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| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:37:09 -0700 |
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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:37:09 -0700 |
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diff --git a/11528-h/11528-h.htm b/11528-h/11528-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..144155a --- /dev/null +++ b/11528-h/11528-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1610 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" +content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /> +<title>The Mirror of Literature, Issue 341.</title> +<style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[*/ + + <!-- + body {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + p {text-align: justify;} + blockquote {text-align: justify;} + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 {text-align: center;} + pre {font-size: 0.7em;} + + hr {text-align: center; width: 50%;} + html>body hr {margin-right: 25%; margin-left: 25%; width: 50%;} + hr.full {width: 100%;} + html>body hr.full {margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 0%; width: 100%;} + hr.short {text-align: center; width: 20%;} + html>body hr.short {margin-right: 40%; margin-left: 40%; width: 20%;} + + .note, .footnote + {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + + span.pagenum + {position: absolute; left: 1%; right: 91%; font-size: 8pt;} + + .poem + {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; margin-bottom: 1em; text-align: left;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem p {margin: 0; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem p.i2 {margin-left: 1em;} + .poem p.i4 {margin-left: 2em;} + .poem p.i6 {margin-left: 3em;} + .poem p.i8 {margin-left: 4em;} + .poem p.i10 {margin-left: 5em;} + + .figure + {padding: 1em; margin: 0; text-align: center; font-size: 0.8em; margin: auto;} + .figure img + {border: none;} + .figure p + + .side { float:right; + font-size: 75%; + width: 25%; + padding-left:10px; + border-left: dashed thin; + margin-left: 10px; + text-align: left; + text-indent: 0; + font-weight: bold; + font-style: italic;} + --> + +/*]]>*/ +</style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 11528 ***</div> + +<hr class="full" /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="page321" id="page321"></a>[pg +321]</span> +<h1>THE MIRROR<br /> + OF<br /> + LITERATURE, AMUSEMENT, AND INSTRUCTION.</h1> +<hr class="full" /> +<table width="100%" summary="Banner"> +<tr> +<td align="left"><b>VOL. XII, NO. 341.]</b></td> +<td align="center"><b>SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 1828.</b></td> +<td align="right"><b>[PRICE 2d.</b></td></tr></table> +<hr class="full" /> +<div class="figcenter" style="width:100%;"> +<a href="images/341-1.png"><img width="100%" src="images/341-1.png" +alt="Grand Druidical Temple at Abury." /></a> +<h3>GRAND DRUIDICAL TEMPLE AT ABURY.</h3></div> +<hr /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page322" id="page322"></a>[pg +322]</span></p> +<h2>TEMPLE AT ABURY.</h2> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Sermons in stones</p> +<p>And good in every thing.—SHAKSPEARE.</p></div></div> +<p>What means the mysterious circle of stocks and stones on the +other side? Such will be the question of many a lover of fun, +novel, fiction, and romance; and though we cannot settle their +origin with the quickness or the humour of Munden's +<i>Cockletop</i>, we will try to let our inquirer into the secret +with the smallest show of mysticism possible.</p> +<p>Our engraving represents the Temple of Abury, the most extensive +of all the ruins in Wiltshire, attributed to the Druids. Such was +its original state, before the Vandalism of modern times destroyed +and levelled much of its monumental grandeur. It consisted of a +grand circle, containing two minor circles. The outer circle +contained upwards of 28 acres, and was surrounded by a ditch. There +was a circle within each of the two circles, contained within the +circumvallation; and according to Dr. Stukely, the antiquarian, the +original was thus composed:—</p> +<pre> +Outward circle, within the vallum 100 stones +Northern Temple, outward circle 30 — +Ditto, inward circle 12 — +Cove, or cell 3 — +Southern Temple, outward circle 30 — +Ditto, inward circle 12 — +Central Obelisk 1 — +Ring Stone 1 — +</pre> +<p>The Temple occupied a spot to which there is a gradual and +imperceptible ascent on all sides, and was approached by two +avenues of two hundred stones each. Its general form was that of a +snake, in by gone ages, the symbol of eternity and omniscience. "To +make the form still more elegant and picture-like, the head of the +snake is carried up the southern promontory of <i>Hack</i>pen +Hill—and the very name of the hill is derived from this +circumstance."<a id="footnotetag1" +name="footnotetag1"></a><a href="#footnote1"><sup>1</sup></a></p> +<p>The whole figure thus represented the circle, snake, and wings. +By this the founders meant to picture out the nature of the +Divinity; the circle meant the supreme fountain of all being, the +Father; the serpent, that divine emanation from him, which was +called the Son; the wings imported that other divine emanation from +them, which was called the Spirit, the <i>Anima Mundi</i>. That the +Temple was of a <i>religious</i>, and not of a warlike nature, is +proved by its ditch being withinside the agger of earth, contrary +to the mode adopted in works of defence.</p> +<p>Of the devastation and decay of Abury, the following data will +afford some idea:</p> +<p>The grand total of stones, included in the temples and avenues, +was 650; in the original temples, 188.</p> +<pre> +In Aubrey's time, A.D. 1663 73 stones +In Dr. Stukeley's time, A.D. 1722 29 — +In 1815 17 — +</pre> +<p>Of very late years, says Sir Richard Colt Hoare, I do not +imagine the dilapidations of the temple have been very great.</p> +<p>It should, however, be mentioned, that the tracing of the +<i>snake form</i> is due to Dr. Stukeley; for his predecessor +Aubrey mentions the avenue as "a solemn walk leading to a monument +upon the top of the hill, without any allusion to the supposed +design or its connexion with the Grand Temple at Abury."</p> +<p>It is a matter of greater speculation than we can here enter +into, as to the <i>date and founders of Abury</i>; and their +history is as dislocated as are the masses of its ruins. +Antiquarians agree on the purpose for which it was founded, viz. +for the performance of the religious ceremonies of the Druids. Sir +R. Colt Hoare illustrates this point by supposing the flat ledge +projecting from the vallum, to have been intended for the +accommodation of sitting, to the spectators who resorted hither to +the public festivals; and adds he, what a grand and imposing +spectacle must so extensive and elevated an amphitheatre have +presented, the vallum and its declivities lined with spectators, +whilst the hallowed area was preserved for the officiating Druids, +and perhaps the higher order of the people!</p> +<p>Gentle Reader! be ye lordling or lowlier born, once more <i>turn +back to the engraving</i>. We have a subject of yesterday rife and +ready for you, on the next page; but <i>turn to the engraving</i>. +Look again at those circles, and the fantastic forms that compose +them, and think of the infatuated thousands that were wont to +assemble round them, and of the idolized sons of power that once +stood within their hallowed area. Think of those days of sacrifice +and superstition—those orgies of ignorance and +barbarism—and contrast them with the happy, happy age of +religious liberty in which it is your boast and blessing to +live—and then you may read "sermons in stones," to the +masterminds of your own time. To us, the stones of Abury are part +of the poetry of savage life, and of more interest than all the +plaster toys of these days. But they may not be so with you and +"FINIS." We were once compensated for missing +<span class="pagenum"><a name="page323" id="page323"></a>[pg +323]</span> Fonthill and its finery, by witnessing day-break from +Salisbury Plain, and associating its glories with the time-worn +relics of STONEHENGE!</p> +<p>The <i>engraving</i> and data are from Mr. Higgins's Celtic +Druids, for the loan of which and a portion of this article, we +thank our friend "JAMES SILVESTER," whose valuable note on +"<i>Circular Temples</i>" must stand over for our next.</p> +<hr /> +<p>We had penciled for our Supplement the following beautiful lines +from Mr. Watts's "Literary Souvenir," but they will be more in +place here. <i>Silbury</i> is an immense mound adjoining the road +to Devizes, and opposite Abury; Sir R.C. Hoare thinks it part of +Abury; but H. and many others think it the sepulchre of a King or +Arch-Druid.</p> +<h3>SILBURY HILL.</h3> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Grave of Cunedha, were it vain to call</p> +<p class="i2">For one wild lay of all that buried lie</p> +<p>Beneath thy giant mound? From Tara's hall</p> +<p class="i2">Faint warblings yet are heard, faint echoes die</p> +<p>Among the Hebrides: the ghost that sung</p> +<p class="i2">In Ossian's ear, yet wails in feeble cry</p> +<p>On Morvern: but the harmonies that rung</p> +<p class="i2">Around the grove and cromlech, never more</p> +<p>Shall visit earth: for ages have unstrung</p> +<p class="i2">The Druid's harp, and shrouded all his lore,</p> +<p>Where under the world's ruin sleep in gloom</p> +<p class="i2">The secrets of the flood,—the letter'd +store,</p> +<p>Which Seth's memorial pillars from the doom</p> +<p class="i2">Preserved not, when the sleep was Nature's +tomb.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>H.</p></div></div> +<hr class="full" /> +<h2>FINE ARTS</h2> +<h4><i>(For the Mirror.)</i></h4> +<hr /> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>"The way to be an excellent painter is to be an</p> +<p>excellent man—and these united, make a character</p> +<p>that would shine even in a better world</p> +<p>than this."—JONATHAN RICHARDSON.</p></div></div> +<p>The sister arts of <i>Painting and Engraving</i> have been +making great progress in England for some time past, and we are +disposed to think this a subject of congratulation and importance +to all classes of the community.</p> +<p>The literature of the Fine Arts is likewise becoming more and +more popular every day. They form a prominent feature in every new +literary project, and not unfrequently literature, to use a +hackneyed phrase, is made their vehicle—like the namby-pamby +of an English opera for the strains of Rossini or Weber. The public +are contented with excellence in one department and mediocrity in +the other; they cannot be constantly admiring—that is out of +the question—and it is probably on this account that much of +what appears <i>below par</i> is tolerated and even encouraged.