the people of Epworth and Misterton* thought it was a convenient time to pay back their old grudge, and revenge the foreigners' victory in the law courts by force of arms. When harvest was nearly ripe, they gathered themselves together in a tumultuous mob and destroyed the houses and growing crops on the low lands to the value of upwards of twenty thousand pounds; not content with reeking their fury on the new comers, every sign of authority seemed odious to them. They defaced Epworth church, tore up the ten commandments, and buried filthy carrion under the communion table. And, not satiated with this, a furious rabble tore up the gates of Snow Sewer, where the water from a great part of the newly drained land flowed into the Trent, and thus endeavoured to reduce the country to its old state of unprofitableness. Some quaint stories are told of the way in which the mob shewed its hate to the new-comers. When Snow Sewer was

destroyed, it is reported that they erected stakes in the form of a gallows to show, by an easily understood symbol, what would be the fate of its restorers. Several of the settlers and their workpeople were thrown into the water and held under with long poles until they were almost drowned, and one unfortunate Dutchman is said to have been set floating on the river Trent, when the tide was ebbing seaward, among the branches of an uprooted elder-tree, with instructions to "go back to Dutchland." The poor man is reported to have escaped the perils of so long a voyage by being stranded on the opposite bank, where men's minds were not so passionately inflamed. He was, therefore, protected and kindly treated.

Things remained in this state for some years; at length, in 1645, the Parliament took what seemed forcible steps to put an end to this lawlessness and to preserve the remains of the property of the settlers. Fighting of a desultory kind, however, was kept up until 1650, when another violent riot occurred, in which the Flemish Chapel at Sandtoft was sacked and eighty-two houses of the settlers destroyed. For ten days the Islemen were in open and avowed rebellion. Colonel Wildman and the notorious John Lilburne were their leaders on this occasion. Lilburne's language was, as usual, grotesquely violent; he called the Parliament "a Parliament of clouts," said he "could make a better Parliament himself, and would when he went to London,” and used various other highly offensive expressions. It was not until late in the reign of Charles the Second that these violent outbreaks were finally suppressed.

Had the settlement been permitted to go in peace, there can be little doubt that one half of the district would have been peopled by

*Misterton is not in the Isle of Axholme. It lies across the Nottinghamshire border, but was included in Vermuyden's drainage scheme.

persons of Dutch and Flemish blood. The constant state of alarm in which the earlier settlers lived hindered fresh supplies coming in from abroad, so that the infusion of foreign blood has not been so great as might have been looked for. The foreigners had a church or chapel at Sandtoft, and the register of this place from 1641 to 1681 was seen by Mr. Hunter, the learned historian of South Yorkshire. It has now strangely disappeared. If this record should ever be discovered, it would no doubt furnish us with nearly a complete list of the foreign families, and, possibly, in some cases might give indications as to what part of the Continental Low Countries was their native home.

If it had

One of their account books, now in my possesion, gives a list of the landowners in 1635, but this goes but a small way to forming a complete list of those who came over, as the servants and workpeople would be far greater than those who could afford to settle as farmers. No attempt has been made to estimate their numbers. They must have been far more numerous than is commonly thought. not been so, during the stormy times of our great civil war they would not have been enabled to keep up what was little short of a continuous warfare with the old inhabitants. Many of the old names yet exist in the Isle or the immediate neighbourhood, shewing unmistakably, by their foreign sound, that their owners are sprung from Dutch or Flemish settlers; but the strongest evidence we have is the present appearance of the people. If the whole history of these transactions were lost, that alone would shew that the present Islemen had inherited other blood than their neighbours east of Trent. Their build is decidedly larger, their under-jaw more massive, hair lighter, feet and hands proportionately larger. There is a greater proportion of blue eyes, and it is said (but on this I have no means of judging) that the teeth have a much slighter tendency to decay. They have not preserved, as far as is known, a single word of their old language in their present folk speech, but the accent of their dialect has a distinct resemblance to the modern Flemish, and is, on that account, very distinct from that of Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, or the other parts of the county of Lincoln. The women work constantly in the fields, in a manner familiar to everyone who has crossed the Channel, but strange to those whose experiences are only insular.

Nearly the whole of the land in the Isle of Axholme is in the hands of small freeholders, and, as a consequence, the people are industrious and frugal in no ordinary degree.

THE THEORY OF THE ARTS.*

THIS is an elaborate and painstaking treatise. Mr. Harris has brought to his task great research, close observation, profound and matured thought, knowledge, taste, and feeling for the beauties of nature and art. The whole work, of over 600 pages 8vo., is pre-eminently characterised by one quality, that of reverence. We specially notice this, as we are convinced that, without reverence, it is impossible even to understand, far less to achieve, anything great either in art or science. To give a thorough analysis of this work would require several notices. We must endeavour to convey a general idea of its contents, by glancing at the points which struck us as most salient, during our perusal. In limine, we entirely agree with the remarks in Chapter 1, Section 9, on The Religious Influences and Application of Art. Mr. Harris thinks "we greatly err in not employing pictorial composition for this the highest purpose for which it could be used," and refutes most successfully the religious objections, based not on the use, but the abuse of the arts. He observes (page 26) on the ludicrous inconsistency of certain zealous protestants in their determination to exclude Papal ornaments from our churches: "All scriptural paintings, even those calculated to excite the most devotional feelings, are utterly forbidden to enter, while sculptured monuments of the most heathenish and irreverent character, in many cases erected to memorialise persons of immoral and irreligious lives, are admitted without scruple and without restraint. In our abhorrence of Popery, we have sought refuge in Paganism. The church has been converted into a Pantheon; tombs are placed there to record the bad acts of bad men, to the exclusion of all representations of the actions of Him, to whom the temple is devoted. Painting suspected to be Popish is rigidly excluded, only to afford room for sculpture undeniably Pagan."

