dead, and all the preparations were accordingly made for his funeral. The dirges were sung by the school-boys, the clergy of the place accompanied the corpse to the grave, and the church-yard was crowded with spectators attracted by curiosity. But while they were letting down the coffin, and the grave-digger was throwing in a shovelful of earth, Kyan drove up the lid, and out he jumped like a squirrel. "The clergyman, who was just going to begin the burial service, from terror and amazement, ran down the clerk. The latter, notwithstanding his unwieldy corpulence, got up as quick as lightning, and in his flight threw down the first rank as neat as a large bowl throws down all the ninepins at once. The first rank tumbling brought down the second, and so on till all were flat on the ground, like a castle of cards blown down by the breath of the youthful builder. What a mishmash of hats and cloaks, of periwigs and shoes, lay around! The owners did not spend time in picking up their property, but hastened, out of breath, to the gate of the church-yard, bringing to the ground, in their flight, many a straggler, just as they themselves had been mown down before. The eccentric Baron, author of all this terror and disorder, dressed in a shrowd, as he was, followed close at the heels of the flying multitude, and drove them before him, as the autumnal wind drives the rustling leaves. No one ventured to address him, and he himself remained perfectly mute. At last the grave-digger ventured, with a trembling hand, to hold up his shovel before him, and to ask, Art thou a good or an evil spirit?'

"Kyan raised a shrill laugh, and answered, I have not the honour of being a spirit; I am an ensign alive and well; but tell me, pray, what are you all about here? Were you really going to bury me?'" &c.

The last story in the collection is, perhaps, the best.

"It was mentioned before, that Baron Kyan was commandant of the fortress Koenigstein, and he obtained that lucrative and honourable post by one of his humorous extravagancies. An account of this shall make the last specimen, for the present, of his eccentricity. That place became vacant

to

in the year 1715, and there appeared for it a great many candidates. Kyan, who was one of them, had, from good authority, the strongest reasons hope that it would be conferred upon him. But when, after some considerable time, he saw the appointment still undecided, he began to apprehend that, in the end, some other might get the start of him. He therefore thought of means to hasten the decision of the prince.

"One day he sat silent and demure at the king's table, who remarked his low spirits, and wished to know the The baron's answer was,

cause.

6

That the blue devil by which he was possessed, and which annoyed him so much, was an unsatisfied wish.' The courtiers, who were present, took hold of this expression, and now began to guess. One said, He would wish to live to the age of Methusalem.' Another, That he would fain be as rich as Croesus.' A third, That Cupid had shot an arrow at his old heart.' In like manner, many others played off what wit they had, each in his own way. But Kyan shook his head at all that was said, and assured them, that they had, one and all of them, missed the mark. Well, what do you wish then?' asked the king. Have you, perhaps, a hankering after the crown and sceptre? Your majesty is really a Solomon,' replied the sly rogue. 'It was, indeed, my wish to be king only for three minutes.' That you shall be,' said the monarch; and I, in the meantime, shall be General Kyan.' The minute-king now rose from the table, took up a silver-ladle as his sceptre, seated himself in an arm-chair which stood against the wall, bristled up, and turning to the king, said, with the utmost gravity in his voice, and in his manner: Our trusty and well-beloved Kyan, after having duly considered your humble petition, we have graciously resolved to confer on you the place of commandant in the fortress of Koenigstein.' When he had uttered these words, he immediately quitted his throne, and laid down his sceptre; on which the king said, amidst abundance of laughter, it as you have said, you are commandant of Koenigstein;' and on the following day he was installed. This comic scene will remind those, who are readers of Shakespeare, of the short

Be

So much for Langbein's jest-book. It is at least worth knowing what is the state of pleasantry among our German neighbours. Strong symptoms, here, of the drollery and buffoonery of a people only on the road to civilization!-yet we may not judge quite fairly from this specimen. Langbein gives this as the rifacciamento of an old set of tales, that had long been current among the populace, exactly like those of our George Buchanan; but it was scarcely worth while to revive them.

