Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 68, No 422, December 1850

Which I've been working at a twelvemonth and a day.
Where there was a lesser one I substitute a bigger list'
Saying that the true bill is far, far away."

I wish you had seen Heavywet's face when young Fitztape of the Treasury sang it in his presence on Tuesday last! The old fellow looked as though the waiter had handed him verjuice instead of curaçoa.

I hope, Dick, you are not above receiving a hint from an old hand, who has seen some service in his day. I am sure I have every reason to acknowledge my infinite obligations to the pen which I have wielded with more or less effect for wellnigh forty years, and which has not only provided me with food and raiment, but with a snug patent Government office, which makes me entirely independent of any change of Ministry. These are the kind of prizes, Dick, which are open to us literary men, who have the sense to adopt politics as a trade, and to write up our party, without troubling ourselves about that fantastic commodity which the parsons term conscience. I never could see why a public writer should have a conscience any more than a lawyer. The French fellows are better up to this, and don't even pretend to its possession. And it must be acknowledged that they are allowed occasionally far better chances than we have. Only fancy, Dick, you and I members of a Provisional Government! Wouldn't we have a pluck at Rothschild and the Bank? Don't your fingers itch at the bare idea of such close contact with the feathers of the national pigeon? But it is of no use indulging in those fairy dreams. And after all, I daresay that neither Etienne Arago, nor Armand Marrast, nor Ferdinand Flocon, nor Louis Blanc, are half so well off at the present moment as I am, with my snug salary payable quarterly, and no arrears. It is better not to be too ambitious, Dick, nor to overshoot the mark; for I have always remarked that your most prominent men are precisely those who pocket the least in the long-run. I am for your golden mediocrity, which insures an easy berth, and the power of offering to a friend a cool bottle of claret. You like the wine, Dick? Help yourself again; there's more where that came from.

As I was saying, you should not despise a hint from an old hand. We ancients may not be quite so smart as you moderns, but we are tolerably good judges of the taking qualities of an article – we know, by experience, the sort of thing which is likely to tickle the public ear. Now, you will forgive me for saying, that in your late writings you exhibit, now and then, certain marks of precipitancy, which it might be as safe to avoid. What I mean to express is, that you are too dashing – too daring – too ready to encounter your antagonist with his own weapons. You assume the part of Achilles, instead of imitating the example of Ulysses; you don't touch the Hospitaller's shield, though he has the worst seat of the party, but you make your lance ring against the buckler of Brian de Bois-Guilbert. This may be plucky, but it is not wise. People may applaud you for your hardihood, but it is not a pleasant thing to be chucked over your horse's croup, among shard, and mire, and the general laughter of mankind. You made a great mistake the other day in pitting yourself against Lord Stanley. You might have known better. You were no more than a baby in the hands of the best lance of the Temple; and the attempt only ended, as all must have foreseen, in your own confusion. Don't be angry, Dick. I know you only obeyed orders, but the result demonstrates, very clearly, the utter imbecility of the clique under which you have had the misfortune to serve.

You say you did not write the article about gestures and looks being more expressive than words? I am aware you did not. I am talking to a sensible man, and not to an irreclaimable idiot. It is no fault of yours if the dunderheads, who find the money, will occasionally mistake their vocation, and commit themselves by using the pen. Such things are inevitable in journalism; and they are enough to sow the seeds of decline in the bosom of a printer's devil. But you know very well, notwithstanding, that you committed yourself most egregiously. You were laughed at, Dick, and held up to scorn in every paper from Truro to Caithness. And for what? Why, for attempting pertinaciously to maintain that a statesman meant and said one thing, whereas he distinctly meant and said another. Did you seriously expect to impose upon any one by such a stale device as that – so palpable, and, moreover, so exceedingly open to contradiction? You might as well expect the public to believe that the Duke of Wellington has broken his neck on the hunting-field, in the teeth of a letter from the Field-marshal announcing that he is well and hearty. Yes; I know very well that John Bull is a gullible animal, but not to the degree which you assume. You may state, if you like, that the moon is made of green cheese; or, as some wiseacre did the other day, that the electric telegraph is to be superseded by the employment of magnetic snails; but you won't persuade any one that Ferrand is a friend of Cobden, or that Sir Robert Inglis is a Jesuit in disguise who is working for the supremacy of the Pope. By the way, I was wrong in recommending you to persist in your averment that Protection is dead and coffined. You have, I observe, of late dedicated at least a couple of Jeremiads each week to that topic, and there is a degree of ferocity coupled with the announcement revolting to the feelings of a Christian. You should assume the fact, Dick; not insist upon it in this absurd manner. If the old lady really is under the sod, and beyond the power of resuscitation and the reach of the resurrection-men, e'en let her repose in quiet. In that case she can do you no further harm, and it would be but decent to give her the benefit of a final forgiveness, or at all events to leave her to oblivion. Queen Anne has been defunct for a good many years, but nobody thinks it necessary to proclaim the fact weekly in a couple of leaders. You differ from me, do you? Very well, then; carry on in your own way; all I shall say is, that if your muttered conjurations don't evoke the shade of the departed saint, in a shape that may appal you consumedly, you run a mighty risk of calling a counterfeit into being. It is a good maxim never to put forward anything which the public cannot readily swallow.

