THE NEW COINAGE.

It is with a feeling of proud gratification that we observe set down as an item in the just published Miscellaneous Civil Estimates, Branch VII, the sum of £50,000 for a new Copper Coinage. It will be within the remembrance of our readers that this journal has for months past been urging the Government of the day to commence a reform of the inferior metallic currency of the kingdom, which has become so deteriorated by wear and tear and ill-usage as to be positively a disgrace to the community amongst whom it circulates. Our exertions have evidently been effective in the quarter where it was intended they should tell, and we record the fact with much pleasure. Fifty thousand pounds represents the purchase money of something like five hundred tons of copper, and these converted into coin would give an enormous number of individual pieces -say one hundred millions of the different denominations. This is a fair instalment, therefore, for a commencement; but we shall expect the vote of £50,000 to be an annual one for several years to come, if the reform is to be made complete.

No doubt there will be a considerable diminution in the weight of the new coins as compared with those now in use-at least there ought to be-and if instead of "Copper," Bronze" might be read in the estimate, that also would be an improvement. However, with the Mint will rest probably the questions of size, weight, impression, and material, and that establishment will, we should think, know how to

The Damascus Steel and Iron Company of New York are now making from three to six tons of best cast steel per day out of American iron by this process, producing finished barsteel at a cost not over £28 a ton of a quality equal to that made here out of the best brands, costing in iron bar £30 to £36 a ton. From an THE STEEL MANUFACTURE REVOLU-iron puddled by the Damascus Company direct

dred miles of shoal-water near the coasts of Ireland and Newfoundland respectively; and it is possible that the whole fault might be discovered there, thus superseding the necessity for raising the deep portion at all.

To the Government, also, who have shown their intention to lay a submarine cable to Gibraltar, we would suggest that the question is a national one, and well worthy an attempt at solution by the means which, without any great extra expense, are at their disposal, before risking the large sum which has been voted for the cable on an attempt either by themselves or through contractors, at laying it from ships.

Indeed, it is difficult to understand how, in the cases of very large sums such as those here involved, any contractor can be found to risk the loss, in the present state of our knowledge of the difficulties attendant on deep-water laying. And how do the contractors show that in the event of their losing in laying a cable like the Atlantic, which costs say £300,000, their estate would afterwards be capable of paying a fine, or even repaying the sum advanced to carry on the work? Say the contractor fails-is that any satisfaction to the shareholders who want the interest of their money, or to the public who

want the communication?

In conclusion, the whole subject deserves and should receive most careful consideration before next year, if any attempt is then to be made to revive what can never be allowed to remain dormant, since it has been proved practicable, viz., an electric communication with America, and no elucidation will be valuable which has not a due admixture of Practice combined with Theory. The laying of a cable is an operation which naval officers may be justly expected to manage more efficiently than landsmen, and we hope the experience of such men as Captain Preedy and others will be made available in future undertakings.

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our cannon would not be, according to our system of manufacture, ready for many months to come. But that was not the whole matter. "There were many questions connected with "the subject to which the inquiry of the noble "and learned lord referred. He did not, however, think it desirable that he should now enter into a discussion of the questions con"nected with the improvement of cannon, "which were now under the consideration of "the department to which they properly be"longed. He therefore must decline to follow "the noble and learned lord into that discussion, to show what we had done in that way in answer to what the noble and learned lord "imagined the French had done."

Now, if this is to be taken as an example of the manner in which questions of great public moment-not to say questions of public safety -are to be replied to by the head of the Admiralty, the sooner the Admiralty loses its head the better. Is it not monstrous that a public functionary should be permitted to answer the plain and pressing question," Are we taking any step towards arming our navy with rifled guns, as the French are said to be doing?"--by the evasive remark that he, the first lord of the Admiralty, thought it undesirable that he should discuss the "many questions" connected with the "improvement of cannon" in the House of Lords! However ignorant the Duke of Somerset may be of the fact, we can assure him that the question which he thus contemptuously slights is agitating the thoughts of many able and patriotic officers of the navy, and other gentlemen, at this moment. We have had it from the lips of several of them, that, in their judgment, the policy of waiting for, and depending almost exclusively upon, the Armstrong gun is in the highest degree imprudent and dangerous.

666

"which appears to be definitely adopted con'sists of three grooves about three inches "broad and an eighth of an inch deep, with a "twist of one-sixth.' These guns are being supplied rapidly to the French line-of-battle "ships. It would certainly seem but a prudent step to make use of the guns we have as sup"plemental to the Armstrongs,' which must "be comparatively few in number for the next "two or three years. There are, we believe, no "less than 7,000 smooth-bored guns now "lying at Woolwich Arsenal. To rifle a part "of these would be an easy and, comparatively,

66

an inexpensive work. If beyond the powers "of the Government establishments, the work "might be distributed among the various facto"ries in our great towns, and by the end of the 'year large numbers of rifled guns might be fit 66 for use."

