longing to it was very seasick. It was about as disagreeable a scene as it could be; for Spaniards are not heroic under such a trial.

Sunrise found us, however, at anchor in the fine harbor of Mahon. The frowning forts of Spain were to our right; and on the other side of the inlet we could see the dismantled ruins of the works built up so spiritedly and with such art by our own engineers nearly one hundred and fifty years ago. A rosy sun was just peeping over the red houses of Mahon, and casting a fair welcome sheen upon the still water of the inlet, and making the rather bare, hilly boundaries of the harbor look pretty enough in the translucent air.

But a fair acquaintance with the world had taught both my friend and me to distrust the opinion held by the inhabitants of one island about the nature of an adjacent island. Such opinion is apt to be based upon prejudice, or even upon reasonable envy. No sensible person would give full credit to the judgment of an average Frenchman about Great Britain and her people; or suppose that our insular ideas of France and the French are trustworthy through and through. Besides, there were special reasons why we should feel a curiosity about Minorca. Had we not, in the Palma Museum of the Lonja, seen a great escutcheon in stone of the lion and the unicorn lolling against a wall with cobwebs about it; and had we not been told that the monument was a relic from Minorca a reminiscence of the days of the last century when the British made themselves very much at home in the little island? Majorca is a very lovely land, full of flowers, and with a nook of mountains where the scenery is so alluring and grand that it would be hard to match anywhere. But Majorca has been Spanish ever since its conquest from the Moors in 1225. It has never, like Minorca, had the Unionjack flying gaily from its forts during dries up and cracks, as if it besought the spring and autumnal equinoctials. the obdurate heavens to pity its agony of thirst.

There was every promise of a fine day, a mercy to be grateful for in the Balearics in spring, when a good deal of rain is wont to fall. Summer here is generally as dry as a bone. The hot, plain country of Majorca is then, in spite of its vineyards and olive woods, a profoundly disagreeable place of sojourn. The dust and glare of the long white roads are very conducive to ophthalmia. They are bad enough in spring, but summer much intensifies the badness. Each brook bed then

And so we resisted our friends' counsel, and one afternoon went aboard the The diligences of the interior are steamship City of Mahon, bound for vile instruments of torture at any time. Port Mahon. It was a breezy April Even in the coupé, where you do get day, and the white horses were running plenty of air, you are half choked by at a great pace outside Palma's bay. the cloud of dust in the midst of which Our passage was not a pleasant one. the three or four little long-tailed horses The boat had a fiendish kind of roll in jog along with a well-assumed air of the open sea. Moreover, the deck was resignation. Those who are used to populous with a crowd of little boys the land find support in the bad cigars and girls a juvenile theatrical troupe, of Spain and the thimblefuls of brandy engaged to perform twice or thrice in which it is the fashion to drink in the Minorca before returning to Spain. different villages by the way. But to They were attended by half-a-dozen an unbroken foreigner, these are addiolder folk, including the 66 prima tional sources of irritation, not springs donna," a languishing beauty, whose of consolation. pallor was soon emphatic enough to show through her painted blushes in a very sad way. And save the fat manager of the troupe, I believe in half an hour every man, woman, and child be

Late in the day we found ourselves in the diligence from Mahon to Ciudadela, with a blue sky over us, and a very endurable amount of dust in our midst, arising from our horses' feet.

In Minorca, by the way, they have a plastered walls, Spanish as well as

wicked habit of cropping their horses' tails poodle-wise, which much detracts from the dignity of the noble animals.

British. Of the latter, some are as modern as you please, for the Mediterranean squadron often comes to an anchor in Port Mahon and gives the jack-tars a day on shore.

Unless the Duke of Newcastle's ghost revisits the earth to afford us information, I am afraid we are unlikely to know the truth about the tragedy of

relieve the siege of Port Mahon, and so we lost the island. But it is by no means certain that he deserved blame for the failure. Be that as it may, he died like a gentleman.

We had in the mean time spent several hours among the ruins of the British forts at the head of the harbor, and reflected about Admiral Byng. It seems clear that in our day we did not seize upon the right positions for fortification. Out of question, Spain has | Admiral Byng. He certainly failed to shown wisdom in concentrating her powers upon the other side of the inlet. It is a torpedo-shaped headland, all but an island, elevated, and with precipitous red rocks as a seaward boundary. From this elevation, the Spanish engineers look down upon the remains of our Forts Marlborough, St. Philip, and the suburb of George Town across the water. Their guns have a very formidable air, and the acres of red-roofed ammunition stores, barracks, and other buildings on the heights, are sufficiently impressive.

