the superstitions he meets with, and to conclude that the clergy encourage, where, and possibly wisely, they only tolerate. It may not be amiss here to refer to a fact narrated by our author, that a Capucin convent at Ozieri is at present indebted for the severity with which its laws are inforced, to the interference of the bishop, not to establish but to put down a pretended miracle. A nun had announced that she had received the "stigmata;" pilgrims flocked, and offerings were made. The bishop suspected, perhaps more than suspected, fraud, caused a strict inquiry, and the miraculous Stigmata disappeared. But let us come to an instance where the clergy encouraged, or, to be candid, assuming the perfect truth of the narration, originated a superstitious fear. It is one that had so much reverence of a right kind in it, and so much of truth at least in the feeling, if not in the fact, as may well pass for a kind of belief in the minds of those who propagated it.

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When the King of Sardinia visited the island, he caused some excavations to be made at Terranova. Tombs were broken into, and the dead despoiled of their rings, buckles, and other ornaments; upon which, Mr Tyndale says, a heavy gale of wind and storm, having done some damage to the town, during the progress of digging up the graves, the priests assured the people, and the people reiterated the assurance, that the calamity arose from, and was a punishment for having disturbed and dug up the tombs of the holy saints and martyrs of Terranova !"

Is the mark of admiration one of approbation or the reverse? We cannot believe it to be one of contempt, and are sure our author would not wish to see the feeling-to the credit of human nature, a common one-eradicated. When the Scythians were taunted with flying before their invaders, they simply replied, "We will stay and fight at the burial places of our fathers." They considered no possession so well worth preserving intact.

When Mr Tyndale was receiving hospitality in a shepherd's hut among the mountains, a Ronuts arrived with a box of relics. The household within doors, a mother and daughters, placed

themselves on their knees before it. They embraced the box, and three times affectionately kissed it, and expressed dismay in their looks that their guest did not do likewise. He admits they looked upon him as an infidel, but they did not treat him, on that account, as Franklin's apologue feigned that Abraham treated his unbelieving aged stranger guest, but bore with him, as the warning and reproving voice told Abraham to do. The poor hostess, in her ignorance, knew not even whose relics she had reverenced, for hers was the common answer, when inquired of as to this particular—“ Senza dubbio la reliquia d'una Santa del Paese, ben conosciuta da per tutto." But this poor family superstition did not harden the heart; the shepherd's wife believed at least in the sanctity of some saint, and that veneration for a life passed in holiness, by whomsoever, demanded of her goodwill to all, and kindly hospitality, and such as should overcome even the prejudice of an ignorant shepherd's wife; and therefore we must quote Mr Tyndale's confession to this virtue of her faith. "If the ignorance and superstitious credulity of my present hostess were great, her hospitality and generosity were no less. She soon recovered from her momentary horror of my heretical irreverence, and, though not the bearer of a holy relic, it was with some difficulty I could get away without having several cheeses put into my saddle-bags; and when my repeated assurances that I was not partial to them at length induced her to desist, she wanted to send her husband to bring me home a kid or a lamb. She would have considered it an insult to have been offered any payment for her gifts, had they been even accepted; and after repeated expressions of her wish to supply me from her humble store, we parted with a shower of mutual benedictions." We have brought to our remembrance patriarchal times, when kids and lambs were readily set before wayfaring strangers. There have been, and are, worse people in the world than those poor ignorant superstitious Sardes.

Not far from San Martino our traveller halted, to inquire his way at an "ovile," the shepherd's hut. It

