Clarissa, and you don't do your uncle justice. To be sure he was most unreasonably angry when we parted, and I am ashamed to think that I was angry too. Tomorrow I will see him and tell him so; and I shall tell him too, little trembler, that I have you on my side; and we shall see if together we cannot persuade him to forget and forgive."

This, and much more that we shall not betray, was said by the tall young gentleman, who, now that his cap was off, showed brow and eyes, such as are apt to go a good way in convincing young ladies; while Miss Bensley seemed partly to acquiesces and partly to cling to her previous fears of her uncle's resentment against his former protégé, which, first excited by some trifling offence, had been rendered serious by the pride of the young man and the pepperiness of the old one.

When the moment came which Clarissa insisted should be the very last of the stranger's stay, some difficulty occurred in unbolting the kitchen door, and Miss Bensley proceeded with her guest through an open passage-way to the front part of the house, when she undid the front door, where she dismissed him with a strict charge to tie up the gate just as he found it, lest some unlucky chance should realize Mr. Keene's fears of nocturnal invasion. And we must leave our perplexed heroine standing, in meditative mood, candle in hand, in the very centre of the little parlour, which served for entrance-hall and salon.

We have seen that Mr. Keene's nerves had received a terrible shock on this fatal evening, and it is certain that for a man of sober imagination, his dreams were terrific. He saw Ashburn, covered from crown to sole with a buzzing shroud of bees, trampling on his flower-beds, tearing up his honey-suckles root and branch, and letting his canaries and Java sparrows out of their cages; and, as his eyes recoiled from this horrible scene, they encountered the shambling form of Joe, who, besides aiding and abetting in these enormities, was making awful strides, axe in hand, toward the sanctuary of the pea-fowls.

He awoke with a cry of horror, and found his bed-room full of smoke. Starting up in agonized alarm, he awoke Mrs. Keene, and half-dressed, by the red light which glimmered around them, they rushed together to Clarissa's chamber. It was empty. To find the stairs was the next thought, but at the very top they met the dreaded bee-finder armed with a prodigious club!

"Oh mercy! don't murder us!" shrieked Mrs. Keene, falling on her knees; while her husband, whose capsicum was completely roused, began pummelling Ashburn as high as he could reach, bestowing on him at the same time, in no very choice terms, his candid opinion as to the propriety of setting people's houses on fire, by way of revenge.

"Why, you're both as crazy as loons!" was Mr. Ashburn's polite exclamation, as he held off Mr. Keene at arm's length. "I was coming up o' purpose to tell you that you needn't be frightened. It's only the ruff o' the shanty there,-the kitchen, as you call it."

*

"And what have you done with Clarissa?”—“ Ay! where's my niece?" cried the distracted pair.

"Where is she? why, down stairs to be sure, takin' care o' the traps they throw'd out o' the shanty. I was out a 'coon-hunting, and see the light, but I was so far off that they got it pretty well down before I got here. That 'ere young spark o' Clary's worked like a beaver, I tell ye!"

It must not be supposed that one half of Ashburn's hasty explanation " penetrated the interior" of his hearer's heads. They took in the idea of Clary's safety, but as for the rest, they concluded it only an effort to mystify them as to the real cause of the disaster.

"You need not attempt," solemnly began Mr. Keene, "you need not think to make me believe, that you are not the man that set my house on fire. I know your revengeful temper; I have heard of your threats, and you shall answer for all, sir! before you're a day older.

Ashburn seemed struck dumb, between his involuntary respect for Mr. Keene's age and character, and the contemptuous anger with which his accusation filled him. "Well! I swan !" said he after a pause; "but here comes Clary; she's got common sense; ask her how the fire happened."

"It's all over now, uncle," she exclaimed, almost breathless; " it has not done so very much damage."

Damage !" said Mrs. Keene, dolefully; we shall never get things clean again while the world stands !"

"And where are my birds?" inquired the old gentleman.

"All safe-quite safe; we moved them into the parlour."

"We! who, pray?"

"Oh! the neighbours came, you know, uncle; and— Mr. Ashburn—”

"Give the devil his due," interposed Ashburn; "you know very well that the whole concern would have gone if it hadn't been for that young feller." "What young fellow? where?"

"Why here," said Silas, pulling forward our young stranger; chap.

"this here

"Young man," began Mr. Keene, but at the moment, up came somebody with a light, and while Clarissa retreated behind Mr. Ashburn, the stranger was recognised by her aunt and uncle as Charles Darwin.

