sent to take them before Judge Baker's court at Wash- I love him so-better an he own self. He better mind; one o' dese ington. The attempt is defeated, by means shown in days Tom show him how dat is." the following extract: They, meantime, quietly awaited the return of their officer at the great gate, a quarter of a mile from the house. Rather as a point of military etiquette than from an idea that any precaution was necessary, they had stacked their arms in form before the gate, and stationed a sentinel, who, with head erect and military step, walked his post in front of them. They had not long been there, before they heard a negro's voice, who, as he approached from the house, sung merrily a song, of which only the following lines could be distinguished: "Peep froo de winder; see bronk o' day; The song ceased, and cuffee advanced in silence, but with a heavy swinging step, that rung audibly on the hard ground. As soon as his dusky figure began to be distinguishable, which was not until he was quite near, he was arrested by the sharp challenge of the sentry. "High!" exclaimed the negro, in a tone of amazement and alarm: “Law-Gorramighty! what dis?" "I don't think you love him much yourself, Sambo." "Who?-I, Massa? My name Jack, sir. Lord, no sir! What I love him for? Hard work and little bread, and no meat? No, Massa, I love soldier; cause I hear 'em say soldier come after awhile, set poor nigur free." "That is true enough. I hope it will not be long before we set you all free from these d-d man-stealers. How would you like to go with us?" Lord, Massa, you joking. Go wid you? I reckon the old man find it right hard to get somebody to saddle his horse if all our folks was here." "Well, cuffee, the old man's in hockley by this time; and when we march him off in the morning, you will have nobody to stop you. But bring us the brandy, and then we'll talk about it." "Ees, Massa! tank ye, Massa! But, Massa, I got two boys big as me, and my brother, and my wife, and all; I don't want to leave them. And, Massa, my boys got some apples. You want some, sir?" "To be sure I do. Bring them along; but mind and bring the brandy, at all events." The negro disappeared, and the soldiers occupied themselves in discussing the means of making a profitable speculation on their disposition to leave their master. They were still on this topic when they heard Jack returning, with several more. One brought a chunk of fire; another a basket of apples; another one of eggs; a fourth came provided with some cold provisions; Jack himself "Advance!" said the sentinel, mechanically, "and give the brandished a couple of bottles of brandy; and one of his boys countersign." "What dat, Massa? I never see sich a ting in my life." "Advance!" repeated the sentry, bringing his piece down with a rattling sound against his right side. The metal glimmered in the light from the windows. The negro caught the gleam, and, falling flat on his face, roared lustily for mercy. The Sergeant now went to him, raised him up, calmed his fears, and, as soon as he could be made to understand any thing, asked if Lieutenant Whiting was at the house. "I hear 'em say, sir, one mighty grand gentleman went there while ago. Old Tom say, he Mass Douglas' old crony, and Massa and Mass Douglas, and all, mighty glad to see him.” "The devil they are!" said the Sergeant. "Well, I hope they'll be mighty glad to see us, too. I do not care how soon, for this night air is something of the sharpest; and I have drawn better rations than we had at that d-d tavern. I say, darkee; the old man keeps good liquor, and plenty of belly timber, don't he?" "Ah, Lord! Yes, Massa, I reckon he does. But it an't much I knows about it. Old Massa mighty hard man, sir. Poor negur don't see much o' he good ting." "But, I suppose, he gives his friends a plenty?" "Oh, to be sure, sir! Massa mighty proud. Great gentleman come see him, he an't got nothing too good for him. But poor white folks and poor negur!-pshaw !" "A bad look out for us, Rogers," said the Sergeant to one of his men. "D-n the old hunks, I hope he don't mean to leave us to bivouack here all night. Well, we must wait our hour, as the Lieutenant told us, and then he'll come back to us, or we have to march to the house. D-n it! I shall be pretty sharp set by that time, and, if it comes to that, the old gentleman's kitchen and wine cellar may look out for a storm." "You talk like you hungry, Massa," said the negro, in a tore of sympathy. I mighty sorry I an't got nothing to give you." "But could not you get something, cuffee? Is there no key to your master's cellar and smoke house besides the one he keeps? Don't you think, now, you could get us some of his old apple brandy? I hear he has it of all ages." "Ah, Lord, Massa; dat you may be sure of. I hear old Tom say brandy dare older an he; and he most a hundred. 'Spose I bring you some o' dat, Massa, what you gwine give me ?" "Will a quarter do for a bottle of it?" "Law, Massa! why he same like gold. Half a dolla, Massa!" "Well, bring us a bottle of the right old stuff, mind!