“One of those remarks,” said Mr. Barclay,
“which having a semblance of truth, are
by many mistaken for true.”

“Yes,” said Mr. Keppel, “there is a connexion;
and though my epicurean friend did
know that it was collateral, several who
heard him did not. You recollect the anecdote
of the traveller who, journeying through
a region possessed by savages, rejoiced at the
sight of a gallows, as an assurance that he
had reached a civilized people:—the sight of
a truffled turkey would have authorized the
same agreeable inference.”

“There is however,” said Mr. Barclay, “a
serious error that has taken root even among
the cultivated, on which the playful remark
of your friend may be taken as satire—the
opinion, that the state of the fine arts is an
index of the degree of general refinement;
an opinion derived from the radical mistake
of believing the sense of the beautiful and
the sense of the moral to be dependent upon
one and the same element of mind.”

[figure description] Page 134.[end figure description]

“And to the diffusion of this error,” said
Mr. Keppel, “I think the great German
Goethe has much contributed.”

“He himself, however,” said Mr. Barclay,
“does not entertain it.”

“No,” said Mr. Keppel; “and that he is
believed to be authority for it, proceeds from
a misapprehension of him. His works are
so strongly tinctured with his fondness for the
fine arts, and are so much indebted for excellence
to their spirit, that the means of successful
execution are mistaken for the end of
composition, and that which was secondary
and subordinate in the mind of the author,
appears to many to be primary in his works.”

“Do you think, Mr. Keppel,” said Alfred,
a short time after, giving another turn to the
conversation, “that a young man can receive
much benefit from travel?”

“A young man,” answered Mr. Keppel,
“may reap much good. But besides that he
is not so likely to use his means of improvement
so well as at a maturer age, these means

[figure description] Page 135.[end figure description]

themselves are greatly less at twenty than at
thirty. To learn by travel, a good deal must
already have been learnt. A stock of acquirement,
as well as a certain maturity of
thought, both of which presuppose some
years of manhood,—are needed, in order to
gather up the various knowledge that is to be
gathered; a perception, too, searching and
discriminating through exercise and self-examination,
and capacious from extensive
study. There must be a solid nucleus of
knowledge, to collect kindred stuff; otherwise,
many rich grains will be touched but not attracted,—
much will be seen and heard unheeded,
because its significance is unsuspected.
In answering your question, I suppose a
man eager for improvement, who can choose
his time.”

“The chief want of a young American
traveller,” said Mr. Barclay, “is the want of
knowledge of his own country. His memory
is burdened with a heap of dead fragments
of Greek and Roman doings and writings,

[figure description] Page 136.[end figure description]

while he is left ignorant of, utterly uninstructed
in, the nature of the institutions that
surround him in living entireness, acting
daily upon and interwoven with his individual
being; an acquaintance with whose conditions
and principles is to him more important, a
thousand fold, than the most thorough knowledge
(even could he obtain such) of the circumstances
and laws of all the nations of
antiquity; which, too, independently of the
practical value of acquaintance with them,
are in themselves, as subjects of abstract
study, far more fruitful of instruction than
ancient institutions, being, unlike the latter,
not approachable only through the imperfect
record of a foreign tongue, but visibly present
in moving fluctuating operation, directly
cognizable in their details, ramifications, beginnings
and consequences.”

“But, uncle,” said Herbert, “should not
the foundation of a liberal education be laid
with the knowledge of the history and literature
of the two nations who reached such a

[figure description] Page 137.[end figure description]

height of power and civilization—who have
exercised such an influence over the world?
Is not the study of them the best beginning?”