"Charles! what on earth brought you here?”.

“Ask Clary,” said Ashburn, with grim jocoseness.

Mr. Keene turned mechanically to obey, but Clarissa had disappeared.

"Well! I guess I can tell you something about it, if nobody else won't,' said Ashburn; "I'm something of a Yankee, and it's my notion that there was some sparkin' a goin' on in your kitchen, and that somehow or other the young folks managed to set it a-fire."

The old folks looked more puzzled than ever." Do speak Charles," said Mr. Keene ; "what does it all mean? Did you set my house on fire?"

"I'm afraid I must have had some hand in it, sir," said Charles, whose self-possession seemed quite to have deserted him.

"You!" exclaimed Mr. Keene;" and I've been laying it to this man!"

"Yes! you know'd I owed you a spite on account o' that plaguy bee-tree," said Ashburn; 66 a guilty conscience needs no accuser. But you was much mistaken if you thought I was sich a bloody-minded villain as to burn your gimcrackery for that! If I could have paid you for it, fair and even, I'd ha' done it with all my heart and soul. But I don't set men's houses a-fire when I get mad at 'em."

"But you threatened vengence," said Mr. Keene.

"So I did, but that was when I expected to get it by law, though; and this here young man knows that, if he'd only speak."

Thus adjured, Charles did speak, and so much to the purpose that it did not take many minutes to convince Mr. Keene that Ashburn's evil-mindedness was bounded by the limits of the law, that precious privilege of the Wolverine. But there was still the mystery of Charles's apparition, and in order to its full unravelment, the blushing Clarissa had to be enticed from her hiding-place, and brought to confession. And then it was made clear that she, with all her innocent looks, was the moving cause of the mighty mischief. She it was who encouraged Charles to believe that her uncle's anger would not last for ever; and this had led Charles to venture into the neighbourhood; and it was while consulting together, (on this particular point, of course,) that they had managed to set the kitchen curtain on fire, and then--the reader knows

the rest.

These things occupied some time in explaining, but they were at length, by the aid of words and more eloquent blushes, made so clear, that Mr. Keene concluded, not only to new-roof the kitchen, but to add a very pretty wing to one side of the house. And at the present time, the steps of Charles Darwin, when he returns from a surveying tour, seek the little gate as naturally as if he had never lived anywhere else. And the sweet face of Clarissa is always there, ready to welcome him, though she still finds plenty of time to keep in order the complicated affairs of both uncle and aunt.

And how goes life with our friends the Ashburns? Mr. Keene has done his very best to atone for his injurious estimate of Wolverine honour, by giving constant employment to Ashburn and his sons, and owning himself always the obliged party, without which concession all he could do would avail nothing. And Mrs. Keene and Clarissa have been unwearied in their kind attentions to the family, supplying them with so many comforts that most of them have got rid of the ague, in spite of themselves. The house has assumed so cheerful an appearance that I could scarcely recognise it for the same squalid den it had often made my heart ache to look upon. As I was returning from my last visit there, I encountered Mr. Ashburn, and remarked to him how very comfortable they seemed.

"Yes," he replied; "I've had pretty good luck lately; but I'm a goin' to pull up stakes and move to Wisconsin. I think I can do better, further west."

WAR WITH AMERICA.

AN EXAMINATION OF THE INSTIGATIONS AND PROBABLE EFFECTS.

BY A KENTUCKIAN.

IN a late debate in the French Chambers on the subject of the treaties lately concluded by the five Powers, M. Guizot remarked, that "the Americans object to that treaty, because, when, through any pretence, British officers visit an American ship, they claim any British seamen who may be on board and carry them off," and added, "this is the motive of the resistance opposed by the American Government, to the right of search; and I think they are right; and if the British pretended to seek for their sailors on board French ships, we would resist them as the Americans do."

The London Times, commenting upon the debate, says, "It has shewn us that the absurd claims which have been put forward by the interested motives, or the over-weaning conceit of the United States, will find abettors and allies in Europe, and it has brought with it the irresistible conviction that men will again be slaughtered, and states ruined, and the earth deluged with blood, because mankind call their passions by the high and sacred names of principles, mistaking their own presumption and pride for the rights of patriotism and justice."

