scarcely seated herself in it when she began to beat herself in a frightful manner. It was with difficulty I could endure the sad spectacle. I assumed the attitude I did on the former day, extending my arms towards her. Her convulsions continued; but at length, with a soft sigh, she seemed relieved, and the impression of sadness gradually disappearing from her countenance, the glow of inspiration began to return. At length she said, in a tone of angelic softness 66 Oh, dear friend, what would become of her but for you? She seems floating in an atmosphere of light, in which her being seems to mingle with thine." She continued to have her eyes close shut, but could tell all that was passing behind her; she even told the number and description of persons who were passing in a gondola near. She began to converse, at length, of her illness of her night wanderings, and of a long fainting fit, in which many of her family believed her dead, and which had lasted nearly ten hours. She described how her father, leaving her in despair, had retired to his chamber, and, throwing himself upon his knees, prayed a circumstance which could have been known to no one but himself, for the room was dark, and he had locked the door. In these conversations she still continued to speak of herself in the third person, as if of a stranger. At one time she said 66 She is a countess, and the daughter of the Count von Rosenthal; but I am not." Her whole appearance in these trances was of the most lofty and beautiful kind. Presently she sank into a fit of deep reflection. Upon the occasion of this interview, her fit of inspiration ended almost as it did before. Thus matters went on for many months. Although very anxious, I can scarcely describe what passed. The health of the countess appeared gradually to improve. In consequence of her frequent trances I became almost a slave; I could scarcely leave the house for a moment. Every day seemed to clothe her with a fresh charm. Had I never seen her but for an hour, its memory would endure for a lifetime. Oh, the rapture of first love! Yes, I deny it not -love it was, but I may truly say, not an earthly one; my whole being was bound up in this inspired priestess. I felt so unworthy to be regarded by her slightest look, could she only have tolerated me as the meanest of her servants, without antipathy, I would have thought it the highest celestial happiness. But, alas! in proportion as my society seemed to charm her when asleep, rose her antipathy to me when awake. This antipathy gradually increased to hatred - always showed itself in some manner of which I was sensitive; with passionate tears she would entreat her father to send me out of the house. She despised me as a common vagabond, who was unworthy to breathe the very air with her, still less to be so much in the confidence of the Graf von Rosenthal. Incredible as it may appear, when she was in these trances she seemed to follow all the movements of my hands, and to anticipate my very thoughts. At length, it seemed scarcely necessary that I should extend my hands towards her; my wishes were sufficient to bring relief. She would drink neither wine nor water which I had not touched with my fingers, out of which issued, as she said, "streams of light." One day the count proposed to me that I should make an experiment of the affection of his daughter, by asking her, when in a trance, that she should give me a beautiful full-blown rose when she was awake. The experiment was tried, notwithstanding my objections; and I one day interrupted a friendly conversation, by making the request, previously to which, however, I ought to mention, that I had gone over to some roses which were growing in the balcony, and in selecting one of them, a thorn pierced my finger-the countess actually uttered a violent exclamation, as if in severe pain. 66 "Take care," said she, Emanuel; whatever hurts you, pains me also." Thinking this the most suitable moment to make my request, "Why do you not tell her," said the countess, "that you wish her to give you a full-blown rose to-morrow?" I was astonished she had divined my wishes; and I attempted to make some excuse. Oh, nonsense, said she laughing; “I knew my father put it into your head. 66 But it is also my dearest wish," I replied. "Will you, when you waken at twelve o'clock, remember it?" "Can she do anything else?" she replied, laughing. When this conversation ceased, the count departed, and summoned the attendants and the doctor. It might have been a little after ten o'clock that Hortense awoke, and showed to the physician the hurt on her finger. She thought she had injured it with a needle, and wondered there was no outward sore. At eleven she showed symptoms of uneasiness-walked up and down the chamber, and began to abuse me to her women, and overpowered her father with reproaches for not having dismissed me before. She then began to talk about other matters. Her restlessness increased; she was asked if she was unwell. They tried in vain to find out the cause of her uneasiness. She hid her face in the pillows, and begged of them all to leave the room. A quarter before twelve, her bell was heard. She informed her maid, when she entered the apartment, that I must be present when the clock struck twelve. Although I had looked forward to this