peared. The Parisian city-guards, who when the bloody orders were issued had drawn back with a shudder, now, in the current of their passion, overstept the expectations of the most inhuman officer. They threw the maimed and gory carcases naked into the Seine, and even dragged them about the highways for their amusement, with every mark of fury, amid the most brutal jests. All who escaped the royal soldiers, and imagined themselves safe at last, fell for the most part into the hands of the wandering armed citizens, whose ferocity Tavannes inflamed with a laugh of derision. "On with this work of blood-letting bravely!" he cried; "it is as healthy in August as in May!" This wild jesting in Tavannes was as much the consequence of warlike education as of a wish to serve God and the king, although, in the confession he made immediately before his death, he declared the slaughter of St. Bartholomew to be the chief event of his life, on which he grounded his assurance of forgiveness from Heaven. But every degree of private hatred now found its booty delivered into its hands, under the holiest pretences, by religious fanaticism, and the nobility themselves plundered under the protection of this blind demon. The king and his mother disdained not to receive presents of stolen property; everything had changed its name; theft became a gentler appellation for humility, and a chain of brilliants, wrenched from a dying Protestant, shone like an early earthly reward upon the warriors of God. In the palace itself, under the eyes of the king, where the most miserable criminal should find an asylum, a few fugitives owed their life with difficulty to the wilfulness and caprice of certain of their pursuers. The others, who sought shelter in the Louvre, were butchered by the sentinels at the portals of that palace; and it is even said that Charles himself shot at the miserable Huguenots from the battlements. Within an hour from

the commencement of the assassinations, blood and corpses filled ⚫ the obscurest corner in the interior of the royal buildings. The chamberlain of the Prince of Condé was not saved by the entreaties of his pupil from the daggers of the murderers; and although he was eighty years of age, he was slain, in spite of the weak hands raised imploringly up to defend him. Amid blood and despair, Gusto, of Leyran, threw himself into the chamber of the Queen of Navarre, and shielded her from the violence of four soldiers, who were pursuing him, until she effected her escape to the Duchess of Lorraine, her sister. At the door of the apartment, a nobleman was struck down; she sunk senseless into the chamber, and only awoke to wail with reviving terror over the fate into which this "bloody marriage" (bluthochzeit) was to have hurled her own husband.

Intoxicated with the fortunate consequences of this murderous night, during which it had wavered between fear and passion, the unfettered character of the king knew no hesitation more.

For

three successive days continued the slaughter; and the most perfectly concealed victim was sure to be hunted out for vengeance. And, amid all these barbarities, the monarch, with his courtiers, traversed regularly the city, and marched through a confused mass of ruins, corpses, and blood! The dead body of Coligny was drawn out at last, mangled in the most ferocious manner, and fixed upon the gallows at Montfaucon. Charles went thither to behold the shattered body of that old man, to whom, but a few days before, he had looked up with unspeakable reverence. "What a delicious smell," he jested, in imitation of Vitellius, "does the carcase of an enemy possess !"

TERENCE O'GRADY; AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

(Continued from vol. iii. p. 396.)

I WISH the good Christian people of England had a better understanding as to the real case of their Irish neighbours. They know wonderfully little of the true feelings of the people, and how thankful they would be to exchange the misery of their sinful, turbulent, lawless life, for peace, quietness, industry, and good order! I don't say that it is now the wish of their hearts, or the thought of their minds, to do so;-poor creatures! such blessings are held out to them at a distance, and are only to be reached by wading through Protestant blood: but I do say that wherever a poor Irishman is rightly taught, by the word of God, to forsake his false trust, and to follow the truth, he is the most thankful man you may meet with.

Our people are very lively; they have no notion of sitting still, plodding with their hands while their minds have nothing to occupy them; and so long as only mischief is put into their heads they will do little else. When a man comes to see how God has loved him, and to know how he may render back a service to his heavenly Master, then, to be sure, he will have enough to think about, minding his own duty and striving to do good to others; but it goes beyond my comprehension entirely when I hear English gentlemen making complaints of the savageness and wickedness of poor Irishmen, and they, all the while, fostering Maynooth itself!

"It's a true word for you, Terry!" says Father Clauncy; "sooner shall you make a drunkard sober by supplying him daily with drams, than remedy any of Ireland's evils by giving Popery more licence in the land. Tis the cruel policy of the system to hold men's eyes darkened that they may not rightly see in what vile work their hands are employed; and, as you say, they have no notion of keeping still. It is not man's nature to be idle, Terry: when God made him, upright and good, holy and happy, he

gave him a garden to dress and to keep-idleness was no part of the blessedness of Eden. To be sure, that became a toil and a trouble, and a sore hardship, after man's fall, which had contributed to his enjoyment before. The ground brought forth thorns, and briers, and poisonous weeds, where it had only yielded sweet flowers and pleasant fruit; but man must be employed. The man who feels that he has to make his calling and election sure, and to walk even as Christ walked, will find enough to do-ay! and to toil through, though he were a king; and the poorest beggar, the most ignorant child, may become a mighty engine to work mischief if he refuses to labour in the right path. Satan will be sure to find drudgery enough for him

the wrong; and he who doesn't choose to be working out his salvation, will be working out his perdition, and that of those around him."

Why, then, it's as good as a sermon what his reverence has just said; but the case of our poor countrymen is, that they are put in the wrong way, and set a-going in it before they have reason and power to judge for themselves; and the lessons they are taught are lessons of hatred and strife, until they are ripe for any violence, and commit it, too, as a religious duty so long as they see and know how entirely the priest is with them. They have a notion, taught them while young, that if they disobey the priest they disobey God; and that the Most High cannot be displeased at anything the priesthood may do. If ever a doubt crosses their minds as to the truth of their religion, they throw it all on the priest, who undertakes to stand between them and judgment in the great day; and this, too, they are encouraged to do; so everything helps to keep their minds in a false peace as to the next world, and leave them at liberty to plan and execute all manner of wickedness for the benefit of the Church—that is, of the priests, who want to rule over the land as they did in the old days.

