The labourer, be it remembered, from the moment in which he stands committed for an infraction of the game laws, proceeds onward, step by step, at the public expense. He is conveyed to gaol at the public expense: he is kept there at the public expense. The county feeds and clothes him. His family become instantly burdens on the public industry. The doors of the Union House are opened to them; and there they have to be maintained at the expense of their respective parishes. What an equitable, honest, and reasonable arrangement! many heavily burdened for the amusement of the few! The Now, surely, as game is preserved for the special amusement of the country gentry,-an amusement in which they will tolerate no participation on the part of the multitude,-common sense suggests that "the exclusives" are the parties who ought to pay "for their fun." But then it is urged by those who hold Lord Eastrington's views, "Game is entitled to protection; and ought most fully to receive it because it is property." Indeed! Has it the responsibilities of other property? Unless this can be established, there is manifest injustice in the conclusion that it ought to receive similar protection. In point of fact, game preservers inflict infinite damage on a community. They are, in many points of view, obnoxious to its welfare. Farmers incur heavy loss by the depredations of game. Labourers suffer injury by the want of employment, since it is a well-established and notorious fact that in any district where there is much game, it is an utter impossibility to have good farming. The community, as a body, is injured; first, by the destruction of food which game occasions; and next by the facilities and temptations to crime which game affords. An agricultural labourer earns nine shillings a-week. A single night's poaching will bring him twenty. Is it wonderful that gaols require new wings, and that the crowded state of our prisons calls for a winter assize? The cause of this perpetual increase of misery and crime-where is it to be found? ̄ In the laws enacted and maintained for the amusement of the country gentry. These last are the parties who convert their fellow creatures into criminals. The disappointed poacher is, by rapid and easy progress, converted into a robber. Precluded by the vigilance of keepers, or by an unexpected augmentation of watchers from taking game, the agricultural labourer will enter his master's fold, and take sheep; or he will stealthily climb into a neighbour's barn, and take his corn. A poacher's calling and habits have depraved him. He has lost all sense of right and wrong. But who has caused this sad and wondrous change in his character? Let the game preserver supply the answer. At a late hour, in a small but luxuriously furnished breakfast-room, looking over a sunny terrace into a noble park, sat a lady and gentleThe latter seemed out of sorts, peevish, and irritable; and the former distrait and ill at ease, as if at a loss for a topic that would accord with the moody humour of her fretful companion. man. Make no further attempts to mislead me," said the gentleman; "I heard shots in the Rectory Preserve about one this morning. My mind is made up on the point. I could not be deceived." "The night was very boisterous," suggested the lady timidly; "and the wind among the trees-" "Bore the sharp report of fire-arnis towards my dressing-room. I ought not to heed the sound, I admit," continued the speaker bitterly, "for it is of nightly recurrence, and my people seem thoroughly indifferent. They will probably attach to it more importance this day three weeks when I send them one and all adrift, as I shall do to a certainty." His companion looked surprised, but hazarded no reply. "I am surrounded by mercenaries," continued the speaker sarcastically, "mercenaries in heart as well as calling.” The rising colour of the lady proved this taunt did not escape her. "The bond-" resumed his lordship-Lord Eastrington was the speaker-"the sole bond acknowledged at the present day is that loathsome one-money." The diatribe finished, he rang the bell smartly. "Beamish, my lord, is below," said the servant who obeyed the summons," and begs to see your lordship when you are at leisure." "I am at leisure, now," said the peer, with that lowering brow, and in that muffled tone, which generally were the precursors of reproof and dismissal. Beamish, however, thought differently, for he stepped lightly into his lordship's presence, and looked up at his employer with a frank and well-assured air, as if convinced a welcome awaited his tidings. "Any new disaster, keeper?" was Lord Eastrington's inquiry, in a tone partly irritable, partly careless. "None, my lord; rather the contrary. I have discovered a sly hand-a very sly hand-near home." "Indeed!" and the peer's moody manner gave way to an expression of eagerness. "I found, my lord, last night, a leash of birds, a pheasant, and a