imitive Christian than the Minister o' Kirkintulloch wi' twa
hunder and fifty--or if folk should aye be readin' sermons or fishin'
for sawmon--or if it's best to marry or best to burn--or if the national
debt hangs like a millstone round the neck o' the kintra or like a chain
o' blae-berries--or if the Millennium be really close at haun'--or the
present Solar System be calculated to last to a' eternity--or whether
the people should be edicated up to the highest pitch o' perfection, or
preferably to be all like trotters through the Bog o' Allen--or whether
the government should subsedeeze foreign powers, or spend a' its sillar
on oursells--or whether the Blacks and the Catholics should be
emancipawted or no afore the demolition o' Priests and Obis--or whether
(God forgie us baith for the hypothesis) man has a mortal or an immortal
sowl--be a Phoenix--or an Eister!--_From the Noctes_.

* * * * *

CURSES OF ABSENTEEISM.

What is the condition of the country-seat of the absentee proprietor?
The mansion-house deserted and closed; the approaches to it ragged and
grass grown; the chimneys, "those windpipes of good hospitality," as an
old English poet calls them, giving no token of the cheerful fire
within; the gardens running to waste, or, perchance, made a source of
menial profit; the old family servants dismissed, and some rude bailiff,
or country attorney, ruling paramount in the place. The surrounding
cottagers, who have derived their support from the vicinage, deprived of
this, pass into destitution and wretchedness; either abandoning their
homes, throwing themselves upon parish relief, or seeking provision by
means yet more desperate. The farming tenantry, though less immediately
dependent, yet all partake, more or less, in the evil. The charities and
hospitalities which belong to such a mansion lie dormant; the clergyman
is no longer supported and aided in his important duties; the family pew
in the church is closed; and the village churchyard ceases to be a place
of pleasant meeting, where the peasant's heart is gladdened by the
kindly notice of his landlord.

It is the struggle against retrenchment, the "paupertatis pudor et
fuga," which has caused hundreds of English families, of property and
consideration, to desert their family places, and to pass year after
year in residence abroad. At the close of each London season, the
question too often occurs as to the best mode of evadin