FOOTNOTES:

O Willie brewed a peck o' maut,And Rab and Allan cam to prie;Three blither hearts that lee-lang nightYe wadna find in Christendie.

It was well known that the affair described was a realone—that the Willie who gave the entertainment was Mr William Nicol, a master in the High School of Edinburgh—Rab, the poet himself—and Allan, a certain Mr Masterton, likewise of the Edinburgh High School: three merry-hearted men, of remarkable talents and many other good properties, but who, unfortunately, were all of them too liable to the seductions of the 'barley-bree.' That such was the scene, and such the actors, we had learned from Burns himself, who thus annotated the song in a musical collection: 'This air is Masterton's; the song mine. The occasion of it was this: Mr William Nicol, of the High School, Edinburgh, during the autumn vacation being at Moffat, honest Allan—who was at that time on a visit to Dalswinton—and I went to pay Nicol a visit. We had such a joyous meeting, that Mr Masterton and I agreed, each in our own way, that we should celebrate the business.' That is to say, Burns undertook to compose a song descriptive of the merry encounter, while Mr Masterton, who was an amateur musician, should compose an appropriate air. So far there seems to be little obscurity about the matter. The locality pointed out is the well-known spa village of Moffat, situated among the hills of Annandale, about twenty miles from Ellisland. Nicol had had a lodging there, in which to enjoy his few weeks of autumn vacation; Burns and Masterton—the one from Ellisland, the other from Dalswinton—had journeyed thither in company; and there, probably in some small cottage room, had the strength of the peck o' maut been tried. Most likely, as Moffat is so far on the way from Dalswinton to Edinburgh, Mr Masterton would part with his two friends next day, and proceed on his way to the city, while Burns returned to his farm, lone-meditating on the song in which he was to make the frolic immortal.

With so explicit a statement from the poet, we never should have had occasion to feel any doubt about the circumstances referred to in 'Willie brewed a peck o' maut,' had not Dr Currie, the editor of the posthumous collection of Burns's works, inserted therein a note, stating that the merry-meeting 'took place at Laggan, a farm purchased by Mr Nicol in Nithsdale, on the recommendation of Burns.' Currie, proceeding upon the undoubted fact of Nicol having purchased such a farm, seems to have imagined that the meeting was what is called in Scotland ahouse-heating, or entertainment given to celebrate the entering upon a new domestic establishment, Laggan itself being of course the scene. To add to the perplexity thus created, Dr Currie's assumptions were taken up by a subsequent editor, who ought to have known better—the late Allan Cunningham. He gives the whole affair with daring circumstantiality. The song, he says, 'was composed to commemorate thehouse-heating—as entering upon possession of a new house is called in Scotland. William Nicol made the brewst strong and nappy; and Allan Masterton, then on a visit at Dalswinton, crossed the Nith, and, with the poet and his celebrated punch-bowl, reached Laggan "a wee before the sun gaed down." The sun, however, rose on their carousal, if the tradition of the land may be trusted.' Thus, as Laggan is on the right bank of the Nith, while Dalswinton is on the left, we have Masterton crossing the river to join Burns at Ellisland, which is the converse of the procedure necessary on the supposition of Moffat being the locality. A place called Laggan, about two miles from Ellisland, being further assumed as the seat of Nicol, we have the poet marching along to it bearing his punch-bowl as an essential of the frolic!—a particular which this biographer would have probably suppressed, if he had known that the real Laggan of William Nicol is eight or nine miles from Ellisland, in a part of the country naturally so difficult of access, that a visitor might be glad to get there himself without any such nice burden as a punch-bowl to carry.

In a more recent edition of the poet's life and writings—where at length an effort is made to illustrate both, by documentary and other exact evidence[1]—the affair is set in such a light as to throw a ludicrous commentary on such testimony as the 'tradition of the land.' It appears, from a letter of Burns in which two verses of the song are transcribed, that it was written before 16th October 1789; while it equally appears that Mr Nicol did not purchase Laggan till March 1790:ergo, the maut was not brewed at Laggan; Masterton did not cross the Nith; and the punch-bowl is a myth, which most likely originated in editorial fancy.

Laggan is, nevertheless, a remarkable place, for Burns and Nicol must have been there together in some fashion, if not a Bacchanalian one, since it was upon the recommendation of the former that the latter became its proprietor. There are, however, two Laggans—one in Dunscore parish, about two miles from Ellisland; the other in Glencairn parish, a comparatively remote situation; and the latter was the Laggan of Nicol. Mr M——, of A——, who now lives near Ellisland, remembers, while living in his father's house, Laggan of Dunscore—the place erroneously assumed by Cunningham—that Burns and Nicol came there rather late one evening, and induced his father to accompany them to the town of Minniehive, whence he did not return home till next day at three o'clock. Laggan of Glencairn being on the way to Minniehive, and near it, and there being no other imaginable reason for Nicol going to such an out-of-the-way place, it seems a very reasonable supposition, that the pair of friends were on their way to see the property which Nicol thought of purchasing; and that Burns, knowing Mr M—— to be well skilled in land, had thought of asking his advice on its value. The junior Mr M—— adds a reminiscence, too characteristic, we fear, to be much doubted, that Burns and Nicol on that occasion were for a whole week engaged in merry-making.

We had, therefore, a half-melancholy interest in seeing Laggan—a name, we felt, associated with reckless gaieties, but then they were the gaieties of genius, and well had they been moralised in the punishments which they drew down—for, as Currie remarks in 1799, these 'three merry boys' were already all of them under the turf. Our kind host, the successor of Masterton's, took us in his carriage across the Nith, through a scene of natural luxuriance and beauty not to be surpassed, and under a sun of as intense brilliancy as ever shone in these climes. Passing into a high side-valley, we soon left the glowing plains of Nithsdale behind. We passed under the farmstead of Laggan of Dunscore, and thought of Burns and Nicol coming there to seduce the worthy farmer away to partake of their festivities at Minniehive. By and by we came to Dunscore kirk, which Burns used to attend with his family while resident at Ellisland—a gloomy-looking man, the people thought him, all the time that he, with his generous, benevolent nature, was in reality groaning over the stern Calvinistic theology of the preacher. It is a tract of country which has but recently been reclaimed from a marshy and moorish state, and which still shews only partial traces of decoration and high culture. In a gloomy recess among the hills, we caught a glimpse of the situation of the old castle of Lagg, a fortalice surrounded by bogs, the ancient residence of the persecutor Grierson of Lagg, and fit scene to be connected with the history of a man who could coolly stand to see innocent women drowned at a stake in the sea for conscience' sake. The name of the place is pure Norwegian, expressing simplywater, such being, no doubt, the predominating feature of the scenery in its original state—while Laggan merely gives the articleen(the) in addition. Soon after passing Dunscore, we entered the valley of the Cairn,which, with its chalet-like farmhouses far up the slopes on both sides, reminded us much of Switzerland. Here, a few miles onward, we saw Maxwellton House, surrounded by those slopes so warmly spoken of in Scottish song—

Maxwellton braes are bonnie,Where early fa's the dew;Where I and Annie Laurie,Made up the promise true, &c.

