charities of human nature. Time, however, warned us to depart, unless we would be overtaken by darkness in our rough and precipitous descent; and wishing, somewhat presumptuously, that, as in the days of Joshua, the sun would stand still, we were reluctantly commencing preparations, when, lo! to our dismay, "the Devil's table-cloth" was suddenly spread, which cut off all chance of a retreat for some time at least.

To some persons an explanation of this phenomenon may be necessary. "The Devil's table-cloth," as it is called at the Cape, is nothing more than a white fog, or cloud, which covers the whole summit, or Table Land, sometimes extending half-way down its sides, and enveloping it in a vapour so dense, that the hand can scarcely be discerned if held at arm's-length before the face. The most untravelled reader need scarcely be told that if he treads gingerly in a dirty London fog, along smooth-flagged pavements, and through streets with which he is familiar as with his hearth-rug; if he peers cautiously about, and anxiously listens for a quarter of an hour before he ventures to cross from one side of the road to the other-that it is not quite pleasant for even a bold cragsman to attempt the descent of a mountain in an atmosphere through which he cannot see a yard beyond his nose; or, to use a sailor's phrase, which he might cut with his knife.

The south-east gale, of which the spreading of the devil's table-cloth is the precursor, now began to blow freshly, and we held an anxious consultation as to what was to be done. Terrible stories were told anent persons who had been foolhardy enough to attempt the descent of the mountain under the same circumstances under which we were now placed-of their having been dashed to atoms down the tremendous precipices, or having found a dreadful and prayerless tomb in some of the unplumbed fissures. After much talking, however, there seemed but this terminus to our deliberations, viz. :--that we must remain where we were for the night, in hope that by morning his Satanic majesty would be pleased to withdraw the table-cloth with which he had so unceremoniously and inauspiciously covered us. But the women, true to the principles of their sex, argued the absolute impossibility of remaining in such a situation all night, at the same time that they admitted the equally absolute impossibility of accomplishing the only alternative. To satisfy the feminine portion of our commuity, I set out on a Voyage of discovery, crawling cautiously on my hands and knees; but, after traversing much ground with difficulty and trouble in that novel and uneasy posture, I could not succeed in making the mouth of the ravine by which we had ascended. The difficulty now became to rejoin my companions, and, having lost my bearings, I could not have done so, had I not fired my gun as a signal, which being answered, I accomplished a re-union. Our only chance for comfort was now to find a rock, the projection of which should shelter us from the south-easter. I again set out on a crawling expedition, and, having found a favourable spot, I fired my gun as a direction to my friends, and presently the whole party shuffled into port, hands and knees, the gentlemen of course leading the way, and the ladies clinging somewhat ludicrously to the stern sheets of their male companions' attire. We all nestled under the lee of the rock as comfortably as circumstances would admit, and began to fumble for our provisions and culinary utensils. here the question arose how to procure water, and, nobody else volun

But

teering, poor Pill Garlick was obliged to set out as before, loaded with a huge kettle, as well as a gun. The necessary element obtained, we boiled coffee, broiled ham, and fell to upon our supper. We would willingly have kept up a fire all night, but the gale grew too strong, and we were compelled by the stern necessity of cold to pack together as closely as possible when "addressing ourselves to repose," and to stretch the coolies at our feet, after the fashion of invalids' hot-water bottles. Few of the party slept except myself, and one or two others, who had been too much beaten by the elements, and too well accustomed to be rocked into slumber by wild winds and waves, to heed a lodging on a mountain-top. I slept soundly about a watch or more, much to the envy of the sleepless shiverers; and at dawn I started up on the look-out. I found the wind had lulled, and the clouds were fast dispersing.

In another hour I roused some who at last had dozed off, and the fog by that time having entirely cleared, we all walked to the edge to see the sun rise-a sight, the glories of which few, comparatively, have had an opportunity of contemplating from so elevated a situation. And here let me observe that, although in passing through the different grades of the service to which I belong, from a boy on board a WestIndiaman to at last master of an Eastern-going craft (or, as Jack terms them, South-Spainers), I have seen the same sun rise some hundreds, ay, thousands of times, and in almost every description of place-though I have seen it tinging the foliage of the mighty forests of Gucatan, and the deep bush of New South Wales-though I have seen its first rays reflected in all the colours of the rainbow on vast islands of ice in the Antarctic circle-and though, on one memorable occasion, I hailed its opening beams with grateful gladness, when they dispersed a night of hurricane and storms, and my ship lay dismantled, and nearly a powerless wreck, the crew exhausted with working at the pumps, and when welcome light and genial warmth, together with the knowledge of the gale having abated, imparted to us all that confidence which is the British sailor's right-although, I say, I have seen that sun rise so often, and under such varied circumstances, never do I remember to have seen it rise with greater grandeur than from the summit of Table Mountain.

Having feasted our souls with this sublime spectacle, we ministered to the wants of the body by a plentiful breakfast, and about noon we commenced the descent, rendered ludicrous enough by various tumblings and sprawlings on the part of the more inexpert mountaineers. We arrived at the "Oven " about three o'clock, and dined; after which, to wile away the hour of digestion, we set up our empty bottles as marks for our rifles and fowling-pieces. We did not forget to visit our friend the Hottentot, but the women marched indignantly on, absolutely refusing to countenance by their presence so improper a person. About eight in the evening we arrived in Cape Town, much to the joy of our friends there, whose fears for our safety had been excited by observing the summit of the mountain enveloped in the table-cloth. After a good supper we turned in for the night, heartily tired, but certainly well pleased with our two days' frolic. BLUEJACKET.

