ti, took him each by an arm, led him to a seat immediately in front of the stage, and placed themselves one at each side of him.

Scarcely were they seated, when Signor Formica appeared on the stage as Pasquarello!

"Formica -reprobate !" shrieked Signor Pasquale, starting up and clenching his fist at the player.

Toricelli and Cavalcanti drew him down into his seat, and with grave looks admonished him to silence.

Pasquarello sobbed, wept, cursed the malice of fate, that heaped nothing but affliction and woe on his head, protested he had cried so much that he did not know if he should ever again be able to bring his face into the proper position for laughing, and finally declared that he would cut his throat on the spot, only that he always fainted at the sight of blood, or that he would presently drown himself in the Tiber, did he not know that, once in the water, he should never be able to prevent himself from swimming.

Doctor Graziano now entered, and, with looks of great concern, demanded the cause of Pasquarello's grief.

Pasquarello asked, in his turn, if the signor dottore, then, did not know what had happened in the house of his, Pasquarello's, master, Signor Pasquale Capuzzi?-if the signor dottore did not know that a villain had carried off that worthy gentleman's niece, the fair Mariana?

"Aha! Signor Formica," murmured Capuzzi; "I see how it is! you want to clear yourself in my eyes-to get into favour with me again. Well, we shall see, we shall see.'

Doctor Graziano expressed his sympathy, and remarked that the villain must have managed matters very slily, to baffle all Signor Capuzzi's efforts to get a clue to his retreat.

"Ho ho!" cried Pasquarello: "the signor dottore will err egregiously if he imagines that the rogue Antonio Scacciati has been able to escape the pursuit of a gentleman so wide awake, and so powerfully befriended, as Signor Pasquale Capuzzi. No, sapient sir! Antonio has been taken up, his marriage with Mariana declared null and void, and the lady restored to the arms of her afflicted uncle."

"Has he got her back?" cried Capuzzi, starting up from his seat in an ecstacy: "the good Pasquale! has he VOL. XXVIII, No. 165.

got back his dove, his Mariana? And is the rogue Antonio taken up? O blessed Formica!"

I

"You take too lively an interest in the representation, Signor Pasquale," said Cavalcanti, in a serious tone. must pray you, good sir, to let the players speak without interruption, which is calculated to confuse them in their parts."

Signor Pasquale sat down, looking -and, indeed, feeling-very much ashamed.

"Well," said Graziano, "and what happened next in your master's house?"

"A wedding," answered Pasquarello; "a wedding happened next. Mariána repented of her wilfulnessSignor Pasquale obtained the long wished for dispensation from the holy father and, out of the old gentleman and the young lady, was made a middle aged pair!"

Ŏ heavenly Formica!" murmured Pasquale Capuzzi to himself; "O blessed man, what things do you tell me!"

"Then every thing," observed Graziano, "is as it should be, and I don't see what there is to grieve about.”

Thereupon began Pasquarello to sob and to cry much more lamentably than before, and at last, as if overpowered with the excess of his grief, dropped to the ground in a dead faint.

Pas

Doctor Graziano ran about in consternation; upbraided destiny for having brought him out that morning without his smelling-bottle; searched, first in all his own pockets, then in Pasquarello's, and at length brought out a roast chesnut, which he clapped eagerly to the sufferer's nose. quarello came to himself, sneezing fearfully, and entreating Graziano to lay this unmannerliness to the account of his weak nerves, while the doctor, at every sneeze, made him a profound bow, and cried "Felicità !" to which Pasquarello responded with bows profounder still, and repeated exclamations of "Gran mercè signore !" As soon as these compliments were over, Pasquarello related how Mariana, immediately after her wedding, had fallen into the deepest melancholy, called incessantly on the name of Antonio, and testified a decided abhorrence and contempt for her husband. The latter, horribly jealous, and still more horribly fond, plagued her in the most unheard of way, and invented, every

Y

hour, some new insanity, to make her life intolerable. And now Pasquarello related a multitude of madman's tricks, as played by Signor Pasquale, and many of which were really told of him at Rome.

