EXPLORATIONS. place. Just here I involuntarily swallowed a in the cistern. The Captain, however, while directing Birtles' steps, fell himself over a large stone into the water flat on his face. The weather was frosty, and a bath in one's clothes, as he says, not pleasant under the circumstances. The building they were in was not a church, but an extensive underground area, surmounted by groined arches resting upon many piers. Its present use is as a tank, but it is not yet clear whether it was In following the originally so or not. One can hardly wonder that these poor course of an aqueduct which they traced for 250 feet in one direction and 200 feet men got fevers; the marvel rather is how passage in another, this was the sort of which they had in some places to make: they were able to persevere at all with "Sometimes we could crawl on hands such work to its completion. They cerand knees; then we had to creep side-tainly were strangely protected. Once on of a well, they saw a piece of loose maways; again we lay on our backs and having worked their way to the bottom But this was a mild wriggled along." aqueduct adventure compared with an-sonry (which was afterwards found to weigh 8 cwt.) hanging 40 feet above their heads. One of the feebly-held stones other which we quote:· starting would have sent the whole mass on them, and there they would have ended their labours, crushed and buried in a deep enough grave, had the least thing gone wrong; but with the greatest coolness and care they climbed up to the top, using many odd means of raising themselves, but doing all so cleverly as to emerge unhurt. Here is another of Captain Warren's escapes, quite as worthy to be called hair-breadth as many that make the excitement of fiction, which we cannot refrain from quoting: Sergeant it now forms the bottom of the aqueduct; the I was particularly embarrassed: one hand ne- LIVING AGE. About a mile south of the village of Lifta, on the crest of a hill, is a chasm in the rocks, about which there are many traditions, and which we failed to explore in the spring. We went there last Monday, provided with three ladders, reaching together 120 feet, and a dockyard rope 165 feet long. We had three men to assist in lowering us on the rope. The entrance from the top just allows of a man squeezing through; but as you descend the chasm opens out, until at 125 feet it is about 15 feet by 30 inches. At this point is a ledge, and we rested there while we lowered the ladders another 30 feet, to enable us to descend to the bottom, which is at the great depth of 155 feet from the surface. The chasm is exactly perpendicular, and the bottom is horizontal. Water was dripping quickly from the rocks, but ran out of sight On the floor was a rough stone pillar, at once. and near it the skeleton of an infant; close to the pillar is a cleft in the rock, very narrow, into which water was running. I got down into this; but it is a crevice which gets narrower and narrower, and there being no hold, I slipped down until my head was about 4 feet below the surface. Here I stuck, every moment jamming me tighter down the cleft. Ten minutes of desperate struggling, and the help of a friendly grip, brought me to the surface again, minus a the Arabs, and was in every way qualified considerable portion of my skin and clothing. On ascending we had some little excitement: at one time the grass-rope-ladder caught fire; at another, the men suddenly let me down nearly 3 feet, the jerk nearly wrenching the rope out of their hands. Antres vast, and deserts wild, Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads touch heaven, for his office. The people who did the work were Arabs from Siloam and Lifta, villages near Jerusalem, and Nubians and the usual higgling about wages; but when men from the city. There was, of course, this was over, it was found that the true Now and then they had a comic adven-believers were constantly seized with an ture-as, for example, when Sergeant inclination to pray during working hours, Birtles, down a shaft and working lateral- although they were never seen to do so in ly through a wall, found himself in an un- their leisure times, so that it became nederground smithy. The conscience of cessary to make a deduction from the pay the smith told him that the intruder must for every prayer, which had the effect of be a gin come to torment him for his hard considerably moderating the religious arbargains, and he accordingly fell on his dour. One good old fellow and old fellah, knees before the apparition. It is, how- though, did submit to the deduction, and ever, comforting to know, that of all their ask leave regularly on Fridays to go to moving accidents in the Mosque; and the directors cleverly proposed that he should pray for all, and, in consideration of so doing, receive pay for the time of absence. This aronly one had at all a serious termination. rangement smoothed matters greatly. They had been making a cut some 20 feet The wages fixed were rather high, but deep through