invitation, I felt quite upset by it. With a palpitating heart, I entered the room; the countess was sitting carelessly upon the sofaher beautiful head, shaded by its dark locks, supported by her delicate hand. In a manner half sorrowful, half angry, she rose as I entered; and I then requested the honor of her commands. She did not immediately answer, but seemed to hesitate, as if at a loss for words. At last she said "Mr. Emanuel, it seems as if I ought to make you a present, in order to induce you to retire from our service.' Countess,' I said, as I felt my pride rising, "I did not force myself into the count's employment; you are aware of the reasons which have induced me to remain in the company of my lord. I would willingly obey your commands just uttered, but for the hope of being useful." I regained my apartment, and pressed to my lips the rose, which I considered worth all the crowns and jewels on earth. The dislike of the countess from this period, strange to say, seemed to increase. Her father, convinced of my honesty, as well as my ability to be useful, was proof against all his daughter's suspicions and fears. My position became very irksome; for I perceived that every one else, even to the servants, treated me with aversion and contempt. This at length increased to such an extent, that I perceived that it had gradually the effect of alienating from me the count's esteem; and I should have been unable to remain, had it not been for the kindness of the countess, who, in her trances, would entreat me not to mind such temporary estrangements. One evening the count called me into his cabinet. He asked me to give him the books I had managed, as well as an order for two thousand louis-d'ors recently come, which he said he wished to put into the bank of Venice, as he intended remaining for another year. I took the opportunity to entreat of him to give these matters of service to the management of some one else, as I intended, as soon as the health of the countess should be a little restored, to leave his house and service. Although I said this with some emotion, the count did not appear to pay much attention, but merely replied, that he would be able, doubtless, to get some one to attend to his affairs. This was enough; I perceived that he wished to get rid of me. I went back to my room, and collected all the papers, both those he had asked me for, and the others; but I could not lay my hands upon the order he required; I searched for it, but in vain. The next morning the count reminded me. "You have forgotten," said he, "the steward's accounts I asked you for yesterday, with the money order." The only excuse I could devise was, that I had temporarily mislaid some papers, among which I supposed was the one in question, but that I would surely have it by the following morning. My search, however, was utterly in vain; and at length I came to the conclusion that the checks were either lost or stolen, or that I had unknowingly destroyed them myself. No one, except my servant, who could neither read nor write, had the key of my room. My apprehensions were terrific. (To be concluded.) A RAILWAY CIRCULATING LIBRARY. An important addition to the comfort and convenience of the travelling public has been suggested by the general manager of the NorthWestern Railway Company, Captain Huish, and is likely to be brought into early operation. The supply of books at the stations on the line is about to be largely increased and improved in character; and the whole of them being now undertaken by Messrs. Smith, of the Strand, Captain Huish proposes to establish a gigantic circulating library, on the plan that the passenger may select a book at a stall, paying the price thereof, and after travelling any distance on the railway (where his journey terminates) deliver it at the station, receiving back the value, less a trifle for the perusal. When it is considered that the London and North-Western Railway extends over nearly 500 miles, and that more than six millions of passengers travel upon it annually, we cannot conceive any plan more likely than the above to while away a tedious hour, and improve the time necessarily spent in journeying.-Examiner. ETRURIA. COLLECTANEA. "How far we transalpines of the nineteenth century are indebted to her civilization is a problem hardly to be solved; but indelible traces of her influence are apparent in Italy. That portion of the Peninsula where civilization earliest flourished, whence infant Rome received her first lessons, has in subsequent ages maintained its preeminence. It was on the Etruscan soil that the seeds of culture, dormant through the long winter of barbarism, broke forth anew when a genial spring smiled on the human intellect. It was in Etruria that immortality was first bestowed on the lyre, the canvas, the marble, the science of modern Europe. Here arose the all Etruscan three, Dante and Petrarch; and scarce less than they, art and literature? May it not be to the deepseated influences of early civilization that he owes that superior polish and blandness of manner which entitle Tuscany preeminently to the distinction claimed for it of being a rare land of courtesy ?"-The Cities and Ceme teries of Etruria. KNOW'ST THOU THE LAND?