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was put into the mouth of the passionate Juliet, by the sober reflective Shakspeare, as his own opinion,

after due consideration, and weighing of the subject in all its bearings. To this Con replies, that we must not always take for granted, that an author gives his own opinion in his works; besides, Shakspeare had a character to clothe and adorn. The dry bone of a name was before him, and he had to breathe with poetic inspiration upon it, and create the ideal flesh and blood; the mind and faculties of the beauteous love-lorn Juliet. "Oh that I were a

glove upon that hand, that I might touch that cheek," exclaimed Romeo, and the most lovely creature in nature, nay, in imagination, rises in our mind. To a fruitful fancy, the pleasure of reading such passages as this is far superior to that of seeing it performed, even by the most exquisite woman, both in talent and in person; because every one has his own opinion of the beau-ideal of beauty, and to each would Juliet be the most beautiful according to his own fancy. Detached passages of Shakspeare, or of any other book, as well as the bible, may be quoted and perverted, to support theories or opinions diametrically opposite their meaning, when taken with the context. "Stolen waters," saith Satan to the thief, "are sweet; and bread eaten in secret is pleasant." He leaves out the prefatory words, "the foolish woman saith;" and if we trace the tragedy of the ill-fated lovers to its conclusion, it will be found that it is altogether calculated to demonstrate the truth, that "a name is of vital importance, for it is because of this "name" that Romeo and Juliet, and her brother, are killed, and out of which all the tragic incidents of the play arise.

Only imagine if Napoleon had been born to parents of the name of Snooks,-Shakspeare Higgins, or Milton Higginbottom,-would they ever have married such names to immortal verse? Had the parties been ever so well agreed, the public would have forbidden the banns.

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Depend on't, the smooth euphoneous designations by which all our celebrated men are known, have been a negative, if not a positive cause of their sucThe witlings of the "folio of four pages were in hysterics, because Captain Ross has chosen to call the newly discovered continent "Boothia," and say, that if his patron's name had been Snooks, the appellation Snooksia would have been the consequence. I do not like things to be taken for granted in this manner; the brave Captain has, no doubt, more common sense than to have committed such a blunder. As it is, "Boothia" has a very pleasant, smooth, Grecian sound, and is of the same family with the classic names Boeotia and Bithynia, and kept in countenance by Bohemia and Batavia. It has been a custom from time immemorial, for conquerors and discoverers to continue the names of their native country to the new possession. So did the Romans with Britain, and from Britain they have been transported to America, which, as to its names, is but a second edition of Great Britain, following the good old custom of naming a son after his father.

It indeed shows a great barrenness of invention thus to "filch from a country its good name," and transfer it to another. I had rather the new continent had been called even Snooksia than New Somers Town, Nova Pimlico, or some other of the same stamp. The narrowest lane in our crowded city has been commemorated by Captain Parry in Cape Turnagain, and the frost-bitten cit is reminded of the warm smoke and comfortable fog of Turn-again lane. We leave it to antiquarians to decide, but we imagine that this designation must have arisen from some such romantic incident as the Highland legend of "Hell Bridge." There are many more Turn-again lanes than that which is so designated, par excellence, in the first city in the world; and many a time and oft are the inhabitants of these strait streets entertained with the oaths and curses of draymen and jarvies, carters and cabmen, disputing like lawyers as to who entered the street first to a moment, who should turn back, or back out, and who should not. Often as stiff-necked as the before-referred-to Highlanders,

neither will yield, and when jarvie meets drayman, "then comes the tug of war"--the war of words, of

oaths and curses, imprecations and appellations obscene, as if hell had for the time been let loose upon earth; and it is only because they are walled by houses hundreds of feet high, instead of being on a rock that height, that they do not dash each other to

atoms, after the same fashion.

While the public streets are of these dimensions, while the citizens are as niggardly of a few feet of earth, as if the city had been built in honour of King John, surnamed Lack-land-while streets, I say, are of their present narrow dimensions, the only preventative for such scenes would be to place a "proper authority" at each end, who, with chronometer in hand, timed from the Greenwich Observatory, should watch the precise moment that the tip of a horse's nose enters the lane, and so decide in case of dispute, and compel the parties to abide by his decision. Government would, I think, pay attention to a petition to this effect, as it would give rise to an immense quantity of very useful patronage in the offices of Judges of the Court of Coachmen, Cabmen, and Carters. All the watchmakers in the town would certainly sign the petition, as everyone would have the "chance" of getting the contract to supply the chronometers which would be required.

Talking of watchmakers, it was a sad blunder o the astronomers at Greenwich to be a minute too late in letting the ball fall, which was to regulate all the ship chronometers in the port of London. How many shipwrecks may this not occasion to those who have gone on their voyage without having the mistake rectified? This minute too late makes the mariner a mile out of his reckoning; and what dangers may not lurk within the space of a mile-shoals, sand-banks, sunken rocks, breakers, and all the perils of the ocean! It would be no harm to be a mile farther from danger, but it is as likely that it should be a mile nearer, or that mile may bring them into the very jaws of danger. The sailor may now be whistling at the maintop, enjoying his can of grog, or singing "All in the Downs," in supposed safety. The landsman, confiding in the skill of the seaman, and sympathising in his apparent security, sits at ease, and, perhaps, passes the tedious hours in reading the shipwreck in Don Juan,' little thinking that he is about to partake of the same horrors. The females are chattering and sewing, talking of past pleasures and imagining future. The officer, confiding in the accuracy of his calculations, little supposing the treachery of his data, retires to his cabin and repose. The "faithful watch patrols the deck " and keeps a look out, as he imagines, for mere form's sake. The silence of safety and confidence pervades the "thing of life." "Breakers a-head!" is shouted by the watch in a voice of terror and astonishment.

Reader, my steel-pen gets scratchy and restive. I must pretend to have been in a dream, and that the shout of the ship-watch was that of the watch in the

street.

HISTORY OF SUGAR. (From Mr Galt's Literary Autobiography.) I was led to investigate the History of Sugar by a casual remark of the late Sir Joseph Banks, one day at breakfast. I forget now how the conversation arose, but he inquired whether I had met with any of the remains of the sugar cane in Sicily, mentioning that it had been previously produced in the island of Crete, but the sugar manufactured in that island was more crystallized than ours, and was called, from the place where it was boiled, sugar of Candi, otherwise sugar Candy, and it seems never to have been prepared better there than in that form.

It is certain, however, that in the year 1148 considerable quantities of the article were produced in the island of Sicily, and the Venetians traded in it; but I have met with no evidence to support the Essai de l'Histoire du Commerce, in which the author says that the Saracens brought the sugar cane from India to Sicily.

