Chapter IX: Will the Architect Have Employment? (5)

We have spoken entirely of the Chinaman. What of the Chinawoman in America? In California the word "Chinawoman" is synonymous with what is most vile and disgusting. Few, very few, of a respectable class are in the State. The slums of London and New York are as respectable thoroughfares compared with the rows of "China alleys" in the heart of San Francisco. These can hardly be termed "abandoned women." They have had no sense of virtue, propriety or decency to abandon. They are ignorant of the disgrace of their calling: if the term may be allowed, they pursue it innocently. Many are scarcely more than children. They are mere commodities, being by their own countrymen bought in China, shipped and consigned to factors in California, and there sold for a term of years.

The Chinaman has bitter enemies in San Francisco: they thirst to annihilate him. He is accustomed to blows and brickbats; he is legitimate game for rowdies, both grown and juvenile; and children supposed to be better trained can scarce resist the temptation of snatching at his pig-tail as he passes through their groups in front of the public schools. Even on Sundays nice little boys coming from Sabbath-school, with their catechisms tucked under their jackets, and texts enjoining mercy and gentleness fresh upon their lips, will sometimes salute the benighted heathen as he passes by with a volley of stones. If he turns on his small assailants, he is apt to meet larger ones. Men are not wanting, ready and panting, to take up the quarrel thus wantonly commenced by the offspring of the "superior race." There are hundreds of families, who came over the sea to seek in America the comfort and prosperity denied them in the land of their birth, whose children from earliest infancy are inculcated with the sentiment that the Chinaman is a dog, a pest and a curse. On the occasion of William H. Seward's visit to a San Francisco theatre, two Chinese merchants were hissed and hooted by the gallery mob from a box which they had ventured to occupy. This assumption of style and exclusiveness proved very offensive to the shirt-sleeved, upper-tier representatives of the "superior race," who had assembled in large numbers to catch a glimpse of one of the black man's great champions. Ethiopia could have sat in that box in perfect safety, but China in such a place was the red rag rousing the ire of the Democratic bull. John has a story of his own to carry back home from a Christian land.

For this prejudice and hostility there are provocative causes, although they may not be urged in extenuation. The Chinaman is a dangerous competitor for the white laborer; and when the latter, with other and smaller mouths to feed, once gets the idea implanted in his mind that the bread is being taken from them by what he deems a semi-human heathen, whose beliefs, habits, appearance and customs are distasteful to him, there are all the conditions ready for a state of mind toward the almond-eyed Oriental which leans far away from brotherly love.

Brotherly love sometimes depends on circumstances. "Am I not a man and brother?" cries John from his native shore. "Certainly," we respond. Pass round the hat--let us take up a contribution for the conversion of the poor heathen. The coins clink thickly in the bottom of the charitable chapeau. We return home, feeling ourselves raised an inch higher heavenward.

"Am I not a man and brother?" cries John in our midst, digging our gold, setting up opposition laundries and wheeling sand at half a dollar per day less wages. "No. Get out, ye long-tailed baste! An' wad ye put me on a livil with that--that baboon?" Pass round the hat. The coins mass themselves more thickly than ever. For what? To buy muskets, powder and ball. Wherefore? Wait! More than once has the demagogue cried, "Drive them into the sea!"

PRENTICE MULFORD.

A WINTER REVERIE.

We stood amid the rustling gloom alone
That night, while from the blue plains overhead,
With golden kisses thickly overblown,
A shooting star into the darkness sped.
"'Twas like Persephone, who ran," we said,
"Away from Love." The grass sprang round our feet,
The purple lilacs in the dusk smelled sweet,
And the black demon of the train sped by,
Rousing the still air with his long, loud cry.

The slender rim of a young rising moon
Hung in the west as you leaned on the bar
And spun a thread of some sweet April tune,
And wished a wish and named the falling star.
We heard a brook trill in the fields afar;
The air wrapped round us that entrancing fold
Of vanishing sweet stuff that mortal hold
Can never grasp--the mist of dreams--as down
The street we went in that fair foreign town.

I might have whispered of my love that night,
But something wrapped you as a shield around,
And held me back: your quiver of affright,
Your startled movement at some sudden sound--
A night-bird rustling on the leafy ground--
Your hushed and tremulous whisper of alarm,
Your beating heart pressed close against my arm,--
All, all were sweet; and yet _my_ heart beat true,
Nor shrined one wish I might not breathe to you.

So when we parted little had been said:
I left you standing just within the door,
With the dim moonlight streaming on your head
And rippling softly on the checkered floor.
I can remember even the dress you wore--
Some dainty white Swiss stuff that floated round
Your supple form and trailed upon the ground,
While bands of coral bound each slender wrist,
Studded with one great purple amethyst.

* * * * *

My story is not much--is it?--to tell:
It seems a wandering line of music, faint,
Whose sweet pathetic measures rise and swell,
Then, strangled, fall with curious restraint.
'Tis like the pictures that the artists paint,
With shadows forward thrown into the light
From the real figures hidden out of sight.
And is not life crossed in this strange, sad way
With dreams whose shadows lengthen day by day?

