From The Examiner.

The Letters of Horace Walpole, Earl of
Orford. Edited by Peter Cunningham.
Now first chronologically arranged. In
eight volumes. Vol. I. Bentley.

justice to think and say you possess in a great degree; but it has been mixed with what I dare say you can't help, and never meant offence by, but still what I am not obliged to bear, such a confidence and preTHE first volume of this, which is unques- sumption of some kind of superiority, that, tionably to become the Standard Library that head, it has been very unpleasant. my sentiments not tallying with yours upon Edition of Horace Walpole's Letters, does You have assumed to yourself a pre-eminot provide us with much new matter to nence, from an imaginary disparity between discuss, though what little there is is very us in point of abilities and character, that, interesting, and may be taken as a foretaste although you are a very great man, I canof the novelty to come. Here we are among not submit to; and you have crowned the the early letters. Mr. Cunningham, after a have not mistaken you; therefore, since the whole with this most evident proof that I short preface of his own, gives all the pre-conditions of your friendship and kindness faces by former editors of Walpole, then are such that I must be subject to direct Walpole's "Short Notes" of his Life, his injuries, such as this cruel wrong done me Memoir respecting places under Government, now, or those kinds of hurts that a man and the Reminiscences. The Letters then feels most when they have the face of kindbegin, and are throughout illustrated withness, I must be excused, if I beg it of you the best notes of all the previous editors as a favor, never to be kind to me again. carefully examined and corrected, and with very many notes by Mr. Cunningham himself. To each note the name of its author is appended. Of the new matter in this volume the best will be found in three letters pertaining to a quarrel between Horace and his brother Edward, on the Castle Rising election, in 1745. Castle Rising was a family-borough. General Churchill's death caused a vacancy, and Horace interested himself actively in the return of John Rigby -who was in fact returned-as his successor. Sir Edward, beginning with "Sir" a letter to his brother-who was by ten years his junior-expressed wrath at this interference, and after laying down family law, said:

"How you came never to think of me, who stand so directly before you, or, if you did think of me, how you happened to imagine that I was not to be consulted in an affair of this consequence, where birth and seniority give me so just and natural a pretension, I cannot conceive. It is so contemptuous and arrogant a treatment, that it is not easily to be forgotten; for to be sensible yourself how very desirable a thing it is, either in a private view in regard to a friend, or in the eye of the world, in respect to oneself, and to think that I either did not desire it, or did not know its advantages, is to despise me beyond measure. But your conduct to me has always been of the same kind, and has made it the most painful thing in the world to me to have any commerce with you. You have, I must confess, showed a great disposition to me and to my children at all times, which is agreeable to the good nature that I shall ever do you the

"I am your humble Servant,
"ED. WALPOLE."

Horace, as many men do when they feel affronted, cleared his mind by passing it through a retort, and in this process he thus decomposed the offensive letter, sentence by sentence:

"Brother, I am sorry you won't let me say, Dear Brother, but till you have still farther proved how impossible it is for you to have any affection for me, I will never begin my letters as you do- Sir.'

Before I enter upon your letter, I must be so impertinent even as to give my elder brother advice, and that is, the next letter you write, to consider whether the person it is addressed to, has any dependence upon you, or which I am sure your heart will tell you I have not any obligation to you. If they have neither, they may happen to laugh at your style.

"Castle Rising is a Family-Borough. This is your first proposition, but not very definite. It is a borough in our family, but I never heard that it was parliamentarily entailed upon every branch of our family. If it was, how came Mr. Churchill to be always chosen there? However, before I ever undertake any thing again, I will certainly examine our genealogical table, and be sure that Lord Walpole, yourself, and all our eleven first cousins, have no mind to the same thing.

"How you came never to think of me. For your sake I won't answer this.

"Or how you happened to imagine I was not to be consulted. I will ask you another question, how you happen to imagine it was

necessary for me to consult you? Have you jealousy. I'll tell you, brother, the only ever given me any encouragement to consult superiority I ever pretended over you, was you in any thing? How must I consult you? in my temper." By letter? You never would see me either at your own house or here! The authority you affect over me is ridiculous; and for consulting you, good God! do you think you ever judge so dispassionately, as that any man living would consult you?

