LETTER XXVIII.

TO A FRIEND IN AMERICA.

EVER DEAR SIR,

Paris, September, 1844.

AFTER spending the entire afternoon of yesterday in wandering around and through the suburbs and gardens of Rouen, we started for Paris, by railway, where we arrived about ten o'clock in the evening, and “engaged our quarters" at the Windsor Hotel, opposite the gardens of the Tuilleries. Having letters of introduction to the Rev. William Toase, Wesleyan Missionary, through the kindness of the Rev. Dr. Alder, and the Rev. Robert Young, we walked out this morning in quest of his habitation, which we found on the borders of the Champs-Elysées,-Elysian Fields. We were disappointed at finding that he and Mrs. Toase were out of town, but we were politely received by Miss Toase. Finding ourselves in the vicinity of that monument of Napoleon's pride and ambition,-the Arch of Triumph, we concluded to pay it the first visit. It stands upon an eminence at the extremity of a beautiful avenue; and is, I believe, universally admitted to be one of the most elaborately finished monuments in Europe. The height of the edifice is more than one hundred and fifty feet; the thickness, nearly one hundred and forty feet. Groups of figures, in elegant sculpture, each eighteen feet high, are ranged in squares, and are chiefly commemorative of battles in which Napoleon was victorious. The statue of War, in the form of a female, summoning the French people of all ages to the defence of their country, is a terrific figure. The departure of the French army; the victorious return; the people distributing flags to

heroic officers; the triumphs of Peace, displayed in agriculture and commerce; the Hero himself, in various positions in battle, victory, and triumph; cities prostrate, rendering him homage; France proclaiming his mighty deeds; History recording them; are all arranged in their respective departments, in full accordance with military taste; and are, certainly, admirable pieces of sculpture. But I could not help thinking that these and the like exhibitions, serve but to fan that passion for war and bloodshed, for which this excitable and thoughtless population have been so famous. The horrors of war are not represented here, but rather its blandishments. Indeed sculpture, painting, poetry, oratory, and music have long united in throwing a blazonry around the profession of arms. They have long combined to dazzle the imagination of the unthinking. By keeping out of sight all that is revolting, and presenting all that is brilliant and fascinating in the aspect of war, they have inspired a passion which the slightest difficulty with a neighbouring nation fans into a flame, that torrents of blood are ineffectual to quench. These have long contributed in forming what one terms "the powerful spring of war;"—that is, "admiration of the brilliant qualities displayed in war. These qualities," he adds, more than all things, have prevented an impression of the crimes and miseries of this savage custom. Many delight in war, not for its carnage and woes, but for its valour and apparent magnanimity, for the fortitude which despises suffering, the resolution which courts danger, the superiority of the mind to the body, to sensation,-to fear. Let us be just to human nature, even in its errors and excesses. Men seldom delight in war, considered merely as a source of misery. When they hear of battles, the picture which rises to their view is not what it should be,- -a picture of extreme wretchedness; of the wounded, the man

gled, the slain. These horrors are hidden under the splendour of those mighty energies, which break forth midst the perils of conflict, and which human nature contemplates with an intense and heart-thrilling delight. Attention hurries from the heaps of the slaughtered to the victorious chief, whose single mind pervades and animates a host, directs with stern composure the storm of battle; and the ruin which he spreads is forgotten in admiration of his power. This admiration has been expressed, in all ages, by the most unequivocal signs. Why that garland woven? that arch erected? that festive board spread? These are tributes to the warrior. Whilst the peaceful sovereign, who scatters blessings with the silence and constancy of Providence, is received with faint applause, men assemble in crowds to hail the conqueror,-perhaps a monster in human form, whose private life is blackened with lust and crime, and whose greatness is built on perfidy and usurpation. Thus war is the surest and speediest road to renown; and war will never cease while the field of battle is the field of glory, and the most luxuriant laurels grow from a root nourished with blood."

We ascended the spiral staircase of the Arch to the promenade upon the top, and enjoyed a splendid view of Paris. How instinctively did our eyes turn to the Hôtel des Invalides, within the precincts of which repose the bones of Napoleon. Solemn and awful were our reflections upon the career and character of that violent and reckless man. How many

millions of human beings did he plunge into wretchedness and despair! How vast the multitudes that were sacrificed to his ambition and lust of power!"whose fiat millions slew." The cry of innumerable widows, orphan children, and bereaved parents, has long since entered the ears of the Judge of all the earth. The author of their miseries has appeared

before his bar. The ghosts of the departed have recognized him in "the land of shades," and exchanged glances and words, such as disembodied spirits may use. There is Paris, and yonder lies Napoleon, we reflected; and how strangely do the sentiments of Napoleon sound,-"My destiny is not yet accomplished, there must be one universal code, one court of appeal,-the same money, the same weights and measures, the same laws, must have currency throughout Europe. I must make one nation out of all the European states, and Paris must be the capital of the world." But this was spoken at a time when he stood upon the highest pinnacle of his power,-when he had declared himself, "forced to assume the DICTATORSHIP of the world." But he was then upon the brink of a precipice. "He had poured the strength of France over the north and east of Europe, with the consuming rapidity of the stream from a volcano; but he was to encounter another species of resistance ;-to plunge his torrents of living fire into a new and mighty element, in which they were to be extinguished and buried forever:"- -one step more, and he was involved in the disasters of the Russian campaign, from which he never recovered himself. The French empire had then attained to an extent of territory and power that astonished the world. A hasty sketch of its mere outlines, I well remember, created a powerful sensation, several years after the downfal of him who was denominated "the master and soul of it,"-Napoleon. "Its actual limits were scarcely defined by a line drawn from the Baltic round the shores of the Continent, along the Pyrenées, and from the Pyrenées round Italy, to the dominions of the Porte, Naples alone. excepted, as under the nominal sovereignty of Murat. But the virtual empire also comprehended Switzerland, the Confederation of the Rhine, and a crowd of minor princedoms; thus constituting a dominion of 800,000

square miles, and eighty-five millions of people; the fifth of Europe in territory, the half in population; and in site, fertility, and military means, immeasurably overmatching all that remained. What but the arm of Providence could have scattered, with the suddenness of the fall of a billow, the power of such an empire?" The field of Waterloo was the last step but one of Napoleon's undoing. The next terminated his earthly career upon the death-bed :

"When Justice seal'd the gates of heaven and hell,

The rest that day, that day alone shall tell.”

All is now calm, "yet," to use the language of another, "there are mysterious threatenings, that may well keep the eye of the philosopher and the Christian strongly turned to that loftier region in which the changes of human things are born. A moment may cover earth with clouds, and break up the slumbers of mankind with a visitation, to which all the past was peace; a tempestuous development of power, in which the strength of man will be withered and scattered like forest leaves before the blast, and the final ends of punishment and mercy be wrought upon the world." But the "Arc de Triomphe " still glows with sculpture which proclaims, beneath a brilliant sky, events that are still deemed glorious and important by the French people; and yonder lies a little heap of dust and bones, all that remains of Napoleon,-the man whose ambition almost shook the equilibrium of our planet!

This afternoon we passed beneath another Triumphal Arch in honour of Napoleon. It stands near the Palace of the Tuilleries; and is said to be modelled after the arch of Septimius Severus at Rome. I know not whether you will think the following description worthy of the time it occupied me in "pencilling it." The fabric appears to be fine free-stone; the height,