100 Notes of the Month. 



noble earl showed, however, some ingenuity; for he uttered a certain 

 number of words, to which it was impossible to give any definite meaning : 

 he was marvellously like Juliet ; " he spoke, yet he said nothing." 



THE RUSSIAN EMBASSY. Sir Charles Bagot has, it seems, refused 

 the post of Ambassador to the court of Russia. He has done right. It 

 was impossible that he could be the English Ambassador at the shambles 

 of St. Petersburg!!. Sir Charles might have been the Duke of Wel- 

 lington's Ambassador the Earl of Aberdeen's Ambassador Croker's, 

 Wetherell's, Sugden's Ambassador, but not the Ambassador of the 

 people of England. The appointment was offered by Lord Palmerston 

 to Sir Charles ; an offer met by the people with a feeling of deep scorn, 

 mingled with wonderment arid regret at the indifference of Lord Grey, 

 who could tamely suffer the great measure he had advised at home, to be 

 " explained away " abroad, by the disaffected instruments of his own 

 cabinet. Poland is deluged with blood : the iron hath " entered the 

 souls of tens of thousands of her bravest children" the most sacrilegious, 

 barbarous acts that ever staggered a faith in human goodness, have placed 

 Nicholas of Russia on a level with Caligula and Nero, (he will walk 

 arm-in-arm with them down ''the burning marie" of history), and we 

 were not only to look on with eyes of stone at the progress of each new 

 atrocity, but when the sum of villainy was accomplished, when the fire 

 of cruelty could no further go, we were to send the nephew of the Duke 

 of Wellington " to kiss hands " on the glorious consummation. Freedom 

 shrieks, and enter Sir Charles Bagot to give his judgment on the music. 

 Poland is in ashes, and the spirit of Toryism takes a journey of pleasure 

 to the ruins ; for it would be vain to look for that business which is 

 demanded by the feelings of Englishmen from such politicians as Sir 

 Charles, Does it fit, that the haggard witch, exorcised from Old Sarum, 

 should represent us in congenial Russia, there to change nods and 

 " wreathed smiles, " and banquet, and weave her web of policy (" of 

 human entrails made ") with the eldest born of blood and rapine. Eng- 

 land expects a man at the court of St. Petersburgh to speak in accents 

 of thunder let not the Grey cabinet send a gentleman to pass compli- 

 ments. We want tardy justice done to Poland not a ball given by 

 Nicholas to a Sir Charles Bagot. The English mission involves the fate 

 of millions, it must not be made a courteous message from the Duke of 

 Wellington. 



VESTED INTERESTS. Sir Charles Wetherell objects to the removal of 

 the taxes for the encouragement of ignorance, on the ground that the 

 measure would be unjust to the proprietors of the daily papers already 

 established. We know not how Sir Charles can reconcile it to himself 

 to travel to York by a stage-coach, seeing that that convenience was 

 established to the utter annihilation of the interests " vested " in the 

 waggon. 



APSLEY FORTRESS. Oliver Cromwell put himself to a deal of 

 needless trouble, for it is recorded of him, that so suspicious was he of 

 the designs of his enemies, that, towards the close of his career, he never 

 slept two consecutive nights in the same chamber. Had he caught but a 

 glimpse of modern light, he need never have changed beds._ Had Mars 



