CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL. Then from the blacke corpse a payle spectre appeared, Whyle behynde thunderes after the spryte. And nowe ruddie mornynge agayne gilds the skyes, as he stands, leaning against the gate answering our The forrest and castle no more meete their eyes, ryse, Nowe spreades the darke poole on the moore. For stylle guardian angels dyd keepe her, I ween So the villain is discomfited, and virtue is triumph ant, after the orthodox manner; and a dread interest is thrown about the poole' by the final verse of the ballad, which affirms that Stylle as the trav'lere pursues hys lone waye, In horrour, at nyghte o'er the waste, He heares Syr Tregeagle with shrieks rushe awaye, He heares the Blacke Hunter pursuing his preye, And shrynkes at his bugle's dreade blaste! Well-we are not pursuing a lone way now, nor are we likely to be benighted on the moor; but in good sooth, the scene is desolate and eerie on which we now moors. We are on the St Ncast our eyes. Round us, on far as we can see, stretch the great barren wastes, swelling here into hills, crowned with some fantastically shaped group of tors-sinking there into hollows terribly suggestive of swamps and bogs. A few rough cattle are scattered about among the gorse clumps and heather near, and very far away to the left rise some one or two mine-stacks-their tall chimneys diminished to toy-like dimensions by the space between. This is everything suggestive of life that is to be seen in that wide prospect. Savage desolation usurps the rest, and reigns supreme. And yet wilder and stranger was the scene, when presently the turbulent clouds overhead burst into that peculiar soft, fast rain that we never know to perfection except on mountain or on heath. Like a shroud it wrapped us round, isolating us from all surroundments for a while, as we galloped on through it. Then we found a turf-pile, under the lee of which we sheltered ourselves and our horses, and watched the storm clearing off. Very soon those restless clouds, more passionate than inexorable, began to part and sweep off in grand masses to the north-east; while through the rifts and breaks little rills of intense gleaming light began to trickle down upon the moorland, making oases of emerald brightness upon its darkness and desolation. Once more the wind came in our faces, vigorous, vital, yet withal protecting rather than assaulting, as though indeed it had a giant's strength,' but disdained 'to use it like a giant.' Once more the veil is drawn aside from distant hill, and tor, and flat, and the vast plain is before us again, in the clear, gray, cloudy light of the autumn afternoon. And now the pony-chaise is seen wearily toiling along the wretched road, one wheel about a foot above the other, proceeding along the ridge of a wagonrut. They are all very wet, and the suggestion that 'possibly a house is near, judging from the pile of turf against which we are standing,' is received with eagerness. In short, another turn of the road brings us to the outbuildings of a little farm, and at the yard gate stands a man with a child in his arms. Looking up as we approach, the man reveals a face equally comely and kindly-dark intelligent eyes, well-formed features, and curly brown hair. There is freedom, and therefore a certain picturesque grace in his movements, as he stoops to set the child on its feet, and not lived there long-only five months. There is a and extent the further we went on. Still there was a slight rise in the ground, and as we ascended, the bleak prospect widened, till suddenly, like a great ghost glaring on us, there was the pool. It certainly was the very eeriest and most uncanny-looking sheet of water that could be imagined. Brightly it flashed in the sunlight, that just then burst forth benignantly; the wind rippled its surface into sea-like waves, and it plashed against the mimic shore of sand and pebble that surrounded it, with the low music that was as an echo caught from the greater harmonies of the grand waters afar off. And yet, for all this brightness of aspect and soothingness of sound, it was a ghostly, unreal, phantom-like, deceitful-looking lake-such as one might dream of in a feverish sleep, and shiver to remember when awake. A very devil's pool, of which the beauty itself was chilling, and inspired neither love nor trust. It might have vanished like a wraith, melted like a mist from before our eyes, and it would scarcely have seemed unnatural. A little boat was offered to us to row across, were we so minded; but I think we should instinctively have recoiled from launching forth on those treacherouslooking waters, even had our time been longer, and the clouds not gathering so blackly in the distance. And we turned our faces from the pool, and retraced our way, still guided by our miner, whose cheery face, ever and anon