If we are to form our opinions of the purposes of England by the official correspondence and the tone of her public press, it would seem that a war is inevitable, and that the slave trade treaties have been negotiated as a means of committing the public opinion of Europe against the United States. The correspondence between the American minister and her majesty's government, and an able review of it, treating of the right of search, by an American in Paris, have done much to arrest the current of public opinion, which, under the guidance of the British press, was setting strongly against the United States; but there are matters having a most important bearing upon the controversy between the two countries, which have not been treated of in the correspondence or by the review in question, and which in the nature of things have excited very little attention in Europe.

The fact that the English language is much diffused throughout the world, is one great element of British power and influence, and it is the misfortune of America as well as France and the other continental powers, that accounts from Europe reach America through the British press, and that Europe receives the greater part of its information of America through the same channel. It is characteristic and highly creditable to England, that whatever may be her local dissentions; whatever may be their divisions as to home questions, all parties agree in supporting England as against the rest of the world, and hence the late change of administration, it is feared, has not changed the purpose of England, so far as it affects a determination to accomplish the end in view, even at the risk of a war with the United States.

That purpose is not the abolition of slavery, nor yet of the slave trade, which are but means subordinate to it. It is to increase her manufactures and extend her commerce; and, as indispensable to this, to substitute the raw products of India for the like products of Cuba, Brazil, and the United States.

We have said, that it was the misfortune of Europe that they receive their accounts of the United States through the British press; we might have added, that it is a still greater misfortune, that in consequence of being published in a different language, most European statesmen do not read British papers. In England the operations of government are so much regulated by public opinion, that its measures are shadowed forth by her periodical publications, most of which are re-printed and extensively circulated in the United States. Hence the American reader, who notes carefully the progress of public sentiment, can anticipate the purposes of the British government.

The Edinburgh Review, speaking of the Eastern question, says, 66 the defect of French statesmen, is inexperience of affairs." May not that inexperience be attributed to this cause? We believe that it can be demonstrated, that the American side of this question, is not only the side of France, but also of the other powers of Europe; that England seeks her own aggrandisement, at the expense of all other nations, and that the plea of benevolence, is but a mask, however sincere the enthusiasts whom she has enlisted in her cause may be.

We wish to be rightly understood. If it were possible for England, consistently with the rights of her East India subjects, and with what is due to other independent powers, to extend her commerce and manufactures even beyond the utmost limits of her wishes, no one would have cause to complain; if she would do this by reducing the cost of production in India, or in England, it would be right; but when instead of reducing the cost of productions in her own dominions, she attempts to accomplish it, by increasing it in Cuba, Brazil, and the United States, and adds insult to injury by calumniating its institutions, and attempting to trample upon the rights of America, her calumnies will be refuted, her purposes exposed, and her aggressions resisted by force.

We cannot persuade ourselves that a majority of the British people will countenance war with the United States. Misguided as public sentiment is, in relation to slavery; deeply interested as they are in extending their commerce and manufactures; and misled as they may be by the false views they have taken of the effects to be produced by the abolition of slavery and the slave trade, upon the price of East India produce, as compared with Cuba, Brazil, and the United States, we do not believe that the majority desire to accomplish them by a war. We do believe that such is the present state of parties, and such the force of truth and reason, that all that is wanting to prevent a war is, to diffuse in England a knowledge of the truth. The public press, however, is in so false a position, that it is difficult to reach the people. The effort to mislead their judgements, the system of misrepresentation, has been so long presevered in, and prejudice is so deeply seated, that, “hearing, they will not hear, and seeing they will not see."

Continental Europe having an adverse interest, will more readily receive the truth; and as England cannot persevere against their enlightened public opinion, it is important that the real questions in issue, and the American view in relation to them, should be fully presented.

The questions in issue are:

1st. The Boundary-line, including as well the occupation of the Columbia River, as the dividing line between Maine and Nova Scotia.

2nd. The invasion of the territory of the United States for the purpose of destroying the Caroline.

3rd. The capture of American vessels on the coast of Africa.

4th. The right of search set up, under pretence of suppressing the slave trade.

5th. The case of the Creole.

Our purpose is not to discuss these questions in detail.

It is to show that these

are but the incidents; that the real question lies deeper. In doing this we must speak:

1st. Of the United States, their form of government, and the relation to slavery and the slave trade.

2nd. Of the slave trade, and the exaggerations in relation to it.

3rd. Of the commercial necessities which control the policy of England, and her

revival of the slave trade.

4th. Of India and her relations as a colony of England. 5th. Of the condition of the labouring poor of Ireland.

