primitive make of the articles, nearly all the spurs, bits, stirrups, and other iron implements and accoutrements in use in the country, are supplied by Great Britain; an attempt on the part of Germany to undersell the great emporiums of Birmingham and Sheffield having beeen attended with little success. The Sheffield knife will ring upon the nail, the Tserlohn one, although as bright to the eye, and cheaper! will not such are the simple tests practised by the Gaucho, such the data which guide his choice.

The ponchos of the poorer classes also, are very commonly of Manchester cotton, the patterns being copied from those of the Indians, and all sorts of small articles of hardware and cutlery, of British manufacture, find their way to Buenos Ayres in large quantities.

SERMONS IN TREES.*

(From the German of Anastasius Grün.)

AT the midnight hour, when silence reigns

Through the leafy forest deep, Begins a whispering, rustling sound, For then each bush and tree around

Finds tongues when mortals sleep.

The WILD ROSE breathed soft odours round

And gaily spoke though low,— "Short is the Rose's utmost prime,E'en so!-the shorter is the time

The brighter will I blow!"

The ASPEN said, "Me gaudy day
Allured not with its glare
The sunbeam oft a death stroke gives-
"Tis in the shade that wisdom lives

Safe, though I tremble, there!"
And next the slender POPLAR spoke,
And pointed to the sky :

Thence streams so sweet so pure a light

Of moonlight beauty, calm and bright, 1 fain would wave on high!"

The WILLOW glanced to Earth, and
said,

In accents fond and mild,
"My floating locks o'er thee I bend,
Thy fragile flowers be mine to tend,
As mothers tend a child!"

And next the laden PLUM-TREE sighed
"Relieve me of my hoard!

I bear it not for self alone,

My treasures when you make your own
My vigour is restored."

Then spake the FIR, "What tho' on me,
Nor flowers nor fruit ye view,
From constancy my honours grow-
Alike, in sunshine, storm, and snow,
I never change my hue."

The lofty OAK exclaimed," Alone

Heaven's lightnings me can rend; No storm hath power to bend me down

Let my strong stem and leafy crown
The weaker tribes defend !

The Ivy heard him offer thus

His staunch support to lend : And round him soon her arms were thrown,

For they who cannot stand alone

May lean upon a friend.

And now so many voices rose
That memory fades away;
Each whispering leaf had found a
tongue,

Only the mournful CYPRESS hung
Mute o'er a mound of clay !

Oh, that their whispered morals all,
In human hearts sank deep!
But all unheard and all untold
The Trees their nightly converse hold
While mortals are asleep!

* Baumpredigt.

ETA.

STRAY LEAVES FROM THE LEVANT.

"Thence over Egypt's palmy groves,
Her grots, and sepulchres of kings,
The exil'd spirit sighing roves;

And now hangs listening to the doves

In warm Rosetta's vale."-Lalla Rookh.

It was "written "-to use an Oriental phrase-that I should be a wanderer along the shores of the Levant during a portion of that interesting period, following Ibrahim Pasha's successful invasion of Syria, when a crisis ensued, which had well nigh involved both the Eastern and Western world, in the red flames of an universal war.

It is during this interval of time, extending from 1839 to 1841, and rife with events of such momentous import, that I propose to jot down unconnectedly, and as they occur to memory, such passages of my Eastern wanderings and adventures, as may perchance find a momentary interest with, or afford a little amusement to the general reader.

Thanks to the convention of Alexandria, concluded between Commodore Napier and Mehemet Ali, the war had been at last brought to a close, of which I received the first notification at "El Khalil ”—the ancient Hebron-that last resting place of the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob-where, with a strong column of troops, we had halted on the evening of the 19th January, 1841.

Here, whilst concocting with the Osmanli chiefs, the plan of our future movements, for intercepting Ibrahim Pasha's retreat to Egypt, across the Desert, two British officers-Major Wilbraham of the staff, and Lieutenant Loring of the Navy-were unexpectedly announced.

The intelligence of which they were bearers, put an end, for the time, to all further warlike resolves. The Turks appeared nothing loth to desist from the pursuit of their dreaded adversary; and Hassan Pasha, our gallant chief, forgetting, in the exultation of the moment, the strict. injunctions of the Prophet, retired that evening to his couch considerably excited with the forbidden juice of the grape.

Pursuant to their instructions, the British officers started off next morning in quest of the Egyptian army-supposed then to be wandering somewhere to the southward of the Dead Sea-and "my occupation being gone," I mounted at break of dawn, the gallant old grey Arab charger, who had carried me so well throughout the recent campaign, and pushed rapidly on for Jaffa-some fifty or sixty miles distantthen the head quarters of General Michell, and of the British staff.

