mises. On the other hand, the picture of Jane's development from original immaturity, rather than absolute defect, to perfect sweetness and ripeness of character, is as natural as it is captivating. We are indeed reminded at every stroke how much better it would have become the pages of a work like "The Mill on the Floss," where copiousness and minute precision of detail are rather to be cultivated than avoided. Had the writer attempted to rival Miss Evans's exactness, he might have filled two volumes with this single theme; as it is, he is at once too particular for poetry and too superficial for fiction. Yet, as the stalk is forgotten in the flower, we acknowledge a justification of much prose in the lovely poetry that comes to crown it at last.

"Too soon, too soon, comes death to show
We love more deeply than we know !
The rain, that fell upon the height
Too gently to be called delight,
Within the dark vale reappears
As a wild cataract of tears;

And love in life should strive to see
Sometimes what love in death would be.
She's cold. Put to the coffin-lid.
What distance for another did,
That death has done for her!

Were those that foil'd with loftier grace
The homely kindness of her face.
'Twas here she sat and work'd, and there
She comb'd and kiss'd the children's hair;
Or, with one baby at her breast,
Another taught, or hush'd to rest.
Praise does the heart no more refuse
To the divinity of use.

Her humblest good is hence most high.
In the heavens of fond memory;
And love says Amen to the word,
A prudent wife is from the Lord.
Her worst gown's kept ('tis now the best,
As that in which she oftenest dress'd),
For memory's sake more precious grown
Than she herself was for her own.
Poor wife! foolish it seemed to fly
To sobs instead of dignity,

When she was hurt. Now, more than all,
Heart-rending and angelical
That ignorance of what to do,
Bewilder'd still by wrong from you.
(For what man ever yet had grace
Not to abuse his power and place?)

No magic of her voice or smile
Rais'd in a trice a fairy isle;
But fondness for her underwent
An unregarded increment,

Like that which lifts through centuries
The coral reef within the seas,
Till lo! the land where was the wave.
Alas! 'tis everywhere her grave."

To deny the character of poetry to tenderness and truth like this, would be to rob the Muses of their fairest province to treat Parnassus as Catherine and her confederates treated Poland.

"Some Seiks, and a private of the Buffs, having remained behind with the grog-carts, fell into the hands of the Chinese. On the next morning, they were brought before the authorities, and commanded to perform the kotou. The Seiks obeyed; but Moyse, the English soldier, declaring that he would not prostrate himself before any Chinaman alive, was immediately knocked upon the head, and his body thrown on a dung-hill."--See China Correspondent of the "Times."

Last night, among his fellow roughs,

He jested, quaffed, and swore; A drunken private of the Buffs,

To-day, beneath the foeman's frown, He stands in Elgin's place, Ambassador from Britain's crown, And type of all her race.

Poor, reckless, rude, low-born, untaught,
Bewildered, and alone,

A heart, with English instinct fraught,
He yet can call his own.
Ay, tear his body limb from limb,
Bring cord, or axe, or flame :
He only knows, that not through him

SINCE the day when to man was given dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowls of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, there is no record of any new attempts on his part to turn his sovereignty to use. Immemorially our beasts of burden have been of the same races as they are now, and equally unchanged have been our methods of subduing them to our service. In these last days comes to us, from the farthest prairies of the Western world, one who tells us that the error of our methods is the cause of the narrowness of our reign. He shows us that strength must always yield to skill, and that ferocity will always disappear before gentleness. He shows us that violence is but feebleness, and that kindness alone is irresistible. He shows us that intellect can create intelligence; and that animals willingly learn of man whatever man rightly addresses to their understanding. To all this we have listened with no deaf ears. Never has discoverer met with more rapid recognition than this unknown American farmer. His first exhibitions were witnessed and applauded by royalty; the highest in the land eagerly bought, as an expensive secret, the knowledge of his process; when by accident its principles became published, scarce a murmur was heard that more had been given

than the exploded secret was worth. Now, amongst all classes, it is expounded with still unabated interest; the competitors whom success called up have dropped out of sight; Government has adopted the system for the Army; and the Humane Society has rewarded its discoverer with a medal. There must be something remarkable in the man that wins such a success; but there must be also something remarkable in the nation that grants it, and perhaps still more in the times that permit it.

