and greatly facilitate the inevitable liqui- | Eton-perhaps no school has been so dation of Turkey in Europe, or to an successful as Eton-in giving an openalliance with the western powers of the ing to those boys who wish for work out Mediterranean France and Spain. of the ordinary classical path. The modWith anything approaching to a cordial ern side, as it is generally called, is at understanding between Italy, Spain, and Eton peculiarly successful. Incredible as France, the fate of the immense region it may seem, French and German are on the southern side of the Mediterranean really taught at Eton; and there is foswould be very speedily settled, and that tered in the school a literary taste which in a way which would render either re- has dwelt there, with fluctuations cersistance or insurrection nearly impossible. tainly, but with nothing like a visible This would be a gain to civilization, even eclipse, for the better part of a century. if Africa, with its huge extent and great population, were not to be entered from the north far more easily than from the south, or from the valley of the Nile. If the southern shore of the Mediterranean, with its vast capabilities, is ever thoroughly made useful to Europe, the success of the effort will be due in great measure to the conquest of Naples for Italy by the audacity and insight of the hero who has this week passed away with a final and rather foolish defiance to the Roman Catholic Church. North Italy might have been a quiet, though overburdened, State without Garibaldi; but the Italy we know could not have been made. From The Saturday Review. MR. MATTHEW ARNOLD has, in the Nineteenth Century, given a picture of a simple and manly nature which had been formed at Eton, and was so fresh from Eton that, when disease in the Cape campaign ended a happy and promising life, the young officer had scarcely ceased to be a schoolboy... . Eton is a school of character as well as a school of learning. The world would, perhaps, be inclined to say that it was more conspicuous as a school of character than of learning. But to say this is to be somewhat unjust to Eton. There must be in the nature of things many Eton boys who do not learn much at Eton. But the mass of Eton boys learn as much of what English public schools are supposed to teach as the mass of boys at any other school. In a very large number of boys there will be many who do not work and a few who do, and the few who work at Eton are taught to work in a very neat and brilliant manner. Year after year and generation after generation Eton turns out a little band of sound and finished scholars. No school, again, has been more successful than But it is no doubt as a school of character, a school of manners in the larger sense of the term, that it is best known to itself and to the world that bears of it. It is as a specimen of the character formed or finished at Eton that Mr. Matthew Arnold dwells on the life of the lad who forms the subject of his notice and his comments. So skilful an artist is sure to handle every theme so as to mitigate to the utmost everything that could awaken the repugnance of his readers; but few readers can avoid a passing pang at finding the sacred veil of secrecy torn away from the artless communications of a lad to his mother. It is perhaps better for the world that the precincts of sorrowing homes should remain inviolate and that the best of Eton boys should not be put into a lay tract. But Mr. Arnold is quite justified in assuming that every reader must feel much admiration, and something of love, for this noble-minded, natural, and right-thinking boy. What, perhaps, adds to the interest of his short history is that he was not in any way very remarkable beyond other Eton boys. He was merely a handsome blossom of the standard Eton rose. It may even be said that he was very like all the good undistinguished boys who are produced at all public schools. But those who know public schools, and are interested in them, have long recognized that each public school offers a type of its own. Amid general resemblances there are slight differences, and the Eton boy is not so absolutely like the whole flock of public schoolboys that a shepherd of very moderate cunning can. not recognize him among them. The distinguishing marks of a typical Eton boy are happiness and naturalness. The boy has expanded in the sunshine of an easy, delightful life, and a thousand influences have conspired to teach him the last great secret of art in manners as in everything else, which is to have no art at all. Mr. Arnold's comments are of the peculiar kind with which he has so repeat From Blackwood's Magazine. BARON FISCO AT HOME. again! Sit down, sit down! - 'tis years since we have met. How goes the world with you? You shake your head Not well? Indeed! I'm sorry. So your plan you would not heed me, thought my counsel Did not succeed. You see 'twas as I feared. bad; Would go your own way; had your notions Of honesty and honor, and all that, If Was it not as I told you? Honesty friend! No, no, my