may not be unsatisfactory to describe the dwellings whose inhabitants are thus hospitable. The hut here spoken of was rude enough-a mass of stones in a circle of about twelve feet diameter, and eight feet high, with a conical roof made of sticks and reeds. The whole family had but one bed; a few ashes were burning in a hole in the ground; a bundle of clothes, some flat loaves of bread, and three or four pans, made up the inventory of goods. The shepherd was preparing to kill a lamb for his family, yet he offered to accompany the stranger, which he did, and went with him a distance of three miles. "After showing me the spot, and sharing a light meal, I offered him a trifle for his trouble; but he indignantly refused it, and, on leaving to return home, gave me an adieu with a fervent but courteous demeanour, which would have shamed many a mitred and coroneted head." We are not, however, to conclude that all the shepherd districts, however they may bear no reproach on the score of hospitality, are regions of innocence and virtue. We are told, on the authority of a Padre Angius, that the people of Bonorva are quarrelsome and vindictive; and a story is told of their envious character. A certain Don Pietrino Prunas was the owner of much cattle, and ninetynine flocks of sheep; he was assassinated on the very day he had brought the number to a hundred, for no other reason than out of envy of his happiness. And here Mr Tyndale remarks, in a note, a French translator's carelessness. "Valery, in mentioning the circumstance, says that he was murdered 'le jour même où il atteignait sa centième année.'" The words professed to be translated are,

Padrone di 99 greggi di pecori, trucidato nel giorno istesso che ei doneva formarsi la centessima."

The reader will not expect to find accounts of many treasures of the fine arts in Sardinia. Convents and churches are, however, not without statues and pictures. Nor do the clergy or inmates of convents possess much knowledge on the subject. If a picture is pronounced a Michael Angelo, without doubt the possessors, with a charming simplicity, would inquire "who Michael Angelo was."

We quote the following as worthy the notice of the Arundel Society, particularly as it is out of the general tourings of connoisseurs.

church at Ardara) is covered with por"The screen of the high altar (the traits of apostles, saints, and martyrs, apparently a work of the thirteenth or early part of the fourteenth century; and, notwithstanding the neglect and damp, the colours and gildings are still bright and untarnished. Many of them are exquisitely finished, with all the fineness of an Albert Durer and Holbein, and will vie with the best specimens of the early masters in the gallery of Dresden, or the Pinakotheke at Munich."

Valery, the mistranslator just mentioned, is in ecstacy in his notice of these works. He considers them worthy the perpetuity which the graver alone can give them, and considers how great their reputation would be had they found a Lanzi, a d'Agincour, or a Cicognara.

We have now travelled with our agreeable, well-informed author over much country-wild, and partially cultivated; have speculated with him upon all things that attracted attention by the way; and, though the roads have been somewhat rough, we have kept our tempers pretty wellno light accomplishment for fellowtravellers; and our disputes have been rather amusing than serious. We now enter with him the capital of Sardinia-Cagliari. We shall not follow him, however, through the modern town, though there can be no better cicerone; nor look in at the museum, fearful of long detention; not even to examine the Phoenician curiosities, or discuss the identity in character, with them, of some seals found in the bogs of Ireland; or to speculate with Sir George Staunton as to their Chinese origin, and how they unaccountably found themselves, some in an Irish bog and some in excavated earth in Sardinia, and from thence into the museum at Cagliari. We are content to visit some Roman antiquities, and read inscriptions probably of the age of the Antonines, or of an earlier period. The monuments are sepulchral: one is of a very interesting character. It is of some architectural pretensions-in honour of an exemplary wife, who, like Alces

tis, is said to have died for her husband. The prose tale, were it in existence, might have told, perhaps, how Pomptilla-for that is her name-attended her husband in a sickness, caught his fever, and died, while he recovered. The inscriptions are many. Some have been made out tolerably well they are in Latin and Greek. One, in Greek, has so much tenderness, that, deeming it quite worthy the melancholy cadence of verse, we have been tempted to substitute our own translation for that of Mr Tyndale in prose, with which we are not quite satisfied.

Pomptilla, from thy dew-embalmed earth, Which mournful homage of our love receives,

May fairest lilies rise,

Pale flow'rets of a sad funereal birth-
And roses opening their scarce-blushing leaves,
Of tenderest dyes,

And violets, that from their languid eyes,
Shed perfumed shower-

And blessed amaranth that never dies.
O! be thyself a flower,

Th' unsullied snow-drop-being and witness true

Of thy pure self, e'en to perpetual years—
As erst a flow'ret fair Narcissus grew-
And Hyacinthus all bedew'd with tears.

