Amidst all that Audley said— amidst all that admitted of no excuse -two predominant sentiments stood clear, in unmistakable and touching pathos. Remorseful regret for the lost Nora-and self-accusing, earnest, almost feminine tenderness for the friend he had deceived. Thus, as he continued to speak, Harley more and more forgot even the remembrance of his own guilty and terrible interval of hate; the gulf that had so darkly yawned between the two closed up, leaving them still standing, as it were, side by side, as in their schoolboy days. But he remained silent, listening-shading his face from Audley, and as if under some soft, but enthralling spell, till Egerton thus closed

"And now, Harley, all is told. You spoke of revenge?

"Revenge!" muttered Harley, starting.

"And believe me," continued Egerton, were revenge in your power, I should rejoice at it as an atonement. To receive an injury in return for that which, first from youthful passion, and afterwards from the infirmity of purpose that concealed the wrong, I have inflicted upon you-why, that would soothe my conscience, and raise my lost self-esteem. The sole revenge you can bestow takes the form which most humiliates me ;-to revenge, is to pardon."

Harley groaned; and, still hiding his face with one hand, stretched forth the other, but rather with the air of one who entreats than who accords forgiveness. Audley took and pressed the hand thus extended.

"And now, Harley, farewell. With the dawn I leave this house. I cannot now accept your aid in this election. Levy shall announce my resignation. Randal Leslie, if you so please it, may be returned in my stead. He has abilities which, under safe guidance, may serve his country; and I have no right to reject, from vain pride, whatever will promote the career of one whom I undertook, and have failed, to serve."

"Ay, ay," muttered Harley; "think not of Randal Leslie; think but of your son."

"My son! But are you sure that he still lives? You smile; you-yon oh, Harley-I took from you the mother-give to me the son; break my heart with gratitude. Your revenge is found!"

Lord L'Estrange rose with a sudden start-gazed on Audley for a moment irresolute, not from resentment, but from shame. At that moment he was the man humbled; he was the man who feared reproach, and who needed pardon. Audley, not divining what was thus passing in Harley's breast, turned away. "You think that I ask too much; and yet all that I can give to the child of my love and the heir of my name, is the worthless blessing of a ruined man. Harley, I say no more. I dare not add, 'You too loved his mother! and with a deeper and a nobler love than mine.'" He stopped short, and Harley flung himself on his breast.

"Me-me-pardon me, Audley! Your offence has been slight to mine. You have told me your offence; never can I name to you my own. Rejoice that we have both to exchange forgiveness, and in that exchange we are equals still, Audley-brothers still. Look up-look up; think that we are boys now as we were once ;-boys who have had their wild quarreland the moment it is over, feel dearer to each other than before."

"Oh, Harley, this is revenge! It strikes home," murmured Egerton, and tears gushed fast from eyes that could have gazed unwinking on the rack. The clock struck; Harley sprang forward.

"I have time yet," he cried. "Much to do and to undo. You are saved from the grasp of Levy-your election will be won-your fortunes in much may be restored-you have before you honours not yet achieved-your career as yet is scarce begun-your son you will embrace to-morrow. Let me go-your hand again! Ah, Audley, we shall be so happy yet!"

PERHAPS it may be a symptom of approaching senility, but we are forced to confess that, with each successive year, our faith in the authenticity of books diminishes. The time was when we swallowed the narratives of Sindbad with as much zest and devotion as could have been displayed by Hindbad, the porter who was expressly hired as a listener by the adventurous circumnavigator of Serendib. In Mandeville, while we were young, we recognised not the traces of a liar. Mendez Pinto we never read-we do not even know whether we spell his name aright; but were he sevenfold the fabricator which men aver him to be, we have seen the day when we would have bolted his narrative as easily as an apricot. We were too old for Kaloolah when that ingenious romaunt appeared, otherwise we should have manfully opposed its being included in the list of literary apocrypha. Of course, all of us believe most firmly in Robinson Crusoe, Peter Wilkins, and Philip Quarl; but, with these rare exceptions, what reliance can be placed in the veracity of those who have travelled afar?

