should be resumed in the following summer and autumn.

Α

considerable overplus must inevitably remain to be gathered up in future seasons; and this overplus, in the case of the tenant-at-will, is virtually converted into a deposit lodged in the hands of the landlord, to secure the depositor's political subserviency and vassalage. Let him but once manifest a will and mind of his own, and vote in accordance with his convictions, contrary to the will of the landlord, and straightway the deposit, converted into a penalty, is forfeited for the offence.

I spent a few fine days in revisiting the Silurian deposits of Dudley, and in again walking over the grounds of Hagely and the Leasowes. I visited also the Silurian patch at Walsall, which, more than one-half surrounded by the New Red Sandstone, forms the advanced guard, or picket, of this system in England towards the east. It presents, however, over the entire tract of some six or eight square miles which it occupies, a flat, soil-covered surface, on which the geologist may walk for hours without catching a glimpse of the rock underneath; and it is only from the stone brought to the surface at sinkings made for lime, and wrought after the manner of coal-pits, that he arrives at a knowledge of the deposits below. I picked up beside the mouth of a pit near the town of Walsall, at least two very characteristic fossils of the system,—the Atrypa Affinis and the Catenipora Escharoides; and saw that, notwithstanding the proximity of the Coal Measures, the rock, though mineralogically identical with the Carboniferous Limestone, cannot be regarded as belonging to that formation, which, with the Old Red Sandstone, is wholly wanting in the Dudley coal-field. The coal here rests on the Upper Silurian, just as the Lias of Cromartyshire rests on the Lower Old Red, or the Wealden of Moray on the Cornstone. On my way north, I quitted the train at Nantwich, to see the salt-works

which have been carried on in that town for many years; but I found them merely editions in miniature of the works at Droitwich. I would fain also have visited the salt-mines of Cheshire, so famous for their beauty. They lay off my road, however; and, somewhat in haste to get home, I did what I afterwards regretted,-quitted England without seeing them. Before nightfall, after leaving Nantwich, I got on to Liverpool, and passed the night in a respectable temperance coffeehouse, one of the lodging-houses of that middle grade in which, in England, the traveller is sure to meet with a great many Dissenters, and the Dissenter with a great many of his brethren; and in which both, in consequence, are apt to regard the cause of Dissent as rather stronger in the country than it actually is. But the consideration of this somewhat curious subject I shall defer till the next,-my concluding chapter.

CHAPTER XX.

Dissent a Mid-formation Organism in England.-Church of Englandism strong among the Upper and Lower Classes; its peculiar Principle of Strength among the Lower; among the Upper.-The Church of England one of the strongest Institutions of the Country.-Puseyism, however, a Canker-worm at its Root; partial Success of the Principle.-The Type of English Dissent essentially different from that of Scotland; the Causes of the Difference deep in the Diverse Character of the two Peoples. Insulated Character of the Englishman productive of Independency.—Adhesive Character of the Scotch productive of Presbyterianism. Attempts to legislate for the Scotch in Church Matters on an English Principle always unfortunate.-Erastianism; essentially a different thing to the English Churchman from what it is to the Scot.Reason why.-Independent Scotch Congregation in a Rural District.— Rarely well based; and why.-Conclusion.

WHEN I first came among the English, I was impressed by the apparent strength of Dissent in the country. At least two out of every three Englishmen I met in the lodging-houses, and no inconsiderable proportion of the passengers by the railways, so far as I could ascertain their denominations, were, I found, Dissenters. I had lodged in respectable second-class coffee-houses and inns: I had travelled on the rails by the second-class carriages: I had thus got fairly into a middle stratum of English society, and was not aware at the time that, like some of the geologic formations, it has its own peculiar organisms, essentially different, in the group, from those of either the stratum above or the stratum below. Dissent is a mid-formation organism in England; whereas Church of Eng

landism more peculiarly belongs to the upper and lower strata. Church of Englandism puts up at the first-class inns, travels by the first-class carriages, possesses the titles, the large estates, and the manor-houses, and enjoys, in short, the lion's share of the vested interests. And in the lower stratum it is also strong after a sort: there exists in its favour a powerful prejudice, capable of being directed to the accomplishment of purposes of either good or evil.

ents are.

Among the mid-stratum Dissent of England I found a marked preponderance of Independency, which, indeed, seems the true type of English Dissent in the middle walks; and shrewd, intelligent, thoroughly respectable men the English IndependBut when I descended to a humbler order of lodging-houses, and got by this means among the lower English people, I lost sight of Independency altogether. The only form of Dissent I then encountered was Wesleyism,-in the New Connection, political, speculative, and not over sound in its theology,-in the Old, apparently much more quiet, more earnest, and more under the influence of religious feeling. The type of Dissent seems as decidedly Wesleyan among the humbler English, as it is Independent among the middle classes; nay, judging from what I saw,-and my observations, if necessarily not very numerous, were at least made at points widely apart, I am inclined to believe that a preponderating share of the vital religion of the labourers and handicraftsmen of the English people is to be found comprised among the membership of this excellent body. And yet, after all, it takes up but comparatively a small portion of the lower population of the country. Among the great bulk of the humbler people, religion exists, not as a vitality,—not even as a speculative system, but simply as an undefined hereditary prejudice, that looms large and uncertain in the gloom of darkened intellects.

And, to the extent to which this prejudice is influential, it favours the stability of the Established Church. The class who entertain it evince a marked neglect of the Church's services, -give no heed to her teachings,―rarely enter her places of worship even,-nay, her right has been challenged to reckon on them as adherents at all. They have been described as a neutral party, that should be included neither in the census of Dissent nor of the Establishment. But to the Establishment they decidedly belong. They regard the National Church as theirs, as a Church of which an Englishman may well be proud, and in which each one of them, some short time before he dies, is to become decent and devout. And there may be much political strength, be it remarked, in prejudices of this character. Protestantism in the Lord George Gordon mobs was but a prejudice, not a religion. These mobs, scarce less truly in history than as drawn by Dickens, were religious mobs without religion; but the prejudice was, notwithstanding, a strong political element, which, until a full half-century had worn it out of the English mind, rendered concession to the Papists unsafe. We see nearly the same phenomenon exhibited by the Orangemen of Ireland of the present day,—a class with whom Protestantism is a vigorous, influential principle, though it bears scarce any reference to a world to come; and find, in like manner, the Episcopalian prejudice strong among the English masses broken loose from religion.

Church of Englandism is peculiarly strong in the upper walks of English society. Like the old brazen statue, huge enough to hold a lighthouse in its hand, it strides across the busy current of middle English life, and plants its one colossal foot among the lower orders, and the other among the aristocracy. It undoubtedly possesses among the higher classes a double element of strength. It is strong, on the principle eulogized by