family to as much as parsimony can scrape together out of them. For people egotised by repletion of the good things of this world, rendered foolhardy by prosperity touching the permanency of human life, rarely exercise the self-denial which in the youthful rectitude of their principles they once held due to their expected offspring. They lay up their income, in short, as they lay up their leg in a fit of the gout, chiefly as a pretext for grumbling, and when too late to be of ser

vice.

The father of Lawrence Curwen married like other landed proprietors in love, with a vague sort of idea that a good estate must naturally provide for a numerous family. His flocks and herds, his beeves and southdowns, were sufficient to keep a nursery as large as King Priam's from starving; nor was it till he had two sons in coatees, and four daughters in the stocks (i.e. the dancing-stocks), that he began to reflect seriously upon parental responsibilities.

Reflection is pain and grief to a squire. John Curwen thought and thought till he thought himself ill, which under all the circumstances was the only further imprudence he had to commit. It was his business to have repented before it was too late. The result of his tardy cogitations was the curtailment of his rural pastimes. He sold off his hunters; and as he did not at the same time renounce the strong port and strong ale with which he had been accustomed to season his hard exercise, he underwent a stroke of the palsy, and after dwindling away a few months in driveldom at Cheltenham, pining after the swamps and sallows of his beloved Clayfield, died-died without a will-so that the squirearchical representative came into possession of 37401. 5s. 6d. per annum, charged only with a jointure of five hundred a year to his mother, and a sum of ten thousand pounds to be divided between the five younger children, by virtue of the marriage settlements of their improvident parents.

Mrs. Curwen, who had hitherto found her destinies run smooth as glass, without any further control over the means that made them so than the disposal of an allowance of two hundred a-year pin-money, now little more than doubled for her whole maintenance, and who during her prosperous days had enjoyed the reputation of being a charming woman, and the most affectionate of mothers, soon grew peevish and irritable from the curtailment of her means of enjoyment. She had never been taught to rely upon better things. All she fully understood was the "comforts of life," and these were gone. Nothing remained but five children, brought up to be useless, and consequently burdensome to themselves and her.

he

Lawrence was the only one of them old enough to perceive all this. He was a strong-minded, strong-hearted youth. But though he submitted cheerfully to be bound to a conveyancer, while the brother, of whom till that day he had been the friend and equal, was entered at Christchurch, he was far less resigned when, at the close of a year, found that John had formed fast friendships with other young men of fortune, while he was only a lawyer's clerk; that his mother's invitations to her now comfortless' home were few and far between; that even his sisters were gradually becoming strangers to him. His early training had not prepared him for such reverses. He had been pampered as much as the young squire. He and the girls had never been warned that the

Even when

luxurious ease in which they lived was not to last for ever. informed by his mother's trustee, a callous cousin, that he "had his own way to make in the world," he was not told that a younger son with seventy pounds per annum, must make it unshared by those joys of family affection to which he fancied himself still entitled.

Still he hoped. When John should attain his majority, he would of course do something for his mother and sisters, and assist his only brother along the thorny ways of professional life. For three years did he labour on cheerfully in this persuasion. He thought it odd that among the multitude of his father's friends, so hospitably entertained at Clayfield, who used to make him ride on their walking-sticks, and had voted him such a fine little fellow when they visited him with his brother at Eton, not one ever thought of calling upon him in his small lodgings in the Adelphi! It did not much matter; as soon as the young squire became his own master, he should be placed upon a fairer footing in society.

But alas, the first thing accomplished by John Curwen on becoming his own master was to pay off his Oxford debts, and set up a hunting establishment at Melton. The selfishness of his parents had begotten selfishness in him. Why should he care for Lawrence more than Lawrence had been cared for by his father? John was working out his destinies as a younger son. Mrs. Curwen, a respectable widow, in easy circumstances bringing up her daughters in modest competence, was very well able to assist her second son if she thought proper. He even profited by a flaw in the settlement which enabled him to defer the paying off of the children's fortunes till the coming of age of the youngest, on pretext of better security for their interests.-And Lawrence saw that in the rich man he had lost his brother!

All this, by compelling him to strive to thrive, might have turned to his advantage, but that the pampered boy was ill prepared to become the laborious man. A blight was upon his heart-the chill of mortification-the anguish of wounded affections. He was a Paria, alienated from his family, exiled from those of his own condition. He worked hard indeed, as a plant grows with a more rapid and unwholesome growth on some wall excluded from all sunshine. But he worked with bitterness in his soul. Money was to be his sole object-money, which had hardened the hearts of his kith and kin, and would harden his. He once told me all this, but I fancied he would outgrow so gloomy a view of human nature. Yesterday, however, I saw his brother step gaily from his cab at Crockford's club, and perceived that he had a crape round his hat. My mind misgave me. I inquired of the tiger who was holding his fine horse at the door, after Mr. Lawrence Curwen. He had never heard of such a person. My voice faltered, I fancy, for the lad touched his hat as he added," Perhaps you mean master's brother, sir, as was buried yesterday? Master came up from Melton, sir, a purpose for the funeral ;-but I never saw the gemman, sir, he lived summars in the city."

