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was to personify virtue by characters superior to impulses prompted by common passion; and that with this object, he gave them an action inconsistent in a great degree with real life, but in unison with the peculiar character of his genius-a measure, that while it effected his object, rendered the poem inferior in interest to one founded on human fallibility. For the purest of mankind only was Comus written, and it can only be enjoyed to the full extent of its excellencies by the " heart."

pure in

Y. J.

PLAIN PREACHING.

A PRIEST-not such as Hogarth drew
With paunch rotund and visage red,
And eyes that glistering like dew
Protruded fatly from his head-
Yet still with look canonical,

Though feminine as any Molly,
Prank'd out in dandihood withal

To the top pitch of fashion's folly:
Full to the throat of Greek and college,

And words 'twould break the jaw to speak 'em,
Though he at best could only squeak'em,
While doling forth his stock of knowledge :-
Asked to ascend a country rostrum,

And "hold forth" to the congregation ;
Up-mounted to his proper station,
Carrying his black morocco nostrum

Fill'd with fine sentences omnigenous,
Words ne'er to man nor jay indigenous,
And moral axioms gleaned from heathen scribe,
Displayed his white hand decked with rings,
His cambric handkerchief, and things
That trap the eyes and hearts of lady-tribe.
He was the pink of parsons, essenced o'er
With nard and perfumes from a foreign shore.
He spoke of "theism," the "cosmogony"-
Of vice, that "autocrat pestiferous,"
Of" Hyperborean blasts frigoriferous,"
And how, "disjunct" from home and prog any,
The "boding fowls" the prophet fed,
While "scistose rocks" composed his bed.
The pulpit's owner was a man of worth

Who loved, as Vicars should, his congregation,

And well he knew no mortal power on earth

Could make it comprehend his friend's oration-
Zounds, thought he, college men in this our day
Are sadly gone from good old rules astray,

I'll ne'er ask Finnikin to preach again-
The farmers stare; even Miss Deborah Screw,
Through all the parish noted as a "blue,"
To understand will find no little pain.

The service o'er, the Vicar freely spoke,

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My brother Finnikin, it was no joke

For country folk to sit and hear your lecture

You are too learned for my parish,
My people's eyes were all vagarish

While striving your hard phrases to conjecture.
There seem two modes of College teaching,

If I might judge from this your preaching:

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Mine for the world, your's for the college bred.”—
Why surely, my dear reverend brother,

They are not fools," replied the other,

"I used the tongue vernacular,

My words would suit Sam. Johnson's ear-
I precedent can plead."

"I use plain words among plain men,"
The Vicar quick replied again,
"I'll prove my course is just-
There's Hodge, my carter-Hodge, I say,
Tell me, what's the cosmogony,

D'ye know, man?"-" Iz, I trust."-
"I thought he knew, my reverend friend,"
Said Finnikin.-"Stay, hear the end,"

The Vicar said, and shook his snowy wig.
"What is it, Hodge?"-" Why, Sur, I know
Az how 'tis zomething that do

grow,

I thinks, inzide a pig!"

52.

THE LEPREGHAUN, OR GOLD GOBLIN.

"Ireland hath been always accounted a land of wonders."-BURTON. "CLEAVE to the staunch oak, my son," said Jasper Trevenny to a youth who stood by his side in a dillosk-gatherer's* hut. "Cleave to a tight ship, my boy, as long as the wind blaeth, and while she lives upon the waters, she'll aye be a mauther to thee. Pine not upon a down pillow ashore wi' pale maids and wrinkled beldames bewailing about thee;--but when thee diest, die like a true heart-the white foam for thy winding sheet, the roaring voice of the ocean for thy deathlament, and a noble bark for thy coffin. What can mate with the great sea? Look thee, my son, it's beautiful at all times-when it beats against the beach-rocks that hem it in, foaming and raging like a madman wi' his fetters, as well as when the waves be one and all asleep, moving as gently as slumbering babies wi' the broad moon poring like a fond mauther above 'em. What though thee diest, as the Hollanders had like to ha' died an hour aback, in a cockle-shell smack? Even then, thee goest out of the world like a man. You shall hear, brethren," continued the stout Cornish mariner raising his voice as the dilloskers gathered around him. "The brig was scudding away like a sea-bird afore the breeze, and we afearing nought, though 'twas dark as death, having those aboard that knew the course as well as the way to their hammocks, and warranted coming 'thwart o' little 'pon that tack, while the wind spoke Nor' about. Anon the forward look-out, a whistling time after he'd howled out his dismal 'All's well,' jumped upon the cable-coil and shouted wi' all his breath, 'Vast! avast! mates,