hare, in a cottage not fifty yards distant from the Forest Lodge Gate, -all of them, I'll be sworn, from our covers: in fact the fellow admitted as much; I teazed it out of him.” "Good!" exclaimed his lordship; "and his gun?" "That I found hid between the sacking and mattress of his bed; and for a poor man, a very tidy gun it is.' " "Well and cleverly managed!" cried his lordship; "you shall find your account in this, Beamish: now for the name of the offender." "Marcot, my lord." "Marcot!" repeated the peer musingly: "Marcot! that man has had work-constant work throughout the winter. Want has nothing to do with his crime. What are his wages?" "Nine shillings a-week, my lord; has a wife and four children; the eldest rising six. Rent, four pounds ten. Maintains an old mother besides." "Nine shillings a-week!" ejaculated the peer solemnly; "nine shillings per week!" he repeated, as if lost in the contemplation of so enormous an income. "I shall treasure up this case in my recollection," continued the noble, with an air of profound reflection: "I shall advert to it in public: I shall, perhaps, submit it in detail to the consideration of the House. It supports the view I have always taken, that the agricultural labourer is not driven to become a poacher by want." "Marcot says he was. He told me, eyes, that he and his family couldn't live find house rent and firing out of them. my lord, with tears in his poacher, and nothing else. He was starving; and took to the woods." "A subterfuge-a vile, audacious subterfuge," said his lordship with dignity. Poaching, Beamish, arises from loose notions of morality." Beamish made an acquiescent bow, as was his duty. "Want, the cause of poaching! Absurd! Immorality is its cause. It is spreading rapidly and abominably among the lower classes. It is lamentable to view the hold it gains on them. We are becoming an immoral people." "We are, my lord," said Beamish humbly. His eye glanced at the lady opposite him, who looked disconcerted enough. His noble master observed the look and its result, and abruptly closed the interview. Was it shame, or pride, or wounded feeling, or a determination to "sin on" that caused him to mutter, as the door closed on the confused keeper, "That fellow grows saucy,-has an opinion of his own,—I'll be rid of him the first opportunity." TOBACCO. BY WILLIAM JONES. LET poets rhyme of what they will, My theme shall be tobacco! Mild comforter of woe! The source of ev'ry pleasure! Forth sprang the plant, and then was bless'd, As man's chief treasure! Throughout the world who knows thee not? Of palace, and of lowly cot The universal guest! The friend of Gentile, Turk, and Jew, And soothe us into rest! Companion of his lonely state, And still can brave an adverse fate All honour to the patriot bold, Ay, Raleigh! thou wilt live till Time The fruitful theme of story! And thou, O leaf! shalt keep his name And teach us to remember; Made summer of December ! EARLY YEARS OF A VETERAN OF THE ARMY OF WESTPHALIA, BETWEEN 1805 AND 1814. IN hours of severe trial and visitation the following sketches were traced for my amusement. I was blind during three years, and could therefore only relate what was then committed to paper by a faithful hand. But now that, through the goodness of Providence and a skilful oculist, my sight has been restored, my first occupation is to put these scattered leaves in order, and offer them to the public, since they contain a true picture of circumstances, in a most eventful period, which may not perhaps be without interest for the reader. My younger comrades may hope that for them too, as once for me, such a time of deeds and daring, at their years so ardently longed for, may as unexpectedly arrive. Should that happen, I trust they may not meet with the like hardships and contrarieties, that crossed my path; and my elder comrades will surely feel themselves called back to the past in this memorial. From all I would desire indulgence for any deficiencies in the following narrative and representation of events, and hope, besides, that the reading of these sketches may fill up an idle hour agreeably.-BAUMANN. I was born at Cleves, where my father was a counsellor, and superintendent of the Consistory. I was so unfortunate as to lose him in my childhood, but had a careful guardian in the late Provost Offelsmeyer, through whose influence I obtained, in 1805, a commission as cornet in the dragoon regiment of Frederick Landgrave of Hesse. Enthusiastic for my new profession, and with a lofty sense of its dignity, I set out for my garrison, and from Wesel to Munster travelled under the surveillance of an intimate military acquaintance; for my relations would not permit my first flight into the world to be made without the protection and counsel of an experienced person. This officer had his sergeant-major with him in the stage-coach, and being a very kindly man, he treated the old soldier in the following