instructed and pleased in the course of the delineations and suggestions furnished in the numerous antecedent scenes. We must find room for a specimen of the wit and the hints which have delighted us. The occasion is one that is most dextrously worked up; viz. that of a synodial council of great formality and pomp, held in the Tower, to pass judgment on Edwin's marriage to Elgiva, which such deep offence to the monks. As the members to be convoked, secular as well as regular, traverse a gallery to the synodial chamber, we have the following spirited dialogue:

First Deputy. Here they come. though he shall not be welcome.

gave

What! a Secular! Well, he must pass,

Second Deputy.-There are more than he.

First Deputy. They are stricken deer; I would not come amongst the herd if I were they.

Second Deputy.I never saw Dunstan's chair before. 'Tis a choice piece of workmanship.

First Deputy. He made it himself, and they say if another were to sit in it, it would toss him in the air. He can make anything, and make it do his bidding.

Second Deputy.-But should his chair be set above the Archbishop's ?

First Deputy.-It was so ordered, and indeed he that is above the King may be above the Archbishop. King, said I! Who knows whether there be a King, or in which brother's reign we that are living live?

Second Deputy-Hush! Speak not so.

First Deputy.-Nay, 'tis the way of the beehive, and Courts are no better. Make way, Sirs, if it please you. No offence. Sirs, 'tis my office. Farther back, I pray.

Second Deputy-Here's Godredud.

First Deputy.

What though he be a Secular? he's noble

And of a generous life.

A Monk,

I say ye shall make room.

Six meals a day,

With morat and spiced ale, is generous living.

Also the gout he hath is generous.

Another Monk.—Bed, board, nor bath, he never yet forewent

The joys of for a day. Look at his tonsure;

A well-grown acorn's cup would cover it.

First Deputy.

Nay, softly; hush!

But pass no further yet; here you shall stand,
And I will tell you, as they come, who's who.
The first of men! the angels of the church!

I know them all, and most of them-Room, ho!
The Abbot of St. Winifred's-Room, room!
And most of them I call my friends.

Sidroc (aside to Wulfstan.)

Lived much amongst the tadpoles, and averred

He was acquainted with all kinds of fish.

The newt

First Deputy.-Here is the Abbot Morcar with one hand.

A woman kissed the other, for which cause
He chopped it off. He emulates St. Arnulph,
And wears a shirt of hedgehog skins. No need
To clear the way for him.

First Deputy.

And here is Monn,

The Abbot of St. Clive's, that heals the sick

And makes the dumb to speak. From far and near
Thousands and thousands make resort to him,
And them that may not for infirmity
He goes to; or if so be he cannot go,

He sends his walking-stick, which does as well.

*

Room, I say,

Place for the Abbot of St. Clive's!-Lo, there
Cumba, the Priest of Sherborne ; more than twice
Hath he changed sides; but he 's so mild and sweet,
That there are ever some to hold him up.

Betwixt the Monks and Secular Church, half-way
Stands Cumba, smiling upon both.

Sidroc (aside).

Is good for breakfast; and an egg is good;

A chicken

But something half-way 'twixt an egg and chicken

Is vilely bad.

First Deputy.

His faith is mounted on his charity

And sits it easy.

Sidroc (aside).

And, to say the truth of him,

Cumba is my gauge,

And by the crown of his head I know the times.

Grow they ascetic, then his tonsure widens;

Or free, it narrows in.

These specimens may serve to invite our readers to the ample and sweetly-flavoured feast which he has here set before us,-to examine the life-looking picture which he has drawn of a notable epoch in Anglo-Saxon history. We trust that the author will be more frequent with his banquets hereafter.

ART. XI.-History of Europe from the Commencement of the French Revolution in 1789, to the Restoration of the Bourbons in 1815. By ARCHIBALD ALISON, F.R.S.E., &c. Vol. X. Blackwood and Sons.