But you, dear heart--sweet heart loved all these years--
Will recognize the passion of the strain:
Who eats the lotos-flower of Love with tears,
Will know the rapture of that numb, vague pain
Which thrills the heart and stirs the languid brain.
All day amid the toiling throng we strive,
While in our heart these sacred, sweet loves thrive,
And in choice hours we show them, white and cool
Like lilies floating on a troubled pool.

MILLIE W. CARPENTER.

"PASSPORTS, GENTLEMEN!"

The close of July, 1870, found our party tarrying for a few days at Geneva. We had left home with the intention of "doing" Europe in less than four months. June and July were already gone, but in that time, traveling as only Americans can, Great Britain, Belgium, the Rhine country and portions of Switzerland had been visited and admired. We were now pausing for a few days to take breath and prepare for yet wider flights. Our proposed route from Geneva would lead us through Northern Germany, returning by way of Paris to London and Liverpool.

We had intentionally left Paris for the last, hoping that the Communist disturbances would be completely quieted before September. At this time their forces had been recently routed, and the Versailles troops were occupying the capital. The leaders of the Commune were scattered in every direction, and, if newspaper accounts were to be believed, were being captured in every city of France. Especially was this true of the custom-house upon the Swiss frontier, where report said that more than one leading Communist had been stopped by the lynx-eyed officials, who would accept no substitute for the signed and countersigned passport, and hold no parley until such a passport had been presented.

In view of these facts, the American minister in Paris had issued a circular letter to citizens of the United States traveling abroad, requesting them to see that their passports had the official visé before attempting to enter France, thus saving themselves and friends a large amount of unnecessary trouble and delay. Nothing was said of those who might think proper to attempt an entrance _without_ a passport, such temerity being in official eyes beyond all advice or protection. Influenced by this letter and several facts which had come under our notice proving the uncertainty of all things, and especially of travel in France, we saw that our passports were made officially correct.

While at Geneva our party separated for a few days. My friends proposed making an expedition up the lake, while I arranged to spend a day and night at Aix-les-Bains, a small town in the south of France. My object in visiting it was not to enjoy the sulphur-baths for which it is famous, but to see some friends who were spending the summer there. I had written, telling them to expect me by the five o'clock train on Wednesday afternoon. As my stay was to be so brief, I left my valise at the hotel in Geneva, and found myself now, for the first time, separated from that trusty sable friend which had until this hour been my constant companion by day and night.

The train was just leaving the station when a lady sitting opposite to me, with her back to the locomotive, asked, in French, if I would be willing to change seats. Catching her meaning rather by her gestures than words, I inquired in English if she would like my seat, and found by her reply that I was traveling with an English lady.

I should here explain that although I had studied the French language as part of my education, I found it impossible to speak French with any fluency or understand it when spoken. My newly-made friend, however (for friend she proved herself), spoke French and English with equal fluency.

In the process of comparing notes (so familiar to all travelers) mention was made of the recent war and the unwonted strictness and severity of the custom-house officials. In an instant my hand was upon my pocket-book, only to find that I had neglected to take my passport from my valise.

The embarrassment of the situation flashed upon me, and my troubled countenance revealed to my companion that something unusual had occurred. I answered her inquiring look by saying that I had left my passport in Geneva. Her immediate sympathy was only equaled by her evident alarm. She said there was but one thing to be done--return instantly for it. I fully agreed with her, but found, to my dismay, upon consulting a guide-book, that our train was an express, which did not stop before reaching Belgarde, the frontier-town.

I would willingly have pulled the bell-rope had there been any, and stopped the train at any cost, but it was impossible, and nothing remained but to sit quietly while I was relentlessly hurried into the very jaws of the French officials. The misery of the situation was aggravated by the fact that I could not command enough French to explain how I came to be traveling without a passport. As a last resort, I applied to my friend, begging her to explain to the officer at the custom-house that I was a citizen of the United States, and had left my passport in Geneva. This she readily promised to do, although I could see that she had but little faith in the result. After a ride of an hour, during which my reflections were none of the pleasantest, we arrived at Belgarde. Here the doors of the railway carriages were thrown open, and we were politely requested to alight. We stepped out upon a platform swarming with fierce gendarmes, whom I regarded attentively, wondering which of them was destined to become my protector. From the platform we were ushered into a large room communicating by a narrow passage with a second room, into which our baggage was being carried. One by one my fellow-passengers approached the narrow and (to me) gloomy passage and presented their passports. These were closely scanned by the officer in charge, handed to an assistant to be countersigned, and the holder, all being right, was passed into the second room. Our turn soon came, and, accompanied by the English lady, I approached my fate.

