her. He did the same with another lady, | which carried out to Spain the news of his by whom he had had a son. It may be about first queen's death contained an indirect offer a year since he gave up, so at least it is from the king to marry Katharine of Arrabelieved, his love-making, as well from fear gon, the widow of his own son Arthur. of God as from fear of scandal in this world, Queen Isabella's reply to this is dated 11th which is thought very much of here. I can of April, 1503, exactly two months after the say with truth that he esteems himself as event which made the monstrous proposal much as though he were Lord of the world. possible. We should, perhaps, expect that He loves war so much that I fear, judging it would be pretty strongly worded. It is by the provocation he receives, the peace certainly decided enough, but not in the will not last long. War is profitable to him least indignant. Though Isabella directed and to the country." her ambassador to speak of it as a thing not to be endured,' and even to be sure he put the king completely out of hope to accomplish it, we have no reason to believe that her feelings were much outraged by the suggestion. Her reason for refusing, as she herself tells her ambassador, is that it would young Prince Henry; and she adds that if prevent the marriage of Katharine with the the King of England wished another wife, she could perhaps find one for him. She accordingly suggested the young Queen Dowager of Naples already referred to. After a time that project, too, was dropped, and Henry endeavored to gain the hand of Margaret of Savoy, daughter of the Embeen twice married. Her reply was rather peror Maximilian. This lady had already curious. She had hitherto, she said, been unfortunate in husbands, and had no wish to try matrimony a third time. This project also, though spoken of more than once, never came to anything.

How many features of the Scottish character, precisely as we see it at the present day, have been noted by this shrewd observer of the fifteenth century! The extreme regard for personal character and good fame, the importance attached to the "precepts of the Church," observance of the Sunday and study of the Bible, the noble truthfulness descending even into trivial matter of fact, and the degrading prevalence of intemperance, all go to prove that Scotchmen in the days of James IV. were wonderfully like Scotchmen in the days of Queen Victoria. A few points no doubt have been altered as civilization has advanced. The Wednesday and Friday fasts have long been abandoned as superstitious; even the fasts of the Scottish Church, though formally, are not painfully observed; and we would not for the world tell our Highland friends that Gaelic is the language of sayages. But, radically, the national character is the same.

per

But the most extraordinary of the new facts brought to light by Mr. Bergenroth are undoubtedly those relating to Henry's numerous projects of marriage. It was already known that on the death of his queen, Elizabeth of York, he entertained from time to time various plans for a new alliance, and that on one occasion he sent three gentlemen to Spain with minute and by no means delicate instructions to report upon the sonal qualities of the young Queen of Naples. He commissioned them to see her if possible fasting, to smell her breath, to give a particular account of her skin, her hair, her eyebrows, teeth and lips, nose, forehead, fingers, breasts, and a great deal more besides. It would be difficult to find in the history of match-making anything more extraordinary than this; yet even this is almost equalled in indecency by Henry's other pursuits in a similar direction. The very letter

tion of the kind was that which Henry made,
But perhaps the most repulsive proposi-
on the death of Philip of Castile, for the
hand of his insane widow. He himself was
at this time laboring under the most seri-
ous illness. His life had been despaired of;
one might almost suspect his intellect had
been impaired. He could only hope to effect
such an object through the aid of Ferdinand,
and Ferdinand's interest
against it. Yet he not only made the offer,
was obviously
but made use of the poor unhappy Princess
Katharine of Arragon to negotiate it. Не
would marry her whether she were sane or
insane, and his council told the Spanish am-
bassador the English would not mind her
insanity provided she were able to bear chil-

dren!

We have by no means exhausted the points of interest in Mr. Bergenroth's volume. Henry's treatment of Katharine of Arragon is also a dark chapter in his history. But we believe we have said enough to indicate the very important nature of these researches, and to call due attention to their results. And so we take leave of Mr. Bergenroth for the present, hoping to meet him again when he has brought down his work to the days of Henry VIII. and Charles V.

i

7

From The Spectator.

