agricultural teachers, farmers, land-stewards, &c., such instruction in the science and practice of agriculture as will qualify them for the proper discharge of their duties. The farm contains about 180 acres; and 'with a view of exemplifying the most approved systems of culture, various rotations of cropping are followed upon separate divisions of it.' The system of house-feeding cattle is pursued both summer and winter. "The arrangements,' says the prospectus, for affording the pupils as large an amount of information as possible upon every branch of the business of farming, including dairy-husbandry, the fattening of cattle, the breeding and rearing of different kinds of live-stock, the various operations of field-culture, and the permanent improvement of the soil, are such as to place within their reach the opportunity of becoming acquainted with the practical details of every department of agriculture.' The training institution is situated on the farm, the buildings comprising dormitories, lecture and school room for seventy-five pupils, dining-hall, museum, library and laboratory, a comprehensive range of farm-offices, and suitable apartments for the various officials and servants. The chief supervision of the entire establishment devolves upon the superintendent, Thomas Kirkpatrick, M.D.; and the practical working of the farm is carried out by the pupils, under the superintendence of an agriculturist, who resides on the premises, assisted by a land-steward. A practical gardener instructs the pupils in horticulture; and instruction in the usual branches of a good English education, together with land-surveying, levelling, and mapping, is imparted by two competent literary teachers. Two sessional courses of lectures are delivered annually on the following subjects: Animal physiology and pathology; botany and vegetable physiology; chemistry and geology; practical agriculture; and horticulture. The pupils perform, under supervision, the whole labours of the farm, such as drainage operations, feeding and cleaning the horses, cattle, sheep, pigs, &c.

To this excellent institution there are two classes of pupils admitted. One is maintained entirely at the public expense, and consists of young men intending to become land-stewards or farmers; the other is composed of literary teachers qualifying themselves for the conduct of agricultural schools.

The prospective land-steward or farmer is admitted on the condition that he has acquired at one of the minor national agricultural, or one of the elementary national schools, such literary attainments as will enable him to read correctly any passage in the Fourth Book of Lessons; to write legibly, facilely, and correctly from dictation any passage selected from the Third Book of Lessons; to recognise the parts of speech, and parse easy short sentences in grammar; to define correctly geographical technical terms, and to know the general outlines of the map of the world, and the boundaries, rivers, counties, and chief towns of Ireland. He must also be able to repeat the arithmetical tables correctly, and to work with speed and accuracy the elementary rules of arithmetic, and, besides, have a knowledge of fractions. Bookkeeping he must likewise understand, so far as to know the 'nature and use of a cash-account;' and in geometry he must have an acquaintance at least with the first book of Euclid. If he is able to do all this, and can produce satis factory certificates as to his moral character, and can prove by the testimony of a doctor that he is free from disease, he is admitted, and boarded and lodged for two years, to all the privileges of the institution, provided he has attained the age of seventeen. The literary teachers are admitted on the condition that they have been previously trained in the literary department of the national schools, and are able to produce satisfactory testimonials of character. Their period of training extends only to one year.

The second class, who board and lodge at their own expense, are admitted on the payment of a two-guinea entrance-fee, which is expended in the purchase of agricultural books for the library. They are required to perform their share in all the ordinary labour of the farm; to attend punctually with the intern pupils all the lectures, and are amenable like the others to all the rules and regulations of the institution. There is no time specified as the period of training for this latter class of pupils.

