measureless moral advantage which repeated success confers-an advantage that went far to counterweigh the mediocrity of Villeroy and Tallard. They issued from the fortresses and ports of France, a well-trained, perfectly accoutred host, the several arms of service duly proportioned, and ample provision made for siege or entrenchment. The troops of their ally, the Elector of Bavaria, were officered by skilful Frenchmen, and perfectly obedient to a common purpose. On the other hand, Marlborough was the first Englishman who had ever held supreme command in a continental war; his own troops were newly raised; and the Austrian and Dutch contingents had repeatedly suffered defeat at the hands of France. He was generalissimo in little more than name. The Dutch and German generals were vain and obstinate. The States of Holland, besides, sent into the field with their troops certain deputies, for the most part civilians, without whose consent nothing was to be undertaken. These functionaries, with the timidity natural to a com French lines were unbroken; and it was known that Louis meditated a combination of his forces in the south of Germany, between the Danube and the Inn. Marlborough saw that to prevent this combination being effected, was essential to the safety of Austria; and he resolved to avail himself of the fears of the Emperor for the purpose of executing a counter conception. He arranged with Prince Eugene the plan of a campaign, which would draw both commanders from their respective fields of operation, and would therefore leave exposed the extremities of the field of war; but which offered a chance of finishing the contest at a blow. He dared not reveal this scheme in its entirety either to the Government at home or to his allies, the Dutch. With much difficulty, however, he procured permission to carry a portion of the army to the Moselle, leaving the Dutch general Overkirk in occupation of the Netherlands. The Elector of Bavaria was the ally of France, but Baden and the other German states were with the coalition. On the 10th of June, at Mondelsheim, on the Neckar, Marl-mercial people, were indifferent to borough met with Eugene. In a few days, the allied army crossed the Rhine, to the astonishment and perplexity of the French. On the 27th, Marlborough and the Margrave of Baden came up with the enemy at Donawert, on the banks of the Danube. The Gallo-Bavarians were rapidly converting the heights of Schellenberg into an impregnable camp. The Margrave would have delayed, but the English general was peremptory: the next morning he led an attack in person, and before night the bloody battle of Schellenberg had been fought and won. On the 11th of August following, he fought and conquered at Blenheim. It is this campaign on which rests the basis of Marlborough's fame; and in which we may, therefore, expect to find, if any where, his resemblance to Wellington. Both had to oppose to an enemy possessing the prestige of invincibility, and armed with all the resources of an empire, an inferior and heterogeneous force, without the reputation of valour, and very defectively furnished with the implements of war. The armies of Louis XIV., though no longer commanded by the genius of Turenne or Condé, yet enjoyed that everything but the safety of their frontier. They therefore vetoed every movement which would derange the line of defence they had drawn, and would permit neither the invasion of France on the one hand nor of Bavaria on the other. And when the fears and interests of the deputies had been overcome by personal remonstrance at the Hague, Marlborough had yet to conquer the impracticability of the generals. Repeatedly he lost the opportunity of battle for which he panted, by the failure of the Dutch contingent to arrive in time; and, on one occasion, they exposed him to a general defeat by moving too soon. He was compelled to leave the experienced and chivalrous Eugene on the Rhine, because the Margrave of Baden, as his senior officer, insisted on leading the advance, and even himself to take alternate days of command with that pompous and obstinate old German. In his siege operations, the tools sent from home or from the arsenals of Holland, broke in the hands of the soldiers; and the magazines he had established with infinite labour, were destroyed or given up by his own allies. That he surmounted all these difficulties is greatly to his honour. But as much greater is the honour of Wellington, as his difficul- of the enemy, was denounced as incaties were greater than those of Marl- pacity; his recall was petitioned for by borough-as Napoleon was greater the Corporation of London; and when than Louis, and Soult than Tallard-as he issued from his lines to give battle, the Spaniards were more impracticable he was stigmatized as rash and overthan the Dutch. Marlborough's forces confident. To both, however, success were numerically inferior to those of was counted as virtue. The victor of France, but by many degrees superior, Blenheim was hailed in Vienna as the in proportion, to those of Wellesley, at deliverer of the empire, and in London any period of the Peninsula war. Sir as the pride of England. Addison was Arthur, it will be remembered, landed employed to sing his praise; the thanks in Portugal with but 15,000 English to of Parliament and the Manor of Woodoppose to Junot's 70,000. The 10,000 stock were voted him; long the faPortuguese added to his ranks by Beres-vourite of his Sovereign, he was now ford, had first to be trained; and the