to proceed, and with no other assistant than his own vast strength, raised the body and bore it to the end of the scow. Two parts of a rope were passed beneath the legs and shoulders, as they are placed beneath coffins, and then the corpse was slowly lowered beneath the surface of the lake.

"Not there-Hurry March-no, not there,' said Judith, shuddering involuntarily; 'do not lower it quite so near the spot where mother lies.'

'Why not, Judith?' asked Hetty, earnestly. They lived together in life, and should lie together in death.'

"No-no-Hurry March, farther off-farther off.-Poor Hetty, you know not what you say.-Leave me to order this.'

"I know I am weak-minded, Judith, and that you are clever-but, surely a husband should be placed near a wife. Mother always said that this was the way they bury in Christian church-yards.'

"This little controversy was conducted earnestly, but in smothered voices, as if the speakers feared that the dead might overhear them. Judith could not contend with her sister at such a moment, but a significant gesture from her induced March to lower the body at a little distance from that of his wife; when he withdrew the cords, and the act was performed.

"There's an end of Floating Tom!' exclaimed Hurry, bending over the scow, and gazing through the water at the body. He was a brave companion on the scout, and a notable hand with traps. Don't weep, Judith-don't be overcome, Hetty, for the righteousest of us all must die; and when the time comes, lamentations and tears can't bring the dead to life. Your father will be a loss to you, no doubt; most fathers are a loss especially to onmarried darters; but there's a way to cure that evil, and you're both too young and handsome to live long without finding it out. When its agreeable to hear what an honest and onpretending man has to say, Judith, I should like to talk a little with you, apart.'

"The Peasant and the Prince," is the second of a series of stories under the general title of "The Playfellow," which Miss Martineau is bringing out quarterly. They are three-and-sixpenny publications, and are professedly intended for young folks. In reality, however, like everything which this lady cannot but write, if she writes at all, the tales before us deserve and will command the attention of the mature in years, be they high or humble. Every one knows how she taught political economy in a series of small volumes; and now social morality, individual culture of the intellect and the affections, and even lessons for a nation's and a statesman's digestion, are enforced and illustrated in these unpretending little volumes. As fictions the stories are arresting, being constructed in a craftsman-like manner, and abounding with incident, character, and description.

The French Revolution furnishes ample materials both for the tale of the "Peasant," and that of the "Prince." Indeed the fate of the latter was but the necessary concomitant and result of the

condition of the other. The two were inseparable; and wisely, ably and with deep earnestness has Miss Martineau exhibited the connexion and the results. One might have suspected that a writer of her political school would exaggerate and incline to over-drawing or over-laying. But her taste, her judgment, her knowledge of human nature, and of history,-above all, her determination to give a faithful and truth-telling picture, have preserved her from such errors. We must now, for a while, have done with novels.

ART. VI.-The History of Guernsey. By JONATHAN DUNCAN, Esq. B.A. Longman and Co.

MR. Duncan, who is the author of the "Dukes of Normandy," the "Wars of France," and other esteemed works, has here, according to a very distinct, complete, and very comprehensive plan, given us a history of Guernsey. According to a regularly constructed system, he presents us with a political, a commercial, and an ecclesiastical treatment of the island; describing not merely its government, constitutional and military, but its natural history, its agriculture, climate, and diseases; and also its antiquities and architecture, as well as the character of the people. True, the chief interest felt in the work must be local; still, from the manner of Mr. Duncan's treatment of it, the knowledge that he has brought to its execution, the parallels which he draws or suggests, and the variety of assistance which he has derived from friends, each particularly acquainted with some particular or peculiar topic within the scope of the entire plan, the publication is calculated to be of more general service, and has a more extensive attraction than may be anticipated. We should say-just as any text may be made the peg or hinge in competent and accomplished hands for the development and exercise of a world of thought, comparison, and teaching-that the " History of Guernsey" supplies us with a large and instructive discourse, though the theme may appear narrow and confined. Guernsey, besides, has special claims upon the attention and affection of Englishmen, were it for nothing else than its devotedness to the British cause, and the sacrifices it has made in common with the larger and dominant island. Guernsey has furnished her due proportion of eminent men to the national glory. The names, Saumarez, Le Marchant, Tupper, Bowes, &c., stand high in our naval and military lists; and in the paths of peace the small island has sent forth worthies. During the reign of George the Third, "two natives of the Bailiwick, Peter Perchard, and Paul le Mesurier, were lord mayors of London, and the latter was also member of Parliament for Southwark. Peter Paul Dobrée, another native, succeeded Dr. Monk, now Bishop of Gloucester, as Regius Professor of Greek at the University of Cambridge."

