lie Murdered by Means of his Wanton Wife, who Hired Two Desperate Ruffians, Black Will and Shakbagge, to Kill him. "With equal eagerness," says John Ireland, "he sought for and read the accounts of murders, battles, massacres, martyrdoms, earthquakes, the death of Regulus, or burning of Cranmer, particulars of a criminal's behaviour when broken upon the wheel, the barbarities Cortes and other zealous propagators of the Gospel inflicted upon the Indians, the tortures suffered by the victims of superstition in the Inquisition, or any event, whether in or out of nature, which was calculated to give strong and forcible impressions."

It may be laid down as a clear maxim of morals, as well as a manifest principle of prudence, that no one is justified in murdering any one else, without having previously made proper arrangements for the disposal of the body. To murder your man or woman first, and then to set about considering what you are to do with the lifeless form, is a most unbusiness-like proceeding, arguing culpable want of forethought. But though it involves the artist in much trouble that might have been avoided, it is not without beneficial results for the community at large, inasmuch as it necessitates a mass of harrowing details which, so to speak, "incarnadine" the newspapers, and delight, by horrifying, the public. The maddening mysteries incidental to mutilation must assuredly occasion a strangely pleasureable sensation, else they would not be as they are, the theme of animated talk and curious conjecture among all classes of people. Everything relating to the discovery of a crime and the hunting down of the criminal has for morbid imaginations an extraordinary fascination. Nor

does that fascination end with his life. After death he passes into the Chamber of Horrors in Baker Street, where, in waxen effigy, he holds posthumous levées, and is for generations afterwards an object of appalling delight to visitors, both from town and country. Nay, more, his very Executioner becomes a hero, and finds his account in attending private parties, where, no doubt, he is fêted and lionised to his heart's content. Incredible though this may appear, it is true. The footman's soirée, where, as Charles Dickens informs us, "the soirée consisted of a leg of mutton and trimmings," was sufficiently enjoyable. A private party, where the lion of the evening is a hangman in swallow-tail and a white tie, must be something still more delightful.

If the French proverb, La joie fait peur, “Joy creates fear," is true, not less so, assuredly, is the converse proposition, La peur fait joie, "Fear creates joy." If this were not so, what would become of our Spiritualists, our street tumblers, our rope-dancers, and the whole tribe of artists who live by sensational exhibitions? Do you suppose that any one would go the length of his or her nose to see a young lady shot out of a cannon, or a young gentleman clinging to a "flying trapeze" by the skin of his teeth, were it not for the horrible contingency that either performer may come to grief in the twinkling of an eye? Can you, sweet reader, look me in the face, and seriously assure me that you would care one figstalk to see a gentleman put his head into a lion's mouth if there were not the terrific possibility that one of these days he will not draw it out again? No. The terror inseparable from the exhibition constitutes its whole attraction. Let a manager "on horror's head horrors accumulate," and his

fortune is made. But he must take care not to announce a horror that does not come off. It is nothing less than heart-breaking to read of a disappointment such as an American contemporary describes in the words following:-"Five thousand fools were huddled together the other day on and about the Upper Suspension Bridge at Niagara, in order to see another fool jump off. He was dressed in tights, and he was tighter than his own tights-being as drunk as a lord. He was not permitted to make the attempt, and the crowd went home very mad." And very naturally so, for to baulk people of a promised joy so very horrible was, as George Caswell would say, "to trifle with the noblest feelings of their nature."

Londoners of the present day are happy beyond all their predecessors in opportunities of being horrified into delight. It is impossible to walk fifty yards in any direction without seeing some ghastly picture which strikes horror (and rapture) into your soul. Mrs. Allen, with her head embowered in a mass of superfluous hair; the rollicking friar who, spectacles on nose, opens his mouth as wide as a cavern to show you his teeth; the young woman lying dead-drunk on a snow-covered plain with the awful word Drink printed at her feet; the Indian Nabob eating pickled herrings; the young gentleman in the act of braining a young lady with an uplifted baby; the old man who, having cut the head off another old man, whisks a serpent over the decapitated trunk; and, Oh, horror of horrors! the naked figure of Mr. Holman, with his liver-pad on, grin, scowl, or smirk at you from every wall and hoarding in the Metropolis. It is the perpetual recurrence of these and many similar pictures that makes a walk through London one of the

most edifying and entertaining pastimes in the world.

One instance more of the delight that dwells in Horror, and I have done. If man were not the horrible being he is, do you really believe that Woman would love him and serve him as she does? By no means. It is because he is a horror, that she pities and comforts him. Look around you dispassionately, and you will find that the most odious men have the best wives. A woman supremely lovely, gentle, and good, is sure to be wedded to some ugly, unmannerly fellow, 66 her great reverse in all." But there! Men are a bad lot, all round, and women may as well make up their minds to have nothing to say to them for the future. I give this advice with all frankness and candour, and in evidence of my sincerity will send a fine tusk of ivory to any lady who will promise, upon her word of honour, never again to speak to a man. By taking this course, she may not indeed be horrified into delight, but she will have peace of mind, the only thing worth living for.

LILIPUT

EMUEL GULLIVER'S invaluable contribubution to ethnological science is nowhere

so conspicuous for accuracy of observation and minuteness of detail as in that acute philosopher's account of the inhabitants of Liliput. It is there that his analytical power, no doubt resulting from previous anatomical study, reaches its zenith; and it is there, nevertheless, that his narrative has a fascination usually only found in fiction. But this distinctive excellence is scarcely sufficient to account for the fact that the interest taken by mankind in the pigmy people is more absorbing than that felt for the inhabitants of Laputa, the Brobdignag, or Houyhnhnm country. It is impossible to shut one's eyes to the circumstance that beings of diminutive stature have always been held in greater admiration than those who exceed the ordinary standard of humanity. And the reason for this preference must be sought in the depths of our nature. It cannot be engendered of pity for the helplessness of the tiny race, for in all their contests with the sons of Anak the Liliputians invariably get the best of it. The veracious histories of Jack, surnamed "the Giant-Killer," and his namesake of the Bean-stalk, go to prove this; and without wishing for one moment to cavil at the admirable moral of the well-nigh