men, it is only justice to bear this testimony to their practice. And so far from cause of alarm, we think that that very success points out to Protestants of all persuasions the most luminous means of its counteraction. If the faith of these men be adulterated by grievous errors and traditionary superstitions, as it unquestionably is-and yet, by their simple practical policy of interesting themselves in the welfare of the people around them, they have succeeded in restoring to popular favour, a religion which for three centuries has been stigmatised throughout England and Scotland as a bloody and superstitious religion—a religion which, in fact, when it was the established religion of the land, crowned itself with odium for its rapacity, its sensuality, and for the folly, idleness, and everlasting bickerings of its monks; and what is more, if they who have done this belong to an order of that religion which, beyond all others--by the depth of its policy, the ambition and the talent of its leaders, by the pliant and most persevering pursuance of its objects-rendered itself the terror and abhorrence of the English nation-what shall not the professors of a purer faith achieve by the same means ? The doings of the Jesuits of Stonyhurst are, in fact, a study of curious interest to all those who are alarmed at the growth of Popery, or who would strengthen their own influence in the hearts of the people around them.

HISTORICAL REMINISCENCES.

WHAT an interesting old city is Winchester! and how few people are aware of it! The ancient capital of the kingdomthe capital of the British, and the Saxon, and the Norman kings -the favourite resort of our kings and queens, even till the revolution of 1688; the capital which, for ages, maintained a proud, and long a triumphant rivalry with London itself; the capital which once boasted upwards of ninety churches and chapels, whose meanest houses now stand upon the foundations

of noble palaces and magnificent monasteries; and in whose ruins or in whose yet superb Minster, lie enshrined the bones of mighty kings, and fair and pious queens; of lordly abbots, and prelates, who in their day swayed not merely the destinies of this one city, but of the kingdom. There she sits-a sad discrowned queen, and how few are acquainted with her in the solitude of her desertion! Yet where is the place, saving London itself, which can compete with her in solemn and deep interest? Where is the city except that in Great Britain, which can shew so many objects of antique beauty, or call up so many national recollections? Here lie the bones of Alfred-here he was probably born, for this was at that time the court, and the residence of his parents. Here, at all events, he spent his infancy, and the greater portion of his youth. Here he imbibed the wisdom and the magnanimity of mind with which he afterwards laid the foundations of our monarchy, our laws, liberties, and literature, and in a word, of our national greatness. Hence he went forth to fight those battles which freed his country from the savage Dane; and having done more for his realm and race than ever monarch did before or since, here he lay down in the strength of his years, and consigned his tomb as a place of grateful veneration to a people, whose future greatness even his sagacious spirit could not be prophetic enough to foresee. Were it only for the memory and tomb of this great king, Winchester ought to be visited by every Englishman with the most profound veneration and affection; but here also lie the ashes of nearly all Alfred's family and kin:

his father Ethelwolph, who saw the virtues and talents, and prognosticated the greatness of his son; his noble-minded mother, who breathed into his infant heart the most sublime sentiments; his royal brothers, and his sons and daughters. Here also repose Canute, who gave that immortal reproof on the Southampton shore to his sycophantic courtiers, and his celebrated queen Emma, so famous at once for her beauty and her trials. Here is still seen the tomb of Rufus, who was brought hither in a charcoal-burner's cart from the New Forest, where the chance arrow of Tyrrel avenged, in his last hunt, the cruelties of himself and his father on that ground. But, in fact, the whole soil here seems to be composed of the dust of kings and queens, of prelates and nobles, and every object to have been witness to some of the most signal struggles and strange histories, which mark the annals of the empire; and in order to have a due idea of the wealth of human interest here accumulated, it is desirable that before we ramble through the streets and beneath the crumbling ramparts of this queen of British cities, we should take a rapid glance at the long line of the illustrious personages who have figured within it, many of whose acts indeed have given an inextinguishable cast and colour to the destinies of the realm. Winchester has been fortunate in her historians; and especially in her last and best, Dr. Milner; and following in their track, we may confidently walk over her most hallowed ground, and mount her hills, every one of them rife with historic memories, and point out the footsteps and the dim receding figures of crowned

monarchs, embattled hosts, the duels of renowned champions, or the peaceful processions of mitred and cowled men, amid the sound of martial or sacred music, and the hushed awe of the myriad of lookers on.

Throwing aside the fables of Nennius, and Geoffrey of Monmouth, and the pedigree of King Brute, drawn from Eneas of Troy, our historians claim a high antiquity for Winchester, as the Caer Gwent of the Celtic and Belgic Britons, the Venta Belgarum of the Romans, and the Wintanceaster of the Saxons. The history of Winchester is nearly coeval with the Christian era. Julius Cæsar does not seem to have been here, in his invasion of Britain, but some of his troops must have passed through it; a plate from one of his standards, bearing his name and profile, having been found deep buried in a sand-bed in this neighbourhood: and here, within the first half century of Christendom, figured the brave descendants of Cassibelaunus, those noble sons of Cunobelin or Cymbeline, Guiderius and Arviragus, whom Shakspeare has so beautifully presented to us in his Cymbeline;—that Arviragus, the Cogidubnus also of his countrymen, and the noble Caractacus of the Roman historians. Who is not acquainted with his dignified conduct at Rome? with the joy of the Emperor Claudius, and the whole Roman court and people, when he was betrayed into their hands? with their generous treatment of him, and with his return to this country to reign at Venta, with his new Roman queen Gewissa? This lady, our ancient historians do not hesitate to style the daughter of Claudius himself. But both they and the Roman