Her passport was declared to be official, and handing it back the officer looked inquiringly at me. My friend then began her explanation. As I stood attentively regarding the officer's face, I could see his puzzled look change into one of comprehension, and then of amusement. To her inquiry he replied that there would be no objection under the circumstances to my returning to Geneva and procuring my passport. Encouraged by the favorable turn my fortunes had taken, I asked, through my friend, if it would be possible for me to go on without a passport. An instantaneous change passed over his countenance, and, shrugging his shoulders, he replied that it was impossible: there was a second custom-house at Culoz, where I should certainly be stopped, forced to explain how I had passed Belgarde, and severely punished for attempting to enter without a passport. I did not, however, wait for him to finish his angry harangue, but passed on to the second room, where I was soon joined by my interpreting friend, who explained to me in full what I had already learned from the officer's countenance and gesture. She thought that I was fortunate in escaping so easily, and advised an immediate return to Geneva. I again consulted my guide-book, and found that there was no return train for several hours, and consequently that I should arrive in Geneva too late to start for Aix-les-Bains that night. This would necessitate waiting until Thursday, and perhaps force me to give up the trip, for our seats were engaged in the Chamouni coach for Friday morning. I imagined my friends in vain awaiting my arrival at Aix, and the smiles of our party when they found me in Geneva upon their return from the lake. But, more than all, the possibility of not reaching Aix at all troubled me, for I was very anxious to see my friends there, and had written home that I intended to see them.

I found by my guide-book that our train reached Culoz before the Geneva return train; so on the instant I formed the desperate resolve of running the blockade at Belgarde, and if I found it impossible to pass the custom-house at Culoz, _there_ to take the return train for Geneva. I walked to the platform as if merely accompanying my friend, stood for a moment at the door of the carriage conversing with her, and then, as the train started for Culoz, quickly stepped in and shut the door. Her dismay was really pitiable: had I not been somewhat troubled in mind myself, I should have laughed outright. She saw nothing before me but certain destruction, and I am free to confess that the prospect of a telegram flashing over the wires at that moment from Belgarde to Culoz was not reassuring. The die, however, had been cast, and now nothing remained but to endure in silence the interminable hour which must elapse ere we should reach Culoz. There we were to change cars, the Geneva train going on to Paris, while we took the train on the opposite platform for Aix-les-Bains. This necessitated passing through the dépôt, and passing through the dépôt was passing through the custom-house. As our train stopped in front of the fatal door, and one by one the passengers filed into it and were lost to sight, I seemed to see written above the door, "All hope abandon, ye who enter here!" It was simply rushing into the jaws of fate: there was not the slightest possibility of my being able to pass through that dépôt unchallenged. I should be carried on to Paris if I remained in the train; I should be arrested if I remained on the platform; I was discovered if I entered the custom-house. Eagerly I glanced around for some means of escape. Every instant the number of passengers on the platform was decreasing, the danger of discovery rapidly increasing.

I had feared lest some benevolent French officer, anxious for my safety, would be found waiting to assist me in alighting: I was thankful to find that I should be allowed to assist myself, and that no one paid any particular attention to me. As I stood there hesitating what course to pursue, and feeling how much easier my mind at this moment would be were I waiting on the Belgarde platform, I noticed a door standing open a few steps to the left. Without any further hesitation I walked directly in, to find myself in a railroad restaurant. It proved to be a tower of refuge.

No one had noticed me. There were other passengers in the room, waiting for the Paris train; so, joining myself to them, I remained there until the custom-house doors were closed and the guards had left the platform. The question now arose, How should I reach the opposite platform? The train might start at any moment: the only legitimate passage was closed. I knew that the attempt would be fraught with danger, yet I felt that it was now too late to draw back. If I remained any length of time in the restaurant, I should be suspected and discovered; and as I thought of that moment a terrific scene arose before my mind in which an excited French official thundered at me in his choicest French, while I stood silent, unable to explain who I was, how I came there, whither I was going; I imagined myself being searched for treasonable documents and none being found; I seemed to see my captors consulting how they could best compel me to tell what I knew. These scenes and others of like nature entertained me while I waited for the coast--or rather platform--to be cleared. When at length all the immediate guards were gone, I started out to find my way, if possible, to the train for Aix. I have read of travelers cutting their way through trackless forests, of ice-bound mariners anxiously seeking the North-west passage, and, worse than all, of luckless countrymen wandering bewildered through the streets of Boston; but I am confident that no traveler, mariner or countryman ever sought his way with more circumspection and diligence than I in my search for a passage between those two platforms.

As I glanced cautiously up and down I saw a door standing open at some little distance. Around that door all my hopes were immediately centred. It might lead directly to the custom-house; it might be the entrance to the barracks of the guards; it might be--I knew not what; but it might afford a passage to the other platform.

I walked quickly to the door, glanced in, saw no one and entered. The room was a baggage-room, and at that moment unoccupied. It instantly occurred to me that a baggage-room _ought_ to open on both platforms. I felt as though I could have shouted "Eureka!" and I am confident that the joy of Archimedes as he rushed through the streets of Syracuse was no greater than mine as I felt that I had so unexpectedly discovered the passage I was seeking. Passing through this room, I found myself in a second, like the former unoccupied. It had occurred to me that all the doors might be closed, and the thought had considerably abated my rejoicing; but no! I saw a door which stood invitingly open.