For when, now in the tremulous hour of death,

Her spouse Philippus near to Lethe drew
His unresisting lips and fainting breath,

A woman's duteous vow she vow'd→
And gently put aside his drooping head,
And her firm presence to the waters bow'd,
And drank the fatal stream instead.

Such perfect union did stern Death divide, Th' unwilling husband and the willing wifeWilling to die, while he, now loathing life, Through the dear love of his devoted brideStill lives, and weeps, and prays that he may

die

That his released spirit to hers may fly,
And mingled evermore with hers abide.

In taking leave of our author, we confidently recommend the three volumes on Sardinia to the general

reader-we say general reader, for, whatever be his taste or pursuit, he will find amusement and information. The work is a full work. If the reader be an antiquary, he will be gratified with deep research and historic lore; if an economist, he will have tabular detail and close statistics; an agriculturist, and would he emigrate from his own persecuted lands, he will learn the nature of soils, their capabilities, and how fair a field is offered for that importable and exportable commodity, his industry, so much wanted in Sardinia, and so little encouraged at home; if a sportsman, besides the use of the gun, which he into the mystery of tunny fishing, knows already, he will be initiated and, would he turn it to his profit, have license to dispose of his game. Nay, even the wide-awake shopkeeper may learn how to set up his "store" in Sassari or Cagliari, and what stock he had best take out. If he be a neer-do-weel just returned from California, and surprised into the possession of a sackful of gold, Mr Tyndale will conduct him to the Barathra into which he may throw it, whether they be sea-fisheries or landmarshes; or into whose pockets he may deposit the wealth, whose burthen he is of course wearied in bearing, for the excitement of generosity in becoming a benefactor, or for the amusement of corrupting.

The work is indeed a “guide book,” as well as much more, for it tells every one what he may do profitably or unprofitably in Sardinia-whether as traveller and private speculator, minding his own concerns; or as an enthusiastic disperser of ignorance, and renovator of the customs, manners, religion, and political condition of a people as unlike his own race and kindred as possible.

THERE would have been nothing in what had chanced to justify the suspicions that tortured me, but for my impressions as to the character of Vivian.

Reader, hast thou not, in the easy, careless sociability of youth, formed acquaintance with some one, in whose more engaging or brilliant qualities thou hast-not lost that dislike to defects orvices which is natural to an age when, even while we err, we adore what is good, and glow with enthusiasm for the ennobling sentiment and the virtuous deed-no, happily, not lost dislike to what is bad, nor thy quick sense of it, but conceived a keen interest in the struggle between the bad that revolted, and the good that attracted thee, in thy companion? Then, perhaps, thou hast lost sight of him for a time-suddenly thou, hearest that he has done something out of the way of ordinary good or commonplace evil: And, in either--the good or the evil-thy mind runs rapidly back over its old reminiscences, and of either thou sayest, "How natural! -only So-and-so could have done this thing!"

Thus I felt respecting Vivian. The most remarkable qualities in his character were his keen power of calculation, and his unhesitating audacity-qualities that lead to fame or to infamy, according to the cultivation of the moral sense and the direction of the passions. Had I recognised those qualities in some agency apparently of good-and it seemed yet doubtful if Vivian were the agent I should have cried, “It is he! and the better angel has triumphed!" With the same (alas! with a yet more impulsive) quickness, when the agency was of evil, and the agent equally dubious, I felt that the qualities revealed the man, and that the demon had prevailed.

Mile after mile, stage after stage, were passed, on the dreary, interminable, high north road. I narrated to my companion, more intelligibly than I had yet done, my causes for apprehension. The Captain at first listened

eagerly, then checked me on the sudden. "There may be nothing in all this!" he cried. "Sir, we must be men here-have our heads cool, our reason clear: stop!" And, leaning back in the chaise, Roland refused further conversation, and, as the night advanced, seemed to sleep. I took pity on his fatigue, and devoured my heart in silence. At each stage we heard of the party of which we were in pursuit. At the first stage or two we were less than an hour behind; gradually, as we advanced, we lost ground, despite the most lavish liberality to the postboys. I supposed, at length, that the mere circumstance of changing, at each relay, the chaise as well as the horses, was the cause of our comparative slowness; and, on saying this to Roland, as we were changing horses, somewhere about midnight, he at once called up the master of the inn, and gave him his own price for permission to retain the chaise till the journey's end. This was so unlike Roland's ordinary thrift, whether dealing with my money or his own-so unjustified by the fortune of either-that I could not help muttering something in apology.

