chief officers of state. On the death of modern times in the Pope of Rome. The a minister she either goes herself to con- sacredness of his person throws a religious dole with the widow, or sends one of the halo around every action of his life. His three junior wives of the first rank to rep-meals are so arranged as to symbolize sacresent her. She exercises jurisdiction over rificial feasts. When he partakes of vege the imperial concubines, and examines with tables he is invited to reflect on the work care the work done by them in the year. of the Chinese Adam; and when he tastes On all state occasions, when the Empress the six kinds of grains his thoughts are is unable to be present, the three senior carried back to the first turner of the sod. wives act as her deputies, and on her de- Soft music is played to encourage his ap cease they play the part of chief mourners. petite, and the dishes are removed from To the lot of the wives of the second rank table to the tune of fifes and drums. The falls the duty of instructing the nine maxim that "the king can do no wrong," troops, into which the twenty-seven wives takes rather the form in China of "whate of the third rank, and the eighty-one con-ever the king does is holy, righteous, and cubines are divided, in the virtues, lan- pure," and hence many of the imperial doguage, deportment, and work which are ings, which would be frowned at in Europe, fitting for them. They attend on the Em-receive in China the sacred sanction of press at all state funerals, and add loud religion. To this circumstance we owe it wailings to her lamentations. They su- that in the "Rituals" we find so many deperintend the female servants of the pal-tails of the private life of the Emperor ace, and they prepare the objects to be of- and of the ladies of the palace. We learn fered at the great sacrifices. In each and that in every fifteen days the Emperor all of these various services the concubines receives visits from representatives of each play inferior parts. Their special duty is rank of wife and concubine. On each of to assist the wives of the third rank in the first nine days of the month one of managing the servants and in preparing nine concubines selected from the eightyfor the religious services. Some of them one pay their respects to him; on the next also help the thirty-two eunuch tailors to three succeeding days three of the wives make the clothes of the court, and others of the third rank have that honour; then find employment in similar company as follows one of the second rank; then one dressers to the Empress and junior wives. of each of the two superior grades; and These and the numerous other duties ex- at every full moon the Empress, and she pected of them are quite enough, if faith- alone, is his companion. During the last fully performed, to keep the hundred and half of the month the order of visits is twenty-one pairs of little hands busily en-reversed, and in this way, in the course of gaged. The "Rituals" declare that there shall be no drones within the palace, and let us hope that her Majesty Ah-lu-te and her hundred and twenty rivals, who are now assembling round the boy-Emperor, will prove themselves as diligent as are said to have been the model ladies of days gone by. about four months, the Emperor enjoys the If we wander from the ladies' apart ments into the other quarters of the palace we find them swarming with those officials whose various callings and immense numbers go far to make up the barbaric splen dour of eastern courts, - marshals, chamIf to the performance of his public func-berlains, and lords-in-waiting are there in tions we add the duty of his becoming ac- shoals, but we do not concern ourselves quainted with all these fair daughters of with those great gentlemen. Our object Hau, it is plainly impossible that the Emperor can pass his days in idleness; and down to the minutest detail the "Rituals prescribe the part he is to play in all and every capacity, whether as king upon his throne, as priest before the altar, or as paterfamilias in the midst of his domestic joys. And this illustrates the peculiar position which the Emperor of China occupies among the monarchs of the East. As a temporal sovereign he is obeyed, and as a spiritual ruler he is worshipped. In his double claim to supremacy he somewhat resembles the kings of Hebrew history, and finds his approximate counterpart in is to gain some insight into the every-day are making hashes of the various sacri- | favour of heaven for their Imperial Majesficial meats; the cellarmen are pouring ties and the Empire at large. out the allotted quantity of half-a-dozen different kinds of wine; skilful hands are slicing the meats for the savoury dishes, and are weighing out the hundred and twenty kinds of spices which are to season them; while others are preparing delicate morsels, such as the choice parts of a sucking-pig or the fat of kidneys, to serve as a bonne bouche at the last. When all the covers have been duly laid out and prepared, they are carried into the kitchen, where 128 cooks stand ready to receive them. On fast-days-that is to say, when any great misfortune overtakes the country the Emperor goes without this grand