bation of the Alabama Convention on our the object of which was to determine whethpart is a considerable concession of English er law had been infringed by considerations dignity, and a triumph for their national directed to prove that, whether it had been power and their diplomatic skill, - which infringed or not, feelings had been grievto us seems the natural view, but rather ously injured. that to submit to plead against us at all on equal terms before an arbitrator, to submit even as much as that we have a case to plead, is a great descent on their parts. They would rather lose all the advantages of the Convention than consent to reason with us as to any legal defence for what we have done; a legal defence might seem like a moral defence, and in that case our success would be a double humiliation. They would rather wrap themselves in the cloak of offended dignity and leave us to suffer, - probably they over-estimate the suffering, from the fear that if ever we are involved in war again, America will return upon us our own play, and so obtain redress, or at least revenge.

We believe this to be the real state of mind indicated in Mr. Sumner's speech. Indeed he indicates it clearly enough when he complains that no apology of England for her wrong-doing is affixed to the Convention as we have affixed to former conventions, when we have admitted our own wrong-doing beforehand. To which we might reply, how apologize for what is to be sub judice, for what may prove to be legal innocence? The Convention was never intended to appreciate and heal sentimental wrongs on either side of the Atlantic. It was a convention for determining what legal obligations were due on either side and for satisfying them. But this reply is not really to Mr. Sumner's point, because Mr. Sumner entirely ignores the legal doubts to be resolved, and insists that we are absolutely out of Court; that we have no case to plead; that we are rather insulting America afresh by asking for a fair hearing, when we ought clearly to begin by admitting our guilt and submit to arbitration only as to the question of damages. If we had paid a few millions into Court with a humble apology, then Mr. Sumner might have been satisfied to admit a convention to decide whether those few millions were or were not enough; whether they ought or ought not to be made many millions. But nothing short of that would satisfy the demands of his speech. It seems to us, we confess, a womanish speech, mixing up matters of feeling with matters of law, and inveighing against a convention,

It seems to us that after this reception of our overtures the time has come when Great Britain will act most wisely in letting this matter alone, and leaving the United States to make the next move if they wish. The time for an impartial discussion of our legal liabilities cannot be come when a body of men of business so acute as the senators of the United States act in this weakly, susceptible, and sentimental fashion. And when it is come we shall know from their own mouths that it is so. Doubtless we must remain in that terrible uncertainty, on the awful nature of which the United States seem to plume themselves, whether when next we get into a war we may not have Alabamas swarming out of American ports, or worse still, an American foe to meet in Canada in addition to the European foe. We do not at all dispute that such a prospect is unpleasant; but we do clearly see that we shall not in the least avert it by hurrying negotiations or evincing any reluctance to wait. We are not by any means proud of the part the English middle-classes played during the American civil war. It was no doubt somewhat of an ignorant and a jealous and an ungenerous part. But this is not the point at issue. We believe that our Government with the exception at least of one very doubtful case were sincerely and scrupulously neutral; and this is the only thing for which our Government is still responsible. We have done what we could to make concessions which might clear up this one doubtful point. We have been repelled with very unreasonable and almost unintelligible disgust. It is the turn of the United States next. Whatever risks we may run in leaving the matter unsettled, they are no greater than we have often run before, and less than would result from undignified anxiety to bring matters to a conclusion. The fault of the misunderstanding now lies at the door of the Government of the United States, and as soon as it is aware of this we shall be as ready as ever to take the matter up with candour and good temper. Till then we hope our Foreign Office will have the good sense to act on Lord Melbourne's policy of "Can't you let it alone?"

freedom and right in our Cabinet were paralyzed by Mr. Seward's despatch. If he told them that the President willingly admitted that he had no right to conquer the South, how could they deny that when he tried to do it the South had a right to resist him? Well may Mr. Seward now wish to close the discussion, if to open it will fix upon him the chief blame of that recognition of belligerency which Mr. Sumner justly treats as the primal cause of mis

chief.

