what one of his own sergeants told him of his other sergeant two days ago; one of his sergeants is worth 500l. and a very honest fellow, and he told him he did not like his brother sergeants so often going to an Anabaptist's house a mile from Limerick. I have taken such a course, that if any sergeant has been tampered with, I doubt not I shall know it speedily. And I hope to get such good spies in every company, as nothing shall stir unknown to me. But I beg your Grace, if any money can be gotten, send down some to the soldiers speedily, for really they are in much want. Though the commissioned officers staid, yet, if the soldiers and uncommissioned officers had three months' pay, it would be a very good advantage. I beseech your Grace by the next post send me a letter of thanks from yourself to Captain Oliver, who is an honest stout man, and one, I will engage, will serve the king with his life and fortune upon all occasions, and such men deserve to be countenanced in the humble opinion of,

May it please your Grace,

Your Grace's most humble servant,

ORRERY.

The letter of thanks, recommended in the concluding paragraph, was immediately written by the Lord-Lieutenant. It was brief, but ex

pressive:

To Captain Robert Oliver.

Dublin Castle, February 24, 1665.

SIR,—I have the very good account sent me, in yours of the 15th and 20th of this month, of the affair you were employed into the country about, as also an explanation of some particulars from my Lord of Orrery, to which you referred me. I am in daily expectation of further information, and doubt not, but that you, who have so honestly and so prudently began, will bring the discovery to a full and useful conclusion. This is only to assure you, your endeavours and faithfulness ever are, and will be, well received, rightly valued, and proportionately rewarded; and that upon all occasions you shall find me to be

Your very affectionate friend, to serve you,

ORMONDE.

We

Captain Oliver having discharged his mission in the country, returned to his post at Dublin; and the last letter, which it will be necessary to give, is from his lady, to whose sense and prudence the three kingdoms were indebted for their deliverance from a formidable insurrection. know not whether our readers' judgment goes with our own, but to us there seems a depth of tenderness in the quaint old-world salutation of "dearest heart," and, in the parting words "your faithful wife till death," that are employed in this and her other communications. We do not use such phrases now. They seem too homely to our overwrought fastidiousness; and we borrow terms of endearment from other tongues, that we may speak more smoothly and winningly in the loved one's ear. Have our vows gained in their sincerity by the change? We think not. Loving the Past in all its guises, as we ourselves do, we cling to the olden words, and contend for their usage; for they come before us in quiet beauty, invested with a simple loveliness, that appears to us more rich, more full, more sweet than all the jargon of Paris, or the Peninsula. We know and

believe that, behind the thickest plate of the steel corslet, and the taffeta doublets of other days, there beat the self-same human heart that pulsates now both in reader and writer. We are sure that knightly vows were not all words, nor were ladies' tendernesses empty ceremonials. In short, we are satisfied of that truth's reality, which no romancer has painted, or can paint, that the fulness of the heart's overflowing in love and duty from husband to wife, and from wife to husband, existed, with our predecessors in the flesh, in all its rich abundance, just as the most blessed can enjoy it now. The strength of woman's passion, the gentleness of woman's love, have a thousand times gone down to the grave without name or notice; and you walk above their dust, knowing not what deep wishes engrossed the sleepers beneath :

"The most loved are they

Of whom Fame speaks, not with her clarion voice,
In regal halls!-the shades o'erhang their way,
The vale, with its deep fountains, is their choice:
And gentle hearts rejoice

Around their steps! - till silently they die,
As a stream shrinks from summer's burning eye;
And the world knows not then,

Not then, nor ever, what pure thoughts are fled."

Remembrances of this have, we confess, often filled us with our most subduing meditations on bygone days. When we traversed some baronial hall, and caught a glimpse of the cold, stiff, portraits looking down upon us from the pannelled side-walls, it was not the memory of the historical achievements in the field, or in the council of the personages represented, that so engrossed us, as the endeavour to call up again the tale of their affections. Here was the golden link that bound them to us. They were men of like passions with ourselves. Individualize their story, and you perceive the truth of our reasoning Take that full matronly figure near you, the work of Van Dyck or Sir Peter Lely, and mentally run through the changes she experienced from girlhood to marriage, from marriage to motherhood, from motherhood to old age, and decay, and death; and can you help recalling all her changes, all the scenes, sometimes of sorrow, and sometimes of joy, that took place in her domestic career, without a sigh? What is love? is the same thing as to ask, What is life? and the one answer will suffice for both. It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. The treasures of buried love, which the grave hides in its close dark abyss, are as bright and precious as those on which the light of common day falleth continually; and what, though the coronet, in which those jewels were fixed, seems to us unshapen and antiquated, can we doubt its intrinsic value, or its once becoming grace? So, those olden words of affection may now sound strangely in our ears, but their sincerity was deep, and their meaning well understood, and tenderly reciprocated.