Our hopes of a closer inspection of the Mola, as this great fortified post is called, were signally defeated. Though I bore a letter to the chief officer of the place, he could not act as he would like to have acted. A government pinnace was offered us, that we might sail round the cape. But as for getting within the walls, that was impossible. The war minister had issued an express prohibition, and not to oblige a crowned head would my friend have run counter to it.

We rambled from one heap of rubbish to another, and marked where the French cannon-shot had harmed us most. Flowers were blooming heartily among the ruins, and bees buzzed about

"What satisfaction," he asked, "cau I receive from the liberty to crawl a few years longer on the earth with the infamous load of a pardon on my back? I despise life upon such terms, aud would rather have them take it. I am conscious of no crimes, and am particularly happy in not dying the mean, despicable, ignominious wretch my enemies would have had the world believe me."

When the news reached him of his suspension, he stripped off his uniform and threw it into the sea. This was at Gibraltar. He was executed at Spithead, on the Monarch, on the 14th March, 1757. A cushion was set for him to kneel upon in the forecastle of the ship though he protested he was entitled to die on the quarter-deckand at the dropping of his handkerchief five of the six marines who had been told off for the hateful task shot into his body. The sixth missed his aim.

"There lies the bravest and best officer of the navy," exclaimed a common sailor, when he fell dead.

It is hard to read Byng's last words without feeling some emotion. If he was merely a State tool, to be discarded and broken when done with, then the statesmen who sacrificed him had much to answer for. In any case, none but a man of sterling worth could have expressed himself as follows at such a time: "Would to Heaven I had died discharging my duty in the day of bat tle; then would my name have been

》:

transmitted, with my father's, to posterity with honor, which now will be remembered with indignation, a reproach to my relations, a disgrace to the marine, and a scandal to my country."

When we had ridden the whole length of the island and viewed it from an eminence in the middle, we reluctantly came to the conclusion that Minorca is rather a dull and not at all a beautiful country. Save its harbor of Mahon, it has little to recommend it to the world at large. The winds are so strong over it, and the surface is so flat, that nowhere are there trees of any size. For the most part in the interior, where barley is not grown, a low scrub covers the land; though in places there are the beginnings of little artificial copses of pines which may in time get the better of their enemy, the storms.

to the common traveller they repay investigation less than one has a right to expect, seeing how their fame has been noised abroad. They are not nearly so attractive as the nuraghe, or round towers, of Sardinia, with which they may have an affinity. They are harder to discover, and as spectacles they are trivial. But there is no doubting their antiquity. Even the nuraghe must yield them the precedence for their roughness of architecture and crudity of design.

A talayot is merely an irregular round or polygonal heap of rocks, with or without a central chamber, the rock masses at the base being of course the largest. There is little attempt at masonry in them. The limestone lumps have been dug out of the adjacent soil, and piled one upon the other until the edifice is of the desired height They are of various average being about fifteen yards in diameter and about six in elevation. Where internal chambers exist, they are generally approached by a hole that is little better than a burrow, slightly below the surface of the soil. Here, too, the workmanship is much more primitive than that of the nuraghe, which are not only built of stones very fairly dressed, but which further have in some instances spiral inner staircases as well as a lofty domed chamber of considerable strength.

Who shall say, with assurance, whether the builders of the talayots and the builders of the nuraghe were

A capital road runs through the island magnitude. and from north to south. General dimensions, the Wade started it; but since our day Spain has much improved on it, and now it would gladden even the critical soul of a bicyclist. The Minorquins meander up and down it on a very respectable species of ass, and in a mood that makes them ready to stop and gossip with any one who addresses them with a commonplace civility. There are several bright little villages in the interior. Alayor is the chief, with a big church and a sheaf of windmills conspicuous over its white-faced houses. Also, there is Mercadel; and close behind Mercadel is the famous peak called Monte Toro- or the Bull contemporaries? It is not improbable, Mountain - upon which, several cen- even though the latter seem to belong turies ago, the Virgin is said to have to a more cultivated age. Both may be appeared one day, in consequence of the handiwork of men of Phoenician which the place was made the site of a origin, or of the primitive population church and monastery. whom the Carthaginians displaced. In the neighborhood of certain of the talayots one sees clear traces of an arrangement of monoliths in the form of colonnades, porticos, and chambers open to the air. This is notably so with what is termed the Hostal group by Ciudadela, the old capital of the island, at the north-west corner of it. Some of these monoliths are recumbent, having evidently been overturned by

From Mercadel, which is as nearly as possible in the middle of the island, a good road trends west to the clean little village of San Cristobal. Here we pic nicked agreeably with a native to whom we had been recommended, and paid respectful visits to sundry talayots of the vicinity.

