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great party which was at hand, and said, she and pale, and her beautiful countenance had a hoped that they might meet there. She also con- pensive, nay, almost anxious expression, which gratulated Agnes on the friendship that must sub-Agnes interpreted as the expression of intense love. sist between her cousin Ada and herself. She Mrs. Sam had long interviews with Mrs. Colville, spoke of Ada with warmth and kindness; called but about what nobody knew. her a noble and a generous-hearted girl, and said that she considered her as beautiful in mind as in person. Agnes was grieved that she could not respond as warmly as she saw was expected to the praises of her cousin, and felt, as she had often done before, how differently things and characters present themselves to the rich and the poor, to the powerful and the dependent.

It was now the last week in May, and the whole country was one gush of mature vernal beauty. "Glorious weather," all the world said, "for the grand party at Merley Park !" Nothing had been talked of but this party for weeks; and since the time when Mrs. Acton had expressed a wish and an expectation of meeting Agnes there, the desire to go had taken possession of her mind.

"Is Agnes going to Merley Park on Wednesday?" asked old Mr. Lawford, one day, of his sister Colville.

Agnes' heart beat, and she glanced to her aunt

for an answer.

"She has not been asked," said Aunt Colville; "but that is not of so much consequence: the question is, can you spare her, and whether she wishes to go?" said she, looking at Agnes, with an expression that said as plainly as words, "Of course you do not!"

"I should very much like to go," replied Agnes, decidedly but timidly.

"You should?" said Aunt Colville, in a tone of bitter surprise; "but there are many things to be considered. I don't very well see how we can make room in the carriage. I dislike crowding on such occasions there will be Mr. and Mrs. Sam, Ada, and myself.”

"Sam can go with me," said Tom, who was present; "or, Mr. and Mrs. Sam can drive together."

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And then your dress," continued Aunt Colville, "it would not do to go badly dressed."

"I will give her a dress," said her uncle: "see that she has a handsome one; I know that Mrs. Acton will expect to see her there."

"We must see if you are well enough, brother," continued the pertinacious old lady; "but you know that you are often very poorly of an evening. You have often kept Ada and me at home; and I know that Agnes would not wish to go, unless it were quite convenient. This is a large party, and I don't know whether we ought to take an additional one with us; and there will be plenty of opportunities, besides this, of her going out with

us."

Agnes felt wounded; to her it seemed as if no one wished her to go; and with an agitation of voice, which she in vain tried to repress, she replied, that she would stay at home.

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Well, I see no great hardship in it," said Mrs. Colville; "and I think it better that you should." No more was said; visitors were announced, and the subject, as Agnes believed, passed from every mind but her own.

The beautiful dresses for the party came home on the day it was to take place, and with them the one for Agnes. Mrs. Colville was amazed. She had no idea, she said, that her brother had really given an order for one. No less surprised was Agnes: a very natural reaction took place in her own mind; she had been unjust to them; they were kinder to her than she had imagined. She was filled with gratitude and love; her countenance beamed with happiness. The surprise of such unlooked-for kindness, and the anticipation of now really meeting Mrs. Acton that very night, and seeing Mr. Latimer, filled her with a quiet animation which gave altogether a new expression to her whole person. With affectionate gratitude she hastened to her uncle, to thank him for his munificent present. "I know that I owe all this to you, dear uncle," she said; "but much as I should like to go, if I thought you would miss me, or that you were not so well, I would gladly stop at home."

What a blessed feeling, capable of every sacrifice, is that of love and gratitude!

The old gentleman was as much pleased as she was. He ordered her to put on her new dress, and come down to be looked at. He smiled and kissed her, and said that she really was a very lovely girl, and that he had no idea that she could Took so handsome. He insisted on Ada and Aunt Colville coming down to see her. But Aunt Colville was at that moment busy; she was in Ada's dressing-room, passing judgment on that young lady's dress; for her toilette on this evening was of particular importance, and nothing could exceed its elegance.

"Have you seen my little Agnes?" asked Mr. Lawford, as half an hour afterwards Aunt Colville entered. "She is really quite charming!"

"I have," said Mrs. Colville; "but I must tell you, brother, that I had a great deal rather she did not go. It never was my wish that she should; we have no room for her in the carriage, and she is not expected. She knows nobody who will be there; she will have to sit all the evening without dancing! You do not consider these things!"