You look surprised to find me titled, rich, edly charmed, puzzled, or enlightened his readers. As in the pictures of a celebrated painter there is always sure to be HA, my old friend! so, you've come back somewhere a white horse with a man on it in a red coat, so in Mr. Arnold's disquisition there is sure to be somewhere the familiar group of Barbarians, Philistines, and Puritans. The excellences of his young Eton hero are to him the excellences partly of a Barbarian and partly of a Puritan. These excellences belong to types that he has long settled must soon fade away, and he is oppressed by the sad thought that this beautiful Eton flower is the flower of a tree to the root of which the axe has been laid. That everything earthly will certainly change, and, in a sense, perish, may be accepted as one of those general truths which no one denies and few remember. But there is perhaps more continuity in history than accords altogether with Mr. Arnold's theories. This late flower of the tree of Eton seems to be very like other flowers that bloomed centuries ago, and have continued to bloom in every century since. The characters in Shakespeare's English historical plays are in substance uncom. monly like Eton boys. There is no apparent reason why a hundred years hence the Eton boy of that day may not think himself the true successor of the Eton boy of this day. Public schools, no doubt, help to form the national character, but the national character also forms public schools. It is difficult to see why there should be any break in this process of action and reaction. Far from being a decaying type, the Eton type seems to have that vitality which is shown by its being a permeating influence. Public schools are now very numerous; some have been invented, some have been restored to eminence; but all are getting more and more to exhibit, with characteristic differences, a general type, which is more or less the Eton type. England is being every day transformed, but it is being transformed by causes which operate as much from above as from below. If in England there are to be noticed a growing desire for political equality and a growing desire for an equality in the means of enjoyment, these democratic passions are in daily life largely tempered and softened by the increasing desire to approach to that type of character in the young, and therefore sooner or later in the old, which has bloomed, and blooms now, and will bloom again and again in the average honorable, kindly-natured Eton boy. Of dignity is sometimes hard to bear! So now, a truce to lying and pretence, You bring the old times back, how vividly! wares - all mere Spread on a tray, and swinging from our necks, what yours were, you know best; And so, mere boys, we bore along the streets Our tawdry store, and cried: "Who'll buy? Well, passers bought of me more than of you So daily turning over our small gains, will talk Over old times. Perhaps 'tis not too late Even now to put you on the prosperous road. We'll see- we'll see! Ab, you are looking at my pictures! Well, By-faith, I've quite forgot who painted it! these | Breeds almost of itself left quite alone. fine, High, noble, anything you will, but then Purely unpractical. I took the world Just as I found it; strove not to amend Its many faults, but profit by them all, Made large professions, crouched and crept and crawled, Put in my pocket all my pride, - picked up Truth, honor, justice, duty, honesty. Prayed loudly, openly declared myself A cloak, you say! Well, yes! I wore a cloak. Men use them in the pulpit, in the mart. 1 What is usurious interest? If I own A little sum, and some poor man has need I dare not run even temporary risk. But for your note, say, for a hundred francs, And smiling, I shake hands with some like you Having such principles as yours, I mean- seams. It pays, you see— – it pays, say what we will. You must at once have money. Ah, good sir, Success, my friend, covers all kinds of sins. I have but fifty; and your simple note, I once forgot some money that was placed But somehow it was proved that I was wrong, There have been several mistakes like this; With altered numbers, -in one case, indeed, With awkward signatures, mere careless Never be found out, that's my rule of life. Little by little small things grow to great. And then, again, with riches at command, - we are old friends; You see I nought conceal, speak openly. We began life together. I am rich, You poor. You see my principles were best. If you object to the word principles, I'll say my practices. We'll not discuss The word that's nothing. Now I say to you, Join me, I'm getting old and tired too; Be my first clerk, first confidential man — I'll pay you well; and having gone thus far, Made enough money, if indeed one has Ever enough, quite, I can now afford To let you have your way, since I can trust Your honesty, and that, I must confess, Is of all things the rarest on the earth. I have been seeking for an honest man, God knows how long! I find him here at last. } No. 1986.-July 15, 1882. { From Beginning, |