overturned, the altar destroyed, the aristocracy levelled with the dust the nobles were in exile, the clergy in captivity, the gentry in affliction. A merciless sword had waved over the state, destroying alike the dignity of rank, the splendour of talent, and the graces of beauty. All that excelled the labouring classes in situation, fortune, or acquirement, had been removed; they had triumphed over their oppressors, seized their possessions, and risen into their stations. And what was the consequence? The establishment of a more cruel and revolting tyranny than any which mankind had yet witnessed; the destruction of all the charities and enjoyments of life; the dreadful spectacle of streams of blood flowing through every part of France. The earliest friends, the warmest advocates, the firmest supporters of the people, were swept off indiscriminately with their bitterest enemies; in the unequal struggle, virtue and philanthropy sunk under ambition and violence, and society returned to a state of chaos, when all the elements of private or public happiness were scattered to the winds. Such are the results of unchaining the passions of the multitude; such the peril of suddenly admitting the light upon a benighted people. The extent to which blood was shed in France during this melancholy period, will hardly be credited by future ages. The Republican Prudhomme, whose prepossessions led him to anything rather than an exaggeration of the horrors of the popular party, has given the following appalling account of the victims of the Revolution : all the influential classes, ruled mighty armies with absolute sway, kept 200,000 of their fellow-citizens in captivity, and daily led out several hundred persons, of the best blood in France, to execution. Such is the effect of the unity of action which atrocious wickedness produces; such the ascendency which in periods of anarchy is acquired by the most savage and lawless of the people. The peaceable and inoffensive citizens lived and wept in silence; terror crushed every attempt at combination; the extremity of grief subdued even the firmest hearts. In despair at effecting any change in the general sufferings, apathy universally prevailed, the people sought to bury their sorrows in the delirium of present enjoyments, and the theatres were never fuller than during the whole duration of the Reign of Terror. Ignorance of human nature can alone lead us to ascribe this to any peculiarity in the French character; the same effects have been observed in all parts and ages of the world, as invariably attending a state of extreme and long-continued distress. The death of Hebert and the anarchists was that of guilty depravity; that of Robespierre and the Decemvirs, of sanguinary fanaticism; that of Danton and his confederates, of stoical infidelity; that of Madame Roland and the Girondists, of deluded virtue; that of Louis and his family, of religious forgiveness. The moralist will contrast the different effects of virtue and wickedness in the last moments of life; the Christian will mark with thankfulness the superiority in the supreme hour to the sublimest efforts of human virtue, which was evinced by the believers in his own faith. A continuation has been made to this workThe History of Europe from the Fall of Napoleon in 1815 to the Accession of Louis Napoleon in 1852, eight volumes, 1852-59. The author, however, had not exercised much care in this compilation. It is hastily and inaccurately written, and is disfigured by blunders, omissions, and inconsistencies. Some of the author's opinions or crotchets are pushed to a ridiculous extreme, as his delusion that most of the political changes of the previous thirty years-the abolition of the cornlaws, Catholic emancipation, and parliamentary reform-may all be traced to the act of 1826 which interdicted the further issue of £1 and £2 banknotes! The diffuse style of narrative which was felt as a drawback on the earlier history, is still more conspicuous in this continuation-no doubt from want of time and care in the laborious work of condensation. The other writings of our author In this enumeration are not comprehended the massacres at Versailles, at the Abbey, the Carmes, or other prisons on September 2, the victims of the Glacière of exclusive of pamphlets on Free-trade and the Avignon, those shot at Toulon and Marseille, or the Currency-are a Life of Marlborough, 1847 (afterpersons slain in the little town of Bedoin, of which the wards greatly enlarged in the second edition, whole population perished. It is in an especial manner 1852), and Essays, Political, Historical, and remarkable in this dismal catalogue, how large a pro- Miscellaneous, three volumes, 1850. These essays portion of the victims of the Revolution were persons in were originally published in Blackwood's Magathe middling and lower ranks of life. The priests and nobles guillotined are only 2413, while the persons of zine, to which their author was a frequent contributor. The other works of Sir Archibald are plebeian origin exceed 13,000! The nobles and priests put to death at Nantes were only 2160; while the-Principles of