learned Albanian appeared and told the people they were all fools for using Christian swords, since the cross of the hilt had the effect of pinning the demon more firmly in the body, instead of expelling him, and that the only sword for the purpose was the straight Turkish scymetar. The people would not wait for the experiment, but, with one accord, determined on burning the body entire. This was accordingly done on the point of the island of St George; and the people then defied the devil to find a niche in which to quarter himself, and made songs in celebration of their triumph.

Ricaut, in his history of the Greek church, relates, on the authority of a Candiote Caloyer, a history of a young man of the island of Milos, excommunicated for a crime committed in the Morea, and who was interred in a remote and unconsecrated ground. The islanders were terrified every night by the horrid apparitions and disorders attributed to the corpse which on opening the tomb was found, as usual, fresh and flowing with blood. The priests determined to dismember the corpse, and to boil it in wine-a profanation of the grape which, we suspect, the descendants of the priests of Lyæus would hardly in fact have executed, however they might urge the people to open their cellars for the pious occasion. The young man's relations begged for delay, in order to send to Constantinople for an absolution from the Patriarch. In the interim the corpse was placed in the church, and masses were said night and day for its repose. One day, as the Caloyer Sophronus was reading the service, a sudden crash was heard to issue from the bier, and on opening it the body was found mouldered and decomposed, exactly like a corpse deceased for seven years. The messenger arrived with the absolu. tion, and on inquiry it was found that the Patriarch's signature had been affixed at the precise moment when the dissolution of the corpse produced the report in the coffin !

We can hardly read of such things with gravity, but they are the cause of serious annoyances to the poor relations of the deceased, who are by some accident the subjects of accusation. That will be seen from the above narrative.

In these extravagancies to this hour many believe. No doubt the general credulity enriches the few, which is the cause of the delusion being kept up from generation to generation.

A SCENE IN THE EAST. IN Mr Davis's lately published work, the 'Vizier Ali Khan,' the writer gives a striking picture of the situation in which his father was placed. Ali Khan was a

deposed Indian prince, who was permitted to reside at Benares, where he enjoyed a large pension, and was permitted to collect a vast number of retainers, and was well disposed to act the part of Akbar Khan. For a time he escaped suspicion, and when at length it was thought necessary to guard against his treacherous designs, Mr Cherry, the resident, who had been slow to credit anything to his prejudice, was treacherously assassinated, with some of his servants.

Mr Davis was at this period the judge at Benares. He had been active in suggesting the importance of taking steps to secure Ali Khan; and, after murdering Mr Cherry, to the house of Mr Davis the ruffians proceeded. He was at home, and had only time to escape, with his wife and children, to the terraced roof, having no weapon for his protection but a pike or spear.

"The pike," Mr Davis writes, "was one of those used by running footmen in India. It was of iron, plated with silver, in rings to give a firmer grasp, rather more than six feet in length, and had a long triangular blade of more than twenty inches, with sharp edges. Finding, when on the terrace, that the lowness of the parapet wall exposed them all to view, and that they were fired at by the insurgents from below, Mrs Davis was directed, with her two female servants and the children, to sit down near the centre of the terrace, while Mr Davis took his station on one knee at the trap-door of the stair, waiting for the expected attack. The perpendicular height of the stair was considerable, winding round a central stem. It was of a peculiar construction, supported by four wooden posts, open on all sides, and so narrow as to allow only a single armed man to ascend at a time. It opened at once to the terrace, exactly like a hatchway on board ship, having a light cover of painted canvas stretched on a wooden frame. This opening he allowed to remain uncovered, that he might see what approached from below. In a few minutes, hearing an assailant coming up, he prepared to receive him. When full in view, and within reach with his sword drawn, the ruffian stopped, seeing Mr Davis on his guard, and addressed him abusively. The only reply was, 'The troops are coming from camp;' and at the same time a lunge with the pike, which wounded him in the arm. The enemy disappeared, and Mr Davis resumed his former position, when presently he observed the room below filled with Vizier Ali's people, and heard some of them coming up stairs. At the first who appeared he again drove his spear, which the assailant avoided by warily withdrawing his person; but Mr Davis, being by the action fully exposed to

