path: root/76910-0.txt

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76910 ***





                           THE PENNY MAGAZINE

                                 OF THE

             Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

 18.]                   PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY.         [July 14, 1832

------------------------------------------------------------------------


                             THE COLOSSEUM.

             [Illustration: Colosseum or Coliseum of Rome.]

When the imperial power was firmly established at Rome, the sports of
the amphitheatre were conducted upon a scale to which the Consuls of the
republic had scarcely dared to aspire. Caligula, on his birth-day, gave
four hundred bears, and as many other wild beasts to be slain; and on
the birth-day of Drusilla, he exhibited these brutal spectacles,
continued to the succeeding day on a similar scale[1]. Claudius
instituted combats between Thessalian horsemen and wild bulls; and he
also caused camels to fight for the first time with horses. Invention
was racked to devise new combinations of cruelty. Many of the emperors
abandoned themselves to these sports with as passionate an ardour as the
uncultivated multitude. Sensuality debases as much as ignorance, because
it is ignorance under another name. Claudius rose at daylight to repair
to the Circus, and frequently remained, that he might not lose a single
pang of the victims, while the people went to their afternoon meal.
Sometimes, during the reigns of Claudius and Nero, an elephant was
opposed to a single fencer; and the spectators were delighted by the
display of individual skill. Sometimes, hundreds and even thousands of
the more ferocious beasts were slaughtered by guards on horseback; and
the pleasure of the multitude was in proportion to the lavishness with
which the blood of man and beast was made to flow. The passion for these
sports required a more convenient theatre for its gratification than the
old Circus. The Colosseum was commenced by Vespasian, and completed by
Titus (A. D. 79). This enormous building occupied only three years in
its erection. Cassiodorus affirms that this magnificent monument of
folly cost as much as would have been required for the building of a
capital city. We have the means of distinctly ascertaining its
dimensions and its accommodations from the great mass of wall that still
remains entire; and although the very clamps of iron and brass that held
together the ponderous stones of that wonderful edifice were removed by
Gothic plunderers; and succeeding generations have resorted to it as to
a quarry for their temples and their palaces; yet the “enormous
skeleton” still stands, to show what prodigious works may be raised by
the skill and perseverance of man, and how vain are the mightiest
displays of his power when compared with those intellectual efforts
which have extended the empire of virtue and of science.

The Colosseum, which is of an oval form, occupies the space of nearly
six acres. “It may justly be said to have been the most imposing
building, from its apparent magnitude, in the world; the pyramids of
Egypt can only be compared with it in the extent of their plan, as they
cover nearly the same surface[2].” The greatest length, or major axis,
is 620 feet; the greatest breadth, or minor axis, 513 feet. The outer
wall is 157 feet high in its whole extent. The exterior wall is divided
into four stories, each ornamented with one of the orders of
architecture. The cornice of the upper story is perforated for the
purpose of inserting wooden masts, which passed also through the
architrave and frieze, and descended to a row of corbels immediately
above the upper range of windows, on which are holes to receive the
masts. These masts were for the purpose of attaching cords to, for
sustaining the awning which defended the spectators from the sun or
rain. Two corridors ran all round the building, leading to staircases
which ascended to the several stories; and the seats which descended
towards the arena, supported throughout upon eighty arches, occupied so
much of the space that the clear opening of the present inner wall next
the arena is only 287 feet by 180 feet. Immediately above and around the
arena was the podium, elevated about twelve or fifteen feet, on which
were seated the emperor, senators, ambassadors of foreign nations, and
other distinguished personages in that city of distinctions. From the
podium to the top of the second story were seats of marble for the
equestrian order; above the second story the seats appear to have been
constructed of wood. In these various seats eighty thousand spectators
might be arranged according to their respective ranks; and indeed it
appears from inscriptions, as well as from expressions in Roman writers,
that many of the places in this immense theatre were assigned to
particular individuals, and that each might find his seat without
confusion. The ground was excavated over the surface of the arena in
1813; a great number of substructions were then discovered, which by
some antiquaries are considered to be of modern date, and by others to
have formed dens for the various beasts that were exhibited. The
descriptions which have been left by historians and other writers of the
variety and extent of the shows, would indicate that a vast space and
ample conveniences were required beneath the stage, to accomplish the
wonders which were, doubtless, there realized in the presence of
assembled Rome. We subjoin, from Messrs. Cresy and Taylor’s work, an
interior view looking west, taken at the time when the arena was so
excavated. It has since been filled up. The external view of this
remarkable building is given as it existed in the time of Piranesi, in
the last century.

Gibbon, the historian, has given a splendid description, in his twelfth
book, of the exhibitions of the Colosseum; but he acknowledges his
obligation to Montaigne, who, says the historian, “gives a very just and
lively view of Roman magnificence in these spectacles.” Our readers
will, we doubt not, be gratified by the quaint but most appropriate
sketch of the old philosopher of France:--

“It was doubtless a fine thing to bring and plant within the theatre a
great number of vast trees, with all their branches in their full
verdure, representing a great shady forest, disposed in excellent order,
and the first day to throw into it a thousand ostriches, a thousand
stags, a thousand boars, and a thousand fallow deer, to be killed and
disposed of by the people: the next day to cause an hundred great lions,
an hundred leopards and three hundred bears to be killed in his
presence: and for the third day, to make three hundred pair of fencers
to fight it out to the last,--as the Emperor Probus did. It was also
very fine to see those vast amphitheatres, all faced with marble
without, curiously wrought with figures and statues, and the inside
sparkling with rare decorations and enrichments; all the sides of this
vast space filled and environed from the bottom to the top, with three
or four score ranks of seats, all of marble also, and covered with
cushions, where an hundred thousand men might sit placed at their ease;
and the place below, where the plays were played, to make it by art
first open and cleft into chinks, representing caves that vomited out
the beasts designed for the spectacle; and then, secondly, to be
overflowed with a profound sea, full of sea-monsters, and loaded with
ships of war, to represent a naval battle: and thirdly, to make it dry
and even again for the combats of the gladiators; and for the fourth
scene, to have it strewed with vermilion and storax, instead of sand,
there to make a solemn feast for all that infinite number of people--the
last act of one only day.