</p> +<p>We will not go the length of assenting to the proposal of +converting Sir Joshua Reynolds's Lectures into Sermons, by the mere +alteration of the terms of art into scriptural phraseology; but we +venture to assert that much national good is likely to result from +these advances of art, and its constant introduction into all our +amusements. That it promotes the growth of virtue is too old an +axiom to be refuted:</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>——Ingenuas didicisse fideliter artes</p> +<p>Emollit mores, nec sinit esse feros.</p></div></div> +<p>"The Italians commonly call a taste for the fine arts, or skill +in them, by the name of Virtue. They term the productions of +artists objects of virtue; and a person who has a taste for such +things is denominated <i>a virtuoso</i>, that is, a virtuous man." +Such is the language of the <i>Edinburgh Review</i>, in commencing +an article on a recently-published translation of Lanzi's +<i>History of Painting in Italy</i>, in six octavo +volumes—and what a delightful relief is this from the party +declamations which usually occupy so large a portion of that +"critical journal." But this is not singular, for it is now no +uncommon thing to see a large letter column of a newspaper, and a +similar proportion of a printed sheet published at twopence, alike +occupied by "the Fine Arts."</p> +<p>Patronage, royal and noble, has already achieved much for +painting, and even the <i>reported</i> project for a National +Gallery does much to foster the art. It keeps the study afloat and +uppermost in the public mind; and the immense increase of +exhibitions, not only in London, but in provincial towns, serves to +prove that patronage now consists in something more substantial +than tutelar notice, and unpaid promises. Artists need no longer +journey to the metropolis to find sale for their works, for their +genius is nourished on its native soil by the liberality and good +taste which abound in the neighbourhood of every important town in +the empire. It may be as well to keep up the hue and cry about the +folly of portrait-painting, if it be only to keep down the vanity +of wealth; but the munificent rewards which painters receive for +this branch of their art will enable them to devote a greater +portion of their leisure to higher studies. <i>Their taste</i> will +not thus be impugned; for Cooke, the actor, is known to have +entertained the meanest opinion of his own performance of Richard +the Third, as an historical portrait, notwithstanding it was the +corner-stone of his fame. We do not invite the comparison; but Mr. +Hayden began with history—his want of patronage is well +known; he then tried portraits—but his want of success was +reserved for the style of his Mock Election pictures, and, in all +probability, they will turn out the philosopher's stone for his +future life.</p> +<p>But it is to the splendid union of Painting, Engraving, and +Literature that much <span class="pagenum"><a name="page324" +id="page324"></a>[pg 324]</span> of these beneficial effects may be +traced. In every branch of the fine arts and literature, what a +powerful influence will this triple advancement produce. Only +compare the topographical works of Mr. Britton with those of his +predecessors—his highly-finished line engravings, excellent +antiquarian pieces on wood, and erudite descriptions, with the +wretched prints and the quaintnesses of old topographers—or +even with the lumber of some of our county histories. With this +improvement, and that of map-work, painting has comparatively but +little to do; and yet how evident is the progress of the literature +of these works.<a id="footnotetag2" +name="footnotetag2"></a><a href="#footnote2"><sup>2</sup></a></p> +<p>It would be easy to adduce hundreds of instances of the recent +union of painting and engraving. About five years ago, a plan was +started for illustrating the Bible from pictures of the old +masters. Upwards of two hundred of them were transferred to +wood-blocks; but the scheme did not repay the ingenious +originator—partly from their small size, uncertainty of +<i>effect</i> to be produced on <i>wood</i>, and partly from the +very cheap rate at which the engravings were sold—the whole +series being purchaseable for three or four +shillings.<a id="footnotetag3" +name="footnotetag3"></a><a href="#footnote3"><sup>3</sup></a> But a +similar design is now in progress on metal, being the idea of <i>La +Musée</i> in little. It consists of beautiful outline copies +of the great masters, published at so cheap a rate as to be within +the reach of a school-boy. Within the present year, also, two +series of Views in Great Britain, one of Views in London, and +another of Paris, have been publishing at the rate of threepence +for each view; and when we see among their artists the names of +Westall, Pugin, and Pye, we have a sufficient voucher for their +excellence.</p> +<p>A passing notice of a few of the more splendid works of art, +(for the above are among the cheap and popular projects of the +day,) and we must conclude.</p> +<p>It would be tedious to enumerate even a small portion of the +fine pictures which have been engraved during the last two years; +the mention of two or three will answer our purpose. Every +printseller's window will attest the fact. Only let the reader step +into Mr. Colnaghi's parlours, in Cockspur-street, and we might say +the spacious print gallery in Pall Mall. There let him turn over a +few of the host of fine portraits which have been transferred from +the canvass to the copper—the excellent series of royal +portraits—and of men whose names will shine in the history of +their country, when their portraits shall be gathered into the +portfolios of a few collectors. Among portraits, we ought, however, +to recollect Mr. Lodge's invaluable collection of historical +characters, the originals of which were exhibited a few months +since, previous to their republication in a more economical form. +The Temple of Jupiter, published a few months since, is perhaps one +of the proudest triumphs of the year. Martin's Deluge, too, has +lately appeared, and we look forward to the publication of his last +splendid picture, the Fall of Nineveh, with high hopes.</p> +<p>In the SUPPLEMENTARY NUMBER<a id="footnotetag4" +name="footnotetag4"></a><a href="#footnote4"><sup>4</sup></a> +<i>(published with the present)</i> we have noticed in detail a few +of the many superb engravings which embellish the Christmas +presents for the ensuing year, as well as their literary talent, by +a string of extracts like</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>"Orient pearls at random strung."</p></div></div> +<p>The success of these elegant works has benefited our artists to +the sum of twelve thousand pounds, in their preparation for 1829. A +fortnight since we mentioned the cost of the plates of the Literary +Souvenir to be 100<i>l.</i> and upwards for each subject. Another +work, still more splendid, (being nearly double the price,) is +under the direction of Mr. Charles Heath, whose masterly hand is +visible in some of the finest engraving ever submitted to the +world—equalled only by a rival in its first year—one of +the best proofs of the patronage these works enjoy. It would be +invidious to particularize—but we must mention the +transference of two of Martin's designs—Marcus Curtius (in +the Forget Me Not) and Christ Tempted on the Mount—as two of +the most surprising efforts of genius we have ever witnessed. Our +readers need not be told that all the engravings are <i>on +steel</i>; and were it not for the adoption of this lasting metal, +the <span class="pagenum"><a name="page325" id="page325"></a>[pg +325]</span> cost of half the engravings would exceed that of the +whole work: all we hope is, that the public patronage may be as +lasting as the metal; then it will be no idle vaunt to call this +the march, or even race, of genius. In conclusion, we recommend all +our lady friends (who have not done so) to place on their +drawing-room table a <i>Print Album</i>, or <i>Scrap Book</i>, to +be supported "by voluntary contributions." They may then form a +pretty correct estimate of the taste of their visiters; and if +taste in the fine arts be a test of virtue and integrity, they may +even settle the claims of any two rival aspirants by this fair and +unerring method, which should admit of no appeal.</p> +<hr /> +<h3>ANECDOTES OF CHRISTINA, THE YOUNG QUEEN OF SWEDEN.</h3> +<h4><i>(For the Mirror.)</i></h4> +<p>Christina was the only child of the great Gustavus Adolphus, who +succeeded to the throne of her father in 1632, when she was but +five years of age. The young queen, at an early age, discovered but +little taste for the society and occupations of her sex. When +young, she was capable of reading the Greek historians. At the age +of eighteen she assumed the reins of government. Several princes of +Europe aspired to her hand; but she rejected them all. To prevent a +renewal of applications on this subject, she solemnly appointed +Gustavus her successor, but without the smallest participation in +the rights of the crown during her own life. During her minority, +Sweden enjoyed internal repose, but was involved in a long war with +the German empire. She was crowned with great splendour in the year +1650. From this time she entertained a philosophical contempt for +pomp and parade, and a kind of disgust for the affairs of state. +She invited to her court men of the first reputation in various +studies. She was a great collector of books, manuscripts, medals, +paintings, &c. In 1654, when she was only in her 28th year, +Christina abdicated the crown, in order that she might live a life +of freedom. With her crown, she renounced the Lutheran and embraced +the Catholic religion. In quitting the scene of her regal power, +she proceeded to Rome, where she intended to fix her abode. Some +disgust which she received at Rome, induced her, in the space of +two years, to determine to visit France. Here she was treated with +respect by Louis XIV., but the ladies were shocked with her +masculine appearance and demeanour, and the unguarded freedom of +her conversation. Apartments were assigned her at Fontainbleau, +where she committed an action, which has indelibly stained her +memory, and for which, in other countries, (says her biographer,) +she would have paid the forfeit of her own life. This was the +murder of an Italian, Monaldeschi, her master of the horse, who had +betrayed some secret intrusted to him. He was summoned into a +gallery in the palace; letters were then shown to him, at the sight +of which he turned pale, and entreated for mercy; but he was +instantly stabbed by two of her own domestics in an apartment +adjoining that in which she herself was. The French court was +justly offended at this atrocious deed; yet it met with +vindicators, among whom was Leibnitz, whose name was disgraced by +the cause which he attempted to justify. Christina was sensible +that she was now regarded with horror in France, and would gladly +have visited England, but she received no encouragement for that +purpose from Cromwell. She returned to Rome, and resumed her +amusements in the arts and sciences. In 1660, on the death of +Charles Gustavus, she took a journey to Sweden to recover her +crown; but her ancient subjects rejected her claims, and submitted +to a second renunciation of the throne; after which she returned to +Rome. Some differences with the pope made her resolve, in 1662, +once more to return to Sweden; but the conditions annexed by the +senate to her residence there were now so mortifying, that she +proceeded no farther than Hamburgh. She went back to Rome, and +cultivated a correspondence with the learned men there, and in +other parts of Europe, and died in 1689, leaving behind her many +letters, a "Collection of Miscellaneous Thoughts or Maxims," and +"Reflections on the Life and Actions of Alexander the Great."