view from below, was fired at by the assassins. The spear, by striking the wall, gave the assailant on the stairs an opportunity of seizing the blade end with both his hands; but the blade being triangular, with sharp edges, Mr Davis freed it in an instant, by dropping the iron shaft on the edge of the hatchway, and applying his whole weight to the extremity, as to a lever. The force with which it was jerked out of the enemy's gripe cut his hands very severely, as was subsequently observed from their bloody prints being left on the breakfast tablecloth below, where he had staunched them. There was blood likewise on the stairs, and some dropped about the floors of the rooms. Though the present assailant disappeared like his predecessor, the repeated firing from below was discouraging, and Mr Davis now thought it necessary to draw the hatch on, leaving such an opening at the edge as still admitted of his observing what was going on below. He saw them for some time looking inquisitively up, but not al together liking the reception that there awaited them, one of the number went out to the verandah of the room, to see if they could get at Mr Davis from the outside, while no further attempt was made on the staircase."

In this awful situation did Mr Davis remain for an hour and a half, exposed every moment to some new attempt upon his life. The assailants, however, were eventually baffled. A body of soldiers arrived from General Erskine's camp, and the danger was at an end. Order was promptly restored, and Ali Khan made prisoner, who would seem to have been too leniently treated. He was removed to Fort William, and thence to Vellere, where ultimately his career was closed, not by the hands of the executioner, but by the visitation of God."

:

CHEMICAL MANURE. METHOD OF MASHING-SUPERPHOSPHATE OF LIME.-Calcined bones are to be reduced by grinding to a very fine powder, and placed in an iron pan with an equal weight of water; mix the bone with the water until every portion is wet while stirring empty at once into the pan sulphuric acid, 60 parts by weight to every 100 parts of bone; the acid should be poured in at once, and not in a thin stream. Stir it for about three minutes, and then throw it out of the pan. With four labourers and two pans you may mix two tons in one day, the larger the heap that is made the more perfect the decomposition; the heap remains intensely hot for a long time. It is necessary to spread the superphosphate out to the air for a few days, that it may become dry. The great me

Το

chanical difficulty of reducing unburnt bones to a very fine powder renders the formation of superphosphate of lime from them very difficult, but common bone-dust in a pure state may be decomposed by boiling it in a leaden pan with half its weight of sulphuric acid and twice its weight of water, which may afterwards be dried up with sawdust or clay-ashes. Now it may be asked, In what do the fertilizing qualities of bones consist? There seems still to be some doubt whether the phosphate of lime, or the gelatine, is the fertilizing substance in the bone. The following experiment will show that the animal matter in the bone merely acts by yielding, by slow decomposition, phosphate of lime in a state capable of being assimilated by plants; and to the phosphate of lime being in a similar state in guano, and not to the ammonia contained in it, may be attributed the powerful effects of this valuable manure. every 100 parts of large bones add 400 parts of water and 100 parts of muriatic acid; let it stand for four or five days, and then drain off the liquid, and add the same quantity of fresh water and acid four times; by this means the whole of the phosphate of lime will be dissolved in the liquid, and the bones will retain their original form; they must be repeatedly washed until the water ceases to taste acid, then dry them in an oven, and rub them to powder. Evaporate the whole of the liquid in which the mineral matter of the bone was dissolved until nothing but a dry paste remains; heat this to redness, rub it to a fine powder, and convert it into superphosphate of lime in the manner already described. Let two equal quantities of ground be sown with turnips, strain the seed and one of these two manures together, and the result will satisfy the most sceptical. Swedes are growing upon the light sands of Norfolk, in which four bushels of superphospate of lime per acre were used, and the crops excellent,-the superphosphate was formed from calcined bones which did not contain one half per cent. of carbon.

AN ALDERMAN'S ORTHOGRAPHY.
One of these turtle-eating men,
Not much excelling in his spelling,

When ridicule he meant to brave,
Said he was more PH. than N.

Meaning thereby, more phool than nave.

