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tion for the latter, than the former event. The whole party now sallied out to a little green plot in front of Mrs. Mallony's cottage, in order to settle their differences by an appeal to gunpowder. On reaching the ground, however, it was discovered that there was a scarcity of pistols, there were six couple, and only two pair of fairly matched weapons. Under these circumstances, it was found necessary to decide the business by turns. An arrangement was therefore made, that so soon as one couple had fired, they were to lend their pistols to another, and so on, till every gentleman had had his turn in the pastime.

This point settled, the parties took their ground, and the business began. Fortunately the condition they were in-every man of them being less or more affected by the evening's debauch-rendered them wholly unfit to take any thing like a decisive aim. The consequence was, to the great disappointment of the parties themselves, that not a single shot out of the whole took effect. When the last couple had fired, Seymour and father Mulligan conceiving it a favourable opportunity for again interfering for they had already attempted a reconciliation to no purpose-now stepped in between the combatants, and the calls of honour being now satisfied by an exchange of shots, not only succeeded in putting an end to the contest, but in generating the most brotherly love amongst the fiery and reckless, though generous spirits, who were the objects of their solicitude. Always in extremes, they now took each other by the arm, and shouting out mutual love and friendship, returned to the apartment which they had left, to discuss another jug of Mrs. Mallony's whisky punch.

THE CAGED LARK.

BY DELLA CRUSCA.

I.

BIRD of the sky! it were far more meet

That the minstrel's hand replace thee

In the earth's green vales, where thy song might greet
The breeze that was wont to embrace thee;

Than that thou shouldst beat thy fluttering breast
'Gainst the bars of thy cheerless dwelling;

Or cow'r thee lorn, with a drooping crest,
When thy notes subdued are telling
Of the purpled morn, when thy dewy wing
Bore thee up, like a speck of glory,

To the throne of God, with thy matin hymn,
While the white sunny clouds swam o'er thee.

II.

Bird of the sky! while ye lowly sit

In the prison ye now inherit,

I look upon you as an emblem fit

Of the weary and broken spirit

That a sinful world has shut out from God,
And the blessed light of heaven;
Till the mind has become a dreary blank,
Where no ray of truth is given
To lighten the faint and fettered soul,
When the star of hope is clouded,
That beamed o'er its far-off home of rest,
Which sin hath in darkness shrouded.

III.

Bird of the sky! while the earth laughs out,
And the stream leaps on in gladness,
Thou shalt rise again as a holy thought,
From thy prison-house of sadness;
And wing thy flight to the gates of bliss
With liberty's song so tender,

Till far from my sight ye seem to melt
In the pure and delightful splendour,
That wells so bright from the fount of light,
The blue calm of ether wreathing;
Like the soft sunshine of a seraph's soul,
On the bosom of Mercy breathing.

IV.

Bird of the sky! ye are free again,

And away 'mong the grey clouds winging:
And deep is my joy to behold thee there,
And to list to thy clear sweet singing;
For now to the eye of faith ye seem
Like a soul on its way to heaven,
To summer high on the hills of God,
Where the fulness of bliss is given
To the tried and believing ones on earth,
Whose anguish and grief could never
Dispel from their thoughts that land of light,
Where their spirits have gone for ever!

BORDER CHARACTERS.

SKETCH OF THE REV. EDWARD IRVING.

BY JOHN MACKAY WILSON.

EDWARD IRVING was born about forty-three years ago, in the town of Annan in Dumfriesshire; where his father still lives, and formerly carried on the business of a tanner. After finishing the routine of his college studies, and entering probationer, he crossed the Queen'sferry, and taking up the birch, which he resolved should be no idle

instrument in his hand,-the future orator, enthusiast and fanatic, became dominie in the lang town o' Kirkaldy. And full soon

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The boding tremblers learned to trace,

The day's disasters in his morning face,'

which frowned "dark as Erebus," and showed

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The mild method of Professor Pillans, and the beautiful system of Infant Schools, would have been regarded by the rigid-discipline-loving-dominie of Kirkaldy as heresies not less abominable and prepos terous in a school-room, than those of his own fair babblers, Miss Campbell and Company, are confessed to be in the church, by every person who is not a knave, or an idiot. The taws, the rack, the birch, wringing of ears, thrusting up the chimney, hopping for hours upon the same foot,—are only a few of his practices and inventions in the art of torture and punishment. To record all,

'The longest summer day would be too short.'

The imps that tortured Caliban were so many mercies in the contrast. His method of instruction, like his preaching, was by main force, and being an excellent scholar himself, by main force he made several excellent scholars in Kirkaldy. He forced dunces to learn whether they could or not; and in other instances made genius incapable of learning. At length on his being appointed assistant to Dr. Chalmers, who was then in Glasgow, the bare-legged tremblers of the school escaped with joy from his reign of terror."

