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    that a Creole lady -with whom he was m correspondence was surpassingly beautiful , invited her from Spain to act as his mistress , promising to adopt her son as a reward . Ou her arrival , lie found her to be hideous , and kicked her into the streets . Being left utterly helpless in a strange country , she committed suicide . AH these circumstances have been freely commented on . For a long time the presence of a soldier in any society has been considered a disgrace .

    This feeling was expressed in . a very light and easy and general manner some weeks ago in the Fiaaro , by M . de Pene , under the signature of " Nemo . " He jeered at the eternal sub-lieutenant who was always tearing ladies' dresses with his spurs in the saloons of Paris . The joke -was not new . It had been made by M . Scribe . De " chirez leurs tendres cosurs , Mais ne de " chirez pas leurs robes .

    But that was in other times . In this Praetorian period thirty or forty officers took offence at once , and the most insulting 1 letters poured in upon Nemo . To one of these he replied publicly . The consequences are now known . He was under the necessity of accepting a challenge , and went to the Wood of Vezinet to fight . The unfortunate , man did not know , however , that he was engaged in a duel a la martingale . It -was resolved to knl or disable him . Forty or fifty furious officers were ready in tlie neighbourhood to take up the quarrel . They had not time to come up , however , soon enough

    after M . de Pene wounded Ins adversary . That adversary ' s second , a notorious drinker of absinthe , Hysena by name , advanced towards him as he stood breathless , insulted and struck Mm in the face . A new conflict was necessary . It now came on . as it was commenced , in the most irregular manner . Hyene , who had been a fencing-master in his day , ran his opponent through the body , and not satisfied with that , as he span roundj again transfixed Mm through and through . What were the seconds about ? They suffered this murder to be committed . In a civilized country Hyene would be hanged , and all other parties present sent to the galleys . 3 n France it is difficult to say what will be the

    result of the trial that is to take place . Will the jury of Versailles dare to take up the cause of the civilians against the brutal violence of the soldiery ? Some say they will be overawed . Meanwhile the bourgeoisie , by its conduct , does not countenance this view . In France there is an absence of what is called civil courage , but there is no absence of personal audacity . The black coat , too , has shown that it knows how to fight . Great prudence will he required to prevent the skirmish between the civil and military which has begun from leading to the most serious consequences .

    There is a point of view which seems to be neglected by those who make comments on . this deplorable incident- —we allude to its bearings on the liberty of the press . French journalism is surely sufficiently gagged by the laws and the police . Every week almost we hear of fresh prosecutions and suppressions of journals . The Revue du Nord , a literary organ , was put down the other day for making some remarks on political economy . Yet here we have a new kind of censorship established . All the idle , dissolute oificers of the French army set themselves up as judges of what may or may

    not be published . In the article of M . de Pene there was no allusion to an individual . The sting was in the consciousness of the army ., that its arrogance has at last become insupportable to well-bred society . Perhaps the sub-lieutenants in question had pursued a less conquering career this season than usual . Their conversation is never remarkable for its quality . The ladies may be tired of it . Besides , Paris beauties have husbands and brothers like other women , and cannot fail to be i n fluenced by the ton -which has now become almost universal . Swords and spurs are at a discount . This may account for a good deal of bitterness . ~ ko sublieutenant is capable of answering a witty attack

    he therefore retorts with cold steel . Literary men are accordingly placed in this dilemma : they must fight , or they must lay down the pen . Most of them scorn ready to fight against this new attack on the press ; and we doubt much whether they will not carry the day . Meanwhile , it is reported tlmt there is an unusual affluence of writers to tlio various salles d ' ar / ncs of Paris . No one feels certain of not having an aflair . The action of the Government in such a case must be limited . It is afraid to show partiality to one side or the other . It is a great charge for a military despotism to have wie armfe qui s ennuie .