a bank of earth that lay the officer was able to adhere to them, and against a wall of the city, and the men the men did not at all relish being sent (natives) were just getting into the exca-off the works. It was customary for the vation to set to work-only six of them sergeant to keep always enough money were dangerously advanced-when the bank gave way, falling in upon the wall, and partially inhuming the six men. One of them was wholly buried; but before the second slip occurred which took him from their sight, they saw for a second or two his ghastly face. They were all extricated the other five with ease, but this man only after some digging; and when the latter was got out he had to be carried to his friends at Bethlehem. His pay was drawn for two weeks; but they could never see the man again, and were left to conjecture either that he had not been much hurt and had been drawing pay while able to work, or that he had died soon after the accident, and his brother had concealed the death that he might get the pay. Of course the small staff sent out from England could do no more than direct the various operations and keep account of them. Native labour had to be largely used, and very troublesome and inefficient gangs they appear for the most part to have been, requiring all the skill and tact of the Engineers to get work out of them. It is a remarkable fact that Jews, as workmen, were found to be utterly useless. We might have added that they were useless in any capacity as regarded the explorations, had it not been that one Jew turned out a capital overseer, who administered the corbatch in first-rate style when the men were idling, showed no fear of In a about him to settle with a man and dis- It seems that he was a descendant of the Prophet. invitation, and the young men were soon rapidly borne along the Champs Elysées. As briefly as he could Alain described the state of his affairs, the nature of his mortgages, and the result of his interview with M. Gandrin. nation, who would be sure to inform counsels of the Count de Vandemar! against him. They work best in summer, Hope, though vaguely, entered into his not caring for the heat, which is so far heart. Willingly he accepted Frederic's unfortunate for the explorations that Englishmen in Palestine are not generally in their best working trim during the hot weather. In winter they become very miserable creatures, and cannot understand how working can keep them warm. Their idea, derived from some wiseacre among themselves, of the object of the explorations was, that the Franks were dropping all round the walls of the Sanctuary small deposits of gunpowder, which in time would grow to be large ones, and that when these should have sufficiently expanded, say in twenty years or so, the explorers would return with some machine and blow the whole place up. Here we must leave the exploration of the Holy City for the present, earnestly hoping that Captain Warren and Sergeant Birtles, or some Engineers of equal energy, may ere long be able to give us much more information. We had purposed to follow our notice of the work by some account of the survey of the Sea of Galilee; but we have found so much to say that we have outrun our space, and must await another opportunity to speak of that water so familiar in name to us, and of the undying region about its coasts. In addition, we presume, to the search for treasure. From Blackwood's Magazine. THE PARISIANS. BY LORD LYTTON. THE next day, towards the afternoon, Frederic Lemercier, somewhat breathless from the rapidity at which he had ascended to so high an eminence, burst into Alain's chamber. I "Pr-r! mon cher; what superb exercise for the health-how it must strengthen the muscles and expand the chest; after this, who should shrink from scaling Mont Blanc ?-Well, well. have been meditating on your business ever since we parted. But I would fain know more of its details. You shall confide them to me as we drive through the Bois. My coupé is below, and the day is beautiful come." Frederic listened attentively. 66 'Then Gandrin has given you as yet no answer?" "None: but I have a note from him this morning asking me to call to-morrow." "After you have seen him, decide on nothing if he makes you any offer get back your abstract, or a copy of it, and confide it to me. Gandrin ought to help you; he transacts affairs in a large way. Belle clientèle among the millionaires. But his clients expect fabulous profits, and so does he. As for your principal mortgagee, Louvier, you know of course who he is." "No, except that M. Hébert told me that he was very rich." "Rich I should think so; one of the Kings of Finance. Ah! observe those young men on horseback." Alain looked forth and recognized the two cavaliers whom he had conjectured to be the sons of the Count de Vandemar. "Those beaux garçons are fair specimens of your Faubourg," said Frederic; "they would decline my acquaintance because my grandfather kept a shop, and they keep a shop between them!"" "A shop- I am