by "travel in Turkey and intercourse with the people," and comprehending the rising nationalities.

But it may be asked, is even this limited and temporary support of the Turkish power, this trusteeship for immature nations possible? Are there not too many suitors for these tender wards, not to make us fear they may be wedded to undeserving strangers under our very eyes? Perhaps not, for there is a potent influence at work, which might fight on our side," nationality is taking its place as a new power among us ;" and it may be added, that the Liberal party throughout Europe would support it, while one great Despotism at least could hardly now disown it. The danger is that we chill and alienate this power, these budding nationalities, by joining hands too long with the effete government of the Turk. For guidance in so difficult a policy, the best ambassador, the best attachés, the best consuls, the best Englishmen not Levantines, are, as Lord Strangford justly says, required to do England's work in Turkey.

Thus far as regards the "dual policy" and its adroit manipulation by the ablest men that can be selected. Something more, however, is required, something practical, to meet the sharp practice of physicians not so unselfish as England in their attendance on the sick man. On three different sides of the Turkish Empire three great powers are preparing vantageground to spring forward when the last scene of all arrives. France advances by the line of Africa and Egypt, where the completion of the Lesseps canal would give her overwhelming influence. Russia is peopling Circassia with Cossacks, and sits now in terrible strength before the open portal which leads into the centre of Asiatic Turkey. Austrian troops are being massed upon the frontier of the Principalities, and in that direction, and towards Bosnia, the German power is pre-potent. The strength of England lies in linking herself with India by the nearest bridge across Turkish territory. As England acted on India in putting down its mutinies, so might she draw support from India in a great struggle in Syria, Mesopotamia, or Egypt. For every Sepoy regiment that landed with Baird in Egypt, ten regiments of Sikhs, little, if at all, inferior to Russian or French regiments, could now be drawn from India. But the way must be prepared. It will not do to alienate Persia by coldness and indifference, and to leave her to be bribed by France with offers of the coveted shrines of Kerbela and Najuf and Kázimain. It is but a shallow policy that surrenders the Shah's army to be officered by Frenchmen and Germans, that would let Persian ships of war, manned or at least officered by Frenchmen, make their appearance in the Persian Gulf. It would be little credit

How England should prepare for that Event.

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able were a French company to get the start of English enterprise, not only with a Suez canal, but also with a Syrian, Mesopotamian, and Persian railroad.

To sum up in few words, safe and rapid communication with India, implying and including a commanding influence throughout the line, is what will give England strength to resist her rivals when the Turkish Empire breaks up. India, in fact, is at once a beacon and a support. The past history of India shows the Empire of the Moguls, resembling in many respects that of the Turks, dissolving at length from internal weakness, and leaving a few Mohammedan states, the Nizam's kingdom, for example, as the only traces of its existence. The present history of India displays to us a development of resources, and an increasing revenue, that would give England surprising strength in any new contest. To obtain paramount influence in Persia, the English Government has only to will the acquisition. English instructors would be readily received for the Shah's army, and would be what Lindsay, Hart, Sheil, and Rawlinson were before. The Persian Gulf is still completely under our control. We have treaties with all the petty states there, and it will be our own fault if we suffer the French to supersede us. A double line of telegraph will soon be complete to India. A railway from Jokenderna to Mepps and Baghdad, and from Baghdad to Jehran, worked by an English company, is the next great want. We must have an iron bridge from sea to sea between England and India. Iron links must rivet the communication. It is calculated that the new Overland Route from Ostend to Brindisi will be quicker by two days than that by Paris and Marseilles. It will be, too, on safer ground. From Brindisi to Alexandretta, and thence by rail to Baghdad, and so by the Persian Gulf to Bombay, would be a gain of five days on the route by Egypt. A railroad from Baghdad to the Mediterranean would carry off from the present route by Egypt all the passengers and much of the traffic between India and England. It would enrich the country it passed through. The Arab tribes, unmanageable by the Turks, would be peaceable with us, and in return would be enriched and civilized. Above all, England and India would be brought by this railroad en rapport, and their weight as regards Turkey would be, if not irresistible, at least many times greater than it now is.

ART. IX.-Sporting Books.

INSTINCTS are curious things. The hunting instinct is one which seems to be common to men and carnivora, but the omnivorous intellectual biped which hunts instinctively is often driven by the better half of his human nature to write a book. The book is worthy or worthless as intellect or instinct prevails in the hunter who writes. "Poeta nascitur non fit." All men are hunters, but all hunters are not poets, though some are.

As an uneducated kitten, just able to toddle, pounces on mice, and a young otter on fish as soon as it can swim, so every boy delights to chase and catch and slay mice, cats, fish, and otters. If girls be less blood-thirsty, they too make early prey of embryo-hunters, and women run each other down, and write novels to describe their sport. The last new sporting book1 which has passed from the publishers' shelves to the editor's box is not a mere record of slaughter. It is full of pictures of animate and inanimate nature, of scenes and events which have an interest for men and women with minds. The author has seen much of the world, and he has taken notes; he has published them, and he has produced an amusing and instructive book. As one of its chief merits it suggests pictures to other minds. Who that has ever been a boy can read the first picture of country life without feeling the truth of it stirring within him to make him young again? The boy joins the other old boy, and runs back with him to the hills.

