and dazzle the commonalty with their gold and
scarlet, where were they then? I will answer
for it, there were urgent private affairs in those
days. No wonder that braver men, the brisk
quick-eyed Frenchmen, when they fall to
quarrelling and angry words, flout each other with
the derisive title of " Garde Noble," and interchange
the scoff, " Vilain soldat du Pape." It
is no matter of surprise that one of this body,
when named by special grace of the Supreme
Pontiff to be a commander in the newly formed
Civic Guard, should come like a whimpering
child to an English friend of mine, and, half
crying, pour out his griefs under the disagreeable
honour thrust upon him. " At any other time,
indeed," mourn the desponding hero,
"'twould have been most kind and gracious
of the Santo Padre; but now, when we are
on the eve of commotion, when there is fighting
and disorder at hand, when blood may be
spilled-—" The prospect fairly overpowering
the honest youth, he hides his face in his hands.

Again. In Conductor-street -- down which it
is your destiny ever to make but slow progress,
owing to those Dalilahs of jewellers' shops which
draw you witchingly, now to the right, now to
the left, in a sort of zig-zag procession—we pass
a great arch which is at the sign of a great red
staring eight-pointed cross the Cradle or
Commandery of Malta—a catacomb where is laid up
in ordinary the dry bones of the famous Order.
The old forms, with perhaps a little of the spirit
of the ancient knighthood, are flickering up and
down spasmodically; the old machinery of Prior
and Brethren, with the theatrical adjuncts and
decorations, still has a certain life—for there are
revenues to be administered. It is surprising how
difficult it is to scotch an institution when there
is that one element of vitality left. Nay, there
are commanderies and knights in other countries,
and there is obedience, and orders, and
communication by letters, and so the thing works
on somehow. Its members sweep by at public
processions in all the theatrical majesty of their
robes, in the dark, flowing gaberdine, with the
eight-pointed cross upon their shoulder, making
up fine monkish figures, very Titianesque. In
rank and number they are eminently respectable,
but have about the same proportion to the old
spirit of the Order, as Mr. Hawkins's Crystal
Palace models have to the extinct mastodons
and fossil elks. Now, however, that pontifical
affairs are at such a crisis, and that levies of
moneys and legionaries are being made in foreign
countries, a young and spirited knight of Malta
who has long been in protest against this pure
mumming and playing at religious orders, thinks
that now their lawful sovereign having come
into such straits, it were fitting time to put life
and motion into the defunct mastodon: the
quaint two-handed sword might now be put to
better use than mere show of gala days. They
might fight for the Cross again; not, indeed,
against the Crescent, but against the
excommunication of Christ's Vicar. And with that
he begins to agitate, working on whatever
chivalry might be in the ranks. He writes, he
preaches, he points to Belgian, French, Austrian,
Irish, and general polyglot fighting company,
trooping and offering their swords. And with
what result?

The Noble Roman, true to his nature, remains
inert, prefers the pure sham to the sham vivified,
and chants softly his old tune, " Che farà, sarà."
Agitator is buffeted like a shuttlecock between
chancellor and secretary, between secretary and
knights. Will he grow sick and weary? The
vis inertiae of the Noble Roman caitiffs are too
much for him, and the fighting order of Malta
will not fight.

There is a certain shabbiness, notwithstanding,
about these magnificent Guardsmen. Out
of their fine tinsel and jack-boots, they look like
actors who have just taken off their gaudy
clothes in the green-room. A word not elegant,
truly, but forcible and appropriate, fits them
exactly: they look sadly scrubby. See you
those two mean windows, squeezed in as a sort
of entresol, one of which runs awry, having
been shaken out of its right line? That is the
Guardsman's " Clob," or Cercle, and the noble
members may be seen lounging over the
squeezed windows, and hanging about the shop
door, which is the entrance, and playing out
other little incidents of what they deem to be
"Clob" life.

The pay and allowances of these noble
gentlemen are ample. The service is therefore
desirable for more objects than the mere nobility
of the thing. Ingots do not too much abound;
and so the little windfall comes in acceptably
enough. A noble gentleman whose means are
straitened, striving to keep up a show on an
ill-lined purse, is to be regarded with a just
compassion and respect; yet in those little
gusts and whispers which at times sweep
across our social circles, are borne to me
curious little meannesses and queer bits of
shabbiness which I will swear a Spanish hidalgo
of bluest blood would not stoop to. Thus the
carriage, horses, and liveries of such a grand
seigneur may be justly admired; albeit the body
seems laid down a little too much on lifeboat
lines; yet I hold it scarcely consists with the
dignity of such a seigneur to let out his
equipage, appointments and all, on hire, to the
moneyed English. The noble owner, meantime, may
tramp it afoot, and must have a quaint and
curious sensation as his own vehicle, trundling
by, splashes him royally, or goes nigh to running
him down at the crossing. It is humbly
submitted that this touches ever so nearly on
shabbiness. Shabby too, but with more reasonable
show of excuse, is that letting for hire, by noble
persons, of flights and stories in their mansions.
To poor straitened nobility, who durst not keep
up a gloomy state in the palatial Newgates,
such grist may be welcome, and the attitude of
il Signor Giovanni Torro from Inghilterra,
tendering four hundred scudi per month,
utterly irresistible. But for wealthier houses
I take it there is no excuse beyond pure greed
of money. That noble family whose palace