in safety, after encountering much risk and difficulty. | of twenty-five whales, the proceeds being 152 tuns On all occasions, when they had to ask for assistance, of oil. Such, indeed, were his ability and enterthey found the women ready to help them and facili- prise, that his average success was "four times as tate their escape, sometimes while their husbands great as the usual average of the Whitby whalers; had gone to denounce the strangers. By a fortunate in like proportion above the average of the Hull coincidence the fugitives arrived on the coast just whalers during the previous twenty years; and as an English vessel of war was about to sail with more than double the Hull average for the same an exchange of prisoners. By the connivance of actual period!" These successes, which excited the crew, they concealed themselves on board until no small amount of envy and hatred in some quarthe ship was fairly at sea, when they made their ters, spread Scoresby's fame abroad in other ports, appearance on deck, greatly to the astonishment and produced many tempting offers, and solicitaand vexation of the captain, who made them sign a tions; but, for a time, chiefly on his wife's account, promise to pay a heavy sum for their passage, as a he preferred retaining his connection with Whitby. punishment for their intrusion. In the Bay of At length, in 1798, he accepted an engagement Biscay a formidable gale came on. The two in- as captain of the Dundee, a vessel much larger and truders refused to work, on the plea of being pas- finer than the Henrietta, sailing from London. sengers, unless the captain destroyed the document With this ship he brought back thirty-six whales exacted from them. This was done; immediately from his first voyage, a number unprecedented in the two sprang up the rigging, and, before long, the annals of whale-fishery. This and subsequent Scoresby, by his superior seamanship, had brought voyages were performed, too, more rapidly than the reefing of sails and striking of masts to a suc- usual, whereby the greater freshness of the blubber cessful accomplishment, and by his example cheered when brought to the coppers, produced a superior the before dispirited crew, who, during the remain- quality of oil. On one of the voyages in the Dunder of the voyage, were observed to manifest a dee he first took his son, then a lad of ten years "higher character" than before. old, (the author of the work before us,) to sea with him. At that period armed vessels of the enemies of Britain cruised in the North Sea A few days after leaving England a ship was suddenly observed bearing down so as to intercept the track of the whaler. Scoresby, however, had anticipated the possibility of such an occurrence; the Dundee carried twelve eighteen-pounders, besides small arms, and a well-selected crew of sixty men. Among the latter, one had been chosen for his expertness in beating the drum, and another for his proficiency "in winding a boatswain's call;" and with all these means and appliances a surprise was planned. We shall leave Mr. Scoresby to tell it in his own words: "The men on deck," he writes, "were laid down flat on their faces. My father, coolly walking the quarter-deck, and the helmsman, engaged in his office of steering, were the only living beings who could be discerned from the deck of the assailant.

After this, Scoresby married the daughter of a small landed proprietor at Cropton, and resided with his father for two or three years, assisting in the management of the farm. But a desire for more stirring employment made him again turn his attention to the sea. In 1785 he entered as seaman on board the Henrietta, a vessel engaged in the whale-fishery, at that time an important branch of the trade of Whitby. Here the general good conduct and ability for which he was remarkable gained him the post of second officer and specksioneer of the ship; a technical title used to distinguish the chief harpooner and principal of the fishing operations. In 1790 he became captain of the vessel, greatly to the mortification and jealousy of his brother officers, who, being inconsiderately engaged by the owner to go out on the first voyage under their new commander, conducted themselves so vexatiously that a mutiny broke out. "One of the men, excited by his companions' clamors and his own dastardly rage, seized a handspike, and aimed a desperate blow, which might have been fatal, on the head of his captain. The latter, now roused to the exertion of his heretofore unimagined strength and tact, while warding the blow with his nand, disarmed the assailant, and, seizing him in his athletic arms, actually flung him headlong among his associates, like a quoit from the hand of a player, filling the whole party with amazement at his strength and power, and for the moment arresting, under the influence of the feeling, the unmanly pursuance of their mutinous purpose. "In addition to these adverse proceedings, the season was a bad one, and the Henrietta returned to Whitby without having captured a single whale.

"Without showing any colors in answer to our English ensign waving at the mizzen-peak, the stranger came down to within short musket-shot distance, when a loud and unintelligible roar of the captain through his speaking-trumpet indicated the usual demand of the nation or denomination of our ship. A significant wave of my father's hand served instead of a reply. The drum beats to quarters, and while the roll yet reverberates around, the shrill sound of the boatswain's pipe is heard above all. And whilst the hoarse voice of this officer is yet giving forth the consequent orders, the apparently plain sides of the ship become suddenly pierced; six ports on a side are simultaneously raised, and as many untompioned cannon, threatening a more serious bellowing than that of the now-astonished captain's trumpet-aided voice, are run out, pointing ominously toward the enemy's broadside!

