ever, that he had got into bed, having once more spelt over the note in question, he felt as despondent as ever, and thought that Huckaback had not known what he had been talking about. He also adverted to an apparently careless allusion by Huckaback to the injuries which had been inflicted upon him by Titmouse on the Wednesday night: and which, by the way, Huckaback determined it should be no fault of his if Titmouse easily forgot! He hardly knew why-but he disliked this particularly. - Whom had he, however, in the world, but Huckaback? In company with him alone, Titmouse felt that his pent-up feelings could discharge themselves. Huckaback had certainly a wonderfulknack of keeping up Titmouse's spirits, whatever cause he fancied he might really have for depression. In short, he longed for the Sunday morningushering in a day of rest and sympathy. Titmouse would indeed then have to look back upon an agitating and miserable week, what with the dismal upsetting of his hopes, in the manner I have described, and the tyrannical treatment he experienced at Dowlas and Co.'s. Mr Tag-rag began, at length, in some degree, to relax his active exertions against Titmouse, simply because of the trouble it gave him to keep them up. He attributed the pallid cheek and depressed manner of Titmouse entirely to the discipline which had been inflicted upon him at the shop, and was gratified at perceiving that all his other young men seemed, especially in his presence, to have imbibed his hatred of Titmouse. What produced in Tag-rag this hatred of Titmouse? Simply what had taken place on the Monday. Mr Tag-rag's dignity and power had been doggedly set at nought by one of his shopmen, who had since refused to make the least submission, or offer any kind of apology. Such conduct struck at the root of subordination in his establishment. Again, there is perhaps nothing in the world so calculated to enrage a petty and vulgar mind to the highest pitch of malignity, as the calm persevering defiance of an inferior, whom it strives to despise, while it is only hating, which it at the same time feels to be the case. Tag-rag now and then looked towards Titmouse, as he stood behind the counter, as if he could have murdered

him. Titmouse attempted once or twice, during the week, to obtain a situation elsewhere, but in vain. He could expect no character from Tagrag; and when the 10th of August should have arrived, what was to become of him? These were the kind of thoughts often passing through his mind during the Sunday, which he and Huckaback spent together in unceasing conversation on the one absorbing event of the last week. Titmouse, poor puppy, had dressed himself with just as much care as usual; but as he was giving the finishing touches at his toilet, pumping up grievous sighs every half minute, the sum of his reflections might be stated in the miserable significance of a quaint saying of Poor Richard's,"How hard is it to make an empty sack stand upright!"

Although the sun shone as vividly and beautifully as on the preceding Sunday, to Titmouse's saddened eye there seemed a sort of gloom every where. Up and down the Park he and Huckaback walked, towards the close of the afternoon; but Titmouse had not so elastic a strut as before. He felt empty and sinking. Every body seemed to know what a sad pretender he was: and they quitted the magic circle much earlier than had been usual with Titmouse. What with the fatigue of a long day's saunter, the vexation of having had but a hasty, inferior, and unrefreshing meal, which did not deserve the name of dinner, and their unpleasant thoughts, both seemed depressed as they walked along the streets. At length they arrived at the open doors of a gloomylooking building, into which two or three sad and were entering.

paces past the

prim-looking people After walking a few door-"D'ye know, Huck," said Titmouse, stopping, "I've often thought that-thatthere's something in Religion."

"To be sure there is, for those that like it-who doubts it? It's all very well in its place, no doubt," replied Huckaback, with much surprise, which increased, as he felt himself slowly being swayed round towards the building in question. "Well, but what of that?"

"Oh, nothing; but-hem! hem!" replied Titmouse, sinking his voice to a whisper-" a touch of religionwould not be so much amiss, just now.

I feel uncommon inclined that way, somehow."

"Religion's all very well for them that has much to be thankful for; but devil take me! what have either you or me to be"

"But, Huck-how do you know but we might get something to be thankful for, by praying-I've often heard of great things; Come."