--and you shall have half a dollar. And see, darkee; cannot you bring us a little cold bread and meat?" brought a pail of water and a tin cup. The liquor was tasted, approved, paid for, and eagerly swallowed. A torch of lightwood being kindled, a chaffering commenced, interrupted by occasional allusions to the interesting subjects of slavery, hard masters, and emancipation. The brandy, however, chiefly engaged the attention of the soldiers. The sentry, whose duty was but formal, was permitted to join, as the guns were but a few feet off, just without the gate, which stood open. The light of the torch glittered strongly on the arms, and seemed to make all things distinct, while in fact its unsteady flickering did little more than dazzle their eyes. The negro held it aloft, and, as if to brighten the flame, occasionally waved it to and fro. Suddenly it dropped from his hand into darkness shrouded every eye. the pail of water, and in an instant the blackness of impenetrable At the same moment, a heavy trampling, as from a rush of from the stack of arms, as if it had fallen down. The soldiers many feet, was heard without the gate, and a shivering clash groped their way towards it, feeling where they supposed it to be. They felt in vain. They winked hard, as if to free their eyes from the blinding impression left by the flaring light, then opened them, and looked about. Judge their astonishment when, as they begun to recover their sight, they found themselves surrounded by a dusky ring, from which issued a voice, not unlike that of their friend Jack, which informed them, in good English, that they were prisoners. The prick of a bayonet on one or two who endeavored to pass through the circle, convinced them that such was the fact; and, after a short parley, they permitted themselves to be marched off, and safely stowed away in a strong out-house. The following conversation in the bar-room of a village tavern in North Carolina, throws some light on the causes of the change of public sentiment on the south side of James river: "I cannot say I like it altogether, Squire," said the planter. "It may suit my neighbor Jones, here, well enough to have one of them high-headed Roanoke planters to come here with his family, and spend his money. I dare say he will make a pretty good spec out of them; but, for my part, I would rather they would stay at home, and live under their own laws. I ha'nt got no notion, after they saddled that d-d rascal Van Buren upon us so long, that now, the minute we have shook him off and made a good government, and good treaties, and all, they should be wanting to have a sop in our pan. If that's what they are after, in rebelling against their government, I don't want to give "I don't know, Massa, what de cook say. I try her." "Well, go; and, while your hand is in, help yourself well. If them no countenance. What we have done, we have done for the liquor is good, may be we'll take two or three bottles." "Well, Massa, I try old Tom. He keep de key. Ah, Lord? Old Massa tink Tom mighty desperate honest; and he tink Tom ourselves, and we have a right to all the good of it. They have fixed their market to their liking, and let it stand so. If we can get thirty dollars for our tobacco, and they cannot getten, I reckon we ha'nt got nobody to thank for it but ourselves. I dare say, now they see how the thing works, they would be glad enough to share with us, but I see plain enough that all they would get by joining us, we would lose, and may be more too." "You are right there, Mr. Hobson," said the merchant; "and that is not all. There's an advantage in buying as well as selling. Now as to this Mr. Trevor, or whatever his name is, coming over here, and buying things cheaper than he could get them at home-why that he is welcome to. Though you may be sure, neighbor, I don't let him have them as cheap as I sell to you. But as to letting in the Norfolk merchants to all the advantage of our treaty with England, that is another matter. For though, when we deepen the bar at Ocracock, I have no doubt our town down there will be another sort of a place to what Norfolk ever was, yet if Virginia was to join us now, right away, the most of the trade would go to Norfolk again, and they would get their goods there as cheap as we get them here, and may be a little cheaper. So you see it is against my interest as well as yours; and I don't like the thoughts of putting in a crop, and letting another man gather it, any more than you do." "No--I would not. I would not let them come; or, if they did, just give them up to their own government. If they had not a chance to be running over here, as soon as they got into trouble, they would keep quiet, and never get a chance to separate, and so ruin our business, whether they joined us or no." "Old Rip is wide awake at last," said a voice from behind; "but it is to his interest only." Douglas turned to the voice of the speaker, the tone of which expressed a scorn and derision most acceptable to his feelings. He was a tall and fine looking man, powerfully made, and inclined to be fat, but not at all unwieldy. The half laughing expression of his large, blue eye, and the protrusion of his under lip, spoke his careless contempt of those whose