Of this estate, the Laggan of William Nicol was originally a part, being sold in 1790 by Sir Robert Laurie of Maxwellton, a gentleman whom Burns has celebrated in his famous poem of 'The Whistle.' Even in this splendid summer-day, the whole vale has a rude and triste appearance, somewhat at issue with the declaration of the old song just quoted, and not likely, one would have thought, to attract the regard of such men as William Nicol and Robert Burns.

We had inquired, as we came along, as to the place of which we were in quest; and finding nobody with a very clear or ready conception of it or its whereabouts, began to feel as if it were of a half-fabulous character. At length, however, at a place called Crossford, we were told we should have to leave our carriage and the road, and ascend the side of the valley to the northward, where, about a mile and a half onward, we should find a small farm called Laggan Park. This we hoped to find to be the true place. To walk a mile and a half up hill on a roasting July day was not a task to be encountered on light grounds; however, we had resolved to make out our point if possible. Behold a couple of wayfarers, then, pursuing their way along the skirts of turnip-fields, through slight coppices, and along various clayey braes, with this unseen place of Laggan Park still keeping wonderfully ahead, long after it ought to have been reached. We wondered how the Ayrshire bard would have looked carrying a punch-bowl along our present path, after a journey of eight miles similarly loaded; and whether he would have thought any amount of the 'barley bree' during 'the lee-lang night' a fair recompense for his toils. At length, we arrived at the spot, but in a state of deliquescence and exhaustion not to be described. It is a small farm-establishment, nestling in a bosom of the hills, with some shelter and good exposure, making up for elevation of position, so that its few fields of growing grain, of potatoes, and meadow grass, have a tolerably good appearance. Some patches of ancient coppice at the base of the barish hills behind, give it even a smiling aspect. The farmer, seeing us approach, left his people in the field, and came to greet us. We entered a neat clean room, and met a kind reception from 'the Mistress,' who was as trigly dressed as if she had been expecting company. It soon became clear, from our conversation with the good couple, that our toils were crowned with success. This really had been Nicol's property; it still belonged to a member of his family. That line of gray heights seen from the door was what Burns alluded to when he facetiously dubbed his friend 'Illustrious lord of Laggan's many hills.' This cottage had been the retreat of the High School master in his hours of rustic vacation. There was a difficulty, which we discussed over a glass of most welcome spirits and water furnished by the farmer: Did this neat room form a part of the dwelling of Nicol? It appeared not. It was a modern addition. The original house, to which it adjoined upon a different level of flooring, was the merest hut, of one room, with a line of box-beds dividing the sitting-place from a small space, which, being rudely causewayed like a cow-house, had probably been employed in keeping animals of some kind. Such was the humbletuguriolumof Willie Nicol of the 'peck o' maut'—an interesting memorial of the simplicity of country life in Scotland at the close of the eighteenth century. We did not venture to indulge in any dreamings as to festive meetings between Burns and Nicol in this humble shed; for we felt that here there was no certain ground to go upon. Enough that we could be assured of Burns and Nicol having been together here; two most singular examples of the peasant class of their country, and one of them an unapproached master of his country's lyre, whose strains have floated to the ends of the earth, and promise to last through many ages.

The elements of the place, and the ideas connected with it were, after all, too simple to detain us long. We only waited to snatch a slight pencil sketch of the house and its adjuncts; and then, having taken leave of the farmer and his wife, we retraced our steps to the road. Somewhat unexpectedly, and not at all in keeping with the idea of either Maxwellton braes or Laggan's many hills, we discovered in our walk that the rough terrace-like ground over which we had passed before coming in sight of Nicol's estate, was amoraine, or mass ofdébris, produced and left there by a glacier. Its surface, thickly covered with loose blocks of rock different from that of the district, first fixed our attention; then looking into some openings which had been made in the earth for building materials, we readily observed that the internal constitution of the mass was precisely like that of the moraines of the existing glaciers of the Alps, and of the similar masses of drift scattered over Sweden—a confused mixture of angular, slightly-worn blocks of all sizes, bedded in clayey gravel of a brown colour. Such objects are rare in Scotland; but here is undoubtedly one, though we cannot pretend to tell from what quarter it has come. The thing most nearly resembling it in general appearance, which we have ever seen, is an undoubted ancient moraine at a place called Mosshuus, in the Valley of the Laug, in Norway.

One reflection arises at the conclusion of this trivial investigation, and it is this—If so much doubt and obscurity have already settled on circumstances which took place scarcely beyond the recollection of living people, can we wonder at that which invests the events of a more remote epoch? If editors in our enlightened time have contrived so soon to give the history of Burns a mythical character, what safety have we in trusting to such ancient narrations as those of Plutarch or Thucydides? On the other hand, where even such a biography as that of Burns is placed by sound and carefully-examined evidence upon an irrefragable basis, a service is rendered to the public beyond the merits of any immediate question that may be under discussion, in the encouragement which it gives to historical inquirers of all grades, to rest satisfied with nothing on vague assertion, but to sift everything to the bottom.

FOOTNOTES:[1]Life and Works of Robert Burns, edited by Robert Chambers. 4 vols. Edinburgh: W. & R. Chambers.

[1]Life and Works of Robert Burns, edited by Robert Chambers. 4 vols. Edinburgh: W. & R. Chambers.

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Plantagenet.The truth appearssonaked on my side,That any purblind eye may find it out.Somerset.And on my side it is so well apparelled,So clear, so shining, and so evident,That it will glimmer through a blind man's eye.First Part of Henry VI.

Plantagenet.The truth appearssonaked on my side,That any purblind eye may find it out.

Somerset.And on my side it is so well apparelled,So clear, so shining, and so evident,That it will glimmer through a blind man's eye.

First Part of Henry VI.

Having made up our mind upon a question, probably by a delightfully curt process, how pleasant and natural it is to laugh sublimely at all dissentients! Poor creatures, those nonconformists are almost to be pardoned, so much does their impenetrable dulness amuse us! How theycanhave scrambled to a conclusion opposite to ours, is a problem so absurd that it tickles us amazingly.

