no you think me wrong, Doctor Snoaker, but this was exactly the course the poison took in my father's constitution; and, by these successive gradations, conducted him to his grave at the early age of thirty-three, leaving his troubles, a wife and four small children, behind him. The funeral was strictly private, for three reasons-first, because my mother wished it; secondly, because we had friends; and, thirdly and lastly, because we had no money. In the whole range of the shady side of human existence, which I delight to study, because I live on the shady side of life myself, there is no spectacle so touching as that of the remains of a poor man on the way to their last restingplace. It is not alone that my eye is arrested by the miserable cavalcade, it is the picture of domestic bereavement that presses upon, and fills the imagination. I mourn not for the dead thus rudely huddled to the grave, for "they rest from their labours, and their works do follow them: " I lament with the survivor drooping beside the desolate hearth-the bereaved wife the fond husband-the good parent-the. dutiful child, in whose heart of hearts the memory of that perishable clay is for ever enshrined. It is not that there I see conveyed away to kindred dust the staff of the father's age, or the joy of a mother's hope the provider of the widow and the orphan the fond partaker of domestic sorrow-the gentle solace of a poor man's toil-no-no— there is more gone with the dead, for ever gone the tender recollection of divided joys, the sweet remembrance of sympathy in sorrow, affections never to blossom again on this side the grave! These losses I mourn, for that they are human-for that they are mine own. I lament over the dead with the living. He is gone-my friendmy brother! Flow, generous drops, flow on! nor let a blush mantle upon the cheek whereon they fall, or, if bitterness mingle with thy tears, may it never be the bitterness of mine that the barren wish, and the vain compassionate tear, make all the bounty it is thine to bestow! An impoverished country exhibits this sad finale in the greatest variety; and accordingly if you had happened any of you, to be tanding at the gate of Bully's acre near Kilmainham, on a Sunday afternoon in May, thirty years ago, you might have observed, among other exhibitions of the sort, four drunken scoundrels in rags that had once belonged to suits of black, huddling along a coffin of rough elm, naked, upon their shoulders. You are not to suppose that they walked soberly and with decency as is usual in such cases. On the contrary, they floundered along, carrying their burden, en echellon, and giving it a couple of bumps against the gate-posts as they entered the burial-ground. Behind tottered an old gentleman with a spade and shovel, and a weeping boy holding a little girl by the hand, closed the procession. Arrived at the ground, the old gentleman proceeded to scrape a hole, for as to digging a grave that piece of extravagance is never thought of at Bully's acre, while the drunken bearers produced from their rags a bottle of whisky each, the sole remuneration they had received or expected for their services. When the hole had been scraped, just deep enough to hold the coffin, two of the drunken bearers seized upon it by pieces of pack cord which protruded through perforations at either extremity, and with many bumps and kicks succeeded in getting it into the hole; a little earth was then scattered over by the old gentleman, one end being purposely left uncovered, in order that the public might see there was a coffin, and that they might not disturb it for a fortnight at least. This ceremony being concluded, there remained nothing further than to recompense the old gentleman, which I did by untying the corner of my pocket handkerchief, and producing a shilling secured therein for this last melancholy service. Thus ended the funeral of a cabinet-maker and common councilman, who understood the sources of national wealth, had mastered the true theory of rent, and could argue Peyronnet Thompson himself upon the Corn Laws. Not to keep you longer engaged with my ancestors,-I was born on the 19th day of August (old style), in the year I perceive you are glad I am coming to myself at last, and I dare say you wish, ungrateful dogs that ye are, that I had been born before my father and grandfather, by which inversion of the order of nature you would have had me married by this time, to my second wife at least. This is all the thanks I get for leaving out the hissory of my aunt Bridget, who eloped with Teague Duffy, the French dancing-master: her adventures would furnish materials for three fashionable novels as fashionable novels goplot, dialogue, and catastrophe, and which any autobiographer alive, except myself, would make a right good living of! I omit Bridget with the less regret, as she disgraced