sullied their worldly transactions. They both gave their gold freely where it was wanted, and they gave it, moreover, with kind words to enhance the value of the gift.

According to the generally received characteristics of nations, it ap peared as if De Courtine and St. John had exchanged natures—the former being of as melancholy a temperament as the latter was lively. This op position of character is usually looked upon as promising a safer bond of union than is offered by inclinations of precisely the same tendency, and perhaps it was the reason in this case of their unbroken friendship. There was at any rate no dangerous equality to make them rivals, for in all intellectual qualities that deserve the name, the marquis was immeasurably superior to St. John.

In spite of my boast to Bobèche, the length of the ride from Orleans to Fontainebleau caused me to sleep somewhat longer next morning than usual, and I was only just dressed when my new friend entered my room. “Well, Adrien,” he said, with a smiling countenance, "I think I have arranged your affair. An additional servant is precisely what Monsieur le Marquis requires; I was tolerably sure of that before I brought you along with me. He is quite satisfied with the description I have given, but wishes to see you of course, before he confirms the engagement. Come down stairs and get some breakfast, and then, as old Chassepot would say, you will be fortified for the interview, not that there is any thing formidable to encounter, only, as you are a novice, perhaps you may think so."

We descended accordingly, and Bobèche did justice to a very substantial meal, but for my part, notwithstanding the assurance he had given me, I was too nervous to eat any thing; the thoughts of having to speak to a man of such high rank as Monsieur de Courtine, completely took away my appetite. It is the anticipation of any thing unusual that destroys one's equilibrium much more than the thing itself, for self-possession always returns after a few minutes have rendered the object familiar. I am now so perfectly accustomed to the presence of great people, that I believe all Napoleon's marshals, with the emperor at their head, would not possess the power to add a single throb to my pulse.

Bobèche laughed at me for not following his example, or the advice given me by Monsieur Chassepot," But," he said, "I'll be bound you will make up for it before night, though where we shall sleep to-night is more than I can tell you, for our route is not yet decided on.'

Neither he nor I, however, were long kept in suspense, a summons arriving before Bobèche had well finished his breakfast for us to appear in the salon.

The Marquis and Mr. St. John were both there, the former seated at table writing letters, the latter standing, as Englishmen invariably do at all seasons, with his back to the empty fire-place, and his coat-tails spread. Monsieur de Courtine's personal appearance corresponded with the description I have given of his character, seriousness being stamped on his features, which were good, without being handsome; their grave expression was, however, relieved by the quick glances of large gray eyes, that seemed to have no rest in them. Mr. St. John was very tall and stoutly built; his features were large and full, he had bright blue eyes, and his complexion was of that striking red and white which is nowhere

seen in France, unless imported from England. A constant smile hovered upon his lips, and an affected, mincing voice caused a strange surprise to any one hearing it for the first time, as it appeared so entirely out of keeping with the huge frame from whence it issued.

On our entrance the marquis suspended his writing for a moment, as he glanced keenly at me; his questions were brief and rapid, and my replies seemed to give him satisfaction. He then spoke a few words in Italian to Mr. St. John, and resumed his employment, while the latter, beckoning me to the fire-place, examined me more in detail. I had the gratification of pleasing him also, and when he dismissed me with a few good-humoured phrases, Bobèche was instructed to put me into a costume, as soon as he could procure one, more suitable than that which I wore to the position I now occupied.

This was a matter of no difficulty; a very smart dress was soon purchased, in which, though I did not in any degree approach the magnificence of Monsieur Bobèche, I cut by no means a contemptible figure, and soit dit en passant, a French lad, in his seventeenth year, if he chances to be well-dressed and tolerably good-looking, as, without vanity, I think I may say I was, is not exactly the one to hide his light under a bushel. There were only two things of which I envied Bobèche the possession ; these were his whiskers and his couteau-de-chasse; but I comforted myself with the reflection that patience and bear's grease would one day put me on an equality with him.

In the course of the morning we learnt the direction in which we were to travel. Our destination for the present was to be Baden Baden, taking a cross country road, till we fell into the grande route from Paris to Strasbourg. This we did at Sezanne, after passing through Montereau and Nogent-sur-Seine, stopping, of course, for what poet could pass the spot unheeded, at St. Aubin, where once stood the monastery of Paraclète, sacred to the memories of Abailard and Heloise. Mr. St. John made the loudest demonstrations of enthusiasm, though he did not go quite so far as one traveller, with whom I afterwards visited the place, an Englishman also, who would be content with nothing less than stretching himself at full length in the stone sarcophagus in which the leaden coffin that contained the bones of the lovers formerly reposed. The same gentleman, who seemed to have taken the memories of all the celebrated lovers of former days under his protection, told me he had raised a monument to Laura at Avignon, and passed the night in the tomb of Juliet at Verona. He did nothing but repeat verses, and talk about Pop and Shacspare.