Capuzzi fidgeted on his seat during these exposures, and muttered, "Infernal Formica !-son of darkness!What demon speaks out of thee!" Only the consciousness that the eyes of the grave Toricelli, and the dignified Cavalcanti, were upon him, kept his wrath from an outbreak.

Pasquarello, in fine, declared that the ill-fated Mariana had at length sunk under the weight of her sorrows, and, in the blossom of her years, died of a broken heart.

At this moment the doleful tones of a De profundis were heard, and several figures, in long black mantles, entered, bearing an open coffin, in which the corpse of the fair Mariana was visible, arrayed in the habiliments of the grave. Pasquale Capuzzi, in deep mourning, was seen following the coffin, with faltering steps, weeping aloud and beating his breast, and crying in a voice of the profoundest despair, "O Mariana! Mariana !" The moment Capuzzi below beheld the of his niece, he broke out into the most grievous lamentations, and both Capuzzis, he on the stage, and he in the pit, wailed and cried in heartrending accents, "O Mariana! Mariana! my child! O, Mariana! Mariana!"

corpse

Picture now to thyself, reader, the open coffin, with the pale, still, young face, lovely even in death, that it disclosed-the sable-shrouded figures that stood, nothing of them visible but their eyes, around it; the dismal chorus of the de profundis, coming out in hollow and muffled tones from those unseen mouths; then the doctor and Pasquarello in their grotesque masks, testifying their grief by the most unimaginable grimaces and the strangest attitudes; and finally, the two Capuzzis wailing in the wildest despair! In truth, there was something ghastly in the effect, something which the spectators felt creeping coldly along their veins, and suddenly checking their laughter when at the loudest.

All at once the theatre darkened, a flash of lightning was seen, thunder rolled over head, and an awful form, wan, spectral, menacing, seemed to rise out of the ground, presenting features which Capuzzi recognized with

horror for those of his deceased brother, Pietro, the father of Mariana!

"Accursed Pasquale!" cried the phantom, in a sepulchral voice, fixing a terrible look on Capuzzi on the stage, and pointing to the open coffin; "to this hast thou brought the child I entrusted to thee? Despair, inhuman murderer! Beyond the grave-beyond the grave awaits thee the recompense of this damning deed !"

Capuzzi on the stage fell as if lightning had struck him, but in the same moment Capuzzi below sank senseless The from his seat to the ground. folding-doors closed, the theatre was vanished: Signor Pasquale lay in so deep a swoon, that he was not without difficulty brought back to consciousness. At length a deep sigh announced that sense was returned; he stretched out his hands, as if against some invisible object of dread, and cried in a smothered voice, "Off, Pietro off!-save me from him!heaven-save!" Then, as recollection returned more fully, tears burst from his eyes, and he began to sob and cry, Ah, Mariana! my sweet child! Ah, Mariana Mariana!"

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"Nay, Signor Pasquale," said Cavalcanti, "do not forget that your niece has died only a stage-death. She lives, my good sir, and is here at this moment, to implore your forgiveness for a giddy act, to which love -and I must say your own injudicious conduct also impelled her."

As he spoke, Mariana appeared, with Antonio at her side, and both fell at the feet of the old man.

"My uncle," cried Mariana weeping, "I will love you-I will honour you as a father; but you send me to my grave if you take my husband from

me!"

The most opposite feelings seemed to struggle for a moment in Signor Pasquale's breast, but his good genius. prevailed; he bent forward from the arm-chair in which he had been placed, he clasped Mariana in his arms, he raised her to her feet, he held out his hand to Antonio, and said with emotion

was mad, Antonio-indeed I was; you will consider that, and forgive me. God be praised! I am in my senses now. But where is Signor Formica? where is my worthy physician, that I may thank him a thousand times for the cure he has wrought on me? We have all three to thank Signor Formica."

Pasquarello came forward; Antonio grasped his hand, and exclaimed—

"Oh, Signor Formica, to whom I owe more than my life, throw off, I beseech you, this mask, and let me, at length, know a man whom I have so much reason to call my friend."