repast; and if he and his Court were to take a little more exercise and to fast a little oftener than they do, it is possible that a reduction might be made in the staff of fifty-two doctors who at present reside within the palace walls. But, unfortunately, the idea of bodily exertion is abhorrent to the mind of every true Chinaman; the three score and two imperial huntsmen must often have cause to complain that 66 ROBERT K. DOUGLAS. From The Saturday Review. FORCE IN LITERATURE. A CURIOUS paper might be written on the singular errors made by men of high reputation in their critical judgments. Something of the kind was lately done in one of the magazines. Instances of such blunders abound since people first began to cultivate the art. When, for example, we read the critical sentences of the last century we are amazed at the inconceivable blindness which they seem to imply. Goldsmith, to take a case at random, was undoubtedly a man of fine taste; he tells us, à propos of Waller's ode on the death of Cromwell, that our poetry was not then quite harmonized; so that this, which would now be looked upon as a slovenly sort of versification, was in the times in which it was written almost a prodigy of harmony." In the same place, after praising the harmony of the Rape of the Lock, he observes that the irregular measure at Their hawks are tired of perch and hood the opening of the Allegro and Penseroso Their weary greyhounds loath their food, "hurts our English ear." We can only -unless, indeed, they cater for the market wonder at the singular taste which inon their own account, a supposition to duced our grandfathers to fancy that which the occasional activity observable in "harmony," of all things, was their strong the neighbourhood of the royal preserves point, and that Pope's mechanical monotolends some colour-for hunting, which, ny was to the exquisite versification of before the Tartar habits of the founders of Spenser and Milton as Greek sculpture to the dynasty had been subdued by contact the work of some self-taught mediaval with Chinese luxury, was the constant carver. The same incapacity for perceivamusement of the Emperors and their ing what to us appear almost self-evident Courts, has now, under the degenerate truths is as obvious in a wider kind of rule of their descendants, dwindled down criticism. When Voltaire called Shaketo a very occasional battue, conducted in speare a drunken savage," it was a mere the most contemptibly luxurious and un-outbreak of spleen; but Voltaire in his sportsmanlike manner. But though the sober moods, and he is followed in this by huntsmen of modern times have little to Horace Walpole, speaks still more condo, we can well imagine that all those temptuously of one of the two or three whose duty it is to pamper the appetite are men who can be put beside Shakespeare. fully employed. There can be little doubt He marvels at the dulness of people who that the hands of the hundred wine-mak- can admire anything so "stupidly extrav ers, the ninety turtle-catchers, the ninety-agant and barbarous as the Divina Comthree icemen, the cighty-nine fishermen, media. These monstrous misunderstandthe eleven jewellers, and others, are seldom ings are to be explained by the natural idle. It is also worthy of remark that, incapacity of the subjects of one literary amid all the vast population assembled dynasty for judging of those of another. within the palace walls, we find no refer- But the judgments of contemporaries on ence to a single priest of any sect or de- each other are not much more trustworthy. nomination, the Emperor himself excepted, The long-continued contempt for Bunyan and four praying women seem to be deem- and Defoe was merely an expression of ed amply sufficient to gain forgiveness for the ordinary feeling of the cultivated classthe sins of the Court, and to secure the les towards anything which was identified with Grub Street; but it is curious to ob- the principle of the conservation of forces, Thus the quality which chiefly serves to distinguish talent from genius is origin ality. The man who produces a new idea capable of germinating in the minds of his readers is so far a greater man than he who is merely the channel for transmitting ideas already expressed by some original thinker. This is the one great quality which distinguishes the few leaders of the world from the great mass of dealers in second-hand opinion; and it is due simply to an excess of power. Anybody can fol low a beaten track, but to strike out a path for yourself involves an amount both of intellectual and moral force which falls only to the select few. Wherever it is found, we may say that its possessor is by birthright one of the immortals, though circumIf criticism should ever rise to the dig- stances may stifle his powers of utterance; nity of science, such mistakes will be im- and every one knows what a strange inpossible. We shall discover some infalli-fluence he possesses even when his remarks, ble gauge of literary merit, which will im- though original, have been anticipated by 'mediately detect lurking genius in the some one else. A man who speaks from most improbable disguises. One of the his own mind is so far a new force, and axioms