From the Athenæum. must attend church twice or thrice daily; confess, Peru: Sketches of Travels in the Years 1838-at least, once in the week; retire for penance 1842.-[Peru. Reiseskizzen u. s. w.] By J. J. VON TSCHUDI. 2 vols. St. Gallen, Scheitlin und Zollikofer. London, Williams & Norgate. THE writer of these volumes is well known in Germany by his contributions to Peruvian zoology. In his preface, he disclaims the intention of adding to the list of" romances of travel;" and, accordingly, writes more of Peru than of himself, giving notices rather of the beasts, birds and fishes of the country than of the breakfasts he consumed there. Yet, his devotion to scientific pursuits did not entirely withdraw his attention from the social circumstances of the Peruvians; of which he gives a portraiture on the whole unfavorable, but too true. In this part of his work there is little novelty; for life in Peru is but a copy of life in Mexico-having all the low and sordid features of Spanish colonization. A mind disposed towards a hopeless view of human affairs may find motives for such a tendency in South America. Over all its splendid natural scenery man's errors have cast their shadows. The memorials here and there scattered of the Incas' dominion, and the equally melancholy relics of a transitory civilization produced by the schemes of the Jesuits-the low and stationary condition of society among the Spaniards and Creoles of Lima-the mines of natural wealth doing so little for man's elevation—the various tribes of degraded Indians whose chief solace is found in the narcotic cocoa-plant-all furnish sad observations for the mind, disposed to dream of man as he ought to be. Our author devotes, we think, too much of his space to Lima; with which preceding travellers have made us well acquainted. Here are some of his observations on the fair Limanese : during passion-week; send delicate luxuries to their confessor, or a calash to carry him when he is not disposed to walk; and in many other ways expose their sanctity as a spectacle. This seeming piety, far removed from everything like a sincere devotion, is so much more disgusting as it is generally accompanied by a bitter and uncharitable humor. These devout ladies, having renounced all other pleasures, enjoy the more keenly the luxury of scandal-and turn their venomed stings against their neighbors; so that the Beatas' may be reckoned the most dangerous class of society in Lima." Of all the inhabitants of Lima, according to our author's observations, the lowest are the free negroes; and he seems disposed to ascribe their faults rather to their organization than to their circumstances. But what can be expected of the lower classes, where the higher can find no better recreation than brutal bull-fights-patronized in Lima, as in the Sierra, on a scale of cruelty far exceeding that of Madrid? It is well known that the pleasantness of the climate of Lima is counterbalanced by the frequency of its earthquakes; and the very transitory moral effects of these most awful of nature's outbreaks might furnish a good hint to some who are disposed to exaggerate the use of fear as a moral influence. Deep-seated and rational veneration is a power widely different from the mere animal terror which may be excited by an earthquake or a thunder-storm. But we must leave Lima: and notice our author's travels in the Peruvian Cordilleras and the Sierra. There is some indistinctness among geographers with regard to the Andes and the Cordilleras. In the time of the Incas, both these mountain-chains were called by one name, "Ritisuyu,” —meaning "the snow region." As the principal tribe of the old inhabitants of Peru had their dwellings along the base of the eastern chain, and explored its hoards of metal, our author conjectures that the name, Andes, took its rise from "Anta," the Guichua word for metal; and proposes that the western chain shall be distinguished as the Cordilleras. The Creoles of Peru, however, use the two names indiscriminately. Between these two lines of mountain-peaks lie vast and scarcely inhabited plains, at an elevation of 12,000 feet above the sea-level. These highlands of South America are styled, in the native language, the "Puna,"-meaning uninhabited parts. In some districts, the Puna extends as an unbroken plain from the Cordilleras to the Andes; in other parts, it is intersected with deep valleys-which, of course, enjoy a climate far warmer than that of the highlands. These valleys are termed by the Peruvians, "the Sierra;-but it should be noticed, that the people of Lima give that name also to the whole interior of Peru. Whether the traveller contrasts these temperate valleys with the sultry coast, or with the bleak and inhospitable islands of Peru, he is equally charmed when he first beholds them-and readily adopts the expression of an old traveller (Bouguer,) who called the Sierra" an earthly paradise." The Puna, though At a certain age, the ladies of Lima gener- bleak, and favored with but a scanty vegetation, is ally make a great change in their mode of life. the abode of the principal quadrupeds of PeruTheir bloom is gone, and they no longer charm; the llama and its relatives the alpaca, the huanacu, or, satiated with the pleasures of an unchastened and the vicuna. Over these plains, and the peaks life, they leave the world, devote themselves to of the Andes, the condor hovers in search of its religion, and become so-called 'Beatas.' They prey. "The fair Limeña rises at a late hour, dresses her hair with