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    THIS VACANT GARTER . The spirit of chivalry is not dead but only dormant , and dormant only amongst us at home . If , indeed , we were to look only to the centres of civilization , Paris and London , the two great " , eyes of the intellectual world , we might be inclined to think that chivalry was dead and buried—that it had become an antiquity , a tradition—a memory as antiquated as the Lord Mayor ' s Show , and almost as foolish . A gentleman no longer wears a sword , imil one consequence is , that m assemblies where gentlemen meet , language is used , taunts arc uttered , which would , in better days , have been kept m check . Good taste can always restrain the real gentleman ; hut now that society has adopted a general uniform without the sword , tlierc is no distinction hetwemi

    the gentleman and the bully . The sword is left entirely to the soldier , which in England moans cither a man of high birth who can purchase rank m the avniy , or a professional man who is liable to ho sent abroad in order to serve as police for colonies . In France the soldier has become a caste , and so completely has the spirit of chivalry died out there under the futnl breath of despotism , that forty soldiers can form a conspi mcy to light successive duels with one man until he shall be killed . His faithful quittnncc in tho first battle , his apology , his bravery , his manly candour , go for

    nothing . In England , we say a gentleman and officer ; in France , the phrase has oeen translated an officer and a butcher . France and England have adopted widely different forms of the anti-chivalric—1 ranee the brutal England the effeminate . In France , the soldier ' who is pampered with wines , trained to run , drilled to trample on his own country , takes the brutal form of the anti-chivalric . In England , the march of in . tellect has put down our national sports . The police forbid boxing in the streets , or elsewhere in public . If men still go to look at liorse-races , it is no longer to see the finest types of horseflesh trying the wind of the men that ride them , but it is to see

    swindling bets settled in a few seconds by gallo . ways trained to run short distances , the very men who go down to witness the sport wearing Teils against tho sun and dust , as women alone used to do . If we look into the mirror which Art holds up to Nature at the present moment in England , -what anti-chivalric forms fill its dull plain!—but how extolled is the truthfulness of the painting . No picture has ever been so crowded by siglit-seers as Frith ' s Epsom Race-course . A policeman is stationed to prevent the picture being destroyed by its admirers . And what , is therein it ? A crowd , a heap of faces moved by small and superficial emotions ; - —amusement , the comedy of life ; jiot a particle of interest , not a shadow of feeling .

    At every step the anti chivalrie meets us . We come upon it in high places as in low . We go into Parliament and find the authenticated statesmen of the day fighting to maintain the principles of their quondam opponents , because Tones can keep pace only so long as they uphold Liberal principles . We find leading Liberals . making the agonized empire of India mere pretext for recovering place . If Mr . "Vernon Smith commits the equivocal mistake of suppressing- a letter , his censors are nioic at fault : he stumbles , and then there is a competition to kick him , becemse he is down . We look for the patriots in Committee-room NoV 11 , and find

    that they cannot hold together even , to the number of a score , for want of anything like patriotic object , national purpose , or fixed purpose of any kind . The fact is , that each man is thinking of "what lie can do best for himself , or how he can best display himself . We go to still higher places . The Queen is holding . a Chapter of the Garter . Around her stand some old gentlemen who have never drawn a sword , admitting another old gentleman to be one of the order whose motto is Ho / ii soil' qui mal ij poise , because , he has been a sharp-tongucd partisan , and adds to that chivalrous quality high rank not earned by himself , and great wealth .

    Philosophers tell us that the day of chivalry is gone , because the time is passed when the sword decided anything . Oh ! blind that they are ! ' Why , at this moment-, Europe is governed by the sword , held by men who are death to ideas , who hate the very name of ideas , who will send their police after any single idea , if they hear that one is lurking in the purlieus of their capitals . Civilization has not suppressed chivalry , it has shrunk away from it ; and by withdrawing nobility and intellect from those who lield the sword , it has divorced understanding and heart from the brute strength which rules tlic world -. and that is the result of modem