I think that, in one respect, the modern system is decidedly preferable to the older. Formerly, we used to combat arguments; now, I observe, you evade them. This I hold to be a great improvement. In the first place, it saves trouble both to the writer and the reader. It is not always easy to reply to a fellow who knows his subject a great deal better than you do. You have to follow him from point to point, investigate his facts, controvert his reasoning, and take, in short, such a world of trouble, as would render the life of a gentleman journalist absolutely insupportable. Milton was occupied nearly a year with one of his replies to Salmasius, – Selden, I believe, took a longer time to double up his opponent Grotius. This is slow work, and you cannot reasonably be expected to submit to it. If anything like argument is to be brought forward, you are entitled to look for it in the Edinburgh Review, though I do not intend by any means to assume that your expectations will be realised in that quarter. Costive, beyond the power of medicine, must be the man who battens on the hard dough dumplings, dished up quarterly under cover of the Blue and Yellow! But I forgot – you are not entirely with the Whigs, though you agree with them as to commercial policy.

You do well, therefore, to avoid argument in all points that require previous preparation and study. A general slashing style, without condescending to particulars, is undoubtedly your forte, and I cannot sufficiently admire your dexterity in avoiding a direct reply. You have got hold of a capital phrase in answer to everything that can be advanced against you. No matter how clearly your opponent may have stated his case, no matter how distinct his logic, or how incontrovertible his facts, you come down upon him with your pet cry of "exploded fallacies," and extinguish him at once and for ever. Very righteously you eschew the trouble of pointing out where, when, and by whom, the said obnoxious fallacy was exploded. It is perfectly possible – nay, in nine cases out of ten, absolutely certain, that you never in your life heard that particular view stated before, and that you do not comprehend it when stated; still, you continue to occupy the vantage ground, and pooh-pooh it down as calmly as though it were one of the Manchester unfulfilled prophecies. This is a pleasant way of getting out of a dilemma; and the best of it is, that by generalisation you may contrive to apply your epithet to every fact, however notorious, which has been brought forward by your antagonist. For instance, an indignant farmer writes you a letter enclosing a balance-sheet of his operations for the last year, which shows that, instead of making any profit, he is out of pocket some ninety or a hundred pounds; and he argues, quite fairly, that if grain is to continue at its present rate, in consequence of importations from abroad, he will be a ruined man before the expiry of his lease, and his labourers thrown out of employment. Six months ago, your answer would have been hopeful, courteous, and encouraging. You would have assured him that the present depression was merely temporary, and that in the course of a short time wheat must be at sixty shillings. You are wiser now. You are perfectly aware that any considerable rise in the value of agricultural produce, under the operation of the present law, is a pure impossibility; and you resort to no such assurance. Three months later you would have told him to go to the devil or the antipodes, whichever he pleased, and not bother the public with his wicked and insensate clamour. But you are also tolerably aware, by this time, that the public does not exactly approve of a wholesale system of expatriation, however admirable it may appear in your eyes; and that you have exposed yourself, by recommending it, to certain reflections, which are not very creditable to your character either as a philanthropist or a Christian. Nor can you much mend the matter by insisting upon another pet phrase of yours, which did good service so long as it was new. You cannot always aver that we are in "a transition state" of society. In the first place, the expression, when you analyse it, has no meaning. In the second place, granting that it had a meaning, people are naturally anxious to know, what sort of state of society is to be consequent on the "transition state" – a piece of information which neither you nor any one else have it in your power to supply. So that an ignorant or commonplace person, who is not versed in the mysteries or resorts of journalism, may be well excused for wondering in what possible way you can meet the allegations of Mr Hawbuck. You cannot refuse