the Mexicans with fresh water, so that, during the rest of the siege, they had no other way of procuring a supply than by means of canoes. The brigantines, when they were launched, did immense service in overturning and dispersing the Mexican canoes, and also in protecting the flanks of the causeways on which the other detachments were pursuing their operations. At length, after much resistance on the part of the Mexicans, the two causeways, the western and the southern, were completely occupied by the Spaniards; and Sandoval having, by Cortes's orders, made a circuit of the lake, and seized the remaining causeway of Tepejacac, the city was in a state of blockade. But so impatient were the Spaniards of delay, that Cortes resolved on a general assault on the city by all the three causeways at once. Cortes was to advance into the city from Xoloc, Alvarado from his camp on the western causeway, and Sandoval from camp on the northern, and the three detachments, uniting in the great square in the centre of the city, were to put the inhabitants to the sword. The plan had nearly succeeded. The vanguard of Cortes's party had chased the retreating Mexicans into the city, and were pushing their way to the great square, when the horn of Guatemozin was heard to sound, and the Aztecs rallying, commenced a furious onset. The neglect of Cortes to fill up a trench in one of the causeways impeded the retreat of the Spaniards in such a way as to cause a dreadful confusion, and it was only by efforts almost superhuman that they were able to regain their quarters. Their loss amounted to upwards of a hundred men, of whom about sixty had been taken alive.

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This triumph elated the Mexicans as much as it depressed the Spaniards and their allies. It was prophesied by the Mexican priests that in eight days all the Spaniards should be slain; the gods, they said, had decreed it. This prediction, reported in the quarters of the besiegers, produced an extraordinary effect on the allies. They regarded the Spaniards as doomed men, refused to fight with them, and withdrew to a little distance from the lake. In this dilemma Cortes showed his wonderful presence of mind, by ordering a total cessation of hostilities for the period. specified by the Mexican gods. When the eight days were passed, the allies, ashamed of their weakness, returned to the Spanish quarters, and the siege recommenced. These eight days, however, had not been without their horrors. From their quarters the Spaniards could perceive their fellow-countrymen who had been taken prisoners by the Mexicans dragged to the top of the great war temple, compelled to dance round the sanctuary of the gods, then laid on the stone of sacrifice, their hearts torn out, and their bleeding bodies flung down into the square beneath.

Famine now assisted the arms of the Spaniards; still, with that bravery of endurance for which their race is remarkable, the Mexicans continued the defence of the city, and it was not till it

had been eaten into, as it were, on all sides by the Spaniards, that they ceased to fight. On the 14th of August a murderous assault was commenced by the besiegers. It lasted two days; and on the evening of the second some canoes were seen to leave the city, and endeavour to reach the mainland. They were chased, and captured; and on board of one of them was found Guatemozin, with his family and his principal nobles. Guatemozin's capture was the signal of complete defeat; and on the 16th of August 1521 the city was surrendered to the Spaniards. The population was reduced to about forty thousand, and in a few days all these had disappeared, no one knew whither. The city was in ruins, like some huge churchyard with the corpses disinterred and the tombstones scattered about..

CONCLUSION.

Thus was the ancient and beautiful city of Mexico destroyed, and its inhabitants slain or dispersed. A monstrous act of unjustifiable aggression had been completed. Following up this great blow, Cortes pursued the conquest of the country generally; and in this, as well as in organising it into a colony of Spain, he did not experience any serious difficulty. On proceeding to Spain, he was received with honour by Charles V. He returned to Mexico in 1530; and again revisiting Spain in 1540, for the purpose of procuring the redress of real or alleged grievances, he died in 1547, in the sixty-third year of his age. It is very much to be lamented that, in the execution of his purposes of colonisation, the monuments of Mexican civilisation were everywhere destroyed, leaving nothing to future generations but the broken relics of palaces, temples, and other objects of art, scattered amidst the wilderness. Some of these ruined monuments, recently explored by Stephens and other travellers, show that the ancient Mexicans had made remarkable advances in social life as well as in the arts, more particularly architec ture; and what renders all such relics the more interesting to the archæologist, is the growing conviction, that the old Mexican civilisation was of an original type- a thing noway derived from, or connected with, the civilisation of Egypt, or any other nation in the eastern hemisphere.

It is consolatory to know that the Spaniards have not succeeded in making Mexico a perpetual tributary of their rapacious monarchy. The cruelties they committed seem to have contained in themselves the elements of retribution. After a career of indolence, oppression, and bigotry, extending to com paratively recent times, their yoke has been thrown off; and their feeble and ignorant successors may be said to be in the course of coming under the thraldom of their Anglo-Saxon neighbours. It is difficult to compassionate the fate which appears to await the slothful and proud race whose ancestors laid the ancient empire of Mexico in ruins.