Population, 1840; Free Trade and infants drowned and shot are 2000, the women 764, and Protection, 1844; England in 1815 and in 1845, the artisans 5300! So rapidly in revolutionary convul- &c. sions does the career of cruelty reach the lower orders, and so wide-spread is the carnage dealt out to them, compared with that which they have sought to inflict on their superiors. The facility with which a faction, composed of a few of the most audacious and reckless of the nation, triumphed over the immense majority of their fellow-citizens, and led them forth like victims to the sacrifice, is not the least extraordinary or memorable part of that eventful period. The bloody faction at Paris never exceeded a few hundred men; their talents were by no means of the highest order, nor their weight in society considerable; yet they trampled under foot SIR ARCHIBALD ALISON was the eldest son of the Rev. Archibald Alison, author of the Essay on Taste, &c. His mother was Dorothea, daughter of Dr John Gregory of Edinburgh. He was born at Kenley in Shropshire in 1792. His father having in 1800 removed to Edinburgh to officiate in the Episcopal Chapel in the Cowgate, Archibald studied at Edinburgh University, was admitted to the bar in 1814, and in 1834 was He had disappointed sheriff of Lanarkshire. tinguished himself professionally by his Principles 569 of the Criminal Law of Scotland, 1832, and his Practice of the Criminal Law, 1833. He was successively Lord Rector of Marischal College, Aberdeen, and Glasgow University, and subsequently the title of D.C.L. was conferred upon him by the university of Oxford. In 1852 he was created a baronet by Lord Derby's administration. He died on the 23d of May 1867. W. H. PRESCOTT. volumes. A decision of the House of Lords, however, annulled this bargain. It was found that no American, not domiciled in England at the time of the publication of his book, could claim the benefit of our copyright law. If Mr Prescott had thought proper to have resided in England during, and for a certain time before and after the publication of the book, he might have reaped the full benefit of its great success on both sides of the Atlantic. But he would not take this course. At a great pecuniary sacrifice, he preferred to present the world with one signal example more of the injustice to which the writers of England and America are exposed by the want of a reasonable system of international copyright-a want for which the American legislature appears to be wholly responsible.'* Two volumes of Philip II. appeared in 1855, and the third volume in 1858. In the interval the author had experienced a shock of paralysis, and another shock on the 28th of January 1859 proved fatal. When sitting alone in his library, the historian was struck down by this sudden and terrible agent of death, and in less than two hours he expired. His remains were followed to the grave by a vast concourse of citizens and mourners. As an historian, Prescott may rank with Robertson as a master of the art of narrative, while he excels him in the variety and extent of his illustrative researches. He was happy in the choice of his subjects. The very names of Castile and Aragon, Mexico and Peru, possess a romantic charm, and the characters and scenes he depicts have the interest and splendour of the most gorgeous fiction. To some extent the American historian fell into the error of Robertson in palliating the enormous cruelties that marked the career of the Spanish conquerors; but he is more careful in citing his authorities, in order, as he says, 'to put the reader in a position for judging for himself, and thus for revising, and, if need be, for reversing the judgments of the historian.' The celebrated American historian, WILLIAM HICKLING PRESCOTT, was born at Salem, Massachusetts, May 4, 1796. His father was an eminent judge and lawyer. While a student in Harvard College, a slight accident threatened to deprive the future historian of sight, and in the result proved a severe interruption to his studies. One of his fellow-collegians threw a crust of bread at him, which struck one of his eyes, and deprived it almost wholly of sight, while the other was sympathetically affected. He travelled partly for medical advice, and visited England, France, and Italy, remaining absent about two years. On his return to the United States, he married and settled in Boston. His first literary production was an essay on Italian Narrative Poetry, contributed in 1824 to the North American Review, in which work many valuable papers from his pen afterwards appeared. Devoting himself to the literature and history of Spain, he fixed upon the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, and commenced his history of that period. He had only, however, commenced his task when his eye gave way, and he enjoyed no use of it again for reading for several years. His literary enthusiasm, however, was too strong to be subdued even by this calamity; he engaged a reader, dictated copious notes, and from these notes constructed his composition, making in his mind those corrections which are usually made in the manuscript. Instead