September a courier announced the fall of Verdun--the last barrier that stood between the enemy and Paris. The news fell upon the doomed city like the shock of an earthquake; the recklessness of despair laid hold of the minds of men, and the boldest shrank back in dismay-all save Danton, whose lion heart rose superior to the peril which surrounded him. He went to the Commune, and there proposed those energetic measures which saved France and the revolution. "To-morrow," said

he, "let the alarm-gun be fired; let the tocsin be rung let every citizen capable of bearing arms repair to the Champ-de-Mars, and set out on the following day to meet the enemy. If we are to perish, let it be beneath the ruins of the capital; but our enemies shall perish before us!"

On the following morning Danton repaired to the Assembly, and succeeded the orator Vergniaud in the tribune. "Citizens!" he exclaimed, we must send couriers into every part of France, that the whole country may imitate Paris. Pass a decree that every citizen shall serve his country in arms. The sound of the cannon, which you will presently hear, is not the alarm-gun; it is the charge against the enemies of the country. What need we," he continued, raising his mighty voice that rang out like the signal for battle, and with gestures as impressive and striking-" what need we, to conquer-to annihilate our enemies? Courage, more courage! and always courage

At that moment the report of the alarm-gun was heard. It was the signal for the rendezvous in the Champ-de-Mars, and not for the massacre, as one is led to infer from those distorted accounts which make Danton its author. Neither did the massacre follow immediately the firing of the alarm-cannon, and the assembling of the armed citizens in the Champ-de-Mars. It was not until late in the afternoon of the same day that it was commenced, by the murder of the priests at the Abbaye. These priests, closely confined in carriages, had been taken under arrest from the Hotel-de-Ville, and were followed to the Abbaye by a mob-a wanton, irregular, unorganized mob-assembled together, without any other apparent design than to cover the prisoners with abuse and execrations. One of the priests, becoming exasperated at the insults of the mob, struck one of the assailants with his cane-and the work of death commenced. It continued several days; the prisons of Paris were broken open by a mob, and their inmates ruthlessly slaughtered to the number of more than a thousand.t

That the massacre was not premeditated, at least not by Danton, we think may be safely asserted. His words in the Assembly, on the morning of the day the massacre commenced, had no more connexion with the event, that we can perceive, than those of Vergniaud, who had preceded him in the tribune. On the Commune of Paris, over which Marat presided, doubtless rests a large share of the odium and guilt of these horrid murders; but we cannot believe that even the Commune premeditated them-they were too lawless, too terrific, too rashly and thoughtlessly executed, to have been anything else but the spontaneous impulse

* 'Right so thou brawny Titan; there is nothing left thee but that. Old men who heard it will tell how the reverberating voice made all hearts swell in that moment, and braced them to the sticking place, and thrilled abroad over France like electric virtue, as a word spoken in season."-Carlyle's French Rev.

Some estimates are as high as five or six thousand.

of the worst part of a frenzied and terrified populace. Besides, as we have seen, the circumstances atttending the massacre show, that it sprang out of a popular riot rather than from a premeditated plan. But the Commune, when it might have put a stop to the massacres, encouraged the murderers, and paid them the wages of blood. Marat and his associates even published a proclamation to the people of France, boasting of the commission of these " acts of justice," as he styled them, and urging the departments to imitate Paris! The opinion that Danton was not directly accessory to, or at least the cause of the September massacres, is further confirmed by the views of his contemporaries, the Girondins, respecting that occurrence. They never ceased to denounce the Septembrisers, and yet Danton does not appear to have been implicated by them, or openly accused. When Louvet delivered his celebrated philippic against Ropespierre, upon whom he charged a connexion with the massacres, he did not venture to accuse Danton; but then, says Louvet, "when all the authorities, the assembly, the ministers, the mayor, spoke in vain to stop the massacres, the minister of justice did not speak! And can'st thou, O Danton! clear thyself in the eyes of posterity from his dishonoring exception?" Here in reality lay the guilt of Danton. He adopted that wretched, Machiavelian policy-the policy of a false, a criminal expediency; he deemed the terror necessary to the salvation of France from the armies of Brunswick; he made no effort to arrest the Septembrisers in reaping their haavest of death; and he threw over the crime the sanction of his silence.

We are free to confess, however, our own want of reliance upon any opinion we have as yet been able to form as to the real guilt or innocence of Danton, in respect to this bloody tragedy. To our mind, the September massacre, as an historical fact, is inexplicable; and more inexplicable still, if such a man as he actually devised the plan as a means of giving energy to that despair through which alone the salvation of his country could be wrought out. True, he was unrelenting and stern as a statesman; but as a man he was munificently generous, and knew no vindictive cruelties. During the arrests, he released from prison many of the victims indeed, nearly all who came to him-his enemies as well as his friends. Among those whom he set free were Barnave, Duport, and Lameth, his old opponents, all of whom would have met with certain death. "No personal enemy of Danton perished in those days." Such is the testimony left of him, alike honorable to his humanity and his generous manhood.

