were some fragments of glazed medieval pottery of a later period-probably of the sixteenth century-which the sexton ingeniously accounted for by supposing them to be the remains of the jugs out of which the men who collected the bones drank

their beer! It is a curious circumstance that there was once a similar collection of bones in Folkestone church, which we now

know to have stood on or by the site of an early Anglo-Saxon cemetery.

In confirmation of Mr. Wright's opinion, we may add, that Saxon sepulchral remains have been frequently found on the high ground at the back of Hythe church.

:

THE name of Rachel Russell is one for which, Protestants as we are, we are well nigh tempted to demand canonization. Still, with ever new wonder and admiring love, do we return to each memorial of that noble woman; to the proofs of a submission to the Divine Will, and fidelity to the memory of her earthly lord, not to be read only in expressions of pious resignation and of faithful love; but in the course of a long life, filled, as few lives have been, with positive acts of duty marked also by the cultivation and exercise of a sound judgment in all things. Who is there whose character, take it for all in all, is richer in qualities which seldom meet in one and the same person? Gentleness and can dour, combined with a very keen sense of indignation against moral wrong,sympathy with the young,-tenderness to the weak, with severe judgments of herself. Neither soured, nor spoiled, nor deadened in her perceptions by trial; ready for every emergency; humble, but not to be diverted from any right purpose; quiet, brave, simple, just, and loving-can this picture be thought overcharged? To us, indeed, every trace of this remarkable woman is sacred, and, under other circumstances, we would not willingly have been among those who have made her private memorials and letters common to all the world. But it is far too late in the day for reserve. The confidential outpourings of Rachel Russell, the loving wife and mourning widow, are the rich inheritance of every reading English man or woman, and our testimony of gratitude for such treasures is all that remains for us to bestow.

In order to explain the special cha

racteristic of this new edition of the famous Letters, it is necessary to go back to the year 1819. In that year Miss Berry, whose decease, at the advanced age of ninety, we but lately chronicled, was appointed, or permitted, by the Duke of Devonshire to edit a series of letters from Lady Rachel Russell to her Lord, which, preserved in the archives of Devonshire House, had, till then, never been published; although those letters which were written subsequent to Lord Russell's execution had, long before, been familiar to English readers. Miss Berry accompanied this edition (in 4to.) by a Memoir, the best which has appeared before or since, which was afterwards reprinted in a fragmentary work entitled, "A Comparative View of Social Life in England and France," in 2 vols. 1844. Meanwhile a new edition of the Life of William Lord Russell by Lord John Russell being called for, it seems to have struck the noble biographer of the husband, that a complete edition of the Letters of the wife, of corresponding size, would be adviseable, and we have accordingly, for the first time, the two series united-the letters before and after Lady Russell's widowhood. To those who possess both works this arrangement is useful; yet it fails in the desired completeness, so far as Lady Russell is concerned. It is surely to be complained of, not without reason, that the Letters should have been thus flung upon the public, accompanied merely by foot-notes and a very short introduction. A violence is done to the reader's feelings by passing, without a pause, without even the intervention of a significant blank page, from a fond, endearing letter addressed to the living husband, in which the

moments that were to pass before a happy meeting are almost counted, and one from the widow to her uncle, and to the Lord Privy Seal. Surely Lord John Russell, if, as we suppose, the initials J. R., appended to the introduction, mark this edition as being under his superintendence, should have looked to this point. It is revolting to the feelings to pass from a picture of pure domestic happiness thus at once into the presence of utter desolation; and it is neither truthful nor natural to give no trace of the dreadful scenes that intervened. not this barbarous mode of throwing down original documents without a connecting link, so that each reader must contrive to spell out the true story as he can. A question will also be asked, why, if there be no better Memoir than Miss Berry's (and it is very sufficient, reliable, and fairly written,) it should not have been appended or interwoven with the original documents ? *

We like

In making these observations, let it not be supposed that we undervalue the uses of the foot-notes, many of which are by Miss Berry, while some have been added by Mr. Martin, the librarian of Woburn Abbey. A few letters not before published at all, appear also in this edition; but the most remarkable new contribution is a letter addressed by Lady Russell to her children, and dated on the anniversary of her husband's execution. To this we shall again recur.