            [Illustration: Interior View of the Colosseum.]

“Sometimes they have made a high mountain advance itself, full of
fruit-trees and other flourishing sorts of woods, sending down rivulets
of water from the top, as from the mouth of a fountain: other whiles, a
great ship was seen to come rolling in, which opened and divided of
itself; and after having disgorged from the hold four or five hundred
beasts for fight, closed again, and vanished without help. At other
times, from the floor of this place, they made spouts of perfumed waters
dart their streams upward, and so high as to besprinkle all that
infinite multitude. To defend themselves from the injuries of the
weather, they had that vast place one while covered over with purple
curtains of needle-work, and by and by with silk of another colour,
which they could draw off or on in a moment, as they had a mind. The
net-work also that was set before the people to defend them from the
violence of these turned-out beasts, was also woven of gold.”

“If there be anything excusable in such excesses as these,” continues
Montaigne, “it is where the novelty and invention create more wonder
than expense.” Fortunately for the real enjoyments of mankind, even
under the sway of a Roman despot, “the novelty and invention” had very
narrow limits when applied to matters so utterly unworthy and
unintellectual as the cruel sports of the amphitheatre. Probus, indeed,
transplanted trees to the arena, so that it had the appearance of a
verdant grove; and Severus introduced four hundred ferocious animals in
one ship sailing in the little lake which the arena formed. But on
ordinary occasions, profusion,--tasteless, haughty, and uninventive
profusion,--the gorgeousness of brute power, the pomp of satiated
luxury--these constituted the only claim to the popular admiration. If
Titus exhibited five thousand wild beasts at the dedication of the
amphitheatre, Trajan bestowed ten thousand on the people at the
conclusion of the Dacian war. If the younger Gordian collected together
bears, elks, zebras, ostriches, boars, and wild horses, he was an
imitator only of the spectacles of Carinus, in which the rarity of the
animals was as much considered as their fierceness. Gibbon has well
remarked, “While the populace gazed with stupid wonder on the splendid
show, the naturalist might indeed observe the figure and properties of
so many different species, transported from every part of the ancient
world into the amphitheatre of Rome. But this accidental benefit, which
science might derive from folly, is surely insufficient to justify such
a wanton abuse of the public riches.” The prodigal waste of the public
riches, however, was not the weightiest evil of the sports of the
Circus. The public morality was sacrificed upon the same shrine as its
wealth. The destruction of beasts became a fit preparation for the
destruction of men. A small number of those unhappy persons who engaged
in fight with the wild animals of the arena, were trained to these
dangerous exercises, as are the matadors of Spain at the present day.
These men were accustomed to exhaust the courage of the beast by false
attacks; to spring on a sudden past him, striking him behind before he
could recover his guard; to cast a cloak over his eyes, and then
despatch or bind him at this critical moment of his terror; or to throw
a cup full of some chemical preparation into his gaping mouth, so as to
produce the stupefaction of intense agony. But the greater part of the
human beings who were exposed to these combats, perilous even to the
most skilful, were disobedient slaves and convicted malefactors. The
Christians, during their persecutions, constituted a very large number
of the latter class. The Roman power was necessarily intolerant; the
assemblies of the new religion became objects of dislike and suspicion;
the patience and constancy of the victims increased the fury of their
oppressors; and even such a man as the younger Pliny held that their
obstinacy alone was deserving of punishment. Thus, then, the imperial
edicts against the early Christians furnished more stimulating
exhibitions to the popular appetite for blood, than the combat of lion
with lion, or gladiator with gladiator. The people were taught to
believe that they were assisting at a solemn act of justice; and they
came therefore to behold the tiger and the leopard tear the quivering
limb of the aged and the young, of the strong and the feeble, without a
desire to rescue the helpless, or to succour the brave.

                    ⁂ Abridged from Menageries, vol. ii.

-----

Footnote 1:

  Dion, lib. lix.

Footnote 2:

  The Architectural Antiquities of Rome, by E. Cresy and G. L. Taylor: a
  work of equal accuracy and splendour.


                         ---------------------


                         SALE OF THE SPECTATOR.

It is Addison’s friend Tickell who tells us that the sale of the
‘Spectator’ sometimes amounted to 20,000 copies. The statement, however,
is scarcely credible. In the tenth number of the work it is mentioned on
the authority of the publisher, that the sale was already 3,000 a day.
We question if it ever rose much higher than this. No. 445, which
appeared on the 31st of July, 1712, was the last published without a
stamp; and in it the writer (Addison) intimates that the price will in
future be two-pence instead of a penny. Half of the addition was to pay
for the halfpenny stamp, and the other half to compensate for the
diminished circulation. A hope is at the same time expressed that the
country may receive “five or six pounds a day” by means of this tax laid
on the work. Even if this hope had been realised to its utmost extent,
it would have implied a sale of only 2,880 copies. But in point of fact
this appears to have been nearly the full circulation before the duty
was put on; for, in No. 555, the concluding paper (of the first series)
which is written and signed by Steele, the editor, the average produce
of the tax is only rated as being then “above 20_l._ a week.” The sale
must therefore have been only about 1,600 a day. And yet it seems to be
intimated that it had for some time been rather recovering from the
depression occasioned by the imposition of the tax: it was at first
reduced, we are told, “to less than half the number that was usually
printed before this tax was laid.” The circulation before the imposition
of the tax, therefore, could not have greatly exceeded 3,000; and, such
being its average amount, it seems scarcely possible that even on
extraordinary occasions it should have ever risen to anything like the
number mentioned by Tickell. At the time he wrote, however, the papers
making the first four volumes had been reprinted and published in a
cheaper form, and above 9,000 copies of each volume have been sold. This
sale of the third and fourth volumes appears to have been effected in
the course of the preceding three months; during which time, however,
very few copies, if any at all, of the first and second volumes, would
seem to have been disposed of. For, in No. 448, we are told that of
these two volumes an edition of about 10,000 copies had already been
carried off. It may be concluded, therefore, that this was the whole
number which the demands of the public would be made to absorb. Many
editions, however, of what extent we do not know, were sold in the
course of the next twenty or thirty years. We have before us Tonson’s
tenth edition, published in 1729; and his eleventh, dated 1733. There
had been a new edition, therefore, about once in every two years since
the first appearance of the work.

