In heaven's top vault, one instant hung The vast, intense, and blinding flash! Then all was darkness, stillness, dreadThe wave moan'd o'er the valiant dead. She's gone! blown up! that gallant foe! So many slain-so many drown'd, grog go round! Messmates, I've done. A spell, ho, spellThough a press'd man, I'll still be found I would have defied any cold ever to have penetrated into their stomachs;-but I have said enough of my mother for the present, I will now pass on to my father. My father was a puffy, round-bellied, long-armed, little man, admirably calculated for his station in, or rather out of, society. He could manage a lighter as well as any body; but he could do more. He had been brought up to it from his infancy. He went on shore for my mother, and came on board again-the only remarkable event in his life. His whole amusement was his pipe; and, as there is a certain indefinable link between smoking and philosophy, my father, by dint of smoking, had become a perfect philosopher. It is no less strange than true, that we can puff away our cares with tobacco, when, without it, they remain an oppressive burthen to existence. There is no composing draught like the draught through the tube of a pipe. The savage warriors of North America enjoyed the blessing before we did; and to the pipe is to be ascribed the wisdom of their councils, and their laconic delivery of their sentiments. It would be well introduced into our own legislative assembly. Ladies, indeed, would no longer peep down through the ventilator; but we should have more sense and fewer words. It is also to tobacco that is to be ascribed the stoical firmness of those American warriors, who, satisfied with the pipe in their mouths, submitted with perfect indifference to the torture of their enemies. From the well-known virtues of this weed arose that peculiar expression, when you GENTLE READER, I was born upon the water-irritate another, that you "put his pipe out." hot upon the salt and angry ocean, but upon the To do a seaman's duty well. I wish our brother-landsmen knew From the Metropolitan Magazine. JACOB FAITHFUL. "Bound 'prentice to a waterman, I learnt a bit to row; And, bless your heart, I always was so gay." My father's pipe, literally and metaphorically, resh, and rapid-flowing river. It was in a floating was never put out. He had a few apothegms ort of box, called a lighter, and upon the River Thames, and at low water, that I first smelt the nud. This lighter was manned (an expression mounting to bullism, if not construed kind-ly) by ny father, my mother, and your humble servant. My father had the sole charge-he was monarch of he deck; my mother of course was queen, and I vas the heir apparent. 66 which brought every disaster to a happy conclusion; and as he seldom or ever indulged in words, these sayings were deeply impressed upon my infant memory. One was, " It's no use crying; what's done can't be helped." When once these words escaped his lips, the subject was never renewed. Nothing appeared to move him: the adjurations of those employed in the other lighters, barges, vesBefore I say one word about myself, allow me sels, and boats of every description, who were conutifully to describe my parents. First, then, I tending with us for the extra foot of water, as we ill portray my queen mother. Report says, that drifted up or down with the tide, affected him not, hen first she came on board of the lighter, a lighter further than an extra column or two of smoke rising gure and a lighter step never pressed a plank; but from the bowl of his pipe. To my mother, he used 3 far as I can tax my recollection, she was always but one expression, Take it coolly;" but it always fat, unwieldy woman. Locomotion was not to had the contrary effect with my mother, as it put er taste-gin was. She seldom quitted the cabin; her more in a passion. It was like pouring oil upon ever quitted the lighter-a pair of shoes may have flame; nevertheless, the advice was good, had it sted her for five years, for the wear and tear that ever been followed. Another favourite expression e took out of them. Being of this domestic habit, of my father's, when any thing went wrong, and all married women ought to be, she was always which was of the same pattern as the rest of his be found when wanted; but although always at philosophy, was “ · Better luck next time.' These ind, she was not always on her feet. Towards aphorisms were deeply impressed upon my memory. e close of the day, she laid down upon her bed-I continually recalled them to mind, and thus I bewise precaution when a person can no longer came a philosopher long before my wise teeth were and. The fact was, that my honoured mother, alough her virtue was unimpeachable, was frequentseduced by liquor; and, although constant to my ther, was debauched and to be found in bed with My father's education had been neglected. He at insidious assailer of female uprightness-gin. could neither write nor read; but although he did he lighter, which might have been compared to not exactly, like Cadmus, invent letters, he had acother garden of Eden, of which my mother was customed himself to certain hieroglyphics, generally