of dictating the work thus composed, he used a writingcase made for the blind, which he thus describes: 'It consists of a frame of the size of a piece of paper, traversed by brass wires as many as lines are wanted on the page, and with a sheet of carbonated paper, such as is used for getting duplicates, pasted on the reverse side. With an ivory They had not advanced far, when, turning an angle or agate stylus the writer traces his characters of the sierra, they suddenly came on a view which between the wires on the carbonated sheet, more than compensated the toils of the preceding day. making indelible marks which he cannot see on It was that of the valley of Mexico, or Tenochtitlan, as the white page below.' In this way the historian more commonly called by the natives; which, with its proceeded with his task, finding, he says, his picturesque assemblage of water, woodland, and cultiwriting-case his best friend in his lonely hours. vated plains, its shining cities and shadowy hills; was The sight of his eye partially returned, but never spread out like some gay and gorgeous panorama before sufficiently to enable him to use it by candle-light. them. In the highly rarefied atmosphere of these upper In 1837 appeared his history of Ferdinand and regions, even remote objects have a brilliancy of colourIsabella, in three volumes, and the work was emi-ing and a distinctness of outline which seem to anninently successful on both sides of the Atlantic. In 1843, The Conquest of Mexico, three volumes, and in 1847, The Conquest of Peru, two volumes, still further extended Mr Prescott's reputation, and it is calculated that latterly he received from £4000 to £5000 a year from the sale of his writings. The successful historian now made a visit to England, and was received with the utmost distinction and favour, the university of Oxford conferring upon him the honorary degree of LL.D. In 1854 his History of Philip II. was ready for the press, and he was to receive £1000 for each volume of the work, which, it was supposed, would extend to six View of Mexico from the Summit of Ahualco. Their progress was now comparatively easy, and they marched forward with a buoyant step, as they felt they were treading the soil of Montezuma. hilate distance. Stretching far away at their feet, were seen noble forests of oak, sycamore, and cedar, and beyond, yellow fields of maize, and the towering maguey, intermingled with orchards and blooming gardens; for flowers, in such demand for their religious festivals, were even more abundant in this populous valley than in other parts of Anahuac. In the centre of the great basin were beheld the lakes, occupying then a much larger portion of its surface than at present, their borders thickly studded with towns and hamlets; and in the midst-like some Indian empress with her coronal of pearls-the fair city of Mexico, with her white towers *Memoir of Prescott, by Sir William Stirling Maxwell, in Encyclopædia Britannica. and pyramidal temples, reposing, as it were, on the bosom of the waters-the far-famed 'Venice of the Aztecs.' High over all rose the royal hill of Chapoltepec, the residence of the Mexican monarchs, crowned with the same grove of gigantic cypresses which at this day fling their broad shadows over the land. In the distance, beyond the blue waters of the lake, and nearly screened by intervening foliage, was seen a shining speck, the rival capital of Tezcuco; and still further on, the dark belt of porphyry, girdling the valley around, like a rich setting which nature had devised for the fairest of her jewels. Such was the beautiful vision which broke on the eyes of the conquerors. And even now, when so sad a change has come over the scene; when the stately forests have been laid low, and the soil, unsheltered from the fierce radiance of a tropical sun, is in many places abandoned to sterility; when the waters have retired, leaving a broad and ghastly margin white with the incrustation of salts, while the cities and hamlets on their borders have mouldered into ruins: even now that desolation broods over the landscape, so indestructible are the lines of beauty which nature has traced on its features, that no traveller, however cold, can gaze on them with any other emotions than those of astonishment and rapture. What, then, must have been the emotions of the Spaniards, when, after working their toilsome way into the upper air, the cloudy tabernacle parted before their eyes, and they beheld these fair scenes in all their pristine magnificence and beauty! It was like the spectacle which greeted the eyes of Moses from the summit of Pisgah, and in the warm glow of their feelings they cried out: 'It is the promised land!' Storming the Temple of Mexico. Cortés, having cleared a way for the assault, sprung up the lower stairway, followed by Alvarado, Sandoval, Ordaz, and the other gallant cavaliers of his little band, leaving a file of arquebusiers and a strong corps of Indian allies to hold the enemy in check at the foot of the monument. On the first landing, as well as on the several galleries above, and on the summit, the Aztec warriors were