invincibility, let any confederacy of the aristocracy, the press, the Orangemen, or any other men, be they who they will, assail him, -is here disclosed. As Raumer justly remarks,- "Even the popular talent of so distinguished a mind as Brougham's, wears itself out, because it sometimes trusts more to rhetoric than to truth. O'Connell, on the other hand, whenever his powers fail him, lays himself down on the soil of his injured country, and rises, like a new Antæus, to fresh struggles."

The extracts we have made from this work, are almost entirely descriptive of Ireland. They shew how extensively every thing that relates to this country enters into the consideration of an intelligent traveller, whose chief object it was to become acquainted with the actual state of England in 1835. He could scarcely glance over a single Parliamentary debate recorded in Hansard, without meeting the wrongs of Ireland in almost every page. He found in her a volume of history such as he was utterly unprepared for such as, with all his research, he has not encountered amidst the archives of any other nation upon the earth. His pages contain a great mass of the most interesting matter connected with the condition of England. What endless contrasts do not those pages present between the two sister islands! There, where the great majority have long enjoyed the benefits of a free constitution, and of equal laws, wealth abounds to an extent impossible to be estimated; and, as Raumer aptly expresses it, "the coal-fire of industry and thought burns steadily the livelong day." Here, where the British constitution is still unknown in practice, and where equality of law exists not in theory, half a million of our population are beggars, upon a land teeming with fertility, and three millions are scarcely a degree above pauperism. What a commentary upon the system of government of which we have been the victims! What an illustration of the blessings bestowed by the Church of the few upon the labours of the many!

ART. VII.-Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk, as exhibited in a Narrative of her Sufferings during a Residence of Five Years as a Novice, and Two Years as a Black Nun, in the Hôtel Dieu Nunnery at Montreal. 12mo. London, 1836. A BOOK bearing the above title has just appeared in London. It is a verbal reprint from the original edition published in New York in January last; and its object is to calumniate the members of the Catholic religious establishments of Montreal, in Lower Canada, and thereby to cast discredit and obloquy on the professors of that faith generally.

A work of such a character will not long be without patrons. We may expect it to find immediate favour with all those, who are led by their prejudices or interests to seize upon any extravagant tale which seems to tell against the objects of their bigoted hate, without giving themselves the trouble to inquire into its truth, or even its probability.

Indeed, large extracts from it have already been inserted in several of the London journals, especially in the Standard, which may be said to live upon the circulation of falsehoods of every kind against the doctrines and members of the Catholic Church. "The details here given," says that calumnious print, alluding to the publication now before us, "are almost beyond the bounds of credibility, but we are assured that every word is true. Can we wonder, then, at the crimes and demoralization of the Roman Catholics in Ireland, when under the sanction of their religion we see such profligacy and horrid enormities?" The editor who penned these lines was not altogether so devoid of shame, as to say that he believed the statements to be true, to which he lent the columns of the journal under his controul. Somebody assures him that every word Maria Monk has written "is true;" but who the informant is, what means of knowledge he possessed, what weight may be due to his testimony, the readers of the Standard are left to conjecture.

The internal evidence of the volume itself ought to be sufficient to convince any reasonable being, not utterly blinded by error, that at least "every word" it contains is not true, nor even like the truth. Indeed, there are so many passages in it indicative of a diseased mind, and so utterly irreconcilable with probability, that were there no other proof of the real character of the whole tale, these passages alone would have been abundantly sufficient to have stamped it as a falsehood from the first page to the last.

Let us hear how this precious nun introduces her awful disclosures.

"It is hoped that the reader of the ensuing narrative will not suppose that it is a fiction, or that the scenes and persons that I have delineated had not a real existence. It is also desired that the author of this volume may be regarded not as a voluntary participator in the very guilty transactions which are described; but receive sympathy for the trials which she has endured, and the peculiar situation in which her past experience, and escape from the power of the Superior of the Hôtel Dieu Nunnery, at Montreal, and the snares of the Roman priests in Canada, have left her.

"My feelings are frequently distressed and agitated by the recollection of what I have passed through; and, by night and by day, I have little peace of mind, and few periods of calm and pleasing reflection.

I have given the world the truth, so far as I have gone, on subjects of which I am told they are generally ignorant; and I feel perfect confidence that any facts which may yet be discovered, will confirm my words, whenever they can be obtained.-Whoever shall explore the Hotel Dieu Nunnery, at Montreal, will find unquestionable evidence that the descriptions of the interior of that edifice, given in this book, were furnished by one familiar with them; for whatever alterations may be attempted, there are changes which no mason or carpenter can make and effectually conceal; and, therefore, there must be plentiful evidence in that institution of the truth of my description.

*

"There are living witnesses, also, who ought to be made to speak, without fear of penances, tortures, and death; and possibly their testimony, at some future time, may be added to confirm my statements. * It would distress the reader, should I repeat the dreams with which I am often terrified at night; for I sometimes fancy myself pursued by my worst enemies; frequently I seem as if shut up again in the convent; often I imagine myself present at the repetition of the worst scenes that I have hinted at or described. Sometimes I stand by the secret place of interment in the cellar; sometimes I think I can hear the shrieks of helpless females in the hands of atrocious men; and sometimes almost seem actually to look again upon the calm and placid countenance of Saint Frances, as she appeared when surrounded by her murderers."-Preface.