the family trade, CHORUS. by demeaning herself with Teague Arrah, widdy, says I, stop my bachelor's Duffy, and so I was going to say, I was ushered into public life on the nineteenth day of August (old style), at twenty-two minutes past eight in the morning, in the year I perceive you are somewhat impatient, gentlemen, but what would you have me to do-take precedence of my lawful father and grandfather, and break through the settled precedents of a thousand autobiographies— excuse me, gentlemen, if you please"after your ladyship," as Prince Posterity said to my grandmother! Well, the devil a syllable more of my autobiography will you get from my lips this blessed night-for I see it is between three and four in the morning. Pat! no sugar for me, I never take sugar with my "night-cap." While Pat is mixing our grog, gentlemen, Or, as sure as you live, I will die an ould maid! III. Arrah, widdy, says Mick, stop my bachelor's trade, we can't do better than indulge the Or, as sure as you live, I will die an ould Counseral by allowing him to sing a maid! IV. No longer they tarried, But off to be married, As thick as two sweeps, to the church they were sped; When, who should be stalking, To stop their church-walking, But the widdy's live husband-the boy that Poor Mike was confounded, The men picked her up, and the women FINALE. So here I am left to my bachelor's trade, And if none of yees take me, I die an ould maid. ITALY AS IT WAS. You tell me, my dear Eusebius, that you wish to deter a young friend from going to Italy; and therefore desire me to put on paper some of those disagreeable incidents, that when I told them to you some years ago, you thought, if published, would keep many a tourist of our comfortloving age, within the more decent bounds of our own counties, or the three kingdoms; though I know not, but that if decency be the measure, one of the three may be omitted. In the first place, Eusebius, I greatly admire your simplicity in imagining that incidents of difficulties, annoyances, or even danger, will deter a young friend from his proposed travel. For, suppose him to be of that extremely indiscreet age at which the law of the land thinks fit to make him his own master, the prospect of encountering them will naturally so excite his youthful spirits, his courageous energies, that he will but bid you good-bye the sooner. Try the contrary method, and tell him of all the pleasures he will have to enjoy, and the chances are that none will be to his taste, and he will grow cool. There is always a disposition in youth to kick manfully at every obstacle put in its way; how ever pleasant a toy that which you put in their way may have appeared, before they find it out to be an obstacle, then fire and fury is in them, and the very moon looks pale lest that obstacle be kicked in her very face, so high does the spirit of indignation mount; and if you repeat this, you will surely beget in them pertinacity, which, nolens volens, will make a fool of you, excuse, (dear Eusebius, the personality,) and of themselves too. You had better let them expend their illtimed and megrim-bred desires by giving them the full scope of talk, and they will subside of themselves. Hercules would never have made the choice, if Virtue had not put the difficulties before him, and you know Pleasure was sent packing. But there is proof in matter of fact, and, therefore, I give you an example. I was requested to remonstrate with a youth who had unaccountably, so his friends said, taken a whim, a fancy to enter the army, to which profession his friends had an aversion, and the youth an unfitness. It arose from their laying before him a scheme of life, it being then about the time he should finish his course at the university. They dwelt upon the country Elysium of a quiet parsonage, how easy would be his progress through the university; but unfortunately they did not stop there, but dwelt in much detail upon the dangers, disgusts, horrors, and turmoils of the several other professions, and particularly of the army. Would you believe it, the gentle youth, the amiable youth, who never had a hand to grasp a sword, a heart to shed blood, or a head for "plots and stratagems" whom nature had gifted like the cat with domesticity, and to purr out his days of quiet happiness at a parsonage hearth, with his infant cherub faces about him, copies of his own and their mother's tenderness, this lamb of men decides upon acting the tiger, and nothing will go down with him but the army. Letters of remonstrance passed in quick succession: this only made the matter worse, or rather made it what it was, a temporary fever; and in this state I was requested to remonstrate with him. But I took care to do no such thing. I talked it over with him, and, assuming that he had chosen that profession, I spoke of the glory of it, and thence gently let down