country), standing six feet in his top-boots, you might have walked from Barton to London, which is a good fifty miles, without meeting so stalwart or fine a young fellow as he. The ruddy glow of health beamed upon his honest, open countenance, and, as he followed his little Tilly about the house, helping her in her decorations, or in the evening walked about the garden with his arm round her waist, admiring her day's triumph among her flower-beds, you might see that, if he were all in all to Tilly, Tilly was the object of his manly love and pride.

And thus they spent the first part of their married life in quiet, happy Barton, living the life God had designed for man before sin or trouble became his inheritance. Twelve months after the marriage, Miss Spiflicken was busy from house to house telling her friends that Doctor Scott had been summoned from behind his poplar-trees at two o'clock in the morning, and that a sweet little creature, whom, by a little coaxing of the nurse, she had had the privilege of seeing, had come to share the comforts and blessings of that happy home.

Twelve more months had gone by, when I stole a holiday from hard work, in my close parish in London, to see my old college chum, William Worboys.

There was the dear little cottage, as neat, and as nice, and almost as trim as ever. The honeysuckle, it is true, hung in untrained clusters about the porch, and the rose-tree sadly wanted nailing to the wall; but Tilly had got something else to take up her time and engage her attention now; perhaps (for I had not heard from them for some months) there might be even more than one little wardrobe to be looked after. It was late summer, or early autumn, and the geraniums in the garden were scarlet enough to look warm and comfortable, and the fuchsias were putting on their last bright array of bloom, to be stripped off them, perhaps, by some ruthless early frost; but the verbenas were growing tall and weedy, and most of the flowers had run to seed. "Did you ever

see," I asked myself, with some petulance" did you ever see a garden as neat and tidy in the autumn as at spring-time ?" The tall mountain ash looked cheerful in its red berries, and, albeit it was September, the sun was still warm, and the front door stood wide open. I meditated a surprise, and, getting off the coach, stole up the garden, and, unchallenged, walked on tiptoe into the little passage. The door to the right was open, but I tapped at it, and a female, wan, pale, and haggard, with a livid bruise under her eye, but whom I did not remember ever to have seen before, started up before me, and then rushed back. The door to the left was closed, so I knocked loudly at it; a husky voice cried, in reply, "Get away! Who the devil are you?" Pained and astonished, and with or without thought, I opened the door. A coarse, bloated figure of a man sprang from a chair as I entered, and then staggered back again, shaking his fist at me with impotent malignity, and exclaiming, as he fell into his chair, "What, has the parson, or old Spiflicken, sent you up to talk to me, or to hear her whine? Never mind! She shall pay for it—she shall pay for it! I don't want advice gratis-I pay her for all that's sent me. Ha! ha!"

With a half-emptied bottle on the table before him, and a clay pipe in his hand, in a stifling atmosphere of tobacco-smoke, polluting that little sanctuary, which I so well remembered, this horrid figure, clad in a worn

velveteen jacket, unlaced boots, stockings shuffled down and exposing the knee of one leg, begrimed breeches, with the strings hanging loose, again stood up and glared at me with eyes of painful gloss, almost starting out of a skin stretched till it shone again. In all the terrible symptoms of delirium tremens, there was something that told me this was the wreck of William Worboys! The shock unnerved me. I retreated before his tipsy menaces, and made my way, with a sad heart, to the Red Lion.

"Ah, sir, it's a bad job," said the bluff host, in reply to my inquiries, "but Will" (he was no longer " Mr. Worboys" with the honest man) "has took to drink shocking for the last six or eight months. He's a reg'lar radical; they won't have him in the parlour, so now he goes into the taproom, till he gets so troublesome that they pitch him out. Isn't it a shocking thing, sir? What's come of him I can't think. Some say he came into a lot o' money, others say he lost a lot o' but no one money, knows the rights on it. So different, you know, to what he was-though they tell me he was a little wild like at college."

Well, well, we all were in those days, and Worboys was not the worst of us."

Very like, sir, very like; but now, oh Lord! he's dreadful. And his poor wife-poor Miss Tilly!-it's well the old folks are dead and gone, and don't see it, though perhaps they do-and it's to be hoped they'll pray for him where they are! Do you know, sir, he-he

The honest old fellow was ashamed for manhood's sake to say the word, but he brought his hard fist down upon the table with a significance that turned me faint and sick, and added with a sorrowful shake of his head, "Ah, sir, he dew-indeed he DEW!"

