THE LEAGUER OF LATHOM.* "'Twas when they raised, 'mid sap and siege, At their she-captain's call; Who, miracle of womankind! That mann'd her castle wall. THESE simple yet eloquent lines, quoted by Mr. William Harrison Ainsworth, give the key-note to his new story. That "miracle of womankind,"-Charlotte de la Trémoille, Countess of Derby, is the heroine; but although her name is more popular than that of her husband, from her gallant defence of Lathom House, the Earl of Derby is the real hero, and his feats at Manchester, Lancaster, and Preston, and, above all, his entire devotion to an ungrateful monarch, ending in a tragic fate, more then entitle him to the distinction which is conferred upon him by the author. Manchester, at the time of the succession of Lord Strange to the Earldom of Derby, was held by the Parliamentarians, and it had been put in an efficient state of defence by a skilful German engineer-one Colonel Rosworm, who had served under Wallenstein during the Thrity Years' War. As Lord Strange," the earl had assembled a force of over sixty thousand efficient men on the moors of Lancashire, in the cause of King Charles; but that monarch misled by perfidious counsellors to believe that the Stanleys had pretensions to the crown, forbade the lord to take the command of the force, and these potent auxiliaries were thus lost to the King. When that monarch, alarmed at the rapid progress the rebellion was making in Lancashire, was reduced once more to claim the aid of Lord Strange-now Earl of Derby-that aid was willingly tendered; but it was no longer possible to raise the same amount of men-many had even gone over to the rebels. The King's desire was that Lord Derby should, with the aid of the local nobility and gentry, send such forces as they could assemble, crush the rebellion throughout the country, and to do this begin with Manchester. No time was accordingly lost in laying siege to the city; and as Salford had remained faithful to the King, the opposing forces "The Leaguer of Lathom, a Tale of the Civil War in Lancashire." By William Harrison Ainsworth. 3 vols. Tinsley Brothers. soon found themselves in very close proximity. A view of old. Manchester, at this epoch, with its preparations for defence, taken from the tower of the Collegiate Church, is one of those masterpieces of description in which the author excels, and one which, from his intimacy with localities and past history, no other writer could equal. Before entering upon the siege, an attempt was made to win over the German engineer to the royal cause, and a gallant young cavalier-Frank Standish-was employed upon the delicate mission. But, although a soldier of fortune, Colonel Rosworm was firm in his allegiance, and he indignantly repelled the overtures made to him. Not so his daughter Gertrude, a fair German girl with profuse flaxen locks, summer-blue eyes, a delicately-fair complexion, and graceful figure; her instincts were in favour of the monarchy, and these received a new impulse in the acquaintance thus brought about with the handsome young Cavalier, with his long brown locks falling upon his shoulders, a great contrast to the closely-cropped, sour-looking Puritans, with whom she was daily brought in contact. The intimacy thus brought about was ripened by Captain Standish being wounded at an assault on the barrier in Deansgate, and removed to Colonel Rosworm's house, where he was tended by the lovely Gertrude. This youthful maiden was not only fair, she was a personlike others whose characters were developed by the peculiar circumstances of the times--who had actually martial instincts; and so far did these carry her, that she assumed male attire in order to accompany a nocturnal sortie, resolved upon by the rebels, to burn down Alport Lodge, at that time the head-quarters of the Royalists. Gertrude, made prisoner by Frank Standish in this untoward affair, was induced by the Earl of Derby to plead with her father that he would aid in the defence of Lathom House. She did so with earnestness, but to no avail; and so far were the young maiden's sympathies with the cause won over, that she consented to separate herself from her father, and attend upon the Countess at Lathom House. This episode in a most eventful history has a melancholy ending-like the story itself. The Cavaliers appear in some instances to have been more firm in their allegiance to royalty than they were to their loves; and Frank Standish becomes desperately enamoured of a Spanish maiden, with magnificent black eyes, who had been stranded, with her father, in a large Spanish man-of-war, bringing arms and ammunition for the King's party, in the estuary of the Wyre. Poor Gertrude is no longer thought of, until, after many acts of devotion and courage, she is shot by a puritanical fanatic, known as Asaph the Avenger, and on her death-bed pardons her faithless lover. It is not for us to anticipate the striking incidents and strange RR events which attended upon the great civil war in Lancashire. The Earl of Derby, baffled at Manchester, the siege of which city was raised by command of the King, obtained possession of another of the strongholds of Puritanism-Preston-after storming Lan caster; and the royal cause was, with a few drawbacks, prospering in the county, when once more the weak monarch was induced by the Earl's enemies to take from him his command, and to summon his friends and followers to Oxford. The bearer of this unwelcome order was no less a person than the redoutable Lord Goring-there was no eluding it-although the earl pleaded earnestly to be allowed to make one more assault on the stubborn Parliamentarians of Manchester; and nothing was left for the noble leader of the Lancashire Royalists than to retire to Castle Rushen in the Isle of Man-leaving to his brave wife the defence of Lathom House. The true interest of the work lies with this well-known and most remarkable siege. Never, however, has it been before so fully related in all its striking incidents, as they occurred day by day, acts of heroism which fully deserved being rescued from oblivion by such an elaborate and careful record. We have read some strangely-coloured stories of devices used to annoy and terrify the besiegers, when a scarcity of powder diminished the means of defence, and no longer allowed of the frequent and daring sallies which constituted so remarkable a