oderate
and conciliatory to the last degree; that the military and financial
position of the United States is such as to forbid a warlike crisis; and
that, if hostilities were to ensue betwixt Great Britain and his
country, no time could be more favourable to the former than the
present. Yet, with all these inducements to peace, we fear he will find
it impossible to bring matters to a satisfactory termination. But should
an opportunity occur of taking us at disadvantage--should we find
ourselves, for instance, involved in war with any powerful European
nation--we may lay our account to have this envious and vindictive
people on our backs. We are not, therefore, called upon to anticipate
the trial, and to take the course of events into our own hands; but
still less ought we to make any concessions, however trifling, which may
retard, but will eventually exasperate, our difficulties. Much is in our
power on the continent of North America, if we are but true to our own
interests and to those of mankind. We should cherish to the utmost that
affectionate and loyal spirit, which at present so eminently
distinguishes our flourishing colony of Canada; we should look to it,
that such a form of government be established in Mexico as shall at once
heal her own dissensions, and guarantee her against the further
encroachments of her neighbours; and we should invite other European
nations to join with us in informing the populace of the United States,
that they cannot be indulged in the gratification of those predatory
interests, which the public opinion of the age happily denies to the
most compact despotisms and the most powerful empires.

ANTONIO PEREZ.

As often as we revisit the fair city of Brussels, an irresistible
attraction leads us from the heights crowned with its modern palaces,
down among the localities of the valley beneath, the seat and scene of
so many of the old glories of the capital of the Netherlands. On these
occasions our steps unconsciously deviate a little from the direct line
of descent, turning off on the left hand towards the Hotel d'Aremberg.
But it is not to saunter through the elegant interior of this princely
mansion, and linger over exquisite pictures and rare Etruscan vases,
that we then approach it. Our musing eye sees not the actual walls
shining with intolerable whiteness in the fierce summer-sun, but the
towers of an ancient edifice, long ago demolished by the pitiless Alva,
which once,