university course at twenty, he returned to Chambery, to be promptly raised to the rank of senator. Several years glided by in studious retirement, in the honourable service of his country, and in the tranquil enjoyment of domestic happiness (he had married Mdlle. de Morand, by whom he had three children, a son and two daughters, after his return to Savoy), when the revolutionary storm, which he had already foreseen, broke over Europe. On September 22nd, 1792, the French troops, under the command of Montesquiou, crossed the Alps and invaded Savoy, thenceforward annexed to France as the department of Mont Blanc. The next day the King Victor Amadeus III. fled, followed by De Maistre, who succeeded in gaining the valley of Aosta, to quit it four or five years later, and proceed with his family to Turin. Meanwhile a sojourn at Lausanne, where he found a temporary resting-place and a shelter from the storm, afforded him sufficient leisure to elaborate his great work, Considerations sur la France, which made its appearance in 1796, was hailed with delight by the adherents of the fallen monarchy, and raised the drooping courage of many families, victims, like himself, of the terrible Quatre-vingt-treize. "M. de Maistre," says a recent writer, “is the grand adversary of the Revolution. It profoundly troubled his life, stripped him of his possessions, drove him from exile to exile, kept him fifteen years separated from his family in that hard mission at St. Petersburgh, where his devotion to the interests of the House of Savoy brought him hardly anything from his court but humiliation and disgust. That long sojourn in Russia, in the midst of a brilliant society where, while actively advancing the cause of truth, he cultivated the most distinguished friendships, allowed him, at a favourable distance, to fix a calm and penetrating glance upon the succession of revolutionary events. The vengeance he took upon the Revolution was to consider it. He saw it marked with the seal of the Beast, and noted its true origin. His Considerations sur la France disclosed to him, in 1796, the depth of the evil, and the only possible remedy."* The book, which had the double distinction of being condemned by the Directory and praised by Louis XVIII., created a profound sensation, and made an imperishable name for the author, henceforward recognised by all whose recognition was of any value as one of the masterminds of the age. Summoned in 1798 from Lausanne, where he had made the acquaintance of Necker and his celebrated daughter, Madame de Staëlt-a thoughtful observer, like himself, of the

Joseph de Maistre, par Louis Moreau, pp. 4, 5.

De Maistre said of this remarkable woman: Ah! if Madame de Staël had been a Catholic, she had been adorable in place of being famous." Of her Considerations sur la Revolution Francaise, he says: "Nowhere has she displayed more distinguished talent, but it is the talent of evil. All the errors of the Revolution are there concentrated and sublimated. Any man who can read this work without getting angry, may have been born in France, but he isn't a Frenchman. When these kind of works will be despised as much as they deserve, the Revolution will be ended."

Revolution, but from a totally different standpoint he rejoined his sovereign, Charles Emmanuel IV., who, driven from his capital on December 10th, 1798, by the victorious French, still pursuing their conquering and aggressive march, had taken refuge in Tuscany, and finally retired to Sardinia. The same year De Maistre set out for Venice, where he remained until the expulsion of the French from Piedmont by the combined forces of the Austrians and Russians enabled him to return and fill the office of Regent of the Royal Chancellery, and other important functions conferred upon him upon his arrival at Cagliari, in January, 1800. After remaining nearly two years at Cagliari, he was sent, in September, 1802, as ambassador to St. Petersburgh, which he reached, May 13th, 1803. Here is a rapid outline of the life of humiliations and trials his Sardinian majesty inflicted upon his noble servant, sketched by the writer just quoted: "He is sent abruptly across Italy and Germany to St. Petersburgh, unique whirlpool of luxury and expenditure in Europe,' and no account is kept of the expenses of his journey. Separated for years from his wife and children, he is reduced to actual distress. His treatment is thus arranged: Madame de Maistre, left alone in Turin, sells her plate to make out her subsistence. From a lodging given up by a dentist, which he quits, unable to pay the rent, and another lodging vacated by an opera singer, he is obliged to go to the inn. He cannot appear at the Russian court fêtes, where his presence is required, for want of a coat or a decoration his gracious master obstinately refuses him. His patience and resources exhausted, he writes to the Chevalier de Rossi: 'The fates are against me. I send you a leaf of my account-book, as it is scrawled by my valet de chambre. Read this beautiful document; you'll admire the price of the slight repast I take at home. You'll tell me I have the hope of being paid in Sardinia; but what can my wife buy with a hope? If there was the least shadow of delicacy and real attachment to his majesty in that country, I wouldn't send you this letter. What! do you want to force me to quarrel all the year round for this beggarly sum? It is horrible and insupportable. I am ashamed of it, as if I were wrong. I am eaten out of house and home. Notwithstanding this sacrifice, I cannot wait until February.' They refuse him everything. Twice he sends in his resignation, twice it is refused; and he resigns himself to undergo to the last, not only the sufferings of this incredible destitution, but also all the suspicions, insults, and silly and brutal dictations which this scurvy court pours out upon the most intelligent and active zeal. At length, the Restoration accomplished, pursued by the same jealousies, harrassed by the same distrust, misunderstood by the royalty that knows neither how to reward his services, nor at least indemnify him for the entire loss of his fortune confiscated by the French Revolution, he dies, leaving his children for their sole inheritance a piece of land hardly worth a hundred

