the vibrations more completely than any stuffing; and provided it be not too tightly distended, it isolates from much of the surrounding jar the part resting on it. An invalid thus air-collared and airgirt, with the legs on an easy foot-rest, and a pillow or cushion or two, if needed, to prop up against the rolling or lateral motion, may generally travel in a first-class carriage with ease. The noise might be further excluded by stuffing the ears with cottonwool, but this causes a sensation disagreeable to some persons." I do not stuff my ears with cotton-wool at present,' explained my companion, bowing as courteously as his defensive armour would permit him to do, in order that I may enjoy the pleasure of your conversation.'

I expressed my sense of this compliment as seriously as I could, although the appearance of my vis-avis was more ludicrous than anything I had ever beheld out of a pantomime; I could not, however, altogether suppress a smile.

'You will find these precautions are not a laughing matter one day, as you grow fatter,' observed my new acquaintance severely. An eminent hospital surgeon gives the following evidence of what came within his personal experience on a journey from Leipsic to Berlin; it occurs in page one hundred and eleven of the volume I have given you. "I was travelling in a first-class carriage with a very corpulent man for my companion, upwards of sixty years of age, formerly an officer of rank in the Prussian army. The train was lightly laden, and the carriages loosely coupled, and we had not proceeded far before we found the motion of the carriage most inconvenient, and, indeed, to my fellow-traveller, most distressing, in consequence of the shaking of his enormous abdomen. placed him in the centre compartment of the carriage, persuaded him to press his feet firmly against the opposite seat, packed him in his seat with greatcoats, &c.; but in vain. His cries were piteous, and his aspect, as we approached the end of our journey, really alarming. For the last four or five hours, I sat opposite to him, at his request, endeavouring to prevent his pendulous stomach swaying from side to side with the motion of the carriage. As I was myself subject to the same motion, of course the efforts were not very effectual, although my companion said it was the only ease he obtained. On arriving at Berlin, I took my fellowtraveller to his lodgings in a carriage, at a foot-pace, and placed him under medical treatment." I think this is a warning to you at least to wear a bandage. Here is an elastic piece of cork large enough to place your feet upon as well as mine; I am only sorry that I have no duplicate of this sheet of india-rubber which I place under my cushion with a horse-hair seat atop of it, in order to deaden the vibrations. The royal carriages, and those of the post-office officials, have already been provided with them. As for ventilation, nothing has been done to promote that most important end.'

"We can, however, keep a window down,' observed I. 'Not if I know it,' remarked the stout gentleman somewhat abruptly; and when you have read that little book, you will know why. It is bad to breathe bad air, but it is worse to fall a prey to pleurisy, pneumonia, and sciatica. Half the pulmonary diseases in Great Britain, sir, are caught through travelling on the railway with an open window; see pages thirty-four, thirty-five, and thirty-six. If this imprudence be committed on those northern and eastern lines which pass through marshy districts, the results are almost certain to be fatal.-Bless my heart and body, here is a cracked glass-there is a crack in this window-pane, upon my sacred word of honour. Guard! guard! The man pays no attention whatsoever, you observe. Deafness is one of the affections set down by Duchesne and others as frequently following the labours of guards and engine-drivers; and a very

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serious disqualification indeed. 'Hence," says Mr White Cooper, "the men rather conceal this defect from their employers; and it is probable that a considerable amount of disease of the ears exists among them." This guard, you see, is perfectly deaf. My cries are unavailing; the train is actually in motion. O goodness gracious me!'

If you are afraid of that little crack,' said I, 'why do you not change places, and remove yourself from its fatal neighbourhood?'

The stout gentleman frowned and shook his head. 'Do not speak to me, sir; I am about to stuff my ears with cotton-wool, as recommended at page ninety-six. You should never converse while the train is in motion-no, sir, nor read;' and with a gentle violence, he took from my hand the pamphlet of which he had made me a present, and thrust it back again into my coat-pocket.

