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ENGLAND'S

JOHN MILTON.

him late in life; but even there was a realization in his experience of the old promise, "at evening time it shall be light," and he could

say :

"I am weak, yet strong,
I murmur not that I no longer see,

Poor, old, and helpless, I the more belong,
Father Supreme, to Thee."

John Milton was born on the 9th of December, 1608. He was instructed first by private tuition, at the hands of Thomas Grey, and was afterwards sent to St. Paul's School, under the care of Mr. Gill. From thence he was removed in the beginning of his sixteenth year to Christ College, Cambridge, where he was admitted as pensioner, on the 12th of February, 1624. He took the degree of Bachelor of Arts in 1628, and that of Master in 1632. He had entered the University with the intention of becoming a minister of the Church of England, but changed his mind on account of conscientious scruples to the taking of the required oaths.

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After quitting the University, he resided for five years with his father at Horton, in Buckinghamshire. While there, it is said that he read all the Greek and Latin writers; and it is certain that he there composed the Masque of Comus," which was presented at Ludlow Castle, then the residence of the lord president of Wales, and had the honour of being acted by the children of the earl of Bridgewater. In 1637, he composed an elegy on the death of Mr. King, of Cambridge, under the title of "Lycidas." About the same time he wrote his "Arcades;" but beginning to grow weary of the country, left England in 1638, and went to Paris. We need not follow him in his tour; everywhere he was well received, for his fame as a scholar went before him. From Paris he went to Florence, and from Florence to Sienna, from Sienna to Rome, from Rome to Naples, from Naples

POETS.

back to Rome, from Rome to Florence, from Florence to Lucca, from Lucca to Venice, from Venice to Geneva-then considered the very metropolis of orthodoxy,from Geneva to St. Bride's Church-yard, London, where he engaged apartments in the house of a tailor named Russell, and undertook the eduIcation of John and Edward Philips, his sister's

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Not long afterwards, we find that he had left his rooms at this place, and had taken a house in Aldersgate Street; widely different place, by the way, from what it is at present. Milton became a schoolmaster. This is the period of his life from which all his biographers seem to shrink. They are unwilling that Milton should be degraded to a schoolmaster; but, since it cannot be denied that he taught boys, one finds out that he taught for nothing; and another, that his only motive was zeal for the propagation of learning and virtue; and all tell what they do not know to be true, only to excuse an act which no wise man will consider as in itself disgraceful. His father was alive; his allowance was not ample; and he supplied its deficiencies by an honest and useful employment.

Great things have been said about the wonderful manner in which Milton communicated instruction, and the course of education he pursued. In his letter to Hartlib, Milton does indeed startle even the most ambitious of students. There he proceeds to chalk out a general outline of rational studies for young gentlemen between twelve and twenty-one :Grammar, arithmetic, agriculture, natural history, geometry, astronomy, geography, fortification, architecture, engineering, navigation, history of meteors, minerals, plants and living creatures, as far as anatomy and the art of medicine. All this is to be assisted by the helpful exercise of hunters, fowlers, fishers, shepherds, gardeners, apothecaries, architects, engineers, miners, anatomists, &c. ethics, theology, politics, law-as delivered first by Moses, and, as far as human prudence can be trusted, Lycurgus, Solon, Zeleucus, Charondas, and thence to all the Roman edicts and tables, and so down to the Saxon and common laws of England-and the statutes, joined to the French, Italian, Latin, Greek, Hebrew; whereunto it would be well to add the Chaldee and Syrian dialects. Whether he followed out these suggestions in his own school, history saith not.

