of the play is developed, and thus it is made to arise out of an incident in a drunken brawl. Iago, himself a moderate drinker, knew how far to go, yet he could simulate sufficient enthusiasm to excite others. This misleading of the weak Cassio was an easy game, and not for a moment to be compared with his influence upon Othello; but, in its own way, it is a masterpiece, and proves how carefully, in the more finished plays, Shakespeare worked up his subordinate scenes, making them subservient to the main action. We cannot fail to notice the weakness of Cassio, conscious of infirmity, yet unable to resist solicitation. If he had possessed but a little of the strong will which Iago speaks of he would have been safe; but self-indulgence undermines the will, and easy compliance too often passes for good nature. In this sense the old proverb is true, that A good-natured man is little better than a fool.' That Cassio was acquainted with higher principles is proved by the indignation-nay, the revenge, which he denounces against himself after his fall. Here, again, was a man who knew the right but did the wrong; yet he does not seek, with Falstaff, to justify the wrong. For a time he mourns over it, though liable to fall again under a future temptation. There is all the difference in the world between a repentant sinner and a sinful penitent. A wolf howls when he is caught in a trap.

III. The introduction of stimulants among uncivilized tribes.The conduct of Christian nations towards savage races is one of the blackest chapters in modern history. True it is that the roughest specimens of our European civilization have generally been the first to come in contact with the natives of Africa or America; but the comfortable merchants at home inquired little about the interests of the savages abroad if they themselves could make money. If slaves paid, they bought them; if whiskey left a profit, they shipped it; and certainly the temptation was great. Articles of small value were sent out from England, exchanged for slaves upon the coast of Africa, and resulted in a rich cargo of rum or sugar from Jamaica. But we sometimes see retributive justice working on a large scale; and nations should learn that in the long run honesty is the best policy.

In Shakespeare's time America was emphatically a new world. The strangest reports were circulated about its inhabitants: while the spirit of the adventurer was stirred to seek the land of gold, the imagination of the poet drew gorgeous pictures of the country, and the philosopher speculated on the future destiny of colonists and natives. Considerable attention was excited by an account which was published of the shipwreck suffered by part of a squadron on the Bermuda Islands, on which narration Shakespeare is supposed to have founded his play of the Tempest; and

there

Stimulants introduced to the Uncivilized.

191

there is good reason to suppose that in the savage and deformed slave Caliban he drew a picture of the natives of the western continent, borrowing from the exaggerated descriptions current at the time. The savage is taught the use of wine by drunken fellows; and it is worth our while to follow Shakespeare in his delineation of the effects produced, remembering that the abuse of stimulants has caused the destruction of whole tribes and races of North American Indians.

Caliban, who complains that his own island has been taken from him, groans under servitude to Prospero, and wishes, if possible, to shake off the yoke. He is met by Stephano, a drunken butler, and Trinculo, a jester (Tempest, 2. 2), and begs them not to torment him. Do not torment me, pry'thee; I'll bring my wood home faster.' Stephano rejoins: 'He's in his fit now, and does not talk after the wisest. He shall taste of my bottle; if he have never drunk wine afore it will go near to remove his fit: if I can recover him and keep him tame I will not take too much for him ; he shall pay for him that hath him, and that soundly.' Here we see the two curses introduced by civilized nations among the uncivilized-drunkenness and slavery.

When Caliban has tasted the wine, he exclaims, 'These be fine things, an' if they be not sprites: that's a brave god, and bears celestial liquor; I will kneel to him.' He swears upon that bottle to be a true subject, for the liquor is not earthly. He will show Stephano every fertile inch of the island, will kiss his foot, and beseeches him to be his god :

Ill show thee the best springs; I'll pluck thee berries;

Ill fish for thee and get thee wood enough;

A plague upon the tyrant that I serve!

I'll bear him no more sticks, but follow thee,
Thou wondrous man!'

On which Trinculo remarks, 'A most ridiculous monster, to make a wonder of a poor drunkard.'

In considering the history of early discoveries it is important to inquire what the savages thought of their visitors. Many of the American natives were well disposed until they found by bitter experience that confidence was misplaced. They were amazed by the ships, the fire-arms, the equipments, and in some instances believed that the strangers were gods, who had come from the rising sun to visit them. So, too, the wine which they introduced seemed a nectar, or drink of the gods, possessed by these wonderful beings; and what wonder if, in their ignorance, they were ready to fall down and worship the possessors! This was one among the many powers which the Europeans held in their hands, and was by them abused for the vilest purposes, to win gold and to enslave the unsuspecting savages.

Caliban enters into a conspiracy with his two superiors to murder Prospero

Prospero and to regain the island. The scheme fails, of course, and at the end of the play even Caliban gains knowledge enough to see that he has been grossly deceived (5. 1) :—

'I'll be wise hereafter,

And seek for grace. What a thrice double ass
Was I to take this drunkard for a god,

And worship this dull fool!'

In spite of missionaries and all the efforts of philanthropists, very few of the American Indians have been equally enlightened: the fire-water, as they expressively term it, was too strong for them, too deadly a foe; and it has been calculated that the ravages of rum, whiskey, and other stimulants have been more destructive among the red-skins than war or disease. A hundred years ago there were about sixteen millions of Indians in North America; now there are barely two millions, and the number decreases every It is remarkable, however, that the evils of the fire-water have signally reached upon the pale faces' themselves, the descendants of those who first introduced it; so much so that, in this very America, attempts have been made to stay the plague by legal enactment. The Maine Liquor Law, as it is commonly termed, whether wise or unwise as a legislative measure, is convincing evidence that the tremendous evil has recoiled upon the introducers of stimulating drinks; for if the abuse had not reached an alarming height, the mind of man would never have thought of limiting individual action, and appealing to the interference of government.