Humble and modest as we are, we do not conceive ourselves less liable to imposition than was Herodotus, the Father of History. That old Halicarnassian was, in truth, an exceed ingly wary individual, who listened to a great deal of astounding narrative with an imperceptible inward pressure of the cheek; and noted it down, simply because he knew the value of fiction in relieving the dull monotony of fact. Since his day, many other men have arisen, who, pursuing the same line of conduct, have infinitely stimulated that thirst for adventure and voyage which is the characteristic of a civilised people. But long ago the wonders both of Europe and Asia have disappeared. What has become of Prester John, that mysterious potentate, with whom half the kings of Christendom would have been proud to enter into alliance? Whereabouts dwelt the Amazons, the true assertors

of the Rights of Woman, who spurned even the gentle bondage of the pettiloon? Also anent the Centaurswhere trotted they? or in what central race-course do their descendants still exercise for the Derby? In the old world--or worlds-giant and troglodyte alike have died out; nobody expects to find them, any more than the unicorn; and the unbelieving miscreants of this age even sneer at the existence of the sea-serpent.

In Europe and Asia, we suspect, it is difficult for a man to lie. Difficult, but not absolutely impossible; for we can conceive the composition of a most unimpeachable book of wonders, with the scene laid in Thibet; or most miraculous discoveries of natural phenomena on the eastern skirts of Siberia. Also there is good lying still to be had in the interior of Africa. Round the margin of Lake Tchad, or to the south of the Jebel Kumrah, a fine, fresh, young, unadulterated fancy may still afford to run riot, and amaze the world with an avalanche of novel wonders. Were it not that we lack enthusiasm, and also, to a great extent, the faculty of invention, we should certainly try our hand upon a batch of new discoveries. It is full time that the mammoth should again appear in life. Another dragon is wanted to replace that salamander which Gozon slew in Rhodes. Snake-cities require a revival; and we are decidedly in need of a more closely connecting link between the man and the monkey. The old fables are disappearing fast; honour to the daring chief who will furnish us with a new supply!

We grant that, in America, there still exists scope for a bold imagination. There are the Patagonians in the south, a race of which little use has been made since the days of Captain Wallis. Then there are the Lost Cities, in which a voyager might spend a winter or two greatly to his profit and delectation; more especially if he possessed sufficient knowledge of Hebrew to connect satisfactorily the inhabitants thereof with the Ten

Tribes. A glance at the map convinces us that there is fair food for fiction towards the upper sources of the Amazon; and of what use is fact when you find yourself panting among the Andes? Condors are all very well in their way; but we are anxious to have something bigger.

But, while we point to these countries as affording an almost boundless field for romance, and for harmless exercise of invention, we are sorry to say that, in our opinion, North America is dying out. Monsieur Violet did his best for Texas; but he was the last of a great race, and we have not found his successor. Lately, indeed, at a railway station, we picked up a book, denominated, if we recollect aright, the "Hair-raisers," in which there was a considerable allow ance of scalping, wigwams, and stampedoes; but, on the whole, it was terribly dull. There was one scene of a ride amidst a herd of buffaloes, which reminded us unpleasantly of Falkirk Tryst. The only tolerable parts of the book were palpable cribbages from poor Ruxton, who was, indeed, as true a lover of the prairie as ever tightened his belt from famine. But, even in Ruxton, it is remarkable that the pure Indian-the aboriginal Red-skin-cuts but a poor figure. Ruxton, we believe, drew with a hand as faithful as bold; yet it is evident that he had very little respect for the character of the "noble savage." This we hold to be a very remarkable instance of the decadence and gradual expiry of fable. We were all nurtured in the belief of the sublime qualities of the Indian. Outalissi, as Campbell conceived him, was not very much short of Achilles; and had it been advisable for the modern bard to make the plains of Wyoming a battle-field like those of the Troad, doubtless the tomahawk would have glanced as fiercely as the Grecian spear. Is it unfair to ask ourselves, as a question of speculative æsthetics, whether, had such been Campbell's plan, we should have been favoured with any scalping or no? It is a question of some artistical interest. To raise the hair of a slain enemy is not worse than to drag his body about the field-to secure a top-lock, as an honourable trophy, is less mercenary than to make play for golden armour. Yet we doubt if the

