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THE FEMALE OPIUM-EATER!

A ROMANTIC BALLAD.

I.

THERE was a noble lady as fair as fair could be,

And when she did whate'er she pleased, a gentle dame was she;
But when controll'd, her dark eye told of rage within restrain'd,
And she ceased to be a gentle dame-until her point was gain'd.
Her lover in the city dwelt, full three long leagues away;

Her uncle bade her spurn the youth-oh! how could she obey!
She nightly wept, she never slept; at length she thought she'd try
An opium draught, which ev'ry morn her page went forth to buy.

II.

"Why daily goes thy page to town?" her noble uncle cries;

"To seek the doctor's shop," says she," where opium draughts he buys." "What need hast thou of opium draughts?"—" I'd fain forget the past, And all my former foolishness is fading from me fast."

The uncle smiled, well pleased at this, and walk'd away content;

And unmolested to the town the page was daily sent;

And daily from the town he brought a bottle of small size;
His lady snatch'd it from his hand, and bore away the prize.

III.

She bore it to her secret bower, and then she turn'd the key,
And there were none her words to hear, and none her acts to see;
She daily round the bottle found a short sweet sentence traced,
She broke the seal, and then began unfolding it in haste,

And then she read with throbbing heart, (love's ardour never stops!)
Till she devoured the contents (the writing, not the drops):
And daily from her casement high the opium draughts did flow,
Till on a shelf stood fifty empty bottles in a row!

IV.

Upon that grim and ghastly row the lady's maid did gaze;
The footman to their hollowness a wondering glance did raise;
The page who saw them, simpering, said, “ Alas! 'tis pretty clear,
If she takes so much doctor's stuff, she will not long be here!"
Her uncle saw the bottles, too, and saw them with affright;
He counted them--he scarcely could believe he counted right!
"The dose too strong-thou'lt dose too long; at counsel do not scoff;
Some night, my dear, a drop too much may chance to take thee off!""

V.

Next morn the page went early forth along the well-known track,
And soon with the composing draught composedly rode back;
A doctor, (it was rumour'd,) muffled up, was by his side,
But one beneath the doctor's cloak a soldier's garb espied!
That night (by medical advice) the dame tried change of air!
This bulletin her uncle read next morning in despair-
"The dear departed owns your warning words were true enough,
By bottle number fifty-one your niece was taken off!”

T. H. B.

NOTES ON NATIONALITIES.

BY A TRAVELLER.

"I HATE the French," says the one-legged sailor of Goldsmith, "because they are slaves, and wear wooden shoes." This sentiment is not extravagantly portrayed, for there are a great many people whose patriotism is a horse of the same colour; and in these individuals I dare affirm the wooden shoes come in for a greater share of hatred than the slavery such a perversity governs the passions of men, that they seldom love or hate one another for the right reason. I know not whether Beranger had the above expression in view when he penned his ironical Anglomane, but the introductory couplet furnishes quite a pendant to Jack's unsophisticated antigallican speech

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Quoique leurs chapeaux soient bien laids,
G-d dam moi! j'aime les Anglais."

Which I propose to translate

John Bull you wear a shocking bad hat,
But, sacré I don't dislike you for that.

Leaving it very plain that he thinks it fair not to like a man who insconces his caput in a felt of outlandish proportions. Some of these antipathies have been conquered on both sides, but the two nations have their own modes of thinking still. All men were sent into the world for the same end, yet it seems they will think differently on points where one would suppose they were made to agree. We know that mankind differ, and we have a thousand ingenious reasons to account for these differences, but I am not aware that I recollect a satisfactory one.

Human nature, according to the oft-repeated maxim, is the same everywhere. Now general maxims I hold to be worth very little they are commonly either false or insignificant. It is true that all men have the same passions, but it is not true that they universally assume the same modes of operation, or lead to the same results, or exhibit the same moral phenomena in their progress and effects. It is a dangerous error to trust altogether to this crude principle in our calculations upon the conduct of men. When Augustine Iturbide returned to Mexico from his banishment, doubtless he expected the result would be an exact copy of Napoleon's return from Elba, on the strength of the popular maxim; but what was the consequence? Napoleon regained a throne, and Iturbide was shot for a runaway. Such are the miscalculations of those who confide in general maxims, and do not make proper distinctions.