REMARKS ON MELMOTH, CONCLUDED.

We concluded our observations on Mr Maturin's performance in our last Number by remarking, that, if there be any truth in the picture which he has drawn of the monastic life, and by a fair inference, of the Catholic religion in general,-if its ministers are all gloomy, suspicious, and vindictive tyrants over those unhappy victims whom superstition has subjected to their sway, if they are really capable of using this unhallowed and unlimited power to such deadly purposes, breaking asunder without remorse every tie of nature, of religion, or morality, that in the least seems to obstruct their purposes or diminish their influence; again we would ask, if these be so, does he indeed "bear a charmed life," when he ventures thus boldly, wantonly we might say, to disclose the secrets of their prison house, while dwelling in the very vortex of their influence, and this, where an ignorant, bigotted, and ferocious populace, would never hesitate to obey any mandate of their spiritual guides? If our author is not protected by some invisible panoply, his safety is the clearest demonstration of the comparative innocence of the body which such an attack must have provoked. It is more-it is an evidence of uncommon meekness and forbearance in the Catholic clergy.

To return to Monçada. This unfortunate young nobleman, on being confined in the prison of the Inquisition, had the most alarming terrors hanging over him that can be imagined; yet one would think he had supped so full of horrors in the infernal

VOL. VIII.

that nothing remained more torturing to the body or more afflicting to the mind. Here, to be sure, the climax of horror should have been attained; but Mr Maturin seems rather injudiwhat was to be expected even in that ciously to have anticipated much of ultimatum of misery and oppression. It is difficult to understand the construction of a mind so pregnant with dily suffering, that it seems absoluteevery aggravation of mental and boit describes, but in that which he proly to luxuriate, not only in the pain duces in his readers. Surrounded as he is with terrible objects, and gleams of sulphureous flame, which his hero is ever and anon presenting to our view, the reverend author appears to our imagination like some Vulcan of the anvil, assiduously labouring at forging shackles, bolts, and instruments of torture, with this difference, that with the poor mechanic it was not matter of choice, whereas Mr Maturin, with all the flowery paths of fiction open to him, has preferred this tortuous and gloomy one.

We have so many more tempting subjects for quotation before us, that we shall proceed at once to the catastrophe that relieved Moncada from the apprehensions of the torture and death that were prepared for him, as well as from the suggestions of the fiendish visitor who was in the hour of his misery and weakness tempting him to give up "his eternal jewel,' for a release from present and dreaded temporal suffering. This was no other than a fire which had broke out in the Inquisition, and consumed some part of those dwellings of despair before it could be extinguished. Escaping with other fellow-sufferers through the crowd, Moncada stumbled into a dwelling, where, a most unwelcome guest, he became unconsciously a witness of the secrets of the family.

"The room was very small; and I could perceive by the rents, that I had not only broken open a door, but a large curfolds still afforded me concealment, if I retain which hung before it, whose ample quired it. There was no one in the room, and I had time to study its singular furni ture at leisure.

"There was a table covered with cloth, on it were placed a vessel of a singular construction, a book, into whose pages I look3 Y

ed, but could not make out a single letter. I therefore wisely took it for a book of magic, and closed it with a feeling of exculpatory horror. (It happened to be a copy of the Hebrew Bible, marked with the Samaritan points.) There was a knife too; and a cock was fastened to the leg of the table, whose loud crows announced his impatience of further constraint.