We

Bard of Hope, in his epic mood, would have ventured to indicate the tonsure. Achilles, attended in his tent by Briseis, is a fine picture of an heroic prizefighter;-could we have stood Outalissi, distended with buffalo hump, making signs to his trembling squaw to pour out for him "the strong firewater of the pale-face ?" Campbell's was, of course, a fancy portraitureand a very splendid one it undoubtedly is-but we are beginning to entertain serious and painful doubts whether all the notions which we have hitherto entertained regarding the innate nobility of the Red Indian, are not absolute exaggerations. pass Pocahontas and Captain Smith. What sort of a fellow Smith really was, has never been fully explained; but we take him to have been a longlegged, red-headed son of a gun, whose scalp, from its very brilliancy, must have been an object of excessive desire to the nobility and gentry of that respectable tribe into whose hands it was his fortune to fall. The more honour to Pocahontas ! She became aware, through a process of intuitive logic, that the possession of the sinewy Smith, with his radiant locks intact above his brow, would be more valuable to her than the separated radiance would be, if girt around the leggings of her uncle, "The Grizzly Bear;" and so, with sweet woman's instinct, she struck in, and no "brave" dared forbid the banns. What could Smith do less than take her to his hairy bosom? To Cooper we are disposed to assign the credit-for success in fiction is everyway creditable-of having misled the civilised world for a long time with regard to the habits of the Redskins. Cooper is a great author. We say so in the gravest earnest; for several of his earlier fictions have taken a hold of the public mind in a wonderful degree, and those who have read them in their youth, cannot forget them in their maturity. That he is a most unequal writer may be allowed. Some of his novels are so heavy that it is severe work to wade through them; and some of them, again, are absolutely childish and maudlin. But, in his best days, he was a grand fellow in the prairie or the forest; and The Last of the Mohicans is a work which any man might be proud to have written.

Many years have elapsed since we read that book-and it may be we shall never read it again, for the recollection and impression of it is still so strong within us, that we almost fear another perusal might destroy somewhat of the charm which still haunts us whenever we hear its name; -but well do we remember the Sagamore, and Uncas, and Natty Bumppo, and the rest of the characters that figured in that fascinating tale. It was not only the sagacity of the Indian "on the trail" that then struck us with amazement, or the almost superhuman development of the more physical attributes-but the wisdom, the philosophy, the retinence, the justice, and the self-denial of the untutored children of the desert. Young as we were when we read that tale not less credited than many a truer story-we could not help asking ourselves whether, if savage life could produce so many instances, not of valour only, or of improved instinct, but of profound estimate of character and design, civilisation could add much to the mental development, or the happiness of the stoic of the woods. What was the use of putting any question of the kind? Uncas was, undoubtedly, supposing him to be a real character, superior to any young man who had received a university education. Of the three great springs of human action-truth, duty, and interest he acknowledged but two, refusing the more personal motive; and, as Cooper depicts him in his splendid heathenesse, he is unquestionably a more faultless being, as regards his mastery of the passions, and pure native feeling, than any character that can be extracted from the writings of pagan antiquity. In him the graces of chivalry mingle with unsullied nature. He is a compound of Antilochus and Sir Galahad-fearless as the one, and noble and tender as the other. But then Cooper was an educated and a Christian writer; and where have we any assurance-or, in fact, reason to suppose that his portraiture was drawn from the life? None at all. Cooper knew no more about the real habits of the Red Indians, in their state of freedom, than did the late Lachlan MacTavish, distiller in Campbelltown, who forwarded to us not long ago a manuscript en

titled, The Last of the Assinaboins, with a request that we would publish it as a serial in our "world-renowned periodical." The eulogistic phrase is Lachlan's-not ours. We read the novel, penned by young Alcoholides; and, though we loved the man, and patronised his whisky, we must needs confess that his literary production was infernally bad. His notion was to transport a distant relation of his own-a MacTavish, of course-to the wilds of America, train him in the ways of the forest, and finally elevate him to the high rank of Sachem. It was a queer jumble of Celtic and Indian character; sennachies consorting with squaws, and duinhewassails carousing with braves. There was in it, if we remember aright, one terrific equestrian combat of twelve, which would have made the fortune of the late Mr Ducrow, could that lamented artist have reproduced it in the circus at Astley's. Also there was a sufficiency of cedar-swamps, cane-brakes, and snapping turtles, with other natural horrors familiar to the readers of Transatlantic literature. However, notwithstanding such allurements, Tavish made on the whole but an indifferent leader of the Assinaboins ; and we could not divest ourselves of the impression that, instead of hunting buffaloes, he would have been more appropriately depicted as driving a Sassenach creach. Far are we from wishing to diminish the poetry of life in the wilderness. Willingly we shall unsettle no man's faith in the realities of Crocodile Island that splendid sketch which we owe to the genius of our beloved contributor, the author of Sir Frizzle Pumpkin-but we are compelled candidly to avow our conviction that the Redskin of the novelists differs as much from the scalping Mingo of reality as does the British sailor of the Surrey boards from the veritable Jack of the forecastle. Nay, more; we entertain a strong suspicion that buffalo-hunting is, after all, but a sorry kind of sport, and certainly not worth the fatigue and privation which every one must necessarily undergo in order to make the practical experiment.

