serve, and "leave their country for their country's good." Last, though not least, in this galaxy of talent and patriotism, we pronounce to be the greatest most thorough-going Humbug of the whole-Daniel O'Connell, Esq., M.P.

Alas! it is vain for us to even pretend to allude to the different ranks and conditions of our kindred in every part of the globe. We hasten to a close; and merely notice our intention of giving a compendious history of free-masonry, from the time of Adam to the last festival of the order—also elaborate disquisitions upon the South Sea Bubble Law's French Scheme -valuable information upon foreign loans and joint-stock companies-the Cock-lane Ghost-and the Quack Bottle-conjuror.

Volume 666-"The number of the Beast"-in the courtly and elegant language of a celebrated divine (not the judicious Hooker)—this mysterious symbol is at length pronounced to be "a pig with its face unwashed." It is strange this subject should have been in doubt so long ; as, now the fact is announced, we perceive much collateral evidence to prove its truth, and it at once accounts for the circumstance, that, in every emergency, the Papal see contrives, if possible, to "save its bacon." By a closer inspection of Dens, there may probably be discovered much respecting the purity and habits of the animal. Until now, we could never understand the ancient romaunt of "The Ladye and Swine," which, we believe, is an old "mysterie." "Hear the Church," as she sings

"And thou shalt have a silver shrine, Honey, if thou'lt be love of mine; Hunk, quoth he!" From the sweet word in the second line of the distich, we are led to imagine the "relique" is one of Irish

composition, and may serve to show that the national custom of keeping a pig in each pisant's dwelling is a purely religious observance.

The whole history will be adorned with the finest engravings, chiefly from pictures painted expressly for this work.

Splendid likenesses of Semiramis, Cleopatra, Christina of Sweden; numerous portraits of emperors and kings; also of all the popes, omitting only such as can be proved to be either Pius or Innocent.

There will be many beautifully grouped pairs of individuals, who, though divided in life, are joined in our pages such as Talleyrand and the Vicar of Bray-the Grand Lama of Thibet and Johanna SouthcoteTom Paine and Rousseau-St Dunstan and Ignatius Loyala-also Voltaire receiving the Holy Communion —Prince Leopold abjuring the Protestant Faith-a praying windmill— a walking dervish-Catherine viewing Potemkin's cities in the distance, &c. &c.

The whole to conclude with the finely emblazoned coat-of-arms of the House of Humbug, with an account of the achievements for which every device was granted.

The shield is painted invisible green, studded with gold and silver coins-a belt of twisted snakes-a masked battery-a dove with the tongue of an asp-a monk's hood-a net a snare-a gudgeon-a shark.

The supporters are a laughing hyæna and a wolf in sheep's clothing.

The crest, a fox holding a firebrand, and a friar's cowl on its head. Suspended from the shield is a crocodile with a pocket handkerchief in its claws.

The family motto is

Ilka ane for himsel, and the deil for a'.

ST MARTIN'S is striking ten; and, while the last stroke yet vibrates through Trafalgar Square, the crack equipage that is to carry us off winds round Adelaide Street and pulls up. In an instant the attendant porter jerks up the carpet-bags to the guard, who stands in front of the boot (the lion's mouth for all light baggage), precipitating these, and half of himself, down its ope esophagus. "Now, gentlemen, if you please," already sounds painfully in your ear; yes! the moment for the last good-bye, the last wring of the hand, and the first wring of the heart, is come; the moment when stifled emotion has hard work of it, when a sigh will find a voice, and the unmanly tear an exit; when friendship is expected to be heroism, and love to compress itself into self-denying calmness! Oh! Paley, is it so happy a world "after all?" The friend that would come with us is gone, or lies perdu within the gateway, or is reading with unusual interest the names of the proprietors on the coach panel, or- "sit hard, gentlemen, all right,"-would we could say, "amen!"-but the coach is already half down Parliament Street, and the curious have set their watches (a very ancient absurdity, with which no true Cockney is ever known to dispense) by the Horse Guards; presently the summit of Westminster Bridge affords its unequalled view up and down the river, and then down we go at the rate of twelve miles an hour to the Marsh Gate. Good bye, Astley's (dearer to our youthful recollection than can ever be the theatre of Herodes Atticus); and heaven protect you, Mr Van Amburgh, in your den of lions!-may we not, after your remarkable conquest of ferocious natures, have to read of a melancholy inquest, some month or two hence, on all that the tiger has left! Wide swings the open toll-bar; coachee bows protectively to the man of tickets and white apron; awe-struck cart-folk, as they approach the gate, take special care to keep clear of the attraction of the Dover" Magnet!" Now, then, for Bethlehem Hospital and its unreclaimed territory of stagnant puddle, withered herbage, dust heaps, and

