Louisa, I think the gentleman would like a fowl-oh yes, a fowl and some soup." " Pepper pot, anything in the world, madam." The old lady went to the opposite side of the hall, where another door opened into a back piazza, and, by some enchantment of corn or eloquence, enticed and caught a cock that had taken shelter there from the rain. This she began twirling round and round by the neck, standing all the while with her back towards me, and singing the "Blue bells of Scotland," to drown the cries of the dying chanticleer. Miss had been commissioned, I suppose, to create a diversion of my eyes and ears from the ceremony of this murder, for she placed herself between me and her mother, and offered me an old volume of Roderick Random, in which she called my attention to the plates.

After waiting the proper time, the soup entered between the sable paws of little Kitty, oozing through the cracks of a white slop basin, all the rest of the dinner-set being in requisition for the rain. It was as black as ink, as black as Kitty, and tasted of nothing but pepper and water. I was obliged to decline it, which I was loth to do, for fear of offending my hostess, and because I expected to see nothing else but poor Alectryon, who I knew must be as tough as a halter from age. He followed of course, boiled as black as the soup, of which I am afraid he had been the basis, the sole material, and I should have had a banyan day but for half a dozen eggs that Miss Louisa had the humanity to offer me, and a slice of Dutch cheese as hard as Pharoah's heart.'-pp. 247-252.

We have already given our author's description of a negro-house and its furniture. The following extract pourtrays a mansion of the best class in the island, and presents also a picture of the every day life of those who inhabit it.

'The house stands on an elevation, perhaps a hundred and fifty feet above the sea, backed by everlasting woods and wildernesses, commanding a most enchanting view of the two harbours of Port Antonio, part of the town, Titchfield, and a grand expanse of ocean to the north. The mansion consists of an entrance-hall, with sleeping chambers on each side; and this hall leads to a piazza about fifty or sixty feet long, which forms the northern façade of the house. At one end of the piazza is likewise a chamber, and at the other end a dining apartment or hall, where we are accustomed to take our meals. The piazza is about fifteen feet wide, furnished with a few chairs made of cherry-tree wood, a spyglass, a backgammon board, and chessmen. The furniture of the diningroom is much of the same character, except a set of tables, a sideboard, and a dozen of chairs, all of mahogany, and the entrance-hall contains a couple of sofas. The sleeping-rooms are furnished in the same simple manner; a bedstead, with a mattrass and a pair of sheets, covered solely with a lawn net to keep off the musquitos, a chest of drawers, and two or three chairs, form the contents of each apartment. There is a narrow piazza on the south side of the house, too hot to inhabit an hour after sun-rise, and the offices are all detached. Nature here requires but shelter from the sun and rain. In many houses the rooms are not ceiled, and all is on the ground-floor, which is generally built, as in this case, on stone buttresses.

'After a breakfast of strong coffee, having a rank taste of oil from being

too new, roasted plantains, and excellent cocos, lubricated with salt butter, my old friend takes a ride to inspect his negroes at work, or to hear the news at the Bay, as the town is called. He indulges in a nap (a siesta) sometimes from one to two, and promenades or plays a game of chess in the piazza till three, when dinner is announced; and then andther promenade or ride till dusk fills up our day. He goes to bed at eight o'clock, and rises at five. One day is much like another, except varied by the appearance of an occasional visitor, who generally stayed the night. In bad weather, we read plays, novels, and newspapers, play at piquet or backgammon, ogle every sail through the telescope, and the old gentleman smokes a segar at dusk, as he says, to drive away the musquitos. We are waited on by a black butler and two footmen, who wear each a shirt and white trowsers, with a short blue jacket. The sable females, who make the beds and polish the floors, are often clad in gayer and more expensive apparel, very neat and clean, but none of the servants, male or female, know the pleasures of shoes or stockings. At night the females retire to their own houses or to those of their parents, no accommodations being thought of for servants; the men seek the abode of their wives, and the waiting-boys lie on the floor in the hall, or at their master's doors.' pp. 314-317...