"The ancient Greeks and Romans," says Dr William Douglas, "used honey only for sweetening." And Paulus Ægineta, who calls it cane-honey, says it came originally from China, by the East Indies and Arabia, into Europe. Salmasius says, however, that it had been used in Arabia nine hundred years

before. But it is certain that sugar was only used in syrups, conserves, and such like Arabian medicinal west of Europe; but Mr Wotton, in his Reflexions upon Ancient and Modern Learning,' says that the sugar cane was not anciently unknown, since it grows naturally in Arabia and Indostan; but so juice, that "some of the ablest men," says he, " doubtlittle was the old world acquainted with its delicious ed whether it were a dew like manna, or the juice of the plant itself." It is, however, certain that raw sugar was used in Europe before the discovery of America. Herrera, the ancient historian, observes that sugar grew formerly in Valencia, brought thither by the Moors; from thence it was transmitted to Grenada, afterwards to the Canary Islands, and lastly, to the Spanish West Indies. island of Madeira with sugar canes from Sicily; and About the year 1419, the Portuguese planted the Giovanni Batero, in an English translation of his book in 1606, on the Causes of the Magnificence and Grandeur of Cities,' mentions the excellence of ported to the West Indies; and there can be no the sugar cane of Madeira, for which it was transdoubt that Madeira was one of the first islands of the Atlantic Ocean in which this important article was earliest manufactured.

compositions, when it was first introduced into the

In 1503, two ships arrived at Camperre, laden with sugar from the Canary Islands. As yet, it is said, no sugar canes were produced in America, but soon they were transplanted from those islands to the Brazils.

It was about this time (1503) that the art of refining sugar was discovered by a Venetian, who is said to have realized a hundred thousand crowns by the invention. Our ancestors made use of it as it came in juice from the canes, but most commonly used honey in preference.

From the Brazils and the Canaries sugar canes were brought and planted in the island of Hispaniola, and in the same year sugar was brought from the dear, and used only on rare occasions, honey being Brazils into Europe. The commodity was then very till then the general ingredient for sweetening of meats and drinks.

When sugar was introduced into this country first is doubtful; but in 1526 it was imported from St Lucar, in Spain, by certain merchants of Bristol, who brought the article which had been imported there from the Canary Islands.

In the year 1641 the sugar cane was imported from the Brazils into Barbadoes, and being found to thrive, A Colonel James sugar mills were established. Drax, who began the cultivation with about thres hundred pounds, declared that he would never return to England till he had made ten thousand a year; and Colonel Thomas Modyford was still higher in his expectations.

It was from the island of Barbadoes that the slave trade began. The first planters finding such immense profit, induced the merchants at home to send ships with assorted cargoes for the product of the island, but they found it impossible to manage the cultivation of sugar by white people in so hot a climate. The example of the Portuguese gave birth to the negro slave trade, and it flourished till abolished by Act of Parliament; but in that age it was a most flourishing business, and the ports of London and Bristol had the main supply. Barbadoes, in the year 1569, attained its utmost pitch of prosperity. In a pamphlet, entitled Trade Revived,' it is spoken of as "having given to many men of low degree vast fortunes, equal to noblemen; that upwards of a hundred sail of ships there yearly find employment, by carrying goods and passengers thither, and bringing thence other commodities, whereby seamen are bred and custom increased, our commodities vended, and manie thousands employed therein, and in refining our sugar at home, which we formerly had from other countries."

In 1670 our sugar colonies drew the means of support from what were then our North American colonies, particularly New York, Pennsylvania, and the Jerseys; and the first time that sugar was made subject to taxation at home, was in 1685. Like other merchandize, it was previously subject to a five per cent poundage.

In 1739, the importation of sugar from the West India Islands was so great, that there was a relaxation of our colonial policy towards them; and they were permitted to carry their sugar to any part south of Cape Finisterre, without being obliged to land them first in Great Britain. From this time sugar has continued to increase, and it is needless to purtrade, and, as an ingredient, the consumption has sue its history further; it was then a great article of been continually increasing. Whether the cultivation has exceeded the wants of the commercial world, or that the new colonies have been found more fertile than the old, I cannot pretend to say; but at this moment, the proprietors of the sugar estates are suffering at all hands, and their greatest calamity is not the emancipation of their slaves.

THE WEEK.

From Wednesday the 14th, to Tuesday the 21st October.

BEAUTY OF THE FALLING LEAVES.-MERITS OF
ELDER WINE.

[FROM the Mirror of the Months, one of the numerous elegant publications which have appeared of late years on the successive beauties of the seasons.]

The year has reached its grand climacteric, and is "fast falling into the sere, the yellow leaf." Every day a flower drops from out the wreath that binds its brow not to be renewed. Every hour the sun looks more and more askance upon it, and the winds, those summer flatterers, come to it less fawningly. Every breath shakes down showers of its leafy attire, leaving it gradually barer and barer, for the blasts of winter to blow through it. Every morning and evening takes away from it a portion of that light which gives beauty to its life, and chills it more and more into that torpor which at length constitutes its temporary death. And yet October is beautiful still, no less "for what it gives than what it takes away;" and even what it gives during the act of taking away.

Let us begin our observations with an example of the latter. The whole year cannot produce a sight fraught with more rich and harmonious beauty than that which the woods and groves present during this month, notwithstanding, or rather in consequence of, the daily decay of their summer attire; and at no other season can any given spot of landscape be seen to such advantage as a mere picture. This, therefore, is, above all others, the month for the artist to ply his delightful task, of fixing the fugitive beauties of the scene; which, however, he must do quickly, for they fade away, day by day, as he looks upon them.

And yet, if it were represented faithfully, an extensive plantation of forest trees now presents a variety of colours and of tints that would scarcely be considered as natural in a picture, any more than many of the sunsets of September would. Among those trees which retain their green hues, the fir tribe are the principal; and these, spiring up among the deciduous ones, now differ from them no less in colour than they do in form. The alders, too, and the poplars, limes, and horse-chestnuts, are still green, the hues of their leaves not undergoing much change as long as they remain on the branches. Most of the other forest trees have put on each its peculiar livery; the planes and sycamores presenting every variety of tinge, from bright yellow to brilliant red; the elms being, for the most part, of a rich sunny umber, varying according to the age of the tree and the circumstances of its soil, &c.; the beeches having deepened into a warm glowing brown, which the young ones will retain all the winter, and till the new spring leaves push the present ones off; the oaks varying from a dull dusky green to a deep russet, according to their ages; and the Spanish chestnuts, with their noble embowering heads, glowing like clouds of gold.

As for the hedge-rows this month, they still retain all their effect as a part of a general and distant view; and when looked at more closely, though they have lost nearly all their flowers, the various fruits that are spread out upon them for the winter food of the birds, make them little less gay than they were in spring and summer. The most conspicuous of these are the red hips of the wild rose; the dark purple bunches of the luxuriant blackberry; the brilliant scarlet and green berries of the nightshade; the wintry-looking fruit of the hawthorn; the blue sloes, covered with their soft tempting-looking bloom; the dull bunches of the woodbine; and the sparkling holly-berries.