turned back towards us, it was a wholesome pleasure to see. Now fell the rain again—and once more washed from our vision the vast scope of rugged barrenness. But this was a storm that rapidly passed us by, leaving us in clear atmosphere, with the wind blowing lustily about us, while afar off the clouds seemed wildly and tumultuously leaping from very sky to earth. It was a wondrous scene; as slowly coming down the hill again we watched that fury of rain in the distance spend itself, and subside; while, coming into life with the death of its violent passion, was born a rainbow; at first pale, then gradually increasing into perfection of arch, and radiance, and colour, till the bleak moorland was transfigured, and the world once more looked as though it knew God. It was good so to depart on our way back, with that last vision in our eyes; it was good to remember, when we were at home again, not only the weird lake, but the soft sky that shone above it-not only the legendary Tregeagle, but the real flesh-andblood miner, our friend for ever, with his honest face and genial, generous warmth of heart-not only the great moor, looking like incarnate desolation and despair, but the glorious rainbow, the visible type of divine love and human faith. OCCASIONAL NOTES. A WORD ON THEATRICALS. Ir is matter of common remark, that the theatres in general are now ministering to a lower taste than was formerly the case. The managers say they find the galleries more resorted to than the boxes, and they have to legislate for the amusement of their supporters. It might be asked, why do the more affluent classes not go to the theatre? and there might be some difficulties to settle before a satisfactory answer could be given; but we set all such questions aside, and content ourselves with the acceptance of the facts placed before our eyes, that vast multitudes of nearly all classes-both those who would be found in boxes, and those who would be found in galleries, if they frequented theatres-now prefer the lecture-room to the playhouse. It shews there are evenings to spend away from home, and money to pay for entertainment, now as heretofore, but that the theatre is no longer the | exclusively favourite place for the spending of evenings from home. It seems to us that theatrical managers should lay this fact well to heart. They should see in it that, in getting up frivolous vaudevilles for the sixpenny galleries, they are letting vast numbers of potential auditors of a better class escape them. The questions for them are: Could any of these people be brought back to the theatre, or induced to give it a share of their patronage? and, Would the theatre, in recovering them, necessarily lose any other class? It strikes us that the management of the Princess's Theatre by Mr and Mrs Charles Kean is a fact greatly favourable to the affirmative in one case, and to the negative in the other. By legislating for a cultivated taste, by introducing a thoroughly respectable element into their system, they have carried all classes, and been highly successful. We regard this as the first theatre to discern the tendencies and actual attainments of the age-to see that men and women now require that even with their amusements there must go some mental improvement, some gratification to a refined taste, something of a worthy nature to form an excuse to themselves for the time they are spending in amusement. Its reproductions of esteemed plays with correct historic illustrations in dresses and scenery, at once pleasing in general effect and highly instructive, have been, in our apprehension, amongst the most meritorious doings in the whole history of the English theatre. We speak as provincialists who only see London occasionally and superficially-neither bound over by private spite to be snarlers, nor allured by private regard to be panegyrists. We report our own simple impressions from what we have witnessed. Well, may not other managers profit by taking the same or analogous means to throw a respectable element into their performances? We really can see no reason why they should not. THE SCOTCH SYSTEM OF BANKING. The Scotch system of banking, of which one used to hear panegyrically a few years ago, was simply this -a joint-stock bank, prudently conducted. There have of late been several banks both in England and Scotland, professedly on the Scotch system; and they were so-barring the prudence. That made a great difference-so great, that it is questionable if they could justly be said to be upon the Scotch system. Scotch banks will probably be for some years more coolly referred to than they used to be. Yet this is only as it were to talk depreciatingly of a family because it has had one or two mauvais sujets in it. The steadiness, solidity, and durability of the good old Scotch banks are precisely what they have ever been. The