piano, it has also its forte, and very frequently a pianoforte. A bag-pipe has been known to revive the ardour and re-kindle the courage of a regiment of Highlanders, when their defeat and retreat seemed inevitable, and to make them fight like lions. The dying war-horse will start from the ground, in the agonies of death, on hearing the brazen trumpet sound the well-known charge; and the scraping of a threestringed fiddle at a wake, will set Paddy's heart in a blaze, and, in the pleasures of a lilt, efface the remembrance of the loudest sorrow. I say loudest, because, in Ireland, the quantum of sorrow is measured by the howls of the mourner.

Sir Charles fancied himself a first-rate violinist, and if the old adage be true, that " practice makes perfect," he certainly had arrived at perfection. One morning, when in the midst of one of Mori's Pot Pourris, his ears were very unceremoniously assailed, by the scratching of an old blind fiddler, executing Maggie Lauder in flats and sharps, immediately under his window, in the most unnatural manner. It was but the impulse of a moment to ring the bell, and desire John to drive the utterer of counterfeit notes away from the door. This was not, however, so easily accomplished. The scraper demurred to this summary sentence of transportation, and would not be kept at bay, for though out of sight, he was not out of mind, and continued so long within hearing, that the amateur wished him hanged, and was obliged to suspend his performance.

The next day, at the same hour, while Sir Charles was practising the same subject, came the itinerant scraper of cat-gut;-the same orders were repeated with the addition, that he was to evacuate the street altogether. This however the melodious murderer

declined doing-alleging, “that he was a poor old man, who subsisted upon the charity awakened by his fiddle, that many benevolent ladies and gentlemen lived in that street, who were in the habit of throwing him, half-pence, the loss of which would to him be a very great privation."-Sir Charles was glad to purchase an honourable peace, on the terms prescribed by his enemy,-viz. six-pence per week, being satisfied that one scraper at his door was sufficient.

P. L. DUMONT.

AMONG the persons liberated by Lord Exmouth, on his glorious triumph over the Algerines, was a Frenchman of the name of Pierre Joseph Dumont, who had endured a slavery of thirty-four years in Africa. He was one of the crew of La Lievre, which was wrecked by a storm on the coast of Africa, between Oran and Algiers. Sixty individuals perished in the waves; eighty escaped to land; out of these, about fifty were almost instantly massacred by the Koubals, a ferocious race, who were watching the effects of the tempest, and in the dead of the night, rushed down on the helpless mariners, armed with sabre, lance, pistol, and musket. All who escaped death from the first assault of the savages, were seized by them next morning, while vainly endeavouring to find a place of shelter along the sandy beach; each prisoner had his arms bound across, and was then attached with a long cord to the tail of one of the Arab's horses. In this manner the unfortunate captives were dragged along for eight days, without being allowed any other subsistence than bread and water.

At length they reached the mountain Felix, and were brought before the Sheik Osman. He inquired what country they they were of; and being told France, exclaimed, Let them be chained." The order was put into immediate execution. They were first stripped of their clothes, and supplied with nothing more than a sort of petticoat or trowsers. They were then bound together, two and two, to a large chain ten feet in length, and weighing about sixty pounds; and thus, half naked and in irons, they were taken to the prison appropriated for slaves.

"A little straw," says Dumont," was allowed us to lie on, with a stone for a pillow, and permission to sleep, if we could."

"Although I felt my wounds extremely painful, particularly one inflicted by a lance, I was compelled to labour with the rest at six every morning, dragging along my chain. Our food for the day was three ears of Indian corn, which were thrown to us as if we were dogs."

All the time the slaves were at work, the Koubals formed a circle round them, not so much to prevent their running away, as to protect them from the lions and tigers who would otherwise devour them. There are always," says Dumont, " a hundred and fifty armed men to watch over the safety of a hundred slaves. But though the Koubals are incessantly on the look out, it will not prevent the lion from sometimes carrying off its prey, if greatly pressed by hunger. One remarkable circumstance is, that the shouts and outcries of men will drive the wild beasts back into the woods; whereas, peals of musketry draw numbers of them out of the forest, as if curiosity formed some part of their instinct."

"But nothing," continues Dumont, "could exceed the horrors of what we endured one day, from the prison taking fire, with all the slaves shut up in it. Though no lives were lost, our beards and hair were partly consumed. The water intended for our use was turned off, to extinguish the flames. The heat and the torrents of smoke were suffocating, so that we foamed at the mouth; and, at one time, we were in apprehension of being burnt alive. No one thought of unloosing us, probably from a dread of some confusion and disorder; and only the usual quantities of water were dealt out to us, at the usual times: nor was this all; for a liberal distribution of the bamboo ensued, applied to some for setting fire to the place from negligence, to others, for not foreseeing the accident, and to others, for an imputed criminal intention, as if they would take an advantage of such an opportunity to effect their escape."

After being thirty-three years in slavery, Dumont was one of five hundred Christians who were exchanged for the two sons of Osman, taken prisoners by the Bey Titre. Dumont now became the slave of a new master, but received much better treatment; his irons were struck off, he was clothed, and had two black loaves, of five ounces each, and seven or eight olives, allowed him daily.

At Algiers he remained eight months. At length, the great deliverer, Lord Exmouth, appeared before Algiers and obtained the surrender of all the Christian slaves of every nation. Dumont adds,

"We were taken in by a number of English boats, and there it was that our last chains fell off, not without the deep sighs and regrets of three thousand renegadoes, who despaired of obtaining deliverance, and

lamented the day wherein they had apostatized from the Christian faith."

TRIUMPH OF HUMANITY.

THE piratical aggressions of the Algerines, and the cruel slavery to which they were for ages in the custom of dooming their Christian captives, had, at different times, provoked the indignation of European powers, and brought heavy inflictions of vengeance upon the barbarians. But to the united fleets of Britain and the Netherlands, under the command of Lord Exmouth, was reserved the glorious task of completing the triumph of humanity, by forcing the Algerine government to make a solemn renunciation for ever of the practice of Christian slavery.

Most truly was it observed by Lord Exmouth, in his official despatch, announcing the victory of Algiers, that "To have been one of the humble instruments in the hands of Divine Providence, of bringing to reason a ferocious government, and destroying, for ever, the insufferable and horrid system of Christian slavery, could never cease to be a source of delight and heartfelt comfort to every individual happy enough to be employed in it."

M. Salame, who accompanied the expedition in the capacity of interpreter, thus describes the anxiety of the slaves to escape from bondage.

"When the British boats came inside the Mole, the slaves began to push and throw themselves by crowds, ten or twenty persons together. 'It was, indeed, says M. Salame, 'a most glorious and ever memorable