now slanting sunbeams; then, dropping, one by one, into shade and obscurity, as though melting and dissolving into the expanse, and thus breaking the hitherto distinct outline of the stupendous chain.

"These are thy glorious works, Parent of good," was impressed on their minds, if not uttered by their lips, as they moved downward, and the lower hills shut out the splendid back ground from their view. In their rapid descent, amid fantastically-shaped rocks and fearful declivities, we need not follow them but, as they were approaching Nice, by the new winding road that leads to Genoa, Charles pointed to a house standing upon the very brink of the rock above them. "You talked of commingling with spirits," said he. "Behold a miracle! I can't tell you what virgin or saint performed it, inasmuch as the light sufficeth us not to decipher that inscription below the niche or shrine cut in the rock. the owner of that house opined that it must be destroyed by the formation of this road, and so he made a vow, and lo! we and all others pass it by. There is an 'on dit' about a certain number of crowns being judiciously distributed; but, of course, if the engineer had previously arranged his plan, he could not have deviated an inch. So it is a miracle."

66

66

But

Always the same!" said William Moreton, you can extract mirth from any thing. You think this man superstitious and weak-minded, no doubt; but, judge not rashly. Bethink ye of those who ruled in this land ere our native country appertained to the civilised world. Even there, on the other side of the little river Paglion, stands before us Cimiers, the remains of a Roman city, with its amphitheatre, and enough to tell us of arts cultivated, and luxuries and conquest, and all that we can boast of in our pride. Aye, and more. They were the masters of the world, yet ventured not upon important expeditions, nor dared to risk a battle unless assured of success by certain appearances in the entrails of a beast, or the flight of birds. Will you, on that account, say that they were weak-minded? No. The aruspices, even as priests of more modern religions, were looked up to by the many as beings communing with another world. Do we despise their omens? Let us look into our own hearts and we shall find, in some secret corner, lurking presentiments of good or evil, and fancies utterly irrecon

cilable with the dictates of reason. Yes, we have, all of us within, a tint of superstition."

"Some of us have to a certainty," exclaimed Charles. "But come, my dear fellow! Let us trot out now, or we shall be too late for dinner, and my mother and Caroline will be visited by some evil 'presentiments concerning us.'

Now, the said Caroline Harland was a young lady, to describe whose personal endowments would be a pleasant task to attempt, were we writing a tale of love at full length; but, as matters are, it will suffice to say, that though every body declared her to be very beautiful, equally unanimous was the opinion that a little more of the roseate hue of health upon her cheeks would be an improvement. And perchance it was with the hope of producing some such effect, that the little family resolved to winter at Nice. What the result was we shall see in due time, but on the present occasion, a stranger noticing her uneasiness at the procrastination of the dinner hour, might have judged her appetite to be considerably improved.

At length, the two gentlemen made their appearance; and then followed one of those cheerful, placid evenings at home, when, in the luxury of mutual confidence, the heart enjoys perfect repose, and which, in after days we love to recall, and cherish fondly in memory, as calm and sunny spots strongly contrasting with the hours of feverish excitement, spent in gaiety and frivolity, and the wild chase after plea

sure.

Caroline and her venerable parent listened with flattering attention to their visiter's historical details of events that had occurred on and near the spot where they were then seated; and he, like most of us when we find our hobbies admired (and sometimes too when they are not,) proceeded unchecked in his course, from the foundation of the ancient town, six hundred years before the Christian era, through the continued and harassing incursions of the Salians and Ligurians; the invasion of the Romans, who held possession of the country till the downfall of their mighty empire; after which, it successively fell a prey to the Goths, the Burgundians, the Visigoths, the French, the Counts of Arles, the Houses of Arragon and Anjou, and the Kings of Naples. He then referred to the incursion of the Lombards, who are

said to have destroyed the Roman city of Cemelion, now called Cimiers.

It is not to be supposed that William Moreton ran through such important events with the rapidity they are here noted; but having reached this epoch, he paused for a while, and then said, "We now have arrived at the time of the Saracens. William, your sister must visit Fraxinet with us. I will engage to procure a good boat, and steady, able men."