It may seem strange to some to say so, but we do not hesitate to believe that the Lancaster gun is, after all, that to which we must look for a successful settlement of this question of rifled guns for the Navy. Those which burst in the Crimean war were merely ordinary service-guns turned out to an oval bore, and their failure in no way proved the principle bad. On the contrary, recent experiments have amply demonstrated the soundness of the principle. We know also that the Lancaster gun can be produced in large numbers with great rapidity. These two facts taken together justify us, we submit, in the confidence we feel in this extraordinary but simple weapon, which will, we are sure, speedily prove itself inferior to none in this or any other country.

THE NEW AMERICAN RIFLED
CANNON.

We have no predisposition to panic in connection with our national defences, but we sub- THE Americans are not disposed to fall far mit that the rapid armament of French vessels behind the more belligerent nations of the Old with rifled cannon, which is said in the best World in their implements of war. At Chicoquarters to be now in progress, is a matter of pee, Massachusetts, experiments have lately the most momentous nature. And we further been made with a new rifled cannon, the invensubmit that if the Duke of Somerset have any tion of General James, which promises extraorgenuine patriotism in him, and if he be in any dinary results. From a synopsis of the official way worthy to control the navy of the people of report of the Board who superintended these England at this crisis, he will not be content trials, which has just reached us, we learn that with saying he is without authentic information the guns examined were a 6-pound bronze canon the subject, but will at once bestir himself, non, with 3:80 inch calibre, and rifled 15 and put himself in possession of such informa-grooves; a 12-pounder, 4-inch calibre and same tion, and act vigorously, if need be, upon it. number of grooves. In both instances, the twist If our informant and the statements of our in rifling was equivalent to one turn in 60 feet greatest contemporary are to be relied upon, the at the beginning, and ending in one in 20. The French are rapidly producing large numbers of projectile designed by General James for these rifled cannon for the navy; and it will be peri- guns is a cast-iron cylinder pointed by a solid lous indeed for us if the first lord of our Admi-conoidal head, the diameter being only 02 of ralty is to be the last man in England to learn an inch less than the bore of the gun, and the the fact. length twice the diameter of the calibre. The cylinder retains its full diameter for a quarter of an inch of its length at each end. For the intermediate length its diameter is reduced half-an-inch, forming a recess in its body, which is filled by a compound of canvas, sheet-tin, and lead. The base of the cylinder has a central cavity or opening of 195 inches in diameter, and 15 inches deep. When the charge is fired the gas evolved by the burning of the powder, in its efforts to expel the projectile and to escape from the gun, is forced into the cavity against the compound filling, which is thereby pressed into the grooves of the bore, and by its firm hold in them the rotary motion is imparted to the projectile.

RIFLED GUNS FOR THE NAVY. THE article on rifled guns for the navy which we last week published has not been without result. The unprofessional press helped to gain increased attention for our remarks, and Lord Lyndhurst patriotically availed himself of the first succeeding opportunity afforded him by his place in the upper house of Parliament, by questioning the first lord of the Admiralty upon the subject. "The question I have to put to "the noble Duke (of Somerset) is this," said he, "whether he is aware that the French are arm"ing their fleet on the other side of the Channel "with rifled cannon? I put this question because from the reports I have heard it would "appear that the rifled cannon we are preparing "will not extend to above 100 in the present year and 200 in the following year, whereas it "is said the French rifled cannon are manufac"tured with such rapidity that they will be Since the above was written the Times has "able to arm their fleet in that mode long be- been provoked by the Duke of Somerset to the "fore we can make use, to any extent, of the publication of an article upon this subject. The "rifled cannon of Sir W. Armstrong." The editor says:-"The Armstrong gun will, no reply given to this most serious inquiry was, we “doubt, be an astonishing weapon; but as yet regret to say, calculated to remind us of the we have only one or two specimens of it. The accustomed hauteur of noble functionaries, "works are only in course of erection, all the rather than to give us any kind of confidence in machinery has to be brought into order, and our armaments. The reports of the Duke of "the utmost that we are promised is a hundred Somerset's answer to Lord Lyndhurst vary Armstrong guns by the end of the year. somewhat in the various morning papers, but "Even this promise is hardly likely to be kept. the tenor of the whole is the same. We extract "On the other hand, thousands of Armstrong it as follows from the Times:-"He [the noble guns will be required for our ships, our "Duke] had only to say that of course he had "fortresses, and for service in the field. The "heard the report, though that report was not "construction of these must be the work of “based on any authentic information in his pos- several years. In the meantime what is going "session, that some rifled cannon had been pre-"on across the Channel? The most noticeable "pared in the arsenals of France. He was "feature in the Arsenal,' writes our Marseilles pware also that although we had very many correspondent, is the effort made to provide improved cannon in the course of manufacture "rifled ordnance for the Navy. The system