Yet the formation of opinions is vastly dependent upon circumstances. Whang-shing is born in the Celestial Empire; and the chances are that the fellow will go the length of pinning his faith to Confucius. Yonder squalid urchin, turning out of Saffron Hill or some other sweet-scented purlieus, has been cradled on the ragged lap of professional mendicancy; and there is a strong probability that he will come to amisunderstanding with the police one of these fine days. The mild-eyed priest who just passed you, was born and educated within the states of the church; and somehow or other he firmly believes in the Romanism you so hotly repudiate. The sallow-faced gentleman crossing the road, and exhibiting so wobegone an aspect, has always had a bad liver; and you will never persuade him to look on the bright side of life. While this bustling, vivacious personage, who approaches us with such a springy step, and rapid merry glance, has never known a day's illness—is indebted to hearsay for his belief in nerves—and is ready to challenge Europe to beat him at a hearty guffaw—heis perplexed by the shadow of a long face, marvels with all his might at a heavy eye, and cannot unriddle the philosophy of a bent brow. When shall we learn that the result of looking depends on the state of the eye—that the vision is modified by the position of the seer—that he who stands on one side, sees one side only? Says Wordsworth—

We safely may affirm that human lifeIs either fair or tempting, a soft scene,Grateful to sight, refreshing to the soul,Or a forbidden tract of cheerless view,Even as the same is looked at, or approached.

And the pastor of theExcursion, who is the spokesman, illustrates his doctrine by shewing that the church-yard among the mountains, in which he and his companions are standing, if approached from the sullen north, when 'in changeful April, fields are white with new-fallen snow,' and ere the sun has gained his noontide height, will appear an 'unillumined, blank, and dreary plain, with more than wintry cheerlessness and gloom saddening the heart;' whereas, if it be regarded from the quarter whence the lord of light dispenses his beams, 'thenwill a vernal prospect greet your eye'—

All fresh and beautiful, and green and bright,Hopeful and cheerful—vanished is the pallThat overspread and chilled the sacred turf,Vanished or hidden; and the whole domain,To some, too lightly minded, might appearA meadow carpet for the dancing hours.

The same principle of mental optics is of universal application. We cannot ignore it without fatal results when studying history, science, art, human nature, or any conceivable object of inquiry. Thus, in forming our opinion of the actions of others, there is no more mischievous absurdity, it has been remarked, than to judge them from the outside as they look to us, instead of from the inside as they look to the actors; nothing more irrational than to criticise deeds as though the doers of them had the same hopes, fears, desires, and restraints with ourselves. 'We cannot understand another's character except by abandoning our own identity, and realising to ourselves his frame of mind, his want of knowledge, his hardships, temptations, and discouragements.' If we turn to history, we are reminded of Thomas Moore's lines—

By Tory Hume's seductive page beguiled,We fancy Charles was just, and Stratford mild;And Fox himself, with party pencil drawsMonmouth a hero 'for the good old cause!'Then, rights are wrongs, and victories are defeats,As French or English pride the tale repeats.

Thus, too, Macaulay remarks, that for many years every Whig historian was anxious to prove that the old English government was all but republican—every Tory, to prove it all but despotic. 'With such feelings, both parties looked into the chronology of the middle ages. Both readily found what they sought, and obstinately refused to see anything but what they sought.' Accordingly, to see only one-half of the evidence, you would conclude that the Plantagenets were as absolute as the sultans of Turkey; to see only the other half, you would conclude that they had as little real power as the Doges of Venice: and both conclusions would be equally remote from the truth.

Carlyle justly affirms, that if that man is a benefactor to the world who causes two ears of corn to grow where only one grew before, much more is he a benefactor who causes two truths to grow up together in harmony and mutual confirmation, where before only one stood solitary, and, on that side at least, intolerant and hostile. Every genius rides a winged horse; but all are apt to ride too fast. Plotinus, says Emerson, 'believes only in philosophers; Fénélon, in saints; Pindar and Byron, in poets. Read the haughty language in which Plato and the Platonists speak of all men who are not devoted to their own shining abstractions.' If genius is liable to such one-sidedness, the greater the need of educational correctives to common-place minds. Hence the overpursuit of any one subject may be hurtful, unless duly balanced by countervailing forces. As the author ofFriends in Councilsays, a human being, like a tree, if it is to attain to perfect symmetry, must have light and air given to it from all quarters. This may be done without making men superficial—without sanctioning the dissipation of mere desultory reading. One or two great branches of science may be systematically prosecuted, and others used in a more supplementary and illustrative form. 'A number of one-sided men,' observes the same writer, 'may make a great nation, though I much incline to doubt that; but such a nation will not contain a number of great men.' With the advance of intelligence, advances a catholicism of literature, of taste, of humanity at large. Uncultured intellect, 'cabined, cribbed, confined,' is ill at ease among the riches of variety in literary lore; it is satisfied with the little, because, as Menzel says, it knows not the great; it is content with one-sidedness, because it sees not the other sides. If criticalesprit de corpshas its advantages, it has its penalties also; potent within its self-imposed bounds, it is impotent outside of them. Longfellow reminds his brethren of the lyre, that whatever is best in the great poets of all countries, is not what is national in them, but what is universal: their roots are in their native soil, but their branches wave in the unpatriotic air, that speaks the same language to all men, and their leaves shine with the illimitable light that pervades all lands. 'Let us throw all the windows open; let us admit the light and air on all sides; that we may look towards the four corners of the heavens, and not always in the same direction.'