“But, Herbert,” answered Mr. Barclay,
“a beginning cannot be made with them; because
the young mind cannot reach them.
There is the great error. With much toil
you get little fruit. It is like trying to collect
water in a sieve. The history and literature
of a people are entirely beyond the capacity
of a school-boy. He is not instructed—
he is not educated, by learning by rote,
a meagre sketch of its existence, and the shell
of its language. The principle of adaptation
of means to the end is utterly disregarded: it
is attempted to make a beginning with that
which should be the conclusion; precious
time is thus wasted, and no substantial beginning—
no foundation is made. What might
be learnt best, and therefore should be learnt,
is neglected for the sake of that which cannot
be learnt. The young mind is translated to
a distant age on the heavy wings of verbal

[figure description] Page 138.[end figure description]

memory: its whole power is expended in
moving the wings. And you are kept at
this barren labor, while rich materials, suit
able to your capacity, apt to exercise various
powers, and to fix in the mind useful facts
and distinct images, lie around you neglected.
Your attention is tasked to seize that which,
from its remoteness, its dissimilarity to all
that surrounds you, its foreignness to all that
interests you, and from the indirect way
(through books) that it is presented, you
cannot even realize to be a substantial existence.
The physically obvious, the teeming
present, inviting you with a living voice that
speaks to the affections as well as to the curiosity,
is uncommuned with; and you are toiled
in pursuit of the vague phantoms of extinct
existences that answer coldly and indistinctly
to your laborious appeals. Yourself,
Herbert, what have you learnt of the people
among whom you have lived for the last four
years? What do you know of the laws and
customs of the town whose streets were as

[figure description] Page 139.[end figure description]

familiar to you as the passages of this house—
of the origin and operation of these; of its
political and social institutions and their principles—
of the differences between them and
those of your native place; of the constitution
and its framers, the history and the men who
moulded it, of the state under whose protection
you studied? Neither, of the spirit of the
community where you abode, nor even of the
forms of its organization, were you taught any
thing. As a student, you lived out of the precincts
of real life, pondering over the strange
signs of unintelligible ideas; as if a man who
had to provide food for his dinner, should, instead
of setting to work with his hands, spend
the morning in speculating on the phantasms
of his last night's dream.

“Language being the signs of things, ideas
and feelings, is subordinate to these, is dependent
upon them, grows out of them.
The manner of its formation points both to
the reason for acquiring it and to the method
of acquisition. As words come into

[figure description] Page 140.[end figure description]

existence, viz.—to represent things, &c. so they
should come into the mind of the learner.—
They are not knowledge, but the symbols of
knowledge; they should, therefore, follow not
precede it. The reverse of this natural
course is taken, as well in the branches of
instruction in the native language as in those
called classical. In the latter, not only is language
taught as if it were the creator of ideas,
instead of being created by them; but this
preposterous end is pursued by means in
which art, far from aiding nature, strives
against her; for, not only is the symbolic,
secondary character of words lost sight of it,
but the mistake thereby committed is doubled
by making words, themselves not recognized
as symbols, the symbols of other words.—
The boy of fourteen who translates Horace,
learns that certain Latin words, correspond
to certain English ones—and that is all that
he does learn. And what do his lessons of
ancient history teach him? That war is the
condition of humanity; that the first of

[figure description] Page 141.[end figure description]

warriors is the greatest of men; that courage and
pride are cardinal virtues; that ambition is
exalted; that power is the proper aim of
statesmen, and conquest of states. To you,
Herbert, ancient history has been only a tale
of war—the story of Jack the giant-killer of
childhood adapted to boyhood. All of it
that was intelligible to you was the movements
of fleets and armies, victory and defeat,
sieges and massacres—the most general
effects of the commonest passions. Too
few and isolated are the acts of virtue to give
a brighter color to the image painted on your
mind—unconsciously perhaps to yourself—
that man is a warfaring, treacherous, revengeful,
superstitious, tumultuous, animal.

“This false system—false in its aims, and
false in the mode to attain them—is as artificial
as if human ingenuity in building it up,
had striven to outdo nature by opposing her.
The course which she, ever simple and uniform,
prescribes, may be learnt from an infant.
In its unconscious development is

[figure description] Page 142.[end figure description]

legible the principle which should be the basis of
education. Every object within its reach it
examines earnestly: it is eager to look into
every thing it can put its hands on. To feed
its curiosity, it crawls and walks and climbs.
Its store of learning accumulating, and the
wants of its mind becoming more distinct
and multiplied, the need of signs to indicate,
to label as it were, their classification, calls
into action the innate power to create them;
and language displays her mirror, bright and
perfect, faithful to represent whatever is held
before it, but in itself, nothing—casting back
images, as images, complete, but only images—
all idea and significance being in that
which is imaged. To continue this process is
the duty of the educator: to lead, and not to
drive, is, as the word indicates, his vocation.
He should encourage the spontaneous tendency
of the young intellect, engaging it on
that which is immediately around, which is
tangible, which the senses, those natural instruments
of acquisition, can reach; exciting