"A confidence and presumption of some kind of superiority. This I must answer a little fuller as being the only thing in your letter which you have not confuted yourself. I won't appeal to everybody that has ever seen me with you, but to yourself. Lay your hand on your heart, and say, if I have not all my lifetime to this very instant, treated you with a respect, a deference, an awe, a submission beyond what, I say to my shame, I ever showed my father; and you ought to be ashamed, too, who made it necessary for his peace and for my' own, that I should treat you so; I never disputed your opinion, I never gave you my own till you had yours: this was confidence and presumption!

"You have assumed to yourself a preeminence, from an imaginary disparity between us in point of abilities and character. Who told you so? not your eyes but your

Towards the close of this letter Horace speaks of his brother's jealousy, and other illustrations writes:

per, there remained to Horace only the good- | of friendship and equality; but I don't mind nature with which it was put quietly aside. your anger, which can only hurt yourself, Immediately afterwards he wrote this, when you come to reflect with what strange which was the answer actually sent to his passion you have treated me, who have albrother, and of the same date with the ways loved you, have always tried to please you, have always spoken of you with regard, and who will yet be, if you will let me, "Your affectionate brother and humble servant, "HOR. WALPOLE.”

affront:

"Dear Brother,-You have used me very ill without any provocation or any pretence. I have always made it my study to deserve your friendship, as you yourself own, and by a submission which I did not owe you For consulting you in what you had nothing to do, I certainly did not, nor ever will, while you profess so much aversion for me. I am still ready to live with you upon any terms

All this is full of life, and we have reason to believe that in forthcoming volumes the new letters will be not only far more numerous but even more distinctly illustrative of good points in their writer's character.

verse of the distinguished Russian engineer officer, Gen. Tottleben :

ISTHMUS OF SUEZ CANAL.-Nothing decisive has yet been done in regard to the projected Suez ship canal. The English government is I ken'd him weel. The chiel was born in Fife, charged with being hostile to the enterprise The bairn of Andrew Drummond and his wife; from selfish considerations, while Lord Strat-Sae restless, that the neebors ca'd him, when ford, the English Minister at Constantinople, is A bairnie, "toddle-butt and toddle-ben;" said to exert his utmost influence over the Sultan Because, instead of biding by his mither, to obstruct and defeat the project. The canal He roam'd the house, frae ae room to anither. would open an easy and rapid communication When he grew up, his uncle (wha was rich, between France and British India, and serve to Frae being gairdner to The Czarovitch), extend French influence over an important part Got him to Russia, where part of the name, of the world, from which it is now nearly excluded. Should direct colonization extend from He took discreetly; so that he was then Jocosely gi'en him when he was at hame, Algeria down to Egypt, an event by no means Known by na ither name than "Toddleben." improbable, and should Egypt itself come under Atweel! consider'd gleg beyont his years, direct control, another event not impossible, and He was pit in their schule of engineers, very likely not beyond serious contemplation, Rose to be captain, and, when war brak out, and then the future battle-fields of France and Obleeg'd to choose 'tween duty and the knout, England might be removed from Europe to He went to the Crimea. There, if ta'en, India, and the unequalled navy of England be By his auld name he might be ken'd again; required in the Indian ocean to defend the Sae, from the woodie to preserve his throttle, English possessions in India and Australia, and He chang'd the spelling "Toddle" into thus France and the rest of Europe be delivered "Tottle." from the reign of terror created by the presence Thus Scottish Andrew passes, amang men, of such a resistless force. It is now believed by The great Russian Gen'ral Tottleben.'"' many that the projected Railroad from the Mediterranean to the Euphrates is the veriest sham, got up only to divert capital from the Canal, and thus to defeat it; and that no more will be heard of the Railroad when no more is heard of the Canal. Thus British selfishness plays the intriguer and the hypocrite, accusing the United States when it annexes territory by fair and honorable purchase, and at the same time annexing entire kingdoms to English domain without compensation, without a solid reason, and without a blush; jealously watching every, movement in the United States tending to open a free communication by railway or canal across the Isthmus of Panama, and plotting with equal cunning and unscrupulousness to defeat the joining of the Mediterranean and Red Sea for the benefit of the world. - Letter to Journ. of Com., dated Beirut, 8 Dec.

GEN. TOTTLEBEN.-A correspondent of the Montreal Gazette gives the following history in

For

GRINCHUCKLE.

Montreal, December 12, 1856.

