Even in the snow they had no shoes nor underclothing. Is it any wonder, then, that the great spirit of Montalembert was inflamed by visiting such a country? As Mrs. Oliphant says in her Memoir, “He had seen a worshipping nation, and his imagination had been inspired by the sight, and all his resolutions had burst into flower." Another spectacle that entertained us here was that of an artless maiden. Such a treat for an American! To see a girl of eighteen or twenty years so modest and artless in her ways. There is a charm about such an one; she seems God's fairest work, as an honest man is his noblest. At the convent schools in Ireland one notices the same gentleness, which contrasts beautifully with what we have so much of at home, and that feature of which Shakespeare says, speaking of Perdita: Her voice was ever soft, Gentle, and low-an excellent thing in woman.” I heard an American express his notion of it characteristically by saying: "How quick these girls would find a husband in America!" An English writer, speaking of a city. which was remarkably Irish, though not in Ireland, first indulges in some of his usual pokes and jokes about its inhabitants, and then says: "Nowhere did I ever meet better bred ladies"; and a lady well acquainted with the high society of one of our sister cities told me that the ladies in Ireland were far better educated. Indeed, the love of education is very great amongst the Irish people. I never saw finer schools than those of the Christian Brothers in Cork, and all supported by the voluntary contributions of the people, without a cent from the government, and in a very poor country. Although a poor Protestant is rare in Ireland, the statistics of the Dublin census for 1872 show that the number of illiterates amongst the Catholics is smaller than amongst the adherents of any other religious denomination. And still people will talk of the ignorant Irish, and the opposition of the priests to education! The ignorance, whatever it is, of the Irish, like the rags that hang on their limbs, is a sad but glorious sign of their fidelity to God's truth! If they had wished to sell their heavenly treasure, they might have got the mess of pottage called godless education. All honor to them and to their priests for the inestimable value they place on the deposit of faith handed down by saints and scholars! There is a good deal of carelessness and want of enterprise amongst the Irish people, no doubt; but as for the former, as F. Burke says: "God help us! Much they've left us to be careless with." The less a man has, the more thriftless he is likely to be. Having in this country a sure title to his own and a prospect of success, I maintain that the Irishman will become as thrifty, without being niggardly, as any other citizen. Their wit is proverbial, their goodnature under all circumstances most remarkable. In Kilkenny, one Sunday, I saw a party in miserable uniform marching about playing rather unskilfully on a few musical instruments, and calling themselves a band. A crowd followed them through the wet, snow-covered streets, and continually assailed the musicians and each other indifferently with snow-balls. A policeman standing on a corner got one behind his ear, but, like most of the rest, laughed and made nothing of it. Imagine a New York M. P. under similar circumstances! On one occasion, I watched a group of men bantering a rather old seaman who complained of toothache; one suggested that he should take a sup of cold water, and sit on the fire until it boiled; another advised him to hang his night-cap on the bed-post, and, mixing a little whiskey and hot water, etc., should drink until he saw two night-caps; a third said the best thing was to tie the tooth to a tree, and run away from it. He heard them all very good-humoredly, but simply remarked, as if it were not worth while now at his time of life to learn cures: "Faix, I can't have many more o' them.” A jolly, witty, careless bachelor lived on his own property in Blackpool. His houses were two; that which he occupied was open to the weather, and the adjoining one looked as if it had been burned. It was a complete ruin. They were in such a state that some friend remarked that they were likely to fall in and bury him. "Faith," said the poor lonely bachelor, "'twould be the best thing that could happen me, if I was prepared." We must repeat here the story of an Irish Protestant, who went to church with his Catholic friend. His surprise at the strange sights and sounds soon got the better of him, and he whispered: "Why, Pat, this beats the very ould divil." "That's the intention," said Pat, and kept on blessing himself all the same. Americans, who are not taxed to support a foreign despotic master, who have a sure and enduring title to their property, and who stand or fall by their own free, unimpeded efforts, sometimes wonder at the want of enterprise, neatness, and care of the Irish people. But a visit to the country and a look into its circumstances explain why this is the case. The man who feels that his house may be taken from him to-morrow is not likely to spend much on its decoration; the father who knows that his children are destined to the lowest servitude is even tempted to be careless about sending them to school, and no doubt reprehensible habits which may take several generations to eradicate are naturally formed in such a condition of things. I have said enough, however, to show and a visit to Ireland, combined with a knowledge of her people under a free and favorable government, will convince