The gentle (query genteel) reader will be good enough to remember that I am now speaking of old times; that is to say, twenty years ago; and will not suppose me ignorant enough to imagine that they can possibly know what I mean either by "elderwine," or a "chimney-corner." But though the merits of mulled claret, an ottoman, and a hearth rug, shall never be called in question by me, I must be excused for remembering that there was a time when I knew no better than the above; and that I have not grown wise enough to cease sighing for the return of that time ever since it has passed away. Accordingly, though I would on no account be supposed to permit elder-wine to pass my actual palate, I could not resist the above occasion of tasting it once more in imagination; and I must say, that the flavour of it is quite as agreeable as it was, before claret became a common-place.

Drawing towards the home scene, we find the orchard by no means devoid of interest this month." The apples are amongst the last to shed their leaves; so that they retain them yet; and in some cases of late fruit, they retain that too,-looking as bright and tempting as ever it did. The cherry trees, too, are more beautiful at this time than ever they have been since their brief period of blossoming, on account of the brilliant scarlet which their leaves assume,-varying, however, from that colour all the way through the warm ones, up to the bright yellow. There are also two species of the plum, the purple and the white damson, which have only now reached their maturity.

The elders, that frequently skirt the orchard, or form part of its bounding hedge, are also now loaded with their broad outspread bunches of purple and white berries, and instantly call up (to those who are lucky enough to possess such an association at all) that ideal of old English snugness and comfort, the farm-house chimney-corner, on a cold winter's Saturday night; with the jug of hot elder-wine on the red brick hearth; the embers crackling and blazing; the toasted bread, and the long-stemmed glasses on the two-flapped oak table; and the happy ruddy faces of the young ones around, looking expectantly towards the comely and portly dame for their weekly treat.

THE EROOM GIRL.
BAVARIA'S daughter comes to seek
Some pence in London streets and lanes;
Few English words her tongue can speak,
Save those her little song contains.

From home's endearments forced to part,
For one last kiss her face she lifted;
And bracing up her infant heart,
With little went, save blessings, gifted.

The village gathered in a ring,

Sadly the exile swarm beholding,

And mothers, touched with sorrow's sting,
Press'd close the babes their arms were folding.

The work stood still-the meal was left,
That day was offered up to pain,
And each of some fond tie bereft,
Retired to dream farewell again.

But, 'neath the curtain of the sky-
And, 'neath the morning gale that blew them,
The pilgrim train forgot to sigh,
And telt youth's soul of hope renew them.

Their voices burst-the hills resound them,
Some paused to eat, and some went straying;
And as the landscape widened round them,
It found the little things a-playing.

They talked of arts that nourish ease-
Of Alps to heaven their summits raising—
Of customs-costumes-ships and seas,
Till all the traveller's zeal was blazing.

Till they, like fields from winter's wreck,
Grew gay again, sweet fancies spinning;
And when they stepp'd the vessel's deck,
The world seem'd spread to wait their winning.
To the Great Babylon they beat
The untiring march, their broom-load bearing,
By day the turfy bank their seat,
By night the cow-shed cover sharing.

And in great London's heart the band
A second time love's bonds undoing,
Exchanged adieus with waving hand,
And went, with songs, subsistence wooing.

How, hour by hour, the shifting scene
Lay life's worst features bare to view;
And how the rush of truths so keen
Moulded God's precious work anew,—

How lines on many a brow were writ
Of wringing care that pity craves—
How many a once-mild eye is lit
With fire it brought not o'er the waves,—

We pause not on:-but oft have yearn'd
O'er some lone straggler in the ways,
Whose sadly smiling face upturn'd
Bore, all unharmed, its mountain traits.

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HINDOO SUPERSTITION.

[FROM the Oriental Annual for 1835, (just published,) containing the usual information on Eastern subjects, from the pen of Mr. Caunter, illustrated by the clear pencil of Daniell.]

He

One morning, as I was about to quit my tent, which was pitched a short distance without the walls of Delhi, in a fine tope of tamarind trees, I perceived a gossein standing with his back against a broken pillar, and at a short distance from me. had assumed that attitude which betokened an expectation of receiving something more tangible than mere courtesy from the benevolence of myself, or any other person whom he might thus silently condescend to supplicate; for with these devotees the social order of things is frequently inverted they consider the recipient the benefactor when of their own community, or the giver the beneficiary when of any other. As I came near him, I perceived that he had a thick iron rod passed through his cheeks, riveted at each end, from which a circular piece of iron depended, inclosing the chin. Though the rod passed quite through the tongue, it did not materially affect the articulation; he spoke with some difficulty, but was nevertheless perfectly intelligible. He was an elderly man, of gentle manners and mild aspect, without being offensively filthy, as the members of this strange tribe so frequently arc. I invited him to enter the tent, which he immediately did, and to my surprize was very communicative. The iron through his tongue and cheeks had been a penitential infliction to which he had submitted in consequence of the breach of a vow. He declined my invitation to seat himself, but stood erect with his back against the pole of the tent, and entered freely into conversation upon the strange events of his life, answering all my questions with the most perfect readiness; and he appeared gratified at giving me any information, either respecting himself, or the singular customs of the religious fraternity to which he belonged. He stated that he was then under a vow to remain erect for the space of fifteen years. During thirteen of this time he had either stood or walked; yet he suffered little or no inconvenience, sleeping every night in the jungles with his back against a tree, as soundly as the most voluptuous man could upon a bed of down. He confessed, however, that sometime after he had commenced the performance of this strange vow he was obliged to be supported with cords when inclined to sleep, and his feet swelled to such a painful deAfter a gree that he could scarcely stand or walk. time, however, this inconvenience ceased, when the performance of his penance became no longer either a pain or a grief to him.

This was not the only infliction to which he had voluntarily subjected himself; the fingers of his left hand were so completely bent upwards from the palm, as to form a right angle with the back of the hand, and were thus rendered entirely useless. He further told me that he had been suspended from the branch of a tree during three hundred and sixty-five revolutions of the earth, as he expressed it, or a whole year. He was suspended by a cord with a strong bamboo crossing the end, upon which he sate, while a strap confined him to the rope, and thus prevented his falling; this he described as the severest infliction to which he had ever submitted. I gave him a trifling gratuity, with which he departed perfectly satisfied.

The self-tortures inflicted by these fanatics are entirely voluntary; they are, like many of the Roman Catholic penances, merely acts of supererogation, and are not necessarily enjoined in the Hindoo ritual, as will appear from the Mahabbarat, a work esteemed almost of divine authority among the Hindoos. "Those men who perform severe maceration of the flesh, not authorised by the Sastra, are possessed of hypocrisy and pride; they are overwhelmed with lust, passion, and tyrannic strength. Those fools torment the spirit that is in the body, and myself who am in them."

