perforated by a quill, for the admission forts and fall to the ground perhaps twenty times in succession, yet, by unremitting perseverance, and the aid of reinforcement, they always succeeded. of air; the insects seemed carefully to avoid each other, retiring to opposite sides of the bottle, which was placed horizontally. By giving it a gradual inclination, the scorpion was forced in contact with the spider, when a sharp encounter took place,the latter receiving repeated stings from his venomous adversary, apparently without the least injury, and with his web, soon lashed the scorpion's tail to his back, subsequently securing his claws and legs with the same materials. In this state I left them some time, in order to observe what effect would be produced on the spider by the wounds he had received. On my return, however, I was disappointed, the ants having entered, and destroyed them both. In the West Indies I have frequently witnessed crowds of these little insects destroying the spider or cockroach; as soon as he is despatched, they convey him to their nest. I have frequently seen them drag their prey perpendicularly up the wall, and although the weight would overcome their united ef A struggle of this description once amused the officers for nearly half an hour: a large centipede entered the gun-room, surrounded by an immense concourse of ants; the deck for four or five feet around was covered with them, his body and limbs were encrusted with his lilliputian enemies, and although thousands were destroyed in his efforts to escape, they ultimately carried him in triumph to their dwelling. In the woods near Sierra Leone, I have several times seen entire skeletons of the snake beautifully dissected by these minute anatomists. From these circumstances, it would appear, that ants are a considerable check to the increase of those venomous reptiles, so troublesome in the torrid zone; their industry, perseverance, courage, and numerical force, seem to strengthen the conjecture; in that case, that amply remunerate us for their own dations. From the Literary Gazette. ANECDOTE OF GENERAL THEODORE REDING VON BIBEREGG, Commanding the Swiss troops in the service of Spain. are, (Extracted from the Journal of a German Officer in the Spanish Service at the Battle of Baylen. CANNOT refrain (says the officer) from quence of their crime. At last the relating an anecdote, which throws Commander appeared. Curiosity had such a pleasing light on the character drawn together some young officers, to of the immortal Don Theodore Reding, whom Reding said, " Gentlemen, form a man who by his intrepidity, personal a circle. These men (continued he advalour, and sound judgment in the mil- dressing us with great seriousness), itary art, greatly contributed to the suc- were conveying to the enemy, who cess of that day. On the evening be- we know, suffering for want of water, fore the battle, several dragoons of one that necessary article; now determine of our most distant pickets of cavalry their punishment-I will collect your brought bound into the camp, about votes. "The gallows, according to twenty Andalusian peasants, who were the laws of war," said the first, the secconducting a number of mules and ond, and the third. The peasants turnasses loaded with water, by a secret ed pale. Some voted for shooting them; road to the French, when they were the most compassionate for drawing seized by our people. The heat was lots, and punishing every fifth man. so excessive, that persons of eighty "But do not let us," said the General, years of age remembered nothing equal" decide too hastily in a case of such to it. The peasants trembling awaited importance; which of you, gentlemen, their sentence before the General's tent, can know how many of us may survive well knowing that death was the conse- to-morrow? What induced you (turning to the peasants) to act in this manner? You ought to contribute to our success ;-you, whose interest it is to do the French all possible harm, even you bring provisions to the enemy's camp!" "General, we have done wrong (said one of the peasants) but have some excuse to offer. Our huts and our corn were a prey to the flames. We are all fathers of families, and no prospect but starvation remained to us for the approaching winter. We knew very well that the French paid two reals for a glass of water, with this money we hoped to relieve ourselves from want. Our sons are here in the army, and we also are prepared to die fighting for our country. A part of this very money was intended for powder, as we are too poor to procure our ammunition, as is required of us." Tears sparkled in the eyes of the hero.. He went into his tent, came out with a purse in his hand, and gave every peasant a piece of gold worth five ducats, saying, “Divide the water among your countrymen, and leave the French to me; to-morrow they will have something to drink." He would not stop to receive their thanks, but immediately after this noble action withdrew. PRESENT STATE OF ROME. From La Belle Assemblee, Jan. 1820. This volume is written in a series of letters,each agree ROME. IT T is probable that we are arrived at that period of history, when this queen of cities will lose her splendour, and preserve nothing more than the glory of a name, which, in the lapse of ages, will never be forgotten. In Rome, as within the walls of Volterra, will be seen only an immense assemblage of monuments, palaces, and ruins of all ages; under the porticoes will then vegetate the shepherds, the goatherds, and the husbandmen. The grotto of Evander will then no longer be sought for, he will seem to live again to be the king of this rustic people. Thus will terminate the history of Rome; long will she have survived her rivals, but like Athens and Persepolis, she will undergo the fate of