Then

But Milton's attention was soon occupied

with sterner business than that of school teaching. The public mind was then in a ferment, the King and the Commons were at open war with each other, and Milton uncompromisingly threw himself into the quarrel, warmly taking up the side of the Commons. Milton's father came to reside with him in Aldersgate Street, and his school having increased, Milton sought the hand of Mary Powell, the daughter of an Oxfordshire justice of the peace. He married this lady and brought her to town, expecting all the advantages of a conjugal life; but the lady, not delighting in the pleasures of spare diet and hard study, obtained his leave to visit her friends on condition that she should return at Michaelmas. Michaelmas came, but not the lady. Milton sent a letter, but received no reply. He sent again and again, with the same result. He dispatched a messenger, being too angry to go himself, and the messenger was sent back with contempt. The family of the lady were cavaliers; so Milton published two or three tracts on the doctrine of divorce, which brought him into some trouble; and began to put his own doctrine into practice by courting the daughter of Dr. Davis. The news soon spread into Oxfordshire; the wife of the great man became alarmed, sorry, and anxious for a reconciliation. So one night, when Milton was visiting at a friend's in St. Martin's-le-grand, his wife rushed out of an adjoining room, and casting herself before him, begged forgiveness. It was an affecting scene. The stern man resisted for a time; but his own generous nature, and the entreaties of friends, brought about the desired re-union and a firm league of peace. Milton, when the Royalists were in danger, sheltered the father and brothers of his wife from harm.

But, whatever were the occupations of Milton, he never forsook the Muse. In 1645 be published a collection of poems, in which the "Allegro" and "Penseroso" first appeared. On the establishment of the Protectorate, under Oliver Cromwell, Milton became his Latin secretary, and engaged in a controversy on monarchy with Salmatius-a controversy which called forth the satirical remark of Hobbes, that it was difficult to say whose Latin was best, or whose arguments were worst."

At the age of forty-seven, Milton, who had lost his sight, but never lost his energy, turned his attention to the accomplishment of those works on which he desired his fame to rest. These were, first, a "Dictionary of the Latin;" second, a "History of his own Land;" third, An Epic Poem." The first he never completed; the second he carried only as far as the Norman Conquest; the third he achieved, and by its production established for himself an undying reputation.

Oliver Cromwell was dead; monarchy reestablished; a prosecution had been instituted against Milton-his fortune wrecked, his person endangered-but he weathered the storm; and, finally, taking advantage of the Act of Oblivion, lived in comparative peace at a house in Artillery Place. There he devoted himself to the great work of his life; and he showed his MS. to a Quaker friend, who, having perused it, remarked, "Thou hast said

a great deal about Paradise Lost, what hast thou to say about Paradise Found?" This suggested the "Paradise Regained."

Before the work could be published a licence was necessary, which was granted; and on the 27th of April, 1667, the book was sold to Samuel Simmons for £5, with a stipulation to receive £5 more when thirteen hundred should be sold of the first edition, and again £5 after the sale of the same number of the second edition, and another after the third. The first edition was in ten books, in small quarto. The titles were varied from year to year, and the arguments of the book were omitted in some copies and inserted in others. The sale gave him, in two years, a right to his second payment, for which the receipt was signed April 26, 1669. The second edition was not given till 1674; it was printed in small octavo, and the number of the books was increased to twelve, by the division of the seventh and twelfth, and some other small improvements were made. The third edition was published in 1678.

"Much has been said," Mr. Howitt remarks, "of the small sum received for the "Paradise Lost," and the slow recognition which it received. But the only wonder is that it sold at all; for Milton was at the moment the most hated and dreaded man alive. It could not be soon forgotten that he had stimulated Cromwell and the republicans to the destruction of the monarchy; that he defended the death of the king in his famous Eiconoclastes, a reply to the Eikon Basilike, supposed to be Charles's own work, and in his Defensio Populi, in answer to Salmatius. But it is not a fact that Paradise Lost' was coolly received. Long before Addison gave his laudatory critique in the Spectator, the glory of Milton's great poem had been attested by Barrow, Andrew Marvel, Lord Anglesea-who often visited the poet in Bunhill Fields-by the Duke of Buckingham, and by many other celebrated men. Sir John Denham appeared in the House of Commons with a proof-sheet of Paradise Lost' in his hand, wet from the press, and being asked what it was, replied, Part of the noblest poem that was ever written in any language or age.' had to rise from under piled heaps of hatred and ignominy, on account of his politics and religion; for he had attacked the Church as formidably as the State, in his treatise on 'The best Mode of Removing Hirelings' out of it, as well as in his book against prelacy. But he flung off all that load of prejudice, and rose to universal acknowledgment."