After we quitted Ivanpoor, nothing occurred worth recording until we came in sight of Benares,-that celebrated city, called the splendid, containing the most renowned specimens of Hindoo learning to be found in Hindostan, a more detailed account of which will be found in the first volume of this work. As we approached the city, we were induced to moor our budgerow and land, in order that we might. witness the Churrack Pooja-one of those revolting inflictions which some particular order of devotees undergo, together with such unhappy Hindoos as have had the misfortune to lose their caste; the former to enhance their claims a blessed immortality, the latter to recover that temporal superiority over a large portion of their fellow beings which the well-known distinction of caste confers. A man frequently loses his caste by circumstances over which he can have no control: such as the casual contact of a pariah whom he might not have known to have

This is spoken by Krishna, the casef Avatar, or incar nation of Vishnu.

been within his vicinity, or eating out of a polluted vessel, though not at the time aware of its pollution. I once happened to be present when a sepoy of high caste, falling down in a fit, the military surgeons ordered one of the pariah attendants of the regimental hospital to throw some water over him, in consequence of which none of his class would associate with him, and he was considered to have forfeited the privileges of clanship. The result was, that as soon as the afternoon's parade was over, he put the muzzle of his musket to his head, and blew out his brains. Although, however, the distinction upon which the Hindoo so highly prides himself is often thus easily forfeited, it is not to be regained but by undergoing either severe mortification, or terrible infliction, which happened to be the case in the instance I am about to record.

some

On landing, we found a large concourse of people assembled, and forming a circle of about twenty yards in diameter, in the centre of which was a strong pole fixed upright in the ground. On the top of this pole a transverse bamboo, sufficiently strong to sustain the weight of a man, was attached to a moveable pivot, so that it could be swung either vertically or circularly, as occasion might require. The insertion of the transverse bamboo was about one-third part from the end, leaving two-thirds on the other side, to which was attached a cord that reached the ground. At the extremity of the shorter division was a pulley from which a longer cord depended about the size of a man's middle finger, having two ends, to which were affixed a pair of bright steel hooks. Both the vertical and cross poles were of bamboo, which is extremely tough and difficult to break. When the apparatus was prepared, a Brahmin, who is usually the functionary on these occasions, advanced to the centre of the area, and having anointed the points of the hooks with a small portion of ghee, from a sacred vessel especially set apart for this holy purpose, he beckoned to the person about to undergo this trying ordeal. The penitentiary was a handsome man, in the full vigour of manhood, and had lost his caste by eating interdicted food during a voyage from Calcutta to China, whither he had gone as servant to the captain of the ship.

On perceiving the Brahmin's signal, he advanced without the slightest indication of alarm, but rather with an expression of joy on his countenance, at the idea of being restored to that position among the members of his own peculiar caste, which he had unhappily forfeited. He was stripped to the loins, and had nothing on but the cummerband and a pair of white linen trowsers, which reached about half way down his thighs. He was a muscular man, and rather tall; he came forward with a firm step. Upon reaching the place of expiation, he knelt down under the cord to which the two bright hooks were attached. Gently raising his hands, and clasping them together in a posture of devotion, he continued for a few moments silent, then suddenly elevating his head, declared himself ready to undergo the penance that should release him from the pains of his recent pollution. The moment his assent was pronounced, a burst of acclamation was heard from the surrounding multitude. The officiating Brahmin then took the hooks, and with a dexterity that showed he was no novice in his sacred vocation, slipped them under the dorsal muscles just beneath the shoulders. The operation was so instantaneously and so adroitly managed, that scarcely a drop of blood followed. Not a muscle of the man's countenance stirred; all his features seemed stiffened into an expression of resolved endurance, which imparted a sort of sublime sternness to every lineament. Not even the slightest quiver of his lip was perceptible, and his eye glistened with thrilling lustre as he raised his head after the hooks had been fixed. His resolution was as painful as it was astonishing. At a certain signal from the presiding functionary, he started from his recumbent posture and stood with his head erect, calmly awaiting the consummation of his dreadful penalty. After a short interval he was suddenly raised into the air and swung round with the most frightful velocity by at number of half frantic Hindoos, who had stationed themselves for this purpose at the other extremity of the transverse pole. They ran round the area at their utmost speed, yelling and screaming, while their cries were rendered still more discordant by a deafening accompaniment of tomtoms, tobrics, kurtauls, and other instruments so familiar to Indian devotees, and which are indispensable on these and similar occasions, producing anything rather than "a concord of sweet sounds."

The velocity with which the poor man was swung round, prevented any one from accurately observing his countenance, though, during one or two pauses made by his tormentors, who became shortly fatigued with the violence of their exertions, there was no visible expression of suffering. Had he uttered a cry, it would have at once neutralized the effect of the penance, though I do not think it could have been heard through the din by which this terrible ceremonial was accompanied. The ministering Brahmins, however, are said to have a perception of sound so accute on these occasions, that the slightest cry of the victim never escapes their ear.

After this barbarous ceremony had continued for about twenty minutes, the man was let down, the hooks extracted from his back, and he really seemed little or nothing the worse for the torture he must have undergone. He walked steadily forward amid the acclamations of the surrounding multitude, and followed by his friends, who earnestly offered him their congratulations on the recovery of his caste.

Accidents of a very serious nature have been occasionally known to happen during the infliction of these fearful penances, though such occurrences are, I believe, rare. Should the cord chance to break, the suspended person is propelled forward under the influence of such a powerful impulse, that he is invariably killed on the spot. When this occurs, it is imputed to the magnitude of his sins, and he is immediately cast upon the funeral pile, neither pitied

nor lamented. I have heard a circumstance related

by a person once present at the ceremony of the Churrack Pooja when the muscles of the back gave way, the penitent being of considerable bulk, and on his being immediately lowered, the mischief was so extensive, that the wretched man died soon after he was released from the hooks. These things are really too dreadful to be permitted in a civilized country; but in India custom is a positive and even a paramount law, and is therefore implicitly followed. Immemorial custom," says their imaginary law. giver, "is transcendant, approved in the sacred scripture and in the codes of divine legislators; let every man, therefore, of the three principal classes, who has a due reverence for the supreme spirit which dwells in him, diligently and constantly observe immemorial custom.'

"IT IS BUT."

For the London Journal.

FROM the days of Shakspeare to the present time, it has constantly been written and repeated that "Because is a woman's reason;" but, hitherto, we have heard of no word or words that have been particularly denominated "A man's reason," nor do we ourselves pretend to have discovered any phrase that will serve the purpose but such as is of epicene or doubtful gender, and applicable to both sexes. "It is But" forms a reason which is seized upon, and applied with equal avidity, by male and female, of all ranks and stations. It is wonderful the power these three little words have, in soothing conscience and lulling

it to rest.

