In him the savage virtue of the race, Revenge, and all ferocious thoughts, were dead: Nor did he change; but kept in lofty place The wisdom which adversity had bred. Glad were the vales, and every cottage [and more: hearth; The Shepherd Lord was honoured more Mr. Southey, describing the mountain scenery of the Lake region, says, "The story of the Shepherd Lord Clifford, which was known only to a few antiquarians till it was told so beautifully in verse by Wordsworth, gives a romantic interest to Blencathara." Henry Lord Clifford was the son of John Lord Clifford, who was slain at Towton, which battle placed the House of York upon the throne. His family could expect no mercy from the conqueror; for he was the man who slew the younger brother of Edward IV. in the battle of Wakefield-a deed of cruelty in a cruel age. The hero of this poem fled from his paternal home, and lived for twenty-four years as a shepherd. He was restored to his rank and estates by Henry VII. The following narrative is from an old MS. quoted by Mr. Southey: "So in the condition of a shepherd's boy at Lonsborrow, where his mother then lived for the most part, did this Lord Clifford spend his youth, till he was about fourteen years of age, about which time his mother's father, Henry Bromflett, Lord Vesey, deceased. But a little after his death it came to be rumoured, at the court, that his daughter's two sons were alive; about which their mother was examined: but her answer was, that she had given directions to send them both beyond seas, to be bred there; and she did not know whether they were dead or alive. "And as this Henry Lord Clifford did grow to more years, he was still the more capable of his danger, if he had been discovered. And therefore presently after his grandfather, the Lord Vesey, was dead, the said rumour of his being alive, being more and more whispered at the court, made his said loving mother, by the means of her second husband, Sir Lancelot Threlkeld, to send him away with the said shepherds and their wives into Cumberland, to be kept as a shepherd there, sometimes at Threlkeld, and amongst his father-in-law's kindred, and sometimes upon the borders of Scotland, where they took lands, purposely for these shepherds that had the custody of him: where many times his father-in-law came purposely to visit him, and sometimes his mother, though very secretly. By which mean kind of breeding this inconvenience befel him, that he could neither write nor read; for they durst not bring him up in any kind of learning, lest by it his birth should be discovered. Yet, after he came to his lands and honours, he learnt to write his name only. 66 "Notwithstanding which disadvantage, after he came to be possessed again, and restored to the enjoyment of his father's estate, he came to be a very wise man, and a very good manager of his estate and fortunes. "This Henry Lord Clifford, after he came to be possessed of his said estate, was a great builder and repairer of all his castles in the north, which had gone to decay when he came to enjoy them; for they had been in strangers' hands about twentyfour or twenty-five years. Skipton Castle, and the lands about it, had been given to William Stanley, by King Edward IV., which William Stanley's head was cut off about the tenth year of King Henry VII.; and Westmorland was given by Edward IV. to his brother Richard, Duke of Gloucester, who was afterwards King of England, and was slain in battle, the 22nd of August, 1485. "This Henry Lord Clifford did, after he came to his estate, exceedingly delight in astronomy, and the contemplation of the course of the stars, which it was likely he was seasoned in during the course of his shepherd's life. He built a great part of Barden Tower (which is now much decayed), and there he lived much; which it is thought he did the rather because in that place he had furnished himself with instruments for that study. "He was a plain man, and lived for the most part a country life, and came seldom either to the Court or London, but when he was called thither to sit in them as a peer of the realm, in which parliament, it is reported, he behaved himself wisely, and nobly, and like a good Englishman." 23.-STRUGGLING WITH ADVERSITY. BASIL HALL. [THERE is only one book of biography in our language, that, in our view, can compare with Boswell's Life of Johnson, and that book is Lockhart's Life of Scott. The life of the great novelist is more artistically put together than the life of the great moralist and critic; but they each, in their several modes, place you in the most intimate companionship with the heroes of their respective stories. There is more of varied incident in the narrative of Scott's career than in that of Johnson. When Scott falls from his splendid position as regards wealth into comparative poverty, with a load of debt upon his shoulders that might have sunk him to the earth, we trace the gradual approach and consummation of his ruin with an interest that no writer of fiction could ever hope to excite and sustain. And when, again, we see the brave man