66

64

The Board having examined the guns and projectiles, proceeded to test their efficiency, the results obtained being very satisfactory. The report says, respecting the guns, their merit is due to the rifling, which can be readily applied,

at little cost, to all bronze cannon of the United States, and so render them as far superior to the present smooth bore guns as, in small arms, the most improved rifle surpasses the musket. The depth of grooving is so shallow as in no wise materially to impair the strength of the gun, while it is sufficient to compel the projectile to take the rifle flight. The effect of these contrivances was exhibited in an extraordinary manner, by the increased range obtained while using the same charge of powder and elevation in projecting masses of double the weight of the

'any gun of a calibre equal to Armstrong's will
"throw a ball, with less than half the powder,
"the full distance attained in his practice."

PRE-ADAMITE MECHANICS AND
THEIR TOOLS.

A VERY curious controversy has lately sprung
up among our geologists and antiquaries re-
specting the duration of man's past existence
upon the earth, the occasion of it being the
discovery in several places of various flint-
implements which appear to have been the

determined occurrence of worked flints mixed indiscriminately with the bones of the extinct cave bear and rhinoceros, attracted great and general attention amongst geologists.

usual spherical balls. The merits of the pro-tools of some very ancient race of mechanics. quarian point of view, still the statement of the

jectile are represented to consist in their answering fully the expectations desired of them; their ready fabrication and adaptation to guns; their ease in loading; the certainty of the expansion of the filling and its firm hold in the grooves of the guns. The greased canvas wipes the rifling clean and leaves the bore in condition readily to receive the next charge, and which is also a sure protection to the bore from injury. For these reasons the gun and projectiles are commended to the favourable consideration of the Government; and as the experimental firing was subject to several disadvantages which may hereafter be avoided, the Board recommend that guns of the service calibre be granted to General James for rifling according to his principle.

We learn that another series of experiments is in contemplation, in which will be compared, side by side, the performances of this new gun with those now in use. Of course the remarkable precision and power of the new rifled ordnance constitute its chief value, but the great saving of ammunition effected is a matter of no small importance. The results of the experiments above referred to are expressed in tabular form, at much length. As an example, it is shown that in one instance 18 shots were fired a mean distance of 674 yards, at an elevation of one degree-the powder weighing 14 lb., the projectile 123 the deviation being only four inches to the right of centre, and half an inch above it. On reaching ground the missile was buried five feet in compact sand. another instance a shot was fired 2,050 yards, at an elevation of five degrees, and passed about 25 feet above the top of the hill towards which it was directed. The Board believe, from the testimony of several witnesses who were near the range, that the projectile "continued its "flight many hundred yards beyond the hill," the summit of which was nearly on the same level as that upon which the gun was placed in battery. According to the statement of Mr. Ames, the manufacturer of the gun, who carefully examined the ground, "it is almost

In

"certain the ball went four miles." After what

is already known it is safe to say that any object within the reach of an ordinary spy-glass is a fair mark for this terrible weapon.

In 1849 M. Boucher de Perthes, President of the "Société d'Emulation" of Abbeville, published the first volume of a work entitled "An"tiquités Celtiques et Antediluviennes," in which he announced the important discovery of worked flints in beds of undisturbed sand and gravel containing the remains of extinct mammalia. Although treated from an antigeological facts by this gentleman, with good These tools consist, first, of certain fint-flakes, sections by M. Ravin, is perfectly clear and secondly, of certain pointed flint weapons trun-in England his conclusions were generally conshaped apparently for arrow heads or knives; consistent. Nevertheless, both in France and cated at one end, and intended probably for sidered erroneous; nor has he since obtained lance or spear-heads; and, thirdly, of certain such verification of the phenomena as to cause oval or almond-shaped flint implements with a so unexpected a fact to be accepted by men of cutting edge all round, which were used, it is science. There have, however, been some few thought, as sling stones or as axes. found that in form and workmanship-for all Dr. Rigollot, of Amiens, urged by M. Boucber exceptions to the general incredulity. The late seem to agree that they are products of work- de Perthes, not only satisfied himself of the manship the two last classes differ essentially truth of the fact, but corroborated it in 1855 from the implements of what is called the Celtic by his " Mémoire sur des Instruments en Silex period, which are usually more or less ground and polished, and cut at the wide and not the been discovered, very remarkably, in intimate narrow end. All these flint implements have association with the remains of extinct races of animals, and in undisturbed beds of drift of a geological period hitherto considered long antecedent to the existence of man upon the earth.

