of the chief dramatis personæ in Mr Macdonald, W.S. Edinburgh, a pawky carle, we ought rather to say, a know ing knave, who in good time deve lopes out into a character most forbid ding and formidable. The insides talk away in a very amusing manner, and we were just going to quote a bit of bam and balderdash from their various argumentations, and wranglings, and sparring, when we came suddenly on the following description of an Eng lish landscape. We quote it as a striking example of the sudden splendour of imagination with which this writer often lights up what he beholds, whether it be a mental or material vision, and the capricious wilfulness with which he as suddenly flings himself away from it, and turns off to other images of a lower, and even ludicrous kind, but which, notwithstanding, are made, by the power of genius, to blend, without offence, in the richness or magnificence of the picture.

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"Never had Reginald opened his eyes on that richest-and perhaps grandest, too of all earthly prospects, a mighty English plain, until he saw it in all its perfection from the Hill of Haynam, that spot where Charles Edward, according to the local tradition, stood rooted below a sycamore, and gazing with a fervour of admiration, which even rising despair could not check, uttered the pathetic exclamation, Alas! this is England,' The boundless spread of beauty and of grandeur-for even hedges and hedgerows are woven by distance into the semblance of one vast wood-the apparent ease the wealth-the splendourthe limitless magnificence-the minute elaborate comfort-the picturesque villages-the busy towns-the embosomed spires the stately halls-the ancestral groves-everything, the assemblage of which stamps' England herself alone' -they all lay before him, and there needed no Alas!' to preface his confession. -But as to the particulars, are they not written in John Britton, F.A.S.?-And who is it that has not seen all that Reginald saw, just as well as he? Who is not acquainted with the snug unpretending little inns, with their neatly papered parlours, and prints of Hambletonian and Lord Granby, and handy waiters, and neat-fingered waiting-maids, and smiling landladies, and bowing landlords, and good dinners smoking in sight of the stopping coach? and the large noisy bustling inns, with travellers' rooms full of saddle-bags and dread-noughts, and tobacco-smoke

and Welsh-rabbits, enormous hams and jugs of porter, and stained newspapers, and dog-eared Directories, and chattering, joking, waiter-awing bagmen, and civil contemplative Quakers,

Some sipping punch, some sipping tea, All silent, and all-?

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and the charming airy country towns near a shady grove and a murmuring brook,' with cleanly young girls seen over the Venetian blinds, in the act of

rubbing comfortable old fellows' bald pates

-and other comfortable old fellows just mounting their easy pad-nags to ride out

a mile-and other cleanly young girls laying the tablecloth for

roast mutton, rather than ven'son or teal?'-and the

filthy large towns, with manufactories and steam-engines, and crowded sloppy streets, and doctors' bottles, green and blue,' in the windows? and the stately little cities, with the stately little parsons walking about them, two or three abreast, in well-polished shoes, and blameless silk aprons some of them, and grand old churches, and spacious well-built closes, and trim gardens, and literary spinsters?

We have all of us seen these thingsand they are all of them good in their several ways. We have all been at such places as Preston, and Manchester, and Birmingham, and Litchfield. We have all seen statesman Brougham's paddock, and listened to

"

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"

Long-Preston Peggy to Proud-Preston went, For to see the bould rebels it was her intent.' We have all heard of Whitaker's History, and the late Dr Ferrier, and the Literary and Philosophical Society of the Mancunian Mart.' We have all admired Soho, and pin-making, and Chantry's bust of James Watt. We have all heard of Anna Seward, and sighed over her lines on the death of Major André; and sympathized with the indignation of Richard Lovell Edgeworth, Esq. at the damned goodnatured friend,' who asked across the table for Mrs Edgeworth and the babies, just when he and Anna were opening the trenches of their flirtation. And we have all seen the house where Samuel Johnson's father sold books; and many of us have (like Reginald) walked half-a-mile farther, on purpose to see the willow which Surly Sam' himself planted in Tetsy's daughter's garden. And we have all been at Stratford-upon-Avon, and written our names in black lead upon the wall, and heard that old body that says she is Shakespeare's great-great-greatgreat-great-great-grand - niece- in - law, spout the opening scene of her 'WATERLOO, a TRAGEDY.'

which the antagonists are alternately driven, in the most spirited manner, but to the manifest advantage of the priest, to the ropes. Reginald listens with intense interest to the old priest's narrative of his own and niece's escape from drowning; and well he might, for a more powerful and terrible picture of danger, and fear, and death, never was painted.