Milton

Of the minor productions of Milton's pen it is not necessary to speak in detail; his magnificent sonnets, his exquisite "Comus," his "Samson Agonistes" built on Grecian model, are chief amongst them. As a prose writer he stands as the foremost man of his time. His works are marked by a depth of thought and eloquence of expression certainly not surpassed by any writer in our language.

In his sixty-fifth year the gout, with which Milton had been long afflicted, prevailed over his system. He gradually wore away, and quietly, silently died on the 10th of November, 1674. He was buried next to his father in the Church of St. Giles, Cripplegate.

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ABOUT LIONS.

THE LION OF AUVERGNE.

Among the animals in the public gardens at Cape Town, says a recent traveller, was a real wild lion, not long taken, and bearing his imprisonment with a very bad grace, having received from nature an irritable disposition, not improved, perhaps, by the deceit practised in his capture. He had been taken somewhere on the northern frontier when full grown. The lion is particularly fond of Hottentot flesh -probably from its being of a more gamey flavour than other meat. A Hottentot in the service of a boer had frequently observed that he was followed by a lion, probably from his possessing in a higher degree than others of his race the relish which the lion delighted in. As the man naturally desired to be relieved of these polite attentions, he readily lent himself to a scheme for capturing his enemy. There was a hill in the neighbourhood of the boer's house, which sloped gradually on one side, and ended in a precipitous cliff on the other. This seemed a favourable spot for this experiment. A strong net was made, something in the nature of a cabbage-net, of twoinch rope, and the meshes sufficiently small to prevent the lion from dropping through. A very strong rope was then run through the upper meshes, and fastened to stakes driven into the ground at the edge of the cliff, the net hanging down over the precipice, and its mouth kept distended by slender rods or branches, not of sufficient strength to impede the lion, but merely to keep open the mouth of the purse which was to receive him.

IN the summer of 1478, a tame lion, kept by a gentleman of Auvergne, became weary of being caged up and eager for a little variety. After sundry efforts, this lion succeeded in escaping, and attacked tooth-and-nail every man, woman, and child upon whom it could lay a paw. The gentleman of Auvergne was horrified at the idea of having cherished a creature capable of such atrocities; and the people of the country coming to him, declared that they intended to assemble in a body for the purpose of destroying it. Very well," said he, "I will be your leader."

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Accordingly, one morning an immense crowd appear, to hunt the tame lion, and the owner placed himself at their head. After some time the object of their search came in sight. No sooner did the lion recognize his owner than he became quite gentle, and ran up in token of familiar acquaintance. But the gentleman of Auvergne said, "Monsieur, this comes too late," and rushing forward stabbed the lion on the spot.

All things being ready, the Hottentot went about his usual avocations, keeping, however, a bright look out for his would-be consumer, and taking especial care to avoid the bush and keep in the open plain as much as possible. One afternoon he felt, rather than saw, that the lion was on his trail-his senses being, no doubt sharpened by consciousness of his own attractions. He was a long way from home and from the trap, and it became a question

whether the lion would not waive ceremony, and run in upon him before he could reach it. He hastened anxiously forward, turning round occasionally to see how his pursuer got on. The lion kept his motions concealed as well as the ground permitted him to do so; stealing with belly crouched to the ground, and, when the Hottentot stopped, lying down till he resumed his walk-his large muzzle resting on his paws, and his ample mouth watering with the expected enjoyment; while just the very end of his tail was flirted convulsively to and fro, indicating the seriousness of his intentions. The faster the Hottentot got on, the nearer the lion approached him-probably the better to enjoy the whiff of his coming meal, as we find the smell of the kitchen becomes more savoury as the meat gets hot. The Hottentot is now ascending the hill, and the guest invited to dine upon him scarcely twenty yards behind, lashing his tail, and anxious to sit down to dinner. The Hottentot goes over the edge of the cliff, slipping down between the net and the rock to a place contrived for him, but pausing to give the lion a notion that he was sitting down to rest himself; then depositing his hat on the very edge, hastened to his hiding-place. The lion, seeing the hat stationary, naturally imagines that the man is below it, and crawling up to within a few yards makes his spring. Finding nothing to stop him, over the cliff he goes, right into the purse-net, which, sinking with his weight, draws the ropes tight, and he hangs suspended in his net. Plenty of assistance is, of course, at hand, and with strong ropes the lion's legs are tied, and he is put into a waggon and brought to Cape Town, where I saw him fretting, no doubt from the trick which had been played him.