to print his letter and his statement, for, if you don't, somebody else will; and either you lay yourself open to the charge of suppression, or it may be held that you cannot frame an answer. How valuable, in such a position, is the shield of "exploded fallacies!" You assume, in your commentary on the letter, a tone of heartfelt commiseration, not for the circumstances, but for the prejudices and benighted mental condition of the writer. "We willingly give a place in our columns to the communication of Mr Hawbuck, not on account of its intrinsic worth – not because it contains any novel information – but because it is a fair specimen of that state of intellectual depression and economical ignorance, which the existence for so many years of a false protective system has unhappily fostered, even among that class of agriculturists who are entitled to the epithet of respectable. Here is a man who, from the general wording and caligraphy of his letter, appears to have received the advantages of an ordinary good education – a man who, by his own confession, is the tenant of a farm for which he pays five hundred pounds a-year of rent, and upwards – a man who, we doubt not, is most estimable in his private relations, a kind husband, an indulgent father, and possibly a considerate master – a man who, not improbably, is on good terms with the squire, and, it may be, visits at the parsonage – and yet this very individual, Mr Hawbuck, is complaining that he cannot make ends meet! We shall not, at the present time, minutely question the accuracy of his statements. These may be grossly exaggerated, or they may contain nothing more than a simple narrative of the truth. Assuming the latter to be the case, we ask our readers, with the most perfect confidence, whether the whole of the argument which he has attempted to rear upon such exceedingly slender foundations, is not, from beginning to end, a tissue of exploded fallacies? Here we have the whole question of British taxation brought forward, as if it was something new. Hawbuck ought to know better. His father was taxed before him, and so, we doubt not, were several antecedent generations of Hawbucks, supposing that the family lays claim to a respectable agricultural antiquity. Hawbuck junior – who, we hope, will have more sense than his father – must make up his mind, in future years, to contribute his quota to the national burdens, in return for which we receive the inestimable blessings of good government, [O Dick!] sound legislation, and impartial administration of the laws. Then Mr Hawbuck, as a matter of course, acting upon the invariable example of the writers and orators of that unhappy faction to which he has the misfortune to belong, drags in the 'foreigner,' just as the Dugald creature is dragged into the hut at Aberfoil by the soldiers of Captain Thornton. This is another exploded fallacy, which we had fondly hoped was set to rest for ever. It seems we were mistaken. Mr Hawbuck cannot dispense with the 'foreigner.' He haunts him ever and anon in the silence of the night like the Raw-head-and-bloody-bones of the nursery, or like the turnip lantern placed on the churchyard wall by some juvenile agricultural humourist. Really it is very distressing that any one should be so persecuted by a phantom which is the pure growth of mental apprehension and disease. Mr Hawbuck certainly ought to consult his medical adviser; or, if distance and the embarrassed state of his affairs preclude him from applying to the village Galen, perhaps he will allow us to prescribe for him. A good dose of purgative medicine twice a-week, moderate diet, abstinence from intoxicating liquors, and change of scene – we would suggest a visit to Mr Mechi's farm of Tiptree – will work wonders with our patient. But he must beware of all excitement. He must on no account attend any gatherings where Mr Ferrand is a speaker, and he had better refrain from passing his evenings at the Agricultural Club. He will thus be able to effect considerable retrenchment in his expenditure by avoiding beer, and Mrs Hawbuck will love him none the less. By attending to these few simple rules, we are convinced that a radical cure may be effected. We shall then hear no more of Mr Hawbuck's complaints, nor will it be necessary again to reprehend him for the adoption of exploded fallacies. We shall not do the farmers of Great Britain the injustice to suppose that this gentleman is a type of their class. We regard him simply as an honest, easy-natured, but very credulous person, who has been unfortunately imbued with false notions of political economy, and used as a tool in the hands of others to promote their interested designs."