Eve, and my father the Adam to consort with, speaking sufficient for his purposes, and which might is entered by this serpent who tempted her; and be considered as an artificial memory. "I can't she did not eat, she drank, which was even write nor read, Jacob," he would say, "I wish I orse. At first, indeed, and I mention it to prove could: but look, boy, I means this mark for threew the enemy always gains admittance under a quarters of a bushel. Mind you recollects it when ecious form, she drank it only to keep the cold I axes you, or I'll be blowed if I don't wallop you." t of her stomach, which the humid atmosphere But it was only a case of peculiar difficulty which m the surrounding water appeared to warrant. would require a new hieroglyphic, or extract such a y father took his pipe for the same reason; but at long speech from my father. I was well acquainted time that I was born, he smoked and she drank, with his usual scratches and dots, and having a good m morning to night, because habit had rendered memory, could put him right when he was puzzled almost necessary to their existence. The pipe with some misshapen z or z representing some uns always to his lips, the glass incessantly to her's. known quantity, like the same letters in algebra. in embryo, or I had even shed the first set with which kind Nature presents us, that in the petticoat age we may fearlessly indulge in lollipop. I have said that I was heir apparent, but I did not say that I was the only child born to my father in his wedlock. My honoured mother had had two more children; but the first, who was a girl, had been provided for by a fit of the meazles, and the second, my elder brother, by tumbling over the stern of the lighter when he was three years old. At the time of the accident, my mother had retired to her bed, a little the worse for liquor; my father was on deck forward, leaning against the windlass, soberly smoking his evening pipe. "What was that?" exclaimed my father, taking his pipe out of his mouth, and listening; "I shouldn't wonder if it wasn't Joe." And my father put in his pipe again, and smoked away as before. My father was correct in his surmises. It was Joe who had made the splash which roused him from his meditations, for the next morning Joe was nowhere to be found. He was, however, found some days afterwards; but, as the newspapers say, and as may well be imagined, the vital spark was extinct; and moreover, the eels and chubs had eaten off his nose and a portion of his chubby face, so that as my father said, "he was of no use to nobody." The morning after the accident, my father was up early and had missed poor little Joe. He went into the cabin, smoked his pipe, and said nothing. As my brother did not appear as usual for his breakfast, my mother called out for him in a harsh voice; but Joe was out of hearing, and as mute as a fish. Joe opened not his mouth in reply, neither did my father. My mother then quitted the cabin, and walked round the lighter, looked into the dog-kennel to ascertain if he was asleep with the great mastiff-but Joe was nowhere to be found. "Why, what can have become of Joe ?" cried my mother, with maternal alarm in her countenance, appealing to my father, as she hastened back to the cabin. My father spoke not, but taking his pipe out of his mouth, dropped the bowl of it in a perpendicular direction till it landed softly on the deck, then put it into his mouth again, and puffed mournfully. "Why, you don't mean to say that he is overboard?" screamed my mother. My father nodded his head, and puffed away at an accumulated rate. A torrent of tears, exclamations, and revilings, succeeded to this characteristic announcement. My father allowed my mother to exhaust herself. By the time that she was finished, so was his pipe; he then knocked out the ashes, and quietly observed, "It's no use crying; what's done can't be helped," and proceeded to refill the bowl. "Can't be helped!" cried my mother; "but it might have been helped." "Take it coolly," replied my father. "Take it coolly!" replied my mother, in a rage"take it coolly! Yes, you're for taking every thing coolly I presume, if I fell overboard, you would be taking it coolly." : You would be taking it coolly, at all events," replied my imperturbable father. other's arms. With this beautiful metaphor, I shall wind up the episode of my unfortunate brother Joe. It was about a year after the loss of my brother, that I was ushered into the world without any other assistants or spectators than my father and Dame Nature, who I believe to be a very clever midwife, if not interfered with. My father, who had some faint ideas of Christianity, performed the baptismal rites, by crossing me on the forehead with the end of his pipe, and calling me Jacob: as for my mother being churched, she had never been to church in her life. In fact, my father and mother never quitted the lighter, unless when the former was called out by the superintendent or proprietor, at the delivery or shipment of a cargo, or was once a month for a few minutes on shore to purchase necessaries. I cannot recall much of my intany but I recollect that the lighter was often very briliant with