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"She'll get partners," said her uncle, never fear. If I were young, I should fall in love with her."

"Well, Mr. Lawford," said Mrs. Colville, raising herself with dignity, "I can tell you, once for all, that I am not going to take her. I had left the thing quite satisfactorily arranged; she had no expectation, till you put it into her head; and I must tell you that it is no kindness to take her out to such parties. What is she, in fact?-but a sort of domestic!"

"She is my niece!" said Mr. Lawford, in a towering passion; "and I insist upon it that she goes!"

"I shall not take her!" said the lady, with decision.

The two might have proceeded to even fiercer The day of the party was at hand, and news contention, had they not, at this moment, been incame to the hall that Mr. Latimer had arrived at terrupted by Agnes herself, who, still in her new home. They expected to meet him for the first dress, and with eager and delighted astonishment time at Merley Park. A stillness and repose in her countenance, entered with a set of splendid seemed, for some days past, to have fallen upon jet ornaments in her hand. The fact was, that the household at Lawford, as of intense and almost when she returned to her chamber, and was about breathless expectation. Ada was unusually calm to take off her dress, her eye was caught by a

carefully-wrapped-up packet on her toilette table, | I can to get her introduced to partners and people ; addressed to herself. She opened it, and found it to contain these ornaments.

Who had given them to her? was her first question. How kind and generous every one was to her! thought she; and, believing the donor to be her cousin Ada, she entered her dressing-room with a freedom which she had never used before. "I know, dearest Ada," said she, "that you have given me these. How beautiful they areexactly the ornaments I want. How you all make me love you!"

"I have not given them to you," replied Ada, as much astonished as her cousin. "I never saw them before!"

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Then, to whom am I obliged?" asked Agnes. Perhaps to papa," returned Ada, thinking that very likely this conjecture was not true, however. With this, Agnes hastened to her uncle, and entered, as we have seen, in the midst of contention regarding herself. In a moment, she saw the excited and angry countenances of both her relatives; and holding the ornaments displayed in her hand, she stood for a second, and then, apologizing for her intrusion, was about to withdraw, but her aunt called her back.

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Agnes," said she, "I give you credit for a great deal of good sense, and perhaps for some knowledge of the world-Do you wish in reality to go with us this evening?".

"And why not, aunt?" said she.

"Why not?" repeated her aunt, with difficulty suppressing her passion. "Because, unless you had been especially invited, I consider your duty to be in attendance on your uncle."

"I do not want her attendance," said the old gentleman, angrily; "and I say she shall go! Am I to be thwarted in this way? No; I tell you plainly that Agnes shall go, or else Ada shall stay too!"

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Agnes' heart beat tumultuously, and she seemed hurled at once into the dust from the pinnacle of delight to which she had been unexpectedly raised. Agnes," said her aunt, almost fiercely, are you going to be a firebrand amongst us?" "Indeed, I am not," returned Agnes, meekly, "at least not willingly; and to end the contest, of my own free will I prefer to remain at home. You and I, dearest uncle," said she, laying her hand on the back of his chair, "will have a quiet evening together." More she could not say, for her heart was very full.

man,

but if she knows anything of parties of this kind, she knows very well, that unless a girl have acquaintance in the room, or have great beauty or fortune to bring her into notice, she may sit the whole evening like a cipher in the room; and I know nothing more painful to witness than that, to say nothing of what the feeling of it must be." Agnes thought to herself, that the fact of her being the daughter of Mr. Frank Lawford would, in such society as she had any knowledge of, give her distinction enough; but, thus appealed to by her aunt, she replied, that she should greatly prefer staying at home. Poor girl! she never had really felt till then how the spirit of pride and arrogance can set its foot upon a human heart, and crush it to the dust. She felt utterly humiliated; she longed to weep freely to pour forth her outraged feelings into some tender, sympathizing bosom; but none was near her.

Mrs. Colville had gained her point. When did she fail of doing so?-and this being the case, she could even flatter.

"I must say, Agnes," she said, "that your dress is handsome and very becoming. I am sure you are greatly obliged to your uncle; and these," she said, taking up the jet rosary which hung in Agnes' hand-" these, too, are your uncle's present, I suppose?"