We have been led into this train of thought by a perusal of Mr Sullivan's American Rambles, a book from which we acknowledge we have derived not

a little useful information. The author, as we gather from his own statement, set out for the new country upon no especial mission. He neither wanted to inquire into the state of agriculture, nor to collect manufacturing statistics. We are pleased to observe that he has no touch of the geologist in him, and does not make his pages heavy by a lumbering affectation of science. Mr Sullivan simply wanted to see the United States, and to take a peep at the prairies; and, having time at his disposal, he has occupied a year profitably in these objects, as well as in visiting the principal West Indian islands. He writes like a thorough gentleman, without any preconceived bias; his style is always lively and entertaining; and his pictures are not over-coloured. Other tourists may lay claim to more attention, on account of that ostentatious exaggeration which is too commonly the fault of your very fartravelled author, who, like the artist, carries his colour-box with him, and never hesitates, for effect, to dash in the lake and the carmine. We have a strong notion that some fellows set out upon their travels with the deliberate intention, not of depicting things as they really are, but of eclipsing, by all manner of rhetorical appliances, the narratives of former writers who have preceded them on the same ground. "Won't I draw a picture of Niagara that shall do for Dickens!" quoth Tims the younger, as he finds himself and portmanteau safe on board the steamer at Liverpool. "Look out for a Choctaw chief!" are the departing words of young Higginbottom, as he valiantly turns his face, like another Columbus, towards the West. And, to do them justice, both Tims and Higginbottom exert themselves wonderfully; but woe to the man who believes them! We lately read, in the columns of an American paper, a touching account of the last moments of an unfortunate Cockney, who was found, in a state of extreme starvation, somewhere about the Rocky Mountains. The poor creature was so far gone that he could not masticate the morsel of dried bull-buffalo which his discoverer humanely tendered; and, with his dying lips, he accused, as the shortener of his days, a noto

rious scribe in the pay of a London publisher, who had put forth a volume containing a most fascinating account of the delights of existence in the prairies—the said scribe having never penetrated beyond the Astor House hotel in New York. No such charge can be laid at the door of Mr Sullivan. He gives us the prairie and its people as he found them; and we are so satisfied with his account, that should we ever be called upon to take our part in the national exodus, we have pretty nearly made up our mind to emigrate in a different direction. No sane man would be inclined to lodge his household gods in the interior of an Indian wigwam.

Sullivan's first

Let us take Mr Indian acquaintance at the lake of St Croix.

"One evening when we camped, an Indian, greased and naked, came in to ask for food. They are the most improvident people, too proud to dig, but not in the least too proud to beg or thieve; never looking to the morrow, gorging one day, and barely subsisting for the next month. The Chippeways are a well-formed race, with the strut of a prince. This Indian had to keep his eyes skinned,' as he was not very far from the Sioux country, where he would have been snapped up like a young trout. However, an old guide told us, from the manner he was painted, and his carrying nothing but his arms, not even a blanket, that he imagined he was out on the warpath himself, prowling about in the hopes of picking up some stray Sioux. The mosquitos, who were grazing on us in shoals, did not appear to touch him. I suppose he was anointed in some way."

However, this fragrant child of nature, whom even the mosquitos avoided, showed himself to be no way deficient in smartness. Notwithstanding that he had been made free of the camp-kettle, he set his affections on certain movables; and proceeded to put into practice the socialist principles in a manner that would have won the heart of Blanqui. On turning over the page, we find the following entry: "The Chippeway that came into camp the other night stole a hatchet and comb! They are the biggest thieves in the world, thinking it quite as worthy to take as to receive. The education of the youth, with regard to the right