all foreigners make it a point of duty to go and listen to at the Sistine Chapel during Passion Week. When the gay assemblage, after an animated conversation, repaired for the concert to the brilliantly lighted saloon, a choir of sixteen singers from the chapel filled the air with their solemn strains. We do not wonder, as Chevalier Bunsen says, that "the assembly was evidently seized with a peculiar feeling," or that many of them stole away to something they thought more amusing.

sorial duties, we must glance at a little essay given us in the appendix, written by Chevalier Bunsen, and entitled Niebuhr as a Diplomatist in Rome. Bunsen was, during part of this period, secretary to the embassy, and of course in perpetual communication with Niebuhr. The few anecdotes he relates present us with a very distinct picture of this German Cato amongst the modern Romans. Judging by what are popularly understood to be the qualifications of a diplomatist, we should certainly say that our historian was by no means peculiarly fitted for this department of the public service. He was an unbending man, had much of the stoic in his principles, though very little of the stoic in his affections, and was more disposed to check or crush the hollow frivolity about him than to yield to it, or to play with it. He could throw a whole dinner-table into consternation, by solemnly denouncing the tone of levity which the conversation had assumed. At the house of some prince in Rome the events then transpiring in Greece had led Niebuhr to speak with earnestness on the future destiny of the Christian Hellenes. On the first pause that occurred, a fashionable diner-out con

trived to turn the conversation, and

in a few moments the whole table was alive with a discussion-on this important point, whether a certain compound sold at the Roman coffeehouses, under the slang name of "aurora," was mostly coffee or mostly chocolate! Niebuhr sat silent for some time; but he, too, took advantage of the next pause to express his indignation and surprise, that “in such times, and with such events occurring around us, we should be entertained with such miserable trifles!" For a short time all were mute. Not a very diplomatic style, we should say, of conversation.

It was very characteristic of such a man, that, on the occasion of giving a grand entertainment in his character of ambassador, he should have the music of the Sistine Chapel performed in his house. He detested the modern Italian operatic music. He thought it becoming his embassadorial position that something national should be selected. He therefore chose that celebrated music which

Even his connection with the learned men of Rome was not of long continuance. But this was owing to no want of sympathy in their studies or pursuits on the part of Niebuhr, as the following anecdote will testify(those who know Leopardi as a poet will read it with peculiar interest) :—

"I still remember the day when he (Niebuhr) entered with unwonted vivacity the office in which I was writing, and exclaimed, 'I must drive out directly to seek out the greatest philological genius of Italy that I have as yet heard Just of, and make his acquaintance. look at the man's critical remarks upon the Chronicle of Eusebius. What acuteWhat real erudition! I have ness! never seen anything like it before in this

country-I must see the man.'

"In two hours he came back. 'I found him at last with a great deal of trouble, in a garret of the Palazzo Mattei. Instead of a man of mature age, I found a youth of two or three and twenty, deformed, weakly, and who has never had a good teacher, but has fed his intellect upon the books of his grandfather, in his father's house at Recanati; has read the classics and the Fathers; is, at the same time, as I hear, one of the first poets and writers of his nation, and is withal poor, neglected, and evidently depressed. One sees in him what genius this richly endowed nation possesses.' Capei has given a pleasing and true description of the astonishment experienced by both the great men at their first meeting; of the tender affection with which Niebuhr regarded Leopardi, and all that he did for him."

Our diminishing space warns us that we must limit ourselves to the last scene of the life and labours of Niebuhr. After some intervals spent at Berlin, he took up his residence at Bonn, recommenced his lectures, recommenced his History. Before proceeding further in his task, he found

it necessary to revise the two volumes already published. In this revision he engaged so zealously that he almost re-wrote them. The third volume, as is well known, was not published in his lifetime: the manuscript was revised for the press by his friend and disciple, Professor Classen.

This and other manuscripts ran the risk of being consumed by the flames; for his new house, in the planning and arrangement of which he had taken much pleasure, was burnt down on the night of the 6th February 1830. It was indeed a misfortune, he said, but he did not feel as he felt "that night when he was near headquarters at the battle of Bautzen, and believed the cause of his country to be, if not lost, in the most imminent peril." But though much else was destroyed, the books and papers were preserved; and there was great rejoicing when here and there a precious treasure was found again, which had been looked on as lost; and the reappearance of the longed-for manuscript of the second volume of the history (then going through the press) was greeted with hearty cheers.

