Chapter II: Part 2

"Yours of the 5th inst. came safe to hand, and will meet prompt attention. We have to inform you, with deep regret, that the son of the trustworthy cashier of this long-established house has absconded, taking with him bills accepted by our firm, to a large amount, as per margin; and a considerable sum in cash. We have been able to trace the misguided young man to a ship bound for Holland, and we think it probable he may visit Hamburgh, (where our name is so well known and, we trust, so highly respected) for the purpose of converting these bills into cash. He is a tall, handsome youth, about five feet eleven inches, with dark hair and eyes; speaks French and German well, and was dressed in deep mourning, in consequence of the recent death of his mother. If you should be able to find him, we have to request you will use your utmost endeavours to regain possession of the bills named in the margin; but, as we have a high respect for the father of the unfortunate young man, we will further thank you to procure for him a passage on board the first vessel sailing for Batavia, paying the expense of his voyage, and giving him the sum of two hundred louis d'or, which you will place to our account current, on condition that he does not attempt to revisit England till he receives permission so to do.

"We are, most respected friend,

"Your obedient servants,

"BENNETT, FORD, AND CO.

"Mynheer Von Kapell."

"My life on't," said Yansen, "'tis the very lad I saw this day, walking up and down in front of the Exchange, who appeared half out of his wits; looking anxiously for some particular object, yet shunning general observation: his person answers the description."

"That's fortunate," said the merchant, "you must devote the morrow to searching for him; bring him to me if possible, and I'll do my utmost to serve my excellent friends, Bennett and Ford of London."

Early next morning, Yansen went to the Exchange, and kept an anxious watch for many hours in vain; he was returning hopeless, when he saw the identical youth coming out of the door of a Jew money-changer; he brushed hastily past him, exclaiming, "The unconscionable scoundrel! seventy per cent, for bills on the best house in England!"

Yansen approached him. "Young gentleman," said he, in a very mild tone, "you appear to have met with some disappointment from that griping wretch, Levi. If you have any business to transact, my house is close by; I shall be happy to treat with you."

"Willingly," replied the youth, "the sooner the better. I must leave Hamburgh at day-break."

The clerk led him to the house of the merchant, and entered it by a small side door, desiring the young man to be seated, whilst he gave some directions. In a few minutes he reappeared, bringing Von Kapell with him. The worthy Hamburgher having no talent for a roundabout way of doing business, said bluntly, "So Mynheer! we are well met; it will be useless to attempt disguise with me; look at this!" and he put into his hand the letter he had the night before received.

Overwhelmed with consternation, the young man fell at his feet.

"Oh heaven!" he cried, "I am lost for ever--my father, my indulgent, my honourable father, is heart-broken and disgraced by my villany. My mother!" Here he became nearly inaudible, and hid his face in his hands. "You," he continued, "are spared all participation in the agony your wretched son is suffering."

"Boy, boy!" said the merchant, raising him, and quite melted at this show of penitence, "listen to me! are the bills safe? if so, you may still hope."

"They are," eagerly exclaimed the youth; "how fortunate that I did not listen to the offers of that rapacious Jew. Here, sir, take them, I implore you," pulling from his breast a large pocket-book; "they are untouched. Spare but my life, and I will yet atone--Oh, spare me from a shameful death."

There was a pause, broken at last by Yansen's saying significantly to his employer, "as per margin."

The merchant turned to the unhappy young man. "Take heart," said he, "'Wenn die noth ist amgröszten die hülfe ist am nächsten.'[11] There's an old German proverb for you. Sit down and hear what I have to say. I think myself not a little fortunate in so soon being able to fulfil the wishes of my English correspondents; your natural alarm did not suffer you to finish their letter; you will perceive how generously they mean to act; their house's credit saved, they intend not to punish you. Read, read; and Yansen, order some eatables, and a bottle or two of my old Heidelberg hock, trouble always makes me thirsty--three glasses, my good Yansen."