[figure description] Page 143.[end figure description]

it by gratifying its curiosity; delighting it
with palpable results of its power; limiting
his agency to the facilitating and methodising
of its action. His function is, not to use his
own mind to make impressions upon that of
his pupil, but to make the latter develope itself.
He is not to pour into it, or rather on
it, the opinions and conclusions of others, but
to keep it in the way of imbibing knowledge at
the original sources thereof,—of self-instilling
knowledge from the fresh products of nature.
The space of a few miles square may embrace
all these,—the physical world with its
beauties and powers—living man in all the
conditions and relations of his being—a complete
theatre for instruction. Brooks and
fields and hills contain the geography of the
globe: the narration of a village's birth and
growth is history: its municipal organization
involves the principles of politics. Here the
learner earns knowledge instead of borrowing
it, and can realize that it is knowledge; for
what he learns is a reality—not a memory; is

[figure description] Page 144.[end figure description]

incorporated with his mind—not impressed
upon its surface. Such knowledge is a foundation;
for it is adapted to a superstructure:
it is a proper beginning; because it invites
and facilitates continuance. From such a
centre the young intellect will expand with
its own growth eagerly to a wider sphere,
calling to its aid, with a distinct appreciation
of their legitimate purpose, books, as messengers
between the mind and its objects,
telescopes for the mind, to place before it
through the media of mute signs that which
on account of distance it cannot directly approach,—
consulting them to extend not to
originate information, and understanding
them clearly from already possessing absolute
definite knowledge similar to that which
they display, and obtained at the same source.
Acquirement thus made will feed itself: circle
will be added to circle by the strengthening
impulse of gratified curiosity: the conformity
to nature will make the acquisition more substantial
and the disposition to acquire more

[figure description] Page 145.[end figure description]

active; until the learner, having penetrated
to the latest results in science, and ascended
in the history of man to the remotest record,
shall have surveyed—as far as one mind can
survey,—the workings of nature and the doings
of man.

And yet, what is the grasping power of
intellect, thus beautifully taught to gather
and to hold all outward forms and subtilest
relations—what is it to the inward teaching—
to the education of the feelings? This
first want of a human being can by this process,
and only by this, be fully satisfied.
Self-knowledge can only be obtained—self-discipline
accomplished, by action; and in
childhood this course of action may and
should be entered on. What is done by telling
the pupil how he should act? Vain are
many words. Make his own feelings tell
him: make them their own instructors.—
Place before him the objects—lead him into
the situations, that shall move their deep
fountains to overflowing. Use your power

[figure description] Page 146.[end figure description]

of control only to multiply opportunities—
your art, only to add emphasis to the lessons
of nature. In the family circle and in the
little community around him, all these lessons
are written, and there and thus may be easily
learnt. Selfishness may be made to seem
what it is, and be shunned as a torture. In
the liquid flow of unchecked tenderness, love,
reverence, justice, may have their birth in
joy, not in pain: duty may be practised as
a pleasure, not as a law: self-sacrifice may
be felt as a giving to self, not as a taking
away.”

Mr. Barclay having been led into these
remarks by the question of Herbert, was encouraged
to express himself at such length
by the evident interest with which he was
listened to. When he paused, Mr. Keppel
returned to the subject Alfred had introduced.

“The traveller,” said Mr. Keppel, “who is
not furnished with knowledge of the social
usages and political institutions of his own

[figure description] Page 147.[end figure description]

country—their form and spirit—will find
himself, from the want of a standard of comparison,
imperfectly qualified to judge of
those of others. Our countrymen sometimes
carry with them prejudices against the countries
they visit, instead of information on
their own; and sometimes, on the other
hand, the absence of theoretical knowledge
(the only substantial basis for conviction) of
the principles of the republicanism under
whose influence they have lived, exposes
them to be dazzled by the outward gorgeousness
of foreign aristocracy.”