THE COUNTRY OF ILL-WILL-Reminding one, as the name does, of some land in a fairy tale where ogres prowled about on the frontier, and giants sate in the capital, it is, nevertheless, the by-name of a district hard by St. Arnaud, in the north of France. There tenants, when ejected by a landlord, or when they have ended their tenancy on uncomfortable terms, have been in the habit of spoiling the crop to come by vindictively sowing tares and other coarse strangling weeds among the wheat,-from whence has been derived the sinister name in question. This Christian practice, says a report in the Constitutionnel, was only made penal a few weeks ago, when it was laid down as the law that any man proved to have tampered with any other man's harvest was to be dealt with as a criminal.—Athenæum.

From The Athenæum.

Monarchs retired from Business. By Dr.
Doran. 2 vols. Bentley.

commence with an account of the way in which kings came to wear crowns.

"Nimrod was abroad one day in the HAPPY as a king! Among popular delu- fields, following his vocation of the chase. sions, which so common as the delusion Happening to look up, he beheld in the respecting the happiness of kings and heavens a figure which resembled that subqueens? Once upon a time, to be as drunk sequently so familiar to man-the figure of as a lord expressed the popular notion of a crown. The mighty hunter summoned to human felicity; but, since uncrowned kings who resided in the vicinity, and pointing his side the most skilful craftsman in gold, have become common as blackberries, and out to him the still glittering shape in the attempts at assassination have ceased to be a sky, asked if he could fashion a headpiece nine days' wonder, street boys and girls, of like that visibly intended for Nimrod by all ages, have adopted the more violent and Heaven, whence the pattern had expressly ridiculous sentiment. Readers of a higher come. The artist answered confidently in grade-accustomed to hear of dynasties the affirmative, sketched the model, and, in going the round of Europe hat in hand a short time, produced a radiant crown, have, perhaps, learnt to estimate regal station at a more moderate figure. If they have not, we advise them forthwith to read and learn. Who would care to say with the Roman, Crown me to-day-kill me to-morrow? Who would care to be a ruler whose love for his people was tempered by the daily fear of a stiletto or a pistol? Who would care to live, or have his son live, the life of a Pretender-that insufferable exile, which has no country and no career?

which the King forever wore, and at which his subjects could seldom look without peril of being blinded by its dazzling glory. This is, perhaps, the first suggestion on record of the right divine fof monarchs; and it is not impossible that from Nimrod is derived the grand syllable here discussed. That potentate was styled the mighty ing,' is thus supposed to typify that regal hunter; and Kenaz, which implies huntgovernment to which people of old were subjected by their rulers."

This crown-of which Dr. Doran really ought to have given us the benefit of an engraving-was, we assume, extremely primitive in shape. The progress of the crown from being a mere circlet of gold to its present form may be told in a few words:

On some such text as this Dr. Doran sat down to preach a long, eccentric, humorous discourse; and he achieved his task in his peculiar manner,-the substance of his sermon being eminently sound and respectable. But, as usual with this lively writer, the "There is no mention in Scripture of a decorations and additions form the real royal crown, as a kingly possession, till the charm of his talk. As with poets who time when the Amalekites are described as write poetry-and not poems-the manner bringing Saul's crown to David. The first is more attractive than the matter. In the Roman who wore a crown was Tarquin, B.C. one case we read for the metaphors, the 616. It was at first a mere fillet, then a turns of thought, the flowers of language; garland, subsequently stuffs adorned with in the other, for the whim, the anecdote, pearls. Alfred is said to have been the first the repartee. Dr. Doran has now conquered authority, A.D. 872. English king who wore this symbol of Athelstan (A.D. 929) his place in literature and marked the wore a modern earl's coronet. In 1053, boundaries of his empire. He is the King Gos- Pope Damasius II. introduced the Papal sip of Letters; and he rules, with pleasant cap. Thirteen years later, William the and hearty waggery, over the world of Anec- Conqueror added a coronet with points to his dote. Sterne is not more whimsical, Scaliger with a crown till the era of John XIX. ducal cap. The Papal cap was not encircled not more rich, Diderot not more widely read. He has picked up more trifles than Auto- VIII. added a second crown. (1276). Nineteen years afterwards Boniface Benedict XII. lycus. His wallet would supply a host of completed the tiara, or triple crown, about writers with apt quotations. If Magliabec- the year 1334. In 1386, Richard II. pawned chi had married Mrs. Nickleby, Dr. Doran his crown and regalia to the City of London would have been their offspring. for £2,000. The crosses on the crown of England were introduced by Richard III., 1483. The arches date from Henry VII. (1485). The sceptre has undergone as many Originally it was a

But why keep the reader waiting for the literary pleasantries set before them in "Monarchs retired from business"? We changes as the crown.

