COWARD'S Life, a, Two Episodes in. 232 | Numidian, The Manette Andrey; or, Life During the Reign of Terror, 11, 137, 266, 399, 525, 652, 779 Man, The, with no Voice, 164, 357, 422, 496, 611, 672 For EIGHT DOLLARS remitted directly to the Publishers, the LIVING AGE will be punctually forwarded for a year, free of postage. Remittances should be made by bank draft or check, or by post-office money-order, if possible. If neither of these can be procured, the money should be sent in a registered letter. All postmasters are obliged to register letters when requested to do so. Drafts, checks, and money-orders should be made payable to the order of LITTELL & Co. Single copies of the LIVING AGE, 18 cents. I SCATTERED my rhymes on the barren HENCE Thrasybulus' eagle-swoop struck ground, Nought was its barrenness to me; Or cast them adrift on the vagrant winds, And the stormy billows of the sea. I never cared, or sought to know, Whether like fruitful seeds they grew, Whether they perished as soon as born, Or faded away like the morning dew; Whether men heeded them or despised; For the light must shine, the lark must sing, And the rose unfold its blushing buds To the warm embraces of the spring. And yet, though careless as the flowers That shed their odors on the air, I dreamed a dream that grew to a hope, Some of my fancies, robed in rhyme, To strengthen the weak, console the poor, To cheer the brave in their conquering Upcoils full wearily its snowy crest, down The traitorous Thirty. Let me muse awhile, Where yon lone castle guards the dark defile, From age to age, with dread majestic frown; Yon crags are clasped with more than Nature's crown; Stern Fate hath doomed that immemorial pile; But, for the patriot hero, History's smile Shall spurn the assailant years, that wreck THE BLIND SUMMIT. [A Viennese gentleman, who had climbed the Hoch-König without a guide, was found dead, in a sitting posture, near the summit, upon which he had written, "It is cold, and clouds shut out the view."- Vide the Daily News of September 10th, 1891.] So mounts the child of ages of desire, Man, up the steeps of Thought; and would behold Yet purer peaks, touched with unearthlier fire, In sudden vision virginally new ; But on the lone last height he sighs: ""Tis cold, And clouds shut out the view." Ah, doom of mortals! Vexed with phantoms old, Old phantoms that waylay us and pursue, Weary of dreams, fold True; we think to see un Of after-brooding, not of Passion, slave !- The eternal landscape of the Real and Spectator. And on our Pisgah can but write: ""Tis cold, And clouds shut out the view." JOHN HOGBEN. Spectator. WILLIAM WATSON. From The Nineteenth Century. THE QUEEN AND HER FIRST PRIME MINISTER. WHEN from the vantage-ground of far-distant centuries men come to look back upon the history of the British Empire, probably no figure will surpass in brilliancy and interest that of Queen Victoria. In order to form a just idea of the strong relief in which the queen will stand out from her predecessors, it is necessary to imagine Elizabeth known to us by the light of her own utterances and those of her contemporaries; for it is thus that the queen is revealed to the readers of her journals, her correspondence, and the memoirs of those who have been privileged to observe closely the higher political movement of her reign. The life of the queen has been laid open to the eyes of all who care to look. It is pure and honest and simple beyond the lives of most women, and harmonizes with the fancies upon which idealists have loved to dwell. Emotional, with full play of the higher feelings, tempered by caution and sound reason, the queen has reigned over half a century without making a personal enemy, without creating a political foe. It is a famous record; for the negative virtues are the rarest of all in monarchs. No act of cruelty sullies the rule of Queen Victoria, and, so far as her subjects can judge of her, she has been unjust to none of them. This alone, apart from the lofty moral atmosphere in which she has always moved, is higher praise than any of her ancestors can boast. It was "in a palace in a garden, meet scene for youth, and innocence,' as one in later years to be her minister has said, that she received the news of her accession to a throne overlooking "every sea and nation in every zone. There are but few who would deny that in its sequel her reign has proved worthy of its opening. Seldom has a woman been called upon to play a more difficult part than the young girl, hardly eighteen years old, who in June, 1837, stood with bare feet, and in her night-dress, receiving the homage of the lords who had come to announce to her that she was queen of England. The scene has been admirably described. William the Fourth was dead. The Archbishop of Canterbury and Lord Conyngham were despatched to inform the Princess Victoria of the fact. It was a warm night in June. The princess was sleeping in her mother's room, her custom from childhood, and had to be summoned out of her sleep. The messengers awaited her in the long, unlofty room, separated only by folding-doors from that which was inhabited by the Duchess of Kent and her daughter. The young girl entered alone, in her night-dress, with some loose wrap thrown hastily about her. The moment she was addressed as "Your Majesty " she put out her hand, intimating that the lords who addressed her were to kiss it, and thereby do homage. Her schooling and her instincts were admirable from the first. Self-possession combined with perfect modesty came naturally to her. A few hours later, at eleven o'clock in the morning, the child-queen met her Council. In the corridor at Windsor there is a picture which commemorates the event. Never, it has been said by an eye-witness, was anything like the first impression she produced, or the chorus of praise and admiration which was raised about her manner and behavior, certainly not without justice. Her extreme youth and inexperience, and the ignorance of the world concerning her―for she had lived in complete seclusion-excited interest and curiosity. Asked whether she would enter the room accompanied by the great officers of state, she said she would come in alone. Accordingly, when all the lords of the Privy Council were assembled, the folding-doors were thrown open, and the queen entered, quite plainly dressed and in mourning, and took her seat for the first time, a young girl among a crowd of men, including all the most famous and powerful of her subjects. She bowed, and read her speech, handed to her by the prime minister, Lord Melbourne, in a clear and firm voice, and then took the oath |