Various

“ Is it desirable that the zone of tall chimneys, sickly faces, brick houses, and crowded jails, which at present spans across the whole of England and part of Scotland, should be doubled and trebled in breadth; and the fertile fields of Kent, Norfolk, and East Lothian, be reduced to vast unenclosed pastures, such as overspread Italy in the later stages of the Roman empire? Or is it desirable to Russia and Prussia that they should be for ever chained to the labour of boors, serfs, and shepherds, and all the vivifying and unimportant effects of commercial wealth be denied to their exertions? ”

“ From these immortal portraits, my Antonio, you may learn that colour was the grand secret of the great Venetian painters. Their pale forms are never white, nor their blooming cheeks rose-colour, but the true colour of life—mellow, rich, and glowing; both men and women strictly true to nature, and looking as if they could turn pale with anger or blush with tender passion. From these great men can best be learned how much charm may be conveyed by colour, and what life and glow, what passion, grace, and beauty it gives to form. ”

“ It is in vain, therefore, to say, cheap prices are a blessing in themselves, [pg 400] and the consumers at least are ever benefited by a fall in the cost of grain. Cheap prices are a real blessing if that effect consists with prosperity to the producer, as by improved methods of cultivation or manufacture, or the benignity of nature in giving fine seasons. But cheap prices are the greatest of all evils, and to none more shall the consumers, if they are the result, not of the magnitude of domestic production, but of the magnitude of foreign importation. ”

“ In their extremity, making a violent effort, their pent up voices found vent in a cry of such startling wildness, that the Uzcoques, struck with terror, sprang back from the mouth of the cave, hurrying the maiden with them. The cry was not repeated, for the Turks had lost all consciousness from the stifling effects of the smoke.
"Banish your fears, Uzcoques!" exclaimed Strasolda, staying the fugitives. "The voice that to you is a sound of dismay, gives me hope and confidence. I see the golden crescent rising in irresistible might, and shedding its rays over all the lands of the earth. ”

“ The free traders would have England sacrifice its agriculture to its manufactures, and Russia sacrifice its manufactures to its agriculture. Would such a system benefit either? Would England be happier or richer, more stable or more moral, if the already colossal amount of its manufactures were trebled; or Russia, if its rising iron and woolen fabrics were destroyed, and its industry confined exclusively to the slow return of agricultural labour? ”

“ Insignificant stations on the coast, to carry on a peddling traffic, are beneath a manly and comprehensive policy. We must penetrate the mountains, ascend the rivers, and reach the seats of sovereignty. We must, by a large and generous self-interest, combine the good, the knowledge, and the virtue of the population with our own; and we must lay the foundation of our permanent influence over this fourth of the globe, by showing that we are the fittest to communicate the benefits, and establish the example of civilized society. ”

“ On rounding the Cape, the British eye was delighted with the sight of the Red Sea squadron, riding at anchor within the noble bay. The arrival of the frigate also caused a sensation on the shore; and Major Harris happily describes the feelings with which a new arrival is hailed by the British garrison on that dreary spot, their only excitement being the periodical visits of the packets between Suez and Bombay. In the dead of the night a blue light shoots up in the offing. ”

“ While so great was the multitude of free citizens which the Republic bequeathed to the empire, resident and exercising unfettered industry in Italy, the cultivators of Africa and Egypt were all serfs and slaves, toiling, like the West Indian negroes, beneath the lash of a master. How, then, did it happen that the labour of the Italian freeman was disused, and at length extinguished, while that of the African and Egyptian slaves continued to furnish grain for Italy down to the very latest period of the empire? We are told that the labour of freemen is cheaper than that of slaves ”

“ Gazing through the aperture, they perceived not many feet below what had once been the castle ditch, now dry, and forming a portion of the archduke's gardens. With a joyous heart and an elastic bound, Ibrahim reached the soft turf beneath. The more timid and helpless Hassan lowered himself by clinging to a remaining iron bar, and with the aid of his companion was soon on his feet, enjoying, with many thanks to Allah, the fresh air of heaven and the consciousness of escape from captivity. ”

“ They had arrived not long before the comencement of the festival, and when going under guard along a corridor in the east wing, Ibrahim passed the open door of an apartment in which Strasolda was adjusting the rich jewels of the counsellor's lady before her appearance in the ball-room. Startled by the approaching tramp of armed men, the Uzcoque maiden raised her eyes, and beheld the noble and well-remembered features of the young Turk, whose captive she had been, and whose image had so strangely reappeared to her through the flitting cloud of smoke in the cavern. "Mother of Heaven!" ”

“ Rich rows of pearls wind through her braided hair, in colour gold, in texture soft as silk. A band of gold forms the girdle of her ruby-coloured velvet robe, which descends to the wrist, and there reveals the small white hand and tapering fingers of patrician beauty. All this may captivate the fastidious noble; but, to men less artificial in their tastes and habits, could such a woman be better than a statue—and could love, the strongest of human passions, be ever more to her than a short-lived and amusing pastime? ”

“ But England, which changes every thing, is changing all this. Within the next generation, the railway will run down the romances of Nutrib; a cotton manufactory will send up its smokes to blot out the celestial blue by day, and shoot forth its sullen illumination by night, over the anointed soil; the minstrel will turn policeman, and the sheik be a justice of peace; political economy will have its itinerant lecturers, enlightening the Bedouins on the principles of rent and taxes; the city will have a lord mayor and corporation of the deepest black ”

“ History tells us in all parts of the world, that it is in the intermixture of commerce and agriculture that the best security is to be found for social happiness and advancement, and the most effectual antidote provided to the evils with which either, when existing alone, is so prone. Mr McCulloch has told us, that the commerce and manufactures of Great Britain have now risen to such a prodigious height, that any further extension of them is undesirable, and that no real patriot would have desired them to have become so extensive as they already are. ”