No guards were stationed on the platform; so I stepped out, and before me stood the train for Aix, into which my fellow-passengers were entering, some of them still holding their passports in their hands. Taking my seat in one of the carriages, in a few moments the train started and I was on my way to Aix. The relief was unspeakably great. An instant before it seemed as if nothing short of a miracle could save me from a French guard-house, and now, by the simplest combination of circumstances, in which a restaurant and baggage-room bore an important part, I had passed unchallenged. I remember that I enjoyed the scenery and views along the route from Culoz to Aix more than while passing from Belgarde to Culoz.

My friends were found expecting me upon my arrival, and joined in congratulating me upon my happy escape. A night and day were passed very pleasantly, and then arose the question of return.

I suggested telegraphing to Geneva for my passport, but that was vetoed, and it was decided that I should return as I had come--passportless. I confess that the attempt seemed somewhat hazardous. If it was dangerous to attempt an entrance into France, how much more so to attempt an exit, especially when the custom-house force had been doubled with the sole object that all possibility of escape might be precluded, and that any one passing Culoz might be stopped at Belgarde! It was urged, however, that our seats had been engaged in the diligence for Friday morning, and to send for the passport would consume considerable time--would certainly delay the party until Saturday, and perhaps until Monday, which delay would seriously affect all their plans, time being so limited and so many places remaining to be visited. I had passed once, why not again? Influenced by these facts, and thinking what a triumph it would be once more to baffle French vigilance, I determined to attempt the return. There was a train leaving Aix about eight P.M., reaching Geneva at eleven: it was decided that I should take this train. I had arranged a vague plan of action, although I expected to depend rather upon the suggestion of the moment.

It was quite dark when we reached Culoz. As the train arrived at the platform, and we were obliged again to change cars, I thought of the friendly restaurant; but no! the restaurant was closed, and moreover a company of gendarmes was present to see that every one entered the door leading to the custom-house. There was no room for hesitation or delay. I entered under protest, but still I entered.

In a moment I perceived the desperate situation. The room had two doors--one opening upon the platform from which we had just come, and now guarded by an officer; the other leading to the opposite platform, and there stood the custom-house officer receiving and inspecting the passports. It was indeed Scylla and Charybdis. If I attempted to pass the officer without a passport, I was undone; if I remained until all the other passengers had passed out, I was undone. For an instant I felt as if I had better give up the unequal contest. The forces of the enemy were too many for me. I saw that I had been captured: why fight against Fate? A moment's reflection, however, restored my courage. It was evident that one thing alone remained to be done: that was to find my way out of the door by which I had just entered, as speedily as possible. But there stood the guard.

The train by which we had come was still before the platform: an idea suggested itself. Acting as if I had left some article in the train, I stepped hurriedly up to the guard, who, catching my meaning, made way for me without a word. Once upon the platform, I resolved never again to enter that door except as a prisoner. The guard followed me with his eyes for a moment, and then, seeing me open one of the carriage doors, turned back to his post. As soon as I perceived that I was no longer watched I glided off in the opposite direction under the shadows of the platform. I was looking for a certain door which I remembered well as a friend in need. I knew not in which direction it lay, nor could I have recognized it if shut; but hardly had I gone ten steps when the same door stood open before me. It was the act of an instant to spring through it, out of sight of the guard. Why this door and baggage-room should have been left thus open and unguarded when such evident and scrutinizing care was taken in every other quarter, I have to this day been unable to understand. But for that fact I should have found it utterly impossible to pass that custom-house going or coming.

Once in the baggage-room, the way was familiar, and, passing into the second room, I found the door open as on the day previous, and in a moment stood undiscovered upon the platform. Entering the waiting train, I was soon on the way to Belgarde.

My only thought during the ride was, What shall I do when we arrive at Belgarde? I expected to see the doors thrown open as before, and hear again the polite invitation to enter the custom-house. Was it not certain detection to refuse? was it not equally dangerous to obey? The officer at Belgarde had seen me the day before, and warned me not to go to Culoz. What reception would he give me when he saw me attempting to return? Or it might be he would not remember me, and then in the darkness and confusion I should surely be taken for an escaping Communist. That I had passed Culoz was no comfort when I remembered that this would only aggravate my guilt in their eyes.

The case did indeed seem desperate. Willingly would I have jumped out and walked the entire distance to Geneva, if I might only thus escape that terrible custom-house, which every moment loomed up more terrifically. At length this troubled hour was passed: we had arrived at Belgarde, and the moment for action had come. I had determined to avoid the custom-house at all hazards. When the doors were thrown open I expected to alight, but not to enter. My plan was to find some sheltering door, or even corner, where I could remain until the others had presented their passports and were beginning to return, then join them and take my seat as before. The dépôt at Belgarde was brilliantly lighted, and the gendarmes pacing to and fro in the gaslight seemed not only to have increased in numbers, but to have acquired an additional ferocity since the day previous.

As I looked but my spirit sank within me. I could only brace myself for the coming crisis. For several moments nothing was said or done. The doors remained shut, and no one seemed at all concerned about our presence. Each minute appeared an hour as I sat there awaiting my fate. The suspense was becoming too great: I felt that my stock of self-possession was entirely deserting me. At length I began to hope that they were satisfied with the examination at Culoz, and would allow us to pass unchallenged. Just at that moment, as hope was dawning into certainty, the door opened and the custom-house officer entered with a polite bow, while a body of gendarmes drew up behind him upon the platform. He uttered two French words, and I needed no interpreter to tell me that they were "Passports, gentlemen!"

