and darkness as ever; but I am naturally glad to fly from the perplexities of sympathy, to bewilder myself awhile in the undefined and undefinable difficulties of its opposite. Were antipathies entirely confined to human nature, it might be more ashamed of itself than it has reason to be, considering the actual state of the case. For, sharing as it does its uncontrollable aversions in common with all things animal and vegetable, as well as with the meaner productions of nature, it may console itself in the certainty that these repugnances are quite inseparable from moral as well as material existence, in its most sublime as well as its lowest gradations. Pliny, at the head of the naturalists, points out the animosity existing between stones, even as well as minerals and metals. The diamond, he remarks, is in dissension with the loadstone; while a particular stone of Ethiopia, which he specifies, repulses iron with as much force as the magnet attracts it. Among minerals and metals, gold and mercury unite together with an ardour equal to human friendships; while others oppose and fly off from their associates in the crucible, with as much sputtering and asperity as might be found among the whist-players of the most romantic and unsophisticated village in England. It is the same with plants. The vine has its peculiar attachments and enmities. It can live on excellent terms with the elm, and twines round the appletree with the most insinuating fondness; but the vicinage of a cabbage is mortal to its comfort, and sometimes even to its existence. It is unnecessary to swell the list of vegetable animosities; but let us look for a moment at animal dislikes. We can all understand the feelings that impel the sheep to shun the wolf, or the dove to fly from the kite. It is as needless to ask why, as to demand a reason for the rich man's shrinking from a doctor, or one in health from an attorney. But how are we to account for the terrible lion trembling at the crowing of a cock-the ponderous elephant waddling off at the sight of the ramor the valiant war-horse shuddering at the odour of the camel? These are the extraordinary facts that force us into the mysteries of occult research, and the study of natural sympathies and dislikes. There can be no doubt that the secret in these instances, where the antipathy is possessed by the whole of one genus against the whole of another, consists in some mystery of organic construction, that we may indulge a hope of seeing one day discovered by Doctor Gall, for the elucidation and developement of his theories of amativeness and combativeness, and the confusion of the sceptics all over the world. To conquer these antipathies is rather the business of custom than reason, another proof of our imperfection, stamping us too plainly "things of habit, and the sport of circumstance." We should, nevertheless, labour to overcome them, and throw ourselves in the way of the best remedies we can find, meeting as often as possible the persons we dislike on the most unreasonable grounds-as manner and appearance, the cut of their coats, or the colour of their eyes. We should read, too, not exactly treatises or sermons, to prove the absurdity, of which we are all sensible, but powerful delineations in poetry or prose of the dangers attending our malady, as well as overdone exhibitions of its effects for ridicule and caricature are weapons as effective against prejudice, as is wisdom. Who that has read Miss Baillie's "De Montfort" has not shuddered at the possible excess to which he himself might be led by a wanton or irresistible enmity? Or who, on the other hand, has not started back in surprise and indignation to find that the hatreds of men seem to justify a malignant writer like Helvetius in uttering such a sentiment as this: "Men love their grandchildren, because they see in them the enemies of the grandchildren of their enemy." Such writers as the two last cited serve, in their most opposite objects and styles, to help us towards the cure of unprovoked personal antipathies, respecting which alone it is worth while to take any trouble--and with them, after all, not half so necessary as with ill-regulated sympathies. Once again, then, I beg to warn my fair readers, who have gone with me thus far, against every yearning they may feel toward such general objects of sympathy with their sex as red coats, ogling eyes, pieces of poetry, Waterloo ribbons, fine speeches, and mustachios. We have all our weaknesses; and who may tell how many of the ten thousand lovely girls, ascertained by nice calculation to read monthly every line of this work, are at the moment of cutting open this identical page, on the point of yielding to some one of those treacherous sympathies just now enumerated? Who knows that this warning against these perilous sappers and miners may not make her repulse their next approach, "Like the plant whose closing leaves do shrink At hostile touch?" Aware of the efficacy of a sly hint, in cases where many a set discourse may fail, I shall not farther press the topic, always liking to do good, as it were, by stealth. And to remove every thing like gravity from the minds of readers, gentle or simple, I will wind up the whole by mentioning the most profoundly ludicrous point connected with the subject, in its most extended meanings and applications. This is the theory of national antipathies,-a monstrosity