three of Edinburgh, whose notes were put into the Castle at the approach of Prince Charles's army in 1745-namely, the Bank of Scotland, the Royal Bank of Scotland, and the British Linen Company's Bank-are all flourishing in the highest credit to this day. The first of these has had its doors open every day, and answered every demand upon it, since the time which Lord Macaulay describes in his History can ever be shut. And as this bank has always a of England. It is not easy to imagine that such a door reserve of two millions in government stocks, it may be said to have given a tolerably good guarantee that the door will continue to be kept open. Of like character and credit-worthiness are several of more modern establishment; but as a rule, the solidity is in proportion to the antiquity. And the reason is plain. The newer banks, in their eagerness to obtain business and connection, have in general been less disposed than the older ones to hold by the old prudential maxims. The old, having fewer temptations to go wrong, have more generally kept right. The safety of the joint-stock banks lay CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL. in the caution they exercised in trusting men of The personage in Marryat's novel of Peter Simple The recent failure, then, of the Western is a second splendid example of the error of an over-facility in granting accommodation. It ought now to be seen, through the medium of experience, if the principle be still obscure, that it does not do to deal out large That is Scotch banking, minus the sums to traders without capital and men struggling with debt. When the old private banks of England failed in prudence; a thing altogether to be condemned. such large numbers in 1825-6, it was thought desirable to introduce new establishments in imitation of the joint-stock banks of Scotland, which were understood to be thriving and solid concerns. Banks were accordingly set up on what was called the Scotch planwere obtained for them from Scotland. But it was namely, joint-stock; and, in many instances, managers soon found that the directors took accommodation for never heard of in Scotch banks; and the management themselves out of the coffers of the bank, a thing was in general unable to exercise that careful discrimination in a large bustling mercantile community like Manchester or Liverpool, which it could do in a little community such as that of Edinburgh, where Owing to these causes, there the character and circumstances of everybody are But were these more or less known. have been many disastrous failures of banks on the so-called Scotch plan in England. We would wish our southern readers to understand banks truly like the Scotch banks? that the Scotch banks which used to be referred to as such models of banks, are all still much as they used to be. Or if they have given in, as we believe they have, to the vice of over-facility-forced thereto by on vicious principles-it is not to any serious extent, the competition of younger establishments conducted and will probably be hereafter to one still less so, for The venerable establishments we have enuthe history of the two suspended banks is a serious lesson. merated, and several of the more modern, are all of them prudently conducted and of fair prosperity. They are the depositories of some forty millions, the floating uninvested capital of Scotland; and their three millions of notes, backed by the legal proportion of gold, are the circulating medium of the country (sovereigns being barely known in Scotland). We believe we can prognosticate with tolerable safety that this system of things will long go on unchanged, and to the perfect satisfaction of Scotland itself, if the state-doctors will permit. 'AFAR IN THE DESERT.' WHEN the gentle and genial Thomas Pringle sang his Desert ode, which lingered in the ear of Coleridge like a spell, the desert in question was comparatively little known. The silent Bush-boy alone by his side' had only begun to tell, or to click, his tale in the ear of Europe; and the valleys remote' of the ourebi, the gnu, the gazelle, the hartebeest, and the gemsbok, were still covered by the blue veil of distance, behind which Since then, many an adventurous they played their fantastic tricks, more like shadows than realities. knight has threaded the maze of these primeval forests, and sounded the horn at the gates of their enchanted castles of living rock, and started with a thrill of gallant fear as the challenge was answered by the roar of the lion, and the trumpet of the elephant, the ogre and giant of the region. Many a story of brave emprise and of religious heroism has come to us from these wild regions. The shadiest nook of the African south is as well known as a field of silvan war as the scene of an English steeple-chase or a Scotch deer-hunt, but still our curiosity is unsatisfied; and here comes the narrative of another last Nimrod, as new, and fresh, and exciting as ever.