silence. In silence I afterwards passed over the whole adventure, for I was a little ashamed of its sudden termination. But a child will sometimes cry from vexation, or to gain a point. In either of these cases let him cry unheeded. If he were very obstreperous, or very persevering, I should say, "Cry, if you like to cry, but as I do not like to hear you cry any longer, I shall leave you." The chances are many that the child would be silent when he was convinced that he was no longer heard. If a refractory and ill-advised boy were to kick against the || door, I should return, and say, coolly, "I am afraid you will spoil the drawing-room door, come with me into the nursery; there you may kick as long as you please, you can hurt nothing but your toes, and when you are tired of kicking, come to me again." And in the nursery I would leave the gentleman, taking care to exclude, for the time, all other children and the nursery maid. mother's work table, and began to read the tale of Blue Beard. I read with deep and silent attention. I was good enough to blame the wife for doing what she had been forbidden to do, and I trembled for the consequences of her disobedience; I was shocked at the clotted blood, the murdered ladies, and the stain on the fairy key. I proceeded to the terrible explanation demanded by the husband-to his dragging the wife by the hair of her head-to his holding his drawn scimitar over her, and dooming her to instant death. I closed the book, burst into tears, and exclaimed, " Mamma, I never will be married!" I knew that all men's beards were not blue; but I believed that all men might hold their scimitars over the heads of their wives, and murder them at their pleasure, as Blue Beard had cer||tainly done. I never had the courage to finish the story till many years afterwards; and it was not till then I discovered that the wife of Blue Beard had With regard to gaining a point, prevent been saved by the arrival of her brothers. crying, by granting the thing desired, with The other instance of childish credulity, a good grace, and with pleasure, when-which happened about the time of my ever it can be done with propriety. If first reading Blue Beard, is almost too the thing be improper, refuse it steadily. || ridiculous to repeat; however, the exNo means ought to obtain it, and least of treme youth of the little novice may, perall the being troublesome. What trouble haps, render it excusable. I was deeply would this method spare the mother, and read in "The Tales of the Fairies," and what vexation the child! I no more doubted the existence of these beings, and their power, than I did my own existence, or my capability of reading their exploits. Nay, how did I know that I was not a fairy myself. This I determined, if possible, to ascertain ; but, as I was conscious that I might expose myself to ridicule, if I should fail, I kept the whole affair a profound secret. Children believe all they hear and read, till they find they have been cheated, and they never should be cheated. Nothing should be told them that is not true, and they should read nothing that could not be true. But a mother cannot be continually with her child; and what nursery-maid has not said to a pet boy, who has hit his head against the table, "Give me a blow and I'll beat it?" at once teaching the dear creature to believe a falsehood, and revenge an injury. I fear this is an evil without a remedy. With respect to children's books, they are much improved, and may, in general, be read and believed. My books were of a different sort, and of my implicit faith in them I can give two instances. I should think I must have been about five years of age when a beautiful little book, bound in gilt paper, fell in my way; it contained "Mother Goose's Tales." I seized the treasure, placed myself at my || || || I understood every part of "The Tales;" though if there were a considerable change of place, or lapse of time between the parts, I had some difficulty in regarding them as a whole; but there was one thing of which I was totally ignorant, and which it concerned me much to know, what the powerful instrument was with which the fairies worked such wonI applied to my mother for informaand desired to know what a wand She not having "The Tales of the Fairies" in her imagination, replied that it was a neat, white stick. Is that all? thought I, then I am sure I can get a ders. was. wand. I got the neatest stick I could procure, and peeled it, and, thus prepared, I struck my wand three times on our parlour grate, and ordered it to become gold! Not a particle of the stubborn steel would change its nature! Disappointed, but not discouraged, I concluded that my first attempt had been too bold, and that I ought to have tried my power on a smaller subject. I struck my black bonnet, and commanded it to become a green one, and I struck my little doll, and commanded it to become a large one; but the one retained its hue and the other its dimensions. After a few more attempts, which proved equally unsuccessful, I was convinced that I was not born to be a fairy; though I believed as