</p> +<p>P.T.W.</p> +<hr /> +<h3>METHOD OF ASCERTAINING THE STATE OF THE LUNGS.</h3> +<h4><i>(For the Mirror.)</i></h4> +<p>Persons desirous of ascertaining the true state of their lungs, +are directed to draw in as much breath as they conveniently can; +they are then to count as far as they are able, in a slow and +audible voice, without drawing in more breath. The number of +seconds they can continue counting must be carefully observed; in a +consumption, the time does not exceed ten, and is frequently less +than six seconds; in pleurisy and pneumonia, it ranges from nine to +four seconds. When the lungs are in a sound condition, the time +will range as high as from twenty to thirty-five seconds.</p> +<p>G.W.N.</p> +<hr class="full" /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="page326" id="page326"></a>[pg +326]</span> +<h2>THE COSMOPOLITE.</h2> +<hr /> +<h3>ARTISTICAL ERRORS.</h3> +<h3>A SECOND CHAPTER OF BULLS.</h3> +<h4><i>(For the Mirror.)</i></h4> +<p>I saw a picture not long since, in Edinburgh, copied from an +engraving in Boydell's Shakspeare; subject,—"Lear (and suite) +in the storm," but coloured according to the imagination and taste +of the artist; its name ought assuredly to have been <i>Redcap and +the blue-devils</i>, for the venerable and lamented monarch had +fine streaming locks of the real <i>carrot hue</i>, whilst his very +hideous companions showed <i>blue</i> faces, and blue armour; and +with their strangely contorted bodies seemed meet representatives +of some of the infernal court.—In a highly adorned prayer +book, published in the reign of William III., the engravings of +which are from <i>silver-plates</i>, one print illustrates our +Lord's simile of the mote and beam, by a couple of men aiming at +each other's visual organs, ineffectually enough, one having a +great <i>log of wood</i> growing from his eye, and the other being +blind in one eye from a <i>cataract</i>; at least, though I think I +do not err in saying, a <i>moat</i> and castle, in it—I have +seen an old edition of Jeremy Taylor's "Life and Death of Christ," +illustrated with many remarkably good engravings. Of one of these +the subject is, the Impotent Man at the Pool of Bethesda; the fore +ground is occupied by our Saviour, the cripple, and other invalids; +and in the distance appears a small <i>pond</i> palisaded by +slender pilasters; over it hovers an angel, who, with <i>a long +pole</i>, is, to the marvel of the beholders, dexterously +"troubling the waters." In the same volume, some of the figures are +clad in the garb of the time when drawn, and St. Jude is reading +the <i>New Testament</i> in a <i>pair of spectacles</i>!—In +Holyrood House, and in one of the rooms added in the days of +Charles II., is a panel-painting of "the Infant Hercules strangling +the serpents;" and leaping up in front of the cradle, appears one +of those pretty and rare spaniels called <i>King Charles's +breed</i>. In the same palace, and in one of the chambers, once +occupied by the unfortunate Mary, is a very old painting, intended, +as the guide assures visitors, to represent St. Peter's vision of +the great sheet; it may be, but if so, <i>one</i> archangel in +<i>military sandals</i>, holding in his hands a <i>small towel</i>, +represents (by a <i>figure</i> in <i>painting</i> I presume,) St. +Peter, the sheet, and its innumerable living contents. He must have +taken a hint, from the artist who painted for the passage through +the Red Sea nothing but ocean, assuring his employer, that the +Israelites could not be seen, because they were all gone over, and +the Egyptians were every one drowned!—"I once saw," writes a +friend, "a full length portrait of <i>Wordsworth</i>, in a modern +painting of 'Christ riding into Jerusalem;' it was amongst a group +of Jews, and next to a likeness of <i>Voltaire</i>. I believe the +painter intended to contrast the countenances of the Christian and +infidel poets, and thus pay a handsome compliment to the former; +but the taste that placed the ancients and moderns together, remind +me of a fine old painting of the Flemish school; a 'David with +Goliah's head,' in the fore-ground of which were a number of fat +<i>Dutchmen</i>, dressed in <i>blue coats and leather breeches</i>, +with <i>pipes</i> in their mouths."—"Raphael," says a little +French work on painting, in my possession, speaking of <i>unity</i> +of time, "<i>A peché contre cette regle, dans son tableau +d'Heliodore, ou il fait intervenir le Pape Jules 2 dans le Temple +de Jerusalem porte sur les epaules, des Gonfalonniers</i>." The +same work notices a breach of the <i>unity of design</i> in Paul +Veronese, "<i>qui dans la partie droite d'un de ses tableaux, a +represente Jesus Christ benissant l'eau, dont il va être +baptise par St. Jean Baptiste; et dans la partie gauche notre +Seigneur tente par le diable</i>."—Upon the celebrated +"Transfiguration" of Raphael, I heard an artist remark, +"undoubtedly it is the first picture in the world, yet the painter +has erred in these respects:—the upper portion of the picture +is occupied by the subject, but the lower and fore-ground by the +<i>Healing of the Demoniac</i>. Now that event did not happen until +after the transfiguration, and we infringe upon our Saviour's +<i>ubiquity</i> by supposing it to occur (contrary to the sacred +story) at the same time. <i>He</i> may, indeed, as <i>God</i> be +<i>omnipresent</i>, but as <i>man</i>, the New Testament no where +asserts that the Incarnate Presence was in different places at the +same moment." Instances of erroneous judgment are frequent in those +who illustrate holy writ. Some have attempted to embody <i>Him</i>, +"whom no man hath seen at any time." Some have filled their skies +with beings as little aerial as possible, or apotheoses of the +Virgin and sundry saints. Angels, as some represent them, even in +whole lengths, are by <i>anatomists</i> regarded as +<i>monsters</i>; but what then are the chubby winged heads +<i>without bodies</i>, with which some artists etherealize their +works. Some err by mingling on the same canvass the sacred and +profane; scripture characters and the +<span class="pagenum"><a name="page327" id="page327"></a>[pg +327]</span> non-descripts of heathen mythology. Nor is poetry free +from the latter error, as is exemplified in the major and minor +epics, &c., of many Christian poets. The drawings of the monks, +splendid in colouring and beautiful in finish, are mostly ludicrous +in design, from glaring anachronisms, erroneous perspective, +&c. I saw a print in Montfauçon, where fish were +gamboling like porpusses on the surface of the sea, and one or two +were visible <i>through the paddles</i> of a boat. In the same +volume was a print of the apotheosis of St. Louis, from an +illumination. The holy prince was represented dying in the +fore-ground, but over head were a couple of angels flying away with +his soul, (under the figure of a wretched infant, skinny and naked, +save the glory that covered his head,) in a kind of sheet, or +rather sack.</p> +<p>But to detail all the absurdities and indecencies of these +revered artists, whether limners, or carvers in wood, were endless. +Their anachronisms, however, have been of considerable service to +the antiquary. Sculpture has its monstrosities, architecture its +incongruities, though not so palpable as those of painting, because +the art is less generally understood by the common observer, or +rather pictorial errors are in general easily detected by the eye +alone, and sometimes by the most commonly informed mind; but +architectural defects are only recognisable by those who have +studied the principles of this fine art. Poetry, I am sorry to say, +is not exempt from bulls and blunders, of various kinds and degrees +of enormity; many of which have been, from time to time, exposed in +a very amusing manner. I shall therefore, in conclusion, crave the +liberty of producing one which has lately come under my own +cognizance. A modern poet, whose compositions are fraught with +beauty and genius, sings:—</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>"Then swooped the winds, that hurl the <i>giant oak</i></p> +<p>From <i>Snowdon's altitude</i>."</p></div></div> +<p>And another, in stanzas of extreme strength and eloquent +description, describes a storm at night "among the mountains of +Snowdon," with these expressions:—</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>——"The bird of night</p> +<p>Screams from her straw-built nest, as from the womb</p> +<p>Of infant death, and wheels her drowsy flight</p> +<p>Amid <i>the pine-clad rocks</i>, with wonder and +afright."</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>——"The night-breeze dies</p> +<p>Faint, on <i>the mountain-ash leaves that surround</i></p> +<p><i>Snowdon's dark peaks</i>."