"I came to thank you for them, dear uncle.' said Agnes, turning to him.

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"I know nothing about them," returned he, petulantly. "They are not of my giving, and Í wish I might not be bothered."

"Whose giving are they, then?" said Aunt Colville; " but we must see about that ;" and, as if with the intention of doing so, she left the room "Go, Agnes," said her uncle, "I can do very well without you."

"Are you angry with me, then?" asked she, no longer able to suppress her emotions.

"No, I am not angry with you," said he, in a husky voice; "but I can do without you: not that I am angry with you, my poor girl," added he, seeing her weeping figure before him attired in that splendid dress, which so little accorded with her state of mind; "but I do not wish them to think that I am quite an idiot. Now. go!"

"Not until you have kissed me!" returned Agnes, feeling that she needed this token of reconciliation and kindness to keep her heart from

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"I know, Mrs. Colville," said the old gentle-breaking. "that you think me a childish, fanciful old Well, well," said her uncle, kissing her with man, who must have somebody to look after him real affection-" there is no need for us to quarrel. and amuse him: now, I am not this; and I tell There, now, don't spoil your good looks with cryyou plainly that Agnes shall not be kept at home ing. I wanted everybody to see to-night how for my sake. I do not want her; I do not wish lovely you were. I know they think you a plain her to stay; I can take care of myself, and amuse girl; but you are not so!" myself. I dislike being treated like a child, Mrs. Colville."

Agnes smiled at her uncle's compliment, and withdrew. She returned to her chamber, and Mrs. Colville, who had full reliance on Agnes' took off the beautiful dress which, but a short time own pride and good sense, replied in a much more before, had filled her with such joy and gratitude. moderate and amiable tone than she had hitherto How differently it looked to her now! The charm spoken in. "At our time of life, brother," she and beauty was gone from it; and she felt acutely said, "it is not seemly for us to be disputing about that, let even this dark time pass away, the sting trifles. I think I must have given evidence enough of it would long remain. Anguish of heart and how much your dear children's interest is at my mortification seemed stitched into every fold, and heart. If, however, you cannot trust our sweet it seemed to her as if she never could put it on Ada to me, you must find another chaperon for again. Those ornaments, too-which the donor her. But that shall make no difference in my feel- no doubt intended should give her pleasure-were ings towards her; and as to Agnes, I will leave it the subject of unpleasant questioning and surmise. to herself. She shall go to-night, if she likes, and She enclosed them again in their case; and, throwI will be a good chaperon to her, and I will do all'ing herself on her bed, wept bitterly.

LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.-No. 75.-18 OCTOBER, 1845.

1. Mexico and the United States,

2. Duffy's Irish Library,

3. Mesmerisers,

4. American Fiction,

CONTENTS.

5. British Combination against the American Union,
6. Eyre's Expeditions of discovery in Australia,
7. Margaret of Valois,

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Spectator,

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Blackwood's Magazine, Silliman's Journal, Mary Howitt, .

8. Discoveries in the Ruins of Nineveh, 9. The Author's Daughter-chaps. 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, SCRAPS.-M. Royer Collard; Scientific Congress at Rheims; Lowell's Conversations, 106 -Air Engine; Sublime and Something more, 113-Site Refusing, 114-Ibrahim, 116— Paris Academy of Sciences, 11 Aug., 120-Intercourse of the Great and the Little, 131Vegetable Non-Conductor; Mineral Region of Lake Superior, 136—Artificial Quartz; Anti-Friction Metals, 152.

POETRY.-The Cross is Bending, 114-The Spirit Tryst, 115-Fide et Fortitudine, 131.

MEXICO AND THE UNITED STATES.