There, Dick, is a leader for you cut and dry; and I think you must admit that it will answer every purpose. In the first place, you won't hear any more of Hawbuck. Men of his class cannot bear to be laughed at, so that his only revenge will be a muttered vow to break your head, if it should ever come knowingly within the sweep of his cudgel. In the second place, you will have the satisfaction of knowing that you have raised a laugh, which is at all times equivalent to a triumph in argument. The majority of your readers will esteem you a very clever fellow, and henceforward the name of Hawbuck will be the signal for general cachinnation. It is quite true that Hawbuck's statement is in no way refuted, or the cause of his distress investigated – but how can you possibly be expected to occupy your time with his affairs? As a "special commissioner," indeed, you may treat him more minutely. You may pry into his pigsty, investigate his stable, criticise his mode of drainage, disapprove of his rotation of crops, inquire into the wages which he pays, and decidedly object to his turnips. You may hold him up as a lamentable victim of that species of wretched farming which, under the baneful shadow of protection, could do no more than render British agriculture by far the finest and the most productive in the world. You may exhort him to lay out more capital – you need not care about the amount, as he is not likely to ask you for a loan, nor would you be willing to advance it, if he did, on such dubious security; and you may abuse him as an obstinate ass, because he does not plough with a steam-engine. All this you may do with impunity, (provided you never visit the district again;) and you will be hailed by your own party as a genuine national benefactor, and as an oracle of agricultural progress. But don't mix up the two characters – that is, keep statistics for your report, and general assertions for your leading article. Hold hard by the doctrine of "exploded fallacies." It will apply to everything, and every system, which was ever hatched under the influence of the sun. You may adapt the term to physics quite as appropriately as to opinions. If you are inclined to set forward as an exploded fallacy the dogma that climate has any influence upon crops, you are perfectly entitled to do so, on the authority of the Huxtables of the present generation.

But I fear that I am exhausting your patience, and, as it is now rather late, I shall merely add a word of personal advice. Never attempt to rear up your independent judgment against the wishes of your proprietors. In ordinary times this caution might be unnecessary, since few men are sincerely desirous to quarrel with their bread and butter. But there is a foolish spirit of insubordination visible just now on the surface of society, against which you ought to guard. Young men are beginning to fashion out opinions for themselves. The old traditional landmarks are not sufficient for their guidance; and I, who am a veteran in politics, find myself not unfrequently bearded by some pert whippersnapper, just escaped from school, who is now setting up, as the phrase is, on his own hook, as an earnest man and a patriot, and who probably expects before long to hold office in that new Downing Street which has been so seductively prophesied by the blatant seer of Ecclefechan. I need hardly tell you, Dick, that this is all mere moonshine – pure flatulency, superinduced by a vegetable diet upon a stomach naturally feeble. If you wish to see the results of young independent journalism, you have only to step over to the Continent. I have been watching the progress of events there with considerable interest for the last three years, and my only wonder is, how several scores of able German editors have managed to escape the gallows. You see what a pass they have arrived at in France. Nobody is allowed to write an article in the most paltry paper without affixing his name; and the consequence is, that journalism, as a profession, is terribly on the decline. I don't like this, I own. I wish to see its respectability kept up, and its decencies preserved; and I don't think that can be accomplished by the suppression of the editorial We. People are very anxious to know what are the opinions of a leading London journal upon any given point, but I question if they would pay twopence to ascertain what Jenkins, or Larkins, or Perkins may please to think, should the names of these gentlemen appear at the end of their respective lucubrations. Therefore, Dick, stand up for your order, and do not be led astray by the impulses of individual vanity. Dismiss all egotism from your mind, and keep in your proper place. Supposing that you have achieved any notable feat of arms, rest contented with the consciousness thereof, and don't run about telling the whole world that it was you who did it. Benvenuto Cellini would have been a precious ass had he stated during his lifetime that it was he who shot the Constable Bourbon. He was wiser, and kept the statement for his memoirs. This would be no world to live in if reviewers were obliged to give up their names. Fancy Hawbuck at your door, or lurking round the corner, armed with a pitchfork or a flail! The bare idea is enough to make one's blood curdle in the veins. Far rather would I evacuate my premises in the full knowledge that two suspicious gentlemen of the tribe of Gad were waiting to capture me on a writ.

