We ask, nay, we demand, in the name of justice, how long are we to be thus trampled down by a foreign people?"

We must do the Americans, however, the justice to add, that they have been misled by the most erroneous information. Indeed, neither party in the dispute appears hitherto to have been in possession of any thing approaching to correct geographical knowledge. For this we are indebted to the present report of Messrs Featherstonhaugh and Mudge. It is a report which does them great credit, as well in that part of the controversy

which concerns the ancient boundaries of the American states or colonies, as in the light it thows upon the topograph of the district. It was no common survey which they undertook; and in making their numerous observations, they must necessarily have undergone much labour and fatigue, the narrative of which, like high-minded men, they have suppressed. The following passage will be read with interest :

"We have to ask your Lordship's attention to the fact, that upon reaching the scene of our operations, we learnt that they were to be carried on in a wilderness, where not a human being was to be met with, with the exception of a few settlers upon the Roostuc river, about forty miles west of the St John's river, and of a few wandering Indians employed in the chase, or, occasionally, of some American lumberers; and that our endeavours to procure from any quarter, correct topographical information of the interior of the disputed territory were unavailing, the most superficial and contradictory being entertained upon the frontiers as to the sources of the streams, and as to the direction in which it would

be most advisable to push our investiga tions, with a due regard to that economy of time which we were compelled to observe. This wilderness, thus situated,

had never, we believe, been crossed in the

direction it was necessary for us to take, by persons capable of describing the country with any thing approaching to accuracy; and, consequently, all the maps which we had seen, proved in the end remarkably defective. Indeed, had we not been so fortunate as to engage in our service two intelligent Indians, who had become somewhat familiar with the country, by having frequently made it the scene of their hunting grounds, and whose rude maps, traced upon sheets of the bark of the birch

tree, served often to guide us, a great portion of our time might have been lost in cutting our communications through forests and almost impenetrable swamps, upon injudicious courses, for the purpose of transporting our provisions, instruments,

and canoes.

*

We have troubled

your Lordship with these remarks and incidents, not for the purpose of showing that our duty was accompanied with a greater degree of personal inconvenience

than was anticipated by us on accepting

the charge we have been honoured with, but to account, in some measure, for the

delay in sending in our report."

the sight is impeded by thick forests, In this uncleared district, where barometric observations were almost the only means which could be employed for determining heights. Here is a glimpse of the country which was the scene of their operations.

"A large portion of the disputed territory may be seen from the summit of Mars Hill, which is nearly 1700 feet above the level of the sea. On the top of that hill a space has been cleared by cutting down the trees, and a framed stage has been erected, about twenty feet in height, for the purpose of obtaining a view of the distant country. It presents to the eye one mass of dark and gloomy forest to the utmost limits of sight, covering by its umbrageous mantle the principal rivers, minor streams, and scanty evidences of the habitation of man. The hill itself is also rarely distinguishable from any part of the surrounding territory; and it is only by the increased difficulty of the ascent, that the traveller becomes aware of his approach to the summit.”—Appendix, p. 1.

Accompanying this report, are portions of the correspondence between our Government and the United States on this long-agitated subject. The tone of this correspondence is highly creditable to both parties-for the deportment of Congress and of the little state of Maine are not to be confounded together; but the facts which for determining this question. The it discloses prove the urgent necessity state of Maine, a short time ago, secretly organized a force, denominated civil, which entered the disputed territory for the professed purpose of driving out certain trespassers, who had no right from either Government. Our governor of New Brunswick, Sir John Harvey, was under the necessity, in his turn, of expelling these Mainites, and thus ill-blood arose,

The question was mooted-a question which, if there had been any ground for doubt, would certainly have been stirred long ago-which of the two countries had the right, pending the controversy, to govern this debateable land. It had always been understood that England, who was, at the time of the treaty, in possession of the territory, and who was bound to surrender nothing more than what would be proved to belong to its old revolted colonies, was to retain the government, in order to protect the soil, for the sake of both parties, from all interlopers. But even this, we say, has been questioned, and the state of Maine, turbulent and impatient, thinks it a hardship that she is not let into possession of this litigated property.

In this state of things Mr Stevenson, the Minister of the United States residing in this country, writes to Lord Palmerston," to invite the attention of her Majesty's Government to the subject, and in the most solemn and earnest manner invoke its speedy and prompt interposition."

To this letter Lord Palmerston replies (April 3, 1839) with truth and dignity.

"The undersigned begs leave to state, in reply to Mr Stevenson's note, that her Majesty's Government fully share the opinions expressed by the Government of the United States as to the importance of a final settlement of the Boundary Question; and they partake of the anxiety felt by that Government, that such settlement should be arrived at with as little delay as the nature of things will admit and her Majesty's Government flatter themselves that they have given indisputable proofs of their sincerity in this matter; first, by accepting, without hesitation, the award of the King of the Netherlands, however disadvantageous to Great Britain; and by adhering to that award until the United States had irrevocably determined to reject it; and, secondly, by afterwards proposing to solve the question, by dividing equally between the two parties the terri

tory which is in dispute. If, then, the difference between the two countries has not been long since settled, it is not for want of proposals on the part of Great Britain, which, as it appears to her Majesty's Government, were in their nature honourable for both parties.