It was probably this stamp duty which chiefly contributed to bring the
‘Spectator’ to a close. In the number in which the rise of price is
announced, considerable hesitation is expressed as to whether the
publication should be continued or dropt, as it was understood many of
the other penny papers would be. From a letter in No. 461, it appears
that the ‘Spectator’ was the only one of these periodicals which had
doubled its price; the others which survived contented themselves with
merely charging their subscribers the additional halfpenny required to
defray the tax. These, however, could not have allowed the retailers any
additional profit concurrent with the additional price. On account of
the increased price several coffee-houses had left off taking the
‘Spectator.’ In No. 488 we have again a notice of complaints made by
subscribers on account of this rise in the price of the publication. In
a short time after this we find the writers evidently beginning to make
preparations for concluding their work. The members of the club drop off
one by one. In No. 513 the clergyman is laid on his death-bed. No. 517
announces the death of Sir Roger; and No. 530 the marriage of Will
Honeycomb. In No. 541 the Templar withdraws himself to study law. “What
will all this end in?” says a letter in the next day’s publication; “we
are afraid it portends no good to the public. Unless you speedily fix a
day for the election of new members, we are under apprehensions of
losing the ‘_British Spectator_.’” But the process of dissolution goes
on. No. 544 communicates, in an epistle from himself, the transformation
of Captain Sentry into a Squire; and, finally, No. 549 the removal of
Sir Andrew Freeport by the same fate. Another week terminated the
original series of the ‘Spectator,’ after it had continued to delight
the public for about a year and three quarters. It was resumed about
half a year afterwards, as a thrice-a-week publication; but the attempt
is not understood to have met with the success by which it had formerly
been attended; and the work was again laid down after it had continued
for about six months.


                         ---------------------


                           AGE OF THE HORSE.

The method of judging the age of a horse is by examining the teeth,
which amount to forty when complete; namely, six nippers, or incisors,
as they are sometimes called, two tushes, and six grinders on each side,
in both jaws. A foal, when first born, has in each jaw the first and
second grinders developed; in about a week the two centre nippers make
their appearance, and within a month a third grinder. Between the sixth
and ninth month the whole of the nippers appear, completing the _colt’s
mouth_. At the completion of the first year a fourth grinder appears,
and a fifth by the end of the second year. At this period a new process
commences, the front or first grinder giving way, which is succeeded by
a larger and permanent tooth, and between two years and a half and three
years the two middle nippers are displaced, and succeeded by permanent
teeth. At three years old the sixth grinder has either made or is about
making its appearance. In the fourth year another pair of nippers and
the second pair of grinders are shed; and the corner nippers, toward the
end of the fifth year, are succeeded by permanent teeth, when the mouth
is considered almost perfect, and the colt or filly becomes a horse or a
mare. What is called the _mark_ of the teeth by which a judgment of the
age of a horse for several years may be formed, consists of a portion of
the enamel bending over and forming a little pit in the surface of the
nipper, the inside and bottom of which becomes blackened by the food.
This soon begins to wear down, and the _mark_ becomes shorter and wider,
and fainter. By the end of the first year the mark in the two middle
teeth is wide and faint, and becomes still wider and fainter till the
end of the third year, by which time the centre nippers have been
displaced by the permanent teeth, which are larger than the others,
though not yet so high, and the mark is long, narrow, deep, and black.
At four years the second pair of permanent nippers will be up, the mark
of which will be deep, while that of the first pair will be somewhat
fainter, and that of the corner pair nearly effaced. At this age, too,
the tushes begin to appear. Between the fourth and fifth year, the
corner nippers have been shed, and the new teeth come quite up, showing
the long deep irregular mark; the other nippers bearing evident tokens
of increasing wearing. At six years the mark on the centre nippers is
worn out, but there is still a brown hue in the centre of the tooth. At
seven years the mark will be worn from the four centre nippers, and will
have completely disappeared at eight years from them all. It may be
added, that it is the lower jaw of the horse that is usually examined,
and which is here described. The changes of the teeth taking place in
both jaws about the same time, but the cavity of the teeth in the upper
jaw being somewhat deeper, the mark lasts longer, though the exact
period is a matter of controversy. According to what may be considered
good authority, however, it may be stated that at nine years the mark
will be worn from the middle nippers, from the next pair at ten, and
from all the upper nippers at eleven. During all this time the tushes
(the extremities of which are at first sharp-pointed and curved) become
gradually blunter, shorter, and rounder. For further information on this
subject, the volume on the Horse, published by the Society, may be
advantageously consulted.


                         ---------------------


                                TOBACCO

  [Illustration: A tobacco plant, with several birds standing nearby.]