“ Resembling the work of nature in the simplicity of its growth, it will probably also resemble the work of nature in the permanence of its existence. It is not an exotic, fixed in an unsuitable soil by capricions planting; but a seed self-sown, nurtured by the common air and dews, assimilated to the climate, and strikig its roots deep in the ground which it has thus, by its own instincts, chosen. The necessities of British commerce, the urgency of English protection, and the overflow of British population, have been the great acting causes of our national efforts ”

“ Within a step of the spot where I sat, were the noblest and the most unhappy beings in existence—the whole family of the throne caught in the snare of treason. Father, mother, sister, children! Not one rescued, not one safe, to relieve the wretchedness of their ruin by the hope that there was an individual of their circle beyond their prison bars—all consigned to the grave together—all alike conscious that every day which sent its light through their melancholy casements, only brought them nearer to a death of misery! ”

“ The rich old state is as superior to the young one in the production of manufactures, as the poor young state is to the rich old one in that of subsistence. The steam-engine, capital, and machinery, have so enormously increased the power of manufacturing production, that they have rendered the old commercial state omnipotent in the foreign market in the supply of its articles. Nothing but fiscal regulations and heavy duties can protect the young state from ruin in those branches of industry. ”

“ Admitting that the true policy for government is to protect all the branches of national industry, and stoutly contending, as we do, and ever shall do, that the real and ultimate interests of all is the same, and cannot be separated—the question comes to be, if one fiercely demands the sacrifice of the other, and insists that its interests are so weighty and momentous that all others must be sacrificed to them, which of the two thus placed in jeopardy is the most momentous? ”

“ A lion's skin over his shoulders, richly ornamented, and half concealing beneath its folds an embroidered green mantle of Indian manufacture; on his right shoulder were three chains of gold, as emblems of the Holy Trinity, (!) and the fresh-plucked bough of asparagus, which denoted his recent exploit, rose from the centre of an embossed coronet of silver on his brow. His dappled war-horse, in housings of blue and yellow, was led beside him; and in front his "champion" rode a coal-black charger, bearing the royal shield of massive silver, with the cross upon it, and dressed in a panther's hide. ”

“ And if we would see a memorable example of the manner in which the greatest and most powerful nation may, in the course of ages, come to be paralysed by this cause, we have only to cast our eyes on imperial Rome, when the vast extent of the empire had practically established a free trade in grain with the whole civilized world; and the result was, that cultivation disappeared from the Italian plains, that the race of Roman agriculturists, the strength of the empire, became extinct, that the fields were laboured only by slaves and cattle. ”

“ Without bestowing a salutation or a look upon the lady whose apartment he thus unceremoniously entered, he addressed himself at once to the Uzcoque Jurissa.
"Away with you!" cried he. "Out of the palace; and quietly, too, as your own shadow. Thumbscrews are waiting for you if you linger."
Strasolda gazed in alarm at Father Cipriano. Jurissa thrust his right hand under his cloak, and seemed to clutch some weapon. Even the counsellor's dame for a moment turned her eyes from the jewels she was admiring to the anxious countenance of the padre. ”

“ But there can scarcely be a doubt, that the existence of a great English viceroyalty in the most prominent position of South Africa, the advantages of its government, the intelligence of its people, their advancement in the arts essential to comfort, and the interest of their protection, their industry, and their example, must, year by year, operate in awaking even the negro to a feeling of his own powers, of the enjoyment of his natural faculties, and of that rivalry which stimulates the skill of man to reach perfection. ”

“ One day, in the lovely month of April, Phil Lorimer sat on a sunny part of the enornous wall that guarded the castle, and leaning his back against one of the little square towers that rose at intervals in the circuit of the fortifications, sang song after song, as if for the edification of a number of crows that were perched on the trees on the other side of the moat. ”

“ A man less than a pipe! A woman less than a pipe!'
"'Osmin is not a man, and Zaida is not a woman: they are slaves. I will cut off Osmin's head, and throw Zaida into the sea.'
"'No!' said the magistrate. 'Not at Naples at least.'
"'Dog of a Christian!' shouted the dey, 'do you know who I am?'
"'You are the ex-dey of Algiers, and I am the Neapolitan minister of police; and, if your deyship is impertinent, I shall send him to prison,' added the minister very coolly. ”

“ All the governments of Europe, despotic, constitutional, and democratic, meet our concessions, in favour of free trade, by increased protection to their manufacturers. They dare not destroy their rising commercial wealth any more than we dare destroy our old colossal agricultural investments. The republicans of America even exceed them in the race of tariffs and protection. Sixty-two per cent has lately been laid on our British iron goods in return for Sir Robert Peel's tariff; a similar duty on iron and cotton goods, it is well known, is contemplated in the Prussian leagues in Germany. ”

“ What wouldst thou with it?" "What would I, maestro?" exclaimed the alarmed youth, hastily removing his sketch from the extended hand of the painter, "Finish the subject of course, and place this wonderful old head upon the magnificent form to which it belongs."
"But, saidst thou not, Antonio, that the poor creature in the gondola hastily concealed her features when accident revealed them, as if ashamed of her unnatural ugliness? And canst thou be so heartless as to publish to the world that strange deformity she is doomed to bear through life, and which she is evidently anxious to conceal? ”

“ Of all animals, saving the Bundela goat, there is none that suffers more from change of climate than the elephant: of the numbers caught on the eastern frontier, probably not one in four survives a journey to Delhi. Bred in the darkest and most gloomy forests, they are in a great measure sheltered from heat by the eternal moisture of the cool shady bower under which they rove; and are then expected to bear all on a sudden the most intense heat, acting directly on their jet-black skins, when brought into the plains of Upper India. ”