also the idol of the people. The reSpaniards, commanded by their own wards of Wellington are not even yet generals, worse than useless them- complete. selves, could not be got to act with the Portuguese. Marlborough had the heart of Europe in which to operate, and, for the most part, a friendly country-Wellington was confined to a narrow country, fully occupied by a victorious host. Marlborough had means at his command to feed and clothe his army in a style that astonished their continental comradesWellington's legions marched almost barefoot, in tattered coats, with pinched bellies; while the people for whom they fought were clothed, armed, and enriched from the English treasury. Marlborough's contingents at least stood fire, when once posted-Wellington could rely upon his Spaniards neither to stand nor charge. Marlborough, in short, worsted, by judgment, boldness, and perseverance, the first military power of his dayWellington, by native genius, heroic daring, and indomitable constancy, withstood till he had destroyed the greatest military power the world has ever seen. In their temporary subjection to misjudgment, there is a further comparison between these two illustrious men. When Marlborough transferred his army from the Netherlands to Germany, ill-omened predictions prevailed in London. He had rushed like a madman, it was said, to the distant banks of the Danube, and would never return to give an account of his lost army. When he was manoeuvring in deference to his allies, he was timidly avoiding battle-when he was known to intend the invasion of France, his capture was foretold as a certainty. So, it will be remembered, Wellington's wonderful self-control in the presence In the after-part of their respective careers, great is the happiness and glory enjoyed by Wellington over Marlborough. Both were closely concerned in the political as well as military events of their day. Marlborough, like Wellington, was a leader of the Tory party; and both became estranged from the ultra section of that party. But political names do not stand for the same things in the time of Victoria, as in the reign of Anne; and, happily, the methods of political warfare are vastly improved. On the war in which Marlborough was engaged, the succession to the British crown depended. If, therefore, he seemed either idle or rash, the Whigs charged him with unfaithfulness to the Protestant cause; when victorious, the Tories broke from him, because he had gratified the Whigs. With each campaign the breach widened; and when Mrs. Masham supplanted the Duchess of Marlborough in the Queen's affections, the Duke was subjected to intolerable annoyance, threatened with prosecution on charges which, if true, were not criminal, and dismissed from his command at the hour of final victory. Blenheim Palace was ordered to be erected at the public expense; but the workmen's wages were withheld, that they might sue the Duke. The severest satirists and the lowest buffoons of the day were employed to libel and ridicule him. His appropriation of certain revenues was connived at, if not approved, till his ruin was necessary to save France from destruction, and our ministers from the punishment of traitors. So there was a time when Wellington was regarded as an upholder of despotism on the Continent, and of every abuse at home; and another time when the madness of party coupled his name with the designs of treason. But, happily, he lived to be respected by all parties, at once for his fidelity to conviction and his openness to the instruction of events; and, with every year of his life of peace, fresh honours have been added to his name. Not altogether, however, in the improved spirit of the times, must we seek for the cause of this contrast, but in the character of the men. To all, substantial justice is meted out by history; and while that arbiter of reputations has acquitted Marlborough of the crimes alleged against the soldier, it has confirmed the ill-reputation of the man. "His renown," says Macauley, "is strangely made up of glory and infamy." We have already remarked the baseness of his origin. He owed all to the Duke of York and James II. | At twenty-five years of age, he was a Lieut.-General, a Privy Councillor, a member of the peerage, a well-paid courtier, and an old diplomatist. He was one of the first to join in the invitation to the Prince of Orange; yet he professed unabated attachment to James, had a high command in the army which set out to oppose William, and on the very eve of his desertion renewed his allegiance and urged the King to fight. He took with him in his flight the King's nephew and several of the principal officers, while his lady carried off the Princess Anne and George of Denmark. The virtual betrayer of one master, he was notoriously unfaithful to the next. Though raised by William to the rank of an earl, and entrusted with the command of his armies, he entered into correspondence with James, and engaged to lead over the troops with whom he was sent to Flanders as soon as his plans should be matured. As William sat more firmly on his throne than was expected, those plans never were matured, and the crime of overt treason was not added to that of ungrateful and treacherous desertion. These faults were not forgotten when the motive for their repetition had passed away. There was probably as much of selfreproach as of self-control in the serenity which Marlborough evinced under the alternate distrust of both parties in the state; nor could he fail to