreeable society, composed of French and English. The term fixed for our detention was ten days, and the party promised to be an harmonious one. The restaurateur was a man of great promise. Our antiquated virgin ensconced herself in her corner; and we did not much regret the loss of her company. There is an anecdote told of Hoffman, that perhaps might not have been inapplicable had she joined our mess. Whenever it chanced that at dinner he was placed next to a bas bleu, he would tuck his napkin under his arm, whisk his plate off the table, and go and post himself as far as possible from her, looking wildly out of his little keen eyes, as though he had escaped being bit by an asp. This by the by.

We found the cook a distinguished artiste. He gave us little oysters, almost equal to those of Ostend. They are found imbed. ded in the rocks, and it must require a most experienced eye to detect them; red mullet en papillote-they proved, at least, if the Genoese are uomini senza fede, their sea is not senza pescé; quails, with their envelope of vine leaves, &c. The champagne and Burgundy were excellent in quality; and, after the cloth was removed, we proposed to pass the evening in recounting to each other our several adventures.

THE LOST BATTLE.

FROM THE FRENCH OF VICTOR HUGO.

OH Allah! who will give me back my terrible array ?
My emirs and my cavalry that shook the earth to-day;
My tent, my wide-extending camp, all dazzling to the sight,
Whose watch-fires, kindled numberless beneath the brow of night,
Seem'd oft unto the sentinel that watch'd the midnight hours,
As heaven along the sombre hill had rained its stars in showers ?

Where are my beys so gorgeous, in their light pelisses gay,
And where my fierce Timariot bands, so fearless in the fray;
My spotted khans, my spahis brave, swift thunderbolts of war;
My sun-burnt Bedouins, trooping from the Pyramids afar,
Who laugh'd to see the labouring hind stand terrified at gaze,
And urged their desert horses on amid the ripening maize ?

These horses with their fiery eyes, their slight untiring feet,
That flew along the fields of corn like grasshoppers so fleet-
What! to behold again no more, loud charging o'er the plain,
Their squadrons, in the hostile shot diminish'd all in vain,
Burst grandly on the heavy squares, like clouds that bear the storms,
Enveloping in lightning fires the dark resisting turms!

Oh! they are dead!—their housings brave are trailed amid their gore
Dark blood is on their manes and sides, all deeply spotted o'er :
All vainly now the spur would strike these cold and rounded flanks,
To wake them to their wonted speed amid the rapid ranks :
Here the bold riders red and stark upon the sands lie down,
Who in their friendly shadows slept throughout the halt at noon.

Oh Allah! who will give me back my terrible array ?
See where it lies along the fields for leagues on leagues away,
Like riches from a spendthrift's hand flung prodigal to earth.
Lo! steeds and riders;-Tartar chiefs, or of Arabian birth,

Their turbans, and their rapid course, their banners, and their cries,
Seem now as if a troubled dream had pass'd before my eyes.

My valiant warriors and their steeds, thus doom'd to fall and bleed !
Their voices have no echo now, their footsteps have no speed;
They sleep, and have forgot at last the sabre and the bit-
Yon vale, with all its corses heap'd, seems one wide charnel-pit.
Long shall the evil omen rest upon this plain of dread-
To-night the smell of solemn blood, to-morrow of the dead.

Alas! 'tis but a shadow now-that noble armament!

How terribly they strove, and press'd from morn till eve unspent,
Amid the fatal fiery ring enamour'd of the fight!

Now o'er the dim horizon sinks the solemn pall of night:

The brave have bravely done their work, and calmly sleep at last;
The crows begin, and o'er the dead are gathering dark and fast.

Already through their feathers black they pass their eager beaks,
Forth from the forest's distant depth, from bald and barren peaks,
They congregate in hungry flocks, and rend their gory prey.
Woe to that gorgeous army's pride, so vaunting yesterday!
That formidable host, alas! is coldly nerveless now

To drive the vulture from his gorge, or scare the ghastly crow.

Were now that host again mine own, with banner broad unfurl'd,

With it I would advance and win the empire of the world.

Monarchs to it should yield their realms, and veil their haughty brows; My sister it should ever be, my lady, and my spouse.

Oh! what will unrestoring Death, that jealous tyrant-lord,

Do with the brave departed men that cannot wield a sword.

Why turn'd the balls aside from me ?-why struck no hostile hand
My head within its turban green along the bloody sand?

I stood all potent yesterday; my bravest captains three,

All stirless in their tiger'd selle, magnificent to see,
Hoisted before my gilded tent, full-flowing to the gales,

Shorn from the tameless desert steeds, three dark and tossing tails.

But yesterday a hundred drums were heard when I went by ;
Full forty agas turn'd their looks respectful on mine eye,
And trembled with contracted brows within their hall of state.
Instead of heavy catapults, of slow unwieldy weight,

I had bright cannons rolling on their wheels in threatening tiers,
And calm and steady by their sides my English cannoniers.

But yesterday, and I had towns, and castles strong and high,
And Greeks in thousands, for the base and servile Jews to buy.
But yesterday, and arsenals and harems were my own;
While now, defeated and proscribed, deserted and alone,
I flee away, a fugitive, and of my former power,
Allah! I have not now at last one battlemented tower.

And must I fly-the grand vizier-the pacha of three tails!
O'er the horizon and the hills, where distant vision fails,
All stealthily, with eyes on earth, and shrinking from the sight,
As a nocturnal robber holds his dark and breathless flight,
And thinks he sees the gibbet spread its arms in solemn wrath,
In every tree that dimly throws its shadow on his path!