SUBJECTS FOR PICTURES.- -NO. VI.

THE TWO DEATHS.

I.-The Death of Sigurd, the Earl of Northumberland.
The Earl lay on his purple bed,
Faint and heavy was his head,
Where the snows of age were shed-
Heavy on his pillow.

Never more when seas are dark

Will Earl Sigurd guide his bark
Thro' the dashing billow.

Never from that bed of pain
Will the warrior rise again.
Yes, he will arise :-e'en now
Red he flushes to the brow;
Like the light before his prow

Is the dark eye's gleaming.

No: it never shall be said

Sigurd died within his bed

With its curtains streaming

Whose sole curtain wont to be
Banners red with victory.

Lift me up, the sea-king said-
At the word his sons obey'd,
And the old man was convey'd

Where the sea was sounding.

At his ancient castle gate,
Death's dark coming to await,

With his knights surrounding,

Morn was reddening in the sky,
As the Earl came forth to die.

In a carved oaken chair,

Carved with carving quaint and rare-
Faces strange and garlands fair-
Is the chieftain seated,

As when at some festival

In his high ancestral hall

Bards his deeds repeated.

And there was no loftier song,
Than what bore his name along.

Round him swept his mantle red,
Like a chief apparalled,

With his helmet on his head

With its white plumes flying.

At his side the sheathed brand,
And the spear in his right hand-
Mid the dead and dying.
Where the battle raged the worst,
Ever was that right hand first.

He-the tamer of the wild-
Who invincible was styled,
Now is feeble as a child

By its mother sleeping ;

June. VOL. LIII. NO. CCx.

N

But the mind is unsubdued-
Fearless is the warrior's mood,

While his eyes are keeping
This last vigil strange and lone,
That his spirit may be known.
As a ship cuts through the froth
Shining comes the morning forth,
From his own ancestral north,

While each rosy vapour

Kindles beautiful and bright,

With an evanescent light:

But the human taper

Hath an even briefer ray :
Strange, oh life, is thy decay!
Haughtily his castle stands
On a rock amid the sands,

Where the waves in gather'd bands
Day by day are dashing.

Never is the sounding shore

Still with their eternal roar,

And their strife is flashing

To the noontide's azure light,
And the stars that watch at night.
Sigurd's look is on the foam

Where his childhood wont to roam

For the sea has been his home

From his earliest hours

Gathering the echoing shells,

Where the future tempest dwells,
As some gather flowers;

Trembling when a rosy boy
With a fierce and eager joy.
Many things long since forgot
In a hard and hurried lot
Now arise-they trouble not

He, the stately hearted:

But he saw a blue-eyed maid,

Long since 'mid the long grass laid, And true friends departed.

Tears that stand in that dark eye

Only may the sea-breeze dry.

Longer do the shadows fall
Of his castle's armed wall,
Yet the old man sits, while all

Stand behind him weeping:

But behind they stand, for he

Would not brook man's tears to see. One fair child is sleeping

To his grandsire's feet he crept,

Weeping silent till he slept.

Heavily beneath his mail

Seems Earl Sigurd's breath to fail,

And his pale cheek is more pale,
And his hand less steady.

Crimson are the sky and surge,

Stars are on th' horizon's verge,

Night and Death are ready!

Down in ocean goes the sun,
And Earl Sigurd's life is done!

II.-The Death of Camoens.

Pale comes the moonlight thro' the lattice gleaming,
Narrow is the lattice, scanty is the ray,

Yet on its white wings the fragrant dews are streaming-
Dews-oh how sweet after August's sultry day!
Narrow is the lattice-oh let night's darkness cover
Chamber so wretched from any careless eye-
Over yon pallet whatever shadows hover,

They are less dark than the shadow drawing nigh-
Death it is thy shadow

Let the weary one now die!

Beautiful, how beautiful!-the heavy eyes now closing
Only with the weight of the moonlight's soothing smile-
Or do they recall another hour's reposing,

When the myrtle and the moonlight were comrades the while? Yes; for, while memory languidly is fetching

Her treasures from the depths which they have lain among, A fragile hand-how thin-how weak-is sadly sketching Figures and fancies that cell's white walls along.

On the lip there is a murmur—

It is the swan's last song.

Dark order of St. Dominick! thy shelter to the weary
Is like thy rule-cold, stern, unpitying in its aid;

Cold is general charity, lorn the cell and dreary—

Yet there the way-worn wretched one may rest the dying head; Who would remember him-ah, who does remember

He the ill-fated, yet the young and gifted one?

Grief and toil have quench'd life's once aspiring ember:
High heaven may have pity-but man for man has none !
Close thine eyes, Camoens;
Life's task is nearly done.

Feebly his hand upon the wall is tracing

One lovely face and one face alone,
E'en the coming hour-other memories effacing—
Leaves that as fresh as when it first was known;
Faintly he traces with white and wasted fingers
What was once so lovely-what is still so dear:
Life's latest look-like its earliest one yet lingers
On the large soft eyes that seem to meet him here;
Love's ethereal vision

Is not of Earth's dim sphere!
Large, soft, and dark, the eyes where he has blended
So much of the soul are somewhat like his own;

So in their youth the auburn hair descended,

Such the sad sweet smile to either red lip known.
Like were they in beauty, so the heart's light trembled
On the flushing cheek and in the kindling eye;
Yet more clearly like-the inward world resembled-
In its sweet communion-the tender and the high;
Our cold world is cruel

To rend so sweet a tie.

Thro' a weary world-path known to care and sorrow,
Still was her influence o'er his being cast;
She was the hope that whispered of to-morrow,
She was the memory music of the past-