at large with their folly and vice; but this is an unavoidable evil. It is part of the price which we pay for our individual liberty, and after all, it is not a very heavy one, and it is one which the growth of science will certainly diminish and possibly will ultimately remove. Suppose, for example, that in the course of time the specific nature of madness should be discovered, and symptoms should be detected affording an infallible test of its existence. Assume, for the sake of illustration, that it could be shown to demonstration that madness is caused by some morbid condition of the spinal marrow, and suppose it were also shown that wherever that condition existed a certain mark was produced on the finger nails. Then, when the question was whether a man was unable, or merely unwilling, to manage his affairs properly, the question would be settled at once by the inspection of his hands. Of course there is no sort of reason to suppose that any test of the sort will ever be discovered; but there is every reason to hope that the notions of scientific men on the subject will become more fixed and definite as time goes on and well-digested experience accumulates; and it is not impossible that they may ultimately be able to speak with as much confidence of the existence of madness in a particular case, and of the degree in which it has interfered with the mental processes of the person affected, as they can show at present in speaking of scarlet-fever or small-pox, or in discriminating between weakness and delirium. Till that is the case it is hopeless to try to make an obscure question clear and easy by devising new modes of discussion. The defect is not in the definition, or rather description of madness, nor in the tribunal which is to decide it, but in the evidence by which its existence is to be proved. Where evidence is capable of several constructions people must do as well as they can, but no rearrangement of their modes of decision will enable them to give satisfactory judgments in all cases.

The last matter to be considered in reference to Commissions of Lunacy is their expense. The monstrous costliness of the Windham inquiry has not unnaturally attracted great attention, and it is said with much plausibility that such inquiries are like the famous case of the oyster, in which the plaintiff recovered one shell and the defendant the other, whilst the lawyers absorbed the contents. There is some truth in this, but there is a great deal of error, and it is an error which is greatly aggravated by the hasty, noisy way in which the real difficulties of the matter are poohpoohed by those who speak of madness as a question of degree, and of eccentricity as being "unquestionably" a mild form of madness.

The expenses consist of three main items,-counsel's fecs, the expenses of witnesses, and the attorneys' bills. As to the counsel's fees, it is a mere question of supply and demand. It is said, that in the Windham case, an eminent member of the bar was offered a fee of 500 guineas, with refreshers of 50 guineas a-day during the inquiry, and that he refused to take it on the ground that it was not worth his while. If a man chooses to employ highly skilled labour, he must pay the market price for it.

There are scores of barristers who would have joyfully accepted a tenth part of the sums mentioned, and it was a question for the parties concerned, and for them alone, whether they would make the one offer or the other. As to the expenses of witnesses, the same remark applies. If a doctor in large practice is to be brought 100 miles from his home and his patients, and to be imprisoned for a fortnight or three weeks in a wretched court for the purpose of saying that Mr. Windham slobbered, of course he must be paid for it. If those who set the inquiry on foot think such a piece of evidence worth such a price, that is a matter exclusively for them. If a man likes to light his candles with bank notes, the bank will be much obliged to him, and nobody except himself will be any the worse. With regard to the attorneys' bills, the case is even stronger they are subject to taxation by public officers appointed for that purpose, who are perfectly competent to see whether the charges made really represent work done. It must be added, that the expense of such proceedings is a matter of absolute indifference to the public at large. If Mr. Windham's estates were swallowed up by an earthquake, no doubt the English nation would be a great loser; but if the 250,0007., which they are said to be worth, is cut up into slices of 5007. and 1,000l., and handed round to a number of barristers, attorneys, doctors, railway guards, and others, the operation might possibly be for the public advantage. It certainly would not diminish the national wealth. There are plenty of country gentlemen in the world, and if the Windham family should lose that honourable position, the English nation would survive the loss.

The real truth-and it is a truth which people are wonderfully slow to grasp is that the expense of litigation under our present system depends almost entirely on the litigants. As far as the public are concerned, the administration of justice is nearly gratuitous. If a man chooses to conduct his own cause-if he calls no witnesses and employs no attorney-he may try an action without paying more than two or three pounds. Few men, of course, have the necessary leisure, knowledge, and confidence, to do this, and they have accordingly to pay those whose business it is to act for them, but just in the same way they pay the doctor, and (but for the Established Church) would have to pay the clergyman; and the rate of payment depends, like the price of all other commodities, upon supply and demand.

No doubt if the inquiry into a man's sanity were conducted, not by those who are interested in maintaining or in contesting it, but by the public, at the public expense, it might be done far more cheaply; but such a course of conduct would be utterly at variance with the fundamental principles of the administration of justice in this country. In every department of the law our maxim is, Vigilantibus, non dormientibus, leges subserviunt. Law is private war. A man who wants to bring an action must bring it for himself; even if he wishes to prosecute a criminal he must do it for himself. There is no public officer to do it for him. To deprive a man of the right of defending his own liberty and property

in his own way and by his own agents, would be, and be felt to be, a monstrous act of tyranny; and if he is allowed to do so at all, he must be allowed to do so as expensively as he pleases.

It has been asked how is the matter managed with paupers, and why should there be one law for the rich and another for the poor? The answer is, that the most wretched pauper in England may, if he pleases, demand that his insanity shall be established before a jury, just like Mr. Windham, but that as it is seldom worth while to lock him up, unless he is mad beyond all possibility of dispute, it hardly ever is worth his while to make the demand.