jasmine and orange-flowers, and waits for breakfast. After this, she receives her visitors and pays her visits. During the heat of the day her solace is a swing in her hammock, or a cigar. After dinner, she visits her friends; and the day is concluded in the theatre, the great square, or on the bridge. But few ladies employ themselves in needlework or netting, though some are very expert in these arts. In society such work is never introduced-happy city, where we may meet with ladies not knitting stockings! The pride with which the ladies of Lima cherish their tiny feet can hardly be exaggerated. Whether they walk, or stand, or swing in the hammock, or recline on the sofa, their principal care is to keep their pretty feet in view. No praise of their virtue, their intelligence, or even their beauty, will flatter them so sweetly as a commendation of their delicate feet. A great foot (pataza inglesa-'an English paw,' as they say) is their horror. I once heard the praises of a fair European from some ladies in Lima; but they ended with the words, pero que pie! valgame Dios! parece una lancha but what a foot! Heavens! 't is like a great boat!'-yet the foot in question would have been reckoned of a moderate size in Europe. Our traveller confirms the statements of Another story is the following: "A certain Franciscan monk, a passionate gambler, lived at Huancayo. By his friendly offices, he had become a favorite among the Indians, to whom he often applied when in want of money. One day, when he had suffered losses at the hazardtable, he begged of an Indian, who was his relative, to help him out of his poverty. The Indian promised assistance on the following evening; and arrived punctually at the appointed time, with a bag full of silver-ore for the monk. This process was repeated several times; until the still needy monk earnestly prayed that he might be favored with a view of the source from which his wants had been so often supplied. This request also ingly, on the appointed night, three Indians came to the house of the Franciscan-desired that he would allow them to bandage his eyes-and, he assenting, carried him away, on their shoulders, some miles among the mountains. There, they lifted him down-conducted him down a shaft of Humboldt and others-sadly toning down the old | Soon after drinking, he felt unwell; and, as a marvellous stories which tell of the size and power suspicion of being poisoned flashed upon his mind, of this bird. The span of its extended wings he instantly packed the specimens of ore in his sometimes reaches twelve feet. Its general food wallet, hastened back to the village, and thence is carrion; though, when urged by hunger, it will rode to Huancayo. He had only time to explain seize the young of sheep, vicunas and llamas; his adventure to his employers, and point out, as but it cannot rise with a weight of more than eight well as he could, the locality of the mine; for he or ten pounds. The huts of the Indians on the died in the night. Another exploring party was Puna are wretched and filthy; and there is nothing immediately sent into the neighborhood, but withto repay the traveller who visits this lonely and out success: the Indian and his family had vandrear region, save a scientific interest, or a delight ished from the place, and no trace of the mine in nature's wildest scenes. But when he has could be discovered." passed over the elevated plain of Bombon, and gains a glimpse of Cerro de Pasco, he feels that he is again approaching the abodes of civilization. It is but a sordid civilization, however: the love of silver has collected, in a dreary clime bordering on the eternal snow, the men of various nations-Spaniards, Germans, Englishmen, Swedes, Americans and Italians. The first glimpse of a considerable town in such a region is a pleasure and surprise; but little is found on a nearer approach, to please the eye. The beauty of the place is subterraneous-in its rich silver mines. Many a tale of wild speculation belongs to this remarkable town. Gambling is the favorite amusement. The Indians employed in the mines of Cerro de Pasco are among the most degraded in-was granted by the friendly relative: and, accordhabitants of Peru. Our traveller relates some stories of the faculty of secretiveness, as developed among these natives, who have been made the slaves of European rapacity. We cannot decide on the probability of these tales; but instances as striking are recorded of the Indians of Mexico :— "The Indians have discovered that their silver-little depth-and displayed to him a rich and shinmines have made their condition rather worse than ing vein of silver. When he had amply feasted better. They determine, therefore, to keep secret his sight, and had taken ore enough for his prestheir knowledge of some rich veins of silver not ent necessities, his eyes were again bandaged, and yet explored by Europeans. Traditions of these he was carried home on the shoulders of his mines have been handed down, it is supposed, guides. On the road, he slily untied his rosary; from father to son, through centuries. Even and dropped a bead here and there, that he might brandy, which will open the Indian's mouth on any have a clue to the mine. Arrived at home, he lay other subject, fails in this case. A few years ago,down to rest, in the comfortable hope of exploring there lived, in the large village of Huancayo, the the path to wealth on the following day; but, in brothers Don Jose and Don Pedro Irriarte-who the course of about two hours, the