Leaving this, however, for the moralist or the metaphysician to explain, I will only remark further, that let men differ as they will in their modes of thinking, they appear to be aiming at the same point,they all wish to think right. All nations, however rude or savage, have some idea of a quality which they praise under the name of virtue, goodness, justice, or the like, although their habits may exhibit some points which strike our eyes as contradictions to such an idea. The South African, who lives by plundering the flocks and herds of his neighbour, has certain notions of property which do not precisely tally with the code of laws in which we glory. A Caffre chief was once put to his catechism

by one of the missionaries. "What is the chief end of man?" asked the divine. "To steal cattle," was the ingenuous reply.

Now the honest missionary, who looked, I dare say, for some refined theological subtilty in answer to his query, was much shocked at this strange answer, and fell straightway into some very dismal surmises as to the morals of a people who made such an open profession of thieving;. yet do you think the Caffre might not be an upright man after his own fashion? In the matter of quadrupeds, to be sure, he is not a text for our handling, but in other respects he might be just, and veracious, and beneficent,-in short, an honest man, in spite of his kill-cow principles. It is equally clear that the French may be a good sort of people in spite of their wooden shoes. The anecdote perhaps is yet remembered of the Englishman in a coffee-house who refused to sit at the same table with his neighbour because he never ate mustard with his beef. This difference alone completely occupied his mind, and under the impression thus created, he looked upon the mustard-avoider as a being of a distinct species. The thing was natural: in comparing other people with ourselves, we are struck vastly more by the differences than by the resemblances. How many there still remain among us, who in imagining a Frenchman, do not consider the thousand characteristics which he has in common with themselves, but think only of fiddling, frog-eating, and parley voo!

But let all that pass; my purpose is to specify a few national peculiarities rather than to account for them. Are the English more humane than the French, or the reverse? The French are allowed to be the more polite, and as politeness is the outward expression of good feeling, it follows that the French exhibit more external evidence of humanity. This, however, is not the question, as it is possible to do the most disagreeable things in the politest manner in the world. The French avoid sanguinary punishments, and their juries have the greatest aversion to convict capitally. The disregard of human life in street-accidents seems to be vastly greater in London than in Paris, or indeed than in any other city. Not even in the Toledo of Naples, where the whole city is out of doors, and horses and carriages are perpetually driving through the dense mass of population, is it possible to witness the hundredth part of those occurrences which meet the eye in the London journals under the title of "Cab and Omnibus Nuisance," or " Accident from furious Driving."

A Frenchman is more cheerful than an Englishman-that is, in company, for a Frenchman appears to be miserable when left alone. On this point the Englishman has certainly the advantage, as he is not dependent upon others for enjoyment. Nevertheless, the sociality of the Frenchman appears the more amiable: give him salad, soup, and chatter, and he wants nothing more to fill up the day. The Frenchman makes a parade of his feelings: the Englishman studies to conceal them. The one affects the enthusiast, and the other the stoic. A Frenchman does not forget that the world is looking on him even à l'article de mort. How many smart sayings were prepared for utterance at the last moment by those who fell by the guillotine during the reign of terror! The perruquier who, a few weeks since, committed suicide, because, according to his own account, he had calculated all his chances, and found he could never be so great a man as Napoleon, was perhaps quite sincere

in his grief; but was it not genuine French vanity, the ostentation of feeling, that induced him to make this display? The grief alone did not cause the suicide, but the opportunity of making it known to the world in this very striking and theatrical style was so tempting!

Another incident of a kindred complexion is still more recent. A little girl kills herself in the regular charcoal way, because she feared her parents did not love her! But mark the desire for exhibition and effect even in a child. This little creature had taken the pains to learn to write, solely for the purpose of leaving behind her a letter explaining her motives! She might have done this orally to her parents, her relatives and acquaintance; but this was not sufficient, the world must know it, and a suicide would not be regularly sentimental without a letter. Here again we have the coup de théâtre.

Are mankind ever likely to lose their national characteristics? New systems of policy reconcile those who have been accustomed to regard each other as hereditary enemies. The intercourse of travelling and trade, a more liberal interchange of thought by literary intercourse, the reciprocal adoption of foreign customs, and other similar causes, are in action, and not without effect. The Italians drink beer, the French are convinced that the trottoir may have its advantages over the totalité de la rue; yet is there any disappearance of what constitutes the real distinctions? Are not our neighbours the same in substance that they ever were? The age of chivalry is past among them, and a little alteration in outward behaviour may be remarked, yet they are in substance the men of the fronde, of Louis XIV., of the Revolution, and of the empire. Political circumstances have brought in the dynasty of the grocers; yet a Frenchman is a Frenchman still.