drawn up to dispute his passage. From their elevated position they showered down volleys of lighter missiles, together with heavy stones, beams, and burning rafters, which, thundering along the stairway, overturned the ascending Spaniards, and carried desolation through their ranks. The more fortunate, eluding or springing over these obstacles, succeeded in gaining the first terrace, where, throwing themselves on their enemies, they compelled them, after a short resistance, to fall back. The assailants pressed on, effectually supported by a brisk fire of the musketeers from below, which so much galled the Mexicans in their exposed situation, that they were glad to take shelter on the broad summit of the teocalli. Cortés and his comrades were close upon their rear, and the two parties soon found themselves face to face on this aerial battle-field, engaged in mortal combat in presence of the whole city, as well as of the troops in the courtyard, who paused, as if by mutual consent, from their own hostilities, gazing in silent expectation on the issue of those above. The area, though somewhat smaller than the base of the teocalli, was large enough to afford a fair field of fight for a thousand combatants. It was paved with broad flat stones. No impediment occurred over its surface, except the huge sacrificial block, and the temples of stone which rose to the height of forty feet, at the further extremity of the One of these had been consecrated to the cross; the other was still occupied by the Mexican war-god. The Christian and the Aztec contended for their religions under the very shadow of their respective shrines; while the Indian priests, running to and fro, with their hair wildly streaming over their sable mantles, seemed arena. hovering in mid-air, like so many demons of darkness urging on the work of slaughter. The parties closed with the desperate fury of men who had no hope but in victory. Quarter was neither asked nor given; and to fly was impossible. The edge of the area was unprotected by parapet or battlement. The least slip would be fatal; and the combatants, as they struggled in mortal agony, were sometimes seen to roll over the sheer sides of the precipice together. Cortés himself is said to have had a narrow escape from this dreadful fate. Two warriors, of strong muscular frames, seized on him, and were dragging him violently towards the brink of the pyramid. Aware of their intention, he struggled with all his force, and, before they could accomplish their purpose, succeeded in tearing himself from their grasp, and hurling one of them over the walls with his own arm. The story is not improbable in itself, for Cortés was a man of uncommon agility and strength. It has been often repeated, but not by contemporary history. The battle lasted with unintermitting fury for three hours. The number of the enemy was double that of the Christians; and it seemed as if it were a contest which must be determined by numbers and brute force, rather than by superior science. But it was not so. The invulnerable armour of the Spaniard, his sword of matchless temper, and his skill in the use of it, gave him advantages which far outweighed the odds of physical strength and numbers. After doing all that the courage of despair could enable men to do, resistance grew fainter and fainter on the side of the Aztecs. One after another they had fallen. Two or three priests only survived to be led away in triumph by the victors. Every other combatant was stretched a corpse on the bloody arena, or had been hurled from the giddy heights. Yet the loss of the Spaniards was not inconsiderable it amounted to forty-five of their best men ; and nearly all the remainder were more or less injured in the desperate conflict. The victorious cavaliers now rushed towards the sanctuaries. The lower story was of stone, the two upper were of wood. Penetrating into their recesses, they had the mortification to find the image of the Virgin and Cross removed. But in the other edifice they still beheld the grim figure of Huitzilopotchli, with his censer of smoking hearts, and the walls of his oratory reeking with gore-not improbably of their own countrymen. With shouts of triumph the Christians tore the uncouth monster from his niche, and tumbled him, in the presence of the horror-struck Aztecs, down the steps of the teocalli. They then set fire to the accursed building. The flame speedily ran up the slender towers, sending forth an ominous light over city, lake, and valley, to the remotest hut among the mountains. It was the funeral pyre of paganism, and proclaimed the fall of that sanguinary religion which had so long hung like a dark cloud over the fair regions of Anahuac. Fatal Visit of the Inca to Pizarro and his Followers in the City of Caxamalca. It was not long before sunset when the van of the royal procession entered the gates of the city. First came some hundreds of the menials, employed to clear the path from every obstacle, and singing songs of triumph as they came, 'which in our ears,' says one of the conquerors, 'sounded like the songs of hell!' Then followed other bodies of different