feature in the defence of Lathom House; but our careful and experienced author reduces them to the flinging of balls of clay, furnished with a lighted match, such as were used at that epoch by the musketeers; and the besiegers, thinking that an assailing party was at hand, fired in the direction of the lights, to the great delight and amusement of the spectators on the ramparts. The gallant Prince Rupert came at last to the relief of the besieged mansion-the Parliamentarians were defeated at Stockport Bridge-Bolton was taken by assault-Lathom House was set free; a banquet was given in the great hall, and a marriage took place in the chapel. The faithless Standish did not, however, live long to enjoy the company of his Spanish beauty; he fell shortly afterwards at the siege of Liverpool, and finally the King having been beheaded, the youthful Charles had once more been aided by the brave and loyal Earl of Derby to recover his father's throne, when a sad conclusion is brought about to this most eventful history, by a picture of which it is justly said: "it will retain its melancholy attraction as long as any reverence shall remain for what is noble and heroic or any pity for tenderness and constancy in the saddest reverses of fortune-in fact, as long as there are hearts that can feel and eyes that can weep." THE RISE OF MAXIMIN, EMPEROR OF THE OCCIDENT, Compiled by LUCIUS, Keeper of the Imperial Archives at Iscapolis. TRANSLATED AND EDITED BY RICHARD JEFFERIES. CHAPTER II.-Continued. MAX now sent his agents, one or two together, about among the mountaineers, the hardy, independent dwellers near and upon the Blue Mountains, who entered their small circular camps, carrying the "Rah" in hand, and read from it, and addressed them. These men had never been subjected either by Saudover, Brucester, or any of the petty kingdoms which lined its coast. They had no king, but a number of chiefs, who, however, had little authority: and their hands had been for generations against the dwellers upon the coast. But even taking into consideration all the circumstances, it is impossible to explain the enthusiasm which seized upon them when the enterprise of Maximin, and the principles of his works, were expounded to them. They flocked to the Sacred Stone in hundreds, and laid themselves at his feet, begging him to lead them against their enemies, and he received deputations from the camps for two days' march along the Blue Mountain range, requesting him to be their regulus. At first, Maximin, urged on strongly by his new friends, was inclined to head a general descent into the coasts with these men; but before he decided, he, as was his wont, went out alone to commune with the wilderness. Alone upon the great Plantain, with the sun and the sky, he thought over the proposed expedition. He reckoned up, one by one, the reasons for and against. He saw that the mountaineers were hardy and brave; but he also saw that they were illarmed, having nothing but spears and darts, and they had no organisation whatever. The dwellers upon the coast were, it is true, badly disciplined; but they possessed firearms and cannon and could retire, if pressed, behind stone walls. If they did that, the mountaineers, as soon as they had exhausted the supplies of the country, must return to the bills, and then, the cities uniting, would pursue them, and attacking one camp after another, cause a great slaughter. It would be cruelty to expose his friends to such destruction. He could not arm them better, for there was no iron in the hills, and he had no forges; and if he attempted to start an arsenal, the cities would hear of it, and destroy it before he could manufacture sufficient arms. He could never conquer the cities without cannon; and he could not starve them out, because they had the command of the sea. have iron, arms, and ships. Where to get them? Casting back among the memories of his travels in the boat or speronare, he remembered the beautiful Pinerie Islands in the midst of the sea, whose inhabitants had begged him to stay amongst and instruct them, so that they might throw off the yoke of those tyrants the Cythes, who occupied the only cliff. These islanders were expert sailors, well provided with ships. Their islands were full of iron, and they understood how to work it. The body of the Cythes who held the cliff fortress had disarmed them; but they were bold and fearless. Their ignorance only kept them under. The Cythes in the cliff fortress were not a large body. He would see these with his friends, destroy the barbarous Cythes, and make himself chief of the islands, and finally return with arms and ships, and disciplined Then with the aid of the mountaineers he might become a power. These Cythes were the curse of the land. They came from Cytheria, in the distant and inaccessible north-west, and were undoubtedly of the bravest of the brave, but cruel, barbarous, and superstitious to an incredible degree. He had long viewed the practice of the kings employing these men as mercenaries with disgust-by their aid they trampled upon their subjects, and maintained a despotism. Even then he dreaded the time when the Cythes might come in an irresistible wave, and sweep away all civilisation and learning. Their galleys and ships grew more numerous year by year, and they landed and burnt towns and villages upon the coast. No ship of traffic was safe from their piracy. He determined that one feature of the policy he would pursue would be to expel these rude invaders, and, in one word, to keep Lyonesse for the Lyonnais. men. Returning, Maximin called his council together, and imparted his resolution. They opposed it on the ground that now was the time, while the enthusiasm of the mountaineers was at its highest, and represented to him that these men would shrink from encountering the perils of a voyage in which they must lose sight of land. Maximin was firm, and in the end carried his point. Even at that early date it was wonderful what an influence this man had acquired over the better judgment of his followers. The next thing was from what port to set out, and how to obtain vessels. Maximin determined to build his own ships. He remembered a bay out of the track of vessels, and surrounded with forest, where they could build their galleys unmolested. Sydney and Stewart were both clever mechanics-they could design the ships. Before |