“As travelling,” observed Alfred, “is said
to have the effect of curing prejudice, most
books of travels must be looked upon as transcripts
from the traveller's mind when in the
crisis of the process of cure; at which period,
as in cures of the body, the disease about
to be thrown off, rages with its greatest violence.”

“To depict a civilized people,” said Mr.
Keppel, “is a high literary and philosophical

[figure description] Page 148.[end figure description]

achievement; requiring, acquaintance with
all the circumstances of its birth, growth and
present being; insight into the spirit which is
partly the cause and partly the effect of
these; graphic skill, so as to paint picturesquely
the outward appearance, the physiognomy
of a nation—”

“Stop,”—cried Alfred, “what you have
said is quite enough to seal up all manuscript
journals.”

“By no means,” said Mr. Keppel. “But
to judge of what is done, we must have in
our mind a conception of what may be—an
ideal standard, with which to compare the
real production; and the more exalted that is,
and consequently, the more difficult of approach,
the more tolerant should we be of
failure.”

“That is a sound rule in morals, but not in
literature,” said Mr. Barclay. “A bad man
should be pitied and pardoned: a bad work
is out of the sphere of charity. Of taste the
fundamental law is severity—of morals,

[figure description] Page 149.[end figure description]

forgiveness. Books of travels, however, are not
as such, amenable to this law; for they are not
(with few exceptions) works of elegant literature.
They should be held in the light of
papers called for by a legislative body.—
They are documents and reports on manners,
customs, statistics, politics, laid before the
reading world by its order—drawn up with
various merit, but all answering, according to
their accuracy and fulness, the end of furnishing
facts, descriptions, and conclusions in relation
to far distant members of the human
family.”

“They follow,” said Mr. Keppel, “in the
footsteps of the great civilizer, Commerce.
And even one which betrays the mean spirit
and shallow intellect of its author, may have
a high value from its store of facts and its
graphic descriptions, the inferences and impressions
produced by these in the reader,
being the reverse of those recorded by the
industrious little-minded writer.”

“Those who do not or cannot visit other

[figure description] Page 150.[end figure description]

countries themselves,” said Mr. Barclay,
“may, through the works of those who do,
in a measure share the benefits of travel, the
chief of which is the tolerance of spirit created,
in men capable of it, by learning how
opposite are the opinions entertained on the
same subjects by different communities. This
moral effect is more to be prized than the accompanying
enlargement of intellectual vision,
produced by beholding questions from new
points of view and through new modes of
thought.”

“It is with the traveller as with the student,”
said Mr. Keppel. “Although it is
both possible and profitable to obtain a considerable
acquaintance with many subjects;
thoroughly to master one, requires long and
assiduous attention to that one. He who
travels for the high object of instruction,
(which embraces, by the by, the highest and
most varied entertainment,) may learn much
of all the countries he shall visit; but to penetrate
deeply into the spirit of a people,—to

[figure description] Page 151.[end figure description]

understand its peculiar genius,—to work into
his mind a clear picture of its individuality,—
he must devote years to the study of it, and
pursue the study, not with industry only, but
with a genial zeal. I can speak here from
experience. Having spent many years in
different countries, I went to Italy with the
determination to carry fully into practice a
system I had partially followed every where.
I had no knowledge of its language, and a
superficial one of its history. I established
myself in an unfrequented middle-sized town,
and got admitted as lodger and boarder into
the house of a respectable tradesman, having
a large family. With this family I set out
with identifying myself: I made myself one
of it. From the children I learnt more of
the language than from my grammar and
dictionary. I played and talked with them,
went with them to their schools and read
their books. I entered into the feelings of
the family as if I had been born a member of
it. I shared its amusements and troubles and

[figure description] Page 152.[end figure description]

occupations. Through it I made my first acquaintances,
cultivating intercourse with its
friends and relations. In a short time I learnt
with the language the history of half a dozen
families. I was soon a favorite, from listening
to every one's story, and taking an interest
in every one's little pains and pleasures.
In the mean time, I made daily progress in
the study of the literature and history of
Italy. I talked, read, wrote, thought, felt,
nothing but Italian. In this way a year
passed. I then removed to a large city.—
Here I associated with a different class. My
acquaintance with the language, customs, and
literature enabled me to take the fullest advantage
of the facilities for intimate association
which letters and my American birth
opened to me. I avoided foreigners and
foreign subjects. I moved freely through a
large circle, on the most familiar footing with
many, living the life of a native. I made excursions
to the country, spending weeks with
my Italian friends at their villas, and taking

