market for any thing they wanted, and so must he. Besides, wages had really been quite exorbitant. Half his men threw each of them as much money away in gin and beer yearly, as would pay two workmen at a cheap house. Why was he to be robbing his family of comforts to pay for their extravagance? And charging his customers, too, unnecessarily high prices-it was really robbing the public! ernment work is just the very last, lowest resource to which a poor, starved-out wretch betakes himself to keep body and soul together? Why, the government prices, in almost every department, are half, and less than half, the very lowest living price. I tell you, the careless iniquity of government about these things will come out some day. It will be known, the whole abomination; and future generations will class it with the tyrannies of the Roman emperors and the Norman barons. Why, it's a fact, that the colonels of the regiments-noblemen, most of them-make their own vile profit out of us tailors-out of the pauperism of the men, the slavery of the children, the prostitution of "Such, I suppose, were some of the arguments which led to an official announcement, one Saturday night, that our young employer intended to enlarge his establishment, for the purpose of commencing business in the 'show trade;' and that, emulous of Messrs. Aaron, Levi, and the rest of that class, magnificent the women. They get so much a uniform alalterations were to take place in the premises, to make room for which our work-rooms were to be demolished, and that for that reason for of course it was only for that reason-all work would in future be given out, to be made up at the men's own homes.. ...... "We were all bound to expect this. Every working tailor must come to this at last, on the present system; and we are only lucky in having been spared so long. You all know where this will end-in the same misery as fifteen thousand out of twenty thousand of our class are enduring now. We shall become the slaves, often the bodily prisoners, of Jews, middlemen, and sweaters, who draw their livelihood out of our starvation. We shall have to face, as the rest have, ever decreasing prices of labor, ever increasing profits made out of that labor by the contractors who will employ us-arbitrary fines, inflicted at the caprice of hirelings-the competion of women, and children, and starving Irish -our hours of work will increase one-third, our actual pay decrease to less than one-half; and in all this we shall have no hope, no chance of improvement in wages, but ever more penury, slavery, misery, as we are pressed on by those who are sucked by fifties-almost by hundreds -yearly, out of the honorable trade in which we were brought up, into the infernal system of contract work, which is devouring our trade and many others, body and soul. Our wives will be forced to sit up night and day to help us; our children must labor from the cradle without chance of going to school, hardly of breathing the fresh air of heaven; our boys, as they grow up, must turn beggars or paupers; our daughters, as thousands do, must eke out their miserable earnings by prostitution. And after all, a whole family will not gain what one of us had been doing, as yet, single-handed.' . lowed them by government to clothe the men with; and then-then, they let out the jobs to the contractors at less than half what government give them, and pocket the difference. And then you talk of appealing to government!'"' Only DICKENS or THACKERAY could have rivaled the following sketch of a discussion on THE REAL OFFICE OF POETRY. What do you mean, Mr. Mackaye!' asked I, with a doleful and disappointed visage. "Mean-why, if God had meant ye to write about Pacifics, He'd ha put ye there-and because He means ye to write aboot London town, He's put ye there-and gien ye an unco sharp taste o' the ways o't; and I'll gie ye anither. Come along wi' me.' "And he seized me by the arm, and hardly giving me time to put on my hat, marched me out into the streets, and away through Clare Market to St. Giles's. "It was a foul, chilly, foggy Saturday night. From the butchers' and greengrocers' shops the gas-lights flared and flickered, wild and ghastly, over haggard groups of slip-shod, dirty women, bargaining for scraps of stale meat, and frostbitten vegetables, wrangling about short weight and bad quality. Fish-stalls and fruit-stalls lined the edge of the greasy pavement, sending up odors as foul as the language of the sellers and buyers. Blood and sewer-water crawled from under doors and out of spouts, and reeked down the gutters among offal, animal and vege table, in every stage of putrefaction. Foul vapors rose from cow-sheds and slaughter-houses, and the doorways of undrained alleys, where the inhabitants carried the filth out on their shoes from the back yard into the court, and from the court up into the main street; while above "Government-government? You a tailor, hanging like cliffs over the streets-those narand not know that government are the very au- row, brawling torrents of filth, and poverty, and thors of this system? Not to know that they sin-the houses