I shuddered as I saw him standing so near, within reach of my arm. There were six persons besides myself in the carriage, and I was occupying a seat beside the door farthest from the platform. Any one who has seen a European railway-carriage will understand me when I say that I sat next to the right-hand door, while he had entered by the left. One by one the passports were handed up to him until he held six in his hand.

With the rest of the passengers I had taken out my pocket-book and searched as if for my passport, but had handed none to him, and now I sat awaiting developments. I saw that he would read the six passports, and then turn to me for the seventh.

The desperate thought flashed upon me of opening the door and escaping into the darkness. The carriage itself was so dimly lighted that I could barely see the face of my opposite neighbor, and I therefore hoped to be able to slip out without any one perceiving it. The attempt was desperate, but so was the situation. The officer was buried in the passports, holding them near his face to catch the dim light. The door was fastened upon the outside, and so, watching him, I leaned far out of the window until I was able to reach the catch and unfasten the door. A slight push, and it swung noiselessly open. I glanced at the officer: he was intently reading the _last_ passport. I had placed one foot upon the outside step, and was about to glide out into the darkness, when he laid the paper down and looked directly at me.

It would have been madness to attempt an escape with his eyes upon me; so, assuming as nonchalant a look as my present feelings would allow, I answered his inquiring glance with one of confident assurance.

He saw my nonchalant expression. He saw the open pocket-book in my hand. He had _not_ counted the number of passports. All the passengers were settling themselves to sleep. It must be all right; so, with a polite "Bon soir, messieurs!" he bowed and left the carriage. My sensation of relief may be better imagined than described. Hardly had he left our carriage when we heard the sound of voices and hurrying feet upon the platform, and looking out saw some unfortunate individual carried off under guard. I trembled as I thought how narrowly I had escaped his fate. In a few moments, however, we were safely on our way to Geneva, and as we sped on into the darkness, while congratulating myself upon my fortunate escape, I firmly resolved to be better prepared for the emergency the next time I should hear those memorable words, "Passports, gentlemen!"

A.H.

OUR MONTHLY GOSSIP.

THE CORNWALLIS FAMILY.

The death was lately announced of two of the last survivors--only one of the name is now left--of a family whose chief played a very conspicuous, and for himself unfortunate, part in this country a century ago--the marquis Cornwallis. His only son, who married a daughter of the celebrated match-making duchess of Gordon, left no male issue, but five daughters. Two of them, the countess of St. Germans--wife of the earl who accompanied the prince of Wales on his visit here--and Lady Braybrook, died some years ago; and recently Lady Mary Ross, whose husband edited the correspondence of the first marquis, and Lady Louisa, who never married, have also gone to their graves.

The family of Cornwallis is very ancient, and can point to many distinguished members. Its ancestral seat is at Brome, in Suffolk. This is a fine old mansion, and the hall, which is very lofty and open to the roof, is an excellent specimen of the work of other days. The chapel contains capital oak carving. In the village church there are monuments worth notice of the family.

Following the fate of so many other places, Brome passed after the death of the second marquis to a _novus homo_, one Matthias Kerrison, who, having begun life as a carpenter, contrived in various ways to acquire a colossal fortune. His son rose to distinction in the army, obtained a seat in Parliament, which he held for thirty years, and was created a baronet.

He left at his death a son and three daughters. The former, long married, is childless. The sisters are respectively the wives of Earl Stanhope, the well-known historian; Lord Henniker, a wealthy Suffolk proprietor; and Lord Bateman. It is understood that under the late baronet's will the son of the last will, in the event of the present baronet dying childless, succeed to the property. It will thus be observed that Brome, after having been for four centuries in one family, is destined to change hands repeatedly in a few years.

When the second Marquis Cornwallis died sonless, the marquisate became extinct, but the earldom passed to his first cousin. This nobleman, by no means an able or admirable person, married twice. By his first marriage he had a daughter, who married Charles Wykeham-Martin, Esq., M.P., whose father, by a concatenation of chances, became the owner of Leeds Castle, near Maidstone, in Kent--a splendid moated baronial pile, dating from the thirteenth century, but added to and improved in admirable taste. Leeds was formerly the property of the Fairfax family, whose chief, the present lord, resides near Washington. It came to them from the once famous family of Colepepper.