Monomania is sometimes simply the exaggerated regard to one side of many-sided truth. It is not absolute, but only relative delusion. It is in its degree true; but by affecting to be the whole truth, it becomes untrue. Philosophic reflection shews, that if a man fasten his attention on a single aspect of truth, and apply himself to that alone for a long time, 'the truth becomes distorted, and not itself, but falsehood;' and may be compared to the air, which is our natural element, and the breath of our nostrils; 'but if a stream of the same be directed on the body for a time, it causes cold, fever, and even death.' 'How wearisome,' exclaims Emerson, 'the grammarian, the phrenologist, the political or religious fanatic, or, indeed, any possessed mortal, whose balance is lost by the exaggeration of a single topic! It isincipient insanity.' The bore of society is constituted by his one-sidedness. His ear is deficient in the sense of harmony, and he deafens and disgusts you by harping on one string. The retired nabob holds you by the button, to hear his wearisome diatribes on Indian economics; the half-pay officer is too fluent on his worn-out recollections of the Peninsular War, and becomes savage if you broach a new theme, or move to adjourn the debate; the university pedant distracts you with his theories onphilology and scansion—with his amended translation of a hexameter in Persius, and his new reading of a line in Theocritus; the bagman is all for 'the shop;' the policeman is redolent of the 'lock-up house 'and 'your wertchup;' the tailor is profoundly knowing on the 'sweating system; 'the son of Crispin vows and protests there's 'nothing like leather.' All theseminussigns have a tendency to cancel each other: and thus the equation of life is worked out. Society has been said to have at all times the same want—namely, of one sane man, with adequate powers of expression to hold up each object of monomania in its right relations. 'The ambitious and mercenary bring their last new Mumbo-Jumbo—whether tariff, railway, mesmerism, or California—and by detaching the object from its relations, easily succeed in making it seen in a glare, and a multitude go mad about it; and they are not to be reproved or cured by the opposite multitude, who are kept from this particular insanity by an equal frenzy on another crotchet. But let one man have the comprehensive eye that can replace this isolated prodigy in its right neighbourhood and bearings, and the illusion vanishes—the returning reason of the community thanks the reason of the monitor.' There is perhaps nothing which more urgently calls for such a controlling and overseeing mind, to curb eccentric excesses, and to restore equilibrium of action, than philanthropy itself. In the enthusiasm of its impulses, it thinks it can afford to sneer at political economy, and that it is right to wander at its own sweet will, benevolently defying the remonstrances of all who have a method to propound, a science to explain, a system to uphold. Though the heart be large, yet the mind—as Nathaniel Hawthorne somewhere observes—is often of such moderate dimensions, as to be exclusively filled up with one idea; and thus, when a good man has long devoted himself to a particular kind of beneficence, to one species of reform, he is apt to become narrowed into the limits of the path wherein he treads, and to fancy that there is no other good to be done on earth but that selfsame good to which he has put his hand, and in the very mode that best suits his own conceptions. 'All else is worthless; his scheme must be wrought out by the united strength of the whole world's stock of love, or the world is no longer worthy of a position in the universe. Moreover, powerful truth, being the rich grape-juice expressed from the vineyard of the ages, has an intoxicating quality when imbibed by any but a powerful intellect, and often, as it were, impels the quaffer to quarrel in his cups.' Even a saint with one idea may be a plague to his neighbourhood; and, by being canonised, may retard, not further, the progress of his church.

Let us own, however, that one-idea'd people are often amusing as well as mischievous—or rather, when not mischievous. The rapt devotion they pay to theiridola specûsoscillates between the sublime and the ridiculous. We have all seen such people, and alternately admired and laughed at them. We have all witnessed or read pleasant illustrations of their doings. With one such illustration we conclude this discursive fragment. It is related by the witty author ofA Defence of Ignorance, who introduces it in the course of an imaginary dialogue on one-sided university training, in which one of the speakers (at dessert) says to his companion: 'If you reach after that pear, without considering what stands against your elbows, you may empty a decanter over me. He who desires thoroughly to know one subject, should be possessed of so much intellectual geography as will enable him to see its true position in the universe of thought.' The allusion to upsetting a decanter reminds the other interlocutor of a story, which he proceeds to tell. A gentleman who carved a goose was inexpert; and thinking only of the stubborn joints that would not be unhinged, he totally forgot the gravy. Presently, the goose slipped off the dish, and escaped into his neighbour's lap. Now, to have thrown a hot goose on a lady's lap would disconcert most people, but the gentleman in question wasnotdisconcerted. Turning round, with a bland smile, he said: 'I'll trouble you for that goose.' Here we have a sublime example of a man with one idea. This gentleman's idea was the goose; and in the absorbing interest attached to his undertaking, that he was to carve the goose, not altogether knowing how, he had shut out extraneous objects. Suddenly the goose was gone, but his eye followed it, his mind was wrapt up in his struggle with it; what did he know of that lady? 'I'll trouble you for that goose,' expressed the perfect abstraction of a mind bent on developing its one idea.

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The popular fame of Mr Kirby rests upon theIntroduction to Entomology, a work (partly written by him) full of interesting facts respecting the economy of the insect world. Amongst the scientific, his reputation depends on a variety of elaborate papers which he wrote for learned societies on subjects connected with natural history. For sixty years previous to the conclusion of his long life in 1850, he had devoted the leisure of a parsonage to that delightful study, and being a diligent and accurate observer, and an elegant and entertaining writer, he had attained the highest rank amongst the British naturalists of his day. It appears, from a memoir just published,[2]that Mr Kirby was born in 1759, and settled in 1782 in the cure of Barham, near Ipswich, where he was ultimately rector, and which he only left for his last long-home sixty-eight years thereafter. In an age of sluggish theology, he was an earnest minister and zealous controversialist, all the time that he was cultivating a taste for natural objects. This is equally unexpected and creditable. And yet it does not appear that his personal conduct was characterised by anything like rigour, for, as an example, we find, from the journal of an entomological excursion in 1797, that it was commenced on a Sunday afternoon, and involved one other Sunday of constant travelling. A reference of the dates to an almanac enables us to establish this fact, so unlike the spirit of a zealous man in our times.

Of the sister sciences of nature, botany first attracted Mr Kirby's regards. 'This he pursued in no hasty or superficial manner, but with the greatest perseverance and research. It was not enough for him to know a plant by sight, and to ascertain its proper name, but he compared the minutest parts of inflorescence and fructification; he sought for the most trifling differences in those nearly allied, and studied with a keen but generous criticism the various theories of writers on the science, from the earliest age to the time of the immortal Linnè. Of every plant he met with, even to the daisy and primrose, the whole physiological structure was thoroughly investigated; he discovered, or rather observed, what it was which enabled some plants to endure great changes of temperature, while others perished—the formation which enabled some to live in water, while others flourished in the most dry and arid sands; he carefully marked the causes which combined to clothe even rocks with verdure, in consequence of the wonderful structure of the plants inhabiting them, enabling them to live as it were by the suction of their numerous mouths, rather than by nourishment transmitted by a root in contact with that which would refuse to yield the ordinary food of plants. And as he thus marked all these peculiar adaptations of plants totheir respective situations, his mind was by a constant train of thought directed from the beauty and wondrous mechanism of the creature, to contemplate the supreme and ineffable glory of the Creator.'

