Diary and Chronology. Wednesday, Oct. 26. St. Evristus, Pope and Mar. A.D. 112. It was an Autumn evening, and the rain And called the deluging tempest back again. And through the black clouds ran a lightning And then the flapping raven came to seek Its home; its flight was heavy, and its wing Seem'd weary with a long day's wandering. Thursday, Oct. 27. St. Frumentius, bish. and conf. 4th Cen. Sun rises 1m after 7-Sets 58m after 4. Oct. 27, 1614.-Meeting of the States General of France. These Etats Generaux were convoked at Paris by Marie de Medicis, Regent of the kingdom during the minority of Louis XIII., at the solicitation of the Princes, who complained of the abuses of government." The Estates," says a celebrated historian, "were not the depot of the laws, like the Parliament of England, and the Diets of the Empire; they formed no part of the supreme legislation, yet they had a desire to be legislators; that desire will naturally influence a body which represents a nation. The ambition of each member, in that respect, will become a general ambition. It was most remarkable, that, during the meeting of these Estates, the clergy demanded, without success, that the Council of Trent should be received in France. The Tiers Etat also demanded, in vain, the promulgation of a law, that no power, temporal or spiritual, should have a right to dispose of the kingdom; neither should subjects be released from the oath of fidelity, and that the doctrine that kings could be put to death by their subjects was impious and detestable. What is still more extraordinary, the Tiers Etat of Paris demanded the above law after they had endeavoured to depose Henry III., and after they had suffered famine rather than acknowledge Henry IV. Friday, Oct. 28. St. Simon and St. Jude, Apostles. Oct. 28, 1700.- Battle of Narva gained by Charles XII. of Sweden. Frederick IV. King of Denmark, Augustus, King of Poland, and Peter, Czar of Muscovy, wishing to profit by the youth of Charles XII. and to dismember his estates, entered into alliance against the young monarch. Charles attacked them one after another, and besieged Copenhagen, where he compelled Frederick to sue for peace. He then marched to Narva, which the Russians besieged with an army of 80,000 men. With only 9000 Swedes, he forced the Russians in their entrenchments. Thirty thousand were killed or drowned. Twenty thousend begged quarter, and the rest fled, or were taken prisoners. Charles permitted half the Russians to return without their arms; the other half re-passed the river with their arms. He only detained the generals, to whom he returned their swords and money. Among the prisoners, there was an Asiatic prince destined to live a captive amidst the ice of Sweden. "He must find his si tuation," said Charles, "just as I should find mine were I prisoner with the Tartars of the Charles himself was forced to seek an asylum in Crimea." The observation was remembered when Turkey. Saturday, Oct. 29. St. Narcissus, Bishop, 2nd Cent. Unconscious of a less propitious clime, Her crimson honours; and the spangled beau Live there and prosper. Those Ausonia claims; Cowper's Task. Lessons for the Day. -Proverbs, 22 chap Morning Oct. 30, 1741.-A Prodigy of Nature. On this Monday, Oct. 31. Allhallows Eve. Sun rises 9m after 7-sets 50 after 4. The minister of Callander, in Perthshire, mentioning peculiar customs, says, "Ou All Saints' Even they set up bonfires in every village. When the bonfire is consumed, the ashes are carefully collected into the form of a circle. There is a stone put in, near the circumference, for every person of the several families interested in the bonfire; and whatever stone is moved out of its place, or injured before next morning, the person represented by that stone is devoted, or fey, and is supposed not to live twelve months from that day. The people received the consecrated fire from the Druid priests next morning, the virtues of which were supposed to continue for a year. Part 50, with four fine Engravings, is published with this Number. Vols 1 to 7 being again reprinted, they may be had; also all the Parts and Numbers mentioned, as singular, the numerous desertions to the French which occurred THE LAST INTERVIEW.* amongst our Irish soldiers, during the A TALE OF A NIGHT-WATCH. "What! can the dead hold converse?" A few years since, it was my fortune to be weather-bound in a solitary inn, on the northern coast of Yorkshire, in company with a disbanded officer of the German Legion. There were no other travellers in the house; and thus, being brought into close contact, we soon fell into a pleasant intimacy.Major Zollermann was a tall, grimlooking Hanoverian, who concealed, beneath a cold exterior, much of the strong feeling, sober enthusiasm, and love of the marvellous, ascribed to his countrymen. I found his mind stored with strange, obsolete information, and legendary lore; as well as fertile in reminiscences of unusual vicissitude and adventure. To a conversation on the subject of his Peninsular campaigns, I owe the following narrative. I had campaign of the