[11] When things are at the worst they must mend.

Again the young Englishman hid his face, and sighed convulsively, "I do not deserve this lenity. My excellent father! this is a tribute to your virtue."

Von Kapell left his guest's reflections undisturbed, till a servant entered, who placed refreshments on a well polished oak table; when she retired, he resumed.

"And now, what devil tempted you to play the--runaway?" swallowing the term he had intended to use. "Was it for the wenches, or the dicing table?"

"Spare me, most kind and worthy sir, I intreat you! To my father I will make full confession of all my faults; but he must be the first to know the origin of my crimes."

"Well, well, take another glass of wine; you shall stay in my house till we can find a passage for you. It was but last night my good ship the Christine sailed for Batavia, and--"

"Under favour," interrupted Yansen, "she has not yet left the harbour; the wind blew too fresh for her to venture on crossing the sand-banks at night, and it is now only shifting round a point or two."

"You are lucky, youngster;" quickly added the merchant, "the Christine has noble accommodations; you shall aboard this evening. Put these in the chest, good Yansen," handing him the bills, "and count me out the two hundred louis d'or the boy is to have. Come, man! finish your meal, for I see," said he, regarding a vane on the gable of an opposite house, "you have no time to lose."

The meal was finished--the money given--the worthy merchant adding as much good advice as the brief space would permit. The Briton was profuse in his expressions of gratitude, promised amendment, and returned the warm grasp of Von Kapell, unable to speak for his tears. Yansen accompanied him on board, gave the owner's most particular charge to the skipper, to pay his passenger every attention on the voyage. The vessel cleared the harbour--was in a few hours out of sight--and the next morning, Mynheer Von Kapell wrote to London a full account of the transaction, returning the bills he had so fortunately recovered.

* * * * *

In less than a fortnight, the following letter reached the good old German:--

"Sir,--We have to inform you, that we never lost the bills sent in your last favour, every one of which is fabricated, and our acceptance forged. Our cashier has no son, nor has he lost a wife. We are sincerely grieved that your friendly feeling towards our house should have led you to listen to so palpable a cheat.

"We remain, with great respect, yours,

"BENNETT, FORD, AND CO.

"P.S. If you should ever hear again of the person you have, at your own expense, sent to Batavia, we shall be glad to know."

* * * * *

What can be said of the good old German's feelings, but that they may "be more easily conceived than described?"--_Monthly Magazine._

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NEW BOOKS.

* * * * *

OTWAY'S "VENICE PRESERVED."

(Hundreds of our readers who have again and again heard

Belvidera pour her soul in love--

may not be aware of the precise historical connexion of the incidents of Otway's play with the events of history. They are taken, in the main, from an atrocious conspiracy formed at Venice in 1618. Sir Henry Wotton, then English ambassador at Venice, writes as follows on the 25th of May, in the above year:--"The whole town is here at present in horror and confusion upon the discovering of a foul and fearful conspiracy of the French against this state; whereof no less than thirty have already suffered very condign punishment, between men strangled in prison, drowned in the silence of the night, and hanged in public view; and yet the bottom is invisible." Beyond this quaint, meagre, chronological notice, little is actually established of the details, although the event is perhaps as familiarly known by name to English readers as any other in the History of Venice. We are, therefore, happy to see the affair treated with minute consideration in the second volume of "Sketches from Venetian History," in the _Family Library_; and so interesting is the narrative, or rather the facts and conjectures, to the lover of history, as well as to the unstudious playgoer, that we are induced to quote nearly every line of the passage. The editor observes:--)

Muratori indeed has scarcely exaggerated the obscurity in which this incident is enveloped when he affirms that only one fact illuminates its darkness; namely that several hundred French and Spaniards engaged in the service of the Republic were arrested and put to death. The researches of Comte Daru have brought to light some hitherto unknown contemporary documents; but even the inexhaustible diligence of that most laborious, accurate, and valuable writer has been baffled in the hope of obtaining certainty as its reward; and he has been compelled to content himself with the addition of one hypothesis more to those already proposed in explanation of this mystery.

