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    No. 468. Mabch i^^T THE LEADER- 339

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    O F These, Not The Least Important Have ...

    iSs an / sounds were growing ^ ^ ° ™^ vften , perhaps aroused by the noisy " bravo of the comrriauclante , I gatheredmy faii t in & s * ^ f ^' ^^ away from the fair lady , and beat a retreat from the room . I was fairly danced down . If the following description be not overdrawn , the pleasing impression which the expedition left upon our author ' s mind , and which , , perusal of hts work leaves upon his reader ' s maid , is far from ill-founded : — « I can convey no faithful impression of the beauty of the face of . the country . It presents throughout , from river to river , the most varied physical features ; fine alternations of mountains , forests , and plains . The lofty Mbenaypey , crowned by primeval forests , and the Ytagua with " its truncated cone , though-but

    hillocks compared with the majestic eminences of the Andean range , are imposing objects m the mountain system Through whole districts the sierras are covered by forests of gigantic trees , and slope by rounded wooded hills to the broad sunlit plains , which were everywhere brilliant with veTdure , and intersected by perennial streams . The hill-sides were enlivened by the habitations of a numerous populationrand the plains were covered by-herds and flocks , which , with the approach of night , could be seen seeking the protection of corrals that dotted the campos . We saw no sterile wastes . The whole land seemed to be enriched by the vegetable tribes of tropical and temperate zones . The air AV-as laden at times with the rich odours of orange blossoms and

    aromatic shrubs ; arid yet the climate there , as in everv part of the basin of La Plata that E visited , is free from the humidity and excessive heat , which , in other sections of this continent , exhaust the powers of man , or increase those of nature beyond his control . All ! tha . t fine country is occupied by a people simple , kind , and hospitable . Thefts are not unfrequent i but a higher degree of crime is rare . The administration of President Lopez is , so far as I could learn , unstained by bloodshed . Though the Paraguayans groaned for a [ quarter of a centiiry under the sanguinary tyranny of Francia , they have been saved from the demoralizing civil contests that have almost depopulated other states of La Plata . "

    These interesting states are only commencing their mature existence . The policy pursiiqcl by Spain and Portugal , during the whole period of their supremacy , the same policy as was piusued by England , Avit-h her Colonies , until the war of American independence taught her its fatuity , of closing their ports to all communication -and commerce with the world , and discouraging all hidiistrial energy and manufacture , . perpetuated as it was , after they threw off the yoke of European

    rule , by the cruel and repressive Governments of Rosas and Francia , prevented even the first steps towards commercial activity . These are only now being taken ; but being taken eagerly , nn < l with the confidence of success . Captain Page believes that , ere long , cotton , sugar , and tobacco , -which grow with little , culture , almost spontaneously , will become staple exports , and most of the Governments give land to immigrants for nothing . With regard to timber ,-he says :- ^

    * ' We brought homo sections of a variety of woods , and of their indestructible qualities I had some opportunity of judging in my frequent visits to the abandoned missions of the Jesuits in Paraguay , whero the finest wood-work—columns , statuary , and roofing—exposed to the action of the elements for more than two centuries , wore as untouched by time us granite oriron , " A ship built of Paraguay wood , " says Azarn , " will outlast four of European timbpr . " The economy of nature also is most wonderful and

    beautiful . In thp edible fruits , foliage , barks , fibres , and jucios of its groat forest trees , as well us iuthoso of every species , of minor vegetation , wo find furinuccousi food , a stimulant , or tea , more healthful than that afforded by the Chinese leaf , precious medicines , raw materials for the finest tissues and the most useful fabrics , dye-stuffs offering varied and unfading tinges , gums , rosjiiH . This exuberance of vegetable life is united with a climate as delicious as it is salubrious . "

    Of the progress of trodo in these countries , the increase of population will bo acceptoil as a reliable tost . In the United States tlio population doubles itself in twenty years . In some parts of those republics the population has triplud in twelve years . Lot this , too , not bp forgotten : the Argentine moon iiuuiufucturo nothing . To a country like our own , which exports nuvnulue-turea and imports materials , trading with those republics , tjhoro is a consequent certainty that tlloy will buy , as woll as sell , and that a fair balance ol ( ratio will tUus bo preserved .

    ber of the secret society charged with the abovementioned plot against the Imperial life . Though- ; personally no party to the attempt—his name bavins been removed from the roll prior to its organisation . —he was proscribed and pursued by the police . Hiis wanderings led him to the coast of IJrittany and su night scene , when , he finds himself exhausted , starving , and penniless among the mj-sterious stones of Carnac-Notwithstanding the comparative proximity of . these : wonderful remains to our shores , so few English travellers , and so limited a circle of English readers ; , are acquainted with them , that we venture to extract , their picture—and a . piece of broad scene-painting it is—from the pages ' before us . ' .