</p></div></div> +<p>Now, a painful pilgrimage of eleven hours, up Snowdon and back +again, enables me to declare that had oaks, pines, and +service-trees adorned that appalling and volcanic chaos, five or +six years since, some storm sufficient to have shattered the +universe, must have swept them all away, ere I looked upon that +dreary assemblage of rocks which seems like the <i>ruins of a +world</i>. I ascended from the Capel Cerig side of the mountain, +and therefore venture not to say what may be the aspect of the +Llanberries; but the only verdure I beheld, was that of short, +brown heathy grass, a few stunted furze-bushes, and patches of that +vividly green moss, which is spongy and full of water. The only +living inhabitants of these wilds were a few ruffian-like miners, +two or three black slugs, and a scanty flock of straggling +half-starved mountain sheep, with their brown, ropy coats. The +guide told me, that even <i>eagles</i>, had for three centuries +abandoned the desolate crags of Snowdon; and as for its being a +haunt for <i>owls</i>, neither bird nor mouse could reside there to +supply such with subsistence. Snowdon appeared to me too swampy to +be drained for cultivation in many parts, and in most others its +marble, granite and shingles, forbade the idea of spontaneous +vegetation. I am sorry for the poets, having a sincere regard for +the fraternity, but Snowdon is not adorned with pines, firs, +larches, and service-trees, like parts of the Alps; it is +<i>not</i> wooded like the romantic Pyrenees, nor luxuriantly +fertile in fruits, flowers, and grain, like the terrible, but +sylvan Etna.</p> +<p>M.L.B.</p> +<hr class="full" /> +<h2>OLD POETS</h2> +<hr /> +<h3>DRUMMOND OF HAWTHORNDEN.</h3> +<p>["A Lover of Old English Poetry," has, in the last <i>London +Magazine</i>, a short paper on DRUMMOND of HAWTHORNDEN, a name dear +to every poetical mind, and every lover of early song. His +intention, he says, is "rather to excite than satiate" the taste of +his readers for the poetry of Drummond,—an object in which we +cordially agree, and would contribute our offering, had not the +task, in the present instance, been already so ably performed. We +cannot, therefore, do better than introduce to our readers a few of +his judicious selections. They are exquisite specimens of the +evergreen freshness of old poetry, and by their contrast with +contemporary effusions will contribute to the mosaic of our sheet. +By the way, we hear of a sprinkling of the antique world of letters +in some of the "Annuals"—an introduction which reflects high +credit on <span class="pagenum"><a name="page328" +id="page328"></a>[pg 328]</span> the taste of the editors, and +serves to prove that sicklied sentimentalities, like all other +sweets, when enjoyed to excess, will cloy the fancy, but not so as +entirely to unfit the mind for a higher species of intellectual +enjoyment. We would have <i>old and new alternate</i> in the +literary wreath, lest, by losing the comparison, the "bright +lights" of other times should be treated with irreverence and +neglect.]</p> +<h3>FROM THE "HYMN ON THE FAIREST FAIR."</h3> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>I feel my bosom glow with wonted fires:</p> +<p>Raised from the vulgar press, my mind aspires,</p> +<p><i>Wing'd with high thoughts</i>, unto His praise to climb</p> +<p>From deep Eternity who call'd forth time:—</p> +<p>That ESSENCE, which, not mov'd, makes each thing +move,—</p> +<p>Uncreate beauty—all-creating love...</p> +<p>Ineffable, all-powerful GOD, all free,—</p> +<p>Thou only liv'st, and all things live by thee...</p> +<p>Perfection's sum—prime cause of every cause,</p> +<p>Midst and beginning, where all good doth pause...</p> +<p>Incomprehensible, by reachless height;</p> +<p>And unperceived, by <i>excessive light</i>.</p> +<p>O King! whose greatness none can comprehend,</p> +<p>Whose boundless goodness does to all extend,—</p> +<p>Light of all beauty, ocean without ground,</p> +<p><i>That standing, flowest—giving, dost abound</i>...</p> +<p>Great Architect—Lord of this universe,—</p> +<p>That sight is blinded would thy greatness +pierce.</p></div></div> +<p>Then follows this noble simile, nobly sustained, and with a flow +and harmony of verse not common in the poets of his +period:—</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Ah! as a pilgrim who the Alps doth pass,</p> +<p>Or Atlas' temples crown'd with winter glass,—</p> +<p>The airy Caucasus, the Apennine,</p> +<p>Pyrenees' cliffs, where sun doth never shine;—</p> +<p>When he some craggy hills hath overwent,</p> +<p>Begins to think on rest, his journey spent,</p> +<p>Till mounting some tall mountain he do find</p> +<p>More heights before him than he left behind,—</p> +<p>With halting pace so while I would me raise</p> +<p>To the unbounded limits of Thy praise,</p> +<p>Some part of way I thought to have o'errun;</p> +<p>But now I see how scarce I have begun—</p> +<p>With wonders new my spirits range possest,</p> +<p>And, wandering wayless, in a maze them rest.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Oh! that the cause which doth consume our joy</p> +<p>Would the remembrance of it too destroy!</p></div></div> +<h3>LIFE.</h3> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2">Woods cut again do grow:</p> +<p>Bud doth the rose and daisy, winter done,</p> +<p>But we, once dead, do no more see the sun!</p> +<p class="i2">What fair is wrought</p> +<p>Falls in the prime, and passeth like a thought.</p></div></div> +<h3>SONNET.—SPRING.</h3> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Sweet Spring, thou com'st with all thy goodly train,—</p> +<p>Thy head with flame, thy mantle bright with flowers:</p> +<p><i>The zephyrs curl the green locks of the plain</i>,—</p> +<p>The clouds for joy in pearls weep down their showers;—</p> +<p>Sweet Spring, thou com'st—but ah! my pleasant hours,</p> +<p>And happy days, with thee come not again!</p> +<p>The sad memorials only of my pain</p> +<p>Do with thee come, which turn my sweets to sours.</p> +<p>Thou art the same which still thou wert before,</p> +<p><i>Delicious, lusty, amiable, fair</i>,</p> +<p>But she whose breath embalmed thy wholesome air</p> +<p>Is gone—nor gold, nor gems can her restore,</p> +<p>Neglected virtue—seasons, go and come,</p> +<p>When thine, forgot, lie closed in a tomb.</p></div></div> +<h3>SONNET.</h3> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Sweet bird, that sing'st away the early hours,</p> +<p>Of winters past, or coming, void of care,</p> +<p>Well pleased with delights which present are,—</p> +<p>Fair seasons, budding sprays, sweet-smelling flowers,</p> +<p>To rocks, to springs, to rills, from leavy bowers</p> +<p>Thou thy Creator's goodness dost declare,</p> +<p>And what dear gifts on thee he did not spare,—</p> +<p>A stain to human sense in sin that lowers.</p> +<p>What soul can be so sick, which by thy songs</p> +<p>(Attir'd in sweetness) sweetly is not driven</p> +<p>Quite to forget earth's turmoils, spites, and wrongs,</p> +<p>And lift a reverend eye and thought to heaven?</p> +<p>Sweet artless songster, thou my mind dost raise</p> +<p>To airs of spheres—yes, and to angels +lays!</p></div></div> +<h3>SLEEP.</h3> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Now while the Night her sable veil hath spread,</p> +<p class="i2">And silently her resty coach doth roll,</p> +<p>Rousing with her, from Thetis' azure bed,</p> +<p class="i2">Those starry nymphs which dance about the pole;</p> +<p>While Cynthia, in purest cypress clad.</p> +<p class="i2">The Latmian shepherd in a trance descries,</p> +<p class="i2">And, looking pale from height of all the skies,</p> +<p>She dyes her beauties in a blushing red;</p> +<p class="i2">While Sleep, in triumph, closed hath all eyes,</p> +<p>And birds and beasts a silence sweet do keep,</p> +<p>And Proteus' monstrous people in the deep,—</p> +<p class="i2">The winds and waves, hush'd up, to rest +entice,—</p> +<p>I wake, I turn, I weep, oppress'd with pain,</p> +<p>Perplex'd in the meanders of my brain.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Sleep, Silence' child, sweet father of soft rest,</p> +<p class="i2">Prince, whose approach peace to all mortals +brings,</p> +<p class="i2">Indifferent host to shepherds and to kings,</p> +<p>Sole comforter of minds which are oppress'd—</p> +<p class="i2">Lo! by thy charming rod, all breathing things</p> +<p>Lie slumb'ring, with forgetfulness possess'd,</p> +<p class="i2">And yet o'er me to spread thy drowsy wings</p> +<p>Thou spar'st, alas! who cannot be thy guest.</p> +<p class="i2">Since I am thine, O come,—but with that +face</p> +<p>To inward light, which thou art wont to shew—</p> +<p>With feigned solace ease a true-felt woe;</p> +<p class="i2">Or if, deaf god, thou do deny that grace,</p> +<p>Come as thou wilt, and what thou wilt bequeath</p> +<p>I long to kiss the image of my death!</p></div></div> +<hr /> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Hark, happy lovers, hark!</p> +<p>This first and last of joys,</p> +<p>This sweetener of annoys,</p> +<p>This nectar of the gods,</p> +<p>You call a kiss, is with itself at odds:</p> +<p>And half so sweet is not,</p> +<p>In equal measure got</p> +<p>At light of sun as it is in the dark:</p> +<p>Hark, happy lovers, hark!</p></div></div> +<hr class="full" /> +<h2>NOTES OF A READER</h2> +<hr /> +<h3>INDIAN FEAST OF SOULS.</h3> +<p>Every three or four years, by a general agreement, the Indians +disinter the bodies of such as have died within that time; finding +the soft parts mouldered away, they carefully clean the bones, and +each family wrap up the remains of their departed friends in new +fur. They are then laid together in one mound or barrow, and the +ceremony concludes with a feast, with dances, songs, speeches, +games, and mock combats.</p> +<hr /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page329" id="page329"></a>[pg +329]</span></p> +<h3>PALEY.</h3> +<p>We think it next to impossible for a candid unbeliever to read +the Evidences of Paley, in their proper order, unshaken. His +Natural Theology will open the heart, that it may understand, or at +least receive the Scriptures, if any thing can. It is philosophy in +its highest and noblest sense; scientific, without the jargon of +science; profound, but so clear that its depth is disguised. There +is nothing of the "budge Doctor" here; speculations which will +convince, if aught will, that "in the beginning <i>God</i> created +the heaven and the earth," are made familiar as household words. +They are brought home to the experience of every man, the most +ordinary observer on the facts of nature with which he is daily +conversant. A thicker clothing, for instance, is provided in winter +for that tribe of animals which are covered with <i>fur</i>. Now, +in these days, such an assertion would be backed by an appeal to +some learned Rabbi of a Zoological Society, who had written a deep +pamphlet, upon what he would probably call the <i>Theory of +Hair</i>. But to whom does Paley refer us? To any dealer in rabbit +skins. The curious contrivance in the bones of birds, to unite +strength with lightness, is noticed. The bore is larger, in +proportion to the weight of the bone, than in other animals; it is +empty; the substance of the bone itself is of a closer texture. For +these facts, any "operative" would quote Sir Everard Home, or +Professor Cuvier, by way of giving a sort of philosophical +éclat to the affair, and throwing a little learned dust in +the eyes of the public. Paley, however, advises you to make your +own observations when you happen to be engaged in the scientific +operation of picking the leg or wing of a chicken. The very +singular correspondence between the two sides of any animal, the +right hand answering to the left, and so on, is touched upon, as a +proof of a contriving Creator, and a very striking one it is. Well! +we have a long and abstruse problem in chances worked out to show +that it was so many millions, and so many odd thousands to one, +that accident could not have produced the phenomenon; not a bit of +it. Paley, who was probably scratching his head at the moment, +offers no other confirmation of his assertion, than that it is the +most difficult thing in the world to get a <i>wig made even</i>, +seldom as it is that the <i>face</i> is made awry. The circulation +of the blood, and the provision for its getting from the heart to +the extremities, and back again, affords a singular demonstration +of the Maker of the body being an admirable Master both of +mechanics and hydrostatics. But what is the language in which Paley +talks of this process?