Poor Lawrence! I seem to see him now, with his bright face, at cricket with his brother on the lawn of Clayfield; or side by side in the old fishing boat, or with his arm round his neck, sauntering through the shrubberies. But Curwen the dandy was then only little John, while Lawrence-no matter ;-I am now going to visit his grave.

A DAY AT TIVOLI; OR, THE OLIVE RACCOLTA.

BY EDMUND CARRINGTON, ESQ.

"Me pascunt olive."-HORACE.

WELL may every country almost in Europe designate its retreats of revel, of dance, of song, and merrymaking, a Tivoli. There is scarcely a wild rustic haunt-call it rather an Arcadian haunt-in all lovely Italy even, that more invites to love it and linger over it, than the classic spot where the sibyl looked of old from her shrine on yonder height, over spirit-haunted flood, and cave, and wood labyrinth beneath and around her. We think of Horace to admire his taste in having made it his chosen abode; and dwell over those scenes with a sense of sacred pleasure, to recognise in them the same on which the lyrist's eye delighted to wander, while their present features reflect to us the picture he drew of them ages ago. Unlike many scenes that yet bloom in song, though themselves have passed away, they yet retain the charm in which nature originally arrayed them; nor were they ever viewed with greater or more varied gratification than at the peculiar season at which we visited them.

It was the period of the olive raccolta, and the whole slope as you wind upwards from the plain, where spread the wrecks of Adrian's villa, to the summit where Tivoli lies nested among its olive-crowned heights, was one busy maze of glad excitement and stir; and those echoes of the crag resounded to the rustic laugh, with voices confusedly mingled, and at intervals, to the song of the rude jester, that modern Fescennine, the licensed ribald poet, dear to the Italian genius of buffoonery. The tarantella swelled the glee of this olive "harvesthome" (as we should call it); the fairest feature of which was the swarthy beauty of the contadiné (“Sabina qualis, perusta solibus," just as Horace describes their ancestors), as they passed us to and fro, with laughing faces, happy as any bacchantes, bearing, some of them, wide wicker fans or baskets, others, the more classic earthern pitcher or vase, full of the cærulean-coloured fruit that Minerva of old loved, as much as a modern schoolboy delights in Barcelona nuts or gooseberries.

Well might the pretty savages-and some of them brought here for the occasion, from beyond the mountains, might indeed be called sowell might they smile, since they saw they were admired. Many of them went carolling along with their welcome burden, having their glossy black hair fantastically twined with sprigs of olive. Others, colonists as it would appear, from the far north-western border, wore the little straw "platter," rather than hat, with its fanciful ribbons, and wild flowers streaming in a bunch from behind it, where it glittered, just stuck on at the back of the head. A damsel of Sarzana or Carrara would have felt herself at home to see it. Others, again, were witnessed here and there, whose round black hats, overshadowing keen piercing eyes and sharp features, bespoke the stray denizens of the Firentine territory; and exhibited a costume the least agreeable, because the least feminine of any that we observed. The fair Perru

gian, and the damsel of the Roman campagna, wore their jet bright luxuriant locks plaited into a thick coronet at the back of the head (this old Roman fashion, may still be seen, by the bye, in the antique female busts in the Florentine gallery), and skewered with a huge pin headed with an enormous silver ball. Some, more profuse of finery— daughters of some richer padrone-exhibited massive pendants at their ears, of a sort of copper-alloyed gold, hanging quite down to their polished, sun-embronzed shoulders.

It was a fair and grotesque as well as festive "phantasmagoria" that floated backwards and forwards before our eyes, as we sat midway in the slope on a little myrtle-tufted green knoll, where the lizards, blueand-green-tinted, darted from out the rustling bushes at one's feet to bask on the warm bank in the sunbeams.* We were therefore in a good situation to view the workers in the olive-harvest as they passed by, some to gather, some to carry away what was gathered. These wilder scenes, too, of happiness, ever and anon challenged us to look towards the spot where the laughter-shout and carol told of circles, here and there, that had foregone the not unwelcome toil, to indulge in an interval of revel, and steal an hour to do due honour to the genius of Tarantella,