And now, Dick, good night. You see I have used my privilege of seniority pretty freely; but you are not the lad I take you for, if you are offended at a friendly hint. By the way, how do you intend to come out on the Catholic question – strong or mild? Are you going to back up Lord John Russell's "noble letter" to the Bishop of Durham? – or do you intend to twit him with his support of Maynooth, his acknowledgment in Ireland of the territorial titles of the Papist bishops, and the rank which he has given them in the Colonies? You don't like to commit yourself, I suppose? Ah, well; perhaps you are right. But this I will say for Lord John, that whatever may be his capabilities as a statesman, he would have made a first-rate editor. Upon my conscience, sir, I believe that there never lived the man who had a finer finger for the public pulse. He knows to a scruple the amount of stimulants or purgatives which the British constitution will bear; and the moment that the patient becomes uneasy, he changes his mode of treatment. I should like to see Shiel's countenance when he reads the letter. I have no doubt that by this time he is convinced that he might have saved himself the trouble of excising Dei Gratia from the coinage, and that his tarry in Tuscany will hardly give him a complete opportunity of studying the relics of ancient art. Seriously, Dick, I look upon the almost unanimous opinion expressed by the British press, with regard to this insolent Roman aggression, as by far the best and surest symptom of its vitality.

THE GREAT UNKNOWN

A JEST FROM THE GERMAN

It was a bright afternoon in the beginning of October, and the little town of Miffelstein lay basking in the genial sunbeams. But its streets, generally so cheerful, were upon that day solitary. The town seemed deserted, and its unusual aspect evidently surprised a pedestrian, who ascended the steep slope of the main street, and gazed curiously about him, without perceiving a single face at the windows. Everything was shut up. No children played on the thresholds; no inquisitive serving wench peeped from door or garret: some fowls were picking up provender in the road, and a superannuated dog blinked and slumbered in the sun; but of human beings none were to be seen. In seeming perplexity the traveller shook his head. Then – not with the hesitating step of a stranger in the land, but with firm and confident strides – he walked straight to the principal inn, whose doors stood invitingly open upon the market-place. Like one familiar with the locality, he turned to his left beneath the entrance archway, and ascended the stairs leading directly to the coffee-room. The coffee-room was empty. A waiter, who sat reading in the bar, welcomed the new comer with a slight nod, but did not otherwise disturb his studies.

"God bless you, old boy!" cheerfully exclaimed the traveller, casting from his shoulders a handsome knapsack; "just see if you can manage to leave your chair. I am no travelling tailor or tinker, but the long-lost Alexis, returned from his wanderings, and well disposed to make himself comfortable in his uncle's house."

With an exclamation of joyful surprise, the old servant sprang from his seat, and grasped the hand of the unexpected guest.

"Thanks, my honest old friend," replied the young man to his affectionate greeting, "and now tell me at once what the deuce has come over Miffelstein? Has the plague been here, or the Turks? Are the worthy Miffelsteiners all gathered to their fathers, or are they imitating the southerns, and snoring the siesta?"

The waiter hastened to explain that the great harvest feast was being celebrated at a short distance from the town, and that the entire population of Miffelstein had flocked thither, with the exception of the bedridden and the street keepers; and of his master, and the young mistress, he added, the former of whom was detained by business, and the latter was dressing herself, but who both would follow the stream before half-an-hour was over.

"True!" cried Alexis, striking his forehead with his finger: "I have almost forgotten my native village, with its vintage and harvest joys; and I much fear it returns the ill compliment in kind. I can pass my time, however, till my worthy uncle and fair cousin are visible. Bring me something to eat: I am both hungry and thirsty."

"What cellar and kitchen contain is at your honour's service," replied the waiter. "We had no strangers at table to-day, but cold meat is there; and, if it so please you, some kail-soup shall be instantly warmed."

"Kail-soup," said Alexis with a smile; "none of that, thank you. Cold meat —bene. But don't forget the cellar."

"Assuredly not. Whatever your honour pleases. A flask of sack, or a jug of ale?"

"Sack! sack! – Miffelstein sack!" cried Alexis, laughing heartily. "Anything you like. Only be quick about it."