Caroline hesitated, and Mrs. Harland inquired if there was any danger, and the young men averred that there was none, and wished her to make one of the party; but that offer she declined, leaving her daughter to please herself, and her daughter was with no great difficulty induced to join in the excursion, little dreaming how it would terminate. And then fixing on the hour of noon to meet on the morrow, they separated for the night.

Cloudless again was "the blue Italian sky," and playfully light and refreshing was the breeze that scarcely ruffled the face of the transparent and glistening waters, when our little party descended into a boat, and glided forth from the small harbour of Nice.

"How unlike is this to February elsewhere," said Caroline. "If we had but such a climate in dear, dear old England!" "Heaven forbid !" exclaimed her brother. "Think of the summer! No, no, these rocks and hills shelter one nicely during the winter months, and the eternal olive trees are a very good make-shift for verdure; but give me our native green valleys our gradually budding springs-our moderate summer heat, and our rich and glorious autumn, with its thousand tints of beauty! And even now! By George! the very mention of home makes me wish myself with my dog and gun at the old woodside. And then, who ever heard a 'Tallyho!' among these breakneck precipices and rolling stones? And look at these poor creatures who presume to call themselves sailors. Compare them with one of our jolly jack-tars! Ha, ha! The idea is absolutely ridiculous. But don't let us talk of home, or I shall be lowspirited. So, William, my dear fellow, brush up your memory and go on with your chronicles. You'll have one attentive hearer, I'm sure, for Cary has been dreaming all night about Goths and Vandals. There now is a beautiful subject! The

castle rock, rising boldly from the sea, between the port and the new town. You have something to tell us of that, I hope?"

"The original town was built upon its summit," replied William," and a strong position it was for many centuries before the invention of gunpowder, after which it was regularly fortified as a citadel, the inhabitants having long before withdrawn and built a new town at its base."

"But who destroyed the citadel?" inquired Charles, impatiently.

"An Englishman," replied William, "the Duke of Berwick, a natural son of our King James the Second, and, by his mother's side, nephew of the great Duke of Marlborough. After the revolution, he followed his royal parent into exile, and entered the French service, in which he rose to the rank of marechal, and commanded here in 1706, when he besieged and took the town and demolished the castle. But your question has made me leap suddenly over the events of somewhat like a thousand years. However, don't be alarmed, I will not attempt to inflict the whole now upon you in detail."

"Do not mind him," said Caroline, "tell me every thing. What I have already heard will give an interest to all my walks and rides in the 'vallons' and the country, that I never felt before. I have been used to look upon and admire all around me listlessly, merely because the rocks were fantastic in form, and the narrow passes and lofty hills were, as we say, picturesque; but, henceforth, I shall imagine every spot to have been the scene of some wild and romantic encounter."

Aye!" exclaimed William Moreton, "and if those rocks could speak, each Iwould have its tale to tell of deeds more fierce and wild and deadly than aught your fancy, gentle lady, could depict. But, not to weary you, and because I would not trust to memory, I have noted down on paper the principal events that have passed (since the inroads of the Lombards), upon the scene before us. I have omitted the Saracens, who, for more than two centuries, ever and anon came with fire and sword, because we shall visit their strong hold, and, when there, you will better judge of the terror they spread over land and sea. Shall I read my notes?"

"Let us have all the murders out at once," said Charles. "Have your smelling

bottle ready, Cary, and eke your handkerchief."

:

It was

"I have merely jotted down events," observed Charles, and he read as follows:"After the abandonment of the country by the Saracens, it returned into the possession of the kings of Naples, but they, being far distant and too much occupied by their troubles at home to pay proper attention to a colony, it was governed by its own consuls till it formed an alliance with the then powerful republic of Pisa. The town was subsequently besieged, but without success, by Raymond Berenger the Fourth. Then it was allied to the Genoese till Alphonso the Second, king of Arragon, came with a large army and re-established the authority of his house, which was shaken off about forty years after, and a new alliance formed with Pisa. next besieged and taken by Raymond Berenger the Fifth. Its next period of suffering was a long resistance against the Dukes of Anjou, who (having invaded Provence) resolved to wrest it from Ladislaus, of Sicily, who, being unable to afford efficient aid, agreed that the town and province of Nice should choose any sovereign they thought fit save the Duke Louis the Second, of Anjou ; and the choice they made was Amadeus the Seventh, of the royal house of Savoy. In 1543 the town was besieged, by sea and land, by the combined forces of the French and the Turks, under Barbarossa and the Duke d'Enghien, and, after a valiant resistance, being reduced to the extremest distress, was induced to capitulate on condition that the lives, liberty, and property of the inhabitants should be secured and respected. The Turks, nevertheless, seized upon upwards of five thousand citizens, and sent them off in their ships, which, fortunately, were met at sea by the united squadrons of Sicily and the knights of Malta, by whom the captives were liberated.