Pasquarello took off his cap, and the ingeniously contrived mask which, but for its grotesque caricature-like features, seemed a natural face, so completely did the great number of pieces of which it was composed obey the will of the wearer and behold! Formica-Pasquarello-was transformed into Salvator Rosa!

"Salvator!" cried Antonio-Mariana-Capuzzi-in the profoundest astonishment.

"Ay," said this extraordinary man : "Salvator Rosa it is, whom the Romans would recognize neither as painter nor as poet, yet who, without their knowing it, held them under his wand for more than a year, on the stage of Nicolo Musso's little miserable theatre, and never gained more rapturous plaudits from them than when scourging those very vices and follies which they were ready to crucify the same Salvator for laying a finger on, in his poems and his pictures! Yes, Antonio, my dearest fellow, it is Salvator Formica that has stood by you in your troubles."

"Salvator Rosa," began Capuzzi, as soon as he found voice, "true as it is that I have held you for my bitterest enemy, yet I have always honoured in you the great master; now, however now, I love you as my benefactor and my friend; and, in fact, I want you at this moment to befriend me.'

"Speak, my good Signor Pasquale," replied Salvator: "tell me how I can serve you."

The simper of former days, which had forsaken Capuzzi's face since the elopement of Mariana, now once more lighted up his features; he took Salvator's hand, and said in his old mellifluous way

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My good Signor Salvator, nobody has so much influence as you with my esteemed young relative, Antonio Scacciati; do ask him to let me live with him and my dear niece-I would say my dear daughter-Mariana, for the rest of my old days. And there's another thing, Signor Salvator-ask him not to be angry if I, now and then, just kiss the sweet child's little, white, darling hand. And one thing more, Signor Salvator-perhaps, perhaps he would at least on Sundays, when I go to mass-perhaps he would, Signor Salvator, just put my moustache a little in order. I protest to you, my best Signor, it is run quite wild since he and I disagreed, and there is not a man on this earth that understands the management of it so well as he."

Before Salvator, who could not repress a smile at the curious points in which he was requested to mediate between the uncle and nephew, had time to make any reply, Antonio and Mariana, affectionately embracing the old man, assured him that they would not believe him fully reconciled to them, nor, consequently, be in all respects happy, till they saw him occupying a father's place at their hearth and board: Antonio added that, not only every Sunday, but every day of the week, he would put Signor Pasquale's moustache into a trim that should send envy and despair into the hearts of all the gallants of Florence. At this promise the old man felt peace take possession of his soul, and bathed in the serenest sunshine of happiness, the evening prospect of life lay smiling before him.

IF an inhabitant of the moon took such an interest in the affairs of our planet as to read the newspapers, and attached as much interest to the little speck of it called Great Britain as we do, he must be struck with the comparatively small portion of their contents latterly occupied with Scotland. While perusing-if, indeed, even a Lunite could have patience for the taskthe Conciliation-Hall harangues, and the English County, or Covent Garden, League, or Protection speeches-he might fancy that Scotland had no Union with England, leading to the absenteeism of her nobility and gentry, nor any agricultural interests to be protected; and that, with the exception of the episode of Lord John Russell's letter from Edinburgh to his London constituents, and Macaulay's letter to Edinburgh, enlightening one of the baillies on the causes of his lordship's failure in the attempt to construct a ministry, -she was equally uninterested in the cabinet-making and cabinet-breaking exhibitions that, last Christmas and New Year's Day, cast into the shade the London Pantomimes. And yet there was a Union with Scotland, before that of Ireland;-warmly contested, firmly resisted, vigorously opposed by her clergy and people, upon grounds both religious and political; but when accomplished, and found to confer unhoped-for advantages, admitting Scotsmen to an equality with Englishmen, in the pursuit of wealth and fame in the wide-spread dependencies of

Britain throughout the globe, and leaving them at home in full possession of civil and religious freedom, it was quietly acquiesced in; nor did any selfish adventurer arise to traffic for its repeal for his own aggrandizement; nor would an educated, thinking, enlightened population have become his dupes, had such an one arisen. And extensive as is the commercial and manufacturing enterprize of Scotland, her agricultural interests are not less dear to her people; but instead of banding themselves together, as a separate, detached, and isolated interest, her landed proprietors and farmers have been devoting all the energies of cultivated minds, and all the resources of scientific skill, to make a soil, comparatively unproductive, teem with abundance; at once raising agriculture to the dignity of a science, and conquering by the power and skill of art, the sterility of nature, in order to the enjoyment of wealth, social comfort, and national prosperity.