Mr. Williams has not favoured us with any statistical details, and says scarcely any thing of the present state of the plantations. In the early part of his book he promised some observations on the natural capabilities of Jamaica, but he seems never to have thought further on the subject. Three or four lithographic prints, intended we presume as illustrations, are scattered through the volume. They are among the most wretched specimens of that art which we have seen since its invention.

ART. IX. Secret Memoirs of the Royal Family of France, during the Revolution; with original and authentic Anecdotes of contemporary Sovereigns, and distinguished Persons of that eventful period, now ・first published from the journal, letters, and conversations of the Princess Lamballe. By a Lady of Rank, in the confidential service of that unfortunate Princess. In 2 vols. 8vo. 258. London. Treuttel and Wurtz. 1826.

THIS is unquestionably one of the most affecting and most valuable contributions to the history of the French revolution, which we have yet seen. In point of interest and copiousness of detail it is, we think, superior to the memoirs of Madame Campan; it corrects several of her statements, and supplies many curious and important facts with which even that faithful attendant was wholly unacquainted. It is occupied chiefly in the personal history of Marie Antoinette, and proves beyond all doubt that that unfortunate queen exercised a much more active and disastrous influence on the events which ultimately led to the downfall of her throne, than impartial historians, at least, could have been hitherto induced to

believe. Throughout the journal of the Princess Lamballe, though it glows with constant and warm affection for her illustrious mis tress, and holds her up to the admiration of posterity as the most injured and irreproachable woman that ever wore a crown, there is quite enough to show that when she found the storm approaching she took the helm into her own hands, and, by her determination to keep the vessel in its former course, urged it upon those breakers by which it was at last overwhelmed. The king was, from habit, and from the weakness of his capacity, so much under the control of his consort, that though he made concessions at different stages of the revolution, without her consent, it was easy to see, that for that very reason they were not so be depended upon.. She maintained, to the time of her death, the true Austrian pride of dominion, and amongst her confidential friends never exhibited the least disposition to accommodate the interests of the throne to the just wants and rights of the people. Every measure to which she may have acceded, which had any tendency in that direction, appears to have been nothing more than an expedient, for the purpose of averting the dangers that impended over her family; but in secret she clung to every hold that might enable her, at a more favourable opportunity, to recover to its utmost extent the ancient, absolute authority, so dear to her own recollections, and so essential to her wishes for the future splendour of her son.

"Oh, sire!" she exclaimed to the king, when a riotous mob was shouting to him at Versailles to return to Paris.-" Oh, sire! why am I not animated with the courage of Maria Theresa? Let me go, with my children, to the national assembly, as she did to the Hungarian senate, with my imperial brother, Joseph, in her arms, and Leopold in her womb, when Charles the Seventh of Bavaria had deprived her of all her German dominions, and she had already written to the Duchess of Lorraine to prepare her an asylum, not knowing where she should be delivered of the precious charge she was then bearing! But I, like the mother of the Gracchi, like Cornelia, more esteemed for my birth than for my marriage, am the wife of the king of France, and I see we shall be murdered in our beds for the want of our exertions!"'

What a beautiful spirit of disdain flashes through this majestic reproach! It pourtrays, within a small compass, the character of Marie Antoinette, and betrays that fatal adherence to the pride of birth, and to habits of supremacy, which no mifortunes could eradicate from her bosom. Yet was she too much of a woman to assume the vigour and steadiness which her secret course of policy. demanded. She had none of those high and overpowering talents, which would have been necessary to carry her victorious through such a crisis as that by which she was destroyed. She was too conscientious to incur even the imputation of crime; her religious, as well as her natural feelings, forbade her to be sanguinary; the empire of her personal fascination once departed, the sceptre fell. from her hand, and she remained an anxious, agitated wife, an

agonized parent, catching at every resource that was offered her without looking to consequences, listening to every counsel that held out a glimpse of safety, without being able to contemplate the real perils that were before her, or to provide adequately against them. Many circumstances conspired to bring about the French revolution; but it is only necessary to read the journal of the Princess Lamballe, in order to be convinced, that if Marie Antoinette had not been the queen of Louis XVI. there would have been no Philippe Egalité, no guillotine, no republic.