conversation had called forth his sarcasm. The attention of the whole company was drawn to him at the same moment; all looking as if they wished to say something, without knowing what. At length the wagoner spoke, on the well understood principle that, when men talk of what they understand imperfectly, he who knows least should be always first to show his ignorance. "I cannot say I understand rightly what you mean, stranger," said he; "but I guess, by the cut of your jib, that you are one of them high dons from South Carolina, that always have money to throw away, and think a body ought never to care any more for himself than another. But this business don't consarn you, no how, because these people don't interfere with your cot "It would be harder upon me than any of you," said the wagoner; "for if that was the case, that d―d rail-road would break up my business, stock and fluke. As it is, there never was such a time for wagoning before. Instead of just hauling the litthe tobacco that is made here to the end of the rail road, now 1 have the hauling of the Virginia tobacco, and all, down to Com-ton crop." merce."* It is hard to say whether surprise or disgust most prevailed in the mind of Douglas at hearing these remarks. The idea of the advantages lost to Virginia, by her connexion with the North, had never entered his mind; but still less had he conceived it possible that a sordid desire to monopolize these advantages, could stifle, in the minds of the North Carolinians, every feeling of sympathy with the oppressed and persecuted asserters of the rights of Virginia. The reply of Mr. Hobson to the remark of the wagoner gave him a yet deeper insight into that dark and foul corner of the human heart, where self predominates over all the better affections. "I don't think that's right fair in you wagoners," said he. "You haul the Virginia tobacco down to Commerce, and when it gets there it is all the same as mine. Now, if it was not for that, I am not so mighty sure but I'd get forty dollars instead of thirty; and I don't like to lose ten dollars to give you a chance to get one." "It is all one to me," said the wagoner. "You may just pay me the same for not hauling that they pay me for hauling, or only half as much, and I will not haul another hogshead." "But if you won't, another will,” said Hobson. "Like enough,” replied the wagoner; "for all trades must live; and if them poor devils get a chance to sell a hogshead or two, instead of leaving it all to rot, you ought not to grudge them that." "Yes, but they do, though," said Hobson; "for if they drive me from tobacco, I shall make cotton. But, if I can keep them out of the tobacco market, I shall be willing to give up the making of cotton to South Carolina." "Why that is true," said the stranger, with a sudden change of his countenance, from which he discharged, in a moment, every appearance of intelligence, but that which seemed to reflect the superior wisdom of Mr. Hobson. "That is true," said he, looking as if making a stupid attempt to think; "I had not thought of that before." As he said this, he sunk slowly and thoughtfully into a chair, his knees falling far asunder, his arms dropping across his thighs, his body bent forward, and his face turned up toward Mr. Hobson, with the look of one who desires and expects to receive important information. The whole action spoke so eloquently to Mr. Hobson's self-esteem, that he went on, with an air of the most gracious complacency. "You see, stranger, just shutting only a part of the Virginia tobacco out of the market, makes a difference of ten dollars, at the very least, in the price of mine. Now, we used to make a heap of cotton in this country, but we are all going to give it up quite entirely, and then, you see, it stands to reason it will make a difference of five cents a pound, or may be ten, in your cot ton." This interesting proposition was received by the stranger with a sluggish start of dull surprise, from which he sunk again into the same appearance of stolid musing. "To think what a fool I have been," said he, after a long pause. Then, scratching his head, and twisting in his chair, he added: "You are right. You are right; and the only way to manage the matter, is to get your **I see,” said Hobson, “how it does good to you, but none to Legislature to pass a law, as you say, to make those fellows stay at home." "Certainly not," said the merchant, "for I guess that what ever they get, they take care to lay it all out in goods on this side of the line So the money stays with us after all, and friend Stubbs's hauling does good to more besides him." me." "But that an't all, Mr. Hobson," said the landlord, who had entered while this conversation was going on. "Them hotbealed fellows over the line there, like this old Squire Trevor, will be getting themselves into hot water every now and then; and when they run away and come to us, if they did not bring no moncy, we'd have to feed them free gratis for nothing. Now Stubbs hauls Squire Trevor's tobacco to Commerce, and he gets a good price; and then he gets into trouble, and comes over here to stay with me, and so he is able to pay