bearing his load gallantly through years of labour, and gradually casting it off, bit by bit, and winning universal love and admiration by his wondrous exertions of talent and industry, that he may work out his emancipation by the strength of his own hand alone-the world can hardly show another such example of the sublime spectacle of will o'ermastering fate. We offer these obvious remarks upon the career of Scott, as an introduction to a most interesting narrative extracted from Captain Basil Hall's Diary, and published in Mr. Lockhart's Life of Scott. Captain Hall was a most accomplished naval officer-one of that class now happily so common, who unite a taste for science and literature with their professional knowledge. He has described some of his travels and adventures with remarkable spirit, in various popular works. He was born in 1788, and died in 1844.] A hundred and fifty years hence, when his works have become old classical authorities, it may interest some fervent lover of his writings to know what this great genius was about on Saturday the 10th of June, 1826-five months after the total ruin of his pecuniary fortunes, and twenty-six days after the death of his wife. In the days of his good luck he used to live at No. 39 in North Castle Street, in a house befitting a rich baronet; but on reaching the door, I found the plate on it covered with rust (so soon is glory obscured), the windows shuttered up, dusty, and comfortless; and from the side of one projected a board, with this inscription, "To Sell;" the stairs were unwashed, and not a foot-mark told of the ancient hospitality which reigned within. In all nations with which I am acquainted the fashion able world move westward, in imitation, perhaps, of the great tide of civilisation; and, vice versa, those persons who decline in fortune, which is mostly equivalent to declining in fashion, shape their course eastward. Accordingly, by an involuntary impulse, I turned my head that way, and inquiring at the clubs in Prince's Street, learned that he now resided in St. David Street, No. 6. I was rather glad to recognize my old friend the Abbotsford butler, who answered the door-the saying about heroes and valets-de-chambre comes to one's recollection on such occasions; and nothing, we may be sure, is more likely to be satisfactory to a man whose fortune is reduced than the stanch adherence of a mere servant, whose wages must be altered for the worse. At the top of the stair we saw a small tray, with a single plate and glasses for one solitary person's dinner. Some few months ago Sir Walter was surrounded by his family, and wherever he moved, his head-quarters were the focus of fashion. Travellers from all nations crowded round, and like the recorded honours of Lord Chatham, "thickened over him." Lady and Miss Scott were his constant companions; the Lockharts were his neighbours both in town and in Roxburghshire; his eldest son was his frequent guest; and in short, what with his own family and the clouds of tourists, who, like so many hordes of Cossacks, pressed upon him, there was not, perhaps, out of a palace, any man so attended, I had almost said overpowered, by company. His wife is now dead-his son-in-law and favourite daughter gone to London, and his grandchild, I fear, just staggering, poor little fellow, on the edge of the grave, which, perhaps, is the securest refuge for him-his eldest son is married, and at a distance, and report speaks of no probability of the title descending; in short, all are dispersed, and the tourists, those "curiosos impertinentes," drive past Abbotsford gate, and curse their folly in having delayed for a year too late their long projected jaunt to the north. Meanwhile, not to mince the matter, the great man had, somehow or other, managed to involve himself with printers, publishers, bankers, gasmakers, wool-staplers, and all the fraternity of speculators, accommodation-bill manufacturers, land jobbers, and so on, till, at a season of distrust in money-matters, the hour of reckoning came, like a thief in the night; and as our friend, like the unthrifty virgins, had no oil in his lamp, all his affairs went to wreck and ruin, and landed him, after the gale was over, in the predicament of Robinson Crusoe, with little more than a shirt to his back. But like that able navigator, he is not cast away upon a barren rock. The tide has ebbed, indeed, and left him on the beach, but the hull of his fortunes is above water still, and it will go hard indeed with him if he does not shape a raft that shall bring to shore much of the cargo that an ordinary mind would leave in despair, to be swept away by the next change of the moon. The distinction between man and the rest of the living creation, certainly, is in nothing more remarkable than in the power which he possesses over them, of turning to varied account the means with which the world is stocked. But it has always struck me, that there is a far greater distinction between man and man than between many men and most other animals; and it is from a familiarity with the practical