ranks, and dressed in different liveries. Some wore a showy stuff, checkered white and red, like the squares of a chess-board; others were clad in pure white, bearing hammers or maces of silver or copper; and the guards, together with those in immediate attendance on the prince, were distinguished by a rich azure livery, and a profusion of gay ornaments, while the large pendants attached to the ears indicated the Peruvian noble. Elevated high above his vassals came the Inca Atahuallpa, borne on a sedan or open litter, on which was a sort of throne made of massive gold of inestimable value. The palanquin was lined with the richly coloured plumes of tropical birds, and studded with shining plates of gold and silver. Round his neck was suspended a collar of emeralds, of uncommon size and brilliancy. His short hair was decorated with golden ornaments, and the imperial borla encircled his temples. The bearing of the Inca was sedate and dignified; and from his lofty station he looked down on the multitudes below with an air of composure, like one accustomed to command. He then demanded of Valverde by what authority he had said these things. The friar pointed to the book which he held as his authority. Atahuallpa, taking it, turned over the pages a moment, then, as the insult he had received probably flashed across his mind, he threw it down with vehemence, and exclaimed: 'Tell your comrades that they shall give me an account of their doings in my land. I will not go from here till they have made me full satisfaction for all the wrongs they have committed.' The friar, greatly scandalised by the indignity offered to the sacred volume, stayed only to pick it up, and hastening to Pizarro, informed him of what had been As the leading files of the procession entered the great done, exclaiming at the same time: 'Do you not see square, larger, says an old chronicler, than any square that, while we stand here wasting our breath in talking in Spain, they opened to the right and left for the royal with this dog, full of pride as he is, the fields are filling retinue to pass. Everything was conducted with admir- with Indians? Set on at once; I absolve you.' Pizarro able order. The monarch was permitted to traverse the saw that the hour had come. He waved a white scarf plaza in silence, and not a Spaniard was to be seen. in the air, the appointed signal. The fatal gun was When some five or six thousand of his people had entered fired from the fortress. Then springing into the square, the place, Atahuallpa halted, and turning round with an the Spanish captain and his followers shouted the old inquiring look, demanded, 'Where are the strangers?' war-cry of 'St Jago and at them!' It was answered by At this moment Fray Vicente de Valverde, a Domini- the battle-cry of every Spaniard in the city, as, rushing can friar, Pizarro's chaplain, and afterwards bishop of from the avenues of the great halls in which they were Cuzco, came forward with his breviary, or, as other concealed, they poured into the plaza, horse and foot, accounts say, a Bible, in one hand, and a crucifix in the each in his own dark column, and threw themselves into other, and, approaching the Inca, told him that he came the midst of the Indian crowd. The latter, taken by by order of his commander to expound to him the surprise, stunned by the report of artillery and muskets, doctrines of the true faith, for which purpose the the echoes of which reverberated like thunder from the Spaniards had come from a great distance to his country. surrounding buildings, and blinded by the smoke which The friar then explained, as clearly as he could, the rolled in sulphureous volumes along the square, were mysterious doctrine of the Trinity, and, ascending high seized with a panic. They knew not whither to fly for in his account, began with the creation of man, thence refuge from the coming ruin. Nobles and commonerspassed to his fall, to his subsequent redemption by all were trampled down under the fierce charge of the Jesus Christ, to the crucifixion, and the ascension, when cavalry, who dealt their blows right and left, without the Saviour left the apostle Peter as his vicegerent upon sparing; while their swords, flashing through the thick earth. This power had been transmitted to the suc- gloom, carried dismay into the hearts of the wretched cessors of the apostle, good and wise men, who, under natives, who now, for the first time, saw the horse and the title of popes, held authority over all powers and his rider in all their terrors. They made no resistance potentates on earth. One of the last of these popes hadas, indeed, they had no weapons with which to make commissioned the Spanish emperor, the most mighty monarch in the world, to conquer and convert the natives in this western hemisphere; and his general, Francisco Pizarro, had now come to execute this important mission. The friar concluded with beseeching the Peruvian monarch to receive him kindly; to abjure the errors of his own faith, and embrace that of the Christians now proffered to him, the only one by which he could hope for salvation; and, furthermore, to acknowledge