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CROSSING THE ALPS MATHEMATICALLY.

The following anecdote is founded on fact, and the local description is strictly accurate.

Everybody has seen or heard of Bonaparte's road over the Simplon. As some English travellers were ascending it on their way into Italy, two young men of the party walked on considerably before the rest. Soon after they had passed the post-house on the summit, one of them, who had lately taken a wrangler's degree at Cambridge, and was now first launched into the world, observing the barrier of mountains in front, proposed to make a short cut along a cow-track which presented itself on the left. His less speculative companion thought it would be better to keep the road, and an argument ensuing

"It is really quite astonishing," exclaimed the mathematician with warmth, "that people cannot reason. Don't I pursue with my eye an unbroken chain of mountains there, covered with eternal snow? It is clear the road cannot continue in its present direction-it must curve round here. This track is evidently the chord of the arc, and where cows can go, I can go. The case is as clear as anything in Euclid-it does not admit of a doubt."

"But why then," said the other, "did not Bonaparte cause the road to be made here?"

"Because he was a fool," replied the wrangler. So saying, he struck into the path, and his friend, after a moment's hesitation, followed him.

"I knew I must be right," said the Cantab, chattering away most authoritatively, till the cow-track at length diminishing into a sheep-track, he became rather less loquacious; and the sheeptrack also terminating soon after amongst some ominous unevennesses, a dead silence and a halt ensued.

"Oh!" exclaimed the wrangler again, 66 we have only to go on subtending the arc;" and so they did, till they suddenly arrived at the edge of a precipice at least 500 feet perpendicularly deep, from which awful position they descried in the distance the road magnificently descending before them towards the village of the Simplon.

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"I wish," said the prudent traveller, you had not been so extremely clever in proving this to be the nearest way, which proves itself to be no way at all. I will back Keller against Euclid for a Swiss guide.'

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"I was right, however," said the wrangler, "about the direction; you may now see where the road winds under the *The author of the well-known travelling map.

mountain there, and but for this precipice we should just have cut off the curve, as I said."

"A very near thing, truly!" replied the other; "but come, I shall take the command now." So saying, he turned to the right, and keeping along the brink of the precipice, was followed by the disconcerted wrangler till they arrived at a practicable descent over broken masses of rock, interspersed with stunted shrubs and alpine plants. The sun was already far in the westthe way was most difficult-the distance to the road was uncertain the carriages would most probably have passed: the anxiety of the two increased to a degree, that those who have not been in a similar situation, or seen such tremendous scenery, can have little idea of. Here they slid down a steep descent of loose sharp stones-there they scrambled up a rugged breastwork-then they skipped from fragment to fragment-till at last the wrangler, setting his foot amongst some plants which concealed a cleft, sank up to the knee; and in his haste to withdraw his leg, snapped the small bone of it. His companion, though slow in getting into difficulties, was ever prompt in getting out; and being strong and stout-hearted, he quickly mounted his friend upon his back, and, with extreme labour and scarcely less danger, succeeded in carrying him into the road. Here he deposited his burden to rest; and as they sat in painful meditation, the shades of night were fast veiling the sublimities of nature no sound was heard, nor was there any sign of living being. They had, however, only just resumed their harassing march, when they were cheered by the rolling of wheels behind them, and their own carriage, which had most fortunately been detained by an accident, rapidly descending the hill, put an end to their anxiety, and soon conveyed them to the inn, where they found the rest of their party assembled, and everything prepared for their reception for the night. The next morning the mathematician was carefully conveyed towards Milan; and there, during a vexatious confinement, he had ample leisure to reflect on the danger of ingenuity, when unaccompanied by experience. He is not the only one, whose theorizing has brought himself and others to the brink of a precipice.

LONDON IN TIMES PAST AND PRESENT.

Considering the enormous, and in many parts demoralized, population of London, it is quite marvellous there should be so little personal insecurity. I have been in the habit for many years of going about all parts of the town and the environs, at all hours, without any precaution, and I never experienced on

any occasion the slightest molestation; and I scarcely ever met in society any one whose own actual experience was different. It was not so formerly, as the following instances will serve to show. At Kensington, within the memory of man, on Sunday evenings a bell used to be rung at intervals to muster the people returning to town. As soon as a band was assembled sufficiently numerous to ensure mutual protection, it set off; and so on till all had passed. George the Fourth, and the late Duke of York, when very young men, were stopped one night in a hackney coach, and robbed, on Hay Hill, Berkeley Square. To cross Hounslow Heath or Finchley Common, now both enclosed, after sunset, was a service of great danger. Those who ventured were always well armed, and some few had even ball-proof carriages. There is a house still standing, I believe, on Finchley, which in those days was the known place of rendezvous for highwaymen. Happily these things are now matters of history.

