composition; and perhaps
were hardly worth publication. Allowance is to be made, as Mr. Phipps
remarks, for their unrevised state; and revision might have removed
crudities and imparted more closeness and strength. It would not,
however, have altered their main defects; which may be summed up
by saying that they belonged to another age, without reaching the
peculiar force and finish which alone can give interest to an obsolete
mode.

[Footnote 3: Memoirs of the Political and Literary Life of Robert
Plumer Ward, Esq., Author of "The Law of Nations," "Tremaine," "De
Vere," &c. With Selections from his Correspondence, Diaries, and
unpublished Literary Remains. By the Honorable Edmund Phipps. In two
volumes. Published by Murray.]

* * * * *

THE BAGPIPE.--In Gothic sculpture and tracery angels are sometimes
portrayed practising on the bagpipe. It was occasionally used in
churches before the introduction of the organ, which occurred early
in the fifteenth century. Written music came into use about the same
time, and both were loudly denounced by many of the old school-men as
unnecessary and vain innovations.

* * * * *

THE IVORY MINE:

A TALE OF THE FROZEN SEA.

I.--YAKOUTSK.

Yakoutsk is one of the principal cities of Siberia, a country the
name of which excites exaggerated ideas of sterility and desolation.
Watered by rivers, which in every direction do the work of railways,
with richly-wooded mountains and valleys, with green slopes,
cultivated fields, soft meadows, gardens, and grassy islands in
the great streams, with all the common vegetables in pretty fair
abundance, with an endless source of commerce in furs and ivory,
Siberia, except in its extreme northern provinces, presents, like
most other lands, a very considerable amount of compensation for
considerable rigor of climate. Yakoutsk is a completely northern town
on the great river Lena, with wide streets and miserable huts, all of
wood, in many of which ice is still used in winter for panes of glass.
A very eminent traveler tells us that on his visit there were 4000
people living in 500 houses; with three stone churches, two wooden
ones, and a convent. It had once an antiquity to show--the ancient
Ostrog or fortress built in 1647 by the Cossacks; but which menaced
ruin more and more every day, being not of stone, but of wood, and
at last disappeared. Even here progress is observable, and w