The number of pupils receiving instruction in the Albert Institution in 1855 was ninety, all of whom were supported by the state. To systematise the labour and the study, the entire number is formed into two divisions, A and B. Their time is apportioned as follows, during the summer half-year: All the pupils rise at five o'clock; half an hour is allowed them to dress and say prayers; and another half-hour is employed in feeding and cleaning the stock, and working in the yard and on the farm. They then wash, dress, and prepare for study, for which another half-hour is allowed. An hour and a half is spent in the schoolroom, and another hour is spent in listening to the lecture. This brings the time down to nine o'clock, which is the breakfast-hour. Half an hour having sufficed for the morning meal, class A departs to make preparation for construing Milton, or solving a problem of Euclid; while class B proceeds to don its working-robes, and gather up its rakes, hoes, mattocks, or spades. By ten o'clock, these preparations are expected to be complete: A descends into the schoolroom, and B marches into the fields. For four hours, A handles the pencil and the pen, and evolves theories; while, for the same length of time, B manfully wields the various implements of husbandry, and carries out these theories into practice. At two o'clock, both classes are considered fairly to have earned their dinner-the one by the efforts of its brain, the other by the sweat of its brow. An hour is occupied at the dining-table-for slow eating is the wholesome rule of Glasnevin, at the expiration of which, A accompanies B on to the farm, where both work together until six o'clock. At this hour, they return, and prepare for study. Preparation is completed by halfpast six, when they enter the schoolroom and engage together in study until half-past eight. Supper is then served, and half an hour is consumed over it. Another half-hour is devoted to the feeding and cleaning of stock. At half-past nine, the pupils enter their dormitories. For devotional exercises and preparations for bed, three-quarters of an hour are allowed, at the end of which time they are all snugly ensconced in the blankets, and the lights are turned out. So end the duties of the day, which is a type of every day during the summer half-year, the duties of class A of course alternating with the duties of B. In winter, the pupils rise at six o'clock, and work till dusk.

With regard to the literary instruction at the institution, it may be stated that the four hours from ten to two are devoted to the study of the usual branches of an English education, and that the hours in the morning and evening at which both sections attend in the schoolroom, are devoted to the reading of agricultural books, and in preparing notes on the lecture subjects. Drawing and singing are taught for an hour on four evenings in the week, and surveying is taught to the advanced pupils three evenings in the week, and also from half-past three to half-past five o'clock every Friday afternoon.

The food is plain, wholesome, and notwithstanding the elasticity of young farmers' stomachs, ample.

General rules and regulations are laid down for the observance of the pupils, in which punctuality and prompt obedience to the orders of the officers are strictly insisted upon. They are required to cultivate habits of cleanliness and neatness; to wear slippers

within doors, and school-coats at study, but to divest themselves of both before they go outside. No unnecessary noise is permitted inside the building, and smoking and the use of spirituous liquors are strictly prohibited. The principle of meum and tuum is rigorously adhered to, no pupil being permitted to wear or injure any article the property of another;' and any pupil who carelessly injures or mislays any article belonging to the institution, is required to bear the expense of repairing or replacing it. Regard ing religious instruction as of the greatest value, the neglect of attendance on Sunday worship, and of other religious duties, is regarded as a serious offence. Intimacy with the servants in the institution is prohibited, as is also undue intercourse with persons living in the immediate vicinity of the farm; and also, unfortunately for those who have tastes and ambitions in common with M. Soyer, admission into the culinary department cannot be obtained without the authority of the officers. There is also a strict rule with regard to books and newspapers. 'It is not permitted to become a member of any political society, nor to take part at any meeting of a sectarian character. Newspapers, books, and periodicals of a political or polemical character, are prohibited; also discussions on these subjects.' Yard-officers are, in their turn, appointed to attend to the stock, and keep the farmyard and offices clean; and in this, as we have seen, they are assisted by the entire class, morning and night, Sundays and holidays excepted. Each pupil is called upon in turn to take charge of a horse, which he cleans and litters under the direction of an experienced ploughman. Such is the process by which young peasants are transformed into intelligent farmers at the Albert Institution, Glasnevin.

The total expenditure of the Institution in 1855 was L.4568, allocated as follows: General farm-expenses, L.173; seeds, implements, live-stock, &c., not included in general farm-expenses, L.809; rent and taxes, L.788; maintenance of agricultural teachers, pupils, and servants, L.1943; and salaries of lecturers, teachers, and servants, L.854. The total receipts for the sale of farm-produce amounted to L.1497, and the live and dead stock was valued at L.3151. The live-stock consisted of 7 draught animals, 65 cattle, 90 sheep, 54 pigs, and 90 poultry. Between January 1847 and December 1855, no less than 270 young men were educated in the Albert Training Institution, and left it to carry out the instruction there received on farms of their own, or on the lands of others committed to their charge; many of them as teachers, who would impart that instruction to hundreds.