thousand francs, which a generous loan from M. de Blacas enabled him to purchase.' As a solace, however, for the treatment he received from his sovereign, he received a most flattering reception from the Emperor of Russia and his whole court, as well as the aristocratic salons of the capital, where his brilliant conversational powers, full of French grace and scholarly tone, heightened the favourable impression already produced by his Considerations. "His genius, poured out upon every subject he touched," says M. Cretineau-Joly, “left its vivid impress upon each. Possessed with the love of the true, the good, and the just. Joseph de Maistre had acquired at St. Petersburgh a position as novel as it was tranchée. Ardent Catholic, he had created it for himselfamong schismatic Greeks, who honoured his faith, esteemed his private virtues, and were proud of his genius." In this milieu, not over favourable, one would imagine, to the quiet, studious pursuit of literature and philosophy, some of his best works were written.

Recalled in 1817, the highest titles and dignities in the king's gift were conferred upon him, but he did not live long to enjoy them. Years of sorrow and suffering, and much anxious thought -an anxiety not merely personal, but allied to a profound solicitude for ne state of society in the evil days in which his lot was cast, and for the future of Christian civilization-had broken down his health; and in the midst of the sinister rumours that heralded the revolutionary commotion of 1821, which made him suddenly exclaim, when the council of ministers were debating important legislative changes, "Gentlemen, the ground trembles, and you want to build!" his great soul quitted this earth, where the jarring of petty passions and petty interests make eternal Babel, with the mournful expression upon his lips, "Je meurs avec l'Europe!" De Maistre died on the 26th of February; on the 10th of March the revolution broke out at Turin, and Victor Emmanuel I. abdicated in favour of his, brother, Charles Felix Duke of Genevois.

I reserve to a concluding paper a consideration of the general purport of De Maistre's writings, which may be very profitably studied at the present critical juncture in European affairs. R. F. O'CONNOR.

Moreau, op. cit.

Hist. de la Campagnie de Jesus, t. vi.

He had

A FEW days after Francis Percy went to New York. received a letter from the publisher of the paper for which he was to write, and it was necessary, he said, that he should go without delay. He did not show this letter to his mother nor to Clara, and neither of them asked to see it, though Mrs. Percy was both hurt and surprised at his omission. It was not, indeed, so urgent a call as he represented it to be.

As it lacked now but four weeks of the time fixed for their departure for Europe, it was decided that he should await them in New York instead of returning. There were many things for him to do besides attend to his own personal business. He had to engage their passage in the steamer which should have the best reputation for comfort and safety, and provide a number of those encumbrances which ladies fancy they cannot travel with.out. It was, on the whole, better that he should precede them, they thought, as it would enable them to go directly to the steamer from the train, on their arrival in New York; and though it was a pity that he should have to pay a hotel bill for nearly four weeks before starting, yet the journey back would perhaps cost quite as much.

The evening before starting he went out for a last walk with Clara, to pay a farewell visit to their summer haunts. But the old pleasure in them was gone. The world had rushed in with its feverish excitements and goading interests, and the cool, unhurried life of nature knew him no more. He was glad to get

VOL. II.-NO. VIII.

F

rid of it. It bored and tormented him. Yet, for Clara's sake, he tried to recall something of its former charm, and to seem, at least, to leave it with a slight regret.

She hardly noticed his omission. Overflowing with the thoughts which should also have filled his own mind-that here he had dropped the burden of his poverty and friendlessness, and taken up in their stead health and hope-she took his silence for feeling, and was content.

Their walk was a short one, as Clara would not deprive the mother of her son's society on this last evening; and the evening was a short one, as Francis had to start very early in the morning. Nearly all their talk was of business; and Clara, whose pretty brown hair covered considerable financial ability, took a very exact account of their several incomes, and arranged their plans accordingly, insisting peremptorily, however, that her aunt's travelling expenses should always be at her charge.

"You may buy your own dresses," she said. "I will not even give you a pair of gloves, if you wish me not to; but you are my mother, and all the reason why the money is not in your hands. is because I want to save you trouble. It would annoy you, I am sure, to keep accounts, and I like to. I have a very plodding little head."

"You have a very clear and lovely little head," her aunt replied, kissing her. "And you are quite right in not leaving your accounts in my hands. I know nothing of accounts, and should be sure to make the most dreadful mistakes. I know nothing, indeed, of reasonable expenditures; I have always been extremely rich or extremely poor. I either used money as if it were the leaves of a forest, or had scarcely enough to buy bread."

She said truly. Until the civil war swept away her fortune, she had lived like a princess. She went from plantation to plantation, as the whim seized her, and everywhere a crowd of slaves awaited her. Cotton fields, rice fields, sugar-cane fieldsshe only glanced them over, and knew that they and all their dusky workers were hers. Gold came to her in bright yellow rolls, and she used it with careless profusion. Silver was common and clumsy. She looked upon it as others look upon copper. It was not thrown away. It went, she hardly knew how. She supposed that it might have gone for little things, and for charity.

Then came the terrible four years, like a four years' earthquake, and when she looked about her after it was over, she knew the land no more. She did not even know herself. She had scarcely ground enough to set her foot on; and those whose necks she might have walked on unquestioned, if she had willed so, were now free men and women, and no longer at her command. There had been times when she had put her hands to her head, and tried to waken herself, or to recall her senses. It