"With respect to the events that have recently occurred between Maine and New Brunswick, her Majesty's Government deeply deplore that any circumstances should have arisen tending to threaten an interruption of the friendly relations between the two countries; but her Majesty's Government cannot refrain from observing, that if any collision shall unfortunately have taken place between the people of Maine and the authorities of New Brunswick, that collision will have been brought on by hostile proceedings on the part of Maine, planned or decided upon in secret, executed suddenly and without previous notice, and so conducted that, if it had been the intention of the Government of Maine to provoke a conflict, better means could not well have been devised to attain that end. Her Majesty's Governa ment, however, feel great pleasure in doing the fullest justice to the wise and enlightened course pursued upon this occasion by the President of the United States; and they beg Mr Stevenson to assure the President, that the British Government is equally animated by the same spirit of peace which has guided the councils of the President in this conjuncture of affairs." P. 62. Part I.

Mr Stevenson, in his reply, as he was in duty bound, throws his shield over his countrymen of Maine; but a perusal of the correspondence of their own authorities, and of the resolves of their own legislature, is sufficient to prove that they do not merit his defence. We anxiously hope that this question will now be brought to a speedy determination; but if the contest is prolonged, we are convinced that, in the judgment of every impar tial man, this will be owing entirely to the unreasonable pretensions of the inhabitants of Maine.

NO CONCIX. VOL. XLVIII.

Y.

sential to every advance, but a rough corps after all; stout, strong-handed serfs; and with hatchet and saw in hand formidable to thickets and rocks; but what man ever looks among the pioneers for a hero ?"

"Yet they had esprit enough to admire the romantic glitter and magic freaks of Napoleon.

"Yes," said the general, "all children are fond of tales of wonder, and all gossips of telling them. We Germans are proud of our country, and it is by nature a noble one-certainly superior in its natural advantages to any other that I have seen, not even excepting your own; for the unrivalled loveliness of England is the work of man, of freedom, good sense, and the simple tastes of the nation. But we are still in our infancy. Germany is only one huge nursery, in which the population is in its cradle. But we are children with a fine inheritance waiting for us when we shall arrive at the age of discretion; yet, until then, we must be allowed to play the antics of the nursery, to stare at every thing, to imagine that we know every thing, to attempt every thing, and, finally, like children who never see a toy but with a longing to know what makes it squeak, or dance, or tumble, breaking up every one of our graver toys of state, religion, and science, with a curiosity worthy of the cradle, and having only the fragments, after all, for our pains. I am a patriot, Sir," said he with a smile, "yet you see I too can play the philosopher."

"But when is your infant to arrive at man's estate ?"

"National minds are of slow growth," was the answer. "I do not think that Germany will be mature in less than five hundred years. It will take at least a century to get rid of her presumption that she is the cleverest nation in the world; and until then she cannot be said to even have the use of her understanding." "A long probation. But she is certainly not retrograding: she is clearly advancing."

"I am not so fully convinced of that. She is yet got little beyond the line where the French Revolution placed her. I allow that to have been an advance. But it was universal. It pushed every nation of Europe some degrees nearer the moral equa

The

tor. Politics are the sun of the world. England had sun enough already, and could be tropical only to be scorched; but Germany, cold, aguish, swampy, and wild, would be much the better for being half roasted alive. world has to thank a German for that revolution. Joseph the Secondof all Germans that ever lived the truest model of the German of the nineteenth century-was the man." "What-Joseph the philosopher and philanthropist! Where was the fire?"

"We shall long remember him,” observed the general, "for three things-the partition of Poland, the loss of the Netherlands, and the overthrow of the Bourbon throne.”

The evening was one of southern beauty; and the window of the hotel overlooked one of those small lakes which are so numerous in the coun<< try, watered by the thousand springs of the Tyrolese hills. The air, after a day of intense warmth, flowed in filled with the freshness of the mountain vegetation; and a young rising moon, just touching with her circlet the brow of a forest above, gave the due finishing of the picture. But even this was not all; for a troop of the travelling horn-players, who range all Europe from the Mediterranean to, I believe, the Pole, seeing our casement open, took up a position in the adjoining garden and began their display. All this is common; but the effect was as good, on the whole, as if we had heard it in a salon of Vienna, or were even enjoying a painted moon and canvass forest, with the full crash of a Parisian orchestra in front, to take us by storm.

We had both sunk into silence; and after a while I observed my companion had drawn from his bosom a miniature, on which he gazed with a fixed eye. He saw that I was looking at him, and handed it over to me. It was well worth his study, for it was one of the loveliest faces that I ever saw in my life.

"I presume I may ask the name? It is excessively lovely-at once gentle and noble."

"You may; for she is neither an opera girl nor a goddess. It was exactly in such an hour, and in this very apartment, five-and-twenty years ago, that a German friend of mine