firmly as ever in fairyism, its gifts and || transformations—in a word, in every thing that was written in my book. C. H. MATERNAL REVENGE. effected, although the blood with which the window-sill was imbrued testified that he had not escaped unhurt. GIANNINA was one of the most comely || to witness the intruder's escape, which he damsels in Calabria, and had many a wealthy suitor. To none, however, did she seem inclined to lend a willing ear. Some, of a more timid nature, admired the maiden, and would fain have wooed her,|| but were kept aloof by the haughty glance of her light blue eye; a glance that was rendered more remarkable from the tender colour of the eye, whose sable fringes formed another striking, but agreeable contrast, with its azure hue, and agreed with the glossy, raven locks that shaded her snowy brow. Giannina's father was by no means a thrifty man. His cottage had a better appearance than most of those in the village, of which it was the furthest habitation. The village itself was on the confines of a wood, which reached half way up the side of a wild, and, in some parts, inaccessible mountain; and dreadful were the tales told of the banditti, by which it was infested. The villagers, however, having little to lose, had also little to fear from their depredations; and indeed, of late, only one instance had been given of any attempt to disturb their tranquillity. This attack was made on the abode of Giannina's father; and it was supposed to have been thus directed from his being reputed one of the wealthiest inhabitants. By the courage of Giannina it had been defeated. She was roused in the night by an attempt to force her window; when, seizing a hatchet, she struck at a man, who was in the act of entering. The robber fell to the ground, as Giannina's father, whom her cries had brought to her assistance, arrived, but only in time Not long after this event, a stranger made his appearance in the village, and succeeded in obtaining the affection Giannina had so constantly withheld from her rustic admirers. The suitor to whom she seemed thus favourably inclined was about thirty years of age; of handsome,|| though wild and haughty aspect. His stature was considerably above the middle size, and he would have appeared robust had not his extreme paleness, occasioned by a wound that, he said, he had lately received at the chase, and which still obliged him to wear his arm in a sling, || given a sickly delicacy to his features. Giannina's father, whose will was entirely subservient to her own, consented to the marriage; but from the day on which it took place, the bride and bridegroom disappeared, leaving the afflicted parent as completely ignorant of their fate as the rest of the villagers. "Giannina," said Antonio to his bride, as, after the marriage ceremony, they were returning towards their father's roof, "Let us escape awhile from the noisy festivity that awaits us, within the shade of the adjacent wood." ""Tis but a dangerous resort," rejoined Giannina. "Dost thou fear?" said Antonio; and the inflexion of his voice seemed to import more than, "dost thou fear?"-Giannina attended but unto the words. The damsel was somewhat proud of her merited renown for courage; and, replying, with a degree of pique, that she ness: he wandered there with bandits such as they, and he hath left us the wild mountain scene, the rude banditti, and his captive self, storied on his canvas. would prove her daring, took with him || vator* hath pourtrayed in all their wildthe road that led to the ill-famed forest. They had wandered some minutes in its glades, when Giannina asked Antonio if he could still reproach her with her fears? “What should a sovereign dread within More than once had Antonio, for whose her realm?" he answered, in a sarcastic head a large reward was offered, been tone. "My realm!" "Aye, thine, my rescued by the quickness and courage of bandit queen!" and, on a loud whistle, a Giannina. But the Tyrolese troops, to number of well-armed ruffians appeared whom the Austrian commander at Naples to rise from the earth, descend from the had assigned the task of exterminating the trees, and, in a moment, to encompass banditti, left them no repose. One day, them. "Homage to your Queen!" said harassed beyond measure, and closely the robber Captain, for such he was, and pursued, they reached a bridge, so extaking his wounded arm from a sling- || posed to view, that they dared not hazard "My gentle bride!" said he, " dost know passing it. It was in summer, and the this nerveless hand! It was not such the river, over which the bridge was built, night it opened thy casement! But, for now flowed in a narrower bed, but yet too this hand of mine, I've now a hand of deep to ford. They determined to take thine; and the few drops of blood I do refuge under one of the arches which the forgive thee! Homage to my Queen!" current had abandoned. Hark! their And at this moment Giannina looked a pursuers approach! Their steps are Queen. She turned to Antonio as though heard on the bridge! The outlaws he, also, were her subject. "I neither scarcely dared to