Earl Cornwallis married a second time late in life, and had an only daughter, Lady Julia. From that time his one idea seemed to be to accumulate for this child, and accordingly at his death she was the greatest heiress in England, her long minority serving to add immensely to her father's hoards. Of course, when the time approached for her entering society under the chaperonage of her cousins, the marquis's daughters, speculation was very rife in the London world as to whom she would marry, and many a mamma of high degree cast sheep's eyes at the heiress, and thought how charmingly her accumulations would serve to clear the encumbrances on certain acres. But they were not kept long in suspense. One night during the London season, when the ladies Cornwallis gave a grand ball, a damper was cast over the proceedings, so far at least as aspirants to the heiress's money-bags were concerned, by the announcement of her engagement. Said a lady to a gentleman in the course of that evening, "Most extraordinary! There seem to be no men in the room to-night." "Why, of course not," was the rejoinder, "after this fatal news." Lady Julia's choice fell upon a young officer in the Guards, Viscount Holmesdale, eldest son of Earl Amherst. Lord Holmesdale was unexceptionable in point of position, but his pecuniary position was such as to make one hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year a very agreeable addition to his income. It may, however, be a satisfaction to those less richly endowed with this world's goods than Lady Holmesdale to reflect that being an heiress generally proves rather the reverse of a passport to matrimonial bliss; and by all accounts she is no exception to the usual fate in this respect. We can't have everything in this world.

Lady Holmesdale's property was tied up by her old father (whose whole thoughts were given to this end, and who was in the habit of carrying his will on his person) to such a degree that in the event of her death her husband can only derive a very slight benefit from his wife's property beyond the insurances which may have been effected on her life. She is childless, and has very precarious health. Her principal seat is Linton Park, near Maidstone, Kent, in which county she is the largest landowner. In the event of her dying without issue, her estates pass to the son of Major Fiennes Cornwallis, who was second son of the late Mr. Wykeham-Martin by Lady Holmesdale's elder half-sister.

A cousin of Lady Holmesdale, Miss Cornwallis, the last representative of a third branch, died some years ago. This lady, who possessed rare literary and social acquirements, bequeathed her property to Major Wykeham-Martin, who thereupon changed his name to Cornwallis. The major, a gallant officer, one of those of whom Tennyson says,

Into the jaws of death
Rode the six hundred,

only survived the Balaklava charge to die a few years later through an accident in the hunting-field. "A fine, modest young officer," was Thackeray's verdict about him, when, after dinner at "Tom Phinn's," a noted bachelor barrister of eminence whose little dinners were not the least agreeable in London, the story of that famous ride had been coaxed out of the young _militaire_, who, if left to himself, would never have let you have a notion that he had seen such splendid service. The only Cornwallis now left is Lady Elizabeth, granddaughter of the first marquis.

NOVELTIES IN ETHNOLOGY.

Two savants of high reputation have lately undertaken to seek out the origin of that German race which has just put itself at the head of military Europe. One is Wilhelm Obermüller, a German ethnologist, member of the Vienna Geographical Society, whose startling theory nevertheless is that the Germans are the direct descendants of Cain! The other scholar, M. Quatrefages, a man of still greater reputation, devotes himself to a proposition almost as extraordinary--namely, that the Prussian pedigree is Finn and Slav, with only a small pinch of Teuton, and hence, in an ethnographical view, is anti-German!

That M. Quatrefages should maintain such a postulate, his patriotism if not his scientific reputation might lead us to expect; but that Obermüller should be so eager to trace German origin back to the first murderer is rather more suprising. Obermüller's work embraces in its general scope the origin of all European nations, but the most striking part is that relating to Germany. He holds that, from the remotest era, the Celto-Aryan race, starting from the plain of Tartary, the probable cradle of mankind, split into two great branches--one the Oriental Aryans, and the other the Western Aryans, or Celts. The former--who, as he proceeds to show, were no other than the descendants of Cain--betook themselves to China, which land they found inhabited by the Mongolians, another great primordial race; and we are told that the Mongolians are indicated when mention is made in Scripture of Cain's marriage in the land of Nod. The intermixture of Cainists and Mongolians produced the Turks, while the pure Cainist tribes formed the German people, under the name of Swabians (Chinese, _Siampi_), Goths (_Yeuten_ in Chinese) and Ases (_Sachsons_). Such, in brief, is the curious theory of Obermüller.

The question next arises, How is it that we find the Germans transplanted from the Hoang-Ho to the Rhine? We are told that, being driven out of China by the Turks, they poured into the European countries which the Celts or Western Aryans had already occupied. These latter had in the mean time gone out from the Asiatic cradle of the race, and following the course of the Indus to Hindostan and Persia, had, under the name of Chaldeans, overrun Armenia, Syria, Arabia, Egypt and North Africa, which latter they found inhabited by certain negro races, whereas in Egypt they discovered red-skins or Atlantides; which latter, by the way, form also our own aborigines. The intermixture of the Celts with these primitive races just named produced the Jews and Semitic people. At the time of the Celtic invasion Western Europe and Northern Africa were occupied by the race of the Atlantides, while the Mongolians, including also the Lapps, Finns and Huns, peopled the north of Europe and of Asia. The Celts pushed in between these two races, and only very much later the German people, driven out of China by the Turks, as we have said, arrived in Europe.