It has been

Royal and the Geological Societies, has lately Mr. Joseph Prestwich, a Fellow of both the furnished a paper to the Royal Society in which he very temperately states the facts hitherto ascertained in reference to these strange discoveries. He commences by noticing how comparatively rare are the cases even of the alleged discovery of the remains of man or of his works in the various superficial drifts, notwithstanding the extent to which these deposits are worked; and of these few cases so many have been disproved, that man's non-existence on the earth until after the latest geological Tichorhine Rhinoceros, and other great mamchanges, and the extinction of the Mammoth, mals, had come to be considered almost in the light of an established fact. Instances, how ever, have from time to time occurred to throw some doubt on this view, as the well-known cases of the human bones found by Dr. Schmerling in a cavern near Liège--the remains of man, instanced by M. Marcel de Serres and others in several caverns in France--the flintimplements in Kent's Cave—and many more. Some uncertainty, however, has always attached to cave-evidence, from the circumstance that man has often inhabited such places at a comparatively late period, and may have disturbed the original cave-deposit; or, after the period of his residence, the stalagmitic floor may have been broken up by natural causes, and the remains above and below it may have thus become mixed together, and afterwards sealed up by a second floor of stalagmite. Such instances of an imbedded broken stalagmitic floor are in fact known to occur; at the same time the author does not pretend to say that this will explain all cases of intermixture in caves, but that it lessens the value of the evidence from such sources.

In one other respect the exploits of General James's gun demand attention. "According to "the laws of projectiles laid down in the Ordnance Manual, and which have long been “established, as was supposed beyond power of "refutation, the range of a 6 lb. shot at five deg. "elevation and 1 lb. powder is," says the New York Journal of Commerce, to which we are indebted for this information, "1,523 yards; but, "in the example now afforded, a ball 12 lb., "with the specified quantity of powder, has The subject has, however, been latterly regone between three and four miles. As com-vived, and the evidence more carefully sifted pared with the celebrated Armstrong gun, the

"results are not less curious. Mr. A. claims to

"have thrown a ball 5 miles with six pounds of powder, employing an area or calibre of 3 "inches-which is a result of 55-100ths less “favourable than that obtained by the experi"ments at Chicopee, According to the latter,

by Dr. Falconer; and his preliminary reports
the Royal Society, announcing the carefully
on the Brixham Cave,* presented last year to

On the 4th of May, this year, Dr. Falconer further
though singularly varied, recently discovered by him in
communicated to the Geological Society some similar facts,
the Maccagnone Cave near Palermo.-See Proe. Geol. Soc.

66

trouvés à St. Acheul." Some few geologists suggested further inquiry; whilst Dr. Falconer, tions and specimens, warmly engaged Mr. himself convinced by M. de Perthes' explanaPrestwich to examine the sections.

took the inquiry full of doubt, went last Easter,

Mr. Prestwich, who confesses that he under

first to Amiens. On his first visit he obtained

he was not successful in finding any him-
several specimens from the workmen, but
self. On his arrival, however, at Abbeville, he
received a message from M. Pinsard of Amiens,
to inform him that one had been discovered
the following day, and was left in situ for his
inspection. On returning to the spot, this time
with his friend Mr. Evans, he satisfied himself
that it was truly in situ, 17 feet from the sur-
photographic sketch of the section taken.* Dr.
face, in undisturbed ground, and he had a
Rigollot also mentions the occurrence in the
gravel of round pieces of hard chalk, pierced
used as beads. Mr. Prestwich found several,
through with a hole, which he considers were
and recognised in them a small fossil sponge
(the Coscinopora globularis, D'Orb), from the
chalk, but does not feel quite satisfied about
their artificial dressing. Some specimens do
certainly appear as though the hole had been
enlarged and completed. The only mammalian
remains Mr. Prestwich here obtained were
some specimens of the teeth of a horse, but
too imperfect to determine; and part of the
whether recent or extinct, the specimens were
tooth of an elephant (Elephas primigenius?).
and on a lower level, mammalian remains are
In the gravel-pit of St. Roch, 13 mile distant,
far more abundant, but the workmen said that
they are mentioned by Dr. Rigollot.
no worked flints were found there, although

