I AM not a native of this terrestrial globe, for I was born in the city of Benares; and the Brahmins, who are a very wise people, have declared that highly-gifted spot to constitute no portion of this elementary world; an assertion, the accuracy of which I am, in no wise, inclined to dispute, for I somewhat enjoy the idea of having been born in an extra-mundane habitation.

VOL. I.

B

My name is Claude Jerningham. My father was a civilian in the service of the Honourable United Company of merchants trading to the East Indies. The ingenious Mr. Henry Fielding, in that very admirable book of travels, entitled "A Journey from this World to the Next," has informed us that he fell in with an individual, upon the high-road to this upper earth, destined to enjoy a fortune of 100,000l., and the character of a wise man. I have every reason to suppose that this gentleman was my father.

Of my mother I know little. Few people who are born in India know very much about their mothers, and I was not one of the few. I take it for granted that she was an adventuress, -a damsel-errant ere she became the wife of my father; but the birth and parentage of this excellent woman I never thought fit to investigate; and such of my readers as have perused Swift's story of Strephon and Cælia," will understand why I did not.

A brother, by name Frederick, anticipated my claim to the rights of primogeniture. I know not exactly how it happened that we were never, at any season of our lives, very remarkable for fraternal affection. Eteocles and Polynices were but types of us; we battled it out so manfully.

Of my first sojourn in Hindustan I recollect very little: for I was not quite five years old when my brother Frederick and myself were consigned to my father's agent at Calcutta, to be shipped for England, by the first vessel, under cover to my uncle, Matthew Jerningham, barrister of the - Temple.

In like manner has my remembrance of the voyage home almost wholly evaporated. The wife of the ship's steward was our ostensible guardian during the passage; she was a woman of a placid disposition, and contented herself with utterly neglecting us, and stealing two-thirds of our wardrobe. My great ally was the boatswain; but Frederick (for he was a sly boy) clave to the cook and the butcher. The hot pastry of the one and the new milk of the other, were the magnetic powers which attracted the needle of my brother's affection. As for myself, I was quite happy when blowing the boatswain's whistle, and piping all hands to grog.

Montaigne's "three most excellent men," were Homer, Epaminondas, and Alexander the Great. If my uncle had lived in the old time, he would certainly have been one of this triad, to the exclusion,-I know not of whom, but I think, most likely, of the Macedonian. He was, indeed, a most excellent specimen of humanity in its highest state of perfection. "Nature went about some

full work, she did more than make a man when she made him."* He was the very soul of wisdom and benevolence, just such an one as would have found his way into the heart and pages of Isaac Walton, whose pen, saith a kindred spirit of our own times, dropped from an "angel's wing."† A meet companion would my uncle have been for Donne, Wotton, Hooker, Sanderson, and Herbert.

He was the elder brother of my father, and he was a widower. His wedded happiness had been unto him as a dream of joy, brief as it was delightful. There was a rose-bud in the garden when my uncle stood at the altar, and ere the leaves of the full-blown flower had fallen withered to the ground, he stood by the grave of his beloved, a bereaved and solitary man. And now he was sore stricken; the world was a wilderness to him, where no flowers blossomed and no sunshine ever entered. Outwardly he was quite calm; at times he was even gay; but his inward reflections were desolate as those of Valerio in the drama.

But my uncle did not pause here: he answered this latter question as the question ought to be answered, and his answer was, "To do good." The love which had lately been concentrated into one strongly-burning focus, was now to be diffused over the world; and his heart, from the love of an individual, betook itself to the love of the species. He lived to disseminate the happiness which he was no longer suffered to enjoy; walking upon earth like a blind torch-bearer, upon whose sightless orbs falleth not one grain of the light which he is shedding all around him.

Perhaps, however, I ought not strictly to say that my Uncle Matthew was wretched; for if, as has been asserted by Hartley, and several other wise men, that happiness is inseparable from benevolence, my uncle was abundantly happy. The tranquillity of an un-upbraiding conscience, the will and the power to do good, brotherly love towards all men, and trust in the mercy of God, are blessings which may have rendered him happy, but which never having experienced myself, I do not know how to describe.

My uncle received us upon our arrival with a heart overflowing with kindness. He embraced us as if we had been his own children; he sighed, and a solitary tear on either side rolled down his cheek. Perhaps he remembered that he was him