A DUCHESS IN A LION'S DEN. IT was a tradition in the family of the old Electors Palatine that no lion would attempt to hurt a human being in whose veins their blood ran. So firmly did some of their descendants believe in the security enjoyed by them in this respect, that they were not afraid to put the tradition to the test; and an interesting story is told of a Duchess of Orleans, who, relying on her descent from the Princes of the Rhine, bearded a lion in his den, under circumstances which trightened everybody but herself.

It appears that one day, when the Duchess of Orleans, with her ladies of honour, was at Fontainebleau, a town of France thirty miles south-east of Paris, where from an early period the kings had that palace associated with the name of the Great Hunter, she saw a number of people assembled in the street. "What is the meaning of that crowd?" inquired the duchess.

They are viewing a lion, madame," replied the person addressed.

"Where is the lion ?" asked the duchess. "It is shut up in a kind of cage," was the

answer.

"I must go and see it," said the duchess, and walked straightway towards the cage.

The lion appeared tame and gentle, and the duchess, going close to the bars, examined it

with interest. The cage, however, seemed the reverse of secure; and the ladies of honour became terrified, and eager to begone.

Pray, madam,” cried they earnestly, “stay no longer. The lion is to be shown in another part of the town, where it can be viewed with safety."

Yielding to such entreaties, the duchess left the somewhat fragile cage; but she frequently asked when the place for showing the lion would be fitted up, and on learning that it was ready she proceeded thither with her train. The ladies of honour deemed it prudent to keep at a safe distance; but the duchess not only approached close to the lion's den, but, to the horror and surprise of all present, insisted on entering.

Every spectator felt the blood run cold; loud cries of "Save the duchess!" rose; and the ladies of honour, believing she would be torn to pieces, wrung their hands and screamed distractedly. The courage of the duchess, however, continued unshaken, and the lion did not show the slightest inclination to hurt her. Admiration began to blend itself with the terror felt by those present; and when, after stroking the lion several times, she emerged from the den safe and unmolested, an expression of wonder and surprise pervaded the crowd.

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Madam," said the ladies of honour, “what a risk you have run!"

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No," replied the duchess, calmly. "No lion ever attacked any of my family; and as I am confident of being a legitimate descendant of the Electors Palatine, I felt certain there was no danger in doing what you have just witnessed."

PRINCE RUPERT AND HIS LION.

PRINCE RUPERT was son of Elizabeth Stuart, wife of the Elector Palatine, daughter of the first James, and sister of Charles the First.

Rupert was born at Prague, in 1619, where his father had been crowned King of Bohemia, but carried from that city while yet an infant, when his father was attacked by the army of the Emperor of Germany. At a very early age, he became a soldier; when only fourteen he served at the siege of Rhinberg, and when little more than twenty he fought with desperate valour at Vlota. Having been there taken prisoner, he was confined in an Austrian castle for three long years.

It was a tradition in the family of the Electors Palatine that no lion would harm an individual who inherited their blood. Rupert, perhaps, had some confidence in the tradition. At all events, his familiar companion was a tame lion, which followed him about wherever he bent his steps, and was in the habit of showing its devotion by licking his hand like a dog.

One day, however, when Rupert was sitting in a melancholy mood, and the lion was crouching by his side, the Prince became aware that the animal was showing a more than ordinary degree of fondness for his hand, and especially occupying itself with one of his fingers. Suddenly, he remembered that the finger had been recently cut, and recollected

having heard, that when lions, however tame, taste fresh blood from a human body, they fall on it with all the original ferocity of their nature.

The Prince immediately started with alarm, but, luckily, he retained his presence of mind; apprehending an attack in spite of his descent from the Electors, but resolved to avert a catastrophe, he laid hold of a horse-pistol, that lay loaded within reach, and suppressing the regret which he felt at destroying so faithful a companion, he shot the lion dead on the spot.

It was this Prince Rupert, who, when war broke out between Charles the First and the Parliament, came to England, led the royal cavalry at Edgehill, Marston Moor, and Naseby, and made himself so terrible to the Roundheads by his fiery charges.