Pyrenees; and which were generally attributed to the repugnance of sentinels on the out-posts to keep watch, in that desolate region, had fallen in skirmishing with Soult's near to the corpses of comrades who troops. The Major, in reply, alluded to a similar feeling in the German, particularly the Hessian soldiers, and which, he said, was perhaps in some measure owing to strange traditions still current among them. "One of these, he said, " is related in connection with my own family; it is such as you will hardly have heard in England; and if you are in the mood for listening to a wild story, I will repeat it to you." I gladly assented, and he proceeded as follows: "We have been naturalized in Hanover for the last two generations only; having been formerly subjects of the Duchy of Hesse-Cassel. Most of the males of my family were soldiers, and it has been the fortune of several among 212 especially, this change had been most marked; until the pensive and timorous creature began to tremble in his presence, and to quail beneath the rude coldness of his look. them to bear a part in singular occurrences. That which I shall now relate took place shortly after the peace of Utrecht. At this period there resided at the court of the Grand Duke Frederick of Cassel, the young Count Von "Some attributed the change to FreLindenau, a nobleman of remarkable derick's disappointment in his hopes of personal beauty and accomplishments. an heir; his union with Ludovica not He was a bold and successful soldier; having been blessed with offspring. and the Prince had rewarded his dis- The temporary gaiety, which the Court tinguished bravery by successive court had assumed upon the accession of the preferments. The Grand Duchess young Princess, wore away by degrees; Ludovica, a daughter of the house of and a deep gloom seemed insensibly to Dessau, was also supposed to regard settle upon its precincts. The courtiers him very graciously, to the great envy and officers of the household prudently of his rival courtiers: and upon his reflected the dark gravity of their liege's appointment to the post of Oberhof- deportment; the sound of laughter was meister, or grand Chamberlain to the rarely heard within the palace; and the Court, there were not wanting malevo- hunting parties and solemn banquets lent tongues to hint that his favour was resembled funeral games rather than procured by the Princess's influence, the gladsome festivals of courtly rewho was not unwilling that he should creation. The Count Von Lindenau, thus obtain a more frequent access to alone, seemed to have escaped from the her presence. It must be remarked, general infection; he continued, to all however, that such observations were appearance, as gay and gallant as ever; only heard after subsequent circum--although the scrutiny of some wellstances had lent some plausibility to a practised observers would pretend to suspicion possibly erroneous. Von discover a perturbed spirit beneath his Lindenau was a passionate admirer of light and jovial bearing. women; the young Duchess was the fairest of all the court beauties; yet it would have been hard to say whether the Count's homage went beyond the gallantry due to a lovely woman, and the devotion he owed to his princess. Ludovica, 'considerably younger than her consort, was supposed to form no exception to the many sad instances of feeling sacrificed to state necessity; and it is possible that the known harshness of the Grand Duke's temper, and his unequal age, may have been too hastily assumed as grounds for unjust interpretation of her favour to the gallant young officer. She was pale and stately in her deportment; the melancholy expression of her features but rendered them more touchingly beautiful; and she had not long been the bride of Frederick, before the old servants at court, too well read, alas! in such exterior indications, began to predict that she would not long occupy her share of the ducal crown. A few months after Von Lindenau's appointment, his favour with the Prince appeared to be on the wane, and his reception was more cold and ceremonious than it formerly had been. This, however, was not particularly commented upon: as the Duke, always harsh and stern in his manners, had lately displayed an unusual ungraciousness to all around him. Towards the Princess, "The secrets of the heart, and the hidden counsel of princes' chambers, can but be traced by vain conjecture, until some violent burst of feeling, or sudden and startling catastrophe betrays their concealment. On the first day of the year of grace 1715, the court and city of Cassel were astonished by the unexpected intelligence, that the Count Von Lindenau had been banished from the presence, and imprisoned in the castle of Fichtenburg on the Plesse, fifty miles distant from the capital. At court, the news was received in the manner customary in such places upon such occasions: the disgraced favourite became the object of loud and ostentatious invective; although the several causes assigned for his banishment proved that the nature of his offence was, at