* Nor is this surprising, when we know that as yet we are only on the borders of the mighty population of London: feræ naturæ; that in the far interior, the whole face of the country may sometimes be seen, as the Boers report, covered for miles with a densely-packed body of blesbok, boutebok, springbok, and wildebeest. In the trek-boken, or migration of the spring-bok, the inconceivable numbers destroy all the grass, leaving the plain like a vast cattle-fold; hundreds die from being in the rear, and not getting anything to eat, while those in the front are fat, but from this very cause become at last lazy, and gradually fall in the rear, to become thin in their turn, and move again to the front.' Captain Drayson, even in the civilised part of the country, encountered a herd of two hundred elands coming on at full speed, led by their bulls, and at the sound of the hunter's fire, although large and apparently unwieldy animals, making prodigious leaps in the air. Scenes like this occur in the 'open;' but the bush has other denizens, and awakens other sensations. Our adventurer's first excursion into the forest introduced him into the presence of a herd of forty elephants. 'A strange mysterious feeling came over me in being thus brought for the first time on the fresh traces of evidently a numerous herd of these gigantic animals. I began to ask if it were not great impertinence for two such pigmies as we now seemed, to attempt an attack upon at least forty of these giants, who, by a swing of their trunks, or a stamp of their foot on us, could have terminated our earthly career with as much ease as we could that of an impertinent fly? There is also an utter feeling of loneliness and self-dependence in treading the mazes of these vast forests. One mile of bush always appeared to remove me further from man and his haunts than twenty miles of open country. One is inspired with a kind of awe by the gloom and silence that pervade these regions, the only sounds being the warning-note of some hermit-bird, or the crack of a distant branch. The limited view around also tends to keep every other sense on the alert, and the total absence of every sign of man, or man's work, appears to draw one nearer to the spirit-world, and to impress us with a greater sense of the Divine presence.' It would be easy to fill our space with very exciting combats between the knight and the giants; but these being the staple of various other books of the kind, we prefer turning to details of a more novel character. Captain Drayson has a very observant eye, and does not content himself with adventures and pictures. His volume, in fact, may be described as the vade mecum of South African hunters; it is so full of remarks useful or necessary to the sportsmen of these regions. His pupils, however, cannot well be numerous, if we judge by the qualifications considered as absolutely essential, even to mediocrity in the chase. It is absolutely necessary not only to be a good shot, but to be so after a sharp four-mile gallop, and from either shoulder; to load as well while at full speed as when on foot; to be able to ride boldly across country, and allow your horse to go downhill at speed over the large stones and with a loose rein; to pull up, dismount, fire, and get up again with a rapidity a monkey might envy; and when an animal has been wounded and is out of sight, to lean over your horse's shoulder, and follow the spoor at a canter on the hard ground, with the accuracy of a hound; and last and not least, to take care to fly clear of your horse when he turns over in a jackal's or porcupine's hole, instead of letting him come on you, and smash a few ribs. These and many other qualifications, I have no doubt, most of my readers possess; but there may be some who do not, and who in consequence would not stand Al in the far south.' To follow the spoor, or, as the Americans call it, trail, is not the gift of instinct. The tracks of the animals pursued are as obvious to the experienced European as to the native, although in his novitiate he is no doubt frequently astounded by what may seem to him the supernatural intelligence of his black guide, who not only points the path the unseen object has taken, but describes the sex, size, and pace of the animal. The footprint of a male elephant is round; that of a female, elliptical; and six times the diameter of these impressions gives the height of the animal. An engraving in the volume puts us in possession of numerous secrets of the kind; and after studying it by the fireside, Mr John Smith may comfort himself with the idea, that if fate should ever lead him into the South African bush, he will be able to tell at a glance the spoor of a rhinoceros from that of a hippopotamus, of a buffalo from an eland or a hyena, a leopard, an ostrich, or a wild pig. He will be able to distinguish, likewise, whether the animal has galloped, or trotted, or walked. 