In this thick volume, extending to considerably more than a thousand pages, Mr. Alison has brought his elaborate history to a close. Many of the subjects comprised in it are of that mighty and hurrying import, that must be expected in the last scenes of a terrific and magnificent drama. Beginning with the campaign in France previous to the first abdication of Napoleon, when Wellington in one direction and the Allies in another, were pressing upon Soult's dispirited and flinching army, we are soon carried forward to the

restoration of the Bourbons, and the fallen Emperor's retirement to Elba, and next to his invasion and triumphant march to Paris. The reign of the Hundred Days, the Waterloo campaign, and the second downfall of Napoleon, follow in due course. Numerous, however, and important are the subjects and questions for discussion that occur with regard to each one of the prominent acts in this unparalleled outline. The alienation of the heart of France from the military despot; the follies of the restored and ancient dynasty; the preparations for, and the results of, the battle of Waterloo; with many incidental points, call for discussion and obtain particular investigation on the part of the diffuse and long-winded historian. The war with America too, which took place between Napoleon's two abdications, claims attention; furnishing an occasion for Mr. Alison to dilate on certain of the tendencies of democratic institutions in general, and of those of the American Union, in particular. Other disquisitions of a speculative kind, and retrospective as well as prospective, engage our historian. The Revolutionary Principle furnishes one of these; the necessity for Napoleon to maintain himself by wars, supplies another; while several obvious enough questions arising out of the progress of the History of Europe, are handled, as if for the first time, and pronounced upon with an authoritative air.

We have heretofore expressed our opinion of Mr. Alison's work, and more than once complained of its heaviness and dragging progress. It is without doubt the production of an industrious compiler, of sound but stolid judgment. The writer seems to have carefully consulted every book and pamphlet that has been published relative to the origin, the progress, and the results of the revolutionary war; and to have garnered in his mind, not untainted with political prejudice, a set of doctrines that were ever pressing for utterance, no matter how long the current of the history might be thereby impeded. Indeed, our author is hardly less remarkable in respect of common-places, than of prolixity and diffusion; so that it is fully as much an impression of Mr. Alison's mind that is left with the reader, as that of the passage of history, or its lesson, which have been in hand.

At the same time, the History of Europe is one of anxious, protracted, and honest labour; having this superiority too over every work which treats of the condition & fortunes of Europe, from the period of the French Revolution, that it gives us a continuous and a complete account of all the great events, and also of all the important principles which the epoch comprised has presented. Besides, it was impossible for any man, even of a very ordinary mind, to set himself earnestly to the task of writing the history of Europe, between the years 1789 and 1815, not to be often stirred and inspired by the magnitude of the events, by the characters and fortunes of

many of the great men which these events awoke, so as to rise to the dignity of the historian and to read the world impressive truths. And perhaps one of the most salutary and best taught of these truths is that of the unstable and ill-founded power of Napoleon, requiring as it did the ceaseless and self-destructive efforts of war for its maintenance.

While we look upon Mr. Alison's elaborate work as one that exhibits a very considerable political bias, we are far from charging him with any intended unfairness. To be sure, his deductions are frequently entirely false or deficient, when taken in connexion with his narrative or his premises. But he is a perfectly impartial narrator with regard to matters of fact; nor does he shrink from coming to a strong expression of opinion, when he feels that these facts may even go to the condemnation of a favourite character. Take as an example his critical reflections on the military conduct of Wellington and Blucher immediately antecedent to the day of Waterloo.

