when "fire answering fire, each battle show- No. 4.-Intelligence by Birds, by Sounds, by The practice of swift and secret conveyance by pigeons is of very great antiquity, since it is mentioned in history that Hircius the Consul, during the seige of Mutina, carried on a secret correspondence with Brutus, by tying his letters "unto such pigeons as were taught beforehand to fly from the camp to the city and back again. Thaurosthenes also sent the news of his victory at Olympia to his father at Egina, by a pigeon 'tis affirmed. Anacreon gives us an ode upon such a pigeon. Gentle pigeon, hither, hither Fly, and tell me whence or whither It was usual for the Roman magistrates, (says Lipsius,) when they went to the theatre, or other public meeting, whence they could not return at pleasure, to carry a pigeon with them, in order that, if any unexpected or untoward event should happen, they might give warning to their friends and families at home. The attendance of running footmen is also of considerable antiquity. Alexander the Great was usually attended by these messengers; and it is related of two of them, Anistius and Philonides, that they ran 1200 stadia in a day. It is also related of a boy amongst the Romans, who being but eight years old, ran five-and-forty miles between sunrise and sunset. Dromedaries, camels, and mules were also in common use in early times for carrying messages; and the custom of riding post, by renewing both horse and man at certain stages, it is said by Herodotus to have been made use of by Xerxes in the Grecian war. Swallows are said by Pliny to have been sent to Rome as intelligencers of a battle fought and won, being anointed all over with the color of victory. Sounds and reports of cannon and mus. ketry, the roll of the drum, and the blowing of horns, have been made use of by agreement, so as to express, twixt friend and friend, some sign or signal of distress or necessity, and even letters and words distinctly given. Suppose, for instance, the word Victuals were to be sounded, let the bigger sound be represented by A, and the lesser by B, when, according to the table I have before given, in which two let ters of the alphabet are transposed through five places, the word may be thus made : V That is, the lesser note sounded once and then the bigger twice, after which the lesser again twice gives the V, baabb. So the larger once, the lesser once, and then the larger thrice, represents the letter I, abaaa. (See pages 72, 73, for alphabet.) This, however, will seem the less curious from our own more modern practice in the light infantry manœuvres. Cambden, in speaking of the Roman wall built by Severus in the North of England, and which he says was above a hundred miles in length, affirms that its towers, which were more than a hundred in num. ber, and situate a mile apart, were so contrived that, by means of hollow pipes in the curtains of the wall, the defendants could presently inform one another, from tower to tower, of anything necessary to be told regarding the intended assault of the foe; and, even long after the total ruin of this wall, there were many inhabitants of those parts who held their lands by a tenure in cornage; that is, they were obliged, by blowing a horn, to discover the advance of hostile forces. The ringing of bells I need hardly mention, since that species of alarum is to this day used by the timorous in their dwellinghouses, even in our own peaceful times. No. 5.-Hieroglyphics. Amongst these ancient customs and inventions it may be as well to glance at hieroglyphics, which were, perhaps, in use before any I have yet mentioned; the Egyp tians using these curious symbols on their pillars, obelisks, pyramids, and monuments, before the invention of any other sort of writing. Thus by a bee they represented a king, intimating that he should be industrious, gather honey, and bear a sting; a serpent, with his tail in his mouth, signified the year, which returns into itself, and so forth. Darius, during his war with the Scythi ans, received as presents a bird, a mouse, a No. 6. Conclusion. Varieties of Epistolary To return to the subject of communication by secret writing, there are several modes of doing so besides those shown in the commencement of this paper; amongst others, it was not uncommon, with the Eastern leaders, to write from the right hand to the left, or from the top to the bottom, and so upwards again. For instance, erfd l e e 11t y S wsb n s di 0 e c 1 d p i e Begin this at the first letter towards the right hand, and so downwards, and then up again, and you will find this lamentable situation expressed : 1 the gods for success, he pulled out the entrails of the beast, and impressed upon them the words Regis victoria, having before hand written them backward in his hand with some thick and glutinous matter he had prepared for the purpose; so that the entrails, on being tumbled about by the priest, in