himself a tributary of the Emperor Charles the Fifth, who, in that event, would aid and protect him as his loyal vassal. Whether Atahuallpa possessed himself of every link in the curious chain of argument by which the monk connected Pizarro with St Peter, may be doubted. It is certain, however, that he must have had very incorrect motions of the Trinity, if, as Garcilasso states, the interpreter Felipillo explained it by saying, that 'the Christians believed in three Gods and one God, and that made four.' But there is no doubt he perfectly comprehended that the drift of the discourse was to persuade him to resign his sceptre and acknowledge the supremacy of another. The eyes of the Indian monarch flashed fire, and his dark brow grew darker, as he replied: 'I will be no man's tributary! I am greater than any prince upon earth. Your emperor may be a great prince; I do not doubt it, when I see that he has sent his subjects so far across the waters; and I am willing to hold him as a brother. As for the pope of whom you speak, he must be crazy to talk of giving away countries which do not belong to him. For my faith,' he continued, 'I will not change it. Your own God, as you say, was put to death by the very men whom he created. But mine,' he concluded, pointing to his deity-then, alas! sinking in glory behind the mountains—my god still lives in the heavens, and looks down on his children.' it. Every avenue to escape was closed, for the entrance to the square was choked up with the dead bodies of men who had perished in vain efforts to fly; and such was the agony of the survivors under the terrible pressure of their assailants, that a large body of Indians, by their convulsive struggles, burst through the wall of stone and dried clay which formed part of the boundary of the plaza! It fell, leaving an opening of more than a hundred paces, through which multitudes now found their way into the country, still hotly pursued by the cavalry, who, leaping the fallen rubbish, hung on the rear of the fugitives, striking them down in all direc tions. Meanwhile the fight, or rather massacre, continued hot around the Inca, whose person was the great object of the assault. His faithful nobles, rallying about him, threw themselves in the way of the assailants, and strove, by tearing them from their saddles, or, at least, by offering their own bosoms as a mark for their vengeance, to shield their beloved master. It is said by some authorities that they carried weapons concealed under their clothes. If so, it availed them little, as it is not pretended that they used them. But the most timid animal will defend itself when at bay. That they did not so in the present instance, is proof that they had no weapons to use. Yet they still continued to force back the cavaliers, clinging to their horses with dying grasp, and as one was cut down, another taking the place of his fallen comrade with a loyalty truly affecting. The Indian monarch, stunned and bewildered, saw his faithful subjects falling round him without hardly comprehending his situation. The litter on which he rode heaved to and fro, as the mighty press swayed backwards and forwards; and he gazed on the overwhelming ruin, like some forlorn mariner, who, tossed about in his bark by the furious elements, sees the lightning's flash, and hears the thunder bursting around him, with the consciousness that he can do nothing to avert his fate. At length, weary with the work of destruction, the Spaniards, as the shades of evening grew deeper, felt afraid that the royal prize might, after all, elude them; and some of the cavaliers made a desperate attempt to end the affray at once by taking Atahuallpa's life. But Pizarro, who was nearest his person, called out with stentorian voice: 'Let no one, who values his life, strike at the Inca;' and, stretching out his arm to shield him, received a wound on the hand from one of his own men-the only wound received by a Spaniard in the action. The struggle now became fiercer than ever round the royal litter. It reeled more and more, and at length, several of the nobles who supported it having been slain, it was overturned, and the Indian prince would have come with violence to the ground, had not his fall been broken by the efforts of Pizarro and some other of the cavaliers, who caught him in their arms. The imperial borla was instantly snatched from his temples by a soldier named Estete, and the unhappy monarch, strongly secured, was removed to a neighbouring building, where he was carefully guarded. All attempt at resistance now ceased. The fate of the Inca soon spread over town and country. The charm which might have held the Peruvians together was dissolved. Every man thought only of his own safety. Even the soldiery encamped on the adjacent fields took the alarm, and, learning the fatal tidings, were seen flying in every direction before their pursuers, who in the heat of triumph shewed no touch of mercy. At length night, more pitiful than man, threw her friendly mantle over the fugitives, and the scattered troops of Pizarro rallied once more at the sound of the trumpet in the bloody square of