tion is arranged, they start for their merciless expedition; we are roused by the sudden clattering of hoofs, the clang of arms, the sound of voices, the periodical word of command. We have arrived at the encounter and are prepared for the dismay of the surprised peasants expressed in the furious shouts of men, the shrieks of women, the cries of children, as by the power of arms and the force of numbers their stores and cattle are seized and carried away amid violence and bloodshed, and the defenceless owners made captive.

But things are not to end thus, the innocent will be avenged; retributive justice is not to be mocked and awaits the dastardly plunderers; the battery of Heaven interposes to avenge the wrongs of the helpless; and the dark eye of the Zigeuner flashes as he draws down the forked lightning in vivid flashes, and presently follows the roar of the loud thunder echoing from one mountain peak to another and answering again and again as it pursues its mysterious transit into the far-off distance and dies away. The cowardly victors, seeing one of their chiefs, horse and rider, struck to the ground in the immediate front of their band, and so suddenly that the rest, having no time to rein in, ride headlong over him, have recourse to a hasty flight; more than one is thrown with violence to the ground, and they are unable to gain their forest fastness; the fury of the storm pursues them; shelterless and bewildered they are scattered in all directions; their booty escapes them, their captives are freed, while the confusion that prevails among them renders their expedition abortive. In the midst of the fury of the elements, and the general consternation it has occasioned, a shot from the cross-bow of one of the peasants, who have now summoned presence of mind to defend themselves, has struck their leader, and while trying to rally his band he has fallen dead from his horse, and the panic is complete.

But see the leader of the performance; he has worked himself into a frenzy by the time this consummation is reached; his countenance becomes of a deeper hue; the perspiration runs down his face, and as he gives the final stroke, the whalebones drop from his hands and he

sinks back in his chair completely exhausted.

To ourselves this exciting performance was perfectly magical, and we had so completely followed every stage of the story that, when the finale came, difficult as it seems to understand it now, we were not even surprised at this result to the poet-musician. The audience, more or less used to these exhibitions of genius, though not astonished, were enthusiastic in their applause, and testified their sympathy and admiration by loudly cheering the band, raising their glasses in the air and drinking the health of the performers with reiterated bravos.

A hat was carried round by one of the Zigeuners, and we were glad to have this opportunity of testifying our gratification; but Hungarian hospitality admits of no compromise, and we were disappointed as well as surprised, on beckoning the collector to us, to find his approach forbidden by the landlord, who, advancing, whispered that the little performance must be considered as offered to us in our character of strangers, and that all present would feel gratified if we would accept it as a mark of their welcome to us on coming among them. All we could do, therefore, was to assure the spokesman of the pleasure we had derived from the entertainment and to beg him to convey the expression of our warm recognition of the courtesy of those who had provided it for us. the same time we would not be denied the pleasure of seeing the Zigeuner band drink our health, and requested the landlord to provide them wherewithal to perform this task.

At

The history of these strange folks is as interesting as curious. Each of these wandering detachments owns a tract or beat, the bounds of which are recognized and respected by the rest, and they pay their periodical visits to the towns and villages it contains with great regularity. Those who claim the town of Raab as their privileged resort have from time immemorial earned, and have traditionally maintained, a brilliant reputation as virtuosi. Among them, the names of Bibary, Szarcoszy, and Ketskemety are recognized as stars of the first magnitude, but Farkacs Miskah is the "fullmoon" of tzymbalon-players.

The Zigeuner-volk constitute an im

portant element in the social habits of the Hungarian people; they are regarded as a national institution, without the help of which their popular festivities, public or private, their marriages, baptisms, betrothals, anniversaries and family gatherings would be devoid of spirit or interest. The musical faculties in herited by these people seem to amount almost to a supplementary sense. Theoretically speaking, they know nothing of the science of music, but their ear catches with marvellous facility, and their mind retains, any air they may once hear, and they possess the power of reproducing it on any of their own simple instruments. It is sufficient to hum or whistle to them the suggestion of a tune they have never heard, for them to play it with elaborate accompaniments. This is the delight of the Magyar population. Every Hungarian has his favorite air, and sometimes a whole evening in a cavéhaz is passed in calling upon the Zigeuners for this reproduction of one tune after another; their success in responding to these appeals being met with the most rapturous applause. The popular dances such as the Czardacs could not be danced without the accompaniment of the tzymbalon.