After the king's execution, he retired to the Continent; but when the Restoration of the Stuarts took place he returned to England, and, surviving that court more than twenty years, died in 1682, Vice-Admiral of England and Constable of Windsor Castle.

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intent the serpent was on its prey, he drew his sword and, with one blow, killed the reptile. The lion finding itself free came up to its preserver, evinced the utmost humility, licked his hand, and did all it could to manifest gratitude. However, it followed the knight about the forest, attached itself to him, attended his steps to Jerusalem, and, during the siege of the Holy City, followed him wherever he went.

When Jerusalem fell into the hands of the crusaders, and Godfrey of Bouillon was elected king, most of the warriors of the cross embarked for Europe. Geoffrey de la Tour being among the number, shook off his acquaintance of the forest, and went on board. The lion, however, was not inclined to part with the knight. Scarcely had the mariners given their sails to the wind when the lion was observed making strenuous efforts to swim after the vessel. The attempt proved vain; and its strength gradually failing it sunk beneath the waters.

AN ESCAPE.

UNDER the will of Sir John Gager, who was Lord Mayor of London in 1646, provision is made for a sermon to be preached annually, on the 16th of November, in St. Catherine Cree Church, Leadenhall Street, in commemoration of his providential deliverance from a lion, which he met in a desert as he was travelling in the Turkish dominions, and which suffered him to pass unmolested. In addition to the fees directed to be given to the minister, the clerk, and the sexton, £8. 16s. 6d. is to be distributed among the necessitous inhabitants. It would be well were such providential interpositions in times of imminent danger, always followed with such evidences of true and fervent gratitude.

THINGS OLD AND NEW.

HOW I KILLED THE BIG BEAR. THE following bit of characteristic Yankeeism will be read with a relish :-" I told my neighbours, that on Monday morning-naming the day-I would start that BAR, and bring him home with me, or they might divide my settlement among them, the owner having disappeared. Well, stranger, on the morning previous to the great day of my hunting expedition, I went into the woods near my house, taking my gun and bowie-knife along, just from habit, and there sitting down also from habit, what should I see getting over my fence, but the bar! Yes, the old varmint was within a hundred yards of me, and the way he walked over that fence-stranger, he loomed up like a black mist, he seemed so large, and he walked right towards me. I raised myself, took deliberate aim, and fired. Instantly the varmint wheeled, gave a yell, and walked through the fence like a falling tree would through a cobweb. I started after, but was tripped up by my inexpressibles; and before I had really gathered myself up, I heard the old varmint groaning in a thicket near by, like a thousand sinners, and by the time I reached him he was a corpse. Stranger, it took five niggers and myself to put that carcase on a mule's back, and old long-ears waddled under his load, as if he was foundered in every leg of his body; and with a common whopper of a bar, he would have trotted off, and enjoyed himself. 'Twould astonish you to know how big he was; I made a bedspread of his skin, and the way it used to cover my

bar-mattress and leave several feet on each side to tuck up, would have delighted you. It was in fact a creation bar, and if it had lived in Samson's time, and had met him, in a fair fight, it would have licked him in the twinkling of a dice-box. But, stranger, I never liked the way I hunted him, and missed him. There is something curious about it I never could understand, and I never was satisfied at his giving in so easy at last. Perhaps, he had heard of my preparations to hunt him the next day, so he just come in, like Capt. Scott's coon, to save his wind to grunt with in dying; but that ain't likely. My private opinion is, that that bar was an unhunted bar, and died when his time, come."

DOGS AND LOGIC.-A fat old gentleman was bitten the justice of the peace, and preferred a complaint in the calf of his leg by a dog. He at once rushed to against a joker in the neighbourhood, whom he supposed to be the owner of the offending cur. The following was the defence offered on the trial by the wag:"1. By testimony of the general good cha racter of my dog, I shall prove that nothing could make him so forgetful of his canine dignity as to bite a calf. 2. He is blind and cannot see to bite. 3. Even if he could see to bite, it would be utterly impossible for him to go out of his way to do so, on account of his severe lameness.-4. Granting his eyes and legs to be good, he has no teeth.-5. My dog died six weeks ago."

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