Tobacco was introduced into Europe from the province of Tabaca in St.
Domingo in 1559, by a Spanish gentleman, named Hernandez de Toledo, who
brought a small quantity into Spain and Portugal. From thence, by the
means of the French ambassador at Lisbon, Jean Nicot from whom it
derived its name of Nicotia, it found its way to Paris, where it was
used in the form of a powder by Catherine de Medici. Tobacco then came
under the patronage of the Cardinal Santa Croce, the pope’s nuncio, who,
returning from his embassy at the Spanish and Portuguese courts, carried
the plant to his own country, and thus acquired a fame little inferior
to that which, at another period, he had won by piously bringing a
portion of the _real_ cross from the Holy Land. Both in France and in
the Papal States it was at once received with general enthusiasm, in the
shape of snuff; but it was some time after the use of tobacco as snuff
that the practice of smoking it commenced. This practice is generally
supposed to have been introduced into England by Sir Walter Raleigh; but
Camden says, in his ‘Elizabeth,’ that Sir Francis Drake and his
companions, on their return from Virginia in 1585, were “the first, as
far as he knew, who introduced the Indian plant, called Tabacca or
Nicotia, into England, having been taught by the Indians to use it as a
remedy against indigestion. And from the time of their return,” says he,
“it immediately began to grow into very general use, and to bear a high
price; a great many persons, some from luxury, and others for their
health, being wont to draw in the strong-smelling smoke with insatiable
greediness through an earthenware tube, and then to puff it forth again
through their nostrils: so that tabacca-taverns (tabernæ tabaccanæ) are
now as generally kept in all our towns, as wine-houses or beerhouses.”
No doubt the tobacco-taverns of Queen Elizabeth’s times were not
unworthy predecessors of the splendid cygar divans of the present day.
It appears from a note in the ‘Criminal Trials,’ vol i. p. 361, that in
1600 the French ambassador, in his despatches, represented the Peers, on
the trial of the Earls of Essex and Southampton, as smoking tobacco
copiously while they deliberated on their verdict. Sir Walter Raleigh,
too, was accused of having sat with his pipe at the window of the
armoury, while he looked in at the execution of Essex in the Tower. Both
these stories are probably untrue, but the mere relation of them by
contemporaneous writers shows that they were not then monstrously
incredible, and they therefore prove the generality of the practice of
smoking at that time amongst the higher class of society. After a time,
however, the practice of smoking tobacco appears to have met with
strenuous opposition in high places, both in this country and other
parts of Europe. Its principal opponents were the priests, the
physicians, and the sovereign princes; by the former its use was
declared sinful; and, in 1684, Pope Urban VIII. published a bull,
excommunicating all persons found guilty of taking snuff when in church.
This bull was renewed in 1690, by Pope Innocent; and, about twenty-nine
years afterwards, the Sultan Amurath IV made smoking a capital offence.
For a long time smoking was forbidden in Russia, under pain of having
the nose cut off; and in some parts of Switzerland, it was likewise made
a subject of public prosecution--the police regulations of the canton of
Berne, in 1661, placing the prohibition of smoking in the list of the
Ten Commandments, immediately under that against adultery. Nay, that
British Solomon, James I., did not think it beneath the royal dignity to
take up his pen upon the subject. He accordingly, in 1603, published his
famous ‘Counterblaste to Tobacco,’ in which the following remarkable
passage occurs:--“It is a custom loathesome to the eye, hatefull to the
nose, harmfull to the braine, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black
stinking fume thereof nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoke of
the pit that is bottomless.” But notwithstanding this regal and priestly
wrath, the use of the plant extended itself far and wide; and tobacco
is, at this moment, perhaps the most general luxury in existence. The
allusion to the practice in the following lines, taken from the ‘Marrow
of Compliment,’ written in 1651, seems to show the prevalence of smoking
at that period:--

                  “Much meat doth Gluttony procure
                     To feed men fat as swine;
                   But he’s a frugal man indeed,
                     That on a _leaf_ can dine!
                   He needs no napkin for his hands,
                     His fingers’ ends to wipe,
                   That hath his kitchen in a box,
                     His roast meat in a Pipe!”


                         ---------------------


                               THE WEEK.

                       [Illustration: Petrarch.]

July 15.--_Saint Swithin._--Swithin, or Swithum, was a bishop of
Winchester who died in 868. He was, if the tradition connected with his
memory is to be believed, a man of sense; for he was above observing one
of the vain distinctions which exist even in our own day. He desired
that he might be buried in the open church-yard, instead of the chancel
of the minster, where the great reposed; and Bishop Hall adds, that he
wished his body to be laid “where the drops of rain might wet his grave;
thinking that no vault was so good to cover his grave as that of
heaven.” This was a wise and a Christian wish; for assuredly the desire
that the worthless body shall be entombed beneath the sacred aisles
where the living come to elevate their thoughts with the hopes of
immortality, is a poor clinging of the soul to the perishable garment
with which it is clothed. The wish of Swithin that his ashes should
speedily mingle with the elements, and that the rains of heaven should
water his grave, showed a humble and a truly religious mind. His monks,
says the tradition, thought more highly of worldly distinctions; and
therefore, upon the good bishop being canonized, resolved to remove his
body from the common cemetery into the choir of their church. This was
to have been done on the 15th of July; but it rained so violently for
forty days that the design was abandoned. Mr. Howard, in his interesting
work on the Climate of London, says, “The tradition is so far valuable
as it proves that the summers in this southern part of our island were
subject a thousand years ago to occasional heavy rains, in the same way
as at present.” The popular superstition connected with St. Swithin’s
day is expressed in a Scotch proverb:--

               “Saint Swithin’s day, gif ye do rain,
                For forty days it will remain;
                Saint Swithin’s day, an ye be fair,
                For forty daies ’twill rain nae mair.”

Mr. Howard has taken some pains to ascertain how far the popular notion
is borne out by the fact. In 1807, according to him, it rained with us
on the day in question, and a dry time followed; and the same in 1808.
In 1818 and 1819 it was dry on the 15th, and a very dry time in each
case followed. The other summers, occurring between 1807 and 1819,
appear to have come under the general proposition, “that in a majority
of our summers, a showery period, which, with some latitude as to time
and local circumstances, may be admitted to constitute daily rain for
forty days, does come on about the time indicated by the tradition of
St. Swithin.”