Precocity Futal.-It is proverbial that children remarkable for precocity of intellect or acquirements die prematurely. Boerhaave knew a boy who was a miracle of erudition, but scarcely attained his fifteenth year. Another learned youth, who passed night and day in study, died in his nineteenth year without any previous illness, merely of premature age.

THE NOBLE HOUSE OF LIVERPOOL. ROBERT JENKINSON, Esq., of Walcot, in the county of Oxford, had the honour of knighthood conferred on him by James I, in 1618, and, dying in 1645, was succeeded by his eldest son, by Anna Maria, daughter of Sir Robert Lee, of Billeslee in Warwickshire. This son, who was named Robert, was created a Baronet by Charles II, May 18, 1661. He represented the county of Oxford for several years in parliament. He married Mary, daughter of Sir John Banks, of Kingston hall, in the county of Dorset, Knight and Lord Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas, in the reign of Charles I, and had, besides a daughter, an only son Robert, who succeeded to his title and estates on his decease in 1677.

Robert represented the county of Oxford in parliament, and married Sarah, daughter of Thomas Tomlins, Esq., of Bromley, in the county of Middlesex, and sole heir of her brother, Thomas Tomlins, Esq., by whom he had surviving issue three sons-Robert, who succeeded him; Robert Banks, who afterward succeeded as fourth Baronet; and Charles, who was a Colonel in the army, and a Major in the Blues at the battle of Fontenoy. Sir Robert, as already stated, was succeeded by his eldest son, who bore the same name. The latter gentleman sat in parliament for the county of Oxford. He died in 1717, when his title devolved upon his brother, Robert Banks. He also was M.P. for Oxford, and married Catherine, third daughter of Sir Robert Dashwood, Bart. At his death, in 1738, he was succeeded by his eldest son Robert, who, in 1766, was succeeded by his brother Sir Robert Banks, at whose decease, unmarried, July 22, 1789, the Baronetcy came to his cousin, Charles

Jenkinson, born May 16, 1727, the son of Charles above mentioned, as third son of the second Baronet.

This gentleman, a person of superior talent, having taken his degree of Master of Arts at Oxford, repaired to London "with some literary reputation," says Burke, "to seek his fortune, and through the first Lord Harcourt obtained an introduction to King George III, as also the favourable notice of the Earl of Bute." In 1761 Mr Jenkinson was returned to parliament for Cockermouth, and promoted to the office of Under Secretary of State. In 1763 he became Secretary to the Treasury, and in 1766 one of the Lords of the Admiralty, and from the following year to 1773 he was a Lord of the Treasury. In 1786 he obtained the Chancellorship of the Duchy of Lancaster, and on the 21st of August in the same year was elevated to the Peerage by the title of Baron Hawkesbury, of Hawkesbury, in the county of Gloucester, and was from this elevated, May 28, 1796, to the Earldom of Liverpool. His lordship married, first, Amelia, daughter of William Watts, Esq., Governor of Fort William, in Bengal, by whom, who died in 1770, he had an only son Robert Banks, his successor, who was summoned to the House of Lords as Lord Hawkesbury, during the lifetime of his father, November 16, 1808. The Earl having become a widower, married a second wife June 22, 1782, Catherine, daughter of Sir Cecil Bishopp, and relict of Sir Charles Cope, Bart., by whom he had a son and a daughter, Charles Cecil Cope, the present earl, and Charlotte, who was married, in 1807, to James Walter, present Earl of Verulam. His lordship died December, 17, 1808, and was succeeded by his eldest son Robert Banks, K.G., who

was for a series of years first Lord of the Treasury. He was born June 7, 1770, and married, first, March 25, 1795, Louisa Theodore, third daughter of the Right Honourable and Right Reverend Frederick Augustus, Earl of Bristol, and Bishop of Derry, by whom he had no issue. She died June 12, 1821. His lordship married, in 1822, Mary, daughter of the Rev. W. Chester. A sudden attack of apoplexy compelled the earl to retire from public life in 1827. He died December 4, 1828, and having no issue his honours devolved on his half brother, Charles Cope, above mentioned.