sider the normal standard of a Parisian œuvre de luxe. Almost every page brings before the eye some illustration of the rich scenery of the tropics or some characteristic type of native physique or manners, executed in M. Riou's highest style from the writer's sketches, or engraved directly from M. Marcoy's own drawings. The letterpress, enhanced by paper of the finest tone, forms a triumph of typographical taste and skill. We would, however, by no means be understood to point to M. Marcoy's Journey across South America as simply an ornament for the drawing-room. It is no mere album of the gorgeous landscapes, or of the singular native models, of Brazil or Peru. The author, while keenly alive to all that is picturesque in

Mr. Sumner, alas! has plenty to say against us but unless the Hon. John Jay misquotes the despatch, I no longer see how a reasonable man could expect a government constituted like ours, and accustomed to technical routine, not to declare the combatants equal, when the President nature or piquant in humanity, and gifted had volunteered to tell them that he believed that he had no right of coercion. The American people at last, step by step, brought their Government round to a sense of its duty and dignity, says the Hon. John Jay. Well, so did our people, happily, at last, bring our government round. Adversity taught Mr. Lincoln, and a sense of danger taught Lord Palmerston, a lesson. Mr. Sumner also unavailingly asks for expressions of regret and contrition. Without a total change of men in power, such expressions could not be sincere. Surely Mr. Sumner cannot desire hypocritical words. Are we once more to show ourselves a very excitable nation, on discovering that an ambassador who was always in heart and policy with the South has not negotiated according to the desires and sentiment of the North? I hope better things.

F. W. NEWMAN, Clifton, Bristol.

From The Saturday Review. A JOURNEY ACROSS SOUTH AMERICA.*

M. MARCOY'S splendid record of a recent journey from the Pacific to the Atlantic, through the whole breadth of Peru and Brazil, is a work which must be seen in order to be appreciated. It is impossible by mere analysis or description of their contents to do justice to the two handsome, not to say sumptuous, volumes which transcend even what we are accustomed to con

with the artist's power to set each and all in their most striking phases before the reader's eye, shows himself no less competent as an observer of all that appeals to the reason and arrests the thoughtful attention of the traveller. We find him careful, while delineating the bold outline or dazzling summit of the Cordillera, or catching the wild grace of the semi-savage of the Pampas, to note and generalize the geographical or geological phenomena of those varied regions, as well as to store up and reduce to system the facts, whether of observation or of popular tradition, bearing upon the condition, the origin, or the history of their multiform population. The result of his ardent and philosophical pursuit of knowledge and adventure is to enrich our literature with a mass of matter imperfectly, if at all, accessible heretofore, embodied too in a form suited in a peculiar degree to attract and even fascinate every reader who is susceptible of the impressions of art.

Few countries are less known to the ordinary public than the rich regions of the Southern continent of the New World stretching from the Pacific to the Atlantic seaboard. Humboldt's bold and scientific researches have been the chief means of bringing within our reach what little we know of the physical marvels or the mine of ethnological study which those vast tracts are capable of yielding up. The historical problems which underlie the quaint traditions or the mysterious monuments of the land await much of their solution, after all that we owe to the magnificent work of Lord Kingsborough and M. Dupaix, or after all the labours of comparative philologists or students of ethnology like Blu

Voyage a travers l'Amerique du Sud, de l'Ocèan Pacifique a l'Ocean Atlantique. Par Paul Marcoy. Illustré de 626 vues, types et paysages, par E. Riou, et accompagné de 20 cartes, gravées sur les dessinsmenbach and Pritchard. Since the time de l'auteur. 2 tom. in-fol. Paris: Hachette et Cie. 1869.

when the strange and mystic civilization of

the Incas struck the lively imagination of Cortes and his fellow pioneers, not much has been done to lift the veil which hides the source of that most singular of races, and to refer them by their relations of blood and speech to their proper place in the comparative genealogy of nations. We welcome, therefore, whatever means of information can be added to our slender stock, whether by the studies of philologists or by the personal observations of travellers as energetic and intelligent as the writer before us.