To Captain Robert Oliver.

Cloughanodfoy, March 9, 1665.

DEAREST HEART,-I have received yours, and have not much to say of the account you desire of Taylor, and, that he was with me that very

day you left home, thinking to meet with you, and would have been sooner. but that he mistook the day you appointed him to meet you; all that he told me was, that their arms were a making with a great deal of speed for that wicked design. He shewed me one of the pistols that was given himself, and was to receive more against the time appointed, and some money also, which he was resolved to take. The time that they intend to put this plot in execution, is the five-and-twentieth of this month. Captain Walcot`s arms were a making all this week: a great deal of provision for arms and money is a making amongst them. He was somewhat shy in telling me the names of them. I did not much press him to it, by reason that he promised to tell my Lord of Orrery of all that he knew from time to time. There are two sergeants at Charleville, who, as he says, received above two pottles of money from the plotters upon that account. When the time comes, he is resolved to justify it to their faces, and discover as many as he knoweth ; but first he would have himself carried to prison with the rest, fearing he should be known by the rest to be him that betrayed them. I have no more at present to trouble you with, only praying to the Lord to bless you, which is all from her, who is

Dear Heart, your faithful wife, till death,

BRIDGET OLIVER.

The plot, thus timely communicated to the Chief Governor of Ireland, was providentially frustrated. The arms of the conspirators were everywhere seized, and their preparations in consequence came to nought. Walcot and the other leaders cast themselves upon the royal mercy, as soon as they knew that their plans had been discovered. The vigilanceof the English Fleet, at the same time, prevented the landing of the expected succours from Holland; and although the French Admiral, the Duc de Beaufort, meditated a descent at Kinsale, he found the coast everywhere too well guarded to accomplish his design. In August of the same year, the Duke of Ormonde made a progress through Munster, and, the loyalty of the inhabitants reviving, he was everywhere enthusiastically received.

Cloughanodfoy is now called Castle Oliver. It is the property and occasional residence of MARY ISABELLA OLIVER GASCOIGNE, and her sister ELIZABETH OLIVER GASCOIGNE, the co-heiresses of the late RICHARD OLIVER GASCOIGNE, ESQ., of Parlington, co. York, and granddaughters of the Right Honourable SILVER OLIVER, of Castle Oliver, who was lineally descended from Captain Robert Oliver, and Bridget, his wife. The Misses Gascoigne are now building a magnificent castle, near the site of the old mansion of Cloughanodfoy; and throughout the late famine and pestilence in Ireland, they so distinguished themselves by their personal exertions in the relief of the peasantry on their estates in the county of Limerick, as to win universal admiration. One noble Peer, from his place in the House of Lords, made their self-sacrificing and judicious measures the subject of well-merited panegyric. It is happy to find the nineteenth century keeping pace with the heroism of the seventeenth.

MARTIGNAC, POLIGNAC, GUIZOT, AND THIERS.

As the above gentlemen have played a predominant part in the political drama which has for these last twenty years been performed in France, and in which two great dynasties have been overthrown, we think that an impartial review of their deeds, character, and influence over human affairs, will not be unacceptable to that class of English readers who, on account of their high social position, are more particularly interested, to know the real causes that have produced such extraordinary and unexpected events.

A mighty battle was fought at Waterloo, not to obtain but to get rid of the possession of the Bourbons; and France, having been conquered, was compelled to have them. Hence, no wonder if a position so little desired did not gratify the vanity of the possessors.

However, Charles X., an amiable prince, remarkable for his kind feelings, ascended the throne under favourable circumstances.

