prised that the young man should have ventured to trust himself in his company, for I should not like to meet his fellow on the road by myself even in the day-time. Well: the Englishman's money, a good round sum,-they say, two hundred napoleons d'or,-was paid him by an order on our bankers; and then they set out, but not as before.

"They had only been two days in company, when the villainous Italian, who either did not know the road over the mountains, or had purposely gone out of the way, thought it a good opportunity of perpetrating an act, no doubt long planned, which was neither more nor less than despatching his master. It was a solitary place, and a fit one for a deed of blood. A narrow path had been worn in the side of a precipice, which yawned to the depth of several hundred feet over a torrent that rushed, as though impatient of being confined, foaming and boiling through a narrow chasm opened for itself through the rocks. I could show you the spot, for I know it well, having a right of commune on the mountains; and have often driven my cows, after the melting of the snows, up the pass, to feed on the herbage that, mixed with heath and rhododendrons, forms a thick carpet under foot. It is a pasture that makes excellent cheese.

66

But, solitary as the place looks, the Italian did not know that there are several chalets, mine among the rest, in the Alp; and herdsmen. As for me, I happened to be down in the plain, or I might have been an eye-witness of much of what I am about to describe. I was saying that the spot seemed to suit his purpose; and his impatience to ease his master of his gold was such, that, happily for the ends of justice, he could not wait till night-fall, or none but (and here he pointed to the sky) He above might have been privy to the crime. It was, however, mid-day. Into the deep-worn pass I have mentioned runs a rivulet, which, sparkling on the green bank, had made for itself a little basin. The day was hot and sultry; and the young gentleman, tempted, it would seem, by the gentle murmur of the water as it fell rippling over the turf, and its crystal brightness, stooped down to drink. The Italian watched this opportunity, sprung upon him like a tiger, and plunged a dagger, which he always carried concealed about him, into the Englishman's back. Fortunately,however, the point hit upon the belt in which he carried his money, perhaps on the napoleons; for, before the assassin could give him a second blow, he sprang up and screamed for help, calling Murder, murder!'

"Three of the herdsmen whom I have mentioned heard the cries, and came running towards the direction whence they proceeded, when they discovered two men struggling with each other; but, before they could reach them, one had fallen, and the other was in the act of rifling him, in order afterwards to hurl him down the precipice into the bed of the river. So intent was he on the former of these occupations, that he did not perceive my countrymen till they seized him. He made much resistance; but his dagger was not within his reach. They bound his hands, and, together with the lifeless corpse of his master, transported him to Coire, where, not to enter into the trial, he was condemned to death.

"But he has been now some weeks in prison, in consequence of our not being able to procure a bourreau; and we have been forced to send for one to Bellinzona, no Grison being willing to perform the

office. He arrived last night; and how do you think, sir? According to our laws, he is to be executed with a sword that has not been used for forty years, no murder having been committed in the canton during all that period,-though no sword could be applied to better purpose than it will in a few moments."

Whilst he was thus speaking, we reached the dense circle already formed. On seeing a stranger approach, they made room for me; and curiosity to witness this mode of execution, the remnant of barbarous times, as well as to see the Italian, induced me to enter the Place de Grève.

At the first glance I recognised Mascalbruni. He was stripped of his shirt, and on his knees; by his side was a Jesuit to whom he had just made his confession; and over him, on an elevation from the ground by means of a large stone, stood the prevôt, with a sword of prodigious length and antique shape, and covered with the rust of ages, pendent in his hands.

The lower part of Mascalbruni's face was fallen, whilst all above the mouth was drawn upward as from some powerful convulsion. The eyes, that used to bear the semblance of living coals, had in them a concentrated and sullen gloom. The cold and damp of the cell, and the scantiness of his diet, which consisted of bread and water, had worn his cheek to the bone, and given it the sallowness of one in the black stage of cholera. His face was covered with a thick beard, every hair of which stood distinct from its fellows; and his matted locks, thickly sprinkled with grey, trailed over his ghastly features and neck in wild disorder. His shoulders down to the waist were, as I said, bare; and they and his arms displayed anatomically a muscular strength that might have served as a model for a gladiator. Over all was thrown an air of utter prostration moral and physical, -the desolation of despair.