blue and red paint, and that my mother used to point it out to me as "so pretty," to keep me quiet. I shall therefore pass it over, and commence at the age of five years, at which early period I was of some little use to my father. Indeed, I was almost as forward as some hoys at ten. This may ap pear strange, but the fact is, that my ideas, although bounded, were concentrated. The lighter, its equip ments, and its destination, were the microcosm of my infant imagination; and my ideas and thoughts being directed to so few objects, these objects were deeply impressed, and their value fully understood. Up to the time that I quitted the lighter, at eleven years old, the banks of the river were the boundaries of my speculations. I certainly comprehended the nature of trees and houses; but I do not think that I was aware that the former grew. From the time that I could recollect them on the banks of the river, they appeared to be exactly of the same size as they were when first I saw them, and I asked no ques tions. But by the time that I was ten years old. I knew the name of every reach of the river, and every point-the depth of water, and the shallows, the drift of the current, and the ebb and flow of the tide itself. I was able to manage the lighter as it floated down with the tide; for what I lacked in strength, I made up with the dexterity arising from constant practice. It was at the age of eleven years that a catastrophe took place which changed my prospects in life, and I must therefore say a little more about my father and mother, bringing up their history to that period. The propensity of my mother to ardent spirits had, as always is the case, greatly increased upon her, and her corpulence had increased in the saine ratio. She was now a most unwieldy, bloated mountain of flesh, such a form as I have never since beheld, although at the time she did not appear to me to be disgusting, accustomed to witness imperceptibly her increase, and not seeing any other females except at a distance. For the last two years she had seldom quitted her bed-certainly, she did not crawl out of the cabin more than five minutes during the week -indeed, her obesity and habitual intoxication retdered her incapable. My father went on shore for a quarter of an hour once a month, to purchase gin. tobacco, red herrings, and decayed ship biscuit-the latter were my principal fare, except when I could My father continued for some time to smoke his catch a fish over the sides, as we lay at anchor. I pipe, and my mother to pipe her eye, until at last was therefore a great water drinker, not altogether my father, who was really a kind-hearted man, rose from choice, but from the salt nature of my food, from the chest upon which he was seated, went to and because my mother had still sense enough left the cupboard, poured out a teacup-full of gin, and to discern that "Gin wasn't good for little boys" handed it to my mother. It was kindly done of But a great change had taken place in my father. I him, and my mother was to be won by kindness. was now left almost altogether in charge of the It was a pure offering in the spirit, and taken in the deck, my father seldom coming up except to assist spirit in which it was offered. After a few repe- me in shooting the bridges, or when it required more titions, which were rendered necessary from its potency being diluted with her tears, grief and recollection were drowned together, and disappeared like two lovers who sink down entwined in each "O dear! O dear!" cried my poor mother; "two poor children, and lost them both!" "Better luck next time," rejoined my father; "so, Sall, say no more about it." than my exertions to steer clear of the crowds of vessels which we encountered when between them. In fact, as I grew more capable, my father became more incapable, and passed most of his time in the cabin, assisting my mother in emptying the great stone bottle. The woman had prevailed upon the man, and now both were guilty in partaking of the forbidden fruit of the Juniper Tree. Such was the state of affairs in our little kingdom, when the catastrophe occurred which I am now about to relate. corner of the cabin. Nothing was burning-not even the curtains to my mother's bed appeared to be singed. I was astonished-breathless with fear, with a trembling voice, I again called out " Mother." I remained more than a minute panting for breath, and then ventured to draw back the curtains of the bed-my mother was not there! but there appeared to be a black mass in the centre of the bed. I put my hand fearfully upon it-it was a sort of unctuous pitchy cinder. I screamed with horror, my little senses reeled-I staggered from the cabin and fell down on the deck in a state amounting almost to insanity: it was followed by a sort of stupor, which lasted for many hours. From the Athenæum. One fine summer's evening, we were floating up with the tide, deeply laden with coals, to be delivered at the proprietor's wharf, some distance above Putney Bridge; a strong breeze sprung up, and checked our progress, and we could not, as we expected, gain the wharf that night. We were about a mile and a half above the bridge when