First, however, we must say a few words about the earlier series, when Lady Russell, still bearing her first married name of Vaughan, writes to her husband, yet un-ennobled. A wife and a mother, we know, she had been before; but so early in life, according to the parental orderings of that time, that it is fair to conclude the strength of her affections had not been called forth. Her baby died almost immediately after its baptism, and Lord Vaughan himself soon followed: so she carried her wealth of soul, and person, and purse, to Mr. Russell, second son of the Earl of Bedford, in the close of

the year 1669. Her parentage and early years have all the light possible thrown on them by Miss Berry, to whose Memoir we refer the reader, as also for the following remarks on this series of the Letters:

The first letters in the following series husband, Mr. Russell, in the spring of the are addressed by Lady Vaughan to her year 1672. They are continued, at distant intervals, to within a twelvemonth of his death. They are few, for during the fourteen happy years of their union they were little apart. Their only moments of separation seem to have been some visits of duty to his father when living entirely at Woburn, or during his elections for two successive Parliaments; some short absences in London, on private or political business, and his attendance at Oxford during the only session of the Parliament so suddenly dismissed by Charles.

These letters are written with such a neglect of style, and often of grammar, as may disgust the admirers of well-turned periods, and they contain such frequent repetitions of homely tenderness as may shock the sentimental readers of the present day. But they evince the enjoyment of a happiness, built on such rational foundations, and so truly appreciated by its possessors, as too seldom occurs in the history of the human heart. They are impressed too with the marks of a cheerful mind, a social spirit, and every indication of a character prepared, as well to enjoy the sunshine as to meet the storms

of life.

Thus gifted, and thus situated, her tender and prophetic exhortations both to her Lord and herself, to merit the continuance of such happiness, and to secure its perfect enjoyment by being prepared for its loss, are not less striking than his entire and absolute confidence in her character, and attachment to her society.

The death of Mr. Russell's elder brother in 1678, caused the title to devolve on Lord William, and then first the well-known name of Rachel Russell is presented to the reader, for heretofore she had retained that of Vaughan. Two daughters and a son were born during these fourteen happy years. Once, at least, it would seem in the course of this time that the fond wife had an alarm,—a boding of what might

ment of his committal she worked with the industry of a practised lawyer in collecting evidence and information as to the course likely to be pursued against him, adopting every possible precaution in his behalf. It is said that her appearance in the court on his trial caused a thrill and murmur of anguish throughout the assembly; and when the prisoner requested leave to employ a person to take notes at the trial, and was answered that a servant would be allowed him for the purpose, Lord Russell's immediate rejoinder, "My wife, my lord, is here to do it,' must have occasioned yet a deeper and more thrilling emotion. We pass over the cruel scenes that ensued: the unjust verdict; the unrelenting tenacity of the King, who suffered the daughter of his old friend Southampton to kneel at his feet in vain; the aggravated bitterness of the Duke of York, who, it was said, wanted to have the execution take place in front of Southampton House, which occupied the north side of what is now Bloomsbury Square. Thus much is certain, that, dear as was the life of her lord to her, Lady Russell, firmly believing in his innocence, would not, any more than himself, listen to any abject or base compliance. When Tillotson would fain have prevailed on him to own that "resistance to kingly authority was in every case unlawful," he replied "that he could not utter a lie." "I can have no conception," he afterwards added, "of a limited monarchy which has not a right to defend its own limitations : my conscience will not permit me to That say otherwise to the King."* these sentiments were partaken by his wife Tillotson knew so well, as that when, after all was over, he appeared for the first time in her presence, his consciousness of ill desert, in having

How, with such intense love, her unflinching uprightness gained the victory, is known only to Him at whose throne her devout spirit sought strength and aid. She was aware that plans had been laid for his escape, even at the last; but, knowing that he deemed them dangerous and likely to involve others, it does not appear that she troubled him with any entreaties to avail himself of them; and at her final parting, the night before the execution, she left him without allowing a single sob of passion to disturb his heavenly composure. And so she returned to her home, hopeless of earthly relief, and feeling that all her prayers must now be for the future meeting in that world to which her dearest treasure was going.

A very few days had passed after the cruel event ere the lion spirit in her was again aroused by a cruel attack on his memory. The court affected to believe that the paper delivered by Lord Russell to the sheriffs was not his own. She wrote emphatically to the King

I do therefore humbly beg your Majesty would be so charitable to believe, that he who in all his life was observed to act with the greatest clearness and sincerity, would not at the point of death do so disingenuous and false a thing as to deliver for his own what was not properly and expressly so. And if, after the loss in such a manner of the best husband in the world, I were capable of any consolation, your Majesty only could afford it by having better thoughts of him, which, when I was so importunate to speak with your Majesty, I thought I had some reason to believe I should have inclined you to, not from the credit of my word, but upon the evidence of what I had to say. I hope I have written nothing in this that will dis