After he arrived in London, and was appointed to the Caledonian Church in Cross-street, Hatton Garden, crowding thousands thronged from all parts of the city, to stare, gape and wonder at the singu lar man and his original orations. The first exhibition I went to witness, no sooner were the doors opened, than the body of the church was crammed, the galleries groaned, and the passages were wedged with breathing beings. Canning and Brougham sat in front of the pulpit hob-a-nob with each other, here sat Basil Montague, his countenance seeming to say- the man of God-the admired of all admirers, is my friend,'-and there sat honest Allan Cunningham, waiting his approach,-yea, Honourables and Rt. Honourables, Peers and Peeresses were sprinkled over the congregation like raisins in a Christmas loaf. Into the midst of this motley assembly stalked a huge, bony figure, whom the audience might have bowed down and served, without infringing on the literal reading of the second commandment. He was six feet high, and broad-shouldered,-a mass of a man moving in a piece. The covering of his outward person was after the fashion of the old school, plain and outlandish. His skin and countenance were yellow and leathery; his whiskers bushy, black and enormous;—his shaggy hair divided a la nazarene, and falling in uncouth clusters upon his shoulders. His eyes!-aye!-there lies the difficulty of description,-they looked to the ceiling, the floor,

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and the four corners of the chapel at one and the same instant!He drew himself up to his full height, the most unpolished-looking piece of humanity that ever wagged a pow in a poopit.' He opened his lips; his accent was as unpolished as his person; it was provincial, harsh, grating and disagreeable. It was like a heavily laden waggon passing over a road newly macadamized!-His language, or composition, was a jumbling together and a transposing of participles, adjectives and new-made verbs,-a sort of new edition of Ossian with additions, or the rules of Syntax run mad. His action was vehement and overwhelming. He poured forth a torrent at the full pitch of his thundering voice, swung his long right arm round and round his head, and ever and anon made it hurl upon the cushion like a sledge hammer,

"Till roof an' rafters a' did dirl!"

Or crouching together like a tyger ready to spring upon its prey,— his wild eyes rivetted, his voice deepening, and the power and solemnity of his subject increasing, as he crouched closer and closer together, with his hands raised above his head, till the climax of his argument being ready to burst forth, he sprang forward, and pell mell fell his clenched fists upon the Bible, like the lusty blows of a brawny blacksmith.

He is one of the most logical reasoners I ever heard; and all his arguments are deduced with the power and closeness of a mathematical demonstration. But while we admire the frequent magnificence, the apparent strength and fitness of parts of the fabric he has reared, we are aware that his premises have been taken for granted, and that the building he has erected in such exquisite proportions is without foundation, and like his fantastic theories, is merely a baseless fabric.

With all his folly,-all his eccentricity,—and all his fanaticism— not to call it by a worse name-Irving, in a limited sphere, is the most powerful-the most effective orator I have heard either in the pulpit or out of the pulpit. Again and again, while the Bible and common sense told me he was merely giving vent to the effervescence of a diseased imagination, I have felt the flesh creep and tremble on my bones, and the hair on my head move. He will not speak a quarter of an hour, till you are convinced, the rough accent, the fierce manner, the wild language, and the wilder looking man were all made for each other, and form an orator in some respects as powerful as the whole are singular or individually ridiculous. He has few claims to true originality, and his principle merely is a determination to be like no one else. Still fewer are his claims to the qualities of a truly eloquent man. He can neither affect the heart nor convince the head; he can only throw a whirlwind around the imagination, or keep a continual thunder-storm before it. Almost the only quality he possesses, which comes within the region of true eloquence, is earnestness. True eloquence is the tongue of poetry, it is unto it as Aaron was unto Moses. It is poetry bursting forth, and flashing among the multitude. Its po try's shout of welcome in the embrace of freedom. I do not mean the rhetorical whimperings trimmed by an Aristotle ;-he was learned in philosophy, learned in words,-learned in verse, --but he was ignorant in poetry, he was the enemy of eloquence.

VOL. I.

2 F

He attempted to forge chains for the invisible soul,-to prescribe rules for the limitless mind,-to set a depth and a breadth upon the feelings of the human heart. Poetry disdained his trammels. It knows every name but the name of a slave, and it would not be the slave of a critic:-it forsook the walks of his tyrannic school, and eloquence fled in company with its mother and its guide. To lay down laws for poetry is to lay down laws for feeling, and do you need to be told how to weep?-Do you need to be told how to sigh? -Cannot passion glow on the cheek, beam from the eye, or bound from the hand, without the artificial, the cold, the insipid dogmas of the pedant, which have assumed the place of eloquence? Freedom is the nurse of Poetry, and eloquence rests her head upon her breast. Poetry may visit the heart of a slave, but eloquence never dwelt upon his tongue,-or he was a slave no longer. It is true that for the words which have burst from his spirit, they may bow down his body with chains,-they may bury it in the darkness of dungeons, -but he who dares to say-I am free! is not-cannot be a bondman, for his soul laughs at the fetters, and

"Brightest in dungeons-Liberty! thou art,

For there thy habitation is the heart!"

In a word, Poetry and Eloquence will only flourish with a free people, and under a free constitution. And it is from this cause that the pulpits and senate of Britain have exhibited examples of poetic eloquence, rivalling Greece in her glory,-Rome in her pride. As has been said, the only claim that Irving has to any portion in this description of Eloquence, is in his passionate earnestness. I am indeed inclined to give him credit for sincerity through all the stages of his folly but the last, and there also I will give him the benefit of my doubts. He is not only by nature an enthusiast, but his morbid imagination is too powerful and extravagant for his judgment; and being guided by it, every Will-o'-the-wisp of his brain, to him becomes "Confirmation strong as holy writ."

Like all religious enthusiasts, he is a compound of piety and absurdity. And while I do believe him in the main, to be not only sincere, but zealously sincere, if I can do so without involving a contradic tion, I would add-public notoriety is his idol, singularity the temple in which he worships, and novelty the sacrifice he offers up. In conclusion, Irving is a mixture of the christian—the man of genius-and the charlatan.

VERSES,

Written in the Vale of Yarrow.

BY D. J. LIETCH.

WHO hath not felt the magic spell,
Which in our olden measures dwell,
A music quaint and wild?

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