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for the railway and its staff. But whilst thus willing to believe in this attractive future, we cannot afford to wait for even its most feasible projects-we cannot consent to let slip the homely and cheap opportunity that lies at our doorstep. And we take therefore the Ja'ber Castle line as the welcome instalment of the final solution of the problem of the true highway of the nations.

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Electricity and steam," it has been said, " are the twinsisters of civilization; and without the application of the latter to the general purposes of transit, it is highly probable that the former would not have come into practical use as a means of communication." Of the truth of this saying we have almost daily proofs, and perhaps none more pertinent that, the rapid extension of the electric wire throughout India, as the companion, and in many places as the pioneer, of railroads. When we remember within how short a time the Electric Postman has been naturalised even in Europe, it speaks well for the readiness of the people to adapt themselves to a novelty of really practical application, to see how thoroughly familiarised they have become with its operations, and how readily they resort to its use even on the most trivial occasions. It is more remarkable, however, to note its ready acceptance in the East. "The number of native correspondents" writes Dr. O'Shaughnessy, in his report on the working of the 4080 miles of electric wires in India, "is daily increasing. Not only do they use the lines for financial business, but on the most delicate and secret matters affecting family araangements, bethrothals, marriages, and other domestic affairs, of which they treat with an absence of all disguise which is almost beyond belief." The progress of the telegraph in India is indeed most encouraging: already Calcutta is placed in almost instantaneous communication with each of the presidencies. Ceylon is on the point of being united with the main land, and the cable that is to connect Kurrachee with the head of the Persian Gulf is already in course of construction by the orders of the Indian Government. In Europe, from Cattaro on the Adriatic-already in union with the great system of continental telegraphs, the submarine cables are to join the main land with Zante, Candia, and Alexandria, whence the wire will run by Jaffa and Beyrout to Seleucia. At this point the sister enterprise to the Euphrates Valley railway, mainly promoted by those who are most interested in the prior undertaking, will carry the wire along the route of these intended railways, by the valleys of the Orontes and Euphrates to the terminus of the

submarine cable at Kurrachee. Mr. Ainsworth, who twenty years ago accompanied Capt. Chesney, as the geologist of the Euphrates expedition, has recorded it as his opinion, that no special means will be required in the construction of the telegraph, and that there is no reason why " the connecting link should not be established by the ordinary telegraphic system."

"As to physical difficulties," continues that writer," there are none whatsoever. Whatever difficulties do exist, are connected with the more or less lawless and semi-barbarous state of the country through which the wires would have to be conveyed. But the Arab, although in some instances by education and by profession a robber, does not appear to be wantonly destructive. No instances of the kind will be found in the books of travellers. The untouched ruins and monuments of different kinds, met with along the banks of the rivers Euphrates and Tigris, attest rather to a conservative feeling. There are castles on the Euphrates which date as far back as the time of the Khaliffs, the rooms of which are perfectly inhabitable. There are fresco paintings in the halls of Birijik Castle of the times of the Crusaders, and inscriptions at Rakka of the time of the first sultans, that have never been injured save by time. The Arabs do not even appear to destroy animal life wantonly. They detest pork, yet they do not trouble themselves to destroy the innumerable boars that fatten in their hawis—the rich alluvial plains of the rivers. In fact, from all that can be gathered, they appear to rob but not to destroy. Were they wantonly destructive, so as to fire encampments, cut date-trees, break down dykes, or ravage corn-lands, olive-groves, and gardens, the consequence in such countries would be very disastrous. Providence seems not to have given to them such an evil propensity in addition to others. But, supposing even that the contrary were the case, and that the Arabs were wantonly destructive, those dwelling along the banks of the Euphrates are for the most part of sedentary habits, pastoral or agricultural, and they would be among the least disposed to injure property, the destruction of which would be of no advantage to them. They might entertain some superstitious ideas in connexion with a system of wires carried across their lands, but these would be easily dissipated by proper explanations made to them of the meaning and purport of the wires; and the most perfect security would be obtained for them by its being in the power of the Company's agents to say that they were used not only by Europeans, but also to carry the messages of the Sublime Porte and of the Sultan himself-the actual Khalif and head of their religion."

The electric postman has become so necessary to us, that it is as difficult as it is needless to estimate the advantages that must result from this rapid communication with our eastern empire. Whether it be in the cause of good government, of

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humanity, of defensive or offensive operations, of commerce, or merely of private interests, the utility of such an establishment would be inexpressibly great. But a few years need pass ere this is done, and but comparatively trifling sums need be expended in its attainment. The whole line down the Euphrates Valley could be completed for less than it cost to connect London and Birmingham, and the instalment to Ja'ber Castle can be constructed for two millions sterling; whilst so far as English public enterprise is called on to take its part in speeding the electric postman to Calcutta, its contribution will be confined to one million, half the cost of the Ja'ber Castle line. The cost is indeed trifling, the expectation of profit more than reasonable, the results to be anticipated, social and political, hardly to be estimated. England will indeed crown the trophy of peace with a corner-stone worthy of the occasion, other sons open up the highway of the nations from Europe if the once fabled Cathai, and make it possible for the message of joy, of hope, of sorrow and of consolation to fly really with the lightning's speed between those who are separated by half the circuit of the globe.