It is a singular and suggestive fact that the idiosyncratic talent evinced by these unlearned musicians is a gift per se and is incapable of being attained or improved. The great Maestro Liszt himself a Hungarian and conversant with the music of these tribes-gives an interesting account of an experiment made by himself to train and educate a Zigeuner lad, very proficient in his own natural art. The result, however, proved abortive, and so far from cultivating the germ which appeared so fertile, he only succeeded in disturbing his preconceived notions without imparting any new ideas.

It must not be supposed that music forms the occupation of all Zigeuners; there is only one section that gives itself up to this æsthetic pursuit; others employing their early youth in acquiring the various trades by which they earn their living: these are, as in other countries, charcoal-burning, tinkering, smithying, nail-making, horse-shoeing, while the women carry on an auxiliary "business" in tambourine playing, danc

ing and fortune-telling, and often earn from the credulity of village maidens more than the men who supply the domestic needs of the population.

Thus they travel from village to village in their movable wooden hut, with their families and all their chattels about them; pigs and dogs, their only livestock, bringing up the rear, a hammer and bellows their only tools, and an iron pot their compendious batterie de cuisine. Arrived at their halting-place on the outskirts of a town, they encamp, dig a hole and kindle their bivouac-fire; they then unharness their horse and leave him to find his pasture. While the women wash their clothes and cook their food, the men present themselves to their expectant employers and generally find repairs and orders awaiting their arrival.

Although the Zigeuners belong to all countries, those of each country maintain their distinctive peculiarities so rigidly from generation to generation, that there is no tracing in them any affinity to the races among which they have established themselves.

Wonderfully hardy in constitution, they will face the extremes, whether of heat or cold, without any of those artificial compensations which with all other people have become necessities of nature. Thus a mere rag suffices to cover them beneath the keenest blast, and they expose themselves bareheaded to the fiercest sun. The Zigeuner is reckless as a child and wild as a beast of prey: he knows no care for the morrow and is always in need, and in squalid poverty: though eager for a meal when he can get it by no matter what means, he will go without food uncomplainingly when it is not to be had; tobacco, however, is to him a necessity, and he cannot school himself to do without it; but he is content with the vilest sort, and if he cannot obtain any fit to smoke, he rolls up into a ball such as he can procure and keeps it in his mouth.

The newly born Zigeuner child is from the hour of its birth used to cold water by being plunged into the nearest spring at whatever season of the year, and after a couple of weeks' travels tied to its mother's back or borne on her head whether through piercing cold or torrid heat. For the first two years it wears no clothing; it receives no train

ing of any kind unless in the art of plundering or acquiring its trade, so that it moral degradation may be easily estimated.

Sigismund granted to the Zigeuners of Hungary certain privileges and recognized their right to be represented by deputies; and his successor tried in vain to induce them to settle and take up fixed habits as artisans or agricultural laborers. Then, as always, it was found impossible to wean them from their independent habits and nomad propensi

ties.

We are glad to add that it has been ascertained the musical Zigeuners exhibit a great moral superiority over the rest of their tribe, and there seems every reason to attribute this elevation to the refining influences of their pursuit. These generally appear in peasant cos

tume, but they are always glad to purchase second-hand the rich dress-costume of the Magyar, and this graceful and picturesque attire becomes them well.