us-that these faults of some of the Irish are their misfortune rather than their natural character, and that, when they are free from the iron shackles of a barbarous conqueror, they will shine forth in all the virtues which adorn a great Catholic nation. All the advantages undoubtedly derivable from going abroad are attended with a danger which sometimes overtakes men of limited education and small mind, and which experience teaches we are all obliged to guard against. Contact with the institutions of most parts of Europe has a tendency to undermine the simple, independent qualities of the republican. The splendor of the throne, the tinsel of rank, the worship of mammon, family pride, etc., by which the sterling worth of the individual is overlooked and individual virtue is disregarded for the glitter which often covers the rottenness and impurity of caste-all these appeal temptingly to the wealthy but otherwise undistinguished American. His daughters are sought in marriage by members of brokendown princely houses, because they have money; his sons are courted by noble gamblers, because they are rich; and I need not tell why it is that principle in these cases is often sacrificed to that base tendency of our fallen nature which makes us aspire to power, rank, and title, just as a little boy does to the possession of a whip, a sash, and a cocked hat. I recall now the case of one of our American admirals, who, when patriotic New Hampshire objected to changing the Indian names of our men-of-war to Saxon ones, defended his action by saying: "He did not see why England should have all the fine names." The poor man was actually so infatuated by the style, pretension, and wealth of England that he thought even the stale nomenclature of her vessels preferable to the fresh, historically endeared ones taken from our native landa piece of weakness and folly which drew out the merited protest of the Granite State, which had given some of those fine old Indian names to ships that under them gained glory in war, and won admiration and respect when they visited the coasts of Europe. Imagine exchanging such names as Tuscarora, Niagara, Oneida, for such ones as Vixen, Hornet, Viper, Spitfire, or even for Hector, Ajax, and Captain! It were unjust, however, to the rude. health of our republican atmosphere to suppose that weakness such as this can be called characteristic of those nurtured on our soil, and were conclusive against hope in the perpetuity of our institutions. Such exceptional and deplorable examples need not make us fear the consequences of travel to the majority of travellers. The really educated, reflecting man knows the lessons of history too well to be deceived by the glitter of such institutions, which, like the ignis fatuus itself, is a token of the underlying rottenness. The religious man feels deeply that, while obedience to authority is essential to all government, still modesty and simplicity have given life and vigor, while pride and luxury have been the bane and caused the death of nations; and he knows that the conscientious, willing adhesion of the democrat to the laws he has had an VOL. XVII. 53 influence in making is more trustworthy, as it is more noble, than the abject, servile submission of the slave, disgusting to God, as well as dishonorable to his image. The priest cannot but feel deeply that the only system and the only land which allows the church to stand or fall by her own strength and merits is America; and his consciousness of her increasing prosperity, in contrast to her maimed and bleeding condition in other lands, must only attach him still more to his country and her institutions. And while he adverts, as I have done, to her faults, and wishes her to take pattern by the virtues and warning by the sins of other nations, it is because his heart as well as his interest are bound up with her fate: Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee, We may theorize about patriotism by our firesides at home, but you feel what it is when you are in a foreign land. The beating of your heart, the brilliancy of your glance, the warmth of your grasp, all without reflection and spontaneously occurring when you meet a fellow-countryman, while they afford a most pure and exquisite delight, prompt us, with the force of unerring instinct, to love our country. I remember, when out on the broad Atlantic, with the monotonous waste of waters in every direction, to have noticed something in the kiss of the sunbeams, in the familiar sweetness of the air, denoting the nearness of home by these embraces, so to speak, of our own clime. The lifting up of the heart, the light gladness of the spirits that succeeded, were not even due to the thought of home and friends The magic influence of atmosphere alone had been enough to produce them. And is it not natural ? "Breathes there a man with soul so dead, Who never to himself hath said, This is my own, my native land? Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned, As home his footsteps he hath turned, From wandering on a foreign strand?" If such an one there be, he is a rare and monstrous exception. The feeling of common humanity is expressed with universal truth in the lines of sweet-singing Goldsmith in his classic poem, "The Traveller ": "Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see, My heart untravelled fondly turns to thee: Still to my country turns with ceaseless pain, And drags at each remove a lengthening chain." CHARTRES. IT is the hour of pilgrimages. Probably never since the middle ages were they so numerous, or, with regard to the public ones, so carefully organized as at the present time; whether to the favored localities to which in these latter days heavenly manifestations have been accorded, or to the ancient sanctuaries whose history is coeval with that of the whole Christian era. At this moment, when a vast concourse of pilgrims from various parts of France, and especially from its capital, are gone to pay their homage to our Lady of Chartres, and beg her intercession on behalf of their country, it may not be uninteresting to some among our readers if we endeavor briefly to trace the history of this celebrated shrine. On entering the richly sculptured entrance-too large to be called a porch, and too truly Gothic to be called a portico of the church of S. Germain l'Auxerrois in Paris, the visitor is struck with the beauty of the ancient frescos with which its interior is adorned; so effective in composition, so spiritual in expression, and in execution so delicate, simple, and refined. In one of these, which fills the tympanum of a closed arch forming part of the north side, is depicted the form of a venerable, white-bearded sage, who might without difficulty serve to represent a Druid (though in all probability it is the prophet Isaias), kneeling, with an expression of wonder and joy on his aged countenance, while an angel, opening a window, shows him a distant vision of the Virgin Mother and her divine Son. The connection between the subject of this fresco and that of the present article will shortly be apparent. The ancient city, which was formerly the capital of the Carnutes, claims the honor of having been the first in the world to consecrate a temple to the Blessed Virgin. Chartres, before the Christian era dawned upon the earth, foresaw from the midnight darkness the shining of the "Morning Star" which should precede its rising, and by anticipation did homage to the Virgin who was to bring forth-Virgini Pariture. It was previous to the subjugation of the Gauls by the Roman arms that this homage began. They were still a free, wild, and haughty race; Mala gens, according to the Commentaries of their conqueror; liv * ing little in their towns, much in their pathless forests; they are, moreover, by the same author reported to be a religious people; that is to say, submissive to their priests, from whom they had not only their faith, but also their laws and government. These priests were the Druids. If old Armorica was the cradle of their worship, it is no less true that it had at a very early period spread not only into Britain, but also over the whole of Gaul, establishing at Chartres the central point of its continental empire. There the solemn sacrifices were offered, and there were held the tribunals of justice; in loco consecrato, which expression, by a slight variation, might fittingly be rendered, in luco consecrato, considering the veneration in which woods and groves were held, and that it was in these that the assemblies met. Not until after the Roman invasion was polytheism gradually and with difficulty engrafted on the more primitive Druidic worship, which was evidently neither of Greek nor Latin origin, but rather the offspring of Egypt or Chaldea, with occasional indications of affinity with the belief of the Hebrews. The Galli and Cymri had originally come from the East, being alike descendants of Gomer, the son of Japhet.† As some writers have imagined the Egyptian cross in the form of the Greek T, the signum vitæ futuræ, to have proved the expectation among that nation of the coming of the Messias, so others have seen in the venerated mistletoe attached to the oak an image of the Redeemer on the cross, and in the offerings of bread and wine a foreshadowing of the sacrament of the altar. In any case, these were but vague notions or veiled presentiments of truths of which Israel alone possessed the certainty; yet some stray gleam from the light of Hebrew prophecy may have shown to others than the chosen people a faint and distant vision of that great second Mother of the human race who should repair the ills brought on it by the first. According to the oldest traditions, it was a hundred years before the birth of our Saviour that this expectation manifested itself in a public manner among the Druids of the Carnutes, by the consecration of a grotto, for a long time previous famous among them, to the " Virgin who was to bring forth." No written document of equal antiquity to this epoch exists in support of the tradition; nor would it be possible, from the fact that the Druids committed nothing to writing, but transmitted the doctrines of their religion and the facts of history solely by oral teaching. The Cathedral of Chartres, however, from the time of its foundation by the Blessed Aventinus, who is said to have been the disciple of S. Peter, faithfully guarded the memory of an event which was its peculiar glory, by consigning the history thereof to its archives. These were carefully consulted by the Abbé Sébastien Rouillard, especially a very ancient chronicle which was transla ted from Latin into French in 1262, during the reign of S. Louis, and of which he gives the following account, although, in rendering it into English, we lose the charm of the quaint original: "Wherefore the Druids having arrived at this last centenary which immediately preceded the birth of Our Lord, the said Druids being assembled together by the revolution of the new year to perform their accustomed ceremonies for gathering in the mistletoe, which, coming from heaven and at |