that the industry of our forefathers must have had a long and painful struggle before it could have bequeathed to us such magnificent accumulations as we now enjoy. The writers who lived at the periods when Europe was slowly emerging from ignorance and poverty, through the first slight union of capital and labour as voluntary exchangers, complain of the increase of comforts as indications of the growing luxury and effeminacy of the people. Harrison says, "In times past men were contented to dwell in houses builded of sallow, willow, plum-tree, or elm; so that the use of oak was dedicated to churches, religious houses, princes' palaces, noblemen's lodgings, and navigation. But now, these are rejected, and nothing but oak any whit regarded. And yet see the change; for when our houses were builded of willow, then had we oaken men; but now that our houses are made of oak, our men are not only become willow, but many, through Persian delicacy crept in among us, altogether of straw, which is a sore alteration. In those days, the courage of the owner was a sufficient defence to keep the house in safety; but now, the assurance of the timber, double doors, locks, and bolts, must defend the man from robbing. Now have we many chimneys, and our tenderlings complain of rheums, catarrhs, and poses. Then had we none but rere-dosses, and our heads did never ache." These complaints go upon the same principle that made it a merit in Epictetus, the Greek philosopher, to have had no door to his hovel. We think he would have been a wiser man if he had contrived to have had a door. A story is told of a Highland chief, Sir Evan Cameron, that himself and a party of his followers being benighted, and compelled to sleep in the open air, when his son rolled up a ball of snow and laid his head upon it for a pillow, the rough old man kicked it away, exclaiming, "What, sir! are you turning effeminate?" We doubt whether Sir Evan Cameron and his men were braver than the English officers who fought at Waterloo; and yet many of these marched from the ball-room at Brussels in their holiday attire, and won the battle in silk stockings. It is an old notion that plenty of the necessaries and conveniences of life renders a nation feeble. We are told that the Carthaginian soldiers whom Hannibal carried into Italy were suddenly rendered effeminate by the abundance which they found around them at Capua. The commissariat of modern nations goes upon another principle; and believes that unless the soldier has plenty of food and clothing he will not fight with alacrity and steadiness. The half-starved soldiers of Henry V. won the battle of Agincourt; but it was not because they were half-starved, but because they roused their native courage to cut their way out of the peril by which they were surrounded. The Russians of our time had a notion that the English could not fight on land, because for forty years we had been a commercial instead of a military nation.