operation of this marvellous difference that I venture to predict, that our Crusoe will cultivate his own island, and build himself a bark in which, in process of time, he will sail back to his friends and fortune in greater triumph than if he had never been driven amongst the breakers. Sir Walter Scott, then, was sitting at a writing-desk covered with papers, and on the top was a pile of bound volumes of the Moniteur,— one, which he was leaning over as my brother and I entered, was open on a chair, and two others were lying on the floor. As he rose to receive us, he closed the volume which he had been extracting from, and came forward to shake hands. He was, of course, in deep mourning, with weepers and the other trappings of wo, but his countenance, though certainly a little wo-begonish, was not cast into any very deep furrows. His tone and manner were as friendly as heretofore; and when he saw that we had no intention of making any attempt at sympathy or moanification, but spoke to him as of old, he gradually contracted the length of his countenance, and allowed the corners of his mouth to curl almost imperceptibly upwards, and a renewed lustre came into his eye, if not exactly indicative of cheerfulness, at all events of well-regulated, patient, Christian resignation. My meaning will be misunderstood if it be imagined from this picture that I suspected any hypocrisy, or an affectation of grief in the first instance. I have no doubt, indeed, that he feels, and most acutely, the bereavements which have come upon him; but we may very fairly suppose, that among the many visitors he must have, there may be some who cannot understand that it is proper, decent, or even possible to hide those finer emotions deep in the heart. He immediately began conversing in his usual style—the chief topic being Captain Denham (whom I had recently seen in London) and his book of African Travels, which Sir Walter had evidently read with much attention. * * After sitting a quarter of an hour, we came away, well pleased to see our friend quite unbroken in spirit-and though bowed down a little by the blast, and here and there a branch the less, as sturdy in the trunk as ever, and very possibly all the better for the disciplinebetter, I mean, for the public, inasmuch as he has now a vast additional stimulus for exertion, and one which all the world must admit to be thoroughly noble and generous. 24.-OMENS. DAVY. [SIR HUMPHREY DAVY, the great chemist, may fairly take his place amongst "the best authors." The qualities by which he raised himself to his professional eminence were the very qualities that make a great writer-a vivid imagination subjected to the discipline of accurate reasoning, and both working with unwearied industry. Davy took the largest views of science; but he worked them out by the most diligent examination of the minutest facts. We trace the same genius in his lighter writings. The extract which we are about to give is from his little book on fly-fishing, entitled 'Salmonia'-a book full of the most charming pictures of external nature, seen through the brilliant atmosphere of a poetical philosophy. Davy was born in Penzance, in 1778. His father was a carver in wood; and, while an apprentice to a surgeon and apothecary, the future president of the Royal Society was laying up materials for his career in diligent study. In 1801 he came to London, and became a Lecturer at the Royal Institution; from this time his life was one continued series of brilliant discoveries and beautiful exposition. The Miner's Safety Lamp is one of the most signal examples of the practical benefit of the highest theoretical science. He died, in the maturity of his fame, at the comparatively early age of fifty-one.] Poict. I hope we shall have another good day to-morrow, for the clouds are red in the west. Phys. I have no doubt of it, for the red has a tint of purple, Phys. The air when dry, I believe, refracts more red, or heat-making rays; and as dry air is not perfectly transparent, they are again reflected in the horizon. I have observed generally a coppery or yellow sunset to foretel rain; but, as an indication of wet weather approaching, nothing is more certain than a halo round the moon, which is produced by the precipitated water; and the larger the circle, the nearer the clouds, and, consequently, the more ready to fall. Hal. I have often observed that the old proverb is correct A rainbow in the morning is the shepherd's warning, Can you explain this omen? Phys. A rainbow can only occur when the clouds containing or depositing the rain are opposite to the sun,--and in the evening the rainbow is in the east, and in the morning in the west; and as our heavy rains, in this climate, are usually brought by the westerly wind, a rainbow in the west indicates that the bad weather is on the road, by the wind, to us; whereas the rainbow in the east proves that the rain in these clouds is passing from us. Poict. I have often observed that when the swallows fly high, fine weather is to be expected or continued; but when they fly low, and |