There were

struck with the extent and beauty of M.
At Abbeville, Mr. Prestwich was much
Boucher de Perthes' collection.
many forms of flints in which he, however,
failed to see traces of design or work, and
which he only considered as accidental; but,
with regard to those flint-instruments termed
"axes" "haches") by M. de Perthes, he en-
tertains not the slightest doubt of their artificial
make. They are of two forms, generally from
four to ten inches long. They are very rudely
made, without any ground surface, and were

*On revisiting the pit, since the reading of his paper, in company with several geological friends, Mr. Prestwich was fortunate to witness the discovery and extraction by one of them, Mr. J. W. Flower, of a very perfect and fine specimen of flint-implement, in a scam of ochreous gravel, 20 feet beneath the surface. They besides obtained thirtysix specimens from the workmen.-June, 1859.

of the figures, and the introduction of many
forms about which there might reasonably be
a difference of opinion; in the case of the arrow-
heads in Kent's Cave a hidden error was merely
suspected; and in the case of the Liège Cavern
he considers that the question was discussed on
a false issue. He therefore is of opinion that
these and many similar cases require recon-
sideration; and that not only may some of
these prove true, but that many others, kept
back by doubt or supposed error, will be forth-
coming,

-

or honoured. The history of the modern workman or handicraftsman-his ascent from serfhood to manhood- is the grandest fact in European history. The few great events that evolved this fact of facts were as the tollings of the hours on the world-dial, whose hours are centuries. We chronicle them here to set the reader's mind thinking of them afresh. But first, one word about the material to be wrought upon-the Teutonic race.

The strongest element in shaping a people's destiny is peculiarity of race. We have a signal example of this in the Gallic blood of our neighbours across the Channel. How excitable they are-mobile, quickly susceptible of change for better or worse. How sociable, communicative, wearing their secret on their tongue. How demonstrative to vainness, personal and national! What a generous, high-mettled people! Thus, 'tis said that Louis Philippe's Government fell in 1848, because it appealed to nothing generous and high in the people; based itself only on material interests; set up the cash-box and ledger for worship; warning against revolutions as bad for trade.

In tracing the history of Anglo-Saxon freedom we find the germ of it in the race. Tacitus, the first keen, cultivated observer of the German tribes, said of them that they were remarkable for personal attachment, trust in one another, devotion and loyalty to one another. This gravitation of man to man is the fountain of

the work of a people probably unacquainted with the use of metals. These implements are much rarer at Abbeville than at Amiens. Mr. Prestwich was not fortunate enough to find any specimens himself; but from the experience of M. de Perthes, and the evidence of the workmen, as well as from the condition of the specimens themselves, he is fully satisfied of the correctness of that gentleman's opinion, that they there also occur in beds of undisturbed sand and gravel. Besides the concurrent testimony of all the workmen at the different pits, which Mr. Prestwich after careful examination One very remarkable instance has been saw no reason to doubt, the flint-implements already brought out. In the 13th volume of ("haches") bear upon themselves internal evi- the Archeologia," published in 1800, is a dence of this opinion. It is a peculiarity of paper by Mr. John Frere, F.R.S. and F.S.A, fractured chalk flints to become deeply and entitled, "An Account of Flint-Weapons dispermanently stained and coloured, or to be left" covered at Hoxne, in Suffolk," wherein that unchanged, according to the nature of the gentleman gives a section of a brick-pit in which matrix in which they are imbedded. In most numerous flint-implements had been found, at a clay beds they become outside of a bright depth of eleven feet, in a bed of gravel containing opaque white or porcelainic; in white calcare-bones of some unknown animal; and concludes, ous or siliceous sand their fractured black sur- from the ground being undisturbed and above faces remain almost unchanged; whilst in beds the valley, that the specimens must be of very of ochreous and ferruginous sands, the flints are great antiquity, and anterior to the last changes stained of the light yellow and deep brown of the surface of the country-a very remarkcolours so well exhibited in the common ochre-able announcement, hitherto overlooked. ous gravel of the neighbourhood of London. Mr. Prestwich purposely abstains for the This change is the work of very long time, and present from all theoretical considerations, conof moisture before the opening out of the beds. fining himself to the corroboration of the Now in looking over the large series of flint-facts-"1. That the flint-implements are the implements in M. de Perthes' collection, it can"work of man. 2. That they were found in not fail to strike the most casual observer that "undisturbed ground. 3. That they are asso-liberty. those from Menchecourt are almost always "ciated with the remains of extinct mammalia. white and bright, whilst those from Moulin "4. That the period was a late geological one, Quignon have a dull yellow and brown surface;" and anterior to the surface assuming its preand it may be noticed that whenever (as is often the case) any of the matrix adheres to the flint, it is invariably of the same nature, texture, and He does not, however, consider that these colour as that of the respective beds themselves. facts, as they at present stand, of necessity In the same way at St. Acheul, where there carry back man in past time more than they are beds of white and others of ochreous gravel, bring forward the great extinct mammals tothe flint-implements exhibit corresponding wards our own time, the evidence having refervariations in colour and adhering matrix; addedence only to relative and not to absolute time; "Let us examine feudal society as it is in its own to which, as the white gravel contains chalk and he is of opinion that many of the later nature, looking at it first of all in its simple and fundamental element. Let us figure to ourselves a single débris, there are portions of the gravel in which geological changes may have been sudden or of possessor of a fief in his own domain; and consider the flints are more or less coated with a film of shorter duration than generally considered. In what will be the character of the little association deposited carbonate of lime; and so it is with fact, from the evidence here exhibited, and from which groups itself around him. He establishes himthe flint-implements which occur in those por- all that he knows regarding drift phenomena self in a retired and defensible place, which he takes tions of the gravel. Further, the surface of generally, he sees no reason against the conclu-he terms his castle. With whom does he establish many specimens is covered with fine dendritic sion that this period of man and the extinct markings. Some few implements also show, mammals-supposing their contemporaneity to like the fractured flints, traces of wear, their be proved-was brought to a sudden end by a sharp edges being blunted. In fact, the flint- temporary inundation of the land; on the conimplements form just as much a constituent trary, he sees much to support such a view on part of the gravel itself--exhibiting the action purely geological considerations. of the same later influences and in the same force and degree-as the rough mass of flint fragments with which they are associated.