Indian, his relwere among the wealthiest mine-proprietors of ative, came to the door, with his hands full of Peru. As they had reason to suspect the exist-beads- Father,' said he, as he gave them to ence of rich unexplored veins among the neighbor-the monk, you lost your rosary on the road!'" ing hills, they sent out a young man in their em- A short extract from the traveller's journal will ploy to examine the country, and use the likeliest give some notion of the climate and character of means of discovery. Accordingly, he repaired to the Puna:a village, where he found lodgings in the hut of an "I had now reached the high plain, 14,000 feet Indian shepherd-from whom he concealed his above the level of the sea. On each side rose the object. In the course of a few months, an attach-peaks of the Cordilleras clothed in eternal icement had grown up between the young adventurer gigantic pyramids towering into the heavens. It and the shepherd's daughter; and, at last, the seemed to me as if nature, on these snowy plains young man succeeded so far in his object as to win of the Cordilleras, breathed out her last breath. from the girl a promise that she would point out to Here life and death met together; and I seemed him the mouth of a rich silver-mine. She directed to be arrived at the boundary-line between being him to follow her, at some distance, on a certain and annihilation. On which side would my lot day when she should go out to tend her flock on fall? I could not guess. How little life had the the hills; and to notice where she dropped her sun awakened around me; where the dull-green 'manta,' (a woollen shawl.) There, she told puna-grass, hardly the height of a finger, mingled him, he would find the entrance of the mine. The its hue with the mountain glaciers! Yet here I young agent obeyed her directions; and, after saluted with pleasure, as old friends, the purplesome digging, found his way into a moderately blue gentiana and the brown calceolaria. ** As deep shaft, which led to a rich vein of silver. He I rode further, life awakened in richer variety was busily engaged in breaking off some specimens around me: animals and birds appeared-few in of the ore, when he was surprised by the old species, but rich in individuals. Herds of vicunas shepherd, who congratulated him on the discovery, approached me-then fled away with the speed of and offered assistance. After working together the wind. I saw, in the distance, quiet troops of for some hours, they rested; and the Indian offered huanacas gazing suspiciously at me, and passing to the young man a cup of chicha, which he drank. I along. I had ridden on for several hours, 66 noon when I heard a monotonous, short cry, now and then breaking the stillness. Recognizing the tones, I mounted on the nearest point of rock; and, looking down, discovered the two Indian llama-drivers whom I had met on the previous day. I hastened to them; and persuaded them, by the gift of a little tobacco, to leave one of their llamas with me, to carry my baggage.' The people of the Sierra are noted for hospitality and some other peculiarities. The least favorable feature in their disposition is their love of carousals-where brandy flows too freely for anything like " the feast of reason." The superstitious burlesque of Christianity among the Indians of which our author gives an account that we should hardly dare to quote-is of the same nature with the performances of the Mexican Indians. Among the least profane of their grotesque theatricals, is the following custom : ་ The writer devotes a chapter to describe the lonely, Crusoe-like, mode of life which the naturalist must lead when he explores the vast forests of Peru. He gives, too, a long account of the universal use of the coca-plant among the Indians: and, strange to say, recommends the use of this powerful narcotic, as a relief for severe toil and hunger, to European seamen engaged in such services as the Arctic Expedition. observing the varieties of life in this elevated plain, when I came upon a dead mule which had been left here by its driver to die of hunger and cold. As I approached the carcass, three condors rose from their repast; and hovered, for a while, in narrowing circles round my head, as if threatening punishment for the interruption. It was now two o'clock in the afternoon, and I had ridden on a gradual ascent since the break of day. My panting mule slackened his pace, and seemed unwilling to toil up an elevation which lay in my route. I dismounted; and, to relieve the beast and exercise my limbs, began walking at a rapid pace. But, in a short time, the rarity of the air began to be felt; and I experienced an oppressive sensation which I had never known before. I stood still, that I might breathe more freely; but there was no support in the thin air. I tried to walk; but an indescribable distress compelled me to halt again. My heart throbbed audibly against "On Palm Sunday, an image of Christ, seated my side; my breathing was short and interrupted; upon an ass, and followed by the foal, is led a world's load seemed laid upon my chest; my through the town. The Indians strew palmlips were blue and parched, and the small vessels branches in the way; and fight with each other of my eyelids were bursting. Then, my senses for the honor of spreading their garments to be were leaving me: I could neither see, hear, nor trodden upon by the ass. The creature is destined feel distinctly; a grey mist was floating before my to this service from its birth--and