With the woodcut of Skipness, in Colonel Campbell's pleasant volume, a flat Highland strand rises up as if in a magic mirror; the bright flickering sunlight of a hot summer's day makes the air quiver; the blue sea is crisped by a gentle breeze; the warm yellow sand gleams like gold; a herd of cows stand in the water, switching their tails to drive away the summer flies, and drowsily champ their jaws, while gulls and terns chatter and scream over the tiny silver fish that make their prey. A gay troop come scampering down the road and scatter over the sand. Two ladies come driving a trotting team of Shetland ponies in a phaeton, and three young savages, half naked, their kilts and flannel shirts streaming in the wind, gallop through water and over wet sand, splashing and screeching, while fish and birds flee in dismay. They are the Skipness boys as they used to be, and as one of them describes himself.

On a quiet Sunday afternoon, a stately lady and her brother, a young imp of a boy, and some terriers, pace gravely through a 1 My Indian Journal. By Colonel W. Campbell, author of The Old Forest Ranger. Edinburgh, 1864.

garden amongst the flowers. Of a sudden a terrier's tail is seized with convulsions, and his nose is into a bed of violets. The infection spreads, the hunter's instinct is roused; the boy runs after the terrier, and beats the coverts; the grown man follows helter-skelter; the lady cheers them on. From violetbed to rose-bed, from wild hyacinth to grass-tuft, dogs and men rush, barking, cheering, and shouting with glee, for the hunt is up. At last the wild whoo-whoop of the best sportsman in all wide Scotland, and the worry, worry, worry of the terriers proclaims the death-of a mouse!

The garden fades, and in its place a stackyard grows. On the top of a stack is a farm-servant unbinding thatch, and round about the yellow fortress stand a grinning army of boys. The grieve's son and the blacksmith's boys, and the keeper's boy with a game-bag, and the gardener's boy with a big shinny, and the rest of the boys, all armed with sticks. Down comes the thatch, and down come nests of young mice and rats, and all that come die. Down comes the stack, sheaf by sheaf, to be carted away to the barn, and the garrison of grown rats begin to stir. A sharp nose, long whiskers, and a pair of beadlike eyes peep out, and draw back in dismay. "Look out, lads," shouts the man with the pitchfork, and with the next toss he bolts the quarry, and off go the pack at score. Hit him!" "smash him!"" that's it, Spotty;" "weel dune!" "that yin's deid;""'od man, ye're a real slunge;" "that yin's awa;" and so on till the last stone in the foundation of the stack is turned over, and the last mouse escapes, or finds a grave in the maw of pet eagles, ravens, falcons, hawks, and hoodie-crows.

Stacks and stackyard, pets and boys have vanished and scattered, as the chaff was scattered by the wind, but the "old forest-ranger's" picture of the life of a bare-legged kilted savage, gathers the grain once more, and it grows green again in

autumn.

A river of amber, with pools of creamy froth sweeping through a brown moor, glowing with the bright purple of heather-bells in autumn, water and heather dancing and waving gladly in the bright sunlight of a summer's noon, wells up. Two lanky boys, naked as they were born, followed by a keeper, and armed with rods, wade through the shallows, swim through the pools, peer into holes and under banks, and grope under stones. There is a sudden commotion: a salmon has been found, and at it they go again with heart and soul, as if they were born. otters. They pelt the fish, they chase him, they drive him into the pool, and dive till they drive him out on the shallow, with the water flying from his back-fin and broad silver tail. At last with a wild yell of triumph the mouse-hunter pounces on nobler prey, grips a ten-pounder by the gills, and carries him

to land writhing and struggling. It was a fair fight and the naked bipeds won.

The river swells till it grows a sea. A Highland shore comes next. It is a maze of rocky islands and points, green birch woods and heather, a calm glassy ground-swell is rolling in from the wide Atlantic, the horizon is studded with white sails of big ships becalmed, the foreground is brown seaweed moving in the green sea, a round-eyed bullet-headed seal, with the sunlight glittering like a star on his wet brow, lifts his blunt nose to stare at a gull; the gull hangs his legs and his head and stares and screams in return. Both are hunting. A boat with four oars comes sweeping round the point with a steady even strong pull, the water foaming under her bows. The gull wheels off, the seal goes down stern foremost, and the boat stops at a cairn. As she touches the first stone the silence is broken by a chorus of discords made by a dozen open canine throats, all barking and screaming at once with keenness. The pack scrambles forward, falling over the thwarts, plumping into the sea, scrambling over the oars, slipping on the wet sea-weed, and in they all go with a rush. There is a pause, and then the breathless silence of expectation is broken by a muffled Yaff! yaff! yaff! far away down. "She's in;" they have her, hurrah! and out go men and boys, as the dogs went, helter skelter to join the otter-hunt. With the patience of a cat, the sportsman sits watching the hole from which the otter is to bolt. This battle is not to be won by brute force alone. Men have sent dogs to go where they cannot follow, and they are armed with weapons which they have learned to use. It is a trial of skill outside, and a furious brute battle under the stones. The collieshangie grows hot and furious, the dogs get hoarse with barking, and breathless with fruitless efforts to cram themselves into chinks. The yaff yaff is varied by shrill yells of pain, and angry growls, and mingled with the sputtering and blowing of the angry otter who is fighting for dear life. "Oh, she's cuttin' them terrible," "Bee sas," shouts the keeper; and as he shouts, a stone, which a giant would think twice about lifting, is lifted and hurled down on the cairn with a crash that shakes the rock. The thunder over head stills the row below, and the vexed otter thinks it time to move; a mass of brown fur seems to flash through the air, but the flash of the gun is swifter still, and the otter rolls over on the slippery sea ware. From every hole and cranny the pack spring, yelling, and fasten on the prey, and then it is worry, worry, worry, "bee sas;" and men and dogs growl and roar till their mouths foam. The master of the salmon has been mastered; the otter is slain by hunter's instinct and man's intelligence combined.