With regard to the geological age of these beds, Mr. Prestwich refers them to those usually designated as post-pliocene, and notices their agreement with many beds of that age in England. The Menchecourt deposit much resembles that of Fisherton near Salisbury; the gravel of St. Acheul is like some on the Sussex coast; and that of Moulin Quignon resembles the gravel at East Croydon, Wandsworth Common, and many places near London. The author even sees reason, from the general physical phenomena, to question whether the beds of St. Acheul and Moulin Quignon may not possibly be of an age one stage older than those of Menchecourt and St. Roch; but before that point can be determined, a more extended knowledge of all the organic remains of the several deposits is indispensable.

Mr. Prestwich next inquires into the causes which led to the rejection of this and the cases before mentioned, and shows that in the case of M. de Perthes' discovery, it was in a great degree the small size and indifferent execution

"sent outline, so far as some of its minor fea-
"tures are concerned."

All are not, however, so temperate as Mr. Prestwich. Many have already taken sides upon the question; the one side contending that man-and man as a mechanic, too-is a much more venerable being than the other side will admit. We shall probably recur to the subject on an early occasion.

Infinite space makes not liberty ; liberty is an orbit of one's own, springing from mutual attractions and reciprocities.

The earliest civiliser of our wild ancestors was the sight of the external civilisation of the peoples they conquered: Roman roads, aqueducts, towns, municipal institutions, civil laws.

Feudalism was the first social form into

which modern Europe crystallised. Guizot thus pictures the owner of the fief or feud :—

care to render safe and strong; he there erects what

himself there? With his wife and his children: probably, also, some few freemen who have not become landed proprietors have attached themselves to his person, and remain domesticated with him. These are all the inmates of the castle itself. Around it, and under its protection, collects a small population of labourers of serfs, who cultivate the domain of the seigneur. Amidst this inferior population religion comes, builds a church and establishes a priest." In the early times of feudality, this priest is at once the chaplain of the castle and the parish clergyman of the village; at a later period the two characters are separated. This, then, is the organic molecule, the unit, if we may so speak, of feudal society."

In these feudal times, reaching from the 10th century to the 15th-the middle ages, as we THE WORKING MAN: HISTORY OF call them-the workman was a serf, the pro

HIS PROGRESS.

THE orthodox division of society amongst us
English people is into three classes. The car-
riages of a railway-train are of three classes.
The seats of a theatre are of three classes. In
public print and talk three classes are acknow-
ledged middle, upper, and lower. This is
quite right; there are three and only three;
though which is highest and which lowest we
cannot say, but should call him happiest who
belongs to all of them. The three classes of
society, then, are these: thinkers--workers-
and another class, difficult to name, who are
distinguished by character and beauty of
demeanour and life, rather than by thought
or action. Only as belonging to one or
all of these classes are men to be revered

perty of his lord, a part of his goods and chattels. Much as the Teutonic personal devotion and loyalty modified this condition, the labourer was essentially a slave.