every thing raised by the hand of man, she will be destroyed. The marks of ruin, produced by the ravages of time, are every where imprinted in Rome. As there are more houses than inhabitants, no one thinks of repairing that in which he lives; when it falls into decay he changes it for another; he never thinks of repairing his gate, his roof, or his stair-case; they break, fall down, and remain on the spot where chance has thrown them. Thus a great many convents appear only heaps of rubbish; many palaces are no longer habitable, and have not This even a porter to guard them. universal abandonment, this Tartar population which fills the streets, the flocks which overrun them, and the general appearance already exhibit the character of decay and destruction. * * On the other side of the Tiber, towards St. Peter's church and the gate Angelica, I passed through streets entirely deserted, and where no other inhabitants remained but the shepherds, who came thither to pass the night, though they even found them but a dangerous refuge. All the environs of the Vatican are also abandoned to the shepherds: I was particularly struck with this loneliness in going, at break of day, to St. Peter's church. The sun was rising just at the moment of my arrival, the gates of the temple were still shut, a profound and universal stillness prevailed; I heard only the distant sound of the bells of the flocks which were returning to the fields. The obelisk rested on its brazen base, and the two fountains ejected their unceasing streams. Neither passengers nor travellers crowded the pavé, and I arrived at the vestibule without having met a single human being. The freshness of the morning, and the tints of Aurora threw an inexpressible sweetness over this divine solitude. I contemplated at once, the temple, the porticos, and the heavens; and, for the first time my soul was impressed with the august ceremonies of nature when she gives and when she withdraws the light of day. At length the church doors were opened,and the bells solemnly proclaim. ed the beginning of day. But this Angelus in vain called the Christians to prayer; none came to implore the blessing of heaven. Alas! this temple, the most beautiful homage that the world has rendered to the true God; this temple is already in a state of solitude; the grass grows in its courts, and its sides are covered with moss. Having lifted up the curtain which covers the gate of the church, I found myself at the entrance of that monument which every where excites veneration, I proceeded under the domes and reached the altar; a few wax tapers were still burning, but the odour of incense was not perceived,...it is no longer burned there. A solitary female, an old inhabitant of the temple, approached me, and asked alms, which she had se dom the chance of receiving. The noise of my steps alone interrupted the silence of this sanctuary. The dead repose undisturbed in their tombs, but the living no longer come near them. In vain the walls display the wonders of art; there are no eyes to behold them; in vain the seven altars expect prayers and sacrifice; in these days of mourning, the sacrifice is to desert them. Struck by the religious solitude which surrounded me, I stopped near the altar; I was seated on the steps of a confessional, and involuntarily repeated these words of Abner, Que les temps sont changes, when a slight noise arrested my attention; I turned round and perceived an aged priest, who was come still to pour out his prayers at the feet of the Almighty. He also saw me, and approached me he was advanced in years; his dress shewed that he was poor, and that be resided in the country, for his shoes were covered with dust; he sat down by me, but hesitated to speak; perceiving his intention I addressed him first; this temple, said I, in Italian, is very magnificent; yes; answered he, but fortunately it was built in former times, it could not have been built at the present period; no, I replied, I am of your opinion. ΡΟΜΡΕΙΑ. I took the road to Portici, and I did not stop until I arrived at Pompeia, where I spent the remainder of the day. I will not repeat to you what has been so well said, on the unexpected impressions produced on seeing these beautiful remains of antiquity. The ashes have kept them in perfect preservation, and they appeared to want only inhabitants. I shall merely add, that, within the last four years, the digging has been much extended. They have discovered an entire new quarter, the buildings in which being much ornamented, indicate the residence of richer proprietors than those of the houses previously discovered. They have found a second gate of the city. With a few years more labour, Pompeia will rise completely from the tomb, in which it has been buried so many ages. There are no ruins in Italy, nor, probably, in the world, which excite so much interest as those of Pompeia, for there is nothing conjectural in what we see there: the imagination has nothing to fill up, and nothing to suppose. Every thing remains there as the Romans left it; every thing indicates their habits. We live with them, we use their furniture, we eat at their tables, we view their drawings, we read their mannscripts. The time which has elapsed since the day when Pliny met his death there, seems to be lost, and it might have been yesterday. I remained a long while looking at the workmen, who were digging. They had just gotten into the inside of a house, and every stroke of the spade made a discovery. I know nothing likely to excite so lively an interest as the digging in such a celebrated spot. Expectation and curiosity equally affect us. The imagination is excited by the historical recollections, at this instant. called forth. The eyes are involuntar ly fixed on the trowel with which the known, but astonishing