Thus the author confesses that she is afflicted by terrific dreams-that she imagines herself to be pursued by enemies— shut up again in the "black convent"-present once more at the hideous scenes she describes-about to be conveyed to the "secret place of interment" in the cellar-that she hears the shrieks of helpless females in the hands of atrocious men." Well, then, if the lady be subject to visions of this description, is it not just possible that some of them might have found their way into her book?

A glance at her early history, even as it stands recorded by herself, will throw some further light upon her character. Her parents, she tells us, were both from Scotland, and resided in Lower Canada. She was born at St. John's, and has spent the most of her life at Montreal. Her father was an officer under the British government. He is dead, and her mother has a pension. The latter is a Protestant. Our heroine, when about six or seven years old, went to a school kept by a Mr. Workman, a Protestant, who taught her to read and write, and arithmetic as far as division. A number of girls of her acquaintance went to school (as day scholars) to the establishment of the Congregational Nunnery, or Sisters of Charity, as they are usually called. When she was ten years old, being anxious to learn French, she obtained permission to attend the school of the

Sisters of Charity. She complains that here her time was engrossed chiefly with lessons in needlework, as if that were not a much more useful occupation for young women in her station of life, who had to earn their bread in service, than geography and the languages. "It would require," she assures us, "only a proper examination to prove, that, with the exception of needlework, hardly anything is taught excepting prayer and the catechism." What she means to say is, that these are the prominent departments of education in this day school. No sensible person will find any fault in this system. Maria, we perceive, would have had no objection to be taught music and dancing instead.

The terrible" Black Nunnery" is adjacent to that of the Sisters of Charity, being separated from it only by a wall. The Black Nunnery "professes to be a charitable institution for the care of the sick, and the supply of bread and medicines for the poor; and something is done in these departments of charity, although but an insignificant amount compared with the size of the buildings, and the number of the inmates." This is the institution which Mrs. Monk and her confederates have thought fit to libel. It is called the "Black Nunnery," from the colour of the dress worn by its inmates.

"From all that appears to the public eye, the nuns of these convents are devoted to the charitable objects appropriate to each, the labour of making different articles known to be manufactured by them, and the religious observances which occupy a large portion of their time. They are regarded with much respect by the people at large; and now and then, when a novice takes the veil, she is supposed to retire from the temptations and troubles of this world into a state of holy seclusion, where, by prayer, self-mortification, and good deeds, she prepares herself for heaven."-P. 14.

Now, here it is admitted, that these establishments, which have existed at Montreal for upwards of half a century, are regarded with much respect by the people of that place, although we shall presently learn from the evidence of Maria Monk, that one of them, at least, is the perpetual scene of every crime that can degrade religion, and disgrace human nature. But let us pro

ceed.

While Maria was at the school of the Sisters of Charity, priests regularly attended to instruct the pupils in the catechism. With a view to forward them in the essential part of Catholic education, the small catechism in common use amongst us, a copy of which any body can purchase for three pence at Keating and Brown's, was put into their hands. "But," says Maria,

"The priests soon began to teach us a new set of answers, which were not to be found in our books, from some of which I received new ideas, and got, as I thought, important light on religious subjects, which

confirmed me more and more in my belief in the Roman Catholic doctrines. These questions and answers I can still recal with tolerable accuracy, and some of them I will add here. I never have read them, as we were taught them only by word of mouth.

66 6

Question. Why did not God make all the commandments?'— Answer. Because man is not strong enough to keep them.'

66

Q. Why are men not to read the New Testament ?'-' Because the mind of man is too limited and weak to understand what God has written.'

"These questions and answers are not to be found in the common catechisms in use in Montreal and other places where I have been, but all the children in the Congregational Nunnery were taught them, and many more not in these books."

Well might Maria say that she had never read these questions and answers, and that they are not to be found in the common catechism. The first question is an absurdity in itself, and the propriety of the second may be judged of by those who take the trouble to look into the missal used by the Catholic laity, which they will find almost wholly composed of extracts from the New Testament.

We now begin to see a little of this lady's character. Her first acquaintance with the Black Nunnery arose from a service it conferred upon her.

"In the Black Nunnery is an hospital for sick people from the city; and sometimes some of our boarders, such as were indisposed, were sent there to be cured. I was once taken ill myself and sent there, where I remained a few days.

Α

"There were beds enough for a considerable number more. physician attended it daily; and there is a number of the veiled nuns of that Convent who spend most of their time there.

"These would also sometimes read lectures and repeat prayers to us."-Page 20.

Such are the practices, attending the sick, reading lectures to them, repeating prayers with them, spending most of their time with them-of the Black Nuns, whom, nevertheless, we shall, by and by, find charged by this grateful patient with the perpetration of the most horrid crimes! The only opportunity she appears ever to have had of becoming acquainted with the interior of the Nunnery in question, was that which she enjoyed on this occasion; and yet she has the audacity, as well as the ingratitude, to put forth, as a test of the truth of her narrative, the knowledge of the localities, which she acquired during the period she received from the sisterhood the most kind, the most beneficial attentions! She proceeds :

"After I had been in the Congregational Nunnery about two years,