In the first place, it is evident, whatever the English writers may say to the contrary, that both Blucher and the Duke of Wellington were surprised by Napoleon's invasion of Belgium on the 15th of June; and it is impossible to hold either of them entirely blameless for that circumstance. It has been already seen from the Duke's despatches, that on the 9th of June, that is, six days before the invasion took place, he was aware that Napoleon was collecting a great force on the frontier; and that hostilities might immediately be expected. Why, then, were the two armies not immediately concentrated, and placed in such a situation that they might mutually, if attacked, lend each other their assistance ? Their united force was full one hundred and ninety thousand effective men; while Napoleon's was not more than one hundred and forty thousand. Why, then, was Blucher attacked unawares, and isolated at Ligny; and the British infantry, unsupported by either cavalry or artillery, exposed to the attack of a superior force of French, composed of all the three arms, at Quatre Bras? It is in vain to say that they could not provide for their troops if they had been concentrated, and that it was necessary to watch every by-road which led to Brussels. Men do not eat more when drawn together than when scattered over a hundred miles of country. Marlborough and Eugene bad long ago maintained armies of a hundred thousand men for months together in Flanders; and Blucher and Wellington had no difficulty in feeding a hundred and seventy thousand men drawn close together after the campaign did commence. It is not by a cordon of troops, scattered over a hundred miles, that the attack of a hundred and twenty thousand French is to be arrested. If the British army had from the first been concentrated at Waterloo, and Blucher near Wavres, Napoleon would never have ventured to pass them on any road, however unguarded. Those who, in their anxiety to uphold the English general from the charge of being assailed unawares, assert that he was not taken by surprise in the outset of the Waterloo campaign, do not perceive that in so doing, they bring against him the much more serious charge of having so disposed his troops, when he knew they were to be assailed, that infantry alone, without either cavalry or artillery, were exposed to the

attack of infantry, cavalry, and artillery, in superior numbers-contrary, not only to the plainest rules of the military art, but of common sense on the subject.

It results from these considerations, that in the outset of the Waterloo campaign, Wellington and Blucher were out manoeuvered by Napoleon. Being superior by at least seventy thousand troops to those at the command of the French emperor, it was their business never to have fought at a disadvantage, and not made a final stand till their two great armies were in a situation mutually to assist and support each other. There seems no reason why this should not have been done by their mutually converging from the frontier to Waterloo, without abandoning Brussels. But even if it had been necessary to evacuate that capital before the union was effected, prudence suggests that it would have been better to have done so, even with all its moral consequences, than to have exposed either army to the chance of serious defeat in consequence of being singly assailed by greatly superior forces. Nevertheless, Napoleon so managed matters in the outset of the campaign, that though inferior upon the whole by full seventy thousand men to the allied armies taken together, he was superior to either at the points of attack at Ligny and Quatre Bras, That is the most decisive test of superior generalship.

Napoleon's defeat on the field of Waterloo, was not more complete then was the desertion of those whom he had raised to lofty distinction, and who owed him allegiance.

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And now commenced at Fontainbleau a scene of baseness never exceeded in any age of the world, and which forms an instructive commentary on the principles and practice of the Revolution. Let an eye-witness of these hideous tergiversations record them; they would pass for incredible if drawn from any less exceptionable source. Every hour," says Caulaincourt, "was after this marked by fresh voids in the emperor's household. The universal object was how to get first to Paris. All the persons in office quitted their post without leave or asking permission; one after another they all slipped away, totally forgetting him to whom they owed everything, but who had no longer anything to give. The universal complaint was, that his formal abdication was so long of appearing. "It was high time," it was said by every one, for all this to come to an end: it is absolute childishness to remain any longer in the antechambers of Fontainbleau, when favours are showering down at Paris; and with that they all set off for the capital. Such was their anxiety to hear of his abdication, that they pursued misfortune even in its last asylum; and every time the door of the emperor's cabinet opened, a crowd of heads were seen peeping in to gain the first hint of the much longed-for news." No sooner was the abdication and the treaty with the allies sigued, than the desertion was universal: every person of note around the emperor, with the single and honourable exceptions of Maret and Caulaincourt, abandoned him: the antechambers of the palace were literally deserted. Berthier even left his benefactor without bidding him adieu ! "He was born a courtier," said Napoleon when he learned his departure: "you will see my Vice-Constable mendicating employment from the Bourbons. I feel mortified that men whom I have raised so high in the eyes of Europe should sink so low. What have they