"When does the next coach pass through for London ?” I asked, not caring to hear more.

But his reply was stopped by the hasty entrance of a man, who cried, "Mister Walton! Mister Walton! send some chaps up to Worboys's directly. He's shot his wife, and he's kind o' mad, and they can't hold him down. Wake up Bill Judd-he's in the taproom-he's as strong as a horse if he's not drunk! Doctor Scott says she's dead. Send 'em up quick!"

Oh that the coach would come up and take me from this delusive picture of repose-even to wicked London!

But it was long enough in coming to give time for another breathless messenger to arrive with the news:

"He broke away from 'em, and has gone and cut his throat!"

Miss Spiflicken's house is as trim and neat as ever, I am told (but I have never ventured near that place again), although a little child whom she adopted runs wild about it in all the license of her kindness-poor Tilly Worboys's baby!

YANKEE-LAND.

WHILE a portion of the Germans who were driven across the Atlantic by the storms of 1848 and 1849 appear to have learnt nothing and forgotten nothing, or have become more obstinate than before, another portion have learnt a great deal, and not alone materially assisted their transatlantic brethren with their knowledge, but have also, to a certain extent, acquired the right of standing forth as instructors of Europe in matters American. To this honourable class of German Americans, of whom we will only mention Kapp and Olshausen, belongs the author of a work we have now under notice.* It contains a very instructive description of the four great types of population into which the nation of the American Union is divided, and also supplies us with useful information about the German element in the Union. More especially are the Yankees proper-i.e. the population of the New England States and their colonists in the north-west-described in this book most fully. In the following sketch we will give an extract from this chapter, so far as we can agree with our author's views.

The territory of New England is a peninsula of nearly quadrangular shape, which is again divided into several smaller peninsulas, is traversed by several ranges of hills, and has a seaboard with which only that of Greece can compare in extent. This soil has since its settlement by Europeans produced a most peculiar population, varying considerably from that of the Western and Southern States. The Yankee proper is remarkable for height, thinness, a narrow skull and face, great variability of temper, inclinations, and occupations, a deficiency of simplicity and humour, premature manliness, and an early old age. On the other hand, he is distinguished from all the other American sof English origin by a grateful remembrance of the mother-land, by a constant connexion with its mental life, and by the maintenance of many old English customs in his manners, life, and taste. Then, again, he has a feeling for comfort, and takes delight in landscape beauty. Before all, he has richer mental dispositions, a stronger will, and a more persistent adhesion to what he has once determined on. Of the patents for new inventions annually granted at Washington, above one-half belong to little New England, although it contains but one-tenth of the whole population of the Union. The cotton-press, the steam-engine, the sowing and mowing machines, the steam plough, and other prominent inventions, all owe their paternity to Yankees. The same is the case with the poets and philosophers and historical authors of the country: Longfellow, Hawthorn, Bryant, Beecher Stow, Wendell Holmes, Theodore Parker, Everett, Emerson, Franklin, Bancroft, Prescott, Squier, Hitchcock, Mitchell, and Olmstead, are without an exception New Englanders. The land of the Yankees has supplied a majority of the most prominent preachers, lawyers, physicians, and fessional men. It has brought forth but few statesmen, but they were the most talented, as the names of Otis, Hancock, Adams, and Webster will prove. Even the uneducated Yankee has an intelligent appearance, a

pro

* Land und Leute in der Union. Von Adolf Douai. Berlin: Janke. 1864.

sensible, inquiring glance, and a propriety which is rarely found among this class in Europe. Moreover, he is distinguished by a firm, worthy demeanour, and a prevailing seriousness which is far more peculiar to him than to the other Americans.