It

Of course these observations are subject to qualification as to details. The court has already some power over the costs of the inquiry. might, perhaps, be advantageously trusted with more. There would be no difficulty or impropriety in giving a somewhat stringent and peremptory discretion to the Master as to the propriety of calling particular witnesses. He might be allowed to say, 'Whatever may be the result of the cause, you who have called this witness must pay for him, and not the other side.' How far he has that power at present, and how it might be enlarged, are questions of technical detail unsuited for these pages.

Agnes of Sorrento.

CHAPTER XX.

FLORENCE AND HER PROPHET.

Ir was drawing towards evening, as two travellers, approaching Florence from the south, checked their course on the summit of one of the circle of hills which command a view of the city, and seemed to look down upon it with admiration. One of these was our old friend Father Antonio, and the other the cavalier. The former was mounted on an ambling mule, whose easy paces suited well with his meditative habits; while the other reined in a high-mettled steed, who, though now somewhat jaded under the fatigue of a long journey, showed by a series of little lively motions of his ears and tail, and by pawing the ground impatiently, that he had the inexhaustible stock of spirits which goes with good blood.

"There she lies, my Florence," said the monk, stretching his hands out with enthusiasm. "Is she not, indeed, a sheltered lily growing fair among the hollows of the mountains? Little she may be, sir, compared to old Rome; but every inch of her is a gem,-every inch !"

And, in truth, the scene was worthy the artist's enthusiasm. All the overhanging hills that encircle the city with their silvery olive-gardens and their pearl-white villas were now lighted up with evening glory. The old gray walls of the convents of San Miniato and the Monte Oliveto were touched with yellow light, and even the black obelisks of the cypresses in their cemeteries had here and there streaks and dots of burnished gold, fluttering like bright birds among their gloomy branches. The distant snow-peaks of the Apennines, which even in spring long wear their icy mantles, were shimmering and changing like opal, with tints of violet, green, blue, and rose, blended in inexpressible softness by that dreamy haze which forms the peculiar feature of Italian skies.

In this loving embrace of mountains lay the city, divided by the Arno as by a line of rosy crystal barred by the graceful arches of its bridges. Amid the crowd of palaces, spires, and towers, rose central and conspicuous the great Duomo, just crowned with that magnificent dome which was then considered a novelty and a marvel in architecture, and which Michael Angelo looked longingly back upon when he was going to Rome to build that more wondrous cupola of Saint Peter's. White and stately by its side shot up the airy shaft of the Campanile; and the violet vapour swathing the whole city in a tender indistinctness, these two striking objects, rising by their magnitude far above it, seemed to stand alone in a sort of airy grandeur.

And now the bells of the churches were sounding the Ave Maria, VOL. V. NO. 26.

12.

the monk and the cavalier bent low in their saddles, and seemed to join devoutly in the worship of the hour.

When Father Antonio left Sorrento in company with the cavalier, it was the intention of the latter to go with him only so far as their respective routes should lie together. The band under the command of Agostino was posted in a ruined fortress in one of those airily perched old mountain towns which form so picturesque and characteristic a feature of the Italian landscape. But before they reached this spot, the simple, poetic, guileless monk, with his fresh artistic nature, had so won upon the mind of his travelling companion that a most enthusiastic friendship had sprung up between them, and Agostino could not find it in his heart at once to separate from him. Tempest-tossed and homeless, burning with a sense of wrong, alienated from the faith of his fathers through his intellect and moral sense, yet clinging to it with his memory and imagination, he found in the tender devotional fervour of the artist monk a reconciling and healing power. He shared, too, in no small degree, the feelings which now possessed the breast of his companion for the great reformer, whose purpose seemed to meditate nothing less than restoring the Church of Italy to the primitive apostolic simplicity; he longed to listen to the eloquence of which he had heard so much. Then, too, he had thoughts that but vaguely shaped themselves in his mind. This noble man,

so brave and courageous, menaced by the forces of a cruel tyranny, might he not need the protection of a good sword? He recollected, too, that he had an uncle high in the favour of the King of France, to whom he had written a full account of his own situation. Might he not be of use in urging this uncle to induce the French King to throw before Savonarola the shield of his protection? At all events, he entered Florence this evening with the burning zeal of a young neophyte who hopes to effect something himself for a glorious and sacred cause embodied in a leader who commands his deepest veneration.

"My son," said Father Antonio, as they raised their heads after the evening prayer, "I am at this time like a man who, having long been away from his home, fears, on returning, that he shall hear some evil tidings of those he hath left. I long, yet dread, to go to my dear Father Girolamo and the beloved brothers in our house. There is a presage that lies heavy on my heart, so that I cannot shake it off. Look at our glorious old Duomo; doth she not sit there among the houses and palaces as a queenmother among nations, worthy, in her greatness and beauty, to represent the Church of the New Jerusalem, the Bride of the Lord? Ah, I have seen it thronged with the multitude who came to crave the bread of life from our master!"

“Courage, my friend!" said Agostino; "it cannot be that Florence will suffer her pride and glory to be trodden down. Let us hasten on, for the shades of evening are coming fast, and there is a keen wind sweeping down from your snowy mountains."

And the two soon found themselves plunging into the shadows of the