We own that we were not prepared for the enlarged and-we may add-statesmanlike views, which characterize not only the journal itself, but the comments and additions of the Lady of rank' to whom we are indebted for this valuable publication. The princess, who was the daughter of Prince Carignan, was appointed superintendent of Marie Antoinette's household soon after she became queen of France, and from that time to the period of her death she continued, with some few intervals of absence, in daily, and, during the alarms of the revolution, in almost hourly attendance upon her royal mistress. They lived together upon terms of the most tender friendship, a circumstance that reflects the highest honour upon both parties; the princess, who appears to have been endowed with a sound judgment, with talents of a superior order, and with one of the purest and noblest hearts that ever animated a woman, obtained a marked influence over the queen from the very origin of their connection. But until the worst of times, Lamballe was a favourite of the people, because it was known that she was no mere courtier who flattered the credulous ear of royalty, but always gave her advice for the public good, and had firmness and dignity of character, which conspired with her high birth and virtuous manners to elevate her motives beyond the reach of suspicion.

The account given of herself by the fair editor (Madame Solalle) is extraordinary, if notindeed romantic. She informs us, rather mysriously, that' from her birth and those who were the cause of it (had it not been, from political motives, kept from her knowledge), in point of interest, she ought to have been very independent,' and that she was indebted for her resources in early life to his grace the late Duke of Norfolk, and Lady Mary Duncan.' She was placed for her education in a convent at Paris, where her musical talents accidentally attracted the attention of the Princess Lamballe, who took her under her patronage. The young protegée was found skilled in the Italian, German, French, and English languages, the latter being her native tongue, and during the progress of the revolution she was employed on several confidential missions. Her sex afforded her many facilities for the execution of those missions; but when occasion rendered it necessary, she did not hesitate to assume male attire; and she seems, from some motive or another, to have had a particular preference for the costume of a

drummer. In such a disguise she sometimes attended the debates of the national assembly, and took notes of them for the information of the royal family. Sometimes she wandered as a forlorn lover in the gardens of the Tuilleries, with a book in her hand, waiting for a signal from Lamballe's window to enter the palace and prepare for a secret service; often she appeared there with all the paraphernalia of a milliner; and it is a remarkable proof of her talent for intrigue-if indeed her missions do not deserve a higher and more meritorious character-that notwithstanding the vigilance of the police, and the more jealous espionage of the jacobins, she was never discovered or impeded in any of her numerous journeys. Much of the correspondence which Marie Antoinette carried on with her relatives in Austria, Piedmont, and Italy, and with her friends in England, was entrusted to the young Englishwoman, who seems to have loved that ill-starred sovereign almost to idolatry. The journal now before us she says she received from the Princess Lamballe, shortly before the death of that amiable person in 1792; and though the assertion comes to us without the sanction of the editor's name, yet it is impossible, from the whole tenor of the work, to feel the least doubt as to its authenticity. She was induced to prepare it for publication upon perusing Madame Campan's Memoirs, which she considers as in many respects inaccurate and defective, though not intentionally so, as she nowhere questions that lady's fidelity in the relation of events which came under her special observation. As to the facts added by the editor to Lamballe's journal, they seem to have been carefully collected from the conversations of that princess, and from other equally satisfactory sources of information.

The reader is aware that the marriage of Marie Antoinette to the Dauphin of France arose entirely from political motives. It was the object of the empress mother, Maria Theresa, to ally herself with France, for the purpose of inducing Louis XV. to assist her in recovering the provinces which the king of Prussia had violently wrested from her ancient dominions; and at the same time to support her against the rising power of the North, vested as it then was in the daring hands of Catharine the Second. The dauphin was never even thought of; the beauty of Marie Antoinette was intended to influence the king, and the plan was warmly supported by Choiseul, then minister, and by Madame de Pompadour. It was however looked upon with great jealousy by the king's daughters, by the court, the cabinet, and the nation at large; and that jealousy rather increased than diminished, after the accession of the dauphiness to the throne. Her education had been limited; she was free and lively in her manners, and, like most German princesses of her time, was extremely fond of private theatricals, in which she frequently performed, and which became the source of much calumny against her. Her predilection for simplicity in her attire, and her hostility to the pompous decorum