the talk into the requisites for it, and questioned him, as I remembered reading that Socrates did a youth of a somewhat similar ambition. Of course, I made him prove himself consummately ignorant in all that related to war. I questioned him upon statistics and politics, and all the mysteries of strategy generally, and in particular what I could muster up or invent. I saw some considerable shame at his own ignorance, and the first interview ended, after he had shown up himself as unfit for the regular army, with a determination to join General Evans in Spain. I reported the matter to his friends-advised them to let a little while pass, and then to authorize me to let him take his choice. They did so, and my next interview with him showed that his fever was of the ague kind, and had its hot and its cold fits. I began by lamenting, on his account, love!-not he; he took a wiser course, that General Evans (for so it was), entered into his schemes, made calcuwould return, and receive no more vo- lations for him, in the most friendly lunteers but that I had great satis- manner, of expenses, in detail the faction in assuring him, that his youth never thought of, by the day, friends had fully acquiesced in his by the week, by the month, by the wishes, and that they would procure year, And all this was done during him a commission in our own army, a walk they took together, when the and without doubt he would soon see father said they might as well go and military service. This was an unex-look for a house for him and his wife pected blow to his pertinacity, for it to live in, "Of course, said he, you took him in the very place where he must choose one according to our calhad prepared no defence. He looked culations; and you will not think of the cold fit, when he should have as entertaining, or even visiting your sumed the hot, and stammered out friends A, B, C, D, &c., and I darethanks to his friends; but that, in fact, say you'll be very happy. Love, my he had made up his mind to join Ge- dear boy, is every thing, though it be neral Evans in his glorious career, not handsomely lodged," and just and of course he could not exactly yet then, in a narrow passage, that could make up his mind to fight on the other neither be called street, lane, or aveside. But he would think of it, and nue, the father suddenly stopped (not in a short time acquaint me with his arrested by the perfumed air of Cudecision. I laughed in his face, ex- pid's roses), in front of a low house, posed to him the humbug he had been not remarkable for neatness, nor even practising, perhaps upon himself, and cleanliness, but that the operation certainly upon others, and showed him of the latter was going on. For there, so clearly that I knew all the turnings at the door, was a laborious mother of his own mind, that in the end he washing her two dirty children, padlaughed too, and said, with a little re- dling at her feet, and the end of a cramaining air of humbug, that perhaps dle just peeped in at the back-ground. it would be better, or at least more ho- "There, now, my dear boy," said he, nourable in him now, as the case stood, "the rent of just such a house would exin his turn to acquiesce in the wishes actly suit your means." "Don't say of his friends, and that he therefore another word about the matter," said would make a sacrifice of his own de, the shamed youth," I see it won't do." sires to theirs. The rest is easily And so they went homewards, and told. "Cedunt arma toga." in the way took another lodging, the cold fit being pretty strong upon him I will furnish you, Eusebius, with another example. You know my excellent friend B. He was in life a practical philosopher, and many a delightful proof of it will I, one of these days, give you, for he loved to be open in all his thoughts and actions to his friends. Well, then, he had a son in London, in employment that brought him in a moderate income, even for a single man, but he was young, and there were hopes of progressive improvement. The youth fell in love with the daughter of the woman with whom he lodged-this was a very hot fit-and of this there is almost always sure to be a cold fit, but it comes frequently too late, when the remedy taken has proved worse than the disease. The good father had ever encouraged candour, and his children were as open-hearted and minded as he was himself, so that the affair was soon communicated. And what, think you, the father did ?-oppose his son's and he told me since that for a year or two, whilst he lived in really single blessedness," he never saw a pretty face, that would otherwise have fascinated him, but he saw in the back ground of the picture, the very scene his father had pointed out to him, and then involuntarily set himself running through the catalogue of items of daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly expenses, and at such times the two following lines of the modern poet were constantly ringing in his ears "Love in a hut, with water and a crust, Is-Love, forgive us!