gravely contended for in "the good old times," and affording matter to a sapient writer in the seventeenth century, for a goodly treatise on the delectable doctrine. This worthy was a Spanish doctor, by name and title Don Carlos Garcia, who published, at Rouen, in 1627, a book entitled Antipatia de los Franceses y Espagnoles. This furnished materials, some time afterwards, for a tract on the same subject by La Mothe le Vayer, whose object was to nourish the dislike then subsisting in France against Spain; and he hoped, by arguments or assertions like the following, to convince his countrymen that this feeling was not less national than natural. "The Frenchman is tall, the Spaniard short; the one has the skin generally fair, the other dark; the Frenchman eats much and quickly, the Spaniard sparingly and slow; the Frenchman serves the boiled meat first, the Spaniard the roast; the Frenchman pours the water on the wine, the Spaniard the wine on the water; the Frenchman speaks freely at table, the Spaniard does not say a word; the Frenchman walks after dinner, the Spaniard sits still or sleeps. The Frenckman, in order to make a sign to any one to come to him, raises his hand and brings it towards his face, the Spaniard, for the same object, lowers his, and motions it towards his feet; the Frenchman kisses a lady on saluting her, the Spaniard looks on such a liberty with horror; the Frenchman esteems the favours of his mistress in proportion as they are known, the Spaniard values nothing so much as secrecy in love. The Frenchman wears his clothes of one fashion, VOL. V. No. 30.-1823. 65 and the Spaniard of another, which, taken from head to foot, are totally unlike. The first puts on his doublet after all the rest, the second commences to dress himself by that; the Frenchman buttons himself from the collar to the waist, the Spaniard begins at the bottom and finishes at the chin. The Frenchman reduced to want sells every thing but his shirt; it is the first article that the Spaniard disposes of, keeping his sword and his cloak till the last extremity." Such is the serio-comic absurdity by which the French and Spaniards were taught to believe in national antipathies two hundred years ago. By means as criminal and still more monstrous are those two gallant nations spurred up to enmity to day. But I must avoid the serious mood; and in place of the outpourings of my own indignation, give the opinion of Bayle on such atrocious doctrines as this. "All those antipathies which are pretended to arise from diversities of temperament and customs, and which their apologists endeavour to represent as incurable, as mere chimeras. Leave to neighbouring nations their differences of manners as of climate, but give them a reciprocity of interests and institutions, and you will soon see how closely they will sympathize together!" And now I bid adieu to my subject and my readers, by asking in the words of honest Jack Falstaff "Would you desire better sympathy?" G. ITALY TO SPAIN. FOR Spain that crush'd the infidel The hour that shall be kept for aye Now draw your sword again! and The scabbard far away, And naked bear the blade in hand, Naked as the right it guards, Stand close, stand close, and fear them Remember where you stand- Remember what you stand for there, And all it yet should be. For all it clothes in bliss and bloom The smiles and tears, the hopes and It shades and sanctifies; For home and hearth, and children's For renovated mind, For Spain, and all mankind! And oh! for me, the trampled one! Among the nations of the earth A slave beneath my own blue skies, The love and laugh, the grace and And pity of the world. For me, for me! I raise myself Within my summer bowers— I raise myself, and look to you, When first it comes o'er cloud and And they are tempest-worn. Strike-smite! and though I can but My prayers and curses now, THE LAST OF THE O'NEILS. "Ultimus Romanorum." THE description of real life, and of civilized manners and characters, seems to fall within the province of Prose-writers, while Poetry appropriates to herself the romantic, the wild, and the barbarous. But her delineations are often so unfaithful, she is so prone to sacrifice truth to her great objects of exciting admiration, and presenting what is sublime or pathetic, that it becomes needful to expose her exaggerations and partialities. How egregious have been the misrepresentations of the pastoral poets! how sadly have they duped the luckless wights, who, enraptured by their glowing descriptions of rural felicity, have extricated themselves from their happy urbane occupations, to endure a total wreck of happiness in a country solitude! Since Johnson, however, in his lordly prose, has rebuked those quacks and deceivers, they have been less successful in imposing upon the credulity of mankind; and it is pleasant to remark, that since his time this wicked species of poetry has had few or no cultivators. But, then, there is another criminal class of poets, who up to the present hour carry on their operations with unabated vigour and resolution. These dishonest gentlemen are in the habit of delineating cut-throats, robbers, and savages, as the most noble and amiable of the species. The criminality of one poet, in this respect, has been so flagrant that his offences will immediately occur to the mind of every reader, while the Corsair, the Giaour, and half a dozen other