The intentions of this victim to science were so obviously humane and considerate, that I did not like to insist upon having my own way. But his silent companionship was certainly not agreeable. After watching him and his wonderful attire for a considerable time, and admiring the movements by which he endeavoured to adapt himself to any oscillation of the train, I turned for variety to the window, on the other side of which trees, hedges, and hay-ricks were racing past with their usual distracting agility. The stout gentleman laid his hand upon my arm, appealingly. Giddiness-nausea-blindness,' exclaimed he with emotion.

When we stopped at the next station, he put the window down (as permitted, he said, at page thirtyseven), and explained himself at greater length. There is nothing so pernicious as looking out upon objects near at hand, and especially at those white telegraph posts, from which the wires seem to fall and rise in fancied undulations. See Dr Budd, F.R.S., page-when you get home, sir, when you get homepage forty-four.'

All the conversation that passed between us was compressed into the stoppages (when my friend unplugged his ears), and exclusively confined itself to the precautions and improvements that should be adopted by railway companies or their passengers. At one station, the name of which I inquired of my companion, he took occasion to remark that all the porters should have its title on the bands of their caps, as their ship's name is borne by sailors. 'Numbers of persons naturally deaf, or rendered so by railway travelling, would thus be greatly convenienced. And it would conduce much, sir, to the comfort of everybody-see page one hundred and forty-eight-if, on some prominent part of the station, there were roughly frescoed a plan of the neighbouring town or country.'

And do you not think,' said I, 'that if wet-nurses were provided by the railway companies, at all their termini at least, it would afford much convenience to parties travelling with very young families?'

'That is not in the book, sir, observed the stout gentleman gravely; but I quite agree with you that it should be done. The government is criminally sluggish in all matters relating to our locomotion; while the juries in cases of compensation are viciously lenient.'

And yet they make the companies pay large damages, do they not?'

'They give a little money, sir, but a great deal of insult and inconvenience with it. If my nervous system sustains such a shock in a collision that my pulse rises from 40 to 140 on the least excitement, the medical people retained by the company "consider the character of the pulse to be constitutional." If I am unfitted for business-see page one hundred and seventeen-and the countenances of my fellow-travellers with terrified eyes (as at the time of the catastrophe) come before ine whenever I attempt to do any reading

It would have been idle for me to have reasoned with this unfortunate Victim to Science, and besides we were just arriving at the terminus; but I could not help remarking, as my companion divested himself of his armour, that if a collision, or anything else, should cause such an affection of the optic nerve as to make some objects appear more couleur de rose to him than they did at present, I thought it would be a great advantage.

But as my companion had not yet taken the cottonwool out of his ears, I am afraid that my delicate sarcasm was thrown away.

THE SHEFFIELD GRINDERS. A GOOD name is said to be better than riches, though having the disadvantage of requiring effort for its maintenance; and it may be in consequence of this needful effort that some people prefer a bad name, which generally supports itself.

It frequently happens, however, that classes of men obtain reputation or notoriety without special endeavour, and when their characteristic is once established, it takes a long time to wear away the impression. Recent occurrences have done much to give an unenviable prominence to some of the operatives in the neighbourhood of Sheffield.

The common idea of a grinder is, that he is some brute of a fellow who crawls at the lowest stratum of civilisation that he is a reckless being who neither fears God nor regards man-that he has no respect for the law, and his highest authority is physical force. He is generally supposed to be ignorant, vulgar, and rude; as full of strange oaths as an old soldier; altogether incapable of the finer feelings of manhood, and insensible to the ameliorations of our advancing civilisation. Such ideas of grinders are common. may be worth while to inquire how they originated, and how far they are correct.