July 20.--The birth-day of FRANCIS PETRARCH, one of the three renowned
fathers of the literature of modern Italy. He was born in 1304, at
Arezzo, in the Florentine territory, the same district which had the
glory of giving birth to his immediate predecessor Dante, and also to
the other member of the illustrious trio, his contemporary and friend
Boccaccio. Petrarch’s father had been a notary in the city of Florence,
but had, like Dante, been banished some time before the birth of his son
in consequence of one of the political convulsions then so frequent.
Being intended by his father for his own profession, he was sent to
study first at Montpellier and afterwards at Bologna; but he soon became
deeply smitten with the charms of the newly-revived literature of
antiquity, Virgil and Cicero stealing most of the hours which were
professedly devoted to more rugged pages. His father is related to have
been so much displeased on discovering how his son employed his time,
that he took his favourite authors from him and threw them into the
fire. This severity, however, failed to make a lawyer of Petrarch. His
father died when he was about two and twenty, and he immediately
abandoned the law altogether. He then chose the church for his
profession; but he never was ordained, although in the latter part of
his life some valuable clerical preferments were bestowed upon him by
the patrons whom he had gained by his poetical fame. The remainder of
Petrarch’s life took much of its colour from an incident which happened
to him in his twenty-seventh year, his meeting at Avignon, in Provence,
with the celebrated Laura, whose name he has rendered in so many
beautiful verses as immortal as his own. After the researches of a long
succession of biographers and critics, all is still uncertainty as to
who or what this lady really was. Many have even believed that Petrarch
spent his life in pouring out his passionate rhymes to a mere ideal
being, or vision of his imagination. The same obscurity hangs over the
very existence of Laura as over that of Dante’s Beatrice. Several
succeeding years were spent by the poet in wandering through Italy and
other countries. He then retired to Vaucluse, a solitary retreat not far
from Avignon, and it was during several studious years which he spent
there that he composed his principal works. The most memorable event of
his life after this was his coronation, in 1340, as poet-laureat in the
Capitol of Rome. “Twelve patrician youths,” says Gibbon, “were arrayed
in scarlet; six representatives of the most illustrious families, in
green robes, with garlands of flowers, accompanied the procession; in
the midst of the princes and nobles, the senator, Count of Anguillara, a
kinsman of the Colonna, ascended the throne; and at the voice of a
herald, Petrarch arose. After discoursing on a text of Virgil, and
thrice repeating his vows for the prosperity of Rome, he knelt before
the throne, and received from the senator a laurel crown, with a more
precious declaration, ‘This is the reward of merit.’ The people shouted,
‘Long life to the Capitol and the Poet!’ A sonnet in praise of Rome was
accepted as the effusion of genius and gratitude; and after the whole
procession had visited the Vatican, the profane wreath was suspended
before the shrine of St. Peter. In the diploma which was presented to
Petrarch, the title and prerogatives of poet-laureat are revived in the
Capitol, after the lapse of thirteen hundred years; and he receives the
perpetual privilege of wearing, at his choice, a crown of laurel, ivy or
myrtle, of assuming the poetic habit, and of teaching, disputing,
interpreting, and composing, in all places whatsoever, and on all
subjects of literature. The grant was ratified by the authority of the
Senate and people, and the character of citizen was the recompense of
his affection for the Roman name.” After these honours he made other
journeys to different parts of Italy, and also to Paris, in 1360, where
he was received with great distinction. An archdeaconry in the church of
Parma, a priory in the diocese of Pisa, and a canonry at Padua, were
also bestowed upon him, as more substantial rewards of his merit and
attestations of the public admiration. Our own Chaucer is supposed to
have met with Petrarch either in 1368, at the marriage of Lionel Duke of
Clarence with the daughter of the Duke of Milan, or more probably in the
beginning of the year 1373, when he is supposed to have gone on an
embassy to Genoa. At this interview Petrarch is thought to have
communicated to the English poet the beautiful and pathetic tale of
Griselda, which he had recently received from his friend Boccaccio, and
had translated from the latter’s Italian into Latin. This translation,
which Warton, in his History of English Poetry, inadvertently affirms
never to have been printed, may be found in several of the old folio
editions of Petrarch’s works. Petrarch, in a letter to Boccaccio, tells
us, says Warton; “that on showing the translation to one of his Paduan
friends, the latter, touched with the tenderness of the story, burst
into such frequent and violent fits of tears, that he could not read to
the end.”

Petrarch spent the last four years of his life at the beautiful mountain
village of Arquà, about twelve miles from Padua; and here he died
suddenly, in all probability of apoplexy, on the 19th of July, 1374,
having just completed his seventieth year. He was found that morning in
his library, with his head resting on a book. Here, too, his remains
were deposited and are still preserved. Many of our readers will
remember Lord Byron’s fine lines on this subject:--

         “There is a tomb in Arquà;--reared in air,
          Pillared in their sarcophagus, repose
          The bones of Laura’s lover: here repair
          Many familiar with his well-sung woes,
          The pilgrims of his genius. He arose
          To raise a language, and his land reclaim
          From the dull yoke of her barbaric foes:
          Watering the tree which bears his lady’s name
          With his melodious tears, he gave himself to fame.

         “They keep his dust in Arquà, where he died;
          The mountain-village, where his latter days
          Went down the vale of years; and ’tis their pride--
          An honest pride--and let it be their praise,
          To offer to the passing stranger’s gaze
          His mansion and his sepulchre; both plain
          And venerably simple, such as raise
          A feeling more accordant with his strain
          Than if a pyramid formed his monumental fame.

         “And the soft quiet hamlet where he dwelt
          Is one of that complexion which seems made
          For those who their mortality have felt,
          And sought a refuge from their hopes decayed
          In the deep umbrage of a green hill’s shade,
          Which shows a distant prospect far away
          Of busy cities, now in vain displayed,
          For they can lure no further; and the ray
          Of a bright sun can make sufficient holiday.”