All that can be positively affirmed is that during the summer of 1617, Jacques Pierre, a Norman by birth, whose youth had been spent in piratical enterprises in the Levantine seas, from which he had acquired no inconsiderable celebrity, fled from the service of the Spanish Duke d'Ossuna, Viceroy of Naples; and, having offered himself at the Arsenal of Venice, was engaged there in a subordinate office. Not many days after his arrival in the _Lagune_, Pierre denounced to the Inquisitors of State a conspiracy projected, as he said, by the Duke d'Ossuna, and favoured by Don Alfonso della Cueva, Marquis de Bedemar, at that time resident ambassador from Spain. The original minutes of Pierre's disclosures, written in French, still exist among the correspondence of M. Leon Bruslart, the contemporary ambassador from the court of France to the Republic; and they were translated into Italian, with which language Pierre was but imperfectly acquainted, by his friend Renault, in order that they might be presented to the Inquisitors. In this plot, Pierre avowed himself to be chief agent; his pretended abandonment of the Duke d'Ossuna forming one part of the stratagem: and he added that his commission enjoined him to seduce the Dutch troops employed in the late war, who still remained in Venice and its neighbourhood; to fire the city; to seize and massacre the nobles; to overthrow the existing government; and ultimately to transfer the state to the Spanish crown. The sole immediate step taken by the Inquisitors in consequence of these revelations was the secret execution of Spinosa, a Neapolitan, whom Pierre described as an emissary of the Duke d'Ossuna; and whom he appears to have regarded with jealousy as a spy upon his own conduct. For the rest, the magistrates contented themselves, as it, seems, by awaiting the maturity of the plot with silent vigilance. Ten months elapsed during which Pierre communicated on the one hand with the Duke d'Ossuna, unsuspicious of his treachery, and on the other with the Inquisitors; till at the expiration of that term he was seized by an order of the X, while employed on his duties with the Fleet, and drowned without the grant of sufficient delay even for previous religious confession. More, perhaps many more, than three hundred French and Spaniards engaged in various naval and military capacities were at the same time delivered to the executioner; and Renault, after undergoing numerous interrogatories, and being placed seven times on the cord, was hanged by one foot on a gibbet on the _Piazzetta_, which day after day presented similar exhibitions of horror.

This evidence of Pierre remained at the time concealed in the bosoms of the Inquisitors to whom it had been delivered; and no official declarations satisfied public curiosity as to the cause of the sanguinary executions which deformed the Capital. A rumour indeed spread itself abroad, and, although not traced to any certain authority, was universally credited, that a great peril had been escaped; that Venice had trembled on the very brink of destruction; and that the Spaniards had meditated her ruin. Popular fury was accordingly directed against the Marquis de Bedemar; and so fierce were the menaces of summary vengeance that the ambassador was forced to protest his innocence before the _Collegio_, more in the spirit of one deprecating punishment than defying accusation. He then earnestly solicited protection against the rabble surrounding his palace; for "God knows," affirmed his pale and affrighted secretary more than once, "the danger of our residence is great!" The Vice-doge, who during the interregnum between the death of one chief magistrate and the election of another presided over the _Collegio_, replied vaguely, coldly, and formally; and, the application having been renewed without any more favourable result, Bedemar, justly apprehensive for his safety, seized a pretext for withdrawing, till a successor to his embassy was appointed. Meantime, considerable doubts were entertained, not only by the resident foreign ministers,-- especially by that of France, better informed than his brethren through the possession of Pierre's minutes,--but by the Venetian senators themselves, also, whether any conspiracy whatever had really existed. Nevertheless, in spite of these misgivings not obscurely expressed, it was not till the expiration of five months that the X presented a report to the Senate, detailing the information which they had received and the views upon which they had acted. That report however is so manifestly contradicted in many very important instances by Pierre's depositions, that it must be considered as drawn up and garbled solely with the intention of _making a case_; and therefore as revealing only so much truth dashed and brewed with a huge proportion of falsehood, as it suited the interests of the magistrates to exhibit to public view. All mention of the denouncements of Pierre during the long period of ten months is carefully suppressed, and yet no fact in history is more distinctly proved than that he did so communicate. The first intimation of the plot is there said to have been given but a few days before it was to have been executed, by two Frenchmen, Montcassin and Balthazar Juven, whom Pierre had endeavoured to seduce. "Look at these Venetians," said the daring conspirator one day to his apparent proselytes, "they affect to chain the lion; but the lion sometimes devours his master, especially when that master uses him ill." According to their further evidence, some troops despatched by the Duke d'Ossuna were to land by night on the _Piazzetta_ and to occupy all the strong holds of the city; numerous treasonable agents already within the walls were to master the depots of arms; and fire, rapine, and massacre were to bring the enterprise to consummation.