With a mind so predisposed and so fitted for the study of entomology, a casual occurrence of a trivial nature was sufficient to awaken and give it direction. 'Observing accidentally, one morning, a very beautiful golden bug creeping on the sill of my window, I took it up to examine it, and finding that its wings were of a more yellow hue than was common to my observation of these insects before, I was anxious carefully to examine any other of its peculiarities; and finding that it had twenty-two beautiful clear black spots upon its back, my captured animal was imprisoned in a bottle of gin, for the purpose, as I supposed, of killing him. On the following morning, anxious to pursue my observation, I took it again from the gin, and laid it on the window-sill to dry, thinking it dead; but the warmth of the sun very soon revived it: and hence commenced my further pursuit of this branch of natural history.'

A Dr Gwyn of Ipswich was his preceptor in this study. 'Though now in his seventy-fifth year, so much was the good old doctor interested in the pursuit of his friend, that he would frequently walk over to Barham, a distance of five miles, to see what had been the success of recent perambulations. The parsonage-house was then approached by a narrow wicket, with posts higher than the gate, and often, while working in his garden, or sitting in his parlour, Mr Kirby would look up and see, to his great delight, the shovel hat of his facetious friend adorning one post, and the cumbrous wig and appertaining pig-tail ornamenting the other. And soon the kind old man would walk in with his bald head, as he used to say, cool and ready for the investigation. These visits were always hailed with pleasure, the delights of which were still fresh in the memory of Mr Kirby, and would call forth expressions of affectionate gratitude, even when nearly half a century had elapsed, after his friend and Mæcenas, as he loved to call him, had gone to his rest.'

There seems no room to doubt, that his studies tended not merely to the happiness of Mr Kirby's life, but to its duration. It is at the same time abundantly evident, that much hard work was undergone. He carried on a most laborious correspondence with other naturalists, often extending a letter to the dimensions of a pamphlet: this altogether over and above his practical researches and his published writings. He took good-humoured views of most things, and was not easily put out of temper. A slight dash of absence of mind increased that quaintness of character so often found in zealous students. On an entomological excursion with two friends, Mr Marsham and Mr Macleay, it happened on their arriving at an old-fashioned wayside inn, that 'there was only one large room for them, with three beds in it. The arrangement having been made for the night, according to the custom of the time, three nightcaps were laid upon the dressing-table. Mr Kirby retired before his companions, and was soon sound asleep. Perceiving no caps ready for them, his friends inquired for what they considered the due appurtenances of the pillow: they were assured by the hostess that three nightcaps were laid upon the table, but they stoutly averred they had not seen them; the landlady no less stoutly maintaining her side of the question. What actually passed in her own mind did not transpire, but she appealed to the first gentleman as being the only one who could throw light upon the subject; when, lo and behold! as soon as his head appeared, in answer to the hasty summons, the three nightcaps appeared at the same time upon it, one being dragged over the other, much to the amusement not only of those present, but also of those who long after heard the tale.'

Another example of the pleasantries that sometimes enliven the path of the naturalist. It is related by Mr Spence, and refers to the time when that gentleman was engaged with Mr Kirby in preparing the work which has for ever combined their names. 'Mr (now Sir William J.) Hooker was at that time staying at Barham, and being desirous to have pointed out to him, and to gather with his own hands, a rare species ofMarchantia?from its habitat, first discovered by Mr Kirby, near Nayland, some miles distant, it was agreed we three should walk thither, entomologising by the way, and after dinner proceed to the hedge-bank where it grew. Entering the head inn-yard on foot, with dusty shoes, and without other baggage than our insect-nets in our hands, we met with but a cool reception, which, however, visibly warmed as soon as we had desired to be shewn into the best dining-room, and had ordered a good dinner and wine. We intended to walk back in the evening, but as the bank where theMarchantia?grew was a mile or two out of the direct road, and it came on rain, we ordered out a postchaise, merely saying we wanted to drive a short way on a road which Mr Kirby indicated to the postilion.

'When we arrived at the gate of the field where the bank was, the rain had become very heavy; so, calling to the postilion to stop and open the door, we scampered out of the chaise, all laughing, and hastily telling him to wait there, without other explanation we climbed over the gate, and not to be long in the rain, set off running as fast as we could along the field-side of the hedge, to the bank we were looking for. We saw amazement in the face of our postilion at what possible motive could have made three guests of his master clamber pell-mell over a gate into a field that led nowhere, in the midst of a heavy shower of rain, and then run away as if pursued; and it was the expression in his countenance which caused our mirth, which was increased to peals of merriment when we saw that, instead of waiting for us at the gate, as we had directed, he mounted his horses with all speed, and pushed on in a gallop along the road on the other side of the hedge, evidently to circumvent our nefarious plan (as he conceived) of bilking his master both of our dinners and the chaise-hire. When the cessation of our uncontrollable mirth had allowed us to gather specimens of our plant, perceiving through the hedge whereabouts we stopped, he also halted to watch our motions, and when he saw us run back, he obeyed our orders to return to the gate—where we got into the chaise, still in a roar of laughter at the whole affair, and at his awkward attempt to explain away his not having waited for us there, as we had directed, and evident high satisfaction at bringing back in triumph to our inn the three cheats whose intended plans he had so cleverly frustrated, as he no doubt told his master; to whom, being too much amused with the adventure, we did not make any explanation, but left it to form one of the traditions of the inn.'

When a man excels in anything, it must always be of some consequence to know what were his habits, and what external means he employed, in connection with his particular gift. Mr Spence says: 'There were two circumstances in Mr Kirby's study of insects, by which I was always forcibly struck on my visits to him at Barham. The first was the little parade of apparatus with which his extensive and valuable acquisitions were made. If going to any distance, he would put into his pocket a forceps-net and small water-net, with which to catch bees, flies, and aquatic insects; but, in general, I do not remember to have seen him use a net of any other description. His numerous captures of rare and new Coleoptera were mostly made by carefully searching for them in their haunts, from which—if trees, shrubs, or long grass, &c.—he would beat them with his walking-stick into a newspaper; and, collected in this way, he would bring home in a few small phials in his waistcoat pockets, and in amoderate-sized collecting-box, after an afternoon's excursion, a booty often much richer than his companions had secured with their more elaborate apparatus. The second circumstance in Mr Kirby's study of insects, to which I allude, was the deliberate and careful way in which he investigated the nomenclature of his species. Every author likely to have described them was consulted, their descriptions duly estimated; and it was only after thus coming to the decision that the insect before him had not been previously described, that he placed it in his cabinet under a new name. It was owing to this cautious mode of proceeding—which young entomologists would do well to follow—that he fell into so few errors, and rendered such solid service to the science; and a not less careful consideration was always exercised by him in the forming of new genera, and in his published descriptions of new species, as his admirable papers in theLinnæan Transactionsamply testify.'

