wall, and half-smothered by soot and dirt; but, at length, they arrived at the summit, and, as they anticipated, no bars opposed their passage. They emerged carefully. The next step was indeed one of danger. Neither knew the construction of the roof,-it was parapetted they were sure, but to what extent they could not even conjecture. The intense darkness prohibited them from guessing how far they had to drop, or whether the part of the roof on which they had to fall was sloping or not. If they fell off the roof, death was inevitable; the house being at least sixty feet high. Determination, however, was necessary, and that speedily. "I shall try it," said O'Reilly, "I may as well be dashed to pieces as hanged. I shall drop, and by my success, you may decide as to your own conduct." Before his friend could reply, the thing was done. Letting himself down his whole length, he dropped. The roof sloped as they had dreaded, and down he rolled, but fortunately the parapet was of sufficient height to protect him. He fell inside, repelled with great force, and thereby, as Homer would have said, escaped black death.

Mulvany listened to his fall, and halloed as loud as he dared, to inquire if he was safe. "Yes," was the reply," the parapet is high enough; but take care of the slanting roof." He immediately made the attempt, and succeeded better than O'Reilly. He came on the ridge-tiles, and carefully crept down to the parapet, where he joined his companion. Their course was now comparatively clear. They would find little difficulty in passing to the roof of the neighbouring house, to which they therefore moved carefully along. An accident nearly discovered them. As they groped by the parapet, O'Reilly's hand shook down a loose stone, and it came thundering to the ground, just at the feet of two sentries parading below.

"Who goes there?" said one.

"One," replied the other, "who will not answer you. It is the wind, you fool."

"I'll fire," said the first, "if not answered. Somebody is giving us the slip."

"Fire, if you like," said the other, "and make an ass of yourself, which indeed is needless, as you are one already. You would make a pretty sentinel, if you were to fire at every blast of wind that sings by your ear."

The first sentry growled, but was persuaded, and continued his march up and down without farther argument. The fugitives above had no other interruption. They entered the next house by a sky-light, and proceeded hastily down stairs. inmates were asleep, and they gained the yard undisturbed. Their knowledge of the localities of the city informed them, that

The

the back of this house looked over the hill side, where the steep, sloping gradually, was accessible, if somewhat dangerous. A small quay was below, at which a ferryman plied his poor trade. This therefore was their line of escape. The wall was easily scaled, and they fearlessly jumped on the ground below. Half staggering, half rolling, they came to the bottom, and immediately found the boat. They tore it from its moorings,—it was no time to discuss questions of property, and, seizing the oars, rowed rapidly down the river. About three miles' rowing brought them to a house where they could venture to ask admittance, and, as the day had dawned for some time, though still it was very dark, and overcast with clouds, they knocked, and were answered from the window above by the owner himself. Gloomy as the light was, they made themselves known at once by communicating the word which marked them as initiated. He hastened to admit them, astonished at their escape. They turned the boat to the mercy of the current, and entered. He protected them till night set in again, and they then, venturing on the river, made their way to the harbour, where an American vessel, bound for Lisbon, took them on board, and secreted them, till out of the jurisdiction of England.

The next day, when the escape was discovered, the astonishment of all parties may be conceived. The sheriff had seen the prisoner at two in the morning safely chained. The sentries had not been alarmed. It was evident that the chains had been filed, but how or by whom it was impossible to guess. The ferryman attributed the loss of his boat to the violence of the storm; and, as it was found adrift about seven miles lower down, he never doubted that he was right in his conjecture. Suspicion fell on various individuals, but the mystery was never cleared up, until by the fugitives themselves in letters to their friends at home. Mulvany never told how he had got into the prison, and nobody was more perplexed how to account for it than the worthy bailiff himself who had admitted him, and he, you may be sure, kept the secret till his death.

What became of them?

They got to Lisbon, whence Mulvany went to America, rose to some eminence there in the law, but was shot in a duel. I forget for what.

And the other?

His fate was more singular. It is odd enough, that three years ago I had told this story of the escape of these men to a Roman Catholic priest, who had returned from Portugal to his native country. "I can finish the story for you," said he, "O'Reilly's narrow escape had not taught him caution. When VOL. III. PART II.

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the French advanced on Portugal in 1808, he was living in the frontier town of Elvas, and he had the temerity to enter into a correspondence with them. It was intercepted. The populace rose in rage against him, and dragged him out of his house. I stood by him, and endeavoured to mitigate their anger, but in vain: I almost implicated myself in his fate. They, after cuffing and kicking him most unmercifully, cut him literally in pieces with their knives, and I was spattered all over by his blood. They kicked his mangled remains through the town, and flung them into the river. Such was the end of O'Reilly." The cottage never was again inhabited. It gradually became out of repair, and is now in the condition in which you see it.

The hare may kittle on its hearth-stane,

And there never will be a lord of that mansion again.

TALE OF A CHEMIST.