A few yards to the right, the priest, with his eyes uplifted to heaven, seemed absorbed in prayer; and between them the bourreau, who might have superseded Tristan in his office, and been a dangerous rival in the good graces of Louis the Eleventh. He called to mind a figure of Rubens',-not the one who is turning round in the Descent of the Cross at Antwerp, and saying to the thief, writhing in horrible contortions after he has wrenched his lacerated foot from the nail, "Sacre, chien,"--but a soldier in another of his pictures in the Gallery at Brussels (the representation of some martyrdom,) who has just torn off the ear of the saint with a pair of red-hot pincers, and is eyeing it with a savage complacency.

It was, in short, exactly such a group, with its pyramidical form and startling contrasts of colour and expression, as the great Flemish painter could have desired.

A dead silence, which the natural horror, the novelty of the scene created, prevailed among the assembled crowd; and it spoke well for the morality and good feeling of the simple peasantry, that not a woman was present on the occasion.

The hand of the swordsman was raised, and the stroke fell on the neck of the culprit; but, horrible to say,-what was it then to witness?-though given with no common vigour, so blunt was the instrument, that, instead of severing the head, it only inflicted a gash which divided the tendons of the neck, and the undecapitated body

fell doubled up, whilst only a few gouts of blood issued from the wound.

The tortured wretch's groans and exclamations found an echo in all bosoms; and it was not till after two more sabre strokes that the head lay apart, and rolled upwards in the dust. I then saw what I have heard described of Charlotte Cordé, after she had been guillotined; the muscles of the face were convulsed as if with sensibility, and the eyes glared with horrid meaning, as though the soul yet lingered there. Even the executioner could scarcely meet their scowl without shuddering.

It was the first and last spectacle of this kind at which I mean ever to be present; and I should not have awaited its awful termination, could I have penetrated through the living wall that was a barrier to my exit.

You may now guess from whom I obtained many of the details contained in this memoir of Mascalbruni. It was from the confessor, who had endeavoured, but in vain, to give him spiritual consolation in the dungeon and at the block. The Jesuit and myself had mutual revelations to make to each other, connecting the present with the past, and which have enabled me to weave the dark tissue of his life's thread into one piece. I repeat the last words of the good old man at our final interview,-" May God have mercy on his soul !” F. MEDWIN.

SMOKE.

"A trifle light as air."

SWIFT sang a broomstick, and with matchless lore
Rehearsed the contents of a housemaid's drawer;
Great Burns's genius shone sublime in lice;
Old Homer epicised on frogs and mice;
And, leaping from his swift Pindaric car,
Great Byron eulogised the light cigar;
Pope for a moment left the critic's chair,
And sang the breezy fan that cools the fair;
And he whose harp to loftiest notes was strung,
E'en Mantua's Swan, the homely salad sung;
Colossal Johnson, famed for dictionary,
A sprig of myrtle; Cowper, a canary,

Nor scorn'd the humble snail; and Goldsmith's lyre

A haunch of venison nobly did inspire;

Of such light themes the loftiest lyres have spoke,

And my small shell shall sound the praise of smoke.

Essence sublime! serenely curling vapour !
Fierce from a steam-boat, gentle from a taper,-
Daughter of fire, descendant of the sun,
Breath of the peaceful pipe and murderous gun,--
How gloriously thou roll'st from chimneys high,
To seek companion clouds amidst the sky!

