voyage of a hundred days from Liverpool,
when the Diamond entered New York in
the first week of February, Captain Trale
had to report the death of some of his
passengers through insufficiency of food.

Now, in all these sad narratives, and
others of similar kind, it is observable that
they were sailing ships which suffered;
ships, moreover, mostly in old and battered
condition. The mishaps of maritime
venture might have happened to better vessels,
in regard to winds, storms, striking on shoals,
and running against rocks; but the better vessels
would have borne more buffeting
before planks, and masts, and rudders gave
way. A steamer without sails presents much
less surface to be torn and rent by storms
than a sailing ship spreading a wide area of
canvas. It is quite true, as we know in the
cases of the President, the Amazon, and
other noble ships, that steamers are lost by
wrecking or burning; but it is equally true
that, in regard to the detention of "missing"
ships, there is much more ground for hope
now, than at any former period of nautical
and maritime history: because, firstly, there
is a larger proportion of the shipping afloat,
fitted to battle against storms; secondly,
there is a shorter duration of voyages
generally, and greater chance of succour at
hand in case of disaster. We know that,
quite recently, the fine Cunard steamer,
Samaria, broke her shaft on her way from
America; she was "missing" for some days;
but help came, and help would very likely
have come had she been out in mid-ocean
instead of nearing the Irish coast. In
February and March of the present year, whole
fleets of corn-laden ships were "missing" at
Liverpool; that is, were long overdue; but
they came in one after another, as the
weather moderated. And so of any great
ocean steamer, not until every vestige of
hope is gone will she be treated as a lost
ship.

THE GREAT MAGYAR.

IN FOUR PARTS. CHAPTER I.

THE rightful owner of this title is not
Louis Kossuth, to whom it was assigned in
1849 by the enthusiasm of the English and
American public. It is Count Stephen
Szechenyi, whose imperishable claims to it
are embodied in the enduring monuments
of his beneficent genius, and on whom it
has been deliberately conferred by the
grateful admiration of his countrymen.

It happened to the writer of the following
sketch to be present on the occasion when
Louis Kossuth was introduced, as The
Great Magyar, to the American Senate.
The celebrated Daniel Webster, who, as
secretary for the state department, then
conducted the foreign affairs of the American
Union, was subsequently invited to preside
at a banquet given to Kossuth. He
declined the invitation, on the ground that it
would not become the representative of the
foreign relations of the Union, to propose
toasts in honour of a man charged with
high treason against a sovereign with
whose government the United States were
on terms of peace and amity. Mr. Seward
represented to Mr. Webster that his refusal
to attend the Kossuth banquet would cost
him the loss of the Presidency for which he
was then a candidate. This argument
prevailed. The invitation was accepted: and
"The Independence of Hungary," coupled
with the name of "Louis Kossuth, the Great
Magyar," was proposed by the American
minister for foreign affairs. We ourselves,
calidâ juventâ, had what we then esteemed
the high honour of being presented to the
pseudo Great Magyar, at the hotel where
he was sumptuously lodged and boarded
at the national expense, together with his
fellow-refugees; nor has time entirely
effaced the vivid impression made upon
our youthful fancy by the quaint costumes,
and wild, unwashed faces of those hairy and
hungry heroes. The quantity of
champagne and tobacco which they consumed
in the course of a month appeared
prodigious, when their hotel bill was presented
for payment to the nation.

Meanwhile, broken in health and hope,
and tortured by the most terrible martyrdom
which a morbidly sensitive conscience
can inflict on a proud nature and a powerful
intellect, the real Great Magyar was
languishing in an Austrian madhouse, of
which he had become the voluntary inmate.
Many years afterwards we visited that
establishment. Times and things had greatly
changed since 1848. M. Schmerling had
produced his new nostrum for the salvation
of the Austrian empire; consisting of
a central legislature, to which the whole
kingdom of Hungary refused to send
deputies. Some of the ablest organs of the
English press were extolling the wisdom
of the new political régime in Austria.
But, already, every man adequately
conversant with the social and historical
conditions of this complicated empire
perceived its unpractical and futile character.
Every month rendered more and more apparent
the necessity of promptly pacifying
Hungary, and the utter impossibility of
inducing her to swallow M. Schmerling's