Another fact worthy of notice is, that more rain falls mountainous countries than in those which have a level surface; which may be accounted for by the fact that the atmospheric vapours collect round the summits of lofty elevations, and are there cooled and condensed by contact. Keswick in Cumberland has been long known as an instance of this. The average annual fall is there 67 inches, while at Greenwich it is only 24. To mention another instance at Paris the fall is 20 inches, at Geneva 30, and on the Great St. Bernard 63 inches. On a part of the Julian Alps the rain gauge measures 100 inches annually; in the plains of Lombardy only 35. These observations enable as to give a reason why less rain falls on the sea than on land. From them we learn that in the absence of lofty eminences there is no deposition but that which is produced by the saturation of the atmosphere.

BIRMINGHAM AND HER MANU-
FACTURES.

4-WORKS OF MESSES. FOX AND HENDERSON, Near SMETHWICK.

STARTING from the central railway station in New-street, a ride of not more than a quarter of an hour's duration transports the visitor to Smethwick, a long straggling village located upon the borders of the iron district, described in our last sketch. Away to the right of Smethwick, at the distance of about a mile and a half, in a level open country, but yet within sight and sound of the industrial operations going on in the neighbourhood, stand the extensive works of Messrs. Fox and Henderson-names which a few years ago were almost unknown beyond the limits of the commercial and manufacturing world, but which are now, in connexion with that of Paxton," familiar in our mouths as household words." It was to energy, promptitude, and persevering activity of these gentlemen, as all the world knows, that Mr. Paxton was indebted for the carrying out of his gigantic design. It was on this spot that the various portions of the immense fabric, destined to contain the fruits of a world's industry and skill, were fitted together and tested, before they were transmitted to Hyde Park for erection; and it was here, and in the near neighbourhood-for the resources of surrounding factories had to be called into requisition for the purpose that that inconceivable forest of iron columns and net-like tracery sprung so rapidly into being. Truly the

the

establishment is worthy of its wondrous production; the factory is in keeping with the marvellous structure to which it gave birth*. It would require a month's residence on the spot, and a daily examination of the numerous processes there carried on, to qualify us to give the reader an accurate idea of every thing that can be and is here accomplished, in the various departments of manufacture in iron. Instead of this, we have but an hour or two to spare, and we are going merely, with the permission of the proprietors, to take a morning's stroll through the enormous workshops, gathering at a glance those features which may happen to strike us as most interesting and impressive.

While yet some furlongs from the assemblage of buildings which constitute this immense industrial establishment, we see swelling aloft a huge elliptical arch of light iron work, which stands in a meadow near the works. Men are clambering about over its graceful curvature, and the noise of heavy hammers proclaims that they are putting it together to test its strength and fitness. On inquiry we learn that this monster arch is the roof of the new central railway station in Birmingham, now advancing to its completion, and that the contractors have undertaken to rear it aloft, spanning the platforms and lines of rails beneath, without interfering with the traffic! The approaches to the various workshops we find, as usual, piled with accumulated stores of iron in pigs, bars, and sheets, and not a little in broken and rusty fragments, lying ready to feed the furnace. The first department to which our guide introduces us is an enormous building, in which some scores of brawny fellows, each armed with a sledge hammer, seem striving to see which can make the greatest uproar; the clang and din is bewildering, and for a moment bars our perception of what they are about. We soon see, however, that they are making iron-girders, probably for railway bridges, an operation which one need not expect to be conducted in silence. The separate parts have already been cast, or otherwise fashioned according to pattern, and these men are now riveting them together. The rivets are stout iron bolts as thick as a broomstick, from two to four inches in length, having a finished head at one end only; these are heated red-hot in portable forges worked by a small bellows, and under the charge of a boy, who wheels the forge to the spot where it is wanted. The parts to be joined, having been previously pierced with holes the size of the rivets, and laboriously craned, levered, and hammered into juxtaposition, a workman seizes a red-hot rivet or bolt with a pair of pincers, inserts it in its destined hole, pushing it upwards from below, and presses his heavy hammer firmly against the head, while a couple of his companions with rapid and furious blows forge in a few seconds a