Antiquaries and archæologists would delight in the talayots of Minorca. But

1

force; but it is easy to give order to staple manufactures in Mahon as in
the others, in spite of the jungle of Majorca. The cobbler looks up from
flowers, bramble, and rye-grass which his work for a moment at the sound of
envelops them. Very interesting and a strange step on the very rough stones
suggestive here is the rude highway which pave the streets; but he has not
through the brake of vegetation still enough curiosity in him to follow the
indicated by the monoliths. A brace wayfarer with his eyes for more than a
of stones, each about five feet and a moment. Another industry merits no-
half in height, stand like gate-posts tice: this is the arrangement of shells
in front of the entrance chamber of and seaweed in fancy forms, such as
one of the talayots; and at the base ships, boxes, bouquets, and the like.
of one of these monoliths my friend It would seem a species of labor likely
and I discovered, deep embedded, a to be better rewarded at Ramsgate or
basin of stone for all the world like a Ilfracombe than in Mahon. There is,
piscina, about a foot in diameter. We however, a certain demand for these
hit upon it by chance. What purpose pretty trifles from the British sailors
it may have served, we could not of when the fleet calls here.
course tell.

When we had been four days in The talayots apart, there is not much Minorca, we felt that we knew the to say about Minorca. The town of island as well almost as the oldest inMahon is humdrum and rather preten- habitant. It is but twenty-eight miles tious. Its four-storied red houses seem long by about ten broad, and easy of to date from the same epoch which saw access everywhere. Word was then the rise of the Bloomsbury district of brought us of a steamer likely to set off London. I dare say the same architects, for Palma on the fifth day. Without or their pupils, had a hand in both delay, we offered ourselves as passenachievements. The town deserves some gers; and so duly the shores of the praise for its hotels, in which you may little island receded from us as the live satisfactorily for about four shil-grey mountains of Majorca grew clearer. lings a day. This includes wine and There was a lusty gale again, and a sea also certain of those nice little biscuits in which we tossed somewhat rudely. which in Spain are known generically But eight hours sufficed to carry us as "Minorquin pastry." No doubt, across the strait, and enabled us to set thanks to the tradition of British occu-foot once more on the much livelier pation at least we will take leave to strand of Palma.

fancy so - cleanliness is in much es-
teem here.

The entire population of Minorca is only about thirty-five thousand, whereas Boots and shoes appear to be the Palma alone has nearly twice as many.

DR. JOHNSON'S LAST PRAYER. A few | ration available to the confirmation of my days before his death, previous to receiving faith, the establishment of my hope, and the Holy Sacrament, Dr. Johnson com- the enlargement of my charity; and make posed and fervently uttered this prayer: Almighty and most merciful Father, I am now, as to human eyes it seems, about to commemorate for the last time the death of thy Son Jesus Christ, our Saviour and Redeemer. Grant, O Lord, that my whole hope and confidence may be in his merits and thy mercy; enforce and accept my imperfect repentance; make this commemo

the death of thy Son Jesus Christ effectual to my redemption. Have mercy upon me, and pardon the multitude of my offences. Bless my friends; have mercy upon all men. Support me by thy Holy Spirit, in the days of weakness, and at the hour of death; and receive me, at my death, to everlasting happiness, for the sake of Jesus Christ, Amen."

I. THE RELIGION OF LETTERS, 1750-1850, . Blackwood's Magazine,
II. THE FETISH-Mountain of KroBO. By

Hesketh J. Bell,

III. A TALE OF TWO STUDIOS,

IV. THE LIVES AND LOVES OF NORTH
AMERICAN BIRDS. By John Worth,

V. THE WANDERINGS OF THE NORTH
POLE. By Robert S. Ball,

VI. DISCIPLINE. By Roy Tellet,

Macmillan's Magazine,
Blackwood's Magazine,

Nineteenth Century, .

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