—technical?—that mystical +nomenclature of Diaforius, which frightens country patients out of +their wits, thinking, as they very naturally do, that a disease +must be very horrid which involves such very horrid names? Hear our +anatomist from Giggleswick.</p> +<p>"The aorta of a whale is larger in the bore than the main-pipe +of the water-works at London Bridge; and the roaring in the passage +through that pipe is inferior, in impetus and velocity, to the +blood gushing from the whale's heart."</p> +<p>He cares not whence he fetches his illustrations, provided they +are to the purpose. The laminae of the feathers of birds are kept +together by teeth that hook into one another, "as a <i>latch</i> +enters into the catch, and fastens a door." The eyes of the mole +are protected by being very small, and buried deep in a cushion of +skin, so that the apertures leading to them are like <i>pin-holes +in a piece of velvet</i>, scarcely pervious to loose particles of +earth. The snail without wings, feet, or thread, adheres to a stalk +by a provision of <i>sticking-plaster</i>. The lobster, as he +grows, is furnished with a way of uncasing himself of his buckler, +and drawing his legs out of <i>his boots</i> when they become too +small for him.</p> +<p>In this unambitious manner does Paley prosecute his high theme, +drawing, as it were, philosophy from the clouds. But it is not +merely the fund of entertaining knowledge which the Natural +Theology contains, or the admirable address displayed in the +adaption of it, which fits it for working conviction; the "sunshine +of the breast," the cheerful spirit with which its benevolent +author goes on his way (κυδει +γαιων +[Greek: kudei gaion],) this it is that +carries the coldest reader captive, and constrains him to confess +within himself, and even in spite of himself, "it is good for me to +be here."</p> +<p>...We mourn over the leaves of our peaches and plum-trees, as +they wither under a blight. What does Paley see in this? A legion +of animated beings (for such is a <i>blight</i>) claiming their +portion of the bounty of Nature, and made happy by our +comparatively trifling privation, We are tortured by bodily +<i>pain</i>,—Paley himself was so, even at the moment that he +was thus nobly vindicating God's wisdom and ways. What of that? +Pain is not the object of contrivance—no anatomist ever +dreamt of explaining any organ of the body on the principle of the +thumb screw; it is itself productive of good; it is seldom both +violent, and long continued; and then its pauses and intermissions +become positive pleasures. "It has the +<span class="pagenum"><a name="page330" id="page330"></a>[pg +330]</span> power of shedding a satisfaction over intervals of +ease, which I believe," says this true philosopher, "few enjoyments +exceed." The returns of an hospital in his neighbourhood lie before +him. Does he conjure up the images of Milton's lazar-house, and +sicken at the spectacle of human suffering? No—he finds the +admitted 6,420—the dead, 234—the <i>cured</i>, 5,476; +his eye settles upon the last, and he is content.</p> +<p>There is nothing in the world which has not more handles than +one; and it is of the greatest consequence to get a habit of taking +hold by the best. The bells speak as we make them; "how many a tale +their music tells!" Hogarth's industrious apprentice might hear in +them that he should be "Lord Mayor of London"—the idle +apprentice that he should be hanged at Tyburn. The landscape looks +as we see it; if we go to meet a friend, every distant object +assumes his shape—</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>"In great and small, and round and square,</p> +<p>'Tis Johnny, Johnny, every where."</p></div></div> +<p>Crabbe's lover passed over the very same heath to his mistress +and from her; yet as he went, all was beauty—as he returned +all was blank. The world does not more surely provide different +kinds of food for different animals, than it furnishes doubts to +the sceptic and hopes to the believer, as he takes it. The one, in +an honest and good heart, pours out the box of ointment on a +Saviour's head—the other, in the pride of his philosophy, +only searches into it for a dead fly.—<i>Q. Rev.</i></p> +<hr /> +<h3>"ALL FOR THE BEST."</h3> +<p>When Bernard Gilpin was summoned up to London to give an account +of himself and his creed before Bonner, he chanced to break his leg +on the way; and, on some persons retorting upon him a favourite +saying of his own, "that nothing happens to us but what is intended +for our good," and asking him whether it was for his good that he +had broken his leg, he answered, "that he made no question but it +was." And so it turned out, for before he was able to travel again, +Queen Mary died, and he was set at liberty.</p> +<hr /> +<p>Men keep their word simply because it is <i>right</i> to do so. +They feel it is right, and ask no further questions. Conscience +carries along with it its own authority—its own credentials. +The depraved appetites may rebel against it, but they are aware +that it is rebellion.—<i>Q. Rev.</i></p> +<hr /> +<h3>ARAB HOSPITALITY.</h3> +<p>M. Pacho, the African traveller, lately arrived at Marmorica, +when the rains had commenced, and the ground was preparing for the +seed, and was admitted to all the rites of Arab hospitality. +Invited to a great feast, he was regaled with the usual dainty of a +sheep roasted whole, and eaten with the fingers; while girls, +dressed as Caryatides, presented a large vase of milk, which was +passed round to the company. All that was expected in return was to +cover bits of paper with writing, and thus convert them into +amulets; for, in his capacity of sorcerer, the Christian is +supposed to possess supernatural powers.—<i>Edinburgh +Rev.</i></p> +<hr /> +<h3>IMPROMPTU ON WASTE.</h3> +<h4><i>By the late Edward Knight, Esq. of Drury-Lane +Theatre.</i></h4> +<br /> +<br /> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Oh! waste thou not the smallest thing</p> +<p class="i2">Created by Divinity;</p> +<p>For grains of sand the mountains make,</p> +<p class="i2">And atomics infinity.</p> +<p>Waste thou not, then, the smallest time—</p> +<p class="i2">'Tis imbecile infirmity;</p> +<p>For well thou know'st, if aught thou know'st,</p> +<p class="i2">That seconds form eternity.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p><i>Forget Me Not</i>—1829.</p></div></div> +<hr /> +<h3>AN ELECTION.</h3> +<p>G.A. Steevens says an election is "madman's holiday;" but in the +last <i>Quarterly Review</i> we find the following ludicrous +supplemental illustration.</p> +<p>Let a stranger be introduced, for the first time, to an +election, let him be shown a multitude of men reeling about the +streets of a borough-town, fighting within an inch of their lives, +smashing windows at the Black Bear, or where</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>"High in the street, o'erlooking all the place,</p> +<p>The Rampant Lion shows his kingly face;"</p></div></div> +<p>and yelling like those animals in Exeter 'Change at supper time; +and then let him be told that these worthies are choosing the +senate of England—persons to make the laws that are to bind +them and their children, property, limb, and life, and he would +certainly think the process unpropitious. Yet, in spite of it all, +a number of individuals are thus collected, who transact the +business of the nation, and represent its various interests +tolerably well. The machinery is hideous but it produces not a bad +article.</p> +<hr /> +<h3>SPANISH COMFORTS.</h3> +<p>In Spain, there are few or no schools in the villages and small +towns, that would have the effect of releasing the minds of the +natives from monkish tyranny, which at present influences their +principles, and biasses their choice, with regard to political, and +indeed almost all other pursuits. Nor is any attention paid to +trade. The peasantry simply exist, like cattle, without any other +signs of exertion, than such as the necessity of food requires. +They <span class="pagenum"><a name="page331" id="page331"></a>[pg +331]</span> have no idea of rising in the world; and where there is +no interest there is no activity.</p> +<p>It appears, that in the North of Spain, so little encouragement +is given to the arts, that even physicians are not able to obtain +support; that prints are unsaleable, and no new publications appear +but newspapers; that the tradesmen neglect their persons, very +seldom shaving, and having frequently a cigar in their mouths; that +the breath of the ladies smells of garlick; that the gentlemen +smoke cigars in bed; that there is hardly a single manufactory in +the kingdom belonging to a native in a flourishing state; that, +from recent political events, the flocks have been neglected, and +the wool deteriorated; that cleanliness is neglected, and rats and +mice unmolested; that the porters of the most respectable houses +are cobblers, who work at their trades at their doors; that women +are employed in loading and unloading ships; and that they, as well +as the servants in houses, carry every thing on their heads, even +lighted candles, without the least fear of their being +extinguished; that oxen are tied to carts by their horns; that in +the inns, generally, no one can read or write but the landlords; +that the constitutional soldiers, for their fare, generally took a +leathern bag, (<i>barracho</i>,) and got it filled with red wine as +sour as vinegar; not appearing to wish for meat, bread and cheese, +with boiled soup, onions, and garlick, forming the substance of +their frugal repasts; that no memorial is erected on the spot where +the battle of Vittoria was fought in 1813; and that, in fact, there +is no national feeling in the country.