It greatly diminishes our pleasure in visiting the spot of the birth of the Crystal Palace, to recollect that what was the source of so much innocent enjoyment threatens to become an instrument of national evil. The London City Mission has recently shown, in an admirable address, that the closing of the Palace on the Lord's day would not diminish the visits to it of that from such a course a positive temporal boon would in the the working classes. We would confidently hope indeed, end accrue to labouring men, leading as it would do to the cessation of labour at an early period on the Saturday afternoon, and thus paving the way for what has been often pleaded for a national half-holiday.-ED.

corresponding head, finishing it off with a few strokes upon a steel die, applied to give it a neat appearance. The hot metal of the bolt contracting as it cools, holds the parts together with a grip which nothing short of actual fracture can relax. This process of riveting is the same as that resorted to in the construction of boilers for steamengines and locomotives. In the mean time other hands are employed in cutting holes for the receptions of the rivets, in plates of iron, from one-third to two-thirds of an inch thick; this is not done by drilling or boring, as one might be led to imagine, both of which would be tedious, and therefore expensive processes, but by means of machines worked by steam, which do the work in an instant, cutting out the discs of iron, whatever the thickness of the plate, with as much apparent ease as though the solid iron were a captain's biscuit. The workman has but to place the cold metal in the right position, and down comes the cutting tool sheer through it, never pausing an instant in its passage, whatever resistance it meets with. The same machine, which acts so effectually in place of a drill, does equal service as a pair of shears, cutting plates of metal as a child cuts paper, only with a little more gravity, as becomes the importance of its function.

Escaping from this boisterous domain, and passing through others not a whit more tranquil, we follow the steps of our guide to the mouth of a blazing furnace, where a party of smiths are about to proceed with the forging of the fluke of an anchor, under the steam-hammer. The mouth of the furnace is closed, but beneath the door projects a long and ponderous iron bar, terminating in four horizontal handles; at the other end of the bar is the mass of iron to be forged, so soon as it has attained the proper welding heat. The fire-man raises the door of the furnace, and in reply to a question from our guide, announces that it will be ready in a minute. We are just beginning to speculate as to the means by which the enormous weight of hot metal, is to be transported to the anvil, a distance of about twenty feet, when round swings the beam of a crane, from which depends a strong chain; this is linked round the centre of the projecting bar, the men lay hold of the handles, | and in an instant the glowing white mass swings forth out of the furnace, veers round half its orbit, and rests upon the anvil. Down comes the ponderous hammer crashing into the yielding iron, and raining a tempest of terrific blows at the rate of a hundred a minute, beneath which, as the workmen, by aid of the leverage afforded by the long cross handles, move it forwards and backwards and twist and turn it in every possible position, it is gradually fashioned to the desiderated shape. Beneath the first few strokes of the hammer, a deluge of fiery flakes spreads horizontally on all sides, and the sound of the blow is that of a heavy weight plunging into a yielding surface; but as the particles of the hot iron are driven close together, the sonorous ring of the stroke gives token of its increased hardness. Ten minutes' subjection to this hard discipline has considerably diminished the bulk of the mass, and reduced it to something like symmetry, and it must now be returned to the fire to be re-heated, having become too cool for the forge. The advantage of the steam hammer in

forging heavy masses of iron can be best appreciated by seeing it in action. It is impossible for any human hand to deal a blow that should take effect upon the centre of a lump of metal so large as is used in the construction of many parts of machinery, which yet require to be of wrought iron. The invention of Nasmyth's steam hammer was an important epoch in the history of iron manufactures: by its means masses of iron above seven tons in weight have been forged, and yet its prodigious force admits of such easy management, that its descending blow may be made to crack a nut without crushing the kernel.

On quitting the forge we soon find ourselves in the open air, and in the neighbourhood of a furnace which the men are charging with iron and fuel, preparatory to casting. We recognise some old acquaintances among the fragments of iron that lie about upon the ground, or make a part of the last charge heaped upon the furnace: these are wrecks and débris of the Crystal Palace, betrayed by their coating of blue and white, and which, being accidentally broken in removing the building, have been brought here to be melted up again. Pending the preparation of the metal, a number of men are employed on the floor of the casting room in preparing the moulds, into which the metal is to be run: this, in certain cases, when complex articles have to be cast, is rather a nice and delicate operation, requiring lightness of handling and no small share of patience in the operation. How some of the models were ever got out or the moulds they had been pressed into, was beyond our comprehension. The models, which are all manufactured of well-seasoned wood, and finished to a nicety that few cabinet-makers dream of in their choicest work, are made on the premises: they are pressed into, or piled around with the fine red sand of the district, which, being of a remark. ably small grain, is admirably adapted for giving a sharp impression of the model. The sand is used in a slightly moist state, being just damp enough to cause it to cohere together, and to retain the form impressed upon it after the model is withdrawn, but, of course, not sufficiently moist to cause the hot metal to fly upon contact with it. A mould formed of sand, it need hardly be said, is available but for one casting.