                         ---------------------


         THE ADVANTAGES OF A TASTE FOR THE BEAUTIES OF NATURE.

        [From Dr. Percival’s Moral and Literary Dissertations.]

That sensibility to beauty, which, when cultivated and improved, we term
taste, is universally diffused through the human species; and it is most
uniform with respect to those objects, which, being out of our power,
are not liable to variation, from accident, caprice, or fashion. The
verdant lawn, the shady grove, the variegated landscape, the boundless
ocean, and the starry firmament, are contemplated with pleasure by every
attentive beholder. But the emotions of different spectators, though
similar in kind, differ widely in degree: and to relish, with full
delight, the enchanting scenes of nature, the mind must be uncorrupted
by avarice, sensuality, or ambition; quick in her sensibilities;
elevated in her sentiments; and devout in her affections. He who
possesses such exalted powers of perception and enjoyment, may almost
say, with the poet--

         “I care not, Fortune, what you me deny;
            You cannot rob me of free Nature’s grace;
          You cannot shut the windows of the sky,
            Through which Aurora shows her brightening face;
          You cannot bar my constant feet to trace
            The woods and lawns, by living streams, at eve:
          Let health my nerves and finer fibres brace,
            And I their toys to the great children leave:
          Of fancy, reason, virtue, nought can me bereave!”

Perhaps such ardent enthusiasm may not be compatible with the necessary
toils and active offices which Providence has assigned to the generality
of men. But there are none to whom some portion of it may not prove
advantageous; and if it were cherished by each individual in that degree
which is consistent with the indispensable duties of his station, the
felicity of human life would be considerably augmented. From this source
the refined and vivid pleasures of the imagination are almost entirely
derived: and the elegant arts owe their choicest beauties to a taste for
the contemplation of nature. Painting and sculpture are express
imitations of visible objects; and where would be the charms of poetry,
if divested of the imagery and embellishments which she borrows from
rural scenes? Painters, statuaries, and poets, therefore, are always
ambitious to acknowledge themselves the pupils of nature; and, as their
skill increases, they grow more and more delighted with every view of
the animal and vegetable world. But the pleasure resulting from
admiration is transient; and to cultivate taste without regard to its
influence on the passions and affections, “is to rear a tree for its
blossoms which is capable of yielding the richest and most valuable
fruit.” Physical and moral beauty bear so intimate a relation to each
other, that they may be considered as different gradations in the scale
of excellence; and the knowledge and relish of the former should be
deemed only a step to the nobler and more permanent enjoyments of the
latter.

Whoever has visited the Leasowes, in Warwickshire, must have felt the
force and propriety of an inscription which meets the eye at the
entrance into these delightful grounds:--

              “Would you, then, taste the tranquil scene?
               Be sure your bosom be serene;
               Devoid of hate, devoid of strife,
               Devoid of all that poisons life:
               And much it ’vails you, in this place
               To graft the love of human race.”

Now, such scenes contribute powerfully to inspire that serenity which is
necessary to enjoy and to heighten their beauties. By a sweet contagion
the soul catches the harmony which she contemplates; and the frame
within assimilates itself to that which is without. For

             “------Who can forbear to smile with nature?
              Can the strong passions in the bosom roll
              While every gale is peace, and every grove
              Is melody?”

In this state of composure we become susceptible of virtuous impressions
from almost every surrounding object: an equal and extensive benevolence
is called forth into exertion; and having felt a common interest in the
gratifications of inferior beings, we shall be no longer indifferent to
their sufferings, or become wantonly instrumental in producing them.

It seems to be the intention of Providence that the lower order of
animals should be subservient to the comfort, convenience, and
sustenance of man. But his right of dominion extends no further; and if
this right be exercised with mildness, humanity, and justice, the
subjects of his power will be no less benefited than himself; for
various species of living creatures are annually multiplied by human
art, improved in their perceptive powers by human culture, and
plentifully fed by human industry. The relation, therefore, is
reciprocal between such animals and man; and he may supply his own wants
by the use of their labour, the produce of their bodies, and even the
sacrifice of their lives; whilst he co-operates with all-gracious Heaven
in promoting happiness, the great end of existence.

But though it be true that partial evil, with respect to different
orders of sensitive beings, may be universal good, and that it is a wise
and benevolent institution of nature, to make destruction itself, within
certain limitations, the cause of an increase of life and enjoyment; yet
a generous person will extend his compassionate regards to every
individual that suffers for his sake; and whilst he sighs

            “Even for the kid, or lamb, that pours its life
             Beneath the bloody knife,”

he will naturally be solicitous to mitigate pain, both in duration and
degree, by the gentlest mode of inflicting it.

I am inclined to believe, however, that this sense of humanity would
soon be obliterated, and that the heart would grow callous to every soft
impression, were it not for the benignant influence of the smiling face
of nature. The Count do Lauzun, when imprisoned by Louis XIV. in the
Castle of Pignerol, amused himself, during a long period of time, with
catching flies, and delivering them to be devoured by a rapacious
spider. Such an entertainment was equally singular and cruel, and
inconsistent, I believe, with his former character and subsequent turn
of mind. But his cell had no window, and received only a glimmering
light from an aperture in the roof. In less unfavourable circumstances,
may we not presume that, instead of sporting with misery, he would have
released the agonized flies, and bid them enjoy that freedom of which he
himself was bereaved?

But the taste for natural beauty is subservient to higher purposes than
these which have been enumerated; and the cultivation of it not only
refines and humanizes, but dignifies and exalts the affections. It
elevates them to the admiration and love of that Being who is the Author
of all that is fair, sublime, and good in the creation. Scepticism and
irreligion are hardly compatible with the sensibility of heart which
arises from a just and lively relish of the wisdom, harmony, and order
subsisting in the world around us; and emotions of piety must spring up
spontaneously in the bosom that is in unison with all animated nature.
Actuated by this divine inspiration, man finds a fane in every grove;
and, glowing with devout fervour, he joins his song to the universal
chorus, or muses the praise of the Almighty in more expressive silence.
Thus they

            “Whom nature’s works can charm, with God himself
             Hold converse; grow familiar, day by day,
             With his conceptions; act upon his plan,
             And form to his the relish of their souls.”