THE UNDERGROUND RAILWAY.

perforated brick carry a low roof of tiles and ground plate glass, very useful for sheltering THE idea of an underground railway people against wind, but not very beautiful through London is due to the late City So-to look at. However, as the Underground licitor, Mr. Charles Pearson, who died but Railway was certainly made to be used, and recently. When the scheme was first started, not to be looked at, there is not much to be some ten or twelve years ago, it did not find said in the matter, and the visitor must many admirers, and the public was as in- check his reflections on this score. Stepcredulous about the possibility of burying a ping bravely down on the rails, the road of "line" beneath houses and shops as the cap-exploration lies for some distance among italists were unwilling to risk their money high brick walls, which gradually approach in the enterprise. However, Mr. Pearson was nearer to each other, until they end in a bellindefatigable in explaining the eminent utility mouthed arch. The yawning tunnel, black of his project, and by dint of hammering it as Erebus, is by no means inviting for lonely into the heads of men, he, of course, carried foot-passengers; but it is Hobson's choice, his object at last. Gradually, timid moneyed for no other mode of locomotion is to be had citizens came forward to invest their surplus for the present. Fortunately, after treading cash in underground shares; gradually, a some distance into the dark region, a little company was formed, a legion of lawyers blacksmith's boy offers himself and his naphfeed, and parliamentary sanction obtained tha lamp as guide, making it possible to for the new scheme; and, gradually, the proceed in the journey of inspection. What army of navvies, with their spades and bar- strikes the eye first in the long tunnel through rows, set to work digging into the London which the way now lies, is the exquisite symclay, converting the whole ground from Pad-metry of the proportions of the arch above. dington to Clerkenwell into one huge mole- The curve is perfectness itself, looking more hill. The project of the City Solicitor was as if moulded in one mass by the help of found to be of no easy execution, for the mathematical instruments, than as if put towork of the navvies was not a mere boring gether piece by piece, in single bricks. The through the ground, as in the ordinary tun-arch is of a most graceful elliptical form, sixnelling process, but a careful groping with spade and pickaxe through a maze of acqueducts, sewer-pipes, gas-tubes, and magnetic wires. More than once the water refused to give way to the light, and the light to electricity; but, ultimately, all were conquered by steam, and the iron links, which bind together nations, were safely laid down in the bowels of the metropolis. At the present moment, after more than five years' hard and uninterrupted labor, the Underground Railway is finished at last, and about to be opened to the still somewhat sceptic pub

lic.

Anything more curious and startling than a promenade along the iron highway which now lies below London, can scarcely be imagined. The road commences at the end of Farringdon Street, close to Old Smithfield market, and not far from the grim stronghold of Newgate. The entrance is formed by a temporary station, some five hundred feet long and ninety feet wide, built in the ordinary style of railway architecture, a cross between a goods-store and a greenhouse. Tall iron girders and long arches of white

teen feet and a half high from the level of the rails, and twenty-eight feet and a half wide. This great width is made necessary by the fact that the Underground Railway is to be worked by the Company of the Great Western line, the broad guage carriages of which are to carry the whole passenger traffic. There is a narrow guage between the broad lines; but the former is to be used only for the transport of goods, and for such occasional trains as the Great Northern Company may think fit to send to the city. The branch tunnel, leading up to the Great Northern station, is the first object which diverts the eye, being separated from the main tunnel by a brick wall, close to where the turbid waters of the Fleet Ditch are carried across the rails in a flat iron trough. The noise of the gushing stream is distinctly heard overhead, and, in the darkness all around, the imagination is at liberty to call up pictures of ancient London, at the time when the Fleet carried crowds of sailing vessels on its bosom, and shoals of jolly salmon in the fold of its waves. How the poor old Fleet must feel the change now, squeezed into an iron