Huckaback stood for a moment irresolute, twirling about his cane, and looking rather distastefully towards the dingy building. "To be sure," said he, faintly. Titmouse drew him nearer; but he suddenly started back. -"No! oh, 'tis only a meeting-house, Tit! Curse Dissenters, how I hate 'em! No-I won't pray in a meetinghouse, let me be bad as I may. Give me a regular-like, respectable church, with a proper steeple, and parson, and prayers, and all that."

Titmouse secretly acknowledged the force of these observations; and the intelligent and piously disposed couple, with perhaps a just, but certainly a somewhat sudden regard for orthodoxy, were not long before they had found their way into a church where evening service was being performed. They ascended the gallery stair; and seeing no reason to be ashamed of being at church, down they both went, with loud clattering steps and a bold air, into the very central seat in the front of the gallery, which happened to be vacant. Titmouse paid a most exemplary attention to what was going on, kneeling,

sitting, and standing with exact pro priety, in the proper places; joining audibly in the responses, and keeping his eyes pretty steadily on the prayerbook, which he found lying there. He even rebuked Huckaback for whispering (during one of the most solemn parts of the service) that "there was a pretty gal in the next pew!"-Не thought that the clergyman was an uncommon fine preacher, and said some things that he must have meant for him, Titmouse, in particular.

"Curse me, Hucky!" said he heatedly, as soon as they quitted the church, and were fairly in the street

"Curse me if-if-ever I felt so comfortable-like in my mind before, as I do now-I'll go next Sunday again."

" Lord, Tit, you don't really mean -it's deuced dull."

"Hang me if I don't, though! and if any thing should come of it if I do but get the estate-(I wonder now, where Mr Gammon goes to church. I should like to know! - I'd go there regularly) - But if I do get the thing - you see if I don't."

"Ah, I don't know; it's not much use praying for money, Tit; I've tried it myself, once or twice, but it didn't answer."

"I'll take my oath you was staring at the gals all the while, Hucky!"

"Ah, Titty!" Huckaback winked his eye, and put the tip of his forefinger to the tip of his nose, and laughed.

IT would be thought strange indeed, if there should exist a large-a memorable section of history, traversed by many a scholar with various objects, reviewed by many a reader in a spirit of anxious scrutiny, and yet to this hour misunderstood; erroneously appreciated; its tendencies mistaken, and its whole meaning, import, value, not so much inadequately-as falsely, ignorantly, perversely - deciphered. Prima facie, one would pronounce this impossible. Nevertheless it is a truth; and it is a solemn truth; and what gives to it this solemnity is the mysterious meaning, the obscure hint of a still profounder meaning in the background, which begins to dawn upon the eye when first piercing the darkness now resting on the subject. Perhaps no one arc or segment, detached from the total cycle of human records, promises so much beforehand-somuch instruction, so much gratification to curiosity, so much splendour, so much depth of interest, as the great period -the systole and diastole, flux and reflux of the Western Roman Empire. Its parentage was magnificent and Titanic. It was a birth out of the death-struggles of the colossal republic: its foundations were laid by that sublime dictator, "the foremost man of all this world," who was unquestionably for comprehensive talents the Lucifer, the Protagonist of all antiquity. Its range, the compass of its extent, was appalling to the imagination. Coming last amongst what are called the great monarchies of Prophecy, it was the only one which realized in perfection the idea of a monarchia, being (except for Parthia and the great fable of India beyond it) strictly coincident with ή οικουμένη, or the civilized world. Civilisation and this empire were commensurate: they were interchangeable ideas, and co-extensive. Finally, the path of this great Empire, through its arch of progress, synchronised with that of Christianity: the ascending orbit of each was pretty nearly the same, and traversed the same series of generations. These elements, in combination seemed to promise a succession of golden harvests: from the specular station of the

Augustan age, the eye caught glimpses by anticipation of some glorious El Dorado for human hopes. What was the practical result for our historic experience? nce? Answer - A sterile Zaarrah. Prelibations, as of some heavenly vintage, were inhaled by the Virgils of the day looking forward in the spirit of prophetic rapture; whilst in the very sadness of truth, from that age forwards the Roman world drank from stagnant marshes. A Paradise of roses was prefigured: a wilderness of thorns was found.