He lived in most eventful times, and acted a very important part. It was while he was high in the councils of the Crown that the great triumphs of the Peninsula were achieved, which paved the way for the overthrow of Bonaparte. Russia, the ally of England, he saw all but crushed by her mighty foe, and the genius or good fortune of Napoleon, when the firmness with which he had uniformly resisted the movements of revolutionary France was rewarded, and he had the happiness to see the tide of victory rolled back to its source; the invaded became the invaders, and the lately retreating Russians pursued the vanquished French, even into the heart of the superb capital of France. If England generally had to exult in this consummation, the Earl of Liverpool had especial reason to rejoice, not only as a minister, but as a man. For twenty years he had been pointed at with derision, for having advised the first coalition formed against the regicides, to march at once to Paris. Subsequent events led politicians to suppose that what he had contemplated was about as easy as a hostile advance to the moon, and "the Earl of Liverpool's march to Paris" became a by-word. He lived to see it accomplished, not merely once, but twice. It, however, gives but a melancholy view of the life of a statesman to know that he who might indulge the proud boast that, during his administration, the arms of England had been crowned with greater victories, with more undying glory, than had been witnessed in the course of the preceding 400 years, remarked to a friend, a short time before his death, who was with him when opening his letters, "You know not what it is to be the first minister of a nation like England for seventeen years, and never to see the post come in without anxiety and apprehension."

The present Earl was born May 29, 1785, and married, July 19, 1810, Julia Evelyn Medley, only daughter and heir of Šir George Augustus William Shuckburgh Evelyn, by whom, who died April 8, 1814, he had issue three daughters, but no son.

THE SEVEN SLEEPERS OF

EPHESUS.

FOR centuries the strange tale of the 'Seven Sleepers' has commanded attention. Mr W. F. Ainsworth has given it with much curious detail in the last number of Ainsworth's Magazine.' He shows that, charged with adhering to the Christian faith, an example was to be made of them. With much Pagan pomp they were entombed alive, in a dark cave, where each in succession fell into a deep unbroken slumber. The narrative adds :—

"Two centuries, all but a few years, had elapsed, when the slaves of Adolius, removing stones from the mountain side without knowing it, let the light of the sun into the cave, and the seven sleepers awoke. After the first feelings of astonishment at the novelty of their situation were over, and prayer and meditation had restored the memory of past events, it is not surprising that after so long a fast the feelings of hunger began to make themselves paramount over all other considerations. After some discussion, pressed by the urgency of the call, it was determined to draw lots as to which of them should descend the mountain, and endeavour to penetrate into the town by stealth till he could meet with some friendly Christian from whom he might obtain provisions.

It fell to Jamblichus to go forth. He accordingly left the cave. Every object which then met his eyes, after a sleep of two hundred years, filled him with amazement.

"Within the city he scarcely knew his way; old shops had disappeared, and new ones sprung up in their places; the streets followed new and different directions; and above all, amidst the great crowd moving about, each in the pursuit of his own avocations, he did not meet with a face he knew, or a single person whom he could determine to be a fellow-Christian. Fatigued and awed he resolved upon making a purchase of bread at a baker's shop and returning to his companions. With this view he approached the nearest, and tendered, in exchange for the bread, a golden coin, having on one side the head of the Emperor Decius, and on the exergue the inscription, ‘ΕΦΕΣΙΩΝ ΠΡΩΤΩΝ ΑΣΙΑΣ ΤΗΣ ΙΕΡΑΣ ΚΑΙ ΑΥΤΟΝΟΜΟΥ. The baker, examining the coin, and looking at Jamblichus, said 'Young man, your dress bespeaks you a stranger; wherefore do you tender a coin no longer current?'

"Jamblichus felt faint, as he distinguished, with difficulty, from an unfamiliar language, the meaning of the inquiry.

"The coin,' he answered, with a broken

voice, was good yesterday; what has occurred that it should not be so to-day?' "Such a coin has not passed in Ephesus,' observed the baker, for nigh two centuries; and I suspect your intentions are about as honest as your disguise of dress and language, and your manners would indicate them to be.'