round the body, and descends to the knee. Hair of prodigious length and thickness, of a jet black, which once adorned the head of a sinner of that city, brought by unexampled orgies to an early tomb, floats from the Redeemer's temples in wild locks, blown about by the wind. This exuberant chevulure was presented to the cathedral Chapter, as an expiatory offering, by the father of this Magdalen, an intendant of police well known to the author. The strange emblem is borne upon a platform upon the shoulders of thirty cholos, ragged In no other portion of the globe perhaps and shoeless Indians. Invisible springs is the contrast more strongly marked be- give its members an incessantly trembling tween the artificial habits and modes of life motion. Wax torches in numbers burn imported from Europe and the primitive around it, and bunches of flowers are flung manners of the children of the soil. In by women in its face. Thousands crowd Peru, Chili, or Brazil, the traveller has for the honour of supporting or even touchonly to pass the city gates to find himself ing the sacred burden. The bearers are in contact with Indian tribes as rude or hustled, beaten, their hair wrenched from quaint in aspect, customs, or belief as those their heads, but stoutly they battle for the which greeted the gaze of Cortes or Piz- privilege which is to bring them ten years' arro. It is chiefly with the aboriginal pop-remission of sins. Other images precede ulation that M. Marcoy seems to have felt the crowning glory of the day the Holy sympathy, and it is with a feeling of relief Mother, in court dress of amazing cumthat he passes from the flimsy convention- brousness and splendour, and wearing a alities, the tasteless fashions, or the coarse golden crown, a gigantic ruff, and a vast orgies of the capital, to the free and pictur- jewelled fan; San Josef, bearing the insig esque life of the Pampa, and the teeming nia of his craft; San Cristoval, bearded and banks of the Amazon. Landing from Liv- filleted with Assyrian pomp, carrying a erpool at Islay, the port of Arequipa, he lofty palm; San Benito, whom the crowd gives us a rapid but graphic sketch of that receive rather coldly, taking the reverend chief city of the earthquake zone, anticipat- Abbé to have sprung in a straight line from ing by a year or so the terrible visitation Ham, the son of Noah. First in order is which has since left its permanent impres- seen San Blas, the patron saint of the chief зion upon the whole length of the South faubourg of the town, in aspect and cosPacific seaboard. A striking evidence of tume a precise facsimile of the traditional the action of this element of fear upon the Richard III. of our stage. A winged angel popular mind is seen in the curious proces- holds a parasol of pink silk over the saint's sion of nuestro Señor de los temblores, which head. After two hours' circuit of the city forms one of our author's most dramatic the heated and panting concourse reaches pictures of Peruvian life. On Easter Mon- once more the cathedral gates: day, the great image of Our Lord of the Earthquakes makes its tour of the capital, among a frenzied throng of ten thousand struggling devotees. This lifelike ancient effigy, originally sent by Charles V. in a caravel from Cadiz, has never had its primitive colours retouched by a profane brush. The gigantic crucifix of which it forms the principal figure is made of a huge block of oak. Time, dust, the combined smoke of incense and candles, and the irreverent handling of the monks, have turned the brilliant flesh tints to a dirty red. The blood with which the idol is liberally bespattered from head to foot has assumed the hue and texture of bitumen, relieved with patches like those of a panther's coat. In place of the usual waist-cloth, a kind of petticoat of coloured silk is tied by a sush

Le Christ des tremblements est resté seul dans le parvis, entouré de dix mille Indiens qui l'interpellent dans l'idiome local. Ou vas-tu? lui crie-t-on de tous cotes; reste avec nous; n'abandonne pas tes enfants! Les porteurs de la litière impriment un movement de gauche à droite, et vice versa, à l'image, qui semble répondre aux fidèles par une négative. - Ingrat! Dieu sans entrailles! reprend la foule en pleurant à chaudes larmes; tu vas donc nous quitter jusqu'à l'an prochain?. - L'image du Christ fait un signe affirmatif. d'une seule voix l'immense cohue. La porte Eh bien, va-t-en! hurle centrale s'est ouverte à demi. Les porteurs de l'image vont se glisser par l'entre-bâillure, mais la foule s'attache à eux et la grande porte est fermée de nouveau. Après quelques minutes de cette étrange lutte, cette même porte se rouvre à deux battants, et la litière du Christ,

poussée par un flot furieux de têtes humaines, the Acolhus, the Tlastlecs, and the Aztecs,

disparait dans l'église. Le désespoir de la foule éclate alors en crescendo final, les femmes jettent des cris aigus et tiraillent leur chevelure, les hommes hurlent et déchirent leur vêtements; les enfants, effrayés par la douleur de leurs parents, piaillent d'une façon lamentable, et les chiens, renchérissant sur le tapage, aboient avec

fureur.