    " Beep purple clouds lay heavy over all the heavens ; but , in the east , the morning suri was driving them before it , and came up triumphing , round arid bold , and tin-owing back on each side a curtain of white mist ,, which rolled sparkling away . Paul looked up . Around , him stood a score of " huge gaunt stones , rough , grey , and irregular , and caught the rising- beams upon ther yeHow lichen of their faces . " He raised himself wondering , to wonder more . He was in a camp—an army—of stones . Par away , down the gentle slope , and up the smooth fields beyond , far m fact as he could see , and bounded only by the sky and triumphant sun , were stones—stones , nothing but stones . Their number was countless . Men have tried to count them in vain , and when the calculators have come together to compare their countings , one says two thousand , another twenty thousand . .

    , ¦ "' There they stood , in regular lines—some say eleven , some thirteen—at regular distances , and in regular descending , size ; those where Kaul lay being the largest , standing higher than giants , and those at the further end , towards tlie east , smaller than pigmies . " Was it C & snr ' army turned to stone upon tne Druid ' s hallowed ground ? . The peasants tell you so ^ __ " Was it the last resting-place of some band of Celtic patriots , and tliese their toinba ? So some shy . " Was ity perchance , a stone temple raised to . some * unknown God . TDerhaDS the Maker himself , and each

    stone of which designated some attribute of His divinity * " Qu'ien snhtii Tliis field of st ones , stretching- for miles awav , till its limits are lost in the smallness of the objects—this wild plain is failed Carrihc , the city of the ( lead . True name ! whatever be its origin ; since all they mean is dead , save the lifeless stones . themselves ; winch live , though lifeless . The people that raised—Hie mechanical power employed to move . these huge blocks—the mystic meaning- of tlie eleven lines , and tlie regular , distances of the pillars—ajl , all are unknown—lost to the world for ever . .. d

    Behind thi Scenes in Paris ; a Tale of the Clubs and the Se -ret Police . James Hogg and Sons , The author of this work—a reprint from the pages of our excellent contemporary " Titan "—has constructed a . powerful fiction upon one of the numerous conspiracies against the life of Napoleon III ., which the Imperial police have so much distinguished themselves by thwarting , or , as their enemies say , bv inventing . ' ¦ ' ' " Singularly enough , the scene of the chapter , entitled " How to Play Regicide , " is laid at the door

    of the Opera-house ; and its action is an attempted assassination of the Emperor , This and other coincidences might induce some to suppose that the book was written subsequent to the Orsiili affair ; but the pledge of the talented author , that he had previously completed is task , his ! sufficient to establish his claim to be considered a farseeing man , if not a prophetic one . The chapter in question furnishes the following passage , which we extract as a specimen-of his smartest manner . Among his remarks on the crowd at the door of the Opera-house he says ( p . 253 ) : —

    "On these two carriages tlie looks of a motley crowd were fixed ; Bat what looks ! The looks of a people unworthy of liberty , because they can be so easily cheated out of it;—a people who , respecting little in this world , have so < n-eat a respect for power , that they worship it . There were looks of stupid admiration ; of servile appreciation ) of childish fascination . The sturdy Englishman pooh-poohs and scoffs at a show of finery , though he will go miles to . see it ; but the Frenchman enjoys it thoroughly . There are three ways by which a French mob may be tanied , and only three — a bori-mot , a dazzling show , and the mouth of a cannon . The present Smperor lias had recourse to the latter two already . He . is not celebrated for smart sayings , bu t a day may come yet , when his lite at least , if not his throne , will depend on liis ready wit . "

    One of the opening scenes is laid in a Parisian cellar dwelling . The characters are a starving mechanic and , his family . We are introduced to a degree of wretchedness that we confess we would not have believed , except on the word of an old resident in Paris , to have existed in that city . We even till now believed that the absolute starvation of an entire family , whose head being able-bodied enough to seek work at his trade , could have at least made known the deplorable situation of his wife and children to the public charity board of that ¦ town ; but bur author gravely ignores any such resource . He evidently does not do so to relieve his hero from the degradation of public relief , because he makes him adopt the lower depths of begging and treason . We have either , then , marvellously erred all along respecting French charity , or one who , like