half sunk brick-bats, recalling its former site in Moorfields, and affording a neutral ground for cat-killing and carpet-beating; and next the lamp-post which we call obelisk; and then, dashing on amidst Greenwich, Blackheath, and Deptford coaches, and gigs, and "busses," and rattling taxcarts, and hotley boys in blue frocks, bearing huge baskets, and carried away at speed on large lean horses, and sundry urchins nearly rode over, and catching the lash for their encouragement, that well-known hostelry, the Elephant and Castle, the last place of open penknives and the morning paper, compels us to pull

up. "Any body for Dover ?"-four minutes more and the Bricklayers' Arms, "that last goal of short stages and divaricating roads-that Ultima Thule" of coach stands, is also left behind.

And now the coachman

slackens his speed, and the team treading the ground with a more uniform rhythm, as if conscious of impediments surmounted, gives time for more discriminative valedictions to well-known objects on the road. Ye paragons and crescents, rejoicing in unambitious patronymics-ye Arabella Rows and Cleveland Terraces, farewell!

Ye "seminaries" sown by the wayside-commercial, or classical, or both, or neither, and for whatever sex provided-if you only flourish like your sign-boards, into what a palmy state will you have grown, ere we return to place little girls and boys yet unborn under your fostering care! Statuaries (so I read your title)-carpenters in stone-lithographists of epitaphs to suit everybody-whose yards are full of the most engaging ready-made churchyard furniture, sprawling sculpture, and rhymes of which the efficacy is undeniable-in sixteen seconds the screech of your stone saw will be all your own! As for the proprietor of that one solitary gem, that green-glass globe over his hall door, which illuminates the else dark Row, like a single glow-worm in a hedge-(him of the threefold epithet)-I suppose to wish him many labours with few pains will be the most appropriate of vows. Et vos valete, prohibitors of suburban riot, black-belted, grey-coated,

hat-glazed, slow-walking policemen Peel's terriers-this is your proper region-you are revolting impertinences in Pall-Pall! Here comes a better man!—that jolly brewer, trudging along the road by the side of his team, or carolling as he sits on the shaft, with a pair of immense gastro cnemii cased in white stockings, and a two-inch bit of pipe-clay in his mouth-him whom sundry turnpike tickets adorn as to the band of his slouched hat.-Oh! when shall I taste porter again, or see a bright pewter mug of anybody's "entire ?" Secondhand book-stalls-which have so often afforded me a motive for a walk on the Surrey side-ye are already far behind! Bird shops, whose slender wires are all alive with twitter and chirrup, are seen no more; and as we approach the fields, where money is not wanted, or where there is less improvidence and fewer artificial wants, the last pawnbroker-the primum vivens and ultimum moriens of all traffickers beyond the Bridges-no

longer suspends the temptation of his three balls to the thirsty and the thoughtless! "Arms" of departed warriors, with your "long rooms," that hold out no delusive promises of a hundred table-spoons and napkins (cent couverts), I see you still; and strangers though ye be to " nosces et festius," may no sour Dissenter abridge your number, or disappoint your well-conducted visitors of their London Sunday! And, ye still more multiplied Victoria tea-gardens, although your shadeless bowers have been untried by me, they are meant for most harmless enjoyment, and so may your cockle-shell and periwinkle grottos continue to overflow, in sæcula sæculorum, with sober-minded young linen-drapers sipping bohea, with pretty sempstresses to put in the sugar for them! But we are now, I see, ascending Greenwich Hill, and are at last fairly out of London, and in for ten hours' fatigue, and no want of ten grains of Dover's powder to make us sleep to-night.

