interior of the cone hung strange figures, all red-hot, resembling in shape the incrustations of a cave, or the forms of large icicles; laterally were other figures equally glowing and capricious, which a heated imagination might easily have converted into infernal fiends, and damned sufferers. While we stood, the wind as it passed the dreadful orifice, roared deep and awfully, a few sparks and small particles of fiery matter issued forth; now and then a piece of matter breaking away from the sides of the hollow, fell upon the flowing lava with a strange tinkling noise, that chilled one's blood, and at times a low murmuring was heard, as if proceeding from far within the mountain. We had stood in this critical situation some time, holding by the side of the mouth, and hanging over the deadly stream, when a sudden gust of wind, which caught my plaid cloak, and almost hurled me in, warned us to depart.

How dreadful would be such a death! or rather, how horrible is its aspect--for such a fire, and the sulphur, and the smoke, no doubt would stupify and destroy one in a few seconds; but, perhaps, death itself is nearly, in every case, equally mild; it is the preparation which is tremendous, it is the path which leads to the bourne, and not the bourne itself, that is occupied by anguish and despair.

Be this, however, as it may, but two nights before our excursion, an unfortunate Frenchman threw himself into this mouth. He ascended with only one guide, a lad; when at the terrific spot which he had chosen for his destruction, under some pretext he sent the youth away to some little distance; after a few minutes the lad returned; he found a coat and hat--he gazed (we may suppose, stupified with horror) into the mouth, but of the resolute victim, not an atom was to be seen. It appears he had arranged all his affairs, and

written several letters, one of which, to the police at Naples, to prevent suspicions, imparted that he died by his own deed-another was to his mother-unhappy woman!

It is said in Naples, that a hopeless, cureless disease urged him to the commission of the dreadful act.

On descending from the perilous eminence, we proceeded to examine the course of the lava. It continued to flow for about twenty yards from the mouth, under an incrustation in which several apertures allowed us to see the fiery flood beneath: from this covered passage it emerged in a bold wide torrent, which, running for some time along an inclined plane, came to a steep descent, down which it precipitated itself with headlong fury. The effects of this tremendous cataract, were seen for some distance in the hurried pace of the lava"the waves of torrent fire inflame with rage," the stream widens, and rushes rapidly on.

Qual torrente allor, che gonfio, e altero
D'acque non sue, fuor dell' antica sponda
Torbido uscendo impetuoso e fiero
Le cittadi minaccia e i campi innonda.

We continued to cotoyer the flood, until we came just below the elevated ridge, on one point of which stands San Salvatore; here the stream had divided itself into another branch, and from a hillock of lava, we saw it continue its course in two large currents, until it was lost in some of those deep hollows which fortunately former eruptions have made, and left between the often destroyed town of the Torre del Greco, and the sides of the mountain.

But should the present eruption continue with vigour for two or three weeks, or should another considerable one in the same direction succeed it, these hollows will be filled up, the stream will roll onward to the sea, and some of the inhabitants of the lava-built * Torre del Greco, will once more be obliged to abandon

their homes, and see their houses and streets buried beneath their old

enemy.

We stood awhile, on the before mentioned hillock-the scene was too novel to some of us, and too interesting to all, to be speedily abandoned. I have seen the volcano under many and various aspects, for we are old friends; and on this night, I wrote my name in the book at the hermitage for the thirteenth time: I have seen it belching out flames to the clouds, and throwing out red-hot stones to overtop the flames; I have watched those innumerable stones as they fell, and observed immense fiery masses chase each other down the declivities: I have stood by the brink of the lava, which poured rapidly down the steep sides of the cone-I have seen the mountain nearly in all its humours, but I never saw it more impressive than on this night. The broad burning streams came down, slow, silent, and majestic-at times, pieces of lava were broken away from the banks, and slid into the current with a slight tinkling sound; not unfrequently large pieces of lava (carried away in a similar manner) came floating, like horrid black islands, down the stream, and at intervals ghastly vapours, some of a bright blue colour-some yellow-some of an angry red, played over the scorching waves. There is a tall hardy sort of weed grows in the crevices of the lava; at the foot of the hillock on which we were, there was a large clump, on a sudden the winding stream approached it, and it was soon in a blaze. We observed many of these conflagrations while watching the course of the lava.

