cepted, and it solves the question why his views as to a sound currency and the annexation of Texas and Mexican territory never prevailed as the ruling policy of the country. The democratic party was aggressive, and involved us in the Mexican war by taking Texas. This precipitated the slavery agitation, which was never after wholly allayed. Mexican territory was taken as an indemnity for the war; and this proved a Pandora's box, and civil strife and sectional agitation soon followed. The South demanded slave extension over territory thus obtained by the common blood of all, and the North demanded that there should be a further prohibition enacted by congress to secure the freedom of the territories, where all was free by Mexican emancipation and the law. The compromise obtained under the lead of Clay and the Fillmore administration in 1850, secured tranquillity and the freedom of the terrritories, while the great men who carried through that settlement were denounced by the North as apostates to liberty. Mr. Webster and Mr. Fill. more united with Douglas and Cass, and that compromise became the law of the land. The democratic party in 1854 re. opened that agitation; but Webster was then no more, and the policy of 1850 was disturbed by a new principle of settlement, leaving this and all domestic questions to the people of the territory. Mr. Webster's policy against annexation could have saved the country from the disasters that came upon us after that event. But after annexation of Mexican territory there could be no peace so long as the sections pursued their own sectional interests, and utterly disregarding all national har. mony. Mr. Webster saw there remained only one course to be safely pursued, and hence he sought adjustment of all conflicting disputes. Calhoun and Webster, as well as Clay, agreed as to the necessity of a settlement of our difficulty, and only differed as to the mode by which it could be accomplished.

Thus the events of many years show how wise was the policy of those statesmen who sought the preservation of the Union without war and without needless strife, and thanks to the valor of a great people, the United States is a power among nations in spite of the shortcomings and folly of our internal polity in the past.

Mr. Curtis, in his life of Webster thinks there is some parallel between the Hayne and the Crown speech of Demosthenes. He says one is the American, while the other remains the masterpiece of Grecian debate. We agree in placing this reply to Hayne as the masterpiece of American eloquence; and it will make Webster known wherever our language is spoken in after times. It has been said that Webster has equalled the first orators of any age; but we think he has sufficient fame without claiming so much for him. Indeed, while he equalled, in many respects, the great masters of eloquence, such as Chatham, Mirabeau and Burke, and surpassed them in logical force; yet we realize that these great orators were, in other respects, his superiors. Thus while we place Webster at the very head of American orators, and name the reply to Hayne and Calhoun upon nullification as the masterpiece of American eloquence, and while we hold that he must long hold the foremost rank as a great debater, we cannot assert that he has left one speech that the world will pronounce comparable to the Crown speech of the great Athenian, or that shows so great a statesmanship as Burke's speech on conciliation with America.

Whether he rose far above the time in which he lived or was much in advance of his age, or whether he remained among the common level of politics, are questions that will be answered according to the stand-point of those who corsider him. He certainly seemed as free from partisan trammels and as elevated in his career as any man of his age. He was surely a large-minded statesman; and had no superior for love of country and the welfare of his kind. His reforms took the constitution as the basis of his advancement of the nation and of society, hence he was denounced by revolutionists.

ART. III.-1. La Bretagne, ancienne et moderne. Par PITRE

CHEVALIER. Paris. 2. Histoire de France, par M. MICHELET. Paris. 1855. 3. Brittany and its Byways, some account of its inhabitants and

its antiquities during a residence in that country By Mrs.

BURY PALLISER. London. 1869. 4. A critical History of the establishment of the Bretons among the

Gauls, and of their dependence upon the kings of France and dukes of Normandy. By the Abbè de VERTOT. Translated from the French. London. 1722.

BRITTANY is one of the extremities of the Old World, and partakes of the characteristics which belong to such portions of that division of the earth's surface. In common with Ireland, Cornwall, Scotland, Norway, and the northern or Iberian por. tion of the Spanish peninsula, it has its own peculiar antiquities and legends, differing in their style and nature from those of the rest of Europe. The history of Brittany is that of a country of quartz and granite, covered with rough herbage, of sombre forests and immemorial oaks, of bleak mountain ridges, wild ravines, and impetuous torrents, alternating with balmy valleys, lakes reposing in the bosom of sylvan retreats, and brooks which gurgle amid flowers.* The character of its inhabitants is as peculiar as its soil. Its leading feature is an intense love of home and country. “The Breton not only loves the village where he was born, but he loves the field of his fathers, the hearth and clock of his home, even the bed on which he was born, and on which he hopes to close his eyes. The conscript and sailor are often known to die of grief when away from their native land. Brittany possesses for its children an inconceivable attraction, and there is no country in the world where man is more attached to his native soil.”+