the tide turned against us, and we dropped our anchor. As the reader may be in some doubt as to the ocMy father, who, expecting to arrive that evening, casion of my mother's death, I must inform him that had very unwillingly remained sober, waited until she perished in that very peculiar and dreadful the lighter had swung to the stream, and then say- manner, which does sometimes, although rarely ocing to me, "Remember, Jacob, we must be at the cur, to those who indulge in an immoderate use of wharf early to-morrow morning, so keep alive," he spirituous liquors. Cases of this kind do indeed went into the cabin to indulge in his potations, present themselves but once in a century, but the leaving me in possession of the deck, and also of my occurrence of them is but too well authenticated. supper, which I never ate below, the little cabin She perished from what is termed spontaneous combeing so unpleasantly close. Indeed, I took all my bustion, an inflammation of the gasses generated from meals al fresco, and unless the nights were intensely the spirits absorbed into the system. It is to be precold, slept on deck, in the large dog kennel abafi, sumed that the flames issuing from my mother's which had once been tenanted by the large mastiff, body, completely frightened out of his senses my but he had been dead some years, had been thrown father, who had been drinking freely; and thus did overboard, and in all probability had been con- I lose both my parents, one by fire and the other by verted into Epping sausages, at 18. per. lb. Some water, at one and the same time. time after his decease, I had taken possession of his apartment and had performed his duty. I had finished my supper, which I washed down with a considerable portion of Thames water, for I always drank more when above the bridges, having an idea that it tasted more pure and fresh. I had walked forward and looked at the cable to see if all was right, and then having nothing more to do, I laid down on the deck, and indulged in the profound speculations of a boy of eleven years old. I was watching the stars above me, which twinkled WHEN Napoleon marched, in the summer of 1800, faintly, and appeared to me ever and anon to be ex- to bring back victory to the Eagles of France, a tinguished and then relighted. I was wondering division of his army, as it hastened to the scene of what they could be made of, and how they came action, halted within sight of the little town of there, when of a sudden I was interrupted in my Sarre-Louis, on the borders of German Lorraine, reveries by a loud shriek, and perceived a strong and the general who led it, pointing with his sword, smell of something burning. The shrieks were re- said with emotion, “Gentlemen and fellow soldiers, newed again and again, and I had hardly time to that is my birth place: I am the son of a cooper, get upon my legs when my father burst up from the and thirteen years ago, on the spot where I now cabin, rushed over the side of the lighter, and dis- stand, I parted in tears with my father and mother appeared under the water. I caught a glimpse of to become a soldier; I bid you welcome to my nahis features as he passed me, and observed fright tive town." This leader was the celebrated Marand intoxication blended together. I ran to the shal Ney, whose Memoirs are now before us-the side where he had disappeared, but could see incident we have related, could have happened nonothing but a few eddying circles as the tide rushed quickly past. For a few seconds I remained staggered and stupified at his sudden disappearance and evident death, but I was recalled to recollection by the smoke which encompassed me, and the shrieks of my mother, which were now fainter and fainter, and I hastened to her assistance. Memoires du Marechal Ney, [Memoirs of Marshal where save in America or France. We are glad to see this work: it is, beyond all doubt, authentic, and comes from his family: there is, however, less individuality-less of a connected line of events, than we could have desired; in truth, it is more a succession of pictures of individual characters, among which Ney is prominent, and a narrative of A strong empyreumatic thick smoke ascended marches, and battles, and sieges, than the life, prifrom the hatchway of the cabin, and as it had now vate and public, of the great Marshal. Be that as fallen calm, it mounted straight up in the air in a it may, the work is a valuable one: it has very dense column. I attempted to go in, but as soon as little of the leaven of national feeling and partiality I encountered the smoke, I found that it was im- in it, and it makes us acquainted not only with Ney possible; it would have suffocated me in half a himself, but with some of the chief leaders of the minute. I did what most children would have armies, such as Kleber, Hoche, Jourdan, Moreau, done in such a situation of excitement and distress and others scarcely less celebrated. We always I sat down and cried bitterly. In about ten admired the dauntless bravery of the "bravest of minutes I removed my hands, with which I had the brave,"-now, we must love the simplicity and covered up my face, and looked at the cabin