that will lie at the foundation of therefore affects us in a manner essentially the future science will probably be ex- different from the ordinary writer, who can pressed in some such formula as this, that be considered merely as the surface upo the one real virtue is force, though it may which external forces have impinged, in appear in many manifestations. Mr. Her- order to rebound. Within the same class, bert Spencer maintains that the laws of again, it is easy to accept the theory that every phenomenon throughout the uni- the merit of a writer is proportional to his verse, including all spiritual and intellect- vigour. The difficulty begins when we enual as well as physical phenomena, may deavour to compare writings differing be ultimately stated as corollaries from in species as well as in merit. There are the primary laws of force. By applying some writings in which force shows self, as it were, naked, and is obviously the secret of the influence which they exert over us. Such, for example, is that masculine and nervous prose of which we have so many masters in English literature, and which sometimes looks so easy when it is really so difficult. The clear compressed reasoning of Hobbes, the manly common sense of Locke, the incomparable energy of Swift, and the comparatively coarse dogmatizing of Cobbett have all a kind of family, or rather national, likeness; and, fortunately, we are not without some modern examples of the same style. Lovers of a more florid rhetoric are apt to despise h the simple downright vernacular of the writers we have named, and even to fancy that it must be easy to express such plain thoughts in plain words. Nothing can in fact be further from the truth; because the quality which makes such writing possible is just that intensity of mind which belongs only to powerful natures. The direct expression of the thoughts of a feeble person is simply insipid. On the other hand, the gorgeous rhetoric of Burke or Milton or Jeremy Taylor is also good so far as it is a symptom of force taking a different direction. The energy which in one case displays itself by a strong grasp of a few leading principles displays itself in the other by overlaying them with a vast variety of illustrations and applications. The same amount of intellectual power may be displayed in Swift's attack upon Wood's copper coinage, and in Burke's on a regicide peace. Swift's power appears in the kind of bulldog tenacity with which he throttles his antagonists; and Burke's in the versatility with which he perplexes them by every conceivable mode of assault. To decide which is the greater, we must wait for that new calculus of the future which will enable us to estimate the total expenditure of force in either case. Hasty critics, as a ter el form balance. The very greatest men, the Dantes, Shakespeares, or Goethes, are men of thoroughly healthy and equable development. But the second-rate men, the Popes or Shelleys, are apt to be morbid because some of their talents are developed at the expense of the rest. Pope, for example, had, as Atterbury said, a mens curva in corpore curvo. But his greatness was owing, not to the distortion, but to the marvellous quickness and keenness, of his intellect. He abounds in the most brilliant flashes of thought, but is unable to maintain a steady pressure. He is a poet therefore by fits and starts, and has composed innumerable couplets of wonderful merit, but scarcely one satisfactory poem. He is an example therefore of intermittent power; which is to the sustained power of healthier writers what a series of explosions by gunpowder is to the continuous expansion of steam. So Byron said of himself that he was like a tiger who would make but one spring, and if he failed went grumbling back to his den. The force is the same in all cases, but it may vary indefinitély in its mode of action. The morbid poets have an extraordinary sensitiveness to certain emotions and perceptions; and sensitiveness of all kinds is a symptom of an active intellect and of strength of feeling. The man who can perceive the most delicate variations of colour or temperature is not in ordinary parlance so strong as the man who can raise a hundredweight with his little finger. But he has a finer touch, a more delicate instrument in his physical organization. The value of his work will depend, not upon the degree of his perceptive faculty, but upon the strength of his feelings and his power of expressing them. The fineness of his organs determines what kind of materials he is to use; but the merit of the work depends entirely upon the vigour with which he turns them esrule, happen to find one variety of expres- to account. sion more congenial to them than the other, and fail to observe that it is a question, not of the essential power, but of the mode of application. In some cases a concentration, and in others a diffusion, of force may be most appropriate; and it is a great, though a very common, mistake to apply the same measure to all. There is another variety of literature in which the principle does not seem to apply at first sight. Many of our poets, for example, appear to owe their success to a weakness rather than to strength. The more accurate