Enough of pictures.  The principal subject of political discussion since I have been in England, has been the expediency of allowing Jews to sit in Parliament.  You have seen by what a large majority Baron Rothschild has been again returned from the city of London, after his resignation, in spite of the zealous opposition of the conservatives.  It is allowed, I think, on all hands, that the majority of the nation are in favor of allowing Jews to hold seats in Parliament, but the other side urge the inconsistency of maintaining a Christian Church as a state institution, and admitting the enemies of Christianity to a share in its administration.  Public opinion, however, is so strongly against political disabilities on account of religious faith, that with the aid of the ministry, it will, no doubt, triumph, and we shall see another class of adversaries of the Establishment making war upon it in the House of Commons.  Nor will it be at all surprising if, after a little while, we hear of Jewish barons, earls, and marquises in the House of Peers.  Rothschild himself may become the founder of a noble line, opulent beyond the proudest of them all.

The protectionist party here are laboring to persuade the people that the government have committed a great error, in granting such liberal conditions to the trade of other nations, to the prejudice of British industry.  They do not, however, seem to make much impression on the public mind.  The necessaries of life are obtained at a cheaper rate than formerly, and that satisfies the people.  Peel has been making a speech in Parliament on the free-trade question, which I often hear referred to as a very able argument for the free-trade policy.  Neither on this question nor on that of the Jewish disabilities, do the opposition seem to have the country with them.

Letter LI.

A Visit to the Shetland Isles.

Aberdeen, July 19, 1849.

Two days ago I was in the Orkneys; the day before I was in the Shetland Isles, the “farthest Thule” of the Romans, where I climbed the Noup of the Noss, as the famous headland of the island of Noss is called, from which you look out upon the sea that lies between Shetland and Norway.

From Wick, a considerable fishing town in Caithness, on the northern coast of Scotland, a steamer, named the Queen, departs once a week, in the summer months, for Kirkwall, in the Orkneys, and Lerwick, in Shetland.  We went on board of her about ten o’clock on the 14th of July.  The herring fishery had just begun, and the artificial port of Wick, constructed with massive walls of stone, was crowded with fishing vessels which had returned that morning from the labors of the night; for in the herring fishery it is only in the night that the nets are spread and drawn.  Many of the vessels had landed their cargo; in others the fishermen were busily disengaging the herrings from the black nets and throwing them in heaps; and