pride nor improvidence of man can destroy. The children of the poor sleep as sound and are as merry, probably, as the children of the rich. And perhaps, after all, these splendid equipages that are passing on every side, bear as many heavy and aching hearts, as lean against the steps and balustrades by the wayside.

For

Everything is done here to get money. instance, the scene in the street before the windows of my hotel, last evening, presented the two following specimens. First, a man with a hand organ struck up, and a woman and child, (his wife and daughter probably,) after carefully laying down their bonnets and shawls, commenced dancing in the street, and after a variety of evolutions, they went around to the spectators to collect as many pence as they could. Next came a man with a flute, and a child apparently four or five years old was set to dancing upon stilts five feet high.

SUNDAY, P. M. This afternoon I have heard the finest church music by far, that I ever listened to; and the only performers were a man and two boys. It was at St. Patrick's Cathedral. The organ is the richest I ever heard. As to the ages of the children, the one of them might be ten, and the other twelve or thirteen years old. Their voices were so completely formed that I supposed, for some

ST. PATRICK'S CATHEDRAL.

41

time, that women were singing, and at the same time peculiarly soft, with none of that shrillness which is apt to be the fault in a woman's voice.. The man's voice was a perfect organ. Amid the deepest notes of the organ, I heard it as distinctly as the diapason itself. The greatest ease characterized the whole performance, as it always does the highest music. The sermon was very well; the reading execrably bad. The prayers were sung forth in a kind of recitative tone peculiar to the cathedral worship of the church of England; for it falls short in the tone of song of that which is used in the Jewish and Romish rituals. The service held as it was in this ancient building, beneath high Gothic arches, surrounded by ancient marble tombs and statues, by galleries

of

every fashion, and carved work curious and antique, with banners over head, and helmets and swords hung on the walls-the service, I say, in such circumstances, seemed as if it ought to be held by no common people—but by the high born and high bred-by renowned knights, or heroes going forth to battle for their country.

After attending upon the service at the Cathedral, I passed the evening with Mrs. Hemans. The conversation naturally turned upon the scene I had just left, and her part in it was sustained with

the utmost poetical enthusiasm. She spoke of the various accompaniments of the service, and when she came to the banners, she said, "they seemed to wave as the music of the anthem rose to the lofty arches." I ventured here to throw in a little dash of prose-saying that I was afraid that they did not wave; that I wished they might, and looked up to see if they did, but could not see it. "No," she replied with vivacity, "wave is not the wordbut they thrilled-I am sure of that." And that, it is very likely, something short of " the vision divine” might see. Such vision, however, this lady undoubtedly possesses. She has the genuine afflatus, and those who think its breathings too measured and monotonous, do not consider or read her poetry in the right way. There is nothing dramatic or epic in her best poetry; it is essentially lyrical. And those who attempt to read it by the volume, as much mistake, as if they should undertake to read a book of hymns, or the Psalms of David in that way. In her own chosen walk, Mrs. Hemans has few competitors in Britain, and no equal; and so long as solemn cathedrals, and ancestral halls, and lowly homes remain in England, her song will not die away.

JULY 8. I have experienced to-day my first travellers' vexation. I had fallen in with a couple

of travellers in Wales, and we had agreed to go in company to the Giants' Causeway. We had taken our passage to Belfast, for this morning, and when the coach drove up to the door of our hotel, it was so overloaded that we would not go in it. It was amusing to see the national characteristics of my companions on this occasion. The Englishman was all pride, and wrath, and decision. "I will not go in this coach!" was his reply to the apologetic coachman-" and I will be sent on! or I will apply to a magistrate and see if there is any law in Ireland." The Frenchman appeared not a little like a subject under a galvanic battery; he shook his fist, and his elbows twitched, and he stammered and stuttered saying I know not what-for I was too much amused with the muscular contractions, to take notice of anything else. The Americanvidelicit myself was very calm on the occasion, and this calmness is said to be our national trait of manner. I understand this last observation, however, to apply only to the case of an affray or dispute.

TO BELFAST, JULY 9. The most remarkable town on this route is Drogheda, with a population of 25,000, and yet looking like a population of mendicants; scarcely a well-dressed man or woman in the thronged streets; but decrepitude, disease,

beggary, rags, presenting themselves everywhere in frightful masses. It is almost entirely a city of mud-walled cottages, and thatched roofs; and altogether a spectacle, so entirely unlike anything I ever witnessed before, or shall probably ever wit ness again, that I would not have failed to come and see it. Drogheda is a walled town, standing on the river Boyne, and known in history as surrendering to William III. after the battle of Boyne. The battle was fought near this town; an obelisk, which we saw at a distance, marks the spot. William's conquest is celebrated on the twelfth of this month, by processions of the Protestants, which, being held in dislike by the Catholics, often occasion quarrels-on which account, troops are at this time ordered into the north, and we passed a regi ment of them to-day. Indeed, these "grievances red-dressed" of Ireland appear everywhere in all the cities and villages.

We have passed hundreds of Irish cottages today; but what pen shall describe them, that does. not literally bespatter the page with mire and dirt! mud and thatch, with little light-nasty as pigstyes-ragged women and children about the door, and often the men lying down by their hovels, in laziness, filth, and rags-a horribly vile puddle