with their teeming load of lifə first set the example, by getting the army and were piled up into the dingy choking night. A navy clothes made by contractors, and taking ghastly, deafening, sickening sight it was. Go, the lowest tenders? Not to know that the po- scented Belgravian! and see what London is! and lice clothes, the postmen's clothes, the convicts' then go to the library which God has given thee clothes, are all contracted for on the same in--one often fears in vain-and see what science fernal plan, by sweaters, and sweaters' sweat- says this London might be! ers, and sweaters' sweaters' sweaters, till gov 666 'Ay,' he muttered to himself, as he strode along, "sing awa; get yoursel' wi' child wi' pretty fancies and gran' words, like the rest of the poets, and gang to hell for it.' "To hell, Mr. Mackaye ?' "Ay, to a verra real hell, Alton Locke, laddie—a warse ane than ony fiend's' kitchen, or subterranean Smithfield that ye'll hear o' in the pulpits—the hell on earth o' being a flunkey, and a humbug, and a useless peacock, wasting God's gifts on your ain lusts and pleasures-and kenning it—and not being able to get oot o' it, for the chains o' vanity and self-indulgence. I've warned ye. Now look there' "He stopped suddenly before the entrance of a miserable alley: nose, and keep your eyes open, and ye'll no miss it." One other extract, and we will have done with this original but captivating and convincing volume. ALTON speaks prophetically of THE DANGERS THAT ARE LOOMING. "Ay, respectable gentlemen and ladies, I will confess all to you-you shall have, if you enjoy it, a fresh opportunity for indulging that supreme pleasure which the press daily affords you of insulting the classes whose powers most of you know as little as you do their sufferings. Yes; the Chartist poet is vain, conceited, ambitious, uneducated, shallow, inexperienced, envious, ferocious, scurrilous, seditious, traitorous.-Is your charitable vocabulary exhausted? ask yourselves, how often have you yourself, honestly resisted and conquered the temptation to any one of these sins, when it has come across you just once in a way, and not as they came to me, as they come to thousands of the work Then "Look! there's not a soul down that yard, but's either beggar, drunkard, thief, or warse. Write aboot that! Say how ye saw the mouth o' hell, and the twa pillars thereof at the entry -the pawnbroker's shop o' one side and the gin palace at the other-twa monstrous deevils, eating up men and women, and bairns, body and soul. Look at the jaws o' the monsters, how they open and open, and swallow in anithering-men, daily and hourly, 'till their torments victim and anither. Write aboot that.' do, by length of time, become their elements?' What, are we covetous, too? Yes? And if those who have, like you, still covet more what wonder if those who have nothing, covet something? Profligate too? Well, though that imputation as a generality is utterly calumnious, though your amount of respectable animal enjoyment per annum is a hundred times as great as that of the most self-indulgent artisan, yet, if you had ever felt what it is to want, not only every luxury of the senses, but even bread to eat, you would think more mercifully of the man who makes up by rare excesses, and those only of the limited kinds possible to him, for long intervals of dull privation, and says in his madness, 'Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die!' We have our sins, and you have yours. Ours may be the more gross and barbaric, but yours are none the less damnable; perhaps all the more so, for being the sleek, subtle, respectable, religious sins they are. You are frantic enough if our part of the press calls you hard names, but you can not see that your part of the press repays it back to us with interest. We see those insults, and feel them bitterly enough; and "Then ye ought. What do ye ken aboot do not forget them, alas! soon enough, while the Pacific? Which is maist to your business? they pass unheeded by your delicate eyes as -thae bare-backed hizzies that play the harlot o' trivial truisms. Horrible, unprincipled, villainthe other side o' the warld, or these-these thou-ous, seditious, frantic, blasphemous, are epithets sands o' barebacked hizzies that play the harlot o' your ain side-made out o' your ain flesh and blude? You a poet! True poetry, like true charity, my laddie, begins at hame. If ye'll be a poet at a', ye maun be a cockney poet; and while the cockneys be what they be, ye maun write, like Jeremiah of old, o' lamentation and mourning and woe, for the sins o' your people. Gin ye want to learn the spirit o' a people's poet, down wi' your Bible and read thae auld "What jaws, Mr. Mackaye!' "Thae faulding-doors o' the gin shop, goose. Are na they a mair damnable man-devouring idol than ony red-hot statue o' Moloch, or wicker Gogmagog, wherein thae auld Britons burnt their prisoners? Look at thae barefooted, barebacked hizzies, with their arms roun' the men's necks, and their mouths full o' vitriol and beastly words! Look at that Irish woman pouring the gin down the babbie's throat! Look at that raff o' a boy gaun out o' the pawnshop, where he's been pledging the handkerchief he stole the morning, into the ginshop, to buy beer poisoned wi' grains o' paradise, and cocculus indicus, aud saut, and a' damnable, maddening, thirst-breeding, lust-breeding drugs! Look at that girl that went in wi' a shawl on her back and cam out wi'out ane! Drunkards frae the breast!