order dust that the words were distinctly legible. to find their signification, gathered so much After which omen the soldiers advanced with such spirit and confidence that they won the day. THE LAWYER; HIS CHARACTER AND RULE OF HOLY LIFE. The Lawyer, his Character and Rule of Holy 1842. THIS little book, which is manifestly the result of much patient and laborious reflection, deserves public attention on many accounts. The subject it canvasses is one of the very highest practical importance to society at large; and the exhibition which the book presents of the character of the Again, the order both of the letters and est and to instruct. It is the posthumous author is scarcely less calculated to inter The pestilence doth still increase amongst us wee shall not be able to hold out the seige without fresh and speedy supply. lines were sometimes altered thus: work of a singularly upright, thoughtful, hsudesralotaihdupysremsyid and gifted man; who had entered for some Teolira elmsfm se splvo weutel The souldiers are allmost famished supply us or we must yield. Another mode was by inversion; when either the letters or syllables are spelled backwards, as in the following: Mitto tibi metulas cancros imitare legendo. In this the word salutem is expressed by inversion of the letters. Again, Stisho estad, vecabiti. years on the practice of the profession it discusses, as a member of the Irish bar; and who, prematurely taken from the world by an illness which itself was caught in a course of devoted charitable exertions, left it behind him as a record of the maxims by which he meant his professional life to be regulated. The object of the book is, to apply the highest principles of conscientiousness to the practice of the Law; and Which, by inversion of the syllables, of course many will at once pronounce gives us, Hostis adest, cave tibi. It was also customary amongst the ancients to write with various kinds of juices, and otherwise endeavor, by the material or liquor with which they inscrib. ed their epistles, to evade the prying eyes of their enemies. Putrified willow and the juice of glow-worms being mentioned, as also milk, urine, fat, and other glutinous liquors, which were made legi. ble upon being powdered with dust. Attalas is said to have made use of some such method when, before giving battle to the enemy, and intending to sacrifice to maxims so inconvenient, to be altogether inapplicable to actual experience, the fond ideal of a benevolent speculatist. He did not think-what is much more important, he did not find them so. This book is no collection of moral exhortations leisurely delivered from the closet by a teacher unconcerned in the temptations it exposes; it is no binding heavy burdens on men's shoulders by one who would not move them with one of his own fingers; this is no sophist lecturing Hannibal on the art of war; we have here a manual composed by one personally engaged in the conflict, and who (it * Cicero De Oratore, ii. 18. is well known and attested) was resolute to | truths, and can only be realized through aid from carry into daily practice every maxim of above. This will account for the Christian tone duty he delivered. And this trial was not that pervades his work: indeed, but for these convictions, I do not know whether it would ever have likely to be spared him as he advanced in been written. Justice is fond rather of upbraidlife. Mr. O'Brien had already begun to at-ing than assisting. It was Christian zeal and tain professional reputation, and was there- Christian charity which inspired him with an unfore to look forward to the prospect of per- ceasing desire to maintain what he believed to be petually testing, in his own person, the the cause of truth. In particular he was anxious practicability of his principles. The book to assist those young men of his own profession, itself witnesses as strongly to the intel- who with views in the main honourable, and avlectual power which would have ensured rage clearness of mind, are yet unequal to contend against the favorite corruption of the time, distinction in the profession, as to the moral supported as it is, not only by personal interest, principles which he had determined should but by a very large number of specious sophisins regulate its practice. The simplicity of his offered to their choice, as well as a considerable own character rendered it indeed much weight of pretended authority and modern tradi. more likely that he would silently make his tion. life transcend his precepts, than that he would overstate the precepts themselves: the notion of adjudicating moral questions for any other purpose than that of submitting the conduct to the decisions of the purified reason, was to his sincere and unaffected character intolerable. Assuredly the removal of such a man from among us is a severe loss to his profession, and to society at large; the rare example of such conscientiousness