We have referred to the suggestive and general characteristics of Mr. Duncan's work, and cannot instance a better chapter for their display than than which treats of agriculture; wherein a thorough knowledge of the subject-nay, of the subject of tenures of many varieties coupled with a minute acquaintance with that species of holding which obtains in Guernsey and other of theChannel Islands, has the attractiveness of an enthusiastic appreciation. Our author's facts are numerous and fresh,-are apt and practically applied in the course of his description or narrative. An extract will best and most briefly explain the Guernsey system :

"An island whose productive surface thus consists of little more than ten thousand acres of orchard, garden, arable, and pasture land, cannot be expected to afford a great variety or any very enlarged system of agriculture. There are however circumstances connected with the tenure of property, its extreme subdivision and fertility, and with the numbers and comforts of its inhabitants, which may suggest useful reflections to the farmer, the political economist, and the statesman of large countries. The tenure of property partakes of the double nature of land held as a farm subject to the payment of annual rents, and as land held as freehold in perpetuity. A purchase may be made by the immediate payment of the price agreed upon; or by the payment of a part only, and the conversion of the remainder into corn-rents to be annually paid; or, finally, by converting the whole of the price into such rents. In the two last cases, where a part of or the whole of the price is stipulated for in annual rents, the purchaser is to all intents and purposes as much the proprietor as in the first case, where the whole price is paid down in cash; and so long as the stipulated rents are paid, he and his heirs can never be disturbed, but hold the land as freehold for ever. To the former proprietor the rents are guaranteed by the land sold, and by all the other real property held at the time of sale by the purchaser free from incumbrance; and the rents being transferable, and such property being always in demand, money can be raised by their sales with as much ease as it could before on the land itself. Thus, without the necessity of cultivating the soil, the original possessor enjoys the net income of his estate, secured on the estate itself, which he can resume in case of non-payment; while the purchaser, on the due payment of the rent charged, becomes real and perpetual owner, having an interest in the soil far above that of farmers under any other tenure. Experience has proved that, under this tenure, a spirit of industry and economy is generated, producing content, ease, and even wealth, from estates which in other countries would hardly be thought capable of affording sustenance to their occupants. And thus also arose two classes mutually advantageous to each other.-the one living on its income, or free exercise of trades or professions; the other composed of farmers raised to the rank of proprietors, dependent alone on their own good conduct. The faculty of acquiring land in perpetuity without paying any purchase-money, is undeniably proved to have been of infinite benefit to the people of this island; but it is obvious that this source of so much good could never have existed, or could never continue without a corresponding security,

well guaranteed to the original proprietor of land, before he parted with it.

"This relation of landlord and tenant being peculiar to the Channel Islands, it may be advisable, for the sake of English readers to whom the system is a novelty, to explain it more fully by an example. Suppose A. possesses land valued at twelve hundred pounds, which he desires to sell, as we should say in England, or to give to rent, as the phrase runs in Guernsey, the following would be the process. A. would either convey his estate to B., the purchaser, wholly in quarters, without receiving any cash, or, as is the more usual mode, he would receive one-fourth of the price, and convert the remainder into quarters. One Guernsey quarter is equivalent to twenty pounds sterling, local currency. In the first case, B. would have to pay annually to A. sixty quarters, the interest on twelve hundred pounds, the assumed cost of the estate at the rate of five per cent. per annum; in the second case, he would have to pay annually forty-five quarters. The reason why it is usual to pay one-fourth of the purchasemoney in cash is, that such payment may be some guarantee to A. that B. will faithfully work the estate and pay the rent regularly; for should the rent fall in arrear, then A., by a process called saisie, may totally eject B. from the property; and the three hundred pounds paid by B. when the contract was passed would be lost to him for ever. In this manner, then, is the seller or landlord secured in the receipt of the equivalent for which he has parted with the estate. As soon as the contract is executed, B. can fell timber, convert meadow into arable, and arable into meadow, and perform any and every act that a tenant in fee-simple can do in England. The estate thus acquired descends to the heirs of the blood of the purchaser, lawfully begotten, and on failure of direct issue to his nearest of kin. Sometimes these annual quarters are made permanent, but most frequently they are redeemable by certain instalments, as the buyer and seller may have agreed.".