me a good price; and bere it is," added he, showing a roll of notes. "Still," said Hobson, "I don't see how that does me any good. If they were to come here begging, d--n the mouthful I'd give them." "Then you would leave the whole burden on the poor tavernkeepers," said the landlord. *The reader will look, in vain, on the map, for the name of this place. It was somewhere on the waters of the Sound, and, dodiess, would have become a place of some consequence, had to the union of Virginia to the Southern Confederacy laid the foundation for a degree of prosperity in Norfolk, which bids fair to make it the first city on the continent. The town of Commerce, of course, went down with the necessity which gave rise to it. "To be sure it would," said the gratified Hobson; "but then there are so many conceited fellows in the Legislature, with a fool's notion in their heads about taking sides with them that cannot help themselves, that there is no getting any thing done." "Well," said the stranger, "this gentleman guessed right when he said I was from South Carolina. So I don't know any thing about your laws here. But I suppose you have no law to hurt a man for taking up one that runs away from the law in Virginia, and carrying him back. I expect old Van would pay well for them." Hobson looked hard at the stranger, and only answered with that compound motion of the head, which, partaking at once of a shake and a nod, expresses both assent and caution. The landlord and merchant both exclaimed against this sug gestion, the one illustrating his argument by the freedom with which his guest had ordered wine from the bar; the other, by his former experience of his liberality as a purchaser of goods, while he kept a store in Mr. Trevor's neighborhood, which he had withdrawn since the revolution. Among the bystanders there was no expression of opinion, but that sort of silence which betokens an idea that what has been said is well worth considering. The views presented in the following extract are familiar to many, but, being strikingly displayed here, they may help to attract attention to a subject on which too much thought cannot be bestowed: "You must be sensible," said B-, "that the southern States, including Virginia, are properly and almost exclusively agricul tural. The quality of their soil and climate, and the peculiar character of their laboring population, concur to make agriculture the most profitable employment among them. Apart from the influence of artificial causes, it is not certain that any labor can be judiciously taken from the soil to be applied to any other object whatever. When Lord Chatham said that America ought not to manufacture a hob-nail for herself, he spoke as a true and judicious friend of the colonies. The labor necessary to make the hob-nail, if applied to the cultivation of the earth, might produce that for which the British manufacturer would gladly give two hob-nails. By coming between the manufacturer and the farmer, and interrupting this interchange by perverse legislation, the government broke the tie which bound the colonies to the mother country. "When that tie was severed and peace established, it was the interest of both parties that this interchange should be restored, and put upon such a footing as to enable each, reciprocally, to obtain for the products of his own labor as much as possible of the products of the labor of the other. "Why was not this done? Because laws are not made for the benefit of the people, but for that of their rulers. The monopolizing spirit of the landed aristocracy in England led to the exclusion of our bread-stuffs, and the necessities of the British treasury tempted to the levying of enormous revenue from our other agricultural products. The interchange between the farmer and manufacturer was thus interrupted. In part it was absolutely prevented; the profit being swallowed up by the impost, the inducement was taken away. "What did the American government under these circumstances? Did they say to Great Britain, 'relax your corn-laws; reduce your duties on tobacco; make no discrimination between our cotton and that from the East Indies; and we will refrain from laying a high duty on your manufactures. You will thus enrich your own people, and it is by no means sure that their increased prosperity may not give you, through the excise and other channels of revenue, more than an equivalent for the taxes we propose to you to withdraw.' "Did we say this? No. And why? Because, in the northern States, there was a manufacturing interest to be advanced by the very course of legislation most fatal to the South. With a dense population, occupying a small extent of barren country, with mountain streams tumbling into deep tide-water, and bringing commerce to the aid of manufactures, they wanted nothing but a monopoly of the southern market to enable them to enrich themselves. The alternative was before us. To invite the great European manufacturer to reciprocate the benefits of free trade, whereby the South might enjoy all the advantages of its fertile soil and fine climate, or to transfer these advantages to the North, by meeting Great