The man of rank and fortune, when he is about to give hundreds for "an Arabian," or thousands for some work of art, which he must mortgage part of his estate to procure, says "It is But" seven thousand, and the present owner gave much more for it. Excellent reason!-yet, for no better, many a younger son has been deprived of a comfortable independence. The merchant, when he is inclined to speculate beyond what prudence suggests to be right, says, if the speculation fail, "It is But' three thousand pounds lost, and to make it up I can dismiss two or three of the servants: the children can go to a less expensive school, or be kept altogether at home." This is promptly decided upon; but he allows himself no time to scan the consequences which will inevitably follow his measures. Such a disarrangement of a family will undoubtedly produce years of

discomfort and misery. His object is to get back his money; he gains it; but, in the meantime (to state one result only, by way of sample), his wife has lost her temper for life, and when that is gone where is his happiness? By the poor man these words are used (oh melancholy sight) as he staggers back into the beer-shop to spend his remaining pittance, declaring "It is But" sixpence-not worth keeping. And forthwith he proceeds to pour into his burning throat what will only make it burn more. The sixpence thus destroyed, to worse than no purpose, would have bought as much bread, perhaps, as his family could eat in a day. Simple as the argument appears, its general application makes it of great importance to mankind. If my readers, particularly the female part, would look over their purchases for the last three months, and mark such as have been bought for no other reason than "It is But" a trifle, in many instances, I am certain, they would amount to one fourth of their expenditure, and, in some cases, to one third.

There is one class, who, compared with the rest of the world, make but little use of this sophistry; I

mean professional people, with certain limited inthree or four times as rich as themselves, and to comes. They contrive to live amongst those who are a common observer there is little or no difference between them in all exteriors, and it is possible that one may have as much real comfort as the other. The secret is this, the man of small fortune has long since learnt to dispense with the "It is Buts." There were two families, and in each three daughters. Mrs Jackson often wondered how the Miss Wilsons managed to be so neat and fashionable in their appearance, for She it was well-known their father was not rich. declared she spent a great deal of money on her girls, but the effect produced certainly did not equal the Wilsons. Mrs Jackson took the earliest opportunity to endeavour to learn the cause of the difference: Mrs Jackson candidly told her the amount of the yearly sum she allowed her daughters for dress. "Bless me!" exclaimed Mrs J., " is it possible that so little as that will buy them more than shoes and bonnets? Mine have three times that sum; and their father always gives them several pounds each as a Christmas-box; and after all, that they should appear worse dressed than their neighbours is really provoking."

66

There

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Money is not the only valuable possession these words are employed to get rid of. How much does time, which is "every man's estate," suffer from them! Many months, yes, years, of some lives have been trifled away; true it is, the evil has been effected by half hours, and quarters, but the loss is scarcely less on that account. If a man is compelled to give away a thousand pounds, it makes but little difference whether it is taken from him by sixpences, or by five shillings at a time. How few people of fortune attend to any useful or necessary employment before eleven o'clock in the day. Walter Scott is a bright. example of a contrary practice: from six to eleven in the morning was the time he devoted to writing and study; a whole world has felt and acknowledged the pleasure and instruction it has derived from his The tradesman who has risen economy of time. later than usual, exclaims "It is But" half an hour till breakfast, which is too short a period to finish anything in; and, therefore, according to his reasoning, nothing ought to be begun. He afterwards dis--⚫ covers that many little arrangements may have been begun and ended in the half hour.

The young lady who idles away small portions of time, because "It is But" a few minutes till the arrival of something or other which she is expecting, would do well to turn her attention to the proper applicacation of these odd minutes: a short trial would convince her of the many useful things that may be effected by it.

I have a young acquaintance who can play, for hours together, a succession of waltzes and quadrilles, and she has assured me, that they were most of them

acquired during odd-quarters of hours before break

She has advanced fast, or whilst waiting for dinner. considerably in my estimation since I have known this proof of her wisdom in “ taking care of the minutes." An officer who served in the Peninsular war, made very considerable progress in the Spanish and German languages, by devoting to them only those moments which would have been spent by others in "waiting," as it is generally termed.

It would be an easy task to multiply examples of the use and misuse of small portions of time and money; but these hints, it is believed, will suggest to the mind of every reader, capable of self-improvement, with the help of the congenial variation of the old proverb, "Take care of the minutes, and the hours will take care of themselves."

V. V. V.

[There is a great deal of good sense in our correspondent's "It is But." It may be as well, however, to add, that any principle driven to a formal excess, may become dangerous and a “snare," tying up the human conscience too painfully, and hazarding a "bursting out" in the other extreme. It is a good thing to take care of the "It is Buts" in nineteen

cases out of twenty; say, if you will, twenty-nine out of thirty; but let us have an " It is But " once and away, to refresh one's self-denial, and keep us in heart with ourselves and charity with others. We are bound to confess (like honest teachers) that we are not without an eye to our own impulses in this particular. We cannot afford, for instance, to lay out money in books (our great temptation); and yet if we did not occasionally treat ourselves to a shilling or eighteen-penny enormity on a book-stall, we should inevitably grow carking and sad, and we flatter ourselves that our readers would suffer also.

Nevertheless, the principle should be taken far more care of, than the indulgence. What our correspondent says of time, and of hours before breakfast, and half hours, is excellent. A wit of our acquaintance (who likes a truth highly coloured) says, that he read the whole of Rapin's History of England' through, merely by devoting to the perusal of it those moments which elapsed after his sisters had told him they were ready to walk out!!]

GHOST-READING OF OUR

ANCESTORS.

[FROM the Latin of Camerarius, previously noticed. The old spelling has been retained, for the greater venerableness of perusal. The story ensuing, is the one which Mr Keats has told so beautifully in his poem entitled Lamia.']

The learned Budæus reporteth a storie, or poeticall fiction, taken out of Philostratus in the life of Apollonius, as followeth. A yong man of Lycia, called Menippus, of some five and twenty years of age, havinge a reasonable good wit, a faire stature, a pleasaunt and youthful face, was thought of all to have won the favour of a woman stranger, who seemed faire and verie gallante; besides she made herself verie rich: but all this was nothing, though all men thought it a great matter. As Menippus was walking one day all alone in the way to Cenchreæ, a spirit, (it was the wicked spirit), comes to him in the habit of a woman, and taking him by the hand, sayd unto him, That she had of a long time beene in love with him: that she was a Phoenician, dwelling in one of the suburbs of Corinth, and named it. If thou wilt come thither, Menippus (quoth she), thou wilt take singular delight to heare me sing;