"Well, sir, we did get on,' he proceeded; and we got on bravely and gaily too, for a time, till all at once, sirs, the Bauer-knecht, that rode before us, halted. The mist, you will observe, had been clearing away pretty quickly on the right hand, but it was dark enough towards the front, and getting darker and darker; but we thought nought on't till the boy pulled up. 'Meinherr, Meinherr!' cried the fellow, I am afraid I hear the water.' He stopt for a moment, and then said, 'Stay you for a moment where you are, and I'll soon see whether we are right.' With that, off he went, as if the devil was at his tail; and we, what could we do-we stood like two stocks-and poor little Ellen, she looked into my face so woefully, that I wished to God we were both safe in the blackest hole of Bieche. In short, I suppose he had not galloped half a bow-shot, ere we quite lost sight of the fellow, but for several minutes more we could hear his horse's hoofs on the wet sand. We lost that too-and then, sirs, there came another sound, but what it was we could not at first bring ourselves to understand. Ellen stared me in the face again, with a blank look, you may swear; and, Good God!' said she at last, I am certain it's the sea, uncle ?'- No, no!' said I, 'listen, listen! I'm sure you are deceived.' She looked and listened, and so did I, sirs, keenly enough; and, in a moment, there came a strong breath of wind, and away went the mist driving, and we heard the regular heaving and rushing of the waters. 'Ride, ride, my dear uncle,' cried Ellen, or we are lost;' and off we both went, galloping as hard as we could away from the waves. My horse was rather the stronger one of the pair, but at length he began to pant below me, and just then the mist dropt down again thicker and thicker right and left, and I pulled up in a new terror, lest we should be separated; but Ellen was alongside in a moment, and, faith, however it was, she had more calmness with her than I could muster, She put out her hand, poor girl, and grasped mine, and there we remained for, I dare say, two or three minutes, our horses, both of them, quite blown, and we

should I make many words about all that? I screamed, and screamed, and better screamed, but she only squeezed my hand, and shook her head, as if it was all of no avail. I had shouted till I was as hoarse as a raven, and was just going to give up all farther thoughts of making any exertion; for, in truth, I began to feel benumbed and listless all over, my friends -when we heard a gun fired. We heard it quite distinctly, though the mist was so thick that we could see nothing. I cried then; you may suppose how I cried; and Ellen too, though she had never opened her lips before, cried as lustily as she could. Again the gun was fired, and again we answered at the top of our voices; and then, God bless me !-was there ever such a moment? We heard the dashing of the oars, and a strong breeze lifted the mist like a curtain from before us, and there was a boat-a jolly ten-oar boat, sheering right through the waters towards us, perhaps about a couple of hundred yards off. A sailor on the bow hailed and cheered us; but you may imagine how far gone we were, when I tell you that I scarcely took notice it was in ENGLISH the man cried to us.

of the water, coming so near the boat, that one of the men's oars struck him on the head; and with that he groaned most pitifully, snorted, neighed, and plunged again for a moment, and then there was one loud, shrill cry, I never heard such a terrible sound since I was born, and away he drifted astern of us.-We saw him after a very little while had passed, going quite passively the way the current was running, the other had done so just be fore; but I've been telling you a very long story, and perhaps you'll think about very little matters too. As for ourselves, we soon reached one of the transports that Sir George Stuart had sent to fetch off the brave Brunswickers; and though the rascally Danes kept firing at us in a most cowardly manner, whenever we were obliged to come near their side on the tack, they were such miserable hands at their guns, that not one shot ever came within fifty yards of one vessel that was there. It would have been an easy matter to have burnt Bremerlee about their ears, but the Duke was anxious to have his poor fellows in their quarters-God knows, they had had a sore campaign one way and another and so we only gave them a few shots, just to see them skipping about upon the sand, and so passed them all, and got safe out of the Weser. We reached Heligoland next day, and then, you know, we were at home among plenty of English, and Ellen nursed my rheumatics: and as soon as I was able to move, we came over in one of the King's packets, and here we are, alive and kicking-I will say it once more-in merry England.""

"In five minutes we were safe on board. They were kind, as kind as could be-good jolly English boys, every soul of them. Our boor lad was sitting in the midst of them with a brandy bottle at his head; and, poor soul, he had need enough of comfort, to be sure, for to Heligoland he must go and three horses lost, of course-besides the anxiety of his friends.

"It was a good while ere I got my thoughts anyways collected about me, Ellen, poor thing, sat close nestled beside me, shaking all over like a leaf. But yet it was she that first spoke to me, and upon my soul, I think her face was more woeful than it had ever been when we were in our utmost peril; it was a sore sight truly, that had made it so, and the poor lassie's heart was visibly at the bursting. There were our two horses-the poor dumb beasts-what think ye of it? -there they were, both of them, swimming just by the stern of the boat. And our honest Bauer, God bless me! the tears were running over his face while he looked at them; and by and by one of the poor creatures made an exertion and came off the side of the boat where the lad sat, quite close to ourselves, with an imploring look and a whining cry that cut me to the very heart. Ellen sat and sobbed by me, but every now and then she bolted up, and it was all I could do to hold her in her place. At last the poor beast made two or three most violent plunges, and reared himself half-way out

Shortly after, an infernal row takes place in the High Street, and Reginald accompanies the good old priest to his house, to guard him from any menacing danger. Lo! the vision rises before him at the door of that humble dwelling, which never afterwards is to fade from his brain-and certainly a lovelier vision never thrilled the heartstrings, nor stirred the blood in the veins of youth.

"A soft female voice said from within, 'Who's there?'

"It's me, my darling,' answered the old man, and the door was opened. A young girl, with a candle in her hand, appeared in the entrance, and uttered something anxiously and quickly in a language which Reginald did not understand. 'Mein susses kind,' he answered-' my bonny lassie, it's a mere scart, just a fleabite-I'm all safe and sound, thanks to this young gentleman.—Mr Dalton, allow me to have the honour of presenting