Now, besides the general obligations of Britain and the world to the arms, and literature, and commercial enterprise of Scotland, Ireland has not a few, peculiar to herself. To Scotland it was mainly owing that Ulster-poorest of the provinces in soil, now most densely peopled; once as wild and uncivilized in her inhabitants, as rugged and uncultivated in her natural aspects-exhibits in cultivation, industry, comfort, and morals what Ireland may become; and were there but the

peaceful opportunity afforded, other parts would soon owe somewhat to Scottish intelligence and capital, as the factories testify which are now rising, under the auspices of Glasgow men, in Ballinasloe and other places in the " far west;" and therefore are we inclined to discourse a little with our "public" upon "Scotland; its faith and its features," as well as upon her farms and fisheries, the national characteristics of her people, her literature, and her prospective destinies.

Religion and literature are interwoven with the web of Scottish history, from its earliest times throughout, if we except those periods of internecival barbarism, which, of course, existed there as elsewhere, and which Milton says are no more worthy of being recorded than "the battles of kites and crows," and at every step the national impress was left upon them, that of perseverance. There is no feature in the Scottish national character that more strikes one who attentively studies it, than that of going through with any thing, in the face of difficulties to dismay, as well as of fascinations to allure

the will to stick to whatever has been deliberately undertaken, and, as far as may be, to exhaust it. Accordingly, at whatever time the peculiarities of Romanism superseded that pure form of Christianity which, in common with our own country, Scotland received in the apostolic age, and which, at Iona, so long survived the prostration of it in districts less remote, certain it is that in no part of Christendom was the pope's authority more firmly established.

The remains of abbeys and cathedrals, which still attract the tourist and the antiquarian, testify to the wealth that was so profusely lavished, there as elsewhere, upon the Church and her institutions; while the judgment displayed in the selection of their sites, and the skill and taste exhibited, in the elegance combined with massive solidity in the structures, amply shew-as Melrose, and Elgin, and Aberbrothock bear witness-that art enabled the opulent votaries of the dominant religion to carry into practical effect what their love and veneration prompted them to expend.

The Free Church movements, upon the original merits of which we here offer no opinion, though embracing as yet

a very brief space, afford living demonstration that the principle of entire and unreserved devotedness to what has once thoroughly taken possession of the judgment and affections of Scotsmen, flourishes in unimpaired and undiminished vigour. The relinquishment of kirks and manses rendered the erection of new ones necessary all over the country, not only in the large towns, but in the remote, rural districts; and this was required to be done at once and simultaneously, for the same thing had been done before progressively by the "secession," the "relief," and other bodies. And this has accordingly been done, for some six or seven hundred ministers and congregations; while the whole machinery of supporting them by a "sustentation fund," and of founding schools in connexion with themand of carying on missions to the Jews and among the heathen, by means of missionaries and agents, most of whom, at the time of the rupture, adhered to them not only goes on with uncurtailed resources, just as if no extraordinary call had been made upon their liberality at home, but the sums raised actually exceed what had formerly been contributed by the undivided Church. And besides all this, twenty men are found who subscribe as many thousand pounds for the erection of a free church college for the biblical and theological training of candidates for the ministry. The entire sum raised within so brief a period from that portion of the people of Scotland, seems more like what a nation's exchequer would expend upon some national enterprize, than the result of individual contributions from a section of the population of a comparatively small and poor portion of the empire.

The education of Scotland-what Bacon calls "the Georgics of the mind" has ever held a high place among the elements that have contributed to form the national character, and that more from the quality than the quantity that has been imparted to the lower classes. M'Crie, in his "Life of Melville," has given much information on the subject of the early literature of Scotland, from which it appears that the fondness for classical learning that prevailed in the age of Buchanan was but the continuation of the tastes of a preceding period, and which extended somewhat farther