</p> +<hr /> +<h3>THE EQUIVOCAL GENTLEMAN</h3> +<p>Must always keep his dignity, for his dignity will not keep him. +We have no objection to meet him at a dress party, or at the +quarter sessions, nor to read his articles in the Edinburgh, the +Quarterly, or the British Critic; but we request not his +contributions for Maga, nor will Mr. North send him a general +invitation to the Noctes.—<i>Blackwood's Mag.</i></p> +<hr /> +<h3>INTENSE COLD.</h3> +<p>The lowest temperature witnessed by Capt. Franklin in North +America was on the 7th of February, of the second winter passed on +the shores of Bear Lake. At eight in the morning, the mercury in +the thermometer descended to 58° below zero; it had stood at +-57.5°, and -57.3° in the course of that and the preceding +day; between the 5th and the 8th, its general state was from +-48° to -52°, though it occasionally rose to -43°. At +the temperature of -52.2°, Mr. Kendall froze some mercury in +the mould of a pistol-bullet, and fired it against a door at the +distance of six paces. A small portion of the mercury penetrated to +the depth of one-eighth of an inch, but the remainder only just +lodged in the wood. The extreme height of the mercury in the tube +was from 71° at noon to 73° at three +o'clock.—<i>Quarterly Rev.</i></p> +<hr /> +<h3>PARR'S PUNNING.</h3> +<p>Of all the species of wit, punning was one which Dr. Parr +disliked, and in which he seldom indulged; and yet some instances +of it have been related. Reaching a book from a high shelf in his +library, two other books came tumbling down; of which one, a +critical work of Lambert Bos, fell upon the other, which was a +volume of Hume. "See!" said he, "what has +happened—<i>procumbit humi bos</i>." On another occasion, +sitting in his room, suffering under the effects of a slight cold, +when too strong a current was let in upon him, he cried out, "Stop, +stop, that is too much. I am at present only <i>par levibus +ventis</i>." At another time, a gentleman having asked him to +subscribe to Dr. Busby's translation of Lucretius, he declined to +do so, saying it would cost too much money; it would indeed be +"Lucretius <i>carus</i>."—<i>Field's Memoirs</i>.</p> +<hr /> +<h3>HOUBRAKEN'S HEADS.</h3> +<p>Houbraken, as the late Lord Orford justly observes, "was +ignorant of our history, uninquisitive into the authenticity of the +drawings which were transmitted to him, and engraved whatever was +sent;" adducing two instances, namely, Carr, Earl of Somerset, and +Secretary Thurloe, as not only spurious, but not having the least +resemblance to the persons they pretend to represent. An anonymous +but evidently well informed writer (in the Gentleman's Magazine) +further states, that "Thurloe's, and about <i>thirty</i> of the +others, are copied from heads painted for no one knows +whom."—<i>Lodge's Illustrated Biography</i>.</p> +<hr /> +<h3>VIRGIL'S GEORGICS.</h3> +<p>Every reader of taste knows that "glance from earth to heaven" +which pervades the Georgics throughout, and that poetical almanack +which the poet has made use of for pointing out the various seasons +for the different operations of husbandry. Will it be believed that +his Spanish translator has actually taken the trouble to convert +these indications into days of the month, and inserted the result +of his labours in the text?</p> +<hr /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page332" id="page332"></a>[pg +332]</span></p> +<h3>WOMAN'S EYE.</h3> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>The light that beams from woman's eye.</p> +<p class="i2">And sparkles through her tear,</p> +<p>Responds to that impassion'd sigh</p> +<p class="i2">Which love delights to hear.</p> +<p>'Tis the sweet language of the soul,</p> +<p class="i2">On which a voice is hung,</p> +<p>More eloquent than ever stole</p> +<p class="i2">From saint's or poet's tongue.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p><i>Forget Me Not</i>—1829.</p></div></div> +<hr /> +<h3>"NIMIUM NE CREDE COLORI."</h3> +<p>Jack Taylor once said to a water-drinking person, with a purple +face, "better things might <i>prima facie</i> be expected."</p> +<hr class="full" /> +<h2>SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.</h2> +<hr /> +<h3>MR. ABERNETHY.</h3> +<p>Of Mr. Abernethy's independence and strict veneration of what is +right, we have many examples. Among others, the following is +characteristic:—A certain noble personage, now enjoying a +situation of great responsibility in the Sister Kingdom, had been +waiting for a long time in the surgeon's anteroom, when, seeing +those who had arrived before him, successively called in, he became +somewhat impatient, and sent his card in. No notice was taken of +the hint; he sent another +card—another—another—and another; still no +answer. At length he gained admission in his turn; and, full of +nobility and choler, he asked, rather aristocratically, why he had +been kept waiting so long?—"Wh—ew!" responded the +professor; "because you didn't come sooner, to be sure. And now, if +your lordship will sit down, I will hear what you have to say."</p> +<p>One thing Mr. Abernethy cannot abide, that is, any interruption +to his discourse. This it is, in fact, which so often irritates +him, so often causes him to snarl.—"People come here," he has +often said to us, "to consult me, and they will torture me with +their long and foolish fiddle-de-dee stories; so we quarrel, and +then they blackguard me all about this large town; but I can't help +that."</p> +<p>That Abernethy is odd all the world knows, but his oddity is far +more amusing than repulsive, far more playful than bearish. Yates's +picture of him last year was not bad; neither was it good—it +wanted the raciness of the original. Let the reader imagine a smug, +elderly, sleek, and venerable-looking man, approaching seventy +years of age, rather (as novel-writers say) below than above the +middle height, somewhat inclined to corpulency, and upright in his +carriage withal; with his hair most primly powdered, and nicely +curled round his brow and temples: let them imagine such a person +habited in sober black, with his feet thrust carelessly into a pair +of unlaced half-boots, and his hands into the pockets of his +"peculiars," and they have the "glorious John" of the profession +before their eyes. The following colloquy, which occurred not many +days since, between him and a friend of ours, is so characteristic +of the professor, that we cannot resist its insertion:—</p> +<p>Having entered the room, our friend "opened the proceedings." "I +wish you to ascertain what is the matter with my eye, sir. It is +very painful, and I am afraid there is some great mischief going +on."—"Which I can't see," said Abernethy, placing the patient +before the window, and looking closely at the +eye.—"But—" interposed our friend.—"Which I can't +see," again said, or rather sung the professor. "Perhaps not, sir, +but—"—"Now don't bother!" ejaculated the other; "but +sit down, and I'll tell you all about it." Our friend sat down +accordingly, while Abernethy, standing with his back against the +table, thus began: "I take it for granted that, in consulting me, +you wish to know what I should do for myself, were I in a +predicament similar to yourself. Now, I have no reason to suppose +that you are in any particular predicament; and the terrible +mischief which you apprehend, depends, I take it, altogether upon +the stomach. Mind,—at present I have no reason to believe +that there is any thing else the matter with you." (Here my friend +was about to disclose sundry dreadful maladies with which he +believed himself afflicted, but he was interrupted with +"Diddle-dum, diddle-dum, diddle-dum dee!" uttered in the same +smooth tone as the previous part of the address—and he was +silent.)—"Now, your stomach being out of order, it is my duty +to explain to you how to put it to rights again; and, in my +whimsical way, I shall give you an illustration of my position; for +I like to tell people something that they will remember. The +kitchen, that is, your stomach, being out of order, the garret +(pointing to the head) cannot be right, and egad! every room in the +house becomes affected. Repair the injury in the +kitchen,—remedy the evil there,—(<i>now don't +bother</i>,) and all will be right. This you must do by diet. If +you put improper food into your stomach, by Gad you play the very +devil with it, and with the whole machine besides. Vegetable matter +ferments, and becomes gaseous; while animal substances are changed +into a putrid, abominable, and +<span class="pagenum"><a name="page333" id="page333"></a>[pg +333]</span> acrid stimulus. (<i>Don't bother again!</i>) You are +going to ask, 'What has all this to do with my eye?' I will tell +you. Anatomy teaches us, that the skin is a continuation of the +membrane which lines the stomach; and your own observation will +inform you, that the delicate linings of the mouth, throat, nose, +and eyes, are nothing more. Now some people acquire preposterous +noses, others blotches on the face and different parts of the body, +others inflammation of the eyes—all arising from irritation +of the stomach. People laugh at me for talking so much about the +stomach. I sometimes tell this story to forty different people of a +morning, and some won't listen to me; so we quarrel, and they go +and abuse me all over the town. I can't help it—they came to +me for my advice, and I give it them, if they will take it. I can't +do any more. Well, sir, as to the question of diet. I must refer +you to my book. (Here the professor smiled, and continued smiling +as he proceeded.) There are only about a dozen pages—and you +will find, beginning at page 73, all that it is necessary for you +to know. I am christened 'Doctor My-Book,' and satirized under that +name all over England; but who would sit and listen to a long +lecture of twelve pages, or remember one-half of it when it was +done? So I have reduced my directions into writing, and there they +are for any body to follow, if they please.