church of their villages; whilst the smiling appearance of their country, the brilliancy of the sun, and the freshness of the atmosphere, invite them to sing the praises of the Author of all things. They march at a slow pace; the men separate from the women; the priests in the middle; the children follow behind the priesthood. When the procession is arrived at a point of land which commands the prospect below, the Curé gives his benediction to the country around, prays the Almighty to chain the tempests and torrents, the winds, and all other natural causes inimical to the fruits of the earth, intended for man's subsistence. The congregation, on their knees, listen with profound attention. As soon as the prayers are finished, the procession returns in the same order to the parish church, where the people obtain bundles of little wooden crosses, which they fix separately on their lands

"The fête days in honour of the patron saint of each village, are consecrated to prayer, and the effusion of the tenderest feelings. On these days, relatives generally assemble together; and this union of the different members of a family is considered as a sacred obligation imposed on all. A refusal to attend on such occasions, is considered as a denial of their family; and produces much injury to a man's reputation. At these festive meetings, the Corsicans arrange, in general, the marriage of their daughters, and other family matters; and talk over the politics of the island, or of the village in which they are assembled."--pp. 43, 44.

Hospitality is not the predominant virtue of countries which possess good roads, good taverns, and expeditious means of conveyance; and where the ends of commerce, or of pleasure, make travellers of a large proportion of the inhabitants. That it should exist in a high degree in Corsica, only proves that virtues will sometimes spring up where they are needed.

"To be hospitable to friends, to acquaintances, and even to strangers, is one of the first duties instilled into the mind of the Corsican; and the traveller may knock at any peasant's hut, secure of sharing the fare of its owner. He must not, however, offer his host a pecuniary recompense; for that would be considered insulting. Indeed, the duty of hospitality is here sometimes carried to a romantic extent, as the following traits will evince..

"The families of Polo and of Rocco had long entertained a violent hatred towards each other. The former resided in the village of Tosa, the latter at Orbellara. Important business called the chief of the family of Polo into the neighbourhood of Orbellara; and as he left his house suddenly, he conceived his rivals would not be aware of his journey. When about to return homeward, he learnt that emissaries of Rocco were lying in ambuscade to attack him. The day was on the decline, and darkness soon surrounded him; whilst one of those dreadful tempests arose, which are not unfrequent in the south of Europe.

"Polo knew not which way to direct his steps; each noment he expected to find himself in the midst of his enemies, to whom the flashes of lightning were so likely to discover him. Danger thus besetting him on all sides, he determined to knock at the house of his antagonist, Rocco, the chief of the family. A servant appears. "Go," said he to her, "tell your master that Polo wishes to speak with him." At this name, so dreaded by all the family, the servant trembled with VOL. II.

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horror. At length Rocco presented himself; and with a calm look, and unfaltering voice, asked Polo what he wanted of him at such an hour. "Hospitality," Polo answered; adding, “I know that many of your household are concealed in my road homeward, for the purpose of taking my life; the weather is frightful; and I know not how to avoid death, unless you afford me, for this night, an asylum." "You are welcome," replied Rocco; "you do me justice, and I thank you." Then, taking him by the hand, Rocco presented him to his family, who gave him a cold, although a courteous reception. After supper, Polo was conducted to his chamber. "Sleep in peace," said his host; “you are here under the protection of honour." On the following morning, after breakfast, Rocco, well knowing that his emissaries were watching for Polo, conducted his guest to a torrent, beyond which he might se curely proceed. They here parted; and Rocco added, as he bade his companion adieu-" In receiving you into my house, I have done my duty. You would have saved my life under similar circumstances; here then end the rights of hospitality. You have insulted me; and my hostility has been for a time suspended, but it revives on our parting; and I now declare to you again, that I seek for revenge. Escape me if you can; as I, on my part. shall be on my watch against you." "Listen," replied Polo; "my heart is overwhelmed, and my anger is extinguished. Follow your projects of revenge, if you choose; but, for me, I will never stain my hands with the blood of one, to whom I owe my life. I have offended you, you say; well, forget it, and let us be friends." Rocco paused for a moment, embraced his enemy, and a reconciliation ensued, which, extending itself to the two families, they lived afterward on the best terms imaginable."—pp. 47–50.