spout, with the road above and the rail be- | harmonize with the church opposite," as the low-a true Procustes bed. clerk of the works explains. Two biggish At length we emerge from the tunnel, after kind of sentinel-boxes, covered by domes about ten minutes' walk, and arrive at the modelled after the originals of Captain Fowke, first station of the Underground Railway, R.E., start out of the ground, stuck to what that of King's Cross. It is a structure a appears to be a stable on the one side, and good deal more comely than the departure a pigeon-house on the other. Our friend, shed in Farringdon Street, consisting of two the clerk, says it is "Doric;" but it looks wide platforms on each side, covered by a Kensingtonian all over. Luckily, there is huge dome of glass of nearly a hundred feet not much light below to examine the niceties span. By laying a floor across the rails, on of the" style," and the tunnel opens its arms a level with the platform, the building might near to the platform on either side. The easily be converted into a fine ball-room, for next station, Baker Street, is close at hand. merry Underground directors and sharehold-It is a simple contrivance, without attempts ers to dance in. There is capital accomoda- at Doric, lighted by nineteenth-century chimtion for a good orchestra, on a pretty aërial ney-pots, and covered like an honest railbridge, which hangs high under the glass way-shed. The stairs leading into the outer roof, spanning the rail from side to side. world are well lined with brass, as a protecClose to the bridge the tunnel yawns again. tion against hob-nailed boots, which proves It is an exact counterpart of its brother on that the architect was a man with no nonthe other side; the same height and width sense about him. Another tunnel, rather throughout, the same beautiful elliptical arch damp, and revealing to the nose the existabove, and the same double line of broad ence of sewers somewhere near, brings us to and narrow guage rails along the ground. the penultimate station, that of EdgwareThere are the same “man-holes " too at the road. It lies in an open cutting, some five side of the tunnel: small niches cut in the hundred feet long and more than one hunsolid wall, sufficient for sheltering two per- dred feet wide, and is consequently well sons, and met with every twenty or thirty lighted and aired. There are extensive yards. The tunnel is large enough to allow" sidings" for housing locomotives and carfree passage on either side, and between the riages; the top is covered by an elliptical trains; but these "man-hole" excavations arched roof of iron and glass, as at King's are made, it seems, as extra security, or to Cross; aad the whole appearance of the staserve as a refuge in case of accident. After tion is very cheerful and pleasing. But one another six or seven minutes' walk through more tunnel beckons invitingly beyond, the dark we emerge again in the light, in a promising to carry us to the end of the iron building somewhat less lofty than King's underground highway. It is not long, and Cross, and by no means so well lighted. It one of the most interesting works of the is Gower Street station, lying below the car-whole line. The road gradually ascends unriage way of the New Road, and having no other illumination than that obtained by a number of chimney-like openings, enamelled inside with white tiles, and covered at the top with thick ground glass. On a clear day sufficient light for all ordinary purposes is obtained in this manner; but in good orthodox London weather, the chimney illumination must be largely supplemented by gas. The latter is near enough at hand, the main pipe running right across the arch, in close grip of road and rail, like the poor Fleet ditch.

Another black tunnel of four or five hundred yards, and we arrive at Portland Street Station. This is a very pretentious edifice, in the pepper-box style of architecture: "to

til it arrives at an open space, where it divides into two branches, the one leading to the Paddington station and the other to the GreatWestern Railway Hotel. The entrance to the latter is by a huge bell mouth, covered with thick elliptical wrought-iron ribs, with cross girders between them, and stout iron plating over the whole. It is one of the grandest engineering pictures which it is possible to imagine; and lit up by a profusion of gas jets, the effect is truly magical. The tunnel, from this place to Paddington station, follows the direction of the South Wharf-road, till, creeping out below the coal wharf, it emerges at last and falls into the Great Western line. There is a separate station here in course of erection; but at present it

the "King of Railways."