manner. Wherever we stopped for our repasts, he made him sit at table with us, as I still vividly remember, on account of the many laughable scenes it occasioned. In the coach, where at that time smoking was practised without animadversion, he filled his pipe simultaneously with the captain, and not one moment later or earlier, permitted himself to light it,-nay, he went so far as to extinguish his own pipe the very instant when that of his superior was set aside. Moreover, he held himself continually in an erect military posture, spoke only when spoken to, and therefore never for a moment erred against that severe subordination, according to which the inferior in those days stood in a servile relation to his superior. But it was during dinner at Cosfield that what was ridiculous in our stiff fellow-traveller came out in its full colours; and it was all I could do to observe silence, and keep my countenance. For the universe he would not have sinned against propriety, and, utterly ignorant of the usages and manners of the higher classes, he had nothing for it but to imitate, with extreme minuteness, each and every movement made by the Captain. If the latter took up a glass, he did the same, like him he handled his knife, fork, and napkin, but did it all as if under arms, and with the most steady official mien. Captain von B- -'s favourite dish was fricasseed turkey, and he liked the head in particular; therefore, if one fell to my share, I failed not to offer it to him: whereupon the Sergeant-major, as if determined not to be outdone in courtesy, immediately imitated me; but, unluckily, the Captain was already provided with two of those dainty bits. What may seem surprising is, that since the dinner had been only prepared for, and laid before three persons, there should have been occasion to decapitate so many of those innocents, as one after the other made its appearance, so that the whole might be called a fricassee of heads: however, its flavour to our palates was delicious,— thanks to the then construction of stage-coaches, which seemed intended to create a most voracious appetite. In this manner we arrived at Munster, where Captain Von Bhanded me over to my guardian, who, after the preparations necessary for my new appointment, sent me on with the least possible delay. My road, in this second part of my journey, lay by Paderborn and fair Cassel, to Fritzlar, my first garrison, -one of those petty, insignificant towns in which formerly the cavalry used to be quartered. The townspeople, through long years upon the most intimate terms with the garrison, were immediately made acquainted with every circumstance of general interest; and the arrival of a new officer-a foreigner besides occasioned no small stir in the narrow circle, and furnished conversation for the day, both to old and young. Soon after my arrival I was presented to the General, and afterwards, by the Chef d'Escadron, to the old Quarter-master, Behbein, in order to be fitted out in a military manner, which was the commencement of my tortures, as will appear from the following description :-First of all, the glossy curls of my hair, which formed no slender part of my boyish vanity, were-O Vandalism of former times! - shaved off from the front part of my head; the back hair was, contrary to the present mode, left long, and gathered together into a stiff queue; to which ornament, since mine was not of the requisite length, a pitched cord was appended, by which means the tail obtained its due length of twelve inches. Besides this half-savage ornament, my ears were surmounted by two sumptuous curls, which, suitably pomatumed and waxed, made the crowning adornment of my sixteen-years-old head. At first my queue was very rebellious; in spite of all my attention, it never would hang perpendicularly, and I often discovered it comfortably reposing upon my shoulder. When this important part of my toilet was ended, next came the adaptation of the leathern small-clothes, which, rubbed with wet pipe-clay, were to be drawn on before they were dry, that they might sit the better; and then followed the stiff boots, overtopping the knees. Deep ruffles set off the pale-blue uniform, with facings of silver lace, and a mighty frill, blowing itself out below the stiff collar. And there stood the bold dragoon, in all his magnificence! When Behbein, busy and important, added to the abovementioned glories hat, sabre, cane, and belt, the latter ornamented with a silver buckle and the golden lion, I contemplated, in pride and pleasure, my thus ornamented person, in the small looking-glass hanging in my chamber. But this survey of myself, however gratifying, could not long suffice me; I must make the change which had come over me apparent to the whole town; and with this purpose hastened towards the staircase; but, alas! the force of nature could no further go, the villanous boots made it clearly impossible for me, |