There cannot be a doubt that the teaching and example of these model national agricultural schools, is greatly conducive to the material prosperity which Ireland is now beginning to enjoy, and, therefore, to her freedom from those foul outrages which made humanity shudder. They are much praised in the localities where they have been established. The rector of Farrahy, after quoting the testimony of men who have greatly profited by following the example of model-schools in their district in their system of farming, says: 'I can only add that this district has become more orderly and quiet. I see fewer drunken people on the roads than when I first resided hereagrarian disturbances are unknown, rents are not in arrear; there are no religious animosities, to the best of my belief.' Mr Bernard writes regarding the influence of Sally bank Model School, county Clare: 'Such have been the effects of the small model-farm, by rotation of crops, &c., no farmer in the locality is now without his plot of turnips, clover, ryegrass, &c. There is also more attention paid to winterfeeding of stock, and the cultivation and preservation of manure, than formerly.' Similar accounts are given from many quarters, and although some of

the writers may be somewhat prejudiced in favour of the schools, there is, after every deduction on that account, ample evidence of their beneficial character. An outcry has recently been raised against the schools on account of their expense. Their total cost per annum is, according to Dr Kirkpatrick, the agricultural inspector, L.7000, a sum comparatively trifling considering the advantages accruing from them. It is to be hoped that the commissioners will not listen to the cry for their abolition, but that they will rather make greater exertions to establish others.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT EELS. No inhabitant of the deep has attracted more notice, from its natural character and habits, than the eel. It is associated in our minds with our earliest attempts to gain a knowledge of the 'gentle art;' and there are few persons who have not some lively recollections of their fishing exploits in securing this slippery and troublesome customer. It is not at all improbable that the serpentine form of the eel may have added to the singular interest which has attached to it, particularly since the commencement of the Christian era. Its resemblance to the serpent tribe has, no doubt, tended to deepen the dramatic power and interest of many legends about this fish, which are current both on the continent and in this country.

Respecting the generation of the eel, there have been the wildest and most ridiculous notions. One ancient author supposed that eels were born of the mud; another, that they were produced from particles scraped from the bodies of large eels when they rubbed themselves against stones-that they grew out of the putrid flesh of dead animals thrown into the water-from the dews which cover the earth in spring and summer-from water, and so forth. Among modern writers, we have the same confusion of theories. There is a popular notion in many districts of the north of England, that eels are generated from horsehairs deposited in springs and rivulets, A recent German author mentions that they owe their origin to electrical phenomena; but he is sadly at a loss about substantiating his theory by facts. The great naturalist, Buffon, is said to have remarked, in the latter part of the last century, at a meeting of French savans, that he considered the question as to the generation of eels to be one of the most puzzling in natural history. The late Bishop of Norwich, Dr Kay, read a paper to the Royal Society on this subject. He noticed some small eels in the thatch of a cottage; and he endeavoured to establish the proposition that the spawn of the fish had been deposited on the reeds before they were cut, and had been subsequently vivified by the sun's rays.

The gastronomical qualities of the eel have been extolled from the earliest times. It was prohibited, however, as an article of food among the Jews; and the ancient Egyptians, while rejecting it as such, gave it a place among their deities. The Greeks were passionately fond of the fish, and cooked it in every possible fashion, as we find recorded in Athenæus and other classical writers. Archestratus, in his work on gastronomy, says of the eel:

I praise all kinds of eels; but for the best
Is that which fishermen do take in the sea
Opposite the Strait of Rhegium,
Where you, Messenius, who daily put
This food within your mouth, surpass all mortals
In real pleasure. Though none can deny
That great the virtue and the glory is
Of the Strymonian and Copaic eels,
For they are large and wonderfully fat;
And I do think, in short, that of all fish
The best in flavour is the noble eel.

The conger-eel was offered to Neptune and his divine colleagues, as being capable of imparting immortality to those who partook of it; and Macrobius informs us that it was a common saying among the Grecians that the dead would return to life if it were possible for them to taste a morsel of this delicious fish. Another writer tells us that near Sicyon, a city of the Peloponnesus, there were conger-eels caught of such dimensions as to require a wagon drawn by oxen to carry one of them. Even the head and intestines were eaten, and esteemed delicacies.