least, a matter of conjecture. Still, a few of the more wary courtiers, observing that no public edict had yet declared the post of chamberlain vacant, cautiously abstained from any irrevocable censure of a favoured servant, whose disgrace might be but temporary. No certain information transpired respecting the cause of his punishment; but it was remarked, that from the day of its announcement, the melancholy Ludovica appeared no more at the court levees or banquets; some said that she, also, was subject to some species of restraint within the precincts of the palace; and the ladies of her bed-chamber shook their heads with a mute and mournful gesture in reply to all inquiries concerning the Princess's seclusion. "Time passed on: the Grand Duke went to chase, and gave audience, as was his wont; and the frames of the Princess Ludovica and of Adolph Von Lindenau seemed as things that were forgotten. But on one of the first days of spring, word went through the palace, that the Grand Duchess was dead! Upon the publication of these disastrous tidings, all affected reserve or hypocritical indifference was changed into open wailing and lamentation. The calm and gentle beauty of the deceased Princess, her gracious meekness to all around her, and the beneficence which had flowed from her heart in secret acts of mercy, had won her the love of all classes; so that her death spread sorrow and consternation over the city and the court. "From the moment that the event was made public, you might have heard a dry leaf fall from one end of Cassel to the other; the windows were darkened, and the streets deserted; save where scattered groups of the poorer burghers, with their weeping daughters, wandered in the square before the palace, as though their grief were soothed by gazing upon the walls. which enclosed the remains of their beloved Princess. The court was truly ' a house of mourning;' the atttendants of the household went to and fro, pale and silent as shadows; the lips of the old quivered, and the eyes of the young were red with weeping; while evermore you might hear, from the deceased Princess's apartments, the lament of woman's passionate sorrow, which crieth aloud and refuseth to be comforted. Amidst this alternation of silence and woful sound, the sharp impatient neighing of the Grand Duke's steeds, and the yelling of his hounds, weary of their unwonted confinement, thrilled at times through the palace court, startling the ears of the mourners with a suddenness almost fearful. The widowed Prince sate alone in his chamber; and admitted no one to his presence, unless to receive the needful orders for the solemnity of the corpse's lying in state and interment. "Now my ancestor, Carl Zollermann, was at this time a Captain in the body troops of Cassel, amongst whose duties and privileges was the charge of keeping watch without the hall wherein the deceased members of the ducal family were wont to be laid in state. This chamber is in the front of the palace, and is used for the same purpose unto this day; the outer, or guard-room, opening directly upon the esplanade of the grand staircase which leads from the western entrance. I must tell you, that Carl was a rough, thoughtless soldier, as were most of his rank at that period, but distinguished amongst his fellow officers by an uncommon fearlessness and hardihood. In his youth he had served with the Italian troops of the Emperor, and possibly owed to such incredulous associates his utter ignorance of superstitious belief or awe, at a time when most Germans were still strongly influenced by supernatural fears. In common with all the Grand Duke's soldiers, he had almost idolized the late Princess, who had bestowed his first pair of colours; and this feeling, no less than the distinction considered to attach to the service, made him receive as a high favour the order appointing him to the command of the night-guard over her corpse. It was on the evening of the festival of Good Friday, that the deceased was laid out in state; and Captain Zollerman proceeded at nightfall, with a body of forty-nine chosen soldiers, to undertake the honoured but melancholy service of the watch. "The hall, which is of great extent, was hung round with heavy folds of black velvet in deep festoons, looped up with silver escutcheons, bearing the Princess's arms in funeral blazon. In the centre stood the Prachtbette, or state bed, whereon reposed the body, wrapped in gorgeous robes of dark purple, and decked with a profusion of jewels, which shone dazzlingly above the pale, uncovered brow. Beneath the canopy, on a broad black field, were traced the heraldic insignia of the deceased, as reigning Duchess of Cassel, and born Princess of Anhalt; imparting, with their glittering devices and pompous legends, an impressive solemnity to the funeral state of the possessor of so many honours. A number of tall wax tapers, placed around the bed, threw an intense light upon the face and body of the corpse; but the extent of the lofty hall seemed to swallow up the illumination, and the distant corners remained in