"I felt that this apparatus was somewhat singular it looked like a preparation for a sacrifice. I shuddered, and wrapt myself in the volumes of the drapery which hung before the door my fall had broken open. A dim lamp, suspended from the ceiling, discovered to me all these objects, and enabled me to observe what followed almost immediately. A man of middle age, but whose physiognomy had something peculiar in it, even to the eye of a Spaniard, from the clustering darkness of his eye-brows, his prominent nose, and a certain lustre in the balls of his eyes, entered the room, knelt before the table, kissed the book that lay on it, and read from it some sentences that were to precede, as I imagined, some horrible sacrifice; felt the edge of the knife, knelt again, uttered some words which I did not understand, (as they were in the language of that book,) and then called aloud on some one by the name of Manasseh-ben-Solomon. No one answered. He sighed, passed his hand over his eyes with the air of a man who is asking pardon of himself for a short forgetfulness, and then pronounced the name of 'Antonio.' A young man immediately entered, and answered, Did you call me, father? But while he spoke, he threw a hollow and wandering glance on the singular furniture of the room.

"I called you, my son, and why did you not answer me?' I did not hear you, father-I mean, I did not think it was on me you called. I heard only a name I was never called by before. When you said Antonio, I obeyed you, 1 came.'

But that is the name by which you must in future be called and be known, to me at least, unless you prefer another.You shall have your choice. My father, I shall adopt whatever name you choose."

No; the choice of your new name must be your own-you must, for the future, either adopt the name you have heard, or another.' What other, Sir ? -That of parricide.' The youth shuddered with horror, less at the words than at the expression that accompanied them; and, after looking at his father for some time in a posture of tremulous and supplicating inquiry, he burst into tears. The father seized the moment. He grasped the arms of his son, My child, I gave you life, and you may repay the gift-my life is in your power. You think me a Catholic-I have brought you up as one

for the preservation of our mutual lives, in a country where the confession of the true faith would infallibly cost both. I am one of that unhappy race every where stigmatized and spoken against, yet on whose industry and talent the ungrateful country that anathematizes us, depends for half the sources of its national prosperity. I am a Jew, 6 an Israelite,' one of those to whom, even by the confession of a Christian apostle, pertain the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh-' Here he paused, not willing to go on with a quotation that would have contradicted his sentiments. He added, The Messias will come, whether suffering or triumphant. I am a Jew. I called you at the hour of your birth by the name of Manasseh-benSolomon. I called on you by that name, which I felt had clung to the bottom of my heart from that hour, and which, echoing from its abyss, I almost hoped you would have recognized. It was a dream, but will you not, my beloved child, realize that dreani ? Will you not?-will you not? The God of your fathers is waiting to embrace you and your father is at your feet, imploring you to follow the faith of your father Abraham, the prophet Moses, and all the holy prophets who are with God, and who look down on this moment of your soul's vacillation between the abominable idolatries of those who not only adore the Son of the carpenter, but even impiously compel you to fall down before the image of the woman his mother, and adore her by the blasphemous name of Mother of God, and the pure voice of those who call on you to worship the God of your fathers, the God of ages, the eternal God of heaven and earth, without son or mother, without child or descendant, (as impiously presumed in their blasphemous creed,) without even worshipper, save those who, like me, sacrifice their hearts to him in solitude, at the risk of those hearts being

PIERCED BY THEIR OWN CHILDREN.'

"At these words, the young man, overcome by all he saw and heard, and quite unprepared for this sudden transition from Catholicism to Judaism, burst into tears. The father seized the moment,

My child, you are now to profess yourself the slave of these idolaters, who are cursed in the law of Moses, and by the commandment of God,-or to enrol yourself among the faithful, whose rest shall be in the bosom of Abraham, and who, reposing there, shall see the unbelieving crawling over the burning ashes of hell, and supplicate you in vain for a drop of water, according to the legends of their own prophet. And does not such a picture excite your pride to deny them a

drop?" I would not deny them a drop,' sobbed the youth, I would give them these tears. Reserve them for your father's grave,' added the Jew, for to the grave you have doomed me. I have lived, sparing, watching, temporizing, with these accursed idolaters, for you. And nowand now you reject a God who is alone able to save, and a father kneeling to implore you to accept that salvation. No, I do not,' said the bewildered youth.- What, then, do you determine?-I am at your feet to know your resolution. Behold, the mysterious instruments of your initiation are ready. There is the uncorrupted book of Moses, the prophet of God, as these idolaters themselves confess. There are all the preparations for the year of expiation-determine whether those rites shall now dedicate you to the true God, or seize your father, (who has put his life into your hands,) and drag him by the throat into the prisons of the Inquisition. You may-you can-will you ?'