-harlots frae the cradle !-damned be· ́fore they're born! John Calvin had an inkling o' the truth there, I'm a'most driven to think, wi' his reprobation deevil's doctrines !' “Well—but—Mr. Mackaye, I know nothing about these poor creatures.' Hebrew prophets; gin ye wad learn the style, read your Burns frae morning till night; and gin ye'd learn the matter, just gang after your of course when applied to-to how large a portion of the English people, you will some day discover to your astonishment. When will that day come, and how? In thunder, and storm, and garments rolled in blood? Or like the dew on the mown grass, and the clear shining of the sunlight after April rain? BURKE AND THE PAINTER BARRY. BURKE delighted in lending a helping hand to genius struggling against adversity; and many who were wasting their powers in obscur chef-d'œuvre; I think I have been more than a match for them; I have outdone them at last." Mr. Burke asked of whom it was he spoke. "The rats," replied he, "the nefarious rats, who robbed me of every thing in the larder. But now all is safe; I keep my food beyond their reach. I may now defy all the rats in the parish." Barry had no clock, so depended on the cravings of his stomach to regulate his meals. By this unerring guide, which might have shamed the most correct regulator in a watchmaker's shop, he perceived that it was time for dinner; but forgot that he had invited Burke to partake of it, till reminded by a hint. “I declare, my dear friend, I had totally forgotten, I beg your pardon-it quite escaped my memory; but if you'll just sit down here and blow the fire, I'll get a nice beef-steak in a minute." ity were led by his assistance to the paths of eminence. Barry, the painter, was among those to whom he had shown great kindness; he found pleasure in the society of that eccentric being. A long time had passed without his having seen him, when one day they met accidentally in the street. The greeting was cordial, and Barry invited his friend to dine with him the next day. Burke arrived at the appointed hour, and the door was opened by Dame Ursula, as she was called. She at first denied her master, but when Burke mentioned his name, Barry, who had overheard it, came running down stairs. He was in his usual attire; his thin gray hair was all disheveled; an old and soiled green shade and a pair of mounted spectacles assisted his sight; the color of his linen was rather equivocal, but was evidently not fresh from the bleachgreen; his outward garment was a kind of careless roquelaire. He gave Burke a most hearty welcome, and led him into the apartment which served him for kitchen, parlor, studio, and gallery; it was, however, so filled with smoke that its contents remained a profound mystery, and Burke was almost blinded and nearly suffocated. Barry expressed the utmost surprise, and appeared utterly at a loss to account for the state of the atmosphere. Burke, however, without endeavoring to explain the mystery on philosophical principles, at once brought the whole blame of the annoyance home to Barry-as it came out that he had removed the stove from its wonted situation by the chimney-piece, and drawn it into the very middle of the room. He had mounted it on an old dripping-pan, to defend the carpet from the burning ashes; he had in vain called in the assistance of the bellows, no blaze would come-but volumes of smoke were puffed out ever and anon, as if to show that the fire could do something if it pleased. Burke persuaded Barry to reinstate the stove in its own locality, and helped him to replace it; this done and the windows opened, they got rid of the smoke, and the fire soon looked out cheerfully enough on them, as if nothing had happened. Barry invited Burke to the upper rooms to look at his pictures. As he went on from one to the other, he applied the sponge and water with which he was supplied, to wash away the dust which obscured them. Burke was delighted with them, and with Barry's his-able instances of presentiments; indeed, on one tory of each, and his dissertation as he pointed out its particular beauties. He then brought him to look at his bedroom; its walls were hung with unframed pictures, which had also to be freed from the thick covering of dust before they could be admired; these, like the others, were noble specimens of art. In a recess near the fire-place the rough stump-bedstead stood, with its coverlet of coarse rug. "That is my bed," said the artist; "you see I use no curtains; they are most unwholesome, and I breathe as freely and sleep as soundly as if I lay upon down and snored under velvet. Look there," said he, as he pointed to a broad shelf high above the bed, "that I consider my Burke applied all his energies to the bellows, and