[figure description] Page 153.[end figure description]

note of the mode of life and condition of the
peasantry. At the expiration of another
year I left this city, and set out to visit every
part of Italy, tarrying weeks or months in the
principal towns, and continuing to unite with
constant intercourse with the inhabitants, and
the collecting of every kind of statistical information,
the study of poetry and the fine
arts in the spirit of a native. This consumed
two years, making the entire term of my residence
four, every week of which had been
devoted intently to the study of the Italian
people.”

“And when you re-ascended the Alps,”
said Mr. Barclay, “and took your last look at
the Italian soil—”

“It was a look of longing,” interrupted Mr.
Keppel. “I wished to turn back and spend
another year. I felt as if I had left much
uncompleted.”

“You liked the Italians then?” asked Herbert.

“I have never known a people,” answered
Mr. Keppel, “that I did not like.”

[figure description] Page 154.[end figure description]

“As, after what has been said, we have
all, no doubt, our ideal standard of what a
book of travels may be, pretty well elevated,
and are therefore prepared to judge of a real
production, suppose we have a specimen
from the manuscript of a traveller,” said Alfred,
drawing from his pocket a roll of paper.

“Come Alfred,” said Mr. Keppel, “no
treachery.”

“Of course not,” said Alfred: “trust to my
discrimination.”

“Now you are going to bore us, Alfred,”
said Mr. Keppel.

“Bore you! well, what if I do! Every
one should have his turn.”

CHAPTER X.

[figure description] Page 155.[end figure description]

Alfred opened the paper and read as
follows:

—“I had spent several weeks—as every one
may spend them at Dresden—delightfully.
It is one of the most charming towns in Europe.
Far away from travellers' thoroughfares;
free from the bustle of commerce, and the
tramp and insolence of soldiery; a cultivated,
polished society, over which the good-hearted,
old-fashioned royal family diffuses additional
courtesy; rich collections of the treasures
of art, and curious hoards from antiquity;
the best music; one of the finest galleries
of paintings in the world; a beautiful
country around;—all these form a whole of
singular attractiveness, and makes Dresden a
spot where the traveller, enjoying a luxurious

[figure description] Page 156.[end figure description]

repose, delights to linger. The summer was
drawing to an end. I had staid a fortnight
beyond the time I had fixed for continuing
my journey south through Bohemia. Having
at last resolutely made up my mind to set off in
a few days, I took leave of my kind Dresden
friends. Talking with one of them of the
resources for amusement of his city—`Have
you,' said he, `been at a boar hunt?' `A
boar hunt! No. Are wild boars hunted
near this?' `Yes,' said he. `The king
has a hunt at stated times at this season: if
you would like to see one, to-morrow is one
of his days.' `I would'nt miss it for the
world,' said I. `Then, send a horse to
Moritzburg this afternoon; and ride out in a
carriage to-morrow morning to breakfast: the
hunt begins at eleven o'clock.'—`How fortunate,
' said I to myself as I proceeded to a
livery-stable to engage a horse, `how fortunate
that I heard of this! A royal boar hunt
away in the interior of Germany! What a
rare chance for a traveller!' I examined

[figure description] Page 157.[end figure description]

several horses, and having chosen one, recommended
as strong and sure-footed, I ordered
him to be sent out that afternoon to be
fresh for me the following day. I provided
myself with a good hunting sword and a pair
of large pistols; and the next morning, after
a two hours drive, I found myself at nine
o'clock at the inn near the palace of Moritzburg,
the royal hunting lodge.