Considering how well Mr Kirby performed his professional duties, how much he did to advance his favourite science, and how greatly he contributed to the happiness of society within the sphere of his personal influence, his may truly be said to have been awell-spent life. On this account, Mr Freeman's memoir may be recommended to the notice of many who are not as yet conscious of the charms of entomology.

FOOTNOTES:[2]Life of the Rev. William Kirby, M.A.By John Freeman. 8vo, pp. 506. London: Longman & Co. 1852.

[2]Life of the Rev. William Kirby, M.A.By John Freeman. 8vo, pp. 506. London: Longman & Co. 1852.

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The phrase, 'Catching a Tartar,' points to a peculiarity in Tartar life, which, however correct historically, is not in keeping with the actual current state of the Mongol character. It implies something impetuous, stern, unyielding, relentless, and cruel; whereas the modern life of the children of the desert exhibits much that is simple, confiding, generous, and even chivalric. It is nothing to our discredit that we should have been so long in discovering these features in the great nomadic class of the day, because European barbarians are absolutely prohibited from visiting the desert places which are the scenes of their wanderings; and but for the enterprise of two Roman Catholic missionaries from France, we should probably have remained in ignorance for a much longer period. These gentlemen, however, have thrown a light on this subject, which is too remarkable to be passed over without notice. Messrs Gabet and Huc composed their work in 1846, but it has only recently been published in this country,[3]and its perusal cannot fail to modify many of our preconceived notions regarding Tartar life.

It will, for example, be admitted that, according to the hitherto popular acceptation of the character, Tartars were not exactly the sort of persons on whom practical jokes might be perpetrated with impunity. Read, however, the following anecdote:—While our two travellers were one day in their tents, two Tartar horsemen dashed up to the entrance, and threw themselves on the ground. 'Men of prayer,' said they with voices full of emotion, 'we come to ask you to draw our horoscope. We have this day had two horses stolen from us. We cannot find the robbers, and we come to you men of learning, to tell us where we shall find our property.'

'Brothers,' answered the missionaries, 'we are not lamas of Buddha, and do not believe in horoscopes. For a man to say that he can discover stolen goods by such means, is falsehood and deception.'

The horsemen entreated, but the priests were inflexible, and the disappointed Tartars mounted their steeds, and galloped off. It so happened that Samdadchiemba, the guide of the missionaries—a Christianised Oriental, but withal a very merry fellow—was present during this interview, but he sat drinking his tea without uttering a word. All on a sudden he knitted his brows, rose, and came to the door. The horsemen were at some distance; but thedchiahour, by an exertion of his strong lungs, induced them to turn round in their saddles. He motioned to them, and they, thinking that the horoscope was to be given, galloped once more to the tent. 'My Mongol brothers,' said Samdadchiemba, 'in future be more careful: watch your herds well, and you won't be robbed. Retain these words of mine in your memory: they are worth all the horoscopes in the world.'

Samdad—the reader will perhaps thank us for the abbreviation—gravely returned to the tent; and the Tartars did not dismount and whip him, as two horsemen of any other nation under the sun would have done, but quietly resumed their journey. It appeared that Samdad had once acted as diviner on a similar occasion. The missing valuable was a bull, and the sage having called for eleven stones, counted, arranged and rearranged them with great gravity, and then appeared to meditate. 'If you would find your bull, go seek him in the north,' said the magician; and without querulously inquiring, like Shakspeare's Richard, what Taurus did in that region, the Mongols pursued a northern course, and by mere chance actually discovered the animal. Samdad was entertained for a week, and took his departure laden with butter and tea. He hinted his regret that 'his attachment to Mother Church' prevented him from playing the soothsayer to the two horsemen.

A peculiarity in Tartar manners, regarding stolen horses when abstracted near caravans, is likely to prove of more service than casting horoscopes. Some time after the occurrence mentioned, the missionaries lost a horse and mule. 'We each mounted a camel, and made a circuit in search of the animals. Our search being futile, we resolved to proceed to the Mongol encampment, and inform them that our loss had taken place near their habitation.By a law among the Tartars, when animals are lost from a caravan, the persons occupying the nearest encampment are bound either to find them or replace them.... This it is which has contributed to render the Mongols so skilful in tracking. A mere glance at the slight traces left by an animal on the grass, suffices to inform the Mongol pursuer how long it is since it passed, and whether or not it bore a rider; and the track once found, they follow it throughout all its meanderings, however complicated.

'We had no sooner explained our loss to the Mongol chief, than he said to us cheerfully: "Sirs Lamas, do not permit sorrow to invade your hearts. Your animals cannot be lost; in these plains there are neither robbers nor associates of robbers. I will send in quest of your horses. If we do not find them, you may select what others you please in their place from our herd. We would have you leave this place as happy as you came to it."' Eight horses darted off in pursuit; the missionaries were invited to take tea in the interim, and in two hours the strayed cattle were recovered. We should like to know in what other country travellers would be so treated?

Regal personages in these regions observe the characteristic simple manners of the country. Our pilgrims were pursuing their solitary way, when the tramping of many horses and the sound of many voices disturbed the silence of the desert. A large caravan belonging to the queen of Mourguevan overtook them, and a mandarin addressed them.

'Sirs, where is your country?'

'We come from the west.'

'Through what districts have your beneficial shadows passed?'

'We have come from Tolon Noor.'

'Has peace accompanied your progress?'

'Hitherto we have journeyed in all tranquillity. And you—are you at peace, and what is your country?'

'We are Khalkhas of the kingdom of Mourguevan.'

After some other Oriental queries and answers, her majesty comes up. The cavalcade halted, and the camels formed into a semicircle, the centre being occupied by a close four-wheeled carriage. Two mandarins, 'decorated with the blue button,' opened the door, and handed out the queen, who was attired in a long silk robe.

'Sirs Lamas,' said she, raising her hands, 'is this place auspicious for an encampment?'

'Royal pilgrim of Mourguevan,' said we, 'you may light your fires here in all security. For ourselves, we must proceed on our way, for the sun was already high when we folded our tent.'