Britain on the ground of prohibition and exaction. The latter was preferred, because to the interest of that section, which, having the local majority, had the power. "Under this system, Great Britain has never wanted a pretext for her corn-laws, and her high duties on all our products. Thus we sell all we make, subject to these deductions, which, in many instances, leave much less to us than what goes into the British treasury. "Here, too, is the pretext to the government of the United States for their exactions in return. The misfortune is, that the southern planter had to bear both burthens. One half the price of his products is seized by the British government, and half the value of what he gets for the other half is seized by the government of the United States. "But what remedy has been proposed for these things?" asked Douglas. "A remedy has been proposed and applied," replied B-. "The remedy of legislation for the benefit, not of the rulers, but of the ruled." "But in what sense will you say that our legislation has been for the benefit of the rulers alone? Are we not all our own rulers?" "Yes," replied B--, "if you again have recourse to the use of that comprehensive word we,' which identifies things most dissimilar, and binds up, in the same bundle, things most discordant. If the South and North are one; if the Yankee and the Virginian are one; if light and darkness, heat and cold, life and death, can all be identified, then we are our own rulers. Just so, if the State will consent to be identified with the Church, then we pay tithes with one hand, and receive them with the other. While the Commons identify themselves with the Crown, "we" do but pay taxes to ourselves. And if Virginians can be fooled into identifying themselves with the Yankees-a fixed tax-paying minority, with a fixed tax-receiving majority-it will still be the same thing; and they will continue to hold a distinguished place among the innumerable wes that have been gulled into their own ruin ever since the world began. It is owing to this sort of deception, played off on the unthinking multitude, that, in the two freest countries in the world, the most important interests are taxed for the benefit of lesser interests. In England, a country of manufacturers, they have been starved that agriculture may thrive. In this, a country of farmers and planters, they have been taxed that manufacturers may thrive. Now I will requite Lord Chatham's well-intentioned declaration, by saying that England ought not to make a barrel of flour for herself. I say, too, that if her rulers and the rulers of the people of America were true to their trust, both sayings would be fulfilled. She would be the work-house, and here would be the granary of the world. What would become of the Yankees? As I don't call them we, I leave them to find the answer to that question." The impression made on Douglas by these observations was so strong and so obvious, that his friend paused and left him to meditate upon them. Some minutes elapsed before he made any reply. When he did speak, he acknowledged the existence and magnitude of the grievance, and again inquired, with increased solicitude, what remedy had been found. "You heard what passed in the bar-room, just now," said the stranger. "I did," replied Douglas; "and I was as much surprised at the facts hinted at, as disgusted at the sentiments of the speakers." "Then your surprise must have been extreme," said the other; "for I hardly know which amused me most: their unblushing display of selfish meanness, or the glow of indignation in your countenance, which showed how little you know of this world of philanthropy and benevolence that we live in. But had you no suspicion of the cause of those enviable advantages which these sons of Mammon are so anxious to monopolize ?" "Not at all, and hence my surprise; for I had supposed heretofore, that, between the two States, all the advantage lay on the side of Virginia.” "You judged rightly," replied the other. "In the way of commerce, nature has done nothing for the one, and every thing for the other. But the conversation you have heard is a proof that the sand which chokes the waters of the Sound is a trivial obstacle, in comparison with the legislative barriers which have shut out prosperity from the noble Chesapeake. Look at your rivers and bay, and you will see that Virginia ought to be the most prosperous country in the world. Look at the ruins which strew the face of your lower country, the remains of churches and the fragments of tombstones, and you will see that she once "This they called retaliation and indemnification. It was indemnifying an interest which had not been injured, by the farther injury of one which had been injured. It was impoverish-was so. Ask for the descendants of the men whose names are ing the South for the benefit of the North, to requite the South for having been already impoverished for the benefit of Great Britain. Still it was indemnifying ourselves. Much virtue in that word, 'ourselves. It is the language used by the giant to| the dwarf in the fable; the language of the brazen pot to the earthen pot; the language