The Sun.
London, England, 1864-06-04 00:00:00

Rothschild's Bank,

Notwithstanding
131,: avarice in ordinary life,
Nathan ltatheehild was fond et owing his wealth
in luxurious entertaiiients and mai."nous ban-
quets, to which he invited the aristocracy or :lank
and birth—though not that of talent. Veers and
princes of the blood sat at his table; bishops and
archbishops bowed before him ; and those who
preached loudest N.; ainst Mammon were foremost in
worshipping the successful representative of the
golden guinea. At his grand entertainment, Nathan,
who was really a very uneducated man, and scarcely
able to write, covered hs ignorance by an effected
brusquerie of speech and manner which, though it
imposed on some, made him extremely ludicrous in
the eyes of others. Thus ho was a constant mark for
the satirists of the day. His huge and slovenly
appearance; the lounging attitude he assumed
when leaning against his pillar at the Royal
Exchange ; his rugged speech, with strongly
marked Jewish accent and idiom, made caricature
easy, and gave him up an helpless victim to his
enemies. Of these he had many—some of them
created, no doubt, by envy—but also a large num-
ber of others whom he had ruined, or who had
fancied themselves ruined by him. Few weeks
passed in the latter part of his career without his
receiving threatening letters, informing him that
unless he should deposit a certain sum of money at
a given place he would be shot, or poisoned, or,
more liberally, blown up in his house in Piccadilly.
These threats sometimes took such an effoct upon
Nathan Rothschild as to haunt him like a night-
mare. One day two tall, moustachioed men—it
must be remembered that this was the anti-mou-
stachioed period—were shown into his private par-
lour at the St. Swithin's-lane counting house.
Nathan bowed ; the visitors bowed. Nathan arose;
and his beardedvisitors moved close up to him, their
hands fumbling about in the pockets of their great-
coats. Nathan saw it at a glance—the moustachioed
fellows had come to shoot him, their hands searching
foe deadly weapons in their pockets. Quick as light
ning, Nathan took up his brass-bound ledger and
hurled it at the heads of the strangers, at the same
screaming " Murder !" in a paroxysm of fright.
The screams brought all the clerks and porters of
the house into the sanctum of the millionnaire.
Explanations took place place, when it was found
that the two thousand moustachioed strangers were
rich bankers from abroad, who, with a little nervous
anxiety in the presence of the Cmiar of the Stock
Exchange, had fumbled in their pockets for letters
of introduction and other necessary credentials.
" You must be a happy man, Mr. Rothschild," said
once a gentleman sitting at N than's banquetting
table, and glancing around at the superb appoint.
meats of the mansion of his host. " Happy !—me
happy !" was the reply. " What! happy, when
just as you are going to dine you have a letter
placed in -ybur hands, " saying, " If you do not
send me £5OO, I will blow your brains out ?'
Happy ! me happy !"—lnstead of with his wife,
Nathan frequently slept with a pair of' loaded pis-
tols by his side. Poor Nathan !—Railway News.

Original Letters of Daniel Defoe.
_.,_____

It will be seen, by'a reference to their dates, that

they apply to a period of Defoe's life of which no.

thing has been hitherto known. In the reign of
Queen Anne he had been sent, by the instrumenta-
lity of Harley, into Scotland to watch and report
measures touching the Union. He committed his
observations to paper, and they are full cf that
peculiar talent in which Defoe excelled—pithy and
pointed descriptions of the chief actors who took
part in those momentous debates. In the course of
his observations the writer had represented the
party of the Cavaliers in favourable colours; he had
even ventured to present his patron, Godolphin,
and the Duke of Marlborough, in an odious light,
as eclipsing the dignity and authority of the Queen.
The work was not ready for publication until
1714, when George I. bad ascended the throne; the
fories were now in disgrace, and the Whigs had
monopolized the King's favour. With a baseness,
happily singular in the annals of literature, Thefee
printed his work and published it anonymously, for
reasons which Rill appear afterwards. But in order
to neutralize any favourable impressions on behalf
of the party by whom he had been employed end
make his peace with the Whigs, he prefaced it with
an introduction, written in the spirit and tone of a
Whig, professing the utmost abhorrence for "a set
of men in both kingdoms, who had the felonious in-
tentions towards their country, " and been a con-
stant dead-weight upon the Revolution." He pre-
tended that the book had come by accident into the
possession of the publisher, and had been designed
by some Tory high-flyer " for the triumph of another
day," when liberty and the Protestant religion
would have been emtinguished ; and, therefore,
every expression favourable to the Tory and High
Church party was the servile praise of an author
hostile to the real interests of his country. Next
year (1715) appeared a defence of Defoe's public
conduct, evidently emanating from himself, though
ostensibly given to the world by his publisher, lett
incomplete, and so artfully worded, that whilst it
defended his intimacy with Harley, the Whigs and
dissenters were led to believe that Defoe had re-
mained faithful to tbeir principles. It concluded
with this solemn appeal—" I cannot doubt bet some