Once again it was our lot to hear the Zigeuner band, but this time on foreign soil, in the precincts of the Trocadero. Strange as it may seem, we scarcely recognized our enchanters of Raab. Their strains were marvellously sweet, and they were also distinctive in their character as all national music always must be; but it was like the song of the caged nightingale. The effect was that produced by seeing a choice relic of antiquity in a museum instead of on the spot where it was found; the prestige was gone with the cadre that surrounded it, and the Zigeuner of Magyar-land had lost his witchery !-Fraser's Magazine.

taken by his mother to Geneva, where he received a classical education. In 1805 he went to Paris with a view to the study of law, but soon became engrossed in literary pursuits. He began to contribute largely to journals and periodicals, wrote pamphlets and edited translations, and exhibited a strength and maturity of intellect that soon brought him into notice. In 1812 he became assistant professor of modern history in the Sorbonne, and the same year married Mlle. Pauline de Meulan, whose royalist influence opened for him a political career, on which he entered on the fall of Napoleon. He was made successively Secretary-General of the Department of the Interior (1814) and of Justice (1815), Master of Requests (1816), and Councillor of State (1817); and from 1816 to 1820 he was DirectorGeneral of the Communal and Departmental Administration. In 1822 he was dismissed from the Council of State and the Sorbonne for criticising the government in his pamphlets, but was reinstated by the Martignac ministry in

1828.

In a pamphlet advocating constitutional government, published in 1816, Guizot had expressed the sentiments of the party afterward known as doctrinaires; and this, with his high literary reputation, austere presence, and scholarly eloquence, gave him a remarkable political influence from his first appearance in the Chamber of Deputies, in January, 1830. He promoted the downfall of Charles X., became Minister of the Interior in the first cabinet of Louis Philippe, and of Public Instruction in the coalition ministry of Soult (1832-6); and after a few months he received the same post in the Molé cabinet, but soon disagreed with his colleagues and resigned. He was ambassador in London from February to October, 1840, when he succeeded Thiers as Minister of Foreign Affairs; and in 1847 he replaced Soult as premier. The revolution of 1848 chiefly resulted from his upholding, in concert with Louis Philippe, the policy of peace at any price abroad,

and of opposition to democratic reform at home. Guizot regarded the growing agitation for electoral reform as a trifling matter, and reluctantly consented to resign his office on February 23d, when the Revolution had actually begun. He fled to England, but returned in 1849, and was defeated as a candidate for the legislative assembly. In 1861, although a Protestant, he came forward as an advocate of the temporal power of the Pope. After supporting the Ollivier ministry and the plébiscite in 1870, he objected in 1874 to the former's academical eulogy of Napoleon 111. ; and on hearing that Napoleon had formerly paid his son's debts, to refund the amount he sold for 120,000 francs a picture by Murillo, given him by the Queen of Spain, and to the last supported himself by his pen in compiling a history of France for the use of children, and other works. He died on the 12th of September, 1874.

For many years Guizot was a leading member of the Protestant Synod, but finally withdrew on account of his aversion to any deviation from the strictest Calvinism. Nearly all his works have been translated into English. The most celebrated are his histories of Civilization in Europe and France, based upon his lectures in the Sorbonne, and his histories of the English Revolution, of the English Republic under Oliver Cromwell, and of the Protectorate of Richard Cromwell and the restoration of the Stuarts. At the time of his death he was engaged upon an elaborate history of Spain in ten volumes, for the preparation of which he had learned Spanish at the age of seventy-two. Noteworthy among his other writings are his essays on Corneille and Shakespeare," his admirable sketches of Sir Robert Peel and of Washington, and his "Histoire de Quatre Grand Chrétiens Français" (2 vols. 1873-4). His speeches have been collected under the title of "Histoire parlementaire de France," etc. (5 vols. 1863). He also published Memoirs pour servir à l'Histoire de Mon Temps (8 vols. 1858-68).

66

THE DATA OF ETHICS. By Hert ert Spencer. New York: D. Appleton & Co.