of all dangerous or interested friendship. sculptured on those monuments, and their present condition will tell you that her prosperity has passed away. Then ask all history. Go to the finest countries in the world--to Asia Minor, to Grecce, to Italy; ask what has laid them desolate, and you will receive but one answer, misgovernment.'” "But may not the fault be in the people themselves?" asked Douglas. much of the manufactured article as the Carolina planter will get for his. This is her fate. She sees it, and would throw off the yoke. But her northern masters see it too. She is all that remains to them of their southern dependencies, which, though not their colonies, they have so long governed as colonies. Take her away, and they are in the condition of the wolf when there are no sheep left. Wolf eat wolf, and Yankee cheat Yankee. This they will guard against by all means lawful and unlawful, for Virginia alone mitigates the ruin that their insatiate rapacity has brought upon them. They will hold on to her with the gripe of death; and she must and will struggle to free herself, as from death. "The fault of submitting to be misgoverned, certainly. But | North, from which she will not receive in return the third part as no more than that. Let the country enjoy its natural advantages, and they who are too ignorant or too slothful to use them, will soon give place to others of a different character. What has there been to prevent the Yankee from selling his barren hills at high prices and coming South, where he might buy the fertile shores of the Chesapeake for a song? No local attachment, certainly; for his home is every where. What is there now to prevent the planter of this neighborhood from exchanging his thirsty fields for the rich and long coveted low grounds of James river or Roanoke, in Virginia? Are these people wiser, better, more energetic and industrious than they were twelve months ago, that their lands have multiplied in value five fold? Is it your uncle's fault, that, were he now at home the tame slave of power, he could hardly give away his fine estate? The difference is, that this country now enjoys its natural advantages, while Virginia remains under the crushing weight of a system devised for the benefit of her oppressors." "And now, how say you? Are you prepared to do your part in furtherance of this object?" "I am," replied Douglas promptly; " and I now eagerly ask you to show me the means by which I can advance it." "You asked for men," said B-, "and you shall have them. "I see the effect," said Douglas. But tell me, I beseech you, They are already provided, and want but a leader." the cause of this change in your condition here." "The cause is free trade." "And how has that been obtained ?" "I will answer that," said B-; "because my friend's mo desty might restrain him from giving the true answer. It has been obtained by intelligence, manly frankness, and fair dealing. It has been obtained by offering to other nations terms most favorable to their peculiar and distinctive interests, in consideration of receiving the like advantage. Instead of nursing artificial interests to rival the iron and cotton fabrics, and the shipping of England, the wine of France, the silk and oil of Italy, and enviously snatching at whatever benefit nature may have vouchsafed to other parts of the world, this people only ask to exchange for these things their own peculiar productions. A trade perfectly free, totally discharged from all duties, would certainly be best for all. But revenue must be had, and the impost is the best source of revenue. No State can be expected to give that up. But it has been found practicable so to regulate that matter as to reduce the charges which have heretofore incumbered exchanges to a mere trifle." "How has that been effected?" asked Douglas. "If that question were to be answered in detail,” said B—, “I should leave the answer to him by whom the details have been arranged. I will give you the outline in a few words. These States were first driven to think of separation by a tariff of protection. Their federal constitution guards against it by express prohibition, and by requiring that the impost, like the tax laws of Virginia, should be annual. "They have felt the danger to liberty from excessive revenue. Their constitution requires that the estimates of the expense of the current year shall be made the measure of revenue to be raised for that year. The imports of the preceding year are taken as a basis of calculation, and credit being given for any surplus in the treasury, a tariff is laid which, on that basis, would produce the sum required." "Then there can never be any surplus for an emergency," said Douglas. "Always," replied B-; "in the right place, and the only safe place, the pockets of a prosperous people. There is no place hole in the bottom, and the money always finds its way into the pockets of sharpers, parasites, man-worshippers, and pseudo patriots. But let that pass. You see that a small revenue alone will probably be wanting, and being raised annually, the tariff can be annually adjusted. in the treasury to keep money. The till of