The Yankee, furthermore, with a few exceptions, "is no equality scamp who spits without a spittoon." He has generally a great aversion from the vulgarities which justify the above description, and which are certainly met with very frequently in the south and west. At times he becomes troublesome through his curiosity, but is very rarely impertinent, and there is no coarseness in his nature. He readily grants others every liberty that he claims for himself. The New Englander is fond of mental and moral training, and this distinguishes him more especially from other Americans. The latter generally seek only a lacquer of education, and are church-goers and bigoted, in order to be regarded as moral. The Yankee, on the other hand, wishes to be really educated, and is a moral rigourist, so far as this does not impose too heavy duties. A true enthusiasm for the highest mental gifts is rare among all Americans, and the same is the case among the Yankees, but the latter make proportionately enormous sacrifices for the nurture of these gifts. The small State of Massachusetts pays annually for its public schools one and a half million dollars, while all its other outgoings hardly exceed the third part of that sum. The same State founded the first blind, deaf and dumb, and idiot hospitals in America, upon the model of the best institutions of the sort in Europe. Boston has two large libraries, one of seven hundred thousand, the other of one hundred and fifty thousand volumes, whose selection leaves but little to be desired, and which everybody is at liberty to consult. In the New England States there are hundreds of public libraries, nearly one in every township, which altogether contain several million well-selected books. From Massachusetts also emanated the first movement for the improvement of the school system, and the first American Kindergärten were established at Boston. The other five Yankee States (Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine) follow the example given by Massachusetts, as the latter is not only their mother but their model State.

Two institutions are common to the whole Yankee population: public lectures and debating clubs. The former extend over every branch of learning, and are delivered by celebrated professional men, philanthropists, enlighteners, or beaux esprits, who receive invitations to this effect. The honorarium, which is raised by subscription, amounts to from twenty to one hundred dollars for each lecture. Most of the lecturers live by the profession. In the debating clubs the younger townsmen assemble and discuss some generally comprehended subject in a regular debate, in order to practise themselves in the art of public speaking, in which, it is true, a great deal of empty straw is thrashed, but there is always some amount of eloquence.

The Yankee goes to church, not only to be edified, but also to seek employment for his restlessly active mind. His preacher must be a man of education, a practised dialectician, rich in thought, and correct in language. Mere unction will not do. The women are enthusiastic for him, and outbid each other in attentions and presents to him. The salaries of the clergy are often very considerable, and the expense of belong

ing to a congregation is great. The churches, generally small, and, on the average, only calculated for four hundred hearers, and frequently the property of the preacher, are comfortably fitted up, and in winter carpeted and warmed. The organ and organist are good, and there is always a choir of voluntary or paid singers. The expenses are usually covered by putting up the seats by auction, which, with popular preachers, often cost a thousand dollars or more a year for a family. With the Yankee belonging to a clerical community is certainly the sign of a respectable man, but it makes no material difference when he indulges in a free-thinking tendency, or belongs to such denominations as the Unitarians, Universalists, Friends, and Herrnhuters, who constantly increase in numbers, and probably already comprise one-third of the population of New England. The Episcopal Church has very few adherents; much more numerous are the outsiders, or persons indifferent to religion, who join no confession, do not even have their children christened, but, as a rule, they belong to the lower and rougher class. Spiritualism, or the doctrine that it is possible to enter into communication with the souls of deceased persons by the aid of Mediums, has its partisans in New England as well as in the whole Union, and among them is a great number of free-thinkers.

The scrupulous observance of the Sabbath is peculiar to the Yankee, but he is now relaxing his severity under German influence. Sacred concerts, at which a great deal of secular music is performed, have grown fashionable in New England. While formerly there was no cooking in a Yankee household on a Sunday, but they ate cold dishes prepared on the previous day, now the majority of the New Englanders have hot dishes on their table on Sunday as well.

The Yankee is accused of being more fanatical in matters of conviction than the other Americans, but unjustly so. The author, on the contrary, sees in him the most tolerant and indulgent of the North Americans. If witches were burnt in New England, and a Quakeress hanged on account of her creed, this happened at a time when things were no better elsewhere. If the old Puritans had most intolerant laws, they have now been abrogated. At the present day-what a horror for the Pilgrim Fathers! -Catholic festivals like Christmas and Easter are kept; there are a carnival and theatre, and even balls are no longer regarded as godless. A trace of the old fanatic puritanism is certainly still to be found in the Temperance and Sunday laws, as well as in the nativism of the Yankees, but there is a good deal to be said in excuse. Spirits intoxicate in America more easily than in Europe. They are cause of most of the crimes and accidents, and they more especially cause so many promising youths to sink into the class of roughs and rowdies. Lastly, they played a prominent part in the political contests of the last ten years, as the democratic party, or party of roughness, was mainly recruited, and prepared its attacks on the electoral liberty of the opponents, in the publichouses. The temperance societies, founded to check these evils, could not make head-way, and hence demanded the interference of the legislature, especially when the immigration of drunken Irish seriously swelled the ranks of the opponents. The first prohibition of the sale of spirits took place in Maine, the other New England States followed the example, and ere long the law was passed in most of the Southern and Western