built not upon vague notions of honor, but upon simple and definite principles of moral truth, would have been invaluable for direction and encouragement to others. He has, however, left his own best monument in his admirable little treatise; and his memory has certainly been in no small degree fortunate in having the care and adornings of the monument consigned to the affectionate offices of the friend who has exhibited it to the public. "His religion was eminently practical in the true sense of the word. It was his habit to observe the influence of Christian principles as applied to the common detail of life. He disliked religious controversy; and occult dogmas, he thought, were to be believed in faithfully, not scrutinized impertinently. He loved the reflected light of Christian truth; and remembered that if we fix a direct gaze too long upon the sun, our eyes are dimmed, and we walk in the dark. He meditated often on that text, Thy Word is a lantern unto my feet;' and appeared to discover a spirituality in obedience which escapes the penetration of more speculative religionists. The consequence was such as might be expected. The professions, indeed all occupaelements in society, seemed to him delivered from tions by which men live, and which are permanent the secular character that belongs to them naturaly. He did not consider the Christian commonwealth as consisting of statesmen, lawyers, physicians, fariners, and other classes of men, who, besides their social avocations, possess religious opinions: rather he viewed it as a body of Christians who are led providentially to certain outward pursuits; who undertake them on Christian condipursuit a calling (the state of life to which it hath tions who speak sincerely in naming each such pleased God to call me'); and who regard it not the sphere of those labors allotted to them by the chiefly as a means of selfish advancement, but as divine command, and for the good of their neighbor. Such a doctrine must always appear to the world as visionary, because it requires us to beenemy's camp: and seems to violate that silent come unworldly: nay, it carries the war into the truce by which religion, on condition of not tresbel-worship of the world, is permitted to remain passing beyond bounds, or interfering with the Baherself unmolested-except by being superseded. Such, however, were the opinions which my friend maintained."-pp. 11–13. "From his earliest years," writes his Editor in the introductory notice, “my lamented friend was remarkable for a scrupulous regard to justice. I have never known another person so entirely conscientious. On all occasions his first desire was to know what ought to be done, and to do it. The great and invisible things which belong to truth, justice, and mercy, seemed with him ever present. On the other hand, the ordinary objects of selfish ambition appeared to him fantastic and unreal. It is not uncommon to meet men who inquire, as metaphysicians, into the first principles of right and wrong but he followed justice into its minutest details; he believed the broken bread of justice to be the food of all social life, and reverently gathered up its very crumbs: nothing seemed trivial to him in which conscience had a part. While his faith was thus strong, he was, from natural disposition, and from habits of philosophical inquiry, unusually skeptical as to matters of the mere understanding. Those who remember his extreme caution will not be tempted to think that on so important a subject he had rushed precipi-alone he wished to gather round him. What detately into a system of his own. "His religious convictions were profound: he knew that moral principles have their root in divine And again "The few points in my friend's character to which I have adverted will best explain the design of his book, and his motives in writing it. I have recorded them for that small but fit audience which gree of popular favor may await this work is of but little importance. The grave which has closed on its author does not more securely shield him from the arrows of fortune, or the sharp and flat-help borrowing more or less their very tering speeches of men, than did his own manly forms of phrase. Indeed we are sometimes and modest nature; and those who remain will obliged to do so, in order to preclude the possess in this book a memorial of their friend false associations that gather round the more consoling than public applause could be. In it his portraiture remains; stamped upon it, they language of a peculiar age, and that insinwill find not his love of justice alone, but that kind- uate themselves into the mind of a reader ness which made him seem, if injured, to remember in defiance of all our explanations. A bad justice only against himself: they will observe his philosophy contaminates the language fearless reverence for truth, and at the same time which it has degraded by making it the inhis