The papers abovementioned, together with a few letters from the Doge to the Venetian ambassador at Milan, and one or two other not very important documents contained in the archives of Venice, all printed by Comte Dam, are the sole authentic vouchers for this conspiracy now known to exist; and it must be confessed that they are insufficient for its elucidation. The Abbe St. Real, who for a long time was esteemed the chief historian of this dark transaction, is an agreeable and attractive writer; but--since he was unacquainted with the report of the X; since he does not cite the correspondence of the French ambassador containing Pierre's depositions; and since he frequently varies from a MS which he does cite, _The Interrogatories of the Accused_,[12] a MS indeed, which, even when quoted faithfully, is often contradicted by the few established facts, and by numerous well-known usages of the Venetian government,--little faith can be attached to his narrative. It was his opinion, and it has been that which has most generally prevailed, that the Duke d'Ossuna, the Marquis de Bedemar, and Don Pedro di Toledo, governor of Milan, mutually concerted a plan for the destruction of Venice; the chief execution of which was entrusted to Pierre and Renault: and that, on the very eve of its explosion, Jaffier, one of their band, touched by the magnificence of the Espousals of the Adriatic which he had just witnessed, was shaken from his stern purpose, and revealed the conspiracy. In order to overthrow the latter part of this hypothesis, it may be sufficient to state that the first executions took place on the 14th of May, 1618, and that it was not till the 24th of that month that the Feast of Ascension, and its gorgeous ceremonies, occurred in the same year.

[12] A translation of this document is given by Daru: the
original Italian may be found in the _Memorie recondite_ of
Vittorio Siri, i. 407.

Comte Daru, on the other hand, first explains a design which it is notorious was entertained by the Duke d'Ossuna to convert his viceroyalty of Naples into a kingdom, the crown of which, wrested from Spain, should be placed on his own head. And hence he establishes the impossibility that d'Ossuna should at the same moment be plotting the overthrow of Venice; that power whose assistance, or at least whose connivance was one of the weapons most necessary for his success. On these grounds, Comte Daru contends that the Duke maintained a secret understanding both with the Signory and the court of France; that, refining on political duplicity, he deceived Pierre by really instructing him to gain over the Dutch troops quartered in the _Lagune_; not, however, as his emissary supposed, to be employed ultimately for the seizure of Venice, but in truth for that of Naples; that Pierre's courage was not proof against the dangers with which his apparently most hazardous commission beset him; and that accordingly he betrayed his employer, and revealed to the Inquisitors a plot which _they_ well knew to be feigned: and, lastly, that when the ambitious plans of d'Ossuna, partially discovered before their time by the Spanish government, might have compromised Venice also if they had been fully elucidated; in order to blot out each syllable of evidence which could bear, even indirectly, upon the transaction, so far as she was concerned, it was thought expedient to remove every individual who had been even unwittingly connected with it. So fully was this abominable wickedness perpetrated, that both the accused and the accusers, the deceivers and the deceived, those either faithless or faithful to their treason, the tools who either adhered to or who betrayed d'Ossuna, who sought to destroy or to preserve Venice, were alike enveloped in one common fate, and silenced in the same sure keeping of the grave. Some few, respecting whose degree of participation a slight doubt arose, were strangled on the avowed principle that _all_ must be put to death who were in any way implicated; others were drowned by night, in order that their execution might _make no noise_.[13] Moncassin, one of the avowed informers, was pensioned, spirited away to Cyprus, and there despatched in a drunken quarrel; and if it be asserted that his companion Balthazar Juven was permitted to survive, it is because he is the only individual concerning whose final destiny we cannot pronounce with certainty.[14]