It is surprising that Shakespeare should have touched upon a point which has had such important consequences upon the native tribes of the western continent; but it is only another proof, if proof were wanting, that the highest poet is the highest philosopher: he beholds the past, the present, and the future: the past, to see what has been, and to derive instruction; the present, to improve and make it better; the future, to divine what will be, and to speculate upon the destinies of humanity.

ART. II.-A Vindication of Secession and the South, &c. By B. M. Palmer, D.D., New Orleans. Columbia, South Carolina. 1861.

NOTWITHSTANDING the expressions of sorrow for the threatened dissolution of the American Union, with which the newspaper and other periodical exponents of English publicopinion have almost invariably set out when discussing the matters at issue between the seceding States and the National government of the Republic, the practical tendency of their remarks, with few

exceptions,

Attitude of the English Press towards the North. 193

exceptions, has been to give encouragement to the rebellious States, and to strengthen them in the belief, that, however difficult it may be for them to attain their independence, and however many reverses they may at present, and in the immediate future, experience, in their efforts to organize and establish a rival confederacy, still that, ultimately, they cannot fail to succeed.

This position of our press is not always the fruit of an avowed sympathy with the cause of the Secessionists, nor yet of dislike to the North; but arises sometimes from a misconception of the real questions at issue; sometimes from a lack of knowledge of the constitutional relations between the States and the national government; and sometimes from the tone in which the subject is approached, and the measures of the Washington administration criticised.

Some writers altogether ignore the great principles at stake, and look upon the struggle as simply premonitory of the downfall of Democracy, and as such an event to be welcomed rather than otherwise. Others, looking at the matter from an equally sinister point of view, talk of the impending dissolution as a meet recompense to the American people and government for what is termed the impudence and arrogance which have almost uniformly characterized their conduct towards Europe in general and Great Britain in particular. With two republics, we are told, we shall have more reason and less bombast. The rival nations will have enough to do in watching the movements of each other, and will both have an interest in observing a more civil demeanour towards the great powers of Europe. These insinuations, though intended to be applicable to both North and South, manifestly affect the latter but little, save in helping it in its treason, insomuch as it is the North alone which is endeavouring to prevent a disruption of the country. The accusation, therefore, in plain English, amounts to this-the Free States are seeking, through the preservation of the Union, to perpetuate an insolent and overbearing foreign policy, whilst the Slave States are endeavouring, through the destruction of the Union, to inaugurate a civil and gentlemanly diplomacy. Now whatever may be the effect upon the American people as to the mode of carrying on their foreign affairs (and it is purely speculative to suppose that any change will take place at all), should a separation of the conflicting sections occur, it is unjust to charge the North with the bad manners of American diplomatists in times past, the offending parties having pretty nearly always hailed from the South. It was not the freemen of the North, but the slaveholders of the South, and their contemptible and unprincipled organ, the New York Herald,' that made all the noise about the affairs of Central America a few years ago, and created all the bad feeling about the right of search still more recently.

It was the South which bullied Spain into selling Florida; which let loose the Fillibusterers who got up the Mexican war, and 'annexed' (including Texas and California) something like a thousand millions square miles of territory. It was the South which invaded Cuba, and attempted to revive the African slave trade. None but Southern politicians have talked of bringing 'abolitionist old England to her senses,' by cutting off her cotton supplies. Even at the present time, as if conscious of the badness of their cause, as if aware that they can expect no sympathy from the outside world, they seek to coerce England into recognizing their Confederacy' on the pain of riot and starvation in Lancashire and Yorkshire, and yet these are the people who are to be let alone! whose every demand, however outrageous, is to be conceded!

Another class of writers oppose the present war on the grounds that the policy of the Unionists is inconsistent with the principles of the Declaration of Independence;' and they tauntingly ask the Lincoln Cabinet why it refuses to accord to the Secessionists the right of self-government, claimed and obtained by the colonists from the mother-country in 1776. Such a carping spirit can have no other effect than to give offence to the proverbially sensitive people of America, more especially as the analogy attempted to be drawn between the present war and the rebellion of eighty-five years ago, fails in every essential feature. "The Declaration of Independence' exhibited a long string of grievances; but the Secession Ordinances are miserable imitations of a great original, and remarkable only as exhibiting an utter failure to point out a single instance in which the rights of the Southern people have been infringed upon by the National Executive.

As to the cause of the present troubles, it should be distinctly understood, that though there is a difference of opinion between the North and South as to whether the institution of slavery should be extended or restricted, and though there may have been a considerable amount of ill-feeling engendered between the people of the two sections by the intemperate agitations of the extreme abolitionists on the one side, and the ultra pro-slaveryites of the other, still the object of the present war is not the abolition of slavery, for the North has never on any occasion expressed an inclination to interfere with the rights of the Southern slaveholders. Indeed, the Free States have been very justly censured for their indifference in the matter, and for the manner in which they have on many occasions given their support to measures which have added to the possessions of slavedom, and increased the power of the institution in the national council. Nevertheless, we are repeatedly told that the present war is a contest between slavery and freedom; that it was the attempt of the Northern States to abolish the peculiar institution of the South, which has caused the leading

politicians