The dance took its jocund course; and amongst the musical rude strains, we recognised those of the bagpipe, to the delight of a gentleman from North Britain, who was one of our party, and who was antiquarian enough to cite Walter Scott upon its introduction into Italy. Other less renowned authors too were cited by him, while he added his regrets that the bagpipe had (comparatively speaking) long been mute in its original land, the Highlands; and that Highlanders nowadays, were not the Highlanders of old. If the bagpipe is ever to be heard to advantage, it is amidst the wild echoes of mountain-crag and valley, where the harsh discord of its strain becomes softened through space, and rendered pleasing from associations connecting its barbarous notes with the savageness of the scenes around. We were all well pleased with the effect, which was aided on the present occasion by tambour, pipe, and horn; and castanets rattled merrily away, and the wild glee of the male dancers outpoured itself, every now and then, in a 'whoop" that would have done credit to the most jocund soul in an English fox-chase! Not those winged rubies, the crimson-glittering flies that played "see-saw" on the slant sunbeam before us, seemed to possess greater happiness in the mere feeling of existence alone, than those happy revellers: for to exist seemed to be happy! Fruits, polenta, cheeses of goats'-milk, the flesh of the kid, and cinghiale, made up a banquet fit for a whole college of cardinals! Flasks of a beverage made from the juice of various fruits, and with a mixture of Tossoglio in it, served as an accompaniment to the feast. Nor were flasks, too, of the loftier beverage, the grape of the Orvietto, wanting. Hilarity was quaffed in at every goblet; and as quickly did the heart outpour it again in many a jest, and song, and merry tale, connected with past happy meetings at the olive raccolta. And bright black eyes beamed brighter, and lit up those olive-shadowed recesses, with lustres that shone, so many lamps of jet, to show the way to Love!

* See Horace, Od. xxiii. Lib. I. v. 6.

As we contemplated so much of life's content in the scene before us, we forgot the miserable beggarly condition of the humbler classes, too often witnessed through the Romanian and pontifical dominions; and felt that, at least, we could bear testimony to the freedom of one spot from the taint of squalidness and destitution. Some of us, indeed, had felt the effects not too agreeably of that "valiant beggary," as our old English documents call it, which, while it pretends to beg, asks alms in a tone of surly significance that implies it will not be denied.

We began about this time to find, amongst other palatable matters, our appetites! It would have been strange, if we did not, considering the example of "jollification" that was being set us by our friends of the olive-harvest.

Out with the Diamante! Come Mr. North Briton! since you were charmed with the bagpipe just now, perhaps you will be willing to put up with this choice libation as not inferior to your own Glenlivat ! For our parts, however, not to speak of any better quality of wine or liqueur, we would rather mix us in due "Ambrosian fashion," a noggin of Glenlivat, or rare Farintosh dew of the mountain, than quaff such a liquid gem as this! Diamante indeed! the "diamond" is "sham," and its name a "puff!"

In vain, too, do the " lacrymæ di somma," or "Christi" weep for us! We cannot yield them "tear for tear!" In other words, their tears are lost on us; and we are afraid we must remain pertinaciously dry rather than empty a flagon of them. We would sooner cool our lips with a draught from yonder living fountain, gushing so transparently, so musically too, from the rock near us! The cellar of Italy indeed, whether north or south, has little wherewithal to warm us in its praises. What! have you Asti there? What have we to say to this? We'll tell you when we've tasted it. There! Why, the utmost we can say of "Asti" is, that it rhymes with "nasty," and so far would suit a British improvisatore.

16

We speak of the red kind: the golden-coloured is far better: and there is something so pleasing to the eye in it, that, like a child that longs to pluck a plum with its azure bloom from the stem, we cannot resist raising a cup of it to the lip. And what next, pray? Falernian? Pray, put that apology for Falernian" on one side! Would that the spirit of Horace could rise amongst us, and pronounce whether this modern shadow of the wine he loved, is in any way worthy of the name of those "Falernæ vites" that inspired, together with Cæcuban and Chian wine, his song! What have we to say for the dews of the Florentine grape? Albeit the stuff itself is "roba dolce," poor" sweet stuff," yet its colour is lively and truly nectareous! The brilliant mellow purple or violaceous lustre of its hue would set old Silenus leering at it with an involuntary chuckle as he held up the crystal bowl through the translucence of which blushed its rosy gleam!

Willingly then resigning all the above specimens of the Italian cellar to such of our thirsty friends as may be content to quaff them, we will address ourselves for our own particular recruital (and recommend the reader to join us) with a "smack" of the Muscat bouquet which the Montefiascone so agreeably yields. Of this peculiar bouquet, a soft and pleasing soupçon may be obtained from the Frontignac grape; or, in truth, from the old hautboy strawberry-not the more modern libel