The Tartars are divided into two grand classes—lamas and laymen. The former act as priests, lawyers, physicians, painters, decorators, &c., and in fact monopolise every learned and liberal art and profession. Of course, they are held in high repute; and our travellers having, like Joseph Wolff, adopted sacerdotal costume, they were everywhere received with the honours and respect awarded to the indigenous clergy. It will duly appear, from subsequent illustrations, that mere ecclesiasticism did not secure the hospitality and kindness which they experienced at all hands; but even after making allowance for the national devotion to the cloth, the attentions shewed by the Mongols are often marked by a delicate sense of the hospitable. On one occasion, M. Huc and his companions encountered an unusual storm of rain and wind. After travelling several weary miles, Samdad contrived to erect the tent in a place that, for the locality, was tolerable, but no more. 'My spiritual fathers,' observed the guide, 'I told you we should not die to-day of thirst, but I am not at all sure that we don't run some risk of dying of hunger.' In point of fact, there seemed no possibility of making a fire. There was not a tree, not a shrub, not a root to be seen. As to argols, the rain had long since reduced that combustible of the desert to a liquid pulp. The pilgrims were about to partake of the primitive fare of meal steeped in cold water—a cheerless beverage to three men drenched to the skin—when at the critical juncture up came two Tartars.

'Sirs Lamas, this day the heavens have fallen. You doubtless have been unable to make a fire.'

'Alas! how should we make a fire? we have no argols.'

'Men are all brothers, and belong to each other; but laymen should honour and serve the holy ones: therefore it is that we have come to make a fire for you.'

The fire soon blazed and crackled, and a hot repast speedily rejoiced the jaded frames of the two priests and the imp Samdad.

The domiciliary hospitalities of the Tartars are frank and artless, forming a marked contrast to the formal reception of strangers among the Chinese. 'On entering, you give the word of peace,amorormendon, to the company generally. You then seat yourself on the right of the head of the family, whom you find squatting on the floor opposite the entrance. Next, everybody takes from a purse, suspended at his girdle, a little snuff-bottle, and mutual pinches accompany such phrases as these: "Is the pasturage with you rich and abundant?" "Are your herds in fine condition?" "Did you travel in peace?" "Does tranquillity prevail?" The mistress then silently holds out her hand to the visitor. He as silently takes from his breast-pocket a small wooden bowl, the indispensablevade mecumof all Tartars, and presents it to the hostess, who fills it with tea and milk, and returns it.' In higher families, a table is spread with butter, oatmeal, millet, cheese, all in small boxes of polished wood; and these luxuries are all mixed in the everlasting tea. Amongst the uppermost aristocratic classes, fermented milk is proffered; but Europeans would perhaps regard this liquor as more honoured by being set aside than indulged in.

We now proceed to exhibit some traits of Tartar character, as developed in their intercourse with their Asiatic brethren. As usual, a horseman overtakes or meets the travellers; and after the customary salutations, the missionaries inquired why he and his brethren did not cultivate corn, instead of allowing every field to run to grass.

'We Mongols,' replied this stranger, 'are formed for living in tents, and pasturing cattle. So long as we kept to that in the kingdom of Gechekten, we were rich and happy. Now, ever since the Mongols have set themselves to cultivating the land, and building houses, they have become poor. TheKitats(Chinese) have taken possession of the country: flocks, herds, lands, houses—all have passed into their hands. There remain to us only a few prairies, on which still live under their tents such of the Mongols as have not been forced by utter destitution to emigrate to other lands.'

'But if the Chinese are so baneful to you, why did you allow them to penetrate into your country?'

'We took pity on these wicked Kitats, who came to us weeping, to solicit our charity. We allowed them, through pure compassion, to cultivate a few patches of land. The Mongols insensibly followed their example, and abandoned the nomadic life. They drank the wine of the Kitats, and smoked their tobacco on credit; they bought their manufactures on credit, at double the real value. When the day of payment came, there was no money ready, and the Mongols had to yield to the violence of their creditors houses, lands, flocks, everything.'

'But could you not seek justice from the tribunals?'

'Justice from the tribunals! That is out of the question. The Kitats are skilful to talk and to lie. It is impossible for a Mongol to gain a suit against a Kitat. Sirs Lamas, the kingdom of Gechekten is undone!'

After-experience amply corroborated the truth of these statements. 'The commercial intercourse between the Tartars and the Chinese is revoltingly iniquitous on the part of the latter. So soon as the Mongols arrive in a trading town, they are snapped up by some Chinese, who carry them off, as it were, by main force to their houses, give them tea for themselves, and forage for their horses, and cajole them in every conceivable way. The Mongols take all they hear to be perfectly genuine, and congratulate themselves—conscious, as they are, of their inaptitude for business—upon their good-fortune in thus meeting with brothersAhaton, as they say, in whom they can place full confidence, and who will undertake to manage their whole business for them. A good dinner, provided in the back-shop, completes the illusion—and when once the Chinese has established his hold, he employs all the resources of a skilful and utterly unprincipled knavery. He keeps his victim in his house, eating, drinking, and smoking one day after another, until his subordinates have sold all the poor man's cattle, or whatever else he has to sell, and bought for him in return the commodities he requires, at prices double and treble the market value. But so plausible is the Chinese, and so simple is the Tartar, that the latter invariably departs with the most entire confidence in the immense philanthropy of the former, and with a promise to return, when he has other goods to sell, to the establishment where he has been treated so fraternally.'

The missionaries were themselves mistaken for Tartars when they visited the 'Blue Town,' and every kind of imposition was attempted to be practisedon them. The hotel scouts assailed them at their first entry, and almost compelled them, by physical force, to become their guests; shopkeepers cozened on all hands; and even bankers condescended to cheat. Messrs Gabet and Huc wished to exchange silver for Chinese coin current. The Tartars can weigh, but cannot calculate, and accordingly the bank-teller of Blue Town, after gravely consulting hissouan-pan(exchange-table), announced the value to be about a thousandsapeksless than it should have been. The missionaries remonstrated, and a colleague was called in to check the sum, but he, with due gravity, declared that the first was right. A bystander interfered, and declared in favour of the strangers. 'Sirs Lamas,' said the banker, 'your mathematics are better than mine.' 'Oh, not at all,' replied we, with a profound bow; 'your souan-pan is excellent; but who ever heard of a calculator always exempt from error?' These phrases were, it seems, rigorously required under the circumstances by Chinese politeness. Whenever any person in China is compromised by any awkward incident, those present always carefully refrain from any observation which may make him blush, or, as the Chinese call it, take away his face. A further proof of Chinese cupidity was afforded by the admission of a gentleman, whom we may take the liberty of denominating an Oriental bagman. This worthy arrived at an inn after our travellers had secured all the accommodation.

'Peace and happiness unto you, Sirs Lamas; do you need the whole of your room, or can you accommodate me?'

'Why not? We are all brothers, and should serve each other.'