(To be continued.)

CALIFORNIA*—ITS POSITION AND PROSPECTS.

Ir is not a little remarkable, that the portion of the North American continent which has last attracted the attention of the American race, should suddenly have been found, not only to be of more value than other sections of the continent, but superior in attraction to any other known regions of the world. Scarcely a year has elapsed since the whole region, vaguely known as California and New Mexico, was denounced in the American Senate by a leading statesman, as "not worth a dollar." It was ridiculed as an 66 indemnity" by partisans at home, and sneered at as "a territorial acquisition" by the organs of the English government abroad. To-day it is the cynosure of civilization. Its geographical position, its commercial resources, its agricultural wealth and mineral treasures, have suddenly burst upon an astonished world-startling statesmen, confounding politicians, dazzling the industrious, stimulating the enter prising, and attracting the adventurous in all portions of the knowu world. The talisman that has wrought this wonderful change has been a few grains of gold, but it will prove but a symbol emblematic of the real wealth which human industry will create upon the soil, and extract from the shores of Asia.

The state of Upper California is divided into two grand divisions by the "Sierra Navada," a continuation of the rocky mountain chain, running parallel to the Pacific coast, and at a distance from it, varying from 100 to 200 miles. This strip extends from the peninsula of California, in latitude 320, to Oregon, in latitude 42° on the north, consequently the tract embraces some 100,000 square miles, or equal to two and a half of such states as New-York, or as England. This tract is watered by two principal streams that run in contrary directions, longitudinally through its whole extent. Thus, the Sacramento, rising in the mountains of Oregon, in latitude 430, after entering California, runs due south, parallel with the coast on the one hand, and the mountain on the other, and equi-distant from both, until it reaches 38°, where it meets the San Joaquin coming from the extreme south of the tract. These streams are fed by innumerable affluents, that, flowing down from the mountain, enter them at right angles. Of these lateral waters, Feather River is the

*A TOUR OF DUTY IN CALIFORNIA; including a description of the Gold Region, &c. By Joseph Warren Revere, Lieut. U. S. N, and Commander of Sonora. C. S. FRANCIS & Co. OREGON AND CALIFORNIA, in 1848. By J. Q. Thornton, late Judge of the Supreme Court, Oregon. HARPER BROTHERS.

THE CALIFORNIA AND OREGON TRAIL. By B. Francis Parkman, Jr. GEORGE P. PUTNAM. WHAT I SAW IN CALIFORNIA. By E. Bryant.

NOTES OF TRAVEL IN CALIFORNIA; Official report of Col. J. C. Fremont, D. APPLETON & Co.

LIFE IN CALIFORNIA. By an American Citizen. WILEY & PUTNAM.

OREGON MISSIONS AND TRAVELS OVER THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS. By Father P. J. De Smet of the Society of Jesus. E. Dunigan, New-York.

HISTORY OF OREGON AND CALIFORNIA, and other territories on the North-West Coast. By Robert Greenhowe. D. APPLETON & CO.

ADVENTURES IN MEXICO AND THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS. By George F. Ruxton, Esq. HARPER BROTHERS.

HISTORY OF THE HAWAIIAN OR SANDWICH ISLANDS. By James Jackson Jarvis., C. E. HITCHCOCK, Honolulu.

largest, and it drains an extensive valley as remarkable for its fertility as for its mineral wealth. The Sacramento itself is represented as a beautiful stream, running through level plains, interspersed with groves of oak, and of a soil exceedingly productive. The river is heavily timbered on both banks, and navigable for 100 miles at all seasons of the year. The tributaries of the Sacramento, as of the San Joaquin, rising in the Sierras on either hand, amongst large timber, descend to the main streams in clear and cool currents, affording numberless sites for mill seats in their courses. The united waters of all these streams, impeded by the narrowness of the passage, through the highlands, spread into a sheet called Suisan Bay. This passage is known as the Straits of Karquin, and through it, at ebb-tide, the waters rush in a strong and dangerous current, again spreading, after passing Mare Island, into the Bay of St. Paul. The outlet of this bay is through a narrow strait formed by the opposing promotories of San Peter and San Paul. Clear of this obstacle, the waters flow into the broad bay of San Francisco, some 60 miles in length, and of irregular breadth. From this bay a narrow passage, between a divided mountain, opens upon the Pacific. The region in the neighborhood of these land-locked waters, is thus described in the graphic pages of Lieutenant Revere :