</p> +<p>"Having settled the question of diet, we now come to medicine. +It is, or ought to be, the province of a medical man to soothe and +assist Nature, not to force her. Now, the only medicine I should +advise you to take, is a dose of a slight aperient medicine every +morning the first thing. I won't stipulate for the dose, as that +must be regulated by circumstances, but you must take some; for +without it, by Gad; your stomach will never be right. People go to +Harrowgate, and Buxton, and Bath, and the devil knows where, to +drink the waters, and they return full of admiration at their +surpassing efficacy. Now these waters contain next to nothing of +purgative medicine; but they are taken readily, regularly, and in +such quantities, as to produce the desired effect. You must +persevere in this plan, sir, until you experience relief, which you +certainly will do. I am often asked—'Well, but Mr. Abernethy, +why don't you practise what you preach?' I answer, by reminding the +inquirer of the parson and the signpost: both point the way, but +neither follow its course."—And thus ended a colloquy, +wherein is mingled much good sense, useful advice, and +whimsicality.—<i>New Monthly Magazine</i>.</p> +<hr /> +<h3>GIPSIES.</h3> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Whether from India's burning plains,</p> +<p>Or wild Bohemia's domains</p> +<p class="i2">Your steps were first directed:—</p> +<p>Or whether ye be Egypt's sons,</p> +<p>Whose stream, like Nile's for ever runs</p> +<p class="i2">With sources undetected,—</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Arab's of Europe! Gipsy race!</p> +<p>Your Eastern manners, garb, and face</p> +<p class="i2">Appear a strange chimera;</p> +<p>None, none but you can now be styled</p> +<p>Romantic, picturesque, and wild,</p> +<p class="i2">In this prosaic era.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Ye sole freebooters of the wood</p> +<p>Since Adam Bell and Robin Hood—</p> +<p class="i2">Kept every where asunder</p> +<p>From other tribes—King, Church, and State</p> +<p>Spurning, and only dedicate</p> +<p class="i2">To freedom, sloth, and plunder.</p> +<p>Your forest-camp—the forms one sees</p> +<p>Banditti like amid the trees,</p> +<p class="i2">The ragged donkies grazing,</p> +<p>The Sibyl's eye prophetic, bright</p> +<p>With flashes of the fitful light,</p> +<p class="i2">Beneath the caldron blazing,—</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>O'er my young mind strange terrors threw:</p> +<p>Thy history gave me Moore Carew!</p> +<p class="i2">A more exalted notion</p> +<p>Of Gipsy life, nor can I yet</p> +<p>Gaze on your tents, and quite forget</p> +<p class="i2">My former deep emotion.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>For "auld lang syne" I'll not maltreat</p> +<p>Yon pseudo-Tinker, though the Cheat,</p> +<p class="i2">Ay sly as thievish Reynard,</p> +<p>Instead of mending kettles, prowls</p> +<p>To make foul havock of my fowls,</p> +<p class="i2">And decimate my hen-yard.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Come thou, too, black-eyed lass, and try</p> +<p>That potent skill in palmistry.</p> +<p class="i2">Which sixpences can wheedle;</p> +<p>Mine is a friendly cottage—here</p> +<p>No snarling mastiff need you fear,</p> +<p class="i2">No Constable or Beadle.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>'Tis yours, I know, to draw at will</p> +<p>Upon Futurity a bill,</p> +<p class="i2">And Plutus to importune:—</p> +<p>Discount the bill—take half yourself</p> +<p>Give me the balance of the pelf.</p> +<p class="i2">And both may laugh at fortune.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p><i>Ibid</i>.</p></div></div> +<hr /> +<h3>GEORGE HARVEST.</h3> +<p>The Rev. George Harvest, of Trinity College, Cambridge, having +been private tutor to the Duke of Richmond, was invited to dine +with the old duchess, and to accompany her party to the play. He +used to travel with a night-cap in his pocket, and having occasion +for a handkerchief at the theatre, made use of his cap for that +purpose. In one of his reveries, however, it fell from the +side-box, where he was sitting, into the pit, where a wag, who +picked it up, hoisted it upon the end of a stick, that it might be +claimed by its rightful proprietor. Judge of the consternation of a +large party of ladies of rank and fashion, when George Harvest rose +in the midst of them, and claimed the night-cap (which was somewhat +greasy from use) by the initials G.H., which were legibly marked on +it. The cap was restored to him amidst shouts of laughter, that ran +through the pit to the great discomfiture of the duchess and the +rest of the party.—<i>Ibid.</i></p> +<hr class="full" /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="page334" id="page334"></a>[pg +334]</span> +<h2>SCIENTIFIC RECREATIONS.</h2> +<hr /> +<h3>ELECTRICAL PHENOMENA.</h3> +<h4>(<i>From the Treatise on Electricity—in the Library of +Useful Knowledge</i>.)</h4> +<p>The colours produced by the electric explosion of metals have +been applied to impress letters or ornamental devices on silk and +on paper. For this purpose Mr. Singer directs that the outline of +the required figure should be first traced on thick drawing paper, +and afterwards cut out in the manner of stencil plates. The drawing +paper is then placed on the silk or paper intended to be marked; a +leaf of gold is laid upon it, and a card over that; the whole is +then placed in a press or under a weight, and a charge from a +battery sent through the gold leaf. The stain is confined by the +interposition of the drawing paper to the limit of the design, and +in this way a profile, a flower, or any other outline figure may be +very neatly impressed.</p> +<p>Most combustible bodies are capable of being inflamed by +electricity, but more especially if it be made to strike against +them in the form of a spark or shock obtained by an interrupted +circuit, as by the interposition of a stratum of air. In this way +may alcohol, ether, camphor, powdered resin, phosphorus, or +gunpowder be set fire to. The inflammation of oil of turpentine +will be promoted by strewing upon it fine particles of brass +filings. If the spirit of wine be not highly rectified, it will +generally be necessary previously to warm it, and the same +precaution must be taken with other fluids, as oil and pitch; but +it is not required with ether, which usually inflames very readily. +But on the other hand, it is to be remarked that the temperature of +the body which communicates the spark appears to have no sensible +influence on the heat produced by it. Thus the sparks taken from a +piece of ice are as capable of inflaming bodies as those from a +piece of red-hot iron. Nor is the heating power of electricity in +the smallest degree diminished by its being conducted through any +number of freezing mixtures which are rapidly absorbing heat from +surrounding bodies.</p> +<hr /> +<h3>HEATING ROOMS.</h3> +<p>A new invention for heating rooms has met with much +encouragement in Paris. A piece of quick-lime dipped into water, +and shut hermetically into a box constructed for the purpose, is +said to give almost a purgatory-heat, and prevent the necessity of +fire during winter.—<i>Lit. Gaz</i>.</p> +<hr class="full" /> +<h2>THE SELECTOR;</h2> +<h2>AND LITERARY NOTICES OF <i>NEW WORKS</i></h2> +<hr /> +<h3>GOLDEN RULES.</h3> +<h3>TO RENDER MEN HONEST, RESPECTABLE, AND HAPPY.</h3> +<h4><i>By Sir Richard Phillips</i>.</h4> +<p>All members of the human family should remember, that the human +race is, as to time and nature, but as one totality; for, since +every man and woman had two parents, each parent two parents, and +so on in geometrical progression, hence every individual, high or +low, must necessarily be descended from every individual of the +whole population as it existed but a few hundred years before, +whether they were high or low, virtuous or abandoned; while every +procreative individual of the existing race must be the actual +progenitor of the entire race which may exist at the same distance +of future time. What motives for charity, for forbearing from +injuries, for benevolence, for universal love.</p> +<hr /> +<p>The bed of sickness, with its increased sensibility of nerves, +is a delicate test of man's conscience, and of self-approbation or +reprobation. Requiring sympathy himself, he now sympathizes with +others; and, unable to direct his thoughts to external things, they +are forced upon himself. Great is then his solace, and efficacious +his medicines, if he has no other reflections than such as are +supplied by his justice, liberality, and benevolence; but +accumulated will be his sufferings, and dangerous the result, if +crimes and misdeeds force themselves at such a time on his mind; +while in any delirium of fever he will rave on those subjects, and, +without vision, will often perceive, by the mere excitement of his +brain, the spectres of the injured making grimaces before him.</p> +<hr /> +<p>If you are rich, and want to enjoy the exalted luxury of +relieving distress, go to the Bankrupt Court, to the Court for +Insolvent Debtors, to the gaols, the work-houses, and the +hospitals. If you are rich and childless, and want heirs, look to +the same assemblages of misfortune; for all are not culpable who +appear in the Bankrupt and Insolvent Lists; nor all criminal who +are found in gaols; nor all improvident who are inmates of +work-houses and hospitals. On the contrary, in these situations, an +alloy of vice is mixed with virtue enough to afford materials +<span class="pagenum"><a name="page335" id="page335"></a>[pg +335]</span> for as deep tragedies as ever poet fancied or stage +exhibited; and visiters of relief would act the part of angels +descending from Heaven among men, whose chief affliction is the +neglect of unthinking affluence.</p> +<hr /> +<p>Marriage is a circumstance of life, which, in its actual course, +involves the feelings and fortunes of human beings more than any +other event of their lives. It is a connexion generally formed by +inexperience, under the blindness and caprice of passion; and, +though these conditions cannot be avoided, as forming the bases of +the connexion, yet it is so important, that a man is never ruined +who has an interesting, faithful, and virtuous wife; while he is +lost to comfort, fortune, and even to hope, who has united himself +to a vicious and unprincipled one. The fate of woman is still more +intimately blended with that of her husband; for, being in the eyes +of the law and the world but second to him, she is the victim of +his follies and vices at home, and of his ill success and +degradation abroad. Rules are useless, where passions, founded on +trifling associations and accidents, govern; but much mischief +often results from fathers expecting young men to be in the social +position of old ones, and from present fortune being preferred to +virtues; for industry and talent, stimulated by affection, and +fostered by family interests, soon create competency and fortune; +while a connexion founded on mere wealth, which is often speedily +wasted by dissipation, habits of extravagance, and the chances of +life, necessarily ends in disappointment, disgust, and misery.