-cinders, ashes, dust." Now, my dear, Eusebius, you will endeavour to deter your friend, the Tourist Youth, in what manner you please; but I will comply with your request as well as I can; for many years have passed since my travels, 66 and I was robbed of my notes-and sticks, mere dots, and as it seemed all my travel now is by the fire-side, over them the dim beings that could and all my speculation into it-and so not enter the regions of fiery punishwas I employed when this letter of ment; and I thought of a deluded yours, with so strange a demand, people, vain prayers to saints, and reached me and had far other priests and purgatory,-the double, thoughts and imaginations than of scarlet kingdoms of Pope and Popery, sitting down to write an account of above and below-then, by easy tranmatters of fact, and they of times so sition, of Italy—and as if all the vision long since gone. You, in your con- . had been a preparation, and an omen, fabulations with me, fly off into all your letter, Eusebius, was put into my vagaries, and so will I, after your own hands. And is not the vision in many fashion, tell you what waking dreams respects descriptive of Italy? It is a I was indulging, and what visions I land of a golden age, of fabled deities saw in the hot coals, when you start- that walked the groves, and lingered led me by your pen and ink questions; about the fountains. The land of and in faith I think they may not be Poetry, the brightest, ancient, and unapt to the subject of your requests. revered of noble souls, high action, I had looked till imagination center- and romance. But it has been sadly ing sight, had subtracted all that could shaken-evil have been the changes, measure space. Fairer scenes than and worse they are. There are falsi poets' "Fairy Land" opened to the fying Eustaces," and many more view; illumined palaces, gardens, ter- than " Forty Thieves;" a population races, and glistening rocks, and my- of robbers or cheats, and, to wind up riads of star-like happy beings wan- all, it is the fountain-head of superstidering over regions brighter, infinitely tion, where crimes multiply, for pardon brighter, than any this world's sun is bought for money-of blasphemy ever shone upon. Then the whole and impiety, for Popery reigns there. shook, and as with the sudden move- How like you the phillipic? I have ment of a magic glass, there was a beard more vehement from yourself, change, but it was perfect. I beheld Eusebius, on the same subject. Yours the enchanted land of Ariosto, figures has been the flash of indignant genius of larger size-knights and ladies, the cliff and tower of polished steel, and the great magician issuing from the gates, his shield uncovered. The coals again subside; they shake-instant is the change. I am inclosed in a theatre of caverns, receding into immense distances, and all illuminated as with ten thousand lamps. I was the happy Aladdin_suddenly there is a slight noise-it is the "Open Sesame!" the caverns grow darker, and in rush the "Forty Thieves." Is there no escape? The coals again shake there is another and an awful change -there is a black incrustation around a horrid gulph, all red, with caverns and abysses, from whose depth shook forked flames, visions such as Dante saw, and drew in his Inferno; and over this fiery abyss was one, a huge figure foreshortened, falling headlong into the oven of perdition, and without, dimly seen, and partly in blue light, were fiends or angels that had accompanied the condemned to the very verge, either to hurl him deeper, or to save. Another movement, and the gulf is closed, and over it were dark arches, in which were a few burning mine is but a sketch from nature. "Experto crede Roberto." It is a strange time, after the lapse of so many years, to call upon me for my adventures; and I am almost tempted to answer in the words of the celebrated Knife-grinder,— "Story, God bless you, I have none to tell, sir." But I will tell you, as well as I can remember, what I found Italy in the year 18-; and since you more particularly wish me to give an account of my falling in with the banditti in Calabria, I will begin with that adventure. In Italy it would be common-place-here it may have some interest. At whatever inn you stop in Italy, you are sure to find a number of persons about it, wrapped up in brown cloaks, and half their faces hid, apparently mere idlers. These are, in in general, either robbers or emissaries of robbers, who find out all it may be requisite for the fraternity to know about travellers, particularly their time of leaving and the road they are going. It must be here observed, and the observation is to be remembered in all places during this narrative, that I |