'Words of excellence! You are Tartars, I am Chinese; yet comprehending the claims of hospitality, you act upon the truth that all men are brothers.'

'Whither are you bound? Are you going to buy up salt or catsup for some Chinese company?'

'No; I represent a great commercial house at Peking, and I am collecting some debts from the Tartars.... You, like myself, are Tartar-eaters—you eat them by prayers, I by commerce. And why not? The Mongols are poor simpletons, and we may as well get their money as anybody else.... Oh, we devour them; we pick them clean! Whatever they see, when they come into our towns, they want; and when we know who they are, and where we can find them, we let them have goods upon credit of course at a considerable advance upon the price, and upon interest at 30 and 40 per cent., which is quite right and necessary. In China, the emperor's laws do not allow this; it is only done with the Tartars. Well, they don't pay the money, and the interest goes on until there is a good sum owing, worth the coming for. When we come for it, we take all the cattle and sheep and horses we can get hold of for the interest, and leave the capital debt and future interest to be paid next time, and so it goes on from one generation to another. Oh, a Tartar debt is a gold-mine!'

The yearly settlement of accounts amongst the Chinese furnishes another curious chapter in their commercial life. Bills are made up to the last few days of the year, 'and every Chinese being at once debtor and creditor, every Chinese is hunting his debtors and hunted by his creditors. He who returns from his neighbour's house, which he has been throwing into utter confusion by his clamorous demands for what the neighbour owes him, finds his own house turned inside out by an uproarious creditor; and so the thing goes round. The whole town is a scene of vociferation, disputation, and fighting. On the last day of the year, disorder attains its height; people rush in all directions with anything they can scratch together to raise money upon at the broker's or pawnbroker's—the shops of which tradesmen are absolutely besieged throughout the day with profferers of clothes, bedding, furniture, cooking utensils, and movables of every description. Those who have already cleared their houses in this way, and yet have not satisfied the demands upon them, post off to their relations and friends, to borrow something or other, which they vow shall be returned immediately, but which immediately takes its way to thetang-ponor pawnbroker's. This species of anarchy continues till midnight, then calm resumes its sway. No one, after the twelfth hour has struck, can claim a debt, or even make the slightest allusion to it. You now only hear the words of peace and good-will; everybody fraternises with everybody. Those who were just before on the point of twisting their neighbour's neck, now twine their friendly arms about it.'

Tartar warriors and Tartar robbers are also peculiar of their kind. The warrior presents a curious combination of the national simplicity with the spirit of the ancient Gascon. Two of those military gentlemen gave a singular account of the war with theRebels of the South, as the English are designated. They belonged to the Eight Banners, or army of reserve—and stated, that when at war the grand-master (the emperor of China) first sent the Kitats against the enemy; next the banners of the Solon country are set in motion; and if they fail, then 'we (the Tchakars) take the field, and the mere sound of our march suffices to reduce the rebels to subjection!' In the English war, the first two classes availed not, and then came the turn of the sacred order. 'The Kitats told us everywhere that we were marching upon certain and unavailing death. "What can you do against sea-monsters? They live in the water like fish: when you least expect them, they appear on the surface, and hurl the fire-bombs at you; while the instant your bow is bent to shoot them, down they dive like frogs."' The third class was not to be intimidated; the lamas had opened theBook of Celestial Secrets, and predicted victory; and on they marched, till met with the intelligence that the rebels, hearing of the approach of this invincible legion, had sued for and obtained peace!

The robbers of this extraordinary territory are also entitled to claim credit for their share of eccentricity. 'They are extremely polite; they do not rudely clap a pistol to your ear, and bawl at you: "Your money or your life!" No; they mildly advance with a courteous salutation: "Venerable elder brother, I am on foot; pray lend me your horse. I've got no money; be good enough to lend me your purse. It's quite cold to-day; oblige me with the loan of your coat." If the venerable elder brother charitably complies, the matter ends with: "Thanks, brother!" but otherwise, the request is forthwith emphasised with the arguments of a cudgel; and if these do not convince, recourse is had to the sabre.'

As a matter of course, Chinese thieves belong in contrast to the species of which the 'Artful Dodger' may be regarded as the type. Themodus operandiof Eastern appropriators is this: 'Two of them, associated together for the purpose, hawk about various articles of merchandise—boots, skin-coats, bricks of tea, and what not. They offer these for sale to travellers. While one of them engages the attention of the destined victim by displaying his goods and bargaining, the other ferrets about, and pockets whatever he can lay his hands on. These rascals have inconceivable skill in counting your sapeks for you, in such a way as to finger fifty or one hundred of them without your having the slightest notion as to what is going on. One day, two of these little thieves came to offer for our purchase a pair of leathern boots. Excellent boots, said they—boots such as we would not find in any shop in the whole town; boots that would keep out the rain for days; and as to cheapness, perfectly unexampled. If we missed this opportunity, we should never have such another. Only just before they hadbeen offered 1200 sapeks for them! As we did not want boots, we replied that we could not have them at any price. Thereupon the acting merchant assumed a lofty tone of generosity. We were foreigners, we should have them for 1000 sapeks, 900, 800, 700. "Well," said we, "we certainly don't want any boots just now; yet doubtless, as you say, these are very cheap, and it will be worth while to buy them as a reserve." The bargain was accordingly concluded; we took our purse and counted out 700 sapeks to the merchant, who counted them over himself, under our very eyes, pronounced the amount correct, and once more laid the coin before us. He then called out to his companion, who was poking about in the court-yard: "Here, I have sold these capital boots for 700 sapeks." "Nonsense," cried the other; "700 sapeks! I wont hear of such a thing!" "Very well," said we; "come, take your boots, and be off with you!" He was off, and so quickly, that we thought it expedient to count our sapeks once more: there were 150 of them gone; and that was not all. While one of these rascals had been pocketing our money under our very nose, the other had bagged two great iron pins that we had driven into the court-yard for the purpose of our camels. Therefore, we took a resolution, better late than never, to admit in future no merchant whatever into our room.'

We cannot sufficiently regret, that two travellers who have furnished us with such interesting accounts of territories comparatively so little unexplored, should, after a brief sojourn, have been compelled to quit the scene of their labours. After eighteen months' travel, Messrs Huc and Gabet arrived at the Thibetian town of Lha-Ssa, where, under the protection of the local authorities, they remained unmolested for several weeks; but their presence excited the jealousy of Ki-Chan, the deputy of the emperor of China, and at his instigation the nomekhan of Lha-Ssa ordered them to quit. They ultimately settled at Macao in 1846, and there compiled the narrative from which we have been quoting.

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