The visitor to these works will not fail to remark the immense stores of wheels for railway carriages, vast numbers of which appear to be always ready on hand. The forging and finishing of these wheels is the one department of iron manufactures, in which perhaps the public is more generally interested than in any other that could be mentioned. The bare thought of such a catastrophe happening upon a railway as the breaking of a wheel, suggests a train of frightful consequences, which must be avoided at any cost; and against the possible occurrence of such an accident, every precaution that prudence and science can suggest is taken. Various devices and experiments have been tried to insure their stability; they have been cast in solid masses, and they have been put together at the forge from a hundred different pieces. We are not technically acquainted with the subject, and are not qualified to define the principle upon which they are constructed at this establishment, but that a vast number of them are here manufactured, we

had ocular demonstration on a visit to the turning room, where numbers of them were undergoing various processes in the lathe. Experience has shown that the utmost precaution is requisite in their construction, and in most instances we believe wrought iron is the principal, if it be not the only, material employed. The tire of the wheel, with its overlapping flange, is formed from a bar of iron rolled at the rolling mill, into such a shape that a section of it forms a right angle. This being heated red-hot in the furnace, is bent round a mandril the size of the wheel, and the two ends welded firmly together. It will occasionally happen that the tires are made a trifle too large or too small; in the former case they are reduced by hammering, and in the latter they are enlarged by means of a kind of model wheel, the circumference of which is capable of expansion by a powerful lever. The tires are finished in the lathe, where it is curious to watch the accurate performance of the tool, which shaves off the narrow ribbons of iron: some of the lathes are so constructed as to move forward the article to be turned, while the cutting tool remains in a fixed position; this contrivance insures a uniform reduction of the surface in turning long shafts, axletrees, etc. When the wheel finally leaves the hand of the workman, it receives a thin coat of paint, to preserve it from rust, until it may be wanted to start in the race of perhaps half a million of miles.

In following our guide through the reverberating chambers of this Titanic museum of the arts of peace, we are suddenly greeted with a vision of war, in the shape of a huge cannon, some nine feet in length-a novel species of ordnance, designed for the projection to a long distance of a conical shell, intended to burst on striking the mark. On arriving at another department of the works, where men are employed in finishing off, by means of hand-lathes and other appliances, various portions of steam-engines and other machinery, we find the shell itself in process of completion-a curve of iron of the size of a small sugar-loaf, and rather resembling the bullet of a Minie rifle in shape, and with a cavity large enough for the reception of several pounds of gunpowder, intended to ignite by the explosion of a detonating cap, so arranged as to present itself to the first obstruction it meets on leaving the gun. The cone weighs sixty pounds, and would be scattered in death-dealing fragments on every side should it fall in the ranks of a foe. With regard to this awful missile, we may well breathe the wish that it may long require to be unused.

It is pleasant to turn from the contemplation of what might come to pass if such a deadly sugaraf as this were to alight suddenly upon a quiet tea-party, to the spectacle of what is actually going on in the model department of this extensive domain of industry. The reader of course knows that well-nigh everything which has to be cast in metals, has first to be fashioned in wood or some other suitable material, in order to the formation of the matrixes or moulds in which the metal has to be run. The making of these models is one most important item in the expense of manufacture; they have to be made with a mathematical precision, to which, in many instances, a close approximation would only be a failure. In the