    "We have unearthed Nineveh ; we have recovere Babylon j the wi > e men of the West have given tongries to the graven slabs of Nimroud and Khorsabad , and the Past lias been dragged back a skeleton into the Present , and Learning played coroner over his bones . But here the corpse has lain beneath our very eyes for centuries , and refused to rot . " We have preferred to quote the preceding passages for our readers' pleasure and instruction to givingthem the mere plot of the love story which runs through tlie book . The trials of the hero and . heroine will find admirers in plenty among ordinary : novel readers , but the extracts we have given will ^ we hope , procure recognition of the author and his excellent performance among readers of a far higher stamp . On Liberty . 1 \ y John Stuart Mill . . 'London : J . W . Parker . Fiaw persons who have directed their attention to the progress of political philosophy will receive without interest the announcement of a new work on ' . that subject from the pen of JUr . Stuart Mill , ' The power which Mr . Mill has displayed , in his " Essays , * and in his great wWk on " Political Economy , " m dealing with the most important and difficult questions in the social science—the admirable clear-: ness witli which lie unfolds his views—the high regard for truth , the fairness and perfect good temper towards opponents , everywhere manifest m Ins writings , entitlahim at all times to ¦ attention . It is impossible that « . work from Mr . Mill on theso subjects should be wanting in that which will amply repay a careful study . This writer is no bookmaker . His publications mark , each one , a step gained in iiiunan knowledge—an addition to that stock of truths whose good fruits . vet to come noman can estimate . It is lamentable to think that the influence of such a writer should he re tan Jed hy tho deluge of contemporary publication *—by the noisior claims of worthless book * , which must j unk into their dostinod oblivion before tho true value ot m » works can bo fully manifest . „„ + „„„ . Tho subioet of Mr . Mill ' s Knany >« " . l lio nature and limits of the power which can bo logltiniatoly exorcised by society over tho judlvltlual . « A mioBtion Mm hiivh ) soldom stated , ami hardly over now that I i Mirtiilii sonae , It Iiiih divided mankind , al-SioSftSStUo wiuottwt ag (« K but , In tho stage oi pro-S-Sint which the moroolvlnaod portions of ? h « spec e * Rave now ontowtl , It presonts itHOlf under now

    condithe writer before us , boasts twenty years' acquaintance with that country has , by implication , cruelly libelled it . We cannot pretend , at a minute ' s notice , to decide the point ; but we much incline to the latter alternative . But our sympathy for French charity has led us far astray from the point mo had in vi e when we ca lled the reader ' s attention to Girardin ' s collar . Our desire was to quote , for _ tho reader ' s instruction , and to submit for his admiration , some true and forcible remarks on French domesticity . The ties " de iamille" we have ourselves always observed to mean something more among our neighbours than do their representative words in our own language : and we share the author ' s views on their comparative strength among the two peoples as well as the nervous language with which he has clothed them , as follows : —

    " England is a very boastful country , usro one of her many boas ' ts so highly cherished , yet so utterly unfounded , as that of her domestic ties . 1 know that in saying this I call down thunderbolts upon my head . I care not—truth is inore precious than popularity . But to p'rove it ; and first butwoon husband and wilo . Has any , who has lived longqr in Franco than the author , ever heard of a husband , in any class oflifif , beating his wife , Knocking her about with hisfists ^ brutally assorting his superior stronjrth , and taking 1 advantage- of her weaknes s , as wu hear or every day , in every class i « England ? And if to this it lie answered that the husband abroad inflicts a far worse than bodily injury on his wife , and lavishes hls'lovu on some wretched mistress , I reply that I do . not uphold their morality , only their domesticity . . Attain , as uutwuun parent and child ; whore , tell m « , do

    you 8 oo in England that ) tender nfkiction , x'espoct and devotion , which we have scon a thousand times abroad in sona and daughters ? Would it not appear even ridiculous t »> our colil eyes , if a dashing young dandy , starting in his cabriolet for his club , wont to press a kiss upon hia fn ' tluir ' fl brow oiiohiinjo ho left tho houso ? Or where do you sou in liiighuitf generation after generation content to live together in the same house ? la it not almost a rule that tliu young married couplu Blinll install themselves rathot' In wretched lodgings than In the saine Iiouho with tliulr parents ? Nay , tha love of honour n-oin child to puront Is so strong in Jwnnfco , compared to England , that It ; is this which partly account * for tho mnijbev of mnde-up ma ^ rln ^ ca ; 03 many a eon and daughter would wthor marry a ' cannibal at oneo than oppose tho will of a father or motlior , ' " The hero , Mail Montague , wJio it need hardly bo said is an Englishman , happons to have boon a mem-

    No. 468. Mabch I^^T The Leader- 339

    No . 468 . Mabch i ^^ T THE LEADER- 339

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), March 12, 1859, page 13, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_12031859/page/13/