see in the undeserved calamities of his latter days, the providential retribution of his earlier sins. And though the peculations of which he was impeached, were probably justified by precedent, and exaggerated in amount, the man who began life by purchasing an annuity with the gift of a mistress, who wrangled with government about the payment of £9,000 to the builders of his mansion, and died worth more than £100,000 per annum, cannot be acquitted of an ignoble passion for money. It would be injustice to a memory thus heavily weighted with honour and dishonour, and to the times in which he was so conspicuous and influential an actor, not to close this brief and imperfect parallel-to which only the pen of Plutarch would be fully adequate-with the final summary of his character and deeds by his greatest enemy, the eloquent Bolingbroke :"By his (King William's) death, the Duke of Marlborough was raised to the head of the army, and, indeed, of the confederacy, where he, a private man, a subject, obtained by merit and by management, a more deciding influence than high birth, confirmed authority, and even the crown of Great Britain had given to King William. Not only all the parts of that vast machine, the grand alliance, were kept more compact and entire, but a more rapid and vigorous motion was given to the whole; and instead of languishing or disastrous campaigns, we saw every scene of the war full of action. All those wherein he was not then an actor, but abettor, however, of their actions, were crowned with the most triumphant success. I take with pleasure, this opportunity of doing justice to that great man whose faults I knew and whose virtues I admired; and whose memory, as the greatest general and the greatest minister that our country, or any other, has produced, I honour."-Wellington is not indebted, like Marlborough, for his highest panygeric to the pen of a generous antagonist; yet is it one of the worthiest offerings cast upon his tomb, that the historians and journalists of France concur with those of England in praising him as the Deliverer of Europe, and a benefactor to the world. PAGANINI. THE name which stands at the head of this sketch will long be remembered beyond the limits of merely musical circles as that of the most gifted violinist upon record, who crowded into a short life a thousand triumphs, and left behind him an enduring and welldeserved fame. It is curious to notice that, amid all circumstances and in the most widely differing nations, musical genius commands popularity and wealth. Those who express the emotions of the heart in the sweetest sounds rise more rapidly, and are rewarded more munificently than those who devote themselves to other branches of the fine arts. The sculptor, the painter, the romancist, emerge more tardily from obscurity than the musician or the vocalist; and this happens alike in commercial England, where people are practical and wealth-seeking; in volatile France, where the woes of yesterday and the hopes of the morrow are forgotten in the pleasure of the present hour; in sunny Italy, where the very atmosphere seems full of the artistic and the ideal; and in severe, barbarous Russia, with its snows and its serfs. The free man of America, or the bond slave, bows with equal fervour to the soft influence of music. It would be hard to find an instance, in this country at all events, where the most talented and learned have excited such enthusiasm as that which was produced by the high-souled Malibran ; the simple, kind-hearted Jenny Lind; or the wizard of the violin-Paganini. If a parallel could be found it would be in the triumphs of great dancers. However highly our intellect may prize efforts which lead to more solid results, those which gratify us with the poetry of sound and the poetry of motion appeal more directly and powerfully to the sympathies and passions of our nature, and win a higher present estimation. In the future it is true the picture is reversed, for musicians and dancers leave behind them their memories alone; while others, in the chiselled marble, the glowing canvas, and the written page, bequeath to posterity enduring memorials of their efforts. Nicolo Paganini was born at Genoa, on the 18th of February, 1784, and seems, to some extent, to have inhe rited the talent which he afterwards developed in so extraordinary a degree. His father, who is represented as having been engaged in commerce in some subordinate capacity, was a musician at heart; his favourite instrument was the mandoline. Of Paganini's mother we have not any record, and are, therefore, unable to estimate the influence she exerted over his mind. The father soon discovered the direction which the talents of his son took, and resolved that they should be cultivated to the utmost. In this respect the commencement of the life of Paganini was different from that of many of those who have left behind them great names as composers and musicians. The histories of several of the most eminent show us how their natural tendencies were checked and restrained by injudicious parents who destined them for other occupations, deprived them of all the recognized means of culture, and resorted to severe punishments to cause them to abandon the profession of their choice. It is true that in these instances genius triumphed, as it ever does triumph, over all obstacles. We read of one solitary boy tuning a set of horse-shoes till they became in his hands a rude musical instrument; of another using pieces of glass for the same