The ancient Anglo-Saxon tribes were passionately fond of eels. Grants and charters were often regulated by payments made in eels. Four thousand of them were a yearly present from the monks of Ramsay to those of Peterborough. In one charter, twenty fishermen are stated to have furnished sixty thousand eels to the monastery. Eel-dikes are often mentioned in the boundaries of lands belonging to religious establishments. The Gauls were great consumers of eels; and among their descendants there are many tenures of land in France stipulating for the payment of rent, and the discharge of stipulated public taxes in eels. In one of the capitularies of Charlemagne we find allusions made to the same subject.

There are several places in England which derive their names from the quantity of eels they formerly produced. Elmore, on the river Severn, and Ellesmere, on the Mersey, were once famous for the production of this fish. The town of Ely, too, is singularised in this way. Fuller, in his Worthies of Cambridgeshire, has the following remark: 'When the priests of this part of the country would still retain their wives in spite of whatever the pope and the monks could do to the contrary, their wives and children were miraculously turned into eels; whence it had the name of Ely. I consider this a lie.'

Eude, the celebrated cook to Louis XVI., was known all over Europe for his mode of serving up this fish. He says in his book On Cookery: "Take one or two live eels, throw them into the fire; as they are twisting about on all sides, lay hold of them with a towel in your hand, and skin them from head to tail. This method is decidedly the best, as it is the means of drawing out all the oil, which is unpalatable. Note.Several gentlemen have accused me of cruelty (astonishing!) for recommending in my work that eels should be burned alive. As my knowledge in cookery is entirely devoted to the gratification of their taste, and the preservation of their health, I consider it my duty to attend to what is essential to both. The blue skin and the oil which remain when they are skinned, are highly indigestible. If any lady or gentleman should make the trial of both, they will find that the burnt eels are much healthier; but it is after all left to their choice whether to burn or skin.' The consumption of eels, as articles of food, throughout Europe, is prodigious. In London, the number imported, chiefly from Holland, amounts to about ten millions annually; and the fish is met with on the most sumptuous as well as on the most frugal tables-food alike for the London alderman and the gamin in the streets.

The ancient and modern physicians have dabbled with the eel, as with most other fish, to a great extent. Hippocrates denounces him to all his patients, and particularly to those afflicted with pulmonary consumption. Galen says he is indigestible to weakly people. Rhases and Magninus maintain that his food is deleterious to persons recovering from fever; and Franciscus Bonsuetus, when speaking of rheumatic ailments, forbids the eel, for the general reason:

All fish that standing pools and lakes frequent, Do ever yield bad juice and nourishment. Another of the olden medical writers says that he found the oil of the eel highly useful when used as a

mollifying unguent to soothe the nerves when suffering under hot rheumatism.' The gall of the fish he employed as a liniment for sore eyes; and the bones of the head were ground to powder, and found efficacious in bleedings at the nose. It is a common practice in the north of England at this hour for young lads to tie a piece of eel-skin round their ankles, to keep away cramps and pains. There is an old ditty, in this part of the country, which reads thus: Around the shin Tie the skin

Of full-grown river-eel;
And every sprain,
And cramp and pain,
Will fly unto the deil.

The eel has been a subject of augury in dreams. If a young woman dreams of eels, she may expect to have slippery lovers. To dream of fish generally, is a sign of sorrow; but if you catch eels, and can retain them, it is a sign of your possessing a kind and fast friend. A writer on dreams, in the middle ages, affirms that to dream of eels, portends a large family of children; and if you dream of cooking them, your children will give you a great deal of trouble. The following is stated in a work called the True Interpretation of Dreams (Bologna, 1614): One of the kings of Spain dreamed three successive nights that an eel came out of his mouth, and made a desperate struggle to regain a small river which flowed hard by. The king took his sword and endeavoured to prevent it entering the water: but it escaped, got into the water, and mounted up on the opposite bank. It then went into a cliff in a rock. This was in a locality which the monarch knew very well. He called together some of his domestics, told them the dreams he had had; and they all went to visit the chink in the rock, where they discovered a very valuable treasure of gold and precious stones.