THE Athenæum of 13th September, after giving an account of the dilapidation of Mexico, thus proceeds:

"In such circumstances nobody can be surprised at the ambitious views of the sister republic on the eastern shores of the same continent. As early as 1803, Colonel Aaron Burr made no secret of his intention to revolutionize New Spain. His conduct indeed was disavowed; but what satisfaction was that to Mexico or Spain, seeing that it was approved by government and people? Still the older republic was taught one lesson-to act with greater caution-to substitute cunning for open force. In conformity with this policy, a treaty of limits was proposed by him some years afterwards; and the basis of the proposal deserves especial consideration at the present moment. The whole country north of the river Bravo del Norte, and of the thirty-first degree of north latitude, was to be surrendered to the United States-in other words, there was to be an absolute cession of Texas, New Santander, New Biscay, New Mexico, most of Sonora, and Upper California! Degraded as the court of Madrid undoubtedly was, she rejected these unworthy proposals with indignation, and directed the colonial provinces to protect themselves against both the open and secret attempts of their insidious neighbor. The cession of the Floridas in 1819, suspended these proceedings; but on the downfall of the royal authority, they were resumed-with greater caution indeed, but with greater effect. If any faith is to be placed in the assertion of men who ought to be well informed, concessions of territory have been repeatedly though secretly wrung from the Mexican governments, from Iturbide down to Santa Anna. One thing at least is certain-that the agents of the United States have for many years been actively employed in preparing the minds of the people in all the northern provinces, and VOL. VII. 7

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LIVING AGE.

PAGE.

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especially New Mexico, and Upper California, for an incorporation with the great republic. Nothing could be safer than such intrigues. When unsuccessful, they are disavowed; when likely to lead to a good result, they are uniformly supported. Thus it is with Texas, which, in spite of all the opposition that England could offer, is " nexed." And thus it will also be with New California. In 1836 the inhabitants were prevailed on to rise against the authority of Mexico, and to assert their independence-a measure necessarily preparatory to "annexation." Before a province can treat with an independent state, it must itself be free, or at least pretend to be so, which answers the same purpose; for no sooner does it declare its independence, than its act is recognized by the cabinet at Washington. In 1841, and the following year, as we shall soon have occasion to observe, the strides made by those agents, and even by the acknowledged functionaries of the United States, were still more decided. While the question in regard to Texas was pending, a show of moderation was necessary; but now that it is settled, the intrigues in California will go on with greater vigor, until a new annexation takes place. Whatever our ministers (who seem strangely negligent of information full of meaning to everybody else) may say or think of the matter, the aggrandizement is systematic, and its results are inevitable. They are clearly perceived by our author, and by the government which he serves. All the Spanish provinces of North America will soon form an integral portion of the most ambitiousrepublic the world has yet seen. And we know not, that such a result ought much to be deprecated. Whatever may be thought of that Utopian dream, the balance of power, the interests of humanity are paramount to every other consideration. In Mexico any change must be for the better; government, law, religion, education, individual happiness-everything must gain by it. However, while as Englishmen we regard the pro

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ceedings of the American cabinet with indignation, | inst. ; and upwards of one hundred native members, as philanthropists, we can hardly avoid looking with many foreigners of distinction, were then in with satisfaction to their results. Government is the town.-For the Congress of Scientific Italians to be valued only as it conduces to the welfare of about to assemble at Naples, on the 20th inst., the the governed. Where it does not and cannot President-General, the Marquis San Angelo, has answer this obvious end, the sooner it is replaced published a variety of regulations, designed to by another, the better for humanity. We are by simplify the relations of the individuals with the no means sure that the United States will gain by body, and lighten, as much as possible, for the her" system." To a nation the reverse of mili- occasion, the police regulations applicable to strantary, and (what is much more serious) without a gers.-While on scientific matters, we may mention direct central authority, an indefinite extension of a fact of some especial interest, in view of the profrontier must necessarily be a source of weakness. digious demand for iron which the extension of That frontier in many cases could be defended railway works promises to create that mines of neither by itself, nor by the union to which it be- that metal, apparently of great richness and extent, longs. Then the diversities of character, of feel- have been discovered in the States of the Church. ing, and of interests, between the component parts We live in what may be called emphatically, the of such a body politic-diversities the more strik- age of Iron; but the name has another meaning, in ing as we recede from a given point-must daily our day, than the mythological.—Athenæum, 13 weaken the bonds of connection between parts Sept. so heterogeneous. Such unions, whatever their ostensible political advantages, can never be cordial, and therefore, they can never be permanent. Conversations on some of the Old Poets, by J. R. In our opinion, the greatest curse that could befall the Anglo-Americans, would be the immediate accomplishment of their own designs. They would lead to a union indeed, unexampled for extent in the history of the world; but it would assuredly not be a union of strength. And the day would not be far distant when the rival interests of the northern and southern states would be brought into fatal collision.