respect for opinions long established, his slowstrument of its diffusion; pure thoughts ness to oppose them, his candor in weighing them, his charitable desire to exculpate those who consecrate that shrine of holy words in held them, and that higher charity which stimulated which they have been made to dwell, and him to combat their error: they will be reminded from which they evermore reveal themof his reluctance to give pain, and his greater fear selves to mankind. And thus the very lanof doing wrong; his distrust of his own judgment, guage of our old sages comes to possess a and his invariable faith in the moral sense and the sort of sacredness; we reverence even its Divine commands; bis indifference to promiscuous fragments as we would the broken beams applause, and his solicitude for the esteem of those and columns of a temple; we cannot withhe esteemed, the love of those he loved. They will find many light traces for memory to fill up, out an effort bend its dignified gravity to of his single-heartedness, his humility, his earnest any low or trivial purpose, and we feel it, ness, and his courtesy. Some passages will bring when out of its own high region, stiff unback before their eyes the very gestures and ex-couth, and unsuitable. It is high praise of pression of countenance with which he used to enunciate such sentiments."-pp. 15, 16. It is with perfect truth and fairness that he observes, of the work of so singularly sincere a mind our Lawyer to say that he may fairly stand on the same shelf with Herbert. The difference of the two seems to turn more on the difference of their respective subjects than on any great inequality in the treatment of them. If there is more of contem"Such a work, if read at all, should be read with plative tenderness in Herbert, perhaps there attention and respect. Unless we approach it in an ingenious spirit, willing to understand before is more of force and dignity in our author we criticise, deeming it possible that the objections -more too of that closeness of practical which present themselves to our ininds so readily, detail which gives body and substance to may have occurred to the author also, and been for principles. It is possible also that the good reasons put aside; desiring to stand, at least novelty of the subject strengthens the ef for the time, on the spot which he occupied, and fect. For we are all accustomed to direct contemplate the subject from his point of view; if religious exhortation; but it is something we do not possess this small measure of self-com-religious mand and philosophical docility, then there does new, something to startle and arrest, to find not exist between our mind and that of the writer legal practice reformed to this high ideal. such a degree of moral conformity as is necessary The Country Parson is at best but living for the appreciation of the work. We shall in the blessed life we were prepared to admit such a case do ourselves least injury, and our to be his duty and his privilege; the LawMonitor least injustice, by leaving his book un-yer seen in the same light has unfortunately read."-p. 10. almost the novelty of a discovery. For The plan of the work is formed upon the even those (and they are few in this counmodel of George Herbert's beautiful Country) who do carry their Christianity into try Parson; a happy thought, which might, their legal practice, seldom do so on any perhaps, be advantageously extended to the very definite principles; their honesty, real other professions, so as to form a cycle of and unaffected as it is, seems but the indimoral directories for the different callings rect result of strong religious impressions; of life. It adopts (it would seem, almost and they usually appear unprepared either unconsciously) the archaisms of Herbert to discountenance, by vigorous public proand his times; and certainly the ancient test, the less scrupulous course adopted ly costume has seldom been worn with more their brethren, or to exhibit as their own perfect ease. The thoughts of the writer, basis of action any absolute moral axiom formed in an antique mould, appear to as- or well-considered moral theory on the subsume the corresponding dress as their natu-ject. ral garb. Separated as we are from those Our author was not to be satisfied with ages by the corrupt philosophy of the this indecisive position; he has thought out eighteenth century, which created its own his theory; and has exhibited his ideal appropriate formulas; when we would think Lawyer moving under its influence through with Hooker and Herbert, we can scarcely the whole orbit of his profession. An in troductory "Apology for the Work" vin- Law of Conscience, in despite of the evil dicates his general principle at considerable prescription that so strongly countenances length; and we are then presented with a oblique and dishonest courses. This, as series of scenes from the moral drama of we have