[13] Laurent Brulard, concerning whose fate much discussion
arose, was strangled _par beaucoup de considerations et par une
suite du parti qu'on avrait pris de mettre a mort tons ceux qui
etaient impliques dans cette affaire_. The brothers Desbouleaux
were drowned by night in the _Canale Orfano, pour ne point
ebruiter l'affaire_; and the instructions sent to the Admiral
who was to drown Pierre were to fulfil his commission _avec le
moins de bruit possible_. Accordingly that ruffian, and
forty-five of his accomplices, were drowned at once _sans
bruit_. _Interrogatoire des Accuses_, translated by Daru, vol.
viii. § x.

[14] It is believed that Balthazar Juven, and a relation of the
Marechale de Lesdiguieres, who is stated to have escaped
punishment, are one and the same person.

Of one personage who holds an important station in St. Real's romance, and yet more so in Otway's coarse and boisterous tragedy, which, by dint of some powerful _coups de theatre_, still maintains possession of the English stage, we have hitherto mentioned but the name; and, in fact, even for that name we are indebted only to the more than suspected summary of the _Interrogatories of the Accused_.

Antoine Jaffier, a French captain, is there made chief evidence against Pierre and Renault, who are employed by d'Ossuna, as he vaguely states, to surprise _some_ maritime place belonging to the republic. This informer was rewarded with four thousand sequins, and instructed forthwith to quit the Venetian territories; but having, while at Brescia, renewed communications with suspected persons, he was brought back to the _Lagune_ and drowned. The minute particularities of Jaffier's depositions, and the motive which prompted him to offer them, (the latter, as we have already shown, resting on a gross anachronism,) are, we believe pure inventions by St. Real; and Otway has used a poet's license to palliate still farther deviations from authentic history. Under his hands, Pierre,--whom all accounts conspire in representing to us as a foreign, vulgar and mercenary bravo, equally false to every party, and frightened into confession,--is transformed into a Venetian patriot, the proud champion of his country's liberty; who declaims in good, set, round, customary terms against slavery and oppression; and who, in the end, escapes a mode of execution unknown to Venice, by persuading the friend who has betrayed him, and whom he has consequently renounced, to stab him to the heart, in order "to preserve his memory." The weak, whining, vacillating, uxorious Jaffier, by turns a cut-throat and a King's evidence; now pawning, now fondling, and now menacing with his dagger an imaginary wife; first placing his comrade's life in jeopardy, then begging it against his will, and finally taking it with his own hand, is a yet more unhappy creation of wayward fancy; and it is only in the names of the conspirators, in the introduction of an Englishman, Eliot, (whom he has brought nearer vernacular spelling than he found him,--Haillot,[15]) and in the character of Rainault, that Otway is borne out by authority. The last-mentioned person is described by the French ambassador as a sot, a gambler, and a sharper, whose rogueries are well known to all the world; in a word, therefore, as a fit leader of a revolutionary crew wrought up, "without the least remorse, with fire and sword t' exterminate" all who bore the stamp of nobility; and _not_ as the most fitting depository in which Belvidera's honour might be lodged as a security for that of her irresolute husband.