If the reader has ever travelled from Paris to Strasbourg, he will be much obliged to me for not reminding him of the excessive dulness of the journey, and if he has not, I need only say that it offers little to attract his attention. He crosses two or three rivers, famous as they flow onwards, but here of narrow dimensions, and he traverses the defences of several formidable fortified towns; but he carries on with him a recollection of little beside a monotonous high road, relieved by little beauty of scenery, except he chooses to pause for a day at Nancy, the ancient capital of Lorraine, and the prettiest town in France. But at Strasbourg the toilsome part of the journey is over, and the traveller, whether he be antiquarian or gastronome, will equally rejoice in this antique city, which prides itself no less on its cathedral than on its inimitable pâtés de foie gras. It

was not the first time on the journey that I had missed the excellent Felix Chassepot, but I confess when I passed by Monsieur Hummel's establishment, in the Rue des Serruriers, it was with a pang that I reflected upon the absence of one who would not have failed to pronounce the most brilliant eulogium, as well on the "estimable bête" which supplies the matériel for the pâté, as on the accomplished pâtissier who has acquired such universal fame by his mode of preparing them. Bobèche, however, had not been silent on the He instructed me in many things which it was important for me to know, narrated various anecdotes of our masters, with whom he had already been a journey into Italy, and when he left off talking, invariably broke into song, so that, to me at least, the time since we left Fontainebleau, was very agreeably filled up. My impression of the road itself refers to later experience.

way.

Monsieur de Courtine had a motive for not lingering at Strasbourg, so our stay there was a brief one, and Bobèche and I were sent forward with as much expedition as we could use to engage apartments at Baden Baden. This would have been no easy matter for a less accomplished courier than my companion, for the summer season was at its height, and the place crowded to excess, but by dint of cajolery, impudence, and promises of a most magnificent, but at the same time of a very indefinite nature, he succeeded in inducing the landlord of the Hôtel de l'Europe to relinquish for our use a splendid suite, which had been engaged for some time by a Russian Prince, who was expected daily. This done, we again mounted our horses, and rode back to meet the travellers, whom we encountered at Stollhofen, and escorted in triumph to the queen of watering places.

A VISIT TO THE GRAVES OF THE FOLLOWERS OF HENGIST AND HORSA.

BY THOMAS WRIGHT, M.A.

It was, according to the most probable calculations, in one of the years between 440 and 450, that a party of warriors from the coast of Friesland-" pirates" some call them, but in those days the distinction was not very easily made, and we can now see little difference in this respect between the conquests of a Cæsar or of a Hengist-swept over that sea which their own minstrels designated by the expressive epithet of the "whale's bath," and obtained possession of the Isle of Thanet. The tradition-perhaps we may call it the fable-of after ages, said that they were led by two chiefs named Hengist and Horsa; that they had been banished from their own country, and that they came hither at the invitation of the Britons, who sought their assistance against domestic enemies. The commonly received story of Hengist and Horsa will, however, hardly bear a critical examination, and those worthies appear to have belonged rather to the mythic poetry of the heroic ages of the north, than to the sober annals of Saxon warfare in our island. The names are nearly synonymous in meaning, each signifying a horse, an animal reverenced by

the people of whom we are speaking, who carried it on their standard, and in this sense it may be perfectly true, that the settlers in the Isle of Thanet were, in this expedition of conquest and colonisation, the followers of Hengist and of Horsa.

At this time, England had been for many generations a Roman province, covered with Roman towns and villas, and inhabited by Romans and Romanised natives, who used the Roman manners and customs, and spoke the Latin tongue. The Isle of Thanet was, in these early ages, separated from the rest of Kent by a more considerable river than at present, and by what was then more like an estuary of the sea than a mere succession of marshes and morasses. On the south, this was defended by the strong Roman post of Richborough, or, as it was then called, Rhutupiæ, the grand port of entry of the Romans into Britain, and the spot from whence their luxurious tables were supplied with the choicest oysters, the shells of which are still scattered in profusion among the pottery and other remains which the spade of the husbandman or the pick of the "navy" is constantly turning up. On the north stood the no less formidable station of Regulbium, the remains of which are now known by the name of Reculver. We know little of the manner in which the Isle of Thanet was occupied by the Romans; no towns are mentioned there in their itineraries; but the number of Roman coins and other antiquities found in laying the foundations of Ramsgate pier, and the remains of Roman burial places in the neighbourhood, prove that that great people must have had a settlement of some importance at Ramsgate, and their presence has been traced by similar memorials in the neighbourhood of Minster.

