horrible the evils to be dreaded. The clergy preached about Bonaparte out of the Revelations; conjurers and “wise-men,” greater authorities even then than the clergy, saw a connection between Bonaparte and the strange lights which every one had seen in the heavens! The popular notion was that “Boney” was an undefined, horrible monster, who had a sheep dressed every morning for breakfast, who required an ox for his dinner, and had six little English children cooked—when he could get them—for supper! At the name of “Boney” naughty children were frightened, and a false alarm of his coming and landing often made grown-up men turn pale. “This way and that the anxious mind is torn.” The impulse was in proportion to the alarm; the determination raised was spirited and praiseworthy. Stout hearts constituted an _impromptu_ force, daily advancing in organization, with arms and accoutrements, ready to march with knapsacks to any point where numbers might be required. Once or twice, when a company received orders to march, as to Bridgnorth, for instance, an alarm was created among wives, daughters, and sweethearts, that they were about to join the battalion for active service, and stories are told of leave-takings and weepings on such occasions. Beacons were erected, and bonfires prepared on the highest points of the country round, as being the quickest means of transmitting news of the approach of an enemy. Of these watch-fire signals, Macaulay says:— “On and on, without a horse untired, they hounded still All night from tower to tower, they sprang from hill to hill, Till the proud peak unfurled the flag o’er Derwent’s rocky dales,— Till like volcanoes flared to heaven the stormy hills of Wales,— Till twelve fair counties saw the blaze on Malvern’s lonely height,— Till streamed in crimson on the wind the Wrekin’s crest of light— Till broad and fierce the star came forth on Elsig’s stately fane, And tower and hamlet rose in arms o’er all the boundless plain.”