LOWELL.

THE literature of America still follows in the

footsteps of that of England. What Lamb and others have done for the popular mind in this country, the essayists of the United States are now seeking to do for the growing intelligence of the New World. They desire to indoctrinate it with a taste for our old poets, our old dramatists, and our sterling old writers, whose books, like dreams, have made the world of many a studious spiritone and entire, and as of chrysolite, perfect and THE Paris papers mention the death, on the pure. Mr. Lowell has earned by his own poems 4th instant. at his estate of Chateauvieux, in the the right to converse on poetry, and we therefore 82d year of his age, of one of the most distinguished willingly listen to his opinions on Chaucer and philosophical writers in France, M. Royer Collard. Chapman, Marlowe, Shakspeare and Ford, and on This gentleman was a member of the French all others whom he may, as he does, collaterally Academy, and Professor of Philosophy at the introduce, whether ancients or moderns. We like Collège de France; and, as we remember, it is not his corollaries for the sake of the main proposition, many months since his published works were and also for their own. Keats and Tennyson, adopted as classical by the university of Paris-Wordsworth and Shelley, are among his idols this being the first instance in which that honor but Byron he repudiates. What "spirit he is was ever conferred, by the Institution in question, of " is accordingly so manifest as to need no illuson the writings of a living man. M. Royer Col- tration and no remark. In disputing with him on lard had other titles to distinction amongst his matters of taste, it is not with an individual, but fellow-citizens; and most of our readers, no doubt, with a school, that we should be found conflicting; 'know that he had filled the chair of President in and the present, therefore, would be an improper -the Chamber of Deputies.-The Augsburg Gazette occasion to raise the argument. The truly catho: announces the decease, at Rome, of the learned lic minds in the world are, of course, few; and, in Barnabite Ungarelli; who was Rosselini's instruc- the majority of instances, we must be content to tor in Hebrew, and his pupil in hieroglyphic make the best of partial views, and to bring our science. As Order-brother of the Cardinal-Secre- own as supplementary where needed. We cannot tary Lambruschini, he enjoyed peculiar advantages quote from the work, for the ground it traverses is, for the study and cultivation of Egyptian antiqui- in this country, so preoccupied, that, notwithties; and his death is especially lamented for the standing its obvious merits, there is much in it as delay which it is likely to occasion in the produc- tedious as a thrice-told tale." The writer's tion of the projected, and already far-advanced, chief fault is, an over refinement and subtlety in edition of the Museo Gregoriano Egizio.-The his thoughts and mode of expounding them.Spanish journals speak of the death, at Mondragon, Athenæum. at an age exceeding 80, of one of the patriarchs of the Basque country, Senhor Juan Ignacio Iztueta -a poet distinguished by his originality-espe- AN English merchant having built a vessel of cially remarkable, it is said, for a very curious work seventy tons, gave the command of it to a Chinese on the warlike dances of the Basques, for which named Fowqua, to enable him to levy a species of 1 he had a strong predilection-and emphatically black mail on the native smuggling-boats engaged ! known, among his compatriots, as the Basque in the opium-trade. Suspicions were excited; Bard. Fowqua was seized by the Chinese authorities and The Scientific Congress at Reims assembled, ac- tortured, and he denounced a hundred persons as ..cording to our previous announcement, on the 1st | being implicated in the enterprise.

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From the Britannia.

ginal version, which might have been obtained in Duffy's Irish Library. The Ballad Poetry of Ire-Ulster with very little trouble. We cannot con

land. Edited by CHARLES GAVAN DUFFY, Esq. J. Duffy. Dublin.