We at length left the little height, but before I leave it, I must attempt a description of the scenes that spot commanded. The moon was shining pretty clearly-just above us, in front, was a bold precipice, on whose edge lay the white buildings of San Salvatore, its chapel and its large

bell, the fine high trees before it, the little avenue of white pillars, terminating on the brow of the steep with a large wooden cross; on our right hand, at some distance up an ascent, we saw the fiercely burning mouth already described, and the streams of fiery matter rolling down-further on, the rugged cliffs of the Monte di Somma, mournful and sombre: on our other hand, we saw the lava continuing its course, and getting paler and paler, and slower and slower, until it reached the hollows-still farther down was the Bay of Naples, darkened at intervals by dense clouds, which were scudding across the sky, and roughened by the strong night wind: behind us,—

There stood a hill not far, whose grisly top Belch'd fire and rolling smoke

the lower part of the cone lay in a thick shade; for the small flames which were playing above, only illuminated the head of the mountain.

As we were already sufficiently fatigued, and there was nothing of much interest to invite us to undertake the difficult climb up the cone, we determined, when we left our hillock, to make the best of our way to the hermitage. To shorten our way, we descended a little to where the stream was less wide and rapid, and with hasty steps crossed over the burning lava; the other stream which lay in our way, we crossed in the same manner, and after a most laborious walk of about half an hour we reached the hermitage. Here we got on our asses and began to descend, "highly gratified" of course, but somewhat less gay than when we mounted; for the spirit of the good wine was evaporated; we felt fatigue, and that lassitude which always follows exhilaration, and exertion. Each of us was very glad, when, a little after sunrise, he found himself in Naples at the door of his own lodgings.

In the novel of "The Abbot," where Queen Mary is offended by the taunts of one of the rebel lords, she asks her attendant for the "Rodomontades Espagnoles." A rebuke which the peer feels sufficiently for her purpose. The passage reminded me of a little adventure.

It may be now six years since I found myself one evening in the heart of a forest in Lorraine. My business was not with the world, or the men of the world, so I avoided the high road, where I should have found nothing else, and generally took up my rest for the night in the houses of the farmers. Nature is the same every where, but in Paris; and I found decent hospitality for my civility, and for the trifling contributions which I could prevail on pride to accept, and which it seldom accepted without a look of half-courteousness and half defiance,-that to a painter, or even to a mere wander ing collector of the curious shades and shapes of the human heart, was worth twice the money.

It was a delicious evening, one of those in which Autumn puts on all its beauty, as if to make us grieve for its departure. But I leave the setting sun, and its radiance upon forest, and lake, and mountain, to those whose pens are dipped in poetry. My business is to talk of other things. The path which had been pointed out to me by a red cheeked garçon, with hair as brown as the chesnuts that he was gathering, seemed leading deeper into the forest. I was rapidly losing sight of the sun, among oaks and elms that might have made the "mast of some great Ammiral." Stories of banditti came lucklessly over my recollection. I listened for the baying of a dog, the whole canine race seemed to have been struck with sudden dumbness. I plunged on, but what had been a path was now a thicket. A glimpse of the sky through the vault of branch and leaf above showed me that the sun was down; it was twilight without the wood, and night within. I suddenly remembered what I had heard from my last host, that I was in a royal forest. My next step might

then be on the lair of a wild boar, and I might be, like Polonius, at supper, not where I ate, but where I was eaten. My powers were now fairly tasked, and after a consultation with the two most perplexing advisers in the world-anxiety and ignorance, I fired my only pistol, without knowing whether my signal might not invite a banditti. The report of the pistol was answered by hallooings and the sound of horns on every side, and in a few minutes I was surrounded by half a dozen robust, dark-featured men with couteaux de chasse, and rifles in their hands. They were the gamekeepers, who were on the look-out for intruders on the king's venison,-and my pistol had put the forest on the alert. I soon proved myself guiltless of poaching, and after a good deal of coarse humour on all sides, was led to the house of the chief farmer of the district, the Sieur Bourdeille, who received me at his door, and, with the profusion of bows and compliments, which a Frenchman in his hour of civility lavishes on every thing human from his mistress downwards, introduced me to his mansion. He was a venerable and handsome old man, with long white locks. Yet age had come gently upon him, and "his eye was not dim, neither was his natural force abated." He had served,-and when we fell into conversation, our talk was of "hair-breadth scapes i' the imminent, deadly breach." Above the fire-place, a huge hearth piled with wood, that lighted up a circle of bright faces of sons and daughters,-hung an old picture of a cavalier, somewhat obscured by the hospitable smokes of this hall of breakfast, dinner, supper; but evidently painted by a superior hand. The figure was in the costume of the age of Henri Quatre. He was lying on a sofa, with a little table beside him; a manuscript was on the table, -and from the pen still hovering over it in his hand, and his look down the leaf,-that certain, indescribable look of authorship, the grave complacency-compounded of doubt and delight-he was obviously its author: yet the smile was on a pale