the treasury has a "Now, what says justice, as to the revenue to be raised by two nations on the trade between the two, seeing that it is equally levied on the citizens of both ?” **On that hypothesis each should receive an equal share of it," said Douglas. "Precisely so," answered B--; "and let these terms be held ent to all nations, and if one will not accept them another will. On this principle a system of commercial arrangements has been set on foot, which, by restoring to these States the benefit of their natural advantages, is at once producing an effect which explains their former prosperity. It places in stronger relief the evils of the opposite system to Virginia, and really leaves her, while she retats her present connexion with the North, without any re. source. Tobacco she cannot sell at all. Invita natura, she will have to raise cotton to supply the beggared manufactories of the "But what authority can I have to be recognized as such?" "You have heard your uncle, aunt, or cousins, speak of Jacob Schwartz ?" "I believe I have; but what can such a fellow have to do with such affairs as we now speak of. Is he not an ignorant clown?” "He is all that," said B-. "But he writes as good a hand as Marshal Saxe, and has probably read as many books as Cincinnatus. But to speak seriously, he is no common clown." The author has connected together the incidents of his story with much dramatic skill, and has rendered them exceedingly interesting, as a mere narrative of events, notwithstanding their political character. It required no small power to manage such a plan as his with success. When the writer of fiction lays his scene in past times, there is no great difficulty in persuading the reader that the events narrated have actually occurred. Indeed every reader of a novel goes to it with a wish to be deceived; for it is necessary to the interest of the subject that he should throw an illusion over his own mind and feelings. It is not easy to do this, however, when the scene is laid in time yet to come. In this case the reader's mind is apt to struggle in vain against the consciousness that, as it is impossible for any thing to have happened in time which has not yet arrived, all that he reads must necessarily be purely imaginary. It requires, therefore, more than moderate powers, and a great confidence in those powers, to attempt a work of fiction upon such a plan. Our author has done no more than justice to himself in this respect. It is impossible to read his book, without imagining that the scenes he describes are actually passing before us. The incidents are all so probable, and follow each other so regularly and naturally, that we are forced to forget that we are not in the very career of the revolution which he imagines. Apart from the political lesson which it conveys, the interest of the work, considered only as an agreeable story, will amply repay the reader. Upon the whole, we recommend this book as worthy, in a high degree, of public attention. The author is not a light thinker on any subject, and it is evident he has thought, with deep and anxious interest, on the subject of this book. It ought to be read in the north, as well as in the south. To the north it presents a lesson of solemn warning, and to the south it inculcates the necessity of vigilance and caution. As a mere political speculation, it is but too probably correct. We trust that a benign Providence will so order events, as that it may not also prove a POLITICAL PROPHECY. VOL. III.-12 BULWER'S NEW PLAY. ed to wonder, what he has seen in the character of his contemporaries, which leads him to suppose that such The Duchess de la Valliere: A Play, in Five Acts. By an exhibition can be acceptable to them. Are we to the author of "Eugene Aram," "The Last Days of Pom-infer that the vice of incontinence has preferred its peii," "Rienzi," &c. New York: Saunders & Olley. claim to Mr. Bulwer's good offices, and insists on being exhibited to the public in the same favorable light with theft and murder? Is it necessary to the compiction of his exhibition gallery, that the pictures of the generous demagogue, should be accompanied by that of the sentimental and devout courtezan? Does he mean to content himself with thus painting all the cardinal sins of both sexes, couleur de rose, or does he propose to go on and complete the series, by showing up the amiable and attractive accompaniments of minor offences; the grace and address of the blackleg, the surly honesty of the drunkard, and the uproarious and infectious mirth of the heroes of the Corinthian school? Perhaps not. Mr. Bulwer may probably think these less hardy offenders unworthy of his offices good or ill, and may leave their fame to the care of Mr. Pierce Egan. "It seems among the caprices of literature, that one whose life has excited an interest so unfading and universal, and whose destinies invest-even more than the splendors of his reign, the solemn graces of his court, or the stately muses [muse] of Ra-highwayman, the philosophic assassin, and the virtuous cine-with no unreal poetry the memory of Louis XIV-that one whose very fate was a poem, whose very