Poor Michell! brave, kind-hearted old veteran! I only arrived in time to shake him once more by the hand; for he very shortly after fell a victim to the combined effects of annoyance, fatigue, and climate, to which he had been so much exposed during the concluding operations of the war.

Disease, more than the enemy's sword, had, since landing in Syria, sadly diminished our little band. Sir Charles Felix Smith had been obliged to leave in a most debilitated state of health-his gallant successor had just departed for his last narrow home-and Colonel Bridgman, who was doomed to be soon likewise stricken down by the same myste

rious power, now assumed the command; and perceiving that the Turks showed every disposition to break through Commodore Napier's recently concluded convention, and to attack the now disorganized Egyptian army-which, on the strength of that treaty, was then assembling at Gaza, for the purpose of returning to Egypt-I was forthwith despatched from the latter place, in a British war steamer, to Alexandria, to acquaint the Commodore with the actual state of affairs.

Most gladly did I embark on a mission which promised to afford an excellent opportunity of beholding Egypt, that most interesting part of the world; a country not only interesting from its own ancient and historical associations, but now rendered doubly so to me, by its relations, even from the remotest recorded periods, with that classic and scriptural land I had so recently explored in its whole length and breadth, from Lebanon to the Dead Sea, from "Dan even unto Beersheba."

Yes-from the remotest times, from the earliest periods recorded in sacred or profane history-a strange, an unaccountable link appears ever to have influenced and connected the destinies of this cradle of young civilization; of the dark, gloomy, and mysterious "Nile begotten" land of Misraïm, with Canaan or Syria-that bright and joyous region of plain, mountain, and valley, known in the poetic language of the East as "Bellud el Shums;" the "Land of the Sun."

From "On"- the Heliopolis of the Greeks - from Thebes and Memphis, first issued those war chariots of old Sesostris, which accompanied that conqueror and his swarthy legions over the remote plains of Asia, leaving by the way those imperishable Egyptian records, even amongst the rugged steeps of Lebanon, still extant to the present day; and which may still be traced in the idolatrous animal-worship of the Druse, and in those rude monumental excavations, sculptured ornaments, and gigantic figures, chiselled out of the craggy mountain side, on a surface of living rock :

“Lo, these are they whom, lords of Afric's fates,

Old Thebes hath pour'd through all her hundred gates,
Mother of armies! How the emeralds glow'd,

Where, flush'd with power and vengeance, Pharaoh rode!
And stol'd in white, those brazen wheels before

Osiris' ark, his swarthy wizards bore;

And still responsive to the trumpet's cry,

The priestly sistrum murmur'd-Victory!"

It was from the Oasis of the Libyan Desert, from the foot of the Pyramids, that the "Macedonian madman" rushed forth on that brilliant field of conquest, which commencing at the banks of the Jordan, led him from victory to victory to the furthest limits of the gorgeous East; the actual Oriental boundary of our widely extended British empire; the sacred stream of Gunga; the remote, the magnificent, and the then almost fabulous waters of the Ganges :

"Twas also from old Nilus' banks that

The second Cæsar's many trophies rose, when
In Ambracia's gulf there once was lost

A world for woman, lovely, harmless thing!"

Next behold a long dynasty of Grecian Ptolemies, of Saracenic. Caliphs-Amru the Destroyer-the Ommniades and Fatimites: then comes the renowned Saladin, who, from the "city of victory"-Kahirah the Great-pours forth, over Syria's "Land of Roses," his turbaned,

warlike hosts, there to do battle with Britain's lion-hearted king, and the fierce Crusaders of the North.

Egypt now remained prostrate, during a long succeeding leaden age of oblivion and neglect. Science, scared by the conflagration of her noblest fame, had long since flitted to the more favoured regions of the West.

The genius of the sons of Ham, lethargically dreaming of the past, lay slumbering under the shadow of the Sphynx; whilst the fair land of the Pharaohs groaned helplessly beneath the iron rule of the Mamaluke and the Turk, until suddenly aroused by the unexpected approach of the warlike legions of invading Gaul.

Again did Egypt bid fair, once more to become the starting post of another mighty conqueror's Eastern race; but it was otherwise decreed. "When he, from towery Malta's yielding isle, And the green waters of reluctant Nile,

Th' apostate chief, from Misraim's subject shore
To Acre's walls his trophied banners bore;
When the pale desert mark'd his proud array,
And Desolation hoped an ampler sway;
What hero then triumphant Gaul dismay'd?
What arm repell'd the victor renegade?
Britannia's champion !-bath'd in hostile blood,
High on the breach the dauntless seaman stood:
Admiring Asia saw th' unequal fight,-

E'en the pale crescent bless'd the Christian's might.
Oh, day of death! oh, thirst beyond control,
Of crimson conquest in the invader's soul !
The slain, yet warm, by social footsteps trod,
O'er the red moat supplied a panting road;

O'er the red moat our conquering thunders flew,
And loftier still the grisly rampire grew."