Can you guess why I was a miser?" said Roland, calmly.

"Amiser!-anything but that! Only prudent-military men often are so."

"I was a miser," repeated the Captain, with emphasis." I began the habit first when my son was but a child. I thought him high-spirited, and with a taste for extravagance. 'Well,' said I to myself, I will save for him; boys will be boys.' Then, afterwards, when he was no more a child, (at least he began to have the vices of a man !) I said to myself, 'Patience, he may reform still; if not, I will save money that I may have power over his selfinterest, since I have none over his heart. I will bribe him into honour!' And then-and then-God saw that I was very proud, and I was punished. Tell them to drive faster-fasterwhy, this is a snail's pace!"

All that night, all the next day, till

towards the evening, we pursued our journey, without pause, or other food than a crust of bread and a glass of wine. But we now picked up the ground we had lost, and gained upon the carriage. The night had closed in when we arrived at the stage at which the route to Lord N-'s branched from the direct north road. And here, making our usual inquiry, my worst suspicions were confirmed. The carriage we pursued had changed horses an hour before, but had not taken the way to Lord N-'s;-continuing the direct road into Scotland. The people of the inn had not seen the lady in the carriage, for it was already dark, but the man-servant, (whose livery they described) had ordered the horses.

The last hope that, in spite of appearances, no treachery had been designed, here vanished. The Captain, at first, seemed more dismayed than myself, but he recovered more quickly. "We will continue the journey on horseback," he said; and hurried to the stables. All objections vanished at the sight of his gold. In five minutes we were in the saddle, with a postilion, also mounted, to accompany us. We did the next stage in little more than two-thirds of the time which we should have occupied in our former mode of travel-indeed, I found it hard to keep pace with Roland. We remounted; we were only twenty-five minutes behind the carriage. We felt confident that we should overtake it before it could reach the next town-the moon was up-we could see far before us--we rode at full speed. Milestone after milestone glided by, the carriage was not visible. We arrived at the posttown, or rather village; it contained but one posting-house. We were long in knocking up the ostlers--no carriage had arrived just before us; no carriage had passed the place since

to the panting sides of our horses. For answer, Roland opened his hand-full of gold. Away we went back through the dull sleeping village, back into the broad moonlit thoroughfare. We came to a crossroad to the right, but the track we pursued still led us straight on. We had measured back nearly half the way to the post-town at which we had last changed, when, lo! there emerged from a by-lane two postilions and their horses.

At that sight our companion, shouting loud, pushed on before us and hailed his fellows. A few words gave us the information we sought. A wheel had come off the carriage just by the turn of the road, and the young lady and her servants had taken refuge in a small inn not many yards down the lane. The man-servant had dismissed the post-boys after they had baited their horses, saying they were to come again in the morning, and bring a blacksmith to repair the wheel.

"How came the wheel off?" asked Roland sternly.

"Why, sir, the linch-pin was all rotted away, I suppose, and came out."

"Did the servant get off the dickey after you set out, and before the accident happened?"

"Why, yes. He said the wheels were catching fire, that they had not the patent axles, and he had forgot to have them oiled."

"And he looked at the wheels, and shortly afterwards the linch-pinch came out?-Eh?"

"Anon, sir!" said the postboy, staring; "why, and indeed so it was!"

"Come on, Pisistratus, we are in time; but pray God-pray Godthat" the Captain dashed his spur into the horse's sides, and the rest of his words was lost to me.

A few yards back from the causeway, a broad patch of green before it, stood the inn--a sullen, old-fashioned building of cold gray stone, looking livid in the moonlight, with black firs at one side, throwing over half of it a dismal shadow. So solitary! not a house, not a hut near it. If they who kept the inn were such that villany might reckon on their connivance, and innocence despair of their aid-there was no neighbourhood to alarm-no

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