them; and when their characters are given
up to the Superintendent, during their
residence there, as security for good conduct,
they at once undergo inspection. With such
securities, a large class of the population
would be materially ameliorated, and if, when
such securities existed, people were silly
and wicked enough to employ any one without
taking advantage of it, they would well
merit whatever might befal them. One
advantage, also, which we have neglected to
name, is that a servant's home, such as we
have pointed out, would put a stop to the
proceedings of a class of persons who keep
what are called "Servants' Registers."

In conclusion may be mentioned an odd
society existing in Vienna, being established
for no greater object than the following: any
person being a member of it may secure the
cost of liveries he may have furnished to any
servant quitting him within three months of
the time it has been provided. Of course the
employer who is doubtful of a new servant
deducts the subscription from his wages!
It is quite astonishing that so notable a
scheme never occurred to some Robert Macaire
in Paris or some entrepreneur des biftek à
domicile.

BITS OF LIFE IN MUNICH.

PEOPLE usually call the neighbourhood of
Munich very stupid, flat, and utterly devoid
of natural beauty; they speak of the singular
contrast between the beauty of the city and
the barrenness and want of interest in the
neighbourhood. Strange to say, I shall bring
away with me memories of Nature's beauties
which, in looking back to my sojourn, I
almost think will outshine the memory of the
Art beauty. I recal a dozen sun set skies,
that, for gorgeousness and glory, put to shame
all the gold and rainbow hues of the churches.
This vast plain, with its dreamy horizon of
Alps, the desolate banks of the Isar, the
lovely English Garden, and all the many
pleasant, quiet strolls to quaint old villages;
what delicious memories shall I not carry
away with me of them!

Then the ground in summer is one mosaic
of lovely flowers; and the sky is a never-
ceasing delight, so blue and clear. I often
wonder whether it is owing to the
atmosphere being clearer than in England, and
also to the greater beauty and freshness of
colouring of the public buildings here; but
there is not a single day without its
presenting you with some beautiful architectural
picture.

Every evening as I cross the Ludwig
Strasse, I look down it to see some new
effect upon the Sieges-Thor (Triumphal Arch).
Last night the ground was sparkling with
snow, the horizon the palest tint of peach-
colour, deepening into a warm rose, and
against the sky stood forth the Sieges-Thor,
as if carved in ivory. Sometimes it glows as
if carved in ruddy gold. I had no conception,
till I came here, of the wonderful beauty of
colour in architecture, and how Nature seems
to pronounce her blessing upon it, by heightening
the beauty of man's work, through her
showers of sunshine, and her clouds of shadow,
and her glow of reflected lights. Oh, if man
would only strive with instead of against
Nature, what a world this might be!—and
will be in time! Still more so is it in the
soul, of which all these outward things are
but types.

How lovely are my walks to and fro through
the English Garden! The ground is covered
with pure, crisp snow—the trees often sparkling
with hoar frost, till all is like a forest of
enchantment, and the sun sparkles and glitters
upon their branches as though they were
covered with diamonds. If, perhaps, there is
no hoar-frost—only the trunks and branches
powdered with snow—the delicate, wondrous
tracery of branches relieve themselves against
the purest, deepest, most glowing azure sky,
like a warm summer's sky, so blue and cloudless.
I have no words to describe the delight
which these walks are to me; the air is pure,
keen, and bracing; the ground hard and crisp,
and morning and evening I find some lovely,
fresh picture painted for me by that most
wonderful of all artists—Nature. Now it is a
sky all creamy and pale amber, with early
morning light, the more distant group of trees
lost in delicate haze; mist hanging about
mysteriously among the glades and hollows
of the garden, dropping from branches, and
veiling grotesque giant stems, and yet
sunshine is struggling through the haze, casting
long blue shadows over the snow. Now the
effect is different; ruddy sunset-light falls
across the snow, turning it to rose-colour,
and burns upon boles and branches with a
glory almost unearthly. The trees stand as
of molten copper, with an azure sky behind
them, and the green ice of the mill-streams,
powdered with snow, looks yet more vivid in
colour.

Last night, as I came back, a large, calm
moon was rising out of a pale, rose-tinted
horizon above a lawny opening in the garden.
The ground was a sheet of snow, with lovely
groups of trees rising here and there into the
quiet, warm sky. I stopped for a moment to
drink in its beauty. It was close to King
Carl's palace, where two unlucky sentinels
are always standing—often pacing to and fro
this cold weather with foces of intense misery.
I always think that the placing of sentinels is
a great piece of humbug; it is not an active,
useful watchfulness, like that of the police—
it is merely a pompous piece of man's tyranny.
Well, I felt so sorry for these unlucky
sentinels—one of whom passed me at the moment,
pacing up and down with a blue and scarlet
face. I longed to say to him, " Look, how
beautiful that moon is, and how lovely the
garden looks! " But that would have been