hatch. kindliness of his nature, his affection for his soldiers, The smoke had disappeared, and all was silent. Ihis love for his country, his scorn of all that was went to the hatchway, and although the smell was sordid, and his resolute exposure of the arts of the still overpowering, I found that I could bear it. I mercenary and vile: we may add-and the sympadescended the little ladder of three steps, and called thy is not solitary-that we lament his too tragic, "Mother," but there was no answer. The lamp and, we fear, unmerited death, and grieve that fixed against the after bulk-head, with a glass before Britain-so often merciful-failed to interpose and it, was still alight, and I could see plainly to every remonstrate. Michael Ney, born at Sarre-Louis, 10th May, thought myself rich at Metz when I had two loaves 1769, was educated by the Monks of St. Augustine; of bread upon my shelf.'" sars. he was of a turbulent disposition, kept his school With the commencement of the Revolutionary comrades in awe, and showed such a liking to the war, commenced the rise of Ney: a man whose military life, that his father, who had himself been presence of mind never forsook him-whose fortia soldier, sought to wean him from it, by painting tude was unshaken-who was not only brave himthe privations he had endured, and the dangers he self, but inspired with his own courage all who had encountered in the bloody battle of Rosbach. were in his company-who seemed to court danger, This served but the more to strengthen the resolu- to show with what case he could triumph over it, tion of Michael to become a soldier, and, accord- and who was as fortunate as he was daring-could not ingly, in the eighteenth year of his age, after having but rise to distinction, in times when talent was tried the profession of Notary and Overseer of called to take the precedence of birth. Nor did he Mines, he announced his determination to his father rise by soldierly qualities alone: he was merciful and mother-parted with them in tears as we have and he was honest: all this did not escape the related-and, hurrying to Metz, enlisted in the Hus- penetrating eye of Kleber, who pushed him on to At this moment he was without money, distinction, much, as it appears from official doenalmost without clothes, and had nothing to depend on ments, against Ney's. inclination. Kleber was not but a dauntless nature and a resolution to do or die. a little vain, and what was worse, the slave of The army of France was then as the army of England is now: commissions belonged to the aristocracy alone; and genius, without money or patrons, was confined to the ranks. Even in those times, Ney was not undistinguished; he submitted patiently to all the rules of discipline; he mastered all he set his heart upon with astonishing rapidity, and, as he wrote a fine hand, he was soon employed "Because,' replied Kleber with violence, 'I in the Quarter Master's office. He had other don't like him.' merits :Well then,' said Ney, 'you may get somebody "He distinguished himself among his comrades else to write the minute, for I would cut my arm off by his fine, soldierlike appearance, his great dexterity rather than be the instrument of recording such an in the use of his weapons, and by the ease and bold-order.' passion: "Having once taken a dislike to an officer to whom he had formerly been attached, he wanted to get rid of him. Having ordered his aide-de-camp, Ney, to make a minute of an order to this effect, You are going to send him away,' the latter oberved, because-' 64 6 It was his fortune in some of the first of his fields, to encounter whole regiments of French emigrants, who, in their anger, had drawn their swords against their country to spare them was to incense the Directory, and to be stern, was contrary to the nature of Ney: his men had captured some emigrant ness with which he rode the most dangerous horses, "Kleber, speechless with astonishment, looked and broke in those hitherto considered unmanage- for a considerable time at the presumptuous aideable. On this account, every regimental affair of de-camp without speaking a word; then mildly honour was confided to him. The fencing-master said, well, let him remain! You desire it, and so of the Chasseurs de Vintimille, a regiment also let it be."" quartered at Metz, was, like most regimental fencing-masters of those days, a dangerous duellist, and, as such, dreaded not only by young recruits, but by old and experienced swordsmen. This man had wounded the fencing-master of the Colonel General, and insulted the whole regiment. The noncommissioned officers having held a meeting to take priestsmeasures for the punishment of this bully, Ney, "In the presence of those who captured them, be just promoted to the rank of Brigadier, was selected, as the bravest and cleverest swordsman, to inflict the chastisement deemed necessary. He accepted the mission with joy, but just as the duel was about to commence, he felt some one pull him violently by the tail. On turning his head he perceived the colonel of his regiment, who immediately put him under arrest." affected to speak with great violence, and to threaten them with the