possessed by one who is connected by ties of the closest affinity with her house. England can not complain that such a power is enjoyed by a government molded upon constitutional principles analogous to her own. Both would find in that monarchy a powerful confederate. As their armies were united on the banks of the Tchernaya, so would they be likely to

be found side by side in every European struggle. Both England and France have, therefore, a direct interest in the establishment of such a monarchy; and if they consult their own advantage, under their united ægis, Victor Emmanuel may fairly expect to become the last King of Piedmont and the first King of Italy.

IN anticipation of presenting to the readers of the ECLECTIC this fine portrait of Count Cavour, which stands at the commencement of the present number, we have deferred the publication of the following article till now. The great panorama of Italian affairs has so changed the aspect of things since it was written, that it seems needful to read the article in the sunlight of last October, in order fully to appreciate all its statements.

About a quarter of a century since, a young nobleman from the Subalpine kingdom, a cadet of an ancient and immensely wealthy patrician house, long notorious for its aristocratic hauteur, besides being eminently unpopular as one of the most priest-ridden and reäctionary families in the land, escaped like a bird out of its cage, from the stifling atmosphere which surrounded him at home, and alighted on the chalk cliffs of Dover. Once safe in England, Count Cavour-for it is of him we speak was in no hurry to quit the coign of vantage which its free and happy soil afforded him for studying the ideas, arts, laws, and institutions by which nations become great. The vast world of London, its roaring maëlstrom of trade, the Thames, with its forests of masts and floating chimneys, its magnificent bridges and groaning wharves what a contrast to Torino, a sort of Islington asleep on the equally drowsy Po! The men, too, whether mechanics or millionaires, who jostled one another in the Strand or Cheapside, how unlike the machines in

the Porto Susina, tame and passive tools of despotism! Here a people of kings, there every body still in the leadingstrings of the police. What a difference, again, between the aristocratic fribbles of his father's saloons and the English House of Lords, and, above all, between such statesmen as a Russell, a Palmerston, a Peel, and a Della Margherita and the other Jesuit marionettes who figured in the Cabinet of Carlo Alberto! The young Piedmontese had brought to this country strong prepossessions in its favor. He had eagerly read of us in books, and had often longed to witness for himself the practical working of the free press, the municipal and political franchises, and the active parliamentary life of the great Constitutional State. Now that he did so, his admiration kindled into enthusiasm, and he was never weary of contemplating the spectacle from every possible point of view. No wonder he prolonged what he had at first intended to be only a short visit to this country, into a stay almost long enough to entitle him to letters of naturalization. During all these years he was ever on the qui vive to add to his stock of information; and probably no more active, keen, and sagacious observer of English life and manners was ever in our midst. His high birth, his ample fortune, his refined bearing, and witty conversation, made him quite a lion in the brilliant circles of Belgravia and Mayfair, whenever he chose to grace them with his presence, which was not so often as