Thrice welcome art thou to the traveller's sight,
And his heart hails thee with sincere delight;
As soft thou sail'st amid the ethereal blue,
Visions of supper float before his view!
Emblem of peace in council, when profound
The sacred calumet goes slowly round!
Breath of the war, thou canopiest the fight,
And veil'st the bloody field in murky night!
Precursor of the cannon's deadly shot,
And soft adorner of the peasant's cot;
With Etna's roaring flames dost thou arise,
And from the altar's top perfume the skies!
I see thee now

To the breezes bow,

Thy spiral columns lightly bending
In gentle whirls

And graceful curls,

Thy soft grey form with the azure blending.
When Nature's tears in dewy showers descend,
Close to the earth thine aerial form doth bend;
But when in light
And beauty bright,

With radiant smile she gladdens all,

And the sun's soft beam

On thy shadowy stream

Does in a ray of glory fall,
Thou risest high

'Mid the deep blue sky,

Like a silver shaft from a fairy hall!

When from the light cigar thy sweet perfume
In od'rous cloudlets hovers round the room,
Inspired by Fancy's castle-building power,
Thy fragile form cheers many a lonely hour.
O'er every wave thy misty flag is seen
Careering lightly over billows green;

And when, 'mid creaming foam and sparkling spray,
Celestial Venus rose upon the day,

Thy vapoury wreath the goddess did enshroud,
And wrapt her beauties in a milk-white cloud.
'Twas thou, majestic! led the way before
Retreating Israel from th' Egyptian shore;
From out thy sable cloud, 'mid lightning's flash,
The trumpet's clangour and the thunder's crash,
From Sinai's mount the law divine was given,
Thy veil conceal'd the Majesty of Heaven!

When sun, and moon, and heaven's bright hosts expire,
And the great globe decays in flames of fire,
Then shalt thou rise, thy banner be unfurl'd
Above the smouldering ruins of the world!

SNODGRASS.

SOME PASSAGES IN THE LIFE OF

A DISAPPOINTED MAN.

WITH AN ILLUSTRATION BY GEORGE CRUIKSHANK.

ARE you a sympathetic reader? If not, I pray you to pass over the few pages which constitute this article, and indulge your risible propensity with the happier effusions of the laughing philosophers of this Miscellany. I have no cachinnatory ambition, and would have my leaves well watered, not with the sunny drops of joy, but with the camomilical outpourings of sorrow.

Concluding that my request is granted, I will now proceed, symeventful pathetic reader, to narrate a few passages of my “strange, history."

I am a disappointed man,-nay, I was even a disappointed baby; for it was calculated that the parental anticipations of my forebears would have been realised on the 1st of May 1792, whereas, by some contradictory vagary of Dame Nature, I entered this valley of tears on the 1st of April! This ought to have been considered prognosticatory of my future disappointments, and the law of Sparta should have been rigidly enforced; for what are crooked limbs to a crooked destiny?

It was the intention of my father (whose name was Jacob Wise) to have had me christened after my maternal uncle, Theodosius Otter, Esq.; but, having selected a stuttering godfather, I was unfortunately baptized as "The-odd-dose-us Oth-er Wise." Nor was this the only disappointment which attended me on this occasion, for the pew-opener having received instructions to clean the copper coalscuttle in the vestry-room, the basin which contained the vitriol necessary for that purpose was by some means or other placed in the font; and to this day I have more the appearance of a tattooed Indian than a Christian Englishman.

My babyhood was composed of a series of disappointments. My hair was to have been, in the words of the monthly nurse, "the most beautifulest horburn," but sprouted forth a splendid specimen of that vegetable dye called carroty. I was to have been "as straight as an arrow;" but a cup of tea having been spilled over me as I lay in the servant's lap before the kitchen fire, I became so dreadfully warped that I am now a sort of demi-parenthesis, or, as a malicious punster once called me, "a perfect bow."

I had the measles very mildly, as it was affirmed, for the whole virulence of the disorder displayed itself in one enormous pustule on the tip of my nose. This luminary so excited my infant wonder, that my eyes (really fine for green) were continually riveted to the spot, and have never forgotten it, for one or other of them is invariably engaged in searching for the lost treasure.

I was not in convulsions above a dozen times during teething; but no sooner had I completed my chaplet of pearls, than the strikingweight of a Dutch clock which overhung my cradle dropped into my mouth, and convinced me of the extreme simplicity of dental surgery.

My "going alone" was the source of an infinitude of anxieties to my excellent mamma, who was so magnificently proportioned that it