"The subsequent sorties and attacks of the French and Spaniards are too numerous for detail; but, at last, it was taken by the Duke of Berwick. Its next visitation was an epidemic fever, which carried off more than three thousand persons; and, scarcely had it recovered from that affliction, than it was again visited by the horrors of the Italian war of 1744, which were prolonged till the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748.”

Here the reader took his eyes from the paper, and observed, "That the country

66

"Let our little bark dance merrily onward for a brief space," said William, we shall soon pass this bold and barren hill of Montboron now on our left, and the scene will be changed. Yes; we have now nearly the whole length of the Fraxinet before us. And now-now we are opening the land-locked harbour of Villa Franca, compact and deep as though designed for his own purposes by the imagination of man and completed by a mightier architect, with ramparts towering to the skies."

"What is that miniature of a ship at the farther end of the harbour?" inquired Charles, "she looks like the model of a vessel with her three tiny masts and yards, like black threads against the mountain side."

Το

"When what we call mighty ships approach the mighty hills," observed William, smiling, "they do indeed seem to 'diminish to a speck. That is a Sardinian man-of-war, carrying sixty-four guns, and is the abode of some hundreds of our pigmy race. look at it where it is, truly a bird's nest or an ant-hill would seem a thing of little less importance. But, now we see the town, with its long line of buildings at the water's edge, and clustering towers and houses studding the hill-side. So, to my task again. It was not always the poor 'triste' place it is now, for in 1539 the Emperor Charles the Fifth came there, at the instigation of the Pope (Paul the Third), by whose mediation a truce of ten years was eventually agreed upon here between him and Francis the First, King of

France, who, with his Queen, came for the same purpose to Nice. The two sovereigns did not meet, but the Pope went to and fro, between them, from Nice to Villa Franca and from Villa Franca to Nice, till his humane intent was effected. To your imagination I leave the splendour and pageantry of the three courts, the imperial, the kingly, and the papal, thus brought into contact. Suffice it to say, that the Queen of France paid a visit to the Emperor, and that the concourse of princes, dukes, cardinals, counts, dons, barons, and knights, together with haughty dames and maidens fair, was such as perchance shall never again be seen in these parts."

‘Si, si, due botiglia, for aught I care!" exclaimed Charles Harland, who had been holding a brief motley-lingual colloquy with the padrone of the boat, "A botiglia a-piece, if you like. C'est tre botiglia. Only pull awayo! Vite! Dépêchez-vous! Sollecitate più! Get on! Hang the fellow! He has only this moment told me that they are all as busy as bees at the tunny fishery, just on the other side of the neck of land that you are going to show Caroline, and tell a Saracenic history about. Never mind me! I can hear it afterward, for I must run across directly we land, or I shall not be in time. Allez! Presto! Allegro or you shan't have the botiglias, mind. Give way! as our sailors say. Da via! Why the fellows are laughing."

And no great marvel, but nevertheless they pulled away smartly for the sake of the "botiglias," and presently the amateur tunny fisherman had the gratification of finding himself upon terra firma, scampering away from his sister and friend.