When, therefore, did these Cainist invasions of Germany take place? Obermüller says that the date must have been toward the epoch of the Roman conquests. Gallia was then inhabited in the south by the primitive Atlantid race of Ligurians and by the Greek colony of Massilia; in the centre by the Gaelags (Celts) or Gauls, who, pouring northward from Spain, had conquered it fifteen hundred years before the Christian era; and in the north by the Belgic Cimbrians, who had come from Germany, and who were designated under the name of Germans (_Ghermann_) or border-men, and who, though called _Germani_ by Caesar and Tacitus, were yet not of the Cainist stock, but Celts. However, these Germans, whom the Romans encountered to their cost on the Rhine and Danube, were of the genuine Oriental Cainist stock, and these, after centuries of fierce struggle, they failed to conquer, though the Celts of Britain, Gaul and Spain, as well as all the old empires of the East, had fallen an easy prey to their victorious eagles.

It only remains to add that this invasion of Germany by Cain's progeny was accomplished in three streams. The Ases (Sachsons) directed themselves to the Elbe and Danube, and thence to the north; the Suevi, or Swabians, chose the centre and south of Germany; while the Goths did not rest till they had overrun Italy, Southern France and Spain. But each of these three main streams was composed of many tribes, whom the old writers catalogue without system, mixing both Celtic and Teutonic tribes under the general name of Germans; and it is only in modern days that the careless enumeration of the classic writers has been rejected, and a more scientific method substituted. It will be seen, in fine, that in the main Obermüller does not differ from accepted theories in German ethnology, which have long carefully dissevered the Celts from the Teutons, and assigned to each tribe with approximate accuracy its earliest fixed abode in Europe. It is the tracing back of the German race proper to the first-born of Adam, according to scriptural genealogy, which makes this theory curious and amusing.

To the work of M. Quatrefages we have only space to devote a paragraph. Originally contributed to the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, it bears the marks in its inferences, if not in its facts, of being composed for an audience of sympathizing countrymen, rather than for the world of science at large. M. Quatrefages says that the first dwellers in Prussia were Finns, who founded the stock, and were in turn overpowered by the Slavs, who imposed their language and customs on the whole of the Baltic region. The consequent mixture of Finns and Slavs created a population wholly un-German; and what dash of genuine Germanism Prussia now has was subsequently acquired in the persons of sundry traders from Bremen, followed by a class of roving nobility, who entered the half-civilized country with their retainers in quest of spoils. Besides these elements, Prussia, like England and America, received in modern times an influx of French Huguenots; which M. Quatrefages naturally considers a piece of great good fortune for Prussia. Briefly, then, the French savant regards Prussia as German only in her nobility and upper-middle classes, while the substratum of population is a composition of Slav and Finn, and hence thoroughly anti-German. As, according to the old saying, if you scratch a Russian you will find a Tartar beneath, so, according to M. Ouatrefages, we may suppose that scraping a Prussian would disclose a Finn. The political inferences which he draws are very fanciful. He traces shadowy analogies between the tactics of Von Moltke's veterans and the warlike customs of the ancient Slavs, and suggests that the basic origin of the Prussian population may lead it to cultivate a Russian alliance rather than an Austrian, forgetting, apparently, that by his own admission the ruling-classes of Prussia are German in origin, ideas and sympathies.

L.S.

THE STEAM-WHISTLE.

While Mr. Ruskin was lately bewailing the bell-ringing propensity of mankind, the English Parliament and several American legislatures, city or State, were assaulting the greater nuisance of the steam-whistle, and trying to substitute bell-ringing for it. Mr. Ruskin's particular grievance was, that his own nerves were _crispé_ by the incessant ding-dong of the church-bells of Florence summoning the devout to prayer, but he generalized his wrath. Possibly, he would have been less sensitive and fastidious regarding the musical carillons of the Italian city were he wont to dwell within ear-shot of an American factory or railroad-station. Not that Mr. Ruskin fails to appreciate--or, rather, to depreciate--railways in their connection with Italian landscapes; for, besides his series of complaints regarding the Florence bells, he denounces the railway from Rome to Naples, and the railway-tunnels under Monts Cenis and St. Gothard, and the railway-bridge leading into Venice, as enemies of the beautiful and picturesque in Nature. But it is the locomotive, independent of the shriek, that is his abomination; whereas a man less sensitive to sights, and (if possible) more sensitive to sounds, might pardon the cutting up of the landscape were his ear-drum spared from splitting.

Emerson asks, "What is so odious as noise?" But a _Saturday Reviewer_ once devoted an elaborate essay to the eulogy of unmitigated noise, or rather to the keen enjoyment of it by children. People with enviable nerves and unenviable tastes often enjoy sounds in the ratio of their lack of melody--say, such everyday thoroughfare music as the slap and bang of coach-wheels on the cobble-stones; the creaking of street-cars round a sharp curve, like Milton's infernal doors "grating harsh thunder;" the squeaking falsettos of the cries by old-clothes' men, itinerant glaziers, fishmongers, fruiterers, tinkers and what not; the yells of rival coachmen at the railway-stations, giving one an idea of Bedlam; the street-fiddlers and violinists with horribly untuned instruments; the Italian open-air singers hoarsely shouting, "Shoo Fly" or "Viva Garibaldi! viva l'Italia!" the gongs beaten on steamboats and by hotel-runners at stations on the arrival of trains; the unearthly squeals and shrieks of new "musical instruments" sold cheap by street-peddlers; the horrible noise-producers which boys invent for the torture of nervous people--such, for example, as this present season's, which is happily styled "the devil's fiddle," or "the chicken-box," whose simplest form is an emptied tomato-can, with a string passed through the end and pulled with the rosined fingers. Now, that a man may be pleased with a rattle, even if it be only a car-rattle, is conceivable, but it is hard to understand how he can retain a relish for the squeal of a locomotive-whistle. The practice of summoning workmen to factories by this shrill monitor, of using it to announce the dinner-hour, the hour of resuming work after the nooning, and the hour of quitting work for the night, ought to be abolished everywhere. There is not the faintest excuse for it, because clocks and bells will do the same work exactly as well. On the other hand, the whistle causes perpetual irritation to the nervous, feeble and sick, and frequent cases of horses running away with fright at the sudden shriek, smashing property or destroying life.