"In prostrate and tremulous agony, the father held up his locked hands to his child. I scized the moment-despair had made me reckless. I understood not a word of what was said, except the reference to the Inquisition. I seized on that last word-I grasped, in my despair, at the heart of father and child. I rushed from behind the curtain, and exclaiming, If he does not betray you to the Inquisition, I will.' I fell at his feet. This mixture of defiance and prostration, my squalid figure, my inquisitorial habit, and my bursting on this secret and solemn interview, struck the Jew with a horror he vainly gasped to express, till, rising from my knees, on which I had fallen from my weaknes, I added, "Yes, I will betray you to the Inquisition, unless you instantly promise to shelter me from it. The Jew glanced at my dress, perceived his danger and mine, and, with a physical presence of mind unparalleled, except in a man under strong impressions of mental excitation and personal danger, bustled about to remove every trace of the expiatory sacrifice, and of my inquisitorial costume, in a moment. In the same breath he called aloud for Rebekah, to remove the vessels from the table; bid Antonio quit the apartment, and hastened to clothe me in some dress that he had snatched from a wardrobe collected from centuries; while he tore off my inquisitorial dress with a violence that left me actually naked, and the habit in rags.

"There was something at once fearful and ludicrous in the scene that followed. Rebekah, an old Jewish woman, came at his call; but, seeing a third person, retreated in terror, while her master, in his confusion, called her in vain by her Christian name of Maria. Obliged to remove the table alone, he overthrew it, and broke

the leg of the unfortunate animal fastened to it, who, not to be without his share in the tumult, uttered the most shrill and intolerable screams, while the Jew, snatching up the sacrificial knife, repeated eagerly, Statim mactat gallum,' and put the wretched bird out of its pain; then, trembling at this open avowal of his Judaism, he sat down amid the ruins of the overthrown table, the fragments of the broken vessels, and the remains of the martyred cock. He gazed at me with a look of stupified and ludicrous inanity, and demanded in delirious tones, what my lords the inquisitors had pleased to visit his humble but highly-honoured mansion for?' I was scarce less deranged than he was; and, though we both spoke the same language, and were forced by circumstances into the same strange and desperate confidence with each other, we really needed, for the first half-hour, a rational interpreter of our exclamations, starts of fear, and bursts of disclosure. At last our mutual terror acted honestly between us, and we understood each other. The end of the matter was, that, in less than an hour, I felt myself clad in a comfortable garment, seated at a table amply spread, watched over by my involuntary host, and watching him in turn with red wolfish eyes, which glanced from his board to his person, as if I could, at a moment's hint of danger from his treachery, have changed my meal, and feasted on his life-blood. No such danger occurred, my host was more afraid of me than I had reason to be of him, and for many causes.

He was a Jew innate, an impostor,-a wretch, who, drawing sustenance from the bosom of our holy mother the church, had turned her nutriment to poison, and attempted to infuse that poison into the lips of his son. I was but a fugi.. tive from the Inquisition,-a prisoner, who had a kind of instinctive and very venial dislike to giving the inquisitors the trouble of lighting the faggots for me, which would be much better employed in consuming the adherent to the law of Moses. In fact, impartiality considered, there was every thing in my favour, and the Jew just acted as if he felt so, but all this I ascribed to his terrors of the Inquisition."" Vol. III. pp. 2—13.

Mutual confidence became necessary to all parties; yet the Jew, though not so void of humanity as the monks, began to tire of his involuntary guest; and here the feelings, of the forlorn exile from all the charities of life, are naturally expressed, upon the Jew's mildly asking what he next meant to do, or where to go. He says," This question, for the first time, opened to my view that range