of a Missionary from the holy see; a Franciscan soon afterwards joined them, and, uniting their voices, they loudly reproached Pitot with his apostacy, at the saine time declaring that they would make his peace if he would consent to sign certain propositions, and perhaps obtain for him a Chaplaincy to some Foreign Minister, with a liberal pension.

Near three hours were passed in severe contention, when the missionaries conducted Pitot up and down flights of stairs, who thought the apartment which was the termination of his excursion the same he had left, as it contained a bed with green furniture, on which he reposed during the remainder of the night. On the following morning he was taken to a room communicating with a chapel, whence he saw five masses celebrated by the same number of priests, who administered the host to several persons: after the conclusion of the service, his conductors led him to the room he had before occupied, where he dined, and, being left alone, he contrived to open the locks which detained him a prisoner, and, after some difficulty, he reached his lodgings.

When the family of M. Fontaine missed their inmate, some circumstances induced them to suspect the servant, who, upon being sharply interrogated and terrified, confessed she had been instrumental in his detention; and, consenting to

con

conduct her master, and three other persons, to the place, she led them to the house already mentioned, where she immediately claimed and obtained the minister's protection who resided in it. As a further proof of the fact, M. Pitot's friends caused him to be conveyed to different parts of the city, and finally to the house in ques tion, which he immediately recognized.

The party implicated endeavoured to invalidate the monk's testimony by the following statement; that he was neither decoyed or deceived, as he went voluntarily to the house of the minister, and offered to continue in the faith of his forefathers, provided he might be absolved from his monastic vows, and act for the future as a secular priest. This proposal being rejected by the missionaries, he left them, and went to a public+ house in the neighbourhood, where he slept; and a person made oath that he was in Pitot's company, and actually let him out the next morning through a back door: in addition to which, others declared he did not remain at the Envoy's residence: "The Postman" observed upon this occasion, the affair has appeared so material that the Government has taken notice thereof; and no doubt will provide, in their great wisdom, against future attempts of the like nature; and rather the more, because not long ago a Spanish proselyte, who had been a Carmelite Friar, and proved a man of good morals and principles, vanished

away,

away, being doubtless taken up by missionaries, and likely carried away into Spain; for several advices from thence told us of a man being burnt alive for deserting the church, and the picture they made of that martyr was very like our Carmelite."

On the 14th of September the servant girl was apprehended, and committed for trial; and, on the following day, Mons. Pitot made a solemn renunciation of the Roman Catholic religion in the French church already mentioned.

UNCOMMON INSTANCE OF MATERNAL INFAMY.

The judicial court of Holland pronounced judgment on an affair, in October 1700, which surpasses almost every instance of turpitude upon record, except in the solitary cases to be found in our State Trials. Madam Noortwyk, a lady of fortune, and of the most respectable connections, had a daughter who unfortunately excited the admiration of a rich Jew. We are not told whether the young lady felt a similar regard for the Israelite; but, however that may have been, the mother arranged a bargain with the gentleman, who agreed to give her 33,000 florins as the price of the former. The parties were not sufficiently guarded in their conduct to prevent this infamous contract from being known: the public voice was loud in execrating it, and Madam Noortwyk's relations most honourably consigned

her

her to unobstructed justice. The sentence of the court was severe, but not cruel; though the case almost warranted some of the corporeal inflictions of the law. Madam Noortwyk was imprisoned for life, forfeited the detestable bond (for the Jew took care not to pay in money), and paid a fine of 66,000 florins. Guardians were appointed for the daughter; the punishment of her purchaser is not mentioned.

GENERAL VIEW OF POLITICAL EVENTS DURING THE XVIIth CENTURY.

This article appeared in the Postman of December 31, 1700. The masterly manner in which it is written compels us to regret its brevity. The author calls it an iron age; feelingly laments the waste of human life, and that the earth had become a field of blood; coucluding, the then generation had reason to dread the succeeding cen tury as likely to be even worse than the former. Little did he imagine the Commonwealth of Eng+ land would have been imitated eighty-nine years after he wrote by a ferocious set of people, who wasted more blood in one month than the Eng→ lish did in twelve years, by attempting to estab lish a phantom, while they were, in reality, forging the heaviest chains of despotism for themselves, for the rest of Europe, and even South America, where the dæmon of revolution now stalks abroad, surrounded by scenes of carnage,

only

only surpussed by those exhibited in France, Austria, Prussia, Poland, Russia, Holland, and Denmark. In the first of those countries more fell by the guillotine, and the hands of their countrymen, than the survivors dare enumerate; and in the remainder instances might be cited when vast armies perished in a day, and the fate of kingdoms was repeatedly decided by a single battle. Let it not then be pronounced that the 19th can be more detestable than the 18th century; and surely no one will contend that the last twenty years of it did not present a more dreadful picture than the one hundred of the 17th.

"This being the last day of the year 1700, which concludes the XVIIth century, it will not be improper to present the Reader with a short epitome of the most material things that have been transacted during the same, that he may, in some manner, foresee what is like to happen in the following.

"The XVIIth century has been justly called, from its very beginning, the Iron Age; for though the former have been very lewd and dissolute, this has certainly exceeded in all manner of wickedness; Virtue, Sincerity, and Justice, have been scared from the world; Christendom has been a continual Aceldema, a field of blood, a theatre of ravage, cruelties, and destruction; and Piety and Religion have received such mortal

wounds,