mistaken, then. Who are they? "Raoul and Enguerrand, sons of that mocker of man the Count de Vandemar." "And they keep a shop! you are jesting." A shop at which you may buy gloves and perfumes, Rue de la Chaussée d'An- tin. Of course they don't serve at the counter; they only invest their pocket money in the speculation, and in so doing treble at least their pocket money, buy their horses, and keep their grooms." "Is it possible! nobles of such birth! How shocked the Count would be if he knew it!" "Yes, very much shocked if he were supposed to know it. But he is too wise a father not to give his sons limited allowances and unlimited liberty, especially the liberty to add to the allowances as To the young Marquis, the gaiety, the they please. Look again at them; no heartiness of his college friend were a better riders and more affectionate brothcordial. How different from the dryers since the date of Castor and Pollux. Their tastes, indeed, differ: Raoul is re-, friends, whom he joined for a few minligious and moral, melancholy and digni- utes. fied; Enguerrand. is a lion of the first Alain, left alone, looked down into the water, élégant to the tips of his nails. hall. He thought himself in some stormy These demigods are nevertheless very scene of the First Revolution. An Engmild to mortals. Though Enguerrand is lish contested election in the marketthe best pistol-shot in Paris, and Raoul place of a borough when the candidates the best fencer, the first is so good-tem- are running close on each other, the repered that you would be a brute to quar-sult doubtful, passions excited, the whole rel with him; the last so true a Catholic, borough in civil war, is peaceful comthat if you quarrelled with him you need pared to the scene at the Bourse. fear not his sword. He would not die in the committal of what the Church holds a mortal sin." "Are you speaking ironically? Do you mean to imply that men of the name of Vandemar are not brave?" "On the contrary, I believe that, though masters of their weapons, they are too brave to abuse their skill; and I must add, that though they are sleeping partners in a shop, they would not cheat you of a farthing. - Benign stars on earth, as Castor and Pollux were in heaven." "But partners in a shop!" Bulls and bears screaming, bawling, gesticulating, as if one were about to strangle the other; the whole, to an uninitiated eye, a confusion, a Babel, which it seems absolutely impossible to reconcile to the notion of quiet mercantile transactions, the purchase and sale of shares and stocks. As Alain gazed bewildered, he felt himself gently touched, and, looking round, saw the Englishman. "A lively scene!" whispered Mr. Vane. "This is the heart of Paris: it beats very loudly." "Is your Bourse in London like this?" "Bah! when a minister himself, like "I cannot tell you; at our Exchange the late M. de M, kept a shop, and the general public are not admitted; the added the profits of bon-bons to his reve- privileged priests of that temple sacrifice nue, you may form some idea of the spirit their victims in closed penetralia, beyond of the age. If young nobles are not gen-which the sounds made in the operation erally sleeping partners in shops, still they are more or less adventurers in commerce. The Bourse is the profession of those who have no other possession. You have visited the Bourse?" "No." "No! this is just the hour; we have time yet for the Bois. - Coachman, drive to the Bourse." "The fact is," resumed Frederic, "that gambling is one of the wants of civilized men. The rouge-et-noir and roulette tables are forbidden- the hells closed; but the passion for making money without working for it must have its vent, and that vent is the Bourse. As instead of a hundred wax-lights you now have one jet of gas, so instead of a hundred hells you have now one Bourse, and—it is exceedingly convenient; always at hand; no discredit being seen there, as it was to be seen at Frascati's-on the contrary, at once respectable, and yet the mode." The coupé stops at the Bourse, our friends mount the steps, glide through the pillars, deposit their canes at a place destined to guard them, and the Marquis follows Frederic up a flight of stairs till he gains the open gallery round a vast hall below. Such a din! such a clamour disputatious, wrangling, wrathful. Here Lemercier distinguished some do not travel to ears profane. But had we an Exchange like this open to all the world, and placed, not in a region of our metropolis unknown to fashion, but in some elegant square in St. James's or at Hyde Park Corner, I suspect that our national character would soon undergo a great change, and that all our idlers and sporting-men would make their books there every day, instead of waiting long months in ennui for the Doncaster and the Derby. At present we have but few men on the turf; we should then have few men not on Exchange, especially if we adopt your law, and can contrive to be traders without risk of becoming bankrupts. Napoleon I. called us a shopkeeping