must never bear eyes-tinged, at times, with red, when the blood any other burden. It is, indeed, almost esteemed gathered on my eyelids. In short, I felt myself holy, and styled the Burra de Nuestro Señor.' involved in that strife between life and death, I have seen such favored animals, in some villages, which I had before imagined in surrounding na-so fat that they could scarcely walk." ture. My head became giddy, and I was compelled. to lie down. If all the riches of the world or the glories of heaven had been but a hundred feet higher, I could not have stretched out my hand towards them. I lay in this half-senseless condition for some time-until rest had so far restored me that I could mount my mule. One of the Puna storms now suddenly gathered, and the snow began to fall heavily. The sun looked out at intervals but only for a moment. My mule could scarcely wade through the increasing snow. Night was coming on; I had lost all feeling in my feet, and could hardly hold the reins in my benumbed fingers. I was about to yield myself up for lost, when I observed an overhanging rock sheltering a cave. I hastened to explore the spot -and found there a shelter from the wind. I unsaddled the mule, and made a bed of my cloak and trappings. After tying the animal to a stone, THE name of the late Right Honorable George I appeased my hunger with roasted maize and Canning has been so prominently brought forward cheese, and lay down to sleep. But scarcely had in the late debates, that we are induced to give a my eyes closed, when an intolerable burning pain sketch, with some of our personal recollections, of in my eyelids awakened me. There was no more that distinguished statesman. A new generation hope of sleep. The hours of the night seemed has sprung up since his time; a new policy has endless. When I reckoned that day must be superseded the old; new men fill up the position breaking, I opened my eyes, and discovered all which he and his contemporaries maintained; and, the misery of my situation. A human corpse had as the most striking distinction of the whole, a served as my pillow. Shuddering, I hastened out new spirit, impulse, and power have been infused of the cave, to saddle my mule and leave this dis- into the people, which, already producing many mal place; but the good beast was lying dead changes, menace the production of more, of a upon the ground;-in his hunger, he had eaten, fierce character, of a more headlong career, and as it appeared, the poisonous garbancillo. Poor of more irreparable evil. When the history of the beast! he had shared some hard adventures with fifty years which have just closed over us shall me. I turned again towards the cave. The sun come to be written by some one worthy of the had risen upon this frozen world; and, encouraged task, Canning will probably be represented as the by signs of light and life around me, I ventured to inspect the body of my lifeless companion. It was the corpse of a half-Indian; and several deadly wounds in the head explained that he had been murdered by the slings of Indian robbers, who had taken away his clothes. I seized my gun, and shot a mountain hare-which served for breakfast; then waited for help. It was near As in many German books of travels, we notice an occasional want of conciseness and precision: but the volumes are interesting, and contain useful contributions towards the natural history of Peru. From the Britannia. GEORGE CANNING. last figure of the old system, and as the first of the new; standing on the boundary which divides the government by an aristocracy from the government by a populace, and exhibiting the original graces of his early political association combined with the energies essential to eminence as a leader of the people. Of all the crimes of man, there is none more un pardonable with an old aristocracy than humility | their eyes? They had other employment for their of origin. To the latest hour of his career George tens and fifty thousands a year. The rent of an Canning was called an adventurer. This stigma opera box, the purchase of a ring, the price of a he retorted in the most effectual style, by the ex- racer, might have rescued him from the bitterness hibition of talents which they were compelled to of solitude and despair. But he was suffered to praise, and by the possession of power which they sink and die. were rejoiced to share. Still, even by the populace, he was called an adventurer. But to them he had other modes of appeal. He answered the charge with easy scorn, with indignant ridicule, or with stern contempt." Me, an adventurer!" "well, so be it! To such a charge I am willing to plead guilty. I came before you to be your representative. I am one of the people, and I am only the fitter to be your representative. I came to you relying on no other claims than those of character. I look to neither patrician patronage nor party recommendation. Is it in this free country, in this nation, whose boast, and it can have none nobler, is, that the road of honor is open to every man, that I am to apologize for being born in a private station? If-to depend wholly on the people as their representative-if, as a servant of the crown, to lean on no other support than public. confidence if this is to be an adventurer, I plead guilty to the charge. I would not exchange those feelings and that situation to have an ancestry of a hundred generations." The same spirit of sullen apathy and haughty selfishness subsists at this hour. The man will give £500 for his portrait, or £5,000 for a picture to hang in his gallery, who would not give 5s, to lighten the difficulties even of all the genius of the globe. Every object of vanity or folly, of paltry pride or abortive ambition, has its price, and the price is readily paid; but there the account is closed with mankind. There is no habit which calls more powerfully for reform than the apathy of rank and opulence! Those were manly sentiments. Yet the birth of Canning was from a line of gentlemen; and, though he might not reckon the peerage in his genealogy, he had blood in his veins that ascended to the fourteenth century. George Canning, after receiving the rudiments of education at a school in the neighborhood of Winchester, was sent to Eton, where he joined a boy debating club, was a contributor to a boy periodical paper, and wrote verses of the usual boyish calibre. Eton has the reputation of making the fortunes of poor students by forming connections with the rich. But Canning's Etonian intercourse fell among a singularly lacklustre generation. No name of any future distinction is mentioned among them, except those of Ellis and Frere. Even they were twinkling lights, and were soon extinguished in the glow of public life. But in Christ Church, Oxford, he found associations of higher value. Jenkinson, (afterwards Lord Liverpool,) Sturges The father was a barrister, the son of a family Bourne, Lords Holland, Grenville, Carlisle, and of fortune in Ireland. By falling in love with- others of the same rank, all intended for public out his father's permission," he alienated his Irish life, were students of his college; and his graceconnection, and came to live by his pen in Eng-ful scholarship, and still more graceful manners, land, his principal dependence being on a wretched gained him at once general respect and general annuity of £150 a year. He wrote poetry with popularity. some vigor, and political pamphlets with some success. But the French proverb is true. "I n'y a que bonheur, et malheur." Ill luck lay on him, and no man, let his abilities be however brilliant, ever broke that spell. All his plans served only to prolong the struggle; he sank year by year. The prefatory lines to an edition of his poems in 1767 contain some expressions of this feeling which it is painful to read even at this distance of time. They are addressed to a friend his old preceptor : "Formed by thy care to hopes of simplest praise, In the midst of his difficulties he married. His Those are the examples which make us shrink at the abuse of wealth. There must have been many a man of wealth acquainted with the difficulties of this struggling and suffering man. Yet there does not appear to have been a single helping hand put forth to save him from ruin. What was it to them if a being of genius, of accomplishment, and intellectual industry perished before An initiation of this order naturally led to a life of politics. In those days there were whigs and tories. They are no more. The parties are gone, and the names are almost as obsolete as the parties. The simple object of both was power. The parliamentary contests had lost all their reality since the American war. Public men played their game in parliament almost as exclusively as in the clubs of St. James' street. Clever men made clever speeches. Fox, once in every three months, charged Pitt with his early propensities to reform, and Pitt as often charged Fox with the scandalous flexibility of the coalition. The public amused themselves with both, stood by as at a match in a fencing school, numbered the hits given and received, and, when both performers were wearied, quietly saw them change their costume, lay by their foils, and walk away from the place of exhibition. And this " passage of arms" they called the noblest privilege of British liberty. But other times and things were at hand. In a period of the most profound peace known in Europe for a hundred years-in a scene of European progress unexampled since the revival of European knowledge-the age of barbarism seemed suddenly to have returned. If Europe had been instantly overspread with the swamps and forests of the sixth century, and those swamps and forests pouring out a savage invasion of the wolf and the panther by millions, the consternation could not have been more universal, or the resistance more hopeless. The continent was devastated at once. The masters of its thrones either fled or perished, and the supremacy of brute force seemed to be the destiny of all nations. But the sea was the barrier of England, and she preserved her soil unravaged. Sheridan; but Fox living on a subscription, and Sheridan living on nothing, might have awakened a hermit to the barrenness of opposition; and Canning, with all the ardor of genius and of proselytism, devoted himself to Downing street forever. We can now glance back in safety on this period, and see the infinite blunders committed by the most renowned statesmanship, the marvellous Still it would be injustice to his memory, as shallowness of the most profound political sagacity, well as to a great cause, to doubt that he had the measureless ignorance of the most experienced, taken the side of personal honor and political wisand, above all, the astonishing escapes which we dom. There is now no longer any attempt to had from utter ruin. But terror sobers the vanity defend the rebellion of France. There never was even of politicians. The whigs were startled at any doubt of its guilt in the mind of any honest their own extravagances, and dared