fitful obscurity. The features of the Princess still wore their wonted expression of profound sadness; and, but for the sunken eyelids, and that indefinable air of motionless rigidity which the finger of death alone can impart, you might have thought (so pale had she been during life) that she was distant echoes of a horse's hoofs apstill asleep in unaltered beauty. A proaching through the deserted streets: tress of her long hair had, either by ac- the sound came rapidly nearer; the cident or design, been suffered to es- pavement of the court without rang to cape from beneath her tiara, and stream- the fiery trampling of a steed; instantly ed upon the pillow in glossy waves the great doors of the palace were heard which at times were slightly agitated by to open; and the clanking step of a the wind that moaned through the cham- cavalier ascended the western staircase. ber, and made the wax lights burn red It approached the anti-chamber ; while and fitfully. The body was not strewn a voice from without demanded admitwith flowers, the last adornment of the tance of the astonished sentinel. The young and beautiful dead of humbler captain hastened to his side, surprised rank; but lay with its gorgeous robes at the boldness of the untimely intruder ; in the proud solemnity befitting the ob- but far more, when, on throwing open sequies of a Princess; a statelier and a the door, he saw that it was the Count more mournful sight. For there is a von Lindenau, in his ordinary garb, deeply pathetic significance in the pom- but pale and covered with dust, as pous and public ceremonial of princely though he had ridden hard and long. biers, undecked with the tribute of do- He recognised Carl, who had served in mestic love, and wet with no sacred his division, addressed him by name, tears of private sorrow; - the last cold and repeated his demand for admission. pageant, in a career of uncompanioned The officer respectfully refused; instate, frozen affections, and lone and sisting on the express prohibition in lofty solitude. his orders, the late hour of night, the Count's unseemly want of a mourning dress; and begged him to postpone his request until the morrow. To none of these reasons did Von Lindenau pay the least attention, but renewed his instances more sternly, until, finding them still resisted, he said, in a raised voice, 'I claim, in virtue of my Chamberlain's office, the right of admission at all hours to the presence of my Princess, be she alive or dead; your authority touches not this privilege. I demand to see her while it is yet time; deny me at your peril!' Embarrassed by the Count's resort to this plea, urged by the respect due to his superior rank, and perhaps a little confused by the strange air of the whole occurrence, the officer made no further opposition; and the untimely visitor passed forward to the chamber of the dead. "The officer led his company in mute procession around the corpse. One by one the rough soldiers stooped to kiss the hem of the pall, with tears streaming down their bronzed cheeks; and the ladies who had watched beside it during the day, slowly abandoned their mournful charge. When they had retired; the guard assumed its station for the night in the anti-chamber, from whence, through the half opened door of the funeral hall, the dark draperies of the bier, and the still features of its tenant, were distinctly visible. The footsteps of the female mourners had died away in the long gallery; and the hush of death and night sank down upon the palace. For the soldiers on guard occupied their respective stations in silence; or if they uttered a word to each other, it was in such whispers as caused the stillness, so faintly interrupted, to appear yet more profound. Carl, with his unsheathed sabre beneath his arm, paced the apartment slowly to and fro, until the unusual scene, and the deep silence of every thing around him, awoke in his breast a sensation more nearly allied to awe than he had ever before known. The anti-chamber was but partially lighted, while the brilliant lustre, streaming over the bier in the hall of state, increased by contrast the effect of obscurity without; the more, as the wood fire, around which the soldiers were grouped, waxed dim as the night deepened. Thus did the hours creep heavily on, until, about the second chime after midnight, Carl was aware of the "It may be imagined that Carl felt the strongest curiosity to observe the result of this nocturnal intrusion; but it was necessary, in order to its gratification, that he should approach close to the separating door, the leaves of which had swung together upon Von Lindenau's entrance, remaining barely ajar. On placing himself so as to command a view through the aperture thus left, my ancestor beheld an awful and unnatural spectacle. The corpse of the Duchess had half raised itself from the bier, leaning upon one arm; and by its side stood the Count, who seemed as if he were speaking to the dead, although no uttered sound was heard. The head of the corpse was bent towards him, so that its long hair streamed over his |