The voracity of the eel has been a fertile topic of discussion and romance among naturalists and anglers. It is doubtless great. We have ourselves witnessed this fish devouring each other greedily. There is scarcely anything too delicate, and few things too nasty, for his ravenous appetite. He has often been found with a half-decayed water-rat in his mouth; and it has been recently stated in the newspapers, that at Wimpson, in Hampshire, the ducks on the farm were denuded of their feet by some large eels that were found in a pond which this species of poultry were in the habit of frequenting. But we find the most remarkable statements about the voracity of the creature in a work called The Wonders of Nature and Art, published at Berwick-upon-Tweed in 1780. About the middle of last century, the farmers near Yeovil suffered greatly by losing vast quantities of hay. This could not be accounted for. A reward was offered for the supposed culprits; upon which several soldiers, then quartered at Yeovil, kept watch, and to their great surprise found, in the dead of the night, a monstrous eel making its way out of the river, and setting itself to feed greedily on the hay! It was destroyed, and roasted; and the fat that came out of its body filled several casks and tubs! This work was expressly designed by the writer as a useful and valuable production for young people.'

The eel has been a fruitful topic for legendary lore in most European countries. The subject, however, is so voluminous, that we can do little more than merely dip into it. The legend of the Lambton Eel' is well known, and fully recorded in the various histories of the county of Durham. The substance of the story is as follows: The heir of the Lambtons, in the early part of the middle ages, fell into a profane habit of angling on a Sunday. On one of these hallowed days, he caught in the river Wear a small eel, little thicker

than a common thread, which he threw into a well. In process of time, this young heir of the Lambton family was called to the wars against the Moslems in the First Crusade, organised by Peter the Hermit, where the ambitious young soldier distinguished himself by many feats of daring and valour. On returning to his own country, he learned with great surprise that the small eel he had thrown carelessly into the well had grown to a fearful magnitude, and manifested the most cruel and ravenous propensities. He was solicited to rid the vicinity of the monster. It frequently coiled itself nine times round a large tower; daily levied a contribution of nine cows' milk on the inhabitants; and when this was not immediately granted, it devoured both man and beast. Before, however, the valiant knight undertook a personal conflict with this enormous eel, he consulted a noted witch in the neighbourhood. She advised him to put on a coat-of-mail, furnished on the outside with numerous razor-blades. Thus equipped, he sallied out and encountered the huge fish near a high rock on the banks of the Wear. It immediately coiled itself round him. His coat of razor-blades, however, proved more than a match for the gigantic eel, which was soon cut in pieces by the sheer exercise of its own strength. There is a sequel to the legend: the witch promised the Count of Lambton her aid only upon one condition, that he should slay the first living thing he met after the conquest. To avoid the possibility of human slaughter, he directed his father that as soon as he heard three blasts from his bugle in token of victory, he should release his favourite greyhound, which he would immediately sacrifice. When the bugle was heard, the old father was so overcome with joy that he entirely forgot the injunction his son had put upon him, and ran out himself and threw himself in the victor's arms. Instead of committing parricide, the heir repaired again to the old sorceress, who evinced considerable wrath at the neglect of her commands. By way of punishment, she foretold that no heir of the Lambton family should die in his bed for seven-some accounts say nine-generations; a prediction which some local historians affirm came literally to pass.

There was a very ancient custom among the clergy of Notre Dame, in Paris, called the Rogations, which consisted of carrying a figure resembling an eel through a certain locality on the river Seine, and throwing fruits and cakes into its mouth. It was made of wicker-work, and was considered a representative of a great eel which emerged out of this river, and threatened destruction to the entire city. vanquished by some valiant sons of the church. This procession was observed till the year 1730; after which the chief personage in the procession contented himself with merely pronouncing a benediction on the river.

It was

But the superstitions connected with eels, and the mythical and legendary stories in which they figure are innumerable; and to avoid being carried beyond our limits, we had better let the subject slip through our fingers at once.