The standard of wealth is no less changed than the standard of safety. Tavistock-street, Covent Garden, was once the street of fashionable shops-what Bond-street was till lately, and what Bond-street and Regent-street together are now. I remember hearing an old lady say, that in her young days the crowd of handsome equipages in Tavistock-street was considered one of the sights of London. I have had the curiosity to stride it. It is about one hundred and sixty yards long, and, before the footways were widened, would have admitted three carriages abreast. Within memory the principal carriage approach to Old Drury Lane Theatre, the last but one before the present, was through that part of Drury-lane which is now a flagged foot-passage, and called Drury-court, just opposite the new church in the Strand. The ring in Hyde Park, so celebrated in old novels and plays, and so often the scene of duels, is still traceable round a clump of trees near the foot-barracks. It encloses an area of about ninety yards in diameter, and is about forty-five yards wide. Here used to assemble all the fashion of the day, now diffused round the whole park, besides what is taken off by the Regent's Park. At the rate the country is advancing in wealth, what will be the comparison at the end of the next half century, and what will be the burden of the national debt?

I will add one more instance of change. A retired hackney coachman, giving an account of his life to a friend of mine, stated that his principal gains had been derived from cruising at late hours in particular quarters of the town to pick up drunken gentlemen. If they were able to tell their address, he conveyed them straight home; if not, he carried them to certain taverns, where the custom was to secure their property and put them to

bed. In the morning he called to take them home, and was generally handsomely rewarded. He said there were other coachmen who pursued the same course, and they all considered it their policy to be strictly honest. The bell at Kensington, the glories of Tavistock-street, and the coachmen's cruises, may all be referred back a little more than seventy years, and afford indisputable and consoling proofs of improvement in security, wealth, and temperance. I like to look at the bright side of things.

ITALY.

WRITTEN AT VIENNA IN 1822.

"Fair Italy!

Thou art the garden of the world, the home

Of all art yields, and nature can decree.—Lord Byron.

I have seen Italy, from Pæstum to Roveredo, during the most brilliant season of a very brilliant year. I have seen it and enjoyed it, by sunlight and by moonlight, each hour in the twenty-four, from the dawn of spring to the ripeness of autumnI have watched the sun set upon "the relics of almighty Rome," and rise upon the bays of Naples and Mola di Gaeta. Floating in a gondola, with the setting sun behind me, I have seen the full moon illuminating the towers of Venice, and I have wandered in the Coliseum by her light; I have seen her at Florence shining through the most brilliant foliage, with myriads of fire-flies glit. tering beneath. I have watched her silvery light streaming over the waves in the bay of Naples, before purpled by the setting

sun.

I have seen vegetation bud and come to maturity, unchecked by frost or blight, and uniting the freshness of spring with the fulness of summer. I have inhaled the powerful odour of the orange-flower and the delicate fragrance of the vine, listening to the song of the nightingale on a lovely evening by the bay of Naples. I have seen the vast remains of Adrian's villa, rising in broken masses from amidst the ilex, the pine, the cypress, and the olive, mingled with the blossoms of the peach, the cherry, and the most beautiful shrubs-all canopied by a deep and cloudless azure-crumbling arches, amid sombre evergreens and the gayest garlands of crimson and white-such a contrast and such a harmony!

I have ridden a hundred and fifty miles in vigorous health, between Nice and Genoa, with the smooth and beauteous Mediterranean on my right, and the snow-covered, rugged Alps on my left-through olive and lemon groves, with towns and villages,

convents, bridges, rocks and dells, all romantically blended together. I have sailed on the magnificent gulf of Genoa, and the enchanting bays of Naples, Mola di Gaeta, and Baiæ. I have seen the lovely gulfs of Villa Franca and La Spezia, and the falls of Terni and Tivoli.

I have breathed the gales of spring on the banks of the Tiber, and in the delicious environs of Naples. I have traversed the Lago Maggiore and the Lake of Como, and have bathed in the soft and limpid waters of the Lago di Garda. I have gathered the most delicious fruits fresh from the tree, and have passed during the vintage through loaded vines, hanging on trellises or in festoons, for miles and miles. I have exercised during the freshness of morning, enjoyed at my ease the tranquil glow of the mid-day sun, and sat uncovered at midnight beneath the starry azure-feeling simple existence delicious enjoyment.

I have visited St. Peter's again and again; I have seen it illuminated in the interior and on the exterior. I have seen the Apollo and the Laocoon by torch-light, and have passed hours before the Venus de' Medici and the masterpieces of Raphael.

I have stood upon the Alban Hill, and looked along the Appian Way, a ruin itself, bordered on each side for fifteen miles with ruined tombs. I have wandered many an evening, on foot and on horseback, over the inspiring solitudes of the Campagna di Roma.

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Even in thy desert, what is like to thee?
Thy very weeds are beautiful, thy waste
More rich than other climes' fertility;
Thy wreck a glory, and thy ruin grac'd

With an immaculate charm, which cannot be defac'd!"

I have visited the ruins of Pæstum, of Tusculum, and of Pompeii. I have leaned over the crater of Vesuvius in darkness, listening to the fiery storm below. I have explored the stupendous remains of the Palace of the Cæsars, and of the Baths of Titus and Caracalla. I have viewed from Cecilia Metella's tomb the three ranges of aqueducts magnificently stretching across the plain, and once connecting the walls of the "Eternal City" with the distant mountains-now standing in solitary grandeur, broken, and overgrown with ivy and wild flowers. I have descended into the tombs of the ancient Romans, visited the dungeons of their captives, and followed the track of their triumphs. I have wandered over the scenes which Virgil has sung, stood where Cicero harangued, and walked on the very road which Horace loved to frequent.

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