thou shalt have wine the best that ever was tasted, thou shalt live there in all securitie without feare of any fellow rivalle, I will passe all my time with thee, and we will live faire and faire together. This young man, allured with the bait of such language (though he was otherwise a good resolute philosopher, but loose and given to follow women), conveied himself in the evening to this womann's house, and had the companie of her (as commonlie such people used to do), not mistrusting but that she was indeed what she seemed to be. Apollonius being come to Corinth, and measuring Menippus by the eie, as an image-worker would an image, after he had looked upon him a long time, he sayd unto him, Alas! faire lad, so much desired of faire ladies, know this, that thou nourishest a snake in thy bosome, and a snake nourisheth thee. Menippus amazed at this word, Apollonius went on saying, But in truth, Menippus, this woman is none of thine, and dost thou think she loves thee? Yea, marrie, answered Menippus, and with great affectione. By this reckoning (replies Apollonius), thou shouldest marrie her, and it shall be most honestly done, in my opinion, to take her for thy wife, seeing she loves none but thee; but tell me, I pray thee, when shall the wedding be? Verie shortly, answers Menippus, and peradventure tomorrow. Well, the day being set downe, Apollonius remembered it most carefullie. So the guests being all come, and set at the table, Apollonius failed not to be there in time, and then turning about to the companie, Where is the faire bride (quoth he), for whom you make all this good cheer? There she is, answered Menippus, who, blushing, begins to stand up. Apollonius going on, But I pray thee Menippus (quoth he), this vessel of gold and of silver, and all the stuffe this chamber is furnisht with, is it thine or not? It is the bride's, said Menippus; for I have nothing in the world that I can call mine but this, shewing his philosopher's gown which he had on. You will find in the end, replied Apollonius, that all these goodlie shews come from Tantalus garden, that is to say, are mere illusions. All the companie began to crie out, saying, We know that the Poet Homer speaks of those gardens, but we never went down to Hell to be able to tell more particular news of them. Yet for all that, answers Apollonius, you should account the spouse and all her provision a Tantalian garden, for there is not anything here that is firm, all is but smoke and dreams. And that you may know my

words to be true, this fair bride is an Empuse, or Hag, one of those that glut themselves with the blood and flesh of those men they converse with. Whereat the Empuse began to say thus, Soft and faire friend, be not so cholerick; and therewith set a good face on the matter, as if she defied him and all that he had said; flouting all philosophers, and calling them poor doting fellows. In the meanwhile the golden cups and all the vessels of silver (or that were taken for such) began to melt away at Apollonius' protestation. The servitors, the cooks, the pages, the carvers and other such officers were gone upon a sudden; and the Empuse herself began to pray Apollonius that he would not force her to tell what she was. But Apollonius would not so leave, but begins to urge her so sore, that at last she confesseth herself a spirit and no bride: and that her purpose was to make Menippus fat, that afterwards she might eat him up. This is Philostratus tale.

mancer, if the execrable trade of a most vaine and wretched man may be termed skill. Among other cosining tricks of his I will speak of one, ridiculous in shew, but most devilish in deed; for it discovereth how cunninglie and seriouslie (and that in such things as to us seem pleasant) the wilie enemie of mankind goeth about to destroy and overthrow us. And therefore the vanitie (or rather impietie) of those men is not to be suffered, who deriving some sport and pastime that may offend nobodie (as they termed it) consider not in the meanwhile how they leave the alliance of God to enter acquaintance with an unreconcileable enemie, who walketh about like a roaring lion that he may devoure them, lying in wait incessantly for his prey, like the cat when with close pawes and without any noise she watcheth for the mouse to snap at it, and crush it in peeces; for which cause Chrysostome said, "If wicked men say nothing to thee, yet thou without any intermission. For what do they else hast the prince of wicked men who persecuteth man but insinuate themselves into the devill's company, seeing they use exercizes as it were with the furious enemie of their salvation, and leaving the standard of Jesus Christ, march under the banner of Sathan, as if there were truce proclaimed between them. But God, who hath created men to this end, that they should be soldiers in this war, will that they should appear in their ranks with the arms about them, and that they should carrie always a readie eye upon the secret ambushes, or open assaults of their sworne enemie, who (after the manner of expert and politicke captaines) useth divers and sundrie slights, displaying his rage, as he knoweth the nature and inclination of those to be whom he setteth upon. Now Faustus juggling part which he plaied was this. Meeting one day at a table with some who had heard much of his craftie conveyancies and tricks of liegerdemaine, he was earnestly entreated to shew thein some sport; and being overcome in the end by the importunitie of his pot companions that were well warmed in the head, he promised to shew them whatever they would have. They with one general consent require him to bring into the place a vine loaded with ripe grapes, and readie to be gathered; for they thought because it was in the month of December, Faustus could not shew promising that forthwith, before ever they stirred them that which was not. He condescended to them, from the table, they should see the vine they desired: but upon this condition that they should not speak a word, nor offer to rise from their places, but should all tarie till he had them cut the grapes; and that whosoever should do otherwise was in danger to lose his life. They having all promised to obey him, Faustus by his enchantments and magical spells forthwith so charmed the eyes and phantasies of these drunken. revellers, that they saw, as it seemed to them, a merveilous goodlie vine, and upon the same so manie bunches of grapes (extraordinary great and long) as there were men setting then at the table. Enflamed with the dainties of such a rare thing, and being verie drie with much drink, everie man takes his knife in hand, looking when Faustus would give the word, and bid them cut the clusters. But hee having held them awhile in suspense about this vaine peece of witcherie, behold, all the vine and the bunches of grapes were, in the turn of a hand vanished quite away, and everie one of these drunken companions thinking he had had a cluster of grapes in his hand readie to cut off, was seene to hold his owne nose with one hand, and the sharpe knife with the other to cut that off: so that if any of them had forgetten the enchanter's lesson, and been too forward never so little, instead of cutting a bunch of grapes, he had whipt off his own nose. And such a marke had such profane fellowes been worthie of, (or rather of a worse maim), who being carried away with an intolerable curiositie, would needs make their pastimes of such devellish illusions, which a Christian cannot be present at without extreme peril, and should not come there (indeed) at any hand; for it is called a blaspheming and a spiting of God.