                         ---------------------


                      DISTRICT SOCIETY OF BRIGHTON

Among the numerous benevolent schemes and institutions formed by the
wealthy to assist their poorer brethren, many may no doubt be found,
which instead of being beneficial are pernicious in their
effects--palsying the hand of industry, and destroying the sense of
independence by mere almsgiving. All those societies, however, which
give motives for industry, and which tend to create a sympathy and union
between the two classes of those who have abundance and those who want,
must be of moral benefit to both parties, and few can doubt their
practical utility.

The following is a slight sketch of a Society which appears eminently to
combine the above advantages.

About five or six years back “The District Society” was formed at
Brighton, in consequence of the suggestions of that benevolent lady,
Mrs. Fry. The purport of this association was, that its members should
visit the poor at their own houses--affording them assistance where
required, and encouraging in them habits of industry and frugality. The
idea was eagerly seized by those of the inhabitants whose activity and
influence were best able to promote this object, and in a very short
time the society was established.

This society is divided into three departments--the mendicity
department--the relief department--and the department for the
encouragement of frugality and saving. It is not our intention at
present to touch upon the first or second of these, but to confine
ourselves solely to the latter object.

The town is divided into six districts, and each district into about
twelve divisions. To each of these divisions a visitor is appointed, and
this office is voluntarily undertaken by some benevolent individual. The
number of ladies who devote themselves to this duty considerably exceeds
that of the gentlemen. The recommendation most urged by the visitors is
the exercise of frugality. The industrious poor are exhorted to save, at
a time when they have the power of doing so--thus reserving to
themselves the means of obtaining the enjoyment of such comforts as they
could not otherwise procure, at periods when their exertions produce to
them less profit. As an inducement to prefer the future good to the
present gratification, a small addition from the funds of the society is
made to the savings of individuals.

The visitors receive deposits, however small--enter these sums in a
book--and pay them over to the treasurer. The depositors feel that they
may have their money at any moment they think proper to call for it,
unchecked in their demand, save by the moral restraint which would
prevent them from requiring it for vicious or wasteful occasions.
Deposits are returned either in money or in such articles as are wanted
by those receiving them, the small gratuity already noticed being always
duly added. The number of depositors, and the sums deposited, have been
gradually increasing. Many of these depositors have, at various times,
candidly confessed to the visitors, that but for their interference and
the facility thus afforded to them for saving, their money would have
been spent on things useless in comparison with those comforts which
frugality has enabled them to procure.

Here then was a sum of money distributed among those who had a right to
it--who were under no obligation to any one, farther than that which is
incurred when others interest themselves in our welfare. While the
depositors enjoy the comforts thus obtained, they feel, with a proud
satisfaction, that these are not doled out to them by means of the
poors’ rates, nor administered to them by the hand of charity, but are
derived from their own savings, and result from their own industry,
prudence, and forbearance.

This feeling of independence thus called forth, raises man in the scale
of being; and an institution which fosters or awakens this ennobling
sentiment, offers, besides all other claims to merit, a sufficient proof
of its great value.

The above outline has been given in the hope that its consideration may
prove of general utility.

That class of labourers whose earnings are the least profitable,
generally earn more in the summer than in the winter, while their
expenses during the latter season are always the greatest. It is then
during the former period that the prudent labourer would lay by to meet
the increased demands at the latter time. If a person can only get
twelve shillings per week during the winter months, and fourteen
shillings per week during the summer, since he can live much better on
twelve shillings per week in summer than on fourteen shillings per week
in winter, he would act wisely to lay by two or three shillings weekly
at the one time, and thus provide for the deficiencies of the other. But
he may ask, how is this to be effected?--he has no “district society” in
his neighbourhood--no kind visiting friend to remind him of the
propriety of saving, and to receive his small deposits. The savings’
bank is at some distance--it is inconvenient to send there--it requires
time, and is therefore expensive to be constantly going there
himself--in short, a thousand reasons will always suggest themselves as
excuses for not doing at all what is not done with hearty good will. But
to save money it must be put as much beyond our reach as possible--it
will burn in our pockets, and will be got rid of somehow or other. What
then is to be done? We remember when we were young possessing a small
earthenware pot with only a slit in it for an opening, and so
constructed that whatever was put in could not be got out again without
destroying the pot. This was the receptacle for our spare money, and
whenever any temptation was felt to spend the little savings, the
circumstance of being obliged to break the jar previously to
appropriating its contents, always induced us to pause for reflection.
The result of such deliberation generally showed that the money was
about to have been expended uselessly, and that it would be much better
to leave the pot whole, and to go on putting in instead of taking out.
The benefit of this prudent determination was ultimately reaped, at a
time when it was most acceptable. We would recommend a plan somewhat
similar to this to those who are desirous of constantly making small
savings. A tin box might be made at a very small cost, with a lock and
key to it, and a slit at the top, large enough to put any sized piece of
money into it, and a piece of cloth so placed in the inside as to act
like a valve, affording ingress, but not egress, to the coins. This box
should be locked, and the key intrusted to some one to whom the
possessor would not like to apply on trivial occasions. It should be put
in a safe place, but where it might often meet the eye, and should be
looked upon as a friend who will furnish a supply of extra comforts
during winter time. But as it is not Fortunatus’ purse, which we read of
in fairy tales as abounding with an exhaustless fund, it must receive
its supply from the practice of self-denial, by withholding from oneself
any unnecessary gratifications when the means of procuring them are at
hand, and slipping the money that was to purchase these in the slit of
the box.