It was at Ebbs-fleet, or, in other words, in the port of Richborough, that the followers of Hengist and Horsa came to land. The Saxon fleets had long infested the eastern shores of Britain with their incursions; and, in the long series of usurpations of the imperial title by governors of the island during the latter period of Roman sway, the Saxon and Roman ships had frequently ridden, side by side, in friendly alliance. In fact, it is probable that the Romano-British navy consisted in a greater degree than we suppose of Saxon mariners. It is not unlikely that they had formed settlements on the eastern coast, called after them, the Littus Saxonicum, long before the Roman legions had relinquished the island. Richborough, the chief station of the Roman navy, would be the last post deserted; and a comparison of the various traditions on the subject, with the few facts that are known, would lead us to suppose that these Saxon settlers came rather as the allies of the Romans than under any other character, and that they established themselves in Thanet under the protection of Regulbium and Rhutupiæ, rather than in fear of these strong fortresses. As the support of the Roman power was tually withdrawn, supremacy in the province of Britain was left to be contended for in a confused struggle between the new Saxon settlers, the older and more civilised Romano-British population, and the barbarian Picts and Scots of the north. It is not improbable even that much of the Roman population, who had been long accustomed to fight under the same banner with the Saxons in support of their own usurpers, joined with them in this new struggle for power; the two peoples must have been long in the habit of mixing together; along the Saxon coast, the population was probably a mêlée of the two; even Roman legions in Britain consisted in some instances of Saxon, or at least of German,

even

soldiers; and when the followers of Hengist and Horsa had obtained an acknowledged right to the Isle of Thanet, their numbers and strength were soon increased by fresh arrivals from their native country. When the Roman eagle at last bid adieu to the shores of Britain, it is likely enough that Richborough and Regulbium were left in their possession, and from thence, after their occupation had been for a brief period restricted to the Isle of Thanet, they issued forth to make themselves masters of a more extensive domain, the chief seat of which was established at the Roman city of Durobernum, to which the Saxons gave the name of Cantwara-byrig, or the city of the Kentish-men, which it still retains under the slightly altered form of Canterbury. We have proofs that in the Isle of Thanet itself the Saxon settlers intermixed with the Roman population, in the circumstances which will be noticed further on, that the two peoples are found burying in the same cemeteries; and it appears that Richborough and Reculver were favourite residences of the first Kentish kings subsequently to the adoption of Canterbury as their capital. Richborough still continued to be the port of communication with Gaul.

Within the last few months Canterbury and Ramsgate have been joined together by one of those wonderful structures peculiar to modern society-a railway, and one which, from the nature of the ground over which it runs, affords as great a proportion of interesting views as almost any other line of the same length. You leave Canterbury amid the rich and varied scenery so common to the Kentish districts, and which continues until after passing the station of Grove Ferry, you touch upon the extensive marshes which separate Thanet from the rest of Kent. At a short distance further the view each way becomes more extensive, and you see at once distinctly to the left the twin towers, the only remaining portion of the monastic establishment which formerly occupied the area of the Roman fortress at Reculver, and in the opposite direction the Roman walls of Richborough. The scenery is again more picturesque as you approach Minster, and after passing that station the ground becomes more and more uneven until, within little more than a mile of Ramsgate, the railway passes through a deep cutting in the chalk hills. This hill is called Osengell Down; its old name was Osendun.

A pleasant walk of about a mile and a half brings the visitor from Ramsgate to the top of Osengell Downs, and is well repaid by the magnificent prospect it affords. It is still open ground, the only habitation being a house known by the name of the Lord of the Manor, which it bore recently as a public house, but it is now a private residence. On one side of the railway cutting the ground is covered with a crop of sainfoin, on the other a field of sprouting corn gives it a hue of brighter green; but no outward marks gave reason for suspecting that any thing lay under the surface more than is found under similar circumstances elsewhere, when the operation of cutting for the railway about two years ago led to the discovery that the whole summit of the hill is covered with the graves of the early Saxon settlers in the isle of Thanet. Within the narrow space of the railway cutting about two hundred graves are supposed to have been destroyed, and their contents were thrown heedlessly and confusedly into the immense heap of chalk and soil cleared out of the excavation, with the exception of a comparatively small number of interesting articles which found their way into the hands of Mr. W. H.