nation. Napoleon III. has taught France to excel us in everything, and certainly he has made Paris a shopkeeping city." Alain thought of Raoul and Enguerrand, and blushed to find that what he considered a blot on his countrymen was so familiarly perceptible to a foreigner's eye. "And the Emperor has done wisely, at least for the time," continued the Englishman, with a more thoughtful accent. "He has found vent thus for that very dangerous class in Paris society to which the subdivision of property gave birth-viz., the crowd of well-born, dar ing young men without fortune and with- to any one with whom she would fall in out profession. He has opened the love. That would disenchant me. Take Bourse and said, 'There, I give you em- the Marquis by all means." ployment, resource, an avenir.' He has Meanwhile Alain, again looking down, cleared the byways into commerce and saw just under him, close by one of the trade, and opened new avenues of wealth pillars, Lucien Duplessis. He was standto the noblesse, whom the great Revolu- ing apart from the throng - a small space tion so unwisely beggared. What other cleared round himself and two men way to rebuild a noblesse in France, and who had the air of gentlemen of the beau give it a chance of power because an ac-monde with whom he was conferring. cess to fortune? But to how many sides Duplessis, thus seen, was not like the of your national character has the Bourse Duplessis at the restaurant. It would of Paris magnetic attraction? You be difficult to explain what the change Frenchmen are so brave that you could was, but it forcibly struck Alain: the air not be happy without facing danger, so was more dignified, the expression covetous of distinction that you would keener; there was a look of conscious pine yourselves away without a dash, power and command about the man even coûte que coûte, at celebrity and a red at that distance; the intense, concenribbon. Danger! look below at that trated intelligence of his eye, his firm lip, arena there it is; danger daily, hourly. his marked features, his projecting, masBut there also is celebrity; win at the sive brow,-would have impressed a Bourse, as of old in a tournment, and very ordinary observer. In fact, the man paladins smile on you, and ladies give was here in his native element—in the you their scarves, or, what is much the field in which his intellect gloried, comsame, they allow you to buy their cache-manded, and had signalized itself by sucmires. Win at the Bourse-what fol- cessive triumphs. Just thus may be the lows? the Chamber, the Senate, the change in the great orator whom you Cross, the Minister's portefeuille. I might rejoice in all this for the sake of Europe could it last, and did it not bring the consequences that follow the demoralization which attends it. The Bourse and the Crédit Mobilier keep Paris quiet at least as quiet as it can be. These are the secrets of this reign of splendour; these the two lions couchants on which rests the throne of the Imperial" reconstructor." Alain listened surprised and struck. He had not given the Englishman credit for the cast of mind which such reflections evinced. Here Lemercier rejoined them, and shook hands with Graham Vane, who, taking him aside, said, "But you promised to go to the Bois, and indulge my insane curiosity about the lady in the pearl-coloured robe?" deemed insignificant in a drawing-room, when you see his crest rise above a reverential audience; or the great soldier, who was not distinguishable from the subaltern in a peaceful club, could you see him issuing the order to his aides-decamp amidst the smoke and roar of the battle-field. "Ah, Marquis!" said Graham Vane, are you gazing at Duplessis? He is the modern genius of Paris. He is at once the Cousin, the Guizot, and the Victor Hugo of speculation. PhilosophyEloquence audacious Romance; -all Literature now is swallowed up in the sublime epic of Agiotage, and Duplessis is the poet of the Empire.” "Well said, M. Grarm Varn," cried Frederic, forgetting his recent lesson in English names. "Alain underrates that great man. How could an Englishman "I have not forgotten; it is not half-appreciate him so well?" past two yet; you said three. Soyez tranquille; I drive thither from the Bourse with Rochebriant." "Is it necessary to take with you that very good-looking Marquis? "I thought you said you were not jealous, because not yet in love. However, if Rochebriant occasions you the pang which your humble servant failed to inflict, I will take care that he do not see the lady." "No," said the Englishman; "on consideration, I should be very much obliged "Ma foi!" returned Graham, quietly; "I am studying to think at Paris, in order some day or other to know how to act in London. Time for the Bois. Lemercier, we meet at seven- - Philippe's." CHAPTER V. "WHAT do you think of the Bourse?" asked Lemercier, as their carriage took the way to the Bois. "I cannot think of it yet; I am stunned. It seems to me as if I had been at a Sabbat, of which the wizards were |