of his heroes, rise in review. The Autalissi, also, of a certain poet, who shall be nameless, may be remembered as represented (though a mere Indian barbarian, who, it may be averred, had never heard a sermon, or been taught so much of Mrs. Barbauld or Mrs. Trimmer, as any of our own children ten years old) to have demeaned himself with a dignity, and to have been inspired with such pure and noble sentiments, as would do honour to the most civilized creature of Europe. The sins of another popular writer are, if possible, yet greater. We have in one work an old drunken harper (who would undoubtedly have fallen within the strict letter of the vagrant act, and been committed by the mildest justice that ever presided in Marlborough-street) depicted as a most venerable and engaging personage. In another work, we have a termagant Highlander-but there is no end to the evil of those fine ballads which go by the name of " Sir Walter Scott's poetical works." And in those other works, which (whosesoever they be) do not go by that title, but are yclept "Novels, by the author of Waverley," being in truth a species of poem without metre, if the philologist will allow the description, the deceptions practised on the novice in human nature are manifold. In the gallant Rob Roy, who, that did not know what a cow-stealer is, could recognize an object fit for the gallows? And who in the courteous Cleveland could discover a worthy mate for the three pirates, who, with the help of iron chains, harlequinade it in the air on the banks of the Thames, opposite the Isle of Dogs? The representation of Tom and Jerry has not been productive of half the damage to Charlies and Jarvies, that such delineations of human character may occasion to the artless and inexperienced. But I despair of bringing poetical delinquents to a proper sense of their errors, and must con tent myself with only letting the reader peruse the following true, full, and particular account of "The Last of the O'Neils," in which may be found some antidote to the pestilent potions of those who dole out the waters of Helicon. Of the sept of O'Neil there were several distinct tribes that of Tir Oen, that of Clandeboy, and that of the Fews. 1 believe that of the two first no direct descendants survive: the peer who bears the name, springs from a collateral and inferior branch of the Clandeboy O'Neil. I am to narrate the fate of the present representative of the third. : To the west of a noble mountain, in the county of Armagh, which bears the name of Sheir Guillan, lies a wide expanse of low and boggy lands; which formerly sheltered in their secure fastnesses many of the families of ancient Irish, who after the battle of the Boyne were forced to flee. Its inhabitants at this day may claim the melancholy and somewhat strange distinction of being at once representatives of the noblest of the ancient families of their country, and among the most abject of its present peasantry. The northern part of Armagh is comparatively prosperous; but there is, perhaps, in no part of Ireland more misery than in the southern part where the Fews extend. On the frontier of this district next to Monaghan lies the townland of ****, which, even in that desolate and wretched region, is noted as peculiarly possessing those characteristics. It is almost entirely a bog, traversed by causeways connecting the various spots where rock appears and affords a sure foundation for a cabin. One of the most extensive of these rocks is the site of a long range of hovels, which were lately occupied by Barney More O'Neil and his family. In this sequestered place his progenitor in the third or fourth degree, a gentleman of courtly manners, took up his abode. He was amongst the adherents of James II., and instead of fleeing with that unhappy monarch to France, was seduced, by the attachment to the place of their nativity for which the Irish are so distinguished, to shelter himself in the Fews. In the residence which he fixed upon he was within a short distance of the ancient seat of his family. The neighbouring lake of Ross (Lough Ross), one of those small lakes which form so beautiful a feature in the scenery of Ireland, contains an island, on which may yet be seen the ruins of a castle once constituting that seat. As far as the happiness of the individual himself was immediately concerned, the indulgence of this predilection for his country was, perhaps, not injudicious. It may be that, amid all his distresses and sufferings, he derived an ample consolation from the sympathy of his companions in exile, and from the thought that he remained to abide, with his country, all that the wrath of Heaven might inflict upon her. But in the fine language of Chief Justice Crew (in the famous case of De Vere)-"I suppose there is no man who hath any apprehension of gentry or nobleness" but will compare with regret the destiny of his descendant, which I am about to relate, with the prosperity of another branch of the family which emigrated, and whose representative bore, in 1790, the dignities of Captain-general of the Infantry of Spain, and Viceroy of Arragon! It was the policy of the grantees of forfeited lands in Ireland to give leases for long terms of years to individuals of native extraction, who were, from their personal interest with the tenantry, better enabled than strangers to make the properties productive. But when time made |