Now, William Moreton had not at all anticipated that he should be left that morning, tête-à-tête with Caroline Harland, to tell his tale; but, as matters were so, he resolved not to flinch. So he conducted her carefully over the somewhat rugged ground, and pointed out where the Saracens probably erected their strong hold, and the natural pier and haven, and divers small inlets, wherein, doubtless, their vessels lay hidden till the moment when their prey had arrived within reach. Then he called her attention to the irregularities of the surface, comprising small rocky eminences, and minute but very picturesque dells, all well calculated for observation and concealment. And doubtless, in order to impress upon her mind the advantages

of the spot, and gain credence for some tale he had to tell, he pointed out to her a small hollow, in which a piece of rock formed a natural seat, under the shade of a wide-spreading olive. And so it was that, as they sate thereon, they might see the boats busily engaged in the tunny fishery on one side, with the long line of coast beyond, toward Genoa; and on the other, the rock of Montboron, with the castle of Montalbano on its summit, the town and environs of Nice, and the western shore towards Antibes. Yet, while commanding this extensive range, to say nothing of the lofty hills in the clear back-ground, where any signal would have been apparent; they were sensible that no eye could discern them, for they saw all over a gentle elevation, rising a few yards on either side, the outline broken here and there by an irregular drooping olive branch. In sooth, it was a very snug bird's-nest-like retreat, and admirably adapted for the telling of a long tale without interruption, as there was no sound, save that of the playful and not unmelodious plashing of the waves, against the timeworn, but immovable rocks below. long William and Caroline sate there, is immaterial, and nothing can be more uncertain than how long they would have sate there, had they not been roused by a sort of tallyho from the volatile fisher

man.

How

"You've lost such a chance, William !” he exclaimed. "A glorious sight! One fish, twenty feet long, at least! And you've been sitting here talking about the Saracens! Well, there's no accounting for tastes, but, come along!"

William smiled as he rose, and, drawing the arm of his fair companion through his own, pressed it to his heart; and she, mayhap from the fatigue of listening to his long story, leant much more heavily upon him than usual for support, till they reached the water side, and re-embarked. And from thenceforward, it is scarcely necessary to add, their relative position toward each other was entirely changed; for Caroline dutifully related to her mother the substance of what she had been induced to listen to in that pleasant spot, and which in no way was connected with the wiles of the Saracens. And her mother's eye thereupon glistened, for she was a widow, and Caroline was her only daughter; and she had known William

Moreton from his youth upward. Therefore, she fell upon the neck of her child, and kissed her; and for a brief space, they, together, mingled precious tears, which were to be followed by long-enduring smiles.

So, after that day, Caroline and William enjoyed many quiet and delightful rambles together, talking sometimes a little of history, and bygone years, but much more of the present and the future. And thus ends our notice of "What happened at Nice," for to the reader's imagination may be left what afterward happened in England.

Yet, a few words in explanation of why these pages are written! We know they will meet the eyes of many fair and high-born ladies, who will not feel displeased at the reminiscence of a winter passed at Nice; and, brief as is our historical epitome, it may perchance lead others, who are about to sojourn there, to farther inquiry; and thus awaken in the breast of some invalid a local interest, that shall lure the spirit, at times, from its own sorrows, while in pursuit of health; and breathing the balmy gales, and the grateful fragrance of the orange trees and manycoloured flowers that flourish there in the depth of winter.

In conclusion, and by permission, we add a farewell, written on the spot.

RABY CASTLE is one of the most interesting features in the county of Durham, less perhaps as regards its past history than from its antiquity and the natural advantages of its situation. It was formerly the principal seat of the Nevilles, the powerful Earls of Westmorland, who occupy a prominent place in that twilight period between what may perhaps be called the feudal and the regal time of England. A portion of the castle appears, from the style of its architecture, to have been built in a very remote age, nor was it until 1379 that it assumed the castellated form and character. In that year John de Neville, Earl of Westmorland, obtained a license to “make a castle of his manor of Raby, and to embattle and crenellate its towers." His successors continued to make additions

and improvements up to the time of the unfortunate Charles, the last Earl of Westmorland of that family, who, in 1568, became involved in intrigues against the throne of Elizabeth. Jealousy of Cecil's influence with the Queen seems first to have mixed him up with the ambitious schemes of Dudley, Sir Nicholas Throgmorton, and the bigoted Earl of Norfolk. The pretence for their clamour against the secretary was the supplies sent to the protestants in France, but Elizabeth easily penetrated their designs and defeated them. Not satisfied with their escape from the fears or the prudence of the Queen, those noblemen still continued their machinations, but this time their schemes went far beyond the gratification of private and petty malice against the secretary. Their