ceive where Mr. Duffy heard of the Orangemen singing a version which talks of

We shut the gates of Derry walls

“Venturing over the water." TAKING Mr. Duffy's account of the object of this publication, viz., that of vindicating the character which would be popular amongst the Orangemen "Venturing" is about the last word we fancy of the native ballads of Ireland, the book, although in describing the passage of the Boyne. The porin other respects having many merits, must be tion of original version given in the appendix is considered a failure. Had its object been to select for distribution a number of well-finished and carefrequently sung in Ulster, with the exception, we fully-polished poetical compositions, breathing in think, of the compliment in the penultimate line the majority of cases that air of nationality so much to the mercy of James II. A large selection in vogue with "Young Ireland," but not having might have been made from the multitudes of many of the characteristics of the real ballad poe-Ulster commemorating processions and skirmishes characteristic Orange ballads which are extant in try actually current in the country, Mr. Duffy would have well performed his task. The popu- such as a song of "The Apprentice Boys," which as well as matters of greater historical interest; lar songs of Ireland, the ballads really sung by the yeomanry and peasantry, have never found a col- we remember to have heard, commencing lector, nor will Mr. Duffy's volume in any degree "We are the boys that fear no noise, assist in that object. The popular ballads of all And never will surrender; countries suffer only from attempts to refine them, and Mr. Duffy gives us one or two so disguised in On the eighteenth of December," &c. "improvements" as to present a brilliance and The tragedy of "The Battle of Aughrim" has "gentility" similar to that of some of the old ca-not fallen into disuse among the Orangemen, as thedrals of his country with their Gothic orna- Mr. Duffy fancies. It has the rare merit, which ments brightly glistening under a new coat of legislative measure nor administration never poswhitewash. The Croppy Boy" is evidently sessed, of pleasing both Irish parties; and St. one of the pieces which have fallen into the hands Ruth and Saarsfield are frequently made in Ulster of the improver; for in Mr. Duffy's version the barns to speak most exquisite Scotch. Another peasant laments very much in the style of a lacka-Irish song, "The Wearing of the Green," might daisical hero of the Surrey theatre, about being the last of "his name and race." (By the way, we should like to know of what name amongst the Irish peasantry any individual could boast of being the last, or within ten thousand of the last.) The version of "The Croppy Boy" really sung in many parts of Ireland is much more characteristic than this. There is nothing, for instance, in Mr. Duffy's version to equal the threat of the hero when about to be transported :

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have very appropriately found a place here. The original version, (not Mr. Curran's beautiful ballad of the same name,) is one of the most Irish of Irish songs; witness:

:

"I met Napoleon Bonaparte,
He tuk me by the hand;
Says he,How is ould Ireland,
And how does she stand?'
She's the most unhappy countery
That you have ever seen,

For they 're hanging men, and women,
For the wearing of the green."

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We have looked for this in vain as well as for the Lover's Molly Carew."
conclusion:-

"In New Genayvay this young man died,
In New Genayvay this young man lies,
All true Roman Catholics, as they pass by,
Say the Lord have marcy on your sowle,
croppy boy."

The only really Irish song in the volume is Mr. All the others are written in good wholesome Saxon, with Saxon idioms and Saxon images; and but for the local allusions might have been composed anywhere between Berwick and the Land's End. The followmying stanzas, however, reveal their origin in every line:

Och hone! by the man in the moon,
You taze me all ways

Again, although we are presented with a spank
new Nation song, entitled "The Nameless One,"
by J. D. Fraser, describing England as this country
is usually described at the Conciliation-hall, there For you
is not in the book any one of the thousand versions
of the "Shan Von Vacht," the most popular of all
the songs of the Irish peasantry, yet there are
stanzas in versions of that song of the highest or-
der of heroical poetry. The demand about the
invasion by the French, for instance :-

"What color will they wear?

Says the Shan Van Vocht;

What color will they wear?

Says the Shan Van Vocht.

What color should be seen
Where our ruined homes have been,
But our own immortal green?

Says the Shan Van Vocht." The version of "The Boyne Water" is execrable trash. There is in it scarcely a stanza of the ori

As

when

That a woman can plaze,

dance twice as high with that thief, Pat Magee,

you take share of a jig, dear, with me. Tho' the piper I bate,

For fear the owld cheat

Would n't play you your favorite tune.
And when you 're at mass,

My devotion you crass,
For 't is thinking of you,

I am, Molly Carew.

While you wear, on purpose, a bonnet so deep,
That I can't at your sweet purty face get a peep.
Oh, lave off that bonnet,

Or else I'll lave on it

The loss of my wandering sowl!

Och hone! weirasthru !

Och hone! like an owl,

Day is night dear, to me, without you!

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