Even this fact has been missed even the bare fact has been overlooked; much more the causes, the principles, the philosophy of this fact. The rapid barbarism which closed in behind Cæsar's chariot wheels, has been hid by the pomp and equipage of the imperial Court. The vast power and domination of the Roman empire, for the three centuries which followed the battle of Actium, have dazzled the historic eye, and have had the usual re-action on the power of vision: a dazzled eye is always left in a condition of darkness. The battle of Actium was followed by the final conquest of Egypt. That conquest rounded and integrated the glorious empire: it was now circular as a shield-orbicular as the disk of a planet: the great Julian arch was now locked into the cohesion of granite by its last key-stone. From that day forward, for three hundred years, there was silence in the world: no muttering was heard: no eye winked beneath the wing. Winds of hostility might still rave at intervals: but it was on the outside of the mighty empire: it was at a dream-like distance; and, like the storms that beat against some monumental castle, "and at the doors and windows seem to call," they rather irritated and vivified the sense of security than at all disturbed its luxurious lull.

That seemed to all men the consummation of political wisdom the ultimate object of all strife-the very euthanasy of war. Except on some fabulous frontier, armies seemed gay pageants of the Roman rank rather than necessary bulwarks of the Roman power: spear and shield were idle trophies of the past: "the trumpet spoke not to the alarmed throng." Hush, ye palpitations of Rome! was the cry of the superb Aurelian, from his far-off pavilion in the deserts of the Euphrates-Hush, fluttering heart of the eternal city! Fall back into slumber, ye wars, and rumours of wars! Turn upon your couches of down, ye children of Romulus-sink back into your voluptuous repose: We, your almighty armies, have chased into darkness those phantoms that had broken your dreams. We have chased, we have besieged, we have crucified, we have slain. "Nihil est, Romulei Quirites, quod timere possitis. Ego efficiam ne sit aliqua solicitudo Romana. Vacate ludis-vacate circensibus. Nos publicæ necessitates teneant: vos occupent voluptates."-Did ever Siren warble so dulcet a song to ears already prepossessed and medicated with spells of Circean effeminacy?

But in this world all things re-act: and the very extremity of any force is the seed and nucleus of a counteragency. You might have thought it as easy (in the words of Shakspeare) to "Wound the loud winds, or with bemock'd-at stabs

Kill the still-closing waters,"

as to violate the majesty of the imperial eagle, or to ruffle "one dowle that's in his plume." But luxurious ease is the surest harbinger of pain; and the dead lulls of tropical seas are the immediate forerunners of tornadoes. The more absolute was the security obtained by Cæsar for his people, the more inevitable was his own ruin. Scarcely had Aurelian sung his requiem to the agitations of Rome, before a requiem was sung by his assassins to his own warlike spirit. Scarcely had Probus, another Aurelian, proclaimed the eternity of peace, and, by way of attesting his own martial supremacy, had commanded "that the brazen throat of war should cease to roar," when the trumpets of the

four winds proclaimed his own death by murder. Not as any thing extraordinary; for, in fact, violent deathdeath by assassination-was the regular portal (the porta Libitina, or funeral gate,) through which the Cæsars passed out of this world; and to die in their beds was the very rare exception to that stern rule of fate. Not, therefore, as in itself at all noticeable, but because this particular murder of Probus stands scenically contrasted with the great vision of Peace, which he fancied as lying in clear revelation before him, permit us, before we proceed with our argument, to rehearse his golden promises. The sabres were already unsheathed, the shirtsleeves were already pushed up from those murderous hands, which were to lacerate his throat, and to pierce his heart, when he ascended the Pisgah from which he descried the Saturnian ages to succeed :-" Brevi," said he, "milites non necessarios habebimus. Romanus jam miles erit nullus. Omnia possidebimus. Respublica orbis terrarum, ubique secura, non arma fabricabit. Boves habebuntur aratro: equus nascetur ad pacem. Nulla erunt bella : nulla captivitas. Ubique pax: ubique Romanæ leges: ubique judices nostri." The historian himself, tame and creeping as he is in his ordinary style, warms in sympathy with the Emperor: his diction blazes up into a sudden explosion of prophetic grandeur: and he adopts all the views of Cæsar. "Nonne omnes barbaras nationes subjecerat pedibus?" he demands with lyrical tumult: and then, while confessing the immediate disappointment of his hopes, thus repeats the great elements of the public felicity whenever they should be realised by a Cæsar equally martial for others, but more fortunate for himself: " Æternos thesauros haberet Romana respublica. Nihil expenderetur à principe; nihil à possessore redderetur. Aurcum profecto seculum promittebat. Nulla futura erant castra: nusquam lituus audiendus : arma non erant fabricanda, Populus iste militantium, qui nunc bellis civilibus Rempublicam vexat" aye! how was that to be absorbed? How would that vast crowd of halfpay emeriti employ itself? "Araret: studiis incumberet: erudiretur artibus: navigaret." And he closes his prophetic raptures thus: "Adde quod nullus occideretur in bello. Dii boni! quid tandem vos offenderet Respublica Romana, cui talem principem sustulistis?"