N the summer of 1812, a fine ship was holding her course in solitary pride through the blue waters of the South Atlantic. Though her sides were lofty, and she carried a heavy battery of guns, with a numerous crew, neither had her canvas the cut, nor her yards the squareness, of those of a man-of-war. She was, in truth, one of the richly-freighted barks belonging to those merchant princes of the East, of whom it may be truly said that few monarchs rival them in power, and fewer still in wealth. Every sail was set below and aloft, with studding-sails on each side, to take advantage of the favourable breeze which was sending her along at the rate of nine knots an hour from the shores of England. Her course was towards that surge-beaten rock which rears its lofty summit, dark, rugged, and alone, from amid the ocean depths -the island of St Helena-a spot which was afterwards to become famous throughout the world as the prison and the tomb of the great wonder of his age, Napoleon.

It is difficult clearly to describe the scene which the Indiaman presented, with her crowded cabins supplied with every article of luxury: the rich merchandise below; the stores of provisions; the dark berths of the seamen; the carpenters, blacksmiths, and tailors' shops; the cow-house; the sheep-pens and hencoops; the kitchen, with its ever-active cook; the butcher and baker following their avocations; people moving in all directions; and the hum of voices heard from every part; these, with the dark

line of guns lashed to her bulwarks on each side, the snowy hammocks in the nettings, the numerous boats, the clean decks, the ropes fastened down, the tall masts, the outspreading yards, the white sails, and the intricate tracery of the rigging, the whole forming a defined and familiar picture to a seaman's eye; but to a landsman, who has never beheld the like, appears an almost incomprehensible mass of confusion.

The glowing sum of the tropics, now approaching the horizon, was casting his burning rays from an unclouded sky in a shower of golden refulgence upon the dark blue waters which rose and fell in gentle undulations, merely rippled over by the playful breeze, but unbroken save where they curled and leapt round the bows of the majestic ship as calmly she parted them asunder, or where her steady track was marked by a lengthened line of snowy whiteness. Her decks were crowded with people: the after-part with the officers and cabin passengers, while on the forecastle were collected the greater part of the crew; a few women-some natives of India, servants of the cabin passengers -and a considerable number of soldiers, mostly fresh recruits, for the service of the Company. The latter were raw youths, collected from all parts of the United Kingdom, of every sort of character and disposition, possessed of various degrees of education, and intended originally for different trades and professions, which many opposite motives had induced them to quit for the profession they had now adopted; and it was the duty of the older soldiers to amalgamate these very incongruous materials-a task not easy of accomplishment without the strictest discipline, firmness, and discretion, which latter quality was too often neglected, with the most fatal results, as the following narrative will show.

In those days it was the custom of the Company frequently to disembark their newly-levied troops at St Helena, both to drill and discipline them, and to inure them to a tropical climate, before they were exposed to the hardships of actual warfare, as well as to make them take their turn in garrisoning the island; a duty which appears always to have been distasteful and irksome to the young soldiers, from the unvaried routine, the constant parades, and rigid subordination to which they were subjected, instead of beholding the wonders of the East, which they had been taught to expect.

II.

Two young men were pacing together the short space afforded them for a walk on the top-gallant forecastle-a small deck raised above what is called the upper deck, at the fore-part of a ship. They wore the military cap and undress uniform of the other recruits, though the manner in which they trod the deck

showed that they were accustomed to the sea, and there was that in their air and appearance which distinguished them from the rest of their comrades, and betokened them to be possessed of superior education. There appeared to be a slight difference in their ages, and the eldest therefore claims the first description. His figure was about the middle height, strongly built, with well-knit limbs, which gave promise of great bodily activity; his complexion was florid, with light closely-curling hair, while his features were not only well-formed, but would have been considered decidedly handsome and pleasing, had not fierce and unrestrained passions already stamped them with their indelible traces. His full gray eyes, when his feelings were unexcited, looked so calm and soft, that they appeared beaming with almost a woman's tenderness, but on the slightest opposition to his will, they instantly flashed with the angry blaze of his fiery temper; and his mouth, that more certain index of the disposition, betokened him to be a firm and fearless character, more likely to attempt leading others, than tamely to submit to dictation. The physiognomist examining his countenance would at once have pronounced him to be possessed of qualities which, if welldirected, might raise him to the most elevated position, but which, were he left to his own devices, would too probably prove the cause of his complete destruction. Such was William Halliday.

He was the second son of a wealthy farmer in the north of England, whose property bordered the sea-coast. He had been sent to various schools, as well as to one of the northern universities, but had, although possessed of good abilities, been expelled from each on account of his determined resistance to all authority. At the same time that young Halliday was pronounced an incorrigible reprobate by his masters, he was beloved by his companions of the same age as himself for his kind and generous disposition. He was at all times the champion of those who were oppressed and unable to defend themselves: often, too, would he bear the punishment due to the faults of another boy, rather than betray him to his superiors. He was always the first to be accused when no other culprit could be found. The behaviour of his masters by degrees hardened his temper, and made him alike indifferent to punishment or applause. How little did his instructors imagine the ruin they were working in a noble fabric! whereas, by judicious management from the first, his faults would have been corrected, and his disposition unimpaired. Notwithstanding his general idleness, he had contrived to gain a considerable amount of information, and his indulgent father had hopes of his reformation. He listened calmly and leniently to his son's excuses for his behaviour, forgave him, and told him that he must henceforth make amends for his former wildness by assisting him diligently in his business. William promised, and intended to perform his promise, but the