Whilst the waiter hurried to the larder, Alexis examined the apartment, which struck him as strangely altered since his boyish days. The old familiar furniture had disappeared, and was replaced by oaken tables, stools, and settees of rude and outlandish construction. The shining sideboard had made way for an antiquated worm-eaten piece of furniture with gothic carvings. Altogether the cheerful dining-room had undergone an odd change. The walls were papered with views of bleak mountain scenery, dismal lakes and turreted castles, enlivened here and there with groups of Scottish peasantry. The curtains, of many-coloured plaid, were not very elegant, and contrasted strangely with the long narrow French windows. "What on earth does it all mean?" exclaimed the puzzled Alexis. Just as he asked himself the question, the waiter entered the room, with a countenance of extraordinary formality, bearing meat and wine upon a silver salver. This he placed before him with an infinity of ceremonious gestures and grimaces.

"Your lordship will graciously put up with this poor refreshment," he said. "The beef is as tender as if it came from the king's table, (God bless him;) the sack, or rather the claret, is of the best vintage. The kail-soup would hardly have been forthcoming; for although the cook is kept at home by a cold, she is reading, and cannot leave her book. And now, if it will pleasure your lordship, I will play you a tune upon the bagpipes."

In mute and open-mouthed astonishment, Alexis stared at the speaker. But the old man's earnest countenance, and a movement he made to fetch the discordant instrument, restored to him his powers of speech.

"For heaven's sake!" he cried, "Tobias! stop, come hither, and tell me if you have lost your senses! Lordship! claret! A cook who can't leave her book! A bagpipe! Tobias! what has come to you?"

"Ah, Mr Alexis!" said the old fellow, suddenly exchanging his quaint and ceremonious bearing for a plaintive simplicity of manner, "to say the truth, I hardly know myself what has come to me. But pray don't call me Tobias before the master. Caleb has been my name now for a matter of three years. Master and the customers would have it so."

"Caleb?"

"Yes, my dear Mr Alexis. I and the inn were rebaptised on the same day. I am sorry for both of us, but I am only the servant, and what everybody pleases – "

Alexis pushed open the window and thrust out his head. "True, by all that's ridiculous!" he exclaimed, turning to the rebaptised waiter; "the old Star hangs there no longer. What is your house called now?"

"The Bear of Bradwardine; and since that has been its name, and everything in it has been so transmogrified, the place is full of strangers, particularly of English, who throng us in the summer. And there's such laughing and tomfoolery, that at times I'm like to go crazy. They stare at old Caleb as if he himself were the Bear, laugh in his face, and apologise by a handsome tip. That would be all very well, but the neighbours laugh at the master and the inn, and at me and Susan, whose name is now Jenny, and never think of putting hand in pocket to make amends. But what can I do, Mr Alexis? Master is wilful, and I'm sixty. If he discharged me, who would give old Tobias – Caleb, I mean – his daily bread?"

"I would, old fellow," replied Alexis heartily; "I would, Tobias. You've saved me a thrashing for many a prank, and were always kinder to me than my own uncle, who sometimes forgot that I was his sister's son. If ever you want, and I have a crust, half is yours. But go on, I do not yet understand – "

Tobias cast a timid glance at the door, and then continued, but in a lower tone than before.

"Three years ago," he said, "the mistress died, and soon afterwards things began to go badly. Your uncle neglected the house, and at last, if we had one customer a-day, and three or four on Sundays, we thought ourselves well off. It was all along of books. Every week there came a great parcel from the next town, and master read them through and through, and then the young lady, and then master often again. He neither ate, nor drank, nor slept: he read. That may have made him learned, but it certainly did not make him rich. One day, when things were at the worst, a stranger came to the inn, and wrote himself down in the book as an Englishman. He it was who turned master's head. The first night they sat up talking till morning; all next day and the day after that, they were poring over books. Then the folly began; everything must be changed – house and furniture, sign and servants. They say the Englishman gave your uncle money for the first expenses. If everything had gone according to his and master's fancy, you would have found us all in masquerade. The clothes were made for us just like yonder figures on the paper. But we only wore them one day. The blackguards in the street were nigh pulling down the house, and" – here Tobias again lowered his voice – "Justice Stapel sent word to master that he might make as great a fool of himself as he pleased, but that he must keep his servants in decent Christian-like clothing. So we got back to our hose and jackets. The Englishman, when he returned the following spring, and a whole lot of people with him, made a great fuss, and scolded and cursed, and said that we upon the Continent were a set of miserable slaves, and that it was a man's natural right to dress as he liked – or not at all, if it so pleased him. For my part, slave or no slave, I was very glad Justice Stapel had more power here than the mad Englishman. As it was, I had to learn to play the bagpipes; and Jenny had to learn to cook as they do in England or Scotland; and we all had to learn to speak as they speak in master's books, eight pages of which we are obliged to read every day. Jenny likes the books, and says they are better fun than cooking: for my part, I can make nothing of them, and always forget one day what I learned the – "

The old man paused in great trepidation, for just then the door opened, and a beautiful girl, attired in gorgeous Scottish tartans, entered the room.