The prospect of public affairs, now embroiled by the French Revolution of 1830, seems to have disturbed him more than the loss of his house. From the selfishness of the governing party, and the rashness of their opponents, he was disposed to predict the saddest results-loss of freedom, civil and religious. "In fifty years," he says in one place, "and probably much less, there will be no trace left of free institutions, or the freedom of the press, throughout all Europe-at least on the Continent." In this enforced darkness, Protestantism would, of course, have no chance against her great antagonist. Wherever the spirit of mental freedom decays, the Roman Catholic must triumph. He says, "Already, all the old evils have awakened to full activity; all the priestcraft, all, even the most gigantic plans for conquest and subjugation; and there is no doubt that they are secretly aiming at, and working towards, a religious war, and all that tends to bring it on."

The interest which Niebuhr took in the public events of Europe was indirectly the cause of his last illness. One evening he spent a considerable

time waiting and reading in the hot news-room, without taking off his thick fur cloak, and then returned home through the cold frosty night air, heated in mind and body. He looked in, as he passed, on his friend Classen, to unburden some portion of his fervid cares for the universal commonwealth. "But," said he, "I have taken a severe chill, I must go to bed." And from the couch he then sought he never rose again.

"On the afternoon of the 1st of Janu

ary 1830," thus concludes the account of his last days which we have from the pen of Professor Classen," he sank into a dreamy slumber: once, on awakening, he said that pleasant images floated before him in sleep; now and then he spoke French in his dreams; probably he felt himself in the presence of his departed friend De Serre. As the night gathered, woke up once more about midnight, when consciousness gradually faded away; he the last remedy was administered; he recognised in it a medicine of doubtful

operation, never resorted to but in extreme cases, and said in a faint voice,

What essential substance is this? Am I so far gone?' These were his last words; he sank back on his pillow, and within an hour his noble heart had ceased to beat."

Any attempt at the final estimate of Niebuhr as a historian, we have already said we shall not make. The permanence of the structure that he has reared must be tested by time and the labours of many scholars. Indeed, where a reputation like this is concerned, old father Time will be slow in his operations-he is a long while trimming the balance and shuffling the weights-perhaps new weights are to be made. Niebuhr's great and salutary influence in historical literature, we repeat, is undeniable; and this signal merit will always be accorded to him. For his character as a man, this is better portrayed even by the few extracts we have been able to make from his letters, than by any summary or description we could give. But these extracts have necessarily been brief, and are unavoidably taken, here and there, from letters which it would have been much more desirable to quote in extenso, and therefore we recommend every reader who can bestow the leisure, to read these volumes for himself. He will find them, in the best sense of the word, very amusing.

THE recent death of the Poet Moore has rendered it incumbent on us, as taking an interest in the literary honour of the empire, to give a brief sketch of his career. In this outline we scarcely need say that we shall be guided by the most perfect impartiality. We have the due feeling for the memory of genius, and the due respect for the sacredness of the grave. Though differing from Moore in political opinions, we shall be willing to give him the praise of sincerity; and, though declining panegyric, we shall with equal willingness give our tribute to the talents which adorned his country.

It is to be hoped that a Memoir will be supplied by some of those friends to whose known ability such a work can be intrusted; and with as much of his personal correspondence, and personal history, as may be consistent with the feelings of his family and the regard for his fame.

Thomas Moore was born in Dublin on the 30th of May 1780. His parentage was humble; but it is the glory of Britain to disregard pedigree, where nature has given the ability which leads to distinction.

The period at which Moore first came before the public eye was one singularly exciting to Ireland. The Civil War under James II. had left bitterness in the Roman Catholic mind, and the Penal Laws gave ample topics for the declaimers. But, from the commencement of the reign of George III., those laws had undergone a course of extinction, and all the harsher parts of their pressure were gradually abolished.