is difficult to determine the end of the un-long boxes, lined with vulcanized india-rubderground road and the commencement of ber, and freighted with heavy weights, which press the aëriform fluid to the burners. Into At Paddington the passenger vehicles of these boxes the gas is pumped by hydraulic the new line stand ready for their work. pressure, each carriage holding sufficient to They are really handsome carriages, im- serve for three hours. The contrast of the mensely superior to the mass of old railway splendid illumination thus obtained with the coffins on wheels, into which travellers are wretched semi-opaque condition of the old oilstowed away. There are only two classes of lamp light is something marvellous, and will carriages-both, as already mentioned, for go far, probably, to make underground travelthe broad guage. The first class is divided ling popular in London. In Belgium railway into compartments for ten persons, five on carriages have been lighted by gas for some either side; each passenger having an arm- years, and in Ireland also the system has chair of most comfortable and luxurious di- been tried, and found to answer admirably. mensions. The benches of the second-class There is no reason, therefore, why it should carriages, too, are bolstered, with cushions not be a success likewise in the bowels of at the back; but there are no divisions of the British metropolis, and throw a new seats, and the compartment holds twelve pas- light upon the subject of railway travelling. sengers. Both classes of vehicles are so With locomotives consuming their own high that the tallest life-guardsmen need not smoke, such as have been built for the new stoop while standing upright, helmet on line; with soft-cushioned seats, and plenty head; and so broad that even ladies in gar- of room to breathe and move; and with artiments of the latest Paris fashion can move ficial light, far surpassing the metropolitan along without damaging their hoops. But sunshine, the Underground Railway can what is most satisfactory is that all carriages scarcely fail to obtain a fair share of public are lighted to profusion with gas, there be- patronage. If it accomplish no other good, ing two large burners in each compartment it is likely to have the one great effect of of the first as well as the second class. The either annihilating or improving those horrigas is kept on the top of the carriages in ble sarcophagi of London called omnibuses.

Blackwood's Magazine has an article on America, in which it says:

AN Irish local paper, the Munster News, gives an account of a curious silver cross that has been

"So far, therefore, as it is a question of legal- discovered in the ruins of Quin Abbey, County ity, England would be amply justified in recog-Clare, by a herdsman of the neighborhood, while nizing the independence of the Confederate States."

On this The Press, 8 Nov., a strong Tory paper, and perhaps especially devoted to Mr. D'Israeli, thus speaks :

"The only comment we feel disposed to make on the statement, is that precedents for recognition do not necessarily prove either the justice or the wisdom of recognition. What we ought to be more careful of than anything is establishing a precedent against ourselves. It may be said, of course, that this has been done long ago, and by the acts of intervention above quoted; so that as we cannot make our own case worse, we may just as well get all the good out of the precedents that we can. Perhaps so. But the point is a very nice one; and we rather distrust that appeal to the "voice of humanity" by which one people would justify dictation to another. The voice of humanity is a singularly elastic and ubiquitous voice, and may possibly be heard next in a quarter where it will not be very welcome."

making some casual researches amongst the old stones that had fallen from the walls. This is abbot of the Franciscan order, to whom tho absupposed to have been a pectoral cross of a mitred bey, one of the oldest in Ireland, belonged. It is of silver, gilt, perfectly solid, claborately wrought for its size, and bears a figure of the crucified Saviour; the prominent features were partially worn, presumably by constant attrition. It is said to be of the fourteenth-century workmanship. From the fact of the wearing away of the features, and also of the ribbon-ring, by which it would be suspended, this relic would appear to have been in use for a considerable period, and to have been a sort of official heirloom of successive abbots. The foot-ring, from which is suspended an ornamental silver drop or tassel, is, in like manner, worn to a mere thread. Above the head of the Redeemer's figure is a small, square, silver box, embracing a precious stone of sanguine hue, and affording room for a relic; in the foot of the article was another hole, probably intended to contain a second

stone.