case of a model, for instance, of which a hundred repetitions in metal were to be used in juxtaposition, the slightest error in the dimensions would be multiplied a hundred-fold, and the castings, if not altogether useless, would, by their want of symmetry, reflect little credit on the founder. The only way to guard against such a contingency is to employ good workmen, long trained to the business, and qualified, by education and practice, to work from plans, which they may be called upon either to enlarge or reduce, put into their hands by the architect or designer, and to turn out their work geometrically true. Another essential point, at least if we are to judge from the specimens which here come under our notice, is the perfect surface finish of every article, without which it would hardly be detached from the mould of sand so as to leave a clear impression. The model department of this establishment is a huge welllighted chamber, furnished with a couple of regiments of carpenters' benches, and tenanted by bands of men, engaged in the careful construction, in wood, of the various designs, of all sizes and shapes, which have to be afterwards cast in the foundry. Judging from the pleasant nature of their occupation, the comfortable quarters in which they labour, and the evidence of intelligence and skill manifested in their productions, we should be tempted to cast in our lot with the makers of the models rather than with any other denizens of this iron domain, though some of them, it is evident enough, have been born to make a prodigious noise in the world.

With this brief notice we must bid adieu to this establishment. We feel that we have done it but a very imperfect kind of justice; but the multiplicity of objects that claim the attention must be our apology; it is impossible even to catalogue them all, much less to comment upon the industrial processes carried on in their production. We have spent but two hours in going over the ground, and have but described what appeared to us the most remarkable things. It may very likely happen that a visitor, who should follow us through the same route, will have a different report to make; the proceedings of no two days will be precisely similar in a factory, where new experiments are constantly making, and novelties in manufacture are being continually produced.

THE EMPEROR MONK.* ON the 28th of September, in the year 1556, the old Spanish seaport of Laredo was a scene of unexpected excitement, as a fleet of fifty-six sail of vessels cast anchor in its roadstead. If we enter the Espirito Sancto-a ship of five hundred and sixty tons-which forms one of the squadron, we shall see an old respectable-looking Spanish gentleman making preparations to leave his cabin, which has been fitted up with a degree of comfort unusual in those days; for it is curtained with green hangings, and has a swing bed, while the light is admitted through no less than eight glass windows. Care and travail have left their marks upon the old

The Cloister Life of the Emperor Charles v, by William Stirling. An admirable volume, well worthy of being added to all libraries.

man's face, but intelligence gleams from his eye, and decision is stamped upon his features. When he lands at Laredo, great respect is evidently paid to him; a train of some hundred and fifty domestics wait upon him, and the Spanish bishop of Salamanca does, with all deference, the honours of the place. Not to keep the reader in suspense, we may mention, without farther introduction, that this old man is Charles v, the Napoleon Buonaparte of his day, who after troubling Europe with his ambition, and clutching some half-dozen sceptres within his greedy grasp, is now aweary of the world, and on his way to spend the evening of his life in a monastery, having resigned his throne to his son.

Charles, it appears, had long cherished the design of retiring from public life, in order to prepare, as he conceived of it, in a befitting manner, for the eternal world. In 1542 he confided his design to a courtier, but in 1546 the secret had oozed out, and was whispered amongst the loungers in his palace. Although the morning of Charles's career as an emperor had been gilded with success, yet clouds attended its afternoon. His health became broken, and the hand which had wielded the lance and curbed the charger was so enfeebled with gout that it was unable at times to break the seal of a letter. His later schemes of conquest, too, had ended in nothing but disappointment; so that with Solomon of old he was ready to say, "All is vanity and vexation of spirit." Calling, accordingly, his court together at Brussels, he publicly resigned his empire to his son Philip-the husband of our bloody Mary-and, taking shipping, he had landed, as we have seen, at Laredo, being thus far on his way to his abode at the Convent of Yuste.

As the old monarch, after leaving Laredo, journeyed along, attended by a little staff of friends and a train of domestics, the neighbouring towns turned out to do homage to him whose name was indelibly associated with the most eventful passages in Spanish history. There was not very much, however, that was dignified in his mode of travelling. At one part of his road five alguazils or constables, with their staves, formed his attendants, making the little party, as Charles's chamberlain complained, look very much like a troop of rogues marching to prison. Charles, however, would have no display. He seemed to hug with complacency the idea that he was now a private gentleman, who had cast the cares of kingcraft over his shoulder. At one part of the road he was hospitably entertained by a rich money-broker, who, amongst other luxuries, provided for the emperor's use a chafing dish of gold filled with the finest cinnamon of Ceylon- -a piece of wealthy ostentation which displeased Charles so much, that he insisted upon paying for his entertainment as if he had been lodging at a common inn, and refused at parting to allow the mortified capitalist the honour of kissing his hand.