The mortification to a man of Scoresby's ardent character was extreme; to guard against a recurrence of a similar misadventure, he insisted on engaging the whole of the next crew and officers "The stratagem was complete; its impression himself, and carried his point, notwithstanding the quite perfect. The adversary seemed electrified. opposition of the owner. The advantageous con- Men on the enemy's deck, some with lighted sequences of this measure appeared in the result of matches in hand, and plainly visible to us, by the voyage; " no less than eighteen whales were reason of her heeling position while descending captured, yielding 112 tuns of oil." The unusual obliquely from the windward, were seen to fall flat, importance of this achievement will be best under- as if prostrated by our shot: the guns, pointed stood from the fact, that six and a half whales per threateningly at us, remained silent; the helm flew year had previously been regarded as a satisfactory to port, and the yards to the wind, on our opposite average. Scoresby's fifth voyage gave a "catch" tack; and without waiting for the answer to his

summons, or venturing to renew his attempt on of seals, some hundreds of walruses, very many such a formidable-looking opponent, he suddenly narwals, and probably not less than sixty bears. hauled off, under full sail, in a direction differing The quantity of oil yielded by this produce was by some six points from that in which he had pre- 4664 tuns; of whalebone, about 240 tons weight; viously intercepted our track." besides the skins of the seals, bears, and walruses, According to a long-continued custom, the flens- taken;" the money value of the whole being estiing, or cutting-up of a whale could only be per-mated, in round numbers, at £200,000. formed with a prescribed number of incisions and Scoresby lived but a few years after his retirement. apparatus, causing much loss of time when the fish Subsequently to his decease, a manuscript was was a small one. Scoresby had often remonstrated found among his private papers, which proves him with his subordinates on this hindering process, but to have been possessed of mechanical genius, as in vain. At last, to convince them, he offered, as well as nautical ability. In stature he was tall and a challenge," that with the assistance of only one athletic; and in the power of his eye he exercised third part of the available crew, he would go on a a remarkable control over the lower animals, and fish, and send it in single-handed, in half the time individuals on whom he wished to make an impresoccupied by the four or six harpooners, with the sion. A life like his shows that there is no path help of all hands." This he actually performed. in existence wherein superior intelligence, energy, The work which had occupied the harpooners and and moral feeling may not distinguish themselves the whole of the crew for two hours, was success-through the benefits which they will diffuse around fully accomplished “in almost forty minutes ;" and, them. Our brief sketch of him may be considered by the exercise of forethought on the part of the as complete, when we add that he held " Temperchief operator, the assistants were not kept standing ance to be the best physician, Seriousness the idle a single instant. greatest wisdom, and a Good Conscience the best estate."

Here we see a man prompt in emergencies, and ready with new inventions when the old failed to satisfy him. No one was more active than ScoresFrom the Morning Chronicle, 20 May. by in pushing his way into the ice when on the DECREASE OF THE POPULATION OF IRELAND. whaling-grounds. If a full cargo was not obtained, As the census returns of localities in the western it was that certain natural obstacles were insur-and southern counties transpire, it appears that the mountable by ordinary means, not that energy or present decennial enumeration for Ireland is likely perseverance were lacking for the attempt. Scores to exhibit an immense falling off instead of a by's spirit of enterprise once led him into a higher progressive increase in the population, which might northern latitude than any other on record. This have been expected in an ordinary state of society. was in the year 1806, he being then in command I have already noticed some instances of decrease, of the Resolution. The ship had been worked but they occurred chiefly in midland counties, where through the ice on the western side of Spitzbergen as far as 77 degrees north latitude. All the other whaling vessels were left behind out of sight, when the adventurous captain determined to push for an open sea more to the northwards, the existence of which he considered certain, from several sagacious observations. In this task he is said to have been

the first to introduce the operation of" sallying the ship; that is, swaying her from side to side, so as to facilitate her onward motion when beset by ice. At last, after extraordinary labor, the open sea was entered an ocean lake, as it were, of vast extent, surrounded by ice. Here, in thirty-two days, a full cargo was captured, and the sea explored for a distance, in a direct line, of 300 miles-the highest latitude reached being 81 degrees 30 minutes north, not more than 510 miles from the pole, and the furthest northerly point ever attained by sailing. Parry went beyond it in 1827, but in boats drawn over the ice; and subsequent navigators have been baffled in their endeavors to penetrate so far in the same direction.

the famine had been comparatively light. The Galway Vindicator gives the particulars of the parish of Annadown, in that county, where the diminution has been nearly to the extent of one half the entire population ten years since. That journal says:

of Annadown amounted to 7,108; in 1851 it is reIn the year 1841 the population of the rural parish duced to 3,663, leaving a decrease of 3,445 souls. In 1841 there were 864 families in the parish; in 1851 there are only 454. When the returns shall have been completed, we are certain that many other districts in Connaught will exhibit a still greater decrease, for Annadown suffered less from the effects of famine than many other portions of the province.