No pleasant thing, I ween, after dreaming Clarence's dream with variations all night, to hear the approaching tramp of thick-soled shoes, which suddenly cease before your particular cell, followed anon by three premonitory thumps, duly delivered on the sounding pannels-to perceive the first coruscation of ante-matinal lanthorn, and be certified that the yawning commissioner is bodily beside you to see him light your sputtering and ill-smelling candle at five on a November morning-to hear the sea-gulls screaming in their flight, with a basso accompaniment of baggage-carts, proceeding in all the mystery of darkness from their different hotels to the place of departure but to endure all this, and all that is to follow, for nothing! Well, it was your own fault. You must have heard the angry gust getting wilder and wilder as the night waxed on, and rising to a climax as the hour for being called drew near. Shrill pipings of the winds were also heard along the corridor, of which suitable portions were blown through your key-hole, like so many hisses from the head of Megæra. And were such intimations

VOL. XLV. NO. CCLXXXIII.

to be disregarded? Had not the convulsed window-frame been agitated in all its loose compages? Had not the external shutter slapped against the casement, and banged back again upon the crumbling brick-work, fifty times before the London mail came in? Did not out-of-door bells, hung in the yard below, ring unbidden? And was not your chimney full of Eolian music, sent to warn you that there could be no leaving the pier on that inauspicious morning? What a fool, then, you were to expose yourself to the condolence of the fellow that called you, and be obliged to hear, into the bargain, of the fine passages of all the last week! Nay, in the very act of routing you out, the caitiff muttered a something about wind, as he placed the greasy brass candlestick, with its two inches of tallow, on your dingy toilet, and went along the passage croaking the same raven-like notes at each of the condemned cells. Ah, the smell of morning candle! Out upon the fringe and festooning of the white dimity hearse of your English bed! Ha! what ghastly vision is that in the glass, with a razor in its hand?

2 x

Why, your very wife would be afraid of you! What accident may not befall the shaver who contends with beard in such a penury of light as the blustering morning without, and the unsnuffed dip within, contribute to afford? Shaving at Dover, at best, is only trying to shave, for futile is the attempt to coax hard white soap by help of harder water into a proper crasis. And now, dressed in Guy Faux fashion, and gone forth to explore, behold all your misgivings of the weather confirmed! Two incorruptible weathercocks give you your doom, SW. or SSW. to the letter. Think not, O, Cockney! to sap the judgment of some veteran pilot (who laughs at your ignorance), into the faintest expectation of better things; nor set yourself to bawl, holding your hat with both hands, to the imperturbable skipper on board, whose reply, if he vouchsafe any to such a pale-looking miserable devil, cannot possibly reach you, but is borne away to Deal and the Downs. No, no; you are in for it for at least twentyfour hours, during nine or ten of which you may stare through the hazy horizon along the denuded country, or make a desperate sortie in the interval of squalls to yonder cliffs, to the west, and listen to the noisy seabird working up against the gale, or pore upon the uplifted and prone descending mass of turbid waters; but it is too early for these out-of-door pleasures. The first meal of the day and the newspapers (which, however, you read yesterday in London), would at present be more acceptable, and help to cheat you of at least one of the hours before you; in obedience to which instinctive feeling you make

