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or another. They are associations of students belonging to the same province, for the purpose of enabling each, thus backed by all, to carry through his own rude will, let it be what it may, and, of late years, it is averred, to propagate wild political reveries, if not to foment political cabals. They are regularly organized; each has its president, clerk, and councillors, who form what is called the Convent of the Landsmannschaft. This body manages its funds, and has the direction of its affairs, if it have affairs. It likewise enjoys the honour of fighting all duels pro patria, for so they are named when the interest or honour, not of an individual, but of the whole fraternity, has been attacked. The assembled presidents of the different Landsmannschaften in a university constitute the senior convent. This supreme tribunal does not interfere in the private affairs of the particular bodies, but decides in all matters that concern the whole mass of Burschen, and watches over the strict observance of the general academic code which they have enacted for themselves. The meetings of both tribunals are held frequently and regularly, but with so much secrecy, that the most vigilant police has been unable to reach them. They have cost many a professor many a sleepless night. The governments scold the senates, as if they trifled with, or even connived at the evil; the senates lose all patience with the governments for thinking it so easy a matter to discover what Burschen are resolved to keep concealed. The exertions of both have only sufficed to drive the Landsmannschaften into deeper concealment. From the incessant

quarrels and uproars, and the instantaneous union of all to oppose any measure of general discipline about to be enforced, the whole senate often sees plainly, that these bodies are in active operation, without being able either to ascertain who are their members, or to pounce upon their secret conclaves.

"Since open war was thus declared against them by the government, secrecy has become indispensable to their existence, and the Bursche scruples at nothing by which this secrecy may be insured. The most melancholy consequence of this is, that, as every man is bound by the code to esteem the preservation of the Landsmannschaft his first duty, every principle of honour is often trampled under foot to maintain it. In some universities it was provided by the code that a student, when called before the senate to be examined about a suspected Landsmannschaft, ceased to be a member, and thus he could safely say that he belonged to no such institution. In others, it was provided, that such an inquiry should operate as an ipso facto dissolution of the body itself, till the investigation should be over; and thus every member could safely swear that no such association was in existence. There are cases where the student, at his admission into the fraternity, gives his word of honour to do every thing in his power to spread a belief that no such association exists, and, if he shall be questioned either by the senate or the police, stedfastly to deny it. Here and there the professors fell on the expedient of gradually extirpating them, by taking from every new student, at

his matriculation, a solemn promise that he would not join any of these bodies: but where such principles are abroad, promises are useless, for deceit is reckoned a duty. The more moderate convents left it to the conscience of the party himself to decide, whether he was bound in honour by such a promise; but the code of Leipzig, as it has been printed, boldly declares every promise of this kind void, and those who have exacted it punishable. Moreover, it invests the senior convent, in general terms, with the power of giving any man a dispensation from his word of honour, if it shall see cause, but confines this privilege, in money matters, to cases where he has been enormously cheated. Such are the tenets of men who chatter unceasingly about liberty and patriotism, and have perpetually in their mouths such phrases as, the Burschen lead a free, honourable, and independent life in the cultivation of every social and patriotic virtue.' Thus do moral iniquities become virtues in their eyes, if they forward the ends, or are necessary to the continued existence of a worthless and mischievous association; and who can tell how far this process of measuring honour by imagined expediency may corrupt the whole moral sense? Is it wonderful that Sand, taught to consider deceit, prevarication, or breach of promise as virtues, when useful to a

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particular cause, should have regarded assassination in the same light, when the shedding of blood was to consecrate doctrines which he looked upon as holy?

"The students who have not thought proper to join any of these associations are few in number, and, in point of estimation, form a class still more despised and insulted than the Philistines themselves. Every Bursche thinks it dishonourable to have communication with them; they are admitted to no carousal; they are debarred from all balls and public festivals by which the youth con

trive to make themselves notorious and ridiculous. Such privations would not be severely felt, but they are farther exposed to every species of contempt and insult; to abuse them is an acceptable service to Germany; in the classroom, and in the street, they must be taught that they are 'cowardly slaves; and all this, because they will not throw themselves into the fetters of a self-created fraternity."

"The following may be taken as a satisfactory example of the ordinary genius of university minstrelsy; it is by way of eminence, the Hymn, or Burschen Song of Jena; it contains all the texts which furnish materials for the amplifications of college rhymsters, and shows better than a tedious description how they view the world.

Pledge round, brothers; Jena for ever! huzza! The resolve to be free is abroad in the land; The Philistine* burns to be joined with our band, For the Burschen are free.

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Pledge round, then; our country for ever! huzza!
While you stand like your fathers as pure and as true,
Forget not the debt to posterity due,

For the Burschen are free.

Pledge round to our Prince, then, ye Burschen! huzza!
He swore our old honours and rights to maintain,
And we vow him our love while a drop's in a vein,
For the Burschen are free.

Pledge round to the love of fair woman! huzza!
If there be who the feeling of woman offends,
For him is no place among freemen or friends;
But the Burschen are free.

Pledge round to the stout soul of man, too! huzza!
Love, singing, and wine, are the proofs of his might,
And who knows not all three is a pitiful wight;

But the Burschen are free.

Pledge round to the free word of freemen! huzza!
Who knows what the truth is, yet trembles to brave
The might that would crush it, is a cowardly slave;
But the Burschen are free.

Pledge round, then, each bold deed for ever! huzza!
Who tremblingly ponders how daring may end,
Will crouch like a minion, when power bids him bend;
But the Burschen are free.

Pledge round, then, the Burschen for ever! huzza!
Till the world goes in rags, when the last day comes o'er us,
Let each Bursche stand faithful, and join in our chorus,

The Burschen are free.