ART. VI.-The Great City Frauds of Cole, Davidson, and Gordon fully exposed. By SETON LAING, Assignee to Cole's Estate. Dedicated by permission to the Rt. Hon. the Earl of Clarendon, K.G. Fourth edition. London: Mann. 1856.

THERE is a prevalent impression abroad, especially amongst a certain class of Churchmen and Dissenters, that there never was an age in the history of the world wherein greater iniquity prevailed than in the present; and most certainly the numerous swindling transactions that have recently been brought to light would seem to confirm this impression, were it not that the persons who are thus acted upon forget, or, perhaps have not yet learned, that human nature is much about the same as it has ever been since the Fall; and that in every nation and people there have been, from time to time, specimens to prove that honesty is not one of the most prominent characteristics of the human family. The appearance of a lower tone in commercial transactions, and the tendency to cheat and overreach are but, in fact, as cause and effect. Selfishness-inordinate selfishness-is at the root of each transaction that must be branded as foul and infamous, and

selfishness is but a development of the nature of the human race, whether its progeny be inhabitants of the more or less civilised portions of the earth. When, therefore, we hear people exclaiming that the wickedness of mankind is growing larger and more extensive than it formerly was, and see them throwing up their hands, and lifting up their eyes, as if their lot was the most unhappy that can befal mankind, because they are now living instead of in former years, we are very much inclined to give them credit for being either fools or hypocrites; for, most assuredly, if they would only take the trouble to think, and reason, and read, they would learn that there is scarcely a year that has elapsed since the world began which has not proved to a demonstration that fraud and chicanery are the rule of human transactions, and far— very far-from being the exception in the transactions passing continually and continuously between man and man.

An immense outcry has very recently been made in the city of London on account of the discovery of a systematic series of frauds, that have brought immense loss and, perhaps, in one or two instances, ruin also upon firms of hitherto established credit. This discovery has been seized upon by the multitude for the expression of the opinion to which we have adverted. In the market, in the exchange, in clearing houses, and at home as after dinner talk, denunciations both loud and deep have been hurled against the heads of three men, whose fraudulent transactions have been found out, and against one house in particular, which has been accused of propping up these individuals, in order to save themselves at the expense of others. There is no palliation for the conduct of the rascals themselves; assuredly very little, if any, excuse for the house which is said to have bolstered them up in order to save themselves from ruinous loss, if half that be said about them be true: but many of those who sit in judgment, and are so exceedingly loud in their vehement admiration of honesty and probity, would do well to take into account a certain transaction that passed some centuries ago, when a royal personage, expressing similar indignation to that now vented upon criminals and houses of business, had himself to be told, in somewhat specific terms, that "he himself was the man" who had robbed his neighbour of his chiefest good, and shown no pity. Few counting-houses, we fear, could bear a similar searching test. Wherever moneygetting is the end and aim of life, we do not hesitate to say every transaction will not bear the strictest investigation. The heads of the establishment may be world-renowned for their

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pious professions, their large charitable gifts, their extensive benevolence; but in far too many instances, they are but specimens of the whited sepulchre,-" fair without and foul within," whose inner life, could it be laid bear with all its schemes, and adventure, and trickery, would lead no small number, unexposed to similar temptations to self-aggrandisement, to assert there is not a just man upon earth that feareth God and keepeth his hand from evil. Wherever commerce largely abounds, wherever there is a turn in the market to be made, wherever a per centage of larger amount than usual is seen to be within reach, there will rarely be an indisposition to make the most of it; and if success attend the venture, no matter what have been the means to the end, no one will have a higher repute than those who have gained it. If misadventure follow, however, there never were such rogues in all creation as these, who have aimed at the prize but, unhappily for themselves and others, have not hit the mark. The inference from all this, therefore, is, that it would be far better if those who make the most noise, and pretend to show such a keen sense of what is honourable and noble, would just dwell upon the injunction of One who knew what was in man, and who said to similar accusers concerning another transaction of which very few are guiltless," he that is without sin, let him cast the first stone.'

Now, it is just in this spirit that we would treat the publication which calls forth these remarks. Undoubtedly the annals of commercial life will not show many transactions of a darker hue than those which Mr. Seton Laing, with more show of virtuous indignation than was perhaps needful, has done his best to make appear amongst the blackest-if not the very blackest-that have ever transpired within the city of London. The inference his bulky pamphlet seems to draw is just that of which we have denounced the follythat the present commercial age is more ripe in fraud and duplicity than any other that has preceded it. In his eyes it may be so, because he has been fleeced. He made a venture, and expected to obtain considerable profit thereon; but he failed, as we shall presently show, to take the most ordinary care to find out the character of his clients, and would never have entered the lists as an exponent of virtuous indignation at the crimes of others, had he not lost some thousands in his eager desire to make a profit out of Joseph Windle Cole. We have really no patience with a man who so thoroughly shows that his anger is chiefly roused by the breeches-pocket influence. That is evident on every page of

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