PROGRESS OF EMIGRATION.-The human tide still rolls outward, and the extent of the emigration is causing serious concern amongst those who think it will lead to an aggravation of the evils and difficulties of the country. Last week the departures from Dublin exceeded those of any previous week since the opening of the spring, and the reAfter several voyages in the Resolution, Scoresby ports from other ports mention a decided increase became a member of the Greenock Whale-fishing in the rush of emigrants from all parts of the counCompany, and made four voyages in the John, try. On Saturday last 500 persons proceeded by without any diminution of success-the proceeds one vessel, the screw-steamer Albatross, from Cork of only one out of the four having been £11,000. for Liverpool, to take shipping for America. He then went out again for a Whitby firm; and in 1817 bought the Fame on his own account, and The Roscommon Journal, referring to the wholemade with her five voyages to the north, and was sale emigration from that part of the West, says :preparing for a sixth, when the vessel was acci- "This county is nearly depopulated. Every comfortdentally burnt while lying at the Orkneys. This able farmer and able-bodied laborer has either gone, event caused him to retire, though with an ample shoals pass through this town on their way to a counor is preparing to go, to America. Day after day competence, from active life. He had been thirty-try where, at least, they will be able to earn their six years a mariner, and had sailed thirty times to bread by the sweat of their brow.' The emigrants the Arctic seas, and captured 533 whales-" a direct from Galway, from the 15th of February to the greater number than has fallen to the share of any 9th of May, were 2,039, who left in sixteen vessels, other individual in Europe-with many thousands all, with one exception, for the United States."

From the National Era.

WORDSWORTH.
31

WRITTEN ON A BLANK LEAF OF HIS MEMOIRS.

DEAR friends, who read the world aright,
And in its common forms discern
A beauty and a harmony

The many never learn!

Kindred in soul of him who found

In simple flower and leaf and stone,
The impulse of the sweetest lays
Our Saxon tongue has known,—
Accept this record of a life

As sweet and pure as calm and good,
As a long day of blandest June
In green field and in wood.

How welcome to our ears, long pained
By strife of sect and party noise,
The brook-like murmur of his song
Of nature's simple joys!

The violet by its mossy stone,

The primrose by the river's brim,
And chance-sown daffodil, have found
Immortal life through him.

The sunrise on his breezy lake,

The rosy tints his sunset brought,
World-seen, are gladdening all the vales
And mountain-peaks of thought.

Art builds on sand; the works of pride
And human passion change and fall,
But that which shares the life of God,
With Him surviveth all.

J. G. W.

2d 6th month, 1851.

MY NOVEL; OR, VARIETIES IN ENGLISH LIFE.

CHAPTER VII.

pectations in your mother, which must end in bitter disappointment; and suppose we do, it will be time enough to write when something definite is settled." "But my mother will be so anxious-"

LEONARD had been about six weeks with his | Suppose we don't, you will only have raised exuncle, and those weeks were well spent. Mr. Richard had taken him to his counting-house, and initiated him into business and the mysteries of double entry; and in return for the young man's readiness and zeal in matters which the acute "Make your mind easy on that score. I will trader instinctively felt were not exactly to his write regularly to Mr. Dale, and he can tell her tastes, Richard engaged the best master the town that you are well and thriving. No more words, afforded, to read with his nephew in the evening. my man-when I say a thing, I say it." Then, This gentleman was the head-usher of a large observing that Leonard looked blank and dissatisschool-who had his hours to himself after eight fied, Richard added, with a good-humored smile, o'clock-and was pleased to vary the dull routine" I have my reasons for all this-you shall know of enforced lessons by instructions to a pupil who took delightedly-even to the Latin grammar. Leonard made rapid strides, and learned more in those six weeks than many a cleverish boy does in twice as many months. These hours which Leonard devoted to study, Richard usually spent from home-sometimes at the houses of his grand acquaintances in the Abbey Gardens, sometimes in the reading-room appropriated to those aristocrats. If he stayed at home, it was in company with his head-clerk, and for the purpose of checking his account-books, or looking over the names of doubt-interest in his progress. About the same period ful electors.

Leonard had naturally wished to communicate his altered prospects to his old friends, that they in turn might rejoice his mother with such good tidings. But he had not been two days in the house before Richard had strictly forbidden all such correspondence.

"Look you," said he, " at present we are on an experiment we must see if we like each other.

them later. And I tell you what-if you do as I bid you, it is my intention to settle something handsome on your mother; but if you don't, devil a penny she 'll get from me."

With that, Richard turned on his heel, and in a few moments his voice was heard loud in objurgation with some of his people.

About the fourth week of Leonard's residence at Mr. Avenel's, his host began to evince a certain change of manner. He was no longer quite so cordial with Leonard, nor did he take the same

he was frequently caught by the London butler before the looking-glass. He had always been a smart man in his dress, but now he was more particular. He would spoil three white cravats when he went out of an evening, before he could satisfy himself as to a tie. He also bought a Peerage, and it became his favorite study at odd quarters of an hour. All these symptoms proceeded from a cause, and that cause was-Woman.