he best of Rhenish wine.
I would the Pope's gay lot were mine.

II.
But then all happy's not his life,
He has not maid, nor blooming wife;
Nor child has he to raise his hope--
I would not wish to be the Pope.

III.
The Sultan better pleases me,
His is a life of jollity;
His wives are many as he will--
I would the Sultan's throne then fill.

IV.
But even he's a wretched man,
He must obey his Alcoran;
And dares not drink one drop of wine--
I would not change his lot for mine.

V.
So then I'll hold my lowly stand,
And live in German Vaterland;
I'll kiss my maiden fair and fine,
And drink the best of Rhenish wine.

VI.
Whene'er my maiden kisses me,
I'll think that I the Sultan be;
And when my cheery glass I tope,
I'll fancy then I am the Pope.

CHAPTER XLIII.

THE JOURNEY.

It was with a feeling of pleasure I cannot explain, that I awoke in the
morning, and found myself upon the road. The turmoil, the bustle, the
never-ending difficulties of my late life in Paris had so over-excited
and worried me, that I could neither think nor reflect. Now all these
cares and troubles were behind me, and I felt like a liberated prisoner
as I looked upon the grey dawn of the coming day, as it gradually melted
from its dull and leaden tint to the pink and yellow hue of the rising
sun. The broad and richly-coloured plains of "la belle France" were
before me--and it is "la belle France," however inferior to parts of
England in rural beauty--the large tracts of waving yellow corn,
undulating like a sea in the morning breeze--the interminable reaches of
forest, upon which the shadows played and flitted, deepening the effect
and mellowing the mass, as we see them in Ruysdael's pictures--while now
and then some tall-gabled, antiquated chateau, with its mutilated terrace
and dowager-like air of bye-gone grandeur, would peep forth at the end of
some long avenue of lime trees, all having their own features of
beauty--and a beauty with which every object around harmonizes well.
The sluggish peasant, in his blouse and striped night-cap--the he