It

In the earlier history of manufactures in Sheffield, long before Chaucer wrote of the Sheffield whittle, it was the custom for the makers of knives to do everything for themselves. The minute division of labour which now a days turns men into little better than machines, was then unknown, and continued to be so for a long period after Chaucer's time. But as the town and its manufactures increased, the advantages of divided labour began to be recognised. Instead of the maker of whittles forging the several parts of his knives himself, he employed men to do the forging only, confining himself to fitting and putting the several parts together; and instead of grinding his blades and polishing them himself, he employed other men to do so. In those times, the method of grinding was for one man to turn a wheel by hand, while another worked. But this was a costly mode of labour, and also very hard work for the man who officiated as the motive-power. The necessity of the case drove men to seek forces in nature, and the most ready means appeared to be found in the neighbouring streams, where water-wheels were erected, and suitable machinery fixed for carrying on the grinding processes. These were very rude in the first instance, but yet an improvement on the hand-grinding system which had previously been used. The buildings in which the grinding trades were carried on were called 'wheels,' in reference to the origin of the water-power; and at the present day the same term is applied, locally, to all buildings where grinding is done. They are called 'wheels,' while in other parts of the country

they would be termed 'mills.'* With the waterpower thus applied, wheels became erected on all the streams within a few miles of the town, and they still exist, not the least picturesque objects of the lovely scenery by which Sheffield is surrounded. No one has more thoroughly studied the character of the Sheffield grinders, and the scenes of their labours, than the poet, Ebenezer Elliott. His sympathies were entirely with this class of men, in consequence of their love of freedom. He has described the localities of these grinding-wheels; but while the description of them is still correct, the character given to the men does not continue so strictly applicable. Many of the streams of the neighbourhood of Sheffield have their rise in the northern part of the Peak of Derbyshire, being, in fact, the drainage of the moorland. These scenes are thus apostrophised by the Corn-law Rhyıner:

Beautiful rivers of the desert! ye

Bring food for labour from the foodless waste. Pleased stops the wanderer on his way to see The frequent weir oppose your heedless haste. Where toils the mill, by ancient woods embraced, Hark, how the cold steel screams in hissing fire! But Enoch sees the grinder's wheel no more, Couched beneath rocks and forests that admire Their beauty in the waters, ere they roar Dashed in white foam the swift circumference o'er, There draws the grinder his laborious breath; There, coughing, at his deadly trade he bends. Born to die young, he fears nor man nor death; Scorning the future, what he earns he spends ; Debauch and Riot are his bosom-friends. He plays the Tory sultan-like and well: Woe to the traitor that dares disobey The Dey of Straps! as rattened tools shall tell. Full many a lordly freak by night and day Illustrates gloriously his lawless sway. Behold his failings! hath he virtues too? He is no pauper, blackguard though he be. Full well he knows what minds combined can do, Full well maintains his birthright-he is free! And frown for frown, outstares monopoly ! Yet Abraham and Elliot both in vain Bid science on his cheek prolong the bloom; He will not live! he seems in haste to gain The undisturbed asylum of the tomb, And old at two-and-thirty meets his doom.' The above extract, from the Village Patriarch, will give an idea of this singular class of men, and the feelings which the poet entertained towards them. In his hatred of monopoly, he even admires, or seems to admire, the vices of a class of men whose practices were not always consistent with the poet's ideas of free-trade. While Elliott's description gives some notion of the characteristics of the grinders, it does nothing towards explaining the philosophy of their character. Strange as it seems that these men are described as being old at the early age of thirty-two, this was not at the time an exaggeration. grinders were subject to a complaint of the nature of consumption, locally known as the grinder's asthma— a disease that has engaged the attention of some of our noted physicians, several of whom have published the result of their investigations. The average lives of the grinders did not exceed the number of years above stated. This great mortality was considered the cause of their recklessness. Perhaps these terms might be reversed with some degree of truth. It was a common opinion amongst them, however, that their lives were necessarily short, that their trade was a 'deadly' one, and hence no regard was paid to such sanitary regulations as might have

The

*This term is only applied to such buildings as are used for grinding steel or metal articles; a corn-mill would not be called a wheel,' but a mill.

and felt assured that the 'God bless thee, oud lad,' was uttered none the less sincerely for its homeliness.