We are not the panegyrists of those laws; they erred, in making the religious belief of the Romanist an object of penalty. Faith, let it be of whatever blindness, cannot be enlightened by force of law. But we are to remember, that the Irish Roman Catholics had been in arms against their sovereign; that they had shed English blood in the quarrel of a religion notoriously persecuting; that they had brought foreign troops into the country in aid of their rebellion; and

that they had formed an alliance with France, then at war with England. It was further to be remembered, that in their Parliament under a returned rebel, who had abdicated the throne of both islands-and whose success would have made Ireland a vassal, as he himself was a pensioner, of France

they had confiscated (against the most solemn promises) the property of two hundred leading Protestants, and would have eventually confiscated the whole property of Protestantism.

Ireland had made itself a field of battle, and the only relief for its emergencies was to make it a garri

son.

The wisdom of that measure was shown in its fruits-the true test of all statesmanship: Ireland remained undisturbed for seventy years. During the party and popular irritations of the two first Brunswick reigns, during the two Scottish invasions of 1715 and 1745, and during the American war, Ireland was perfectly tranquil-certainly not through loyalty, and as certainly through law. At that time there was no favoured party of agitation-no faction suffered to clamour itself into place, and the country into tumult. There was no relaxation of the laws of the land for scandalous intrigue or insolent importunity. The rule was strict, and strictly administered; no manufacture of grievance was permitted to give a livelihood to a disturber, and no celebrity was in the power of a demagogue, but the ascent to the pillory. Common sense, public justice, and vigilant law, were the triad which governed Ireland, and their fruits were seen in the most rapid, vigorous, and extensive improvement of the country. No kingdom of Europe had ever so quickly obliterated the traces of civil war. Improvement was visible, in every form of national progress. Ireland had previously been a country of pasture, and, of course, of depopulation: it became a country of tillage. It had formerly been totally destitute of commerce: it now pushed its trade to the thriving States of America, and grew

in wealth by the hour. It was formerly compelled, by the want of native manufactures, to purchase the clothing of its population from England: it now established the northern province as an emporium of the linen trade, which it still holds, and which is more than a gold mine to a crowded population.

The increase of human life in Ireland was perhaps the most memorable in the annals of statistics. In the beginning of the eighteenth century the population was calculated at little more than 700,000. It now started forth by millions. And the national increase of wealth, intelligence, and public spirit, was shown in a manner equally significant and singular. Ireland had the honour of inventing (if we may use the word) the Volunteers. The threat of a French invasion had alarmed the people, and Parliament asked the important question of the Viceroy, What forces were provided for the defence of the kingdom? His answer was, that he had but 7000 men at his disposal. The nation instantly determined to take the defence on themselves, and they raised an army such as the world had never before seenwholly spontaneous in its rise, selfequipped, serving without pay, selfdisciplined-80,000 men ready for the

field!

The armies of Greece and Rome, even when republican, were conscriptions; the levée en masse in France was compulsory, and the guillotine was the recruiting officer; the gigantic columns of the Imperial armies were chiefly raised under the absolute scourge. The land-sturm of the Germans was created under the rigidity of a system which drove the whole population into the field-rightly and righteously drove them; for what but the low selfishness of brawling and bustling Radicalism, or the petty penury of superannuated avarice, would declare it a hardship to defend one's own country, or hesitate to pay the manly and necessary expenditure which fitted them for that defence? But Ireland, without hesitation, and without stipulation-without the pitiful pusillanimity of a weaver's soul and body, or the shrinking selfishness of a pawnbroker in the shape

of a legislator-rushed to arms, and scared away invasion!

The expense of this illustrious effort was enormous, the occupation of time incalculable-but the act was heroic. And let what will come, whether Ireland is to have a career worthy of her natural powers, or to perish under the ascendancy of her deadly superstition, that act will form the brightest jewel in her historic diadem, as it will the noblest inscription on her tomb. But the whole effort implied the prosperity, as well as the patriotism, of the kingdom. Paupers cannot equip themselves for the field. The country must have had substantial resources to meet the expenditure. The arming of the volunteers would have exhausted the treasury of half the sovereigns of Europe, and yet the country bore it freely, fearlessly, and without feeling the slightest embarrassment in those efforts which were at the moment extending her interests through the world.