breathe - Giannina love nor fear thee! Of love thou art un-pressed her infant to her breast-it gave a worthy! and fear-what have I left to fear? Deem not I shall attempt to forego my fate, for whither should I flee, but infamy would follow? I do devote myself thy victim, nay, even thy faithful wife, and my own injuries forgive. Beware, alone, no deed of thine do injure aught of mine! of that alone beware, for even a victim may avenge! Respect my father! and all that is mine!" feeble cry-Antonio smothered it upon its mother's bosom ! The danger was past:-Giannina dug a grave in the sand, and placed within it the body of her poor lifeless child. Antonio, the robber's head!" cried the populace of a small town in Calabria, as a female with dishevelled hair and haggard mien brought a bleeding head, fresh severed from the trunk, to the magistrate of the district. "A thousand crowns are thine, thou second Judith!" "I seek not the reward-Antonio was my husband-he killed my child, but yesterday-this night I slew him as he slept!" She was his faithful wife. Three years had passed, and Antonio's band had been hunted down, until some had died of hunger and fatigue-some on the scaffold. Antonia and Giannina wandered now alone, except that Giannina carried in her arms an infant, that slumbered sweetly amongst dangers. She thought if ever she again could reach her native village, to prisoner by Calabrian banditti, and to have been leave the babe at her old father's door, detained some months by them in the mounwith these few words, "It is Giannina's tains. One of his landscapes, in which are inchild!" But they were distant now-far || troduced some figures of robbers, and of a young distant-from her home, in the recesses of|| man who appears in captivity, is supposed to reCalabria, which, alone, the pencil of Sal- || late to his own story. Salvator Rosa is said to have been made COUNT RAVENSTEIN. THE death of the great Gustavus, instead of terminating the war that had for so many years convulsed the German Empire, inspired the troops he had so long led to victory to avenge his fall. Years of havoc ensued, and the sword of slaughter desolated the land. While the heroic Bernard Saxe Weymar defeated the Imperialists' General, Count Gallas, and possessed himself of Alsace, the Saxons were, in their turn, victorious on the Elbe, in the daily skirmishes which took place between their armies and their old allies the Swedes. It is true, that they owed their good fortune more to the superiority of their numbers, than to their military skill; but the Swedes had so long triumphed in the field, that their adversaries had learned to consider them as the peculiar favourites of heaven. Like gleams of sunshine through a storm, these short triumphs called forth the energies of many a youthful hero who drew the sword in his country's cause, and fought for renown or a grave. Alas! how few of these generous spirits survive their first field! Urged on by excited feelings, they engage with their whole heart and soul in the contest; and, in the tumult and hurry of the scene, they lose all consciousness of danger, and forget that the stake they are playing for can be won only by a waste of life. Death strikes them to the dust in the moment of victory,|| and they expire with its name upon their lips. Do they in that moment consider that they have bartered life, and all its endearing domestic ties, for a shadow; or do they close their eyes exulting in the wreath that fame will cast over their mouldering ashes? Such a spirit-so warm-so enthusiastic-so eager for renown-so full of hope, and fearless of danger, had just joined the Saxon army in the person of Maximilian Count Ravenstein, the only son of one of the bravest Generals in the Elector's army, who beheld, in his gallant boy, the last male descendant of a proud line of Princes. Having in his own person, and in the loss of his family, bitterly experienced the evils of war, and the hardships of a life spent in the field, the General was grieved in witnessing the strong bias that his son had taken for the profession of arms. To oppose his wishes, however, he knew would serve only to increase their ardour; and, reluctantly yielding, he had that morning placed in his eager hand the standard of his country. How did the heart of the young Saxon glow within him! What visions of future glory rushed before his eyes, as he unfurled the banner, and gave its ample folds to wanton in the winds of heaven! Victory in idea already appeared descending upon it; and he waved it exultingly aloft, as though in its acquisition he had attained the summit of human ambition. “I am a soldier!" he cried aloud; and hill and dale re-echoed-" I am a soldier !" He panted like a young war horse for the fight, and cursed the tardy movements of the Swedish cavalry, which shewed no inclination to abandon their advantageous position on the hills, to attack the enemy on the plain. A lovely summer evening descended on the respective hosts. All was still, as though the spirit of peace had been brooding over the war-contested earth. No sound broke on the ear, but