1 time or other it will please God to open men's eyes. A
constant steady adhering to personal virtue and to
public peace, which, I thank God, Ica n appeal to Him
has always been my practice, will at last restore me
to the opinion of sober and iropartia; men, and that
is all I desire." With this solemn protest on his lips,
Defoe continued rot only a Tory ostensibly, but, as
such, was the conductor of a journal in the interest
of the Tories. AB such he offered to sell himself
and his principles to Walpole and Townshend, then
omnipotent in royal favour. His own account of
his interview with the latter exposes a piece of ras-
cality we will not trust any other words than his
own to describe :—" In considering, after this,
which way I might be most useful to the Govern-
ment, it was proposed by my Lord Townshend
that I should still appear, as if I were
as before under the displeasure of the Govern-
ment, and separated from the Whigs, and
that I might be more serviceable in a kind of dis-
guise than if I appeared openly." Oa this under-
standing, alike discreditable to Defoe and his
employers, ho was to manage the Tory paper in
such a way as that the style should continue Tory,
" the party be amused, and the sting of it taken
out." So, whilst to his employer and his readers
Defoe represented himself as an enemy to the
Government, and estranged from the Whigs, he
engaged to do all in his power as editor to bring all
attacks upon the Government into contempt, and
betray the secrets of the paper he was employed to
conduct. In his own words, "Whilst the journal
should pass as a Tory paper, it should be disabled
and enervated, so as to do no mischief or give any
offence to the Government."—London Review.

SINGULAR CHARGE OF STEALING NEWSPAPERS.
—At Blackburn, yesterday, Nathaniel Eccles, yarn
agent, of Hoddlesden, near Blackburn, was charged with
stealing two newspapers—the Manchester Guardian and the
Times—from the Exchange News-room. The prisoner, who
has been a member of the trews •room for about three months,
was seen to handle the papers somewhat suspiciously by the
secretary, who, owing to the theft of a number of papers
from the room during the past six months, had secreted
himself so that he could observe what passed in the news-
room without being seen. Yesterday morning, about eleven
o'clock, he saw the prisoner and another member in the room.
The prisoner took up a copy of the 21anchester Guardian,
and, after looking around the room, he put the paper in
his pocket. Be then took a Copy of the limes, and the
other member having left the room, the prisoner put the
'Limes into his pocket and followed. Whin at the door he
was stopped by the secretary, who told him he beli:ved he
had some papers which did not belong to him. " Weil,"
he replied, "I have got the Illanchester Guardian," and
4ave that paper to the secretary, who told him that he had
another paper. He then produced the copy of the Times
remarking that he was going to Colne, and wished to read
the paper as he went. Ile was given into emitody, and
when charged, replied, "I brought the papers out with
me, but I did not know that 1 was doing wrong, I am only
a new member." The defence was, that it was the custom
for members of the Darwen news-room to take papers
away with them, and that the prisoner had done so without
any felonious intent, tlr, Clough objected that the bench,
who were also members of thn news-room, had no jurisdic-
tion, and that the prisoner could not bo charged with steal•
tag his own property. The bench, however, committed
him for trial, but admitted him to bail,—.2llziellester
Guardian.

tialTrt
CA:
lierfo, trpti.
44 MI;