We have alluded to this fragment of Irish history, because it illustrates the system of fraud and falsehood under which pretended patriotism in Ireland has libelled, and continues to libel, England-a system which talks of peace, while it is perpetually provoking hostility; which boasts of its zeal for the country, while it is cutting up every root of national hope; and which is equally boastful in the streets, and cowardly in the field.

But another crisis came, and the manliness of the national character was to be tried in a still severer emergency. The Penal Laws were virtually extinguished, on the presumption that Popery was reconcilable by benefits, and that Irish patriotism was not always the language of conspiracy. The mistake was soon discernible in a Popish League for the subversion of the English Government. The "United Irishmen❞— -a name in itself a falsehood, for the object was to crush one-half of the nation, by establishing the tyranny of the other -were formed into a League. But the League was broken up, not in the field, but in the dungeon, and the insurrection was extinguished by the executioner. Wolfe Tone, the Secretary of the United Irishmen, came over in a French ship of war, to

effect the peaceful liberation of his "aggrieved country," was imprisoned, and cut his own throat. Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the hero of novels, and the martyr of poetry, lurked in the capital, in the soldierly disguise of a milkwoman, was taken in his bed, wounded in the arrest, and died of the wound. Not one of the leading conspirators died in the field; all who were not hanged begged their lives, delivered up their secrets for their own contemptible safety, and were transported to America, there to recover their courage, and wipe off their shame, by libelling England.

But among the most cruel acts of those villains was the attempt to involve the students of the University in their crime. Their converts were few, and those among the most obscure; but those were effectually ruined. A visitation was held under the Lord Chancellor Clare, and the delinquents were chiefly expelled. On this occasion Moore was questioned. His intimacy with the family of the Emmetts, who seem all to have been implicated in the charge, and his peculiar intercourse with the unfortunate and guilty Robert Emmett, who, a few years after, was hanged for open insurrection, rendered him liable to suspicion. He was accordingly examined at that formidable tribunal. But his stature was so undersized, his appearance so boyish, and his answers were given with such evident simplicity, that, to suppose him intrusted with the secrets of conspiracy, still less the sharer of a sanguinary revolt, seemed next to impossible, and he was dismissed without animadversion. Thus the future author of so many strains on the slavery of Ireland, and the tyranny of England, the publisher of such stores

"Of fluent verse, and furious prose,
Sweet songster of fictitious woes"-

must have been a source of perpetual vexation in society. He was one of the smallest men, perhaps, in existence, above a dwarf. Yet he was well-proportioned; and his lively countenance, which looked the very mirror of good-nature, aided by his manners, which had by instinct the grace of good society, made his figure, after the first introduction, almost forgotten. When he had established his fame, of course, none adverted to defects of any kind, and the little Tom Moore " of Ireland became the MR Moore of England, by the consent of all circles. He possessed, also, those gifts which create popularity. The people of Ireland have a remarkable fondness for music, and Moore was a musician by nature. Of music he knew nothing as a science, but he felt its soul. The heavy harmonies of Germany-in which the chief object is to show the toil of the performer and the patience of his auditory, to press discords into the service, and to crush the very sense of pleasure-would not have been endured by the Irish, who, like all lovers of the genuine art, prefer songs to musical problems, and to be bewitched rather than be bewildered. Moore, accordingly, cultivated the finer part-its feeling. He has been heard to say, "that if he had an original turn for anything, it was for music;" and he certainly produced, in his earliest career, some of the most original, tender, and tasteful melodies in existence for the Piano, which he touched with slight, but sufficient skill; and, sung to his own soft and sweet lines, he realised more of the magic of music than any performer whom we ever heard.

He

This subject, however apparently trivial, is not trifling in a Memoir of Moore; for, independently of its being his chief introduction into society, it was a characteristic of the man. was the originator of a style, in which he had many imitators, but no equal; and after he abandoned it for other means of shining, almost no follower. It was neither Italian, nor, as we have observed, German; it had neither the frivolity of the French school nor the wildness of the Irish; it was exclusively his own-a mixture of the playful and the pathetic;