[15] Nani, iii. p. 169. He was to have commanded the naval part
of the enterprise.

Whatever hypothesis may be adopted, be this conspiracy true or false, there is no bloodier, probably no blacker page in history than that which records its development. Were it not for the immeasurable weight of guilt which must press upon the memory of the rulers of Venice if we suppose the plot to have been altogether fictitious, we should assuredly admit that the evidence greatly preponderates in favour of that assertion. But respect for human nature compels us to hesitate in admitting a charge so monstrous. Five months after the commencement of the executions, either a tardy gratitude or a profane mockery was offered to Heaven; and the Doge and nobles returned thanks for their great deliverance, by a solemn service at St. Mark's.

(Among the master-spirits who have commemorated the olden glories of Venice, but more especially her association with our dramatic literature, must not be forgotten Lord Byron:

But unto us she hath a spell beyond
Her name in story, and her long array
Of mighty shadows, whose dim forms despond
Above the dogeless city's vanish'd sway;
Our's is a trophy which will not decay
With the Rialto: Shylock and the Moor,
And Pierre cannot be swept away---
The keystones of the arch! though all were o'er,
For us repeopled were the solitary shore.

* * * * *

I lov'd her from my boyhood--she to me
Was as a fairy city of the heart,
Rising like water-columns from the sea,
Of joy the sojourn, and of wealth the mart;
And Otway, Radcliffe, Schiller, Shakspeare's art
Had stamp'd her image in me, and ever so,
Although I found her thus, we did not part,
Perchance even dearer in her day of woe
Than when she was a boast, a marvel, and a show.

Returning to the "Sketches," we must observe that we beg to differ with the Editor in merely applying the epithets "coarse and boisterous," to Otway's play, and pointing to "_coups de Theatre_" as its only merits. He surely ought not to have omitted its originality of whatever order it may be.

The volume before us brings the history of Venice to her subjection to Austria in 1798. It is throughout spiritedly executed. The illustrations, antique and modern, are precisely of this character, being from Titian, and our contemporary artist, Prout.)

* * * * *

THE GATHERER.

* * * * *

_Sir Hercules Langreish and his Friend._--We found him in his study alone, poring over the national accounts, with two claret bottles empty before him, and a third bottle on the wane; it was about eight o'clock in the evening, and the butler, according to general orders when gentlemen came in, brought a bottle of claret to each of us. "Why," said Parnell, "Sir Heck, you have emptied _two bottles_ already." "True," said Sir Hercules. "And had you nobody to help you?" "_O yes_, I had that bottle of _port_ there, and I assure you he afforded me very great assistance!"--_Sir Jonah Barrington._

_The Irish Bar._--They used to tell a story of Fitzgibbon respecting a client who brought his own brief, and fee, that he might personally apologize for the smallness of the latter. Fitzgibbon, on receiving the fee, looked rather discontented. "I assure you, counsellor," said the client (mournfully) "I am ashamed of its smallness; but in fact it is all I have in the world." "Oh! then," said Fitzgibbon, "you can do no more:--as it's all you have in the world--why--hem--I must _take it_."

* * * * *

Speaking of the Catholics in the hall of the Four Courts, Keller seemed to insinuate that Norcott was favourable to their emancipation. "What!" said Norcott, with a great show of pomposity--"what! Pray, Keller, do you see anything that smacks of the _Pope_ about me?" "I don't know," replied Keller; "but at all events there is a great deal of the _Pretender_, and I always understood them to travel in company."