Enagrius writeth, that the mother to the Emperour Mauritius would oftentimes tell how a certaine empuse or hag had taken Mauritius, being a suckling child, and carried him from one place to another with full purpose to have eaten him, but that she had not the power to do him any hurt. And Lylius Gyraldus saith, that some, to whom such women spirits have appeared in our time, have told him (and besides affirmeth he hath read it in authors), that of such spirits as these the Prophet speaketh in the 91st Psalm, where he maketh mention of the evil spirit that killeth men at noonday. We read in the historical collections of Suidas, that the empuse is a devilish hag sent from Proserpina, and appearing to poore distressed persons; and is called so, because it goeth like an ass's foot. but of one foot, the other being of brass, or made Manie thought, saies he, that these hags used to appear about noon, at such time as the funeral obsequies for the dead were performed, and that they used to bring them bread, wine, light, and silver. And at this day the Russians feare and reverence the noon-deville, who useth to walk like a widdow that weareth mourning, at such time as they are cutting downe of their hay, and their harvest, breaking the mowers and reapers arms and legs, if they fall not downe to the ground upon their faces so soone as ever they see him. Philostratus, and after him Cœlius Rodiginus write, That the ancients called these Empuses Lamia and Mormolycice, as who would say, witches and wolfe-snowts. If we say that these Menippian loves are but fictions, tending to withdraw men from infamous thoughts and actions, let us adde thereto a true narration of that which hapned to Alexander of Alexandria, a witnesse worthie of credite, as himself setteth down thus:-Being once sick at Rome, (saith he), as I lay in my bed broad waking, a verie faire womann (mee thought) appeared unto mee; looking upon her with mine eies wide open, I lay still a long time, much troubled, and not speaking a word, casting and discoursing with myself, whether I wakt or was in a dream, and whether it was a phantasie or a true sight that I saw. Feeling all my senses whole and perfit, and seeing the shape continue in the same being, I began to ask her who shee was; shee smiling and repeating the same words that I had spoken, as if shee had mockt mee, after she had looked upon me a long while, vanish way. Thomas Erastus, a learned physician, witnesseth that in the time of the Emperour Maximilian the first, in the year 1503, such a like apparition was seene at a place near Ausbourg, resembling the abbess of Etesteten, called Marguerite de Roth, which suffered itself to be seene and han dled, yea and spake in plaine and significant terms to those that came neare unto it. I. Wier reporteth a memorable storie of Magdalene de la Croix, an abbess in Spaine, whose place a phantosme held in church and elsewhere while she was with a wicked spirit that had married her.

For the rest, it cannot be denied, but that wicked spirits take upon them divers bodies, and may present certaine shapes to men's eyes, although they have not a perfect organical bodie as a man hath. Therefore it is no new or strange thing, if it fall out sometimes that profane persons, or such as be sick or troubled in their brain, have their senses deceived with divers and sundrie illusions, as it hath oftentimes happened in our age, and not long agoe.

*

There was within the memorie of our fathers as famous an enchanter and conjuror as anie could be, called John Faustus of Cundligen, a German. There is none in all Germanie, little or great, but can tell some tale or other of this wretch's illusions and magicall tricks, who had learned the black art at Cracow in Polonia, where in those days it was taught in open schools.

Wier saith, that this Faustus was found dead by a bed-side, in a certain village within the duchie of Wirtemberg, having his neck broken, and the house, wherein he was, being beaten down at midnight. These are the rewards due to such wicked and most intollerable curiositie.

To speak more of Faustus, I have heard manie things reported by those that knew him, which do anew that he was an arch coziner and skilful negro

Admirable maxim respecting doing others a service.. When your endeavours are directed towards doing good to an individual, in other words, to do him service, if there be any option as to the mode or way, consider and observe what mode is most to his taste. If you serve him as you think or say, in a way which is yours, and not his, the value of any service may, by an indefinite amount, be thus reduced. If the action of serving a man, not in the way in which he wishes to be served, be carried to a certain length, it becomes tyranny, not beneficence; an exercise of power for the satisfaction of the self-regarding affections, not an act of beneficence for the gratification of the sympathetic or social affections.-Bentham.

Reasonable study of others in conversation.-If you have two topics to talk to a man about, one of which interests him the most, while the other interests you the most, begin with that which interests him the most. It will put him in good humour; it will confer pleasure.-Bentham.

FAIRIES.

[Third and concluding Article.]

NEXT Comes Drayton, a proper fairy poet, with an infinite luxury of little fancies. Nor was he incapable of the greater; but he would not blot; and so took wisely to the little and capricious. His Nymphidia, a story of fairy intrigue, is too long and too unequal to be given intire; but it cuts out into little pictures like a penny sheet. You might border a paper with his stanzas, and read them instead of grotesque. His fairy palace is roofed with the skins of bats, gilded with moonshine;-a fancy of exquisite fitness and gusto. There ought to be type by itself, pin-points, or hieroglyphical dots, in which to set forth the following

NAMES OF FAIRIES.

Hop, and Mop, and Drop so clear,
Pip, and Trip, and Skip, that were
To Mab, the sovereign lady dear,

Her special maids of honour;
Fib, and Tib, and Pinch, and Pin,
Tick, and Quick, and Fill and Fin,
Tit, and Wit, and Wap, and Win,

The train that wait upon her.
Oberon's queen (who is here called Mab) has made
an assignation with Pigwiggen, a great fairy knight.
The king, furious with jealousy, pursues her, and is
as mad as Orlando. He grapples with a wasp whom
he mistakes for the enemy; next plunges upon a
glow-worm, and thumps her for carrying fire; then
runs into a hive of bees who daub him all over with

their honey; then leaps upon an ant, and gallops
her; then scours over a mole-hill, and plumps into
a puddle up to his neck. The queen hears of his
pursuit, and she and all her maids of honour secrete
themselves in a nut shell. Pigwiggen goes out to
meet the king, riding upon a fiery earwig!

A FAIRY'S ARMS AND WAR-HORSE.
His helmet was a beetle's head
Most horrible and full of dread,
That able was to strike one dead,

Yet it did well become him.
And for his plume a horse's hair,
Which being tossed by the air,
Had force to strike his foe with fear,

And turn his weapon from him.
Himself he on an earwig set,
Yet scarce he on his back could get,
So oft and high he did curvet

Ere he himself could settle;

He made him turn, and stop, and bound,
To gallop and to trot the round,

He scarce could stand on any ground,*
He was so full of mettle.

The queen, scandalized and alarmed at the height to which matters are now openly proceeding, applies to Proserpina for help. The goddess takes pity on her, and during a dreadful combat between the champions, comes up with a bag full of Stygian fog and a bottle of Lethe water. The contents of the bag being suddenly discharged, the knights lose one another in the mist; and on the latter's clearing off, the goddess steps in as herald on behalf of Pluto to forbid further hostilities, adding that the ground of complaint shall be duly investigated, but first recommending to the parties to take a draught of the liquor she has brought with her, in order to enlighten their understandings. They drink, and forget everything; and the queen and her maids of honour, "closely smiling" at the jest, return with them to court, and have a grand dinner. Now this is "worshipful society," and a good plot. The "machines," as the French school used to call them, are in good keeping; and the divine interference worthy.

In the Muses' Elysium of the same poet is a description of a fairy wedding. The bride wears buskins made of the shells of the lady-bird, with a head-dress of rose-yellows and peacock-moons, &c. ; but her bed is a thing to make one wish one's self only a span long, in order to lay one's cheek in it. The coverlid is of white and red rose-leaves; the curtains and tester of the flower-imperial, with a border of hare-bells; and the pillows are of lily, stuffed with butterflydown.

We think, with the author of the Mythology, that Herrick's fairy poetry is inferior to that of Drayton.

⚫ Stare loco nescit, &c.-Virgil.

