ness should operate to the commission of homicide. That an offence so heinous should cease to be regarded as a crime, can only be accounted for by the total deficiency of moral principle, and the facility of obtaining absolution for every thing short of sacrilege and heresy, which, in Spain, Portugal, and Italy, are sins infinitely greater than the violation of all the ten commandments.

"Pray," said a priest to one of his parishioners, who in his confession, particularly enumerated offences of such little moment as eating flesh on fast-days,-" pray friend, have you never been guilty of robbing a traveller, now and then?"-"Oh yes, father; to be sure, I have," answered the peasant with great frankness.

Well, and I suppose, that upon a time you and your fellows have not scrupled to murder some of those unfortunate passengers who have chanced to fall in your way."-"No," says the robber, "not exactly murdered them, your reverence; we only put them to death, when they made a show of resistance; and then it was a matter of course."

Our noble traveller, therefore, might have easily

traced the cause of the indifference with which assassination is treated in Portugal, to something else than the degeneracy of the people of that country; since he must have known that the crime is not peculiar to that nation, but prevails, more or less, wherever the form of sacerdotal absolution is regarded as equivalent to a complete remission of sins.

During his short residence at Lisbon, Lord Byron made excursions to Coimbra, the university of Por tugal; to Mafra, the palace where the late Queen resided after the loss of her reason; and to the ro mantic seat built in a secluded spot on the side of a mountain by our countryman Beckford, but which was then abandoned by the owner, whose history in many respects bears a melancholy resemblance to that of the noble poet.

Having just seen enough of the Portuguese capital to admire the beauty of the surrounding scenery, and to conceive an utter dislike to the nation, our traveller pursued his course across the mountainous ridge that divides the province of Alentejo, and then, descending

to the banks of the dark Guadiana at Beia, entered the plains of Andalusia. The period was extremely critical, for upon the fate of Spain, hung suspended that of Europe: but though a general anxiety prevailed among all those who were panting for the peace of the world; and who knew that this desirable object was a consummation not to be expected, so long as the Colossus of France remained unsubdued; such was the apathy of the noble lord, an apathy acquired in the school of politics to which he had attached himself, that he looked with splenetic unconcern upon the tremendous struggle, and beheld the agitated state of the country where he now stood, with the same feelings that he would have contemplated the war of the ant-hill.

The very circumstance of a nation being forced to contend for its political existence with a gigantic power, by whom it had been drawn into an alliance under the pledge of protection, was of a nature to rouse the most phlegmatic spirit into resentment against the oppressor.

Yet nothing of this natural sense of justice, or this

sympathy with the injured, appears to have been felt by Lord Byron when, on passing the gentle river that divided Portugal from Spain, he heard that warlike sound which threatened the annihilation of a kingdom, and the subjection of the people to a foreign and hated yoke. Instead of being warmed, with the usual ardour of youthful heroism in such a cause, and looking upon the men with admiration, who were thus generously resolved to save their country or to perish with its independence, Lord Byron ventured to ridicule the Spanish Patriots as fools, and to pronounce a decisive judgment against the mighty undertaking in which they were gloriously embarked.

It is much to be regretted, that a mind so feelingly alive to the harmony of nature in other respects, and so susceptible of the most powerful impressions from the wonders of the material creation, should have been out of tune only when brought into association with the rest of the species. Yet thus early did the disposition to expel the whole moral world from the communion of charitable sentiment develope itself in this noble person, who saw nothing wrong in the universe, except mankind.

From Seville, which, according to the representation given of the place by its noble visitant, was at this period sunk in lewdness, his lordship proceeded to Cadiz, where he remained some time, and then embarked with his friend Hobhouse in an English frigate for the Mediterranean.

Our travellers explored Albania before they visited any other part of the Ottoman dominions, and having reached Joannina, the capital of Ali Pacha's territory, were presented to that chief by Major now Colonel Leake, the English resident. Ali received them with the greatest respect, and gave them an invitation to Tepaleni, his birth-place, and favourite seat, which though only one day's distance from Berent, where he then was, the journey took up nine in the accomplishment, on account of the rains. In this excursion, Lord Byron and his companion were overtaken by a violent thunderstorm, during which the guides lost their way, so that - it was with great difficulty and no little peril that they regained the right road in this mountainous country. The resemblance between the inhabitants of this region, and the Highlanders of Scotland, in dress, figure, and manner of living, struck his lordship very