g to that eminent Orientalist Sylvestre
de Sacy, is derived from _hashish_, being the liquid preparation on
which the Old Man of the Mountain used to intoxicate his operators, and
which appears to have been an uncommonly powerful tipple. The men whom
he thus drugged, or _hocused_, when they were to commit murder, "were
called, in Arabic, _Hashishin_ in the plural, and _Hashishi_ in the
singular." The Crusaders brought the word from the East. The ancients
had not the word, but they had the thing, as the English suffer from
_ennui_, but have no name for it. A temperance lecturer might turn this
connection between blind drunkenness and reckless murder to some good
purpose.

[C] Mr. De Quincey's immortal Connoisseur, who delivered the Williams
Lecture on Murder, speaking of the supposed assassination of Gustavus
Adolphus, at the Battle of Lutzen, says,--"The King of Sweden's
assassination, by-the-by, is doubted by many writers,--Harte amongst
others; but they are wrong. He was murdered; and I consider his murder
unique in its excellence; for he was murdered at noonday, and on the
field of battle,--a feature of original conception, which occurs in no
other work of art that I remember." His memory was bad. He must have
heard the story that Desaix was murdered on the field of Marengo, after
coming up to save Bonaparte from destruction; and he must also have
heard the story that Dundee was murdered at Killiecrankie. Mr. Hawthorne
mentions that he saw, in an old volume of Colonial newspapers, "a report
that General Wolfe was slain, not by the enemy, but by a shot from his
own soldiers." All these reports are just as well founded as that which
represents Gustavus Adolphus as having been assassinated. Harte's doubts
are, as the reader can see by referring to his work, well sustained, and
leave the impression that the King was killed in fair fight. We have
heard a very ingenious argument in support of the proposition that
Stonewall Jackson was assassinated by some of his own men,--and there is
some mystery about the cause or occasion of his death.

THE CHIMNEY-CORNER.

VII.

LITTLE FOXES.--PART VI.

DISCOURTESY.

"For my part," said my wife, "I think one of the greatest destroyers of
domestic peace is Discourtesy. People neglect, with their nearest
friends, those refinements and civilities which they practise with
strangers."

"My dear Madam, I am of another opinion," said Bob Stephens. "The
restraints of etiquett