    political philosophy . Tlic sword is held by lladetsky or Hyene , while a Gladstone preaches ideas enough to stimulate insurrection , or to lead ou a Sardinia —for a British Grand Cross of the Bath to abandon . But tho spirit of chivalry is not dead , it is only abroad . In our own day wo sec Yicfor Emmanuel surrounded by great ; powers , abandoned by great powers , and not quailing for an instant , we sec ii Camillo Cavour generously proclaiming bis predecessor , Massimo d'Azcglio , whose ideas lie has adopted and so magnificently carried forth . We sec a James Outram , waiving hi , s rank , serving" under Havclock and afterwards , when he has received , his command , forgetting his own exploits to expatiate on

    the help which he has had from others . \\ c see a llavelock , marching through hordes of the enemy , braving death , misconstruction , defeat , apparent hopelessness , not ; only to fulfil the cause of duty , but to prove , that , hope and cll ' ort ; never leave the heart of a gontleiuan . And there is the chivalry , too , of womanhood faithful unto death , we see Heleno d'Orleans preserving patiently , through a whole life , tho mission bequeathed to her b y her husband ; maintaining , single-handed , the dignity of a dynasty unabated for her son : a patrimony which the successful despot ; could not confiscate . No ; the order of the Garter , by - \ vhich _ the world should be ruled , is not extinguished , —it ia only vncant .

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    496 THE : LEaDER . [ Ko . 426 , May 22 , 1858 .

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    A CONGREGATION OF VAPOURS . Complaints are sometimes made of the few worshippers in City churches—but this is because the pew-openers do not count a part of the congregation . The City bankers do not come in from . their country villas—but the dead come from their graves . There are , it is calculated , about " sixteen thousand corpses beneath the pews occupied in the City churches by Sunday congregations . " The vaults are so badl y secured that the dead burst their cerements and join the congregation . How ? not to the sight ? Very nearly so , but at least to the smell . " It is generally noticed at . night when the church is lighted up with gas , and the warm rarefied air rises out of the church and draws from the

    graves and vaults the mephitic gases , which have accumulated during the week . " What an idea to preside over evening prayer ? the gases from the corpses of old parishioners stealing out to the accustomed pew , hovering over the old prayer-book , perhaps coining with a kind of memory , making sick and faint to the orphan daughter , or the bereft widow . " Here is fine revolution , ail we had the trick to see it : " a City vampire coming from the grave to stiflle his own children . But fancies and fictions are pale beside the simple fact told by Dr . Letheby , in his Sanitary Report , published this week

    •"In some cases the effluvium from the vaults is most offensive , for although it is the general practice to confine the body in a lead coffin , yet the metal gives way after a longer or a shorter time , and there oozes out a dark treacle-like liquid , TV-liich stinks abominably , and which is , I believe , a most deadly poison . I lave seen tills escaping from a lead coffin that bad been deposited in the vault for more , than a hundred years—so that there is no saying for how long a time the mischief of decay and slow corruption may be carried on . "

    A hundred years ! Poisoned by a great-grandfather , to whose portrait in the dress of tie period we look with veneration ! In one of her pleasing letters , Miss Anna Seaward ( a blue-stocking of the last century , whose name all our readers may not have heard ) gives a story of the plague renewed in a country village by digging up clothes over a hundred years buried in a plague graveyard : so immortal are some essences of poison . But the City congregations have only themselves to blame .

    " In many cases the vaults are entered by imperfectly closed traps or doors from the general area of the church , and the vaults are either not ventilated at all , or they are ventilated into the public way , so that there streams out incessantly a poisonous vapour . " In most cases , " Precaution is taken to shut in the vapours by means of stone and cement ; but so powerful in its action is the diffusive law of gases , that , with all our precautions of wood , and lead , arid stone , the vapours ' will find an outlet , and will mix with tlie surroundi ng atmosphere . The remedy , therefore , for the evil is to divert the gases from tlie vaults into a proper channel , and by conveying them through a shaft to a high level they may he safely disposed of . "

    We have neglected the dead , and they have made a . terrible retaliation . May we not in imagination trace the dust of an energetic vestryman until we find it stiflinpr a churchwarden ? ¦ .

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), May 22, 1858, page 496, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2243/page/16/