“After seeing to my horse, I went to breakfast.
I was impatient for eleven o'clock to
arrive. The anticipation of danger whetted
my eagerness. I had read accounts of desperate
fights between boars and their hunters,
of narrow escapes, and chivalrous deeds—
one of a king, whose life, in peril from a furious
boar, was saved by a knight at the risk
of his own. Perhaps, said I, something of
the kind may happen to myself! Perhaps I
may beat the king and his suite, and be the
first to strike the animal! I examined my
sword and pistols. But I must not be too
bold; and one of Snyder's finest pictures, a

[figure description] Page 158.[end figure description]

foaming boar at bay, came into my mind.—
In the mean time two other gentlemen
had arrived at the inn, and were taking
breakfast out of doors under a tree. As they
talked loud and seemed to have no objection
to be listened to, from the piazza a few feet
above them could be heard distinctly their
whole conversation, from which I learnt that
they were two young Frenchmen, one of
them attached to the French legation at
Dresden, the other a student of Heidelberg.
Their talk was of themselves and other
Frenchmen, which at any other time might
have interested me; but my mind was now
too much pre-occupied to listen long to any
thing, and I soon walked out to the stable.—
I had my horse brought out and saddled and
bridled in order to try him. I saw that the
girths, reins, and stirrup leathers were all
strong and well fastened, and having girded
on my sword and put my pistols in my belt,
I mounted, and following the direction given
me to turn round the corner of a wall that

[figure description] Page 159.[end figure description]

ran near the inn, a little beyond which was
the starting point, I in a few minutes came
up to the hunting party, already assembled
without the palace court. It consisted of the
old king and his brother Anthony, attended
by half a dozen of the royal household.
They were just about to start, as, falling into
the rear, I joined them. I scanned their
horses, and thought, as I spurred and reined
in my hired steed, that he would prove a
match for any of them. In a few moments
I heard steps behind us, and looking back
saw the two Frenchmen.

“We had entered a pine wood and were
proceeding in silence, still keeping to the
road, at a moderate trot, hearing every now
and then from a valley to the left the cry of
the dogs. The two Frenchmen continued
their talk, and so loudly as to attract the attention
of the royal party, several of whom
looked round. Lest I should be taken for
one of the Frenchmen, I separated myself
from them as much as I could, riding up by

[figure description] Page 160.[end figure description]

the side of the hindmost of the king's attendants,
who seemed to be half groom half
gentleman. He eyed me with a suspecting
air, and his look was several times, I thought,
directed towards my pistols. Wishing to
let him see that I had no connexion with the
Frenchmen, I put on a deaf look as to their
conversation and made a remark to him in
German. I got only a monosyllable in return;
and observing that he appeared as
anxious to keep me behind him as I was to
keep the Frenchmen behind me, I fell
back,—thinking to myself, how I would dash
ahead of him in the thick of the hunt,—
when a rattling volley of French, exchanged
between the two Frenchmen, drove me forward
again. Presently a yell as of a hundred
hounds swept up from the valley. The
party quickened its speed. `Ah!' said I to
the German, `the hunt, I suppose, is going to
begin now.'—`Begin! its ended, I believe.'—
`Ended!'—`Yes;' said he, with evident satisfaction
after listening for a moment, `they

[figure description] Page 161.[end figure description]

have caught the boar.'—`Caught the boar!
who have caught the boar?' `The huntsmen.
' The party suddenly turned to the
left through another road in the direction
whence the cries of the dogs came. We
had now got into a gallop and were approaching
the dogs whose cries however had become
faint. Suddenly we halted. One of
the party rode forward, and soon returned.—
Upon this the king dismounted under the
shade of some tall trees. We all followed
his example. One of the Frenchmen was
describing to the other a boar hunt he had
witnessed in France, and in so loud a tone
that even the old king looked round. I drew
off from them, fearing that I should be implicated
in their discourtesy. I kept my
eyes fixed in the direction of the dogs.
Presently I described the boar—bleeding and
exhausted, dragged along on his back by four
men, one having hold of each of his legs.—
They dragged him before the king. One of
the attendants presented to his majesty a

[figure description] Page 162.[end figure description]

drawn hunting-sword. The king took it,
walked up to the prostrate boar, and pierced
his heart. He drew out the sword and gave
it back to the attendant. He then remounted
his horse, and the rest of the party did so
after him, and we trotted back by the same
road to Mortizburg. The wood through
which we passed was intersected in every
direction by smooth roads. The wall I had
gone round on starting from the inn was part
of an inclosure in which wild boars, taken in
the forest when young, are confined. When
the king wishes to have a boar hunt, a full
grown animal is caught in the pen; his tusks
are sawed off; and he is then let loose.”