Caxamalca. DR ARNOLD. Rugby School. He longed to 'try whether our public school system has not in it some noble elements which may produce fruit even to life eternal,' and his exertions not only raised Rugby School to the highest popularity, but introduced a great change and improvement into all the public schools in England. He trusted much to the 'sixth form,' or elder boys, who exercise a recognised authority over the junior pupils, and these he inspired with love, reverence, and confidence. His interest in his pupils was that of a parent, and it was unceasing. On Sunday he preached to them; 'he was still the instructor and the schoolmaster, only teaching and educating with increased solemnity and energy.' All'unpromising subjects,' or pupils likely to taint others, he removed from the school. 'It is not necessary,' he said, 'that this should be a school of three hundred, or one hundred, or of fifty boys; but it is necessary that it should be a school of Christian gentlemen.' His firmness, his sympathy, his fine manly character, and devotion to duty, in time bound all good hearts to him. Out-of-doors, Arnold had also his battles to fight. He was a Liberal in politics, though not a partisan, and a keen church reformer. To the High Church party he was strenuously opposed. The Church, he said, meant not the priesthood, but the body of believers. Christianity recognised no priesthood the whole body of believers were equally brethren. Nothing, he conceived, could save the Church but a union with the Dissenters; and the civil power was more able than the clergy, not only to govern, but to fix the doctrines of the Church. These Erastian views, propounded with his usual zeal and earnestness, offended and Early Roman history has of late formed the sub- alarmed many of Arnold's own friends, especially ject of investigation and discussion. The cele- those of the clergy, and he also failed to conciliate brated work of Niebuhr, the Prussian historian the Dissenters. The Whig government, in 1835, (1776-1831), was published in 1811, and again, appointed him a Fellow in the Senate of the new much modified and enlarged, in 1827. For some university of London. Arnold, convinced that time it attracted little attention in this country, Christianity should be the basis and principle of but gradually followers and disciples sprung up. all education in a Christian country, proposed that The leading theory of Niebuhr (derived from every candidate for a degree in the university James Perizonius, an antiquary of the seven- should be examined on the Scriptures. This was teenth century) was, that the commonly received resisted-at least to the extent that the examinahistory of the early centuries of Rome was in tion should not be compulsory, but voluntary— great part fabulous, founded on popular songs or and Arnold afterwards resigned his appointment. lays chanted at the Roman banquets. Greece In 1841, he obtained one more congenial to his had her rhapsodists, the Teutonic nations their tastes and pursuits-he was nominated Regius bards, and Rome, he concluded, had also her Professor of Modern History at Oxford. His inaupoetical chroniclers. To eliminate whatever por-gural lecture was attended by a vast concourse of tion of truth was contained in the stories of the mythic period-and Niebuhr believed that they did contain many authentic facts-was the chosen task of the learned Prussian, and of all those who adopted his ballad theory' as a sound historical hypothesis. One of the most enthusiastic of his admirers was DR THOMAS ARNOLD (1795-1842), the well-known and popular master of Rugby School. Arnold was a native of East Cowes, in the Isle of Wight, where his father resided as collector of customs. He was educated at Winchester, and afterwards at Oxford, being elected a Fellow of Oriel College in 1815. He remained at Oxford four more years, employed in instructing pupils; and in his twenty-fifth year he settled at Laleham, near Staines, in Middlesex. At Laleham he took pupils as before, married, and spent nine years of happiness and study. He took priest's orders in 1828, and in that year occurred the great turning-point of his life-he was appointed to students and friends, for the popular tide had now turned in his favour, and his robust health promised a long succession of professorial triumphs, as well as of general usefulness. He had purchased a small property in Westmoreland-Fox How, situated in one of the most beautiful portions of the Lake country, with the now classic river Rotha, purior electro,' winding round his fields. At Fox How he spent his vacations; and he was preparing to return thither in the summer of 1842, when one night he was seized with spasms of the heart, and died ere eight o'clock next morning, June 12, 1842. The works of Dr Arnold give but a faint idea of what he accomplished. He was emphatically a man of action. His writings, however, are characteristic of the man-earnest, clear in conception and style, and independent in thought. His History of Rome, which he intended to carry down to the fall of the Western Empire, was completed only to the end of the Second Punic |