THE advancement of knowledge is the triumph of truth, and, as such, is the eventual interest of mankind; inasmuch as the extension of reason is by its very definition the necessary object of rational beings. Timid theologians have trembled on the confines of some topics which might lead to dangerous discovery; forgetful that religion and truth, if not identical, are at least inseparable. Some nice and sensitive chemists have forborne the search of the ne plus ultra in alchemy, dreading that as gold is the great fountain of wickedness on earth, the indefinite increase of that metal might be the unlimited multiplication of human evil: but forgetting that in all human affairs, from fluids up to theories, there is a specific gravity in all things which keeps constant the level of terrestrial operations, and prevents the restless brain of man from raising any edifice, in brick or discovery, high enough to be the ruin of his own species. To me, however, the one consideration, that the eternal search of knowledge and truth is the very object of our faculties, has been the main spring of my life, and although my individual sufferings have been far from light, yet at their present distance the contemplation gives me pleasure, and I have the satisfaction to reflect that I am now in possession of an art which is continually employed, day and night, for the benefit of the present generation and of ages yet to come.

I was born in the Semlainogorod of Moscow; and for ten years applied intensely to chemistry. I confess the failure of many eminent predecessors prevented my attempting the philoso

pher's stone; my whole thoughts were engaged on the contemplation of gravity-on that mysterious invisible agent which pervaded the whole universe-which made my pen drop from my fingers-the planets move round the sun-and the very sun itself, with its planets, moons, and satellites, revolve for ever, with myriads of others, round the final centre of universal gravity, that mysterious spot, perhaps the residence of those particular emanations of Providence which regard created beings. At length I disco vered the actual ingredients of this omnipresent agent. It is little more than a combination of carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, and azote; but the proportions of these constituent parts had long baffled me, and I still withhold them from my species for obvious reasons.

Knowledge is power,-and the next easy step from the discovery of the elements, was the decomposition of gravity, and the neutralization of its parts in any substance at my pleasure. I was more like a lunatic than a rational chemist ;-a burning furor drove me to an immediate essay of my art, and stripped me of the power and will to calculate on consequences. Imagine me in my laboratory. I constructed a gravitation-pump-applied it to my body-turned the awful engine, and stood in an instant the first of all created beings-devoid of weight! Up sprung my hairmy arms swung from my sides above the level of my shoulders, by the involuntary action of the muscles; which were no longer curbed by the re-action of their weight. I laughed like a fool or a fiend, closed my arms carefully to my side, compressed or concealed my bristling hair under my cap, and walked forth from my study to seek some retired spot in the city where I might make instant experiment of a jump. With the greatest difficulty I preserved a decent gait; I walked with the uneasy unsteady motion of a man in water whose toes might barely reach the bottom: conscious as I was of my security, I felt every instant apprehensive of a fall. Nothing could have reconciled me to the disagreeable sensation I experienced, but the anticipation of vaulting unfettered into the air. I stood behind the cathedral of the Seven Towers; nobody was near-I looked hurriedly around, and made the spring! I rose with a slow, uniform motion,-but, gracious heaven! imagine my horror and distress, when I found that nothing but the mere resistance of the air opposed my progress; and, when at last it stopped my flight, I found myself many hundred feet above the city-motionless, and destitute of every means of descent. I tore my hair, and cursed myself, for overlooking so obvious a result. My screams drew thousands to the singular sight. I stretched my arms towards the earth, and implored assistance. Poor fool! I knew it was impracticable.

But conceive the astonishment of the people! I was too high to be personally known ;-they called to me, and I answered;

but they were unable to catch the import, for sound, like myself, rises better than it falls. I heard myself called an angel, a ghost, a dragon, a unicorn, and a devil. I saw a procession of priests come under me to exorcise me; but had Satan himself been free of gravity, he had been as unable to descend at their bidding as myself. At length the fickle mob began to jeer me-the boys threw stones at me, and a clever marksman actually struck me on the side with a bullet; it was too high to penetrate-it merely gave me considerable pain, drove me a few feet higher, and sunk again to the ground. Alas! I thought, would to God it had pierced me, for even the weight of that little ball would have dragged me back to earth. At length the shades of evening hid the city from my sight; the murmur of the crowd gradually died away, and there I still was, cold, terrified, and motionless-nearer to heaven than such a fool could merit to rise again. What was to be the end of this! I must starve and be stared at! I poured out a torrent of incoherent prayers to heaven-but heaven seemed as deaf as I deserved.

Imagine my joy when a breeze sprung up, and I felt myself floating in darkness over the town: but even now new horrors seized me;-I might be driven downwards into the Moskwa and drowned; I might be dashed against the cathedral and crushed. Just as I thought on this, my head struck violently against the great bell of Boris Godunuff;-the blow and the deep intonation of the bell deprived me for some minutes of life and recollection. When I revived, I found I was lying gently pressed by the breeze against the balustrades: I pulled myself carefully along the church, pushed myself down the last column, and run as straight as my light substance would permit me to my house. With far greater joy than when I had been disrobed of it, I speedily applied a proper condensation of gravity to my body, fell on my knees to thank heaven for my deliverance, and slunk into beď, thoroughly ashamed of my day's performance. The next day, to escape suspicion, I joined the re-assembled crowd-looked upward as serious as the rest, gazed about for yesterday's phenomenon, and I dare say was the only one who felt no disappointment in its disappearance.

Any one would imagine that, after this trial, I should have burnt my pump, and left gravity to its own operations. But no ! I felt I was reserved for great things;-such a discovery was no every-day occurrence, and I would work up every energy of my soul rather than relinquish this most singular, though frightful, field of experiment.

I was too cautious to deprive myself again entirely of gravity. In fact, in my late experiment, as in others, when I talk of extracting my gravity entirely, I mean just enough to leave me of