said, he is induced in his "Apolo. the Lawyer's life. We have the Lawyer gy" to reason out elaborately, in order to choosing his Calling, his mode of Life, his resist prejudications which would have been Knowledge, and his Duties. He is exhibit-fatal to the influence of his views. The ed in the details of his profession-Draw insertion of this preliminary argument was ing pleadings, advising on evidence, con- the judicious suggestion of a distinguished sulting with his brethren, examining wit-legal friend. It is a valuable dissertation, nesses, drawing wills and deeds; as a peace- expressed with great strength and unaffectmaker as an arbitrator-as engaged in the edress, and leaving few or none of the poptumult of elections. He is seen exercising ular allegations unanswered. Humanity, Charity, Courtesy, Hospitality.) We will dedicate a page or two to the He is contemplated in the higher charac- consideration of this question; stating its ters of Legislator and Judge. And, "last moral bearings as they appear to us, and scene of all that ends this strange eventful in general conformity with the principles of history," he is beheld upon his death-bed-pure and elevated truth, delivered in the the death-bed of an humble but unshrinking excellent little digest before us. Christian man. These successive chapters The whole will of course turn upon our exhibit the Lawyer's various temptations conception of the Relation of the Lawyer to avarice, dishonesty, and craftiness; and to his Client. The true idea of that relathey evince how the simple and inflexible tion is well expressed in various parts of Rule of conscience is equally applicable to Mr. O'Brien's book. He feels the importthem all. In an appendix the author has ance of precisely defining it. collected a large body of testimonies, drawn principally from our elder divines, and confirming his statements in various ways: an appendix which he modestly "commend to the reader as the worthier part of this little book." The first chapter offers a fair specimen of the style, and presents us with the author's conception of his Calling: It is very beautifully written, though we fear we cannot answer for its universal popularity in the Four Courts. "A lawyer is the servant of his fellow-men for the attainment of justice; in which definition is ex pressed both the lowliness and the dignity of hi calling; the lowliness, in that he is the servant of all, ever ready to assist as well the meanest as th loftiest; the dignity, in that the end whereto h serves has among things temporal no superior or equal. For justice is nothing less than the sup. port of the world whereby each has from al others that which is his due; the poor their succor, the rich their ease, the powerful their honor For it were governments framed and powers or dained of God; flourishing it cheers, and languish ing it dejects the minds of good men; and in its overthrow is involved the ruin and fall of common wealths. That justice should ever be contemned or trodden under foot is a grief to God and angele: hov glorious then is his calling whose work it is to prevent her fall, or to raise her fallen! Truly the Lawyer, while the servant of earth, is the minister of heaven; while he labors for the good of his fellow-men he works none other than the work of God." The great principle of Mr. O'Brien's book is the obligation of governing legal practice by strict reference to the supreme Thus "If, as is obvious, the resulting force (to speak mechanically) of the three persons united-the client, attorney, and advocate-ought to be the same as that of the client alone, were he endowed with the powers and knowledge necessary to plead his own cause, it follows, as a necessary consequence, that the advocate should not lend himself to produce, in concert with his client and the attorney, an effect which could not with justice be produced by the client alone, when filling all the three characters in his own person."—(Appendix, p. 188.) Or again, and to the same effect To barristers properly it appertains, legally and in order, to set before judges and juries that which the diligence of the attorney has gathered from the complaint of the client; so that the whole togetherbarrister, attorney, and client-make as it were one man, whom of right one spirit of truth, justice, and mercy should move and animate."-(Chap. ii.) Or thus-" In one word, the lawyer regards himself as put in his client's place to do for him whatever he might do for himself (had he the lawyer's skill) consistently with truth and justice; more than this he will not do; and he lesires not those for his clients who dare not trust him to act with the same prudence, integrity, and zeal as if the cause were his own."-(Chap. vii.) Or once more-" All that is maintained is, that the advocate has a right to expect what every person who calls upon another to aid him in any undertaking is bound to give-an assurance that |