For, in far lands, with scarlet
Nassau-Siegens, with sinful Imperial Catherines, is not the
heart-broken, even as at home with the mean? Poor Paul! hunger and
dispiritment track thy sinking footsteps: once or at most twice, in this
Revolution-tumult the figure of thee emerges; mute, ghost-like, as 'with
stars dim-twinkling through.' And then, when the light is gone quite
out, a National Legislature grants 'ceremonial funeral!' As good had
been the natural Presbyterian Kirk-bell, and six feet of Scottish earth,
among the dust of thy loved ones.--Such world lay beyond the Promontory
of St. Bees. Such is the life of sinful mankind here below.

But of all strangers, far the notablest for us is Baron Jean Baptiste de
Clootz;--or, dropping baptisms and feudalisms, World-Citizen Anacharsis
Clootz, from Cleves. Him mark, judicious Reader. Thou hast known his
Uncle, sharp-sighted thorough-going Cornelius de Pauw, who mercilessly
cuts down cherished illusions; and of the finest antique Spartans, will
make mere modern cutthroat Mainots. (De Pauw, Recherches sur les Grecs,
&c.) The like stuff is in Anacharsis: hot metal; full of scoriae, which
should and could have been smelted out, but which will not. He has
wandered over this terraqueous Planet; seeking, one may say, the
Paradise we lost long ago. He has seen English Burke; has been seen
of the Portugal Inquisition; has roamed, and fought, and written; is
writing, among other things, 'Evidences of the Mahometan Religion.' But
now, like his Scythian adoptive godfather, he finds himself in the Paris
Athens; surely, at last, the haven of his soul. A dashing man, beloved
at Patriotic dinner-tables; with gaiety, nay with humour; headlong,
trenchant, of free purse; in suitable costume; though what mortal ever
more despised costumes? Under all costumes Anacharsis seeks the man; not
Stylites Marat will more freely trample costumes, if they hold no man.
This is the faith of Anacharsis: That there is a Paradise discoverable;
that all costumes ought to hold men. O Anacharsis, it is a headlong,
swift-going faith. Mounted thereon, meseems, thou art bound hastily for
the City of Nowhere; and wilt arrive! At best, we may say, arrive in
good riding attitude; which indeed is something.

So many new persons, and new things, have come to occupy this France.
Her old Speech and Thought, and Activity which springs from those, are
all changing; fermenting towards unknown issues. To the dullest peasant,