In the year 1851 my magisterial duties, which did not indeed afford any incident worthy of being particularized, were interrupted by a severe attack of gastric fever; on my recovery from which, I was directed by my medical attendant to proceed to Wiesbaden, and take such baths and drink such mineral waters as should be prescribed by a certain English physician residing there, Dr. Lewis. I waited on the Chief Secretary, Sir William Somerville, who subsequently became Lord Athlumney, and requested leave of absence for a month or six weeks. He took a printed form of reply, directed it to me, and signed it. By this document I was granted "leave of absence for ----." On remarking to him that he had not specified the duration of the indulgence, the worthy gentleman was pleased to compliment me by saying, "I have left a blank for the time. Go, and stay until your health and strength are completely renovated, and fill up the blank at your return. You are deserving of the most favourable treatment." I record with gratitude and pride such an acknowledgment of my anxious endeavours to discharge my official duties with efficiency; but I must also say that kindness and benignity were amongst his prominent characteristics. I left Dublin at the latter end of May, and proceeded through London to Ostend, and from thence by railway to Bonn, where I commenced ascending "the wide and winding Rhine." Whilst waiting at the wharf for the steamer, and contemplating "The castled crag of Drachenfels," I thought of Byron's lines, in which he describes the scenery which appeared so enchanting to Childe Harold, and also how "Peasant girls with deep blue eyes, And hands which offer early flowers, Walk smiling o'er this paradise;" and I felt that the landscape before me transcended even his description. I had, however, the greatest contrast offered to my view so far as regarded eyes, hands, or smiles. Four females approached with flowers, which they desired to sell. They were all old women, and they constituted, in their features and figures, the most complete realization of hideous ugliness. It is not my intention to attempt any description of the scenes which successively astonished and delighted me whilst proceeding up the Rhine from Bonn to Mentz. I would fully adopt the unexaggerated truth contained in four short lines-- "The river nobly foams and flows, The charm of this enchanted ground, And all its thousand turns disclose Some fresher beauties varying round."