This box then may stand in lieu of a visitor of the District Society;
and every time anything is put into it, it may be considered as a friend
ready to afford its assistance in the time of sickness, in the hour of
distress, or during those periods when expenses are greatest and wages
least.


                         ---------------------


                                LYCIDAS.

One of the most beautiful minor poems of Milton, though slightly obscure
in some passages from the use of antiquated phrases, and in one instance
strongly imbued with the author’s political feelings, is his Monody of
Lycidas. This was written in Milton’s 29th year, on the occasion of the
untimely death of his friend, Mr. John King, who was drowned in the
passage from England to Ireland. The character of the poem is pastoral,
it being assumed that the author and his lamented friend were brother
shepherds:--

       “For we were nurst upon the self-same hill;
        Fed the same flock by fountain, shade, and rill.
        Together both, ere the high lawns appear’d
        Under the opening eye-lids of the morn,
        We drove a-field, and both together heard
        What time the gray-fly winds her sultry horn,
        Batt’ning our flocks with the fresh dews of night
        Oft till the star that rose, at evening, bright,
        Toward Heav’ns descent had slop’d his west’ring wheel.”

The complaint of the poet on the shortness of life, and the glowing
reply of Phœbus to his lamentation, is one of the finest passages in the
whole compass of English verse:--

          “Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise
           (That last infirmity of noble mind)
           To scorn delights, and live laborious days;
           But the fair guerdon when we hope to find,
           And think to burst out into sudden blaze,
           Comes the blind Fury with th’ abhorred shears,
           And slits the thin spun life. But not the praise,
           Phœbus reply’d, and touch’d my trembling ears;
           Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil,
           Nor in the glist’ring foil
           Set off to th’ world, nor in broad rumor lies,
           But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes,
           And perfect witness of all-judging Jove;
           As he pronounces lastly on each deed,
           Of so much fame in heav’n expect thy meed.”

But Milton’s soul was nourished with the hopes of the Christian, as well
as excited with the ambition of the poet;--and thus the monody finely
concludes with an eloquent expression of the only real consolation under
every such calamity:--

        “Weep no more, woful shepherds, weep no more,
         For Lycidas your sorrow is not dead.
         Sunk though he be beneath the wat’ry floor;
         So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed;
         And yet anon repairs his drooping head,
         And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore
         Flames in the forehead of the morning sky:
         So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high,
         Through the dear might of him that walk’d the waves,
         Where other groves and other streams along,
         With nectar pure his oozy locks he laves,
         And hears the unexpressive nuptial song,
         In the blest kingdoms meek of joy and love.
         There entertain him all the saints above,
         In solemn troops and sweet societies,
         That sing, and singing in their glory move,
         And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes.”

           [Illustration: Lycidas. From a design by Fuseli.]


                         ---------------------


That sanctity which settles on the memory of a great man, ought, upon a
double motive, to be vigilantly sustained by his countrymen; first, out
of gratitude to him, as one column of the national grandeur; secondly,
with a practical purpose of transmitting, unimpaired, to posterity the
benefit of ennobling models. High standards of excellence are among the
happiest distinctions by which the modern ages of the world have an
advantage over earlier, and we are all interested by duty as well as
policy in preserving them inviolate.--_From a Memoir of Milton in ‘The
Gallery of Portraits.’_


                         ---------------------


This liberty in conversation (fiction and exaggeration) defeats its own
end. Much of the pleasure and all the benefit of conversation depends
upon our opinion of the speaker’s veracity.--_Paley’s Moral Philosophy._

------------------------------------------------------------------------




 ⁂ The Office of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge is at
                        59, Lincoln’s Inn Fields.

                LONDON:--CHARLES KNIGHT, PALL-MALL EAST.

  _Shopkeepers and Hawkers may be supplied Wholesale by the following
  Booksellers, of whom, also, any of the previous Numbers may be had._

 _London_, GROOMBRIDGE, Panyer Alley, Paternoster Row.
 _Bath_, SIMMS.
 _Birmingham_, DRAKE.
 _Bristol_, WESTLEY and Co.
 _Carlisle_, THURNAM; and SCOTT.
 _Derby_, WILKINS and SON.
 _Doncaster_, BROOKE and Co.
 _Falmouth_, PHILIP.
 _Hull_, STEPHENSON.
 _Leeds_, BAINES and NEWSOME.
 _Lincoln_, BROOKE and SONS.
 _Liverpool_, WILLMER and SMITH.
 _Manchester_, ROBINSON; and WEBB and SIMMS.
 _Newcastle-upon-Tyne_, CHARNLEY.
 _Norwich_, JARROLD and SON.
 _Nottingham_, WRIGHT.
 _Sheffield_, RIDGE.
 _Dublin_, WAKEMAN.
 _Edinburgh_, OLIVER and BOYD.
 _Glasgow_, ATKINSON and Co.

               Printed by WILLIAM CLOWES, Stamford Street.

------------------------------------------------------------------------




                          Transcriber’s Notes


This file uses _underscores_ to indicate italic text. New original cover
art included with this eBook is granted to the public domain.
Illustrations have been moved in some cases to natural breaks in the
text. Itemized changes from the original text:

 • p. 148: Added missing or misprinted “t” in “advantageously” in phrase
   “may be advantageously consulted.”
 • p. 148: Added missing or misprinted closing single quote after
   “trials” in phrase “It appears from a note in the ‘Criminal Trials,’
   vol i. p. 361.”
 • p. 150: Capitalized “Capitol” in phrase “the title and prerogatives
   of poet-laureat are revived in the Capitol” to match other
   references.
 • p. 150: Added semicolon after phrase “uncorrupted by avarice,
   sensuality, or ambition.”
 • p. 150: Added missing period after phrase “or become wantonly
   instrumental in producing them.”



*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76910 ***