full penalty of the law; but after he had dismissed his men, under pretence of exmining the prisoners in private, he altered his manner, gave them food and money, and sent them the same night under a disguise to a town through which he knew the army would not pass. Next morning, Ney affected violent anger at their escape, The quarrel did not end here: Ney sought the which was publicly announced to him. Although man out-disabled him by a wound in the wrist-he endeavoured to keep as secret as possible the on which he was discharged from the army, and share he had in this flight, it nevertheless became reduced to poverty: but when his conqueror grew known to the representatives. But the measures rich, he sought him out, and made him comfortable of blood, so rife a short time before, were now be with a small pension. Ney never forgot his origin-ginning to be less frequent, and political hatred he was in most matters too a thorough republican: was rapidly subsiding. The representatives were "When at the very climax of his fortune, he loved to call to mind the point from which he had started. It grieved him, during his career, to see old errors revived, the principles of equality lost sight of, and the bearers of ancient names and titles loaded with favours, without any personal merit to justify such partiality. He was much displeased at the eagerness shown to court such individuals; and he required numerous proofs of courage and talent, ere he could overcome the unfavourable impression which he at first conceived of officers forced upon "Calm amid showers of grape-shot, unmoved by him by policy, and in opposition to his own glorious the most terrific discharges of artillery, by the halls recollections. When in their presence, he always which dealt death and destruction around him, Neg made a point of speaking of his early life. If any appeared unconscious of the danger, he seemed as officers talked before him of their noble birth, of the if he bore a charmed life. This calm rashness, pecuniary allowances they received from their fami- which twenty years of peril did not overcome, gave lies, or of their expectations of hereditary wealth, to his mind that freedom of thought, that promptihe would say, 'I was less fortunate than you, gen-tude of decision and execution so necessary amid tlemen; I received nothing from my family, and I the complicated manoeuvres of war and battle. therefore afraid to act against the kind-hearted General. One of them, however, loudly exclaimed against so flagrant a violation of the law; the other, more generous, admired Ney's magnanimity in risking his own life to save those of his prisoners. Your friend Ney,' he observed to Kleber, knows how to spare the blood of his countrymen."" Of the calm intrepidity of Ney, many instances are given in these memoirs: but they are scattered at random, and often out of place :— This surprised the officers under his command, | selves in conducting the war into the heart of Gerstill more than that courage of action in which they many: Scherer and Jourdan united themselves to all shared. One of the latter, a man of tried valour, Kleber in the campaign of 1794-the van was led asked him one day if he had ever been afraid; thus by one whose high fortune has survived till now, summing up in a single word that profound indif- and is likely to continue:ference to danger, that forgetfulness of death, that "Bernadotte led the van. This officer had been tension of mind, and that mental labour so neces- recently promoted to the rank of General; he comsary to a general-in-chief upon the field of battle, bined with the courage which characterized the I never had time,' was the Marshal's reply. army of Sambre-et-Meuse, an experience seldom "This indifference, however, did not prevent found at that period in the French ranks. He had him from noticing in others, those slight shades of been a soldier from the age of fourteen; had seen weakness from which very few soldiers are wholly service in America as well as in Europe; and had exempt. An officer was one day making a report to evinced on the banks of the Delaware, as he then him; a cannon ball passed so close to them, that did on the Sambre, that eagle eye, and velocity of the officer bent his head as if by instinct to avoid manœuvre, which few of his colleagues then possessit: nevertheless, he continued his report without ed. He added to the ascendency which the habit of betraying any emotion. Very well,' said the Mar- warfare had given him, many qualities not less preshal; but another time don't make so low a bow.""cious in a soldier. He was enterprising, intrepid, As he arose in fame, he began to appear not only and as ardent in action as in the expression of his as the friend of the soldier, but also of the people opinions. His enthusiasm delighted the men under whose country the army in which he served, occu- his command; his fine soldierlike appearance, and pied he repressed exactions, and refused to parti- his confidence, warmed their imaginations. There cipate in that system of plunder which disgraced was nothmg too difficult for them when led on by others. Of this high feeling, there are many in-him-nothing