-(NEW VERSION.) Know'st thou the land where the kangaroos bound, Know'st thou that land, John Bull, my friend? Know'st thou the land where the cattle and sheep, Know'st thou the land that thy paupers may reach It was Etruria which produced Giotto, Brunelleschi, Fra Angelico, Luca Signorelli, Fra Bartolomeo, Michael Angelo, Hildebrand, Machiavelli, "the starry Galileo," and such a noble band of painters, sculptors, and architects as no other country of modern Europe can boast. Certainly no other region of Italy has produced such a galaxy of brilliant intellects. I leave it to philosophers to determine if there be anything in the climate or natural features of the land to render it thus intellectually prolific. But much may be owing to the natural superiority of the race, which, in spite of the revolutions of ages, remains essentially the same, and preserves a distinctive feature;-just as many traits of the ancient Greek, Gaul, German, and Spaniard may be recog nized in their modern descendants. The roots of by-gone moral, as well as physical culture are not easily eradicated. The wild vine and olive mark many a desert tract to have been once subject to cultivation. And thus, ancient civilization will long maintain its traces even in a degenerate soil, and will often germinate afresh on experiencing congenial influences.ery in existence, can be an idiot; and to the The wheat three thousand years interred How else comes it that while the Roman of to-day preserves much of the rudeness of former times while the Neapolitan in his craft and wiliness betrays his Greek origin, the Tuscan is still the most lively in intellect and imagination, the most highly endowed with a taste for THE EX-EMPEROR OF AUSTRIA. which have been applied to the ex-Emperor "Idiot' and 'blood-thirsty' are the terms Ferdinand. To us it is difficult to understand how a man who has learned and speaks half a dozen languages, whose pastime is the study of mechanics, and who has formed one of the most beautiful collections of models of machin accusation of blood-thirstiness his whole life gives the lie. As Prince and Emperor, every day of his existence has been marked by acts of kindness and benevolence. We see him in our mind's eye, with his spare form and countenance, on which constant illness had imprinted deep traces of melancholy and suffering, accompanied by a single gentleman, walking on the bastions of Vienna, or in the gardens of Schonbrunn, doffing his hat to every per son that recognized him, often stopping to speak to a poor man or woman who might address him, and who was certain of relief, for all the prohibitions of the police could not prevent the importunity of the distressed, who knew full well that to their gute Kaiser (good Emperor) no application for charity was vain. We have conversed frequently with persons who were in daily contact with him, and never have we heard him reproached with an unkind word or an unfeeling act. It was a wellknown fact that at least one-third of the houserent of the poorer inhabitants of Vienna was paid by him, or other members of the imperial family. The munificent donation of £400,000 for the relief of the sufferers by the siege of Vienna, speaks more in his favor than all the obloquy and detraction of the newspapers can to his disparagement."-Dolman's Maga zine. WOLVERTON REFRESHMENT ROOMS. It appears from the books, that the annual consumption at the Wolverton refreshmentrooms averages-182,500 Banbury cakes, 56,940 Queen's cakes; 29,200 patés; 36,500 lbs. of flour, 13,140 of butter, 2,920 of cof fee, 43,800 of meat, 5,110 of currants, 1,277 of tea, 5,840 of loaf sugar, 5,110 of moist sugar; 16,425 quarts of milk, 1,095 of cream; 17,520 bottles of lemonade, 35,040 of sodawater, 70,080 of stout, 35,040 of ale, 17,520 of ginger-beer, 730 of port, 3,650 of sherry, and, we regret to add, 730 of gin, 731 of rum, 3,660 of brandy. To the eatables are to be added, or driven, the 85 pigs, who, after having been from their birth most kindly treated and most luxuriously fed, are impartially promoted, by seniority, one after another, into an infinite number of pork pies.-Quarterly Review. MILITARY AMBITION. War and its unfailing attendants, taxation and crime, will ever go hand in hand. While any people are unwilling to think for themselves, and take no constitutional means of re PIANOS. A six and three-quarter octave cottage piano, either rosewood or mahogany, in height four feet six inches, in breadth four feet two inches, contains 200 superficial feet of wood, comprising eleven different kinds: 160 strings, the average pull upon each being from fifty to sixty pounds, or the total pull upon the instrument about twenty cwt.; and the whole length of wire, including copper and steel, measures 1,822 feet; the united number of pieces required in the completion of a piano-forte amounts to nearly 3,000. The average weight of the instrument when completed is nearly three cwt. To preserve the tone of a piano-forte it should be regularly tuned, at least four times a year, and kept to one pitch; if suffered to go too long without tuning, it will very soon get flat, and not only troubles a tuner to bring it up to concert pitch, but the wires become elastic, and lose their brilliancy of tone. There is no greater enemy to a piano than damp; it should ble of equal temperature. The less the soft be kept in a dry