It is impossible to over-rate the power of the old Catholic church in those centuries. Fancy yourself in one of our old churches seven centuries ago, when high birth was the sovereign possession in Europe. The baron-rugged, valiant, proud-and the dull dim serf, in the chime of Sunday bells, have crossed heath and meadow in the summer sunshine: there under Gothic arches, in the light of the coloured window, rich as a July sunset behind English elms, in the hearing of these is read the old words, "Put on the new manhood, wherein is "neither barbarian, Scythian, bond, nor free ;

"but intelligence and worth are all in all." That reader, in his person and in his book, represents self-discipline and gentleness amidst war and brigandism-genius, intelligence, and learning amidst pride of descent and brute force. No one in that building is higher than he, and he is perhaps the son of a herdman. The monastery he belongs to is the only haunt of learning in that whole region. There is better tillage of the earth there than on the baron's estate; a knowledge and skill of handicraft and manufacture wholly unknown elsewhere. There, too, is spoken and practised the grand sentiment for the industrial ages: Bene laborare est bene orare; To work well is to pray well.

to discharge cargo 515, by collision 251, total 766; making the whole number of wrecks 1170. By these disasters the lives of 1,865 persons were emperilled, of which number 340 persons or 18 of the whole were actually lost.

But what is the true elevation of the working classes? Stephenson, the founder of the railway, was a poor lad, earning twopence a-day at watching cows, because his father was too poor to send him to school; and at public meetings of mechanics and artisans he used to This is the dark side of the doleful map. It hold up this success of his as a stimulus to the has, however, a bright side, and on that we find workmen :-"Persevere as I have done, and you that by the life-boats of the National Life-boat "will get on." Now, any youth growing inde- Institution, those of local bodies, and various pendent of others, standing on his own feet, other craft, 1,555 of our fellow-creatures were, cutting out his own path, is always a fine spec- during the past year, rescued from a watery tacle. We confess to a thrill of delight at the grave. The red dottings on this unique chart sight of a poor lad, by unaided effort, rising to are cheering marks, as indicative of the places any real eminence, were it merely of wealth. where life-boats and the life-preserving appaBut it is a poor, vulgar aim to hold up to work-ratus are to be found in the hour of distress. ing men, that of rising above their own class The latter are under the control of the Board of This is no idle sentimentality about those merely at any price to better their livelihood. Trade, and as the firing of the apparatus requires old ages. It is a fact, growing clearer and Yet this is the tone of some of our eminent some knowledge of gunnery, they are principally clearer, that the old Catholic church was the teachers. We remember an address of Sir in the charge of the coast guard. first great civiliser and humaniser of modern Bulwer Lytton's to the boys of one of our pubEurope. In the nfiddle ages she was the fore-lic schools, in this strain:"I set out in life most fact. She literally saved and preserved "determined to be something; aspire, and you the learning of antiquity; she fostered the "will rise." Lord Palmerston the other day ruder and finer arts; she educated the serf to addressed university students in the same be a priest, or cardinal, or even pope; she spirit :-"Every department of labour is stood between the serf and his lord; in one of "crowded; you must struggle and fight to her earliest quarrels with the nobility, her "win." All this may be very well; but the clergy were reproached as the sons of serfs." high-minded man asks, Persevere -aspireAnd it has been well pleaded, that had she not fight-for what? been the huge European organism she was, she could not have checked the violence of kings and nobles.

Now we would suggest that the end of life is not to grow rich, or learned, or famous-but to live. To live, first, bodily; not to be cooped It should be observed that in England the up in a place and employment where your power of the feudal baron was a far more senses and limbs have no free play: above all limited one than on the Continent. Norman to keep intellect, imagination, taste, affection William made his barons immediately respon-alive; to put forth all your powers; to taste sible to him; allotted the land of each in places the whole round of existence; to be able to say distant from each other; while, again, the peo- at the end of every day, every year, aye, at the ple they had conquered were almost as strong end of life itself" I have lived." That we as themselves: hence the closer union between have remained in the same social class we were the nobles and the people. The Magna Charta, born in, have followed the same humble calling wrung by the barons from John, was as much as our fathers, is a small matter; but that our a people's as a nobles' charter. intelligence has grown larger and larger; our manners and thoughts more and more beautiful and magnanimous; that our whole life is truthful, and brotherly, and lofty, rich in relationship and fellowship, enjoyment and influence this is success—the true rising of the working man!

46

Again, the first crusade was a great awakening of the people. Kings, chiefs, vassals, and serfs, were for the first time inspired with a grand aim in common. "That remarkable expedition was the first great event of modern times which had a European and a Christian "interest-an interest not of nation, or place, or rank, but which the lowest serfs had in common, and more than in common, with the "loftiest barons. When the soil is moved, all "sorts of seeds fructify. The serfs now began "to think themselves human beings."