From The Spectator.
CHRISTOPHER NORTH.*

geniality, we might almost say joviality, which made them lords of the ascendant in IN the course of this year, the British all societies. We note in both the absence public has been asked to read the lives of of t'e sense of time and the same supreme two remarkable Scotchmen-two men of indifference to money. Both had "learned very unlike outer fortunes, to whom very love in huts where poor men lie," and were different fields of labor were assigned, who, completely elevated above the region of in certain respects, possessed very dissimi- Flunkeyism. In both there was an exhaustlar qualities and intellect, and yet in whom less fund of generosity and benevolence, and we find sundry elements of a very kindred the twain were alike unsystematic in their character-Edward Irving and John Wilson. philanthropy. Two more passionately de To begin with, both were sons of Anak, voted husbands ard fathers were not to be handsome and good looking, and charged found in Scotland; and in these two men with a quite extraordinary amount of phys- of giant mould there was the tenderness of ical activity, endurance, and strength. Wil- a woman's heart, and a vast capacity of sor son could clear the Cherwell-twenty-three row. Irving mourned all his days over the feet with a running leap, and readers of loss of his first-born. A mere boy of Irving's "life" will remember how, after a twelve, Wilson fainted at his father's grave, hard day's march, the preacher vaulted with and when, after twenty-five years of wedded amazing ease a many-barred gate. Largely love, his wife was taken from his mortal alike in their indomitable pedestrianism, sight, he fell half delirious on the floor of there was in both a very characteristic no- the room in which she had just ceased to madic or "Bohemian " tendency, the er- breathe; nor during the eighteen years he ratic impulse becoming at times, in each survived her "did mourning ever entirely case, wholly dominant, leading Irving to leave his heart." The two were orators of roam in the north of Ireland, and take the the highest order: and although Wilson, chance shelter for the night, of outhouse or mainly, we suspect, through the malign incabin, during the weeks preceding his set- fluence of Lockhart, failed wholly to appre tlement in Glasgow and ever and anon ciate Irving,—the one instance, as far as we sending Christopher North into the solitary can remember, in which his marvellous dishills and valleys of Ireland, Wales, or his cernment of contemporary genius was at passionately loved Scotland. Again, when fault, and although the men were, appar we hear of Irving saying to a friend that he ently, personally unknown to each other, would greatly relish an encounter with a yet they were fellow-workers; and, so it certain grenadier soldier, who was standing seems to us, as prophet and poet, have conncar, or of his reckless gig-driving down a ferred on their country everlasting benefits, very steep incline, scattering in dismay a and have nobly helped forward that day party of soldiers at the bottom of the de- when Scottish song and Scottish theology scent, we recognize the presence of the will work in heartfelt concord. If any of our same abounding animal vigor which on a readers suspect that we are overestimating certain occasion caused an Oxford pugilist or misestimating Irving, let them remember to exclaim that the antagonist who had ter- what Carlyle says of the "uncelebrated, highribly punished him for stopping the way souled, blooming young man ; " let them sun across a bridge, "must either be Jack Wil-der the sublime prophesyings of his earlier son or the devil," or which, to the alarm of London days from the confusions of a later his faithful Palinurus, "Billy Balmer," period, and ask themselves what he might not would indulge in a midnight boat excursion still further have accomplished, with all his on Windemere, in weather so cold, the "ici- genius, his culture, his humanity, his faith, cles hung from Wilson's beard." Fear was had he lived like Wilson in constant com equally foreign to the two; and in both, munion with Nature, and had he not, aban aboriginally, there was a superabounding doning all literary and scientific interests, become the subject of a fixed idea.

:

Christopher North. A Memoir of John Wilson, late Professor of Moral Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh. Compiled from family papers and other sources, by his daughter, Mrs. Gordon. Edinburgh: Edmonston and Douglas. 1862.

It is a somewhat curious coincidence that the biographers of these two noble-hearted men are both ladies. Of Mrs. Oliphant's