It is an old saying, 'Give a dog a bad name, and hang him,' and this appears to be the case with the grinders. But while recording their former errors and extravagance, we would give them credit for their improvement, and encourage them to follow an upward course.

FIFTEEN YEARS AT THE GALLEYS. WITH the exception of the very few Englishmen who have obtained the favour of admission to inspect the criminal establishments of France, and the still smaller number who, like myself, have been condemned to a compulsory residence therein, I cannot hope that any who read this will be capable of sympathising with me in the sufferings I have undergone, since they cannot by any effort of the imagination conceive the horrors of a confinement in those pandemoniums.

I am of English birth and parentage, but my father dying when I was only eleven years of age, my mother was induced to accept the offer made to her by a French gentleman who had married a near relative, and had frequently stayed at our house during his visits to England, to take entire charge of me while I was completing my education. This gentleman, whose name was Evrart, had been on the stage, though he was known by another name there, and by his talents had realised what in Havre was considered a handsome independence. His first wife had been dead about four years when I went to live with him, but he had married again with a woman a little older than himself, who, I believe, had also been on the stage, and, I imagine, failed, for she never spoke of it herself; and the only reason I had for supposing this had been the case, was from something said by her husband when they were holding a discussion on some circumstance of the past. Her principal occupation was writing plays, which, so far as I know, were never acted, but which she used to read to me, as soon as had acquired sufficient knowledge of the French language to understand them, at every opportunity. Having no children of her own, she adopted the poor little English boy enthusiastically, and was even fonder of me, and more kind to me, than mothers usually are to their children. As soon as I left the academy, I hastened home; and when we had dined we used, if it were the summer, to take a walk a little way into the country, sit down until I had learned my lessons for the next day, and then stroll along on the sea-shore, madame quoting from her own plays, or those of others, apropos of everything we saw. It would have been difficult to have found a happier family than we were. M. Evrart was happy, because he was no longer called to account for staying out with his friends late at night, and the kindness and attention of his wife to his little requirements when he was at home at first seemed to surprise, and then to delight him. When I first went to reside with them, he rarely went out with his wife, except when we were going to parties, but after a time he regularly accompanied us in our walks, and the information I derived from him was as useful as the intimate knowledge of their language imparted to me by his wife's incessant quotations, and rather more interesting. I mention these things, because it will enable the reader to judge how much my sufferings were aggravated by what subsequently happened.

My visits to England were not frequent, but this was not from any want of affection on my part for my family, but because having no means beyond those I derived from my benefactors, I did not like to employ them in making journeys which always appeared distasteful to them. The climate and mode of living at Havre agreed with my constitution so well that I grew

with great rapidity, and by the time I was sixteen years old, I was tall and as strong and muscular as most men. My principal amusement was boating, and very frequently in the summer and autumn have I seen the sun rising after my fishing-line had been dropped in the sea. The man who looked after my boat usually accompanied me, though it sometimes happened that I was unable to get any answer when I knocked at the window of the cottage where he lived; but, supposing that he did not wish to get up, I did not give myself the trouble to wait for him, but went down to the shore, unlocked the padlock which attached my boat to the mooring-chain, and went to sea alone. I have since had reason to suppose that he was not always indoors when I knocked. It is necessary that I should here say something of this man, though the averting a tragedy the recollection of which even now, knowledge came to me too late to be of any service in notwithstanding the length of time that has since elapsed, compels me to lay down my pen for a time until my hand is steadier.