A journey slowly prosecuted brought the party to Xarandilla, an exquisitely beautiful spot, from whose lofty eminence the eye ranged over all that was most lovely in Spanish scenery. Here the emperor took up his abode for a while, until the neighbouring monastery of Yuste was prepared for his reception. A small band of followers, similar in some respects to the little company which lingered round Napoleon at St. Helena, attended Charles. Prominent among these were Quixada,

his chamberlain, a nobleman of high family, passionately attached to his royal master, with William de la Male, a sort of poor scholar, who acted as the emperor's literary companion. Borja, the celebrated Jesuit, accompanied Charles as his confessor. He had pretended, on receiving the appointment, to have some qualms about the responsibility of the office, but was assured by Charles that he might make himself easy on that point, as, before he left Flanders, five doctors of divinity had been engaged for a whole year in cleansing his conscience. The last of the ex-monarch's attendants whom we shall name, was Dr. Matheoso, the emperor's physician. He seems to have lived in a continual state of warfare with Charles's love of cookery-being sadly perplexed, too, at times, by the interloping of a quack doctor in the neighbourhood, who ingratiated himself with his majesty by allowing him for his diet to eat and drink pretty much what he pleased.

A few months having rolled away, and the monastery being ready for his reception, Charles passed over to it from Xarandilla, and calling for the book of the registry, duly signed his name as a brother of the order of the monks of St. Jerome an autograph which was carefully preserved until destroyed by the French soldiers during the peninsular war. A grand service attended the enrolment of the new friar. All the monks kissed his majesty's hands; the altar was brilliantly lighted up with tapers, and Charles at last found himself in a spot where he might indulge his superstitious tastes to the very utmost. A chamber had been constructed for him, out of which he could look into the chapel as he lay in bed, and see high mass performed, while out of doors everything had been done to make the retirement agreeable. A fountain cooled the air; orange trees diffused their fragrance, and the eye wandered over a district of surpassing loveliness. Nor were the luxuries of life forgotten. Charles, who was fond of paintings, had brought some of Titan's masterpieces with him, as well as a tolerable supply of books, and a decent complement of rich plate and jewels. Altogether his majesty had a very comfortable residence of it; and had there only been less of superstition in his form of piety, the spectacle would not have been unpleasing, of an old man retiring from the storms of the world to a peaceful haven where he might tranquilly spend his time in preparation for the great change which awaited him. But superstition-foul, deadening superstition-tainted, as we shall find by and by, the whole atmosphere.

One of Charles's most pleasing occupations was the feeding of his dumb favourites. Of these he had several, including an old cat, and a parrot endowed with wonderful power of speech; some birds also were his favourite companions. The story indeed is told of him in his early youth, that when, in one of his campaigns, a swallow had built a nest for her young on the top of his tent, he ordered the latter, on the encampment being

It is Dr. Chalmers, we believe, who states, that when a threescore and ten of the Psalmist should be spent as the man passes sixty, the ten years remaining to complete the sabbath of life--not of course by going into anything like conventual existence- but by retiring from the bustle and strife that sit well upon manhood, and devoting the time to quieter walks of usefulness.

broken up, to be left undisturbed. Music too formed his favourite pastime, and so correct was the old emperor's ear, that if a monk in the choir sung out of tune, he was pretty sure to get some sharp rebuke from his majesty. On the whole, however, Charles lived on excellent terms with the monks, being condescending and affable in his manners, and dismissing almost entirely the pomp that usually surrounds crowned heads; still, it must be acknowledged, he displayed, for a friar, a most unmortified appetite for good eating. Rich dishes and iced beer he would have, whether the doctor protested against them or not. The weekly courier was ordered to change his route that he might bring eels and fine fish; partridges were ordered from a choice neighbourhood, while sausages of a particular order were specially provided.