Thus, after his defeat, pale Reschid speaks.
Among the dead we had a thousand Greeks.
Lone from the field the Pacha fled afar,
And, musing, wiped his reeking scimitar,
His two dead steeds upon the sands were flung,
And on their sides their empty stirrups rung.

W. D.

RAMBLES AMONG THE RIVERS.-No. II.

BY CHARLES MACKAY.

THE THAMES AND HIS TRIBUTARIES.

So taken up were we at the conclusion of the last chapter with the woes of Mary d'Este, recalled to our memory by the ancient church wall of St. Mary's, Lambeth, that we were nigh passing over, with less notice than their importance demands, the historical purlieus of Thorney Island, on the opposite bank of the river.

This spot was originally the most desolate and barren of any in the neighbourhood of London. In the time of the Romans, it was a waste, overgrown with weeds and thorns, bounded on two sides by a dirty stream, afterwards called the Long Ditch. One of the first buildings erected upon it was a minster, undertaken by the converted King Si bert, in the year six hundred and ten. To this minster the now fa. mous city of Westminster owes all its greatness, and even its name. The seat of a bishop, it soon drew a busy population around it, who built upon and cultivated the waste, and in process of time filled up the ditch. King Rufus was the next to add to its dignity by the erection of his handsome banqueting-hall, where he used to keep his Christmas in great style with his court and retainers. Then the judges began to hold their sittings there, and finally the parliaments, until, in the course of time, all these advantages made Westminster the first city of the empire. A good story is related of James the First and one of the Lords Mayor, in reference to the prosperity of the twin cities, and which, for its happy, quiet laudation of the Thames, it would be unpardonable to omit. James being in want of twenty thousand pounds, applied to the corporation of London for a loan of that sum. The corporation refused, upon which the king in high dudgeon sent for the Lord Mayor and some of the aldermen, and, rating them in severe terms for their disloyalty, insisted upon their raising the money for him. "Please your majesty," said the Lord Mayor," we cannot lend you what we have not got.' You must get it," replied the King. "We cannot," said the Lord Mayor. "I'll compel you," rejoined the King. "But you cannot compel us," retorted the Lord Mayor. "No!" exclaimed the King;" then I'll ruin your city for ever. I'll make a desert of Westminster. I'll remove my courts of law, my parliament, and my court to York or to Oxford, then what will become of you?” "Please your majesty," rejoined the Lord Mayor meekly, "you may remove yourself and your courts wherever you please; but there will always be this consolation for the poor merchants of London, you cannot take the Thames along with you."

Leaving Westminster and all its reminiscences behind us, for they are too many for our purpose, and would occupy as much space as we have to bestow upon the Thames itself, we continue our course upward to Vauxhall Bridge, passing the gloomy Penitentiary of Milbank on the right, and the low shores of ancient Lambeth on the left. How squalid and how miserable they look! and how well do the lines of Pope, written more than a hundred and twenty years ago, describe their present appearance;

In every town where Thamis rolls his tide

A narrow pass there is, with houses low,
Where ever and anon the stream is dyed,

And many a boat soft sliding to and fro,-
There oft are heard the notes of infant woe,

The short, thick sob, loud scream, and shriller squall—

*

*

And on the broken pavement here and there

Doth many a rotten sprat and herring lie;

A brandy and tobacco shop is near,

And hens, and dogs, and hogs are feeding by;

And here a sailor's jacket hangs to dry.

At every door are sun-burnt matrons secn

Mending old nets to catch the scaly fry,

Now singing shrill, and scolding oft between

Scold answers foul-mouth'd scold: bad neignbourhood, I ween.

Such place hath Deptford, navy-building town,

Woolwich, and Wapping, smelling strong of pitch,

Such Lambeth

The years that have rolled by since the time of Pope have inade little or no difference in the habits or habitations of the poor. The progress of civilisation does nothing for them. Noble mansions may lift themselves on either side, bridges may be built, railways constructed; but the dwellings of the poor experience no improve. ment. A thousand years can effect nothing more for them than to change the wigwam into the hovel, and at the latter point they stop. It is hard to say whether their change of habits is even so much in their favour. As "noble savages," they had at least the advantages of health and fresh air; as independent labourers, doomed to the gas-work or the factory, they have neither-besides wanting the contentment which was the lot of their naked progenitors of the woods and wilds. However, this is merely a hint for the political economists, and has nothing to do with Vauxhall, at which point we have now arrived, and caught for the first time since we left London Bridge, a view of the green fields and the open country. Of Vauxhall itself there is little to say, and that little not worth repeating except in the pages of a parish history. But its gardens, a glimpse of whose tree-tops we can just obtain from the river, how shall we describe them? Where in all England is there a spot more renowned among pleasure-seekers than

"This beauteous garden, but by vice maintained,"

as Addison, paraphrasing Juvenal, expresses it? Famous is Vauxhall in all the country round for its pleasant walks, its snug alcoves, its comic singers, its innumerable lamps, its big balloons, its midnight fireworks, its thin slices, its dear potations, its greedy waiters, and its ladies fair and kind, and abounding with every charm, except the greatest which can adorn their sex, and the want of which renders their beauty coarse, their kindness selfish, and their very presence an offence to the well-minded. In Addison's time, Spring Gardens, as they were then called, were noted for their nightingales and their sirens; and Sir Roger de Coverley is represented as having wished there were more of the former and fewer of the latter, in which case he would have been a better customer. But in our day there are no