had a nice clear fire when Barry returned with the steak rolled up in cabbage-leaves, which he drew from his pocket; from the same receptacle he produced a parcel of potatoes; a bottle of port was under each arm, and each hand held a fresh French-roll. A gridiron was placed on the fire, and Burke was deputed to act as cook while Barry performed the part of butler. While he laid the cloth the old woman boiled the potatoes, and at five o'clock, all being duly prepared, the friends sat down to their repast. Burke's first essay in cookery was miraculously successful, for the steak was done to admiration, and of course greatly relished by the cook. As soon as dinner was dispatched the friends chatted away over their two bottles of port till nine o'clock. Burke was often heard to say that this was one of the most amusing and delightful days he had ever spent. [From Hogg's Instructor.] A TALE OF GERMAN ROBBERS AND "I AM inclined to side with our friend," said the venerable pastor, "and I would rather not see you so skeptical, Justus. I have known, in my own experience, several remark occasion, I and those who were with me, all save one, greatly profited by the strange prophetic apprehension of one of our party. Would we had listened to him sooner! But it was not so to be." "Come, tell us the story, dear grandfather," said Justus; "it will doubtless edify our guest; and, as for me, I do not object to be mystified, now and then." "Justus, Justus, lay aside that scoffing mask. You put it on, I know, to look like another Mephistopheles, but you don't succeed." "Don't I?" returned Justus, with a smile. "Well, grandfather, that ought to be a comfort to you." "No, you don't, so you may as well give up the great Thuringian Forest, and one fine morntrying. But come, if you would really like to ing off we set. Just as we got beyond the hear the story "(the fact was, that the good town, Macdonald said, 'My dear brothers, let man was anxious to tell it, and feared to lose us return; this expedition will bring us no the opportunity), "I shall be happy to please good.' 'You would almost make one think you you. I think, however, we shall be better out were a prophet,' said Laurenberg, with mock of doors. Let us go and take our wine under gravity. 'And what if I be?' cried the other, the great plane-tree. You had as well bring quickly. Why, then, don't be a prophet of your chair with you, my young friend" (this evil-that is to say, unless you can not help it. was addressed to me), "for the bench is some- Come, my dear fellow.' 'I tell you,' interwhat hard. And Trinchen, my girl, put glasses rupted Macdonald, 'that, if we go on, one of us on a tray, and some bottles of wine in a pail, will never see Göttingen again—and Laurenand bring them out to us under the great plane-berg, my beloved Laurenberg, it is you who tree. And you, Justus, my boy, be kind enough to transport thither this big chair of mine, like a dutiful grandson and a stout, as you are.' We were soon established in the pleasant shade. The pastor took an easy posture in his chair, when, after many efforts, Justus had coaxed it into touching the ground with all its four legs at once; I straddled across the seat of mine, and, placing my arms on the back, reposed the bowl of my long pipe on the ground; and Justus, with his cigar in his mouth-the twentieth, or thereby, that day—threw himself down on the turf at a convenient distance from the wine-pail, prepared to replenish our glasses, as need might be. Noble glasses they were, tall and green, with stalks to be grasped, not fingered. | "It is now nearly sixty years ago," began the pastor, when our arrangements were complete, "a long time-a long time, indeed, to bear the staff of one's pilgrimage. I was then in my third year at the university, and was something like what you are now, Justus-a merry, idle, and thoughtless student, but not a very bad boy either." "Thank you, grandfather," said Justus; "however, that accounts for your being the man you are at your years." will be that one. You will never return, unless “No, it does not,” said the old man, smiling; "but let me tell my story, my boy, without interrupting me- - at least, unless you have something better to say than that. As I was saying, I was in my third year, and, of course, I had many acquaintances. I had, however, only two friends. One was a countryman of yours, young gentleman, and his name was Macdon-Laurenberg, your gayety is oppressive,' interald. The name of the other was Laurenberg." rupted Macdonald; why sing that song? You "Why, that was my grandmother's name!" know there is death in it.' 