nations who workman cautiously removes the ashes, built, in Italy, Cyclopean walls, while for fear of breaking the articles which in Africa they raised the pyramids of he may chance to expose. Gize and the avenue of the Sphinx? History is silent, and gives us no infor mation respecting the miracles of that age, whose monuments confound our reason, and almost our imagination, for they appear above human power. Nothing in nature has, to this day,explained the singular mysteries of this monumental civilization; a civilization so great as still to astonish the world by its ruins, so religious as to have raised colossi for the altars of its gods, and mountains for the tombs of its dead. I was immoveably fixed near these labourers: they threw shovels full of ashes into wheel-barrows. They discovered a wall; it was painted in fresco, beautiful arabesques gradually appeared. May not these medallions explain some of the secrets of antiquity? But our expectation, in this instance, was disappointed: they represented only bacchants and cupids. The work went on in emptying a room of the ashes with which it was filled, we came to the lower part of it and the precautions were increased, as they expected to find furniture and some valuable articles. The trowel touched a hard and resisting body. The workman removed the ashes very slowly, and he perceived a bronze ornament. Beautiful carved leaves rose from the ground; they adhered to branches, having fruit upon them, which The stem of the tree were oranges. rested in a vase of the same metal; it served as a pedestal: this bronze, of an elegant form, was only a candelabra, in the fruit of which were inserted sockets, which diffused around the light of twenty lamps. Art has produced nothing more natural, or more graceful, than this candelabra, whose reappearance I witnessed after two thousand years, as clean and as polished as when it first came out of the hands of the workmen. On the side of this bronze, and on the same pedestal, was a bust of Marius; I was gratified at being present at discoveries of so much interest; but night put a stop to the work; the workmen, as well as the antiquarians, went away, and I followed them with regret. In this short time I could not help thinking, how one might pass a whole life in these places without experiencing a moment's fatigue or ennui. DARKNESS OF HISTORY CONCERNING GIGANTIC PRODUCTIONS. At what period of history, at what age of the world, must we fix the poch of the existence of those un How is it that all the traces have been lost of that race of giants who had mammoths for their domestic animals, and who constructed their ramparts with rocks? The ruins which they have left us, astonish us the more, because we cannot conceive that genius of the ages which presided at their birth. It is a world, the secret of which has never reached us, and with respect to which we can do nothing, but remain mute before those august monuments, which time has preserved by placing them in wildernesses. Nature in our days, does not seem these ruins; they are so massive, and to have strength sufficient to destroy the earth has been so long accustomed to support them, that they seem even like a work of the creation. ADDITIONAL REMARKS ON Rome. Antiquity presents Rome to us great and noble above all other cities; but modern ages exhibit it under an aspect still more august. The throne of its earthly glory has been broken down, for it was the will of God to raise his altars amidst its ruins and desolations. He has depopulated the country surroundwhich ing this sanctuary, with a scourge unceasingly carries death with it,as if to teach Christians, that it is not the delights of this world which are promised them, but the hope of that which begins beyond the grave. A holy resignation, therefore, involuntarily affects the soul on entering the temples of Rome. The spirit of God alone resides in them at WHY did Adam bite the apple?" said a school-master to a country boy. "Because he had no knife," said the boy. One of the Paris opposition papers bas revived the following anecdote."A minister is sick. His colleague M. P. to induce him to take the medicine presented by the physician, said, "Take it, I intreat you: I'll be hanged if it does not do you good." "Take it," added the doctor, "after the assurance that Monsieur has given you, you may be convinced that, one way or other, the remedy must have a good effect." were, by way of revenge. Prince Mirza had been betrothed to the niece of a Nabab; he had been appointed to the office of aumildar, which signifies superintendant of direct and indirect taxes; finally, he had been created a general, for in Asia, the art of levying taxes is very much like the art of war; and in a great victory he had had the honor to kill a Rajah. In spite of all these titles to public esteem, be was hurled from his exalted rank; but, instead of retiring to the country, or writing for the opposition Journals, as our disgraced European statesmen do, he bade adieu to the banks of the Ganges, and embarked on board of a European vessel, without caring whither he went ; and, as he himself says; in the hope that some accident might put a period to his life and his sorrows." "Prince Mirza arrived in England. There he was enchanted by a thousand new objects. He forgot his political disasters, and observed and described every thing from Windsor Castle to the humblest cottage, from the English kitchen to the institution of the jury. England became his favourite country. However, the Oriental observer is far from approving all the customs of the three Kingdoms. The English, he says, have twelve vices or defects :They are haughty, voluptuous, dull, indolent, cholerick, and vain; they are atheists, gourmands, spendthrifts, egotists, and libertines; and they affect a |