The violation of the duty of hospitality is sometimes terribly avenged:

"The laws relating to the conscription, are very unpopular in Corsica, and the young conscripts frequently fly to the mountains, to escape from service in the French army. The gendarmerie are employed in the arduous and dangerous service of pursuing the refugees. On one of these occasions, a conscript presented himself to a shepherd of the interior, begging for concealment. The shepherd said, "My house is at your service, but I think that of my son better adapted for your security; go to him, tell him I send you for protection " The conscript departed and was received by the shepherd's son. There the gens d'armes soon discovered him; and the old shepherd learning that his son had been treacherous to the conscript, and that he had yielded to the temptation of a bribe, went to his son's house, and his suspicions being confirmed by actual confession, he destroyed his child on the spot."-pp. 50, 51.

The Corsicans are a rare example of a barbarous and indolent people, addicted neither to intemperance nor gaming. Their women, though obliged to perform those labours from which, in other countries they are exempted, submit to them quietly enough as the common condition of their sex, and are otherwise treated with kindness. They are chaste too; the soft airs of Italy breathe over their island, but the voluptuousness of the land of singers has not yet crossed the Tuscan sea.

When Boswell visited Corsica, after lingering for some time in what he calls the "sweet Siena," the Corsican passengers who were on board the vessel in which he sailed, thought that a traveller from that effeminate land might possibly need some caution as to his conduct in their own country. They told the young Scotchman, that he would be treated there with the utmost hospitality, but that if he attempted to debauch any of their women, he might expect instant death. When Boswell had time to reflect on this admonition, he professed to find it extremely reasonable. "Better," says he, "occasional murders than frequent adulteries. Better cut off a rotten branch now and then, than that the whole of society should be corrupted."

Great fortitude in suffering is a characteristic of the Corsican character. It is a proverb among the Genoese, their old tyrants and enemies, that "the Corsicans deserve the gallows, and they do not fear to meet it." Numerous instances of heroic resolution and greatness of mind, are to be found in their history, which make us think of the days of the earlier Romans. The following anecdote shows that their courage and patriotism are not exclusively confined to the lordly sex. The writer is speaking of the mansion of the Gaffori family at Corte:

"Madame Gaffori, in the absence of her patriotic husband, was here besieged by the Genoese for several days. She possessed courage and strength beyond her sex. Although in want of provisions, she and a few followers succeeded in repulsing the assailants; but the latter increasing in numbers, a part of her little band fell in the contest, while the others, alarmed at the fate of their comrades, advised Madame Gaffori to capitulate. Reproaching their cowardice, she seized a lighted match, and hastening to one of the vaults beneath the house, which served as a powder magazine, told her men, if they stopped firing on the enemy, she would bury herself and them in the ruins of her mansion. At this conjuncture, General Gaffori arrived with a reinforcement, and saved his heroic wife and his home."-p. 31.

A taste for poetry is common throughout the island, and the works of some of the most illustrious Italian poets, treasured up in the memories even of those who are unable to read, unquestionably tend to nourish noble sentiments, and to inspire the disdain of mean vices among this singular people. Almost every peasant possesses this accomplishment. The guide who conducted Benson from Corte to Bastia, began the seventh canto of the Gierusalemme Liberata, and continued reciting for a quarter of an hour, till interrupted by inquiries about the road. Another poor Corsican, whom he met, repeated a whole poem of Fulvio Testi, the recitation of which took up at least an hour. The mountain songs of the interior, composed

by the shepherds in their solitary and contemplative occupation, and delivered down from father to son, are said to be highly interesting, and full of liveliness and spirit. Two curi ous specimens of this rustic poetry are given in the volume before us. A talent for improvisation is common among them; and the women lament at the funerals of their husbands in unpremeditated verses, which draw tears from the by-standers. The instance of Corsica is sufficient to refute the notion that the tendency of a taste for poetry is to produce effeminacy of manners; it shows, at least, that it is friendly to the cultivation of virtue. It is probably the most powerful of the causes which have prevented her from becoming as degraded as she is barbarous. The following is certainly no prosaic adventure:

