in writing to Mr. Murray, "remember, above
all things, that their morality is not your
morality." And this profound truth should never
be lost sight of in our judgments of a foreign
nation. Although the man who could not
command credit for his words, would be with
us, in England, a very worthless public
man, the case would be very different in
Italy, since he would be only exposed to the
epidemic of distrust that afflicts the whole
people.

This distrust implies no censure nor blame
of the individual discredited. Far from it.
It very often indicates a high estimate of
his craft and ability. To give an instance:
About two years ago an English Secretary of
Legation, in a moment of absence, and under
the influence of a zeal to carry out a peculiar
policy, had the misfortune to substitute his own
views for those of a ministerial despatch. It
was on the memorable case of the Cagliari. For
this mistake — and that it was a mistake his own
confession proved— he incurred the severe
reprimand of his chief, and forfeited— for
a time, at least— the reputation which long
and most valuable services had acquired for
him.

What was the Italian version of the incident?
It was, that the English Foreign Secretary having
determined to revoke certain pledges he had
given, and change the line of policy he had
adopted, resolved to sacrifice the character of
one of his subordinates, throwing upon him the
entire blame of words written by himself, and
destroying— so far as such an imputation could
destroy— the character for usefulness of a most
efficient public servant. It was useless to answer
this allegation, by stating that no English
minister would stoop to such a subterfuge, nor
any English gentleman submit to become his
accomplice in it. The ruse was accounted not
only a very fair and honourable one, but actually
as exhibiting a high capacity for office, and
considerable diplomatic skill in the man who
devised it.

Where, therefore, Falsehood is shorn of a
great, deal of its blackness, Incredulity is venial,
and Distrust scarcely a fault.

Any one who has ever lived in Italy, or had
ordinary dealings with Italians, must have
found out how far his character for acuteness
and intelligence depended upon his never
believing anybody or anything. To assume as a
fact something which you had not submitted to
the test of your own knowledge was always the
sign of a weak, credulous nature, of one who
was, and deserved to be, a dupe.

Now— not to take any higher or better
ground— what a lamentable loss of time, what a
cruel waste of human life, is incurred in all this
incredulity! How slowly would the work of
construction go on if the mason had to test
every brick before lie laid it! Only fancy the
man who would not venture on a voyage if he
had not inspected the vessel before she was
coppered!

The spectacle Italy presents at this moment
is, rightfully and wrongfully, Universal Distrust;
nor can you so successfully appeal to the Italian
public as by the expression of your want of
confidence in this man or in that, and your firm
conviction with the Psalmist in his impatience,
"that all men are liars."

HOUSE-TOP TELEGRAPHS.

ABOUT twelve years ago, when the tavern
fashion of supplying beer and sandwiches at a
fixed price became very general, the proprietor
of a small suburban pot-house reduced the
system to an absurdity by announcing that he sold
a glass of ale and an electric shock for
fourpence. That he really traded in this combination
of science and drink is more than doubtful,
and his chief object must have been to procure
an increase of business by an unusual display of
shopkeeping wit. Whatever motive he had to
stimulate his humour, the fact should certainly be
put upon record that he was a man considerably in
advance of his age. He was probably not aware
that his philosophy in sport would be made a
science in earnest in the space of a few years,
any more than many other bold humorists who
have been amusing on what they knew nothing
about. The period has not yet arrived when the
readers of Bishop Wilkins's famous discourse
upon aërial navigation will be able to fly to the
moon, but the hour is almost at hand when
the fanciful announcement of the beer-shop
keeper will represent an every-day familiar fact.
A glass of ale and an electric shock will shortly
be sold for fourpence, and the scientific part of
the bargain will be something more useful than
a mere fillip to the human nerves. It will be an
electric shock that sends a message across the
house-tops through the web of wires to any one
of a hundred and twenty district telegraph
stations, that are to be scattered amongst the
shopkeepers all over the town.

The industrious spiders have long since formed
themselves into a commercial company, called
the London District Telegraph Company (limited),
and they have silently, but effectively,
spun their trading web. One hundred and sixty
miles of wire are now fixed along parapets,
through trees, over garrets, round chimney-pots,
and across roads on the southern side of the
river, and the other one hundred and twenty
required miles will soon be fixed in the same
manner on the northern side. The difficulty
decreases as the work goes on, and the sturdiest
Englishman is ready to give up the roof of his
castle in the interests of science and the public
good, when he finds that many hundreds of his
neighbours have already led the way.

The out-door mechanical exigencies of this
London district telegraph require at least six
house-top resting-places in the space of a mile.
To get these places at the nominal rental of a
shilling a year (with three months' notice for
removal) has been the object of the company,
professedly that a low tariff of charges may be
based upon a moderate outlay of capital on the