Even in his lamentations, it is clear that he mourns as for a blessing delayed-not finally denied. The land of promise still lay, as before, in steady vision below his feet; only that it waited for some happier Augustus, who, in the great lottery of Cæsarian destinies, might happen to draw the rare prize of a prosperous reign not prematurely blighted by the assassin; with whose purple alourgis might mingle no fasciæ of crape-with whose imperial laurels might entwine no ominous cypress. The hope of a millennial armistice, of an eternal rest for the earth, was not dead: once again only, and for a time, it was sleeping in abeyance and expectation. That blessing, that millennial blessing, it seems, might be the gift of Imperial Rome.

II.-Well: and why not? the reader demands. What have we to say against it? This Cæsar, or that historian, may have carried his views a little too far, or too prematurely; yet, after all, the very enormity of what they promised must be held to argue the enormity of what had been accomplished. To give any plausibility to a scheme of perpetual peace, war must already have become rare, and must have been banished to a prodigious distance. It was no longer the hearths and the altars, home and religious worship, which quaked under the tumults of war. It was the purse which suffered--the exchequer of the state; secondly, the exchequer of each individual; thirdly, and in the end, the interests of agriculture, of commerce, of navigation. This is what the historian indicates, in promising his brother Romans that "omnia possidebimus:" by which, perhaps, he did not mean to lay the stress on "omnia," as if, in addition to their own property, they were to have that of alien or frontier nations,

but (laying the stress on the word possidebimus) meant to say, with re. gard to property already their own"We shall no longer hold it as jointproprietors with the state, and as liable to fluctuating taxation, but shall henceforwards possess it in absolute exclusive property." This is what he indicates in saying-Boves habebuntur aratro: that is, the oxen, one and all available for the plough, shall no longer be open to the everlasting claims of the public frumentarii for conveying supplies to the frontier armies. This is what he indicates in saying of the individual liable to military service that he should no longer live to slay or to be slain, for barren bloodshed or violence, but that henceforth "araret," or "navigaret." All these passages, by pointing the expectations emphatically to benefits of purse exonerated, and industry emancipated, sufficiently argue the class of interests which then suffered by war: that it was the interests of private property, of agricultural improvement, of commercial industry, upon which exclusively fell the evils of a belligerent state under the Roman empire: and there already lies a mighty blessing achieved for social existence -when sleep is made sacred, and thresholds secure; when the temple of human life is safe, and the temple of female honour is hallowed. These great interests, it is admitted, were sheltered under the mighty dome of the Roman empire: that is already an advance made towards the highest civilisation: and this is not shaken because a particular emperor should be extravagant, or a particular historian romantic.

No, certainly: but stop a moment at this point. Civilisation, to the extent of security for life, and the primal rights of man, necessarily grows out of every strong government. And it follows also that, as this government widens its sphere-as it pushes back its frontiers, ultra et Garamantas et Indos, in that proportion will the danger diminish (for in fact the possibility diminishes) of foreign incursions. The sense of permanent security from conquest, or from the inroad of marauders, must of course have been prodigiously increased when the nearest standing enemy of Rome was beyond the Tigris and the Inn-as compared with those times when Carthage, Spain,