"The two families of Vincenti of Monte d'Olmo and Grimaldi of Ampugnani, had long been enemies; and on the day of a solemn fête, and even in the midst of the religious ceremonies on the occasion, these families, who were assembled together, could not repress their mutual hatred. From language of reproach they broke out into open hostility; and Astolpho Vincenti, in protecting himself, discharged his musket, and dangerously wounded the eldest son of Roger Grimaldi. Rage seized the adversaries of Vincenti; and he was about to fall a victim to their fury. A house, which happened to be near, was the only means of temporary protection that presented itself; the door was open; and thither Vincenti fled. It was the identical house of Roger Grimaldi; and the family were at church, except the second son of Grimaldi, a child of eight years of age, who was asleep. The Grimaldi party rushed towards the house; certain death awaited him who should first enter the door, for Vincenti was armed, and ready to defend himself. The expedient of firing the house was proposed; but the thought of the child asleep there suspended its execution. At length the body of the wounded son of Roger Grimaldi was seen advancing on a litter. At this sight, the rage of the father could no longer contain itself. Blinded by revenge, and deaf to the voice of nature and the prayers of his wife, who clung to his arms, uttering violent imprecations, he fired his own house. Vincenti, surrounded by flames, now sought for shelter, suddenly his ears were pierced with the cries of an unhappy child; he ran towards the boy, and recognised the son of his relentless enemy. Vincenti raised his stiletto, and was about to stab the child that held out his little arms towards him. He paused a moment; compassion seized him; and clasping the child in his arms, he determined to save it, or to hug it to his breast, as the companion of his last moments. In the mean time, the conflagration increased, the roof fell in, and the beams gave way, and scarcely a hope for Vincenti remained. Gratified with the idea that Vincenti must have perished in the flames, Grimaldi betook himself to the house of a relation, where his wounded son was lying. Here the disturbed spirit of Grimaldi began to calm itself; while his wife continued to sob for the loss of her child, whose death she thought must have been shared with that of Vincenti. At length the stern Grimaldi became a participator in her sorrows; remorse seized him for the sacrifice he had made; and he was gradually worked into a state of frantic despair. At this moment the neighbourhood resounded with the name of Astolpho, With a face

blackened with smoke, and a dress evincing the dangers he had survived, Vincenti appeared, having extricated himself, with the child, from the ruins of Grimaldi's house, in the midst of acclamations from the surrounding multitude. The mother rushed to meet Astolpho, and clasped him to her bosom, calling him the saviour and second father of her beloved child. This scene melted the heart of Grimaldi. Yielding to the feelings of admiration, of gratitude, and of shame, he threw himself at the feet of Astolpho, and swore to him eternal friendship.

"This account was drawn from the statement made by Vincenti himself, to my acquaintance, M. Renucci."-pp. 73-76.

It was this singular and oppressed race of men that, in our time, has given to Europe an emperor, whose reign did more to change the condition of that continent than any political event which has happened since the irruption of the northern nations. It shook and overthrew the old Gothic institutions, and brought back, in some degree, the state of things that existed before them. The days of the Lower Empire seemed to have returned, not only in the rapidity with which the kingdoms of Europe changed masters, but in the humble origin of those who were raised to sit upon their thrones, and of those chiefs and warriors who stood around them and upheld them. The parallel to the history of that period is to be found in those times, when a Dacian herdsman, and after him, a Thracian soldier, were invested with the imperial purple. Yet, if the world must have a master, Corsica was not unworthy to give it one. That rude island was, in many respects, a fitting nurse of those qualities which lead to the summit of military glory. It would indeed be hardly possible for a settled state of society, a state of submission to the laws and of personal security, to form a proper temperament for pushing one's fortunes to such a height as Napoleon carried his; still less could we expect to see it spring up in the enervating atmosphere of courts. That constant presence of mind, that cool and quick speculation on emergencies which startled and took away the power of reflection from other men, and that incredible promptitude of expedients which he possessed, could no where be so perfectly acquired, as in a country where personal danger is a thing of course, where it besets every man from his childhood, where it lurks about his dwelling, and lies in ambush in his path, and where his vigilance, is always awake, and his sagacity always in exercise, to avert it, or to encounter it. These qualities were what such a man as Napoleon needed most, and these are, in a greater or less degree, common to every Corsican peasant. When they had received a direction in Napoleon's mind by the severities of a military education, when he had been taught to become as persevering as he was ardent,