In no land but ours, indeed, could such a result have followed. Elsewhere Mr. Rarey has amused, and been rewarded by praises, but here alone has he drawn the popular sympathy. We are, in truth, above all nations, a horseloving nation. To us, riding seems nature; with us, men, women, and children are alike infected with the passion. Those who cannot ride delight to watch those who do ride; our chief national amusements are connected with the use of horses; and the most dignified of our Houses of Parliament thinks a discussion of the weights that racehorses should carry no waste of its time. Nor let us in our gravity deem this turn of the national taste a thing wholly insignificant and immaterial. In the world's history it has happened too often to be wholly an accidental coincidence,

that national supremacy has fallen to the nation which was distinguished by pre-eminence on horseback. Were those old fables of Centaurs and Amazons not based on a dim perception of this truth, when they taught that the first horsemen were half divine, and the first horsewomen more than a match for men? Shall we recall the first great monarchy of the old world, established and maintained by the innumerable Persian cavalry, till it was broken up by a greater horseman than they, the invincible tamer of Bucephalus? Shall we tell how in the most palmy state of Rome the title "horseman" was one of high honour and esteem, alike in peace and war, and how the uninterrupted spread of Roman power was stemmed at one point only, where it encountered the never-conquered Parthians,-those fatal horsemen, fiery in advance, deadly in flight? Shall we recount the prowess of Arabs and Moors, by whose cavalry alone a new religion was carried to the ends of the earth, till the flower of mounted Christendom at Tours met and broke the overwhelming torrent? Need we speak of the days of chivalry, (the very name expressive of the glories of horsemanship,) when mastery lay ever with him who could bring into the field the greatest number of heavy-armed knights, before whose tremendous onset pikemen and archers went down as grass before the mower? Or passing by all other instances, need we now to be reminded that when, first since the time of Charlemagne, Europe fell under the yoke of a conqueror, it was before a nation of horsemen in the Cossack steppes, and a nation of horsemen in the plains of Spain, that his star first paled? And, when at length Cossack and English themselves met in combat, with whom did the final victory rest but with those whose heavy cavalry at Balaklava rode through the opposing squadrons as if they had been a line of paper, and whose light brigade, on that same day, dashed over the Russian batteries with a sweep as resistless as the surge of the tide-race over an outlying reef?

the past; that now we are a nation of riflemen, not of horsemen; that victory will rest for the future with the surest aim, and that long range and accurate sighting have made cavalry henceforth useless in the field? With all deference to ardent volunteers-with, if possible, even more deference to certain military authorities who have announced that opinion-it may be suggested that, as the introduction of gunpowder did not abolish cavalry, although it converted mailed knights into light armed hussars, it is possible that the improvement of the art of gunnery may only further modify, without destroying, the special use and purposes of mounted troops. That we shall not again have cavalry charging infantry from long distances, that we shall never again see cavalry walking about among the squares, seeking leisurely for an opening, as we saw them at Waterloo, may be very true, for the simple reason that with riflemen before them they would not live to reach the squares. But, on the other hand, neither shall we ever again see squares in such a situation, for the simple reason that, at three miles. distance, a rifled and breech-loading thirty-two-pounder would mow lanes in them with its shot, and shatter them with its shell at the rate of half a dozen discharges per minute. For all this, we cannot do away with infantry, and just as little shall we be able to do without cavalry. Only the tactics of both must be altered to meet the new circumstances in which they will have to act. Our infantry must be kept more in shelter, and, when shelter is abandoned, it must advance in looser formation than hitherto. There may be moments when the men must be collected for a final charge, but the charge in line will often be superseded by the rapid dash of swarming skirmishers. So must it be with cavalry too. As of old, the charge will often decide the conflict; but, till the moment comes when cavalry can charge in a body, they must manœuvre more under cover, and in smaller and more open bodies

why should we not go further? Why should we not have cavalry acting as skirmishers, in exactly the same way and in exactly the same circumstances as we employ infantry skirmishers?— only with this distinction, that they would trust to the speed of their horses' legs instead of their own.

The distinction is invaluable. The distance to which skirmishers can advance from the main body—that is, the distance at which an army can assume the offensive, or keep its antagonists at bay; the distance, too, at which it can acquire information of an enemy's force and movements-has for its limit the distance from which its skirmishers can safely run in, if attacked by an overwhelming force. Mount your skirmishers, and you at once more than double the precious limit. A position in advance can be felt and secured; a position in retreat can be held, at twice the distance from the main body, if your skirmishers are on horseback. To counterbalance this advantage, there are, however, disadvantages. A horse and man are much easier hit in open ground than a man only; and yet this, perhaps, would not in practice be found material, for the greater speed of a horse over open ground would restore equality in their chances. But then it is said that a horse cannot be concealed by the cover that will shelter a man, and that a mounted rifleman cannot get across an inclosed country as a rifleman on foot can. These are the two grand obstacles that deprive us of the benefit of mounted skirmishers. Now these two obstacles are capable of being removed by a judicious application of the instructions which for two years Mr. Rarey has been giving us.