'When judging of elephants, it may be concluded that, if they browsed, they must have moved slowly; if they are found to have passed through the forest in Indian file, they travelled at a quick walk; and if they disregarded old paths, and smashed the branches of trees in their course, that they moved very rapidly.' Our sportsman mentions, that when his attention was drawn to an object about four miles distant, before he had found the correct focus of his glass, the Boers with their naked eye would have decided correctly that it was a hartebeest. Elands,' said they in explanation, always look light fawn-coloured when they turn, whereas hartebeest look red; buffaloes, black-these three animals being the most commonly met with in these plains. The wild boar-the "vleck vark" of the Dutch-is told by its dark colour, and because it is not so large about the head and shoulders as a buffalo; besides, four or five are generally found together. When the sportsman becomes acquainted with the habits of the animals, the positions which they occupy, as also their way of moving, will generally shew to what class the game belongs.' An animal whose spoor is not thought worth describing, will perhaps be found as interesting by the reader as any other. Captain Drayson had gone out one morning to see the sun rise in a very beautiful part of the desert. 'Suddenly I heard a hoarse cough, and, on turning, saw indistinctly in the fog a queer little old man standing near, and looking at me. I instinctively cocked my gun, as the idea of Bushmen and poisoned arrows flashed across my mind. The old man instantly dropped on his hands, giving another hoarse cough, that evidently told a tale of consumptive lungs; he snatched up something beside him, which seemed to leap on his shoulders, and then he scampered off up the ravine on all-fours. Before half this performance was completed, I had discovered my mistake; the little old man turned into an ursine baboon, with an infant ditto, which had come down the kloof to drink. The "old man's" cough was answered by a dozen others, at present hidden in the fogs; soon, however, Uprose the sun, the mists were curled and I obtained a view of the range of mountains gilded by the morning sun. A large party of the old gentleman's family were sitting up the ravine, and were evidently holding a debate as to the cause of my intrusion. I watched them through my glass, and was much amused at their grotesque and almost human movements. Some of the old ladies had their olive branches in their laps, and appeared to be "doing their hair;" while a patriarchal-looking old fellow paced backwards and forwards with a fussy sort of look: he was evidently on sentry, and seemed to think himself of no small importance. This estimate of his dignity did not appear to be universally CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL. acknowledged, as two or three young baboons sat close behind him watching his proceedings; sometimes, with the most grotesque movements and expressions, they would stand directly in his path, and hobble away One daring youngster only at the last moment. followed close on the heels of the patriarch during the whole length of his beat, and gave a sharp tug at his tail as he was about to turn. The old fellow seemed to treat it with the greatest indifference, scarcely Master Impudence turning round at the insult. was about repeating the performance, when the pater, shewing that he was not such a fool as he looked, suddenly sprung round, and catching the young one before he could escape, gave him two or three such cuffs that I could hear the screams that resulted therefrom. The venerable gentleman then chucked the delinquent over his shoulder, and continued his promenade with the greatest coolness: this old baboon evidently was acquainted with the practical details of A crowd gathered round the Solomon's proverb. naughty child, which, childlike, seeing commiseration, shrieked all the louder. I even fancied I could see the angry glances of the mamma, as she took her dear little pet in her arms, and removed it from a repetition of such brutal treatment.' certain Peshauna, a young lady whose reputation for We are told likewise of a tame baboon whose great delight was in frightening the Kaffir women. On selecting his victim, he would rush at her as if he intended to devour her, and away she would fly for bare life, dropping her basket or hoe. But he soon caught hold of her, and seizing her by one leg, stared in her face, mowing and grinning, and moving his eyebrows at her like an incarnate fiend. When her screams at lengthened lest some one should carry her off before I could brought assistance, in the shape of a Kaffir cur, Jacko