the best of your way back to your inn, and find-a clean fire and a hissing kettle? No, an empty, fireless coffee-room, every element of discomfort and incentive to ill-humour. To the still silent streets, therefore, you must necessarily betake yourself, and there, amidst the sadness of unclosing shops, abide the resuscitation of hotel life. Yonder (let me be your cicerone) is the gaunt figure of Mr Mummery, at the door of his slop-shop, in Snargate Street; those sly harbingers of the day (like the Hours in Guido's Rospiglion), are Messrs Levi and Moses, of whom the one is arranging his "museum," and the other getting his temple of fancy" ready for the stray visitor of Cocaigne. Still more certain signals of commencing day are soon afforded in the mopping and slopping of door-steps, the friction of brass-plates and knockers, and the war of the scrubbing brush and sand upon much-enduring door-steps. I think that we may now venture back to the hotel, and call at least for breakfast-not that it will come, for the water does not boil, the rolls are not arrived, the bread has to be toasted, and the milk-pail is late. The coffee - room, however, which was empty, is now occupied, and the occupants are of a class of individuals whom the waiters and chambermaids designate by the name of "gents."*

With these companions, then-fellow-creatures, no doubt, but not interesting, natural, or informed oneswe are to pass this blessed 10th of November, amidst fresh arrivals of wet umbrellas and drenched coats from mud-bespattered coaches. the heaviest day wends on! waiter's proposal of one of three eter

But

The

nal and loathed alternatives, veal cutlets, beef steaks, or mutton chops, with relays of bad potatoes between them, is to be listened to; and then for the brass candlestick once more, amidst the hopes and fears of the morrow, and a last attempt to extort comfortable assurances from the subordi

nates, who know and care nothing about it. Mean-while, the mate of the Britannia, it is certain, does not make his entrée, to beat up for passengers, nor is he seen lounging about the door-and this looks ill. O, Dover! Dover!

Eight o'clock, A. M.-And here, accordingly, we are for a second day, the weather fine enough to go out, but not fine enough to go over. Let us cut the coffee-room, walk till we can walk no longer, and think a little where we are, and why.

What unnumbered thousands, their hearts overcharged with various fortune and emotion, have, since the peace, approached that inconsiderable jetty, or seen that shingly beach disappear beneath the lofty cliff and the batteries on high! To what innu merable feet, and sped on what a variety of errands, have those sea-washed pebbles yielded a noisy pathway! Under what strangely altered views and unanticipated changes do many of our countrymen gaze once more on those "marine terraces"-those manywindowed rows! Surely no spot on earth has drunk so many tears, or heard so many sighs commingling with the sea-spray, and whirled on in the passing gust. Verily, if but a few specimens of the last twenty years' suffering enacted on this small arena could be in evidence, soon would the gay fancies of youth, and the smiling uncertainties of a first trip, be quelled! Figure to yourself whole thousands of already hectic forms (never so dear as when that cruel cast of expatriation befell them) sent from this tiny port to occupy some far-off tomb, or

received into it the shadows of the shades they were, and to die in the arms of friends and kinsfolk;-the only son of his mother, and she a widow -the cherished daughter, and the last!—the lately blooming wife, the lustre of whose bridal garment is scarcely tarnished,—or, sadder yet, if sadder can be, she that but for this parting was to have become such. These are familiar things to the hotels of Dover, both great and small. All, however, who hurry down to the packet do not die consumptive; nor is health the only object for which men go abroad. Science and curiosity, listlessness and debt, a reputation that requires nursing and will be the better for repose, economy and education, politics and pleasure, urge their re spective votaries. The Bourse, the Boulevard, the Institute, the Balletare not all these at Paris?

"Please, sir, are you for Boulogne?" "Why?" "Because the captain says he intends to try it, as the wind is falling." Will he ?-then I'm at his service;"-back in a twinkling-portmanteau in the passage-bill called for-waiter assiduous-the last English shillings disbursed,-in an hour we were on our backs in sight of Shakspeare's Cliff, with an assurance that the passage would be tedious, and a painful experience that its quality was to be of a piece with its duration.

Although, on some extraordinary occasions, genius, whether in man or psittacus, will make its way even in the sorriest coat; and though the bird of humbler plumage sometimes rises from the ranks by merit alone, yet you may take it as a general rule that a handsome Amazon swears,

sings, and whistles more cleverly, and with more variety of emphasis than any bird of her inches, and consequently brings the highest price in the parrot market. Your grey parrot comes next; "ornatur lauro collega secundo"-and don't despise him-he always attends to his lesson, and a