This man's name was Philippe Loret, and he had been landed at Havre from an American vessel in a sad state of health, arising, so some said, from a severe beating he had received from his shipmates, but, as he himself said, from having fallen from the yard to the deck one dark, windy night. After he had recovered his health, he used to get his living on the beach in various ways; and a very precarious living it must have been in those days, for Havre was not then the busy port it is now, nor was it frequented by visitors to anything like the same extent. However, he lived somehow or other until he became the tenant of one of the prettiest cottages near the shore. He had no wife, but a woman kept his house, and to her, I suspect, was due the credit of surrounding it with abundance of flowers, and the neat and clean appearance of everything both within and without. For taking charge of my boat, and going out with me fishing when he had nothing better to do, I gave him seven francs a week, which M. Evrart thought quite enough; but Loret must sometimes have increased this sum considerably by the sale of the fish we caught, all of which I abandoned to him, except such as were required for our consumption at home, and an occasional present to friends or a harbour-official. He performed the duties I required of him well enough, and I was much too happy to feel annoyed at, or even hardly to notice, his usually sulky manner, and his excessive greediness.

When I was sixteen years old, I wrote to my mother to learn whether she had set her mind on my following any particular career; but she declined to interfere, and left the matter to be arranged between myself and the Evrarts. The habit I had acquired of spending several hours a day on the sea had given me a love for that element; and although the idea of a sea-faring life for me was not welcome to my kind friends, they offered no opposition beyond affectionately advising me to weigh well the dangers I should have to encounter. It is possible they may have thought that one voyage would be sufficient to cure my passion for the sea, if they did not awaken my self-love in support of my desire by opposing it. They only insisted on my going as agent or supercargo the first voyage, during which I might learn navigation, and anything else necessary to qualify me to command a vessel, without going through the inferior grades; for it seemed to them perfectly ridiculous that a man such as I was in appearance, if not in age, should be forced to associate with boys and share their occupations.

It was not long before an opportunity offered itself of making a short voyage to Madeira, in company of the son of a shipowner, whom I knew pretty intimately, and it was arranged that I should go, and that we should spend a few weeks in the island. The time passed happily enough. We made numerous

pedestrian excursions, and visited every place which strangers usually visit, and a good many beside.

On arriving off the port of Havre, the wind, of which there was very little, was rather unfavourable to us, and we made but slow way; still we were advancing, when a large French vessel, which was coming out, ran into us, the top of her bowsprit striking our aftermast just in the middle, and breaking it short off. Luckily for us, the rate at which she was sailing was so slow, that, notwithstanding her much superior size, the shock caused her to recoil, and drove us out of her course, so that we escaped without any further damage, and in a little while we were continuing to move towards the harbour. I suppose the collision had been seen from the quay, for several boats put off to us, and among them my own, in which were Loret and another man, whom I had never seen before. The sea being rather rough, and not supposing that it would make much difference in point of time if I landed from the vessel, I did not attempt to enter the boat, but directed Philippe to go ashore and inform M. Evrart that I had returned, and would be at home in the course of a short time. I was, however, mistaken as to the time required for working up to the quay, in consequence of our disabled condition, and it was near midnight when I knocked at our door.

