backward somersault with ease and certainty. Of
course I must not be understood to imply that
ordinary pupils should be taught to perform the
daring and difficult feats which are achieved by
professional acrobats, whose whole lives are
devoted to muscular development. But a good
steady working mind requires a healthy body for
its lodgment, and the intellect is not only more
enduring, but is keener and brighter when the
body is in thorough health: a blessing which
now seldom falls to the lot of those whose work
is of the brain unduly more than of the hands.
The present writer owes all his health to the
course of gymnastics through which he passed,
and which, after he had broken down from sedentary
mental exertion and fallen into a habit of
annual fever, gave him back his body and mind
strong to bear the freest use.

OUR LAST ATTEMPT.
BY A GARIBALDINO.

V. CATANIA.

I SCARCELY ever passed as busy a day as on
that Saturday at Catania. I was appointed
orderly to the General, but I found myself at
every one's bidding! Whenever I carried a
message, be it to Corte, Nullo, Bideschini, or
any other, they were sure to send me on some
private mission of their own. It was always
the same story. "I'm not quite ready to reply
to this; but, meanwhile, do me the favour to
look up the commissary about those shoes, or
that hay, or those red shirts; and if you should see
any vegetables, or good fruit, or any fresh fish,
send them up here;" "Ordinanza! remember we
have no wine, no straw, no cross-belts, no
percussion-caps!" such were the reminders
addressed to me from all sides, and in a way
that showed a very considerable laxity of all
organisation, and a profound confidence in my
influence. If I was worried and jaded, and
overworked to a state little short of exhaustion, I
was, let me own it, warmed by the nature of my
employment into a high state of enthusiasm. I
felt myself in a great enterprise. It was a great
stake we played for. Our adversaries were
great and powerful—Popes and Emperors! The
man under whom I immediately served, was
himself one of the greatest of his age. A hero,
who remained a hero, even to those who came
into his intimacy and saw him nearly and
frequently. If I continually came in upon lively
discussions and disputes as to how far the King's
government was really with us, whether we were
to have the same measure meted out to us, as on
the former expedition—ignored at first, then
connived at, then recognised and abetted, or to
be distinctly disavowed—I never took the
slightest interest in these argumentations. My
faith was entirely in Garibaldi; he had done
scores of things which none but himself had
ever dreamt of; achieved successes which all the
wise ones declared impossibilities, and why
should he fail now? Was the Pope, with his
mercenaries, stronger than the King of Naples,
with his fleet and his army? Was the public
opinion of Europe more favourable to the dark
doings of the Vatican than to the crimes of
Caserta? A few such unanswerable queries
smothered all my misgivings, and there was not
in the whole force a more trusting, believing
Garibaldian than I was!

One unhappy incident threw a gloom over this
day. It was the dismissal from our service of
a young officer called Grazziani, a Tuscan, I
believe; he had dared to speak disparagingly of
our means of attack, and the constitution of our
force, and of the certainty that the government
would disavow us. Being questioned as to all this,
he declared that he had so spoken; and he believed,
besides, that more than half of those who followed
us had been duped and deceived. It was
rumoured that Corte ordered him to be shot; but
that Garibaldi, hearing of the affair in time,
simply said: "These opinions will do him some
good in Turin. Let him go back and repeat
them to Ratazzi!" and with this milder sentence
he was sent adrift.

I had not any suspicion at the time, though
I have learned since, the fatal effects produced
by this first inkling of distrust. Nothing, however,
could have increased the confidence I felt
in Garibaldi, save the mood in which he treated
this event. It was so high-hearted, so generous,
and so noble. As he said himself: "In a
regular army, the crimes against discipline must
be heavily dealt with; but, in a force like ours,
new to restraint, unused to repression, patriotism
must be the provost-marshal, and good
fellowship the bond of obedience."

It was nine o'clock of the evening before I
got time to eat my dinner, and even that meal
I despatched on the steps of the "Municipality,"
where the General lodged, by the light of a
paper lantern, and with a clasp-knife for all table
equipage. A staff officer brought me a flask of
excellent wine and half a dozen cigars, and I
never enjoyed myself more.

While I was deliberating with myself whether
I'd repair to the little cafe on the opposite
of the piazza, or send over to have my
cup of " Moka" brought to me, I fell fast asleep
where I was, my head resting on the rude cornice
at the base of one of the lions in marble. I
was awakened by what I thought to be a violent
kick, but soon found that a heavy man had
tripped over me in the dark, and rolled head-
long down the flight of stone steps into the
piazza. It was Corte, who had just left the
General, to ascertain what was doing in the
bay. I picked him up, and gave him my arm to
help him along, for he was bruised by his fall, and
limped badly. On learning who I was he grew
very friendly, and assured me that if Garibaldi
had rightly heard my name, he would take care
to place me in a more becoming position. "Not
that he likes men to jump into promotion," added
he, "on any grounds of rank or fortune, still
less of family influence. He never made Meuotti
anything but his orderly all through the Lombard
campaign. It was the war minister made him
an officer. You'll have to win your spurs, but
you'll be sure of them when you have won them."