The occupation of these people is gathering the edible sea-weeds laver and dillosk, both of which are boiled for use, but a portion of the latter is often dried in the sun, until it assumes a fine ruddy complexion, when it is esteemed a luxury.

helm a-lee and about ship!-a sail a-head here, all hands, yohoy!' Reuben roared, but 'twas too late. A sloop of a thing, wi' all aboard snoring under hatches, lay just neast our bows. We crushed upon her about midships, and rode her down awfully-most awfully, by G-d. A demurrage, for a second, succeeded the shock, and then on we went again as if nought had mattered. She proved to be a Dutch swab, lurking in yander seas for fish-or something richer mayhap. To put about, or bring to, in time for help, was impossible-moreover every sand in the glass was gold to us. But the yawl was out, and three hearties, with the captain himself, and my fool of a boy here, wer' aboard her in a snatch. It got light in the nick, the moon having struck out from her black cloudy harbour into the broad blue sea of Heaven. We tugged aback wi' heart and sinew, but all was quiet and silent above and about the place where she went down, as a grave at midnight, and nought visible but the trailing feather o' foam which the strong brig left astern. I thought I heard a deep screech in the waters 'below us-'twas fancy mayhap, but it hit me hard like a bullet. "Twas just as if my heart heard it afore my ear. It reminded me against my will o' the night when my old father sunk abaft the keel (as we say), long ago. Presently up shot a cask and a few spars, then a shoal of hake, skate, and your beggarly ling, some gasping, others quite dead wi' their white bellies and glazed eyes glittering in the moonlight. We heard a dash and a splutter windward, and upon looking about, to our awful wonder, eyed a little out-o'-sorts creature kicking and spluttering amid another troop o' floating milk-bellies, and laying among 'em wi' his arms, like a windmill in a hurricane. His face was lean, hard, and tawny. It looked like old gold horribly tarnished by time, but age could not wrinkle it. Sometimes he stood aloft, and clamouring kneedeep about in the sea; then he sunk fathoms, and we saw nought of him for a time again. We were one and all mortally gallied at the sight, but the captain. The yawl lay like a log upon the waters, while we stood to glowy at the wonder. Anon, however, the captain doffed woollens, and, dashing among the pieces of wreck that now covered the sea's face, grappled the tawny one, and towed him manfully alongside. Upon hauling him aboard, smite me, cousins, but there was a most enormous Hollander hanging by his legs, and he came up, clumsily wriggling in the wake, like a thumping chub at the tail of a fisherboy's muckworm, ha ha! But I must tellee, the whole crew (three Dutchmen and a black boy) was saved by line or spar, and preciously swabbed was the captain about it; howsomever, just as we'd hove in sight of your blazing hearth, he tacked about, and bore away like a Geneva pink that has run full upon a king's ship in a fog."

As Jasper Trevenny concluded his tale, the dillosk-gatherers were summoned to front about to the hearth, by the deep voice of their patriarch and Brehon King, old Fergus Consadine the wise. The Cornishman, who had entered the hut with his boy to seek refreshment after landing the Hollanders, now beheld for the first time, as the dilloskers opened on either side, the gaunt old monarch of the beach. Although reposing on the oak-log, which had been the throne of his predecessors for ages, it was plain, that, when erect, he towered far above even those of surpassing stature who gathered around him. His huge legs, encased in dark brown leather trowsers instead of the custo

mary hose, wandered along the floor, seeming like the main roots of a giant oak in its senility, than the limbs of a man. His mantle of yellow frieze, curiously embroidered at the edges, was thrown entirely from one shoulder, so as to reveal the bandel cloth vest, and studded bark belt beneath it, and streamed down in great plenitude of fold to the base of his oaken throne. His long hair was turned back in the ancient Glibb or Cooleen fashion, and surmounted by a burred or conical woollen cap: moreover, it was of so peculiar a complexion and wavy a nature, as (like the bard's of old) to be compared to a living stream of milk. His large features, worn as they were by time and mischance, bore an imposing similarity to a mouldering ruin of which sufficient masses remain to shew what it had been in the days of its glory. The transient smile upon the one, as the passing sunbeam upon the other, illumined but to expose. A wreath of the red sundried dillosk-weed, mingled with old laver, encircled his brows, and while his bony left hand wandered lovingly among the light tresses of a sleeping girl, he supported its fellow on one of the bends of a huge black staff, warped and scotched by nature or art into the figure of a snake. This was the Brehon King's sceptre, the symbol of his authority, and all in his domains paid implicit obedience to the laws promulgated by him who wielded it, for the time being, on the oaken log of ages. Tradition and legend were fertile in its honour, but neither Bard nor Shanaghos could narrate the story of its mysterious origin. The general belief was, that it had been vital, and would again resume its pristine nature, to the infinite peril of man, if ever the old Tanistry laws and Brehon Kings should be banished from Erin.