</p> +<hr /> +<p>Wretched is the man who has no employment but to watch his own +digestions; and who, on waking in the morning, has no useful +occupation of the day presented to his mind. To such a one +respiration is a toil, and existence a continued disease. +Self-oblivion is his only resource, indulgence in alcohol in +various disguises his remedy, and death or superstition his only +comfort and hope. For what was he born, and why does he live? are +questions which he constantly asks himself; and his greatest +enigmas are the smiling faces of habitual industry, stimulated by +the wants of the day, or fears for the future. If he is excited to +exertion, it is commonly to indulge some vicious propensity, or +display his scorn of those pursuits which render others happier +than himself. If he seek to relieve his inanity in books, his +literature ascends no higher than the romances, the newspapers, or +the scandal, of the day; and all the nobler pursuits of mind, as +well as body, are utterly lost in regard to him. His passage +through life is like that of a bird through the air, and his final +cause appears merely to be that of sustaining the worms in his +costly tomb.</p> +<hr /> +<p>The decline of life, and the retrospections of old age, furnish +unequivocal tests of worthiness and unworthiness. Happy is the man, +who, after a well-spent life, can contemplate the rapid approach of +his last year with the consciousness that, if he were born again, +he could not, under all the circumstances of his worldly position, +have done better, and who has inflicted no injuries for which it is +too late to atone. Wretched, on the contrary, is he, who is obliged +to look back on a youth of idleness and profligacy, on a manhood of +selfishness and sensuality, and on a career of hypocrisy, of +insensibility, of concealed crime, and of injustice above the reach +of law. Visit both during the decay of their systems, observe their +feelings and tempers, view the followers at their funerals, count +the tears on their graves; and, after such a comparison, in good +time make your own choice.</p> +<hr /> +<p>Constant change is the feature of society. The world is like a +magic lantern, or the shifting scenes in a pantomime. TEN YEARS +convert the population of schools into men and women, the young +into fathers and matrons, make and mar fortunes, and bury the last +generation but one. TWENTY YEARS convert infants into lovers, and +fathers and mothers, render youth the operative generation, decide +men's fortunes and distinctions, convert active men into crawling +drivellers, and bury all the preceding generation. THIRTY YEARS +raise an active generation from nonentity, change fascinating +beauties into merely bearable old women, convert lovers into +grandfathers and grandmothers, and bury the active generation, or +reduce them to decrepitude and imbecility. FORTY YEARS, alas! +change the face of all society; infants are growing old, the bloom +of youth and beauty has passed away, two active generations have +been swept from the stage of life, names so cherished are +forgotten, and unsuspected candidates for fame have started from +the exhaustless womb of nature. FIFTY YEARS! why should any desire +to retain their affections from maturity for fifty years? It is to +behold a world which they do not know, and to which they are +unknown; it is to live to weep for the generations passed away, for +lovers, for parents, for <span class="pagenum"><a name="page336" +id="page336"></a>[pg 336]</span> children, for friends, in the +grave; it is to see every thing turned upside down by the fickle +hand of fortune, and the absolute despotism of time; it is, in a +word, to behold the vanity of human life in all its varieties of +display!</p> +<p><i>Social Philosophy</i>.</p> +<hr class="full" /> +<h2>THE GATHERER</h2> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>A snapper up of unconsidered +trifles.—SHAKSPEARE</p></div></div> +<hr /> +<h3>SHERRY.</h3> +<p>Commentators have puzzled themselves to find out Falstaff's +sherries sack: there can be no doubt but that it was <i>dry +sherry</i>, and the French word <i>sec</i> dry, corrupted into +sack. In a poem printed in 1619, sack and sherry are noted +throughout as synonymous, every stanza of twelve ending—</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>Give me sack, old sack, boys,</p> +<p class="i2">To make the muses merry,</p> +<p>The life of mirth, and the joy of the earth,</p> +<p class="i2">Is a cup of old sherry.</p></div></div> +<hr /> +<h3>CURIOUS WILL.</h3> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p><i>By a Student of the University of Dublin.</i></p> +<p><i>Cum ita semper me amares</i>,</p> +<p>How to reward you all my care is,</p> +<p><i>Consilium tibi do imprimis</i></p> +<p>For I believe that short my time is;</p> +<p><i>Amice Admodum amande</i>,</p> +<p>Pray thee leave off thy drinking brandy,</p> +<p><i>Video qua sorte jaceo hic</i>,</p> +<p>'Tis all for that, O sick! O sick!</p> +<p><i>Mors mea, vexat matrem piam</i>,</p> +<p>No dog was e'er so sick as I am.</p> +<p><i>Secundo mi amice bone</i>,</p> +<p>My breeches take, but there's no money,</p> +<p><i>Et vestes etiam tibi dentur</i>,</p> +<p>If such old things to wear you'll venture;</p> +<p><i>Pediculos si potes pellas</i>,</p> +<p>But they are sometimes prince's fellows;</p> +<p><i>Accipe libros etiam musam</i>,</p> +<p>If I had lived I ne'er had used them,</p> +<p><i>Spero quod his contentus eris</i>,</p> +<p>For I've a friend almost as dear is,</p> +<p><i>Vale ne plus tibi detur</i>.</p> +<p>But send her up, Jack, if you meet her.</p></div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p>C.K.W.</p></div></div> +<hr /> +<h3>OLD ST. PAUL'S.</h3> +<p>In the old cathedral of St. Paul, walks were laid out for +merchants, as in the Royal Exchange. Thus, "the south alley for +usurye, and poperye; the north for simony and the horse fair; in +the middest for all kinds of bargains, meetings, brawlings, +murthers, conspiracies; and the font for ordinary paiements of +money, are so well knowne to all menne as the beggar knows his +dishe."</p> +<hr /> +<h3>THE LINCOLNSHIRE EEL,</h3> +<h4><i>A bit of Munchausen</i>.</h4> +<p>In the year 1702, there was a universal complaint among the +feeders of cattle in the fens, that they frequently lost a horse, +an ox, or a cow, and could not discover by what means; when +watching more narrowly, they observed a horse, and presently after +a cow, go to the river to drink, and suddenly disappear. On going +to the river-side they saw an eel, the body of which was as large +as an elephant. They could not doubt but this was the thief who had +so often robbed them of their cattle, and they very reasonably +concluded if they could catch the eel, their cattle would +henceforth drink in safety. A council being called among the +farmers, they determined upon the following expedient:—They +sent to London and purchased a cable and anchor, by way of +fishing-line and hook, and roasted a young bullock, with which they +baited the hook, and fastened the end of the cable round a barn, +which stood about a hundred feet from the river, and then waited to +see what the morning would produce. At break of day they repaired +to the riverside, when, to their great astonishment, they found +that the eel had been there and swallowed the bait, but in +endeavouring to disengage himself, had pulled the barn after him +into the river, and having broken the cable, made his escape.</p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p>With the present is published a SUPPLEMENTARY NUMBER, containing +the SPIRIT of "the ANNUALS" for 1829—with Critical Notices of +their Engravings and Literary Contents, copious Selections, and +Unique Extracts, and a FINE ENGRAVING from a splendid subject; in +one of the most popular of these elegant works.</p> +<hr class="full" /> +<h4>LIMBIRD'S EDITION OF THE</h4> +<h4>FOLLOWING NOVELS ARE ALREADY PUBLISHED:</h4> +<pre> + <i>s.</i> <i>d.</i> +Mackenzie's Man of Feeling 0 6 +Paul and Virginia 0 6 +The Castle of Otranto 0 6 +Almoran and Hamet 0 6 +Elizabeth, or the Exiles of Siberia 0 6 +The Castles of Athlin and Dunbayne 0 6 +Rasselas 0 8 +The Old English Baron 0 8 +Nature and Art 0 8 +Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield 0 10 +Sicilian Romance 1 0 +The Man of the World 1 0 +A Simple Story 1 4 +Joseph Andrews 1 6 +Humphry Clinker 1 8 +The Romance of the Forest 1 8 +The Italian 2 0 +Zeluco, by Dr. Moore 2 6 +Edward, by Dr. Moore 2 0 +Roderick Random 2 6 +The Mysteries of Udolpho 3 6 +</pre> +<hr class="full" /> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote1" +name="footnote1"></a><b>Footnote 1:</b> +<a href="#footnotetag1">(return)</a> +<p>Dr. Stukely, who says, that <i>acan</i> in the Chaldee signifies +a serpent, and <i>hac</i> is no other than a snake. In Yorkshire +they still call snakes <i>hags</i>; and in the British language +<i>pen</i> denotes a head.</p></blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote2" +name="footnote2"></a><b>Footnote 2:</b> +<a href="#footnotetag2">(return)</a> +<p>The only place in which they do not progress mutually is the +theatre. Look at the scenery of our patent theatres, and compare it +with the vulgar daubs even of John Kemble's time. Some of the +scenes by Stanfield, Roberts, Grieve, and Pugh, are "perfect +pictures." Yet the language of the stage is at a stand, and insipid +comedy, dull tragedy, and stupid farce are more abundant than +before the "march of mind".</p></blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote3" +name="footnote3"></a><b>Footnote 3:</b> +<a href="#footnotetag3">(return)</a> +<p>While on the subject of <i>wood-engraving</i>, perhaps we may he +allowed to mention our own humble plan of illustrating a sheet of +letter-press for twopence. Of course, perfection in the engraving +department would have ruined all parties concerned; for each of our +subjects (as the miniature painters tell you of their works) might +be <i>worked up</i> to "any price". It is now six years since the +MIRROR was commenced, and as we are not speaking of ourselves, +individually, we hope we may refer to the progressive improvement +of the <i>graphic</i> department without any charge of +vanity.</p></blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote4" +name="footnote4"></a><b>Footnote 4:</b> +<a href="#footnotetag4">(return)</a> +<p>The engraving is from Prout's exquisite picture of the +magnificent city of <i>Vicenza</i>—for which we recollect our +obligation to the "<i>Forget Me Not</i>."</p></blockquote> +<hr class="full" /> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 11528 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/11528-h/images/341-1.png b/11528-h/images/341-1.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..5821218 --- /dev/null +++ b/11528-h/images/341-1.png |