purpose; and of a third consoling himself with melodies drawn from the humble Jews'-harp. The opposition, not so much to their wishes, but to their very natures, only served to increase the ardour of the passion which was an element of their lives, and the manifestation of which defied all attempts at restraint. It is doubtful whether the father of Paganini, by going to the opposite extreme, did not run a greater risk of crushing the genius of his child than if he had neglected or discouraged its development. He had resolved that the boy should become a musician; and subjected him to such a rigorous discipline, that if the young Paganini had not possessed a fervent innate love for his art, his training would have tended to disgust him with it. As it was, the severity with which he was treated had an injurious effect upon his sensitive nature, and probably acted upon his delicate constitution so as to scatter the seeds of future disease and premature death. Paganini's chosen instrument was the king of instruments-the violin, and though, at one period of his life, he for a short time gave it up, and applied himself to another, he soon resumed it. The change, indeed, was not owing to any dislike for it, or consciousness of its inferiority to any other, but to the fact that he was the slave of another passion, which, for the moment, unhinged his mind and made music a secondary consideration. At six years of age he was a violinist; and from the first his peculiar genius began to make itself apparent. He was not content with the ordinary routine of instruction, nor satisfied with the level flow of orderly melody, but felt himself impelled to practise novel effects. and to perform wizard-like feats requiring great power and quickness of execution. This was quite in keeping with his after efforts, for the performances upon the violin, on which his reputation mainly rests, are those associated with wild, eccentric, unearthly harmonies, rather than more sober and less difficult compositions. The father, musician as he was, soon became unable to control or direct the lofty and rapidly growing genius of the child. His incapacity had become evident before Paganini had attained his eighth year, and about that time the services of one of the musicians of the Genoa Theatre, named Servetto, were procured. The choice of the new teacher was a bad, or at least an insufficient one; for only a few months elapsed before he was bewildered and left behind by the acquirements of his pupil. Giacomo Costa, an eminent violinist, employed principally in the churches, succeeded Servetto, and proved a more efficient instructor; for under his care, the young artist improved rapidly, and shortly after he was eight years old, composed his celebrated Sonata. This, and many other productions, with what appears to have been an habitual carelessness, was lost -not a single copy now remaining. At nine years of age, Paganini made his first public appearance at the largest theatre of Genoa, and caused the same unbounded enthusiasm and admiration as marked the later years of his career. He performed variations, composed by himself, on La Carmagnole, a French air, and roused the audience almost to frenzy. He was at once regarded as a prodigy, and received unbounded plaudits. It is likely that this event, which first brought him into any thing like prominence, exercised a great influence on his future life, for it was, most probably, his success which interested numerous friends in his fate. By their advice the elder Paganini was induced to endeavour to obtain for his son the instruction of the best violinists and composers of the day; and with that intention, when Paganini was twelve years old, he went to Parma, where Alexander Rolla, celebrated as a conductor and a composer, then resided. The first introduction of the young aspirant to Rolla was accompanied by a circumstance which gave promise of his future eminence. The anecdote rests upon the authority of M. Schotsky, and was published in one of the Journals of Vienna. When Paganini went to Rolla's house the latter was ill in bed, and very unwilling to grant him an interview. Rolla's wife, however, ushered him and his companion into a room adjoining that occupied by the sick musician, and then went to consult with her husband. During the time which was thus occupied Paganini observed upon the table a violin, and the last concerto written by Rolla, and, prompted by some momentary caprice, took up the instrument and played the difficult music at sight. Rolla, who heard the sounds, was astonished at the excellence and finish of the performance, and inquired the name of the master, and, until convinced of the fact, would not believe that it was a boy of twelve years old. Rolla then told Paganini that he could not teach him anything, and recommended him to take lessons from Paer the composer. Paganini did not remain long at Parma. He quitted that city at the commencement of 1797; and at the age of thirteen, in company with his father, made his first musical tour, visiting the most considerable places in Lombardy, and laying the foundation of his after reputation. During his stay at Parma, besides improving himself in his regular studies, he was occupied in evolving those strange and wild effects which entered so largely into his compositions. After the tour of Lombardy was completed, Paganini returned to Genoa and applied himself to composition; and the music he then produced was of the most difficult character-so difficult that he was |