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My sons," said old Fergus to his attentive dilloskers, "you have heard enough from the Sassenach, to put every young limb among you in motion. Far be it from one who sits on the oak of old times, to rise up against the festivals which our fathers rejoiced in and honoured-above all, so sacred a one as that of the Wren on the holy tide of Saint Stephen-may the Bancointhat wail over poor Onagh, the dear child of my child, when I do so! But, my sons, the honours of the day are done-you have ensnared the kingly little Wren on the brown furze-you have enthroned him in the green holly bush, set off with white love-knots and the fair tresses of your most comely virgins; you have carried him far and near in glory and state, and lastly, raised him above your broad board while feasting on what men have bestowed on you, as homage and gift to the king of all birds. 'Tis now near unto morning, and the reign of the Wren is over. Bestir yourselves, boys. Misfortune has come upon a crew of strangers on your coast. They are now, perhaps, watching with eager eyes for the remains of

The choice colour of the old Irish.

The praises of the dead are sung prior to interment by the Bancointha or Cointaghaun, who is hired by the friends of the deceased for that purpose. A similar custom prevails among the Greeks. Les pleureuses publiques are mentioned by Pouqueville, in his Voyage en Morée, and there seems to be but little difference between their occupation and the Bancointha's. The whole ceremony of a burial, as described by him, approaches remarkably near to a rural wake and funeral in Ireland.

The Wren feast is still kept up in Munster with the ceremonies detailed by the Brehon.

their wreck on the morning tide. They may lack a brotherly hand to aid them. Away then, all of you-prove yourselves strangers to the cursed blood of inhuman Kerry, and my blessing be on his head who proves first in the good work!"

The young dilloskers tumultuously rushed out of the hut as old Fergus concluded, and hurried on towards the beach; young Paudrigg Dooley, the swiftest of foot among them, taking the lead. Christy Scanlon, the next in repute for speed, as usual, outstripped the mass of his companions, and trod close upon the steps of Paudrigg. On emerging from a little valley dingle that broke abruptly upon the beach, he came on a sudden in full view of the timorous Dooley, not in high action as he had expected, but pale and motionless as a wind-bleached hill-rock. "What happened you, Paudrigg?" was the young dilloskgatherer's first question on reaching his fellow. "Is it elf-struck ye are, man? or has one of old Finn's giants been down from the Sliabh and scared you? or maybe the heart's kilt in your body by the cruel kiss of a wave girl :-Avoch! avoch! he's dead dumb!" "Husht! husht! asy, Scanlon," whispered Paudrigg; "asy, boy Christy, and look above there.". "Where? what?" eagerly inquired the youth. "Now see him," replied Paudrigg, across the crake to the right of the bushes where the ship struck, and all died long ago when the sea flowed up to the glynn. It's the spirit of a father cursing the rocks that wracked all his little ones." 66 Powers, now I have him," shouted Christy; "the spirit of a father, said ye?-Paudrigg, ye're a fool-a caubeen entirely, boy-It's a gold spirit !"—"A Lepreghaun?"—" Ay that is he, as sure as Maccoul built the Binguthan-'tisn't the first myself saw.". "Will we be able to get a clutch at the treasure he watches, think ye?"-" Maybe yea, maybe nay,-but look, Paudrigg--by the holy Lough Darragh the creature's vanished."-"My grief then! he heard us, Christy, and sure enough he'll build up a whole legion of rocks in a minute, twin brothers to the one he stands by, and we'll have no mark of his station."

66

The whole body of dillosk-gatherers had by this time joined the two youths, and drank with greedy ears the residue of their discourse. "But was it indeed a gold goblin, think you, Paudrigg?" "As sure as you're a simpleton, Dinnis,” replied Dooley to the inquirer; "Christy himself said it was. The crature tallied to a hair with the song in the wake mummery-an't I right, Christy?

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Aged and warped, and yellow was he,
As the dry dead leaf beneath the tree,
On a crooked root he shivering sat,
Till scared by the moth or flapping bat,
Then round and over the gold grave shot,
As if whirl'd by winds-but left it not;
"Twas a miser's ghost, a Lepreghaun,
Whose doom is to watch from dark till dawn,

By the brown turf shroud where his own gold lies,
And keep it by craft from mortal eyes."

* Lough Darragh was always accounted holy. In a copy of the articles of faith, which, it is said, was found in the pocket of priest Murphy, who was killed at the battle of Arklow, the 26th article runs thus, "We are bound to acknowledge the lake in the north to be holy, called Lough Darragh." St. Patrick's purgatory is situate on a small island in the lake.

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