niards gave great credit to Astolphe Balion. He made,' said they such slaughter, that it was enough for him but to touch a man with his sword, and the fellow tumbled down a corpse.'

"They boasted of two of their captains, Leon and Espinasa, that, during the battle, they never touched the ground, but continually walked on the bodies that they had killed."

"A Spanish prisoner, brought before the king, after the loss of Cambray, was asked, what did the Spanish army say of him. Nothing,' was the bold answer, but that by looking for thirty thousand ducats in Franche Comte, you have lost Cambray.' And the answer was true, for the king had wasted his time in Franche Comtè."

"When the Prince of Parma was marching to the succour of Paris, he besieged Lagny, to draw off the king from the siege of the capital. 'What,' said the king, will he attack a town at my very beard.' Go tell him,' said the duke to a French prisoner, 'that I will take it, if it were on the point of his moustache.' The king sent to let him know that he would throw mountains of steel in his way. I wish to Heaven,' was the prince's retort, that they were mountains of gold, we should be only the richer.' The prince took the town and relieved the capital."

This man of observation attributes the superior bravery of the Spanish troops to their high rate of pay, and to its certainty, though it might be occasionally delayed. It was the opinion of the ancient military men of the day, that no king, but the king of Spain, could keep an army long in a state of discipline, and that his secret was in the wealth arising from his vast territory. The extent of his dominion was prodigious, and unrivalled in Europe since the Roman empire. Philip the Second was at the same time sovereign of Spain, the Two Sicilies, Portugal, Sardinia, Corsica, the Canaries, Austria, Burgundy, the Milanese, Flanders, the Tyrol, and the New World: an overgrown dominion, to which no human wisdom was equal, and yet, which was shaken, not by the tendency of unwieldy authority to break into fragments, nor by war, but by VOL. IV.

pastors and preachers, and the art of printing; Luther and Calvin were the true conquerors of the Spanish empire. The Spanish army was a model of internal regulation. But no troops were more apt to burst out into sudden mutiny. Yet in this they proceeded by system. They usually began with a cry to their officers. "Off, off with the gentlemen! Let them retire, because we intend to revolt." They then proceeded to fix on a commander, whom they called "the chosen," and who must not refuse the appointment on pain of death. They paid him regular obedience, and marched to take some town, which they pillaged. But those mutinies were, in general, rapidly brought to order.

One of the extravagancies of national prejudice is the mutual contempt of the Spaniards and Portuguese. The Spaniard's character of a nation, separated from his own applauded country only by a rivulet, with the same common ancestry, religion, habits of life, and nearly the same language, is " pocos y locos; "few, and the few are out of their reason."

Some of these anecdotes are pleasantly illustrative of the prejudice and boasting on both sides.

"The Portuguese observe the anniversary of the battle of Aliuvarata with great rejoicings. The king said to a Spanish monk, who happened to have arrived at court during the ceremony, What do you think of our fête? Have they such in Spain for their victories?' By no means, was the answer, for if we were to celebrate every victory of ours, every day would be a holy-day, and the working people would die of hunger.'

The Portuguese were not inferior to this pleasant rodomontade, and sometimes the blow was directed to even a more tender part than military vanity.

“Ön another anniversary of this battle, a Portuguese cordelier preaching on the event, thus described the position of the parties: we, the Christians, were on this side the river, and the Castilians on the other.'"

"One day in Lisbon I went into a silk-mercer's shop; there was only a young girl in the shop, and as I

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