the murmur from each army, which, softened by distance, resembled the wild hum of a beehive. At length, the armed tread of the centinels, each on his lonely post, the solitary neighing of a war horse, the call of the bugles announcing the hour of rest, mingled with the mournful voice of the moving waters, ruffled by the breeze of night. The sound of human voices had died away; but a light still glimmered in the General's tent, and discovered, by its solitary beam, the august figure of Count Ravenstein, tracing, with an old and experienced officer, their destined route on a large map spread on a table before them. Maximilian was leaning on his sword in the door of the tent, alternately contemplating the beauty of the moonlight scenery, and watching with interest the expression of his father's countenance. It might literally be said of the Count, that his head had grown grey beneath the helmet: he had not seen sixty summers; yet his hair was mingled with silver, and his brow, to a casual observer, seemed the enemy. Are their persons better deeply furrowed by the hand of age. proof against a bullet than the steel breastThey, however, who looked closer, read in || plates of our cuirassiers? or is courage that fine expansive forehead the strong || confined to the natives of a petty northern characters which a vigorous and inquiring || region?" mind had planted on the seat of thought. His eyes, deeply seated, were dark, piercing, and intellectual, apparently embodying, at a glance, the objects which they encountered. His nose was aquiline, his mouth small, and the lips rather compressed, with that peculiar expression which often denotes a mind deeply engaged in abstract speculations. His figure was tall, athletic, and finely proportioned; yet spare and fleshless, as though the energies of his soul had worn out the body it was intended only to animate.-Maximilian inherited the same features, the same finely-proportioned figure, and stood before his father, in the early dawning of manhood, the living image of his own youth. "Krantzner!" said the General, at length raising his head, and addressing the veteran, who was diligently studying, with spectacles on nose, the map before them, we must direct our course towards Perlberg, where a most advantageous situation offers; thence, with a little finessing, we might easily destroy Bannier's army without hazarding an engagement."-The old Major nodded his head significantly, and made a half smile to himself, as though he had almost intuitively comprehended the General's plan;|| while the hot-headed Maximilian turned on his father the full lustre of his speaking eye, and replied for Krantzner, in a hasty tone Why adopt this cold calculating method of warfare, my father?-Are our swords to rust from day to day in the scabbard? Let us to the field, and prove that the Swedes are only men, like our selves." "You speak like a young and inexperienced man," returned the General calmly. "It is not by following the wild schemes of a visionary, that battles are won. I cannot sacrifice the lives of the troops committed to my charge, by hazarding a combat to which their forces are not equal." "Their numbers are indeed comparatively small," said the Count, smothering a sigh as he encountered the fiery glances of his impetuous son; "but had you, Maximilian, commanded men as long as I have commanded them, you would know that a few chosen and well-disciplined troops would find small difficulty in defeating a whole army of raw recruits, who, like you, have never stood the fire of an enemy; and who, acquainted only with the theory of this dreadful science, never discover its terrible realities till on the point of becoming their victims. Despair succeeds their high-raised expectations, and they hastily abandon a scene they had so eagerly anticipated." "Do you suspect me of cowardice, Count Ravenstein?" cried the young standard bearer, stepping back and grasping his sword; "nature never formed a mind capable of conceiving great and noble actions without endowing it with a spirit capable of realizing its glorious speculations. Thank God! I am a soldier, and will prove myself not unworthy of the name?" He ceased speaking; and the Count, awaiting till his passion had subsided, replied-" Maximilian, I once felt the same ardour which at this moment is glowing in your breast. Ambitious of fame, I deemed it was to be won only at the cannon's mouth. It was my dream by. night, and the theme of my conversation by day: all my thoughts were directed towards the profession of arms, and every idea centred in the same point. My spirit caught a loftier tone, and I lived in a world of my own creation. The bugle hushed me to sleep, and the trumpet broke upon my early slumbers. I arose with the sun to pore over the pages of history that told of the conquests of great and wicked men-men who had made the world turn pale with repeated acts of bloodshed and violence; yet, in the blindness of my dark idolatry, I viewed them in the light of heroes. Dost thou not think that I awoke to find all this vanity and vexation of spirit? Yes! I have shed |