struggles were a drama, should have furnished so little inspiration to a poet, and escaped altogether the resuscitation of the stage." The above is not our own. It is the first sentence of a sort of critique raisonnee, under the name of a preface, prefixed by Mr. Bulwer himself to his play. We have given the thought in his own words, by way of furnishing the style-fanciers, who copy Mr. Bulwer's fashions, with a specimen of the latest cut, in the art of involution, convolution, and obscurity. Having said this, we beg leave to add, for ourselves, that we do not altogether dissent from the opinion here expressed. It would not have been strange, if the taste, which introduced Jane Shore upon the stage, as a heroine, had selected, for the like use, a person whose crimes did not so deeply dishonor her sex, and whose redeeming virtues are certainly far less apocryphal than those of the aban-exhibitions of splendid villainy and alluring sensuality, doned adulterous paramour of Edward IV. The age which tolerated the one, might perhaps have smiled favorably on the other, and the tragedy of Madame de la Valliere, might, in that day, have taken its turn upon the stage, with the obscene comedies of Congreve and Farquhar. We do not profess to have much acquaintance with the character and tastes of the playgoing public, either of Great Britain, or the larger cities of the United States. In such vast assemblages of people, there may be enough of that class who delight to gloat over to fill the pockets of the actors, although there may be another and more numerous class banished from the theatre by such scenes. If so, they may act wisely in their generation, in thus catering for the tastes of their best customers. Of thus much, thank God! we are sure. We are absolutely sure, that, in our unrefined, These have had their day; and a change in the man-unenlightened, unpretending, uncanting community of ners and tastes of society has driven them from the white and black, no such dramas as this of Mr. Bulstage. The same change has probably deterred drawer's would draw together such audiences as would matic writers from other adventures in that line. It is pay the candle-snuffer. We have-and again we say worthy of remark that, while the stage is said to hold | thank God!—we have no titled libertines, no demi-reps the mirror up to nature, and to exhibit her to the audience, it has the farther property of exhibiting the audience themselves to the rest of the world. Plays which do not please, can never attract full houses; and no judgment that criticism can pronounce in their favor, will prevent them from being laid aside for such as do please. The success of these is the test of the only merit about which the managers of theatres feel any concern. They thus retain their place upon the stage; they find their way to the press; they become one of the amusements of the drawing-room; and go down to posterity, an unerring criterion of the taste and manners of the age which favored them. of quality, no flaunting divorcées-none either rich, or great, or noble, who seek their wives from the stage or the stews. What we may come to with proper training; how we may be infected by the example of sin in high places, and the outrageous violation of all the decencies of life on our very borders, we are not prepared to predict. But, as yet, we can speak of the maidens and matrons of Virginia with a proud confidence, that the example of her degenerate sons has not yet inclined them to dishonor the memory of their chaste mothers, by frequenting and favoring exhibitions intended to gloss over that crime, which unfits a woman for all the duties of life. the duties of a citizen. In like manner, among ourselves, and in reference to the softer sex, the word is applied to that, without which no woman is worthy to become a wife and a mother. There is nothing arbitrary in this nomenclature. Its universal acceptation is nature's testimony to important truths. What dependence on the principles of any man, however extensive and correct We know enough of the private life and character Among the Romans the name of virtue was given, exof men who figured in the world in the days of Queen cellentiæ gratia, to that one quality, without which no man Ann and the first George, to be pretty sure that the man-in that iron commonwealth was capable of performing ners and the drama of that day were, alike, different from the manners and the drama of this; and the connexion between the two is not only proved by the reason and nature of the thing, but established by history. While we concur, then, with Mr. Bulwer, in wondering that the corrupt taste of a corrupt society did not seize upon the character of Madame de la Valliere, as a bonne bouche for an appetite at once dainty and vora-his code of morals, whose firmness is sure to fail him at cious, at once refined and gross-an object in the contemplation of which, lewdness and sentiment might take their turn of enjoyment; we may again be allow the approach of danger? Then look at the condition of woman in a virtuous, enlightened, and refined society. Estimate the advantages of her position. Her every |