Let us give moral aid and comfort to the campaign, Cisatlantic and Transatlantic, against the steam-whistle. In the local councils of Philadelphia, Camden and other cities it has been well opened in our country; in the House of Commons has been introduced a bill providing that "no person shall use or employ in any manufactory or any other place any steam-whistle or steam-trumpet for the purpose of summoning or dismissing workmen or persons employed, without the sanction of the sanitary authorities." They call this whistle, by the way, it would seem, the "American devil," for the Manchester _Examiner_ congratulates its readers that the "American devil" has been taken by the throat, and ere long his yells will be heard no more.

John Leech, it is said, was actually driven from house to house in a vain effort to escape the nuisance of organ-grinders, whom he has immortalized in Punch by many exquisite sketches, showing that they know "the vally of peace and quietness." Some of his friends declare that this nuisance so worked on his nerves that he may be said to have died of organ-grinders. Holmes has immortalized the same guild of wandering minstrels as a sort of "crusaders sent from infernal clime to dock the ears of melody and break the legs of time." And yet the hand-organ, so often the subject of municipal legislation, is dulcet music compared with the steam-whistle, even when the latter instrument takes its most ambitiously artistic form of the "Calliope."

SIAMESE NEWS.

Letters recently received from Bangkok, Siam, bearing date July 25, 1872, give the following interesting items.

His Majesty has just appointed an English tutor to his royal brothers, associating with them some of the sons of the higher nobles to the number of twenty. This certainly indicates progress in liberal and enlarged views in a land where hitherto no noble, however exalted his rank or worthy his character, was considered a fit associate for the princes of the royal family, who have always been trained to hold themselves entirely aloof from those about them. The young king now on the throne has changed all this, and says he wishes not only that his brothers shall have the advantage of studying with others of their own age, but that they should thus learn to know their people better, and by mingling with them freely in their studies and sports acquire more liberal views of men and things than their ancestors had. He insists that his young brothers and their classmates shall stand on precisely the same footing, and each be treated by the teacher according to his merits. The king intends to appoint yet other teachers in his family for both boys and girls; and though perhaps the time may not yet have come, it is certainly not far distant, when Siam will sustain high schools and colleges, both literary and scientific.

The religious aspect of the nation is somewhat less promising. Though the royal edict gives protection to all religions, and permits every man to choose for himself in matters of conscience, it can scarcely be said that the two kings take any real interest in Christianity. They think less of Booddhism, its mystic creed and imposing ceremonies, and have made very many changes in the form of worship; but, apparently, they are no more Christians than were their respective fathers, the late first and second kings. They treat Christianity with outward respect, because they esteem it decorous to do so; and the same is true of the regent and prime minister; but none of them even profess any real regard for the worship of the true God. The concessions made thus far indicate progress in civilization, not in piety; and while the kings and their subjects are assuredly loosing their grasp on Booddhism, they are not reaching out to lay hold on Christianity. It seems rather as if the whole nation were swaying off into the frigid regions of skepticism, and, influenced by the example of many unworthy representatives of Christian countries, they live only for the luxuries and laxities of the present life. Priestly robes are much less frequently seen on the river and in the streets than formerly; and many of the clergy no longer reside at the temples, but with their families in their own houses; thus relinquishing even the pretence of celibacy, which has hitherto been one of the very strongest points of Booddhism, giving it an appearance of sanctity and a hold on the affections of the people that nothing else can do. With this rapidly-increasing renunciation of priestly celibacy and the daily-diminishing ranks of the clergy, Booddhism, the mammoth religion of the world, seems tottering to ruin, and even the present generation may see its utter demolition, at least so far as Siam is concerned. Services at the temples are now held in imitation of English morning and evening prayers; a moral essay is read, at which the body-guards of the kings and the government officers are generally required to be present, and the remainder of the day they are excused from duty, instead of being kept, as formerly, Sundays and week-days, in almost perpetual attendance on His Majesty.

The supreme king is now in his twentieth year, and will take the reins of government this year. He is tall and slight in person, gentlemanlike in manners, perfectly well bred, and always courteous to strangers, though even more modest and unassuming than was his father, the priest-king, whose praises are still fresh in every heart. His Majesty speaks English quite creditably, wears the English dress most of the time, and keeps himself well informed as to matters and things generally. His reign, thus far, promises well for himself and his kingdom.