Our readers will observe that this is the old Norman system of tenure; at least it is a system, by which the tenant is to possess the fee-simple, subject to an annual payment in corn. It is a system to which Mr. Duncan assigns much of the peculiar and exalted character of the people of Guernsey; nor do we see any difficulty of introducing it into England, if the landlord,-if the national mind and prejudices did not-with a strong feudalism and conventional attachment, say No. Perhaps the Channel mode does not sufficiently protect the original proprietor; and where there are buildings with little or no land, what is to be said? However, let us hear what are some of the alleged results and advantages.

"One of its first consequences is to raise the standard of virtue-to inspire the whole population with a manly and independent spirit—and to destroy that cringing adulation and fawning servility, which leases for years have engendered among the tenantry of England. All men, no matter to what political party they belong, have admitted that the institution of property is the basis of civilization. This principle being admitted

sound by universal consent, it follows that whatever contracts its expansion must be vicious, and that whatever promotes its extension must be nationally beneficial. The bare possession of property on a doubtful tenure is scarcely a good; it is essential that the possession should be secure; and if security for a term of years be desirable, much more so must it be for permanent enjoyment. Now, the plan of leases for seven, fourteen, or twenty-one years, together with tenancies from year to year, and at will, is bad in principle, as these tenures merely convey a temporary interest determinable at a date specified; the working farmer thus becomes a bird of passage, without any fixed home. He may be prudent, industrious, and sober, a good father, a good husband, a good master, a good neighbour, and a good citizen; but these virtues avail him nothing; he lives in a state of agricultural servitude, and at the expiration of his lease, the caprice or spite of his landlord may expel him from the farm. Widely different is the condition of the Guernseyman. Once possessed of land he can never lose it, except by his own fault; he has only to pay the stipulated quarters of rent, and he continues absolute lord of the property,- he feels proud of his position, and the spirit of independence is within him, he is not classed among the locomotive machines of humanity, who, in Great Britain and Ireland, are shifted from county to county, seeking a precarious subsistence from an insolent and grasping squirearchy. No; he has a solid stake in the country, though it be small; he can say, with honest pride, This house is mine; that field is mine; and, when I die, the law will give them to my children.'

"This system of tenure prompts to industry, encourages economy, and represses intemperance. A man, having paid down in cash one-fourth of the value of the land he holds, is stimulated by the most powerful impulse to redeem the annual quarters, and disengage his estate from the payment of rent. In the eyes of a person so circumstanced, labour loses its repulsive character, for he feels that he is working for himself. He has an object constantly before his mind, which he steadily pursues. The propensity to drunkenness, so fatal to the working classes of Great Britain, is counteracted with the Guernseyman by the desire and the opportunity of acquiring a disencumbered landed property. But the English or Irish labourer has no such incentive to moral restraint. Far from contemplating even the most remote possibility of becoming the absolute owner of an acre of land, he considers himself eminently fortunate, if he can secure regular wages as a labourer. He passes through existence only one remove higher than the oxen which he drives at the plough. His feelings are deadened his mind is brutalized-his energies are depressed. His life resembles that of a horse in a mill, confined within a circle out of which he can seldom escape."

Our readers may think that this is high colouring; but Mr. Duncan's facts, sincerely and truthfully put forward, go a long way towards framing and supporting the picture.

Akin to the subject of agriculture, both in ability and particularity of treatment, and of natural affinity, is that of horticulture, which Guernsey, on account of the mildness of its climate, renders spe