To my surprise there was no light visible at any of the windows; and when I had repeated my knock several times without receiving any answer, I became seriously uneasy, though I could not conceive that anything was the matter, because I had been told by Philippe that he had seen M. and Madame Evrart that day, and they were both quite well. At last I determined on trying to enter the house by another door. One side of the garden was protected from the street by a wall about seven feet high, the top of which was covered with pieces of glass. I took off my coat, folded it, and laid it on the top to keep the glass from cutting me. In another instant I was in the garden, forgetting, in my anxiety, to remove my coat. I had no difficulty in finding the door, but it was fastened, and I knew the careful manner in which this was done too well not to know that any attempt to burst it open would be useless. I then looked about for a ladder to get up to the balcony which ran along madame's sitting-room, but could not find one; I, however, found a rake, and by hooking this into the rails, I drew myself up until I could reach it with my hands. The rest was easy enough. The window was open, and though the room was in darkness, I was too familiar with the arrangement of everything in it not to be able to walk straight to the table. Always nervous and excitable in matters where those I loved were concerned, those similarly constituted will be able to form some idea of the horror which seized me when my hands, which I held stretched out before me to protect me from coming in contact with any misplaced article of furniture, rested one on the face, the other on the back of the head of a corpse. I did not doubt for an instant that this was the body of my benefactress; in fact, I never thought of it at all, the conviction struck me like a flash of lightning, and I fell to the ground as instantaneously as if I had been shot. How long I remained so, of course I cannot know of my own knowledge, but it would seem to have been between two and three hours. As soon as I became a little conscious, I crawled towards the door, got on my feet, and staggered down stairs to the street-door, which I quickly opened and ran to the next house and alarmed the inmates, who were a widower named Talbot, his son, and two daughters, young women. All these came rushing down to the street, supposing the house to be on fire, and heard the dreadful news. M. Talbot got a light and returned with me, and the first object which we saw on entering the house was the body of M. Evrart, lying with the head in a pool

of blood. Under any circumstances, the sight of a dead body is a painful spectacle, but how much more painful when it is the body of one we love, and from which life has been driven forth by violence. There was by this time no lack of assistance, and the body was carefully raised and carried into the dining-room, and laid on the table. Inquiry was now made for Madame Evrart, and I told them that she too was murdered, and that we should find her body in her sitting-room.

It is not necessary that I should describe the details of what followed, nor attempt to describe my own feelings. I sent a message to the authorities, informing them of what had happened, and then threw myself on my bed, and gave free vent to my grief. Will it be believed that, in spite of my suffering, I fell sound asleep?

When I awoke I found it was broad daylight, and the commissary of police and three of his agents in the room. He asked me to give an account of the matter, which I did as I have described it above. He then left me to indulge my grief alone, and I remained undisturbed during the entire day. It was not until evening that it struck me as strange that nobody had called to express their sympathy with me in my affliction, but then a circumstance occurred which explained it. The door was opened, and the commissary and a party of gens d'armes entered. The former desired me to dress myself and go with them, for that he had been ordered to take me into custody. I doubted at first whether I could have understood rightly what he said, but I was soon made to comprehend. Of course, I felt very acutely the humiliation of being the subject of such a charge, but my grief for the loss of those I had loved so dearly prevented me from feeling it so much as I should otherwise have done. Even when in prison, I felt scarcely any uneasiness as to the result of my trial; it appeared to me so absurd to imagine that anybody could for an instant believe me guilty. Many friends visited me in prison, and these all encouraged the view I took of my situation. Among them was a lawyer named Langenis, in whose office it had been proposed that I should study the law, in the event of my not persisting in going to sea. He undertook the management of my case, and I thought, from the questions he put to me in preparing the brief for my defence, that he doubted my innocence. I tried to induce him to acknowledge this, but he would not. Had he done so, I would have declined his services, and have preferred to take my trial undefended, which, after all, might have turned out the wiser course.

When the day arrived for my trial, the court was crowded with my friends, those near enough stretching out their hands to shake mine. I felt comforted by this public manifestation of their belief in my innocence to a degree which only those who have lain for weeks under an accusation, however false, can fully appreciate; and I prepared with calmness, and something like curiosity, to hear how the authorities could have made a case out against me sufficient to justify them in arresting me.

I knew the president of the court well, as indeed I did all the principal officials, and I felt a vague apprehension of something I hardly knew what, when I saw the grave expression of their countenances as they looked at me. The jury having taken their seats, and the usual formalities having been gone through, the prosecutor proceeded to read the acte d'accusation, which contained a full statement of the case against me; and I was utterly astounded at finding with what infernal art the most trivial circumstances were woven together into a web, which I felt that I could only hope to escape from by the jury refusing to convict me of such a monstrous crime. The following is substantially the case against me as stated for the crown, and it will shew how