Hitherto the successive volumes of Mr. Spencer's System of Synthetic Philosophy" have followed each other in an orderly progression according to a preconceived plan; but "The Data of Ethics," which forms the first part of the "Principles of Morality" ap. pears out of its regular place in the series, leaving the second and third volumes of the "Principles of Sociology" yet unpublished and probably unwritten. The reason for this break in the original plan is explained by Mr. Spencer in his preface. "I have been led," he says, thus to deviate from the order originally set down, by the fear that persistence in conforming to it might result in leaving the final work of the series unexecuted. Hints, repeated of late years with increasing frequency and distinctness, have shown me that health may permanently fail, even if life does not end, before I reach the last part of the task I have marked out for myself. This last part of the task it is to which I regard all the preceding parts as subsidiary. Written as far back as 1842, my first essay, consisting of letters on "The Proper Sphere of Government," vaguely indicated what I conceived to be certain general principles of right and wrong in political conduct; and from that time onwards my ultimate purpose, lying behind all proximate purposes, has been that of finding for the principles of right and wrong in conduct at large a scientific basis. To leave this purpose unfulfilled after making so extensive a preparation for fulfilling it, would be a failure the probability of which I do not like to contemplate; and I am anxious to preclude it, if not wholly, still partially. Hence the step I now take. Though this first division of the work terminating the Synthetic Philosophy cannot, of course, contain the specific conclusions to be set forth in the entire work, yet it implies them in such wise, that definitely to formulate them requires nothing beyond logical deduction." He explains, further, that he is the more anxious to indicate at least the outlines of his final work because "now that moral injunctions are losing the authority given by their supposed sacred origin," "the establishment of rules of right conduct on a scientific basis is a pressing need."

It would be useless to attempt to summarize a work which is itself a summary, or to epitomize an argument which is itself an epitome; and we probably cannot convey a better idea of the scope and subject of the treatise than by reproducing the titles of its several chapters: Conduct in General," "The Evolution

of Conduct," Good and Bad Conduct," "Ways of Judging Conduct," The Physical View,' "The Biological View," The Psychological View," "The Sociological View," Criticisms and Explanations," The Relativity of Pains and Pleasures," Egoism versus Altruism,” "Altruism versus Egoism," "Trial and Compromise." Conciliation," 'Absolute Ethics and Relative Ethics," and "The Scope of Ethics."

As regards literary quality, the "Data of Ethics" is the most compressed, the most easily understood, and the most readable of all Mr. Spencer's philosophical writings. The author's style has always been remarkable for its precision and lucidity, but in this work he seems to have determined to omit all those details which might perplex the average reader and to make it a popular classic in its department. If this was his intention he has succeeded most admirably, and his work can hardly fail to influence profoundly the course of ethical speculation.

THE YOUNG FOLKS' CYCLOPEDIA OF COMMON THINGS. By John D. Champlin, Jr. With Numerous Illustrations. New York: Henry Holt & Co.

The difficulty of answering the numerous questions asked by children as new subjects are suggested to them, is one of the most familiar of household experiences. It cannot be met by sending them to the ordinary cyclopædias, because the articles in these presuppose on the part of the person consulting them a more matured intelligence and a wider range of information than children can be expected to possess. The result is that the questions, which are often of the highest importance to the child's mental growth, are either not answered at all, or are put off with such lame and inadequate explanations as the parent can muster on the spur of the moment. It is this want that Mr. Champlin's work is specially designed to meet; and it meets it so admirably that, after examining it and perceiving how generally useful it is likely to prove, one is inclined to wonder that the scheme was not carried out earlier. Now that the work is done, however, it ought to be considered, in every household where there are children, as more indispensable than any other book of reference. In regard to the scope of the work the author explains that he has " attempted to furnish in simple language, aided by pictorial illustrations where thought necessary, a knowledge of things in Nature, Science, and the Arts which are apt to awaken a child's curiosity. Such features of Astronomy, Chemistry, Physics,