play their man. It was an insurrection against more than antics no more; public council, forced by the the French monarchy; it was an insurrection hazards of the crisis to grow serious, became against all government, against all human rights, rational and real. The question was no longer against all property, all order, and all principle. how to displace the minister, but how to preserve the empire. The public would endure the artistical dexterity of the masters of rhetoric no more, and disputation gave way to the demand for national wisdom. The whigs, already reduced to the skeleton of a party, sank from the public eye, and no one dreamed of either exhuming the remains or invoking the spirit. Pitt, in unquestioned power, was now the natural refuge of the state, and every man of opposition who had either property to protect or principle to maintain took refuge under his shadow. It was at this time that George Canning came into public life. There is a romantic story that Pitt, struck with his talents, sent for him, inquired his political tastes, and proposed to bring him into parliament. But the story belongs to Arcadia more than to Downing-street. No English minister ever selects his young performers like a ballet-master, from their display at a rehearsal. Pitt was the last man to submit to the trouble of temptation, or to the chance of a refusal; and Canning, though never capable of being charged with a dishonorable passion for place, was never destitute of that quickness of vision which sees future office in present zeal, or that niceness of tact which at once discovers on which side of the parliamentary field the soil promises to be most productive. Still, an introducer was necessary, and he could not have a more effective one than his honest and heavy friend Jenkinson. If the eye of man could embody the invisible things of that world of darkness from which the evil of the earth is administered, it would have seen in the ascent of that spirit of overthrow a new enemy commissioned to visit human crime with new suffering and new sorrow. While Jacobinism struck the unfortunate king from his throne, and usurped it with a diadem of fire, and the axe for a sceptre, it commenced a reign of havoc in France by a manifesto of havoc to the continent. Once in possession of Europe, it would have been in possession of the world. All property would have been a prey, all life a sacrifice, all religion a fable, all morals a mockery, until some fearful interposition of the great Disposer of man and his destinies vindicated his own providence, and turned the globe into a dungeon or a grave. Times like those may come again. France is not the only country which may be frenzied by the rabble. It is only wisdom to be prepared against the coming trial, and the noblest preparation is to be found in the voices that still speak from the dust of memorable men. No one will suspect Grattan of a passion for the prerogative. Yet what was the language of this great political prophet in 1795 ?— "The speech from the throne goes to three objects-the preservation of Europe, the harmony of the present generation, and the education of the future. We cannot debate the causes of the war; we deliberate on the danger of Europe, and our own. Do not depreciate so much your danger, or your preeminence, as to imagine that you are no more concerned in the evils of the times than to read the Gazette which relates them, nor forget that you have raised your head too high on the globe not to encounter the storm. If the continent shall belong to France-if all the coast, from Holland to Brest, shall belong to France-this island (Ireland) must sink to the bottom of the ocean.' This son of old Lord Liverpool had been born for office. Every sinew and bone of his frame was long before paid for by the public. With him, if parliament was purgatory, Downing-street was paradise. To do his duty behind his desk-and he did it faithfully-to make an appointed speech once a month, and no man could do it with more toilsome sincerity, and to receive his handsome salary four times a year, and his punctuality in this point was never denied-formed the outline of his political history. And such is the memorable He follows up the view of French physical effect of perseverance, that his rise was as uninter-power by the exposition of the greater peril of her rupted as it was unnoticed. The country became so much accustomed to see him in office that it felt no surprise when it at length saw him in the premiership; and there, alike unmoved and unassailed, he remained for eleven years, and would probably have remained for ten times the number if disease or nature had not prohibited his ministerial perpetuity. Canning had been a whig. Every showy schoolboy is at heart a whig, as every rational man is at heart a tory. He had been patted on the head when in petticoats by Fox; and had tried on his first principles under the helping hand of principles : "A strip of land, a barren island, a remote and uncultivated tract, the speculation of the produce of a waste, or the vision of a punctilio of honor, do not now, as once, kindle Europe to arms. It is Europe herself and her islands that are at stakeprinces, potentates, her orders and degrees, the creature and the Creator. It follows that the present object of the war is not, because it cannot be, to interfere with the internal government of France. It is to prevent her interference with every realm and government, by arms, intrigues, and money-by land and by sea-in consequence |