The Bretons are full of religious sentiment and of resignation , to the will of the Almighty, of loyalty to their word and to each

other, and of hospitality. The loyalty and good faith of the Bretons is proverbial. They have a proverb “E pess hænt lealdet,” (in the ancient Breton language) now rendered into French, "En tout chemin, loyauté,” which expresses this feeling. In the year 1548 the citizens of Martaix welcomed Mary Stuart, then only five years old, on her landing in France, but while passing through one of the gates of the city, the drawbridge, overloaded with spectators, gave way, and several persons were thrown into the water. Mary's Scottish attendants cried out “Treason !" but the Seigneur de Rohan, who was on horseback by the side of the royal litter, indignantly exclaimed, " Jamais Breton ne fit trahison !"*

The Bretons are brave soldiers and good sailors, but their disposition is hasty and violent, and even ferocious when angered. Among their vices are avarice and drunkenness, and recent travelers accuse them of despising women, t a very serious charge, seeing that Brittany has produced some of the noblest heroines recorded in history. The names of the Lady Constance, the mother of the unfortunate Prince Arthur; of the Countess Jeanne de Montfort ; of the Lady Typhaine, the wife of Du Guesclin; of the Duchess Anne, and of the Lady of Garaye, ought to suffice to secure them reverence. And while we are mentioning illustrious Breton ladies, we may as well enumerate some of the illustrious men to whom Brittany has given birth ; the foremost are the famous warriors and constables Du Guesclin and Oliver Clisson; the naval hero, Duguay Trouin; the Vendean leader, Henri Laroche-Jacquelin; the orator Lamennais; the learned philosopher De Chateaubriand; the knightly family of Beaumanoir ; the counts Arthur de Richemont and John de Montfort; the kings Conan Meriadec and Gradlon. St. Corentin ; Le Sage, the author of "Gii Blas;' the poet Brizeux; Pierre Abélard ; Descartes, the mathematician ; General Moreau ; Latour d'Auvergne; Emile Souvestre, the elegant novelist; Michel Colomb, the sculptor; and General Trochu, the defender of Paris; also the sceptics Duclos, Maupertuis and Lametrie.

* Lives of the Queens of Scotland, “Mary Stuart,” by Agnes Strickland. Vol. 3, p. 26, citing Albertus Magnus.

+ Mrs. Palliser. Brittany, p. 99,

The foregoing furnishes an answer to the Breton poet's ques. tion, contained in these verses :

“O landes ! O forêts ! pierres sombres et hautes,
Bois qui couvrez nos champs, mers qui battez nos côtes,
Villages où les morts errent avec les vents,
Bretagne, d'où vient l'amo' de tes enfants ?'*

As is the case with all other ancient nations, the early records of Brittany are very scant, and are found in the form of legends and traditions, embellished, more or less, with all the marvels to which patriotism and the imagination of the people could give birth. But this is not a sufficient reason for despising and rejecting these ancient histories. Nothing is more unphilosophical or unjust than to disdain the early chronicles of a nation because the people had the good faith to write according to the ideas of their times. We are entirely of Guizot's opinion on this subject. “Quereller de la sorte ces vieux maîtres," says het “est d'une ridicule outrecuidance. Ils ont fait ce qu'ils pouvaient faire ; ils nous ont transmis ce qu'on disait, ce qu'on croyait autour d'eux ; voudrait-il mieux qu'ils n'eussent pas écrit, qu'aucun souvenir des temps fabuleux ne fut pas venu jusqu'à nous, et que l'histoire n'eût commencé qu'au moment où la société aurait possedé des érudits capables de soumettre cette histoire à leur critique pour en assurer l'exactitude ? A mon avis, il y a souvent plus de vérités historiques à recueillir dans ces récits où se déploie l'imagination populaire que dans beaucoup de savantes dissertations."

The Abbè Vertot, however, is of a different opinion; he professes the utmost contempt for the ancient Breton legends, which, he says, are fabrications of later ages contrived for the purpose of proying that Brittany was more ancient than France, and independent of her. “To the intent to establish this distinction and to procure to the Bretons an original superiority over the French, among the Gauls, the greatest part of the historians of this nation, if they may be said to deserve that title, have not been ashamed to have recourse to fable and to také