Well, it wasn't long after my failing in the night expedition I told you of, that I had to go on a mission to a distant part of the country. It was no great matter they trusted me to do, but rather, as I thought, to keep me decently out of the way till some work was finished where I was likely to flinch again. I went, and didn't leave my Bible behind, though little enough was the benefit I got from reading it; for I went against my conscience daily, and had no lasting desire to seek the truth. One day I was loitering about the streets in a small town, watching for one of the sworn men whom I had a message to, when I passed the open door of a Protestant church, and heard some very fine music and singing within. I entered the porch to listen to it; and by degrees I got edged in, so that when the music left off, and the preacher began, I was just opposite him. Curiosity led me to stay and hear what he would talk

about, but I only remembered the text, which took a strange hold on my mind: it was, "If any man have not the spirit of Christ, he is none of His." I repeated it often to myself, after I left the church, and so got it fixed in my memory. My business being completed I went back, and gave an account of it to Father Flynn. I thought he looked more dark and threatening than usual, but nothing was said; and next Saturday I went to confession.

Now it isn't, may-be, known to all Protestants how the poor Papists look on this sacrament, as they call it: they think that to hide anything from the priest, when questioned about it, is to provoke the vengeance of God, to make the absolution of no value, and to burden their souls with mortal sin. Of course, they tell everything, whether relating to themselves or others: and whatever the priest absolves them from, they regard it all one as if it had never been committed. This is why murderers at the gallows persist in declaring they are guiltless of the crime; for why should they not, when the priest tells them his absolution has made them as clear from all sin as the babe that's not yet born?

Well, to confession I went; and Father Flynn, for the first time, questioned me very closely as to what I had been lately doing, and especially if I had been listening to any Protestant talk, or reading any of their books. At first I said "No," to both; but when he repeated the question, "You're sure you haven't listened to a heretic preacher, or Bible-man, or looked into the Bible itself?" I remembered my strolling into the church, and hearing a few sentences of the sermon, and I told him of it. You, being English, wont credit me, may-be, but the poor Romans of Ireland will know well enough the commonness of the thing, when I say the priest, in his passion, hit me a knock over the head, and the best word he spoke, out of many that I wont repeat, was, "You unlucky child of perdition!—you've taken the first step to hell." I was frightened, I own; for the power of the priest is never so great as when he sits in the confession-box. He saw it, I fancy, and went on: "You'd best make a clean breast all out, now you're at my knee, or may-be you think I don't know what's on your conscience as well as yourself does. Come, Sir, what about the Bible ?" fessed I'd look into it now and then, and that I found it to unsettle my mind. He said, "I'm not clear that your soul isn't burthened with mortal sin, for you denied the one and the other when first I questioned you." I told his reverence I did not think going in at a church door to hear music, and stopping a bit with no thought, was going to listen to Protestant teachers; and as for the Bible, I didn't regard it as their book, seeing God had given it to all men alike. At first, he seemed going to break out again, but checked himself, and said, " The book you call

So I connothing in

the Bible isn't God's word, as he gave it to the church, but Luther's forgery; and even if I was to lend you my own Bible, you couldn't understand it, seeing you are an ignorant man, and not able to comprehend the mysteries of religion, which are only revealed to the church for the instruction of the laity. We take all the trouble, and ye get the benefit, ye ungrateful rabble, with the pains we take to make you understand what is right for you to know, in the catechism and our sermons. I suspected your mind was being poisoned with falsehood, seeing how remiss you've been in your duty to God and your country. No wonder you were struck with dread, when going into danger in a cause you had betrayed. Sure enough, if you'd died in that state of disobedience, it's to hell you'd have gone at once. But now, I insist on knowing exactly what you heard from that heretic in the pulpit." I told him I did'nt remember a single word barring the text. “And what was that ?" says he. I repeated, "If a man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his." His look changed a little; he seemed half abashed, but quickly said, "It's a true word, O'Grady, though a heretic spoke it; and little proof have you of belonging to Christ, who flinch from the cause of his holy church. The only church; for where else is Christ present upon the altar? Where else have the people any opportunity of paying him worship? Where else is there power to forgive sins? Why, the Protestants don't even pretend to any of these things; but make it an accusation against us, that we have Christ among us, while they have not. Where should his spirit be, but with his body, and where is his body but in the sacrament of the altar? Sure enough, they are none of his, not having him, body or spirit, among them; and you're being drawn away into the same condemnation, you unfortunate rebel!"

His words had wonderful power over me; I couldn't then see their folly and craft, as now I do; and I smote my breast, and humbly craved forgiveness for my sin. "Well," says he, “ I'm doubtful, but I'll lean to the side of mercy; you must do penance to atone for this sin, and you must bind yourself to go no more in the hearing of false doctrines, nor to read the Bible, nor any books not sanctioned by me.” He talked much more, and filled my mind with terror as to what was likely to come on me for my disobedience; and he reserved full absolution till I should have performed my penance, which was a long pilgrimage to a distant station, and much punishment when I got there. With a heavy heart I left the place; but the more I thought about it the less satisfied I felt, as to his being able to save my soul, or condemn it. I resolved, however, to do my penance, and the first thing I set about was taking the Bible back to Phil Ryan. “Well, O'Grady," says he, "have you found what you looked for ?"

"I hadn't time for poring over a book: and what little I read did me no good, I can tell you."