room, and as nearly as possi stand in tune; using this pedal is not only liapedal is used, the better the piano-forte will ble to strain the action in the movements, but the whole blow of the hammer falling upon one string must destroy the unison of the note. in a piano; such things frequently cause a Avoid putting metallic or other articles on, or jarring noise, and will generally injure the in strument. - was STEAM V. THE TURF. A good many years ago, one of the stoutest and hardest riders that ever crossed Leicestershire undertook to perform a feat which, just at the moment, attracted the general attention, not only of the country, but of the sporting world. His bet was, that if he might choose his own turf, and if he might select as many thorough-bred horses as he liked, he would undertake to ride 200 miles in ten hours! The newspapers of the day described exactly how "the squire dressed-what he had been living on how he looked-how, at the word " Away!" he dress, so long they may realize the truth that started like an arrow from a bow-how gallantly Tranby, his favorite racer, stretched the iron-hoof of military despotism will never relax, but press and weigh down their energies himself in his gallop-how on arriving at his to the dust. The words of Gibbon are strik- second horse he vaulted from one saddle to ingly significant in reference to great war- another-how he then flew over the surface of the earth, if possible, faster than before-and riors. "As long as mankind shall continue to bestow more liberal applause on their destroy-how, to the astonishment and amidst the ers than on their benefactors, the thirst of military glory will ever be the vice of the most exalted characters."--Anti-War Tracts. *On the North-Western Railway. acclamations of thousands of spectators, he at last came in a winner! Now, if at this moment of his victory, while with dust and perspiration on his brow-his exhausted arms dangling just above the panting flanks of his horse, which his friends at each side of the bridle were slowly leading in triumph-a decrepit old woman had hobbled forward, and in the name of Science had told the assembled multitude that before she became a skeleton she and her husband would undertake, instead of 200 miles in ten hours, to go 500-that is to say, that for every mile "the squire" had just ridden, she and her old man would go two miles and a half-that she would, moreover, knit all the way, and that he should take his medicine every hour, and read to her just as if they were at home-lastly, that they would undertake to perform their feat either in darkness or in daylight, in sunshine or in storm, "in thunder, lightning, or in rain"-who, we ask, would have listened to the poor maniac?-and yet how wonderfully would her prediction have been now fulfilled! Nay, wagons of coals and heavy luggage now-a-days fly across Leicestershire faster and farther than Mr. Osbaldestone could go, notwithstanding his condition and that of all his horses.-Review. INWARD INFLUENCE OF OUTWARD BEAUTY. Believe me, there is many a road into our hearts besides our ears and brains; many a sight, and sound, and scent, even, of which we have never thought at all, sinks into our memory, and helps to shape our characters; and thus children brought up among beautiful the fruits of their nursing by thoughtfulness, sights and sweet sounds will most likely show the expression of the countenance. and affection, and nobleness of mind, even by Those this, for their own sakes, for their wives' sakes, who live in towns should carefully remember for their children's sakes. Never lose an opportunity of seeing anything beautiful. Beauty is God's handwriting a wayside every fair' sky, every fair flower, and thank sacrament; welcome it in every fair face, for it Him, the fountain of all loveliness, and drink it in simply and earnestly, with all your eyes; it is a charmed draught, a cup of blessing.-Politics for the People. LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC INTELLIGENCE. NORWEGIAN SILVER. From the Swedish | the regulations which forbid it, to expose their official paper of the 27th of October, we learn that on the 14th of September the workmen employed in the king's mine, which is one of the Konigsberg silver mines in Norway, found a lump of native silver, weighing 2081bs.—and that on the 6th of October another lump of native silver equally pure in quality, of no less weight than 436lbs., was dug out of the same mine. It is a fact worthy of being recorded, that about twenty years ago this mine was offered for sale in London for £10,000; but the capitalists of that day had not sufficient confidence in the treasures it was represented to possess, to give this comparatively small price. Subsequently the Norwegian Government were urged by the scientific of that country to work the mine for the benefit of the state. The operations were prosecuted with vigor; and for a considerable number of years this mine has annually yielded to the Government a larger revenue than the price which could not previously be obtained in England for the mine itself. A PARACHUTE FOR COAL-PITS-To descend into mines and coal-pits, and to ascend by means of vertical ladders, are operations so fatiguing that the pitmen prefer, in spite of lives to the risk of the strength of a rope, |