PATENTS FOR INVENTIONS.

In Newton's London Journal of Arts and Sciences, there is an article on the Fourth Report of the Commissioners of Patents. Invention, it would appear, goes briskly on; applications for patents amounting in 1856 to 3106, being 148 more than in the previous year. The applications produced in 1856, 2048 completed and specified patents, being 59 more than in 1855. About one-third of the completed patents stand the test of trial; the rest being suffered to lapse by the non-payment of the additional stamp-duty of L.50. This was the fate of the patents dated in 1853-4; and it is a triumphant answer to those

who assert that not one in a hundred patents is worth to the inventor the fees paid in obtaining it, 'for here is proof that nearly one-third, after a three years' trial, have stood the test.' In 1856 the receipts from the progressive stampduty of L.50 nearly doubled those of 1855, which were L.15,950. A great part of the fund produced by patents is expended in printing and publishing the specifications; but the public do not seem to patronise the work, or else the cost at which it is carried on is too heavy, for a loss of L.116,000-the difference between the cost of production and the sale-has taken place in four and a half years.

THE STAR IN THE EAST.

A LURID star is burning in the east-
Not o'er a cradle, but a sepulchre :

It cleaves the heavens like that fiery sign
Which set of yore our Highland hills a-flame
When blood was i' the wind. Plague-spotted land,
The leprosies of old were white to thine!
In this new slaughter of the innocents
The Prince of Peace is crucified again.
O women-martyred sisters! we could weep
But for the hot shame which burns up our tears.
Our quivering lips are prayerless o'er your dust:
We may not strew the desecrated sod

Where fiends have trampled, with the flowers of heaven;
But, fierce in the strong passion of the weak,
Yet helpless as the babes upon your breasts,
We fold our white robes round us with a vow
Unto the God of battles!-Lisping babes!

O world, world! could not those mother-hands
Pluck down the wrathful heavens on such deeds?
The innocent lotus on the unstirred waves,
The pale, pure crescent in the warless heavens,
Smile in each other's faces: what is man
That he should warp the beautiful to wrong,
Turning God's gifts unto ignoble use?
Were these the fitting symbols for a curse--
The direst-most profound-the curse of war?
There was a time-methinks 'tis but a tale-
When bread and salt, partaken brotherly,
Did sign 'twixt fellest foes a bond and pledge-
The freedom of the city of the heart!
Yet these were of our house, our home, our hearth,
Embosomed in our trust; before whose eyes
Our weakness was paraded and unmasked.
O Pariah of nations, hide thy head!
Alien thou art, and alien shalt thou be,
Thou and thy races, from all men whose pulse
Beats to the music of a noble nature!
Say, had ye wrongs?-Ye have undone your cause.
By your own crimes self-branded, do ye fall;
While we stand righted in your depths of shame.
The seed accursed brings forth a millionfold:
Behold the fruit! Why we, even we, who once
Would snatch the snared bird from the fowler's clutch,
Now point to yon red star, and cry- Go forth !'
White-headed fathers, stint not your gray hairs!
Brothers! let not your might of manhood sleep.
Lovers and husbands!-lo, the star is red
With too much looking on red Indian plains,
With too long burning over martyr-graves,
With too deep blushing over woman-wrongs;
Go forth! Till that foul stain be branded out,
We look no more on you-but on the star.
Our sickening eyes shall track it, till that day
When ye shall stand amidst the ransomed souls
Who cry to ye for succour; till again

The sword shall know its place in the scorned sheath;
Till horror's shriek is silenced, and once more
The fiery symbol shall be blotted out,

And the red star stand white before its God!

E. L. H.

Printed and Published by W. and R. CHAMBERS, 47 Paternoster Row, LONDON, and 339 High Street, EDINBURGH. Also Bold by WILLIAM ROBERTSON, 23 Upper Sackville Street, DUBLIN, and all Booksellers.

POPULAR

LITERATURE

No. 199.

BÖTTGER, THE INVENTOR OF DRESDEN

CHINA.