statement, however, would appear to be that great strength of any one faculty is apt to throw a man off his The man of very delicate sensibility produces, it may be, a rarer variety of work; his fabrics are spun of gossamer instead of cotton; but though more interesting to the connoisseur, they do not possess more intrinsic excellence than those of the man of coarser organization but equal intellectual and emotional vigour. Shelley's poetry is more exquisite than Byron's, but it is not therefore more admirable. Critics of young authors should therefore judge the performances of the novices by the energy they display. What is called good taste is generally a very questionable symptom in a young man; for it is too often symptomatic of a docility resulting from deficient vigour. The advice to a cision should be performed; and a superyouth to cut out his finest passages was fluity of energy, whatever faults it may all very well with a view to the propitiation produce at starting, is the best of all symp of ordinary critics and as a way of recom- toms. Unluckily faults of taste do not almending vigorous self-discipline. But it is ways or generally proceed from an excess, infinitely more important that there should and may easily arise from a deficiency, of be something to cut out than that the ex-vigour. L SUPPOSED DISCOVERY OF THE QUEEN OF SHE-into deep water in the direction of Madeira BA'S PALACE. M. Mauch, an African traveller, Favourable weather prevailing after leaving thus writes: "I believe that I have found Lisbon, a few hauls were made with the dredge the real Ophir, in lat. 20 deg. 15 min. S., long. which were attended with fair results. On the 26 deg. 30 min. E., and I think I possess proofs finest day a common fishing trawl was lowered of the fact. The ruins which have been so often to the bottom, a depth of three-quarters of a spoken about are composed of two masses of mile, with the greatest success, for on its being edifice, in a tolerably good state of preservation. hauled again to the surface not only did it conThe first is on a mountain of granite; and, tain in great abundance beautiful specimens of amongst other constructions, is to be remarked corals and sponges, but several deep-sea fish one which is an imitation of the Temple of Sol- were found. These latter arrived at the surface omon, being fortress and sanctuary at the same nearly dead, the expansion of the air in their time, the walls of which are built in wrought bodies on being relieved from the pressure of granite, without mortar, and still being more the water at such depths proving sufficient to than 30 ft. high. Beams of cedar served as tear them open. By the experiments already ceiling to the narrow and covered galleries. No made on board the Challenger it is considered inscription exists, but only some special designs to be placed beyond doubt that similar captures of ornamentation which announce a great anti- can be made from the greatest depths, but the quity. The whole western part of the mountain consequences to the fish captured must alway is covered with blocks of great size, which seem prove an insurmountable obstacle to any idea of to indicate terraces. The second mass of ruins acclimatization which might be entertained. is situated to the south of the mountain, from The utmost care has been and will continue to which it is separated by a low valley; it retains be taken in preserving specimens of these newlya well-preserved circular form, with walls con- discovered animals. The Challenger may be structed as a labyrinth, also without mortar; a expected to arrive at Madeira from Gibraltar on tower still exists, 30 ft. high, 17 ft. in diameter the 30th inst. at the base, and 9 ft. at the top. The circular edifice is accompanied by a large number of others situated in the front, and which doubtless served as the habitation of the Queen of Sheba's suite. I have drawn, not without difficulty, a general sketch and a plan of this palace. I was confirmed by the natives themselves in the idea that these ruins date from the Queen's time. Forty years since sacrifices were still offered up on the mountain. The natives still call the circular building the House of the Great Princess.' DEEP-SEA EXPLORATION. - Her Majesty's surveying ship Challenger arrived at Gibraltar from Lisbon on the 18th ult. It is stated that deep soundings which have been taken show that a gentle slope extends from the Lisbon shore AKAZGA, THE AFRICAN ORDEAL POISON. -A French chemist has made some experiments with the poison akazga-received from West Africa in bundles of long, slender, crooked stems, and used there as an ordeal — and finds it to resemble nux vomics in its physiological effects. He has separated from it a new crystalline alkaloid, closely resembling strychnia, but differing from it in being precipitated by alka line bicarbonates. A suspected wizard is made to drink an infusion of the bark, and then to walk over small sticks of the plant; if guilty, he stumbles, and tries to step over the sticks as if they were logs, finally falling in convulsions, when he is beaten to death by clubs; if innocent, the kidneys act freely, and the poison is supposed to be thus eliminated. S & PA M |