this was done at a biggish fire, and the heat got
that the man was found insensible at
his post, when moving only a few yards would
have kept him cool. That's discipline and
practice; and if you could only be with us at a
fire you'd see for yourself how well our plan
works. There's none of the 'rushing' and
blethering about you read of in the papers. Yet
I've known the Duke of Sutherland and the
Prince of Wales to be both at a fire, but, never
in the way it's supposed. They never ' rush,'
bless you, or do anything but smoke a cigar
and keep out of the men's way. No one would
be allowed to interfere with the work, and the
duke's the last man to want to do it. He's
very kind to the brigade '— the firemen's
friend' we. call him— and he takes a great
interest in his seeing that it's proficient and
improving; but as for the working with us, or
shouldering his axe, or 'rushing' — it's always
' rushing' I notice— it's just a pack of old
woman's stories, neither more nor less. Why,
sir, our men would soon turn one of the big
hose on, by accident, of course," the speaker's
eye twinkled humorously here, " and half drown
any one, whether duke or prince, who bothered
them by ' rushing' when they've got their
work before them. Could you go with us to a
fire ? Well, sir, I haven't the power to say.
No one but Captain. Shaw can give permission
for that, and he's very averse to having
strangers or any one else on an engine besides
the men. Perhaps if he knew your name was
All the Year Round it might make a difference,
and I really should like you to see how quietly
we do our work ; I should indeed. No, sir,
there's no particular day of the week when
there's a higher average of fires than another ;
and of course no way of knowing beforehand
when one's likely to happen. From half-past
nine at night to one in the morning is a very
frequent time, but there's no certainty about it,
and it's impossible to lay down a rule."

CONVICTS FOR THEIR FAITH.

WHATEVER else we may be and there are
some things in which we may well wish to be
other than we are — we English are certainly on
the whole a tolerably humane people. Except
a little witch-burning — and all Europe went
mad on that matter; in France and Germany
they burned five to our one, though they
have talked less about it — even our mediæval and
post-mediæval cruelties were as nothing compared
with those of nations claiming to be at
the time far more civilised than we were.
Smithfield fires were bad enough; but what were they
compared with the fires which blazed almost
unceasingly in some continental capitals? Even
when we did persecute, we showed little of the
elaborate cruelty in which other people seem to
have revelled. It was on the north side of the
Solway that poor wretches were " planted"
chin-deep in the sand, and left for the tide to
creep over them. It was in " the sister island"
that both sides vied with one another in
barbarity both in 1641 and again in 1798. No
doubt there often was grievous persecution
among us. Bunyan and many others in his day
suffered sadly. Good men died of jail fever;
others were spoiled of their goods; many were
browbeaten by insolent judges: even kind
Sir Matthew Hale seems to have taken a leaf
out of the French judge's book when he had to
deal with nonconformists. But all that was the
merest trifle to what sectaries suffered elsewhere
as a matter of course. It was unusual in England.
Most unusual of all was anything like
that forcing of the law which was the rule
elsewhere. Here men did not even in the worst
times lose their rights because they " dissented."
What they did suffer was but little, considering
that toleration, properly so called, was utterly
unknown here as elsewhere — dreamed of only
by a few despised Dutch anabaptists.

These are the thoughts which always enter
my head when I take down, in our town library,
one of our splendid volumes of Montfaucon
(folio Paris edition of 1733, "with the king's
approbation," as was the style in those days);
vol. v. is what seems to come handiest; and it
opens naturally perhaps because I've turned
to the place so often at the grand persecution
of the Huguenots (there were always petty
persecutions going on) which preceded the treaty of
Amboise. The plates of horror are bad enough.
You may see the noyades of '93 anticipated, the
Loire full of drowning wretches, on whose backs
the crows have already settled, while ferocious
men in armour are cutting off the heads of those
who escape to some little islands. The young
king and court ladies used to go and look on at
these atrocities, which so sickened gentle-natured
Chancellor Olivier that he died outright.
Then you have the massacre of Vassi, the
slaughter of a whole chapel full of Protestants,
whom the Duke of Guise's varlets had interrupted
during prayers, and (being turned out
as they deserved to be) had called in their
companions and their noble master. The picture gives
us, in the good old comprehensive style, the
scene both inside and out. The chapel is as
full of murder as was Baal's house when Jehu
loosed his captains on the poor idolaters.
There are old men, richly dressed ladies,
children, all being hacked and stabbed without
mercy. Two have taken refuse in the
pulpit; but they are found out, and a pike-
thrust will soon force them to break cover.
Outside, the roof is covered with runaways,
whom the duke's "people" are amusing
themselves  by " potting." Such is one phase of the
Huguenot persecution, as illustrated by
Montfaucon. The other is the solemn humbug of
conferences, such as the " Colloque de Poissé"
in 1561. Here is Catherine of Medicis with
all her grandees, male and female, about her,
and a row of bishops and abbots comfortably
seated on each side of the hall, while at the end
of the room, fierce, rugged, and ill-favoured,
gesticulating wildly in their scanty Geneva
gowns, are Beza and the other preachers. Such
villanous faces the artist contrives to give them
all, and such contempt he throws into the