It has been remarked that, in times of great political excitement, the French theatres are the most crowded, while the reverse is true in the case of the English. A Frenchman is everything in a crowd, he is nothing alone only persuade him that tout le monde will do this or that, and he is ripe for it at once. Under this excitement there is no excess, good or bad, of which he is not capable. But sauve qui peut is a sound that puts his self-possession to flight. Look at a French crew in a shipwreck; what panic, insubordination, blind precipitancy, confusion, and despair! How different from the cool presence of mind which an English sailor preserves in the same circumstances! It is here that the individual is everything. How many a British ship has foundered at sea, and gone down with every man at his post!

Why is John Bull so notorious a grumbler? Why does he grumble at home and grumble abroad?-grumble at his meat, and grumble at his drink? — grumble at sunshine, and grumble at rain? — grumble at Hardy's dishes, and the vintage of Ai?—and at roast beef and heavy wet?-grumble at the fog and smoke of London, and at the sky and landscape of the Campagna Felice ?-grumble at quick time, grumble at common time, and grumble against time?-for he confesses to all this, honest man! Is it that John cares more for his personal comfort than other people, or that he only wishes to make a show of this super-serviceable egotism?

Fogs, rain, and raw winds keep the English within doors; hence their occupations and amusements have a fireside character: but the French and Italians are an out-of-door people; they are of the air, airy. An

Italian must have sunshine as a fish must have water; his nature must be changed ere he can live without it. Yet there are strange contradictions here. "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die," appears to be the motto of the Italians, yet this sensual people produced Dante and Galileo, Tasso and Buonarrotti.

A little girl of my acquaintance at Florence surprised me one day in a pensive mood.

"What are you doing here all alone?"

"I was thinking of something."

"Think! Holy Virgin! you think! a giovanotto without wife or child! What can you have to think about?"

Now there spoke the true Italian, for without wife or child, which, according to Corporal Trim, are the only things that can make a man sorrowful, one may sit in the sunshine all day, and practise that "sweet do-nothing," which is the summum bonum with these people; and while he can do this, no Italian it seems can imagine an inducement to subject himself to the labour of thinking.

"Sono

Englishmen are proud, Frenchmen are proud, but the Italians are not proud. I must make an exception in the case of the Romans. Romano Io" is an expression that comes forth as majestically as "Je suis Français moi," or "Do you know, Sir, I am an Englishman?” But the Roman pride is different from that of the two others: an Englishman's or a Frenchman's pride rests quite as much upon what his nation is, as on what it has been, but a Roman is proud only of the past, for how can a Roman be proud of anything present except the materiel of which his city is composed, and which of course is not the work of his hands? The populace, however, may still believe, for aught I know to the contrary, that the eternal city yet gives laws and legions to the world, since the regular clap-trap at the theatre is the expression," Roma invincibile sempre sara."

The old caricatures of meagre, starveling Frenchmen are, after all, not without truth. It is impossible to mistake their faces for Englishthere is a thin, unsubstantial, soup-and-salad appearance about them, which contrasts strikingly with the roast-beef robustiousness of the sturdy insulaires. Any one who has seen a French regiment under arms must have been surprised too at the diminutive stature of the soldiery; they are mere boys in height. The newspapers recently furnished us with an account of a decently tall recruit being sent home as unfit for a soldier on account of his height. Some ingenious reason was invented for this, but the true cause was, his comrades could not bear to be reminded of their diminutive looks by comparison with him. If you ask a French officer, he will endeavour to persuade you that short men are selected from choice, because they move quicker, and everything with the French soldiery depends on celerity of movement!-so reluctant is a Frenchman to allow his inferiority in anything. Napoleon's victories have cost the male population three-quarters of an inch of their altitude. The English are an inch taller than the French, but the Yankees are taller still, for they are on an average nearly an inch taller than the English.

The politeness of the Parisians is less the expression of any real amiability of feeling, than a consciousness that it behoves them not to lose sight of the fact that Paris est le centre du bon gout. In truth, they are for ever obtruding upon your notice the substance of the old inscription in front of the Louvre

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