sprung up a tree, and resting secure on an upper branch, 'gazed upwards and around, with a quiet and contemplative air, as though he had sought this elevated position for the sole purpose of meditating on the weakness of baboon and animal nature generally, but more particularly on the foibles of excited Kaffir curs.' The baboon, when tame, however, is sometimes of more use than to frighten women, who he knows will throw down the hoe instead of breaking his head with it. He is made use of to discover water in the desert when his master would perhaps perish without it. A little salt is rubbed on his tongue to irritate his thirst, and he is then let go; "he runs along a bit, scratches himself, shews his teeth at me, takes a smell up-wind, looks all round, picks up a bit of grass, smells or eats it, stands up for another sniff, canters on, and so on. Wherever the nearest water is, there he is sure to go." This anecdote was corroborated by others present.' as Besides the author's adventures, there are several very exciting narratives in the volume, more especially one of a Boer who was severely bitten in a conflict with a wounded leopard. After contriving to despatch the animal with his knife, he lay down helpless, expecting death before the morning, and thinking it hardly worth his while to notice a sensation he had if something were crawling upon his shoulder. When daylight came, he looked at his broken arm lying useless beside him, and saw a great brownlooking thing lying over it-the fat bloated body of a hideous puff-adder.' The sound of voices was now heard-his friends had come to look for him; but he As their steps dared not answer, he dared not move. came near, the puff-adder raised his broad head, and looked towards the new-comers, and then, removing from the warm lodging he had tenanted perhaps for hours, glided away through the brushwood. But the most novel narrative in the book bears no relation to wild animals; it is a genuine Kaffir lovehistory, wearing to us the air of romance, owing to the manners being new and strange. The heroine is a "I had long heard people talk of Peshauna being a I stopped beauty, but did not think much about it until I went there one night and saw her. Ma mee! she was muthle buffalo-shooting near her father's kraal. kakulu! [the superlative of beautiful]. I talked to her I went out next day, and shot a young buffalo. I a great deal, and I thought that she would soon like me. managed to get help enough to bring it to the kraal, and I gave it all to Peshauna. Her father had asked many cows for her, but somehow no one had yet offered enough. When I heard this, I felt very frightmanage to buy her. My two wives I had always thought would have been enough for me, and I had given so many cows for them, that I really had not twenty left. I considered how I could manage, and hoped that fourteen cows paid, and seven more in ten moons, would be as good as twenty now. But Ama that a young chief named Boy would give the twenty Sheman, her father, would not have this, and told me cows at once. I was very angry at this, and asked Ama Sheman to wait a little, which he agreed to do for four months, as he said he would sooner see her my umfazi [wife] than Boy's. I went home, and was always after elephants. I got very rash, and was nearly killed by them once or twice, for my gun was not big enough. At last I killed a large bull-elephant, and got eight cows as my share. I started off at once to tell Ama Sheman that my cows were ready. He did He was an old chingana [rogue], and not seem pleased to see me, but told me he should like to see my cows. or I, as Boy had now offered twenty cows as well as wanted to see which had the finest lot of cattle, Boy myself. Mine were the finest, so it was agreed that I was to take Peshauna as my umfazi. When this was settled, I went out to try and shoot a buffalo for our marriage-feast. I did kill a large one before the sun was up high, and I returned with it to the kraal. As I came near, I heard the women and children screaming. I ran up, and found that Boy had watched all the men out of the kraal, had then walked quietly in with three of his people, and caught my dear Peshauna, and, before she had suspected anything, carried her off. Ama Sheman went out to try and stop them, but he was knocked on the head with a knob-kerry, I shouted for the and lay as if dead. They got off well from the kraal, and were out of sight when I returned, for they did not think I should be back so soon. men, who soon came in. We got our assagies, and I eight of us started in chase. We went fast, and soon had my gun. Ama Sheman came all alive again, and sighted the four rascals. As we came near them, they soon let Peshauna loose, and ran for their lives. We seemed surprised, and did not know what to do. They gained on them, and I threw away my gun, that I |