"These rivers have a common delta, which actually bears some resemblance to that much-abused Greek letter inverted, the apex of the triangle being at their mouths, and their main streams forming the two sides. The intervening district is composed of low, alluvial soil, covered with a thick growth of tulé, a species of gigantic bulrush, the stem of which is tender and filled with air cavities. It grows sometimes fifteen feet high, and has a semi-bulbous root, fresh and pleasant to the taste, and is the food of some of the smaller amphibious animals. This district is traversed by an interminable net-work of "slues," or sheets of shallow water, (Bunyan would have said sloughs,) nearly all of which open broadly and invitingly; but the unwary voyager who trusts to their seeming resemblance to the mouth of either river he wishes to ascend, is sure to become involved in labyrinthine mazes, and is not extricated without the exercise of some tact and judgment, the expenditure of a large stock of patience, and peradventure the consumption of all his provisions. The mouths of the two rivers, however, when once discovered, are afterwards easily recognized, and the sand-bars and slight impediments to navigation are easily avoided. The whole of the tule lands bordering on these rivers will doubtless be valuable at some day for the culture of rice, which will become a prominent product of California, and probably be exported to the accessible and ready markets of the East Indies. Indeed, I was struck by the resemblance which this immense tract of tulé land bears to the often laboriously prepared paddy fields' of China, Hindostan, Sumatra, and the Dutch and Malayan Archipelago. In the tulé region of California, bounteous nature has herself prepared these fields for the industry of any who may choose to cultivate them, the quantity of land being vast and the quality unsurpassable. These lands are indeed of immense extent, comprising not only the delta of the principal rivers of California, but extending at intervals, in tracts of various areas, far up towards their sources. They are periodically submerged during the rainy season, and, as the head waters of the San Joaquim communicate at that season with the Tule Lakes, transportation from above may be easily effected."

Thus the whole region bears evidence in its formation of deposits of fresh-water shells, and in other indications, to the truth of the Indian tradition, that the bay of San Francisco was once a lake, covering a con

siderable portion of the land now drained in its neighborhood; and that at no remote period an earthquake rent the mountain asunder, forming a passage for the waters to the ocean.

The surface of California is for the most part level plains of great fertility. The largest of these lying on the peninsular between the bay of San Francisco and the ocean, is described by the author just quoted, as follows:

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Passing near the mission of Dolores, along the Porto Suelo of San Bruno, which is a steep chain of lofty and precipitous hills, extending from the point of that name on the bay across the Peninsula to the sea, and converting the northern end of it into a natural fortification, we saw the sea and bay at once on either hand, and both so near that a thirty-two pounder could have carried to either beach. Hence the road lies across a level prairie with the bay to the east, and a chain of lofty hills called the Santa Clara Mountains, on the west or ocean side. This plain, which is more than sixty miles in length, and averages nearly thirty in width, is said to be the largest single body of good agricultural land in all California. With the exception, however, of the little milpas,' near the different ranchos, it is not cultivated, although it affords grazing to vast herds of cattle and sheep, and numerous manadas' of brood mares and colts, and 'caballadas' of tame horses, of which we saw great numbers on both sides of our road. This extensive plain is divided into ranchos of four and eight square leagues in extent, and the soil is a black loam many feet deep, as any one can see in passing the dry beds of what, in the wet season, are running streams, emptying into the bay. This great prairie is sprinkled here and there with points or islands of timber, and reminded me very strongly of similar land which I have seen in the State of Illinois."

This description answers for a considerable portion of the land of Upper California, and the valleys of the rivers are represented as of unrivalled beauty and value, as well for the growth of timber as the productiveness of the soil, and the work just referred to contains the following enthusiastic description of them :

"The scene now before me was one of surpassing beauty. The infinitely varied outlines of the lofty mountains lying beyond the valley; the grotesque appearance of the broken and rugged crags of basaltic rocks; the quiet river winding through the level plain at our feet, its banks distinctly defined by a long line of willows and other trees of larger growth; the gracefully undulating outlines of the smaller hills, which, like the far-spreading plain itself, waved with a golden harvest of ripe grasses, made more golden by the living light' of the setting sun; the scattered clumps of the dark green oaks, and the miniature herds of grazing cattle-all combined to paint a landscape worthy of a country whose natural opulence is matched only by its natural grandeur.

"The season had now advanced so far that the wild oats, ' alfileria' (pin-grass,) and burr clover, which chiefly compose the unequalled and fattening pasture of California, had dried up to straw, the spires still standing, while the seed had fallen to the earth. These seeds are very large and nutritious, and serve for food both for the cattle and the Indians. At this season the cattle grope along the ground for the seed, and are fatter than at any other time of the year. Napa Valley is said to be the finest portion of this part of California. It is about thirty-six miles in length, and extends nearly north and south, the lower part lying on the Bay of St Paul. from which a navigable estuary sets up and receives the waters of the Napa river, which traverses the whole length of the valley. It is bounded on each side by lofty Sierras, broken into every variety of Alpine scenery, the ravines of which are filled with the finest timber, and

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* Lomas.