How finely M. de Tocqueville depicts this movement of liberty. "The erection of corpo"rate towns introduced an element of demo"cratic liberty into the bosom of feudal monarchy; the invention of fire-arms equal"ized the villein and the noble on the field of "battle; printing opened the same resources to the minds of all classes; the post was "established, so as to bring the same inform"ation to the door of the poor man's cottage and to the gate of the palace; the discovery "of America offered a thousand new paths to fortune, and placed riches and power within "the reach of the adventurous and the ob

scure."

Of all material things trade was the strongest in emancipating the people. Every new invention, luxury, and want made the workman of more value to society, while it kindled his ingenuities and raised him higher as a man. Mentally, the Reformation was the greatest quickener of the people of Europe to ndividuality and self-esteem. Every man found himself called on to think, to form a judgment, to take sides, and often to stake goods and life for his cause.

J. S. Mill's Review of Michelet's History of France,

THE WRECK CHART.

WE have lying before us a remarkable map
the Wreck Chart of the British Isles for 1858.
It is to be found in a return to Parliament,
carefully prepared by the Board of Trade. The
chart is of the same appearance as an ordinary
map of these islands, except that the whole line
of coast, from the Orkneys to the Land's End,
is dotted with a series of black marks. Each
mark indicates either a shipwreck or some
casualty to a vessel nearly approaching that
disaster.
chart when this key to its object is given. The
A most melancholy effect has this
whole coast, particularly near the approaches to
our great commercial cities, bristles with the
dottings which indicate clearly the site where
some noble ship has gone to destruction with her
human freight. All round our coast, with the
aid of this valuable map, we can trace clearly the
frightful work of destruction during the past
year. The total number of British merchant
ships, including steamers, is supposed to be
27,097, giving a tonnage of 4,558,730. These
ships are handled probably by no less than
300,000 men and boys.

The nature of the disasters to British and
foreign ships is thus epitomized:-In 1858 the
number of vessels wrecked on the coast and in
the seas of the United Kingdom was 1,170; of
these 354 were total wrecks, 50 sunk by colli-
sion, making the number totally lost 404.
Vessels stranded and damaged so as to require

dangerous points of the coast have, of late years, It is very gratifying to find that life-boats on greatly increased in number and efficiency under the management of the National Lifeboat Institution, whose energies in this good work are untiring. It has now eighty-two lifeboat establishments under its management, and we only wish that we were able to report that it had twice that number, for there are still too many exposed points in need of these arks of withstanding all our precautions, yet if life-boats mercy; and although shipwrecks will occur, notwere more numerous on the coast, and if shipowners paid more attention to the condition of their vessels and crews before they sent them to sea, much might unquestionably be done to lessen the melancholy disasters on the coast of the British Isles.

SMALL-ARMS FACTORY AT ENFIELD. THERE are not many manufactories in the kingdom which are of more immediate importance to the public at this moment than those wherein heavy guns and sn all arms are manufactured and never, fortunately, was the rate of production greater in either case than now. At Woolwich gun foundries, with all the rapidity contingent upon increased facilities and more room, they are turning out the former; whilst at Enfield the smaller-but not less necessary implements of war-rifles, are completed with a speed almost incredible. Of Woolwich we have aforetime ren

dered an account to our patrons, the public, and it is now intended to give some information as to Enfield.

A few years back and it might have been advisable to have given, by way of preface, the geographical position, and means of getting to this place; but now all know its whereabouts, and such a course is quite unnecessary. The exterior of the small-arms factory at Enfield Lock is constructed after an elegant design, and cannot fail It is of considerable size, but unfortunately the to create an agreeable effect on the mind of the visitor, be that mind scientifically trained or not. interior of the edifice is not equal in beauty to the exterior-unfortunately, we say; but since the useful predominates inside, it may be admitted that that fact is a set-off against the merely ornamental character of the outside. The arrangement of machinery within the walls is simple. There, in one large square room, in which perhaps 700 hands, young and old, are engaged, are placed the machines for fabricating the furniture, stocking, locks, screw-sights, bayonets, &c., &c., for rifles. Some of these machines are of exceedingly ingenious construction, and they are all kept in excelproduction of the stocks is of American origin, lent condition. The plant of machinery for the and the Messrs. Ames and Co., of Massachusetts, figure largely in the inventive way. Greenwood and Botley, of our own town of Leeds, have, however, effected considerable improvements in point of detail, whilst, as stated recently, Messrs. Hayes, Hague, and Williams,

Messrs.