they would not undertake at his bidstances the following not the worst:ding. But everything has its limits; valour even meets with obstacles which it cannot overcome." "General Ney having taken Eberfeld, whose manufactures of steel had rendered it opulent, the The invading army, having crushed that of the magistrates, dreading its occupation, offered him a veteran Clairfayt, was now divided: Kleber became large sum of money if he would maintain the strict- solicitous of retaining Ney, and for this purpose inest discipline among his soldiers. Yes,' he replied, voked the aid of Gillet, a representative as well as a I thankfully accept the conditions you offer; not, leader-it was given in these remarkable words :however, for myself, for I want not your money- "I know them all extremely well,' he wrote to but for my soldiers, who are in want of everything. his colleague, and have seen them in actual serThey are destitute of clothing and shoes. Employ vice. They belong to a good and energetic school, the money you offer me in providing them with by whose precepts they have profited. They display these necessaries, and I promise you they shall give great zeal, and I urgently recommend them to your you no reason to complain.' The magistrates, in notice. It is but justice to these brave young men. surprise, readily subscribed to these terms. Under As for Ney, you will determine whether or not he similar circumstances, Turenne evinced the same is to remain with Kleber. For my own part, I think disinterestedness. But Turenne belonged to a rich he would be very useful in the army before Mayand noble family, and Ney was very poor; never-ence. He is a distinguished officer; and is neces theless, the action of the former is trumpeted forthsary to our large body of Cavalry. Men of his by every one,-that of the latter, forgotten. Such stamp are not common.' tion of fame." is worldly justice-such the even-handed distribu- The war continued, and Ney had many opportunities of showing his daring and fiery promptitude of The earliest friends of Ney, were Kleber and Mar- soul: he had also an opportunity of refusing the ceau-they both perished early, one in Egypt and the rank of general of brigade, which Kleber, an admiother in Germany, and both too soon for their coun-rable judge, attempted in vain to persuade him he try: they were the artificers of their own fortunes-deserved. At length, in that campaign concerted hey became what their own deeds made them, by Carnot, in which Napoleon was to lead his conand though numbered by noble emigrants among quering army into Germany, and, uniting with Mohe vulgar plebeian race, they appear to have been noble and high-souled: here are their portraits in mall: - "These were Marceau and Kleber;-the one hort, delicately formed, and in the spring of life; he other tall, strong, and of heroic stature. Both, nder this contrast of form and appearance, displayd equal ardour and ability; both had won laurels n the field of battle, and both had already given roofs of those great military talents which they aferwards more fully developed." We have already said, that these Memoirs are eficient in arrangement: the passage which relates ow Kleber and Ney became acquainted, should ave found an earlier place. reau, advance upon Vienna, the genius of Ney became so conspicuous, that Kleber rode up to him, on his return from the capture of the fortress of Forcheim, and, in the presence of his soldiers, complimented him on his success-the passage is remarkable : "In the presence of his men, he said the most flattering things respecting his activity and courage; and suddenly interrupting himself, be added: But I shall not compliment you upon your modesty; because when carried too far, it ceases to be a good quality. In sum, you may receive my declaration as you please, but my mind is made up, and I insist upon your being General of Brigade.' The chasseurs clapped their hands in applause, At the end of July 1791, soon after the battle of and the officers warmly expressed their satisfaction leurus and the taking of Mons, Kleber, still ex-at the general's determination. Ney alone remained ted by his victory, was preparing to follow it up. thoughtful. He seemed still in doubt whether he he Austrian army was at some distance from him. should accept a promotion which he had already nxious to reconnoitre its position, he set out with declined, and he uttered not a word. a escort picket, and on the road entered into conersation with the officer who commanded it. He as so pleased with the clear and judicious obserations of the latter, that he determined to appoint m to his staff. Pajol, aide-de-camp to Kleber, deliered the order of appointment to this officer, who rned out to be Ney." "Well!' said Kleber in the kindest manner, you appear very much grieved and confused; but the Austrians are there waiting for you; go and vent your ill humour upon them. As for me, I shall acquaint the Directory with your promotion.' Other great warriors began to distinguish them-ing "He kept his word in the following terms: Adjutant-general Ney, in this and the precedcampaigns, has given numerous proofs of talent, No. 138-3 Q |