Acre may indeed be considered as a memento of British valour, of which every Englishman may justly be proud. With that name is inseparably connected the old crusading recollections of Richard Cour de Lion-of the gallant Earl of Cornwall-of Prince Edward and his devoted bride. British valour-directed by the brave Sydney Smith— here arrested Napoleon in his victorious course-whilst the capture of Acre, in 1840, effectually curbed the ambition of Ibrahim Pasha, and caused him, at the period alluded to in the present narrative, to be wandering in the desert with his broken and scattered host.

All these, and a thousand other associations, crowded rapidly on my mind, as on a lovely, still, and moonlight night, the "Hecate" boldly steered her course into the western or ancient harbour of Alexandria, and, letting off her steam, anchored probably in the self-same spot where Julius Cæsar witnessed, two thousand years ago, the conflagration of his fleet.

We landed on a smooth, level, and sandy beach, where broke a gentle ripple, brightly sparkling under the mild influence of an unclouded moon, which likewise illumined tall masses of white Oriental buildings, slumbering, apparently like their inmates, beneath her silver rays: for not a human sound was heard; all appeared to be buried in profoundest sleep; and, save an occasional challenge from one of the numerous lean, gaunt, and hungry-looking dogs-which, goul-like, roamed about this seeming city of the dead-we entered, unquestioned and unopposed, into the deep shadow of its winding streets, or rather narrow unpaved lanes,

overtoppled by high, thickly-trelissed, flat-roofed houses, whose upper stories appeared nearly to meet each other over head.

Fortunately for us, some of the party were, from a previous visit to Alexandria, acquainted with the localities around; and under their guidance we safely piloted through all these intricate channels and narrow straits, until we reached a noble European-looking square, where we soon gained admittance to a comfortable French hotel.

Learning here that the "Commodore" had a few days previously gone on an excursion up the Nile, I forthwith penned an epistle to the Pasha's Prime Minister: his Excellency Boghos Bey; stating that I was the bearer of important despatches from the seat of war, and solicitingnotwithstanding the lateness of the hour-the favour of an immediate audience, which being forthwith granted, I proceeded to his residence without delay.

After being long accustomed to the formalities of Oriental etiquette, I was not a little surprised at the total absence of all ceremony on the part of old Boghos Bey-the "First Lord of the Treasury"—of his Highness Mehemet Ali Pasha.

I found a mean, wretched-looking little man, very like in appearance a Gibraltar or Barbary Jew, who arising, welcomed me in French of purest Parisian accent, and placed me at his side, on an uncommonly shabby and dirty-looking divan, in as shabby and dirty-looking an apartment, most sparingly and dimly lit up.

With few of those usual preliminary Oriental inquiries, as to the mutual state of our health, but with the indispensable accessories of coffee and a pipe, we immediately proceeded to business.

I communicated the nature of the intelligence of which I was the bearer. Boghos Bey agreed with me as to the propriety of seein the Pasha with the least possible delay; but owing to the extreme lateness of the hour, it was resolved that my visit to "Son Altessa" should be deferred until the following day; by which time he would be made acquainted with my arrival, together with my desire of an audience, which Boghos Bey said would no doubt be granted early in the morning, as Mehemet Ali always arose betimes; when "Monsieur le Ministre" further promised to send his own carriage, in order to convey me to the palace of " Ras el Tin.”

It may not perhaps, be deemed out of place, to say here a few words of the Prime Minister of Mehemet Ali, and who then played no inconsiderable a part on the stage of European diplomacy, more particularly as relating to the, at that period, all-engrossing" Eastern Question."

By birth an Armenian, in early life Boghos Bey was dragoman or interpreter to Mr. Wherry, then English Consul at Smyrna; but he gave up that appointment, to accompany, in a similar capacity, the Turkish army, which, during the occupation of Egypt by the French, was sent to co-operate at Alexandria with Sir Ralph Abercrombie's British force.

At the close of the war, on the expulsion of the French, he remained in Egypt, where he attached himself to the rising fortunes of Mehemet Ali, with whom he successively occupied the post of interpreter, secretary, and finally that of Prime Minister, when his master-from the Albanian adventurer-became the self-elected successor of the Pharaohs and Ptolomies.