The daily routine of the king's life, according to Mr. Stirling, was somewhat as follows:---

"The workshop of Torriano was often the resource of the emperor's spare time. He was very fond of clocks and watches, and curious in reckoning to a fraction the hour of his retired leisure. The Lombard had long been at work upon an elaborate astronomical time-piece, which was to perform not only the ordinary duties of a clock, but to tell the days of the month and year, and to denote the movements of the planets. Twenty years had elapsed since he had first conceived the idea, and the actual construction cost him three years and a half. Indeed, the work had not received the last touches at the time of the Emperor's death. Of wheels alone it contained eighteen hundred. Torriano also constructed a self-acting mill, which though small enough to be hidden in a friar's sleeve, could grind two pecks of corn in a day; and the figure of a lady, who danced on a table to the sound of her own tambourine.

Sometimes the emperor fed his pet birds, of the sylvan sort, which appear to have succeeded, in his affection, the stately wolf-hounds that followed at his heel in the days when he sat to Titian; or he sauntered among his bees and flowers, down to the little summer-house looking out upon the Vera; or sometimes, but more rarely, he strolled into the forest with his gun, and shot a few of the woodpigeons which peopled the great chestnut trees. His ont-door exercise was always taken on foot, or if the gout forebade him, in his chair or litter. Next came vespers; and after vespers supper, a meal very much like the dinner, consisting frequently of pickled salmon and other wholesome dishes, which made Quixada's loyal heart quake within him."

It was probably the fact of the artist Torriano residing with Charles, that gave rise to the saying, that the ex-emperor, on seeing how his numerous clocks and watches would not keep time together, wondered at his own folly in having endeavoured, by persecution, to make his subjects think alike on religious questions. Mr. Stirling has well shown that there is no authority for Charles having uttered such a saying, and that it is contradicted by all that he did while at the convent of Yuste. He was, in fact, a most bigoted Roman Catholic: clear as his intellect was on every other question, superstition was the enchanted ground on which, when he entered, his understanding and ability seemed to desert him. The Reformation in Spain

had just broken out, and it is melancholy to perceive how Charles, at a time when he had retired, as he thought, to devote himself to the service of his Creator, persecuted unto death those who were evidently the true children of God. He wrote letters to his son Philip, urgently requesting him to use every means to extirpate heresy. Too well were these orders obeyed. The fires of the Inqui sition blazed throughout Spain, and autos-da-fé rejoiced the hearts of the orthodox. "What have I done to be treated thus ?" cried a nobleman, as he walked to the stake, looking up, as he said so, to Philip, who sat in a gallery feasting his eyes with the spectacle. "Were you my own son," replied the pitiless monarch, "I would myself carry a fagot to rid the earth of a heretic like you.' Charles himself was constantly watching this spread of heresy, as he termed the Reformation. The only thing which could ever induce him to leave his pleasant retreat, he asserted, would be the hope of putting down such a monstrous evil; and bitterly did he grieve that, when some years before he had had Luther in his power at the Diet of Worms, he had not, in spite of his promise of a safe conduct, broken his word and put him to death. The only consolation which the poor bigoted old man had was, that he had resolutely declined hearing any of the heretic preachers argue against the true catholic church, or in favour of the reformed faith!

It may be well imagined how strictly Charles, entertaining such views as these, performed the monastic duties at the convent. The friars were quite edified by the zeal of their royal brother of the cowl.

Some eighteen months rolled on in this manner, when Charles began to find serious indications of illness approaching. Anticipating the possibility of his end drawing near, he asked his confessor the extraordinary question, whether it would not be good for the health of his soul that he should perform his own funeral, and received a reply in the affirmative. His funeral was performed accordingly. Here, however, we must follow Mr. Stirling's narrative, correcting, as it does, some of the mistakes into which other historians have fallen on the subject.

The high altar, the catafalque, and the whole church, shone with a blaze of wax-lights; the friars were all in their places, at the altars and in the choir, and the household of the emperor attended in deep mourning. The monarch himself was there, attired in sable weeds, and bearing a taper to see himself interred, and to celebrate his own obsequies. While the solemn mass for the dead was sung, he came forward and gave his taper into the hands of the officiating priest, in token of his desire to yield his soul into the hands of his Maker, High above, over the kneeling throng and the gorgeous vestments, the flowers, the curling incense, and the glittering altar, the same idea shone forth in that splendid canvas, whereon Titian had pictured Charles kneeling on the threshold of the heavenly mansions prepared for the blessed."

Charles had too truly guessed the character of the symptoms of his disease. From the day of the above ceremony he grew gradually weaker and weaker, until at last the grand climax arrived. It is thus affectingly described :