_National Gallery and Record Office, on the site of the King's Mews, Charing Cross._--The estimated expense of erecting the above building is 50,000_l_.; the amount proposed to be taken for the present year is 15,000_l_.; leaving to be granted in future years 35,000_l_. The proposed building will be 461 feet in length and 56 feet in width in its extreme dimensions, and will consist of a centre and two wings. The western wing will contain, on the ground floor, rooms for the reception of records, and an entrance into the barrack-yard such as now exists. Above them will be the picture-gallery, divided into four rooms; one 50 feet by 50 feet; two 50 feet by 38 feet; and one room 50 feet by 32 feet; together with four cabinets for the reception of small pictures, or for the use of the keeper. The floors will be made fire-proof. The eastern wing, of similar extent, will contain, on the ground floor, a hall for casts, the library and council-room of the Royal Academy, and a dwelling for the keeper. There will be likewise a gateway or entrance corresponding to that leading into the barrack-yard in the other wing. In the basement below this wing there will be offices for the use of the Royal Academy, and a separate set attached to the dwelling-house of the keeper. The centre building will consist of halls, vestibules, staircases, &c. for both establishments; they will be distinct and separated; but so brought together as to form one grand feature of interior decoration. The building is proposed to be executed in stone. The central portico is to be constructed with the columns and other members of that which formerly decorated the palace at Carlton House. The materials of the present building are to be used in the construction of the new building, so far as they can be employed with propriety. The whole cost of the building will be 50,000_l_., exclusive of the old materials above mentioned, which have been valued at 4,000_/l_. It is impossible to state with any degree of accuracy the cost of the grates, air-stoves, and fittings of the buildings, which will mainly depend upon the mode to be adopted in warming them; but it may be confidently stated that it will not exceed 600_l_.--_Parliamentary Paper, No. 611._

_Home Truth._--"Give me my liar," was the phrase in which Charles the Fifth was used to call for a volume of history; and certainly no man can attentively examine any important period of our annals without remarking, that almost every incident admits of two handles, almost every character of two interpretations; and that, by a judicious packing of facts, the historian may make his picture assume nearly what form he pleases, without any direct violation of truth.--_Quarterly Rev._

_Envy._--"Of all the spies that are," says Mr. Owen Feltham, "envy is the most observant and prying. When the physicians to Frederick were relating what most would sharpen the sight, some were for fennel, and some for glasses, and others for other matters; the noble Actius did assure them, there was nothing that would do it like envy. Whatsoever man does ill, by it is magnified, and multiplied; his failings are all watched, drawn out, and blazed to the world; and under the pretence of good, he is oft led to the extremest issue of evil. Like oil that is poured upon the roots of trees, which softens, it destroys and withers all the branches. And being once catched, with scorn he is insulted on. For envy is so unnoble a devil, that it ever tyrannizeth most upon a slip or low prostration, at which time gallant minds do most disdain to triumph. The envious is more unhappy than the serpent: for though he hath poison within him, and can cast it upon others, yet to his proper bosom it is not burdensome, as is the rancour that the envious keeps; but this most plainly is the plague, as it infects others, so it fevers him that hath it, till he dies. Nor is it more noxious to the owner than fatal and detrimental to all the world beside. It was envy first unmade the angels and created devils. It was envy first that turned man out of Paradise, and with the blood of the innocent first dyed the untainted earth. It was envy sold chaste Joseph as a bondman, and unto crucifixion gave the only Son of God. He walks among burning coals that converses with those that are envious. He that would avoid it in himself, must have worth enough to be humble and beneficent. But he that would avoid the danger of it from others, must abandon their company."

_Extraordinary Whipping._--During the minority of King James I. he was at Stirling Castle, under the tuition of the celebrated Buchanan. It is reported that Buchanan's reverence for his royal pupil, did not prevent his giving him a severe whipping when he persisted against remonstrance, in disturbing him whilst he was reading. Historians do not tell us how the royal pupil supported this chastisement. Swift says, "Heirs to titles and large estates, have a weakness in their eyes, and are not able to bear the pain and indignity of whipping." P.T.W.

* * * * *

_Erratum_ in page 2--the line quoted from Montgomery should be "The parrots swung like blossoms on the trees."

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