Herrick is indeed very inferior to the reputation which a few happy little poems have obtained for him; and the late reprint of his works has done him no good. For one delicacy there are twenty pages of coarseness and insipidity. His epigrams, for the most part, are ludicrous only for the total absence of wit; and inasmuch as he wanted sentiment, he was incapable of his own voluptuousness. His passion is cold, and his decencies impertinent. In his offerings at Pagan altars, the Greek's simplicity becomes a literal nothing; though there is an innocence in the pedantry that is by no means the worst thing about

him.

His verses on his maid Prue are edifying. Herrick was a jovial country priest, a scholar, and a friend of Ben Jonson's, and we dare say had been a capital university-man. Scholarship and a certain quickness were his real inspirers, and he had a good sense, which in one instance has exhibited itself very remarkably; for it led him to speak of his being "too coarse to love." To be sure, he has put the observation in the mouth of a lady, and probably he found it there. He well deserved it for the foolish things he has said. He made a good hit now and then, when fresh from reading his favorite authors; and among them, we must rank a Fairy poem mentioned by the author of the Legends of the South of Ireland.' His office helped to inspire him in it, for it is a satire, and a bitter one, on the ceremonies of Catholic worship. We must own we have a regard for a Catholic chapel; but it is not to be denied that some of the duties performed in it are strange things, and open to quaint parodies. The names of the saints in Herrick are worthy of Drayton.

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There is one thing in the Fairies of Drayton which deserves mention. He does not shirk the miscellaneous, and, in some respects, anti-human nature of their tastes. The delicacies at their table are not always such as we should think pleasant, or even bearable. This is good; perhaps more so than he was aware, for he overdoes it.

Milton's "pert Fairies and dapper elves" are a little too sophistical. They are too much like Fairies acting themselves; which is overdoing the quaint nicety of their consciousness. But in addition to the well-known passages we have quoted from him already, there is a very fine one in his First Book. He is speaking of the transformation of the devils into a crowd in miniature.

As bees

In spring-time, when the sun with Taurus rides,
Pour forth their populous youth about the hive
In clusters: they among fresh dews and flowers
Fly to and fro, or on the smoothened plank,
The suburbs of their straw-built citadel,
New rubb'd with balm, expatiate and confer
Their state affairs. So thick the aery crowd
Swarm'd and were straiten'd; till the signal given,
Behold a wonder! They but now who seem'd
In bigness to surpass Earth's giant sons,
Now less than smallest dwarfs, in narrow room
Throng numberless, like that Pygmean race,
Beyond the Indian mount; or faery elves,
Whose midnight revels, by a forest side,
Or fountain, some belated peasant sees,
Or dreams he sees, while overhead the moon
Sits arbitress, and nearer to the earth
Wheels her pale course; they on their mirth and

dance

Intent, with jocund music charm his ear; At once with joy and fears his heart rebounds. There is a pretty fairy tale in Parnell, where a young man by dint of moral beauty loses his hump. Perhaps it was this poem that suggested a large prose piece to the same effect, written, we believe, by a descendant of the poet's family, and well worthy the perusal of all who are not acquainted with it. It is entitled Julietta, or the Triumph of Mental Acquirements over Bodily Defects; and is found in most circulating libraries. But the most beautiful of all stories on the subject, and indeed one of the most beautiful stories in the world, is the celebrated Fairy tale of Beauty and the Beast. Of this, however, we may speak another time; for the Fairies of the French books (however minute may be their dealings, occasionally) are not the little elves of the north, but, the Fates, or enchantresses of Romance, paying visits to the Nursery.

We shall conclude with a few goblin anecdotes illustrative of the present state of Fairy belief in its

true northern region, that is to say, in the British and other islands, Scandinavia, and Germany; and, as the creed is, in fact, the same throughout the whole of that part of the world, though modified by the customs of the different people, we shall not stop to make literal or national distinctions, when the spirit of the thing is the same. Our authorities are the

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Fairy Mythology' and the Fairy Legends of the South of Ireland;' but it is proper to state, as the authors of these works make a point of doing, that the great masters of Fairy lore now living are Messrs Grimm, the German writers, with whose language (the language of Goethe) we are, to our regret, unacquainted. But we are zealous students at second hand.

A man who had a Nis, or goblin, in his house, could think of no other way of getting rid of him than by moving. He accordingly packed up his goods, and was preparing to set off with the cart, when the Nis put up his head from it, and cried out" Eh! Well, we're moving to-day, you see."

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A German, for a similar reason, set fire to his barn, hoping to burn the goblin with it. Turning round to look at the blaze, as he was driving away, the goblin said, It was time to move, wasn't it?" There was a Nis that was plagued by a mischievous boy. He went one night to the boy as he was sleeping in bed by the side of a tall man, and kept pulling him up and down under the pretence of not being able to make him fit the other's stature. When he was down, he was too short; and when up, not "Short and long don't match," said

long enough.

66

he; and kept pulling him up and down all night. Being tired by daylight, he went and sat on a wall, and as the dog barked, but could not get at him, the Nis kept plaguing him by thrusting down first one leg and then the other, saying Look at my little leg! Look at my little leg!" By this time the boy got up dreadfully tired with his dream, and while the Nis was wrapt up in his amusement, the boy went behind him, and tumbled him into the yard, saying, "Look at him altogether."

Two Scotch lassies were eating a bowl of broth. They had but one spoon, and yet they scarcely seemed to have tasted their mess, but they had come to the bottom of it. 66 I hae got but three sups," cried the one, "and it's a' dune!" 66 'It's a' dune indeed," cried the other. "Ha ha ha!" cried a third voice, 66 Brownie has got the raist o't."

A husband going a journey, gave a Kobold the charge of his wife during his absence. The good man departed, and Kobold had nothing to do from that day forward but assume frightful shapes, fling people down, and crack ribs. At length the husband came back, and a figure at the door welcomed him with a face, pale, but delighted. "Who are you?" cried the husband; for he did not know Kobold, he had grown so thin. "I am the keeper of our fair friend," said the elf, "but it is for the last time. "what a Whew!" continued he, blowing, time I've had of it !"

A Neck or water-spirit was playing upon his harp, when two boys said to him, "What is the You use, Neck, of your sitting and playing there? will never be saved." Upon this the poor spirit began to weep bitterly. The boys ran home, and told their father, who rebuked them; so they came back again, and said, "Be of good cheer, Neck; father says you will be saved as well as us." The Neck then took his harp again, and played sweetly, long after it was too dark to see him. [This is very beautiful.]

The most ghastly, to our taste, of all the equivocal fairies, are the Elle-women or Female Elves, of Denmark. The male is a little old man with a lowcrowned hat; the female is young and fair, very womanly to all appearance, and with an attractive countenance, "but behind she is hollow like a doughtrough." She has so many lures that people find it difficult to resist her; and they must always follow her about, if they once fondle her; otherwise they lose their senses. But she is apt to bring herself into suspicion by trying never to let her back be seen. If you make the sign of the cross, she is obliged to turn round. We know not whether the charm re

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