"If they ever give vent in song to the democratic and sanguinary resolves which are averred to render them so dangerous, it must be in their more secret conclaves; for, in the strains which enliven their ordinary potations, there is nothing more definite than in the above prosaic effusion. There are

many vague declamations about freedom and country, but no allusions to particular persons, particular governments, or particular plans. The only change of govern ment I ever knew proposed in their cantilenes, is one to which despotism itself could not object.

Let times to come, come as they may,
And empires rise and fall;

Let Fortune rule as Fortune will,
And wheel upon her ball:

High upon

Bacchus' lordly brow

Our diadem shall shine;

And Joy, we'll crown her for his queen,

Their capital the Rhine.

In Heidelberg's huge tun shall sit
The Council of our State,
And on our own Johannisberg
The Senate shall debate.
Amid the vines of Burgundy
Our Cabinet shall reign;
Our Lords and faithful Commons' House
Assemble in Champagne.

Only the Cabinet of Constantinople could set itself, with any good grace, against such a reform.

"There is (says the author) in the church-yard, an epitaph in the form of a bill of exchange for a certain quantity of salvation, drawn on and accepted by the Messiah, in favour of the merchant who is buried below, and payable in heaven, at the day of judgment."

11.-Narrative of a Pedestrian Journey through Russia and Siberian Tartary, from the Frontiers of China to the Frozen Sea and Kamschatka; performed during the years 1820, 21, 22, and 23. By Capt. John Dundas Cochrane, R. N.

Captain Cochrane is the son of the well-known Mr. Cochrane Johnson, and consequently the nephew of Admiral, and of the Hon. Basil, and the cousin of Lord Cochrane.

In 1820, when as a commander in the Royal Navy, he had nothing to employ his time, and evidently partaking of a portion of that spirit of oddity and enterprise so strongly and variously developed in his family, he offered his services to the Admiralty to explore that grave of European endeavour, the interior of Africa. This offer not being accepted, he turned his attention towards Russia, and, having previously wandered

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over France, Spain and Portugal, determined to walk from Europe into Asia, and thence into America by its northern limits!" a journey of many thousand miles, and over a country considered as next to impassable.' How much of this stupendous undertaking was accomplished, and by what means, will appear in the sequel; but we shall, perhaps, startle the public at the outset, when we quote from the Preface the following general statement of the author

"I frequently walked, and as frequently rode, and was thus enabled to go over a vast extent of country in a short time; and such is the kind disposition of the Russian character towards a stranger, as evinced in my case, that I feel convinced that, by studying their manners and customs, partaking of their amusements, shewing respect to their religion, and other

wise

He says elsewhere," I was not, however, the less convinced of the practicability of my plan: but finding that a young commander like myself was not ed to undertake a journey, varying only likely to be employed afloat, I determinthe object and the scene to that of the unfortunate Ledyard, viz. to travel round the globe, as nearly as can be done by America, at Behring's Straits; I also land, crossing from Northern Asia to determined to perform the journey on foot, for the best of all possible reasons, that my finances allowed of no other. of absence, and prepared to traverse the I accordingly procured two years' leave continents of Europe, Asia, and America.”

wise conforming to their rude notions, the Empire of Russia may be traversed by a foreigner in every direction, with much convenience, plenty of food, good lodgings, and even suitable raiment, without molestation, and this for so inconsiderable a sum, that to name it were to challenge disbelief. I shall, therefore, only state that the expenses of my journey from Moscow to Irkutsk (by the route I went six thousand miles,) certainly fell short of a guinea."

Trying to get to Memel in a fisherman's boat, together with a young recruit, they were beset with ice, and Capt. C. relates

"In this exigency, to give more room, the young recruit and I were obliged to quit. He, poor fellow! had been enjoying a sound sleep, wrapped up in great coats; to him, therefore, this reverse seemed severer than to me. For myself, I felt aware of the impropriety of resuming our journey at that hour, hungry and fatigued as we were. But what was to be done? Return I would not, although a village was within two miles of us; yet to proceed was impossible, from our ignorance of the way, and the darkness of the night. We were also quite destitute of bread, tobacco, or schnaps, and my knapsack was in charge of the young Saxon, who had agreed to take it to Memel for me. I felt as if completely undone. Putting, however, a good face upon it, I took off my shoes, hat and jacket, and taking a spare flannel waistcoat and drawers, which I had fortunately retained in a bundle with a dry pair of worsted stockings, with this I made myself a bed, putting my

feet into my hat, and pointing them towards the wind, and my shoes under my head for a pillow: then lying down and drawing my jacket over my shoulders, I slept very soundly; although, upon awaking next morning, I was both wet and stiff; but after taking some strong exercise backwards and forwards, I recovered the use of my limbs and my health."

On the road to Yedrova, I received two roubles as charity from the master of a posthouse, from whom also I had received refreshment gratis. I had declined the money, and, as I thought, with success, but on my arrival at the next station, found it in my cap: this is, indeed, real benevolence."

And at Pogost, "Being too jaded to proceed farther, I thought myself fortunate in being able to pass the night in a cask."

Capt. C. rapidly crossed France and Prussia; and at Petersburgh was furnished with documents, by the liberality of the government, to protect him in travelling, forward his views, and, in case of need, replenish his purse. He accordingly set out on the 24th of May; and his first memorabilia. were of bad omen, for he witnessed the destruction of the Emperor's magnificent summer palace, at Tzarsko Selo, by fire; and his next adventure was still more immediately and personally distressing. We will put it in his own words:

"I passed the night in the cottage of a farmer, resigning myself to the attacks and annoyance of such vermin as generally haunt impoverished dwellings. I was proportionably pleased in the morning to pursue my journey. My route was towards Liebane, at

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