England and France.

“ κεῖνο κἀλλων, τέκνον,

ισοτήτα τιμῶν, ἡ φίλους ἀει φίλοις
ξύνδει· το γαρ ἴσον νόμιμον ἀνθρωποῖς ἔφυ,
νύκτος τ ̓ ἄφεγγες βλέφαρον, ἥλιου τε φῶς
ἶσον βαδίζει τὸν ἐνιάυσιον κύκλον,

κ' ου δ' έτερον αυτῶν φθόνον ἔχεν νικώμενον.”—EURIPIDES.
"Infestisque obvia signis.

Signa, pares aquilas, et pila minantia pilis."-LUCAN,

«ἴτε νῦν κάθ ̓ ὅδον, τὴν καλλίστην

θέων, Ειρήνὴν, τιμῶντες.”-EURIPIDES.

"That sweet enemy, France."-Sir PHILIP SIDNEY.

"Britannia needs no bulwarks, no towers along the steep."-CAMPBELL. "Whatsoever nation should get the start of the other in making the proposal to reduce and fix the amount of its armed force would crown itself with everlasting honour."-JEREMY BENTHAM.

"I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start."-SHAKESPEARE.

"That English may as French, French Englishmen,

Receive each other-God speak to this Amen.-SHAKESPEARE.

How long, O! France and England, will ye stand
Watching each other o'er the narrow seas,
With hearts full of suspicion and unease;
On either coast your camp-fires midnight brand
Redd'ning the white cliffs of the opposéd land?
How long, like leash'd-up war-dogs, strain to seize
Each other's throats, ye "natural" enemies,
Self-styled; for "natural" friends by Nature plann'd?
Why waste ye half your substance to increase
War's iron panoply 'gainst false alarms,
Making Earth groan with armaments; with fleets
Burd'ning the Ocean? O! let Peace be Peace:
Or, if ye must be rivals, let the feats

That crown the victor be of arts, not arms.

The Chrystal Palace (1851.)

"When the war drums beat no longer, and the battle flags are furl'd,
In the Parliament of Man, the Federation of the World,

Then the common-sense of men shall hold a fretful realm in awe,
And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapt in universal law."-TENNYSON.
"Trade is the golden girdle of the world."-CowPer.

"Respice vindicibus pacatam viribus orbem

Qua latam Nereus cærulus ambit humum,

Se tibi pax terræ, tibi se tuta æquora debent,
Implecti meritis orbis utramque domum."-OVID.

O blessed Thought that arch'd the chrystal hall!
O great World-teacher, telling how the Mind
May labour best to benefit mankind!

O! princely herald of good-will for all
Earth's corners, sent, as with a trumpet-call,
To bid the nations throw down arms behind
God's Truce',* as in the days of old, and bind
Peace captive in a golden girdle's thrall!

O! living Thought! lo! as a seed dropp'd down
By Ocean-crossing bird, from the pure sky,
On rocky isle, grows, rooting its firm hold,
A mighty tree, though weak its infancy;

So Thou, though war's storms on thy promise frown, Shalt burgeon, and bear fruit a thousand-fold.

*Trenga Dei': one of the benefits conferred by the Church on society in the dark ages. It was extended from the Advent Sunday to the octave of Epiphany, and from Septuagesima Sunday to the octave of Easter.

Looking to the happy effect upon England and France, may we not apply to this 'tree' the words of Shakespeare:

Whose arms gave shelter to the princely eagle,

Under whose shade the ramping lion slept.-Henry VI, pt. 3, Act V, Sc. 2.

CCXXXVIII.

The Chrystal Palace.

Palace of glass! In thought alone and dream
Did I behold thee; for a hemisphere

Swell'd 'twixt us; but to me thou wast most dear,

Not for thy fairy grace or crystal gleam,

Thy novel boldness, a world's wonder-theme :
But for that thy good builders did uprear

Thine honest fabric without sigh or tear;

From base to dome thou cost nor sob nor scream.

Not like the Pyramids, whose scourge-raised stones Save not the record of their founder's name, But echo still a whole slav'd Nation's groans: Not like Toledo's fortress-palace, built

With hecatombs of Indian life, and gilt

With new-world gold, wrung forth by blood and flame.

See Note 28.

Albert! I name thee not for thy high state
In England's realm, thou Consort of our Queen:
My very soul abhors what erst hath been
Our poets shame, their flattery of the great:
And hadst thou been but First, no Laureate
Could save in Ode thy memory from the keen
Cold tooth of Time: no mausoleum green
With malachite, engraved with golden date;
No statue cut in marble, run in brass;
Nor e'en thy fairy Palace of bright glass.
Man must himself achieve his deathless fame:
And thou hast earn'd, not on war's field of blood,
But in thy peaceful life, the proudest name
Boasted by monarch or by prince, ‘The Good.'

Merton Meadows.

"Ut nubeis facile interdum concrescere in alto
Cernimus, et mundi speciem violare serenam,
Aëra mulcenteis motu: nam sæpe Gigantum
Ora volare videntur, et umbram ducere late :
Interdum magni montes, avolsaque saxa

Montibus anteire, et solem succedere præter;

Inde alios trahere, atque inducere bellua nimbos."-LUCRETIUS.

«Ηδη ποτ' ἀνάβλεψας είδες νεφέλην κενταυρῳ ὅμοιαν ὴ παρδάλει, ή λυκῳ, ἡ ταυρῳ ;”—ARISTOPHANES.

"Sometimes we see a cloud that's dragonish ;

A vapour sometime like a bear or lion,

A tower'd citadel, a pendant rock,

A fork'd mountain or blue promontory,

With trees upon it, that nod unto the world,

And mock our eyes with air. Thou hast seen these signs;

They are black vesper's pageants.”—SHAKESPEARE.

"Pleasant at noon, beside the vocal brook,

To lie one down, and watch the floating cloud,
And shape to fancy's wild imaginings

Their ever-varying forms."-SOUTHEY.

Ay! there they rush in strange fantastic race,
The Sunshine and the Shadow, o'er the mead;
Swift as Camilla in their airy speed;
One following close the other in the chase;
Sure as the smile and tear on human face.

Oft when a child, not without dread indeed,
Perch'd on some breezy hill, I loved to heed
The same wild rushings o'er the meadowy space;
And dream'd them fiery horses yoked with black;
Or gold and ebon chains of giant size;

Or happy angels driving shapes of sin.

Would I might view again the scudding rack Checker the silent earth, with child-like eyes, And read no sign of human pain therein!