'It is true,' replied said Justus. Laurenberg, somewhat gravely, the poor little daughter of the landlady lies in her coffin. Another stave, then, if you like it better, แ Laurenberg was your grandmother's brother," continued the pastor, "and the event I am about to relate to you was the means of my becoming acquainted with her. But has any one ever told you his fate, Justus ?" No," said Justus, "I never before even heard of him." Up, brothers! up! enjoy your life!' and so on he went with that stupid song." "Stupid!" cried Justus, rising suddenly on his elbow; "stupid, did you say, grandfather?" "Well, my boy, I think it stupid now, though at your age, perhaps, I thought differently. But there," continued the pastor, "I was sure of it; I never can keep both my pipe and my story going at the same time. Give me a light, Justus. Thank you. Those matches are a great invention. In our time, it was all flint, and steel, and trouble. Now, fill our glasses, and then I shall go on again." Justus obeyed, and his worthy relative thus town. About noon, Laurenberg said, 'Come, proceeded : "Notwithstanding all his singing, Laurenberg was evidently more impressed by our companion's words than he was willing to own; and, as for me, I was much struck with them, for your countryman, young stranger, was no common man. But all that soon wore off. Even Macdonald seemed to forget his own forebodings. We marched on right cheerfully. That night we stopped at Heiligenstadt, very tired, for it was a long way for lads so little used to walking as we were." "Did you put up at the Post, grandfather?" asked Justus. "It is a capital inn, and the landlady is both pretty and civil. I staid there when I went from Cassel to Halle." brothers, do you not find this road tiresome? "I don't remember where we put up," replied the pastor, "but it is scarcely likely we put up at the Post. In those days, students preferred more modest hostelries. Don't interrupt me. The next night we slept at Dingelstadt; and I remember that at supper Laurenberg knocked over the salt-cellar, and that Macdonald said, 'See, I told you! every thing shows it!' Next night we were at Mülhausen, making short journeys, you see; for, after all, our object was to enjoy, not to tire ourselves. Mülhausen is a very prettily situated town, and, Here my excellent host launched in a current though I have never been there since, I remem- of descriptive landscape, which, though doubtber it quite well. The next afternoon we got less very fine, was almost entirely lost to me, to a place whose name I forget at this moment. for my thoughts again wandered. From time Stay-I think it was Langensalza; yes, it was to time, the words valleys," "mountains," Langensalza; and the following day we arrived "crags," "streamlets," "gloom," “rocks,” in Gotha, and lodged at the sign of the Giant," Salvator Rosa," "legends,” “wood-nymphs," in the market-place. Gotha is the chief town and the like, fell on my ear, but failed to recall in the duchy, and-" my attention. And this must have lasted no little time, for I was at length aroused by his asking for another cigar, the first being done. Here the worthy pastor diverged into a description of Gotha and its environs. This, however, I lost, for, the interest of the story ceasing, I went off into a sort of reverie, from which I was awakened only by the abrupt cessation of the tale, and the words, "Justus, my boy, you are not asleep, are you? Give me a cigar; my pipe is out again." Justus complied, and the old man, leaning his long pipe, with the rich bowl, against the great plane-tree, received "fire" from his grandson, lit the Cuba, and, after admonishing the youth to fill our glasses, thus went on: "Our new friends were students from Jena. They were each of a different country. One was a Frenchman; one a Pole; the third alone was a German. They were making a sort of pilgrimage to the different places remarkable for events in the life of Luther-had been at Erfurt, to see his cell in the orphan-house there, and were now going to Eisenach and the Castle of Wartburg, to visit the Patmos of Junker George.' However, on hearing that we proposed marching through the Thuringian Forest, they gave up their original plan, and agreed to join us, which pleased us much, for all three were fine fellows. That night we got to Ohrdruff, and the next day we set off for Suhl. But we were not destined ever to reach that แ "The glen gradually opened out into a plain," resumed the pastor, "and our progress became easier. We, however, had no idea where we were, or which way to turn in order to find a resting-place for the night; we were completely lost, in short. Nevertheless, we pressed on as fast as our tired limbs would admit of, and after half an hour's march across the wooded level, we were rewarded by coming on a sort of road. It was, indeed, nothing more than the tracks of hoofs upon the turf, but we were in ecstasies at its appearance. After some deliberation as to whether we should take to the right or to the left along it, we resolved on following it to the right. Half an hour more, and we saw before us a house among the trees. It was a cheerful sight to us, and we gave a shout of joy. 'I trust they will give us hospitality,' said Richter, the German from Jena. 'If not,' exclaimed his French friend, 'it is my opinion that we will take it.' 'What! turn robbers?' said the Pole, laughing. 'It is a likely looking place for robbers,' remarked Macdonald, looking rather uneasily round him. We soon reached the house. It was a long building, with low walls, but a very high thatched roof. At one end was a kind of round tower, which |