It is, doubtless, owing to the prejudice against pictures as savouring of Popery, that there should be such a marked contrast between Catholic and Protestant churches, as regards paintings. We know no reason to be urged against pictures in a church, which would not prove equally valid against the sister arts of sculpture, archi

*The Theory of the Arts; or, Art in Relation to Nature, Civilisation, and Man. Comprising an Investigation, Analytical, and Critical, into the Origin, Rise, Province, Principles, and Application of each of the Arts. By George Harris, F.S.A., of the Middle Temple, Barrister-at-law; author of Civilisation considered as a Science. 2 vols. Trübner and Co. 1869.

tecture, and music, vocal and instrumental.

We make a compromise

as to painted windows. But if paintings on glass are consistent with devotion and the purity of our reformed worship, why should not paintings on canvas be admissible?

Our author traces the origin in the mind of every species of art, of which he enumerates nine forms: Painting, Sculpture, Poetry, Eloquence, Music, Architecture, Dramatic Acting, Costume, and Gardening. The germ of all these exists, active or passive, more or less, in every human mind. Indeed, were it otherwise, the productions of art could not meet with sympathy and appreciation from mankind at large. With the great majority, these artistic powers are wholly passive, in many doubtless, completely latent, or so slightly developed, as to be practically inappreciable; but still susceptible of growth and education. With the comparatively few, they are active, and are evinced in the production, or appreciation of works of art. Man has a natural propensity to imitate. He is not only fond of the art of imitating, but is pleased with successful efforts of this nature. Our author observes that, "although animals as well as man derive pleasure from imitation, yet they never appear to experience any gratification from works produced by this effect, which is a purely intellectual operation." There are, however, authentic instances of animals being deceived by pictures. Humboldt relates a curious instance of a monkey, who recognised engravings of insects and reptiles, and tried to seize the supposed animals; and what makes the fact still more extraordinary, is that the engravings were not coloured! There is, however, a faculty beyond imitation, and far more exalted—that of origination or invention, or as it is sometimes called creation, and our author finely says: "Surely, if the creative power of man is that which causes him most to resemble God, of all his pursuits that of art must be considered as the most divine.” (Chapter II, Section 7, p. 60.)

One great advantage of the study of painting and sculpture is, that they lead to a real taste for nature, and an admiration of her fairest scenes. When we consider how evidently adapted the beauties of this visible world are to man's faculties, the mind is profoundly impressed with a sense of reverence and gratitude, and we are led from the contemplation of nature up to nature's God. Chapter III deals with the invention of the different arts, drawing a distinction between their origin in the mind, or conception, and their invention, or manifest execution, or production. Painting and sculpture subsist by themselves independently, and are at once produced by the imitative effect which calls them into being. Other arts cannot exist independently, but require to be grafted on some other pursuit or sus

taining medium; e.g., architecture is grafted on building, and eloquence on speech. The necessities of mankind drove them to construct habitations. These they ornamented by imitating natural structures, trees, foliage, etc. Thus arose architecture. "Architecture is to building what eloquence is to language" (p. 85). One would like to believe that portrait-painting was first invented by a Grecian maiden tracing on a wall the outline of her sleeping lover's shadow. "As shadows may be deemed the inventive cause of painting, so the impressions left by objects pressing on earth or stone, may in the same manner, be considered as the inventive cause of engraving, a branch of this art." (page 70.)

Sculpture appears the most simple of all the arts, as regards its invention, through mere imitation of nature. Blocks of stone or trunks of trees bearing a fanciful resemblance to men or animals were roughly hewn, so as to render the imitation more perfect. Thus we may trace the gradual progress of this sublime art till its culmination in Greece in such statues as the Laocoon, the Apollo, and "the statue that enchants the world." Poetry is the natural speech of unsophisticated man. Primitive man, beholding the glories of sun-rise and sun-set, (especially in those climates where such effects are most gorgeous) was impelled to express the emotions of his heart. How magnificently has Buffon described the perception of beauty ministered through each sense, and the effect of the contemplation of nature upon the first man! Every savage expresses himself in poetical language. In the artificial life of civilisation, where close communion with nature is hindered by carking cares, and daily necessities, such mode of expression becomes comparatively rare. Nevertheless, there are few persons of liberal education who have not in youth attempted poetical composition, and it is remarkable that fifty or a hundred persons rhyme with fluency, for one individual who can write prose elegantly, or even correctly. Coleridge has remarked that the first person who expressed himself fluently in prose, must have excited far more astonishment in his hearers, than would be produced by the more natural and common, emotional, spasmodic, and unconnected utterances of poetry. It is not always easy to make a distinction between poetry and eloquence, so closely are these arts connected. Mr. Harris defines the essential distinction between them in Chapter v, Section 5.

The invention of music is easily explicable in the attempts of man to imitate the various harmonious sounds of nature, e.g., the melody of birds, the numerous sounds produced by animals, the murmur of the gently flowing stream, the sighing of the winds through the trees, etc. Even sounds of an opposite kind, such as the howling