OF THE UNITED STATES, THEIR FORM OF GOVERNMENT, AND THEIR RELATION TO SLAVERY AND THE SLAVE TRADE.

In explaining the relation which the United States bear to the subject of slavery, we must look to the organization, the powers, and purposes of the Federal Government.

The United States were originally colonies, settled under the authority and subject to the crown of Great Britain. One of the grievances of which they complained before the Revolution, was, that the mother-country compelled them to receive African slaves, imported by authority of British law.

The immediate cause of the Revolution was, the attempt of the British parliament to tax the colonies. This led them to scrutinize the principle of taxation. They saw that no representation in parliament would protect them against oppression; that the right of taxation was in fact a right of conversion, and that to permit parliament to levy taxes, was to surrender their property to the discretion of that body. This principle was carried into the struggle of the Revolution. The colonies dispersed over so large an extent of territory, saw clearly that their congress, composed as it was of delegates representing different sectional interests, would sympathize with the interests which they represented, and that they, too, might abuse

the power of taxation. Hence the congress of the Revolution had no power to levy taxes. They were but an advisory council. Men and money were furnished by the states. Each state was a distinct and separate independent government. Each state had a distinct organization; its governor, its legislature, its judiciary, its civil and military officers. Upon declaring themselves independent of the mothercountry, each state organized their respective governments for themselves. The people of slave-holding states were compelled to take into consideration the state of their society as it then existed.

The question was not whether they would institute slavery; it had already been instituted by the British government. The black man was already the property of the white, by the law of England.

Is it matter of surprise, that under such circumstances, the master believed that his slave was not qualified by habits, education, or intelligence to exercise political rights? that the black man was not the equal with the white, and that legislation could not make him so that to emancipate the slave, without giving him equal political rights, would have created a degraded caste, which so far from contributing to their moral or physical improvement, would have led to their still further degradation? and that to have given them equal political rights, constituting them a part of the government itself, would have inoculated the government with a moral disease, which must have caused its premature decay? Is it not surprising, that they should have believed, that the public safety forbade to engraft the blacks upon the bodypolitic, and that they had no alternative but to recognise and continue the preexisting system of slavery? Having resolved to do this, they passed laws to ameliorate the condition of the slave, and placed him under their protection. They identified the interest of the master and the slave, and compelled the master to provide him sufficient food and raiment. Instead of living on dry potatoes, as is the case with the Irish labourer, the American slave has an abundance of wholesome diet, and to spare. Instead of sleeping upon wet straw, with a single poverty blanket for a whole family, as in Ireland, the American slave has good bedding and an abundance to spare of bed-clothes. Instead of the suit in seven years, as in Ireland, he has his three new suits, one for winter and two for summer, and good shoes and stockings. Instead of killing them off by unmitigated toil, long before they become burthensome, through age or infirmity, as charged by the Edinburgh Review; and instead of permitting them to perish by exposure to hunger and cold, as in Ireland, the American slave is nursed in sickness, and comfortably provided in his old age.

Upon the organization of the federal government, the slave trade was abolished, and not a single African slave has been imported into the United States since 1808. The slave population in 1810 was 1,191,364. In 1840 it was 2,487,113; the increase being more than one hundred per cent., although many slaves have been liberated. The white population in 1810 was 7,239,000. In 1840 it was 14,581,000, showing that the natural increase of the slaves has been more than the natural increase of the whites. But the most striking proof that the institution of slavery as it exists in the United States has been so modified as to secure the personal comfort of the slave, is exhibited in the fact, that in a population of 2,634,348 (including the free blacks,) there are 1980 over one hundred years of age; whereas there are but 647 whites over one hundred years of age, in a population of 14,581,000. It so happens, that we have before us a pamphlet published in 1827 by Dr. Niles, (then a citizen of New York, now resident and well known in Paris) in which he gave a comparative statement of the mortality in the cities of Philadelphia, New York, and Baltimore, deduced from the official reports of the boards of health of the respective cities, from which it appears, that in the years 1823, 24, 25, 26, the deaths were as follows:

The learned gentleman to whom we are indebted for this table, remarks: "The disproportion of deaths between the free blacks and the slaves of Baltimore is worthy of particular notice, and probably arises from the care bestowed on the slaves by their masters, their comparative temperance, and the more regular course of their lives, contrasted with the idleness, the intemperance, and improvidence of the free blacks."

*The increase of slaves in the United States during the last ten years, has been more than 22 per cent., hile that of the population of Great Britain has been but 111⁄2 per cent.