who in the early centuries of our era occupied New Spain. These tribes in turn traced back their religion, their architecture, and their customs, including the peculiar method of noting dates by their QuiOlmecs and Xicalanques, two powerful pus or variously coloured threads, to the races of immense antiquity. Driven out by From Arequipa to Cuzco the traveller's the Incas, the Aymaras dispersed, partly route lies over the lofty passes and glaciers towards the Pacific, where they mingled of the Andes, of which an impressive pano- with the fish-eating tribes of the coast, rama is given by our artist. Striking near partly into the vast sierras of the interior. this point the head waters of the Amazon, Two hundred thousand of these aborigines he followed downwards the course of that are computed to survive at this day, tomightiest of rivers to its outfall into the wards the Bolivo-Peruvian frontier and the Atlantic. In the terrible drifts and storms seven departments of Upper Peru. The of the Sierra Nevada the traveller meets with great ossuary or burial plains of the Aymabut rare and rude halting posts, such as the ras, the discovery of which M. Marcoy lonely hut we see figured at Huallatá. Often claims for his party, lies four leagues southhis sole refuge lies in the rude but solidly-east of Islay, in the centre of the zone wrought tombs of the old Aymaras. The of trachytic ashes which extends from that history of this early race offers an interest-part of the entrance of the valley of Tambo. ing, though in many respects a vague and The mummies are found in groups huddled indecisive, chapter in the ethnology of the together in their pyramidal tomb of rock, Western continent. When the Children of the knees touching the chin, and the head the Sun came to establish themselves in exposed. The head is flattened in the manPeru, they found the great Aymara race in ner usual with all these tribes, and this is possession of the wide plateau which extends to be depended upon as a distinctive mark from Lampa to the confines of the Desagua- of their common origin. In most of these dero, comprising, under the name of Collas, huacas ears of maize have been discovered, the region of the Punas to the east of the together with traces of chicha, the popular Western Andes. This district, some ninety liquor distilled from the same cereal, at the leagues in length by thirty in breadth, bottom of the rude jars of clay lying by the showed here and there temples and other side of the corpse. In tombs of the Incasic monuments of an advanced civilization more period, greater art of construction is apparor less in decay. The then existing Ayma-ent. Vases of terra cotta, bizarre, yet ra inhabitants assigned these to a very highly artistic in form, are met with in abunearly date, and to the Collahua race from dance. The architecture, which is well ilwhom they themselves claimed to have lustrated in M. Marcoy's pages, passes sprung. This race, which came from a dis- from the rude cyclopean layers of an early tant source north of Peru, and spread over date to the regular courses of squarely the high plateaux of the interior, left the wrought masonry. Sketches of such temtrace of their name in the existing coast ples as have survived the pillage of three town of Callao. Together with the secret centuries, as well as of the curious fortressof hieroglyphic painting, they brought with es, sometimes circular in shape, sometimes them a singular cosmological legend. Be- suggestive of Egyptian types of structure, fore the present sun, four other luminaries give a clear idea of the state of the arts in in succession gave light to the firmament. reference to worship and warfare in the The first of these suns was extinguished by palmy days of the Incas. It is deeply inan inundation, the second by an earthquake, teresting to see still facing each other in the the third by a general conflagration, and streets of Cuzco the massive but irregular the fourth by a hurricane in which all living stonework of an age of prehistoric antiquiforms perished. Total darkness next en-ty, and the trim but monotonous lines of the veloped the world for twenty-five years. In the midst of this universal night a man and a woman were created, for whose behoof the great Master kindled the fifth sun, which had already been formed a thousand years. The system of cosmogony based upon this curious fiction was common to the Toltecs, the Cicimecs, the Nahuatlucs,

mason of to-day. To the artistic eye of our traveller the heterogeneous group of domes and spires, intersected by long straight avenues and vistas, presents in a quaint panorama" the old capital of Manca Capac revised, corrected, and augmented, but little embellished, by Francisco Pizarro."

M. Marcoy's stay at the capital of Peru