"A crowd had been quickly attracted by the discussion, and still more so by the appearance of Jamblichus; and some among them suggested that he had found a treasure, and wished to impose on the good Christians of Ephesus.

"You are no Christians,' said Jamblichus; for if you were, you would scarce dare to own it. Your dress and language bespeak you of a different race.'

"It was too much for an always excitable mob to have it supposed that there still existed pagans in the peculiarly sacred and Christian city of Ephesus, and they called out lustily, "To the magistrate -to the magistrate! Away, away with the Pagan impostor!' The crowd reechoed the cry, and Jamblichus was hastened along by a resistless mass of people, increasing every moment in numbers.

"If under the milder rule of the Byzantine emperors, and the establishment of Christianity as the religion of the state, the abuse of the military spirit had been much subdued, and violence suppressed, it was only to be supplanted by an artificial system of tame and ceremonious servitude, out of which occasionally popular feeling broke with an unrestrained licence and overwhelming vehemence. The attendants at the porch of the chief magistrate of the city refused admittance to what they considered as a madman borne along by the crowd. The baker held out the Roman coin in vain, till impatience broke the bounds of decorum; and the clamour of the people made itself heard within the walls of the palace, and then Jamblichus was hurried into the presence.

"Whence do you come?' said the governor, viewing the Roman Ephesian with a contempt not unmingled with wonder. The youth hesitated for a moment; but twice had the great apostle to the Gentiles enjoined the Ephesians to put away lying, and to gird their loins with truth as part of the armour of God, and he determined at all risks to abide by that injunction.

"From the cave in Mount Coressus,' he answered with modesty, but firmness; and the statement was followed by a confused murmur, which ran through the crowd at the lower end of the apartment.

666

"Do you live there? or have you found a treasure in the cave?' inquired the governor, astonished at the youth's dialect. "I was put there last night, with six

other noble youths of Ephesus, by order of the emperor; and my name is Jamblichus,' answered the accused. The governor smiled incredulously, but the public devotion of the age was impatient to exalt the saints and martyrs of a now triumphant church; the murmur in the crowd grew louder and more distinct. A miracle-a miracle!' was called out, and repeated from mouth to mouth, till it quickly spread over the whole city. The aged primate, Memnon, followed by several bishops-for the first synod was supposed to be still sitting-issued from his place to see a living martyr. Rich Ephesians and merchants of the city crowded to the governor's residence, and it was hastily resolved to clear up the mystery by a visit to the cave.

"Once more all Ephesus was collected in front of that rugged mountain -once more thousands of eyes strained themselves to discover aught but the same perpetual alternation of rock and verdure, the same overflowing fountain, trickling peacefully down the hill side. It was with difficulty that the attendants of clerical pomp and civil power could force a way through the enthusiastic multitude. Hundreds threw themselves at the feet of Jamblichus, to kiss the hem of his garments, or to be sanctified by being trod upon; and the women wept for joy at the doors and windows of their domiciles.

"The labour of tearing rocks and stones from their long resting-places to men roused by the most powerful incentives of curiosity and superstition, was but that of a moment; and what had taken the Roman soldiery hours of toil to accomplish was undone by the sinewy Christians in a few minutes. The chief men of Ephesus stood, within a most brief space of time, in the presence of the six young nobles of the reign of Decius. Their dress, their appearance, the long loss of a cavern sacred only to legendary lore, and now suddenly disclosed to them, and the deep faith of the age, ripe for any miracles vouchsafed in favour of the church, left no doubt as to the reality; but if there had been any the sequence of events would have destroyed such at once; for, as if guided by a holy impulse, the youths arose, and advancing towards their brethren, blessed them in the name of the Almighty God and of his Son, their Saviour and Redeemer. The proud prelates knelt before youths of nearly two centuries of existence; and those on the rock joining in prayer were seen by the multitudes in the city below; and one loud Hallelujah!' proclaimed the amazing discovery from the Cayster to Mount Prion, and seemed to rend the skies in twain. When the witnesses arose from prayer and benediction the seven sleepers had sunk peaceably into eternal sleep.