For Mr. Rarey has not merely shown how vicious horses may be subdued, or unbroken horses made fit for work; he has shown how, very easily, very gently, and very completely, ordinary horses may be taught a great deal more than has commonly been taught them. He has shown how the feats which strike us as wonderful when seen in the circus,

ments is the result of months of labour, and in some cases of a good deal of bad usage, may be taught the horse in a few minutes, hours, or days. In a few minutes Mr. Rarey will teach a horse to follow him, to turn, to stop, to go on with him as closely as if he had been led, although all the time the horse's head is, and he knows it, loose. In an hour or two Mr. Rarey will teach the horse to stand immovably still, although his master leaves him, and to gallop up at his master's call. In a few lessons he will teach the horse to lie down at a given signal, say a tap on his fore-leg, and to remain lying till the signal is given to rise. All these things are no speculations; still less are they vain boastings. Any one who has been at Mr. Rarey's exhibitions has seen them accomplished; and those who have been often there have seen them done, or begun, with evident assurance of the same result, every time they have been present. We shall have occasion afterwards to discuss the nature of the means used; meanwhile, accepting the facts, let us consider their bearing on the subject of which we have been speaking.

And first, as to cover. The difference here between a mounted rifleman and a foot rifleman lies in the greater height and bulk of the horse. But make the horse lie down, and very little difference remains. What will shelter a man will in almost every case equally well shelter a horse lying on the ground. Moreover, if in any particular situation there is not cover for a horse, even when lying down, it is pretty certain that at a very short distance sufficient cover can be had. There will be found a rising ground, a clump of trees, a hedge, a bank, or a dry ditch, any of which will quite serve the purpose. Here let the riflemen dismount, cause their horses to lie down, and leave them, perhaps, in charge of one of their number. While the skirmishers steal on from point to point the horses remain close at hand, yet in safety. Suppose that the skirmishers drive the enemy back, and wish to make a further advance; or, suppose they are themselves

possible speed-in either case a call brings each horse to his rider's side. What immensely rapid advances could thus be made; how closely might the light troops hang on an enemy's flanks; how daringly might they cover a retreat, when every distance of any length could be traversed at a gallop, and the means of rapid flight in case of surprise was thus ever within call! Suppose, now, that the country is enclosed, as this England of ours for the most part is, does that form any reason against its being traversed by light horsemen, or heavy horsemen either, if horse and man are English? Let hunting men answer that. Assuredly an enclosed country, impervious as a fortification to the cavalry of every other nation, would be no defence against the attack of English horse, were it not that the rifle, or the pistol, or the sword, would be rather awkward accoutrements in charging a bull-fence, and might chance to hurt the wearer more than the foe if the horse's knees just touched the top rail of timber. But here also Mr. Rarey can help us. Horses taught, as he shows us how to teach them, will follow their masters over a fence as handily as a dog. Coming up, then, to a rasper, our armed hunting man must for the moment forget that craning is an unknown word in his vocabulary. He must have the goodness to dismount, to push his way through the hedge, or to climb over the gate, (supposing he cannot unlock it, which I trust he would always have the sense first to try,) just as he would have to do were he a skirmisher on foot. When over, he calls his horse to him. Over, lightly as a bird, skims the horse. Up jumps our skirmisher, and in a moment is at the next fence, to pour his fire into the secure camp beyond, or the slow winding column in the hollow road below. Till, surprised and confused, the enemy discover the source of their danger, and throw out skirmishers on their part, in force sufficient to carry the hedges, or till they have time to bring up artillery, the game is in our hands. So soon as the tide seems likely to turn, our light

tecting hedge is passed by the enemy they are through the next hedge, and half-a-dozen more are placed between them and pursuit ere this one is reached by the pursuers. Will any one say that men and horses trained thus, and used thus, might not half bait their foe to death ere the foe could reach an open battle-field? And when that is reached, would the thundering charge of the cavalry be less resistless because they had already seen the flash and smelt the smoke of distant battle, and man and horse had learned to rely on their individual skill, and to have confidence in their mutual prowess? Whoso says

that, must say that the charge of bayonets will not be what it was, since a rifle sighted to 900 yards has been substituted for brown Bess without any sight at all. I do verily believe that in all this a development of the science of war is opening to us such as the world has never yet seen; and such as will make that nation which first sees it mistress of the world, whether she cares to assert her sovereignty or not. We are getting past the age of men used as machines; we are getting into the age of machines used for men, in everything that senseless wood and iron can do as well as senseful men. So, instead of treating men as implements for discharging a certain number of balls in a given general direction, we now place in each soldier's hand a machine so accurate that one discharge from it is more than equal to a hundred from his old piece. But, in entrusting him with such a weapon, we demand from him a commensurate increase of thought in its use. Forced thus to depend on the intelligence of the men, to us, in good time, comes Mr. Rarey, to show how much we may cultivate the intelligence of the horse. He shows us that the value and use of the horse is not restricted to the purposes to which, in the days when men were machines, we put him; but that he will be of equal service and advantage now to the self-dependent and self-acting soldier. We have but to make this new system part of the regular instruction