We were walking, a friend and myself, one day last April, in the bright little garden of the Japanese Palace at Dresden. It was one of those first days of spring, when the cold of winter is but half vanquished, and when one chooses sheltered shadeless paths such as this garden offers. The discourse fell upon the doings in China, and we reasoned much of the three hundred millions of enigmatical barbarians who people it. Of course we agreed in regarding them as 'very shallow monsters,' cunning in the drying of tea-leaves, and gluttons in the absorption of silver dollars; but we could recognise in them no quality which should exem pt them from the common lot of humanity in the nineteenth century-submission to foreign dictation. It seems only natural that we Englishmen should wish to make them taste the civilising sweets of the law of interference by which international relations are now governed, working, as we all know, as harmoniously as the similar provision does on the heavenly bodies. Why should they be exempted from a condition to which, islanders though we be, we are ourselves subjected? We have learned, or are learning, that we must sometimes acquiesce in the dictates of public, or rather kingly, opinion in foreign countries, and, like all new converts, we are of course eager to thrust a participation of our pleasant experiences upon others.

The Chinese ought to be gratified, vain as they are, at the earnestness of our efforts for their good, and their distance from our habitat only renders more meritorious the trouble we are taking to teach them the principles of sound political economy. 'It is not good for man to be alone;' and as John Chinaman persists in shutting his eyes to this truth, it is mere humanity in us to open them for him. We are doing so by a process of couching which, ingenious as he is in the manufacture of fireworks, he must as certainly admire now as he will bless it in some contingent future.

Thus we ran on in self-satisfied praise of the national high deeds, which we are each so ready to take individual credit for. At a turn in the walk, my friend remarked that, unendowed as I might think them with philosophical souls, the Chinese have most dexterous fingers; and in proof of this, cited the marvellous collection of their handiwork in porcelain existing in the Japanese palace which we were sauntering round. He told me how, about two thousand years ago, when aluminum was undreamed of, the Chinese had discovered this way of turning their clay into something

PRICE 1d.

more precious than gold. He expatiated on the national importance which they had given to this manufacture, and on the imperial patronage by which it had been encouraged in the remotest times. Since the Tatar invasion, the yellow-dragon china has been reserved for the sovereign's exclusive use; but formerly, one of the first acts of a new emperor on his accession was to determine the particular kind of earthenware on which he would be pleased to dine. Barbarians though they be, the Chinese had preceded us considerably in the formation of museums, as well as in the invention of some other trifles-such as gunpowder, printing, and the compass. One of their museums is devoted to a collection of vases in bronze and porcelain, of which the catalogue, illustrated with engravings, and published about a hundred years ago, by command of the emperor, is contained in twenty-four folio volumes. It is well that we should be informed of its existence; for the acquisition of this little collection of crockery might be added to Lord Elgin's or the commander-in-chief's instructions for their projected visit to Peking.

Having talked ourselves up to paying pitch, we now entered the palace, disbursed the two dollars at which his majesty the king of Saxony values a sight of his china-ware, and descended into the cold vaults in which it is deposited. There we saw the eighteen blue and white jars which Augustus the Strong received in exchange for a regiment of dragoons; other vases of the same material, worth, or which at least cost L.2000 apiece, cups, saucers, teapots, bowls, and chargers-in short, an immense collection of several descriptions of Chinese and Japanese porcelain. If this had been all which the vaults contained, we should have thought our money very badly spent, for the collection is very far from complete. But it is not our object now to speak of the productions of the ovens of Ki-en or Ki-un. We have not to describe the invaluable 'blue seen through the opening of storm-clouds,' nor the equally costly and still rarer 'congealed fat;' we leave these and such-like curious particulars for more learned pens.

What struck us most in the Japanese palace were the contents of four of the vaults, in which are preserved specimens of the Dresden china which our grandmothers loved so dearly, and our lady-friends now adore so extravagantly. We plead guilty to sharing in their taste, and we are not ashamed of the preference we give to the old Dresden china over that of Sèvres. The very bizarrerie of its contorted forms seems more adapted to its object, mere ornament, than the stiffer purity of the French porcelain.

It was more than sixteen centuries after its first