Towards the unexpected end of his reign, M. Martignac became his prime minister, and was rather popular; and yet he had been the most zealous and most able supporter of all the measures that were passed under Villèle's administration. But the liberal party, nevertheless, fancied it had achieved a mighty triumph, because M. Villèle had been compelled to yield his place to the most skilful continuator of his policy. However it had some ground for shewing a kind of partiality to M. Martignac. This gentleman was indeed a Tory in politics, and sincerely devoted to royalty; but he was a liberal in religion: we mean, he had no fixed principles, and cared not whether those who solicited ministerial and royal favours went to church or not. If to that indifference with regard to religious matters, so precious to those who fancied they knew too much to be bound by any belief, we add that he was a bel-esprit-had written pretty verses that were not over moral; was of a conciliating disposition; elegant in his manner; excessively polite towards the Opposition; and had no superior in the art of making brilliant speeches, sparkling with lucid ideas and wonderfully well arranged, we shall easily come to the conclusion that such a premier was highly calculated to carry on smoothly an administration.

But in the meanwhile Charles X., who, like Solomon, had discovered that all pleasures were vanity, grew an enthusiastic radical, and came to the astounding resolution to undertake no less than the religious and moral regeneration of his subjects, to whom, actuated by his good nature, he wished to secure a perpetual bliss in the kingdom to come. M. Martignac, known for jokes very unpalatable to the clergy, could not be an efficient assistant in this praiseworthy mission.

There was at that time in France a nobleman, who, through his devo

tion to the throne and altar, had several times exposed his life in fruitless attempts against the power of Napoleon. When he saw the mighty empire, that was to last for ever, crumble to pieces, he attributed the fall of the stupendous Colossus to divine intervention, and was confirmed in his belief that religion and royalty could alone secure the well-being of France. There was no hypocrisy about him; his life had been too honourable to allow a doubt concerning his sincerity. This personage, who was the Prince de Polignac, the favourite friend of the King, whose abilities were probably below mediocrity, but who was possessed of that undaunted perseverance which, when successful, is transformed into magnanimous firmness, and when defeated by reverse, is branded as stupid stubbornness, became suddenly the head of a new administration, and was proclaimed to be the Omar of the Jesuits.

The unexpected dismissal of Martignac and his colleagues filled at first France with astonishment, and that astonishment was soon converted into discontent, not only with the liberal party but also with a large portion of the royalists, who professed liberalism with regard to religion. Prince de Polignac, stern in his determination to work out the religious and moral regeneration of his countrymen, began with the higher classes; and his resolute and inexorable hand withheld royal and ministerial favours from those who were known to neglect their religious duties, and live an immoral life. This was a fair opportunity for cunning rogues to play the part of hypocrites, to put on the mask of religion and assume a sanctified appearance. Never churches had been so much crowded. Prince de Polignac, seeing piety revive, was led to the belief that new elections would return a Chamber of Deputies composed of the most religious men of the kingdom. But no sooner was the Chamber of Deputies dissolved, than a coalition was formed between the liberals and those royalists, who considered it a great hardship to go to church, and an unbearable tyranny to require a religious and moral conduct as an indispensable qualification to office. Messieurs Martignac, Guizot, Dupin, and other individuals, distinguished for their attachment to the elder branch of the Bourbons, became leaders of that coalition, the real purpose of which was solely to overthrow the Polignac administration, and thereby to obtain a dispensation from going to church and performing religious and moral duties. The unpopularity of the Jesuits had then reached its highest point, and it proved a powerful engine in the hands of the coalition, which, not to frighten the electors, assumed the name of Constitutional party. It carried many hard-contested elections with the cries of "Down with the Jesuits." The Deputies consisted of 432 members; the coalition succeeded in obtaining the return of 221, which reduced the supporters of Polignac to 211 and to a minority of 10.

Prince de Polignac, as we have stated, was a man of a fearless perseverance, which originated in his profound conviction that he was fighting for the right cause. Therefore, far from yielding to adverse fortune, he dissolved again the Chamber, and made a new appeal to, what he considered, the better feelings of the electors.

Again he was defeated, and again the coalition mustered 221 members. Persons who are not thoroughly acquainted with the political opinion of the electos of France at that time, fancy, no doubt, that liberalism formed a power ul body. Not at all. It was composed of some Buonapartists, some Orleanists, and individuals who, having no fixed principles, took the name of liberals, because their services had been rejected by royalty.

VOL. VI., NO. XXIX.

R