We are tempted-Mrs. Nickleby-wise-to pass from this historical illustration to a pretty story of a king,-the authority for which, we dare say, is that unfound volume of "Mémoires Historiques on which "St. Leon," "Zanoni," and many other veracious histories are based.—

staff, intended for the support of the monarch; they who shortened it sometimes turned it into a club, to lay prostrate their people." From a page of gossip on the royal-and editorial-style, we extract the following: "With respect to the style and title of Kings, it may be here stated that the royal We'represents, or was supposed originally "There is a story told of an anonymous to represent, the source of the national King, the moral of which may be well appower, glory, and intellect, in the august plied by all sovereigns. The old monarch, power of the Sovereign. Le Roi le veut' when dying, called his son to him, put in -the King will have it so-sounded as arro- his hand the sceptre, and then asked him if gantly as it was meant to sound in the royal he could take advice as easily as he had Norman mouth. It is a mere form, now taken from his father the symbol of authorthat royalty in England has been relieved of ity. The young heir, grasping the sceptre responsibility. In haughtiness of expression tightly, and hinting at the excellence of it was matched by the old French formula brevity in counsel as well as in wit, said, at the end of a decree: For such is our good under the circumstances, he could.'pleasure. The royal subscription in Spain, will be brief as my breath,' answered the abYo, el Re,' I, the King, has a thundering dicating monarch, and that is short enough. sort of echo about it too. The only gallant You look upon the world, boy, as a house expression to be found in royal addresses was of pleasure; now, hear better from me. made by the Kings of France, that is, by the Woe, my lad, tumbles in pailfulls, and good married Kings. Thus, when the French luck is only distilled in drops.'-The son monarch summoned a Council to meet upon looked down at his now silent sire, and affairs of importance, and desired to have found he was dead. The new King comaround him the princes of the blood and the manded a splendid funeral, and arranged a wiser nobility of the realm, His Majesty grand hunting party for the day after. He invariably commenced his address with the laughed at the paternal simile, and, to words, Having previously consulted on this publish its weakness and his own felicity, he matter with the Queen,' etc. It is very caused to be placed above his palace a large probable, almost certain, that the King had silver-toned bell: a rope passed from it to done nothing of the sort; but the assurance each room which he occupied. I will ring that he had seemed to give a certain sort of it,' said he, whenever I feel thoroughly dignity to the consort in the eyes of the happy. I have no doubt that I shall weary grandees and the people at large. my own arm and deafen my people's ears." Michel de Marolles was proud of this display -For a whole month the bell was silent. of gallantry on the part of the Kings of I have had my hand on the rope,' said the France. 6 According to my thinking, says King, fifty times, but I felt that I was the garrulous old Abbé of Villeloin, this is hardly happy enough to proclaim it to my a matter highly worthy of notice, although people; but we have got over our first diffifew persons have condescended to make culties, and to-morrow' On the morrow, remarks thereon down to this present time.' as he was boasting of the fidelity and friendIt may here be added, with respect to Eng- ship of one of his Ministers, he learned that lish Kings, that the first 'King's speech' his friend and servant was in the habit of ever delivered was by Henry I., in 1107. betraying the contents of his private disExactly a century later, King John first patches to a neighboring potentate, from assumed the royal We'; it had never whom the traitor received stars and crosses before been employed in England. The same in return. The King sighed, We shall not monarch has the credit of having been the toll the bell, then, to-day; but assuredly tofirst English King who claimed for England morrow.'-In the morning he rode over to the sovereignty of the seas. 'Grace and the house of the mistress of his heart. my Liege were the ordinary titles by which There,' he remarked to himself, as he went our Henry IV. was addressed. Excellent along in that pace which used to be observed Grace' was given to Henry VI., who was by the pilgrims to Canterbury, and which in not the one, nor yet had the other. Edward England has taken its name from the first IV. was Most High and Mighty Prince.' two syllables of that city's name,' there I Henry VII. was the first English Highness.' have never found disappointment.' What Henry VIII. was the first complimented by he did find he never told; but on his return the title of Majesty'; and James I. pre- to the palace, when his groom of the chamfixed to the last title 'Sacred and Most Ex-bers looked interrogatively between him and cellent."" the bell-rope, the monarch simply twisted

DCLXVII.

LIVING AGE. VOL. XVI. 40

Old