hand, estimates the actual cost of lodging,
food, and servants, for a young diplomatist
in Paris, at six hundred a year, and
expresses his opinion that very exaggerated
notions prevail as to the expenditure necessary
to the maintenance of a social position.
Mr. West thinks that the social position
of a junior member of an embassy, depends
in a great measure on his own merits, and
upon his refined habits and gentlemanly
manners. The diplomatist who has a
private income sufficient to enable him to
support the expense of a style of living
"erroneously considered," as the report
puts it, "as adding height and dignity to his
position as a diplomatist," is, in Mr. West's
opinion, just as likely as not, to get no
advantages out of his expenditure. The pomp
and show of diplomatic life are not so
necessary or so effective now, as in former
years. There may be a great deal of truth
in this way of putting the case, but it must
be borne in mind that a man's expenses
are inevitably affected by the style of
living customary in the society in which
he moves; that even junior diplomatists
"of refined habits and gentlemanly
manners," can procure admission to the very
best society; and that the very best society
in such cities as Vienna and Paris is not
altogether the cheapest.

Even in Berlin, prices have risen and
luxury has increased. The style of living in
the best society of that dusty city on the
Spree has lost its old simplicity; where
three hundred pounds a year was enough
in 1837 for a junior member of the legation,
five hundred would represent genteel
poverty now-a-days. In St. Petersburg,
eight hundred pounds is not thought an
excessive year's expenditure for the
budding diplomatist; and, as the report from
that city goes into the minutest details of
wages of coachmen and housemaids, it is
probable that the estimate may be taken
as strictly accurate. Twenty- two pounds a
year, besides "allowances for tea," &c., and
gratuities at Christmas and Easter, represent
pretty good wages for a housemaid; while
the footmen are not ill off with forty
pounds as their year's pay. Altogether, it
would seem that the servants have
decidedly the best of it in St. Petersburg. Why
living in Brussels should have suddenly
become a costly amusement, does not quite
appear, but the fact is on record. The
second secretary to our legation in that
city, is described as being in receipt of the
magnificent salary of two hundred and
fifty pounds a year: out of which (he is
married and has a small family) he has to
pay a trifle under fourteen hundred pounds
for his year's expenses; and even here,
clothing, medical attendance, furniture,
and miscellaneous items, are not included.
It is remarked that this gentleman does
not entertain, as his house is so small that
he would be unable to do so even if he
desired it; and it is naïvely added that "he
considers living at Brussels expensive."

What, under circumstances such as these,
is to become of the diplomatic service, as
a career, except for men of considerable
private fortune, and with a taste for
residing abroad? There is not much
complaint of the pay of the ministers
themselves. It is not large, but it will serve.
But the prizes are few. Promotion is
absolutely stagnant, and unfortunate
attachés, paid and unpaid, are hoping
against hope, with an average expenditure
of seven or eight hundred pounds to be
provided for. It is obviously impossible
that the country should be expected to pay
salaries sufficient to defray these heavy
expenses; it is obviously ridiculous to expect
educated and often very able men to waste
the best years of their lives in the almost
gratuitous fulfilment of subordinate duties,
with little or no hope of promotion to
higher posts. The diplomatic service on
its old footing is doomed. It is not our
province to discuss here the whole question
of the needful reforms. But if any extensive
re-adjustment of salaries should take
place, it will be necessary to keep well in
view the practical advice contained in Mr,
West's report from Paris, already referred
to. "If regard is to be had in such a re-
adjustment to the increased cost of
representation, and to the necessity of being
up to an exaggerated social standard, no
just estimate of necessary expenditure can
ever be arrived at: for there will be found
no limit to ideas respecting the amount
of representation which may be judged
necessary, or to exalted notions of social
position which may be formed."

TEN YEARS IN AN INDIAN PRISON.

ON the 17th of January 1781, Sir Eyre
Coote, the veteran commander-in- chief of
India, who one-and-twenty years before had
defeated Count Lally and the French army,
and taken Pondicherry, commenced a
campaign against Hyder Ali, by encamping
on the Red Hills near "the above named
city.

On the 6th of February some artillery-