"Emily! dear cousin!" cried Alexis, springing to meet the blooming damsel, "though eighteen years instead of nine had elapsed since we parted, I still should have recognised your bright blue eyes." Bright the eyes certainly were, and at that moment they sparkled with surprise and pleasure at the wanderer's return; but before Alexis had concluded his somewhat boisterous greetings, their brightness was veiled by an expression of melancholy, and the momentary flush upon the maiden's cheek was replaced by a pallid hue, which seemed habitual, but unnatural. The change did not escape the cousin's observant glance, and he pressed her with inquiries as to its cause. At first he obtained no reply but a sigh and a faint smile. His solicitude would not be thus repelled.

"Upon my word, cousin," he said, "I leave you no peace till you tell what is wrong. I see very well that, during my absence, house and furniture, master and servants, have all been turned upside down. But what can have caused this change in you? Have you too been rebaptised? Has the barbarous Englishman driven you too through the wilderness of his countryman's romances? Have you been compelled, like this poor devil, to swallow Redgauntlet in daily doses, like leaves of senna? Speak out, dear cousin, my old friend and playmate. Assuredly, I little expected to find you still Miss Wirtig. Ere now, I thought some fortunate Jason, daring and deserving, would have borne away the treasure from the Miffelstein Colchis."

Emily cast a side-glance at Tobias, who stood at a short distance, listening to their conversation with an air of respectful sympathy. As if taking a hint, the old man left the apartment. When Emily again turned to her cousin, her eyes glistened with tears.

"Dear Emily," said Alexis, laying aside his headlong bantering tone, and speaking earnestly and affectionately, "place confidence in me, and rely on my zeal to serve you and desire to see you happy. True, I left this house clandestinely, because your father would have made a tradesman of me, when my head was full of Euclid and Vitruvius, and my fingers itched to handle scale and compasses. But it is not the worst sort of deserter who returns voluntarily to his regiment. Think not ill of me therefore, and confide to me your sorrows. It is nearly three years since William Elben wrote to me that he hoped speedily to take you home as his bride. But now I see that he deceived me."

"William spoke the truth," the maiden hastily replied; "the hope was then justified. He had my consent, and my father did not object. But fate had otherwise decreed. The author of Waverley is the evil genius who prevents our union and causes our unhappiness."

"The devil he does!" cried Alexis, starting back.

"Alas! good cousin," continued Emily sentimentally, "who knows how the threads of our destiny are spun!"

"They are not spun in the study at Abbotsford, at any rate," cried the impetuous Alexis. "But it is all gibberish to me. Our neighbours beyond the Channel have certainly sometimes had a finger in our affairs, but I never knew till now that their novelist's permission was essential to the marriage of a Miffelstein maiden and a Miffelstein attorney. But – "

He was interrupted by Tobias, who threw open the door with much unnecessary noise, and thrust in his head with an ominous winking of his eyes, and a finger upon his lips. The next moment the innkeeper entered the room.

Alexis found his uncle grown old, but he was more particularly struck by his strange stiff manners, which resembled those of Caleb, but were more remarkable in the master than the servant, by reason of the solemn and magnificent style in which they were manifested. Herr Wirtig welcomed his nephew with infinite dignity; let fall a few words of censure with reference to his flight from home, a few others of approbation of his return, and inquired concerning the young man's present plans and occupations.

"I am an architect and engineer," replied Alexis. "My assiduity has won me friends; I have learnt my craft under good masters, and have done my best to complete my education during my travels in Italy, France, and England."

"England?" cried Wirtig, pricking his ears at the word: "Did you visit Scotland?"

With a suppressed smile, Alexis replied in the negative. His uncle shrugged his shoulders with an air of pity. "And what prospects have you?" he inquired.

"Prince Hector of Rauchpfeifenheim has given me a lucrative appointment in his dominions. Before assuming its duties, I have come to pass a few days here, and trust I am welcome."