“Well,” said Mr. Barclay, seeing that Alfred
had finished, “there was good sport, although
not of the kind you expected.”

“You should head this,” said Alfred,--“A
royal boar hunt in Germany, in which the
hunter was hunted by two Frenchmen.”

“These two young men,” said Mr. Keppel,
“as they appeared on that morning, were,

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with the exception of their want of courtesy,
a realization of the vulgar English and American
notion of a Frenchman; and had I not
lived some time among the French people
and known personally many individuals of it,
I should have exclaimed—What complete
Frenchmen! whereas they only presented a
caricature of traits superficially distinctive of
their nation—talkativeness, and fondness for
display.”

“And perhaps,” said Mr. Barclay, “had
you become acquainted with them, you would
have found that their conduct on that occasion,
though unwittingly on their part, was a caricature
even of themselves.”

“About the same time,” said Mr. Keppel,
“I met with another and more complete caricature—
an Englishman, whom you might
have supposed to be travelling for a wager or
as a penance. He admired nothing, and despised
the people: he was always uncomfortable
and always grumbling. He avoided contact
with the natives and associated only

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with Englishmen. He seemed to feel as if
he had been taken in, when sometime after
we had been acquainted, he discovered that
I was not an Englishman. His countrymen
called him, by way of distinction, John Bull.”

“The hunt itself was another caricature,”
said Alfred.

“Not exactly a caricature,” said Mr. Keppel;
“rather a degeneration. The old king,
no longer capable of performing the reality,
went through the form merely of a hunt.”

“This condition of the royal amusement in
Saxony,” said Mr. Barclay, “may be taken
as a type of that of the serious vocation of
kings in most countries of Europe, where the
ceremony and outward circumstance of monarchy
are continued, while much of its power
has passed, and is further passing away;
where, indeed, although there is a nominal
monarch, there is, in strictness, no monarchy.”

“I hav'nt yet done with the traveller's journal,”
said Alfred. “Listen to some verse.”

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And, re-opening the paper, he resumed reading,
pausing at the end of each piece, to make
comments, or to listen to those of Mr. Keppel.

“Wherefore and what are ye?—unlike all else
Of earth: changeless where every thing is change:
Motionless 'midst the ceaseless flow of life!
Ye bear no earthly stamp; but lift on high
Your speechless, spotless heads, snow-capt, above
All nether influence,—cleaving earth-born clouds,
That round your cold sides cling like living arms
Around a corpse, insensate to their touch.
Ye are a mystery,—and from the plain
And common of this world, sudden ye rear
Your giant forms, midst the recurring spans
Of time, fit emblems of eternity.
Since first from Zurich's hills, your image loomed,
A heaven-descended vision, on my sight,
Filling my mind with wonder—day on day
I've journeyed towards ye. At your mighty base
I've stood in awed silence, pondering
With baffled thought.—Around me darkness spreads
Its veil. But ye with beaming summits still
Glow in the sunshine. Telegraphs 'twixt worlds!
For on your tow'ring heads, the westward sun
Casts his last ray for Europe—unto me,
A golden herald from my far-off home.

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Mr. Hayward, should Mr. Keppel's translation, meet his
eye, would be amused by the coincidence, as the Editor of
this volume was on reading his,—extracted in a beautiful arti

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His aspect Angels aye rejoices,
Though none his law can see or say.
The unrevealed works and voices
Are grand as on creation's day.

Michael.
“And storms in contest wild are pouring
From land to sea, from sea to land,
cle in Frazer's Magazine, to which the editor is indebted for
all that he has seen of Mr. H's highly commended version.

In a fine critique on Faust, is Nos. 1 and 2 of the Knicker-bocker,
there are translations, whose excellence, combining
fidelity with poetic lightness and spirit, prove the writer competent
to give a poetic version of the whole of the great original.
Although it be, in strictness, true, as the writer states,
that a perfect translation of a great Poem is an impossibility;
the specimens he has given are evidence that, would he perform
this task, his production would be an acquisition to the
English language, and an honor to American literature.

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